all right everybody thank you for coming to the select meeting of Thursday March 14th 2024 looks like we get a full house call the meeting to order tonight at 7:00 p.m. did everyone in the audience just just write down so we can have we're starting the meeting now guys you didn't bring the G one I'm sure here we go there we go all right first up uh we have a roll call we have uh Kevin sned um is on Zoom he's out of town tonight I don't think Meg's going to be able to join us we also Denise Alec myself and N Mike units so right up right up um first to the flag of the United States of America and to the it stands na God indivisible withy and justice for all all right right up the bat we have some appointments and resonations there appointment of pexon hos to the open space committee see here no I don't think so P's not here um do you have anything I just want to say the committee has been very active and uh doing a lot of good things developing a plan for us and uh I looking forward to his participation all right so I'm looking for a motion make a motion to appoint Paxon Hall to space committee second since Kevin is on Zoom we have to do a roll call Uh Kevin you're welcome for slowing everything I I'm still G to Rapid Fire this we're gonna get done Denise oh sorry Kevin I will V I will vote Yes on PX all right Denise yes Al yes and IM yes thank you pxton um next up we have a appointment of Robert Kimble to the permanent building committee uh apparently that needs to be a joint meeting so we're going to postpone that until I believe our next meeting and we'll have a joint meeting on that and we have a reappointment of Dorothy McOwen as the Democratic member to the board of register Dorthy here think here I'll make a motion to reappoint Dorothy McGowen as a democratic member of the board of regist second Okay Kevin yes Denise yes Al yes and I am a yes all right thank you Dorothy and now we have minutes for February 29th 20124 did everybody get a chance to look these over yes any changes Corrections no Kev I'm not going to forget about you so if you if you have anything just jump in okay yeah I'm good all right um okay so without any changes I'll look for a motion I'll make a motion to approve the meeting minutes from February 29th 24 motion the second Kevin yes Denise yes Alec yes and I yes right we don't have any licenses of permits tonight um we do have some announcements yep first one is uh we want to recognize the town cler's office and her team on the recent primary election uh OA and everybody involved they were also uh on CNN um at least they were recognized by CNN they were we were the first town in Massachusetts that reported so thank you very much to everybody involved with that uh we also have Community excuse me Community dinner at the trinitarian Congregational Church at T Pine Street North Mass Tuesday March 19th from 5:00 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. there live music and activities for children I obviously the March menu is Bam mashed potato Co um it's at the trinitarian congregation church Tuesday March 19th 5: to 6:30 p.m. and in April uh the Norton Community liance for the uh annual indoor spring Market at St Mary's uh one power Street that's Saturday April 13th 9:00 a.m. to 2: p.m. there's local vendors with all kinds of stuff so that's pretty much it that's [Music] it okay we're on to a new business and we have an update on the Elm Street sewer Improvement project do we have some folks here this is my spot YF so good evening uh my name is Steve Peterson I'm with Wes sson Engineers uh we're the design Engineers uh for the water and sewer uh Department in Norton um so here with me tonight I have Ryan Henley from from my office also from West and Samson uh we have Frank Foria the superintendent uh we have two members of the commission uh James Jordan uh and Steve Bernstein are also here so we're here uh can I yep go back too far ahead there we go let start that way um so so we here tonight to talk about the El Street sewer and water Expansion Project um so might go to the next [Music] slide so just as an overview of of what we're going to cover tonight um so I'll start with a an overview of the project give you some of the background some of the the det details of of what we're talking about in terms of that infrastructure project um you know one of the main reasons we here tonight is because we um put forth an article a warrant article for town meeting um so we want to talk about that um and with any town meeting article comes a discussion of how much is it going to cost and and how are we going to pay for it so we want to talk about the anticipated cost of the project uh and the options that we're looking at to rec those costs uh and then we'll just give you a you know final update that where we're at with the design and what the next steps are in the process that's kind of what we're going to cover tonight we can I can take questions as we go um or we can try and get all the way through it ask questions at the end whatever works for you guys so just stop me if there's something you really want to ask but otherwise we'll just move through it so as overview background on the project um um the entire project encompasses about 6700 ft of 8 in gravity sewer pipe and that's you know the entire length of Elm Street all the way from U from uh Reservoir to Main Street uh and it includes a piece um of Reservoir Street as well as Miller terce along the way so that's the um the basic area of the sewer it's about um 70 properties that would be fronted by sewer as part of the project uh there's one Municipal Wastewater Pump Station at the low Point um so the waste water will all be flowing by gravity in this area collecting at one um low Point uh and