okay thank you everybody this is the town of vanover board of Finance meeting for Wednesday March 27th we'll go ahead and start by reciting the Pledge of Allegiance pledge allegiance to the flag the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation indivisible Liberty jce for all thank you we'll move on on to our next agenda item which is public speak I don't see anybody from the public Eric do you on your screen no there does not appear to be anybody here from the public okay all right how come they don't love us we're meeting too often for them they don't we delute the thing here sorry okay we'll move on to agenda item three which is changes or additions to the agenda does anybody have any proposed changes or additions to the agenda for [Music] tonight I'm off set okay hearing none we'll move on to Old business the first one is 4 a review the policy for AES Capital expenditures I don't know if we have any new on that so I can speak to that Mark you know I had a chance last week after the CIP meeting on Thursday I met with Shannon for a bit we
sat down and talked about sort of conceptually where we were and set up a meeting for tomorrow night at my place hopefully we'll have a couple of hours to sit down and actually draft we didn't make progress on language we just sort of talked about you know where we were and everything because it's been a while so excuse me with last week having both Board of finance and board of n CIP meetings no I didn't have a ton of time so we're hoping sounds like progress in re-engagement so that's something right yeah we're hoping to make some real progress tomorrow night okay anybody have anything else on that the the only thing I would say to that is that the audit that we are submitting does assume that the $112,000 Surplus from AES will be put in that Capital account so that was based on the board of Finance agreeing to the earlier amount even though the amount has changed so just as a point that's and I know they haven't given us anything we don't actually have the money but that is what was that is what the audit is is basically claiming so I think as we file it we probably out a figure out how to actually get that money you know Eric remind us how that that was decided
you're saying the board of Finance decided that so the board of Finance if you remember back last last summer when the AES wanted to do the parking lot okay what was agreed was that they transfer a check okay and you requested $130,000 they originally wrote a check for like 124 MH which they then took back because they didn't actually have 124 to write and the the final number I think was like 112 and I thank you for remind I get it I just you know I wanted to make sure right it was because it was the par and it had just to clarify it was that right that we weren't just deciding we were GNA transfer the balance and the only other thing I wanted to add Mark hopefully with Rob talking to Shannon tomorrow night I think we had made progress at that last meeting discussing it where hopefully you know a lot got discussed a lot of points were made and I know Shannon now understands that it there was going to be money put in it besides just the transferring money so I'm I wish you luck and thank you for taking that on hopefully it'll be a productive meeting that's all thank you the only thing I
want to add to that is and I could be missp speaking so just bear with me but I have a me memory from a discussion it was either at the CIP meeting or just after because Celeste was there and Shannon was there and I'm not sure they have 112 anymore Eric do you recall what I'm talking about I feel like it was a slightly lower figure as far as I know that was the last number the auditor gave me all right was that that was what their Surplus was okay I'll have to which is not to say they didn't decide to do something else with their Surplus they could have but that's not what what was in the audit yeah I don't know that
they've spent money per se I I'm not really clear on this but for some reason I had a different number in my head a just not not a huge difference but you know more like 103 or something like that so that's something I'll have to nail down I'll talk to shanm night about that too I I can't remember it was Celeste or her who mentioned that to me last week but it may be because we're putting in a 100,000 is the idea from the town side and the idea was that they had 10 something on their side and then we were discussing at that CIP meeting we talked about the project that could be 200ish and that would cover so that's that's the those are the figures I had in my head but I I honestly can't recall well enough now so I'll let it right I'll let you guys know what I know when I know it but I think the 112 may be a touch High any other comments or questions on that just a clarification they will get the 100 and whatever put into the capital fund plus $100,000 in this year's budget added to it okay I just want to make sure I understood that correct I thought that they were giving aund and something back to the town and
then going forward we were to add $100,000 but that's basically it because the controls the account so they'll have to they'll have to transfer the money to the town and then into that account right grand total would be like 200 though is the point yeah next fiscal year once we had a chance to to move that money in okay I just want to make sure I understood that thanks and then Mark is it they still of course want to go forward with the parking lot hopefully they'll be or are we not talking about that when we get to CIP yeah okay all right yeah yeah I don't know I don't know that that may be a second on the priority list okay no questions okay well I guess let's move on to item 4B which is review of budget to actual we have this in our packet I have not had a chance to even open
this till tonight but I don't know if anybody has any specific questions Eric you have anything needs to be highlighted no at this point overall you know we're in good shape we don't really have any specific issues so so I'm budget wise right now I don't see any issues with us through the end of the year so go ahead bill just say so Eric is it normal that we would be at this point in the year or in the budget still short you know $2 million in tax revenue property tax revenue a million dollar in government revenues I'm just looking at the short the shortages so far like does that we fully intend to get all that by yeah so the state is notoriously late for supplying the full Freight for ECS or educational cost sharing and that is that is the bulk of what we get from
the state so usually this time of year we're still a million short on ECS funding so yeah that's that's not at all surprising they've paid us basically half of what they owe us for a year we will get that before the end of the year but they'll take their their time in in sending that to us and with the property taxes though like you would think they're due in July right and here we are in almost other quarterly some of them Bill no so so the way it works is automobile taxes are one time a year got real estate is quarterly so that's four times a year so we expect a very significant fraction of taxes you know are due in the month of April yep I forgot about that okay thank you can I Mark real quick with with I backing up to I apologize I
missed I was looking at the the agenda and I don't see that we have CIP liazon on there can we add it we can just do it under board open discussion I suppose what's that that's actually under under item nine liaison reports we normally deal with that oh oh oh sorry I see it now yep my fault okay good other questions about the budget today actual for actuals to budget year to date and remember we budget fairly closely overall so usually by the end of the year roughly onethird of the line items that we have the individual line items are over but overall if we look at Department budgets we're in pretty good
shape across the board with Department budgets so I'm not seeing any major shortfalls that we're going to need to account for you know in this budget other than we will be over in the transportation drivers they'll definitely be some areas where we're over but overall in the budget we're in good shape and we can absorb those overages and still be in the black for the year yeah I mean some of our stuff like sand and salt and DPW overtime are probably under significant right right so yeah I'm looking at that right now on snow removal like 52 54 this year anyway yeah for this year yep we could still have a snow event we shouldn't talk too loudly well no discussion earlier and believe it or not we have used an awful lot of salt this year because the the funny things is the snowier years don't necessarily correspond to when we use the most snow that we had a lot of rain events with freezing yeah we have more icing so it's it's kind of an odd odd thing in that yeah I hadn't thought about that it's that's interesting good point all right okay any other questions about the budget okay hearing none I guess we'll move on the next item is check register same thing any specific questions on that use little big items Big Ticket items are there town of Mansfield what's that Eric is that the waste or health dep town of Mansfield there's two things we pay the town of Mansfield for the first is they are the fiduciary for the Eastern Highlands health district that's with the majority
of the money we pay we also pay them a small sum because they manage some of the programs for Mid neok which is our hazardous waste Consortium so you'll see two payments to town of Mansfield for that most of the money is would be the health district art and Luchi LLC so Bart that's Barton and Le Judas they are the yeah don't ask me why but that's how they pronounce it that is the engineering firm we hired to do the route 316 connectivity study okay and Grant application that is that is actually funded that is a congressional or a legislative grant that we got to pay for for that so that's not I mean we're paying it but but it's not we you know that's not tax
dollars covered yeah okay got it and and what is just curious what is spring what is what there's a line item it calls out Spring spr iing right under Tuttle Robert Tuttle that's only 14,700 but I'm just I'm just curious what is what is oh that that goes to that's basically Health payments why that's listed as that I don't know but I was just curious when I saw the word spring I was like oh spring cleanup like spring I wonder if the note they put in there had to do with the spring payment or something is it it's a monthly payment right no it is spring it it's probably should put Q2 Q3 or something like that you know yeah so that is one of their so that is basically health and benefits payments from the town that's what that is spring is I think that's the the organization that actually manages the ram Consortium why it doesn't say Ram Consortium I don't know the one below it is the monthly payment to AES and the a below that is our our monthly payment to Ram yeah AES is the same payment
