the open public meeting act notice of this meeting was provided to the home News Tribune The Star Ledger on the Highland Park planet on January 8th 2025 and was posted at ball website at www.hpborrow.com and on the bulletin
board at ball 221 South fth Avenue in Highland Park New Jersey and has remain continuously posted as required by law fire exit are to my right and left of council chambers Nora can you leave us the pleasure [Music] Allegiance my pleas Ali to the flag of
the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with libery and justice for all looster yes council member George yes counc member ha here council member H
here counc council member herec member here attorney here administrator here now discussion item will be the 2025 Municipal budget no formal action
will be taken handing it off and I'm handing it off to Terry and I believe everyone has their budget in hand so uh thanks yes I I made a copy of my memo and kind of the summary sheets from the budget uh worksheet that I emailed around that's
you have in front of you um that's the version uh there's also a copy of the Main Street budget because mayor we did want to just briefly touch on that uh uh as kind of proposed um so that's what you have and I was basically uh if you don't mind I'd like to just kind of walk
you through some of the points in the memo and then we can discuss individual buckets and or questions that you know may come up sure kind of the big and I want to just make sure to point out we have n here our CFO I think everybody knows maybe Harlin I
don't know if you guys have met yet so this is Nora Champion our CFO um and she's been inter world of pulling all this stuff together um so the big kind of highlevel points that the memo makes and I'd like to highlight here um kind
of the big changes from last year really boil down to three things one we're proposing a potential de acceleration of our tax sale which would basically mean instead of collecting all of our um
build taxes by the end of the year we would hold that tax sale the following year and uh but in order to do that you have to budget for what you don't collect and that we estimate at 400,000 based on our experience last year's tax
sale the advantage of doing that uh a it it is ex extremely painful and some of you have been on the receiving end of these calls uh from a homeowner who's lived here my whole life never missed a bill in my whole life but if you missed that fourth quarter payment and you
don't realize it you missed our notices which there's not much turnaround time between when those payments are due and when the first round of notices and the list gets generated for the tax sale you're talking about a matter of weeks um you're in the tax sale you can get
out of the tax sale but it is it's it's it's it's also extremely tight turnaround for the tax office uh it's a busy time of year um and we're also doing kind of the last billing for the water department so this would give us a little bit of a breather it's a little
easier on the taxpayer those who pay their own taxes not through their their mortgage okay meaning you know they come to us so that's one of the advantages but you take a hit because you have to now budget for that money you're not going to collect over time we might find
collections are better but yeah yeah just a quick question then we would be starting this for the first time so we'd roll it over so essentially we'd be skipping a tax sale in 2025 but would it average out over if we continued it again so we would have to budget again
for whatever we don't collect in 2026 now we might have more time to do notices and things like that you know we'll continue to try to collect as much as we possibly can and if our experience is that the question you're asking I'm not sure that's sort of it if we say
well we're going to do instead of doing it in the fourth quarter so that we make our you know 99.6 I think we're at for collections and we roll it into the following year so we have to budget for that short do we make it up in the following year and
then it becomes a rolling event so it's back to normal again I'll put it in my words and you tell me if I'm answering your question the way I think about it is we take this $400,000 hit because we're basically going from a $200,000 reserve for tax
sale uncollected excuse me uh taxes to a 600,000 reserve fronut and we'll have to maintain that budget line moving forward money the but the the blow to the taxpayer and to our budget is this year moving forward we may find with
experience that number could go down based on what our actual collection is but this is the year where we have a hit we did use a little more Surplus to kind of soften that blow as best we could without overusing the Surplus we have but I is that the answer your question
because we're have to maintain that on that's a little bit more of it but what I'm saying is if that then normalizes does it become back to normal for the following year so the it will always be the next year so we're always going to
be building that in but we're always going this will be the only year with no tax sale we're only we would always then be collecting it again in first quarter or around then we were discussion point when we would do that tax sale we could delay it doesn't have to be in the first
quarter of the year that might not be optimal but that's a discussion we I think what Phil is saying hypothetically we did it for 2026 come 2027 we're going to do the same thing so do the taxes then average out in other words does it back get does it level out does it level
from the 400,000 that we're putting in it's going to stay there it's gonna so the answer is yes it levels out because the money understand so we don't have to but the collection in the following year levels it out should because if past experiences as any indicator with our
accelerated sale we always had good collection you know some towns they can't sell the leans and they left ho in the bag we don't anticipate that happening sorry I miss I I was overthinking you so the message public is this year it's going to be a bit of a
hit but number one it averages out makes life a lot easier and we are giving release to our taxpayers there are a number of people who run into this Pro yeah and and the reason we have I'm sorry man the reason you know it's it's always been kind of one of those things where it just seems
too daunting because of it's such a for our budget 400,000 is not inconsequential but it came up this year um in you know emails between council members and me during the last tax sale it was incredibly busy for some reason
