Select Board: October 22, 2025

Transcript captured from MHTV’s Vimeo auto-captioning. No speaker labels; proper names and dollar figures occasionally misheard. Click any timecode to jump to that moment in the source video.

0:00 You ready? Yep. All right. Let’s call this meeting to order on Wednesday, October 22nd, 2025. Just need to announce this meeting is being recorded. We will open up our meeting with public comment. Is there any public comment before we start the meeting?

0:16 Anything online with public comment? Not yet. Okay.

0:27 Nothing. Alright. We’ll close public comment. Let’s move on to town Administrator to update that. It was the chairman. Um, similar items, which are in the packet. I’m gonna start with the good news. Uh, through the work of our, uh, representative Jenny and Senator Creighton, uh, they were successful in, at the state level to get us some earmarks. And again, it’s a very challenging budget at the, at the state level. So we are receiving $50,000 for repairs in irrigation at the water site cemetery, and 35,000 for updated firearms training for the police department. So that Awesome. Yeah. Is the police now have, I think,

1:14 bi-annual requirements for firing. So it’s an additional a cost, um, for that. So anyways, uh, I think the earmarks were cut somewhere in the process and they went to bat for the town and have the money restored. Great. So that’s a good, the other news is, uh, sort an accounting of a number of grants that we applied for through the one stop in Coastal Zone Management grant program. Um, and so there’s a number of grants dealing with the projects, the Harvard projects, uh, as well as the Abbott Hall attic for the Historic commission folks. Uh, rail trail projects, the Washington Street Corridor

1:59 where we’re looking to improve between five corners and I think down, I, I forget how far to, to re enhance the Washington Street Corridor kind of tie the Old town and the five corners together and historic. So we put in a grant for that. The coffin School Rios, we applied for a downtown parking study, vacant storefront tax credit program and the State Street Land and Tucker Wharf Resilience Project. So in that window when we were, we compliant under three A, we filed all these things and we’ll rush in to see if we can get approval and done. Um, we’ve since gone out of compliant after the referendum vote. And as, as a result of that, we were deemed ineligible

2:48 for all of those grants, uh, which totaled $2,816,493 of potential grants that were not no longer eligible for. So again, I, I laid the details out in, in the memo, um, and, and it kind of talks about the, the impact around the community of, of not doing these type of projects. Pastor Will, will we continue to apply for these grants given though we, My my position with the staff is we just keep applying keep Keep Applying. Yeah. Just keep applying. Yeah. We’re just gonna stay in the fight. Good. And at some point, and, and again, it’s at the state level, um, they’re still working out which grants are affected

3:34 by three A and which ones are not, because there’s so many grants are done through so many different agencies, they are still figuring out which ones apply, which ones require and which ones don’t. So we’re like, apply for everything that we’re gonna apply for and let them tell us whether we can have it or not. Mm-hmm. Um, so the, for example, the $1 million for the Abbot Hall Accessibility Project Yeah. Is that to upgrade the elevator or what’s the a DA and and is this something that, you know, regardless of the grant we’re obligated to do? No, this is a, uh, an equipment and up in the attic space to turn it into, uh, appropriate historic storage space for the Outof apps. So it’s, it is sort of bringing the environment. Mm-hmm.

4:22 You know, air condition, whatever, heating, uh, walls, you know, all the improvements to be able to appropriately store historic r FFAs up at the attic level. ‘cause right now that’s outside of the environmentally controlled zone of, of the building. Um, whether that brings elevator, I don’t think that would involve the elevators directly For now. Is there anything on here that, you know, we would be, I mean, some of these are just really nice Yeah. To be really nice things to have done. Um, you know, for now, I mean this, for example, this resiliency project at some point that just needs to get done. Yes. So, just wanna point that out. And the tax credit, the vacant store on tax

5:07 credit, how does that work? You remind me. Is that it that it gives, is that right? It gives people money to come into them. Yeah. Okay. I I, I, I’d have to have Okay. Yeah. About folks give the detail. Okay. But generally it’s an incentive. It’s for the, the town to provide incentives for local businesses to, to grow our commercial basis. Couple, yeah. Through the chair. I guess there, there, there comes a time when we all have to determine whether we want to kind of pursue this through, for example, a debt exclusion override or something like that. I’m just curious about, you know, we, we, if we can get, get some more judgment around when we think it’s, you know, definitely going to be turned down, I think that that would be helpful. I mean, it, may You clarify on one that’s definitely gonna be,

5:53 Well, because we’re gonna be presumably reapplying for these, for these grants. Right. The needs. And the question is, at some point we’re gonna run up against that, you know, of the Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So I, I think to the extent that we can get, um, you know, some, yeah, I guess some certainty around, you know, when it’s, you know, that that non-compliance will result in a denial that would be helpful for our next decision to, so to look for alternatives On them. So there’ll be other needs, borrowing needs for debt exclusions as a sort of a precursor to coming is one of the things we’re identifying is we’re spending a lot of operational money, buildings, money patching our historic buildings that are leaking,

6:39 falling apart, where it’s like, so they’re priorities. Yeah. And so at the staff level, what we’re pulling together is we need a historic building, debt exclusion to shore up this building, the old townhouse and some of the other historic buildings that are literally are, need care before they are damaged beyond preparing to lose them. Well, I think that’s right, Patrick. There, there is a natural debt capacity that we have in the town. Right. And then we have to prioritize the capital planning around that. But I, I suppose, you know, when does that, you know, for example, the, you know, the, the, uh, aha, uh, projects, you know, the, the million dollar project here, when does it, where does it fall in that cycle? Right? I guess where, where do we start committing it to

7:26 that order of precedents? Yeah, yeah, Yeah. With regard to like, I know, where are we at with the Village Street Ridge? I mean, if we, if we have an update on that. Yeah. So we are, we’re pursuing with the tip, the Transportation Improvement Program through the NPO through some alphabet. The Metropolitan Planning Organization, which is the entity that makes decisions on transportation funding for the region. We’ve gotten to 75% design. We are now working with the tip to go to 75% design paid for by the MP. So that’s the next step. So, you know, ideally we get just full funding to do the whole project, but in reality, the way

8:12 you fund these type of projects is you, you get funding for one step in the process at a time. So we’ve, we’ve achieved 25%. Um, and so the next step in the planning phase is to get to 75%, which then kicks it into sort of the next phase of the conveyor belt of getting the actual construction funding. So that’s where we’re at right now. Is that discre are the discretionary elements to that, that are, we are concerns about in terms of being out compliance with Yes. Okay. It is unclear to us, uh, and, and I, we’ve been asking the questions, I’ve not yet heard a definitive answer as to whether our non-compliance kicks us out of the process

8:59 as I described the tip. Right? It’s, it’s a long conveyor belt. Right. And, and you have the different functions. Um, I would guess, and I, I served on three different NPOs, including the Boston region and instance. Mm-hmm. Uh, I, I’m gonna take a professional guess that if we were at the end of the process to fund the, the final funding, that’s probably saying, Nope, we’re gonna move you off in another community that is fully compliant. Their project will go ahead. But I think thus far, that since we’re in the, the design process, we’ve, we’ve not gone high enough on their radar screen for them to make decisions as to whether we should be kicked off the conveyor belt or not. And we’re communicating with ‘em and encourage them Yeah.

9:46 To let us keep going through the process. Because At some point that becomes, that’s like a safety issue in terms of where we prioritize debt exclusions and no such. And I’ll just say that I think it’s just, it’s just a, it’s a shame that residents of this town are paying state taxes. These are where, you know, potentially, you know, we would’ve received the $2.8 million back, um, as residents who pay state taxes that now this money is going to other communities because they’re not quiet.

10:20 Okay. All right. So more good news. Uh, the Council on Aging Roof Project is moving forward. Um, so, and I don’t think that’s a long gone out project to, uh, repair the leaking roofs there, as well as the Mary Alley roof, Mary Alley building roof project. So if you try to go up to Mary Alley right now, parking’s a little bit of a premium because some of that area is used for staging the materials and, and, and construction trucks and whatever. Um, that project is expect to take about four weeks to complete. Um, we’re excited, you know, and both of these projects were approved at town meeting debt exclusions, uh, basically to take care of our building.

11:06 So those projects are, are in the works and won’t be long before they, they’re done. Um, update coffin, school reuse project. Um, just an outline of the steps. So, um, the community development planning department internally reached out to the departments to, to get input as to any potential municipal uses of the former conference school site. Um, and then, uh, so, so we collected that and then, uh, have held a, a public meeting. The first public gather was, uh, reaching out to the immediate neighbors to hear from them first. They’re the ones that are gonna be most impacted by whatever is done there. So the decision was made, let’s,

11:53 let’s hear from them first and their inputs. And it was a lively conversation and, and a lot of good, a lot of good input and, and a lot of, a lot of things for us to, to flag on the list to be aware of, you know, their concerns about the project. Not just the result, but the construction itself and such. So it was very valuable. Um, we have out currently out on the street a request for information. So what this is, is reaching out to any potential developers and say, Hey, we have this property. Here’s sort of the basic information of the property. Give us some ideas of what you would do in redevelopment of this property. And it’s just big fish net. Just give us your ideas.

12:40 Uh, so that’ll be part of the input. There’ll be, uh, schedule another public, a general public, sort of the large community public meeting. Um, forget the dates, the either first week or second week of November, somewhere around there, it’ll be announced to, to get that input. And then all of those inputs will be pulled together by, by our planning department, and they will draft up recommendations as to, um, you know, what, what, based on all the input, what’s the best uses of that property. And all of this helps us to make the decision as to what do we put in the request for proposals? ‘cause in the request for proposals for development of

13:25 that site, we get to define what we’re looking for mm-hmm. To be built in. And so all of this input is what is informing us as to what to ask for. Um, so somewhere around the end of the calendar year, probably the first of the new year, we’ll be ready to present to the select board to say, here’s our, here’s our recommendations. And, you know, with the support of the board, we put the ROP out in the street and off we go. And there’ll be public input about this. Yes. Uh, just that one time and stage will allow for public input so that it’s, it’s the town can say what they want and We’ll, and we’ll take that into consideration, obviously. Yeah. And, and based on communications

14:10 with especially the neighbors and such, and their concerns about the, you know, how the construction is handled, um, you know, all the impacts of a, of a work site, um, you know, letting them know that’s part of the permitting process. So a developer wins the mm-hmm. Request for proposals. They say, this is what we’re gonna build. We say, we like what you are gonna build, go forth. Um, there is still, through the planning board and the, and the community develop plan department to deal with putting conditions on how, you know, what hours of operation, you know, dust control all of the usual construction site requirements on a site. So there are, there are multiple places where we can address

14:55 the concerns that the neighbors and the community, uh, as we Get through this possible. And I just wanted to add, one of the, you may have seen one of the neighbors from Susan wrote on behalf of, uh, the neighbors, put a nice summary of their concerns together, was sent to Brendan for on cc. And I, I responded to the person and I said, said, I can forward that to the rest, but it’d be best if you send it to the chair in that maybe you’ve seen it. Yeah. We got a copy of it, but, yeah. Yeah. And it was a, a very nice synopsis. Mm-hmm. Uh, you know, no one knows what’s gonna be done, but there was concerns that, that you would expect with a reasonable above blasting spto removal. Yep. Uh, Steve Elliot, who lives up there told me, I never realized this, but if you go down where the playground was, has lived there his entire life,

15:40 uh, that used to be wetlands down there were filled in. So, um, did you know that Jason? And, uh, but there, there’s all sorts of concerns if you do stuff down there. And it, it was very, you know, honest and like I said, very reasonable. And, uh, and they, they had some suggestions what they would like. They, they definitely, uh, there’s a fair amount of office space there, and they, they want to maintain that at some level, which I think is reasonable. And, uh, but, uh, I, I thought it was a, a good session. Good. Thank you. Great. Yeah, go ahead. Um, I, uh, clarification. So when we review, I know we brought it, this just brings us up, I going out and feature that’s

16:26 Our RFIs eyes. Yeah. And then, so are we having, I assume don’t have some type of like, no, maybe not the RFIs, but RF p some type of selection criteria and like organized way of evaluating, um, like Allison Jenkins, our procurement officer, help us with that. Oh, she’s, yeah. A being player putting the RFP together. Yes. Yeah. And, and Erin, to that point, one of the things they asked for was a transparent scoring system, which I assume is gonna be done, which is really the way it should be done. Mm-hmm. Uh, and, uh, Moses, Thank you. So, yeah, no, I think, I think I was just wanted to reiterate that point as well. You know, I think there ought to be, number one, a good capture of the requests

17:13 and preferences that each of these meetings and then kind of a way to, you know, say, aggregate those and then spore them, I think is really important. I think the other piece of the feedback loop, of course, is making sure that we, uh, disseminate that process of kind of the capture and the feedback. And I think, you know, we wanna avoid, I think the, the feeling that we’re putting a construction RFI out there ahead of the, you know, of the, a broad consideration of preferences for, for what would potentially be done for the property. You know, we have, we have obviously an interest in municipal use. We’ve got an interest in open space, we’ve got an interest in certain types of development. There’s an affordability component as well. So I think all of these things, you know, we, we have to,

18:02 uh, you know, figure out ultimately, and I, I think with the, uh, you know, with the Gary School Reuse Committee, for example, our experience was, was that the, the fiscal benefit kind of took on, there was a consensus around how important that was. And so I think that ended up driving kind of the implementation of having it redeveloped. But there were lots of ideas. Yeah. You know, everything from a gym to a library to alternative municipal uses. But I think vetting that is like, is very important. So I’m, I’m glad that there’s, there’s questions around the kind of a scoring system. And, and I think it’s worth mentioning, I, I believe four departments requested, uh, use park and Rec, I believe put a dog park in electric light battery storage, uh,

18:48 housing authority housing, and then the cemetery put cemetery in. So, and this, this certainly, uh, it’s coming close down, uh, waterside. So, you know, they’re all putting things I, uh, heard from citizens. Someone wants to put a arm down there and all sorts of other ideas. So these Are the types of things that’ll come out to this process. Yeah. And, and you gotta score ‘em and Yep. Well, that’s right. And I guess who gets to spo them, I think is the other question. Yeah. Uh, ‘cause that’s, it was a very public process in our, you in our last reuse exercise. Yeah. But, uh, yeah, Let’s, I’m sure Just issues. We’ve got a big agenda tonight. We could probably spend all night doing this, and I did not bring a pillow. Whoa, whoa. Um, number two there. No, it’s not. Whoa. I could, I could get right in there myself. Uh, number two, Bob could not make it.

19:34 So we’re gonna move on from that. Number three, we have our fiscal year 27 revenue forecast. Alicia is here, and I think we have the chair of our finance attorney Al Goby on online. Alec, are you there? Yes. Can you hear me? Evening? Hey, Alicia, first, right? Yes. To Alicia. And Alec is there for support. Good evening, Alicia. Good Evening. Michael Select Ford. Hi, Alicia. Hi. Let give you the financial process. We usually do annually in October. In preparation, I sit down with the income, like last year, and we do a three year in December. But right now we’re just gonna go all our revenues. Okay. Alicia, can you go to full screen on that? Like we did you before screen for your, there you go.

20:20 That’s good.

20:26 Hey, next, just tell me when you change. Uh, next slide. So we’re gonna go over the property taxes and debt exclusion. So for, we’re showing our fiscal year 25, actual our fiscal year 26 budget, and our fiscal year 27 projected revenues based on the position two and a half cap on property taxes, we bring in approximately $2.2 million year over year. And property taxes accounts for 80% of the town’s revenue. Next slide, please. Chair is, uh, state aid is the big blue chart. Um, the life department surplus that we get each year. It was raised for the first time and Complet 26 by 30,000 360. We’re projecting that again for fiscal year 2027.

21:13 State aid is projected to increase by 1%. Assessments kind of go in line with the increase in revenue. And then enterprise indirect costs, I estimated about 3%. Can you expand on what that is? Yes. Indirect costs is the cost that we provide them. We do their admin, we we do the payroll, we do Social Reimbursement. Right. So the general feedback That Next slide please. Here I go more into detail on state aid. So state aid, please write 315,183, the majority of which is for chapter 70 funding for the schools. Uh, that was due to the Student Opportunity Act. That changed back in fiscal year 24. Um, unrestricted general government aid is

21:59 our flexible aid for the town. And that went up 15,420 foot dollars for the year, which is pretty negligible. So, uh, as you can see, for fiscal 27 cities, we fed to, to increase 1%, not keeping pace with inflation or increasing budget costs. Next slide please. Local receipts. Um, here’s our local receipts. So we show the 25 actual 10,000,026 decline with our budget at 8 million 8 68, 6 88, 6 68, and then 8 million 1 0 5 200 declines in fiscal year of 2027. Alicia, if we had further to the left here Yep. Would this be a, a continuous decline or would you see ups and downs? It depends on the economy

22:44 and it depends on what, what’s happening. So, uh, more vehicle is volatile depending on how many vehicles people are buying at the time. Interest income is volatile based on what the interest rates that are coming. I guess my point is, if you look at this, it looks like we’re clearly going down. Yes. If we went out further, you would see more variation Yes. To it, not just, right. Let me ask you that as I rolled in Yeah. Before Brian, Alicia, um, the approach building the budget was to significantly underestimate mm-hmm. Those local receipts and then let the difference generate into free cash cash. Sure. And so one of the changes we made, sort of the truth in numbers, is to do a legitimate estimate. And, and the methodology I used, the, the first project

23:31 before Alicia came on board, I took 95% of the last three year average of actual receipts mm-hmm. And used that number. So if you were really to graph what was reported, it would probably be low come off and decline again. But it’s not a, But going back, that would’ve been actual. So if you look at the difference between actual budget, but go ahead, Jim. So I, I have two questions. Why is the motor vehicle ex size tags decreasing? And the other is it mentions interest down there is interest in there. Yes. She’s got, Oh, yeah. So if you flip the next slide, please. So, so, So, so interest in that five. Yeah. Next slide. So we think there’s, there’s,

24:10 so you can see local receipt dip in do on 21, 3 0.1, then up to 4.2, go back down to 3.6, back up to 8.9, back up to 4.1. We’re projecting 3.8. So there’s been a decline in the amount of, uh, more vehicles, meals in rooms since brand new exercise. So the first year I projected a 200, 200 to be conservative. We actually brought in 2 77 and 4 23. So I brought that up to 200 and 400. Still conservative. But within what we’ve actually received. And I kept that flat for 27, depending on, let’s see what happens in fiscal 2026. So Vehicle excise taxes are very susceptible, susceptible to the economy. So we get maximum revenues when people are buying new brand new cars. So the first year value assessment is the highest. Right.

