okay good evening everyone my name is Laura schiffren and I am calling the joint meeting with the finance committee um to order here at
602 p.m. could I have a roll call please Veronica C present Flor sh from present would you all join me please in the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge of allegiance 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 i' like to thank all of our veterans and all of those currently serving and all of our First Responders
for all that they do for our communities as well as their families definitely including the families from now on um the meeting is being did you snowplow
guys go ahead I would I would like to thank all the people in town who have pulled papers for our 20 or so open positions and I would like to encourage others to get involved with the community and um pull papers for the
positions that have no one running so thank you all very much everybody okay thanks Veronica um this meeting is being recorded and will be uploaded to YouTube uh is anyone
else in the meeting room or on Zoom recording the meeting if so please announce yourself all right I don't hear any um
Veronica just announced my additions and deletions regarding the elections and all those positions available I'd like to go to 1.5 review approve the meeting minutes
of January 28 2025 and January 30th 2025 is there a motion um I move to approve meeting minutes of 128 2025 and 130 2025 and I second any further discussion
yeah thank you Sabrina for getting those to us in a timely manner so we could review them before now okay uh roll call Veronica Cal I Laura shiff
I okay appointments and hearings 2.1 we're probably just about it 605 I think yep on the nose so um we have a joint meeting with the
trustees of soldiers Memorial to appoint Peter buckton as trustee to the trustees of the soldiers Memorial effective February 18th 2025 until Town elections April 28th 2025 is there a
motion so move W demand chairman of the trustees ass solders memorials I call meeting the order at 60 six roll call wal demand present ke Jackson
present Ryan bourman on Zoom okay so bman on Zoom oh good welcome um all right so you have your call to order and you have a roll
call um is there a motion I make a motion that we vote approve the appointment of Peter buckon to fill the unfilled vacancy or trustee non-veteran position effective February
18 2025 until Town election all in favor hi you have to do a roll call you have to do a roll call vote so your name and how you vote because you're virtual and in
person okay I'll let you go first and we'll do after okay wal man I Keith Jackson I Brian bornean I Jason bornean
I okay so you have an unanimous vote and um roll call Veronica I and Laura shiffer I thank you very much to all of you and Peter for
volunteering I will adjourn our joint meeting please a mo a motion to adjourn Veronica um I move that we adjourn the um select board joint meeting with the
trustees of soldiers Memorial at 6:06 PM okay second any discussion hearing none roll call Veronica Cal I LA shiffer and I do you want to um Walter do you want
to uh adjourn your meeting I uh I'll accept the motion to adjourn the meeting with the trustees at 607 any discussion is there a
second second second ke Jackson if no discussion you can have a roll call call vote okay roll call vote wal de man I Keith Jackson I uh Brian bour and I Jason bourman I okay I declare this
meeting adjourned at 6 okay thank you very much all of you so we are now at about 607 or8 and just we're calling for the joint meeting with the finance committee at
6:15 um Lor did you want to maybe do 3.1 3.2 or Le yes I just wanted to ask okay let's do that uh under three uh appointments of officials and Personnel uh 3.1 appointment of Jessica
Deo as I hope I'm saying these names sorry as the police matron with effective start date of February 18th 2025 is there a motion um I move to appoint Jessica Deo as the police matron with an effective
start date of 218 2025 okay I second any discussion yes okay um roll call Veronica Cal I and
Laura shiffer I 3.2 appointment of David Langton as an on call firefighter with effective dates start date of March 3rd 2025 is there a
motion um I move that we appoint David Langton as an on call firefighter with an effective start date of March 3rd 2025 and I second any discussion hearing none roll COV Veronica I Laura
shiffer and I okay now we are at we have still have five minutes what do you want to do um [Music] Nelson uh yeah we can go to 4.5 if you
want okay 4.5 contract with kimley horn to perform surveying work on the kids country playground project is there a motion um I move uh to Grant signatory
authority to the land use coordinator Aaron steepfield to sign a contract with kimley horn to perform perform surveying work on the kids country playground project
um on Nelson isn't that supposed to be you as the signatory authority I thought it was me but then uh upon further review of the paperwork um the contractor had put Erin's name on it and she's been working with them since the
beginning so um I I don't I think her signing it would be perfectly fine since is she allowed to do that um I thought all contract signatures had to come from the select board's office
um I mean I can um I can certainly have them revise the paperwork to say my name um so we could yeah because I mean I'm concerned it Aaron resigned do I have
person what's that is that the Aaron that resigned yeah her yeah her last day is um actually um the 26th that was one of my um ta updates and reports but yes she
she is resigning um as of next Wednesday so um I can have the contractor uh revise the paperwork to um have me as the person signing on behalf of the Town um so we can
um sort of amend the emot the motion that uh Veronica just just read okay I'm I um I would like to amend the motion to Grant signatory authority to uh the
Town Administrator Nelson mu to sign a contract with kimley horn to perform surveying work on the kids country playground project and I second that um any further discussion on the main motion now that's
amended hearing none roll call Veronica Cal I and Laura shiffer that takes care of 4.4 and what is 4.5 here looks like the same thing and we have two minutes
contract with kimley horn to perform no that's what we just did that's what we just did 4.5 um there's one before it for the walk Bridge okay we can do that 4.4 Mass
Works $1,000 walkbridge Route 13 Grant contract is there a motion yes I move to Grant signator signatory Authority uh to Nelson M the Town Administrator to sign the mass Works
$100,000 walkbridge Route 13 Grant contract second any discussion hearing saying none roll call Veronica Cal I Laur shiff
I okay so that's that 4.6 you would you like to quickly yeah I um or did you want to talk more about that no I there's not much you can say um all this is is to have the we
have a Housing Authority which is separate from the Housing Trust the housing authority and the Housing Trust work kind of like this um but the Housing Authority is a state entity and it requires Ires a um State appointed
housing representative and there's a process to do to becoming a state appointed um representative and so um I would like to move that we appoint um that we post for and um
appoint once someone has been that we post for someone to apply to be the state appointed housing representative I think that's what I want okay um do we need a motion for that was that your motion that is my
motion okay and I'll second that and everything you said is correct and it is a long process it's very interesting but you can interact with the state in that uh position it's a good position if somebody's interested in housing I I guess I will say something
too is that our Housing Authority right now is um um kind of at a standstill only because we have two appointed members uh Natalie and Jack Moran uh we have no State appointed representative
and we have two open positions and we've received no volunteer response forms for that one of those open positions I believe has to be someone that lives at either outward Acres or towns and woods and nobody has stepped up um so right
now we don't have qu for and the Housing Authority can't meet so it's really important that we people on that board and that we get a state appointed representative so if I can just add to that vacant seat there is a tenant
vacant seat right but my we we need to look into that a little bit because my understanding was that they they being the state said that you could have another representative but I'm not sure sure
about that otherwise the only place would be out of Atwood or um towns and woods which we did have at one time for about two years but then that went away um okay so thank you Veronica for
bringing that up and now we are done do you want to call your meeting to order I'm sorry I went over wait don't we have do we have to vote I made a motion I'm assuming you seconded it I did I'm sorry roll need to
vote okay roll call we had discussion did ver and Laura shiffer I and thank you again for bringing that up Don you have the floor thank you um at this point I'd like to uh call
the town and finance committee meeting to order at 6:17 p.m. um I don't see Sam on the list um so um we'll do a r voice
attendance please David Walker here car HS is present Mary Jane chville here joh ha's here um is Jerry here by Zoom I don't see Jerry are you here by Zoom I don't see her so um with we do have a
quum so good call meeting to order um and this meeting is being recorded um and for playback on Channel 9 and posting on the
YouTube 1 point4 the additions or deletions um at this point uh I have no additions or deletions to the agenda for the evening so Don I just have one thing I just want to let you know remind you again that next on February 25th I will
not be able to attend and and I did get an email from Sam today said he wouldn't be here so that's why we don't have Sam on the line so I appreciate knowing in advance who may not be able to attend I know meeting every Tuesday and Thursday
is a lot the month so um you may for a minute there's one uh caller on the zoom and I don't know who that is if uh the phone number
508-529-7000 seven could identify themselves let's see he unmuted and then mut it again I don't see the mute or the video icon I oh I do
okay okay he's unmuted now can you tell me who you are please at 508-529-7000 okay um and let me see if I have and this is a call out to T cam um would you allow me to share my screen
okay just to he the screen and I did not find I did not file so my assumption is we're going back to the guess good question for Nelson it's a stien position is that going to be a 4% increase
on the agent say keeping in line with everything that we've seen and I do see last year was you know was 4% too so I think keeping in
line things should be another but everything else uh should stay same I guess if if we look at their office supplies and Fs and membership they really hav much this
year yeah the me the memberships for some reason jumped significantly basically zero year we can just out see if there going to be additional
organizations that membership for and then maybe readjust that as we get closer to the budget and the same on offer supplies I I suspect they need they need some
but we haven't used any yet to this point in December and then the last lines is the benefits of the services which has start started to be used I did a quick look at the Cherry sheets and it look like the state is going to go for 29,000 this year so I
think it's up about 7,000 last year and it's been flat at 75 the last couple years so I think we get something from the get that put together on the bus on the bus um how how was that
coming along uh it's good I I I've had like a very rough version um because I've been I've been putting everything in there um I've only started um entering in sort of the revisions as a result of these
meetings so I haven't quite put them in yet but there is a um there is a rough version of it that I'm happy to share with everyone actually want asked for a copy this afternoon so I'm I'm happy to share of everyone um okay and then we
can we have that opportunity look at it and see again um we with the new members it's kind of they haven't seen the on the yet y it's uh it can be quite daunting if you look at um I I asked that it be updated like
every Monday from what went the week before yeah so that we could stay up today so uh yeah I can start doing that um luckily there has there's been some changes here and there and I've started tweaking it this afternoon so yeah we
haven't it hasn't been a lot but um give us the opportunity to see the the bottom line and take a look at and start looking comparing where revenues are going to be for the year abely I I was wondering if I I mean this
is school but can we put in um we have the increase for nooba so we can put that in the Omnibus and could we at least put a two and a half% in for the school district as we as we did with that's what we started with last year
until we have North midle sex final number okay I don't want to see a zero in other [Music] words and then it was changed to zero later on yeah I did put in the number that was presented to us at the the meeting a couple weeks ago
because that they did present that number I realized it it's not final because they actually vote on the budget on the 26th so but I had to put something in there because doesn't quite work and it's certainly going to increase so I just put it in there
because that's what they um presented okay y that works just so there's a number other than zero for North no no no that's I think that H us last year is by putting a zero in for a town meeting with with the
Ballance bud with zero knowing that need to inrease so we're working really on so don I I guess I have on the what is the the veteran benefits other
services line um because last year that was also budgeted at 75,000 but they only used 26,000 okay now with last year the veterans we we had our veterans agent
for multiple years and he retired and we went without the position for a while okay and the towns and purple help so it might been well for those for the for that reason okay
but again some of the history that comes with haven't been here a couple years yeah so what do those other services entailed do you know um I don't know in detail um we can we can so they don't go to the VA for that some
some they do but um so get Natalie to give us a St okay questions on next on the agenda agent I'm going
back salmon yeah it's at the is it's after the library there's a blank page blank divider oh okay and it's so after really quickly we do
have us app um yourself I know we went through call but um they Walker hi
Carol I see you every week I see her every week at Mary Jane Churchville nice to meet you just I know there's a lot of Interac thank you for doing that okay with that
um you want to start on the summary sheet or so is it a is this a union position as director you contract yes everybody else in there um not everyone okay uh I'm in the supervisory
Union um would you like me to list everyone who's in the other you want the names or Physicians okay um assistant director is Union uh program coordinator SL Outreach
that's one one position also Union um um the the kitchen manager volunteer coordinator is also Union that's it looking for the kitchen manager
um formula grant she's not under Wes L 66 so she so that position is not paid out of the Town budget and everybody else's Union those um the assistant director program coordinator kitchen
manager and yes and that is also clear for and I was going to say it does say non Municipal labor we have the kitchen volunteer we have um Regional Transit that is a un
position the transportation coordinator that it that that is Union you're right I'm sorry I forgot that one currently there's no one in that role but um that [Music] was oh the van dri well is a transportation
coordinator Administration Transportation y but that's also not out of the Town budget no correct it's not out of the Town budget okay how does that get paid by the LR
low Regional Transit Authority pays the salary and pays the van drivers as well even though all of us is same Mar no not not the COA bus they say LRTA we have both and I can go into why if you