this last one was crazy and we just decided let's at least have the conversation let's not assume it's a no um so yeah Matt I'm sorry um what is the Surplus that we're using to cushion the blow how much of it is do well it's it's to cushion several blows I haven't
gotten through my whole presentation over last year we added another maybe you should run through and then get the question because I think as you run through then the questions are answered and we could just make a note okay so um so remember that one and see if we get
there so that's kind of one big $400,000 chunk okay um and the other area is our debt service which is basically paying back what you borrow and that went up by just about 400,000 390 something okay so
those are two areas like coming out of the gate that are just a lot different 800,000 pretty much from last year and this year the first being discretion we don't have to do that but it's our recommendation if not this year we would suggest we should do it but maybe this
is the year I don't know we'll we'll talk about that um there are also um the the rest of the budget is one I'm I'm just GNA follow my memo because I had a my method to my madness when I wrote it
the um other thing I want to point out if you look at the Appropriations uh summary sheets it starts on page five of the packet um but you know Skip to the end I ran it a couple of ways because if you look at total General Appropriations
again this includes the debers and the de Accelerated Tax sale you know the percent change over all Appropriations is 11.4% but if you take out grants which thankfully we're doing well on grants uh
because they're offset by revenues the total appropriation increased with the de Accelerated Tax sale and that and some of the other things we'll talk about it it's 4.3% over prior year Appropriations uh which is pretty close to what it was
last year just to give you a general sense of what the rest of this budget looks like kind of a couple of areas I want to highlight that are for one reason or another over what they were last year and this isn't exhaustive but these are the ones that I thought were
different uh we have an increase in the clerk uh expenses due to primary election costs and we also have an additional $8,000 which we hadn't budget for prior even though we always have to pay it at the end of the year um and so
we're trying to not scramble at the end of the year to pay it um and then we have General code updates which is basically you can hire our code codification company to basically do a legislative and code update to kind of scrub our code and that's the quote so
that's that's we don't have to do it but it's been a long time so the would be we're going to have to do that at some point um the library budget um The Proposal that is in the the numbers you see is a 3% increase over last year um
the their initial request was more but I in consultation with Phil and Mike bobish suggested that you know subject to your discussion three would be more appropriate um but that's for you guys to kind of further chew on the fire
salary and wages is up uh in part to address uh an additional hire that would be recommended um in part to help us save off some overtime increases that we're having and we can talk a little bit more that did come up at uh Public Safety this morning um so this is one
solution is to hire a full-time person to work evenings so that if someone calls out an evenings we're not bringing in someone from the day shift into the night ship thus incurring these overtime costs it won't solve it entirely but it
will we were able to lower overtime a little bit in anticipation if we go that route um Public Work salary and wages we discussed at our um goal setting session there seem some enthusiasm about an additional labor that could maybe focus
on the Avenue that's something that we did put in uh again don't have to do it um we could do it next year you know these These are discussion points and then um electric service in street light is just up and I just they were up significantly so we highlighted those um
n caught that when we were doing the budget so we just redistributed the money there we had some areas where we felt like we had a cushion so we offset some of that with lowering like natural gas for example um so those are kind of
my highlevel points on kind of changes from last year's proposal to you to this year I thought you know I I've run some numbers different ways kind of int anticipation of that but I guess let me pause there and maybe Matt you can come
back to your question I don't know that I address it at all um uh oh yes so so um uh with the D acceleration it's a it's essentially it's a $400,000
charge against and and are we are Surplus is less it seemed like our Surplus was $200,000 more more this year so we're taking more out or we are so we were 2,
2,250 24 and this proposal says 2,450 um and so we we looked at our numbers what we regenerated last year and felt we had a we could we could do that without even if we didn't
regenerate the full2 200,00 000 we had enough there to to be comfortable with that we were able to regenerate what we um used last year and so with that that's why we we we suggest we could go
a little deeper having had that experience so we're we're saving an extra $200,000 in Surplus is that correct or we're spending that we're spending it okay with the and I can't tell you for sure we'll regenerate that 200 but in looking at we didn't use up
all our this is not all of our Surplus right okay we have some in reserve that should we not be able to regenerate the full 2,450 if we only regenerate what we did last year we're okay okay we don't want to go much deeper than
that we bounced that off Lori our auditor and some other folks there's no like rule like towns must have x% of their budget in Surplus but we've gotten out of since I started here where we had nothing and now we have a cushion so
that if we had some unforeseen really big deal we do have something found supposed to use what's the word supp remember from that budget class maybe Matt REM I miss I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm bad I'm being bad sorry
sorry sorry okay um yeah I I'm sorry this is a dummy question what what is do we have an accounting of our of our Surplus now well we we know what it is right about 4 million so we'd be basically going down
to about two which we think is a healthy number and and based on kind of Prior iterations of getting our bond rating that is definitely something they look at as like kind of your stability that you're not going yo-yo up and down and you kind of have a whatever you're it's
