good afternoon i'm now going to call the Wednesday April 23rd 2025 meeting of the Northol County Commissions to order now we're going to read the executive order on remote participation
on March 28th 2025 Governor Healey signed into law House Bill 62 an act relative to extending certain COVID 19 measures adopted during the state of emergency which included a two-year
extension of the option for public bodies to hold remote meetings by suspending certain provisions of the open meeting law that is Mass General Law Chapter 3A sections 18- 25 that action was effective immediately
extending the current option for remote meetings through June 30th 2027 thank you we are live and remote today i'm going to ask everyone to join me in saluting the flagges to the flag of the United States
of America and to the republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all thank you i'm going to call the role commissioner Spade I'm here sir commissioner Collins and Commissioner Shay is present we have a quorum there
is no executive session today call to order roll call no executive session number four minutes of the open session meeting of April 16th 2025 for your approval commissioners you okay sure yeah i'll
move approval as presented Mr chairman second motion made and seconded to approve the open session meeting of April 16th 2025 all in favor it is approved number five is appointments we have none number six public
comment each week at our meeting we have a section on our agenda for public comment whether people commit in person or join us in Zoom land uh for any public comment now is the time for the public comment director Buckley you haven't had any
inquiries about public comment nothing on the short week sir okay last call for public comment thank you moving right along old business we have none number eight personnel matters we have
three at the recreation facility and one at the high school mr chairman if you will yes i I move first that the Wallist Recreational Facility a notice of rehire for Isabelle Madua as a seasonal golf
associate at the rate stated at 420 effective 42425 and also Brendan Brennan Shapiro as a seasonal golf associate to rehire rate stated effective date 42525 oh yeah and uh so moved second
motion made seconded all in favor I it is a vote next agricultural high school mr chairman I move for approval at the North County Agricultural High School the notice of contingent employment for Olivia Rose Pov as a student labor and
the rate stated as uh listed the effective date for Olivia would be 42825 so moved second motion made and seconded all in favor i it is a vote number nine payroll and expense warrants all right short list Mr chairman I'll
move for the warrant list of 42325 the following number one 25-42 payroll the county the sum of $144,961.3 so moved second motion made and seconded all in favor i next and the
second item uh expense of the county 04-0425 i move the sum of $46,63.89 so moved second motion made seconded all in favor i it is a vote that concludes that Mr chair includes payroll and expense warrants thank you
number 10 report from the procurement department and bid openings and contract awards we have none today Mr chairman okay number 11 uh letter to federal delegation support RSVP program funding uh director
Buckley has uh three Mr chairman couple of comments go ahead as you know uh the North County retired senior volunteer program is a long-standing I think multi-deade now program that's been very successful here in the county it's the
local regional affiliate of the Americanore senior corps um national program and it does receive grant funding from that over the last few weeks the activity of the Department of Government Efficiency has been uh
focused on Americanore there have been a number of Americanore staff which our staff interact with who've been furoughed um laid off uh they've been doing stop work orders and so we received um a request from some of the regional folks
to continue to advocate uh for this program to our federal delegation so we put a uh pretty short pretty succinct letter to the four congressmen who represent portions of Mford County Congressman Lynch Congressman Okenclaus Congressman Presley Congresswoman Presley and Congressman McGovern as well
as our two uh United States senators just advocating for continued support of this quite frankly very lean and efficient program and in that letter just just to highlight it it highlights some of the great work we do here um to
date we the Northfor County RCP program has accomplished 1,150 ride individual rides for veterans with more than 50 individual drivers program so popular we can only do about 75% of the requests and we're concurrently uh with this
letter we're working on continuing ways to publicize opportunities for volunteering there uh in fiscal 24 200 active RSV volunteers logged 17,000 hours performing various duties including rides or vest vets elementary
school-based classroom volunteers meal deliveries for seniors who are mobile friendly visits to seniors and work in food pantries throughout the 28 cities and towns and finally just a really as as a school person as all of you are as