every month Ram they give us basically a schedule a year ahead of time which is based on past experience when they need what money so each each month the Ram one varies every month but the AES we give them the same amount every month because you know yeah just a weird it was just a weird one that's M the name of that's all I was asking about yeah yeah no that should be renamed and that should say something like I don't know healthc care Consortium or something like that yeah I have a related question Eric just because you've mentioned before I know she's part of the treasurer you know Works in is she you've mentioned before she's in Florida has she been checking in is she working remotely is yeah she's working remotely oh okay so we do have contact but there she's just you know I mean she's able to take meetings if she has to or yeah you can always you know I we still talk to her and and go back and forth and she still you know reconciles remotely so I mean she can function it's easier when she's local but but it's functional having her
in Florida no gotcha I mean I know she doesn't want to hang on and be the treasurer forever and we've said we're lucky to have her so I just wanted to make sure she's still in contact and if she needs to I mean that's the great thing about remote you could be anywhere I was in Vermont on vacation did one of these meetings so okay thank you yep another just curiosity what is Cargill Inc just curious oh perill that's who we get salt from oh that's the salt bill thanks Y no that's probably a fairly large payment yeah I remember that one though yeah others okay I guess we'll go on to audit review so Eric you know my understanding is you know we've approved the budget this is going to be submitted to the
state obviously we still have the open item of the corrective action plan which we're working on scheduling a meeting to discuss with the various entities including the the board of San and the Board of Education the treasurer Etc yep that's pretty good summary Mike is planning on I think submitting the audit this week I signed the the audit review notes the endover representation letter and forwarded to Cheryl to sign and usually the the school signs a separate management letter also to the auditor so hopefully that will be accomplished in the next couple days and Mike can hit send on the audit because that's important right Eric because March ends the end of I knew we were all hoping to get it submitted right by the end of March March and that that comes this week and with the holiday and all so hopefully plan Friday yeah I know Monday's the 1 so you feel like that's all in line like you said and hopefully Cheryl sign I mean I know we voted it in at the last meeting or whatever right Mike sent it to me this morning I printed it out signed it sent it to Cheryl so all she has to do is sign it yeah so I don't think it'll be a problem on the town end and there's no reason the school can't couldn't have turned their end around today also okay sounds good I know that March 31st is this week that's all okay yep okay no other questions or comments in that item we'll move on to 5A which is the new business DPW equipment schedule get out your magnifying glasses and you
can look at schedule I need my printed in so I think Jay did send you this before separately in in Excel so you can see it you know in in big screen but I ask that this gets put in the packet because what happens is every year or two the equipment schedule and the equipment request list for Public Works gets updated and then it gets shopped around to CIP Board of Selectmen and Board of finance and what CIP does is reviews the request list and say yes that makes sense or no it doesn't so they've submitted it to CIP CIP has agreed to endorse the Capital Equipment plan and so then it goes on to you and that's important because future decisions on what equipment we make or by you know get based off of that and so what I've been working with Jon is to put it all in more coherent set of data than he was presenting before he had all the information he just was presenting it in a very non easy to understand so I think we've reduced it to something that's easy to review and understand you know what the plan is and why so I I don't think you need to make any action on this there's there's nothing you need to do this is just for your information as the board of Finance so you can kind of keep it in the back of your head and know you know in a few years what you're
likely to see for an equipment request Eric when when will the I'm I'm sorry I forget this but when will the referendum be on the new mower that's a good question so I working furiously with the town's attorney to get all the things that we need to get together for the public meeting because there's two lot line adjustments there's at least three ordinances that the board of Selectmen you know want to put through and then there is the grant request for the AES field and you know and then the request for the mower so there's going to be a lot at that meeting you know I'm I honestly don't have everything collated I'm missing a couple of things oh and the you know so I've got most of it but I don't have all of it and the board was kind of adamant that they only wanted to have one meeting so I'm gonna hope that at the next Board of selectman meeting we can identify a date and I've talked a little bit about the town clerk for that and then also at the next meeting the board of Selectmen has to officially set the date for the annual Town budget meeting so that should be early May because Eric I know we've been talking about this for months so it's just and I I'm not putting any blame at
all but it just will help us as a board making decisions you know that are current with the budget you know we want to have the input we've had plenty of meetings and costs and you know things that are going to be this year like you said there's there's multiple things that will help us make decisions so I would hope like when you say it's after the next Board of selectman meeting isn't that usually mid-mon or like the 10th or something yeah next Board of selectman meeting is the eth I don't decision at that meeting when they want to schedule it because I would hope I mean because we're going to be stuck we'll all I mean obviously we'll be having budget meetings moving forward so that was a really good question so hopefully they prepared be prepared since there's weeks before that to maybe set a date that next week or something or whenever yeah we'd have to do a couple weeks out because we still have to do public notice and a bunch of things but I can see it doing it more towards the
third week in April that would certainly be my goal is to get that done so we have that meeting and then have the budget meeting well we need some time in before you know it's just going to push everything back if everything's been pushed back a year and we don't have the stuff in our hands I want to have enough time to ponder what the public says if we have to go but I I understand what you're hoping for but because of the way we're budgeting now where we're putting money in permanent funds we're basically spending money at this point that has already been allocated up to this point so I don't think that hear you're saying my my fear or uneasiness with it is we've made decisions and never really brought it to the public meeting so I just want to have their input on it I agree with you that we've decided How we'll fund it and we'll put certain amounts in you know and and now there's going to be like you said we're going to be looking at this Public Works projection and the the equipment and that'll be a time cycle I know it's different things but yeah I mean I especially the big items like the tankers and the trucks and the this and the that you know you
want to I I know that they needs or whatever you know so some things are going to dictate that we can't have the public input because we're going to have to do it if something just breaks down and doesn't work anymore and the town needs it but that's that's my point understood thanks any other questions on those documents it's actually a good layout looking at it so kudos to you and Jay to get that organized it's pretty clear you know it lays it out well you see the progression you see the changes you know it makes sense so I think that's well one more question just on the equipment I think bill was alluding to this too Eric is that did we decide at the last
budget meeting and what the board of Selectmen had hoped for that the trailer will be purchased out of funds from this year right yes that that that was the board of Finance decision not that was not actually the board of selectman's decision but that's okay well I mean I had listened to the board of selectmen's Select idea or the way they wanted it to go and I brought it up at the board of Finance so thank you for that correction right and then we did vote on it vot correct and we've actually purchased the trailer and it's sitting at public works at the moment that was my next question some things get done quickly that's great well once it get once all three boards have approved it you know then it's just a question of me doing the paperwork so so you know plus plus we could have they could have sold it if if we didn't act on it right I mean it was right there yeah right there so you like to act fast and not lose that so yeah we chose to avoid The Debt
Service is what we did that was last meeting perfect any other questions on the DPW heavy equipment no I guess my last question would be just out of curiosity I know you talked about this in the past Eric but you look at that Frontline spare truck that's like way past it's usable service it looks like we've had it for 26 years and usable service 15 like would we ever just like sell that just to get rid of it and get a little money for it or is it Way Beyond that or what's the plan for that truck just out of curiosity so right now that's our spare truck so we have three trucks the oldest of our Frontline service trucks is a 2004 and then the 97 for is an emergency spare the 2004 is a piece of junk we're actually going to get rid of the 2004 and keep the 97 because the 97 is way more reliable and way better conditioned than the 2004 and there were a couple reasons for that first of all 2004 they didn't want to spend the money so they bought a really cheap plow truck and that's cost us we've put over the life of that equipment you know we've put like almost $130,000 into maintenance of that piece of equipment and we're actually it's actually we've taken it off the road now because we blew the power steering unit in the vehicle so so basically the reason we're keeping the 97 is cuz it's a lot better than our 2004 it was an older the older Fords were all the pre pollution equipment so they had a lot less problems overall
and we have had to spend the money to completely redo the breakes on it but right now that vehicle is fully functional so that will remain our spare plow truck even though it's really old questions okay I guess we will move on to our next agenda item which is the approval of Capital purchase process form so I think can kind of see what's going on here Eric you're looking for a form to kind of track these capital projects do you want to talk to this sure so basically this wasn't an audit finding but one of the recommendations the auditor put in there is that we produce a form to track Capital purchases and the reason is every year they come out they do an audit and they pull you know 20% or 30% of our major and say okay give me all the supporting documentation for this and we have it all but we've never kept it in a coherent package so meeting agendas and things minute minutes and stuff like that yeah right so what it takes is I then have to go back through the board of Selectmen meetings figure out what month it got approved make a copy of that do the same thing for Board of Finance do the same thing for CIP so instead we have a form
