All right. Good even good evening everyone. Welcome to tonight's meeting. I call the meeting to order. This meeting of the Hopkins Select Board is being held both in person and remotely using the video conference platform Zoom. All members participating in the meeting are going to be present in the meeting room. The public has the option
of attending in person here at town hall or via Zoom using the link posted in this meeting's agenda. This meeting is being recorded. We will start with the pledge of allegiance. >> I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the
republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, liberty and justice for all. All right. Uh, next we will move to public forum. Each person will have up to two minutes to speak at public forum. Please start by stating your name and
address. Is there anyone present in the meeting room that would like to start? >> Welcome. >> Steven Snow, 78 Pine Island Road. I'm just following up on the Dave Cormier public forum comment at the last select board meeting. We had the neighbors get
together and come up with what our plan would be. And the plan is to just present to you all of our signatures that we the town has taken care of Pine Island Road for at least 50 years. My uncle was the first one that plowed it. He was paid by the town. Town Hopington
paved the hill on Pine Island Road without any input from from residents. They've taken responsibility for maintaining and plowing the road. We have a letter that I'll hand you from
June of 2024 that states that they will plow us, but they will no longer do any repairs. Also, what David said was there's a couple of mass laws that govern our sort of unique thing where we have to go to Milford to get home.
And that would be all I need to say. I'll give you the paperwork. Elaine already got a copy this afternoon. There is all the neighbors that were >> Thanks, Steve. some Steve >> and a letter from
DBW. >> All right. Thank you, Steve. Um, who else would like to come up and speak tonight? >> Yep. So, Mason Challenor, 26 Connelly Hill. Uh I am also a teacher at the high school and the vice president of the
Hopkin Teachers Association. Uh I am here to present a joint statement on behalf of the Hopkin Teachers Association as well as Hopington Firefighters and Hopkin Police. Um it is a page and a half. I do have one copy I can share with you all. Um but I would
hope since I'm representing about a couple hundred town employees, a little bit of flexibility on the time would be appreciated. Um yeah, within reason. Uh so we are here today to speak on an issue that is
neither new nor unfamiliar to you as you have received countless emails on the topic over the p last year. These emails and pleas for help have largely gone without response or acknowledgement and with the impending 2025 tax season upon us, concerns that this will be another
year with mistakes and delays and frustrations are rising. We are here yet again to ask for your help and to express our frustration in the fact that there are still many many Hopington educators, firefighters, and police officers who are waiting for refunds on
tax filings made a year ago. I wish I will spare you all a detailed recap of what has transpired. But in short, for two years in a row, several employees of the schools, police, and fire departments have received letters from the IRS either asking for additional
information from the employer or notifying of a delay in processing due to additional review. In 2025, Sheena Martin, HR director for Hopington Public Schools, discovered that there had been a mistake in how W2s had been issued and
that it had likely been occurring for several years prior. As a result, the town issued new W2s to everyone in June of that year. For two years, numerous dedicated employees across three critical departments, school, police, and fire have suffered the frustration of having their tax refunds be delayed.
To date, there are clo still close to 100 employees who have not received their refund for returns filed a year ago. These are people who, despite their valued work for the community of Hopkin, receive modest incomes. Throughout this process, multiple requests for help have
been sent to the town, including town manager Ela Lazarus and many of you on the select board. In response, we've either received silence or we have been offered denials that the town's errors had anything to do with the refund delays. We finally reached out to Senator Ed Marky's office in a desperate
attempt to find someone who would help, and we received this message from his staff after they took immediate action to communicate with the IRS. Unfortunately, as this is the second year in a row that there have been issues with Hopkin taxes, some people may be audited, which causes delays.
This only confirmed what we already knew to be true. What astounds us is that the town continues to deny that any of their mistakes led to the delay of Hopington employee tax returns being processed. The town seems to suggest that it's just a strange coincidence that so many
people had their returns delayed. Surely you can understand that this is only added insult to injury for the dozens of employees still waiting for their money. The insult being the disrespectful, apathetic, and to be clear, gaslighting response from the town to the employees who with unwavering dedication fulfill
their duties to the community. HPS employees were recently notified that W2s would be issued soon. We were asked to check our mailing information. >> I'm going to need you to Okay. >> Final thoughts, please. >> Yes. Um whether you care to respond to this request being made tonight, please
know that any further silence from the town will not be taken to say that a mistake wasn't made, but that the town is choosing not to hold themselves accountable. We understand that you can't do anything to expedite an IRS belleaguered by government shutdowns and reductions of staff. But we hoped that there would be some assurance that could
be made to everyone that the information provided on the W2s this year are correct. We implore you to take action today because any action, no matter how late, will be greatly appreciated. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Uh, is there anyone else from public
forum? Amy, you on the Zoom? >> Uh, there's no hands raised on Zoom, but there are three people. >> All right. Anyone on Zoom that would like to speak tonight? >> No. But I do have a question and I'm going to be very mindful to not try to respond to anything I just heard. But I
do want to ask out loud. This is not the first time that the issue of W2s and taxes has been brought to this board. I recall myself specifically asking in this forum if there were actions that needed to be taken, if there was any risk for this coming calendar year. I
would like to reaffirm that question here. Now, is there any known risk to the FY26 W2s that will be issued for the town of Hopkins? >> Chair, I move that we hold on this question for now. We've got a future
agenda item on the agenda coming up and we can talk about it then. This is in violation. What's your talking? He's welcome to interrupt me. >> Both of you guys, we like we can't discuss this right now. >> I'm not trying to have a discussion. >> This is a discussion. You can't even address back off.
>> Both of you enough. We are moving on. We will discuss this at a future one. I think you brought up it as a future agenda item. >> I don't want to discuss it as a future agenda item. I'm trying to clarify that it has been discussed here previously. We don't have to discuss it any more than that. I am just trying to reaffirm my understanding
>> and it it is not to my understanding. So we will discuss it. >> All right. >> Moving on, we will move to the consent agenda. The board will consider the following consent agenda. The board will consider accepting the resignation of
Jack Buckley from the trails committee. The board will consider confirming the town manager's appointment of David Larder as a heavy equipment operator for the Department of Public Works. And the board will consider accepting donations of $50 from Janet and Bob's Skagnelli, $50 from Janet. Uh it looks like there's
a duplicate there. $100 from Kathleen McIntyre. Um $100 from Mara Lombard. $75 from Kevin and Ellie Pine. and $50 from Russell and Marylu Ellsworth in memory of RD Pine to the fire department.
So with that, do we have any thoughts or do we want to break anything out of the consent agenda before we make a motion? >> I move the motion for the consent agenda as written in the agenda agenda package. >> Second. >> Okay, got a motion and a second. Um
before we do go to a vote, you know, a lot of people gave a donation tonight, so I wanted to thank all of them for their donation to the fire department in memory of RD Pine. Um so with that, if there's no additional thoughts, um all those in favor, >> I >> I >> I
>> Any opposed? Okay, so that is unanimous. All right. Next, the board select board will announce the board's vote to sign um uh July 1st, 2025 to June 30th, 2028 contracts with the
Hopington Public Safety Dispatchers Association for Mass COP Local 254A, AFL CIO, and Hockin Permanent Firefighters Association local 3772. And we'll and we'll review the terms of the contracts. So, um, as stated, this
was voted on and signed, but we like to, you know, give kind of a review of what this, um, this was announced and, you know, voted on at the executive session on January 20th, 2026. It's a three-year contract with both, uh, unions. The
terms of the fire union contract include allowing employees to earn up to 48 hours of compensatory time off in lie of overtime payment. Establish a minimum of three hours for for details worked. Increase the education incentive in years one and three of the contract. Add
paid parental leave to mirror what what non-UN employees receive. Add a new position of captain and related promotional process language. add a requirement for mandatory live fire training and pay increases of uh 2% on July 1st, 2025, 3% on July 1st, 2026,
and 3% on July 1st, 2027. Uh the terms of the dispatch union contract include allowing the posting of administrative coverage shifts when staff must attend meetings and training. Clarify the protection for time off where there are shift forces. Placed all employees in the same vacation schedule. Increase the
evening and night shift differentials. Pay increases are 2% on July 1st 2025, 3% on July 1st, 2026, and 3% on July 1st, 2027. And a new top step added to salary schedule. So, you know, on behalf of the board, thank you to all the union members, you know, continued service and
dedication to the town. Um, any thoughts, comments from the board on those two? >> But they'll be publicly on our website when they're now that they're signed, right? >> Yep. >> Yeah. Matt. >> Nope. Shadow. >> Yeah. I just want to take a moment to
thank the town administration and u the union to work it out in a very um amicable and uh win-win way. And one question or I know the answer but Ela for the residents it might be helpful to know what is the budget impact or if
there is any because of the new contract uh in the coming year and the upcoming years. >> So the uh the raises that were effective um July 1st of 2025 uh were included in the uh budget voted at the last annual town meeting. So everything was within
the budget that was appropriated and we will appropriate uh the correct wages going forward. >> Thank you. >> I don't appreciate how that went. >> We'll talk about it later. Let's move on. Um, so next the board will consider
appointing Shashwat Jai Puria to the youth commission as high school student representative, a non- voting member with a term expiring on June 30th, 2026. >> They are available on Zoom if we have any questions. >> Hi, can you hear us out there? >> Can you live up there? Come. They're coming.
>> Uh, yeah, I can. >> Hi, welcome. You know, thank you for coming tonight. you know, we just want to give you, you know, appreciate appreciate you signing up for the youth commission and we just want to give you the opportunity to introduce yourself and share with your board your interest in this.
>> Okay. Yeah. So, hi, thank you for this opportunity. I'm excited to serve on the youth commission and bring a student perspective. I'm particularly interested in creating more opportunities for teens in Hopington. similar to my work in the HCA student advisory board. Um, I'm
committed to being an active member and representing my peers. >> Great. Awesome. We appreciate that. Does anyone on the board have comments or questions? >> Nope. Just a welcome. >> Yeah. >> Thanks for your service.
>> Thanks for stepping forward. I appreciate your volunteer your interest for volunteering. >> Brian, all set. Thanks. >> Yep. I kind of echo that. Thank you for your interest and stepping forward for this. Um, so I believe we do need a motion here.
>> I would move to appoint Shashwat Jory to the youth commission as a high school student representative non- voting member to a term expiring on June 30th, 2026. >> Second. >> Okay, we've got a motion and a second. Any further discussion? All those in favor? I.
>> Any opposed? No, that is unanimous. Congrats and thank you again for volunteering here. All right. Next, the board will consider approving an amendment to the land disposition agreement with Habitat for Humanity for 28 Null Road.
Elaine, do you want to introduce this one? >> Uh, assistant town manager >> or Lance. No problem. My pleasure. Um, so as the board may recall, uh, they previously approved a land disposition agreement for 28 no road to develop the property as a single affordable unit. Um, so with the new council on board,
they've been reviewing these agreements that we have in place. And this was this amendment comes from them. It's just a recommendation. It's basically a a different but similar mechanism for the deed. And whereas previous council recommended a right of reverter, this is what they refer to as a revisionary
deed. Um, it's something that our legal new legal council felt would be beneficial to community. It's something that they had done with Habitat Humanity in a prior project in another community. So, Habitat for Humanity was comfortable with it. Um, so they asked if the board would be willing to sign the amendment.
>> Perfect. Um, to the board, do we have any thoughts, questions? Brian, you want to start here? >> I don't. I'm all set. Thank you. Shel U, >> I'm good. Thank you. >> Nope. Amy, >> no. I'm just glad we're going to get
another affordable house. So, thank you. >> Okay. Um, so there's there's a motion for this one. >> I I move to approve the amendment to the land disposition agreement with Habitat for Humanity for 28 Null Road. >> Second.
>> Okay, we've got a motion and a second. Any further discussion? All those in favor? I >> I. >> Any opposed? I abstained. >> Okay. Um, next we'd like to welcome Parks and
Rec Commission. You know, the board will hold a joint meeting with the remaining members of the parks and recck commission to vote to fill one parks and rec commission vacancy with the term to expire on May 2026 annual town election. There's one applicant for two vacant positions. Lynn Taylor, would you like
to come join us? >> Hi. >> Oh, do we do the chair? Do we have our parks and recck members here? >> I Yeah. Would the rest of the commission like to join us? >> 6:40 and I know two are going to come in person and one is online.
>> So, yep. So, Lynn, if you want to take a seat, we'll move on to some other items and we will come back at 6:40 so that we can make sure everyone's here. >> Thanks. Can I ask through um through the chair, how many are needed for a quorum when it's a joint meeting of the two bodies, three three of three parks,
>> all three of them. Okay. >> They're not on Zoom yet either, but it it's early. >> All right. So, we'll come back to this at 6:40. So, hang in there. Um I think we should just move on and start with some of the budget presentations. Uh for those, again, we're running a
little early. So, we've got the board will review the proposed FY27 operating capital budgets of the following departments. Public library, uh, information technology and innovation services, parks and wreck, human resources, youth and family services, town clerk, board of health, and land
use planning and permitting. So, is anyone here right now that would be ready to go? Who would like to come first? I see John. Well, I see John got his hand up first. Kyle, if you don't mind. >> Yeah, you're going to be up for all of them. Yeah. The presentation is in order. >> Oh, is it
>> Josh first? >> Even Even better. All right, Josh. Sorry. >> Can we get >> Can we get that? That's That's why we have her to keep us in line. Can we get the presentation up
on the screen, please? Sorry. It's starting at page 21. >> Yep, I got 21. >> All right. Yes. >> Welcome, Josh. >> Good evening. Thank you. Uh Josh Crusetti, director of IT for the town.
Uh thanks for having me tonight. Um so our proposed FY27 IT budget is largely consistent with last year. Uh this reflects a level service approach. Uh we took a bottom up approach here and
submitted a budget that meets the town's budget guidance. Uh no material service changes. So what we're seeing is some inflationary increases with some of our vendors and licensing. Um but a lot of those costs are um you know kind of
otherwise offset by some careful spending and renegotiated discounts um in other areas. So, I've got kind of two um notable adjustments or items to mention. So, the first is an adjustment related
to the town's change in payroll providers. Um so, as part of that transition, certain munis modules that are now used exclusively by the schools. Um there's been some adjustments there. So historically those costs were always
carried in the IT budget and uh in FY27 with some of those modules now be used used only by the schools uh the budget reflects kind of a cost sharing adjustment um to better align those expenses with the usage.
