welcome everybody to the Monday March 25th meeting of the Conway select board and at 6:30 or though probably quite a bit after that will become a meeting of the joint meeting of the Conway select board and finance committee and we are also blessed with the presence of the Conway Personnel committee um uh yes yes as as well as um numerous members of the community and age age friendly Franklin County and North cin Regional action plan people um so uh this is being recorded live on FCAT and town website on Zoom if for any reason those recordings fail the meeting will still proceed live and in person call the meeting to order first item vote to approve the minutes of March 18 no issues or changes needed I'll make a motion to approve the meeting minutes second all in favor I next is um approving the account's payable warrant in the amount of $5,988 16 the payroll warrants in the amount of $1 13,254 48 and the payroll deduction warrant in the amount of $ 32,1 155 I'll just note that the reason for the very large numbers in the payable warrant is that these are the quarterly School expenses um so once every once every 3 months there's really a large one like that and um I've gone through them I've had all my questions satisfactorily answered about the rest of you um yeah I move to approve the warrants second all in favor I um meetings attended by select board members none for me uh yeah none since our last meeting do meetings every day um but but I'm here now uh public comments all right um new business first item the age friendly 5year plan for regional action plan for the P County and North C cabin um with us are Meg Ryan and Rachel Stoler from fog should we come sit at the table or should we talk from here um the microphone is there so if you talk from there you got this okay all right well thank you for having us thanks bar um we are coming tonight to give you an update um you are the governing board that signed on to the uh local Regional age and dementia friendly initiative three years ago or so um and we published an action plan based on the um survey of needs we did a couple of years ago so we wanted to just let you know um I know you guys have a very active um working group for the mass in motion Grant that's supporting this age and dementia friendly uh work and I also want to recognize that there's there's a lot of other um entities the Council on Aging um Etc who are already doing agent dementia friendly work but we wanted to go over this Regional plan um it's you know a collaboration with life path um so I think I gave you all a copy um and if you just go through the first few pages um it's organized by the eight domains of livability and what I wanted what we wanted to do tonight was to just briefly go through um the action items for each of the eight domains that the steering committee um identified as actions that we want to work on regionally um to give you a chance to think about um how Conway may want to participate in some of these action steps you're already doing some of them so um you know one of the one of the things with the AG and dementia friendly work is that whatever we do is not just for older citizens but benefits everyone in town you put that ramp in and it's not just for an older person with mobility issues it's for somebody who might be disabled it's for a young family with um a stroller it's for that High School athlete that uh had an injury and is now on uh crutches for a little while so um domain one is uh outdoor spaces and buildings we're on page nine page nine um uh one of the you know improving access and making sure everything is physically accessible is really important um the furog planning department is working on a lot of these items um one of the things is to uh note that you do have some information handed to you this evening about ADA grants that might be available for some of these um actions we want to uh you could do an ADA audit for your wreck and public facility you could do a walkability audit um for your town uh you might be able to improve things by participating in complete streets I don't know do are you guys um a do you have a complete streets um I don't know about the plan but complete streets was done here a number of years back uh so I I don't know if it you know if it's Revisited every decade or something like that probably do you know anything about comp I don't I'm sorry thank you that's okay we have a member of our planning department here with us tonight so um another thing is to look at making sure that whatever work you do on Town Open Spaces considers uh age-friendly elements and to um implement the age-friendly recommendations for many open space and wreck plans that you have and I forgot to find out where if you guys have a current open space in W plan you do yeah great so that's a helpful thing to have um domain two transportation is a perennial problem throughout the region um one of the things we found was that there are resources that people don't know about so just getting the information out about that is important and another action is to laun launch a Transit ambassador program and the fr frt has actually hired a woman named Elizabeth cork who is doing that program she's available to come up I believe the mass in motion uh committee is considering having her up to talk to us so this week y she's actually coming this week so it's helpful to know how to access the services that are already there and then the other thing is that a lot of the need isn't met by formal Transportation things so getting more volunteer drivers is important as well actually the F frta Med ride program and the life path ride for health program both need more volunteers um and looking at a neighbor to neighbor or um a village organization to look at whether that's a helpful um thing for transportation as well Rachel do you want to talk about housing um sure I'm going to just keep going yeah I'll jump happy just to hear a different voice so the thir the third domain is housing um and housing tends to be very expensive uh you know to build housing but there are a variety of options that um can help with housing that aren't quite as expensive so um uh looking at zoning ordinances um advocating that for zoning that it supports more affordable and accessible housing including accessory dwelling units or multiple units or a conversion of large single family to duplex um participating in advocating for State funding that supports more affordable housing options in rural areas and working with towns to create um housing that is suitable to older adults um so not all of it is about constructing new housing but um it can also be about looking at what housing stock you have and figuring out are there ways to improve it and make it um accessible for older adults as well as younger families and and I think correct me if I'm wrong you guys already have zoning in place where you can uh create a a second unit out of a single family home as a right as a right and adus in the back ground backyard and those are also very helpful to to make sure there's enough housing in a town so that is one of the actions um social isolation and um the ability to participate socially is a major help indicator um it there's been so much isolation uh since increase since pandemic so creating Partnerships between older adults and youth organizations like the Council on Aging and schools um creating or supporting existing marketing campaigns for the COA or Senior Center use um a Facebook ad can be a pretty inexpensive and uh um helpful thing if if you have something you want to advertise um intergenerational discussion groups um Greenfield Community College has started one um with between students and older adults that anyone's welcome to participate in um making sure that people know about life paths phone pal program and then thinking about whether you want to um support the growth of Village initiatives um a lot of the towns in the area have um neighbor to neighbor I think weightly uh started one recently and there's been some discussion about maybe participating but having enough volunteers to help run the program um Can can be hard to find domain five respect and social inclusion um making sure that people are aware of uh problems that may prevent participation provide providing anti-ag bias education um is something that I've been doing a lot uh and there's now a recording of one if anybody's interested providing technical assistance about age and dementia friendly policies systems and especially the built environment changes if you're going to repaint something you're going to spend that money anyway you may as well paint in a color that's more helpful rather than preventative for someone with Dementia or sight problems and there are resources available for considering that um providing dementia awareness and uh making sure that everyone knows about resources for elder abuse civic participation and employment um domain six is an area of of um concern for a lot of older adults one action step um encouraging towns to create a senior tax workof program you guys did recently so I applaud you um keep us posted on how how the process of setting it up is going because we'd love to share that with other towns in the area and then uh making sure that public meetings are accessible as you are doing with uh recording this having the owl so that people can participate virtually as well as in person and then thinking about Pathways for Meaningful incl employment for older adults communication and information is uh very important um we've noted how hard it can be to get the information out to people there's so many different Pathways um but towns that have a newsletter as you guys do it's usually very well used um so using that as a model is very [Applause] helpful and then think about um whether you have a current Municipal vulnerability planning uh process happening now or plan currently in place we do great MVP well we need to redo it yeah well yeah but we've been good with that the past few years this is this is ver valy way can't be ped up only with Incredible help from the F God right Al yes happy to be here for you all of the Departments and then working on making sure that older people have an A have ability to access um the world digitally whether it's providing devices education on how to use them um etc etc and that is a a an issue both in communication and information and then again in health services and community supports a lot of older people can struggle to use uh patient portals or to make vaccine appointments things that can actually often only be done online so having the support there um and uh as Phil pointed out you do um you are working on digital literacy with the grant with the South County Senior Center so and then advocating for more uh primary care practice ractice um support for for portals and then use the Department of Public Health Health Equity survey to get information about what the older adults here actually need um the department Rachel and I work in at the furog is will be um helping you find information from that and handing it to you so um then think about whether whether you have uh the enough of a program to identify and support residents who H may have access and functional needs during emergencies um you've had more than your share of floods who do you need to worry about helping get out of a house um because they can't do it on their own uh some towns have a very formal system others have a very informal system is is the one that Conway has has adequate to your needs um something to consider it is very informal it's very informal yes well if you're ever interested or your EMS people are interested there are a couple of different actual um models that can be shared there yeah I'd love to see them just to have an idea of how we could yeah absolutely Paulie in particular has a very specific uh and useful database they send out um a survey with the census information every year so you voluntarily opt in to let somebody know and the data is kept private and protected with only certain people having access um so that's that's the gist of it you know we were looking for things that that had um organizations that could be the lead on it and things that might we might be able to make progress in in five years which is the length of this plan um so we're we're here really to offer support and help for anything that sounds good you know we don't necessarily expect a response right this minute um and I I do want to uh highlight that your mass motion group is also working to uh make the the town a better place for people to age