Hardwick Select Board Reorganization and FY26 Budget Planning

[00:00:00] I'd like to uh start with the pledge of
[00:00:07] allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the
[00:00:09] flag of the United States of America and
[00:00:12] to the republic for which it stands, one
[00:00:15] nation under God, indivisible, with
[00:00:18] liberty and justice for all.
[00:00:21] Thank you.
[00:00:26] Mr. Chairman, can I get our meeting
[00:00:28] order? Sure. Uh call me to order
[00:00:31] at
[00:00:36] 6:30 and we're rolling.
[00:00:40] Uh Mr. Chairman, um just one piece of
[00:00:44] business I want to please. So um Mr.
[00:00:48] Smith, you've you've you've requested a
[00:00:50] couple of foil requests from us, which
[00:00:53] I'm exactly trying to trying to find
[00:00:55] exactly what you're looking for. Um, I
[00:00:58] cancelled the request. You did? Okay.
[00:01:00] Um, we're it's it's definitely a burden
[00:01:03] on our group. I mean, we're not a lot of
[00:01:04] these guys aren't really technically
[00:01:07] savvy to go pull those emails and um, so
[00:01:09] I'm wondering if we just copied you on
[00:01:11] our correspondence, would that be okay
[00:01:13] to do that? Is there anything that
[00:01:15] states us that we can't? I don't know. I
[00:01:18] don't think so. Like any correspondence
[00:01:21] you want to copy?
[00:01:23] I just to avoid these for requests going
[00:01:26] forward. But if I just copy you on
[00:01:27] everything, would that that's the place?
[00:01:28] I have no problem with that. Okay. And
[00:01:30] if you go ahead um if you have any like
[00:01:34] specific questions, Jeeoff, or anything
[00:01:35] like you know, please reach out to me
[00:01:37] and if it's anything I can get to them
[00:01:38] or something and get it to you, make,
[00:01:40] you know, their life easier, you know,
[00:01:42] I'll facilitate anything. Um but like
[00:01:44] for them, they have unfortunately
[00:01:46] personal emails. We are working to um
[00:01:49] fix that. We're working on getting town
[00:01:51] emails for elected and appointed
[00:01:53] officials. Um, so it's just a lot. I had
[00:01:56] a particular topic in mind and then I
[00:01:59] had additional information come to me
[00:02:02] separately and I saw that there was no
[00:02:04] need for the request anymore so I
[00:02:05] canceled it. Okay.
[00:02:09] Thank you.
[00:02:12] Okay. Visitor comments.
[00:02:19] Anybody new business?
[00:02:22] uh discussion and vote on select board
[00:02:25] reorganization we are bound to
[00:02:27] reorganize after an
[00:02:33] election pretty standard that third year
[00:02:37] you're the chair correct it's pretty
[00:02:39] much always been that way I move to
[00:02:42] nominate Eric Fhheim for chairman I'll
[00:02:46] second the motion all in favor I
[00:02:50] I nomination were closed because there
[00:02:53] wasn't anybody else that couldn't. So
[00:02:55] now Jeff Jeff will be clerk. I will be
[00:02:58] vice chair. Correct. Okay. Do you can we
[00:03:01] just for purposes just do on each of
[00:03:04] Yeah. I'll nominate uh William Tinker
[00:03:07] for uh vice chair. I'll second it.
[00:03:13] Other no other nominations. All in
[00:03:15] favor? I
[00:03:18] I would nominate Jeff Sha as clerk. And
[00:03:21] I'll second the nomination. All in
[00:03:24] favor? I
[00:03:28] So that's
[00:03:30] discussion and vote on select board
[00:03:33] goals. What's this? Um so that just you
[00:03:37] know now that you know you've
[00:03:39] reorganized, we're about to go into new
[00:03:40] fiscal year. It's just an opportunity
[00:03:42] for you guys to talk about what you
[00:03:44] would like to see in FY26 as we move
[00:03:47] forward. Um any specific goals like for
[00:03:50] example just bringing in finding, you
[00:03:52] know, different ways to bring in revenue
[00:03:53] for the town or just something that the
[00:03:54] board would like to accomplish. And it
[00:03:57] doesn't have to be set tonight. I asked
[00:03:59] put this on the agenda so we can just
[00:04:01] work as a board for the greater good of
[00:04:03] hard work. Okay. And so absolutely
[00:04:06] that's why we're here. Right. Good.
[00:04:09] think about it and come back to
[00:04:11] different meetings.
[00:04:14] So, is that enough discussion?
[00:04:17] Are you happy with that?
[00:04:20] Well, do you not want like specific
[00:04:23] goals or I don't know what you were
[00:04:25] looking for? No, I'm I'm just trying to
[00:04:28] find direction. So, like we are on the
[00:04:30] same page. We're all working together.
[00:04:32] That's all. Yeah. looking for direction
[00:04:35] like suggestions like with finance.
[00:04:38] Talking about finance tonight, creating
[00:04:40] policies into the future that set up our
[00:04:43] town like whether it's a fouryear plan,
[00:04:45] 5year plan, financial policies, stuff
[00:04:48] like that. So, we're all on the same
[00:04:51] page and it doesn't matter who the
[00:04:54] players get removed, the outline is
[00:04:57] there, the direction's there and they
[00:04:59] work towards
[00:05:00] it. Something like that.
[00:05:04] So, we'll save it for the later agenda
[00:05:07] item. Yeah. I mean, yeah, as we go
[00:05:10] along. Sure. It'll come up. Come up. Do
[00:05:14] you want me to add it to the next
[00:05:15] meeting or whether I add it in a couple
[00:05:16] subsequent meetings? I would say after
[00:05:18] we get through the budget. Okay.
[00:05:23] In the town meeting. After that, when
[00:05:25] the pressure's off, we can actually have
[00:05:27] a working meeting and work work together
[00:05:30] and come up with some stuff.
[00:05:32] If that's good with everybody. That's
[00:05:34] fine with me. Okay.
[00:05:37] Okay. Appointment of Cheryl Wolf to the
[00:05:39] historical commission. She has a letter
[00:05:41] here saying that she would like to be on
[00:05:44] the historical commission.
[00:05:48] Do they have room? Oh, they serve. We
[00:05:51] certainly do. Okay.
[00:05:55] I'll nominate her for Cheryl Wolf for uh
[00:06:00] a seat on the historical commission.
[00:06:03] I'll second the motion.
[00:06:05] All in favor? I
[00:06:07] [Music]
[00:06:09] I appoint a seasonal
[00:06:12] employee Raymond Walker to the highway
[00:06:15] department.
[00:06:20] move that we appoint Raymond Walker as a
[00:06:22] seasonal employee of the highway
[00:06:24] department.
[00:06:27] I'll second the motion. I mean, unless
[00:06:29] you want me to make a motion for him to
[00:06:31] make the motion. Yeah, usually as chair,
[00:06:34] you wouldn't make the motion, would you?
[00:06:36] As chair, I can't make a motion. Okay,
[00:06:39] I'll make a second, but I can't. All
[00:06:42] right, I'll make a motion to appoint
[00:06:44] seasonal employee Raymond Walker to the
[00:06:47] highway department. I'll second. All in
[00:06:50] favor? I I So that's why I'll be kind of
[00:06:53] moping around saying, you know, I'd seek
[00:06:55] a motion to do something, but um chair
[00:06:59] can't can't move. Okay. Well, you can
[00:07:02] second though. I
[00:07:04] can. Okay. Surveyman.
[00:07:11] Um and finding your packet. All the
[00:07:13] information has been submitted. Um if
[00:07:16] you have it, please sign. um should you
[00:07:18] vote to approve it? They have attached
[00:07:20] their um their bills and everything is
[00:07:24] fine. You wrote a letter. You lost the
[00:07:27] use of it for a while.
[00:07:29] Yep. Order.
[00:07:37] I'll make a motion to approve the sewer
[00:07:38] abatement at 2931 Church Street,
[00:07:41] Gilbertville, Mass. I'll second
[00:07:46] discussion. All in favor? I I
[00:07:55] uh discussion of the Quabin watershed
[00:07:57] support letter. Uh there was a Zoom
[00:08:01] meeting.
[00:08:02] Uh representatives of towns around the
[00:08:05] Quabin. Uh this grew out of an earlier
[00:08:08] meeting up at Eagle Hill. Uh, Bill and I
[00:08:12] both were there. Perhaps you'd like to,
[00:08:15] it was your idea to get this letter to
[00:08:20] Yeah. Um, well, all the towns are going
[00:08:23] to be looking for support letters
[00:08:24] through the board of selectman and
[00:08:27] they're trying to hit a date of May 26th
[00:08:30] or the very first week in June. So,
[00:08:32] depending on how we meet, I just wanted
[00:08:34] to bring it up to the public and let
[00:08:36] everybody in be aware of it. So, at the
[00:08:39] next meeting, we have a letter cuz the
[00:08:42] lady's going to draft one. Um, I I
[00:08:45] forget her name, but she's going to put
[00:08:47] something together. We're going to
[00:08:48] submit like a story from Hardware from
[00:08:50] the seven towns. She's going to mash it
[00:08:52] all together and hopefully we present it
[00:08:56] at WGBH in Boston and, you know, get
[00:09:00] some get a lot of public support behind
[00:09:02] this. And what what exactly
[00:09:07] the idea is that the towns are
[00:09:10] supporting the quabin reservoir by
[00:09:13] protecting the watersheds. Mhm. It's um
[00:09:17] asking for some kind of recognition and
[00:09:21] compensation for that through the MWR.
[00:09:24] Right. Yeah. And not so much a tax but a
[00:09:27] fee to the MWR. There's a Senator
[00:09:31] Cmerford who behind out the other side
[00:09:35] of the
[00:09:36] Portland and also Peter Peter Durant's
[00:09:39] behind it. Um, okay. All of behind it.
[00:09:42] There's there's a lot of support
[00:09:46] and and this is for an extra pilot
[00:09:49] payment pretty much. Yeah. Okay. Or
[00:09:52] raising the pilot payments cuz I know we
[00:09:55] it's it's a totally separate dollar
[00:09:57] amount. Okay. and the pilots and it's
[00:10:00] going to go to the seven communities and
[00:10:02] there's it's going to go to some
[00:10:03] nonprofits. It's all in the bill and how
[00:10:05] they're going to break it down. This the
[00:10:07] if it passes there'll be a board made up
[00:10:10] of these seven towns that decide what to
[00:10:12] do with their this financial money. Um
[00:10:16] and it's going for infrastructure stuff
[00:10:18] like that to support these communities
[00:10:21] that have given for 80 plus years and
[00:10:24] haven't received any compensation.
[00:10:27] Well, we do get some a cup of coffee a
[00:10:30] day. That's pretty good for 4,000 plus
[00:10:34] acres in hardick for the chair. Yes,
[00:10:37] sir. Uh, Bill, will this will this uh
[00:10:40] legislation also protect the wershed?
[00:10:43] So, you know, we're not going to be
[00:10:45] fighting, you know, another dump
[00:10:48] or a battery park or something else on
[00:10:51] top of a wershed for I I believe it does
[00:10:54] to some degree. Yes.
[00:10:56] It will also take the burden off of the
[00:10:58] talents because we'll have financial
[00:11:00] support where we won't have to consider
[00:11:03] stuff like that. You know, I mean, it
[00:11:07] puts us in a tough position right now
[00:11:09] cuz things are growing, things are
[00:11:12] costing us more and more and more and
[00:11:16] we've we've said no before, but what if
[00:11:19] they come back and wave 5 million, 10
[00:11:21] million? You know, it's a much bigger
[00:11:23] number. It's a tough hard much harder
[00:11:24] decision.
[00:11:26] Mr. Chair, sure. I have a question. Um,
[00:11:29] you said May 26th. Your next meeting is
[00:11:31] May 27th. Is that going to be an issue?
[00:11:34] I was thinking that we might have to
[00:11:37] call a different meeting or we could
[00:11:41] agree to a letter in spirit tonight and
[00:11:46] go with what the group comes with. Yeah,
[00:11:49] that's fine. Do that. Yeah. Seem all
[00:11:52] right. seems fine with me. All right.
[00:11:54] Okay. Certainly agreeable. All right.
[00:11:57] I'll make a motion to
[00:12:01] um approve the quad watershed support
[00:12:04] letter by the select board. I'll second
[00:12:07] that. All in favor? I I So when the
[00:12:11] letter comes in, we'll uh we'll know
[00:12:15] about it and uh we'll all come in one at
[00:12:17] a time and sign it. Mhm. Yeah, that
[00:12:20] sounds great. Good. quickly before.
[00:12:22] Yeah.
[00:12:26] Good. So, joint meeting with the finance
[00:12:28] committee. Here we go.
[00:12:33] I'll just come down to this was
[00:12:37] um finance committees. Oh, sure. Great.
[00:12:40] Thank you. You have one. Okay. Thank
[00:12:43] you.
[00:12:49] um in your packet uh you'll see
[00:12:54] um your budget um and then I just passed
[00:12:57] out um the email that went out to all of
[00:13:00] you um from Mr.
[00:13:12] So, I really like the column about the
[00:13:15] difference between the two budgets.
[00:13:18] That's very handy. You want to start
[00:13:20] there,
[00:13:23] shar it over to you. Start. Okay. So, um
[00:13:28] we've been delivering a lot this year on
[00:13:30] on the budget and um certainly with the
[00:13:34] the issue we had with the retirement
[00:13:37] uh and the uh deficit that we have there
[00:13:39] this year which is
[00:13:41] um
[00:13:43] $110,000. Uh and then there have been
[00:13:46] several other uh budget increases that
[00:13:49] um we felt put this budget into
[00:13:51] jeopardy. Mhm.
