##VIDEO ID:https://videoplayer.telvue.com/player/994DtmGEsi0VDYK3jJI2BJ72GfgNIpU2/media/925786?autostart=false&showtabssearch=true&fullscreen=false## <v Speaker 1>Good evening and welcome to the</v> January 8th select board meeting. We are live and on Zoom and being recorded by Pegasus for later viewing declaring the meeting open at 6 32 and calling it to order. If everyone in the room who is able will stand so we can see the pledge of allegiance and take a moment of silence to think of those who are serving in harm's way to protect our town and our nation. <v Speaker 2>P to the flag of the United States of America</v> and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under, under God, indivisible, with Liberty. Liberty, and Justice for all. Thank you. <v Speaker 1>First announcement is</v> regarding the Eversource vegetation management work 2025. Mr. Marshall, <v Speaker 3>Thank you members of the board, this is just</v> to update the public that Eversource is gonna be completing right of way work. You will be notified if they're gonna be completing work within your area. They'll reach out to you, be in contact. This work is within their right of way and work that needs to be done to make sure that trees don't impact their transmission lines. We will get information up on the website so that people are aware of it and this is just a annual, annual work that they complete. <v Speaker 1>Thank you Mr. Marshall. Martin Luther King Day is</v> approaching Mr. Erickson. <v Speaker 4>Thank you Madam Chair. Yeah,</v> the town is working in collaboration with our some community partners on the MLK event, including the school department as well as Spark kindness. There's a a series of events and I'd encourage everybody to go to the Spark Kindness website 'cause they have a whole series of events at their website, but it's really, there's a main program that's gonna be featuring some student groups, some creative contests, some community leaders, and keynote speaker Jamel and Amy Adams. And then there's a community connection event held at 9:00 AM that same day before that main program with activities for all ages. And then there's also a service opportunity fill the van food drive for the service council as part of the day's events. There's other materials for viewing at the, the, sorry, the Spark Kindness website. Most of the event starts at 9:00 AM There's also a 10:00 AM program January 20th. All of this has actually happened at the Natick High School, so all are encouraged to attend. <v Speaker 1>Thank you Mr. Erickson.</v> Lastly, I wanted to raise an issue that came to my attention shortly after the last meeting on December 18th. And that was that there were some individuals who were in the room or on Zoom who did not want to speak because they did not want to give their address in public. So going forward, this board will not, it's not legally required. This board will not ask for an address. We will ask only if the individual is in Natick resident and keeping with town meeting tradition 6 45 public speak. We can start that early. Any individual may raise an issue that is not included on the agenda and it will be taken under advisement by the board. There'll be no opportunity for debate during this portion of the meeting. And that's due to open meeting law. This section of the agenda is limited to 15 minutes and any individual addressing the board during this section of the agenda shall be limited to five minutes. If you could just give us your name, please and whether you're an NAIC resident. <v Speaker 5>Good evening folks, and Happy New Year.</v> My name is Jerry Pierce. I live at 2 0 1 Elliot Street in South Natick. And I just wanna let you know that I've been an avid advocate for senior citizens all my life. And even when I was a kid, my dad instilled in me and five sisters that we should take care of our elders. You can imagine that was quite a hoot. Have five sisters. But, but anyways, so I brought that philosophy to me with me to natick my, my adopted hometown and as a result of volunteered other senior center for over 30 years in one capacity or another, I've been chair of the COA board. I've been president of the board, the friends of the COA and right now I'm treasurer of the friends board and I have been for 10 years there has a term limit. So I'm in there for a good, unless I'm voted out. But you could imagine if someone would dare to do that. But anyways, I've been very okay. I I said that I have to have notes because the, that pre is not what's cracked up to be. Okay. I I said that it, well, what I, what I want to tell you is actually over those 30 years I've observed a lot of things down at the senior center, wherever, wherever it has been housed. And it's been housed in many places. And what I haven't observed down there, I've been told about, as, you know, people like to confide in. I'm one of the targets. So what I wanna tell you this tonight is don't look so somber. This is gonna be a good one. I wanna say thank you. Thank you to Jamie, the human resources and anyone else that had anything to do with hiring our current Director of Community and Human Services. Is it okay to mention Angela's name? <v Speaker 1>That would be perfectly suitable. Thank you.</v> <v Speaker 5>Well, anyways, it's for all of us down there,</v> especially the friends board because we have a lot of interaction with the COA board and the staff down there. It's been a breath of fresh air to say the least. It has been absolutely wonderful to be able to voice concerns, express ideas, and to ask for little things and not to hear a great big no from the very outset. And so we are just so happy that we have someone like Angela there and her staff. They are terrific, every one of them. And this is not a paid political announcement. I did not know that Angela was gonna be here today. <v Speaker 1>I</v> <v Speaker 5>Met her in the hallway really.</v> But that, that was my main purpose of coming here tonight, was to say thank you again. Because, you know, it's been a rocky road down there for many years. And now we just have a, a whole new environment and a whole new inspiration to do good things for the seniors. And the friends are very senior oriented, just last year alone with given over $25,000 for various programs and events down there. And we're so happy to do that. We wanna do more all that we can, but it's nice to do it in conjunction with the COA. And now that we have that renewed inspiration down there, we hope to work with the COA much more and do things on a collaborative basis. So thank you for that. And thank you again everyone who had anything, anything to do with Angela's appointment. O Okay. Angela, I'll send you my invoice. Yes. <v Speaker 1>Thank you so much Mr. Pierce.</v> I would recognize Mr. Foss, please. <v Speaker 6>Yeah, Josh. Thank you Frank Foss.</v> And yes, I am a resident of Natick. Does that comply? All right, <v Speaker 1>I'm gonna check that out.</v> <v Speaker 6>Yeah, you better check that. Two small things.</v> We lost our 39th president most recently. And I would hope that the select board and, and all of our boards recognize that that happened. This doesn't happen very often and a pretty important person. So that, I would hope that the record of the meeting shows that the board duly recognizes the only democratic president that I've ever voted for, quite frankly, who I think was actually a very good man, showed more character when he wasn't president. The, when he was, I think, and many people would, would agree with that. So I, that's one point. The second point is, where's the 2023 annual town report? I'm having a hell of a time trying to validate and, and square up the information that was provided on December 12th. I think during, in the presentation and the 2025 budget report and what was voted at town meeting. And I can't get the actuals. I don't have the actuals to really come to any, at least understanding of what the budget is. You need that town report for that purpose. Where is it? So maybe you don't have to answer it because that's not part of this process, but you gotta have that. It's an important tool. It also has a lot about the good information in there that I think we, we need to make a good decision on the override. <v Speaker 1>Thank you very much Mr. Foss.</v> I, I would also like to just ditto my ditto Mr. FO's comments about the passing of President Clinton. Who, for those of us who are in public Carter Carter, oh my goodness. That wasn't wishful thinking. That was not wishful thinking. Honestly. President Carter, thank you. Who, for those of us who choose to be involved in public service, he was a model. And I remiss in not recognizing that at the beginning of our meeting. And thank you. He's lying in state now in Washington and his funeral will be shortly. So thank you for reminding us Mr. Fos. It's very important. Is there anyone else in the room who would like to speak address the board through public speak? Mr. Ostroff, did you have your hand up? Mr. <v Speaker 7>Ostroff chair? Hi Josh Ostroff.</v> I am live Natick of course. And and I'm speaking to you on behalf of the Friends of Natick Trails. I want to thank everyone that supported and participated in the New Year's Eve celebration on the rail trail last week. And to particularly commend the town staff who were instrumental in this being a fun and safe and successful event. The Public Works department led by Brian Casey and and the director Lang, the Deputy Chief Lanne and patrol officers who provided assistance, chief KY and lieutenant, sorry Deputy ick and of course the board and staff in town hall made a huge difference in making this be a successful event. We know that we can do better. We, a couple thousand people had a great time, but we really want feedback so that this annual tradition can improve. So if people want to go to the website friends of natick trails.org, there's a link to a survey that we'll have up for a few more days and we wanna know what you liked and what you think we can do better so we can improve upon this event. We've got some great ideas and really appreciate all the community input. I just want to comment that you know, we had a couple of dozen hosts, many most of whom had fire pits, a lot of non-profit organizations or businesses, community groups were involved. We had live performances, we had wonderful participation from the amvets and it was just a really fun evening. We could definitely use more volunteer help. So even if you don't have an opinion about the event and you wanna sign up to volunteer at the same website, friends of native trails.org is the place to go. I appreciate the opportunity to comment and glad to be part of that event. Thank you so much Madam Chair and select board members. <v Speaker 1>Thank you Mr. Ostroff, is there anyone in the room</v> who would like to address the board under public speak? Yes sir. If you could come to the podium and just your name and that you're a resident of Natick. <v Speaker 8>My name is Roger Scott.</v> I live at 40 Water Street and I just wanted to throw an idea out there. Hopefully it'll be listened to. I'd like to see a Slack board taking an initiative of having a website that displays purchases and expenses as we pay bills so that people in the community can see today we bought a police car invoice, scanned, pop it out there, let the people see what's going on. I think we need more disclosure in the town. It's a lot of mystery to a lot of the things that go on the town. I think it needs to be brought out there and and that I think would open it up in anyone who wants to look at what the expenses were in a situation, what a payroll over on might look like or some kind of a deal where they'll be able to have the ability to follow what the town is doing and how much is it costing the tax base of the town. So I'd like to see select board act on that as policy. Thank you very much. <v Speaker 1>Thank you Mr. Scott. And I assure you</v> that the board does listen to all the comments and make notes that are brought before us. Ms. Dr. Mackenzie, <v Speaker 9>I, Donna Mackenzie.</v> This is more our point of order. I think the door is supposed to be open. When I came here there was actually somebody sitting outside it it, you can't tell if you're in executive session or open session. And it was my understanding that the door is, so are we supposed to to be left open during an open meeting? <v Speaker 1>They're supposed to be left unlocked</v> and if we're in executive session we always put a sign saying that we don't normally leave it open just because the sounds from there interfere with Pegasus picking up the sounds for our microphones. <v Speaker 9>Okay then thank you for that clarification.</v> <v Speaker 1>Thank you Dr. Mackenzie.</v> Are there any other comments in the room or anybody else who wishes to address the board? Mr. Coburn, I'm just winding up public speak. Are you here for public speak? No, thank you. Just that I check. Moving on to the agenda, discussion and decision. The first item is override decision. Discussion. Oh, dis discussion, not decision. Discussion. And yes, override discussion. Thank you Mr. Erickson. <v Speaker 4>Thank you Madam Chair. Wanted to use this</v> as an opportunity just to highlight a few updates since the last time the board met in December and also to highlight to the public the, the, the website or the town page on the website. Regarding the override, we've established a town page for the website for the override sorry town website for the override and for the budget override for FY 26. It's a very interactive website, meaning you can ask questions through the website, you can sign up for alerts. I encourage anybody to sign up for alerts 'cause anytime we post something new on the website, it'll ping people who have signed up for alerts. Our goal with people who ask questions through the website is to try to turn around answers to those questions on a weekly to 10 day basis. Depending on the number and volume of questions, will we get to every single question? Potentially our, our goal is to do that, but it could be that we have so many questions in volume that we might need to, to make sure that we answer as many as we can as quickly as we can. We did actually, for example, today just released a batch of questions. There's about 15 to 20 questions that came in over the holiday break through the website. And there's the question and the answer on there are tend to publish all questions with answers on that website. It also has other materials, the presentation that was provided to the public on the 16th, the public meeting, the school committee, and the select board joint meeting. There's also other documents that are on there and there'll be more documents posted on there as this process moves forward. This is also the, we just formalized the schedule or a schedule for a series of public forums. The first of which will be the 21st of January. The idea there is for the public to have an opportunity to ask questions if they can't do it through the website or through other means to come and basically listen to and, and be able to understand more about the override and what an override is and, and how can and be part of the process and be engaged in the process. There's also intended the intent to have two additional public forums, one on February 11th and one on March 12th. Those are strategically placed around the times of one post when the budget will be released. So we're obligated to post the budget on February one. It'll be February 3rd this year. 'cause February 1st is a weekend, so it'll be the following Monday and we'll likely do a joint meeting that week with the school committee select board and finance committee. That's what we've been doing the last couple years. So the following week we scheduled a public forum so that members of the public can also learn more about the budget and the line item in detail of the budget. And then the march is really just an opportunity, another opportunity for the public to be engaged and and for us to understand and be engaged with the public as well. All of those are intended to be in locations that are not town hall so that people can, can feel welcome. Not that town hall is not welcoming but in a different environment. The first one on the 21st of of January is at the Morse and then the next one in February is at the community senior center home of our great leader. Thank you Mr. Pierce. And the final one will be back at the Mors Library in the Lebowitz meeting room at the lower level. In addition, we do wanted to make sure the board was aware that we did get certified free cash as well as certified revenues or free the version of free cash for our enterprise funds. For the general fund, our free cash got certified at 7.8 million approximately. So that is meeting the targets for what we had presented on the 16th to the public. With regards to the override, that's a pretty decent number. It's above average. Is it sustainable long term? I mean meaning is it gonna be consistently that high? Long term? That's not our expectation, but it is the free cash certified number for federal fiscal year 25, sorry, fiscal year 25. The other funds were the enterprise funds with Water and Sewer Enterprise Fund that was certified at 2.8 million and the Golf course Enterprise fund, which is certified at 947,000, which is actually great for the golf course. 'cause for a while there we were actually helping to subsidize that. So the fact that they're getting revenues above their expected expenses is a, is a great story. Both those enterprise funds are really unrelated to the override because they operate in their own revenue generation model, meaning the rate payers of the users pay for those funds. So those are somewhat unrelated to the override, but I wanted to make sure 'cause they were all in the same report. I wanna make sure the public was aware of that on the override. I'm, I'm really just trying to ensure that the public is encouraged to utilize the portals on the website to ask questions through the portal. It'll let us collect the questions, be transparent with the public on answers to those questions and engage in the process. I've also been working with the school department on other ways for engagement. We're actually also working with the finance committee chair to figure out how best to work with the finance committee and their process. Obviously once the budget's released, their process for town meeting continues and, and really jumpstarts. But we're working to figure out what between now and then is most beneficial to the finance committee. Happy to answer any questions to the board at this time or however you want to handle it. Madam Chair, <v Speaker 1>Members of the board, do you have questions or comments?</v> Ms. Pope? <v Speaker 10>Mr. Erickson, thank you for that update.</v> Those numbers that you just stated about the free cash and the, I think it was the sewer and <v Speaker 4>Water enterprise fund and</v> <v Speaker 10>Golf course.</v> All of those numbers, are they gonna be added to the website, the override information website? <v Speaker 4>We can add the,</v> we we can certainly add those to the website. I think we wanna look at how we add them because the water and Sierra enterprise and the golf course are somewhat separate from override and I don't wanna wanna make sure there isn't a confusion there. One thing that we've also actually as of today, we've already put together a draft free cash. We call it a spending plan, but it's really the intent of, of the use of free cash that we'll bring to this board at your next meeting. It wasn't quite ready for tonight 'cause we only just got the certification this morning. And once that is sort of reviewed by this board, we'll then also can post that on the website as well. <v Speaker 10>I can see that being the,</v> the more appropriate number, leaving out the others. And I'm specifically speaking to that number. A lot of people ask about that number, they're curious, they're confused. And I think in the way of transparency, we could let the public know that that is a thing. Absolutely. Yeah. And allow them to ask questions and, and be that a point of clarification as to what it is and you know, why it should not necessarily play into the budget, not not the budget, it's a part of the budget, but play into their decision about whether or not we need an override. <v Speaker 4>Yeah, we'll we'll probably just more put the number up</v> there and and answer questions as people have that number. Yeah. In the presentation that we provided on the 16th, there was some dialogue around free cash and the intended use of free cash and how Nat has typically used free cash. So we wanna be mindful of ensuring that, that we are consistent with, with, with, with our, with our dialogue <v Speaker 10>To date.</v> Yes. And that's mainly what I mean. I just, I see it as a point of clarification for people who, who need it. <v Speaker 4>Absolutely.</v> <v Speaker 10>Yeah. Yes. Thank you.</v> <v Speaker 1>Mr. Erickson, could you speak to,</v> or would it be inappropriate at this time to speak to the projections which were pre presented on December 16th with regard to override calculations with an override? How much of free cash would be projected to be used when with the initial numbers and without one? How much would be projected to be used? <v Speaker 4>Certainly and, and obviously a lot depends on,</v> on the final budget. That will be of course presented of course or the final draft budget that will be presented February one. But then the presentation which is available on the override website, the no override use of free cash. Meaning if override, the board chooses not to put on the ballot or if it gets voted negatively by the voters or we just for whatever reason, don't have the override As, as contemplated in the presentation, the intended amount of free cash use was 6.5 million. That was helpful really just towards all operational costs to cover all operational costs. The with override use of free cash for operational purposes was 2.5 million. Now in both scenarios, any balance and now that we have the $7.8 million number, we can better understand what that balance is. But any balance of unused of free cash that would not be used for operational purposes. Our intent and our recommendation, which is consistent, how we've always intended and recommended to town meeting and to to the town to consider is use those things for one-time funds such as or one-time expenses such as rebuilding stabilization accounts and or capital. So in both scenarios, and this is what we'll presenting to the board at a future meeting about the free cash scenario use of the use of free cash scenario, it would be showing replen continuing to replenish our stabilization accounts and or use for one-time capital OPEP is also part of that. We've used it for opep, which is sort of a, an unfunded long-term liability. So can <v Speaker 1>You define that for those who are not</v> <v Speaker 4>Familiar other post-employment benefits?</v> Thank you. It's a great, thank you for catching me on that. And those are basically benefits for retirees and other post-employment after you're employed by the town, those are the benefits that we're still obligated to pay. And essentially those are the obligations that are projected in the future that we're trying to get ahead of needing to spend the money on. So we're trying to build up a trust fund of sorts to ensure that we don't have a, a financial burden down the road. And so we've been investing in our opep in fund for several years and typically we've been using free cash to help invest in the opep. So those are the types of things that are typical for the use of free cash. And then both scenarios of override or no override, it really is the amounts that go towards those other uses, but the intent is to then continue to use those for one-time expenses like capital. <v Speaker 1>Any other questions or comments from the</v> board at this time? Mr. Evans? <v Speaker 11>Madam Chair. Thank you Madam Chair.