Tell Do you want to start? >> Tom, >> what >> are you starting? >> Are you waiting to Are we ready to go? >> Yeah, it's on. >> Okay. All right. Good. We can start then. All right. Uh good evening. It's uh June 11th, Thursday at 7:01.
Uh this is the Lunberg Finance Committee. Uh uh in accordance with the requirement of the open meeting law. Please be advised that this meeting is being recorded and broadcast over the Lunberg public access channel and on Facebook live on the public's access
Facebook page and will be uploaded to the Lunberg access YouTube page uh channel after this meeting. Um the agenda uh lists all the topics which are to be discussed at this uh at this meeting and anticipated by the uh by the
committee. Uh but uh but uh but uh uh the votes may take uh because uh let's see votes may be taken because of these discussions. Not all items listed on uh may be discussed and other items may not be listed might be brought up at at the
uh up for discussion to the extent allowed by open meeting laws. So I think we can do the pledge of allegiance. 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. >> Our chairman is away. So uh we will try to conduct this meeting without his guidance. Uh first of all, any
announcements? Anybody from the uh I don't see anybody here. Anybody online? Uh no. Okay. Uh public comments. Any public from the public? Any comments from the committee?
>> Yeah. Um I have a I have one. So, I don't know if you all recall, but a few years back the there was a capital plan item to add cooling at the primary school and then
we didn't it wasn't enough money to do the project. So, the school committee asked to use that money for um to buy the mini splits.
And um at the time the town manager Heather Lemieux said that she did see that those things as different items and but she gave the opportunity for the school committee to ask this board and the select board if they would support
using that and if the select board supported this committee didn't support and then then we had to waited for Tommy and then a couple years ago I was on the parks commission and I wanted to use the
revolving fund that we had to hire to increase the hours of the rack director and Heather Lemieux said I'll support that if the slack board and the fincom supported. Uh the slack board said yes and this body said no and I was on that other
end. Um so that was a conversation. Um again I requested for this and I support um the parks commission recently on June uh launched a pilot program and I don't
know if that's going to be a part-time rack director or a full-time rack director but it's pretty much that request that I had when I was the chair chair of the parks commission and and and it was done um you know with
uh It seems that the town manager supports it. Um, again, I requested the same thing. I didn't like when I got a no, but it was the it was the was. Um I I just really like how Lunberg Town
Government has stayed very close to the boards and commissions um you know wishes even when it has not been necessarily you know our bylaws or charters. So anyway, so that's my comment that I hope
that when we go to make any any financial decision of this such as these um um that you know the boards and commissions get you know looped in before it's made
the decision to go forward. But again I support doing this. So that's my comment. >> Thank you. Any other comments of the committee? Any announcements or comments? Nope. All right. Uh we don't have uh town manager of finance
director's reports. And on our list of year-end transfers, we don't have those either yet. Uh hopefully next meeting. So the next item on current business is the prioritization of fiscal policies to be reviewed in the for future meetings.
