All right, folks. 7:01. So, let's get this show on the road. This is the March 24th, 2026 Board of Finance Special Budget Workshop meeting. We'll start with the Pledge of Allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America
nd to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible,
with liberty and justice for all.
Okay. we'll do a quick round of public speak. we have a number of folks here who are select board members, but I'll go around with them. Scott, do you have anything before we get going?
I'm good. Thank you.
All right. Annie. Carol,
you're on mute.
There you go. Oh, you're muted again. Okay, you're all set. Joanne,
I'm all set. I'm here to listen.
I'm admitting a couple people. Here's Kim and Jeff Murray.
Hey, Kim. Hey, Jeff.
Hey,
Jeff. We were just doing public speak so you know I'll give you an opportunity but obviously we're going to probably hear from you during the meeting but if you have anything to start off with go ahead.
All set.
Okay. Okay. So, last meeting we went through, I'd say roughly the first half of the town ops budget and we had a number of things crop up that were raised as questions and some changes we made and and I think part of what we're trying to do tonight is make sure that we are not doing things and making choices that don't comport with the select board's understanding of things or what you guys are trying to do. you know, we don't want to make a misstep there. There's a lot going on. So, I'm going to, unless anybody has other thoughts, what I was thinking of doing is going back to the spreadsheet that we were working off of last week where I had my notes. Lisa gave us a new spreadsheet, which is great. But, you know, and just sort of going through the ones where I think maybe we can say the select board could weigh it on for us if that helps. so what I'm going to do here is I'm going to share my screen if I can do this properly. One moment. So, one of the things we talked about, the first thing we talked about was the admin assistant line under the town administrator. and
you're not sharing yet.
What?
You're not sharing yet?
I'm not sharing yet. I apologize. I thought it says I'm screen sharing.
I can I see it. I see it.
I can see it.
Okay.
I'm not seeing it. I don't know why. All right.
that's weird, Bill. So, I think this was originally set to 30,000 and we voted to cut it, but I we weren't real sure about what we were doing. So here here's my apologies, but you know I kind of typed this up as we were talking. So the question here is how many hours was the board of selectman intending for this position?
We did a calculation of 19 hours at $25 an hour at 52 weeks. That came out to 24,700. So we cut it down to 25K. But if this is intended at a more than at a 20 hours plus position, which I think would have benefits implications, that might not have been the right thing for us to do. So,
can any of the select board members chime in on that?
your intent.
Carol, are you going to talk on this? I was going to because I know when I asked about at the board of selectman meeting, I had suggested 20 hours a week so that we get someone in there that would stay.
Yeah. But I I have a question for you, Carol, anyways.
Okay.
Because we already have an administrative assistant in town that we pay. So,
so I'm not sure why why what are we doing with that? Why are we having another administrative assistant
because Kate right now I think her stipen is like $5,000 or 6,000. It really isn't that much. But when Kate is out with five weeks vacation during the year, the admin, the town administrator doesn't have anyone. And it just gives more stability for that office. So if if a town administrator leaves, at least we have the admin assistant in there to give guidance to a new incoming town administrator. So it
what what you could to do is to increase her hours then
o it would be to hire a different person. Now if you wanted to keep Kate on as the some you know with her little stipen to do the website or something which is really all that she really has a lot of time to do for the town administrator. you know, get let her continue doing that, but hire an additional person that is just the admin assistant to the town administrator because in July and January, Kate's busy taking taxes. So, she can't really devote much time to the town administrator. So that was the discussion and that was why we came up with 20 hours and you know it wouldn't be Kate but again Kate could stay on as just the website person.
Yeah. Have you talked to Kate about this thought process?
Yeah. This is I mean this is How do you think Kate feels about this, Carol?
I don't know. But when we talked about it at our last meeting, Scott, you seem to think
No, I didn't know, Carol. I didn't know where you were going with this. I thought maybe you were going to give Kate a raise or something. I didn't know you were trying to get rid of her job.
I did not say that. I just said we needed an additional person as the town administrator's assistant. Kate, for what do we give her? $6,000 a year.
I think it was $5,150 was what was in the 2526 budget.
Okay. And basically now she does most of the work on the website. So let her stay as the website person with that additional stipend and just give the town administrator a 20our a week assistant that they should be entitled to. So,
can can I ask some questions about this?
I'll never I I'll never agree to that. Carol,
can I can I clarify? I'm
not gonna get rid of I'm not gonna get rid of Kate.
Okay. We're not getting rid of We're not getting rid of Kate at all.
We're not getting rid of Kate. Kate would still be doing She's wearing a lot of hats, but Kim, what was your question?
So, so Kate Kate kind of serves a dual role in the town hall right now. two or three. I think she's got
So, she's an assistant
ax. She's our tax collector or assistant tax collector?
The tax collector.
She is the tax collector and she works about 19 hours a week for that.
No. she's
I think she's 34 hours in July, October, January, and April. And then she's 20. How many Lisa during the Wednesday off?
I think 22.
So Lisa can help me understand. So her position as the the admin right now,
how many hours is that?
Is it,
you know, I I'm trying to remember where I put it. I've got so much going on. I'm because I did her calculation for that line and I figured the two of them. if you can hold on I'm I did the whole
Hold on.
So So my thinking because I I have done some research on this position is you know Kate Kate has brought in probably $200,000 in back taxes for the town. She's a very to me that's pretty valuable
in the last year. Just in the last year. What if what if we in just increased her hours? So, she had set hours for her tax collector position and she had set hours as the administrative assistant, which it seems like she's already got her hands in and is touching it and we kept her. We don't have to hire a new employee or look for a new employee. She seems to me like she's a very valuable asset to the town and give it a try. I mean, I think it's a conversation that we could have with her, but hiring new people, finding people that fit in, people with a skill set like this, it's tough,
right?
It's I I would really like to consider us doing that. I mean some of that some Oh, so go ahead, Bill. No,
I just want I think originally when we talked about this last week, our thinking was the reason for this is if we get a new town admin, which we we're still trying to fill the admin position. They may need a good admin themselves, right? If we get a new town administrator, they're going to need an admin. They're learning a new role, coming to a new job. I think that was part of the thinking. Is is that correct? I'm asking the board of selectman. That's what we were thinking of. Yes. And I have a lot of vacation time.
Stop sharing this first time. Go on.
Well, vacation time vacation time.
Everybody gets vacation.
I mean, what what is that?
She takes off a I'm not sure if she's getting paid for all the time, but I know she takes off quite a bit. And between her time, the months that she's the tax collector and then taking off sometimes for vacation, I think we need somebody in there for more hours as an admin. And we had that back before she took the job. what was it? Was it Amanda? I'm trying to think of the name of the girl we had before.
You're right.
It was Amanda.
Yes. And we need that again. And Amanda was 19 hours per week
every week.
And she was in addition to the tax collector. So we've always had an admin assistant whether it been was to the first selectman or the town administrator. So just trying to get that position back where that person is dedicated solely to the town administrator because again Kate in July and January is is full-time collecting the taxes. And you're right, she does a good job. Nobody's arguing that. And we're not trying to take her money away. continue to give her the $5,000 stipend to handle the website and concentrate strictly on that and keep that updated because
I don't think this was a good place. This wasn't a good place to talk about this whole position. Carol, you you should have talked about this to us before we got to this point.
It was talked about. It was completely talked about.
How can you have how can you have Kate
Yeah. I can have Kate sitting in the tax Jeff Maguire is the one who said let's up this to 30,000 Carol so that we can get the 20hour a week admin assistant for the town administrator. So you if you want to text Jeff I don't know if he's available but he is the one who advised Lisa to put that up to 30,000. So, we could do that and have a 20hour a week admin assistant.
So, I just want to clarify something and then I want to hear from Jeff Murray again because I basically didn't catch what you know it was a lot of cross talk. But before we go there, I just want to be clear. The I is are you saying Carly the idea behind the 30K was 25 really for this new position and then keeping a $5,000ish stipend for Kate? because that's not clear in the budget. The way it's
I I believe so because I had suggested $25 per hour for 20 hours which would equate to 25,000. Jeff Maguire instructed you can listen to the board of selection meeting to put it at 30. So
I'm not I don't want to speak for Jeff but he is the one who said to keep it at the 30. Just
he reason I asked that question and then yeah I do want to hear from Jeff Murray but the the reason I asked that question is
we made a cut and if that cut stands what we just did was cut the stip end out. So
I just want everyone to be clear on what we did.
Jeff, would you I'm sorry. I I really didn't catch what you had what you were saying before. No, I mean it's it's it's the problem is Kate Kate morphed into, you know, she moved into the tax collector's office and it's going to be very difficult to have her doing the admin duties during the day and doing the tax collector duties, especially during the tax season. So, you know, it's it's good to have a somebody dedicated to the town administrator. I mean, we're going to have a new person in there and I said that assistant does a lot and especially with a new person coming in. I just I feel for the money, the expenditure, it's not a it's not really a big it's not a really big ask.
I I don't think that it is. I I just wanted to get clarity. I don't think we fully understood
what we were looking at with that $30,000.
and I think we made a decision that now in retrospect I'm not so sure about. So that's why we had you guys on. That's why we wanted to talk about this because
yeah, we made a cut, but does that cut make sense? I think we might want to revisit it, guys, based on what we're hearing here. by the way, welcome to the other Jeff. I see you there, Mr. Magcguire.
And can I just add one more thing? I was looking through the spreadsheet that Lisa sent us. There is a $5,000 some odd dollar stipen for the assistant to the treasurer that was given specifically to Chris. So,
yep,
that could probably
that was on my list to talk about tonight because obviously we've lost Chris.
Okay,
we'll get there. fair enough. And may and maybe that's where maybe we can make a motion and and and put the one back up and take the other one out. But we also have to talk about what we're planning for assistant treasurer moving forward. I mean, we know we need one. We just lost one. I'm assuming we're gonna try to replace that position.
We will be. We just got the res resignation on
Friday. Got it.
Yep.
The the treasurer is working on the issues that we have internally in that office. I'm I'm working with her to try to sit there and get it straightened up, but we have some issues that we have to resolve. And yes, we will be putting forth a job description on that. and then putting that out for the public so that maybe some people can sit there and apply.
All right. And and obviously my take on this is I just want our line item in our budget to properly reflect that. are we in fact budgeting appropriately for hiring that for that position? That's all. So but before we get to that going back to this,
you know, this is last week again. Oh, sorry I stopped sharing. But last week we made a cut to the town to the administrator assistant to the town administrator line from 30 to 25. And now I'm you know based on what I've just heard that may have been illconsidered. So you know we might want to put that back to 30 under the understanding that although here's another question. Should it be broken down? Should we have the 25 that we have in that line and then a separate line for a stipend for what Kate's doing in her other duties? I don't know. They should be aggregated. What do you think, Lisa?
I'm sorry. I was trying to I was trying to look for that information for Kim before. What did you say,
Lisa?
I was saying that so last week we made that cut, right? We we had $30,000 in the town administrator assistant line. We talked about it without having all the information we had tonight and we cut it down to 25,000 under the idea that wait a minute if you do the math 20 hours a week get you know 25 bucks an hour and you get to 25k. So but then the discussion here is talked about how well we still need a stipend for the other duties that K takes on and that was 5150 last year. Now that incorporates her helping a little bit at least with the town administrator. Do we need a separate line then for that stipend instead of rolling it in if we increase the assistant line back to 30 as per the original board selement request? I don't have a problem with the number but do should it be in the same line right or shouldn't we have a separate line for Kate stipend? So this is considering if she re No, this is if you have a new administrative
assistant,
right? But consistent
with what Carol was saying and I think unless I'm misunderstanding, you know, Jeff Murray was saying Kate still does a lot of other stuff,
right? and so at least Carol's understanding was the idea was we were hiring this person, we're going to hire this person and that bit is about 25K and then there's still this 5K stipend and that's how you get to 30.
But
well, wouldn't you just leave it in the same lines that it's in? Leave her.
That's what I'm asking. Yeah. I mean, I would still leave administrative assistant. It would You're considering the website still to be administrative assistant oriented, right?
But it would be going to two different people. That's the only reason I asked it. I I again I don't really care how it's done as long as it's done if you think it's done properly. If it's fine to have it all in one, cool. All right, fine. We'll we'll we'll leave it. That's fine by me.
Well, the the like the section town administrator just because it says administrative. Well,
I I would think
just leave it in one. Listen, if you're going to put the money in, leave it in one line item. It it really the stipen not stipen doesn't really make a difference.
That's true because you could share two people in one line.
I'm just trying not to make Lisa's life harder later. That's all.
Then simple as well.
Then leave it.
Okay. Then we'll leave it.
Did you share the budget again, Rob?
Yeah. One moment. Sorry. you're right. I stopped sharing. And again, I'm going to switch over at some point to Lisa's new spreadsheet. This is I'm using this old one because of
you had our last week's questions on it.
So, here's the line item. Here's the old stipend here, right? And this is this was originally 30,000 and we cut it down last meeting to 25 because we did some math and said, "Wait a minute. Why is it 30?" This now this is exactly why I wanted to have this discussion. We're finding out that Okay. But the actual idea here was that this incorporates two different things. I don't think we understood that last week.
No, we didn't. No.
Okay. So, let's go ahead and change.
Sorry. so I I you know, I would suggest Yeah. If if somebody wants to make a motion to kind of reverse our last week's decision, I'd be fine with that. make a motion to put put the salary back to
I'll make a motion to put the salary of the admin assistant on that line 102-101 back to 30,000 for the 2026 budget.
I'll second it.
Okay. So, Liz motions, bill seconds. Oops. does anyone have any further discussion on the board?
So, you only What did you change then? Wait, we haven't voted yet.
Okay,
we're getting there.
