Good evening. Welcome to the Milton, Massachusetts Warrant Committee meeting. It is March 23rd, 2026. Karen, can you do a roll call to call us to order? >> We have Jay Funling, Macy Lee, Ela Craig Hats on Zoom, Lorraine D is here, Larry
Johnson, Brian Maguire. On Zoom, we have Lee Michael Mlan, Ron Sia, and here we have Nicholas Tangi, and Cecil Yang. Do you have a quorum? >> Okay, great. So, the agenda for tonight uh will be it'll be a full meeting. We'll first talk about the sign bylaw
which we had previously discussed. We'll get updates on that. We have Liz Manning the planning director and Meridal the planning board chair to assist us with any questions. We'll discuss it and I assume vote on it. After that, we're going to have Nick Milano present an
overview of the town budget. I know we've all taken a look at our own individual pieces. Uh Nick's going to tell us where we stand overall and then we can start voting on things regarding the budget. I think the next thing after Nick's presentation, we'll turn to Lorraine who's our representative on the
capital committee. Get her to present where things stand with the capital budget. Presumably vote on that. A couple of things I'd like to be sure to vote on tonight. the school's budget, which we discussed at length at our last meeting, and the stabilization funds because that does have a little bit of
question about what's the best place to put some money. I don't think it'll be too heated. At least there's some questions for us to answer. Once we get done with that, we'll be at the point where sort of turn to the committee, see if anybody everybody's experts on their
individual parts of the budget. Assuming nobody has anything to say or comment on their parts of the budget, we'll start going down articles. Now, depending on the time of night, we might go through a bunch of articles. We might go through all of the articles tonight. Uh, whatever we don't get
through tonight, depending on how late we want to stay. Uh, Thursday, I booked an in-person only meeting. The reason I booked an in-person only meeting is because if we've got 20 votes to do and we're in person, you can do voice votes fast, fast, fast. Um, so we'll get as
far as we can or feel like tonight and then finish it up on Thursday. I don't want to rush anything. If there's an outstanding item that I didn't just mention, if somebody was the head of the whatever budget and they have issues to raise, don't let me rush you can raise
them. Got a meeting scheduled for Thursday. We can ask questions if needed. I don't want to rush, but you're real. So, all that being said, let's talk about the sign. Uh, can Miss
Hall and Miss Manning join us at the table? And Larry, do you want to take the lead? >> Yeah. I mean, I didn't really, you know, you summarize, you took my slides and you summarized the changes to the slides. So, >> yeah, sure. Absolutely.
>> Wouldn't be restating what you wrote. >> Share the slides. >> Um, I I'm not prepared to share them. I can though if I sign into the into the webinar. >> No, I'm prepared to share them if you >> Oh, absolutely. Yeah, that'd be great. Okay. Thank you. >> When I said prepare, I give you a second,
>> but let me stop you. >> Uh, did you want to walk through the changes in the language where I had summarized the, you know, sort of page by page or did you just want to focus on the slides? I mean, I can we could jump right there if if that's quicker. >> I I'm following your lead.
>> Okay. Um so and I've got some hard copies here of the of the um slide presentation if that would be useful for anybody on scrambling a little Anybody need a hard copy or is everyone get them sort of
segment? So there's a lot of discussion about temporary signs at last meeting. So the third slide um in the presentation there were no changes to the the first slide. The third slide in the presentation talks about the temporary sidewalk signs
and the review process there. So what I had done um was I followed the same um format as the previous slide which is which kind of gives you that sort of flowchart for the sign review process and how this works. Um and so
essentially uh the sidewalk the the only temporary sign that is going to follow this new flowchart are the are the temporary sidewalk signs for businesses. Um the language for that is contained in section 12 12 um I and it you know it's
an application to the building commissioner. They review that the application to ensure that it meets all of the requirements and then the DPW is going to um the change there as well as to have the DPW make the um make the decision to um you know that that it's
that it's appropriately in the in the public rightway and that there aren't any issues with clearance and etc. Um, and assuming the building commissioner and the DPW are both in agreement that the sidewalk sign is acceptable, then it just moves to a to an approval and that's the end of the process. If the
building commissioner, you know, does not certify that it's a complete application or the DPW has some issues with the with the sign being in the public right ofway, um, then they're, you know, they can communicate that, communicate that to the applicant. the applicant can go back and sort of you
know reconvene and you know try to make some adjustments and then you know submit it back to the building commissioner and with the hopes that they can you know address the issue and then and then that becomes an approved sign as well. Um if the applicant disagrees with the building
commissioner's decision for any reason then they can make that um appeal to the to the board of appeals um and it would follow the same process as a um any type of appeal to the board of appeals. So hopefully that's that that's a pretty, you know, straightforward um you know,
depiction of of how that would work for for businesses that wanted to do a do a sidewalk sign. Um >> can I ask? >> Yes. >> Two related questions. One, it might be obvious, but why the DPW? And the second
question, >> um so excellent question. I had conversations with the the town administrator. I had conversations with the building commissioner. I don't know that I actually was able to close the loop with the DPW commissioner on on this
particular item. Um, I think the the the thinking was that they would be the ones that would be the most the most um closest to to understanding if there were concerns about about, you know, clearances and conditions and if there was a, you know, perhaps a sidewalk was
being repaired or something during a time period that they would be the they would be the department that would have the best the best handle on that on those conditions. Like out in the in the business districts. talking about this, I asked if she had discussed with the DPW if they're okay
with being a part of this process. She said not directly. Did you either either discuss with the DPW or through your extensive work with the DPW, does your gut tell you they're okay with being a part of this process? >> No, I think where we had left it was
they are generally involved already on occup occupancies of the right away. So they already have a permit process if you if you want to occupy the right of pay right away to store something to do work etc. So um it felt like a natural additional mission scope increase um but
I don't know that Liz followed up and I didn't either. So in terms of closing loop not fully closed but I think the connection was occupancies of the rightway already kind of flow through the engineering department as is. This is a another occupancy of the rightway
and it was also one of the only places where the you know there was sort of a role in those in the zoning bylaw to to be sort of you know checking in with the town administrator. So, we thought that it would, you know, to make things really really clean and sort of take away take take that out of that
wheelhouse of the of the select board and the town administrator and keep it nice and tight with the with the building commissioner and the DPW. >> I'm sorry I didn't follow that. >> The the the the existing process for having a for having a sidewalk sign
approved has a role for the town administrator's office. So, we really wanted to keep it crystal clear that that this new process going forward was going to be solely the building commissioner and the DPW sort of like taking that that piece off of their
plate and keeping it nice and nice and nice and clean. And this is probably an obvious question too, but this applies to anything that like any A-frame signs that might go section or porch vest or
what center anything like that this it's the same process for those as well. >> So no it's not yeah it's not actually >> businesses >> yeah so so those those signs follow I actually need a copy of this I'd be happy to to pass it around it's called
rules and regulations for nonprofit event signage and banner display. So this is a permit from the board of selectman. This these are the these are the sidewalk signs and the lawn signs and the banners and what have you. They follow a very specific process. It's not within the zoning. It's a separate
process through the board of selectmen. >> Yeah. >> Is it because those are temporary and these are the vision of these are more permanent signs? >> Yeah, I mean that's that's part of it that the the these are limited I think to three weeks and have to be and have to be removed within a certain like a
really certain period of time um after the um the approval lapses. Um the these signs are also temporary because they they're only allowed for certain certain times of the year and certain periods of time. So, but this is this has its own separate distinct process. And there's
language in here that I think that's very clear about these the types of signs that have to get this permit from the select select board are very expressly exempted in the in the in the bylaw language. And this also this application um
clearly determines where where the sites are where the locations that that the signs can be put. So >> certain intersections locations. >> Yeah, I found that here. >> Moving on. >> Okay. So on the next page, no changes on
this um on this um slide. the the next slide, we've just got some new new language around um temporary signs. So temporary signs allowed for 45 days and like I had just mentioned exhaustive exhaustive I think list of exempted
signs. So I think you can find just about every type of sign in that list of exemptions if there's concerns about you know we we we addressed the question about you know um special festivals. We ex we addressed, you know, the the um
questions around the the A-frames for the for the for the, you know, nonprofit, you know, types of situations. Like we we added some language to to make sure that those that those types of uses that have been have been brought up at the last meeting were
expressly exempted. Um and so that that's the change there. And then the temporary sale signs which uh apply just to the business districts, just to businesses I should say in in in the business districts. Um the the planning
board had a long conversation about wanting to make that more um to uh expand the time frames for that to 180 days. I think the existing language was 90 days. Um and so and also too to allow
exterior science as well because there was talk about you know folks wanting to say oh we've got you know pumpkins for sale or native corn or that sort of kept coming up and or if if you know some of the restaurants have special special types of um you know promotions or what
have you that that they you know they really wanted to make sure that the brick and mortars were were really thought about and and taken care of. Um, and those signs do not count to the total sign area. >> And then what I Oh, yeah. Yeah. >> Temporary signs like that, sale signs.
Do they have to apply? They have to apply for that. >> Yes. >> And so if they have to apply for corn one if it's like September and a pumpkin one for October, like that's two separate does change it. You can't just say one sale sign.
>> That's a good question. Um, I'd have to honestly I'd have to kind of like I I kind of have to look at that a little bit more carefully. Do you think you talked about that at all? >> It has been >> in the Yeah, it has been that it is per
sign um and you know they can vary they could overlap in different times you know it could be seasonal corn and then they might have something else that might >> So it's just the space. It's the space. Okay, that makes sense to me. All right, let's see. So that so that
was that's pretty much it. And then I know you guys had suggested it would be it would be nice to sort of see some of these images of different types of signs. So I went ahead and I just sort of, you know, pulled together some some different representative images, point of purchase display, what an awning sign
will look like now, a blade projecting sign. Oh, yes. purchase sale inside a store. >> Yes. >> Like a display like that would require >> clients with this. >> No, those are those are those are exempted. >> So, there was some there was some
questions about it because it came up a lot with the planning board because if a if a display like that was sort of like right in the window, >> okay, >> it could kind of it could kind of double, you know, sort of as as a as a as signage. Okay. So, but those are
those are expressly exempted and again it's in recognition of you know the the brick and mortars like needing to do what they can to sell to sell their >> Thank you. >> And on just on that note to follow up one of the questions was um the real estate signs and so what we had a
discussion about that and whether we needed to have language but technically the real estate signs that you see are not affixed to the window. So that's where the diff the difference between a sign and a display. A display is not affixed to a window. So technically what
the realtor's offices have are displays. They're separately freehanging. Yes, they're in front of the window, but they are technically a a display of >> and those are exempt. And again, a liquor store that has
Miller light inside the window >> if it's affixed to the window. And I that's where just to keep it if it's stuck onto a window, attached to a window, a fixed, it is a sign. It if it is not, if it is set back behind the
window, it is a display. That's the the difference is it's a fix to the window. >> I mean, it's a loophole. What do you do? You got to draw a line somewhere. Right. >> Right. So I think that's the simplest way to explain >> Yeah. >> the difference.