So we talked a little bit about this at the last meeting I believe it was and um so these are uh policies that either we as the finance committee would like to
do or if we do have a uh the tri uh tri committee tri board committee if we have that uh we'd uh we'd probably be pushing to get those things done. So we wanted to make a list of of things and maybe discuss them a little bit uh uh so that
we can at least uh when that time comes be able to present ourselves in a in a pretty uh in a good manner. So I uh Chris had put down a list and I had looked my list that we had talked about. Um
um free cash uh the policies on free cash that was something that we wanted to look at. Uh revenue projections uh the policies on revenue projections. How do we uh do that? Uh stabilization accounts there's a bunch of them. Um um
and uh how how do we do that? Capital committee um what do they uh what do they do? How do they do it? Um it might be tied to free cash because uh uh but uh those and I
think the uh uh the cont was it the opb contributions? >> OPED >> oped contributions. So those that have uh that was that the uh retirement funds. Yes. >> Yeah. Okay. That was like that's the um
retirement funds. Okay. So that was um uh should we be doing that um all the time or or whatever? So those are the ones we have. Do we have anybody think of any others that are that would be discussed? I I don't know how much
time is going to be allotted for this either at our for our meetings or um at any other meetings but uh I think it's a good list but any others >> um so are we talking about discussing those
polic separately or discussing them within that draft of a policy book that we have? I I think if it is just us, we pro and I guess we'd ask our chairman uh to u to lead us on this, but I would
think we would probably want to um start with the ones that we think are most important uh look at the policies um and uh discuss them as a group, make recommendations uh to either the uh um the select board
or um the tri board or whoever uh would make sense. That that would be my thing. If it's at the tribard level, I think it would be let you know we would be brought up at that level. Uh to me, it would be to me it would be better to serve at the tribe board because I think
there's a lot of discussions that a lot more people talking might be better, but I think we have to see what their appetite is for it. Even if there's going to be a tri board, I don't I don't know. I haven't heard anything on that yet. >> Okay. So, um, >> Tom, when we do the tri board, we have
the school committee ourselves and the select board. Um, does that look like we're prioritizing one department over other department heads when we have, you know, when we're discussing like major things with like just three entities and not department heads from other
places? I don't know. >> I Yeah, I don't triboard the tri board. Um, that was the first time we've done it, I think, at least in my memory. Um, so I think we should uh look at what worked and what didn't.
>> And um to me I the biggest thing I saw was that we did all this work and then at the end of it there were people saying, "Hey, did you think about this? Did you think about that? Did you think about this?" And we're like, "Yeah, did you see the
meeting on this date? We talked about that for 45 minutes." And that's always going to happen because people are busy. People have lives. And when I, you know, 20 years ago when I was living in town, I wasn't watching these things or
listening to the select board talk about things. Uh even though my kids were in the school, I didn't even watch the school committee meetings. So I um I don't there's no criticism on that. Everybody has their own lives to lead. Um, I think we would want to try to get
some of the people who were who maybe not in those three committees who were people of influence and people with uh who have were had different feelings bring them to that tribe board
for whatever reason. we you know if we want to talk about free cash then we so who is you know let's talk about that um and have some people come in. So that would be my suggestion is to to invite um everybody but maybe certain people
who might have some expertise to come in or have strong opinions to come in because I think it's uh the most important thing at in anything that we do is to get buyin from as many people. We can have the best policy ever, >> right? the best plan ever. But if we
don't have buyin from every not everybody, but enough people to get it through, uh then um we're we're stuck. And uh I'm not saying that, uh what happened was bad. I think it's just we
did the best we could and we got uh we have the budget we have and we're going to get through it. And let's take a look for next year and see what happens. And um you know, let's see. I I don't think there's there's a positive or negative to have there's there's definitely a
positive to having more voices. A negative might be it's going to be harder longer. Um you know, might get a little testy at times, but to me, it got testy after the meeting. So, let's let's haggle it out.
Now, that's my own personal view. Um >> um I think the um the stabilization accounts I think that's something uh I don't know enough about the policies for them. When do we draw them out? Um same
thing with the u uh uh you know I know for example one of one of the accounts has to do with fire trucks because they're like $2 million and so we put money aside. That's pretty easy. I I don't think but when do we you know do
state why don't we take out money uh is it only when we have a you know usually when I think of stabilization accounts it's like when you have a uh a drop in revenue for a one-time drop in revenue for a period uh because of something I
remembered like 20 years ago the state took back 10% of uh uh cut the budget by 10% after the budget was approved and we lost and every other city in town lost 10% of their of their uh their monies and so that would be a time to use it.
That was uh uh or there was some increase in expense that was a one time. I again I don't you know we had uh a fire in in the town hall and we had to spend a bunch of money to do something just to keep things going. Okay. Well,
that's not going to happen next year hopefully. So yeah, that to me would be where you would use your reserve accounts on it. I So short-term one-time expenses or revenue fluctuations, but you know, I I was hearing a lot of comments, well, when times are tough,
why don't you draw on that? And that's a reasonable thing to discuss. So I think maybe if that's what some people are feeling, then let's have a discussion about that and discuss, you know, the positive and negatives of those things and see what happens.
