Good evening. Welcome to the Milton Town Meeting April 13, 2026 meeting. I'd like to call to order. Karen, can you do a roll call? >> Yes, we have Jay Fundling, Elaine Craighead, James Lee Dassi, Lorraine D,
Larry Johnson, Brian Maguire, Ronald Thea, Nicholas Tangy, and Cecil Yang. You have a quorum. >> Okay. Thanks. I'd like to welcome everyone. I'm dressed a little bit differently than normal tonight because just in the past hour I filmed the pre-T
town meeting show with our moderator where we go over all the things that you know help PE town meeting members get prepped. So I encourage anyone watching this or you can all encourage your town meeting friends especially newly elected town meeting friends to uh watch the
show and get ready for town meeting. Uh so what are we doing today? So today we are about two to three weeks away from town meeting. What I why I wanted Thank you for joining me tonight. What I wanted to do
tonight is sort of do a beta test, a dry run of some things that I want to present at town meeting. I sent you all an email yesterday and a slew of attachments. You're totally forgiven if you didn't look at any of them. Uh but this is the sort of thing I'd like to
present at town meetings specifically looking at not only where is the budget this year but where is the budget going where do we see it going and what should we be doing about it. Uh I appreciate you joining me tonight. Uh I wanted you to join me for a couple reasons. One is
if I'm sharing something in your name I I want you to at least know about it if not okay it. Uh if I'm going to be saying you know for example I'm going to be talking about forecasts. Forecasts depend on assumptions. If I'm saying this is our forecast, uh, I'd like the warrant committee to at least know what
assumptions went into that forecast and preferably even give me feedback and say, "Do you like it? Do you not?" I also want feedback for the presentation. You'll see. I mean, you saw if you looked at it yesterday or today. I sent you a more refined version of the presentation about an hour ago, but it's
um it's not refined. It's not final. You know, we got three weeks to finalize it. I want feedback to how to make it better. Um, I certainly could use the help on that. Um, what else is saying? Yeah, let's talk about assumptions. When we're
thinking about the assumptions that go into the forecast, I do want to keep in mind we want the assumptions to be what we think things will be, not what we wish them to be. I certainly there are certainly several assumptions that I wish were different than what I'm showing here, but it what I'm showing I
think is the best we have for the best forecast of what's coming in the future. Um, and we should talk about, you know, what we present. Should we I mean, you'll see this will become obvious as we go through what we're seeing. You know, there going to
be a few options that the town will have to make. Do we want to make recommendations? Do we want to just share the numbers? Uh any questions or thoughts before I jump into what I've prepared? Okay, I will share my screen. Sharing is not
turned on. It's okay. Should have tried that out earlier. Karen, I don't know if you got the sharing request. >> Sean, are you I used to have this ability, too. Sean, are you there? >> Yeah, you're good. It's some weird Zoom
permissions thing. >> Okay, great. >> Thank you. Okay, I think I'm sharing now. And I said this presentation is not polished. You can tell that by the first title slide. It's not polished. Um, I'll be working on polishing in the next couple
weeks. I will be open to help from any of you. Already got help from uh Nikki helped me out yesterday. I did not implement all of her help, all of her changes. I apologize, but she's already helping me make it better. Um, so one thing I want to talk about when we come to the budget is how we got
here. This is something that we've already discussed in the past that you know especially in January when it looked like we were having you know budget crisis that then now is better but you know why are we at a place where one year out from an override the school
budget was underfunded by a million dollars and is having layoffs. Long story short is there was a forecast that was used to look at the override last year that had some assumptions that were too low. Um
getting into and I guess I would also request for all of you committee members watching this I'd like you to take on two roles tonight. One is be yourself. You know a lot you know a lot of the background. You know a lot of what's going on. What do you think of what I'm saying? but also have part of your brain
be the average town meeting member who doesn't know everything that's going on and you know am I explaining things well what do we need to explain so that they understand what's going on so one fundamental fact of our budget is expenses grow faster than revenue
revenue we can increase current people's property taxes by two and a half percent we also get to add to that new growth meaning new buildings built new uh renovations done on buildings that ends up being about 3% a little more than 3%
per year that our tax base grows but our um our expenses grow I mean their union negotiated salaries and their health insurance is large drivers those grow by more than 3%. What I'm showing here is calling it ongoing revenue expenses. I'm
excluding one-time funds and one-time expenses. Those are in another bucket. We can look at those later, but I'm just looking at the ongoing expenses and revenue. Uh, I'll get in a minute to the assumptions that underly this,
especially the change in expenses. You might wonder if I have if these are just assumed expenses in the future. Why do why does the percent change vary from year to year? And that's because for one thing, some bond payments are going to be coming online. And for another thing,
in FY30, the schools, as the people in the warrant committee know, the schools are setting aside money in their circuit breaker account. In FY30, they will no longer be doing that. And so, I've incorporated that into here. So, but either way you look at it, our expenses are rising faster than our revenue. And
this next slide gets to the similar idea. Uh, we have a shortfall going up. and the shortfall. One thing I one thing I one reason I like this slide is because it shows the shortfall going up like in a stairst step fashion. So when we're talking
about ways to address it, I want to keep this in mind that our shortfall goes up in a stair step. So any solution we have to this problem, if we can make that look like a stair step, that's also good. I will say that we have an operating budget stabilization fund in
this town that we set up with the last override. And the whole point of that is to help us get from override to override without taking too much of a hit to the services provided. So I'll talk more about that in a few minutes, but these numbers are shown before we use that
fund. So here we go. >> Quick question, please. >> Um, yeah, in slide four, is that percentage on the y- axis of your graph? >> Good que. >> Cecil yeah >> slide four that is dollars. That is
millions of dollars. millions of dollars. Okay, >> cool. Thanks. >> Yep. Good question. Thank you. So, we have an operating budget stabilization fund. It's something that was established with the override. Uh last year at town meeting, we put $2
million in free cash in there, and the override provides another $700,000 per year, growing a bit, growing with two and a half%. Uh this year at town meeting this year, we're going to put an additional $1 million in free cash. And
I will say that the assumption the forecasts we see going forward throughout this presentation are going to assume no more free cash contributions are put into here. Now that's that's an assumption. We certainly might have free cash in future years to put into here, but that's what
these numbers are going to look at. So, all right, we have this operating budget stabilization fund, but now we really need rules about how we use it for this year. The way we're using it is
more or less we're taking the $700,000 in tax revenue that's going into that this in FY 26 and we're using that in FY27. That's fine for one year. We really should have a more
well planned out idea of how we're going to use the entire operating budget stabilization fund, including the two million in free cash from last year, including the 1 million free cash from this year. How are we going to use it? And then um to plan how we're going to
to plan how we're going to use this. Like for example, I said we have $3 million in cash here. How are we going to pay that out? Well, we need to know what our target is. Are we paying that over three years, four years, five years? We'll need, you know, we need to have some idea of when the next override
is going to be so that we can plan for how to spend down the operating budget stabilization fund. Uh I will say one plan is to pay out at a stair step. You know, I'm hearkening back to that
stairstep uh graph we saw before. One way is to say, okay, we've got a certain amount in there. We've got 700,000 going in there every year. We've got 2 million plus 1 million in there. If we spend it down in this way through FY30, then
we'll go down to zero. So that's one plan is withdraw a larger amount, you know, larger dollar amount every year to try to bridge that gap. Uh now I'm talking about I'm saying we should have a plan
for how we use the operating budget stabilization fund. I think this last point is important. It needs to be flexible. I don't think We can or should have a plan that says this is the dollar amount we will pull out from this fund and it's set in stone. But right now we
don't have anything. Right now if you asked me or one of the select board or perhaps even the town administrator and said how much we're going to use next year, I think the answer would be I don't know and I don't think that's a great idea. I think we should have a
target for how much we're going to use from this fund next year and the year after. And then we'll see if reality brings us away from that target. Uh so this is the same uh same point. We're going to need a policy. We can
