##VIDEO ID:ae-qFMOf8pU## e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e um it being 6 o'clock I'm going to call the Tuesday January 21st 2025 board meeting of the board of Selectmen to order and we will begin with the pledge aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all and there's no need for a roll call vote because we're all here um all right so we have um couple of announcements uh this meeting is being recorded by the local scene anyone intending to make an audio or video recording of this meeting should notify the chair at this time nobody um financial assistance applications are available on the town's website or by calling the selectman's office for anyone in interested in volunteering there are several vacancies on various committees and boards to see a complete list of the openings please visit our website at Kingston ma.gov and also check the website for any additional events or notices at again www. Kingston ma.gov um any other announcements from the rest of the board before we get going no all right um we now have time for open forum is there anybody who wanted to speak at open forum either here in the room or online seeing nobody um we're going to move on to um our appointments our appointment is uh last week during our meeting um we decided to set up uh the meeting for tonight to um put together a working group so that we can take a deeper dive into the FY 26 budget um before our our meeting next week um there's certainly a lot of challenges in our budget this year um the schools are are um looking at some massive increases and we don't have final budgets from them um but without overrides the schools are going to be making U massive cuts to um positions it's not just going to be supplies and technology and projects it's going to be um teachers and Paras and other staff um regardless unless uh there is an override I believe the um the regional budget correct me if I'm wrong Keith but the regional school budget I believe was $2 million over and then that the local schools are 1.7 million over the 4% that we had originally allocated so we're looking at at potentially some big overrides then within the town Department last week we discussed um basically a 4.12% increase townwide um giving the fire department and police department a little bit more some other departments a little bit less because they don't have as many increases um but we need to kind of go through this whole budget probably take a look at at fire and police tonight um in a deep dive um without an override and correct me if I'm wrong if on this it looks like we're still going to have to if we don't have an override the police budget even with being a little bit higher they will still potentially lose um bodies um there are requests for additional staff from police so we're still looking at um and we'll get into the nitty-gritty of that tonight um if we were to approve the additional request for the additional positions in the police department it would require an override um fire department uh we're going to hear from both of the Chiefs tonight to kind of go through these um uh through their budgets before we move forward um are there any questions or comments about what we're doing here tonight before we move forward um I I still think it's a little premature to be placing this the override like we're definitely moving forward with an override we don't know yet we haven't gone through the budgets as and when it comes to schools we have no line out autonomy correct of that that's all them they have they have that under their purview so with that said we determine what this budget sort of looks like and how much of that goes to schools is usually based on what they tell us they need I've argued this in Prior meetings um I think we need to be looking at this a little differently and saying this is how much we have and then this percentage goes to the town and this percentage goes to the schools then they have as much time as they need to figure out what that budget looks like but at least we've given them a number that they can work with historically that's been around 53% I believe so if we are looking at I don't know what we want to be able to leave with excess Levy capacity I don't know if we're to the point where we just can't have excess Levy capacity but if we wanted to have X number of dollars in Levy capacity what does that leave us with and then what is 47% of that number and then we make sure that we've we have a budget before us that fits under that umbrella giving the schools whatever that 53% number is and you know what I have not seen um I I don't recall what the exact percentage was of the budget that you put together giving them a 4% increase of what percentage that is but I think it was with just the 4% I think they were still around 53% it's 53% so if we do that I I know we haven't said we're doing an override we haven't we're just talking about it in generic terms and I'm glad you brought that up because that's something that we are going to have to agree on on doing and we have not done that we're just through all of our budget meetings we're looking at these numbers and if the town wants level Services it's we're going to um in in my opinion it's going to require an override if we're okay with cutting back on some Services whichever departments they are school police fire um uh streets and Highway what whatever it is Library um then we'll go down that that road and and figure that out um my fear is that an override will likely fail given the The increased costs people are facing outside of just Town costs but also increases in water and sewer people are really hurting and I think anywhere that we can try to reduce that burden for them is ideal how we do that I'm not sure and and I know I'm jumping the gun again talking about an override but but one of the things I keep coming back to when we did this before um in ' 08 and 13 13 it was just I I think I got the year right wasn't 11 it was 13 13 yeah yeah so that was just the school and it was 390,000 back in '08 there were three different it was broken up I don't remember if it was three different Warren articles but there was one for the elementary there was one for um the regional and then there was one for the town the the and the town I believe was police and fire if I remember correctly um but I can't remember how the votes went at town meeting I know that the two School ones did pass the town one did not so I know in terms of the um the warrant articles what I was thinking is that we would potentially have and again I know I'm jumping the gun but it still lays out the basis for some of my thinking and how I approach this um have two different warrant articles one at a higher override amount and one at a lower and and this is where we have to figure out what services especially police buy and schools would be retained at those different levels and I'm just going to throw out numbers I mean we're talking what is it almost four million just between the two schools so I'm just going to take a number of that's assuming that's what they end up needing we don't actually know that we don't but what let's let's just throw out some fake numbers here I'll say half a million for a lower override and a million for a higher override and split between those um the four the elementary the Regional Police and Fire if we need o if we need overrides for those but what I'm suggesting is that each department have a lower number for that lower tier to override and then a slightly higher number for the for the um for a higher override knowing that the residents have already spoken out all the the higher cost inflation um higher water sewer electric gas everything's gone up crazy this year um it's going to be a tougher sell so trying to come in with some lower numbers and then maybe when we when we go to town meeting we would vote on the higher number first if it passes then great then it goes on to the ballot um and then folks can can vote there if it doesn't pass then you go to the lower number um you know and try to and maybe as as the following uh article on the warrant again this is I'm just talking I know it's it's just it's hard for me to be thinking there when we haven't even looked at the budget I don't know it's just years of doing this it I don't see how we do this without an override or we're making the decision um to cut Services across across the town yeah um so and then it comes back to who should be making that decision should we if we make the decision that we're not doing an override and we're not putting it on the ballot or putting it on the town warrant then we're making the decision for the entire town by putting it on the the warrant and and in town meeting um then it's it's up to um town meeting voters and eventually um U the voters at the at the ballots making that decision so we're in a we're in a tough spot you know where it's it's a big burden facing us um the town's being um uh hit hard we've been hit hard with with costs at the schools um and then from police we've had years of of not being staffed up where we should be having additional um and for both police and fire additional calls both from uh Baymont and from the departments up at the mall so um there's a higher call frequency um that the town is facing so um we're really going to be struggling here so we need to kind of go through this I was thinking tonight um what we should start off with unless anyone has another idea uh maybe let uh Chief Douglas go first um discuss his his budget and his request um and then we can have any questions for him and then move on to um Chief Holmes and the police department Department I just quickly from a high level perspective and this is probably for a future meeting M if an override comes to fruit hat starts to be discussed fully um is I think we need that data broken down to the average household too so we need to it doesn't mean we're raising our rates we're raising $2 million what does that actually mean to the individual homeowner right because that's really what and we did that back in 2013 and 28 I remember that because it was like okay the average home was worth back then it was like 400,000 so you're going to be hit with $130 I think it was something one of one of those votes one of them I remember specifically cuz I had an average house then and I remember it was going to be 130 bucks yeah so I would I would be curious about the percentage increase as opposed to a doll an average dollar amount only because if you say if it's a the average homeowner will see a 10% increase in their taxes then you can apply it to your own taxes and you as no I think they did all of that but I think what they did specifically too I don't know why just like $400,000 was an average house and you know your your increase would be $130 but back then I think our taxes were like probably half what they are now yeah honestly in 2008 and then back that and then the other information going forward would be how is this solvable how many years is this going to happen because obviously it's a yearly override it's not a correct so so so like all that it's it's more just we need to get as much possible information out there if that's what's happening right um and and the other thing I think is um you know with with police I know he's asking for several um not several but a few positions and this is a onetime thing if we don't do it he's going to ask again next year or the year after um for these positions my understanding I mean police doesn't get hit like schools do schools are there's a lot more costs there's a lot more varability um state aid there's so much more that that's hitting the schools so an override for the police department if you did it at one time arguably shouldn't be doing this again there shouldn't be other surprise costs and same with fire I would think schools we could do an override this year just like last year was a a 10% increase I think on the elementary last year something like that and the arguments from a lot of people Kim even you you were saying well we're going to get hit harder next year and we did you know and there's nothing to say we won't next year as a reminder I know I voted no on last year's budget yep I didn't have too many solutions though so now so I mean last year luckily we could do it I shouldn't say luckily we did it without an override we did it within but but we ate up a lot of our um excess Levy capacity which we had done very well for several years without having to do um but the schools that that hit last year was hard and again we're getting hit again this year so um and and no guarantee that we won't get hit again next year the following year and then and then regarding longterm and I don't know if I believe I remember seeing it at some point in an email so if I'm wrong I apologize but has water looked into asking for more capacity with what's available with I I I I remember seeing something that they can request more capacity from the state to to bring why haven't they how do we they have they have okay and the state said no or well so I had conversations with State probably a month or six weeks ago um it was it was a follow-up conversation to a conversation I had had at a meeting that I attended at Oak Colony planning a regional water meeting uh where I was I guess from my in my point of view was fortunate enough to sit next to somebody from D of the state I don't know I don't know if he felt the same way after the questions I was asking him but um the challenge um and I asked him specifically could the town of Kingston or could the town of Kingston ask for additional water to be withdrawn from our wells uh his answer was you can uh the challenge right now or at that point anyways uh has been that our unaccounted for water went from 10% um you know in 200 22 I think to to 177% in 23 to 22% um I maybe a year off I apologize um but but the the last the last submitt from the Kingston water department had showed or reflected a a 22% unaccounted for a water amount meaning for every 100 gallons that come out of the ground they don't know where 22 gallons of that went um in speaking to the to the high to the uh water superintendent a couple of times um he's mentioned that they had they had a company come in and do uh some sort of a unaccounted for water audit um what he uh indicated to me two or three weeks ago was that um the bleeder lines at the end of a deadend water line so a water line typically you want to have it looped so the water is moving continuously so you know particles sediments minerals things of that nature don't get don't get um you know just don't sit in line which it impacts the water quality for the people at the end of those dead end