not a formal policy but you have a practice of you know maintaining that and building it back each time so we've got a last couple years we had a pretty good track record can we should we ask questions or should yeah please I
mean I guess on that kind of the opening Gambit stuff but also if there's points in other areas of the budget that you wanted to review have a better way to go so the mayor had a better way no no no this is the way this is so bu or way I I
one of the questions that I had is that that on some of the grants yeah and and I wasn't sure when I we talked about it earlier so I just wanted to clarify it is that that in 2024 there's a whole bunch of grants that are listed and then in 2025 they're not and so my
question is are they not listed because they don't exist or not listed because we haven't got them yet both so some of those grants were like a good example is uh the community center Capital Improvement uh legisla grant that was
you know 330 right that's not coming back but what we did get was and I could have made them in the same line if you wanted Capital Improvements to South Third in a million so in a way we did we more than recoup that you know I I guess what I'm wondering is is that
that is there any possibility that some of those are still going to come in as a result and and are we going to know those before we as many as come in before we had introduced we'll go on the Sho okay and and do we have any sense of the only one that I think might is
sometimes the uh the recycling tonnage one yeah um and I'm trying to think what else most a lot of these came in you know come in routinely well after budget and I mean I could certainly highlight
for you the ones I think are likely but some of these are you know the middle sex County uh open space for Felton but we'll probably go in for Molly moach but I just don't have that in yet so there's no and there's a those chapter 159 resolutions that the council passes
during the course of the year or how we insert them into the budget after with that one point I would like and especially is important just I know you know this map but they're off it's expenditures offset by Revenue so as they come in they're kind of tax neutral
in the sense that they the the expenditure is here but so is the revenue in the revenue sheet unless there's a match sometimes there's a match but um so that's so the expenditures for some the revenues in the revenue sheet you'll see for everyone that we're anticipating in the
Appropriations there's a revenue for it and and an expenditure the Appropriations yes and the revenue so they're in both places which is annoying because often times we we like the numbers don't match in nine1 out of 10 it's because it got entered into one and
not the other and and so that's a that's also one of the reasons we like to wait till we're sure just because you you're not supposed to count those chickens until they fully hatch we get a letter of commitment from whatever entity or the grant of okay no that I mean the the
um that actually my bigger question is if they were not in yet and were going to be not tax neutral they were going to have an effect on the tax I'd like to know that but if they're tax neutral doesn't with the exception of matches but what I've done there is a line for
municipal match and Appropriations right there's like a small shade tree grant that I know we're going to go for and are likely to get that has like $33,000 match you we're talking but like the NPP matches in there a municipal Alliance Grant matches in there so those aren't to the extent that we have to have skin
in the game but the Lion Share of the grants we get are are grants in full 100% the ones we're used to anyway cops being the exception but the cops grant our match is you know Fringe payroll related so we're not showing it that way
it's just it's you know we're showing the revenues but our match is being handled kind of through the budget that's going to be n's problem to figure out how to report that um I don't know if it's possible to do this but the the Cannabis tax revenue
is that based on is it based on a number of stores based like how many stores what we got it's it was Anja and herbalis so there only what was collected in 202 so the $55,000 projected were 25 based on two stores okay so we should expect that with
additional stores we're going to but we can't anticipate anticipate show so hopefully if that goes up this year in next year's budget you'll see $100,000 you know that's the goal I just wasn't sure how many how many we had and keep in mind there's always a delay they
open and then they have to have a month in and then they can start remitting the tax payments so I think Main Street came in kind of Jan early in this year so we just didn't have any 2024 experience with that but at least it's on the budget now you
can see it in the revenues so that's something along with licensing right oh you're looking at your questions I think I got most of them answered earlier while m is looking anyone
else um conversation that we had this morning with regard to the fire I this is in in the memo as well I think some of that might be more of a you know which policy we're going to follow that we discussed this morning I I don't know if now is the time but just the
announcement is that we incurred it's rather High overtime because some of our per we have full-tim and their staff so they do tours 24hour tours and so on um and we've had to call in pums who you
know are full-time at times when they call out or they're unavailable because they're on another tour with another department we've incurred overtime calling one of our three in so there's kind of a balance here realistically I think it's going to be a little bit
above to bring in one more full-time firefighter so that we cover a lot of those spots and we have people here all the time but then we're still going to have to fill in with some forams and we're still going to have some overtime problems so I think
we need to we will at soon but maybe not for tonight discuss you know are we going to go with the fulltime or we going to cover pums or bring in more per yeah and one thing I'll mention just to give you an order of magnitude I just I wanted to double check my numbers we had
overtime costs in the magnitud of $70,000 last year from from various places from from fire department so it's a significant and we had budgeted what was it like 45,000 but fortunately there was we didn't