Okay, I thought I missed
I gotta do this right and and Kate's schooled me on this. I got to go person by person so she can record it properly later. So, unless there's further discussion, we'll take a vote. Okay. I'll just go by who's on my screen. Liz,
yes.
Bill,
yes.
Louise,
yes.
Kim,
yes. Heather,
yes.
Nick,
And I am a yes. I believe that's all of us. 70. We agree to put this back to 30,000. Although this isn't the spreadsheet where I really need to be changing it, but we need to use the new one. okay. So, that's hopefully sorted. this brings up what we were talking about a moment ago which is this issue the assistant treasurer stipend if we are looking at hiring a new person what do we need in this line what's appropriate in this line are we okay if we leave it do we have opinions from the select board on that please chime Since we've lost our assistant treasurer and obviously we're going to be doing a job search,
you should you should leave the again that stipen was to that stipen was with the understanding that the the person that was in that role was going to be able to fill some of the treasurer's positions. That is not you should take the stipen again. We shouldn't have stipens. Honestly, stipens should be part of the wages and they should all be in there. So, in my mind, you should sit there and and increase that line item to, you know, 566.99 and and move on. And then if we can sit there and make some adjustments internally, you know, to be really honest, the the the treasurer needs to get that that money. You know, she's she's in there right now. So she we're going to be spending the money that is remaining on the assistant wages until we can hire a new one to compensate the treasurer to be quite frank.
So I would get rid of the stipen line and I would put it into the the the 5500 treasurer clerk wages.
So So you would take down
45150? No, that's
down down
that one.
Sorry.
Yeah.
So,
so it's just a combination of those two numbers,
right?
All right. So, that's the proposal. I mean, do we have any other commentary on that from anyone else here? so
how many hours a week does the assistant treasurer work? Just out of curiosity.
I mean, 38400 the answer.
How many? Sorry.
I'm sorry, Lisa.
30.
How many?
30.
Thank you.
Yeah.
Okay.
so it's not a question. It's it's a it's a delete. You just added it right to the other one.
So, I did the math down here. I haven't messed around with it yet, Bill. And again, this is this is last week's spreadsheet, so some of this I'll have to transfer over later. And hopefully, you know, Lisa's following along. But if we did this, if if we follow what Jeff suggested, my understanding would be we zero out, we delete this line entirely, and this number here, we would increase to this number here.
Correct? If if that if I'm understanding the idea,
I'm fine with that personally. does I mean if there's any other thoughts or commentary, I'd like to hear it, but otherwise it makes some sense. I agree in general like stipens aren't necessarily great. I'd like to have everything in wages. So
just a question. Oh, go ahead.
Who is that? Okay.
if if the point of this is to use that money, that 50150
. Yeah.
To try and compensate for Lisa, why don't we just move it up to that line? Just out of curiosity. I mean, is there an argument against that?
Yeah, it's a good idea.
There there is. We We've done that. And what you want to do is is sit there and determine the way I'm seeing this after being in the office and understanding what's going on is to determine what the assistant treasurer's role will be moving forward
and then determining what that money is and then splitting that out between the assistant treasurer's line and the treasurer's line for this year because you know that that's what's going to happen for this even for this year coming up. And just from my opinion, I wouldn't just put it into the treasurer's line because this is like with every line item you guys deal with. Once you put it there, you don't ever get it back. It's very hard, especially from an employee standpoint. It's very hard. And and so what I would tell you is leave the 40 there. leave the assistant treasurer's wages there. As we as Lisa determines what she really needs in the office and how effectively it will work out, she might hire somebody at slightly a different rate and then some of that money will get transferred to her for next year and then it'll be a determination of how well the system is set up and does Lisa need to be doing what she's doing now, which the answer better be no. So
just I'm just telling you. So I wouldn't I wouldn't sit there and move it because
you know this is this is the same thing I when I got involved with you guys last year is the same thing I said to you. It's like once you give it it's really hard to take it away and that's the whole key to to what you
So we should just leave it.
We should just leave it as as a on a stipen line. Something that's easy to
No. No stipen. No, we should move in.
Put it in the cler. Put it in the clerk's wages. And then what can what should happen if I if I'm is that clerk's wages will be adjusted and then next year you'll be able to sit there and make a downward adjustment if everything goes according to plan.
Okay. Okay. All right. So Rob, I don't think we need a a motion for that, right? We can just do it because
No, I mean I think we would want a motion to move.
So I can do that
o there.
Combine it with this to make that.
Yep.
Okay. I'll make the motion that we take the assistant treasur stipen to 5150 add it to line 109120 the treasur clerk's wages to make that total 58.40 40 and delete 109 101
58400
second it
I think Liz second 58400
is the total so okay so bill motioned
Liz you in a second
I corrected it
you corrected it I corrected in a second
sorry apologies
again I have such a little bar here when I'm sharing my screen. okay. So, if there's further discussion, now is your time. Otherwise, we'll take a vote. All right. Liz,
yes.
Bill,
yes.
Louise,
yes.
Heather,
yes.
Nick,
yes.
Kim,
yes.
M.
Thanks, Phil.
Welcome. Goldfish brain, you're not on my screen. You don't exist. And myself. Yes, that's 70. we will do we'll go ahead and do that. obviously hopefully Elisa is tracking this in there. Oh, look at that. Let me break the spreadsheet. Okay, it's 58 400. Boom. And this gets zeroed out. And this gets deleted. Do we want to make a note on that line saying stating that it includes that dollar amount we just took out we just added in so we know about it next year?
There you go.
I mean, honestly, I'm putting this in the wrong spreadsheet, but
yeah. Yeah,
I'll get it into the at some point. I'll transfer it over for treasure. Okay. we had this high highlighted. I don't know if I really care enough to go back to it. This was a this was a discussion with Lisa about what to do for payroll. I don't know if this is really the time to to revisit that, guys.
that's not payroll though, Rob.
Oh, sorry.
That's QuickBooks update.
Quickbook updates. And then I had ADB for payroll. And oh, that was a whole another discussion down below. Right.
Yeah. My my bad. Okay. So, okay. land records, there was an increase here. We had asked about it. I talked to both Robera and Kate. There's apparently there was a system update and that is the new required amount. I I I think that was the justification. that's pretty much what I have on that. I'd leave it alone personally. It's not a ton of money and if that's what they're telling us we need, then so be it. this here. Okay. So, I'm a little I want to make sure we've got this right cuz I talked to Kate about this. She's apparently like one class away and like a certification where she gets a pay bump. And I don't know if it's built into this number here because that's supposed to come in the fall. She
It is not.
Okay. So
it's 45. It should be 45 804.
Okay. So that's just
All right. Well, let me not do that yet. But that's what I have here. 45 804 upon completion.
Yep.
One class left. Going to get happen in the fall.
So this would need to go up about 800 bucks. not quite
to make this right because otherwise we're going to be under on this line.
so I mean I just think this is a quick fix. We I I personally think I don't like this isn't something we avoid. Like it happens. It triggers a raise.
Yep. Yep.
So I propose I'll go ahead and I'll just I'll just move I'll move that we increase this line to 45. Sorry, the line 111-100 tax collector salary that we increased that to 45804 from the current 45 032 number that we had on this spreadsheet. Now, Lisa, it wasn't updated in your new one yet, right?
No, it was not.
Okay. So, this is this motion is then live. Okay, great. So, do we have a second on that? Second.
Okay. Any further discussion on that? Great. Okay. Liz,
Liz is a yes. Bill,
Bill's yes. Kim,
Gotcha. This time, yes. Louise,
Is a yes. Heather,
yes.
Nick,
Me, yes. Okay, so that's 45804. Done deal. Okay, great. okay. So, we had a line, we had a question mark here because it was a big percentage increase. Not a lot of money, but it's a big percentage increase. And what I have here is estimate for sorry, estimate from contractor plus a small buffer from Kate. She said actually 15,000 should probably take care of it. We have it at 16 at the moment. So, her opinion was we could cut this by $1,000 without causing a problem. a movie that we cut at $1,000 to 15.
All right, second that.
Second was
Louise.
Louise, thanks. Sorry it didn't light you up. Great. Okay. any discussion? Fantastic. Liz,
yes.
Bill,
yes.
Louise,
yes.
Heather,
yes.
Nick,
yes.
Kim,
yes. me. Yes. Fantastic, guys. Boom. All right. There we go. So, that we saved $1,000. All right. so much is for the assessor. Okay. So, this one I'm a little uncertain about. what I got out of Roberta when I asked her about this issue, this mileage issue was that basically we have a new person who needs some training in classes. And so it's probably put in for mileage, whereas our current assessor guy apparently really doesn't put in for his mileage, which is why we keep seeing this thing not being used, but he's actually entitled to it. So her take was be careful about cutting that down.
I I don't necessarily
It's 500 bucks.
Yep. I I I'm going to tell you I think you should keep the mileage on this one simply because the new person that's working in an office is going to get trained in the in the facility in Waterberry. So she's going to have mileage. Just just letting you know. So
right, it's essentially what Bur told me. Thanks. So thanks Jeff. I agree with that. if anybody disagrees and wants to make a change to that line, fine. Otherwise, I think we should leave it. It's just not a lot of money and and we may we actually have a need for it this year that we might we haven't had in the past. we had a question about books. So, this here we just we had made a cut last time and I just think we we roll with that. But book subscriptions. So she said there's NADA books that have changed her subscription service for VIN check for some sort of VIN checker software and that's why this number went up. So I would be inclined I I would suggest again is it it's not a lot of money and there's a justification for it. I would suggest we leave it unless anyone else has you know a belief that we should cut it. I I don't want to make it such that they can't do the job.
No, don't believe it. Especially if you had a conversation with Roberto.
Yeah, we just wanted to clear it up. That's all.
Yeah. No, I I agree. I've been having and my head's spinning a little bit. I've got all these notes because I've talked to Robera. I've talked to Kate. I even talked to Chris. I talked a lot to people this week. It's been there's been a lot. but I that one made sense to me. let's see. Most of these I think we kind of already talked about and talked through. this we highlighted them, but we, you know, I feel like we talked about them last time and and I think this was the one I guess we could talk about a little bit more, but because we're just I I'm perfectly fine with paying more for our election folks who are doing more, but it was a big increase. so I don't know if anybody wants to rever revisit this one. Did you talk to Wall-E and Linda about it?
That that is that one I didn't get to. I apologize, guys. I could try to if I could catch somebody tomorrow,
but I I can't I can't tell you tonight. I did not get a chance.
Okay.
or if anybody else wants to try to reach out and have that conversation, I'd be thrilled. because my day tomorrow's pretty busy.
who is that? Wall-E andor
Oh, Linda Derek.
Yeah,
I can give them a call if you want.
that that'd be great, Bill. If we can maybe just come back to that next time.
And I'm sorry. It's 121
8:30 meals.
8:30.
Just it's it's just a big jump. It's It's not a lot of money. It's $1,000.
Okay. but our past experience numbers were a lot lower and it doesn't look like we're expending this year. Now, we do have this year, you know, midterms coming up. So, you'd expect this to jump. It's just a question of is that jump make sense? So, you follow I think I think it's just a question. Frankly, again, we're not making some sort of giant savings here if we cut this. But
we had a question on town planner wages last time because and it wasn't a huge thing. And I just asked about where there whether there why do we have kind of a town planner down here and a project manager up there and Kate's take was that there's no real overlap there. This does the plan of conservation and development and and something else I forget now. whereas the other one is really for assisting the administrator I think in project management and grant writing and that sort of thing.
The town planner just finished finished up the POC
that he worked on well the planning and zoning commission worked on for almost two years. Now, he's gonna be working on on affordable housing,
which is gonna come up quickly. Now,
thank you for that, Scott. That's the other one I the other issue that she mentioned and I didn't get in my notes. So, yeah. this here I think had to do with a specific printer that died.
yeah. And I think Kate said, was this the printer that she was it this printer or was it one? I think this is the one that prints out the big big maps.
Broad printer.
It's the building department. So, you're going to have You're going to be building
That's why it's more
building plans.
yeah.
So, I think that's why it was in there.
it's needed. It was more of a maybe more of a last year thing than a this year thing, but I think they had left it in there. I don't know if anybody else has thoughts on that. I mean, the the the supply budget pretty lean and we already cut some, so not sure.
Oh, yeah. Oh, so they actually did buy that printer already, right?
I think they had to. I think the old printer was actually eating things.
Yes.
according to what K told me.
So we don't need the 1800.
So it's still just sitting in that line item. Okay.
Well, I thought they used it though. See, this is the weird part. And I got a little confused when I was talking to folks about sometimes apparently different supply budgets get used for things and this is why somehow there's only it looks like there's nothing expended here. Lisa, do you happen to know where that that printer got taken out of? It's okay if you don't. It's been an issue.
No, because it was probably bought before I came, so I'm not familiar with it, but So, you're saying that it could have come out of supplies for the building department? I mean, I
or or town clerk or somewhere else. I It sounds like things have been a little wishy-washy in terms of whose budget gets used to do a thing that needs to happen immediately. we had bought one where I was before and we split it up actually between three departments. but I wish I had the vendor name so I could just look and see where it went to. because obviously if only Let me just see if it's since December has been purchased.
Let me just go look.
Okay. I I would tell you that Rob, you're you're accurate that there is a an inconsistency within the finance department as to which supply account things get posted to. it is something that Lisa and I have been talking about as I've been reviewing the bills and having to sit there and get them to be signed as to who's determining which account gets used for that. So, hopefully we can sit there and make some adjustments to that process and get it posted to a more accurate account line. So,
okay.
And if if we had bought there's nothing else in there besides that $35.
She said it came out of the tax collector tax collector supply budget that printer.
Okay. Let me see.
So, I'm not quite sure
which is strange with this line. Wow.
