gary Gilbert 11 who is it who has not muted echoing yes let go step away from the uh me all set sorry about that thank you very much good no echo no echo
okay um I'm Gary Gilbert 11 by Nyavo i just want to beg your patience for a few minutes i have a statement to read about a week ago i witnessed what I feel was a serious miscarriage of justice when the planning board um uh
misused their power in a hearing to to divide the Spy Rock Hill property currently under construction into two lots i'll say right up front I'm not trying to rehear the case here and I know that the select board has no jurisdiction over the planning board however the select board as managers of
our town are the last place anyone can go for an appeal to fairness very importantly it is the select board that controls the spending of our tax dollars a lot of people don't like the construction going on in Spy Rock Hill and it's very understandable and natural that big changes to trees and topography
is disturbing but property owners do have fundamental right to do to their properties what they wish within the law last week the owners were denied their right to split their property into two when they in fact met all the criteria of something called an ANR division of
land that law is really simple if you have enough land and enough lot frontage and you can access the lot you must be granted an ANR they have more than enough land more than enough frontage and the board denied them saying they have only
illusory access to their lot anyone can see that they have plenty of access this forces them to file an appeal costing them and equally the town $50 to $100,000 of legal fees that's an amount similar to one year's teachers salary at our school for me the tipping point and
why I'm bringing this to your attention is that the chair of the planning board began legal proceedings saying that she would not allow discussion of the merits of other ANR plans that have been endorsed by the town that is a direct quote she also did not share with the
board that our town planner recommended the application be endorsed her statement forced the pling board to make a decision without all the facts denying the applicant their constitutional right of equal treatment under the law the censorship of directly relevant
information is critical because the same planning board just granted an ANR to someone else who had no access to their property across their lot frontage but were allowed to use the common driveway elsewhere located elsewhere another precedent was some time ago when Bobby
Atwater the former owner of Beach Street Cafe divided up the land where Moses Hill Road now stands he proved he had access simply by driving his little Volkswagen across the property boundary because there was a big huge hill beyond that for a decade I've been a steadfast
supporter of our town boards and served many years on both the planning board and the zoning boards but this issue has crossed a serious line for me and is not the way our boards should administer our laws if laws affecting people's property rights and the value of their land are used as a weapon for some people then
they can be used as a weapon against anyone our town is now faced with an expensive lawsuit that they cannot win i'm here to ask you to take action and request the board to invite the applicant to reapply waving any further fees and present all the facts
alternatively you could direct our town attorneys to meet sooner rather than later and resolve this issue before the property owners and the town spend more time and money it's very disheartening to see such an ill and unfair decision occur in a town I spent years trying to support
so thank you for listening thank you for your presentation i'll send you a copy in writing great and one will add it to the package for the the meeting
okay okay good is there anyone else present or um online who would like to make a comment on items not on the agenda i don't see anyone if there's someone I've missed please
just email otherwise I will go ahead thank you very much okay um the uh chairman's report
um I have received I believe you have all had got a copy of uh a letter from law offices declaring um the Manchester Marine Morings they were under the impression that we were going to talk
about them on April 7th we weren't and I will ask Debbie to help me write a pleasant letter back to them saying that we had agreed that we would take this item up again in the fall that's so action items are the next
thing that we talk about are there any new action items that we should consider any action items that not not a new one but one that I think fell off or maybe was completed and I
just didn't know notice but Greg um the signs that the wayfinding team uh put together and the select board approved last June still have not been installed to
the best of my limited knowledge and um I know there was an issue with the cost but I thought where we left it was we were going to purchase what we could and then purchase the remaining ones in the fiscal year 26 budget i have an update
on that oh great uh they have uh ordered the signs they are on order they are expected to deliver not sure in the in the next week or two something like that but initially the signs are going to cost the entire sign budget right
and they found somebody that would make them for about half that cost okay like $6,000 but they did order them finally they are ordered and so they are on on the road to being Well thank you because I was going to have it added to the list if they hadn't been ordered but since they've been ordered I
presume they will be installed what's discussion about reducing the number of redundant signs after the new styized what is happening on that break
i believe the committee was going to follow up and do some recommend you know recommending what signs to take down i'm not I'm not uh I'm not up to speed on where that stands i can find out though yep the downtown improvement
committee is meeting tomorrow it's that committee that was supposed to do that so yes I I would be happy to ask them for you okay so I will take that off of your plate Greg and just put it Yeah just put it on the um action item list
though so we don't forget about it uh just in case no one's noticed it because no one pops up there the uh connoisseur you'll notice that the uh they've started outlining for parking spots out on Central Street now it's just a matter of So