Um and the the second part of that is uh for the fourth consecutive year now it has submitted an initial request in our budget to add to staffing capacity and um that request was removed as part of the overall balancing budget process
this year. Um so as a result of those two things what you'll see is the recommended FY27 budget actually represents a net decrease over FY26. Um, so at this point I'm happy to answer any questions about the operating side or I don't know if you want to me to
move on to capital. >> Yeah, I I'll open up to the board and as as a reminder for not just you you guys were great right on time. We're kind of pegging like five minutes for each one since we've got nine of these departments. Uh we're not making a motion or anything on them tonight. So
this is just the chance for the board to review them. So with that um Matt Amy, would you like to start? >> Sure. Um so uh about the payroll software I think we've talked about this in previous meetings when we looked at the budget but so the payroll software
used by the schools is going to be now in the school budget and they are keeping their provider right >> correct >> even despite the discussions okay and the town has decided to switch to a new provider but only the town's um W2s will be will be processed with this the new software we're getting right
>> the W2s are processed with the old provider because that's what we finished our calendar year on all issued last week. >> Okay. But for the following year after after this budget passes, >> correct? >> Okay. So next Well, so it's too late for this year, but for the following year, it'll be the new software provider. Ex
>> the for the town >> for the for the town. >> Harpers in the school will continue to be on Munis >> and they've decided that's their decision. >> Correct. >> Okay. >> I don't think I have any other questions, but I do know we have a very lean IT department. So I hope you know in a future year you can get the extra
person that you need. >> Thank you. Yeah, I'm not in a great mood tonight, so I'm going to be pretty blunt about it. I'm deeply concerned to see a budget cut to the IT department. There's absolutely nothing going on in our world that does not involve an expansion and enhancement of information technology
and the role it plays in our government. I feel like I am actively rubbing Peter and I don't know which Paul I am paying. I would strongly encourage you to go back to this one and reconsider this one with Miss Lazarus and town staff. I think we're doing ourselves a disservice. With that said, I'd like to
understand why a priority came for the police department is in your budget. >> Uh, sure. I'm happy to talk about that as part of our capital. Um, but I can answer that now if you'd if you'd like. >> If only because it's on the screen and you invited the question. >> Sure. So, um, so that's one of our three
capital requests for FY27. um the the camera platform um and system of all of our integrated cameras into our central system has always been an IT expense. Um, so what this item represents here under the pay as you go that you see,
it's a $13,200 um, request. And while we acknowledge it, it doesn't, you know, technically meet the 25K threshold for capital, it's included there um, because first of all, it's a it's a onetime non-recurring
expense. So this this is to upgrade a number of priority cameras, existing cameras that are already in inside the police department. Um, so these are cameras that are that are no longer supported and outside of um kind of recommended
um usable life. Um, and so again, we're we're including it here because it's a onetime non-recurring expense and because historically all of our other camera projects have exceeded that $25,000 threshold. And so just in the name of transparency and being clear in
what we're asking and um how how that money is being um appropriated, we wanted to call that out separately. So I recognize I'm not on CIC anymore. So I will try to stay with my own boundaries here. But I'm having a hard time understanding how something that is a core infrastructure system is considered
a capital expense when you have just described something that is inherent to the operation of the department. It sounds to me as though this is to maintain existing infrastructure which is required to do your role and I would consider that to be an operational expense. I'm not going to quibble about
the 13K. It feels really reasonable. But you've essentially come up here and explained that you were paying for the IT infrastructure of the town and that you're taking a budget cut. I don't know what makes that sound smart. It sounds really stupid to me. >> Thank you Sh uh to the chair. First on
the opics, thank you um for keeping it tight on the budget, but I am curious to know how did you go down from 470 to 473 to 434 on personnel? What was the driver for it? just to understand a little bit
for the requested numbers. >> Um, >> add to staff. >> Yeah, that was that was removing the the add to staff. So, the original proposal included the that add to staff. >> You're not cutting any current capacity or staff, right? It was >> no no
>> newly requested and then you removed it. Correct. >> Correct. >> With that, do you have to absorb any additional services or do you see any challenge on the services? One thing I want to emphasize is uh obviously I mean we want to keep the tit budget tight but
u with the uh especially cyber security and some of the other threats some of the towns and government agencies face do you feel comfortable with what services and protections that you have? I think it could always be improved. I mean, I know it's not intended to be a
loaded question, but you know, yeah, I think um I think we do really well with what we've got. I am comfortable with existing staffing and systems. Um you know, adding to staff would be would would be helpful. I mean, we've seen a a
big increase in the uptick in kind of support and training that we provide um ad hoc day-to-day, week to week. And um I mean we we do try to be a service first department. So that's a big chunk of of what we do and the services we provide. >> Yeah. So something to think about for
future and again one of the things with it is that your service doesn't have to explode unless you're in that service business which we are not. So um it's uh we trust your judgment to kind of balance that out. And I think since we
touched on the capex, the capex item below is completely new installation of firewall and licensing consulting combined a new project. That's why it's capex. Is that correct? The 17. Yeah. >> The the Yeah. The second request for the
firewall that's a that's an uh an upgrade replacement, >> right? And it it is a capex. That's a correct. This the $75,000 request is a is a capital request. >> We haven't covered those yet. >> All right. Thank you,
>> Brian. >> Josh, are you comfortable with this budget? >> I am. >> And is this your budget? >> It is. >> Did anybody put you under undue pressure to slash $100 million or anything like that? >> No, not at all. >> So, you own it? >> I own it. >> I'm all good. Thank you.
>> All right. I have no additional questions. Thank you for walking us through this. >> Sure. Appreciate you coming tonight. >> Yeah, of course. You want me to talk about the other uh remaining capital? >> Oh, the hardware refresh. >> Yeah. So, I mean, happy to to elaborate
a little bit more about the $75,000 um if if needed. Um yeah, the the third item is the it's just the $33,557 and that's an ongoing program that we've had for, you know, literally a decade now at this point. Um, so it's just the
kind of rolling replacement of uh end-user computing devices, laptops, desktops. Um, we've continued to kind of push out the usable life of those devices. And so this year kind of just coincidentally is the is the dip year um where the value uh what we're what we're
requesting is about half that of a of a typical year. >> Okay. And one thing on the capital request that you'll see throughout the department updates is that you will see multiple years, but the intent here is just to look at 2027, but I want you to
all know that these could be recurring because they are recurring requests that you will see year-over-year in our 5-year plan. >> Um, thank you for the clarification. Sorry, through the chair. Quick question. Why do you see it as a recurring if it's a capital one time?
It's projected, but it may or may not happen next year is your point. Is that correct? >> Um, well, these are ongoing refreshes that Josh has planned. So, they're part of our five-year plan. That's why you have different amounts throughout the years, and we just want to be
transparent that they will be on the capital request form year-over-year. >> So, so you don't refresh all the laptops at the same time. It's a gradual thing. You do piece by piece every year on a rolling schedule. >> Correct. So we don't we just we don't have the the person power to do a you
know 200 device upgrade once every four or five years. So we just do it on this ongoing um you know kind of rolling basis and that's how we get to a kind of a normalized cost of around $65,000 for normalized year. But again it's not you know the the fleet doesn't match this
perfect distribution. So that's why you've got these kind of you know up years down years. >> Makes sense to me. Questions from the rest of the board there? >> Yeah. Uh just one last question on the funding. So it's coming from free cash.
Um and does it have to go to CPC or has it gone through CPC yet? >> Uh C CP um CIC through CIC. Uh yes, we've we've had those meetings. >> Okay. Thanks. >> So again, to the chair, at the risk of not being CIC any longer, it was never
the intent to be using capital cash for known recurring consistent repetitive expenses. It was meant to be for unique one-off expenses. If you can define the schedule of recurrence and expense, you have articulated a year-over-year operational expense. You have not
articulated a capital expense. I would really challenge you to go back and think about how you are structuring this. I do not think you are representing the capital expenses accurately. >> All right. Anything else for the board? I think we're good from our end, Josh. >> Thanks, Josh. >> Thank you. >> Thank you for your time.
>> John, would you like to join us? >> Welcome. >> Good evening. >> I think we can move ahead a slide on the or two. One more. Yep. Thank you. Welcome. >> Thanks for having me. John Gellich, land use director.
So, uh, we've got a total budget request of $73,31456. That's a 2.36 increase. Uh, mostly that's going towards personnel um salaries and whatnot. Expenses are uh within the recommended increase that
town manager has given us. And we have two pay as you go requests. One is a turbidity meter and one is a stadia rod. Both of those are used in conservation commission work. >> Okay. Um, open up to the board. Who wants to start? You want to start this
time? Just going to keep moving. >> Sure. >> Did you want to go? >> Okay. Okay. >> I'll go say >> I I don't I don't really have much. It's a very small basic basic budget here, but um what what did you have to remove um to get to the town manager recommended budget? >> So, uh I had put in the 3.5% increase.
So they just removed that and so that's what the town recommend town manager recommended budget is. >> Okay. But staff will still get their raises right. Yeah. >> I'm sorry. >> Staff will still get their cola their their >> Yeah. So that's that's done in a process that I got wrong. So >> Okay. >> Yeah. >> Thank you.
>> I'm going to sound like a broken record, but I'm going to ask the same question about the pay as you go expense. A turbidity meter, which is going to be routinely used for the work performed by the department is an operational expense and is well below the $25,000 threshold. Why is this not being budgeted for as an operational expense? And why are we
using PIGO funding? >> It's a one-time expense that he said he needed. >> You just buy one meter and you just use that meter over and over. You don't have to >> I understand, but I am concerned with how loosely we are interpreting the availability of PIGO and the intention
of using it as a capital expense buffer. Here we are essentially supplementing what I would view as operational requirements for the department well below the capex threshold. when we are using money that is ostensibly there for the purpose of supporting bigger picture capex. >> If it's a one-time expense, we can use
it for pay as you go. >> I am entirely aligned with you, Miss Lapier. I am challenging that for $125. I'm having a hard time understanding how that's not an operational line item. I'm just concerned that it appears that the majority of the budget balancing and
readjusting appears to have been done through a liberal interpretation of capex and pay as you go and that we are ultimately taking money which will not be available for us in future years. Future years look leaner than this year. I know you know all this Kyla but I have
to say it out loud for the public. I'm really concerned with the approach that we have taken to get to the numbers tonight >> through the chair. I I hear what Mr. Kisner is saying and appreciate that comment. Uh Kyla, can you um help
explain just so people are not confused and we are not confused. How do you determine the opex and pay as you go and capex there are specific rules and definitions and um from the appropriations also there are vetting
that goes on on these matters. So it's not something you know someone comes up with an idea and certainly imposes as far as I understand the budget process but I think because there's some confusion and Mr. Kisn raised a good question it would be helpful to clarify
that so residents and us we are all on the same page. >> Yeah. So pay as you go are one-time expenses that are not part of operating expense. Capital requests are items $25,000
or more. Um, and there's four different criteria. I don't obviously have them in front of me, but four different criteria that come into what a capital request is. Um, and then everything that is recurring and part of an operating budget obviously would go into your
operating budget. in something like you approved last year the um the emergency call system once that is up and running and the maintenance required to run that that becomes an operating expense at that time but the cost for the
infrastructure of that system is a capital expense so I don't really know how to define it other than we saw the tubidity meter and the stadia >> stadia >> stadia rod as a one-time expense
We're not going to use it year or request it year over year. We're going to buy it once and use it and not have to repeat the purchase multiple times. >> Yeah, it makes sense to me. Thank you for the clarification. And I'm sure
through appropriations lens, you have gone through uh some of these as we used to during my >> appropriations sees it after you. So, they have not been through this yet. They haven't seen it yet, but I think they'll have their lens as well. But the way you explained it, I think that makes
sense. And again, um I I don't particularly see any issues, but if you find any other um clarification to make, feel free to uh let us know as a follow-up as well. And I'm just curious, um what is a turbidity meter? So, uh,
during storm events, if there's construction and there's sediment, um, and the water runs off, takes that sediment, it creates turbid water, um, cloudy water. And so, the turbidity meter measures that turbidity to to identify how many suspended solids are
in that water and then conservation uses that because if the water's running off into the conservation wetlands and it has impacts based on their bylaws and regulations. So, it's a way to measure the the runoff and the the quality of the water that's in the runoff. You learned today something new. Thank you.
>> Brian, >> um John, this is your budget, >> correct? >> And are you comfortable with this budget and you own this budget and you can make it work? >> Yes. >> I don't have a strong opinion about the $2,100 bucks. $2,100 does not move the needle. Not even It's not even a
percent. It's 2% uh whether it's in capex or whatever. So, I'm okay with that. Thank you. I have no additional questions. John, appreciate you coming up tonight. >> Great. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> I think next we had >> health.
>> Health Department of Health. >> 640. >> Um >> Oh, >> yeah. We We can jump to that quick. >> Yep. Arsen would like to come up. Can make this motion quick.
slide over. >> Do you need Do you need Kyle? >> Sure, we do. We do have a quorum. So, >> yeah. Do they need Do they need three or >> Oh, that's mine. I'm sorry. >> I don't It's We're looking for Kyle, right?
>> Oh, okay. >> Dan, we're looking for Kyle still, right? >> Yes. >> I don't see him on Zoom unless he's on with a different name. Uh, >> he might be looking at 6:40, so we're probably a couple minutes away. So, maybe Sorry about that. >> Okay. >> Oh, he's not on. >> Well, I know he's he's away right now,
so he's going to log in. >> You need one more to be a moment. So you need a quorum. >> Uh we do not. >> We do have a quorum actually. >> We get started. >> Yeah, we have a quorum. You >> sure being a quorum? >> Elaine, do we need the third person?
>> It's a It's a five member board. So a quorum is three even though there are only three in total. >> Three members on the board. >> We only have three people. It's >> three members on the board right now. >> Still a five member board though. Okay. >> Something new. >> Oh, Connor has an opinion.
I wondered if it might be a quorum of the two boards together if if that would count >> because we're having a joint meeting. >> Yes, it's an interesting thought. If I may through the chair, I know we've had similar opinions from council in the past. We're shy on members when there's
actually empty vacant seats that we can count that towards that quorum because it's the same ones that allows them to operate and the the way it's stated for filling the vacancy says the select board and remaining members. So, you
probably can proceed at this point. >> Honor, thank you to our town clerk. All do we have a quorum though? I >> No, you don't need to you don't have a quorum so you can't call the meeting. Yeah. >> Yeah. So you don't need to open the meeting. >> You only have three members total, right? >> Yes.
>> So two is a quorum. Three. >> That's all I do. >> There we go. So uh we are holding a joint meeting with the remaining members of parks and recck commission to vote to fill one parks and rec commission vacancy with the term to expire May 2026 annual town election. There's one applicant for two vacant spots, Lynn
Taylor. So welcome. Would you guys like to introduce Lynn? >> Just before we do that, since this is the posted meeting, I'm going to call this meeting to order. >> But you don't. >> Oh, because you have to >> think I got that. >> Yep. That's not >> perfect. So, welcome. Uh, would you guys
like to introduce Lynn? >> Sure. >> Do we have Wait, do we have to select a chair for the joint meeting? I think >> usually we do. >> So, would you like to be the chair of the joint meeting? >> Yes. >> So, do we have to vote on that? >> Uh, no. Just by consensus. >> Okay. census. Anyone have an issue with
that? >> Okay. >> Welcome, Lyn. We've so we've had uh a couple of vacancies for a couple of different reasons. Uh we've had two resignations since about October last year. Uh so we're down to three of the
five members and um I'm looking forward to to having someone else on the board. It was posted. We did ask for for people to uh apply. Um Lyn Taylor here has been uh has has volunteered um to to join us join the parks and rec commission for
the rest of the year. I don't think we have anyone else here to discuss tonight. >> Perfect. >> Sure. >> Welcome Lynn. Would you like to introduce yourself? >> I'm Lynn Taylor. I live right here on Ash Street. Um I had submitted sort of a
resume with the various organizations and groups that I have worked with in the past. Um, I'm interested in serving on park and wreck. I think it's the right niche for me and it's finally a good time in my life to get more involved. That's code
for the kids have launched. Yay. Um, so, uh, prior to moving to Hopkin, I had collaborated with Nem Park and Wreck and initiated, um, several new programs with them. Um, I have a lot of experience
sponsoring programs and also advocating for kids and their parents. Um, as I had outlined in my resume. Um, and when I learned that you were had a five member committee and you were down to three, I thought I should probably get involved
sooner rather than later. So that's why I'm looking for an appointment now. >> Perfect. Great. Um, well, we appreciate that your interest. I'll open up to the board any questions, comments.
>> I don't think I really have any questions. I've read through Lynn's pack uh information she submitted in the packet and you know, the parks actively does need a new member. I know Laura had big issues to fill. She was really enthusiastic about the concerts on the common. So, welcome to the board. >> Thanks,
>> Matt. you ready? >> From your perspective, can you tell me what you think success would look like in this role for you? >> What success would look like in this role for me? >> Yep. What is your vision for what you hope to accomplish in this term?
>> Okay. Um, well, I know we have a lot of things going on right now with uh Pinefield and and so on. My first my first step is to get better acquainted with exactly what park and wreck is wrapping their arms around right now and
trying to accomplish. I know there's a lot going on with budgets and there have been various projects that have been taken off the table. So for me, my success would be getting a better understanding of park and wreck, how we all work together and what we can do to
benefit um the kids and the families here in town. What a wildly grounded and practical answer. I'm real glad you're applying to be on this board. Thank you so much. Good. >> Thanks. >> Yeah. No, thank you for stepping forward and volunteering your time for the town.
Certainly appreciate that. Um, what interests you um to Park and Wreck over others? Obviously, it's a great place and wonderful committee and lot of great activities, but what particularly interests you for this committee? >> What particular interest in what? I'm
sorry. in the park and recre committee. >> Oh, the the various programs for the kids. I've been looking at the fact that our population has been growing like crazy. I think we've increased by about 25% as have as has the student population here in town. So, I'm really
hoping to keep up with that and maybe expand or introduce new programs to accommodate everybody and make everything accessible for all children whether they have disabilities or their their regular uh developing children.