>> Thank you. >> So those were those were pretty much the the the the summary of of the the changes that were that were made in the language. Um, and um, I don't know, are there are there more
questions or or you know, we had some comments back from town council on some of the questions about the political signage and sort of how you can, you know, how you can and can't regulate that in in a storefront window. I I feel pretty comfortable. We've got some some
nice um guidance on that. Um, there's anything else >> I know more about science than ever. >> Well, it is a lot of people don't know we have a sign review committee which has been doing a wonderful job. So hopefully this will help the sign review
committee. We'll help the building department, the planning staff and and really make it >> for an applicant just everything just very, you know, more clear. >> Yeah. And imagine the business is no. We have a center in your committee. The business
isn't done. >> So I'd like to be 100% clear what we're voting on. So the language that is there's a word document dated titled 323 signed by bylaw revised. >> Miss Manning, are you saying that's the
current version? This was sent to the whole war committee today 2 o'clock if not >> yes 3 319 >> 31926 yep >> the one I have is titled 323 sign >> that was my title for the meeting
document file >> oh thank you but it is what she said today >> thank you very much >> yes I will share it on the screen. Uh I will share it, I promise. Um speak now
if you did not receive the document and or otherwise don't know what we might be voting on tonight. This is the one you sent at two o'clock. Someone car. >> Yes.
>> Um I understand if people want some time to look at this and we take it up on Thursday. Uh otherwise I'll entertain a motion. Well, yeah, I will say I'll entertain a motion. Can I just ask one thing? Isn't there a public forum to
like a public review of this at some point? >> We have a public forum on Thursday. >> On Thursday. >> I mean, if we voted for this now and then they made changes during the public, we have to vote on it again, I guess. Right. >> True. >> Yeah. >> True.
>> So, the public forum will be you talking to the public and then it's a possibility that you'll make changes. It's unlikely at this point because it's really been vetted quite well. There may be questions about this that we'll be able to answer and that's really what
it's just informing the public of what's happening, what we've been, you know, letting you all know. Um certainly if there was anything significant, >> you know, we would discuss it and would, you know, come to you right away with that. But I don't see
>> really um because there's been so much input with the building commissioner staff the um >> I'm just >> Yeah, >> Ela, I see your hand up. Larry, I'll say >> do love to have a >> That doesn't worry me a whole lot because we we should probably have a meeting on the books for next Monday, a
just in case meeting. >> Yeah. Right. >> So, that doesn't worry me. >> Okay. All right. That sounds good. Uh Elaine, >> um I was able to look at this but not with any in any great detail because I just received it today and I'm wondering
if there are other people that are sort of in the same situation. >> Did it Did it get sent on Friday? Because it's the same one as Friday. >> It probably got sent to me on Friday. I don't know when or if I forwarded. >> Okay.
>> Yeah, >> because it's it's the same document. I just wanted for people if they saw it to read it over the weekend. I thought you would requested it on Friday. So that and I think you sent it. >> I'm sure I did but actually Friday. >> It hasn't changed. That is good for me.
>> Same. It's the same as what you sent on. >> Yeah. >> Okay. So, yes, I did send it to the team on the 20th. >> That's not to invalidate someone's objection if they still feel like And you know, another way of looking at
it is the reason we have experts on the warrant committee this year is so that not all 15 members have to read the 10-page document. You can I'm not trying to stop anyone. That was one of the ideas. >> I mean, you know, I've read it, so I'm
fine with voting on it today, but you know, I'm not the only one. It's also um you know the discussion we had last time about the 20% coverage andrew had some issues with that and I don't know if any anyone else but if nobody else has any concerns about that then I think we can just let it go and
possibly it'll come up during time meeting as an amendment or something like that. >> Yeah I mean I I know Andrew is not here to speak for himself. My interpretation what Andrew was saying I mean the current law says 20% the new law says 10%. Andrew didn't like either
of those, >> right? >> And I'm I feel like let's focus most on what the law is changing, not do we rip out the whole thing. So >> that's kind of the way I see it, too. Yeah. >> And the planning board did discuss that also and and brought that back. Um and it was really because it was the
recommendation of the chair of the sign review committee who felt very strongly that 20% was way too too much that he said it was his recommendation for 10%. And so that's why we decided to >> could continue with the temp what John
Zikowitz had recommended >> as an expert because we also defer to you all as the experts on this. >> Well, how about this? I I I will entertain a motion if someone wants to make one and as always we have a motion, we have a second, we have discussion and
if during that discussion people say guys that's really not do this now remember emotion failing doesn't mean we recommend against it. Motion feeling means we don't take action on this tonight. So that might be one way to do it. >> So make a motion to to vote on it
tonight. Okay. I'll make a motion that we vote on this tonight. That we vote to approve this article tonight. >> Second. >> Great. We have a motion. We have a second. Is there discussion on this? >> I like the PowerPoint, by the way.
Thought it helped a lot. The um >> organization chat. Larry and Liz, >> I liked it. >> Larry, >> it is. It's very helpful. >> Great. >> I I have something I'd like to say. Um I would really really like it if you would
close the loop with DPW. >> Um I would suggest before your open hearing on Thursday night. >> Y >> I'll just sleep better. >> Y >> and then, you know, we may be meeting Thursday night. We may have a you know, we'll probably have a meeting on the
books for Monday whether we need it or not. just in case. But I would sleep better if you close that. >> Okay. Absolutely. >> We have a motion. We have a second. I see no more discussion. >> Uh Karen, can you do a roll call vote?
>> Macy. >> Yes. >> Elaine. >> Oh. >> James. James Lee. Yes, >> Lorraine. >> Yes, >> Larry.
>> Yes, >> Ryan. >> Yes, >> Michael. >> Yes, >> Ron. >> Yes. >> Nick, >> yes. >> Cecil, >> yes. >> Jay, >> abstain.
>> Motion carries. >> Okay. Thank you to our guests for all. >> Thank you all for your time and >> thank you. Okay, I'd like to invite Mr. Romano and Dexter have the guest seat. You can have my seat. You can have wherever you're most
comfortable. Ronnie has no idea. >> You better share something quick. J >> hanging on the screen. Let's put on some weight over the winter. Okay. >> So, while Mr. Milano is getting ready, I realize we haven't had we haven't had
Mr. Milano, Miss Dexter in as often as we had in previous warrant committee years and and that's my my mistake for not inviting them as much. Uh we did each of us had our expertise things that we looked into on the budget. Some people presented months ago about what
they thought on the budget. Uh since then, you know, Mr. Milano put together his level service budget. I did ask at one point, do people have concerns on their specialties? I haven't heard back. So, we will be hearing from Mr. Milano about the
about the big picture of the budget and then we'll be discussing ready to be voting on individual budget items. >> All right. Well, thank you. Um Jay, I think you said you'd be ready for us at about 7:30 and you nailed that on the
dot. So, well done. Um, thanks for taking the time tonight. I'll um, as Jay alluded, walk through where things stand with the budget presently. I'll identify a few places where there have been some kind of discussion and and um, you know, I've made my recommendations which I'll
walk through here. Um, so I know I did come down previously to talk about revenue forecasts. I'll provide an update on what the revenue forecast looks like. Uh, as you can see here, I've just summarized kind of all the topline revenue. I won't go through them in in too great detail, but if anybody has a question about them, please um
feel free to let us know. Property taxes assumes a million dollars in new growth plus the max that we can increase under the Prop 2 and a half, which is 2 and a half% of the prior year tax levy. Uh local receipts are again, you know, building permit fees, motor vehicle excise taxes, interest income,
um local other local fees that we assess. Um the trash fees that you use for your annual trash card or if you buy stickers all uh roll up into what we call local receipts. Local receipts has been a strong revenue source for us in recent years. Um we've increased our
forecast pretty significantly from where we were to start this year um at about $10.8 8 million driven by what we see is continued strong uh revenue on particular motor vehicle excess taxes but also interest income building permit fee revenue staying strong although
maybe not quite the outlier years that we've had in the past couple state aid uh the state aid figure that we are using is the state aid number that was set by the governor and her budget that was released in uh the third week of January uh that is only the first step in the state budget process
but um that's the number we're going to use the is going to release its budget in late April. Uh so we generally stick with the governor's um budget recommendation. Um I was at a Mass Municipal Association uh conference earlier this week or I'm sorry, last
week, not early this week. And one of the things that the master association has been pushing on is um you know having a broader conversation about Prop 2 and a half more generally uh with stakeholders but also more specifically pushing for the state to put more dollars into state aid. Their tagline
right now is $351 million for 351 cities and towns um which would result in a significant increase in state aid account uh for everybody. um we don't necessarily expect that to happen, but I just want to share that that that advocacy continues um even in what some are kind of as challenging financial
years for the state budget. The operating budget stabilization fund is the new stabilization fund that was you uh approved by this town meeting in voters last year. Uh right now we're are I'm recommending a withdrawal of about $777,000 out of that. Um, broadly, we're looking
at about a 4% increase in revenue year-over-year. And, um, I've shown down below that we are recommending usage of about $4 million of our $4.5 million in free cash. And I'll explain that, uh, more in a moment. So, that's the overall revenue um, forecast for now. Obviously,
um, property taxes drive the majority of what we take in, but we do have these other revenue categories that help out. uh on a computer >> we um I have a couple slides here and here that kind of talk that say adjustments. So I know when we had last
or when I had um met with the warrant committee at one time we had a much more um significant deficit in terms of what town and schools were trying to reach and and there were some changes since that kind of $2.6 million number was first released publicly. Um, so some of
these changes, um, I just discussed briefly, but our baseline forecast had a more conservative estimate for state aid. We changed that with the governor's budget that comes out. That's typically what's going to happen on a year-to-year basis. Local receipts, again, um, we had a more conservative forecast. Once we
got more information about how motor vehicle excise taxes were trending this year, we felt a lot more comfortable increasing that forecast for next year, and we'll do the same again in a year from now. penalties and interest. Again, as we're working to close out some uh kind of long outstanding tax bills, we
feel confident that those will continue to be strong. We did dial back our increase our anticipated increase for our building department revenue. Um not because we we're seeing a slowdown or anything, but what has been permitted in the last couple years, if you've been driving around town, are a number of
large projects. Those have substantial fee revenue um associated with them. Um, at this point, just about all of those large projects that are going to be built have been permitted by the department. So, we've already captured that revenue. So, the revenue moving forward is more likely going to revert
back to the typical new construction on single family uh, two family homes, additions, and renovations rather than the large projects. The only large projects that have been approved by land use bodies in Milton that have not gotten their permits are 648 650 to
Kent, which is a large 40B project, 116 units. The memory care project has not received its building permit yet. That's on Highland. And then um a smaller 40B at 16 more. All the other projects have all been permitted are or heading are already well under construction.
The operating budget stabilization fund um we had been carrying a usage of about $700,000 and we've increased that slightly um and then dialed it back. But overall we're looking at about $778,000 come out of the operating state position fund in fiscal 27 to support budgets.
in terms of kind of key takeaways of the fiscal 27 budget in a big picture sense. Um so one of the biggest cost items is employee benefits and particularly health insurance. Our we are expecting we are forecasting and and budgeting for an 8% premium increase on employees and
on the town's contribution to for health insurance. This follows a 14% premium increase in fiscal 26 that the employees in the town budget um had to support. There's been a lot of headlines on on health insurance and the cost going on there. So, we're hopeful that uh we can
hopefully hit lower numbers in future years, but that's 14 and eight in back-to-back years is is certainly significant. Um the budget meets our OPED policy uh by we appropriating um about $1.6 million into our OPED trust and about a million dollars into the Milton
retirement system over and above what's needed to have that system at full funding. Um, our policy states that $2.5 million are going to are dedicated to these long-term liabilities. That grows at two and a half% a year. Met that fully. We've met our new financial policies by appropriating $675,000 of
free cash into the general stabilization fund um which will bring that balance to about $7.8 million uh which will hit over 5% of the fiscal 27 budget which is our metric. If you combine our other two uh stabilization funds, general uh
stabilization, cap stabilization, and road stabilization, um that balance is closer to $9.3 million or 6% of the budget. I'll just note, I was looking back that at the end of fiscal 24, the general stabilization, end of fiscal 23, excuse me, the general stabilization fund was at $5 million.