propose a policy and I emailed all of you. I think I emailed you a proposed policy. I can propose a policy. It's really going to have the most teeth if the select board approves a policy rather than winging it. Now, one part of the policy, as I said, is what is the
target year? When do we think we're going to need this to last us till the next override if I think the select board can adopt a policy and put off selecting a target year for a few months if they want to, but they really need to do both pretty
soon as much as possible. >> Hey Jay, >> yes, >> it's Ron. I I have a question. You may get get to it in your later slides since I see you have 32 of them, but >> Oh, most of them are appendices. >> Okay. Okay. Hey, you know, I I think
this is super helpful. I do wonder as a citizen, what is a school board's position on how would they propose to control the cost? I know we want level service, >> but given the realities of cost way
outpacing revenues and the fact that we don't want to do overrides every couple years and these stabilization funds, >> you know, they I I don't think that they're able to fix this permanently, maybe for a couple rounds, right? Eventually that stabilization fund goes
away. I would love to hear what the school board has to say and I want I don't want to hear it for the first time at town meeting. I would expect that the school board sits down with the select board and this warrant committee and the three bodies come up with a plan as
opposed to we get there and we're all like not sure who's doing what. And I don't know if it needs to happen for this town meeting, but at some point I think our three bodies need to sit down and think holistically how can the schools contain
costs and maybe that means they need to cut services somewhere. they maybe they need to make some tough calls and then they should do as much as they can. Then the select board I would think should propose what they think is a way to you
know allocate the budget and then we I I would think our job is to think about the use of emergency funds that that's how I think as a citizen I would expect these three organizations to to tackle this so it's not just warrant committee proposing something and who knows if the
select board will agree or not and you know that just my thoughts. No, that's um I'll tackle that last point first. I mean, I'm saying, you know, there's the policy, you know, let's have a written policy on the stabilization fund and
then that we got to have a target year. I think for the target year, I think that for both of those, we as a warrant committee can just say here's what we think. Um, and maybe we should maybe we should just say
here's what we think for the policy. I don't think there's going to be a whole lot of argument about the policy. You know, I've talked to Mr. Milano. We're sort of in agreement. There's not much disagreement as to how to how to pay things out. The question is what year you am for.
>> Uh, that's one of my questions. >> The policy does make sense in general, right? There should be some standing understanding that the the town meeting sets forth for for us on what when would we tap into these funds. So it's not just on a given year we decide or the
select board asks for it and we don't have any guidance. So so I think the policy makes sense. >> Yeah. But one question is do we just does the warrant committee just declare this is the policy and so shall it be? Do we ask the select board to approve it? If we ask the slipboard improvement,
if they drag their feet, what do we do? Um, that didn't get to your question about cost containment by the schools. I think I mean, as we go through this, we'll see there's a couple scenarios that have the schools needing to contain costs. I'm
not talking about how they'll contain costs. They've said, you know, we only got one lever, and that's people. So, >> yeah, I know I'm not answering that question. >> Yeah, I I don't know the answer. Welcome to thoughts from the rest of the warrant committee. But are we thinking that we
would decide on the policy for this upcoming town meeting and just throw it out there in front of town meeting or would we hope to put it together and then I don't know if it becomes part of a warrant or something like I don't know how town meeting hears about something
like this because it's not a law. It would just be an internal policy, I guess, unless we said there the policy goes into law and that goes into the definition of these these reserve funds. I guess we could put it in law or we can just say this is a guiding principle or
guiding policy that we will use, but it's not law, right? >> Yeah. What I was thinking of doing was putting together the polic, you know, putting forward the policy. And I guess now that I think about it, you know, nobody could see these slides and come away saying, "Ah, I totally understand
what the policy is." Um, but putting forth a policy and twisting the selectboard's arm to adopt it and twisting the selectboard's arm to pick a year for an override. Um,
I don't know if that's answering your question. it does for the policy how we get something agreed to. Uh my my my broader question is just I would think that there should be some more discussions on the planning and maybe that's something
we need to sit down with Nick to figure out how do we get you know get the the school board working with the select board and us >> or not. I guess maybe we just >> Yeah, I'm I'm I'm
not sure. Brian, your hand has been up for a little while. >> Yeah. Um, my thought is, um, I think it's good to, you know, give some illumination to the town meeting members
what we want to do, but like I would I would want the So, just so people know, Jay and I are on this um Milton budget committee. That's not the right name of it, but it's basically trying to come up with policies on the budget. And I don't
know if they've seen this, but I would want to make sure that they sign off on like so there's select board people on it, there's plenty board people on it, there's school committee people on it, and um warrant committee people on it. And I would want to make sure that like so there is a group, Ron, but I would
want to make sure that they've signed off on this, which I don't think they have. I don't know when we're meeting again, but um right, you would agree with that, Jay? >> Well, here's my thoughts, and I know I'm being recorded. Um
I sent an earlier version of the polic proposed policy and an early version of the forecast to that whole group in early February, and I've heard very little back. So, um I'll just say I'm getting a little it we seem to have a problem of
who who's going to act who's going to act and do something. Um I've heard positive noises from people regarding all this, but everybody's looking at everybody else and wondering, okay, who's going to do something? >> Yeah. >> So, this is this is me and this is the
warrant committee doing something. Well, and I also wonder and I think that they had some hesitation about it at the last meeting because I know it came up, but the biggest question is what do you project for increased expenses over the future years?
>> Sure. And that's the challenge. And um and I don't know that people wanted to bake in a 5% increase or have it out there because it might not be, you know, it might be better. We might get class savings. Things might change.
>> Um >> yeah, that's that's >> and they have been lower before. So >> yeah, that goes back to when I was saying assumptions, you know, what we think things will be, not what we hope them to be. And I guess it's a level service cost increase. So if level
service, let's say for the schools, let's say level service is 5%. But they can get by 4% if they, you know, reduce some people's hours and cut expenses here and there. That doesn't change the fact that level service is 5% even if
they might limp by the 4%. So, so that means >> well I'm not sure level level service is only like we can I can talk about I want to talk about this after this presentation but I'll do it now if you want but level service the 5% has been
is like a postcoid number but it wasn't a precoid number and the pre-COVID number was somewhere in the 3% range >> and well for Milton it was higher for Milton it was um
4.2%. Precoid, postco, it's been much higher and it's you know and it's um and and if things change and we get back to pre-inflationary economies,
that should change also, right? Well, here here's here's my thought is that the school administration provided that committee, the joint budget committee with a detailed multi-year financial forecast. Um, and that was one of the
what eight files I sent everybody yesterday, so I apologize, but you have it in your email. And that's pretty detailed, and that shows how they came up with those numbers. Now there might be some assumptions baked in into those that are conservative but
the experts on that topic gave us their level service numbers. We have not received those from the town. So I would find it hard to say the school administration gave us detailed numbers showing what they
expect their cost to increase year-over-year, but I'm going to put in something else. Well, they have like close to 5%. Correct. >> Correct. >> For teacher salaries. Correct. >> I don't remember the details. >> The actual the actual 10-year average
for increase in teacher salaries in Milton is 2 and a half%. In postcoid, it's been 4%. 4.1% excuse me. So, I do challenge the numbers if you wanted to look at what they actually
are. So, I think that's one of my struggles. And I don't know, I sent out an email to the budget committee about this >> and I know they were digging into it, but I haven't seen anything on it. But >> yeah, I do have some caveats later in the in this presentation. Um, one of them in particular might get to what
you're talking about, but uh yeah, can can we put a pin in the I I knew this was going to be a point of discussion as it should be. Um, can we put that on hold for a minute? Sure. >> Okay. Thank you. Uh, Nick Tagy, did you have your hand up?