</v> Just had a question, which is just in looking in viewing the school committee's meeting on Monday the sixth, there was a comment made that $2 million savings from the Kennedy Middle School project was coming back to the town and could be spent on, in, in the case of the, the school committee was on the feasibility study. Can you comment on whether I got that wrong or let, <v Speaker 4>Was just tell Sure.</v> So the final certification over the holidays did come back from the state regarding the final amounts of, and it's the closure of basically all the different finances that go into building a a school in the ca in this, in our case the Kennedy. And that includes like the reimbursements from the state, from the MSBA and how much we've borrowed. And, and the final basically balance and there is a remaining amount of approximately $2 million. It's not exactly 2 million, but it's approximately 2 million. And yes, they're, they're, they're, they're borrowed or they're funds that need that they're not to be used for operational purposes 'cause they're one time funds. In the past the town has used those for continued like capital type projects. But it can also be considered for like the feasibility study in this case for Memorial. That would ultimately be the decision of town meeting. The recommendation or the, the thinking right now is that's a pot of funding that could potentially be used for a feasibility study for Memorial, which could be in the range of one to $2 million. We're, we're trying to figure finalize that figure in advance of, of taking that recommendation to town meeting. Alright, <v Speaker 11>Thank you.</v> <v Speaker 1>Could you say just a word about why we can't use that</v> to offset an $8 million budget shortfall? <v Speaker 4>Well, they're one-time funds</v> and they're borrowed for a specific purpose. So you have to, when you borrow funding for a certain purpose, the borrowers actually obligate us to use it for a like purpose. And so study for another school building or actual capital in a school building is a like purpose. <v Speaker 1>And that's mass general law.</v> <v Speaker 4>Yeah. And our and our</v> <v Speaker 1>And our financing borrowers.</v> Yep. Yep. And the borrower's requirement. I think the rest of my questions can wait until you are ready and able to present the free cash spending plan that you're putting together. <v Speaker 4>Sure, yeah.</v> <v Speaker 1>I'm opening this up to members</v> of the public with regard to the override discussion. Mr. Fos, <v Speaker 6>Bring that call my coffee so I can settle in here.</v> Thank you very much. Frank Clause and I am a nadick resident. I've been trying to evaluate what was presented on the, I think there's 16th. 16th, yes sir. December. And also look at some of the reports, look at the finance committee reports from, from previous in them. And I'm listening to not only people that are have my ear but also watching social media and all kinds of things. And there's a sense that I'm getting to some degree is that we need as a town, and this lands on your desk, in my opinion, we need in, in a town to make a court's correction. That is to say the winds have changed from what we have done over the last three decades so that we can't continue to do the same things that we have done. Or quite frankly, we're gonna start living the definition of insanity, which is basically doing the same thing and expecting a different outcome to occur. So there are a number of things that I think that we all have to realize that need to change. And there are also a number of things that we have to also realize that we pony up to the realization that we need an override. I think there are a couple of, there's one select, former select board here and another one online. I think that I say, I have said, well they were on the board that we needed it and the pandemic came up and all kinds of things happened so that, that got got or went by the wayside. But I'm asking myself and I keep hearing, do we really need an $8 million override this year? And I can't answer that question with the information that's provided. I think it's great what the finance department has given us. I think it's great with the, even the school department, school public schools has been forthcoming in giving us all kinds of information, being very straightforward about, about what they're looking for. But it's evident right now, unless I hear or see something different. We're not changing our ways, we're not making a course correction, we're actually reacting. This is reaction management of our fiscal wellbeing. And I don't think that's a good practice. I really don't because quite frankly, we've known this for quite a long time. This is not a, this should not be a surprise to any the, the two or 300 people that are deeply involved in our town that we need. We're gonna need an override sooner or later we're here. We can't avoid it or other things have to happen. So what lands on your desk I is, is the policies that you can change, that you can course correct our town to possibly make things occur differently when that young man, those two young men on the, on the end of the table start to develop what's called a preliminary budget, which is gonna be presented in February one to you and to the finance committee and what you need to do. I, I believe what you need to do is to start to give those directions to these folks. And what's more important, you need to let the public know that you're doing this. Because the other thing I'm hearing is why should I trust a select board? Now you're not the same select board that was here 30 years ago. Why should I trust the select board that kept doing the same thing over and over again by using free cash and one times monies to build up our budget? Why should, why should I trust those people? I do trust you because I voted for you. But quite frankly, those of you who are on the finance committee know very well that we need to make the change and we need to let the public know the changes that we're making. So I started to work on the correspondence. You know, I, I sent you a letter during the, the, I shouldn't say this, the immigration policy period that talked about your level of policy making, the broad policy making and sting and where you, you folks go. And I think that's instructive because I hear people saying, well why don't the select board just get rid of this person or this new employee or whatever. Select board doesn't do that. We do not, it's not your role, it's his role or it's town. As he said, aptly town meeting makes those decisions too. 'cause they, they set the appropriations issue all know. So what your role is to start, I believe telling him, which then he will convey to the finance committee and, and back to you folks and the school department. I hope those policies that will, and I'll use the words of the charter, bring the town agencies in alignment so that you can bring the town into harmony within its own all its agencies. That is your job. That was part of what was in, in my letter. And it doesn't matter whether the, in my humble opinion, the native public schools makes policies for the schools, it still should be in harmony with what you folks set forward. So now I set the stage for, for dropping the bombs, I mean to making a few suggestions and, and I really haven't refined these, but I just wanna throw these things out. Given, given that information, one, I don't think a one time big blast override vote is appropriate. I made a suggestion to a few people and I eyebrows kind of rose. One was of two leader in the town and I said, why not do this over a multiple of years? We can act, you actually can put a ballot questions on or questions on the ballot that not only authorized for fiscal year 26 but also for fiscal year 27 and 28. And the reason why I say that is that one of the biggest complaints is now they're the, the town is suggesting that not only do they take my taxes and add 2.5% plus plus plus with whatever happens with reclassification and all those other impact outside forces on our tax bills, but they're also gonna add another $500 or more on top of all that or 250. It depends on how you interpret the presentation. So you, we've gotta at least diminish the hurt, the pain. And by doing this in a stage manner, in a menu manner, manner does just that. It doesn't hide the fact. It doesn't, you don't go away from the fact that you need to have an override. We need it, but it actually starts to program it for, for one, it it actually saves people money in year one. But it also boxes us in as decision makers, you the finance committee, the town town administrator, the school committee and town meeting into a programmatic focus on what our fiscal plan is. Something I had hoped for years that we would do that we would actually start to plan and look at these things in this manner. Now is the time when I think we have to do that. We really need to get down to brass tacks and you don't have a lot of time to do it. 'cause you have, you have to make a decision on the ballot question in February. I think that's correct. 30 some odd days. 35 or 40 days before the ballots. That's <v Speaker 4>Correct.</v> Election. Yeah. Technically by the 18th. I <v Speaker 6>Believe the 18th.</v> Okay. You don't have a lot of time to do this. And this is a, this is why we should have been talking about this a year ago or the policy part of it a year ago. So I, I'm running a little long and I I don't want to take up all your time and I know other people may want to speak but I have some, I have some thoughts and I know some people are gonna like them. Some people are gonna hate them. First you mentioned the capital CapEx spending plan. I don't believe that we should ever in the next five years buy or appropriate any capital through tax levy borrowing. Because what that does is that as soon as it's borrowed, it then goes into our debt schedule and we have a tendency to fulfill our debt schedule through free cash. And in sometimes levy itself we should, I don't think we should be doing that. I think our free cash as it was back when I first got onto the finance committee should be what dictates how much capital we spend in a particular year. Many towns, towns do it that way. Natick got away from it unfortunately some time ago because it, it decided that it could, it could borrow. So one, a policy should be said, <v Speaker 1>I just had a question</v> and now it's gonna go right outta my little head. Do you mean not to fund the capital improvement plan, the five-year plan? Or are you saying something different? <v Speaker 6>I'm saying something different. Okay.</v> You have a capital plan. Yep. You have free cash. $7.6 million, 7.87 point. You'll see why I, I'm at, I'm saying 7.6 or the 7 million plus use that for your, your capital at CapEx purchases. Gotcha. Or appropriations do not use, well the stabilization fund was partially set up for that, for this re for that reason too. But you do not use that money for anything else. Your policy should also say free cash will net for never more be part of an operational budget or at least for the foreseeable future. 'cause if you look at the presentation again, there's a five year period where we're looking at so many revenues, which is deficient to the expenditures if we keep going the way we're going. So free cash is out now what do you do in year one with my, my menu type of staging out? You, you're gonna have to use stabilization fund to fulfill the portion of the budget plan that has been proposed in the year one, which is fiscal year 2026 to supplement for what the override would have put. And I think it was $4 million would have put into the operating budget for 26. That's a one year, one year thing. Don't like it, but we gotta live with what we don't like here. In addition to that, when you get, and I asked a question about collective bargaining agreements today and thank you very much for the quick response. I, I haven't heard from the school department yet. Nobody's gonna like this. I remember a few years when I was on the finance committee, the town administration had to ask for a zero plus plus plus agreements on CAB or CBA agreements. It's not fun. The employees don't like it. So I think that you need, you need to seriously think in the public schools have to do the same thing. That we cannot stay on the same course and provide the same agreements without some kind of abatement or holdback in one or two fiscal years. Because if you look at the way I calculate it right now, you take the two and a half or the levy cap le levy capacity that we have right now and you add two and half percent to it with the current agreements that we have, we're still in a deficit or we're edging right up to that edge. You need to do something to stop that, to halt that. The other way that the other policy you may consider is you got freeze hiring. And it's not to say that you don't wanna fill vacancies, it's not to say that you don't wanna operate the town, but you cannot start any new positions and keep adding to our budget. And the fir worst thing that we've done over the past is that we've had grants that we've got for certain personnel, personnel like the ARPA money that we used for certain positions and then all of a sudden once the ARPA money goes away, we we're stuck with this position. <v Speaker 1>That's not correct. I just wanna stop you there.</v> Well, okay well I just, I just because I already had a conversation with three people today about this. When the opera money on a particular grant on the Townside runs out town meeting has to appropriate funds if we want that person to stay. And that, and this board may not be making that recommendation. To be clear, the financial policies that you're asking for are things that we've been talking about for several months. So I've heard for 10 years when I served on on town meeting, we need to use fiscal conservative financial principles. Do not use free cash, do not use one time funds, do not use stabilization funds. And it sounds like that's where you're going. And I'm just, <v Speaker 6>I've been listening very careful to</v> what you've been saying and a lot of other people have been to, they have not heard you say that in your public meetings. You have not, I'm I'm just saying what I'm saying. Not heard you be clear that that's the policy. That's what you're doing. You have not codified that. You have not made that clear. And because year after year, over the last 10 years at least we have not stuck to that. People are not trusting that that's what you're gonna do. People are not looking at what what you've just said as as going to be what is I'm suggesting you set policies and hold to them. <v Speaker 1>And if we already have those policies, then we need</v> to be much more proactive about making sure that people know we have them. <v Speaker 6>Absolutely. You need, you need to put</v> as much sunshine on everything because you people need to feel comfortable. They need to, they need to trust us <v Speaker 1>First Trust.</v> <v Speaker 6>Yep. And they also need to understand that the changes</v> that we're gonna be going through need to be sustainable then we need to maintain the services that we have. So that's why I ag I am ag agreeing with what was proposed in the, the presentation that yeah, the schools need $2.7 million at a minimum because they, in their infinite wisdom, used onetime money on top of the onetime money that we were also using in our operational budget, which li lifted that six point or $7 million to eight or $9 million deficit. Alright, we can't do that anymore. It's gotta stop. And the only way it's gonna, they don't have any more money or at least that's what they tell us. They're gonna have maybe what, $200,000 in the, in that the reserve fund that they used or I forget what, it's the circuit break of money. So if that's the case, we need to make certain that they don't have a rollback and, and we don't step backwards in our, the education of our kids, but we maintain what we're doing. I think that's key. And I think that has to be a message that comes from here, from this board. Then not easy messages to deliver. And I haven't refined them com my mind them in my mind. So I may for all, all intentions not know something because as I'm going through gov a clear gov and I'm going through all the records and the files that are on the town, town website and, and the things that I collected when I was standing at the podium, at town meeting. When I'm putting all that stuff together, I'm still missing pieces. If I'm missing pieces, the public is not, is missing pieces too. And I think you really need to compile that. <v Speaker 1>Mr. Foss, I just,</v> did you have any other specific policy recommendations? 'cause I do wanna get to other people in the room and online. Yeah, <v Speaker 6>I think I touched on all of them.</v> Oh, there is one more and I, I know that the moms and dads are gonna hate this as much as I think anybody that puts trash in our curbs. I think we need to reevaluate the fees that we have for our, our town services. And I think that means looking at trash fees, implementing a recycling fee. I know that's not, people aren't gonna like that, but I think we need to at least understand that, evaluate it and possibly look at how do we take off budget those things and move forward. Bus fees are gonna be the same way. Same thing. Okay. I think that touches base on most of the things I said and I've been a little scattered about it and I I did promise that I would send this in I written form <v Speaker 1>When when you're, when you're ready, when it's finished.</v> I I I welcome all, everything that you've said. I've written down largely illegible notes, but I know I can call you and let you know that I can't read what I wrote. I I will say publicly, and we've said this, if people, I mean you follow many of our meetings for the last three years at least, and maybe four, almost every single fee in town has been right sized, has been looked at from something as simple as when a home asks for a second recycling bin, we discovered that they cost us $80 and we were charging 60. So something that small to program fees and I'm, I'm gonna yield to Mr. Erickson who has more information about specifics. <v Speaker 4>Yeah. So, so just to that point,</v> we have definitely looked at fees, the trash recycling fees are the last area that we're looking at. So I will just Oh, good note that that is an area that we are looking at it, it's just in process right now. 'cause we're also examining the recycle center, how it's set up and also how it's used in a number of other components that are part of that. It's just a, it's a, it's a comprehensive challenge and so that is an active one, but we have also updated our fees on building permits and, and other permits in the CED, which has actually led to quite a bit of new revenue, our alcohol fees and permits, which this group did last month or two months ago. So we've been doing a comprehensive scrub on as much as we can, but the transfer recycling is one of our final sort of frontiers on that front. <v Speaker 6>Just remembered one thing</v> that I think is a critical calculation that I think that Phil Lems and I went through back when, when we were looking at, when MIT Romney, our Governor Romney pulled back like 10, 10 or 15% of state aid is we asked our, our, our ourselves what would it cost if we had to lay off 50 people? Because there is a cost, it's not that you're gonna save right, those 50 people's salaries, you still have to pay, pay unemployment, you still have to pay other, other costs for those employees, which you do lay off. So I, and I think that message should be very, very clear to the naysayers or the people that might want to vote no, because what what that does is it, it forces a real cliff and we have to avoid that cliff at all costs. 'cause that costs us even more money in the long time, long term. That's, that's pretty much what I wanted to say. <v Speaker 1>I would just like to thank you for, I have extensive notes</v> and I, when we next meet, which may not, it may be an off cycle meeting, which is something we'll talk about later on during select board updates if we have an off cycle meeting before the next meeting. Much of this will be addressed. Some of the questions that have come in will be addressed and, and that meeting will only be dedicated to the override. We won't be doing other business. Excellent. So thank you very much for coming in. Thank you so long. Thank you. I appreciate your, your thoughts and your comments. Ms. Edelman Foster, please. Thank you Madam Chair, if I could just quickly say thank you to the moderator <v Speaker 12>As well.</v> It's still, still the moderator got a couple weeks, my friend wishful, but it, it's, it's really heartening to me and people should really see that this town works collaboratively. I mean there are people who have been doing this stuff for decades who are bringing their full intelligence to try to figure out what's best for everybody, including you guys, including many, many members of the public, including Mr. Foss. And it's, I find it very moving frankly. It's great. Thank you. I have a quick question actually. So with the, I'll just say with the, currently the currently envisioned scenario of override, if you look at the presentation, of course in 2030 there's an easing because of the, of the opep situation changing. But right now it looks like there's still gonna be a gap, a budget gap in say 2028. And I've heard a lot of concerns that what that means is that we're going to need an override in 2028 and that that's sort of what's being planned. My understanding was somewhat different. So I would love to have that clarified. I'd like you Mr. Erickson. <v Speaker 4>Okay. Certainly. So,</v> and I believe this slide for folks working from home or if you want to go home and look at the, the slide on the, on your, on your home devices, it's, it's slide 28 which talks about the forecast and it does show budget gaps in FY 28 and 29 actually starts even in FY 27. Forecasts are obviously done conservatively and things that, that's why we update them on a regular basis. Almost every six months we update forecast because we're getting more data on revenues, we're getting more data on expenses. The gaps that we're seeing here are well within what we feel comfortable with that we can absorb or at least be able to address without the need to go back to the voters. It's when that gap becomes the much larger numbers, which is why we're asking or thinking, considering an override now that we see the need for a potential request for an override. But the 1.8, I believe is the number for FY 28 and the 2.8 for FY 29 are within the ballpark of what we feel is is reasonable to address. There are some assumptions also in the forecast that we should be also aware of. And they're noted on that slide. So for example, some of the assumptions are that moving forward after the override, that there's certain expect expected revenues and certain expected expenses. So for example, education, the expected increases over time would be around 4%. The expected increases for town non-education will be in the 3.27% range and so on and so forth. And the revenues would have similar type of expect, expect expectations. We feel comfortable, town administration feels comfortable that barring unforeseen circumstances like another economic crisis or another pandemic or those never happen things that we would never know about that we can't plan with this override. We can reasonably get to FY 30, which is a year that some liabilities come off of our books. We recognize that it doesn't address some of the items that the prior speaker noted. And, and is it the ideal scenario in our opinion, no. And we, we've mentioned that before. It's not an ideal scenario, but it is a scenario that we feel is reasonable to ask for taxpayers and is one that if these assumptions stay true and we stay true to our conservative budgeting modeling and our conservative revenue modeling, that we can, we can reasonably expect to get to 2030 without the need for another request to the public. <v Speaker 12>Thank you. May I ask a Oh yeah. Yes, please.