want to know why but we have both we have both and yeah I've seen the programs but the mar yeah my house that's because of the MBTA communities um it's all a long story so basically only the the first
block here on that front page yourself and the other four people are come come from the town budget that's correct okay yeah um but the as far as Union goes the two that are not from the town
budget are also Union Yes okay so do those individuals only work in our in this town or do they work across the region just in this town two yes well current so there's no one right now currently as Transportation
administrator she resigned as a being in January we have not filled that role yet and then um uh the the Donna Fenton under form Grant Works only in this town yes um now are you responsible for
filling that position or or or is that done by the L Transit we are we are Greg and I is my assistant director we have been um learning the role to see what it actually needs I I don't think it needs as many hours as a position calls for um
and that is why we haven't filled it okay that was put in place before I came in as director so what you going to plant if or you just going to wait and see what it's going to look like when you discuss it um we had talked about I don't know if I
should bring this up now but um can I talk about Bey um maybe not right now because uh we're okay we still have to select board budget to discuss amongst the all right um so that's not the
public I wouldn't say it's not but we're discussing decided and actually it is on our agenda tonight discuss after we so okay yep now on the work I
did follow up I just [Applause] the salaries and with the 4.7 now eligible for longevity so this is
$600 longevity coming in which one is that would be J she she's on so that's gonna go up 600 y it's kind of like that's what that does if you take that
$600 out the the percentages are EX everybody go up 2% no um sorry just kind of like so if we look at column J out here on the screen these are the actual I think these were just and typed in at 2% in
column G so they're not 2% raises they're actually Four all% yeah plusus all 4% what is the plus or minus of T that why isn't it for
exactly on this from the wage tables that were supplied to us I I took the numbers right off the tables yeah so like it's you know to the pennies so sometime it's te if you want to be super accurate you probably need like three
decimal places to get exactly 4% so sometimes it's like 3.99 or sometimes it's like 4 point Z 4.3 3.97 so if we again if we did like fractions of a penny we would get
exactly 4% and again that may be why people take there and don't want actually I've been in towns where they actually go to the third decimal for the rates to to get that okay to get
exact somebody Half Penny on on the hour we don't have half pennies anymore right any other [Applause] questions and on the expense side bottom bottom lines are it's being
reduced by about 70000 total but some individual lines are going up and Communications is totally going away is that why it's lower um what do
you mean Communications going the communications line is going from 2375 down to zero so they have no phone no radio no I I think it's not a separate charge it's part of the Town um and part of the the internet system that's
connected here but it's mainly do with Comcast we getting and to putting in the fiber optic line yeah yeah so that okay so that line was their modem and PC connection to to the Internet so that is
no longer needed with the upgrades we did as part of the AR projects oh okay that's good to know so they've got six their
equipment increased to zero now is that contractual increases or yes yes the Xerox is a service contract as well as the UNIF first service contract now is that because of use that
they the Xerox yes yes yes it's a dying it's an older machine and we had to go with the contract to yes maintenance it's more than paid for itself so far our our first bill was over $2500 to have machine repay and
we're paying about $175 a quarter for this contract so we're going to get in a machine soon uh we're we've been talking about it but it won't be paid for by the town if we do oh we're hoping for a donation on that
oh I see okay that's good to know Professional Services are what I can't even read that that's our it's a software oh your software oh
okay we decrease went Library did which cost us them less and US less a shared system nice okay good work good
work Library good work yeah if I could say something we're reducing our budget here but we've seen a huge increase in the use of the senior C the use of the senior center the services uh
the events and all that we've increased in in um calendar year 24 we increased our events programs services and all that by over
7% and at the same time we had a 23% increase in active users at the senior center more than 50% of them are towns and residents we we do where we have one of the nicest buildings around we do get
a big draw from the surrounding towns more than 50% of towns Investments and and we also track signin people that are actually attending programs using our services that went up
22% last year to over 21,000 signings the the place is really utilized thank goodness we got the um addition but you didn't lose some budget
then we had to cut back some out so there there are tradeoffs going on here but at least there's space for yes there is space so you cut back hours of opening yeah and how's that going to impact the
22% um we'll see in next year's numbers oh that just happened this year yeah just at the beginning of February we we cut back some evening hours on we were open until 8 on Wednesdays we cut it back to 4 and it's not highly utilized
during those hours so there was the least amount of impact and and this kind of stemmed from the last the loss of our transportation administrator who filled some of those evening hours and now do some of the events that are
held there are there charges to the groups having the events well there no we don't charge groups for stuff we have like instructors that will charge individual
patrons directly like U the president does yoga classes they each pay our five okay when when they attend the class okay we don't we aren't part of that whole transaction sure um we have craft
instructors that will collect a small fee usually to pay for materials that kind of stuff okay um the stuff we typically charg for is meals because we don't have the money the town
provide the meals program so we charge $5 per meal which for the most part will pay for okay I I was curious like if um the baseball league or the soccer league uses the room do they have is
there a charge to them to use to use the medum no but we don't have a lot of that happening I can answer that you want sure um so the meeting call actually to the board of s meeting itself a long time ago we
had a committee of probably 10 people or so and a lot of the people in the committee did not want the responsibility the keys and opening and closing and it conflicted with the library and the senior center needing to use it for their programs so the committee disbanded um the town has
policy but um they changed policy to say there's no paid usage of the room it's just for um any kind of um Town entity or boy scouts or girl scouts nonprofits can use the room for free so they scheduled through the library um they'll
you know they they'll F A official form and if they meet the criteria in the room is you know free okay um then they can use it but we don't do like birthday parties or or collect fees or anything like that um there was nobody to clean up after any of those things there was damage um people want an event
coordinator so it was a very it was it was very difficult thing to manage right no I remember because we I when my son was in voice Scouts we used the room once in a while I know we always clean we always had to clean afterwards we own the voice Scouts and raw Scouts will still use use the rooms and things like
that so yeah is that policy on the library website then um it we just readed our website it is it is seeing it under our policy um so you guys should have that the last time that we redid
the policy I think Eric was here right um so um I can talk with Sabrina and Nelson about um the L copy and make sure that they get it there you guys because I don't see it but we definitely reviewed it with Saina The Arc I believe it was was it when Ken was still here
right before she left right that was after my first time around yeah so um so yeah yeah it should live somewhere over here but I don't um and it got when the website moved over things like that got lost
and so we're just trying to find everything I sure that you know you guys have the copy that we have too thank you okay and just so we' seen others with the electricity heat and water and
all of these are Tak Care by the facilities Department theill in there so that's why we don't see anything on can I just ask are there Grant funds that the um Senior Center gets based on the
usage we the form of the grant is based on the how many Elders are in in in towns in $16 per Elder as of FY 26 and an elder is a senior I'm sorry senior what's the age on0 and old 60 and okay
yes and that's how we pay Donna the um volunteer coordinator I mean yes kitchen manager volunteer coordinator gets paid out of form of the grant questions why are you there any question you good job because none of the numbers
had to get changed years all set that's where people have been this the fiscal years haven't been updated on all the okay and some of the numbers are up um I did fill in some of the numbers on on the main worksheet I
brought through your labor numbers and expense numbers so that we could have the comparison year that's the only thing I did we could see the comparison I don't have any additional questions thank
complete library on the hot seat if you would I appreciate it it's kind of like and um while we're here and before the introductions you ladies introduce yourself just for the rest of the team I don't know who goes to the
library who knows so I am Selena Thomas um I am a a board trustee I'm the chair of the trustees and I'm Stacy shler of the library director thank [Music]
you m of trust kind of with a lot of we kind of fall outside the S board a little for the purpose of rules yeah exactly Library all the
rules let's see um I the library is in the same same section yeah right before everybody all set to questions to start any lead in or do you want to just go right
to looking at the numbers I do have um I printed out some of the um I sent this to John earlier um this is some of the requirements that the state has for um so we we receive um state aid monies each year and um this
is um the this is what qualifies us have to you want a paper copy down no almost okay anybody the room Onre I guess that'll this this will explain what are the items in the yeah
yeah so so when we get to it's just good have it when it yeah and I also have this that was um from the math board I only printed one um from the mass Board of Library Comm Commissioners it kind of um they break
down um what the library budget is in comparison to the rest of the town can you find this on the DLS website you can you can um actually yeah I can send you the the link to it the direct link if you would like oh yes the mlc send me
that y probably yeah yeah yeah yeah there's a lot of different and statistics you can look up through this is the town
town and the blue slice is the library yeah 1.64% of the total budget 1.64 we did work for a while the average I think state is like 2% n years ago I got
[Laughter] one this [Music] is see orange the schools no well the pink pink whatever it's not that big are you
I knew that was gonna get it 6 okay um and Rising yes Rising that's a really this one is not on it's just a PDF file so um just of curiosity on your
salary St the longevity is only $900 is that something that's set because everywhere else I see it it's because we're not Union I think I don't know actually we were just talking about that over here P up theity so I don't
know I was always confused by like Ken when she did the you know the senior Cent prior to Elise she got they got a lot more longevity than the library staff but she said it was because of Union well we not Union we're not Union none of us are so that
would go to the um the uh I just looked up the person the regular personel policies and procedures right so all the people who qualify for longevity at this point the library have been there for longer than
15 years I see they all get 900 yeah yeah that is not you I think I mean I'm going with that okay okay yeah I'm not sure everybody in the library is non if
I remember right I have a contract and the rest of the staff is nonunion so you don't get a clothing allowance either no no clothing allowance no and then way and share s people the
tax yes so rather than list them individually I see 2157 and hour I do rotate a little bit Yeah manages that line a separate spreadsheet yeah monly just to manage
make sure stays within budget she yeah show me the details if anybody's interested I'm sure yes I called it math for the insanity but I think Don followed me I was actually looking at cont and then how long your contract for
three years so there um the trustees will be redoing my contract again in um July July 1 yeah no questions on everything put together good you can read it it's
big and and I will say there's only one one piece down on the personal summary okay um it's no big deal it it just shows the f 24 and FY 25 for your fulltime equipments oh oh my
gosh yeah there's so many of them that it's not it's not a big I'm ass it hasn't changed yeah it hasn't changed so um no that's been yeah so we just have to change the
num change the the header okay all right it's not a form okay so on this hand out are you explain the hand out um so let's let's go down I'll scr down to the expense R the
expense l um that is Associates with books and materials line um yes so um so the formula so we receive approximately $30,000 or so a
year from the state um in two separate payments as long as we remain certified um part of our certification requirements are based on these formulas here so um one of the things is there is a minimum number that are overall budget
needs to be which is um the red number if we went below 441 349 for FY 26 then um we would have to apply for a waer
um and um does that make sense to everybody so that's basically what they're looking for our total number to be they take the last three fiscal years um and then they divide it by three it's this this formula here on this line and
and that's how they come with their magic Certification Number um the materials requirement um is is um items that we buy for patrons um for patrons checkout use that includes um you know ebooks and regular
books and materials that you would check out in the library um um electronic equipment that um you know people would check out for the from from the library um our library of things if we have um if we buy new computers for the public use that would count towards that as
well um for that um material's requirement so um basically they take the number and they multiply it by .16 um so um that 70,000 is our number
um now we qualify for something um because we're open 40 hours a week we actually um only have to pay the 16 if we were open Less hours we would have um we'd have to pay more they up your
materials requirement I think it's a protective thing from the state you know they don't want libraries hours to be cut so that's one way that they protect librar hours um so anyways because we're open for the amount of hours we're open
for we qualify to spend the 70,000 instead of the 83,000 how many total hours are you a week 40 well 40 I think well right now um during um the um winter hours it's 44 hours
okay with the Sundays by priv are they still privately 48 hours a week wait we're open yeah we're open Tuesday Wednesday and Thursday we're open 10 hours a day and then Monday and Friday we're open
seven so that's 44 we're open Saturdays most of the year um so that's 48 hours and then we have the Sunday hours that are paid for by the friends Library so right now we're open 52 hours a week a lot of hours
so a lot of hours yeah so without the sending what was it again 48 48 but you have to stay open 40 in order to qualify for the lower right right there's a there's a number yep yep I