in in place so were we were we talking before about an 88 Grant well the one the mod grant that I'm looking into is for the lift for Town Hall so the lift and um cuz th this building needs a and then um the other thing that we've been talking about that I would really like to see is the automatic door the just the front entrance to this building yeah is it's a fire door it's the the automated those little blue buttons that you press um we have the we have the plan for all that that was put in place right now to be honest it's just a matter of getting to it and there is some funding even still for it for Ada I think there's like 4500 still left those doors are like 10 or aren't those doors I'd have to you know now they probably are when this was done less last time I think I remember hearing that they were over10 but the plan that Conway did um when Tom was here you know reviewed sizes of the doorways and making sure the widths of everything you know all that kind of stuff um so we have the plans for that it's just getting to it now so okay are there any other things that um and looking through this that jumped out at you as things that you haven't thought about before that seemed interesting or that you would want more information on um and again you don't have to answer that right this moment on the spot unless something did jump out at you we can take that back and make sure you get the information you need the local community based transportation thing MH is it's um just like everything else if you really want to solve your problems you just got to look within your own town and just solve it yourselves it's just um what we just mean like is with funding um funding and enough volunteers yeah you know every town every individual only has so much bandwidth so that's a limit limited Resource as well we recognize that especially in small which is why we tried to put together this Regional plan to help support smaller places with with less bandwidth um and then when we did a previous survey and we found that um what was it almost almost half of all seniors in town and that that's the other thing when you look at your data that says Statewide it's 177% senior population you know your town is 40 something per. um uh you know that when when uh but but we looked and the the the the one the the data point that always strikes out at me is that the number the large percentage of seniors in our town that said that they were social that they were isolated that they didn't have anybody to call for help um and those are things I would like to really address so I yeah yeah that's that that one takes some creative thinkings yeah well we will uh keep you posted on what's happened with with the agent Dimension friendly planning and um any other thoughts or questions housing housing yes State funding the life path options for Grants um not for just new housing but also for the repairs needed on existing there is they do have um some um money and help for uh home repairs through life path um so people can be directed to call I can get more information to you guys yeah more information fantastic absolutely we'll do that um they they have been trying a home share program um but there is a great imbalance of uh you know trying to match up younger people who are looking for housing with older people who are struggling to maintain their independence for whatever reasons um and I think there were a lot of younger people looking and not very many older people um wanting to wanting the service so they're they're trying to figure out if that is um something that can really be worthwhile in addressing I mean housing costs are brutal they are brutal for everyone so any of you have any questions so I just the only comment i' make I'm fad Bennett I'm on the age friendly group and just know the key here is that you got to pass this right as a select board you already did so you're just you're just C we just giving an update so the great thing I would say is that arnal group has had great support from um these wonderful people and or the key is there's too much here um and picking out what's going to help Conway I think is the key and so you got a little local group working at it with back up from a bigger group perfect model than just to be clear there's a mass in motion grant that Rachel administers that Conway opted into that gives you a small amount of money to support your age and demension friendly in um Endeavors here in town just for people who might not have that background and the mass and motion is meant to um be sort of leveraged to incorporate AG friendly thinking into broader town planning so that could be uh open space and Recreation planning or comprehensive planning or complete streets planning MVP any of those um plans that towns work on are um are improved by incorporating age friendly thinking into them thank you so much for your time you we'll be back at some point yes thank you and I will note on the way out of my seat that the um Regional mass in motion towns are going to have a a a region get together here in Conway at your beautiful Library we're going to have it catered locally in in May so thank you Conway forting thank you thank you next is creating the rain Garden the MVP Grant you should have already gotten it but there's an updated drawing on the second page and some more okay there's the maintenance information for the pl you don't have you don't have thank you all righty well hi again I'm Allison I'm a planner of the furog I'm here with Cynthia Watton singer PA Conway and living garding design and also Kate and Kendall from PA Conway um so the short story is I have a good chunk of funding with the current MVP action Grant to do an educational activity with school age kids and I was thinking it might be fun to teach them about something that they could do in their own sphere of influence which a good option could be uh rain Gardens or teaching them about the urgent need to capture storm water runoff um so my proposal is to do a classroom based activity to teach them about how rain Guardians work and then to try and do on on Town own property so they could have a part in it and then also see it after it's done and then you know observe it over the years and see how it all works um so our we do have a bit of a time constraint it would need to be done by June 30th um myself and some members of on Conway went down to the South River Meadow to see if anything could be done there but I think more observation of how the water comes down off the road need to be done to do them effectively there so if we want to get it done by June 30th the easiest spot to do it at would be the town offices um Cynthia put together a design two years ago before the ramp went in um but then I think there wasn't funding or that hasn't been done yet so this could be a good opportunity to get that project uh completed um so Cynthia is available to rework the design um based on the size of the ramp we would have to do a little bit more work with where the pipe would be sighted um but we would be able to do most of the work and then have the kids involved time so yeah those are our thoughts the ramp is in though yeah yeah the ramp is in um and the pipe would not go under the ramp it would go around the side do you there is going to be just so you know um at this end of it right oops right here there's going to be a put up okay yeah that's fine you talking about buring it in the soil not C the soil there's a little bit of a slope there there's a lot of a slope there yeah um so in revisiting this as just a rain Garden without all the other plantings that we had um originally proposed um I've you know I've looked at the site again and and looked at noticed that the new ramp is larger than the original ramp so that's why I drew it in red a little bit bigger because it's a little bit larger than the original um and this steep slope um is eroding the The Mulch is running off so I'd probably want to do some you know lay in some uh stones on the top of the surface just to hold the soil back from washing off um but other than that you know it would just be a buried pipe that's connected to the down spout and that is you know it's sloping down to below the BM um at the base of the uh ramp and and then there would be a depression dug out and I'm thinking that the depression would um the the perimeter of it would be raised on the on the part the front of it which isn't there'd be the slope and then the rain garden and then the the material that's dug out would be like a raised rim to make it a little bit even deeper and also to use the material and then we can plant into the material that dug out we could plant um a few Wetland loving plants that can tolerate dry spells as well so that's that's the proposal so is the tree part of it as well well I mean unless unless you approve a tree I mean uh Ron was opposed to the tree when we originally proposed it um I don't know how people feel about it tree now but we'd still love to put a Shad Tree in there which is what is in the um the town common I Now understand the library triangle has three Shad trees in it and the Veterans Memorial planting that we're going to be doing is going to have two more Shad Tre so it'll sort of be a a theme on our Main Street um yeah I think the only issue was the maintenance was the mowing because right now they can just get in and right right so putting a tree would make it a little bit more difficult right that's the only issue great we thought about instead of having the down spout go directly into the ground using a raining catchment Barrel um because we have the planting beds right so if you had a raid and catchment Barrel you could have an overflow for the groundwater or the water that goes down down the slope but then also have that Barrel to water the plants and the and the beds well you could do that my experience with rain barrels is that they fill up and they overflow and they Splash your building right which is what we're trying to avoid um and with you know the kind of torrential rings that we had they're also really hard to use you have to elev at them because the spigots at the bottom I you're noing your I lot of experience with rain barrels they really aren't very functional I mean they're like they it sounds good the pipe that I would put in would have perforations in it so it would be releasing water in in the pathway of the pipe and I was even thinking I could Loop it a little bit more through the front part of that mound into the beds yeah yeah to to let it you know percolate through there right with one just one of those percolating hoses that you could put in the bed right something like that well it's it's a pipe that has perforations in it so when the water runs through it it leaks out got through the preparation so yeah so you could have a watering the whole bed there right and overflow to the exactly yeah that's the whole point of move moving the rainwater is to use it and to slow it down and and to deconcentrate it you know to disperse it more um so it's not you know just one spout that's washing away I mean I noticed even the gravel below that was pushed off in in the landcape fabric was exposed from the water flow um so so do we know about whether the existing planting bed right right next to the ramp is that something that they want that Ron and the highway department want to keep doing do you mean in terms of it was this was my understanding was that um that was all planned even before I got here and they they were ready to go with it and they did the plantings but it wasn't you know it's it's supposed to be like a m as maintenance-free as possible planting it's my understanding but I don't know that I mean I don't think anybody's weighed in with any kind of formal this is what we want to see in front there yeah CU my recollection was that he would be okay if that was if he was the he would be happy if he was relieved of I I believe it was there there were needs to water it in July and August and that that was a problem or not a problem but that that was something that would be okay if they didn't have to do anything that makes more maintenance work for them is definitely like you know less maintenance work is better I mean and that the the the thing about that is that that's has a greater street level visibility and pedestrian visibility sure um and that that might be a better location for your plan than I mean it's it's already existing cly defined and you mean the the bed are you talking the slope bed the bed we'd have to have the rain Garden lower right yeah the rain garden needs to beow cuz