[Music] Yeah. No. What's the I thought this one is yours. Yeah. One here. Oh, shoot. [Music] [Music] I thought it was Oh,
doesn't seem to. You're all set. Okay. That's very good. [Music] All right. All right. Testing. Okay. All right. It's Thursday, September 25th, 2025. I'm going to call the Lunberg Finance
Committee meeting to order in accordance with the requirements of the open meeting law. Please be advised of this meeting is being recorded and broadcast over the Lunberg public access channel and on Facebook live on the Facebook on the public access Facebook page. Um
there is a zoom link for this meeting and um the details of it can be found on the agenda which is posted um at lunenbergmma ma.gov. And with that if we can stand for the pledge of allegiance.
[Music] I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.
All right. Um, any announcements from anyone? [Music] Okay. [Music] Can you Jen, can you ask PAC to make me host so that they don't have to do it? Oh, sure.
All right. Um, any public comment from There's no public yet. Any public comment from the board? No. No. Okay. [Music]
Thank you. All right. So, the next thing on the agenda is town manager and finance director report this evening. [Music]
Good evening. Um through you, Mr. Chairman, to the finance committee. Good to see everybody tonight. Um for those of you that aren't aware, we have had a lot of changes in our finance department here in the town. Um Ezekiel Ayala, the
finance director, um is has given his notice and his last day with the town will be the second to last week of October. I think it's the 24th. Um he's going on to be the executive director of the Latin American Health Alliance in Worcester, which is a great opportunity for him. Um but we had to react very
quickly obviously to such a large position. So we have brought in Eric Kinurf CPA who um provides these types of services either transitionally to municipalities across the Commonwealth and he has some towns that he is the
finance director and accountant in uh to provide us services through the transition including assisting us with the interview process. Uh we did post the job very quickly and uh we did engage in interviews and the chairman of
your finance committee and the chairman of the select board and the um the uh clerk of the select board all interviewed a candidate this Sunday. Thank you very much. And um an offer went out and that person has accepted
the position. So Katie McKenna um who I have worked with previously and is currently the Oxford uh finance director. She's been there I believe about 7 years uh will be joining us on October 20th. So um I think that we will
be in good hands and uh thank you for the quick assist in getting this facilitated quickly. In addition to uh the finance director, we also had the planned retirement of Nancy Oor, who is the payroll and benefits administrator
at the end of October. Uh we have interviewed several times for this position and we've even gone so far as appointing somebody uh who ended up not taking the job. Uh currently we are still interviewing for this position. We had hoped to have one month of overlap
period through the month of October for training. um that's not going to happen. So, at this point, I am going to be likely getting a consultant for some coverage while we fill the position. The good thing is is that we have qualified candidates who are applying, so we know
we're in the market correctly. It's just we're running out of time. Uh and the assistant accountant is going on to become the assistant controller, and her last day was today in the city of Lemonster, which is a great opportunity for her. Um but unfortunately that
leaves the entirety of our finance department um empty. So uh some of you may remember Steve Barrett who assisted the town in the past as interim accountant. He is a retiree. He lives nearby. Um he's currently doing three days a week up in Rockport, Massachusetts, but he is doing our
accounts payable on Wednesdays and Fridays. And one of the benefits al maybe the only benefit of having a position posted for the payroll and benefits position is that there were many folks who were looking at us who had accounts payable experience. So we
had a ready applicant pool and we have a good applicant pool for that position but will have to rely on contracted work. Um so that is the changes to the finance department. Um we also do not
have our FY 24 audit yet back from the auditors which is very late. Um they are stating that the reasons for this is there were two major mergers um within their field
and they got two large companies got swallowed and then got swallowed again. Um so they're being delayed but we've been told that it's close. So, you should be seeing the FY24 audit report soon, but it is late. Um, I'm not hearing that there's any issues that
have been identified in it, though. So, uh, the only other announcement that I have tonight is that the town meeting warrant remains open until October 2nd for uh, warrant articles to be submitted. Um, if finance committee has
any, I um, you have tonight. All right. Um, can we ask? So the benefits position which is the payroll position, we have one person in that position. One person. Does the school have one person on that position?
