everybody let's go ahead we'll we'll call this meeting to order this is the town of Andover Board of Finance regular meeting for March 26 2025 for recite the Pledge of Allegiance a pledge allegiance to the flag the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation visible with liberty and justice for all okay thank you I guess could open up to public speak I don't see anybody other than Wall-E Eric is that what you're seeing that's all I see yeah okay well he'll have a chance to speak so if that's okay with you w we'll go ahead and proceed I'm just here for Section seven Mark okay the next item is changes and additions to the agenda so we will entertain motions to change the agenda the one thing I would suggest is that we might think about moving section 71 which is the fire department commission budget discussion up so Wally can talk talk to us about that and then he can head out if he chooses that way he's not stuck through the
whole discussion anybody have any other suggestions or changes Joanne yeah I didn't know if if more people were involved were here and AES Personnel were here to discuss the request I was going to do the same thing but since they're not here it looks like we can keep that as is and yeah I think yeah I'm good with that thank you great idea okay I guess I'll just normally I don't make a motion as chair but I'll make a motion just because this is procedural to to put under under item three we'll change it we'll add item four which is item 41 which is the fire department of commission budget discussion so everybody do I have a second on that Bill thank you anybody else when when did you move it to Mark sorry I would I would just do it next perfect y yeah so it would be basically 41 yeah or 31 right four is executive three is changes and additions so it would technically be another agenda item okay no I just see executive session under four unless I'm looking at
the wrong thing yeah well it is but it would normally move to five and then five to move to six so we okay thank you re number like that yeah oops Got It other discussion or questions okay all in favor say I I any opposed any extensions okay so moved so we will go ahead and I don't think we have any no other additions or changes recommended okay we'll go ahead then W you can you can we'll have give you an opportunity to kind of explain this Eric do you have the Fire Commission budget oh I've got it in front of me if you want me to share yeah you can share it that's probably easiest I can pull it up if not I've got it right here okay so this is pretty straightforward it's fairly simple and straightforward looks like you're you're looking for a fairly flat budget there Wall-E and you know it's because one of the things that kind of made us made us kind of I think two things
that the board had had questions on is just kind of what are some of these items used for and is there any particular rationale to the changes there must be something driving vehicle maintenance for example equip equipment maintenance that kind of thing you know to me I guess looking at electricity is electricity and that's a lot of money but it is what it is I'm assume that's based kind of on History Telecom is probably just what your costs are propane is that for heating yes it is that's all we use propane for heating the building okay gas and Diesel obviously for the vehicles and apparatus yep Building Maintenance so you got about $20,000 fair amount of money there what what typically does that cover okay that takes care of everything on the exterior of the building and the interior of the building we paint different sections each year we maintain the plumbing the heating system the bathrooms anything that has to be changed things like UR or toilet bowls that break that have to be changed that's all in that budget changing light bulbs anything to do with the building or the actual grounds is within that building maintenance budget does that tend to be flat year to year or do you guys end up with big expenses occasionally or normally it doesn't vary very much if we have a good year without things breaking down we put money towards like painting a room or something else else that needs it but
it does seem to operate fairly well at a flat level well are there any specific items that that we know about for this year for the building maintenance no not other than our normal routine maintenance items and the lawn care and whatnot the exterior of the building we just did some painting inside this year and there may be another section where we're gonna do some touch-up painting in one of the rooms do you have maybe a detail report w-e to show the detail of how that $20,000 is spent not really to be honest give us okay as the year goes progresses and we have costs that come in that are associated with the building maintenance we authorize those expenditures but we don't have a real breakdown that we plan each year to do X Y or Z you don't typically I would think for the kind it's fairly simple straightforward accounting you do you you don't separate accounts or things like that this is basically your account
that's correct each of these are the line items that we utilize as a Fire Commission to charge back to kay and what what is pro teac cloth protective clothing protective Gear helmets boots gloves that's protective [Music] gear and FF supplies Wally firefighting supplies H nozzles adapters anything associated with firefighting that either needs to be replaced or is purchased new to upgrade something and Joan you had your hand up before I'll go ahead I just wondered because I like to learn about the town Wally and any given day how many people like are at the fire St are there people there every day no what no there are no people at the firehouse we have no paid
Personnel yeah strictly volunteer yeah the tones go out to respond to a call people respond to the Firehouse but there's no one sitting at the firehouse waiting for a call on a regular basis sure unless there's something going on at the firehouse itself and that kind of that just kind of helps us you know I was thinking that out loud right that that answers the question so obviously it's a beautiful building from the outside I've never been inside but right everyone's volunteers you have how yeah so there's not people there and so it's not used a lot right hopefully we hope they're not fighting fires every week or every day so our call volume has increased this year dramatically from the last two years so there are people in and out and if you've never seen the firehouse this Sunday I believe is Carol Le's retirement which is being put on by the fire department and if you want to walk into the building and see what it looks like you're more than welcome I appreciate that I don't want to crash the party or no I just I like to see different things and and know how often they're used and all of that and it just goes along with all the questions no thank you Wally and again every Wednesday night they have a drill and if you're in the area around 7 o'clock you can stop in and they'll give you a tour of the firehouse show you the fire apparatus show you anything you want to see and once our weekly meetings are
done that would be nice we I know I was thinking the same thing yeah last question I was going to ask was cost recovery Wally what is cost recovery okay for every time a firefighter responds to a call he earns a point for every drill he attends he earns a point for every meeting he attends he earns a point all of these points are put together and twice a year they take the total number of points and they have $7,000 to divide by the total number of points each firefighter that responds let's say you went to 50 calls and 10 meetings you would get a cost recovery check equivalent to let's say $100 to help cover your cost for your gas vehicle maintenance any clothing that you dist destroyed a fire or an ambulance call that's what the cost recovery was put in place four years ago thank you yep and are there years Wally that you have you know hopefully we have some lean years where you're not and I understand your volunteer you they all go out like when there's car crashes and all that kind of things as well like for safety so I know it's not just fires in town we get that are there years that you're like okay we have $167,000 budget but we really didn't use it all
has that happened quite a bit it has happened we have years where things like the vehicle maintenance we just got rid of two vehicles and we're getting a new one this year hopefully so we decided we could reduce the vehicle maintenance budget last year we didn't have a lot of vehicle maintenance we had a good year things go up and down and equipment maintenance that saw an increase last year because all the vendors are charging more of an hourly rate they're all charging us a fuel charge because if they have to drive from wherever to the Firehouse to do the service we're paying a fuel cost so our costs have increased and that sort of a thing last year we did return money to the town I don't have the exact figure I think it was around $3,000 but if we have money at the end of the year we always turn it back in at the end of the year no thank you I I mean I imagine it varies right yes it does yeah we've been very fortunate that we've never had a
big problem where we've had to go back to the board of the finance in the middle of a year to ask for more money because we try and work our budget so it lasts us all the way till the end of June that's great follow-up question just because you're here and I appreciate your time I know that you came on earlier and we already covered it immensely but I just want to make sure that when we come to the time to vote on it that whole countertop or cabinet replacement this is for the firehouse somewhere in that somewhere in that building that sits there okay yes okay in like a kitchen is that what we're great because I love I do like f you know obviously if there are people there you have to have a kitchen to feed them and all that yeah Wally showed us there's two different spots go ahead Wally I'm sorry right because CIP right or something you guys yeah CIP looked at this the cabinets are for the kitchen the countertop is for the kitchen and the watch room where the radio sit where they do all the report writing that counter has actual damage to it from all the years of service so the two counters we're looking at are the kitchen and the watch room the cabinets are just for the kitchen itself and the kitchens and the
cabinets are in a horri I'm just thinking for a building you know you've already talked about it they're because they're old they're just in a bad it's not a building that's used all the time and I you're trying to revamp it so it but they're in bad shape pretty much yeah they are they're showing their age again the building was built in 89 and they are showing their age and to be perfectly honest when it was built they weren't topshelf cabinets if Serv Joan when we went through yeah there's at least a couple cabinets where the doors are they don't actually hang right anymore you know you know it's not a complete disaster area in there or anything but it makes sense to to do this you know if it wasn't this year you know next year you know that kind of thing but you're not going to put this off for any significant period of time I don't think I think I think we all looked at it and we're basically satisfied the CIP committee I mean we're basically satisfied that some work needed to be done in there just FYI no I appreciate I mean since he's here I figure take ADV and learning that it's not used all the time no thank you looks like Liz sorry Markel am I right in that that would be covered in the current Year's budget or is that going to be budgeted for this budget season that we're working on now that's a capital expense so I think
it's in the I thought that they had said it's already in that building fund But Eric or Mark or Eric will answer but I'm pretty sure it's already in there I thought so Liz that's expected to be paid for out of the building maintenance fund and we currently have the money to cover that within the building maintenance fund I think that's what I said too Liz But Eric Eric yes gotta yep got it any other questions for Wally on this can I am I allowed to ask him since he's here of his free will thank you Wally I did ask a question last week about the elections and I know you're part of that too reg you know or elections and I know there was kind of a I don't have it in front of me there was a little bit of a sizable increase and I had asked Eric the question he said it should go to you or
someone okay I'll explain a piece of that let me just and thank you Wally yeah it just seems like it's it's a non-election year so I didn't know why the bigger increase this particular year thanks Wally the state is going to dump two brand new systems on us whole new voter registration system we're getting brand new tabulators that are not what we have now so we have to go through training we have to train our people in how to use all of these and somewhere in the fall we're supposed to talk about another brand new system that's going to go into effect in early 2026 so between the time that we have to sit in the office and actually utilize these systems and get fluent in the
operation of them and one system in particular the new voter registration system is going to require us to take every address and Handover and tie it into a global positioning pin so I've got 2200 voters in Handover and for each one of these voters sometime within the calendar year we're going to have to sit and adjust every voter's address to a GPS location so our workload is exploding with all these wonderful new systems the state has so yes the the two registra are going to have to put in a lot more hours to handle all of these things as well as all the early voting and other
things that come down the road where we have to spend the time time before the election getting all the paperwork in place getting everything to the Secretary of State's office lining up our people to work so our workload has increased dramatically that's a great explanation having you here like two seconds like that thank you that you explained it perfectly appreciate that Wally all right Mak sense any other questions for Wally Louise yeah that's not a question it's more of a I think I speak for all of us we thank you for your service Wally and all your all the f fighters and all the staff associated with that that's all right I'll pass that on to the chief so we can pass it on to the membership please do thank you y thanks for coming back again Wally we appreciate it it's okay you didn't beat me up too bad I didn't mind it at all thank you thank you we need our brain to expand yeah that's good that's helpful yeah okay thank you okay good very good thank you everybody yeah I would just say one of the things
I've really appreciated about our fire department is we are one of the few fire departments that have been able to maintain enough of a volunteer basis or enough of a volunteer base to to run essentially 100% volunteer and if you look at the budget for the Fire Commission the entire Fire Commission it's basically the same as one resident state trooper which is another way of saying if we had to hire a professional fire you know if we had to actually hire an employee to do that every employee is going to cost us within directs today close to what we're paying for the whole operation so good point it's not a bad deal it really is the yeah yeah I I think I wanted to Echo that too and that's the one comment I was going to make having kind of been involved with the fire department in Suffield my prior life the the cost here is you know peanuts compared to what it takes to run either a semi staff or even a larger volunteer Force so they're really doing a pretty good job I think for with what with what they're doing so I think my only comment that I would like to make is you know many members of this board have asked for you know excruciating levels of detail when it comes to AES but there's no detail in this budget and I'm all for the fire department and I know what everybody's saying right now but I would just appreciate a little more detail I mean it's just flat round numbers 20,000 15,000 it just looks like but there's no actuals I think if