[00:13:54] And you know the if you if you think
[00:13:57] through what a a town uh budget is all
[00:14:00] about um you have a fixed amount of
[00:14:01] revenue and you have to build the budget
[00:14:03] around that revenue um to to provide you
[00:14:07] know the the critical services that we
[00:14:09] have and anything above that is is to
[00:14:13] support the community. So what we feel
[00:14:16] is that um the budget that is that is
[00:14:20] out there today, we need to we need to
[00:14:22] rightsize it because when you look
[00:14:25] forward into 2027 and beyond the deficit
[00:14:30] that we have is grows at a at a at an
[00:14:33] exponential rate. Um so and we looked at
[00:14:37] that. We looked at 2027 and if we if we
[00:14:40] keep uh the budget as it stands today as
[00:14:44] presented um uh or as you guys proposed
[00:14:48] uh the budget to be we'll have a very
[00:14:50] significant gap in 2027 that would be
[00:14:53] very very difficult to to
[00:14:55] close.
[00:14:57] So there's some other fundamental things
[00:14:59] uh that I think we as a policy that we
[00:15:02] should be working on this year and
[00:15:04] certainly we cannot take non-recurring
[00:15:07] funds and fund an operating budget. So
[00:15:12] uh for instance um I know we have some
[00:15:14] we have some reserve that's getting
[00:15:16] released for the assessor. It's about
[00:15:19] $62,000. We should not use that to fund
[00:15:22] the budget because it's only going to
[00:15:24] make next year worse.
[00:15:26] So, um, those types of funds, you know,
[00:15:30] we we, uh, uh, Mr. Corsick has been on
[00:15:33] the capital and we've identified a many
[00:15:35] many capital programs that need to be
[00:15:38] funded and that's really where our
[00:15:41] effort should be is to get those those
[00:15:43] those capital items done. Uh so
[00:15:46] supporting the capital stabilization
[00:15:48] account is I think critical and we feel
[00:15:50] it's very critical but also it will it
[00:15:53] will help reduce the maintenance costs
[00:15:55] going forward with having to replace a
[00:15:57] roof, having to replace vehicles, a new
[00:16:00] fire truck, you know those things when
[00:16:02] you have old equipment and you're
[00:16:03] putting in operating dollars to maintain
[00:16:05] those. You're driving your budget up and
[00:16:07] you have to you have to do that to keep
[00:16:09] that equipment running. Can I interrupt?
[00:16:12] Yes. uh the u the using the overlay
[00:16:16] uh if we don't if next year is even
[00:16:19] worse. Can you explain that?
[00:16:23] Yeah. Yeah. So for instance, we have um
[00:16:27] we can only we can only raise through
[00:16:30] taxation and money that we we we get
[00:16:33] through local receipts and then we've
[00:16:35] got our our state um the state funding
[00:16:37] that we get that really doesn't change
[00:16:40] year-over-year. I mean, our taxes go up
[00:16:42] 2 and 12%. So, we know we're going to
[00:16:44] get a 2 and 12% increase. We know we
[00:16:46] have a little bit of new growth. Um, we
[00:16:49] know we're going to get some uh local
[00:16:51] receipts. We've got a trending on that.
[00:16:53] It's, you know, it's grows a little bit
[00:16:54] every year. State funding can can be can
[00:16:58] go up or down. I mean, it's not it's not
[00:17:00] guaranteed, but there is certainly a
[00:17:02] level. That's what we have to work
[00:17:04] within. And if we take a
[00:17:07] nonrecurring like the overlay and we
[00:17:09] inject it into the operating budget,
[00:17:11] where's that money come from next year?
[00:17:13] Assuming that there wouldn't be another
[00:17:15] overlay,
[00:17:17] correct? So that money automatically
[00:17:19] comes off of a budget we've funded now.
[00:17:21] So now you're
[00:17:23] $60,000 already in the hole. Um and in
[00:17:27] doing so, um it's only going to make the
[00:17:30] future years much much worse. So what
[00:17:34] we're proposing this year is um you know
[00:17:36] we need to start right sizing the budget
[00:17:38] to the revenue that we have and
[00:17:42] sustaining the future going forward so
[00:17:44] we can live within that and then as we
[00:17:47] we work on getting new revenue sources
[00:17:49] whatever those are going to be. Then we
[00:17:51] can look at if they're sustaining then
[00:17:53] we can start to look at bolting on
[00:17:55] additional services and additional
[00:17:57] budget dollars to support programs that
[00:18:00] we we want to be supporting.
[00:18:05] Thank you.
[00:18:10] So, in in the material I sent you over
[00:18:12] the weekend, um Justine have Justine and
[00:18:15] I have spoken and we've got a a good
[00:18:17] reconciliation
[00:18:19] between the Sleman's budget and what our
[00:18:22] recommendations are. Um, and you can see
[00:18:24] it in that that difference column. But
[00:18:26] we feel pretty strongly that we've, you
[00:18:28] know, we've got to make some adjustments
[00:18:30] this year so that next year is
[00:18:32] sustainable. And even with the
[00:18:35] adjustments we're making this year,
[00:18:37] knowing that we're going to be adding
[00:18:38] some of those positions back on next
[00:18:40] year, we still have a um the fin still
[00:18:44] is projecting a deficit that is we feel
[00:18:48] we can close it with some things, but
[00:18:50] it's still a deficit that is concerning
[00:18:53] to us.
[00:18:55] Mr. Shik. Yes, ma'am.
[00:18:57] Um so you know we've we've talked in
[00:19:00] other meetings too where I've talked
[00:19:01] about the trajectory of the town and how
[00:19:03] it's not sustainable. So the uh chair of
[00:19:05] the finance committee and myself we do
[00:19:06] agree on that. Um however this board you
[00:19:12] know made a commitment not too long ago.
[00:19:14] I know the word just changed um to find
[00:19:17] add additional ways to bring in revenue
[00:19:19] for the town through different programs
[00:19:21] and and different so
[00:19:23] um we need to we need to find ways to
[00:19:26] bring to bring in revenue to the town um
[00:19:29] just you know like Mr.
[00:19:31] said we're not we're not we're heading
[00:19:32] down a really poor trajectory, right? Um
[00:19:36] which I've said till I was blue in the
[00:19:38] face.
[00:19:41] Um I am working on a 5-year plan. Um
[00:19:45] which my priority right now is to get
[00:19:47] through this year's budget and town
[00:19:49] meeting. Um then after that I'm going to
[00:19:51] go back to working on that. Um so and
[00:19:53] then I will definitely share that with
[00:19:54] the finance committee and hopefully we
[00:19:56] can come up with you know we can work on
[00:19:57] it together. um and have our numbers
[00:20:00] reconcile. But I do agree with
[00:20:02] fundamentally that we're not doing well
[00:20:05] financially because we're not we're not
[00:20:07] living within our means. We're not
[00:20:11] um the we're not we're running out of
[00:20:13] out of money and accounts in like March
[00:20:16] and that's just going to keep getting
[00:20:17] earlier and earlier and earlier and
[00:20:19] right now I'm going have to pick from
[00:20:20] places and kind of bal and figure out
[00:20:21] how I'm going to balance the budget for
[00:20:23] this current year. Um and I don't
[00:20:25] believe it is it is frivolous spending.
[00:20:27] I sign off on every single in every
[00:20:30] single invoice. I just think everything
[00:20:31] is going up. The cost of everything are
[00:20:33] growing, but we're not. So, everything
[00:20:35] around us is is growing, but we're not.
[00:20:37] Um, so I definitely think that should be
[00:20:40] a priority of the board. Um,
[00:20:43] I guess I I just I see his point that
[00:20:46] overlay is a is a one-time money.
[00:20:48] However, every year we come up with
[00:20:50] different ways to bring in my like we
[00:20:52] rent it up upstairs like we're finding
[00:20:54] different ways um to bring in revenue.
[00:20:56] local receipts do change. Um I think you
[00:21:01] know putting my issue with putting it
[00:21:05] all into um capital stabilization while
[00:21:07] I believe that is very important that we
[00:21:10] put money in reserves wholeheartedly
[00:21:12] believe that I can't tell you what we're
[00:21:14] going to have for free cash next year
[00:21:16] because I'm trying to fill holes right
[00:21:17] now in this current budget. So, putting
[00:21:20] every single penny of free cash or
[00:21:21] overlay into
[00:21:23] stabilization, I I don't I don't fi find
[00:21:26] that to be the best financial uh
[00:21:27] decision. Um because I can't tell you
[00:21:29] right now what we're going to have for
[00:21:30] free cash next year, right? And this
[00:21:33] year we ended up with $100,000 in the
[00:21:36] hole
[00:21:38] from just changes
[00:21:40] in the uh state system, the retirement
[00:21:44] fund, most regional retirement and
[00:21:46] that's going to be roughly our new
[00:21:47] assessment month number going forward.
[00:21:49] So that's not going to go away. Give or
[00:21:50] take a little bit, but yeah. Right.
[00:21:56] Well,
[00:21:58] um I think uh the town clerk is also a
[00:22:03] point of contention here and you have a
[00:22:06] plan
[00:22:08] to work that through.
[00:22:11] So, a suggestion and I' I've made it to
[00:22:15] the available the finance committee is
[00:22:18] we budget for Ryan to start full-time,
[00:22:21] but we give him the date of January 1st,
[00:22:24] 2026 to start
[00:22:27] full-time. Um, and the reason why is our
[00:22:32] budget is is strapped. It's tight. and
[00:22:36] uh put somebody on full-time without
[00:22:38] knowing where like a permanent position
[00:22:40] where where are we going to get this
[00:22:42] revenue to cover that position. And and
[00:22:45] it it builds a little bit of say fluff
[00:22:49] into into this number like a to allow us
[00:22:53] that 6 months puts a little bit of money
[00:22:56] in this budget and he's still going for
[00:22:59] it full-time. It just starts January 1st
[00:23:02] and just delaying it. Delaying it by 6
[00:23:04] months, but it gives the time for the
[00:23:07] town to properly plan and figure out
[00:23:09] some things. All right, Mr. Corser.
[00:23:12] Yeah, the uh finance committee has a
[00:23:14] conflict of interest in making any
[00:23:16] recommendations on the town clerk
[00:23:19] because we are appointed by the town
[00:23:20] clerk
[00:23:22] as moderator, I'm sorry. And therefore,
[00:23:25] uh that's an appearance of a conflict if
[00:23:27] not a conflict. So it would be your
[00:23:30] decision as the select board. We will we
[00:23:33] will abstain from now that's the the
[00:23:35] last meeting we had. We were going to
[00:23:37] abstain from or make on a town hall
[00:23:40] floor recommendation was if whatever we
[00:23:44] would make a note that we have no
[00:23:47] position on the town clerk position on
[00:23:50] the town clerk salary simply because
[00:23:52] there's an appearance of a conflict.
[00:23:54] Good. So it's on you guys to argue in
[00:23:57] behalf of the town. We can't and should
[00:24:00] I can explain that attempt. Yeah. And it
[00:24:02] would be okay. But in the meantime to
[00:24:05] avoid that appearance of a conflict,
[00:24:07] right? Um we should stay out of this
[00:24:09] conversation. Okay. They can stay out of
[00:24:11] it. Um I I think the idea I present to
[00:24:14] the board here tonight to chair is is a
[00:24:18] sustainable workable
[00:24:21] idea. Um is it going to prevent anybody
[00:24:23] from making a motion? Maybe because, you
[00:24:26] know, hopefully cuz otherwise we're
[00:24:28] going to, you know, we don't have money
[00:24:30] to just pull, you know, $30,000 plus
[00:24:34] benefits and everything else to fund
[00:24:36] this
[00:24:37] position. So, it gives us 6 months of
[00:24:39] planning. We're not saying no. He's he's
[00:24:42] a good worker. He's, you know, he's
[00:24:44] great at what he does and he's an asset
[00:24:46] to the town. We all know that. But at
[00:24:49] the same time, we got to be fiscally
[00:24:51] responsible. So, it's a
[00:24:54] suggestion and that's it. Mr. Chair,
[00:24:58] yes, I did talk to the town clerk today
[00:25:00] cuz I didn't want I knew this
[00:25:02] conversation was going to happen. I
[00:25:03] didn't want to blindside him. Um, so I
[00:25:05] did have a conversation with
[00:25:06] him. Um, very very not in favor of this.
[00:25:12] um what you guys decided to do was
[00:25:13] totally your call, but I wanted you to
[00:25:14] have all the information that I did have
[00:25:16] a conversation with him today because I
[00:25:18] didn't want him to see this or hear
[00:25:19] about it and just be blindsided by this
[00:25:21] conversation.
[00:25:23] Okay. Thank you,
[00:25:30] Jeff. What would the be the
[00:25:34] savings kicking the can down the road,
[00:25:36] so to speak? You had it. You did it.
[00:25:41] Is that this uh A219?
[00:25:46] Um I'm sorry. I need to change. Um Yep.
[00:25:50] Right. Yep. Yes. Okay.
[00:25:55] On page 13.
[00:26:00] So it would be more than doubling his
[00:26:03] existing
[00:26:05] salary or pay.
[00:26:08] Yeah.
[00:26:11] Does he go away if uh if we don't
[00:26:15] do the full-time thing? Oh, okay. No,
[00:26:17] doesn't What do you mean? No. I mean,
[00:26:19] does does do we lose the person that we
[00:26:22] now have as town clerk? Well, did I
[00:26:25] don't believe he said he'd terminate his
[00:26:27] job just because he didn't get full-time
[00:26:29] position. We haven't had that
[00:26:31] conversation with him. Okay. I He is
[00:26:34] elected. He's not appointed, right? He's
[00:26:36] not appointed. So, I can't I don't want
[00:26:39] to speak for him. I just know that at
[00:26:40] the conversation we're having with him
[00:26:42] today, he was extremely unhappy.