which tracks that and we put a packet together and it gets kept in the finance office and next year when we they ask for that we just pull out the packet hand them the packet and go and make everybody's life easier so that was an easy audit recommendation this I think should essentially outline all the players so that we we say you know what type of capital expense it is what we based the approval on what board approved it and when when I signed it and out it goes so my my comment on the on the form itself is is just generally that there's no place to put the actual definition of the project there so you want to come up with something there I mean it's fine I me I think that the other fields of data are appropriate okay you know you I don't think you really need anything anything more you know the public meeting required yes no and then date you might want to have date approved or something like that I guess by Maybe by definition it's data approved so so that's probably fine but I think you other than just having a place to describe you know give it a give it a project name and then give it a little brief description this project this is to approve the purchase of a you know trailer for The
you know DPW [Music] sure okay I can certainly add that that makes sense I I just had a quick question on the approval based on and what's right underneath that you've got RFP and like a little line there for I assume yes no whatever and then State contract should there is there supposed to be like a are there supposed to be two separate things should there be a spot check check box off or not that that line just looked a little wonky to me and I I want to make sure that that's what you're intending yeah you want to make it clear what's to be filled in yeah I mean I just assumed if it was an RFP we would put our RFP number on there make that easy and we're going to put a copy of the RFP in the packet if it's a state contract you know I guess we could put a thing in there to put the state contract bid number on if you wanted to see that just make it clear by saying Circle one or something put check box they should be separated way it was my my thought because those are things right yep just so it's clear like when this when you think about how this would actually be filled out and then two years later somebody wants to look at it you know absolutely so that it makes sense but otherwise yeah I think this is a good form okay I like it okay I can certainly
make those Corrections you want to see it again next month and whatever I came up with yeah yes yes okay not a problem looks good though just a couple extra things other comments or questions input on the form okay I guess we'll go on to item 5C which is the kerma budget so I'm bringing this to you because every year they come back and tell us what our actual increases are going to be so we're locked in for a three-year window with a they give us basically what our maximum rate increase year-over-year would be but we don't necessarily actually get charged that it's based on our claims history what but basically they're giving us the max rate increase for both liability and workers come on the workers comp side we did have one moderately significant claim from Public Works that wasn't related to an accident but it was related to somebody who had a medical emergency while he was at work as far as the the lap policy there was a very significant Claim by AES that was about $35,000 related to their plumbing system so that blew our lap rate up so those two things combined they're giving us the max contractual rate increase
they could but I'd already accounted for that in the budget so it just means the budget's not going to go down now that they've given us the final rate increase but that's the reason why so so those two claims kicked us up to their you know contractual maximum basically yeah correct correct I'm actually vaguely surprised that the as plumbing issue was covered I'm glad it was you know this not my bailey Wick I I do environmental claims so it's a little different but I usually know my way around a liability policy and I was thinking you know but whatever I'm glad they they helped with it because obviously it was a you know immediate need yep and I just want to comment too I'm surprised and I don't want to get into anybody's personal business or even what a medical emergency was but I've dealt with Kera a lot too so I'm surprised that if someone had a medical emergency at work that wasn't caused by work that there was a claim against that I mean I could see where an individual would want to do that but having it
affect our town rates is shocking to me having worked with kerma all the time so I I mean but remember he's on the town's health insurance plan so it's built against the town one way or the other it just makes whether no but I mean if you have it's just in not talking if you have a personal health something whatever like I'm at work and some health thing happens to me I'm just going to go through however I'm insured I'm not going to the town for my personal you know that's why the town offers insurance and again I want everybody to be healthy I'm all about Wellness so I'm not getting this is shocking to me so are you able to I'll look in my packet I thought I had printed that out and it's hard for me to shuffle through so I'll take a look at that but yeah that's shocking that someone's personal illness would affect a Town's policy so well I mean if you have somebody that's working in the shop and has a heart attack if it occurs while they're working that is to issue we right no we have things that happen like that all the time again I don't want to fight anybody's personal thing but I could be walking from my car into my job and I unfortunately have that happened to me and I it wouldn't be a work issue at all it would be a personal health issue and my health insurance would take care of it so again I can't wrap my head around your way of thinking with this but again probably an
off camera thing it it's only because you're bringing it up as a finance thing and it's affecting the town's policy is shocking to me because I've never seen that happen sure it doesn't matter where it happens as long as I mean I've had people get injured at work and have to go in for surgery and that's you know so that's all just I don't want to go on and on about it because I want everybody to be well but it's pretty surprising to me and that it at least it in kind of you're siding with them so you're not the voice of kind of asking the questions to determine what made that happen unless but it's it it's ultimately it's not for me to decide it's for kerma to decide whether that is a legitimate claim yeah so an employee has the right to submit and I said that please when you talk it sound right I do get that and I said I want I can understand why the employee would do that but probably want information on both sides and it looks like Rob knows a lot about it so I'll defer to him but so did you get a report back stating Eric that that particular situation was covered under Kera kerma made a determination that that was a covered CL wow interesting however the only thing
that occurs to me this is Insurance hat on but I'm not a health insurance guy but you know the the thing that ultimately comes to mind is subre we don't know necessarily if Kera will go subate against the health insurer for the individual if they did they shouldn't raise our rates then exactly that's yeah that's where it gets tricky and I I'm not an actuary but yeah yeah that's where this is where you know when you make a claim even if it isn't covered you know it can it can trip some things so I don't know and I'm I'm Pro I'm outside my area of expertise but it it occurs to me that me first blush just just looking at it I actually had the same reaction in Joanne had which is wait a minute you know that's not really a work comp thing but the work comp carrier said it was covered so a little weird I work with Kera a lot I mean I'm involved in investigations with Kera so I'm I have experience with this or I wouldn't be bringing it up so that's generally speaking insurance company doesn't go out and go oh yeah sure we'll cover something that's not covered so it's a little weird I don't know I don't know what to do and like I said I would never you know be upset that an employee is going to try I just if they have health insurance I don't know what the claim would be but anyways again interesting thank you for that subtext that's gonna worri surprising I'm glad people have health insurance too but
yeah yep okay other questions or comments okay I guess let's move over to seven agenda item seven is our budget discussion so we had a couple approval minutes oh I'm sorry you're right I'm jumping out of time those are usually at the end so meeting minutes for February 28 2024 be looking for for somebody to make a motion to approve those meeting minutes I'll go ahead oh go ahead I'd makeing motion to approvement as submitted okay second Rob any discussion all in favor say I I any opposed any extensions okay so we will move on to the next agenda item and that is the approval of the meeting minutes for I'm sorry I should have called them out but March 13th these a separate agenda item this is the March 13th meeting minutes anybody want to make a motion to approve that's the special budget meeting Workshop I make motion to approve the March 13 2024 special budget meeting minutes okay in a second Louise seconds thank you all right any discussion all those in favor say I I any against any extensions okay very good thank you now we can move on to agenda item seven which is the budget discussion we have three subtopics listed here the first is the AES gymnasium floor is this one that Louise wanted to add Lou you had a question on that you wanted to add that end for discussion yeah get your mute you still muted okay that's better yeah I was just curious I had given a a question back a couple weeks ago and I was just kind of curious why we're doing the entire thing and we're not splitting it with AES because I know we use it and AES uses the floor as well so is this going
to be a continual thing I would guess so I you know the kind of the the running philosophy we've had regarding the gym the gym work that's been done is that a the town's going to pay for it one way or the other and B a lot of the activities that occur within the gym though by no means all but a lot of the activities are Town related activities so the wreck leagues the town meetings the you know few other things that happened there I don't really know exactly all goes on there but that's that's kind of been something that's been championed by the rec commission so that's that's where this this particular request is coming from and actually
