um I'm still going to give you a quick report from Essex where um the ess6 town Administration is saying that they plan to put the entire increase in the school budget on an override so that will be
level funded from asex is there will be more later but just have that in the back of your mind it's it's wow yeah okay the uh calling Mor is
um action items is there any comment on the action items anything that we need anything you don't need um I no this that
there's something on here for um the I guess the new positions come under discussion the new positions and the rearranging of the finance department that'll be part of your budget
discussion incor okay yeah all right Colleen Morris is not is unable to be here so we won't be interviewing her the next thing is the FRS and trees uh
presentation um we have we have been asked to bless the new trees um I don't know that it's and I think I would like to hear about them so J thank you very much um Greg can you do you have the the
little outline that I gave you if you want can follow along thank you very much I'm going to be brief because I know you have a very pack schedule today and I'm really appreciate being able to fit in quick background we um applied for and received a CPC Grant in 2023 to
plant trees in both ra Rosedale main cemetery and also the little Cemetery um and it was a grant of $28,000 so in 2023 we actually planted 10 new trees in rosale we did a lot of clean up of invasives and so forth in
rosale extension and when 2024 came along we started looking at rosale extension we recognized that because there's so few trees there I believe it's our newest Cemetery we wanted to step back because I think we had an opportunity to do something special as opposed to you know
let's put a tree here here and here um and so I actually asked um the CPC if we could have an extra year and so in the past year we have done just that we have taken a complete Tree in inventory we have assessed the health of the existing trees and we have come up with a design
with the help of Loi Gibson who is a professional landscape architect so my first thank you is to Loi I'm not sure if she's on Zoom or not um but this is her plan and we had four goals for this plan the first was when we plant trees we obviously want to make the cemetery
look beautiful that seems to be that's what that's what you're blessing I guess we also needed to remove some high-risk dangerous trees there are number of Norway Naples that are in there especially along the borders that are I mean I wouldn't even want to walk under them if they're in such poor shape and
then finally if you might be aware the new it's not that new but the idea of planting native plantings in order to improve our ecosystem support Wildlife support insects and birds and so on it has become very top of mind for anybody
planting today whether it's planting flowers or trees or um working in agriculture whatever so that was one of the things that we thought that we would do is we would only plant native trees and so when we specified and these are some of the trees there I think we're we
have 10 or 11 different species that we've chosen for for rosale so far and they're all Native we try not even to have cultivates so we're somewhat purists and if you look at the second page of your um little handout here you
can see the native habitat value of each of these trees they some of them are nesting for nesting they're pollinators there's a lot of benefits it also improves the soil they sequester more carbon native trees are good so one of the goals of this project was to use
this as a showcase to educate people in town if you're going to plant trees on your property maybe you should think about a shagar hickory or something that maybe you've never heard of before there's some beautiful trees and this is going to allow them to come in and actually see what these trees look like the stretch goal for this once we get up
to at least 25 unique species is to be certified as an arbor so that's down the road maybe another year or two but that is definitely you know behind this is that I think it would be really great for the town of Manchester to have one of our cemeteries U be certified and we would have signs on the trees and so
forth and we'd have to work that out with obviously the DPW and get permission to do that but that's a stretch goal when is this going to happen next month we're going to plant 39 new native trees removing about 8 to 10 unhealthy trees
we'll be doing some dead some Deadwood pruning there's some actually beautiful sugar Maples over by the high school that um could definitely benefit from some pruning and they are native so we're saving those uh we're going to be testing and amending the soil as needed and we're also going to install a
temporary just drip system so the first two or three years after trees are planted it's very important to be able to water them gives them supplemental watering if we have a drought which seems to happen every year other year so we want to make make sure that these trees live and who's going to do this first of
all I wanted to thank also the DPW this was Chu had asked me to make a presentation because when I think I told him all this work he was going to do that we were going to do was like maybe you should have everybody understand what's happening before we move over here we get permission from the DPW and they're extremely helpful for us where
can we plant in the cemetery Sean is great and he knows that he spends time walking around the cemetery making sure that we plant them in the right place the friends of so the friends of Manchester trees is going to be doing all the planting and watering and that will be paid for completely by the CPC
Grant and by funds from our nonprofit so my second thank you and if there's anybody on Zoom I thank our members and our donors for supporting this project and this is just going to be a very fun thing to see um come to fruition um
thank to J thank you to jack Burke think he might be on the line for the grant and uh in front of you you've got this plan if anybody has any questions that's pretty much the end of the story any questions um I've got one for
Chuck this is not going to interfere with any future human plantings so yeah I think the there's a couple locations where we just need to verify that there's nothing uh going on so there there's a couple on the plan
that I think we'll need to slightly move so I think we can work with jod on that one uh the next one is some of the removals like the invasive Maples M nervous that they might disturb somebody who's already planted there so we're just going to have to take a closer look at that get to the field but um the only
place that we can sell more make more Lots would be where the cemetery offices which I do have plans to remove that and make that grave site um but you know that's I was still a few years on road I don't think that interferes um and
then yeah the only other thing that we had talked about the cemetery master plan was potentially along the side where you know where the school would be if we did some sort of um burial plot so this would prevent that probably would be
consideration this is this is ready to we haven't we haven't really talk no I'm good I'm I'm looking forward to start learning about trees all of these trees that I didn't recognize the names of about half of them so just great basically you're encouraging
strolling through a cemetery I'm doing what you're encouraging strolling through a cemetery yeah yes yes absolutely like whistling fast absolutely well um you know you look at uh you look at the cemetery what's the one in Cambridge that's so famous Mount Auburn Cemetery is one of the first
cemeteries that actually created an arboretum as part of a cemetery and I mean what better place you know when you go to visit a loved one's grave is to have some you know beautiful trees shading and and uh being able to do that as a walking area I also love the fact
that it's right near the high school because I think it'd be a great place for you know kids in a biology class or botany you know they're studying botany to come and see this because this is a living example of how to how to um take a degraded site which this was a gravel
pit and this will start to you know birds will start arriving and insects and all sorts of good things that we want and so it' be a great educational um opportunity as well um question are there plans to expand the number of
plantings in the future distant or near or I'm always looking for I know you are well if you look at this planned we have concentrated on the side where the high school is sure um but the side where the building is over here and I
had not I was not aware of this idea of having a place for for earns or whatever but this would be a great area to actually once this building comes down is to plant with that in mind you wherever that I think we open up grave wants the
idea certainly somewhere yeah there's there's always opportunity I'm just curious Arboretum there's a certain criteria you are to become quote in Arboretum yes 20 so we this we would we would go for the lowest level because we don't have paid help we
don't have all these things which you which you would need so there needs to be signs on the trees like little plaques identifying them you need to have at least one event there a year so we would probably do a tree walk as part of the friends of trees and you need 25 unique species all
right thank you very much for your time um Chuck you are the one who encouraged us to hear this what would one of the in the back of my mind we did work with Joey on at the pleasant girl Cemetery where we built out that new area and there were some comments
from the public you know that when we went up in there so I just wanted to make sure that this was a public you know place to see this um you know not just us showing up with 39 trees couple months from now that's a good question do you have plans to
communicate to the community prior to having the trees show up the absolutely absolutely um I'm my background is marketing so we're definitely going to get the word out that we're doing this thank you
Kathy shall we just um agree that that this is a pro that we can support as a consensus absolutely good luck thank you thank you thank you okay the
um what I should have said one of the things I should have said at the beginning is that I have asked that we move the town meeting ahead of the DPW of the DPW discussion um because because
the moderator asked me to problem um the next item on the agenda is the um alol license for back for a motion anyone John you sometimes have something
to say sometimes with regard to this I looked at it I I've had drinks there uh no no questions from time to time there have been questions um about complaints from noise from the neighbors and I have heard
nothing couple years it's better yeah so whatever they're doing is working yeah they should keep doing it yes they should keep doing it yes I'm ready for a motion okay I move select board approv the seasonal alcohol license for the
Manchester bath and Tennis Club second okay ready for the question yes John and yes answer yes Kathy yes Brian yes and J yes the affordable housing trust is unable to join
us um so the next thing is the discussion of the annual time sorry just clarification so are because they had sent us a memo are we going to be just putting it on the next meeting's agenda I found I want to find
out if the 7th or the 22nd is good for them okay so the draft the draft warrant is uh contains 20 20 articles um there's the pretty standard um
budgetary lines um locational School ess6 Tech um there's the obious town operating the town Capital the school operating in capital the OPB funding annual event um
the funding for the revolving funds that the park and wreck has and that the Board of Health has as well so those are all fairly um this like I said pretty standard that you see every year not that the numbers are necessary standard
um the the school remains um a challenging Factor here uh the school committee will be meeting tomorrow evening to finalize the request um currently we have in in the proposed budget um School District
appropriation increase of of 7.29% um track what they call their model a um projection um so we'll see if that is what they vote on tomorrow night um so with with their number assuming
that that's the school number and with our um operating budgets and capital request the the bottom line for taxpayers currently is is a 3.5% increase um so that's roughly one and a
half% on the town side and then the the two and a half plus on the school side um to have that number um the there are some additional there's a few more items on the on the town
budget that you wanted to to review um the proposed budget does have a couple of um has one new full-time position as as part of the move to a finance director model and then also has
a boost in the um assistant to the town clerk from a halftime position to a full-time position and then the third staffing change that's in the proposed budget that the finance committee has um approved has a new Deputy fire chief
starting in the fourth quarter um so not so waiting until fourth quarter to start that full-time but obviously then it would hit as a full-time position in the FY 27 budget so I know that you wanted to
spend a little time on on those those Staffing um potential Staffing changes and in addition um the capital side um there at one point you had endorsed
going forward with a bond for the for the senior center and anticipation of fundraising finance committee is is not enamored by that idea they would prefer to have the fundraising get started um and then do a bond um so you you talked
a little bit about that but you need a final decision um which which Direction you want to go with that as well um and then in addition to the um bonding of the project there has been discussions
regarding funding for the architectural work the design work for the addition and is there an ability to put some monies towards that to help with uh finalizing the design and coming up with a plan that then can be presented to
potential donor um so it would be helpful to have at least some dollars available for that again in the discussions with the finance committee we talked about um again finance committee was not in favor
of putting Town money into that at this point and would prefer to see that perhaps we we um secure some donated funds to jump start the the architectural work as well so again you need to make a final
decision as on that as well and then uh a potential uh new article would be to amend our existing water regulations where as IT addresses
drought conditions and your ability to impose uh restrictions for outdoor water use the state is looking for communities to up update their regulations to contain some of the language that they
would like to see referencing um State declarations so right now our bylaw focuses on um you making the decisions and the state would like to see some additional language that says when the state declares a drought then you
respond to that and they're not looking for standards based on our res sources but on their declarations correct correct um and so um chck I were reviewing that earlier today and feel
like it wouldn't be that hard to add a couple of paragraphs to our existing uh bylaw that would incorporate those um desired changes from the state uh we're under some pressure to do that um Chuck can explain that a little
better than I can off hand right so all of our water regulations are through Mass D and in the most recent registration update so we have to register our water source every 10 years with DP for basically the quantity of
water we're allowed to pump uh and so having a registration is one step uh easier than having a permit uh permits would absolutely require us to have all of these types of things in place no matter what that would be a permit condition they had up until last year
not been able to condition our regist registrations so that's where we're at is they're conditioning our registration to include their nomeclature about drug and it is very subjected to the state standards nothing really to do with our local water supply standards in terms of
the Declaration of a Dr so um if I'm understanding this we have to abide by the state definition or Declaration of a drought
even if Bry Pond and the well are chalk full and happy and like just as like a for example right now the the the condition that they gave us we have to implement it by April of 25 so right now
uh it was pushed back and back and back because of Co but like last fall we did declare a drug because you know things were going down but the state had also declared the level three critical drop in January people started asking hey you know do we still have that restriction in place that seems weird you know we've
had a lot of rain we've had a lot of snow we said yeah but the state hasn't lifted yet but uh they did and then you know I sent a memo I think to Greg and you guys lifted them a week later they went right back into Dr so technically based on that we would have had to
reinstitute the um in Institute the outdoor band uh which doesn't make a lot of logical sense but that's where that's what I'm trying to just clarify practical application so basically it takes away the Lo local control so that when the state declares
a drought even if our coppers are full we have to enact some type of water ban based on the level of the drought regardless of our local inventory and the state would argue that their drought plan takes into
more takes into account more than just the water supply there has to taken into account like red flag warnings and you know drush brush you know overgrow you know all the you know Wildfire risk all that kind of stuff that's not really you know centered around your water supply that's
so that's that's the differentiation in is in essence yes okay State declaration is one size fit all well so they broke the state into regions at least but but we're not at the same level necessarily as the cape or you know
western Mass right but we are in the same bin as if switch Basin and you know other basins that are more I actually saw in the paper that Rockport had instituted a ban like they reinstituted the because of the the level three that
the state red declared that was yesterday didn't include today's one I a little curious how we get when is the warrant does the warrant have to close we need
to close the warrant by um like the 25th 26th of March so next week so and we're looking at putting something on that we haven't seen at all right so we would have something to
you by the first of next week or end of this week first of next um like I say it's a paragraph or two that would be added to our existing and what horrible thing happens to us if we don't do it I mean I'd hate to put into Jeopardy
our registration uh because it is kind of grandfathered in from the 80s um I don't think they would get there you know we could say we're working on it we could say they were um you know we we have the ability to restrict based on
your um you know declaration anyway but is so I guess um how did this come to our attention at this point in time I guess is my question since we know this was delayed as a result of Co or whatever what what yeah
there's been some litigation involved trying to push back on this there's 20 plus water suppliers been are you know in the middle of a process of appeals on those registrations so those registrations were issued a year or two
ago um we're part of that but basically you know all water suppliers are saying you can't restrict us because we have a registration this is a whole bunch of legal stuff from the 80s uh but uh you know in the event that you do like we know that's so we're we're waiting for
