So that's a great deal. >> I mean >> Oh yeah. Are you guys all set? >> Uh, >> yeah. >> All right. So, stand by
>> in five, four, three, two, one. >> All right. Uh good evening everyone. Uh welcome to the December 1st, 2025 meeting of the Long Meadow Select Board. Uh we have a joint meeting with the school committee and the finance committee. So I will ask them if they
would like to open their meetings. We have a we have Erica for finance. She doesn't have >> Okay. Uh Erica, if you'd like to open up your meeting. >> That's my problem.
>> Okay. And how about our school committee? Um, I'm not sure if Michaela is actually getting in because she is calling me as we speak. Um, so she might not have it. So, I'll go ahead and start for us. Um, we'll call the school committee meeting
to order. Um, and just do a quick roll call for attendance. Jamie Hench >> here. >> Kate Bean >> here. >> Um, Michaela, if you can hear me. >> She might not be able to. Oh, >> there you are. Is anyone else from school committee online? Can't see a
list of people. >> Sorry. Any better now? >> They're working on audio. Hang tight. >> Um, is there anyone else from school committee on the call? No. Okay. Thank you. >> Okay.
>> Um, I will start with my select board script. >> This is select board chair Josh Lavine. I will be confirming that all members and persons anticipated on the agenda are present and can hear me. Members, when I call your name, please respond in the affirmative. Dan Zero >> here. >> Beneath Mavathy >> here.
>> Andrew Lamb >> here. >> Shelley Maynard Dwalt >> here. >> Staff, when I call your name, please respond in the affirmative. Lynn Simmons >> here. >> Mike Barbie, >> not here. Peggy Sheldon >> here. >> This open meeting of the Long Meadow Select Board is convened in person and via Zoom webinar as posted on the agenda
and town's website identifying how the public may join. There is no chat or Q&A function. All the materials for this meeting are available on the agenda posted on long meadowmma.gov. The public is encouraged to follow along using the posted agenda unless I note otherwise. This meeting will feature
resident comment. For residents attending the meeting in person, please raise your hand when we get to the comments section of the meeting and I will call on you to approach the microphone. For residents participating in the meeting via a Zoom webinar format, please use the raise hand icon at the bottom of the screen. The meeting
moderator will promote you to panelist, unmute you and give you permission to speak. If you join the webinar by phone, dial star9 to raise your hand and star six to mute unmute. Residents to wish residents who wish to speak will identify their names and addresses only. Each individual is afforded three minutes for comments. Please note that
this meeting is being recorded that some attendees are participating by video conference. Please remember to mute your mute the mute your phone or computer when you are not speaking. If anyone is in attendance is recording this meeting, please announce yourself now. >> Okay.
>> All right. Uh we'll start our joint meeting. And uh first off, we have the financial forecast presentation. >> Thank you, Select Board. Uh my name is Ian Kington. I'm the finance director. Um, this is a project that is a
culmination of many months of work. Um, and it started back in March. So Lynn and I went to a training by the Financial Management Resources Bureau that went over some forecasting templates that the Department of Revenue
had built and gave finance directors, town managers, and administrators tools to better understand and interpret the data that they have in response to their financial information. So, what I have for you today is a high level overview
of that model that was built. Now, this model looks at a five-year historical and a five-year projected for the town of Long Meadow. Um, I'll go over today some things in particular. Those things being a historical look at our revenues
and expenses, a look at specific expenses being um pensions, oped, employment benefits, school costs, and debt and then give a broad projection as
to the next five years and how that will look for the town and some important things that I want both the select board and residents to understand about the position that we're and and help make better decisions. Now, while um they're working on pulling up the slides, I can give a broad
overview of what what you'll be looking at here. There won't be a lot of words. This is strictly graphs, and I hope to um go over specifically what each of these graphs um represent and are looking at. There's a lot of different
data here, and there's a lot of data that isn't here. What you won't see in this presentation is any sort of sensitivity analysis or um scenario driven. This is strictly looking at what we've looked at historically and what we have historically projected in the
future. So there won't be any anything in the way of um special or odd predictions. Now on top of that um this is something that is always um in motion with any
kind of projections. the further out you go, the less accurate they become. So, I caution anyone from relying on this data wholly because there are many things that can impact the data over time. With that being said, um I would
appreciate if all questions were held to the end as I want to make sure that everything is gone over within the presentation itself before we jump to any questions. Sure. Any Ian, what was the presentation where you
where you learned about this? >> So, there were meetings held in I believe it was months in mass and what they did is they had two separate meetings where they went over one how to use the forecasting model and two um
different scenarios and tools that we could use within the model. So, the eventual goal is to share this model with the board. So you can see a a multitude of different things. You can see historical revenues, state aid, local receipts, available funds, uh
position control, which highlights the entire um staffing of the town, colas, which will be helpful for future bargaining sessions within town unions, as well as a look at net school spending, snow and ice, and other
things. This is a really encompassing database and I think the important thing for me to realize is we have a lot of this data. It's just using it effectively. I brought also today our ACER which is the financial statements that are prepared by our auditors. Many
of our data comes from this database as well as within our munis system which is what our town accountant and assistant town accountant uses on a daily basis to do our budgetary basis of accounting. Um can you go to the previous slide
please? So why are we doing this? Well, one, um, it's also recommended by GFOA, which is the Government Finance Officers Association, who states that a community should have at least a five-year
forecast as to the financials of a community in order to better understand both the historical context of how we got where we are and two, what is coming down the road. So this model is hopefully able to allow you to
understand the pain points that both Lynn and myself see and create the basis for future select board decisions both within your purview and hopefully in the future. You'll see within this presentation a couple of main key points. Health insurance, pension
obligations, um employee benefits in particular costs are all rising unpredictably. We see this in the form of cost of living adjustments both as a resident and as a commercial entity. U with a multi-year plan, we're able to link financial
policies that are set by the select board to our long range goals. These are both sustainabilitydriven, housing driven, service expansion so that we have a bigger strategy rather than short-term patching. Um, lastly, long-term financial planning supports
transparency and builds trust. As both the select board and myself understand, the goal is ultimately to provide the residents the best understanding as to what we're looking at so that they can truly grasp the difficulty of the decisions we have to make and know that
we look at their best interests at heart. So the first slide goes into a five-year historical look at the revenues that the town generates. You'll see at the bottom our biggest piece of revenue that we
generate is the tax levy. So the tax levy makes up about 70% of the total revenues coming in. Now you might ask the question um within town reports it shows closer to 80%. Now, that is
correct when we're talking about the general fund as a as a standalone thing. In this case, we're looking at the total revenues that are generated by the town. So, what is that? What does that make up of? State aid. This is your chapter 70 funding that the schools get. This is
unrestricted general government aid. Uh local receipts. This is your motor vehicle excise tax. This is your investment income. This is your ambulance receipts. Available funds. This one is a little different. Excuse me. This is our free cash appropriations,
any money that goes towards PEG access, um ambulance reserves, bond premiums. So, you see there's a very different um amount each year as it comes to the different revenue breakdown that we receive. The biggest piece is our tax
levy. Uh the town is over 90% residential funding. So, you'll see that the change in tax levy is very stagnant on a year-to-year basis, and there's not a lot of growth. This growth is normally driven by our new growth when that comes
from additions that people do to their houses um and other projects held within the homes. Otherwise, you see small commercial entities and or industrial projects that buy new um property and
that's also captured within new growth. So with this alone, you'll see um that revenue is pretty slowly generating over time. So with that being said, going into our expenditures, you'll see on this slide,
next slide, thank you. Uh you'll see on this slide, there are two or I should say three main items that make up the majority of our expenditures. Um the first being education. This makes
up the largest piece of our um town expenditures. The next being debt service. Um and then following that is our enterprise funds andor public safety. You'll start to see as we move through
the presentation that debt service is becoming a larger piece of our um total expenditures. Peggy, can you zoom out just a little bit? Thank you. That's perfect. So, as you see over time, um this continues to be a
breakout of pretty similar um line items. You'll see your um debt service in dark blue. You'll see your education in the light gray. Um you'll see employee benefits in the dark gray,
which is what I'll lead into next. So just to give a broad overview of the expenditure detail for the last five fiscal years. >> Yep. Thank you. >> So talking about education, education is
far and away the largest expense that the town generates on a year-to-year basis. This is both through the residents as it is something that they demand and and expect and as well it is the goal of the select board and or past
select boards to fund education as is a it is it is a hallmark of our town. Now there's a trade-off with that. So the graph that I'm showing you is a school aid analysis. Desi Department of Education um provides databases each
year which goes back to about the mid 90s um about what schools are required to spend their fund what what communities are required to spend on schools versus what they actually spent on schools. Now for the past for fiscal
year 20 to fiscal year 25 law meadow spent over what was required by net school spending. Now when I say net school spending what is that? So there is the foundation budget which is the
minimum that schools are required to spend based on their communities that drives a number of factors that drives population that drives um income levels amongst other things. Um, I'm sure Marty
could speak to it better than I could, but in terms of understanding, this is very important to see not only for Long Meadow, but just to understand how are we comparing to other communities. It's one thing for me to
say that we are spending more than what is required. It's another thing entirely to understand how do we compare to our neighbors. So, as a helpful piece, I compared Long Meadow in the past uh five
fiscal years to a couple different communities. Ammerst, East Long Meadow, Hampton, Wilberham, Northampton, and I threw Welsley in there because I wanted to see how we compared. Um Hampton Wilberham
in the past 5 years has spent very close to if not just over their net school spending. He saw me was very close as well at about 107% to about 104%. Now, Long Meadow has historically spent
about5 to6 million over their net school spending. Compared to Northampton, Ammerst, um they spend upwards of 10 to 20 million over their NES school spending
requirements. So what that takes away from me is communities that want to invest into their education choose to and the residents support this. The trade-off with this is other factors, but it seems
that to me we are competitive in the sense that the communities that continue to invest in education will choose to do so despite the challenges that it might create. Next slide. Yeah, thanks. So, what's the
other piece of this big um cost that we have driven? The next piece is our employee benefits. So, those are made up of three main pieces. Our retirements um which is driven through the Hampton County Retirement Bureau. Now, as a
caveat, the retirement only equates to town employees. Um these school employees fall under the mass teachers retirement and is not part of our annual contribution. That is a separate contribution that's funded by the schools only. The next two pieces are
health insurance which is for employees and health insurance retirees. So as you can see um this makes up about 8 to9 million and pushing towards $10 million of our budget. Now, what does that mean in terms of the actual budget
itself? Well, as of 2020, 14% of our budget was spent on employee benefits. We are reaching about 17% as of 2025. Now, it's important to know that these are
actuals. What I will show you in the future will be projections and they will be based on our historical figures. That is a 10% increase in health insurance for retirees and a 7 and a half% increase for health insurance for town
employees. These numbers here do not always equate to those exact amounts. But I want you to understand that employee benefits are continuing to increase as we bring in better, more competitive wages for staff, which
allows us to better have a long-term future when it comes to employee staffing. Next slide. So the next piece of this is our pension. Slides seven and eight you will see show the Long Meadows portion of the
pension as well as Hampton County's portion of the pension. So you saw in the previous slide we spend about three and a half to about 4 and a.5 million each year on our retirements. So you see that as the light blue line which shows
the town statutory contribution. The red line indicates our funded status. We have treaded around 50 to 60% in the last five years. And the goal of the Hampton County Retirement Board is
to have the Hampton County Retirement System fully funded by 2036. So what does that mean for us? It means for us that as we continue to bring on new employees, our town's proportionate
share of the net pension liability grows and our town statutory contribution goes up. Now, it's important to know also what our contribution is. Hamn County requires an 8% contribution from its communities that is calculated through
an actuarial determined contribution. We receive these reports every two years and they determine how many people are in the plan and the proportional share that each community is required to pay.
Now you can go to the next slide. Uh this slide shows the overall net pension liability. So this is your pension assets less the overall liability. So this is the net liability that we owe.