So, there's been a significant um inputs into that fund to increase the town's overall financial foundation, which um is not easy to do. and we've been fortunate to have high free cash numbers in the recent years, but I just wanted to make sure folks are aware of the progress that we've made on that. Uh
we've also set aside additional funds in future years by appropriating or recommending million-doll appropriation into free cash, I mean into the operating budget stabilization from free cash. Um so the way that works is we had $2 million from free cash last year,
$700,000 on the override. That $700,000 has been voted by the select board to increase by two and a half% for next tax year. So that would be another $717,000 plus the million dollar. So additional money keeps going into that operating budget stabilization fund to support operating budget in future fiscal years.
The budget is supporting town and school capital needs through um 1.2 uh16 million in free cash um paying for capital for pay as you go items, things that will pay directly. There's also about $4 million in debt service um supported capital projects that are um
covered by the fiscal 27 debt service budget. Um we're increasing our overall reserves by appropriate, you know, recommending an appropriation of $500,000 of free cash into the sped stabilization fund which will provide um additional reserve funds for the schools
and unanticipated um expenses. Uh the budget does maintain town departmental budgets at level service. There is one adjustment to that which is um the budget includes adding a position at the police department uh for the technical support coordinator. If you're on the warrant committee last year, you heard Chief King talk about it. I know
um I'm sure Macy has talked about it again this year. Um so that's the one kind of ad that's a potential recurring um expense um assuming you filled up that position and maintain it. Uh then we do propose several onetime projects that are are not recurring costs, but
I'll explain those more in a minute. So that's kind of the high level. Obviously, I didn't go department by department. Happy to answer questions, but that's some of the key takeaways that um I see in this this budget from both a townwide perspective, but also a um town department specific perspective.
So, what does that mean in terms of the numbers? So, here you can see our budget has increased about 4% over the prior year when you take that all in. Um I've shown here what the percent increases are when we we you know generally break it out into these four categories. Milton Schools, Blue Hills Regional,
Vote Tech, the shared budgets. The shared budgets are capital, employee benefits, debt service, um the OPED Trust, all of those kind of expenses that are cover employees both on the town side and the school side as well as town and school expenses, the
consolidated facilities department, which is a shared department. We um tag into the shared category. and then town departments. Um, as you can see just from this initial chart, obviously town departments are shooting up a little bit higher than schools. Uh, that's largely due to non-recurring onetime items that
you can um, I'll discuss more in a moment, but the one recurring expense is police. Um, if you take out the one-time costs, we're looking at about a 4% increase year over year on towns compared to a school department increase about 3.76%. And then again just as I had mentioned
earlier some of the changes that took us away from that large significant deficit earlier in the year um we had made some reductions on our debt service forecast by um reassessing how we're planning to borrow particularly our more expensive
um longer duration projects. Um so that was more of a shift of costs out of 27 into 28. So it's a cost was still experience just not necessarily in fiscal 27. health insurance. Um, working with the school department, we have allocated some costs for health
insurance to other funds. If those funds support employees um, 100% and the big example here is that there are a number of employees that are paid out of the school's food service budget. Now, their employee salaries plus their health insurance benefits will be paid out of that fund. Um, rather than being by
taxpayers, uh, we've identified one position as well on the town side that will pull out and charge outside. um of that junk shared health insurance budget. We also had savings due to the reduction. We had been carrying a 10% premium increase. So, we were able to reduce that down to 8% which triggered
some savings. Then lastly, our general insurance line, which is our prop property general general liability, automotive liability insurance, workers comp, um public officials, um police officers liability insurance. We've experienced a significant reduction um
and expenses there. We've already received our renewal for fiscal 27 and it's much lower than anticipated largely due to um much better improved experience on workers comp which is resulting in significant savings. So that's you know just a testimony in the
good work of um HR departments and also just employees who if they are expansion injuries getting back to work. Um and Maya, which is our insurer, um it's a branch of the Mass Municipal Association and and being aware of the challenges cities and towns are facing, they have
um changed some of their underwriting. So we had about a $40,000 savings just from um a statewide change that they're doing to all of their member communities. So um one of the benefits of um procuring our insurance to them. So we're realigning that budget to kind
of reset it um so that we have been over budget in that line. um in the past year. Uh this will um significant reduction will get us kind of more back in line and get back to where it should be rather than the inflated budget it's been under.
And then as I had mentioned um kind of ads into the budget. So I've identified here what those are. Uh recurring as I mentioned the police department position budgeted for a $90,000 increase for that position. We have budgeted health insurance um an increase for that
potential employees benefits which are obviously unknown. We've budgeted thinking of full family plan the full town cost for a single family plan there and then a number of onetime costs. Um so in in the DPW budget, we've increased the traffic engineering um services line
by $120,000 is we're working on a scope with a traffic engineering consultant to come in and do a lot of community engagement and write a plan and a policy around traffic coming townwide um with proposed interventions and proposed projects to come out of that. um it's
you know one of the number one issues that we hear a lot about and are trying to take a datadriven kind of researchbased approach on that issue and this plan would go a long way to being able enabling us to put that into place. Another one-time cost is um an economic
development plan we had some grant funding for lost the grant funding and now looking to back fill that with um tax dollars or town dollars rather. Um, so we're proposing um that $50,000 be split between the select board and planning board for a joint project on
economic development plan. From free cash, we're proposing um additional appropriation to the building department for $50,000 for additional hours for inspectors. We have a number of part-time inspectors. with all the large projects going on um that's the province's feeling a lot of pressure um
you know we may look to appropriate this again in fiscal 28 um while all these projects are ongoing then kind of reassess what our proper level of staffing will be um but that department is feeling a lot of pressure from um all of these projects kind of hitting all at
once and then lastly the planning board has been work trying to do work on a zoning bylaw reconification so just like a thorough review of the zoning bylaw cleaning made up making it more accessible to to property owners um and and identifying potential changes and
we're uh proposing to do that work with our new town council KP Law. So that appropriation would fund um that project. So these are the kind of quoteunquote ads to the budget that are beyond what we would consider level service. And just as I mentioned um all
the town departments have submitted level service budgets and we're we're proposing funding all of those. One of the kind of largest changes within that level service category is we did increase or recommend increasing the appropriation to DPW for snow and ice. That that snow
and ice budget has been at $160,000 for as long as anybody can really remember. Um so we've proposed increasing that to $250,000. Um we really spend in a in a light winter closer to half a million and this winter we're upwards of $ 1.5
million in overspend of that line item. So, this is just a small thing that we can do to um hopefully have a little bit of our wiggle room within um the DPW budget. What that means is we know going into every year that we're working on a deficit because we're going to overspend that account. Uh largely DPW has to
absorb that within the rest of its budget. That just means, you know, fewer projects are done. Um less money is available for other other things because we're working kind of at a deficit um from day one. This will help um reduce that deficit a little bit. Otherwise, the departments are uh minimally changed
as most of you will have seen. Um the budget includes um appropriations for our collective bargaining agreements and the collective bargaining set aside. We're now approaching the end of year one of um the new contracts. However, we haven't reached agreement on any new
contracts. So, all the employees have been working under their prior contract that expired on June 30 of 25. So the budget includes um a payment for retro payments to go back to July one of 25 as well as for years one and year two of
potentially new contracts. So that's that's a large kind of uh outlier um warrant article. It's just because we haven't been able to reach a those unions who are budgeting for both year one and year two account. I've mentioned all of these proposed
uses of free cash in passing. Um here it is all on one page. Um, you've already appropriated $60,000 for the special election um that was held in November. Um, and then going down the line, the $1.2 million to capital, 675 to general stabilization, 590 that's included in
the collective bargain wage set aside. This would be for um retro payments back to July 1. That's budgeted in this year's budget. But if we turn the page into fiscal 27 and haven't paid those out, that money will go unspent. So, it's either going to be paid out in this budget or it'll be zero
in this budget and paid out in the fiscal 27 budget. That's why we feel comfortable with using free cash for that appropriation. The school reserves as I mentioned um there's been discussion about the right place for that. Um I've proposed the sped stabilization fund which would require both select board and school
committee approval before money can be taken out of it if uh if appropriated by town meeting. The operating budget stabilization fund for a million dollars. building department planning board uh projects that I mentioned. And then one change that we made in our policies was to leave some free cash not
appropriated. In our past, we had always left it appropriated. Um this way um in a you know in a more challenging financial year, we'll know kind of going into the next year that there's a little bit of money in our reserve um that we could think about using if necessary um
against policy. But it it just leaves a little cushion for the next fiscal year to not bring that appropriation down to zero. Um at the end of the fiscal year, free cash goes away. You have zero until the department of revenue tells you if you have any. Uh this gives us a little bit of a starting balance on that. Um on
that. I think that's that was my overview of where I see kind of some of the big takeaways for the fiscal 27 budget. Um obviously go in a ton of detail department by department. Um, if you have any questions, I'm happy to take them um on
any and all of it. >> Yes. Um, on the snow removal, since we're so we seem to have been so under budget for the last few years, why not try to do like an average of five years, put that in as a budget, like a more realistic number? >> Yes. I mean, we could try to do that. I
just it would just be so much money to go from like 160,000 to half a million. So, I think we're just hopeful that we can do a series of these increases over several years rather than doing all at once. Um, so that would be our goal is to build it up to closer to what a kind
of a light winter would be. Um, but we have a couple more years that we would want to kind of roll that out. In a perfect world, yes, we go up, but um just kind of knowing some of the pressures, >> correct? Um, but in a year like this year, a year like last year where there
where there are budgets that have vacancies and turnover and savings, we can take that money to snow and ice. So, it's a way of we're able to move the money around at the end of the year, which helps. It'd be better to have a higher kind of baseline before we have to resort to that. But, I just think it
would be a significant ask to to raise the snow and ice budget by $400,000, for example, in a single year. And I would I'm uncomfortable with trying to increase it slightly over the course of several years. >> Would you increase it from >> from $160,000 to $250,000?
>> Ron, I see your hand up. >> Yeah, thanks. Uh, very helpful, Nick. I got a couple questions. I think the first one is maybe to build on the comment about the snow budget. I mean, I feel like this winter has been so much
snow. Do we know what the cost could look like? Is this going to be astronomical or is it going to be in line with prior years for salt and snow removal? >> No, we're um we're well over budget. So
um last year we were about $800,000 in deficit. This year we're about $1.5 million in deficit. So certainly in outlier year if you look past the past 10 years um between cost to our employees, cost to contractors, cost to
just buy salt and then cost to fix broken equipment and everything else. So we're able to attribute all that to snow and ice budget. Um so yeah, we're at about a $ 1.5 million deficit that we still need to erase. Um there are a few
pathways to do so. Um, starting with, as I just mentioned, of taking money from other budgets and moving them into the DPW budget at year end, which we're starting to map out what that might look like, and then if necessary, future appropriations um in a future town
meeting to address it as kind of the next step. >> Yeah, that that makes sense. I had a couple other >> questions. One was a general question. Um, and maybe you we've talked this before, but with the MBTA's community
uh issue that we went through, I know we had lost some grants and funding. Is anyone looking at whether or not there are things that we could still apply for? Maybe we haven't been keeping an eye on or anything that's retroactive. I assume there's not nothing that we can go after that we haven't wanted to
double check. not really retroactive in trying to get the money quote unquote back. Um we did apply for last year and receive um a Mass Works grant to look at um infrastructure improvements in East Milton um in the vicinity of the two
projects at 440 Granite and Franklin Ambassador Street that are ongoing. So, it's like a a road and infrastructure um design uh grant that we applied for and received uh that DPW is starting to get to work on now of several hundred,000.