we just had actuals you know for something from last year over the years and it just seems like remember they don't have a Treasurer bill you know I agree with you completely it's just just broad brush no detail and again we harped on Valerie we want detail detail detail but right here it's just broad brush that's why I asked those questions bill I agree with you I tried to understand it's an empty building we don't have people in there every day those are my ways of saying the same thing yeah we're and tear but no one's ever there a fire call comes in all go out new bathrooms right and again I support this and yeah my hats off to all these volunteers I would just like to see a little more $20,000 for billing maintenance I'm like okay agreed good point I know I just I know I think we need to about a resolution for it bill you know how do we get better detail I agree I think you say the same thing to Wally that You' said to Valerie where's the detail but again I support the fire department and I don't want I do too you know the next time there's a fire and it's in my house they're not gonna show up I don't know but I just think holy crap there's no detail here we should ask how does this get paid Eric there must be some kind of account I would
think if I this is me if I was the treasurer and we were having a meeting like this or anybody I could run the report that goes with this like I are we supposed to ask for that like Bill brings up a good point there must be there's account lines I just want to there's account lines that are attached to all of this because I think this is Town money there should be a report in the system like if I was doing a report at my school I'd say okay let me run a report of you know Fire Commission let's do the expenses let's put it in Eric you want to go ahead and respond because it's not in our system right so sure so the fire department has their own checking account the town of Andover makes two payments a year to the fire department and at the end of the year they send us their reconciliation to be placed in with the audit we do not reconcile them independently as a town they are their own essentially entity but why I mean I'm sure we're all GNA say this why is that a require to me I would think the leaders up here need to see all of that and then that's just easy that there's no oversight of what's being spent we're not complaining we've all given them their flowers there isn't oversight that oversight just isn't you it is the board of fire Commissioners just like the and Library I'm a volunteer Eric not my questions aren't confrontational right I'm just giving a lot of time to my volunteer position here and I piggybacked on what you know just because I want to ask questions are because like everyone said I don't
oversight so you're saying they can't the town can't ask for this it's just the fire whatever you just said that oversees them they say yes or no but the town supplies the funds I mean theoretically the town could take all of that inhouse and cut all of the checks for the fire department we could cut all of the checks for the library you know for that matter we could cut all of the checks for the school but we don't if the board of Finance made a decision that you wanted to bring all that in house you know we would start down that process but we're going to need more you we don't have the Personnel to do that right now so that would be something you know we would have to discuss in terms of that's a it's a good
discussion that's all I want is a good discussion I didn't know that until today and I've been on the board and I put a lot of time in I knew that when there was trouble and I don't mind saying that out loud that you it had broken away and AES now does theirs because of some of the audit trouble and all of that and I don't want to get into the Weeds on this but I didn't know that the Fire Commission or that the library did their own it just seems like if we have a treasure and we have an assistant that it'd be easy oversight of the money for those two things so I learned again tonight I I never pretend to know all I didn't know that I know AES had trouble and then you broke off and gave them the that responsibility did anyone else know that I didn't know that no I did know that yeah I knew it yeah okay febrary budget is a fairly small budget this is you know a bigger budget so I'm not sure that tonight is the right time to talk no it's not I but I learned and I don't want to keep maybe needs to be looked at and again to Eric's Point 167,000 seems like a deal like you say compared to one f one what do you call it
state trooper I'm just saying it doesn't like we have any at all it's just $20,000 again for building maintenance it just seems like a lot but for people that are never there but I agree it up later on I agree that's all I just would love to see a little more detail but that's fine so Eric when they get audited they run over to the Fire Commission and they have to bring over all the the receipts and all of that no the the Fire Commission gives us all of that to pass off to the auditor yes okay okay that's it I don't want to make it a big deal no I like to learn more thank you thank you thank you okay I'll stop sharing this then if we're kind of done with okay so the next agenda item would be to go into executive session so Joan this is your request you want to make the motion to go into executive session I
make I make the motion to go into exec session as a board first and it's it has nothing to do with Eric or I want to make that publicly said I just wanted to to bring him in after I kind of want to say a couple things to the board and what oh here I am like take an oath sorry is that okay I mean how are we doing this yeah yeah we make a motion to move into executive session then everyone would need to agree and at this point it's just going to be the board and add Eric back in so Eric do you need to give me ability to host then or co-host yep you are now the host so you can do whatever you want the only thing I would suggest is that whenever you go into executive session you state the reason why because you don't have un to go into executive session so why don't you go ahead and yeah that's that's a good point so Joanne do you want to State make a and state the reason I'd like to make a motion to go into executive session because I have just some Personnel issues that involve finance and that's the reason the board of Finance is you know having an executive session yeah to discuss a couple things with the board and then then we'll go back out of the meeting we can call Eric in whatever we decide to do okay anybody second one second I saw Louise's hand up first okay Louise second saw any discussion I just want to say because we're respecting anybody that could get discussed or any items that I just want to bring forth you can't say in public
we're being we're on TV so but he wants you know I want to be fair to the public that watches these meetings yeah that's one of the few reasons we can go into executive session so all right all those in favor I any opposed any exstension okay we'll move into executive session we're going to stop recording now we will start recording when we come out of executive session and everyone will be placed in the waiting room except for the Board of Finance okay right Mark and you're the one who asked to stop the recording yep got it peace this stuff okay we'll go ahead and continue then all right thank you everybody that discussion is concluded no action to be taken at this point in public I think that takes us to item 5A which is review of budget to actual we kind of need Eric for that one yeah I looked at it briefly didn't have a lot of time but did take a look at I don't know if anybody had any specific questions I'll be right back yeah un I didn't five minutes but yeah get to do as much as I wanted to with that today I think we got yesterday or late yeah yeah unfortunate on my end but we're already at March right so we have three more I know it's crazy right
three quar of the Year through this this fiscal year I mean that one me lost LGE what's that that one meeting we lost is just you know it was so tight already I know I know I know no but while we're waiting for Eric this would be a good question to bring up because I was thinking of this today we were talking about the we have this meeting is our regular meeting we have the hearing next week and the hearing Mark is we'll have members of the public and we'll we'll take their feedback from the we won't have a document that goes to the public yet just saying it for everyone's you know those what I found out when we were trying to figure out the date for the meeting and what needs to be prepared ahead of time is they won't do the actual spreadsheet of our final budget you know probably a couple days before the 9th you know so we we do have we don't have a lot of time we're we're now we're running out but we do have next week to have the hearing get some
feedback and still make some additions Corrections whatever we need to do yeah typically what we do is we have this thing pretty close to where we want going into the hearing right we have the hearing listen to any public comment and at at that point we can entertain motions to change any line items if you don't then we typically will pass a recommended budget that'll be presented to the town meeting so we typically do that at the same meeting we have the public hearing okay and I really don't want to schedule another another meeting if if I know but I feel personally because we missed one that that's where we are you know I think I feel like we're a little bit of a week behind of where we should be and I mean we'll get there I hear what you're saying and it's it's I think it can be fast with what we want to do like you said we can make motions and do things then but as far as the preparing the budget the paper things like that I was told you know that final spreadsheet when we have all the corrections and make sure it's correct then they print it out for
the meeting yep that's right Eric where we are is the budget actual didn't see any red flags there I don't know if you have anything you need to Eric nothing significant at this point overall we're okay okay there is a major concern there is also the check register that's in there if anybody has any questions on that I had a lot of questions on that actually okay let me get my book you are you GNA bring that up marked by any chance or no I can sure that would be great it just makes it easier for me anyway I looked at it earlier but it's nice if we look at it together I should probably know the answer to
this but in the beginning well let's see I'll go by date January 13th what is the liability check EFTPS January 13th hang on January 13th liability check EFTPS it's a' 06 Connecticut 9,480 is [Music] so it's a good question it's one of our what's the what's the company Liz what's the line I'm sorry it's a January 13th liability check the name of the company is FPS 9,000 9,482 off the top of my head I don't know looks like it's one of our standard a payments so I'm liability EFT is probably electronic funds transfer PS might be the recipient so yeah my gut feeling tells me that that is probably our no it can't be that I don't know I'll 27th oh same thing it comes again January 7th the same amount yeah y little more then there's leading Ed construction what is that 6,39 for on 129 so that is the final reconciliation of the bills between the
town and the contractor the general contractor for the community center okay okay and then I wonder if this is s is related to January 29 restaurant equipment Paradise is that Community Center too that is for the community center that is the kitchen equipment for the community center okay and then I saw a fund transfer January 31st anybody else feel free to jump in I'm un I didn't have a chance to to go you're you're asking questions I I don't have any questions I didn't have the time this coule okay I have an answer for your first question there I just looked up the EFTPS and it's a it's a service offered free by the US Department of Treasury the site allows clients and partners to exchange files for a single debit State Levy or insolvency applications so is that like a general type of charge that we have to pay that is a lot of money sure is no that's a payment to somebody yeah even though it's PS okay all right I mean there's a there's a invoice or a fund or some type of account reference on there so she'd have to check it out and see all right and then asking about this transfer on February 3rd the funds transfer 14,000 no January 31st a million a million 400 looks like
yeah oh yeah oh is like yeah so those funds are what that's us putting money into and out of the stiff account that's what I figured yep that much money yep so we hold as much money as we can in the stiff account we transfer back and forth when we have to okay that's what the TC January 2025 is yeah correct okay okay and then on February 12th no that's not that's that can't be because it wouldn't be an odd number TC oh TC is tax collector so that's money that's going into the general fund from yeah it's a positive amount positive amount deposits from the the tax collector oh okay yep that's not money back in in the 501 that is the the 501,000 that would be one of the payments for ECS or educational cost sharing you're talking about a 131 here and that's a plus again to pay yeah yeah so it's payment from the state okay okay what is the US Postal Service for $500 so we have a bulk mail postage
account that we have to put money into regularly whenever we send out either Every Door Direct or other mailings to town residents so okay so we run a pretty big postal fee every year okay and I'm wondering why why there's a 367 fee bill for Andover Pizza on February 12th because if there was a party I wasn't invited you got it 10 years older that probably would have been one of the senior luncheons 10 years older years old probably 30 years older for you Liz but wa wait what's 30 years older yeah you will be invited to those I'll give you a compliment yes oh oh thank you to Young about those things you're way too young to be thinking about thanks thanks wish I I wish that was true okay
so so you think that was a senior center thing or senior thing I'm assuming that was an expense for the senior Cent senior senior lunch is what that is yeah probably it's about the right amount oh and then there's on February 25th there's three February 25th there are three bills three payments for $17.99 one to Andover congregational one to the scouts and one to Andover food pantry sure so the town is the fiscal sponsor for something called cart which is collect andover's recyclable Treasures so when you take your bottles and cans to the transfer station those get
turned into the Redemption Center the money comes to the town the town semiannually Cuts checks back to the organizations that actually do the work so that's not tax dollars that's them the town the fiscal sponsor for the group that does that oh that's interesting I never knew about that that's cool and what is on the next line what's Avenue Enterprise Solutions so that is the software in use by the town clerk's office then annual subscription you know well there's annual subscriptions and then there's occasional costs depending on what they're doing they handle all the the they're basically the records keeping group the records keeping firm for the town clerk for all the electronic records economy home I'm sorry go ahead Mark no I was just asking if there's any others yeah there's a lot here economy Home Improvement what's that for economy
Home Improvement was part of finishing off the kitchen in the community room we basically had one large Bill and that was to the equipment supplier and two smaller bills one was to a carpenter the other one was to the plumber that hooked everything up okay so that represents the Carpentry Services for that it's Nathan Jacobson is the town Consulting engineer we pay them for a whole range of things one they're doing the design work for the recreational field improvements and and getting that to be a bitable project secondly they are doing the design work for the bridge replacement for Long Hill Road so we pay them for both and and just looking at it I can't tell you exactly which pool that particular one is going to it gets allocated in different pools depending on what they're I I just like to be able to recognize who it is sure and then Fe March 5th Cargill Cargill Inc who are they yeah they're are they're are salt supplier actually oh yeah we're into them for a pretty big tune every year