fully hire up so we had some cushion so one of the things we were looking at was well how do we you know another approach would be forget a full-time person at night we could just fill it with a series of seven days a
week part-time individuals but the challenge there is filling that schedule it's it's an we just to be clear we have two people on all times except for the daytime we have three um I think um I'm 99% sure about that so
we would we could have three on at night so that if somebody calls out we've always at least got two and then we don't necessarily even need to bring somebody in unless we had some reason to think um so I budgeted it was easier to explain this is a full-time body but the
reality is for the same money if you include their benefits package um we could probably do one part part time person seven days old versus one full-time person four days old so it's it's going to be at the end of the day
from a budget standpoint um it's it's a it's a question and either way would help with the overtime problem but I get concerned about having so many part-time the roster becomes more and more unmanageable one thing the fire chief
was going to look into was how much appetite from our existing part-time folks was would be it would be easy to fill these overnight shifts in which case that might inform but from a budgetary standpoint I guess what I want you guys to think about is not so much should it be a full-time or part-time
tonight because pretty much for the same price we could get some coverage uh from the budget it's more like it's going to be more and are we okay with that you know you know or do we just you know I think we have to do something because the overtime costs were so up that we
have to do something and it kind of it's almost a break even even if we don't do the the well I think that um we should wait for Public Safety to bring a recommendation to the the governing body and have a discuss the chief is going to look into whether with this with the
roster not staff but the roster he has which one which way is going to be more workable and talk with the chief we're going to talk about Which choice seems the better choice when when because if he says well we've got 10 10 pums that we could look
at but only four of them really say they're willing to make a commitment to to us that we go one way if they say that we we have a commitment for all 10 and they're anxious then we have another way so and then chief chief shami's got
to discuss it with Chief Abrams uh and bring it to Public Safety hopefully next month so that we can make budget soon than that I I more like if we could if we allocate in salary and wages enough for either alternative which we kind of
have we I think that's a better way but we can make the policy havec later based upon what we feel is more important for coverage for the amount of calls and the safety of the public yeah budget wise it kind of works
out but there is a policy decision behind it that's why I say when you guys come when Public Safety comes and make a presentation to us then we'll have a very informed place in which to work from shammi's got to discuss Abram's got to discuss and then Public Safety go over it and make a recommendation I
think we should build in that cushion for either scenarios so that's what's kind of in the numbers you have here it kind of assumes one of those two hiring scenarios okay yeah just a a note on the library because it is up by 35,000 but
uh we did some we did um libraries using a lot of attrition um and internal promotions and Mike is moving to a policy of more part-time Librarians which tends to be popular in the library World um so that
it did go up but there are some other they're offset by some an addition additional cost for Contract Services because of you know Library improvements um the new Services were dropping hoop love up we have other services that we
have to contract with uh but by doing internally and then Terry did knock off the 54,000 to reduce the requests because because we've requested more than what we wanted because we're an independent board and we could do that a very stringent
Council the library doing it the the way they're doing it with the internals on it we actually manag to keep it to 35,000 U you know with the 1/3 mil plus the budget um it really is a good I was speaking with Michael again today early
this morning and again this evening and is a good workable budget with Staffing and he is moving into the uh we have been moving a new plan which which the U uh the board is very much in support of is moving to um more actually more Staffing more available Staffing at peak
hours but with part-time part-timers because then we don't have the we don't have the Pack we don't have the insurance and pension um and it is it's a trending that we're seeing in other libraries moving to a lot more part-time have to cover a lot of nooks and crannies whereas you have a regular
employee you know that they work eight hours or 10 hour or 10 hour shift sometimes then you you know they're not looking to stay at night so you're limiting your night hours you're limiting your weekend now so it is a trend they are open seven days which I
know was a big deal a couple years ago and um I will say they are taking on full responsibility for custodial management you know DP doing a lot of work even even despite them having so they're they are taking that and we're
we're trying to get more to a landmore tenant Arrangement if we you know finish now that we've no exactly and we've been looking at that since the the since the library reopen we been looking at at new planning going forward and um the plan
is is working out pretty well the in the the increases were um you know in services that we have to pay for were largely offset except for that 35,000 so that's you know just news on the library it is the one independent board that
yeah you know so that's the FYI of that and the only other thing I mentioned in talking with Mike B uh was that they are he's been talking to me I don't know if it's come up in your meetings yet hopefully about getting to doing more fundraising now that they've got the the
the renovation kind of nailed down but there's some new projects that are coming up and he mentioned that that was something he was trying to we did have a rather serious conversation about it uh not at the last board meeting which was rather active but the board meeting before that yeah I just mentioned it
because those are historically things that council members have inquired it was not you know we were in building mode for so long and it's nice to hear them talking about not building mode roof mode that's the excuse me Jason had a