>> Thank you. That's great to hear. >> Brian, >> hi Lynn. >> Hi. >> Thanks for coming tonight. >> Sure. >> I think it's great that you're volunteering. We appreciate your service. We look forward to what you can do. Do you think you would run for the office in May? >> I will definitely be running for the office in May, but I was asking for an
appointment now given you're down to a pretty slim group here. >> Yeah, that's great. Thank you so much. Pleasure. >> I have nothing additional. I appreciate you reaching out, especially doing it ahead of the election. So, um I think with that, unless there's other comments from the parks,
>> one other president that that Amy may have a comment. I just wanted to say that I'm excited that we have um more interest in joining the board. We have gone from five to three. So looking forward to um having a new member and um
to Amy's point um Laura is big shoes to fill. So we're very excited >> um to >> through the chair. I I just one additional comment. I I've had a little bit of a dialogue with Lynn since she she decided that she was interested and
and uh not just in this this interim position, but in in running more permanently. And I I will say that one thing that I really appreciated about the dialogue was her interest and willingness. We weren't sure of the timing of this meeting and uh how this process would play out, but she was uh
very interested and willing to start attending meetings just to come up to speed. And I I think that's an excellent way for anyone that's running for any role in town to start to become a uh familiar with the processes and to start to, you know, to potentially hit the ground with their feet running. It's not
a prerequisite for anyone to run or or or hopefully participate in a board, but I think that was commendable. >> And Dan, to let you know, Kyle is on the Zoom. >> Kyle, we we started uh everyone has kind of gone around and and made comments at this point. Okay. Yeah, I was on on
mobile. >> Sorry. >> Yeah, Dan, I I couldn't agree more with with your last comment. I think it's a great way to get going. Um, is it Kyle? You you have any additional comments just joining us? >> No. Excited to have somebody that's
excited about joining the parks and recck commission. >> Perfect. With that, I move to appoint Lynn Taylor to the Parks and Recreation Commission to a term expiring at the annual town election on May 18, 2026. >> Second. >> Second.
>> Perfect. We have a motion and a second. Um, this doesn't need to be roll call, right? Just >> Kyle's remote. So, right. >> That's So, do we because one's remote? >> I think so. >> Yeah. >> Yes. >> Do we need to do roll call since Kyle's remote? Right. >> Yes. Someone's remote. So we we'll start
here. >> Amy Ritter Bush, yes. >> Matthew Gizner, yes. >> Shad, yes. >> Brian Hur, yes. >> Yes. >> Amy O'Donnell, yes. >> Kyle. >> Kyle Smith, yes. >> And Joe Clark, yes. That is unanimous. >> Congratulations. >> And thank you. >> Thank you, Lynn.
>> To your point, Brian, I have my papers here. So, if you want to sign, I'm more than happy to pass. >> Dan, do you need to adjourn your meeting? >> Yes, you need to. >> Oh, yeah. Thank you very I'll say on a second. Uh, so we're set to adjourn this meeting, this joint
meeting. >> Thank you. Congratulations. Of >> course. >> I can't hear you, Dan. >> Oh, the mic. >> Kyle, we're voting to adjourn the meeting. How do you vote? >> Yes. >> And I vote yes. >> Votes yes. >> All right. Thank you guys for coming. >> Thank you.
>> We we will get back to um I think the health department. We said Sean, would you like to join us? Welcome. Thanks for as we bounce around. Thanks for the flexibility. >> It's fine. >> Um, thank you for having me. Sean McAuliff, health director. >> Um,
figured I'll take a a brief I'll provide a brief explanation of what we did to get to the budget and then um we can take a look at the uh the numbers presented. So the bottom-up budgeting process from fiscal year 26 gave us an accurate
measurement of what we would need um to you know to fully fund and budget the department um so that we could meet the minimum regulatory and legislative standards um set by the commonwealth. Um, with our notes from fiscal year 26,
we constructed a fiscal year 27 budget uh proposal that would meet our deliverables, address our opportunities, and most importantly comply um with uh the budget directive received from the select board. The first draft of our
budget came in slightly over the select board request at 3.31%. Given the draconian cuts to the Mass Department of Public Health budget, we were uncertain whether all of our training, certification, and licensing
fees would be covered um by outside sources. So, we came in slightly higher than just prior to meeting with Elaine, Lance, and Kyla. We learned that these expenses would be covered. And as such,
when discussing the budget to be presented, we took a $45 um $100 budget adjustment and fell within the budget goal of the select board. Um, since that meeting, we learned from the Department of Public Health that our shared
services arrangement group, they're the group that covers or that I'm able to pass my training, certification, and other anything related to CUS. I can pass those expenses through um that we
would be able to do uh or forward them those expenses through the end of calendar year 20 uh 28. At that point, the federal funding that supports the SSA will expire.
The SSAs will end and then we will have to again start um covering those costs. Um, today I calculated our training, certification, and licensing fees to be about $12,000. Um,
um, they could be slightly higher when we get to the end of 28. Um, but it's always been a practice of our department to try to find outside funding sources. So, we will look um to get either outside grant
um outside grants or other funding to cover those uh certifications that we need in order to do our job. And then um so like most of the departments, we came in um with a goal to level fund. Um
we um we our operating expenses were where we took the reduction to get from a 3.31% budget to a 2.52% um increase. And um if you've got any
questions, I can go over what the uh you know how those operating expenses break down, but essentially it's it's our um salary expenses um and then our
operating budget, our expenses. >> Perfect. Thank you for walking us through that. Um Sher, you want to start this time? >> Sure. Yeah. Thank you for u again keeping it to a very tight budget and for all the service and all the good work that your department is doing. It's
amazing actually that in these days when federal funding and state funding and everything is being challenged so much but you are keeping up um all the good work the same way and expanding in some I think for us to understand and for the town residents to know it would be
helpful how much um in addition to this do you depend on grants and what has been the historical trend and what do you expect in the coming years if you have any ballpark number. So the board had um back in 24 we started discussing
um like a grant um goal for me for each year. So this year I've brought in um I think just just under $60,000 and that's covering
um specialized senior services. And then we received a um equity vaccination grant from the Metro West Health Foundation. Um we've received very favorable reviews from Metro West and I'm fairly certain
that I can tap them for additional funds um in the following years. Um, and then we did have um we had leftover COVID grant money that they um allowed us to um put
towards our current vaccination work. So, we've seen some, you know, savings there. And um the the one thing that really the big drain on our department is the
cost of vaccines. So if we're going to fund the vaccination goals um that the Department of Public Health lay out um you know that's that's a a considerable expense, but we've been doing well at
covering those. Um yeah and then we for most of those vaccinations we get reimbursed for the um for the administration of the vaccine. So, we're seeing starting to
see checks coming in, reimbursement checks coming in and uh >> yeah, >> I'm fairly confident that uh we can continue down you know this you know >> yeah you'll do keep doing your magic and kudos to you and the team wonderful team
for bringing in that and keeping the services in these days as well. Uh and that said uh my last question is do you see any uh risk or any u anything in the horizon that may impact your services to our senior citizens or to our
vaccination programs or any other public health initiative? Actually, no. Um, like kind of based on Kyla's guidance, um, we set ourselves up, um, with a a
solid budget and, uh, we're, uh, we have a a good team. Um, and we're we're meeting all of the goals that the uh the state and our grant um
providers have um given us. So, I'm confident that um we'll continue that work and and it's a credit to the team that I have. I mean, >> certainly. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. Kudos and keep up the good work. >> Thank you, >> Ryan.
>> Same question. Sean, you put it together, right? >> Yes. >> Budget. You feel good about it? Feel good. >> You can make it work. >> Confident? >> Done it many years. >> No, >> I'm confident you can do it, too. So, if you're good, I'm good. >> I'm good. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> No commentary about the number of years
you've done it. You look like you just came off a chalet. I think you look relaxed. >> It's the turtleneck's keeping my throat warm. My voice my voice is shot. >> I'm thinking of Hot Tottis. That's where my head usually goes. So, my my question is unfortunately going to be aimed more towards Ms. La here and I'm really just
trying to seek alignment on our practices tonight. I'm having a hard time understanding how the lensures that Mr. McAuliffe just described are different than the lensures which we have agreed are a capital expense for school textbooks. As Mr. McAuliffe
outlined this, this is a known expense required to do his job. They are currently in as an operational expense, but it's not actually physically required. It's a it's a compliance requirement. So it is required in that sense but it is not a literal scalpel.
It is not a needle. He will not be giving vaccines. He will be making no cuts. Can you help me understand why this license is being viewed so differently than the school textbooks license? I I think I'm a little better. Um so the
so Simone Brian soon to be Tom um we all have we have our sanitarian licenses. We have our nursing licenses and then we have so those are you know annual um
l we have annual licensing and certification requirements to to maintain our regulatory compliance and then we have our we are a vaccine for children provider. So we get being a
provider in with the state we're allowed to get free childhood vaccines from the state. So that comes with a cost that is another annual um none of this none of this is concerning or confusing for me. I'm just drawing the parallel that we
have made it that a capital expense is a recurring lensure for the schools. I am asking why your recurring lensure is considered an operational expense. There's a huge difference in cost as well. It >> I can see that >> yours is an annual certification.
Correct. >> Right. >> And theirs was a 5 to 10 year renewal. >> I can appreciate the difference. I'm just trying to tease out the delineation and to make sure that there are firm principles behind it. Kyle, I have a lot of private conversations with you that
are not evident to the town. I feel very comfortable with the answers to these questions, but I feel like I need to ask them out loud for the purpose of saying them in the open meeting. So, I am comfortable here. My only watch out, and you articulated it yourself, so I can't emphasize it more than you did. We don't
have any feel for where the budget cuts are going here. Please do not hesitate to come back to this board sooner rather than later and with urgency when things change because I suspect they will. We will understand. I will. >> Okay. I don't think I have any further
questions after all the questions that have been asked and answered to date. >> Yep. I'm good. I appreciate you in the sheet calling out where your difference was from what you requested and what you push forward. So, we we appreciate >> any opportunity I have to save money for the town. >> Yeah, we appreciate it. That's what we
did. >> All right. Awesome. Thank you. >> Thanks, Sean. Thank you, Sean. >> Thank you, Sean. >> Thanks. >> Uh, next up we have human resources. >> Jessica should be on the left. >> Shenzoom. >> She has her hand up. Jessica, you out there?
>> Jessica, can you hear us? >> Here she's coming. >> Okay, she's she's on mic now. >> Hear me? >> Oh, it's a little quiet. Um, >> could you hear something? >> Can you hear me? >> I hear. Jessica, we're having a little trouble hearing you.
>> Okay, >> that was a little bit better. >> Maybe just closer to the mic. >> Is that better? >> Yes, >> that's much better. Awesome. >> Thank you. >> Um >> Okay, so um I'm Jessica Leins. I'm the
HR director and um the personnel um costs um from fiscal year 26 to um 27 remain primarily the same. The reason for that is that we had
um changes in staffing in the department. Um, so even though we did follow the same merit increase process as all of the rest of the employees, um, because we had changes in staffing, it affected or rather didn't really affect
the that particular, um, budget, um, account for HR. Um, so that remained pretty much the same. Um, we were able to reduce the budget from fiscal year 26 to 27 by just over 11%.
Um, mainly from the compensation contingency fund. Um, that was budgeted at 500,000 for fiscal year 26. And that was a year where we had all four unions were we were negotiating new
contracts. So, it was an unknown what the um new rates were going to be for all four of those unions. So, we had budgeted 500,000 to be on the safe side to be able to afford um what was
negotiated. Um because now they have three-year contracts. Um we felt comfortable um in our discussions around the budget to reduce that fund to 400,000
um to cover other unknown unexpected um salary requirements that may come up during the year. So that's where the reduction in the the budget comes from. Perfect. Thank you for walking us
through that. Um, Brian, you want to start? >> Sometimes I have the curse of experience on this board and I apologize for that. Jessica, I don't remember a $400,000 fund for salary adjustments midyear. Has
that always been a thing? >> Um, it hasn't always been that much. Um it the compensation contingency fund has been um in the HR budget for a while. Um
a a lot of times what happens is you know some we well we've had to offer sometimes positions at a higher rate. Our um our applicants for our public sector jobs now are coming from the
private sector. So sometimes we'll have somebody who has a level of experience where we're offering them a position at a higher rate than the person before them was making and we need to make up that cost somewhere. Um obviously not
budgeted in that that budget for that year but would be budgeted in the next year. We have people who go out on leave for one reason or another. they're still getting paid their salary while we have to pay somebody else to cover their position. So all of those kind of
unknown situations that come up um require that fund to pick up those extra costs and salary. Um and there has people are paid more than they were in previous years. So that fund needs to be
ample to cover those necessary costs in order to keep services running um at the level that they need to. >> Those scenarios make sense to me running the business um a business and obviously this business too. But uh how does that money then get released into other
budgets? Like what's the approval process for that? >> Just if I may add, the the contingency fund also includes the raises for non-UN all non-un employees. So, none of the budgets uh presented this evening have raises for non-UN employees. It's something that comes later.
>> And is that something we've always carried in this other bucket here? That's what's kind of new to me or maybe I forgot. >> So, bulk of it is the raises for non-unities. >> When you have a lot of experience, you tend to forget, too, because you're getting along, right? So, okay. All right. Uh yeah, I'm good. Thank you.
Thanks, Jessica. >> You're welcome, Amy. >> Yeah. Yeah. I don't think I really have any questions. I appreciate the explanation for the comp contingency fund. Um because otherwise it looks alarming that you're going down 11 11% but it sounds like um due to the union negotiations that should be fine.
>> No specific questions on this one, but I did want to ask if there were any known or expected shifts in HR software coming our way. We've had a shift in finance software. I'm just trying to be mindful of what could be other unanticipated expenses with potential impact from your
department. we've been able to cover um litix which is uh software that um helps us to compare with our other towns. Um software um typically
before would compare salaries with um other private sector entities but not specifically public sector. This is specifically for public sector and it it it does fall within the budget that we
have already established. Okay. >> Um so I'm comfortable with that. And then we now have for our new payroll software, we have Harper's payroll um which is budgeted separately outside of HR but comes with an HIS component to it
which will be much more comprehensive along with an applicant tracking system and it will help to streamline a lot of processes in HR to free us up to focus on um even more that we can do in HR. Okay, perfect. Because what I was really
trying to fish for was whether or not you had adequate performance management tools to support things like succession planning, organizational charts. These are things that I've been asked for in the community before, organizational charts in particular. I know there's some people in this room even who have asked me that question a couple times. So, I just want to be mindful about
whether or not you're getting the tools you need and you're budgeting for the tools you need. I'm hearing you say you are. >> Yes. >> Thank you. >> Good. >> Yeah. Quick question. Thank you uh for uh tight budget and actually reducing it
by 10%. And we for good reasons. So uh kudos to that. But at the same time we want to be cognizant that all the services and quality of services um are stays the same or gets better. My quick question is for the com contingency is
it only for the union um u adjustments union related adjustments or is it for non union employees as well? None. >> It's for all. It's for all. And um and as um Elaine was saying, the the
increases also come out of the compensation contingency fund because we um we do merit increases um at the town of Hopington. So, um, we don't know until people have their reviews what
their merit increase is going to be, um, based on the the rating that they get in their performance review. So, um, it isn't as because somebody might say, well, why don't you just budget for um,
the increases? But they vary based on merit. So, they come out of the contingency fund. >> Thank you. That makes sense. A follow-up question, Elaine, what what is our average um planned or anticipated
merit increase and salary adjustment for the coming year? Average um the reason I ask is of course we want to incentivize our um town employees for their dedication and hard work and also want to be competitive in the market and uh
with especially with the neighboring towns. So just wanted to get a glimpse of that picture. Sure. Based on the fiscal year 26 budget, we had assigned
um for the the three main ratings um a 3% 3 and a half and 4% increase. the large majority of people like around 80% 80 85% of people get that
three and a half%. Um the every year the percent is um worked through as to what we can afford to um assign and stay within
budget. So I usually do a projection of what everybody's making. If everybody got that percentage, this is what the total increase would be. And then we look at can we stay at that percentage level for those ratings
and potentially adjust them if we need to. But that that was what FY26 was is primarily a 3 and a half% increase. >> Thank you. That's reassuring. And your market u research shows that is competitive with the um surrounding
towns. Is that right? Yes. >> Uh sorry another quick follow up on that is that um based on that can you share with us a little bit tangent what is our current attrition rate and what is the trend?
>> Um I I don't have the data um to present um but I can certainly follow up with you on that. >> Sure. I don't have any concern there. I know it's I hope it's healthy and the indications I see and hear is it's healthy, but I'm curious if you can
share that. Thank you. I appreciate your work. >> Uh Jessica, no additional questions. Appreciate you kind of calling in tonight. We know you're dealing with some issues with frozen pipes at home. So, hope hope that's going okay. >> Thank you.