I mean, those are like
tens of thousands. That's like a $10,000 printer. That broad printer. They're very expensive. They'd be like a monthly lease payment of three or $400. So,
I thought she I thought she said it was 1,800 bucks. But, okay.
To to I mean,
maybe it just makes sense that when we're saying supplies for the building department that that's the paper and the materials going into that department to sit there and operate that department.
And
I don't think it's a printer. It shouldn't be a printer.
No,
no, there's nothing in the tax collector line either.
Okay.
But that's what we did when we purchased a broad printer. It was the clerk's department because she had to print land maps and the tax collector and not the tax collector, the assessor and the building department and they all split the cost of that new broad printer. But it's a very very expensive printer and it I don't think it was just $1,800. It was
It was It was definitely not. This is this is this is where there's inconsistencies inconsistencies as to where things are being posted and what they're for because that broad printer to me the paper is going to be a bigger
and the print the ink. Yes.
Carol, sorry Carol raised her hand. Do you have further on that?
So the wide format printer was bought a few years back with a grant that the town clerk's office got. and we did stock up on paper and things like that, but obviously they're low now. So, it probably is just the paper and the ink because those are both very expensive.
Oh, the ink. I got you.
Yep.
So, it's I think we were just we went through this. I think we were just keying in on this number right here that it didn't look like this line was being expended. So, why are we leaving it? But
I don't I will say in the building department there could be I know a lot of times fire code manuals change and they're very expensive. They're like $400 a book or something.
It's just maybe something where it's sort of cyclical and we're in that position where we need it and
or I don't Yeah, I don't know if there's me no membership is separate. Okay. But I know that those code books can be expensive and they update them a lot. I don't know if that's what it is or not.
All right. we made a small cut here. I don't know if it warrants any further discussion. I didn't ask anybody about this one. payroll services. This was a this is a meta discussion that I don't think we're doing now. this again gets back to what are we doing going forward with payroll. I I don't know may whether we get a service or not. I don't know if we're in position to make that call right now. But Lisa, what I know you would have you would prefer to have a different
ADP she said, right?
ADP, I believe, is what you mentioned.
I would cuz when when Kim just asked me to go in and look up the hours for that person, it was this massive spreadsheet to see hours for somebody and it it's unruly to me and I I just I it's no help to me. This QuickBooks thing is I don't know. Jeff knows. I'm not happy with it at all. So just just look just don't don't go to the the report. Go to the individual employee.
I did
and then sit there and in that area you can run a specific report just for that employee and just see that employees information. to to answer the question, I don't think you put any extra money in as a payroll service because if this is truly what Lisa wants to get done and we decide to do it, that would come out of the assistant treasurer's compensation.
Okay.
Wait, I'm confused. If we decided to switch out of the compensation line, though,
you're not going to switch. You're not going to switch. You're not going to switch anything. What I said was if the choice is made to go to a payroll service, you would want to reduce the assistant treasurer's compensation because the majority a good portion of that job is related to processing payroll.
Okay. Gotcha.
I mean, Lisa Lisa Lisa has legitimate
issues related to the payroll setup within QuickBooks. Without a doubt, 100% not done correctly. we need to fix it. And if the choice is to go to a payroll service, which
you know, you can do it. And and Lisa knows, she and I have had this conversation multiple times as to what's right and what's wrong and and and can it be done correctly? Yes, it can be done correctly. It needs to be set up correctly. So, if Lisa's Lisa's desire as the treasurer is to come to the the board of finance and the board of selectman and say, "I'd like to get to a payroll service," then we're going to have to sit there and get the cost of the payroll service and then we're going to have to sit there and make some
adjustments to the assistant treasurer's salary.
Okay,
makes sense.
So, the take would be they'd leave this alone.
oh, Carol, go ahead.
Sorry about that. I just had a question about that with the payroll service because we did have prime pay before Jeff and I I thought you wanted to go to QuickBooks so and the QuickBooks payroll because we had you know the Phoenix system for financial first and then we went to admins and I thought you were in favor of getting us over to QuickBooks for our financial system and also for payroll.
I I am. It saves it saves us money. But as you know, Carol, I was requested to not get involved in the finance department and I was not involved in the setup of the system, but the people that we had setting it up and running it did not do as an effective job as we they should have. So, if you are asking me, and I've said this to Lisa, QuickBooks is not a difficult system to operate, but it is a difficult system to operate if it's set up incorrectly.
So, are you in there setting it up correctly with Lisa? You're not.
No. No.
You want to ask that question in a different way? Am I Am I advising Am I advising Lisa as to what might need to be done? Absolutely. Okay. So, is there a chance that that will work itself out with the payroll, I guess, is what I'm asking, rather than go back to
another payroll company that's more expensive. Well, it could and and it's a possible, but you have to remember Lisa is the treasurer and if she wants it done in a certain way and we can financially afford it and it makes sense, then we should sit there and listen to her. So, she has a way that she wants to do it and and honestly, that's not a problem to me. What what Lisa needs to do in that situation is get us the costs related to what the payroll service would be. and she has legitimate she has total legitimate reasons to do it. There's less
there's less liability, there's less chance for mistakes. there's probably somewhat better reporting, but there's just those are things we got to do. Lisa's got to make that decision.
And we did talk about it a little bit last week and and I believe Lisa's gut take was maybe it's a $3,000 problem, but we can talk about that going forward. Well, for this year, remember we said it was a thousand only because the first
he teaser rate
six months are free. Yeah. Next year it would be a difference. Yeah. This year would be $1,000.
So, what I want to get to, guys, cuz that's all interesting. Let's in the interest of moving forward.
Then we should leave this line item alone is is basically what we're talking about, right? We'll leave it alone for now. Move on because I I really want to try and get through more of this budget. if if there's a reason to cut this, fine. Otherwise, just leave it. And we'll come back to the issue when Lisa has a moment to take a breath.
Never.
Yeah. No, no, no. Don't think that it's not that. All right. So, this was a big one, guys. that we've been talking about the Kerma insurance line. Right now, it's showing a zero increase because I don't think we have an estimate, but that can't be right. Or at least I can't imagine that's right. I
can't either. I've always heard from them before now and I even emailed them before now. So,
maybe I'll talk to some other contacts I have and see what they have received so far. I can't see that Kerma would be this late in the process.
It's bizarre to me. I mean, you can see, I mean, this is this is our property casualty insurance, our work comp, things like that. They're going to go up. it it's not necessarily like the healthcare, but it's going to go up by some percentage. And I hate to have this number here. If it's low, I was wrong. So, let's let's see if we can find out. it's really late in the game, but this remains a worry for me. But what's the percentage increase from 2024 to 2025? Maybe we could do like an estimate for at least something a little more
7 like 7.16.
Sorry, I just did the formula right here.
if you divide this by this.
Yep.
So if you assumed Sorry,
is that something to consider? this you'd get to 131ish 131400 something like that. It gets to a point where we're going to have to put a dummy number in there if we don't have anything else. And you know whether we want to pick 5% or 7% or what have you, but it shouldn't be this that there just no way you're getting a flat number. I can't see that. Yeah, I agree.
Does three-year contract mean it's the same rate for three years
for workers comp? Yes.
What a work comp. I don't think property casualty works that way.
And that's both. That's workers comp and property casualty.
Am I right about that, Lisa? Am I
in that line? Yes, that is both. But the workers comp is the one we usually get the
And is that also like our property insurance like our fire insurance and
Yep. Yep.
That's Prop GL. It's crime insurance, bond insurance, it's all different. That's all the municipalities.
It's basically everything but health, right? I mean, health and dental.
Yes. And life. Yeah.
I do not believe the fire department is included in that. I believe the fire department has a different policy for a company in Coventry.
When I say fire insurance, sorry, Jeeoff, I I mean property. Sorry, I'm talking as a PNC guy.
sorry, term of art. I I meant, you know, first party property coverage. Yeah.
we'll have we'll have an answer on that.
yeah, I'll give a call. I'll have to find out the I don't know if it's the same rep as I had where I was before, but I'll have to call.
Okay. I mean, the only reason I again, and I really don't mean to be a pain, but we sort of need to make a decision on that tomorrow.
well, I'm just wondering, could it be Jeff Magcguire? Could it be in the email for town administrator and we just haven't seen it because that's been open.
Kate's been checking that weekly, right?
Correct.
So, I have a I have a request. I have a request and
too. Yeah.
so, I was just told that there's no set increase for kerma going across the board from a percentage standpoint. So, we'll get an answer on that, but I I will tell you the kerma rate over the last number of years hasn't escalated very much to be really honest. It was a lot. it's been a hund It's never I've never I never remember it being greater than $105,000. And so this year it might be going up slightly, but I wouldn't expect it. It's not like Rob it's going to go up to $150,000. It's not like our health insurance. So it it's going to be a smaller increase, but we will get a number for you. I I will work with Lisa and in the kerma of people and get you an answer.
Okay, I appreciate that and I completely agree. I don't expect it to be like the healthcare and and these things are affected by things just like what our claims are and what what the claims experience has been. If we have some claims dropping off their radar, you could even see benefits. So that's fine. I just want as a board for the board of finance to put a number in there that's realistic so that we're not shorting it. That's all. So, yeah, get back to us on that as soon as you can. Thank you very much. we increased this line. I had a long conversation today with both Kate and Lisa about about this about this particularly about the stipens, right? And I think we've covered it, but something I wasn't aware of in the past is apparently the contracts that govern what we do for the stipens, which means the people who don't take the town's insurance, they agree to kind of take a chunk of money from the town and not go on our insurance. that those have clauses, those contracts have clauses where 50% of what the cost would be goes and makes up their stipend. and I wanted to make sure that this number is accurate and inclusive not just of the healthcare premium increase but of that stipid increase. So, we did a flat change to this number where we pumped it up 21% as opposed to 15. I hope that covers it. Does anybody have thoughts on that as to whether we handled that properly?
So, you're saying the stipen has to go up because the insurance is going up.
That's right. My understanding
and that's forever or
No, those contracts are renegotiated periodically. my understanding is we're getting one this year that's coming due
and one that comes due in 27.
Okay. Yeah.
However, right, and the flip side to it would be if I was one of the people affected by said contract, I'd certainly fight hard to keep a clause like that in there. But yes, we we have one expiring I think June 30th and the other one expires I think probably June 30th, 27. That'll have to be renegotiated. Well, you when you say one like a person,
there are different kind of employees that are governed by different that are in different unions. I don't have chapter and verse on this personally. I don't have the recall on it, but it can be like one person. It could be two people.
I just meant like when when you had contract. Yeah, it's for some people and then another.
And since with different unions, they're not they're not necessarily the same schedule. That's all.
Carol, I'm you have your hand up. I I just wanted to say that it's part of the personnel policy that employees who opt not to take the insurance get 50% of the cost of single insurance. So if you were to call the RAM consortium and find out we have six employees let's say that are on and the insurance whether it's a twoerson a family or single insurance and then you'd be able to easily calculate what the single insurance is you know if it ends up being $600 per month
it's96 right now without
21% %
and it's definitely going up 21% not the 15.
Yeah, that was that that is my understanding that that came out of the consortium
a week or two ago.
There's a meeting on Thursday about it and I told Val I would go with her but so I'll hear what they say on Thursday.
Okay. And then
great you could be our liazison and report back. Thank you Heather.
Y
I really appreciate that. you know, as as far as we know right now, Carol, we're looking at 21%. Yes.
Okay. Does it I we had heard 15 before what? Last month.
Yeah. And then I can look it up when I got the word from the last meeting. Valerie attended and immediately alerted me it's now 21. Not great.
So, we did a quick and dirty here. What we did here is we just cranked this up to instead of plus 15 plus 21. I hope that's the right way to do it. If it's not, please tell me. because I want to get this line right. The last thing I want to do is underfund this line. I also don't want to, you know, obviously if if we're doing this wrong and but I just think since it seems tied together, it makes sense to go up to 21 to make sure that we're okay here.
Can I just suggest all the more reason to put that by department so we can see exactly what every department and you'd have a clear picture of what that would be. I I wouldn't have any objection to that going forward when if and when. I mean, I don't think we're going to accomplish that between now and and taking this budget to meeting, but it Lisa, what is your thought on disagregating that line?
I I don't have a problem July 1. I mean, it's you guys budget, but I'm just sitting here right now because like I told Rob about an hour ago because just everything in this office is a whirlwind. I'm looking at the spring bill. Well, I can see who's on it. and now I'm trying to figure out who gets a stipen, how much their stipen is, look at the union contracts. So, I don't want to give you fake numbers or, you know, incorrect numbers for me to try and figure out by department. It I don't think I can get it done for you. I was trying to get this just a basic how many you have on insurance, single, family, single, I mean plus one, and how many you have on the stipen, but I didn't even have time to do that today.
The the issue the issue is not even the current spring bill. The issue is the positions that are unfilled and the position will be filled and what will their level of insurance be. So, you have to estimate for those empty positions, and that's what I was trying to do, but
I'm sure the town administrator will probably want insurance. I would think we just got a new assessor assistant that's going to need it.
h how many hours do we have does somebody have to work before they can get insurance from the town?
Isn't it 20?
20.
That's pretty low.
Is that right, Lisa? 20. again what I'm hearing maybe Jeff knows better than I but go I'm trying to go through
I thought that was the federal number
well I don't know where I came from it was 30 it wasn't 20
30 seems low
so I don't think it was f I don't think that's a federal mandate I don't know
Carol's got her hand up maybe she knows
yeah Carol do you know the answer
it's 20 hours for single coverage and 30 hours for family. So if you
Oh, okay.
We had to Am I on mute? No,
no, no, you're you're
we had to we had to sit there and give a previous board of selectman member who was working 20 hours at the transfer station health insurance and that's how we got stuck in this position.
