Meeting transcript
BOE BOF BOS Joint Meeting
October 12, 2023 · Watch on YouTube · All meetings
So
thank you all for coming. This was my vision for us to kind of have a meeting where all three boards could work together. My name is Kate Greenhouse. I'm on the board of Ed. Paula King and Joanne Hubert helped me to kind of orchestrate and organize this to coming to fruition. So I'd like you to thank them as well. And then we will go ahead and get started. Paula had a couple of couple words to say as well. So Just just a couple housekeeping things. I think
everybody saw we've got a sign up for the round and take some notes tonight and post what we normally do in meetings. As you know, the acoustics in here are not great. So if you're soft spoken, just try to speak up and and remember to project. And like Caitlin said, Joanne, Caitlin and I have been working behind the scenes. So this is a work in progress. Right? We've never done anything like this before. This is great. I love it. But we're asking for patience and grace and understanding. We're gonna come out of here tonight, and we already have a list of things that we're looking at doing differently for next meeting. So if you have any suggestions, let us know, but just be able to understanding that this is organic. It's gonna it's gonna evolve as we go. So just please be patient with how the process is gonna go tonight
in in the future. Does anybody need to sign? Yeah. Okay. We'll send we'll send that that way, and there's some agendas on the phrase or the front to meeting agenda. So that's all that's all I have. Okay. So, I guess, then we'll call the order and do the pledge of allegiance, and then we're gonna elect the moderator. Okay.
For a show of hands, who would like Jed Larson as moderator? Okay. Do I have somebody count that has a really good view in the group? Please, a show of hands, who would like to have hamburger as moderator? Okay. You're welcome, Bob. So, mister Larson, can you sit at table, please?
In a couple of different orders here. The couple of ground rules that I think it goes without saying everybody's gonna be cordial and respectful tonight. We are friends family neighbors I always heart back to you know what I mean the disciple of schema cubby to see first and understand then be understood so hopefully with that we do some learning tonight and understand better with the people's concerns our other the courts that we that we're working with. I was looking to have each spokesperson for each of the different groups tonight speak from the podium for about five minutes after that's done the other people on that particular commission that if they got something that they want to add, you don't have to, it can take about a minute to add whatever they feel, you know, they need to, they amplify on what what's already said there. So we'll go through all the number of rules that are on the agenda tonight in order, and we won't do questions until we get to do the end of all the rules and responsibilities. At that point we'll we'll rotate through the different boards and if somebody's got a question you've got thirty seconds to raise their question we'll get a thirty second response and we'll alternate between the different boards until everybody's had a chance to ask a question. At that point we'll have a discussion on the defining of the capital improvement that sort of thing. And I think that's all the rules that we've come up with for tonight. I think that's all. Any questions before we start? Okay. So with that in mind, the the spokesperson for the board of select
Sorry to interrupt. We we just need comments from the public.
Okay. At at this point, we'll do comments from the public. And we'll wait. The opening comments from the public are on items that are not on the agenda for tonight. We'll have public comment again when we get done, and,
and the responsibility of of the rewards. The role of responsibility need to be clearly defined before I think we extend the sole of our discussions. I would now like to reference the auditor's review of the 2020 fiscal year. In that, the auditor raised concerns about how they bring
I would like to make sure you're trouble, and we'll have them done. You hear them in the quarters.
K? Understood. So what I would be referring to is that
I'll have a planning corrective action plan that is dated 06/30/2023,
All of them, including the greater understanding of the board of education, is independent, and it's beholden to the auditor directly. And just one final point, in regards to the town charter for the chapter eight, finance and taxation of the town charter, and adding one very important note that I did make prior to this meeting. So thank you. Any other discussion, Paul?
Just just two things. I appreciate the time that you took to share that. So we shared an agenda with all four all three boards ahead of time, and I'm I'm surprised that this motion was put on the floor. I'm just looking at this document now. I don't even know how to respond. And we had packets that we shared usually with the public. So let's maybe think about for our next meeting if if we wanna share in the pub with the public all the information that stand out to the meeting. I think that would be very helpful so that if something's handed out, I'm I'm dying. I don't have time to look at this right now and to internalize this when we have to vote about this immediately. So can we just maybe think about our next meeting to look at the agenda at lunchtime? And maybe let's talk about if we're concerning something on the agenda, and let's talk about that. And then can you submit anything that you wanna talk about that, like, the meeting to complete an impact?
Common sense. This is a collegial need. This has no effect on anything that we get done. We're not gonna go and get something accomplished here today. It is just to understand what the roles are for all of the organizations. What you're missing, what you're really missing is the treasurer is not just the treasurer for the town entity, the treasurer had a role in this hospital related to ordering all of the informations from the school and branding it into the financial statements that presented. So the only thing the only reason we would want to talk about the treasurer is to get an understanding of what information do it for board verification and not make any final information, but let you afford all that and and understand what information your board is responsible for providing treasurer so that he can prepare. So we can get into the weeds. We can have our alerts go ahead and have a negative meeting, or we can just talk
can I echo what Jeff says too right from the get go when I was feeling good walking in? I don't mind hearing opinions and getting information presented to us, but it just put me back right away. And I'm all about education too in this setting with education. And like Jess said, I wanted to just not to make a decision on who should do what or the judge or what needs to be involved or what the board said about. I like to learn. If I'm an elected member of the board of finance, I just wanted to hear a five minute, you know, synopsis of the role. You know? It just would have been local to me. I think, you know, we were just learning about roles, responsibilities. I mean, I spent time putting something together. That was my first meeting, getting together too. But now I get back on my heels even though I was really moving forward to this. Gonna get a hold of it and listen and learn, that's crazy. Any there's people. I would push that you vote on what he's
administrators to pull together the boards of the town to discuss things. And, you know, I didn't think any action you can take in. I think it's just suggested final action that would be, you know, legally, you know, effective.