[00:26:45] We're extremely unhappy with the state
[00:26:47] of the budget and the finances of this
[00:26:48] town. No. Right. No, I'm just saying I
[00:26:50] just want you to have that information.
[00:26:52] Right. Yeah. Um and it's not an easy
[00:26:55] decision. I get it. But it's a decision
[00:26:57] that has to be made.
[00:27:01] I'm just there
[00:27:03] other areas.
[00:27:06] If you can find some, good for you.
[00:27:11] Come on, guys. I'm new to No, I'll I'll
[00:27:13] throw you some rope. We're going to get
[00:27:15] rid of a coffee that's costing the town
[00:27:17] quite a bit of money.
[00:27:20] Throw that rail the door and say see you
[00:27:22] later. Take a hard look at the it and
[00:27:25] everything else going forward. Again,
[00:27:28] it's going forward right now. this
[00:27:30] moment in time we need to make. Yeah.
[00:27:33] The budget is static. Yeah. It's a
[00:27:35] snapshot of what is, right? But that's
[00:27:38] that's a one time.
[00:27:41] Yeah. But think about it this way. Have
[00:27:44] we continue paying the cost of that
[00:27:45] copier over 5 years would be $169,000.
[00:27:51] So I believe it because that's what they
[00:27:54] do. Uh, so we're going to correct that
[00:27:56] mistake and use that money elsewhere
[00:27:58] which we already used that money. Well,
[00:28:01] we we already built it in. Okay. Just
[00:28:04] want to make sure. Yeah. So, through the
[00:28:05] chair, uh, uh, Jeff, um, we we're
[00:28:09] recommending cuts of
[00:28:13] $98,355. Now, from those cuts, we're
[00:28:17] adding back
[00:28:19] in, I want to say $40,000 is going back
[00:28:23] into the budget next year. This is a
[00:28:24] temporary cut to get this year to
[00:28:26] balance out. Can you repeat that? I
[00:28:28] didn't understand what you just said.
[00:28:30] So, we're recommending cuts of
[00:28:36] $98,355 of which we've um Ryan was um
[00:28:40] Ryan goes back in full-time next year.
[00:28:44] And then we made we made an adjustment
[00:28:45] for the highway, not to reduce not to
[00:28:49] eliminate a position because we know
[00:28:50] Marty's been struggling to get people,
[00:28:52] but if he hired in January instead of
[00:28:55] now, that's a
[00:28:57] $22,000 savings that we can use to to
[00:29:00] fund this year. And that would be hiring
[00:29:02] someone who's still imaginary. Yes. Yes.
[00:29:05] Yes. But that does that does force the
[00:29:08] problem into next year. It does because
[00:29:10] you revert back to the full settlement.
[00:29:12] Sure. We have received some applicants.
[00:29:15] So, we were going to start interviewing
[00:29:16] just um finally receiving applicants. Um
[00:29:22] so, no Marty's holding on to two right
[00:29:23] now that we were going to interview.
[00:29:27] And there's money in this year's budget.
[00:29:29] Yeah. To hire somebody else. Good.
[00:29:35] Not if you if what they're proposing,
[00:29:38] which would be to delay it till January
[00:29:40] 1st.
[00:29:43] It's still that's a one-time deal. It's
[00:29:46] really just putting off, but it gives
[00:29:48] the town time to come up with a plan and
[00:29:52] it's a much needed time. It's not
[00:29:55] money. I mean, government doesn't move
[00:30:00] like super light speed. Money does.
[00:30:05] Money moves pretty quick.
[00:30:07] Well, what we do need to do is go into
[00:30:10] the town meeting in agreement. Yes.
[00:30:14] That's it. So, what are we going to do?
[00:30:20] Well, I want to I want to talk about
[00:30:22] next year for a minute. Okay. Because
[00:30:23] this is where I think we have to be look
[00:30:26] taking a little bit uh longer approach
[00:30:28] to this some of the decisions we're
[00:30:30] making today.
[00:30:32] So, if we roll the select the select
[00:30:34] boards budget
[00:30:36] forward, we're looking at $125,000
[00:30:39] deficit next year. And that's
[00:30:42] assuming the increase in local receipts
[00:30:45] stays the same, which is a little bit
[00:30:48] 2.5. Everything else stays the same.
[00:30:50] Free cash. I'm I'm projecting free cash
[00:30:53] next year to be anywhere between $45 and
[00:30:55] $80,000. And that's not that's not going
[00:30:58] to do you that that'll fund snow and ice
[00:31:01] if
[00:31:02] that. So if we roll our budget forward,
[00:31:05] we have a deficit of
[00:31:07] $46,000. So it's a pretty significant
[00:31:11] difference and we're not we're not
[00:31:13] comfortable with that e either. So and
[00:31:15] it's those two positions that we're
[00:31:17] taking out this year and rolling them in
[00:31:19] full-time next year. Um so we do believe
[00:31:23] there's still some room there to move.
[00:31:25] Um because if we could balance this year
[00:31:28] and next year and then as things change,
[00:31:32] you know, let's say we we get some
[00:31:34] additional revenue sources in, business
[00:31:36] moves in, whatever the case is, then we
[00:31:38] can look at it and say, "Okay, we we've
[00:31:41] got a a we have a um stable revenue
[00:31:44] source that now we can rely on. Let's
[00:31:46] add that
[00:31:48] position. Let's add that." And then I
[00:31:51] think that's prudent financial planning
[00:31:53] versus saying, "Hey, we know we're going
[00:31:56] to have a deficit next year. We're going
[00:31:57] to kick the can down the road and we're
[00:32:00] going to hope for the best. We could
[00:32:02] find another another, you know,
[00:32:05] something else could jump out at us that
[00:32:06] we haven't uncovered yet, right? And,
[00:32:09] you know, now we're, you know, we're
[00:32:11] $200,000 in in deficit. So, I just think
[00:32:14] we have to we have to rightsize this
[00:32:16] thing and reset it."
[00:32:17] Now, our our belief is it's not a
[00:32:20] revenue problem. We know what our
[00:32:21] revenue is. It's a spending problem. We
[00:32:24] fix the spending problem for the revenue
[00:32:26] we have. Now, we're we're set. We don't
[00:32:29] have to worry about going forward. As
[00:32:31] revenue
[00:32:32] increases, then we look at adding adding
[00:32:34] to budgets. That's kind of the position
[00:32:37] that we have.
[00:32:38] So cutting
[00:32:41] expenses might include firing
[00:32:46] somebody or for instance, we don't give
[00:32:49] Marty his third labor. So, you know,
[00:32:53] that's $22,000 off of the $46,000
[00:32:57] deficit we have next year. So now we
[00:32:59] have to come up with another, you know,
[00:33:01] $25,000
[00:33:02] to to to fix that. All we can do is
[00:33:05] control future costs. You can't go
[00:33:10] back, sell off highway equipment. Those
[00:33:14] are onetime charges, right? So, you know
[00:33:18] what Justine's talking about, we
[00:33:19] shouldn't use all our free cash or free
[00:33:22] cash. We need to put that free cash. We
[00:33:24] have it. We can't use it for the
[00:33:27] budget. So, if we do, it's just going to
[00:33:30] it's just going to make it's like hiring
[00:33:31] somebody on a grant. you're just going
[00:33:34] to shoot yourself in the foot two years
[00:33:36] from now. You're right. I understand.
[00:33:40] So, we feel let's let's make the right
[00:33:44] size it now so going forward we're we're
[00:33:48] in a much better position because we're
[00:33:50] not the town is not financially in in
[00:33:53] trouble. It's just we have a spending
[00:33:55] problem. Mr. Chair. Yes, ma'am. Um, as
[00:33:59] the person who signs every single
[00:34:00] invoice that comes in, I don't see this
[00:34:02] town having a spending problem. I've
[00:34:04] seen other places where I've thought
[00:34:06] towns have had a spending problem,
[00:34:07] besides the stupid copier, which I'll
[00:34:09] give you cuz it's ridiculous. Um, it's
[00:34:12] it's extremely bare bones here, as you
[00:34:13] know. You've been around here so long,
[00:34:15] but there's a couple things I want to
[00:34:16] bring to light that I don't think the
[00:34:17] room knows. Um, I'm meeting on Thursday
[00:34:20] with Kira Sarge Energy for the the solar
[00:34:22] field uh that's going to go inside Roach
[00:34:25] Field. Um, so I'm meeting with them to
[00:34:27] get more um concrete numbers and
[00:34:29] everything from them and and timeline.
[00:34:32] Exactly. Thank you. Um, I also talked to
[00:34:34] George Lang today from the U marijuana
[00:34:36] facility. He is looking to um, if
[00:34:38] everything goes well to open by the end
[00:34:40] of the year.
[00:34:42] Um, and I just lost my train of thought.
[00:34:46] Um, right. Potential potential rep.
[00:34:49] Yeah, thank you. Potential revenues
[00:34:50] coming in. Um, and not to mention other
[00:34:53] pilot stuff that we've been working on.
[00:34:55] So, um, again, person, I I cannot sit
[00:34:59] here and tell you that we have a
[00:35:00] spending problem.
[00:35:03] Um, we're we're extremely bare bones. I
[00:35:06] know you know that. I just,
[00:35:09] um, it's it's it's really tough to it's
[00:35:12] really tough to get through the whole
[00:35:13] year um, with the budgets that are
[00:35:16] already given. Like I said, I'm trying
[00:35:17] to fill holes right now in the current
[00:35:19] fiscal year. That's why I can't give you
[00:35:21] a free cash number. Um the thing about
[00:35:24] putting money to stabilization which I
[00:35:26] agree we need savings absolutely um but
[00:35:30] in order to access that money we need we
[00:35:32] need to go to town meeting um and it
[00:35:35] requires a town meeting vote um
[00:35:39] which I mean I'm not arguing but that's
[00:35:41] not a big deal going to have a town
[00:35:43] meeting in here. We've done it before
[00:35:45] with school budget and all that stuff. I
[00:35:48] just um again because I don't I can't I
[00:35:51] cannot I don't even know what we're
[00:35:52] going to have left over this year um
[00:35:54] using every scent uh in putting it
[00:35:56] somewhere it we've only got about 6
[00:35:59] weeks left right
[00:36:02] in this fiscal year. Yeah. And we're not
[00:36:04] we're we're not looking we're not
[00:36:06] looking good. It's not Eric. I mean Mr.
[00:36:08] Chairman. Thank you. Sorry. Sorry you
[00:36:10] didn't call me Eric. I don't care.
[00:36:13] Um, I think I I think we need to take
[00:36:16] real serious note about the word
[00:36:18] spending problem. Uh, this is not
[00:36:21] something you guys created. You
[00:36:23] inherited years of decisions either in
[00:36:27] personnel or equipment or lack of
[00:36:29] maintenance that have led to this point.
[00:36:31] Agreed. Uh, good example,
[00:36:34] our spending problem starts with ARPA.
[00:36:37] Think about that. What was that number
[00:36:38] when we started? Over a million dollar.
[00:36:40] A million dollars.
[00:36:42] Poof. You guys didn't do that. But now
[00:36:45] we're we were not living on ARPA anymore
[00:36:48] as an example. So it's important to
[00:36:51] understand that there is a spending
[00:36:52] problem. There's an income problem too,
[00:36:54] but the spending problem is something
[00:36:56] you can control. The income problem is a
[00:36:59] little bit out of your control. And my
[00:37:01] understanding is the town definitely
[00:37:04] wouldn't approve an override. Like this
[00:37:07] town would not approve a tax override.
[00:37:10] Am I mistaken? No, I think we've already
[00:37:13] done two now. So, I I actually think
[00:37:17] that to be honest with you, the town's
[00:37:19] going to look at us.
[00:37:21] We're obviously advisory, but we're
[00:37:24] advisory to the community. The checks
[00:37:26] and balances are here between these two
[00:37:28] boards. So, you got to figure out along
[00:37:31] with us what we're going to say because
[00:37:33] if we say there's a spending problem, we
[00:37:36] had to agree that there is one and that
[00:37:38] this is how we're going to address it
[00:37:39] and it's in this budget. Well, that can
[00:37:42] override us on the town hall floor,
[00:37:44] which is all right. That's the way
[00:37:46] government works, right? And that by
[00:37:48] doing that could also create further
[00:37:50] problems right then and there. Yeah.
[00:37:52] Well, and it's really just a way of
[00:37:53] kicking the can further down the road,
[00:37:56] you know, the 40year obligation. I've
[00:38:00] heard that there's 20 towns in the state
[00:38:02] that are looking at overrides. I agree
[00:38:04] it's more than 20 dead exclusions and
[00:38:06] all. It's closer to 40, Mr. Chair. Yes,
[00:38:08] ma'am. Can I I just want to amend uh
[00:38:10] something that Mr. Quors said because I
[00:38:12] thought it was beautiful and very
[00:38:14] eloquent. However, I guess I will I'll
[00:38:16] amend this the word spending problem to
[00:38:18] the cost of doing running a the town.
[00:38:20] Like it's Yeah, it's spending, but it's
[00:38:23] like the cost of to operate as a town.
[00:38:25] That's not So, you don't want us to
[00:38:27] appear to be spent.