Brian you're on that so you you might want to have a you I don't if you have anything to add to that but that's really my understanding and that's why you know we we did this for the seating if a request to help support the refund the refinishing of the floor and also to replace some of the fans so all three of those I think fit under that rubric that you know we're we're trying to basically support the infrastructure that is partially used by the town outside of school activities so liability wise something were to happen there is the town on the hook for that or is this the AES on the hook for that for which sorry I didn't catch that is it the town or the AES on the hook if there's any liability issue it doesn't actually matter in the sense that the town pays 100% of the insurance bills for the town the school does not pay into the insurance we as a Town Fund on our side all of the kma bills so you know the only thing they pay for is the chubs Rider policy that covers the oil tanks the inground oil tanks at the elementary school everything else the town assumes so okay they have inground oil tanks yes how old are they old W they why maintain Insurance on them okay maybe we could talk about that at
some point maybe not now but that's a big flag for me just based on what I do for work depending on on their age and what composition those tanks are do you know what they're made out of Eric off the top of your head nope I don't because if they're fiberglass tanks the new tanks are fiberglass the old tanks are sing steel they're B but yeah but they just don't like okay we'll talk about that some other time Eric I'd like to maybe have a sidebar on that at some point because that scares me it's very scary if that had a leak that that's like this is my point it doesn't take much and you don't know because okay in the course of my career I've had a bajillion tank clams and the thing is underground storage tanks with oil in them when they start to leak you barely know it it's such a small slow thing you get a pin hole it a little bit dribbles out and the next thing you know it's gone on for years and you have a whole plume coming off of it and only when it gets really bad do you notice oh wait a minute the the level in the tank is low or we're getting water in the furnace the things that start to happen when things get really mixed up in there by that point you have a disaster on your yeah have a huge EXC lot of hazardous Phil right so it it it becomes a it can be it depends on the scenario
and it's not like we don't know how to clean up oil leaks but the the point is these things can spiral very quickly and a modern day liability policy I don't know what we have for our entire insurance program I tried to stay out of it because I work for insurance company but you know it the modern day liability policies exclude pollution So you you're in a situation where if you have this old tank in the ground and it rots out on you it rusts out on you because it's been in the ground for 15 20 however many years especially if it's sitting in the water table you got a real problem on your hands so that one I had no idea that we still have stuff buried in this town you want it indoors you do not want that in the in the ground and so sooner rather than
later I don't even depending on the age of the tanks and the composition thereof that's another thing to put on their Capital list to get the the heck out of that get those things out of the ground because the longer you wait the more you recording disaster I I agree 100 perc I I've had some experience of that too Rob in disaster so we should find that out let's put that on the agenda for next meeting maybe we can have somebody I don't know if somebody from school needs to represent or give us a report on that but I think that that point is sooner we start talking about better off we'll be planning installation date composition you know that sort of thing I mean if they're single wall tanks which are really the old ones I'm hoping they're not but if they are good God if they're fiberglass tanks no problem okay I'm not gonna freak but you know if
they're the older tanks or even a double wall steel I I'm not quite sure what the DAT of installation is and so what sort of they what would they what they would have been but in my my claimes experience the number of times I've seen this scenario occur oh yeah they've been in the ground forever you know we just didn't think about it and then it's you know oil's bubbling out of the ground it's not a good story and it's not something I want to see happen at the school so let's maybe nail that down you know when I when I was an energy auditor one of the first houses I audited I audited because they were complaining that they had excessive oil usage and I looked at their oil usage and I looked at what they had for in what their Phill history was and I said your burner can't possibly burn that much oil where's your line right through the concrete corroded the end result of that solution was they they cut out the entire slab of the basement took out a wall brought in a mini excavator and excavated down to bedrock in the foundation it was a you know a couple hundred, repair of a residential house it was ugly and and that's not even the worst case scenario I I could I could tell War Stories but I'm not going to take up the whole meeting with it the the point is let's let's get some more info and before we lose our minds let's get some more information then we'll we'll talk about it again that's going to vastly change
priorities but it's interesting that you two and I'm glad this is why I like to learn from just the looks on both of your faces Bill and you I'm surprised it hasn't be and and Mar whoever knows about it I'm not trying to leave anybody I just didn't know I didn't know they had an underground tank I had no idea right and no good to bring it to the Forefront before things happen when you have old infrastructure it's one of these things you kind of have to go through and think about it and that one is a prime example used to be that was the standard operating procedure every house every place heating oil tank sure out back under the ground terrible idea you used to drain your engine oil your driveway too all right Circle back to oh thank you for that I'm circling back to the floor just for a second so I know we're
talk I think we should get back on topic here I think we apologies sorry about the no no no it's abely the right good thing to add up you know to to bring up I think need to get back to the agenda yeah no that was good to know just are we considering this because they're bringing it Forward I know we have some quotes are we thinking we're going to find money like leftover money this year is that what we're trying to do with this they're not thinking of adding these totals to the dollar amount of the budget that's already been presented I guess that's my question or for the Jim floor you know since they have the quotes and it's something that they want to do and they brought it forward we know we had the safety issues with the bleachers last year and then we found the money so I'm just wondering at what status are we were requesting to refinish and repaint and they would love to so I'm just wondering where in the cycle they want us to consider this is this with if we're lucky enough to have leftover money in this year's budget or or does anybody know that or are we we're not adding it to the total of the budget we already have
I wouldn't think we can do that and but I mean I would think if anything we would do this through the building maintenance fund it' be typically right Eric I mean do you know kind of what the intention is here so the board of Selectmen has identified that as one of the key priorities for the building maintenance fund so presuming that fund gets funded as it's in the budget there is enough to do that so that's that's essentially currently budgeted it's not additional money the board of Selectmen did ask that at the same time we do that they they repair the overhead fans that are in the gymn gymnasium because anytime you have a super tall building Heat Rises and you get a a significant temperature stratification and the old build the building was designed initially to have fans to push that heat down to ground level so you didn't have to to run the heating system as much but they've elected not to turn the fans on because they're too noisy and the old fans weren't really all that effective so the question is do we at the same time spend
the money to replace the fans because it makes sense right you don't want to just spend $330,000 on a new gym floor and then move a bunch of heavy equipment onto there to install big fans so their suggestion is to do both projects at once it would add approximately $10,000 to the cost that combined that will take a pretty big hit of the money we have in the building maintenance fund so we will have to to shift some other priorities but that's okay we can do it that answer your question yes yes and so you're saying the 10 I don't I didn't print the the page yeah I think if I could ask Eric for some clarification so they're asking for us to there's they want to choose the quote from New England Sports floor which is about a 22,000 $23,000 quote there an additional quote for $6,000 for fans it it's not clear from this letter but I presume that that's where the 30,000 comes from no that's actually part of that is there's some additional costs that are going to be you know engendered because when you get a floor sander to do a gymnasium floor those are really large three-phase Sanders and they all start with the assumption that we have three-phase power in the gym we don't so in addition to the quote they're doing two things asking that we use a water-based finish
not an oil-based finish because ultimately they do work a little better but they're more expensive because they take more quotes So that increases the price and we're going to have to supply a three-phase generator as part of the project and have spent some money with the electrician to wire it so they were assuming that the final cost to refinish the floor was going to be up to $330,000 which is why CIP approved that the board of selectman in addition wants to spend around $6,000 to buy the fans and have Lenco you know install them the in installation shouldn't be expensive other than they will have to buy you know bring in a lift they will probably have to rent a lift because I don't think Lenco has a truck mounted lift but I don't want them driving that on the gym Flor so are we thinking time frame is if this was approved in the summer when the students aren't there is that yes what we're targeting have everything in front of me and it sounds like it would be in the next fiscal year and therefore the part of this budget for the with the building maintenance fund right not additional funding right what he said was it's in our current right budget request right
Eric am I misunderstanding that or no correct it is if the budget as approved as before you right now goes through that project is basically funded as part of the building maintenance fund so am I correct in assuming that we don't have to approve it right right now we're just going to be hopeful that we can do it I mean I unless I think I think it's approved as part of the budget at least the funding would be right right the fund okay the funding and we could certainly approve we could I I suppose we could make a motion for approval to spend the money predicated on the idea that the budget passes as in its current format for the building maintenance fund mark That's what I was leading to because if and that's fine that's what I kind of