It's 20 hours. It's bad. And and to be really honest, the contracts aren't any better as far as the amount of money being paid by the employees.
It's very small. It's not a lot.
Yeah.
Well, and the other thing is you're giving the stipend out to people that are working.
You mean in terms in terms of what their contribution to the premium is?
14% right now.
Okay. As opposed to the
30% we pay private sector. Yeah.
And that can't be changed because it's under contract.
Oh, it can be. you have to renegotiate it.
But the problem the problem, Heather, is that it's been
ingrained and you're trying to sit there and up it. And yes, there's increases, but the increases have gone like I was just looking at the contract this morning and it was 14% for last year, 14% for this year, and then it moves up on one of the negotiated contracts to a whopping 15% the following year. So you know that is why that is why it's very important for this board and for the board of selectment to work together on the salary side because the benefits actually have some value to them.
Yeah. So going back to the stipen, is that something that we want to address going forward as far as like as this in percentage increase goes up, the stipen goes up, should we just set a a level amount and keep it at that going forward?
And do I mean, Bill, if I had my way, I would put everybody on a stipen and get them all off the health insurance, but we can't.
I know. So, so yes, there is there is again what should be done and and hasn't been done in the past is we should be engaged in the negotiation on these unions. Now, we have the union for the public works coming up that has to get negotiated. We should sit there and and all be on the same page as to what we would like to accomplish as we negotiate moving forward. that doesn't help you here for this budget process, but those are all things that we should be talking about and having an understanding on because
so my main concern and I completely agree with that. My main concern here is line 141-215. Are we in the right place for this? Is this get us what we need to to get through this budget year? We can obviously hope for improvement going forward, but is is this the right answer? from from my standpoint, Rob, you're not low. you know, it's it's something that I I can't tell you right now, and I don't think Lisa can tell you right now that you should cut it. So, what you did was you just increased in the appropriate percentage. So, if it was going from where it was last year to where it's going to go, I mean, you can sit there and tell that the town I mean, listen, health insurance needs to be evaluated, but at the town level right now, we have about six people on this policy, right? We don't have 20. I mean, the school has 60 people on this policy. So, you have a whole other different realm of of problems related to health insurance,
right? do I think that number that number would be high to me, but I can't tell you. I would tell you not to sit there and do that. What I would tell you to do is go back to the treasurer and I'll work with their focus on that number and get you guys a set number that makes sense.
Okay, for now I think we should leave it and we'll hear if we hear more. Great.
Yep.
okay. Because again, I'm trying to move through this. We made some minor changes here. we had this one question about HVAC maintenance for the community center which seemed to jump from practically, you know, is this a contracted amount? Is that exactly the right number? It's because it's exactly the same as last year.
Th those hours on I'm sorry on your community assistant assistant are really low
this here.
Yeah, because
I don't I don't know that we touched this. No, these pink ones were border selectman changes that I remember here. Let me let me make sure of something. By the way, sorry. this is Lisa's new chart. Hang on. Where were we? Community center. I want to make sure this is right. 195. Same. So, these pink numbers, if memory serves, Lisa put in pink what had come out of your last meeting. This is not us.
Okay.
so I don't know if this is low.
okay. Let's talk about it. I mean
we cut that one down quite a bit.
Assistant.
Well, we're over we're we're going to be over budget on that line item because of a lot of issues, Ann, that we're all fully aware of, right? Oh, yeah. We direct. I'm just I'm just sitting there. I'm just sitting there in my head going, you have right now in the setup for the for the community center, you have a 10-hour per week person doing the drivers and then you have an assistant into the the community center director, you know, that's getting paid more money than she should right now. But I just think that number is way low.
And I don't even know how we got the the revenue the expenditure numbers. Well, I do know because the treasur's office put money into the the wages for the director and that's why that line item is going to be way over even though it should have been put into the assistant. I I just sit there and I tell you I I think that number is way low for the services that should be rendered to the seniors. And when I say way low, I think you should at least have 25 hours a week in there, 15 hours for the assistant and 10
hours for the the drivers, unless the board of selectmen. And and listen, I I don't remember everything. Did we put th those hours in the there is a line there is not not under the community center, but there is something in here over senior driving.
That's where it is under driving. Yeah, there's a driving number in here somewhere.
not in this lineup, but a whole different section.
Yeah, hold it. So, stay up here and then we'll get you'll get to we'll get So, this here, I mean, again, this was our understanding of what the Boris Luckman wanted and this was the explanation that we got 15 hours or $25 an hour.
again, if guys, if this isn't the right answer,
we need you to tell us how many hours.
Yeah. I mean, I don't again, I personally have no intention of of shorting this line. At the same time, obviously, every change we're making, we're increasing things. So, yeah, talk to me. I mean, should we go down and find that driver line?
Yeah,
I I kind of feel like we should. where is that under? Let's find it. I mean, Lisa, do you have the information provided to you by Tess and what was requested on that line?
Does Tess talk? I talked to Tess, too. That's the other thing. I have notes somewhere. Give me a moment, guys.
so this is
enior citizens. Here we go.
is there driving under here? Senior transportation.
Yeah. Right. Right. See,
so we do have
Yeah, driver's dispatch. Right. Yeah, but that that's the drivers. We have drivers. So, so there's no there's no additional cost for
the person managing those drivers, which falls back up was falling back up into the community center line.
Oh, so that's okay. So, that is supervisory. Let me go back up.
It's the person doing all the scheduling.
Yeah, I see your point. That was left blank by by Tess the the community center assistant. That was left blank. Jeff.
Okay.
Apologies everybody. I'm I'm looking at all my various notes because I did have a conversation with Tess about this stuff.
Actually, I was on the board of select meeting last last week and I do remember Jeff you saying that amount the third 15 hours at $25 per hour.
True. Tess, I have a note here from Tess about drivers for seniors. might want to add a line under seedure transport for about 200 bucks for CPR and stop the bleed training.
Yeah, that's a kermit requirement.
There was a training line item in that budget down below.
Yeah, let me look at that again. Sorry, guys. I know I'm scrolling frantically through here, but where was it? Here's the
seen it just a minute ago. I remember seeing training somewhere.
Yeah, I don't see it. Oh, you mean this?
Oh, yeah. There.
Yeah.
Safety, CPR, first aid.
We have an increase in there. Okay. Okay. Okay. That's for the training of the when the stove comes in and
Oh, for the kitchen staff.
For the kitchen. Yes, Chess had mentioned that.
Right.
So, the question is, is the 15 hours adequate or do we need to increase that?
That's right.
We need to make a choice here. let's go back up.
That's the recom that's what you put in your last
That's what we had from your meeting. So if we want to do something here, you know, basically make the argument, Jeff, your take is this is low. Great. What would you, what do you think it ought to be?
I would make it 25 hours. So you have 10 hours thousand. Hang on.
You have 10 hours for the driver and you have
325.
325,
right? 25 hours at $25 an hour.50. for 52 52 weeks.
Is there discussion from the other board of
Yeah, let's let's talk the rest of you guys. Boris, please chime in.
Remember trying to remember if did we say that the test says the director would be managing the transportation part again. trying to remember that because they're getting the
from my
computer program that will help them do that.
They're getting a computer program to deal with scheduling and to track the in the people going in and out, not
sitting there scheduling. But
I thought that was part of it. I'm sorry.
No, no, no, no. You're you're not you're not wrong that that's going to help. But the issue ends up being are we I mean my take is that the community center right now is being run in a certain manner where where we have a higher hourly rate on the current assistant who is supposed to be putting in 19 hours or in the ballpark and then you have on top of that and this is where I would tell you I don't know where it's going. So, they're paying and they had been paying the previous driver coordinator. So, it could be that they've been putting it all in driver salaries and that is something that we have to find out. I'm just telling you that I'm looking at it as a total community center standpoint. You got the the director that's, you know, 30 hours. You would have 15 hours as an assistant to help with keeping it open at certain points in time and then you would have 10 hours a week for the driver coordinator. That's what that's what I believe should be there. Now, the other members of the board of selectmen disagree or they think that they want the the director to be responsible for the the driving profile, which I don't agree with.
Why can't the driver coordinator be just separated out?
I agree. I I think it is I think under driver/dispatch. I believe that the dispatcher is also in there. That's
be under community center.
Okay. So, let's find that out. And if it is, that's great.
There's no dispatch, but
here it is right there.
Yeah. driver/dispatch because it just used the driver salary and then they and then it was combined. let me see if I can see when that was done.
That That's the drivers and the dispatch together. Why Why is it together?
We're together and it and it works. It works. I'm all okay with it.
Works.
Okay, then then we don't have to add any more hours above. I think we're okay unless we hear from
adding hours to the assistant, right?
Yeah. If we hear from Tess after this year that it's insufficient,
maybe we make a change, but for now, I don't know. We're funding this at a pretty good level. pretty high level.
as for why it's together rather than disagregated, I would defer to Lisa going forward on that. For now, it is what it is.
We got to get through this.
Yeah.
can I make can I
comment list? Go ahead.
Just to say can you go back to that line the dispatch line for
Oh, sorry. I was going back up. Apologies. This one here.
I just looked at our last year's budget because the last year's budget we have
all those tabs with everything very
spelled out. And our budget for driverispatch for all the drivers and I assume the dispatcher is 45,320.
That's reflected right here.
Okay. Right there. Okay. Yeah. So
this is a 3%. This is just they they often do a 3%. So there we are. and also, I know that right now Tessa's, contract is for 26 hours. so I guess the conversation or the question is how many hours for for the coming year for the director and the assistant director? I think I might have gotten confused on that. Did we want to bump that up? Did we want to keep it at what she was? And I'm also going to bring up the dreaded conversation about the the stipen for the senior what's what's municipal agent
for the elderly I think is the
and I don't know my feeling was always that that should fall under the duties and salary of the of the director that was always my opinion and yeah, can't win everything. So, I'm willing to, you know, listen to other people's thoughts about that.
Well, Carol had her hand up when you started talking about your first question. So, Carol, did you have something? drivers.
I was just going to say the stipen for municipal agent/director of social services was given to Tess and that is what bumped her from the 26 hours to
I guess 30. I didn't realize that it was bumping her up that many hours per week, but that
Oh, I didn't know. Right. because her contract is 26 hours per week for the starting salary was 45. I think she's up to 47 now.
yep.
But that was the reason for that jump in the hours was for her to cover that municipal a social services piece.
Okay. Yeah.
Kind of already been consolidated is what you're telling us?
No, there's a separate line item,
right? There's separate line items. the stip pend is one, but that was just the way that was originally set up when back when Roberta had that because as the assistant to the assessor and then she was social services municipal agent.
So there it is the resident services coordinator. Is that it?
Correct.
145100.
to be really honest at the next board of selectment meeting there has to be discussion regarding u Tessa's contract and approval of it moving forward.
So under the budgetary guidelines that you guys have here.
Okay. from this standpoint of us making decisions then I mean I'm open you know anybody on the board want to speak up but my gut take is we leave the numbers where they are
I think we leave the numbers where they are
I agree
all right I'm going to All right so this is as far as we got last time I believe this is where we stopped I believe because there's nothing Oh no wait that's not true okay. We had a DMV lookup access line here. Board of Assessment Appeals wanted this. I talked to Kate about this and I got kind of an interesting commentary from her that boils down to that BAA doesn't actually need technically to do this. as in in terms of the burden of proof to challenge your auto automotive tax bill, you are supposed to bring you're supposed to be able to bring the proof and show that it's wrong. And this lookup isn't really technically necessary. I think what BAA is trying to do, however, is help the public out a little bit to be able to show them what the basis is. So, and maybe try to smooth some of this out before it gets into, you know, a big fight. But, and it's 380 bucks. But Kate's take was this isn't actually necessary because they aren't legally
required to do that little kind of helping hand. It's it's the the burden of proof is on the taxpayer.
Well, how does the town how does the assessor actually come up with the amount that's being built
and they have a system I guess that so I asked K I said well what are these disputes about? It's like basically it's it's almost never resolved in you know a tax cut but the only time it ever happens is when you've got say say you have a Toyota Corolla and you've got model XL and the tax bill for some reason is based on XLE right it's worth slightly more and there's a mistake and you know if you could prove that then it could change something but otherwise it's really pretty much just this is the make and model of your vehicle and how old it is and here you go. What I'm saying is can't can't the
board of assessment appeals use the same software that the assessor uses to argue that point we need separate
I think there was access issue
they won't share you remember
they won't share it
hey won't yeah
access problem
so this this lets them go kind of into the DMV and show people like this is how your assessment works
it's 380 bucks I mean yeah we got a lot of other numbers to go out.
Yeah, I know. I don't want to spend a ton of time on this. Carol, sorry, you have your hand up. Do you have further on this?
I just wanted to ask Jeff Magguire. Jeff, didn't the statute change actually where the percentages of reduction went by the year of your car? So, they actually would need this to justify any reduction that they would make from what I understand. Is that how you understood Jeff Magcguire? it it is a more standardized process. But Carol, the issue is that if you are requesting a rebate on your taxes, you need to provide the information to the board of assessment appeals that sits there and says this is how much it's after. What the board of assessment appeals is after honestly is the board of assessment appeals is after 30 10 it costs $38 per lookup. They're asking for 10 lookups to go to an outside service, but to be really honest, the person coming to the board of assessment appeals should go and pay the $38 and bring it to the board of assessment appeals.
There you go.
Okay. Thanks.
Yep. So, I make the motion that you wipe out the $380 and going forward that's up to the person requesting the appeal. As Jeff just stated,
I'll second that because I think that's an excellent idea.
I agree.
I think you can also go to the library, can't you? And get that information.
Probably, but
yeah. So, why would you need it on hand just in case?
I don't know. I think they're having
it's important to them.