[00:38:29] Yeah. I don't think we're not spending
[00:38:31] like sailors on leave, right? No, it's
[00:38:33] just it's just the cost to operate,
[00:38:35] right? We're we're stretching the dollar
[00:38:37] far enough that it's going to snap. I
[00:38:39] mean, we can see through it. trying to
[00:38:42] raise the level of efficiency to Yeah.
[00:38:45] You know, and costs are going up, right?
[00:38:48] No matter what, material costs, raw
[00:38:50] material fuel, the costs are going up
[00:38:53] without uh our uh income going up going
[00:38:57] up, our revenue going up. Our revenue is
[00:38:59] fixed.
[00:39:01] So, in that way, I think we agree with
[00:39:03] you. Yes. So, through the chair, we've
[00:39:06] got we've got a fixed amount of revenue.
[00:39:08] We have to build a budget around that.
[00:39:10] If you spend more than we bring in in
[00:39:12] revenue, we have a spending problem. And
[00:39:15] I think it's great that we've got some
[00:39:17] really interesting things coming down
[00:39:19] the pike for revenue sources. When they
[00:39:21] come, we sign the deal, we cash the
[00:39:24] check, we add the position, right? We
[00:39:27] get another deal, we sign the check, we
[00:39:30] cash the check, we we bring something
[00:39:32] on, we bring it on prudently based on
[00:39:35] the level of services that we need. Can
[00:39:37] I add to that, too? Yes. And that's
[00:39:39] exactly why your point about creating a
[00:39:42] a policy and what this board is going to
[00:39:44] work on in the coming year. This should
[00:39:46] be the number one policy
[00:39:49] you guys are going to have to figure
[00:39:50] out. It's going to be a working meeting
[00:39:52] between the two of us or both boards and
[00:39:55] come up with this policy. What's going
[00:39:57] to make this best for hard work? Yeah,
[00:39:59] exactly. I mean, because we're really up
[00:40:01] against the wall. I mean, we we can fix
[00:40:02] these problem. We can manage them, but
[00:40:04] we can't keep kicking them down the
[00:40:06] road, right? And we can't keep facing
[00:40:08] deeper and deeper deficits where it's
[00:40:10] 125, it's 150, it's possibly 200. Those
[00:40:14] are numbers that we're not going to be
[00:40:15] looking. Yeah. And my fear uh
[00:40:17] representing the capital planning
[00:40:19] portion of this thing is that all of the
[00:40:22] capital projects that we're suggesting
[00:40:24] are basically fixing things that are
[00:40:27] getting worse. Fixing hydrants that need
[00:40:29] to be fixed, cutting down trees that are
[00:40:31] jeopardizing the the buildings here.
[00:40:33] We're not we're not talking about
[00:40:35] capital planning things that are four,
[00:40:37] five or 6 years away. These are
[00:40:39] immediate needs. How many more roofs
[00:40:41] will we have to fix? One only has to
[00:40:43] wait for the next rainstorm, right? And
[00:40:45] and what Justin's saying about like the
[00:40:47] the free cash versus what is it capital
[00:40:50] estate capitalization account is cuz she
[00:40:54] doesn't know where all this is going to
[00:40:55] go and you have to do a special vote or
[00:40:58] special meeting to move that money out
[00:41:00] of there. So if we allocated, you know,
[00:41:03] instead of the 62,000, we'd put 42,000
[00:41:06] into the capitalization of fund and then
[00:41:08] put 20,000 into free cash.
[00:41:11] So I need to understand why we would do
[00:41:15] that because we we have we we have a
[00:41:19] budget this year that we've established.
[00:41:20] We've got we're going to use an overlay
[00:41:22] reserve to fund capital. Okay. We've got
[00:41:25] uh roughly 40 we got we have some
[00:41:26] articles we have to pay. We've roughly
[00:41:28] got $40,000 that we're recommending we
[00:41:30] put into our uh stabilization account.
[00:41:34] So, if we don't use that money, then
[00:41:37] it's just going to roll into free cash
[00:41:39] next year. Yes. So, next year, we're
[00:41:41] going to do the same thing. We're going
[00:41:42] to take that free cash. We're going to
[00:41:43] pay the basics of articles, fund
[00:41:46] reserve, fund, snow, and ice, and then
[00:41:48] we're going to put into capital
[00:41:49] stabilization and stabilization. Okay.
[00:41:52] Do I rationale? Yeah. Um because right
[00:41:55] now we're doing great. We have no like
[00:41:57] prior like no prior year bills, but I
[00:42:00] don't know if some are going to come to
[00:42:01] light after July 1st if we're going to
[00:42:02] have any prior year bills that weren't
[00:42:04] paid. Right now, we're doing great, but
[00:42:06] I can't tell you that we're not going to
[00:42:07] have any prior year bills that are going
[00:42:08] to go unpaid. And also if you
[00:42:11] hypothetically hypothetical situation
[00:42:13] you don't hire someone in the highway
[00:42:15] till January but we get a snowstorm in
[00:42:17] December and now we have a crazy
[00:42:18] overtime and snow and ice again like
[00:42:20] this year that whatever we have left
[00:42:23] over from this year and free cash can go
[00:42:25] to fund um next year's snow and ice or
[00:42:29] if we find any random unpaid bills that
[00:42:31] hopefully we don't have. But it's again
[00:42:33] I'm just thinking in the future if we
[00:42:35] have an unpaid bill or we have a bad
[00:42:37] snow and ice year again. So you're
[00:42:39] you're afraid that we've cut it right to
[00:42:41] the bone and we have an unforeseen Yes.
[00:42:44] emergency or whatever un unplanned
[00:42:47] consequence through which we do every
[00:42:50] year. Even the last three years we've
[00:42:51] done it. So if we uh free cash was
[00:42:55] certified in the summer. Mhm. We'll have
[00:42:57] a special. We can pay any old bills. We
[00:43:00] can do whatever with the free cash that
[00:43:02] is getting certified. It's not like we
[00:43:04] don't have any money. I'm telling you, I
[00:43:05] don't know what that free cap if we're
[00:43:06] even going to have 40,000 in free cash
[00:43:08] because I'm fixing holes in this year's
[00:43:10] budget and moving money because we have
[00:43:12] deficit accounts. I can't tell you we're
[00:43:14] even going to have 40 grand in free cash
[00:43:17] cuz I'm looking at the numbers every day
[00:43:20] and our hole is getting bigger and
[00:43:21] bigger and luckily, like Mr. Chairman
[00:43:23] said, we only have 6 weeks left, but our
[00:43:25] holes are getting bigger. So, the the
[00:43:27] budget we've we're proposing is about
[00:43:29] $30,000 is going to roll into pre-cash.
[00:43:32] Okay.
[00:43:36] And going what you uh excuse me. So real
[00:43:41] quick, if we didn't need to make a
[00:43:43] transfer or something, we could do that.
[00:43:46] We could fund this all. We could take
[00:43:48] what your budget says 62 right in the
[00:43:50] capitalization and if for some
[00:43:52] unforeseen emergency came up, we could
[00:43:55] fund it. We'd have a meeting. We
[00:43:56] transfer money. Yeah.
[00:43:58] And you're saying with your budget
[00:44:01] there's money to go back into free cash?
[00:44:03] Yes. Okay. So the budget that we we've
[00:44:06] outlined Mhm.
[00:44:09] as of
[00:44:15] today. We have a $36,000 surplus that
[00:44:18] we're going to be putting back into free
[00:44:21] cash that's funding our reserve account
[00:44:24] $25,000. So, if there's any issues that
[00:44:27] come up, we can we certainly have that
[00:44:29] like like the treasurer. Mhm. Um, but
[00:44:32] we're going to be able to put
[00:44:34] $62,000 into our capital stabilization
[00:44:37] account, which is going to move
[00:44:39] that fund that up to
[00:44:43] um
[00:44:46] $152,000 if I have the beginning balance
[00:44:48] right. Um, which we're going to be able
[00:44:51] to use to stop doing some some pretty
[00:44:52] good pro uh capital programs. And we've
[00:44:55] agreed that we need to do it through um
[00:44:59] financing because we can leverage that
[00:45:00] capital and we can start doing some of
[00:45:02] these projects and start getting these
[00:45:04] things off the list. And that that's
[00:45:06] going to start a flywheel. It's going to
[00:45:08] start to turn and we're going to not
[00:45:11] need so much free cash to go fix certain
[00:45:14] things that come up as emergencies
[00:45:16] because those things are going to be
[00:45:17] done and and the maintenance is going to
[00:45:18] come down these budgets and we're going
[00:45:19] to we're going to start to drive
[00:45:21] efficiency into this thing. That's how
[00:45:23] we're going to fix it.
[00:45:24] Okay. And one other question just just
[00:45:27] because I I talk about unforeseen
[00:45:30] expenses. Um we're confident now we're
[00:45:34] Are you guys confident that there going
[00:45:36] to be no surprises from the USDA grant
[00:45:40] and the project with the sewer? Oh.
[00:45:42] Yeah. Yeah. I I've been following that.
[00:45:45] Yeah. Like every week, once a week, the
[00:45:48] budgets, everything, they're in very
[00:45:49] very good shape. But but the deadline
[00:45:51] for the project completion we're safe
[00:45:53] on. Oh yeah. Yeah. So what is the there
[00:45:56] there is no right now we still have
[00:45:58] roughly we have 2 million contingency
[00:46:00] right that we're going to apply to
[00:46:02] certain things. And as far as change
[00:46:04] orders go to improve it. We're at
[00:46:06] roughly a million two to a million four
[00:46:08] of that 2 million. So we still have say
[00:46:11] 600,000 to be allocated. And we're going
[00:46:13] to go through Scott and stuff like that
[00:46:15] to find out what is the biggest bang for
[00:46:17] our buck. Yeah. What does he critically
[00:46:19] need? And we're going to use that money.
[00:46:20] Okay. That money isn't going to be
[00:46:22] wasted or No, but in terms of the terms
[00:46:25] of completion of the contract, the USDA
[00:46:28] not Yeah, it's on us on the deadline.
[00:46:31] It's on schedule. It's on schedule. If
[00:46:33] anything, it's more towards ahead of
[00:46:35] schedule. Okay. The only the only I just
[00:46:39] want to make sure was the National
[00:46:43] Bridge Connection. Mhm. that was delayed
[00:46:45] for for whatever reason, you know,
[00:46:47] paperwork through national,
[00:46:50] but that's pretty much the only. So,
[00:46:52] we'll be all set then. You shouldn't see
[00:46:54] anything unproced, right? I mean, I'll
[00:46:56] go through the things and I'll present
[00:46:58] it at the next meeting like, you know,
[00:47:00] just a little update just
[00:47:05] I think it' be great because I think we
[00:47:06] all need to be in line. I'll get all the
[00:47:09] financial numbers cuz we percent
[00:47:11] complete. I asked this about two months
[00:47:13] ago in the meeting where where we
[00:47:15] percent complete wise billing stuff like
[00:47:17] that. Good. Thank you. Yeah. Okay. We'll
[00:47:19] put that on the agenda. Huh. And I'll do
[00:47:23] the whole 2 million contingency, what
[00:47:25] the change orders they're going to use
[00:47:27] to upgrade. Good. That's the 2 million
[00:47:29] that remains unspent in the current
[00:47:32] contract,
[00:47:33] right? But we we don't get it back. It's
[00:47:37] we you use and lose it. That's a real
[00:47:39] important aspect of that. So that number
[00:47:41] is like a million two a million four
[00:47:43] that's possibly allocated out of the two
[00:47:46] million. The deadline is the boogeyman
[00:47:48] for me that all of a sudden they're
[00:47:52] going to say, "Well, that's it. You got
[00:47:54] whatever." It was a hard stop on the
[00:47:55] contract. That's why I asked. Yeah.
[00:47:57] Well, I I agree. I mean, it we were told
[00:48:00] if you haven't negotiated the contract
[00:48:02] completion date, it's in June. We went
[00:48:06] in and that's what they said. There's no
[00:48:08] uh no extensions. As long as they don't
[00:48:10] if they don't pull a rug out from under
[00:48:13] not being done or not spending all the
[00:48:14] money by whatever it is June 24th or
[00:48:17] something like that. Uh we wouldn't want
[00:48:19] that surprise. Okay. Well, we'll reach
[00:48:23] out to them and clarify all of this.
[00:48:26] Yes. They did tell us that there was a
[00:48:29] non-negotiable point completion date on
[00:48:31] the contract. Right.
[00:48:33] And if that's true, there's you can't
[00:48:35] put it this way. It hasn't come up in
[00:48:36] any of the meetings, of course. All
[00:48:38] right. It's not a red flag. It's not one
[00:48:41] of those, hey, June is right around the
[00:48:44] corner.
[00:48:45] Um may I could um just go back to this
[00:48:49] for a second. Mhm. Um this so the board
[00:48:53] of
[00:48:54] assessors certified their overlay
[00:48:56] surplus to the select board. Um, their
[00:48:59] intent was not for this to go to capital
[00:49:01] and I if they knew that that was where
[00:49:02] it was going to go. I know that at least
[00:49:05] the principal assessor wouldn't have
[00:49:07] certified it. Um, well, we don't know
[00:49:10] that. Well, I do. I asked her. Um, or
[00:49:12] she told me she went spoke to her today.
[00:49:14] Yeah, she said she she said she's saying
[00:49:18] um she would have she wouldn't have
[00:49:20] certified it. Um, however, it's also not
[00:49:24] municipal financial best practice to use
[00:49:25] every every last sentiment. So, I mean,
[00:49:28] that's completely on you. I'll drop it.
[00:49:30] However, I'm giving you
[00:49:34] um I'm giving you um what I was told
[00:49:38] today, which we can call her if you'd
[00:49:40] like, but there was no um if answer was
[00:49:42] about it when she talked to me.
