order um this is a hybrid meeting and it is being recorded um from the finance committee I have with me tonight in the room Dean nadas Tom Parkins gar moris myy Graton Andy olderman Peter Twining
and myself Sarah melish we also have the Town Administrator Greg better with us um we have a lot of members of library and not sure what else friends to the
library okay so if are we just maybe if we just go around the room and just say who's here that would be good for the minutes okay good idea GMA Library director H Dave lumon Library trustee chair Davis Library
trustee Rick Rogers Library trustee treasur Lisa baville 8 committee 8e Li l Friends of the library forley Shane here Friends of the library
J Friends of the library Christian 88 chrisy Dixon temp thanks okay um just happens to be that the first item on the agenda is to discuss the
fiscal year 26 Library operating and capital budgets um so if you want to just kind of give us a brief overview of the library budget and Capal reest
I'll begin with a pre words um those that is first of all I have confession me um since I joined the
library I confess had flooding in the basement sewer blockage wof leaks chimney leaks collapsed ceiling in the library which narrowly narrowly missed one of our
Librarians and was over 100 pounds on the floor we had bats bees squirrels and ants in the library the exterior wall of the children's room built in
65 is buckling out in several places we've had H problems notd flooding problem which I think I spoke to you all about two years
ago complet has the um pump and French drain been put in uh the DPW didn't like the idea of French drain they put in one new Su pump replaced one old some PP I've
not connected the discharge pipe anywhere they right outside the building probably blow back into the building again U but we're not done yet my confession includes broken
walkway rotting window sills gutter drain pipes trees growing in the gutter we have technology problems and we have cility I don't think you should be held
responsible for all this well I frankly if I ever had to face in coolage sometime here after I get on my knees humbly apologize been a very good
D and Charles mckin our famous world famous architect would probably also be very angry about the way we've taken care of his so I seek your help tonight help us
to remedy these problems and I'd like to see a l on from the finance committee join us advise us on a on a monthly basis and report back to your own committee progress hopefully
we'll be making in the future to correct these difficulties and to head them off in the future so that we're not dealing with crises we're anticipating these problems and dealing with them in in advance 50 is on hey um so I
I I know you have a copy of operating quest to which um You probably received yesterday or early this morning slight change in a couple of the lines that we ask to increase for our
operating budget um that is on a page attached to this if you just got this hand out or you were sent Greg sent out the copies that you sent um you're looking at this it's the last
page it states those two lines um and that is related to the fact that these came up after we made our submission um budget requests and it's just a matter of you know just having enough money to
operate um the building um repairs and maintenance line is one of the lines we asked to increase further from the initial request which I have we had originally requested $6,000 and I'm now asking that we get
$88,000 to handle these some of these smaller issues that most of the emergency things that theyve alluded to are are way bigger than being able to be handled by this maintenance
but I became aware this year that we have $4,000 annual furnace bill that's just for servicing of the Furnace that happens every year so if that's a maintenance cost that we have to deal with every year and then we
add on to that pest control and we add on to that um water portable water in the building those three things alone surpass that $6,000 Mark and that means there's not a pen for anything else that happens and
things do happen we have fall down the other day that needed to be to that up we have right now an electrician coming to look at a door that's not working we had a a door get stuck the other day that we had to have um some people come out and take a look at the door so those
things happen and you know that's be expected but we want to be able to take care of that within our budget line so that when the bigger things happen and they will um the bats that were mentioned are still there they're not gone yet and that's a huge bill that's
coming um so we have we asked last year for um money for a conditions assessment of the building so that we could more um responsibly plan for Capital expenses in the future and so I hope you know going
forward we'll continue to be able to do that so I will we will be coming before you each year and asking for a certain amount of capital in order to address these issues before they become B problem yeah is that $4,000 for annual
furnace or boiler repairs is that a service contract or those are um no those are a service cont okay great was the Library part of the Facilities Review uh that I can't recall
whether the library was included that they the one we got the report on back in September the master plan the M Master thank you master plan is that part of that I I don't remember so it wasn't in terms of a recommended
expansion U and it identified that it will need significant okay it didn't go into all the things we're hearing about no I mean you know I can appreciate the ly of lows um the they've been addressed
as they come up um I think the DPW has been very responsive to those needs as they as they come up um and it's we really depend on you folks to flag those and and request the MS as the budget process goes forward so we haven't been
seeing those request so um we work together on doing and when we look at the facilities budget a lot of these things are not I mean there's a there's a maintenance budget in library budget as well as a facilities in the long-term capital budget they are
in any of these needs are so the longterm capital budget has a little over $2 million Target towards the library so we trying to I don't know if this also helps
answer the question but the facilities budget that's listed under DPW does not include our building that was my question short the answer and and to go a little bit more
um like the DPW has 11,000 for general maintenance the town hall has 13,000 so the fire department a lot more than what the library is asking so you know maybe we should rework some of these budgets to try to give more to the library from
some of the yeah the other piece of that is some of the other departments have the facilities budget under facilities in DPW and some maintenance money under their own budget so they even have more than that yeah you don't have the second
one and our and our ours is quite small so I it might you know it's the nature of having building that's was built in the 188 we're g to have to have significant issues down the lines how but you had an assessment done is that correct we did
is that completed that is completed and it is now online anyone who wants to look at DPW I had Nate put it under the facilities reports that were done it is now on the town website to look at so that's something
Nate has looked at yes okay that assessments a comprehensive assessment that covers all yeah that's a a full building assessment of everything you know pretty
much everything St they did not wish list yeah I mean it kind of set some it doesn't make recommendations but based on the conditions you can see the timeline we could make priority lists of what need that Etc which is what I tried
to do when we created when we sat together and created the um the long-term facilities plan that I gave to Greg for the next 10 years that was based off of that assessment conditions assessment
trying to not only determine what things needed to be achieved first but also like obviously grouping things together that alike so we're working on Windows we work on on the roof we work on the
whole roof so the conditions that you mentioned try to their past history sorry they're past history meaning they've been F list thing some of it some of it hasn't been taken care of yeah that's I'm having
trouble distinguishing which is which and where where where it fits in the longer term plan the capital I see that's requested um I see a list of things right I'm not sure where they fall in the various well
and I will say we made a change in our Capital request originally the capital request which was part of that five 10e plan we had asked for $270,000 $200,000 was for um a window
project that dealt with all the windows um however not all the windows need addressing right now and so that's the change that we made and we instead um we did apply for a CPC Grant to help
address the windows that need to be addressed now because they are rotting that has not been address but that's what our plan is for f by 26 you're doing the windows through CPC we will we will do
those therefore the 200,000 the thank you question um unlike most other buildings in Manchester this is a historic building and I know in the past we've had some roof issues and we've tried to use CPC funds and there have been some
issues with historic renovation versus regular you maybe it's a question for you Greg you have a sense of how much of this work is falls under the historic that may have limitations versus just plain get it
done um so the most of the exterior would fall under the historic okay so that tends to be different contractors and different bidding process well there's a there just a typically it's more
expensive materials just to follow up on the history since I was there name sorry Rick Rogers um a lot of the roof work other than the recent leak by the chimney um
was in past history right the the roof actually now is in pretty good shape after the recent work it's other building issues and to Greg's Point things that are Street facing right are are where the historic commission is
okay so um has the leak that caused the plaster to fall that has been repairing it has to give a full view on this it's been leaking for years if you were to go into the attic uh you would see that some of the
rafters that are holding that heavy slate Ro have been wet for years it's caus some Rod like was picture in the cricket maybe six months ago that cyy and I took of the rotting Raptors they're Joy they're holding the roof
up the longterm solution is they need some support so when Rex says the immediate problems been fixed yes but years of damage have taken contr well the building is 130
years old there's no other municipal building in this town that I know of that has that age Imagine one of our relatives being 130 years old they need more maintenance and attention so there's 34 of a million
dollars budgeted for roof replacement and repairs in 2018 so that's right you know we're trying to we're trying to address them so is is Nate working with them on the buildings because the finance committee doesn't get involved I in scheduling
when buildings need repairs um so is Nate does Nate have a plan for the library no just the fiveyear plan is what oh that Cynthia that he okay trying to put together the
apprach to okay to address a lot of these issues so we are still get back again and say the other part of our request for this year would be the $70,000 which would lead to the
planning design of an ADA which as we know has been needed for some time um has been uh looked at already um we stopped that process when we were
hoping for a a grant that would have helped P for that and a lot more um we did not rece that Grant um so going forward we still feel it's very important and that would be our first step is to make there be an accessible B
uh in the life and it's um what was done previous was a a concept study which gave us three options um one of which was not really an option two of them were options that were not
ideal and um what we're hoping for in this design process this year is for them to at least consider an exterior connected Ada Library so it's actually built outside the
envelope conce if that's conceivable but we do want to get through the design process this year with that money whether it ends up being outside or inside so that we can actually move forward in FY 27 for the
construction would you anticipate um plans or construction plans as are deliverable from the study yes and how did you determine that the 70,000 was the appropriate amount well
good question um I'm not sure that I have the correct answer to that but I did check with Nate I went to Nate I said is this do you think this and then he actually we had a meeting the other day with the company that did the initial study and they are working on a
proposal of what they think it would be to create this through to the documents that we should get by the end of the month but Nate seemed to think that it was probable that we could get through design with construction
documents um probably if it ends up being the exterior one we may not have quite enough that we're not sure about so so so the 26 budget has that 70,000 in the capital proposed it has
330,000 in 27 for the restroom that will not be enough if it's an outdo if it's an addition footprint if you're expanding the building footprint that 330 will not be enough so that's that's that would
change things so this design would not you wouldn't be starting till July right because the money wouldn't be appropriate until July wouldn't be issuing any type of contract or anything until July okay okay just to go back to the other list we started with I start to be a little
confused are they being addressed one way or another in various things whether we've always provided money for that's a very you gave me a list maybe s sah trust maybe it's easier to focus on the fiveyear capital this
was sort of part of a more General handout that was meant to give like the flavor of historic and current problems but we took the conditions assessment and did the more long-term capital request based on that so it's probably the best resource that has what's
reality and what we' thought about and I think we took the feedback that we should be um you know really specific for what we think we need in any particular fiscal year so that's why we focused on design and sound I appreciate