the water goes down so you can't it has to be below yeah I guess so um yeah yeah but I mean the plantings would be around the depression I'm not thinking of I what I'm thinking is filling the depression most of the way with gravel maybe some decorative stones on top you know some like River Rocks Pol River Rocks or something so you that's that's what would be filling the Basin and then around the perimeter of that would be the plants and there'd be taller plants against the mound and low plants across the front and probably the the um size of this would be bigger than what's shown on this plan it would be it would extend you know more out into this area I'm assuming that there isn't anything underneath there that would keep one from digging down well we would definitely want to call Dig Safe and make sure that there's no utilties under there yeah and the bees they're concerned about it the grammar school I saw that too I was just thinking of barique going in the office I mean it's not going to have the same population and accumulation of children that you would have at the grammar school but I mean we have them anyway there's bees in my backyard honestly if they stay you know outside the office I'd be happier so that is a thing though every year there's one or two kids that are really allergic to bees things and um and it was like 10 years ago that we got a grant the school committee got a grant for planting a few fruit trees I think we planted a couple apple trees maybe three of them the idea was oh in the spring it'd be flowering and in the fall that it'd be fruiting well in the spring when it flowered the kids all got stung by bees and by the Fall all the bears ate all the be the apples so bebal everywhere yeah yeah um I think they actually removed two of those trees just it was so close to the playground the kids were getting stuck my understanding about the bees is that there's um Hornets that live you know yellow jackets that live in the field and that that's really yeah that's really the problem with the bees that they're worried about you know cuz the kids are playing games in the field and they're getting into the nest and getting Stu yeah but you know pollinate those aren't what pollinator Garden draw I mean those those insects like fruit and sugary drinks and things like that so that's perfect at an elementary school you know to attract them but um but the pollinators that we would be attracting are are like bumblebees and honeybees and you know um some of the bees don't even sting you know some types of like bubble bees only the females can stay so and and so if the existing planting bed um closest to the road is still going to stay the way it is then you're not going to have bees right next to people on the ramp right because it'll just it'll be like in the center there it would be yeah it would be down below the yeah yeah so it's not like anybody's going to be rubbing up against plants that have bees on them yeah yeah and and they won't be BL bloming all the time they're perennial so they'll you know I'll probably select a bunch you know plants that bloom in different seasons so there'll be some things that bloom in the fall and some things that bloom in the spring you know winter winter good looks too yeah well I'm thinking some some Forbes in the front you know cuz they like moisture and the grasses are sort of a natural with with water elements so yeah they look nice and and speaking of like safety we would probably have the site at least halfway done so when the kids got there they could see the pipe laid out and they would be involved in the pling but they wouldn't be doing like a lot of digging or anything clear that all the digging would be done and the pipe would be in but I'm thinking maybe have them hook up do the final hook up to the to the down spout or something cuz that's kind of an easy can get someone the [Music] roof no one needs to be on the roof pass out the pickaxes send buddy up with a l sorry you're gonna have something oh no I just um I was going to say I think it's a great idea and I um you know attending the approval by the grammar school which I can't see why they wouldn't want to participate in US I'd like to make a motion that we have go forward with building a rainard in front of town offices second all in favor I it's unanimous great thank you so much thank you thank you well fingers crossed for yes from the school and we know people there we can talk okay good thank yeah thank you both oh okay so I'll make you a co-host got you okay are we going yeah so you want to call your meting to order and um you can also call the Personnel committee meeting to order um well we'll do the tech budget first and then we'll go right into the um job description Highway stuff good I make a motion to call the finance committee me to order join me with the honorable select Board of Congress call in fav I Roy you vot okay carries hi thank you Roy I make a motion to let's call the personel we're doing them all once yeah we're going to do them concurrent concurrent all right all right I as chair of the Personnel committee I'd like to make a motion to start a concurrent meeting of the Personnel committee I second vote vote all in favor all in favor I I okay all right thank you I like I might make a motion to approve the finance Conway finance committee meeting minutes jointly with the honorable select board for May 18th has presented anyone car a second second all in favor I I all right carries 40 thank you so not we're we're here tonight with uh or here with us tonight is Franklin Tech superintendent Rick Martin um nice that we can be in the same room again and U uh I guess you you have your presentation you wish to make yes uh thank you for having me tonight um I'm going to just review and kind of Target how the budget would impact Conway and then just give you a overview on where we are in the budget process um I'm going to share my screen and it's a budget book that was sent to you earlier see here we go I am able to share my screen that's good news we're off to a great start all right um what you have is a budget book but what's more importantly is we we we provide the budget book electronically to you so to make it easy to navigate uh the first place we look we get a table of contents with a clickable link so I go to the sources and uses of funding which is this sheet right in front of us I can blow that up for the screen for those that need to see it better online um and what this is is basically how we get our money and this is a 50 page document so I'm not going to do that tonight um if you can't sleep at night be more than happy to go through all the Blue Links um they'll put your rate to sleep trust me I put it together um the assessment to the town is the first one as you can see we Trend over the last five years a 3% increase and that's pretty you know and that's the same for this upcoming year um that doesn't go up or down because we're utilizing our excess in deficiency to offset the next year's budget as you can see down in line number eight down here and that number was certified at 580,000 for this year so that helps to offset it um how does it impact Conway so assessment to the town so all you got to do is click on anything in blue if you click on it it will go right to that sheet all right so if I go at conways up top you had seven students right here in the first row and when I look at that um and I scroll all the way over you're at about $1 18,857 per pupil now that's a per pupil expenditure that's dictated to us from the state as many of you may be aware so what the state feels is that the town of Conway is just as well as wethy whing Weston Dober Sheran and the most wealthiest towns in the state that's what the state formul dictates to the town of Conway we all know by being out here that is that's not the case you were about to say a more appropriate word very well played um our average for all 19 member towns is down below at 12,200 52 so it fluctuates based on your income what they perceived your property value to be and every two years they do the equalized valuation so that's just some of the formula they won't tell us how they do everything unless they would actually have to give us a lot more money for um per town so on the next thing as you all you got to do is just click to the top left link and that'll get you right back to where we were as sources of funding so the the trend for the town of Conway how how's it going it's trending for Conway so I just click on this chart here it will take me to a 4E Trend and I go here Conway you had four students 10 students nine students and seven students so you dropped by two students so as you go to the far right hand column you'll notice your assessment went from 171,000 down to 132 not because we want to be nice but you have two less students so it's a per pupil expenditure what we are expecting I always do this every year to try to give the town the heads up what might be coming down the pike um right now we have two students in their senior year that will more than likely graduate from Conway we have three applications we're looking at maybe eight students for next year so you're kind of right in that same ballp that you've always been in um and then I am going to scroll back up to the top and Debt Service and that's our um that's that 15year Bond windows and doors project we we did um that's about eight years into the making and how dides it affect Conway so I click on the Blue Link and I go to Conway and I look right down here it's about $6,279 maybe every year maybe a 100 bucks but some sometimes 80 bucks it just depends it's not that much fluctuation uh per year in that in the life of the 15E Bond uh the next um chapter 78 you probably heard a lot about this I'm assuming at this point in the year chapter 78 as you can see we have increased about $500,000 each of the last four years look at at this last year $177,000 even though our enrollment went up from 50060 to 571 they put us into hold Hess now how did that happen when enrollment goes up you're supposed to be out of hold Harless we've been out of hold Harless for The Last 5 Years so how does that happen well they didn't in they didn't increase the educational budget at the state level they actually decreased it but to make it look like an increase from political points they took the hold Hess money that is designated outside of the operating budget for the education and they put it into the budget so what happens it makes it look like you have an overall educational increase but these are the results of course we didn't get an an overall UC education increase I try to explain a little bit about that when you click on that tab right here the chapter 78 we get a little bit more I don't go into great detail so that the state doesn't fire me um but if you wanted to find out more these are external links all through there like two or 300 external links so if you want to really again can't sleep at night you click on an external link and it will um take you to the State website and if you want to learn all about Chapter 70 right here all the requirements and net Aid that will take you right there so I click back on the Chapter 70 it takes right back here the D cherry sheet for those that are familiar the Department of Revenue cherry sheet I clicked that on and how it impacts Franklin County Tech but this is also a teaching tool this budget it will help you identify your local school districts and where they're getting their money from which I think is important uh because we're all taken from the same pool of money if I go down here now if you look at these numbers it's that same number we had in our budget you'll see this number in our budget too the 855,000 Regional School transportation budget if we go to the cherry sheet Department of Revenue and this is real easy to do so if you're just able to follow me for about 20 seconds you'll get this you go to the top all Regional Schools you click you can go down to whatever school you want Franklin County Tech Frontier doesn't make a difference you click on Franklin County Tech you press submit that's it so the same number we have in our budget appear right here all right so that's important to note because um I've been doing this a long time and there are school districts who don't report out the accurate money they're receiving so if you ever want to double check it's a good thing to do right here and as you can see we go from year to year here we have a drop of 60 70,000 in Regional Transportation so there's another cut that we had to end um we weren't counting