they're all they did some laying out trying to figure out and you know uh how many spots they can get in with the uh So couldn't check that'll probably be done in a couple of days but they did do the engineering as far as finding out where the spots would
go good chance you're not parked in one of the spots is probably straddled over one affects you more than anyone else in this okay um that's what we needed to do on action
items um the next item on our agenda is to approve and sign the Mason building purchase and sale agreement we've agreed that we will meet um Friday morning at 8:45 to do that because there are still some details that need to be ironed
out um and the next item is to approve and sign the new town administrator contract with Antonio Barla he was discuss that in in executive session and agreed that the contract is
would be of benefit to him and to us and I would like to have a motion i can make that motion i move that the select board approve town administrator the town administrator and Antonio Barleta's contract beginning on July 1st
2025 and run through June 30th 2028 second is there further discussion john yes and says yes kathy yes brian yes and Jeff yes so we need to remember
to sign that before we leave i have it you have it okay um the next item is well believe is here and uh you've applied for um the zoning
board of appeals as an alternate we've seen your application which is shows that you have enthusiasm and experience a little bit would you explain to us how you came to decide
that that's what you wanted to do and what you bring to the to the position sure um so I moved to Manchester almost three years ago um totally love the community and and really wanted to start to be more involved um I also have the time because I'm don't think the word
retire but we endless May retiring so I will have the the time and the uh the ability to actually volunteer um I think my based on my experience I've owned my own company i've had a real estate broker's license i've had a construction
supervisor's license i've renovated properties both in Massachusetts and Rhode Island um and it just seemed like a good fit for the skill set that I had um and it sounded like a committee that I felt like I was capable of and I had the skills to be able to contribute so
that that would be the reason why great thank you John that um Colleen really I I it's wonderful that you've raised your hand to do this with only being here in town three years i guess you've spent a lot of time in front of zoning boards
i've had some experience yes yes with your with with your background and so that's great when can bring a strong background to this and you're retiring in May so time is not so much an issue have you have you uh provided have you participated in public service before is
this your first fora this would actually be the first i've I've raised kids i've owned my own company um done all of that which keep kept me quite really busy so um I now feel like I have the time and and you know and and the interest to participate so it's more about now I
finally have time so Okay well great well I thank you i mean all of us are participants in that way and we're all glad we did it speaking for everybody mostly for myself sometimes too much no I just want your
um credentials are excellent and a perfect fit for that committee so I just want to thank you very much for stepping up really appreciate it look forward to it ryan you sound more articulate than I remember i know it's because it was an
attention okay so I think that uh I think this is a great opportunity for the talent and you have some experience with that committee yes I do i spent some time on the old zoning board yep oh thank you okay ready to go so thank
you for uh raising your hand um is there a motion yes i move that the select board appoint as the second alternate member to the zoning board of appeals for a term to expire on June
30th 2026 second ready john yes yes kathy yes brian yes and Jeff yes thank you very much thank you wasn't that beautiful thank you very much thank you comment
okay um the next uh up is the reporting review of the fire chief good evening good evening we have your report in front of
us headed by email um so we have a busy first quarter um we're right now we're actually a little bit ahead on emergency responses than we were at this time last year we've um have a great opportunity uh because of
different grants to do a lot of training uh staff development both at the command level as well as the firefighter level and that's still ongoing um probably through the end of this calendaring year
uh that grant will last i did um kind of not knowing what's going on just south of us I did submit for FEMA reimbursement for what we've done thus far uh typically we do the reimbursements all the end i just want to make sure those uh reimbursements are
actually going to um show up in our bank account uh before we spend all of it so uh we'll be doing quarterly reimbursements uh instead of a one big lump sum just to make sure that um we see that money coming in to offset it
um we did have one firefighter resign in March and then um one all firefighter um applied for the full-time position already certified already a paramedic um so firefighter Sakala did a week of days
and he's on shift already so it was good uh transition and succession planning which obviously works out well budgetary wise for us as well uh equipment updates everything uh not Howwood is going well uh we did get a mass uh Department of
Fire Services grant and we were able to get a slide in unit for the back of our UTV that we can take into the woods uh hopefully we won't have to use it as much as we did last year um but it's it's not starting up very well so uh all the equipment's
going well we're expecting the new ambulance uh quarter 1 of 2026 and we were also awarded recently the student education grants uh which allows our firefighters who are trained uh in the safe program to go into the school
systems the joint um grant with Essex so we go into the all the schools and we try to get kindergarten through third and we go into each grade um quarterly uh so we we do that we also uh got senior safe money uh which we utilized last year for our lockbox program which