Yeah, I think we also need some um policy and I think you mentioned revenue projections um because you know I think I think that's a fair thing for us to talk about
it. Um one thing Tanya you mentioned about you know the school committees sitting with us. Um tri board committees are common AC across the street the state and usually is the school committee included because
their budget is about usually more than 50%. Then the town's budget so they become a as important as the select board. I understand that and I know that other cities and towns have certain types of committees, but if we are talking about
specific revenue um that has to do with capital funding or something with the fire department, I feel as though like that invite like Tom said should go out to the to the people in those departments that may want to hear about it. Um I'm not saying that it's not important for the school committee to be
involved in the tri board. As you I as you know I agree the school committee is very important and it does take up generate you know take up a lot of the revenue from the town. So I think the tri board is great but I think if we're discussing more broader things there and then we're talking about our policies
and it affects one of our departments then as Tom said we should invite those said people to that meeting or make them aware. A lot of community engagement I think that's kind of our issue. um people don't know what's going on and as Tom also said, people don't have time to
watch all of these things. Um but if if we make an effort to engage the citizens um on certain issues uh and try find different ways to reach out, I think we will get more buy in of people that can hear and know what's going on. And
that's not diminishing the tri board, the school committee, the select board, or us in that in that tri board um rainbow. Uh, so that's that's an incorrect like uh vision that you're putting out there of me that I'm not putting enough on there.
>> I didn't say that. I I think you you asked about it and I didn't disagree with anything. >> That's fine, Anna. So, you know, I just that's that's my opinion. I think we should involve more people more people in the community if we're talking about broader um broader subjects and that's
it. >> I didn't disagree with that. I I pointed out to I I I don't know what what got you. I I I shared the information without disagreeing with anything. >> Can you explain it to me about what can
I finish my what we do here? We already know what we can please finish. May I not be interrupted, please? >> Go ahead, Hannah. Of course. >> Thank you. Um I I shared the piece of information without disagreeing with anything that has been said so far. >> Great. Thank you.
Um okay. So does anybody want to discuss that more because I think we could um I haven't again I haven't heard much about um that but I think with Chris is back if there isn't going to be a tri board
then maybe um we just handle it here and we'll let Chris figure out how he wants to do that or you know let him take the lead on that. Um any old We don't have any minutes. So is there any old business uh anybody wants to discuss? I don't have anything on the
on the list here. We don't have any minutes. Anything to discuss? Um okay, committee reports. Um I'll just start off. We had a municipal buildings committee meeting uh a couple of weeks
ago and um we have one on Monday and uh at this point we're trying to figure out up we're trying to update what the needs of the town for a town uh offices would
be the square footage and people and all that other stuff. Um, so there were surveys I uh that our chairman uh and the town manager were going to get to us and then we were hoping to be able from there to kind of get that and then from
there decide okay how how much of a um uh how you know do we need to add to the Ritter building? Our hope is that we don't we uh if it's just the town uh offices that maybe we can um do some
maybe renovations and I what we were talking about was the finances being what they are even though we have capital we could borrow money we we have the uh the capacity to do that with the Turkey Hill project whatever that is uh
coming up in a number of years Um, we might want to downgrade the scope of the Ritter in the town hall to be more of a capital items from um, you know, smaller projects. Okay, we're going to like, you know, we
did the roof. Okay, we're doing the roof. Okay, or we're going to renovate this and smaller projects. That might be where we go. I don't know that to be the case. That's just where I'm pushing them to go. Uh but um we'll see what happens with the municipal uh
with with the meeting on uh Monday. Can I ask a question about I I I saw they I watched the last meeting um and of course what you're saying is that has have the committee
um contemplated maybe purchasing the older dealership and because I think that's it's like 11,000 square ft of office space and has a huge garage. Um and then you know
like keep a a function of town hall in town hall. >> Yeah. It's it we we've we've had discussions about um a building a another building to say, "Okay, we're going to build a uh whether it was uh in