that it sounds like if the exterior element but I think don't you think that probably the easiest thing to see of course other than things that will pop up that we don't know about but the sort of planned lead cap yes Ian I do think that you know that is something that should be
reviewed annually that that's right we're still on track yeah no every year revisit we revisit the fiveyear plan every year to make sure it's so that's in the spreadsheet we received in October yes
yes exactly okay exactly that's but I just want to be sure they're covered in already period of spreadsheet all the things the things you listed it's all sounded terrible to make they are terrible are they all covered some of them have been
taken care of I understand that some of them have not been taken care of it wasn't taken care of it was providing the money to get them taken care of Are We proceeding with the plan that's been the problem all along building's been neglected for 50 years are we proceeding
to take care of it yes on a crisis basis we are um that's not what you're telling me you're telling me you've submitted A Five-Year Plan which is addressing your Capital needs if we meet if we if we follow up on
these needs yes that will be and that's not just addressing things on a crisis basis that that may have occurred in the past right but that's not the plan going forward yeah and that's the hope is that we'll do better and that's what the
reason for my apology does that answer your question maybe yeah and I feel maybe too I'm hopeful that what I'm hearing you say is in the 5-year plan you've addressed these things they're all yet to be done not it got it but
it's in the plan we just the plan comes forward we'll deal with the financing it needs yeah there's 800 750,000 in fiscal year 28 that is got some of these issues for
that spending yeah and and sorry I think part of part of the timing the sequencing was informed by our hope that we would get the grant you know have we had we known a year ago there was no Grant this sequencing the conditions and and all that would probably be on like a
the requests at least would be on a slightly moreel that's why probably obviously the 70,000 for those not e 88 B them feels little lighter than what you'll see in future years but and are you are you comfortable that the assessment addressed all the issues which is what you based The Five-Year
Plan on yeah I think it it was very comprehensive we needed it both for the um Grant application and because we the feedback that we need to be a little more organized about planning up the future Capital requests and we all sat down and I mean Cynthia obviously like
lives this dayto day and Nate had looked at it too so I think we felt good about it I'm thinking rotting Rafters yeah yeah pictures the Tet you guys may be familiar with tetratech right the town probably works with them they are
historic architectural engineering firm they're the ones that did the assessment and they did they took a short and long-term view so a pretty good view of what we think will be major comp I mean they're not going to get into minutia
but it it should be a good view of what need can I clarify the the fiveyear plan not clar more oh the CIP 26 through 30 fiscal year
26 and I look downloaded it to my computer on October 19th okay I found that Emil the doesn't it I think the net of all this is with that done with that there planned now we
look at things we're going to do this year which is where we come to the Ada okay I just wanted to be sure we closed off the had some plan with respect to the other quote unquote emergency or non-emergency items before we start
looking to what we're going to do to move forward we have a plan okay and sounds like it's in the it's in the planning so got it now we're talking about ADA I think actually great I just had a question if
it's an exterior building we're looking at maybe 330 due to Interior what do you think the exterior rough would be 2x 3x on that probably 2x if not more and that would
be off of the new part of the I'm not sure where you where you put it the only go right where the bathrooms are just put an addition there um but to go
back to that figure that we put in for the amount the exterior bathroom that's I'm sure you're right in um we did have when we had the initial concept study done for the interior
locations um the highest price one this is a cost estimate they said we should not use pures but you know gives you a um the highest one was 170,000
constru so my thought few years old we pretty high inflation construction cost right um so so that's probably what it would cost now for 300 is probably what it would cost for the interior the
exterior I would just preface that by saying that I think the town's come a long way in the last four or five years by front loading projects with engineering we we've had a history in the past of getting into projects and then saying oh my gosh we probably
should have thought about this more carefully and revising and revising and revising and that gets really expensive so you know whenever we're thinking about what's the next Capital project we want to make sure that engineering and the design has been done pretty
carefully beforehand before the voters start committing money to something and then they then we're coming back going well it wasn't enough and what happened here one of the things that Nate and I talked about when we were putting this
last piece together um was that uh they'll need to look at a concept thing and then we'll need to assess because from that concept is it really possible to put it outside for a cost
that we think is makes sense like it going to make sense to spend 500,000 $600,000 on a bathroom or at that point what we can say to them is nope design one of the Interior versions is going to
be a lot less expensive that what we will go forward with and we will have to figure out how to mitigate the the displacement that that causes but at least we have it we have in mind that we would be stopping at that point and making sure that we're not spending good
money after bad I'll I'll elaborate on some hold on just a moment um Gail I don't know somehow I'm not being able to see people online um Gail has said that Nate has his hand up so maybe we should hear
something from Nate if you don't mind absolutely I always like to hear Nate Nate yeah I think uh Cynthia just really covered it well there um you know I think the general premise that we need to look at if we're going to be doing uh considering an exterior option uh we
need to there's probably two concepts that we need to look at and then we can you know do the full uh concept analys analysis on them and then cost estimating just see where they come in um you know if this was a you know relatively modern building it probably
wouldn't be as as challenging as adding uh an exterior restroom to this building is just given the you know thickness of the walls the kind of odd layout in some spots um so it's just not very conducive to to easily adding um an exterior
restroom you know especially if we're trying to keep it to the you know back and sides of the building where there just really isn't a lot of room room um so I think you know one of the options that we talked about as Cynthia mentioned was just potentially putting
it in the director's office and then giving her an office elsewhere which might give us a little more flexibility on uh you know Ada paths and um fitting the extra space extra exterior space
into a spot that you know might not necessarily work for a bathroom but it can work for a you know her office um but you know in general I think everything that they've already said you know regarding the F five ter fiveyear uh plan you know seems right on the mark
uh you know we have a pretty substantive list uh of projects and I think it's just going to be a matter of fitting in um you know what projects should go together and then using the cost analysis and uh that we already have to
kind of fit into a budgetary number that we're you know that want to spend um you know over the next X years um you know ideally we get to a point where we are designing next year's project while we're doing the construction of you know
the current years or the previous years's design project much the way that we do you know our water main projects so so you would you would have good numbers in time for next year's budget oh yeah absolutely for for an exterior
bathroom you know I I think they would give us you know the the prior report that they did um was very detailed um provided contingencies so I think it would be much the same it it would really just be a continuation of the the previous feasibility study we did that
looked at the three interior options okay thank you Nate I guess as we get you know if we and we'll do design you know assuming we we choose one of the options whether it's interior exterior as they get into
the design they would do uh additional uh cost estimates to you know based on a 60% design to really firm up the construction uh costs great Rick sorry I cut you off yeah no
not at all and Nate said in two words what I was going to say in 100 um concept analysis right like so the previous plans didn't have a whole concept analysis of the impact and a little more time spent on that will
mitigate Town expenditures going forward any more questions from the board on this Capital expense um there lots of people in the room does anybody wish to say anything regarding this Capital
exp no um yes go ahead please state your name and address um Lisa Bonville 23 wood Home Road um I'm here on behalf of the Ada committee as a member um simply to um encourage everything that needs to be
done to put an ADA accessible bathroom in the library it's a long overdue I have in my hand the architectural access board um regulation on uh General Public toilets uh in each adult toilet room uh
at least one water closet one sink in each location shall be accessible to people in wheelchairs or a separate accessible un unisc for the room shall be provided if you can't make them uh separate men's and women so um and this
has been in the in the law for very long time so um it's a it's an event that has come we're a little behind so anyway three of us are here from the Ada
committee and we're here to uh to encourage whatever in order to make that happen thank you um Sarah I just have a yes s it might be I'm sure the the board has considered the library board has
considered that having exterior access to this facility the bathroom could be a useful facility for the town at large um having my experience on another committee the downtown Improvement committee one of the things we want to
do is make sure that we have public restrooms and I don't know whether that works or not but it's just a thought that's it thank you yes say your name and address pleas Lunas 34 benett Street uh I'm just here
because I am on the live princi ofal Library board and I think it's extremely important for the town to recognize the needs that the library has and the treasure that the library is the town and what services are that we provide
and to let these M these maintenance issues um impact how the library can operate is something that has to be address thank you now in this
memo there was one other adjustment to the budget I'm not sure which line it was the other technology yes was technology which is called computer replacement which really should be technology going
forward but um we had the failure of a laptop um happened after we put this budget in um we don't ask for a ton of money for techn techology replacement but as you can imagine in the library it's quite
important for us to keep up to date with technology and um I I I have I am working currently on a on a kind of fiveyear rotational plan so that want so that currently it's a
$2,000 proposal go to 3,000 got it so the total would go to Total expenses would go to 178 200 75 175 200 2,000 up on um 1,000 on Tech
I can't add tonight and then the 570 570 599 yep any any questions from the board on the operating budget
No I um menu on the 2% salary rate wish other departments could do that I mean honestly the only thing that allowed me to do that was our lack of custodial support this year but um I think that
you know it worked out and we still have the 3% raising and I'll take the opportunity to Echo Dave lon's comments earlier uh Meg has been great and we thank her for her new appointment and service she's great new
cust a couple tries but we got there strike up so I just um Greg I had a mechanical question last year at town meeting we voted on funds
for this uh Grant 150 the grant didn't come through correct where are those funds at the moment are those falling back to um reserves they would fall to the fund balance okay all right and was
the was the amount used for that assessment part of the 150 or separate from it I can't remember it was SE it was separate separate okay okay and sir I have a question maybe you can help me with is previously when we talked about the ADA Bathroom maybe a
few years ago we appropriated an amount of money we had there was 250 appropriated and that was sent back to free cash it was sent back because it wasn't used okay that's the question in the timeline we have free for using Capital project back yeah so it just
went back to free cash so we're sort of starting over again we are and and remember part of the whole for that procrastination was that the state would pick up 50% of the cost on any addition and Renovations that were done on on on
the library which would have included the bathroom probably the roof too absolutely the roof so yeah that's that was our justification I hope that I'm not I'm not pressing any issue on that I just want to know where the cash where
the cash is that's all Sarah I KN know of that okay so do I I have a motion to approve the total Library salaries and expenses operating budget in the amount
of $570,500 yes okay that's thank you you wait a minute we got to do the C it um do I have a motion to approve the 7000 Ada restroom design work for the
library don't move Andy moves do I have a second Tom second any discussion I have on question it's a repeat question which is if you think 70,000 is division to get to do what you want that is to come up
with a set of plans here n so we'll rely on Nate I think because I'm I'm anxious to have you get this done than you every young mother with a toddler is anxious to get it done well gar as the rest of the population and the community