</v> Oh, just a very quick follow up. So if, if someone were to ask anyone high up in town government, can you guarantee there will be no anything, would anyone ever feel comfortable giving a guarantee? <v Speaker 4>I would honestly argue no. There's never a guarantee.</v> I mean, I guess the only guarantee is that, and I wouldn't even guarantee this that that we're gonna be able to go home tonight before midnight. I can't even guarantee that. <v Speaker 1>I can guarantee that I feel at 11, I feel</v> that I could ver I feel that I could put my reputation on us being out of here. Yeah, well before, but thank you Mr <v Speaker 4>I can't make that guarantee and I would not put it out on</v> my staff members to make that guarantee. I would only let somebody in a political position like the chair of the select board to make that guarantee. But when it comes to finances, so much of it is a fluid process that to make a guarantee is just virtually impossible on anything on any year because there's so many assumptions built into these forecasting. Again, forecasting is not a budget, but there's so many assumptions built into that, that it's really, if any one of those goes off, we'd have to then figure out, okay, where are the pressure points? Where are the things that we could pull in, pull out and, and how can we address it? So I'll give my assurance that we'll do everything we can to not, but to say there's a guarantee. Whenever I hear the word guarantee, I always think of the, the movie Tommy Boy, you know, I can put a guarantee on a box and sell you something, but it's only worth the words on that paper if it's not actually truly there. So anyway, I don't, I don't want to misquote movies, but <v Speaker 12>It's a good movie if you haven't seen it.</v> But in your years of experience and in the collective years of experience, this is, this is something that you're comfortable with? <v Speaker 4>Yes. Given the assumptions</v> that we built into this forecast and given where we feel we're going with our revenues, which, you know, Natick is a healthy community. It's a, it's a, it's got strong growth projections and modeling. So I, I feel comfortable with that. Yes. <v Speaker 12>Thank you so much. Thank you. Did</v> <v Speaker 1>Mr. Evans?</v> <v Speaker 11>Thank you Madam Chair. Just a, a very quick clarification.</v> I wanted to make sure people realize that it's the pension liability that goes away at 2030, not Opep. Right. So just to make that clear. So, <v Speaker 4>And that's because it gets fully funded so that that</v> expense that we've been paying to the tune of 12 to 15 million a year depending on the year. And we're actually gonna be getting an updated actuarial study hopefully in time to incorporate into the 26th budget. We don't know, it's not our study, it's the retirement board study. Not say they aren't doing it, they're doing it. It's just a matter of, we just don't know when it's coming through. That liability will be drastically reduced. It won't go away, but it'll be drastically reduced. <v Speaker 1>Is there anyone else in the room who has a question</v> or a comment about the for the override discussion? Yes sir. If you could approach the podium and just tell us your name and if you're a resident of Natick. <v Speaker 13>Dave Martin for Saw Wind Street</v> and Natick High class of 62. And I would just like to read from the Natick Service Council's end of year report. And this all obviously has to do with the projected override. Last year we proudly supported 980 families in Natick, marking a 22% increase from the previous year. Since April, we've already assisted over 100 new families and anticipate helping more than 1000 families in total by year's ender year's end to meet this growing need. We expanded our food pantry hours in January, allowing for 72 more appointments each month. However, demand continues to Outpa outpace our capacity, leaving us at times with a waiting list of up to 40 families in need of food assistance. In response, we announced plans to expand our food pantry. The design is complete and we are currently navigating the per permitting permitting process to kick off construction. Our other programs are also experiencing increased demand. We are receiving more requests for financial assistance to help with rent from neighbors facing eviction and utilities. They're in jeopardy of being shut off. Additionally, this past fall we saw another record number of students seeking back to school assistance in light of what Mr. Foss shared about trash fees recycling. All the rest is a retiree on a fixed income. That's stuff I could live with because little here, little there, we all expect it. But the 66 cents I believe, which is per thousand of evaluation that was available a few weeks ago, that makes it an enormous jump for an awful lot of people. And based on what the service council is sharing, I would just like to put it out there for discussion. So thank you Madam Chair and thank you board. <v Speaker 1>Thank you sir.</v> Are there any other comments or questions from members of the public in the room? If you could just raise your hand. Anyone online Not seeing any, I would wrap up this, this conversation by saying this is the first of many conversations. My proposal to the select board is that we have an off cycle meeting. We're already going to have an off cycle meeting that's joint with the school committee at the end of the month. And that that has been scheduled and announced by, it's on the website. It's announced by Mr. Erickson that given the select board's role in creating policy that corrects, as Mr. Fos said, some of the problems that have arisen over the last pick a decade, two decades, three decades. I think it would be helpful for this board to share the policies and also not, not just the policies that have to do with expenses, but how we've worked to raise revenue. And by revenue I don't mean a few pennies on trash bags or here and there or things that are in enterprise accounts. I'm talking about working to build policies and encourage businesses to come here to create re to encourage restaurants to open. They pay local option taxes doesn't come outta your pocket unless you go there to eat, but it's a significant source of revenue. And there are, there are other opportunities for the, for this board to look at revenue enhancers, if you will. And I don't, I just, I don't mean just fees, not bus fees, beach fees. I mean, looking at drawing businesses into town where people come and they spend money, they spend money, businesses hire local people, wages go up. I mean, it's, it's not a very complicated proposition, but I would like an opportunity for us to, independent of the joint meeting or the public forum, have some opportunity for Mr. Erickson to share what, over the last three years, four years, what town administration and this board and a prior board have done to right size revenue to make sure that we're not gouging residents, but we're making sure we're covering our costs, we're making sure that the revenue that we bring in is appropriate and that we're not losing money that we could otherwise have and, and to supplement our operating budget. So that discussion will come during select board updates. We will not, just a minute, Mr. Sidney, we will not take a vote on that because it's not on the agenda. It'll be a discussion. And I have a few other select board updates to cover, and then we will put together a date and a time and hopefully come together and talk about some of the policy considerations that Mr. Foss and others have sent to us and take a little bit of the mystery as Mr. Scott referred to take a little bit outta the mystery of what it takes to run a town. So I'd like to encourage all of you to sign up for override updates. I've instructed, well, that's a hard word, isn't it? I have asked town administration to ensure that every time an override is on an agenda, that that agenda is pushed out through Civic Plus so that you don't have to be watching agendas and what waiting for overrides. So we kind of double, you might get two emails, but it's easier than not knowing about it and having to tune in every week or however often we meet, which generally ends up being about every week. So those are my assurances to you on behalf of the board and as chair Mr. Sydney. <v Speaker 14>Thank you. When we do schedule that off cycle meeting,</v> I would hope that the administration would be able to discuss some of the unusable chunks of money that we have that won't satisfy our need for an override such as the far money and things like that and why we can't use them. Right? Because there's a lot, there's a lot of conversation around town that I've seen and heard where people saying, well, we've got this chunk of money or that chunk of money. Yep. And, and we really need to get clear about why those aren't going to satisfy the need these needs and, and what the restrictions are and how those funds are enjoyed. <v Speaker 1>Municipal finance is largely regulated</v> by Mass General law, and there are a lot of things that would, would we want to do, we can't do. So I'll go ahead and say publicly to the constant conversation about the $2 million that was foregone and not choosing Trask for the property at five Auburn Street, that $2 million would not have been, would not have offset the override. It would not have been money that we could have put in our operating account. It would've had to been used like asset for like asset. Now that doesn't mean that it was a good decision. I'll still stand by the decision and defend it, but it's not because we would only be looking at a $6 million override. So finance is complicated and I I agree with you Mr. Sidney. That'll be part of the conversation. Let's take a five minute recess so that those who are only here for the override, we'll have an opportunity to leave the room quietly and the rest of us can get more water more clearly. Welcome back to the select board meeting. We are going to move to item C, the 2025 membership fees for Memorial Beach. And if you could introduce yourself. I know you're relatively new. <v Speaker 15>Yes,</v> <v Speaker 16>No problem. I am Lauren Moyer.</v> I am currently the interim director of Recreation and Parks. Thank you for having me tonight. I have shared a report with the board, well with Madame Chair and the rest of the board about the, an increase in beach fees. We're looking to increase $5 on those season passes for our residents and $10 for non-residents for adults and children. We do also have a senior slash veteran pass that we do not intend to raise the price on. And a $20 increase to the family maximum, which is a discount provided for parents or actually anyone registering a batch of people for the beach. They'll cap out at $160 currently and we are requesting that they go to $180. <v Speaker 1>Questions, comments from members of the board?</v> Mr. Evans? Nope. Nope. Ready for a motion? <v Speaker 15>I,</v> <v Speaker 1>Yes. Ms. Slager,</v> <v Speaker 15>A question about the family past.</v> Do you know how many people are currently at taking advantage of that or, or who did last year? <v Speaker 16>Unfortunately our tracking system doesn't give me a very</v> accurate number for how many people utilized it, but we imagine it's about a hundred to 120. So we sold just under a thousand passes last year. I imagine that 120 discounts were provided. So a good portion of our, our family has received a discount. <v Speaker 15>Okay. Thank you. Next question, are there any</v> discounts available for peop low income people? <v Speaker 16>There have been in the past, there was not.</v> Last year, the rec department does a standardized discount through the service council approval process. Those discounts are one third or two third of the cost because we're trying to increase our fees. We took away that scholarship just for this past year and provided that family maximum as kind of our biggest discount to people registering. <v Speaker 15>So even going through the service council,</v> people would not get a discount to these fees, is that what you're saying? Correct. <v Speaker 1>Can you explain the Family pass maximum?</v> <v Speaker 16>Yes. So our system is allowed to maximum out, no matter</v> how many transactions you put Beach passes in for, you would not pay more than 180. That could be four adults that live in the same residence. That could be one adult and five children. No matter the combination of people registered under the same residence and our registration software, they will pay just a maximum of currently one 60 hoping to go to 180. <v Speaker 1>And what is the revenue based on pass purchases?</v> The purchase of pass passes in recent past years. What is the anticipated revenue increase for the rec parks? <v Speaker 16>Yep. So the, we're looking at about $5,000</v> for a revenue increase just on the pass increase another about $1,200 on the increase to the family maximum. So that totals about $6,000. <v Speaker 1>Thank you Mr. Sidney.</v> <v Speaker 14>Thank you. Madam Chair, correct me if I'm wrong,</v> but I seem to recollect, and it's been a while since I've been on FinCon and looked at this in detail, but I seem to recollect that these fees, along with other rec and park fees go into a revolving fund that fund rec and parks. So these are paying the expenses of the beach, they aren't general revenues, is that correct? Correct. <v Speaker 16>We are paying, this all goes into our revolving account.</v> We come to you because a portion of the beach is funded through the general town funds and that would be the water treatment of Doug Pond. And that is about a $20,000 expense that the town takes on for Memorial Beach. <v Speaker 14>Okay. I just, I, you know, since we're talking Yep.</v> O other financial matters, I wanted to really note that this is really rec parks trying to pay their own expenses. <v Speaker 1>I appreciate that. Thank you Mr. Sidney. Mr. Evans.</v> <v Speaker 11>Thank you Madam Chair. Just a quick, quick question.</v> I think I know the answer is yes, but just to make sure that, I know there are a lot of, not a lot, but part-time employees, we had a increase because of the minimum wage for lifeguards. And these increases will cover the cost of those increases. <v Speaker 16>Yes. We imagine that the increases we're looking</v> to make will cover the cost of covering lifeguards swim instructors and then also the necessary safety and emergency equipment required to manage the beach. Okay. <v Speaker 11>Thank you</v> <v Speaker 1>Mr. Erickson.</v> <v Speaker 4>Oh, sorry. I just wanted to build off of a comment</v> that was made about why this is in front of the select board. The select board is also the town's rec and parks commissioners. Even though we have a separate rec and parks commit board, they're strictly advisory. So given that this is a rec and park resource, the board actually has the authority to do some of this fee structure work. That's more for the public's knowledge, just 'cause I think there's some, every town's a little bit different. In our case, you're actually the, technically the rec and parks commissioners. <v Speaker 1>Ms. Pope,</v> <v Speaker 10>Thank you for this</v> outlay in 20, from 2022 to 2024, there weren't any increases. Correct. And this, the memo states that these are to keep up with the rising cost of equipment as well as to the ability to adjust salaries. Is there a regular or going to be a regular cadence of increase? <v Speaker 16>Not at this time. There was with the increase</v> of minimum wage that you can see, I provided 2018 and then 2022, you can see that there's kind of a large jump, and that was the increase in minimum wage that we were keeping up with. Now it is more of a maintenance operation of our salaries with returning staff members go up every year as a way to incentivize returning staff and also the increase of costs. So supplies are more expensive than they were in 2022. <v Speaker 10>Okay.</v> <v Speaker 1>Mr. Erickson,</v> <v Speaker 4>Certainly just, just to note on that, we'll continuously</v> to, to review the expenses of obviously the beach along with all of our programs. I think by regular cadence, it's probably like if we come back annually, probably not, it's probably gonna be in every couple year or three to five year occurrence as we, you know, see how usage works and, and just continue to review the revenues and expenses of really all of our assets. But in the, in this particular case, the Memorial Beach, there is a big gap between 2018 and 2022 in the memo. Those were the pandemic years where many of them were. We actually did other different types of programs during those years because of social distancing and because of other things. So those were really years that you cannot compare. And so that's why there's that difference between 2018 or there's no number really between 2018 and 2022. So <v Speaker 10>Thank you both.</v> <v Speaker 1>Are there any other questions or</v> comments for members of the board? I'll open this up to public comment. Mr. Coburn, could you approach the mic? Okay. <v Speaker 17>Thank you. Madam Chair, members of the select board,</v> Dirk Coburn 2 0 2 Bacon Street. I have a question of the, the family maximum that we've spoken of. Is that means tested, targeted to a particular population or is that available to all households in town? <v Speaker 1>All households.</v> <v Speaker 17>Okay. I, I thought so.</v> I just wanted to make sure that my gut reaction to that was fully informed. I, I would encourage this body as a policy board for recreation and Parks to discuss this because the discounted services that do follow the guidelines that come from social service organizations that particularly often align with free and reduced school lunch qualification are targeted to people who most need them. And we heard very eloquently in the previous discussion on the override about the population in town who really, really are in need for whom $180 is going to keep them from using this service. And instead, we are providing the discount to anybody, including people making very, very comfortable household incomes. I'm not sure that's what makes me most comfortable or makes me most proud of devoting resources toward making things affordable to people who really need it. <v Speaker 1>Thank you, Mr. Coburn. Ms. McKenzie or Dr. McKenzie?</v> <v Speaker 9>I wanna thank Ms. Walser for her question about</v> the discounted rates that go through the Native Service Council. And I basically just wanna amplify Mr. Coborn's concerns. I'm not sure I can amplify them as eloquently, but I am really concerned, and I do think that there are a lot of hurting families in this community and giving them a little bit of a discount so they can enjoy recreation when they can't go off to all the places that these people on the Native Moms group are kind of bragging about all the time. It just is the right thing to do. So as you do this, if you can make some kind of caveat that there will be a discounted program for people who are means tested either through this service council or some other criteria, it would be great. <v Speaker 1>Thank you Dr. McKenzie. Mr. Sydney?</v> <v Speaker 14>Yeah, I'd like to ask the interim director, Ms.</v> Mur, I, I dunno that I pronounced that right. What would the, let me see if I can ask this to get the answer I want. <v Speaker 17>What a gated</v> <v Speaker 14>Question.</v> Hey, I'm open and honest about what I do as much as I can be. If we put in a requirement that you discount fees on for means for means testing, would that significantly hinder your ability to provide services? <v Speaker 16>Not significantly. It will take that projected income</v> that we, that I just shared of about $6,000 down. So the Recreation Parks Department doesn't provide a discount by subsidizing that money anywhere other than our revolving account. It is, is just an, a decrease in the cost of the program for families that qualify. We don't have grant funding or anything else to supplement that discount. <v Speaker 14>But you'd still be able to provide the various services</v> if, if we put that caveat in? Yes. Okay. Well that, that's helpful because I think that I'm hearing things loud and clearer myself, so thank you. Thank you very much. <v Speaker 3>Madam Chair, if I could please, just</v> as a former rec professional in my previous lifetime, I think one of the cool things about the town of Natick and specifically the Community Services Department and what Recreation and Parks has done over the years and continues to do specifically with camps and some of those programs as the partnerships with the service council and some of those groups over the years, the service council has really been a screening to make it less intrusive for people to be able to come in and get their finances evaluated and then kind of go back to the recreation department and say, Hey, I've reviewed, I qualify, here's what I get. And, and be able to do that. I think one of the things that I probably could have done a better job when I was in that role is explaining what that discount actually means. It means that it's money that's not actually being collected in the revolving fund. So it's not that the Service council is giving money for those programs. In some cases they do, but it's actually less revenue. So if your expenses are X, you still have to come up with that revenue for X expenses. So, you know, that has to get redistributed within the revolving fund and other people have to pay a little bit more to offset the revenue that you're not making up by providing that discount. I think it's important for the public to understand that because the recreation department has a history of doing that over the years and does it for a number of programs is certain, some certainly something that we can have a conversation on and look at, but it's less revenue that would come in. So if there is a shortfall in the beach budget for the year, it would just be a consideration of where do we come up with those funds to cover that shortfall. <v Speaker 1>Mr. Marshall, when,</v> when the Natick Service Council screens for means testing for its various rec and park programs, do they means test for non-residents or only residents? <v Speaker 3>I believe it's Natick residents for all the programs,</v> and it's actually, Mr. Coburn had alluded to the, the lunch program. I think those, that's one of the qualification criteria that they can show up with and present to the service council. So it's a great partnership. It's fantastic. It, it works well. But from a funding standpoint, you know, it's, it's basically we're not collecting that same revenue for that participant. So it does have an impact on the expenses. <v Speaker 1>And does the town of Natick pay the Natick service council</v> to screen for a program? <v Speaker 3>No, the service council handles that and,</v> and it's a good partnership that's been provided, but there's no funding for that. <v Speaker 1>So what I would like to propose, and this is not a motion,</v> but in light of, of reading the numbers and not quite fully understanding. So my bad that the 180 for the Family Pass maximum had this a built-in discount, but the built-in discount are for people who live in Natick would apply also to people who are people of means. What I would suggest, well my first question is, does this need to be voted tonight? No. Great. That's the answer I was looking for. What I would suggest is if you could build out another model that has a more substantive in increase but build in screening for Natick through Natick service council, and I'll tell you why. I'm, I'm asking for an adult season pass for residents, I'm just gonna leave non-residents out for now. It's a $5 increase. It's a $4 CRU increase for a child resident, no increase for a senior or veterans, which I'm perfectly fine with, but if the proposed 2025 fees were a little bit higher and the family maximum were just a little bit higher, but the, but the model built in means testing, that's something I could definitely live with Ms. Wolf Logger. <v Speaker 15>I'd also like to see the family pass maximum have</v> different rate for resident versus non-resident. Okay. <v Speaker 1>Yeah, actually that's,</v> that's another thing I was looking at the, the child. So the difference for adults between a season pass for an adult between the two resident non-resident is only $15. We're lucky we have a wealth of outdoor recreation. I know that Kiki Park during the, during the summer fills up before many people who don't have transportation can get there for that, for that facility. So this makes, you know, Memorial Beach kind of, in my opinion, a little bit more important. So I'm wondering if we can just defer this to a future meeting. Let's put this on in two weeks and ask you to come back with a different funding model that'll reflect, means testing greater differentiation between resident and non-resident and a higher out of pocket for Family Pass maximum. Yes, that works. Thank you. Thank you. So, and thank you so much and welcome to Town. Oh, thank you. <v Speaker 4>Lauren's been with the town for a little while.