Meeting transcript
Board of Finance Regular Meeting
July 22, 2026 · Watch on YouTube · All meetings
Excellent. Okay, folks. Welcome. This is the board of finance regular meeting, 07/22/2026. We'll start with the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of The United States Of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, where God indivisible, somebody in justice for all for all. K, folks. So we've got some, know, busy agenda. We're gonna do public speak first. I see we've got let's see. We've got Scott, Jodi Ann, Joanne, Shannon, and Kate. So, I'm just gonna go in order of what's on my screen. Scott, you're up first. Just here to listen. Thank you. Great. Jody. You're muted. Just listening. Excellent. Joanne. Hi. Just listening also. Thanks. Thanks, Shannon. Ditto. Indeed. Caitlin.
I just wanted to ask, when the auditor gives his presentation, if we will be allowed to ask questions as members of the other boards. And if not, then I'll probably ask questions at the end in your other public speak. Thank you.
Yeah. I I think it's reasonable since we have members of the board of ed here, including the chair, that, you know, as we go through this, after the board of finance has gotten through what questions we wanna ask that I can kind of bring you into it. That would be my thought. Okay. I don't I think that's every community voice, obviously, recording the meeting, but, I think that's everyone from the public. So let's see. Additions changes to the agenda. Does anybody have any proposed additions or changes? Anybody wanna add or subtract anything? I do not. Okay. Very good. So we'll move on to our audit presentation. Michael, you're up, sir.
Alright. Well, thank you very much. Just give me the thumbs up that you can hear me okay. Thumbs up. Perfect. Alright.
I'm also gonna share my screen. I assume I have the ability to do that. If not, Jeff can give it to you. I'm sending I just sent a request. There you go. Alright.
Just getting my screen set. Alright. Everyone can see the presentation? No. There it is.
You can see it now? Yep. Yes. Stickles chicken. Alright. Perfect. Alright. Well, thank you very much. Again, my name is Mike Van Dieventer. I'm a partner at Mahoney Sable. Ultimately responsible for overseeing Town's fiscal year twenty twenty five audit. This evening, I will go over really the scope of work, the audit reports that were issued, provide some overall financial and then I will make our required communications. And again, happy to answer any questions that the Board members may have. As far as the scope of work, again, no changes from what has been done in prior years. We did do an audit of the town's financial statements. We performed that audit in accordance with both the auditing standards issued by the American Institute of Certified Public Accounts as well as the government auditing standards issued by the Government Accountability Office.
In addition, based on the level of federal and state funding that was received and expended by the town, we did perform both federal and state single audits. In addition, we also performed an agreed upon procedures on the end of year school reports that are required to be filed with the State of Connecticut Department of Education. In addition to those attest services, we do perform some non audit services for the town. So again, we assist in the preparation of the financial statements as well as the schedule of expenditures of federal awards and state financial assistance and then the related notes. We also assist in converting the town's governmental fund financial statements to the government wide financial statements. Although we do assist in these non audit services, again, are the responsibility of management. Management is responsible for the fair preparation of the financial statements, the schedules of expenditures of federal awards and state financial assistance. Again, it is our responsibility to perform our audit procedures and express an opinion on those schedules. In connection with the audit, we do issue a number of reports. In terms of the report on the financial statements, we did issue unmodified clean opinions. Again, an unmodified opinion is expressed when we have concluded that the financial statements are fairly presented in accordance with accounting principles generally accepted in The United States Of America. I do like to point out, if you read our opinion, we do provide reasonable assurance that the financial statements are free from a material misstatement whether due to error or fraud. So again, we are providing reasonable assurance, not absolute assurance. We do not test every transaction. We do rely on some representations from management. There are estimates included in the financial statements,
and therefore, we cannot provide absolute assurance. But again, reasonable assurance is still a very high level of assurance. In addition to the financial statement report, we also issue a report on compliance and on internal control over financial reporting. If you read through this report, we do not actually express an opinion on the town's compliance with laws and regulations or on the effectiveness of the town's internal controls. Essentially, during the course of performing the financial statement and compliance audits, if we identify either a material noncompliance with laws and regulations or a material weakness or significant deficiency in the town's internal controls, we are required to communicate it in this letter. Again, just as a follow-up in the prior year, we did have three findings that we reported in this letter. We had a material weakness in internal control over financial reporting related to the reconciliation of the towns and school districts general ledgers. We have repeated this finding as a material weakness in internal control over the current year as well, and I will discuss that a little bit more on the next slide. In the prior year, we also issued a significant deficiency in internal control over financial reporting related to the bank and interfund reconciliations at the school district. Again, to report that we are no longer reporting that as a significant deficiency in internal control over financial reporting. So again, that finding has not been repeated. And then we did issue a prior year finding, an instance of non compliance
related to some reporting on the ARPA funds. Again, we were not required to test that program in the current year. It was our understanding that that report was filed timely, and therefore we have not repeated that as an instance of noncompliance in the current year. So again, our report on internal control in the current year had one finding reported, which we considered to be a material weakness. Again, that related to the reconciliation between the school district's general ledger and the town's general ledger. Again, those ledgers are not currently integrated. Journal entries are required to record and reconcile the activity of the school district with the town. The town's year end closing process to record the school district's balance and activities were ultimately incomplete. We did have some material audit adjustments that were proposed to record and reconcile that activity. Ultimately, made the recommendation that the town no longer records balances and activities that are already accounted for by the school district. So again, activity that's already recorded in the school district's general ledger does not have to be duplicated in the town's accounting records. The town should ultimately limit its accounting to transactions that involve direct financial activity between the town and the school district. That would include appropriations, transfers, reimbursements, or shared service costs. In addition, we recommended that the school district continue to provide the town with its monthly financial reports to ensure that the town remains informed of the school district's fiscal status.
So again, management is required to address these findings through a corrective action plan. That plan was actually, completed and filed with the, state office of policy and management. In connection with the audit, we do a federal single audit and we issue a report on compliance on internal control at the federal award level. In this report, we do actually express an opinion on the town's compliance with its major federal programs. For fiscal year 2025, the total federal awards that were expended was just over 1,000,000. The major program was the highway planning and construction grant. I believe that was for the Bunker Hill Bridge replacement. We did issue unmodified clean opinions on compliance, and we did not report any significant deficiencies or material weaknesses over grant compliance. Issue a Mike, can
ask you a question, if you don't mind? Because so I don't forget. Can you can you explain what what is meant by a single audit
versus Sure. So yep. There are different levels of audits that are required. And under the federal guidelines and the state guidelines, if you expend over a certain dollar of federal awards or state financial assistance, you are required to undergo a compliance audit. And so for that audit, we perform additional procedures to determine that you are complying with the requirements of your major programs. So again, there is a whole set of standards that we have to follow in terms of doing a compliance audit. So
it an additional level of audit above and beyond the financial statement audit. Okay. Alright. Thank you. Yep.
So again, we do we issue a similar reporting connection with the state single audit. For fiscal year twenty twenty five, the total state financial assistance that was expended was about 2,800,000 The major programs was the local bridge transportation fund, and then the town aid road grants. Again, we did issue unmodified clean opinions on compliance, and we did not report any significant deficiencies or material weaknesses over compliance. So in general, again, clean from a compliance perspective, we really expand our testing in terms of what you're charging to those grants to make sure that it's allowable in accordance with the grant agreement. All right, the next section goes over really your overall financial highlights. This slide covers your general fund budgetary highlights. So your original and final budgets did provide for the use of fund balance of approximately $79,000 Your actual change in fund balance was an increase of about $302,000 so that did result in an overall favorable budgetary variance of about 382,000 The surplus was driven by revenues and other financings, which were about $166,000 more than budgeted. You had favorable collections on property taxes and interest on short term investments. And then overall, your actual expenditures were about $216,000 less than budgeted. And that number does include the transfer of a portion of the education surplus to the 2% non lapsing fund. So again, if you didn't make that transfer, surplus would have been about $86,000 higher. Next slide goes over your governmental fund financial highlights. So this includes your general fund on a GAAP basis as well as all of your special revenue and capital project funds. The Town did report combined ending fund balances of approximately $6,100,000
That was an increase of about $957,000 from the prior year. In terms of your overall fund balance, approximately 2,100,000, was the ending fund balance in the general fund. Of that, about 145, had been assigned for use in the town's fiscal year twenty twenty six budget. So that left an unassigned fund balance of just over $2,000,000 and that represents about 15.5% and is sufficient to cover about one point eight six months of general fund budgetary expenditures. Again, the GFOA guidance is that governments maintain approximately two months of reserves. So again, you are just below that threshold, but you are right up against it. In terms of the capital reserve fund, so again, that does include a number of capital projects, which are detailed out within the financial statements. Your total capital reserve fund balance was approximately 2,200,000
Those amounts again are committed for specific purposes. There is a small deficit that continues to get carried forward each year on the transfer station shed repair fund of about $7,000 Again, recommendation is just that that ultimately gets funded by the general fund. All of your other funds had an ending fund balance of about $1,700,000 Again, those amounts are either restricted or committed for various purposes. And again, a very trivial deficit in the historic preservation fund. Again, just bring that to your attention as, you know, ultimately no governmental funds should have a deficit fund balance. Again, these aren't significant and ultimately should be, funded by the general fund or some other sources. All right. And then the last section just includes our required communications. The first item here talks about our responsibility under the auditing standards. So as I mentioned before, management is responsible for the financial statements. It's our responsibility to express our opinions on those financial statements.