think it's um it's not quite four I think it's a little bit less than that I'll have to look into that I can get you the number if you want it but um so we close we also have to have some evening hours there's other qualifications do you have to have certain day days that you're open after
5:00 um I think they require three days after 5 o'clock and you have to have some weekend hours which we have Saturday hours September through June and then we close for July and August in the summertime so that we can Bank those hours so I can use them when people go
on vacation because like um Don was mentioning I have a pot of money that those same few people work from and and you know so they cover if some of the full-time employees go on vacation I or or this is Formula based
yeah to get the state funds right State funding and and the rates yeah that's that's where in the F and how much is the state so the state funding is not in here because this is the expend they give us they give us um about right now because our circulation
is so high they base it on circulation um so we are up to about 30 it's about $32,000 a year so that um we receive in two lump sums so we get one in November
December and one in like March April so that's 15,000 per month it's about it's yeah it's getting closer to 16,000 yeah yeah this expense work sheeet what's that and the that money offsets this expense oh yeah yeah because
um this $2,000 that we asked for for um for um sorry I'm laughing um office supply or500 it went down $1,500 doesn't even begin to cut the mustard on the um whole Library we
do you've taken out the state aid from your expenses for this well no because state aid doesn't go in we get state aid because the town pays the correct amount that the state requires the state requires the town to pay so much money based on this formula and the town has
always done that so we get our state aid money we use the state aid money to offset a lot of the things that we don't ask the town for you know like if we buy a set of ink for one of the computers it's about 700 and something dollars for a full set of ink so we buy a full set
of ink about three times a year so right there that doesn't even that doesn't even cover Covering Supplies or processing supplies or any of the other things so we offset a lot of that with the state aid money so usually in April when we get the second state payment that's when we
purchase most of our office supplies for the library we're like time our supplies so we can do our stuff and the tape you say yeah one of the small dos and subscriptions lines we've seen yeah that
actually just gets Molly and I um the um membership to the um Massachusetts Library Association so everything else had been paid by special other funds if last year we went to the Massachusetts Library Association conference because we had arpa funds to pay for it so they
paid for all of the do and memberships for all of my staff um so it never seemed the right time to increase that we we never really had any money in that line so Molly and I have not really gotten to go to um you know very many conferences um over the years uh the
friends of the library just paid for us to go to an MLA conference in Phoenix because um when the arpa funding anyway but that was that was nice and it was interesting and we found out we're doing a really good job because the Brooklyn Public Library director sat with us and
he said these two really know where what they're talking about that was highlight of the conference really so what are the other purchased services so other purchased services are um so the photocopy we have a photocopy
maintenance agreement which is $400 um and um CW Mars memberships which is our library Network how we do all of our circulation and processing um our um um calendar our scheduling software that
we share with the senior center we pay the larger portion because we use most of it um and um our deep freeze re boot software licenses which keep the computers private so um every night um it goes into a deep freeze and you know
it clears anything that would have been left out um you know patrons are supposed to log completely out when they leave but the Deep Freeze erases everything every night um and our internet desk top support so all of our um so this whole
um 26830 one is our um it's our um desktop support which they do all of our um computer um support um for us essentially it's all the computer
it's they separated from the town and using Guardian right last year year before libr got a really good deal when we changed the library networks have their
own M support they know Library needs right than a private IT company so and it was less money yeah we pay $2,675 for all of our it support the so you don't use Guardian which is the town
right right wanted to bring that up because again around during that transition because you have your own Library well Molly who's the assistant director she does all of the unboxing and a lot of the um you know um the you
know assessing and then we we call CW Mars they they do all of our um you know if the printers are offline or we have any kind of you know suspicious it things they go in and they can they can solve everything so Molly kind of does like the unboxing and the and everybody
runs it past they like hey should I call CW Mars for this and she says yes or no did you plug the cable in before you call somebody happens a lot so um but yeah it works it works really well for our our needs that's
good to so books the material that speaks for cl doesn't it yes y any any additional questions um still looking here it's the longevity thing [Music]
um parttime people don't get longevity no or they do they don't it says they should no do you have anybody that has been there for 10 years yes but in the town policy it says that they don't get it no it says they should that
it's always been there that's why Janet Cody who part time not got her first longevity payment so we're missing you have to be 10 years you don't get longevity until 10 years so
then yeah so then laoren would qualify now I don't I don't know because I don't people are yeah yeah yeah no I was just uh you guys might want to look at that okay I do feel like it wasn't always that way though
I'm when did they change that I'm sorry Greg when I filled out the spreadsheet for the last fiscal year I went through the policy it was not there when I did it for this year it had change in that year okay because I've
been do this for 15 years for 15 years so what we have here could be an old policy if you're looking online for the policy I have so what happened and when the system switched
over the policies that were I've been going through the policies and pulling in the real ones because the ones that are up we reverted back I don't know how many years I don't know where they got these from but the policies are not necessarily up to date
I didn't realize that the Personnel wasn't so don't quote me on that then because okay if if you look at the one that's online it's here um but right and I didn't memorize everything from you
know so what IO it goes in line with email it go okay I I don't I don't remember who I got it from you would have gotten it from C because she's the person that should have I'm gonna have to look back because I don't think I've got but there was some there was a lot
of confusion for a while there about my email people had my email address wrong they had one apps at the beginning of it and they were I was locked for a little while so it could have been around that time that um that I didn't receive that because yeah because that they did
change all that part-time you know to um receive um holiday pay um and I'm assuming maybe they did that around the same time which um we need we need an updated policy I think another
distinction might be um part-time or fractional employees I I think oh right yeah right so I think a fractional I don't have any part-time employees a fractional less than 19 hours right so I think they
unfortunately wouldn't probably qualify okay that makes okay that makes sense I don't have any part employ a fractional employee is 19 and a half hours or less per week a part-time employee unless has that changed like no that sounds about
right yeah D it told us that there's no difference between fractional and part-time employees receiving the holiday pay well now the fractional employees do receive the holiday pay that yes but I'm just talking about longevity on the policy here that is online so that's
something I need clarify for me is that is do correctional employees qualify for longevity um I mean according to this it's longevity employees eligible for longevity are either full-time employees or part-time employees
I don't have any part-time employees I only have full-time and fractional employees so so yeah I think uh those folks the the fractional wouldn't qualify for okay what are you looking at um are you looking at the policies that
are on line under Personnel policies and procedures for select board policies because that doesn't look anything like what I'm looking at are they dated I can't find a date on this I think I have I think that what's up
online if you go to selectman's policies is old old uh so this is Article 15 if you can scroll down to 15 performance beting some but you scroll down maybe organize so I did a search on one
je that's how I up there no there is yeah I need to talk to and I'm not so sure and it could have gotten changed in the past so I guess the question is do fractional employees qualify for longevity yeah and if they do let me know I have to change my
budget I will ask that question because um it does not it has not said that in anything that I have come come across and I know that I went through this when they made the other change with holiday pay that I don't have any I know I don't have any parttime employees they're all fractional or fulltime shouldn't but
shouldn't a policy have a date on it well yes it should one would think but but things got lost in that transition a a lot of the policies just got backed up many years and so we've
been slowly some I know about because I I was involved in changes and some I don't know about and I don't have access to my email during my last time as a select board person and everything was done through email so it's really a
handicap but we asked Harrison to get some Civic plus libraries that were in place prior to and so we are going to be getting those so um and then we can put the most recent policies that have dates
yeah but it just got dropped um that's not good how long is that how when was that put in June 1st of the year that happened yeah the migration from theic f and so I'm looking at policy except my eyes are crossing because it's not what I
remember and it's because it's old so so I don't know so that's gonna that that information is critical for this yeah there only I believe there' only be one person um because I only
have um three positions that work about somewhere between 15 and 19 hours a week and the other ones are per DM so they only work maybe Saturdays or fill in I have two people who fill in um I mean NE Works once every three months or so and
um Lori and Haley work The Saturdays for four hours most of the year but so they would not they're not even they're not even fractional they're considered like I can't remember IAL I had this conversation a while back they not
they're not consider but I only have three people who would be considered the fractional ones that would be qualifying for that and only one of them has been there around than 10 years I'll find out for you but I I think um there is a distinction between a part-time employee and and a fractual
and I think people think that anybody who is not a benefited employee I think they immediately think it's part-time so I had to get that into my head and try to explain to people that there're are fractional and then there's part-time and part-time is more than 19 and a half hours but not all the way not 40 hours
but yeah wow how much more complicated can we get here got those definitions fractional regular seasonal and you know a full-time employee is actually anyone that works more than 30 hours 30 30 30 30 or more
yeah because we're only so so 40 hour hour thing that you see in the private sector doesn't apply to oh to Municipal yeah okay at least here I know some places are 35 for example but but here in town
[Music] is that by do the Personnel policies and procedures the the part about fulltime being 30 hours it was when this policy went into place that's when it was determined now
whether that's a state guideline or there probably is some um guidance because otherwise we can make up right now but but I think there's some state or federal guidelines that we have to follow and you know
Thena bit of cities and towns can you know depending on the pro cation I just have to compliment the senior in the library this is a great budget thank
you read it expl everything they explain one last round to make sure everything for Library [Music] she's she on she I'm hearing you okay
just wanted to check and see if you had any questions I do not okay then we thank you thank you guys than you everybody I just realized they it's okay it's in
here than you well let's let's hope we're going to ask for that yeah I mean we've seen some others um they all haven't been to the same
level okay so that is that is it for what we have for this evening on the because we were in in the middle of the session last week thank goodness last
week the week before it's been some so I appreciate and we're in the joint meeting with the board of slman they're going to retain um I would entertain a motion toour our
joint meeting at 7:21 I than motion to adjourn the joint meeting with the select board at 7:21 second okay we have a motion second call vote Dave Walker yes car H
yes Jane chille yes John haes yes unanimous we standed thank you I'll uh entertain a motion to adjourn the select board part of the joint finance committee meeting at
what are we at 7:21 I move that we adj the select board uh joint meeting with the finance committee at 7:21 that was really good okay I second any discussion hearing none roll call
vote Veronica I Laura shiff and I thank you very much guys don't we have to the thank you I was trying to up motion to meeting at 721 I'll make that motion
to adjourn the finance Comm second have a motion in a second all Walker I off thank you now it's getting warm here so cold oh no over here thank you very much everyone I
think we are ready for 41 Thurday whatever Friday Thursday we have we have a meeting tomorrow night oh right is that is it just you and me I think so yeah you
inv no um we have a third member that we is there a third member to appoint or nobody's come forward from town it's our uh person with uh Finance experience it was Dave Chanel last time
but he didn't want to be re back so it's you and me so meeting room two tomorrow okay I forgot what time yeah is that your audit
committeee yeah okay okay I think we are at 4.1 which is review discuss budget process and policy revision Amendment and there is a motion only I don't know what it
is um well there isn't a motion until we uh discuss what we want to change so the question becomes do we want to make a motion to revise or do we really want or should we put this kind of as a work session item that we look at right now
and discuss what it is we might want to check change in in here okay I have not made any notes so if you would like to go to we'll move 4.1 to work session uh at the only thing that I would change
right now is changing um Board of Selectmen to select board because that wording has changed with the new um the new uh thingy um the new Charter
but I don't I really um don't want to sit down and make changes to this without um review talking through it yeah yeah without review so
um so so how do you want to do this do we want to revise it um you know get get the revisions done for just the wording for Board of Selectmen to Selectmen or
do we want to do this all at once in a work session at a future meeting I think we can do that but I think that the um Selectmen to select board is is an edit per per a town vote
already select board was changed with the charter right oh I see with the adoption of the charter we would automatic do this so it should have automatically been edited well reference things don't happen automatically I know but I'm