>> All right. So, thank you, Jessica. Uh next we have the library if you'd like to come join us. Welcome. >> Thank you, Nancy Hill, library director. Um, so
we are asking and the town manager's office is recommending a budget of 1,25,315 this year, which is a 5.68% increase over last year. A couple of things make up uh this
difference. The first is our personnel services for full-time. Our personnel services has increased by $51,639.32 and that's due to uh changes in our full-time staff. Uh last year we had
nine full-time staff members. This year when we had a part-time staff member leave us from our children's department, we with the blessing of Elaine uh combined those hours with our part-time reference and technology position so
that that person now has full-time we have another full-time staff member. And that was necessary because even though we're very lucky to have the town IT department, the library does have someone on staff who is doing lots of um
you know fix up work and and uh keeping things updated for us uh and needs to be available for training for folks who come in to do programs and whatnot. Uh so we were glad very glad to do that. Uh we also had a part-time staff member
want to drop down from 30 to 19 hours and we gave her additional 10 hours to another part-time person, our reference technology, our reference librarian, not reference technology. Uh we have a new service station this year. Instead of
having four desks, we now have five desks that we have to ser service. Um and so that helps us with that. Uh that new 30-hour person now also does some of the cataloging um which we weren't able
to have help with in the past. So that helped us there. That um gave us an increase uh in our personal line item, but we also offset
that by decreasing our part-time personnel budget. Um, and the way that we did that again is we put some of that part those part-time hours into full-time. And in addition to that, um,
we decreased our substitute line budget. And we did that both for the libraries, uh, e, uh, expense habits, not habits, um, and to save the town some funds. Uh
we use our subject our um substitute line budget to fill in for when folks are when full-time folks are out on vacation or taking personal days or out sick. Uh we use the substitutes to fill those shifts. And we have also had to
have shifts uh where our substitutes fill them regularly on a regular weekly basis um particularly on our weekends. And so we we decreased our substitute line, but we are asking for two
permanent part-time staff members. So two permanent part-time library associates, which will help us a with staffing more more regularly. Um, it will also help us with uh funding
because when we are offering shifts ups to our substitutes, we don't know who's going to pick up that shift and we have substitutes that are paid at different rates. So, it's hard to kind of project what our expense costs will be um for
substitutes. This will help us budget um more evenly and it'll also help us with staffing and it also decreases our um our uh personnel budget this year by
15%. So uh it decre excuse me decreased by 15%. Our operating expense changes this year um our expenses increased by 9.17%. What accounts for that is last year you
can see over time what our expenses have been. The majority of our expenses uh come out of our materials budget. Uh we are you heard Sean talk about requirements. We are required to spend
15% of our overall budget on materials every year in order to remain certified. The town has traditionally given us close to a third of what we're required to spend, but not the entire amount. And we have made up um for uh discrepancies
in that by using some of our trust funds and our state aid in the past, which we will continue to do. Um, however, last year we requested $51,000 for materials and you gave us 46. So, this year we're
once again asking for the 51%. Um, we are trying to keep a an eye down the future in the next three or four years. One of our trust funds will no longer be available. Um, and so we're trying to ease up our materials so that it doesn't
hurt the town all at once. Um, but rather do it o over time. Um, and oh, and additionally in at the request of the HR department, we've included $1,000 for professional development this year. We've never had
that in our budget before. Um, other town departments have always had it in their budget and last year HR took all of those professional budgets into their account um, and have been paying for staff professional development,
including for the library without us contributing to it. So, they asked us to include that this year. >> Awesome. Thank you. Uh, oh, Amy, do you want to start? Um, I think just my main question is so you're going up a higher percentage than most of the departments.
You're going 5.68. Um, and so that's how what's the headcount total? I know you were shifting around a lot, taking some hours for one position and then or combining two positions. What's the total headcount difference from last year to >> I'm sorry, what's the what >> headcount different from? >> Um, there is no head Well, there would
be with this there would be two >> there would be two new part- timerrs. decrease in our substitutes. >> What about your FTEEs then? Would that make >> our um we added a full-time person in this budget year. So there's no really
>> it's just carrying it. >> So it's about the equivalent of one new position, right? Which Okay, got it. I think that's all I had. >> Yeah, me. Hi. I'll start with the unfund question for Kyla first. So pay as you go on the library floor. The reason I'm asking folks,
>> we've had this discussion. We have and I support it. But the reason I'm asking folks is I'm trying to highlight that pay as you go is a non-sustaining, non-refillable bucket of funding. We can put money into it, but it doesn't mean that we will. This is a fancy way of saying that we're using it to pay for
things this year, but we shouldn't always expect it to be available to us in future years, especially because Ms. Lapierre has put us onto a new finance system, and we should have less extraneous money lying around. So, I know it feels like I'm drilling into this for silly reasons and I'm asking a
really detailed, nerdy question. I am, but I am doing it because I'm trying to highlight to you what it actually means to the tax distribution here and how those funds are used and how it's going to shift over time. So, no question to you about the floors, but I did at least want to talk out why I'm asking about it
in general. My only comment on your budget would be, thank you. I know Josh isn't here anymore, but this is what a budget for a growing department looks like. I have the benefit of being the liaison to the library. So I get to see some of the numbers coming in from them. Folks, I'm going to go ahead and spoil it for you. The number of people they're
seeing each month is increasing. The services they are offering are increasing. The maker space as an example. So I see a growing budget here, but I also see it very much reflective and commensurate with the increase in services and the asks from the community. I'm not always scared when I see the number go up. I'm scared when I
don't understand why the number goes up. Your number is going up for very understandable reasons. Thank you for being creative and for what you do for our town. >> Thank you. >> Good sh. >> Yeah. Thank you Nancy and your team for the wonderful service and work you put
together. I'm a little biased here. I do think that you know u library is one place where uh the increase in service and expansion in usage actually is a good indicator of a town's character and its uh intellectual um metric so to
speak. I'm proud of um the fact that our library has increased its services, the usage and very popular with the events, the books and all the intellectual properties that you offer for our town for our um cognitive practice and um
enhanced intellectual activities especially for the kids and I do think it's directly related also to the growth of the town population as well as the school population. So looking at those metrics, it certainly makes sense to me and I always worry that uh one of the
days you'd come and say I have to cut or I'm going to see some cut because of state or um federal impact which we discussed in the last couple of years and it has been some difficult journeys. So I'm um happy to see that um you have
accommodated within a tight budget and with uh little bit increase in services and expenses and that said do you see any risk in the horizon because I do know like public health you also depend on a lot of grants and a lot of uh state
aids. Is there anything that um sounds like a risk to you or you should be watchful? >> No, not really. Um we have been fortunate enough to meet our requirement for state aid every
year. Hington has never had to file a waiver to my knowledge. Um so we've been very lucky with that. as our trust funds, not all of our trust funds are meant to continue forever. So, we have the
McGovern, which is very healthy and will be around for a long time. And then we have the Crooks, which probably in the next four years is going to be gone. Um, our state aid, we don't really have much of a buffer there anymore. We try to use one year's worth and bank a year's worth
in case we need it. Um, and so I've been trying to get across to this board over the last couple of years that you will be seeing us ask for smaller but increases, no doubt, in our
materials budget as we transition from focusing so much on other funds that may not always be available um to a more permanent solution. Please keep us posted and we'll be um certainly
open to hear and see how we can help collectively we have to solve those problems when it comes hopefully it doesn't. Um one nothing further on this one just clarification as I understand it um uh Kyla the pay as you go here is something that we don't expect to see
happening again and again but this time it happened and we need to uh pay it and it's less than 25k. So it's a pay as go as you go spend for the library carpet replacement. Is that how you define it? >> Correct. We haven't replaced the carpet
in what, 20 years. >> Well, so I have I've used we received a $100,000 um rebate for being leadcertified library. Um and that those funds were to be used only on the library building. So
since I came aboard, we have recarpeted upstairs children's room, the strong room, which is our big event room, and this year we recarpeted the main floor. that leaves only the bottom floor to be recarpeted. Um, and so 13,000 is the amount that's left in the lead
certification reimbursement, which is the amount we were would be using for the carpeting as well as I believe facilities is going before or has gone before CIP for some additional funding. >> I think the pay as you go is what they're >> the pay as you go is what they're Yeah.
So that's what we're looking for there. >> No, thank you. That makes sense to me. Thank you, >> Brian. Hi, Nancy. Uh, same questions as your colleagues. So, you feel good about this budget? >> Yes. Yeah. With a caveat that as I said, you
know, this is a level service budget. We're going to be moving into our next long range strategic plan and I'm sure towns folks are going to want to see additional services that we may not be able to fund with existing budgets. But
for now, it's it's fine. >> You can make this work for the next year. >> Yes. >> Great. Uh question for Elaine and Kyla. So, this one is it above the recommended number. You okay with it? Obviously, you are, but I just want to make sure. >> Yes. >> Okay. Great. Thank you. All set.
>> Thank you. >> I have nothing else. Thank you. Appreciate it walking through. >> Thank you. >> We're going to move on to parks and wreck. Well, John's coming up through the chair to vice chairman on. I had an interesting conversation with Nancy about that 15% material requirement. I
was really frustrated. It defines how embedded that was. I was trying very creatively to look around lensures, recurring costs to see if we could help her from a capex perspective. So, I do want to recognize she's done some interesting work to try to get the budget where it is as well.
>> John, welcome. >> Hi, thank you. Good evening. John Lewis, director of parks and recreation. Um like the rest of my colleagues, we took a bottom up level service approach. Um there are essentially three line items that we'll look at. Uh well, two
personnel services and the expenses for our personnel services. That covers 100% of the parks and recck director salary and then two of our full-time staff members. each of them 50% of their salary is covered by the general fund and the other 50% is covered by the
parks and recreation revolving fund. Um in addition to that our sandy beach staff which is our beach supervisor, our gate guards and our lifeguards all are covered by the general fund here. So when you see personnel services I just wanted to give that breakdown. Um the
next one is our expenses which is essentially broken down into four categories. The first one is our office equipment. Um, very minimal increase of $500. Our public concerts and movies, those are the ones that you will see at the town common, our Sunday music
concerts and our Thursday night movie nights. Those are uh covered by the general fund and we are asking for an additional $850. And our other two line items, uh, one of them is our training and conferences. And for this year, uh, I had requested
$10,000 for myself and my two other colleagues to go to a national conference in Philadelphia this year. Uh, we settled on two staff going instead of the three. Uh, so that is a $7,000 increase for this year. Um,
the last one is our miscellaneous and other contracted services. This is the one that really has more detail involved into it. Uh and this is to maintain our public parks, um the fountain, the town common, uh essentially all places where
residents of Hawkington can go enjoy the town free of charge. Um the main increases for this are around the town comment electrical work that is needed, the EMC playground maintenance,
our sandy beach park maintenance, uh and various fence repairs and surfacing repairs at our playgrounds. Um, essentially what I'm looking at right now is a 7.5 uh% increase, which uh equates to about
$22,000. Um, one additional line item that I did request was for $15,000. Uh, and that was to cover the holiday lights that we have at the town common. Um, further discussions actually with the
vendor, it realistically would be about $20,000 for calendar year 2027 if we wanted to do that. Um, so in our discussions, we decided to eliminate that from our request, but I did want to note that. Um, so that is not included
in this budget. Um, but it's going to come up again next year on how we raise those funds. Um, we had some excellent donors this year. uh Juanita Hansen took charge of this um and we had many local businesses donate uh but again this is
this is an expense that will come up to be discussed um and that is it is a capital request as well for $30,000 for a perimeter fence uh at Sandy Beach and that is to replace what we currently
have there and also extend it. Um there is some safety concerns and some aesthetic concerns uh that we are looking to uh replace that and we had our facility supervisor um walk with me and we calculated the linear footage uh based on previous
quotes from other uh projects and that's where we landed on the $30,000. Um so if that goes to approval, we hope to do that before the this summer. >> Perfect. Thank you, John. Um Matt, you want to start this? >> Yep. Hi, John. lights. I know this isn't
you, so I'm going to talk like I'm talking to you, John, but I want to be so clear to you. I am not talking to John. I'm going to look this way. I don't think it is appropriate for us to consistently cut a line item from an operating budget that we all darn well know that the town expects, wants, and
is going to supplementally fund. It is absolutely not a sustainable way for us to be operating where we are alocotting services and desired outputs from community departments and we are hoping wealthy members of our community are going to support them. I can't take a straw poll of the town right now, but if
I could, I'm fairly certain that should there be lights in the town common for the holidays would pull probably as well as apple pie. 85% by the way if you're curious. Nothing gets around 100 these days. Look, John, I know this isn't you. It is not appropriate to be submitting a budget which knowingly does not contain
all of the items which your department is expected to support. I go find 10 people off the street. They're expecting parks and recck is paying for those lights. So again, I'm not talking to you, but we need to find a way to reconcile this and to remediate this. It's not okay for this budget to be coming forward this way. And frankly,
while John is asking for a budget increase here, and this is going to sound shocking coming out of my mouth, gang, I kind of think John is underfunded. He pays for an awful lot of things to the schools to rent spaces and to get availability for programs. He's frequently in a position of having to
utilize other spaces for storage that are not where he should be. So, we're here talking about an almost 10% line item increase. And I think if I were to ask John Bryan's question and we were in the Chamber of Truth, I would get a different answer. And so, I'm going to respect John and I'm not going to ask him that question because I don't think
there's anything to be gained from the performative nature of it. I'm just saying this to highlight as someone who has been elected as a leader in this community. We're not providing the services that we should be. It's not your fault, John. It's ours. And I think we need to be honest about it. We need to be clear about what those services
are. And I kind of need you to ring our bell a little bit about exactly what it is you are not able to provide that you want to be providing and that the citizens are expecting and what it would look like to deliver it. I know that won't be simple. I know it will involve money. I'm fairly confident it's money
our community wants to spend. You noted aesthetic. You noted about why we do these things and you noted about spaces where we can go, where it is okay to exist for free. I can't think of anything more important in our community right now and I'm a little heartbroken to hear that you're not getting the
support you should be. Thank you, >> Chad. >> Yeah, I had the same question but not not so in so many words. Um, thank you Mr. Ker. Um I have the same feeling that I think it's a very vibrant um time of
the year and everyone loves the lights and we already have seen that in the last year or so how town residents feel about it uh me and my wife and my family included. So I would um definitely want to put that back in. And question for
Kyla, what do we need to do to make that added? So, there are a number of comments being made tonight about putting things back into the operating budget. One thing to make you all aware of is our state aid
number did not come in where we expected it to be. So, instead of it coming in at 4%, it came in less than that. So, we've had to cut additional areas from where we were two weeks ago.
We have started to generate a wish list of items from the various departments where we originally cut where we hope to add back in the holiday lights being one of them. The you'll hear from youth and
family one of their ad one of their um open positions being another one. So all of these things have to come to consideration and prioritization once we get better numbers from the budget.
>> Okay. Um again I I understand and of course we want a healthy budget as well. I would recommend putting it in as pencil in and then as you mentioned show us the big picture impact because of this and some of the other that we have talked about which sounds like what
you're planning to do and then we can help prioritize at large. Some of it are, you know, ab absolutely keeping the lights on, keeping our services at level, which is our principle, and some of it is also listening to our residents and kind of um hearing to our town's um
some of the crying demands. So would appreciate that if we can articulate and if we can pencil that in in that form, of course. >> Okay, >> Brian. Uh, I am going to ask John the same
questions because I believe in holding the managers accountable. If you want it, you got it. It's great. Do it. So, are you good with this? Sand's the lights issue. >> I am. Can I just make a quick note on it, too? Um, that the parks and recreation has the benefit of having a revolving fund. Um, so many of the
expenses that we take on are covered by that. Um, so the miscellaneous and contracted services has gone up every year since I've been here and I'm very thankful for that because that that allows me to manage the dog park which we don't charge for the town comm and
EMC playgrounds. I wouldn't feel comfortable taking from the revolving fund or is it legal to do that to cover these expenses. Uh, so to answer your question, we have the money to maintain. Um, but it's almost a whack-a-ole that one we fix one thing and then something else pops up. Um, so it's hard to
project again in a year in advance also what I'm going to need to fix when another uh fence goes down. Um, so well to that point, it is a budget budget. It is not a etched in stone number and if we have to do something
midyear, we do something midyear and we go to appropriations and figure it out. So I appreciate you saying that. Um, but in general, you can make this budget work. >> Yes. We can't make it work for the lights, but everything else you can make work and we'll solve anything that pops up mid year. >> Correct.