lines and um it creates some challenges with the with the actual water pipe so what he indicated to me was there were the the uh the meters at the end of those bleeder lines were not recording um the amount of water coming out of those bleeders accurately that was I would guess at least two months ago um I haven't asked him recently um where that stands we Valerie had uh reached out to the water superintendent last week uh Old Colony planning had identified a grant for a complete water audit um that um that the water department has chosen not to not to uh pursue um because they had a water audit that that they had done recently so um I don't have specific on where that stands the last I had spoken to the water superintendent he said it's going to take a bit of time to identify whether or not um The Meters that have been placed at the end of these bleeder lines are recording more accurately and have determined what percentage of that 22% of unaccounted for water um is coming from those bleeder lines but this the state you and it makes sense you know we want you to find where you lose all your water before you more yeah makes sense um so are they are they treating this as code red because this sounds like something that needs to be I mean that's our that's our Revenue Source it is I mean that you know we talk about there's a lot there's there's several reasons why we're we're in the position that we're in one of those certainly is because of a lack of New Growth that uh we've had to account for uh to some degree in fiscal 25 5's budget and even even more so in fiscal 26 um because there isn't because the water department and the Water Commission specifically are autonomous um I don't know is my answer I and I frankly I've tried to ask some questions and um gotten some some answers uh back but but I I I think it it's a question that we should C we could certainly ask the water commissioner specifically and I I think they're in their minds they they are it's it's something that's important to them but um you know it's been several months now I don't know where they stand how much that 22% has been addressed and you know are they moving as quickly as possible because again it's not be it's not solely because of the challenges in the in the water that we have available to us but it's certainly of it and and the other thing to keep in mind is um uh up at the mall um they are looking at now moving forward with some renovation some building but it we're still three years off from that Revenue um but you know we I I I I think we need to push the the Water Commission on um the ability to be able to tap more water yeah because it's there it's not that the water isn't there it's that the state won't let us take get up and one of the one of the things in fairness to the water department you know one of the questions that I don't I don't have any answer to at this point um is given the current infrastructure we have the wells and the the the ability to pump water out of those Wells how much more water can our current infrastructure provide uh to the community based on you know what's there now and and if it can't are there any reasonable Solutions because you know the the timeline for a new well from what I'm being told is 3 to 5 years you know they were approved for funding to do the uh engineering work for new well uh in October at ftown meeting my understanding is the water department won't be back for the funding for a new well until uh the annual to meeting of 2026 so a year and a half a little over a year from now and then it's construction time testing and and connection to the m water system so it's right finally all right any other questions or comments before um and any uh objection to having our fire chief come go first and please okay all right Chief we're voting next week right next week correct on on so I did um good evening I did send you each a packet um last week uh with a ton of information in it that I hope you had time to read digest um question if you needed to uh I'm going to just go through that packet kind of quickly um stop me if there's a spot where you you'd like me to uh first page was the budget request overview that was comparisons between the FY 25 budget a request for the 26 and then the 4% potential budget uh since that was submitted uh Keith and I have spoken and we ended up reducing uh the number to just above the 4% for the request so that page is not excuse me particularly accurate at this point next page we started down through the the budget itself the line items um and let me go through those on the Personnel side clerical Union Sal is the 51113 that's my ad administrative assistance salary the next 5114 contract salaries that's the chief and deputies contract our pay fire Union salaries the 1115 that is the cost of base base play base pay excuse me plus uh stiens and Associated additional pay for the union firefighters and Captain so that that line is for the 24 staff uh not including including the call Department uh next overtime which is going to be uh 1131 that's the cost of filling vacation and personal that is not sick that's vacation and personal and that is budgeted at a one for one fill so six person shifts fill to six uh with vacation and overtime being taken off and that money used to fill those shifts holiday pay is the amount of additional pay that they receive when they work holidays and those that are off Duty receive a small a smaller amount of pay um just as a matter of a contractual agreement for the holiday sick leave is where we ended up um reducing the budget uh that is the amount of money that we budget to cover sick leave like we would vacation or personal time uh that covers sick and injury to give you a little history FY 23 we spent $216,000 approximate FY 24 257 approximate and FY 25 to date we've spent 167 now keep in mind on that line that we've had a tremendous amount of injuries unfortunately we at one point last year had four people out injured um three of them longterm one has returned one will retire and one is anticipated to return we had hoped last month but the doctor says differently so we're looking at another couple to three but he will he will come back so that's the money we use to cover those shifts recall jumped down to 1132 that's the amount of money we use to pay off-duty staff for responding to emergency calls uh last year um Keith and I agreed to reduce this hoping that the additional Staffing on the shifts not knowing of course that we're going to have four injuries um would help offset that uh in other words there'd be more people on duty and less uh necessity to recall people between injuries and the increased call volume that has not worked out that way and we've all but expended that annual appropriation at this point training 51137 that's the amount of money we use for off-duty training if there's training that's required fire related training that's required or recommended I should say uh we use that amount of money for that training sick leave buyback is contractually agreed upon and that is the amount of money that we use uh to pay folks that did not take their sick time and that's all of those are um explained a little better than my excuse me horse voice um on those pages that I just went over the next part of the packet that I gave you is my annual report um hopefully you read that that gives you kind of a a good overview with regards to what's been going on in the department for the past year or so and might um either cause some questions or or answer some the next pages are charts and graphs uh and sometimes these visuals are very helpful in understanding especially the upward trajectory excuse me of our call volume um the first one is alarms by year ranging from 2017 to 2024 uh the blue would be what we classify as other non- EMS calls the red are ems calls uh if anybody pulled out their calculator they'll notice on a couple of these graphs that there have um a couple of digits off here and there um since we had our system hacked with ransomware for some reason this isn't pulling the data in two categories correctly but it's only off by very few 10 or less calls so that's the first page there the second is a chart or a spreadsheet I should say that shows in numbers at least the simultaneous call volume concern uh we jumped considerably from 23 to 24 so now 51% of our calls actually result in a second call or not result in but a second call comes in while we're on the first call this is for lack of better description a natural progression when you start to increase call volume the mere fact that you're increasing the number of calls increases the percentage of time that you're going to get more than one at the same time it's really that simple uh averaging your averages 8.72 day for 2024 uh 2025 the last 10 days uh excuse me 21 days we've done 10 per day so we're we're up a bit there the next couple of pages just show you uh illustrate how the reports look before I put them into chart and graph form so it gives us a print out of number of two or more three or more four or more that was just for your viewing pleasure alarms by day of the week why this is important it's the one with the five up in the corner why this is important because numerous times we've talked about Impact Staffing Impact Staffing in the public safety world would be when you have a a day or a night shift that has particularly more calls and I guess it would be typically in many places at least the 4 to 12 or some shift like that the evening shift what I did was try to illustrate that this is not the case here it's pretty consistent across the days of the week so that we don't have an opportunity really to Impact Staff for example day staff um and make a considerable impact on how we handle our call volume number six alarms by time time of day this is pretty standard throughout the fire service you notice your increases and your decreases you do less at night the challenge with the night versus the day obviously it's dark uh the morning more serious calls especially fire related tend to be at night uh why are they more serious one because people are sleeping things like fires get going a little better when when people are sleeping obviously they don't self evacuate as well or as quickly there's a whole host of reasons why working at night is a little bit more dangerous so when we apply that to Staffing excuse me when we apply that to Staffing we look at the day might be a little easier but a little busier the night is a little more d dangerous but less calls as we move on to number uh page number 7 it shows the response times and I drew a small line at just under the 52.89 per uh that's the number of calls that we did 53% approximately of calls we reached on the EMS side within 6 minutes 6 minutes is the line we typically draw a reference point for a cardiac arrest in other words someone stop breathing somebody whose heart has stopped um brain damage begins after 6 minutes in the in the area of trauma and some of the other serious medical conditions uh time is of the essence uh we work with something called the Golden hour get somebody to a Trauma Center etc etc uh so time is of the essence but that six minute line um is an important line as far as the treatment of um someone that's not breathing next few pages uh show our Mutual Aid calls we received 127 times Mutual Aid last year whereas we only gave 79 that's a significant increase for us and I think the fact that we were running shifts a little light because we had the injuries last year um as well as excuse me the increased call volume uh attribute to that number that's that's why that number has gone up to the degree that it has next is ambulance billing summary uh 2394 build TR transports uh excuse me responses building collected 1,927 amount collected 1,698 96755 average collected per call is 881 that explanation is very simple uh we spill some private insurance some is Medicare Medicare gives you whatever it is they give you and you take it and you can't balance Bill the patient private insurance typically will pay the bill so when I give you 881 as an average that's how much across those whole 927 calls we collected per call some would have been $3,000 some could have been 300 the next couple of pages I think are important uh to digest a little bit at least and that shows how how our accounting is done how we Bill and what we collect so that million 698 967 was up 26 6 7 181 from the previous year so that gives you an even better view of the increase in call volume the next page 10 uh is what Pro EMS provides me with every year uh actually I usually get it a couple times a year that shows Statewide billing rates and tells us where about where we are approximately within those rates and that's what we use to make the decision as to whether we want to increase rates or not that's the chart we would have used last year so that's all I have in terms of the packet I gave you in terms of the reduction that we made to get to the just over 4% I think Keith five right about five five um the the place was that was least painful for us to take an amount of money like that from was the overtime regarding sick and injury um that's the least predictable line item it doesn't cause us to lose any people no layoffs but it also reduces Staffing uh in certain circumstances it reduces Staffing Staffing reductions reduce service that there's just no way around it if we're used to us uh doing 3280 or 3184 calls which was last year total with six people per shift then if you do it with 5 4 3 etc etc after you reduce service a little bit you increase response times I can't answer how much so that's the impact of that how severe is the impact I don't have a crystal wall so I can't honestly tell you um if we have a year where we have all our staff back and we're running six more than we normally would you'll see recall um go down some we'll be able to move recall money over a little bit to cover uh sick an injury if that in fact were to occur and that will help balance it all out um and unfortunately that is where we are uh I simply can't tell you the absolute impact of losing that money but I can tell you that if it's if that money is needed and we don't fill shifts that will have an impact so I have a question um in our book it says that you were requesting and this this is what you said the numbers were wrong you have 4.3 million basically is what you had requested but then you're saying that you dropped it and what we had in our book um was 4147 correct keth that was Keith's recommendation yeah yeah I know yeah so Keith's recommendation and that's that's the 5% right is the 4147 514 yes sir okay so um Mark how much did you um you're no longer requiring the 4326 