that process to play out but we did not get a stay from the courts okay to okay do that so there's a again there's a chance that Implement byw waiting for good news and didn't get it okay yeah we implement this bylaw and then they say
the court agrees with us but DP and the state don't really that often so to okay so I my my thought would be for you to have a special meeting sometime next week to approve the final version of the warrant we'll we'll know the school
number um the finance committee will meet tomorrow night uh Wednesday night with the school number and give their final recommendation so if we could meet know Wednesday or Thursday it shouldn't take very long but but you need to do a final
approval of the warrant sorry you saying Wednesday or Thursday of next week yeah so 20 26 or 27 yes right can't be pushed off to the
31st okay it's really yeah we really need to get it to the I can't do wday so I could do Thursday Thursday is this an evening meeting or a early morning to up to all of you it would be
easier for me if it were evening but it's G have to be for me I'm good at there two working steps over here I'm not sure but I think so you got a without me be done how long isig half an hour 4
minutes yeah you need to confirm your position on the various articles whether taking a position or waiting until the flow town meeting Rec yeah can we start at 6 earlier than 6:30 I'm sorry can we start earlier than
6:30 yeah we can we could do 5:30 I guess I'm asking the folks who work I can do I can do as early as 5 o' even 6 or compromise 5 just looking Thursday right I could do Thursday yeah we're
talking Thursday Thursday 5:30 yeah I can do 5:30 530 thank you what's that date Mar um I think we should start at the beginning and go through the things that
are that have to my level of curiosity um and um one two three three is the the Essex T the Essex
Agricultural and Technical School District was not a lot of controversy actually you got the budget don't you I have if you guys are interested I have budget books I can bring if you want to see them if you
know no do you have de online I have actual books if you want it's online too but yeah you could so our number is down because our our enrollment has dropped our enrollment is down a little bit but it's always fluid anyway so
yeah um if you could send us all a pointer to that online B I mean I can give you a physical book if you want THS I don't need more paper but somebody else might
appreciate it'd be nice to be able to see it before the meeting too yeah that's um right um so there's the operating budget
which um and then the capital budget my one area that's going I think is going to be controversial is number 11 the point Renda restoration
on the capital under the capital L 11 um this is because the CPC Grant is not going to happen so we we had hoped for two different Grant
sources C Coast Cort Economic Council for a million and also czm Coos Zone management also 4 million the czm program um was announced a couple weeks ago maybe three
weeks ago and significantly uh less money being awarded so we had 25 million this previous year they're down to five million to award this current year so asking for a fifth of that was is not
going to wasn't going to apply and we will still apply um but we're very um skeptical of our chances because the the priority is is projects that are protecting property uh people their focus is on measures that
are protecting people from floods and so um we're not optimistic that the realer will score high on their ranking and so U we have gone back to a plan B which seeks
um utilization of fund balance from your town plus additional monies from CPC originally we're asking for 300,000 from CPC and now we're asking 500 and they have they have approved that as a recommendation um and then now
there's 800,000 um to to to be paired with the 500,000 plus still the $1 million Grant and what have you been hearing
that you feel to tell out support that um priorities priorities um you know um maybe this is something that we ought to put out for for fund fundraising yeah
um my only thing with that is I think we're on borrow time I mean one storm that's that's the problem think we have time to we don't have a year I don't think to be honest with you loed up this winter but right we just don't want yeah and
you must be the fund balance you had $800,000 lying around we got that to put that there I mean that's pretty big dent into our so the um the Target Fund balance is 8% of total expenditures is that now
seven so no this this um we had we had an extra million to to bring in order to get down to 8% and a p to the finance committee supports this yeah they did approve of this
amount I guess to an's point I mean this doesn't affect anything any other projects moving forward right I mean no but obviously if if you weren't spending 800,000 on this there's plenty of other projects yeah I know I know but like you
can't argue that things this year that for example would another $800,000 speed up the PF PS not at this annual town meeting like ask me again for a special town meeting in the fall and might change my answer
we're still in the process of writing the reports and submitting them to D on that um you know eventually we will need 800,000 whether it's this town meeting or the next one so it depend like Greg saying depends on how your town
what the timeline you're looking for but we will need to spend 800,000 on P there's no doubt about it but it would not accelerate our current time are we still applying to czm we will yes and the application that you
put in isn't the money take it to leave it that's it they could reduce it to some other number correct not that that's probable but they could throw $100,000 they could yes yeah we will probably ask for 500,000 range okay so they don't think
you're crazy right and hope for a couple hundred thousand or something so this number is up to 800 okay stillo a lot of money obviously we wouldn't this is alligated it isn't
spent if we found another source certain um if there's an angel there that wants to come forward and you know things like that absolutely it has taken us quite a while to get organized to start fundraising for the senior center which we were
anticipating um what's your feeling about the likelihood of of having a parallel yeah one's going to take away from the other what's okay yeah I would have a concern I would get that out but
we don't want to attract from fundraising for the anybody have any other concerns in the um app budget just a question again I'm sorry what was number 21 for the boat replacement
what which boat are we replacing so those are for the two um the safe boat and the main uh operating boat right the main so it's the it's the small launch we're
getting rid of and we're getting rid of the the 25 foot Defender old Coast Guard and so police are going to pretty much have their boat and hard Master fire department so we'll be operating two boats we getting rid of two boats so
that way we can better contr har better safety so we're getting rid of the small Lo that we just bought H small yeah bu you want to chip in with a boat
replacement maybe he stepped away I think he told me it was one of the Easterns it's the eastern and okay I'm here yeah go ahead all right hang on let me shut off
this other phone yeah that's me so uh the idea is that we would get rid of um the small launch and move the Eastern into the backup launch position they both can
carry the same number of passengers legally the Eastern has more functional ity that Easter can still respond to Shallow Water Events um it's newer that doesn't really matter but uh it would become the deao
backup launch and also serve other purposes uh for the town which the backup launch cannot uh we would sell the safe boat and uh so the two new boats would replace the safe boat and
the backup launch so you get it so the existing Eastern becomes the launch SL backup yep and you get a new Eastern or equivalent well it it would be uh so the
two new boats would be both metal sharks both aluminum both brand new a small the smaller one would be the 23f footer would be um for the police department for their purposes their patrol uh their needs on the water and then the
other boat the 26-footer would be uh Harbor department and fire department uh primarily Harbor obviously but it would be fully equipped with all of the equipment that the fire department would need to perform EMS Andor
firefighting um incidents so it'll have a pump on it yep yep hard mounted so I'm confused about the police department vote I guess I didn't realize
each Public Safety department had its own boat well so uh we've all of the uh boats are Public Safety Vats that's what they all right so the police department has been moving into a more appropriate
en larger role on the water for enforcement and their mission is a little bit different than ours and uh they've been using the uh the safe boat
primarily as their platform so we're replacing that uh how old is it now almost 20-y old platform with a brand new one and uh upgrading from an Eastern which has been the primary platform for the Eastern for the harbor
department since I took over it never really served the fire department's uh needs adequately uh this would bring us very much in line with all the other communities around us all the other
communities around us have have these uh aluminum newer uh platforms for firefighting EMS and police my by police Andy would be that to do law
enforcement yes so right now with the new uh reforms the har Master himself doesn't have uh okay so You' be outfitted with the blue lights as opposed to correct so
yeah because I'm post certified I'll be able to it's just police certified um so all both posts that we get will both have blue lights and be multifunctional so it's kind of an emotional response
but the easterner is a pretty friendly boat goes into really shallow water I'm not the the metal shark is metal and and it seems too bad to to give up the
the friendly appearance of the harbor um um in in favor of something that looks a lot more martial I think though I mean having something we can fight fires on the water with is important so that that would be the function of one of these at least right
yeah we we don't have anything right now right well you'd have to break up yeah you'd have to break up the pump if you notice there's a small U plastic uh box at the end of the dock there's a there's a monitor in there so they got to break
that out set it all up and then go up and fight the part with the new boat set up all they have to do is Hop on the boat and go because the monitors already built in up front which is the nozzle up front yeah um and it'll be it'll be a
lot more EMS friendly because there'll be a lot more space to work on patients or know subjects and it's got cutouts so you can pull people out one so I guess I I appreciate the additional capabil ities from a safety
standpoint what I'm not clear on is why we need two of them well so basically we have two boats that we use constantly now and we're trying to fill slots to cover the water we think about it technically we should probably be running from covering the HB
from at least 7 in the morning till at least 11 12:00 at night and that's big area to cover so having the police offset us helps out huge we don't have the staff for that kind of coverage even though uh we should that's
so there's the boats but then there's the Staffing I mean I don't I'm not clear we're not adding boats okay we're upgrade we're we're swapping boats so existing we have the existing safe boat the orange boat right yeah right um
which is not the greatest design in terms of friendliness it's even less friendly the shark so you want you want to upgrade that we want to get rid of that it's also an expensive boat to run those are big motors um more horsepower than
really we we need um bu and Andy I go off the course here but um so we get rid of that and we get a new one that replaces that got it I'm okay with that it's the and then we get rid of the Eastern or we we shift the Eastern to be
come uh this the second launch and also a spare for busy Harbor regains I guess I'm just trying and shallow water and shall water so we're getting rid of two boats and we're buying two boats no no no no I understand but I'm trying to understand
the Eastern why so it's too old is that that what we're saying okay well it's the Eastern really served a purpose that Ann touched on uh it was approachable it was uh something people were comfortable with
one person could operate it both of these new boats require just one person on board whe that's you know the right way to go or not the the safe boat really requires two to operate so it's less Staffing for these two boats the
the my sensibility of the Eastern when we started was an approach to make myself approachable and I think that we've reached a point in the harbor now where we don't need an Eastern a
specific type of boat to let people know that we're approachable that we're there to help that people can come and talk to us I uh I think that U it's time to have vessels that
serve any potential incident that comes up far more appropriately than the Eastern does and with potentially less Staffing I don't understand the last Staffing on that part so the two new
boats the two new boats can be they uh open boats walk arounds so one person can safely operate them as we know with the safe boat uh it is it would be extremely difficult to go out and
perform anything with just one person because it's a closed cabin I understand getting rid of the safe boat I understand replacing that with a shark y that has a mounted pump right got it that that all makes perfectly good sense it's the
second shark it's like why do we need two of the same thing for me that's the same Bo I mean they aren't the same build but not the same two okay so smaller
go the second one is smaller second one is actually smaller than the Eastern it's just got more deck room yep so and then the smaller one set up just for police has everything they need on it the second and the second one the
bigger one for us we have a lot more capabilities pump out for boats of sinking uh you know firefighting capability EMS capability it still sounds though like the second one is the police boat and we don't have
the Staffing to have that well always had them I'm sorry we've always had them well that's what I was asking I didn't realize we had like how how many hours are the police on the water during the summer I'm asking so that safe boat is basically a police boat now right B it's
it's largely the small well that would be their new boat Todd is on the line as well he's got his hand up he can he can help you thanks Chief go ahead Todd not we're not hearing
you so while Chief's getting uh that squared away I would point out that these two vessels are purpose built uh built to the needs and specifications of uh the town of Manchester you're never
going to get an Eastern or Parker or uh you know some off-the-shelf boat to really truly uh be exactly what the town needs these boats are designed for what the
Waterfront does for what the police do for what EMS does what fire does what Harbor departments can you hear me now now yes now I can yeah so um thanks um
from the middle of May till um September is maybe uh Labor Day or a little bit after we we currently staff the uh Harbor 40 hours a week with with one officer on the weekends we will backfill
that with two uh just because uh of the busyness and the type of boat the uh safe boat has been um you know obviously we need two two two people to effectively run that boat so with the purchase of this new boat we could not
backfill it on the weekends and just run with one officer since Andy is now post certified we would have actually two police officers out there I that Mak sense and not well I guess what I'm asking is uh do we have uh a member of the harbor
Master's team and a member of the police department both boats out on the water at all times during the high season like from 9:00 am to not every day no so what I'm getting it is um how much downtime do these boats have right the
question is why do you need two I understand getting the one which is professionally outfit for Public Safety totally supportive unless you have the proper staff to staff another you know group of
people on the boat for and and and want to do that for a significant a number of hours wouldn't that second boat experience a lot of downtime so the harbor staff is on duty uh essentially from 8:00 am till 8:00 pm
every single day and uh sometimes that happens when you know obviously during the 40 hours that the police are there it's it's not always the same Mission and remember the reason we have a second boat is because
of the volume of traffic in the main Harbor and the volume of traffic east of us uh at graves white black and Magnolia Beach that created the demand for a second boat that that second boat came
about because the harbor Department was receiving uh lots of communication from Folks up at that end of town saying you're not doing your job you're not down here where are you when in fact getting away from the main Harbor was virtually impossible because of the
volume of traffic so that's why we have two boats um and the police have a place they have their their role out there they are the enforcement arm for the town of Manchester and doesn't matter if that's covered with water or not uh it
was usually helpful to have the police out there um enforcing guess I would just recommend that if this goes forward as is on the warrant you need a I I I agree with an I think this is going to get questioned I think yeah you need a
very crisp story as to why we need these two boats I'm not hearing it I I appreciate the one it's the second one that I'm not well so I I don't want to I think we have other we may have other things to discuss here I just we can find two
need to fine tune The Narrative here because I'm I'm telling you it's um it's a little squishy can I jump in for two seconds sure sure um so just to kind of echo what Bion and chiefest Gerald have uh mentioned um you know you look at it
from a response perspective we've done numerous responses just in the past year in the water where we go out for either a medical or a medical and a police event at the same time if we only have a single boat to do these three different functions when we go out take care of a
person medically then we don't have the Avenue or ability to leave uh the scene or if we do leave the scene now we're leaving the police either without a boat or um the inability to continue what they're doing investigations Etc so it's uh fundamentally important to have two
vessels to you know augment the functions that all the Departments are doing and I guess the question we have is why not keep the small launch keep the easterner replace the safety boat with a shark that's fully
loaded and and that should give you the same number of boats yeah so let let us let us staff work on that yeah also is the shark does the shark go into as shallow water as Easter that's why we would keep it as
the backup launch and uh an auxiliary uh Patrol boat because it would have that capacity we used the second launch very very very very little so to keep that vessel which is good for one thing uh
rather than keep the Eastern which is good more than one thing that that just didn't make sense to me that just sounded the opposite from what I expected you to say it sounded like the Eastern was good in shallow
water yeah and that's why we're keeping it around these new boats are not great in shallow water unless I misunderstood well so the the two new boats are both deep V hulls which are uh
the kind of PS you want for going out when there's a sea or it's rough bad weather that kind of thing need to go fast when there's ways uh the Eastern which many times I won't let staff take out under uh bad enough conditions um