In terms of the plan scope and timing of audit, again, no changes in the overall scope of work that was performed. There were four one month extensions that were obtained from OPM. Those delays were attributed to delays in commencement of the audit field work really due to scheduling constraints. I do want to make mention in terms of municipal auditors. There's definitely a lack of capacity for that type of expertise. You know, out of the 169 municipalities that do file their audit, over half of them file them on extension. So again, I think probably last year, only 40 municipalities were able to file their audit reports on time. So part of the delays is, yes, we start the audit fieldwork in December. Our hopes is typically to get that done by the end of February, except there were some additional delays related really to the transition of town finance personnel. In terms of significant audit findings, again, typically highlight whether or not there is any new accounting standards that impacted the financial statements. Again, were no new accounting standards that were implemented in FY 2025 that had a significant effect on the financial statements. Do you need to disclose that the financial statements do include some significant estimates and judgments? Those consisted of estimated useful lives that are assigned to capital assets,
the discount rates utilized to determine your net pension and OPEB liabilities, those are really at the state level, and then estimated amounts of vacation and sick leave to be used in future years. We did review those estimates, and we did deem them to be reasonable, with industry practices. Happy to report that there were no significant difficulties encountered in performing the audits other than some of those transition issues. We did issue a separate management letter containing some other audit recommendations. However, we're not required to specifically communicate those to the Board. I did want to make you aware of them that there's a separate management letter that we did issue, and we'll follow-up with those recommendations during the next audit. Were no uncorrected misstatements.
Can I can I just ask who that letter went to? So it goes to town management. Town manager. Okay. Yep.
So there were no uncorrected misstatements. We had no disagreements, with with management. We did obtain a management representation letter. There were no unusual representations that we requested by us from management. So, for example, I just skip the Board. If we were testing a transaction and we were unable to substantiate that transaction through some kind of third party evidence, we would disclose that to you if you were relying on a representation from management. And we are not aware of any management consultations with other independent accountants. Again, if management did consult with other accountants, we would be required to understand that communication and also communicate it to the Board as well. And that is really the overall overview of the audit.
Again, all of our communications are included in our reports. But again, happy to answer any questions that any of the Board members may have.
Well, have a few that I have written down. Obviously, some other Board members who couldn't be here emailed some in, and I'm sure the other Board members will have their own or wanna piggyback on mine or what have you. My my first question for you, Mike, is, you know, back to the material weakness, the one material weakness I think that remains regarding reconciliation with the BOE. Can you and, you know, understand that I'm a layperson here. Can you explain to me the the why and the you know, maybe a little more detail on how you came to this recommendation, what's driving this, and what can we do better?
Sure. So in connection with the audit, obviously, when you look at the financial statements, there's a lot of information. There's there's various funds. There's different components within those funds. So in this case, the Board of Education has their own separate accounting system that they utilize. They're recording all of their activity within that accounting system. The town is essentially funding the Board of Education to cover those expenditures. In this case, the town historically has tried to ultimately mirror the activity within the town's general ledger, which again just creates issues from an overall reconciliation perspective. So my recommendation and what I have seen other districts do is that ultimately via town accounts for the appropriation that they are providing to the Board of Education. And then the Board of Education's accounting system stands on its own. So when we come in and do the audit, we will audit the Board of Education's accounting system
as opposed to the town system. So in this case, the town had recorded entries to try to reflect certain balances. And again, those balances just were not complete. It's not to say that you can't do that. I just think it's a more effective and efficient process to handle it the way that we're recommending.
Okay. So just a follow-up to that. Personally are comfortable then with you know, on the BOE side, on on the Andover Elementary side with their reporting and their financials, you're good with that, and it's basically, you know, stop trying to recreate the wheel? I mean, that's yes. That's the recommendation.
Okay. Okay. So that's my first that was my first question. My second question, you've largely already answered, but I I just wanna go back to it really quickly, which has to do with our unassigned fund balance and where we are in terms of fiscal health. You know, we're about, at least at the end of this audit, about 15.5%, which isn't quite two months as you pointed out. The guidance is two months. You know, in your opinion, should we be looking to yank that upward to that six we want to be 16.67 to to get to two months?
You know, the The only requirement really is from like a rating agency perspective. So rating agencies, if you're going go to the market to issue bonds, they will look at your unassigned fund balance as part of that overall rating process. I think in Connecticut in general, we typically see fund balances between 1020%. I think the rating agencies in general will say that Connecticut maintains a lower percentage, but I think there's reasons why economically that towns do that. So again, you know, from my recommendation, I would always defer to the GFOA that you would look to get about two months in your unassigned. However, again, there's gonna be some flexibility there. And I think from a town of Andover's perspective, you need to assess, okay, what is the likelihood of some kind of significant impact that we would need our fund balance available to fund. So I just think of hurricanes,
severe flooding, those sorts of things. Certainly towns that would experience those may want to have a higher fund balance. But again, I think your fund balance is within the reasonable range.
K. Thank you for that. It's pretty much what I thought, but I I wanted to hear it, you know, laid out for me a little bit. Okay. And and this may be a little repetitive, but is there is there anything in particular that we can do to make the audit process smoother, to make your job easier going forward beyond what you've recommended in this document?
No. I mean, I think, in general, as I mentioned, the actual audit work for us went fairly smoothly. We didn't really run into any significant issues. I mean, obviously, there was some transition in personnel. Yes. But again, I think in terms of audit entries, the majority of our material audit entries really related to that reconciliation between the school district and the town. So to answer your question, no, I think things went well. Okay.
Alright. I'm I'm gonna I have one more question that I'm gonna come back to at the end, but I'm gonna open this up to the rest of the board because there are other questions and other people who and I don't wanna monopolize. So other board members, board of finance, you know, go ahead and chime in and ask your questions, please. Oh, and by the way Couple more. Liz, before you start, do we do you wanna handle the or do you want me to do the questions that came in from those of the board who couldn't make it? Yeah. You can do it. That's fine. You you do you, and I'll pull up those emails so I can
do it. Okay. Go ahead. Me. Yeah. So You do you. Had recommended and you'd recommend us before financial reports. Can you be more specific about what we should expect to see on a monthly basis? From a board of finance perspective? Yes.
I mean, essentially, it would be the the same information that's being provided to to the board of education from a financial perspective.
Okay. I'm just wondering if you could define specifically what we should expect to see.
MR. Mean, yep, if I was a Board member, I would expect to see budget to actual reports. And that is, I mean, that is primarily, I think, a Board, what you are looking for is you want to understand, is there any potential for the Board of Education to maybe require an additional or supplemental appropriation during the year? Again, is more of a high level oversight responsibility. Again, the Board of Education is really the one that is responsible for overseeing the finances of the school district. But again, there typically is reporting that is done from the Board of Education to the Board of Finance in regards to, you know, their fiscal status.
Right. Yeah, that's why I was just curious about your opinion, what other you know, what you see of other districts, and we wanna have reasonable expectations, I guess.
Right. And, I you know, I think from my perspective, if that information is being provided to the board of education on a monthly basis, then it obviously, it's something that can be provided to the board of finance. Okay. Alright. Thanks.
Are you good, Liz? Yeah. For now. Okay. Thanks. Because I was gonna I have Kim's email up. She had a number of questions, so I I'll just go through them. K? So I'll just start. She's got, three here. The first one was it was recommended that we see all the bank statements from AES. How does he recommend them monthly? To date, we have not seen them, so that is a full year of not seeing them. There are three to four accounts, I believe. That's the question. We do get monthly reporting from AES. There is some disagreement as to the level of detail provided and so forth. So don't know how familiar you you are with this disagreement in town, I guess, I would put it. But, again, I guess this this is really piggybacking on what Liz just asked you, which is what is and is not reasonable? What level of detail is and is not reasonable for the board of finance to get on a monthly basis from the board of it? I mean, you know, you said budget to actual.
Yeah. I mean, I I I think it would be a budget to actual report. I don't think there's any requirement that that bank reconciliations be provided to the Board of Finance. Again, the recommendation in the past has been that, you know, maybe there is ultimately the Treasurer would review the bank reconciliations that are prepared by the school district. Again, just as an oversight control and making sure that, again, the bank accounts are being reconciled on a timely basis. Again, I don't think that's necessarily required, but it could be considered a control or a best practice.
Okay. Second question has to do with pre K. Does the auditor recommend AES breakout the pre k into a separate budget so we can see it functioning and operating on its own? It is being handled as its own entity and repeatedly told that it would be easier to sort it with a standalone budget as well. No. Sorry. We're we're repeatedly told that. So it seems it will be easier to sort it with a standalone budget as well. I think this would be helpful to everyone. Now this is a point of disagreement in town. So right now, I don't know how familiar we are with this. Right now we have a full time pre k program here in town. It's funded at least largely through grants and tuition. It's not reflected in the AES budget. Right? So whatever financial reporting we get does not include that really, and this is this has been a bone contention. So do you have an opinion on and in your experience with other towns, you know, can you can you opine on that?
So just to be clear, I I haven't necessarily been been asked to give an opinion on that. So I would have to do some some due diligence with respect to that. I can tell you that with our other municipal clients, again, this this hasn't come up as an issue. The pre k is accounted for separately from the operating funds. You know, typically they are grant funded, primarily grant funded, but they also receive some tuition fees as well. There are grant requirements from the state regarding that program where the school district can only carry over tuition
fees of two months to the next fiscal year. So again, the Board of Education has requirements and the school district has requirements to ultimately spend those funds on pre K. That is ultimately why I think it typically is accounted for in a separate fund. And again, there are restrictions on terms of how they use those funds and how much they can actually carry over. And again, all that information, although not necessarily broken out, is included in the Board of Education special funds, which are included in the financials.