then pumped into the existing system uh also as part of this uh it's an entire replacement of the um aging and undersized water M um in El Street 4,500 ft um of water M improvements on El Street next slide all right so what's the main reason we even got to where we are now it's all about grant funding um and the money um and that started with the town PLS so initially it was uh Paul when Paul did youp it was the town planner um he identified an opportunity for a grant um for the design of this work um out here you know he did uh he submitted the expression of Interest submitted the actual Grant application and we've been awarded grants um that are 100% funding the design of all of this work so the design um is completely being paid um through grants uh and then while recently Maria came on board as a planner and she Advanced um as we're into the design here she Advanced um with the gr agencies an application to um participate in the construction and we were successful in getting a $3.5 million Grant towards the work that we're talking about here today so that's why we're talking about it so so why did we even apply for the grants why were we successful um we're going to talk next about 47 uh Elm Street cuz that was really the driving force the the re bment property um was really the driver behind the ability to get that grant money um so just is some background on reading Barton um it was in business from uh like 1972 uh to 2013 I know it's a really small you can probably see it better up there so basically in 2015 it went into receivership so that's where we're at right now nobody owns it uh and there's been a bunch of work you know both mandate and done the state's been involved um epa's been involved uh a lot of work has been done at the site to make it make it safe and secure um and also to ultimately make it marketable so there's been a lot of um clean up at the site and that's and that where still is ongoing um in terms of um like I said at least at a minimum getting it to where um it's safe and secure if we go to the next slide and we can talk more about that timeline if you want but this there's just a lot that's happen up there the last decade so uh the town 20121 master plan it specifically identified this parcel as a priority economic Target area so this this um this proc been um identified already um the plan also talks about um making investments in infrastructure uh to promote Economic Development so those are some of the key elements of the master plan um and again driving forces is behind the reason we got this grant money I think um So currently devco North America is pursuing ownership they have been for some time now um and there's a lot for them to work through anybody that wants to buy this property there there there's a lot of things that they need to look at and determine if it's if it's a viable venture um one of their you know one of the proposals that they put forward um is the development of 150 apartments and 10,000 square ft of commercial space um at that property um whatever they do there's still significant remediation work to be able to do anything in that state uh and also infrastructure improvements Water and Sewer are necessary for the property be to be redeveloped to its full potential the utilities are definitely lacking so that brings us to town meeting article um so we put forth um an article for the 200 uh or article number 10 for the 2024 annual town meeting basically on the article we're asking for 8.6 million to build exactly what we just talked about uh and then there's some discussion on how we will pay for it uh and I'll go into more discussion on that in slides that you can actually read and we come back to next we'll talk about what the aticle so I'm looking at um so the cost of the project so there's two key components the water main and the sewer uh the cost of the water M um you know right now where we stand now with the design and the information we have uh it's ranging from 2 million to 2.3 million um the sewer work um somewhere between 5.6 million and 6.3 million based on the estimates we've done so if you total those up we're looking at a project is between 7.6 million and 8.6 million so we are currently using the highend number um because that's what makes sense to do we want to make sure we have enough money to do everything that we need to do to build this project properly so how do we pay for it so right off the bat 32 million um for the mass works Grant comes off of whatever that final total is um the P the W piece um can be covered through the water rates we covered through the water rates and that is the plan um we'll obviously have to you know separate the contract up clearly Define you know which pieces of it of the water and the sewer um I will say that you know we talk about 7 and 7.6 to 8.6 million if you would have build the two separately it would be more like you know 9 million to $10 million to build them separately come out into the water one time and then come back to the se you know the biggest thing on the economy the scale is Paving the road once obviously but but there are other reasons that you know doing them at the same time safe as one um so if we assume the water I assume that water pieces 2 million and we recover the 2 million from water rates then we're talking about betters you know that is in the the article to approve it with um the assessment of betterments to properties that are um fronted bettered by the sewer you know I mentioned it fronts about 70 units that actually equates or 70 properties that equates to 100 equivalent dwelling units of better so one vment unit is equivalent to a single family home there are some um there are a bunch of single family homes out there but there are also