Board of Education, and the Board of Finance members. All in favor of the motion is presented, raise your hand. Well, I would have been smiling a lot more
before that vote. Listen. The Board of Selectmen is legislative. It's the overseeing body of the town, and the town is represented by the Board of Selectmen, and the Board of Selectmen has specific responsibilities. It It presents a budget to the Board of Finance, which the Board of Finance approves or rejects, makes adjustments, and it's an overseeing body. My whole goal with this meeting, and I had hoped, and I'd asked Jerry about this a long time ago, is that we just have a collegial meeting and understand in a common sense way what we have the authority to do and what the Board of Selectmen don't speak for and what we don't have the authority to do. So in my case, it comes down to attorneys. I'm not going to give you the statutory issues
that that relate to my board, but I am going to tell you that I know enough that our board will be responsible to the town and to the residents, and the the Board of Education is responsible to educate the children, but the Board of Education is another agency and another body of the town, and I it is a body of the time. Listen. If if mister Mooney wants to correct me, I'll let him do it later, but we're all part of the time. We don't have the ability to tell the Board of Education how to spend money. We don't have the ability to tell the Board of Education to move their monies from budget line to budget line. We don't have the ability as a board of selectmen to close the school. It's not within our purview. But please understand that this common sense. When we get to talk about the treasurer, which is the most important item on this agenda to me, right, is the role of the treasurer. What the treasurer, of who it is, what governs that person. It's in our charter what the treasurer can do. It's in state statute what the treasurer can do, and we're not asking. I mean, this is where I feel there's been a negativity coming from the board of education to the board of selectmen that we want to tell you how to spend your money or that we're concerned
that you're spending it incorrectly. No. All we're asking for is that the information, as the financial statements are presented, are presented accurately and with all the information so we get all the findings off of our board, off of our audit. That's what we're asking for, and the only way we'll do that is if we work together. If we do not work together, we're going to come to these meetings, and we're going to be fighting over silly, silly things that we don't need to fight over. So roles of the board of selectmen, I will let attorney O'Brien sit there and address it. If you want it in a statutory manner, I will allow him to do that because I think I'm done with my five minutes, Jed. Is that okay?
I think what they call minor board teams, but essentially, the legislative power. Well, I mostly with the, I'd say, board of finance or going to the budget as an administrative function also. And, of course, with with the voters at town meeting. So those folks they are the executive board. They run town on a day to day basis. In this town, they're a the town minister. Okay? And and that's what you know, they're like, you know, the president or the governor or their executive.
Well, one thing I do wanna say, and I wanted to reference to the to the board of education. I thought really for Eric. Eric works for the board of select. I have Valerie. You don't work for Valerie. We Valerie is our employer. We are responsible for her actions. Your your voice is not correct. We are responsible for her actions. He he does not he works for her. She works for you. And if we're all aware of that, we're clear on that. When we're making decisions, it will be very The role of the treasurer is to accumulate financial data for the town to prepare finances. There are requests that have been made in various
documents that the treasurer is asked to sit there and obtain documentation from those schools in the board of education
that has not been made available for FERC because they're the belief that those documents do not need to be compiled. Nothing more, nothing less. I'm not asking you to have her decide whether you spend the money directly, whether you're moving money to the right spot and not moving money to the right spot. And her request is is to get
Thank you. Robin, please. I need blue book. For a reason. The role of the board of education is very clear, and our roles and responsibilities are derived from the state of Connecticut. These are clear rules are are not open to interpretation, cannot be changed unless the state of Connecticut, state legislature, governor changed them. Our roles as the board of education are to hire. Our superintendent, Valerie, is in that role right now. She is our CEO, and she provides the leadership for the school district. We develop our budget and oversee its implementation, collective bargaining with the unions and nonunion employees about their contracts and employment, review and adopt all board of education policies, create and clarify the goals of the school district and the mission for the Andover Elementary School and the board of education, and we engage with the Andover community. Based upon recent interactions, I believe that all three boards would benefit from a more detailed description about what is and what is not a role or responsibility of the board of education. So I invited the two experts to share their wisdom with all of us.
There's board of education attorney Tom Mooney, his name's on the big book, from Shipman and Goodwin, and Nick Caruso from the Connecticut Association Boards of Education. Attorney Mooney literally wrote the book about connected school law and has been practicing school law for more than four decades. Nick Caruso has trained and worked with almost every board of education in the state of Connecticut to help board of educations understand their roles, best practices for board of education members, and how to run board of education meetings. I very much appreciate their being with us tonight for them to share their words of wisdom with us. Okay. You guys are on.