want to do because if it doesn't pass in the same way it is we still could allocate you know we could move funds around if we thought this was a safety issue you know we are allowed as a board in Eric whoever wants to answer this question you know if we feel this is a safety issue something that really has to get done well then we'd just have to take something from somewhere else and say well this is a big priority for the town just like you do in your house old well we're going to do this this year and then something else is going to have to I mean or is that the way we go into this right we could approve it as long as everything passes and then everything's hunky dory but if it doesn't and we think this is an urgent thing then we still want to make sure it happens right yeah you know yeah so I think brought to us as it needs to
happen sorry Mark and I I get it I take safety seriously yeah so I think the the funding will come up just as part of our normal budget approval process as to whether we just approve them moving forward with the expenditure we can do that but obviously that's kind of dependent upon the funding so we can make it continues on the the funding you know the budget passing with the you know sufficient you know Building Maintenance fund additions yeah I mean you could you could do a motion and just say that you'll expend this this project out of the building maintenance fund and leave it generic and if we get through all the HVAC updates in the town hall and the fire department and get refunded by loow sipp and fast enough we'll do it in this budget cycle if not we'll do it next budget cycle but July 1 is only right after school starts so it does it almost doesn't matter but is this a safety issue is that why we're being I I want to like you said oh we can maybe do it this year and next I want to take it 100% serious this is being brought to us that they want this done this is a saf is it because of a safety issue is there pieces coming up on the floor or just
because we're trying to you know I there is a tripping issue that there that I thought I heard that thank you because it was like wavy from all the 44 years of coating it yeah some spots so they have PE in there all the time that could be a hazard and you know we had the Easter egg hunt over the weekend so that could have been potential Hazard so I don't know yeah thank you no I thought that I had heard something that there was some safety involved with it too so I I doubt it has anything to do with it but last year by now 10-year-old utterly face planted in that gym she was running across the floor just wiped out took a header concussion whole nine so yeah yeah but that's Megan she could do that anywhere so I'm not saying that right all I'm saying is that's your that's your worry right is that get really hurt yeah just to point out too that you know as it states in the in the in the request letter is fish floor is 46 years old yeah it it's time right and that's why the information is good because we want to make our decisions like what's the priority now you know okay we wanted to do this but now we've got a pivot and now we might have to Pivot because of what you guys were saying about the underground tanks like I'm not saying anything I'm just saying that this I take this seriously and that's why I ask the questions like when I'm making decisions which you know
which is going to stack up well something else can wait because that's a that's a want not a need or something so than that's all we're funded for now if we we proceed with this so that's a good thing yeah anybody like to make a motion regarding this item real quick do I need to abstain since I'm in the rec commission or I don't say that again do you need all right I don't think so I don't think there's any kind of conflict of interest and you certainly are in a good position to understand the issue I'll make the motion then to approve the gymnasium floor and the fans for $30,000 I'll second it I I actually think the bill if you improve it approve it with the fans is going to be an excess of $30,000 yeah so
that's Eric was explaining the 30,000 for the floor finishing and additional services so there's about another $6,500 for fans just approved like a $37,000 package so, installation so I would say 40,000 is probably a more re alistic estimate by the time you do that entire project okay okay okay you want to State the motion Brian sure I would like to make a motion to approve the gymnasium floor as Andover Elementary School and the gymnasium fans for $40,000 wait did we say 40 yes 40,000 40 40, all right perfect okay have a second my second okay Rob seconds do we you have any further discussion okay hearing none we'll take a vote all those in favor say I all those opposed any extensions okay thank you the motion passes the next item then is we kind of combine two items there but the item 7c which is the welcome to Andover sign you have a nice little graphic pictorial in your packet now Eric we Vis we we discussed this at one point and I can't it was a second one that we decided to to fund it was it was funded last year all right let me explain and then you can shoot holes in it proceed with your explanation I'm not trying to sway you one way or the other this is not so last
year the the EDC has tried for many years to fund welcome to Andover signs they generally continually shot down last year the board of Selectmen agreed to fund one sign which were're pretty close to signing a contract on then the economic development commission went back to CIP and said well you know you funded the last one out of last year's budget you should fund the second one out of the next budget and CIP agreed that that was a legitimate and should be a fundable you know fundable expense so and they referred it back to board of Finance to see whether you would agree with that this is not budgeted so I'm I'm going to tell you that straight out it's only you know another $4,200 so you could add it to the budget or you could I guess try to find somewhere else to but if we
are going to put up two it would be smart to have them have the guy build both of them at the same time and just tell them you know we're budgeting one for this year and one for next year so don't be expecting money for the second one until after July 1 which they would do if Board of Finance decided you wanted to fund it and Robert was on the CIP so he can probably walk you through the logic for that but that is what that is so this is not a budgeted expense I'm not saying it wouldn't be possible to find the money somewhere but that that is the
request no we could and just for the record we do not have a a firm budget so we could always add $4,000 to some line item to cover it and I think that was our thought at CIP just as Eric mentioned you can kind of have our prior funding takes care of sign number one and then we put something in this year's budget and right after when July hits we can you know fund this you know pay for the second sign the only other thing that came up with CIP and Eric I know you remember this was whether you know there was a little minor installation deta detail that Jay brought up that you know we were going to go back to the contractor I don't know if that's happened but there was going to be a little bit of discussion about how deep to bury it and whatnot but other than I don't think it was something we anticipated that would affect the project cost or affect it
dramatically so my thought be if we do add this to this year's budget to put like 4,500 just to be sure because I think it's 4250 is the request right that's that's what they gave the town for an install yeah probably to make sense to nickel and diam they off although I would where where did we fund the last purchase out of Eric we pay that out of the building maintenance fund we did we did so we would just I mean we could just add 4,500 to the building maintenance fund so the sign number two could go in that would be my thought and my gut
reaction to all of this I mean CIP approved it we agreed with the idea seems fine it's literally just the same sign you know number two where and I think that's it right I don't think Elaine's coming back for a third sign is she I hope not now there was two one was gonna be down by the old dog pound is that correct and the other one was gonna be up somewhere on 316 Eric isn't that what we said one of them will be across that was kind of strange that was great well who did that I didn't do that did I miss you pushed a button and I'm not anyway okay so I'm looking at spreadsheets I missed something good go ahead Board of Selectmen has gone back and forth multiple times about where they would allow the first sign to be put in they made a decision to do it on that little piece of town property right next to over and over so that is where the first sign is going in I don't think they have read on a location for the second sign they will have to argue with the EDC over sign location if it gets approved Eric wasn't I remember at CIP maybe this maybe I thought this was done and I guess it's not done I thought the second sign idea was at the end of
shotty Mill I think that was one of the locations that was considered but I don't think the board of Selectmen has bless any second location yet okay they tend to citate on that for a while before they make decisions and just for a little context for this discussion so our 2023 2024 budget line item for the building maintenance fund was $18,000 the 2024 2025 proposed budget line item is $100,000 so we're we're down from last year in the current proposed budget so if we going to add something in I would suggest we just round it up to the $1,000 amount we could do $105,000 right don't have to decide tonight but we certainly could if somebody wants to to make a motion to follow up on that or we can I just want to comment yep all I was gonna say is we haven't even you know I have a feeling we're
going to be having debating on the the budget we haven't even really gotten into any of that stuff yet so it's hard to to make the decision tonight based on just all the things that are going to go forward it's not a lot of money it's just that because I listened to all as you guys know I tell you that it took forever to even come up with when they want the sign so when I was at in all the debates and I'm so happy for Elaine that this has happened she's put a lot of effort and time into it but I guess I missed the I go to all these meetings so was it just at CIP that they decided let's go for a second sign because that I didn't hear at all that was last week join that literally just happened gotcha so and and I know Elaine had mentioned in the past they want two signs and of course that does all make sense if you're doing it just get it done if it's 4,000 but I'm not willing to add money to the budget yet when we I I'm thinking maybe can we find it out of another line and just kind of move it in there and you know so unless you guys want to add in and then we end up taking some out as we debate and talk I that's my only thought my thought is let's just not forget it so you know get it on the agenda in some in in a specific way or add it to the budget provisionally or something I I don't know that we want to
approve it right today when we haven't done our line by line that's what I'm saying go through the budget which I like I'm following you I agree but I think ultimately I want to approve it but maybe the idea is that we we heard it we table it for now I just if we table it I don't want to forget I don't want to get lost in the shuffle and we forgot to add $5,000 somewhere and it doesn't happen so on the agenda I kept I put a note in my in the budget file just I'm keeping track of some line item notes so you know we can I can bring that up next time we actually talk about the budget we I think we we're at the point we need to start going through line by line by line you know you know just B change that whole first page you know over