was a big hit and we still have uh people that had signed up for them and they were on a waiting list so once that's uh executed on the state side uh we will uh try to go through that list and then promote it for any boxes that we have left again that's a regional
grant between us as well uh budgetary wise we're right on uh target um we're 81% through the year as of today uh and we're 78% expended on our salary budget and 77% expended on
our operating uh we're right on track yeah okay well great i' I've I've read the reports Chief and they're very complete and in fact all of us appreciate the fact that you've got regular reports that keep us up to date on all of that the monthly reports are great so uh things are are running very very
smoothly from all aspects budget wise staff etc i did notice that there is some turnover in the staff now is that going to affect your budget projections because now you're out probably looking for replacement people and depending upon who you find yeah so currently
we're full on the full-time uh side we have one person out long-term uh uh injury um I expect probably in the fall that uh he'll be coming back but our staffing mechanism there's four uh firefighters assigned every group and we're able to drop to three without
incurring overtime so that's worked out um very well um and with the call firefighter positions we have the applications open until Friday March 2nd we've had five applications already because as Bill Sakala moved up that
opened up a position on the call department uh we do have one firefighter um that we anticipate will be uh leaving us to go to another department and we have some applications already in uh for to create a hiring list for the next two years just to be a little bit more
proactive and we do have uh some certified firefighter paramedics on that list as well so everything looks the forecast looks good okay so the budget looks stable in terms of how that's going to work out great i think you're doing an excellent job thank you
yeah I will echo that um I I like everything about the training and the proactive approach to the hiring um I saw the postings u you know on the social media for that i think that's an excellent idea so thank you for doing
that i had a question around um the brush fire risk um because we already had one on 128 not too many weeks ago y um and we were asked you know at our last meeting to declare a drought and tell everybody to stop
watering and so I wanted to get your perspective on two things um well actually one thing in particular when we stop watering right that must elevate the risk for brush
fires I would assume or not necessarily at least early because what we're watering typically is not a high hazard it's our grass is enough um you know if we were watering the wood our wood lines around our houses um then that would add a little bit of mitigation but typically
people are just watering it looks nice and low buying so it's it doesn't that's good to know then my second question is um you talk a lot about prevention and what I've heard you talk about is prevention more around structure fires
i'm wondering if there's any partnership with like MECT or some of the nonprofits that take care of our wilderness areas to make sure they are maintaining those areas properly so it minimizes our brush fire risk because the powderhouse stuff
is right in the center of town and so we we so we did uh last year we um participated in the Cape Regional Forest Fire uh assessment uh as part of that we came up with kind of the areas of highest risk based upon growth um how it
interacts with civilian life and the density around that uh what we've been doing and we're going to start doing uh now the springtime is here our crews are actually going to go out and um you know 20 years ago when I was here we used to be able to drive a truck around most of these trails for access uh a lot of them
are overgrown right uh so we're going to go out identify the biggest risks and try to mitigate those either with the property owners um sometimes the um conservation uh will help us and um I want to say green belts
oh and they're proactive so they they've been um we've just had emails going around a couple weeks ago about gate access to make sure that we have easy access through the gates and things like that so the conversation's ongoing um and fluid okay thank you the powder
house is interesting because it's town land it's town land and and yes I but I thought MCT was respon is MECT is not responsible for maintaining that i think they own maybe one tract of that they only one track okay but the majority of
that is so then who in our town because is it DPW or what like I haven't get into that to be completely honest with you i know a lot of time we did the trails last year they were they were pretty open there was a couple things that we if if there small branches here and there our crews will handle it there
are couple of big trees that fell down the trails I walk obviously so and and you know they were there for long periods of time and just wasn't clear who was maintaining it yeah so I will check into that DPW but I'm sure it's the DPW that would take care of it but
perhaps that they're they have less of an eye to what is a risk yes that's a good way of Yeah it used to be volunteers years ago but that was a long time ago thank you
nothing yep no I'm good thank you everything looks good and appreciate your work yeah just you know I I know uh Todd and I mention it every every time we meet with you but the cooperation between all the town departments is great um last weekend we did an active shooter drill with the police department
we had Essex Police and Fire Rockport Police and Fire and Hamilton Police and Fire so the the training and the collaboration not just between Manchester but our our neighbors is pretty impressive to that point I think that I like to think I could be wrong
that our public safety would be the envy of any small town yeah absolutely i think uh we've set a pretty high standard now you guys got to keep to it but I I mean the cooperation staff and both the police and fire I mean every
even the every every face every town that's the face of the town interacts very well with each other and it's it's obvious i think that uh you and it's not just on the surface it's it's truly it's deep rooted you know um I could call Chuck at you know 2 o'clock in the
morning I have a problem it'll be fixed yeah it doesn't go unnoticed by this board that's for sure thank you congratulations you passed great good for another three months three months