some duplexes and some larger um there's an apartment complex there other properties that have more than one unit so it comes out to you know based on what's out there now um 100 units uh and using the betterments that were assessed on the most recent project the West Main Street project project um was 16,000 per better um so that brings us to one that would be 1.6 million um so it leaves .5 to 1.5 million based again on the range of cost that we're talking about here so let's go back you know important thing to point out on the betterments is that does not include what we would assess the rein baring property so now if we take a look at that uh because we would you know under the betterment laws any property that's fronted will be assessed better um if we were to look at Reed and Barton not have any idea what they were going to build out there just based on the buildable land area using a calculation of you know gallons per acre I think we come up with it could be somewhere around 16 units which would be like $250,000 if we look at it based on what they're proposing to build if they really are going to put 150 in there that's 150 units so now we're talking about $2 [Music] million so we can assess that property so then the issue is nobody owns that property so now you've now assessed a property and how are you really going to pay for that money right so and this is kind of the the the pieces that that still need to be figured out and how how do we make up that Gap and make this project you know viable to go forward with um you know so you could attach it to the property you have to have that I guess that discussion about it's already it's already challenging to get someone to buy that property if there's a a larger lean on it is that going to make it more diff but does the infrastructure offset that there's also you know if these utilities are going to make it more promising to get that property developed are you ultimately going to get something built out there and realize the sign significant tax revenues that you are off right now and can we apply the tax revenues for that property once it's developed to help pay the rest of this debt down until it's paid down and then those tax revenu will just become part of the whole tax base so just some things that again that and that's that is a moving piece the 1.5 million is based on our high-end estimate we're still um let let's go to the next slide I'll explain you know so we're we're still finalizing our design um some of the big components that we're wrapping up soon here are you know and these are probably three of the things are going to drive the cost as much if not more than anything is where we going to put the pump station um we're looking at out of sight um at the intersection of Miller Terrace and Elm Street um it's nor land preservation Society we've had we've met on on site with members of the society and we're going to go before meeting so there's been some open discussions about it um everybody's seems like we're going to be able to make it work but there's some more hurdles we need to get through there um and we're working with the Conservation Commission we're going to get the um Wetlands out there flying there are weapons on the site but um we can get the setbacks that we need so anyway that's and if we can get the site there that's a low Point that'll be the shallowest Pump Station site so that would um be the best cost scenario um we have to look at the Force main routing you know so originally know there's a couple different ways we can go the force man initially we were thinking it would go up to Reservoir Street and into the system that's currently in Reservoir Street um we've done Capacity Analysis up there um and that's system really can't handle it so the force M would be a lot longer we have to go past some of the sewers up there and get all the way to comp Street if you're familiar with the C Street Pump Station um so we also have a force main alternative that we're looking at that comes the other way um to Pine Street and over to the infrastructure associated with the pump station that weat call is the Town Center Pump Station um we're looking at the hydraulic to that but if we can go that route that's significantly shorter um and we'll save us some money and one of the biggest things is starting on Monday we're doing the the borings the subservice investigations um cuz on any Lum project that's going to drive the cost um find out what's under the ground um and what we need to be prepared to account for in the estimates that we have so we have some conservative numbers now we'll be able to refine those um and and see if you know ultimately whatever we're doing now is still just a projection it's going to ultimately be when we actually constructed how much we can bring that that last piece down M the 0.5 to 1.5 million how much can we really bring that down so that's kind of where we are today next slide so what are the next steps um so we're finalizing the design report based on all the information we're compiling we'll file the permits which this point is uh just the Conservation Commission um which doing public Outreach this is part of the public Outreach we will do a a public meeting um for anybody in town but also for you know specifically for the residents in that area and bring them up to speed with what we're looking at doing um we'll finalize the contract documents uh and based on the grant monies the design Grant um goes through the end of this fiscal year so we're wrapping up over the next few months here um with that Grant and with that design and then last slide [Music] just timeline to complete so um assuming town meeting authorization which obviously is is the next big um Step hurdle whatever