So, as a group, the Hammond County group has about a $400 million unfunded liability as of FY24. Uh, the data was not yet available for 25. This is important because Hamen County
has been historically low on the funded status compared to other communities. Thankfully, we are not the worst. That's Springfield. But we are in the bottom half of funded
status. Now that is a question of Hampton County Retirement Board itself as to what they're funding and what they are looking at for data. But I want the board to understand that
when we look at our obligations as a whole, a big piece of that is our pension funding status and our and our pension contributions. Now the other piece of the equation is our OPED or other um postemployment
benefits. You can go to the next slide. This is a pay as you go system. So we could put in a million dollars a year or we could put in no dollars a year. There's no state requirement to fund this at the moment. Now in the last five
years we have grown or I should say we have decreased our pension liability or OPED liability substantially and we've reached almost 30% funded as a town. I think that's very helpful to understand that there's a lot of growth that have
come from uh investment returns and we've also made an effort in the past couple years in order to put larger contributions into the OPED plan. You'll see um as we go on that it becomes
harder and harder to fund OPED at a full level given the different um challenges that we faced in the most recent budgets. So what I want to instill on the select board is to understand that we have we
are on a good trajectory but we should still consider what our goal is in terms of funding the OPE if we want to do it in a more near-term that requires different um considerations than if we want to push it back much further.
The next slide shows our excess levy capacity as a percent of max levy. And what the heck does that mean? So, as a community, we are allowed by Proposition two and a half to levy no more than two and a half percent on our property taxes
at a given year. Now, there's some other factors that go into that. There is new growth, which is on and above the 2 and a half% that we have, but there's also a maximum allowable levy and a levy ceiling. The levy ceiling is driven by 2
and a half% of the town's equalized valuation, which we can go no more than that. Once we reach that point, we would have to cut um we'd have to cut our revenue projections in order to get below that. The maximum allowable levy
is the maximum that we're allowed to set that year without going to an override. So as you can see in the last five years um with the fiscal cliff um from 2020 to 2023 um we were starting to build up excess
levy capacity due to the fact that the town's valuation was reaching that fiscal cliff. Now thankfully in 2024 and 2025 the town has seen doubledigit
valuation increases as a result of um better real estate markets and sales sales data that has driven our valuations much higher that has allowed us to fund to the maximum and remove any
excess levy capacity. So when we think about that's fine, you can go to the next slide. When we think about um our overall revenue picture by leaving money on the table that allowed us to not reach the fiscal cliff, but
the trade-off with that is those funds are no longer able to be accessed. So now that we are levying levying to the max, we are taking full advantage of those funds. So what does that mean for our reserves?
Well, as you can see in this chart, this chart looks at our stabilization funds and our free cash balance. Our free cash balance has been pretty consistent around 2 and a.5 million to about 2.8 million in the last 5 years. Free cash is to be used for one-time purchases or
at least is recommended to be used for one-time purchases, which allows us to do u major projects that we would not otherwise not be able to do. Our stabilization fund, as you can see, has grown substantially over the last five years. This has been a concerted effort
by the select board and the voters to vote to fund this reserve. This has allowed us a couple of things. One, by reaching um a large stabilization fund balance, this has helped us with
borrowing. uh Fitch, S&P, and Moody's all look at communities reserve balances in order to understand where they are, where their creditworthiness is. And given the fact that the town has made a concerted effort to stuff money in the
piggy bank in its stabilization funds, this has awarded us lower interest rates on our borrowings. This is very helpful when we look at a borrowing such as a middle school, which is coming in the next year. The trade-off with this is those funds
are locked up in the sense that they require a twothirds vote to pull out from. Now, that twothirds vote is a select board policy which states that these can only be used for emergencies andor
extraordinary events. So when we reach our policy targets for the stabilization fund, this is helpful for our borrowing, but it prevents us or I should say it heranges us from allowing the use of
funds for other either more important needs or one-time needs. Now going to the next slide, we see what the benefit of this is. This slide looks at the interest revenue that the stabilization fund has
generated in the last five years. Now, as you can see, the last two years have been substantially higher and that is a result of two things. One, it's a result of higher interest rates um both through the work of our treasurer and the resulting marketplace.
But two, as the fund continues to grow, more interest is generated. As you'll see on the line chart, the stabilization fund percent to general fund revenues, there is a select board policy that states once the fund reaches its policy
target of 10%, the select board has the ability to use interest revenue in order to put towards one-time expenditures or capital projects. This is something that the select board has voted in the last year which has given the town greater
flexibility to target and work towards capital projects that would otherwise not be funded. This is a result of work by the finance committee and I want to thank them for their work on this because this is really important for giving us better flexibility in the
future years. As an aside, um FY 2425, um the policy states that it has to be the audited um financial statements interest revenue. So there's a time delay on when these funds are available for the select board and um I will be
meeting with them later this year to discuss what the um potential use of these funds will be. So our biggest piece and our most important piece is our debt service. So
as this chart looks at a historical and going into the future years of our town's debt service, the red line looks at our percent of debt service to general funds which is a select board policy which states that the general
funds or I should say the debt service expended within the general fund cannot exceed 12% of the general fund expenditures. Now, this was known with the middle school borrowing taking place, and I want to stress that to the
members of the public and the select board as this was intended with how we structured our debt in prior years in order to have the funding available for this project. FY27 and FY28 represent the first two years that this project is
coming online. And we will see um that only the middle school is included in this projection. Um we have had some borrowings approved at prior town meetings and those are not yet included in this projection due to
them being enterprise related and we will have some different discussions about those. I didn't want to include them in the presentation today. Um if you go to the next slide um I want to highlight what we're looking at for our debt. So there are
two different types of debt or I should say three but in this instance there is debt that's excludable that that debt that is excludable is the result of a town vote to have the life of the debt
or the payment of the debt over the life of the loan excluded from the town's operating budget whereas it is paid for through the residents through property taxes. This is what we have historically done with larger projects in order to
not um limit the flexibility of the operating budget on such things. As you'll see with the light blue line, total debt service not excluded is relatively small in nature and is for our more it's for our smaller projects
that might have a 5 to 10 year life cycle so that we can continue keeping our borrowing capacity at a consistent level. As you'll see with FY20 through 26, there is a concerted effort by my predecessor to keep this debt at a
manageable level. And this was intended for the middle school borrowing that is taking place. The next slide shows our Proposition 2 and a half debt service specifically. And I'll um highlight the red line which shows
the excludable debt to property tax. This is another select board policy which states that the percent of excluded debt to property tax shall not exceed 12%. Now this is again the result of the
middle school borrowing and is something that we have spoken to our bond council and Moody's about in our most recent ratings call. they were anticipating this and it is something that they are aware of in terms of the actual u future
borrowings. It is my um it is what I want to let the select board know is that with our policies in place, there will be a review of the debt management policy later this month in order to better um figure out what we know we
what we want to do with future borrowings in order to make sure that we stay within our policy targets. Now, with all this with all this talk of debt, we also have to look at what our capital improvement plan looks like for
projects that are not funded either through um our capital or future borrowings. This is a slide that was taken from our FY26 5-year plan, which highlights what
underfunded or non-funded projects that we have that need to be addressed in the foreseeable future. As you'll see, the brown bar on the top on the bottom represents how much we are estimating to put towards capital in the next five
years. That number does not go very far when you have 40 to $50 million um obligations through facilities, general general projects, enterprise funds, grounds work, and public safety. It's
very important for the public and the select board to understand that there are choices that we have to make and we make the best choices given the information possible and we cannot fund everything. It's just not possible to do.
With that being said, um I want to show the select board and the public on the next slide what it looks like going forward for our revenues, expenses, and costs. The first slide looks at a projection at our revenues going forward
into FY31. Now I highlighted earlier that as we go further out the revenues are less reliable due to the fact of many different factors of you know unreliable
data sources or changes in the marketplace that are unforeseen. You'll see here that still the large percentage of our revenues come from tax levies. We will see that in the projections
above. I am projecting that state aid will decrease over time as we are continuing to see that the state is having a harder time managing its own budget and has recently um through the
MMA uh given a presentation that in the last 10 years the state has continuously decreased local contributions to communities. that results in less dollars going into communities like Long Meadow. And I wanted to highlight that
as we look at revenues going forward. Local receipts is pretty consistent year-to-year. However, I want to highlight that within those local receipts contains the MGM funds. The MGM funds are something that is going away in the near future. And I will have a
separate slide andor presentation for the select board as to ways that we can handle that going away in the future. We can't rely on those funds forever and we need to make a plan in order to address those. The next slide looks at our projected
new revenues both in the form of taxation and state aid. So if you the big thing I want you to take away from this is we generate about $2 million of new revenues each year for the foreseeable future. When we think about
contractual obligations for the school, when we think about union contracts, colas for staff, it doesn't go very far. And this is really important to understand when we're looking at ways to balance the budget, when it comes to
things like OPEB, when it comes to funding new positions, when it comes to projects that the town wants to take on, it's all difficult to look at, especially as we see these revenues are not growing substantially.
Um going to the next slide, we look at our expenditure detail. Um as you see, our biggest pieces are our education in the light gray, our employee benefits in the dark gray, and increasingly so our
expenditures when it comes to public works. Um public safety is also a large piece of this. And what I what I want um the select board to understand is these are costs that are going up and are very
difficult for us to trim, especially when it comes to employee benefits. If we are to have competitive wages and have staff and to not have staff vacancies, these are costs that we need to fund. um ultimately leading to the next slide
which shows um our actual employee benefits over time. So the important thing that I want to highlight to the board as is at our current trajectory 20% of our budget will go towards
employee benefits by 2031. That is not a small amount of dollars going towards things that are contractually required and that makes it that much more difficult when it comes to balancing our budget in future years.
The next slide looks again at our school aid analysis going forward. And as we see um our school numbers continue to grow and that is the result of concerted effort by the town to fund these
dollars. Um this five to6 million is something that we have voted on consistently and the trade-off with that is there are other things that go unfunded. This is not an attempt to say that these are the wrong things that we
are doing. I simply want to point out that this is an important distinction for the public to understand that by choosing to fund education at the levels that we are we withgo or we forego other
things and if that is the goal of the public then we will continue to do so and that will be the resulting action. Now, I hope you guys take away from this that there are a lot of considerations that go into future budgets and also
planning when it comes to both long-term planning and short-term planning um for various different issues. And I realize that this is not even scratching the surface of all the different data sets that I look at when it comes to setting
our budget, but I hope this gives you a high level overview of what the decisions are in the foreseeable future when it comes to both revenues, expenses, and the costs that the town will have. >> All right. Thank you very much, Ian.
>> Take a breath. Um, I think we'll open up questions, anybody who's here. Um, I I had a few questions before we get started. Um, on the the aid spending, um, and you can give me a general number, but you know,
the school the big school big gray box is pretty big. What what is our percentage now and going forward? um in terms of what we spend over like >> no no just as a total portion of our budget.
>> Sure. So in going forward um education is about $41 million in FY26 and grows to about 42 to about 45 million 46 million by FY31.
>> And as a percentage of our budget, where is that generally? >> Um one second. slide number. >> Uh, no, it's it's not within the slides. Um, it's it's about well, without doing the
exact math, it's it's greater than 50% of the budget. >> Okay. And I'm not that is not a no >> knock on anybody. I just it's something that comes up in in discussions in our town a lot. >> Um >> this is 51% for 26.