Yeah, but I'm good for right now. Thank you. >> Okay. All right. So, moving ahead. Okay. We're going to start looking at forecasts. What do these forecasts not include? Nick Tagney, I think I'm reading your mind.
They don't include there's an Atherton fire station debt exclusion that may be voted on fall of this year or next year. I'll have some idea of what that would impact on the tax levy. Not a promise, but just a ballpark. There's going to be
a new school, which may be voted on as soon as 2028. Uh, don't know what it's going to cost. Don't know what it'll affect the tax levy, but we'll be able to put some ballpark estimate in there. And the new school of operating expenses, maybe it's up and running in FY32.
We've heard a ballpark of $1.5 million in additional operating expenses. Uh, you know, again, just a ballpark. None of that is included in these forecasts that we're looking at. Um, and also as I said, I'm not including onetime revenue and expenses.
So, one of the forecasts I'm looking at, I'm calling the baseline. It's going through FY 2030. And, uh, here are some of the assumptions that are going to be largely true for a lot of these. New growth of a
million dollars. State aid, I have an assumption in there. Health insurance, I'm assuming 8% growth year-over-year. That's a little high, but that's what it was this year. Um, I don't have any basis to make any other assumption. I mean, I used to be a I used to be an
employee benefits actuary. Forecasting health insurance inflation is witchcraft, but uh that assumes something. I think this is a little on the high side, but we're only talking about forecasting a small number of years, so this might be prudent. It's what it was
this year. Um, those are items not under our control and they're going to be the same through all these forecasts. Items that are under control, school budget, as Brian said, you know, we were provided this by the school administration. It's in the ballpark of 5.2% a year except in that one year when they stop
uh, you know, when they filled up their circuit breaker account and don't have to contribute to it anymore. They've given us a detailed forecast. town salaries. I haven't gotten anything official from the town administrator, but he said that it would be around three and a half to four percent per year. So, I'm assuming three and a half%
per year. Um, and then because I don't have a very good flare for the pneumatic, I'm going to jump ahead and talk about what I see for the results. I'm going to talk about it now and then talk about it circle back and have the same slide later after we see some
details. If we look at an override year of 2030, one thing is if we do that, what would the override amount what would the override amount be in 2030 when we need an override? I don't even bother calculating it because if we don't have an override until 2030, we've
got catastrophic budget shortfalls between now and then. It doesn't seem plausible for the town under any assumptions I'm looking at. So, let's say, okay, let's say we're looking at override year of 2039, 2029. Maybe I should switch these two columns
because you know first I'd like to say what do we have if we have an override year of 2029 then we have significant budget shortfalls for two years and then we could come back up to the level service starting at FY29 by you know I'll get to this in a few minutes but when I say
come back to level service I mean in FY29 get back to what level service would have been if you take the level service now increasing it with what it should have beenre reed with over those few years and get back to this level of
service we have now. In that case, we're looking at in 2029, we'd be asking the voters for a 14.5 million override if we want that to last for five years or a $13 million override if we want to last for four years. Another option is an override in 2028.
That seems a little soon. That's two years from now. Well, I shouldn't shouldn't give a value judgment, but I will say that's two years from now. In that case, we'd get to have a fully funded level service budget every year. We wouldn't have to reduce level service. And then we'd be looking at
override again two years from today $9.5 million. We want it to last for four years. 11.5 million we want it to last for five years. I'll give more details behind this, but this is sort of setting the uh setting the road map of what we're going to be looking at.
Hey Jay, just for feedback on this as you put these numbers together. So in like the 2029 significant budget shortfalls for two years. So you're talking about the 2028 year and the 2029 year.
>> Uh >> the budget we're doing now is for fiscal 27, right? >> You're right. >> And then Yeah. So yeah. So this 30 >> Yeah. if the vote is in the spring of 2029. >> Yeah, I think you just want to kind of
add that level of detail in here somehow because because it would look, you know, reading this chart, it looks like in 2028 you're going to have a level service year, but we know that'll be down probably from where you are today. Um, and so you're talking about the you
know what you should define what those two years are. >> Okay, thank you. >> I think >> Thanks. Yeah, and I did I had it wrong. I had this as FY29. Okay. Um then going I I hope this all comes together eventually, but certainly
the order I'm presenting it matters and so feedback is good. Uh I'd like to take a So going on what I'm calling the baseline forecast going through FY30. Uh and I'm looking at ongoing expenses. I'm just looking at those expenses that
we said, you know, 5.2% 2% for schools and 3 point what was it 3.75 for town salary increases. So then we face a deficit in 28 2930 deficit of $2.5 million $4.5 million
$6.5 million total shortfall of 13 almost $14 million. How do I put this in terms that I can get my head around? Um very much a ballpark. I'm sure the town administrator would have more precise numbers for me, but ballpark. Let's say
an employees pay and benefits cost $100,000. For $2.5 million short, that's 25 employees or their financial equivalent that we're short. FY30, we're 64 $6.4 million short. That's 64
employees that were short. So, I didn't spend a whole lot of time gaming this scenario and tweaking the assumptions to see what we could get. It doesn't seem like one where the town could provide the residents of the town with the expected services.
Uh okay. So what if we move that in a little bit? Instead of aiming for an override in 2030, aiming for an override in 2029. So now a lot of the major assumptions are still the same. I am assuming no additional contributions to the operating budget stabilization fund. if
we have free cash that we can put into there, that'll ease things a bit. Uh, and then I took the school budget and the town department budget below what they wanted them to be by the same percentage. Schools want 5.2%.
I knocked 1.7% off of that. I said, "You're going to get three and a half%." The town wants their pay increases to be 3.75%. I took the same 1.7% off that, said you're getting 2%. Now, you know, any sort of union contractor is not going to let us have townwide, you know,
town department budget pay increases by 2%. But this is know what I'm fiddling with to make it work. And we're using the operating budget stabilization fund through FY29. So, yeah, we're using that up. The override
would be three years from today, four years from the last override. Where does that put us? Again, this is a place where I hope to have prettier slides by the time we get to town meeting, but it's got the information here. We've got revenue
revenue in the top line. Then we use the operating budget stabilization fund in that stair step. $800,000 this year, which is the budget we're looking at now, goes up to two, goes up to 3.2. So, we've got the operational revenue and the operational expenses.
We fall a bit short in 28. We go a bit higher in 29 but it balances out. I show you how the operating budget stabilization fund flows. And then uh on the right hand side I have a comparison of here's what the level service operating budget would
have been and here's what this operating budget is. So if we're going for level service the budget would be 159.4 million. We're only getting 157 million. So, short by 1.8 million and 3.8 million. Does that match the previous
Does that match the previous slide? I sure hope so. Uh, nope. Sorry, unrelated previous slide. Sorry. Sorry for jumping around. Um, I will say, is Mr. Milano on the call? Okay. I will tell you, I checked with Mr. Milano earlier today, asked him what
he agreed with, what he didn't agree with. He said that he thought that the um operating budget stabilization fund policy was pretty much in line with what he was thinking. He said his forecasts were more optimistic than mine were, but he hadn't had the chance to put them side by side and figure out why they're
different. So maybe there's some optimism here. Maybe I made a math mistake. Maybe he has better assumptions. But this is what I'm seeing now. So um then the question is what size override would we need?