it's like a parole okay um the next item uh is the town administrator and transition um it it's under quarterly reviews but
maybe Greg you would share your thoughts um sure happy to um so obviously the last few months have been focused on wrapping up budgets and getting everything ready for the annual town meeting as well as a fair amount of work getting the um Mason PNS and other
documents across the finish line we're awfully close and hopefully we'll get there in another couple days um so looking ahead rapidly approaching the end of June it seems it seems like as we get closer with time accelerates um so
so really wanted to focus uh and hear from you what you would like to see um as part of that transition obviously I'll be working uh with the department heads and I'm sitting down with them over the next two weeks here just identifying where their significant
projects are and what we can finish up before Tony comes on board and then I'll be preparing information and putting together materials for Tony to to pass the baton on to him as as he takes over
um the projects that will still be ongoing um but if you have any particular um concerns or want to flag particular issues I' I'd love to hear from from you on that as we prepare um to make the
transition as smooth as possible I think the biggest thing is just setting up a good road map for Tony to look at where we've been and where we're going and and all that so that's the most important thing at this point
not just what each department wants but some sort of a progression yeah right which I think we we kind of have but maybe just uh some of Greg's side of it so Tony can work move forward
brian if have you heard anything no I'm trying to get the uh I think it's squared away for the uh meeting on Monday and Friday morning okay so I apologize that's fine but do you have anything that you like
no I think that I think that uh the everything I've heard uh it's it should be a very smooth transition and Greg said he would make himself available uh you know so I think that I'm looking forward to I think it's going to be my
opinion my impression based on what I know about Tony which is very little what I've heard and what I in this conversation with Greg uh it should be seamless as as possible don't think with it i don't see
any robots um so yeah usually um these transitions are smooth when the person who is departing leaves behind a very strong team and I think Greg has is leaving behind an extremely strong uh team set
of department heads um and and they will ensure um more than anything that that the transition is smooth because they're going to keep doing their jobs well um I would say I think it's important to help Tony
um I think he's going to be he's going to want to get to know people right so Greg to the extent you can't there are things that you do that we don't see right and so that's and and that the the residents don't see either who who are
your go-to people it might be um people outside of town that that Tony needs to work with so I mean certainly I hope you're preparing a list of people he needs to get to know right um to help him be successful
um as far as the projects go you know like I said I think that the department heads have that all well in hand but certainly the the culvert project getting started um not long after Tony arrives is probably my biggest
um worry bead but we we want to make sure that gets off to a really great start and I think around the time he is here arrives or hopefully before then we should be able to be communicating to
the residents about that project so I think it's a good um test case if you will for maybe public outreach um you know the the more you can get him up to speed on that particular project I think the more
because he's going to get asked about it he's going to go want to go out and meet residents and meet people and everybody's going to be asking him about it so I would think that's a critical thing to to get him up to speed on and also during the summer when he arrives
we should be actively working the school budget issue for next year whatever happens this year is going to happen but we can't wait until the summer's over to start talking about the school budget for next year we need to be working it
now so I would like to see some um information flow and engagement that we have two big come the U covert project what is
our this is not directly about Tony but this is something that he he's going to need to deal with what happens if the brick grant goes away how can we prepare so you know plan plan B for that
um B and C one will be to um talk to our state folks and see if there's any um other grants that we can apply for and see what and we'll be we're doing that now um to see if we can position ourselves um
uh the other fallback though is is having a special town meeting and and bonding for that project if that money is clawed back um the project has to happen it's we don't have a choice um so
we will I think plan C is to seek voter approval for a bond to replace those dollars okay hello John yeah a couple of things um one is the reorganization when when is that
officially kind of fit together Greg is that really uh dependent upon obviously the the vote at uh at town meeting and is that going to be official like July 1 or is it kind of semiofficial now
well um some of the work is is getting ready now in terms of the you know for example getting a new job description written for for the new accounting clerk and working on job descriptions for the
um department facilitators you know who are those clusters those department clusters and having um someone one of a department head being responsible for the cluster um so we're working on some job descriptions now um but it will be
up to Tony to implement those because it does start in the new fiscal year okay well I I just bring that up i think there has to be a sensitivity with regard to that different people the the team you've got is very strong as Kathy had mentioned uh rearranging things a
little bit and there may be some expectations people aren't sure what they're you know exactly who they're going to say what they're going to say to who when and how uh things will move around a little bit and he should be