>> Okay. Thank you. >> Um the the expenditure or I'm sorry the revenues the projections. I I know you're being conservative that we're not including >> you're not including any of the >> things that may be in the pipeline including the the church redevelopment,
anything at Glenbrook. Um, okay. And so now I I I know that we've had some interesting presentations lately and may most of our presentations are like this, which are a huge bummer about how what a pickle we're in. Uh but
we had one recently on the town buildings that are being underutilized and how maybe a potential revenue source or I know we have a big decision come up with Glen Brookke and I these are these are not things that are going to happen tomorrow or next week but um if you look
at our our our the way our expenditures are going it's a runaway train and we know that it's 3% there's contractual stepups and a lot of that is because we have the best schools in area and we fund that incredibly well
and I'm very proud we do that. Um, and so we have to pay our teachers well and our administrators, employees, but also uh for other issues that we have in town that we want to do better about like the DPW, we've uh police, fire, we've made a real concerted effort to pay people well
so they come to us and they stay here. Um, but part of that is they get raises every year and it there's nothing we can really do about that. Um, so I I just to me this says let's keep an eye on
revenue sources and see what we can do about that because we don't have we don't have a whole lot of choices. And um, so it's just something I I think as a board and everyone in town should be keeping uh keeping up in their their minds. Um,
anybody else want to speak or anybody else on from the other committees? >> I have a follow on to some of your comments. So, I appreciate this is a really good Ian. Um, so I as Josh was kind of alluding to, there are certain things that are in it that are positive and aren't in it that could be negative,
but it's I think the message is clear. Personnel, employees, employee benefits. It's like the biggest thing and all these other little things, new growth, your point is well taken that it's those are very minor and even like a Glen Brook property or the old town
buildings, they those are things that might be helpful and those aren't in it, but I'm sure they'll be minor. In the same the same token, you didn't include future borrowing besides the middle school like uh other roads, sewers, water, water, mains, fiber, things like
that. So that's kind of on the negative side of ledger. I I thought maybe Marty could comment on like again this is a probably a minor thing, but like can we expect some like economies of scale by consolidating the middle school into one? Like what what's the what order of
magnitude do you think that would be? Would it be quite modest? Would it be more than I think? >> Yeah, I'd say the way I framed it is sort of on the on the operational side in terms of food service and maintenance of the building which is obviously a time expense. um the buildings and grounds that you
know there'll be some savings there. I think terms of educational staffing I've thought about this as a way to better use to more efficiently use um existing staffing levels to better serve kids. I think right now we have a staffing model
that doesn't optimize, you know, the the staffing levels that we have. So in a combined setting we're going to be able to better serve kids with the staffing levels that we have. But I'd say in terms of maintenance and operations, I would imagine there'll be
some economy of scale for sure. >> So are you saying I'm sorry. So with regard to teachers and that don't ex that won't change that much obviously that's understandable because the number of students is the same. Yeah. >> But maybe administrative and janitorial >> I'd say it puts in a puts us in a place where we can use existing staffing
levels in more purposeful ways. I I I would not anticipate that it would um lead to reduced staffing levels among teaching staff. >> Right. Yeah. >> So I I think that that kind of to me
lays out the things that are missing from your presentation which admittedly are small in comparison to the big picture which is we're fighting a very difficult uh wave of you know when we can we can only go up two and a half%
and wages are going up 3% contractually and then 7 and a half% to 10% for health insurance. We're just continuing to try to do our very best to triage and prioritize. Thanks. >> Okay. >> Oh, go ahead, Chief. >> Yeah, I just have two question just because I'm not I think this is what
Josh was asking, but in your new uh revenues, which obviously you have the tax levy, but in there you had 300,000 plugged in over every single year. Is that what Josh Basically you just that wasn't actually put in as a projection? >> Yeah. So, thanks for pointing it out.
That's just conservative numbers as to what we have for new growth on a year-to-year basis. Um, you know, you'll see in the presentation for 27, um, that this is a little heightened. I should say this is lower than what we're projecting right now, but historically
we've seen about 250 to 300,000 of new growth on. That's why you plug 300 across 5 years, but that's just completely >> It's very hard for me to estimate what new growth will be um without looking at comps on a daily basis. >> Got it. And then my second question
because I didn't quite I I think I was hearing you right but I didn't quite follow. So you threw out Hampton over East Long Meadow. They were spending at what was required by the state. >> Yes. Welssley, Ammerst were 10 million over. >> Welssley, Northampton, and Ammerst were
10 to 20 million over. >> And then we're 5 million over. >> Five to six. Yeah. >> And the the thing I think that ties all that together, >> did we spend well? Are we who where are all those schools ranked within the state? I mean, I'm fine if you spend
flat if you're at the top of the state. It seems like we're probably spending a little bit above, but I would say we're probably ahead of the Welssley and the Ammerst from an educated like state. We got to be in that in that route. >> I think I want to get together with Ian on the on the on the comparison of net
school spending to actual spending. Um my understanding is in the case of Andy Sime that they are above required net school spending levels as well. So, I don't know if we're talking about required net school spending versus actual net school spending, but most
districts go well beyond um required net school spending. So, when you were if you were to look at the ranking of the of districts across the state, we're probably middle of the pack in terms of the the amount above required net school spending that we go.
>> There are districts out east that are spending 100% above required net school spending. there are um urban districts that are probably right at net school spending. So I I think >> I almost think in comparing more to Western Mass is more fair as to who we're competing against, who are we
beating them or we not beating them based off of what we're spending. >> I mean I almost look at as like your neighbor. He puts up something spends 100 grand that basically makes everybody's property go down. You know, that's probably not a good spend, but are we spending well and we're getting what we expect, right? So this so at the
at last year at our our budget presentation to the school committee and to the in the in the public hearing we presented some uh per pupil expenditure rates and we can we can bring that back to the committee and to the select board. I think >> I think that the case that I was trying
to make last year is is sort of the bang for the buck that we're getting. I think um there are >> many districts even locally that are spending you know well beyond what we spend on a per pupil basis. Y >> and I think the other thing to think
about is is um chapter 78 aid has incre although we we all kind of recognize rising costs in all areas um to the state's credit they have in recent years responded with more chapter 78. So I was
looking back as recently as FY23 it was at about 6.5 million and I think we're at about $7.8 8 million in chapter 78 for FY26. So it it really has gone up um in recent years and I think that's
because of the advocacy by school committees, by select boards, by communities across the state. So, it's sort of, you know, I think that's something that we probably can, you know, make a focus of our budget presentation is just to kind of zero in on that sort of that bang for the buck
concept, I guess, and to see where we rank >> spending wise versus results, you know. >> Nicole, >> I was just thinking back to what you were saying too about um percentage of town budget. Um I'm not sure if we have those numbers for other towns as well, but my understanding is that for most
towns in Massachusetts, they're looking at between 50 and 65%. Um often more like 55 to 65% of their budget is their school department. So this is not unusual as a town. For us, if anything, we seem to be maybe a little on the lower end there um as percentage of the
budget. And it speaks to that need to continue that advocacy for chapter 70 funding to keep up with the pace of increased costs as years pass because that is an important factor. Um and and as Marty had said, the state has done pretty well with increasing those
numbers, especially from what we see as our early numbers to where we finally land. Um and hopefully we'll continue to see that that need met. Right. And in a place like Long Meadow, we're in a particularly tough spot because our our property values are high for the area, but statewide they just aren't.
>> And um so we but our schools, we we spend so much on them, such a large part of our budget, but and I have harked about this for years. If we ever cut, that would be the end of our town. It was wild. That that's that's what people
are here for. Um, and I I don't think uh well, we know, everyone in this room knows, but if you look at our budget, there's only so much to go around on everything else. And you can't have a town. We need the schools to have the town, but you can't have a town if
everything's falling apart. And uh, we've all been in rooms where we're hashing out budgets, and it's not it's not an easy question. And I think that putting it up like this and and looking ahead is very important to um just to to
get a handle on it. And I hope people are paying attention and watching this because it is uh it's it's something we have we think about not just once a year at town meeting but we think about all year round because things need to be done but we have to uh we have to keep our schools to be the the pride of
Western Mass. Just a comment on when we compare the amount of the budget spent on schools in our town or others. It's there's when it's important to make sure you're comparing apples to apples. So, for example, the town might pay for a lot of
things for school buildings, it maintenance that doesn't go into the school budget. And I just want to make sure that when we are comparing things that we include, you know, our apples to apples. We saw that last week with uh like Esong Meadow has different staffing for a janitorial
>> than we do. So that's a yeah, >> good point. >> Cat, one other general question because I have no idea. I've been a part of this whole committee for a while, but who in our town goes after new business? Because I drive around town and I see opportunities, but it has to be
somebody. Are we actively pursuing those new business opportunities or like who does that in our town? >> What do you mean for like they can? >> So like the church the whole thing like is that somebody from outside coming in going I want to do this or do we have
somebody actively soliciting hey I've got this and this and this. You interested in doing this to create the new business? Is it is it a kind of a sit back and wait for it to come to us or are we actively going after that? I >> because I see all sorts of things that I would do if I was in full control of it,
but that's obviously not the way this town works. >> It's all privately owned. It's all privately. >> So there's no but we're not allow nobody solicits it in our town though that go hey we should be doing this as part of part of the town plan. >> I don't know what we could >> do not have an economic development team
or department or person. We do not have that. >> I was just wondering because I never really knew. >> Yeah, our commercial vacancy rate is very low. Um, we have sign we when there are vacancies, they're generally filled fairly quickly. But in terms of like we need, you know, this type of business or
that type of business, we don't have there's not a point person here that does that. >> Okay. >> Okay. I just wonder. >> No, it's a good question. I mean, because we do uh you see a lot of towns where a vacant spot opens up and a bank goes in and you only need so many banks.
>> Yeah. Um, no offense to Country Bank, but um, yeah, that's uh, it's a good point. But, you know, be some >> you can have a vacant school at one point, right? And then there's going to be opportunity and we don't whatever it is, it is. But you drive around town. I mean, I see different parcels and
different things like that, you know, all around. You know, some are residential, some are commercial, some should be commercial, but they're residential. Like, is there anybody driving that and go, is there any real money there to be made for the town? I just look at 300 grand and that's not much of a hurdle. I mean that's kind of
like if you're running the business and be like okay 300 grand really that's all we can do. If you don't have somebody concentrating on it you're not going to hit any sort of goal. I mean my that's just me looking at it from a bystander going you know and that's why I brought up the 300 grand but see it's pretty
weak goal you know if that were me and my like if that was my corporation I'd be like give me a break get out of here we're going to find somebody else to do it kind of thing. So, but if we don't have anybody concentrating on it like in some fashion, you're never going to grow revenue, >> right? Well, that I mean that's not our
goal. I think that's just what we anticipate in this what we've seen in the past and yeah, but I I think that Long Meadow, at least from my perspective, I I when I talk to clients, you want to be here. So, we people jump at us, which is good. Yeah.
>> So, we don't have to reach out. um maybe we could be missing out on something uh that is a creative solution out there, but you know, there's only so many parcels and we're so built out. Uh it's an interesting idea though. The other thing and that um I forgot to bring this
up before on new growth. I wonder we have no ADUs still and I I do wonder that could be it's slow across the state. I was reading today, but that could be a driver, but also it that is it could bring more children to uh more
services needed for school, more teachers, uh that we can't necessarily handle, but it's also that if people want to put in ADUs, they can, but it does it raises tax revenue and our property base >> uh accessory dwelling unit. >> Just to follow,
>> so good points, but just to clarify a few things in my view. Um it's not correct to think in my in my opinion that like commercial is like when you say things like switch residential to commercial for example. The the town benefits from the property taxes in either case and frankly we're probably
getting more new growth from people renovating their homes than we are from just for example switching a residential place to a commercial place which frankly is very difficult as we've seen to like change zoning and things like that in our town. We will benefit though if we from property taxes when we take a
public building or plot like Glen Brook and make it something like commercial or residential. So that's that's where the opportunity is. But to be honest, I don't think we like even with Glenbrook, it's to me not a huge percentage of what we have in this town,
this our little 3x3 town, you know. So I drive around too. I don't actually look around and say, "Wow, there's so much opportunity." I still look around our town and say, "Wow, we have a very small town and there's not a lot here." I do think the Glen Brookke property is uh is a once in several decades opportunity,
but it's rare. Um otherwise, >> yeah, I just and I I was just saying it is a small I was just more kind of driving around. I see more development by people who don't pay us, you know, you know, whether it's a a college, whether it's our own properties, whatever it is. I see more developed and
more, you know, basically building up in spend to where it's no revenue for the town. So then we don't have revenue for the town, whether it's Russell Fields, whether it's Glenro Fields, you name it. Drive around and go, okay, is this the best use of the town money? If this was yours as a personal unit, would you
leave it sit there like that? Would you do something different based off of the presentation we just saw? I don't look at that as GL. I I didn't look at that that was bad. I look at as an opportunity, but if you don't have something laid out as to what you're going to do, if you keep doing the same old thing, you're going to run into a
complete cliff at some point. Like we're all guessing. I've been on this for eight years and every year it's a cliff, but it's not really a cliff. But, you know, eventually 10, 15, 20 years, you are going to you're going to you're going to have an issue. So, if you don't have a plan around it, you're going to
you're going to let it come versus going and figuring it out. But I that's where I'm talking. I I see, you know, you know, universities not paying that amount and there's building out everywhere and I'm going, well, that's not right because there's a residential house that was taken for that or you know, driving by Russell. Is that the
right use? I don't know. That's not my opin. I'm just saying. And then you go to Glenbrook and I go is this, you know, this is town property. We don't collect any revenue from. What are we going to do? And who's going to be driving that bus? Because it's a big bus to be driving. So, and you could go around. I
could go street to street and go, okay, what are we doing there? What are we doing there? You know, if there's no one driving that and I'm fine with being kind of more passive, but I don't know whether being passive is going to get us to where we want to go because that looks like a pretty daunting task. >> The property owners might have a problem
with >> it. like the the town speaks. You know what the town has speak in the last five, six, seven years, they've made changes, you know, based off of people who propose things and you know, if you don't go out and actively see and figure out whether the town wants this or this,
yeah, the town could say heck no and they they get to choose. So Jamie, I definitely agree with you. When I looked at this in the sense that I don't think that the next budget might be a little more sobering, but this was not this I read a book recently that I think is apppropo. It's it's it was about
something very bad and it said things are never so bad that they can't get worse. This is this could be much worse and what could be worse is that in five years we've been so lucky that the valuations in town have gotten us backed away from the tax ceiling. If we come if
all of this was compounded with getting close to tax ceiling again, we're in big trouble. So it could be much worse. >> Thanks guys. or just a a comment and I know Ian to what you're saying we have to look at every opportunity to help us and whether
that's revenue or um I know we've talked about staffing optimization with many other departments but Lynn this is a question for you and not to put you on the spot but something I don't know if we're thinking about or if we've done but kind of operational efficiencies across all departments looking for ways
for us just to do more with less or do more with the same have we done exercises like that department by department. >> Um the most recent example would be DPW where we've done it um both the staffing structure but also across the different
enterprise funds to make sure that we're um allocating them properly. Um, but >> even just like processes that we do here is I know with automation, you know, technology, is there a way for us to kind of reduce some of our expenses or what we spend on? I think
what we're looking at and based on this, every little bit's going to help us get to where we need and I just didn't know if we've started exploring any of that yet. >> Um, yes, but it's not as clearcut of an answer. There's some work that we're doing and it um is here tonight with us,
but there's some IT related work we're doing um specifically in our HR department to >> but it's been a long process. >> Yeah. Okay. >> Anybody else before we move on to this year's budget?