</v> <v Speaker 1>No, I'm welcome to this role. I'm sorry.</v> That's welcome. She's <v Speaker 4>Been doing an amazing job in the record parts.</v> <v Speaker 1>I, and I would like to echo the comments from earlier</v> during public speak. Thank you Angela. Deeply not discussing, not deliberating, just thanking <v Speaker 3>If, if I could, Madam Chair,</v> Lauren's actually been serving in the role since July. So right at the start of last summer, we had an employee who left. So she stepped right in, got us through last summer, I think extremely well and has really kept the department running smoothly, basically down a person because she's been doing two jobs. So both of those two over there deserve a lot of credit. <v Speaker 1>Thank you very much. Good.</v> <v Speaker 18>Have</v> <v Speaker 1>Fun. Next item on the agenda is water abatement.</v> <v Speaker 18>Oh, do you want to go? Sorry,</v> <v Speaker 1>I'm not sure.</v> So one of the persons who's applied for water abatement has left and one is here. Could you tell me your name please? Yes, <v Speaker 18>Leslie Panel.</v> <v Speaker 1>Okay. Leslie, could you come to the, the podium,</v> <v Speaker 18>Lemme scan.</v> So if you could intro, <v Speaker 1>Introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about</v> why you've applied for a water abatement. <v Speaker 19>Yes, Leslie Patau. I live at eight Merrill Road in Natick.</v> I'm here to seek some relief from an unusually high water bill that I got that was due to a, a leak that I was unaware of. I was unaware of it due to some kind of unforeseen and unfortunate circumstances for quite a while. As soon as I became aware of it, I did re repair it, but I'm just seeking a little bit of relief. It was pretty high water bill for me. It was over twice as big as my highest water bill ever. <v Speaker 1>Your, your explanation is that the,</v> your irrigation company <v Speaker 18>Severed,</v> <v Speaker 1>Severed by the a landscaper.</v> So your irrigation lines were severed by a landscaper? <v Speaker 19>Yes.</v> <v Speaker 1>Have you spoken</v> to the landscaper about their liability insurance? <v Speaker 19>They don't have any insurance. Okay.</v> It was just a local guy who came and did the work. <v Speaker 1>I appreciate that. I just need to ask the question.</v> <v Speaker 19>Normally it would be something that I take care</v> of my own gardening and mowing and normally I would've done that, but I was not able to do that type of work during a period of time. 'cause of health re health issues at the time. <v Speaker 1>Completely understand.</v> Are, it says that you're enrolled in the Natick Water Spark program, but that program was discontinued. Have you moved over to the My 360 program? <v Speaker 19>I don't know, maybe I haven't.</v> Then if I'm not aware of it, I, I definitely was enrolled because the year before I had gotten a notice about unusually high water usage and I expected it. I had had some plantings put in, so I did know that I was signed up for that, but maybe I'm not, if it's changed then maybe I'm not in it. <v Speaker 1>Okay. We</v> <v Speaker 19>Not sure</v> <v Speaker 1>We can look that or have somebody look into that for you</v> and let you know and make sure you get that information so that you do get notifications. Okay. Members of the board, I'm gonna open up to you for questions or comments and then I'll turn it over to Mr. Marshall. Does anybody have any questions or comments about the documentation we have? Mr. Evans, just <v Speaker 11>A comment.</v> It's pretty clear from, and thank you for sending the illustrations. It's pretty clear that there was no negligence except on the part of the person who severed the irrigation lines. So, and the homeowner would not have noticed that until they got this huge water bill. So I'm very sympathetic to it. <v Speaker 1>Mr. Sidney.</v> <v Speaker 14>Yeah. To know what Mr. Evans said.</v> But also I want to note that this resident, Ms. Ms Pano has tried to be on top of it. She signed up for Water Smart, she was watching and this just got by her for a variety of reasons. I'm very sympathetic and she took every action she needed to take to fix it as soon as she knew. <v Speaker 1>Thank you Mr. Sydney. Ms. Slager</v> <v Speaker 15>Ditto to my colleagues and I also wanted to thank Ms.</v> Pano for a very clear explanation of the problem. It's one of the better ones I've seen. Yeah, I agree. And so it, it covers all the bases and I wanna thank you for that. But I also wanted to ask about my 360. Is that now available for everyone? Can we have everyone sign up for that? <v Speaker 3>Yes, it is. We had done a soft launch with it.</v> We will be getting communication out within the next couple of weeks. We have a bugs that we're trying to work through with the company we're working with. I had a conversation with our water and sewer department today and my understanding that it would be weeks for that launch to get that out publicly. But there has been a nuance that we're working on with the vendor. So we're just trying to clear that up before getting it out to make sure that when people sign up they're signing up without this little nuance that we have in front of us. So that will be within weeks. Alright. <v Speaker 15>So just to be clear, anyone that is already signed up,</v> they will not have to do anything. Is that correct? <v Speaker 3>If they are signed up in the</v> 360 they are in? Correct. Okay. Thank. Yep. And there are some people that are in the system right now. There's a little bit of a bug. So signing up right now is a little bit tricky, so we want to make sure we get through that before pushing that out to people. <v Speaker 1>Mr. Marshall, could I ask you to tickle three weeks out</v> or whatever it is and follow up with Ms. Pano so that she doesn't have to look or wait for the My 360 just to ensure that she gets on it? <v Speaker 3>Yes, I will actually make sure</v> we have someone circle in with her. I <v Speaker 1>Really appreciate that.</v> Second question on that, on the my 360, I'm not sure if this is part of the bug, but I wanted to follow up on the December water abatement on Virginia Road, which is right across from my neighborhood. Could not sign up for my 360, but I was able to, is that part of that? I mean we live 200 yards apart and that neighborhood had not apparently wasn't able, I'm just wondering or able to, that was not available for that person to sign up, do we, is that part of the glitch <v Speaker 3>Ev No, that's, that's something a little bit unrelated.</v> Everyone is gonna be able to sign up for it, but depending on the age of the meter, we have newer technology that's coming out in some of the newer meters. So they're able to read a little bit more frequently than some of the older meters. I see. So with a newer meter you might be able to get more kind of real time information with the older meters, my understanding it's gonna be more daily in terms of when you're gonna be able to get that reading. It's just the technology that's out <v Speaker 1>There.</v> That makes sense. Yeah, I had a new meter installed last year, so I, I understand that difference. So could you outline the information we requested regarding an abatement for Ms. Pano? <v Speaker 3>Sure. So because this is an irrigation meter,</v> even though because it's an irrigation system, sorry, not a meter. Yes, because it's a irrigation system based on the board's policy, that is something that administration looks at, but we don't have the ability to approve that. So that gets denied. That was appealed to the board this evening. If this were something that would have gone through that process, what we try to look at is we look at the past three years and then we look at the highest usage during that prior three year period. So in this case we did that. The total units for this bill were 140. We looked backwards three years to see that highest period time. And we found 77 units. So we would recalculate at the 77 and then everything in addition has would be considered excess. We would take that excess, we would drop it down to the lowest tier. And the reason for that, and the reason why the board adopted that as a policy is that individual is typically not hitting that highest tier on frequency. So that's kind of the relief that is built into that policy. So in calculating what a new bill would be with, again that highest at 77 units and the excess of 63 units at the lowest tier, that would be $955 and 77 cents. The bill that this resident received was 1006 99 80. So the abatement amount would be $744 and 3 cents following that, you know, procedure if this was the event that it could be approved through the policy. <v Speaker 1>And so to be clear, the final bill, the, the bill</v> after adjustment would be $955 and 77 cents for the quarter? <v Speaker 3>Yes.</v> <v Speaker 1>Ms. Slager,</v> <v Speaker 15>Just to be clear, because your email said prior three</v> quarters, but you stated three years, is it three years or three quarters? <v Speaker 3>Sorry. It's, we look back at the prior three years for</v> that same quarter. Quarter. So we try to compare the same quarters because your summer usage, depending on how it is, is likely gonna be higher If we looked at your usage during the winter time, if you're not using your irrigation for example, those are gonna be lower. Okay. So we look at the same quarters where that fell for the prior three years. <v Speaker 1>Mr. Evans, so</v> <v Speaker 14>Are you looking for</v> <v Speaker 1>Motion?</v> Not yet. Mr. Sidney. <v Speaker 14>Yeah, and I just, I, I wanna reiterate this.</v> For every abatement we have to get paid for the all the water. We don't have to get paid for it at the highest rate. So the abatement amount that Mr. Marshall has been talking about has you paying for all the water you used, just that I'll significantly reduce rate. So I just wanted to be clear. Yes, I understand. Be clear about that. Thank you. <v Speaker 1>And I just wanted, for people at home who are wondering</v> how abatements hit the operating account or contribute to an override, they do not, they sit in a separate account what's called an enterprise account. So the revenue and expenses stay in that account. So abatements that this board grants do not contribute to. Well let me ask you, Mr. Marshall, how does an abatement not on this bill, but just in general, how does an abatement hit maybe as a percentage of application to the rate payers in that enterprise account? <v Speaker 20>It's,</v> <v Speaker 3>Oh, let me turn my mic on.</v> It's a little bit difficult to say, but it, my opinion, I would say it's de minimis. This is a commodity. So, you know, water is something that people can use a lot of or they can use a little of, you know, we don't always have the same usage of water over the course of the year. We could have an extremely dry year where we might have to use more. We could have an extremely dry year where we have a water, a water band that goes into play, which could impact our revenue. So, you know, for the, I would say handful of abatements that come before the board that the board approves in terms of this amount, I would say that they're relatively di minimis. That being said, you know, it's less revenue and it's kind of a reduction in the overall revenue that we could collect because we're abating it. <v Speaker 1>So we're being asked to balance two things.</v> One is to provide relief to a rate payer who's responsible and has done everything that she's supposed to do with some less revenue. <v Speaker 3>And I think it per the board's policy,</v> which I think was a good adjustment that the board made, I think it was a year ago when there was a change to the policy, they're still responsible for all of the water that went through the meter, which was a change before the board at times would, you know, potentially reduce the bill, but it wouldn't necessarily be tied to the usage with this change. Right now the board is, all of the water that's going through is is still being charged to the individual. We're just looking at reducing that amount that's over historic averages to the lowest tier, which is that balance I would argue. Madam Chair. <v Speaker 1>Thank you Mr. Marshall.</v> Anyone else on the board? Mr. Erickson? <v Speaker 4>I was just gonna reiterate that this is an enterprise fund</v> and it's basically paid for by the rate payers. So revenues that come in, pay for the cost of it. So therefore it's separate from the general fund. It's separate from the town budgeting, I mean, it's part of the budgeting process, but it's separate from the town general operating fund, budgeting part of the PO process. So really it's a revenue and expense just within its own account. So just reiterating the enterprise fund component to it, to your point about impact, impact on override and impact on, on general fund operating expenses and revenues. <v Speaker 1>I appreciate that Mr. Erickson,</v> <v Speaker 11>I have a quick question then a motion if you'll allow.</v> How many overrides, or I'm sorry, abatements have we approved this year? Less than 10? I, I guess <v Speaker 3>This would be the first one for 25.</v> That's but over the two clock, but I actually did look at this last time, less than 10 historically in going back and looking at it. And I did specifically look at last year, I think last year it was nine. So, <v Speaker 11>Yep.</v> Thank you. Thank you. And thank you for the correction that we're in in new Year. <v Speaker 1>I'm ready for your motion. Mr. Evans move</v> <v Speaker 11>To approve the abatement amount as</v> provided by Mr. Marshall in the amount of $744 and 3 cents. Second, <v Speaker 1>Moved by Mr. Evans, seconded by Mr.</v> Sidney. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes. 5 0 0. Thank you so much. Mr. Marshall, could you tell explain what next steps are? <v Speaker 3>Yeah, so tomorrow, hopefully by the end of the day</v> or if not the by the following day, the staff and the town administrator select board office will reach out to you. They'll let you know about this adjustment. We will communicate with the treasurer collector's office about this adjustment and we'll work with you on how that gets reflected in the bill. <v Speaker 1>Thank you. Can I go? Yes. Okay. Thank you very much.</v> Appreciate it. And thank you for being patient while we move through other pieces of business. No problem. Thank you a lot. Next time a item of business is the discussion of Soen House. I'm sorry. Oh, <v Speaker 11>Are we doing the second abatement or is that</v> <v Speaker 1>She's not here.</v> Okay. So that will be rescheduled. <v Speaker 11>Making sure</v> <v Speaker 1>The next item of discussion is Soen House.</v> And I will start with Ms. Slager. <v Speaker 15>Thank you Madam Chair. Just wanted to let everyone know</v> that because one of the proponents for this is related to me. He's my husband. I spoke with the Ethics commission today to find out if there were any issues with me considering this issue. And in discussing with the lawyer, we had about a half an hour conversation. The conclusion was, as long as I filed a disclosure in advance, which I did today with the town clerk's office, that it is perfectly reasonable for me to be participating in this conversation. But what I do wanna say is in advance, I had no conversations about this. And in fact, until the item appeared on the agenda on, and it was during my call with the ethics office, she was having trouble because I wasn't sure what they were gonna be asking for. So it wa wasn't until I actually saw the items posted on Novus that I understood what the ask was. So I have, there's been a wall between us and I have not had any discussions or participated in any on this until the, at the same time as the public was made available today when the items were posted on Novus. So I just wanted to be very clear about that. <v Speaker 1>Thank you very much Ms. W Slager. I appreciate that. Mr.</v> Hoagland, could you introduce yourself and I know you're an NAIC resident. <v Speaker 21>Yes. I'm trying to get my computer organized here. Okay.</v> My name is Henry Hoagland. I've been involved with this Island House project since the fall town meeting 2015. Our first organizing meeting was September of 2016. And I'm trying to share a PowerPoint. Here it is. All right. Thank you Madam Chair and the board and Mr. Marshall and Mr. Erickson for giving us this opportunity. This is, as I indicated, Almost 10% of my life has been spent on this project. It goes on forever. I'd like to introduce my associate Vincent Van Ventura and then talk a little bit about what is Natick heritage. Natick heritage is a new 5 0 1 C3 that has been incorporated for the specific purpose of protecting Natick historical heritage. We have assembled a board of directors of people from across the community that have significant track records for achievement. So in addition to Vincent and myself, we have, Mr. Foss is on the board, Mr. Coburn is on the board. George Sawman is on the board. He's actually a resident of Natick and Mr. Coburn is on the board. All of these people have a track record of achievement. They did not sign up for this project to fail. And I am convinced that we can make this successful. So the, the presentation also includes a link to a baby website that has just been assembled. Now the, what we're trying to do here is to prevent destruction of the oldest house in Natick. In fact, it was the first house in Natick. And to preserve a memorial for two people whose courage, vision, and integrity shaped much of our history. This project was initiated in Fall town meeting 2015. The text below the, the agenda page is the key operating text that was in the warrant passed by town meeting. And what it essentially did was it said town meeting has a strong interest in acquiring this house and protecting, and it authorizes the moderator to form a committee to provide strategy advice to the select board. So the committee was an advisory committee, it wasn't an action committee, it wasn't charged to go out and make this happen. It was charged to support the select board, which is what it did. We came up with a series of strategies and then the select board asked us to help them work out an agree agreeable series of agreements that would pull this together. The, the mission, as I say, was to provide strategies and we dissolved in the spring meeting of 2023 because there were no pending open missions assigned from the select board. The, as I said, the track record that we have for the Native Heritage Board, I think is strong. One of our strongest members is beside me, who has been raising significant monies for 20 years. All of us have had considerable at time and experience negotiating significant contracts. The, There's a series of reference documents on this project that are in Nova's agenda. I chose not to go through them tonight because you have a very rich agenda and I didn't want to impose on the 15 minutes that the board chair had had agreeably authorized to give us a key part of what we're trying to do here is to create, not just to save the house, but to create a memorial for two people whose courage, whose vision and integrity shaped our history for the last 300 years. And why was that? Well, think about the amount of animosity that exists today. Think about the polarization that exists today. Can you imagine what it would've been like in 16 85, 10 years after a thousand settlers and 3000 indigenous people were killed in King Phillips war? How could two people, Sarah Awasa mug, who was a nip muck representatives and Thomas Soen, who actually owned a sawmill in Sherburne, came together to execute a plan that Sarah put together and sold to the general court. And the concept was fairly simple. The, the Natick indigenous people were going to transfer 50 acres of land to sawn who was gonna come over here and build a gristmill sawmill on the Charles River. Now Sawman took a huge business risk when he did that because he had to finance that himself. And part of the deal was one of the revenue sources, which was grinding corn for the, was gonna be for free for Native Americans in perpetuity. The agreement that they made is remarkable because it's one of the few examples that I could find of an agreement between indigenous people and the colonials in North America anywhere that was never violated until the sawmills finally burned down in, in the early 19 hundreds. That that agreement was still in force. And the impact of what they did changed the evolution of Metro West and of Natick. And the reason it did that was because we didn't have anything here but trees. There were no jobs. If you wanted to have a farm, you had to dig out the rocks and cut down some trees that had to be done manually. There were no colonial houses built anywhere in Natick for the simple reason that