but yeah I did the the Eastern is a shallow water response vessel and it can also carry the same exact number of people as the backup launch which is not a shallow response vessel
um and so we if if we keep the second launch then we don't need the Eastern we don't need an extra boat we
need two boats it makes most sense to get rid of the safe booat and the backup launch and then move the Eastern into a dual roll it it will have more it'll give us more options more
capability I think we've laid out the problem question okay is there anything else in capital but any yeah yeah and I I want to follow up on Greg's comment with regard to the senior center and the bond and he wasn't
addressing the bond so much as he was money's associated with some architectural work and I don't know what that number is 25,000 I think we have 50,000 down there be a good number okay may maybe it is I don't know how far that gets you in architecture seems it would get you it
would get schematics pretty far along get us good schematics a good layout right right right but there won't be there won't be there won't be construction documents no no no I'm not expecting that as long as you brought that up I just want to Pi one more swing one more bite of the apple and feel this
swing away that uh it's a it's a show of good faith to the seniors that we are serious ask them at one point to approve a budget for this for the schools but we can't find the money for
the seniors they've been we've always treated them as second class citizens okay no no let me please okay there is I don't see the downside to approving we're not going to take the money right away we're just
going to approve the money okay and it we can run concurrently we talked about this earlier people they want to get in all right and I think that by presenting having this Bond and running
instruction and fundraising concurrently also I I'm surprised that uh the fundraiser didn't tell tell you that people want to see bricks and water going in they want to see something more than you know pictures are great but actual seeing construction really gets
gets fundraising go point it's it's not unheard of and I think that uh that we can save we can probably we could be in the ground you know I just think that it's it's not a I
think it's not a bad idea right my my thinking is just that uh there's some preliminary work that needs to be done I know that there was a grant that was put out there that largely is being used by I think the uh money raising group maybe not all of it maybe some of it
but to create a story you do need to have some showand tell and I'm not talking bricks in the ground I'm talking about Graphics this is something that it looks like and they will go out and contact some some major donors before this program ever gets off the ground whenever you're money raising you start
money raising and and by the way we're halfway there and to get there you have to have some sort of story to tell these people are already primed but you still need a little something to be able to say this is where we're going and you need some money for some architectural
support here further the building is not just going to be a senior's building exactly the board of health is going in there so it's town offices that we at the uh you know the Council on Aging is going in there there are town offices that are going in there
and that is part of the picture and that the seniors know that those are going in there so the town it's not just a senior's building it is also supporting in part the town's Administration so and so I look at this as probably nodding your head toward
that support as well obviously it's going to be a new line item on our budget next year well maybe not next year but two years because there's operating costs maybe not a lot but there's going to be something with the building going on but the building will be housing some Town Offices but that's
a fair assessment um my main point last week was I I just disagree with the statement that we haven't shown any love to the seniors a million dollar million bucks a I'm sorry that's a lot of love okay and we the commitment we made to
the taxpayers is that we would not spend taxpayer money on the renovations now if we're going to put town offices in there that's a legitimate use of taxpayer money and I'm okay with that so I just think we have to be respectful and
mindful of the commitment we made last year which was not to spend tax dollars on the renovations we we made that commitment well so I know no I don't want to cut you up no no no so we've thrown a $3
million number out there for this renovation right but is that just for the senior center or is that including the officers that's everything so I think we need to
split that somewh right because the seniors shouldn't be up against that whole part of it that's a fair comment yes I agree with that yeah you know if it's if it's a if it's a million for offices you know what I don't even know
but if it's a million for offices and two million for the senior part of it then so so what's the approximate percentage of the the square footage that the town will own approximately what percentage square footage is dedicated
to the senior centers versus the town offices so it's it's a couple of offices so it's it's yeah 15 15% okay and the function hall itself will be wired correct right so again
when senors have priority but anytime that they're not using it then it'll be available for board meetings and legitimate Town expenses that's all I'm getting to so if you put some boundaries around that you know again I
think this is about sharpening The Narrative okay um we made a commitment last year where we are meeting that commitment we're not spending money over here we have Town Offices to set up wiring that will be used by Boards and committees when they hold their meetings
there that's what this money is for totally that's totally appropriate in my mind I think that the bottom line is probably a little bit soft but the objective here is simply to get some money so that you've got some architectural drawings that you can
build into your um money raising activity early as you can and that money has is going to be spent on both the seniors and understand but there's at least a legitimate Town taxpayer funded activity that's
going in there that justifies that it was just the senior center that's I think that's inappropriate so I I I'm I'm with the 50,000 think that's the right number Okay small amount like that the 200 no okay is it would you are you saying that we should put out a fond for
50,000 so that we can start spending it right away no I would that's just money tap your TAP a little bit more of the fund balance okay so you should have that right 800 so it's line is this line 13
that we're talking about yes yeah so we change that to 50,000 and say fund balance okay and and at the fall town meeting we can face again whether we should Bond a
part we will know by then exactly what yeah I agree that's the Tim for that okay if it if it happens if it's needed I I think we ought to I think Greg you need to be prepared to um again that the narrative has to be
clear but also it would is there any when is this fundraising going to get started um I think we need SE September I think I think the advanced stuff is going to happen in the summer but the official launch we've already got X and saying I
think that narrative has to include the timeline yes okay because it's been a year there anything else in capital that we ought to talk about um so I'd like to Circle back to
operating if we could sure we have yeah again we have good staff online if if you have questions Jen is here as well um you have questions about the Staffing I have a general question how'd you get the one and a
half percent when all all these other numbers are going up so high and the operating only went up one and a half% so well so that's the the tax need so there was some shifting of dollars right so there's some additional for example um
um a little higher number on the local receipts okay increased Revenue I'm sorry you had increased Revenue no from receipts local receipts right and um some shifting from um not putting as much into into Capital the new new money
right Capital so some of that so the 1.5 is the tax increase what is the increase in the budget the operational budget last year was like 7% or something what what is the increase in budget or just operation operational budget yeah yeah
um uh don't have that at my fingertips I should I don't do you have that Andrea I do it's 5.6% yeah thank you it's better than seven so I don't I I'll start I did a lot of pushing last week uh two weeks
ago on the head count um and just I'm glad the staff is here the reason I do that is because it's mostly administrative headcount um and I I think we need to always
challenge that very vigorously I especially think we need to challenge it in times when the overall economy is shall we stay challenging right now you know you listen to the news and
you hear you know are we going to go into a recession or not those are not the times typically when adding administrative headcount is a good thing to do um I think so just a big picture
um you know we we tend to look at the budget line item by line line item by line item because that's how we have to approve it but I just ask that we step back and think about the repercussions um if next year the housing prices don't go up the
assessments don't go up and you know not prices or assessments that affect it it's new construction new construction whatever the housing environment if you're in a recession that housing environment um impacts you know what we
can Levy right so I just think we need to be careful about adding administrative headcount um when it comes so each staff member sent a you know a letter Etc the which one do you want to talk about
first so we got Jen and and and Andre here why don't we talk about the the whole move to the finance director and and an accounting clerk which would also serve the would be a swing position for treasur office and assessing office as
well I guess on that particular role um I saw Andrea's thank you Andrea for the memo um it was very detailed my question is if and I fundamentally agree that the
finance area all needs be in one place makes total sense what I'm struggling with is the need to add an employee um at a lower level to make that happen I'm not understanding why we can't in the near term have some sort of
a contract position um to cover that need until things settle down a new you know administrator gets to come in here and put his or her take on on on the staff
so that's my main question um I have worked under a finance department structure in the past it is definitely streamlined um I mean I don't tend to talkten but I've heard a lot of discussions on money tonight and it's
very detailed um I collected a bill for $51 today and 28 cents in interest from this person I'm all about the details there a lot of and you're absolutely right about the uncertainty of the future the you know the finance economic whatever outcome all the more reason to
have really good Finance controls the extra person would be Andrea's role changed drastically it will definitely know a lot show position and that's going Tri down to her assistant when I think about it you know V's Department
of car Master when I agreed to take on those collections eight years ago it was moing and weightless now it's moing weightless launch dingy slip kayak transient dock border I mean it's it's a lot more work um also the budget how
much bigger is that than eight 10 years ago when I decreased Staffing levels in my office so I feel like this might just be like I had made some good adjustments streamlined bringing Andrea on was you know fabulous but the amount of work
being run through the finance chain now is d L up and we have not increased any any staffing levels in a long time um I wouldn't be opposed to saying it would be perfectly only functionable to start
with a parttime and then you know if need be um depending on how the finance department rolls out and and that the role it plays the things that fills for the New Town Administrator whatever it's easier to go from a parttime you know
position to whole time and the other way so yeah so so I think first of all thank you very much for that um I I didn't actually see scope so you are referencing an increase in scope of work as part of the reason for this position
didn't actually see that in the documentation so I appreciate you mentioning that that wasn't something we saw I think there was a little mention in the back the memoral vote more the budget and financial planning responsibilities that's different not increase in scope
so I I understand I I still think we just going right to a full-time body um and making that an employee is I mean it's not a a small cost it's a
it's a commitment a long-term commitment pension everything that goes with it and given the type of role that it is finance here is the same as the finance in the next town and the next town and the next town this is an opportunity to try a contract
position um the other thing I would say is I as far as the structure goes I would expect more when it says here um you know the finance director would take on more of the budget and financial planning my expectation would be that
that person would do the budget and and fpna role and submit that dra those drafts to the Town Administrator right now Greg you do a lot of the fpna work okay because you did it a few weeks ago
fincom meeting where we were talking about the capital plan uh the facilities plans you did a spreadsheet I'm sure working with Andrea but you were laying it you knew all the details and you were intimately involved in the creating of that financial plan that should be the finance
director's job right I guess I'm asking because it wasn't this is a big role and I didn't see the clarification in the accountability the responsibilities that I would have expected to see and also I didn't see anything mentioned on the
automation finance department should be the most automated Department in in town hall there's a lot of Automation in it but in this community too there's a lot of in person Services as well yeah and to your point about you know the
administrative part time I'm partial to the employee um nothing because well in my office you need to be bonded I to give you the code to the door I just feel like an employee is more vested being a part you know a contractual person I don't plan on
bonding a contractual person a vendor um giving them the code to the door I mean they can come in and help I suppose clal position but yeah I feel like if it's a new structure finance department re reorganizing the way things run and
again you're right we don't know how it will go I feel Finance director is the appropriate person to handle the budgeting and everything we don't know what the new person will want to do or how much of a finance Preference they handle but that is a good structure and
um it would be streamlined it would be it would be great here because we kind of operate very closely to that model anyway it's something that we've been discussions in since I don't know six years ago Greg came to those department heads inste I'm looking for structure to
streamline and that was one so yeah and I like I said I don't disagree with the finance director mod but when you talk about streamlining it usually means less has head count not more so that's that's what you know so that's what I'm trying to understand I I can support a parttime
you know to start I really think we need to give the New Town Administrator an opportunity to weigh in he or she may have other ideas on how to do things and and i' rather not box them in I
just Andrea please thank you um I just want to talk about the fin structor piece of it a little bit um yes I would like to take on more of that uh fpna as you put it um I don't have like a lot of bland with right now um like Jen said like a lot of our scope has changed we
have automated a lot um which is now which is why we've been able to go so long um without you know really feeling like a huge impact um you know we've had Grant increases um we've had the collections increase in Jen's office I also feel like
the let's talk about um restructuring and having less um reporting to the Town Administrator but it also we were talking about the in the operational audit which I think is very true that each department is kind of siloed we do work very well together the assessor the
treasure collector and I but having them like just have to report to the finance TR um and make these financial decisions before it comes to the Town Administrator helps um the Town Administrator role in that way and I think it benefits all the community uh
the department heads as well um the other thing that would be is that I really need and Jen also needs too is our assistance become to move up um we can't be like the single point of contact and single point of um different responsibilities for that and then in
order to do that we really in order to shift everything we kind of need to have some kind of relief in a part-time or a full-time clerk in the office and like I said I'll say it for the third time I don't have a problem with the finance director
structure to say I just I think you that's just me what do the finance committee think about this they they endorsed it for a fulltime yes okay so I've got a question Andrea said
uh a lot of the stuff has now got automated Jennifer you said you took over all of this water stuff how much of that was aomy yeah is far fromom it's been on our list so that's
running into a lot of people at the front desk including me yeah okay and that that really is a time it's only about 900 bills I would say out of the okay all right so we've got to get things automated some way so you've got
some direct pay arrang well when I started I think Cindy told me and I started about 13 and half 13 and a half years ago she said there were five people in that office and in her so it's gone down okay so it has obviously automated a lot in order for two people
to be doing what five used to do yeah um okay a lot of automated product but still still got a ways to go and I mean I put in place you know it's definitely place you know ways for autopay ebilling these things have been in town for 10 years I try to promote them but I don't send out flyers constantly it's costly
for one um but there are options available in when I see there are people especially people who might live abroad most of the year I do direct reach outs to them and I let them know about the product and try and get them on board with the eiling the auto pays things like that and
then what percentage of the residents I'd have to pull that report it just goes up though you know when I started there was 18 people paying online and then it just the pandemic helped drastically obviously people had online and now a lot of people it so there's a lot of um
shift to that using of the ebilling the autopay it's growing um I try and send out little friendly notes about it here and there and Tiffy newsletters here and there but should of talking to every person telling themit so Greg one thing
you think about though from a service and you have to tell me if this is allowed or not when we have um services that require labor okay um are we allowed to add a fee to that um for the collections because in you know
collecting a fee by a human being at the front window is more costly to the town than someone going online and well it's that you're already paying me to be here and the staff to do the work and I hear a lot of complaints when people come up and want to use their card online and they're not happy with the fee they have