We process payroll and benefits for the schools. So they don't have anyone on that position. No, they have they have somebody that collects and verifies the payroll, I believe, but they're not inputting the payroll into the system to be paid.
Does is that person have other functions within the school? I don't know. You're saying that maybe we could use them? I haven't even thought of that. But well, I'm not saying that. I'm I'm just thinking of like you know I if there are recording in progress
instead of having two people or one and a half people doing it separate and then when we lose one you know maybe there is a a chance to create a a department of two when they have just functions of paying bills or whatever it is that
maybe creates a little redundancy on such an office that it needs to be happening every every week like this is an office that right to have some right we can certainly look into that um I the person that's in the position now at the schools is not processing the payroll right right right so there would have to be
some learning there but certainly as we get our position filled that might be a good idea to look at some collaboration between the two to grow that in the future any question okay thank you thank you
Okay. Uh, next on the agenda, um, master planning committee requested data. So, a few weeks ago, I had put in the folder sort of a questionnaire that the master planning
um, committee had asked each of the town um, other town committees and bodies to fill out. Um I actually had the opportunity to go through this um during the capital planning committee
which um Matt Brennan is part of. So being a intimately involved in the master planning steering committee, he was able to kind of guide us through how to do it. And whereas that body and this body are kind of similar in nature. I
took the opportunity myself to just fill in the way I think that this form should be filled in. Um, and then if no one objects to I don't know if you had a chance to review it, but I can kind of tell you how I filled it out. Um, and if
you know everyone kind of agrees with that, we can um vote on it and pass it on. They are asking for it by the end of the the month. the the way the open space committee did it was similarly where the um the chair filled and then
revealed with the members and I'm I'm comfortable with that. Okay. So the way I did it is um there were maybe a dozen or so um goals and recommendations that were established. There's goals each with several
recommendations. Um and then they had identified the ones that they thought were ours. Um so then they asked the question, is this controlled by your board's bylaws and policies? So if there is a financial impact
associated with the goal um or the recommendation, I put a yes in there. So as an example, establish an affordable housing trust to help identify and fund housing projects. I that would be something that I think we would want to uh weigh in on. It would be within our
purview to to make a recommendation on. The next one was like advertise federal and state firsttime home buyer programs. Not really a budgetary related thing, you know. So on that one I put no. Um and I just followed that. Most of them
were yes. Uh do we have the second question is do we have bylaw policy on this already? Um, I just put yes on anything that is budgetary related. I think we have policies and bylaws and charters, etc. Um, how does this
recommendation align with your committee's current goals and priorities? I stated, Fincom does not have goals. We assess and recommend to town meeting. Also provide oversight on town financials uh once enacted. So, I put that for each one of them.
Boilerplate kind of statement. Um, other aspects that need further clarification, I stated no. Um, if yes to 4A, I just put NA. Um, and then the next question related
to your board committee commission, what is the impact of implementation that implementing this recommendation? Are there potential unintended consequences? and I just answered um budgetary impacts need to be assessed and fin recommendations prior to
acceptance um at town meeting. So that's kind of the flavor I did for everything that had a budgetary item. Uh most most of them did. I think there was only that one that that did not. So um I I think that approach was similar to the way we
we dealt with it at capital planning. Um, I'm sure if there's additional questions or any kind of feedback, they'll reach back out to us. But, um, if there's no objections to that, I would recommend we just go with this and and send it on.
Okay. We all good? Yep. Yeah. All right. So, I'd entertain a motion to um approve the finance committee master plan recommendation for committee feedback file and send it to the master
plan steering committee. So moved. Second. All those in favor say I. I. All right. Passes unanimously. All right. Thank you. All right. The next one um
that we've been putting on is uh upcoming tribe board topics. Um so just in preparation for the upcoming uh tri board uh public safety, DPW and facilities. So if there's anything I
think going into that meeting we wanted to discuss uh the meeting itself is uh next week right next Tuesday Tuesday the 30th next Tuesday. So, um, I'm looking forward to each of those discussions.