Good evening. My name is Tom Mooney, and I appreciate the opportunity to make some brief remarks to you. I did have an opportunity to read the packet that preceded this meeting, and I'm just like, you know, I just showed up. You've been living with each other. You've been having your agreements and your disagreements, but I just wanted to say that as I read the packet, I think that the areas of agreement are far greater than any areas of disagreement, and I think it's really that any disagreements you have are more in the details. I think that and and I hope that through this, this is a wonderful opportunity for you people giving of your time to your community to talk together. Just a couple quick comments on boards of education. Boards have had a dual status, and that's led to litigation. It's not a simple matter. Sometimes, you know, well, what what does that mean? But I I understand that the concept that the Board is an agency of the town has caused some consternation. The Board of Ed is an agency of the town. The board has dual status. The board is here to serve the community, elected through the charter,
to oversee education here, and in reading the packet, I saw important agreements that the Board of Education's right to extend its appropriation in its discretion is not disputed. The town appropriates to the Board of Education, and back to the dual status. I've said that the board serves as an agency of town, but that the statutes, and no other town agency has an entire title of the general statutes devoted to it, and the Board of Eds serves an important state responsibility to implement the educational interests of the state to fulfill the state's constitutional responsibility for educating children, and so in that state role, that's why the Board of Ed has discretion,
independent discretion, over expending its operating funds. One of the tough issues, and I'm sorry to say that I was around with the New Haven case, which is one of the issues about capital budgets and operating budgets, and I was, peripherally involved in that case. Capital budgets are are one of the more it's just not totally clear, and I'll say this. The town owns the property, and the town has an important responsibility on capital projects, because what you do with a capital asset can affect future obligations. So the town has a vital interest, but the Board of Education has clear and control of property used for school purposes, and I think that there was also agreement that maintenance
I thought my time was up.
Sorry. I keep talking. Okay. You can empty it by extra time. I'm here. But
the Board of Education has care and control of property dedicated to use for school purposes, and I don't think that's in dispute either. So this is the area of Board of Education operation where cooperation is essential. Neither side can control the situation when it comes to capital expenditures and capital, the asset and how you maintain it, but the Board of Ed has that responsibility for maintenance, and then the town owns the property, and so when you talk about investing in that property, the town has the interest in doing that, but the town can't, like, take control of the school building to make a capital improvement that is a a collaborative effort, under the statute. This is an area of the law, and and I appreciate the kind words I have been doing this for forty six years. This is an area of the law where where one of the critical statutes is ten two forty one. It's a mess. The same statute says that school districts build buildings, equip buildings, hire superintendents, create libraries, and there's no clear delineation in that statute as to what a school district's authority is between responsibilities allocated to the Board of Education and responsibilities allocated to the town. The same statute and so the the town the Connecticut Supreme Court in the New Haven case tried to wrestle through that and try and figure it out, and they came up with the, holding that capital budgets are not the same as operating budgets. And although the board has the absolute discretion to expand its operating budget,
the capital budget is a shared responsibility, and it can't be unilaterally implemented by the Board of Education or by the okay. Or by the I was having fun. Or or by the town. But that is I've said my essential piece. If I if there are any questions. I have much more to say, and I do want to, again, say that I hope this is the beginning of a collaborative discussion, because you are all giving of your time to serve your community, so let's focus on what you all want to do, which is educate the children, and not. And so I have just a couple of comments on the town treasurer.
The town treasurer's role here is mechanical relative to the operating budget, but the town treasurer does have an so the town and I didn't hear anyone saying the town treasurer is going say, oh, you can't buy that textbook. That's that's a board of education responsibility. The town treasurer has no oversight responsibility, but the town treasurer does have an accountability responsibility. The town treasurer pays the appropriation out on accounts drawn by the Board of Education within the limits of that annual appropriation, but to the extent that the town treasurer, and now I don't want to get into the weeds and I'm not drawing any conclusions because I don't know about the details, I would just say this, that, the reporting issues are a bit triggering for boards of ed because it's like, hey, you know, we're we're the board of ed, but every document that the joint treasurer may want to see is accessible under the Freedom of Information Act anyway. You would, I think, just want to I wrote down reasonable requests.
Well, let's hope they're reasonable, and if you think they're not reasonable, I think that's a conversation because all of these documents are accessible. So I'd be happy to answer any questions, but I do want to thank you for the opportunity to just lay out, my view of how these two, these three bodies work together in accordance with the statutes.
I'd like to address the question after we get through the rule because we have said that there will certainly be plenty of opportunity to ask you questions at that moment.