>> Okay. Thank you. >> Yeah. Ready? >> Perfect. Let's keep up with the uh the theme. So, tonight will be the kickoff of the FY27 budget assumptions. How this works is
this is our first um look at what Lynn and I are are projecting for FY27 when it comes to uh the general fund itself. Um I want to note that this is the first stage of the budget and a lot of these
are estimations. So, as we get our data in from our department heads and we get our salary and expense budgets, this will be more um fleshed out. So, I I implore you to use this as a guidepost
and not a be all end all. And I'll get into this. So as we as we saw in the presentation um the sources our biggest piece of this is our 2 and 12% increase allowed under Prop 2 and a half. Um this is in the
assumption that the select board will seek to max to the or levy to the max and this will generate about 15 or 1.5 million of additional revenues. Um, in our new growth estimation for FY27,
um, we had actuals in FY2 five of 366,000 for new growth. So, we bumped up our new growth estimation up to 350 in the anticipation of additional projects and work being done around
town. And with that additional new growth, um we've been see we've been hearing rumblings and seeing um difficulties amongst the state budget. So we moved our projection from 4% down to 3 and a half% and this will see in
the form of reduced um unrestricted general government aid and chapter 70 funds. Now just as a note, we won't get a better idea on this until mid January. Uh the governor will release her budget usually around the second to third week of January so we have a better idea of
what we can estimate state aid at. >> Um going further um the other pieces of our >> just refresh your homeage. >> Three pages. like refresh it like your screen.
Oh, you you have document the website. >> Hang on. >> No, you're good. >> So, there it is. >> Yeah, it's like your slides right there. >> Close it out. Start over there.
>> Fresh buttons on the bottom right. Uh oh. Well, I'll just I'll talk out loud. So, estimated local receipts. Um, we're expecting an increase of about 290,000 for um local receipts. These are
predominantly from our motor vehicle excise taxes. Um we have historically or I should say we have predominantly got uh the bene uh the we have received the benefit of growing interest revenues due to higher interest rates as well as
other things like our ambulance revenues continue to grow which helps drive our general fund revenues. The other piece of our sources is our tax subsidy which comes from the stormwater fund. When we originally created the stormwater
enterprise fund, there was a subsidy from the general fund which um allowed the enterprise fund to operate. As we get closer to 100% driven through rates, um there is a piece that falls off um on
a year-to-year basis. It's about 4.11% of the storm water revenues. Um, this is about $33,000 that we will gain in additional general fund revenues. So for total sources, this is about 2.49
million of additional revenues that we're going to see for the general fund in FY27. >> You want me to do it? >> Do you want me to try resending the slides? >> Yeah, I won't you're
>> get off the agenda, too. You're using a hard document instead of going to the website. >> And you can keep going. >> Um, so for uses, so we went over sources, now we'll go over uses. So with
the new FY27 budget, um, we will be including colas within the, um, nonUN positions and union positions. Um, so that is a change from last year and that
will result in what we're estimating at a 3% increase in both school and non-school wages. This comes out to about a $1.4 million increase in salaries. Um, we have historically uh limited our
expense increase to about half a percent which comes out to about $89,000. Obviously, this will be much higher than this as inflation has been around three to four percent in the last three years. So, this is something that we have
historically budgeted on the conservative side, but we understand that this is something that we'll need to prioritize as we get closer to the budget. Oh, perfect. Um, the next piece is our employee retirey benefits. As I went
into in our presentation earlier, um this is a large piece of the um general fund uses. Uh we have to fund our retirement at 8% which comes out to about 400,000. This is required through our actuarily determined contributions
by Hampton County. Um we are estimating a seven and a half seven and a half percent increase for our liability insurance as well as our employee health insurance which is through our Scantic Valley Health Trust. Our Scantic Valley Health Trust manages the town of Long
Meadows employee and retiree health insurance. And as we've seen across the state, uh there have been large increases in health insurance costs due to new pharmaceuticals as well as um the impact of retirees entering into the
system which drives up costs. especially with um COVID, there was a large influx of employees who retired who drive up costs across the board. And we're seeing this not only in Scantic Valley's plan, but also the GIC and MA's health
insurance plans as well. So, we're estimating about a 10% increase as we saw a 10% last year. Medicare comes out to about 3%. And our oped funding as estimated is about 1.14% of the levy. This is spelled
out in our select board's operational policy for OPED as we are trying to reach um 2% of the levy. Um this comes out to about a $530,000 increase for FY27. Uh the capital contribution increase. So
this looks a little strange as um the reason for this large increase is due to the fact that in FY26 capital was not fully funded. We only funded about a million and a half of capital due to our efforts to balance the budget. So in
order for us to fund capital at the full amount for 27, this results in a variance of about $780,000 for capital. In total, uh this would be about 3.8 8 million of general fund uses
for FY27 as an increase which comes out to about a 1.3 million deficit for general fund as of today. Now I want to highlight that this deficit is largely caused by the
increase in capital contributions. If we did not have uh that large of a contribution, as it's normally between 50 to 70,000 on a year-to-year basis, our deficit would be more in line with what we've had historically. On the next
slide, I show kind of a uh historical look back at our projected deficit at the budget kickoff and compare that to where our state aid numbers are at. We have largely seen that state aid has been favorable to the town in recent
years. And as of the last two years, we've used that state aid to replenish either the schools or capital projects that otherwise would have been cut through um planning of the budget. Now, as I said earlier, we don't know what
our finalized state aid numbers will come in at. We will have a better idea mid January, but the ultimate compensation committee does not finalize the state budget until June, which will be after our um budget is finalized. So, right now we're going with about
324,000, which equates to about 3 and a half% increase in state aid. So, with that being said, um we have a large hole to fill as of today. So on the next slide, I go over what that
looks like. So with a preliminary deficit of about 1.34 million, uh there are a couple things that go into that. So if we were to look at our general fund operating budget, which is about 83 million, we'd have to take out things
that are non-negotiables, things that the town is obligated to fund. Those being debt service and employee benefits. That makes about $22 million of the town's operating budget, which leaves um the departmental piece of the
general fund operating budget of $61.1 million. Now this is not our intention but as a illustration of what um thank you of what could happen and I did a analysis
as to if we were to allocate to departments if nothing changed what would would be required to trim from the budgets in order to fill uh this hole. Now, I want
to just highlight the schools in particular because that 69.1% might seem confusing given what we talked about earlier with it being between 50 and 55%. This 69% comes from
the removal of our non-negotiables, our debt service and employee benefits from the total um general fund operating budget. So the general government, public safety, community services, public works is a higher percentage given the fact that these large
non-negotiables are not included in the budget. Now it is important to illustrate this impact, but it does not reflect what we anticipate the final budget to be. I simply want to make folks aware of these are the difficult decisions that we look at when we're
projecting deficits and we have to figure out the best solution for this. The next slide goes over some final considerations as we start the budget process. This will be the first year of budgetary impact for the middle school. So as the plan in place um the middle
school will be starting sometime in summer of 26 and the borrowing will take place beforehand. I'm currently working with our bond council and financial advisor in order to make sure the documents and uh borrowing is in place
before that. Um, as I said earlier, there's uncertainty in state aid with everything going on with the federal government. Um, Massachusetts has been struggling with cutings of federal aid and that trickles down to the local and
state level where communities are seeing or at least projecting lower um revenues coming in from the state. that is something that we need to consider as the budget is developed and hopefully we will see that to be favorable on our end
but it's not something that I'm anticipating further um I'm going over the economic uncertainty and employee benefits if you can go back Peggy. Um, as I mentioned earlier, we are really monitoring our
health insurance costs specifically, but employee benefits on the whole is a big piece of our pie. And I want people to know that with that being said, it's not something that we can really it's not something that we have true control
over. We meet with Scantic Valley in order to set our rates um in January and February. So, I'll have a better idea of what the true cost in the town will be, but anticipate that this will continue to be a growing issue going forward.
Um, finally, uh, temporary revenue sources. I mentioned MGM. MGM goes away in 2034 and the public health excellence grant, which covers a large piece of our health department's budget, will be going away
in 2035. And these are things that we need to start um making plans for so that the budget is not impacted by large swings in revenues. >> Go to the last.
>> Okay. Anybody got any cut ideas? >> Um thank you Ian. Um this is I I think it's interesting that at a at an initial look that our the capital contribution is such a a big part of our deficit. But
I think that we have seen on any number of levels lately that this is the kind of thing that we have to concentrate on because it it's so much cheaper to do to make capital repairs and improvements now uh than it is down the road. Um but
we have to we have to prioritize on uh in a number of ways. So um yeah, anybody else have anything on our projections? Okay. Oh, >> sorry. Just a couple of quick questions.
Thank you for this presentation. Um you mentioned the public health excellence grant. What kind of numbers are we talking about uh in terms of what we receive from that every year? So, in terms of raw numbers, I can't give you specifics, but it makes up um at least
one if not one and a half positions that are funded. Um so, it's it's some it's not I wouldn't say it's a small amount, but it's something that we will have to start um being aware of. >> It's um a little north of 300,000 a
year. So, it's okay. >> It's a healthy amount. >> Yeah. Yeah, that is. Okay. The MGM piece is about the same. It's about 330,000. So, >> yeah. Okay. >> Has that already started dropping? Is that is that this year or is that going forward?
>> Um, so we will get a 2 and a half% increase in the MGM funds up until the funds are no longer paid out. So the funds themselves are increasing, but >> what I'm recommending, and I'll do this in a
>> future meeting, is different ways that we can reduce that number artificially so that once that number goes away entirely, we don't have a $300,000 hole that we have to fill. >> Okay. And then just a second question, when you talk about this capital contribution
increase being around $780,000, so what does that include when you say a capital? So within the budget itself um in prior years we have fully funded um capital and that uh that amount is
between $2 to $3 million where we use that towards one-time expenses and in the past year we've used that to fund the chiller and the road resurfacing projects. So with that being said, this increase does not take into effect those
dollars that are um already accounted for within the capital budget. So >> um >> does that >> I I think um if I understand what your question is um the capital contribution is set by select board policy is 3% of
um your general fund revenue 3 to 4%. >> Um we've generally been around the 3%. So last year to balance the budget, we removed the chiller and the um road resurfacing with just the amount of debt service to stay in the capital plan. So
we were able to reduce the plan by the rest of that amount. And that's essentially the $700,000 increase that we're seeing. So we cut it out last year and now if we were to make it whole again plus what the increase is.