saying that the the vote took place the name change has changed than any reference from the date of the charter date being accepted by the state actually you wouldn't have done it before that and that wasn't that long ago so uh there's
been a lot of changes since the adoption by the state or approval by the state I should say so it just has to go on your list of things to do administrative wise to uh make those changes things that have to be you know
like uh Town Charter Article 4 uh powers and duties uh article Town Charter any references to the town Charter need to be changed in here um and I haven't gone through to say oh let's let's change
this to that so all references to the town Charter because it's the old Charter we need to look at it and see what the content is and do an appropriate update I agree um so it's a
little bit more than do we want to do this in a work session after the budget process is over for this year yep I agree I I think that's what makes the most sense for this policy so I will put this on an
agenda for May or June um when things are quieter yeah agree um we should be able to do the first maybe the first meeting in May
after the annual meeting okay so let's do May after annual town meeting not that far away really yeah I know nothing is far away actually yeah
work session agenda and it's uh Charter references um BOS goes to SB and Charter references um beyond that I don't think this I I think as far as the content of the policy goes I I really don't have a
[Music] well let's read through it and yeah let's read through it okay all right so um I don't have a comment I'm good with that no mo no motion just moving it to uh May meeting
all right let's go to 4.2 and we do have a policy in front of us um the Constable policy is there a motion
um give minute well we have two we do have um we have the note from um Chief SEL that has agreed to do all of the
um all of the tasks uh within there um perview um on behalf of the town you did see that email except for any civil items and anything that's needed civy can go through the U Middle
sex courts I don't see that email um yeah February 4th email I put it on SharePoint I think maybe Sabrina just needs to print it I I only popped it into SharePoint um
few hours I usually go through SharePoint on Sunday and Mond do you have boy that's te me there yeah and Veronica it's tough because we had a
holiday yesterday was a snow weekend so lots of I don't even have the entire email here the left side is is you know like I it um it's very small print well it's small print on the left side it's
not a complete email um the left side is truncated oh I have it all you doo yeah um do you do you have the uh part one administration of the government and
then title Seven Cities towns and districts chapter 41 officers and employees of cities towns and districts section 98 powers and duties I do okay I do that so um so that's part of the Mass
General law that um the chief pulled up it basically um um gives the police department um they have Constable gives them Constable responsibilities um so that's why they
could act um that that's why they can act uh on our behalf to uh you know post um you know Town meeing warrant articles and um things things of that nature um
he didn't me I did speak to him earlier about it okay since we're typically going to be posting during like work hour business hours there wouldn't be a cost associated with making those
postings um in terms of working the elections that's a different story um the officers would be paid um probably their overtime rate to uh you know to have a presence
at the at a town election but that's really a call for the town clerk to make you know depending on you know uh how you know if it's a contentious you know election or you know what have
you they they may um you know request a police officer at an election all right so go ahead go ahead civil process would be served through the middle sex County
Sheriff yes that's like would be done um through the police department correct so uh for example like um tenants that need to be served noticed equip for non-payment of rent
okay or whatever um a lawyer want might want to have somebody served with that would be civil it's not Criminal so so how does so backing up then to the
duties that the police would have how does it affect the town budget for and would that the cost of the um working the polls be under the town clerk's office as opposed to under the police department that's as much as I can blow
it up I could see it on here but yeah I don't know why it's coming out like that depends on what um the town clerk must have something in their budget for the Constable now because um that person has been
at on election day has been in town hall so there must be for that correct is that right I've only seen one person yeah I've only seen one person too and okay I think they would be paid
certainly a lot more um to work the day of the election versus going out and posting the warrant articles around town um but I I I haven't had a chance to look into how
much they pay per day during an election also the um um like at at our town meetings we have a police officer um I yeah I think that's something the
the town clerk handles because I I haven't seen any requests come through this office to um to have one posted there okay I don't see it as a large expense either way because it's not that
many hours um you're talking about one one day maybe you're talking about election day um yes yeah Ty maybe a a town election
yeah so well that's what I mean we have two you know yeah so it's pretty [Music] minimal I don't see that being a big impact I think it was more just having them take over those duties um and and then we don't have to
buy bother with constables hiring or you know appointing or whatever it's just one less thing for us to do so you know I think uh as as a suggestion what you probably could do is um I'm not sure how we would do it um
keep a con like a non-p police officer Constable um I wouldn't say on standby but but I mean depending on how you want to revise this policy um if we're getting rid of
them all together then that means um there are no more viable constables that we can count on if we were to need their services we would just use the police department like
what yeah well I'm just saying as a as a backup I I don't know um of a situation right now I'm just saying if you go down depending on how you revise the policy um you know we
could essentially just be going to the police officers for all Constable related work um for everything that the town needs a constable for correct right and anybody in town that would need a constable for other purposes would use
the middle sex Sheriff's Office correct and um and you know deal with whatever fees they charge for that service whatever they would do that individually
um so as far as policy goes then we need to go through this policy and so if we um I'm looking at the motion here it the motion um if we would were to revise the
Constable policy such that the towns and police department um becomes the designated Constable for the town of Townsen right we we shouldn't have a policy we would adopt I think we should
State um that we are adopting um whatever part of this policy here I do I do see a hand up but there's no name and no phone number I don't know who it
is okay uh the person with the hand up if you want to identify yourself okay I guess not um um so can we take a minute to um do you want to do this right now go through
the read the policy and make the changes um in uh uh in session or do you want to um both of us look at these out of session and make changes so I guess I
would make a motion that um we revise that we make the I move that we make the towns and police department the designated Constable for the town of to Townsend and re iise the Constable
policy of 7223 um make any revisions to the policy of 7-22 3 um that are required including perhaps eliminating policy completely I
I would second that any further discussion hearing none V call vote um Veronica Kell I and Laura shiffer and
I so that'll be the policy now we'll just tweak it um at in a work session when you get the agenda okay thank you so that should be our next meeting so we'll go through through that and make the changes that need to be made to
reflect that okay very good do you have that Sabrina y okay okay thank you all right I think we go down to 4.7
now discuss articles for special town meeting on March 10th 2025 um what we have what we were given by Nelson was his draft and not a final and I have a problem with the
order so you can change um because of what we went through at the fall town meeting right and because we are bringing back uh what was Article 19 I would like that move to the
beginning of the warrant and not the end I don't see that on the warrant yes it is end number six right now it's the last one so Lori wants it move to that to be
article one which I don't have a problem with it that's what we're here talk about um Sabrina wants to say something Madame chair yes 4.3 oh oh we did well let's um let's go
back to that since we're on the warant oh okay sorry about that I had so many check marks on here in fact I I the same thing happened to me I had all these check marks and that kind of all right so 4.3 public policy
request policy public7 right now let's finish 4.7 and then go back to 4.3 okay so we're g to make article 6 article one is that what you're saying yes and that's because of the
experience we've had the last two meetings held you know once they get the people that come for their own agendas leave and then we don't have a quum so uh other than that you know we
can make other changes to the order um um do you want me to do do do we want to at least talk about the um let's you want to talk about the Articles first oh sure okay go
ahead um so you know the planning board one's going to be um the first article um I cut everything I I just cut and pasted Verbatim what it was from before so no
changes um you mentioned if there's going to be changes made it will probably be um on the floor there's if there's yeah it'll be on the floor and it'll be sent to Adam beforehand and this is submitted by planning board so that should be added
in here okay so we're going to pick up article six move it to article one add submitted by planning board y okay so then let's go to article one which will be article
two correct yep um so this is the one that you we've been discussing uh which is um converting the uh the C the town clerk position from elected to a appointed
position so there this language is is kind of um um prescribed by the state of how it needs to be read and how it needs to
look in order for it to be um binding and and official and has Adam seen that no uh so I haven't I haven't sent him any of this yet he is on vacation this week but I confirmed with him over
the weekend that he would find some time because he has his computer that he would uh review it for us there's only six articles and right one of them he's already reviewed before so um you know he he was kind enough to uh take some
time off off his vacation to uh review the language okay um the next one is related to the uh price increase on the fir
Tru um so it's 8,790 the funding source I um I kind of penciled in that we're going to borrow the money but we're going to use a ambulance receipts to to
pay for um the payments on it so you know borrowing mean you know we're to go out um and and um and get you know get a loan for it and all the payments will be coming
out of ambulance receipts um so on this article Lai um I I would like to know from Town Council that we actually need this that it since the town has already voted on
the both these fire trucks and this is this is a combined um if I I don't we don't have the contract that needs to be signed correct for the increase in front of us in this packet but we had it previously
yeah yeah so um I I since this was already voted for purchase by the town and since this price applies to both fire trucks if I remember right they attributed half to one and half to the
other some such thing no so this entire this entire amount is for the first truck the earlier one that was ordered the second one which is which was a year later um there's no price increase on that um but to but they're
kind of rolled together because if you read that there they acknowledge that we have a second fire truck coming that they are not going to increase the price on that if we don't accept this one in in other words if the town says yeah no
we're not we're not going to do that okay cool does that mean we're not getting either fire truck I I want to know the ramifications of this and I want to understand why in fact it has to go to the town when we've already voted
to purchase these and if I if I remember right we've already borrowed money for this we borrowed money for this the first truck and if it's coming coming out of ambulance receipts then why don't we just pay for this out of ambulance re
receipts and stick with the two that we have already in the books this this need needs more investigation it needs to be on this warrant if in fact we need to have this but I want to know that we actually need
to vote this C of town meeting well to to that point when this first got brought up I you had mentioned the the Warren Lang yeah so I actually I went through Adam we even had Bond Council take a look at it um
unfortunately there's nothing in the the wording of the motion that kind of of um preemptively um allows all allows for a price increase okay so I want to know the ramifications if in fact this article
fails what are the ramifications on those two fire trucks if this fails because I think we need to be able to explain to the town why it's a good idea to pay this money because there's an element in town that says oh not going
to pay more but that means we are not getting the fire trucks um the police chief I mean sorry the fire chief has said um current pricing on these trucks is well over a million dollars and there's
about a threee weight so I would say up I would say upfront those are the um real world consequences of um voting this down uh because if if we don't pay for this um price increase then we're going to lose
our line for our place in line for that vehicle and our price correct and yeah like I said it's well over a million dollars right now so you're talking at a minimum than the difference
$250,000 more per truck right per truck because we ordered these in 2022 and 2023 with the intent that and yes they've raised the price I understand that but I also understand what's going on in the
world so um it's uh I I just think that we need we need to know exactly how this is going to work but I think it would be a um this
is you know we're asking for a vote on this but we need to know the consequences if we don't vot it we have two old fire tracks that have been running for 17 to 20 years and um I'll I'll I'll double check I'll
double check with the fire chief and um you know I'm I'm sure he'll be happy to you know attend this meeting and you know speak on it as well so um yeah so so that's one article that um it's going
to be on there um and I would just drop these down so article one becomes correct yeah okay um the next one is um whether we would um vote to hear a presentation um
on the North Middle sex Regional School District budget um there's I think they're going to be sending at least two Representatives one from the
school committee um I think will Hackler might be there and someone from the school district as well um I Heard it might be Brad himself because
um Gary ree I believe is going to be at the either Ashby or peep rolls oh yeah we're all meeting the same and um Nancy Haynes the school business manager is going to be in the
other town so I think we might get Brad that night to okay presentation um what number is that three which is now four and
so just article four what's what's uh five and six uh article four becomes Article Five I let want to talk about that um so this one is the actual ual uh override uh
warrant for the the school budget I haven't put in the number yet the amount because I wanted to to talk to you um are we asking for the full amount above and beyond the FY 25