Yeah. I just would like to thank you to Tom that they didn't plan to be with us tonight,
I'm Jillian Heber, and I'm the board of finance vice chairperson. Mark Brinker couldn't be present tonight, so I'm gonna do my best just to give a general overview. I had asked to be moved to the bottom so that I could watch everyone else. Now I wish I was at the top because that was a great bringing us back together, and we really appreciate that. That is the purpose of why we're here, and I have met you in meetings before and sat in towns that I work as well. So mine is, like I said, more basic. Andover's Board of Finance is an elected board consisting
of seven members that each serve an overlapping four year term. The Board of Finance is tasked as the financial oversight agency for the town of Andover. We follow the rules and regulations set forth in the town charter and the state of Connecticut general statutes as they pertain to the Board of Finance. We are able to set and establish financial and fiscal policies for the town, then oversee them, and revise them as we see needed. We also try to be a collaborative board, often inviting other town, stakeholders to appear at our meetings, which happen once a month, to present to us and maybe I don't wanna go off task. I should just read. To present to us things that will be needed at that time or in the future. We receive financial updates from the town treasurer in the form of monthly expenditure reports and the check register. It's at these meetings that we're able to talk and ask questions, receive information regarding anything that isn't going according to our original plan or additional funding may be needed so we can better meet the needs of the tenant. We also have the responsibility at the end of the year that we are able to change and transfer line items if funds are available in other accounts.
During our busy budget season, we are heavily involved in that preparation. We hold multiple meetings and compile budget documents discussing and assessing the needs of the town at the present time and going forward. We do have the right to request financial data and backup information, follow-up information from any department in the town as part of our process. We will then bring forth a recommended budget at the annual town budget meeting to the town. After the budget is voted on, it is also a duty and a role of the board of finance to set the mill rate for the town. This is a really small snapshot of the board of finance rules. I, open it up to our town attorney to add anything that he feels I could have left out. Thank you. At this point,
Dennis, you wanna make something on that? No. I thought that was very good. I think I just wanted to add one thing.
The general staff and crew do provide that each town agency.
So just the board of the stand, which is the town agency.
Most report and make his records available to the board of finance. With the board of finance, they won't bill the. So that is, you know, as Tom said, that's something that's acceptable under the FOI. We don't want that to go the FOI. So it is it is required. The board I'm not particularly fond of the board of finance one thing I would say about the board of education, called it an an agency of the town, but first of all, of the you know, the important function has under the constitution and the state's actions. It takes all those opportunities
for self governing that you mentioned. Okay. Thank you. I recognize that I forgot after we had the pleasure of listening to Tom Lee to go back to the other Board of Education members and see if there's anything. But at this point, I'm gonna go around the Board of Finance first, and then we'll finish up So that point that that includes the initial discussions of the goals and responsibilities. At this point, I'll try and keep things mixed up with the different words and we'll go around and see if there's any other questions that you would like to have any of the words at this point in an effort to better understand so I'll start with Scott
Yeah.
Would just like to say one thing. So we move forward here on item number nine, and maybe we can get a couple minutes by each board on what they feel capital improvement is so we can open up the discussion. Yeah. In terms of the dual status Yeah. I must say, I spent all my time working in the Board of So when I hear about the Board of Selectmen directing the work at the Board of Ed, I express a little bit because that but I'm not hearing the Board of Selectmen saying that they wish to do that. The dual status is reflected in the statutes. When it comes to the physical plan, you're married. You have to work together.
And Can you can you say that one more time? Please louder.
You you what on capital stuff, you you are together. You have to work together because you control the property. The use of property by statute is the chair, maintenance, and operation of property dedicated to school use with solely within the jurisdiction of the board of education. But the town has an absolute legitimate concern about the fiscal plan because the town is gonna have to pay. So if, for example, you're you wanna put this comes up sometimes. You wanna put solar solar panels up on the school roof. And that's great. But you can't do that without a town's agreement because the school buildings are the towns. And when you put solar panels on somebody's roof, that creates future obligations, whether it's to repair the leaky roof or to repair the solar panels. So that's an example of where they have to work together. But
I would say that the Board of Education, as you educate the children, have extensive discretion within your appropriations. And I would be perhaps better able to offer something constructive. I heard about a way in which the town is serving control. I heard this, you know, this documentation that said something, and that may be the devil's in the details. But as I read the material, I don't hear the town saying that it wishes to second guess court decisions on the operating budget. Perhaps a point of contention is school property, and I'd be happy to hear from the town on that. But school property in several different respects is acknowledged under state law. They're given the board of education, the term jurisdictions. If we want to, this will, if you want to open it up to community groups, that's bystander, the Board of Education responsibility. I think the real rub is the capital
piece and the investment in the in the property. I just could be. Dennis, do you wanna respond at all? Attorney O'Brien is much more conversant in Title VII. And so there's something there. Sometimes the reporting requirements are in charge and charge provisions are binding on the board of education. And this is another opportunity to charge your lives. So this is why it's better to work together and work with the way this is always.
That that phrase you just gave is one that is is firmly in my mind. If we can't do maintenance inimical
Like, I like that, but we are bringing to the table. If that is too much, I have to know with the with the work, you know, the people available. Like, asking I you know, asking the board of med finance person for the the town's finance person how often they need the report. And it's you know, I think it's something something to to work work on. On. Also, when I was in the town of Manchester, I was always on the phone with a town person. So that's I wasn't aware of that employee. I had no problem falling into the town financial person, Maddie, who lived there for the longest time and then went to the town of Cole Center, who needed to report all kinds of things.