24:57 Then it declines if people say, you know what, I, we’re gonna hold off buying a new car for a while. There’s things, the economy looking a little soft that starts showing up on the mobile science tax. And there’s probably a one year lag to that. Yeah. Right. So, so if you look at COVID when interest rates almost nothing. Yep. Next year it went up. ‘cause a lot of people purchased. Right, exactly. Rates went off. So you get decreased people holding on the cards, I think is what you’re saying. They’re saying you need at least $50,000 to purchase. So. Right. That makes sense. So it hit a record Yes. In September. And that’s due to the tariffs and due to expiring, um, tax rebate credits for electric vehicles, those are expiring. And, um, and December 20. So this isn’t a simple process. I actually have to do economic research when we’re doing

25:44 this in addition to, I look at past trend analysis to figure out what we should project each year. And we still have to stay conservative because otherwise you’d have a revenue shortfall. Yeah. And as you recall in the budget, we used to keep money in the health insurance line. That was a free cash generator that has been removed. Mm-hmm. Has it been entitled? Hmm. Has it been entitled Anymore? Yes. The excess, yeah, the, The excess. Yes. It’s been entitled. You’ve Got a, you’ve got a little bit, I have, Obviously I have 300,000 fault. So with 10 people came on our insurance, that $30,000 piece, that would be my entire question. Whereas before we had three to $5 million in, um, penalties and interest on taxes. Pretty flat payments in lieu of taxes have been declining. Um, charges for service

26:29 for trash disposal went up by 200,000. Uh, that is because there are more facility stickers being sold. I talked to the, uh, waste and facilities director about that. And that’s why it was 1 43 40. Um, department of Revenue recreation’s pretty flat, 2 35, uh, cemetery 90 based on actual other charges and services, flat fees, pretty much flat rentals. Three 90, and you may ask, so in 23 is 52 while it go up to 3 86 because we renegotiated the medical building rent agreement with, uh, the administrator did that. So that’s what drove that rise. Um, took compartment revenue libraries flat license and permits. I took that down slightly. I spoke to the building commissioner, the building commissioner told

27:14 me there’s a decline and new building. And to reduce that number, um, times and forfeits is flat, 60,000 in earnings on investment. So on earnings on investment, we had, um, two and a half million that has declined to 1.5. I talked to our treasurer collective most recently. So the rates were at 5%. They’re now at 3.75. And the banks have told her they’re gonna further reduce the rates further. In addition to that, we’re spending down the APA fest and we don’t have that APA balance anymore to build up that interest income. So we’re, we’re on target right now, about eight to 900,000. I saw up on that. I have in my head that at one point last year we had like closer 4 million in returns. Is that outside this number

28:00 or am I just making that up? You can look funny at me. Yeah. Gen general. Well, you could say total interest Total. This is just general. Just general. Thank you. Okay. Yep. Thanks. Um, Ms. Lease, revenue zero, that’s just in, that’s just revenues that can come in that we don’t know if you make it a refund from the prior year. We just put that to revenue on Medicaid reimbursement. That’s flat at 40,000. So we’re projecting 8.1. So relatively $700,000 wrong in our local receipts. Uh, next slide please. Uh, that’s roughly what, there we go. 20% fine. Yeah. That’s a big, it’s a big, it’s a big part. So there, there, there is some conservatism built into This. Yes. You have to be conservative, otherwise you’d have a revenue shift. We Also, I understand There were also a lot of,

28:47 like the federal government in terms of the funding of Medicaid for next year’s budget is dramatically different. So that impacts this as Well, right? Yes. So in summary, property taxes are bringing in roughly 2.2 million with the 2.5% cap. And then I showed the reserve for overlay or abatements and exemptions. So you can see 25, it was 441 7 11, uh, brought it up to projected 6 57, 7 22. And I brought up for them 700. And you might ask, well, why is it driving up? Well, we passed additional, uh, veterans exemptions and senior exemptions at town meeting to help people. So that’s what drives those numbers off. We don’t get reimbursed back for the state from that. Um, free cash to the budget. We are at 7 million last year.

29:32 Uh, fiscal 25, actual 5.5 and I’m projecting 5 million with, uh, estimation of pre-cash between four and $6 million. So that’s a very variable number that you can determine when we come back and talk about this in December. But as of right now, that’s just our rough Estimate. And your assumption there, I know that’s just a plug number. Are we still putting similar type money that we put aside last year towards hold up on free cash capital spend and towards reserves? Or is this just like, who knows? Right. So basically doesn’t matter. It could be, you could decide, like we always leave a million dollars aside to rebuild our free cash. You never wanna start a zero. Yeah. But it could be we come in at six and you say, Hey, a million stays in free cash and million goes to capital. Right. So now that number turns to full. Correct.

30:20 So then instead of me being at a $514,000 for short log, it’d be at a $1.5 million Short bond versus less.

30:28 Sorry, we’re projecting 5 million in Free cash, just projecting 5 million to use cash towards operating budget just towards the operating. But you said if we Allocated one to, um, Capital To capital and one to reserve. Right. We’d be down to four, but wouldn’t be down to three. No. So this is the number that she’s saying after. So I’m projecting four to six. So 6 million back to free cash is five. So five just sitting here without any capital, without anything else. Oh, okay. But in reality, under that revenue, this is just the revenue, right? You have above the expense side, right? Allocated. Yep. Yes. Yep. State aid, um, we brought, we brought in 9 million in 25 budgeted 8 9 5 9 55 32 based on what the governor, the state passed.

31:14 Um, 9 million 4, 9 1 27 is what we’re projecting for 27 lights surplus. We stayed flat at 360 based on last year. Indirect cost increasing about 3% I over local receipts. And the conservation commission transfer, that’s just for, um, the conservation agent that contributes to seven with there work for the compound. So that’s about 9,000 that goes in every year and offset. So our total revenues is 1 0 9 2 4 4 8 57, which is 514,000 less 4 61. I tried to put notes at the bottom for people to see that. 2 million 1 91 property growth, one for 2 million bucks, free cash reduction really equals $191,000 that we have Lining pre cash yield. Gotcha. Okay. And it shows the 2.4 million, um,

31:59 that we had fiscal year 24 to 900,000 projected for fiscal 26 free to drop from five to 3.75. And then I brought in major cost pressure, includes the 800,000 to $1 million increase in the trash contract. So he’s getting that request for a proposal ready. We go out, um, 14% rise in health insurance. We double digit rise. I’ve been participating in different, uh, health insurance forums and the other one coming up is what’s going on. So one of the big cost drivers for health insurance is the GLP one drugs. Uh, a lot of people go to the hospitals for those and it’s, it’s driving their costs and all the insurance companies have a loss and they trying to get those back to the rates. Another one is Massachusetts State has an aging population going to the best hospitals, the most expensive hospitals. And that is driving costs and rates higher as well.

32:48 Um, and inflation above 3%, which is outpacing the two and a half percent property tax cap and Iraq, the state about increasing that cap. They don’t want to talk, but there is a mechanism. We all know it, it’s a general ide. Uh, next slide.

33:07 So in summary, fiscal leader 27 revenue is just declined by 514,641. Our budget pressure is inflation above 3%, which continues to outpace our two point half percent poverty tax cap. Uh, expenses are growing faster than revenue since 2020. We’ve got 9% pension, we’ve got 14% house insurance. We have, uh, uh, personnel costs. It’s just everything’s higher. There’s, there’s nothing that’s growing at two point half percent. Uh, ARA funding federally funds for projects will be fully spent by the end of 2026. Uh, the grant reductions, we have fewer federal grants than the MBTA three A non-compliance limits access to our state funding, which is gonna put pressure on our capital costs. Uh, our capital and bond rating on ongoing capital investment of temporary debt exclusions have

33:54 maintained the towns aaa. So by the towns passing those debt exclusions, it shows the bond rating agencies that they’re very serious about covering their capital costs above what is in the levee. But we’re not funding our operations and maintenance. And that’s a serious issue. We have the base now, um, trash contract I said earlier is going up 802 million insurance, 14% personnel is 80% of the budget. Those, the contract that 3% increase in line with inflation are free cash warning. We keep using it to balance the budget, which is unstable. And the state has said to us, and everybody, do not use free cash to balance your budget. A one time source. And we really should use it for capital needs, which we have been trying to do. Our next step is a general override. We haven’t had one since 2005

34:41 to sustain our high quality services and more information to con the state of time address everything found administrative. So I I just Hold on one second. Sorry. I understand that. One second. Okay, you’re set. Okay, so I ask question, uh, I just wanna make sure I understand that the 14% mm-hmm. Insurance increase mm-hmm. Now is that we, we will have actual for 26 is that 14% increase relative to the actuals for of, of 27, not gonna be relative to 26. Right. So We have double digit increases for fiscal year 26. Yeah. For GFCA committ that They have not committed, they never tell us, they told we have till December they first march. Right. So we have till December 1st right now to tell them whether or not we’re gonna leave or stay. We sell ‘em, we’re in, and we don’t get the rates until after the fact.

35:26 But everybody’s talking, I’ve been talking to multiple municipalities and we’re all projecting demo In, in, in recent years it’d been more like 6% maybe. Right. But what I usually do is I go out and I look at the national average, well, Massachusetts state health insurance is beyond the national average. So no longer can I look at the national average. I have to actually participate in these different seminars and listen to the insurance companies and the state because our rates are actually driving so much faster than the nation of all all states across country. So, so that means fiscal year 27 will be approximately, I know 1.5, $1.6 million more than 26, And then 1 million trash contract row in the coal list for union personnel row in regular costs.

36:13 It’s just unsustainable. 200%. One more call. Anybody else? Yeah, so, oh, sorry. Go ahead.

36:23 You’re off Alex. Oh, sorry. Oh, no. If there’s other questions for Alicia, I just wanted to kind of run through a couple things from, from fin comm’s perspective, but if you have other questions for her, I can wait. Murray, anybody else? Um, I just have a question about, um, with regard to the state aid projections at 9 million mm-hmm. Does this, um, I mean, is this, how does this interplay with the projections from the federal government cuts from the one big beautiful like Bill Act that governor has a dashboard now that shows the state is losing $3.67 billion from federal funding and it keeps going up and up. Right. So I imagine that that trickles down to this 9 million. I guess, how confident are we in this state case number? This is,

37:09 That’s just a preliminary, I always use about 1% as a preliminary, safe conservative, But I mean, that’s wing with It can go down. Yeah, it can go up. But to be conservative, I use 1%. And that’s in line with what we usually, So the state aid is primarily driven by, by the lottery wing. And then the state is capped even though the lottery’s making far more money. So the municipalities are getting a certain percentage of that. So from that perspective, I think that’s protects or, or, or, or moderates those numbers. The threat is that the cuts from the feds are so significant on the state that they have to implement nine C cots. And the governor is actually asking for

37:55 expanded nine C powers in the MMA, the municipalities of saying, hold off. No. ‘cause we’re gonna get the, you know, the, the business end of that stick when that gets implemented. So yeah, there is a, let’s call it an indirect threat to the, to the state aid from the federal cuts, but it’ll, it, it not be directly to state aid based on lottery receipts, if that makes sense. Yes, It does. Yes. And so, one, we had an earmark for Red’s pond and, and they did cuts and we got half of what we thought we were gonna get. Wanted to see. Anything else wanna add? No. Okay. I just have a couple quick questions. Maybe comments, uh, assumptions for new growth in this. Is it, is it flat? Like 300. 300,000? Okay. Mm-hmm.

38:41 And I mean, basically looking at these, and at this spreadsheet, I’m not actually pretend to be a math genius here, but I’ve looked for this. So we’re gonna have about 97 million based on this towards general operating after your net bank. Okay. Um, which is down for $500,000 thing. Yeah. And I’m, I just want to caution all the, to really look at that $5 million prec number. ‘cause I’m, I’m gonna really, I’m gonna go along with your precautions and your, and your, your red, red, red light warnings here that we really need to make sure that we don’t use too much of that. Right. I wanna make sure that we put some money towards capital, towards reserves. Yes. Um, and make sure that we, we actually have a, I think the select board voted at one point to, to build off those reserves. That’s correct. So we need financial policies. Yeah. Financial policies. So I think we need to get, make sure that we follow those.

39:27 Well, we’re trying, we’re trying to wean ourselves off of Yeah. Which, which I think we’re being forced to do here. Right. And we have to make a countervailing commitment. So I think we’re just gotta look at encourage you and the fcom that when we do do the budget that we’re looking at, what do we need to do to get to that 97 million before we start talking about an override or anything like that. Mm-hmm. So a, you still there? Yes. Yes. Can you hear me? Good? You’re good? Okay. Yeah. So I’ll be a little bit repetitive here, but I’ll go pretty quick, um, on the big ticket items. Um, and, and before I start talking about the, um, revenue forecast, I just wanna, you know, reiterate and remind everyone that kind of, this is the first step to the, uh, general fund budget every year. Um, we haven’t detailed out the expenses.

40:16 Um, the process for that Alicia is communicating with all departments with, you know, the, the budget requests for them to build and submit to her. Um, on top of that sort of fall exercise like we did last year, the fin comm’s gonna be working with Alicia to take this revenue number out another two years, and then bucketize the very large buckets of town wide expenses and work to, to come up with kind of a three year outlook. That’ll be a presentation in early December, like last year. Um, so just, just wanted to let everybody know that there’s a, there’s a lot more to this process ahead, but, um, I’ll, I’ll cover kind of what Alicia covered as well. Um, just quickly on the large items, I’m sharing my screen, uh, select board.

41:01 I, I shared this template. It’s just a data collection template we put together with Alicia, um, dating back to fiscal year 21. So I thought for me, seeing the history of actuals for, you know, a five year period is, is very, tells you a lot about how things can go up and down. Um, with respect to the property tax level, levy, we’ve been talking about this for years. Um, it’s, it’s just shy of 3% per year that it grows. And that’s pretty guaranteed as long as the, the town is assessing to the max levy. Um, so you, you’re kind of that that’s, that’s the good news. Every year you get 3% more on the property tax line. These debt exclusion property taxes, as you’ll see in this summary, they’re as part

41:47 of the revenue, but then they’re paid for as part of the operating budget. So it’s kind of an in, in and out. It’s not, it’s not actually revenue available to fund any of our department spending, uh, with respect to the overlay. That actually is an increase. Alicia, I don’t think you touched on that if you wanted to just weigh in on, on the increase in the overlay, but it has come up the last few years. Yeah, I, I did touch up on that, Fred. Oh, you did? Okay. Um, with respect to state aid, like she said, it’s only a percent per year and the, the actuals are fairly consistent with that over the years. Um, state aid revenue offset, just a reminder that a piece of that state aid actually gets offset

42:33 and is not available for part of the budget. Um, local receipts is a big one. So I think this comparison is helpful from 26 budget to 27 forecast, from my perspective, if you look at 25 actual, which is the most recent actual local receipts that we’ve recorded, we’re at like north of 80% of that. So right to begin with, we’re not crazy conservative. If you’re just looking at the most recent actual you’re thinking about, you don’t wanna ever overestimate local receipts, that’s for sure. Um, one item that I don’t know that was touched on, there’s no difference, but that meals and Rooms excise, that generated $700,000 of revenue the first full year that it happened. Um, there’s $600,000 in last year’s budget and then another 600 in this year.

43:20 So there’s no increase over year, over year, but that is something that has helped fund recurring operations. That was new over the, the past few years. Hopefully that number would come up. Um, but we did have a full year in the books and it was just shy of, or just north of 700,000. Um, the other big ticket item that I wanted to touch on was the earnings on investment that at Alicia already covered. Um, you can see back, back in 21, 22, I think this is, there’s, there’s articles in the globe about how towns were basically earning nothing back when interest rates were lower. Um, we obviously peaked in 24 when interest rates were highest. And then also there was additional funds invested. Um, my vice chair, Molly Teets, along with Alicia,

44:06 spent time with, um, the treasurer to walk through her process. And I, we think that 800,000 is a fairly accurate estimate without, without being able to go over the top, you never want to overestimate. So as you can see that, you know, the $2 million of increase in available revenue from the property taxes is quickly reduced to only, you know, a net. I guess that’s 1.3 or $4 million increase once you factor in the, the decrease in local receipts. And then we get down to the, the free cash used to balance the budget. Um, like Alicia said, it was, it was certified at nine and a half last year. I believe 1 million went to capital, 1 million was left not

44:54 appropriated, and 500,000 went to our reserve fund. Um, I guess the expectation, the reason this is in pink, that’s kind of my open item color. Um, it’s not certified yet. I, I would love Alicia to provide a, a very brief update on that process and how we’ve met with her over the summer to try to expedite that this year. Um, we expect it to be certified much earlier. We also expect it to be certified at a lesser amount than last year’s nine and a half. And, and it could be, you know, two to $3 million less than that as she mentioned. So if we have less available to begin with, uh, we’re probably using less in the operating budget. Um, and that’s really the other big offset. The, the reduction in local receipts available along with the reduction in free cash used estimated as of today,

45:42 sort of offsetting that increase in the property tax levy. Um, so very high level, I summarize down to the revenue available for the operating budget, same number as Alicia, less than 500,000. But you can think right away the, the big ticket items that we’re gonna look at over the next few months for that three year forecast. Those salaries and wages, when we did that exercise last year, go up at three to 4% per year. We’ve got contracts on most of the contracts around the town. Uh, most of the union contracts are settled out a number of years at this point. So that shouldn’t be a crazy exercise to project. Um, insurance benefit is another line item that we’ll be looking at. Pension expense that goes up just shy of a million per year I believe as well. Uh, utilities expense, there’s always pressure there.