to pay visa for the platform that is providing the I'm saying we're incentivizing the wrong Behavior yeah it is so I was just asking if there was a way to TI that so if you just put your bank in there and there are some people that are reticent to do that in fact there are a lot of people that are yes
exactly I mean online but then there's no then there's no fee it's just automatic transfer a lot of people still to pay p in it is just an a it's not a like when you do your online banking with your private bank it sends a check well um yeah people and of course
they don't want to pay the fees to be their MasterCard you pay it when you go to a restaurant but you don't see it you pay it when you a different question I was asking that was it was about paying the fee if they're physically here I think don't know the that I think we
need to for future budgeting I know you won't be here but I think we need to look at the revenue side of this we need to be incentivizing people to use the tools that are available and we're incentivizing it backwards yeah it's a good point okay well nevertheless so
that's that that's been a driver for making you busier than you'd like to be or that that would normally be in the office constantly having to take checks and then there's a manual activity associated with all of that somebody's
got to deal with that not necessarily I mean well you can have issues with your online downloads too they drop people they don't you know they have their hiccups for sure that can't be explained those can be very timec consuming to fix particularly when they're done you trying to work with a third party vendor
who's having trouble identifying what happened with that transaction and I go deep behind the scenes and two days later I find the answer but once you do it once okay now the next time it'll take half as long the time after that it'll take 10 minutes so it's a learning process all around all all right so
annual part and the that's okay I would like actually a vote on this um asking the select board whether we endorse a full-time um
accounting I would like to make one more comment on certainly okay and you know I'll say I endorse that but I think we need to broaden the portfolio of the accountant clerk somehow to perhaps take in some of the Personnel issues that was a factor that was brought up in the operations review and
I know there are some things on the Personnel end of things with regard to benefits Etc that kind of fall into the financial area I handle all p and benefits all right well maybe we can take some of that off possible for this person to work in both the treasures and the accounting office depending on what
permissions they have for the softwares and other cannot be collecting and then posting to the G separation of Duties yeah all right I'm looking to add that to the description I mean pay loone you know Personnel benefits it's a lot because
the there's 20% more full-time staff probably or staff in general and when I started 13 and a half years ago the needs the budget everything just has grown so having decreased staff at one point you know I'm a little bit maxed but I'm handling it a lot of the um what
we hear Too is you know what I consider HR function and payroll and benefits so there's HR is policy and procedure and you know all that and then P benefits is your vendors your insurance if it's on your paycheck it's me if it's a FMLA
issue or discipline issue or harassment issue none of that is in our office it's already okay it's already being handled by Mich Maloney or the HR okay is there do we have a motion no motion for what move the that the
select board approves the hire the addition of a accounting clerk fulltime okay yes thir second second okay further discussion Jeff yes Brian yes Kathy no
answer say yes John says yes okay and the other position so there's the um assistant to the town clerk which is Curr part-time position halftime and the request is to go to
that full-time position so um this one here um I read um Christine's memo um didn't really give me much didn't really give me U you know horm and fuzzies on that so I went back and looked at the recording of the
fincom where she went and did a full presentation and talked to fincom about why she wanted to do that I thought her story was um compelling because what she said basically was it's about coverage of the office she's constantly
interrupted and when she has to leave or gets interrupted she can't get her job done or you know a resident comes there and there's no one at the window that is a direct benefit to the residents so I am I am comfortable with that however I
do think you need somebody needs to look at the optional services that are in that office because during her presentation to the pcom um what she mentioned was I keep getting um interrupted we had notary day I think is
what she said every there was one day when everybody was in there asking for things to be notorized that is an optional service it's not required by law we probably have other optional services and if we do we should be charging for those to offset the cost of
this increased Staffing okay we don't have to have the taxpayer you know pay the entire load okay and we're not doing that we need to start doing that so I support um The increased hours for the town
clerk but I would ask that we look at charging for the optional services to offset the cost right now do we notorized for free yes yeah we should be charging you should be chared and it's that's the only one that comes to my mind because
it's a great service and I used it two times in the past six months but we probably do other things that are optional that we do it for free and suck it up and the taxpayer pays for they don't really have to do that with that note do we
support the full move um what should we be looking at next the chief ah yes and uh yeah chief chief M is I hi good
evening um I'm know I've presented to you multiple times on this as have previous Chiefs um the workload at least the administrative workload of the fire department in addition to calls is ever increasing especially with some of the construction going on the increased
needs of our residents um which is becoming more evident uh the more interesting construction goes on uh has been time consuming in addition to being a you know 247 365 um um the
organization it's very difficult to cover uh all those calls especially on the overnights when additional staff is needed um so this person uh primarily role will be fire prevention um which will semi be offset um we'll be
presenting to you uh the next month or so once uh your schedule uh calms down a little bit about increasing our fees as well as increasing a fire um permanent fee which is currently no one pays for our inspectional services when it comes
to building permits that's just lot uh rolled into the building permit fee but separating those out uh based upon the complexicity of uh these dwellings that we're beginning to see and the time it takes to research laws uh and regulations with that um as well as
coverage from me uh to give me a little bit of a break and not be going 247 question that's good I think you got a lot of the challenges that Town's clerk has except that you you have the problem 247 they not so much but your public
facing and got a lot of stuff to do yeah and you know and the environment's changed I we just looked at the you know brush fires that we had this past fall uh if you look at the for forecast looking for the spring it's not looking much better even though we just had two in of rain um so I think things are going to get much worse before they get
any better um this person would be on the same essentially the same schedule as you um my uh my goal would be to put them on I do 8 to four Monday through Friday uh this person would be on four
10hour days um which would coincide with our shift work as well um so if we can utilize them uh in that capacity uh to optimize you know the finances of the fire department we certainly will um you know obviously there's going to be some flexibility in
their hours based upon if I'm away over a weekend and they're covering things like that but the goal would be to make the job ENT uh enticing to people to take um in you know four 10 hour days would be a little bit better uh than the Monday through Friday 8 to four
one good okay so that wraps up the budget items obviously the school is still outstanding um there are the um various planning board proposed zoning
amendments are we can walk through or Mark is here to walk through them if You' like um okay um I think we probably best do that okay so I just walk through the
various there there there is a PowerPoint but do you want to use it or um oh there sumary yeah if you'd like to I'll I'll go through it quickly is that available to put on if not I can run the phone yeah it's
just easier for people who who aren't here miss a word or two if we have a summary go ahead start right now we'll get this up okay um so the planning board
uh we've been working on uh some fing article changes um and we have uh seven that we submitted uh uh to your board last week and that we discussed in the previous meeting as well uh the first uh
article is for well R down them associate members board does not have an associate member um there's been a change to the state law as it pertains to accessory dwelling units there's a right of people
to uh be able to construct an accessory dwelling unit of 900 square feet so uh we have a bylaw that regulates that as well as one for slightly larger accessory dwelling units um we also have
a short-term rental prohibition that um we have drafted four accessory dwelling units um we have a flood plane bylaw update that needs to be reopt it uh we
have uh to expand the applicability of site plan review Many Things fall through the cracks um so it's just a more comprehensive list and um the introduction to the
zoning bylaw we're proposing to delete because it's more informational uh than Regulatory and so that is the list that I just ran through okay associate members is the
one that's up next yes so the uh so for more detail the associate members right now the Plenty board does not have an associate member um to act when someone has to is unavailable
or you conflict interest or something carries over across an election and yes as as last year exactly so there's there's many reasons why when an associate member uh might be uh useful
to have uh the plore discussed this and they decided that they they would like to have two associate members appointed jointly with the select board and that there would be uh for twoyear terms uh there would be staggered uh if this
passes we would appoint one for one year one for two years and then soone uh every twoe terms thereafter any questions so these people attend meetings when there are issues where there are conflicts or for
whatever reason somebody has to recuse themselves or is sick or I don't no exactly he's not there exactly and then you know that person but not there all the time well no so ideally that person would attend
all the planning board meeting that's my question all right okay um it would only be uh eligible to vote on special permits right so if we didn't have anything as a special permit then would
necessarily have to be there but I think just for continuity and for learning the job and and really understanding the all the other things the planning board do does um it would be it's generally
helpful for the planing uh the associate member to be there for all the meetings Okay so that's an expectation for the people that get appointed to this slide that's correct questions other than okay
uh the next one is the I I I assume that we generally you only questioning and I think I've resolved it is uh uh an appointed person appointed person who's going to potentially vote on something
that an elected official would normally be voting on all right there's a disconnect here uh I know that we when there's a vacancy we appoint MH and that's how I kind of reconcile this okay but I was concerned a little bit about
how much how AC of this associate member would be all right given the fact they weren't elected to and they're going to be acting in con acting we have 20 people on the fincom
right the only time the associate votes is when someone else has stepped right I wasn't alter on the ZB well I understand the concept and it makes perfect sense I I thought this was essentially though coverage for special permits to make sure they don't get delayed is it anything more than that if
they get delayed they are constructively approved okay that well that's my understand they their their purpose their really their only purpose is to make sure that special permits don't you know are efficiently adjudicated and not
delayed because of an absence of that's their only role again I can I can but to your point should regular planning board members outside of this associate Arrangement could resign or dis whatever you could appoint planning board member
who would be a planning board member and then be voting anyway without even any associate I'm good I just I had to reconcile Mak sense okay the next one shows up on the screen um is
the regulation of um State mandated adus that's right so it's uh we need to comply with the state law the state law overrides our existing accessory dwelling unit bylaw there are things in
there that we can't enforce such as uh requirements for a special permit having um you know the owner live in one of the units Etc so um so we would uh this
bylaw would comply with that also obviously there's a need to increase housing across the Commonwealth which is why they passed this um and uh by having it uh kind of as Bri uh hopefully people
coming for permits and have inspected and Ure that they are safe units and um uh we want want to ensure that we prohibit short-term rentals in Adu and that's for by definition less than 30 days less
than a month so um uh so our um the state law um allows smaller adus which is 900 square feet or um less or half of the
main unit whichever is smaller by right um uh we would uh delete our existing um U bylaw which one of them talks about ad employees and garages are accessory
buildings and our other Adu bylaw those would be deleted um the standard Adu we call them standard instead of protected that's 900 square ft or less and large would be up to 12200 Square ft um we felt there's some very large estate
maybe big out building that could be an Adu and we can require the large ones to be by special permanent so there are two articles one for standard adus and one for large adus that's correct which
should be voted on seven yes and um again we F shortterm RS so um so our standard Adu bylaw would be consistent with the state law again has to be a self-contained
housing unit um sizes half the grow floor area of the principal dwelling a 900 square ft which is smaller um on the same lot um subject to the dimensional requirements of the district if you're
going to add on to the building for that um it has to maintain the separate entrance um and uh it's in by right by state law and any District where we allow a single family home so the only
District that we can prohibit it is in the LCD because we do not allow single family housing in the LCD and so um uh within half a mile of the MB or NBTA train station cannot
require parking space for that unit uh but outside if we adopt this bylaw we can require one parking space for the um the standard accessory
what so the large dwelling units yeah well yes yes it's it's hard to remember everything at the end any questions on the standard Adu okay okay so back to so the large
one again it has to be self-contained housing unit it's half the square uh gross flow area of the principal dwelling or 1200 sare ft whichever is smaller um it has to be on the same lot as the principal dwelling subject to all
the dimensional requirements maintaining the separate entrance um and we would only allow it in between certain districts a b c and e you would not allow it in the uh districts that
currently allows two families which is the D districts because those people can come in for a special permit for it um and then uh it would be a special
permit so it's not by right and um so there are some extra special permit requirements uh they have to comply um have to be either in main building or an
accessory building uh if they're constructing a new accessory building after uh the data town meeting that accessory building needs to comply with the primary building setbacks because these are larger units but if you have
something pre-existing that's okay um the adus are not so you can only have you can't have a large Adu if you have a standard size Adu you only have one
um you have to comply with our uh parking regular parking requirements so you don't get the passas on um not having a parking space um and um they're only allowed uh on Lots with single
family Welling so you can't have a standard and a large so um questions on large I have H one question well actually two have three
sorry small uh so we have to allow large adus by right also no we don't we don't we do not have to allow anything over the 900 squet and then my second question is I know we were talking about curb
Cuts so if you're going to require the amount of parking what happens if that property requires a second curb cut to achieve that so we we're we say in here you can you can only use one curb cut so you
have to continue to use the primary entrance to the property I suppose you could relocate it and close off another if there's a better entrance because of your second you have a bigger side guard that you want to have four cars instead
of the two that only been on this side right um you know that's that's something you can do but the property still would only have one thank you was that three no I only two okay I
only bought two all right if you have a large Adu you can't have a small and vice versa correct yes these rules say that I I think okay I just wasn't wasn't sure and large adus
can be part of the main home yes okay was there some reason that they could not be or just because of size some people would say that's there but it doesn't necessarily have to be there they can do whatever they want okay okay um um first of all I'm glad the
planning board lowered the uh square footage from 1500 to 1,200 that was going to be my sticking point so I'm glad they changed that um question for Greg so you I like the fact that we're not going to allow short-term rentals for
these adus either type they're operating under the premise that short-term rentals are for 30 days but our bylaws don't Define a short-term rental as 30 days we haven't made those changes yet do we have to do anything to our General
bylaws so that that 30-day ban is in effect you know what I'm saying right so no okay so that the zoning will cover the adus okay um everybody else is
under the the general bylaw of the other less sort of Define we have to fix and have it fixed yet okay thank you that was my question do the comparison or that needs to be updated still says 1500
squet this is just a sum yep and this one is this is this is a in case the other two don't get approved yes we would still have a Prohibition about EV right so we would
pass over this one if the other two got approved either one this this bylaw yeah well no if the standard U um if the standard doesn't pass it would pass over the large
one as well as uh oh I see yeah but if the standard passes we would again we see what happens with the large and we could pass over this one because this defines Abus but the same definition
which refers to the state law it's also in the standard blood plane blood plane bylaw blood plane bylaw um needs to be updated it's been years since we've updated the planing board had started talking about updating it about a year and a half ago
but then the MTA um kind of took up a lot of their time so now we're under um a deadline to pass this by by July so our our count