people couldn't afford the wood because of, if you think about where if we wanna build a house today, you send the truck over to Home Depot, they load it up and they bring us lumber. You couldn't buy hue lumber. You had to have a sawmill created. Saw winds mills were an industrial manufacturing facility that powered the development of our economy for decades. One of the most interesting things that it did was that it attracted a lot of labor to this area of people who wanted to build things. And as we evolved into the 17 hundreds and the 18 hundreds and we developed a whole raft of manufacturing capabilities in Natick that was originally powered by the fact that we created a situation that attracted people who wanted to build something and knew how that's, that stayed, that stayed behind driving what Natick did for literally the whole, the whole last 300 years. The house was actually built in 1696. The agreement with Saan and Awasa mug was actually signed a few years earlier. But it, it's a fascinating study for me in how two people had the courage to go against what all of the people in their surrounding society felt and do something that they thought was right. And I believe that courage and integrity are two of the most important values that we believe in. And they are some of the best examples that, that I could think of the, This summarizes the, the, the basic results of that. There's a more detailed explanation and documentation that are on the thank you Novus agenda. We have spent the last eight and a half years in countless discussions with Mass Audubon to try and come up with a solution that they would find satisfactory and that would work for our ability to get funding for the project. And we have not been successful. Our request of this board tonight is very simple. We believe that protecting this property and creating this memorial is incredibly important. It's one of the few things that you can do that any of us can do that may be here 300 years from now as we envision it. This will be the only memorial in Natick to anything related to our indigenous forebearers. What we're gonna, we're asking you to do tonight is to consider an eminent domain taking. We're not asking you to decide to do that tonight to execute that, we're asking you to consider it. We're going to ask mass ban if you agree to consider that. We're gonna tell 'em that we've asked you for this consideration and ask them to withdraw their demolition permit. If they do not, about five weeks from now, that house will disappear and it'll be gone for forever. No, bringing it back. We're also going to accept as Mass Audubon to accept a strategy that's identical to what was proposed by a prior director of Mass Audubon. Because what we're proposing to do is to essentially do a shell restoration of the house similar to what has been done with a number of houses on Battle Road. In other words, we're gonna make it solidly safe. We're gonna make a weather tight, we're not gonna renovate the interior, but it will be there as a symbol that will be funded and, and looked after through the processes that we set up hopefully forever. And I'd like to, like to throw out to you a couple things that we've lost five houses in, built in the 17 hundreds in the last couple years. We'd like to put a stop to that. The research that I've done suggests that there are quite a few people over the last 300 years, both colonials and Native Americans who have done things significant for us that are not remembered and not identified. We wanna make sure that they get some recognition. So that's what the, that's what the, the key objectives that we're, we're gonna ask you to do as part of kind of our, our concluding comments. I'm gonna let Vince offer some suggestions and then we'll hopefully let you have, have some time to come to a, a decision and let us get on the business of trying to save this house. Vince, <v Speaker 22>Thank you.</v> Excuse on here please. Hi, I'm Vincent Victoria, one Hillside Road in Natick, a big lover of of Natick's history. I just wanna quickly add a few things to what Henry had to say. First, this will be very clear too, what Henry talked about with this house being essentially a, a historical monument not open to the public, but similar to our Henry Wilson shoe shop that you're probably familiar with on West Central Street. Something that's a visible symbol of a history that happened, but close to the public, which would be in keeping with Mass Audubon's mission of wanting to have a peaceful wildlife sanctuary there, but still preserving this very important piece of, of Natick's history. So as Henry mentioned, this is our first and old, this house, the only structure of Natick from the 16 hundreds. To me it's the most visible symbol of natick's. Earliest days. Not just the house though. But if you've been to the site and if you haven't encouraged you to go nearby, there are friendship trees given by the Native Americans to the saw winds, grinding stones or grinding the corn. There's some other native sites nearby if you know where to look and it, and when you take that all together, it tells a really amazing story about the earliest days of Natick. And I've taken my children there and I've showed them that the late chief caring hands visited with George saw wind when, when she was still with us. And she had a beautiful quote about visiting there. She said, I was given a tour of the property by George Saw here. He was the descendant of Thomas saw. And here I was descendant of the praying Indians. I walked on a path along the water and he showed me where my people ground their corn. There were big discs in one of the grinding stones. I could feel the land greeting me. I could feel my people, I could close my eyes and feel I was there with my people. I could feel what had happened. The link between the starving and the abundance. Here we have the man in his homestead. We have the people with the relationship with the land who are able to stand and see that it's saw wind's response and my response to see that for whatever else people think it is, it's deeper 'cause it's so much deeper, obviously to, to her. So as Henry said, and that's a beautiful quote that tells, you know, the, the beauty of this whole site together with all these historical artifacts, as Nate as, as Henry mentioned in the last 10 years, we've lost five colonial houses. We have two more that are in danger that the historical commission's keeping an eye on. And in five weeks we can now lose another one, our first and and oldest house. So I just want just talk very briefly about the whole concept of eminent domain, which I know can be a very touchy subject. There's a lot of precedent for that, including here in Natick. The Natick Organic Farm, the 37 acres used for that farm was taken by eminent domain by the town of Natick in 1974. Similarly in our region, we have Newton that's required land from Boston College to preserve by eminent, taken by eminent domain to preserve as conservation land. Framingham voted to use eminent domain to take some land from some Catholic nuns actually for a school. But that one came to an agreement. Somerville in 2021 used eminent domain to acquire historic armory that they didn't want to lose. And I'm sure there are other examples of it, but it's not unprecedented, even though it can sometimes seem un uncomfortable. So just a quick summary here. You know, this is a really important chance to save a very important piece of our town's identity and our heritage. We have this nonprofit set up and that's ready to go, ready to receive the house, raise the funds. As Henry mentioned, I've been doing major gift fundraising for over 23 years in my career. This is not a heavy lift to raise the money needed to just preserve this house as a, as essentially as a, as a shell. No utilities, nothing, nothing like that. You know, town meeting authorized the select board to acquire this house if needed. And, and it's come to a point where it is needed. In my opinion, I don't believe Mass Audubon really wants the house there. They were supportive of efforts to move it offsite, but that takes it away out of the context of its setting that I, that I referenced. It needs to, the house needs to be there and it's, you know, while the house doesn't really have much monetary value, it's invaluable to our town's history and to our heritage and identity of who we are as a town. And so it's really worth saving. That's why we've been fighting for over eight years to save this house and a hole in the ground if it's demolished or just a flat piece of land. We'll, with a sign, we'll never tell the story of our history and what happened on that site and all the people involved as having the house. Actually there will do. So again, I I hope that you, you see what we're looking to do. We hope that you'll agree with us. You're the only ones left who can save this house to be very honest. And I hope that you'll, you'll choose to do so. So thank you for your attention to this. Thank you very much. <v Speaker 11>And George would</v> <v Speaker 22>Ask me real</v> <v Speaker 11>Quick, thank you. But I</v> <v Speaker 21>Just wanna add just a, a couple of quick little stories.</v> George, we're not gonna go through that <v Speaker 1>List.</v> Actually, you, you've gone well over the 15 minutes and so I would rather if it's, if it's okay if we could just re begin discussion since it's eight 40 now, we've, <v Speaker 21>Okay.</v> That sounds good. Thank <v Speaker 1>You.</v> Thank you both. Thank you Mr. Evans. <v Speaker 11>Thank you Madam Chair.</v> <v Speaker 21>Vince, I need you up here</v> to interpret 'cause I can't hear you. Got it. <v Speaker 11>Sorry. Sorry. Thank you Madam Chair.</v> The first question I had was, you're talking about the shell proposal that was made in a shell restoration of the Sawman house that was proposed in 2017. Have you reviewed that with Mass Audubon at all? And if so, what was their reaction to that? <v Speaker 21>Well, Vince can talk about that.</v> It's basically, it's been, was discussed with them and they weren't interested. <v Speaker 22>Yeah, so Henry and I had a conversation</v> with two representatives of Mass Audubon that they agreed to present to their leadership at Mass Audubon about this concept of keeping the house there as a close to the public shell monument. Similar to other structures we mentioned. We didn't hear back, we followed up with them and we were told there's still no interest and that they, they plan to move forward with demolition. <v Speaker 11>Okay. Second question is,</v> if you were to go through with that shell restoration. When, when we viewed, excuse me, when we toured the site, there were various components of the house, the original salt, I guess it's salt box colonial, I don't remember the exact terminology, but a small structure that was the original house and everything else was added on in the 18 hundreds and, and maybe late 17 hundreds, possibly 18 hundreds. And the entire house is in disrepair. So your proposal was the shell of the original house. Is that a correct statement? <v Speaker 21>Yes. The, the concept that, that some of us are very fond</v> of is taking it back to the original house. Now that would do two things. One, the material that was freed up by taking down the rest of the house could be used to support the repairs and so forth of the original salt, salt box. What we want to do is we want to present something that is significant, is easy for people to understand, and the presents a memorial to the activities that we've just discussed, <v Speaker 22>That that concept was discussed also with Mass Auto Bond</v> to bring it back to the original structure. <v Speaker 11>Could you microphone? Yeah, please. Alright. Excuse</v> <v Speaker 22>Me.</v> I squeeze bit. That concept also was given to Mass Auto Bond to consider, just to bring it back to the original 1696 structure that didn't include the pieces added on the late 17 hundreds. They were interested in that either. So we thought this shell concept would be the simplest thing. Just leave the structure in place, fix what's there, minimal disruption, minimal time to disrupt people at Broadmoor and, and move forward with that. So <v Speaker 11>Let me understand what you mean now by, sorry,</v> shell structure, because the shell structure now is, is sort of several different eras of house, correct? So do does, do you mean bolster that entire structure? <v Speaker 22>Yes, correct. As a, as the simplest thing just</v> to keep it what's there versus trying to selectively remove pieces of it to bring it back to the original 1696 house that's included within this larger structure. Can you speak into the microphone? <v Speaker 1>Sorry. Yeah. People at home can't hear</v> <v Speaker 22>So repeat that please.</v> So, yes, so it seems to be a, a simpler solution rather than selectively taking apart back down to the original, the original 1696 structure, which Mass Auto Bond did not want to consider. We thought it would be more palatable for them to consider just leaving it, the structure that's there and being able to tell the story of what you see. But including the pieces inside are from many pieces inside are from the 1696 structure that are still there. So, so trying <v Speaker 11>To find something that would be a quicker, a,</v> a quicker fix up for Mass Auto bond rather than more disruption for them to remove pieces and reconstruct parts of the interior from the 1696 portion. All right, thank you for that. When I did the walkthrough with the town administrator on that, as well as some hi histor historic experts of that house, they identified a, a very small number of things that were of historic significance from the original period and everything else was added on. And you know, some of it was from the 1950s, some of it was the 18 hundreds. It's, it's an amalgamation of various different things. So the shell concept of that is, I can understand putting myself in Mass Audubon shoe shoes white, why they didn't, why that was not attractive to them. That's why I asked the question about the Saltbox issue, bringing that back, that was part of a plan that was presented to them. They weren't interested in March, I think of last year. 24. 2024. Correct. And they were, they weren't interested. Alright. But I think, you know, if, if they're not interested in a smaller house, I can understand why they'd have zero interest in the, the larger house that that is a bigger problem. So I'll move on. But wouldn't it be, but wouldn't it be their problem under our scenario that it'd be something that we would be managing? So that's the, that it's not in their mission to have a structure there. So our hope is to have it out of their hands to preserve. So it's not their, their their concern anymore. I understand where you're coming from, but here's my other question and this is the bigger question, which is eminent domain versus a permanent easement. We had offered the idea of a permanent easement to be granted to the, forgive me if I got the name wrong. Heritage Foundation, I'll call it the five oh one C3 that you're forming that prevented or or removed the need for the town to enter into mi into the middle of MA Mass Audubon and the 5 0 1 C3 rather than a clean pass through from Mass Audubon to the 5 0 1 C3. So I'm, I'm failing to understand why that was, that avenue was not pursued. Can you can you, can you address that? Because it's, <v Speaker 21>Well, I, I'm not, I'm not sure it's accurate</v> that that's not pursued. What we're proposing is an agreement between Mass Audubon and Native Heritage, and what we would initially propose is that they simply transfer that property to Native Heritage. If they feel that it's absolutely mandatory that Natick is part of that fine, it can be transferred to Natick. And that was part of the original conversations. And then Natick transfers it to the 5 0 1 C3. That's, that's okay. The latest cost estimates we have on this project are from today, and they're derived from Dwayne Houghton, who has a business in Framingham, early American Restorations, who's intimately familiar with this house, with this project. He's been involved since the beginning and he thinks that the number of, of doing the Shell restoration is between 350 and $400,000, which is a, an amount of money that I think we all feel very comfortable that we can generate. If you were talking about a million dollars or a million and a half dollars, that'd be another scope of problem. But we qualify for a number of, of federal and straight grants. We will be going after very, very hard CFP funds and we're gonna hit most large Natick companies such as Cognic and MathWorks. And I think we will be, I think we will be successful. The, the message we're trying to present resonates with a lot of people <v Speaker 22>In, in addition to those funding sources.</v> I also want to add lots of individual family Philanthropy is out here in this area, many generous philanthropists, but also certain found. The 1772 Foundation is one, one Option Preservation of Massachusetts has grants for historic reconstruction projects like this. The Massachusetts State Historical Commission has grants for projects like this as well. So there's a lot of opportunity for philanthropy along with CPA funds potentially to help fund what we're looking to do. <v Speaker 1>Other comments or questions from, oh, I'm sorry, Mr. Evan,</v> <v Speaker 14>I've monopolized enough time.</v> I'll reserve Mr. Come back now. Thank you. I'm looking at this 2017 memo from Mass Auto, from president of, from apparently Mass Audubon, and one of the questions is, what possible management scenarios might we consider mass auto's preference? This is 2017, would be to transfer fee ownership of the house in a small surrounding envelope to an entity responsible for restoration maintenance. Upkeep says we've expressed this interest to the town and continue to be most interested in this approach. Has that changed since 2017, or are they now not interested in doing this? <v Speaker 21>I I'm gonna have to ask Vincent what your question was.</v> <v Speaker 22>Basically, it sound, it sounds like,</v> and correct me if I'm wrong, Mr. Sidney, that in 2017, mass Audubon seemed to be open to transferring the house and some land. But what, what happened with that, those conversations that they were open to options to preserve the house on site. Why didn't anything happen from there? <v Speaker 21>Well, I think the answer to</v> that question is we don't really know Rich. And what we're asking you to do tonight is to help provide some motivation to reopen this, this conversation. I think that we would be really remiss in not taking advantage of every opportunity to save this house and to create this memorial to people and values that are really important to all of us. <v Speaker 22>And so, just wanna add, I wasn't</v> involved at that time, Mr. Sidney. My understanding, and others here might be able to, to elaborate on this if need, I know don't have time for that though. Was proposals, things were discussed in concept with Mass Audubon come to agreement verbally, and then proposals were submitted to them that they then rejected that it seemed like they were interested in doing that, and then they wouldn't agree to it on paper. Am I, am I right about that, Henry? That's <v Speaker 21>Correct.</v> <v Speaker 1>I would ask Mr. Erickson if you could</v> speak to some of what Mr. Sidney was referencing. <v Speaker 14>Can you repeat the question? Yeah, this is,</v> I was asking about this, this is from that 2017 memo from Gary Clayton Masson, and <v Speaker 1>Be, before you answer that, Mr. Erickson,</v> if someone from Natick Heritage has the estimate from Dwayne Houghton, that estimate was provided, but the form it was received in was illegible. So I asked Mr. Walsh to get in touch with you to let you know that we could not read it. It wasn't some, it's not posted on notice. No Novus. So if somebody in the room has it on their computer and they can send it for a quick upload, I I haven't seen that. I don't know if it includes prevailing wages. I don't know if it includes, I don't know what that $300,000 or $400,000 you're referencing includes. <v Speaker 14>Do you have</v> <v Speaker 22>The, the,</v> the quote from Dwayne Poten was illegible? Do you know if we can resubmit that? Do we have that and we can resubmit that? Henry, you, I believe you have that, I presume, <v Speaker 21>Or the quote that I sent around today was an email.</v> It should not have been illegible. It was in response to a note I sent to Dwayne saying, let's update what you did before. He, he was actually with us at a March 29th meeting at the house. He's very familiar with the house, he's very familiar with early American construction techniques. I mean, that's his business. And he came back and said that, you know, unless we find something that is a big surprise, I think it's 350 to $400,000. <v Speaker 1>Mr. Erickson, would you address Mr. Sidney's question?</v> <v Speaker 4>Sure. And and just to reiterate my understanding</v> of the question is, in 2017 in a correspondence with Mass Alban, there was a reference to a preferred desire to have the town of Natick be part of the transfer of ownership. And the question is, has that been, has that opinion changed? I mean, from the town's perspective, I, I we're, I I can't, well, from mass Audubon's perspective, my understanding in talking with them, they had some leadership shifts recently in the last couple years. And with that leadership shift, it has led to my understanding, has led to sort of less of a desire to have any structure at this location. Yes. I can't speak to if the town were to be part of any new agreement or a reiteration of an old agreement if they would think differently from that perspective. I, I don't know. That question has not come up, at least not in my direct conversations with them. I think what I've been hearing from mass ban, which is sounds fairly consistent to the experience of the, of the proponents here, is that their mission is for land preservation, not building preservation or land restoration. And they've been fairly, they've been consistent with me anyway in the last two years that I've been working on this project that they're most interested in bringing back that land to pre-building sort of conditions. I have been expressed from them that they're interested in some level of historic, I guess preservation's probably not the right word, but some preservation of the legacy of the property. I, their vision for that is obviously con not inconsistent, is inconsistent with what we're hearing from the proponents tonight. That's again, my impression, but I have not heard their interest in this type of land ownership that was expressed in 2017. <v Speaker 14>Thank you, Mr. Erickson. If I can continue.</v> <v Speaker 1>Yes,</v> <v Speaker 14>I would like to understand</v> a little, in a little more detail, and I don't want to spend a half an hour on it or anything, but what eminent domain entails my, I have that very high level understanding. I <v Speaker 1>Have that I have</v> <v Speaker 14>It down.