46:29 We’ll do a deeper dive in the next month or so on, on that. Three year es estimate out of district tuitions, we’ll work with the school. That’s always a challenging item. Um, the, the transportation costs and the tuition costs themselves. The trash collection contract is, is, is gonna have to be part of this upcoming budget. I think last time we talked to Andrew that could increase the budget year over year by 800,000 to a million alone. Um, and then there’s the tax funded levy, tax levy funded warrant articles. So, long story short, a lot of repetitiveness there. That’s just the fin comm’s perspective. But you know, we, if you’re looking at what was in our operating budget last year, we have less revenue to fund this year and, and that all of those major expense categories are gonna put

47:14 a lot of pressure on this budget season, let’s put it that way. So we’ve got work ahead of us and uh, the next step is that three year forecast revenue verse expense and, and then state of the town and then the official liaison budget season. ‘cause as you all know, we have to come up with a balanced budget, so. Great. Thanks Phil. Just A quick question. Uh, Alec, great job. Um, how far are you into the, into the salaries, uh, projection exercise? I mean, we did a lot of work last year and I think we’ve got, so we’ve got the templates built and we’ve got the, the contracts in place. I just have to finalize it with the schools. Um, and you know that that’s a difficult exercise. It’s a great question because, you know, you can, you can build that based off

48:00 of funded positions from last year or you can build that based on requested funded positions this year forward under new contracts. So, um, we’ll have to come up with documented assumptions that go into those numbers. But, but that can vary based on if you, if you follow what I’m saying. Yeah, That’s That’s right. Right. We have informed them that level funded for their budget requests this year. So they are aware of that only contractual costs and they have to justify every contractual cost that they have. So all the budgets will be to meet the time of industry by November 17th. So that’s when we’ll be looking and gathering everything. And when you used the word level budget for everyone, that means the exact same as last day, Exact same as last year, even Though in reality it may have to be less Correct. About level service. It’s level,

48:45 Level, level. Yeah. So, so yeah, just to kind of touch on that, there’s, there’s certain departments that might only have one or two employees, right. So their contractual obligations will increase their budget and, and they’re either gonna have to find it somewhere else and their budget or Alicia will have to find it town wide somewhere else. Right. So there’s gonna be certain budgets that have to go up just to be able to keep operating at the level that we need them to. Right. So, um, but yeah, that, that free cash number is, is not finalized. I think we all know that that can move. Um, but you know, a, as of today, I think my prediction would be that we’re gonna have less available overall, so probably less available for the operating budget as well.

49:29 Great. Well thank you for your work and for the appreciate that. And thank you to El and Molly. They’ve spent hours with me. I Know you guys are, you guys are good friends at this point, bill. Yeah, we, we, um, No thank you to Alicia. It, it, it’s a great relationship and we just try to get as much data in front of everybody as possible to be as transparent as possible. Yeah. Appreciate all your work that you guys are doing. Also with Mike over at the school staff. I know that everyone’s working closely on this, Robert, over For sure. For Sure. So appreciate that. Yeah. Thank you. Yep. Go ahead. The chair. Just a quick question on the nails tax. And so, you know, I know we have the 25 and you know, does that seem to be pretty bold based on, you know, anticipate? Well, I stayed,

50:15 I brought it down just to 200 just to be conservative, but I’ll look at this year ‘cause as, uh, if we do decline, the economy does decline, you know, people will cut when eat, right? And so that could decline. So we’re just going to, you know, keep a close eye on Yeah. Defining what’s happening. Okay. We just don’t have a lot of past data obviously. Right, right. So this is our only reference point, Right. No, that’s, that’s why I was wondering like, is that Yeah. With that level of concern and that, so that variable could change. Okay. Yeah, I mean the local receipts is interesting because, you know, one could think about when we, when we passed the meals in rooms excise, and you could say like, I, I would’ve expected that to be going up year over year. But you know, five, six years ago the earnings on investments was nothing. Right. So, so now that’s fluctuating back down and,

51:02 and the motor vehicle excise as well. So it’s a little bit just in my history on fin com, there’s some unique facts that I’ve come across the last few years here with local receipts. So Yeah. That’s great. Thank you. Yep, Go ahead. Um, so at some point we’ll also have to have a conversation on Ms. Ford, like our comfort level with what we’re allocating from free cash versus putting it into our reserves. I don’t, probably was mentioned we didn’t fund the opep last year. We don’t sound like we’re gonna be in a position to fund it this year. Um, with things being equal and um, I guess, you know, how often are we getting reviewed for our ratings on our, um, our borrow rates? And so, and do like, you know, when you get down

51:49 to 1 million in reserves in the free cash, we don’t have that much in our stabilization fund. So that gives me po like concern frankly. Um, so I think just not now, but at some level we’re gonna have to have that conversation about as a board, what we’re comfortable with. Um, in terms drawing, in terms of drawing down Yeah, Absolutely. Drawing down in the free cash In. Yeah. ‘cause we need money in that stabilization for bringing day fund. So as we’re saying, as the state’s like, oh, we’re in a decline. Everything that’s happening with the government, then you should be able to have some reserves to fall back on. And the fact we keep using our reserves to balance the budget is, is, is not the way we should be using it at all. And I think that’s also in line with what we, you know, it’s also we have financial policies in place now that we have to, there’s stuff that take a look at those to you. There’s a reason for footing those in place.

52:35 So we have some guidance. Right. Well I think we’re getting to the point, right where we’re, we’re moving towards weaning ourselves off of free cash. And I then the question becomes kind of what’s the, what’s an appropriate buffer, you know, to kind of maintain, uh, to continue to, to cover. ‘cause I think, I think if you make a credible case for the fact that we’re coming, that we’re kind of bottoming every year at a certain free cash level and you know, we need to find, and we have our, are having a hard time replenishing the, uh, you know, the, the reserve fund, uh, then I think that prepares a case, I think a better case for, for a likely override, you know, so I think kind of removing free cash is kind of this thing that we can rely on. I think we know the sooner we get to that, the better.

53:20 And that’s, you know, that’s part of our policy. What we have stabilization 1.5. Okay. 1.5 million. Yeah. Yeah. And if, if that got to 2 million, that would eclipse kind of that, that 2% of the operating budget when you remove the offsets. So I mean, I think that’s a, a pretty good, I guess, victory over the last few years that we’ve been building that up and we’re getting towards that policy that we’ve all established. You know, gotta say some good things too, right? Sound like that. Good to bad. And then when we keep using the free cash to balance the operating budget, it gets to a point like where it’s, to what end, you know, we’re really deferring on our investment in our operational needs and our maintenance.

54:07 Um, you know, I just, to me, like my takeaway from it is, you know, that knowing that 80% of our budget was to wages and, you know, we’re presenting now projecting 14%, which is a huge jump in health insurance costs for next year. Um, you know, and trying to live between two and a half percent, we got, you know, inflation over 3% and we’re just starting to see the impact on the consumer, um, with the global trade, um, as it relates to new tariffs. And it’s just, it’s, it’s that when you, the dri the, you know, the, the, the cost drivers, um, far outpace what, you know, in terms of living within the two and a half percent, it just seems not that sustainable.

54:54 And again, like, just to emphasize that, I think you, we really need to get off this free cash carousel that we’ve been on because we’re really getting to a dangerously, um, uncomfortable place, at least for need. Um, And I, I did share with, uh, everyone in the meeting, the MMA perfect storm season fiscal, uh, pressures report that came out. But I know you guys have a puppy town administrator that does really detail what cities and towns are going through right now and, and the issues that we’re facing. Thank you. Thank you so Much. Thank you so much. Thank you. Yeah, thank you very much. So we’re gonna move on to the next, but you don’t leave. Exactly. I don’t. Right. So you’ve got an presentation. We have Parker Elmo here coming. Yes. How are doing? Thanks. Welcome. Appreciate you waiting. No worries. Well, wonderful. The, I’m not necessarily gonna deliver a whole lot

55:39 of great news, but it’ll be better than some of that stuff. It’s all how you look at it. Well, it’s the uplifting meeting. Exactly. So appreciate that. I’ll give you the quick 32nd overview about our firm. We’ve been around since 98. We have 500 plus municipalities we work with around the country. We’re in 37 states, Europe, south America, Europe. In other words, I spent a lot of time on planes. Okay. Enough of that. Um, so what is GASB and why do we do total accrual accounting thing in first vote? Why do we do OPE valuations? Everything was great going along. Pay as you go. Everything was great. Well, the problem is you can’t compare town versus town if you’re all using different standards, different pay as you go. We became accrual accounting, which has been the world of business and everything for forever I guess at this point. Um, so I wanna have a way to accrue everything. And one of the other things is gs, we came up with a calculated discount rate model.

56:25 Um, so you can’t just game the system and go, I wanna use 8%, I wanna use 9%. There’s a calculation how the discount rate is done now to kind of, there’s basically five factors that go into it, which are what are currently small bond rates? How much money are you investing each year? How much money do you currently have? How are you going to invest the money? Conservative, aggressive, whatever. And then how much money are you paying out every year? So it’s which one matters? Depends on where you are on the curve is that’s applied to each municipality. Every municipality discre. Exactly. Yep. Everyone is different. And that’s why you’ll see later why, Hey, how come Martin Discovery exists and there’s that. Exactly. So everyone’s there different. Yeah. Um, so in terms of, you know, what happened, you guys were $151 million last year for a liability on the $147 million today. So that’s good news. Um, part of that is your discount rate, uh, went down,

57:12 which is a negative, but you had a couple other things that were good in your favor that we’ll talk about that in a second. Um, you guys are really for lack of almost at peak liability in terms of as a percentage of your budget. Your opep now is about as large as it’s ever going to get because, you know, Massachusetts and New England especially are mature states, let’s put it that way to put it nicely. Uh, these states are not likely to be growing population wise, the demographics. They’ll tell you that they’re going to get older. Um, so what I tell people, the downside of this is kinda what Alicia was talking about, is bad as the budgets are today, these are the glory days. They’re not going to get any better from here. This is as good as it’s ever gonna get. So I tell people that when you’re making your decisions, because demographics don’t lie, this is not a net migration area of the country.

57:59 And you know, 1.6 is the average fertility rate for women right now in the us Look around the world, that’s not likely to increase. So just math tells you best case scenario, you stay level population. Um, your assets went from 4.5 to 4.9 million assets that ever a good year, about 8.9% rate of return. So very good for you on that. Um, so your unfunded liability went from 147 to $142 million, which is good. Your funded rate 3.37%, not great. Sadly, that puts you on the 25th percentile of the state, which means you’re better than 25% of your peers only in discount of a world in 3.37% achieved at that level. But that’s the world we live in. And the discount rate did drop from 5.74 to 5.51. There’s a couple factors that the biggest factor is expected.

58:45 Future returns by asset class went down. And I posted an article about this today, that what people don’t understand is the market has a really, really good time. That means future returns are likely to be less and simple. Oh, we’ve earned 10% last year. We should jack up the rate. And they’re guys, you earned 10%, which means there’s less available to earn in the future. So some people don’t really grasp that. You guys do have 19, uh, people who are over the age of 65 who remain on active healthcare plans, not Medicare plans. That’s a fairly significant, uh, item in your liability. Not really a whole lot you can do about that ‘cause you’re with the GIC. So it wouldn’t be hugely beneficial, but it is a, that those 19 people, by virtue of not being in a Medicare supplement plan, add about $7 million to your liability.

59:27 On the next page, we talk about the service costs, which is the benefits being earned during the year by active employees. About $3.3 million came down slightly. That largely is based always based in the prior year. Interest rate, higher interest rates equal lower liabilities and vice versa. Talked about $5,200 per employee. So if you think about it, if you’re paying Jimmy or Mary $50,000 a year, we’re also getting $5,200 a year of deferred comp payable in the form of medical benefits in retirement is really the easiest way to think about it. And you have a similar thing in your pension plan, which is service cost as well. Uh, the rest of this, you know, it’s, it’s an income statement type thing and a municipality doesn’t really matter. We’re have your earnings per share here. So I’ll skip on that. Um, the good things, higher turnover than expected, which not saying that’s necessarily good, but from an opep context, it is that cut your liabilities by with $10 million

1:00:14 and we had decrease in the number of retirees and covered spouses, which cut your liabilities by $13 million. That’s good. The discount rate as we spoke about went up, I went down, which increased your liabilities by $4 million. And then the premiums went up by more than expected, adding over $2.6 million of liabilities. Now, I will tell you the 14% increase that Alicia’s talking about, I would tell you is some standard, is actually good news because most of what I’m seeing is 15 to 20 with some is closed as 30. So at 14%, you guys are at the low end of what I’m seeing right now. So I hate to say 14% is good news, but as a Wall Street Journal article today, uh, according to Kff study is saying, this is where we are now with GLP ones cancer, higher utilization provider agreements. Um, so this is our near term world of the next couple years. What we’re gonna be seeing is double digit increases, uh,

1:01:02 the actuarial assumptions. And obviously you guys can ask questions anytime. Don’t feel like you have to wait. Um, so what are the key assumptions to go into this 140 million plus number, the discount rate that we spoke about, the termination rates? What’s the problem if somebody you hired today is still here at 22, 23, 24? Okay, they make it all the way to retirement age. What’s the problem? They retired 55, 56, 57. Great. They retire. What’s the problem? They elect to take coverage. What’s elect? Probably they elect to cover a spouse, but how much money is healthcare cost go up each and every year? I can assure you, I do not know. We make our best guess each year. Um, but assuredly your doctor or your hospital doesn’t care what I said. They’re gonna raise their rates, whatever they’re gonna raise them. And so each year we’ll make our adjustments as we go along.

1:01:46 Alright, Your guys’ plans. Your, you have basically comprehensive medical, dental and a thousand dollars life insurance. This liability is all medical. I mean the life insurance and dental are adorable, but they’re not really what’s driving the numbers. You know, you guys have $1,100 per year for a single active plan, about 4 71 for a Medicare supplement plan. Your guys, you know, uh, right now the state, the national average for a family plan is about 27 grand. You guys are about 31 32 grand. So you guys are higher than the national average. Not surprisingly you’re in Massachusetts. I would expect you to be higher than the national average. I’m sorry, You said the average active single plan, that’s you, that’s yearly or Monthly year. That’s that’s a monthly cost. That’s monthly. Yeah. For, for single plan. Yep. And for a family plan, you guys are about to say about 32 grand a year in this. The national are about 27. Here are just some examples of, you know,

1:02:31 where everybody falls to be in the 90th percentile as a town, you have to give about 60% funded. Uh, you guys are bit of a ways from that. Um, again, as you can see, towns fund better than cities, not surprisingly. Uh, cities generally don’t fund much at all. So if you’re a city, you guys would be in the top app. So see, it’s all on how you look at it. Just find your peers. Um, so, um, we came up with some peers to just, we try to people your geographically close or, uh, demographically close in terms of size. You guys can see you’re at a 5 51 discount rate. People like Boxford and Danvers are higher. Uh, Newbury port’s similar to where you guys are tops field’s higher. Um, most of them have much higher funded ratios. Um, they’ve been funding a lot more money. I mean, it’s simple as that. It’s, uh, not saying it’s easy

1:03:16 to come up with the money, but you know, math is math. The more money you put in, you have more money to earn. Kind of like Alicia showed with the interest rates, you know, interest rates have come down, but also some of the capital you guys have had invested with ARPA funds going away is the principal come down and the rate comes down. So what are the returns? So same kind of a thing here. Um, you know, you guys overall you’ll see on, well, one more slide. Pour get there. The service cost. We break this down by, by per department it’s not terribly meaningful. Um, because your departments really aren’t that big. You know, just look at water enterprise. I mean, you don’t have that many people there. Sewer enterprise, not that many people.

1:03:51 The town is higher, which is because that’s where the police and fire is. Um, and public safety people have the highest service cost because they work the shortest careers. They’ve, they come in, they leave at an earlier age, therefore means they have a longer period of retirement. So that means their service cost is, they have a higher liability than they grew over a shorter period of time. On the next page is kind of a, a 30 year projection of what we expect to have happen. Now, if you look at just the opep liability goes from 145 million to 450 million over the next 30 years. Seems insane. I guide your, your eyes over the right hand side of the screen, which is basically present value discount everything back today at 3%. And you see the liability gives from 146 million, you know, goes, basically stays flat and it comes down to 140 million. And the pay as you cost owe cost to retirees goes from 6 million, comes up

1:04:38 to seven, it goes back to six. So, long story short, your liability, like I said, you really have peak liability in terms of what is, is the percentage of your budget to the extent you can afford the retiree healthcare. And this is not all healthcare, it’s retirees only to the extent you can afford the retiree healthcare part of the budget. It’s gonna basically stay the same portion of your budget. Um, you know, the issue is can you afford that? I mean, the budgets are tight for you and every other town that I deal with. So you’re not alone in that regard. And as I was telling at Alicia before the meeting, I have towns looking at all kinds of strategies to try and, you know, find nipples and couch cushions and everything else they can to try and make the budgets work. But I mean, ultimately, as I tell us, every town I work with, um, you know, in other parts of of the country that I work, there’s a lot more things you can do. The state of Massachusetts is much more of a top down state,

1:05:23 which means they take away most of the tools we use. You can’t change the eligibility for benefits. You can’t change retirement eligibility that’s fixed at the state level. Uh, you can’t charge beyond 50%. That’s fixed at the state level. Um, you know, you can’t do certain things about do you wanna cover spouses or not cover spouses? That’s fixed at the state level. So a lot of these things that we do in other states where I might have premium reimbursements that are based on how many years you work or how at what age you retire, we can’t do those things here. Uh, but that’s the world we live in. So we gotta make this system work. Uh, you guys have done, you know, a good job as much as you can on opep, as hard as it is to save with $140 million. But it’s still, again, the number’s not growing in today’s dollars. So you guys have have done the things you can do.

1:06:08 Um, you know, the only o other thing you have, and you look at the Medicare supplement thing, and again, so long as you’re with the GIC, there’s not a whole lot you can do. Now you could change, you know, you could change that and go somewhere else, but you know, people are still gonna go to the same doctors. So the healthcare cost is largely gonna be the same. You say, well what about Medicare Advantage plans? I see all these people on TV advertising. Know your zip code, Medicare Advantage all sounds great, but I just posted an article I should go tomorrow’s newsletter about in Vermont. All the providers are pulled out of Vermont. They down, there’s seven counties now. They pulled out a lot of places to mass. So, you know, there is no silver bullet. You know, eventually the insurance companies and doctors wanna make money and as costs go up and they can’t get reimbursed, they pull out. So, you know, you can, you can buy time,

1:06:53 buy year here, buy year there. But eventually it’s a structural problem. You know, more people are going to the doctor for, they want GLP ones and more expensive things that may save money 30, 40, 50 years from now. But it doesn’t help this year’s budget. And that’s the problem that everybody’s dealing with. So I know there’s a lot there. Questions, comments, concerns. I mean, a lot of concerns. I I understand that we know Anybody nicely. Yeah, thank Yeah. Yeah. Anybody Fixed costs. Yeah. Yeah. I do have a question Yeah. Is around you, how the system works. I remember when I came aboard as, you know, on the fin comm initially liability, it was a one 20. It’s, you know, is if you, you know, good news, it’s not gonna increase, hopefully be beyond 150 million. But you know, if you look at the 50, you know, 50th percentile, you get basically a 10% funding rate of Yeah. Among towns, right? Yeah. So that’s a real systemic issue.

1:07:39 Uhhuh. But I guess, uh, you know, what are your, what are your thoughts around how, you know, how towns are kind of addressing this massive liability? Is there kind of like a timeframe expectation? Um, not funding. It’s Not, it’s not a timeframe. Well, well two things I would tell. But the one, the one strategy that we kind of talked to people about, and I think you guys are doing this with your funding policy is, um, think of retire. Think of one overall retirement liability of pension. Opep as one overall liability. Now the state mandates do you fund pensions? That’s a given. You have to do it no problem. The OPE is really, it’s still part of the retirement liability. So it had, it’s, it’s second tier, it’s number two in the priority list. And so the argument is, you said an overall retirement funding budget, I’ll just, for example, call $10 million a year, maybe pension is $9 million this year. So fine, OPEP gets a million.