>> Okay. All right. I'm good. Uh, and I would, you know, if we want to encourage us to go back. I mean, I think I agree with Matt like this is, you know, this is one that is very clear the town wants on an annual basis. So, let's just stop playing the game and put it in there and we'll figure it out. I know it's 20
grand, but we'll figure it out. >> Good. Thanks, >> Amy. >> Yeah. Yeah, I guess I'm going to take a different tact here. Like to me, the holiday lights are a nice to have, not a need to have. Um, and for most of the time I lived here in Hopkin, we only had um much more subtle lights on the common. Like the Boy Scouts donated the
tree. My Girl Scout troop decorated the tree. The garden club decorated the gazebo. We didn't have this giant light display like we've had just I think just the last two or three years. So, if it can fit in the budget, that's fine and that's what people want. But I think it is a nice to have and people could, you know, when we get to town meeting and we
vote the budget and if if the holiday lights are not in the budget, people could start fundraising because I think it is a thing people would fund raise for if it's not available in the budget. So I would support keeping it out until we make sure we have enough money. >> That it >> that's it. Yeah.
>> So thank you. I don't have any questions. I you know I echo some of my colleagues sentiments. You know some of these things like the holiday lights we should be finding a way to pay for. people pay a lot of taxes in these towns and it's a great thing when the holidays come around to figure it out. So, I know we're doing a lot of different things to
kind of solve the problems that we're facing. So, I appreciate everyone for kind of leaning in and figuring that out. Thank you, John. >> Thank you. >> Thanks, John. >> Thank you. >> Um, town clerk, would you like to join us, please? Connor, welcome.
>> Good evening. Uh, so for for me, I'm presenting obviously two budgets, one for the town clerk, one for the elections. In the operating side, for the clerk, we're seeing uh we're trying to keep everything level expense-wise. The only
increase is just around um a slight increase with the actual salaries that we're we're looking at just due to the increases that we're maintaining from midyear based on merit increases, things
like that. Uh new hire. Uh regarding the elections, as you hear me say each year, this is kind of that one department that works like a roller coaster. It goes up during election years because it's driven solely by the
expenses and hours that go into running effective elections. So for this coming fiscal year, we're going to have obviously a town election like we do every year, but we're also going to have a state primary and a state election. Those will also have vote by mail as
well as in-person early voting for the two in the fall uh primary and the general election. So, we are anticipating those to be expenses that we're going to have to deal with and we're going to still apply for some
reimbursement from the state to try to get back into the the general fund and support that, but we need to be prepared to fund it upfront either way. On I don't I don't know if anyone wants to ask any questions on the operating side before I go into pay as you go and
capital. >> Anyone? >> Mr. Chair Connor, in fiscal 25 it looks like elections was 60K and in fiscal 27 you're suggesting 50k. Is that going to work? >> Yeah. So the um the difference being is
we don't have it. So the presidential election was in that previous fiscal. Okay. >> So uh we're running into some slightly different costs that are affected by it. Uh we're finding ways that we can fund it. We I go when I'm analyzing how much
the cost per election is going to be by looking at how much it's going to pay for minimal staffing at the elections, early voting, town meetings, all that that's going through. So with this, we are going to be able to pull off, you know, conducting elections with all the minimal staffing requirements.
>> See the presidential doing that. Okay. Thanks. >> Anyone else? We're doing questions around like the OPEX side of things right now. >> I just wondered about the um because the increase is slightly over the the average for the departments this year. So what what what makes that difference >> for which side? For the town clerk side
or the >> town clerk side? >> Okay. So uh with the town clerk side it was I mean it's really just that it was a slight ding additionally from looking at uh my own bud my own salary was not included in the original one. So we did
it through compensate compensation contingency this time around. In past years we just included it in the operating budget. So this is included in that for this time around. Um as well as we had the increases for uh for Will for
the last year as the assistant clerk and then we have a new staff member that we had to bring in while looking at internal equity and everything for that. >> Okay. All right. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Uh I know I know you said we're going to get to PGO. So I've already made my point about PO. I do want to ask
relative to your budget. I'd be remiss if I did not ask about everybody's favorite clickers. Does this budget include everybody's fa favorite clickers for town meeting? Will I still be digital and angry? >> I I promise I'm going to get to that in just a second. >> Okay. >> So, I will wait. I will wait patiently.
>> Perfect. So, first thing I just wanted to touch on is the page you go. Uh that is we've been looking at for a few years now um something to help better manage our records requests. We've had a whole lot of increase in our our general
records requests that have been coming into the town over especially over the past four plus years. So this is a way that we can hopefully better manage the workflow and decrease the burden that comes on departments that don't have to handle these every day. Have it all flow
through my department. Have an easy back door in for legal counsel to review things when they need to. And for repeat requests, it allows for those to be automatically filled by the system if there's something that's already been loaded in, fully redacted, everything
else. So, this is really just to help to streamline what we have, increase compliance, and help department heads and what they're already somewhat struggling in. And it would all be under one for all departments. >> Perfect. Yeah, I I think that's
something obviously a lot of the stuff that comes in front of this board, it would, you know, directly benefit, you know, your group, this board, and the residents that ask for some of these things. So, I think that's great to hear. >> I echo that thought exactly. And now to Mr. Kisner's question, electronic voting
machines is something we're looking at in our capital expense that we're going to be requesting. Uh in conversations last year, it was expressed by appropriations in capital that this might be something worth looking into further as an actual one-time expense
that would be a little larger than keep renting them. And essentially, we'd look at we'd pay off the expense by just purchasing the system in 3 years. We'd be at the equivalent of if we kept renting it. Okay. >> So, it's $10,000 roughly per year to
rent, per meeting, I should say. Uh we're looking at $31,000 roughly expense to purchase all the equipment outright. And then we can choose to have our own team operate it or we can also for more
contentious meetings, if we know there's a hot button issue coming up, then we'll go ahead and request that they can give us some additional backup as well. Right. >> What I got one question first. What's the what's the expected useful life of this system?
>> So, from a lot of the clerks that I've spoken to, the useful life is between 15 to 25 years. Sometimes you'll have to do replacements on some of it, but the hardware itself is actually pretty simple software. So, the the hardware
clickers themselves are easy enough to replace as we need to. The technology doesn't change all that much. the software side, uh there's no actual included additional fees in just the software maintenance. It's only for things when we're buying new equipment or we're paying for, you know, replacing
things that might have been damaged or misplaced or accidentally absconded with. >> Perfect. So, if it's 10,000 per like meeting, if we do a special town meeting, it could be 20,000 a year. So, we could theoretically pay for this in a year and a half.
>> Correct. >> Thank you. >> All right. Um yeah, I think >> sure through the chair I think the electronic voting machine the pays for itself. It sounds right. It's a it's a good um cost benefit comparison. I want to go back to the opex. Um I did have a
question there for the expenses. Yeah, you're going down from 28,000 to 15,000. Uh is it the same reason? actually from 25 I was looking at uh what is the spike
um there because seems like the coming year is more comparable to the 25th elections or 25th year for your activities. So help me understand that. >> So So are you looking at the election side expenses or the town clerk side expenses?
>> Sorry, town clerk side. >> So the town clerk side expenses aren't going to be touching the election stuff. We have kind of a clean separation between the two. So that's not going to be impacted by that. That's just impacted by we had a few things that we were able to find efficiencies in and certain expenses that we aren't going to
need to uh for regular operating expenses we don't need to do this coming year whether we've done it this year going to be completing a project this year or just we don't need to to have that money this coming year. So this is just an attempt to make sure that if we don't need to use it we know there's
other departments that are going to need need the assistance on it too. >> I'm glad you had that. So it's going down from the reason I asked that is a your office is very important for the town's uh various services as well as elections.
Um it's going down almost 50%. And you feel comfortable that will not have any impact? >> I am comfortable that won't have an impact. We'll be able to get it done with what we have. But I appreciate it. Shad. >> Absolutely. Thank you, >> Brian. I'm all set. Thanks, Connor. >> Thank you. Yeah, I did have a question
about the um the clicker purchases. So, it maybe it's because it's two line items. So, it says 200 devices, which wouldn't be enough, but and then it's an extra 600 devices. Is that the second line there? How many clickers would we be getting? >> So, the the keypads are going to be the
uh so it's 200 devices for the bundle, but then it's a separate 600. So, it would be a total of 800 devices. >> Okay. And it's very unusual that we had over 800, but if we did, we would go to paper, I guess. >> Or if we knew that we were going to be having a higher impact, we can rent a
few more. It's not going to be anywhere near the same kind of expense we're looking at. The other honest thing we can do is we can reach out to another town that isn't having a meeting that same day, and we can program a few of their clickers to ours, and the the
folks with the software would help us with that. >> Okay. So, they would be interchangeable for from another town. Okay, that's good to know. >> Good, Matt. >> Yeah, my only question here is, so I appreciate that you were thinking long term about the software. I've been longterm all night, so I got to acknowledge you about it. Now, my
question here, and I'm I'm looking at you here, Mr. Moderator, as well, is this the software you actually want? I understand that it is the software that is financially prudent. Having attended those town meetings, I can recall some uh let's say interesting experiences
with the IT platform itself. Are you confident this is the actual solution that makes sense for the town? Not just financially, but operationally. So financially speaking, using anything like this isn't as financially sound as just holding up a piece of paper. But
this is something that operationally gives confidence to voters. It makes people feel comfortable that their vote is being counted and that their vote is private when they are not serving as a representative. They are in fact voting as a resident of the town. >> I will take your capable dodge as an
answer. Thank you. >> Awesome, Connor. Nothing additional. Thank you. Appreciate it. >> Thank you all very much. >> Thank you. Youth and Family Services. >> Good evening. >> Welcome. >> Hi. >> So, I'm Don Alcott Miller, the director
of youth and family services. And um this year's budget, like like everyone else's, was built from the bottom up. And um there were no surprises in this budget. Um we know that um the
department has been funded via grants um for four years um following a strategic plan that um was done and the growth that that came from that strategic plan was driven by the community and what they asked for and I just couldn't see
doing that and asking for that on the residents back. So, um, we wrote three major grants. Um, and we didn't expect to receive all of them, but we did. And so, um, we received the drug-free communities grant. Um, we received, um,
the mental health awareness training grant. And we received a grant that is called mass call 3B, which has a very long title that I I can't tell you, but it's for regional um, substance use prevention. So um we lead um four other
towns in this process um for regional substance use prevention and collaborate with a host of other regions as well. So um we received all of those and so about half of our staff were funded um through
grants. Well, this year um we it's time to kind of pay the piper. So you're going to see my personnel services increase. Um and the total budget um increase in my request at 43.34%.
Um the town manager budget um there has been an open position for quite some time and there's there was an explanation for that but um they've recommended that we drop that position um the program coordinator position and
so my increase would be at 22.67%. um operations we dropped by um 6.36%. Um I I cut out everything we possibly could. Like I feel terribly guilty always. I've worked in municipal life
for almost 27 years and so um I know the struggle people have with their tax bills. Um I live in a community and struggle with mine. So so I understand. So, I I don't like coming forward asking for money, but um it's it's about the
services and about what's provided to the residents. And um uh Holly Morand um was in a pos she filled a position for um resource counselor for us um out of our strategic planning processes. And
because we got the mental health awareness training grant, it enabled that to be possible. and um she's our data person and she's the person who runs like um all our numbers. She built our resource center
and our service enrollments have been at 17,000. I said that could that can't be right. Um that cannot be correct. Like please run that again. And so it it's and she ran it again. And I said, "Pull out what the intern put in, you know,
for all the services before, you know, 2020." Like, pull that out. Like, I just need to see like, is is this correct? And um and no, the numbers in our case management system don't lie. Like, there
my team is amazing and the work they do around the clock for the residents of this town are amazing and and three of them live in this town. So, um, so I'm proud of I'm proud of the work that comes out and and the people that are being reached and the people that are unseen that are being reached. So, if
you had asked me if I'm comfortable with the budget, no, but I'm not. Am I comfortable with the people who are making the decisions and the people I sit across? Absolutely. I know they have to make tough choices and I know they have to make tough decisions and um, I
know that all of us are taking our lumps and it's not fun. Um, and you know, like I'm a social worker for a reason. Like I can be reasonable. But, um, I think you should know. I know the question will come, well, why didn't you fill the
position before now? Um, I was told I would get that question, so I'll answer it. Um, >> sorry. >> We tried. Um, we tried for a year. Um, we had, um, three offers go out and three times we were refused. part of
that even in our advertising um and a lot of our advertising goes into the NASW Massachusetts magazine. Our ad would be posted and the salary range was always a good $10,000 less than all the other ads for social workers and communities that were essentially
similar to ours. And so, um I don't know that we got, you know, all the applicants we could have gotten. Um and and it was just I just kept photocopying that and handing it off to HR to say I think we need to take a look at things. So for a year we either got people that
weren't a good fit like we didn't extend an offer or we got people who turned us down. And then um came January um of 2025 and we had federal grants and I had staff I didn't want to lose and we kept
getting told that we were losing our grants and keeping our grants and losing our grants and keeping our grants and then it looked like we were going to keep our grants and so that was great. And then we had a personnel issue um which necessitated an unanticipated situation that necessitated the use of
that budgeted funds for a period of time. Um and normally that would be absorbed um into the contingency fund that um Jessica talked about, but um because we had it in our operating budget, it came out of that. So I didn't feel like I could post the position at
that time, not having really anything to offer anybody. Um and so we chose to wait. We talked about dividing the position or doing something part-time like we we've done a lot and I researched with other departments like ours and um what I kept hearing back was
that you know well gee what you're offering is a little bit low that could be a problem and um that the tide is turning that for a while there were a lot of these jobs and now with the cuts that are coming um there aren't I think
what we we were kind of everything kind of hit on the head of a pin post pandemic for us. There was incredible growth in the human services and now that pendulum is swinging again. And so that's sort of where we are. That's how we are where we are. Um would we love to have that position? Yes. What got cut as
a result of not being able to fill it. Dropin hours um at different locations across the community. Um a number of programs that we just couldn't continue to run. Things that um people participated in that they loved. Um but we've had to stop all that. Um and and
we have to pay attention to the clinical needs and um we're seeing higher acuity than ever um in those um even at the middle school last week we we did mental health we followed up on mental health screening for kids and only saw the kids
that were the most concerning that had been actively suicidal and and every year that grows and so that's where we are. Um, and so we have to prioritize that and we just shrink all the other stuff that we do. And we still um we still have reached thousands of people
with programs. So I I'm I'm happy with what we're able to do even with what we have. >> Awesome. Well, well, thank you for sharing all that. I mean, I know what you guys do is very critical to this town and a lot of people in it. Um, you
know, congratulations on the three grants. Like that's that's incredible. A lot of work goes into those and it helps it down tremendously. So, Chidel, do you you want to start? >> Yeah, sure. No, I I feel the same way. Congratulations on the grants and keep up the good work. This is a very
critical service and it may not be always visible, but I hear and see and I know a lot of um uh feedback from the community how much they appreciate the work that you do and how much it touches people's lives. So, kudos to you and
your wonderful team for doing that. And certainly the 17,000 that astonishing number tells a lot um on that story as well. So uh don't feel guilty for coming back with a number that may look high. There are certainly reasons for it. As
much as we want to manage and contain the budget and our taxes, we do want the services like this to continue and to serve our community. So we will certainly support and do as much as we can to continue and expand where we see
fit. Now with this uh reduced coordinator work, do you see any immediate adverse impact from the current services cuz our mantra is level service? So based on that principle, where does it stand? >> I just see burnout in the staff. I don't
think they can continue. we we're all cross-trained and so um I made sure I built a team that if somebody like gets sick or somebody has to take a leave of absence or something happens we can pick up on each other's work so the community doesn't notice. Um and I think what's
happened as a result of not hiring that position is people are running themselves into the ground and I'm going to lose the staff I have and um and I don't want to see that happen. So, um I I I see what went away as a result of
the, you know, not having the bodies, right? But also, um my concern is that I I just they just can't continue to work as hard as they are. Um and trying to maintain the same level.
>> Thank you for sharing that. And I would suggest and recommend the same and you'll hear and we'll have tougher discussions down the road on prioritization. But something like this again uh because of our residents appetite or need and demand uh in a
budget of 137 million potentially. I I think um we want to put it on the radar as long as we can and until we absolutely know that no we cannot do this. Uh that would be my ask.
>> We are um our drug-free communities grant is set to sunset um and so is MHAT um September 29th of 2026. Right. So I asked um for a portion of the drug-free community grant coordinator because it
goes into the year. The way the fiscal years work for the feds is different. So, I asked for threequarters of um that position because um I think the prevention role is so incredibly important. Um you know, we'll never
we'll never see the kids that we prevent um harm from coming to, right? Um and so that maintains a staff person that we have and so that one's incredibly important and I'm thrilled that that's
in the budget. Um, and we are writing the drug-free communities grant years 6 through 10 right now. Um, and so there's no guarantee. Last year they had everybody right and then they decided not to fund it. Um, so there's no guarantee that we we didn't write that
year because it wasn't we weren't up yet. Um, and so this year we're not sure um what's going to happen. and they're having they're they'll release the FOA. Um but they're not we're never sure with all the uncertainty. We just don't know.