front of the uh fire and police department that built, you know, buy that, tear down the building, build a new thing or or leasing or buying. Uh over the years, we've talked about various things. Um, and I'll be honest, my biggest concern
is that if we did that, um, we then we have this building, we have the Ritter building, um, with no use. It would be and we would be like we were with TCP and we were like the primary school and the Brooks House. they're just going to
not get the attention they deserve and they're going to just collapse because we're going to say we can't afford to put a new roof on the on the town hall because it doesn't do anything for us anymore. So, um we you know it's just not going to happen. So, to me, we have
to have a plan not only for doing whatever we're going to do, but if there is any buildings that are going to be obsolete, what are we going to do with them? And we've talked about, well, maybe we could sell the Ritter building. Maybe that could be done. Um they were
talking about if the school committee decides to build a new um Turkey Hill um that we could take over the the current Turkey Hill and make that a community center which would be the town hall, the boys and girls uh
the the club uh the senior the senior center uh and others. And then we said, "Okay, so what do we do with the Ritter building, the town hall, the club, and the adult uh center? What do we do with those buildings?" So, it's we got to
there's a lot to think about, right? Right. >> So, but we've talked about it all and and there are plenty of voices out there and none of us agree, which is good. I think it's a good thing. Yeah. To have all sorts of people talking about, oh, we all have different
>> um >> perspectives, right? Which I think are good. >> Yeah. That that building I thought it was interesting because it's a one one floor, so you eliminate a lot of ADA accessibility issues. Has plenty of parking. >> Yeah,
>> plenty of parking. And it has a garage attached. And I think like if you calculate the price per square footage of both the garage like just the office is, you know, the current new construction, it's it becomes a fairly
um like a it's a good prize. >> Yeah. I was joking. We could get the uh the uh the bonfire we used to have. We used to have >> when the old high school was up. So we could have that. We could have in the parking lot of that place, >> right?
wouldn't be a little different. But right >> it's yeah this it's I don't know it's it's I I'm very frustrated in that we've been I've only been on the committee for three years maybe and it was running I don't know Dave Black could tell me
more maybe seven years or something. >> Oh it's been more than that >> maybe. Yeah maybe 10. And it's just it's just uh >> there was another committee before that. >> Yeah. So there's Yeah. There was another one that was doing TCP and >> yeah that TC yeah I start everything
with the that TCP one that had to be right after >> uh TCP closed around 2012 13 >> yeah and and there's a lot of good people having a lot of good conversations and I think that's that's um that's good and I I think we would we
need to I I think again this is just from our perspective of where we are today after the election and after, you know, what we see in the for at least the next couple of years that maybe we at least my opinion is we scale down our expectations and maybe really focus on
making the life better for the people who use the town services and the employees because those are the two things that we were always focused on is when we were talking about town halls and things is how do we make it easier for people to use the services and how
do we make the environment better for the employees. Cuz it it's funny how a few years ago when we were losing employees left and right, you know, we we had people were leaving, they were going to other jobs and some of it was probably uh the environment, you know,
it wasn't great to work here, whatever reason, but some of it was income, you know, we we had a you know, and uh so we changed the policies for for uh for uh overtime and not overtime, the uh vacation time and c certain things to make things better. Pay time off.
>> Pay time off. Yep. PTO and all that. So, we made those changes, I think. And we've uh made some uh other uh adjustments and uh that had a financial cost and we saw that this year we had to up we had to
put some money into an account to to cover some of that. But I think it was the right thing to do. Uh so I think in in this case, we want to maintain that. We don't want to make a step back and have people working in less than u adequate conditions. That's to me
that's um having people I know who would work for the town. It's you know they work for it and they don't complain a lot but it would be nice to have a nice professional setting for them. >> Yep. >> Any other committee reports? Anything
else? I said I I I watched this the select board and the school committee uh not every minute of it. I fast forward through some of the stuff. I won't say who. No, I'm only um but I um so I didn't get
everything, but um it sounds like everybody on those committees are interested in doing the tri board, but I I haven't heard any anything. >> Yeah. And I don't know, maybe Chris knows more, our chair knows more than I do, but um that would be interesting.