too so you know everyone's anxious to have this take a vote Dean yes Tom yes car yes La yes bendy yes Peter yes V so you're all thank you very I just want to raise a question for you uhhuh
so we had that 200,000 in the capital budget originally for the window yes yeah um so that isn't needed for Windows right one option would be to to set aside that money for the
bathrooms I knew you're going to say no that because next year when that project comes in at $550,000 I'm going to be short at250 well we need to look at what other what other thing that we have ready to go can
be put into this year's Capital not something for the future but is there some other Capital item that we can pull in pull in this year yeah I'd rather do that because we've we've set this policy
that we're not setting aside money for the future I understand I understand but I knew the answer to my question but I wanted to raise it the fire ask except for the reserve the fund to the fire
okay you love our new is that pretty I love it when they pull it out down the beach parking lot and fire it up get my stuck on the well thank you all for coming you're welcome to stay thanks for
visiting more visitors than we usually have to fill the room because we moved the meetings from 7 to 5 so we had more room for people right no thank you guys seriously just not even just for the library stuff for
being here at 7 o' at night thank you guys now G to move on to the fiscal year 26 operation and I thought we'd go through it from the
beginning I person personally one request oh yes just if we could take up the town clerk's budget first sure okay so that's no problem Town cler hey wait a minute I've got I've got
the page number from the original budget book is 28 or I have the spreadsheet I have no idea spreadsheet I'm working off the spreadsheet the spreadsheet that was
sent today they're the same okay thank no adjustments so we have a number of budgets for the town clerk um the first one
is Town Clerk just town clerk's office I guess it just town just I but anyways which has 149,90 in salaries which is an increase
of 70 of 22% so that's boosting the current clerk small C clerk um from uh halftime to fulltime
okay so that's that's why you see that Big B and I was in there and she is now a notary yes she said came a notary on January 1 she was very excited took something so good everything actually
we've trimmed a couple of budgets um but the big change is is that assistant to half time to fulltime now is she an assistant or an assistant Town C thank you she's an assistant
to okay she's not an assistant Club okay having read what was sent sorry the town stamping thing this an area where yes I think something like that in the near future I think down the road that would make a lot of sense uh
obviously would object if we did that now but um but it's a brand new person I understand yeah yeah so uh I think it's fine to do it in stages but obviously if fine I just want to ask I think we have a few more pressing needs I'm not to belittle it at all but I think if we can
make this change now I think that's a good step forward what what's the kind of monetary impact of taking somebody in a clerk small C clerk position and making them an assistant town
clerk so typically um it sort of brings it from Union clerical okay to professional out of the Union okay and and so you would you you would pay more for that um so um you know starting out
at the low end of the union scale you're at that low 50s um you know it's going to be closer to 70 okay just is that fair yeah okay just one with some idea yep is there a um added service or what
what are we going to get extra for the M yeah so I think a lot of it is that there are only certain functions that she can do now being part-time and I uh she covers for me when I go away so last week for example I went to a mast
town clerk's conference Wednesday to Friday which Friday doesn't affect business here but um she had to work all day Wednesday and Thursday which meant this week she's cut back and when people are coming and asking for notary services or birth certificates it means
that I'm doing it which means my plan this week of making election worker schedules and planning my trainings and the more long-term things I have haven't been able to do and so the advantage is that she can cover the counter the phones and do that more and then that
leaves me more to do planning and bigger projects there's also there are also things in the office like some records things that I would like to work on that haven't had time to do um so that is really the advantage here and also just really having someone as a backup in
case anything happens because I've I myself have been in positions where I've had a supervisor who had to leave suddenly due to heart issues or you know a death in the family things like that and I want to have someone there to offer those services and who can be relied upon and it's hard now to ask a
part-time person hey all of a sudden I need you to be full-time this week you know that's not something been doing what's the level of people who come into the counter on a weekly or a daily basis it seems busy it is
busy it's nonstop yes you'd be surprised uh yeah this afternoon primarily was answering phone calls and and doing notary services for some reason today was just notary day I don't know what it was um but no it is I
mean between the collector's office and my counter I think those are the two busiest I see it's very regular and we actually get so anyone who googles Manchester Town Hall it goes to our phone oh look you yeah which is fine I don't mind but that means that we are getting this additional calls and then
getting people to the right place or finding answers for them so we have you know we really are one of the first points in the building people either come around the corner to a counter and try to figure out where to go or they need us or they're calling us first to figure out what they need so I would say
yeah it's fairly busy another area that has increased significantly is records request yes we've heard that from the time consuming um and uh number of requests you know es and flows but
overall the trend has been significantly out do do the records requests become simpler if we automate more well the more we can put online Yeah the more we can drive people okay but it takes time
to put stuff online and managing the records I mean I think that's really a significant role for for Christine's office um she just needs time to do that and if she's Staffing the count or answering the phone then that that that
stuff can't get is it worth worth possible contrac to autate record well we can in terms of digitizing yeah I mean that's an option and that's I could look into there's
also you know a certain level that you can have an intern or a senior person help with that the problem then becomes access to they don't have a desktop to work on or things like that but I do think shoot some of I mean some of the records requests are just one specific thing from 1920 you know like it's like
like you might not end up digitizing all of that um but we certainly could look into that but that would be something I need to get bids or contact vendors and find out you know it's still a project it's not yeah I'm just thinking if it if it represents potential for some overall Savings in
time sure yeah yeah no definitely something to to put on the list Greg is this oh I was is this sort of the Freedom of Information requests that come rolling in so that's been a heavy hit over the last several
years I would think any way to minimize that impact we should be looking at really significantly here I mean yes so so continue to work to get all
minutes and so that's that's a help also if that's you saying you'll fund it I'll well I mean it's it's it's I think a reasonable question which is you know what what do we think we spend in your time in a year and what's not getting
done and if we contracted it out to somebody who could take a dent out of it would we come out ahead of the game in a year or two you know it may not break even this year but this has been ongoing so how do we get a hold of this thing
well I been trying for a couple of years now to try to get like the zba app up on the website so that because they have to go to her people have to go to her to get a copy right and to try to get them up like on the zba web page or something
under a street address so that somebody can just be sent there to look yeah you know and that sort of thing so I think the more we can use the website get information
more we can put on the better we but we're happy to research different ways to to do that and didn't we used to have a full-time yes assistant Clerk or something cler little C little c yeah it's it's always been little C okay so
on the records requests um the fees were only the revenue last year was $385 that's not much this was we only charging a dollar for not either well by law go
ahead charge 5 cents a pie and I think there's a certain amount of if it's going to be a very lengthy research time you can charge a certain hourly rate for but it has to be of the lowest paid staff member who would be able to do that um so it's not and
that's only if it's a bigger you know research Pro but then I mean in the time that it takes you but I mean that is that is a big part but also so much has picked up with elections mail and early voting and
all of that that that really is another reason to have somebody who's there full time to be able to help with all those things so so voting has become much more involved right you can explain to me but it's the
length of VO yeah it's it's it's it's not a one day event right it's a multi-week event and that's when you really want to have that fulltime backup because if I suddenly go down or something happens you want somebody who's ready to just in but voting is covered on the next page sorry yes we're
getting a little ahead of ourselves but Staffing wise it would be the same yeah encouragement towards technology when you have those choices so you know you know what percentage uh mail and ballots are report uh
returned in comparison to what you send out or you not track that I did have that number from this past year I don't have enough the top of my head um but I I'm trying to recall like yeah I don't I don't know but I definitely have it written down
just was wondering whether it's a high percentage or a low percentage Yeah Yeah it um depends on the election too A lot of people this past fall get request a mail one as like a backup um okay because if they if something
happens and they may not be able to come then they'll have one at home that they can have somebody drop off but that does mean we spend all that time packaging and sending it out and then it sits but that's fine if it gives people a peace of mind right um so there certainly are some that don't get
returned Christin she get you that yeah I did put on the election results that are on the website the last page how many people voted how many ballots but I don't know has the return yeah
okay so do I have a motion to approve the town clerk budget and the amount of total salaries and expense of 15955 you do I so move second Peter moves 40 seconds any
discussion get that number is that is that all three of them no just just page 28 28 yeah perf find it 38097 you're on a different page I can
tell by the heading it didn't it got shut off should just say Town CL 159 551 okay sorry we're all on the same page yes take a v Dean yes Tom yes Dar yes
Mory yes Andy yes Peter yes and Sarah votes yes now we move on to election and registration the decrease so this fluctuates depending on number of Elections so this current year we had a
obviously local state primary National so it was it was a heavy year this year you came on board during the middle of all that so um he quickly uh quickly got up to speed thank thankfully so are we
assuming two Town meetings per year now we yeah making that assumption but you've got a large decrease in Professional Services what are Professional Services for you so um ballot printing maintaining the
machines um think of what else there are there's those but so last year would have been four elections and this okay so they have someone someone from that the voting button comes out to the site right so for the tabulators
prodctions um somebody comes and maintains those machines um and then we have to pay yeah for the programming for all the little memory cards and that the clickers we're we're doing that in house
yes okay but there is if we end up renting any which I don't know people'll see um do I have any any more questions this um do I have a motion to approve the election and registration
total budget in the amount of $ 28,250 move he to moves second Dar seconds any discussion Dean yes Tom yes SC yes my yes Indy yes
Peter yes and Sarah V yes so excited to get some budgets approved um next is our clerk it looks like we're paying a lot more for those parking
dick I suppose this isn't your of expertise it's really Police Department isn't it the sticks those posts that have yeah the chief kind of talked about it when he was here okay I thought they were free apparently nothing's free well so
we we we do pay them they take a they take a percentage of the ticket but we still have to budget it because it is money going out okay got it okay so the revenue doesn't doesn't include what we pay them it's the total
the revenue is the gross revenue and we pay out of that Revenue 30 grand so this this is assuming additional STI as well yeah I read something about that quite figure out where but as long
as it's not in front of my house I don't have an issue how many more is that like doubling the number we have or ining it by 50% I say a third more maybe a third CH was pretty happy yeah yeah the the police
department is very pleased with it freeze up know par physical parking enforcement officers go other places so and is is there a reason why we don't do it year round because they they have a minimum
charge oh okay and not enough yeah not enough volume there to do okay on this yeah we have do I have a motion to approve the total paring buget the amount of 38097 yes Peter moves second car second
any discussion take a vote Dean yes Tom yes G yes Mor yes Andy yes um Peter yes there you okay that
it last page thank you very much for coming in Christine question on the revenue side okay hold on on the revenue side yes you look recently I know we asked about the fees for making copies of things but in