on that we were just going to budget the 97 with a 0% increase and see what the governor gives us not only did we get an increase we got $70,000 less with a higher student population and we added another bus didn't make sense so um that's our world every year with priner Y well that's the you know things you can control and control so I just went over the regional transportation numbers right here you saw that here right um on non-member towns is how we had to make up the difference so these are you know you saw your assessment at 18,000 in change non-member to average $25,000 um and so those students we use 35 non-member students and that we offset that increase rate there in that budget um and the other ones didn't change much as um we' already talked about they has any questions around those that's not too hot so it's 15.3 million how do we spend that money um we do run an evening school we do other things we have Cola so our district leadership and administration went up slightly we added the dean the students a few years ago to address our increased population um this is a deceiving number instructional Services look like they've gone down a few hundred th000 but what happened in the the previous year's budget um we weren't uh confident we were going to receive a very competitive Grant uh to uh start our evening program so we put the cost of the evening coordinator and the instructors into that particular budget um we did get the Grant and so now we took those out of the next year's budget so it looks like a instructional Services dropped but it really is not um what is an increase is in student services here you see that gone up $100,000 uh the reason for that is because as everyone's well aware the extinction of the S grants for all of the school districts towns and municipalities is in effect for next year we were very careful over the last five years or four years not to put a lot of salaries into that so we are going to be applying for the SRO grant that comes up at the cops Grant so we hopefully that will just recover itself so we didn't have to go go back to that again when I look back at where we are on the table of contents here if I just scroll I know the budget a little bit quicker so I might take someone a little bit longer to get there evidently it's taking me a while um if I get ready to the grants and I think this is important these are all the grants every school district gets these are called your entitlement grants and if you wanted to we're not doing this tonight look at all the links in blue ignore them for tonight again um can't sleep um this explains all your entitlement grants what they're used for I want to um give you guys an idea what we spend it on so we have our Perkins grant money for our vocational programs that's 136,000 right here what we bought it on is all explained in the paragraphs because sometimes in a budget we haven't done the grants in past years but given that there's the extinction of the eser money we thought it was important to show you how we spent all that because those are the same type of questions you can ask your own school districts as well so our EST grants are explained here here's the first one we got in 2020 the typical things everyone else bought you know uh from the air filter sneeze Gods the fogers all that kind of fun stuff we spent it on that the next grant that we um had the co Relief Fund 77,000 again nurse office death Shields that kind of stuff the next one we received is 386,000 Aon is large as your comprehensive school districts because we're only grades 9 through 12 we're not 3 through 12 so they're going to get a larger allocation so ours was right here 386 um not anything that stands out but just things that we needed to do to be able to keep our school open like big outdoor tents and things like that so we can run a classroom uh then the big one came the s a three Grant and that's when I talked about the school resource offic getting put in here that right here I meant this is the school adjustment Council we put into that Grant we then at this next year are moving that into one of the entitlement grants the title two uh I mean the title one Grant and the special education grant so that salary is not going to affect our operating budget that was the key that's it for salaries we tie anything up in our salaries because we knew it was coming to an end um and with that here's all of the entitlement grants this is what every school district outside of Perkins pretty much receives so this is what we receive just so you know because people want to well how do you do everything with just that operating budget well we get entitlement money that's off of the books it's off of the operating um assessment for the towns that's for every school district not just Franklin County Tech what's not for every school district is our competitive grants this is stuff we chase this is competitive without this we wouldn't be able to do a lot of the stuff that we do since 2014 we have received over $9 million in competitive grants that enables us to do programs that I think benefit the community such this is our new veter Clinic that we have up here now those students that are from Conway that go to Smith for animal science and you're paying $30,000 for the tuition cost and $30,000 for transportation can come to Franklin County Tech for $18,000 that makes a big difference and one of the motivating factors of us doing this program was coming here about seven years ago and you were stuck with I think four or five students at a large cost and so I started to explore what can we do so and the end result is um a Veterinary Clinic um in an animal science program the other thing that we were able to do is is this is just got built this is our Aviation hanger for our new aviation mechanic technician program so we're really excited about that to stop the fall that came 100% out of competitive grants so no operating cost to the towns so those are some of the things in our budget that I wanted you to take a look at um you might be interested to know that this this upcoming fiscal year for the first time in memory um we have we have kids signed up for Smith well they're probably coming to us which is which is cost efficient I mean it's not that we're better than Smith B that's not what we're saying what we're saying is that we're right down the street is you're a member of town you're going to be able to pay L um the last Parts I don't want to drag this on I think I'm just going to go the important parts that stand out in the budget if you don't mind so I can be done in about two minutes and then you can take any questions that that you want line 10 and line 11 the ones that would stand out if I were you all right and they are the asset acquisition seens project that's a 15-year power performance contract um that we received for 13 new hbac rooftop units new boilers energy efficient systems at about $500,000 a year we knew that was coming to a close um so and so we put that money into our Capital stabilization which has been averaging about $250,000 we do have nearly a 50y old building and what's happening is um our old electrical switch gear just give you the example what's happened numerous times the electrical switch gear can't always handle the load so when it shuts down um we hope it goes back on well it had it didn't it it then it delayed we got it repaired okay now they were telling us if it goes again you're going to need a new electrical switch gear well there 11 to 12 of those units so um we bought one as a safety not two weeks later it went down we didn't have that sitting there we would have waited one month for a new one to come in and we would have been out of school for a month that's just an example then we put that one in we quickly bought another one guess what happened again it happened again to a different type of system right so it's that type of damage control at hundreds and hundreds of thousand dollars you know per Incident That's occurring 10 times a year right so we're putting a Band-Aid on something that needs an operation so right now we are in the midst of an msba feasibility study right so that's a feasibility we will find out what they tell us we need renovation new building we not sure yet until we go through the feasibility study the feasibility studies are not the same feasibility studies cost wise that they were 5 years ago or even 10 years ago the estimated cost of the feasibility study is around 1.5 million so we have a choice do we go out to bond the towns for 15 years and put the burden on the towns for 15 years or do we just roll the money in that we have in our budget that we've been paying for 15 years for stons into our Capital stabilization and avoid the bond because if we go out the bond I don't want to do it twice I want to do it once be diligent and be very very uh conservative with how we go about this new building and if we do get a new building it's not going to be filled with all kinds of stuff we've already narrowed this they they're trying to get us to build this big thing and we're trying to say well how many students we have let's just build it for that let's just be conservative and build it the right size because these new buildings are going to be expensive if they go that grou so that's line 10 and 11 um as far as that's concerned and that's how we spend our money the other big cost that you'll see up here um is the transportation number up here we have a new fiveyear Transportation um contract and that went up 14% as we would expect but then when you're going up 14% And then you take a $70,000 hit in your reimbursement we're all stuck with the bill yes we are so that is you know that once uh promise that we once heard that it will be 100% refunded when appropriated correctly well uh not appropriated I guess but and we know that we're not getting 90% this year like last year correct we aren't getting close to that so there's some of the uh challenges that aren't new they're the same challenges every school district is going to be coming to you with or hasn't already and and uh so that's uh that's the nutshell of our budget everything else is in there from um all the different line items the hundreds of line items that you see in the budget but again this isn't anything we're going to do right now um but that's my budget any questions how many more years on the transportation contract uh this is year one year one oh good yeah y we just started it so year one year one out of how many year one out of five five yep how many how many uh bus companies been on the contract oh a whole bunch um I think a whole bunch of one um yeah there's no competition out here which is why they can dictate what that price is going to be so it's not the same and you know we have we have RI go forer in grammar but they're their rate went up more than 14% yeah and um yeah yeah um they do junkets down to up so I guess one of the questions was was what is your what is your just from the cost perspective what is your cost per student a cost per student on average or for 12287 on average in Conway 18,8 that's what you're assessing the towns that's not what we're doing that's what they tell us it is that's what their formula tell us it it is but your your overall budget divided by the number of students isn't that it's 12,000 that number you just gave me yeah that number that's where you're talking yeah y it's good for subsidizing certain towns like orange and they need help um and then um what was the other one um oh the so one of the things that that we became aware of this year is that the way you present the information is different than the way the other schools present so um when uh just in in in summary form so when when we were putting our budget your budget before or it's our budget our portion of your budget um before town meeting last year um we be because of the the different layouts of the different budget School budgets that we did we did not include the capital por that $6,000 capital in in our request at town meeting okay so um and when when and that one of the very first slides that you showed was sort of the Conway and the list of costs correct so um my my request to you would be that if if there's a way to redo that for just add a category for the capital um uh part of the assessment to that one page so that the number that the working number that we're giving is the actual number that we need to ask town meeting for okay so what we can do is did the sheet that goes out from the superintendent's office at Frank County Tech that identifies um what that what the total cost