number or are we looking for the difference between you know uh two and a half three% increase and what they're looking for so so depends on the Omnibus budget in my mind you know it depends on that's
why I wanted to put the two and a half in there to see what what we can afford I I mean on if we have no increase how much can we give the schools given everything else that we've
been looking at budget wise right um so so the two and a half needs to be in there and my my thought is go for the amount between what we can afford to give the schools and what the schools
feel they need and you know what well you know if if everyone gets two and a half three% then um anything above and beyond that would would be what we're asking for in an
override yes um and and this says it's for the North Middle sex General School District um what abouta they came in at like
3.77% um I'm not sure if it's worth we would be asking for like $112,000 from them oh okay I'm not saying it's not a lot of money no but I understand it's not worth putting in an override
probably not um it's it's um they came in at a very reasonable assessment this year okay to be posted um this would need to be posted on
Monday the 24th Monday the 20 Monday the 20 is the 24th Monday is the 24th yep so I didn't know was a typo it said fiscal year 2024 and 2025 so I need to
change that um um we can look at this part again on Thursday um if we're any closer to anything if not it doesn't matter because it has to be um printed
or whatever yeah it needs to be posted posted on Monday so we are asking for it specifically for the schools or are we asking for it for the the town budget how are the other
towns um what are the other towns putting in are they asking for it for the schools or are we just asking for it because this is our budget and we need this much more based on what the
departments have asked for I I I'm almost certain they are asking for a article specific an article specific to the school budget
okay and they may not have the same issues that we have or dealing with I mean the amounts are going to be different but all three because of the school all three are as for well I mean that's why we coordinate yeah but we
also have the trash issue I understand that but you know but um they they still have the same school budget issue so they're going to have a specific uh article at their town meeting um just on the school
budget and we are not going to ask um we're not going to roll trash into this then um I don't want to ask for an override for trash because we can charge fees for
trash um we can talk about this at budget time let's keep this for North Middle sex okay yeah what's the next one the last one oh so um what's
549 that's actually the uh water building and why you know it looks like it's been resurrected um our staff actually found out
um this was an article in a previous town meeting but they had the the map block and lot number wrong oh so um they had 540 Main Street correct but the uh I
think they had map three and like block 10 I think lot zero so that's clearly not the water department building so um just to play it safe
um we're just going to reintroduce a new article to correct that error so that so that we can actually legally sell the correct laot okay so those are the articles I I am cck with
these um so did did were we in agreement that the amount we would put on the school override article would be the
um difference between what they were asking and what we can afford to pay them what do you think we I don't know I think we should put 2% for what we can afford to pay them okay um
because I don't know where the general budget is I haven't seen the Omnibus I haven't seen what we're bringing in I mean I have seen it but it's not yeah it's not in any state um and
uh agree with that so I would go with 2% okay because we have to give them you know we're going to give this to them anyway it's just that the ask is um so much farther
along so okay so I'll I'll are you good with 2% laoren I am okay so I'll I'll do the math and figure out what a 2% increase would have come out to um you
know using fy2 numbers and then you know the the difference between that and what there has what they presented to us at that meeting that will be the um that will be the ask that sounds reasonable
to me at the um in the article yeah but it's probably going to be um just doing some quick math probably not quite a million I would say um but it's going to
be 800 900 somewhere around there would be my guess um so once I do should also have the information of what um how much per household or per
thousand in assessment that's going to mean to the residents taxpayers I agree with that yep we'll do that homework so when it when it comes time to a town meeting we can have us like a
little presentation and we'll explain what the what the implications would be for each household good okay do we have to make that a motion uh yeah you're not going to have
another meeting before it needs to get posted so I think the motion so some I think I when drafted um you ready for it Lauren yeah I to approve the warrant articles
for the March 1 2025 I thought it was March 4th what was March 10 um let me start again um I mooved to approve the warrant articles for the
March 10th 202 25 special town meeting um as reviewed pending review by Town Council as well as signing the warrant out of SE session once Town council's review is complete okay I second that
any discussion hearing none roll call Veronica c i and Laura shiffer and I so let's go back to 4.3 public record request policy is there a
motion um do we have an as follows um well I wanted to go through it first so I don't have an as follows um but I I will tell you that um
th this policy is from 20 six yeah I see you have it in front of you um and I just wanted to review it first um because we had a a public records request come in you know uh from a you
know if you're going to take public records requests for everything that a particular person has done from 1988 to present and you're going to sign it you know turn up Uranus or something like
that uh then I think that um most definitely our policy needs reviewed because I definitely think we should be charging so I wanted to look at this policy and see I mean that's an incredible amount of time and if whoever
turn up Uranus or whomever is wants to come in and um uh go through the books I'm certainly that that would be fine our books are open but for a request of that
magnitude um I believe that uh we need to be charging so um looking through this number one this policy supplements by in no way is met to contradict or
supersede um I think that should be and is and is no and in no way is meant M NT as opposed to met to contradict or supersede the Massachusetts Public
Records law mgl blah blah blah if and so that needs edited first of all number two if a department is not the custodian of the records that are being requested then the department should direct the requestor to the appropriate
Department I believe we are doing that number three public records requests May be made verbally in person or in writing telephone requests are not acceptable all requesters should be encouraged to put the request in writing however
verbal requests are acceptable provided that the request is made in person anytime I've made a verbal request I've been asked to write it down but I think this policy is fine the way it is number four this is a question more for all
departments each department is required to keep a blog book of public records requests whether made verbally or in writing noting the date and time when the request is received the name and contact info of who made the request and
the documents requested so my question is do we have those logs um are all departments keeping this log do departments even know they need to keep that log so I think the way
things currently are handled is uh everything flows through the town clerk so they they're called the they're called The Rao the records access officer corre so everything flows through the town clerk and and then behind the scenes if the town clerk um
is not able to um provide all the documentation then the town clerk would um reach out to the department that they believe would best um provide the documentation that's being requested and and then the
then the town clerk would once they get all the information they would then send it off to the request the the requestor okay so I would want to add a a number zero all public records requests are made
through the records or made to the records access officer that would be zero and then under four remove the department and say The Rao is required to keep a log
book um and the rest of it is okay the way it is so I really always thought that the way it was think so let's put it in because that's the way it is make it reflect what it it
is uh in accordance with Massachusetts Public Records law the responding Department um let's just say The Rao must respond in writing within 10 calendar days of the request by doing one of the following providing the
requested documents indicating that the requested documents will be provided by a date certain or indicating that the requested documents will not be provided with explanation of why the documents are not public the denal should only be
made after consultation with the Town Administrator okay number six in accordance with Massachusetts Public Records law a requestor has the right to inspect and examine available public records under
the supervision of the custodian and need not be furnished with copies of the public records unless so requested okay don't they have to pay for that if they number pay for it okay number seven that's where payment is
addressed in accordance with Massachusetts Public Records law a department May charge for copies of public records as well as the time spent to produce the requested documents and that's where I think the you know
grapefruit head case or whatever the name of the person is turnup or Uranus um we should uh um the Departments that are affected by that request should take a look at it and estimate the amount of time it's
going to take for this to be um resolved Department should provide an estimate to the requestor of what the cost will be before the work is done so Department should provide an estimate to The
Rao of what the cost will be before the work is done and The Rao should pass the estimate onto the requester okay the estimate must be in writing for any requests estimated to cost in excess
of $10 and I think that we should change that to $25 but we could leave it at $10 that's let me let me get through that and then okay I don't think anything costs I don't think you can get anything like
that for labor for $10 probably gonna be at least 25 so that means every single one will be you know I'm I'm trying to make it so that every public records request you don't have to have a request for an amount you
know if it's for if you're looking for something speci specific you can usually get that pretty easily it's just that this this public records request in my opinion is a fishing Expedition um against a particular
person they're looking for a needle in a hay stack was something in the past 40 years done wrong and if so I want to pinpoint it that I can't I I think that public records requests I I encourage
but but they should be for specific things um it it you know I want to know you know what went out for the public library as an RFP in 2023 you know or and I can't find it on
the website or something like that but when you want to know every single board and committee every single open meeting law every single you know cost for every single department for every single uh
it's kind of um it's nonspecific it is a fishing exped it appears to be a fishing Expedition okay we can't case just come in that person could come in sit down
and go through all the minutes of meetings in 1988 were taken by hand in books they were not I know on until maybe maybe 10 years ago maybe um
and so what are we doing here why are we even entertaining it in the form that it's in without going out and saying this is going to cost you $10,000 this is Staff time yeah our staff has enough to
do um without I mean certainly if there's a particular document that you you have a question about something you want a particular document you have a a reasonable date range but hey give me the last 40
years um so number seven should be enforced by our records access officer and I think beginning with this request number eight all documents prior to being provided under public records
request must be reacted to exclude any personal information of town employees considered by the Massachusetts Public Records law to be private including individual dates of birth social security numbers or age and that
redaction should be taken into account um and and time to redact right right will be taken into account in the estimate given in number
seven it's sad because there's nothing productive about this doing this and and so someone is going to need to take time to come up with an estimate for this and that in itself should be
part of the um charge yeah to the requester um and so I would like to I have things written down here which I'll make a copy of and leave with Sabrina but my motion is to make the changes
that we just um discuss to the public records re um policy policy um and do a first reading of it
at our next meeting I second that any more discussion um yes we have a person in the audience who has an a a question can we entertain that
Lori yeah who is it Valerie g Road just a guest today um I just on mes it's regarding an act approve public records it says um first few hours of work performed to
respond to public rec requests will be performed in cost after that an agency is recommended to charge up to $25 per hour how much hour 25 this is on M
so okay so we should be charging $25 per hour for the time that it takes to fulfill that request that's thank you Valerie may maybe in the policy refer to that
section that's state law um it's not state law it's just a recommendation based on the law that was passed um I'm just gonna put M up Well you certainly can't do less than 25 an hour
you you can't we pay more than that and it's time that could be spent on something productive yeah so let's start with um we don't have a person on staff to do public records
requests and and consequently it's someone who has a job description and a job to do that's other than this and certainly it's fine if it's a a reasonable public records request but
when it's one of um you know it's um beond repetitive about one person reasonably do so if they want to pay someone to do this then sure that's
okay um we have another question on the floor here it's Harrison my may can we take his question sure Harrison can you come to the table because I really can't hear you well if you're not I apologize um if I may um
the public records law does not allow for more than $25 per hour to be charged um and that's uh municipalities under 20,000 population can charge for the first two hours though and that is municipalities is over cannot so that
that something um that could be included thank you okay I guess it would be up to the r AO individual to determine how much time time has already been spent regarding certain
matters all right so I might want to work on if it's a first timer you know then we understand or they've only asked for one or two things and it doesn't take them that long that's one thing but if it's if it should be a fishing
Expedition so to speak um they have to pay we the town shouldn't be paying for their for one person to to get what they need um when there's another way yeah so
this request that you guys are referring to it's it's on a lot of people's radars because it's it's it's a pretty big request um so I am working with the town clerk to um I I thought we
had come up with kind of a an an estimate of how many hours it would take and I think I need to double check to see if we sent it to the requestor yet okay but it's good to have the policy and then they know ahead of time because we should like I said our tax dollars
shouldn't be going for this I AG all right are you ready to vote um uh yes Veronica motion made and uh
you know we discussed and Laura shiffrin yes so that was 4.3 okay I am thinking we are at 4 .8 um discuss March 1st 2025 budget Summit schedule and select