um we'll have the design complete in June we'll be ready to bid it over the summer um hopefully start construction in the fall and we anticipated is about a yearlong um Construction so anticipate we could be done with construction under this schedule if everything goes Accord to this schedule as early as October under the grant we um the grant monies need to be expend expended before um the end of uh fiscal year 26 so that would be June 26 so that's that's what we're let hopefully I didn't go too fast but that's the information we wanted to present and hopefully paint the picture of we've been up to why we're doing it and you know ultimately we we're hoping to get the support of town we' love to get the support of town meeting I hope it's coming across you know how we feel this is a benefit to the town you know to provide hopefully a path to getting that property cleaned up developed and becoming a viable tax-based viable part excellent anybody have questions yes good uh you guys mentioned the the West Main project that you guys worked on yes uh I believe you came back to town meeting three times for additional funds because of the conditions of the ground correct um so was one of the reasons that was the biggest drive we we I guess we were surprised by the conditions after we did the boring but did you use those same conditions for the estimates that you have here um well no I mean we have different so we have we're still Gathering the data the boring data to come up to finalize those numbers so right now there's conservative assumptions and and we do understand that you know nobody likes to be low so we're trying to make sure we're not low with the numbers um a lot went into what happened before um the ledge certainly um became more problematic than we had anticipated um we had a contractor that that struggled to get the work done um and it was a challenge to actually get that job completed you know based on the conditions that that they ran into and in their ability to get it done in the end um so yeah I I do understand that that that was unfortunate and it be it would be fair to assume that there's probably going to be some ledge was it a half mile away uh yeah yeah that's why in the borings we're making sure that um that we've got a better identification of it okay what we have before we have to do um you know we're going to do more sampling in between you know so the industry standard you do the testing every 300 ft and what really happened is everything came up in the middle in y area so we're going to do more you know more testing along the stre we're spending more money on the testing going in that was actually my question to T on to your your question is is what are you going to do to mitigate those issues this time so yeah I mean short of digging the trench before you start you know which you obiously can't do um you know so we're going to you know do a lot more gring uh and spend a little more money up front to to better save money in the long yep another question is the water rates you said water rates 2 million what what does that mean exactly an increase in water rates to to account for 2 million um I mean no I mean it's within the rate so Frank can you the $2 million would be actually worked into the annual budget um we borrowed over time either typically over 20 or 30 years depending on what the treasur chooses at the time if there's other borrowings that are going to take place you can lump it together you get a better borrowing rate um so we work with the the town Treasurer before we put any of our projects out to Big there could be an increase because of this project there could be an increase because of many other projects that are coming down the night um nothing is really set in stone right now we're doing a um a rate study for both the water and sewer it's actually in progress right now that's probably going to take 68 months to complete and then we actually know exactly where we stand with existing projects pay Downs that we have now and future projects like this one I have question Kevin do you have anything on there uh yeah if I could just ask a question I'm sorry if this was already covered but um will this require any residents to tie into the new uh sewer system so uh yes so the sue the the new time frame is 7 years based on the last Town being boat so under the betterments everybody that's fronted and provided with a service will be assessed a betterment upon substantial completion of the project um that can be paid up front or portioned through their taxes over 20 years um and then they have 7 years to actually tie into the system for those if they choose to wait but they do they are under that time frame to eventually tie in and do we know how many approximately how many residents this would impact so it's 70 properties okay okay thank you any any questions no Frank did you want to add anything else or okay I'll keep you thank you very much thanks all right next up we have the review of the effective Department permit fees um I think I saw Nick here and we have uh Lucas r as well you want to go first you shoot for it you can make your pit and then thank you thank [Music] you should just State the address my address so uh my name is Lucas Ray um for those of you who don't know me I'm a contractor in town I've been here I've been doing contract work for the last 20 plus years um I just basically wrote a recap of our last meeting i' like to read for the citizens who missed the last selectman's meeting where we discussed the building permit fees I'd like to do a quick recap to refresh everyone so as of a few years ago noron was very comparable to the surrounding towns in regards to the building permit fees then the previous building expect to drastically