>> I see. Okay. Okay. Okay. Thank you. All right. Uh, seeing nothing further, we want to move on to the, uh, fiscal year 2027 budget and capital planning calendar. I don't know if that's uh, Ian or Lynn. >> Yeah. So, typically um, we provide the
draft of the calendars to the select board and then you vote on it at a subsequent meeting. Um, we uh, brought it forward here tonight just because it was it seemed like a the right thing to do with the conversation about the overall budget. so everyone knew uh what was coming up ahead. Obviously, tonight
is the kickoff of it and then there's a lot of dates in here until we get to um really when the school committee needs to vote the budget and then when it comes to the select board after that and then the select board would vote it um and then get included in the town
meeting warrant. And so all of that brings us roughly to the uh beginning of April. >> Did we have to change something last year on the calendar? I can't I can't I soon remember something got compacted towards the end.
>> Um I know we were able to extend it out more which we allowed us a little bit more time at the budget. >> Oh, maybe that's what I'm thinking of. Okay. >> And so you didn't actually have to vote it until the first meeting in April. We're projecting that same schedule again. >> Okay.
So, the exact opposite of what I remembered, but um and so this is since we're all in the same room, is uh does this calendar look acceptable to the other committees? >> Looks good to us. >> Okay.
All right. And anybody else want to speak on this before we wrap up our budget kickoff? All right. Great. Thank you very much, Ian. We appreciate it. >> Nice work today. Thank you. >> Thank you. Thank you.
>> Um and then we have our IT study update. >> Before we do that, maybe we'll >> uh Okay. >> Yes. >> I don't know. It probably impacts schools quite a bit. >> Oh, yeah. It is a school department. >> Perfect.
>> Yes. >> Hello. Thanks for having me here today. >> I'm Nick George, uh IT director. Um, >> you only good news, right? >> Only good news. >> Only good news. >> Uh, yeah. Well, it can only get worse, I guess.
>> Um, >> yeah. No, uh, thought it'd be a good time to meet with the entire group and provide updates on a few things and kind of a lay of the land when it comes to it. As someone mentioned, we are housed under the school department, but we provide services to the school and town. Um there it's listed as an IT study
update which I have a couple items that kind of directly relate to follow-ups on some of the IT study recommendations. Um but it was also just anything that I thought you might be interested in updates on. There happen to be a kind of the most number of bullets are under cyber security. Um can kind of keep it
kind of general and vendor non-specific but it's something that we have a continual focus on from kind of a strategic planning. What do we put investments into? But also what do we do for day-to-day operations? what do our practices look like? So, I mean, we recently, for example, added something
called MDR, managed detection. So, we have a firm that does 247 monitoring of detections that might be made on our endpoints throughout our organization. So, laptops and desktops and things like that. The idea being that one of the things we want to protect against as an organization would be a ransomware
attack um or a data exfiltration attack where someone maybe doesn't encrypt our data and hold it you know away from us where we don't have access to it but might just threaten to release publicly information that is private right that we have an obligation for protecting. So MDR is a service that we added recently,
247 monitoring. In addition to us monitoring it during the workday and via proactive alerting, we also have the firm that provides our antivirus software will reach out to us on an e emergency contact list in the event that they see any activity that's indicating an active attack because those things
are things that response time matters. Um we're also doing things like enforcing multiffactor authentication in more places. We have a focus on trying to consolidate our our authentication approach so that users have fewer passwords to remember that we're applying a consistent password policy
against them and that we have controls in in place to make sure that if those accounts are compromised, they're turned off proactively or multiffactor authentication might protect in the event of a password breach or something along those lines. Uh we recently signed up for MS ISAC management which is the
multistate interdisciplinary security sharing. I forget exactly what it stands for, but it's a government organization that primarily helps municipalities share information related to security best practices. They make a lot of resources available. They provide some resources and guidance in the event
of responding to an attack should one be underway. Um, one of the findings in the IT study was the need for a cyber security response plan. Uh, we have a draft plan that we've developed internally in the department as part of our practice. We've been doing things like tabletop exercises. What happens if
we notice this on our network? How do we respond to it? So we have at a basic level a document now frankly that we pulled off the shelf to start with from a reputable source and then began modifying to suit our needs. Who is who performs in the various roles? How does this relate to municipal operation? So
in the event that we do have something that appears to be a cyber security incident, we're not starting from square one of what do we do? We kind of know who do we reach out to at the government level? What tools do we have in our arsenal for responding to it? Who do we notify internally? How do we begin triaging that and preventing an attack
from spreading? Um, also, uh, when it comes to data privacy, for example, this is more on the school side, but we have an obligation to make sure that the different software platforms and web services that we use are adhering to certain standards for data privacy, that they're not using student data, for
example, for monetary purposes, and collecting data that we don't want them to collect beyond what we've agreed is appropriate for the delivery of the service they're providing. So, uh, we're a member of a student data privacy consortium and we've been using that as kind of a filter for any tools that
there's interest in in the school system. If a teacher or someone within the school system identifies a tool that they want to use, they are not allowed by policy to do that. They come to us. We check with student data privacy consortium, see if there's already an agreement with the vendor. Um, if not, we can pursue that if it makes sense to
engage with that product. Um, in some cases it just provides a good way for us to consolidate the requests and have a bird's eye view of what's being used and what do people have a need for and it lets us direct them to use the resources we already have rather than adding, you know, an additional service or
complexity for example. Um, so when it comes to also cyber security, I kind of look at that as the ability to provide operational continuity to the town in the event of something. Is it a cyber attack or is it like a snowstorm that takes out infrastructure? So, we've also been moving more services to the cloud
when it makes sense with the vendor so that we're not relying on internally housed uh hardware and systems that need to be maintained that are in a location that could be impacted by some kind of disruption. Um, and we've also just been, like I said, engaging in internal discussions about
how do we share knowledge among our team to make sure that we're aware of what to do in the event of an incident, how to prevent one from happening. So, that's kind of our approach from a cyber security perspective. Um it sounds a little bit cliche but it kind of becomes embedded in everything that you do because it doesn't take much of a slip
up for there to be an incident. Um so in the way that we provision accounts and the way that we provide access and deploy equipment and troubleshoot and what software we deploy to machines, it's increasingly under uh the lens of are we doing it securely? How do we ensure we're doing it securely and how
do we maintain that through the lifespan of our use of a product. So that's kind of what I had for talking points on cyber security. I don't know if it makes sense to pause there and see if anyone has any questions or move on. Um so I also had a cap a capital request
discussion. We've put a capital request for network equipment refresh. Um that would encompass the network equipment that serves all of the school locations and all of the town locations. It's the equipment that's on shelves and network closets and the it's the equipment that's mounted on ceilings to provide
wireless access. Um, the reason we're considering uh or looking to refresh that equipment is it's some of it is at end of life by the manufacturer's designation, which means that it's no longer receiving support. It's no longer receiving firmware updates. Um, if there's security issues identified with it, they will not be doing anything
other than best effort um at remedying those things. Um, so we are looking at refreshing our network equipment that provides Wi-Fi access throughout the town. It's what public safety rides over for their computing equipment, for example. Um we are using it as an
opportunity to look at other options from the network platform that we're using currently. Uh the reason we're doing that is though we're happy with the platform we're using. Um one of the things that we're trying to get away from are software subscription costs and licensing costs. Um so I won't say the
vendor's name but the vendor that we use right now after a certain number of years with the hardware you have you now have to pay for a software platform to manage them. and there isn't a way to manage them without their software platform. So certainly they use it as a way to incentivize people to approach
the next upgrade cycle. Um there are other approaches that we can take with different networking vendors that don't have that uh burden where we don't need to pay a software subscription cost. We've kind of prioritized looking at those vendors as alternatives. Um it
would maybe put us more in the driver's seat when it comes to the network refresh cycle that we want to take for equipment. we could make a decision based on whether it's still serving our needs or not. >> Um, and we wouldn't be beholden to a subscription cost in order to manage the equipment that we already have in our facilities.
Um, that was put in as a two-part capital request uh for a phased approach to replacement of that equipment. Um, one of the challenges we're running into right now, honestly, is our our first pick from what we've evaluated and what our experience has been uh is one that is not as established in the marketplace
and the supply chain is not as robust. So if we could get the equipment in in time for a project that we could feasibly deploy is the question that we're kind of facing right now. So we've been reaching out to other vendors and other communities to see if they have any experience with the different approaches we're considering taking. Um
and then for the IT report update um certainly along the lines of trying to make sure we're providing as good support to school departments as we are to town departments and vice versa. Um, we've rolled out remote assistance software to systems throughout the organization so that people in the IT department can respond remotely
sometimes immediately in the event that they get a phone call or a ticket coming comes in without having to drive to a different location or manage a schedule during the day. Um, we from a cyber security perspective approach that from the pers same angle. Uh so for example, we deployed it to all computers in town
and we mentioned to staff you you will we do not have access to remotely view your machine without it prompting you and getting your permission. Uh which we thought was an important show of faith and trust with our users to make sure that they don't feel you know uncomfortable that there's someone looking over their shoulder. It's not
our intent. So we have a remote assistance program that allows us to respond quickly for those kind of requests. We've also been stationing an IT person at town hall on a weekly basis to have those kind of face-to-face interactions where sometimes that's the troubleshooting that makes the most sense or someone has a question that
doesn't fit well within a ticket. Um so there's a person down the hall that they can go to that they know will be there at a certain you know day of the week. Um of course people are in and out of the buildings anyway. So those conversations sometimes happen uh just kind of by chance, but this was I think an important step to showing um some
availability and presence to proactively address issues that might otherwise linger or get missed. Um I've been talking with Lyn and Mike recently. We're cons talking about perhaps uh looking at creating an internal committee with different department heads to talk about long-term planning
strategy opportunities for interdep departmental software uh that might show show some efficiencies. Um, and we're also working on our current phone system uh some enhancements to it uh from that improve uh safety. Uh, and we're also
looking at alternatives when we're up for renewal uh a year from now to evaluate other phone system platforms that will allow us to um adopt features like soft phones on people's smartphones should they want such a thing. Maybe we don't need as many desk phones in as
many locations if those extensions are virtual. so we could save money on equipment. Um, and uh, it was a bit of a ramble, but and that's the last bullet. So, in conclusion, should there be any questions or any thoughts or any anything like
>> uh, thank you, Nick. I just have one. Any big capital outlays that you're anticipating beyond the request you already put in? >> Uh, other than the network request, uh, well, so town equipment refresh, our other two, uh, capital requests tend to be the equipment on people's desks,
right? So, the desktops and the laptops, uh, town equipment is currently being refreshed. Town hall was refreshed with the move here. Um, and the other equipment is already in hand and being deployed to the other town department. So, I wouldn't anticipate that for another 5 years. Um, school equipment
refresh happened four years ago, I believe. We just paid off the last year of the lease to own agreement that we had with the vendor. Um so we're planning on continuing with that for the next year or I'm sorry is it a year or two years 2020 summer 2026 would be no
2027 sorry for equipment refresh on the uh school side um the equipment is still running it's just again it's a laptop most cases there'll be laptops getting to six and a half years old so you start having battery run down software support
things like that so that would be the next round but the main one is the network equipment. >> Great. Thank you. Any other questions while we have Nick? >> Thanks. Um I'm in cyber security so this really interests me. >> Um are you are you leveraging any of the
state agencies that provide some of you know they do like pentesting or gap analysis or is that something that the town is is using today? >> Well, we don't have them doing any pen testing currently, but we did sign on for a cyber security awareness grant. So, we're looking at getting that started up again. Um which will be fishing simulation trainings to our
staff. um as well as not just fishing simulations but also training material available to staff. So that's one approach that we're taking. MS Isac would be another government entity that we're partnered with. They do offer um pen testing. We haven't looked to engage
with them on that yet. Uh mostly we've been we adopted for example they have a malicious DNS service that you can use where they there's other companies that offer malicious DNS blocking services but theirs are specifically gauged or I'm sorry targeted towards municipalities and school systems and responding quickly to threats that
they're seeing in that category. >> Um so that's the extent of our uh government partnership so far. Yeah. >> And then on Go ahead. Sorry. >> No, just the I'm looking forward to getting the fishing simulation going again to be honest. I feel like that's one of the lowest hanging fruits. Um, people who were here for the last round
of it, I think kind of have retained what they learned from it. Honestly, one of the things I like about coming back to Long Meadow from a larger organization is that when it comes to email threats, like one of the lessons we just try to get people to have is if you get an email that seems suspicious, do not rush to answer. You know, do not rush to click a link, pick up the phone,
walk down the hall, talk to someone. It's a small enough organization that you can have those facetoface interactions where you don't feel obligated to respond quickly and make a mistake. Um but um some of the people who had been involved in the earlier fishing rounds as asked me proactively recently, hey, what happened to those? Are we bringing
those back? They actually found them useful. So I'm looking forward to getting those out again. I know I think we slept a little bit better knowing that people were getting peppered. Even if they weren't necessarily participating in the training, if they clicked on one of the fake fishing simulations, they got a big screen that shamed them and said, "Ah, well, you just fell for it." You know, so maybe
you didn't you weren't as cautious as you thought you were being. Um, so that's one that we're engaged with right now. >> I feel like that's something that could be like year round, continual, >> but it sounds like we're just doing that on a on a temporary basis. >> Well, I think that will be our intent
assuming that they continue to offer the service. Um, we'll just renew with it yearly. It looks like it's been improved from my last experience with it. It was a little frankly cumbersome the first few years where we didn't have access to the management console that the state used. So we were exchanging spreadsheets with the state who clicked on what you
know and then you give the spreadsheet a week later and then you know but we'll actually apparently have access to I think they're using no before as a platform. So we'll have the management console we can I think even tailor some of the fishing simulations to really target what people in long metal might receive. >> Um so it'll be a little tougher and
we'll be able to follow up a little bit more proactively on where there's gaps. >> Awesome. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> All right. Thank you, Dick. Thanks everyone. Appreciate it. >> Um before we allow free or the rest of
our committee, I I notice I was looking at the rest of the agenda. Doc, I see Dr. Greenberg back there. We do not have any interviews scheduled. >> Oh, I I don't know what happened, but um you're not on the agenda tonight. >> Okay. >> Sorry, >> but you got to hear you got to learn
about it. So, >> what could be better? But if you could reach out to Peggy, we'll we'll get you on the schedule. I apologize for uh the misinformation I gave you. >> Thank you. >> Um and then we have Oh, and go ahead. If
the other committees want to close up, >> so I guess we'll move to close the finance committee. >> Second. >> All in favor? >> Finance committee's closed. >> Thank you for coming. We appreciate it. >> Thank you. >> Uh committee, I'll entertain a motion to
adjurnn. So move. >> Thank you. Do we have a second? >> Thank you. Roll call vote. Michaela >> Jamie. We'll start with you. >> Okay, Kate. >> Yes, for me. And we'll see everybody. Thank >> you.