For reporting not trying to control in any way what they probably put in the monitors and so clearly the state statutes and our contractors say that they have to provide that reporting to the panel treasury that's just in the laws and state laws and our bylaws so I don't understand what the rub is just report how about trying to spend your money tell you how to do it just asking for reporting purposes and there's public information anyway so again I don't understand the road maybe he's gonna clarify the point I don't understand Jerry would you like to respond to that one What's the problem? Why would you want to buy the treasurer with reporting that is necessary for the file we're not trying to put the town's not trying to think about the spending money or how we allocate the money or anything else just report it so that auditing can be done according to state and house entities. There's a lot so
take an annual report the auditor does an annual report after the fiscal year closes So there's no need to make monthly reports. There's no need to report to the town treasurer on a monthly basis. That's the rub. The rub is what's the big snap of mine is we discern the attorney will be by state laws of how often can the annual reports that's the rub. Why why you're being asked at the Board of Education to provide monthly reports when those aren't really necessary, and that's according to our audit that it's not really necessary.
Okay. That completes the round of questions. At this point No. No. I didn't look. So
it's not up against you, but I I would answer for the board of talking. What have we done or how have we tried to enter the theater in the application
of your role and your response? We were not able to get a permit to pay our upper parking lot over the summer, and therefore, it is still sitting unpaid and dangerous for people to walk on and beam. Okay. I think that is interference.
Was not respectful, was not cruel. And that's where all of this is, would say. So now we come to a second issue, which is a safety issue for the school. The
and the fact fact that that we we did did not not acquiesce
to the parliament because it didn't then you didn't ask us about doing it. Correct? So we're gonna go off the capital. So I just find the punch again, and I'm turning it into perspective.
It has come up that there are some improvements that want to be made, and I think there was a discussion that started with, you know, money that that would have had money come up over the end of the year, and we started talking about maybe it would be time to start a capital improvement account for them. So that instead of maybe spending unused money at the end of the year going forward for supplies, because there's been meetings where things have been talked about, could they and I know I the genesis of it and apologize about could they maybe put that money into a capital and put it in the chat? I think we were all in agreement for it. Like Doctor. McGuire has said time and time again, anytime that there's been something that's been asked, we all are made of whatever we can do to benefit, you know, the schools have gone and the children and education. So working in a school system itself, look at capital improvement list that's provided every year and then money is looked at. So capital improvement, I believe, are things that are,
improvement? And I think value of the acquiring value of the plan is probably for the tech. Right? And that is capital purchases for equipment and projects, estimated cost of 15 k or more, and annual or annual maintenance or leasing cost of $45,000. So there's your pay. Right? And that's probably put a number on that's a big project. One is small instead. Okay? And really what I'm do is put that in too, because obviously anything you're gonna do is gonna roll off that kind of requirement of continued expenditure, that's kind of capital as well. But obviously there are things that are not that, like paying your employees, you know,
So in part, it's defined by the annual audit, and the annual audit defines what a capital asset is of the pound and what things are capitalized and not. That comes from the auditor relies on the board of finances, the vision and determination. But what that is, the board of finance have put together two policies. One is purchasing policy. The other is a capital asset policy. So if you're gonna use a common definition of what a capital asset is, ultimately, it has a flowback to the body. So you should probably use the what's defined by the word of finance for that purpose.
Common sense tells you But if you're going to do something such as a roof that you did sit here, right, that's an Italian project. That's a project that goes through the capital improvements.
I was a little so I didn't I think so I can follow that but I'm just saying content should be appropriate
as lab that we have included all you you're doing something that is a $120,000. I don't care. Should be $20,000. But if you're doing something to a physical asset, I'm controlled. I as we as a board or a finance cannot go and tell you, Yeah. Make one one at a time. So so so I can't sit there and go, I have to go and we have paid that parking lot and shut it down to the detriment of the children. Because in the end,
how we might be able to get the parking lot in Hawaii and you and I and Eric had a conversation and you thought that Eric was quite the asset in helping you understand what was needed to get parking lot done. That we're to have to pay for the parking lot maybe at some point It's this is what Christ died. This needs to be done. It's an incredible project.