question oh so I raise my hand before when we were still talking about the additional fire oh no no I missed your hand no no I think no worries um I was just going to briefly say that I'm in favor of or I think it makes sense to uh move forward with the additional
investment and full-time part-time we can work that out later I was say I think that made sense to kind of address the overtime additional investment in fire safety and then I just going also go back to I think the um de acceleration of the tax sale seems to be the biggest uh uh fiscal impact or
difference from last year discretionary fiscal impact you know well I was I think it's well worthwhile I I think for administrative reasons but more importantly so that we save people from the headache it's always the
sweetest like senior you ever met you know write me these letters and it's like it's right next to Christmas we're the Grinch grin I was say we can give it some time to try to you know work things out with
folks in that kind of situation without scaring them to death and um provide some flexibility and we'll still recover the money it's just a matter of coming back a little later but just a side note um tangent on it uh we reminds me that I I believe that we have that new system
in place where you can automate your like water and sewer I believe that's extends to the tax collection as well so I just remind mebe we should promote that just that people like that don't have talking about that I was I actually thought I better sign up I keep forgetting to do my own um absolutely
even even if we don't have the tax sale you incur if you forget to pay you incur a lot of charges you know so and we do send the horrible delinquent notices that everybody gets mad at us but that's basically your reminder you forgot to pay your bill um trying to get your
attention and we all have enough like bills to worry about so like just you know putting out there that you have that ease of yeah I think you're right still going to have the seniors that come in with their payments because and some of them come with it with cash payments yeah to a
penny true story some of it is socialization at the window too but uh it's not the lines like it used to be but it is back up yeah I saw those lines than it used to you co was down here and now they're it's not
around the block but it's definitely busy um so I know that the debt service is mandatory there's nothing we're going to pay the for it can you give council member just one second sorry council person had a question I apologize sorry um
for the 77 because it says for fulltime so we would just calculate for the part really for the purpose of the budget as long as it's in salaries and wages we can charge it out either way so so okay so this was for one fulltime but that's
pretty much what one one part-time part-time hours seven days a week would be about the same person right but if we could get two in then with last hours no it wouldn't we already have two on this would be add a third this would be a
third full-time person with benefit yes but wouldn't the cost be different with a part-timer or no but there's more because there there we have if we did a part-timer for four days it would be less you're right but we're now trying to get them if we go with the part-time route and we have the savings on the
health benefits m we could then do seven days a week two part time two part yeah not two part time we already one person one additional part-time person seven days a week the night shift's longer than the day shift there's a whole thing just
trust me it kind of works out I ran the numbers with Norman and and chief Abrams uh it's pretty close uh it wouldn't all come out of fire though some of the savings with a part-time approach will come in other
areas of the budget like uh health benefits for example okay but then with the with the full-tim we have to guarantee them fulltime hours at all times right yeah fulltime invest yeah but the part that's the benefit thats in right but a
part-time person seven days a week is more than the full-time person's salaries when I'm trying to tell because that 77 is also uh the fire chiefs uh rates and some other things oh it's not the salary of a a fulltime no a full-time firefighter a brand new
person's around okay some of that increase was due to the wage increase for our so what I was saying we're not able to get like two part- timers and not put them on for seven days that's something that the public safy committee is g to
get back to us don't think of the part- Tim as in number of people think of it as shifts covered because it could be seven part-time people one on Monday one on on Tuesday doing a 10-hour shift one on Wednesday so think of it as the way
I'm trying to think about it is imagine you right now we have two people at night part- timers might be different people every night of the week but there's two on at night and they make an hourly rate they all make the same rate so for the purpose of math it doesn't
matter if it's seven people two people you know what I'm saying so it it's but seven days a week times like let's say I don't know 10 hour shifts or 12 hour shifts I forget in the evenings it's longer um they you know when you
math it out it it comes to more than the 50,000 but if you factor in the benefits you don't offer them there savings elsewhere so we could probably with the numbers you have here afford either of those Alternatives
subject to the kind of due diligence that the Chiefs are going to do um because I'm I'm I could go you can probably persuade me on either approach some part of me likes a full-time person because I think it's less um a spending
less time doing like shift management because you know you got that person there and you get and gets the chief more fulltime people to kind of direct and give the dat dat but that's my bias I want them to um and and that's why I suggested
that go back and take a comprehensive look in report back to us and then we can decide which way we're going to go and the truth is by the time we hire somebody there's a month or so so we probably have enough cushion that we can works out council member who um I the
$400,000 we're paying in debt service I know we have to pay that it's mandatory I just get a sense of how are we doing in terms of the amount of debt that we have compared to other cities our size or or are we are we do we have more debt than we ought to
do we want less I mean we always want less debt but like I'm I'm trying to get a sense of of whether we have been borrowing too much or whether we have not been borrowing enough I don't like is there a way of is there a metric that get back to you I'm not prepared to answer that