1:08:24 And the next year pen pension might be 9.5. We go to 500,000, whatever it happens to be. And that number might say go up two point a half percent a year. But your pension system eventually in theory is gonna be fully funded. Right? So when that’s done, then that frees up that $10 million of pension to all come over to opep. And then by 2054 or whatever the date is, OPEP becomes fully funded. Now that’s hard to do because you go, I thought I was getting out of this stuff and what do you mean? I wanna go over there. But the reality is, you know, promises were made, people think they’re getting these benefits and so the money has to be somewhere and you can go, well that’s 2054 fin comm’s problem. And you can do that. And plenty of people have. But I mean, the reality is if you wanna be responsible, why don’t you kind of have to address it? And the rating agencies look at this stuff, um,

1:09:11 and we can argue, Hey, how come the folks in 1975 didn’t start funding these things? Well, they should have, but they didn’t. So this is where we are. And the same thing on the pension side. Why did we get stuck with a big bill on the pension side? That’s just the reality of life. So how do we get from here to there? And the question is really design the timeframe. You know, as I always tell clients, OPEP wants a seat at the table, at the capital table, but there’s a lot of other things you guys have to do from schools to fire trucks to school buses and boilers and you name it. So it’s a matter, but it also can’t get ignored ‘cause there’s liability’s not going anywhere. It’s generally the first or number one or number two side liability on your balance sheet. So we’re going, we, I am gonna submit that Thatcher a funding plan for the tax That explosion. We will not be locking up a hundred percent

1:09:57 of the pension funds that are going to be free because of budgetary constraints that we are facing and will face in the future rights.

1:10:07 Now, is there a measure of progress kind of with Launching? Well, the nice thing is you do have a financial policy where they, we do usually put the 2 51. Yeah, but that’s, we had to not, but I mean, it’s something, at least it’s at least stabilizing as Parker said, versus roaming. So it’s something, um, but we will have a plan in place for the future. Yeah, I mean, the big thing is you can’t get home with the nominal numbers. ‘cause you know, a dollar 20 years dollars worth less than a dollar table. When you look at as a percentage of your budget, it’s, you know, X percent of your budget, it should stay fairly stable over time. Yeah. You know, and again, the big thing is it’s, you’re not gonna solve this problem in an afternoon. It’s gonna be a bunch of series of small changes. It’s things you do on the Medicare supplement side, that’s where all the money is. It’s on prescription drugs. And you know, as I always tell people, listen guys, the hardest thing to do is change the healthcare plans.

1:10:52 But that’s also where all the money is. You know, we can change assumptions, but I can assume everybody’s gonna die at 65 and your liabilities go to zero. But people are still gonna live as long as they’re gonna live. So it doesn’t change the reality of life. The cost of the plan is the benefits to get paid over time. Well, a lot Of times we’re kicking the can down the road. Right? I think hundred percent. We, we need to definitely see what a plan looks like. Yeah. Great. Yeah, you guys are all said. Thank you. Appreciate your coming. Appreciate your time. You gonna go back on a plane? Uh, not, not today. I finish for a couple days yet. Thank you. Appreciate thanks. Hard work about all this. Next up we have an on-call plumbing inspector for Nelson Gag. Steve, you want come off Nelson here as well. Great. Good evening. Good evening. Our building commissioner. Steve. How you doing?

1:11:38 Good, thanks. Lemme give us a quick and so Yeah, uh, uh, for a while we’ve, we’ve lacked, uh, we’ve, we’ve been very fortunate that our plumbing inspector doesn’t take much time off. Um, he doesn’t get sick that often. The reality is, uh, he actually is going in for a knee replacement in another week. And, uh, you know, it’s not really fair that he doesn’t have a backup. And it has actually, I, I believe it’s, um, it’s obligated by law that we do have a backup. Um, I’ve wor I, I know I have worked with Nelson Gagnan in the city of Salem. Mm-hmm. Um, he’s very experienced as well as, um, he’s pretty well seasoned. He’s a backup plumbing inspector and a few other towns.

1:12:27 Clearly he enjoys it. He’s knowledgeable, he is personable. Um, and I, I really think we are more lucky to have him than he is to have us. Mm-hmm. Um, come on, I’ll let him Just be, you know, he’s not doing it for the money. Um, but we need somebody and he stepped up for the plate and I, I think he’d, he’d be a good fit for what we need. Great. Great. Great. Seems pretty straightforward. I read his resume. Looks very well qualified, obviously. So appreciate that. If I could have a motion to appoint Nelson gag on call plumbing inspector with the term to expire in June of 2026. So move All in favor A unanim. Thanks. All right. Thanks Steve. All right. Next we have Harvard’s and Waters for interviews and appointment. Uh, we do have one vacancy for an alternate member

1:13:15 of term one year, and we have three applicants. We’re lucky enough to have three very great applicants here. We’ve got Matthew Burke, Andy Garnet, and John Lucas. So, uh, welcome three of you. I think I see all three of you there. There you’re, um, so just let you know the process here. We will interview you each one at a time. If you haven’t interviewed yet, we’re gonna ask you to sit outside just so you don’t hear what everyone else says. Um, so, and then after that we will ask you, ask you a few questions after you have interviewed, you’re welcome to stay and listen to the next per person since you’re done. And then after that, we will, uh, have a discussion and vote on, on who to appoint. So if, uh, Andy and John, if you don’t mind waiting on the hallway, you’re welcome to talk to each other, what you’re do. So first up, Matthew, if you don’t mind coming up.

1:14:01 Appreciate it. Good evening. Good evening. Thank you for waiting. Um, so if you want to, we have your resume as well as your letter. Thank you for that. Let’s, um, you just wanna tell us a little bit about yourself, quick overview and why you’re looking for the position. Uh, I’ve been a resident for 14 years. Okay. Um, excuse me. And I’ve worked professionally as a captain, uh, in years past until the, um, the winters got too cold and I got in that industry, they call a real job and moved into an office, uh, with logistics. I’m currently now a director of transportation, uh, for DSG logistics, located in puberty. I’ve always been a passionate voter. Um, my family, we’ve always had one. My daughters have been raised on boats here in Marblehead.

1:14:48 I’ve very passionate about the harbor and I’ve, you know, always been a little bit of an introvert, but when I saw this position come available, I thought it was something that I could participate in and Great. Great. Uh, why don’t we go on questions. Kim, do you wanna start? We, we don’t have to. I’ll ask questions. Uh, Yeah, no, I was, uh, gonna ask now what, what do you see as, you know, significant issues with the hiring wise board? Do you see any things? Uh, the issue is, um, with the lack of funding with the project at, uh, state Street Yeah. Is gonna be, um, very difficult for them. Possibility a, um, an override which someone one wants to see. Um, I’d also like to see more, some more emphasis placed on the, uh, the village tree side.

1:15:33 Um, there, I’ve noticed there were some problems with the docks over there this year that didn’t seem to get fully addressed. Uh, and then possibly, I mean, the possibility of saying if is there other, um, revenue streams that can be possibly be brought in to, uh, increase the enterprise fund?

1:15:49 Have you had a chance to go to any meetings? I familiarize yourself a typical idea. I have been to a meeting or two, uh, last year. Okay. And, you know, I’ll put forward, I think it helps when everyone kind of brings a different level of expertise and experience. We spoke a little bit about what your background is when just your overview of like meetings and knowing what for, what would you say for you that you would bring, some people bring more of a financial piece, some people bring more of a, you know, experience of being on the water and what, you know, maybe some of the local merchants need, those types of things. Where would you say you would kind of fit into that mix? I think, uh, on the financial side, I’m used to dealing with budgeting in my, in my current position.

1:16:35 Um, allocating, um, doing our budget for transportation for the year, um, moving our own product. And then also what we’re bringing is revenue. Um, so I’m used to that. And also what I’m seeing day to day, you know, as being on our, being on our own vessels Yeah. In the harbor and seeing what can be approved upon. Okay. Awesome. Great. Hey, you, you go ahead. No, go ahead. Yeah. Um, You mentioned your, you know, your, your time on the water. Yeah. What, what, perhaps you could just clarify a little bit your, your specific experience with the, with the marble head, front collar boat and, you know, what, what has drawn you to, you know, to to any activity regarding, regarding that, just In general? Um, we keep a few power boats over in the West Shore. Yep.

1:17:21 And I’m very active. Um, one of the boats doesn’t come out at all. We use it volume as much as we can all year. Yeah. Um, and seeing

1:17:34 how things have changed over the years. Um, I have some thoughts upon those. Um, you know, I, we see a lot more patrols on the harbor, um, that I would see myself. Um, I haven’t seen those in much in the, in the past years. And it’s the ability of, um, someone that’s having an issue to flag down, um, a town official, you know, I’m having problems. Um, I think we could do more for voter education. Mm-hmm. There’s a law coming up that’s gonna require voting licenses, and I think that town should be providing information on where these people, um, can be getting them. I’d also like to see, um, a way to bring more children involved in boating. To be honest with you, I grew up with boats and I don’t see as many children running

1:18:21 around on little boats in the harbor on, on little whalers. And I have some thoughts on how we could possibly increase that usage. Great. Thank you. Um, my question was going to be, uh, you, you already touched on it with regard to budgeting and ‘cause one of the core responsibilities of the board is to prepare the budget and in conjunction with the Harbor master, the enterprise fund and operate and maintain that. That’s really the self-sustaining, um, that, uh, vehicle, um, for the harbors and waters, um, projects. And, uh, so you’ve touched about a little bit about how you, um, were involved. You are involved in your professional career with the budgeting. The current board and longstanding members of the firm board have expressed a preference, um, for somebody to join the board board

1:19:10 with real finance budgeting experience. So just saying that for the benefit of, of the board. Um, is there anything else you wanted to add about that? I mean, I don’t want, you don’t have to repeat yourself, but that was my question. If you wanted to, you elaborate on any of it, you have the opportunity,

1:19:26 I guess I would say it would be my ability to learn about it and to help participate and help move it forward. It’s not something I wanna turn a blind eye to, and it’s, it would be my, as I said, very passionate about the harbor. And I think that would translate into my ability to learn and to help, um, help with the budgeting process. Great. Um, over the last few years, there’s been a lot of conversations and debates about increasing public access to the harbor and to the water, especially for those who don’t have access to, to clubs. Mm-hmm. Do you have many ideas on, on how that might be improved? Doesn’t necessarily have to be through a club or something like that, but just public access to the water, especially

1:20:08 On the West Shore. You have an interesting scenario. Yeah. Because you have 1200 vessels over there being serviced by 400 launch by four launches. Mm-hmm. Um, and on in Marblehead Harbor it’s 1800 moorings with about 12 launches. Mm-hmm. So there is a, there’s definitely a difference. Um, is there a possibility they could add more now the more rings are fixed, there’s only so many that can be out there. Is there a way that they could put more rings in at the docks? I know at Village Street, is it possible to put rings on those first two floats that sit in the mud? Mm-hmm. And you know that your ring, your boat’s gonna sit in the mud. I mean, another way to provide access. Right. And also is, I mean, is there more, um, opportunities for public launches? We, well, thank you. Thank you. Very informational.

1:20:55 Appreciate you coming.

1:21:14 Welcome, Andy. Thank you. Thanks for waiting. Of course. Uh, I just wanna take a couple seconds or a couple minutes, whatever you feel wanna do to tell us a little bit about your background. Sure. We have your resume and also why you’re applying. Yeah. Uh, my name’s Andy Garnets, uh, eight partly Street Marblehead, uh, applying ‘cause I, you know, wanna get involved in the town. Uh, and I kind of took a look through the website and see, you know, what the open positions were and kind of what the different departments were. And I thought that this may fit, uh, some of my skills. Um, a little about me, I’m a commercial construction estimator project manager. Um, so I managed jobs from 10 million to 150 million. Um, so I thought, you know, that might, uh, help in terms of budgeting, going through, uh, budgets, projects, um, anything else that the Harbors and Water Board might be a part of.

1:21:59 Great. We’re gonna ask you some questions we start, Jim. Okay. Yeah. Um, what, what do you see as, uh, key issues to the, our models for, uh, today? Um, just, you know, keeping access for everyone to be able to enjoy the harbor. Um, obviously, um, global warming, uh, that’s a hot ticket item. Uh, and making sure that we’re, you know, allocating money to, you know, preserve the harbor and keep access for everybody. Good. Hi. Hi. Um, thanks for being Of course. Have you had an opportunity to join any of the meetings to speak with anyone else on the board? Uh, I haven’t joined of the meetings, but I’ve spoken, uh, to one member, uh, Rick Hener on the board. Okay, great. And you know, I think one of the things that makes board, uh, really work well is everyone comes with a different level of knowledge, expertise,

1:22:46 things in their background. So obviously there’s, you know, issues with making sure people have access and finance and all the other pieces that come into managing this board. What would you say would be something that you would bring as your strength? Like what would you highlight and say, okay, this is, you know, one of the things I would bring forward, participate in The board? Obviously you mentioned project management. Yeah. But anything else you’d like to share? Um, uh, just, you know, I’d say access to the harbor for everyone. Um, so I’m also on the board of the Maddie’s Anglers Club. We put on a lot of events during the summer, uh, with the Harbor Master. We cleaned up Parker’s boatyard this year. The neighbors were super thrilled about that. Uh, put on some nice events, um, some more just, you know, some, you know, family oriented events. Uh, you know, not just fishing is kind of what I’m geared toward the, the Maddie’s Club.

1:23:31 So looking to try to, you know, continue that. Okay. See if I can bring anything that to the, uh, the board. Awesome. Great. This is kind of an extension of Alexis question. Sure. I mean, based on your experience on the water or what would, what, what things would you like to see improved or initiative statement to improve the experience on, Um, everybody’s experience? Sure. Uh, you know, I think education. I think the new law that was passed about voters’ licensing is gonna help. Um, I’ve had a Morgan in the harbor since when I was about 18, and I’ve seen, you know, probably in the last 10 years is less and less people that I wanna say don’t know what they’re doing. But, you know, there’s a lot more wake in the harbor than there used to be. So, yeah, I’d say, I’d say education, um, you know, how we can provide education as part of the application and the, uh, you know, the mooring, uh, you know, renewal system. Um, you know, anything like that. Great. Thank you.

1:24:17 Alright. Well thank you so much for already volunteering with the anglers. No, Of course. Again, yeah, That’s really great and a nice asset to, uh, maybe my question was just gonna be around, um, budget and direct involvement in that process. We have, um, a board that long term, it’s long, a few long longstanding members are gonna be rolling off. They’ve expressed a preference around somebody with a finance background or ability to kind of get up to speed on that enterprise fund. Mm-hmm. Uh, operations. So you’ve already answered, you know, I, we’ve got, you’re involved with 10, $15 million budget project management. I didn’t know if you wanted to like, you know, like how you would handle, how you handle your philosophies on like budget shortfalls

1:25:03 or if you wanted to expound on it at all. But I do think you answered my question. Okay. Yeah, sure. Uh, basically, yeah, it’s, um, you know, I’ve experienced both building budgets, maintaining budgets, and then fixing budgets. Um, you know, I’ve done that throughout 20 years in the commercial construction business. Uh, so I think I could bring a lot of experience with that, uh, to the board. So thank you. Great. I got one more for you Andy, and then you’re done. Yeah. Um, you discussed increasing public access Yes. To the water. Do you have any ideas on how you could do that? I think we can utilize Parker’s, right? I think we did a great job cleaning that up. Mm-hmm. Um, I think we can utilize that. Um, and one of my kind of crazy ideas is, you know, everyone wants to be in Marlet Harbor, right. And, you know, we’ve got the Freedom Boat Club, all the different boat clubs in Danvers and Salem, and if we had some sort of access in Marlet, ‘cause everyone just wants to be in the harbor, right. Um, you know, they know they’ve got the options in Salem,

1:25:51 they know they’ve got in Danvers and Beverly, but everyone wants to be in the main harbor. So, um, you know, anything creative we can do with that, you know, uh, I know there’s tons of legalities and technicalities with it, but, um, and it’s probably already been Explored, but, uh, yeah, it was one of the things I was Thinking about because mean you can’t look at it again. Right, right. Yeah. All right. Well, I appreciate All right. Have a seat. Well, thank you guys. Yeah, thank you Andy. Thanks so much.

1:26:26 Come on and thank you. And yeah, appreciate you waiting and, and for volunteering to set yourself up. Um, just wanna take a little time to tell us a little bit about yourself. We do have your resume. Yeah. But anything you wanna let us know and, and why, why you’re here. Uh, sure. So my name’s John Lucas, uh, born in Salem, raised in Marblehead, went to Marble Public Schools. Um, went to Virginia Tech as an engineer. Graduated, uh, in December of 2024, uh, doing computer engineering work currently as a contractor, but among federal employees at Portmouth Naval Shipyard in Kittery. I do make that drive up from Marblehead every day. Uh, it is not a lie. Um, there I work on fast attack submarines, so Los Angeles class

1:27:11 and Virginia class submarines. I work on a specific project. It’s me and three other engineers, although it was two at one point, um, that work on all electronic systems in these submarine and specifically a project. So we work on anything from a light to an outlet to a motor, to a transducer, um, to, uh, controls. Um, and that’s kind of my strong suit is I’ve done projects in the past where I’ve worked

1:27:46 specifically on maritime engineering projects down in Quincy, um, and Braintree, where I worked on projects like that. And I’ve also worked in the, uh, area working on environmental robotics, um, and kind of reef surveying robots that in particular we tested in marble, Harvard. Um, so I have a lot of experience with that. I can get into the fact that John Payne was my marine shop teacher in high school. I can get into the fact that I worked at, uh, or worked, took a course in Northeastern regarding, um, or at the, uh, Northeastern Marine biology center. And not, um, to answer your question, not to make a long, drawn out response. Good. Um, I’m very passionate about public service.

1:28:32 I’m also very passionate about the ocean. Um, I’ve been here for so long and engineering and honestly, you know, this town, and that’s kind of why I’m here. I saw an opening and I thought it’s the perfect position for me. Great. Thank you. Appreciate that. That was great. Yeah. Appreciate that, Jim. Yeah. Um, what, what issues do you see, uh, uh, it important for the Harvard Water Board, uh, at this time? Well, um, I looked back at the records that you guys have online. Um, I didn’t look back through all of them, but mainly 2025. And I saw a, a few key elements. One was that, I mean, I know it got hampered because of the, uh, three a bill, but you guys have the,

1:29:18 or trying to stop environmental erosion specifically on State Street and Cliff. And then you also have an irrigation problem, and then at the landing, and then a negras problem at, uh, well, most of the area, but specifically on towards West Shore Drive. And I think the erosion problems, probably the biggest one that I’ve seen seeing as you guys have adamantly been talking about it throughout past meetings and minutes. Um, now it’s kind of tough given the budgetary, you know, uh, issues unfortunately, and the 500,000 loss. But I would say you’re not asking for a solution, which I’m hope, hoping you’re not, that’s probably the biggest problem. Thank you. Great. Thank you so much for being here. No, ies.