[00:49:48] Well, what do you say? You can't use it
[00:49:51] for your operating budget. So, you need
[00:49:53] to use it someplace else like capital or
[00:49:55] stabilization. I wasn't I was just going
[00:49:57] to say no just make just don't spend the
[00:50:00] whole thing
[00:50:03] and whatever we spend put in
[00:50:05] capitalization all capital yeah I mean
[00:50:07] you want to put half in capital and keep
[00:50:09] or or even 40 just the whole thing I'm
[00:50:12] put 42 in capitalization and put 20 what
[00:50:16] in free cash cash yeah I got 38 roll
[00:50:19] free cash so I think we need so it's
[00:50:21] that it's that and the town clerk Those
[00:50:25] are the two sticking points. Mhm. And I
[00:50:29] don't see the town clerk as being a
[00:50:33] uh you know
[00:50:36] that's8
[00:50:38] $200. It's it's not a make or break.
[00:50:42] Well, it's 8,200. So Jessine hasn't has
[00:50:44] them in for October. Yes. Yes. We have
[00:50:48] them in December. That delta is $8,200.
[00:50:50] So Right. So that's not a make or break
[00:50:53] of anything with the budget. You can His
[00:50:56] budget right now is 32,000. We'll be
[00:50:58] going 64,000
[00:51:00] or something plus benefits. So there's a
[00:51:04] 30 plus,000.
[00:51:06] So I don't know where you're going up
[00:51:07] with the 8200. It's the difference
[00:51:09] between January starts full time in
[00:51:12] January. His FY25 budget was the 33884.
[00:51:17] um bringing up to a moderate um
[00:51:19] full-time salary. If plan if if 65 was
[00:51:21] his full-time salary, that's um the 58
[00:51:24] would be to start him in October and the
[00:51:26] 49 would be January. It's a what what
[00:51:29] you're doing is you're just delaying it.
[00:51:31] That's the savings from delaying it.
[00:51:33] Yeah. Right. So, you get a budget to
[00:51:35] finish. We got the it's it's in the
[00:51:38] budget for starting January 1st, but if
[00:51:42] it starts in October or when was it
[00:51:45] October? October. Yes. October.
[00:51:49] Then it's it's an $8,000 something
[00:51:52] dollar savings until next year. Until
[00:51:54] next year. Right. No, I understand that.
[00:51:57] But we're talking about this, right?
[00:52:01] So, I don't see that as being a huge I
[00:52:04] don't think it's a big deal breaker.
[00:52:07] And also, I don't think it's a deal
[00:52:09] breaker starting January 1 to allow the
[00:52:11] town to properly plan its finances,
[00:52:14] figure out what we're going to do cuz
[00:52:15] we're saying yes to a full-time position
[00:52:18] without knowing our revenue.
[00:52:23] So, um, and can we finesse the
[00:52:26] uh the free cash item and save some and
[00:52:32] put the rest in capitalization? Well,
[00:52:34] you if we if the budget was goes as
[00:52:38] proposed, we'll roll $38,000 into free
[00:52:40] cash plus any plus the difference in our
[00:52:44] in our um um reserve account, which I
[00:52:47] think is maybe what are we spending at
[00:52:50] 25? Yeah, you have 10 left. So, we have
[00:52:52] 10. So it be 45 48,000 plus any budget
[00:52:56] um any budgets that weren't spent. So
[00:52:59] there might be another 20 grand there.
[00:53:00] So you're getting up to, you know, an
[00:53:03] $80,000 number, which is kind of what
[00:53:04] we're projecting the the free cash to be
[00:53:07] for for next year.
[00:53:11] But I didn't understand the budgets that
[00:53:13] haven't been spent. I have to use to
[00:53:14] balance the other budgets that are
[00:53:15] overspent. Yeah. So I'm sure you'll
[00:53:18] you'll pull something out.
[00:53:21] If not, I'll send you the year to date
[00:53:22] if you'd like to see it. I I have it.
[00:53:24] Okay. Um Oh, I did send it to you. Yeah.
[00:53:27] So, um that's all we're saying is you
[00:53:31] know if we fund if you fund capital now
[00:53:33] then he he can get working on getting
[00:53:35] those capital programs done which is
[00:53:37] going to help future
[00:53:40] savings. Um Dale, just so you know to be
[00:53:44] aware that their proposal also um
[00:53:46] completely eliminates the select board
[00:53:47] salary.
[00:53:50] Well, we didn't say it was going to be
[00:53:52] easy, but we didn't. You know, we got to
[00:53:55] make tough decisions. We got to hit a
[00:53:56] reset button. I'm not giving up my
[00:53:58] salary. Don't even look at me.
[00:54:01] We wouldn't want you to. I guess you're
[00:54:03] right. When is the When is the day you
[00:54:04] hit the reset button? Is it today?
[00:54:08] Fiscally, right? Or is it down? 125,000
[00:54:12] 150,000.
[00:54:15] Is that fiscally responsible? I don't
[00:54:17] think so. But that's again that's the
[00:54:19] decision to ask I guess is that when is
[00:54:22] it done sooner or
[00:54:24] later we would we wouldn't run our own
[00:54:27] our own bit home homes that way. We
[00:54:30] would not let ourselves I mean I'll give
[00:54:31] you a quick scenario just for private is
[00:54:33] I would love to have a bookkeeper on
[00:54:35] staff right now but fiscally we can't
[00:54:37] afford one so we outsource it and it's
[00:54:40] cumbersome but until we can fiscally
[00:54:42] raise enough money to have that position
[00:54:44] we will not have that position cuz it
[00:54:46] doesn't make fiscal sense right and
[00:54:48] that's just a private business story
[00:54:51] right um again obviously I don't think
[00:54:53] two separate things but you know and
[00:54:55] what we're talking about is you want to
[00:54:57] figure out how to raise that capital
[00:54:59] however you can, whatever those means
[00:55:01] are before you do it. It's it's easy.
[00:55:03] It's it's you know, you can say we're
[00:55:06] going to put this on and then maybe that
[00:55:08] other capital never comes materialistic
[00:55:10] and now we're burdened more with trying
[00:55:12] to do that. It it just allows us a 6
[00:55:16] month window to figure things out and
[00:55:19] put the town in a better financial
[00:55:21] situation. So, what are we going to do?
[00:55:24] Well, I I recommend that we follow the,
[00:55:28] you know, FinCom's adjustments and
[00:55:30] everything. The clerk starts full-time
[00:55:32] January 1st. The highway department
[00:55:36] employee starts January 1st. We We make
[00:55:40] the necessary cuts. We do what we got to
[00:55:42] do. Can I ask some questions? Sure. We
[00:55:45] want to get rid of your $500 for your
[00:55:47] union. I'll pay for it. Your dues and
[00:55:50] your me and when you get your I'll pay
[00:55:51] for pocket. It's my 500 bucks.
[00:55:56] Listen, there's You ever hear of the the
[00:55:58] straw that broke the camel's back? So,
[00:55:59] when I get your invoice for your finance
[00:56:01] committee association, they said just
[00:56:03] send me the invoice. Okay. I just want
[00:56:05] to make sure we're all making
[00:56:06] sacrifices. We all have to. Yeah. They
[00:56:08] didn't even know I was. Um and that the
[00:56:12] other one that stuck out to me, I
[00:56:13] mentioned this to the accountant
[00:56:15] expense. You completely eliminated it.
[00:56:16] At least level fund it because um you
[00:56:19] can't eliminate that expense. She needs
[00:56:21] hard copies of things and we she only
[00:56:23] comes once a month. It's actually an
[00:56:24] audit item that that showed up in the
[00:56:25] audit audit letter
[00:56:28] because we send her everything so it
[00:56:29] wouldn't show up in our audit letter
[00:56:31] because we're doing it right.
[00:56:34] No, the letter I got was there was they
[00:56:36] had a day concerns with mailing packages
[00:56:39] to the accountant because there's no
[00:56:40] backup. But she still needs those hard
[00:56:42] copies. Scan it and send it to her.
[00:56:46] She does her own mailings and stuff. She
[00:56:48] still needs an expense. She has a phone.
[00:56:50] is we'll let it back
[00:56:52] in,000 bucks. Just
[00:56:54] a,000. Okay.
[00:56:57] How about the select pay?
[00:57:00] That's 5700 between the three of us.
[00:57:06] Some of us
[00:57:07] are leaving. We could we could do some
[00:57:10] creative finance. We could cut it by
[00:57:12] 50%. And then Jeff and I could decide to
[00:57:15] wave our fees or leave that money in the
[00:57:18] budget. And then Mr. chair, you wouldn't
[00:57:20] have to sustain a pay cut.
[00:57:25] Sorry, I hope appreciate that.
[00:57:29] I hope somebody does that for me when
[00:57:30] I'm We'll leave that the way it is. It's
[00:57:32] okay. We can put
[00:57:35] something. It's only another year. What
[00:57:37] about 3,000 something like you guys
[00:57:39] should get something? You do keep
[00:57:40] putting more Sorry. Actually, I keep
[00:57:44] urging people to pay the selectment more
[00:57:47] money. I think it might generate more
[00:57:49] interest in the job, but but I'm fine
[00:57:53] with
[00:57:53] this. We go like this. Are you sure?
[00:57:56] Yep. All right. All right, Mr. I didn't
[00:57:59] mean to. No, it's all right. It happens
[00:58:01] all the time cuz I'm probably flatter
[00:58:04] broke than you are.
[00:58:08] Sorry.
[00:58:11] So, was that a motion?
[00:58:15] I'll make a motion
[00:58:16] to to approve the budget
[00:58:20] um based off
[00:58:22] of the clerk position starts January
[00:58:26] 1st. The highway position starts January
[00:58:28] 1st the time. Um and the we're going to
[00:58:31] fund capitalization account 61,000 cuz
[00:58:36] 1,000's going to the accountant. Um we
[00:58:38] have two more questions. Two more
[00:58:40] questions. Yep. on page
[00:58:43] 14 of the finance committee's proposal.
[00:58:46] Yeah. You cut the townhouse by $2,000
[00:58:50] and you also bring down um I'm sorry,
[00:58:54] hold
[00:58:57] on. The municipal building expense
[00:59:02] um which if you combine were almost
[00:59:05] completely spent. I know some was moved
[00:59:07] from all of boards and some was without.
[00:59:09] We're almost completely spent out of all
[00:59:10] those. Can we get We need We need a list
[00:59:13] of what's being being spent in those
[00:59:15] two. I have them. I can sum them
[00:59:17] together. I don't have the money. Yeah.
[00:59:19] When we talked about this at one of our
[00:59:20] last one of our meetings um we thought
[00:59:24] there was that that was not being spent
[00:59:27] at the level. So million there we're
[00:59:30] just level funding it from uh FY to
[00:59:33] final 25 on the on the missile building
[00:59:36] expense in the town building
[00:59:40] town year I believe
[00:59:44] sorry I didn't hear was that you know
[00:59:47] what I mean when was it 8,000
[00:59:54] previous2 I don't know I also that came
[00:59:57] want you need you need to talk about it
[00:59:59] too. Well, we we did talk about it as
[01:00:02] far as we're getting rid of the copier.
[01:00:04] Their number is different in here.
[01:00:05] That's why.
[01:00:07] So, doing some quick look on for copier,
[01:00:11] scanner, you know, thing. Um, we could
[01:00:15] get a a decent copier. We could do a
[01:00:17] request for proposal, get it for about
[01:00:19] 8,000. Um, and we could get a service
[01:00:22] package with that for like 3,000 and it
[01:00:25] will handle everything we need.
[01:00:27] Okay. Versus own it and we'll own it.
[01:00:29] Yeah. Whether we do a lease to own or
[01:00:32] however we choose to finance it or
[01:00:34] whatever, but the last payment we make,
[01:00:35] we own the machine. If you finance it
[01:00:38] and you you finance it through capital,
[01:00:39] right? We'll finance it through capital.
[01:00:41] It's over 20. If it's 25 or over, if
[01:00:43] it's under if it's under 10, that's just
[01:00:47] This is We have a We have a $2 million
[01:00:49] budget. Anything that's going into
[01:00:50] capital should should go as capital.
[01:00:53] $8,000 is money that we can be putting
[01:00:56] in back into a budget on something else.
[01:00:59] I agree with you. When I bought paper
[01:01:01] today, I didn't run it by capital like
[01:01:04] that's that's a little different. It's
[01:01:07] in your town bylaws. This this is a an
[01:01:10] asset equipment asset. I would say it's
[01:01:13] an asset, an asset, right? You you put
[01:01:15] it through capital. All right. So, and
[01:01:17] reading your bio roughly roughly
[01:01:19] $8,000 3,000 warranty package. We're off
[01:01:24] the hook for $11,000 versus that number
[01:01:27] is more like 32,000 33. Yeah.
[01:01:31] So, we'll have money there. We'll have
[01:01:34] money in it. And also ask Jeff to to
[01:01:38] look at um it Mr. Smith. Mr. Smith over
[01:01:42] here. He volunteered. Great. For free.
[01:01:45] for free. Of course, everybody's working
[01:01:47] for free, Mark. So, if anybody else from
[01:01:49] the public would like to volunteer and
[01:01:51] come down and work for free, we'll
[01:01:53] gladly accept that. Okay.