what is your number down to now so the the number that take out the sick fill uh and what Keith has on the spreadsheet is correct minus the SI fill so the six fill zeroed out um so that Mark just just try to maybe clarify the difference between my the the recommended that was in my column and the department recommended is the amount that came out of your sick time line item to fill for for illnesses or Si should have been down about 177 but the but the the department I I think where Eric may have misunderstood what you were saying the department request of 4,326 that number is correct that's that number is what you submitted for budget for for level Services yes sir yes but you could make 4.1 work I can make zero work but don't expect a lot oh my God zero you can't make zero work no the reality and that's that is a half sarcastic answer and it's meant to be we can make whatever you give us work it's how well we make it work okay right um and it's what you're willing to sacrifice or provide either way um so the least impact as I said with a reduction of that size was in that area and we li as I asked Keith to do please limit it to that area and then we don't lose staff we maintain vacation and sick uh excuse me vacation and personal fill but when we get sick calls or injuries we don't fill that so downside Nora virus runs through the department and you got four guys sick you don't have the overtime to bring people in so you got whoever you got right so that's scary now how do you juggle that right that's not an absolute how do you juggle that you use a little bit of the money for vacation and personal yeah you move it over to sick you know and this is a yearlong Juggle you move it over to sick and then you short vacation coverage at some point along the way right so the the good thing about this is um we can move within Personnel where we need to and we've done that so just just for my full clarification 4.3 is level Services the 4.1 would be no Cuts but there could be potential issues y That's What I okay and that's where we would be relying potentially on Mutual Aid knowing that other towns are dealing with the exact same diget issue that we are but Mutual Aid really only works as long as we also provide Mutual Aid the first word in mutual Aid is really mut yeah um what was the percentage on the 4.1 cuz then 9.5 is with the 4.3 correct yes five so the the fire department budget fiscal 26 versus fiscal 25 in the fiscal 26 ton administrator column versus fiscal 25 approved is a is a 5% increase bottom line okay thank you y so the question before the and we don't need to answer this tonight we're not voting this tonight um basically Mark is saying that they can deal with the 5% budget but there are risks associated with that um you know the other thing not that we have money but you know the big thing I'm worried about is the flu or any of these other things that ran through you know the police department or or any other workplaces over the past 3 weeks so a quick if if I can a quick comment on that two reasons we we're concerned about something like the flu uh today is a good example of that they did I think it was nine calls by the time I left at 4:30 um they had taken eight of those calls as EMS calls transported to both soore and the bi the average wait time with patients on our stretcher was an hour and 20 minutes so when they arrived at the hospital the truck was tied up for an additional hour and 20 minutes with that person on the stretcher right um they they freed up we held recall people from 11: till 4:30 um that we called back to do calls and largely that was because of the delay that the on duty shifts or even actually the uh the recall folks were working as well it's the challenge they were having getting people off the stretches at the the hospitals and when you get there there's no option right um if they're on the stretcher and you're in the hall they're on the stretcher and you're in the hall than y please for the ambulance fees I see that we're right around the community average looking at the numbers you gave us correct could we or should we consider increasing the fees the input or feedback if you will that I typically get from the billing company is try to stay somewhere under the top dog um because it draws attention when you push the fees up high you can sometimes it increases the amount of challenges to your fees and so forth if you're a little lower than the top dog uh which is typically Cambridge honestly um you just kind of get paid because you're just one of the the many so the few dollars we gained um might have value and might frustration to be honest with you that's fine I so there's there's room to wiggle though is what you're saying there is I I just thought it's worth at least asking the question since we are right around the average and because it's a tough budget year revenues be looking at I think all every not just fire no of course yeah but this is just dump stickers potential opportunity so I want to ask the question could we go up if we went up a $100 right now we're correct me if I'm wrong if I'm reading this right I'm looking at the BLS emergency but should I be looking at there's there's three ways we Bill BLS emergency als1 emergency als2 emergency got um the the way those are broken up is based on skill level BLS is basic life support als1 is a limited number of advanced life support skills and als2 would be say a severe respiratory a cardiac or a cardiac arrest where you use many skills and many medications that's how the Medicare folks had broken them up several years ago and everybody's kind of adopted that right Mr chair yeah just a couple of things if I could and I haven't brought it up yet because I I thought it was maybe more appropriate to allow Chief Douglas uh and chief Holmes to make their their presentations um you know again some of the estimates we've included in the budget are conservative um we can C Mark can certainly look at uh what what we're charging for ambulance fees with um the billing company they've been I think pretty pretty stand up about where we ought to be and and recommendations and and they've made a lot of sense so far um so you know that may be worthwhile having a conversation last week um the state announced that the governor's uh Revenue increase percentage will be about 2.2% on state revenues we've estimated um certainly less than that because we just didn't know we estimated at 1.4 so there's you know again we if we apply the state revenue um the 2.2% which is going to move a little bit but it's it doesn't move much yeah um you know if if we we could we could potentially raise the state receipts from 7.3 2.2% of last year is uh is let me just double check hang hang on for a second it's we could we could raise it about you know 60 $60,000 um I've got some suggestions or or at least some things for the board to think about with regards to the transfer station and how we how we build there uh on the on next week's agenda at this point is a is a proposal to adjust the transfer station fees it's really a more of a philosophy discussion there's been discussions in the past uh I know here and in most communities frankly um should the transfer station budget be covered solely by you know the fees that we charge to go there um so so I've i' I've run some numbers to give you a sense of what that what those changes would look like uh some communities use a a pay you throw which is uh a nasty phrase in many cases but um it's probably more fair than if if you wanted to change your philosophy on um trying to balance the transfer station Budget on the users um it's probably it's a probably a fairer way to go about doing things because uh you know a smaller household means a lesser cost than a person who has a larger household for example and throws away more trash uh but that's again those are all philosophical discussions you guys can have but we've I've provided some information some talking points and some things for you guys to think about take with you before next week um so I think there is some you know some a little bit of wiggle room on the revenue side certainly uh depending on how you how you want to attack the budget but really candidly it's it's just shifting the ball from one spot to another very awesome solving the long-term solution finding a long-term solution to problems it's not so what just looking at this really quickly what I was going to ask is on that BLS could we add $100 because that doesn't seem to put us too high um ALS and maybe I and obviously I don't have this in Excel to see if they're all equal going across but it almost looks like we're kind of on the higher end for that and then Als at another 100 cuz there's still plenty that are the ALS to um because there's still plenty that are higher I don't know it's just a thought so where I just don't know if it's going to make a difference I just thought at least should ask 5% it's every 50 cents makes a difference right right um and that's one of the reasons last fall correct me if I'm wrong we went up on ambulance rates and landed where we are so I reached out to Ethan the pro my repit Pro and said what do you think he said a tiny bit he said but don't push the envelope he said because everybody's doing it now and what we're starting to see at the state level um is the push back from the insurance companies if you've watched um I keep want to say fox Boston 25 um they had a segment maybe six weeks or so ago uh it was a very short one but it was about the push back and why isn't everybody billing the same and why is it so much and so forth so I would hate to be adding to that attention uh because I think the more attention it gets the more traction it may get and for the few dollars that you perhaps gain in the next year or so that may cause a lot of attention uh some action at the state level that sets ambulance rates and I will say this if they set ambulance rates they're not going to be the ones you're looking at on the spreadsheet they're going to be closer to a Medicaid ambulance rate which is a 2400 bill that they pay you six for so again I I certainly will as a matter of information look into this um but I can hear in the back of my head right now Ethan's answer on the phone tomorrow but I certainly will just exploring all of our options yep absolutely I think it's a good idea one of the things that I think will be helpful just as a side note on this topic when you look at the amount of injuries we had um we had four people in the academy uh we had a lot of times where we just simply weren't physically able to run Full Staff last year and as I said that's what drove a lot of those Mutual Aid numbers one of the things that will help us is to try to bring those Mutual Aid numbers down because in a strictly business sense we're giving Revenue away um you know we collect it certainly when we go to another town they come here they certainly collect as well but if we can eat up some of that 127 transports um with our folks and our ambulance um you know you can multiply that times the $881 and I think honestly that's probably more effective than raising rates makes sense I don't I don't know the answer to this Mark but I think it might help with the board just to put things in perspective I'm assuming that the majority of your ambulance calls are either als1 or als2 typically als1 is the highest percentage of ambulance call so that's build we Chang I had the last ones memorized you can look at what wanted two are now um those are build plus the $50 a mile the bi is 11 miles so short is much longer longer than that you Bill one way you don't bill for the return but the change in mileage was very helpful in increasing our Revenue so if we were to go up that's probably where we would would go is is the mileage it's the most justifiable because simply because of fuel cost and maintenance right any other questions for the chief no no and anything else chief that that that you want say J what's that I said not that my voice door thank you all right thank you Chief now another guy named chief are weing thank you thank you you can't do this want want to project I'm not sure I don't know she can do here oh uh it looks like she is yeah yeah she's got it oh you need to you need a quick Break um yeah we're going to take it sorry I'm joking a two-minute break I don't know if I don't ever I e e e e e e I am we are resuming the meeting now at uh uh 6:56 we good we're good great thank you um thanks for having us here tonight presentation that I'm going to show you is um what time is it Keith I have 15 minutes sir okay all right so the clock is on um I just I'd like to thank uh the three people from the Department that you see here tonight um I don't speak fluent PowerPoint presentation anymore so the guy on the cover over there he made it and uh Laura and John contributed to helping us put this together there's a lot of things to consider here the context of this uh is actually drawn from Massachusetts Declaration of the rights and the um obligation of the government to provide protection to the people of the Commonwealth uh I can dig it up for you it's going to take me some research but I know it's in the the uh the constitution of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and there's also the government's obligation uh is also to Shield cities and towns from liability for providing adequate Police Service uh I'd also like to thank you Mr chairman for recognizing that um this is the discussion that we've had um I may have had some conversations with some members about this as a one-time growth opportunity in the face of a potential uh two and a half overhead so the presentation um is is basically um a smart growth plan and when we use the term smart I came up with a cool acronym we actually got it together at the last minute today uh that our our goals should be specific and that the goal is concrete tangible and that everybody knows what it's going to look like uh Kim I know you like pictures so this is for you uh the goal has to be measurable um and the success is dependent upon that and it has to be something that everybody can understand the goal has to be attainable uh it is challenging as we know based on the finances of the town at this time uh but it should be achievable based on the resources available should be relevant I definitely think that in the face of what I said uh at the last meeting of a ratio of two patrolman to one supervisor it is certainly relevant uh contributes to the larger larger overall objectives of the mission and it's timely the goal uh has a deadline or at least measurable time Milestones so you've probably heard me talk in the past about the fact that uh in order to get an officer