board budget Veronica what is the budget uh what is the budget Summit schedule I did not see that I'm I'm looking yeah uh I I I put it on SharePoint I kind of since I
wasn't here last year I I kind of used last year's budget Summit schedule as a as a as a framework okay um I think [Music] um the the I think um finance
committee I believe uh is if their budget is kind of buttoned up before the budget Summit they don't really need to make an appearance to sort of you know represent their their
budget um I think it's for the bigger departments that that haven't necessarily um come to these joint meetings we we kind of need them to be there to to to present and
and ultimately defend their budget um so um last year it was um police and fire that were first um so
um we did police but the chief wasn't there um the fire budget is in scheduled to be um reviewed until next week um so you know um you know maybe they just have a a
smaller um window to speak on the in the budget Summit if you know they've already if we've already buttoned up all the questions during the joint meetings um this looks good to me uh I mean I've done these budget Summits
before um and this looks good um I would like to put the town clerk on here because we have a um a question about salary there that that whole budget is going to
change uh given Kathy's retirement agreed um so can we put that at 12m um is the the town clerk isn't under General government is it if it is that would be fine I I would
think so yeah I'm just going to say it as okay I'll agree with you it's not in the list what's that it's um it's actually under Ed boards and officials well yeah they yeah it's not
yeah because it's the only job well the only paid elected correct is um election workers and the Town Clerk and the town clerk's budget is set at town meeting by
the town no other elected officials are paid elected or appointed um with the exception of election workers and the Town Clerk and so um uh and so we need to look at that in
our budget because that is going to change um and I've already um C's been um out for a little bit but um I was going to research about the what the new town clerk's salary would
be yeah we need to look at that um same with certification so the certification line is going to go away for 2026 and also it affects the 2025 budget um because the position will be in
effect for the last two months of 2025 so we really need to um look at that uh um stiens longevity that's going to go away with this um so this budget
um you know the 20 we need to look at the 2026 budget realistically as far as this goes um so so I'm I'm hoping to get most of those answers uh by the the budget
Summit itself I I I should be able to okay yeah we we should have that then so um so I I am good with this but I do want the town clerk put on and I would I would do it at
12m unless we want to do it earlier um that's right although culture and recreation that includes the library correct yes um me look at this where where does the
town clerk sit town clerk sits with General government so let's keep it there all right so town clerk will be at 10: all right so 9:00 amm fire and police 10 a.m. General government including the town clerk but not
including the treasurer why is that I don't know it was set up that way last I just took last year's schedule and and used it okay uh 11 o'cl Highway and streets
Human Services plus landfill and then 12:00 culture and recreation and treasure that looks good to me so do we need a motion um okay so we haven't done the budget
yet I'm doing two motions here um I I make a motion that we accept the um budget Summit schedule for Saturday March 1st as just discussed
second any further discussion hearing none roll call uh Veronica Cal I la Sher I okay so that's that now now let's go to our budget the
board of selectman budget yep all right I have the Omnibus budget up here this is what you sent me way back when um it's V1 yes okay so it's just what we have um
so it's a little bit different from there um all right so I can uh um let me see if Harley Harley um can you give me share screening
privileges thank you so it's what's up is similar to the budget sheets that you've seen for all the various departments so [Music] um you know we'll go through
it ler now everyone knows what I make not that it was a secret not a secret um so my contract is a it's a 5%
increase um from year one to year two um year three is is only a two and a half% increase you know that's for later year so that was yeah that was sort of how
the previous selectman um structured my contract see then we're down to Sabrina um 4% increase uh
um yeah so you have Cal Sabrina now you have cie the HR manager that's also at 4% then you have H Rebecca moris the wellness coordinator um also at 4% and
one of those comes from arpa correct Call's position um will be fully funded through arpa in FY 26 and uh Becky was was
voted not be funded by arpa um so if I may what lease earlier was sort of was referring to was I kind of had some plary discussions with her um given you know
uh Becky's position is not funded by arpa at the moment um you know the there's certainly concerns whether we can you know afford to to fund that position um since she's sort of embedded
in the senior center there and you know she does a lot of work with um seniors as well as other demographics um the um one of those grants that um the senior center gets we were hoping to
have her um do some of those administrative responsibilities um and they're estimating close the half of her salary could be covered by one of those grants so that would really
um you know fill fill a gap in their personnel but also um help us with budget as well I would like to see these um put at 40,000 each of
them um and mainly because I don't want to lose either position next year and if you look at the Omnibus budget the way things were budgeted last year that the town has been putting in 10,000 a year
to try to build up to those salaries correct so I would like to see we have 40,000 in ARA funds I would like to see each of these at 40,000 so that we hold that position both of these positions for
next year and we actually use the 40,000 for the wellness coordinator this year coupled with the you know 33,000 roughly of COA funds um
so um making that switch you know um I've just sort of been talking you know uh to to the senior I haven't really run this by Becky yet you know um I need to um of uh ex you know sort of sell this
idea to her that you know some of your hours every week probably I would say between 10 and 15 hours um will be you know um supporting administrative tasks
for the senior set so I need to certainly run this by her too um to see if she's you know willing to sort of make that pivot because at the moment she's um you know she's pretty independent of what she does it certainly keeps her
quite busy but you know now we're having her to sort of switch gears a little bit so um you know I I definitely would want to speak to her not that we couldn't at least put on paper right now how we would like the salar to be
structure I I certainly would like to run and by her too see if she this is something she's willing to sort of learn and take on but I'm estimating between 10 and 15 hours a
week so uh for budgeting purposes and looking at the Omnibus budget I would like to see 40,000 next to community services coordinator and 40,000 next to human resources manager okay because I want to preserve those positions for
next year okay that's what I'm trying to do and the the 73 267 that's arpa is like poof it's it's hidden it's there so we would have the money in our
budget combine for to one position and ARA for the other and then next year you know hopefully we have the funds in town that we can add more to each of these to fund the position positions if not at full time at almost
fulltime so you wanted um right now it's 20,000 each you want 20,000 each each okay um and that would easily fund the entirety of Becky's salary if in fact
the COA couldn't come through with it and it would preserve the positions on the books for both people because you know last year we funded them both but we had if you look at this it was like 20,000 for one
20,000 for the other and that money has probably never been touched it will be used for transfers at the end of the year but it you know um but right now that's just what I think
um I do I it it will it it's just a way to it's a placeholder and it gives us funds to fully fund the community services coordinator if in fact the senior senator doesn't want to um do that I think it's I think these are both
very important positions I mean would you be amable to 30,000 each because that's sort of been we've been stepping up 10,000 that I'm good with that if in fact we can make
um we it means though that um we wouldn't have quite enough to fully fund the community services coordinator um unless we unless COA came through with some funds right yeah and if they came with some amount you know
they would need to come up with 13,000 on this 14 yeah so um and and I'm pretty sure that the community services coordinator does work with the senior center now anyway oh they do and
and that's why I I thought the you know the idea that you know kind of makes a lot of sense it was where we were going to go with that position it was supposed to roll into an assistant director position fulltime at the um
Council and agent so why don't I talk to the um I'll talk to Becky and then I'll if she's a mean to the idea I'll Circle back to the senior center and have them come up
with a solid number for me and then that may determine how much um uh we need in in in the general fund budget to to cover the rest of position okay I'm good with 30 and 30 but I would rather have
40 and 40 okay I I'll keep that in mind and if we need to split the difference you know then okay are you good with that Lori I can't see you anymore because we're screen sharing are you good with 30 and 30
instead of 40 and 40 yes okay all right okay uh let's see um do we have the temporary help line
still were you putting that in or no I think we should um I don't see it in these in this oh yeah that that just double
check you're right it's not there um let me see yeah temporary health is at 10,000 actually one second I could can I the BBA I think we're over no I can
share the office yeah temporary help we are uh over budget but I think that was because um of the administrator leaving yeah the overlap you know there were you know I think Ross and I overlap by two weeks
and then he was doing some additional um aggregation and he put in a few hours here and there like answering some of my questions and I mean there was plenty of hours that he didn't charge for um but you know there were some longer emails
that he had sent me so um U so yeah we are definitely over in that um but what do you think for next year do you think we'll need it um I think it's a good line to have and I think it's a good line to fund at
a some amount yeah I know that it wasn't always I mean last year we we were budgeted at 10,000 and we were 4,000 over budget yeah and this year we're almost 15,000 over budget so I I think
keeping it there just as um just in case okay um makes a lot of sense okay um and then uh in terms of expenses um pretty much love the fun yeah that's
what I was suggesting Professional Services we do seem to go over that line every year but we kind of underspend in other categories so um did we need the land transfer um or that was because we were
going to um it was for Warren Road and we were going to split some of that off and do a um a survey and sell the back part to fish and wildlife because it
matched Hunting Hills or Hickory Hills or whatever that Wildlife Management Area in lunenberg is to H wordss um that was why that okay so do we need
that probably not I I just kind of level funded everything sort of knowing the history about some of the that's why that was there that was something that we didn't put in before um we added that two years
ago and I think it just was um was never used is it in the BPA is used no no yeah I think we can remove that that was the purpose for that
um and it offsets some of the additional stuff in the um HR and community Services even though it's in a different category but of all okay that's what I
think so see so Professional Services um Town reports Professional Services uh Web Master that's um that's Metro is it do we have a contract with
them and is their contract level funded I think their contract is on the web's page I believe it is too it's just under contracts maybe Town Administrator contracts yes okay so if we go down to
vendor contracts um Metro of solutions how many years is this contract for FY 25 actually they are due to expire it is end of June oh wow
believe I gotten a from let's just leave it there and if you have a quote since we're getting rid of land transfer we can up that a little bit okay yeah I I need to find out my emails
but I had um reached out to Metro go for a quote and it was right around that what was budgeted okay all right uh let me see we have office supplies other supplies travel mileage
budget do you know what has been spent so far in which one for the last fiscal year none of them so where the where you are today the B
does yeah um see January 2025 okay let me want me get to this I have to get to the top I can tell you okay so which one did you want to know
Lori you're muted Lori look like they're spending all of it um well which one which one do you want to look at um Town reports we we have
um we've we've spent 59% other supplies we've spent 31% um travel uh in state I think we're at 50% other charges we have 3% left well
the small ones are I mean or we've spent 3% I'm sorry um so the one that we've spent the most is Communications we've already spent 75% this is the January bva so we're
about halfway through the fiscal year maybe you know one additional month what about the D around 50 5,000 for dues and memberships uh dues and memberships
we've spent 50% on that and it's for six months yes yeah so we should be at 50% roughly for everything having spent
50% for communications we've already spent 75% I don't know why that is um anyway okay they're level funded okay so we're
in we're in pretty good shape I think um yeah for the for the select board budget yeah not a lot of changes am I allowed to talk about parts of the budget that do concern me
yes yes um it's definitely on the insurance side of things the health insurance in particular um we got back a quote from
you know our carrier Maya and U it's um at it's at 15 and a half% increase yeah which is substantial when the budget is already um let me
give you an ex it's just under a million dollars I believe no actually it was just over a million almost 1.1 last year so a 15 and a half% increase now you're at
you know a million and a quarter um you know that's so where else can we go I mean are there um who does the negotiations with Maya
um I mean I'm not sure there's really much quote unquote negotiation that happens but who looks at things like deductibles and those sorts of things um I think in in recent years HR you know
they've looked at the deductible levels and you know it's it's kind of like a balancing act you know and we're kind of at that sweet spot because once you start increasing deductibles um you know you're you're
really passing on um you know depending on the health of the person with the insurance yes yeah um um and you know they kind of look everything across the board as well um
but I will say this we have now asked for a different here um because right now health insurance you're either it's the employee or um a family plan there's nothing in between um there are certain
folks that maybe it's just the employee and um a spouse for example or maybe employee and a child so um we've requested that um additional
tier to be added so the benefit is is twofold I would say um it opens up options for you know employees that you know uh don't quite need a family plan but an individual plan is is not enough
um so there's some savings there but there's also savings on the town side because the town pays 75% of whatever you know premium um that's paid out so um if now you're
paying a a smaller um for a smaller uh less expensive rate plan then you might see some savings there too so okay well that is a consent might be a reason to ask for more in the