raise the fees to some of the highest in the state noron is now comparable to large cities like Cambridge and in Sommerville when it comes to the fees we pay for Central repairs like roofs decks windows and siding at our last meeting I was asked to meet with the building inspector and the town manager Mr units so myself and Mr horns we had a meeting with Mr units and Mr fr the inspector Mr unit said to me at the meeting that he felt that the building permit fees were where they needed to be and that even though we were higher than surrounding towns it was his hope that eventually the other towns would catch up to Norton we were clearly in disagreement on the topic after watching several of the Town meetings I realized that the town is facing a budget deficit and the last thing the town manager wants to do is cut into that Revenue stream by reducing fees on permits so I have to ask a question is the budget current budget deficit a reason to overcharge homeowners for these fees I don't think so should the citizens of noron be paying upwards of four to five times higher fees than surrounding towns like Mansfield Ram East and Foxboro just because we have budget issues I don't think so just to be clear lowering these fees will not affect my business in any way or any other business in town in any way these fees are incorporated into the estimates we provide to our customers who these fees will affect our homeowners in town living on a tight budget the elderly the folks on fixed incomes I just did a roof on King philli Road for my mother's neighbor the elderly folks who live on a fixed income and have been in the house since I was a kid they put away $100 a month to save up $110,000 to do their roof do the the math took them over 8 years to save up this money the permit fee for this job was $150 or a month and a half of savings for these folks another customer of mine an elderly woman on West Main Street was forced by her insurance company to fix up her home where they were going to cancel her policy she' had to do the windows the siding and the roof to satisfy the insurance requirements her permit fee was $650 if we were in Manfield that permit would have been $150 so how is that fair to the citizens in nor so I have brought with me a breakdown of the current fees and the comparison to the surrounding towns if you look through you can see the not uh the DraStic difference in the fees from the surrounding towns such as Mansfield Easton foxb ranam and ROV as a matter of fact we're even higher than Ador which is considered the city Norton also has what's called a base fee on every residential permit and $100 a $50 base fee on every residential permit and a $100 base fee on Commercial permits the only other town with a base fee is showering at 7 $5 this base fee is just a conversation starter and then you get to pay the $10 per th000 for the contracted job price towns like Manfield Foxboro Ram East Berkeley all charge a flat rate fee for small projects like roofs the $10 per th000 um makes sense to me when you're talking about building an addition or a project that requires several site visits or inspections but it doesn't make sense when you're doing small projects I've been Roofing in for 20 plus years and I've never seen a build inspector show up to look at a roof job the higher fees on the smaller projects are just a money grab and not justified so I've done a spreadsheet of the surrounding towns and also a proposal where I think the fees should be here in Norton uh if this spreadsheet doesn't suffice and we can't agree on the fees then maybe we just copy and paste Mansfield as of the closest neighboring town and the Fe fees seem to be very comparable to the other surrounding towns so what I provided to the um select board and the town manager is um it's a breakdown of the towns surrounding towns uh everything I highlighted so the front page we can go Page by page with the front page all the highlighted towns are um cheaper than Norton um Mansfield Foxboro ROM Easton Berkeley lakevi Freetown and Bridgewater all charge a flat rate fee of between $50 and $75 if you look at the difference of a $20,000 roof job newon is $250 Mansfield is 50 Foxboro is 75 ROM 50 e 50 Berkeley 45 you go down low Lakeville 50 Freetown 50 Bridge wall to 75 so just to be fair you know proud cuz you can't see what I'm looking at reoboth is $180 uh so they're $70 less than us titon is $180 for that same project they $70 less middle bro is $200 they're $50 less um Canton 220 so they're $3 Less in adabor which is a city and cities are always notoriously higher for permit fees adabor is $50 less the towns that are higher are planville Sharon Bridgewater and ranham and Ram's always been notorious for the atrocious fees so if you go through really quickly um the first page the second page it just is a breakdown of the Norton permits uh so you can see all the base fees um you know for everything you're talking um demolition accessory structures reconstruction new builds everything has a base fee so the base fee is just like I said a conversation style before you get hit with you know the the 1010 or $12 per thousand rate um if you continue to scroll through these these are all the different towns and what I did was I highlighted um just every single town you know as you can see Mansfield Foxboro I just highlighted the small projects like roof siding Windows um you know right through about a dozen towns so you can see that almost every town is a flat rate fee um you know for smaller projects like I said I I understand when a build inspector has to come out on a new build or an addition we see him you know four or five times times you know that that is Justified to to get the the permit fees but not when we're doing