I know the BAA folks wanted this, but I also understand
I know they understand I actually understand where everybody else coming from, too.
Yeah.
And I agree, too. But I I also think if the town pays for things for people to do their job or whatever and log in and out of, then it technically really does belong to the town. And I'm not sure why if we've already paid for something that we have, it can't be utilized by everyone who needs the access to it. You know what I mean? Like my work gives me a laptop. It doesn't become mine personally after my work has given it to me.
So you're going back to the assessor's program. We should be able to use that,
right? So why you know what I'm saying? Like this is part of your job or whatever. So, I kind of see both sides of this. I get it. I I totally get it.
You you're you're not wrong. And honestly, I asked that question to the assessor yesterday, and I sat there and said, "Why can't we get the password and be allowed to sit there and look at the information?" And his his answer to me was actually was you're you're coming in and and I honestly think everybody should really look at the board of assessment appeals and who's appealing, right? And who is doing all of the appealing, it'll be really interesting if you look at it. And when you sit there and you do it, it's their responsibility to come and sit there and
tell the assessor that he's wrong. And listen, I think the assessor is wrong in a lot of cases and I don't have a problem with it, but you need it's a really tough system. and I asked that question and his his answer was they're they're trying to check my work then bring the information to sit there and prove that I am wrong to the board of assessment appeals and then the board of assessment appeals makes whatever decision that they choose to make. Okay,
Bill, you had made the motion. Did we have a second?
I second it. Louise.
Louise, thank you. All right. Well, I admit I'm a little torn on this, but in the interest of moving on, I think unless there's other commentary, we should take a vote.
All right,
Liz.
No.
Okay, Liz is a no. Bill,
yes.
Bill's a yes. Okay, Kim.
Kim,
I'm torn on it, too. I I don't know.
I hear you. You want me to come back to you?
Yeah, come back to me. Give me a second.
Okay, that's fine. Nick,
I'll go with yes.
Okay. Heather,
I guess I'll go with yes as well.
Okay. So, Bill, Heather, Nick. All right. Louise, you seconded it.
And and second, I I'm torn as well, but
I am too.
Yeah, I go yes.
All right. that's enough for passage, by the way. I'm going to go I'm going to be I'm going to go ahead and actually say no because I don't know. I felt like the BAA folks had their reasons. But, okay. And, the last one, who did I skip? I'm sorry.
Kim
I'm gonna say yes but I am torn I I really understand
I think this when we buy stuff for people it it should belong to the town
right
not to a person not to a human
okay so it's Liz and I against everyone else four five to two motion passes so we'll go ahead and zero this line out. motion to zero out guesses. So this is a zero. okay, I think yeah, I think that's as far as we got last time. Now I will hopefully go back and be able to rationalize this, but I want to switch over. scaling me to Lisa's new spreadsheet. This is the actual new one. I was using the old one, guys, as we went through this and sharing my screen because of our old notes because I for the life of me, I'm
not going to be able to remember everything that we did, right? So, here we are. Now, I can't remember, guys, if we went through every line here, if we jumped around a little bit. cuz like for instance like I don't think we did we talk about town increase that's being requested. I don't think we did.
We did.
I thought we did
community center. Did we talk about this one? Okay. I
think we finished up with the community the different community.
We went all the way to the community center.
That was when I got
right here. Total community center. This is as far as we got. I think that's right. So that moves us to town garage. we have here we have an explanation we need training. I think we have some new folks. I don't have an issue with this if this reasonable. yeah we talked about these estimates. I I don't have any does anybody have any questions in this area? I mean, this is the only increase really. Well,
the town garage area.
Yeah.
I I have something I wanted to talk about briefly. I won't take too long. So, we heard about that diesel I call it a diesel measurement system or something that seems to be failing. It's it's 25 years
past its time. the one that measures the diesel fuel for the school, the
how
public works and one other place
fire department.
It's the pump.
So, isn't it about time that we we replace that?
Should we put that into the budget? I mean,
that would be capital, right?
Would be in capital. Okay. I just want to make sure that we do something about that before we're using like, you know, a piece of chalk and a chalkboard.
Agreed.
Well, that's that's that's totally fair. I I guess my question would be when we get to capital, which is going to be an important discussion. whether it's tonight or tomorrow night, I don't know yet. But when we get to it, where under capital is where that that goes. We have a number of different capital funds. there's I think there's a town garage fund, but off the top of my head, I got to look back at the audit and I got to look at our
the chart that Lisa got me.
Okay.
But yeah, we should definitely consider that
as well as the roof that they talked about, too.
They they they've been working on trying to fix up that old build, that building from the 1800s, right, with the they they have a lot to do there. They I think they've made some progress, but yeah, I think that's right, Bill. and I and I I'll get to this this, but CIP last week and we have a fire department request that we we'll talk about when we get to capital for a compressor.
All right, we should move.
Yeah, let's let's try to keep moving. I don't see a lot here to really discuss, honestly. Anybody have any more or let's move on. The old town hall is zeroed out. Well, not zeroed out, but it's I mean, are we almost done with this thing? This is This is No, this isn't the one I'm thinking of. All right. Sorry. This is the the the the one that's a museum now.
Yeah.
Okay, that's fine. I I don't have any issues here. It's all zeroed out. This is the one I'm thinking of probably. how close are we to being completely done with the old firehouse?
We're still talking about how we are going to arrange the space on the top so that different committees and commissions can put their stuff in the top. So, we we changed the trust system up there and we now we got to get back to the cost and talk to the builder.
so,
and when you ask how close are you are you asking how close we are to starting the project and actually increasing our costs related to the old firehouse?
That's a better way to put it.
Yeah. I know that's a fair question.
So, guess what? for next year. We're not going to increase the cost for the old firehouse.
Perfect.
Right.
We could change it to something else, Jeff.
That's fine. We'll
No, no, no, no. It's going to be It's going to be the new old firehouse. But I I mean, I wouldn't change that long.
That's the That's the That's the storage facility eventually.
Transportation garage.
Transportation garage and storage.
That's what it's called. It should be called the old firehouse, Scott. So anyways, for moving on,
moving on.
It's it's just electricity and it needs to be electrified this year.
It is. It is what it is. I think I think there's an alarm system or something else there. It's fine.
Okay, town attorney, we've got a $4,000 increase projected here for a retainer. is this Dennis's fees going up or anticipation of additional hours? worked
the project over on well this is for for increasing the fees for the town attorney. That's absolutely. So right now what we have is we have the project on Lake Road on the Culvert has eight different easements that need to be drafted and put together for all of the residents to sit there and get that project going. So That's a
That's nothing compared to what we have to do.
Yep. So
that's fine. That's exactly
Is that going to be enough, Jeff?
Say that one again.
Is that going to be enough that the
I mean, this is an addition he's never done. He's
Listen, I I asked I asked for more and the board of selectman said no. So that's what it is. That's fine.
I want to comment on why I said no. because those easements and those fees should be coming out of the project cost of the project, not out of the town's budget. Any any capital bridge or covert project, that should be a line item on that expense.
question, which could you remind me again which project this is? And
this is Solo Road. Solo Road.
Is this a one of the This is a Culvert. Is this one of the ones where we pay half the cost where we pay 80%? Okay.
50%.
Expected cost is to be somewhere under a little bit under $2 million.
So, Jeff Murray, your take is basically that additional work, legal work, whatever associated with that project should be baked into the capital budget for that project.
Correct. Because that is the actual cost of the project,
right? Because when you start bur when you start burying things under other line items, you're never going to know the actual cost.
And and we can do that, but we still owe 50% of it. So there's still going to be an increase in the total cost.
I this isn't a question about I don't think this is a question about what we need to spend. I think it's a question about where it should go. I think that's Jeff's point.
Who did the easement documents for the two bridges? the engineering firm dealt it.
The engineering firm did it, right?
But because of the way that this grant is structured, they're push they're trying to push it back on us.
That's right. So So it's a timetable thing now.
I agree with Jeff.
Yeah, I
'm going to push all of the expenses to the grant to try to get as much of the actual billing paid out of the other side of this or the state side of this. But yeah, I mean with all the legal issues related to what's going on in this town and for all of the other issues, I don't think the $4,000 increase for attorney O'Brien is unwarranted. That's fine. I just asked the question. so if other members of the board of finance have any questions in this area, I mean, I don't see a lot here to discuss other than this.
The auditor is going up $1,000.
here.
Yep.
So, it'll be 42.
That's what he asked. He sent I asked for an estimate and he told me 42.
Okay. I don't. It's up to you guys, but that's what he gave me for an estimate.
Oh, right. We should probably We should probably All right. We need to actually vote on that. All right. but that's the I mean, look, we don't we don't have a whole bevy of auditors knocking on our doors to do our audit. So, my take is that for $1,000 extra we keep our order. That makes a lot of sense to me. Does anybody have any problems with that? Otherwise, I think what we should do I'll go ahead and move
that we increase Oh, go ahead, Liz.
No, I was going to say I don't think I think we already approved this auditing firm for the year, right? So, I think we already approved that in December or something. So, it's not like we can I mean, can we change our mind what auditing firm that we want after we've already agreed to it?
Yeah. And again, we just don't have a a lot of people who want to do our audits. So, my take would be I'll move that we increase 105320 annual audit from 41,000 to 42,000. I'll second.
Bill seconds. Very good.
any further discussion on this one?
Great. Liz.
Yes. Louise.
Yes.
Kim.
Yes.
Bill.
Yes.
Nick.
Yes.
Heather.
Me? Yes. That's seven. agreed. Very good. We're done there. it is what it is, guys. I mean,
yeah, I've been through this audit stuff. I've been through this a lot stuff too many times. Like,
you got to you got to All right, moving on. So, we have the town. We We've talked about the town attorney. It's not a ton of money.
Listen, whether it's here or it's in the other budget, it's still an increase. I I I assume we leave it.
I'm okay with leaving it for now. we could always have one more bite at the apple if we want. Okay. So, this is all neither flat or negative. I don't know there's much to discuss here. All right. Public works. Let's talk about public works. We've got here very little change. We've got some 3% raises, which I mean to me are fine personally. You guys can decide what you want to do there. Additional tires for loader and truck one vehicle maintenance. They need a little bit more money for Okay.
You explained that that was basically have a tire on hand rather than a truck being broken down roadside and having to call in
and they have to bring them in which actually might cost us more money. Right.
That's right.
and then supplies uniforms I guess. I mean this is pretty minimal. Does anybody have thoughts issues in this section? I I honestly think it's okay.
They're under It's a union contract, so we really can't do anything.
Yeah, these are You can't touch these right here.
That's where the money is.
That That's where all the money is right there.
Yeah. It's where all the money is really.
Yeah.
All right. Snow removal. We know.
Can you Can you go back up? Can you go back up for one second? One second.
Sure. What do you want to look at, Jeff? Is that overtime number right for what's been expended, Lisa? That just doesn't seem right to me. I already said yesterday.
That's through January 31st.
Let me look.
I'm sure we've blown that in February. We have
way past that. I was going to mention that.
Hold on.
Isn't Isn't there a snow a snow overtime?
I think they can be.
Yeah, it's snow. Yeah,
there's a snow overtime. Yeah, I think there's a separate line for
snow. What's PW
No, PW
public works. Oh, overtime salary.
Keep going down. Snow, I think.
Yeah, it's just snow. But you're over $23,000.
Over on the over on the snow or over on regular overtime?
Snow. You're not over on regular overtime. Regular overtime. You have $10,000 left.
Okay. All right. Thank you. Right. There's a snow removal 4307.
I'm sorry.
I was gone for about 30 seconds there. Feeding a kid. What? sorry. What was the overtime discussion?
Well, I would like to look at public works overtime salary. I understand there's a 3% increase, but there's also you're going from 3,00 337 3,000 to 13,000 13,000. That seems like a big jump. Why is there such a big increase
in overtime on public work salary overtime?
That is a
I understand there's a 3% increase for salaries, but what it seems like a lot of hours.
It It's interesting. The big jump was last year,
right?
I know we must have approved that, but I can't remember the justification.
Were we down a man last year, Jeff? Weren't we down a man or two last year for a while? Jeff McGuire. I
don't I that I can't tell you as far as the timeline of the people. I mean, we we hired the new individual, but that was during the course of this fiscal year.
yeah, I just know we were short some people for a while. I was just wondering if there wasn't an increase
in overtime because of that. We were short. Do you have do you have do you have last year's Rob?
That's what I'm looking at right now.
Like what did Eric tell you he was thinking that that was going to to increase by and why? Because obviously you went to the budget.
You jumped $10,000 somehow. Yeah. Jeff, I mean I'd have to I'd have to go into my emails and look.
I can do that.
We we could we should circle back to this, but I think Bill is right. We should look at that line, Adam.
All right. All right, I'm going to make a note to do just that.
I mean, and not you're not looking at it because the variance is is excessive. You're looking at it because what is the total budgeted amount?
Yeah, exactly.
No, that's exactly right. This isn't the issue. The issue is No, this says the union contract. So,
well, it's that that just means that by 3% because it takes the budgeted amount by 3% because increase.
No, I get that. So, we can still modify this,
right?
If we looked at it and said we need this,
it still might have
this applied to it,
right?
All right. So, we'll have to come back to that. Who
I I will I will dig through, guys. I will I I will try to take time tomorrow before our meeting to scroll through and try to find anything I can find on that from
a lot of hours. A lot of hours.
Yeah. And it's interesting
because we had we had some easyish years as opposed to this year. okay, I I'll look into that. I'll see what I can find. Do you want me to try and call him tomorrow? Call Eric Anderson. Sanderson.
Hey, if you've got time, I mean, my my day tomorrow's a little crazy, so by all means,
I'll call Eric Sanderson and see if he
is that his name.