end uh that's that's why I wanted to bring it up because a a um a 15 and a half% increase is is it's not sustainable but the health
insurance has has sort of been um that's one of the reasons why North mle Sexes increases so much one of the reasons yeah they have they have health insurance costs as well and I believe in
their um budget documents they they're advertising somewhere between a 10 and 12% increase in their health insurance too right um you know property taxes that's another big one um you know our general liability um um
we don't have an exact number from them it's too early but um I've been our general liability you're saying property you mean yeah general liability general liability insurance um that's up going up 10% as well
so so you know um just those line items uh it's it's basically using up very last of our you know two and a half% overi or I mean not I'm kind of exaggerating but it's using a
significant amount of you know our of our property tax our tax L okay all right other concerns um the you know the the schools is obviously a big one and obviously trash
we have to figure out what to do with that so do you want my opinion on trash of course my opinion on trash is we scrap the purple bags we charge everybody a fee that's what I think and if you if
you work it out and have a calculator with me but it comes out to between 22 and $25 per quarter per I mean per month it month or quarter per household um per month $22 to $25 per month for trash
pickup so that's a 100 a quarter 400 for the year right okay um if you're doing it straight with Shaws you're doing 40 a month to 50 a month yeah um and so it's less than that than
Contracting privately the thing about the um purple bags is we aren't going to bring any enough to cover the cost of the contract and even though the Board of Health wants to do the one where we only pay for them to run their trucks
around town we don't we have the Tipping fee open-ended um cool with purple bags we could pay for that but we don't have money to pay for the open-ended piece unless we charge a fee per month which
comes out to about $10 per month per household but I would rather rather I just think that we can't say you're paying $10 a month and you have to buy purple backs um that would be less for some
people more for others um and it it it uh makes everybody in town pay something to town for trash so those are a two options there's a fee involved next year
regardless for trash if we're doing trash ourselves and if we're not doing trash within the town if we're not going to sign any Trash contract then everybody has to sign their own individual one and that's more expensive um so that's my I just feel
like instead of doing the you're going to pay $10 a month and you have to buy purple bags why not just say scrap the purple bags and pay a fee but I like the purple bags I think it makes you think
about your trash which is a good thing and it means that people that are a one person or a twers household um it's less expensive if you have a fee and the purple bags um but people will complain about
you're making me buy purple bags and you're making me buy pay a fee well if everybody in town bought into the purple bags and didn't contract privately with SH we probably wouldn't need the fee but they but people aren't going to do that they're going to say oh the
town's doing this to me I'm going to buy my own trash and we're paying for them for Town pickup those of us who aren't Contracting privately the town is paying for Ev for trash for every house
household right now yet we have 10 to 20% of the Town who who um has gone off and done their own thing and we're all buying purple bags um so that's my diet tribe on trash so
if we um go the completely other way and you know do away with the pay you throw you know we would lose out on that grant that we had received which was $62,000 which is um you know not insignificant amount of but we have to
spend that by the end of June correct so what we could do if we did keep purple bags we could buy a whole whole bunch of purple bags with that's 62k and give some to Teo to hand out to town and people with food distribution give some
to the senior center for the people that you know can't afford it you know that any hardship cases we could give out purple bags use some of that money to give out purple bags I believe that the
state did somehow give us a one-year extension on using the 62,000 so we wouldn't have to do it by the end of J right but we certainly could because we actually have enough expenses I we can certainly use
some for like uh educational stuff which I believe the war Health was very interested in doing which I think is great because I I feel like um you know some folks are not informed enough about you know what you can or
can't throw away you know recycle more compost more I think we got some educational materials out there um we can um sort of change some the habits of some folks and I think that
might reduce the tonage can we buy a compost spin you know and charge people a nominal amount of money for them um you know you come to this uh lecture
about composting and you can leave with a bin for five bucks you know or something like that maybe I don't figure it out but in any event it's either a fee for the whole thing or
it's a fee plus plus the purple backs and you know some towns actually do do a combination like that they they they charge the fee but but I guess this is the distinction um you voluntar
pay for that fee so you get that you you pay the fee um and then you have to buy the bags but what do you mean voluntarily how does that work because who's going to volunteer to pay a fee well in some of these cities or towns um
they have transfer stations which I I maybe it's not really an Apples to Apples comparison but um they some places do do a combination you have to pay a fee and then you have to pay for bags but but for the most part there is a
transfer station involved to be able to accept all the material which um the recycling center certainly cannot handle that type of volume we are in a transfer C no exactly so um but um but yeah
that's that's that's a tough one so it would be better to take the lower the the the all-in contract because then we no with without the all-in contract if we just do the trash pickup there is a a
a we have to put away more than what the you know it's what 780 for everything I I would say we have to do 900 to a million because we don't know what that typic fee is going to be right and then so we charge everybody a fee
and if we don't if we're Below on the Tipping fee well then then we have that much money if we put it somewhere that we could the following year um not charge as high a fee maybe I don't know
um but I I think a fee say $100 a year that's if we do the that's $10 a month $120 a year and we're doing purple backs
yeah I think that would be a good compromise it's a middle of the road approach um yeah okay we're three hours now so how long do you want to
go I think we're good did did you guys need to actually take a vote on the select board budget or we just talking I I we're just talking about it okay we'll we'll let's do that yeah I don't take a
okay was that our last one in the um meeting business yeah yes and now we're work session I don't is there anything under the under five with the arpa
projects I think we can delete that from future I mean because that's kind of done over and done with right 5.1 Town Administrator report update
um the only thing I had to report was just to um I think I mentioned it to the two of you and we talked about it in the beginning of the meeting um Erin steepfield you know has put in her two weeks so she is
resigning um and her last day is February 26th and have we posted we've posted it internally um this is certainly an opportunity to
potentially talk about regionalizing things um since I've started there's always been talks with our neighboring communities to regionalize whenever there's an opportunity and usually the best
opportunity is when the positions are vacant that gives you a little bit of wiggle room of how you want to switch things up to to you know make it fit um each you know Town um so I'm actually
gonna start um having some preliminary discussions with P roll to see what this might potentially look like because there were talks a few months ago about a conservation agent you know but
um you know we have a new conservation agent who's who's working out great um but you know those are sort of some of the things that has been discussed since I've been here so I don't even know what that would look like to tell you the truth but I at least want to have the
conversation with some of our neighbors um you know we might be able to work something out potentially I I'm with you talking to other people what about you are uh yeah also um it's been mention
when I went to the caucus last week mrpc um which actually was for the transportation part but um there were others that were saying that they have
part-time and they're sharing with other towns so that's not really Regional but they it's a sharing and you might want to call um I don't know if you'll get anybody this week because of school vacation but um Glen eaten at
mrpc okay ask those that are doing it part-time um because I know a number in the commission do have part-time people and a lot of the towns because most of them are smaller towns so I'm not
talking about lemonster I'm not talking about any of the Cities but um yeah you might try there yep and and I think we kind of fall in that uh area at times because as you probably
know some of our staff are um you know 30 hours maybe a little bit less so uh you know if someone left you can maybe reduce the hours a little bit and share the cost with another
town that only needs someone half time and if you pull it together that's you know you have a full-time employee so those are sort of opportunities you know um to explore and you know this with this unfortunate
resignation you know this might be a potential opportunity um you know to make uh you know come to some sort of an agreement also if you've posted intern
internally it could be somebody who maybe doesn't have a 40-hour job but has a 20s something hour job in town that may want to pick up um some of the
difference um uh you mean they would keep their previous job and take this on as well or you're just talking about moving up uh no I'm open to
anything it works you know if you have somebody that wants something enough you don't know that until you post and people start applying actually right okay um any other update that was only
update I I had to provide okay um 5.2 reports um Veronica you wanted to report on Housing Trust I do do I have the ability to screen share we need to ask heartly for
that uh you can screen share if you uh sign your own computer uh that's right up okay okay oh you know what I I can I can uh did I send it to you it's in the
SharePoint right oh yeah yeah you want to just it doesn't have to run as PowerPoint you have all the slides there pop that up and and uh yeah it's just it's just a PDF and I don't have
to well maybe I'll play it on my screen just for fun um you have to start yeah that's the last one all right so um I just wanted to give a status update for the towns and affordable housing trust so um go to the
next Slide the next page yeah all right uh significant dates just for people that aren't familiar with us in January 2020 or with this board us the special town meeting voted to form a Housing Trust and in October 2020 the first
Board of the trustees was appointed by the Selectmen in May 2022 at annual town meeting six properties were identified by the town properties committee to be transferred to the Housing Trust and that was voted
positively in Spring 20 23 the the board of the trust um through a DTA District local technical assistance grant through mrpc Had A Five-Year Plan completed what were we going to do with those six properties that were given to us how are
we going to proceed so after um looking at that the trust the trustees spoke to did a lot of work and spoke to Mass Housing Partnership and applied for a technical assistance grant which we were granted a year ago um in January
2024 and in January 2025 we now have a housing concept on one of the properties so next slide this is the purpose of the trust trust is to provide for the preservation and creation of affordable housing which is Workforce housing and
uh age restricted housing for the benefit of low and moderate income households in town and you can see this this is this statement is from the towns and general bylaws and our mission and this is from the fiveyear action plan is to accept property for the development
of affordable housing or to purchase property to be guided by the housing production plan which is um something that the Housing Authority is required to have in place for the town and to facilitate development work to create
affordable housing in Townson and our goal is to have a project start on a property by 2027 so uh this is just a statement on the area median income we are lumped
with towns in towards Boston Groton peppero dunable are lumped with wall and the numbers are a little different there's a lot that we can talk about on this their numbers are lower which means that the cost of the housing is lower
because it's based off of your um median income so that means affordable housing in Townson is more expensive than affordable housing in Groton or peil or D so um Aaron steepfield what who our
land youth coordinator that's leaving um we worked with HUD to figure out what we could do about that and we can't change our HUD area but we can through a bylaw um work out numbers that are specific to towns and and make it
um fit our area so we're hoping to work on that next slide um these are where our properties are so if you start in the center um that is the Dudley Road
property where Atwood acres and um towns and woods is and we have the 11 acres that's surround it pretty wet and not ideal um if you go to the left oh thank you to the left that's the
corner of West Elm and blood Road there are seven acres there those two properties are adjacent to each other and they have no environmental constraints if you go to the right side of the screen that is Wallace Hill
property and we are currently putting a forestry plant on that and the little piece is a 2 to three acre piece of property that um I'll show you our time timeline uh we're considering offering to Habitat for Humanity and then down at
the bottom is the property that's on South Row Road um and that is about 21 acres and that the town actually had a development worked up in 2007 for there for affordable housing it was done by
Ross Associates and the town decided it was too expensive to um put in place um so they did not go forward so if you look at these um properties you think ah we should do the two big ones first but
the problem with Wallace Hill is that it um it has no Town water and that makes it incredibly expensive to um develop we met with Rick medf at on SHA board of health about that property and then
South Row road is the other big one but it is it has more environmental constraints in that there are a couple streams that run through there and so you have to take that into consideration makes it more um more uh expensive to develop Ron I
had a question sure um the the parcels that don't have Town water um have you talked to Dave over in water because he he has plans to um I believe extend extend certain neighborhoods maybe there
might be some um collaboration so let's talk about town water The Dudley Road has Town water blood Road has Town water in fact we gave the um the water department an easement on there two
years ago hasn't been recorded yet um but um they have an easen on that property so that they can have a pumping station there and it will uh increase what goes up the hill to lunenberg we talked about it in capital planning the
other day so the blood Road property has Town water South Road road now has Town water on either end with the um uh treatment plant going in and the extension up to Emory Road used to be that we only had Town water on Hickory
can you lift that up a little bit so that people can see this you want to go north or yeah no not that way the other lift the other way I want see s road uh yes there so we used to only have in