terms of Revenue in general the eight or 10 things here we looked at what we charge and whether that's being track to anything what it costs or what where charges are in similar communities well most of these aren't
hers public record is yeah dog fees yeah there some are and some aren't I I do appreciate it's a yeah I was just ever increase the dog license fees so dogs are 20 and 25 25 if they're not fixed 20
if they are that's what I've seen other places similarly vital certificates $10 is pretty regular I know some places do 15 I haven't seen 20 um but I think $10 is pretty average from what I've seen I I can also check the Mass town clerks
group is really good at collecting surveys and seeing what other communities charged I could see if they've done one of those recently and where we stand but um I mean dogs I have seem more expensive but I hate to do that people and they're not the tags themselves aren't too much
although the vendor that we work with just send some of them out they might be worth looking at um and then let's see Street list Street list that's a good question I haven't printed them yet since I've been here I'm just wondering if the what we charge covers the cost
probably not yeah um I could certainly look I don't know um yeah I because I'll be ordering those this spring summer um so I can see I know a lot of places are going towards having it available
digitally and then having a few book but the thing is you can print less books they cost more per book and then are you going to just fully charge that to the resident so that's something I can look at um but I'm guessing based on how much it cost where I was previously to make
and to sell them I I doubt that it's covered does the dog license cover cats or are cats that's a free nobody so dog licenses is it's a master no law there's no law that cats have and
one of the reasons is do you have you ever had cats in New Jersey though and we had to register oh did you but it's very hard to keep a collar on a cat with a dag with a tag if you just take a look I think that's hisor
Yeah question about the rubbish um stickers that's that's different than the bags obviously these are stickers that people buy to bring things to the transfer station okay so that includes like lawn mower and that kind of anything you have to
that little sticker for okay and um uh hazardous race too would that go in there uh we don't have much of that no it's more like the metal TVs doesn't Department of Health do hazardous waste
us to we have a separate pick up I Board of Health I thought pick up at houses now I don't know they changed what they were doing we we did for one year um and then that vendor went away oh so we're back
to bringing it behind Town Hall okay that your questions does do I just asked that we just Pi a vot and see what it's possible now you can leave thank you well thank you so much for your time thanks
thanks okay now we go back to beginning non-appropriated expenses the beginning it should be the very beginning okay3 looks fled
Butta if we go to k the number won't change but the amount that the MTA gets will change and so you you divert it is that a short term thing or a longer term
thing it's long term it's it's in place until you vote otherwise so the like actually to interestingly to get into it it's just a select board vote to to um
to remove ourselves from it from from cada it takes a town meeting vote it used to take a town meeting vote to join yeah join but what I'm questioning is is the diversion from MBTA a shortterm thing or
a longterm per it is has it always been there the MTA charge no no no the fact that a portion is going to a regional Bus system it only happens it only that only happens if you vote to join the
regional buses that's that's voting to have them come and do a circuit through town correct yeah we haven't had no I'm just surprised that it comes out of I just think it cost more that's yeah no it's it's an intering Quirk of law okay okay interesting you're allow to you're
allowed to divert you don't have to pay more it's I'm not sure why that ever enhanced service for less money or sa money that's pretty amazing you look at the history yeah
yeah and the NBTA and that M does not right fluctuate an enormous amount no it has it grows very slowly okay do I have a motion to app go ahead Dean so on the uh the first item like the um certified for tax title uh
last year was 7,100 thinking the 5,000 might be low or is there a reason it just has varied I mean so the year before we only had 105 okay you know so it's it's plug number it's just uh okay I'm pretty
comfortable with the F so that's somebody who doesn't pay their taxes for real estate taxes for a certain period of time and then we have to file okay so it's it's pretty rare that okay so the 5,000 is probably
conservative yeah okay just for the ignorant here what's a motor vehicle park search charge that's a state charge I just wondered what it is for all our Motor Vehicle Parks that we have in town okay
I it's a search charge no less um I don't even know how it's count that's right it's for 5,000 many years and have we ever considered not being in the mosquito
control it does come up yeah um um I think with the return of West nle and yeah it's the other one we don't have any mosquitoes manchest so you know maybe once all the
board of heal does debate that yeah okay yeah and metropolitan area planning counil is something we belong to number yeah that's $3,000 again we that's a bill we get okay okay
that's why it's non appropriated right um okay do I have a motion to approve the non appropriate expenses in the amount of 2997 42 sure Peter all second Dean
second any discussion take a vote Dean yes Tom yes bar yes Mory yes Indy yes de uh Peter yes and Sarah say yes next is Town Administrator oh here's the one we
wanted yeah so there is um a small change if you go to it's at the bottom it's under the it expenses just under 6,000 to
that another six from the 598 so so what's the number again please so if yes so at the bottom it expenses the 185 880 y we're proposing 190
880 that's what I have here so the new number is uh what you're looking at the spreadsheet that the Buton that was handed out to okay just gave [Music] you and that what what does the IT
training mean mean what doing it's one of the um one of our our needs are to do more staff training on the softwares that we have um so this is an effort to make
sure that people are are utilizing the software to it's at least more fully I was going to say to the fullest extent but I'll say more fully so U it's an area that I think we're we're a little weaken
okay I think we can improve some efficiencies by getting people more proficient with the software yeah and the money we're carrying for Town Administrator is based on current expenses not an adjustment for high okay
okay um so did we did advertise it at 180 plus or minus okay um you know depending on the experience and was there any um option of hiring within bu
in want to take your so so yes that's a possibility so that'll that they'll unfold as the process goes forward yeah that's a mantra I have of trying to keep costs under two and a half is if you
have more people wear more hats and you know higher within if if we have a 10-year veteran administrator we're going to go to a firste veteran administrator I would think we could maybe cut that but I don't know yeah but my concern about that is in a town this
small I I don't think we have the support to Mentor somebody who hasn't been a Town Administrator I think that's very difficult um that's just my personal opinion um that I think that you know I
see a certain value in having some experience I think it's easier in a bigger place you don't need as much experience because you got an ass assistant down administ I mean you know back it's I just had this conversation with bunch of my colleagues yeah the
extra challenges of small towns yeah yeah yeah I mean you have a town meeting to deal with yeah you get you wear more hats volunteers you wear more hats yeah don't have we don't have as much specialization right yeah right no I but
you have a lot of the same issues well I know our goal for the year is to not have a override that if if the school goes over 3 and a half% then we can use excess Levy capacity that was the goal for the budget this year favor
of using excess Levy capacity for the schools anything over three and a half% is what I'm I'm I'm saying I don't think it's going to be that much my position well I just got something through that it is um my position is we have the
excess Levy capacity because we cut back on Town expenses and I think that we need to chip away at that excess Levy capacity for Town expenses and that if there's the the
most recent thing I got from the school district with the 26 plus increase in health would be a 3.45% increase in our tax rate for the school it's 1.1 million um and that could change because I was told the
school committee had not agreed to eliminate that principle but that what was presented to us had not been voted on by the school committee I didn't realize that I may have Miss um but so who knows seen that what
they'd seen it they'd seen it but they hadn't voted [Music] on I didn't understand that I I assumed that they had you know endorsed
it but it would be nice to see where all these numbers are going right now because they all seem to be going up I know we started with a 1.68 %c increase but we've gone nowhere but up so it's it's it's about three and a
quarter yeah the town with with with assuming the school is at 5.4 which is a little low I think yeah what we got today and I I printed it off somewhere here but I think you're
going to be around three and a half with the new assessment it was 6.98 with the new equalized value valuation and the higher amount for for health care it was 6.98% increase for Manchester 1.1
million for at the 27% right yeah right I think they will do better than 27% right that's not a final number yeah they're they're going out to bid they're going out to bid they're seeking other quotes hopefully going to Mayo
yeah and I don't know how this compared with the the budget that was shown to us I just got it this afternoon and I didn't compare um I think the only difference is that health insurance do you okay does the town have a protocol for
purchasing health insurance either for the town or for the school as to the system or do they have a tendency to go back to the same vendor year in and year out and sign a longer term obligation and I'm curious about the size of the
pool that that vendor is has access to because if you have a pool of one and you have a bad sick year your reum is gonna be Mighty High but if you have a pool of a million the town and the school have taken different
approaches to that so the town has been with Maya for for decades all at least at least two decades um Maya is the Massachusetts inter local Insurance Association um it's a very large pool
it it's tens it's hundreds of thousands locks and the so Maya rates you in a hybrid fashion okay so they they buffer you um at the high end and the low end you're
not going to be your lows may not be quite as low and your highs aren't going to be quite as high if you're on your own uh but then you look at your own utilization rates so this this year the bad year for next year um might had a
range of basically 10 to 20% increase with the average being rather than 15% he um and then so depending on your individual utilization rate for the past year determines where you fall in that
range so the town this year uh a little surprised because I thought we were better than we are yeah we our our utilization was has been doing well I haven't had the sit down been pretty low
our utilization of insurance right was we were running pretty good um but we they came back with a 16.4 hike for us I really thought it was going to be below 15 I was a little disappointed in that
but I I need to I'll be sitting down with our rep in the next week or so to hear more details so the school the school on the other hand has has gone out to bid every other year practically switching carers
frequently um they they were able to take advantage of that they were on the winning side of that for a few years but they've had a couple of really bad years and this is being one RI do they lean away from Maya are they tend not to think Maya's
good oh school systems are not are not they can be they are not I know that I know all of that I was curious they've changed from time quite often I think you just said and I wondered but is Maya one of the ones they've considered yes oh I see yeah they're looking at Maya
possibly Maya will Maya's not interested in a in a one-year deal they they would have Commit that's their model is a little different yes understand what's next on
okay voted yeah do I have a motion to approve the select board budget in the amount of 6 or did people have questions on any other theine it I'm sorry I have a question I have a question on the HR
service this is the three town the cost for the three toown service having read the recent report today um this this needs some attention yeah I is this something we're this is not getting attention this that's a
future item by yeah we we talked long about it today Andrea and I did trying to think of if we should do something for this coming year we basically thought we
needed to and do a little more homework and look at some other options um you got quite a bit of emphasis in the report I was just curious and I agree that it needs attention there it's just like there's a some options for us
I want to explore and maybe we'll try to get that to you in the next two three weeks I'm not precluding it changing for for 20 six um but I'm not prepared to tell you a definitive recommendation
tonight I certainly think that he charge much more enties than it used to be yes I agree very wholehearted can you just tell us a little bit about the um grant writer special projects or specific projects
what what that is is that yeah yes and is and and what sort of guidance is she getting is this mostly sort of the the boilerplate aspects of Grants and then the technical
portion is farmed out to Nate or fire chief or how how does that fit together so um she she's uh she spends a lot of time searching for for different Grant possibilities M um if if a department
had hears about something they'll ask her to research it to see if something that's viable for us um and then yeah so she's sort of the quarterback in terms of assembling all the needed information y so yeah if