$5,000 or whatever our starting point you know that's that's my thought Rob but now we could bring it back bring it back another meeting with that notation by by me all right well if everybody's in agreement with that then then we can move on otherwise if you know somebody could make a motion but otherwise we'll we'll move on I have a question Lise is there any cost Effectiveness to doing both of them at the same time no yeah if we did them both at the same time they'll do them both for the same cost I don't necessarily know if we came back in the year we whether we' get the same cost or not right you know and
are they going to look identical if they're made different timeses that's the concern I would have now right so I mean I would say th you like the idea and you're willing to fund it or you don't you know you're not really interested in it you don't do it well we already made the decision we're going to wait on it right we didn't vote on that right we just right we're gonna we're gonna still talk about it and then once we hit our line by line stuffs I guess or whatever yeah questions okay hearing none I guess we'll move on to agenda item 8 which is the administrator's report Eric okay I'm just going to go over the stuff that's actively Board of Finance related so we did submit a grant to lsip for the route 316 connectivity project I've been told unofficially that we will get that I have not been told officially that but that's around a $2.9 million Grant so
that would be super cool if we get it still an awful lot of work that would have to happen before we get to construction so I wouldn't think you're going to see any excavators in motion for at least a couple of years but at least the funding source is secure probably what's what's the concept for the work to be done there Eric do we have a concept in design at all preliminary yeah we do basically it will be a multi-use pathway that runs from the town hall the school down the road down along Route 316 to Cider Mill Road then goes down Cider Mill Road and then picks up another pathway that runs down 316 and it makes a connection onto the rail trail just before you get to the bridge right the problem is is that even though it's a fairly short path it is an incredibly expensive thing to build because it's going to be a couple of bridges in an elevated section getting over a wetland so it's just you know but it fits right in the center of what that application is for and it's also the only project really that the town could try to fund through that particular budget or that particular Grant program because the other alternative for that is a straight road work project but we actually don't have any road roads that really qualify because we're just to rural so and I've made a number of attempts to get do to upgrade some of our roads to quote unquote be major collectors so I could fund projects on them but you know every time
I've done it made them do a traffic study the road they come back to me and say yeah no still not a major collector pound sand so that's a big Grant we also submitted a wreck Trails Grant kind of as a backup to design a second an alternative Trail if the lsip grant didn't get funded I mean my gut tells me we're not going to get that funded even though it's a really good idea recck Trails grants are incredibly over programmed and they're very hard to get so far if this one fails I will be over for for trying to get money out of the wck Trails program so but you
know you got to keep trying we also submitted a really little Grant something called a micro Grant to the Department of Transportation to fund a little Bike Share program for the Town if we get it it will be fully funded so it won't be anything that requires taxation I have no idea whether we'll get it or not but it was worth the application the next major Grant we're going after is something called The Brick Grant and my goal for that is to fund the remaining to fund a new generator for the municipal complex so one that works for the fire department the new community center and the town hall and at the same time I'm gonna
try to PO put as part of that same Grant the money to finish off the community center so it can function as an emergency shelter the the problem is those grants are really heavily weighted towards distressed community so the work around is to submit it through our Congressional or basically our state senator so we are working with Murphy's office on submitting that as a legislative appropriation at the federal level so that's not something an Avenue the town has tried before so and it it's still competitive but it's a lot less competitive to do it that way I've been told flat out I wouldn't we wouldn't get the brick Grant if we submitted it without that so that's where we're going with that so if we get that we
probably wouldn't realistically we wouldn't have the money for about a year but if it saves us you know a couple hundred thousand dollar we can spend a little time to to get that so that's going on the community center is you know coming along well they're drywalling it currently so we've passed most of the major Milestones and if you looked at the front of the building you would see it's pretty close to the final grades now and you can kind of see what it's going to look like and how it's going to lay out other than that I don't really have anything other than I did we were in discussion today with with Jed Larson from the Planning and Zoning commission and the town planner most of you know the town has been struggling to get the contractor in the owner of the gravel pit that was permitted next to the extramark on Route Six to properly finish that off I suspect the town is going to start running up legal fees forcing him to do that we've done everything we could do cheaply and we're kind of at loggerhead so I suspect we're going to end up in a lawsuit with that individual to force compliance but I don't see a lot of alternative because the abing property owner is kathern Hutchinson who's an extremely sharp legal mind and still a federal judge and I'm pretty sure that you know either we're gonna sue the owner or Katherine's gonna end up suing the town so I would rather be the suer
than the suei so that will affect the budget you know we may end up depending on whether that hits this fiscal year or next fiscal year we may end up having to shift money in around to cover legal expenses but that's basically all I have unless you have other questions or concerns for me true Eric H just a couple quick questions on the connectivity grant that we hopefully are going to get you said it was about a $3 million Grant 2.9 I think you said is that's 100% Grant it's not there's no match it is 100% it funds 100% of the construction costs it does not fund design which is why I worked really hard to get a legislative Grant to fund preliminary design and we should get most of the way through I don't know whether we'll get to final design out of the existing pool of money I have but if not we're going to get pretty close so if the town has to lay out any money for the project it will be very small it'll be design work okay yeah and then the second followup question I have for you is you mentioned you know there's a few little foot Bridges or whatever that'll have to be involved this project I it brings to mind the question of onm costs going
forward once it's built do we have any sort of sense for the order of magnitude of what we might be looking at there because that would be on us right that's not the states not going to fund our onm probably not probably that is on us although the so there is one either one or two bridges that are potentially would end up being on us afterward for maintenance you know and we are at basically adding the equivalent of about .5 miles of a single Lane to our existing 34 miles 34 and a half miles of double lane so you can think about this as roughly a 1% increase in paved surface so there is maintenance associated with that although it is lower for pathway than it is for a road because it doesn't get the weight of traffic on you're not GNA have trucks going on this thing right right but the bridge yes we would be on the hook for the bridges we would you know these are pedestrian style bridges so they are an order of magnitude cheaper than anything designed to take the weight of an automobile and we would probably be just buying you know pre-made conx steel Bridges and dropping them in on micropiling so we're not we're not trying to reinvent the wheel you just
buy those by the length right okay I just you know just something to think about you know if this happens when it happens we're years out probably but it won't be zero we'll have to build it into our budgeting for capital or whatever to keep it up presumably so yep thanks that was my follow-up question Eric I know I went to the the meeting Louise and I attended that meeting that the one you had about that and you had said well this will take clearly it's a lot of money that will be given to the town the 2.9 but this will take Town approval this would be another meeting thing that has to I know you did a lot of the preliminary work we went ahead and submitted the grant but then it has to come before the town in a meeting right because it's going to change the look of the whole in a in a beautiful way but like we said at the meeting it involves like going through people's front yards and Pathways and all of that so does it have to be approved at the meeting or no my suspicion is it does because it's similar to so the two things that trip requirement for a town meeting that are related to this would be if you know let's say they were going
to willing to fund 80% of the construction and the town was on the hook for 20 before I could accept the grant the town would have to agree to that because it's committing Town funds okay because we've basically funded design and we will have funded construction I think actually the town residents will not see any bills for doing this project I think I've managed to essentially 100% fund it which kind of astounds me but but that's a good thing well that's a great thing I just yeah okay so but the other thing that trips a requirement for a town meeting is a town meeting is required to accept a new road and I believe a multi-use so and and it's not quite analogous because usually a new road comes about because you have a subdivision and they put in New Roads as part of the subdivision and then the town has to officially accept the work and I was actually looking through the wording in the charter to see whether it was something that had to go to a town meeting I think you could argue it either way but ultimately I would prefer to go to a town meeting you know when we before we go to construction and go in with the final plans and say you know this is what we're looking to approve it's not costing you money but it does affect your town so I would hope we go to town meeting on it right and I don't want to get S I know we're getting along in our agenda and all so no thank you for that I understand that but kind of like Rob said it will eventually effect like everything else when we put up the