for salt okay yep Circa we buy around two million pounds of salt for down roads every anybody else question the yeah the QuickBooks payroll service that's on March 11th is that payment to employees or is that so it's 27,999 is that you'll see those periodically every every yeah that's couple weeks that's that's payment to employees because we don't list the direct deposit for each individual check okay so all right that's what I kind of thought it was I was hoping that's what it was yeah y I was hoping we weren't paying this company that much money is what I was no QuickBooks is our payroll service we actually have it's kind of annoying but we have two things we have a Time Clock service
and then we have QuickBooks because when we switched to QuickBooks we didn't want to from a company called Prime pay we didn't want to have to buy all new time clocks and go through it so we still pay Prime pay just for the fingerprint scanner time cards or time verification system and then we do payroll and QuickBooks okay I I'm think I'm good with everything else unless anybody else has anything other questions from anybody again we can always if you have specifics later you can always come back and drop Eric an email and you can look it up what up by me no cover quite a bit thank you okay our next agenda item then will take us to the new business over where do we have anything in here Eric listed specifically yeah we do yeah we have a single overe expenditure right now in the senior center programs basically the original budget was 3,000 and so that wasn't really under Tessa's control until January 1st and the problem is is that they ran up a really big Bill at the Christmas party which decreased the amount of money available in that pretty significantly so that one one I thought it was appropriate to Grant a request to run that back up to, 1500 or add an additional 1,500 because the budget Tess was working on you know got blown out of the water by one large bill that was not under her
control where did that money come from the 1500 well it'll probably just either at the end of the budget process if there's Surplus in other areas of the senior budget it would will get transferred in from there first and if not then it will either be taken from contingency or based on a recommendation from the treasur it'll be taken from another department that's over under this is really just informational for us at this point correct correct so if you remember Pere policy you know individual line items up to $2,000 over I'm allowed to sign for them beyond that it's out of my control and I have to forward it to board of Selectmen or Board of Selectmen and board of finance and then what we would do at the end of the year end of the fiscal year we would T typically take all of the small movements between funds and line items and just approve them in at one spell swoop okay okay any further questions for Eric on this okay Kim no no okay and next up we have the request for the elevator upgrade so I think you were all copied on this letter this is from the superintendent or I'm sorry the Board of Ed there's a explanation of of a upgrade that they want to do to their elevator
this is used every day blah blah blah it's an aging system so they basically want to upgrade it to current control systems for about $22,000 so it's not inexpensive so this would be a transfer from the capital account so you know it doesn't affect our budget in any way in order affect any of the Town specific accounts but they're asking for approval to to make this transfer the only question I had Mark can are we up for questions yet yep go ahead it's up for discussion so now so it's a repair right so it's not a purchase or anything like that it's a repair correct are we I think you call it an upgrade upgrade they've got older older you know older control systems that as I well know often these things will they you nurse them along until you can't and sometimes you're caught in the middle of having to try to do something but so basically they're trying to upgrade older control boards components which you can't service anymore it's just the way of the world to a newer control system is this probably allows them to avoid you know replacing the the system but it allows you know they can they can upgrade the the hardware that they have there so and I guess I was just going to ask the people that are experts in that kind of field because I know nothing about it does it seem fair and reasonable because I'm just reading it as we go and I read it before I'm just refreshing my memory we are asking the BF to vote to approve the transfer of the money oh sorry we do have TK elevator as our
maintenance contractor okay so and know the quality of their service one company failed to issue a competitive quote saying so this this is fair and reasonable for anybody that knows these kind of items I guess is my question I'm not I'm not an expert at all in this I can only relate one story we just had an elevator repaired at the church I go to it was $100,000 to have this elevator repaired I don't know what was wrong with it I don't know what they did to it it's not a new elevator but it was $100,000 to get this elevator working again after it quit the bed so I I really don't know if this is a good price but it seems not bad compared to what we just spent at our church for elevator repairs so I I really don't know other than that
is 12 for bid the only that was my question as well it looks like they worked with three different people here they got quotes fromone aligned and TK right but they didn't they didn't provide those oh they didn't provide those other bids which we've seen with other projects usually all the bids are included yeah I think it would be helpful to see them and I don't recall I was talking about this at CIP or anything so I have nothing to add I don't have any expertise at all with elevators so yeah I mean no idea I'll I'll just say that from my standpoint it looks reasonable they've got a history with a vendor you know I have no reason to doubt that they wouldn't do the right thing with their own money as money is really for the school Capital thing so you know I personally if it was a town thing I'd want to see the other the other things but I'm I'm going to leave
that fiduciary function to the board of that I guess with you know with their fund I I think it's it's okay I'm you know they've got got to vested interest in preserving as much of that as they [Music] can I think the amount is reasonable especially after what bill just said yeah three or four years ago we got a quote to put a little tiny elevator to do a you know have access to our second floor at work and it was like 150,000 for a new one so 100,000 to repair one just makes my hair C I can't even imagine what it would be like put a new one in now I actually think was 140,000 to be honest with you but I just this just seems cheap to me but not cheap but reasonable yeah right and it's you know if you look at the actual explanation it's not that it's malfunctioning you know it it's that they have an obsolete control board right so that's why it's cheaper which good you know if that keeps its lifespan going you know I'm fine with it proactively trying to upgrade it replace yeah I think it makes a lot of sense I would make the motion if I could to approve it to approve the 29080 okay Rob seconds any further discussion all those in favor say I I I I okay any opposed Kim okay any abstentions
no we still have Louise right I can't see him I don't see Louise either I don't see Louise did she leave us no oh there she is there she is there you are Louise you're back okay you voted yes right yes I would see more detail okay motion passes six to one thank you everybody okay so we go on to the next item which is there's the work repair blah blah okay so this is [Music] this is the request to move the a AES Surplus to the capital so three so the audit completed we have $36,988 Surplus I actually want to make one point here yeah just so that you're aware is that what this letter says is they have $360,000 Surplus above and beyond the 2% yeah the 2% so they actually have a $440,000 surplus what you do with that information is up to you but I think it's actually more than that I think it's 455,000 if you do the math I I haven't seen the report but if you do the math it's it's it's a lot it's like a 10.5% surplus is any of that Eric and I don't know if you know this but is any of that due to that came in or I don't I don't know anything you don't know well you know a lot that I don't know Eric not related to the school I'm sorry that's not my the one thing that is good about this like we've all said with having the Surplus go into transfer it into the capital fund right the AES Capital fund like they they had talked about I just want to make sure I'm reading it yep and
yeah just I had a little copy over here and that was the goal that we had had when we had our meetings together yep you know in enticing having money Transit forward in there for the projects that are upcoming yes it's a big surplus of course so that that is nice that we're I think Rob had mentioned this in a meeting it's kind of the trust issue that we can transfer These funds into that fund because there's projects coming up big projects coming up yeah especially for this year you know and so it's one of those things where it seems like a big Surplus but it's not a bad thing this year right it worked out in a good year it worked out in a good year
but yeah it does seem like a lot of money and again I would like to know if there was grants or whatever but I guess I'd just be happy that we have the money to pay for some of these big projects I think you know yeah my take on it was you know this is this is kind of our agreement that any any surplus we would move in if we we would see this consistently like over a second year then I think that's something that the public needs to be aware of when we're setting the school budget right that you know I mean it's not a bad thing to have basically a capital fund for the school it's a good thing but it needs to be baked in and understood you know where that's coming from how how how how much it is what the capital plan is you know which you know we still probably need to go more detail on I'm personally in favor of approving it because that's our agreement but it is something that we have to kind of keep an eye on yeah do we have to have a motion to approve it I think we do yeah I make the motion to approve it okay anybody second it I'll second the motion to move the AES C you know Surplus money from or the amount stated there the capital account to the AES capital account thank you yeah further discussion hearing none all those in favor say I I I I any opposed any extensions okay Liz is going to abstain so the motion passes six to0 to one
thank you okay now we come to our favorite subject back to where we were from last week back to where we were 772 we already talked about the Fire Commission Eric's got some stuff information here required for the budget is recommended for Capital stuff so Eric did you want to discuss this material you added here so technically this is a board of fin responsibility to produce this every year for the budget that is one of the charter outlined responsibilities you have to do a recommendation for the capital projects for the you know upcoming fiscal year and then what capital projects you're planning on for the next five years so I've basically given you the outline of that for what we have kind of underway now I don't know what you want to do with it some years you've given it to the public haven't done it in a while though so but you are technically supposed to yeah this is our responsibility that is your you know it's something we haven't really spent a lot of time on during the budget presentation but Eric's right in the in
theuh Charter discusses that that's part of the part of the budget is the discussion of the capital plan is that something that should be brought forward at the budget meetings or hearings or is that for a different time no it should be done then okay yeah yeah I mean you should be you should be basically giving them the PDF document of the budget and then the recommendation for capital projects that you're funding that's what you're you should be that's what we should be giving to the public at the meeting so Eric Eric you've explained this to me very well a number of times maybe in some public meetings too and I'm not sure for the benefit of everybody here if they're quite aware of how this works with these Bridge Replacements and culverts but you do have a plan in place that I may I'll let you explain it but that we we have huge grants that really pay for this but we had to have the money UPF front to get their work and N reimburse so the money that we had to save up front so we could do these projects and they get reimbursed will also after these projects are done the first two Bridges will go into Culver repair that you list further down the line so we'll have the money it's not like it to be new taxation right this is really money that's already accounted for if you will and put in place to do
these projects yeah the two big bridge projects which are Bunker Hill and Long Hill Road anything from the federal government canceling the federal local bridge program those bridges are fully paid for you know both design and construction but the town is obligated to pay the contractor and then seek reimbursement from the state and federal government so we have to have the funds to be able to make the swing payments and then get paid back which right now the plan is basically we have a Permanent Fund or a capital fund called The Bunker Hill Bridge fund and we have a second one which is basically the bridge and Culvert fund we plan to tap both of those right now
because we're in in construction on the Bunker Hill Bridge and as of this week we will paid you know roughly $80,000 so we're just at the very beginning stages of construction you know that's what that's for as far as the smaller culs currently the way that works is it is a 50% reimbursement from the state of Connecticut so the town pays half of the cost of that and those are big nuts to crack because you know those those things are stupidly expensive today based on the regulatory you know require IR ments you have for what you're replacing I will say I've personally been kind of working very hard lobbying for the legislature to increase the funding for that program and to increase the reimbursement there is a a bill in both the House and Senate currently that will increase that the state portion of the funding from 50% to 75% so if that goes through that will probably if that does go through in this legislative session depending on whether they make it retroactive or not that will save us about $450,000 off of that project and as if that's the case then I will put the next you know failing Culver into the system because we've got a bunch we have to address addess I'm just doing it at the limit at which we can fund it inhouse if that makes sense does thank you I had a follow-up question to Eric because I think you did a good job in I think it's the this goes
along with what you've put in the capital fund spreadsheets if I'm saying it correctly I feel like you you gave us the amount that's currently in the account you gave us the projected budget amount and then you combine them so that we could see the total so corre I did appreciate the work and and obviously you know kind of it it spells a lot of this out like you've told us like the bridge and Culvert thing they're pretty much spoken for I want to say I know I'm jumping ahead but it does have to do with this but say like the Public Works equipment we know that's spoken for way at the beginning of our session so I feel like you're extra ating maybe some of that to put here for the public size is that but in a in a much more it's longer Yeah well yeah I mean we're you can present this or not present this it's up to you what you want to do it's