there's if it's a DPW related potential Grant you know Nate or or the engineers that are Consulting Engineers will write the technical aspects so make sure we have the letters of support to make sure that I'm reviewing the budget that sort
of thing so she's she's playing that role pulling everything together but also identifying potential gr and then and then once we get a grant helping to make sure we're meeting the reporting deadlines and filings that sort of a
fair amount of work related with that um but I also pretty pleased with the successes we have had you know we're we 22 23 million in Grants over the last 10 years
and so it's it's been very helpful what would be helpful is if we could take those one of these three positions and combine them into two positions if we could I mean well that's not what the report we got was recommended that's not what the report's
doing yeah these are different skill levels it's really yeah so they are unique skill level so it's just a different skill set communication certainly is a different skill set that Grant the assistant do the communications no you know mean the MBTA
zoning yeah the thing that got that over the starting line yeah and got the town to support was the communications person who had all of the ideas and made sure
everything went through she contacted all of these groups in town and said oh do you want somebody come explain it to you and I went to one of them and I was just surprised that how much people learned um so it's it's it's not
something that the assistant to the board or Town Administrator could do it's it's it's it's a specialty um and keeping up the websites with all that information um well we had a 20 grand
increase last year and we going to do another 10 this year it's just it seems like it's spiraling out of control and and I don't see the added service well those are just the standard 3% increases right well I thought the
standard was two and a half but that's not not too sure yeah I I again well 5,300 of that's a Town Administrator it's not those other positions yeah I have to Echo what Sarah said
about Communications if if we had hired someone on the outside to do what Tiffany did to get the MBTA zoning thing over and they had sent us a bill for
$85,000 I would have said probably reasonable I mean it's it was that significant hands on all the time believe me she was she she really pitched in and maybe she's unique and maybe we'll never replace her but uh it
was it was worth it and if you consider the cost just the legal cost if we hadn't pass that that whatever it is the thing in the town meeting uh and we've been sued by the Attorney General oh boy talk
about short money this was and I was a bargain I think we need to use it more yes when we have things coming before the town because people are very uninformed and things just go wild on
social media misinformed as as uninformed which is you know think that pertains to us also in the coming town meeting in terms of what we're talking about I think that when we have sensitive things it needs
to be appropriately communicated yes um and we've been talking about you brought that up in the fall about that yeah um Gregor these are all basically about halftime jobs roughly or they all vary in hours no
um three three fulltime and one 24 hours a week so the the grant coordinator is is 24 hours a week and the other the other the others are full the others are full yeah no other questions on this anybody else
have any questions on this budget um do I have a motion to approve the select board budget in the amount of $664 15 second Andy moves Mor second any
discussion vote Dean no yes Tom yes my yes Andy yes Peter yes there votes yes so that's a 61
vote okay legal and other Professional Services well this is showing an increase um we we were doing so well on legal up until a couple years
ago and it has really shot up um so some of that is absolutely attributed to the uh the 4 Tob project yeah certainly in the last two years that has counted for majority of that
increase um but we are seeing a higher use um just of regular useed to there's more uh appeals
happening conservation and zba nice thing about zba is they changed the law in I think it was the August thing it was August or November where it's much more difficult to appeal zba ruling yes yeah so hopefully that will help us
should help some yeah um and and also the zoning changes have been made the zoning amendments are taking a lot of legal guidance you know the MBTA
only quite a bit of the legal time and Zoning changes related to the planning yeah proposed Zing changes we've got the Abus coming up yeah we just I don't see that slowing down thought for the time being that's
been a real trip wire lot I still see some all that how realistic do we think the 135 is I mean is that for you all who are more farmed on terms of the amount of I don't know Peels and the like having spent 239 last
year so that was very that was I do appreciate that was yes that was unique but I'm just asking the 135 the um the appeal of the 40b they filed an appeal but it looked to me like nothing happens until April
of 26 so it it sits yeah so I don't expect that to it's it's all on the record yeah so we we have U you'll see a request for Reserve fund
this year um to to to to fund our legal expenses because we do have a in the 25,000 range just for that appeal filing the appeal U and the
M zoning Etc there's we're definitely running high this year we won't we won't have enough at the 150 at the 100 I mean um but 135 for 26 is is a fair guesstimate it's a fair guesstimate
I'm not confident that that'll be enough but I also think it's a it's it's okay and and be surprised if you tapped your reserve help with that yeah mean it seems like each year we we don't over
speculate on it we pick a number and then usually the finance committee is able at the end within the last two weeks of the year to sort of fill in around the edges and and I guess the question is if if that
strategy um if a differential exceeds what we've been able to do in the year past what's the mechanism for dealing with that can we pull from other Town Hall budgets or what something that's UND spent yes what we do but we we can also you know
if as we get closer to to need supplemental appropriation we'll do a supplemental appropriation yeah yeah what I what I would really like to see in the legal expenses is that every board and every
Department that's using the legal services knows the amount they're using right because I see nothing on the zba I have no clue yeah we could be spending 5,000 we could be spending 50,000 I I just don't know and
I think that's true with planning board and so the so the bill we get as itemized so we can easily do that yeah I just think it would be really helpful to just raise people's awareness because I think there a good point some people are very quick to say a sass Town Council
right and and I think that has grown there's I try to keep a lid on that it's been harder value to seeking Town Council in advance of getting in trouble like you know I think they should be involved when we have zoning changes I look at some of our zoning
that's out there and it's really really bad um so I and it's comp more complicated today so I don't know if it's possible Greg I've been on this committee long enough where when I joined we actually had a rollup of all
the legal things that were currently running that's right and I will say at one point it was 14 and and in fact I think having the Selectmen and particularly the fincom looking at that like some like you know
not using 111 as f as an example it was like this thing on forer road has been going on for seven years let's end it you know and it really became a rather than just kind of slicing ourselves with paper cuts it became a let's get it done
and I wonder if maybe it I don't know if it exposes too much of what would happen in executive sessions in different places but I don't know it just seems like a roll up of these numers would doll am we're spending on the various
cases I certainly agree those summaries are public documents I think and they're generic I mean they tell you right the case which are cases are public you can go to the court talk it and see what the case
is I do think it would help us so how what do we want to get that quarterly yeah quarterly would be ideal sure but I mean I think it if we start seeing zba stuff loaded up right and left then we probably say okay is Town Council are we are we are we efficient
enough on zba things from this firm to do this and if we see a lot of you know animal control things or something we deal with that more on the front end than the back end so to speak and I will ask my question about building per building inspectors because I know I
don't know if some of these things are coming around to haunt us on building permits building okay low right yeah that's that appealed to the CBA if somebody has an issue with a building
permit and there I think there's been less than a handful one maybe okay that's good I mean we've had appeals of so we're doing fine with our inspector and all that jazz we had the guy that wanted a variance we denied it and I
don't think that garden shed has ever been pulled down and I think that's still there I walk by it frequently I'll have to send something to Paul Orlando not up to speed on that one 16 University Lane there was a a garden shed that was or was it Jersey Lane
Jersey Wayne yeah um a garden shed that was quite elaborate um erected on the street on the street about one foot from a fire hydrant um the building inspector noted ified him it had to be removed there was
no building permit issued um and he came before zba and we denied the variant because it was a 2 and a half acre piece of land and there was there were about four
driveways in it and there was one to the right that was very suitable to put a a shed that was off the road and it's never come down thank you g meeting to check it out I get so irritated when I walk by there
I don't walk by there okay any more conversation on legal and Professional Services do we have any Professional Services targeted any studies um so
um uh no nothing specific at this point it's uh but typically something comes up can you just give us examples of some things that come up that
useful um so so if we hadn't gotten the um State Grant to do the operational audit that would have that would have been paid out of that okay um we sometimes we'll need some
extra Consulting on a human resource issue so that it would come out of there sometimes that's legal sometimes it's not is it stuff that's approved by the select board or is it just a blank once it's in the budget you're free to do whatever you want with it or no s board
yeah they approve it's contingent yeah any other question the report we got today was ex of that was a very good report on operation yeah interesting read interesting yeah I thought it was very I I yeah I think he got it right
for the most part um I'm anxious to have a more in dep discussion with all of you on it a yeah motion to approve the legal and other Professional Services budget the amount of 185 yes Peter moves a second second are seconds any discussion
vote yes Tom yes scar yes Mory yes Andy yes Peter yes andos yes can I ask a question about revenues just it's always usful to ask about
revenues I know they are dominated by some of the rental Towers here but Greg is there anything we should be thinking about in terms of changing in any of these uh uh fee rates and so forth I know there's just a wide variety here
everything liquor taxi and all the rest yeah um to ask Debbie about some of those licenses some are some are State dictated and and some we have flexibility on not as I sit here I'm not
going to recite which ones are which but I mean they're dominating just submitted something that would allow towns to increase it hasn't been approved yet allow towns to increase the meals tax I think and the short-term rental tax
correct I think so that's part of the U What's called the municipal empowerment act okay 2.0 they filed it last year it never went anywhere so they they have refiled it this year um I'd encourage all of you to
contactar and and Margaret fronte and encourage them to move that bill there's some good pieces in it gives us a little a few more tools yeah but certainly 35 bucks for a one-day liquor license seems a little cheap y yep that one stood
out I agree that drinks thinking I gather that um exis is that Airbnb or is that like X it's just Airbnb stuff yeah it's not tux point or anything like that no I think
that what happens here is Airbnb and BB or whatever that is the the the platforms that do short-term rentals I believe that they have to pay the town's assessment to the state and
then the state pays us right that's exactly right y That's the only reason we receive it State's collecting it for so the revenues for tux and that stuff would be under facilities probably into Parks yeah I
think you see that okay thank you I just wanted to ask and we still have an in holder yes Corner no that's that Summer Street that use has expired because it wasn't wasn't used for over two years oh the cell
tower is that two or three C is it just the one dump and the one there's three yeah okay so the one at the boat yard isn't no no we've got the water tower we've got the one up on School Street and the one at
the Poli station the that's that's a private that's a private one did they need a permit or a fee or but yeah they went through a permanent that was quite a few years ago
before my time oh no there's a new one there's a great big new pole post up there I think it's a 5G Tower we talking the boat yard or we talking about in the water next to the draw bridge I see it
out of my from my house it's new it wasn't it was there I think that's part of could be yeah it's it's part of the uh positive I had heard it was a 5G Tower but I don't know I think I think it's that was social media
yeah that's part of the positive train system yes but it's it's MBTA okay when they're putting these up on 128 to monitor traffic in various places there's one by Pine Street it's all the video cameras to look up and
down Big Brother okay finance committee the budget right there's a budg so the thing that bothers me on this and I thought we' talked about it before was
I wanted the salary Reserve fund yeah that's for contract that is that is okay yeah that's um in the in the one that you got sent today no it's still in yeah sorry about that I forgot to