And I will go back through
my emails, you know, and see if I can find anything on that from the, you know, the last budget cycle where we to we must have. Again, I guarantee at some point whether it's documented well or not, somebody explained that jump to us. Sorry, this jump to this.
Well, I'm looking at 2324 and the budget not spent, but the budget was 125 and 2324.
Wait, what?
It was Oh, we have the actual here, but not the budget. Interesting.
Correct. the actual that is correct for the actual but the budget was 125 in 2324 I'm looking at it in Quickbooks
I mean I I can go back and look
further
2425 we spent 37 and the next
in the fridge
why don't we just make a motion to knock that down to five grand
I mean
go ahead and make it
what what do what do people think of what is what do you guys think about that
I mean we haven't seen something
it was 9,000 in the year before that.
Oh,
you want to do 10?
Was 10 crazy?
I'd like to go to eight, five or eight? I don't know.
Because we had nine one year, you said, right, Lisa?
Nine was in 22 23.
Can I Let me clarify. I'm sorry. When we say nine, are we talking budget or expendited?
Budget.
Oh. Oh,
budget.
Budget. That's not what was expended. Budget.
Oh,
yeah. Then I make a motion to Liz motion.
I make a I make a motion to knock this down to five grand.
I'll second it.
I think the biggest the biggest overtime is going to be in the snow removal. I think
exactly.
And if we have overtime because we're down a man, then
we're fully staffed again. Right.
Yeah. Right. Because somebody's gone then. Right.
So,
okay. I seconded it.
So, we have I'm sorry, Liz made the motion. Bill, did you second?
Yes,
Bill. Yes. Thanks. Sorry, my audio is a little weird right now. Does anyone have any further discussion or comment on this before we move to a vote? Okay. let's start with Louise.
Yes.
Louise is a yes. Okay. Heather,
Heather's a yes. Nick,
Okay, I'm a yes. Bill,
yes.
Liz,
yes.
Kim,
yes.
All right. 70. We reduce this to 5,000. Me, it doesn't work that way. Okay, honey. Sorry. excuse me. I'm getting commentary from my 12-year-old. All right, so let's see. does anybody else see anything in here that we want to zero in on or should we move on to snow removal?
Move on.
I think move on too. Okay. we see a big increase here by percentage, but it's a tiny amount of money and it's ice melt, which I think we've had problems with.
the building.
Yeah, excuse me. These are also these are all like even the numbers that are percentage- wise big are tiny amounts of money. This one is snow plow plow blade increased cost. I mean that kind of is what it is.
Can we just go back to the second line right there it says just stop moving that thing for a minute.
Ice maintenance building and then over at the end it says price increase for ice melt. Is it the building or is it for the ice melt? Seems kind of a weird
ice maintenance at the DPW building. Excuse me. Yeah, I think that's it.
The same thing. Megan, give me that. Kill it.
Sorry. Actually, it's not a lot of money. I was just
Yeah. I mean, I think that's
Can you explain the the plow blade already to us? The two different types of blades and why they do the different types of blades. So, I don't have a problem with that. the rest of it's pretty minimal. I
mean,
are we are we good here? Could we keep moving?
did you have a comment? Scott, somebody
No, no, no. I'm good.
Okay.
Just saying it was a lot of money for salt.
Yeah, I know that salt was a problem this year, too, right? We had trouble getting deliveries
and I think he pre-ordered a big chunk of salt. He said for next year so that we had it to finish out this year as well as next year. He said something about that. It was so hard to get.
Correct. We're going to hold that off until July 1st though, Bill, because we're going to be over budget just basically on what he's got to fill the shed right now.
Okay. So, even though it says we've only spent $17,000 there,
I mean, it's back up.
Okay.
A little higher, but you know, we've spent the majority of that budget plus.
Gotcha. Good.
Yeah. I have 65,000 so far, and that doesn't mean that all those bills are in there yet.
Wow.
Yep.
Yeah. We got lucky for a couple years. Now, we're not so lucky.
Oh, wait a minute. Wait a minute. I want to make sure I'm in the right year. Hold on. No, the bills aren't in here yet because it's only at 21,000. So, the bills aren't in here yet because I I do know he said he put place two more orders and then we have three invoices that aren't sent yet, too.
Right.
Yeah.
Okay. Moving on.
Yeah. So under the custodian here we see a small dollar amount increase a fairly significant percentage increase. I know this was done at a Borman meeting. I haven't a chance to I just didn't have time to watch that meeting. was the thinking behind the 8.7% increase? they do a tremendous job with our facilities. They do all of our facilities. They do the library. They do the the the community center. They do the town hall. And they deserve the increase.
Immaculate.
Sorry, what was that?
Scott said the buildings are immaculate.
They are immaculate. They're
Sorry, I I had a choppy choppy audio. I didn't hear it. Thank you. I think Eric always mentioned that as well. I don't have a problem with this increase at all.
Carol, did you have a comment?
Who? Me?
They do maintenance, too. They are always painting inside, outside. They're washing the windows inside and outside. He cleans out the gutters. So, it's not just cleaning the inside of the building. He's They are doing everything. They have done a beautiful job with bringing that building back up.
It's a good deal.
It's a really good deal.
It's a husband wife team, right? The two of them do it together.
Y
I'm surprised for more.
I think we're lucky.
All right.
Yes.
I I have no issue with it. I just see 8.7% and asked the question.
Fair enough.
Move. I'm happy to move on unless anybody else wants to challenge that or make a motion. okay. That's fine. I I'm I'm willing to pay for talent and hard work and all of that. That's that's sort of my MO. So, that's fine. It's just, you know, as percentage basis. It was one of those things on my radar.
Transfer Station looks bas is is flat. I don't know there's anything to talk about there, guys. is this all right? is is my basic question. this is great. I like that. But are are we are we confident in these numbers? Reasonably confident in these numbers.
We're as we're as confident as we can be.
Okay. Happy happy joy joy. Recycling. Same deal. the resident trooper. So this is always a movie target. This is always you don't know what you're going to get. Bit of a box of chocolates situation. Do we we don't usually find this out until after we pass budget, right?
It comes later in the year. And
no, it came on time. This the last two years they've given it to us on time. I think that
Oh, wow.
I think that's a figure.
This is a real number.
I believe so. It's been so long since I put it in there. I mean, I can't tell you how many years it was always. We were just throwing a dart.
It was always Yes, it was always late. I agree. But, I'm pretty sure because I sent that to everybody.
If that is the number that fantastic and I apologize if I missed an email about it. That's great. If that's a real number, huzzah. That is what it is. I don't love the percentage.
It was in one of the packets I sent of all the documents.
Oh, okay. I may have missed I may have missed.
Pretty sure it was in there.
Okay. I mean, look, this is what it is. This we have no control over this, guys. it's take it or leave it.
Yep.
So, I I there's no real discussion to be had there. There's another productive discussion to be had there.
yeah, it's a fact.
Great.
Yeah,
thanks, Lisa. I really appreciate that. so we have very little here for the fire department. You know, a small 1.5 request. All of this is zeros. Although, I think there's one other place in our budget where we we pay for a fire marshal that we're sort of borrowing from another town, but we'll get to that another bit. This is all zeroed out. Civil preparedness. I don't know what this There's a lot of Oops. Sorry, guys. Menu. There's a lot of memo here. But at the end of the day, it's flat. This here is this I know. I This is a real number now, right?
Yes. We updated it. Yes.
Okay. Because I remember the original thing was they were dropping us, but then it was, "Okay, we'll keep you, but we're going to crank your costs up." And this is the answer. Yeah.
And Yep. And that's an actual document that that I sent out too. Yep.
And I don't think we have any choice there.
We have no choice. We don't have a facil. We We'd have to have our own facility otherwise, right?
And it would cost, you know, you got to air condition it and the cost of building that facility would be staggering.
We we don't have a facility right now that would be compliant. We would have to create it.
so heck lot more than that.
Yeah, a heck of a lot more than this. We'd have to talk about it going forward, but I don't see personally a solution to this other than to eat it. okay. Okay. Punk welfare. So, this we talked about a little bit, right? This is the municipal agent, right? We talked about training. I think this is justified based on some new folks we have coming in that need training
as well as the kitchen opening up and that has
in the kitchen. Yeah. this is literally buying cookware for the again for the kitchen. Senior lunch. We talked about this a little bit and I I had a conversation with Kate about senior lunch, how it's paid for, how it works. my understanding is the seniors get charged like five bucks or something like that per lunch.
Five bucks.
So yeah, five bucks. And there's a certain number of lunches they do a year. They're catered, etc. So Tess told me Yeah, I had a lot of really fuzzy math going on during my conversation with her because she was basically saying, "Look, until I have a full year of data, I can't give you a clear answer, but at once one time the number was increased because at one point there was a desire to do free lunch for the seniors. That wasn't implemented.
that that was to the seniors that could not afford it, we were going to pay for their lunches. That's where you probably heard that, Rob.
No, that's what Tessa was trying to explain to me. Okay. So, to the extent that I misunderstood that. Thank you.
so it was not implemented.
It's a it's an increase. I mean, this year, this is the last budget. We're not increasing. Sorry. We're we're flat from last budget. I don't know if this number is right. It's not a lot of money. My g my gut is Let's let this play out, but does anybody else have a thought?
How much do we actually spend?
Well, Lisa has us at 4,500. I don't know if that's
that gets us to the end of January.
Yeah, let me go back in and look.
Well, and we have to the end of the year. So, how many more lunches are they going to have this year? the test and she said that that all that money is going to be gone.
Yeah, that takes all
by the end of the year it's going to be gone.
Okay. So, what I'm saying is it was budgeted at 5,000 and they're going to spend 5,000.
No, I think No, the budget
was 125
12,05.
Oh,
yeah. The 5,000 was two years ago.
They spent Oh, I got you. Yeah.
5,700751 so far.
They're at 5,000. Okay.
So whether we quite get to here or not, we are at half, not quite half of it.
yeah.
Can I say something?
Yes.
Go ahead, please. Le
Yeah. I go there all the time for the lunches. once I believe it's once a month it gets catered and it's done by the the school forgot the name
the technical school
but the other ones are done by the volunteers in there they buy the chickens and cut them all up and all that and it's a lot of work so they are trying to save money by doing it themselves for most of the time
so I feel that I mean the 12,000 I think is is good and I wouldn't I wouldn't reduce that at all. If anything maybe up it a little bit.
Yeah. Does it does it need more?
I guess my take would be based on past experience guys and this is just my take subjective as it is. You guys have your own opinions but I think we maybe let it ride. See how it plays out this year. give Tess some more time to get in her position and get her arms around everything and we can revisit it next budget year. If if they're wild, if somehow it comes to the point where we just we need a lot more money for this or something, we can talk about it. There are things we can possibly do. but this is just looking at this versus this. My take would be leave it. That's my call. That's my take. I think that's fair.
I think that's good.
I think I think that's fair, too. I'm I mean, if you look at I'm also looking at the next line, the senior programs.
Do we have any Yeah. Do we have any more
xplanation like of what kind of programs?
Let me look at my notes.
All the programs bring this down as she talked to me. Emma, I know they're doing a lot. She's really trying to build that out.
She's right. That's exactly what it is, Rob. Yep.
Yeah. I think I sent out something that was several pages that she listed the entire year and I sent it out to you guys.
Pretty sure.
Yeah. I mean, this is this this represents her trying to scale up
and honestly do her job, right? programs and and and whatnot in there and get people
doing I don't know if it's
yoga or this or that or whatever. It's not it's something I paid too much attention to, but I my understanding is she's her job is basically like, hey, we have this new building. We let's use it. So, I think that's what this boils down to, but I I'm sorry I can't give you chapter and verse. I did talk to Tess, but I don't have my notes are not as great as I'd like them to be. I'm sorry. I just heard somebody put their hand up, but I don't know who that was. Tess. Oh, Tess, you're here.
Okay, by all means.
yeah, I'm I'm h I'm happy to share about the future of the community and senior center. yes. So what I did is I broke down July through June what things that we would keep going that have that have done well and what things we might want to implement. Especially with the stove coming in, we would want to do some more activities that have to do with the stove. having just a hypothetical once maybe twice a month something in there. doing some more trips because if you look there hasn't been a whole lot of trips being spent, but that comes a lot during the summer and the one Christmas party each year. so so a lot of these things with programs, it's not just the program itself. It's like art. We have to pay for the art teacher. If we can find somebody that would do it for free, we would love that. but we do have a
great art teacher. and and that definitely adds up.
I did just book two classes for
a photography class for May and June. So, that's going to get eaten up as well. So, so what we're trying to do is find an art teacher, find these different people that are expertise in their field, and then try to have the program pay for itself. So if that means having the community pay a portion of it and then we would pay a portion and then it would it would it would balance itself out but we definitely need money upfront to do that. So I will be happy with whatever you you give and we will try to make it work as best as possible for the next coming year.
And you also speak that we we had quite a conversation Tess about the senior lunch. Do we have that right or is that 12,500 a good number? Like can you just speak to that number for a minute?
I wasn't going to change that for this year. we'll definitely use it. we can add more more things to the lunchons. I would like to see a little bit more going on. if we can add one more lunch during the course of the week. I think the senior population is will will come. They will definitely come if we feed them. And I think that that definitely helps not only their mental and social, but it's it's I think that yes, we'll use it, but I think right now we can we can keep it where it's at. And and will the kitchen help us offset any of these cost as far as the lunchons or when the kitchen's open? Is that something that we could bring that inhouse or?
what we do now is we have a lunch once a week. It would probably increase that. Well, by the monies that we do receive, we do charge $5, but definitely those that do not are not able to pay for that, they do not. Our drivers do not pay. That's a comp meal for our drivers who drive the senior van. volunteers will eat for free and people that that cannot pay the $5. We don't ask questions. if they come in, they register. if they pay, great. If they don't, that's okay, too. We don't ask questions. and there are some that that definitely take us up on that that don't pay each week. So, the one the funds that do come in will will go back into that
program into that line that we can use somewhere else. So, like we have to pay for Cheni Tech, the culinary school that would come out of the monies that we received that we can pay that back through. I I don't know if that's making any sense to you. I got you. the that money that we receive for the $5 that would go back into what we have in reserve that we can pay that.