So the way I'm viewing this is the blue line is what the level service operating budget would have been if we had made gotten level service in FY28 FY29. The orange line is this proposed budget. It's lower than that. I'm saying you
know what are the goals for the operating override? One is bring services back to what they would have been. So we're short in FY28. We're more short in FY29. We're going to pass an override in FY30. get back up to level
service of what we have today. If we lay off five teachers, then we lay off 10 more teachers, let's hire those 15 teachers back, for example. That's what I'm thinking the override should be. And, you know, consistent with what I think we've done with overrides in the past. I remember not this most recent
override but in previous ones we would lay off an art teacher. We would close the library for the weekend and then we would have an override and the library is back open for the weekend and the art teachers back. So that's if we go this route, this is what I think we would want to do. And I'm saying let's fund
the operating budget stabilization fund so we can provide level services for five more years. No more free cash going into it. just the override, the dollar amount is going to be high enough that working with the operating budget
stabilization fund, it's going to get us through for five years. Um, next slide. So, what are we going to need? Um, all right. This is before the override. I've got revenue and expenses.
We're short by 9 million to 15 million to 21 million. So what number can we stick in 2030 that it can grow for two and a half grow two and a half% for five years. In those first few years it'll put money into the operating budget
stabilization fund in those last few years it'll take money out of the operating budget stabilization fund. Well, here's my math. If the override is 14.5 million, it's a big number. I know it grows a
little bit every year. And you can see in year one we're bringing in we had a shortfall of $9 million. We have an override of 14 and a half. We take five and a half we stick it in the bucket. The operating budget stabilization fund bucket. Second year 12 to 14 we take $2
or $3 million stick that in the budget bucket. Third year the bucket doesn't really need to do much one way or the other. Fourth year money comes out of the bucket. fifth year money comes out of the bucket to provide for um for our needs. That point we'd need another
override. Couple thoughts about this one is that we're not taking any free cash and putting in the operating budget stabilization fund. We could uh I did some math. >> Can I ask a quick question? >> Please do. Please do. >> How much is the override going to be in
what is it? FY30 or 145, right? Okay. >> Yes. >> All right. I'm sorry. There it is. Um, so I did I had a couple thoughts about should we be taking free cash and putting it in here? And we could. One thought is if we don't, then we've got
that free cash for other things like, you know, other onetime expenses like road construction. I think there's no lack of money we could spend on roads in this town. Um, another thought is that, well, also I did the math and you won't be surprised to hear if we take a
million dollars of free cash and stick it into here every year, then the override has to be $1 million less. That the math work I I did the math, but yeah, that's what it works out to be. If we think we're going to have a million dollars in free cash every year to put to this, the override can be a million dollars. Yes, less. But let's start with
this. Um, I wanted to look at some options. What if we have an override that not to get us through four years but to get us through not to get us through five years but through four years? Well then instead of the override being 14.5 million it can be 13 million. Um leads to a lot of questions. Is it
reasonable to have an override four years after the last one? Is the size of override reasonable? What are other towns doing? Um I think there's a lot of work that can go into that. I didn't do it. One might say is that our job or is that the select board's job? were a
non-political bar group. Uh I don't know the answer to that, but that's what I have so far. Uh so what I have in the appendix is sort of repeating those last few slides for
what if I have an override in 2029, but I do put a million dollars in every, you know, this year, next year, you know, 28, 29. Doesn't move the needle that much. Also, I have the math backing up. What if we have an override in 2028? I decided not to repeat those slides
again, but I can cut to the chase. If the override is in 2028, then we get to fund everything at level service. No cutbacks and we use up the operating budget stabilization fund. I think we even have a little bit left. And then the
override, if we want the override to last 5 years, 2028, two years from now, it' be 11.5 million. We want to last for four years, it' be 9 and a half million. So coming back to the slide we looked at earlier from the same place,
you know, we can plan for an override in 2030. I I don't think that's a good plan. We can plan for an override in 2029, which case we'd have a couple lean years. We might be able to pull some rabbits out of hats with the budget, or we might
not. Or we can plan for an override in 2028, which case we'll fund everything. Uh I don't I'm I'm not trying to put my finger on the scale, although one question I have for the warrant committee is should we be putting our fingers on the scales? Should we be recommending something or do we just
give the facts? Uh, I will then say, and this is one thing Brian said, you know, what Brian said earlier got me thinking about this, the only thing I can promise you in my forecast is they won't come true. They're going to be off. Uh, they could
be off in a positive direction, could be off in a negative direction. I tried to split it down the middle, but who knows, you know, positive and negative. I got health insurance on both of those. We could have unpleasant surprise on health insurance. We could have a pleasant surprise. We've had pretty reasonable health insurance inflation for the
previous five or more years. Could it could be a lot less than 8%. Could be more than 8% certainly in the short term. Uh state aid back in those first slides that I sort of waved my hands and said ah the warrant committee doesn't need these. I'm going to talk to Ton
Medium about state aid and how it's been lacking. Uh there are groups lobbying for more state aid pretty hard. So that could increase or it could decrease. Uh especially the next line is there could be a recession. A recession
what we've seen in the past is a recession leads to a decrease in state aid. Probably also lead to a decrease in things like our restaurant revenue, maybe our business in taxes, I don't know. But the number one place that would hit us is state aid if there's a
recession. Uh, I put these two on the same column for positive changes. We could have additional free cash. I'm sort of assuming beyond this year that we're looking at FY27. I'm assuming no free cash that's going to be put right to the
budget. No free cash that's going to be put to the operating budget stabilization fund. There might be some uh there you there often is uh a negative for free cash is snow and ice deficits. We have that this year.
So if we're counting on free cash, if we're saying I expect to have a million dollars in free cash to put in the operating budget stabilization fund, snow to snow and ice deficits is one of many things that could come back to bite us if that's our plan. Uh new growth, I assume a million dollars of new growth every year. If
these new 40bs that are being built, I I don't I'm not an expert on how they're valued, but if when they go on the market, if their valuation goes up, that might put more money in our pocket. Or the other way to look at it is these buildings are being built. Once they're built, once they're done, are we going
to have so much growth and new growth? And the last one, as many of you know, I was an employee benefits actuary for 15 years. This uh takes me back to what Brian was saying a few minutes ago. I agree with Brian. I think um this is
one thing that's been vexing me is when forecasting pay increases, it seems like what certainly the town the school administration does is they look at current employees and they say these current employees are going to grow with
the union negotiated pay. Well, over the long term and maybe even the medium term, we should be having higher paid employees leaving and lower paid employees coming in. uh they've taken a close look at that for this coming year. They know who's
you know to the extent that they know who's leaving this year. They've made assumptions for that. The town the school administration tells me that doesn't move the needle much. I have to think that in the medium term it will and that if we have
you know let's say just throwing out numbers if the school contracts have a cost of living increase of two and a half percent but if everybody for having one more year of uh experience gets another 2% well sure each individual is
going up by 2%. But when you have the older employees leaving and the younger employees coming in, that should over the medium-term get you back down to that 2 and a half% cola. Uh just because I say that should happen doesn't mean that's what we've seen. Doesn't mean that's what the experts
think is going to happen. So that's a big caveat for where things might be better than what we're looking at. But um so keeping on only got a couple more slides before we hit the appendix. Um things we have to decide about an
override. Who is we? Is we the town? We town meeting? Is we the warrant committee? Is we the select board? We want an override to last for four or five years. We saw that's pretty tangible result. It makes an override easy to easier to swallow by a couple million dollars. Do we want any more than level service? Everything I've been
talking about here is level service. Level service, level service, level service. The town could benefit from additional spending. You know, people in the war committee know police, fire, library, council, and aging. Obviously, the schools, they could all put more funding to very good use. The library
could put an additional employee to very good use. So could police, so could fire, so could the schools. Do we want to talk about something other than level service? That's sort of beyond the scope of what we're looking at today, but something we need to think about when we have an override. Uh
yeah, we it's something we should think about before we start planning next year's budget. So my final arm twisting of the select board. I'm saying this today out to the ether. I'll presumably say something similar to town meeting when we have a two new members on the
select board. Uh I think the select board I would like to ask now I'd like the warrant committee to ask the select board to do a couple things. like them to the adopt proposed operating budget stabilization policy. If you don't like mine, something similar by July 1st.