</v> Okay. Let, let me finish my question, please. Of course. Go ahead. My very high level understanding is that we can take the land, but we have to give fair market value for it. And so I'd be interested in, first of all, how much of you know what, what is the process and then what would the fair market value be if we know we may not know and where the funds would come from. <v Speaker 1>Thank you, Mr. Sidney. So in anticipation of this request,</v> I spoke with counsel and did some research and got back to counsel about the process and what this board would need to do to follow imminent domain To the earlier comments, it is not unusual. Massachusetts has an f rating by the private pro, by a outside organization that protects private property rights because in Massachusetts it's very easy to take land. So that's not a problem. It's very easy to do. What has to happen in the following steps, and this will exceed the five week window that you're talking about, is we need a certified plot plan or a plot plan of the land of the exact coordinates that cut out, that the town wishes to the cut out or whatever it is that the board wants. Now, I had asked two years ago when this first came before the board, where are the financial records and how the money that was allocated by town meeting has been spent. I went back through town meeting records. There has never been a financial accounting for the $30,000. I got an accounting from the treasurer and we spent 40, sorry, we spent, we meaning the town spent, I can't pull this, it's about $6,000 on survey work, but I can't get a copy of the survey. I've contacted, I've asked for it from, from this organization before. It was this group I, let me finish please, Mr. Hoagland. I also asked, I contacted DGT Associates that that didn't delineation survey. I contacted them. They have two invoices that are approximately $5,800 no reply. Now, I did also ask for the report that was produced by Structures North Consulting Engineering, and that's attached, I believe, no Building Conservation Associates. Maybe whichever one is attached to Novus is the one that I building conservation that I asked for because we paid for it. And I wanted to see what they did in 2017. So we would first need a certified plot plan or a plot plan of the exact coordinates. Then we would need an appraisal, outside appraisal of the value of the land, which cannot be more than six months old. Appraisals right now of land are running about six months behind because of demand. Town meeting would then need to appropriate that value. We could take a vote on eminent domain, but we couldn't act on it until town meeting appropriated that value or a value to be negotiated with Mass Audubon and from which source of funding. Now, if the appraisal of the land came back, and I'm gonna make up a number, it's $10,000 and that money was raised, we would not have to go through the town meeting route. We'd still need a certified plot plan. We'd need an appraisal of the value of the land. Then the select board takes a vote on the taking. So now we're looking out at longer than five weeks. And then the order of taking is drafted and filed with the appropriate land court, whether that's registered or recorded land. Now, if it's an adversarial taking, meaning Mass Audubon says, yeah, that $10,000, it's worth more to us, then we're in court. So there's legal fees and they have the aggrieved party. Mass Audubon has up to three years to work through a jury trial in Superior Court. And that would also incur legal fees. Now, assuming NATA heritage raised all the money to cover the, the s the survey, the adversarial taking the legal fees and building the structure, assuming all of that, that is well outside the window of time that we're looking at. When this first came before the board two years ago, my colleague Mr. Evans was chair. I asked for fin I noted that town meeting did not recognize the committee because the committee had not reported, it hadn't filed the annual reports, it hadn't filed the financial reports. So when the vote came before the board as to whether or not the board should engage with Mass Audubon, again, I said, no, I didn't wanna spend any more staff time. 'cause it was inevitable that staff time would have to be spent in negotiations or discussions with Ma Mass Audubon until we had an accounting. One of the questions I had at that time is, where's the 5 0 1 C3? There was so much federal and state money. If the 5 0 1 C3 had been created in 2017, you'd be sitting on a bucket of money. But it wasn't, and it wasn't done in 2019. It wasn't done in 2021, and it wasn't done two years ago. And when I asked that question, the answer was, it takes five minutes to form a 5 0 1 C3. I've formed a half a dozen. It takes five minutes due to fill it out, get your board of directors, you file it with the state, you file it with the IRS. It cost about $500 to do. And that work wasn't done. And so now we're at a precipice of looking at an extremely valuable historical structure that has more than just historical value. It has the value of the story. I met with Mr. Hoagland. I'm trained as an historian, unlike a lot of people. I don't go on cruises and I don't go on go beach vacations. I go on historical vacations. So I go to places like the Soen House. When I visit a local area, I go to St. Augustine and I look at the 15th century in late or late 15th century Spanish things that are preserved. The oldest jail is not in Boston, the oldest jail in, in the current United States is in St. Augustine. So this is something I'm really interested in. But now I'm in this position where I have five weeks to threaten a legal action, which is a very bad thing for anybody to do unless they're prepared to act on it. And I, my concern is that if we go through this process that Mr. Sidney asked about, and we say to Mass Audubon, you know what? This is too important to us. We're gonna go through a taking and we're gonna have a vote on that taking. They're gonna say, this will be adversarial. And in the meantime, if you look at the pictures on the, the report I uploaded of the structure, the analysis of the structure, there were very specific steps in that report about what needed to happen to that building in order to preserve it and in order to weatherproof it. I was out there two months ago, I have a stack of pictures. There are trees growing in the gutters. There are windows that are broken. It has not been weatherproofed. Now, assuming that Mr. Houghton, 'cause when I say it was illegible, it came through his text. So however it was transmitted, whatever this estimate was, it was transmitted and received as, what do you call that when it's internet aski or it was, it, it was like ask. So I can't even look at that. And I do know that depending on the source of funding, now if MathWorks gives you money to do this, you're not gonna have a problem with things like prevailing wage. But if you get money from the state or the federal government, they tell you how you can spend that money and what sort of things, what sort of, what's like conditions. And so instead of just giving somebody 500,000, they say 500,000, you pay prevailing wage, multiple bids. And I don't know if Mr. Houghton took all of that into consideration. So now we are being asked with five minutes, with five weeks left to threaten a legal action that we may not wanna follow up on, but hope will cow them into postponing demolition. We don't, they do not have another written proposal. And a proposal is not an email saying, these are kind of our ideas and our concepts. A proposal is this is the goal, this is the budget, this is what we're looking at, and this is what we've done to accomplish that. I went through four years of emails from a prior board and, and a stack about an inch and a half thick from when Mike Kiki was chair of the board. And he went through this, and I haven't seen progress. So when this issue came before the board two years ago, for the first time on the board, I was a no vote. It was a four one vote that until we had some sense of what was going to happen, I couldn't get behind this. Now to be, to be fair, Mr. Hoagland, yesterday I sent you a list of questions because I don't, I don't gotcha speakers. When people, when speakers come to give us a presentation, whether it's staff or members of the public, I send them a list of questions to say, look, this is what you can anticipate. Some of, some of the questions were, and, and, and, and you answered them, but they're not, they're not complete answers. So I, I haven't seen, this board has not seen a certified plot plan, a certifi plot plan. I don't know whatever happened to the surveys that we paid for. I don't know. There's so much we don't know. And now we are being asked to make a decision that might have an impact on the town. And it breaks my heart because the mission, when you and I met and we talked about, when we talked about the meaning of Sarah was mug and sau and getting together and the reflection of the values and how that transformed this area, it struck like historical strings in my heart. At the same time, I'm being asked to do something that I feel like I can't do. That's my personal opinion. And I didn't let the rest of the board finish a asking questions, but I did wanna go into precluding discussion of eminent domain 'cause it's not a possibility in five weeks. <v Speaker 14>Well, I wanna thank you for that</v> 'cause that I, I knew there was process involved and I had this vague feeling it wasn't really possible. So I I really appreciate that and that's really what I wanted to get to. If we can't do this by eminent domain, what we're left with is negotiation with Mass Audubon and, and, and just essentially begging them not to destroy the house. I don't believe there's any action, you know, other than asking administration to restart negotiations. I don't think there's a lot of action we can take tonight. That's my personal opinion as much as it saddens me that to say that. <v Speaker 1>Anybody else on the board who wishes</v> to speak before I address Mr. Sidney's comments? Ms. Wilger, I'm sorry, Kristen. <v Speaker 15>I just wanna point out, and you know, I'm new on the board</v> and everyone is relatively new, but town meeting did authorize under Article 35, the Board of Selectmen to negotiate the acquisition of property interests as may be appropriate to support the preservation of the Thomas Sawn house. And it's a pertinent land. Have we done that? Has the board done that? I don't, I I mean <v Speaker 1>It's done it for about four years,</v> <v Speaker 15>But this is the board who is supposed</v> to be responsible for this. And that is what was to that was town meeting's vote. And I understand what you're saying, that there's probably things that needed to be done, but I think we need to be looking at ourselves too, because I don't see that that's happened. Well, I'm just, that, that's my <v Speaker 1>Opinion.</v> I didn't upload the four to five years of correspondence between the board and Audubon. That is something we can do. We can put, I mean, it is a bucket. So the board did do it, and every time they did it, mass Audubon said, we are not interested in this. What they did say is, we will only work with the town if the town runs the property. They said that numerous times, we don't wanna work with some unnamed untested non-profit that doesn't yet exist. We wanna make sure that the town indemnifies mass Audubon for any injuries that happen on the land. And the board said at one point, and I don't know what year this was, 20 18, 20 19, no, we're not willing to do that. We don't have control and care custody of the property. If we don't own it, why are we taking out insurance and indemnifying a property? So the board, in my opinion, did its due diligence and also asked for things that it needed to help inform the decision. And this board was not provided with that. Now, what we can do is on the, on the 22nd, we can dig up all this correspondence and put it on, on Novus so that the board can have a better sense of what transpired from 2018 when Mike Hickey was the chair and worked on this through to last week. And I'm happy to do that. Ms. Pope. I'm sorry, <v Speaker 4>Sorry.</v> I was just gonna add that there was an, a very extensive process with legal counsel working to negotiate an agreement. That is what Ms. Cran Coughlin mentioned, that included a draft agreement with Mass Audubon between the town and Mass Audubon that still had as noted some components that Mass Audubon wasn't willing to, to say yes to, and the town was not willing to say yes to that was ready to, to continue the dialogue. And then the pandemic happened in 2020. So part of it got paused at that point. And then when we came back to the, to the discussions with Mass Audubon about two years ago, mass Autobahn indicated to the town, and this is what I mentioned earlier, that they had less willingness to entertain that type of agreement. So there was a lot countless, I, we talked to Garris on this yesterday. She spent countless hours on this trying to negotiate something with Mass Audubon about four years ago, I wanna say. But with that said, the process for eminent domain is a very extensive one. I've actually done that in my career in a Massachusetts community multiple times. It's not an easy process. You need to get appraisals. They need to be, they can't be stale. There's multiple steps along the way. So just it, it's, it is an extensive process. <v Speaker 1>I'd like to further comment on that, on the motion</v> that town meeting passed, not just Article 35, the amended motion said, said committee is to explore with the property owner and its board of directors. The possible conveyance said committee is to identify mechanisms to preserve the house. Said committee is to offer technical assistance and advice to the board of Selectmen shall consist of five members who may be nominated, dah, dah, dah, dah, in the field of historic preservation, real estate law, historic site, interpretive planning, landscape architecture and architecture, appropriates $30,000 from free cash for technical assistance and to authorize the board to negotiate that acquisition, which based on my reading of the quite historical thick record, I think the board acquitted itself. It was never gonna be an easy project, but there were also a lot of, there's lots of places to point fingers, but now we're in a place five weeks out where things that have been, could have been done two years ago, would've put us in a better place now, five weeks out. And we don't have that. Ms. Pope, did you? Yeah, when I'm done with the board. Thank you. <v Speaker 10>Thank you Mr. Hoagland.</v> For and and gentlemen I Victoria. Yes, Victoria, thank you for the presentation. A number of times I heard the language people want this. I don't know that this would be, would be necessary or needed or or or a part of this, but has there, is there information on community consensus that desires to save this? Other than the people who are currently working on it? Is, is there community consensus records or anything like that? <v Speaker 22>Your question, Henry?</v> <v Speaker 21>No,</v> I didn't hear the question. She's, <v Speaker 22>Mr.</v> Pop is asking if there's any community consensus about the desire to preserve this house from beyond the people directly involved with this effort to save it, the petition and such. For <v Speaker 21>Instance, we have a petition with 1200 signatures on it</v> that's growing every day to respond to a couple of comments from the chair. None of us were know, knew anything about requests from the board wanting more information. Two years ago, I have the plot plans on my computer. All somebody had to do was access for 'em. They were, the, the key things that we paid for were the surveys and a wetland survey that was about it. And the, the DT BDPW and the building commissioner has the wetland survey. We did not know that Mass Auto been had filed a demo permit until 60 days later because Mr. Erickson decided that we didn't need to know. So we were, <v Speaker 1>That's 100% false.</v> I would like him to respond to that. <v Speaker 21>We were, we were</v> behind the curve from the beginning in terms of what we were gonna do. Our attorney told us that, look, the only thing we can do is probably try and execute a taking because the Stillman deed, which provides this land to Mass Audubon specifically precludes resale of any of that property. So therefore the market value that would, would come up in any discussion if they were opposing a tank is gonna be zero because there is no market value. It's not saleable. The quantity of land that we're talking about is pretty minimal. And the objective of the strategy that we put together was to eliminate any competition, confusion, any issues with the normal operations of, of Mass Audubon. And that's pretty much what happens with the, the houses that are on the, the battle trail. They're there, they're maintained and taken care of and they don't bother anybody. We don't want this to bother anybody either. But I do know that if if it goes away in five weeks, it's gone forever. And we've lost an opportunity. And as I said, I did not hear anybody tell me that we needed certain information Two years ago <v Speaker 1>On, on January 30th, 2023, I specifically stated</v> and voted no because I needed to see financial records, certified pot plan, a report for that would be provided at town meeting. And the committee was not, did not disband the committee was disbanded by town meeting because of a lack of reports filed. So that is a correction of the record, sir, on one 30 chair, <v Speaker 21>Let me respond to that.</v> Nobody told us that we had to file an annual report. We didn't view it as a town committee, we viewed it as a moderator's committee and nobody contacted us, nobody and said you have to file a report. We talked almost monthly with whoever the chairman of the select board was. And we decided early on that we were not going to document and put in minutes negotiations concerning what we were trying to do. You just don't do that when you're trying to negotiate a contract. So if we were remiss at providing you specific information, I apologize for that. I had asked our attorney to make sure that you got that. He probably didn't think that that was a huge issue because there were only three or four items that were related. As I say, the wetland survey and the certified plot plans, of which there were three, including the house and a potential parking structure apart across the street. <v Speaker 1>It's my understanding town bylaws require annual</v> reports from every committee. It's also my understanding that those committees are allowed to go into executive session, to take executive session minutes to discuss negotiations regarding negotiating contracts and land. I think that I, I'm not sure who your attorney was, but it sounds to me like the committee was badly served if that person did not know that you needed to file an annual report at the town. That's the first thing. The second thing is, you, you have to keep minutes. You're a publicly appointed body. Every single, not everyone does it, but you have to keep minutes. Not of the things that you're talking about in negotiation, the fact you come together and say, oh, we're gonna pay X amount of money for a survey that needs to be in a minute, minutes, it has to be voted on. I, I I'm, I'm sorry that, that you did not have that information. I don't know who would've been in charge of giving you that information. <v Speaker 21>Well, the issue really is where we are is where we are.</v> If Yep. The board votes to consider a taking, I think we can change the dynamics of the direction that we're going with Matt Ubon, if you don't want to consider a a taking, then it's a done deal. <v Speaker 1>Why is it not the case that the committee could write</v> and ask for an extension of the demolition date to present the materials that you've presented here tonight? That you have the nonprofit, that you have somebody who's proficient in, in fundraising and that you actually have a plan because you have the survey, a plan and a proposal. Because my understanding that, that there's just been exchanges of emails, there has not been a proposal. What would preclude you from doing that? <v Speaker 21>We had, we've had conversations with them. We can do that.</v> Again, if they're not willing to enter, if they're not interested in accepting a plan, then there's no point in us putting together, we can probably pursue that starting tomorrow. But the, the real issue is we're not gonna have a plan complete in five weeks. And if they're not willing to extend that, that deadline, there's a problem. In other words, we can't do anything about raising funds as long as the property's level to be distorted in five weeks. <v Speaker 1>I would venture that it would be very difficult</v> to raise funds if you are in an adversarial, eminent domain lawsuit. <v Speaker 21>It may be, but on the other hand,</v> I think most people would figure that they don't have a significant opportunity to prevail on that. And it's if what they want to do is get this issue resolved and quit having to worry about the house, we can provide a way to have that, have that happen quickly. <v Speaker 1>I'll ask for last comments from members of the board</v> and then we'll wrap this up. Mr. Mr. Evans, <v Speaker 11>Thank you Madam Chair.</v> I'm gonna reiterate some of the earlier points. We, we've been going in this Groundhog Day cycle for better part of a decade, and you're trying to preserve something that Mass Audubon has steadfastly, at least since 2017 say, is unacceptable. Right? What makes you think, and this is a rhetorical question, what makes you think that presenting this one more time as is, is going to sway them in any way, shape, or form? That's a rhetorical question that it's not. What may sway them is a proposal that you, that was provided to them in the spring. And if you couple that with a permanent easement possibility, that gets passed through to the 5 0 1 C3. You have the financing in order, you have the plans, you have the survey. That's what you need. That's what they need to make a decision. They have said over and over, I've heard this at least 40 times from them, that they cannot, they want this problem to be resolved amicably, right? They do not want eminent domain. They don't wanna fight us. They want to work with us, right? And we are not working with them. We tried as a board to do that. That didn't work. We tried the last couple of years to get different proposals to them that they could go for and never was a fully flushed, fleshed out plan for them to review and, and take a look at. I think as you come to this five end of the six month deadline, you're coming to a point where you can say, here is our best and final. Right? You talk to them and you say, this is the best we can do. We need, we want to move on, you want to move on, let's get it done. But pushing and pushing and pushing the same story to them is not going to change anything. I just don't see how that <v Speaker 21>Will work.</v> Bruce, we've actually, we've actually presented a variety of different stories, including forgetting about the house, simply peeling off the area that was added decades ago. That was the original cottage that Wyn lived in while he built the house and setting up, call it, that's what we call Mill Cottage. They were not interested in that. I think there are two, I think there are two. <v Speaker 11>Lemme just refute that</v> because I was there for those discussions. They were interested in the concept. They talked about, well, where would you store the historic items while the rest of the house is dismantled and we'd be interested in do it, but there was never a completed plan, a completed plot plan plan, an easement, permanent easement discussed identifying the exact location of these things. Those things weren't done. How can they possibly approve? <v Speaker 21>Didn't Bruce, we didn't have the funds</v> to do those things. Finished <v Speaker 11>You, that does not take funds to do that.