aware of that you're certainly got a much better feel for how it's going to fit together but he needs to be oriented to that um the other thing I know that Tony is going to be here for a few days at least prior to your departure um but certainly
I think high on the list is uh how much interaction are you going to need with him after July after July 1 i know that you're flexible on that and you've got to get a feel for that and perhaps schedule some time that you can talk and discuss how things are going to work out
going forward i I my guess is that we'll know a lot more after Tony has been yeah visiting for a week and and I think that's typically something the new leader would it's between really the
the two of them to figure out what what's going to work are you Yeah I'm fine with that you know I'll take Tony's lead and what uh what he would like i'm I'm flexible yeah are you planning any long trips
immediately after not not extra long no okay um any anything else on transition or Great um so we go to the town meeting
i will be making some remarks at the beginning um recognizing that we're losing two major portions of the town maybe their last town meeting maybe not probably almost
certainly for in the case of Greg because I don't think even if the school vote fails on March March May 12th Um I don't think we can get another town meeting in before July
1st um and yeah I would just Yeah I would just comment that let's let's focus the town meeting for Allan yes of
course um okay um article one is the reports that should go very slowly um article two is is the salaries um
usually gets a laugh and not much else um can spend a lot right actually you pretty much can you bank it as as good will I hope
um the article three is the uh Northshore agricultural and technical school um Jeff you're going to move it are you going to speak only if somebody okay has a question but yeah I mean I'll be
prepared but Um and then the um operational budget is article 4 um and I think um Sarah will talk about any question
Sarah or Greg will handle any questions on that do you anticipate anything um no not in particular i mean there there may be a question or two um we we highlighted in the report the um the the
staffing you know the new accounting clerk and the and boosting the full-time the um the clerk and the town clerk's office but other than that I really don't expect a lot of a lot of questions
the notices have said bring your um finance committee report with you um we only got one per household are there going to be a few copies or some copies at the at the meeting yes yeah there
will be okay right um article five um where Greg where do you anticipate questions you know there may be questions about
the rotunda and its funding we have a bigger number in there because the one grant that we had hoped we're not very optimistic for so we wanted to backfill that um there's a bigger number for paving than we normally have seen again
there may be some questions regarding that um and then uh I do want to point out that included in the article is the capital exclusion so 660,000 that's part of the DPW facility
planning um and so in the motion that will be um highlighted and that it is dependent on a a ballot ballot approval so there'll be a a a capital exclusion ballot question uh come come May 20th
anyone else has anyone else heard any discussion of the capital I I expect questions on line item 13 the renovations for the senior center i think it would have been nice
if we could have labeled it in hindsight um you know building renovations because part of it is for the town offices in that in that building not just for the senior um center so in hindsight it would have been nice to
label it that okay um is that something that I we could ask Sarah Melish to include in her remarks as when she
moves this i'm not sure i I just I don't know that she needs to talk about it but be prepared to talk about her question i think it was asked on social media once they addressed that already so okay it's not yeah the only questions I've
heard is people talking about the rotunda okay um and um article six is going to be handled by the school committee and the school
superintendent correct um yes there don't seem to be any seconders for any of the zoning articles yeah I'm assuming that that Alan is working that out with Sarah Sarah
right no right um I don't think we have much to say about any of the zoning no we want
Yeah um which brings us to article 14 which John water yeah that's a moving target isn't it Greg a little bit it is and I
apologize for that so we had um so the motion that you have before you in the packet uh we will not be moving the last paragraph there that talks about watering one day a week
so that was um the moderator of health in the warrant not in the warrant in the motion in the motion okay yes in the motion that's that's um I think that was in the packet
yes yes 16 bottom of page 16 top of page 17 so So that Yeah that that paragraph that suggested adding language about um one of the options for a restriction being watering just one day
a week it's something that the state would like to see in our bylaw um Allan felt that given the wording of the original article that that was um beyond the scope of that original language so we'll have to take that up at another
meeting okay so um I mean there are some changes that are are going to be made to uh the article actually the article and our bylaws do we still create a handout for people
to pick up because the the article is not long right um the fean felt it would be fine just to have that up on the screen and Tiffany will have the wording of those two of those two additions so
they're they're two relatively easy inserts that are being proposed in addition to I think there is supply in two places we had spoken about the second place and then of course the uh non-essential outdoor water use right
right so those are three places those right those three things can be highlighted on the screen fine um Alan thought that would be simple enough and reduce the amount of paper people are trying to trying to juggle in the seats
i agree okay so I I'm prepared to make some comments into that regard because of course what they have in their warrant is not reflective of what we're going to be voting on exactly right it is a it is a it is a change from what they have in the booklet yes
okay so I'll make some comments within Allen's time frame of two minutes correct anything else um then there's article 15 it is the