Again, Mr. Milano and I seem to be of similar mind on this policy. Uh some people on the town budget committee might have slight differences, but they're pretty minor. I think we can get a policy together. Now, that still leaves up on the question of when is a target date for the next override. I
understand we're about to have two new members of the select board. I understand saying we want an override 2, three, four years from now is not an easy thing to say, but we need a plan. We need a plan before we start putting
together next year's budget. I would like the warrant committee to request the select board to make a decision. I'm saying September 1st. If it's October 1st, don't tell anybody I said this. It's not the end of the world, but we need a target.
and my college roommate was a big fan of Rush. So, I've honored him by choosing Rush to say, if you're wondering about when should an override be, if you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice. It's not good enough to say we don't know when the override is
going to be needed. Uh, I've shared a lot. When it comes out of my mouth, it makes less sense than when I put it down in the PowerPoint. I've got I've got some work to do over the next three weeks. My question for you is, you know, I' I've laid out the questions for you.
First of all, what do you think of the what do you think of the forecasts? Are they way off? Are they okay? Um, you know, I my big question for you is, are you okay with me saying something like this in your name? And how should I
change it? So, it's open to the floor. >> Can I Can I weigh in? >> Please do. Can can I share my screen? Please do. Um I did this for um
the budget committee and it's pretty similar. So let me try to find it. Um course never comes out right. I can send this around to everybody afterwards. Can you see my screen? >> Yes. Thank you.
So this is um I got these all this data from DESIE which is which compiles all the data >> department of elementary secondary education >> right and they um they only have it updated through 2024
so they don't have the last two years information in there. Well they would this year >> but they're behind. I don't know when they do it. And this is the growth in in school expenses um over the last 15 years.
>> Okay. Um and and what you can see is that postco there was a big jump with everybody like the the average was more like in the you know 3 to 4% range in Massachusetts
and um but it was high you know but it really jumped for everybody postco and the reason for that was there was inflationary issues and there was also opera money. which um you know people use schools use
to hire people this and that and it increased their uh expenses and if you looked at um precoid postco um the uh
caggr the compounded annual growth rate is um for Milton precoid was like 4.2%. Postcoid it's 7.1%. the state of Massachusetts was 2.8 6.3 uh our peer group which is a group of
towns that the Essie says is similar to us socioeconomic etc. Um it was 3.4 before co and 4.9 so well that's one thing so I'll I'll leave
that. So like I think the point is from this these are real numbers is that um if things get back to normal and this is going to be a high inflation year and I think that's a problem for everybody in this in the schools and the towns. I
don't you know minimize that and I understand it. But if inflation ever gets normal again then you know would we be getting back to the 3 to 4% increases? Um, >> average teacher salaries.
>> Can you make it a little larger, please? >> Yeah. Sorry. Um, >> can you see that now? >> I mean, a little larger would be great. Thank you. >> How's that? Okay. >> Yeah. >> My dog's about to bell on somebody. Um,
so over the last 10 years, this is Milton. The average salary in Milton has increased two and a half% over 10 years, which is interesting. But it was mostly the increases in rate of pay has been over the last five years. The average before that was like 1%. Um, which is
low. And I do think that Milton was trending lower on school costs. Milton was trending lower on average school costs and they spent money, I think, to get back up to competitive rates, which makes sense. But, um,
and I'm going to give you what Massachusetts is. This is the Massachusetts average which I got to increase that size too. And there basically have been like in the state this is the entire state their increases over the last 10 years has been 3%. >> Mhm.
>> And um you know in in to me in this the last three years it's 3.2 3.5 3.6 which I get and I think that's a co factor probably. But my question is um I can stop sharing this
because that's really >> No, please please keep sharing it. I because I want to I want to talk about >> So my thought on this is like baking in a if you say it's going to be 5%. Like you're going to guarantee an override for sure sooner than you need to. So if it was less, if we could
try to keep it less in something that's more, you know, normal to cost of living increases or inflation rate, then shouldn't we be you know, somewhere between three and 4%. And what the schools should increase
less than five, which should also put off an override for a while and try to keep us close to the 2 and a half% that we're supposed to increase expenses Proposition 2 and a half asked for. >> Yeah, I've got a number of thoughts. One of them is, you know, I'm trying to
forecast what things will be, not what I want them to be. So, um, but but I guess getting back to the so when I it gets back to what I was talking about like older higher paid teachers retire, you hire younger lower paid teachers.
So, to me, what I'm imagining is so all these are union contract run statewide Milton all of it. So, if you could go back to the state, what you're looking at just a second ago. >> Yeah, the state one. This is the state. So to me, what I think is statewide, we've got thousands and thousands of
teachers. You got the law of large numbers. You've got statewide an average number of teachers turning 65, an average number of teachers retiring, an average number of young lower paid teachers coming in. So you got that big group and you're going to have averages.
You're going to have it's going up by the, you know, okay, not every town has the same union contract. I, but let's assume they're all similar. Then you've got pay going up by the cost of living because again the law of large numbers
you've got an average number of old high pe paid people leaving young low paid people coming in. So if you switch back to Milton so I I don't know how the teachers union contract changed from 2014 to 2024.
Um, I'm going to start with the assumption that it didn't change radically. Maybe I'm wrong, but let's start with that assumption. Then what that tells me is that between 2014 and 2019, it wasn't that the union contract was less generous. I'm assuming I'm assuming
it was we had a lot of high paid old teachers retire and we had a lot of low paid young teachers start. >> Agreed. >> And and then from 2020 to 2024, it was the opposite. we had a stable population that's growing and getting not only the cost of living increase but the increase
for their um for their longevity, >> right? >> So, so then what does that tell and I'm I don't know the answer. I'm just sort of talking and thinking as I'm going. What does that tell me? Well, tells me I don't know what my cohort is. Do I
still, you know, we might have a cohort that, you know, the oldest teachers are 60 and they're all going to stay around for the next five years. If that's the case, costs are going to go up a lot. We might have a bunch of 65 year olds that are lot about to retire. We might have somewhere in between.
Um, so I think in the long term we'd be back to cost of living increase, but I don't know if we can say that in the medium term, nor I do I know how we would figure that out. >> Yeah, but it's really cost of living, but shouldn't it be based on
negotiation? Like what has it been? Like maybe two and a half seems low, but maybe it should be 3%. You know, like what's the long-term? I mean, it's going to even out. As you can see from this, just from 2022 to 2024, there was a
swing of, you know, 2.7%. >> Yeah. >> And, you know, people hung. Maybe they had a better Well, it was three-year contract, so maybe they did have a decent contract in 2022 and they got up to competitive rates, but does that is that going to keep happening, you know?