community center then we're going to have funding that's going to be part of budget every year and so it'd be nice to have that although it's a great get if you do it it just affects the whole look of the town too so yeah thank you for that for the explanation yep other questions for Eric okay you got anything else Eric nope that's it unless you got questions okay I guess we'll move on to item nine liaison report so sounded like you had something to talk about yeah so at CIP last week we talked about the school Plumbing now I think I mentioned you guys a couple times I gotten into this I don't think I had the full scope of it I'm not sure the school did at the time that I talked to you about it they had a repair done Eric mentioned this in the context of a you know Insurance claim but in the context of that repair I think some I think it came out that there was more damage than was realized and there are there are at least three key things that are wrong with the plumbing in the oldest section of the school that are causing leaks and whatnot one of which is a leak of sewage which is not good so the guesstimate and I I understand this to be a guesstimate a very fuzzy number is that it could be a $200,000 project give or take Eric in the in our CIP meeting Eric
mentioned that given the kind of project it is and the potential scope of it his gut is that we should get a mechanical Electrical Plumbing engineer to do kind of a full survey and work plan which might cost us oh I forget Eric what was your guest of it 15K my guess is that's going to be around 15K but I could be off on that I mean that's just based on hiring MEPS before to do something of similar scope and then once we have that then we'll know what to what to put out for RFP what to put out for you know to for bid because our understanding is that the contractor who did the spot repair his his reaction is look I can't give you a bid to tell you how to fix this unless I understand the full scope of the problem and he hasn't done the Deep dive and maybe not I don't know if he even feels qualified to do it hence the MEP solution to this it sounds like a pretty serious problem there's 70-year-old cast iron pipe involved so anyway long story short you're talking something that is significantly more expensive and also much more pressing than a parking lot based on that I think that moves into number one on the priority list for AES you know and the parking lot you know you just some some basic I think they already did it some basic you know spot repairs and let it ride because this thing is worse and needs to get dealt with in a big way you got three
bathrooms apparently that are unusable at this time in the school so step one would be when we left it last Thursday night there was a hope that the contractor who has been helping us with the problem might be able to get in Monday this week and look at it Eric did that happen I did leave a message for the plumber today he has not responded to me okay so know the school put some conditions on when he could come in to contractors get busy school has it own issues right so it hasn't happened basically is the answer well I don't know whether it's happened or not frankly okay I am following up with it and I'm also looking for actively looking for an MEP and trying to get estimates you know a couple of different ways One is using our in-house engineering firm who has an and does not have a staff MEP but has an MEP that consults for them and getting an estimate from them and then looking at a couple local contractors asking them what MEPS you
know they've worked for in the past that they found successful so my goal right now is to secure an MEP figure out what it's going to cost and get a scope of a repair scope and a repair design and also see whether we can actually get the original blueprints from right Celeste was gonna get back to you on that that's right so yeah that's the big question is we don't really know we have a general sense now of the problem I would not claim that we have the full we've delineated the full scope we we you know since the contract went in there did some repair work we now know it's worse than we thought originally when I first heard about this problem it was described to me as a $50,000 problem it's now $200,000 maybe we don't know well I mean we're already into it for $35,000 it's just the initial hit was on
the insurance company because it was an active sewage spill in a school right so exactly so now we are in the situation of you know when we're looking at the school is is supposed to be working up their Capital plan this one has to be at the top of the list you have a sewage leak you have plumbing problems you have water damage issues you know that could come from this thing right now I know there's been some repair done it may not be super acute but it's not going to I I can't imagine it's going to hold given the age and the fact that we've already have all these problems so anyway the upshot of the CI meeting was gosh this has to go at the top of the list and it has the potential to eat every dollar that the school of the town are putting in that fund this year wow okay well this is why we want to have these meetings and get the information was there a school P thank you Rob was there the school personnel there to present with you with Celeste Celeste presented it okay no that's good I mean that's what we want happen Shannon was there too but Celeste was there to to kind of explain from her perspective and then Eric chimed in with his understanding situ is is there
school generally agree on the priority at this point or based on what they know I know it's early well my understanding is that the Board of Ed has discussed it but they haven't formally agreed that the priority is not the parking lot anymore I will throw one other thing in the mix I did have a discussion with Jay Tuttle the Public Works supervisor and I said if you know because as part of the scope of repairing that we were going to go after some catch basins that are having some issues so what we did say is that even if we don't do the parking lot this year Public Works will take on the catch Basin repair and replace the Basin thops because a couple of them are sinking and we do have to bring up the grade you know so it's the parking lot works better so that will be done if we don't pave it if we do pave it that will be part of the scope of the contractor hired if we don't Public Works we'll take it on and we'll use our in-house Paving contractor to repave the areas we cut out to repair the catch Basin and just those are just the drains right those are small yeah okay so had we known that these
bathrooms weren't just to understand the problem too because now we're hearing of all these problems now that we and I glad we are we want to fix them now that the ideas of capital program you know Capital Improvements are happening so people are looking at these things clo more closely have we known Eric that they've had inoperable bathrooms for a while I know for a while enrollment was down and there was an area of the school that was shut down again huge problem I'm in definitely exactly why I want this to work you know that the emergencies need to be attended to first but all of a sudden now now we're getting into we're going to look at the whole building and you know see because that get a design plan I mean I understand these things I've seen bids in different and and I get that and it kind of secondary to what Mark said are is AES have they been reporting this has been a huge problem they've wanted this and is this their priority and I'm not saying that we have to go with that but when we get this information this is how my brain works like it's all of a sudden we've got all this and I'm definitely for the emergencies getting taken care of first yeah sounds like it's a little preliminary we probably have to get more information to really go forward for all
of us yeah so I'm just wondering when when you have something like this is it totally the board of EDS discretion on whether they fix that or not or does a town have any say the town owns the building the safety of this the students is Town's responsibility I mean where where does the board of EDS Authority like or in our the town's Authority where do they cross I I guess I'm confused about that because you talk about things like even the oil tank now that talk about earlier now that that could take president over in my mind the The Leaky bathroom because you that could be millions of dollars to clean that up I know because I know somebody that had an oil tank leak I know someone and it is huge money so I'm I'm just wondering when it comes to the property that the town owns and the safety and
the hazards and all that where does the line get drawn here the board said well we want a parking lot we don't want to fix you you know a leaky oil tank or we don't want to fix you know sewage problems so I guess I'll shut up now just ask some I think I'm G gonna guess sorry Rob you know ultimately it's got to get funded right and it's got to get funded you know kind of with the agreement of the the taxpayers and the and the you know and the board of finance and the board of aded you know and the administration all working together I think so try to get at is who who has the authority you know to prioritize and things like that and and actually this speaks to exactly the issues that Shannon and I have been trying to work out in the in the in the that Capital you know plan or rather how to use the capital funds because the state statutes and the town Charter say certain things the the state statutes carve out for the Board of Ed of Any Given Town their responsibility to for the buildings and grounds now does that mean does that include Capital does that is that do that maintenance or does that include major Capital expenditures my read of it her read of it you know this is part of the issue actually what does our Charter say and how does it lay out the the the responsibilities long story short I mean ultimately what Mark said is right we're all just going to have to come together on this but as to the question of if the Board of Ed prioritizes in a way that we
think is wrong or what have you what happens I don't know open to interpretation I would say and we could we could talk about State Statute or and Overtown Charter stuff at some point at another time but that's exactly the issue actually exact what what their Bailey Wick is and where it ends is a really important question that feeds into all of these other things that we're dealing with but this is exactly why I'm glad we want to make sure that if an emergency or a safety like Bill said Hazard yourself involved too comes for the children of the town then all bets are off right and so that's that was the only reason I asked that question I wasn't like oh let them decide I'm trying to trying to honor them like was it their priority list but also understanding if it's an emergency we've got to kind of act I would hope so that is interesting I meant to answer your question there actually I don't this is slowly kind of developed months and