Um, I think they're maybe a little bit more meaty than the first one, so maybe they'll more will come out of it. But, um, any anything we want to say going into the meeting? Um, I I I do I have, but it sounds like town manager wants to chime in.
I just want I do want to chime in because I just want to flag the I'll get to the mic. I do want to chime in because I just want to flag the importance of of I think what's going to come out of this process. I've been meeting with obviously the department heads who are presenting next week and
was tracking the fourth shift for the fire department, right? That's something that we've been talking about as an area of growth. But I'm seeing that there's other conversations on a small much smaller scale than that where there are needs that are not met in the current budget. And so this process is helping
to pull those out and identify them early and some of that was quite eye opening. So I think that to your point it will be meteor. Okay. And you know along that same line I think having the discussion at this point in the budget cycle is is very
healthy so that we're aware of it. We can kind of factor it as we're going through the the details of the budget. Additionally, I think this process will put a lot of material that takes a lot of time to go through in the winter months now, so we won't have to repeat it in the winter months and get into a
little bit more meat. Um, additionally, hopefully that will lead towards more of that 3, four, 5 year planning that can go on so that, you know, we maybe we can't fund all of that, but we can put a plan in place to um to try to to fund
all those needs. So that's good feedback. So one thing if I may ask like I I appreciate all the presentations that we have had so far. Um I have two feedbacks. One is I don't think we need to be looking line by line item budget
that is like $18 for a name tag in a year. like we need to like get a bit you know bigger picture like operational supplies you know like if if that line item is not going to have a major impact or change for some reason over the next
few years I don't think we should be talking about it um and and the other one is is you know if there is any major change that they are the departments are coming and bringing up that it is
we're not jumping too much like if it's an idea it's an idea but you don't start by with a budget and to make sure it's vetted with whatever group they are they work with you know like imagine if Chris Ruth comes in and he's like oh we're
going to you know put a water slide at Veterans Park because I think this is a great idea you know ever having spoken with the parks comm so I think as the groups bring anything to us. Um you know
bring it an idea that has been vetted with whatever the group they work with and you know and think of about what is the process of actually making the changes that you're planning to make. And you know the example would be
another one more substantial if the the schools to say hey we need to merge all of these positions. the schools wouldn't show up here with a bunch of zeros in front of the the staff line. They would coordinate with Jen before trying to figure out the staff because getting
those those information first time in the finance committee when it has not been fully vetted or it's not the right step. The next step should not be a budget. Um, so we just need to make sure of that.
Okay, that's my two feedbacks on that. All right. Any other topics related to this? Okay. So, the next topic, I know the warrant
hasn't closed yet, but um when is town meeting? It's November 18th. November 18th. So, we're three every other Thursdays away from um
town meeting. So, um we have three, you know, three more meetings and in which to talk talk about this. So, I just kind of wanted to put it on the agenda. Um, I know Jen had sent out the um the current draft of the
warrant um earlier today to all of us so that we can start to review it. Um, I honestly did not get a chance to to um to look through it in in any detail. Um, I do know that, you know, one one that
was discussed at select board um is the TC Pacios roof. Um, for those of that have followed finance committee for a while, I back 3 years ago didn't recommend putting on, you know, the the roof on that section.