no I want to say I appreciate you taking the time in doing this and right since I've been on the board like for four years you're I don't think we've done this so this level of detail now credit right for putting it together but I would think that we should all kind of take a look at it and then just vote next week or I don't not that we have to vote but if we have any suggestions again you know I like to look at things ahead I I'm sure it's good and it follows your your thing what do you think Mark is that a good suggestion yeah I mean I I think we you know this is a lot to to present in the meeting I think it will make people's eyes glaze over but we should hit the highlights and we should we should probably have a handout that details this so I think the detail is good but I think that we should in the presentation itself maybe just the
highlights perfect very this is a handout that's what I mean but we should all proofread what we're you know since we're respons I think it's a good thing to read through specific questions if we're if it's coming from us and Eric says I so appreciate that he put this together for us then we should all kind of proofread it over the next week and have any edits or say good job rubber stamp it yeah yeah and if anybody's got any specific questions about it it wouldn't be a bad idea to send it around to Eric in an email and copy the board because next week with the with the hearing usually we don't get a ton of public comment or input but it could take some time and and who knows whats we wanted wrap up yeah yeah sorry interupt you there Mark I have a feeling with some of the higher numbers maybe we will get some input this year but you never know if people don't know the process they they might or they've been following along and they don't have any major concerns you know the real the real rubber hits the road in the town meeting of course so right
no so I thanks again good job Eric thank you for giving this to us I really appreciate your work and then I'll you know I won't try to read it from here with my glossy guys as you all said but we'll take a look at it and if we have questions or suggestions send them to Eric or whatever I would just like to add you know Eric excellent job long-term planning that this town never had before we had a Town Administrator we we we just kind of let the roads deteriorate to nothing in this town and the amount of work that you've done I think is commendable out many years getting the funding getting the grants and you know the long-term approach that you've taken to making sure that our roads have
been almost every Road in the town has been redone and and looking at the roads that have to be done the culs the bridges the grants that you've been able to secure kudos to you I think a great job yeah we we did have a Town Administrator but between that administrator prior to Eric and the previous board Boards of Selectmen not a lot got done nothing got done yeah so this is this is a huge huge step forward for the town so some good good movement on every all front so no so we appreciate like we have a job to do he has a job to do everyone has a job to do so no this is awesome having this so I want to give them his flowers along with when I if I make any suggestions so there you go thank you for that and getting it prepared for us yeah thanks so so yeah if the board could review that as as Joanne suggested and and you know keep a lookout and if there's any specific questions that you want to have answered it would be helpful to do that in advance of the next meeting just so we get a chance to kind of see that and digest it I don't like to go through a lot of
details if we can avoid it during the public hearing as said just because we want to allow opportunity for public comment and then any final tweaks we want to make to the budget so we can pass if we can so and Mark remind me do they come on during public speak and they'll you know they have they have their Forum to say what they think people that will appear and then we do our thing and then come on again yeah yeah because it's it's it's an informational meeting it's not the town budget meeting right which has a different procedure yeah yeah so normally I think what I would do we've done in the past is you know give a few of the highlights just in case people haven't seen it you know we'll we'll show what the end result is what the bottom line is what you know what you know the mill rate is going to be talk about the process and then basically just give everybody a an opportunity to speak if we have a lot of people demeaning I I tend to just try to set some guidelines we we had set some long time ago but basically you know try to keep your comments to three minutes or less and if you you know if you agree with you know the person went before you just say that you know say I agree with her her you know this important Point without restating things at nauseum typically it's not a problem but just it helps I think so my I guess followup I mean we're still in the midst of our discussions tonight clearly because we haven't gotten there
but you know so that's the forum for next week and then if we have set things that we want to act on right then we can act on them and make the changes right then as well yeah I think I confirmed enough I just want everyone you know we do have new members and everything and because meeting we can do things tonight but obviously we're back going to go read some more prep some more make some motions before we do some final oh so you're saying next week during because this is my first rodeo next week during the virtual meeting if we wanted to make a motion to change anything we could absolutely it functions like a normal meeting really like we we do the presentation we get feedback and then we basically have our normal meeting afterward yeah and if there's minimal feedback and we're comfortable with the budget we pass it along if there's stuff to address we address it then but basically we we the the presentation is front loaded but then we still have a meeting and we can the board right yeah so the meeting continues after the public hearing portion of okay did not understand oh you didn't know that list yeah she's new you know you don't know that no no I agree absolutely that's why I was kind of I wanted everyone to feel comfortable that we still can change this you know there obviously because we have we haven't really talked much about we've had so many meetings that we haven't really done a lot of changing so we're a little bit I just want everyone to feel comfortable that we can that's all if we I was just G to say you know
obviously because we the presentation at the front end you know you don't want it to be a super long meting but we do have that opportunity to take in the feedback and then do stuff so yeah okay all right thank you yeah tends not to be super long but we do have that opportunity right okay I mean again we all have to remember this got pushed forward for us we're so early we we're having the same amount of meetings but it's earlier so yeah yeah y well and we lost a week and we lost I think that's probably the biggest yeah that had a big impact right so so we we'll do this meeting and then if we have to yeah so where are we at now speaking of which I think probably what we want to do is go back to the budget spreadsheet I'm trying to remember looking right now where we where we left off and I think that we got down through Public Works maybe transfer station we talked I feel like we talked about tipping fees did so I think yeah Eric can I ask a while he's getting that
can I ask a question has was there change I didn't get to click on it today was it updated today at all before our meeting do you know if there's been many changes no there's one dated the 30th is the most recent one that's the one I'm showing right here and I think we maybe the 20th not the 20th 30th hasn't happened yet yeah yes we'd be way ahead sorry I knew it it's been a week for me too and Eric one followup to that while we're getting settled was the health insurance changes and when we look at the mill rate and all that kind of stuff eventually when we get through I just wondered if it's at our our new things because everything's been updated since last meeting yes the health insurance information is in there and update thank you right we'll try to pick a color tonight so that it's easier to yep yep so we had I believe gotten through Fire Marshall we talked about Animal Control I'm not sure if we did senior citizens and transportation I feel like we were I think we may have we did yeah yeah and I think we got yeah in h ahm we voted V we discussed that yep okay so I think that did take us down here to boards and commissions that's right got yeah I should put a big gray line through the middle of this or something so this is the
this is the selectman salary line so we're proposed staying flat but there's an estimated amount it's more than the budget for this year no that that's incorrect I think the treasurer was just confused and didn't realize the first selectman doesn't draw one so that's yeah I was gonna say he never takes it he never has okay so we're gonna leave that at 4,800 correct doesn't seem very controversial the board clerk wages up slightly that for just covering meetings and stuff Eric that is just the the Flatout cost given how we pay for meetings it just it's totally based on how many meetings and special meetings they have understood just just ask it yep yep federan committee slight increase 250 I mean it's 50% but it's tiny amount of money is it just based on experience yeah that's based on you know what they've actually been expending in year over year so the if you look at the note here it says that 12 months date 7:35 I missed the note okay then that answers my question right there yeah their biggest single cost is the Veterans Day celebration but they do other things also that they spend some money out got it yeah they have to go listen to my my daughter try to play the tpet I mean you got to pay people you know wait wait your daughter gets paid to do that no the people who listen to her should be paid oh I see okay sorry this is a matter public record Megan will get me later don't worry Board of Finance clerk wages again this is kind of based on history our
meetings we've got the 12 months data at 1,800 bucks so we'll keep that we had we've previously just ended up not budgeting any legal legal expense directly for the board of finance that was gone back and forth on that a couple of years but decided it just would be something we we haven't used it is a reality well we have used the attorney in a couple cases where I asked for I asked for legal opinions but he just charged it to the town we just continued the budget he's on retainer the concern was that if we somehow needed to have our own representation you know yeah the concern was if we had a conflict directly with the board of Select they weren't going to release the money that was the issue and yeah we basically let that go because it's just not really a thing yeah hope it doesn't ever become a thing Board of assessment appeals slight increase for the for the I'm sorry we're on the Conservation Commission that's basically flat no change Board of assessment appeals yeah no real change same amount so we're we got a note here potential request for assessor training course okay so if that happens great zoning board of appeals board clerk zba basically flat no big change there training and increase for training requ use board under the CT law
new line item okay yep Bill make comment no I was just going to say that three zba members went to an eight hour class on Saturday so I'm sure like part of that came out of that 350 F 350 that's where it would come from okay y Economic Development commission so this is up quite a bit this is in include $5,000 for addition additional welcome to and over signs oh people like oh go ahead and we put I think we've we've kind of staggered the production and implementation of some of these signs over over a period of years I think was the intent so personally am okay with it but the sign is very very nice I think that's exactly what I heard at the BOS meeting that they liked the first one so much and they wanted to get another one for another area of town right yeah yeah
like one coming into town and one leaving town so the signs are really nice I think they're yeah okay U Memorial Day commission sum increase there the note here is per Carol some of the military flag holders need to be replaced okay so they've got some equipment that needs to replace it's just an request of $600 increase happy to do that [Music] personally and by the way if anybody has any questions wants to stop me as we're going through this just just say so but I just think mostly we've seen or they're they're minor Recreation Commission slight increase $200 two portable facility new contract okay I have a comment on the community garden community garden I I heard in one of the last Board of selectman meetings they were talking about it and they said are they no longer donating this food to the food pantry and I think the answer was no and so Jeff Maguire said yeah well then why are we funding that no actually I'll speak to that because I was kind of going thank you oh okay that was the thing that was kind of set up last year Jeff had just started that process it wasn't set up to do that it was set up to actually have people have their own plots what they do with their produce is up to them so this year they're actually having people get their own plots but it's it's not on there stating that you have to give it to it's not there's no mention at all actually for where
that goes so we don't really need to be funding it then right what I said later about W so Joanne oh you're kind of breaking up Lise I couldn't understand what you're saying right there yeah there are things that has done that he's been exceptional about and there are things that still need to be done and I think he's requesting some additional monies for that I don't know the whole who's who's he who's Jeff Ballard Jeff Balor yes so you know they're trying to keep it sustainable and they're working on it I mean Jeff can probably give more details because he kind of wrote up this whole thing about what they actually did in the past couple of years I wonder if we could get that right up so what does he spend the money on yeah you do have that that was one of the things that was available to you in the shared Drive if you want to see it right now I'm more than happy if Mark if you give me permission to share my screen I can bring it up and you can see what their budget proposal was yeah there is so much in that shared
Drive holy mackerel well that's there's a lot of things that go into the budget so so I'll stop sharing okay and then you well you can just go ahead looks like you should be able to share Eric okay okay so if you want to see what you should be is that big enough for you to see yes requesting oh I did notice they you're were working on that rank collection system right Eric in the back there they they are pump and fittings for water collection winter R cover top okay well that explains it I guess yeah I mean why if it's seeds for a community is I mean don't people isn't
the purp of that for people to go and plant their own garden and enjoy their own vegetables and whatever exactly right so I don't I can see maybe the big things if if it's his job to keep it running maybe but why are we Pro fiding seeds people should plant their own stuff I don't know there's a lot of things behind the scenes that need to be done to prepare the plots and all that and that's still something that that group does when people come in to use it yes they have to go in and do the weeding and all this other stuff but there's like a maintenance type of thing that's done by the committee there and it costs cost some money to do
that and in but then but then the people take the vegetables home for themselves for their own consumption trying to understand you're just asking about the seeds right Liz questioning yeah well I'm saying why why is the town why is the taxpayer paying for this if you know for people to go grow a garden for me to go and grow a garden over there so I can bring my vegetables home that I guess that's maybe the the crass way of saying I'm just trying to wrap my brain around that I know in the past when they first built it I was told that the point was to donate a certain part of it to the food the and over the food pantry not necessarily I mean when you see what it says package of seeds for Community use if they have like a plot or two like let's say the cup scouts or somebody doing that then that could be for that reason I don't know what else they would do it for I agree people should have their own seeds but that says for Community use so I'm not sure what that means don't mean to be a kill Joy but we're oh go ahead B I just think we're spending a lot of time we there's I don't know it's not a lot of money we we