a roof or we're doing sing project or some windows and you know we got to pay hundreds of dollars for permits so that's pretty much it any questions thank you any questions Kevin do you have any questions Kevin um yeah sorry so yeah just one question so what's what's the uh what's The Proposal Lucas so what you think well so what I was saying was I I would propose eliminating the base fee I don't feel don't feel that's fair Sharon is the only other town with a base fee um and you know whether we copy and paste Mansfield or some you know one of the surrounding towns I think what we should do is we should you know start basing projects like roof siding Windows you know smaller projects on the cost of job if you get a $20,000 job you shouldn't be paying $10 per thousand of that cost that's 200 bucks plus the base fee you know I think we should go um comparable to the surrounding towns which is a base fee on these smaller projects to give some of the relief to the homeowners home Manfield has a pretty good system um you know foxb has a good system rent the East and I don't have any GP with any of their the way they calculate their fees and noron I never had had a problem with n's fees until you know the previous expector check them up so and like I said I I don't feel like we should be hitting the homeowners for these fees because we have budget issues you know that's not fair to the homeowners so so I mean I I would recommend because we're just seeing your recommendations now um that maybe we get together and put a proposal together an official one for a me in the future and um I mean if everybody's okay with that I I I work just I got no problem sitting down with everybody or even you know sitting down with Mr I fre and coming up with something fair you know and what i propos is there obviously you know we're not in agreement on the fees so but so so I guess I'll pose my what's fair to me and the homeowners and it's you guys make that decision yeah my thought is you know on this I don't think we could do a vote on this tonight but you know I agree I I think we should dig this a little bit more and put a proposal together if there's going to be changes um that that's just my thoughts on it I don't know um what do you all feel I agree yeah I agree so I think you know the that's why I printed these out and I highlighted some of these you know some of these areas where you know you can see if you take you know I did email these to the board last week so you know people have a chance to take a look at it but you know I think we could draw up something that's fair you know a little more fair to the town Mr chairman yeah go ahead Kevin is um I don't know if Mike can speak to this or if Nick is there but in our packets there was like a uh looked like a handwritten note that that uh showed us the total amount of fees collected by the town um for fiscal year 22 looks like um and I just got a question because on that handwritten note it says for for residential fee these 720 permits issued $277,745 it looks like or $87 wave so can someone explain what w means and does that mean that the actual revenue from the um from the fees is 277,000 minus 226,000 Kevin that's an excellent question I was going to actually have Nick come up um if you wanted to and go over his so I do have a little insight into that so some I've done several projects for the town um where I had to pay a permit fee to do a town building um since Nick's been in office that hasn't been a problem I typically call up and complain to him on Kathy and say why is the town paying for permits for their own buildings and we' we've been able to get those waved so makes no sense to me but I think it's been years since we yeah and just just to clarify before you go Lucas um your you thing change just the residential fees not the commercial fees yes so the residential fees well Mr unit I pretty sure I confirm that the uh Plumbing ter the plumbing fees were were built for the new buildings that just went up in the senior center in the town hall so I was able to confirm that you guys didn't we the fees Plumbing fees may have but not the permit well plumbing permit pleas we're not W thank you appreciate it thanks Lucas um that's a quick response right we talked about this before so um to answer your question Kevin um I'm going to be honest this was done a couple months ago the numbers I put together the packet you guys have so I'd have to look back back and give you what an honest answer is to that calculation on the residential fees um and I haven't seen the package Lu's put together tonight I haven't seen but but briefly to not to carry on but when we talked about this a couple months ago I think it was in the fall yeah that we met um we had lugas had run some numbers I rent some numbers for some towns and um it's every 3 or 4 years that we're supposed to look through our fee schedule to compare in contrast and determine if we need to to raise the fees leave the fees or change at all um so doing that I I haven't touched them since 2019 when they were modified by um the previous Building Commissioner because I felt that they were in line and and suitable um so out of the 22 ttimes that I pulled I I thought we were right in the middle of the mix um so that's my reasoning for not coming in front of of the board and in really proposing any change to them um as far as the discussion about changing the fees I that's up to you guys I'd be more than happy to sit down and and assist and give you my opinion if it comes to that um so I that's pretty much it for my response I I I mean i' be open having a meeting with all of us again and maybe go through line by line on the fees um to present something to the board whether it's make changes make no