meeting has to uh uh pass this uh in order for people to continue to get flood insurance it updates definitions some basic rules and but it refers the the the real enforcement is
the building code or we regulations Etc within the flood plank District so um and our uh version was just approved by the state who ask to review and approve it and then we have to
submit it to FEMA after count meeting that doesn't sound like anything that we're going to be able to improve no pretty much we want people to be able to obtain flood insurance you got to do it okay
yes and if you want to look up the flood maps they're online um so the introduction to the zoning bylaw um so we have a two-page introduction to the zoning bylaw which
is more informative it's not regulatory it doesn't set any rules uh and some of those um u u that information is is inaccurate so um and having to having to go to town meeting
to change every time something State Law changes much better to have less is more and so so our plan is to take the information that's good and put it on the planning board website so people can look it up and and uh they it's
informative and then the uh the last one is the expand the app applicability applicability yes oh site plan review um currently we
have a very small um requirement yeah for for site plan review many things would fall through the crack so we kind of uh just thought although we don't have a lot of applications for site plan review and a lot of big commercial
developments modest Siz ones uh the planning board thought it would be good to add uh some specific criteria on things that would kick it off such as like if you putting a drive-thru facility you know if you want to drive up window that can change traffic
patterns within a place as well as entering and exit might not be building or adding more parking which is why it might not kick in today but you know that's just one example so we have uh I think nine new
criteria we've all seen them does anyone have questions on expanding the range of site F okay great and um we had this reviewed by Council uh we
reviewed from the version that I sent out to the board board the planning board met earlier today and approved uh some uh minor uh adjustments in some of the language based on council's opinion
so that's where we're at good okay um thank you thank you that was very complete presentation wel you
heard our commentary we do there's a hand up sure not sure who that is if you have your hand up unmute and let us know who you are please oh yeah it do manifest by the C3 I'm not
sure who is might be it by mistake okay so that brings us um to the three citizen petition articles right um one is uh the a non-binding vote to ask the
they help to resend the um it's called generational tobacco use prohibition those born after 2004 I think it is January 1 2004 yeah 2004 yeah um anyone born after 2004
would not be allowed to purchase tobacco that's so that is slated to take effect this April um there's a a new bylaw that the Board of Health passed so this uh citizen position article asked to be send that but as I say it is it is a
non-binding article based on the authority of the of the Board of Health so that's number one second one is um the pro B of using certain rodenticides and you yeah you know that
well so you want to talk a little bit about that yeah um we can't directly prohibit them in town we have to get permission from the state this this is the first step we go to the state and say will you
allow us to impose more protections um than are allowed to T when the state gets around to voting on that um then we will then I will come back with another citizen petition asking to actually do
it so this is just a request to go this is a request to be permitted to do something have there run other towns that may yeah um Bine comes to mind but there are maybe a dozen um Rockport has it on
there Rockport has it on uh Rockport is working on Banning them within Town haven't made any effort to go to the bo of he to see what we were actually using in town for de aside but um yeah they
um there a move to band them Statewide but um this each town that moves toward it um is more St so would this apply to commercial
pest control people only commercial Pest Control these poisons are these chemicals are not allowed to be used by homers so they're not in products you buy at the hardware store no no they're not in products that you buy at the
hard um and the the third one is the proposal to um increase the fines basically on the noise ordinance um but state law dictates those fines the maximum fine that we can charge is is $300 per offense
the petition article salt $500 and up um so my understanding is that they will be the the uh person who put the petition together has asked that it be passed over that's the warrant that's the
warrant that's the warrant okay um the next article is the W discussion and we start with public restro so quick and easy update there we
have started reaching out to local businesses thanks to Debbie um we had a very positive conversation with the owner donut and they're willing to um make their restroom available to the general public in view of water sewer
bill so that seemed like a a pretty fair deal and so we will pursue that and get a letter of agreement and get some signage and talk to the chamber about putting that on maps that sort of thing um we'd love to have one or two
more so we'll continue to reach out to uh to business owners to see if we can get uh one one or two more lined up Dr Bravo uh we've been in tou with trying yeah clearly on the list
yeah so so I think short and sweet that's a good short one but the other request was I guess there's a bathroom here in town hall yes um the conversation at the downtown Improvement committee was it's the town's best kept secret so how do we
improve signage or what yeah again I think working with the chamber to get it on a map people even when you come in through the front door a town hall is you get better signs on the in the building for sure yeah that's what I I don't think I've ever seen a sign and didn't know was
myself maybe a sign on the door saying yeah if you could add that sign I think that's those are two good short-term Solutions yes that we can do that kind of covers both ends of town
more right that's been the discussion is you need it in both places you go okay um actually we talked about I'm sorry there was discussion about a long-term
right solution okay and with that I know that uh we've been kicking around the H Master's office having public restrooms and by doing that we could probably get entire grants or close to everything paperwork that kills two birds of one
stone so at this point I'd like to I guess there was a h Masters steering committee couple years years ago on that topic yes on that topic I'd like to talk about reconvening
that right uh and narrowing that down and trying to determine you know we know where you stand on the H masses office uh and just stop really looking at that so just a question clarification um is
that different than the harbor management plan we asked another committee to do and different than the harbor advisory committee two Harbor related committees and I'm just trying to understand the time my understanding is that there was
there was one Function One function only there was Master's office yeah so it's an ad hoc as well seems like task force could be part of the the harbor management plan but whatever it is let's
get it started yeah I I would I think it we shouldn't do anything outside of that so I like the idea of getting a task force and just getting it done I would not want it SE completely separated from the harbor management plan and all the other committe you can structure it anywh you want think it's time to we
revisit this in Earnest especially while there's money out there yeah when you say grant grant money to in terms of examining where it should be and downstream of that
um yeah not well not to talk to BU I know that I know that their dollars well there probably be some planning so we had a steering committee uh for for just the discussion of a Harbor
Master office whether or not it would be feasible where would be feasible if it were and what the recommendation would be to the select board that Select Committee was far down the road to making a recommendation when we had the failure at tux point of the ramp access
to the floats and that was a a million-- dollar project so it was decided that that would take precedence over a Harbor Master office so this would just be reformulating that group and uh deciding
how best to approach the select board with the idea of putting an office down there with public bathroom so I I'm looking back at our action item list and it says that the harbor management plan task force is going to
be reviewing a draft plan with us on April 7th so could the first action be to go check with them and see if they already had some thoughts just so we don't have two separate sets of ideas sure
G Morris has his hand up please unmute yourself and go ahead I'm gar Morse on 11 Jersey Lane just a point of Interest the library under the guidance of David lumson came in and said they were going to do some
planning and architecture and said that bathrooms was on their list and we suggested maybe uh that uh public access to those bathrooms Maybe even from outside not through the library might be a great idea they said that sounds good
to them and I believe they said they were going to they were going to pursue that awesome okay when when the library is open I assume that you can walk in and use the bathroom yeah right yes you can it's not accessible is not handic it's not a
great bathroom but yes got a lot of meeting material it is how did they get dunk thank you girl I didn't hear that part you're welcome anything else on public Ben forer Road waterl so there's been discussions over the
last couple of years about the about that water line um in the town's position that it is a private line it's serving half half a dozen homes um you know sort of evolved hodge podge manner it seems haven't
really gotten a complete uh detailed history of it all but um we can tell it was just sort of added on and added on as as homes were built um so certainly um some of the uh residents
would would love to see a new New Town Line put in um that's um so it's not something we have budgeted yet um it uh like I said it is
a private line so a good question how many situations like this do we think we have in the town like how many private roads or private water lines do we have is this the only one or is it one of 20
or I think one on Jersey Lane it fits a similar profile those are the two off top my head at the other end of this line is connected to this at all University L on off a summer oh University Jersey
yeah yeah not try to think there are any others that that's one of my questions is obviously if we did something here you'd have to do it for everybody who was in that you can't play favorites right so the decision is do we do it for
everybody and I'm just trying to understand how big everybody yeah be interesting coolish point would be another interesting one so sure about that that that's why I feel I don't really have enough I think I think we consider that a
toeline that we or not I don't feel we have enough information I don't feel we have enough information to deliberate here because we can't play favorites sure so I would want to know how many of these situations do we have how much is going
to cost and how much would we have to do it for everybody because we favorite then well it can be done with a betterment so yes we pay up front but they pay for the whole line over time that would be the reasonable way to
handle yeah the town isn't pay a hookup right in that regard as far as the Ben goes yeah I thought the question was does the town pay period not do we just pay up front and have them reimbursed I question
asked I that Mis perception too I guess so if you thought was as a betterment it requires them to agree to that but yes that's a that's that's a different anal did I read that you there was one concept of maybe sharing the
class with there yes and I I think they're 100% benefit they knew what they were getting into when they mve there yeah I mean you just opening up a can of worms I have a you know you're going to come to my condo complex of our waterline you know breaks on our private
road I mean okay I'll remember that boote yeah I didn't realize that was part of the options but yeah better sounds is is it has have people been making noise about this recently I mean this is a topic a year ago was it over
year was it year talking about it for two years off and on and and you know we're supplying water we have meters there yeah um well and we're going to be revisiting meters again real soon um there was that
was Lee that was Lee deler he came here and he was was still here he was hurting cats as I recall is because he had different homeowners yellow homeowners well well the other thing mentioned though in in the notes here um
I think Greg you mentioned that when we redo the Bennett Street line that that will help them anyway is that we we simply project that there will be some increase in pressure just says that line gets improved so that's the town I mean
that's a Town Line two years it's not 26 or 27 27 will be T so be 28 would it I mean it be an incremental it's not going to solve that's still
going to be size line yeah so what is the typical um time frame that the home for the betterment like what period of performance is usually it's a 10 years 10 15 or 20 year
betterment that's that's that's have the option how long they want to stretch it out do we ever put boundaries on that so we get our money back faster um yeah you can you can set the limit okay so may maybe we could ask for
the finance committee's recommendation I don't know so I mean looking at example here what are there have 10 homes involved or something like that I'm not even sure it's 10 I'm just doing the maths a lot of money $100,000 a house yeah
yeah why you pay it back to me in four years that's what I'm saying as far as the period of performance what's a reasonable would we want to get the finance committees um look if if we if we were to agree to outlay you know6 or $800,000 that's a big expense I
understand that's value of the money there and all that saying they usually advise on financial matters so so was we as far as we know maybe Lee is still commiserating with his neighbors or you don't know
oh I haven't talked to him in once in while he's probably in Florida he's in Florida half the time I think it's just soing would it make any difference in
the cost if it went at the same time as Bennett Street so typically we would try and add make it an add alternate to the benon street as the base bid so the contractor when they're bidding would know okay we're doing benett which is you know probably a three or four million dollar job if we just add on
this you know marginal piece of water line on this side street we're already there anyway so we would get to see you know some economy of scale there so that would be the best possible time for us to do and that's that's two to three years out generals too exactly so it's all it's all one moment yeah makes sense
okay that's that's kind of the best scenario best case for us the way construction prices are two or three years from now could be so my feeling is that there's a consensus that offsetting the F
cost with a better um is the preferred way to go and that there's advantages to waiting until 28 on the Ben Street
okay unless they make noise between now and then private line they're welcome to they can do that yeah get newpp mes off so the shower they can shower down that's not well safy do fire side snow maintenance
um there were a lot of complaints after the particularly nasty storm and the suggestion that we adopt a b we require people to shovel in front of their houses not really a fan of this
I'm all right with you know if you want to put out there hey help out and you the sidewalk but an actual bylaw I don't know I don't I mean we have elderly people here what are they going to do have to hire somebody to
shovel their sidewalk in front of their house and then some people are the dpw's doing it so they don't have to do anything yeah I don't know true we get clarification on what what it is that
you do now right yeah you know all of our storm response you know is typically mostly DPW personnel and then we have a few hired contractors depending on the Storm um so you know this this particular storm you know in I think it was President's Day uh or President's
Day weekend um you know was kind of one of those you know Kind of Perfect Storm uh you know that was essentially it was a long duration storm there was about seven eight inches of heavy snow uh followed by at least an inch of found more of rain basically had nowhere to go because
of all the snow that gone down before it I also um you know I look back at you know time sheets and our storm reports and you know we had several responses the prior two weeks so even that Wednesday before this storm we were doing off off hour snow removal downtown
and you know sidewalks you know on the on the main streets so our general response is you know we our guys show up we you know start out with the sand and salt then when it starts the heavy snow uh we'll we'll start plowing uh we kind of have you know team system you know
but roads get the priority um you know when we can we will send our sidewalk equipment out uh during the storm uh you know hopefully more than once but sometimes I'll be honest depending on the storm and you know the intensity fluctuates over the duration of the storm you know we might not get out to
the sidewalks until the end of the storm and so the map that we put out a few weeks ago before this storm was you know essentially here's the main streets that will be there within 24 hours of the storm ending here's the that we also kind of feel like we're responsible for
but our response will be you know within 72 hours of the end of the storm and then I did put the pavet on there um you know depending on the Storm intensity and duration you know this might be out the window and of course the next storm that's what happen um so you know it was
unfortunate I will say we were not alone that you know there was Front Page News everywhere around the Commonwealth from Western Mass all the way to eastern Mass so I feel like you know in a typical New England winter we haven't had many the last couple years but in a typical New England winter we're going to get one of
those a year where just nothing we can do is going to really help I think that's where we were here but we did we did spend a lot of time and a lot of effort on on the sidewalks so I I just want to thank you guys because actually I've noticed a difference on Lower Pine Street so um it's been typical the 12
years I've been here only one side of the street gets done um this past year I actually could see the tracks that somebody made a pass through um so I appreciate that it wasn't climbing on 10 inches of ice like I normally do
um but I think there's still um um questions as to you know do you have the proper equipment so that when the sidewalks are cleared they're in decent shape I've never heard one
complaint about the roads I I think you know team does an excellent job you can see them out there pre-treating and everything but I just wonder um so you I know there's been a couple comments about the equipment and whatnot and the piece of equipment that we
bought I believe it was the 2019 annual town meeting was your standard sidewalk tractor that has a V plow and a snowblower attachment that was replacing an identical uh piece of equipment that was retired because it was 20 plus years old so that it was basically a one