hired uh there's a background investigation process that can take several months as you saw and then there's the academy process and then there's a field training process so you can have anywhere from um 18 to 24 months till you have fully trained police officers and boots on the ground uh to describe the present condition and the where are we now of things the total sworn personnel for the Kingston Police Department meaning police officers is 26 we're down to 24 with two of them going into the academy in the month of April uh so so we are budgeted for 26 uh we have eight dispatches one full-time admin and there's several specialized functions in the department including the Investigative Services Unit which is detectives um they are pretty uh pretty busy Unit School resource officers Traffic Safety which is a um ad hoc position right now but we're hoping to make a full-time traffic safety officer with the extra body that'll come out of the academy uh Plymouth County Outreach is a very uh large Endeavor it's the first in the county and it's something that Kingston is heavily involved in because Plymouth County outreaches Home Offices right in Kingston and Elder Services we're also oversee Animal Control the animal inspector the hab master and the shelfish warden uh I want to clarify on the ratio of two supervis two uh patrolman to one supervisor that's just in a raw form um the ratio of officers to a supervisor on the street as they feathered out on the shifts is 3 to one here's your population growth from the town from 1998 to 2023 the source is the US sent data Bureau um by the way anything that's in here that is in error um I take full accountability for it I I got other members of the department that helped us put this together collectively but anything that that's inaccurate it's uh something that I'll take ownership of you have some variables in the town to consider um obviously your Mall two shelters you have Shoreline to think about housing Commerce um River things of that nature uh this is a very steep growth 30 4.84% between 1998 and now it's about a 22 and A2 degree angle there it's not exactly 45 uh but to put us at about 15,000 people uh to me is is a statistical significance and it's pretty steep um we thought that you'd want to take a look at some of the growth that we've had in the recent years this is a seven-year look back obviously to 2018 um 2020 2021 you saw a in productivity here if you're go by these numbers obviously based on the pandemic um 20223 and 2024 the productivity and proactive policing is coming back um the total logged calls for service that's every time we have a log entry and it's in the neighborhood of 18,000 calls uh and then the calls for service motor vehicle stops uh property checks um you know these these are the things that that generate a call for service and we categorize them is that so we're between 9 and 10,000 for the year 2024 as you saw 2023 2024 and 2025 will ultimately be higher than that top number over there uh the business of the business is just getting busier comparable communities um we we thought based on the previous um the next slide that you're going to see um you probably should have put the other one first but the next slide shows how many offices you have in some comparable communities and what we have is we have the number of police offices per thousand residents um so you have a a graph that you can look at um the most comparable Community to US based on previous studies for collective bargaining purposes has been pemr I put Abington right there but I don't know if they've been included in previous uh comparables for Collective bargain or anything like that uh West Bridgewater is a small community and they were an anomaly about how many residents um they have versus how many police officers per thousand um here's your numbers for your comperable communities um Abington is going from 23 to 34 that's 11 vacancies but out of those 11 vacancies that is seven new positions that they've added to their Department uh four people are in the academy right now um they you know they kind of their population is a little bit bigger the town size is about the same uh they have a civilian staff of full full-time administrative personnel and six part-timers um I put the budget numbers on here you can read them at you will you can call me anytime as usual if you would like to ask questions about these things um I'll come back to any of these slides at the end if you have any questions too but you also you have your hand out there that you can write questions down as you go along before I read this slide here I just I'll just qualify this as saying that um Laura and I will continue to work with Kathleen and Keith these numbers might not be exact as to uh some of the exercises that we've gone through um so candidly Keith and Kathleen might not agree with these hypothesis here uh but we're committed to continue to work through um anything that we have to do to get you know the most specific numbers that we're going to need uh the impacts of percentages proposed 4% uh increase in the Department's budget would result in in our opinion at this point in the layoff of two full-time Patrol offices a 6% increase would be one full-time patrol officer one dispatcher 11% would allow us to maintain level services at a cost of half a million dollars that's 17 Patrol offices eight dispatches and the requests that we have in um I'm not exactly sure where all of that is and how many members of the board have seen that um I know that that uh the Town Administrator has these requests in um draft form we're looking for three Patrol officers one Deputy Chief and one full-time dispatcher at a total estimated cost of 1.15 uh 1 million 1,1 156,157 uh I did have some conversations with uh Keith about you know ways to kind of cut money in the beginning side of that about you know what if we just did a half a year for the deputy chief the first year Keith and I both agree that you know if you did uh the deputy chief at six months funding You' still be kind of catching up the following fiscal year so any Cuts like that would make um it'd be something that be willing to work with the board on if the board has been up to any of this again in the face of um two and a half override um but it would be less sustainable any of those positions that were funded at a half a year or whatever uh something else to consider is that when when we put in for um funding for an FTE uh we based that on July 1 uh but we Al always have that variable of when does a police academy start how long is this a process going to take uh could there end up being turned back money on some of these things at the end of the fiscal year and the answer to that of course would be yes if we end up uh funding something beginning in July but not sending to the academy until November uh all the things that we do are based on the availability ofies and their Regional so I mean you got Plymouth you got Randolph you got one down the cape um you got West bston you got them all over the place but it all it's all a question of State funding and the availability of an academy um this is uh an anecdotal analysis of I think where we should be a total sworn personnel of 3 three so again if we were to have some growth um at the beginning of fiscal 26 with three Patrol offices a deputy and a dispatcher you don't count the dispatcher towards sworn personnel for this um this equation I think that over a three to foure period following uh this fiscal year if these positions are requested are funded an attainable goal should be 331 personel uh some things to consider for the board a lot of these discussions would take place behind closed doors and executive session uh for purposes of collective bargaining strategy uh but the town is is a very far cry from being in a position to establish minimum Staffing levels for the police department uh when you have a ratio of 2 to one uh we're not even close so if we ever had that as a standard so we know that this shift the afternoon shift 4 P p.m. to midnight should have a minimum of 300 to1 at all times with an allowance of maybe two people to take the day off um you know we we'd be able will take a look at the you know the measurements of overtime and how much we spend on back fi for vacations and stuff like that um the town is nowhere even close to that uh the substantial growth again I think uh everybody gets the point that we're hoping to do that uh if there is in fact an overhead uh I think the board knows based on the last meeting that we've requested the Cil Le Regional fund one full-time SRO or at least 80% of the funding for that at the middle school their next meeting is February 25th if I got that right uh Keith you recall if that's right I believe that so we're going to be there we're going to make the case that you know it's time uh the work is there it's definitely needed so um in in terms of growth I know it's all mostly Kingston money there will be obviously contributions from schools within the regional uh towards that 80% the admin um this this side of the government would be on the hook for 02 Plus benefits uh if the school did fund uh a full-time SRO at the middle I mean what we're dealing with here I'm not here to sign blame I'm I'm just describing the present condition there's 100 Cooks in the kitchen um it is where it is we are where we are uh but we are in fact catching up um you know uh this job has changed a lot um there's a lot of things that have to happen just to get into the job um I for one and I know the members of The Command Staff and the officers that do the background checks don't want to make the thir dir a mistake of having the wrong person come in so it's for that reason that when we do a background check on our future employees we do a deep dive we want to make sure that we know everything we need to know it includes social media log on to your account let me see what you got you know we want to make sure that we're not having somebody in that said something that they shouldn't have said you know when they were a sophomore in college what did something uh to invoke the Civil Rights penalty enhancement for different crimes that come up when you are attacking somebody for free speech and I say these things as examples of things that I dealt with in my form of life uh so we take the the incoming employees very seriously and it's an uous process if you do it and you're doing it right um you know subsequent requests will be one FTE per year subject to funding and the support of this board and the finance committee uh additional Community variables you know obviously we talked about the population Spike the call volume increase the time for boots on the ground you know there's no certain future about the shelters despite the things that the governor is saying at this point in time they're really not committing that the shelters are gone but what happens to the people that earn them now we don't know what's going to happen with that um so there's a lot of uncertainty uh there's been a lot of talk about what the future holds for the ball the effective water more water coming into this community um so there's a lot of variables to consider um there's some unforeseen costs we haven't we haven't budgeted for them in fiscal 26 um there's an education incentive benefit in the contract and there some members of the department right now that are going for the their degrees should they graduate within this fiscal year and I think we have at least one who may there's now a financial incentive for that that we've not budgeted for um if the future holds us looking at more cost Effectiveness for the body War cameras they good until 2029 right we pay for cloud storage if the town wants to spend the money for our infrastructure and invest in a large uh storage capacity server for that we don't pay for the storage we pay on the front end uh if a server for the station goes down we've already had that happen once for 911 and it was an unfunded liability we were on the hook to replace uh but if a server for the station goes down the servers uh they they run IMC which is our inous records database Vector scheduling which is something that we use for scheduling as well as training fill in details all sorts of stuff power DMS is funded by our membership with Mass police accreditation commission even though we're not accredited we still pay membership and power DMS comes with it so that we can keep track of who's signed off on what policy who's been trained etc etc um but we still need the storage in our inhouse and some of these things are coming to the end of their life that includes the desktops and some of the report writing areas definitely the desktops that are running dispatch U MDT laptops these are the things that that we have not budgeted for that could go at any given time so um it's an unpredicted variable um we do have one person who's out injured right now um it's probably 3 months uh before that employees return to work uh another unpredictable variable is like it's difficult political times out there you get people they want to exercise their right of Revolution so that's going to increase in the likelihood of uses of force when a use of force incident occurs there's a likelihood of an injury injury to a member of the department so these are these things are unpredictable it's been pretty good okay but you just don't know when something's going to happen so um what time is it am I under 15 minutes no sir how many all right well I came close that's you get a bik okay I'm done I'm happy to answer any questions again I know this is a big ask we without catching up this is a lot one pack so I have a quick question going back to the impacts of percentages proposed I'm not sure if there's a typo in here but I I want to get an idea of kind of where we are at each percentage so four 4% which we're not even considering we're at 6% right now with the um ta's recommended budget so with the 6% you're looking at laying off a full-time patrol officer and one dispatcher correct is that an existing position not a new proposed position so we would go from 26 to 25 yeah that's what it sounds like and then 8 to 7 is what you're saying okay so that's helpful and then the next one it says 11% but then it says 17 Patrol eight dispatchers should that be 26 Patrol or 27 supervisors that's just Patrol that's the patrol oh see yeah I had but but 11% is level Services level I got it I got now I understand thank you that makes more sense can I just add one just for cl my clarification yeah the 500,000 is in addition to the four the 6% increase correct no it's based on where I am. million keep talking no can here we may need you to go up to the