Okay. Thank thank you.
Y I'd like to add to what Tess said. again the the food basically except for the culinary school is being done by the volunteers for most of most of the time and without those volunteers you would need to probably hire someone to do the cooking. So I think we're offsetting a lot of that by all the volunteers that are helping. I just want to make sure that people are aware of that.
Yep. I'm here if you have any other questions.
Thank you.
Sorry, I was muted. Here I am talking to myself. okay. So guys, unless there's a motion here, I'd like to move on. I I I'm okay with these numbers and letting tests settle in and and come back to us next year and tell us what what's up. I I think these numbers are relatively reasonable to see and see what she can build out and see what she can get going. And I think it would be great if there was a lot more activity in that building.
Yep.
Okay. So, senior transport, we sort of talked about this a little bit already. This here we talked about it's just you know and again this is the 3% raise built in. Everything else is zeroed out. I don't know there's anything to talk about there. This here oh this is my question. Yeah
I just going back to that and not that I'm looking to increase anything this year but with the fuel prices right now. I wonder if that number is going to be a good number on the fuel.
I just bought gas today. It was a dollar more this week than it was a week ago. So
that was ran. I guess what the question becomes is the D salary line item. This is a salary line item. I don't know if this is in this incorporates mileage reimbursement.
I'm talking No, I'm talking about the fuel.
Oh, sorry.
Down here. Yeah. So, how do we handle fuel reimbursement? Is it a at work? It's, you know, x cents per mile. Well, it's based off a federal rate and
it's not it's not a reimbursement number like is what it is.
Gas. That's gas for the vehicles,
right?
That's gas.
That's just straight up
that's just straight up gas for the vehicles.
Yep.
Well, honestly, since you've raised it, there are multiple parts of this budget that we've already kind of gone through that we could go back up, scroll back up and question. well, no, not really because all right, look, let me re let me rephrase that whole statement. I know we have lockins for diesel and heating oil for the school in the town hall, right?
Is this here incorporated into those lockins or not?
Where did what pump do they get their gas from?
Where do they get their gas, Jeff? Do you know? Does that come out of our tank or
No, it does not.
Yeah,
but Tess will answer it for you. ass. No,
I had myself muted. Yeah, I I can tell you that most of the time they do fill it up right in Andover and it's it's convenient and it's usually right on the ride for right on the road for a medical or an event that they take. So, they fill it up at a gas station.
They fill it up at a gas station. They don't fill it up out of our tanks is the question.
Correct.
Yeah. So, if this is Okay, so here's our question. Yeah. So, if you're dealing with four bucks a gallon instead of three bucks a gallon, Bill, you you make a good point. this number may not be sufficient.
Hopefully, the war comes to an end real soon and go back down. I just I don't know if we should up that a little bit or
I just
That's I will say that we did apply for a grant. We did receive $10,000 9,000 of that the first year will will be going to the software system. and consecutive years I believe that we can apply for this for the next four years and so that can go directly to the transportation.
Great.
Yeah.
Okay.
So, you got about a thousand bucks to play.
we for this year we probably have around $1,000. depends on if we're getting help with that. Even though we have the full grant, we can we're hoping that we have help with that from the wreck department and then we we would have we would have all that at play next year.
So, we're good where we are then probably for now.
I I would say so. I would Yeah.
Okay.
I mean,
good. There's a lot of we could all we could all game this out and there's a lot of speculation, you know, as how long this goes on and what the numbers end up being. $1,000 a play is pretty good. I mean, if we just do this, So, it's a 16% Yeah, you think about it. It's a 16% variance. So if if gas prices go up and stay up, then this may be a problem. But there we do have the buffer. So I guess I'm with you, Bill. I guess I'm saying, "Yeah, let's let it ride."
Yep.
It's not I'm not 100% confident in it, but I'm glad we're locked in everywhere else. Let's put it that way.
Okay.
This year, I think more or less is what it is. Eastern Highlands. remind me guys, isn't this work? So, this is scheduled a 3% increase. Eastern Highlands, don't we pay into a like is this an employee of ours or are we just paying a what's it? I want
he health district,
right? It's the health district. I know. I understand what it is. What I'm saying is isn't so Why is it 3% which looks like a salary increase? We don't.
So, this isn't a salary, right? Isn't this just our contribution?
This is what they told us they and I gave to you guys. This is what it is for the year. This is what they sent us.
Oh, it happens to be 3%.
Yes.
Okay. Sorry. Cuz I looked at it and I thought, "Oh, that's exactly the same as all our sal thing that Bill was thinking." Okay. Thank you.
Well, because it says officer, too. So, at one point, maybe you had a health officer. I don't.
Oh, okay.
Okay.
Well, if that is if that is the increase, it is the increase. This is one of these things where we're in a consortium, right,
of shared services.
Kind of is what it is. You're sharing, we're saving money or we we're required to be in this I think legally.
Yep.
Okay. we talked about does anybody have any further thought I mean I person just speak personally I've always thought very highly of AHM I think they do what they need to do. I'm okay with this but it's a 5% increase. So does anybody have any thoughts? I mean I think we are kind of again we're in a we're in a group of towns. We have kind of a levy
and it is what it is or you withdraw. I guess
you either fund this or you don't.
Can I add something to that? meeting Tresa actually requested another meeting and Ann and I are both invited to that on Friday. So we'll see if there's any other changes to that.
Okay.
So I would probably leave it the way it is at this point and we can report back.
Awesome. Thank you. Thanks.
Yeah,
Louise, about Oh, about that, Louise.
Yeah.
Can and I think I remember us talking about this. Can we
get some sort of report of And maybe you already sent that a report of
Andover's usage. Is that what that report was that you sent us?
I did request that. that was just Andover's usage, but you had also requested a comparison between the towns and I did ask trust of that and she hasn't provided that yet, but I'll check back with you tomorrow.
Look for my
et.
If Andover doesn't use it, maybe it's something we should talk about. I mean,
well, I mean, I think we are I think we are using them pretty consistently is my recollection. my recollection list. but it's something to
continually ask
for sure,
you know, to see what
it's just like looking at enrollment at say RAM versus a AES or whatever, you know. it it makes sense to continually ask the question, but I know my family made use of I know there was a big spike in their usage during the pandemic. There there's a lot that they've done. So that's that's my gut take. But yeah, Louise, please do report back. Thank you for doing that. Thank you for taking that on.
No problem.
Okay. where are we? Library. well, it's pretty small. We I believe already had a budget presented to us but or at least emailed around.
Well, there's that was a separate budget. This is more of payroll.
This is just their their ops
and then their operation. Oh, yeah. And then there's ops below that. That's right.
Yeah, it's in there. It's 2%. I personally have no issue with 2%. These numbers here, these pink numbers, I believe again if they're pink, if Lisa's put them in pink, that means Boris selectman voted on it. Is that correct, Lisa?
That was a change discuss. Yes.
Yeah.
What's child child Prague employee child program?
Let me see. Sorry, let me see if I can.
They get more per hour than basically a lot of the the librarians get minimum wage or a little above. And if they're a program, they handle the programs, they get a little bit more in wages.
Okay.
I I'll speak for for Kathy on that. I guess that librarian that we have,
I think we've had her for 20 or 30 years or something. I don't know, some long amount of time. She's paid basically a salary of a brand new librarian fresh out of college. and she's been with us for a long long long time and really is far far far underpaid. So anyways, I know
that's
we're going to have to look at the payroll on the library because Connecticut's increasing the minimum wage. So I'm not sure if that was taken into account.
Yeah, I see that one point one.
Yeah, there is a minimum wage increase
. Yeah,
memory serves Connecticut a couple years ago tied our minimum wage actually tied it to like an inflation increase.
Did we not?
The cost
I thought we had done that.
Yep. Cost index. It's gone up. It's gone up 3.6%. So, and I believe there's some individuals that are paid at a minimum rate, a minimum wage rate at the library. So, I'm just saying that that calculation the library does probably needs to be revised to affect that.
There is a there is a note in here for the she's got it listed as clerks. Minimum wage increasing to 1694 per hour beginning 1126 calculating 38 hours a week times 52 weeks times 1694.
Okay, so she's done it.
That's good.
Well, that was for January. Now, I don't know if it's going up again because they keep increasing it, but that that's including what went up in January 1.
No, that that's the effective rate for January 1st, 2026.
Okay.
So, I guess the unless we hear further from the library folks, I mean, this is the number they've calculated.
Yep.
Right.
I'm okay with that. it is what it is. I mean, again, we indexed our minimum wage, so it's just kind of it's it's it's bad. so I'm good with this unless anyone else has a question, concern, or motion to make, I would continue on. Nope.
All right. Recommission. this is the only sorry this is the line registration for whisk.
Oh yeah I vaguely remember this. So we had some additional there was a hope for some a concert and and this and that and you know for $1,400. So they're trying to do a little bit more.
Is Carol Canary Carol speak to this section?
Yeah. Carol, are you
Okay. So, what that is is we were agreed to pay half of the cost of the system program that the community center is getting the annual fee that to maintain it or support it or whatever. And we wanted to do one additional concert.
Carol, can you can you come closer? I can't lost you there at the end.
Sorry. I I don't know what that is, but Can you hear me better now?
Yes, thank you.
I'm holding a computer right up to my face. So,
better.
Okay. So, we agreed to split the annual maintenance maintenance cost with the community center for the program that they're purchasing. And that covers half of that and one additional concert. What is I'm sorry.
Is that what is that WSC? Is that the program?
Yeah. What is that? Wix or
Yeah.
I have no idea what that is. I didn't put that in. if if that is what Tess is calling it. I my it was senior center. Okay. Thank you, Tess. Because I don't know what those
Speak up.
Yeah. I'm not sure what that is. So,
and it was carried over from previous previous worksheet. So, I don't know what it is either
because that was in the worksheet.
So, if I'm understanding, Carol, what I heard you say was that something something and I didn't hear you clearly something about partnering with the community and senior center,
right? Remember we had talked about this and you invited us to come to the online training for that and we had
Oh, okay. Yeah. This was for my
Yeah, it's my active center and and specifically would be for my senior center. That's the software system and
Yeah. So, but you're not taking money out of your budget. That was through a grant that you had received was my understanding that you were going to be sharing part of that grant with us
for the initial purchase, but this is for the annual maintenance. So,
Okay. Yep. So,
right. So, is that correct? That was the cost that we were originally g the recck commission was given, I believe, when Haley attended one of our meetings. So, we just cut that in half. We said if we're going to use it for basketball registration and different things, obviously we would be covering half of the annual maintenance,
right? And I think that that may change only due to that grant that we're going to be getting for the next couple years. So, if we can put that that in the annual the annual maintenance in with the grant, we can do that. But, I'll That's it.
So, is it $900? Is that going to be every year?
it's going to be about $1,500 every year
split by both of you, by Wreck and the center. we could put it under ours or if they're willing to do that every year. it's coming out of the town budget whether it comes out of programs for rec center or all of it comes out of ours. It's
okay. I'm just trying to understand what this means.
Yeah.
A little fuzzy.
Little confusing.
Okay.
Did I make it clear or did I make it worse?
You did help. You did. You definitely did. Thank you, Tess. Yep. Can I ask one more question? What is the outside facility rental fee?
Probably a portaotty, I imagine.
Is that what that is?
It is. Yes, the portaotti at the historical museum and the one that is down at the ball fields.
Okay.
Gotcha. Thank you.
All right. So, this one that was a little complicated, but I think we got there. do we want do we want excuse me, I apologize if I'm hiccuping. Does anybody have any further discussion on programs under the recommission? you know, whether we should try to split this out or leave it as it is for now, make any, you know, is there any further discussion here or should we move on?
Move on. eyesight.
Okay. Anybody else? Liz, you good?
Anybody do we want to talk about the community garden at all? Anybody?
Oh, right. I forgot about I'm sorry. Yes. because you had talked about that earlier. Community garden. We had talked about seeds and stuff like that. I I remember we had those folks in.
We did.
So, go ahead. Go ahead. take what what what is your thought?
I'll pipe in.
go ahead, Louise.
Yeah.
You want to start?
Yeah. They did a presentation and they had noted that some a couple two gardens were going to be for the seniors and two I believe were going to be for the school. And when I asked about the seniors, it was my understanding that someone was going to they were going to actually work the gardens on picket and pick the produce and all that and then provide it for the seniors. But after that after that discussion that we had that was not the case. They were they told us that the seniors would need to go out there and do all that work where I mentioned I don't see any of these seniors doing that. And I actually asked Tess about this as well because they had told me that they had talked to Tess about it cuz I
was I was concerned. And Tess had mentioned to me that she did volunteer for one garden for her for the seniors at which time I told her that's a lot of work for one person to handle all that. So I don't know where all that's going honestly. in the past couple years the Andover garden the Andover elementary school gardens were not taken care of and I don't know if there's going to be any change in that for this year as well. So my my point is we should reduce that. I don't know how by how much but I want to hear what everyone else has to say. I have a copy of the the detailed budget in front of me if you would like me to share it. Can is that something I could do?
Sure.
So, so you could see what we're all talking I mean, we're not talking a ton of money here. For sure. We're not.
No.
Share at the bottom of the screen. Can you
Oh. Oh, share.
Okay. Share.
Sorry. I'm gonna stop sharing.