</v> Right? You had the information that you had in the past, yet you didn't present it to them in that fashion. You had a survey done. Right? Has the house moved since that, those <v Speaker 21>Surveys have been prevented</v> to them on three different occasions. <v Speaker 11>So we're at this impasse now.</v> <v Speaker 21>I mean, the, and the issue is tick and the clock is,</v> unless they have some, and we're <v Speaker 11>Some, we're just banging our</v> heads against the wall trying to get this done, it's just not going to happen. Right? The only way this is going to happen is if we start working with them instead of having an ultimatum of imminent domain dangled in front of them. How about a more cooperative spirit to saying, look, we know this is an attractive nuisance to you. Let's work together to resolve this. Here are the elements of the plan. Can you give us an extension to the demo? Right? That's the only path <v Speaker 21>Forward.</v> We can try that discussion. I will actually invite you to join us in that. <v Speaker 11>Happy to join it. The,</v> <v Speaker 21>The reality is that I don't know</v> how many different meetings we had with him and how many proposals we offered to them. The most recent one was just about the time that the covid hit After the covid scenario. We ask Melissa and her successor if they would get involved and have some conversations they did. That was unsuccessful. <v Speaker 11>What happened with Matt March this year?</v> When we go back, we all were walking out, pardon me? What happened in March, 2024 when we were all doing a site visit there? I guess it was April, 2024. All of us were there. All of us were talking to Mass Audubon. They agreed conceptually with the Mill Cottage idea. They said, alright, how do we move forward on this? Right? Then all of a sudden, that was a non, nothing came of that. Right? So what, so, so it was scrapped and, and I just don't get it. I just don't get how we can continue to play the game of Groundhog Day and expect a different result. I'm, I'm totally mystified with that proposal. Then why did it happen? Pardon <v Speaker 1>Me?</v> I'd like to, there are members of the public who would like to speak first. Ms. One moment. First. Ms. Doen is on on Zoom. You can unmute yourself. <v Speaker 23>Yeah, thank you. And</v> <v Speaker 1>Please limit your,</v> your comments if you could to three to four <v Speaker 23>Minutes.</v> I wanna do my best. It's late and I was in the process of listening to this meeting and simultaneously writing a letter to you, the select board about this topic. I'm very uncomfortable with the tone of this conversation. I don't think it's necessary to be, it feels combative and we're all tired. I know, and you all have been working so hard on other things. I have heard about the SEN house. There's so much going on in this town. I just haven't been able to tune into it all. I feel horrible that I haven't, I am shocked that we're at a point where we might lose the oldest structure in the town. It's unconscionable. I don't wanna hear, well, I didn't get an email, we didn't get this report. We asked for this. We stop. Let's just pull together. We have five weeks. You can get a lot done where there's a will, there's a way. I have deep roots in Fredericksburg, Virginia. My family was instrumental in a lot of how that town came about. My family gave the land to what is now Mary Washington College. I could go on and on. I am a 10th great granddaughter of Pocahontas through my, through descended from that family. And like this matters. I, if there's one plank from the original house left, it's worth saving. And I, there may be a six month wait for an appraisal. You know what? We could have someone here this week. That's just how life works. And I really wish he would rally and pull together. And again, my apologies, Mr. Hoagland and his team, they seem like they're smart, well connected. They can get the funding. I believe them. I'm disappointed in mess Audubon, like shockingly disappointed. I feel like maybe the media needs to get involved. I don't know if it were tomorrow that it was going to be torn down. Yeah, it's too late and it's the 11th hour as it is. But I would beg this committee to do whatever it takes to stop the finger pointing or whatever. And yeah, hopefully I'm within my time limit. And I'm not eloquent because I'm just kind of disappointed and upset right now. And this matters once that house has gone and the three other houses in the last few years, colonial houses, we've let that happen. What is happening with this town? Frank Fos is right. We need a major course correction and I support that. <v Speaker 1>Mr. Coburn?</v> <v Speaker 17>Yes,</v> <v Speaker 18>Henry.</v> <v Speaker 17>Thank you Madam Chair, members of the select board,</v> Dirk Coburn, 2 0 2 Bacon Street. I've gotten involved in this Natick heritage organization at this point, because this isn't just about history. This our town's history. This is about history. And there are places in this world where the people who live locally steward something that matters to the country, to our continent, to our world, not just to our world now. But over time, you know, we think of Wounded Knee, we think of Little Bighorn, we think of Gettysburg. And it's not just battles either. We think of Williamsburg, we think of Fredericksburg, who think of Kitty Hawk, the pe, the local people who live in these places are charged with stewarding something for a big purpose and for all of humanity. And through time, and this is why I've gotten involved in this, we have heard, I I want to say eloquently, I'm, you may judge for yourself how eloquent we've been this evening discussing things. I think people have been in earnest trying to yep, understand things that need to be done by a process. But I think we must not lose sight of the importance of this. This is not just a, a agreement that was never abrogated. This was the first commercial industrial collaboration between indigenous peoples and colonialists in a colonial age where it was not just a power relationship where it was a handshake agreement among equals collaborating in a, in a really very substantial industrial commercial way. The first in the world, you know, before that it was, there was trading going on. There was, there was trading including in, in people being bought and sold around the world. There, there are all kinds of things going on when people met each other, but this was something that represented something new in the world and kept going until the early 20th century when the whole model of that business was outmoded. And we are the stewards. We who live here in Natick are the stewards of the place where that happened. And I think I understand, I, I know a bit about the Audubon organization. My mother was heavily involved in the sanctuary committee there. She knew a lot of the people on the board there. And their mission is wildlife. Their mission is not historical preservation. I think when we deal with people whose livelihood is part of that wildlife mission, I understand why they may not feel completely motivated. They may, they may like the idea, but they, they may like their livelihood as well. I think it's important for us to give every possible effort to preserve what we, for better or for worse, who live here, who are resident in this place, where this amazing thing happened. Do what we can to memorialize it, to preserve it, to preserve an archeological site. It's not just the, the structure. It's not just people visiting and thinking about what was going on. It's scholars coming and actually doing research and not just, not just on the structure and not just that at the time that this agreement happened, but the fact that it lasted for centuries and the fact that it did evolve and a structure, you know, was, was added onto. And, you know, during that time, that's all stuff that real scholars would absolutely just dig into and we're the stewards who can make that happen. I don't love the idea of walking out of here with everybody thinking, boy, all these things that happened in the last several years, you know, could have been so much more efficient. But I'm throwing up my hands. I, I hope we can come together and figure out a way forward. <v Speaker 1>Mr. Coburn, I'd like to say that I, I completely agree</v> and thank you for your very eloquent words. There is nothing you said that I don't agree with. I'm just, I need a plan for the board to move us forward. Whoever said what happened in the past doesn't matter. We are where we are. We're five weeks out, we're talking about an override and maybe an adversarial taking. So there are lots of things going on. Mr. Fos, do you wanna speak just one minute please. Okay. <v Speaker 6>I'm try and bring this down to ground zero a little bit</v> here because I think most of us are in agreement that there's great value here. I don't think that that's the case. And I think that's been eloquently stated by a number of people. I had the luxury of negotiating cable franchises for 23 years and what I'm hearing what occurred in the stories I heard, well of course I couldn't get involved in them as moderator are exactly what I used to see day in and day out. Dealing with people like yourself or town managers or city managers or mayor, mayor Menino, one of the toughest people I've ever met or seen. And it always came down to the final moment when things had to happen that things got done when time was of the essence, when it was at a point where you have to do something, you've gotta really make a decision. I think that's where we are right now. And I think that if that communicated to the Mass Audubon folks with your ascent, we're willing to do that. We wanna do that to, to Mr. Evan's point. Well, why don't you just, or, or the chair's point, why don't we, why don't you just go broach them. The value and the weight of your ascent, or at least your input is invaluable for us to go to the Mass Audubon to do that kind of, to have that kind of discussion in my humble opinion, because when I went to Mayor Menino and he said, well, what does your president of your division say? I couldn't answer because I didn't know what Kevin Casey was gonna say and I didn't wanna be dishonest with him, right? So I said, I will get that, that message for you. That's what we're doing here. How can you give us some semblance of ascent or some semblance of cooperation in this issue so that we can take the next steps and have that, let's say weight of the board to give us the ability to go out and raise funds to carry our message out to the public, to to go see Mass Audubon and to see if they will forestall before bear on, on making a move so that we then could take the appropriate steps. I think that's the ask. So let's, let's not get too deep into the weeds into what needs to happen afterwards. We're not there yet. And Mr. Evans, I think was a hundred percent correct that we need to go back and we need to have that state of mind. And with your help, even just a sense of the board, it would be extremely meaningful. <v Speaker 1>Mr. Foa,</v> <v Speaker 6>I took more than a</v> <v Speaker 1>Minute.</v> No, no. I wanted to ask you a question. Sure. Given your extensive negotiation experience, your history of negotiating go, would it be sufficient for this board to vote on and write a letter saying that we would request the demolition to be put off for 90 days to allow for further discussions, concrete proposal and not threaten eminent domain. <v Speaker 6>I don't know if you'd wanna rule out your not</v> taking action on eminent domain because you're giving up your rights <v Speaker 1>Or just not mention it.</v> <v Speaker 6>Exclude that and I think everything else is probably</v> a good step for that. Would would give us some leverage. And that's the key. That was also the key to what, what we used to always look for is where's the leverage in negotiations that you can go to a tough negotiator and say, Hey, I've got this, this is, this is what our customers are telling us and this is what the town of Natick is telling us. And its leaders are saying, this is a good thing. We have some semblance of asset of value here. Let's let's take the next, next appropriate step and do that in such a way that's amicable. Amicable. We don't need need <v Speaker 1>To battle.</v> No, I there's no need to battle. Agreed. That's what I was asking and amicable. <v Speaker 6>I was getting a little concerned when with back</v> and forth here and, and the previous speaker mentioned it too. We don't need to do that. We could be very forthright and very, very strong in our convictions, but we certainly don't have to be combative and I would not be one of wanna be a party of any, any, anything that's like that because I think Mass Audubon the good people and I think they'll listen to our, to a good proposal. I'm hearing that at least from what I've heard. Well over a minute. I'm sorry. <v Speaker 1>Thank you, Mr. Fos. Dr. Mackenzie.</v> <v Speaker 9>I first learned about the Salin House when I was in third</v> or fourth grade in the Natick Public Schools. And it was a powerful example to me of the ability of people to communicate and negotiate. And I was so proud of Natick when I heard that story. And you know, it was an adventure as a child to go and see if we can see the remnants of the mills that were lent out and to even see the house. And I recently had the opportunity, a very dear friend died in a horrible car accident in her daughter lives in one of the six, his most historic houses in Natick, which will probably present some difficulty as she navigates how she's gonna build something for her dad to now live in. And during the course of that, when I found those six historic houses, the pictures in the list is headed off by the Salin house. And I was like, of course, this is so history. This is our town and this says something about how we live together and we are in such divisive times that this story is important to hold onto. And do we hold onto it with, you know, remnants of a house that maybe aren't a hundred percent historical? Well I think we do in part and we have five weeks and I think this is the town and it's like unfair. I mean this board's done a lot of work. They're all volunteers. They've worked really hard and I just like, we can do this and I think you can help them. And Ms. Coughlin, I think it was really your wanting to write a letter I think would be a helpful start. I don't think that you should rule out eminent domain though. I mean this is part of the town and this is part of the town's history and maybe this poor saw house would've been better off if it had been private property and kept to zoning bylaws and stuff that other people in town are kept to. So it's just not helpful to go back and forth and said, you should have did this or you should have done that, or we've got five weeks, let's just try and see if we can save it. Because to kids it's such an important sense of pride about this town. It was, and I think it formed, it formed me as an educator and as Ms. Coughlin, as you've pointed out, history's important and any ways that we can teach our kids and we need powerful examples of cul different cultures working together, of people working together. Thank you. <v Speaker 1>Thank you Dr. Mackenzie.</v> Mr. Pierce, then you. <v Speaker 5>Thank you. Jerry Pierce precinct 10</v> for over 55 years in still Count. I have lived at the junction of Route 16 Elliot Street and South Street, which goes down to the Sawn house in the early seventies, eighties, in the early nineties, a bunch of equestrians would ride our horses down South Street and go riding through the Audubon. We had a wonderful time for almost 25 years doing that. The Audubon manager, I think his name was Bruce, he and his wife and two children lived in the sewing house and he says, go ahead and ride your horses through the property. And we did that and we had a great relationship with them. Later on in the, I guess latter nineties, different management overtook the Audubon, the State Audubon headquarters, and they objected to horses, horses going through the property because of the hoof prints. We, several equestrians came before the board of Select, but at that time, and we raised at the point that we really would like to continue to ride our horses through the Audubon because it was a property in Natick and between the, the three towns, Natick, Dover Sherman, I believe Audubon owns over, has over 400 acres. And we felt that we were as Natick residents paying taxes, we had every right to ride our horses through that property. I really don't remember how it all turned out, but I, I still bought my horse over there. I felt, if they can catch me, go ahead. But our dealings with the audible, like I said, were not as amenable as they could be. I I don't have the same feelings for them. I support them because it's a great thing asset in our neighborhood. But I just feel, I strongly feel, because like I said, I have gone up and down that street over the years so many times and I have pictures of the auto, of the Soen house over those years. And when I went by the edges a few days ago, like your chair did, I couldn't believe the disrepair. I was just stunned by the boards over the windows and the growth around the house and the broken windows. It's my fear and belief that Mass Audubon has purposely made the house in disrepair. So we would be willing to put a match to it or just bulldoze it over. I firmly believe that. Thank you. <v Speaker 1>Thank you Mr. Pierce. Mr. Sidney.</v> <v Speaker 14>So I'm sort of thinking about next steps right now</v> and hearing everything just, you know, I'm not at this, at this stage. I'm not willing to entertain a taking, I am willing to entertain a letter if you would like a motion. And it's, if you'd like a motion authorizing you to write a letter, I'd be willing to make that. It's, it's very hard to see a path forward with five weeks to go and given the fact that we only meet every two weeks or or so, and you know, I mean these we're talking governmental bodies and, and massive entities. It's, it can be really slow. I would like to see them give us a grace period to, to try and revive negotiations if possible. <v Speaker 1>They, they are under a six month grace period.</v> But I hear what you're saying. I just wanted to <v Speaker 14>Yeah, no, I, I got that to</v> <v Speaker 1>Be clear.</v> Any other members of the board? Ms. Pope, <v Speaker 10>I appreciate the, the folks who came up in support of this</v> because that, I think I was looking for that and I appreciate you sharing about the 1200 signatures and, and Madam Chair, I appreciate all of the history that you went and did in the research and kind of connecting the dots for this process. I think it's really important that while there is great sentiment, we also do the business of, of what it takes to make sure that this is done right and well, and the town is benefits. I I mean, those two things have to be balanced justly the sentiment of this historic property, which I mean, I, I agree. I want, I I would wanna see future generations get to benefit from this and with the sentiment, if the board goes out on the limb and writes the letter for the leverage, you know, I, the way I would see it is that there can't be any excuses for the things that need to get done done, because that puts the town to me that would put the town, the, the board in a precarious place. So I too, I'm in, I'm in favor of, you know, the letter and, and the leverage that it would give. But I, I do think we have to, we at least we are in a position of managing the sentiment as well as the, the process that has to happen to make this right. <v Speaker 1>Yes. Mr. Evans,</v> <v Speaker 11>Thank you Madam Chair, very briefly.</v> I agree with what Ms. Pope just said. There isn't anyone on this board who wants to see this go away. What we're trying to do though, and I agree with the need to send a letter, but I think the leverage that we have is coming up with a plan that they're willing to accept. Coming in with a plan that they've already firmly rejected is a non-starter. And I just, I can't emphasize that enough. So if we come to them with a plan that least has a snowballs chance of getting approved that's different from a threat of eminent domain and take it or leave it, this is the house as it exists today, that's just not gonna work. No matter how much time you have, it's not gonna work. It hasn't in the decade that this has been in a discussion. So what we need to do is find, and I think Mr. Frost summarized it pretty well, find a, a, a mutually agreeable path forward. Right? That's how any negotiation works. Pushing and prodding someone and threatening someone never gets things done when, when, when there's any, anything other than, and even if there is unanimous agreement, it still probably wouldn't work, right? So we need to write this letter, ask for the extension with the proviso that the 5 0 1 C3 is going to present a detailed plan to Mass Audubon as a discussion. And then we have the weight of our, the select board, the weight of the 5 0 1 C3 and the petition that you've talked about with 1200 signatures that all con combines to help Mass Audubon get convinced that this is in their interest to make it go away and to, to get a gold star instead of a, I don't know what the alternative to Gold Star is. A negative check mark. I don't know bad publicity name, <v Speaker 1>No sticker on the chart.</v> <v Speaker 11>Okay, thank you.