question compare with other towns yeah I don't know that you can do it that way um I know sometimes when before you go issue new bonds you'll look at when you have some breakage coming like 2029 is probably the first we look ahead and
that's probably the first time where some old debt kind of Falls away repayment and so that might be a time where you might take on but the truth is there's going to be things like we can't stop doing um but it's a fair point I think and actually noray and I were
talking about you know having a meeting with Bond Council to kind of discuss just that just i' like to stay on top of and make sure that we're not overbetting but you know most of the things that are in there you know projects that
are roads you know most roads and and one of the big ones was the six million in acquisition acquisition a lot of times debt Services is the main expenditure too do that so but it's a good question I just
I'm not enough of an expert to give Jason followup question so uh is there a statutory cap on the amount of you can uh that you can bond for and are we I am not aware of it but I yeah I
think it's there's also you know we have to look at State yes State I thought there was I could be but I was just curious if anywhere that's a good question I don't I am not aw I've never run into that in any of the local Finance notices that
have come a across my desk but that doesn't mean that there's not a 2% but we're [Music] council member George very generic question on page one one yes because this is what we have to deal with the
council MERS the six of us that vote on is we talked about the 400,000 and de accelerated um rolls in but the the total that on page one for the total
bill on for the average we're talking about average tax bill of roughly 12,700 Nets out at 3.41% tax increase on page one of the first yeah
he's looking at differ I'm looking at the end total bill you're looking at before we change the school levy all right that's uh you printed I printed out a new one for everybody here sorry I'm like my numbers
aren't matching um so yeah I did I highlighted it in yellow uh for the new sheet because I got some updated numbers from the school which I had assumed 2% it was a little more than two uh so sorry that's why it's order magnitude you're right Phil your number didn't tie
to my number I no that that's that's no when people ask us and when we're yeah when dealing with it looking at the print out the just use those numbers numbers again Phil same but uh but yeah we're looking at the average residential assessment at
4815 meaning the average bill is 12810 with this budget that I've just painted so that's a 469 $470 a year difference for the average tax bill with that's assuming a 2% County thing which we haven't gotten to
the bottom where the County's doing it uh and the school I think that's pretty close but we're going to have meeting with them soon and that you know isn't done but it gives you a good idea so this that number assumes the de Accelerated Tax sale the
debt which we have no choice anyway um the fire DPW and any number of other little things that I pointed out already so that's the kind of impact it's 3.81 over prior year um for a total bill okay
no that's what I was saying but even if we were not need if we did accelerate oh funny you ask oh I calculated it did not that was not a PL question the the so because it was making her crazy well
I did it five times I've done it five ways this Sunday I finally I copied my spreadsheet so I wouldn't mess up the master one but the assuming I didn't screw something up the um formulaically that is um so you mentioned the
difference per year 470 uh with the fold proposal that's 3.81 if we de accelerate the tax sale you're talking about 380 and 3.08 so for the total when you look at
the bill r large if you look at the municipal portion it goes the percentage goes down a lot the the the percent increase on the municipal piece of that bill just talking about the taxx bill is 6.04 and that same percentage with when
you remove the accelerated or de Accelerated Tax sale is 3.25 so it's a big difference it's a 3% is a little less difference between de accelerate or not on the tax bill so that's why I
thought it was worthy conversation yes uh but that's the mun but it's a good idea to keep the bigger bill in mind it's still you know our share of the bigger bill is still the small small well compared to the
county um so but it is that's it's it's it's why it's a tough decision you can't wouldn't have to have I mean one I was thinking about that Matt and I guess we could budget the reserve up let's say 200,000 I was
thinking about this not do it this year but then next year they that would be that would mute that you would eventually feel the increase but you could spread it out over two years or three years and ramp up for it over time that right I but you still would have to have the Accelerated Tax we would still
have to do the Accelerated Tax sale this year right but we could basically start could you know getting people used you know raising that as opposed to Jumping to 2.8% we could jump 1% and 1% right you know just on that item um or you
just rip the I call it rip the bandid it's kind of like but but it's it's basically you know I I didn't do the math I know I'm not very good at math in my head 90 bucks a year difference to the
average uh assessed property whole thing well Municipal is almost it goes from 6 to 3.25 I'm just talking about the difference between doing it and not doing that would cut the municipal increased
Portion by half yes so we go from 6.04 to 3.25 if we do nothing different if we just budget the 200,000 situation normal if we budget 300,000 that it would be higher um I was trying to figure out what the number is to get to like a half
a point and I just I didn't get a chance to kind of figure it out but it's probably like 150,000 is it a decimal I forget I was figuring it out and then I ran out of time so if there's that would actually
be that knowing what that if it's 200 or 150 why I just want me understand like2 200,000 if you just tell me what number you want that percent increase to be like that's the thing like the if you
you you already know uh 400,000 cut away or not raised by taxes basically results in what is it 2.75 so we could do the math you know
okay you know but it's more like do we want to do the thing it's GNA cost one way or the other right just try to run go ahead so the next