1:30:05 Thank you. So, uh, I, my question for you is, have you, had you spoke about reading through the minutes Sure. Have you had an opportunity to go to any of the meetings yet or speak with anyone on the board? Just familiarize yourself with the, I haven’t been able to speak on the, or speak to anybody on the board nor, um, attend these meetings. But I have tried to watch as many as I could online from past sessions. Both, um, these meetings as well as, uh, school committee ones, um, just to get more involved and, and get used to the town gets kind of tough given the fact that, especially now I’m outta the house 12, 13 hours of the day. Part of it’s driving. Yeah. The other part’s kinda allowed to have phones where I’m at, so. Makes sense. Um, but, uh, doing the best I can

1:30:53 to get involved is, and, um, you know, to, to answer your question, no, but I’ve been putting effort in. I think the other part of that is, you know, um, just curious to see if we’ve gotten at the board, be because everybody on a board when it’s successful brings a little bit of a different background and different area of expertise. So you spoke a lot about what your experience is, but what would you say, you know, some people are finding it, some people are, you know, project related. Sure. People are more into, you know, publicity and marketing and, you know, making sure communication with public. What type of thing would you say you would bring to the board? What would your, if you were gonna highlight one of your strengths that you would bring? Um, well, I noticed that a lot of the things in the past that I’ve seen that you guys deal with this project specifically on the Harbors and Waters board.

1:31:39 And that’s kind of my specialty as an engineer. Specifically. I, I am a systems engineer, which focuses on the high level aspect of planning, you know, resource, uh, I guess procurement, um, requirements analysis, uh, what else, cost analysis, whether it makes it even sense to go forward with the project, dealing with stakeholders, um, talking with stakeholders. So I have a lot of project experience and I think that could be valuable, especially bringing it to the Harbors and Waters board, well, specifically a project experience related to ocean environments. So, Yeah. Great. Awesome. Alright, Mr. Greater John, listen, thank you for your service with, uh, a very important composed of the Native Service.

1:32:27 Well, maybe not me, but I appreciate it. Know, they, you know, what they say about people who work on submarines, right? They’re the, they’re the smartest ones, so I Appreciate it. Great, great. Um, well, just based on your experience in, in Marble and Harbor, are there any initiatives that you’d like to see, uh, you know, perhaps implemented in, uh, in the harbor? If you had a, you know, if you had a, had a wishlist, Uh, initiatives? Yeah. Just, uh, you know, to, to improve the, the, the harbor, uh, and and experience on the water for Marble Hunter. Um, well, okay. Are you referring to on the water, you’re saying, when you refer to on the water, do you mean like on the coast or? Yeah, just in, in, yeah. Uh, just base. Well, I don’t mean to, the only reason I ask is because, so I’m talking about the, if you’re talking about

1:33:13 on the coast, then, you know, that would be obviously looking at the water and, and dealing with the irrigation, flooding issues as well as structural issues. So, I mean, that would be, yeah, I guess I’m talking more from the perspective of the experience figure. Yeah, yeah. Boat. Yeah. The boat ladies, um, have so forth. Well, I mean, obviously moorings are, uh, a big thing and hard to come by as well as, you know, as someone that has been on a boat and been in that Harvard finding places to launch the boat and everything. Um, specifically if you go to Riverhead, you can’t launch a boat at any time, really, besides high Tide and, you know, the area by the, um, little Harbor, it’s kind of hard to launch off as well.

1:34:00 Um, for boaters themselves. I mean that using my engineering kind of ideas, uh, easier places to launch would probably be better. But then that gets kind of hard, you know, to do. Um, I, I’m, I won’t give a solution, but I would say that definitely is probably a problem I see is a, a hard time people launching their boats given, especially in the, well, not really in the summer, but the traffic that happens, especially at Riverhead when pulling docks, um, and in all the events that are happening. Thanks, Sean. Good, good, good response. Isha. So, um, John, I, um, one of the responsibilities of, uh, the board is to prepare the budget and, um, in, you know, launch the Harvard Master and, uh, manage the enterprise fund.

1:34:46 Do you have any experience directly, um, in, in budgeting throughout your background? Yeah, I, I, uh, I have to budget for my job. I mean, so currently I’ve spent probably at my job on materials alone at 200,000. Um, and that doesn’t include the fact that in the past experiences and projects I’ve had to budget out beforehand as well as, you know, worry about not only cost and material, but me in hours as well. So I, I have experienced budget. Okay. Thank you. Uh, thanks, John. I can’t say go hold please, but I will. Uh, sorry. Shh. Yeah, I, I I got it. Um, there’s been a lot of conversations over the years about increasing public access for the water, the harbor. Yeah. Do you have any ideas on how, how we could achieve that? You and Matt, the launch? Well, yeah, I mean, besides the launch, I mean, uh,

1:35:35 I don’t know how many people have talked about this in the town, but I mean, there were, there are a bunch of fishing lanes, particularly in the neck, right, that can’t really see too much, but are available to the public. Um, and in specific, I know that there’s one or an issue going on with the fact that, uh, I forget what house it is, but they’re trying to claim that the land is private property and that access to the beach is Yes. Is, um, well, it’s not public and I mean, obviously public access to the beaches is very important. I think maybe a simple initiative would be just putting out there, you know, maybe on the town or, or something along the lines of that, of I guess just access

1:36:20 to the water in certain areas is public where it’s not as well known because who wants to be known. Exactly. Yep. That’s our job, for sure. Yeah. Well, thank you. Really appreciate you taking your time and thank you. Been volunteering. Pleasure. Um, thank you. Why don’t we start, if I could have a motion to place all the names to nomination to fill the alternate member vacancy on the Harbors and Waters board? So, moved Second. All in favor? Yeah. So our process here is that we will go around the circle or last circle. We all go around, do a roll call vote, and each person will nominate a, a name. Uh, if someone gets a majority, which is three, and they will be our nominee. Uh, if we don’t get a majority of the first round, then we will move on to the second round

1:37:06 with the top two highest vote getters. So, uh, is there any discussion before, or are you guys ready to go to both? I, I’d just like to make a comment, um, that I think each three of these candidates bring would be of tremendous value add as a new member. Um, it stands out to me that, you know, Matt has this logistics background and kind of customer service was set to me. Um, you know, Andy, the project management, um, and obviously John, I mean, one of the roles is to be a liaison with the US Army Corps of Engineers. Mm-hmm. He’d be a great asset, um, his background and, you know, whoever, um, is not selected. I really, really would encourage you to, um, to stay, uh, with it

1:37:51 because the board is definitely, um, going through some transition, just a natural succession of the board, um, over the next few years. And so, uh, it, you just all stand out as really, really overly like really great qualified, um, uh, backgrounds for the job. And so it’s, this is like the hardest part, um, of what we do and always makes me a little uncomfortable because it, it’s like, it’s a really tough choice right here. Yeah. I’d just like to echo that. It is difficult because, and we have those spoils of talent essentially, uh, here tonight. So, yeah. Uh, you know, we would encourage you to keep volunteering, uh, to the TA and, uh, the talent relies on, on your expertise and, and spirit to, uh, to forward. So

1:38:36 Yeah, I mean, along those lines is a question of what we think of the biggest void to fill is there, right. And decision making on that, on that current board. It doesn’t necessarily mean that their skill sets aren’t, aren’t, aren’t great or needed, but if it’s filling those gaps to make sure that we have a well-rounded board for sure. All right. Let’s get to it. Patrick, if you’ll do a roll call, Mr. Sisson? Yeah. I just want to add you, uh, Matthew, Randy, and John. Uh, I am going to give, uh, my vote to Matthew Bur on two things. One is the commercial captain’s license he has, and anybody that goes with that, with safety and, and so forth. And also he’s, um, in the transportation business, which the both harbors are a big transportation model, I guess, and, uh, uh, has some budgeting experience there.

1:39:22 So that’s my fault. Okay. Same. And so I would echo the same thing, kind of the question that I asked the applicants is trying to look at balancing, and I would just, uh, what everyone else said, everyone is incredibly qualified, and I appreciate your time and please continue to volunteer and very, very lucky to have the quality of applicants that we have. Um, I am gonna put forth

1:39:49 Ms. Lu, I wish I could vote for more than all of them, but, um, I think, uh, I think I’ll, I’ll, uh, vote for Matt as well. Um, you know, with the, like we, you know, thinking about the finance background and, um, some logistic management stuff that, um, that’d be great. Uh, I’ll vote for Matt. Mr. Degrader, Uh, I think we’re at a majority, aren’t we?

1:40:18 We can still put you on record though. Well, listen, I would like, I would, uh, uh, I’d vote for, for Andy Garnets because of his, uh, you know, his, his expertise in, uh, budgeting. There’s a, there’s a need there that’s, that’s specific to project management and complex project management. Okay. Mr. Fox, You want me to throw out this vote that, that, that means nothing. I like to be able than, or here? Um, yeah. I, I would’ve voted for Andy Garnets as well. Um, it’s a, I think it’s a toss up again. I just, uh, with his experience with it, with anglers, his, his finance background, um, and all that, it’s again, I wanna vote for too. So, um, so thank you.

1:41:06 Uh, congratulations, Matthew, John, Andy, I would recommend, again to the state involved you guys, whether it’s here somewhere else, we definitely need volunteers. We’re all volunteers, and if this isn’t this forward, there’s plenty of places that we could use your expertise or even just your common sense. So thank you. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you. Matthew. Uh, you just need to get sworn in, correct? Sorry. Um, just so at some point you need to go stop by the town. Stop by the town clerk before you first,

1:41:37 so hard. All right. Let’s, let’s move on from our depressing or feeling. Yeah. All right. That’s good that we have a good choice. If it wasn’t hard, then we wouldn’t have good people, is what I would say as well. Um, next up, let’s move on. This one’s gonna be maybe a little easier for you. Alexa. Um, council on Aging interview and appointment. If, uh, Suzanne, is it cruel? Right? Awesome. Everyone makes fun of me for being horrible with aging. Come on up. There’s me. They, well, no, you’re, you’re employed. We still have to vote for you. Okay. So, okay. Um, thank you for coming. Um, as, as we asked before, please tell us a little bit about yourself. Uh, we have your, your resume and, uh, and a town, uh, cover letter, but just a little bit about yourself and why you wanted to be part of the council in. Okay. Um, I, um, live in Marblehead.

1:42:24 I’ve lived in Marton for over 50 years, and I also being 50 years, I’m a member of Council on Nature just by being there 50 years. Um, I have, with a lot of experience in finance, I have a lot of board experience, nonprofit experience, and above all, I have been involved with the COA board since 2012. So I have a lot, I, between friends of the Council on Aging and the Cons on Angie board. I’ve been on those boards. Um, I obviously am very committed to the COAI think it is an incredible asset to this community, and I really feel that I wanna put my time into that kind of a commitment because I think it’s so needed and so worthwhile.

1:43:12 Great. Thank you. Um, I don’t have any questions. Other people have questions. Um, I’m looking at your resume. We’ve done a ton of fun hearing. Uh, I’m gonna, I’m gonna match Alexa, and I’m gonna say go blue. Oh. So yeah, Absolutely. Go blue. Absolutely. Um, since now that’s open game. Thank you. Um, you know, I mean, your involvement in Children’s Fund and family, it’s YWCA as well as everything else. It’s, we’re lucky to have you apply for this, so thank you. I love being there. So, Yeah. Thank you for, for, for keeping on. Yeah, exactly. Thank you. So, that’s it. I ha could we have a motion to appoint Suzanne ga to the council and agent with a term to expire in June, 2028? Moved. Second. Second. Double second. Okay. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Thank you. Welcome.

1:43:58 Thank you very Much. Appreciate it. Alright, next up, bro. Not even making end. I’m sorry. Not. It’s okay. I’m not, I’m never attempting your full name. Who, who did you drag along though? I, between Bobblehead, VFW Commander Ron Knight Did stole the chair. Moses stole the chair. Thank, thank you. Not, not, that’s not Dutch chair. No, it’s not. That’s, that’s a good lead into it. Um, because we work hand in hand with our ceremonies. Yep. No, we, listen, I don’t care what Moses says. I’m really happy to have you here. Thank you. Just ignore it. Okay. Yeah. I don’t want, we, we all, so if you, I think we’re gonna start with the, uh, veterans Day on November 11th. Yes. Just wanna give this overview of that. So it’s just basically the same as last year.

1:44:44 We’re keeping it very simple. Um, commander Knight is, has three speakers lined up. We’re just waiting to hear from one one of them. Okay. And, um, Moses Thank you for agreeing to do the proclamation. We have our chaplain, we have, um, the chorus director already committed to us, which is nice. And then, um, Mr. Collins already committed to us as well for taps. And then we will, after we finish that, we will go over to the VFW for brunch, breakfast, lunch. Great. Yeah, so keeping it very simple. Um, it’s the day after Congressman Moulton’s event. He moved it to six 30 at night. So I’ll be there then and I’ll be at our, so

1:45:30 Great. Perfect. I’m just putting this in my phone. I’m not texting’s out there wandering. Just I gave you a schedule I know I put in

1:45:40 Yeah, yeah. Morning food. Um, food. Great. And I gave everybody a list of the events. There was an event last, last week, last Saturday, last Saturday for, um, read Across America, because we’re doing that again. So, and, um, upcoming events. We’re supporting the New England Home homeless veterans with, um, items that they need a donation. And, um, there’s a young author, she doesn’t live here. She was in PV, I believe, and she did this last year when I came on, who, um, is having a fundraiser for us at F Ruckus in Redding, and 20% of the proceeds, if they hand in the flyer, we’ll go to our donation account, which gets everybody gift cards

1:46:26 for the holidays and meets some financial needs that don’t fall under anything else with our budget. Great. So we’ve been, we’ve been very busy at Veteran Services. Uh, claims have way up. Great. And, um, a lot of legislation, um, more cities and towns have been added to the PACT Act. More bases have been added. So even the Air Force qualified for a VA disability,

1:46:51 Really, really digging deeper. I’m teasing. I’m teasing. So, um, more and more bases are being included with the PACT Act, which is a good thing because it gets those veterans what they deserve. So thank you for our both. Yes. Things just Wanna run down. Uh, first off, I wanna thank Ro, um, a lot of people, not a lot of people, but some people have asked. She’s doing an outstanding job. I mean, she had big shoes to fill with Dave retiring, but I want you to know, as the commander of the Post, she’s doing an outstanding job, uh, for, for all of our veterans. Uh, as she just touched upon it, we had an event, um, last Saturday for East Cross America. Both, uh, Emily Vijo and, uh, uh, Kim Crowley had picked that up. Raised enough money for over 800 res as money is still coming in, uh, for that, uh, great event.

1:47:40 Uh, we had Nick and Brendan, uh, as a band, uh, which has played at the Post probably about a half dozen dimes now. Um, they absolutely love the place. They got a huge following. Just to give you a rundown too, as she said, uh, November 8th, we’re hosting an event for the New England Center for Homeless Veterans. We did this last year, uh, Sue McInnis and Josh Hopkins brought this to us. Uh, the J App band, uh, who play all over the North Shore. They will be there as well. Uh, November 15th, uh, we’re hosting, uh, Py Broden and Brian Ware for the Marblehead Food Pantry. Uh, this will all be ized and everything else. Then the big one, um, December 13th, army Navy, we’ve got a planning committee of nine people. Uh, rumor has it that Moses Greater will be there at 7:00 AM to get into it.

1:48:27 But that hasn’t been, but that hasn’t been, uh, confirmed yet. It hasn’t been before the night seven 30, I’m sorry. Um, but again, you know, we thank, we, we know we thanked the town for their support with these events. Uh, especially last Saturday. I was bowled over by the amount of people, uh, that had, that had come out and, uh, donated. And again, Emily and Kim just did an outstanding job. So we’ve got, That’s pretty Crowded. We’ve got a good, uh, support structure down there. We’re doing a lot of things, uh, to, uh, uh, improve the place. Uh, you know, we thank you for your support. Also, to let you know, too, we’ve already had the committee, uh, first meeting for next year’s challenge coins. Uh, so we’ll make sure that the, that the select board and the town manager secretary get one as well. I’m not gonna give it away right now with what we’re doing. I’m gonna keep everybody suspense. A lot of fun. It’s amazing. That’s

1:49:13 Beautiful. Absolutely. Um, and people have wanted that coin again, but we’re not doing that coin again. And I’m so, but thank you all for your support. Yeah, thank you. We appreciate it. Thank you so much. Appreciate you coming and waiting. You got one? You got one more thing. I know that you have a, uh, about a prisoner of war POW Chair. Yes. And get some information. So I, um, I started it in, I was one of the first ones. ‘cause I had to speak to Leo as my rep, uh, in Winthrop in 2014. And it, back then it was with Rolling Thunder. Rolling Thunder has, uh, worked hand in hand with Hussies, but we’re not really going through Hussies because they’re a little bit pricey. So, uh, Thatcher and Chief Gillian have suggested an older chair

1:49:59 to fit in with the decor. So it’s to represent the po, Ws and ias. Um, I reached out to my VSO Association and my fellow VSOs and over, I’ve gotten over a hundred responses, which adds up to about 136 towns that have A-P-O-W-M-I-H here. Some places have ‘em in two places like Winthrop. We have one at our football field as well as town hall. And, um, I’ve only heard back from two towns that don’t have it, but it’s at their local vfw, which is why they didn’t have it a town hall. So it represents those POWs and MIAs. Um, I’ve printed out a couple different things. I’ll give it to you. Great. Um, thank you. With pricing and standard of the VFW has agreed to help sponsor it with costs,

1:50:43 and we want something to fit into the decor of here. It, it, it makes no sense to have it at Mary Alley. I think it belongs here so everybody can see it. I’d like to make a contribution from the post, but we don’t want to carry the fold. Right. So, you know, So we’ve gotten some different prices. Um, we’re still waiting for a different prices for the plaque, but for the chair and the flags and the stanchions, it’s about six or $700 without the plaque. I’m still getting prices for the plaque. We wanna keep it simple. We wanna, like I said, fit in with the decor. The one, the chair that Hasis has is a folding chair. That, that Does Not fit here. It doesn’t fit here. It fits well in a stadium, but not here. Yeah. Do we, have we picked out a place for it in Abbott Hall? Are we still

1:51:28 Working? No, we’re still looking with, um, I’ve seen a few places, um, e even right here, I’ve taken pictures out in the hallway. Okay. Just something to show reverence. Great. And we’ll, we would have a dedication and the VFW would, um, be involved with that. Great. And support that as well. I think it’s a great idea. Anybody, it is Rachel Chair. It just remembers those who are not Hundred Percent. So I think what we’ll do is we’ll put on a future budget, I mean, sorry, a future agenda. Okay. To, to vote on hopeful. Put it on the next one. Uh, just get the information out there. It’s sort of our, our protocol. And, uh, who will approve the chair? What’s that? Who will, who will make the final decision on the chair? So we will, we will all work collaboratively. Great. And make a proposal to the board. Gotcha. Okay.