Yeah, you have to stop.
I have to stop.
Yep. And I'm gonna allow Liz. Sorry, guys. I was checking on top.
It's okay. Okay. So, share. So, share. Okay. Here we are. can you see?
Yep.
How do we move this thing out of my way? so I I went down there the other day, too. I was down there with Marcy the other day. she was on her bike and I was just driving by. So, we stopped and just took a look and Jeff Ballard came by and he kind of gave us the whole gave us the whole tour of the whole irrigation system thing that I think he'd gotten grants or something with. It's pretty crazy. It's pretty intricate. It's pretty cool. but then, you know, I had this this list in my mind and I I I asked him about the irrigation system that he had, like the $1,800 irrigation system on the budget. And I thought to myself, my feeling is this garden is used by a certain group of people. In my mind, my question is, why are the taxpayers subsidizing a garden that a group of people use? That's just the way I think. And I was thinking, you know, maybe we maybe we say, you know, we'll give you whatever $1,800. Explain this drip system to me thing. And this drip system, so it's set up like with two gardens. So it's it's like one big rectangle broken into two and then two two two over to like I think 10 10 I think.
Yeah.
This irrigation this one piece is for one garden and it's a test to see how it works out. See if it works better than what's happening now because they're having like water problems with too much water and mold and whatever. And so I was like, "So you're saying this is just for one? You're going to need nine more of these?" I I guess I just didn't understand how how much was involved in this garden. And the ask has gone up again. It just seems to me if I was a person just like a person myself and wanted to have a garden, I would be and not have the room in my own yard. I'd be thrilled to have a place that's already prepped and ready to go. I'd bring all my stuff. I'd bring my seeds. I'd bring my stuff. I'd plant. And I just I don't know. I just feel a little odd about all these things that a small group of people are using. That's all. that's my spiel. And you know, I know it's not a lot of money, but I just wonder how other people feel about it. So, it says 37.85. Doesn't the budget say much more? The one that Rob was showing us the request. Did I
One, one moment. Where were we?
Maybe I just read it wrong.
No, no, hold on. Hold on. Community garden.
Take your time.
3785 is the request. So, what did they spend $1,800 on last year?
Yeah, that's kind of
If the budget's only $225 different.
Yeah.
What did he add? What was the 225?
It's interesting. It's interesting because last year's budget is listed as 3560.
And Lisa's number for expenditures year to date, well, we haven't hit spring yet, so I don't know if that really means anything, is 140 bucks. the
's done some purchases since then. Jeffrey Gallard has.
I bet. Okay.
I bet. Well, springtime, right?
$637.
You would not expect in the dead of winter to be spending a bunch of money. But that said,
the actual expenditure for 2425 was a little over $5,000.
Really?
Yes. That's what it's listed on this chart. Assuming that's the correct number.
55. 5,124 2425 action.
Yes.
Can you can you guys switch stop sharing Liz and let
Yep. Yep.
Sure thing. Give me one moment, Jeff. my sorry. My computer's fighting me. Give me a moment. where are we here? community garden. So, this is what I'm talking about.
Oh, yeah. Okay.
Wow.
Okay. It seemed it's bounced around quite a bit, don't you think? so they spent a bunch of money in 242. Shoot. Sorry. Let me fix that. My bad. They spent a bunch of money in 2425. They haven't spent much this year yet, but obviously we're coming into spring. Our budget this year, however, you would have expected I don't know. I don't know if we would have expected some expenditure in the summer, you know, post July one.
I would think most expenditure comes in June.
I would think I would think it would be like May. Yeah, like April, May.
there is a big purchase back in 24 or 25, but I can't tell you because all it says is credit card. People's choice
for $1,800.
I think that's part of the irrigation system. Didn't they buy some big tanks back there, Liz? Weren't you were back there? They
There are big There are big tanks back there. but I know there was a lot of piping and all kinds of stuff. I know that some of there's like two really like big tanks almost as big as this room. And I think he said he got the got a grant for those, I think.
And there's another $1,275 charge, but again, there's no memo in it for last June. So, I would have to look up the bill because there's no memo in it. Okay.
It's made out to Jeff Ballard, but it doesn't say what it's for. Yeah. the community garden did get a a did get an investment from the school through a grant program supposedly to sit there and do fencing and do some other issues. So, there's been additional money spent that's not included in this tool. in the sense of a community garden. I don't really feel that it's really benefiting a community. I think it's benefiting a few people and there was no ill feelings to Jeff because he's worked so hard on that.
But a lot a lot very very very much. And I just don't I mean I I don't see it being a a fee for the town
or some of it at least.
Okay.
and his plan I will say his plan for that garden for the senior garden for whoever wants to tend to it. And I honestly don't think it's fair to for Tess to feel like she should have to do it. is to take the produce from that garden and put it in a refrigerator that's going to be put into the lower level of the senior center and it'll be open between certain hours on Saturdays for people for the community to go in. And
thanks. Can I can I can I ask you to try one thing this year with this?
sit there and take
the garden produce and try to work with and then Jeff Ballard worked with Tess to incorporate it into the senior lunchons and to the seniors to allow the seniors to take the produce.
That's what I that's what I was told by Jeff it was going to happen. I didn't hear anything about the community part of it. Well, what he told me last this past weekend when I
Okay, but what I what I'm really driving at is the seniors that are going to the lunchon on a Friday get to pick up whatever vegetables they want. And if we find that the vegetables aren't being taken by the seniors and the members of the community there, then next year you decide what to do related to the community garden. but give them a purpose and say this is what we would like you to accomplish or we look at it differently next year and pounds of produce was given to the church last year
ight that was his when he came and presented to us he he mentioned that I would love it if they were able to incorporate nice fresh produce into those senior lunches that would be pretty cool
they he did say he did say is not doing the church thing anymore because they weren't getting the volunteers to come and help do it.
Yes, I remember that discussion as well.
Yeah,
and I get it. It's a lot of work.
So, does anybody have a motion?
Yeah, we need to move on. So,
it's not a lot of money.
It's not I mean, we're talking about, you know, a $225 increase from last year. talking about 3785 total. If there's a motion to reduce this line item, let's do it and let's move on. Going once.
I'd make the motion we bring it back to 3560.
That's exactly what I was going to say.
I'll second it.
Big minds.
Okay. sorry. Who seconded it?
Liz. Liz. Very good. So, bill motions. Liz seconds. Any further discussion, guys? All right. I'll call for a vote. Kim,
yes.
Heather,
yes.
Nick,
yes.
Bill,
yes.
Liz,
yes.
Louise,
And myself, yes. So, we're going to reduce this to last year's 3560.
Yeah.
I can type 3560.
Actually, let me put my let me get my notes right here from requested 30 785.
All right. So, this is okay.
Thanks, guys. We're good. we got a bunch of zeros here. Select win. board clerk. This is just 3% increase. I mean, that's just,
yeah,
unless anybody wants to challenge it. I mean, again, these are 3%.
we had a question down here. Oh, we talked about this already. We did this in our other spreadsheet. I got to fix this. This we zeroed out, right? Yeah.
Yep.
Yes. Oh yeah, excuse me. % 3% let's see what is this inland wetland clerk 12 me per year. h you know it's a small amount of money. It's 500 bucks. h just looking at the expenditures.
Do they get
do they get paid per meeting? Is that what that is?
Presumably.
thank you so much for meeting
$84 a meeting usually. It looks like
Okay. Well,
and they want to go up to 13.
They want to go
What is the math? I didn't do it. What's the math?
84* 12 is only like $1,000, right?
I think I think their concern was they're going to have more for this year, more meetings, but I don't know why.
Well, it says 12 meetings per year.
12, right? So $848.
It's 108. No.
Yeah.
One meeting was slightly higher by nine bucks. One meeting. All the rest were $84.
What's 84 time 12?
108. There you go.
Well, unless she has a long meeting, I don't, you know, it depends on the length of the meeting on how much time. I don't I don't know. I don't know if she gets it.
All right, let's make it $1,100. Let's see. I'll make a motion. She say it's $1,100 from 13.
Yeah, but you don't you don't know if what the conversation was. This is like somebody's this somebody's pay. Like maybe they made an agreement with her to make like $110 a meeting or something. Okay.
Who do we know on inland wetlands that can answer this question?
That's all I mean I think
typically I mean it's such a small budget that we don't I don't know that we usually have them on but
Oh, it says on here potential 12 meetings per year plus sitewalk, special meetings, public hearings. So maybe the clerk goes on some of those.
Oh, okay.
Things.
Yeah. And if she gets if she gets paid $100 a meeting, that's 1,200 right there.
All right.
I think that's pretty typical. I think it's pretty typical for the town, right? Jeff Magguire,
I'm I'm good. Just demanding.
Okay.
I don't I don't have a problem with it. I just, you know, see that question.
Yeah. So, okay guys, we've made it to capital, but it's 9:50. So, my gut take here, and members of the board, you can agree or disagree, but I think that's next meeting.
What do you think,
fresh?
Tomorrow night, we can talk about capital. We can circle back about we can talk about AA as if you want. you know and try to tighten this thing up and prep for April 1st. So, but to me to me this is its own thing. We have lots of time tomorrow night that we've set aside. So, my take would be maybe stop here if unless I have significant disagreement from the board.
Nope. I think that's great.
Me too. Is there any more public speak or are we good or
usually I think we added in we've been trying to be do a better job and add in public speak at the end as well. I don't have the agenda up because I have a different PDF up. Sorry I for some bizarre reason on this particular laptop I can only have one PDF at a time and I have Lisa's capital fund PDF up here. So you tell me but I believe there's a public speak at the end. Yes. Let me just I'm gonna stop sharing so I can see.
Did I send Can you remind me? Did I send the board of selectman that PDF on the capital or just the board of finding?
Oh, give me one moment. I got to find it again. Give me one moment.
All right. Cuz I do.
It was your budget docs updated on the 18th and you sent it to our board. You CC Jeff Maguire.
Okay. So, I'll send it to
That's it.
Yeah. If Bill Ba selectman is attending tomorrow night, I can get that out to you in the morning.
Yeah. provided that's still the the best document. great. All right. So, right, let's go around the horn and in terms of public speak well, we have our select people. So, Scott, do you have anything further you want to add to our meeting?
I'm good, thank you.
All right. Thank you. Carol, how you
I'm all set. Thank you.
Okay, Joanne, I know you've been very patient.
That's okay. I mean, a lot of times I know you guys have had long meetings and I don't say things, but because of the discussion tonight, I'm definitely going to weigh in on a couple things. so I know one thing, we have a very small town, you know, 3,000 people. when you start talking about the stipens and things of that nature and, you know, bringing on new positions, it's always important to understand that every new position that comes in could have those benefits that you talk about. The the employees of our town do receive good benefits. I agree with that and and good for them. We want that. We want people to like their jobs. So, I think it's important when you're having a con conversation about hiring an admin assistant that can help a new town administrator and then also trying to keep another person happy. I don't want the leaders of our town to really, you
know, have to focus on that. If you think you need a new admin assistant, that should be the the the drive of the town so that the town administrator can be freed up to do other things. And then if you like that person in the position, then maybe see if she wants to bring on additional hours. so many times through the meetings that I've sat through, it's all about making someone happy and where, you know, sometimes you just have to make a tough call if there's a position available there. A stipen actually is jobreated, not person related. You know, as a person that pays the people stipens in the company and town that I work for, that's what happens. These things get turned over every year, every year. It's not hurting someone's feelings. It's just, do we have a job that has to be done? The reason that Eric was good and had created, you know, a couple stipens in the past, he was trying to save the town
money by saying, "Hey, we have a person that will do this extra duty and we'll pay them." When we hire a senior center director, community center director, every other town in our area has their municipal agent be that person. I'm still trying to understand why we're paying people additional duty, additional money. So across the board in Andover when we have people I understand having a stipen in the past, we didn't have one. Again, I had to say that cuz this was your topic tonight. So, you know, that kind of thing, you know, speaking to the Marborl senior center director in my research who has a town of 6,000 who she's one full-time person. I I don't mind whatever our leaders decide to do with the, you know, staffing and all of this, but every person you bring on, if you're not going to bring on a full-time person, that's fine because then you don't worry about benefits. But again, these stipens have been awarded across the board and then we give the stipen a raise every year. So, I mean, I
just am glad that you're all going to take a hard look at if the staffing needs to be done, do the staffing, but it's not about making people happy. It's about just filling positions. So, thank you for letting me voice that.
Thanks, Jan. so actually that brings us I believe that brings us to Tess who is our last person unless I've missed somebody.
I was going to talk about exactly what Joanne was speaking of. but I would have to respectfully disagree wholeheartedly in regards to each town around us that does have senior center director and the municipal agent in one. I I would just ask the board of finance to do research and and see exactly how accurate that is. it hasn't been my experience to have that across the board. I think I think that as I'm sure you will do do the research and and just see how accurate that is. That's all.
Okay. All right. Is there anyone I have missed? Don't want to leave anyone out. Okay. Hearing none. Do we have a motion to adjurnn?
I'll make the motion to adjurnn.
I'll second it.
Bill motions. Kim seconds. Very good. All in favor?
I. That's unanimous. So, you know, when our clerk gets to it, it's all of us. I'm not counting.
All right. Thanks everybody. Look, I'll see you guys tomorrow at 6. thanks everyone for your work tonight.
Oh, tomorrow 6. Oh, that's right.
Yeah, we moved it up. We moved it up. We're gonna have
Liz, you set it up. We We have a a special meeting
for the first hour.
6 to 7,
right? And then we're gonna
come back in. Yeah, Liz, help me with this. Thank you so much. We're going to come back in and do our regular meeting, right? Starting at 7.
Thank you. Okay. Glad you reminded me.
Yeah. Important. All right, guys. And I thank