We don't have that money in our little piggy bank. So that's the kind of thing we need to be able to get going, I think. And if nothing else compares to media, it's bad. I think it shows where we agree on things and what we can do to contribute to make this more a positive experience for the volunteers who are sitting around in faith. I mean
But I think what you're talking about is the capital improvement plan for the Board of Education. Yeah. The board of education is starting to get the idea that we need capital improvement plan it's got all these things it's got a call next week that says where are we going get the funding you know it could be down it could be from the board of ed budget it could be grant you know you name it but
think it's important not to get too hung up on definitions. I think that the most important thing is to look at your appropriation process because the statute governing the board that said the board has care, maintenance, and operation of a building. So what is or is non maintenance of operations? I think that it's important to look at what you ask for from the town, your itemized budget estimate, and if your town appropriates that goes funds, then you have, I think, broad discretion to to go ahead and use those funds for the purposes, including maintaining your buildings. But there are circumstances, and I have to tell you what this that was an interesting verb that probably This problem. But Chad may be a good example of where you have to go outside the normal appropriation process and say, we have a capital need. We need to do something with our plumbing and you go to the town and you ask for an appropriation. That would be how it would normally be. But I really hope that we can, or you all can not focus too much on definitions, but rather on options. And if through the appropriation process, you get funds to do your work, I really don't know that it's all that important, whether it's called a capital
or a non capital. It's an operational issue for you, and you do have the authority to maintain your facilities. But there are going to be, if I'm correctly understanding, there's not currently a capital fund for the orbit. Right. And you have to make your own decisions, but that's again related to the appropriation process. That's a fund that you would not have unilateral control over. That was the New Haven case where there's a operational fund and appropriations made and there's a capital fund. And that is where you're married and you're gonna have to work together. I understand the attorney's thoughts are not over defining, but I do think we should have a clear cut process that says these critters send us the CIP. So there's not any but to do with this. They're not the same common sense, but who you capital improvement, whether it is specifically for the board of ed, what would trigger them, and understand that the reason we're doing this is in the power. Where the money comes because it's all the same pot of money. It's all coming from all of us taxpayers. It's all going to our kids in the school and the we have five. We wanna make sure that we're involving people who have the expertise in these areas so that when we do projects, especially when we spend a $120,000
that we're making sure we don't have to do it again by the net gross. We didn't go and ask people who knew whether or not this was right then. I I do want to define that, and I don't know whether that's something that's a joint policy or something that would be an internal or a net policy.
It's all gonna go into a pot of money for capital improvement for the board of. I solely agree with you as far as having experts. I mean, that you're gonna spend a $120,000 on a roof, though. In our store, go in a classroom. We never have town. That's it's so hard for me, and so I'm glad that I'm able to hold the line this far. It's just all good. Like, this is great. We were trying to create a capital account that hopefully can be funded through some budget, and I guess one of these things. You know, we do that for that.
When you were talking about based on fund the account, I was surprised that you didn't mention the grants. Would that be a possibility to fund the capital improvement? That's a good point.
I'm not I'm not a wizard of the post grant, but that that seems reasonable.
And the only reason we had money was because we had an incredible superintendent who gets grounded so the money was not used for operation and the board of education who oversees the maintenance and let's see how you speak to Biden. The care and maintenance of the property is very unique. Has broad discretion as to how to maintain our property. So there's the drug. Is it a capital improvement? Is it maintaining a parking lot?
How is that defined? And here's where the problem goes, and that is that we had money in our operational budget that had already been given by the town so to speak pursuant to their or paying our budget and we could have used it for anything what we decided that we wanted to use it for was painting the parking lot because that was really necessary and a steep issue. To So if the preference is this is wasn't a forcing you if the preference is that we now spend a mile on air so that we can call it operational or whatever and we have worried Well, I'm gonna see if that's what's gonna happen.
And that's not on the best of use of the kids, go to the school, or the town. And that's how that's what we gotta get a good.
I'm gonna. Do we intervene? So the whole point of, again, saying positive waitlist was we understood that. We have the board of finance meeting. And so we decided to take baby steps to get to where we would want to go in any town in board of education or even at Raymond because we look at that every year and we see that huge number, you know, and and different things like that, but they have a wish list, so to speak, which is their capital improvement plan. And then they give you the dollar signs of what each thing will cost. And there's nothing wrong with that. I think in our leading step approach, we're not trying to solve the world issues right now. We're trying to make this happen and have this fund that we created, the board of selectmen verified, and, you know, we got it into existence. Maybe it wasn't the exact fund. I understand. Maybe on the accounting side, these digits need to be entered into the computer to make it an account. I understand what that means setting, but it's still positive positive because it's money more than one
when and I'll go through the steps. The board of education applied for a permit on the part of the month for a $128,000. The only caveat that we requested was that the Department of Public Works and the town administrator create specifications for the job so that it was done correct. That's what we asked for. That's all we asked for, and we'd be able to ask you you as a holder. So you understand. I want the guy who said, hey. We have a $128,000 left over because our superintendent has done a great job in France.