1:52:13 And it’ll be the board that both Perfect. For the non, for the non folding chair. Non folding chair Appropriate.

1:52:24 I have my eyes open. Okay. I’ve been looking around at different buildings. You, I’m sure you have. If we could get out of you, out of the coin outta you and the chair outta you on the inside cube here. We would know. Great. Well, thank you both for your time, son. Thank you for having that. All the hard work you guys are both doing. Thank You. I hope to see at the event. Thank you, RO. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. So next up we have, have a public hearing for Verizon. Petition for poll location on Rockaway Ave. Uh, Gabrielle Luso is here. Welcome. So wanna have a seat? I just have to, uh, open up public this sub public hearings on the application from Verizon, new England Inc. Marble Municipal Light Department seeking permission to locate holes, wires, tables

1:53:09 and fixtures, including necessary anchors, guys and other such sustaining and protecting fixtures to be owned in, used in common by petitioners long and across the palming public way or ways Rockaway Ave. And to relocate one Jo Pole, P 18 dash one on the souther East side of Rockaway Ave. At point, approximately 15 feet northwesterly from its existing location. This petition is necessary to accommodate the rail Marble rail trail. Um, Gabriel, thank you for coming. Um, do you wanna present your petition? So I’ll be representing K Oh, I’m sorry. Yeah, I apologize. We’ll name Books. Yes. Name. Ms. Alexander Leslie Murro. M-A-R-R-E-R-O. Okay. Resident 17 Cross Street, Malboro, Massachusetts.

1:53:54 Employer Pipe, PIKE. Telecom renewal. C. Authorized contractor for Verizon, new England Incorporated. I’ll be represent them in front of you this evening and answer any questions that the board members of the public might have about the petition. As you mentioned, Verizon is here by Petition to relocate one existing joint on pole located on the side of Rockway Avenue, approximately 15 feet. And the Northwestern Lee direction. The existing Pole 40 class two move forward will be the same sizing Class 40, class two. This relocation is being requested as the existing pole in the way of the existing marble head rail trail.

1:54:36 Do does the board have any questions about the petitions? So at this point, um, we need to ask anyone if there is just a process here for the public hearing. Does anyone present wish to speak in opposition of this petition? No. Is yep. Yes sir. Not speak in opposition. Okay. So Paul, to this film, Hey, Paul Reside Rockaway. Wanna know how it’s gonna impact that? I’m assuming I got a certified letter. Yep. Figured it was an important thing. So that’s why I’m here. Yeah. Also, my, uh, neighbor Tara Ka who’s in unit too. We’re okay. Just how Is this? Do you want to actually come off? Just because we’re running off the bed. Thank you. Thank you. Appreciate it. Yeah, just Wanna know how this is gonna impact, uh, our property

1:55:21 or, uh, impact our daily lives until this project is completed. And When you’re at 94. Yes. Okay. So I guess I think he’s asking what the process is on, on, on how you’ll go about doing this. How long it’ll take, maybe? Yeah. Um, and what the construction process will be. So installation pole usually takes about two or three days. Uh, transferring of the cabling depending on, well depend on the individual utilities in order to get from the old pole in Newport. Uh, usually it takes about a month. Uh, basically each utility takes about a week to transfer from the old pole in Newport. My understanding is that this marble Head electric, there’s a cable company and then there’s Verizon.

1:56:06 So each individual company will take about a week to transfer cables over. In terms of, you said 94? Yeah. Uh, in terms of the low pole location, the pole will actually be moving away from your property. It will be moving towards the property line of 80 feet, three Rockaway Avenue. Uh, like I said, it will be the same size and class, so it will be the same. Basically how you would, how you see the pole today, it’s just gonna be 50 feet across from where it is. Mm-hmm. There won’t be any disruption in our electricity or cable services. I use Comcast for my Internet. We sure. And expect an and sort of interruption and service.

1:56:52 Like I said, I took a look at the pool and the post moving that direction of the cabling. So basically what they’ll do is to just coil the excess cabling. So they’ll, they won’t even need to cut the cable in order to transfer over from the old bolt pupil. So you shouldn’t expect any sort of interruption, any utilities in the area.

1:57:16 Any other questions please? No, no, I don’t. You answer, we’ll, we’ll, we’ll do it after we close the public hearing for sure. Did you wanna speak as well or are you just hearing support

1:57:27 Moving? Yeah, you’re welcome to take a look at this as well if you want.

1:57:36 So there’s one coming how to this one

1:57:48 you all ask questions about or,

1:57:52 Um, no, I just sounds like there’s no interruption, like as ask services or internet or any We we’re hearing. Okay. Absolutely. Well, thank you for coming up. Appreciate. Thank you. Thanks for hearing us. Thank you. Um, asking questions. Is there anyone present? One speak in favor of this? Yes, sir. Come on up, Brenda, from our community development poll, The polls located, sorry, Brenda Kelly, director Planning, um, the polls located right in the middle of the path that we just constructed. Um, but due to the immediacy to get this immediacy to get this project done and out to bid and everything, we weren’t able to coordinate with, um, Verizon in advance. So the project moved forward, and then we’ve been working with Verizon to,

1:58:39 uh, have it removed. Um, Marblehead light worked with us moving the G wire mm-hmm. Because that would’ve chopped somebody’s head off at some point. Mm-hmm. So they, they moved that for us about a month or two ago. Uh, but they couldn’t move the pole ‘cause it’s a Verizon pole. So this is great. This is, it gets it out of the path and moves aside and it’s not, it’s not gonna be a, an issue with the rail trail anymore. Awesome. Thank you. That was great. Appreciate it. Mm-hmm. That’s all set. You’re welcome to have a seat. Thanks, Alex. Well, oops, wait, we’re gonna do it after gonna close public hearing then We’ll question. Oh, sorry. Yep. Sorry. Thank you. You please stay. Um, Ms. Newan, so questions that come Mr. The Boy. So one of the things that drives me crazy when I go around kind of seeing the poles go up and the old ones stay. Mm-hmm. You see two poles next to each other.

1:59:24 Obviously that’s not the case because the reason we’re moving it is to get it out the rail trail. But I just wanna clarify that the responsibility and the cost to remove the pole is borne by Verizon and off the top. Correct. Okay. Thank you. Along those lines, how long do you anticipate after you put the new pole in to take down the old pole? Like I said, it will depend on whether or not each individual utility, uh, uh, basically the timeline of what each individual’s utility looks. Uh, realistically, it should take about three weeks. Most hole is up. Okay. But I don’t know what kind of scheduling Marble Hill Electric, what the local cable company has in order to get out of the old call. Makes sense. Yeah. Great. Jim did. And,

2:00:11 And yeah, I, and when I’ve seen this, you know, you said it’s three weeks to a month, my impression is a whole lot of nothing happens. And then one day, one of the utilities shows up and makes a transfer in, you know, a few of those and then you, there’s a lot of waiting for the next utility to come. It’s not like there’s a three or four weeks of continuous work. Is that correct? Yeah. So if it were continuous, it would be about three weeks. Okay. So it’s about a week for each utility. Okay. Oh, that much. Okay. Yeah. F any other questions, comments? No. Okay. Thank you for your time. Thank you. We appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you. Alex, if I could have a motion to approve VZ New England Inc. Plan number 180 7 VG zero E from Verizon, new England, Inc.

2:00:57 As presented subject to Verizon hiring police details as required by the Chief of Police Set full shall be of sound timber and reasonably straight. And at the points indicated substantially in accordance with the plan file here with marked VZ New England, Inc. Plan number one A seven BG zero E dated September 9th, 2025, and permission to lay and maintain underground laterals, cables, and wires in the above or intersecting public wave for the purpose of making connections with such controls and buildings as each of sub petitioners may desire disturbing purposes in that space shall be preserved and maintained for the limited pur purpose of attaching one way low voltage fire employee signaling wires owned by the municipality or governmental entity for public safety purposes. And so moved second. Okay.

2:01:44 All in favor, unanimous. Thank you all for coming.

2:01:50 Thank you, sir. Thank, yep. Thank you. Appreciate it. All right. Next up we have licensing secondhand Geo at Joan Rais Music Emporium.

2:02:01 Welcome, Johnny Ray. Hello, Johnny Ray? Yes. To you guys. Should just both introduce yourself so we know Messenger, uh, Coleman. Welcome Richard. Johnny Ray. Yep. Um, just wanna tell us a little bit present your application. Sure, sure. Um, uh, basically, uh, part of our inventory is, uh, secondhand because it’s given up consignment. Mm-hmm. And we have a system already in place where we’ll take the inventory, we’ll take pictures of each individual instrument, serial number, and then we’ll hold it for about 30 days. Well, the license too. We take the person picture Sure. With the license. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Makes sense. Yeah. But most of the merchandises, uh, things that we’ve already owned ourselves in the past. Perfect. It’s a collection that we’ve,

2:02:46 that mainly Richie has accumulated over about a 30 year period. Wow. As a musician. See some of those, Yeah. It’s pretty aggressive. Yeah, that sounds pretty straightforward. Any questions? No, I, uh, I did learn join Ray’s full name though today, so there you go. Oh, Did you? Okay. There you Do. Nobody put that in public. No. Put that in. Yep. I’ll just say that. I, uh, it’s so great to see, um, a retail business going into that location. It’s been vacant. I mean, the Mariner office there for temporary period. Sure. To have, um, you know, bringing something, you know, that would revitalize that corner and, and use that. Um, and just help with that. Downtown Monomy is great. We were very fortunate because when we walked in, we just, we couldn’t believe how perfect it was for what we wanted to do. It’s Great. I’m so glad. Yeah. It looks great.

2:03:32 Yeah. We have Oh, have you, You’ve been, I just walked by and looked at. I’m not very musical. Someone’s scared to come in, but I, I’ll would you give lessons? There we go. Carefully what you asked for. Look, yeah, I think I’m absolutely. Anybody else have any comments or, okay, great. So thank you guys for waiting. Sorry this took so long. Very interesting. Yeah. We appreciate it. Yeah, We love it. Any more job openings, by the way? Any more volunteers? Um, so could, I could have a motion to approve the application of Johnny Ray Music Emporium 31 dash 35 Atlantic Avenue for secondhand dealer’s license, subject to receipt of the acquired document fees and Cory approval. So moved. Second. All in favor, unanimous. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

2:04:17 Come by and see us if you can. Absolutely. Thank you. Thank You very much. So next up we have a continuation of a public hearing that was open on November 13th, 2024 on the revocation of the wine mall. Beverage liquor, liquor light wall. Start that again. Wine, malt beverage license number 0 0 4 2 dash dash 0 6 56 dynasty at one Atlantic Avenue. Uh, the owner, Alexander Lewis, is not able to appear before the board tonight, but he has provided a written update, which you should have in your packets. Um, which summary is that he has made a lot of progress in the last few weeks and that he anticipates that sort of our deadline, which is the end of November, that he should be able to meet that. Awesome. Um, so I think at this point, um,

2:05:04 if we could have a motion, the annual, just so everyone knows annual reviews, renewals are being mailed out in the coming week, and he will be, needs to be in compliance, which is basically meaning for his inspection, his EO, all that in order to, uh, for his license. So, um, do we need to, to vote to continue vote for date? Okay. So the, do, so I, I think we’ll get proposed the 19th or next meeting. So if I could have a motion to continue this public hearing. Bill, November 19th, 2025. Second question. All in favor? Unanimous, overhanging sign, judicial. Just say hey. A back in the corner waiting. Huh? Thank you.

2:05:50 I hope you didn’t fall asleep back there. Aye, pass my bench. Yeah, it’s pass. We’ll try to keep this relatively quick. If you wanna present your application, we have in front of us a picture, which looks very nice. Um, I see it’s two by two. Um, and this is for 1 55 more three. Anything else you’d like us to know about it? No, that would be it. It’s just PVC. Okay. Wrought eye and anger. Is there anything there now Is there Anything left? Is there a sign there now? No. Is this replacing? So there’s nothing there? No. Okay. No. All right. Is the lettering embossed, or is it, uh, just painted on the surface? Just painted on the surface? Mm-hmm. Okay.

2:06:30 Any questions, comments? Sorry. We made you wait a long time for that time. So, motion to approve the request from Judy Gold to erect an overhanging sign at 1 55 Washington Street, subject to approval from O HT C. Signed permanent receipt of the required certificate of insurance. Name the town as additionally insured somewhat. I second. All in favor. Thank you so much. All good. Thank you. I appreciate, Thank you. Thank you. I appreciate that. All right, moving on. We have a memorandum of agreement between the town and the US Army Corps of Engineers, uh, that you wanna give us, or Brendan, whoever, come on up, Brendan. Sure. Please give us a brief o brief overview. We do have the memo from Alex, as well

2:07:17 as MLA in front of us. Would you give us sort of high level? Um, We’re, uh, we’re trying to get a Chapter 91 permit for the Boatyard Miss Bullard project. Um, it was, um, there was a couple structures, uh, not, I think it’s the Parker Boatyard, that area where they, uh, the historical commission flagged potential or historical buildings. Um, based off of the, the letter that the Army Corps of Engineers, uh, received, they, they determined that we need to, uh, survey those buildings and then essentially put ‘em in the registry and then, uh, after we demo the buildings to install interpretive signage, uh, and afterwards. And so, uh, this is just an, an condition that the town has

2:08:03 to do to, it’s the last piece of getting the chapter 91 permit. Um, then we’ll have the permit. We can move on. And you’ve worked with historic on Yes. Uh, some, yeah. Yep. Can. He’s one of the Folks who has to sign off on this. It’s been coordinated. Yep. Great question. I could, I have a motion to approve that memorandum of agreement between the town, the US Army Corps of Engineers and Mass State Historic Reservation Office as presented for the Marvel Shipyard Resiliency Application. So Moved. Thank you. Second. All in favor? All right, now? Sure. Do you wanna take a recess? Good. Okay. Second. Okay, great. So next we are moving on. We’re gonna give an update on the, uh,

2:08:52 officer Gallo arbitration update. Um, I’m gonna read just sort of a quick, quick overview here. So, the town of Marblehead and Officer Christopher Gallup have reached a settlement agreement that resolves all outstanding financial issues arising from an arbitration decision that reinstated Officer Gallo following his termination in February, 2024. Under the arbitration award, officer Garal was entitled to back pay and related benefits for the period between his paid administrative leave in June, 2021 as reinstatement in 2025. This agreement finalizes the exact amount owed, and this includes salary, overtime, and details Officer Gallo would’ve earned had he not been suspended or terminated, as well as a reimbursement for his health insurance premium that he paid under cobra.

2:09:39 The total settlement amount is 295,000. That consists of 260,000 in wages. That money is subject to deductions and withholdings and $35,000 in non wage reimbursement reimbursement. And that’s for the Cobra out-of-pocket health insurance. Uh, that settlement paid in two installments over two fiscal years. So on this fiscal year, the won the following to each budgetary impact on the town, approximately 150,000, which includes his Cobra reimbursement within 30 days of the execution and the remaining 145,000 by July 31st, 2026. Additionally, the town will pay the remaining balance through the arbitrator arbitrator directly.

2:10:25 This agreement represents a full and final resolution of all financial matters associated with arbitration award without admission of wrongdoing by either party. This came about, uh, through, through work as a result of the arbitration proceedings. Um, you know, this is always a compromise. The arbitrator did lots of times very significant risk for both parties and these situations. As such, the arbitrators off often employ sort of a final offer, an either or one that’s usually not created for one side and one that’s not for the other. So we’ve come to a compromise that we feel is a fair representation of this arbitration and not to subject ourselves to, for the legal fees or any, um, further liability. Um, two, just want to state that the town

2:11:13 and Officer Gallow do retain their respective rights and responsibilities under Massachusetts law. And this agreement results only the financial components of this arbitration award.

2:11:26 All questions, we will have that available for you. I think it’s your question. We do have it available. This was put Oh, okay. All right. So still no questions? No. So we can move on from that. Uh, we’re gonna move on to the town charter questionnaire. So we have a questionnaire that was given out by the charter committee. It was given to all different departments, boards, uh, committees. I will just take full credit here. We are delinquent in getting this back to them. So, uh, I’ll, I’ll hit ourself on the, on the hand for that. Um, and I think we just wanna have a discussion about this so that I can sign on behalf. Um, and the biggest, you know, there’s two questions that the charter committee put in front of us, and this is just, and the scope of our board as well as the town administrator.

2:12:12 Um, and the first question, is there any language in this section pertaining to your committee department that is factually incorrect? I dunno if anybody has some, I have something that I have a, a question or concern about that I would make to include at some point. I I can go, or if someone else wanted to start, do not have any facts. So I think the, the one part that, that concerns me on a factual basis is under Article four, section 4.1, paragraph 11, I’m sure you all have that memorized. And this, this talks about, um, it makes, it makes policy roll. It, it’s a policy rule. It makes reference to those matters which the town meeting has authorized or directed the select board to act. Um, it’s my understanding that there have been legal opinions that from the state, the town meeting cannot direct the actions of the select board. So I, I, I would like the,

2:12:59 the charter committee to look into that. Um, I know we had some warrant articles last year where they had to be changed to, you know, directs or advisors. And I would just like to make sure that that language is correct so that we’re not overriding STA law to begin with. Obviously. Makes sense. Yeah. Questions on that? Anything else in the factual context of it? Context of it? Yeah, I would agree. I think, I think it’s biases. Yep. Um, and then on number two, this question, which do we have any other observation comments or concerns?