Um the other big one that was taken away was the Seapport Economic Council um grant for work on the Seaw wall down at Milton Landing. We are in the final kind of stages of applying for a grant for that of actually more money now,
$280,000 to do that work. Um that grant will be in submitted by the end of this week. Um and we just recently received an IT um community compact grant for $130,000. I think maybe 140 for a digitization of
records in the building department, planning department, conservation commission, and elsewhere. Um these are all grant programs that we were not ineligible for while we were out of compliance with MBTA community. So, as they become open and we're compliant, we've been sure to to get applications
in and we've been successful. The other one I should mention is that came up actually at last town meeting or maybe two years ago was um we had been unsuccessful in applying for a community transit grant program to replace one of the buses at the COA. But, um year four
was our year and we've re we've been awarded that grant that should come out soon. Um so uh you know a 14 passenger bus will be supported by a state grant um that we'll be um signing paperwork on shortly. So we've been >> it's great news. I'm sure that the
Council on Aging is very excited. >> Yeah. So we've been you know you know that is all Christine Stanton's doing there. But we've just been chasing what we can now that we're back eligible for all of these grant programs and uh we've been success pretty successful so far and we'll continue to do that.
>> That's that's great. Um, very helpful. Other question I had the 50,000 for the building department. Uh, do you know by chance what what those hours are? Are those hours related to the like trespass
article that we we vote on last year? >> Uh, thankfully not. No, this is really just um additional hours uh to do inspections of projects under construction. So whether it's the 40B projects or it's your addition to
renovation, we have um a full-time building commissioner, a full-time local inspector, a full-time code enforcement officer, um two part-time local inspectors, uh part-time electrical inspector, and then part-time plumbing and gas inspectors. So, this this would
be additional money for um those part-time inspectors to have additional hours to to kind of hopefully catch up with the workload and and keep permits and inspections moving. >> Okay, great. Thanks. I I have this like recurring fear that the the light
trespass enforcements would drive up cost. It's just in the back of my mind all the time like having building inspectors going out to people's houses at night, you know, all over town. But hopefully that's irrational fear that I'll have to get over. >> That's not materialized yet, but I will keep you posted. And it sounds like I
might have a volunteer. >> All right. Thank you. >> Keeping on a theme, I'm also concerned about the snow and ice budget. Um he said we might find places where we didn't spend money in this year's budget or that we might come back to a future
town meeting. Can you say more about that? >> Sure. Um there's really kind of four things at play right now for that. First of all, uh the mass emergency management association MIMA is submitting it as a
disaster declaration to FEMA. So, we have shared our costs of the February storm with FEMA. Uh, DPW director Marina Fernandez had a meeting with FEMA last week to go through our costs and it's really going to be focused on Norfick County and Point South. So, fortunes be
Norfick County. So, there is a possibility that we'll have disaster relief assistance through FEMA that will pay for a portion of our cost for that storm. So, that's kind of bucket one. Problem there is this is can be a lengthy process. Um, so it might be some time before we figure that out, but
that's one potential source of additional funding. Um, source two will be fiscal 26 budget appropriations, our current budget year. Places where um, we're on track to be under budget um, include, you know, select word budget. We've had a number of vacancies. Um, a
couple of other departments including police and fire have had vacancies. The DPW department's had vacancies. So they'll have savings in the general expense budget that can get be moved to snow and ice. the reserve fund. Right now, we're not tracking anything that we're anticipating to be needing the reserve fund. It's still early, but um
that's available. Um we have, as I mentioned earlier, the general insurance budget. Um we have savings there in this fiscal year. So, we'll cobble together a bunch of transfers um that will hopefully eat up a good portion of that. And then under Massachusetts law, we can
leave this account in deficit at year end. So, if we don't have enough within fiscal year appropriations, it can remain in deficit. we have basically until we set the tax rate in the fall to make up for it. Um so that could be a subsequent town meeting vote. Um or if our revenue forecasts improve, we could
um add it to the tax rate in the fall just um through the board of assessors. So there's there's multiple pathways that um can get there. The key one being um fiscal year 26 appropriations to chew up as much of that as we can. Um, all
that means is we've had sky-high free cash last couple years, but if we have very few departmental turnbacks because all the departmental turnbacks of savings go to a budget account to be spent, um, that contributor to our free cash calculation will be much reduced.
So, it will certainly have an impact on our free cash for next year. You know, revenue forecasts have been strong throughout this fiscal year, so that's good. um just our expenditure savings that we've had in the last couple years, we won't expect this year because we'll be putting all those to use.
>> Okay. Thank you. Yeah, that's that's one of my concerns is that it's going to eat into free cash. So, not to jump around the agenda too much, but I think one thing we're going to discuss tonight is school reserves. You know, your proposal is we put half million dollars into the special
education account. We discussed with schools last week about their reserve policy. Is this I don't know if I'm asking you, Mr. Milano, or just asking the world, but is this something that maybe instead of putting the special education budget, we
put in some form or fashion to improve the either improve this free cash next year? Yeah, basically to improve the free cash next year. You have any thoughts about that? If that were the goal, I would say you could either leave it unappropriated as
we already are or some portion of it unappropriated or it could go to like general stabilization. Um, you know, we'd be in excess of our policy. So, that would be available for appropriation and still meet our policy at a future town meeting. Um, but those would be if that was a concern or a
goal, those would be two pathways by which to do that. Uh can you explain the school health thing we going to take? Um someone's gonna said it was not going to affect the taxpayers. I didn't understand that. >> Yes. So there are
fee and grant driven funds programs such as Milton Community Schools and Food Service that has outside revenue funds that come in. Uh the school department uses those revenue sources to hire employees and they pay their salaries out of those funds. So their salaries
are over here being paid out of food service or community schools, but the general fund town budget is paying for those employees health insurance. So our perspective is if these are fee based or grant-based programs they should be bearing 100% of the cost to run them. Um
so that is where it comes from is to say okay if you have 10 employees and an account that generates fees then those employees benefit should also be covered by those fees. So that's the concept that's not what we've been doing. Um but the schools have been um willing partners at least on the food service
front to do that to those employees, community schools. Um they've talked about raising fees on community schools as it is. Um so they weren't comfortable yet with absorbing those additional employee benefits costs in fiscal 27, but it's something we're going to continue to talk about. On the town
side, it was really the retirement um an employee at the Milton Retirement Board, which should have been borne by the retirement system. So, we're just taking that out of the budget, you know, this year and next year and going. >> Okay. Milano, I'll ask uh we all had, you
know, everybody on the committee had their parts of the budget to look at and we discussed some of them last fall, you know, last fall, winter, whatever you want to call it. Uh so am I correct in understanding not counting the schools but the
department budgets are funded at the level service amount that they requested with the exception of the police is getting one position added not talking about schools is that correct that the department budgets are funded at the level service amount they
requested >> correct >> please DPW >> DPW remind me >> well because of the snow and ice Oh, >> and then the one time items that >> Well, that's we're that's level service because it's an expense. So, the onetime items would be separate. So, the
$120,000 for the traffic engineering. So, okay. The level service requests inclusive of the increase on snow and ice or all the >> Okay. Thank you. >> UW, what was some of the things that had to be sacrificed for snow and ice? They just were they just projects that were
just moved down? >> Yeah, we really just asked them to dial back on their other spending. um pause on hiring processes. So, we've paused on hiring um a little bit to try to push any new hires to like June or July potential start dates. So, um they have
a broad payment to contractor line that they'll use to come in for projects, materials, expenses, whether that's buying pothole repair stuff. So, all those kind of little projects are what gets impacted when we start dialing back in years where the snow and ice budget was worse than other years. Generally,
you know, they operate as normal for the first five to six months of the year. We re-evaluate February, March time frame, try to dial back. >> Are we getting new software? >> Uh, so we are I meant I should have
included that in the presentation. So, we are in the works of analyzing and making a recommendation around a new payroll platform. Um, that would really be our kind of number one priority as it stands right now. Um, in terms of accounting software, there's a lot that
goes into that. I'll let you chime in if I get anything wrong here, but we're upgrading components of that. So, for example, our assessors use Patriot platform that was upgraded last year for collections. Cutius So
>> like billing and collections for taxes >> and utility billing. >> Utility billing is the next phase that we haven't done yet. Um it's the partner we were working with. It's just an upgraded system through that software provider.
>> The biggest kind of next conversation would be accounts payable general ledger and how all those systems talk to each other um successfully. It works today. Um but it's something that we we feel we do need to do an upgrade on. Um we
haven't identified the right solution quite yet or the cost and and everything else but that is where we had kind of prioritized was payroll and we're moving forward on that and have sufficient funding to do so. Then internal account upgrades
systems we're using currently. Then we have to assess them to make a determination on the general ledger and council platforms. >> Does the payroll have budgeting? um properties too. >> So >> projections
>> um if we set it up right. Yes. Um so the whole philosophy behind it is if we find a solution that works for payroll and human resources and automate that process that then once we make the determination of what vendor we're going
to go with for that. Then we'll start looking at accounting systems which would include um accounts payable paying the vendor invoices um general ledger recording all the transactions which would then have a budgeting module for
everything else. So in an ideal world, the payroll system, what we would like it to do, especially for the schools, is to project out the remainder of the year, if my staffing stays where it is right now, what does it look like? And why that's important on the schools is
because they have high turnover, but also not high turnover. Let me take that back. Um they they get a lot of people that get paid 10 months out of the year and they take a lump sum in June. So like it's tricky projecting out the
payroll sometimes. So if you get um the right system set it up right that can assist with that that would save their staff a lot of time with the budgeting as well as >> project projections during the year as it's happening.
But it doesn't make sense to pick a ledger AP package without knowing payroll is more important. Find that first and then you know ledger and payables.
Don't need anything too fancy. I'm I'm still thinking about snow and ice and how to help free cash next year. I'm embarrassed to ask, but the the free cash that we're rolling over the 10% Is that in here somewhere or is that's just not being allocated?
>> It's correct because it's not being appropriated. It's not identified in the warrant other than if it were to be explained in the comments for example or in your message that this is what is happening. But it's not >> there's no article that says it's not being appropriate. It's just not being touched.
>> Okay. So if we wanted to hypothetically if we wanted to take some money out of something else and put it to the free cash snow and ice we would just reduce the allocation. >> Correct. >> Okay. Thank you.
>> So I think as we continue with our discussion tonight are you are you two staying here? >> I I am. Yep. I'm >> okay. uh what I had been looking at for I don't mean to cut off conversation but what I'd been looking at for my agenda
was talking about and voting on capital talking about and voting on not talking about much hopefully but voting on schools and then talking about the stabilization funds which may be an issue of we may or may not be making a change for that. Uh so
can we move on to the next thing on the agenda which is capital. >> Okay >> you can't go anywhere. I need him to explain. >> I think he's your only guest. >> Uh, do you need me to share something?