I feel a little vindicated. Um, I still don't think we should do anything with that building. I really think we need to move towards tearing that building down um given its state. Um, so I may not be at uh the next finance committee meeting
um and possibly the one after that. So I just did want to mention mention that one. Um I don't know if there was any other kind of meaty topics that anyone wanted to. So what is the recommendation with this warrant article
like to use it? What is that you're going to be recommending Jen since you're here? Uh it's the recommendation of both myself and um the facilities director
that that we do not move forward with a partial repair of the roof and that we that doesn't stay on the warrant and that anything related to the roof goes through the normal capital planning process. Um, so what are the other
projects on that year on that fiscal year? They're pending on that open projects from that that year that that was funded. Yeah. If you give me a minute, I can No, I'm just So I guess what you're saying is
leave the money, leave the 300,000 that was appropriated and put it back in free cash. No, no, leave it in that article. Um, it doesn't hurt anything by leaving it in that article. And then when we No, I'm sorry. The article that originally
funded it. So, what was that? Uh FY 23. Yes. It was in the article 11 November 23. So, don't do anything. remove that draft warrant article from the warrant and then
the roof project, the whole roof project, bring that through the normal capital planning process. Okay. The money, the $300,000 just stays attached there to the capital plan of that year
of that year. in un in less and until or unless and when we reappropriate that money for other capital spending is what typically would happen. So once everything is closed out, if everything else is closed out of that year, then
you take whatever the remainder is, whether it's $50 or $500,000, and use that when you pay for the next cycle of capital. So our FY27 capital instead of that being paid for all free cash, you can just transfer from those unexpended
prior fiscal years of capital items first. Okay. It's like somewhat six of one half dozen of the other. You could let it roll back through free cash, but then you have to go back through the free cash certification process. So it's easier just to transfer the appropriation from
that prior fiscal year to one going forward. All right. Um All right. So, a couple things. Because this was done in November, I don't know if it was part of the overall capital plan project because what I was thinking
was like we usually have a balanced money. I don't think that's that's the case. If it was a standalone article, if I looked at the warrant, if it's a okay, then it can just then then it's available for reappropriation. So we can just cross this and leave this here or
we can appropriate into free cash and this will get you can't appropriate it to free cash but we could take that money and put it to a different project. So that money is available to be reappropriated at town meeting. Is there any chance that oh I guess never mind.
Okay. So this going to this article will not exist. Gotcha. So that sheet that you have there, some of them are conceptual, some of them are draft, some of them aren't going to be ready, some of them the select board is going to say
absolutely not. I don't care. We're not putting that on. So it's definitely a draft. Thank you. Okay. I don't know if anyone else had any chance to review them or browse through them now and wanted to talk at
all about it, but obviously this will be a recurring over the next um couple couple meetings. I think the next time we meet the warrant will be closed, right? So, yes. Yeah. The I mean, is the personnel
um seller administration plan amendment done or what's the status on this on this one? because I think this one does have financial impact and and I'm not sure what the goal of these changes. Can I just There's a couple.
Let me give you everything. [Music] Okay. So, there the SAP amendments for article F is to change a title. that that one's done. It's to change a title and to add
a position to the pay scale. Um, okay. The article G that just says the town manager and the uh assistant town manager are working on it. That's we're working on a um an a big rewrite um of the SAP.
So what is what is the goal of the rewriting and what are you uh some of it is for clarity some of it is for um alignment with other things. One of one of the biggest
items is um a change to the way that our vacation time works though. And um a lot of this a lot of these changes are being driven by what the select board has been talking about over the past several years about
uh Lunenburgg being a place that we we want to attract people to come and work and stay. And so that is the vast majority of changes are being driven from that aspect. Um but there are we're just going to do other technical changes
as well at the same time. Okay. We are not changing the structure of how the cell administration is managed and or well that's a that's a different article. So there is we're also repealing the sick leave bank and the special merit awards that were
put into the SAP last fall. How come? Um because by being in the SAP they only applied to SAP employees. So we just did the first round of merit awards and there was only a pool of people that you could nominate, not the
entire organization. So um but then there is an article the select board is talking about uh what is I think it just says dissolve the personnel board article P. So I don't know that that one's going to
make it on this. Um but that would that that could take a couple of different iterations. The issue that stands now is that the personnel board is empty. And in the absence of a personnel board, the
town manager is the personnel administrator, which means every decision that I normally would make that would then get vetted by the personnel board, such as hiring somebody beyond a certain step.