changes or whatever we come up with happy to do that M Mr chairman yeah Kevin go ahead yeah just so um so Nick what's the deal with the waved fees that's that's what I was saying Kevin I'd have to look back and and double check those numbers um cuz when I when I put all these together it was back in October November I believe when we sat down okay um okay I have the receipt and everything and and the numbers based off of what what that calculation is back in my office I didn't bring it with me but I can certainly put that together for the next meeting yeah if we could get like even like a like a 3 to five year view or something if that's available that would be great so we can kind of just look at it year over year like maybe there was something unique to 2022 you know and and we want to see a couple more years if if that's possible just to you know have a a a more complete uh picture yeah I can go back three or five that helps that'd be great okay thank you to to add to that I I think something that um that we talked about when we met a few months back was that it's really hard to determine which ones were actually for the new construction versus um Renovations um some of the fees that we want to that Lucas would want to eliminate um it's not all of them so maybe that's something we can try to dig into I know it's it's probably harder to so get those numbers in in order for me to go back and so we just switched your a new pering software in November in order for me to go back in the old permitting software I would have to go through every individual permit to decide to determine if the permit was for a roof it was for aition it was for sing it was for Windows because the the reports didn't run as specific in the old software um I could do my best but it that'll take me quite some time no I wouldn't ask you to to take to take that much time out so so these numbers here were all of the Residential Building permit fees that we issued in that fiscal year okay compared to all the commercial fees as far as the wave numbers I again I have to look back cuz I'm it doesn't drag my memory yeah so the so with the new system you are able to separate it out roof permit versus okay so maybe you know maybe when we get together we can do it from November when you get the new software to to now that'll give you at least a few months worth of data and we can figure it you know we can we can talk about it we can do that absolutely whatever helps awesome all right any other questions Kevin you good no I'm good thanks thanks Lucas and thanks Nick appreciate it welcome Denise guys thanks thanks right thank you very much than you have the cop [Music] right all right uh next up we have a discussion and or vote to open the special town meeting for May 13th 202 if I'm speaking too fast it's because I'm I to make a motion to open Mr special time meeting to be held on Monday May 13th 2024 at 7:15 p.m. articles will be accepted until 4M on March 26 2024 at the select board's office second Kevin yes Denise yes I a yes right when you orig right and obviously commercial yeah but presidential gentlemen Frank I high the ones thank you all right so now we have the discussion indoor vote regarding the ballot questions for April 2024 to so uh this question uh was developed by Town Council um and if uh you do make the motion tonight question one will say shall the town or not revok accepts of General Law chapter 31 the Civil Service law for all positions in the police department and question two shall the appr its acceptance of General Law chapter 31 the Civil Service law for all positions in the fire and we've already endorsed those right y we have and uh we had the fire department out of civil service at U May town meeting October to meeting and uh the unions have agreed to this and we're on board with it than thank questions Kevin all right no questions a motion do I have to read the whole thing or just make a motion to the for the ballot questions that's written right motion to approve it as written like to make a motion to approve the vote regarding the ballot question for April 2024 Town election as written I'll second motion a second Kevin yes Denise yes ad yes I yes all right so would be cruising uh let's see CH it I know right uh now we have to vote uh let's see discussion wrote for the annual town meeting articles just you have the warrant and uh I don't know if you're ready to vote on any of these uh if you wanted to you could start voting on a couple of them I think but that's yeah I think most of them are set right um well so the F article two is the chapter 90 Transportation aid program is voting to accept any monies that the uh state will provide us under the chapter 90 program and the tree service uh for $31,000 that's for um the highway department for trees that are too large for under handle on near wires that uh are danger trees and need to come down they bring in the crane for those okay if anybody wants to make a motion on any of these we discuss it or you want to hold off to the next meeting I think I a hold I read yeah okay all right so I guess everybody everybody here said it's okay if we skip the next one the barrows Court dreaming we can skip that it's not going to rain we have for people at home we have quite a few people in the audience here for this so uh we're going to have an update on the bars Court drainage uh who we have that wants to speak on that first jar jar Jason who we we going to single out here well I can just give you an update and Jared can uh Enlighten you more on it um Jared's been work working at ways along with John Thomas from the conservation on ways to improve the system out there and know Jared's been out this week uh clearing some trees in the area uh so that it