[01:01:57] That's a good That's a good ad. Thank
[01:01:59] you. No problem. So, you're uh the
[01:02:03] Select Word's original it is 38. What
[01:02:05] are you and they and the finance
[01:02:07] committee is recommending 30. So, what
[01:02:09] is your are you changing your
[01:02:11] recommendation or what do you what do
[01:02:12] you want in that number? We're 20 thou
[01:02:14] over we're $21,000 currently in the
[01:02:16] whole in FY25, right? So what do you
[01:02:18] want the number to be? It will we agree
[01:02:21] to say 32 on that number 30 30 if you
[01:02:25] buy a copier 20 $5,000 $28,000 out of
[01:02:29] that number. Okay. Right.
[01:02:32] But we also out of that 30 she's saying
[01:02:34] there's 14,000 for the Var software
[01:02:37] stuff like that geeks are um CM geeks.
[01:02:41] He'll I bet he can take an assessment
[01:02:42] and go we can you know for x amount of
[01:02:45] dollars we can we can run this down from
[01:02:48] a IT maintenance standpoint I know it's
[01:02:51] been
[01:02:52] so this year it's 36,000 so you want to
[01:02:55] bring it down to 30
[01:02:57] 30 we'll agree to 30 and we have to make
[01:03:00] changes and going forward we will well
[01:03:03] if you use the 30 up it's going to be
[01:03:05] late in the year right by the time you
[01:03:07] write that account down and we'll
[01:03:08] probably know where we stand financially
[01:03:10] door will may have a windfall. Who
[01:03:12] knows? The other two are talking about
[01:03:17] Mr. Sheriff, how you feeling?
[01:03:23] You're putting me on the spot, aren't
[01:03:24] you?
[01:03:26] Uh I I think we we can go with uh what
[01:03:31] the finance committee has presented us.
[01:03:37] Um I really
[01:03:40] Well, with there are some corrections
[01:03:44] here and amendments, but I think we're
[01:03:47] very close.
[01:03:48] So, next one is townhouse, which they
[01:03:52] decreased by $2,000.
[01:03:54] From what? From your recommendation of
[01:03:57] 10, they brought down to eight.
[01:04:02] And it depends on the price of oil and
[01:04:05] electricity.
[01:04:07] Um, if we
[01:04:09] increase the revolving account, we might
[01:04:13] be able to get a repair if there came up
[01:04:17] a repair
[01:04:19] uh through the revolving account, which
[01:04:21] we haven't been able to do really with
[01:04:23] only $500 a year in that. Um,
[01:04:29] so the boiler in the townhouse goes
[01:04:33] capital. We go to capital to buy a new
[01:04:36] boiler. Okay. Well, it's new. It's new.
[01:04:41] Hypothetically. Yeah. Yes. Just an
[01:04:43] example. The elevator. The elevator is a
[01:04:46] better example. Yeah. The elevator gets
[01:04:48] problems from 5 to 10. Okay.
[01:04:53] And it's in the warrant for the annual
[01:04:55] town meeting uh to increase the
[01:04:57] townhouse revolving account from 500 to
[01:04:59] a,000. Correct.
[01:05:02] and the municipal building expense if
[01:05:06] we're we're pretty much we're almost
[01:05:08] completely spent um in this current
[01:05:11] fiscal year. And that as you know was I
[01:05:15] was combining
[01:05:18] accounts or I was taking money to make
[01:05:20] it more transparent when it actually
[01:05:21] goes to actual buildings instead of that
[01:05:23] old non. Yeah. So what what do you have?
[01:05:26] What what gets spent through that
[01:05:27] account? Well, it's a newly created
[01:05:29] account so I can't tell you. I can tell
[01:05:31] you the accounts it gets taken out of. I
[01:05:32] can tell you after the meeting or
[01:05:34] something. I don't have it in front of
[01:05:35] me. But And how much have you spent this
[01:05:36] year so far? Very close to almost all of
[01:05:38] it. With 6 weeks left. Yes. And is it mo
[01:05:43] So we have a note. It's mostly electric
[01:05:46] utilities. Um
[01:05:49] now it's also going to go to
[01:05:52] um like other things like
[01:05:57] um
[01:05:59] you talking townhouse? Nope. I'm talking
[01:06:01] um this building length. I'm sorry. I
[01:06:04] just completely lost my train of
[01:06:05] thought.
[01:06:07] So, if we if we uh make it 33
[01:06:12] um or 34, we'll split the difference
[01:06:15] with you. I'd be more comfortable with
[01:06:16] 34. So, we'll move it to 34.
[01:06:21] Which number is this? This is going to
[01:06:23] be
[01:06:26] 14 page 14.
[01:06:32] And through the chair, we we have enough
[01:06:34] surplus in our budget to be able to
[01:06:36] absorb those two
[01:06:37] differences without changing anything
[01:06:39] else. Good.
[01:06:43] Cruiser police cruiser repairs and
[01:06:47] maintenance we cut by 4,000.
[01:06:52] Yeah, cuz they're they're up for another
[01:06:53] cruiser this year. So we we felt pretty
[01:06:56] strong that they they could make they
[01:06:58] could hold their two crews.
[01:07:02] Well, they have Cardick had one the
[01:07:04] previous year, Blue Spring, but there is
[01:07:07] this year and Card's due this coming. So
[01:07:11] So their repair and maintenance account
[01:07:13] is also almost all the way spent.
[01:07:17] So we're getting rid of
[01:07:21] How are we paying for it? Capital. I
[01:07:24] have no idea. So, I think I might have
[01:07:26] said this to both boards, but um we put
[01:07:29] requests in through state the state
[01:07:31] budget through state. One of them was
[01:07:32] for police cruiser. Um the other one was
[01:07:35] for repairs to the highway
[01:07:37] garage. What was the third one? Oh, it
[01:07:40] was um fireproofing record storage,
[01:07:42] right? Um do I We're not going to get
[01:07:44] all three. Um but they're very
[01:07:46] different. All departments, I don't know
[01:07:48] what we're going to get. I'm sure we'll
[01:07:49] get something. So, those applications
[01:07:51] are pending.
[01:07:53] Yeah, they're submitted. Yeah. Which
[01:07:55] which highway department? Ours needs a
[01:07:58] new roof. Um I was very broad with how I
[01:08:01] worded it. So it's repairs to the
[01:08:03] highway garage. So they can use it for
[01:08:06] the break area. They can use it towards
[01:08:08] the roof. So the break area is in
[01:08:11] capital planning. So I know that's why I
[01:08:14] looked at your sheet when I submitted
[01:08:16] everything. That's great. Again, we're
[01:08:18] not going to get everything, but we'll
[01:08:19] get something. Something is Yeah. Great.
[01:08:24] So, are we are we there? Cruiser repair
[01:08:27] and maintenance.
[01:08:29] I think what Chris said with that is if
[01:08:31] you get a new cruiser, you'll be under
[01:08:33] warranty for Yeah. The maintenance
[01:08:35] should be less for a while. I can
[01:08:38] certainly understand that.
[01:08:43] Mhm.
[01:08:44] You know, there's another one that was
[01:08:46] um
[01:08:50] insane. It's probably that selecting
[01:08:52] salary.
[01:08:54] Eric, I'm sorry. That's sales.
[01:09:02] Should get into the paper. We're voting
[01:09:04] down our own salary. We're on TV. Yeah.
[01:09:08] I bet there's people in California
[01:09:10] watching this. There is.
[01:09:15] So was the level funding for the
[01:09:17] equipment maintenance in the fire
[01:09:19] department. The fire chief uh wanted to
[01:09:22] do a a vehicle maintenance schedule um
[01:09:26] and actually up and maintain once we get
[01:09:28] the new truck. Um the old truck is
[01:09:30] literally once we get the new one has to
[01:09:32] go out. Um so he really wanted to put
[01:09:35] like a maintenance plan in place and
[01:09:38] once it's great that we're going to get
[01:09:39] a new vehicle, but we have to maintain
[01:09:41] it so it doesn't end up
[01:09:44] in I guess rough shape. So he had
[01:09:46] requested actually like 38,000 that we
[01:09:48] brought down. Um so their recommendation
[01:09:53] is to level fund it from this fiscal
[01:09:55] year which is what? 25,000 and our
[01:09:59] budget was 30,000. All right. And they
[01:10:02] have other trucks that need Yes.
[01:10:05] maintenance that are being held off
[01:10:08] until we get our new truck. Until we get
[01:10:10] our new truck, which is soon. Soon.
[01:10:13] Hopefully,
[01:10:16] I did speak with Josh Pets about this
[01:10:19] and and mentioned that he is getting a
[01:10:21] new truck and how much really is it
[01:10:23] going to cost for diesel basic
[01:10:25] maintenance on it for the year and could
[01:10:27] he live with a $5,000 cut? And he
[01:10:29] mentioned he has a lot of maintenance on
[01:10:32] other issues in his fire department. But
[01:10:34] he said he would, you know, he'd agree
[01:10:37] to the 5,000 as long as it goes back
[01:10:39] into his budget next year. Did he know
[01:10:41] that we cut it though? Because he might
[01:10:43] be saying 5,000
[01:10:45] 25,000. I told him. Thank you. A number
[01:10:48] 5,000. I'm looking for 5,000. You got a
[01:10:51] new fire truck. He wasn't happy about
[01:10:53] it. He texted me today. I have the text.
[01:10:55] I'll say that. But his his big point is,
[01:10:58] yeah, he'll he'll bite the bullet on the
[01:11:00] 5,000, but he wants it back in his
[01:11:03] budget next year. can't because if you
[01:11:05] look at his budget overall from 1992
[01:11:08] forward, it's only going up very very
[01:11:10] minimal for what they do and what they
[01:11:12] provide, everything like that. So, if
[01:11:15] you can make a note on your budget, I'll
[01:11:17] make a note online that, you know, we're
[01:11:19] going to certainly we could readress it
[01:11:22] next year. Exactly. And if he has a he
[01:11:25] comes back with a um a maintenance plan
[01:11:27] that, you know, we can support.
[01:11:30] Absolutely. I mean, if that's something
[01:11:31] that's going to again prevent future
[01:11:33] expenses. Mhm. But it's worth for.
[01:11:36] That's what it's for, right? Cuz he has
[01:11:38] a lot of hoses and stuff like that.
[01:11:40] That's old. It's going to need to
[01:11:42] replace it. He asked by law. Yeah. So,
[01:11:46] um street lighting you decreased by
[01:11:48] 5,000. Um we increased it by 2,000
[01:11:52] because more lights were turned on based
[01:11:54] on um complaints from residents and um
[01:11:59] complaints from the police department
[01:12:00] cuz we had some bad breakins down here
[01:12:03] and it was pitch black. So some street
[01:12:05] lights were turned on um that were had
[01:12:07] been turned off. So I think
[01:12:11] $5,000 that's less than what you
[01:12:13] currently have this year and we're again
[01:12:14] almost all the way spent.
[01:12:17] uh through the chair. Um you want to
[01:12:20] talk about what we talked about?
[01:12:23] Well, all the lights. Yeah. I mean, you
[01:12:25] had a very compelling argument. I
[01:12:30] s you have four lights that that are
[01:12:33] that we're paying for. They've been on
[01:12:34] for years. So, in my observation, the
[01:12:37] only reason I know is it's because of
[01:12:38] the one in my house. So, the one in
[01:12:40] front of my house went out and it was
[01:12:43] out for years. And I didn't know until I
[01:12:45] finally got a hold of the National Grid
[01:12:46] that they said if you go around if it
[01:12:49] has a black cap on the light fixture, it
[01:12:53] should be on. If it has a red cap on it,
[01:12:55] it should be off. Well, I've got four of
[01:12:57] them down the street from me that have
[01:13:00] black caps that have not been on. I can
[01:13:03] tell you for at least 2 years that I'm
[01:13:05] assuming we're paying for um that could
[01:13:07] inevitably be off. And I don't know how
[01:13:10] many I say how many more of them. The
[01:13:11] only reason I know that they're off is
[01:13:12] cuz I take a walk every night with my
[01:13:14] wife and those those because I started
[01:13:18] looking now on my walk that how many are
[01:13:20] black caps and red caps and they've been
[01:13:22] off for years including the one in front
[01:13:24] of my house. They did fix the one in
[01:13:25] front of my house but the other ones and
[01:13:27] I would sacrifice the one in front of my
[01:13:28] house if I had to for for that when my
[01:13:30] kids were smaller. Um, if I see three of
[01:13:33] them on a 2-m walk, I guess my question
[01:13:36] is how many more of them we got black
[01:13:37] caps we're paying for that aren't even
[01:13:39] working that we potentially could
[01:13:41] potentially turn off for if they have a
[01:13:43] black cap or not paying if they're if
[01:13:46] they're not working, we're not paying
[01:13:47] for them. How how do they know they're
[01:13:49] not working? Um, I they didn't even know
[01:13:51] mine wasn't working until I called that.
[01:13:54] I don't I don't know specifically that
[01:13:56] one. Um, do you know the four that I
[01:13:58] complained about? No, there are four
[01:14:00] that are on all day where all through
[01:14:03] daylight right up around Mimi's all
[01:14:05] around that corner of the common there
[01:14:08] are four street lights that are on all
[01:14:10] the time and I did mention it to you.
[01:14:13] Yeah, that must have I haven't been
[01:14:15] driving down there at night time in a
[01:14:16] while. And let's look into it cuz that
[01:14:18] can't help either. So I guess that's
[01:14:20] that that's my point is how many that we
[01:14:22] pay for aren't really working and then
[01:14:25] are they necess necessarily or working
[01:14:27] incorrectly. Yeah. the one um like at
[01:14:29] the bottom of the elementary school had
[01:14:31] to be turned back on cuz that was off.
[01:14:34] Um but the chief of police is the one
[01:14:36] who really was Now somebody turned that
[01:14:38] one off or it just died. It wasn't
[01:14:40] working. So we weren't paying for it.