>> Yeah. I I don't know. Again, my my assumption is that the contract didn't change radically, but I don't know. I haven't asked uh no I don't see anyone on this call who can address that. So my assumption is the contract didn't change. Yeah. What can I say? It's maybe
you're right. Maybe the contract did get more generous >> or maybe it just is demographic changes. So, I don't know where I'm ending up because I do agree with you that, you know, one fear I have is that we're not prepared for what's coming for us and
we're going to have a big shortfall in the town. But another fear I have is that I'm going to cry wolf and I'm going to say, "Look at how horrible this is." And, you know, instead of the schools going up by 5%, the school's needs only
go up by 4%. And we'd have to, you know, watch them, you know, if their if their needs actually go up by 4% and they still say they want 5%, we've got to have make sure, are you adding people? Are you adding services? What are you doing? But let's say it, you know, truly level service at schools only go up by
4%. Then I've cried wolf. I've said I've told the town, "We need to do this. We need, you know, four alarm fire. We need an override in two years." And I look like an idiot. Not that not that me look like an idiot is the big problem here, but >> well, >> I think that's the problem. I think
that's the conundrum, right? And I I I'm inclined to agree with you that we need a plan um and that you need to start to socialize with everybody in town meeting and with um that with the broader um
citizens that we're going to need an override at some point in time and that that override that point in time is coming, you know, sooner rather than later. And I think you do an awesome job of laying out the rationale and the facts and the reasons for why and that, you know, potentially there are other
overrides as well. So, you know, it might not just be the one and done and, you know, that it's a series of things. I I think the challenge to that is is kind of some of the stuff that we've been talking about over the last few minutes is that if you take this conservative approach in the in the
forecasts and in the um in the trying to set a plan for going forward to try to be thoughtful about this but also try to be conservative. The risk is that some of the different departments in town might not manage as conservatively as
they could or they should. where's the control and trying to make sure that they are um trying to maximize uh the value of every dollar that they get versus oh well you know it's it's budgeted out for the next couple years at whatever that number is that's above
the two and a half I can spend and be comfortable with that and I think there's the trade-off in there and how you kind of try to do that plan in a conservative way which I think is thoughtful and prudent and appropriate and the right thing to do versus then creating a false sense of security and
maybe um maybe a false confidence that they can spend without uh fear for the future um is is a dilemma. And you'd like to think everybody appreciates that it's a conservative approach and you're trying to um take that conservative
approach and we hope to do better than that to everyone's benefit including the services that are rendered. But that that that might be the the negative perception that might come with it and the potential negative consequence that might go with it. >> Yeah. I'm trying to think through like I
mean one thing I might say this is a forecast not a budget. You know we haven't budgeted for x%. we're forecasting as a percent, but that's that's sort of splitting hairs. >> And I think we'd have to depend on, you know, the town administrator on the town side and the school administration
and school committee and us on the school side to see, I mean, first of all, are you adding people, whether you know, what whatever department, schools or any other department, either you're adding a person or you're not, that's easy to see. And then, you know, let's
say it's the library department and they say we want to spend an extra $100,000 on puppets this year. Um, you know, we would we would see, okay, what was your what was your non-personnel expense last year? And okay, you really want it this year and you have a good reason for it. And maybe we'll say yes, maybe we'll say
no, but at least be aware that they're asking for something above level service. Um, >> yeah, I think that's fair. I I I think um I think the content that you've pulled together is really strong. I would maybe think about organizing it a
little bit differently to take it make it easier for people to absorb and process. Um, I might start with trying to make sure that the font is big as much as possible because, you know, anybody that's going to sit in the back
of the even the first half of the auditorium is probably going to be challenged to see some of the numbers and the details. >> Um, and in some cases, maybe you can make the graph smaller because it stands out as pretty clear-cut and make the font on the text around the graph bigger. Um, or you know, maybe simplify
some of the text. That's just one thing. And then I was thinking as as you were going through this, I was thinking that there are kind of four main points that you're trying to make. Um, and that trying to organize it and group it into topics and tell them upfront that there are the four topics that you want to
talk about and then, you know, kind of break it up into those pieces so people can stay with you. I think on the one hand, you're trying to show the and I think you should add the history of where we've been in the past for the school. you have that nice graph that shows the um the revenues and the um
well the projected revenues and the projected expenses and how that gap widens over time. I think you should show it going back as well to show this has been it's not a problem of today. It's been a problem of a long time. Um and that you know it's not perfect. It
does change from time to time. Uh it goes up and it goes down based on some of those conditions that you talk about about what could make it better or worse. Um but you know trying to level set people of what the history has been like and then a little bit of what the projections are forward. I think that's one thing. I think the second thing is
how the operating stabilization fund works and how it came to be last year because um I think we on the warrant committee got a crash. I know I did this year on the got a crash course and in that creation um we've talked about before that it wasn't well publicized as
part of the override last year. I think educating people that that got created last year, why, how it's worked, how it's been spent, I think would be uh time well spent in a couple of minutes. And then the third thing would be to try to um
uh make the case for why the challenges are in the future and that we're going to need an override in the future. Um, and you know, however that's going to come to pass, you're starting to lay the groundwork that that's going to be something that we're going to need and that is probably closer at hand than further at hand. And then the fourth
thing would be, you know, how the operating stabilization fund, what that might get funded at in the new override and how that might protect us into the future. Um, I think would be helpful also. And maybe you can combine the two operating stabilization fund concepts
together, but I think breaking them apart into what's already been passed and approved and how it's been used and why we think it needs to be in the future along with then the plea for the select board to create a policy so that
it can be um spent and budgeted for in a wise manner um I think is a great and that's would be a good way to fit into that last part. So, that was my soap box for today. I'm sorry. >> Oh, I I appreciate that. I appreciate
that. >> But the content's awesome. Like you laid it out clearly. I think uh the the I just think if you organize it just a little bit differently, it'll be easier for the audience to kind of stay with you. >> Yeah. Yeah. I you know, I put these
slides together sort of over the weekend and as I was giving them just now, I was like, they're not flowing as well as I thought they did. And you know, I sort of have two audiences. I have you, the warrant committee, who already knows half of this. And then I my other audience is town meeting who I'm going to assume
knows none of it. And that it's hard to know. Yeah, I appreciate the feedback. And I, you know, again, we've got three weeks to town meeting. I I might be tapping you and anyone on this call to help with this presentation. >> Do you have to keep it under uh 10 minutes, Jay, or is that just No, you
have as much time as you need. Yes. And um this doesn't even cover what the warrant committee chairs of your would say about the budget. They they'd give like other big, you know, pi graphs of here's how much goes to public safety
and here's how much goes to schools and stuff like that. Hadn't thought about how much I'm going to, you know, in addition to this just sort of here's an over overview of the budget. Maybe not a whole lot. Well, I do wonder whether it would be more impactful kind of to Larry's point
to try to maybe have a a short version for town meeting. And I know when they had done the MBTA community's vote a couple years ago, there was a lot of like webinars and seminars and maybe they were webcasts or a lot I don't know
how they did it in advance so people could get a lot of the details and the moderator had really pushed that out in advance. like there's a really good comprehensive summary of all the issues here. You know, at the town meeting, it's really going to be a higher level version of this. Um, and then, you know,
you have all the other slides at town meeting. If there are questions or discussion, you can refer to those, but I think it might be more impactful if you can keep the town meeting part a little bit more focused. Um, uh, you know, and then hope expect that
people do a little homework in advance. Um because people get awfully squirmy at town meeting. >> Yeah. No, I like that. Ron, I see your hand up. But yeah, that's one thing I wanted to ask this group is should we have a dedicated public meeting? All our meetings are public, but let's call it
more public meeting dedicated to this either before or after town meeting. Uh either before after town meeting, dedicated to this, inviting in the public, inviting in questions. Um,
>> should we have a special meeting? One option is, uh, town meeting starts on Wednesday. We could have a meeting that Monday. We might take care of any warrant committee business that's needed for town meeting and have this. You know, it's maybe like in the keys room of the library. I have a theory that
where you hold it communicates to the public who you expect to show up. If we hold in the keys room of the library, we're saying we expect more people to show up. Please do. Um, and then, you know, go into this in detail. a lot of back and forth with the audience. I think I like that idea. I don't know
what other people think. >> I don't know, Jay. I mean, you know, the sort of people that would show up are probably the same sort of people that are either town meeting members already or would u watch town meeting. I would think >> I fully expect it would be town meeting members showing up, but again, they'll
get a little more detail and they'll get to ask them back and forth. >> Yeah. All right. It's not a bad idea. >> Yeah, it's a good idea, I think. Yeah. And then you can keep it a little shorter time meeting since you've already covered it. >> Yeah. The more I think about it, the
more I like that. >> Uh Ron, >> sorry. >> Oh, no. Nick, were you going to continue on the same? >> I was just thinking that like maybe >> uh the election is Tuesday. Um and then >> you said the first town meeting is the Monday.