can take a you can take money somebody we can make a motion to motion it increase it decrease it increase it we got to leave it alone we're good what's and What's the total budget there again 3500 560 3560 3560 so it is this row 401 right here that I've highlighted yep and that's I appreciate the questions and information because I don't know a lot about it either are the and just we can end up wherever we're going Mark with this but is the community use do they sometimes bring children there I mean are we Pro ided in it so kids can come plant things I have no idea and you don't have to go deep into it but yeah I would recommend if you have questions I'd be happy to take
them and go and Supply those to Jeff for answers well you know I think what might be helpful Louise is if if maybe he can just do a little write up about this is the community garden this is how it operates this is the history this is what we're trying to accomplish with it it how it's operated you know kind of you know so I think if we get an overview like that you know do they do they expect this kind of level of funding going forward because looks like $1,800 for a pump in fittings probably aren't going to be needed next year right so I would expect that once they get over that hurdle then you know maybe this drops in half so yeah so if he could if he could kind of come up with that ex that kind of explanation of what of what they do why they do it who who is served by it and you know kind of
what the what the goal is going forward or if the budget's going to stay level I think it would help us have an understanding and context for for the line I can I can talk to him about that okay thanks Louise okay you and then we can we can take action on it now or we can wait till next week and just hold a placeholder and you know if we are comfortable with it fine if otherwise we can you know can adjust the line that sounds good okay say we just wait get the explanation and then wait right unless someone wants to vote tonight like gonna make a motion I'll move on yeah so okay Planning and Zoning commission board clerk wages actually reduced quite a bit I'm assuming that's probably based on you know understanding of what our need is going forward in history that's good Legal Professional is up a little bit that's bad hopefully let's see what this says here the note says ongoing litigation with the Gravel Pit owner is driving up our legal costs
so okay yeah we got to cover ourselves that' be my feeling about it yeah and and two that legal and professional line item covers more than just the Planning and Zoning commission that line covers all of the land use commissions and it's spendable both for engineering advice and evaluation on plans so if the Planning and Zoning commission is reverse reviewing a commercial application or subdivision application they would review it both legally with the town zoning attorney and they would also send that to the engineering firm for a review by the town engineer so that covers all of those expenses that's one of those ones that's highly variable depending on what's going on in town how much that gets spent okay thank you and then we have training going down assume not anticipated and then we have the mapping staying flat with the note that we had a large mapping expense in 2425 and apparently not expected 2526 so good they're probably associated with the maybe with the appraisals but well that's associated with the plan of conservation and development and one of the things we realized with the PD is that the partial map that we have is out of date so right now we're working with the mapping agency and it's both the zoning commission the town planner as well as the assessors so we're trying to get everything all on a correct partial map and that's basically what we're trying to do right now and we that should cover with this year's budget yeah we're going to cover that out of this year's budget so we don't need a big chunk for that next year
okay all right thanks moving down to Inland Wetlands commission we got a little reduction on the blur clerk wages based on 12 months data it's good slight increase in training 100 bucks net reduction of 550 Town historian it's flat $200 what do they use that for Eric I'm sure I've asked that question before but so it depends on the year like for instance if you remember seeing all the the pictures that are in the community room those came from that way back when last year we tapped that budget to produce a historical marker because it was one of the things we were required to do by the state historic preservation office in exchange for allowing us to tear down the old Community Center slf Firehouse so that's that's pretty much under the control of Scott yman the town historian you know he spends that it's not a big budget but we do from time to time spend money on that or on them you know y okay all right okay so we're through most of the
operating expenditures we get down to the capital before we go on to that yeah can I can I can we go up I have one thing to say about the the small the little Firehouse I know it's a very small small budget but it's something else that I heard in a board of selectman meeting and it's a very simple thing but I'd like to make a motion to remove that thousand for fuel and I'll tell you why in The Old Firehouse here the five yeah okay on March 20th the board of find wait minute no on on April 10th I was told or I saw in a board of Finance meeting I can't remember which meeting it was now I'm going to have to go back it was said that Scott was due to fill the oil tank in The Old Firehouse which is minimally heated in the winter a fill is good for 3 to four years so so it's du was due to be filled in the 2425 budget so I know it's not a big dollar amount but we don't have anything in there for fuel oil yeah I zeroed that out for the year oh so the cost are for electricity in the this electric what's the Thousand but but hold on kind of the wrong spot this is The Old Firehouse this is the building that's going to be torn down the only reason we're still paying for the electric is because we technically need that for the asbest remediation contractor okay my mistake I thought that was for for fuel oil so we can move on thank you yeah if
you looked at the budget for the Old Town Hall which is that one you'll see the the fuel item line was zeroed out okay yeah but I was it was specifically Firehouse so obviously it's been zeroed so you took care of it thank you okay okay and again down to Capital okay so the revaluation keeping the cost at the same level and we we just level fund this right Eric and then we have to do the revaluation ever so often so we tap that so for which for the O under Capital Ral yeah yes so what happens is on a normal cycle the town has to do reval every fifth year and depending on what we whether we do what's called a
measure and list reval or whether we do like in a bridged version you know our costs vary but these days are running for a town our size somewhere in the 80 to you know $100,000 range we're actually putting reval off for one year because the state in their Infinite Wisdom decided they want all the counties to do their reval all the towns within an existing County to do their reval in the same year so they've been adding a few years on on to try to get them all synced up so our next reval is starts one year it would have been 2026 it is now 2027 can I ask a question about that then since we basically fund this by plugging the same amount of money in every year to get to a certain figure every five years if it's pushed off a year do we would it make sense to drop this a little bit because you have six years to pay for it now it Rob right like could you go to 15 instead of 165 you know and be okay yeah I I can't answer that off the top of my head my gut feeling says yeah you probably could reduce that a little
bit but you know the the problem comes in when you get the bids back and ultimately the part of the decision making is whether we do a full measure and list or whether we do The Abridged reval we did the full measuring list the last time but unfortunately it was right in the middle of covid so I don't think we really got everything done that should have been done full measuring list is you know significantly not significantly but at least $20,000 more expensive than not okay well just for the boards if some basic math if you take that and you extrapolate it out six years instead of five it would be 13,750 so you know we could potentially we could leave it and have some buffer or we could drop it a little bit and probably not be in trouble probably the 165 over five years gets you to like 82,000 is and if Eric's right you know that 880,000 kind of the low end then maybe we leave it that's just my thought guys just sorry to interrupt Rob I mean we have to remember that we do have money left over every year so I don't think we're taking a huge chance if we do try to reduce it a little this year when we know we have you know
there's beeny fund right right there's a 50k usually we have so mean I would be comfortable moving to reduce that to 15K it's not all the way down you know but it it just you know save us a little bit of money here and it it it makes sense we'll go back to 165 obviously once we're back on cycle yeah but for now I'll second that okay oh so this is the motion my motion is to to reduce to 15 second the motion when we get to discussion I'll ask a question okay okay we're at discussion Rob what did you tell us that it didn't you say 135 yeah so if you do the math if you do 165 right time five that's 82,500 you divide that by six it's 13750 yeah you're assuming no increases I'm still leaving some play in there you know I don't feel like thank you Rob I don't feel like this is a big gamble like we're talking this isn't one of our $100,000 you know trucks this is this is a tiny cut right I feel comfortable with it but I I I'm probably gonna say no because I want to go even a little more I mean I feel like this is a year where there's a big increase across the board for a lot of stuff so let's cut a chunk of this if we're not doing it till 2027 if we feel like we can make it up in a couple years we will you know we well what figure would you prefer I I would have gone right to the 135 I mean this is 13 that's what you and I 137 rob you said 13750 would be sorry 13750 yep that would be just just the the math
14,000 I mean we can cut a couple here you know I if if the rest of the board wants to do that I'm happy to amend my motion to 14 in 15 we should we should vote on the motion as stated yeah what I'm saying what I'm saying is just for the sake of discussion that I'm comfortable if people want to go to 14 then I'm happy to you know have my motion voted down and we Repose it yep that's that's just my thoughts getting the discussion out there now so if I vote it down that's the reason I think we could have gone a little deeper on this small line yeah okay further further discussion I agree that's my discussion all those in favor say I I I'll vote I to to turn down the motion no the motion yes no or abstain the motion is to reduce it to 15,000 if you want to go you vote no no okay okay all those in favor I'll vote Yes because I
proposed it but all those opposed I oppos any extenstions the motion does not pass we can entertain any other motions Rob well Joanne go right for It Go on I make a motion that we cut this line to the 13750 for this given year you have a second I'll second it second seconds any further discussion all those in favor say I I I any opposed any extensions okay hearing none the motion passes and this goes to correct there you go we got a couple years in our favor there so we'll how about purple Joan we'll make that it's hard to read it though I don't know yeah you want some contrast in there go go orange or something there we need a different orange yeah boy all all the cool colors have been taken so I know they're all Blended I'm in a I'm G to go with that blue I like that we can change it later
right there's our change yeah okay Eric will just pop the numbers in the revised spreadsheet anyway yeah okay very good we got zero on the capital planning of conservation development line Insurance sever is zero funds currently has 28825 okay don't need to do that contingency is level funded at 50,000 how much is in the contingency now zero roll over it's not a capital fund yeah right okay so do we have it's in the capital section but it's it's kind of recurrently funded and then refunded but does it have is it used every year Eric there's not an an ongoing total for this because I don't remember using Contin goes into the goes into the M what's it called fund unexpended fund Bal I don't remembering contingency so every year I feel like it's gone to the fund balance so isn't that no we we've spent out of contingency okay that was my many of the years when I've been here yeah and that's by the way generally towns run at least a 1% contingency and we run far less than a 1% contingency Okay so I yeah I mean honestly I don't I
wouldn't want to cut that because that's a pretty small figure but at the same time it's also true that we've gotten by many years with that figure yeah like you said one one major 50k is like yeah so I I would leave it y follow up to that so the contingency is there but we also have the Surplus every year right where we have the fund balance like you're saying the extra am I am I categorizing it right so we've got a contingency history we have right but so so I can probably clarify so surpluses come from two things they come from either you got more Revenue than you anticipated yeah or you had lower expenses than you anticipated I mean one
of the things this town has been really good about is not trying to spend out all our budgets at the end of the year only spending what's necessary every a couple times the board of Selectmen has wanted a medium ticket item at the end of the year and we expended a lot of contingency or other things to get that but remember when you're doing transfers between budgets if you have do a fairly large transfer because remember you expenditures are only what's budgeted so regardless of what the Surplus is my responsibility is not to go over the budgeted amount that the town has you know so the contingency is the way you cover that that's that's basically your float overall the budget your final float yeah so I was just thank you Eric and that's that's what I was trying to understand so I'm just saying out loud if we do have a big disaster like you said the contingency is not the only place we could draw from we would have like the fund balance that's excess that we've been accumulating might have to go to a town meeting for it but yeah oh right I I'm just trying to yeah no I'm not saying we can just go do it we have to make sure so because I mean I don't want to get stalled on this I appreciate it yeah I just yeah it was a good point I don't remember ever hearing okay oh we went over we've got to use
contingency or I we have used it a couple we've dipped into it a few times but nothing I don't think we've ever expended the full 50k but I could be wrong Eric okay all right I know we're going Thing by thing and then we can talk about them if anyone has ideas all right so that's talked out we can we have the trans multi-use building fund at 50k level loaded and yeah could I ask I know that and this is fine but what I did like about this is and I printed them out for myself because I have to be visual but I feel like the thing that Eric did was is there a tab somewhere where it kind of show well sorry let's just do your it can wait yeah yes there is there's so