forone replacement um we have a back a piece of equipment but it's a it's a wheel machine not a tra and so it's not as good of a solution and if there's any downtime on primary one then we have that one as the backup and that other one has many different functions you
know in the summer time and off not not including snow which is the primary function of the primary piece of equipment um so uh it's it's not ideal because you can't get a person they don't make a smaller piece of equipment that a person can fit in you know
obviously there's walk behind kind there's tractors that certain people have but that's not what we're talking about this is a piece of equipment that you can get in and try um so that that's you know there's nothing on the market that I'm aware of that would help us in that situation uh and it was like I said it was a replacement for what we' had
for previous 20 years um so you know I think I think we're where we should be um you know there there's always the you know per instance um you know the guy will make the pass and then your contractor at your house comes by and blocks off the sidewalk that we just
made the pass and we just don't have the time or the ability to get back there and clear it again you know like I said we'll try and usually you know the next daylight hours you know this was storm plus the holiday on Monday but we were back out sanding and salting because of the you know the rain and the freezing
temperatures the next day um so there's really no opportunity for us to go back and clean up um so you know again it was just kind of a one-off instance for that but I don't know that there's anything you know based on our current Staffing and our contractor uh you know what we would be
able to do all that different except you know obviously I think that the reason I think this came up it was came up during the budget discussion at a fincom meeting so the I mean the question was do we have the right equipment do we have enough in the budget to to clean
those sidewalks to you know a little better I guess so you know like like I said I don't I don't think there's you know it's not a staffing issue it's not an issue that we can easily solve um so know could we could we throw more at it
could we you know offer double time on you know sidewalk if you're you know doing something like maybe but that's not really the way things have operated yeah I don't I don't really have a better better answer I don't I don't think so um you're fighting the
environment is what you're fighting you are and and that was a snow rain freeze you were in you're in big trouble that doesn't happen very often and when it does is very very hard to deal so you know I just kind of follow up with that and just say you know um we're doing the
best we can we we see the ice there we see the you know snow backs there and we will remedy to solve that but you know sometimes it just takes time and it takes sunlight and warm weather have we ever like looked um outside of here just
for Best Practices just out of curious like Minnesota or you know Canada places that get real snow consistently you know um I don't know if they have different equipment or different procedures just
curious I can't honestly say that I've looked into you know the snow offs in Canada or Minnesota but I will say you know we're talking about one storm event situation well if it was happening every storm event then I'd be definitely looking more well I just want to correct
it so in past years that's why I compl imped you on Lower Pine past years lower Pine has been a mess on one side consistently and so I'll take a comment and you know I'll keep a better eye on it maybe but I would rather get the complaint in real
time and fix it than you know I think I think it's fixable without you know looking for an outside solution or you know hiring additional contractors the problem really you know if you're looking outside for contractor help you know nobody's nobody's buying the piece of equipment that we don't have just use it for us once a year like that's just
not going to happen so you know we're kind of at the mercy of what we have and what we can staff I think that we've lost sight of of the discussion which was a bylaw to shovel the sidewalks and uh you know I think Trum
is is and DEP has done the best job they can question is are we going to find people to knockan in the sidewalks is what it amounts to I'm I'm I'm looking at the map and you got 24 hours this what you're going to clear and we all know
pretty much what those 24-hour roads are you've got blue which is 72 hours and then you have a number of selected streets which say property owner responsibility and I said I mean it's rosale it's fine I mean it's it's a few
few just a few streets not very many are they put in there do those homeowners knew they're supposed to do something because that's what we're talking about yeah probably not or you know and it's not that they're major you know exactly yeah that so we're saying we're probably not going to get to it with our staffing
and our you know may to the that it's gonna get done it's gonna be the homeowner responsibility what we're saying there but yeah I take the point yeah so that's there but it's there primarily for informational purposes and probably not I mean you're focused on the red and the the red and the blue here yeah I mean I guess I could have
phrase it as not DPW responsibility but um you know well we do have and we have a lot of streets here where there aren't any houses right but they go someplace side and of course if you say well homeowner you got a shovel I mean I liveed in a community where you had to
shovel in front of your walk but that Community was all built out by 1930 it's just house house everything is Define there was no section of sidewalk anywhere that did not have responsibility and so you know I I don't think it needs to be so heavy-handed as a bylaw maybe but there definitely
should be more communication around the fact that you know if even even I would say the ones that we do do like I said sometimes the your contractor might come by after we're gone and block off the sidewalk that happened on a couple of these storms and you know we're not out there finding contractors or you know
anything like that but you know maybe some public notification and Outreach on that for home owners to tell their contractors and for you know to the extent that they're already hiring somebody maybe they should include their sidewalk in front of their house you especially if it's outside of our kind of core area so I education is not a bad
thing I just don't think it's something that's you know ever been highly debated yeah so I guess the question I didn't even realize how far away from the downtown you do um plow I I have heard
that Ocean Street um I'm sorry Summer Street are there sidewalks on Ocean Street too near the beaches or is it just Summer Street store section between corow Island and black Beach okay so I guess the question I would ask is do we
feel that DPW has the right scope um are we asking them to do more then we should um I don't know like I said I've never lived in a community where the the town removed the snow every place I've ever lived it was a property owner's
responsibility so this is new to me um I mean there's a lot of blue here and you know if if you didn't have to do the blue could you make passes around the red more often well we're not getting to those until after the storm and we you know if
like I said if if we do notice like a spot that either you know got plot in or you know there was some other circumstance why we missed it um you know we'll go back but it's kind of the rule of thought and you know there's plenty of times
where we get complaints you know you miss my sidewalk and you know stuff happens and we go back say my sidewalk they say we we missed the towns portion side this I don't sense
strong enthusiasm for a BW um maybe I think you're right maybe um we could encourage Pony um or or maybe even
um after a bad storm a reverse 911 asking people to please clean up help up I got a question John I guess you're shoveling out in front of your street no I don't even have a sidewalk my
street there's a small stretch of about 20 to 30 yards next one so there I mean there's a lot of black um on this map there's there's certainly quite a few sidewalks which are delineated as property owner
responsibility right and to your point do they even know that I I think we're not I'm certainly not ready to enact a bylaw because I don't think the homeowners that live on those streets understand it's their resp responsibility necessarily to remove the snow and we ought to probably to your
point I canate that you know I can tell you on my street there's a large stretch of sidewalk that's owned by a trust that's out of state so there's no way these people are going to do it there's no building there it's just Woods see if there's no building
nobody's doing anything right but that's still a large it's like half my street okay that's not an uncommon Street in this town right so who's going to do it I do enough snow you know it's uh but we're into
march here I my feeling is is that I don't need to worry about this too much now but I think it's appropriate next December when the storm you know once the winter kicks in there should be some sort of a note this is something TI can kind of help put together to say this is
what's going on with sidewalk plows there's a map here here and here are maybe some suggested resident responsibilities with the black so yeah I made that map and it was kind of introduced with kind of a you know reminder about the blue lights and what that means in terms of parking non
parking and stuff like that I think it needs to be at the appropri time I think it would be something that we need to do annually and then you know maybe there's some more work that goes into it in the fall do we want to put that on our action list yes for so we don't forget does it go that far down
can and that way I think it's a good timing and then if there's anything we do want to do is friendship tree lighting time maybe maybe put it in for October yeah oh that's soon okay yeah just
just it's we could use the fall town meeting as an opportunity to communicate that's a good time you know if you November no just the the whatever we're going to do you know not a byw or anything I'm just saying um if there's Communications that we want to
get out to Residents having that communication available at you know a hand out you know something like that would be do the text up when I get the alert the uh Blue Light Special yeah you know
when that text comes out okay maybe maybe a second text shortly after like that we have the we have the technology we do we do uh Central Street crosswalk this relationship to crosswalk
here yep versus moving at West on Central it was that location uh um a little further further down challenges the lack of the the Ada accessibility through the
curb um so Chuck you can so there was a Crossing there um seemed redundant to the one that you know is across here um this one here has more ADA Compliant although it's not totally compliant but
at least it has the curve brakes and the ramps um the one further up I literally witnessed a elderly person with a walker that couldn't get her walker over the curb at that Crossing and so when that was repaved I decided not putting the crosswalk back until we can make an ADA
Compliant so when I was talking to Greg about this I was thinking that um you know we are I believe that we have additional capital in for Pleasant Street for that Paving jump which will make all of those Crossings Ada and include all that um I'd like to see where those bids come in we'll be out to
bid the next couple weeks and you know this is all part of the road maintenance line any way uh so assuming there's enough money to make that further up ADA Compliant then I'll do it at that time as you know do it the right way uh but I I hate to just paint it for the sake of
painting it um without about one in front of Morse cord right the reasons all of us use that is because it had much safer sidelines right um so you know it it is better I think that moving the parking away from the crossing here
will also make that better in terms of sight lines it helps but it's because of the curve of central that yeah I don't dispute that it's just really dangerous typical area you know typical midblock Crossings are less safe um you know you
want it at stop signs and more intersections so you know that's just kind of standard but you know it's Case by case um so I think that you know it's perfectly reasonable to put a Crossing but I rather it an ADA access
so what would the timing of that be uh well I think we'll be doing Pleasant Street in May um so potentially when and it'll be it'll be one contract but typically the people
that win these contracts are a subcontractors doing the sidewalk and Curbing and all that so you know they'll be doing pleasantry first when it comes to doing sidewalk and curving uh and then I could potentially add that section uh as a you know as soon as that subcontractor is done on Pleasant Street
they come down and do that you know something along those lines so you know potentially we could have it done May June time frame so Spring right would be ideal that be great yeah I mean we're not GNA get out there before they mobilize the Pleasant Street but yeah yeah no that'd be great and it's not
just the sight lines the curves of the road it's the way the Sun hits or where where blinds the drivers all this stuff you learn it when you walk it multiple times a day um and and you know I jwalk I crossr it more I don't want to make I don't want to make too much work for
myself however just further up at the Pine Street intersection that's been a you know dips touch point for several years so be doing I'm not offering anything thereby I'm just saying like that's another area where the crossings are not
ideal and a bigger correct solution is better no one is requesting any crosswalks there well they are reques them but they so who who is that we get people quite a bit people I mean mostly it's for
crossing Pine Street like across to the gas station but like that's a very unsafe Crossing it's very unsafe there yeah the now I just want to confused are we still going to eliminate the crosswalk at the corner by
boerd are you in front of Seaside one that's a different question we talk about eliminating that regardless of what we're going to do up the street on Central because we already have one crosswalk in front of
uh we already get to crosswalk on the other side of the uh entrance into the uh right so I mean the timing for that to get done will be when we do the strer street like I cannot paint the culber street the C project so like I'm not going to fix the curbing or do anything
with the curbing until we do that project um which hopefully will be within the next two years you know hopefully we started this year and it finishes two years but the the idea is you know I'm not going to be able to make actual geometrical changes to that or you know remove the Ada ramps
like I'm not doing any of that so it's either leave it as it currently stands and just accept two or remove it all you know I remove it I mean I'm not going to paint it so it's not the ideal Crossing but it's you know still technically there would it be possible to improve
the signage there for the cross for the existing crosswalk just just unfortunately it's historic district then I get in trouble when I put flashy lights or anything like that okay so we kill kids instead of
heavy part of CH I I did notice that um the police already put some of the safety stick right they put some some barriers cones well no the safy the parking sticks that was for the hydrant I think for the hydrants they're because
it's illegal to park yeah like I said we we will paint the cross or the parking the parking stalls and all that okay if I do or do not paint the crossing as it currently stands you know that I go either way on
that um I'm sorry what's the time frame for painting the parking we're typically out in April May June okay so the spr the spr yeah okay but individual parking spaces like in front of town hall
Mor trying to save P of well thought we were getting rid of that after the okay but they going to wait for two years until after the cover work is done okay oh we're just talking
about the loss of parking by the by the boo I think you're losing one space there correct it's really right over the water if you have properly painted individual parking spaces they may actually find more consistency you know right so that's
going to be the double because some instances you know there may be a time when they get six compact customers that are in their spot and they're right up on the current crosswalk uh if we paint them you know they're probably only ever getting five that's that's kind of the
Troff but after the cover done are we going to maintain that sidewalk or we going to get rid of it the sidewalk is maintained the I mean the crosswalk excuse me so right now you know the way the current design is was we were going to um we were slightly modifying the angle of the crossing but we were we
were maintaining the crossing and making it Ada or keeping it Ada um and so I don't think that resulted in a net loss in parking it was just kind of enforcing what should have been always enforced um but if we if we're we're
saying that we don't want to maintain that Crossing in the design you know I'll take a closer look at but that has not been part of the discussion to this point I thought that was that was part of discussion yeah eliminate the one that not part of the discussion in terms
of the cover design I know we talk about separate we talk about we already have another one 20 ft away you know if if we could leave the crosswalk in front of Seaside one so people only used it when they were standing with Seaside one behind their back the lines are fine
okay it's when you're standing by the realtor's um realy office Elm Street side and you're trying to cross it's that's that's when it's dangerous what about moving the walk up to the hydrant that a safer
spot you know where the Hydra is in front on the other side of the driveway on the other side of the driveway uh right uh not ideal because people coming out of town hall making that right they're going to look up and then they're going to make the turn
it's it's not IDE you've got the hydrant there there's no car on the corner there you can see everything that's going right I'm talking about the conflict of the car leaving town hall yeah leaving town hall if you're going to turn right you would be Crossing That Sidewalk but you've got uh that hole or that
crosswalk but you've got quite a bit of space there because of the height his point is people are looking left for oncoming traffic yes that's correct well that's correct it's just not ideal I I'm just trying to get away from the but then you're as you're Crossing on the other side you're definitely
interrupting the parking because there's multiple parking spots on the opposite side yeah so the problems aren necessarily the hydrant in terms of parking it's the the the problem is is a lot of people are crossing from Elm Street they're going back behind the town hall and the sidewalk is next to Seaside one it is not on the hydrant
side right this blue sky spits all I so if if you're telling me we need to lose the cross then I will let you know if it turns into more parking or less or you know
Net Zero in terms of the c pro um but I I think we had already kind of skewed The Crossing to maximize potential parking whether or not it resulted in an extra spot I can't tell you but we we were trying to maximize so maybe if we
can let Chuck paint the lines for the parking this spring and kind of take another look and see what the so that that exercise will be based on the existing cross not reconfigured right let's see what it looks like but that includes