Third question. Many school systems put grants into their budget on the line item it pays for. This makes it easy for BOF and the public to understand what's happening financially. Can we get an opinion on this process or a suggestion? And over, it's been said that we pull the expense out of the budget if it's grant funded. It's about right. We do that on the town side too. This seems and is very complex to sort out for me and, you know, basically alright. So this, I'm gonna paraphrase this a little bit because it goes on for a while, but we do this on the town side too. There are a lot of things that we don't reflect in our budget because they're netted out, basically. We get a grant. We get grant funding. We get state aid, whatever it is, and we don't display it, at least in our budgetary documentation, not necessarily in that maybe what we give you guys,
but what we show when we go to town meeting or what have you. You know, whether it's Town Aid Road, whether it's some grant that the school got for a particular service or have you. Do you have any thoughts on, you know, the best practice in terms of displaying that information, sharing that information, tracking that information?
So I think from my perspective, our clients, my experience with our clients, and again, do audits for over 20 municipalities, from smaller municipalities such as Amover to larger municipalities such as like New Milford and and generally speaking, they do not record or they typically do not show those grant funds within their budget. However, there would be nothing that would restrict you from doing that. So to me, that is really a budgetary policy. And again, the question would be then who sets that budgetary policy? Is it the Board of Finance or is it the Board of Education? Because ultimately, the Board of Education is required to provide to the town their their net request from local appropriations.
Right. And in So I don't know. Yeah. In the past, the way that we've we've done it on frankly on both sides of the ball, if you will, is that we tend to net things out and not display it all. Right? I mean, there's a there's a case to be made and I guess it's just a judgment call. Oh, we get town aid road money and we put that towards our road spending. We show neither the incoming revenue nor that upcoming expenditure because it nets out. I've I've been kind of kicking that around and and questioning whether we should do it differently. And you're saying, if I'm understanding you correctly, that it's fairly common to do it the way that we've been doing it, which is not displaying it.
Correct? Fair? Okay. Correct. Yes.
I mean, in general, that's consistent with the other minis. I'm sure there's probably examples of municipalities that maybe do do it that way. And again, that's not a reason not to do it. Really, think it's to the boards and the town.
Michael, just as a question, just on this, in going through the audit, you have all of the fund balances broken down, you have a balance sheet and issue. You show revenues and expenditures. It's a question of, any of those funds lumped with different grants? Like you have a school grant fund, I believe it is. And
the question is, should that be broken down in more detail? Because you do show those numbers. It certainly could. I mean,
could break, from financial reporting purposes, you could break down the pre K separately from the other state and federal grants. There's no restrictions on what
you present or how you present it. Because if the members of the board look at the audit and you're looking at pages between pages sixty and eighty, there's revenues and expenditures on all of the funds. And it's almost like you're doing the the income statement and the the expenditure, information in the audit in that section for all of the funds. So when you go to Town Aid Road, there's a Town Aid Road fund in here, and it will go through in expenditures. The board might want more detail, but it is there, Rob. So, like, it's there for everything. It's just a question of how much breakdown.
It is there. And and, you know, and I think we've talked about this before. You know, it's it's nice to have it in the audit. I don't disagree with that at all. It just it gets you to June 30. You know? And, you know, the question is, well, what's in these funds now? You know? And and that that goes from I mean, we were talking about AES, but that that goes across the board for me. And and what is reasonable for the board of finance to seek and obtain and and without it straining the the finance department of either side, you know, either the town or the or the board of ed, you know, in terms of reporting on these funds, in terms of their balances as we roll through the year.
Yeah. And and that And with quarterly, could we No. No. No. No. You should you should You know, monthly? From from a town from a town perspective, you should get that on a monthly basis. And and the treasurer is on vacation, but we're working toward that. You're gonna have those. We've we've been doing some work on the QuickBooks so that it's easier to sit there and navigate because it's been it's a little bit clunky clunkier than we would have liked than when we looked at it. So you're gonna get that. You're close, Rob. So all the numbers that are here in this audit are now on the balance sheet for the town.
Michael, I'll just ask you one question because I've been going through this a lot in the last week, week and a half. When you report on the balance sheet of the general fund, that includes all of the bank accounts for the town, not all of the bank accounts, but the operating account for the town, the investment account, the stiff account, And it also includes the AES operating account because it's part of the general fund, correct? Correct. Okay. All right. So the other funds, the other bank accounts that the school operates, which are the lunch and the student activity and the grant fund, are reported as separate funds on your fund report in pages 60 through 80 of the financial statements, correct? Correct. Correct. Those are all included in the special grant funds. So just so you guys understand, the audit comment related to how the previous treasurer was trying to record the transactions in the system, is trying to get to an ending monthly balance so that she could sit there and have her balance sheet kind of work out. And she was not successful in doing it in the manner that she was doing it. The current treasurer has, we've scrapped that, and we're working toward finding a better solution
with information that's provided monthly by the school so that you guys can get that information. Because that balance, that that real balance for that operating fund has to be reported on the balance sheet for the town, because it's town funded money. Right? So and and we will come out with a solution. We will not have that on the next audit. So
thank you. So would it make sense so would it make sense to for the AES to to send reconciliations of the AES operating account to the town treasurer on a monthly basis? Is that question directed at me? Yes, Michael, sorry.
Yeah. Again, I mean, I think the treasurer could play a role in terms of some oversight responsibilities by reviewing the monthly bank reconciliations. And that should also, again, help assist them in reconciling any activity that they may have processed on behalf of the Board of Education as well. And again, I know we've discussed that in the past. And I think part of the issue is the timing of that. So when would that reporting get done? And so again, that's really kind of an internal decision as far as, you know, when when it gets finalized.
I'm sorry. Am I allowed to ask a question, I was I was gonna just I was literally gonna ask if there were other BOF questions, and then I was gonna call on you, Kate. So I'm I'm just more confused now because I, like, I read the audit report, and I thought the report specifically states that you don't recommend the town and school reconciling on a monthly basis. And and yet that's what people just asked if we should be doing, And so now I'm more confused.
It's not Can just re explain? Sure. It's not reconciling the activity in terms of trying to duplicate what the Board of Education is recording on their side, but rather, for example, just a simple reconciliation in terms of we funded the AES account X number of dollars during this month, and we can see on their side that they've accounted for that transaction as well. So ultimately it's that activity that you're looking to reconcile.
Okay so really you're just looking to reconcile like an ACH transfer from the town to the school account? Correct. Okay. Thank you for clarifying. Yep.
Well, that's not exactly the truth. Just a second. Because, Michael, you're the reconciliation that we're talking about really is bank reconciliation. So you're reconciling the bank, and then you're funneling information over to the treasurer who's responsible for the financial statements of the town. And that's all that's being asked for. Right? Because the issue that that the auditor wrote the town up for, and I will explain it as clearly as I can, there was check registers provided or check information provided to the previous treasurer, and the previous treasurer was inputting that information into a bank account for the school and trying to come up with what the ending bank balance was at the end of a month, the real bank balance at the end of the month. And it was causing a lot of confusion within the system. Michael was perfect. I totally understand why he would not want that to happen. But you've got to understand that there's a cash balance that is held at the school that is part of the town's financial statements. It's on the audit right now, this last audit that I'm looking at. And it's not broken down because we don't get all of the detail. Jeff,
understand what you're saying now. Okay, I get it. So that cash account is maintained on the school district's accounting system. Yeah. And it is reconciled by the school district. 100%. So I don't think part of the recommendation is not for the town to necessarily capture that same cash account on their accounting system. Absolutely. Effectively, it would flow through an interfund, if you will, until the end of the year and when ultimately the surplus is determined. Separately, I think from a reconciliation perspective, so you have the school district, they are maintaining their own operating account, they are doing their own reconciliations. I've absent the town taking over that responsibility, I think the providing the the treasurer with the bank reconciliations so that she can just oversee and say, yes. Okay. The the things are reconciled. Know, we don't have any significant issues or concerns from that perspective, that would suffice from an internal controls perspective. That's that's all it's been asked for. But again, don't think Jeff, I don't think you have to have an AES cash account on your trial balance. Understood. Yeah. Okay.
I well, I I would just like to just also clarify that the after I reconcile the bank accounts, I am sending over
the, M and T bank statement to the treasurer. So just so people know, the the bank statement, not the reconciliation, but after I have reconciled it, is going to the town treasurer just for information out there. The for the M and T bank only.
I guess the question I keep trying to come back to is, okay, vis a vis what we're doing now, what our current process is, what is the change, if any, that's actually required here for to quote unquote strengthen internal controls. I think that's the terminology you guys use, Michael. You know, in terms of what we get now, what Jody sends us now, Jody is the finest director of the school. I'm sure you have worked with her. Right? Yep. And, you know, what's being asked for? There's a gap, I guess, and, you know, there has been a proposed change to how this process works. I don't know how familiar you are with that if you've been informed at all. And I just I just sort of want to know if you have thoughts or opinions
on, you know, kind of again, best practice. Are we doing okay? Do we really need to change things? What's the story? So Michael,
about three, four months ago, I started No, wait, I just got to ask you, he want to know if he was informed, he was informed, I talked to you about funding the the school account, as transactions were needed. And we talked about, would it work? What would it cause? And the concept was to sit there and attempt to make it a zero balance, really, had funded for $100,000 but a zero balance. So he was informed. What his opinion on it is his, but I am telling you that I did sit there and speak to other individuals related to this. Great.
And so now I kind of want to hear his thoughts on this because my my basic concern here is, and I'll just lay this out so because so everybody who's listening to this meeting can understand what my perspective is. My perspective is I love interest income. I love the stiff account. I want to make more interest income. That's great. I'm all for it. What I don't want is to gum up the works and put hurdles up internally that could cause us a problem that's worse than whatever interest income that we might derive from a new process. That's really my core issue here, Is is are things gonna still work smoothly so that the school can pay its bills? But, you know, the the the stated purpose here was to make more interest income, which, hey, I'm all for. So I'd like to hear Michael's thoughts. If, Michael, if you've been read in on this, I'd I'd love to hear what you have to say about it. Alright.