that doesn't have that second vetting and um and so in the absence of that it's just consolidated. So they're in one person. So some of it would be to vest that
authority where there is that secondary level of approval with the select board. There's other things that in 2020 2025 simply are not practical about having a personnel board and um many many
municipalities have done away with them. Um personnel boards came from a time when you didn't have you had volunteer boards, committees and commissions and you didn't have a lot of the employment laws that you have today and so um for a number of reasons communities are moving
away from them. I don't know that this will make it on this warrant. Yeah, I was gonna say that seems like a pretty big change and it's the and then that the policy needs to be stood up behind it. So when you're taking away
the bylaw that the policy is there to catch whatever you want to catch and that's the part that right and and the select board being the appointing power to the personnel board don't doesn't the power defaults change no
it does not okay I yeah I I I mean changing of structure of how we do things is I don't like taking how little time we have right now and conversations These things can become if it's not well conversed with the with
the community, it can become like a 10-hour town meeting about this one article. And one of the things that we talked about with well, listen, the community has heard that there has been a need to serve on the personnel board for over a year. Well, I'm not saying I'm just so I'm not
saying like there the applications have been none. So, so let's let's make sure we know what we talk. Oh, there is one thing about we need people to serve on the on this committee and that is another conversation which is we are restructuring how this is done and all
I'm saying is the conversation about restructuring how this is done is one that we should have the the paperwork ready and be ready to talk with the community you know just not that's all what I'm saying I'm not saying that that shouldn't change I'm just saying we should allow for time
one of the things the select board did talk about as an idea when we were talking about this cuz the concern is not having the policy in place for when the bylaw goes away um is putting potentially a delayed start on it. So the bylaw would remain to give the time
to do the work. That's a possibility but we'll see. I don't know if it's going to be this was a request of the select board to be on this and that language is not finalized or and it's not in here. No, they have asked for research which they will be receiving. Yeah. I I I can see myself supporting and even maybe
Jay, but it's just we need to see it. We need to get used to. We need to converse with the community, get feedback. I don't think this is just something we show up and ask the Yeah. And and I want to be clear too because I've had some people reach out and say this is a power grab by you. And it's people actually call and say that.
Yes. And I said it's quite the opposite actually. It's it's I am trying to make sure I'm not the only person approving some of these things. And that's the way it is now. And also like for you know you understand but just for the public
um when when you do have to convene a board that doesn't normally meet to approve things in a hiring process you lose candidates. Yeah. I'm not I'm not disagreeing. It's more about if we're staging the structure, we need to have the
conversation, be ready to have the conversation with the community and give time for the community to get used to it and not expect to show up at town meeting with a language that's brand new. Yeah. And this is this is a heavy warrant. There's a lot of stuff contemplated. So, right, some of that might move to May.
Yeah. Agree. Good. I think the are all the ones that I read and caught my attention and wanted to talk about it. Okay. And we know there might be a couple more. Um I think schools might have one that they're adding um
in any other conversations on this topic. Okay. All right. The next thing on our agenda is town finance policies review and
discussion. Um we spoke with Jen a bit on this. Um I think the way we want to proceed is for Jen to get a chance to put her thoughts and her markups into it first before having us review it. So, as of
now, there's been a lot going on. Um, she has not had a chance to make those markups, so we'll just pass over this item tonight. Um, Jen, can So, I know this is a process that
has that's older than you. Um, and I know you have a goal to be done within a one year. Um, so now we're waiting for you to do your markups, which is, you know, that's wonderful. Do with that timeline of you wanting to
get this done, you know, within a year and walking back, do you have a timeline in which you're have you have a a soft goal of uh maybe getting that done? Because if it's
the you know what I'm thinking is a question of process. It's long gone. My my soft goal was by end of the calendar. So this the whole change because you know some of these things for me is a process right. So if we have a a soft goal of getting this with you
bringing the first markups for us and that doesn't happen that becomes a trigger for us to find a different process to act on and still meet the goal of getting it done within a year. I mean I I did want to have it done by the end of the calendar year. I don't think that that's realistic. Okay.