from um Hickory off of uh Timberly now we have access to water on both sides so we also have access to water on South red SL which is a good thing the one that doesn't have water is Flawless Hill
those two pieces so um go to the next slide let me see which one it is okay so let me talk about this U Massachusetts Housing Partnership is a quasi um state agency they're funded partly by the state and partly from
other sources they support communities housing authorities nonprofit housing organizations in the creation of Workforce housing so we got a technical assistance grant and looking at the properties um the focus is now blood
blood Road extension West down street so go to the next one let me look at the timeline on this so this was our timeline our five years are from fiscal year 2024 which is when we had the fiveyear plan done up through 2028 this we have
changed this every year this is the most recent one we updated it last week so the two large pieces of property South Road Road and hannes we are doing a forest cut on those two properties um in
order to uh have some funds for creating um housing and we won't be doing anything with those two properties for a while um the hannes road the smaller
piece we were going to talk to Habitat for Humanity to possibly put a house on that parcel it does have enviral constraints there's a um a stream to the right hand side that comes through there so that's still
out there Dudley road is the last one that we'll look at um and uh blood Road and those two P Parcels um they have been uh looked at through MHP the wetlands have been flagged you
know the streams the offsets from the stream on the next property so although the stream isn't on the property we still have to have buffers you know the 100 foot you know 50 foot 35 foot those
wetlands are delineated and Wetland delineations are good for three years so our next thing is to um talk to different organizations in town to the town's people as a whole to see what
concept they have of what they would like to see and to get out in RFP for development on those two properties um and then the other thing that we're looking at is atw acres reverts to a market rate in
2029 so we as a town need to be making sure that that remains affordable and so there's a lot of work to be done but we have plenty of time to do it uh between now and then um
so may I ask um you know when it's due to reverse to Market rates in 2029 yeah um how simple is it to keep it as affordable housing is it just it's
not our property it's it's um our cap it was transferred to them um and so it's going to be uh there there are processes and it depends we have to talk to our cap and see what their thoughts are on this if they say no is that just the end
of discussion not necessarily okay um but it would take funds to change that we have 53 units there of affordable housing we have only 4% in town of affordable units and the state
goal is 10% so um so that is something that the trust will look at but it's really the housing authority and at the moment we don't have a functioning Housing Authority so that's sitting out there
until it's looked at so let's go to the owns it Laura what I don't think our cap owns it I think H owns it who owns it HUD yeah and so the HUD um just because
it's HUD does not necessarily mean it's going to go back to Affordable it depends um and so arcat manages it and so we need to have discussions this needs to be
um just because it's a HUD property doesn't mean it's not going to go market rate so anyway that needs looked at um and I haven't looked at it yet so long-term Forest Management on um hannes
Wallis Hill and the South ro road properties it's to produce immediate income for supporting affordable housing to enhance wildlife habitat this is a 60% cut and more in the middle of the
property we put buffers um along the roads so that it won't be cut um completely uh we want to support long-term health of the forest because otherwise it's just going to be sitting
there for a long good long time and to improve the recreational opportunities that exist on the area already so that's the goal for those two this is the concept that we got back
just two weeks ago from MHP this takes into account that's seven acres um and it's wooded and we would like to see it remain wooded as much as possible
um it it they took into account the town zoning bylaws this is the most that could go on there it doesn't mean that this is what's going to go on there it's concept only it is 10
buildings um 20 tow houses so two tow houses like on either end if you look at those things they're kind of split two tow houses three bedroom with um a a on
story uh in between um five one-bedrooms so five of the buildings have a one-bedroom apartment and five of the buildings have a two-bedroom apartment so two tow houses and an
apartment in each building so 30 units of housing on that piece of property the purple is septic area and the the kind of bluish is storm water there's a walking trail that kind of goes through
the whole um development there uh it doesn't have any covered um parking so we I mean this is a concept this is what could go there it's not what will necessarily go there it's nothing that you would take to um the
planning board or the Conservation Commission as is we're only just starting the conversation with the town but now we know that we could put housing there and it could be affordable um 70% from what we've learned going to
all the meetings and all the trainings that we've done to learn about this 70% on a first pass would go to people in town oh and the other thing is probably half of this would be market
rate and half of it would be um income adjusted you know based on income we don't know if it would be um ownership or rental these are conversations to have with the people in you know the town's people what do people want what
does the town want do we want covered parking do we not want covered parking um do we want different style of you know um but anyway that's the max that we can get on there it's 30 units in the
way they have it spw up so that's where we are um I think the next slide is our budget um so again the budget is wishy-washy we have done the administrative assistant uh for two years so we've spent about
10,000 you know between office supplies this is not what's been spent this is what we budgeted so FY 26 again Administrative Assistant which Aaron took the land use coordinator we have do housing administrative assist assistant
right now for either the Housing Authority or the Housing Trust we have office supplies uh registry fees every year we do have to do things at the registry we have to file with the registry all um resignations and
appointments um and various other things you know because we are trust within the state of Massachusetts um we do have money up there because we do have a concept that we're hoping to get in place pre-evaluation and development the 50k
we're hoping to hire um Consulting for the RFP and for the disposition of the land where do we go from here um and that is our budget so we are largely
unfunded uh is what it comes down to so anyway so nand by the town without any funding by the town um other than ARA funds which we do have at this point as of
today um so that's where we stand with that so any questions that's the last slide is the question SL no I was just I was just saying that's a mandate by the state not by the town it's our responsibility according to the state
mandate but no that's not true the town is the what you don't have to have a Housing Trust um the state the trust was put in place by the town it is separate from MBTA the state does say 10% of
affordability but we haven't done anything in town Beyond outwood acres in towns and woods uh to do it anything other that's affordable in town is um 40b and we're losing those left and
right so the the town said let's have a Housing Trust but you don't get any money so you know there hasn't been a warrant article to put even
$10,000 towards affordable hous and the planning board um doesn't exercise the affordability Clause so hopefully we'll get an inclusionary zoning bylaw on the books soon which could help with
funding um we don't have money to buy up an affordable house um if it goes off the affordable list we the town don't have funds for that and so there it goes so it is it's a mandate by the town and
then it was voted in a town meeting but it was voted in without any funding that's what I mean I guess that's what how government works it is I have learned as we have learned and we you know again I'm going
to mention um and I I don't know if that one is going away but Turnpike Village was all affordable housing done by uh Benjamin Builders so it isn't all anymore you can look at the list at the
Shi and see there are it's the the entire thing is not I don't think well I I haven't looked at it re you know recently and I know that we have one habitat house that's affordable that won't be going
anywhere right we do that but anyway um it's it's a lot that's where we are I just thought I I would show you where um and the anybody that watches this tap to know what what it is that where we are
with this this is where we are and what to expect going forward yeah great job I mean we did the town did give you all those lots and we are working on it yeah we
are working on it and hopefully there will be a development out there eventually So within the next you know few years so the RFP we're hoping a year you know to have it in in place now so
we're probably looking at two to three three years um before anything goes in the ground okay thank you when we did uh Town Woods it was seven
years seven years in the yeah that's you know we were told 10 years isn't unusual you know so seven years is good the one just to say did come quicker although it was a big it was a town effort many
helped that um and I would say that was probably within two years of when we started that but then it's just one building okay thank you for the report um okay so the next one is the amendment
to the El the aison assignments um we haven't discuss this yet but I I know that my notes are in [Music] the folder under
4.4 I um I agree with you on the historic district commission since you're on that commission you should just be the liaison right you can I mean the the purpose of the liaison is to report back to the board and you're on that committee so if if I were the Lea
on then we would have quum of the select board that would not be good so um I know anyway so I agree with you you should be any other one that is like that right I think that's the only
one um because you're on anything else that you are on you're the person you know uh yes um okay are are we taking care of the um we did put that back in the
budget right for the inspector of animals we did I just have that note here so I'm just bringing it up again um that's that's under me yeah um and then the two things I had you have a
differ leaon schedule than I do that's an older one I have the one that um Sabrina sent out that has committee assignments and I thought that I should be added San cook Meadows CR committee
and laori you should um add added to your committee assignments is cable advisory committee oh yeah okay and that's what I had so I sent those to you didn't I Sabrina no I didn't send you an email okay send Sabrina I agree with
those so can you update this list because mine still has not the right heading and everything yes I did 2:49 p.m. on assignments kind of
like SharePoint now Sabrina now that could you just get a clean one for us yeah I think the other thing thing that
I was asking was under where it has the name and then the email are those all correct have those been updated well I guess we're gonna have another eron's GNA come
off yeah Teresa comes off Capital planning there's a number of changes that have to be made right now there's no bylaw committee H yes there is I'm on it who's chair bill
cigan um we were reappointed in June I was sworn in this summer I know that okay we will reappointed when was the last time you met uh right around town meeting time
annual town meeting right before it may oh okay that makes sense because nothing and we all got reappointed anybody that wanted to be reappointed at least okay Reed in June
and then we have conservation agent now so that name and email should go there so can you just do the updates Sabrina uh Sabrina I think has already done it because Co on the one I have Kobe is on there already I I think you've
already okay I thought I printed this one off today but I guess not um okay that's that'll be updated and then the only other uh do you have
anything else that you want to say under General government or Public Safety um only that the police car the new police cars are in so just know that if you want to go check them out um are
they electric just check they aren't electric I don't think so not this time around I think so um all right so I just want to say on mine because I have the water
department okay I I think they're having a a lot of concerns at the water department and unfortunately and I was going to ask you if this would be something that you could do a Monday night they meet when
planning board meets and of course I will be done with planning um by April so this would only be a short term but Veronica could you could you do Monday night's
meeting water Commissioners water Commissioners yeah and Nelson if you could still in Veronica with anything that she might need to know um regarding
that the you know okay yeah I I've um I filled both both of you in separately on the same issue so she is aware um maybe of everything except for
maybe um you did join the last water board Mee because my planning board got over early and I only missed 15 minutes of it so yeah so that was definitely a long conversation related to their
um concern about the their their meetings are on YouTube right yeah okay Veronica might want to just if you have a moment look at some of that meeting so that you can be with what is going on I
can do that okay appreciate that because I really feel bad they um I think they need some help um so if you could report back then at our next meeting after
that um we can have a report on how they're going or even if they want to come and meet with us um together might be a good thing I'll watch the meeting um and that's all I have under
the reports 5.3 announcements Communications volunteer response forms have we received any I I see that there's a couple resignations here um do you want to announce okay William BG has his
resignation as the towns and representative uh to the North Middle sex Regional School District school committee um uh let me see Fran um Levi has submitted her
resignation as a member of the towns and cultural camp so effective immediately um Patrick kowanek has submitted his resignation as the associate member of the towns and planning board effective
immediately um and Aron stuffi has submitted her resignation as the towns and land use coordinator effective February 26 2025 so that's all the good news we have um and I have no volunteer response
forms here all right anything else Nelson nope nope I'm good um 5.4 our next meeting is Thursday February 20th 6: PM a joint meeting with finance
committee I will be virtual um 5.5 review and sign payroll and bills payable warrants out of session is there a motion I move that we sign payroll and those payable warrants out of session
second any discussion hearing none roll call veran C ey I 6.1 executive session purum pursuant to open meeting Law chapter 3A
section 21 A3 to discuss strategy with respect to collective bargaining if an open meeting may be a detrimental effect on the bargaining position of the public body and the chair so
declares this is supervisor's Union is there a motion I move that we enter into executive session at 9:38 and adjourn from executive session for to open meeting Law chapter 30A
section 21 A3 to discuss strategy with respect to collective bargaining if an open meeting may have a detrimental effect on the bargaining position of the public body regarding the supervisor Union
second any discussion hear roll Veronica C ey Laura sh thank you all very much and
uh I don't know does Dave still record uh Harley will need to stop recording and then we're gonna jump on the executive session Zoom I'll send you I'll send you the information right now okay