Yeah. So, I mean, I I did have a conversation with with the superintendent as as well as the first select person. And, again, I'm I'm aware of the issue, and I'm aware of the sensitive relationship between the board of education and the town. Again, conceptually, I have no issues with the town implementing a cash management policy that maximizes interest on behalf of the town, Right? When I look at what kind of took place in in Andover, from a a procedural standpoint, I would typically look at state statute. I would look at the town charter. Right? And, you know, state statute and town charter do not address everything. And I am going to tell you that they do not address specifically this issue. And there is no cash management requirement that needs to be filed. So honestly, is an internal issue. And so when Charter doesn't address it, when statute doesn't address it, my recommendation is that it be a board policy that addresses it. So, you know, ultimately, I think the Board of Finance has, fiscal responsibility with respect to the town. And therefore, I would recommend that the town have a cash management and investment policy, and ultimately, that gets approved by the Board of Finance, and then that would provide the parameters for which the administration
would set procedure and follow, right? So again, there are more ways than one way to handle things. The question is who ultimately has the authority to make those decisions, And again, I am not saying that the Board of Finance has to create procedure. It would be more of a cash management policy that certainly could include how the Board of Education, again, the largest component of the town's budget, ultimately gets funded?
Yeah. I mean, we had we we we had existing policy, and that policy is very simplistic. No question about it. It's very, very simple. Right? 10 equal payments for ten months. So you get a $4,700,000 budget, roughly, you you know, it's $470, you know, every month. And I can see I can understand why one would say, well, look, $4,700,000 budget and I'm I'm fudging that number. Just bear with me. You know, it's a lot of money and we can make interest on that money. So, like I hear that but maybe what needs to happen here is another dry board meeting where we try to sit down, hammer out a process that everybody can be comfortable with it because I I think the concern here is that there'll be some hold up and the board of ed will be unable to pay a bill and and that's the concern. That's my concern. It's you know, I'm all for earning more money. I want that. In fact, that's been wonderful for us. So
If if you're if you're in a position where the board of ed can't pay a bill, then I think you're probably bumping up against statute. Right? So Right.
And and I don't want that to happen. I don't want us get anywhere close to that. But I also love the idea of maximizing our our interest income. I I I think that's a perfectly reasonable goal. But from the standpoint of what is reasonable to require for the funds to be distributed, I think that's where the rubber hits the road. I think that's the bone of contention. What is required to get the money over there? In the past, it's just been, okay, it's July. Here's your money. Here's your one tenth. Here's your $470,000, whatever it is. This would change that and and put put a few more hoops, if you will, to jump through. So that's I think that's the concern. And I am in a and again, I am not at all against the idea of trying to earn more interest income. I just wanna make sure we're still running smoothly, and we don't run into problems that are created trying to trying to eke out a few more percentage points on our interest. Rob, what I'm hearing from you, if I understand from you, you know, I'll wrap this up, and I'll I'll turn it over to others, is this is really an internal call. This is something we have to hammer out between ourselves. There's nothing that says one way or the other that this is either verboten nor is it required. It's, you know, it's a judgment call. Is that correct? A 100%. Yes.
Thank you. Alright. I'm gonna I'm gonna shut up because I've been talking too long. Other board members, please chime in. Also, you know, if there aren't other board of finance members to talk, I mean, we do again, we have the board of Ed here. I I'd like to keep them involved.
Rob, can I just ask you a question? Because I know you've been on the board of finance for a long time. Yeah. I don't think it always was. You can correct me because I'm I'm not sure. It wasn't always that we did one tenth.
No. It wasn't always. I think that was hammered out in the Yeah. How did it used to work? Four, five years ago. It's off the top of my head. It's been a few years. It was something that Val and Eric worked out between them, I think. Yep. You I don't how long. I don't recall what we did before. Yeah.
Prior to that, again, the the town shared an a bank account. So all the checks were being cut from the same bank account.
Oh, okay. Yeah. So I sort of of it in that the money wasn't segregated in the first place?
No. Because it's town money. Okay, jet. That's fine. So anyway, I'll give you, I'll give you the, I'll give you the history lesson just so you can get it. Thank you. Right. You know, all the way through, you know, I'd say 2019, let's say, the town and the school used the general fund, the general operating account. And to be really honest, when I got on the board, the ability to reconcile that account was very poor. They were using Phoenix and the school had their own Phoenix account and the town had their own Phoenix account. Everything was running through the town's general fund. When the decision was made to move to Edmunds, we had hoped we would have one one, file for the entire town, and we would run this the board of education and the school and the town out of the same file, but we were unable to do that because the software couldn't handle it. So when that was determined, and we'd already made the decision to go to Edmunds, I got together with Eric and Valerie, and we decided to allow the school to have their own operating account because it would allow us to reconcile each entity would allow it to reconcile properly. And I've hoped, and Michael will tell us, I mean, least we've gotten closer, at least the town I know within QuickBooks
definitely has reconciled much, much more effectively. So that's the decision that was made probably 2019, 2020, something along that lines. And so it's gotten, and then to that point, just so you guys all understand, there was no interest rate, there was no earnings, so it wasn't really a big deal. Now it's a deal, now it means something to the taxpayers. So it's something we're going to all have to address, and yes, I'm driving this, but it's not because of anything nefarious or I'm trying to I mean, haven't made one comment ever, just so you all know about expenses at the school.
Other than the budget, that's it. Now I'm done. I can't tell the board education what to do. You can't tell the board education what to do. They can do whatever they want with their funded balance. But we can all sit there and fund things in a little different manner because it's still town money and still gets reported on the financial statements under the general fund. And we need to sit there and manage it in the best manner for the benefit of the town. So anyway, that's the past history. It was all commingled. We broke it out 2020,
2019, and we
had individual accounts so we could reconcile. Right. And I and I again, I do think breaking it out was very beneficial. Again, given the part time nature of the positions in Andover, anytime there's a reconciliation issue and now you're dealing with, okay, is it on the school side? Is it on the town side? You know, this way, if there is a reconciliation issue, you know, okay, it relates to the Board of Education or relates to the town. So from that perspective, it made things, you know, more transparent from that perspective.
That that actually raises an issue I was thinking about with this. Is it in theory, I know she's been working way more than this, as we bring her up to speed and try to sort everything out. But in theory, Lisa's a one day a week employee. Right? So would Lisa's would the assistant treasurer under this proposal have the authority to release the funds? Jeff? Is that your thought? There's dual authorization.
So there always has to be two authorizing people within the town's current banking setup. There would be the it could be the assistant to the treasurer, the treasurer, and the town administrator.
Okay. So one so two of those three to release the funds?
Yeah. You just but you gotta understand what the transaction is. The transaction is a piece of paper that says this is the amount of money that is required. You put it through an ACH transaction and you you process. It gets done. This is not something to bother Michael with, his time. You can ask him all your questions you want to sit there and see if he wants it or not. But the procedure of how to do it is not necessarily we're wasting his time.
Well, I apologize, but I have a subject matter expert in front of me. I'm going to ask him questions. So if
I wander off the reservation, all right, So be it. Michael, am I am I very far off as far as the process of processing an ACH? No. That's I'm just asking.
Again, I you know, I I I can't tell you how to operate from a town perspective. I can give you the guidelines that you kind of have to follow. And that's why, again, my perspective, something that would address all of this would be actually having a Board policy that addresses cash management and your investment policy. And so that includes, Jeff, I think we were talking, what is the policy of the town in terms of interest that is earned on funds that are in a special revenue fund, right? There's no requirement that that interest be
No. That was one thing that I would ask you. All those special revenue funds really shouldn't get interest earnings. Town should Again, I'm gonna tell you that
would be a policy decision. Right? Yeah. And and and then you you have the funds, the, you put them in the non the non permanent funds, all of the investment funds, the Norton Children's Fund, the Norton Library Fund, the Norton School Fund, the Sprague Library Fund, the Irene Moody Fund, the Brown and Brown Fund. Yep. Any donor funds. Yep. All
need to get interest in. And they would be getting more interest now that we do that. So the Norton School Fund gets a dividend check from the Bank of America. So all of those would have to be calculated separately based upon the total interest earnings for a given month or a given period and be dispersed among those funds in a separate transaction.
And just to be clear, you're talking only about the charitable funds, but, like, you know, if it was AES money that was sitting, you know, and they were holding or whatever, you're not talking about accruing interest there and applying that to AES's budget or something. We don't have those funds.
And and I don't have those funds. The town doesn't have those funds. So the school
lunch fund and the student activity fund and the grant fund are not I believe he's talking about, like, the capital fund or the other individual funds for
different departments as opposed to the interest being applied to the town general fund. There's that too, but that that's part of it, Caitlin. But, no, I I wasn't just talking about that. I'm seeing, if you're holding back, instead of saying, okay, we're gonna give you your money at the first of the month, January of your budget. We're gonna hold it until you give us, you know, documentation that you need it and we earn interest on that. I think the idea here, correct me if I'm wrong, Jeff, is that the extra interest income we earn is gonna accrue to the town.
Correct. You have a problem. I wanted to know. Just asking the question. I mean, all of the funds, all of the funds that have currently had bank accounts, all of these small funds that have had bank accounts, that if you look at the financial statements, there's a small interest earning that gets applied to those funds every year within the audit. All of that shouldn't go there. That should be, It's an earning vehicle for the town to generate income to offset taxes for the residents. All of those small interest add ons don't need to go to those funds. The only funds they really need to go to are the permanent funds that have a charitable component. Charitable requirements. Yeah. Norton? So I I I if you're if you're asking me if you're asking me, Rob, if I'm I'm going, you're thinking I'm trying to isolate this to certain things. It's every fund that the town has inclusive of anything for the school or for the town. The only interest would go to those permit funds that are charitable, and that's it.