there's the capital fund worksheet or spreadsheet all the proposed expenses for that but I know that Mark is maybe trying to get through this to give us all of the amounts but what I liked was that spreadsheet because obviously there's certain ones that we would never want to make any kind of motions or cuts to and there might be others that we could be open to and I commented you on putting the things in but if Mark wants to go through all this and then we could open that because I think that gives us a lot of info you get what's in there now you get the proposed amount and then you see the bigger amount yeah just a thought well we can you know we can do take a quick look if we want to I think it would be helpful I know off thep is this the spreadsheet you're talking about the capital yep yep Eric had it as a separate yeah Capital fund summary that's it Capital funds some it's in with the budget oh right and then on the
bottom sorry my eyes weren't going close enough so if you want details on any particular fund they're all tabbed out there they're all in the tabs here I mean we all we've looked at and what I like is what's nice for example Mark do you have I don't want to overtake but oh good you have the current balance you know which a lot of them are still there because some of the work doesn't get done till the spring and then you know you have the next year whatever but it but it helps us and you told us like bridge and CTS they're all spoken for Public Works equipment spoken for
yeah again gonna sit back and listen I have a couple thoughts but I I can wait till the end on the main page in Orange on the main if you went back to the budget and you looked at the the funds the ones I put in Orange were the ones that really are are truly spoken for so if you're going to cut please don't cut those because those are how we meet our obligations yeah you can't cut to tanker we have a lease engine tanker the Public Works equipment and the bridg cover I Nam them yeah no that's a good color code to just tell us like those are bright lines
completely agree yep sorry thank you for saying that yeah those are the ones that are spoken for and I think I said it yeah and we're making solid progress year to year on the tree removals right Eric that 50k is a good figure it is yeah we've made huge strides townwide you know yes except for those darn trees at the end of long hill there you know if you drove around after the last storm it wasn't just those couple of trees at the end of long hill there are dead trees Still Standing easily fund that at 100K and you could easily fund that at 200k
that is one that I don't want touched because I I am not proposing to touch it that's where that's where the priority in the I think we've done such a great job with partnering with eversource and you know kind of mobilizing with them at the same day whatever and really maximizing our impact that's been really good so no objections on my part I just asked the question you know just informationally but yeah of course so let's let's if we could let's let's just kind of take them in order I want to make sure we hit them all i' like this page my my fault no no it's good it's all good it's all good discussion so contingency I thumbs we're gonna leave for now the multi-use building fund again if somebody wants to propose a change you know we can we can certainly
consider that discuss it I think you know probably we're all agreed that three and orange need to stay right where they are yeah Road Improvement front at 410k just noting the comment here needs to be a board of selectman discussion about future Road workk planning I'm gonna I'm gonna put it out there since you're I am gonna propose a change to this one I agree and it's based on the spreadsheet of all the discussions I've heard Jay talk about all the things I've learned through listening and what's in there now what's proposed and what the total will be I understand from Jay and Eric and everyone that's talked to us that you know road work is done not during the winter because they have to be seasonal you know we got that beautiful plan that he sent us but I'm glad to see that this one has a big balance right now to to start with for his April work you know there's like 600k in there on that form that I had oh here it is y yeah and they're asking for the 420 I get it we're happy that they're making a lot of progress but that would give them a combined of 1 million something for next year and then the work was all listed and I'm sure they're and and Jay said himself he understands that they'll get to what they can so I am going to make a motion to cut this one a little in the event to save the taxpayers some money this year knowing how knowing all the things I just listed
in the funding cycle and the work cycle and getting everything done so do you want to make your motion I'm Mak a motion to decrease this amount by 100,000 for this year leaving 320,000 there 310 310 because it's 410 right Road Improvement fund oh I must have printed an earlier version is it okay 410 it's 420 on my one that I printed so yes I would like to leave it at 3:10 it'll be you know a high amount that will still be in there for the next year that's my motion anybody want to second that Liz seconds no I was I wanted to I wanted some discussion second before disc I'll second it sure I'll second it this second it disc but I definitely have some questions for discussion because I'm wondering if we should lower it more but so when you look on the road Improvement tab Eric it shows 2425 and it shows all these items one two three four five six items six items for the 2425 season sure total up to that total up to 490,000 right what of those has been done what if any of those have been done I guess are those yet to be done that is spring work that is work to that's that seasonal thing Liz that I've learned they do some so this this whole $490,000 is expected to have been spent this spring right it's a wish list this is what they're hoping to get done I mean I
I would assume they're going to do a lot of work in April yeah right so okay basically part of the reason why we frontload a lot of the work before July one typically is that we have that's when we have the contractor availability because most of everybody spends all their road work but budget between July 1 and October it tends to be more cost effective for us to have money prior to the other towns and and the other thing too is that when you take shim and Chip seal you know if you take the amount of shimming that we're going to do that's probably six or seven straight weeks of work by our contractor and then you can
chip seal on top so we spread that out over the whole summer and we try to get all the shimming and a lot of the preliminary stuff done first so that you know we have a new budget and we can go right into additional chip seal part of the reason why we have a much bigger Surplus right now is because not this last fall but the fall before or if our chip seal contractor screwed the pooch and never came out and did the work so we had about $170,000 backlog or $180,000 backlog that we pushed to the following year which has pushed everything else we've done back so that's why but ideally Jay goes into the spring season with three to $400,000 available for early work between the budget and down Aid Road money can I ask a quick question Eric when you have a situation like you just described where you know the contract are bricked and we have money but we can't spend it because literally the contractor didn't show up can we make up time or is it a situation where we run into a problem where there's only so much you can work almost only so much work you can do in a certain amount of time yeah it's it's a little bit of both you could spend as much money as you wanted on chip seal because that process process I mean we'll spend our you know $150 or $200,000 chip seal budget literally
in a day and a half with the contractor so that but the the shimming portion that takes a lot of time because we shim you know we try to shim with as little as little asphalt as we can so we do very specific sections and that's a Time intensive process yep okay so I guess I know I brought this motion up and and like I said it's hard cutting anywhere and we have to go year to year with different things and I felt confident with this amount that's left over knowing they have some for the spring work like Jay says they float this what Eric talked about so you know with trying to get a reasonable budget past this year you know and knowing we have some hard work to do I looked at this as a place that we could based on this spreadsheet you know and that's my take on it so my take for those who care is that this is a little bit of a deeper cut than I'm comfortable with so I would vote I'm gonna vote no on this one but I would be open to the possibility of something in between the current you know requested amount and Joann's motion I would say the same thing that Rob said I think we definitely have we have work to do here so we're gonna have to cut that sum as much as I hate to but I I would like to see it a little bit less
than that Joanne I'm more in line with what Rob said maybe maybe cut it by 50 or 60,000 I think I blipped out and clearly I'm changing room so I I missed that conversation thank you for fit fitting it in you said you wanted to go down lower okay yeah what I what I say is that I'm going to vote no on your motion not because I'm completely against cutting this budget line item I just feel it's too deep a cut and so I'm in favor of something in between what you've proposed and the proposed budget amount that we have on our spreadsheet so basically what Bill said is it's exactly what I'm thinking 50 60k I could be comfortable with your cut a little too much for me got it okay yeah you
might have heard my comment Joan it was the same thing yeah and I know people love it and they're doing a great job I just took every yeah it's just trying to find a place that we can cut and feel comfortable with and you know yeah hey I just I just cut like 1500 bucks out of something because I saw something so I I get it I understand and they've got you know the balance and we know that the guys aren't going to get to everything they want to and some emergency is going to come up and I I just felt good about that this year I understand I won't prolong it right let's just let's just have the vote you know unless somebody else has forther comments Louise yeah I
have a question for Eric would something like this cause any issues in the town do you see any problems reducing the budget of this he's never gonna wantan to cut Louise I don't think but we question I mean of course you know will is it a problem for the town I mean the easy solution is just to eliminate the cape seal line item if we're going to do it you know and I think I don't know what's going to happen with tomorrow's board or Friday's Board of Selectmen meeting every time we do chip seal you know I get an enormous amount of people pissed off at me and frankly it's frustrating I don't like dealing with all the negative comments regarding chip seal we do it because it's cheap and that's what the town can afford that's the absolute cheap cheapest thing we can do to our roads to keep them functioning some of them look really nice Eric I got you know some of the roads I'm I like for a year or two yeah yeah is it people don't like it when it first goes down that it has kind of a grally aspect and they don't like that or something well both both it's dusty and started using a new one Eric right what well you I was saying there was one year that you used kind of a bigger larger Stone but you switch to a smaller finer is that right something that's a little more palatable for people two companies yeah no we we've gone back and
forth between two different contractors and it switches a little bit the nature of complaints we get about it but we get roughly the same number of complaints for both contractors you know the Gorman stuff everybody because it's super Dusty you know because of their process when we use comr we get less complaints about the Dust early on but then the plow scrapes a lot more of it off and they really did a lot lousy job of the overlaps on the roads they did last year so it's a really imperfect process burnap Brook that road has been done correct Eric burnap no burnap you sent me on one road one time then and it it was so nice but sorry wrong road so Eric you made the comment that you would be comfortable with the cape seal eliminating that this year Well it's not that I'm comfortable with it I'm just saying that that's if you look at what the budget is if you're going to drop a 100K out of the budget you know or a big number that's where it's going
to come out of because you can't just say we're going to Cape seal $50,000 wor because the contractor is not going to come out for that so you know you either do it or you don't do it Eric can I ask a further promotional question then based on that sure if hypothetically we were have cut $50,000 out of this budget would that have the same impact because you couldn't get the contractor to do the cape seal or could you find 50k El elsewhere in the budget and keep that because if you what you're telling me is that you know the cape s contractor isn't going to come out for less than the budgeted amount if we cut you know whether it's 100K or 50k if it has the same impact on the town I'd kind of like to know that okay so if you look at the 2526 budget and say what are discrete amounts catch Basin cleaning you either do your catch Basin or you don't if you do it's going to run you about 40 Grand plus or minus it and that depends on the actual time it takes them to suck out each catch Basin in terms of materials I mean we know we have a ton of roads to work off we worked through over the last couple of years most of our drainage material supply so we're going to have to reset a lot of that this year regardless of what we do pavement markings let me tell you straight out I
don't like striping roads I would happily eliminate the $30,000 a year we spend striping roads because I think it makes it less safe for pedestrians and less safe for me as a cyclist but I get an enormous amount of complaints every time I do it people like their Road stried so that can be eliminated but we'll just get a lot of FL for it Flex beam you know every year we budget somewhere between 30 and $50,000 for guard rail last time I checked on our priority list of of guard rail needs we have about around more than $200,000 of priority guard rail replacement because our old post and wire ones I mean they're all falling apart so so we just chip away at that every year so whatever you give me we'll spend wisely you know I mean if you think I mean 50 Grand cut it 50 Grand no I I completely understand all of that I the point I was making is I was keying off of what you said about the cape seal on specific you know the idea that you know look the contractor not going to come out to do a $50,000 job they're going to come out to do $120,000 job and that my concern is that if there's no if I if I'm going to push for a smaller cut and it's still costs us the cape seal then have I achieved anything that's what I'm
sort of going for here but I I'm with you on the payment markings and you can tell them to yell at me instead if that makes you feel better guys I'm going off of what Jay told us point blank in the meeting too and and I'm I think I'm used to towns that operate like that where he just said Hey listen you know he he anticipates he's used to being with towns that will cut budgets and then just work with it and I felt like we had a hefty starting balance not Hefty we all wish we had a lot more could do everything this is just a year that the numberers high for the budget and Jay was very willing to do everything I think hey if I was in Eric's position I wouldn't want anything cut either so that's all you know it's it's not fun but I think that they're going to get done what they can if it's
a 100,000 we cut we're going to put a couple of these things together they're probably going to be so busy that they don't get to all of them anyways I'm not trying to yeah it's just a thought and Rob I know you went into it and we don't want to lose some kind of big thing but I felt very comfortable I felt he was a real version of Something used to people doing budgets getting budgets Cuts had worked with that before and we're a tiny town so yeah I didn't feel like he made it be a big deal if something was going to be