>> No, town meeting starts on Wednesday. It's two days later. >> And so then the election is the prior. So it's eight days before. Um, I wonder whether you're better off to try to have that session earlier after the election so that people can try to get more time
to either attend live and in person or listen to or watch the recording. >> So, I was thinking the Monday that would be two days before town meeting and six days after the election. You're thinking maybe even earlier. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. um just so that
you get a chance for more people to watch the the recording. You know, assuming that >> you're going to get more people there that way than you might and you know, you need the town moderator to really promote the value of it. >> I like that. Yeah, I know there'd be some competition and that the uh you
know, the select board and the planning board and school committee might have to have hold their organization meetings, but uh we can conflict with that. I don't think that's a big deal. Um, so it could be as soon as that Wednesday, the day after the meeting, that Wednesday or
Thursday. Yeah, I like that. >> Uh, Ryan, you put your hand down. Did I wear you out? >> No, no, I uh I I had a comment. I agree with Nick. I would keep the concepts simple, straightforward, and brief at
town meeting because unless we're asking them to decide something, just hitting them with all this information is very difficult in such a big setting because I don't know what we're asking them. I think we're just telling them we need to do something, someone needs to do something. >> That's a good point. >> We're not we're not voting. I would be
careful about >> we don't I don't know what to present, right? It's kind of like this is just putting on people's radar. Uh I I would agree with Nick to keep it simple. The other thought I had is this budget committee uh that that Brian had
mentioned. >> It it sounds like maybe that committee should have a voice in this discussion. Um, I would like to see what that that group proposes and I would think
if that group consists of key leaders across different organizations in this town, that's the those are the voices I want to hear. I I don't know if I have an opinion on this because I don't know what to think about. I I do agree we need to decide something. I just don't know what to decide. But if if we have members of the select board, school
committee, these other committees that that have large portions of the budget, I I would like to hear when they think, you know, we would be looking to do an override. What would be the proposal? And maybe it's something that's a variable, right? Maybe when we hit a certain threshold, then we would need to
to trigger an override. Maybe that's not like, you know, a set in stone. It has to be the 20, you know, 2029. It could be, you know, once we get to 13% above budget or something like that, you know, I I don't know. But but I would like to hear their thoughts and maybe it's they
come to the the Warren Committee. >> I I just worry that we have a public hearing, no one's going to show up and it'll be the 13 of us staring at each other and it'll be like this. But at least if you rope in that that budget committee, then you have some folks who have some responsibility who have to show up and have an opinion. Just my
thought. >> Yeah, that's possible. As far as a budget committee, like I sort of implied earlier, it's been hard to get people to make a decision. Um, as far as like would we decide for the override? I mean, one thing is, you
know, really what we're deciding is the date that the operating budget stabilization fund goes to zero. Now, if that goes to zero and we've had a great few years and we can make it one more year, that's okay. Uh
but uh what we what it certainly as a mostly outsider what I've observed over the past 10 years or so is every year the select board looks at things and says how are we doing? Should we have an override or not? I think we can scrape it together to get one more year. And I
would just or okay, we're gonna have an override. You got three months to get ready for it. Um, I >> I'd rather set a date for an override now, even if it's not not even if it's not needed. Of course, I don't want to cry wolf, but
>> you know, I think at minimum, I would love to have Nick Milano in that discussion, one one thing I've noticed being on this warrant committee for a couple years now is at the beginning of the year, we're way over and it's the house is on fire, all kinds of problems.
And at the end of the cycle, somehow Nick finds an extra five million bucks. I don't know where he finds it. >> Yeah. >> And I do worry that it's a it's a big crywolf situation where we constantly kind of, you know, we're like level service, but level service is going to put us way over on the budget and
somehow Nick finds a way to work it out, but sometimes he doesn't like last year. So, >> and and I think that's um there's again it's sort of the difference between a forecast and a budget. Like I'm forecasting, let's say we're talking
about property and casualty insurance. I'm looking at it and saying on average property and casualty insurance goes up by two and a half%. So that's what's in my forecast. Uh Nick will look at it and say in some years it goes up by 8%. So he'll prepare
for it to go up by 8%. And then when it doesn't, okay, that's a that's either close to free cash if that already happened or if he's setting the budget, then I'll say, oh, we get some room in the budget. So, I understand why they set a conservative budget and then sort of ratchet things down between the month
of January and the month of March. Um, I understand why he does that and I I tried to not do that here. ALS, you know, all sorts of assumptions that I didn't necessarily lay out, but like what's our local receipts going to be?
Nick makes a conservative assumption where I, as I looked at the last few years and said, here's the average. Maybe I'll be high, maybe I'll be low. The way I'm seeing this forecast is if we have lay out this forecast in detail,
then we can say a year from now, ah, here was the forecast. Nope. local receipts came in 2% lower than we thought it would be. Okay, that's fine. We thought it would be this. It's gonna it is now this. We know why there's a difference. Um as opposed to setting a
budget where you're like if you make an incorrect assumption on local sheets, you'll not be able to pay the electric bill. So they're sort of two different things. Um, >> that was a lot of rambling to say I understand why
>> fortunate things pop up, >> but understood. So, we've talked a lot. Um, there are some questions about the assumptions raised by Brian, which I certainly sympathize
with. Uh, I think we can dig into that a bit. Um, other concerns about what we're presenting? Like big question. It sounds like nobody's objecting to in general presenting this. Uh,
do we recommend or do we just share? Do we recommend, I don't know, for example, a 2028 override, or do we just say, if you want a 2028 override, here's what you got. If you want a 2029 override, here's what you got.
I think the message that there's an override coming is probably strong enough and then you can leave it to the um work with the other committees to decide exactly when, you know, to planify that override. But >> just presenting the information seems like good enough to me >> without, you know, unless you're going
to, you know, consult with all the committees ahead of time, you know, the finance committee and the the budget committee and the select board and everything else. >> Yeah, I think practically speaking, that's not realist. I mean, I'll I'll talk to Mr. Milano. I'll I mean, again,
two out of the five select board members are going to be new in a few weeks. Uh, >> I I think you I I kind of agree with Larry. I don't think you should make a recommendation. I think you can say it because it's a SL, you know, and I think you can frame it and say it's the select
board's job to make a recommendation about an override, but as we look at things, it seems like an override is going to be needed um in the 28 2930 range. And the consequences of as we look at a forecast at this point in time
of those different timelines are, you know, X, Y, and Z as you laid out in some of the slides. And um hopefully the forecasts turn out to be better than the conservative estimates that are provided um that might push
that out in the future. But that the the trying to lay the groundwork for the likely necessity and rationale for it and building that case over time so that um it does have more
because transparency builds trust and trust will build confidence in when and if it needs to happen at some point in time I think is the right thing to do and you're starting to build that case and if if nobody listens and picks up on the different factors over time then then I've been I think you have other
means to try to scream louder. But I think trying to um you know walk quietly and and lay the fact is a good way to kind of continue to build trust that I think you've done such a great job of restoring with um with town meeting over the last you know
couple of meetings. >> I appreciate you saying that. Um, one place where we might be at an impass is the, you know, the the school inflation assumptions. I will share a slide that I shared with y'all a few months ago,
which is sort of apples to oranges with what Brian was showing, but it's just another data point. It's a handful of communities, which may or may not be our peers. And you know, Brian was looking at average teacher salary. I'm looking at per pupil expenditure increase sort
of apples to oranges but sort of in the same ballpark. You know the per pupil spending for these 30 different towns precoid and postcoid 2018 to 2023 went up by five and a half percent. So I I I don't know where that leaves us. I
have a lot of sympathy Brian saying >> that's not an average of all the towns. Those are just certain towns. >> Correct. >> Correct. >> Correct. >> Yeah. I mean, you said there's 395 towns in Massachusetts, and some of them were lower than that. >> Well, some of them were lower than that, >> but they're, you know, are should we be
comparing ourselves to towns in Western Mass? Uh, >> I mean, Desi has desi has towns that they think socioeconomic that we should compare ourselves to. >> Yeah, I did see that list. Yeah. >> And Welssley was higher than us in their increases annually. They were the number
one and we were number two in our annual increases, but we were two percentage points over the average. And I just think that's one thing that bothers me is I never hear well I never hear I said this at the last budget meeting we had like nobody ever talks
about cost cutting. Nobody ever talks about being productive or saving money. And um I think they should and I think that people should be looking at why why like not everyone's like everybody in the war committee I don't work anymore so I don't know but I doubt everybody's
gets an automatic 5% increase every year in pay you know I mean I suspect that nobody does and I think people at the time meeting might wrinkle at that a little bit you know because there they have to pay property taxes you know
>> yeah a Couple thoughts. I mean the you know the the pay is mandated by contracts and yeah those contracts are negotiated every three years. Uh but that's that that's driven by contracts. >> Yeah.