2:13:33 Anybody? Mo do you have any? No. Look, I mean, I think we, there’s a, you know, very good outline here that, that works well. We Can, so I mean, some of those will be, we’ve come up with some that, um, by submitting to, to, to Thatcher individually that Thatcher compiled for us. Um, and we can put those together. It talks about, you know, just for the public can hear obviously that section, article four, section 4.1, as well as Article four, section 4.2, about paragraph three. Um, that he can’t, that the county administrator can’t engage in any other business. We just have concerns and questions about any federal commitments such as National Guard or reserves. Mm-hmm. Just wanna make sure that, that, that that language doesn’t, uh, prohibit that. Um, and there is, I think one thing that’s missing, um,

2:14:19 talks about the direct responsibilities of town administrators about procurement. Um, so maybe think about adding that to it. Mm-hmm. Uh, as well as I, I think I have some general concerns that the, that we make sure that in, in our section, maybe throughout that we don’t have anything in there that’s in the charter that would take away power from the select board for making changes without having to go through the state home rule petition. And I mean, ultimately approval. Um, so there are a couple on there is about, um, a capital ping committee, um, that he, that county administrative serves on that if we decide that that’s not appropriate, at some point we like, we’ll make that change. We, we In the recent past reorganized our own committees. Yeah. Um, and we’re doing it later tonight as I understand.

2:15:07 So it would be nice to say less with regard to that in terms of like, um, the charter, uh, you know, in terms of specific, uh, makeup. Sure. Like deferred to our bylaws and any select organizations. Yeah. So we don’t have to set in stone that town administrator is the chair. Right. We don’t wanna make that process any harder. Right. Well, I think as things evolve, the committees evolve. Yeah. Or even if we, as we’ve created new committees that didn’t exist 10 years ago, then you have someone who comes in to play, like even think something like thinking about like Logan Sustainability Coordinator. Right. Those types of things wouldn’t exist prior. Then you’ve created it and now you have a position and now you have somebody that’s chairing it, which would be in some situations more appropriate than having a ton.

2:15:53 If that would stayed in the charter, Then yeah. Then it would take that flexibility away from Yeah. Well, Well, at this level it really makes sense to make, just to kind of keep consistent around the, the ability to select board to delegate specific, uh, responsibilities to the 10 administrator. Yeah. And I think there’s just, there’s just one or two more. I think the, not the most relevant one is just, uh, section article four, 4.2, paragraph nine, um, talks about, uh, the reference about, um, accept those re related to the function, the school system. Just, uh, I thought about the fact that that Thatcher was, um, served negotiator about fact the school committee, um, and he was one of the chief bargaining agents. Just wanna make sure that that doesn’t, you know, that that leaves that broad enough. Well, it’s under state law, right?

2:16:39 That is, yeah. Yeah. So maybe, yeah. So may maybe, maybe that doesn’t come to play, but I think there needs to, so, So chapter one 50 E, which, which there was an added sentence to accommodate the fact that the town administrator under Chapter one 50, which is the collective bargaining law, is a voting member of the school committee for purposes of collective bargaining. But the, the other reference where it restricts the town administrator from being in a, I forget the exact phrase, negotiating agent for the schools, is that it is the purview of the school committee to appoint the town administrator as their bargaining agent. And, and so I think the concern that one is the way that’s written, that that would prohibit the school committee from, if they so choose

2:17:26 to appoint the time yesterday as a agent bargaining on their behalf, which was exactly the role I played last fall, along with two other members of the committee. But, yep. That makes sense, judge. So I have, I have, I have those here. I don’t know if anybody wants to add anything. I think this is again, specifically to the scope of our, OR, and, um, how it relates to, and, and I think without them in front of me that we’re all, Please Look at this issue, please work with that issue. Mm-hmm. They, yeah. It’s, it’s basically what I just talked about and it’s just more of a questioning Yes. To have a look at it and make sure that it does do what they had Yeah. Anticipated or, or were hoping to do. And just to get our feedback. Um, and again, I apologize to the charter committee for, for us there, that’s called their client being,

2:18:12 um, being laid. I apologize to Absolute was on. No, we did not. Yep. I Did have some, um, notes that I jotted down for us to consider under select board, um, under 4.1 under five. Um, I think maybe perhaps adding, um, award, award and execute all contracts for the town in terms of, um, duties and responsibilities. And which One is that on Erin? I’m sorry, that’s 4.15. 4.1. Paragraph five. Yeah. So it’s like, um, uh, let’s see. So it says the, it reads right now the select board shall have direct responsibility for public safety, human resources, budget and finance, long-term planning, public works and engineering and properties and buildings and facilities.

2:19:00 I think I would say, I don’t know if it’s too wordy, but somehow reflecting here that we have direct responsibility for entering into agreements and contracts on behalf of the town. I mean, um, and then the other responsibility and duty that we have that I thought we could clarify in the document would be, since we have so many elected boards, is just that, you know, we retain the sole legal decision making authority for the town and for matters of litigation and purposes of, um, legal strategy that, uh, I didn’t see that in there. And it’s, it’s an important one. I know it’s everything’s covered because they all, it references back to, um, you know, the

2:19:45 law like Law of Massachusetts and our bylaws. Um, so it’s covered, but it might be nice to just state it because there’s are so many elected boards, and it might be that one elected board thinks that they can hire their own council or, you know, just to be clear about it. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And, and it’s gonna, yeah, it is interesting. It’s multi, it’s multi because it’s also, you know, we have to pay attention to the statutory environment. There’s perhaps specific illegal powers that, uh, the boards have based on that basis that fall outside of the perfume realty. Well, we need to get an answer to that in terms of even if it is, Well, I think if, you know, as long as it pursuant to the laws of Massachusetts, you know, I think that Right. That gives us the coverage. I mean, without, without, without necessarily having discussion, Which committee has their own pound counsel,

2:20:30 we do cover the insur, we carry the insurance. And so we make decisions with regard to settlement of those cases. So somehow where we could capture that, you know, as, as executive board, select board, um, you know, is the primary. Um, So I guess the question would be, does that already exist decision making in state acts, statutes or our bylaws? And I, I think it’s a question to find out where that’s covered, right, Aaron? Yeah. Okay. I think that’s, that, that’s presumptive Power to engage in Yeah. With the exact you could say Think has. Right, right. But general government, which is, let’s call that almost everything else. Right. It’s kind of presumptive in the description of the government power.

2:21:18 Okay. Alright. Anybody else have anything else they wanna add? Um, then I had, um, I’m sorry to consider adding that the select board is recognized as the head of town government for all ceremonial purposes. Um, just what we do, in fact this Yeah. Just to memorialize that. And then under town administrator, we wanna add a clause on, um, you know, what happens in an interim. I just, in a lot of other charters, they kind of spell out the interim town administrator and the acting town administrator.

2:21:54 If there’s a vacancy in the position, select board appoints and interim if there’s an extended absence or call from, you know, call away the town administrator appoints the department head to act as the town administrator. Yeah. I guess, I guess when we made this decision is the password we rely on is maybe the question. Well, I think the other question I had, well, that’s right. It’s one question. I think another question is, do we want to introduce something that we’re not actually to some formal right now? Or do we want to have kind, have the charter at least represent, But we do though we always appoint, we’ve appointed John McGinn, we appoint, we, we, we would all, we would appoint an interim town administrator. There was a vacancy. Yeah, that’s okay. I See what you’re, if it’s under our duties anyway, but not, Not assistant town administrator.

2:22:40 No, no, no. Okay. Uh, interim, oh, acting town administrator. Like what do we do in the event of a VA or of a short term disability or absence from our town administrator That wouldn’t necessarily, I mean, in practice when you are unavailable deputize Hockey, which what’s interesting, I I, I haven’t really formally done that in the sense that anytime I’m not physically available, I’m electronically wired in. Mm-hmm. Yeah. I mean, technology is so good. I thought that was one time where you had the fire chief kind of covering like, Yeah, thinking What’s that? That was just wish with me. Yeah. I’m trying to remember.

2:23:28 So Jason, like Jason does that all the time. It’s Something that came up in like a number of stars and brought Yeah, generally I left the department had know that, that they sort of, their issues, but again, thus far electronically, um, I’m connected who have they’ve been. So I don’t feel like we’re saying, I’m just saying yeah, the circumstances,

2:23:57 Like you can imagine and a situation where we did have a town administrator in the future, right. But on short-term disability, like, you know, we wouldn’t necessarily need to go and hire an interim that that’s why they have in these charters acting. Well, I guess my question would be, I think what I’m hearing from the charters, so trying to memorialize, so are you adding something there or does this exist in practice? I mean, that’s a good question, Aaron. Like what happens if, god forbid he got hit with a hockey puck For, For our instance, right. That’s My job. Yeah. So I don’t, I don’t, it’s a, well, or maybe maybe We ask the charter committee How do we, what, where does this make, How do you feel about it? Or Do we need to elevate to those? Because to me it’s kind, adapt, it’s an adaptable operating measure

2:24:44 to large extent. I think we can, So we can develop That policy. Why don’t we get the charter? Yeah. I mean I think these are, this is the whole point of this is to get questions that we have answered. Yep. And then, um, maybe add one of the town administrator duties as to attend all sessions of all town, town, the annual town meetings, not Eric Town. So that’s in the contract. Okay. That’s true. Yeah. That Language. Will it be, I guess if it’s in, guess That we are on us, Um, or whoever and adding the procurement, um, responsibility. I think you spoke about that, Dan, right? Mm-hmm. Adding that. Um, and uh, some like, uh, some of the charters speak to, um, removal

2:25:29 and contract renewal for town administrators and our contract. But I mean, I’m sure we have a like, you know, for cause right? Um, versus you have the two category. Yeah. So I mean it’s, it’s, it’s covered in our contracts as we go. It’s just something that I wanted to break right before us. ‘cause it is, it’s, it’s in, it’s in most of the charters that I’ve seen that were from the, you know, Maynard is in, is a re recently did theirs in 2023. If they, they just, um, updated theirs and from whatever way back Paul and had sent an example, I think it was brought, um, I don’t really even have an opinion on it. I just, it’s something that was missing in this one that I’ve seen in others. And so I thought if we’re going through the exercise, yeah.

2:26:16 And I think my question would be what, you know, if you’re, whatever, I think anything you’re placing in, what’s the benefit if you’re talking about it, about being in a charter versus being in a contract, you know, where is it better served and if they, you know, for example, you just use with mayor, if they have put it in, I’d be curious to know what, you know, what is the, what is the benefit of inserting it in a charter versus a contract. Obviously some things are, you know, qualifying what we’re already doing and policies, but those types of things that, you know, sit on the fence between contractual issues and employment. And I think, you know, I I, you know, I can’t remember off the top of my head even with the appointing and interim, I, correct me if I’m wrong,

2:27:02 isn’t there a cer certain timeframe that that has to be executed into? Is there some sort of Requirement that Yeah, we had to do it. There’s some sort of what statute is, and like, I can’t recite it off the top of my head, but I know there is something that references what our obligation is regarding that. Okay. And when we’ve had to do it, and I, I think we, let’s put this all down and it’s, this is the, The purpose of this form. Mm-hmm. We get some people and then, um, see what, um, times,

2:27:37 oh, article four, 4.2.

2:27:47 4.2, sorry, second.

2:28:00 Um,

2:28:06 I’m sorry. Okay. Important.

2:28:17 Oh. And not hold any other appointed office.

2:28:25 Is that the one paragraph 11? Uh, sorry, paragraph three. Um,

2:28:35 see, hold on. Serving as the chair. Okay. So yeah, serving as the chair. I think it, I think what I was referencing was, you know, designating the role. I like just being broad about it, is that, you know, the appointing authority being the select board determines what That’s what I meant. Sorry, what the, Is it on a specific board or is it just general? Well, just in general. Right. On the committee. And then, and I think you and I talked about like the terms on the volunteer boards, Right? Yeah. Yeah. I think that And leaving that best to, Yeah. Um, yeah. So Yeah, I think that’s, yeah. All right. We do, we, can you, if you can email that to myself and Patrick mm-hmm. We’ll incorporate that into this. Yeah. I mean, I thought Sare though, right? Well, I, so if

2:29:22 You don’t, but that’s your, that’s your info. I mean, I think we’re gonna ask for a motion of if everyone agrees on that. I mean, please look, please consider, consider. Yeah. Please consider this. Yeah. These aren’t, these aren’t, I don’t, it’s not saying anything. No, it’s not doing anything wrong. Maybe it’s clarification for us because we are not as involved, but we will be moving forward. Um, if I could have a motion to authorize the chair to respond as we’ve discussed to a, to the questionnaire received from the Town Charter Committee. I move second. All in favor? Okay. Number 17, social equity policy. That, why don’t you take a over lead on this one. Sure. So we presented this several meetings ago. Uh, this is a requirement under the Cannabis People

2:30:10 Commission to, um, allow for having to have a social equity policy. So Model Ahead has basically two post community agreements that, that, that it’s authorized. Um, what the changes have done and what this policy will put in place process is that with the fact that we have two, one of those at the renewal time, one of those host community agreements will have to meet the social equity criteria that’s been laid out by the cannabis Patrol commission, minority owned business or disadvantage. This is criteria which we sort of went over mm-hmm. Uh, several months ago.

2:30:56 So, uh, basically this is a requirement that we put this policy in place. Um, and it’ll have an impact as our post community agreements come up for renewal. They, they’re both expiring in the next year timeframe. The big ones in April, and it was in November, somewhere in that, that timeframe. Um, in the, what I call the final draft, which is basically no, no changes from what was presented. Um, we weren’t really any further inputs. The one discretionary matter, which is highlighted on the second page is fee reduction. So we we’re allowed to implement up to a 3% impact fee, uh, on, on these organizations

2:31:45 for the cost that they’re, they’re imposing. Um, and that the guidelines for this policy is to discount that impact fee by some amount. So I’m, I’m suggesting a 1% discount. So if So, we can go from zero to three. Yeah. Okay. So, or we can go zero, one, or two. Otherwise it’s not a discount. Right, Right. Otherwise, it’s a waiver. Right. Gotcha. Are there, um, have you looked at how other or municipalities are doing that? Yeah, I, I’m gonna guess pretty much the same. And the total dollars impact fees we’ve collected is zero. Mm-hmm. Because, you know, neither establishment is open. There’s been no impact. And I, I, I would say this, I, my experience

2:32:31 with Framingham, you know, a city, almost 80,000 we had, were authorized six and we had over 20 applicants. Um, and we actually imposed upfront impact fee, meaning a deposit towards impact fee. And I was hard pressed to get my departments to flag anything that we can impose on the impact fee. So there was a lot of screaming and yelling about municipality people who impose impact fees. Um, in my experience, we really haven’t implemented it or utilized it. So I I So do you have to give That, that Issue? Well, you have to give that money by pound of Framingham or something. They Have to give back. Yeah. We actually, we came to the decision that we did not want their money on our books.

2:33:18 Mm-hmm. And I called up the, the businesses we’re sending your money back ‘cause Sure. We’re sitting on it. It, it actually had an impact on our free cash. Mm-hmm. Right. Because it’s a liability on our books. So it was like, uh, I, I think, I think this is a non-issue. So I, I suggested, you know, 1%, which is normal, but mm-hmm. I’ll be surprised if we have any five. Okay. And with impact fee, We have to make a case. So we had to put a, a traffic light in there. We had a fly the road, we had to do this, That police few details because the lines were down the street. Uh, you know, all those things that we feared when this industry started and hardly it had come about.

2:34:07 So, yeah. And, and the Cannabis Control Commission and the legislature have to tell you not

2:34:14 what is defined. You know, what you can impose, uh, as an impact.

2:34:22 Anybody have a return on the 1% higher or lower Seems reasonable assumption you’ve done. Yeah. We Are we looking to vote on this? Yes, I think we are. ‘cause we did it before, right? Yeah. We wanna vote because we, we need to, okay. We’re, we’re past this deadline. The penalty. Yeah. We pass deadline on this is the, they’re gonna, uh, take back any impact fees that we’ve collected. So Sure. The impact is zero. So one at least. So we have two. Yeah. So one of them has to be reserved. Yeah. So when it expires, fund expires and if Right. And we’re up for renewal. Yeah. It’s soon, right? Yeah. Um, it’ll have to, we’ll have to meet the criteria and, um, I think one of ‘em, I, you know, we, we would’ve

2:35:09 to vet it out, but I think based on the, the, the new owners that tick over over seven Leaf, yeah. Mm-hmm. I, I think they may, they may meet the criteria based on the information they have provided. Obviously we would vet that out, but Mm-hmm. Need that. Did I have a motion that the Marble Select would adopt the proposed cannabis social equity policy as presented?

2:35:34 Nothing. All in favor? Unanimous. Thank you Doctor. Next up, we have a whole harmless agreement police department between us and the town and Harm Police. Uh, it’s my understanding that we’ve had problems covering our police details. We do this with some other municipalities. Uh, Salem Swamp. Scott, I think are, yeah, we A number of these in place. Uh, the chief was gonna be here to explain, he’s stuck in an airport somewhere. Uh, so I got the text message from, but we, we had these experie. So in order for us to allow police officers from Han to operate in Marblehead, then they have to align on staff. So it’s a just A back and Forth Standard, standard form that would be used before. Yeah. Great. Could I have a motion

2:36:21 to approve the hold harmless agreement as presented between the town and the town and Han Police Department and authorized fair as on, on behalf of the board. So moved. All in favor? Alright, great. All right. Next up we have Green Marblehead Reorg Committee, similar to what we were just discussing. And this is to replace town planner position. Um, to replace the town planner position, the community development and planning director as a designated member represented community development and planning department. Pretty straightforward. Made sense. I think before we didn’t have a community development planning director at the time and, uh, we’re looking to keep running. Move Had a top planner that was doing Everything. We was doing. Everything exactly. Yep. Any, uh, any questions on that one? And that’s just basically moving from, uh, from Alex

2:37:09 and Brenda swapping, swapping ‘em out. Swapping Who’s, who’s member. Yep. Great. If I could have a motion to approve the recommendation of the Green Marble Committee by from the town planner as a member of the Green Committee. Green Marwood Committee with the Community Development and Planning director. Second. All in favor? Couple of consent agenda items. Uh, if I get a motion to approve the following consent agenda items. Accept those put on hold the minutes of October 1st, 2025 on October 9th, 2025, as well as the Abbott Hall Festival of Arts Artisans Holiday Marketplace. December 5th through seventh, 2025. Subject to the usual rules, regulation fees and receipt from the acquired certificate of insurance. Sub moved second. All in favor, right? Unanimous 21. We have six or seven contracts.

2:37:57 Um, the first one is for Gaels. Um, and this is a, um, oops. So that’s not what I have in front of me. We, we’ll do it out. We’ll, we’ll go to Gaels. We’ll keep an order of that. So the first one is sketches. Playground. Playground lighting project. This is a change order in the amount of 13,000 540 12. Um, and that is being paid out of the recreation revolving fund. I dunno if we have specific questions, we can talk about it or no? No. Okay. Let’s, let’s, if I could have a motion to approve a change order to contract 2 0 2 5 dash 0 1 0 if they get to playground lighting project between the town and Ham electric LLC and the amount of $13,540 and 12 cents.