would be right then what we can do is on that one sheet just add what your debt exclusion is as well so you'll have it on that first sheet so you'll have it on that one sheet I mean it's broken up a lot of towns I go to all the towns so a lot of towns have the the Army bus budget and that does the schools and then they have their Capital within their budget and then we would be in that category as well um and some people list it right under our School Franklin County Tech assessment that number whatever that is and then rate beneath it Capital assessment bang then total for Franklin County Technical School the majority of the towns like Deerfield and towns that's the way that they do it they'll put Franklin County Technical School assessment Franklin County Technical School Capital assessment and then they'll have the total rate in the omn this budget well that's that's what I have here but I think um the confusion and this was on my part but I did get it squared away from fy2 yeah was the 132,000 as the assessment for this year looked to me like that was the total and included the capital so this was the confusion I had last year so you can see here I just found out that I'm the capital assessment is the amount that didn't get added in properly okay because I thought that was included in the 170 well in the 171 272 D that I'm I'm confused about what you have here is transportation's broken out yeah okay so you do it that way all right so if you add if I is if it is 132 and that's just the top of my head um if you had the 125 and the 6,200 you would be in that range for the 132 is that the 132 correct that would be 132 and then if you add the capital assessment to it that makes sense yeah so that's why it was confusing last year so just having another column that says this is the total this is what you put on your word y I'll have I I'll I'll have her send that out to you we talked about it today before the meeting yeah and she's just going to add that for your town because the other towns already have that you know they do it a little bit differently right so we'll just make sure that it goes out the Conway so you all have in one and I want to be clear you gave us that information last year there was nothing there's no but um it was just the way that just like Bernie said it was just the way that it was organized it was y different there just wasn't a column total that just said F this is the total sure okay you know like like the letter that comes from um the treasurer that says here's your Capital assessment here's your assessment underneath that just but here's added up because we're my no my executive my executive assistant says she's got this yes she does well she's got me squared away so we're we're good I know you talk so so how many students are in the vet tech program right now uh we could only take up to 15 in that particular program per grade level all right so that's filled up so 57 or so how many of your programs are at capacity right now um probably 70% 70% one are the ones that are the most efficient last time I checked it was electrical electrical still we had add another teacher um for the electrical program so uh probably most of them are at capacity yeah with electrical being one of those programs like welding and a few others with a long waiting list um students uh um wanted to get into that program so that was the first choice about the aviation program we're going to see how that goes uh next fall is our first freshman class so Westfield does Westfield Tech have any avation Westfield Tech's the only one in the country that's certified by the FAA so we plan on be number two is that commercial Aviation or also defense um it's going no just not commercial Aviation yeah thank you that's good well private and Commercial know they're going to have to learn about the small little propella planes and all that stuff first and build themselves up to the uh to the jet simulators that we have thank you any further questions Ro have any questions no thank you I'm fine thank you for I just have to say I always appreciate how informative your budget is I've learned so much from okay thank you thank [Music] you [Music] so we're we're still in the finance meeting any other Finance issues anything else to present I wanted to go if there's nothing I wanted to just get a do take a quick look at the Omnibus and um look at the recap tab um that's not completely up to date I okay cuz I had questions about that I was to make sense of it um and I couldn't make sense no you can't make sense of it yet it's the four the four new tabs that I did were the straight with the co budget 2% the article twos the article twos yeah all the article twos that's what I just finished working on I I'll get to the recap this week okay I'm just I just yeah I'm I'm finding it hard without understanding you know all the the sources of funds and the so this will be the final version too is that well the Thursday we is the the school committee will be passing eonic grammar school budget and that's really the last major shoe the drop of our budget so Monday we'll really have the article two portion yeah yeah yeah and then we can talk about start to talk about the budget Capital so so you anticipate having updated recap tab yes next week for next Point that's fine yep and what about the uh capital budget haven't gotten started on that yet I don't know yeah all right I mean that'll be that'll be on that the deadline P passes this week right or it already passed capital for Capital submitting submitt submitting Capital was done a long time ago yeah do we still have outstanding right we still have some things that not everyone has submitted correct no everybody submitted um well yes I think I think we're good with that so yeah I do have like the running tab the free cash how much we have this year and the different articles that will come out of that kind of thing thanks than you all right so I should make a motion then to conclude the fin I make a motion to adjourn the finance committee meeting jointly with the honorable select board uh second all in favor yeah I hi all right count that that's great that was wishful thinking next next Monday is April Fool it's perfect for a budget meeting [Music] 63 I also I gu the time sequence on now the Personnel committee has the floor yeah that's all you all order yeah inorder we're taking a candy break here so there's a question Tech uh procedural question we called a Personnel commit committee meeting to order but we didn't post the meeting 48 hours in ADV minut that's okay so you're on the select board agenda I making a presentation okay so you'll consider that as a okay great we won't get we won't get Chief face to arrest us I might do that for the other thing just just I mean you the the the um finance committee always does this too you don't actually have to motion a meeting you the chair can just declare just call it to order and it's it's it's open so thank you to be a real dictator saves 10 seconds seconds or seconds yeah okay so we're going to discuss the uh the report the Personnel committee report is that what's next on the uh agenda um yeah so I'm was going to suggest that you share your screen because I'm assuming that no one on select board has seen this yet oh the report no we have okay yeah and I uh I I have to take notes Mee meeting okay so the way I thought we could begin is well we can do it one of two ways we can step through the report or we can just start with questions if you've already reviewed it and you have any questions or comments what would you prefer I'm pretty agnostic on this okay I too okay so I think then we can just step through it um the point of this exercise was really to try to put some structure around the information that we've collected and reviewed so far which is which is in more detail in the attachments and all of the these sections of this report is is a summary of everything that is in the attachment so you'll see that um there's three bullet points that are some basic the basic premise that we used um so again we call out that it's not in to consider the merits of any individual who's currently a town employee also I'll add that this is in draft status so it can be further revised or we can add additional information if necessary after this meeting and the background of this was looking at current Staffing versus targets um and using the highway examp the highway department as an example of that so there you see in the first table there's the job roles there's the current Staffing and then there's the Target Staffing and the bullet points make some assumptions about for example under normal circumstances chronic understand understaffing of employees with CDL places an unfair burden on the remaining Highway Department employees that's what we have learned anecdotally in the committee um furthermore there's a note that the superintendent has logged 393 hours and that the superintendent has requested um an hourly wage increase for operator CDL and labor laborer jobs as well as hire compensation for himself um and one of the interesting things that we looked at was the comparison of Conway with other towns and that is um attachment a attachment a and that was sort of the premise of all of the analysis that we did to to just Baseline Conway against all the other towns nearby so I'm going to pull up attachment a so that be like Co rain bucking mhm um not Irving not shelburn weight Ley um uh Ashfield and a few other towns with with very similar um Levy limits to to Conway okay how about miles of Road um it's listed in the in the attachment yeah yeah um but the miles of Road it is quite variable as you as you know so suelin doesn't have much yeah yeah so if we go to attachment a for example you'll see um superintendent Foreman operator labor and as you can see Conway is at the low the lower end of this range so that was the Baseline for our discussion think oh it didn't oh got emailed out okay um it did i ph you emailed it out on um Friday THS John mail you mailed it out did I did I oh I think you sent it out I sent it out yes okay all I have is the it's not listed as attachment a probably might not titled that because we hadn't completed the report all I have is the JD the job description ah okay that correct so attachment a has probably not been distributed no I thought I sent them all out this morning I saw it I didn't I didn't I did not see it are you going to send it now to to everybody well I'm trying to I'm um I'm not connected so I can't get into my yeah if you can send it out that well if you send it to me I can put it up on the screen right when I sent out on Friday was a RW it's in the uh it's it's in the shared folder yeah I know but I can't get to yeah there's a link right there it says attachment a is now in the folder if you look at the email the body of the email oh why am I not seeing that attachment so right right here oh in this one this one that's hysterical thank you crime detection yeah right um okay but there's two so there somehow there's a second copy got uploaded they're identic they should be identical okay all right all right um let me see how I can make it come on come on come on come on come on where is it here you go oops so this is the the pure Town grouping it includes superintendent compensation Foreman compensation uh operator CDL compensation and laborer compensation uh it includes insurance percentage paid by the town to the as part of the compensation uh where it's been available uh there's your road miles Tom and then um the levy limits so this is this was a larger spreadsheet of like 30 some towns um and then when all was said and done we we Whittle It Down based on the the towns that were closest to our our own Levy limit it seem to make a lot of sense Ash you know what as has 116 over2 million yeah so then you can see that uh Conway the focusing on the operator CDL because that's really what we wanted to think about first because we feel like the underst Staffing is sort of a a a f foundational problem for the town that's leading to a lot of other issues and um you know with with 2380 being our top rate paid and that's with the CDL operator with four 4G hoers license um Ron actually pays a little bit less for Ron the superintendent pays a little bit less for um folks that have lower lower levels of Licensing so he'll might might take a dollar1 50 off depending so that would be the max level that anybody in the department is being paid as of FY 24 2380 um and you can see that the average is actually High 26 when you take all these towns it's like 2680 something I