[01:14:42] But um again the police department were
[01:14:45] really adamant obviously but I mean that
[01:14:47] one sounds like it makes sense at the
[01:14:48] bottom of the of the school.
[01:14:52] But my feeling is I don't think I would
[01:14:54] be surprised. Who would have ever turned
[01:14:55] that off? I guess would be the question
[01:14:57] to have to turn it back on other than
[01:14:59] the bulb dying.
[01:15:01] I can't remember off the top of my head.
[01:15:02] It's been several months now to be
[01:15:03] honest with you. So I guess my point is
[01:15:05] that how many do we actually pay for
[01:15:08] that haven't worked in years and are
[01:15:10] they truly necessary? And I don't know
[01:15:11] how to address that or how to survey
[01:15:13] that. But I guess that we we pay a flat
[01:15:16] rate per per light whether it works or
[01:15:18] not. Right. There's no meter on it.
[01:15:20] Right. No. It's hardwired to the Yeah.
[01:15:23] So it's it's a flat rate whether it's an
[01:15:26] efficient bulb or not. Well, I guess in
[01:15:28] the question is that if we're paying for
[01:15:30] them, they're not working. Do we
[01:15:32] necessarily we don't need them need them
[01:15:34] and how long have they not worked for I
[01:15:35] guess and I don't know who takes that
[01:15:37] survey and makes that decision. But I
[01:15:38] guess that's just a a point to my
[01:15:40] question would be you're saying shut
[01:15:43] down 20% which lights are you in
[01:15:47] Gilbertville? Are you in Wheelright? Are
[01:15:49] you shutting down some light out? I I I
[01:15:54] guess we don't figure doesn't do
[01:15:55] anything for me. I guess we don't know
[01:15:57] what those somehow there's a survey done
[01:15:59] of which ones are actually supposed to
[01:16:01] be on. So I have that. Okay. I have I
[01:16:04] don't I don't have it physically in
[01:16:05] front of me. But do they have like a and
[01:16:07] and I don't know. That's why I ask is is
[01:16:09] there a poll number? Yes. Okay. Poll
[01:16:12] number two on, poll number three off,
[01:16:15] poll number five on, and then where is
[01:16:18] poll 234? Did did I understand it was 84
[01:16:22] polls we're paying for? I don't I didn't
[01:16:24] something like that prepare for like
[01:16:26] conversation. But I guess that's I guess
[01:16:28] those are further in
[01:16:31] 42 every street and whether they're on
[01:16:34] or whether they're off and if there are
[01:16:36] some that's taken I could come take a
[01:16:38] ride down your street and see how they
[01:16:40] match up on my list. I have every street
[01:16:42] light that's on every street light
[01:16:43] that's off.
[01:16:45] Okay. But you're going to do that at
[01:16:46] night during which I have done. Unless
[01:16:50] you go by the black cap, red cap. I've d
[01:16:53] I drove around at night time when I did
[01:16:56] this. So, not to belabor probably a
[01:17:00] bigger conversation here, but we feel
[01:17:01] that there's savings here. Mhm. There
[01:17:03] potentially could be a savings. Yeah.
[01:17:05] And we're looking for savings. This is a
[01:17:07] place that we can, right? We should we
[01:17:09] should put this on the top of our list
[01:17:11] of of some analysis. go figure out what
[01:17:14] we want to keep on. If it's a flat rate,
[01:17:16] we can we can say these we're not going
[01:17:19] to turn back on and then the $5,000 in
[01:17:22] savings. Okay. When we turned more
[01:17:24] street lights on, this was several
[01:17:25] months ago. Um we didn't turn them all
[01:17:27] back on that were off. We turned maybe a
[01:17:29] third of them on um because they again
[01:17:32] they were either ones we were getting
[01:17:33] complaints from residents or that the
[01:17:34] police department had determined were a
[01:17:36] public safety issue. I don't think
[01:17:38] anybody would argue about public safety
[01:17:40] issue.
[01:17:41] They said that's ridiculous. They even
[01:17:43] think that we would say turn the one off
[01:17:45] at the No, I think it's just a matter of
[01:17:46] somebody has to decide what's
[01:17:48] appropriate. Yeah. And I'm sure the
[01:17:50] police department obviously knows
[01:17:51] probably better than all of us. But I
[01:17:53] guess the question is which ones are on
[01:17:54] and which ones are not on and which ones
[01:17:56] are supposed to be on, which ones are
[01:17:58] not supposed to be on. I guess if we get
[01:17:59] a layout, then we can have a and I'm
[01:18:01] sure the police aren't spending their
[01:18:03] time looking at how many lights are on
[01:18:04] and off.
[01:18:05] We just need to we need to do a road
[01:18:07] trip like that. Oh, that's true. I
[01:18:11] didn't go to every inch of town. I just
[01:18:13] we just went to the road. So, like back
[01:18:15] roads we did I we didn't go down at all.
[01:18:17] I'll do I'll do it free. No charge. Get
[01:18:20] in the car at night and check every one
[01:18:22] of them. Give me a list. If there's 82,
[01:18:25] we can chop that up pretty quick. Yeah.
[01:18:26] Over the course of a couple couple
[01:18:28] weeks. Yeah. So yeah, I guess if there
[01:18:30] is a if there is some sort of a plan
[01:18:33] layout that says pull two, exit, pull
[01:18:36] two is wherever that might be. It's on
[01:18:38] every check check. Supposed to be on,
[01:18:41] not on, not supposed to be on and on.
[01:18:44] I'm a street light girl. Okay, whatever.
[01:18:46] We can all do it. But I think that
[01:18:48] again, that's what I we can get it clean
[01:18:51] together. I'm just telling my story of
[01:18:53] what happened in front of my house. I'm
[01:18:55] very fearful that we're going to end up
[01:18:56] in the exact same position we are this
[01:18:58] year with over spent accounts and this
[01:19:00] is going to be one of them either level
[01:19:02] funded
[01:19:03] or yes no I mean if we do a survey and
[01:19:08] figure out if we're paying for lights
[01:19:09] that are shut off when we're paying for
[01:19:11] them and we're going to decide to keep
[01:19:13] them off there's a savings but I guess
[01:19:15] if we go around and we find out all the
[01:19:17] ones that are supposed to be on are on
[01:19:19] survey and we and we cut the budget a
[01:19:21] little we say hey we were mistaken there
[01:19:24] all the necess necessary ones are on.
[01:19:25] What do we have? What do we have for a
[01:19:27] budget for lights right now?
[01:19:30] 25,000. 25,000 divided by 80. Every
[01:19:34] light you find that you can turn off.
[01:19:37] Give it to the select. You said 84s,
[01:19:40] right? 84. So does 84 street lights. I
[01:19:43] don't want to say that. I don't know.
[01:19:44] Let's use it for a rough. All right.
[01:19:46] We'll use it as a a number. 84. All
[01:19:49] right. So 25,000 divided by
[01:19:52] 84 that is
[01:19:54] $297 per pole. Okay, that's worth it for
[01:19:57] a year. Per pole. Per pole. Would take a
[01:20:00] lot of action.
[01:20:03] We already got $1,200 down on his road.
[01:20:06] Yeah. Well, 10 is 2,900 bucks. So we get
[01:20:09] 20 lights that aren't working. Yeah,
[01:20:11] that's what we thought. You know,
[01:20:12] there's definitely get 5,000. Yeah.
[01:20:15] Yeah. So, we we just drive around town a
[01:20:18] little bit up here, I guess. We have a
[01:20:22] road trip. You all can go on a bus or
[01:20:24] something and check it out if you want.
[01:20:26] There's 90 mi of road in this town. I
[01:20:29] did not drive all down 90 m of road. I
[01:20:32] did the main roads with the chief of
[01:20:33] police at and when it was dark out. So,
[01:20:35] I didn't go out to East Plum, whatever.
[01:20:38] I just We're very uh provincial here. um
[01:20:42] bulcanized all start civil war. We just
[01:20:46] did the main roads. I think a couple we
[01:20:48] turned off, third we turned back on for
[01:20:51] public safety or complaints from
[01:20:53] residents. So does somebody I'm assuming
[01:20:55] and I don't know that's somebody from
[01:20:56] Nashville or somebody in the town has a
[01:20:58] layout
[01:20:59] plan what pole and what one is supposed
[01:21:02] to be on and which ones are. It's all in
[01:21:04] my all in my street light file. Okay. I
[01:21:06] have all of that. So I guess we look at
[01:21:08] that.
[01:21:09] Yeah, we're going to need that printed
[01:21:10] up or share the file to send the file
[01:21:14] Excel spreadsheet.
[01:21:17] They have those on computers.
[01:21:19] Yeah, we did it with the with the
[01:21:21] hydrants, right? Same thing. 40 40 mark
[01:21:25] all hydrants. 48 hydrants that only took
[01:21:27] about 3 hours. Yeah, we even found
[01:21:29] hydrants we didn't know we had. That's
[01:21:31] right.
[01:21:34] All right. Where are we? Street lights,
[01:21:37] right? Street lights. 25,000. Where was
[01:21:44] my more?
[01:22:01] Sorry. I think we, you know, I think we
[01:22:05] can all
[01:22:06] agree. I
[01:22:08] hope. Well, uh, there's some, uh,
[01:22:12] corrections here. Yeah. But I wasn't
[01:22:15] looking to go line by line and we have
[01:22:17] to Well, I think it's already been done,
[01:22:20] right? So, so just so you know, the um
[01:22:23] this week the annual report and the
[01:22:26] warrant are going
[01:22:28] um by the end of the week are going to
[01:22:30] be printed. So that's why this is very
[01:22:32] important that it's it's really hashed
[01:22:34] out. Um so we're finalizing it tonight.
[01:22:37] No, I mean no no I don't need it for the
[01:22:39] warrant,
[01:22:40] but we should be we should be extremely
[01:22:43] close um at that point. Oh, I think
[01:22:46] we're very close. I mean we're we're
[01:22:50] hashing over a few thousand here and
[01:22:53] there.
[01:22:54] And the thing com is is if emergencies
[01:22:57] or something comes up and we have to
[01:22:58] transfer money, you guys are on board.
[01:23:01] We have a meeting 25,000 into our
[01:23:03] reserve account for those specific
[01:23:06] items. Already come for that's already
[01:23:09] the
[01:23:10] warrant that
[01:23:13] Okay. So, we're pretty much covered for
[01:23:16] I I think we are based off of the
[01:23:19] recommendations tonight and everything
[01:23:20] we talked about. And just to clarify
[01:23:22] because I'm taking notes to update
[01:23:24] everything. Um the 62 from overlay you
[01:23:26] were comfortable with only 42.
[01:23:29] We'll do 42
[01:23:32] so we can have it like 20ish.
[01:23:35] You did say that you require some free
[01:23:37] cash or 38. Yeah, I got 38 rolling over.
[01:23:40] I would say I wouldn't I would say just
[01:23:43] just release 42 of the overlay reserve
[01:23:45] and keep keep it. It won't since they
[01:23:48] already um released well that's not the
[01:23:50] words they certified it to the select
[01:23:53] board then I would say put it all into
[01:23:55] capital and I I disagree I think that is
[01:23:58] we have we have municipal 30 uh we have
[01:24:01] 38 rolling in they certified it to the
[01:24:04] select board it's ultimately your
[01:24:05] decision um I think it's really poor
[01:24:09] municipal financial management um it's
[01:24:12] like municipal finance
[01:24:15] 101 Um, we're going to we're going to be
[01:24:18] really really really tough next year cuz
[01:24:20] we don't we don't have any we're not
[01:24:22] going to have much in free cash. We're
[01:24:23] not going to have 40 40 grand left over.
[01:24:25] I'm telling you, you have that many
[01:24:26] overspent accounts.
[01:24:32] Well, we'll have we'll have we'll have
[01:24:34] 38 plus.
[01:24:37] That's the recommendation from your
[01:24:38] channel. I'm going to show her
[01:24:49] What's this?
[01:24:52] It's still, you know, like the whole
[01:24:54] free cash thing. What's What's the
[01:24:55] purpose of having free cash? If if he
[01:24:57] has 38,000 going into free cash or 30 or
[01:25:01] even 30,000. He's saying free cash, he's
[01:25:05] got a number of 30,000 in there. And if
[01:25:08] we take this 62 and put in
[01:25:10] capitalization, why is it an issue when
[01:25:12] you want another 20,000 from that to go
[01:25:14] into free cash? Because free cash can be
[01:25:16] used to pay prior year bills and free
[01:25:19] cash can be used for snow and ice
[01:25:20] deficit. And with no free c and hardly
[01:25:23] any free cash in fiscal year 26, at the
[01:25:26] end of the year when we have if we have
[01:25:28] any unpaid bills or any um or we have a
[01:25:31] big snow and ice deficit, which we can't
[01:25:34] I can't tell you that's going to happen.
[01:25:35] No one can no one can prepare for that.
[01:25:38] We're not going to have we're not going
[01:25:39] to have the free cash to cover it. If
[01:25:41] it's in capital stabilization, I can't
[01:25:44] we can't use that for an unpaid bill. We
[01:25:46] can't use that for snow and ice. And
[01:25:49] we're not going to have money left
[01:25:51] over hardly any in FY25 because we have
[01:25:55] overspent accounts, which I've said tens
[01:25:56] of thousands of times. Can I? Yes.