months ago I think I mentioned it at one of our meetings that I had had a conversation with Val and she was telling me about this bathroom problem and that was the first time I had heard because the school has not had a capital plan right we didn't have a document in front of us to say hey Board of Finance here are our priorities and we're putting this at the none of that exist we want that to exist we want that to come into being we need that to happen but we didn't have it so what I got from this originally was Val just talking my ear off about various things at the school and mentioning to me and we have this problem in the boy bathroom at the time it was the boy bathroom specifically it was a Jal that turns out to be like a third of the problem if that it turns out there's more going on and she didn't know that at the time either it wasn't until the contractor came in to I think investigate and repair that it turns out wait a minute rro there's this that and
the other and that's what's now been brought to and and for my as far as I know our CIP meeting this week was the first time I heard that the scope had ballooned like this and Eric I don't know if you've heard if you you have a different timeline but that's my timeline okay yeah so so basically what happened is around in the mid sometime in December I was discussing a series of projects with Rick Wilson because we use my tech his Plumbing Service for some things and they're doing the community center and he asked me what we were doing about the elementary school and I said don't know what you're talking about and he said ' oh they have a really significant problem there they've got three bathrooms that are closed off there's G to end up being a really expensive repair to get that fixed and that was the first so I didn't hear about it from the school once Rick told me that that issue was occurring I went back to the school and said we've asked you multiple times for a capital plan you're not giving it to us let's at least have a meeting and figure out right now what are the issues you want to get done and what do you you
know because I know you're interested in the parking lot and I know you have concerns well I know there's a plumbing issue in some form or another that has to be dealt with let's get it all on paper so I met with Celeste and the superintendent and Steve Campbell and we talked through kind of their laundry list of things that they had concerns with and then I asked that Celeste give it back to me in letter form from the Board of Ed and say these are the issues that we anticipate having and that we know and then I walked to the building with Steve Campbell because he's the head you know custodian and asked him questions about a whole bunch of things you know and he pointed out some roof leaks and a bunch of other things we weren't talking about that are kind of on his radar you know as well as some of the sections of flat roof so you know they still need to put together a capital plan for that building so we understand and you know what we're really in for but in the short term it seems like there's two things that are you know pressing the first is that there are three sets of bathrooms in that building boy's bathroom a girls bathroom and then one of the sets of teacher bathrooms that are off limits and the plumbing has been disconnected because Rick basically said look all the cast iron Plumbing is completely rotted out in that original section of the building he said as far
as he his gut tells him that it all needs to be replaced you know so the question I had for him is is this an application where we can could consider bringing in a company to just relign them and use a polyethylene liner and he said he didn't think there was enough structural left to that to consider that but you know he also basically said look this is you know this is above my pay grate you know I'm happy to to bid on the work but you need to bring an engineer in and you need to develop a scope of work and a plan and a set of schematics and then then I'm happy to bid and do the work but until then I'm not touching it and I suspect most plumbers will be in that you know that's a this is a commercial building it's
old it's going to need prettyy extensive repairs you need an engineered solution for it understood no than that gives a great overview of course anytime you have an old structure old buildings just like you went through us with the town hall and all the repairs you know it right it's just at what time do you get the plan when you know do you right I understand the concept of don't put a Band-Aid on something and then in in two months you're going to have to just tear it all out to make the big repair it's just at what so thank you I just kind of wanted the timeline of hearing complaints or you know how big the problem had gotten if it had been a real inconvenience at the school or what's been going on you know so you said December and no sounds good I mean this is why we started the capital plan and why emergencies need to be attended to first so I'm good on all of that there's nothing more we can do on it tonight but thanks for all the overview yeah so heads up everybody y okay thanks Rob anything else from the board leaz on reports okay we'll move on to board open discussion does anybody have anything specific to bring before the board we haven't already discussed I was just gonna say nothing nothing long I thought and I'm sure you were going to bring this up too and Eric usually does at the end you know kind of to set our tone for our is it next
Wednesday I don't have the calendar we have another budget Workshop meeting correct because we you know we did a pretty good timeline for tonight so we'll get ready for that my only request was going to be I know Mark if you agree on this or you think this is too preliminary obviously we'll be all of us will be bringing our questions or maybe items that we want to talk about a couple that I'd like to see come before the board is and I I was trying to open my spreadsheet on the side I know there's a couple things that Eric remind me you know how we said we wanted to hear from the people so I know that the town clerk we had done a big thing last last year and we sign she got a significant raise you know welld deserved and we're glad about that I forget if she had a another big request so I was at some point maybe at talk to her that doesn't have to be next week but is it the regist of Voters Eric someone else requested kind of a significant thing so I was just going to ask to hear why because I know we significantly raised them last year too I think it's because they we have additional voting days we have to we have to fund them because of the state requirements right so I will I will look at it it wasn't opening for me while I was listening to other things so if I have any specific questions I'll get back to that those
two came to mind just to get the rationale but maybe maybe it's not needed once I look at it and you know review so Mark do you want me to respond so I did ask the town clerk I told her that you would probably want to speak to her at the next meeting because I know you had said in a previous meeting you wanted to talk to the town clerk so she is expecting to be at the next budget meeting which I think is the thir yes is the third week right and I also told Jed Larsson because I know you some of you had expressed some significant concern about the open space fund so I thought it appropriate that you hear directly from the chair of the Planning and Zoning Commission on why they think funding that is appropriate if you want to talk to the Reg at the next meeting I will tell them that they need to be on I will tell you that let me review it tomorrow you know unless other people do I'll review the figures tomorrow and see I thought it was a significant increase so I was just gonna because I knew we had significantly increase them last year too so right I just try to get it in there the regist is up significantly although remember because we separate out Revenue and expenses we are we do have extra Revenue in from the state to pay for that but
part of the problem is we are now required to have early voting you know instead of one day of voting like for the presidential preference primaries which are going on right now and you can come vote tomorrow if you want I already voted but that's really expensive because instead of Staffing for one day we're Staffing for five days and when we get to the actual presidential elections we will be Staffing for 15 days instead of for one day as in the past so it is a lot more expensive yeah yeah those were my only thoughts I guess we'll get back into the budget things yeah when we get to that line on them we should put a notation in you know like okay this is going up by X but we're receiving y from the state and then we can really that's how you evaluate you know what's the
net than that any other questions for the board board open discussion are there anything else specifically that you want me to have prepped for you or get you additional information ahead of time for the next budget meeting can we have till Friday to get that to you that request to you Eric well Friday is technically a holiday right this is true I will be working the morning of Friday because I have two commitments but I don't want to work any longer than I have no no I mean then I'll try to have if I have any requests but I mean I know we receive our packets the day before so I'm just I just need a
little bit of time not always but I mean I think anything we can get to Eric in advance even if you don't think about it until Monday or Tuesday he's just going to help him prepare a little bit because we're going to ask him one way or the other so you know even if he doesn't have a chance to research it before Wednesday's meeting it at least gives him a little bit of heads up so you know us Sooners better and the only thing I would say about next week is we really probably need to start rolling down through these line by line you know there's a lot of lines I don't think we want to spend much time on the ones that are you know $500,000 or no change but I think that the any the significant changes Eric's already addressed the top 10 but I think we need to start rolling down and just make sure we're comfortable with them and if there's any that are people are concerned about let's let's try to iron it out and start start knocking it out like you know and then you know we've got to get through this you know it's it's there's nothing super surprising we've already talked about the big changes but we do need to start running running it down okay sounds good right just because it's board Open disc discussion I don't know if if one idea that I thought we could look at to generate some more time potential revenue for the town I don't
know if anybody else saw this but I see that the town of tand they I think it's their Conservation Commission is now issuing permits to trap Bigfoot for $10 each and I gotta tell you there's enough enthusiasts out there that if we try to set something like that up see that there's some real opportunity I like it throw that one before the board of Selectmen I think we to added a line item in the budget good ones trapping permits so that's our little joke for the end of the day yeah all right do anybody have anything else if not we will our next agenda item is correspondence I don't have anybody have any other correspondence we haven't discussed public speak looks like we still do not have any members of the
public in attendance okay I guess we will entertain a motion for adjournment I make a motion to Bill makes a motion Louise seconds any discussion all those in favor say I I any opposed any abstentions okay thank you very much folks I appreciate it have a good holiday