think it's in the report um and and this is again FY 24 not FY 25 right so I mean the assumption is going to be that these rates are going to go up for FY 25 by by some Cola amount at these towns so so um the department has requested a a rate of $27 an hour I mean as a committee I think what our our recommendation is is that we're saying we should you know at least set that as a minimum level for for the the highest hourly rate for the Department for the operator CDL um it gets us at least eliminates this non-competitive salary aspect from recruiting um it may not eliminate all the reasons why we're you know not getting staff in or having trouble maintaining staff on the team but at least you know by doing this we're on a Level Playing Field with the other towns and we can eliminate at least one one detrimental aspect to our hiring offs and I think um as and and this is also kind kind of combines with the primary goal which is to staff up the department to its expected levels with the right people the right right licensing and everything else because in the absence of that it's almost impossible to manage performance if you're not staffed if you're budgeted for X number of employees you have open positions it's very difficult to manage performance if you're not even minimally minimally St those I mean think about the the hit the capacity in that department is horrible right you know yeah so um that's a that's right now that's our formal recommendation for the operator CDL wage um as far as the superintendent wage uh there's been a request put forward for fy2 to increase that to 79,000 plus Implement uh you know overtime component uh we're still discussing issues around that um that's complicated for a number of reasons it's only because it's not common to have overtime for salaries positions anywhere and it and it does create a perverse incentive it does which which you you know we're we're kind of not really keen on um but even beyond that uh we think that there's also the town is lacking a lot of um performance evaluation and you know even basic disciplinary kind of policies procedures and procedures and we really need to sort of get our hands around that before we could really feel comfortable making a recommendation around the a can't compensation change for because in the absence of documentation in terms of individual employee performance regardless if it's the highway department or any other role you can't manage performance if you don't have deficits and performance extremely good performance documented now granted that does sort of fold into the employee manual for example because that you know you have you can cite all those things in employee manual then you generally have separately procedures that support those those policies but in in the absence of that it's very difficult yeah very difficult to manage performance if you don't have anything documented um and then so we' pretty much discussed the recommendation at the that's been made by the highway superintendent we there's one we haven't talked about Labor the labor rate which is that's what I was going to get to um this is a little misleading because that's not really Conway's labor rate up there at 2144 that's the actual current pay of a of somebody who's on on the team who's a little bit more than a laborer um so but our the request was to make the labor rate $21 an hour and we didn't we didn't really see any any problem with adhering to that that request I don't think it's foundational and this tar the Target Staffing is only one full-time laborer anyway uh so so truthfully it's it's we haven't had a formal vote vote on this yet but we made the recommendation in the draft report because uh we kind of just assumed it was a reasonable a reasonable request and then our next meeting is Wednesday so presumably we will be voting we'll have a motion we'll have motions and votes on so bar is this target setting reflected in this year's budget request like in the salary line does it show that we yes are should have four operators and one full-time labor okay right so it's it's a department supposed to be a department of seven so the highway superintendent four CDL operators one laborer and one part-time assistant and we did just get um our letter of resignation from our laborer for the end of June so we are now down to the highway superintendent one CDL holder um the temporary CDL is leaving right now then you know basically two labor well two labor but one will be gone in July so and no so we're really we're incredibly short St with Highway incredibly short step so do we know how much of the highway department budget is going to revert to free cash after probably not much but I mean like because because I I assume that we have salary that we didn't spend I do not know yet I do not know yet I do know um sometimes if there's excess and and um there's need for more material right that there might be a request at the you know starting in May to see if it could switch between the lines to buy last year was 40,000 year before was 50,000 exactly yeah yeah that we return to free cash from that no that we a portion to more materials from right quote unquote savings because we've been so low staffed and we had excess in the salary line and yeah so we're basically it's I mean so what what we haven't spent I mean we have spent it I mean we're not I guess my point is we're not sending Highway Department money to free cash year after year right I mean that's probably the last one that sends money to free cash [Applause] so there was the the other recommendation that we included here was um pursuant to the uh disaster relief funds and the time spent by the superintendent uh who logging you know doing the the the storm storm water and and all that the relief uh Paving the roads and and all the work that went into uh trying to get the town back on its feet after after the two July floods in particular um um and so we felt that was that's that's a separate discussion from the new salary new Compensation Plan discussion um and some of the logic around this was well you know that those extra hours were included in the the estimates of damage estimates that the town put forth to the state and when we were talking to U Mima and other organizations we had instructed the superintendent to track his hours for for that purpose um and now that those hours have been tracked and there are 393 I won't call them overtime because there is no overtime for an exempt position but um we'll call them excess hours and so um we felt that there that should be you know there should be some compensation there especially since the state recognized you because this was part of the subil and the funds are there and it's not not coming out of the general operating budget it's the the disaster relief funds are there and we have wide discretion to spend that money our our understanding from the do and our account absolutely except that this was done in service you know yes right yes but even if there was an issue around like I know I don't think anybody could could argue against you know the fact that those hours weren't spent you know remaking the roads yeah no I and that's we've basically been told by the do that like we're we have very we can we could this is not like Z is not going to take issue with us using flood relief money in our in our standard when we were discussing in in the committee was pretty simple did the work get done did the work get done yes the work got done were the hours documented yes they were documented now issues reg this is an ancillary comment on my part is issues regarding performance right discipline that is for the purpose of the analysis we did for this recommendation that is a separate matter right for us it was purely did the work get done so one of the reasons why um I put this on the agenda is because this did come up last week for the select board as part of the Town administrator's report which is generally something that is the the purpose of the creation of the Town administrator's report as a concept was for the Town Administrator to tell this select Board of the town with the town has been doing for the week it um so so because the topic was not on the agenda and did not give Fair notice to members of the public that it would be discussed it's one of the reasons why I put it on for this time so that um I'm not going to call it problematic or whatever but just so that whatever if there was any kind of problem then we're curing it by having it on the agenda and talking about it this time um and um at when when this came up last week um I've kind of thrown for a surprise and I um but I uh I I do agree that the hours were worth or a lot of those the the um we've never he the the the the position does not is not one that fills out time sheets so um these were and were not was not like submitted weekly for whatever for be whatever um they were yeah okay all right um yes but but but that's reimbursed we have to do that but but the position is not um you know the position does not call for um is an exemp position by law that over time would not attach to it so um I don't know what the math at the straight rate would be um as a post cuz the the the $20,000 number that we were given um was based on overtime well it was based on a multiplier that was equivalent to over I would you know because again corre there is no overtime but so but so if if a position is not entitled to overtime then to then give overtime and just call it something else well you can call it a bonus and you can you know but how do you they don't want to call it a bonus like a s what you call it a stien it a distin you call it a bonus it's non-pension right so so there it costs a town less to call it a bonus than to call a apparently I asked about that and apparently that's not I was told that that's not CU that made perfect sense I've got the P act documentation and and everything in in Franklin County because what I what I was told is that what what I was told is that stipend is for work that hasn't been performed bonus is for work that has been performed um and well well yeah which would apply in this case but it's a one it's a one time it's not a recurring payment that will be made to the individual this is a a one-time recognition an extraordinary circumstance for work that has been performed yeah I mean that so I would and the only difference is if we call it a bonus depending upon what we name it if it's a yeah it's if it's a regular expected compensation like a stien you guys get a stien right you every year you can expect a certain amount of money that could conceivably be argued as regular compensation therefore because it's it's regular pay is that is that a a consideration here that if we award this for you guys to decide fin town treasur has suggested stien yeah town treasur has suggested stipend but I mean from a that assumes I'm that's going to cost the town more money because we'll have to pension that so we know how much more it depends how long the answer to that question depends on how long the person lives after retirement no yeah but but but but off the value of $20,000 is probably not I think we're mixing something of what the the count Town accountant was um referring to with the stipend was the the court that hasn't happened yet right I don't think it was in reference to the extra work oh our treasure treasure yeah yeah um uh that was all in reference to yeah the the pickle ball courts and the public safety building that's future work and that's a whole other discussion too this this is completed work and and you know so my question is is there a question from the board to would you like to try to understand for example what would be the pension liability if it was paid as one form over another or not I'm just trying to understand sort of I do but but also I feel like it's probably going to be negligible because the amount we're talking about is $20,000 so I don't really I mean I just I I don't know that you know it's not worth I mean I'm in favor of this this is not worth it's not like I don't want you guys so we left it to you guys we we said you know this is our amount that we're we're going to recommend to you and then the balls in your court to decide how you want to proceed and this is only a draft report so of course it would be changed to final status after this meeting and then the select board would be able to make their decision okay so you're not asking us to vote on this tonight no no we're just doing a presentation we can come back next week M I am in I am in um agreement that I am all for a bonus but I