take it out of the finance committee um page that I sent out earlier today but I did put it those amounts into the salaries in that spreadsheet fantastic they've been distributed so you can just put a zero there okay yeah sorry about that great um so do I have a motion to
approve the total salaries and expensive for expenses for the finance committee in the amount of $5,300 Andy moves do I have a second more seconds any discussion take a vote Dean yes Tom yep
D yes La yes Andy yes Peter and Sarah yes and do I have a motion to approve the reserve Fund in the amount of 150,000 as I recall we used it all last year what we
had so Andy moves do I have a second second any discussion all in favor everyone Ione okay that's what you're asking okay
clerk so here you'll see a change from what was in your books and couple of things happening here one um some of that Reserve salary is is allocated here um and then you
also see in the what was sent out today um adding that accounting clerk so this is this is one where we are showing um we acting on one of the recommendations in the
audit so um so the Boost to to the town account to move formally to the finance director role uh that is paid out of that Reserve money that we had already budgeted uh boosting the assistant to the accountant
to an assistant accountant and then um hiring a new accounting clerk so in order to um allow Andrea to take on the finance director roles we need to provide some relief in that um
in that office and so a way to do that is to hire the account Clerk and also to improve some of the processes and and and trackingsm Andre can speak to this at length as well um but this is one area
where we're recommending going ahead sooner rather than later with the one of the recommendations of in the report do you have comments Andrea thank you for that explation can you hear
me yes exactly what GRE said you know as soon as I can take over some of the more Finance director roles take some things off the Town Administrator you know Greg's plate as far as like budgets um things like that and having an assistant Town accountant instead of an assistant to the town accountant I can give her a
lot more responsibility she can sign off on warrants for me if I'm not in um there's a lot of things that she can do that um she's not able to do right now um so it's a good backup um as well and it would just alleviate and we can do a
lot more um and assist with that um having an accounting clerk uh you know talk to you know treasure collector's office as well and they they could assist in that um area as well and just help with the accounting take some of the um pressure off the assistant Town
accountant um and it would just be a lot better to have more of like a managerial position under the finance director so that they can handle a lot more of the um accountant duties who will the position report to uh the direct the finance director
yes is that what the treasur does I'm sorry it seems like this would take the treasurer would report to the finance director is that correct so the idea the report yeah so the finance director would would supervise the treasurer the
assessor um and um have a not that already does quite a bit but have even a greater role in budget formulation working directly with the finance committee um so one of the things that we've been debating for
years is you know is it should the town go to an assistant Town Administrator role or not um and we debated that with the with Bill Keegan who did the the operations audit and came down on thinking that no we're
better off having less of a flat organization and creating more structure and in more depth having fewer people report to the Town Administrator um and one way to do that is to create the finance director role
and and having that person supervise these other other positions um and also um have the two folks that are in my office office debie and Sue take on bigger
roles as well and doing that avoids we think we feel I'm hiring a an assistant ta um and so put a little more responsibilities on people that we do have boost their pay a little bit but um
avoid avoid the full-time assistant ta so were there'll be cross trining between the accountant the treasurer and the assessor because they're pretty thin on backup is what I'm thinking so like
will the clerk's cross train what what will happen there yeah can you speak to that Andrea so to some extent there there are some limitations in terms of uh what's the word I want segregation of Duties yeah separate
thank you oh sure yeah that that's that's what I was looking for U so anyways want to speak a little to that that would be helpful yes I would love to have like that spe specifically that accounting clerk would be able to go um between the Departments um be cross Tred
um be able to cover anyone that's out in any of those three offices um they I would have to you know obviously be careful of the segregation of Duties like you know if they were to help out in the treasurer's office or the assessor's office and collect money for instance um I also I can't have them
posting to the general ledger all as well um because there's no separation to check to make sure that you know what you collected is what we're actually reporting um so there's like some things like that but I think we can mitigate that having um the assistant Town accountant
um somewhat cross trained but really having that accountant accounting clerk cover and be able to help out in those three offices would be very helpful so what's happening in the assessor's office I'm a little confused
I thought that there was a clerk for the assessor but I'm hearing that the person who's there is still doing all of the building permit stuff so so been slow and implementing that
change okay um with with the new land use clerk full time getting up to speed that's the third area so we started with getting up to speed on planning then zba okay and now the next step will be with the
building building aspect um so yes we and again the um the audit reports sort of reinforced making a better separation there um and and having the assessing
clear focus more on assessment not not on on building so um that is in the works you know the next over the course of the next month or so that that should be fully operational might want to wait more than
a month so going back to the finance chor We Now reduceed by two the number of reports to the Town Administrator is one of the important comments was it three
yeah I was just trying to think so the net of these changes as relates to the town administrator is two fewer direct reports well with with with this yes two fewer direct reports and um a beefed up
role to reduce some of my involvement in the budget development the ta's involvement and so as a function of the finance committee we likely to see Andrea sitting in that chair next year as OPP posted to the Town Administrator
it may be both okay um I mean there's you know but um so that's I don't want to speak for my successor how want that but but that would be one of the possible implications I I'm G to go back all the way to the HR for just a sec I I hope
you'll feel in a position we can talk again about that it was just such a major point in that report well i' I've I've got some meetings next week um to pursue some options that I want to just like to get a little more information before I present you're
nipping off I think some very key uh recommendations that are good um that so yes well I'll make sure to get that information to your soon so yes Dean is there any way I mean
42% I mean I could see given the account and the assistant the Boo and maybe putting off the clerk or if you do the clerk can we cut back on the raises I mean it's
just to spread it out more like can't we go back to 2 and a half% for the raises if we're going to add a clerk I mean a finance director with with two people reporting to them is a
significantly larger job is it or being a town account done by the clerk I mean more of her work you got sobody managing people yeah that's I get it I get it job I get it it just seems like an awful
High 42% in one year it is it is a lot but I I think that report indicated the need for it and I think the problem is is the Town Administrator has way too
many people reported yes aome and and what the report what I how I interpreted one portion of the report is because there's so many people reporting into the Town Administrator you don't have as
much Synergy between the underlying department so now if you have a finance director and you've got the assessor's office and the treasurer's office reporting in you're automatically
creating more Synergy which has to become more efficient and I remember I don't know whether it was last summer or the summer before that we didn't have a clerk in the treasurer's office and Jennifer had
to close that office for a week so she could take a week out of the office and that was the only week she had off and H you had to work remotely from for that as well yeah I think that's asking
a lot of people um you know so to me it makes sense to bite the bullet and we use excess Levy capacity if we need to it seems Seems to make sense functionally to make this change if we're going to
make it at the time when we're going to hire a new right you're right Andy I think the time is perfect I agree with your everything you're saying sir that's why I'm oring the HR thing too because I think the timing is right also on that it's a big pill but but it's also you
know it's there's a functional difference there and and an organizational difference which I think can have some a lot of thank you for taking these steps any more discussion do I have a motion to approve
the accounting department budget in the amount of 75 735 275 my print is so small I can't read it 735 I have to keep looking back at the spreadsheet
um yes Peter makes a motion do I have a second Mory seconds any more discussion take a vote Dean no no yes car yes Mor yes Indie yes Peter yes
sarot yes um we approved it 61 thank you well be relying on you next year don't worry I'm here for it here we need in a transition year
particularly um next is the assessor budget so here that's a big increase adjustment um the so the we're making an adjustment to
to the PED Assessor's pay why a market rate assess are extremely rare to find people are
scrambling and we're we're we're behind so the market is outpacing what we're paying the impact of that is is keeping up to date with our assessments which then the tax
rate yeah it's a critical role yeah um and the problem is there's a real dir of professional assessors out there and everyone is trying to to rob somebody else's assessor at the moment you're looking assessor or Treasurer
assessor okay was Treasure um and so we're proposing a $4,000 increase this says 6700 right 4,000 above oh okay
6.48% um our batement quests relatively low they are yes yeah we and we uh well I can't remember the last time someone W of the batment
request the our valuations are quite strong they accurate you're wondering why the $5 million house next to me is assessed at 1.9 million it wasn't quite finished um I think go ahead one thing
that we might be able to look at so if we if if the assistant is 100% assessing then we might be able to do some additional valuations in housee rather
than rely on the vendor yeah okay so we we you know there may be some savings there but that's something that we have to sort of explore and just could be a year or so away to get get her up to speed and trained and that is that the
total of the 20,000 between the reval update and Professional Services is that Outsourcing or not the reval is that Patriots okay okay um and that Professional Services
uh that and help me out sure that so that's for like any additional um assistance that they need um that's the Professional Services line you're talking about the 4500 and then like the reval update is
like the Outsourcing for the reval it's like a five-year payment um and actually next year is our full um revaluation um so it's going to be extremely busy in the assessor's office yeah yeah so like an abatement we may use that Professional Services to
to the to help with the abatement hearing yeah yes do we use the Professional Services um for instance when we have properties like CST where we don't have
other comparables or what comparables does that go out to Professional Services or is that done informally I'll have to double check that I believe it's done formally okay um but I'll check I know when I asked about it she
said something about talking to people but I didn't know whether that was formal or informal yeah more informal talk in another talked to she was talking to P Patriot up oh they right some of the other
ter whatever that yeah okay change names all the time I know yeah that's that's another um any more discussion questions on the assessor budget and Greg the the m6 and H6 those
are those are under the assessor Administrative Assistant those are some of our internal classifications different okay I just wondered what they were do I have a motion to approve the Assessor's budget the amount of $233,200
so I'm still confused because the assessor has an admin assistant and now we're taking out the building department senior clerk but we only there was only one body
there I'm sorry we live so we have the Assessor's admin assistant and we're eliminating the building department senior clerk but we there's only one person in that
office so in the past it was it was that that the the Assessor's clerk was also the building inspector Clerk and they shared so the seller was divided
two am I speaking Yeah divided between the two but we're paying 60,000 to the admin assistant that would seem like it was fulltime it is now so that's the whole point that's what was budgeted for this year also sorry the
6,000 we increased it in this 2025 budget oh I see yes but we did in the assessors and know building department you know if AG you're on and I'm in the spreadsheet what we've done then is is
so in this current year that 25 293 is using being used to pay for the full-time land use Flo oh okay okay and that person also worked for the building inspector
yes the new arrang have the land use clerk assisting the the building inspect bre a sort of a question for you maybe we're going back a little bit general fund revenues for assessors pageb it's