Just wanted clarity on that. Yep. We can all make our adjustments about it, but I wanted to be clear on what we're proposing here. Yep. Okay.
I I do have one question for you, Michael. You said something before. You said there were some special funds that you you provided some other guidance on? Is that accurate? Did I mishear you? Might have. I thought you said there were some type of special fund. No, no, outside
of charitable donor funds, you know, where there's a restriction. Any of your other funds, again, it would really be board policy. For example, we have municipalities that made the board policy that their capital and non recurring funds would earn interest. And ultimately, that will reduce town taxes in future years by reducing the amount of contributions that the town has to make into the capital nonrecurring. So there's kind of elements to why, ultimately, I think a policy would make sense because then ultimately you have a board sets policy and then the management of the town kind of operates within that framework. And
again, it's because there's more than one way to handle these things. No, totally. And there's there, but there are no, there are no other special funds that you do any other special reporting outside of the financial statement documents. That's all, that's what I was after. I thought you had said something about a school fund, a board of education special fund that you did some reporting, but it was not included in the town audit.
Are you referring to the agreed upon procedures engagement that we do for the school district? So they have reporting that they do with the Department of Education. And so we have to do additional procedures over that reporting. But that's not included in the financial statements.
It's not included in the financial statements. Okay. Well, it would be interesting to see what that is and who would that get shared with. But that's for some other time. Forget that. I'll just note it down.
That's ultimately, it's a report that goes to the State Department. We file it with the State Department of Education. Okay, thank you. Yep.
Do other members of the Board of Finance have further questions or follow ups or anything like that? If not, I'll ask the same of the Board of Ed members who are here. And if not, we maybe can let Michael go. So
I just have one question for you, Michael, if that's okay. Sure.
Are you I know that a lot of, like, regional districts, school have their own stiff accounts. Are there other towns where the where the school that you're aware of where the school has their own short term investment account? Or are those typically only held on the town side? So those are typically
only held on the town side. I don't know, and I think this was a question that maybe was asked a while back when there was consideration of whether or not to invest those non lapsing funds in a stiff account. Yes. Yes. And again, I don't know offhand if we have actually, I can say that we don't have any municipalities where the stiff balance is being confirmed by the board of education as opposed to the town. So I think typically the stiff accounts are established under the town or regional school district, but not necessarily under the Board of Education, like a local Board of Education.
Right. But in terms of like if we wanted that money to also earn interest as well, there's nothing preventing it from going into a separate stiff account. Correct? No.
No. I think you would just have to probably work with the with the town treasurer in in setting that up. Okay. Thank you.
Because that would be interesting if we put the AAS Capital money in a stiff account.
Already in a stiff account, I think. Or or or aggregated it with everything else but tracked it.
Yeah I think the issue really is more in the interest earning potential and whether or not the interest that's earned is equated to the fund that's earning it versus going into the Town General Fund and that would be across the board for like any fund that you're talking about. Right. And really I feel like that's more a board of finance decision on policy.
Yeah. Correct. Yeah. Again, don't think you're gonna find anything in the in the statute that addresses that specifically.
No. I mean, I've been through the statutes. I don't I don't they're they're not that specific.
They're just not. Heather, didn't you have a question earlier? I thought no. I thought you started to ask a question and got cut off or something. No. I think I did, but now I can't remember what it was. Okay.
Sorry. I'm hearing you. It's it's been a long Oh, I think no. I think I was just gonna ask because I just kinda missed it that there's a separate management letter that went out about something else about the audit that we don't see? Is that what that separate letter was about? Yeah. It's not that you can't see it. In fact, I mean, I would encourage
management to distribute. But ultimately, our requirement from an audit perspective, if we identify what we consider to be a significant deficiency or material weakness, we are required to include it in our report on internal control over financial reporting. And those findings require a formal corrective action plan to be completed, communicated to the Board of Finance, and then also submitted to the the Office of Policy and Management. During the course of performing the audit, we will often, you know, identify other recommendations that we may make to management. We have the option of either communicating those verbally or via written letter. And again, in this case, we actually issued a written letter, but there is no requirement for us to specifically communicate those findings to you. That doesn't mean that you can't obviously review the letter and have communication with management. You can certainly do that. And there's actually an electronic audit reporting system with the state of Connecticut through Office of Policy and Management. All municipal reports, single audit reports, management letters, corrective action plans, all that stuff gets uploaded to to the state and is in is publicly available information. Okay. So if we went to the OPM website, we can find it? Yep.
Okay. Well, just so it's up there. I I did that. When when I received that, I did send it to Rob and asked him to forward it on to the rest of the committee. Did I just I I ought to look at that. I'm gonna look for that email. I may have missed it. My bad.
What what date was that, Matt? Let me go check. Thank you. Because I I thought I was caught up, but, again, I was screwing around with this new laptop. So I may have This was some time. On the job. And if that's the case, may I help?
Yes. I had one more question. Sorry. You'll have that letter by tomorrow, the entire board.
Thank you. Yeah. I I had another question. You had said that we should see like every month the budget to actual from the town, I think, and the school, like just in total or really detailed or it doesn't matter as long as we see budget to actual?
Yeah. I mean, again, ultimately, it's up to the board. I mean, as the board of finance, what information do you want to see that gives you some comfort over the board of education? Because ultimately, if they need a supplemental appropriation or something along those lines, the Board of Finance should be aware of that, right? So it's again, you are not necessarily going through that like you would on the town side, but it's more of a kind of a a general oversight control.
Yeah. I mean, obviously, we wanna know, and we talk about this on the town side sometimes. When we go through our budget to actual on town side, We see an item that's tracking well above, you know, where we are in the year and we're thinking, uh-oh, we may have an overage here. Do we have to pull from contingency? What are we dealing with? And we can ask the question of say the town administrator now that we have one or the treasurer or whoever to say, ugh, what's going on there? What do we need to do? And like that makes a certain amount of sense. It's just, I get it, you know, the argument here is basically over the level of detail. And, again, as I understand it, your guidance is essentially, well, within reasonable parameters, it's it's it's it's a policy decision. It's a decision we have to make within our time. And I I expected you to say that, but I I, you know, I was curious to hear if you had specific thoughts from other towns that you work with that you think work well. You know? Because look, you're the subject matter expert here, and I thought we might as well ask these things if you Well, we have an answer. So
Yeah. Yeah. I guess one of the questions is, I mean, I I again, anytime you're getting information, what are you doing with that information? What purpose is it serving? Again, the Board of Education, as Jeff mentioned, I mean, they're responsible for the oversight of the fiscal requirements of school district, right? Again, to the extent that it ends up impacting the town from a larger perspective, again, the Board of Finance needs to be aware of that, but they don't necessarily need to be in the same level of detail as the Board of Education. But again, from my perspective, it would be easy just to say, okay, these are the financial reports that we're providing to the Board of Finance. We can also provide those to the Board of Education. We can also provide those reports to the Board of Finance. Again, because I don't think you want to say, well, we don't want to look at anything,
right? We don't want to be aware of anything. You know, I I think you you do have some responsibility with respect to, understanding how it may impact the town.
So the other thing we look at on a monthly basis is our monthly check register. And we were able to go through it line by line and stop and ask, okay, what is this? What does this mean? What was this for? And in terms of the board of ed, that's something that I don't see them doing, that like if they went and did that, and that was in their packet, that was something they went through each month, that would be something that would make me feel better, but I don't see that happening. So when we talk about, you know, a detailed, like bank statements, I think maybe what we might get is a summary sheet, maybe. And I know it's not up to us to tell them how to spend the money, but I would expect at least them to be looking at, you know, performing a process similar to what we do for the town. And if that doesn't happen, that kind of makes me want more. Kind of makes me want to see more. That's all.
Yeah. I mean, and that would be a discussion point with, you know, ultimately the superintendent and the board. We do see in some Boards of Education where they have like a fiscal subcommittee, where a smaller group will maybe who have a little bit more financial expertise will meet to go into the financial statements into a little bit more detail. Again, not required. So my point is that there are things that you can do to address issues, but none of these things are are, you know, required necessarily by statute or charter. Okay.
I mean, sometimes I got into this with the folks in Scotland. They don't even have a board of finance, but what they do have is a finance guy on the board of ed. Like, instead of a board of finance because they're such a tiny town. Right? So they have a designated finance person on their board of ed, and that's kind of their role. So it it really varies town to town, you know, and and what we decide to do, we have to figure it out between our boards and make it work in a way that I just don't want there to be additional friction. I want it to be smooth. That's my goal. But anyway, Michael, I again, anybody else has otherwise,
I'd really like to let him go. He's given us a lot of his time. Thank you. Thank you, Michael. Anybody on the Board of Ed? Anybody on the Board of Finance?
Jeff? Anybody? I'm all set. Thank you so much for your time tonight.
Rob, just, you know, again, if any of the Board members have any questions, again, I just please, you know, filter them through the through the chair.
Okay. And, you know, you and I, at some point, we should chat when we get the next audit underway. I don't think you and I ever really sat down and and talked, and I think we should probably do that, you know, in December or whatever when you're working up the next audit. Sure. Absolutely. But thank you very much. Thank you, Rob. Thank you, Michelle. Oh, yeah. Michael.
Alright. Where does that leave us? Let's pull up the agenda, shall we? Town administrators report. AES bathroom renovation update. That is the next thing on the agenda. Alright. What you got.