big picture question I have is um we're not running into any c problems with this no okay any what cap cap she ran all those numbers yeah we were like I was like tell me we're proposing something that he can't do
anyway that was my concern yeah no no we are well under appropriation great thank you can you us what's the timeline moving forward that you're hoping like we have to if we want to stay compliant with the states allowed schedule and the reso we passed
we need to introduce at the April 1st is that the date of the meeting the first meeting in April I don't want to tell you the wrong and we want to stay in compliance yeah we can so whatever our first meeting in first council meeting first council meeting in
April it's April 8il sorry I knew it was somewhere thereabout so April 1 April 1 April first oh the next one is the April Fool April fo um the taxes went down 10% have you know we have some time I
can I can run different scenarios and share that after the meeting if that helps but I think the I guess a big chunk is that de acceleration of that sale and it's a you know that's why it's
it's not I I didn't feel like I could unilaterally make that decision in order to you know this is a policy question as much as anything and um you know it'd be nice I think it would the people would like it better I know
we would like it better but it's there's a reason it's hard to De accelerate right yeah we were talking about the Surplus before and it seems like our Reserve is fairly healthy not that I'm a budget expert but U I'll defer to her CFO um
would it be possible to draw down a bit more from the Surplus just a bit more to sof this the extra 200 was where we were going to stay comfortably we don't want to go below 2 million we don't want to go to beer bones we did that this
reflects I did we rest um so you know we did you we're trying let's we live and we we regenerate then that might tell us you know we can go a little deeper next time but you know okay uh Stephanie and then I I did the
same thing you did and then it reminded me of the time we had to have a sech charge on a water tour for a whole year and I said you know what let her just keep doing whatever you know that Surplus we now have a healthy but we
have a healthy Surplus in water now that we can now we don't have to touch the rates this year you know everything is fairly I think we'll be okay this coming year that was C member and that was I mean that was also that was a policy choice
too that we kind you know for years kind of you know not like wishing it away um I think I I I I think I agree with Jason I I I fully accept the proposal to to uh de accelerate this year um also I mean I
you know I don't know what the I mean sorry um you know and and I think the the open question about you know funding coming in from other sources is this is a really strange year for for budgeting and I think that you know sometimes we
just have to my impulse is to make the full investment this year and then see where we're at next year and not try to kind of wh we don't know what we're do cdbg other things um we need every
C our council member are you finished yeah counc member yeah to follow up on on that policy statement and that's policy statement is I'm not sure about the the acceleration of the sale you know we survey there's a section of and I've
dealt with them and I've done the work for free help people out with their you know taxes and pro bono issues the the flip side of increasing the tax increase for everyone in the town so I'm kind of on the fence with it I haven't decided
okay just a policy of it yeah I guess I'm I need to think about play with some numbers but I I I in general like the idea of De acceleration because I don't want to give people a bill right before you get the calls more than anybody I don't know
your your friends call you abely absolutely but it's it's I had the same Pang I I think I said the same thing TOA like okay this is a handful of people versus he does yeah always about
his he gets I get all the for some reason I get the calls when people get the tax Le sale like what you D yeah I'm happy to know someone is bearing my burden with and it's my burden with joy and
just to be clear there's no reason we can't we can wait on the de acceleration it doesn't mean do not doing it this year we can't do it next year I you know it's what we could have done it 10 years ago it's but it's you know it it came up enough this year
between the tax office and the council members it just felt like it was worth a try and just at least to have the conversation understood well one final thought on that so maybe my tangent before is maybe a little bit less of a tangent and maybe maybe something to focus on so if we
consider um and I guess now I fully appreciate the extent to which that is uh impacting the potential increase uh in the municipal Levy for next year um maybe we just do a full court press to try to get as many people as we can signed up for the automatic uh payment
so that way it's not too many people getting caught up in it except for perhaps and we've also talked about different notices and kind of like revisiting all of our standard practices to see if there's anything we can do to kind of
just like ring the bell the problem is so many people there's so a lot of people who don't pay their own taxes and then there this subset of people who have you know paid off their mortgages and now don't have escros and um and they're the ones that that typically
find themselves in this conry so yes those would we we believe you me we you know we discussed it this would it would be nice I won't lie I think everybody would like it better but it is a lar I wanted you to see the numbers because
it's it's sizeable this is basically the you don't have to make the decision tonight and that's the beautiful part about it it's time for you all collectively think about this and let us know okay well we should right well we don't have to vote
on it tonight I think this is your time to think about it and and you have your sheets so you all have your sheets so you all can respond getting back in touch and then we'll talk and admin you know and that'll be how we refine budget from there to get it ready for
introduction um but I think um I really appreciate it I mean I I've been wanting to have that conversation for a while and I I give Mara credit for kind of saying let's just try it and see what what happens and now we know we've burn the numbers we have a sense of the impact so if not this year we can
certainly pursue something in a Subs year um very good what about Main Street next in this micro print Matt did you want to speak to it or you want me to do it uh I mean it's