Um, but I also don't know with getting a finance director on board who has recently done these in the past couple of years, how quickly they might be able to just pick it up and make very quick work of something that I'm going on and
double-checking my understanding of things online to make sure that I'm correct. So, it it could still be on that, but that's what I was hoping for. So you want to stick I mean that at the end of the year because then we can just move take it
out of the agenda and not talk about it until you know December 31st like yeah it's under old business in case we need to talk about it. So I didn't really even plan to talk about I mean if if you want to keep it on and and if you have something that you've
received to react to in sections take it up. Yeah. But the next section is from you. So Right. end of the year. Don't talk to me about it before. Got it. No, no. I'm saying if you want to keep it on the agenda, right, and you'll either for your next meeting, you'll
either have a section or like tonight. Yeah. We often pass over old business, but have it there just in case we need to. My my thought is like I'll just we'll you know, I won't ask you again if you say your goals in the end of the year. That that's
Yeah. like in in my head like okay now I don't need to think about this until the end of the year but it still needs to go through I mean originally I had wanted to be done done so it needs to go through you and select board capital planning has a piece of it
um our adviserss from Bartholomew and Associates they have the investment piece of it to make because that was done pre-prudent investment rule so they're going to comment to update that section I wouldn't imagine you'd need to comment on those two sections by way of
example after those two committees. You may not have as much but so hopefully we can get it flowing again for you though. All right, I'll bring it up again end of the year in the new year. No, you need to bring it up again in November. You're asking.
I know. Okay, the next topic was prior tri board meetings. If there was anything we want to revisit from the from the last one, discuss Okay. Uh the next topic um analysis of historical and current school budget
data. Um I just to alert you know the other members of the the committee here. Um honor and I have had several questions that we have asked the um superintendent
as well as the the new business manager um Chris McNamera. uh related to the um the 600k underrun, related to, you know, the baselining of the the budget as it
relates to this current fiscal year, where the $500,000 went related to that. I think I sent an email that um the superintendent sent to us um to everyone on the board just kind of with some of
those answers. I think we had a lot of confusion based on that. Um we had a small meeting. Um Anna was there, I was there, town manager, superintendent, um Chris McNamera, um and um Tony uh
Skull and Breeny just just to get on the same page as to like what data we want to we want to see. So two thing couple things came of that. one. Um, everything is in Munis. Um, Chris knows how to run Munis reports. We should be
getting kind of Q1 2026 report right out of Munis that we can review. He actually asked to come to finance committee meetings. So, um, that's good. Um, I'm sure he'll be willing to answer questions. So, we
should probably get that on an upcoming agenda when it's once it's ready. uh would like to see the same thing on the on the the town side, you know, just those annual, you know, quarterly reports like we um historically have have seen and maybe haven't seen as much
of lately because part of our role is not just making recommendations on the next budget, but it is to make sure that the current budget is is acting properly. Um there was some questions about some of the data that was sent to us and um we're seeking some
clarifications on at least um a couple of the items. Um I don't know if honor I know you wanted to maybe have some discussion on this topic tonight. I mean, I don't think I have a discussion because I don't think we have the final
answers yet, you know, and uh like I don't know if you recall, but that presentation I did back in February or whenever it was was all about how the information didn't really reconcile like the data didn't recon and I it's better
and we're getting a more clear view like uh the superintendent was able to send us a headcount names you know day one of school day last day of school. So now we have an idea of of headcount. Uh we can take an analysis of that. So there's
data that have become more clear. Um but we're not not everything is there. Um and now we have you know I think there's some more questions. So I like my my fear when I made that presentation back in budget
time was I actually don't have any of the answers, right? It was I I I'm looking at this and the data as presented does not make sense. The budget analysis that they presented the their numbers didn't match their own presentation a slide or two before and
didn't match their budget. So all we've been trying to do is get the right data. And I think all these surprises that are coming about are things that if we were diligent back during that time, these
things would have been discovered, looked at, and addressed back then. But you, I mean, it was the previous iteration of the school committee, you know, the response that we got after we Yeah. which was we're not going to deal with this right now. We're too busy. and you
know and that's I think some of the surprises that we're having now is because we didn't do in my opinion the due diligence that we should have done in the past. So I'm I'm I am I am very pleased with my conversations that I have had with the new superintendent. Um
she she wants to work with the community and the current chair of the school committee who has been nothing but supportive of the questions. So I think that's a big improvement. So hopefully we'll have more clarity about everything. Okay. In the future soon.