Alrighty. So just to let everyone know that the we had a meeting yesterday morning, and the project's moving along. They've got all the rough plumbing in. They'll just they had their inspections. They passed the inspections for the plumbing. They finished patching the floor with concrete, and they're about to put put up some additional partition walls for the bathrooms. The plan is to on schedule. The next step would be they're gonna do some painting. They'll be doing the walls and then at some point, they'll have the tilers come in to tile the tile the bathrooms, and then they'll put the fixtures in there. The they be the urinals or or the toilets for the for two things. And there's also the swaps, I guess, the mop sink in the the room between the two. So everything is on schedule. I think that the
overage was about 35,000, and I think there was a there also the air air testing for another 4,500. So those should be solid numbers. Know that
Kate was on the on the call as well. Yeah. I I do have the actual for you. So it's it's 36,761 is the total overage right now. About 30,000 of that is attributed to the removal of the asbestos piping and the safety testing after the fact. The remainder of that, so roughly close to 7,000, was change orders that they needed various change orders like concrete and some other small things that added up to about $7.
Okay. That was literally, my question was how are we doing on the asbestos? Alright. So that's sorted. All set. It's done? Yeah. All done.
I mean, that's one of those things. I mean, life throws you a curveball. It is what it is. There was asbestos there.
What are you gonna do? So, yeah, we're believe it or not, like, the end of, next week is already gonna be August. So we're already, the timeline is, is short, but, there's confidence high confidence that it'll be done in time.
Good to know. Okay. So do you have other I mean, I I don't know how how much detail the rest of the board wants. You you do a report for the Burstlechman. I know you had a whole whiteboard of your of your activities. You you wanna give us just some highlights about what's going on? Just
do the lateness of the hour. I'll try to make it short. We did get some news last week and then this week that our IT person, we are doing inter intramunicipal agreement with the town of South Windsor. They also cover, I believe, Hebron, Bolton, and and Coventry. Well, South Windsor has decided they're no longer gonna be able to provide that service, so the town is going to have to be looking out for for themselves. They sent the their town council voted on Monday evening to to put that in effect. Basically the end of October, actually, I think it's like October 21, we'll be on our own. So we'll be working with our sort of a transition for the IT. That's sort of like a sort of the biggest thing that sort of jumped up the board.
Still working on some of our dime DOT payments for the two bridges. We do have a significant amount of money that we're waiting on and I was in contact with them today. So we're working to get that so that we have the money flowing. Let's see here. We're going be starting looking at easements for the Basola Road project. That'll be next year's sort of even though it's like a not a bridge project, more of a culvert project, but that'll be, you know, significant. There'll be some traffic deep detours going in there. That Matt, can I ask you Absolutely?
Go Sorry. All this. Sorry. Did you did you oh, yeah. About the easement situation, is that just so I can imagine this in in my head, is this like a matter of asking other property owners if they can temporarily pave over their their yards or something for
for their cars to get through? Yeah. For one homeowner, there's gonna be a a, you know, temporary road that's gonna have to be built. And but some of the other ones are there's like three very small permanent easements, and then there's going to be other temporary easements, including the one that would be kind of significant for the owner that's on the corner there. There's going be some moving of some bushes or trees, and the town at the end would have to is going to make sure that it's it's as, you know, better than it was before. So,
Okay. This is a massive Because I walked by there a lot. Yeah. I walked by there. The thing.
I didn't hear the Sorry. I was gonna say this is an access issue, right? Like, in order to get our equipment in to do what we need to do. Absolutely. Yeah. Okay.
Yeah. Go ahead, Liz. I apologize. We we were I Hold on. I think Rob and Liz, I'm I'm I'm here, you know, all the time. So if any of the other finance committee members want to come in, I just do the lateness of the hour. I don't want go into too deep but I will provide a much more detailed list and then I can answer your, you know, questions. I'll send that out hopefully in the next week and then you can reach reach me before the next meeting. Alrighty. Unless somebody has All
good? All good. Yeah. I mean, I'm okay. So this would move us on to our old business, budget actual check register donation requests. Yai yai. So budget actual and check register folks. You know, I I spent my time proceeding this meeting looking at the audit report. I did not spend my time looking at the the check register. So if if people have questions on that, I don't think I don't think we have Lisa here tonight. No. So I don't know how productive it'll be, but if people have questions that we can mark down for later or something, let's do that now. You know, I don't like I said, I was focused on the audit. I really wanted to get my thoughts together on on what to ask Michael, but, if anybody has issues, questions they wanna raise regarding the check register or budget to actual, now is the time to raise them.
Yeah, so I was looking at the budget, at the financial, the profit and loss statement, and I did highlight a couple things just to ask about. And one is in the town garage area, and maybe we've had this answer before. It's over by 290% in the fuel oil.
Did we talk about that before? I feel like we did. Okay. Correct me if I'm wrong, guys. See if see if my recollection makes sense. Is that we had a lock in up to a certain gallon amount, and then we blew over that.
Yes. Is that correct, Matt? Sounds funny. But due to the due to the large amount of storms and sanding that was going on, the it was atypical year for usage and Rob is correct. Once they reached the threshold of the number of gallons that we had bid for allotted for the bid, then we're sort of on spot payment, which, as you know, the cost of Yeah.
Know, we were at, $2.39 or $2.49 a gallon, and now we're probably paying $5 a gallon. Yeah. So Okay. I I remember that now. There's there's also there's also a significant amount of billing that needs to happen
related to the diesel fuel to the school, to ram,
and a small amount to the fire department. Because we had that issue with the software. Right? Or rather the whole system. The machine.
We had we had an issue with the pump, but that that is a secondary thing. So what Matt told you, plus that line will come down when the billing goes out to the organizations. And I'm not sure if the treasurer has got that done yet.
Okay. Oh, okay. That that had to do with the fact that we had a system fail.
Right? And we were having trouble. We had to manually track We have a problem for the month of April, but we'll get through it. There might be some estimates, and the town might eat more than it should in the month of April. But we'll sit there and deal with it. But then it's got to be billed. The school buses and the big trucks for the town are the ones that consume the majority of the the diesel,
and so you gotta bill it. And so I'm just not sure the treasurer's bill. We'll get reimbursement is the point. For a portion of it. Yeah. Yeah. Mhmm. Understood. So it's a little higher than it probably will end up being. Correct. Got it.
Okay. And I also saw that we're over in legal assess. Is that is our our Yeah.
We talked about that one too, didn't we last time? We had a we had a dispute going on, right? Oh, that's right. Yeah. We had that's right. We had the issue with the
the knee cog and animals. Yeah. The I guess one of my predecessors, I guess I had them take some dogs and some frogs and chickens, and it was a long legal battle. And unfortunately, we had no control over the use of the attorneys, the law firm that they were using, and the bills are going out now now. So. Okay. Yep. That's
coming. Then I think there was one more. So the Veterans Committee. What does the Veterans Committee do? And I mean, I see it's over. It's like $275 but
I'll pay it. I'll I'll pay it, Liz. No. What is the is is that just the monument? Like
There's the Veterans Monument on there. I don't know if there's a Veterans Committee line.
There is. A veterans committee. It's under boards and commissions. Could be for the for the Veterans Day celebration.
So I don't know. But we can look at that. We can get you the summary of the transaction so we understand what's up. I will tell you one thing, looking at the audit, some members of the Board of Finance can do, and I think it would be very good, is we have a tremendous amount of funds. And it would be great to do a quick, small synopsis of the funds as to what they are, and to move some of those funds on. Like he's talking about the transfer station shed project that went over budget by $7,000 We have to fund that and get that off the financial statements. There's a bunch of those things that just need to happen. That fund should just go away. Yeah. It's gonna go away. Yeah. So the next this budget cycle, it will not be there at the next audit. So
I'd love to get those number of funds down. But
what I there are some funds there and some dollars there that we need to have an understanding, a global understanding of both boards, the board of selectmen and the board of finance as to what those funds are for and what we should be utilizing them for, and how we can sit there and, as Rob says, get rid of, there's about six pages of funds, and it would be nice if we get down to maybe four.
If I can interject, Rob. Yes. Okay. I know I've had a conversation with Rob here and at the Capital Improvement Projects Committee that one thing I noticed that we haven't done in a few years is annual report. I know that it's, you know, the Charter said it's something that the Select Board is supposed to do, the Board of Selectmen is supposed to do, and then I'm supposed to assist. I think some of these things would be great to, you know, to inform the public if we can, you know, incorporate that. I know that Kate the other day sent out to a department so that they need to start getting out their reports. I think we're gonna try and get that in effect. And so I think that just to put years out there that, you know, we are trying to do this. And I think whatever financial information the more we give to the public, the better we are for the budget season. So
I just wanna let the other members know that. Yeah. And then, actually, you know, in terms of and I know you and I kicked this around when I came down to town hall and talked to you, is even if we don't track in our budget documents, all of our grant money and expenditure, right, where we net things out. We can talk about it in an annual report like, hey. We funded town roads at $3.85 this year in our in our capital budget. Right? But we spent x 500 yada yada. Right? And we did these roads. Isn't that great? You know, that kind of thing. But yes, we haven't done that report in in years and we need to get back to it. It it would and it would just be, I think, a a good process for our town to to get back to because to feed into that report then raises all these other you're gathering all this information. So yeah. Thank you. Totally agree.
The other thing that I noticed which kinda made me scratch my head was the community garden was over over budget by $386. I mean, I know it's not a lot of money, but it's 110% of their budget, 111% of the budget they spent. I don't know what they That will I mean, I can check with Lisa.
That that will get applied. If you wanna know, that's that's one of the funds there. There's a community garden fund with $1,600 in it. We won't Yeah. Be on each It's a fund.
It's probably something we had a lot of funds. This is the, this is exactly it.
Yeah. Well, and, and when I say, when I say $1,600 $1,600 as of 06/30/2025. 2025.