Jamie, >> Jamie, congratulations to your son. >> Oh, thank you. >> That's awesome. >> I don't blame So, we have some >> we have some items before our tax classification hearing. Um, I think
we'll have to move to take it out of order. Anyone would like to to do that? >> Um, I'll move that we take the uh class tax classification hearing out of order. >> Second. >> Anything further? All those in favor?
>> Unanimous. Okay. Hi. Hi. >> We have to open the hearing. >> Oh, yeah. It's a public hearing. Yes, please. >> Uh, I'll move to open the tax classification hearing. >> Second. >> Anything further on that? All those in favor? Unanimous.
All right. Please, uh, if you'd like to introduce yourself and then go ahead. >> For those of you who don't know me, my name is Maria Catalo. I am the principal assessor here in town. Um, I'm here to give you a little information on
setting the tax rate tonight. >> I know they're there. I've seen the slides. Are are you pulling off the agenda or do you have it saved? >> So stop changing the >> you can uh you can go ahead. >> Okay.
>> I'll make sure you're sharing. >> Perfect. >> Thank you. Okay. >> Um so for some residents that may not know the board of assessors does not set the tax rate. Uh we appear here at the
meeting to provide the select board with information on property values based on fair market value from sales data in the previous year. Um all of our assessed values were reviewed and approved by the Massachusetts Department of Revenue.
The purpose of tonight's meeting um is to decide how the tax burden will be distributed across the property classes. Um the hearing covers a split versus a single tax rate and also possible
residential, commercial or open space exemptions. This page here is just a breakdown of some of the terms that you will see in this presentation and I'll go over them as we get to them as well. This document here is our LA4. This is
what we submit to the state. Um it shows the number of parcels and the value determined for each class. Um, as you can see for 26, our total taxable value was 3,414
376 729 3 billion, excuse me. And the average single family property home valued is now 564,955. This is an approximate 12.37% or $62,220 increase from the average of last year's
single family value of 502755. And again, these values were determined for full and fair cash value as of January 1st of 2024. again are commonly used terms and I'll get to those. Um, one of the things that
the select board must consider at this meeting is open space. Um, open space is one of the four property tax classes. It includes land kept in a natural or open state for the benefit of the public
and not used to generate income. out of the only 12 out of the 351 Massachusetts towns actually have open space classification and none of those are in Hampton County. The Long Meadow Board of Assessors has found no
properties in Long Meadow that qualify under the statutory definition of open space. Another consideration for the board is to adop adopt a residential exemption of up to 35%. But this applies only within the
residential class. It isn't really an exemption. It simply shifts the taxes among residential property. How it works is it's a standard deduction. A percentage of the average home value is then
subtracted from owner occupied properties. The tax rate is then recalculated. So the overall levy would stay the same. The impact is that taxes increase substantially for nonowner
occupied homes and multifamily properties, apartments, vacant residential land, and properties held in trust that are not owner occupied. And why we think that it's not beneficial for Long Meadow is because
there are only 160 properties or 3% that are nonowner occupied. So because we have such few properties would shift the tax burden, the exemption would provide minimal benefit to residents overall.
There is also the option of a small commercial exemption. Um, this allows the board to exempt up to 10% of the qualifying commercial property's value. To qualify, a business must have
occupied the property as of January 1st of this year, have fewer than 10 employees as certified by the state, be located in a commercial property valued under 1 million, and they cannot
businesses cannot be located within multi-tenant spaces, for example, like a strip mall. The tax impact for that is again the levy stays the same and that exemption would then be absorbed within the commercial class meaning a higher tax
rate for any commercial property that doesn't qualify and all industrial and personal property taxpayers. Um, Long Meadow has 28 properties classified as commercial and out of those 28 only
three meet the eligibility requirement for small commercial exemption. This slide is the steps that we take to get there. These are the levy limit calculations. We take last year's levy limit. We add
in any amended new growth which we typically don't have. Um we are allowed the 2 and a half increase. We then add in new growth revenue. Any excluded debt capital exclusions. We
come up with a fiscal year for 26 levy limit. We have a levy ceiling. Then we have the levy to be raised. And then we have what's called the excess levy capacity. This is um valuations
basically just a table and an illustration of valuations by class before a tax shift. And then on the bottom it's levy by class history probably for about the last six years, five or six years or so.
This gives us an idea. This slide here gives us an idea of uh what's been going on with single family sale activity in Long Meadow over the past couple of years. Um from 23 to 24 there was 15.3%
increase in homes decreased in the amount of time that they stayed on the market. the average sale price increased 9.44%. Between uh condominium sales, um not a whole lot. We had three
condominium sales in 2023, only one for 24. Uh in 2023, a condominium averaged 44 days on the market, and in 24, it only averaged 11. So the average sale price in
condominiums increased from 23 to 24 by 2.67%. Commercial sale activity uh in Long Meadow is almost next to none. We had one sale um
in 2023. It was valued in 2020 at 4,750,000. It sold 3 years later for 5.1. So it increased over those 3 years only 7.37%.
So we get to the question of shifting the tax burden um splitting or single. A single tax rate would be one tax rate for all properties. A split tax rate
could reduce the residential share of the levy by increasing the commercial, industrial, and personal property. Um, as a note, most Massachusetts communities choose a single tax rate unless the commercial, industrial, and
personal property classes make up more than 30% of their total base. When that share is smaller, the financial relief to residential taxpayers from adopting a split rate is minimal, while the risk of discouraging existing or potential
businesses is slightly higher. And as you can see from my previous slide, the breakup Residential properties include 93 almost 93 and a half% where commercial industrial and personal property is just
about 6 and a2%. This this is an illustration of the impact of a split tax rate. Um, so for instance, if you look at a single tax rate, everybody pays the same. And then if we
were to split it, it shows the potential savings um broken down annually, quarterly, and then monthly in purple. And then in red to the far right would
show the increase annually and quarterly to a a an average commercial taxpayer. So for instance, if we were to shift it by half a percent,
the residential savings would annually would be $39.71, but it would cost our average commercial taxpayer almost $2,20 extra a year. So,
our recommendation for fiscal 26 is a single tax rate of $19.32. That would give us the average single family home would see a tax increase of
about $297 a year. This is a historical illustration of the tax rate and the average tax bill, the average value. Um,
it's gone up significantly. Right around COVID, I think is when we started to really see a substantial increase. Starting to level out a little bit now. Um, and that's that's it. So,
uh, the board of assessors recommends that the Long Meadow Select Board not adopt an open space discount. As I said, we don't have any property that qualifies for that. not to adopt a residential exemption,
not to adopt a small commercial exemption, and to adopt a single tax rate of $19.32. >> Thank you very much, Maria. >> Thank you. >> So, um I just have a general question. Are
you obviously values have gone up in terms of tax bills. Are you seeing an uptick in abatement proceedings based on the the raised values? >> No. >> Okay. >> No. Last year we had approximately 33
abatements and I believe the year before that there was 70 something >> 77. >> Um so I can't say that I've seen an uptick. >> Okay. Great. Um so all of us have been through these a few times before except
you Shelly. Do you have any particular questions or or thoughts? >> No, this was actually very helpful. So, >> thank you. >> Helpful information. Thank you. >> This presentation has been Maria brought in a new presentation when she joined the town and it I think I do think it's very helpful. >> Thank you. >> I was actually reading it saying system
for me. The only one who hasn't, but very helpful. So, thank you. Thanks so much. >> Um, all right. Anybody else? Uh, Dan, >> I'm just cur Thank you for doing this. this uh it's really nice how you break it down and um dumbify it for people like me. So um I'm just curious how the
past year went. There was obviously some changes on the board of assessors um and I just wanted to get your feedback and how things have been. >> The uh board has been functioning fantastically. Um
they are taking their do classes. We have uh two that have completed the modules necessary to certify values. Um they were extremely helpful and
uh pleasant when it came to discussing abatements and we got it we got uh we got through quite a few abatements you know on the first round. >> So it has been it has been a pleasure. Glad to hear. Um, yeah, I've heard
positive feedback as well. And, um, I I also want to thank the committee, too, because they put in a lot of hours and it's it's not it's not easy. So, >> right. >> Um, and as you mentioned, they're they're putting in extra hours for some of the courses, too. So, it's >> Yes.
>> Um, you know, just thankful for their uh participation and and help. >> Yes, I will let them know. And the only other question I had was I was looking last year when we saw some of the the uh I guess the um the numbers were
increasing for obvious reasons. In particular, I was looking at the the golf courses. I've noticed that they're just flat or they were flat previously. Is there is there a reason for that? >> You say you're looking at them, but where >> in the database?
>> I thought I thought when I was like comparing because I'm you know I'm looking at my house. What was it in 2023 versus today? And I maybe it wasn't the golf courses, but I thought there was a large number. Pretty sure it was the golf courses.