Okay. Yeah. They seem very willing to, you know, take the take the questions, take the meeting, have the face to face to even work through it, right? Honestly, like writing down questions um in emails and firing them back and forth can get difficult, right? So um it
it was a good step and I'm I'm optimistic with the team and the collaboration that is is occurring and um I'm also optimistic with the new finance director coming in that you know she has a a a long I think 15 17 years of
experience in municipal finances that um she'll be a good fit for the town and a good addition. So, um, hopefully everything is is on a good path. Do you do you know if that munice report
is that like can they export that to like a CSV so we can Okay. Yeah. So, um, yeah, you can definitely get it out as a CSV. Yep. And it's pretty easy to get whichever fields you want and then have
it, you know, align on the the mun code and all that kind of stuff. So, okay, which I think is one of the things we we lacked in the in the past is that there was I think a lot of recreating data off of Excel sheets and cutting and pasting
and all this other stuff when going to the source in Munice is really where you should always kind of go to. So, um one thing that I'll you know add to that um the data is good just as as you make the data good. So when I talk about
financial practices and management and procedures, that's what it is. So for example, I know in a recent school committee discussion, um a former school committee member said, you know, I didn't know this was happening and there was a lot of uh you
know, I always heard a lot of complaint about munus. The munus has had issues, but it has been on the billing side of things. So for example the sewer department and that has been across different municipalities but the process of opening a PO
uh creating a purchase order uh receiving a purchase order closing a purchase order that is not going to be fulfilled for whatever reason sometimes POS gets created in duplicate because you have a PO but someone gets the invoice and they think there's no PO
they create a new PO these are financial practice that every organization should have. And when you don't have that, these little things that you think, oh, it's silly. What's the issue of closing a PO? I'll tell you, it's a huge issue
because every time you run a report and you say, how much money is available? If you have duplicate POS that were created, as an example, now it's going to show that expense there twice. So as they get to the end of the year and they go through the process of clo closing pur because they have not done that all
year long now they're going to start finding money that they hadn't found before. So all of these process this is one easy process that I'm sure most people that have worked in a any industry know what I'm talking about. So these things matter a lot and you know
you can have the best software in the world. If you don't have good procedures for ensuring that these financial practices are there, you're going to run into problem and and I think there are a lot of issues related to that based on some of the stories of what I heard and
the number from 583 already went up to 600 and there is still and I actually think now the current number is 621 and the incumbrances have gone down to 70,000. So there were definitely that's already
like from 14 125 to 75 that's $50,000 of PO that were closed then now that money became available. That's one example of like when they were you know financial practice management policies that we're
trying to approve within the next year. Yep. [Music] All right. Any other discussion on that? Okay. Um, minutes. Have people had a chance to read the August 14th and the July 8th? Uh, the July 8th is the tri
board minutes. Yes. Anyone else? I did the August one. Where was July 8th? That was the tri board meeting. I don't recall seeing that one. Was that in the email?
Um, it was emailed to us. Put in your It was emailed to us and it's in our folder now. It might be might have been emailed before the last trial meeting. Did you not get a chance? I did the August one. Okay.
I did the July one way back then. I did the August one as well. Okay. So, you want to make a motion on the August 14th? I make a motion to approve the minutes of the August 14 meeting. Second.
All right. All those in favor say I. I. I. All right. That we'll approve the August 14th and um just get a chance to do the July 8th. I do think I put it in the minutes and review. Um I'll double check and and try to add that there if I if I
forgotten. Okay. Any committee reports? No. Uh any actions and topics for future meetings? So, I think the warrant will definitely be one that we're talking about over the next uh few meetings.
Um we're kind of putting the policies on the back burner. Um, Jen, when do you think we would have a quarter one report? Mid mid October.
What's your next What's your October meetings? Um, October 9th and 23rd. Okay. So, we'll aim for the 23rd. Any other actions or topics? No, I think you got it.
All right. And then, um, Jen, just at some point, we need to put the budget calendar together for So, okay. Um upcoming meetings, tri board meeting, uh
September 30th and October 14th, November 12th, um December 9th, 13th of January, and then 9th and 23rd for finance committee. Uh is there any public comment from the public?
Any public comment from the committee? All right. I would entertain a motion to adjurnn. Motion to adjurnn. Second. All those in favor say I. I. I. All right. We're ajourned. 7:52. Thank you.