Where was the collaboration with regard to working with our paper to give a permit and to tell us what public works to do? Because I'll tell you, if I was Constantine and I was told that another supervisor had to be paid for to supervise my work, I wouldn't be paid and that's what I'm doing. We would love the capital improvement fund we created. What wasn't created is a capital improvement fund, a new account that the board of finance and the board of education will collaborate on, which is what we do with the 2%. Not appropriate for the board of education's farms unless we have an agreement otherwise to be overseen by the town
we're fine 2% non vaccine again that is defined by state law
again, it's all to me. I still feel that, like, control thing. I feel like we're all and I I'm not trying to to rather stick that we're having a conversation. I just feel like it's a positive thing. We just need to set up some grammars if it's a huge thing. Of course, the town are gonna be involved with permits and, you know, maybe sort of things are done right. I I'm not seeing where you think anyone is gonna say no, like, in the control. Everything everyone's sent to me. Sad is it for the seventeen years I've been here in Washington and then involved. You know? I might just move forward. Like, okay. So if there was maybe, you know, some bad feelings or this and that, let's start fresh you know I know that the feelings are going to be negative but we really want to be positive moving forward and establishing making things happen setting the guidelines of course if it's a huge project like grouping getting experts you know things of that nature but the money at least my opinion
the money that was cleared up it's been cleared up the permission to do probably did not take their debt yeah it was good to protect we don't promote we're talking about money and care can't stand up I hope you're going to talk about all the good things that we were able to try and do so that we didn't end up we my example is how many times have you seen a road prepaid and then the next thing that happens and somebody's out there cutting it up so they can work on the plate I think Eric was trying to avoid that And so Eric, say that you you got the floor. Okay. So,
generally speaking, we'll now hand over the projects. Aiding projects are controlled by the public works supervisor. But they're both by me, but primarily him, we you know we usually utilize our accounting in the air when we're writing specs for a paving job. And it's been it depends on what the anticipated traffic is and what the material under the meeting is. So when we found out that the school had an independent data, it sounded like the word selectman was going to agree it to that. The first thing we did at at Public Works is we got a Public Works supervisor and the county engineer within about five days from us knowing that this was happening to come back with a set of specifications for doing the job correctly that address three things, primarily. The first thing was to drain the parking lot, and one of the dumbest things you can do is repave something before you make sure the drainage is fine. So and as you know, because you had asked us to do it, public works had repaired sink holes there fairly recently. So you should have an inkling that your drainage was messed up at the beginning. So we did two things. We looked at the brain.
We dug a hole in the and we did what's called a sieve test, which is basically you dig out the sub base and then you send it off to Nathan Davidson's testing lab, and you get a material sample back for what's underneath Parklawn. We did that in two areas. So we had representative samples. And based on that, the town engineer and public works director gave a set of specifications for how to do that correctly. You talked about oversight of the contractor. You're
right. The town when we send out a project to a contractor that's especially a replaying the behave,
we assume that we are always gonna test. We're gonna test for proper compaction before we pave, and we are going to test that they properly impact the asphalt while we do it. And we accept the fact that we're gonna pay additional money to do that because that is our assurance that the job is great. Because if it's compacted properly, they put down the right amount of asphalt, the right type, and the right depth, you know, you're gonna end up with a good result, and you're gonna sit there for the next twenty five years with a decent parking area. And no paving company is going to volunteer to do that. That is something that you're going to have to tell the paving company that they're going to have to do it. And they'll all give you 50 reasons why you shouldn't do it. But, you know, and Constantine is a good paving company. I mean, so so that at least gave us some assurance job would probably be done correctly. And the second thing that we ask is we ask that you change the type of curbing
for the job to something called a curve. If you look in your lower line, you can see all the spots where the curbing is ranked by the town blocks. Okay? Because, you know, it gets above the curve. You can't see it. You hit it with the plow and you care about Cape Cod curving,
very shallow curving, doesn't get torn out. You can run it all over the plow. You would have done it without doing Cape Cod curving,
In the town, solve your lots. We deal with the drainage of your lots, and we do some repair work of your lots. So it's not like we don't have vested interest in the water. And all of your drainage comes through the town, the property indexes out back there. So the the last thing we insisted was that the contractor produced what's called an ENS, the erosion and sedimentation plan, so that we know we're not gonna dump a bunch of sand in our grain structures, which is gonna cause you problems in your lower box and lots of measures below. So
I think years ago, we used to get, like, a five year roofing plan or something down the road before that. If we had something like this, it would give us a heads up,
and we would come to you and say or Eric will come and say, okay. You're gonna do this. These are the steps. So if we had
Jeff raised the question about the. And I want you to know part of that, you know, that came from me part of that because I've been here. This is my fourth year, and I have
there was something moving forward. I guess from what I read, thought it was done. Maybe it's not done, Jack, but here it is. Just as a clarification, the capital improvement account
is established the day the Board of Finance approves it. Okay. I mean, that is their goal. The money was transferred from the Bold account that was set up for the last Andover Elementary School standard that's sitting on the books for the last fifteen or so years. It is unspentable because the expander is complete, and there was probably not a likelihood of another standard. So the board of finance, which incurs with the board of selectmen, agreed to set up the AES Capital Fund, and I'm I'm a little bit of concern with what they called it. Because they called it the same name as CIP. So I think the creditor has renamed it slightly, and the money came from that previous account. But that account was there. That money is spendable right now. If the board of finance wants
a $122,000 check to be deposited in that account, it will be. The reason I did not deposit it was once Constantine told me that they were money paid it this year,
so that we have to subtract that from our budget? Or does it is it sitting in the capital account, and it stays there, and it's not a factor on any budgetary stuff for this coming year? Because we're not spending it.
It is it would not be on your that one of six with the remainder. The town has about six or seven capital. Bridges, culverts, work improvement fund, tree fund, all those things, buildings, department, mother parts equipment. All those are permanent multiyear funds that roll from year to year because they are all for purchases that we are probably not gonna come up with the money any single year to do. We're not gonna spend a million bucks in tax savings or one year for the fire department. Therefore, we fund fund the money in their equipment fund, absent any policy that was in place, would have the ability to transfer that money to some other capital fund.