yeah thank you while you're while you're there can I ask Commission on the calls for service total logged events the 23% increase over the prior year do we have an idea on why it increased so significantly if you can I I recall giving a number to the chairman about a certain number of calls at a certain end uh location in the south end of town and I thought okay you gave me a number about 2 73 for the calendar year oh we're getting more backups okay 460 yes there are there are hotpots that are affecting these numbers that's I was just curious because it is a significant increase so just yeah so the on that page you're referring to the right side chart is the we're called for a 911 we called the business line whatever it may be right 6% increase in 2024 and 10% over previous year for 2023 correct um you know the location that the chief was just referring to was uh one point I ran a Year's worth of data and we had 360 calls at that one location almost a call a day right so um on the left side chart uh that is all officer initiated type things as well so that includes motor vehicle stops property checks things like that so that's just to some degree the 2024 increase on the left-and side it's cops getting out there doing their jobs more than maybe a couple years prior um the 6% and 10% on the right hand side is is just an increase in cost uh you know also so it could be argued that our as our increas in calls continue to occur officers have less free time to do proactive policing things like motor vehicle stops for Speed and things like that so that you'll start to see if we continue to see these the right side chart increase incrementally the amount of with less officers the amount of time they have free then the officer initiated things like motor vehicle stops for traffic violations things like that start to go back down makes sense that makes sense thank you want to speak on Eric's question yes I'll go back to Eric's question okay so the figure of the half a million dollars to get to a level Services that's based on um going back to the uh current budget of 4.6 million so I would need so it's 210,000 dollars to get us to level services so we do not have to lay off anybody I'm more confused so what I did was I took his the ta's budget yeah which was is the 5193 uhhuh I added the 504 um is that right so what we have in the department request the 6186 that is our wish list of adding that's not L 20 no that's not level services that is adding staff got it thank you that's helpful that's helpful so I was like this doesn't make sense okay so another 210 211,000 will keep their um patol pman and dispatcher correct so what it looks like right now if we went back to what I was talking about in terms of over rides um if if they have 6% they're laying off we're cutting back Services if we add $210,000 to this budget either finding it from another department or an override or new quotas on number of tickets per day from people coming in from Peno Plymouth duck spre that's a joke he's shaking his head no they're all shaking their heads right please don't toilet paper in my house I'm just joking um so um we have more questions too probably probably so um yeah anybody have any questions I wanted to ask too um when you were sort of working with Chief homes and trying to find something closer to the 4% um I guess it's it's not always clear when we look at the budget because we don't have the ability to change the column with so you can't necessarily see what these items are um I guess your proposal included laying off staff it did so I I as with the fire department um you know I back to Chief Holmes said you know I I know we can't make it to the 4% because of the situation that the F the police department excuse me is dealing with as far as Staffing levels and things of that nature so can we get closer to six and allowed the the Poli the police department in this case to determine the appropriate levels of funding based on a overall 6% increase got it that makes sense I have more questions but you guys probably have questions to you go ahead I'm just doing some math real quick um in terms of the comparable communities how do you determine what the comparable communities are like what are you looking at exactly to make so that was um it was basically a hodge podge of uh Chiefs that I knew nearby um communities that were kind of similar I mean there's an anomaly in here where you you have weham I that is a huge Department compared to us I just thought that um I'd give you a sample of some of the communities that that are near to us um and that may be similar in some of their attributes like again Abington is very similar in its Community size they also have a new police chief uh I used to work with so I got his numbers really easily uh Holbrook I'm kind of like that to me is that that's a smaller Department smaller land area and they have the same number as us two motorcycles K9 unit um one full-time admin but their annual budget is 3.8 million so I mean I I don't know how they do the actual um the whole working out of the numbers what gets filled for over I don't know what they do exactly I'm just given numbers of what their numbers were at the end of the fiscal year and what the numbers are going in the fisal 26 um pbrook is is the most similar it was used in a labor relations comparables West and East Bridgewater they're on my ride home I just I called them because they're not that dissimilar I was going to look at Bridgewater was too big there's so many other variables in the town including the college um cver right next door Handover was the one that that surprised me I didn't realize that they were a bigger Community than us there 16,000 uh 19 square miles and the civilian staff is off the hook five five full times and six part times and 30 full times one so the reason I asked is we did a wage study recently where we had able communities and I I didn't put them side by side with this list but I know they were trying to find communities similar to our similar size so if these are on that list it it would be helpful because it would align Chief Holmes and I had a conversation about that probably two or three weeks ago and just suggested maybe he look at that and I think it makes a lot of sense to then refine that list uh based on you know square mileage and and things of that nature that they have to that they have to Patrol so um so he was aware I think there some of those some of those communities are on there um but I think he took that information and massage to feet to to address specifically police departments I think they lieutenant and laa both just told me just about all these were on there I don't think where him was I'm not sure hob was but these other communties were on the last study for the long-term planning um looking at the so where we where we should be um going from 26 to 33 correct so there are other impacts that we should be thinking about as well as we think toward the long-term plan of the department including the building and whether you have space for said humans also Capital so we need to think about vehicles for these folks I don't know that that's in a capital plan but it should be something that we're thinking about should be part of this maybe not this particular conversation but I think now is a good time to have that conversation um it's not just Staffing and benefits I do know that adding staff obviously would likely reduce overtime yes um actually no not until the it's subject to Collective Bing but once once you negotiate in minimum Staffing when you get to that level then you can actually have an impact on some of the overtime okay U not a lot it's not what it's not going to say the money you think okay I got that question 30 days into the job too by the way from the chairman of the finance committee who's not here tonight wow Carl and I are often on the same page um but going back to uh capital I I did revise my request from three Cruisers to four because we actually need that many um after some consideration of of the capital planning committee's meeting uh it was originally three uh looking at the fleet it should be for okay and just if I could just expand upon that so historically it's been two uh because Chief Holmes has proposed or requested uh some additional Patrol Staffing the original CIP increased that number to three and then again after some additional consideration it's been now bumped to four so some of those have been the vehicle issue I think has been addressed at some point once there's a clear Direction on where the board wants to go and how they want to F what they want to fund if anything um you know that those those things can be refined but they have been address to some degree in CIP already last question I hope um is there a way to get closer to 6% without laying off staff no I'm sorry no that's okay it's okay if the answer is no but I would be remiss if I didn't ask there's a lot like I said there's a lot of lines on here and we only see the first five or six letters of each line so I don't really know what each of these are and I know finance committee will do a deep dive but worth asking the question like I said I I I haven't brought here to ass sign blame I'm defining the present condition uh and where I think we need to go um 6% it's going to be catastrophic I mean you got to you got to look at the the growth of the department has been absent you got to look at the fact that uh we are operating at a skeleton crewp and have been since the last time I think it was growth was 1997 again this is some stuff that I'm being told I haven't seen the papers myself self uh the cops Grant and when it was expired at the third year after the third year the position was attrition somebody retired or left and there was no replacement of that person thank you so what I here's a question that kind of Builds on on on on your question Kim and and this is probably more for Keith and I'm not expecting an answer but just something to think about as we go into next week from my perspective I would I would really like to see our budget under the override without losing people at the 6% so basically get to the 11% that what that means is finding $211,000 somewhere else in our budget from other areas without really hurting Services I know we talked about doing this before about closing the library or there other things that we can do to to grab back $211,000 from other areas before you get hate mail when you say closing the library you on specific days or reducing hours and things you didn't mean actually closing the library no not closing the library no and and you get hate mail so I just and I know you you were talking to the um uh Highway Department about uh potentially not staying up as late I'm staying open as late staying up as late and then um uh so what I what I'm happy to do is include in the board's material for Tuesday night um coming up with or or or proposing some additional adjustments um I frankly don't know how that doesn't include staff somewhere yeah um but I'm happy so so just to be clear from my point of view um there's an additional 200 roughly $221,000 if I'm not mistaken is that the number we're talking about I 21 all right I I was trying to read over your shoulder so so I apologize um are we are we are we addressing anything with regards to the reduction in overtime sick leave excuse me for the fire department as well I just what what I'm trying to get to very candidly and I don't know if you guys have a number tonight is what is the number you need me to try to find um I I can do some of it I think through bumping up some of our estimated revenues but again I'm it it's it gets us to where we want to be to some degree here right but now I end up impacting my free cash and my ability to to fund the capital program because that's how we fund we we fund the capital program so I'm trying to balance but I I I would I would rather under promise and overd deliver than vice versa so to speak um but so I I just would like the board to decide if they can or or or provide an example how close can I what else can I find other than $211,000 that would address some of the um needs of the fire department I think I think from my point of view and I'm just one person so you all chime in um I again just based on um on on Mark's statements about this that they can make it work I think the 21,000 is higher priority and then secondarily try to find um some of the sick time overtime uh whatever for for the fire department after the fact and I'm not choosing police over fire Mark you actually are but you said that I I know what you're saying but like when you don't oh sorry this isn't going to be battle but actual when you choose not to staff one fully and to staff one fully that's where you are you're choosing one over the other I'm trying to avoid layoffs that's what that's what I'm trying get but I'm just I'm just saying it you know it is what it is that's all and what is what was the total number that we needed for fire I think that one was 2011 yeah roughly does that sound right Mark that 211 177 177 okay let me see what I can do I understand where the board's trying to get to yeah let me try to get creative I I'll work with I'll work with both Chiefs and and and all the other department heads and and um you know see what we can pull together right re realistically does it have to be the full 177 probably not we could probably get really put our heads together and try to figure out something that lands us whether it's during the day we didn't fill a sick day the there's options there yeah um again don't have a crystal ball so we can just do the best we can I think TI's point yeah okay so I think this gets back to what you were getting to at the beginning of the meeting though and and a little bit about um Chief Holmes talking about the the plan for the future and and potentially using the potential for a prop two and a half override to try to better fill the needs of the police department is I think we're looking at it in two different ways one is we're trying to get in under the levy limit which is what we and finance committee said we were going to try to do right if we have to pursue an override because we need to the schools need to whatever then we need to be looking at it I think what you said in the different levels because we can't we don't want to risk failing right so if we support that even if some of us don't right if we decide that the voters should have the opportunity to vote on it then we then we have different numbers but you know in the end I mean even if we came up with a couple tiers somebody could still come in and make an amendment to any part of it sure even a portion of it um but I still think