30624 are we anticipating in the current year that we'll see CST landing on this line yeah okay so we'll have a onetime bump on this before they H over to real estate taxes and we're going to increase the
the revenue projection by that amount right we discussed this before that's where I'm going with this we we can but it's a onetime bump it isn't it isn't really because we're
going to have the property taxes in future years yes but I would be reluctant I would not recommend using that onetime bump for operating I'm not saying use it for operating I'm saying that it is a revenue source and we should be accurate
on our Revenue projections and use that 300,000 or whatever it is towards capitaline with using for capit what I'm using it for Capital but it still would be in the revenue cap so that it's
available to use as funds because otherwise if you don't include it as Revenue that's an additional three I don't know what the number is I'm saying 300 it's an additional 300 that the town can spend any way it wants it's rolling
down to reserve but we're trying to kind of get a handle on it would roll into reserve and then new the following year it's an underestimation of Revenue and overestimation expenses and it all rains down into reses and I just would like for that number to be accurate it's a
growth it's it's just a change in the growth the number really isn't no it's a it's a billing permit yeah first it'll be yeah and then once it gets built it'll be New Growth so how do we figure out that amount well this looks like it's a for
information only but this is looking backwards but I'm talking about Revenue projections going forward how do we how do we get a good handle on what that number might be what the building permit will be that's the front of the spreadsheet right Peres yeah right right
so I can I can I mean they're preparing their their building permanent so we can ask them what they're going to put down good yeah that would be good yeah but their number will be I know that there not everything that they're
spending goes into a building per all that little groundwork and Blasting is is it included in the building permit anecdotally I haven't noticed any drop off in construction between now and 24 so I would think that we still have this you know it seems
like we still have that same amount of construction going on yeah no I I agree okay I just a comment if I could um as far as like Revenue projections and everything for estimated local receipts um I just want everyone
to be aware that when I go to fill out the tax recap and put that in the Department of Revenue reviews it and I have to make sure I have um if anything's under or over 10% of the previous year actual received I have to submit a lot of documentation to make sure that you know we know we're getting
that amount of money in um else they won't approve it um so I just want everyone to be aware of that process okay that's useful that may help you in the estimation of how we deal with the general back yeah okay thank
you I would think with CST we're going to have the building permit before I'm going have to figure out the timing I mean if they submit before June it'll be in this year right exactly right so we figure that
out which case it'll be in the rain barrel right of a question for we could take we could take that much more out of free cash for next year right if we know what's going to come in and go into it yes yeah so if we
have a more than 10% budget increase Andrea on a line item um yeah do we get the same thing if if the actuals come in or do they not care or is this more of an Auditor's question so if we put in a line item budget for
say building permits for 300,000 and it comes in at 600,000 yeah they don't care they don't care they don't care but but I will say like so the following year um say we were I could say we're gonna get
$600,000 so it's like it's kind of funky um in that way even though I know we were probably not going to get 600,000 so that's so it's like a year behind yeah cases current year future year yeah
okay okay any more discussion on the building department do I have a motion to approve the [Music] $9,99 move I have a second second Tom seconds
any more discussion are we satisfied with our building inspect well sorry bring it up I think we need a building
inspector that provides more I think that there's a lot of building inspections that are done via pictures I last last year I had worked done at my house there was no there was
no iner about my contactor said oh we just have to send a picture um and I you know my experience is similar uh although I don't
record uh my I guess my what I'm I'm curious about and there's probably a job description for the building and I wonder you know whether and it's not a criticism in any way believe me just is
it time for somebody to sit down and look at the job description and then say to the building inspector you know are you doing you know 2.1 2.2 and 2.4 or not I'm and I'm sorry I don't
even really want to raise this as a big deal or anything I'm just an idea just a thought it's not a request or anything like that the challenge would be I think it would be very hard to get
a few more hours I think it's it's either where we are now or it's fulltime yeah I don't think there's an in between okay just in terms of trying to find that person yeah so so Paul's fulltime in Rockport and he basically moonlights for us
um um now could we find a second person to moonl not sure so to so PA won't be able to give more hour probably because it's pretty tapped out so if you want more hours then we're
probably looking at a full-time position well I don't want to spend any more money that's for sure um how many people does Rockport have population wise yeah they're around
758 yeah okay that's what I thought but the also the building inspector I guess is going to be responsible for inspecting uh c signal right well so on a big project like that you you the project owner
hires Engineers who stamp you know their their their licenses on the line they have to certify that it's built for spent so you generally I that's what when the schools were built what we do so I don't really want to talk about
it's difficult it's it's difficult and I'm not aware of' this is not a new conversation yeah okay no it's it's a conversation we've had before but you know we we work really hard to put together you know guidelines and laws and all of that and
frankly you walk around town and you see things that are outside of the envelope and and there is there is no and there is there is no no circling around to correct that and and some of it is minor and you just sort of shake
your head and go okay and some of it's egregious well I was I look at that thing on SE street is that exactly is that kosher or not that that's a utility trench that's not building permit hate to tell you that's under
DPW perview okay because I had that next to me and my neighbors next to me said the DPW made they were only going to go down 4 feet and DPW made them go down 8 ft for the waterline that's why they had the blast
it it has it has a wall it has lights and it was Cloud yeah looks like the entrance to the resort hotel in Las Vegas but I mean I don't I I don't see it I'm not trying to make it make trouble I I'm just not
sure what building inspectors do in other places whether they're just reactive or whether they're proactive VAR by community in my experience okay yeah for
example Westboro South Bor Etc that area they seem somehow very proactive they ask for a lot more from Architects and Engineers uh along the way of getting a permit and they're pretty
construction process others you know are are a lot more relaxed don't see them they don't ask question do you think it makes a difference um not really for example the things that uh that Westboro might ask
for are dotting eyes and Crossing teeth yeah doesn't subst change Des but uh but it can matter in in our example if we feel like there is Construction happening that is not being checked and where you like residential
construction is more of a wild west situation than commercial construction because anybody that goes out buys a hammer do that work so uh so I think there's a lot more reason looking stuff like that I footings poured next to me
today you can't tell me the ground was dry um now my problem because it's much lower than me it won't crash down on top of me but you know I mean there's there's stuff that happens inside of the wetlands I mean I can just say you've
spent 18 to 20 months following up on permitting and you look around some other places and boom there's a doctor or there's stuff done I mean there's a septic system that was put in and pulled out I mean there's Ridge poles that are above I mean I don't in the dark of the
night oh yeah I mean it's just it is the wild west and at some point you say okay well why would Everybody follow this if a bunch of people are not so at some point you just sort of have to figure out what are the losses here and I think it's a good discussion
to have periodically we keep repeating the same result least for bringing it up y right yeah okay okay we V this conversation we we have we have a motion in a second and then we had
additional discussion is there any more additional discussion I'll take a vote Dean what are we voting on now on the department building department $9,99 and the land use clerk is now under the assessors that no the land use
clerk is under land use Department land use Department that's a new Department approv Tom yes my yes yes yes there you okay it is
9:20 um the next is treasure I'm going to suggest that we pause here and we go on to the next agenda item is that okay with people yeah
I think we got through a lot I like things to the next item on the agenda is the status of the Masonic Hall Senior Center and the Project funding um the the reason I put this on the agenda is I went to a meeting
on plans for changes to the senior you know we're doing digit stuff and it appeared as if they had already gone out with a request for proposal I don't know not an RP for
Design Services and when I looked at this year's budget and I looked at last year's budget I didn't see a line item for Design Services for the senior
center and I all so heard so I don't know if this is accurate that we have not yet closed on the sale which makes me nervous about spending money on something we don't own so that's why it's on the agenda do you have any
information so the um the pns is very close to be finalized um should be finalized in the next two to three weeks at the same price yes okay y yep $1
million cond documents how are they doing uh similar they should be done at the same time um so we're close to completing that piece of little um and so we have
gone out to to uh Gone on the street looking for Design Services um and want to have that ready to go as soon as soon as we think we able to um we did receive um some
State funding received $50,000 Grant to help Advance the planning and and efforts on this on the senior center and that could potentially that's could be used for two things get the designer going
and get the fundrais planning underway as well so we have a we went out to bit on the on the fundraising and we have proposals and have we have selected a firm that could help us do that and where is that money coming from that that state Grant oh
okay okay y um so the uh the goal would be to do to start the fundraising in Earnest in the fall once the plan is all designed
identified you know key key donors that sort of thing typically you have sort of your soft get a lot of your funding secured before you go to the more public piece of it that's that's um that hopefully was all done by September and
all one the public campaign for the fund um simultaneously it would be it' be very helpful to be advancing the design work as well so certainly assuming that um we
close on the property by by early April all of this to make sense to keep going but I heard it was going to be 200,000 for the design work right so could do final design yes
okay um so the U uh SE board haven't hasn't completed their discussion but they are interested in uh getting Bond authorization to for the for the
construction and then paying that the goal would be to pay off that Bond then through the fundraising so you would if you had the bond authorization in in April um you could do a short-term note
but just the architectural work and you would know by the end of the year by December how your fundraising was was going and if that was successful then you could then
proceed withing getting a contract around board for scen construction and then the bond would would be ready to would already have been approved so that that's the thinking and how to proceed with with that project
and if if the fundraising is not successful for some reason we sort of pause it y don't hit the pause button and regroup I guess I have a concern that when the million was approved for the
purchase at town meeting the stand was taken but the rest of it the Renovations would be funded through donations I just wonder if the town issues a bond what incentive is that for people
to donate and it just seems to me that number one I think is going to be much more expensive than was expected and it just seems to me that you're going to be pretty far along in the project and not have all the money you
need and the town's going to end up being on the hook that's my concern whether it's valid or not yeah so so it's it's not an uncommon approach for Gloucester for example on on their Library that's a almost a $30
million project so the city approved the bonding with the understanding that the back their private Library um is paying back the town for that when were paying off that Bond they they they proceeded
without all the money in hand they they they went a little further than what I'm suggesting they they've gone ahead and issued the bond even before the money has been raised I'm not suggesting that I'm I'm suggesting uh that we have the vote in order for
things to keep progressing in assuming want to count my eggs before the hat but I I I think that the fundraising would be successful I think those was a lot of interest and there are those resources
out there that I think contribute um but I certainly understand the the question and the concern the thought is that this authorization for that borrowing be part of it may the April town meeting May
Town April Town April town meeting yeah so it be a separate warrant article yeah just stand alone yeah and where does it fit in the very intricate pattern you created of retiring