adding hopefully adding the crosswalk back at Morse Court do you do you have a plan of the reconfigured crosswalk yeah so if you go on the to side we have a Central Street Culvert um yeah I've looked through it a little bit so there
should be a set of dises there show the so typically the traffic stuff is you know at the end it's all the structural and you know Geotech and all that stuff but then if you get to the end you'll see the line painting okay I'll take a look should be should be there
okay um item is thank you ch yes well a to so um couple couple of factors here um the request
from anchester Mo to put in B Stern Mo um was encouraged by by the harbor Department um primarily
because it could take up less you know hard real estate if you will by preventing swing um and better defining the channel so it created a wider channel channel it created a better defined Channel and it took up less Ming
space more Harbor space um so the HC and and the harbor Department certainly felt that that was a positive um even even if they had more more Ms let's just put that aside for just a minute um
and and also as part of Manchester expansion landed their finger floats off off the land um D also required them to put in um balance stiring on the MS
again to create a a better defined and wider Channel and less congestion with the additional boats coming out of the slips um uh that also went through planning board side plan revieww that was
approved H HC had approved it Etc um so the the bylaw with Harbor regulation um has a section on bowstern and that section um identified
area one as the first area that bound stern was going to be required for all Ling holders and so as part of that effort um the bylaw was was amended if I forget four four or five years ago um
maybe something like that um to to better organize the boats in the Inner Harbor um very congested a lot of swim no defying way to exit go from the ramp out to the bridge and out and so the regulation
that was adopted at that time was to say we can everyone is to go to Bow and Stern in the Inner Harbor and it was to add no new additional Moorings there' be no net increase in The Moorings because
the goal was to improve navigation and avoid the congestion that was in the Inner Harbor as part of that bylaw it also said that b and Stern could be considered in other areas um in the
harbor on a case-by casee basis but it had the language in there that said um that additional moing would be prohibited as a result of converting to balance Stern um so from from reading of the of
the language that's in there it would certainly indicate that Manchester moing should not have been allowed to Manchester Marine I'm sorry Manchester Marine thank you Manchester M should not have been allowed to increase the number of of M so if they were going to Bow
Stern they had 10 then and doubling up then they would have reduced to five doubles rather than 10 doubles um now in talking to the HC and and to Bion they they feel that that was an oversight in the
regulation that that they did not intend to prohibit um adding new Mings in the rest of the harbor through bow Stern in fact they're goal is to do just that over
over time they feel that that is a way to um add capacity to the harbor by adding more bound Sterns and more efficient use of Harbor space and you can add more more Ms over
time um but that's not how the bylaw technically reads um the the uh the permission to to Grant Manchester
Marine those additional Moorings did take place in spite of what the what the regulations say um so it wasn't understood at the time regulations when the regulations
were put into place the focus was on inner harbor that was step one there wasn't they weren't thinking about the rest of the harbor though they did add the language that if if it's in the other areas but there's inconsistency there right so it didn't match what
their goal was it focused on the inner harbor saying we don't want to allow it should have said Prohibition in the area one in area one and that was what was not added it should have been it wasn't
um so fast forward here we are today um the Manchester Marine has gotten their permits from the state requiring the loans there they've gotten their flight plan review from the from the planning board that showed the the
the 20 Ms not the 10 um HC has reviewed it and approved it and in fact you reviewed it and and we're going along with that no one was questioning it it has come up just now that there's an inconsistency with the B and that yes
technically granting those extra 10 is in contradiction to what the bylaw currently says um so we need to do something right you need to make a a a decision here as
to what you want to do so if you want to allow it to continue with Manchester Mo to have the 20 and not just the 10 you need to amend the Bible you need to correct what it says in Bowen Stern to to say
that's just for area one not for the other areas um so that's that's an option um you can do that same thing but say Manchester Marine you you should not have gotten those extra 10
mowings that's really for the public the general public through the weit list and not your ownership um you know there's some issues that because they've already invested the money they put in the tackle they put in the floats Etc um so there's an issue there but
that's another option you could correct the bylaw but not allow the extra 10 um a third option is to say we want the ig's office to come in inspector General's office to come in to do a
review of all the transactions anyways we can add this to the list and have their guidance on this um I will say that they have reviewed the in the past the 10 additional Wars and they didn't object to that now I
don't know how deep of a dive they did in our regulations when they said that that was okay I just don't know that um so that's a third option fourth option is you can say okay we're in a bit of a pickle
right now in terms of making commitments to people and their plans and it's now almost April so we allow the the extra 10 to go forward this year with the caveat that you're going to be revisiting all of this between now and the fall and make some
determinations as how to go forward so that that is a potential fourth one that that been talking to Jeff earlier earlier this afternoon he said that might be a fourth option I gave you three in my memo so so is it fair to say though regardless of what option we
choose we need to fix the by law yes okay so that's and it sounds like there's a few three words or something we need to add in there yes I fully believe that long term you want to make sure that that byog gets amended
to allow the possibility of adding more Moorings through bow and Stern conversions when did this when when did this uh bylaw get passed this like five six seven years ago I want to say five plus or minus years ago yes I think driver for this was these
floats these floats were not there 10 years ago which the those in har in the harbor yes they were not there and when you had a bowern moing all right you had a bower and Waring and the boat was just there
we had very few Bower and Wars yes there weren't any but they started to get added but then the floats were not there and as soon as you put a float into the Picture People Say Hey I can put another boat on the other side of this nope well then I'm wondering if that just became kind of a driver for people to say hey
maybe this makes sense and I'm certain that I mean discussions with Bion or whatever and that's how no you can't just do that but it facilitates a decision to say hey this might make sense otherwise you got two bowern boats
that are like what 8T apart from each other right looks a little weird yeah it it's certainly right it adds to the the functionality that's right but if you have a if you have a a float there and so I can see where that got a lot of
people kind of thinking that way and I I don't know bu on you're you're on the phone would would would people come to you and say I'm putting a moing in here I mean I'm putting in a boat I'd like to put a float here can I put a boat on the other side of this so that is absolutely not uh the
Genesis of this the Genesis was bound Stern Wars inside the drawbridge to to alleviate the horrible congestion and lack of access to the ramp the town docks to the in hiber
Marine uh and so we did that in area one and that's when that language was written uh the it was an error of omission in uh the other language that's in that same exact part absolutely
leaves the or door open that's why we have bound Stern Moorings in area 2 with the fisherman are in area three and area four basically everything on the north side of the channel the addition of floats is only allowed uh with a
recreational boats if you partner with another existing moing holder so essentially each of those floats represents two Moorings that already existed in this
Harbor so somebody who had a moing could not put in a float say hey buddy from Beverly or you know hey let's buy another boat that is 100% not how it works so there weren't any extra Moorings necessarily that went in as a
result of a float being put out there correct no no it was uh except in the case another existing moing holder already in this Harbor yeah they partnered with and each side is a moring
when the person on one side gives up the morning it gets reassigned from the wait list so so the exception to that from my wrong mind the exception to that was Manchester Marine where they all commercial well those
those commercial although I have a difficult time conceiving of how you can have two Mo rings at a on either side of a float and in fact those moing existed on or about in that spot with no float when they've got you know
360° freedom to circle around it seems to me that you've got a lot less space there they don't swing around the floats don't swing unless you went bow and St yeah the only way you get 20 boats where you had 10 was to go bow and B bow and
Stern right it's it's less it's less space taken up in the harbor we just use Manchester Marines and say the ones that are the big deal those 20
spots are taking up less space in this Harbor than the 10 free swinging ones that were in that same part of the harbor that's the point I'm making Flats promoted because you could have two boats in where there was just one with a
with with just a single in that sense yes yes so it sounds like we have two separate issues here one is we need to update the Bogue sounds right second is what do we do about the historical
oops yes so two separate issues do we W to you know just take a show of hands is you know are we okay with I would like to see how the Bol law works because what what concerns me is
what Bion is just W said that that when you put in I have a more I put in a float okay does Bion give me an extra moing permit so why does man I just said no why does Manchester Marine get 10
extra moing permits right right I just think there's two separate issues what do we do about the situation but I I just wanted to make sure we agreed that we should change the bylaw to be clearer change the bylaw clear it up yeah is that we're too late
season well well that's what I was asking is that something we can do at this next town meeting um it's a few if it's a few words added to the bylaw is that's something we can fix quickly yeah I mean it's not g get I
don't know it's Not Gon to affect this season this is the harbor regulation this isn't not aw not okay so it's not it's doesn't have to go to town meeting oh okay this just the regulations okay yeah this is your we
don't have to go to town meeting to change this okay that's what I was wondering if we're under a time constraint specifically okay well there time straight in there's a season coming up I think we can change anything now that many boats in the water yet
depends how fast so here's the problem that we proved this to happen Manchester Marine went out and told all these people yeah you're going to have a moing this year now it's almost
April and we screwed up this is what it comes down to I don't and I'm not saying that Manchester marinees should have 10 I'm not saying they should or shouldn't at this juncture today what I am saying is
that it's only fair because we screwed up to allow this one more year the way it is and then figure this out figure out figure out I agree I
agree with that too yeah I agree figure out if they deserve 10 more or not I'm not I'm not right now I've heard a million things okay this has gone back and forth
and I don't feel I can make a decision today whether they should have 10 or not correct but to be fair to people who they promised warnings to on R I don't think this year we can go back
on that I agree with that I totally agree I guess my question is do um this these are the temporary Mars right that we were talking about provisional thank you did did they already give out all of
them I don't think they have so the question is if they haven't made any commitments for five of the mornings let say they've made commitments for five right so they made so they still have five left to go or something like that five or seven we have another problem I'm just
asking a question I'm not the other problem now is the wording of the uh one year waiting list right exactly right if we and we didn't put that into the bylaw right there are five the people that want those mors right okay
and actually they deserve them because we didn't we again we made another groups yeah but right right but so there's five other PE I talked to one gentleman and so there are people that want those
Mings but we can't promise them that moing next year now because we don't know what we're doing we don't know what we're doing right we don't so they have to know this is they were always this would only apply to this year if that's and it may go
beyond that but we can't say that right now right yeah it's a tough situation to do that so and really just by saying hey if you're on the wait list you can be considered by Manchester Marine that's all we have to do all of these people I
think are there I've looked at I've looked at the minutes yeah and I've looked at what we passed and it doesn't say anything about that anybody having to be on the waight L for any L time in the past somehow that got in there I don't know
where it got in because we did have we did have that conversation we did have have the conversation about yeah making sure people were on the waight list for a year but did we not take a vote is that what you're saying we never amended
I don't think we voted anything yeah so we had a discussion but we didn't actually vote a change right got it okay yeah that's my recollection so those people can have those Mings all 10 will be filled for
this year but the every well we don't know that but a lot of them assum they will they'll get fil but every one of those 10 people need to understand this is a one-year thing it could could have no idea right
that but send us another note if you have an opinion because we have an INB those is that where we're at and we still need to we still need to clarify the yes the regulation whatever the right word is is that something that we
can do fairly quickly yeah you do that your next meeting okay okay okay just just one more thing on this topic um the I you mentioned the transactions and an audit potential
audit um I spoke with both Mr starky and with Bion this past week because when I saw um the issue outlined in writing it a light finally dawned as to what the discrepancy was um I went back and
looked at the bylaw the by the actual byaw section seven Harbor Master bylaw and it it says we have to you know publish post lists of all moing permits including moing number stickers so there's like three or four things that we have to Post online to so that
they're public it mentions something called all Mooring assignment transactions that's also supposed to be posted I interpret this language the same way that Mr starky does that I looked at all the things we were posted
I talked to B on we don't have what I would also consider as a transaction log you know a financial person might call it a general ledger someone else might call it an audit Trail um so it's the puts and takes it's like add moing
change moing you know that type of transaction log so it's traceability I also agree that we're not currently meeting the bylaw but I think the bylaw isn't actually clear on what we mean by a transaction um list or transaction log
so I would recommend that we as we deliberate these other things related to the harbor I recommend that we clarify this language in the bylaw what is the what does it mean to have um um all moing assignment transactions what does that mean and perhaps we could get asked
the harbor advisory committee to outline what are the you know few data elements we need to collect as part of a transaction log to meet the the spirit of what was intended when town meeting passed this I wasn't here in 2011 so I don't know what discussion happened and
what people were asking for but I do agree this bylaw needs to be clarified I think would help so anyway that's definely at it no there are lots of different transactions not just talking about boats moving around I mean Buy on from time to time
we'll say I'm getting rid of these Moorings for whatever reason I don't know um I think it's ground has Chang forward that a moing is created a is assigned to someone a moring
isin removed a morning is uh um assigned from one person to another or a name change he said someone got married their name changed and it looked like the moing was assigned to a different person but it was the same person so that's why there are these little nuances that you
know we shouldn't have to necessarily yeah figure out but I just think we need to put those few data elements in the bylaw so it's very clear and and uh I have complete confidence that you know bion's doing great things and and
everything was done on the up and up but I just think this would help with the transparency issue so are you suggesting that we put together a change to that b law for this town meeting I don't I don't know what the sense of urgency is no again it's your it's your
no bylaw this is section seven the haror bylaw which establishes the role of haror Master says that the haror master reports to the administrator yeah it says Manchester by the SE General bylaw that I mean you
could but depends how how much you want to cify it if if you could put it an explanatory expansion in the regulation which is your approval or you could amend through town meeting the general
b I don't have any preference as long as it it satisfies you know our residents need for transparency um I I I don't have a preference I just we should be clear what we mean by a transaction L
somewhere where are we at well we need a motion I think for something the folks who are wondering what's going to happen with their their bootes this year I think I think motion is an order that to open open open the entire weight
list let me try this and you guys can tell me what all right I'll make a motion W I know but I'm trying to think my brain doesn't work I'll make a motion that we allow a
onee yeah more I it's we allow anyone on the wait list to apply to receive receive a Ming from Manchester for this season
only to be to be eligible that's all to be eligible to be eligible for a provisional moing to be eligible for provisional moing for the 2025 season right up to 10 right 10 10 or 12 10 10
but we have to be inclusive TR to say that again oh so we five are five are already spoken for but we're gonna make it inclusive of all 10 for this particular motion we just saying that whatever there are yeah make so let me
try this I mov I'll try this I moved that we allow anyone from the moing waiting list to receive a provisional moing be eligible for be eligible for a