And if Massachusetts is is there have been rumors that Massachusetts won't be funded and so like if Massachusetts is frowned upon, you know, it's all that uncertainty that just keeps swirling around this federal grant process. But we are trying. Um, we've got a good
we've got a good coalition and um, they've been doing excellent work and and so we hope we can continue that. >> Thank you, Brian. >> In the interest of time, Don, I won't ask my question. I got the answer already. Uh, this is one, Kylin, and you and I are kind of laughing here a
second, smiling at each other. Anyway, we got to figure this out. This is an This is an This is a group that touches Hington in a way that is very, very important. This is where this board touches the youth of Hopington in a way that is very very important. The schools generally manage the youth quote quote
unquote, but I think this is something we got to figure out. So, it's on the list, right? >> Okay. Thank you, >> Amy. >> Yeah, to Brian's point, like I think this is a need to have, not a not a nice to have. Like, I would put this higher on the priority list if we could find more money for youth and family services. You know, grants are great or
if we get more state aid than we thought or other revenue comes in higher. Um, I would um I would really prioritize this. So, thank you for the all the information. >> Do you receive any supplemental funding from the schools? >> No. >> Do you provide direct services to the schools of Hopkin?
>> We cover different things. Yeah, we collaborate. I would say we we do collaborative work. >> Where I come from, that's called doing free work. Like to have a better conversation about the services you are providing on build to the town. We're talking about how we bring in supplemental money to your department.
It appears as though you were providing internal services and not being adequately compensated for them. Seems to be a little bit of a recurring theme with that particular department. Actually, moving on. I wanted to start with something else which is first the board doesn't like to talk about their position as a line manager of people in
this town. I don't feel the same way. You are in my line of reporting. You are the only leader that I heard come up tonight and speak about leadership, the efforts of your people, and the pride that you have for them. As someone who nominally is in your supervisory chain,
I want to stop and recognize you and tell you how absolutely important that was for me to hear tonight. Everybody had commanded their budget, yourself included. You came up with the passion to make it clear to us that we needed to stop and have a different conversation here. You were impactful. So, I know you
were worried about how are you coming? How are we hearing you? What are we going to do? We're hearing you. You are incredibly impactful tonight and I appreciate your leadership and it's very obvious your staff does. I haven't met them. But if this is their leader, I'm impressed. I echo the rest of the board
here. We do need to find a way to make this happen, but I'm not going to be naive and I'm not just going to look at Kylo and say, "Find the money. Find the money." Folks, this is a recurring problem. We have far too many services in town. We aren't pulling in enough money. You're already paying far too much in taxes. Your schools are palaces.
The money goes somewhere, folks. There is a fixed pot of it. We would love to have a discussion with you about how it is allocated and the way it is spent. You get to have a very large vote on that at town meeting. I hope you will express your pleasure or displeasure with how the money in your community is
being allocated, but know that we are likely not in a position to give Miss Alcott Miller the money she is requesting despite the fact that essentially all of us agree she should have it. You should ask yourselves why and if you like that outcome from this elected board. I hope you make your
thoughts known at town meeting. >> Okay, >> Don, thank you so much. I don't have anything else really said. >> Thank you. Thanks, Tom. >> Kyla, thank you. >> Thank you, Kyla. >> All right. Um, we are moving on. That's
all the budget presentations tonight. So, next, the board will consider renewing the annual licenses for the following businesses. Section 12, restaurant, all alcohol and associated licenses for Cornell's Irish Pub and Wrap Scallion. Uh, a common Vic license for Domino's Pizza. Section 19 C Farmer
Brewery pouring permit for Startline Brewing. The board will also consider granting extens extensions and/or issuing annual licenses for the following businesses for which certain items are outstanding. Section 12 restaurant, all alcohol and associate licenses for Hton Country
Club, Co- Restaurant, Hopkins Center for the Arts, and Arcos Hospitality. Um, Common Vic license for Arrow Market, Dell, 176 Street, and 228 South Street, Blue Square Pizza, Starbucks at Price Chopper, Starbucks coffee at 85 West Main Street, Red Barn Coffee at Angel's Cafe, and Hapio.
Um, so we we've got kind of two sides of this, right? We've got a list of ones that are completed. Um, and I think we should go through those and just to >> those first. >> Yep. All all those. Um, again, this is all being held up by the inspections um
that we needed to do, you know, from both building department, the fire department. I know the town's been working, you know, diligently to get through all of these. Um, it's just been, you know, a busy part of the year. So, I think we've got, you know, in the interest of time, I think the first motion is,
um, I guess I'll just read it and we want to move from there. I move to renew and release the following annual licenses. Cornell's Irish Pub, 229 Hidden Row, Common Vic license, section 12, all alcohol entertainment licenses. Um, Rap Scallion and Kitchen and Bar, 22 South Street, Common Vic, and section 12
all alcohol licenses. Domino's Pizza, 70 Main Street, Common Vic License, Startline Line Brewing Company, 151R, Hayden Row, Common Vic, Section 19 C, Farmer Brewery, Pouring Permit and Entertainment License, Blue Screw Pizza, 30 Main Street, Common Vic and Entertainment License, Arro Casino and
Bar 42 Main Street. Um, uh, Common Vic license, section 12, all alcohol and entertainment license. Red Barn Coffee at Angel's Cafe, 285 West Main Street, Common Vic license. Starbucks at Price Chopper, 167 West Main Street, Common Vic license. Hopp 36
Main Street, common vic entertainment license. Co- restaurant, 25 Haywood Street, Common Vic and section 12 alcohol and entertainment license. And then Hopkin Country Club. 204 Saddle Hill Road, Common Vic, section 12 alcohol and entertainment license. >> So moved. >> Go ahead. >> So moved and second. So now we can talk
about this a little bit more. Um, Elaine, was there any comments you wanted to give for this around this motion? Understanding, you know, some of these alcohol ones, there was a time, right? Like I think beyond this meeting on the 5th, the ABC would get involved and these licenses would no longer have
their uh would be available to the businesses for a period of time. >> The alcohol licenses, that's the case. >> Just the alcohol. >> Yeah. And so, thanks to everyone for for getting these done. Okay. >> And the quaries and stories were complete and with no flags.
>> That's correct. So nothing outstanding here with regards to inspections, reports uh or background checks. >> Okay. Um so any further discussion on these ones, >> Mr. Chair, so I'm a little confused. You got the first three up above here,
right? >> Yep. >> And then I think you got most of them down below or all of them down below. No, I think >> the at the motion document. Do you have that one or >> Yeah. So, if you look, Brian, you look at the motions. >> Yeah. All right. >> So, if you look at what I just read and
what was moved and then seconded, that lists all the ones that we're talking about. >> Yeah. >> In that top, it's 1 through 11. >> And then we've got kind of two separate things below that we need to talk about quickly. >> Okay. Okay. I'm sorry. I got it. Yep. Thank you. >> Yep. And these were the ones that were
all completed. Corey background check >> because more were completed after we got our packet on Friday. Correct. So it was different than the packet >> since the agenda was posted. >> This is going like right right up to live. So we want this to be accurate. >> I'm good. Thank you. >> All right. Any other thoughts or comments on this section?
>> All right. So we've got a motion and second. All those in favor? >> I I >> Any opposed? Okay. So that is unanimous. And so now we've got another motion around a specific alcohol license. I think the only remaining one um was the Hopkins
Center for the Arts. And before we read that motion, I think we had what both the fire and building inspection. There was there was a really unique circumstance here, right? Considering their, you know, fire prevention service. Chief, do you want to join us? >> We have uh Gary Dhy, fire chief, and
Christopher McHu, uh director of municipal inspections, >> and actually town council is on Zoom. >> Yeah. Jay, can you hear us? Is Jay unmuted? >> He's on there, but he's not. Um, he's he's on mute. >> Is he coming in?
>> He's coming on. Yep. >> All right, Chris, thank thank you for joining us. Gary, thank you. >> There's Jay. Jay, can you hear us? Okay, >> I can. >> Perfect. So, so this one's a little bit unique because I'm going to have you guys explain the situation with the permitting process and like what went
into that. And then we're going to have Mr. walk us through um considering the deadline for the ABC what's recommended and what is you know a safe opportunity for the board to move forward. So uh would you guys like to start in kind of the background here and what's
outstanding? >> You want to start? So in the uh opening chapters of the state building code there is a table called 110 and there are certain number of occupancies the types of occupancies rather that are expected to be inspected uh for certain
life safety systems on an annual bianial and half decade basis and what we're talking about today are the ones uh that deal with uh a more refined portion of the inspection process which is emergency lighting. that has uh been the
uh the sticking point for some uh uh proprietors of properties um because it has been more specified in the past. It simply said there has to be a test for emergency lighting to make sure they function. Um but because apparently there has been some question uh that the uh the state has said we'll have an
answer for. They've required a 90minute test as specified rather than the testing emergency lights. >> Perfect. Thank you. Chief, you got something too? So, just to follow up a little bit on that. So, uh basically the 9 minute the 90-minute test is basically got shut all the power off and the
emergency lights need to stay on for 90 minutes. Um a lot of businesses weren't able to uh produce any type of testing results. So, that's what we're waiting for or u the HDA just waiting for that one. Perfect. So, we're waiting on like that
one thing. Uh Jay, can you talk about because we have, you know, a suggested motion here that the board can take, you know, understanding that the board will not meet again before the fe February 5th deadline by the ABC. Um so can you just walk us through here like what what
we're looking at and why it's important um and how it covers us? >> Yeah, so we worked with um Lance today. Lance um provided the materials to us today. Um we we didn't have any particular
concerns with where the board is at in terms of the inspections and their concerns and this the some of the processoriented things are things that I I think will be can be addressed or and will be addressed as we continue to work with uh Elaine and Lance on and the
board on refining some of the policies and procedures. So, one of the things that we were a little concerned about is making sure that our our motions and actions uh with respect to the three types of licenses are consistent with what we see
in the law. And it can be a little tricky because there are slight nuance differences to the renewal process or to revocation to or to holding or extending licenses under each of those three schemes, even though they're somewhat similar in some respects. So what we did
was work with Lance a little bit in these three classes of motions that you had have here today, the full kind of approval that you already took care of and this one which you're making contingent upon resolving some things and then we have a few others to discuss after this and just making sure we use
the right terminology for what we're dealing with. Um, alcohol licenses have a renewal schedule. Technically, they might have been renewed, but they're they were held because of these inspections, which is
allowed by law. So, what we did was work closely with Lance this afternoon to make sure that the motions that I think you have before you are consistent with the language that we see in those three sets of statutes that govern these things. >> Perfect. Thank you, Jay. Um, so I'll
open up to the board questions for Jay or Chief or Chris. Amy, you want to start? One thing, chair. >> Yep. >> Uh, just so you know, they are scheduled Friday to run the the following test >> Friday. Perfect. Thank you. >> The 90minut test is done. Coming back >> to fix the EBUS then. >> Yeah, fix it.
>> Perfect. Thank you. >> I just wanted to say for the public here that the motion is that um we renew the license, but on the condition that no events or activities for which these licenses will be required will be conducted until the remaining um fire and building inspections are resolved. So, it sounds like that's going to happen at the end of the week. So I
think I'm comfortable with the motion and I appreciate the explanation during the training. Matt, >> what activities would not require an adequate fire protection or emergency plan? >> I'm trying to understand given that you have just outlined for me that we have not been able to complete the necessary
inspections to verify the emergency services at this facility. I'm trying to understand the suggestion that I should be granting a contingent license and operation and you have acknowledged to me that all of the emergency requirements and fire prevention requirements are not adequate or
functioning per your testing. So I ask again, what conditions or activities are acceptable such that emergency fire management and services are not required to be adequate or verified by you? >> I'm not asking a trick question here to you. >> I know that should be none.
>> It should be none. So, can you help me understand then why it is we are having a conversation here today about it not being none? I'm looking to you, I guess, Miss Lazarus, because I'm confused. >> So, there would be no events until it's done. >> Yeah. So, let's just >> But I'm not event. I'm talking about
like is there a human being in the building? Anyone? Is anyone in the HCA? >> Yeah, the st the staff is there. >> Okay. So, I'm back to my question. If it's inadequate for the purpose of serving events because it poses an
emergency response risk, why is it acceptable for general staff? >> So, could I I apologize, but I'm asking a direct question to the fire chief. >> This actually falls under the building code between the both of us. So, um the occupancy um you want to touch on how it falls?
>> I'm just struggling to understand. You were articulating to me what feels like palpable risk. Mhm. So you with a clear black and white reading of the code um it doesn't make exceptions where there is inadequate life safety systems. Uh the response
typically is to either identify a safe allowance which would be in some cases a firewatch is an option um where you can have people available from from first responders to be on on hand should an emergency occur in in the absence of a
functioning system. um where that's not feasible then occupancy can be uh reduced or or eliminated >> to town council. If I grant an extension of this license here and there is an event during the interimm period in which the emergency equipment failed to function as acknowledged does the town
have enhanced liability. >> I'm sorry you your your mic is very faint so I didn't quite hear the question. >> Your mic's not on. My mic's not on. I'm just speaking loudly. Hi to town council. The question I am trying to ask in the interim period in which we have
acknowledged there are deficiencies in the fire protection and life-saving equipment in this facility. If we as a board grant an extension of a license and there is a situation in which those discrepancies result in an event at the facility does the town have enhanced
liability based on the fact that we granted an extension knowing there were deficiencies. >> So my understanding so a couple of things there. Um, one, I don't believe that the I don't like to talk too much about liability outside of the um,
executive session privilege, but I think the liability is not a particular concern to me. But mostly that's because as I understand the prospective motion with respect to what's in front of you right now is that it's going to be based
on the condition that no events or activities for which the which these licenses are required will be conducted until all remaining building and fire inspectional issues are resolved. I I believe that's in the motion, but I'm not exactly sure if we're looking at this.
>> It is. I'm trying to tease out the legal rationale for why it is illegal for them to operate without a license in this case to have an event, but it is fully legal for them to continue to occupy the building with staff given the same acknowledged deficiencies.
Well, I think the former would be up to the building code uh and the building inspector to the extent that there would be a rationale for inspections or concerns with respect to a property that already has occupancy permits.
>> Okay. >> Issue with respect to these inspections that are the subject of a a prerequisite to getting um these kinds of alcohol or entertainment or common vic licenses. we have an annual opportunity to check on
compliance that are a predicate towards granting those licenses. So we can control what we can control with respect to those. If a property already has occupancy but some doesn't have all these licenses that require an annual
check-in but they fall down in terms of the maintenance of some of these inspectional things and there's certainly no liability to the town if we don't have an annual opportunity to inspect those here. We have an opportunity for an annual check-in. So it does provide somewhat it is somewhat
providential that that that we can in fact do this check-in on these particular um sets of services which is why we have the condition that we have in the motion. Otherwise we can't police every single um building in town or business in town
with respect to things that were granted occupancy based upon an inspection of some time ago. >> So so so thank you Jay and just as like I'm thinking about this in a different way. So the license is around the events. You know, when you talk about
having occupancy with the owner, that's at the owner's discretion, right? For any type of property, our licenses revolve around events and having these I think we called it events and activities. Is that the difference here that we're talking about? Is that what
>> Well, essentially, they can't use these licenses for the purposes of these licenses until they get the inspections. Correct. They have other activities that they're permitted to do under zoning or the building code or other building.
>> Yeah. So staff being in the building >> is separate. >> But my kid can't go to music class on Monday then because that's technically an activity. Is that is that how I'm hearing this correctly? >> Activity under these licenses >> under the licenses. >> You're not answering my fundamental
question about what is an activity. >> Well, the most important part of the system will be functioning. We we got the sprinkler report and if something was going to happen in that building, the sprinkler system is what's going to save. >> So, it's clear to me I feel very differently about this than everybody else and I'm fine being on the island. I'm just going to make this point. It's
very clear the two of you are making a riskbased evaluation in this recommendation. The criteria with which you are performing that evaluation are not provided to me. The context for which you have provided that evaluation has not been provided to me. I'm very comfortable following your theme in good faith, but you aren't giving me the
context of it. I'm very leerary of the precedent that this sets. A less desirable business could easily come to us and say, "You extended last time. You weren't concerned about them. Why is it a big deal for me?" And I will sit here and I will watch you all eat crow. I'm
just mindful that this board establishes precedent and the businesses in the community large look to the precedent we set strongly. I'm very uncomfortable with the notion that this business is safe for employees, but it is somehow not safe for the public to interact with for the purpose that the business is
open for. That sounds wildly contradictory to me. I hope your riskbased analysis is good. >> Yeah, I I was just going to say like my understanding is that any events or activities that would require section 12 all alcohol and entertainment license
cannot operate. Anything outside of that is different. And it's out of the view of the town from this license perspective. Correct. >> That that's my understanding. Yeah. We we are using the tools that we have to >> correct. Okay. >> To secure the uh inspections that we need.