CBC um and I suspect there will be um some questions about affordable housing trust they've had two articles in cricket
recently explaining first what is affordable housing and then why it isn't easy to get to the SHI and protection from
housing but I'm not sure that everybody will have read those and I think a lot of people wonder why we're giving Um who is going to answer those questions sounds like Muffin well I think the affordable housing
trust people will be addressing that i think both Muffin and John Forbeck are prepared to do that and it looks like Jack Burke has his his hand up uh good evening everybody either John Furbach or Chris only will speak to
that okay thank you very much you're welcome open should be pretty straightforward 2016 the the good the good news there is we're we we had two and a half years left we are ahead of schedule and that
uh well assumes that yeah I was just going to say I was going to qualify that to see what happens with the stock market here but nonetheless uh with any luck it'll be be fully funded ahead of schedule okay article 17 um which is
uh property tax break for certain veterans any problems there and again the the assessors are prepared to answer questions that people may have right um involving funds
And Greg I think you have explained this any number of times if anyone asks yeah happy happy to step in um article 19 which is trying to rate in
the board of health i'll be speaking to that and I'll send you comments if you choose the smart politically correct one what does that mean she has a filter okay um don't my language
and article 20 is is um poisoning eagles um or rather not poisoning eagles and I will speak to that um and 21 um is being withdrawn by the petitioner um
and I may take a minute and a half to explain what the intention was and why it's being withdrawn and 22 i think we will pass over Okay anything else on the
Just one thing um so Greg I know that um Allan is responsible for the town meeting however you are responsible for the DPW and um at one point we had the logistics
corrected where when we're sitting up on the stage we didn't have to worry about backing up our seats and falling off the back somehow we lost that recipe and I will tell you I will not sit on that stage again unless it is safe
so they need to make sure we can pull our chairs back when we stand safely and not have to worry about that please make sure yeah not interested so somehow we lost the recipe for the fall meeting i really don't want to repeat that for the spring well we're in two different
locations too location they know what the require The requirement is safety and that was an unsafe situation so please make sure that's handled if your phone fall be tapped by the seat yeah that's not going to happen i won't sit
on the stage thank you appreciate it um is the separate voting computer configured uh yes I believe so i know that they were working on that
this past Friday and I believe they got it all done i'll double check i know that I know they they got all the clickers was scanned in and and verified working um and I believe they got the computer all set up but I will double check okay i I guess we could continue
to work with Tiffany's computer if we have to but at some point it would be nice to have two computers that are prepared to run the the turning point whatever they call themselves software so we can cuz going back cards and
counts and it's just it should be just a dedicated there should be two there i believe that we have purchased two which are be dedicated to that yeah the mouse and
and if god forbid we have to have two rooms again sometime right okay um anything else on account um we on updates
yeah yeah yes i already mentioned the DPW um situation with the signs they will start installing new meters and they do have a first trunch of the new meters uh in town here and they're going to be putting them into the uh public
buildings starting I think probably next week or the 1 of May and then broad distribution or broad installation uh at the residential level will probably start in about one and a half to two months or so something like that they're still settling on a contractor to do
that so oh sorry question on that so when do they plan to communicate with people because you just can't walk into somebody's house and change the meters so what is the communication plan yeah for the residents I don't think they are quite that far yet because they haven't
settled on an on a group who is going to install that but the group that does the contractor knows that's a pretty critical part of their job right out of the shoot because I think we have discussed that before so the contracting group is going to be dealing with that
right so DPW is talking to Tiffany and and getting some materials prepared um and once we have a contractor selected we'll be doing the actual install um they'll be Tiffany will be working closely with them and and getting out
getting out um communications to people ahead of time and and getting schedules so they there'll have to be scheduling times for these to happen right thank you so initially they're going to do the public buildings and
then they're also going to do the meters that were part of the pilot program all those people are aware was going on because people went into their houses and put in the pilot meters so those are getting swapped out for the actual meters that will be used and then the then the contractor will be kicking in
so um uh Council on Aging it's all about the Mason's uh purchase and sale that's all that's that's the only topic there we we've talked about that the Historic District Commission um had a meeting last week it was kind of interesting i've been on that commission for a
number of years i'll say probably eight this is the first certificate of hardship and usually they're certificates of appropriateness that get issued for um for whatever the projects are for whatever the people are doing and it was the first hardship uh
certificate that the committee had issued and it all had to do with um a house that was on the subsidized housing uh list and when you're on the subsidized housing list you have the opportunity to take advantage of various funding opportunities one of which is
windows and they had the opportunity to have all new windows in their house which of course were triple pane very efficient windows but I won't say they're exactly fitting with regard to the historic district commission