[01:26:00] So, through through the chair, we have
[01:26:02] $25,000 in our reserve account that can
[01:26:05] take care of unpaid bills. We have we're
[01:26:08] putting an additional $40,000 into our
[01:26:10] stabilization account, which gets us
[01:26:12] just under 5% of our budget, which is
[01:26:16] good financial practice. If by chance we
[01:26:19] had to pull from that to pay a snow and
[01:26:21] ice or something like that, then we
[01:26:23] could do that. But not to take that free
[01:26:26] cash and put it to put it to work now
[01:26:29] with the amount of capital needs that we
[01:26:31] have would be I think would be would be
[01:26:34] a mistake. We have we have the money.
[01:26:37] Mhm. Let's put it to let's put it to
[01:26:39] good use. We've got plenty of money in
[01:26:41] stabilization. If some unforeseen thing
[01:26:42] happened, we can absolutely pull that
[01:26:44] thing out. And in our reserve account is
[01:26:47] plenty of money in it to handle the
[01:26:48] little nits and nats that come through
[01:26:51] that we have to deal with. So if it goes
[01:26:52] into capital and they want to and they
[01:26:55] want to access it, it has to go to a
[01:26:56] town it has to go to a town meeting. It
[01:26:58] can't and right to to pull it for a
[01:27:02] capital need. An unpaid bill is not a
[01:27:04] capital need. No, Justin, you're
[01:27:06] mistaken. So stabilization account,
[01:27:10] which is our savings account, can be
[01:27:12] used for anything. That's not true. Not
[01:27:13] a not a capital stabilization account.
[01:27:15] We have two We have two accounts,
[01:27:16] Justine. We have a capital
[01:27:17] stabilization. We're talking about
[01:27:18] capital right now, though. But we have
[01:27:20] plenty of money in our stabilization
[01:27:21] account which also would require a town
[01:27:23] meeting. Exactly. And that's the way you
[01:27:25] want it. So the difference is either
[01:27:27] having a town vote to get the money or
[01:27:29] just being able to write a check the
[01:27:30] money. Is that is that how it's managing
[01:27:33] your budget? It's bas is that a true
[01:27:36] statement. The difference is being able
[01:27:38] to write a check to pay the bill or come
[01:27:40] to a small town meeting to write a check
[01:27:43] to a town meeting. Again, we've had town
[01:27:45] meetings in this room. doesn't have to
[01:27:47] be. I'm just trying to clarify for
[01:27:48] myself, right? It's either it gets to be
[01:27:51] written out of the checking account to
[01:27:53] pay the bill or it has to go in front of
[01:27:55] somebody to say, "Yes, you can pay." And
[01:27:58] I could be wrong. You're almost there,
[01:28:00] but not quite. I So, if we were taking
[01:28:03] money out of stabilization, like I said,
[01:28:04] it would require a town meeting vote.
[01:28:06] The a Ryan has to do everything on his
[01:28:09] end before we can even and get the
[01:28:11] approval before we even use that money.
[01:28:13] So that would require another town
[01:28:14] meeting to pay a prior year bill to pay
[01:28:17] to put that money towards snow and ice.
[01:28:19] Now we're talking about two town
[01:28:21] meetings. We need that free cash.
[01:28:28] But he's saying you have 30,000 free
[01:28:30] cash or you will have 30,000 in free
[01:28:32] cash, which is a really poor excuse for
[01:28:34] free
[01:28:36] cash. We It's not enough. No, we have
[01:28:40] 116 this year and that and that is
[01:28:43] extremely low. We we were $154,000 in
[01:28:47] the deficit in snow and ice. And the
[01:28:49] only reason why we were able to come up
[01:28:50] with some of that is because we have
[01:28:52] $90,000 left over in salaries for the
[01:28:55] highway department not being able to
[01:28:56] fill positions. So imagine having
[01:28:58] 150,000 whatever left over and only
[01:29:01] having 30,000 of free cash. Now you're
[01:29:03] talking about having two town meetings
[01:29:04] just to fund snow and ice. No, you would
[01:29:07] you'd find someone right through through
[01:29:09] a special.
[01:29:11] You Yes. You have to pull it from the
[01:29:13] stabilization one town meeting. Yeah. It
[01:29:15] takes the town clerk has to has to do
[01:29:18] his work within 30 days, get everything
[01:29:20] to the state to get that approved and
[01:29:21] then have the second town meeting to
[01:29:23] fund the snow and ice. You do a special
[01:29:24] town meeting. You get it get it released
[01:29:26] and then the town at at the annual town
[01:29:28] meeting to fund snow and ice, the
[01:29:30] money's available. So now again, we're
[01:29:32] talking about having two town meetings
[01:29:34] where you have to pay to have a check-in
[01:29:36] person and we're spending money to
[01:29:38] access money. That makes no sense again.
[01:29:41] Well, I think it's gives more control to
[01:29:43] making sure we spend what we need to
[01:29:45] spend and if we have to spend over,
[01:29:47] we're not using all our free cash that
[01:29:49] the the free cash is being used
[01:29:51] appropriately.
[01:29:54] And we were close half an hour ago
[01:29:58] to kind of dividing up the free cash in
[01:30:02] both directions. Yeah. What's wrong with
[01:30:03] the 42? You get your you get
[01:30:07] 42 stabilization and 20,000 free cash.
[01:30:10] Yeah. As long as we don't spend that
[01:30:12] free cash on stupid things. And that's
[01:30:14] what I'm afraid of. We've done that in
[01:30:16] the past where, you know, we we and we
[01:30:19] didn't even find out about the fact
[01:30:20] that, you know, we've taken free cash to
[01:30:22] do something that is not we could do
[01:30:24] this. We'll put 20,000 in free cash and
[01:30:27] we'll make sure that money before it's
[01:30:29] spent comes before this board and it has
[01:30:31] to go before between before them before
[01:30:33] this. It hasn't gone be before us. It
[01:30:36] has not. It did at the last one when
[01:30:38] this town administrator was sitting
[01:30:39] here. Well, the previous years it
[01:30:41] hadn't. I like the idea of splitting it
[01:30:43] and I think this is going to go on and
[01:30:45] on but otherwise I mean if that's the
[01:30:48] happy medium everybody sign off on it
[01:30:50] will be the checks and balances if they
[01:30:52] want to spend that 20 if she needs to
[01:30:55] spend that 20 she presents it to the
[01:30:56] select board and we present it and
[01:30:58] discuss it at a meeting. It has to cuz
[01:31:00] you said the warrant. Okay. We we will
[01:31:03] say that as long as there's an agreement
[01:31:04] between both boards that that's we're
[01:31:05] going to agree that the money is being
[01:31:07] spent. Yes.
[01:31:10] Absolutely.
[01:31:11] And as long as I'm sitting in the seat,
[01:31:14] I will always go through the finance
[01:31:16] committee for stuff like that. And you
[01:31:18] know, well, you could know from
[01:31:19] experience from the last one.
[01:31:22] All right. I'm seeking a motion. All
[01:31:24] right. So, 40 into 42 42 into
[01:31:28] capitalization and then 20 into we we'll
[01:31:30] just stay in free cash. Yeah.
[01:31:34] Okay. And we already have money in free
[01:31:36] cash.
[01:31:38] I'm going to complicate the
[01:31:41] issue. Don't step on that land. So,
[01:31:44] what's going to happen is we're going to
[01:31:45] roll over there be a $50,000 surplus in
[01:31:47] the budget. We're going to roll that
[01:31:48] over. That's what we're going to do.
[01:31:50] Okay.
[01:31:51] Okay. So, make a motion to approve the
[01:31:56] fiscal year 2026 budget through the
[01:31:58] finance committee and the select board
[01:32:00] with all the changes we discussed this
[01:32:02] evening. Uh clerk starts full-time
[01:32:05] January 1st. Highway full-time January
[01:32:09] 1st. Um 42,000 is going to go to
[01:32:12] capitalization. 20,000 is going to roll
[01:32:14] in the free cash with approval through
[01:32:17] the select board before any of that
[01:32:19] money is spent. Second
[01:32:25] discussion. All in favor? Hi. Hi. Hi.
[01:32:31] You on
[01:32:34] the board deciding this? Well, we should
[01:32:37] probably take a motion. We're in joint
[01:32:38] session. Yeah, we should. Yeah, but we
[01:32:40] have to take a separate motion. Okay.
[01:32:43] So, we'll make a motion. I'll make the
[01:32:45] motion that to make what Bill Tinker
[01:32:49] just said to the board. I got a motion.
[01:32:52] I have a second. Second. All in favor? I
[01:32:56] I
[01:32:58] [Music]
[01:33:00] to thank
[01:33:01] you gentlemen. Thank you ladies.
[01:33:05] Fantastic. This was a great session.
[01:33:07] This is sit down
[01:33:12] here. Thank you.
[01:33:15] Thank you, sir. Did
[01:33:17] you
[01:33:19] know your
[01:33:21] first Thank you very much. and
[01:33:24] appreciate everyone's cooperation and uh
[01:33:27] this was a great great meeting to
[01:33:29] collaborate issues and gone through any
[01:33:33] other I'm going to move that we adjourn
[01:33:37] the
[01:33:42] assessors finance
[01:33:44] committee approval of minutes
[01:33:50] and you don't have a report on the
[01:33:54] a couple things. You want to say a
[01:33:55] couple things? Um, so because I was on
[01:33:57] vacation, I did do a formal time. Sure.
[01:34:01] Town time report. Um, so I'll have a
[01:34:03] much longer one for next year. Looking
[01:34:05] forward
[01:34:10] to settle down. We're still in a meeting
[01:34:13] here. I think we
[01:34:17] can have to call
[01:34:19] you. What?
[01:34:23] He wants me pre-warmed. Um, so my legs
[01:34:27] are one reason. Thank
[01:34:28] you. Nice job. Have a good night. I just
[01:34:31] wanted to recognize Scott Potter. Uh, we
[01:34:33] had a sewer emergency over the weekend
[01:34:35] and I thought he did an absolute
[01:34:37] fantastic job. He did a fantastic with
[01:34:39] communication. He handled it like very
[01:34:42] calmly. I, you know, I kind of was
[01:34:43] joking that he had a shitty weekend.
[01:34:46] Sorry.
[01:34:47] Um, no pun intended. Um, but I also want
[01:34:50] to recognize um Justin Hullbrook, Josh
[01:34:53] Peas, Tessa Gurnie from the fire
[01:34:55] department, and Jim Ai and Kevin Landine
[01:34:58] from the police department. Um, they
[01:35:01] also did a really amazing job um
[01:35:03] communicating through a power outage
[01:35:05] last weekend and they um were able to
[01:35:08] keep the fire department open um where I
[01:35:10] was informed that um a senior citizen
[01:35:13] from town was able to get water to feed
[01:35:15] her animals. So,
[01:35:17] um, it just we have some amazing people
[01:35:20] that work for the town and I just think
[01:35:22] they deserve to be recognized.
[01:35:25] Thank you. Thank you. Uh, selection and
[01:35:28] round table. Uh, I would like to mention
[01:35:31] that Marty Guzka
[01:35:34] uh did a lot of work through all those
[01:35:37] events and uh continues to and jumps in
[01:35:41] and carves up the pavement when the
[01:35:43] sewer backs up at Rean's garage and
[01:35:46] every other thing. And he's there on
[01:35:48] Sundays and he's there on Fridays and
[01:35:50] he's there at dawn before dawn clearing
[01:35:54] the road. So, uh, also we have, um, I
[01:35:59] think we have a problem with the
[01:36:01] generator that works the pump, the well
[01:36:06] pump. We are in fact in charge of the
[01:36:11] Hardwick common water department. Okay.
[01:36:16] And, um, I not department, what do you
[01:36:20] call it?
[01:36:22] Water district. District. So, um,
[01:36:25] the uh generator is not coming on when
[01:36:28] the power goes out. So, the water
[01:36:30] pressure has been dropping up there
[01:36:32] through these events. So, um we do pay
[01:36:37] uh for maintenance and operation and I
[01:36:41] would say that we need to look at that
[01:36:42] because it's failed a couple of times.
[01:36:45] Uh again, Marty is the one who goes up
[01:36:48] and jump starts the generator and
[01:36:50] everything, but you shouldn't have to do
[01:36:51] that, right? So, if we can look at the
[01:36:54] uh contract that we have with whoever
[01:36:57] and send a complaint or a heads up or be
[01:37:01] happy to go meet with them, call them,
[01:37:03] whatever. Let me look into that. I
[01:37:05] didn't know about that and uh that's all
[01:37:08] I have. Okay. I was going to do the
[01:37:11] letter with the Quabin thing now, but we
[01:37:14] already did. Yeah, I was going to
[01:37:15] mention the Quabin wershed film, but
[01:37:17] Yeah. You know, good. Yeah, we did all
[01:37:20] that. So, so I'm I'm uh part of two
[01:37:23] water districts now. I know it. It's two
[01:37:26] hats. You're going to have to wear two
[01:37:27] hats. And I'd like to formally welcome
[01:37:30] you to the select board. Oh, well, thank
[01:37:32] you, Eric. Thank you very much for
[01:37:34] taking this on. And happy birthday. It's
[01:37:36] his birthday. Yeah. Yeah. I'm 66 today.
[01:37:39] Wow. That's We got him a cookie, don't
[01:37:41] we? It is, isn't it? Happy birthday.
[01:37:43] Don't forget you're ahead of
[01:37:45] me. I think about it every day. The
[01:37:48] select board got him a cookie today of a
[01:37:51] um a cow. Yes. Nice.
[01:37:56] I didn't even get delivered.
[01:38:00] All right. All right. So, did they make
[01:38:03] a motion to adjurnn? I'll second. All in
[01:38:05] favor? I I don't forget I stuff for you
[01:38:08] guys to sign. over time out at 10
[01:38:11] minutes past