it would be better to have sort of that menu item of the of the different levels available at town meeting so if we do that are we looking at and and schools are their own thing so the school committees will come up with um with their budget and whatnot so we're really talking more specifically about fire and police I I I think we need to be fully funding not cutting not laying anybody off um that's that's first priority obviously then um we're looking at a three new Patrol a deputy chief and a new dispatcher and the chief had said I mean if we do have an override and we split those up into different tiers or priorities you know one of the things that the chief had had mentioned a couple months ago is hey if we're doing an override do this one time and then that's it although we were talking about adding additional uh Patrol one per year to get up to 33 eventually um right but doesn't that I know it's not exactly and we're Crystal balling it but right adding Patrol it's it's a one time but then next year are they going to be coming in at 12% instead of 11% and and so my understanding if I could just try try to respond to that my understanding is once you pass an override unless you resend that override that override you'd have to pass an underride if wanted to bring the taxes back down but you got two and a half over that right correct right yeah or you have more excess Levy capacity sorry I was saying it to the microphone for all those yeah so you know if if we do that override for all these positions in one year it's a then you're not coming back and doing it but if if let's say we pull out the deputy chief and the dispatcher only did three Patrol well he still wants the deputy chief and and and another dispatcher that in the future are we going to have enough in our budget we're not going to have that kind of room in our budget again unless the mall takes off and the money is flowing in you know by the truck load which I don't see um so we have to make we don't have to make a decision tonight um but one of the things I think we should be doing is asking the chief um of those four positions if you had to break them up and along the lines that I was talking about in terms of priority um or tiers what what what's the most important to you like how would you break these up cops on the streets priority yep I could live with a half year funding for the deputy chief uh the dispatcher would fill the two open shifts on the midnight shift there's only one dispatcher on uh the two days off that flow within the rotation of the second dispatcher on the midnight shift so what what is what's your the the next question is what what Chief do you want to do with those extra two days that the dispatcher is now working well there's a need for somebody that would you'd almost have it like a half of a a part-time admin person can do a lot of different things sieges compliance all the compliance with State 911 training compliance uh scheduling supervision of dispatches uh public records requests assistance with Firearms licensing um so in that order the cops on the street priority the deputy chief is part of a succession plan I could live with a half a year funding uh and the dispatcher that is the third priority but I mean it's tough to let go of it because I mean it feels like to folks that have lived here worked here volunteered here like this is everything at once this is only about halfway of Everything at Once going to be a broken record but also say that we when we think about these budgets we're not just thinking about this year we're thinking about next year too so we have to keep that in mind as we make these decisions right any other questions comments Chief anything else that you want to let us know um I don't want to step on your uh your Authority or your prerogative or anything um other than to say that I mean the override is going to have to happen with the way that things are going with the schools is I don't see any way out of it um this is your time to run I'm an employee I work for you um but I mean I would do my calculations if I was sitting where you are based on the assumption that that's going to happen um just I feel your frustration um I actually sent Keith a text the other night telling him well said because he said something that needed to be said um and it wasn't easy and I know that you echoed some of that as did Tyler that you know I mean there's a number they could they could work off of a a draft number and then youd be able to plan going forward it's just that they haven't given you that number so right you have this side of the the government that's affected by that on what we're planning so well again it's our job to give them a number I couldn't agree with you more I appreciate you having this conversation again it's not a small request and um just trying to be uh the guy that delivers the message objectively uh and with the backup information I figured you want if there's anything else you want let me know I think the other thing um to keep in mind is the town meeting just approved the MBTA zoning which is additional 500 and something Apartments um the amount so town meeting approved allows for it right rather than voting it down like a lot of local communities did and one of the arguments was this is going to be an increase on our services our police our fire and our schools now granted the the whatever it is the 280 that are there now there's only 34 students if those numbers are accurate the apartments correct yeah the apartments there's 280 and there's 34 students if if those numbers are correct um which is actually lower than I thought it would be but obviously double that if if you're um uh or triple that number if if if the apartments are going to Triple in size um so and and police and fire have already been pretty busy up there at the apartments as well as at the Baymont so um you know the the the town had okayed all these additional housing units that could be built not this coming year but it it could be built in a couple of years if if if that moved forward um and the increase and the load on our service on our town Services would clearly go up so we need to keep in mind um that and that's one of the things that we said if I I know I heard at least one person say that you better be willing to fund the schools and police and fire if we approve this and it was approved so I don't have any other questions Chief thank you and thank you to everybody who helped put together the the PowerPoint thank you um thank you and chief dudas thank you for all the the information as well always helpful uh any other um Keith do you have any other comments or I I don't I um I I want if if you if you'd like me to I can hand out again the analysis we've done on on the transfer station um it would provide again it it would provide some funding availability for whatever the board decided to fund yeah it it's just meaning frankly that um the cost for somebody to buy a transfer station decal is going up okay um so I can hand that up tonight uh you guys can take a look at it we can talk about it more um you know what it means right now is that right now the the transfer station is costing the town a little over $200,000 a year to operate that is basically their fiscal 26 budget less the anticipated the revenues that we've received based on the permits for the last year uh if the board wanted to modify the amount uh of the permits that are the permit fees that are charged to try to make that that uh Department uh self self-funding um obviously you would need to increase the the fees I I've tried to keep the fees for uh the senior citizens the same and um have increased uh the the fee the fee amount for uh the individual purchasing the first fee purchasing the first decal it's significant you know it certainly is there's no question about that a lot of communities do do the pay as you throw which is this is would be something very similar without having to buy the the bags um again we can argue that whether or not it's it's Equitable or not to those who are using the transfer station uh but again it's There's an opportunity there to um free up you know 200 plus th000 to be reallocated someplace else if that's what the board wanted to do so we will when I say we uh the uh senior staff team will sit down again this week and um with the help of Kathleen and every everybody else will try to figure out how to um Identify some some uh some funding that we can reallocate to police and fire um without significantly impacting um the the services that and the employment of other of other uh departments if anybody has any suggestions at all that you'd like us to consider uh that we can provide in the board materials um for next Tuesday evening we'd be we'd be happy to do that so just as feedback I mean I see these I I I have actually curbside service and then we got a decal for taking excess junk to the transfer station anyways but I will tell you that our curbside pickup has gone up probably 60% in the past four years it's gone up through the roof and our um I I don't remember the last time we raised the rates on the decal here I can't remember we raised the rates in the decals last year um by about $20 and again we didn't the year before right and we in talking to to Sean over at Street trees and parks you know we sat down last week um and talked about you know bumping up the nominal amount we normally do uh it's tenably on the agenda for next week um and again just trying to try to get creative and how we can find a try to find a way to raise some some funds you know this is an option right um so what I was trying to do in this exercise was figure out how much more money would it cost uh a decal holder uh to have uh to to fully fund the operation of the transfer station I I this at the and I don't have it in front of me so I apologize the $300 plus dollars for for a permit 350 350 is is certainly a pretty significant bump uh from the current fee but to your point Mr chair um it's still well below what it would cost somebody if they wanted to have curbside pickup it's about half so um you know again I I tried to be more sensitive to the 65 and older Group by not bumping theirs up at all um understanding the challenges they're facing um and right wrong or different you know place the majority of increase on um users of the transfer station that are that are less than that are younger than 65 years old um so you know you've got that information you can debate discuss and think about um and and we will we will bring back um some some additional opportunities to um transfer monies around and and find ways to to try to meet the needs of the police and fire department um so this will increase $230,000 if I'm reading this correctly yeah I apologize I know there's extra copies I didn't keep one for myself so I apologize U but it would increase it would increase fees by about it would increase fees so right now it's costing it's costing the taxpayers 256 almost $257,000 to operate the transfer stations when you take the take the the budget amount less the revenue we receive by increasing the fees um as I've identified in the in the right on the right hand side of the of the paper you're you're you're increasing the revenues um you also you also decrease the budget by about 30,000 I did so in included in that budget is the reduction of the number of times we're we're we're brush chipping we're not being we're proposing not to be open on on the extra three hours on Monday night so that's what the reduction in the budgets are uh the revenues are revenues that we're already collecting we get money back um for a couple of different items that are recycled and you know and and frankly what this doesn't do which which pays you throw does do and I'm not I'm not advocating for pays you throw so after they come after after they paper they toilet paper your house for the for the library I don't want to paper towel on my house for the transfer station but I'll be doing it too I hate um pay you throw you know the pay you throw situation what it does is it incents people to recycle more you know so you're not throwing your you're not throwing your bottles your cans your your cardboard things of that nature in in a trash bucket you're putting in a recycling bucket so ideally you're not buying as many bags that's the that's the you know the the goal of that um it it works it's not that much different than what you're doing now uh it's just different and people don't like different so I get it and I respect it I've done both single use would go a long way single use recy single stream because people don't like dividing I completely agree and and and I think that would increase uh recycling as well because the easier you make it the more apt people are are going to do it right so um you might reduce some of the revenues that you're receiving now but again what you're going to try to do ideally is incent somebody to recycle the bottles the cans the cardboard all in one spot and um and so they don't have to bring you know four different containers to the transfer station which is what we do like with our curbside pickup we we have that so I just have a recycling bin that we put all everything in and then our garbage and then I still have the sticker so it's $700 a year for the curbside pickup now and it used to be like 350 and as a I guess to me nominal I know it's not nominal to everyone um but I mean you can fund this entire budget if you raised you know between1 $20 per senior senior and Veteran decals that would even like $5 or something so that it's not well that would bring it up to yeah it would bring it up to the 800,000 that you need because it's it's about based on the permits issued so I I need I need 7 I need 700 on the budget that I presented I need 7 $50,000 okay sorry so so I've I've identified yeah just over that amount of Revenue to um and again it there's no magic to to how I um how I propose the the permit fees I I frankly try to take um I tried not to impact people 62 62 and over um or veterans so uh again it's that's you're already you're already over with the proposed right I was looking at the the budget we're looking at in the budget book does not include this being self sustained no okay right now uh again for f for for for the for the calendar year for the last calendar year we have we have um raised about $530,000 in Revenue that's the information of the current fees y um and the and the the the budget that's that was proposed by the by the department less the current revenue is just about 700 $887,000 so that's the $256,000 difference right yeah um so I've I've reduced the bud I recommended reducing the budget with the suggestions from uh Sean uh and um and and