provisional moing from Manchester Marine for the 2025 season up to 10 up to 10 second did you get that okay that's what video that's what video for
is there any further discussion okay John yes and says no yes yesy says yes Brian says yes and Jeff yes okay I would like to recommend strongly
that we do invite the Inspector General to Sure since we have no transaction log yeah to tell us what to do recommend so yeah see whether in their opinion um we
are following the state and local regulations that's y absolutely do we need a motion on that or you just going to go do it we let the minutes reflect there was consensus okay there was agreement to
move forward with that's fine an audit of the operation good through the inspector General's office if they'll do hi Andy anything else we need to know no um I do know that his his program that he has uh now currently it's it's on his
database has all that transactional history the only problem is that you got to be able to go down to his office and sit down talk just hey can I have this and he'll give you everything yeah that that's why I went to see Bion before I mentioned it because the data is there
but it's not posted in a manner that like I said it's it's it's language there you go yeah I think um someone is going to come up with new language for the regulations
regarding um B the creation of new war and where not the Harbor Master is in charge of figuring out where things fit that that that seems perfectly yeah I'm talking about the areas and things right
now it's confusion area one versus everything else and maybe at the same time move the helical Wars back in that right corner yeah that's just out of place so can we put this on our action list because I think we're going to need
to review either the update to the so there's the change in the file um regulation for area one then there is the additional haror regulation change
to enhance the bylaw around transactions and then third thing is the audit requesting the audit from the Inspector General so maybe we put one or few of those on the action list under one category so we can follow
up and how long do you think it would take to like a couple of months or what what's what's a good time frame for a followup well the um the change for that area one issue that can be next at your next meeting
okay um maybe we can flush out some language about that transactional process how to how to um convey that information um also to go into the regulations right yeah okay go into the
regulations um so those can happen in the next you know two to four weeks easily um the IG is probably a fairly lengthy process but we can so it's already on their radar so
they're already doing an people that are they're already looking at things here oh here yes for us okay yes so um um we will we will talk to them and see if they can expand
it and if not then we will have to look at perhaps our auditing firm is is whatever they're doing here now is that a routine audit or was did somebody request it it was requested yeah so we we'll give it
okay thank so as you know uh three U three finalists have been Advanced um will slated to do their interviews on April 3rd um I had hope to have some the questions from from John I don't I
didn't get receive those I don't know you didn't directly from him okay um so I I think it's appropriate for you to at least thank you thanks um it would be fine for you
to discuss some of the key areas of questioning that you want to pursue um and in preparation for the April 3 so so how do we um prepare you know our line of questioning
in a public for here when we don't you know all the candidates are watching us right now so um without you know still allow some spontaneity um you know do so he's going to send us a list of questions we can't deliberate
by email how do we settle on you know the questions with without you know tipping your hand so much yeah tipping everything yeah um so if if if you are
pretty if you're very concerned about you know revealing what the questions are ahead of time then the way to avoid that is for U for John to send all of each of you individually his his suggested questions and then you send your
suggestions back to him and he compiles everything okay that's that's how they did it with the screening committee okay um so that's that would be the way to do it without discussing publicly now right those questions and then each candidate
responds to those questions during the interview during the interview well we that's the other thing we should be asking the questions yeah so joh typically what John does is he leads off and then you do sort of the follow on so I I actually because this is my first
time um hiring in a public forum you know being watched and filmed I went on YouTube and I looked at some of the um other Town um uh select boards that interviewed candidates I watched some of
the interviews and I also watched some of the meetings that where the select board did the deliberation it was really helpful um so you know if you haven't done this before I highly recommend it uh what I saw was a typical panel interview where I'm I'm sure they all
hired their Consultants whatever um but each of the select board members took a turn asking questions there was no consultant there um asking the questions um we asked the questions that's and there's one candidate there yeah so like
a candidate on I saw a candidate there was a little table there you know and the candidate was you know surrounded by the select board and they just took turns asking questions and anybody could certainly type in and ask for a followup but the the consultant didn't ask the
questions so no when I went through a superintendent sege and um that's how we did it so basically we decid on the questions we wanted to ask you know like you're suggesting Greg back and forth and then everybody picked the question they felt
they wanted to ask and that's how we did it either I'm I'm not tied either way I'm just that's my experience so so does John petan become a clearing house for questions is that the way it's going to
work so I I guess I would suggest that one of you volunteered to have a conversation with John um to to discuss how you want to do this he would know they're all what the
ways are right well yeah but but you it's it's your show so ultimately you get to decide he can advise you um as to what he would recommend and you can fine tune it to fit your needs all
right Etc but so the current the couple of things issues for discussion so one was how do we formulate the questions without the candidates knowing what they are in advance the second was you know us getting to ask the the questions ourselves I'll
send you the links Bri um and the third was sorry um the third issue getting there all
right third issue um which somebody brought up in one of those YouTube videos um was they did not um have a live feed of the interview because what they didn't want was one candidate being interviewed the other candidate sitting
in the parking lot listening right so I'm I'm yeah so the they recorded it and so any citizen could view it after the fact um they these other towns had a room you know big enough to accommodate uh the attendance they felt
would be warranted based on the fact that they were not showing aive feed so I just these are Logistics questions that I hadn't thought about until I saw these videos and I just think we need to spend a you know figure out how we want to do this you know I mean I can I can agree with that
point I think that's what I read somewh that's what danris was doing that they weren't live beating yeah I think that's one of the ones I watched the interview process yes yes just last week yes yes I watched that one there I think the one
where the select board was deliberating I think that was conquered it was a few years back but still very helpful to see you know the chair how how he navigated the situation and and how they the other thing was how they discussed the candidate and how they did their
deliberation because obviously you don't want to hurt anybody um you know it's all public um you know that's D is probably par was that Paradigm also D this is Paradigm yes okay so maybe not petran but somebody yeah okay
so they have all right so we still need to figure out the synthesis of these questions I mean we all all have ideas here but petran probably can consolidate or and he brings questions that he says you should ask this right you should ask
that so I mean I will volunteer to do that if uh yeah I'd like to have some input there too okay the two of you could of you could I think we did that the last time when we selected him so let's team up on that okay all right I
think um I'm just not clear on the timing since my calendar what is the schedule for all this stuff we're going to be interviewing them in so April April 3rd so you're two weeks away from this Thursday okay so we need to be
doing this now right and did you get a sense from him as to when he's going to send us the question I thought he should have those questions I'm sure he has them maybe you could ask him to because we need input from everybody right he needs that
input from everybody okay I mean all of us can send I mean we just say hey send them 10 questions no more than 10 10's enough that might be redundant though if he has a list I think yeah but more efficient
for us to fill in the gaps it's also I think we you know based on the packages we get and the candidates we're going to want to ask specific questions of specific candidates based on their background right so okay so we don't have to ask everybody all the same
questions they can be tailored to the individual yes when do we get these CVS um you should get them next week okay how about we tell John by when we need them because we need them you know to Kathy's point we need them
before we formulate the questions because a certain percentage of them will be specific for these yes for these folks you know I mean there are questions that relate to our town but there are questions that relate to the applicants can you at least get us the
general questions you know in a couple of days yes okay he said he would have them today okay okay and then the the candidate packages you know when when can we expect when did you say that was the latest dle of next week
or 26 yeah okay no later than the 26th correct okay so then we get to review the packages and if we have any you know um specific question additional question yeah okay what about the room as far as
Logistics would we want to interview the candidates here or um you know I don't know why not I'm just asking no we have enough do we think any more people would show up than
this should we do it at this school cafeteria do you recall your own interview Greg um was it in this room yes okay it was in this room okay but that was before Oh before social media true that's true that's true World
change for social media yeah 20 matter fact I was the iPad was brand new in 2012 maybe the candidates ought to have access to the Manchester page to know what you're getting into well I mean this is this is not a
public Hearing in the sense that the nobody who's here idea on over there know but they have to be able to witness they can witness it but it will be on YouTube or it'll be it'll be recorded I'm not promoting it one way or another I just like I said watching these videos
caused me to think about questions right and if so I think we're all saying we don't want a live feed right we just want to record it and people can watch it after the fact and the only other question I had about it is uh for people who might want to watch it
live do they is this the right wrong yeah yeah I'm sorry what we're just I'm sorry we're trying to think how we're going to record it without streaming it this is all through Zoom but we can see what their availability
should well they did it for other towns somebody did it for another town so there should be a way to do it we'll check we'll check okay we'll figure it out so we need petons y question we have pet questions we send
our questions back right you do talk to petran about the combined questions yes then he said who's who's leading the questioning yes well so he's well I'm assuming we're all
taking turns I don't know well he's sending the questions are we sending them back before we get these backgrounds or after it's really going to be kind of after because some of the questions we're sending him are specific based
upon the backgrounds so well the petran sends these questions tomorrow or the next day or it doesn't make any difference he just has to get it a couple of days before March 26th because there's not too much that there's some we can do but still we
interview Jake yeah but I'm saying is that the we had questions we get your question that's your question that's your on you know do okay
yeah but you can have oh yeah you can have standard questions and then have follow we we all have standard ones right but we we are all free to ask other questions we're not bound by those questions right but you want to I think the premise is you want to have that
standardization upfront as much as possible so that each candidate is getting a fair shot at at giving their spin you know generic questions right answer the same you know so you you can but you're going to have to tailor it to the person at some point because they
come from they have differents get all that I think so I will call John tomorrow but I will also thank you say that two of you will be reaching out toly soon all
right's next what else going on oh um Le on updates have time okay oh actually had do you have anything I'm pretty much empty I've been away a
lot I can't see I'm trying to think I know Chuck uh I did speak with Chuck about the water meters he's more or less between the consultants and everything else come up with I think a a favored uh supplier okay but that Kath thing when you
suggested the AI and he was impressed I was impressed because I sat down with Chuck to review this feeding all of the information into AI which RFP was and having it spit back yeah it was a very good summary what they rated and what
the consultant rated were not quite the same but still was very useful it's time saer that's all it was it was so uh other things no I'm not say anything about seniors they've already been talked about here and uh no historic
commission is kind of quiet so okay I remembered what I wanted to um so uh there was a Economic Development um breakfast bler yes
chamber the the chamber thank you um L chamber yeah so um I attended with um Steve carart from downtown Improvement committee very informative um they they outlined some resources I was really
hoping um Mark could have been there um and someone from the planning board but it was just the two of us um they were very helpful in outlining resources that towns and cities could use to
help uh you know create a vision for their downtown and also um you know grants that were available to help do that and they talked a lot about what makes uh you know a good downtown and um so I think uh Steve went away
um thinking uh about how the downtown Improvement committee could reach out to the business Community you know working with Jim Brown and and the Chamber to try and um you know better understand what we want our downtown to be we have empty
storefronts people are worried about that left to their own devices um you know the property owners are just going to do whatever they can to fill the the voids um I guess gler was funding an actual district manager
you know cities have more needs um in terms of their downtown management but someone to make sure you know the streets are clean the the signs are in good shape you know the Aesthetics Etc there was somebody whose job it was to worry about that right I'm sorry you're advocating for another job
no no no it's gler gler but but what it clarified is there's somebody who's responsible for the downtown okay and the question is in our town who is that is right now we
have that committee but are they really responsible for determining the what the downtown should be you know should it be 20% retail you know what there's got to be a strategy for the downtown that's right I really wanted
Mark there because I know he's talking about you know potential zoning change he's been talking about that with the planning board but before you talk about zoning you should talk about what you want your downtown to be so it was a very informative breakfast um I do think
if no one else is going to get engaged that the downtown Improvement committee will will take a stab at learning more about those resources bringing them to Mark and and trying to to make some traction there so that was that no uh just just checking with Sherl
right now pick ball start wait a minute when do pickle ball start April be up com up just time drive everyone crazy April 1 just said that's a perfect tags too just hang around she's going to
give me more information to check in with me tomorrow school makes its decision on its budget um as I said earlier has decided that it will level fund the school um and put any increase
in school budget on on which means people aren't saying that yet to administrator and the finance committee and the select Bo are saying
and that's the way it will be presented to the town yeah but what's the budget increase hit for them on that about 8 and8 and a half yeah
D it's quite a statement and it may be bigger because Essex at a at a another meeting explained that they thought that the school should use
150,000 less of their um reserves oh and um not accept body school choice students so that's taking two $150,000 out of the support for the budget um that doesn't count from the
tax I don't know what do they they wanted to reduce the revenue yes they want they wanted to save it for the for next year and they think that the reserves would be saved for next
year the non not taking Choice students they think is just they are concerned that the choice students um will not bring in more Revenue than they cost okay they don't bring in much what do they bring in they don't bring in a whole lot they bring in
$5,000 and yes five per head where we are actually burning $27,000 per head on the other hand the cost of one extra kid in a classroom of 16 should cost may be more than 17 yeah
yes the same so um and it is also true that if a choice student needs special services those special services are paid by sending down um and
not interesting that's that's a state rule or yeah interesting okay great have longevity and who's that oh that's
me I can try to read this too you can do it can you read it I I can okay work okay and any comments to the consent agenda I move that the board approved the consent agenda items
second John yes ansers yes Kathy yes Brian yes and Jeff yes have administrator report um yeah the self-explanatory Pleasant Street site
looking into the cost of the 2020 contamination review trying to get some cost estimates for that senior senator fundraising efforts phase one is is well underway developing
the campaign identifying key donors we talked about that'll get underway this summer under the soft version and then the Public Public facing that will get underway in September um nomination papers for
elections are June April 1st um you know return papers yeah I don't have an update on who return I have Lisa you have your hand up she just been called on yes um I did
raise my hand I wanted to uh thank everyone for the approval of the uh for the longevity bench project for the bench uh in front of the Friendship tree I appreciate it very much it's going to be a very special bench I mean your ongoing support has
been um just so appreciated thank you so much that's all I wanted to say thank you Lisa what up you can yes yes Brian Kathy
Yes Yes I jumped the gun jump the gun what do we uh we need to sign yes and the uh