You do. Sorry, I had the wrong version up. It's whatever was sent out to the Warren Committee today. Just eight slides. Comes home. Huh? Let me just see exactly what I'm sharing. Am I sharing my screen? Yeah,
I'm sharing my screen. Okay, I know that. Okay. Okay. So, the three things I'm going to talk about are the general fund, the enterprise fund, and for that. And then what the article 4 of
the warrant looks like. Go on. So, I'm sorry it's so small, but this page plus the two pages after it are all the um things that were requested for 2027. So, Nick presented this to the committee
as all of the items requested for 2027. You can't cover everything. So, you can make decisions and defer some to 28. So that's why 27 and 28 are listed here. Um so and then the ones on the decisions
and kind of jump in here too when you're making the decisions on what's going to be this year, what's going to be next year. Some of it has to do with equipment that because it's so old it's not even efficient any longer. It needs to be replaced. Some things are, you
know, the schools are 20 years old. Town hall has windows I think it is. So sometimes you have to replace things just because they're worn out and just like in our homes. Um so that's the stuff that's highlighted are the ones
for 27. Um and then as I said there's three pages of this. You can just >> Huh. >> Tell me when to go. >> Yes. Go ahead. I thought you was doing Yep. Just click through and you can even just go to the next one too. People you have this in detail. You can see stop
here. So the number of things that are going to be um are put forward are the ones in 27 and and then the decision of should it be free cash or should it be bonded and and free cash obviously is not free but it's like a one-time
expenditure. Um whereas bonding obviously is borrowing and paying over a large number of years. Um the so the free cash one second the free cash is 1.2 plus million and then the
bonded in this list here is 3 945 million and then I'll explain later on why in the warrant that actually is a higher number. We'll kind of go from there. So um you just the items are up
through multiple departments and so but those are the decisions that have to be made. Um this is where I asked Nick to help explain. Sure. This is just our debt service uh for forecast. So assuming um that all the projects recommended to
be borrowed are approved by town meeting what this sheet shows you um you know about twothirds of the way down under the road bond finance fiscal 27 Rex is um assumes we borrow all of those next
August and start paying them back all together. So it would be a slight increase in fiscal 28 of about $80,000 and then a larger increase in fiscal 29 when we pay full principal and interest on that new debt. Um and you can see down below where it says anticipated um
increase over the prior year. Um so in fiscal 29 when that debt really hits, we're looking at a net increase of about $46,000 from the prior year forward despite you know a large portion of new debt because it's old debt that's falling off the books. And then as you can see each each subsequent year
additional debt holds off. So this is how we try to you know bring additional debt on being aware of what's coming off to continue and invest in our capital infrastructure while um also being cognizant of the impact on the budget. Um so that's that's just the forecast.
So the fiscal 27 line shows you what the cost the debt serving costs of all the projects in this year's capital budget if they're all approved and voted by town meeting. If all if they're all borrowed at the same time, which which really happens is sometimes capital project will get delayed or it won't get
started and finished on time and maybe we won't borrow it until a year or two later. So that would push out these costs a little bit. But this just assumes everything that's approved gets borrowed and complete all at the same time and that's what we anticipate for cost increases over the next uh like
five years. It's exactly what I was set aside. >> And that she is general fund only. >> Yes. >> Yeah. You said earlier enterprise fund. I don't know what that is. >> Sorry.
>> You said something about an enterprise fund earlier. I don't know what that is. >> It's a water source. >> Yeah. Water and storm water. It's the next the next slide. >> Ah. >> Yes. because this is I don't want to say self-supporting, but this comes from fees people pay for these services.
>> Self-supporting. >> Self-supporting. Look at that. Okay. Um so on here there's a number of items that were requested that um are not going to be considered for this year. Um the storm water, the street sweeper at
445,000. the current equipment as I explained before it's it's beyond its useful life and needs to be replaced. Um and then underneath that you say this one I think prior authorization but not spent yet. So that's money that was approved
previously and they just haven't spent it yet. >> So every year there's usually an article and further back in the warrant standalone article for storm water capital and the last few years we've appropriated 320,000. and they haven't
spent it yet, so we're skipping this year. >> Um, and then there are two items that are not considered capital items, so they would not be considered on this. >> And the water and sewer, um, a couple of things that are are going to be put forward will be split between them
50/50. So the truck, the vac truck, um if I understood and I remembered from our meeting, the director said that this piece of equipment would be used often and if we had this new one, it would
reduce the need to outsource certain types of um excavation um work. So between the water and sew it, they both would split the cost. So it would be 345,000 each.
And then the same thing with the um the meter replacement. Um they're going to go to smart meters. I think letters went out to people about the meters and it's going to look like the meter that you have, but everything it the technology is improved. You will know real time
usage. Um so you can make decisions about how you save money in your own house and what your bills may be next year. So that again is being split between these two departments. Um Sure.
>> Did I hear correctly that all been assessed storm water service fees for the last few years that haven't been spended anywhere? >> And no. So um the storm water infrastructure capital that that appropriation is $320,000. So what would
happen is that's an authorization to borrow money against the revenue that comes in. So they haven't put together a large capital project to um spend that money in. So rather than continue to give it more appropriation and borrowing
um we have a number of projects that need to happen within the system for federal compliance of storm water regs that are more important and then um we'll use that money. So, the storm water fee that's been assessed that folks have paid, we paid. We use that money that goes to work to support the
budget. This is a capital appropriation to invest in the capital infrastructure that um they haven't needed quite yet and they don't need this appropriation this year because they already have it on the books if they need to use it. >> And if I can just add this, none of these items will hit the enterprise
budget until we borrow it and the debt service payments are due. So that 320 hasn't hit anybody's bill until we spend the money, borrow it, and then we're paying interest in principle on that debt. Then it factors into the budget,
which then lands on all of our bills. >> And one thing, if I just now that we're talking about, I'll just add that these are the three rates and and fees that we can assess to all property owners, whether you're a charitable institution or not. So Milton Hospital, Curry College, Milton Academy,
they all pay water and sewer rates like the rest of us. Storm water, they all get assessed storm water fees on their impervious surface area. The town pays into the storm water fee. Um so all our town budgets get assessed based on our facilities and our impervious surface area. So it is these are um mechanisms
that hit all property owners unlike those that might be exemp um slides are the article that's being presented and one of the things on here I just wanted to because when I did the capital back here it was 3.9 million for
bonded and now it says 5.3 million and that's because of the water sewer and stormwater enterprise items that are going to be bonded. So that was added onto here. And then the capital um items are the same as
they were presented, 1.2 million for a total amount um of 6.5 96 million. Um so that I just want to point out that's why the reason it went up where it looked like it was only going to be 3.9. Actually, it's we're
asking for 5.3 um billion. So, that's kind of all I don't have this. I mean, that's all I have with my slides here. >> Can I just add one thing? If you wouldn't mind going to a pre the her
previous slide with the um I'm sorry, one more with the enterprise funds. Thank you. If you look at um water, you'll see the water infrastructure capital plan for 596,700. And then under sewer, you'll see the
sewer infrastructure capital plan for 150. Um those are MWR borrowing programs and they are listed in standalone articles um towards the end of the warrant. So that's the other
difference is you have article four and then you have some standalone borrowing articles towards the back which when the capital committee looks at this we usually focus on general funds because we know that that's important to balance the budget
and then we skip over to enterprise funds and go from there. >> Thank you. So if you add it all up, you're going to have to go to multiple articles that this committee will have to vote on to approve.
>> Not just a question. How do you decide what comes from? Generally, we try to keep less expensive or equipment that won't last as long under free cash and then um more
expensive for things with a longer useful life. That's why we chose useful life under borrowing. Um because you know, if we can avoid the principal and interest payments on a five-year piece of equipment, we will just by paying for it out of cash. Um but at the same time
since we can issue bonds tax exempt um we get very favorable rates. Um so it does make sense to to use borrowing as as an opportunity to to spread those tax dollars. Um but the the general gist is less expensive andor fewer years of
useful life will be treated as pay as you go capital or free cash. more expensive, longer duration would be borrowing. Okay, I'm looking around. I can't see if anyone has their hand up on Zoom, but we discuss this item.
>> Oh, yeah. Go ahead. Somebody else does. >> Um, can I just always get to take a shot of some of this stuff, but I have some questions. Well, one thing COA the bus that comes out >> uh I would recommend we leave it in because the grant is an 85% 15% match.
So the state will pay 85% of the cost. So it won't be $130,000. The other thing is until the grant agreement has been signed and it's still so I would my recommendation would be to leave it in. We will not utilize it. Um or at least
we won't utilize the full portion. Um, >> sorry. Where are you seeing that? >> The COA. The first one COA passenger 14 passenger bus. That's the one we got the grant for. >> Thank you. >> The um I don't know is Andrew might know this.
By the way, school technology we replace smartboards 188 and then we place network hardware. That's like $540,000. 550,000. >> That seems like a lot of money, but I don't know. >> It's throughout the entire schools. Um,
and those they'll go school by school and that came from the IT director Bob Patterson. Um, in terms of what his costs are to do an entire replacement for >> all the schools, >> they go building by building, which one are we looking at? School technology replacement. Um, I can pull up the
specific school for network hardware, but it's going through an entire school to replace all of the network hardware in that building that's I think 10 years old at this point. >> Sounds right. for the price for sure, but
actually >> um what's a factory truck? >> Uh it's it's a larger piece of equipment used for trenching um for water work, storm drain works, street sewer drain work. So it's it's a large piece of
equipment um that uses air to assist in trenching in in the renovation projects. It's not something we have today. That would be a new piece of equipment that the town would be purchasing rather than the rest of these which are replacements. >> Do we know what we save by doing by
buying it versus >> um yeah, I mean when we have to bring in an outside contractor, we're talking tens of thousands of dollars um to rent back to truck on a daily basis. Um, so there are certain projects that we can't do without backtrack, which means then
we'll bring in an outside contractor and then generally it'll add to the capacity for town staff to just do projects on a case- by case basis. Um, so I I don't have a breakdown of of dollars. Um, but the department as well as the the
vehicle fleet um had Charlie Collague and us and um our next director Marina is leaving in June, but um they all were aligned on this. What? >> Yes. >> I didn't know I was breaking that. We've um been sharing with staff and and
everybody internally. So, >> so it's we're saving money. We don't It's like tens of thousands. >> It's a cost avoidance. Um it makes trenching safer and more efficient for our staff and it should enable them to to get more done. So in terms of a a
dollar cash analysis I I can't do and I won't speak to I can ask Marina to follow up with additional information should reduce the budget. >> Yes. So, she says in the the request, one of the comments that's made is that
um it can help the engineering department with test kits, which is something that um the G is requiring to them to do some additional and those cost one to $2,000 each time. They do
one she had some metrics at one of the meetings about how many looking at >> and I can send you the link. We had a lengthy conversation on capital with her and others about it. So I can share that information that follow. >> Um
um my other question would be um the um school technology enduser devices. What would that be? >> That's largely the Chromebooks. It's an annual appropriation to do Chromebook replacement. It's largely um it's largely Chromebooks, but it would be any
kind of um device within um school buildings whether some desktops are aging out. Um it's primarily the source that they use to replace student devices with the students use. Is there other discussion? So, what I'm looking at on the
PowerPoint appears to be exactly the same as what's on the warrant. So, we've discussed this. We have it in front of us. Anyone like to make a motion? >> I'd like to wait because we just got this until maybe Thursday. I'd like to
see what the like truck what that what was save on that. >> Um 700,000. >> Is that going to affect vote? Well, okay. >> In terms of timing, hey Jay, my assumption is any savings as a result of
buying that truck wouldn't be seen for more than a year. So, it wouldn't affect next year's budget, I don't think. Is that right? >> Yes, that's correct. I I personally I don't think we need the answer to that question for this budget.
>> Well, you need to know if it's justified. >> Well, the the capital committee fully vetted spent a lot of time >> going over this stuff. I mean, did a lot of work, so it was fully vetted. I >> Yeah, I don't want to just be a rubber
stamp, but yeah, what Amy just said, the capital committee looked at these pass the amendment of the article as it's written. >> Okay. >> Okay. All right. We have a motion. We have a second.
>> Is there more discussion about a motion in front of the body? >> Okay. Karen, can you do a roll call vote? >> Yes. Lane. Yes, >> Jameson.