well in the 2324 academic year 525 students um were assisted by our volunteers with basic um help and reinforcement of basic skills like reading and math with an average roster of 15 to 20 students per volunteer uh we
had 30 volunteers doing that who logged in over 540 hours just in that one school year that's unbelievable it really is that's unbelievable and in the surveys uh 95% of teachers reported very satisfied rating i know uh
just anecdotally in Walpole two of our four elementary schools had these volunteers and so successful this school year three of the four do so there there's growth i know uh Chris who works point in in that program is also looking at expanding opportunities and we have
some retired people i believe Nancy Rockwell's in one of our schools in Walpole uh being a school volunteer as well so it's a great program and uh excuse me one second and just gonna looks like he's running the
meeting himself as well um so the uh Sam you can mute yourself he likes to do this now he likes to do it himself yeah sam can you mute yourself thanks um so anyhow uh
it's part of sort of a wider efficiency dance you know we need to make sure we register with our partners and as I said as I wrote in the letter every single one of the six people who represent Snora County have been uh tremendous advocates in the face of all these federal cuts so we're basically telling
them we we thank them for their support and register you the three of you register your support to the work that they're doing and we know they'll be um helpful in hoping to keep this program moving the way it the way it is so Mr chair thank you bill if I may
couple of things for you of course to Bill uh who's getting this letter who's this going out to we're doing sending it to the the six uh members of the federal delegation so so four congressman and the two senators from Okay massachusetts so Senator M we'll get this okay and the
other thing is at the moment is is RSVP in danger are we in trouble of not being able to sustain our programs i think it's an iterative process we do we're doing the draw down we we have the funds now it's more that currently some of the
people at Americanore who we interface with right regularly are not there not picking up the phone they're they're furoughed and things like that and because it it's so dayto-day it's it's just important to kind of flag the great work
and the small money that this program does so in in the last question as a followup polite respectful suggestion you all support this then we need a plan by Lucille in terms of what happens here and to look at what can what can we do to help her and help them yeah to help
others right cuz we don't this is a great program and this it's I had no idea about the volunteer in the school i mean I know but the ride for best are fantastic and my interaction for the last four years has always been so positive they do a great job we got to see what we can do to help out so yeah
and three we we have had a couple of meetings now John myself and Lucille we are lucky as compared to some of our other colleagues because the commission does have a pretty strong
level support of this program you do in your own budget you uh bankroll a lot of it so we have definitely evaluated where to go from here if let's say next year the federal money dries up um we we are looking at contingencies but right now
it hasn't but it's just important to advocate but join for sure uh there's a you know people will be veterans in Norfol County will be getting rides to their appointments next year regardless we there are paths we will figure it out
for sure oh all right well still good to be on the ball on this you know and I know you you just went to what the uh the VA today doing with RC i was going to mention that but it's it's I had the chance this morning to accompany Lucille
over to the VA uh facility in Jamaica plane and we delivered uh something like 30 handmade uh crocheted afghans right uh it was a wonderful time to go there and deliver that and you know we were wellreceived
of course and she's doing a a great job i said she's a wonderful person and she's trying her best but that's just one small example small example of kind of things that they do there and I was greeted by two other RSVP volunteers right there on the job the fellow helped
us out i mean they're there they're out there everywhere which we're we're so blessed we really are so we got to whatever we can do i know we we all want to support this would it make sense to send this to people in our state delegation of North County to see if there's any state money to let them know
or is that not I I think the real focus is on the the work of Doge right now and what they're doing uh and we could obviously this isn't a onetime thing the advocacy is a dialogue that happens so we're just going to keep an eye on okay
how this progresses hopefully it it trends in a positive direction for us well as Congressman Lynch did say he did say this publicly uh well with the cuts that are taking place in Washington he goes a lot of the things are going to shift to the state and the expectation