cut he said I'll work with what you guys give me yeah so will I I've said my piece I'm good oh yeah any further discussion or can we call a questione let's vote although all those in favor say I I have two all those opposed say Nay Nay Nay so we lose Louise again no l i see L I don't see Kim or Liz I see K I see I said yes where's I thought there was no more yes I'm yes oh so how Mark give us the count I didn't really hear I couldn't see everybody so let's do this again all those in favor I I okay all those opposed okay so we have a motion fails at 4 to three okay Rob so I will move in consideration of our discussion to reduce the to the Town Road budget by $50,000 to 360 for this coming year want to second the motion I'll second it Bill seconds further discussion i' be favor of somewhere I thought we were saying in between the two things so I'd still like to see a little more cut but I don't know is right in the middle that's literally half of what you right exactly in half Joan Oh I thought he said halfway in between sorry he said half you're proposing a level of funding of $360,000 just to clarify $50,000 cut is opposed to $100,000 cut no I know that's half I thought you said me in the middle sorry yeah I think we just needed to clarify proposing funding it at $360,000 yeah yeah which is 50,000 less than the pent currently that's right half half the cut proposed before
further discussion personally I'm GNA vote no because I would like to say it where it is we're bandaid Road as it is but I understand the it's one of the few places we can probably take a little money out that has meaningful so yeah I don't like it either cling it I'm proposing it as a compromise yeah and that's the way this works so yeah oh no one's angry I just misunderstood the thing before I get it yeah okay any further discussion all those in favor say I I I all those opposed I'm sorry were you you're in favor Kim in favor okay the motion passes 6 to1 I the loone dis enter there so hey I I'm with I'm actually kind of with you emotionally I'm with you too it's just a bad year we got we got do things honestly if it if it had been a tie I would have voted probably for it are we gonna kind I'm concerned about our longterm planning for the roads just my I don't like it statement did and now I'm gonna kick myself later for it Mark don't worry yep me too we do we do you you a road last Rob yeah hey it's on the it's on the list I'm gonna get screwed now well at least you don't have to live where Bill and I did we got our road joh said what did they do to our road all say Okay Lise so can Eric direct that where it's best yeah course he can yeah J function not an Eric function but it's a hug whatever 600,000 still left
all right okay here we go okay okay so moving on if we could we make that a different color are we gonna let's finish this out oh yeah we need we got change back to the main sheet I I I was I was making the change and I forgot I was sharing that sheet oh we're almost there folks I think okay so the next line is the tree removal fund I heard no appetite for making any changes there correct me if I'm wrong Bunker Hill root Bridge fund has been zeroed bridg culbert fund again Eric asked if we leave us alone so if somebody has further comments you can we can talk about that the main building fund so already a cut yeah they're taking that from 100,000 down to 50 grand again the the spreadsheet had the projects if anybody wanted refer back to I just want
to ask a question y I feel like what's been good now the building maintenance fund there's been a lot of improvements made to the buildings you know between Eric correct me if I'm wrong is this like where the acoustic money came from to correct the acoustical sound and the things and correct yeah I mean that was a big thing this year so we took it from there so I feel like we're getting to where we want our buildings to be at least kind of like we said with the firehouse that that we might not okay thank you probably need my glasses like thank oh thank you this is this is Building Maintenance funds this is like stuff for the kitchen the hbac because they've done stuff to the generators I feel like if I'm you know I'm paying attention in meetings I feel like we've done a lot of improvements through the year so that's all the HVAC system in the town hall was a retrofit right that's that heat pump install Eric
that's that's that's part of that right yep yep and are those done this is what we're proposing to spend the money how bad is the is the Mason re repairs what what will that entail I'm not recalling oh 25 by the time we finish that I'm GNA say it's going to be somewhere in the order of $200,000 this getss a deposit it on what we need to do and gets us started thinking about an eventual long-term solution for the Public Works building it's a Public Works building thing say no more that's like is that the building that's from like 1850 yes that is a thought this was Town Hall something year old building that we're still using as a public works facility right and frankly so Ju Just background the reason why I want to take that out of the building maintenance fund is because if I spend any loow siip dollars on that I need approval by the state historical preservation Society because that is on the State Historical register gez and I don't want to mess with that so that is one ultimately I want us to eat the cost of it and and frankly probably what we're going to do in the next year or so is we're going to tear down the whole front storage building of that building because the re roof has been leaking for the last 20 years and that whole front piece is going to come down what we call the cold storage and we're just going to tear it down and get rid of it
and then repair the cold storage spot behind that but I mean really what we're trying to do honestly is Band-Aid that building and keep it going because I think there's no expectation that the town is going to cough up the you know six to 10 billion dollar it would take to build us a new Public Works facility so up until as long as we can run that building we're going to run it and we're going to end up spending some money to do it you know there's a bunch of things in there the above ground oil tank that's for the old what is now the Museum that is a concern of mine because we have an old oil tank sitting out there that we don't know what age it is and it's an exterior single wall tank is there containment at all around that Eric nope get rid of it get it out the insurance guy he's putting his insurance hat on fre I'm an I'm literally an environmental claims Handler get it out of there I God I agree totally that steel tank my God the the things that are that we could put off I mean we could put off the heat pump installation in that building considering a solution for that that's definitely possible the cabinet and countertop replacement the board of selectman basically and CIP have already approved that that's the firehouse thing
we so a lot of this stuff is money that's been essentially allocated through the well that's why I thank you that's why I asked the question you know just to see like we talk about in budgets like in your home are all of these needs or wants so I appreciate you putting this out there so that everybody can see this you know in just this year where we were trying to it was a huge Mill read mill rate M am I saying it mill rate increase and then you know overall spending we have to keep remember in that even though we throw Surplus at it and bring it artificially down you know we are marrying the town to whatever we pass for those expenses as the norm so if I'm seen just trying to ask questions here that's what I'm trying to do so like and
you know because once we pass it then everybody thinks that's the level budget we start there and we only go up oh we're going down in this fund for for this compared to last year so there that right but maybe because of all the expenses trying to see which ones are needs or wants so that's why I asked the questions and he said himself just like I listen to things in meetings that could be put off so it's not saying let's not do it we're you know like that HVAC he so I want to get down to the I'm going to get down to public works this week and look at it I mean Jay has invited me I had a shower the day everybody else went and just kind of see some of this stuff and whether I vote for it or not in the masonry I thought was at the Town Hall so that's does anybody just did anybody want to make a motion to change this can I ask a another question first yeah sure are any of these paid for in this current Year's budget like plumbing and electrical for the kitchen I thought that was already done well so remember the building maintenance fund is a rolling fund so
this that top line for Plumbing in electrical will be spent out by the end of this year year but we're just what I'm basically saying is look we forecasted for the next year between now in the end of the next budget cycle about $135,000 in expenses and the only way to do that is to add to our current balance that's all if if you cut the fund we'll do less stuff it's it's not so my yeah my question is not is not whether or not to do it my question is any of these things already done that were paid for in the current budget like the electrical for the kitchen the kitchen's already done so the electrical hasn't been done what electric some of the plumbing is done the electrical is not done it was not but we hadn't I suspect the current balance here is actually lower because we've been tapping that
fund for what we're doing in there that makes sense and the drat fans I thought those were discussed months ago yeah we did I think we approved those as well curious why there why this isn't here and not in the AAS budget but well because it is a capital project and it is not a capital project that the school wanted to do it is a capital project that the board of Selectmen wanted the school to do it's used for recreation widely through the town so that was kind of I think what is that the gym is kind of a multi-use but yeah it was also serves it was kind of Jeff Murray's baby he gave what to me was a very convincing explanation for the idea but yeah I think that's how it went down moving so I guess my question was this was months ago and that and it hasn't been paid for yet I mean shouldn't we haven't done the work all these oh it hasn't okay the work hasn't been done yet is it correct I guess I guess I'm thinking it was already budgeted for in the previous budget and we're looking for next year I'm just trying to showing us how he's gonna spend the money that's in there now if every every the way I look at this is we have a total and then Eric does a good job of showing us what would be done and I heard from Eric's mouth himself which I don't hear very often that's why I'm going to make the the final this next motion that they could put off the hiac thing so to me that's more of a wish and I heard that from Eric so I'm going to go ahead and make
the motion to drop this line by 173 17,300 or this fund so I have to do the math that would be 33 but 32 or let's just drop it by 17 and leave the three so I'm so you're proposing we change the 12al line and put off that project till next year and save the taxpayers a little bit of money there because Eric himself said it could wait am I correct that that would be 1288 that you're proposing I thought it was funded this year at50 it would take 50,000 down to oh we've switched my fault my fault my fault I was looking at the wrong number my fault second the motion I'll second it okay Liz seconds further discussion yeah we're just lowering it to 33,000 if some job miraculously has to come up hopefully there can be some transfers within this budget to to cover it so I feel comfortable you know lowering that this year based on our conversations okay all right anyone lse okay let's take a vote all those in favor say I hi hi all those posed no they so Liz you're opposed no I'm I'm a I'm a okay your hand was sorry I just you're holding up your head from our long yeah yeah sorry I my screen was freezing earlier so I just want to make sure I got it right so the motion passes 4 to two and we will change this to 33,000 thank you okay AES Capital fund this is for zero so we're taking 100,000 out
that's being funded through the Sur right and the 2% non lapsing and I wanted to am I allowed to speak Mark do you have to go first well what do you want to speak about well I know there's only one after the AES you know and the open space fund I heard discussed in I understand it and I I think it's a great fun to have on the spreadsheet you'll see that we have a great total in there already it was discussed at the BOS meeting that there's no properties that they're currently looking at at all and we've got a big pot of money already so you know to help the taxpayers again I'd like to zero this line out for this year and revisit it in the future based on the total if you could show us the total on the spreadsheet it's 284,000 284,000 311 is what's in we're close to 300,000 with no properties in sight nothing on the horizon nothing they plan on buying this year so I feel comfortable with that being more of just we're Pat not patting it you know it's it's a good fun to have but I feel comfortable there's enough in there with nothing on the horizon this year to take that down this year I know it's going to hurt some I know who likes every single fun so I hate to do it but that's my I'd like to make a motion to do that the only sorry go on go ahead are you making a motion Joanne then oh yes so I'd like to make a motion to take that down to zero for this year based on the things
that I said okay and a BIG full budget already okay second second L seconds okay discussion Rob yeah so my only like I understand Joan I do yeah thank you my only the thing that gives me pause here and this goes back way back I can't remember the exact date where we lost out on a property because we just didn't have the money put aside and it hurt us because and it was it was like this really dumb situation where if we just had some money set aside we could have gotten property that was on the rail trail and you know so I I know exactly what you're doing I completely understand it and I just disagree and I I think I'm gonna vote now that's all than I would say the same as Rob we you know the problem is when open space might become available you never know it could it could something could pop next week There's No radar is really what it and you don't know if it's 25,000 or 300,000 right isn't that contingency I don't know can can we use contingency for that I mean we could go to contingency couldn't you if this is
real probably could you just have to either way you got to go to town meeting right yeah you'd have to have a whole town meeting which is it makes the process even more then they should have a vote if they want it the town that I don't I don't that's all it's just one of those they all said they have nothing on the horizon so I I know I just think I think that's just that's how it is yeah understood that it's not on the horizon till it suddenly pops up that's that's my two cents okay anybody else I would you know on the fence with this one too because I hear you Rob and I've I know the exact situation you're talking about I know the exact situation and I was like God why didn't we buy that but to go along with what Joan is saying it is a year where there's a two- Mill increase that's never going to pass and I hate to zero that out I it goes against my grain it's like the road crew the road work but I just think if we're ever to get a budget to pass we have to start looking that some of these line items are we're dead in the water so I'm going to have to say I will vote Yes when it comes to vote understood but I'm I I'm totally in your Camp Rob I yeah it's a tough one it is this is it's just a bad year for none of this is easy I know it's hard on everyone anybody else have any comments okay we'll take a vote all those in favor say I and hold your hand
up if I could okay so we have five eyes all those opposed Nay n okay 5 to two motion passes we'll zero that out thank here oh yep all the blue blue yes well I mean that's I just I'm not like that's when I get to look at it tomorrow with fr helpful though to have we have now gone through all of the line items we have nothing in debt retirement or interest expense so that leaves the current budget at $3,562 51 and five cents we're a 2.8% increase overall that includes of course the AES and the ram budget Eric I at following do we have a final Ram budget NOP I didn't think so I'm just grabbing a pen I'll be right back so that that change is 255,000 so that's less than a