>> Yes, >> Lorraine. >> Yes, >> Mary. >> Yes, >> Michael. >> Yes. >> Yes. >> Cecil,
>> Jay, >> abstain. >> Motion carries. >> Okay. uh don't go don't go too far. >> Um >> the next one I would like to put in front of us
to presumably vote is the school budget because we discussed that quite recently and I'd like to Okay. 22 art 23. So I will share my screen.
>> Um >> I I'll drop on this one for the school budget. >> That's fine. That's fine. >> Thank you. I'll come back in. Uh, this is the recommendation. This is I believe Mr. Milano recommended, what I believe the school subcommittee looked
at, what we had quite a bit of discussion about last week. I will entertain a motion as always. Once the motion is made, we can discuss it. >> I'd like to make a motion to approve article 23 as written.
>> Okay. Do we have a second? >> Second. Is there discussion about article 23? >> Hearing none. >> When you're ready, Karen. >> Macy. >> Yes.
>> Yes. >> James, >> yes. >> Yes. >> Mary, >> yes. Yes. >> Michael, >> yes. >> Nick,
Cecil J, >> abstain. >> Motion carries. >> Okay. The next one I would like to look at this evening. Uh, and I would like to, you know, this
may be a short discussion. It may be no discussion at all, but just to be on the safe side, I'd like to invite uh Mr. Daly from the from the select board to come join us at the table. And I believe we have Mr. Luring from the
school committee on the phone. Uh >> first I'd like to look at is the uh stabilization funds. This is what Mr. Mono is proposing is $675,000 of the stabilization fund.
Nothing to capital and road special education stabilization fund. 500,000 operating budget stabilization fund. Why doesn't that say a million dollars? >> Includes the tax. >> Oh, the tax. Thank you. >> I had the same.
>> Okay. Uh, one reason I wanted to look at this, we we we by we I mean myself, Mr. Bailey, Miss Hagerty, members of the school committee, members of the school administration,
Miss Miss uh Dexter, all discussed uh this $500,000. And I would say the consensus of the room, not a unanimous consensus, but a broad consensus of the room was it' be good to build it in the special education stabilization fund. Uh Mr.
Mona, can you remind us, you know, the 30 secondond version of what that is, how it works, what it can be used for? >> Yes. The special education stabilization fund can be used for unanticipated special education or special education transportation costs that a district experiences
um to withdraw funding from it requires approval of both the school committee and uh the select board. So, it's meant to be, you know, more of a resource for unanticipated costs in a given year, uh, less than a kind of recurring, um,
source of funding each fiscal year, if that makes sense. So, it's it's kind of a backs stop for those unanticipated costs that might hit a district um, throughout the year. >> Not like that's different than the special education circuit breaker,
>> correct? The special education the circuit breaker account takes grant money from the state for circuit breaker for special education special education transportation and that can be used directly by the school department um without oh it's you know without necessarily
coming to a school committee and select board vote. So it's more of a kind of grant fund that they can utilize administratively just as we can administer our grant funds on the town side. >> They think I don't know this okay to ask questions. >> Yes please. I guess two questions. Um,
do they is there an anticipation that that will be funded every single year and is there an a planning other than you know unforeseen expenses? Is there an expectation of how it might be spent? Do they think it will be spent routinely
like some of it might be spent a given year? Is it really just an extra reserve fund in case you break glass something? I I'm just curious what the ant expectation of how it spend. Sure. I mean, I'd be happy to defer to Bark, but I think the what they have
expressed, if I'm not speaking out of turn, is is the latter. It's more meant to be treated as a former more meant to be treated as a emergency reserve kind of backs stop things come up rather than a recurring expense. And we can't commit
here today that we will be able to certainly fund it fiscal 28. But what we can do is in fiscal 28 recommend some appropriation to that fund to be available. If they don't use it in fiscal 27, then it's there in 28 as well. >> I I I will add to that um after our and
I don't think I forward to everyone after our meeting last Wednesday. At our meeting they had some sample policies that other towns have which is sort of mathematical. It's like, well, you look at what you're expecting to spend on special ed out of district or transportation or whatever. Then you
look at what you are and you subtract those. So, it's other towns have policies that make a little more rigorous than oops, we need money. Uh, and if I'm recalling correctly, we said that, you know, Milton maybe between now and the day of
town meeting would put together a policy like that. >> Yeah. This uh so the special education stabilization fund came part in this history better than any of us uh because of the rising costs and the override from last year. Um special education
funds are uh expenses are a major driver of the school budget. So many towns have this stabilization fund where you keep money aside circuit breaker doesn't cover anything or if you're in the middle of the year and you get a particularly expensive uh placement for a student, you can go to these funds and
not have to wait for the state. um the states um I'm not going to have this perfectly I'm not in the schools but the assessment and payments are done in October and so you could have things that happen after that go into operation or going into a meeting that sets it up so the schools and it would be a meeting
between the select board and the school committee to discuss what the issue is and then the funds could be released. Um so that's really the main the main focus of what the fund is. This is the first time this is the second year we've had it. the first year we funded it but the money was used 7,000 was used as part of
the override so this would be us funding it for it to be used in the case that so it may not be used next year uh in the policies would also be included is are we going to fund it year after year where we are right now is only this
first time also included in those policies would be perhaps after a number of years if there is not a cost and we've seen that special education costs have stabilized in some way does it roll back into operating does it get allocated in a separate place. So the school committee is taking the lead on
drafting those policies. Uh we'll be reviewing it. Hopefully we'll have something together before town meeting for all of those extra details. >> Mark, did I miss anything? >> No, I think y'all are doing a great job uh of explaining it. I think the just
the only other thing I'd highlight is uh the consultant report uh as we kind of shared related to kind of its um discussion of circuit breaker and building back circuit breaker. In that same section as well and within that report it talks about the special ed stabilization fund um establishing one
and utilizing kind of um free cash as a seed to begin the fund and then kind of moving forward. Not that um you know free cash allocations would be an annual thing towards it but rather the school department itself kind of came under
budget at the end of the year that a lot of places what they do is then uh utilize that kind of unused revenue to then put into the uh special ed stabilization fund in in future years. So it's kind of self-funded through the department uh but again seated with a a
one-time free cash allocation. And so again, this was I think um you know, Nick has been a great partner in this as he's heard kind of our our desire to to rebuild some of those stabilization funds uh as we've shared within the
warrant committee presentation. And so I identified this kind of early on as a potential avenue. And so we we appreciate that partnership and appreciate the select board's um support and advocacy uh through it. But happy to answer any other questions folks have.
I guess I have one more question, which is um what would be the pros and cons of of allocating that $500,000 to this new fund versus having it in the operating budget stabilization fund.
>> I think Jay's going to handle cons, so I will handle a bit of the pros. Uh one of the main pros for me is that this becomes a conversation point for the select board and school committee. If they are going
to if they're seeing um a rise in costs, we have to meet we have to discuss what those rising costs are before the funds are released. It also I think of it as a bit of a compromise with school committee and select board in the town in that they are giving up some
flexibility where they do not have the complete control over the funds but the funds are available. If the funds go into operating, I do believe we have to go to town meeting to get approval for those funds to be um released, which does not allow the flexibility for the
schools to use it when needed when they have those rising costs or those placements. And we, you know, we're not in the schools, we don't know how quickly those placements happen and how quickly they may need the funds and when they have it through circuit breaker and other sources, they do have a lot more flexibility to just allocate those funds
as needed. So, I think it's a big compromise also through conversation point. It's a way for us to support the schools to go for what we know is a big rise in cost. >> And I'll present the other side. As I said last Wednesday, there was a consensus, but not unanimous, and I was
in the minority. Uh yeah, whether we put it to the operating budget stabilization fund or leave it in free cash to help cover snow and ice, which would then lead to more contributions operating budget stabilization fund next year, maybe. I say it sounds a little um
overly complicated. Yeah, if we put we haven't hammered down an operating budget stabilization fund policy, but me and Mr. Milano working with others hope to do that before town meeting, but basically the idea is we put $500,000 on operating budget stabilization fund.
will have over the course of the next three years spread over three years $500,000 in uh operating revenue. I will say that putting less in the operating budget stabilization fund,
we saw that they are building a healthy reserve in circuit breaker. And so if I sort of mentally put together a special education stabilization fund and circuit breaker, add those together, they're very help
less. Take that a little less, put an operating budget stabilization fund, we get a little more in operating revenue every year. And if someone would say, well, you're taking away from the town. We had a
budget coordination meeting this morning where the town talked where the school administration talked about we need, you know, 5.2% every year to maintain level service and we're probably not going to get it. Let's get as close as we can to that. Well, if we take half a million
dollars, put in the operating budget stabilization fund, take out one point, sorry, half million, take out hund something, thousand dollars every year, that's money that will go to the school's operating budget partially every year. It'll be split among
everybody. So it makes us more likely to hit a comfortable increase every year for the schools but less likely to cover an emergency if we have a kid who cost half million
dollars programs going out of going out of town. So it's a trade-off. I like the flexibility of either not allocating it and having it go to free cash or allocating the operating budget stabilization fund.
Um, so that that's that's my view. Mr. uh no, Mr. Luring and Mr. Daly may have a different view. And I think I also said at last Wednesday's meeting the war,
if I could just add >> Hey, we lost your audio. I didn't hear what you just said. >> Uh, how much? >> I still can't hear you. >> Talking audience. >> Our friends at MATV can't hear you and
they know you can't hear us. >> It's working now. >> If you lean too far back away from the microphone, no one's hear. >> So, it's just a matter. >> There's no microphone. is the microphone. >> Uh, can someone else who's remote tell
us if you can hear us? >> Um, I can hear you now, but I couldn't hear you with the same time that Lee Michael couldn't hear you. >> Okay, how much did you miss? I don't know if >> it was your last like two sentences. >> Yeah,
>> brought tears to people's eyes. Sorry, you missed it. I think I was asking for your input, Mr. Mr. Luring. Do you care to make some? >> Um, yeah. I mean, we we talked about it
as a as a group. I think what we um generally expressed is like this this kind of again came from a place where the the town administrator and the select board were uh looking for the school department to utilize more of the circuit breaker reserve account going
into next year to build that account more slowly. Uh given those are funds we can expect to continue to receive kind of year-over-year uh reimbursements from the state and therefore could use to offset some uh recurring operating funds. Uh, and so obviously as we
presented to y'all, we we did that. We increased it by 400,000. And so, and they're kind of in that discussion, the idea was, well, if y'all increase this, then potentially we can utilize one-time funds to help build the the accounts. Um, uh, which I know, you know, Jay has
said before is kind of the right way to use one-time funds in terms of the stabilization funds. Um, so that was kind of the the genesis of of the conversation. Um, you know, again, I I would push back against the idea that our our balances
are very healthy. I think we've we've shared with you kind of where our goals are in terms of uh where we're trying to get the circuit breaker and why. I think I've shared we've shared previously of, you know, some of the deficits related to special education uh over the last couple years that that led to some
significant challenges with the school budget that, you know, were unfortunately impacted other parts of the town. Um, you know, we're in the the millions of dollars range. Uh, so these are not, you know, having a million dollars at the end of this year and circuit breaker is obviously a much
better position than we were in at the start of this year. And so great credit to Katie and John on that, but it's still not a place where we feel um incredibly confident. Uh, otherwise we wouldn't continue to have this plan to kind of keep building it back. uh you
know certain outofd district placements can be in the upwards of you know 400500 $600,000 for the year for the placement and for transportation and again those are things I think we talked about a little bit in our presentation the warrant committee so um again we feel in
a better place with circuit breaker this uh we've thought of this as kind of a a belt and suspenders model I agree with Winston on the point that you know the benefit of the specialed stabilization fund is it creates conversation between the the entity Um, so I think all those are are points
to the positive. As I said, as I said in the meeting on Wednesday, um, you know, I I could see us not advoc allocating it to the special ed stabilization fund and doing it elsewhere. And I would just want the boards to all be really clear that in a
scenario where there is a, you know, unanticipated special education kind of cost within next fiscal year or the following fiscal year that this funding then would not be available to the school department to
address that. And so it's possible we would need to come to the warrant committee or or the select board or other you know maybe town meeting to get different allocation from different accounts. Like that's just kind of where it is. Um and so like if all the boards are really okay with that and we think
that's the best path forward, I think we might be able to live with that. We just think the special ed stabilization plan itself is really kind of clear for town meeting, for the future select boards, for future school committees of just in the event of kind of these special ed
overages like we saw kind of over the last couple years, where do we go? Where where where do we um find the funds? And this is kind of one of those place to do it. And again, I just go back to the report we just received from our consultants which advocated for this
kind of exact thing. Now, whether $500,000 is the exact right amount or you know something slightly less, I think I also mentioned we want to you know if the boards uh collectively feel like hey a 30020 allocation difference
is is fine then that's something for discussion. I think, you know, at that meeting ultimately both Nick and Amy um who I I defer to a lot as to kind of how they look at the long-term finances of the town uh and where they think things should go. Both of them stated in the
meeting um that, you know, they felt the full 500,000 should go into the special ed stabilization fund. And so we um that's I think a school department uh or the members at least there generally kind of agreed with that. And that's that's where we landed >> for a procedure note. I don't know if
there's going to be any appetite on the warrant committee to amend this, but what I would like is for a motion in a second for what's in front of us. And then if there is the appetite to amend it, then we can
then someone can choose to or not make that amendment. That amendment can be voted up or down. So for processwise, I think it'd be great if someone made a motion for this as it stands. And then if someone wants to amend it, they can.