>> They may be in chapter 61. Um, uh, do you have an Android story? >> I just remember looking at last year. I'm sorry. >> But it just seemed like they were flat, but everyone else had an increase. So I
I wasn't sure if there was a reason for that. >> And the courses themselves are probably 61B, which is the recreation lean. But yeah, I don't know about the buildings themselves. They are we do assess them differently. >> Okay. >> Or separately. >> Mhm. >> Yeah, that's chapter 61. But if I had an
address, I could probably look it up. >> Thank you. Okay, let's see. 400 We can take it offline. I just it was something that stood out to me >> that may not even be on this old to new report. This is all residential. Um 400
Long Meadow Country Club. So it's 25 value. It actually increased 11%. >> Okay. from 25 to 26. >> Okay. Perhaps I was looking uh looking at something else.
>> Went up $753,000 in value. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Of course. >> All right. Um, and so for anyone watching who has not heard us talk about this before, I I I think you you put it very well, you and the board of
assessors, that to me splitting the tax rate, the juice isn't worth the squeeze. To get any real impact to people would be a a really astronomical increase for uh
commercial business. Yes. and the commercial businesses. It's not not generally the property owner that's paying the taxes. If they have tenants, they're passing on to the tenants. >> Yes. >> And which is can be really detrimental to businesses. And we have we don't have a lot of commercial space in town. What
we do have, as we discussed earlier tonight, luckily it gets filled. We want to keep it that way. >> Yes. Yeah. So, >> I think you said it was $39 $39 a year, right? Versus 2,000 the impact to a to a business. >> Yes. Um that's on
>> and that's just the lowest. >> Yeah. And I think >> to make an actual impact and give people some measure of relief would be to get folks $384 of annual tax relief. It would be cost it would be increasing taxes on our businesses by $20,000.
That's Peggy slide 16. >> Yes, please. >> Yeah. >> Um I can move forward some motions. >> Yes, please. >> All right. Um, since we don't have any open spaces, no action is needed on the open space discount. Um, so I will move
to uh I will move to not adopt a residential exemption for fiscal year 2026. >> Second. >> Uh, anything further? All those in favor. >> All right. And I'll move not to adopt the small commercial exemption for fiscal year 2026. >> Second.
>> Any further? All those in favor? And I will move to adopt a single tax rate with a residential minimum factor of one for the town of Long Meadow. >> Second. >> Further on that. All those in favor. Okay. And all three. Thank you, Maria. >> One more. >> Go ahead. >> Oh, one more.
>> The residential exemption, please. >> Oh, I already did get that one. Yep. Yep. >> Okay. >> Perfect. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Thank you very much. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. >> All right. Two hours in. We're at announcements. some sort of record. I mean, um, all
right. Fall 2025 leaf program. Special town and long metal leaf bags are on sale. Long metal big Y. The leaf site on West Road is open through Sunday, December 7th, 7 days a week, 8 a.m. to 5:00 p. p.m. Curbside collection of special town leaf bags will occur on Saturday, December 6th. Please ensure
that bags are at the to the curb by 7 a.m. on days of collection. For additional information, please visit long meadowmma.gov/leafprogram. Long Meadow Community Electricity Enrollment letters were sent on November 7th. Newly eligible Eversource account holders in Long Meadow to notify them
about the town's electricity program, Long Meadow Community Electricity. New account holders will soon be automatically enrolled in the group purchasing program that helps manage electricity costs and increase renewable energy use. The opt out deadline is December 10th, 2025. For additional information on the program or to make
changes to your enrollment, please visit long meadow communityelelect electricity.com. Moving on to resident comments. Tom Shay, 81 Green Meadow Drive. The financial forecast this evening, it's first time
has ever been presented to the select board. This has been historically asked for. Thank you Ian and town management for doing it. Do recommends a financial forecast. Be prepared. All parties in this that were in this room should have
had input and this will be a living breathing document. Long Meadow is a $90 million enterprise and is at a budgetary fiscal and operational crossroad. When formulating the 27 budget, all departments need to be looking at
potential additional revenues and being more efficient. Eararks should be sought by the town and a share of the millionaire tax which is going to schools and hopefully not necessarily just the gateway schools. Just two items
uh after the budget discussion. Like I said, that forecast I thought was very good. the 700,000 that was mentioned for capital um I'm confused um and maybe there'll be clarification later that's
related to the bond for the roads etc. And my the way I remember it is we were frontloading that money to be spent. Now it would look if we add 700 then we're doubling up and keep in mind to use debt
service out of capital was against your policy. If you want to bridge the gap, I don't think Ian, and I don't think he's here, you're going to have $800,000 of interest on stabilization, which I found you in conjunction with the finance
committee that can and should be used for capital. I don't believe that is in this budget. So, if that's true, I just bridged your gap by 800 grand. The other thing is select board policies. You've heard debt, etc. You've got to get those
updated. And one of the things you need to do is talk to the finance committee. It's in their purview to review finance policies of the town. You've got four CPAs, a lawyer, an actuary, etc. You
should use them. It's part of their purview. Now, DPW budget, you should be having a formal budget meeting before the select board. Mass Municipal Association recommends departmental reviews. Long Meadow used to do this.
Other cities and towns do it. Parks just did one. Fire department did one. Both were very good financial and contained performance metrics. The DPW budget review should include a history of the number of employees, vacancies, turnover, and how to address hiring.
DPW underspent its budget in 2025 by 670,000 and 685,000 in 2024, primarily building, grounds, maintenance, and highway. Then it was increased by 7.6% last year.
Significantly underspending a budget is a major management issue. >> Time to finish up your thought, please. >> Work is not being done or the town is paying extra. I'm good on the three. That's it. Thank you. >> Okay. Thank you. I'll get back to you on the others,
>> but I thought the forecast was very good. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> All right, we move moving on to uh a new agenda item just kudos or plaudits. Uh we this was an idea brought up by Lynn um that heard from some other towns and
uh I saw this in action. And I went to a meeting in a town called Dudley, which is out of south of Worcester, and they had a section like this. Um, just to have some uh to be able to say something positive going on around town, birthdays, anniversaries, things like
that. Uh, just something a little light-hearted. Um, so for our first kudos and plaudits, uh, we're and then we'll cover some things that we'd normally cover in our select board comment if that's okay. Uh last night there was a tree lighting celebration on the town green. Um so thank you to Long
First Church for hosting the annual tree lighting. Uh the event was well attended despite the rainy weather. Uh and Santa Claus did show up. Gatherings are important to the community and kicks off the holiday season in a positive way with singing, laughing, and there was hot cocoa and cookies. Um and Mike was
there and looked everyone looked kind of miserable, but uh when the lights came on it was it was okay. >> Keep it positive. Come on. >> Sorry. I barely got poked with umbrellas, >> but no, it was a good event and despite the rain, it was well well attended and
um and Santa was very jolly. >> Um next up, there's a Thanksgiving food drive. Uh food drive was organized by town staff to support the Long Me food pantry during the Thanksgiving holiday. The food pantry provides essential support to about 100 families each week from Long Meadow and surrounding towns,
including the meals on wheels programs for homebound residents. Town staff donated roughly eight boxes of non-p perishable items to bring down to the food pantry located at the adult center. Thank you to the wellness of workers committee for organ or organizing that this great initiative and for the town employees who made donations in the
spirit of holiday giving. I think that's a lovely thing. So um thank you for bringing that to our attention. Uh Mike and Lynn, appreciate that. Uh anybody else have anything they wanted to add to this before we move on back to business? Um, I I did want to mention um I was
yelling to Jamie Hench. His his son was named an all-American um soccer. So the if anyone that was around in the early 90s, you might remember Jay Heaps. Um so Alexander is the I think the only soccer all-American outside of Jay Heaps at
Long High School. So pretty phenomenal uh to to get that. Just wanted to congratulate him on that. And I guess he's going to Bates next year. So, best of luck. >> Anybody watching play this season, it's welld deserved. Dynamo out there.
>> When we were um celebrating some of the Western Mass championship winners a couple meetings ago, I got a text from our excellent golf coach Steve Zigala to remind somebody, I guess me, to say, "Congrats to the golf team for also
winning Western Mass." So, >> absolutely. Thank you for bring >> um Okay. Anything else for that category? >> Happy belated birthday to Venice as well. We you mentioned birthdays earlier, right? >> 27, right? >> Yeah. Birthday on Thanksgiving this year.
>> I'm a Thanksgiving baby, too. >> Happy belated, too. >> I didn't mean it that way, but I've never met another Thanksgiving baby. >> Compliment fishing again. Just kidding. >> I'll make sure to bring up mine. >> Um, all right. The birthday chart over
there. Okay, if there's uh nothing else on that, we will move on to uh applicant appointments. >> Right. I will move to appoint John Glenn to the Council on Aging Board of
Directors for the vacant two-year term expiring on June 30th, 2027. >> Second. >> Anything further on that? I I will just note that I got a text message on Mr. Glenn spoke this never happens spoke
incredibly highly of him. So that doesn't normally don't normally hear from outside and this was just glowing praise. So uh nice job to Mr. Cohen. >> Um I have nothing further. All those in favor?
>> I'll move to appoint Leah Far to the Conservation Commission for a vacant associate uh non- voting term expiring on June 30th, 2026. Second >> further. All those in favor. >> And I will move to appoint Anne Slick uh
to the historic district commission to the vacant three-year term expiring on June 30th, 2028. Second. >> Any further? All those in favor? >> And I will move to appoint uh Samantha Gendrew to the historic district commission to an alternate vacancy
expiring uh June 30th, 2028. >> Second. >> Uh 20. Okay. Uh anything further? All those in favor? Okay. Thank you as always to everyone for their interest.
Uh moving on to applications. We have I believe two. >> Yeah. I'll um maybe just make one motion for both of them. I will move to approve the oneday liquor license applications uh submitted by the Longland Adult Community Fund for December 18th and
December 4th, 2025. >> Second. >> Any further? All those in favor? All right. Um anything on correspondence? finally stopped dribbling in about the water increase.
>> Yeah, >> a lull. >> Um >> I was just going to say good job to or thank you to all the businesses um that batting 100% knock on wood so far. I know we've been very critical uh over the past few years um rightfully so to
make sure there's you know no uh underage drinking at at these establishments. So, I think they're hearing us pretty loud and clear and uh good job to to everyone and and for those I I think maybe there was a a golf course or another a couple
establishments where they uh they weren't open that day. So, um I'm sure we'll be coming back uh soon, but thank you. >> After last year, I'm sure nobody wants to get dragged in front of us from the golf course. >> Um okay, I think we can move on to
the town interest report. >> Thanks. Um, so a report was uploaded to the agenda later today. Um, two I have some three quick updates. Uh, one actually to follow up on Maria's presentation about the tax rate. Uh,
with Maria and our veterans service officer um, support, they are putting together anformational session on all of the different personal property tax exemptions. This will take place on Tuesday, January 13th at 1:30 at the adult center. They're going to provide
education on all the different types of eligible property tax exemptions and eligibility requirements. This is the first time that the assessor's office has done something like this and I think it's going to be um really wellreceived uh because I know that there's been a lot of questions about, you know, the
types of exemptions and um what's eligible and why um the eligible eligibility criteria is what it is. So, I look forward to that and uh hearing um the good conversation that comes from that. >> There is a flyer in the hallway about
it. Um and I've also featured it in my newsletter. So, help me uh spread the word, please. Um uh update on the middle school project. Uh the middle school building committee voted on the construction manager at risk contract between the town and Fontaine Brothers. The contract's been signed and over the
last few weeks there's been multiple design element specific meetings including security turf and traffic. All of this is moving us toward design develop design development submission in February to the MSBA. Uh and we have already started the weekly owner
architect contractor meetings and those will take place through the duration of the project. And then um a bit of good news, the high school pool has opened. Um, we completed all the electrical work and the pool was filled with water. We did hit a minor
bump with um the pump not turning on after it was uh started back up and we did a $19,000 change order to replace the pump. Luckily, it was in stock and it was installed very quickly. The contractor though has put us on notice that future work is needed on the filter
system sooner than later, but it's not going to prevent the pool from opening. So, you can expect to see that in an upcoming capital plan. Um, but again, it has been treated and passed inspection by the health department. >> Right in time for the pool uh swim season. >> Yep. >> That's great. Good.