looked at bumping up the regular and second decals as well as the replacement decal uh the one-day permits and the recycling only decals that we s sell for those who just go into recycle um to try to get to a balanced budget but you know you can do it you can assign fees any way you prefer to get to the revenue number you're looking for it's but this I mean this change solv 80% of the fire and police this this change this change this change provides about 260 70% we need we need 380,000 and that's 250 260 so it's like whatever 70 65% 7% yeah that's if but I mean that's a significant yeah but so I'm going from 240 to 350 for a sticker is going to and it really would be four 430 if you buy a household sticker so yeah if you buy a sticker and your second sticker is now borrow the truck yeah but then you will make that Revenue no but like what's the I mean what are other communities sitting at I mean I I'm pretty sure we're low I don't know if we're low compared to everyone I I can I can try to gather information from area communities I'm not really sure we I think we can use just the communities maybe that uh either a butt Kingston or uh or our two communities away I don't know that we need to use the same communities that were used in the wage survey uh I don't think that'd be necessary in this case but um I can try to pull it I can try to pull all that information together it should not be hard to get um again it's just it's really dependent on the philosophy of the community what are they trying to what are they trying to achieve um but we can I I will get as much information I can I'll provide the board with a menu of uh additional revenues Andor cost savings um to get as close to um the funding needed to um restore to Public Safety yeah I I just you know I the exercise has been done I think later this week like I said we we've we''ve we'll we'll get some revenues from the state that will not be final but they will not they'll move less than probably half a percent yeah um so I'm confident that whatever the governor's budget shows for revenues uh will'll come in at awfully close to what those are we'll take a look at potentially where where we are with the ambulance ambulance billing and see if we can bump that a little bit again it's you're you you're I just I know some people look at free cash and say why why do we have so much free cash cash but it's it's it's it's primarily because we don't spend any Capital Money uh on anything but free cash so I think the community is always budgeted conservatively knowing that there's a need for that free cash and as we chip away at being being less and less conservative with our Revenue estimates um we still might meet we we still I assume we'll still meet the revenue thresholds we we assign it's just going to um impact the the you know the the the back end of the budget which has been Capital needs so um but I think the biggest goal is if we can hit uh if we can get fire taken care of and police taken care of in Terms of level service still getting the overtime the sick time not reducing any staff without an override and then for an override we're not even considering at that point Fire's budget is set it's just police and then maybe schools and and I it's it's a great goal and I'm happy that everybody in this room is happy to try to find that and I'm confident we will that's 46% of the puzzle so I'm not trying to be I'm not trying to be Debbie Downer at the end of the meeting right but and I think it's been said already but you know you've got another large Department that so at some point I think the Board of selectman has to set make a decision because it is your money it's it's your bottom line decision it's not the School departments they can ask for whatever they want it's it's the selectman's budget selectman's recommendation that goes on the warrant um so you know at some point I think a decision I don't know that the board of selectman should wait until March or April when you get the school budget which is where looks like it's going no we to have any any to have a a real good feel that you're going to be able to educate the community on why why an override of whatever the number is going to be can be successful uh every all the homework I've done on overrides in the last couple three months has been you you got to get that number early you got to get it to the people and you got to justify it I think we saw it with MBTA zoning I think we've seen with other budget items in the past it's information is is pretty powerful to to have and to wait another 45 to 60 days well I I think we can watch their their public hearings which are coming up the first week of February and then they're going to meet and discuss it and they're going to talk about what what they may not vote but we're going to hear them talking and discussing and what what cuts are available we can always put placeholders together and we can we could always say Okay override tier a tier B these are our numbers um they can be adjust what's the deadline that we have to have the the warrant I don't have it FR me I apologize it's our books end of March yeah I've got I do have hang I took that sheet out no I got it right here someplace ER I apologize I have it front of have questions about other budgets too yeah I same topic I was going to ask you don't worry about it March 25th Rees the warrant now that date is not hard and fast that that can be pushed so I think we can put a number together in the month of February I I think that should be the goal have our number whatever it is in there if it needs to change but we're going to know probably within the first week of February because the um the state AIDS coming out this week should be fine-tuned by the beginning of February although sometimes they're later um and then and then we can move from there um before we close out tonight though Kim you have other questions about other parts I do I I just had one thing for this and this is just my personal opinion but for when we meet is it Tuesday guess we meet every week now um we didn't leave three weeks for yeah was evening out I personally I would like to see us try to get to these level Services through additional revenues prior to Cuts like me as a citizen I would rather pay $350 a month and see us lose staff or in a year sorry sorry that's a really high that's a really high uh dump sticker I would not use that anymore um at least I want to see that as an option is how can our Revenue solve this as opposed to us saying like Eric said Eric cron said cutting Library instead no I'm and obviously said lease quas and tickets that's what Eric Crone said but no no I I yeah that's my if any I would like to see Revenue changes before if anybody has any suggestions at all um you know again nothing's nothing's off the table so let us know we we we we can tell you why that makes sense or why we think it may not but um the more heads we can we can we can put together to try to solve this problem the better off we'll be so if you have any thoughts we're all ears do you want other people to go first yeah so I mean um I don't know how late we want to go so next week we're going to go through the questions that's what we're going to do I know but we're also doing some of this next week so um by all means yeah just start wherever you want to start all right um accounting yes question so the clerical so 51113 M parag Union looks like in 2025 was 53 and in 2026 is 116 yeah so we're shifting um you'll see a a corresponding reduction in the uh collector budget um we're shifting payroll the pay responsibility of payroll uh under the finance director rather than having it under the uh collector Treasurer got it that makes sense don't leave don't leave I made you walk over there trust me she'll have to answer questions okay um was under the treasurer before treasure collector I apologize maybe Kathleen remember I think it was it was under it was list I told you not to leave it was under the treasure okay that's fine um let's see what's this one Board of Health yes also clerical Union it looks like it went from 47 to 78 is that the uh nurse yes so the the I okay just curious so let me let me verify but I I feel very confidence the nurse but I will verify and provide just for some reason I thought yep that was hired before so I guess I I'm curious about the you know D yeah drastic increase yep um okay that's fine um was it because it was a down was it because it was a down period because didn't we wasn't there a we had someone come on and then they immediately left and we've been working with a grant a nurse that that's provided through a grant and I I let me just verify that and I'll I I'll be happy to I'll do I'll respond in writing so we can keep a track of all the answers sorry questions I think it's great no no it's fine it's absolutely fine um for Community preservation committee what is the $1,775 in office supplies so that's great question and and the uh the uh well-informed um admin who supports the uh the CPC committee and I discussed that last week and what that is is it it it's it's budgeted for and it comes out of the CPC funding for items that the CPC mated to spend money on it has been drastically less expended over the last few years than than the $1,000 budget I think that $111,000 budget has been in place now for at least the last three years okay I I do see in 25 with the actual being 1,800 yeah it's money that's come out of um or allocated from this the CPC funds there is no quote unquote you know if we reduce that I'm got to reduce a revenue so there's offset okay okay but we are looking at doing that anyways because frankly it probably is higher than it needs to be okay we're we're having a conversation right now with our CPC chair about a couple of things for Council on Aging yes I know we get reimbursed for some of that cost that cost there do you know how much we get back it goes to the general fund correct yes okay and and we have uh we have estimated revenues of just over over $100,000 interes in fiscal 26 is 103 uh we haven't received all of fiscal 25s yet but to date we received just under 60,000 and we received uh uh 100 almost 106,000 in fiscal 24 and I've got this all you know beautiful spreadsheet created by our incredibly capable fire director for anybody who wants copies there are copies there for you so while we're talking about unpopular ideas we have 235,000 in wage and Personnel we have clerical Union of 56,000 we have Labor Union of 94,000 and overtime of 500 this is an area where we've added staff fairly recently over the last I don't know years can just Council on agent oh COA they're um yeah that's it's significant amount okay um it is it it's just it's a it's a department where we've grown um so I guess this is an area where I would maybe want to look again at potential opportunities given that we only get 100,000 back and it's almost a $500,000 budget I don't know just something to think about maybe we want to keep it the same but sure um okay I'm almost out of Post-its guys I'm almost out of Post-its that's fine Harbor Master has um contract something R it just say contract R that's all I can see CU it gets cut off I was just curious what it was so we spent 1,500 but we budget 3,300 oh he says your microphone's off sorry um that I bet they can still hear though they can still hear anyways that's correct okay so that uh fee is for um putting the docks in the water in springtime and then removing them in the fall okay and do we have any idea what added funding is at the Bott no additional funding how much is that 500 but I just was like what's added funding can we just add that to everyone's budget just gives us more wi yes I like that can we add a couple more zeros to ours though um that's just for miscellaneous miscellaneous stuff we don't but what so I guess what I would ask is what what account should that be assigned to rather than just additional funding so we can talk about tomorrow yeah we can talk about that it just seems like an odd bucket there were there were two or three departments that had that in there I thought I caught them all but EV did not Harbor Master um so again more on popular conversations we talked about law firms we talked about interviewing law firms we got proposals we never did anything with that um I'm not saying we should or shouldn't but this budget is based on our current current Law Firm um I don't know it it's something that we discussed interviewing and then we never yeah I think we I I it'd be I think it'd be worthwhile having that conversation again um I feel badly that we didn't you know take review them and I'll take responsibility for that I guess um because the law firms that submitted obviously took time and and expense to submit something to us but uh it would be something I think worthwhile looking at okay and I don't think that's all on yeah no I get it but um um you know at the end of the day the amount of money we spent on legal fees has dropped um you know the the uh the amount of money we have in our budget is is the are the fixed costs we pay for General Litigation Services uh as well as um labor on a monthly basis and then there's a I want to say it's about $35,000 addition to for items that may not be covered under the agreements that we have with our current Law Firm um but we we can look at that okay um I don't really have a question per se on this but I think it would be important for you to speak to the elimination of the assistant Town planner in this budget and the combination with the building department if you just want to touch on that sure so the one the one the one impact to um existing labor in the in the operating budget excluding uh Public Safety uh was the was right now we have a uh part-time assistant planner position in the budget that that position was was reduced from Full to parttime in the fiscal 25 budget um in the fiscal 26 budget because there is such a decline in activity in the building department and the planning department um I had conversations with our new building inspector as well as our planning director um and just feel as though I can't justify you know two two full-time certainly even even a full-time and a part-time right now with with you know there are as many planning board beings cancell as there are being held um and then the build the building department again because of the um the water moratorium and whatever other issues there are you know the amount of permits that are being being applied for have dra have dropped drastically and the revenues reflect that um so I looked at it a few different ways you know could you could you have a part-time person each department um you know it it would at least on paper um be the same