2:38:46 And authorize the chair on, on behalf of the board. So move second. All in favor? Unanimous. Second one is on-call. HVAC maintenance repair. We just wanna have somebody you can speak about that. Yeah, Lemme explain this one. So what we’re trying to do for maintaining our buildings, ‘cause we’ve been relying I really on inspectors to be our maintenance. And, um, that’s, I’ve talked about that. So what this procurement is, is for on-call HVAC services whenever we need it. And I wanna explain, you know, we have a a dollar figure of 140 2009 $50. That’s not an obligation that we’re spending or that we’re allocating that.

2:39:31 Um, this is a unit price bid, which means when we go out to bid, we ask them what is your hourly rate and what is the markup on the materials? And in order to make it a fair process for bidders to be, for us to be able to compare, we create a, we, we make assumptions or create a scenario of which in this case, um, the scenario was 700 hours of service time and $25,000 in supplies. Give us your prices. And if you do the math, it comes to 142,950. The only purpose of that dollar figure is just

2:40:17 to create a scenario. So bidders are bidding on a, on a, a comparative basis. Um, we may spend nothing, well, that’s unlikely, but, uh, it’s enter price. We, we can spend up to what, what’s in the budget or if we have to allocate additional funds, that’s the limit to what we spend. So I want to explain it’s not obligated 142,000. That’s just the calculation for the purpose of bidding to get con competitive prices ahead. Okay. Termin question. And, Uh, once, uh, um, town General Air Conditioning being, were they the lowest bidder or did you decide on other things or, Yeah, these are, um, based, yeah, based on,

2:41:03 on calculations of the pricing. No, I know, but presumably there was multiple bidder. Yeah. Were they the lowest bidder as it turned out? Uh, I don’t know in this case. Okay. I don’t know. Okay. Presumably, uh, if they weren’t the lowest bidder, that means there was a lower bidder that was disqualified for whatever reason. Okay. It just, yeah, it’s interesting to make a decision, uh, made up scenario. That’s, I I mean, I understand why you have to do it, but, uh, I, I would hope there’s a little leeway in That. Yeah. This, well, in this type of bid Yeah. You, you set the criteria that Yeah. You have to be qualified in what that criteria is, and then you have your price proposals to compare. Okay. So you have to, you have to pass the bar of being qualified Yeah. To provide the services.

2:41:49 It’s kinda like an advanced appropriation kind of, yeah. In, in anticipation of it. Okay. We could have a motion to where the contract 26 s 12 for on-call HVAC, maintenance and repair between the town and General Air Conditioning Heating and, and the amount of $142,950 for one year with two optional renewal years and authorize the chair to sign the contract on behalf of the board. So moved. All in favor? Okay. Next up, we have a fencing project over at the COA, uh, over on the back there for 18,500. The funding for this is, we found out the building improvement account. Is that ours or the COAs? Uh, I didn’t, Okay, I didn’t get that. Okay.

2:42:34 No. Um, so that is a fence, I assume? It’s, yeah. Okay.

2:42:39 Any questions about this project? Cap doesn’t seem like he had a ton of fence for that. Um, motion to award contract 26 dash 14 COA fencing project between the town and New Generation Landscaping and fencing and the amount of $18,500 and authorized to chair to sign on behalf of the board. So moved. Could I have a second please? All second. All in favor? Unanimous. I’m still here. The next one is a rail trail. Rail trail. This is just a, this isn’t a, this is just an ex extension time. Extension. Extension of time. It allows for the plantings and, okay. There’s no, there’s no dollar amount associated. This is extension of time motion. And this is out of our profiling, if I’m correct. Bless you.

2:43:25 All right. You still here? Yeah. All right. Cool. Motion toward contract number 2 0 2 4 dash 0 7 1 Marblehead Rail Trail, swamp Club Ranch project early construction between the town of Raphael Construction Corporation to extend the completion date until December 30th, 2025. And further authorized chair to sign the change order on behalf of the board. So moved. Second. All in favor ad. The next one is a little bigger. This is, uh, the Reynolds Field project. This is being run by Rec and Park. Uh, if we do have questions, I’m pretty sure that we still have, we have Karen and we have a couple commissioners online. If not, we can, we can deal with it, but this is the bid. Um, she’s got her hand. Okay. Just shut her hand. So she’s here. We do have a detail

2:44:12 of where the money went out. I know that they went out through procurement. They got bid on this, and they had chosen, um, call, however and associates, LLP, this funding would come from the Lars Anderson gift account, Ms. Wayne. Um, so if you wanna add anything to that, Uh, sure. So, uh, we had, um, we interviewed two folks, two, two companies. And, uh, we chose unanimous unanimously CHA and Associates for a variety of reasons, primarily, um, because all of their, they have a whole division dedicated to sport municipalities and sports decks, AUMs.

2:44:59 Um, and they had all of their people, let’s say, engineers, developers, everyone was in-house, which we thought was the best long-term value, uh, for the town. Um, the other firm that we worked with or interviewed had, um, basically they were, they were making up a team of people, um, which we felt there was a significant amount of, uh, area for change orders involved with that planning. So, uh, we all voted for to, to choose them. And then, um, the first, the requisition in front of you tonight, I believe is for 69,100, which is really just to take us through the first two tasks. Um, it’s actually three tasks, but they named them zero through two, which one is to have,

2:45:46 um, a major collaboration between all town departments to see like fire police, DPW, electric light to see, um, what everyone sort of needs, disabilities commission, all of that, what the requirement requirements would be, as well as, um, how we could work together to create some efficiencies, um, congruently with that or concurrently with that, they’d be doing the topography studies, surveys, wetland, delineations, and all of, um, the things that will tell us what we can actually build there. Because yes, we have ideas, we have concepts, but as we know, there’s major drainage issues, there’s a ton of ledge, and it would be irresponsible for us to say, you know, put a budget together without knowing what can actually be built. They could come ver back and say, you know what, um, we can’t do this.

2:46:34 We can’t do that, um, because of a, B, or C. So first step is getting the stakeholders holders together. Step two is doing the topographies, wet Lin Iation surveys. Then they’re gonna present us with an a la carte menu of what all of these, these things will cost. At that point, we will, uh, the record and park commission will get together and clearly define what phase one will be now based on the information. At that point, we will come back to the select board after our vote and asked for the, um, expenditure of the additional Lars Anderson funds. So, um, we, we’ve accepted the whole contract, but it was an RFQ, so we’re taking it bit by bit based on the Chief Procurement officer’s recommendation.

2:47:20 So, just to clarify, I see here that we’re looking to award, so we have to sign the contract for the full amount, is that correct? Correct. Correct. Two two votes here. One to approve. So I just don’t see that in front of me. Well, there’s, there’s, yeah, there’s no $69,000. So you’re looking for, I think tonight, at least what has been posted, it is just to approve the, the contract with CHA for 5 81 2 90. Um, I don’t see a request for the requisition. Might have to, we Was that the vote they Took? Well, that was the vote they took, but we, No, we took, we took a vote for the whole contract, and then there’s a requisition on the table for just the, uh, initial amount, which is 69,000. So you take it sort of bit by bit. But like for example, if the first section comes back

2:48:07 and they said you can build nothing at Reynolds and we have to move somewhere else, that’s gonna create a different type of scenario. Okay. So we’re just proving the contract tonight, you’ll submit the bill, correct? Correct. Yep. Okay. We’ll look through that. Thank you. Alright, great. Anybody have questions on the specific contractor, which is what we’re voting on tonight? I know, I, I do see here we have the line items that are going for one through three. Makes sense now? Yep. Thank you. Thanks for the explanation. Yeah, thank you. Election process, that makes obvious sense to have them all under one roof. Yeah. Um, you know, work that team, like you said, um, versus, you know, kind of making a team with people spread out and for the reasons you mentioned. So, like, Thought. Yeah, and I just wanna say, I, I did attend part of the

2:48:54 selection, uh, process and it was very well put together. And, uh, actually I, I sat in the interview with the other and, uh, um, you know, they were okay too, but obviously this other one is a lot better. So, uh, and they have a lot of ideas and there’s, there’s a lot of challenges down there, as shall we say we’re from wetland into property, but that’s, you know, par for the course of this type of project. Oh, Great. Well, great. Thank you guys for your work and this is exciting. It’s good to see this, this called endowment being used. So if I could have a motion to award contract 2 0 2 5 dash 0 0 9 Reynolds play around for design project between the town and Cloud Harbor and Associates, LLP in the amount of $581,290 and authorized the chair to sign on behalf of the board. So

2:49:40 Moved. Second. All in favor? Can’t see us unanimous. Thank you both. Um, final one, we have Thatcher, if you want talk about the call center. Call center. Yeah. So we originally had that as an, but I’ve been able to work with the COL center, uh, to work out that they, they have an outstanding deliverable in regard to the work of the third committee. So they have agreed that they are gonna complete the deliverable that that’s expected. And it’s under the, under the original contract. So there’s no new contract, no any additional expenses. Um, if there is a need for any, for other services, we so choose as part of that original agreement, it actually has a provision that, that we can engage on, uh,

2:50:29 on an as needed or hourly basis. But, so as, as we said here, no new contract, uh, they will meet the obligations under the, under the original contract to provide the deliverables to the TAR committee. Right. And I just wanna, you know, obviously any work that is done, we wanna make sure they’re doing what the charter has requested. Yeah. Charter commissions request, it stays within their scope. Um, and that we will discuss with ‘em where before we ask for anything else they’ve done, they’ve done the NT This work. Yeah. And is that deliverable the review of revision B? Yeah. And I’ve even, uh, Amy has sent me the sort of more UpToDate work so that they’re looking at the most current inputs Okay.

2:51:14 To, so I’ll call it b plus. Yeah. And, and, And, and just so everyone knows, I think it’s important to note that review of V Vision B is delinquent and they have had, there were two principals at the call center. One left the call center, I believe the other is on medical leave, so I don’t know who’s gonna be reviewing it, but I, I, I just wanna say I have a lot of concerns with their performance of back thereof. But if this is gonna be no cost, uh, to what they’re committed and and the original contract was a flat fee? Or was it a retain? It was 20. It was, it was $20,000 With, with deliverables, but it wasn’t a retainer where we were paying it. Okay. Yeah. We paid 20,000 on. So, um, yeah. And so, So if we, We’ll complete the tasks required under

2:52:03 that conduct, there’d be no additional,

2:52:06 even if it overrides on their end, there was no additional, so it Was fast base as opposed to the charges. Right. So, okay. It was a retainer, well, not really. Well, it, it was so It was paid up upfront, but, you know, there was an accounting, uh, you know, what was, Was it deliverables or a series of hours? That’s what I don’t, never understood about the It’s deliverables, but they estimate the amount of hours would work that I don’t, I’m trying to remember in the contract itself,

2:52:38 there’s only the breakdown, hourly breakdown if it exceeds the, the deliverables that are, that are in there. So it is a deliverable based. Okay. So, so it wasn’t like when we worked with, uh, uh, me Costa that we call ‘em up and you know, Lisa’s there right down, you know, three quarters of an hour, 12 minutes, and since it’s Well, so They’re doing that should be tracking, but the contract wasn’t, and I’ve gotten the accounting from them on that. But the base of the contract was to provide the deliverables. The, the, the agreed price was based on some calculation of how many hours. Right, okay. Uh, that it would take to do that. But it’s on them to provide the, where Are they on their hourly count right Now? So they, they

2:53:24 current account, they expanded 93% of, uh, the total. So this was a, again, every, it was a one year agreement and then, then the charter committee was extended to a second year. But that percentage is irrelevant ‘cause they’ve agreed to perform in the deliverables. So In terms of, um, next steps, I think my understanding is from, uh, Amy, is that the priority is to answer the questions that were submitted over the summer. So if you could relay that in terms of order of importance and priority. Yeah. Um, for outstanding things, We still wanna create more work for the charter all something, so. All right. Well, I appreciate that update. Well, I, I just have one last question. Yep. Have they identified who’s gonna review? Yeah. Yeah. Okay.

2:54:11 And are they experienced with charters? I, this, I I would say the most experienced. Okay. Persons better done charter.

2:54:21 Yeah. Okay. Let’s move on. We have some one day liquor licenses. Uh, we have three to approve.

2:54:29 Um, we have one, uh, old North Church Forensic Performing Arts and Donald Carlton Marblehead Arts. If I could get a motion to approve of follow following applications for one day liquor license as follows, old North Church, eight Stacy Street, November 14th, 2025, 6:30 PM to 9:30 PM Friends of Performing Arts, king Cooper Mansion, November 6th, 2025, 6:00 PM to 10:30 PM And then Donald Carlton Marwood Art Association, eight Hooper Street, November 8th, 2025, 6:00 PM to 8:30 PM subject to the following conditions, delivery of and receipt by the licensed authority of required fee of $50. Delivery of and receipt by the licensed authority of proof that the alcohol purchase from authorized source proof that the applicant received proper delivery,

2:55:14 provide proper storage and disposal of all alcohol, beverage beverages purchased at all in accordance with the general requirements of general law. Chapter 1 38, alcohol will be purchased from CAP’S importing, a distributing distributing company, and Oz Wine Company. So moved. We full vote. Ms. Singer? In favor? Ms. Do in favor? Mr in favor? Does this in favor? Just a fox In favor. Uh, next up rail trail signs. Uh, Mr. Callahan, you’re here. Come on up. So this is for the rail trail completion near the Rockaway Clifton Ave segment construction phase, which is 11 foot wide pathway. It Is 11. Oh boy, I didn’t just take away all the thunder. Uh oh. Yes.

2:56:02 It’s just, this is a sign, uh, as part of the Rail Trail Project. We’re installing signage, uh, for now, the sign, the, the sign was presented to you in draft form, I think in July at the signs and lines from, uh, the town engineer. Um, since then, we’ve had a, we’ve revised it with input from town staff as well as the chief, uh, chief king. Um, and this is the one in front, the one that you see today in front of you, um, we’re proposing to install as part of the Smith Street and the Rockaway segments that were recently completed. That’s where we’re installing ‘em. They’re not going up throughout the rail trail right the second, but, um, so for now, this is where they would be installed at the Rockaway Clifton segment and the Smith Pleasant Street segment.

2:56:48 Okay. Quick question. Yes, sir. Is, is, uh, an electric powered bicycle consider, uh, motorized Vehicle? No, I think that’s something I think, I think it, I think Chief King would be able to answer that better. I think it is. Like there’s, I don’t, I’m not an e-bike expert, but there’s like tier three or something. So there is Something, it’s based on their speed up their max speed. Yeah. Go out one, if they exceed a certain capability of speed, then becomes, becomes motorized. Yeah. It goes into a different, just Curious. Yeah. Correct. Yes. Um, what’s the size that you’re looking? Oh, o uh, I don’t have the spec in front of me. I think it’s I page, it’s like eight and Yeah, it’s like eight and a half by 13 or something like that.

2:57:33 Just like, this is totally personal preference, but like, the color I saw was red Brown. It’s brown. Oh, it is brown. My screen is red. I Was like, it’s kinda like brown, you see in a lot of the state parks and natural Park. That’s what saying like, typically the green or brown. So it must have just been the way the image popped up on my screen. Yeah, No, it was, it came up like, We can make it marblehead red if you like. That’s why I marvel had red The other option. If I was still in Peabody, It’d be pea v blue. Yeah. Yeah. The other option was, it’s just like, it was a beautiful mascot. Green. Yeah. Yeah. Green or brown is like, was gonna be my, my vote. Beautiful mascot. Big deal too. I think the only red on it is seeing nine one. Yeah. Okay, great. Yeah. Yeah. You’re okay with that, right? Yes.

2:58:20 Um, I have a motion request to approve the request from Brenda Callahan, director of Community Development and Planning Department to install the proposed rail trail sign as presented for the marble wood rail trail and install Rockaway Clifton, a rail trail segment. Second. All in favor. Thank you Brendan. Jim, in favor. Still there. All right. We have another one. This is old townhouse signed from the Old Marble Hood Improvement Association. We have a letter from Marianne Griswell. My understanding is that they have done a bunch of work, uh, repairing and stones filled left side of the building, uh, replacement of a brick walkway. We do a pictures, they have done this on their own volition, um, and they, we would like to put a, they’ve asked for a sign to acknowledge that.

2:59:06 Outstanding. It looks Great. Great. So, if I have a motion to approve the request from Marion Criswell, hold Marblehead Improvement Association to install a so of 15 inches by seven inches as presented under the Crabtree apple tree by the main entrance to old townhouse and recognition of O Mia’s contribution to Old Town House. So moved a All in favor? All right. We again there. So we have just a, a notice from the shellfish, which is in accordance with chapter 31, 30 section 40 A of Massachusetts General Laws. This is classification, classification, conditionally approved. Sometimes they will shut it down. But, uh, for seasonal status change that the status was opened, the shell fishing

2:59:52 October 1st, 2025 through April 30th, 2026. All dates inclusive. And this is for the flats at, uh, Devereux and Tuckers Beach. I think that is just an announcement. Great. We’ve done it. We also have a few letters of interest. Uh, staying on topic here. Shellfish Constable, we have three letters of Pinterest. Um, I’m gonna recommend that we sort of deadline for applications for the shellfish Constable. We have two vacancies and three people. Um, set the deadline for November 7th and interviews November 19th. Please should vote on that. I don’t think so. Right? We don’t vote on that. Um, disability commission. We also have an applicant. We do have three vacancies there.

3:00:37 There are different guidelines on who have to fill those, but we do have three vacancies. Let’s set a deadline of December 5th with interviews on December 12th. Sound good everyone? Awesome. That sounds good. Beautiful. Are there any select board announcements? Just housekeeping? Yep. We’re scheduled for November 19th. November 19th. That, That’s a shift. Yep. That would be, um, the only regular meeting unless there’s something that comes up. Correct. I anticipate we might have some, something to do, some contracts or whatever. Yep. So we’ll do November 19th, and then we will likely, I don’t think we have a date. Oh, we do have a date set. What I just said of December. Um, that sounds December 12th. That’s a Regular meeting. Yep. And we’ll just do one. Wait, December 12th. That’s the Friday. What’s that for?

3:01:23 Uh, then do we screw that up? You Mean the 10th? The regular second. Okay. So then let’s, so just let’s move back a little bit there then our, oh, shoot. Then our, yep. So we’re gonna, no, perfect. So, so just, so, just so the public knows, our interviews will be December 10th at our meeting, not on a Friday night, um, for that. Yep. So our other meeting in December will be correct. All right. Can I have a motion to adjourn? So moved. Come second. Second. All right. All in favor? All right. Thank you guys.

3:01:55 All right. Second.