I still have to look at what's in the financial system for this year. But if it's $300 over budget, we can move that $300 and lower the fund balance, and they're now in budget. Okay.
Gotcha. Okay. Alright. That was pretty much all I the only things I pointed out there, and I don't think I I didn't really see my did did we even get the check register?
No. I don't see it. I I didn't see it. See, profits are lost, and then we go straight to the school board the school board request for the snowblower. Okay. Which I can which I can speak to, obviously, as our representative on CIP. So I got wind of this a few weeks ago. Apparently, last year during the winter with all the snowstorms, the AES snowblower broke. And the first thing they did was check with public works to see if they had anything that could cover them or if they could buy a used piece of equipment or anything like that, and the answer was no. So then they went out and they got bids for a replacement. And they came to CIP with these bids, one of which is apparently a very good piece of equipment according to one member of our board, Ed, I think his name is, who did some research on the on the piece of equipment. And it's on you know, it's a it's at a discounted price. It retails at 4,500, and they're asking for 3,900. And we talked about it at our at our meeting. It's the low bid of the three, and it's a it's a unfortunately, the the school needs this piece of equipment because public works can't cover them. They've gotta do it themselves. So, they're asking us to release up to $4,000 from their capital account to purchase this particular piece
of equipment, this snowblower. So, CIP voted unanimously to recommend Board finance plus that and and go ahead and do it. So, I mean, I I don't have any expert personal expertise in terms of snowblowers. I've always had a plow guy. But, from what I can tell, this is supposedly a good piece of equipment. Just to be clear, the last one was something like 17 years old, the one that died. I I forget the exact, the date, but it was it was it was in its teens, in its late teens. It was almost it was getting ready to vote. So we're in this situation where they they need a piece of equipment, and they they have the money in the capital account, and they ran it through CIP. So if anybody has further questions, I'll do my best to answer them, but I don't claim any expertise. Yeah. If I can just add,
Rob, Matt here. Yeah. Go ahead. The reason I went through capital projects is that initially, they were thinking this was gonna be about a $7,000 piece of equipment. So it was like I don't know if that what the threshold is. I think that that was assumed it was a 5,000. Changed it. It's like 3 or 4,000. It's crazy. So so but the prices came in, you know, obviously much lower. That's a good deal for especially with the if we're gonna pick it up, there's a discount too. So
Oh, we're gonna send a sound truck, right, to go get it? Yeah. Yeah. So No problem. Yeah. That was that was the other factor. Thanks for mentioning that, Matt. I mean, yeah, the the the reality is that this is a fairly local business. We can just go get it. That's helpful. So
So yeah. Any My only Questions, Liz, do you My question is does this qualify as a capital purchase? Our the definition in our purchasing policy says capital purchases equipment and projects with an estimate of $15,000 or more. Then there's Yeah, a cost of 15,000 or more, or a leasing cost of 5,000 or more per year. So I'm just saying we have a purchasing policy, so I figured I'd look at it. That's all. Yeah. No. That's That's the definition.
Completely fair to do. And my thought would be, like, I asked them to run it through CIP. Like, initial thought was I asked them to run it through CIP, to the capital improvement committee, because I thought, you know what? That would give everybody some more Visibility and comfort with it. You know? And, yes, it's a small amount of money. On the flip side, I don't disagree. I mean, this is the thing with capital stuff is that, honestly, when I sat down to try and write a description of what is and is not capital, it's funny how fuzzy that can get. It's true that it's possible you could you could argue that, well, they didn't even need to go through the capital process on this, but they'd like to take it from their capital account. The money is there. It is a piece of equipment. I think it's a perfectly reasonable request. They're not blowing money on something dumb.
So my recommendation would be that we approve it. But, I mean, yeah, you're right. Technically technically, according to our purchasing policy, I guess they didn't have to do any of this. They could have, you know, utilized their budget, but, their budget's tight. And, you know, I would just say, in my personal opinion, this is what the capital account is for even if it doesn't meet the exact definition that we've written down. You know, it's it's still it's a piece of equipment for the upkeep of their grants. So that's that's my take. Others can opine. Have your say.
Are we bringing us to vote tonight? Is that what the what we're asking? Yeah. The ask is that we approve it tonight. Okay. And what was the exact amount of money?
Well, it's 3,900, but, the the easy way to do it is just to say approve up to 4,000 from the AS Capital account for, the purchase of the, what is it, Price and Son? I I I don't know how to say it. I remember during our meeting, there was a way of pronouncing it. But the the piece of equipment that they're specifically asking for, which I believe is $38.99 is the actual
number, but 4,000 is is the nice easy way of doing it. So I would make the motion that we approve the $4,000 for a snowblower for AES to come out of their capital funds to pay for the snowblower.
Yeah. I'll second it. Yeah. So do we have further discussion? Anybody I don't this is the time? K. Hearing none. We'll proceed to a vote. We I think we only have five of us. So well, actually, wait. Is Nick even here? He's here. Yeah. I see him. Oh, okay. Eating, so I went off camera. Sorry. There you are, sir. Okay. Nick, you're up first. I'll say yay. Heather? Yep. Liz? I'll say yes.
Thank you. I'm a yes, Bill? Yes. Okay. Did I miss anybody? No. Kim and Luis are not here. Right? Wait. Wait. Is Luis here? No. No. Okay. No. Thanks. Sorry. I again, apologies. I'm still getting used to this laptop. Okay. So I believe we're five o on that vote. And AES may go ahead and purchase their snowblower, which they need for the end of the year, which is good. Okay. Darn it.
That brings us. Hey, Rob. One thing. Can you make sure that that motion gets to the treasurer's office so she knows what to do with it when it comes over to them?
Oh, you want me to send an email to Lisa?
Yeah. Or when the, when the minutes come up, just the motion. Just trying to get the process together of, yes, it got approved, and this is where it's supposed to go. It's not being said by me or Matt or whatever. It's it's the authority of the board of edge board of finance to sit there and do that. Right?
Okay. So if I if I ask Kate when she does the minutes Mhmm. To cc Lisa. Lisa. Mhmm. Okay. Fair enough. Good good good point. Very good. Okay. So liaison reports. Well, we just did CIP.
Anybody else anyone else got anything? I don't think anything else been going on. But I was on the, you know, the school call this morning, and I think Matt did a great job of updating everything and Caitlin. Nothing new to add there. K.
Okay. So alright. Where does that leave us? Let's take a look. Approval of meeting minutes, six twenty four. Are they in the packet? They are. Here they are. I I found some corrections. Great.
We have a new Liz. No, I'm sure Liz found more than I did. Actually, I didn't.
I couldn't look that. Mean, I skimmed it. Good job, Heather. Let's do it. Walk me through, Heather. What do you got? All right. What do you got in four a. Yep. I think that
first sentence needs to just have a period after them, I think. Right?
Wait. The four a's. Master studio provided updates, spoke with superintendent regarding bathroom project.
I've said possible asbestos wrapping on them fiscal year. Shouldn't it shouldn't be them, Terry. Yep. Yeah. Sure.
Okay. Proceed. You know, I'm I'm trying to channel my Liz. I'm finding them all. Yeah. Go for it. And then the I wasn't sure about the it it said we're gonna have Kim on the board of finance for the union negotiations, which we did not a mistake. We we changed that to Liz. Right. Like yeah. I saw that too.
Yeah. I saw it too. I I think it's documented properly in the notes. I think that it wasn't until happened. It wasn't until later we talked about it, so I wasn't sure. Yes. Yeah. Okay. You know, you're not wrong because it this is the reality. At the time, in that meeting, as you walk through the meeting, that is what we did. And then only at the end, we're like, wait a minute. So Joanne came out and said that
there was a Yes. Because of families, so we discussed it. The the minutes accurately reflect
that point of the meeting. It's just a question whether it reflects it at the end. Yeah. Proceed. Yeah.
Maybe number 11 needs to be clarified that and it yeah. I think maybe number 11 needed needs to be clarified. Maybe there should be an 11 a and 11 b
where subsequent to 11 a or discussion, decision, you know Yeah. To the extent that there was a conflict, Liz will fill in. Yeah. Yep. Something along those lines. Yep. But good catch. I caught it. We're all catching it. Yeah. Know that. Was asking about it. It's funny because it it, again, it it does reflect what happened. But right at the end, it it it gives you the false impression. Yep. Okay.
The last and for a, the next to last sentence, it says two select members reigned, which I don't think they did. I think they resigned. Resigned. Correct. Alright. We'll fix that.
And then for b, I said oh, the second sentence, I think. Some items moved in space. I didn't know what that meant. It's been completed. Remediate in your meeting. Oh,
I think I know what that means. It's a little confusing, but I think I know what it means. Didn't I move move slightly?
The third, I guess. The third sentence. Oh, some items to move in to moved in space. Yeah. That's not right. Some small Some items to be moved in space? What does that mean? Moved in space?
Or to be moved. Maybe dropped in space. In the space. Maybe the space they're working at. Bill, wasn't this the thing where they had to move a couple of items within the bathroom, like, a few inches or something to make Yeah. The the urinals had to be moved, like, I think it was Oh, great. Three or four inches one way to accommodate some piping. So
yeah. I think that's what that means because they'll give us the update at the time. Yeah. Yeah.
Okay. Due due to space due to space requirements, the urinals had to be moved. Didn't didn't cost anything to do it. I don't think it was just a move.
Right. So, yeah, items to be moved, instead of in the space, you know, you apart. Like, items needed to be moved or or or fixtures. Maybe fixtures? Yeah. Uranals fixtures need to be moved slightly
to comic plumbing. The in space was confusing me, but I get it now. I remember talking about it. Yep. Okay and then the last one I had was eight E where it says motion carries four to three to zero with Liz, Kim, and Louise voting no but then motion carried seven zero zero.