>> And uh as far as nobody talks about cost cutting. I would disagree with that because I mean you looked at the schools. The schools heard you know you're getting a big cut. Now in January it was going to be a super big cut. Then it went down to a million dollar cut. So they got a million dollars less than
they wanted and as we all know they were putting a million dollars into the circuit breaker. So then they had to decide okay we're going to put less into circuit breaker but we're also going to cut costs. And I would say you can look at their you know especially their
school budget committee meeting. They met every week and if you look at those from you know starting two weeks ago to the previous six weeks they were talking about cost cutting pretty hard. They they obviously laid off people. They increased bus fees. They increased
activity fees. They you know I can't list other thing they did but they certainly did talk. >> Most of the positions that they cut most of the positions they cut didn't even exist. They were just budgeted for and weren't filled. I don't know that they >> maybe like three out of seven.
>> They thought some of the people they didn't well they didn't replace people that left is right. >> Well >> I don't know about most. >> Yeah. And they raised fees and they did raise some fees and maybe they should raise them. I thought some of them they should have raised more but that's an aside.
>> But I don't think this is the issue today. Like I I think the the schools are the you know the biggest budget in the town. So it's an important consideration. But regardless of whether you look at these numbers or even the numbers Brian had pulled up with the
Desi stuff before like costs are going to go up in an average way more than the two and a half% of property taxes. And so and if you combine that with the other parts of the town expenditures like there is a challenge there. There's
a fundamental challenge that we have to account for and you want to hope that everybody involved in all the different departments is going to be as thoughtful and prudent as they possibly can be to keep those costs uh rising at the slowest rate possible. that they're
going to go up and you know the hope would be that this period of 2018 to 2023 which is you know got a really steep inflation in 2022 and you know all the COVID expenses that went with it that this isn't the normalized rate of change but even if you go back with
those other numbers they're above the 2 and a half% you know we have that mismatch we have to figure out and I think that's the most important thing that the the details are not >> the discussion that should be the focus of of this part of the conversation at
town meeting in my mind. >> Yeah. I guess why I wanted to bring up the subject again is because if I'm going to be presenting things in your name and I'm saying these are the assumptions. Are you okay with that? I think we've heard Brian is not I don't want to speak for you Brian but you have
questions about it. I think I would come back to saying we got we and when I say we I mean the town budget committee which me and Brian are on. We got a detailed spreadsheet forecasting the cost from the schools which I forward to all of you yesterday
and that was level service that was same number of people. So if I were to argue for some other amount other than what the schools gave us for their forecast I would have a hard time arguing that. I think my best argument might be they're
assuming nobody retires and what I talked about, you know, old, you know, high paid people leaving, lower paid people coming in. I think that's a good argument. Uh, but I think that's maybe my only argument and
I'd have a hard time forecasting anything other than what the school administration gave us as a forecast because they didn't just scribble down some numbers on a piece of paper. They they gave us some they gave us some backup for it.
Um I you know I I don't love just saying sorry Brian I hear your concerns but I'm the chair so too bad. That's not something I like doing. But eventually we're going to have to make a decision about what assumptions to have in there.
And I'm still at the point where I'd have a hard time doing anything other than what the administration gave us. >> Well, I the data I showed you was accurate data. It was real data from Desi. It wasn't projections. It was real
data. And you know, I'll go back. I mean, how many people get a 5% increase a year? Is that a normal for every job? Like that seems high. Maybe I'm wrong, but I was in corporate up until two years ago for 40 years. And
unless you were changing positions, it was normally like a 3% I think was an average depending on the year and everything else. But >> I mean I mean there's two different questions. There's are they actually getting that? And the answer is yes because that's what their contract says. And now the then there's the question of
either should be they be getting that or you know long-term trends like I talked about employee turnover. Is that going to bring it down to give us numbers closer to what you saw? Well, maybe. But are the employees actually getting 5% a year? Yes, it's in their contract.
Okay. They haven't yet. I mean, that's not been an average, but okay. Maybe future, but that's a negotiated amount then and controllable. I mean actually if you look at you know I know I sent you a bunch of things uh
yesterday one of them is called MPS budget projections and you can look how they roll forward the next few years and they do have you know an increase due to cost of living and steps they do have a decrease due to attrition
maybe that decrease is way too small they've got a number there maybe I maybe we could talk to them and see should it be should that decrease increase due to retirements be higher. >> Yeah, they're trying they were trying to figure it out. I know that they were digging into it,
>> but >> yeah, it's a tricky thing, right? Because you you really kind of I mean, aside from the cost aspect, it's the it's teachers with longevity and experience that contribute to the culture of a program and the consistency
of the quality of the education. So, you know, you want to create an environment where you're retaining those teachers. that it's, you know, assuming they're good teachers, which is why they've been there a while, that that that's that's going to create a stronger system. So, it's a bit of a challenge that way. And,
you know, you hopefully there's a natural cycle to the whole thing and they they analysis of where they fit on that natural cycle, but I would think they want to retain their staff to the best of their ability. There's a reason that they're there.
Okay. Um, I appreciate the conversation. I don't know where else we can go tonight. Uh, as I said, I I'd appreciate, you know, any one of you who wants to give me feedback, work with me on making this presentation smoother. I'm going to certainly watch this recording over, take your comments.
Uh, I'd appreciate help making this smoother. I think I'm going to plan for a public meeting, public publicized meeting after the election, before town meeting. I think I like that idea. It sounds like other people do. Uh
do we need to have a meeting between now and then? That what I'm thinking is working backward from town meeting. Town meeting starts on a Monday on a Wednesday. I think we should plan for a meeting, maybe a Zoom only meeting that Monday to say, are there any last minute changes
we need to address and then a pre a few days before that we'd have our very public meeting where we're sharing information like this? Do we need to meet any other times between now and then? I don't know that we do.
>> I don't think so. I mean, not unless there's any major changes to the warrant, but >> yeah, like I know there's going to be a small change to the U Blue Hills technical school bill. That's something we can tackle a couple days before town
meeting. Just make a, you know, make an amendment. Um, yeah. So, okay. I appreciate your patience and your feedback today. Uh, please send me feedback. you know how to reach me and
I'll you know as this goes through better and better iterations I'll share this with the team. Thank you for putting it together. >> Yeah. Thanks a lot. Really good information. >> Okay. Good night. Okay. All right.