mill we're looking at now right a mill huh half a mill rate it looks like half a mill no a mill is 313 according to what Eric said earlier was 313 135 so we're now less than a mill three all I'm trying to say instead of a two M increase we're we're less than a mill right now no right now your mill rate increase 1.3 1. two something but remember when the final calculations are made coming back right for the motor vehicle assessment we're going to get the grand list will go up based on the board of selectman's decision about 90,000 did you say was that right or oh what was that I'm not going to give you the the mill rate will go up some number of millions how much of that I don't know you know that's because I I can't do the numbers crunching on that that has to be done by Vision appraisal and they've got you know of 169 towns like 165 of them had chosen to pick the higher millry so they're basically redoing an entire Fall's worth of work by April 15 we have I have asked that we get ours done because we're a smaller and simple Town simpler town so we have
it by the April 9th meeting and we can give a final mill rate at the the annual budget meeting but I don't know whether that will be the case or not depends on the contractor and and let's not forget that the mill rate is just the way to calculate what's being taxed at what a level what's really happening here is% the total taxation of the of the taxpayers in the town of Andover is increasing at 2.0% to me that's pretty dang reasonable overall right we still have a pretty big pretty big adjustment on the endover elementary and we've heard the the reasons for that that'll that'll be left to the town meeting and the taxpayers at the town meeting of course but the the mill rate's one thing but the story I think is that there's a 2% overall increase to the town of Andover taxpayers yeah that's what really matters how we that increase yeah it's just one part get caught up in the mill rate yeah total by taxation to me is is the line that's the one to look at well again it's how we get there we have to remember and so I had to walk away and get a pen did did you know we've I wanted to ask a question I guess last year we had put
150 to the B fund balance I think Eric put the 190 so we're not doing Apples to Apples exactly because I think you added that extra 40 that should have been in last year is that what that is Eric or was it the interest right so all right so we have 190 there and I can you guys repeat and I so apologize the beginning of the night you were talking about the total budget and then today I think Bill was saying it what was that statement you made bill just so I could follow that I'm sorry when when I said earlier tonight I thought you said or someone said at the beginning of the night Eric said we had this and now we have this so are we saying that all of the updates that we've made have been has everything filtered in by so we're looking at what we have now as a my understanding is that's the current number that 2% like Mark made the changes and should have propagated right okay I'm gonna look real close so I'm G to take my camera off in case I have a question so I don't annoy anybody right Mark that should be the case right like you you made the line item changes that we voted on tonight and it should have been it should be reflected in that two% number correct yeah yeah that's that's our current working so the the total by taxation increase at the last gotcha yeah at the last spreadsheet that we worked on in our last meeting was at 2.9% right yep and I like to look at how much
we've raised the expenses for the town you know what I mean because we can artificially def no so I I get you and I'll do that on my own so right now we're saying it's a 2% but it's how we got there that's 2% by taxation you're right and right it's 2% by taxation taxation people mainly care about the mill rate things like that I mean we need to tell that story because all it really does is it's shifting a little bit of the taxation more on the homeowners and less on the vehicle owners right right right and then counterbalanced by the reversal that's been allowed where we get to go back and raise that mill rate back up the the auto because you know there was an outcry about that but you know I think just big picture getting from 2.9
to two is pretty good work that's hope we didn't I hope we didn't cut too deep but I don't think we cut very deep you know I think it was it was hard to do what we did but yeah but I'm personally you know that's that's not a bad number all things considered so I'm happy but you know a little bit of the fun balance to get there but I think it's okay yeah we're finally making some good interest off that stiff account which is really nice yeah that me for years and years I can't believe how many years we went without doing that it just kills me anyway let's look forward Rod look for a up back that's
right I think it's good that we're where we are today I think we had some discussions both publicly and private you know and privately that could change things a little bit but I don't think they probably should be done right now I mean I'm just looking for so I think you know so I I like that we've already talked about at this meeting that next week will be the hearing we all go back to the drawing board and we you know come back next week ready as I did today you know I put my put my face out there as do all of you so I'm gonna I'm gonna are we are we okay with this can we move on to the next I can't give my final thoughts all right I will got my final thought y please sorry I wanted to see the bottom line on the main tab what is the bottom line budget number I just wanted to yeah that's what I would like toer 13 million yeah 1 million 2515 hold on please stay there for myself too there you go that's I think what I was getting at earlier thank you let me get close yeah and then you know if you look at the change it's there also the total spending package of 251 2.8 there you go thank you that's exactly and then last year it was 127 correct 128 it says corrected so I don't I would go with the 128 number
right oh 128 sorry right so the approved why we correct I'm not understanding the corrected I mean what did we pass so I will explain that the approved budget last year for total expenditures was 12,841 511 however that as we well know included an error that was around $40,000 gotcha so when you look here at the corrected budget yeah that gives you the number with the correction but which what number the 128 is the corrected yeah yeah the 128 is the corrected number yep the current corrected budget okay okay so that's the real budget for this this fiscal year and so gotcha and this year it would be 13 yeah which is how you get to 255 five as your increase so all right so and I believe last last week making notes it was like in the threes yeah that's what I was at guys earlier I makes sense from the cuts that we made tonight so we did Make Some Cuts we did yep so did we actually cut $389,500 as the total increase I had notes on another thing so whatever because yeah go ahead Liz right now new the new proposed budget is looking at 13,56 251 and before we made these Cuts if I'm not mistaken it it was 13446 136 13446 let me look I that no was not that high it was because remember the board of Selectmen whacked a fair bid out of this budget also right so we we made some cuts on top of Some Cuts guys right like you know the open space fund I think if memory serves there was a $25,000 cut and we cut another 20 we cut it all the way down so right so there were already
Some Cuts in there this was this was the spreadsheet we were looking at last week yeah so 13150 whoops Eric always had something off to the right and on the mill rate page that said the increase in spending and I thought it was 330 one week it might have been 313 but well okay 350 here you go 350 our current increase in spending total year-over-year is $214,700 but that is with the AES going up 380 something in the town coming down you know 115,000 111,000 oh and we've also already capital and the and remember the AES budget has come down hugely when they agreed to give us their Surplus back wait a minute how did the budget come down yes R okay that scared me I'm like wait you can't do figure it out late that's why Ram budget is negative now because year overy year given the two things you know yeah guys they did that last year too they gave they dispersed the money back to the towns at one point the up
increase I wrote it I finally found it was 408 312 at one point then we did like take away the AES Capital so we are coming down to whatever yeah the 255 or whatever number we have I didn't write all the way for the increase in expenses I know it's late Mark but it just it makes sense to see where we've come down on his spreadsheet originally there was a little thing to the to the right that said this budget is up 408 312 that's yeah at one point so y so we have you know and it's up there to the right whatever yeah you got to go all the way over but there we go so now we're at the 214 so that must be linked in okay I see what you did Eric what you were talking about a little propose unless somebody wants to take make a motion to modify any of these numbers we move on to our agenda item next agenda item we got I'll make that motion that we move on to so are you are you before you do that are you approving this this is what you're going to public hearing on this budget right now because we're by definition this is where we are I that's why I wanted to finish and
wrap up my discussion just if we do that and I know you want to go to the next item we will so this is where we are right now and you said all of this is updated and then we're allowed to modify more if we look at things or want to bring MO yeah we'll still have that option yeah that's all just confirming we'll still vote on a final recommended budget to take the town meeting and that'll typically be after the public hearing next week I feel like we made good inroads then because we did get some things done tonight all right let's go go okay hearing no more discussion then we're g to move on okay next up on our agenda we have I think just the approval of the meeting minutes all right that is correct so we have the tri board meeting minutes the regular meeting minutes The Joint Board of finance and board of selectman Workshop minutes and the regular meeting minutes probably need to take tackle all of these in separately since we didn't always have attendance on those the same so could I guess I'll go ahead and share I don't just for the sake of reference the first meeting minutes is the tri board meeting minutes of Wednesday December 4th does anybody want to make a motion to approve these I make the motion I had a couple changes on this one or a couple call outs because I actually read them they're little
on page two of this one there's a few things that are not correct or hey Liz can I just interject for one minute if everyone's I I get the feeling that everyone's tired and if there are going to be projected which it's understandable do we want to just put these all off till next meeting again I mean because we're just right in the middle of budget season and by the time it's it's up to everybody if there's going to be changes on different ones and all of that it's up to everybody do we want to tackle this tonight I was feeling fine but I felt like everyone was rushing us on so does every we've been here for three and a half hours so that understandably so so this isn't an urgent matter so we should maybe put this off and do this next mon I agree with Joan I think it's something that we could put off this is something we should just put off I'm trying to I'm totally okay with that yeah let's do it because I kind of want to read I want to read what I would suggest though is if if if anybody sees any discrepancies and thank you for reading through it Liz I was not at that meeting but maybe what you want to do is
identify those and just highlight them send them out in an email so we can kind of review them in okay I missed that meeting too so good kudos to you for checking yeah and I we've all kind of read through them but it's been a while it's aot it's a lot of text on that one so y yeah I can send out my edits they're minor some of them are just some are spelling some is a sentence that and I think more added in a couple places so I want to have the chance to do that too so so I will send my comments on to the group and then if anybody else sees any comments they can add on email we'll do it that way that's fine all right if nobody wants to make a motion regarding the meeting minutes then I'll make a motion that we that we pass on the meeting minutes until the next official Board of Finance meeting we don't really need to motion that we just don't take action and we'll move on agreement yeah okay good I make to
agenda item nine which is board open discussion I'm sorry what was that nothing we were think I think everybody's getting a little Punchy here see I ate that's why I got my energy back have anything to add under board open discussion no anybody have any correspondence that has not been shared I think we receive all received this stuff from the Board of Ed and we talked about it tonight that's all I've gotten okay we have public speaks we have t gr is that Terry that's t s s anything to add public speak she might asleep this is a one of those longer meetings o okay if you don't have anything test we'll move move on you are still muted but we'll go on next agenda item is adjournment When anybody like to make a motion to adjourn I'll make I'll make the motion to adjourn
okay I heard Louise first thank you Louise anybody second I'll pan thank you any discussion it's a Hot Topic tonight okay all those in favor say I I any opposed any exensions hearing none the motion passes we are adjourned thank you very much everybody we have a everyone we've been through it we'll see you with the public hearing next week and continue continue from there okay Mark quick question before you so is the agenda set for us or it it's a week away I'll send an email no problem yeah I mean I think the agenda is simply you know know presentation of the budget public comment and then board Open disc discussion on the budget you know final final approval yeah I just want to make sure we add budget Workshop continues or whatever we do just to finalize okay yeah we we will absolutely have the opportunity to to make further Chang oh no right thank you and I know I know I've asked it several times don't think I'm forgetting I just want to make sure we don't have to put something on the agenda thank you night everyone you look like you're raising your hand so I was just gonna say tomorrow morning early can you get me so the I made Corrections at the
same time in my copy of the budget but at this point we normally run off of yours so if you could send me that tomorrow morning I'm sending to you in three minutes I will make PDFs of that in the morning and we will publish that on the town's website for the public Mark Mark can you share it with us y copy everybody yeah and just is that a little preliminary to put it on the website is it is it preliminary budget is that what you're saying you're having a workshop you need to tell the public what your budget list I get it I'm only asking a question it doesn't
have to be like I'm a little kid getting yelled at I get that we're having a workshop thank you I I get it I just I asked if it was preliminary to do that that's all thank you if you don't want it publish I won't publish it well I don't know if we've ever done that before so I was I was asking if we have it I don't think it's finalized yet it's a draft budget right not really in its final correct Yeah final one will be what we distribute before the town budget meeting as long as it's to noted as a draft I have no problem I mean what's the problem question fine it's the current working draft Yeah okay I think we're in agreement I'll send it around to everybody thank you everybody thanks Eric as have a happy bye bye try