I'm I would I would whoever's listening uh at least I would I know I think we all pretty much agreed that that's something we would be interested in doing again, >> you know, >> as a group. Yeah. >> Um
Okay. Go to the uh no other committee reports, actions, and topics for future meetings. Well, we'll we'll talk about the um year-end transfers. We'll talk about the tri board if that comes up. And we'll talk about the uh the
policies. Um any other thing any other items you think for for this for future meetings? >> Um >> oh, we're going to have to do an election. We lost our vice chair. Well, I think we usually after appointments in
July, you do a >> I would wait till let's wait till Chris is back because I will hope and pray that Chris would want to be chair again. Um and uh but let's when he's back at the next meeting, maybe that's maybe that'll be we'll do that at that point.
>> Yeah. Um so yeah so the the only topic would be you know reorg if any um but I I'm not going to be here in July 9th so if we could
>> All right >> um >> that's our next meeting is the the 9th >> right >> um >> but I'll be in on the second meeting of the month >> or maybe we can >> and I heard there are uh volunteers ers for the fincom and I think I heard there
was you must have heard because you watched the same meeting they even had uh three people for the personnel committee >> four >> four that's awesome do are you one of them >> I am >> nice >> good
>> you're getting related >> I I I worked at a uh >> that's great >> I worked at a credit union not the one I used to work at but the one before that um and we used to have annual meetings of members And we'd have every year we'd have a meeting and there would be the employees, the board and their spouses
and and a few friends of the credit union and nobody else would show up. And um the the CEO of that credit union was up. I want people to come to these meetings. And so um when I started working there the first year, they uh
added a checking account fee, a $3 a month checking account fee. Um, and people got very upset and there was police surrounding the building we were at to get people to get in and out. And
I said, you know, maybe you don't want too many people to get all all excited about something, but maybe all the talk and all the discussions and all the ins and outs may have gotten people off out of their chairs and maybe wanted to volunteer. Maybe that's the reason and
that's a good thing. >> Yeah. I think what I heard was most um boards have multiple people including the APDC. >> Yeah. Oh wow. >> I know. >> That's I I I think I every time you look there's always a list on the website of
open positions and it you know you got 12,000 people here. You should be able to fill those things. >> Yeah. >> Uh and sometimes it's multiple people uh doing the same, you know, doing multiple things. Uh, and while that's really nice
of them, but it would be nice to get more voices and more just um more voices of people who are from different perspectives and get new people in because at some point, you know, you don't become you
don't go from not doing anything to be getting on the select board overnight. You need to kind of learn stuff to be a good one. No, we had three people there that were >> Yeah. But yeah, but it would be nice to to get people to get ready to to do
other things. You know, I I I've been on the finance committee for a number of years, and it took me a couple of years just to understand how to tell >> municipal financing worked >> from, you know, from my uh uh from business and nonprofit world that I
lived in, this is was a different the numbers were the same, but it was you had to have the right you had to understand how things worked and it took me a couple of years to figure that out. um you know so
that's important uh so um okay so maybe I'll I'll maybe we'll talk about we we have our schedule July 9th for our next meeting u but if there's another date uh maybe the uh
where we can have our uh elections our reorg of us could attend that would be a better thing so we could have a nice discussion So, I'll mention that to Chris to see if we maybe could u move that around. Is there uh anybody else
can't make the ninth? Is that >> I should be here. >> All right. So, but let's see if we can figure out something we can do uh >> to get uh I know the summer months are always tough.
>> All right. Wow, we're moving. I should be I should run this meeting more often. >> Uh, okay. Any um any public comments? We're at the public comment session. Any public comments up there? >> No. No public comments?
>> Any comments from the committee? >> No. Good. Yay. Um All right. I'll uh make hear a motion to adjurnn. >> So moved. >> Second. >> All those in favor? Hi. >> Hi. Hi. >> And we're adjourned.
>> Thank you, Tom. >> Yeah.