just it's a pretty simple straightforward budget there's not a basic expensive they have uh they have shifted around a little bit there there there is
a plan for additional sponsorships um that they have you know they've decided that they need to reach out to businesses a little bit more they need to go a lot more um door too for sponsorships for various events to sort
of raise additional money so one of the budget items that does increase is is from this year to last year is that they're intent on going out and getting more businesses to sponsor existing events and that entails getting out and talking to more businesses face to face which is one are the things we one of
our priorities and so I think that budget reflects that that particular priority but essentially it's a it's a it's a basic flat budget um there's not a just a 2% increase in the bid um the amount that we we give them is is
holding steady which is what we you know was a 2% increase in the bid in the bid right 2% I didn't I didn't calculate it overall sorry right so 2% in but in terms of the amount to be raised is 2% so you're talking about like $5,000 or
something so um uh the only other thing that that is um uh that the um Rec Department is taking um is we're moving to the rec department to take over the 5K 100 happen it has moved it's moved
It's Kind it's it's it's there the rec department is doing a fantastic job um at that there's still some you know Rebecca still has some work that she does in that but but eventually that'll be removed and and that's a good thing hopefully focus on sponsorship
and their idea focusing more on sponsorships and more on Direct Outreach to businesses that's that's kind of the goal okay so the goal would be to um introduce the Main Street budget with
our budget kind of have them on the same track um just so we'll decide it good idea so what uh I see there's sponsorships and funding so is that $20 wor 20,000 20,000 is what they receive
or is that what they're planning I I'm that's the revenue so they're anticipating 20,000 from uh sponsorship and well it's really 43,000 if you look at the total compal they have different categories of
Revenue and expens see the 43325 that's the increase over what previous year was and that's based on their their their plan and a concerned effort to try and increase the number of sponsorships so they're planning to double basically almost is that how I'm looking no you
don't have last year's on you yeah um but it is it was about 18,000 or they went from 18 to 43 oh okay okay it's a big it's a big increase and it I think it's an increase that reflects the priorities that we've sort of work together about about direct Outreach to
business um but it is a big you know that's that's a big big change and they did have a fallback plan if they don't if they don't that they do have some reserves they reserves that they can they want to make a big push for it any other questions on Main Street
budget and the version just to be clear that you'll see in the future will be more based on categories not these line I think and the one that basically the council has the most discretion on is the bid amount because what your your really your purview is now councel
person has a question am am I not reading it right the staff salaries to is say 75 to 191 no that's you look at the columns General men promotions the total is 191 it's not that far over what it is now because she's there's that includes
a full-time person a payroll person and a bookkeeper and uh this the market staff two Market staff I think and I think it's actually two and a half two and half Market so that's all salaries is 191 the First Column this is all 2025
it's this plus this equals that so it's 75 plus 116 they divide salaries by General Administration and promotions so I'm assuming promotions are primarily the people working on Farmers Market out and and then Administration
is payroll and administration like okay so the the rightmost column is the total including you know I know it's not how I it's not just one
person several so um so that's you know and that is not leaps and bound over last year it's probably 2% something yeah um can I get a would I be able to ask a copy of last year's budget just to compare I have a I have a big
version that has well do you have a version like this like just well I have what they gave I will give you that how and just another question what is design what what is that budget yes I think I know where
M the bottom a whole design column there's a whole design so the the right up top of Staff staff salaries to a th000 so the um one of the things that M
does is is um uh the design committee is the one who does um grants to awnings so that if people apply to to to Grants so the part of the design money is the the when somebody new wants a grant they can get it through the design committee and
design committee approves it others is Staff time for helping them with like one of the things that they're doing is revamping the um you know the the banners on the poles right so um the the the poles in Wood Bridge are
different than the poles down here and so trying to figure stuff like that goes into the design cost through the design so that's in that's all that okay so this 50 that includes that that includes all the things for those all those different
design and just one thing she did mention the think they have a grant to do the banners they're applying for one but they don't have it so it's probably not showing the revenue here they want to try to do it either way but they're looking to get a to do that I don't know
where that one grand is on this anyone now it's time for public comment 21 minutes 3 minutes per speakers coming from Members attending in person will be heard first followed by those on zoom and we don't have anyone in public to
speak and um is there anyone on Zoom I do have three attendees on Zoom but I don't see any hands up there okay may I have a motion to close publica comment section so move second all in favor I okay there's no formal
action that will be taken and now we're to move move to Executive session may I have a motion executive session will be on Classic Cleaners potential litigation track a track and track C Redevelopment negotiation may I
have a motion to adopt or reject 3-25 94 classic cleaner potential litigation and track a and track C Redevelopment read development negotiations second welome council
member George yes member H yesc member I okay there will be no formal action taken on this one at all may have have a motion to a journ so
second when you read all in favor okay that when you read a transcriptors