>> Okay. >> Yes. But as the building inspector has noted and as council noted, it's purely at his discretion what the interpretation and allocation of the extension is. So I'm back to my core question of the chair. >> Can we move on here please? I got >> No, Brian, you are not the chair. Please do not end my time. That is the second
time. >> Can you finish your You can finish your comment. >> I'm sorry. No, we need to have a conversation about the lack of professionalism. That is the second time tonight. >> Do that later. I have a question. >> Matt, Brian, hold on. We will solve that another time. Fin. You are going to finish your chance. Like, go now.
>> My god, the curse of time on this board. I would really appreciate if you would bring as a future agenda item what your riskbased evaluation criteria is here. What would have triggered you to make a different recommendation? I'd really like to be able to publish that and make it available to the community so that we
don't find ourselves having to do an ad hoc assessment every time. I trust you guys. The challenge here is not about or the trust that I have for you. The challenge is not having the clarity or the understanding of why you've come to the decision you've come to. >> Thank you.
>> Uh thank you to the chair. I I think I mean all are good question. We all colleagues work together to ask questions. it would be just uh I think helpful for uh to be mindful of having the slots and then we can probably rotate back. That's one way I I think we
can solve this time versus you know um continuity question that that I see on the floor. uh just my suggestion but coming back to this I have a feeling that it's getting a little bit complicated and I'm thinking I'm I I am
in favor of simplifying enough that we understand the risk and um benefits as well as you know what exactly is the situation or if it's escalated to a point or complicated to a point that we don't understand enough. So I'll dumb it
down for my understanding a little bit and tell me if I'm wrong. So HCA has its operating license as a business or as an institute and for that they have building permit they have all the things that they need to have their
staff there to have their classes there to have their day-to-day regular operations. We have no complaint question concern from fire department or anyone else that I know of to deter that or to prevent that in any ways. Now one
step further they're looking at an alcohol license and for alcohol license we have an event which is related to events we have certain rules and part of that is this is much higher risk in terms of fire hazard or in terms of
event hazard or whatever you call it. So it has a different lens and for that we have all these check boxes and check marks for good reasons and there we see certain shortage the 90-minut uh test which is going to be done on Friday.
>> Just just some clarification through the chair the 90-minute test has been completed. They're coming back Friday just to replace the the bulbs or the batteries that need to be replaced in the emergency exit lighting. >> That's the only thing that's pending. Yes. >> Okay. And that is related to this
alcohol license which is for serving alcohol for events, gatherings and others. So it's related to that. So the way it's structured permitting perspective that has a different set of risks or different set of uh permissions
and all that. So that's the scope of this discussion and I appreciate that we want to be concerned about you know the day-to-day operations as well. Hey is this going to impact that? But that we already covered. The worst in this case that can happen is that they won't be serving alcohol and they won't be having
that permit. That's the worst thing that can happen. It cannot deter or impact their day-to-day operations as an institute. That is my understanding. Is that correct? >> That's my understand. >> Okay. So now let's talk about that. So now the scope is only for the alcohol
license and the events and for that the risk is well identified even though it is lower as I listen bulbs and other things need to be taken care but we want to be disciplined and we want to be you know absolutely certain that it gets your permission and your blessing as an
expert on this. So the conditional approval that we are looking at is that they will complete all of those and then they will be able to hold what they are able to hold. Until then this permit does not hold and this permit is not applicable.
Is that the right understanding? >> I believe so. >> Yep. um to our council. Is there anything that you see or hear that I said is out of the out of the understanding that you have from a legal
perspective? >> Well, it's it's pretty consistent that we are compartmentalizing a little bit just because that's what the law really has in front of us. But we have we're using this lensure process and the tools that we have to ensure that the that
these particular inspections are done and to ensure that the requirements for these licenses are fully met. So I I think you you have it correct. >> Thank you. Yeah, I just wanted to clarify that and again above the compartmentalization we always want to take into account of the larger picture
and it sounds to me that larger picture wise the risk is not there or minimal and manageable. So I just wanted to clarify that I I think we have um bitten it enough in my view and for right reasons I fully appreciate and respect
that but I'm I'm feeling more comfortable now. Thank you >> Brian. We are making a massive mountain out of a molehill here. See that exit sign right over there? There's two lights on either side of it. The battery
that's inside that needs to run for 90 minutes. The building is burning. The fire alarm system is all going off. There's lights flashing. The water's coming out of the ceiling. And that thing over there has to be on for 90 minutes. Who's going to hang around for 90 minutes while the building's burning
to see if that thing is still lit up? We're all going to leave. We are making a massive mount out of a molehill here. When did this go into effect? This 90-minute deal on the lights. The specificity of the 90 minutes was clear more made clear in the 10th edition of
the building code as of July of last year. >> Okay. So, July of last year. So, that's why we're doing it this year because I know that other businesses have come to me about this very question. Uh, and those have all passed now, too. And I think that's all cleared up. So, again, this is not a big deal. It's not going to be a problem. They're going to pass.
They're gonna change the battery and it's done. Can we please just take vote? >> Guys, I I'll look for a motion here. Uh Mr. Chair, I move to renew the entertainment license and release the sectional 12 all alcohol license for
Hopkinon Center for the Arts. Section 12, all alcohol entertainment with the condition that no events or activities for which these licens are licenses are required will be conducted until all remaining building and fire inspectional
issues are resolved. >> Second. >> Okay, got a motion and a second. Any final thoughts? All those in favor? >> I. >> Any opposed? >> Nay. >> Okay. All right. And then that brings us to
our last three. Um, like we've been doing in previous meetings, we've got three remaining non-alcohol license that um, we need to do an extension for so they can complete the remaining inspections. Error market Dell 176 Street, Air Market Dell 228 South
Street, and then Starbucks coffee at 85 West Main Street. Um, I I'll just look to the board, get their quick thoughts. You know, this one's more straightforward. We don't have the ABC deadline. Uh, so you know, Amy, you want to start? >> Well, I thought we did ask the applicants if they weren't able to
finish this time that they would either send us a note or attend in person. So, I guess I would like to know if they're extenduating circumstances. >> Yep. Elaine, can you >> is there anyone on Zoom? >> Oh, the people on Zoom, I I don't know. There's Aaron Fish, Dana Sroso. Oh,
okay. Aaron has his hand up. So, one person is here. >> Yep. And Marie Lcowski and Mark Lease. >> Believe Aaron works with Air Mark. Oh, hi Aaron. We can hear you. Thanks. Thanks for attending tonight. >> Absolutely. Um, so yeah, good evening,
Select Board members. Um, my name is Aaron Fish. I am the general manager of the cafe services for Dell at the 176 and 228 South Street locations. Um, as you're aware of, our locations had a few issues during the building inspection in order for our license renewals this
year. All of the issues noted have been addressed, um, with the exception of the 90-minute exit sign test. as we were just previously discussing. >> We're not doing that again. >> Hold on, Brian. Let let him let him finish. >> Um, and then, you know, on this call is Mark Lass, who is the regional JLL
facilities manager, who can provide a little more insight into what our particular situation is with that and hopefully be granted an extension on it. >> Evening everybody. Yeah. So, uh, like Erin just mentioned, um, several of the
findings have been resolved. We provided reports to Hoping Fire Department. Um in relation to the 90minute test um we've proposed to Dell um a holistic replacement of all the exit signs with uh newer self- test devices. Um we're
waiting on approvals for that. Um just some background on the uh Dell locations. All those exit signs are on generator backup. So in the event of an issue or a power failure, all those lights would operate on emergency power
backup. So a little bit different situation uh than most. >> Awesome. Thank you, Mark and Aaron. Um so appreciate them coming. Elaine, Chris, Gary, thought any comments here
from the three of you? Sir, >> could I ask is the fire chief comfortable with us extending this with giving another two weeks? >> Just like the gentleman said at um earlier, >> the generator. >> Yeah, the generator. >> Okay. >> These uh uh light lighting system only
couldn't fail. The generator died on top of everything else. And I also want to make a note that EMC is spending a significant amount of money upgrading their fire alarm systems in the buildings. >> Thank you. >> I'm gonna hold my question. That was a good faith response there. I appreciate
it. I guess my question towards Elaine then is I just want to understand from a town perspective. Is there a rationale why this has continued to hang on this long? We were pretty adamant last time that we were done with extensions. It seems like we've got some good faith engagement here having both people here.
So I'm very inclined to feel differently about it. I just want to understand from your perspective is the inkind engagement I'm hearing what you've been getting as well. So uh all of the business owners have been engaged to create to complete their required test and provide the um the information to the town the reports and
to make the appropriate fixes. Some have not completed that as you have said. So um there's only so much we can do. We can't go in there and make those changes ourselves. >> Okay. But you feel like in the case of these these are moving in good faith commensurate with your expectation? >> I think so. um have had a little trouble
with Starbucks um being perhaps not as responsive as other businesses but >> like the corporate nature of the company >> perhaps um but they are engaged now and uh we hope to have that completed next meeting. >> All right. >> Okay. Let us know if that changes. That could be Hiller's coffee tomorrow.
>> Yeah. Historically we've had trouble with Starbucks. >> Oh, really? You thought so? >> I didn't hear that. Sorry. >> All right. Sh. >> Okay. Gary said something that >> I said historically we've had trouble with uh Starbucks. >> Oh, okay. >> Even last year we had uh multiple fire alarms. Just getting them to come out to
fix the system was a headache because they have to go through their corporate. >> Okay. Gotcha. >> Taking the note that our staff um called, emailed, and visited the location over the last several weeks. >> Okay. >> And the notes in our packet say the testing is being done on the 4th, which
is tomorrow. Is that right? >> Yes. on on this one here. Oh, >> yes. >> Okay. >> Sorry. Go ahead. >> Any thoughts, comments? >> Um, no. I think we've discussed this um
quite a bit. In future, we want to be more vigilant and see how best we can cooperate and collaborate to make it faster. With that, I would like to move the motion to move the following common victual licenses for
for failure to obtain required inspections and further to schedule a hearing. Oh, no. Is that the right one? >> No. >> Option option one. >> You can do either one. >> Oh, I see that. Yeah. Thank you. I move to grant an extension of the following
licenses to February 25th so as to ensure completion of all inspections. Aramark at Dell 176 South Street common week license. Armark Dell 228 South Street common week license. Starbucks coffee 85 West Main Street common week
and entertainment licenses. >> Second. Uh we got a motion and a second. Any final thoughts? >> Just very disappointed in Starbucks. I have to say >> coffee. >> All those in favor? >> I.
>> Any opposed? Okay, that is unanimous. Gary, Chris, thank you guys for sticking around tonight. No one's appreciate. >> Yeah, I think next year this will be a lot easier, I think, because this test was new for a lot of these businesses. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. >> Well, we've made it very clear we're going to ask.
>> We also have Never mind. >> All right. We're going to move we're going to move on. So, our next the board will review and discuss preparations for Saturday, May 2nd, 2026 annual town meeting. >> Um, would you guys like to join us? This is going to be just a very brief discussion. We want to just get it kind
of on residents radars, you know. Matt, you you can you can start here. It's just >> I'll tee this one up. So, thank you Joe for adding this to the board. I will be quick, I promise. So, I was having coffee with Jamie Rona from the school committee talking about a number of things as you do in this position. And
one of the things that came up was concern is not the right word, but just the change in town meeting date to Saturday. And Jamie made a really good suggestion to me and asked that as a select board we have a discussion about what can we be doing to engage town
departments and entities that operate in town your proverbial little league to let them know hey this is the day town meeting is if it's possible can we move the games if it's possible can we not schedule something this day if there's already an event scheduled is it
possible to move it so I really just wanted the benefit of being able to have this discussion in open meeting and essentially ask the board and the two of you as well as our town staff here. How can we be getting the ball rolling as a select board and connecting the other
departments and town entities to get the message out that we've moved town meeting. It's on a Saturday. Amy made a compelling point when we had this discussion in real time. Jamie echoed it. There are a lot of families who have plans on Saturdays. I'd like to do what we can to set them up to succeed and
attend the meeting. That was the purpose of this item. I welcome everybody else's thoughts. I mean, welcome guys. Um, I'll let you guys go share your thoughts. Obviously, you guys help us run town meeting and so we value your input and then we'll see if the board has any other additional
thoughts. >> Service. >> Um, I get face to face in a town as small as ours is probably going to be really effective. I know just with my personal connection with them, I've made sure that both the Cub Scouts and um
Scouts PSA troops in Hopkin are not holding their spring events that weekend, which were traditionally held that weekend. We pushed them back one week. Um >> I'm going have to say Boy Scout Troop One meets on Monday nights. They missed every town meeting up until now. So,
good luck with that. I don't know. So the it's it's an organized event with um 1 411 and the Cub Scout pack and so we've moved that to the next weekend. >> Y >> thank you. >> Perfect. Um, I think it's important to note as well that all of us, especially
those of us in the room who are elected, are representatives in the community who can all do our part to better put this information out there to the organizations that we're a part of, to the groups that we work with, to the boards and committees that we liaison for and interact with on a regular
basis. uh for my department. I know like myself and the town manager's office been working with the school department and ensuring that we don't have certain school events that are going to interfere, but obviously there's still going to be potential of conflict. I
think working with a few other boards and committees and and groups in town, we could actually see a few really great benefits realized, including there are a few towns that do things such as offer
actual townwide babysitting for town meeting. And because it's on a Saturday, it's not a school night. It's during the day. You don't have to worry about the kids getting like having to stay out later, having to get them ear out early because suddenly it's oh, it's 7 o'clock. We have to get the kids back
in. All the people who are babysitting cuz a bunch of them are high school students all have to go home themselves cuz they're studying for finals now. So, you know, I I think this gives us a really great opportunity to make a collaborative approach with I know a few
other towns have done it in collaboration with the National Honor Society, the school department, Parks and Recreation to coordinate the resources and be able to get this kind of this kind of additional feature going that could support everyone in the
community, especially those who are potentially impacted by events going on at that time. Thank you, Connor. I agree. Um, any other thoughts? I think there's we could go down a bunch of different directions with this. I think we should, you know,
my opinion is we should continue speaking about this at future meetings. Um, like ideas like Connor just suggested, you know, right now if we discussed that, I feel like we we'd just be kind of speculating on, you know, what this would look like. If people have, you know, recommendations, I think we should, you know, collect those and
like put some work into them and say, "Hey, here's an idea and here's how it would work." I think that's the best way to kind of move forward um over the next couple of months as we get close to our first Saturday town meeting. But if anyone has any other thoughts, >> yeah, I think it would be really critical now to pick a a specific time
and location and get that set because like I can't even put it on the e-hop calendar correctly because I don't even know when it's going to be exactly. I know the day but not the time or the structure. Will there be a lunch break or will we try to start early at 8 and get them by noon? Um so I think setting
the very and do we have do we know which auditorium where gym is booked available yet? Things like that. >> So we've worked with the school department to maintain the same location. Okay. >> To still be in the middle school auditorium. >> Okay. So we still have the middle school auditorium but we have to pick the time
because that wasn't specified in the town meeting warrant. Right. Okay. >> It gives a range of time. So it gives the option for the select board to pick a time based on other factors. If you need more, if you think the meeting might go longer, you might pick an earlier time to start versus if you it's
a smaller warrant, we might pick a later time. But it's at your discretion. >> I would think like if we could at our next meeting pick the time so that everybody can put that on their calendar because you can't plan until you know when the thing's going to be. So >> inclined to agree. >> Maybe I would look to a recommendation though from the moderator and clerk and
town staff. >> Yeah. Um, I am in favor of getting started early so that we eliminate as much as possible any chance of us needing a second day for the town meeting. Um, to I
to get a better estimate of whether that needs to be 9:30 in the morning or 7:45 in the morning. Uh I' I'd need to see a draft of the warrant and just see um how how much misery is is going to be in there.