>> And that concludes my report. >> Okay. Uh, anything else for the town manager? >> Okay, moving on to old business minutes. Um, I forgot to send this one edit that I found over for the minutes
just at the very end, Peggy. Um, it just uh for the motion to adjurnn, it just doesn't have anyone's name for who made that motion. >> At the at the end, >> uh, at the very end, we're just the motion to adjurnn. It just it doesn't have anyone's name. >> Mr. Blank. >> Yeah, Mr. Blank. So, just filling that
in. Um so I will move to approve the um November 17th, 2025 meeting minutes per any um you know edits sent over. >> Second. >> All right. Anything further? All those in favor. >> Great.
All right. Mobile food vendors. Mike. >> Yeah. So we discussed this um in length at uh two previous meetings. Uh what is highlighted here are the two changes that I interpreted to to make post um the November meeting the whatever it was
the November 17th meeting or um yeah I believe it was. So in highlight mobile food vendors may only operate at the following locations as permitted by the select board during the annual application process. I think that covers our concern that um the locations seem like they're kind of like a blanket
approval for anybody who um may want to just operate. This kind of clarifies that it it needs to be pre-approved by the select board, the specific locations. With that, I think I gave comments on the Barnard parcel um at our last meeting. I would suggest we might
as well keep it in there and just have a stipulation that they need to coordinate with um public safety when they do come in front of the board to um receive a permit. Um and the application must include a detailed geographical description of the intended locations. that was already in there, but I kind of highlighted that
because it um definitely draws people's attention to just letting them know um we are looking for in-depth location descriptions if that makes sense. Um with that, if there's anything else you guys can think of, um let me know
and we could make those changes. But those that that was my big takeaway. >> This might be the lawyer and me. I think 3.2 two still can be misinterpreted as here are the locations where you can operate but I think that 4.3 does limit it and it >> yes
>> looking at it in conjunction I think that that um is clear because when it comes up people will they come with seven locations then we'll we can go from there I guess
>> and you can limit them as you've done in the past and or add in the future when people come back but >> biggest thing is there's something in writing for when applicants come forward, there's something you can draw attention to um as a start and we could always review it again in the future. >> I truly hope that this uh people we need
to use this. I hope we get some more applications. I know you said we got maybe two next year. >> Yeah, about two inquiries. Um one of them is definitely going to probably come forward in the spring. So, >> great. >> All right. Uh do we have a motion on that? I will move to approve the mobile
food vendors on town property policy. >> Second tie, I think. Um, all right. Anything further on that? All those in favor? >> Okay. Moving on to new business. Um, we have a number of things under the liquor
license renewals. Uh, somebody want is somebody presenting this? >> Uh, yeah, I can I can go into detail on it. Um, just going to go off the memo that was posted on the agenda. So, we have 17 annual liquor license that were up for renewal for this year um for
2026. Glenn Meadow um it will be our 18th, but they are still pending approval by the state. Um, we had them submit forms just in case that they were an active license, but at this time we don't believe that they're going to be an active license in 2025. Um, so it'll be status quo until 2026 whenever that
approval comes in by the state. Um, full listing of the licenses you can uh find below. Um, and obviously Clubhouse Cafe Franconia has a seasonal license. Their approval typically comes in late March, early April. Um, so 15 out of the 17 licenses up for annual renewal have
submitted all the required paperwork. Um, we went through the paperwork. Everything seems to be in order. Longm Hospitality LLC. Uh the meeting house chose not to review their annual license for 2026. Um that brings us to the bottle shop. Uh the license was approved by the select board through December
31st of 2025. But to date, we have not been provided with any documentation related to a lease agreement or license transfer application nor um have received any information related to their renewal packet. Um, so with that said, my suggestion would be to um, do
what we've done in the past where we invited them for a conversation, but the fact that we haven't received a renewal application kind of leads me to believe that the board can make a decision one way or another. Um, in terms of the license, >> I'd still I'd like to bring in Jim to the next meeting, find out because I we
have found in our past meetings that there may be things things we don't need to know or doesn't want to doesn't want to get out there. But I I we need to know what's going on, right? because it's been been a long time and we've done a lot and I continue
to feel that we're we've done the right things and are are doing the right thing but uh we need to have a conversation. So I think we should invite him back in. >> My only concern is the fact that we haven't received a renewal application and state guidelines clearly state that
>> they need to be signed in November. >> It's required. >> Yes, it is 100% required. >> Yep. Um but and if that's the case, you know, I' I'd still like to have him here so we can explain it. >> Yeah. >> Um
then we uh move on to uh general bylaw 2319, which uh refers to taxes being no more than 60 days overdue. Um a copy was also sent to businesses with renewal paperwork. Um, as at the time of posting this um to the agenda, Posto and Fletchers were passed to on personal
property taxes. Um, I haven't got a chance to verify if those have been paid, but as we've done in the past, typically we make um the approval for these renewals contingent upon bringing all outstanding dues up to the town by December 31st. Um, the ABCC also
requires the board to complete a seasonal population increase estimation form. Um the bo the board should vote on a temporary increased resident res resident population as of July 10th 2025. The recommendation we always give is to just refer to the federal census
figure which is in the memo. And um lastly once we get all the forms compiled we'll send them to the state at the end of January and if you guys have any questions can answer them now. >> Do we need to sign anything live or is this all electronic?
>> All electronic. Yeah. >> Okay. >> Did you have something to add? No. >> Okay. >> Should we vote on this tonight? Uh, and it's under new business. Uh, can we go ahead and vote on it or do we have to wait till next week? >> Um, in the past we've voted on it, but it doesn't hurt to vote on it December
15th either. Um, because we don't submit the paperwork until January 30th. So, the only thing I guess it delays is us receiving um, payments for license and that can get hold up a little bit. Um, but as of right now, 15 out of the 17
licenses, um, everyone on the memo can be approved besides the bottle shop in the meeting house. >> I'm fine with doing it tonight. Okay. >> I don't see any reason to wait. >> All right.
>> All right. So, there's a few different things we got to do, right? So, um, let's see. I have to vote to approve the annual certification. And I think we in the past we've voted
on the liquor licenses as a bunch. >> Yep. Okay. So, um should I split them up between package stores and restaurant clubs as different and like you know the different types of liquor licenses?
>> Okay. All right. So, I will move to approve uh the liquor license application submitted by Seasons Liquor LLC, Om Shyram LLC, Delaney's Market LLC, The Bottle Shop uh Incorporated,
and Oxbow Wines LLC for a section 15 liquor license. I >> I don't think we should include the bottle shop. >> Oh, shoot. Sorry. Yeah, sorry. Just going through it mindlessly. Um, so, uh, the motion amended to not include the bottle shop.
>> Second. >> Anything further? All those in favor? >> And I will move to approve uh, section 12 uh, liquor license application submitted by Clubhouse Cafe LLC. >> Uh, take that one out.
>> Oh, yeah. Take that one. Sorry. Um, so I meant to take that one out. Uh, Barbecq Billies LLC, Glen Meadow Incorporated, um, pending approval by the ABCC, uh, Spar Now uh, Incorporated, uh, Lee Guang
Brothers Incorporated, Restaurant Group, Luva LLC, Long Meadow Country Club, Maxer Long Meadow LLC, Extra Anchovies LLC, Royal Spice Incorporated, Sushi Time 168 LLC, and Wool Swamp Enterprises
LLC. Second >> and just um Fletchers has to be pending payment of taxes. Mike >> Fletchers and Posto >> and Postto. Okay. >> So amended.
>> Yeah. Pend to amend to approve uh Extranov's LLC and um what's uh Barbecq Billy's LLC uh pending payment of uh unpaid property taxes, personal taxes.
Okay. >> Second. >> And uh anything further? All those in favor. >> And then uh vote. I move to approve the maltton only liquor license application by no malt extract LLC.
>> Second. >> Further on that one. All those in favor. >> All right. And then I will um move to um
set our 2026 seasonal population increase uh estimation at 15,724. >> Second. Further, all those in favor. >> Did we get the first one? The ABCC
annual certification. Um, that's just included in your vote for the liquor licenses. >> Oh, it is. Okay. >> Yep. >> Great. >> Thank you, Vinnie. >> Good job. >> Wasn't perfect, but got it. Got it done. >> I I did have one question if I could.
Um, >> so we're calling So, Franconia, it's it's called um the Clubhouse Cafe, right? Are we receiving um like meals tax from them? >> Off the top of my head, I don't know. I
would have to look it up. >> Is that >> part of the business is in Springfield and part >> So, I wonder how that works because >> I think it depends on where the kitchen is and where >> like literally where if if it's in Springfield then Right. Okay. But I'll I can >> I feel like that's something that we
could we should look into because there's >> there could be So it's where the kitchen is, not the >> I I double I'm going to double check. >> I I not a golfer, but I So I don't know if there's somebody on a cart that goes around selling beer, but >> this is how we make up the budget gap.
>> But I'm not that's unlikely to be in Long. >> Well, the uh >> I'm sorry. All three of them. >> The course would be the course would be the long at least part of it. This came up a few years ago when they were talking about uh stormwater pass fees that were due to the town. We determined that there it's actually in three
different towns. It's Lmetto, East Lo, Springfield. Their liquor license in La Meadow, but I actually don't know if if they're liquor licensed in the other communities, too. I would assume so. Um because there are the clubhouse is a portion in Springfield, portion of La Meadow. Same with the beverage cart that goes around. So that's similar. That's a
good question. >> I mean, after seeing that presentation today, try to close the gap. >> Nice. All right. Um, moving on to common vic license. Uh, I think we just have to Well, go
ahead, Mike. >> Yeah, for the common Vic licenses, this is pretty standard and you can just move in terms of the memo. Um, and as soon as the people, uh, the applicants get their required information um, up to date, we'll just process the $100 payment.
Okay. >> All right. So, I will uh move to approve 2026 Common Vic license uh licenses for the following establishments that do not hold a liquor license. Uh Alex's Bagel Shop LLC, Batch Ice Cream, Big White
Foods Incorporated, Frankie Pizza, Iron Chef, Asian Cuisine, Nate's Subshack LLC, Starbucks Corp, and The Latest Craze Incorporated. >> Second. >> Anything further? All those in favor? And I will move to approve uh 2026
Common Vic licenses for the following establishments who do hold a liquor license. Fletcher Barbecue Shop and Steakhouse, Glen Meadow, Grapevine Pizzeria and Restaurant, Leathers in Long Meadow Country Club, Lola's Tacos, Tequila and Oysters, Max Oneway Brewing,
Posto, Royal Spice Indian Cuisine, Sushi Time, and Twin Hills Country Club. >> Second. >> Any further? All those in favor? Okay. And uh next up, one of the nice things we do every year, holiday trash and
escape. Um do we speak to it or can I make a motion? >> I think you need a motion. Okay. Discuss it if you want. >> All right. I will move to grant a trash amnesty from December 22nd, 2025 through
January 2nd, 2026 of one extra bag per household uh of trash per week. >> Second. >> All right. Anything further? >> Just a question. How would that So just another trash bag and then the they'll just have another extra person just grab
it and throw it in the truck. >> Well, we're absorbing the cost for it, >> right? But they would do that for us. >> I think they've had two people on the truck. Yep. >> And anyway, but even if they went down to one, they'd probably bring another one around this time, right?
>> And I assume it has to go week to week. It can't because it seems it's not we if we're paying for two weeks of it, maybe after December 25th would be more valuable than I understand though, if it's just has to be week to week, then this is proper.
>> But it's not like day by it's not like a Thursday to a Thursday, for example. >> It's generally been the two It's the two weeks. It's a four weeks. >> I I think it had something to do with the number of pickups. So, somebody wasn't getting shorted. >> I think so. >> But, >> okay.
>> We can do whatever you want. I mean, >> I mean, are we paying for the the day or by the week? >> No, we pay by the bag. >> By the bag. I see. Then it's fine. I don't think people are really going to utilize it as much before the 25th, which is no big deal.
>> So, I think this is It's going to be more costly with this current contract than it was in years past because now they get out of the truck. This was that whole conversation about setting the the pay as you throw price. >> So, it will be more costly than it has been. >> I mean, that's a big party weekend the
weekend before, too. So, I think be helpful. >> That's true. >> Uh, see nothing else. All those in favor. >> All right. I'll move that we adjourn. >> Second. All right. All those in favor? >> Great. Thank you.
>> Thank you. >> 8:30. >> This is I mean >> Well, we start at 6.