</v> You were, you were a grade school teacher, weren't you? <v Speaker 1>No. College, but they still needed a</v> college students like those stickers too. Ms. Wolf Schlager. <v Speaker 15>I just wanna thank everyone for all of the comments</v> that have been made and some of them really hit home at this point. I would also support a letter, but I would also like the letter to say that the board would really like to see the Salin house preserved. Absolutely. I think that's really important that we all agree on that. Yeah. That it's, you know, we've worked really hard. Yes. And it's been disappointing to see that we haven't come to an agreement. I wouldn't say that in the letter, but it's, and and I agree with Mr. Foss about maybe it when it comes to be crunch time that we can actually work something out. Yeah. And I'm hoping that that's the case because as everyone has said, when the house is gone, it's gone. So we really do have a very tight window. I'm not sure 90 days is sufficient. That's one thing that would be a concern of mine. If we, if we ask them for only 90 days, I don't know what the right timeframe is. Maybe the committee might have some better ideas, but I, I think that we, you know, we do, we are the stewards, as Mr. Coburn said, and I think we need to make our opinion very clear. Thank you. <v Speaker 1>So my, my thoughts about the letter,</v> and one of the reasons I raised it as a possibility, my concept of that, that letter would be, would have the following elements. One is that the board values this property and its historical meaning, and that we are stewards as doc, as Mr. Coburn mentioned, and that the board supports the potential preservation of this. It would be absent of any discussion about eminent domain or threats. It would include a detailed analysis of this new committee's expertise. So that I would like to have from each of you key points, I don't need a cv, but Frank Fos negotiating your ba what, whatever brought you into this and, and your strength, Mr. Coborn, your strengths, what strengths do you bring to this Vincent Rio, your, your expertise and history and fundraising. What Henry Hoagland, the amount of time that you've spent on, on nego on researching this property and, and what you bring to the, this is this new board of directors for me to convince them to say this is not the same old thing that has happened since 2017, that this board has confidence in this new board native heritage and that this is important to us. So we request respectfully request A period of time to be, to be discussed. I'm gonna ask you a few questions to delay demo, to voluntarily delay demolition. So in addition to those things that I would need from the four of you and anybody else, George Soen, anybody else who's involved in this endeavor, in order to write a compelling letter, because I don't want to waste the board's time mass Audubon's time or the native heritage time. So to write a compelling persuasive letter, I, I'd need those things. I'd also like to see the survey. I'd like to see Houghton's estimate. So what he had put together. If you could just resend that and I'll circulate it to the boards that they have it. We'll get it up on Novus for those who are interested. If you could resend that to me, that would be great. I don't know what happened. I can show you what it looks like on our screen, but that's why it wasn't posted. And then what I can suggest is getting, you know, the letter at its earliest would have to go out. I was thinking about calling an override meeting on the 15th. So the earliest it would go out for, for the board to approve the form and content without us violating open meeting would be on the 15th. But I will, I would commit to writing a very persuasive letter and having the, for the board give me feedback and executing that and sending it over to them on the 16th. I wanna echo my, my colleagues' comments about, gotta know that something's gonna happen. So to the extent that there was combativeness or that there was a sense of conflict, it represents hours that I have spent reading the correspondence and the emails and the proposals that go back to 2017 and asking staff to devote time to something that had not yet come to fruition. Those were my frustrations. The fact that my tone beli belied those frustrations, I apologize. That's context, not an excuse. So I'm willing to entertain that. We can ask for six months. They might come back and say, we'll give you three, we'll give you four. But I guess in negotiations, that's where you start, right? You start with more than you might need and hope that they say yes and then be prepared with what they come back with. Does that sound like a plan, a plan forward? <v Speaker 4>Would you like a motion?</v> <v Speaker 1>Not yet. Yes. Mr. Erickson.</v> <v Speaker 4>I, I just forwarded a series of emails to you,</v> Madam Chair, from literally a year ago, where then chair Bruce Evans, along with Mr. Hoagland and Steve Evers and myself, sent a request over to Mass Audubon to delay what was going to be an application. At that time, I did not send it to the rest of the board, but we can certainly share it with the rest of the board. I think it's important to have that in context since this is not the first time that masks that the board in some capacity, maybe not in this capacity, but the board chair, the town, and this group has asked them to delay their, their application for a demolition permit at that time. They agreed to delay until March one, and then we asked them for an extension on that at that time, and they agreed to delay their application till May one. This all happened last year. Yes. So I'm forwarded those four your information. I want everybody to be aware of that because this is not the first time that this type of request has been provided, mass Audubon. And it was that after that time in May that they applied for the permit. And I may have misheard, but I believe it was accused of me that I had delayed the distribution of a permit for 60 days to folks. That has not happened. I have no role in the permitting process. And I just wanna make that clear for the record as well, that I'm, I take my integrity and honestly, seriously, and that I have zero role in the role of, of the permitting for something like this. But I just wanna make sure that the record is clear on that. And also that the board is aware that we have gone through this exercise with mass ubon almost exactly a year ago. That email was sent by Bruce on JU January 12th, 2024. And there's previous emails to that as well and discussions that led up to that point that had been ongoing. So just for everybody's knowledge that this is not the first time that we have been asked, asking Mass Audubon to delay their demolition, <v Speaker 1>Understood these letters will be made,</v> made available on Novus, along with not all of the correspondence since 2017, because it is quite considerable. But with every substantive piece of correspondence with regard to Soen house, by between the board, the committee as it was originally constituted and Mass Audubon. So all of that will be available. What I would like to do at, because this will be an out of cycle meeting, which I still have not asked the board if they're available, since this will be an out of cycle meeting for the sole purpose, the formerly sole purpose of discussing the override, I would like to take 15 minutes, no more than to approve the draft of the letter and not have substantive input from the public or more comments. Feel free to write emails, feel free to call because people do and I'm happy to, I always take calls. So if, if, if we have a motion and we approve that the outlines of which I basically stated, I will have that ready for a 15 minute discussion and editing and approval to be sent out on the 15th. <v Speaker 14>Well, so I move to authorize the chair</v> to write a letter outlined, as she said, <v Speaker 1>Second, second</v> move by Mr. Sydney, seconded by Ms. Pope. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? So I would like, please, just in reiteration, send me an email, Mr. Coburn all the, all of the officers and directors. It need not be substantive. Bullet points are fine. So, and, and what, what this newly constituted nonprofit brings and, and identify funding sources. So, you know, the great, the corporate ones are great, but if you mention the state and federal ones, be aware that that's likely, they're gonna look at deadlines. So those deadlines come roll around once a year. So if they say, oh, they're looking for a half a million from the federal government XXX, Y, Z, that may not even open until October. So I, I've written a lot of grant proposals and I know how, how it's looked at by benefactor. So let's buckle down and get this done. And I will see most of you, or at least hear from you between now and next week. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you. And please, please resend the hog survey. No, the, the estimate from Dwayne. <v Speaker 21>Yes, I will. I'd just like to say thank you very much</v> for your time and attention, all of you. To the extent that you may be concerned that some of our discussions previously had been other than collaborative and congenial, that's not true. I've negotiated dozens of big contracts and I learned when I was a young man, which has been a long time ago, that if you could create something that was a win-win for everybody, you could make it work forever. That's what we've been trying to do with your help. I think we can make that happen. We can't make it without your help. So thank you very much <v Speaker 1>And thank you for your passion for this project.</v> Thank you for your passion for this project. Thank you. I earlier guaranteed that we would be out by midnight. So I am going FanDuel, so I'm going Yes. So yeah, FanDuel DraftKings. So what I'm going to do is move the discussion of the TIP certification alcohol policy, which is not time sensitive to the, the end of the month. I think that's the 22nd, 22nd discussion of public speak policy. Ms. Slager raised a couple of really good points. I checked with counsel and so we've only made the changes that I'll, I'll just tell you real quickly what they are. 'cause we've, we've discussed this ad nauseum, Ms. Slager caught in the previous caught two potential errors. Well, they are errors. Two paragraphs, paragraph four and five said citizens and not persons. That was a holdover from the old policy, which was called citizen speak. So there in four and five that has been changed to any persons. Paragraph six has been added to note that while we do endeavor to make sure that all persons have the opportunity to address the board, oh, I see a typo. <v Speaker 11>That may not be</v> <v Speaker 1>Possible.</v> Okay. We can still vote this cont cont upon the scriveners, but that nay bot be possible. In cases where there is intense public interest in a particular topic, the board may schedule a future meeting to allow for further input. Those were awesome additions. And with the exception of nay in paragraph six, move <v Speaker 11>To</v> <v Speaker 1>Approve.</v> I have a motion from Bruce. Second, second, second from Ms. Slager. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. All opposed? Thank you. That passes 5 0 0. And Mr. Walsh, if you're still with us, if you could just reprint it with the change in the May, may from May. Put it in the blue folder. We'll get that signed and put to bed. Draft letter of to Civil Service commission. I have, what do I have? This is not Yeah, it, this is not, this is not the version. Yeah, I wasn't sure how to read this because it wasn't filled in. This is not the version and I, I didn't check it because I I didn't check it. So I'm sorry. <v Speaker 4>Correct. Ms. Mr. Walsh has sent around a version</v> to Catherine, myself and Chief Hicks, and unfortunately we just didn't get the correct version up online. <v Speaker 1>Can we put it up online now and vote it?</v> <v Speaker 4>Let me see if I can get it</v> <v Speaker 1>Recorded.</v> I, I, I know, I think I have it. So let me just check. And this is, <v Speaker 14>Could we like have a 10 minute meeting on Friday</v> or something to vote it? <v Speaker 1>Yes, it's possible, but no, I mean it's too late.</v> No, I think it needs it too late. No, it's too late for publicness post. Yeah, to post it's, but <v Speaker 4>Also you can have a 10 minute meeting just not on Friday.</v> <v Speaker 1>And I'm not available Saturday and Sunday this week. So</v> <v Speaker 4>You can do it Monday.</v> <v Speaker 1>You just, I did not recognize you Mr. Erickson. I will</v> <v Speaker 4>Take that back. I'm just trying to just</v> <v Speaker 1>Speak.</v> I know. We're trying to think out of the box. Let's see if we can't pull up the changes that both of us made. I corrected very little and may <v Speaker 11>I make a suggestion?</v> <v Speaker 1>Yes,</v> <v Speaker 11>Sir. It's not a long memo. Can we just read it?</v> <v Speaker 1>No, there were, there were specific changes in the,</v> in the body of the letter by chief. <v Speaker 4>I think I have it.</v> <v Speaker 11>That's what I mean on the, on the,</v> <v Speaker 4>Actually what if I project it on the screen? There's</v> <v Speaker 11>An idea thinking outside. Have</v> <v Speaker 14>To get it eventually.</v> <v Speaker 4>Yeah, but it can be correct,</v> <v Speaker 1>But we can still get out by midnight.</v> That's the, that's what we're that's that, that's the goal. That's the goal. <v Speaker 11>Oh, come on. We, no, I'm not gonna say that</v> unless it's Atlantic time. <v Speaker 1>I'm gonna have to drive with Framingham for last</v> <v Speaker 2>Call.</v> <v Speaker 4>I'll zoom in as well.</v> <v Speaker 2>So I'm get, I tend to be teacher.</v> So the changes that I made is I made sure that this person to whom the letter is addressed was added. Okay. So this name and then moved this here. The rest were punctuation. Okay. And this means that, wait, can you, can you go back up? Okay. <v Speaker 15>To exempt, let's see, I'm, I'm looking at</v> what was in there to be filled in to exempt. Okay. <v Speaker 1>Exemption.</v> <v Speaker 15>The native police department Patrol officers</v> and police supervisors <v Speaker 1>From the, from the civil service provisions. Yep.</v> <v Speaker 15>Okay.</v> <v Speaker 1>Made in</v> connection with the general court. Those were the dates. These are the two signatories that be me and Chief Hicks acknowledges the deadlines. And that is the entire letter. <v Speaker 4>This was a, a form letter that, that was</v> provided by the, I think Mass Chiefs Association. For all the communities that are in the same predicament, for lack of a better term, that Natick is situation. Situation. And the areas to fill in are the areas that, that you see here filled in move approval. <v Speaker 15>Wait, can Yeah, yeah, can, can,</v> can you just explain a little bit more about what this really does? Why is this necessary? When we've already asked for this? I mean, what, what is the point <v Speaker 4>Of the letter?</v> It was the requirement of the legislative approval process. They said for those communities who may still want to remove themselves from civil service, you must file a letter. Got it. With the division of HRD, division of Human Resources by February 15th in order to still make sure that you get outta civil service by March one. Got it. <v Speaker 24>Okay. Move approval. Second</v> <v Speaker 1>Move by Mr.</v> Sidney. Second. Moved by Mr. Sidney. Seconded by Mr. Evans. All in favor, please say aye. A Aye. Any opposed? 5 0 0. We have dispensed with that. Now we vote to submit a letter, the letter to the state legislature, the home rule petition. This is an act exempting the position of assistant fire chief in the town of Natick from the civil service law. Mr. Erickson, since there has been discussion online about this, could you address why and how this affects us and what the history is and <v Speaker 4>Sure.</v> So a year ago or last years annual town meeting, spring annual town meeting, town meeting, authorize the funding for a new assistant fire chief position, essentially second in command to the chief ky our, our current fire chief. What we did not realize at the time, because it's un it's unclear in some of the law and in some of the past votes of, of Natick is whether or not that assistant fire chief was automatically or not automatically brought into civil service. There's differing legal opinions on that front. However, there is some case law precedent and it's less case law and more determinations from the Civil Service Commission precedent that said that for lack of a very clear vote of the town and or state legislature, it's automatically such a position would automatically be a civil service position. So that then led us to realizing that it's, it's imperative that this be not in civil service. This position, the union agreed and town meeting agreed. This was voted on by town meeting at fall town meeting. As with any process after town meeting in order, it's really an authorization to the select for any process for a home rule petition town meeting just authorizes the select board to then submit the home rule petition request. We have to wait until you know, the conclusion of town meeting and then the certified vote to be created by the clerk's office. And once we get that, we get that to you. So this is really just the conclusion of that process. We will then, as soon as you vote on it, we send it to our delegation. It goes through Representative Lansky's office initially first 'cause it has to be entered through the house and then it works through the house and eventually in theory gets tacked onto some type of bill or something as soon as possible to get approved. <v Speaker 1>Ms. Typo in Representative David Linky,</v> can we approve it contingent upon correcting that scribner's error? Sure. <v Speaker 14>I'm sure. Yes. I just wanna be clear.</v> And this is mostly for the public. We haven't hired such a person yet, right? That's <v Speaker 4>Correct.</v> <v Speaker 14>Yeah. So there's been no money spent yet on this person.</v> We just, we wanna get them out of civil service before we hire them that there's been some comments online about that. <v Speaker 1>Thank you Mr. Bruce.</v> <v Speaker 11>Just another quick comment on that.</v> And the reason that the fire chief want, wanted this position not to be in civil service is largely for being able to impartially be responsible for discipline. It's very difficult for someone who is within a union to impartially meet out discipline to, to someone who's a fellow union member. And the the thought process behind making this non-union is to align it with the chief who is also a non-union position. So it just makes that is, that is the impetus behind it. That was also a question that had been asked online. <v Speaker 14>Move</v> <v Speaker 1>Approval. Move approval from by Mr. Sidney.</v> Second. Second Seconded by Ms. Slager. Will do all in favor please say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? It passes with the, the link ski changed. <v Speaker 4>Can I ask, what is the spelling of there?</v> <v Speaker 1>Link very top,</v> <v Speaker 11>The first reference to Linsky</v> in the address P linky in the address 24 Beacon Street right at the top. <v Speaker 4>Oh, it's the, the, the address. It's direct.</v> The address s and the K are, are swapped. Yes. Sorry. <v Speaker 11>Unless he's Banksy.</v> <v Speaker 4>The S and the K are swat</v> <v Speaker 1>Tab Mr.</v> Clerk excuse outta of the park. <v Speaker 14>Absolutely</v> <v Speaker 1>Updates.</v> <v Speaker 14>So a consent agenda, there are five items.</v> Item A approved Natick Police Department's request to accept donations. Item B, approve one day alcohol license for the Natick Community Organic Farm on January 22nd, 2025. Approved the transfer of a common VI license for bill's pizza. Item D appoint Kara Fletcher to the cultural council for term term ending June 30th, 2027. Item E approve. Request to occupy a public waste Saturdays from January 10th, 25 through April 26, 25, 9 to 1:00 AM for the farmer's market. Anybody want to pull anything? <v Speaker 1>Hearing none? Nope. Hearing none.</v> <v Speaker 14>I move all items A through E.</v> <v Speaker 1>Second. Second by Mr. Evans. All in favor, please say aye.</v> Aye. Aye. Any opposed? 5 0 0 passes. Town administrator updates. <v Speaker 4>I was gonna do a two hour update, but at this time</v> <v Speaker 1>You're fired.</v> <v Speaker 4>I hold. Thank you.</v> <v Speaker 11>Yeah,</v> <v Speaker 14>Just to get us out by midnight.</v> <v Speaker 11>What a great reply. No, I'm not</v> <v Speaker 1>Interested. You're not going anywhere</v> <v Speaker 11>That's going on.</v> ES ESPN highlights. You're <v Speaker 1>Not going on anywhere.</v> Holy mo. So you have no, okay. I, I have, I have two quick, really quick updates. One is, what is the availability of the board to meet for an off cycle meeting next Wednesday the 15th? I know, I know. It's brutal. I really wish all the public that was online listening to understood how many meetings we do, but we'll just have to tell 'em. Yeah, we'll, yep, <v Speaker 11>Yep.</v> <v Speaker 1>Good. So let's, let's do a six o'clock.</v> So we're out by eight 30 at the latest. <v Speaker 11>Oh, this is in person.</v> <v Speaker 1>You can be, no, you can be Zoom</v> <v Speaker 11>6:00 PM I'll be in Florida getting</v> <v Speaker 1>That's okay.</v> <v Speaker 11>Wow. Exciting. That's cool. Very exciting.</v> So that is, that's <v Speaker 1>Perfectly fine.</v> You don't have to make every bloody meeting. <v Speaker 11>Yeah.</v> <v Speaker 1>Okay, so let's, let's, it'll be like a six</v> to 8, 8 15. So 15 will be the, for the whatever and no more than two hours for the override. What I would like in anticipation of this, so that we we're not doing a lot of talking is that any questions that you have that have been presented to you, please forward them to Mr. Erickson before end of business Monday the 13th. <v Speaker 11>Okay. Will the meeting be recorded?</v> <v Speaker 1>Oh yeah, the meeting will be recorded.</v> The meeting will be recorded. It'll be on Pegasus. <v Speaker 11>Will we taking this room</v> or are we going upstairs? We'll figure that <v Speaker 4>Out.</v> We'll have to figure that out. There is a planning board meeting scheduled for that same Wednesday and, and it's their regular meeting. So they are typically in this room. I can't guarantee that upstairs is open though, so we'd have to check that. We could, theoretically it's the <v Speaker 1>Community center.</v> <v Speaker 4>Consider the community center of the lebowitz.</v> The challenge with those is that there's zoom or hybrid abilities in those settings. Just they're not set up for that. We have hybrid over at CSC, not when we have Pegasus also involved, got forward. So they have this screen set up, but it's only for this, once Pegasus is involved, it's more challenging. Right. In both those locations. Yeah, <v Speaker 1>I have faith in you Mr. Erickson.</v> <v Speaker 4>We can see what we can do.</v> <v Speaker 1>I I deeply appreciate that.</v> And then there, there has been, there's been some discussion on Beacon Hill. Lot of discussion about the impending ending of hybrid meetings, which is at the end of March. And so I had, I'd spoken with our congressional delegation, our legislative delegation about what's the status, where does this leave us? What? So the, the current discussion is, you know, still being negotiated, but the current discussion is not to make it mandatory because it would be an unfunded mandatory for much of mass Massachusetts and allow them, as a matter of course, the policy and procedures would be accepted by and set by the executive body, which would be this body. So we do not have one, we've not had a policy. Mr. Sidney raised that question in a previous email. So what I would like to do is ask for volunteer to see if any municipality to do the research and find out if anyone has one so we can get to bare bones ready. The legislature, if they do pass this, what they'll do is say you have a, you know, a six month grace period to get this together. But that means six months or three months or however long it takes us to do a policy. And we've seen how long it can take to do simple policies. That means we will not have Zoom participation. We'll only be on Pegasus and all meetings will have to be in person. So take it, you'll take it Rich. Thank you. So Mr. Sidney, whenever you can get that sometime in the next month. <v Speaker 4>Oh, out of it by the end of the next week, I would think.</v> <v Speaker 1>I would think so too, but I'm just saying if you know,</v> I mean you also, we're also doing override, we're doing a lot of other things so that way we can look at, see what other towns have done and maybe put something together for town administration to look at. <v Speaker 14>I'll send it to Kara too</v> <v Speaker 1>And we'll send it to Jamie and me</v> and then we'll get it, we'll get it in on a, he has regular standing meetings with Kara so that, that'll be fast. Those were all the select board updates I had. Does anybody have any other update? Oh, I have another one that I'm not gonna share now, so I'll wait till next week. <v Speaker 24>Move to adjourn.</v> <v Speaker 1>There's a motion to adjourn. Second.</v> All in favor, please say aye. Aye. All opposed. <v Speaker 14>10. 1818.</v> <v Speaker 1>Call this meeting. 10 18.</v>