>> I'll move to approve the article as >> Okay, second. >> Okay, great. We have a motion. We have a second. We have a motion in front of us. Now, we can discuss the motion in front of us, including but not limited to I'm not I'm really not trying to trust any
arms. If there's a desire to make an amendment, you can. Otherwise, we'll vote on this as is shown. >> Yes, I'm inclined to support it. Uh but I I am I I I don't recall discussing
this with the school uh department when they made the budget presentation last week. I thought they did a great job talking about the circuit breaker and describing that. And I feel um disappointed that this wasn't covered as
part of that conversation because they're so interconnected and closely related. So I'm a little disappointed about that from a full transparency angle of it. And I'm also I think the way it's been described tonight makes a lot of sense and is really rationed out.
But I do wish there was analysis that would support the policy of expectations of how it might get spent over time. Um there's been a lot of talk about how we've been overbudget in special education. I would imagine there could be some forecasting of what those unexpected surprise and I know it's
going to be you know have a lot of variance from year to year but I feel like there should be able to come to some forecast on that to understand how it could get expended in the future and what the expectation for future funding requests for that could be in the future as well. So, I feel like it's kind of
incomplete and and and maybe not fully uh transparent as it could have been in discussions with the circuit breaker, but I think the concept of it makes a lot of sense the way it was described and the purpose for it. >> Well, I will take partial if not all responsibility for fact this didn't come
up last Tuesday. You make a very good point. Can I to to that point I had the same qu question but like where did the 500 come from? Like is that some analysis behind that? That's my question. Is there a variance normally 500,000?
>> Uh I mean I'll I'll defer to Mr. Wano, but I think it's that's what we had in free cash. We had x amount of free cash. >> So we but how do we come up with 500? >> Um no magic formula. I was as we were assessing potential use was it was um it
was really driven by um some of the conversations schools have been having about some of their targets around circuit breaker funding but there's no real rhyme or reason to the figure. I won't claim that there was one. >> So it doesn't go up. It hasn't like
jumped 400,000 one year or down. >> It it's been zero. We only just accepted this provision. >> No, no, but the special ed costs >> Oh, those >> you Do those jump that much? That's the question. What do they think? >> They can. They can. And they did. And um I'm not sure if the school committee
showed it in their presentation, but they had a the last 10 years by special education funds. I think from 2021, it was particularly high. Um there was a change in the state laws and costs. Transportation's been the driver. And I
think right now we don't have I think it's a bit till the summer we really know what the amount is going to be for the next year. What the state's going to hit you with? >> What the I'm sorry, what the state's going to hit you with, >> not necessarily the state, the the vendors, the actual cost, the cost of
tuition and transportation. The state has um >> preferred vendors. >> The state has committed to um rising raising funding amounts, but we know that it's a reaction to it. I don't want to get too far off track,
but I will share something with that I have from uh the state. >> Another point um just to add to why it may not have been in the school committee's um presentation is the schools don't factor in that 500,000 into their budget.
Um so that's a separate fund that's outside. So that may be the reason. >> So when we look at This is from state information total eligible expenses an eligible expense and I'm Mr. Lauren can correct me but it's basically if you
have a kid and that kid's expenses are more than $50,000 a year. This is a circuit breaker calculation then they're part of that. So this going between four and a half million up to 8 million down to 7.8 million. I think that's all the
kids who are above $50,000. Add those all up and then uh this is the circuit breaker calculation. This is what we don't get reimbured for. This is what we do get reimbured for. And this is 75 70 to 75% of that. Sorry, the
people at home can't see my hand gestures. >> Who created this chart? Was this from >> I did. >> Oh, it's from you. Where does the data from? >> The data is from the state. So I have >> circuit. Yeah. Circuit breaker >> circuit breaker
>> come from the school though >> every town for every year >> data come from school. >> They have to report it to the state. The state pulls it all together for every district in Massachusetts on an annual basis. Are you saying shouldn't the schools should I not be sharing? >> No. I'm just curious like No. No. I'm just curious like you know um
>> yeah I I don't love sharing sort of unvetted unchecked numbers but this this gross number is I don't think I could have messed that up and no you can see it went from 5.7 to 8.1 million that was that was the year that all hell broke
loose uh other years it went down other years it popped around so >> it's a pretty big range >> yeah it is a big range Uh, sort of. >> That's That's all special ed, right? >> Yes. >> Hey, Jay. >> Yes.
>> You got two hands up. Mark was first. Oh, >> okay. Uh, go ahead, Mark. >> Uh, thank you. I just to comment on two things. U, the reason we didn't bring this up in the, uh, budget presentation was was a bit um, I think what was
referenced is just this is not our warrant article. So, the the free cash allocation is not an article coming from the schools. It is coming from um the town administrator and and the select board. And again, we're we're appreciative of the support, but that that's one of the reasons. Uh and we as
was said kind of built our budget with the um essentially the assumption that we weren't going to get anything within free cash because it still even at that time wasn't clear exactly where this conversation was going to land because we didn't have them. We presented to you
on Tuesday and then we had kind of the joint meeting about the 500,000 on Wednesday. So everything we did around kind of our projections was assuming let's just assume we don't get it because there was some kind of um back and forth disagreement on exactly how to utilize this 500,000 and is this the
right way. And so we decided that again given it was not our warrant article and there was not kind of consensus at that point about exactly what's going to happen to this. We didn't um we didn't bring it up in the kind of school budget presentation uh which was the point of
topic last Tuesday. So certainly apologize if anybody felt like we we should have raised it or discussed it there, but that that was the reasoning uh behind not doing it. Um and then yeah again the the general idea is just special ed costs are really uh
unpredictable very expensive at times and you know when we set the budget in March things change in April uh May June all you know all the way through kind of um the following year and so uh there
have been times years in recent past in Milton where those changes uh really negative ly impacted not just the school department budget uh but also had impacts on kind of the broader town budget. And so um again as we shared
kind of within the presentation warrant committee, we are thinking first and foremost of how are we being good financial stewards? thoroughly making sure we're creating budget sustainability and creating these these places where uh we can accommodate for
what are you know unknown variables but but it is a known unknown. We know that special education can be very costly and unpredictable and we need to create mechanisms for um for anticipating those unknowns to to pop up. Uh and so circuit
breaker is the primary way in which we are doing that. That was our kind of preferred avenue. there's no way for the town to directly allocate funds into the circuit breaker. They would need to kind of put that within the school operating budget. We would just draw down on it. And so it was determined that was not kind of a viable path. So the the
special ed stabilization fund was kind of the next um viable path that that u again most of the the people in that conversation uh last Wednesday kind of seem to agree upon. >> Mark, you uh created a new question with
that update uh from me. Can you just verify the presentation that you made last week? Uh, nothing in there because you said you didn't factor in this 500,000 because you weren't sure what was going to happen. Nothing in that appropriation request changes as a result of what we do or don't do with
this 500,000. Is that right? >> Correct. Nothing changes. >> Okay. Thank you. Um Jay, my question was really for you and that is if you had your brothers, where would you put a breakdown of that $500,000 elsewhere in
the budget? >> Um, speaking as only 115th of the warrant committee. >> Yeah, that's why I used your name. >> Y uh I think I think I'd like to not allocate
it and have it go straight to free cash, which will help with the snow and death. ISIS deficit. >> Mr. Chair, if I could just procedurally to kind of spell that out a little bit more is, you know, we'll have more information about the snow and ice deficit once we close the books, we'll
have a fall town meeting. So, in theory, an appropriation at Falltown meeting could put money, say if the appropriation of sped stabilization sped stabilization fund was zero, it could be made at that point to put some into sped stabilization, some to the snow and ice deficit. So because it's free cash, we
would get to try to get it certified ASAP at the end of the year. All options remain on the table for a fall town meeting. I just want to make sure all the members were aware of that as a process kind of point. So you weren't making a decision making. You had to decide right here and right now. >> I hear what you're saying. I think I'd
rather make a decision. Yeah. I just want to share. I I hate to be too wishy-washy, but this is one where I'd like to I've had my you know, I've given my opinion, but I'd like to hear the wisdom of the warrant committee because I've been I've been
sort of neck deep in this for three months and you all haven't. And uh that's why I want your fresh opinions. >> Um Jay, one more thing. It sounds like there were good discussions between the school and the
town administrator and the select board. Um it it stood out to me that on that list that was cited earlier about folks who agreed where this money was. I wish the warrant committee was on that list too. I really want to be going into town meeting as a united front on most of
these big things um to try and repair some of the hard feelings that exist. And so I would just ask that folks um try hard to come together on decisions like this because I think we probably should have been able to reach an agreement prior to today's meeting
about, you know, consensus on where this $500,000 should go. Um that said, Jay, I don't I don't feel like we're going to reallocate this money today. I don't I don't feel like the support is there for that. Um and I would I would choose to
just vote it the way it is. Yeah, you're you're right me, Michael. One problem is, you know, there are out of five select board members, there are two that are on the finance committee. Out of six school committee members, there are three that are on the finance committee. In theory, all 15 of us are interested
in the town budget. So, I I've struggled a little bit. I mean, I guess the answer is we could have discussed this at a warrant committee meeting, period. But that's what I've struggled a little bit was when everybody's coming together, how is the warrant committee fairly represented? And I don't know the answer.