Bond and then enabling or additional you know you had a schedule sry I to me it's off it's off sheet I thought I looked at the sheet because of the goal of having off sheet yeah okay being fun being paid off through fundraising so I didn't
include it because of that that's interesting and is there a risk that you would be able to use any of it for Town Services if it PID for
with donations for a senior center no no clear to your donors that yes this is for a senior center but when seniors are not using it it's for for other Municipal uses trying to be very clear about
that yeah any more questions on this well it's everything nothing nothing is ever black and white you mean they don't not raise any money they might raise some money a lot of money
but not all you know so you know we're probably going to the town is is probably going to have to kind of you know work on this a little bit here seems to me I don't know that's just a a needless comment but uh the
backup yeah I mean it's I think I think you would have to um basically promis to the to the voters that you'd be coming back if the fundraising was not 100% successful before anything was before anything is
done yeah words before any struction started the design work but I think you'd have to go forward with design work otherwise you standing still you're standing still well unless you just did like concept design for the idea of
attracting correct I mean you need you need you need some pretty pictures to attract the donors some some people argue that you you actually are more successful in fundraising when people see Construction getting underway but I I'm not suggesting that
but I have heard people make that argument I would assume somebody else got has it covered and everything good right so those are two sides of that coin will the leadership be on the fundraising where does that sit where so
a fundraising committee will be created and that with the that's with the leadership so the the friends of the COA for example Friends of the COA that'll be the mechanism to receive
funds um using their 501c3 status and um some of their members will certainly be leading the charge and and some we we anticipate some of the larger donors who will want to be champions for this that's the select board indicated
a recommendation one way the other so they've had informal conversations and and they lean towards asking for the bom but they haven't had that formal convers holding the bag and this is all done at prevailing
wage right y project project OU do we still have the million dollars in our account have we paid any of that out yet we have not paid any yet oh we can increase the interest assumption okay um any updates from the
Town Administrator you have anything for us Greg I gave you the the bad news about health insurance yeah no so you got that um and did the spreadsheet we received today include that number yes it did okay yeah remind me again what's
the delta from what you put in initially into the spreadsheet and what's there now in the new CB 100,000 other updates um anything with the clear
go uh Andrew still with us clear go I am yes I'm still working on it I'm sorry it's taking me a long time to good at that it's going it's coming along is it a town issue or software vendor
issue I at this point it's a town issue um okay but it started as a yes yeah it started as like an update and then we realized like the account structures I have I have like two different numbers for essentially for like one account number in the software
system that I use and so that caused um some issues the update so what we did is instead of doing update they migrated all the data over to the new platform and like a couple of the years didn't transfer over um so I've been having to
go through and like um update all of my account numbers and funds um for multiple years so I don't want to release it without with all the wrong information in it it just it just ballooned into a much bigger problem sorry about that
okay so I think the thing we didn't see in this spreadsheet was the impact on the tax rate right so like I said it's it's right around that three and a quarter total without the schools with the school oh okay with the school which
is going to change right so I'm thinking it's going to I'm thinking three and a half to three and 3/4 well I calc the school at 3 .45 tax increase at 1.1 million I'm assuming it's a full
impacted yeah for our assessment our assessment increases 1.1 million based on what I just got and I'm with the 3.3 billion in assessments I'm assuming every 330,000 increase in
expenses adds 1% per that that was the C iide yeah um okay I lost another thought oh it must have been very important so this is this is going to involve some interesting Marketing in April it sure will you know
I mean so that's we think about yeah we think about this we think about the bonding and the long-term capital stuff um yeah I you know and I think I think there's a need for howow between
you and the select board very soon I would say there should I think there's also enough change happening in your role and others too that people may look at that and say who big big change in who's what are the
feet on the ground and how much change is happen so I think there's a big picture that needs addressing um I also have some concern on the overall timeline because Pam said
today because our town meeting is so much later that they're not going to approve the final budget until 318 um so my question is when is the fincom report due it's going to be several weeks after that
well it can't be several um first week right I don't know need three weeks to submit draft or submit the final copy to go to to get it mailed bu
great we really need four weeks last March so if they're if they finalize they're finalizing it on the my assumption is that we'll have everything else wrapped up that we have
to plug in at the number and either you're recommending it or not so we've been through this before you know back in the anti camera era era and we basically said if you want it in print and you want the best shot of this thing getting approved to town meeting
it should be done in imprint and there's always a lot of this but at the end of the day they did it and I don't know I going into town meeting without a recommendation written in print stuff going out why couldn't
they do it by the exactly you know I think part of the challenge is they're going out to bid so late on the health insurance how long does it take to get bids in should have that they're Fielding a
lot of stuff different towns oh can take be that quick no I mean they' they've already been working on it's not it's not brand new they hav they're not just starting today I'm actually meeting with her Pam and Michelle tomorrow I can okay yeah I can
push on little push for a date a final date and special meeting on the 11th or something and get it done there yeah I mean it just two weeks after the four yeah I just I just think present and we you
know are going to have to make a decision we're going to have to make a recommendation on whether it's an override or not um we need to understand the whole budget our portion of the budget before there'll just be a lot less
discussion and confusion and all that if it's in print distributed early and everybody's behind it as opposed to here's a recommendation on town meeting floor you know which is it could have been formulated 36 hours prior just well
and last year I think it was last year where all the numbers changed right so the numbers were different than what was in the fincom report so I had to explain that yeah I mean and that's not good that's not good
um so it makes me nervous okay um so next week we have CPC we have the rest of the Town budget
we have to Circle back around um DPW so so perhaps we can do that next week because this spreadsheet included everything there was one update minor one um I I got it the other day Okay um
was $5,000 more for the um housing production plan than we anticipated it's just the application oh is going to be approved by the committee on the 20th so it's a day after our meeting but it should be minor enough
but okay would you like me to distribute the updated spreadsheet that'd be great okay yeah um the CPC Town DPW um I talked to the fire chief this morning
and he indicated that he's going to have some memo out to the select board and the fincom within the next week or so I think he's waiting for some input maybe from the union or so I don't know you
know it sounded like it might not be next week but the week after um so that would put that on the 26th probably to finalize the fire and the capital is the capital on this sheet well it
isn't good because that 200,000 there has to be so you're going to adjust the capital and it's the 27th right Sarah we that's the Thursday yes thank you great the capital in the spreadsheet
that is that not adjusted on the 200,000 no the 200's in there it's in there I thought it's just paper no and everyone I just updated the spreadsheet um during this meeting so I'll send it out when later on tonight
thank you is there any way you can set it up so it can be printed with each Budget on one page yes I had I went in and you to adjust that oh I had to adjust it Page
by Page um I couldn't do it on the spreadsheet as a whole but that could have been me and so it first it was coming in at 146 pages I said I canell sorry about that I didn't set it
up to print I had to go I each page to change the margins to make it landcape and to make one sheet fit on a page maybe somebody more expert could have done it in one Fell Swoop but I
tried everything to print so before I send it out that it should be okay it won't be 146 Pages yeah okay yeah um I just wanted to print it because when I'm on Zoom I can't always but I figured out how to do the
spreadsheet I have no clue if there's anybody on Zoom um Okay so so we have the Auditors on 35 um we've been asked if we can do a joint session with a select board on 33 select board
meeting Monday the Tuesday um no it's a Monday Monday Monday Monday I'm scheduled to be away that day but okay I might be able to zoom in what time is that on on the 3 7
that'll be around 730 might be 7:30 7:30 7 or 7:30 okay depending on how much other business they need to do are people okay for that it's fine here
okay um 35 is the Auditors we probably will have time to Circle back around on things too that day I I won't I won not be at that oh you won't be there okay we won't Circle
back around on things um so I would hope to wrap everything up except the school by 312
um and I would like at that 312 meeting to understand and better the tax rate just for the town portion and the funding for the capital stuff and how that
impacts the tax rate to see where our flexibility is um and kind of hold the school out of it for now um if we can get the school to make their final decision on the 11 right that would fit in nicely right
exactly um okay is there any indication on as push back on the school or are they yeah significant push back yeah so so interestingly on what was released today which which
takes into account the new aor the apportionment with the new equalized valuations our percentage goes down a little bit because the Essex valuations increased more rapidly than ours did so
that's going against them as well that's going to be an exciting so they based on this by putting in the 26% for the health the total increase in budget is 7.9% our share is up
6.96% and Essex is up 8.64 but theirs is eight theirs is 8.64 ours is 6.96 and the total is 7.59 that's a over one and a half
spread that's big that's a big spread and I talked to a member of the school committee that said the school hasn't decided to eliminate that middle school principal they will they just not that's not going
to Prevail um so the equalized value we live with for five years three it's a threeyear average ining average this year so it's so this year's is the equalized valuations is only done
every two years right so for this year's assessment we include two years at the fiscal year 24 and one at the higher fiscal year 26 so it's going to get worse for Essex as they get more years
with the fiscal year 26 in there exactly that's for us going with this it's not going to get be a better picture uh What are you hearing if anything from ESS Sarah I haven't heard anything but you
know we're only we're we're 73% of the equalized valuation but we're only 57.5% of the students of the
enrollment because we're down to 650 what was it 57 57 57.5% student that's really dropped we're at 650 in there and that's the threeyear average yeah yeah but for
2024 we're at 650 and they're at 477 which is even even closer yeah yeah right yeah um so it's not going to get better no going the other way yeah that's why I asked you the 's question I
thought they they might be screaming I think there's there's a talking with a couple their fincom people two of them there's a lot of push for that third party audit is there and the school committee has no appetite for that and I
don't think of Manchester has any appetite for that so this is going to this may push that date of March 11 out it's all the wrangling around that should be a shame hopefully stand the ground
say they juston go town meeting here we come yes yeah um this could be the year to how about minutes from five I read
them I thought they were excellent no problem you want a motion to adopt them motion to approve the 225 minutes second no I I comments I had sent them to you I had sent them to Gail I made comment
um I I didn't know if they wanted to be redistributed but you know it was about the um the ambulance billing you know I I just asked about um whether our whether it causes overtime
if we get two two calls and um he said uh we don't cover recover that cost because we don't really get build for the labor so I just clarified the two things that I had said um that was the ambulance one and then the the
deputy the hiring of the deput I mentioned how you know try to hire within you know the Spiel I said I just clarified but I said so I I had sent that to Gail and you um they were significant are they are
they crucial to the minutes it it captures what I said I mean what what my intent what I was saying is not what was written so I I edited to include that okay we'll hold off in these minut
next Mo to return then have a second Peter seconds all in favor thank you very much thanks sir thank you sir