want anything that states or even shows overtime to be removed yeah we don't need to use the word overtime we don't want to set precedents around correct no precedents around it whatsoever exempt it is exempt yeah yep exactly so these almost 400 hours is Ronnie's hours is that right the superintendent's hours yes Ronnie the crew has been paid we know who it is the crew has been paid overtime during those work so that's equivalent of 10 weeks yeah defining exemptions executive it is stated right here that what are you referring to um federal law no well some towns have contracts with our Highway superintendent that does have examp we that you're talking about overtime specifically correct yeah yeah we it's not it's not over right but that's we had a just to do a sidebar comment here is we had it we did have a discussion regard because I brought it up it's like well what other towns have Highway superintendents under contract right and some of them do not a lot handful of the group that we've decided to focus on so could the town consider doing that sure you could that's a decision for a lb but that's but that's in the future that's future we're talking about here is work that's been completed yes you know so when you say so this is like a contract for for work above and beyond what no it's a contract for the position like vque has a contract with the town right the police chief has a okay so right so our Highway superintendent does not have a contct no he do no he does not so so the difference is of course if you have a contract whether it's between a town employee in the town or between other entities it it's it's enforcable for both parties and you can put in a contract all kinds of terms and conditions that would not normally apply to what you would consider to be an exempt employee most CEOs are on employment contracts right you know anybody who's you know above a senior manager in an organization but most Highway supervisors are not there are a handful I could we could report to you next week if you wanted to know which towns do have them um because we know that um I but I I did say last week just sort of as a first impression that I didn't even want to put this concept up for a vote I I definitely would like to retract that and I think that it is worth voting on in some manner um uh it's definitely one of those instances where everybody telling me I'm wrong probably actually means that I'm wrong um but uh but I wanted to mention something too cuz we're looking at um the comparisons between other towns so it should also be noted that our Highway Department um it's hard to compare to other towns over the last year because other towns didn't have the devastating floods that we had true um even if they do are underst staffed like we are um and that brought about quite a bit of a challenge to not just us but obviously the highway department in full mhm that's why I'd also like to you know yeah say I I definitely am am for this and when you think about 400 hours I mean that's 20 % of a full year and we're not even two a full year that was only through the end of January right you'd have to get to Mid July to get to the full year so I mean that's a lot of hours there the thing about the the normally when you would consider this you would consider like a bonus for for excess hours wor you wouldn't consider it in the context of a one month period or a two month Peri you would you would consider in an annual period and that's because you have performance metrics so this is different than that so that's that's again the whole other discussion of how does the town manage performance and and so because we don't have that information about excess hours over the past year the year before that the Year from the 2017 tornado Etc um we do know that this year only had three relatively modest snow events so the normal excess hours at the snow behind the snow plow would not have taken place m just saying actually just just so you know there were a lot of events this year that may not have been snow but there's a lot of ice and the different parts of town get different weather so even though we may be fine here up towards Asheville they may need I'm just saying it's it's not quite as simple but but I you know before I got sidetracked there I just did want to say that um no not by you by my own tangent um um but the the um you know the he no doubt he worked a ton of hours no doubt and the town was a smoking or a dripping pile of rubble um and he got it in Ship Shape the roads um and you know that that is there is something to be said for that and in the United States of America generally the way you express those things is with cold Hard Cash um so you know that there is but when we look at that when we look at what's appropriate and and all that um for any compensation it's important to me that we look at all compensation that's being requested M yes um for by that position for the year yes and um and then look at it you know rather than just peace meal because there are there is other compensation that's being requested well when we have our discussions in the committee you know the three of us are very aware of what is going to set adverse precedent or unwelcome precedent and what won't especially when it comes to subjects like individual compensation so that's why we did a lot of discussion about well what what are we really talking about here which is everything that we just talked about which is the roads did they get fixed they got fixed it was it's a it's a limited a definition right so I'm pretty confident that we're not setting an adverse precedent because every one of these incidents will be judged on its own merits when they happen Ag and it's not a precedent that's going to set anything for future somebody could make any employee could make a claim that somebody got something that they didn't and the other thing yeah the thing that I keep going back to is what is the top priority for the department and that is getting the Staffing in order right building the capacity back up so that we don't find the superintendent does not find thems in this position in the future because you know the town's not setting a president we're not it's an exempt position you can't expect that there's going to be bonus payments or overtime payments or anything like that so so you know it's in the best interest of the superintendent to fully staff that department yeah that's so great point so the one thing you did not talk about those the job description right okay so we can go back through that um there are just minor changes to the job description um and the reason let me just preface before wait did Roy was Roy saying something no indigestion so um the reason the reason why I I sent the revision that Phil asked me to make was for transparency and awareness because ultimately the select board all of the select board is responsible for the for management of town employees so that's really why I sent it out just so that you know what it was and every everything other than the change that I made that Phil requested every all the other changes are a result of discussion that that's happened between myself John Allan and veronique as we were going over that job description and you got all the all the notes and sidebars on this document so you're aware of what the proposed changes are well the only I mean the only change that I could see was the one was was the the addition under supervision required that was the only comment well the Dilemma that I had was was and I said this in my email is that I'm working on a Mac and I don't have Microsoft Office so I would love to be able to send you a redlined work doc Word document I'm on a Mac can you send can you send it directly to me well she doesn't have Word I I don't have office yeah I don't have word so so and she's used to working in word for if I had been working in word which I know like with my eyes closed so what are you using word oh Google using Google yeah I don't have word on my on my laptop so that's why you can't really see the red line and you can't Mouse over the changes to see who made I can see the comments on I thought the change you made was the first paragraph of essential that is the change that I made to reflect that's one change right and then under supervisory responsibility we we we removed the specific number of of employees I had a because it didn't align with the with the Target and and the target will change over time so was not relevant um what I would my Mac is about the batter's about to die but what I am would be happy to do if you want us to come to the next select board meeting so I'll have my laptop charge and we can open it up in Google Docs and you can see all of the comments that might be helpful okay you're I thought this was wonderful as is and I was it's pretty good I I put this on the agenda hoping that we would vote it into existence well there was one sentence I remember reading I can't find it now that was a very broad based statement basically saying I think I know what you're talking that whatever work is given should needs to be performed and I'm trying to find where that is um but I remember reading that and saying that's very broad if I had that in my contract I'd say no way um it's not a contract it's job description oh JD still I mean job description which aren't really finding but I didn't see anything that I would interpret it that like that yeah I don't recall anything like that may I just ask a question um just because looking at it from from the administrating of this point of view wouldn't we want to go through every single job description well that was your recommendation rather than not just pick out one when Phil called me he made it very clear the Town Council instructed him to make that revision that appears in the first paragraph of the highway superintendant description carry that across all the town job descriptions right I'm just saying that it kind of feels like we're just doing one oh are we going to review all the job descriptions yeah that's that's our my you see what I mean I'm not sure why we needed to just pick out the one that's the one that's done well it's the one it's the one that we reviewed maybe we should do them all and bulk instead of exact which which is fine I mean we were we we looked at this because it was the the first step in trying to have a discussion around compensation like what what does the job description say so can we have a fair conversation about compensation without understanding the job description um now that we've sort of sort of Ted that that conversation for for the moment we did get this done and and it's there and we you know so it's got our revisions recommended revisions in it um I think I would prefer to do them all at once if it's not pressing that's your that's your that's your that's personally I would there are reasons to do them as soon as we can all of them as soon as they're off the press there are are are many of them so well now that now that we've finished this one which was the most urgent need the so easy well not really no you know but I assume the need for doing this one was based on the salary request correct which is why so that makes sense and and the request for to be compensated for ex for extraordinary circumstances so so I mean I I would just propose that we just get this one out of the way and just just pass it it's good if you're prepared to vote on it now that's I'm fine with that I I mean I guess I would I would personally I would prefer to see the re I mean because we didn't see like your document with like the red lines and the revision the only thing that I can see that was like changed according to the document I have is the addition of under the administrative direction of the Town Administrator upon the direction of the select board they were they were prior to that prior to me making that change at Bill's Direction there were some revisions that were made in Committee in the Personnel committee that you cannot easily see okay on what you have and that's because of the constraint that I have of going from word to a Mac and through Google Docs did you want then to put on the agenda for next week a vote on the bonus or stipend and a vote on the job description the the vot the the bonus and stipend um when we do the votes for all of the salary stuff which I don't know when we do when we do the votes for I but that's that's that's different that's like Cola and and and salary requests I mean this is like a onetime yes compensation I don't think those should be tied together there it is okay what did you find