requirements and you know the the the the homeowner um came before us and said "Well what can you do for me?" and we came up with some sort of an appropriate uh settlement with regard to putting up appropriate monions because really most of the houses are 1850 to 1900 they're 6
over6 and the the windows that um were being provided had no panes i mean just a single pane which wasn't necessarily appropriate so that'll work out i've gone to Mark and I was just curious how many other houses in the historic district are on SHI because there are
others that might ask about that but I thought that was interesting yeah they can't because of the way the windows are constructed they can't make them true divided lights no true divided lights has middle and I don't think they can even put them inside the uh that was the
case between the two they have to be snap on either front and back and they can make them permanent but they can't make them inside the panes which is what we insist for a regular applicant so we had to kind of the gas that's in there is skip over that but
um I'm sure there are other houses i don't think there are a lot in the in the district but there probably some others who may be coming to us i don't know it's all paid through national credit right i think I don't know yeah action has the deal well it's action i
think it's action what happens is we all pay for it i think it was action inc take a look at the bottom of your utility bill that's but there's a there's a line item and that goes into a big pot and then it just for anything that's affordable
right so uh that's it for me okay tomorrow morning and pad was cancelled uh box and wreck they're ramping up for the summer uh the uh Fourth of July
committee the parachute is coming back and uh um that's I think that's probably the news that's fit to print what about on the beach so dogs are off the beach dogs are off the beach and all is quiet pickle ball i haven't heard
other than the initial one uh incident prior to the someone getting on the course earlier than the you know season i haven't heard anything not to say I noticed a big flurry of myths coming out
oh yes there was a request was uh you know a um freedom of information something that we might think about in the future is since Debbie has had a very successful experiment with AI
um transforming a recording into a summary um making it easier for that don't have professional yeah those are I mean the woman that trans who takes the Yeah she's a volunteer and she's scribbling
and but the disc actually the discussion did come up at the meeting last week and I think the cost was I don't know what the costs are to uh for the AI the AI we already we updated so we we could cover the parks and rep now but we need to get
a recording right they need to get they need to record their meetings so that recorded then why be recorded in the zoom cloud so so the uh yeah so that was that was discussed because I think requests and I don't
know how the zoom it it is a h is it a hybrid meeting yes okay so you have the compatibility of of recording and so at some point Cheryl will figure this out and figure it out y it's an awful lot of work i mean yeah I mean I don't know what the other I
don't know what the other I know we were talking about levels of committees the uh you know primary ones would be select board and planning board and fin secondary might be
ZBA and maybe that's in con then tertiary would be the pox and red the ones that have quite judicial yeah so that one that was discussed Yeah yeah we can do 15 meetings a month
so that'll be helpful good uh I got nothing at the minute so okay um the uh school
lady had a public hearing um at I think 5 before their 6:00 meeting and there were two people there whose names I did not know and whose whose names and faces
were so um there certainly are people in the community who were out arguing for the school budget um I just have to see how that how that comes out
um any interest Oh there there's reason to worry about the school budget um and in particular the override in assets um but that we're just looking at
um just occurred to me uh parks and wreck they also have started looking at reconfiguring Sweeney Park drainage uh some of the costs associated with putting the full size enabling a
fulls size soccer field there so that's in the preliminary stages of discussion have to be it has to be a turf it has to be real grass yes as opposed to a turf field in
order to qualify for some CPC funding right and um so that's now they're just trying to figure out where the sun's going to be in the bad eyes okay so that's an ongoing that's something that Nate's been working with uh Fox and
W on um consent agenda which is the meeting minutes and the little parade it's here somewhere approved i move that the board approved the consent consent agenda items
john says yes says yes kathy yes and yes yes okay administrator reports all right so um yeah in your packet there's a a new declaration from the state lowering the drought to stage two
um again um I don't think there's any action needed at this point um given their conversation last time but I did want to highlight that for you um if we get as much rain as they are predicting for this coming weekend maybe it'll stage two can go away um are there are
there specific restrictions for stage one and stage two we we discussed the restrictions for stage three so under stage um under stage two you can allow for outdoor watering by hand and by drip
that that is something sprinklers but not sprinklers correct so is is stage excuse me is stage two the same as level two are stage and level interchangeable sorry yeah yes i I I do
interchange that okay fine i see in the documents level it's always a little confusing to me sorry wait level um should we somewhere um announce what
the restrictions are for level one and level two in addition to having a bylaw about level three so we talked about having a pretty u simplified graphic that explains what's
what's allowed under each of the different levels and I know that Tiffany has that uh I don't know she has it completed but I know that she was working on it since we are now in a level
two should we let people know um now what they're allowed to do and not from anformational point of view we certainly can my sense was you didn't