estimated cost the problem I I guess the concern I had with that was I think the when somebody walks into the building and wants to speak to somebody to get a per some sort of a permit in the building office there should be somebody there um to answer the question so having you know having a full-time person support both departments uh while we are in this slowdown um is something that I think is is reasonable both department heads um I don't want to say they're not happy about it but they understand uh the situation and um I'm not opposed I guess I could say that um and you know ideally it's a it's a it's a temporary reduction in in the amount of of Staffing we have to support those departments because um you know I expect in the next couple of years that things going to start to turn around and pick back up again and if and one of the costs of doing that to offset the revenues we'll be collecting is trying to uh provide additional Staffing for those two departments thank you I know you spoke to that before F watching this meeting happy to answer any questions you have this one I might get something thrown at me from from that side of the table Recreation sure so I have you want to know I have I have the answer for you so there's a thousand oh good you better there's a thousand so Kim was kind enough to reach out earlier today to ask to to give me a heads up on some of these questions which has allowed me to be able to answer most of them um the recreation department the question I was asked anyway is was was $1,000 for programs yep and $1,000 do are for primarily for um the um concerts at the park okay in the summertime and um going a brain cramp um thought the the event on Main Street The Luminaries are funded out of those so those are kind of more CommunityWide that's what the budget is for the okay the uh the the cost to run the recre the just a specific Recreation program um is is funded through the the um revolving fund that they have so user fee so they pay for the service they so $1,000 is is um you know the Broad Town thing not so much a recreation thing just where it's where it's been budgeted for well I don't think we can get there today but I would love to see Recreation funding itself too but I know it's too big of a budget right now but wouldn't that be great what what part of what do you mean I mean the whole department yeah wouldn't that be awesome it would be anyway just p in this guy I don't have that solution right now cuz obviously there's a lot of stuff here I mean but the beach stickers would have to increase substantially maybe we need to be looking at it yeah I'm not I'm not saying we do it in one year I'm just saying this might be something that we've been talking about making the transfer station fund itself for a while and we're making incremental changes to get there it's just an idea is that it's a in some ways when you think about it Recreation is it's user based right so having more of the costs born by the users makes logical sense I don't know if it's possible but and maybe not this year but might be worth exploring sure yeah I think you have to take into account to all of the properties that are managed there and how you know the amount of money right no but it's it's a thought it's just you got to look at opachinski you've got to look at re you have to look at grey Beach all of those properties and how much it cost to manage that so and how much of that falls under facilities versus parks and wck sure and the kyso user fees and sure all of that would would have to be taken into account yeah food for that yep um almost done I swear something for this this board to consider and it's not it's a little bit it's nickel and diming but we could consider waving our stiens it's 4,200 bucks we could we could say we're not taking it we could take it out of the finance committee's article then it could be out of the budget so just think about it it's not a real number $4200 total but it is and I will say um so I guess I'd want to double check we we did have a board of assessor who has said they would they they would uh forfeit forfeit the stien that they get to be on a board of assessor and I explain to the ass I thought we had a budget for that properly if they wanted to donate that back to the town of Kingston they could certainly do that I think so I think the way I understood it but correct me if I'm wrong we'd have to amend the finance committee article which which says who gets stiens and who doesn't and what that amount is so if that were zeroed out for our five then it could be zeroed out in the budget it would take it's $4,200 but at this point it's more of's I think it's a total across the board minus the ones that are in the office 40 hours that we kind of thing oh for for what all of them for all the stiens well you can't take away the stiens for the folks that are on the insurance well the town clerk The Collector Treasurer I he's talking about I'm no I'm talking about like volunte I'm talking planning assessing water sewer I think that's it yeah Recreation not no so it's just those and and there are folks on those boards that are receiving benefits so they need to receive some sort of a stipend in order to be eligible for those benefits yeah I guess I guess I would be talking about just the yearly I don't know no I mean I know like school committee School committees across the state there was one swamp Scott they get paid like eight grand a year school committee and Kingston get zero but in order to get benefits at the time that we because we did look at look at it nobody on school committee needed benefits at the time but we looked at other school committees that were doing and they said if you just paid a dollar then you can go in and and do that so if you if you literally change it said that everyone's just paid a dollar I mean I don't do benefits I don't else we don't do it anymore okay so the board of Select but none of our members have been on the board they were grandfathered in yeah so you know what that's probably not even an issue anymore just there for us no for the other boards yes um some another topic that we probably were remiss in not talking about sooner um tax title properties so we almost had an auction once we have uh new tax tile custodian that's something that we should be talking about at some point in the near future it is again more potential Revenue so and that's on long term we're thinking about it that way so just want to make sure let's let's check in with with Jim and see how that's going I'll do that y see if we can't move the needle there um the Town Administrator proposed budget for the town clerk reduces the overtime request by 2,000 is that going to be a significant impact for him no okay um that might be that might be it yep that's all I had I just have one general question and that is is there any shortterm or is it all longterm or is there maybe even no budget gains from a DPW because that needs to happen so um included in this budget and I I frankly uh failed to mention it in my presentation but in if you look through the budget there is um I've included in the budget $30,000 for a wage adjustment for a public works director um so there is going to be an increase in in in wages if if if a public works director moves forward I think you're going to save money long across the board um collaborating on on different projects y um or you know bidding or um just and again I think the I think that people have done what they what the best they they could do in the situation that they're in I think there's an opportunity and it's tough to quantify um but I think just by having the public a public works director who's in charge of streets trees and parks Water and Sewer at least for the day-to-day operations they can you know there's I think there's an opportunity to potentially save money on engineering for example because I think all of them use different Engineers um so to be able to collaborate that uh to work together to have one engineering firm um you know I think there's going to be money that's going to be able to be saved and and and more than offset the increase in in the salary that you'd have to um I think pay to find somebody who has the the experience and the capability of um filling that position okay do you foresee other potential Staffing changes so currently those departments most of them that would fall under DPW include a superintendent and a foreman do you foresee that continuing or would we potentially consider restructuring all of the Departments so the the the public works department if I understand what your question was the public works department would no longer have a superintendent that position would be replaced by a public works director you'd have a foreman there but water and sewer still have superintend and forance whatever water yes okay and you know I think at that you know as as as attrition comes forward does it make any sense or as just experience with having a public works department is there a need to have have a a superintendent moving forward as as you know whether because of attrition when they have the opportunities to review you know positions like we do with every position that opens up is this is this what we need moving forward or is it not um I think I think uh just the experience of if a public works department is established you know give it give it a little bit of time and I think um that will probably answer its own question sure um so yeah well that helps thank you sure any other questions I thought one more yeah go ahead um the budget that we have here does that does that include any of the potentially reducing hours at the library or eliminating some of the brush chipping getting rid of Monday nights at the transfer station okay I just wanted to make sure I know we talked about it yeah in my budget message there's there's there's I've identified um eliminating the Monday the Monday evening hours of the transfer station and again I did that there was a saving certainly but in speaking to um Street streets and parks there are the activity up there during those those hours is minimal um the brush chipping reducing it from I think 7 to three um often times you know the they they couldn't find people staff to staff um the brush triing tripping trimming at the transfer station if there was a storm or something out of the ordinary you know we would probably open it up additional hours to help people get rid of their brush um I proposed to reduce the library budget by $25,000 that's included in this in this in my budget recommendation and I and I I did it as a as a just a a gross amount for two purposes one um and the primary one frankly was the my the the librarian happened to be out of town on vacation when I was trying to finalize my budget and I thought it would give the library trustees additional flexibility as to uh what where they could find Savings in their budgets so they wouldn't risk losing their accreditation with the state so that 25,000 is in now okay we're also the high the expensive Health Plan drops off this the two most expensive Health Plans leave uh or are no longer offered J after July 1st or after and I've I've accounted for what I believe to be very conservative reduction in um the health insurance because of the elimination of that I think of $70,000 okay so um I think it's going to be more than that but nobody can really tell us right and i' I'd rather again estimate higher than what it's going to be and instead of coming back later at a later date okay thank you great questions any any any more me no I think I'm done and if it's okay with the board okay if it's okay with the board I'll I'll provide the answers to the board and I'll post those on our website and also give them to the fincom because they've already started reviewing budgets so just so people all have the same answer might might save them save them a question I agree and and it we we have to question them so um that was great uh any other questions that we have for next week um if you guys think of anything before our meeting next Tuesday um it'd be great to to let Keith know ahead of time time like like Kim did so that we had answers the the only thing from me would be after next week if we can give if you can just send it to me because I'm the one that does the newsletter thing an exact breakdown of what's going to be gone at this budget that we're you know just so just so people are starting to get aware of this is what this equals so what's including the town administrator's budget for service cuts no problemo too yeah all right uh anything else that we need to know no I I appreciate you guys coming out for an extra meeting I know it's a tough time of the year but I think having this conversation tonight just helps the debate next Tuesday and I appreciate the Chiefs coming out again I know we kind of wanted to do this last week but um you know all of this was too new we needed to kind of go through this and then and then ask our questions so we appreciate both you guys coming out um a lot this year um it's good for for the folks at home to know as well you know kind of calls uh you guys have been doing and what what those um statistics look like um increas in calls and and whatnot and how that that affects services and and clearly um Chief Douglas um you know that was helpful seeing that the six-minute thing you know I I wasn't aware of that statistic and that's helpful knowing that we're at um around 53% of our calls get what's that that they haven't I just got it today yeah we'll get it up there so we have a budget you know we have a budget tab in the front page and everything that gets distributed to the board gets placed up on that so that'll that'll be up in the budget uh in that budget tab sometime probably tomorrow along with if it's okay with the chief to post his PowerPoint we'll do that as well yes and what I would say is as I said to Keith the same to both of you if you want to provide me the info for the newsletter for when we get to that point what's decided and yeah so people know cuz I don't want it it's not scare tax I want people to know exactly what's going to happen totally agree all right um what I do with the agenda thank you thank do we have my comments n no all right um and no Town administrator's report uh any comments from the from the board I think I've done enough talking for today that's okay hopefully we'll we'll have more and next week we'll have more cuts and we'll find additional revenue and things will work out great uh so our next uh regular meeting is um next week uh at 6:00 pm um with that if anyone would like to make a motion to adjourn motion to adjourn second all right all those in favor I we are adjourned e