implements and administers policies and directives of the Town admin and select board that's very broad policies yes directives is I don't know about that word directives well see that to my my interpretation of that is somewhat uh sort of folds into performance because you can't per you can't you can't fulfill a directive from anybody that that manages you unless you know what the performance expectations are so I agree with you that's a very broad statement and in and of itself if it if it just stayed there without supporting documentation and an employee manual and procedures that that have to be followed then somebody could absolutely dispute that like you never told me what the directive was you didn't put it in writing whatever yeah usually there's like a stipulation about reasonable expectation right well the other thing too is reasonable is a pretty low standard you have to decide do you want a high standard low standard that's why like the policies the directive on there is just a little yeah but the other thing that we were discussing in the committee is you know it and Allan brought this up a couple of times is this is not a large T is not a large corporation which has this whole group of people who manage these things professionally so we have to strike a balance between what's reasonable for the town something that's clear and unambiguous for employees with respect to their roles and something that makes sense so you know that type of that type of editorial change is the kind of thing that does need to be considered and like I said you I suppose you could have it in there in and of itself but you would need to have something around it to support it and the employee would have to be aware of it right I I think that's why I was saying to do them all at once because if if that statement's going in all of them then you want to have the documentation or whatever the process is behind all of them just like when we had the Personnel handbook and when I spoke at Town Council was like you got to take this out and this out and this out because you don't have the forms in the process but you got it in the book yes so I guess that's what I'm saying it kind of feels like putting the cart before the horse there's nothing cart before the horse and that really was a a little bit oh all right um I I I you can make you can make a recommendation the the Personnel committee was fine voting on this now we already spent a half an hour on it this is just enough the job description is okay and let's just get be done with it it's just off let's just pass it let's just why do we want to have to do this again okay so we so you want to vote on the revised job description yeah they did a good job Highway superintendent and then the um the well do you want to vote on the approving the analysis that we did for the extraordinary compensation or do you want to vote on that next week after I you get a n-draft status report I'm you you want there there was an aspect of that thing that you were still that you still wanted to discuss more the the the Topline supervisor salary whatever so well that that yeah that may not I'm not sure that we're going to get to a resolution on that because there's all that you know performance analysis and stuff that has to go into into that um but for just if we I can make a motion to vote on one time compensation for the highway superintendent for if yeah if you guys are ready to do that we actually we actually don't have them on the agenda for a vote but I'm okay put that on for next week okay we just have that discussion oh so because we didn't say V disc okay all right but I'm okay doing that next week well then you get a draft you get a final report before then anyway so it'll be everything will be documented you want to make a motion to add it to next week sure I guess put that on the agenda is that that's not needed right no I don't yeah so um so do do the um so make a motion to approve the job description um um for the highway super for the highway superintendent the revised hot off the press's job description uh Second and this will be implemented when today as of today um I don't have the complete job description so I'm going to need to see the like the UN redlined right yeah yeah and generally when they're revised like within a function they're all done at once and then released to the employees because as of that new release date it applies to that individual because you'll notice that this is dated 2016 but it's subsequently being revised that date has to get up uh updated and will you Bry review this with the outside Council what what what your thoughts on the process you make a recommendation but is the process I I can I mean yeah I guess that's why again why I was saying I just I mean I I I mean I'm ready to move forward with it but it does need to go through counsil right I would assume I guess we are just looking at something that clearly says draft too we haven't seen yeah well I mean I was assuming that the sidebar bits once it gets printed would not be in there but we could specify we could specify that the sidebar bit that the that the job description has presented to us minus the editorial comments on the side and the water water yeah the water the water marks and draft um that be be adopted you it's just um by Council Council makes any change did I guess I I'm pretty sure you did okay all in favor I ious that was it for us sure I think you guys did a great job yeah actually thank you for all your hard work actually it was a really nice first report from the new and uh revised uh Personnel committee and I thank you um and so for next week discussion of stifen versus uh versus overtime yeah well it's going to be it's all going to be the grammar school budget first all right do want do you want anyone else here outside from us like the treasurer or any com yeah so my my way think when we talk about compensation because ultimately when it comes to town meeting eting it's the Topline total numbers that are hugely important so that's like one decision that I don't want to make on a peace meal basis without knowing what the other parts of the equation are yeah I agree with that that's why I was trying to get to that last tab that veric is not completed yet the recap but that's where the other four are there because it tells you the whole budget and what the the other yeah oh yeah it's all there well you don't have to wor but there are a lot of there are a lot of things in there again that I was seeking clarification on so I'm trying to get the whole picture like is so I I I agree that um it's important for us but the but the other part that you're looking at the recap has to do with money that's coming elsewhere that's not just coming out of yeah so the top the top section there the the general fund right General expenses right everything that's in article two yeah yeah so the other stuff is coming from different sources I so it's not going to impact I know yeah so but it the Top Line impacts and if if you know for instance if and this is not actually factually true but if say all the other sources of income would add up to $500,000 even though it wouldn't impact the budget that would still be like a very problematic thing at town meeting and so um that's why I say like all um it you know it's it's good to note the sources of income when you're making these decisions but it's not it they're not irrelevant to the decision so that's that um and uh you know and then the best procedure awaited to like deal with this just because you have the ability to make decisions too some decisions are best left for town meeting particularly controversial ones um town meeting is everything so they think they no I mean you know if if you feel that you know a good a good example that Town Council said to me is like if you think a decision is like a 5050 some hate it love it decision in the town those are good decisions to ask town meeting yeah to take on um well the issue with the stien versus the overtime is that the issue of pension and the uh long-term effect of liability on the town which we think probably Di minous and that's the main thing because otherwise the money we're talking about is coming out outside of the oper leing appropriate por portion of our uh our town budget all right we still step all right um are we done with person we done with person make a motion oh yeah we did to CL move to close the meeting for Comm all in favor good thank you thank you good night folks good night does anybody have any problems with the pr your end assessment request no no motion to approve the prti your end request second all in favor I um the the um policy regarding share of mail I'm going to uh pretend that I never wanted to put that on the agenda and just delete it and table it for permanent uh permanently um good discussion and vote letter to mass District mass. District 1 requesting fast traffic this is the one thing that I get comments about or questions about probably still more than anything else and um I know I know there is the recent news is that mot is meeting with um um the highway Departments of shelburn and um uh and Conway but this is still something that I I I I think we might have talked about this a little bit ago but I would still like to we did the board had asked me to reach out to the Two Towns since they're going to be meeting what I wanted to do was wait and see what happens at this meeting and then talk to them so and and I think maybe just a forget the other towns just a letter from our town just saying that it's really important to us to this proceed expeditiously okay would just help that meeting along or couldn't hurt who is mot meeting with I mean they should like so MTO contacted both um shelburn and Conway Highway departments to discuss and as far as we're aware 2025 is when it's slated for so I'm not sure it can go any faster than that with everything that's got to go on so I'm assuming we'll get an update from Ron right after his meeting well the thing 2025 there fiscal year isil is is July you know July 1 so there's still a big difference between starting it in July you know versus starting it in January so like that and this is just one of those things when when you hear from other towns that you never would have heard from like Goen saying that this is really important to them because they had an officer that had to sit at the side of the road waiting for backup when he pulled someone over at night for 40 minutes waiting for the State Police to get there from the um from the Shel barracks and they had to take the long way down and then 116 all the way through Conway uh um to weightly Road whatever that that's like this is just something that's important to a lot of people I'm surprised it's not a bigger like mover that's that like his that he had on there literally Bridges that's that's why I put this on there because because uh people just ask about it all the time well can we attend that meeting with the mop meeting yeah is that that appropriate or I I don't know I don't even know um I think it's he didn't he didn't know the date yet you're if you want to yes you're allowed to and my understanding is it's going to be in Shel but um could be wrong I would also like to attend yeah how about [Music] it I mention no he said he had to get back but I know um items not anticipated 48 Hours um Town Administrator I know she's been Town Administrator has been burning the burning the midnight oil this week and uh I'm not expecting an update from her as a result um I was never expecting one ever but um but she's been giving ones every week so um this week uh we'll let her off the hook for sure um anything else members comments concerns yeah I'm going to request that um we put on the agenda for next week uh a new vote for select board chair outside of the I know that we that that's going to happen in June but we're supposed to do yearly rotations right um traditionally decided on yeah traditionally I remember doing that vote I'm just going to request that we move that up that's it the discretion of the select board chair of course to put that on the agenda but I have formally made my request you did um all right um next meeting executive session tomorrow yes 5:30 tomorrow that's um uh that's with Donna Donna so are we all on Zoom or we we'll be in my office okay all right so that's all right that's what tonight um and the Wednesday one is rescheduled because of personnel committee is that correct right correct yeah so Wednesday's personnel and then Thursday's grammar school right all right motion to Jour second all in favor I