Can't Motion carried, period. Not zero not yeah. Good point. That's not how that happened. Okay.
Which which one are you looking at? Oh, which one are you looking at? Eight five. Yeah.
E eight. It's asking if three people voted no. It didn't it didn't carry seven zero zero. Right?
This motion carried four to three. Oh, wait a minute. Wait. Did we
no. Is this the correction, though? Motion That we made seven o.
Wait. What's the motion to accept the May 5 special budget meeting minutes with a correction Oh, is that It's a correction.
That's why it's correction to the motion on page four to reduce the AES budget by 50,000 to We had change it to motion carries. I remember this Right. We corrected that so that the motion carries four three. And then we voted
Seven o is correct. O. Right. That's right. The seven o is the fix because we had if memory serves, we had people listed originally voting on the four and the three. Like, we had Luisa on the wrong side and, like, Heather on the other or something like that. Right. I think that's what we fixed. So I think the seven o was actually open. Should've say, like It's the motion to the correction. Yeah. Motion to correct, Gary. Seven zero nine? Yeah. Sure. To make it clearer. That's fair. That is all I had.
Awesome. I make the motion to accept the minutes as amended. Second. Very good. All right, I'm gonna go Nick? Wait a minute. Wait a minute. We Oh, I'm sorry.
We correct 11? Did we correct 11B? 11B. Did we make that clear to the the note person? Alright. Hold 11B. 11B?
Wait. What? Yeah. We're like, so public speak where Joanne had
Yep. Mentioned Oh, we need 11 a, 11 b. Right. We need 11 a, which is Joanne's public speak, and 11 b, board discussion. And I think I don't think we actually voted. I think we just talked about that. It says board will address this concern outside of public meeting, which I guess we did.
Well, sort of. Well, I thought we did correct it. We discussed it right then and there. Right then and there. And it was just we didn't We we almost closed. We
were almost ready to close out. And I said, wait. Wait. Wait. About Joanne's concern? Yeah. We all kinda talked about it. And, Liz, you said, I'll do it. I And don't think we actually voted it. I don't know if we voted. No. We didn't. Well, what I said I remember very specifically.
What I said was, it's not clear to me that the specific union involved here involves the conflict. If there is a conflict, if the union covers a family member, then Lee should step in. And I think, basically, people agreed with that, but we didn't we didn't hold a vote on it. We just kind of went, okay, and ended the meeting because we were I think we were tired. So that's really how it went down. I think that's a reasonable outcome, but that's that's what happened.
But it should be documented. There should be a sentence in there documenting that. You know, board discussion
regarding Liz Lochick as liaison instead or something like that. Does that make sense? How do you how would you phrase it, Liz?
I guess I would say the board discussed Liz Loquette stepping in in case of
To the extent conflict interest. Conflict of interest. Yeah. Correct. Because it was very much to the extent. Right? Like, we didn't know and yeah. Yeah. To an extent to the extent a
conflict exist exists, Liz volunteered to Yes. To to step forward.
Right. Liz Liz volunteers as as board liaison or whatever. That that I think that's that's a good one. Oh, Kate, I hope you don't hate us when you look at this recording. In any event, I I no. I think that's I think that's the right call. So we do eleven a as the public speaking, eleven b as that. I don't know. I don't know if it needs to be an a or a b, just another sentence.
No. Just it needs to be documented one way or the other. Yeah. Yeah. I would just say add another add another sentence or another, like, paragraph with your discussion.
Kate's discussion. As long as it's properly documented, I don't care. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Works for you. With that With that. With those changes. Where are yeah. Where are we? Do we have a motion on the floor? Yes. Say that by Liz and and amended again, and now we can vote. Alright. Lots of friendly amendments here. Nick? I'm gonna go with yes. Alright. I'm a yes. Bill. Yes. Liz. Yes. Heather. Yes.
Okay. That's all of us. Right? Am I missing somebody? We're missing Luis and Camby. Yep. Right. Exactly. So five o. Very good. That okay. So that's the meeting minutes. Very good. Board open discussion. I mean, honestly, I don't know anything at this time. I think we've talked about a lot, but if you have anything to bring forward, now is the time. I would just like to suggest
that a tri board meeting probably is due to be had at some point and planned so that we can come up with a policy that is our purview, the Board of Finance, come up with regarding the school. A couple of items with AES. Yeah. They're not just proposals are gonna go forward, how we're gonna handle the stiff account, all of those issues that came up tonight. We should have a tri board meeting to address these things and to set up a set up policy.
I don't know when that's Yeah. And the year's wearing on, honestly, before you know it. So September, October would actually be a great time to have such a meeting. So I think October's when we did it last time. Right? It's a good time of year for it. Yeah. I mean, look. The charter even says nowadays that we need to have one. So Yep. We should we should look at maybe targeting October. August August, September, October. So September or October or both, honestly, if we can pull together a triboard meeting, I think that would be helpful to our town.
I agree with you both. Maybe maybe next time we can all have some dates in mind. I know I'm traveling two months in October out to Idaho. So but I might be able to, you know, I might be able do some road too. We'll see. We'll see. My son's computer.
You won't be Kathleen. You'll be someone else. I'll be Matt D'Rogers. Yes. Excellent. No. No. We we should definitely talk about that. And, you know, we I know we have new people on the board of Selectmen. We've you know, we gotta meet them and talk to them and and fill them up for for what they wanna do. And so I think it just makes sense to try and schedule something. So let's keep that in mind. I agree. What, time frame are you traveling, Bill?
I knew you were to ask me that and I don't know the exact dates. Can we have that ready for next time in August to have dates Maybe the board select me can think about it and this whole board can think about it and look at their schedules. I'm sorry, don't know the exact dates. Think it's the last two weeks, like the last week of October and the first two days of November, something like that. I think it's the twenty first. I think we fly on the October 21
back on the fourth or fifth or something like that. Speaking of this, the other thing scheduling wise is I can't remember the last, you know, when we scheduled our meetings, our board of finance meetings for when we We make that decision once a year. I can't remember when that runs out. I was looking in my phone, and I was like, that's weird. I don't have anything past July. Now that that may just be a mistake on my part, but I'm not sure if we've got all our dates nailed down going forward. So we should think about that. I mean, typically, we're the, what, the fourth Wednesday of the month. Wednesday of the month. But we we should I think next meeting, maybe talk about our schedule. Okay.
Make sure that we've got that sorted and we're all clear on it, and we can all plug it into our calendars and all of that. Yep. Okay.
Okay. Correspondence. Let's see. There was an email. Whatever. Anyway, I I again, I'm still just sorting out my town emails. I've got it working. Finally, I had to battle with my computer. So as you may know, I had a ancient laptop that was just about to die on me. So I have switched to this machine, which is much better, but did not I I hadn't logged in on it, I had to do all this stuff with it. So I have only recently got back into my town email and caught up on everything. So apologies, but I'm a little behind on on everything. But I don't see anything that's necessarily flashing red. We've got the audit report stuff that I just think I forwarded to everybody from Matt. If anybody else has anything to bring forward, you know,
let's do that. Otherwise, it's getting late. I'd like to go on to public speak. Said on public speak. Twice? Okay. Great. Public speak. Let's do it. Scott.
Sorry, the screen moves away. I'm still just listening. Thank you guys very much. It was very interesting discussion. Very good. Caitlin.
Thank you guys for the meeting tonight. It was great to have the auditor here. I think I think, you know, a lot of good points were brought up where potentially policy needs to change that would be directed as as Bill stated by the Board of Finance. I think having a tri board meeting would probably be a good idea. But you know, specifically, you guys as a board need to to run how you think you want those policy changes to occur as you would be the ones in charge of that. I can do what we did before and send out Google survey with a few different dates listed or weeks listed to say maybe which week is best for everyone, and then we kinda do majority to narrow it down. That seemed to work pretty well in the past in terms of figuring out a good date for stuff. But thank you all for your meeting tonight. Thanks, Yate. Joanne.
Hi, just real quick. I want to thank Matt for bringing up, know, posting information that could be helpful for the public. Because my number one thing as I was listening to the audit was I thought it was really informative and really easy to understand. Having listened for many years in a row, it really sinks in. Hoping we can post the audit for, I believe you just said that was for FY '25. So we're a year and a half behind with that. Understandably, with all of the changes, why this is so late this year, but it could have been so helpful, and I implore the board to just, you know, be on that next year. It used to be about April, and it could have helped, you know, because it is a whole year and some behind. So understandable it's in July this year, but all of those balances and everything that we want to see kind of some of the points I was drumming home about knowing what the funds had and could some cuts be made, could really be an intelligent source of information for the town to just look at.
So hoping you could do that. I want to just no. I think that's it. Thank you so much. Take care. Thanks, Joanne.
Alright. Think that's everybody, unless, Matt, you have anything further. You're not really a member of the public exactly, but you're here. Oh, I'm good. You're good.
Alright. So before I have before my brain leaks out of the the side of my head, Jeff, can you remind me? I'm sending this email to Kate and to Lisa. I want we want Kate to send Lisa the minutes when they're done so that Lisa knows to do help me out. It was capital funds. So that way voted to pay for thousand. The 4,000. This just needs to be the motion that was passed by the board of finance. Got it. Right. Got it. I'm I'm just I was doing the email while we were waiting, and, I realized I I just my brain just kinda fried. Okay. Great. Thank you for that, guys. So given all of that, do we have a motion to adjourn? Bill. Alright. Any second? Nobody else want to second.
Alright, Heather. You got it. I defer to you. And we will see you next month. And, yeah, next month, let's talk about tri board stuff and schedule. Alright, everyone. Matt, you can kill the recording. Thanks a lot.