Yeah. So that is a legitimate I think that's the
your annual work period in that fund. That is completely under your control. Only you can decide how to fund it. If you decide to do a capital project with it, you go out to share that responsibility with the town, but you control that funding, lock, stock, and parent. Town has no input. Director has no input. I have no input. Board of Finance, floor of order selected. If it is in the other fund, then that is ultimately under the purview because of board of finance as is every capital fund. And the board of finance at times has rated one capital fund to supplement another
has a level of 4,000,000. God bless you. You're doing a phenomenal job, but please understand we're not adversarial. We should never be considered adversarial. It is it is
I've I've working with for thirty years at the next one. But and you're that's a board member myself.
Tom was a young talk to my first pet of. Silly. That's right.
I think I love the idea collaboration. That's what I do when I work with boards. It's straight. You know, we have a common understanding of the problem is to figure out the solution that everybody can live with. It is when we have three different interpretations of what the problem is, and we're never gonna I think we're in able to
possibly work with. Happy to do that. That. Thank you. Thank you. Thank
would like HVAC to be a possible action to produce these. There's anything else that we want to you know, I think that was probably most important thing, know, getting the board of bed, the board of finance to work together to come up with something there. Any other actions like follow on meeting to this point in their regard?
I think it was important tonight. I think we all were able to talk about our roles and our issues and hear directly from people rather than assume. I I think another meeting is important. The election's coming up. I hope that we're all back at the table, but that might change. So maybe we'll we'll have to wait and see and schedule something if we're doing it quarterly. But next time around, I'm suggesting that we get a little more input maybe from the from the agenda. I know we we were like Caitlin said, we were doing baby steps. You know, I I think we did well tonight. I thought it would go longer, honestly. I think we did well, between keeping things in time. But, you know, we the three of us wanted input from our boards. We we wanted to be honest and say, here's what's on the agenda. Here's what's in the path.
So we want input from everybody. But that's that's all I have for that. Caitlin, thank you.
I'm gonna go up here. This way I have this way I have your face. So
I know about half the people in the room. For those of you who don't know me, my name is Bob Hamburger. I've lived in town thirty five years. I've previously served on Planning and Zoning Commission. In fact, I was chair just before before Jed was. I I think it's appropriate that we all give Jed a round of thanks for I have to I have to confess I breathed a small sigh of relief when Jed got selected, because I knew that this could be a real hornet's nest, and he's done a good job of keeping you vipers all under control. So thank thanks, Jed. The subject of capital came up several times. I'm an electrical engineer. I've been practicing
forty years. I've worked on a lot of construction projects, lot of manufacturing projects, multimillion dollar equipment. I just wanted to introduce some of the concepts from my world when it comes to capital because maybe these ideas can be useful moving forward, some of the terminology. And when I work on something, it's always capital versus expenses or capital versus operation. And when it comes to the school, we're talking about computers and parking lots versus pencils and paperclips. Capital are usually uniquely budgeted outside of ongoing routine expenses. They have a for Bob, presenting the standard for everybody Well a public person who wants to buy. They they have a tangible lifetime. Okay? And for tax purposes in my world, you know, these things are depreciated
over their working lifetime. I don't know how applicable that is for a school. So repairs are usually expenses. They're predictable and routine. If you have to patch a roof, you patch a leak on the roof, you have to go up there with a bucket of tar, that's an expense. Okay? That's a predictable routine thing. If you have to re tar the entire roof, that's capital. That's something that you have to have to foresee and predict. So you can see that there is there is a gray a gray zone, you know, where one might might go into another. And again, in my world, the earlier you ask for capital, the easier it is to approve and to appropriate.
And that goes into somebody here mentioned the five year plan long term planning. Okay to the extent that that can be used that's always a good thing. And you know I'm a little bothered by the upper parking lot because that didn't just happen overnight. So you know somewhere in the process something broke down. Somebody hasn't been looking at it. We haven't been planning. I realize Eric there's a million things you know there's how many miles of road in this town that have to be to be repaved. So you know hopefully we don't we don't run into a problem like that again. The other thing that I keep hearing with regard to the school with the parking lot and also I was on the commission that helped design the senior center. And there were questions that came up. I sat with Val a couple of times. These were engineering issues And I would like to think that somewhere in the population of 200 parents or so of the students that are there, that there's got to be some engineer, a civil engineer or a road planner or a city planner or something that you can cajole to volunteer because it seems like there are engineering issues that come up with regard to the school that could probably be handled on a volunteer basis. Know, again, little things before they get big. So that's what I had to say. Thanks.
I back when we were going through some planning and zoning and we're looking at the approval for the community center, I saw a lack of collaboration there. We asked the board then was asking for collaboration and it was refused. So I'm glad to see now and try to get some collaboration and I think it's face to face is better than text or email because you can have a lot more communication face to face. So I think this is great. Glad to hear you're talking about doing it for you. Thank you.
So the agenda was worked on by Caitlin, Joanne, and myself. So it was collaborating. We had a a member from each board talking,
and we were we were emailing and texting and all of them. So we as far as the agenda
and everything that we talked about tonight from moderators and and how we were gonna wanna, it it was not one-sided. It was so decided. Emily? I don't know who that one. But I'm not. Okay. Sure. It's gotta be good. I think