is the state have to pick it up so I mean we'll try but I'm hopeful always hopeful you never know but um uh at some point there's only so many ways to cut the pie as you know Mr chairman so we'll put our best foot forward see what
happens excellent thanks for that thank you okay Mr chairman we take a motion to send a letter support be very pleased to make that motion i'll make that motion Mr chairman we send a letter to the federal delegation in support of the RFP
program funding as presented second motion made seconded to support and send a letter to our federal delegation to for RSP funding all in favor i please thank you thanks Bill no problem report
of the county director thank you Mr chair a couple of things just uh a reminder from our friends in the human resources department that it is conflict of interest training season and that all county employees are required to um
every 30 days after being hired and then every two years complete a hourong conflict of interest training program so that's bianually and every year uh we're all required to um complete the conflict of interest law acknowledgement which is this check off that says you acknowledge
you got the summary uh and to study that um that happens every year and folks have uh Michelle I know has been sending out reminder emails to folks who haven't done so yet but you you log in through the uh math ethics training website but
it uh we're getting down towards the end here just making a public announcement to all of us to make sure uh we keep that front of mind moving on uh next week uh the long awaited Page Street get discontinuence uh will be on the agenda
for next week so um so Patrick's been working very closely with the family will be the town of Tony uh maybe we'll get a visitor who knows yeah maybe that will happen bless as well and obviously as we're coming off Easter week was also
and and Josh birthday uh yeah two weeks going on all month his birthday month birthday month it's also the uh anniversary of the battles of Lexington and conquered and uh Paul River's Midnight Ride i think it's important for us to acknowledge that uh two fan
favorite Norfick County employees were heavily featured in the historical um activity over the weekend uh Mike Leage who worked the registry works the registry does John Adams does Robert Walpole fantastic he's impressive uh he went viral over the weekend i don't know
if people saw him oh my god out of the Paul River house there was like 7,000 frat guys cheering him on and and uh I'll send along the Was he Paul River he was Paul River oh I didn't realize there it was fantastic and then in the people people don't know in the next morning he
um he plays one of the red coats on Lexington and our in our county county county surveyor Patrick um Higgins is in the Lexington Minute Man he was on that there's some video of him as well he got on Boston uh Patrick's
not on is he on yet he's probably good he's probably tired but but both of them are did some great uh historical uh recognitions over the weekend so it was cool cool to see that's exciting folks is Patrick part of the guys that shoot the guns at when they go when they get a
touchdown patriots no Mike is I believe Mike is right that's right so yeah they um they do a lot of great work and it was it was really cool to see some of our own uh involved in that over the weekend wow other than that it's a a short week we're doing a lot of filing we're getting ready for the filing
system coming in downstairs organizing records uh that's about it we'll see you then and but uh kind of the key thing to keep a ahead uh top of mind is we'll get Page Street off the decks next week so fantastic move we're excited for that be
careful in case it doesn't go and that is all I have okay keep attorney Lopez and then move so we can Okay moving right along report of the county director thank you yep emergency
items the chair did not reasonably anticipate i have none almost before I take a motion to adjourn I want to keep in mind for us
uh the memory of Jim Jim Johnson of Winchester Mass who is the father of a Jim Johnson of Walpole Mass town administrator okay uh was buried this weekend and
uh Bill Buckley was able to get there yesterday um just as an outline Jim Johnson the father was a selectman in the town of Winchester for 18 years on every town committee the finance committee the town day committee
the capital planning committee n in 2016 he was honored as the citizen of the year in the town of Winchester and he worked a number of years on every town committee and his passion for public
service is carried on by Jim who is the Winchester town administrator so we're going to adjourn this meeting and hopefully in the memory of Jim Johnson s Thank you motion to adjourn yes Mr chairman pleased to make the motion to adjurnn uh
as stated and I'll say the time is 120 on the re okay there are three minutes but that's all right i said no that's good oh I see second on the motion motion made and second to adjourn all in
favor this meeting is adjourned we have a regular meeting next week thank you very much