>> You know, I'm sorry. >> Okay. Also, I'll amend what I said a few seconds ago. I would only want to change this if the representative of the select board and the representative of the school committee who are here gave an informal
okay. It's not worth a town meeting floor fight. committee versus committee over we're gonna save money where are we gonna save so Brian you you're running >> I was just gonna agree with you I um I
do think I you know you you're off one at least 1.2 2 million on snow this year. You were off 800,000 last year I think like you know it's under budget. We know it is. So I think this you don't know that that's under budget. It might be but you don't really know. So I would
agree with Jay that would be a better place to put it. If there's consensus on that I' certainly go forward with that. Makes sense to me. You could make a motion and test whether or not there's consensus. >> Yeah, I mean that's we have a motion on the floor. You can make a motion to
amend. >> Okay, I'll make a motion to amend. Just put this in take this and put it in >> part or all. >> Well, I'd say that's a good question. Paul. >> Okay. >> So, this all goes into the operating
budget stabilization fund. >> No, I think you're no budget. >> Free cash. you want to go to free cash. So, >> okay. >> So, your amendment is to take the 500,000, turn it to zero, >> which would effectively leave an additional 500,000 not allocated.
>> Right. And I do think we should change the budget on the snow. >> Well, that's a separate question. >> Okay. We have a motion in front of us. Do we have a second? >> Second. >> What's that? >> Well, I mean, >> okay. Yeah,
>> we have a second. We should >> um I would like to turn to our two guests from the >> select board and the school committee to briefly >> tell us what they think of this. >> Mr. Dailyy, >> so the if I hear right, what would
happen is this would 500,000 would go to zero and just be left unallocated to be appropriated at a future town meeting presumably to town meet to Stone Ice, but not necessarily. >> I'm not presuming that. I'm presuming you go straight to free cash. But specifically that we want it to go
to snow and ice. >> Oh no. >> Is that or is that No, it could be used for snow and ice or it could be used for special. >> Yeah, I don't think we can hear. >> So what'll happen is it'll be it'll close out contribute to the free cash certificate. I just want to make sure we're all on the same page. It'll close out. It'll be contributed to the free
cash certification. Say we have $3 million in free cash in October. Half a million of that will be from this. for anything to happen with it, it would need to be voted and appropriated by town meeting anyway at a future town meeting just >> Okay. >> Okay.
>> Mr. Dailyy, can I hear your thoughts on this? >> I may need a little bit more time with this. I would not want to change this from schools being as this is where we started our initial budget conversation was having this $500,000 in special
education budget for what was when we started duty override in this year what was one of our major drivers of cost expense I understand that we now have this really bad winter and the snow and ice
cost I think we have a good time with that Mr. Milano was not flagged that as something that is absolutely the most important thing. Um so I think we do have time to fund snow and ice and I would like the school budget to be finished this allocation and this fund
to be funded so that we can move forward schools. That would be my preference. >> Thank you Mr. Daily. Um Mr. Lauren, we we heard some of your opinions earlier but would you like to say anything now? Yeah, I'll just I'll first couch this in that I'm again just one member of a
sixperson board and so we haven't obviously taken a a vote on this or anything like that. So I I hesitate in these moments to speak too much just be because of that. I don't want this to kind of be mistaken as the the voice of the school committee. Um I I will echo
the sentiment that um Lee Michael said earlier and that others did around just uh the the value of approaching town meeting as kind of a united uh tri three boards. Uh I think that's really important. Again, this is not originally our warn
article is a warn article from the town administrator and select board uh in order to support the schools. Uh which we really appreciate. I know, you know, when John has talked to y'all before, um when we were there last week, uh you know, really flagged kind of how we approached the start of this year with
concerns around the ability to address kind of unforeseen, uh high costs, especially um as it relates to special ed. So I I know that is kind of why we we think this would be a positive allocation and it's aligned to what the
um the report uh from our um consultants kind of advocated for as well. I I defer a lot to I don't know enough about the snow and ice and and our ways in which we can close it. I I totally agree with the warrant committee members pieces that like that's obviously a a concerning deficit. It's something that
at some point we will need to close. But in terms of if this $500,000 of free cash is necessary to do that, I don't know from my seat. I would defer to Nick and Amy on uh the ways in which they are, you know, thinking there are reasonable ways to do that that don't
hurt the town long term. Um but again, if this is a place where you know the the warrant committee really ha has significant concerns and would like to kind of delay this vote until by putting this to free cash and having
it kind of come up in in the fall um either some or all of it, then you know I think that's probably something the school department can live with given we did make a decision assuming that this was kind of un unclear and uh we still feel good about kind of how we are building up our circuit breaker over
time. I do think it just puts even more emphasis on our our need to kind of utilize the the circuit breaker account uh build that up uh to kind of a healthy level if we are not allocating anything kind of once again to this uh special ed
stabilization fund because because as I said that just means there's kind of one less lever to use. >> Loring >> in the event of unexpected costs. >> Lauring. >> Yep. >> Um I I took from Mr. daily that he was opposed to this amendment. I I'm Can you summarize where you're standing?
>> Again, I don't I don't want to speak for the full school committee. I in general, I would uh the schools would appreciate having these funds in order to protect against special ed costs. However, again, this is not our warrant article. I I would defer to Nick uh and Amy and
then, you know, the judgment of the warrant committee as as a whole as it relates to kind of um a free cash allocation. Thank you. >> All right. >> Is there discussion among the warrant committee about this amendment? >> So what I guess what I'm hearing then is that if we were to vote for this
amendment that they'd be losing the flexibility to use this for special education without a special vote of town meeting, right? Just to summarize. >> Yes. >> Is that right? >> It sounds it sounds to me that the need um for special education is more
prominent than snow and ice at this point because snow I mean our winter's over, right? I mean it's hopefully >> it's never coming back. >> It's coming back >> snow today. >> I know there's no plowing as well for salting. Um so I mean that's what I gather. I mean not to put words in your
mouth that the need is greater here and more immediate than it is for snow. Am I correct in that? >> I'm I'm not going to speak for Milano or just for you. >> Just for me and as one one member of the select board. >> Uh I believe so. Um I think in our
discussions on snow and ice which having more that we have a sort of a longer road on funding that so I would like this to stay as flexibility.
>> Am I correct in that this deficit of snow and ice can be discussed in the fall town meeting? >> Correct. So yeah, there's the first step will be existing appropriations of fiscal 26 that this committee will have to approve prior to June 30th. Um then
fall town meeting and then the third option I mentioned is related to when we set the tax rate and potential revenue sources then. So there are a few there are a few options. It is a big number. I I don't want to I was just asking Amy if it's coming off like I'm not worried at
all about this one and a half million dollars because I don't want that to be the concern. All I wanted to reiterate is as you say there are a few different pathways and a few different options and we'll have a better more information in a few months particular around the federal funding a and then b how much we
can absorb within this budget that then determines what other resources do we truly need um beyond uh those two Is there further discussion about this amendment? >> So, we're going to have a vote. To be clear, if you vote yes on the amendment,
that means you want to reduce this $500,000 to zero, which will deacto make it go to free cash. If you vote no on this amendment, you're saying you want to keep this as it is shown. Does everyone understand how we're voting?
>> Okay. Karen, can you do a roll call vote? >> Macy, >> no. As >> Elaine, >> no. >> James, >> no. >> Lorraine, >> no. Larry,
>> no. >> Brian, >> yes. >> Michael, >> no. >> Nick, >> no. Cecil >> J >> abstain. >> Motion does not carry.
>> Okay. So, we're back to the main motion which is as presented. Is there further discussion? I think we've discussed it pretty well. >> Further discuss. Well, sorry. >> No, no. I was >> Oh, you're actually sneezing. Okay.
>> Giving you a signal. >> Can we Can we add qualifications? Like I would like I'm as I said before, I'm supportive of it. I think it's seems really well reasoned. Um and respectfully I stand by I think
it was you know that uh transparency builds trust and the fact that even though it wasn't department's um warrant item they knew that this was being discussed broadly and in this really special I mean appropriately but you know in this really important topic
they kind of left out this important discussion topic. I I'll add to that again. Taking on the responsibility. >> We we met Tuesday. >> Yeah. No, I'm not trying to I I do want to add we met Tuesday and then they're saying, "Okay, when can all of us, you know, me, Mr. Bailey, talk about this
$500,000?" And they even said, "Can we do that at your Tuesday night meeting?" And I said, "No, please. That Tuesday night meeting is going to be f full enough. Please do not add that." So, it's even more on me than I previously said it was. >> Um, >> but I I just think that that's good. I
appreciate that. Um, and I just think it would be important to get some sort of understanding of future funding and expectations of spending for future allocations. And if there's a way to attach that to this, that would be great. But at least, you know, to to
have that noted for for next year. >> Well, again, I think >> something we keep in the back of our minds >> between now and town meeting. I hope there's been adoption of a policy or at least a proposal of adoption of policy. I see your hand mark just a second that you know we're looking at these other
towns that say you know plug this formula into this thing and you get out this number that is what's going to come out of this fund. So yeah I I don't love it if it's just well anytime there's special ed you allocate money. Uh Mr. exploring.
>> Yeah, just echo that sentiment that has been discussed uh at the school committee level and um with Winston and Megan uh at the select board level. Uh we totally agree. Uh Wednesday we have our weekly finance meeting and um on the agenda is a special ed stabilization
policy. Um trying to create a first draft to then send over to the select board uh for their review and approval because it needs to be a joint policy. but also happy to share any draft with uh this board as well and and get feedback. Um so yeah, I agree with all
those points. >> Um Mr. Tangney, are would you like to work on this policy with these people? >> I can if people need me to, but I don't need to. >> Well, we'll put a pen in that. In the meantime, we have an a we have an art we
have a motion in front of us. A motion, a second. Is there more discussion? Okay, Karen, can you do a vote? >> Stacy. >> Uh, yes. As to article 27. >> Yes. I'm sorry. Article 27 as originally
proposed is what we're voting on. >> Voted yes. >> Yes. >> James, >> yes. >> Lorraine, >> yes. >> Larry, >> yes. >> Ryan, >> yes. >> Michael,
>> yes. Nick, >> yes. >> Cecil, >> yes. Jay, >> post. >> Motion carries. >> So, I am going to lay out where I think we stand. There are give or take 30
articles that we have not voted on. Uh, most of them are budget articles. I will put a call out. I will ask every warrant committee member who is here now for any budget article that you are the expert on or even any budget article that you weren't the expert on would you like to
discuss it now that's very big then our options in front of us >> we can yeah it is 9:18 we can do some or all of these tonight as roll call votes
another option is on the agenda. It's a Thursday night meeting which is in person only. The reason it is in person only is if we're in person only, they're not going to be roll call votes. They're going to be show of hand votes. Say I going to go a lot quicker than roll call votes.
Um so as the consensus of the room, do we want to stay and grind some or all of these out >> or we want to put it off till Thursday? I think we're pretty good till Thursday. >> Okay. I mean, some people either
>> I was gonna I was going to say my vote would be let's do five tonight, but if people really don't want to, we don't have to. >> Okay, people are parliamentary suggestion. um you may be able to treat it almost like a consent
agenda where somebody moves to recommend articles numbered 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10. So I don't know if that's perfect Robert's rules, but I think for the purposes of the warranty, it might work. >> I appreciate the suggestion, but I want to at least look at every single one and
vote on every single one. I I'm sorry, but I do feel >> I love the consent agenda, but it makes me feel it always makes me a little uncomfortable ever since they adopted it. It's like stuff like that. >> Yeah. >> Let's decide. Are we going to adjourn or
are we going to do a few discussion? >> The people in the room certainly are having the adjourn feeling. Okay. Can I have a commitment? We need eight people for a quorum. I will be there. Will seven other people be there in person in the basement of town hall?
Seeing hands. I'm seeing hands. Does that have to be >> I can be there. Jay. >> Okay. I'm seeing six other people at least. I think we're good. Not Macy. James Lee raised his hand. I I count. Okay. I'm writing your names in blood on
a piece of paper. You will be there in in town hall basement 7 p.m. Thursday. I'm thinking less than an hour. >> Motion to adjurnn. >> Second. Thank you very much.
>> Night.