want to formally declare declare it just based on your last meeting conversation okay but happy to either way we can if you want to declare that's you certainly can i I'm not
I was not aware that there were three levels of drugs and I was not aware that there were different restrictions at each level on have been so why don't why don't for next meeting we yeah why don't we
prepare that for you for your next meeting so that you can see those what the differences are between the different levels so that you'll have that and then um we can also get that posted and that'll I think help people understand what the levels mean and what
they can and cannot do right so I mean I think we didn't feel the need to take any formal action because our water reservoirs are were fine and they're still fine correct correct okay correct so it's still probably helpful information because for
example I just saw in the news I thought it was today um I thought we were in a dry stage as opposed to a you know I thought we were in a mild drought you know the weather people report it a certain way um that I don't know if that's different than what the state is
reporting but um when you see something like that there is nothing to tell you you know to do anything differently so just the town presenting Tiffany's information matterofactly on its you know social media platforms etc I think
would be appropriate without us taking any actions um so yes why don't we work on that and get that out to everybody then when we go to stage three what we should do put the page out of the building and have the blue light
flashing during the summer stage three travel there you go right and only courses can Sorry no that's fine that's fine that's fine
no problem um so moving on um the getting the SHI or subsidized housing inventory list updated um been a long struggle here um the the fundamental problem with uh with the apartment
complex uh the powerhouse hill apartment complex is when the CDC um went through the process they did that prior to having it approved from the state um and so there's a question about the um completeness of the lottery
system that they use and that they have people um who are renting who went through a lottery system prior to the state approving so the state is trying to do it retroactively um they've they keep coming back with more and more
questions every time um and so we keep providing more information um it's it's not our information it's from the CDC so there's been a lot of back and forth um they are doing a final round of reviews now i don't know if they will
sign off on the process that was followed they may require um that the lottery process uh that was developed be modified and that it be used going forward and then it'll have
to be on a you know tenant byten basis as as the units turn over before they get officially added to the SHI um I'm hopeful that we won't have to do that because that's a disappointing
to be waiting this long um but that that may be the case so um it's still under review um Mark Resnik is in is in uh uh pretty constant contact with them
the last few weeks here um and we'll continue to do so until we get a final a final resolution so I know that's been frustrating for people um and uh that's that's the update I can provide anything
else any any questions on that i'm sorry would someone um moving on I commented a little earlier on the covert um the FEMA funding through their what's called the brick program building resilient uh
infrastructure and communities is what brick stands for um so FEMA has announced um uh the program is no longer going forward they have ended the program um they announced that projects
that um the monies have been obligated to the states so it's a it goes through FEMA to MIMA to the municipalities so the funding that we were awarded has been obligated to the state so we thought we were we were in the clear um
there was a new um missive from FEMA uh came out on this past Thursday that said if if a project isn't actually under contract with the construction company doing the work then it may be called back um so we're trying to get clarification on that been reaching out
to um our congressional delegation to see what help they can provide um the state has also been very helpful in trying to track things down but we don't have a a definite word yet um so we will continue to work on that um to see if we can uh make sure we can secure and
maintain hold on to those funds um it's about $4.5 million um that's at risk here so it's obviously a big chunk of money for us and will be very important to try to secure it so that we can proceed with the project as as scheduled
so again I need to say stay tuned and we'll continue to fight hard for those dollars greg uh where are we in uh putting it up to bid yeah that's being prepared and um we're
still waiting for a couple of permits but I told them to go ahead without those final permits in hand um we can always do an addendum to the bid documents um if if there are some new conditions that the permits impose so that is in in the works now
and we hope to get it out on the street uh in in fairly short order that' be helpful thanks then my last note here is on the moorings and doing an audit of the transactions
um got a very high estimate of cost from our auditing firm to do this work really prohibitively expensive um and so we need a another game plan whether or not we try to
um use uh perhaps the committee the the harbor advisory committee and yourselves or andor use some in in in-house staff time to to do that review um so I might suggest that a couple of
you uh work with me to come up with a game plan going forward so that we can um have a have a good resolution to uh to the questions that were raised and and making sure we have a good process
in place going forward um the emotions are continuing to run pretty high on at least the couple of individuals um and so I I I do suggest that if one or two of you could work
with me in putting a game plan together that we work on that in the next couple weeks so I would um I would welcome welcome maybe a couple of you to help with that i I'll work with you great i'll do it soon that'd be great
person thank you all your time's committed so we'll we'll uh we'll put together a game plan and and get back to folks sounds good all in favor
11:40 this is a Oh I apologize you know I just got done saying that