>> We can give them that, right? We have a draft, right? >> Really coming into roles. Zach, >> you guys have anything for now? I think we we're going to be talking about this more. >> Yeah, I think we're just going to have to keep talking this up. I mean, I can't think of my son when he's playing lacrosse saying, "You're not coming to
the game, Dad, because you're going to town meeting." What the heck's a town meeting? like you know we'll have to figure those things out but uh I think more advertising we can do the better and I just want to congratulate the new town manager I think you're doing a great job and very very quickly here you come up to speed so thanks
>> yeah I would the same and I think we'll continue to get the feedback one thing I would also advise is um we have enough time so maybe we can reach out to the known um event areas or possibilities and uh entities and figure out how to orchestrate that if there is option and
if there are conflicts as um was suggested. Let's find those out so we can at least technically find out what's the most probable time slot and we'll keep continuing the conversation and see that >> be any number of uh organizations and events. So if people could let us know
what they are we don't necessarily know them all. So please a challenge >> form or like I'm trying to think what to do like we can have an online form for people to >> or >> yeah something like that could be really effective just to have people in the
community who are already involved with events that can take up people's time especially on weekends to tell us what those are and what organizations might host that time of year even if there's nothing planned yet. uh gives us the opportunity to at least reach out, let
them know and let them know that it could impact them. Um or it could also have an impact on on town business going forward as well. >> So even if you just emailed us, I think we could all reply with all the events we know that have happened on the first Saturday of May.
>> Any information would be helpful. I'm going to take it a step forward, a step further and suggest that this would be a great poll to put into the independent hop news wherever else that we are looking for this information from the community and it can be as simple as emailing the select board and the town manager. Connor, real quick with my voice here, I wanted to thank you for
your idea about NHS and supervision. That is something that we used to do in my hometown both for the teleathon and for the town meeting and it was wildly successful and I got NHS credit for it. It was a good thing for everybody. So that's the exact sort of creative idea that I'm hoping to bring when we come
forward with these discussions. Please to all of you in the community, we are asking creatively about how to make this work and trying to think about how it fits into your schedule. Please talk to us and help us. >> Thank you, Conor. Thank you. >> Thanks. >> Thanks, guys. Thanks, folks.
>> All right. Next, um the board will review and discuss responses to a survey from the charter review committee. Did everyone get a chance to review those results? >> No, I'm sorry. that people did not >> I did but when do we have a deadline when we need to reply by >> Is there a deadline for this?
>> It is the day before your next meeting. >> Oh, okay. >> I'm sure they'll still accept your >> I did have some thoughts but not it's getting kind of late. So, >> can we collect it offline maybe somehow? >> Well,
everyone send it to Elaine and you can compile something like that. Yeah, I don't think >> they want to hear from the chair of each board with the comments from all of the board members. >> Okay. So, I I think that would allow us to, you know, like like is normal and
Connor, you can chime in in a second, but I was going to say it's very common for the whole board to send individually their comments and that like the I can collect those and put them together. >> Is that acceptable? We >> Connor thoughts >> hard to demonstrate consensus but
>> so Connor Degan speaking as chair of the charter review committee. Uh I'm just going to say that the the reason that we put it the way we did is we didn't want just individual chairs giving us their thoughts. We wanted to make sure that both boards and committees had a
conversation about it but also not just had a conversation get had a chance to publicize it more. We want people to be aware that this process is happening. Want people to be aware of the things that might be discussed as we look at what potential changes might come up in the charter. If that means that you know
like we said if you might have time before the next meeting to like work on some things you might want to see reflected these questions and then kind of pick and choose compile and vote at a future meeting on like what you want to submit. That's also fine. If you know,
it doesn't have to necessarily be Joe, you as chair submitting. It can be Elaine submitting on your behalf as well. As long as, you know, the the board has a chance to discuss what the priorities are with the charter going forward. I mean, you are the the chief executive. We want to make sure to have
your input. >> Yeah. But but I think again looking at it from a board's perspective, I don't have concern over collecting initial thoughts, putting them together, sending them back out for again like individual feedback. Hey, you like I feel like this wasn't captured in there. Like we can do
a couple rounds of this. It's >> Well, my suggestion I think would be then if we could all submit them maybe to Eileen, she couldn't give them to you compiled and then we could discuss and vote them at the our next meeting is the day after your deadline. >> We are totally okay extending it. We we
said if if someone needs an extension because of meeting deadlines and everything else, we'll grant it. It's just a case of we we want your input, >> but we also just want to try to see how timely we can get it. So, we don't want to be still collecting this initial survey stuff in March. That's all.
>> Perfect. Thank you so much for suggesting we can just give it to Elaine and have it collect. >> I think Well, I think we can talk about it on our next meeting. We'll come prepared. >> I have a lot of thought. >> If you want to collect, if you want to individually kind of bring up ideas and then at the next meeting have a a real discussion about that. That's fine. the
deadline the day before our next meeting is not >> you'll you'll be okay. >> Awesome. Connor, thank you. >> Very welcome. >> All right. Um Elaine, town manager report. >> Uh just very quickly, um Wintertorm Fern is now fading into our memory, but you know, we did get near 2 feet of snow and
uh just thank you to everyone who uh cleared the roads, um sidewalks, and to residents and businesses who helped dig out hydrants and sidewalks as well. and to um town facilities department who took care of town buildings as well. Um and uh in my memo I had uh information
from Carrie Reed DPW director on the followup from the storm and things that they'll be doing. So they've been continuing to clear snow out of areas um as it has not melted and uh needs to be removed in various places. Any questions about the storm? >> No, no questions. I want to extend the
thanks, special thanks to DPW and Cruz for doing a wonderful job given the situation. So, and their dedication. Thanks. >> So, sorry, I do have one before you move on. So, I unfortunately I'm not going to sound the other side of this. So, I got a number of complaints about the state
of our roads. I'll be honest that my road still has not been plowed. So, if you think being a member of the select board gets your street plowed and salted and sanded, it does not. My wife was not able to get the car up our road. I'm deeply concerned that when I drive into
other towns, as I did on Monday, first crossing into Ashland, then into Southboro, into Westboro, Upton, and Milford, I can tell when I cross into Hopkin by looking at the roads. This is not someone's fault. If it's
anyone's, it's ours because we have underfunded the pavement management and support for Kerry. But I think we need to have a cleareyed discussion here. There are an awful lot of short, dead end, and non-arterial roads in our town that were ultimately left prettyow here.
I'm not assigning blame. I am not criticizing, but I do think we need to acknowledge for many residents, including myself, this missed the mark and we haven't seen any of the services that we're paying for. >> Truly chair. I think this is something we can discuss probably with DPW at some
point uh about the road conditions and others but just to clarify and I don't know Mr. is our for um uh snow and ice. There is no budget limit. It's by by law unlimited budget. Um of course we have
to pay for it afterwards. Uh but I do appreciate you know uh all the snow plowing folks I've talked to and seen, they've been working 24 hours, 48 hours in a row. It was tough. But anyways, I I do appreciate the comments. My my
thinking is the road conditions is certainly something we want to talk about in future. >> Yeah. And >> I'm sorry your street has not been plowed, so I'll let DPW know right away. >> I wrote to her and it still hasn't been plowed. So if you think writing to the head of the DPW as a member of the select board results in changes, you are
mistaken. I I'm not trying to pressure anybody here, but the reality is we all have needs. and if we're not capable of meeting the needs based on what we're budgeting for. I understand there are unlimited funds available, but we're quite clearly not allocating them the
same way or we don't have the people that we need. Both of those are things I would like to hear from Director Reed about. I think the citizens made it pretty clear to me that they need to be heard on this one and frankly, I'd like to be heard. What's the point of being on this board if you can't get your road plowed?
I'm being facitious, by the way, folks. Thank you. Right. The next item is a town department position vacancy. Uh there is a vacancy at of at the uh senior library assistant position. Uh and it's a 19-hour position at the library non-benefited. Um the library is
open 7 days a week. And this role is essential to maintaining front desk coverage, supporting daily operations, and ensuring safe opening and closing of the building. With current staff stretched thin, the filling this vacancy is necessary necessary to sustain service levels and avoid operational strain. The request represents a
straight placement of an approved position and does not increase staffing or the budget. Uh it's due to resignation. >> Thank you. I move to approve the posting of the senior library assistant position. >> Second. >> We've got a motion and a second. Any
additional thoughts? All those in favor? >> I. Any opposed? >> I'll abstain. >> One abstain. >> Thanks, Elaine. And also I included the um the meeting dates between now and the annual town meeting uh to plan ahead. Um we have a number of extra meetings
during this time. Um obviously if something occurs and we don't need one of the meetings, we can make some adjustments there, but this is what's scheduled at this time. >> Perfect. Thank you. >> And then I just put in a year-end uh data for the uh building permits as the year has ended.
>> No, one of them is on my birthday. Oh well. >> Oh well. And that's it. Thank you. >> Great. >> Um, with that, do we want to go through liaison reports, board invites quickly, Amy? >> Um, I don't think I have any I don't
think I have any. I have a future agenda. Agenda item though, but I don't have any lay reports. >> I do. I got a couple. So, I I believe we will hear more about this. It went to school committee but there has been a change in the way KEFET tech is
assigning and allocating seats to potential residents of Hopkinson. So we have now been aortioned eight seats which are potentially available to citizens of Hopkinson. Otherwise you go into the lottery. The lottery is largely populated by people from Framingham
folks. There are many more of them than there are of us. The eight is a good deal for us but please be aware it's eight. the other sorry through the chat I had a followup but please complete. >> Yep. My other one quickly uh speaking of director Reed on the other side here. So
I do want to note that she reached out to me to let me know that we were granted a water management act award from the mass DP to support developing our enhanced water conservation plan website update outreach at community events and supporting the high school environmental club pollinator project with droughtresistant landscaping. So
still doing some cool stuff over at the DPW. Thank you. Uh thank you uh Mr. Gizer. I just want to have a follow-up question. Can we have um maybe in one of the upcoming meetings our keep representatives um
enlighten us what's going on there? Uh cuz I heard that concern quite a bit and it's an little bit adverse impact on our town. Right. So >> yeah, it's it's a result of a change at the legislative level. >> Y >> that's why things are changing. >> Okay.
>> Yeah. And we've got for for clarity we have six seats there now I believe. So the eight's technically an increase for us but >> thank you >> and uh I have a through the chair quick update. So I attended the Metro West regional transit authority uh quarterly
meeting planning meeting today. Um it was pretty intense. a lot of good things going on and I don't drain with the whole but um one thing that um came out is they're doing the fixed route redesign for buses
and they have a proposed redesign that now they are taking feedback on from public forum and I looked at the design it doesn't include Hopington uh routes as much or I didn't see the name so I asked the administrator and I'm
going to meet with him and his um design crew to give some feedback and see opportunities where we can improve our um uh transit facilities or have ours included in the uh route. I know they're
still collecting the public feedback and please if anyone's listening and all of us go to their website give your feedback cuz I do think as we discussed earlier um the transit is a challenge in our economic development as well for
employees or for even our senior um citizens uh to move from our from our various key commercial points as well as um the transits in metro
facilities. So something I I think we may want to push where we can. I don't know if they have flexibility, but I'm going to meet with them and escalate our concerns or my concerns and I believe it's our concerns. Uh that's that's
pretty much on that front. I did wanted to understand a little bit um on our uh ESPC uh discussion. I do know Ela we were trying to have uh the chair give us an update. Any thoughts on that?
>> I recently reached out with some additional dates. >> Okay, great. Thank you. Nothing for Brian? >> I don't have anything at this time. Thanks. >> All right. Um I don't have anything new. I did want to call out um the employee recognition event yesterday was was a
great little turnout for the town. I thought it was great. I think what did you say? It had been six years since the town was able to do something like that. So, it was nice to see all all the employees that do so much. So, I I just couldn't be more grateful for all of them. Um and with that, you know, I will
look for a motion to move to convene in an executive session. >> We have a future agenda item. That's >> what >> a future agenda item. Sorry. Click. >> Sorry. Thought we This is um there's kind of a lot of fear in the community and with the um the ICE takings and not just people who would be illegal
immigrants and criminals being taken but um people who are US citizens or are here illegally on some sort of visa. We have a lot of immigrants that live in Hopkin. So I just wondered if for future agenda item we could talk about that like what what what is in place what should people do if someone is being taken that um that is not an illegal
immort that's committed a crime or that has a warrant against them? And I maybe this is being talked about at staff level, but um I think there's concern in the community. Okay. >> Okay. Anyone else? Future agenda items. >> I just want to echo that. And I think to your point, Amy, they're looking for us to ask the question and make it clear
that we are thinking about this and we care about it. So, thank you for doing so. I do want to provide a quick update to uh item A there, which is on the LG plant oversight. So, I had the opportunity to meet with Fire Chief Doherty as well as Reparina D. Rosa last Friday. So, a couple actions coming out
of this which I would anticipate coming back to this board, including Reparosa is going to be meeting with the plant manager. We're also working on trying to interface with the state agency that does some work over there. I'm going to be talking to Elaine about trying to get a better idea about what the HCA that we
were initially pushing for look like over there as well as if we have an example of one that we potentially would be interested in. And then Gary has an action item to actually go and identify some relevant training. One of the interesting things that came out of this is that an LNG fire is not necessarily
like other fires and that while he has had some training provided by Eversource, he has not had nearly as much staff training on this particular accelerant as he would like. I feel like that is a pretty significant request that we can be working on.
>> Thank you, Matt. >> I think on the future agenda, Mr. Chair, we should put this IRSW2 issue on there just to make sure it's wrapped up. Um, that's what I was trying to get to earlier this evening is that this is the time I think to get this out
there. It should be at a minimum even if even if it is wrapped up, let's get it on there and let's talk about it in a public meeting so that everybody understands what happened and what we're doing. I know we did this before, but it seems like we have to do it again. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> I'm glad you mentioned that as a point of fact there. This has come before this
board before the 17th of June this year. So when we resumed the discussion, I would like if we resumed it based on where that left off. I know there was some comments earlier from member that this had not been discussed in public and that is not true based on a review of the town manager report and meeting minutes.
In fact, if I can while I'm speaking, I would appreciate addressing some of the the decorum and way in which I was spoken to earlier in the meeting. >> Yeah. No, >> you're not the chair. Brian, >> guys, we're not doing this right now. We are going to move on. >> When can we do it? >> It could be a future on the future item
list, right? >> I don't believe discussions of professionalism in decorum is a future agenda item. >> Guys, like we're going to a place like I'm not comfortable going right now. I >> I need you to go there. The way I was spoken to is not appropriate. I was interrupted by him multiple times. >> Guys, both of you, Brian, you're not the
chair of the board. Stop acting like it and stop treating me like a junior member of >> I'm going to continue to challenge you when I need to. Thank you, >> guys. Both of you. I just said like I'm not comfortable dealing with this right now. We will discuss it but not right now. >> I don't want to come to another meeting in which I'm going to be disrespected.
>> Oh my god. >> So, we are going to we are going to move on. Both of you got to stop, guys. >> I'm sorry. I'm not done. >> I'm looking for >> Tell me the topic is done, but I think I need you to say out loud me being respected here doesn't matter. >> I'm sorry. We're going to do >> I literally said we will discuss this at
a different point. I said I'm not doing it right now. I don't want to have another meeting before we have the discussion. You're essentially asking me to come back and be disrespected again. >> I'm sorry. I just need to deescalate and remind everyone we should follow the decorum. The whole town looks upon us as leaders and also we should always go
through the chair. That's part of the reason why we have certain protocols how to conduct and follow the meeting. I fully appreciate the passions on all front. But please let's let's uh move on and as >> I'm going to look for a mo Thank you. I'm going to look for a motion to move
to convene an executive session pursuant to master general law chapter 38 section 21A to discuss strategy for negotiation with non-union personnel the police chief and fire chief pursuant to master general law chapter chapter 38 section 21A purpose 6 to consider the purchase exchange lease or value of real estate
land at 280 Cedar Street because of an open meeting may have a detrimental effect on the negotiating position of the board uh to approve executive session minutes from January 20th 2026 to allow Lance Lazarus Lance Topior and Nicholas Anosopoulos us to participate in executive session and not to convene
in open session at the conclusion conclusion of executive session. >> So moved. >> Second. >> Got a motion and a second. Uh this is roll call. Amy >> Amir Bush. Yes. >> Matt Kisner. No. >> Sherman. Yes. >> Brian her. Yes. >> Joe Clark. Yes. All right. Thank you everyone.
>> Thank you.