will dry out quicker and he can get out uh and he's looking to uh remove a um stale pipe that comes out at the outlaw all right and I know we uh John Thomas wasn't able to make it tonight um but he did put a pretty good plan together so um Jared or you want to come up a brief explanation what we plan to do yeah and afterwards just so just so we know how we're going to do it afterwards if there are any questions from the audience you can come up ask some questions to the board and we'll get some answers for you yeah I'll keep it brief so basically like um the how manager said we're just going to remove about 350 ft of um steel pipe that runs from uh north to south behind I think it starts behind house number four and it gets past further south than house number two and um the goal is to temporarily increase the volume of that that drainage eement just because of the increase in storms obviously that everyone's aware of and um hopefully get that water to flow sou faster just to help drain that neighborhood a little sooner in an event of a moderate rainstorm anyway that's about all um actually will also um create a head wall for the pipe that runs um east to west in between House 2 and 4 that would dump into that s and that's about all Jared was telling me on the way in today he got information from the National Weather Service in January in Norton was the wetest January in 24 years I just wanted to confirm everything you said in 24 years it was 8.38 in in our January and it was actually F previous the previous month in December was uh second or third wetest in 24 years so you had two two months of good rainfall all right thank you jar we're currently 10 and 12 in over the annual average a cute one so do we have anyone in the audience who would like to ask any questions yeah come on up to the the podium and just just say your name and your address my name is Joe I live at One barrels Court the flooding is directly in front of my house I have lived at that house for 48 years and during that time I've seen rainfall that's much much heav than what we see now I've seen 6 in at once and the flood would Street would not flood the drainage system in it the sies itself is more than adequate the problem being is the pipe that runs behind Stanley's house is partially plugged and that's the only problem what's what what number is stle out two two the quick and easy fix is create a a a uh uh spillage to be able to pass across the top of that ground that would handle the water that it doesn't back up on the Barrel's court and you only need to go about 12 in deep and the marking is all still out there you can see the high water mark and all the Rocks right now so if you go 12 in below that high water mark with a back hole even one that's 18 in wide and you go a foot down you're going to have a Spillway that's going to handle the problem and there's only about two sections that's 10 ft long that really needs to be removed and again if you walk out there you can see it you can see two mounds of dirt each one's about 10 ft long you take out that and the problem goes away now it doesn't resolve the problem being pled the pipe being ploted but it does alleviate the water from being on barels cord it's a simple fix it's a willingness to do it why is the PIP why is the pipe FL so the next well it is in my opinion that two years ago well this problem really started about 5 years ago that it started in causing the problem backing up on BS cool 2 years ago the town came down and they ran a camera from the street on Barrow's Court behind Stanley's house pardon which number is number two we're not going to we're not going to have no that's all right that fine um and there was nothing found but what they did do two years ago where the pipe exits towards Barrel Street down that way they came in and took a back hole and clean cleared the brush and rubbish head piled up back there now I theorized I don't know for sure but I theorized because that had backed up the debris that was coming through the pipe didn't have a place the goost what backed up into the pipe that's what I theorized but I don't know for sure okay we have the town I'm sure they'll they'll have response to it question no I was going to come up and yeah jar stay here yes that's yeah um so I I personally clean that um that SW salt to that outfall that you're mentioning but um the assessment I don't believe makes much much sense um it actually opened up you know more volume for that pipe of flow and to back up to your previous question gave me moderated publicly speaking I even remembering any question but perectly but but um the the reason why I I I assess that the pipe wasn't plugged it's I've been here for 10 years and we cleaned that like you said two years ago I've constantly seen the water float to that pipe especially during um before during and after that that rain event so um the the initial rain event on the on the 10th January 10th I believe it was um that issue like you said the water you know if it could just flow over the top of that that land it was and it did for about 48 hours and uh that whole rain that whole flooding event on barrows Court was caused I have I have pictures I mean I only have one copy of each picture but the the water table was actually touching the bottom of the deck of um barel squ bridge and so if you're working your way back from the system from the lowest point so the water table I it was at the base of that bridge and then as you moved further back it was um completely covering the Calvert which crosses the driveway of I think it's 131 113 barrels called it it's the it's the drive with the brick pillars which pretty much put the the outflow that you're speaking to that we cleaned up to almost completely underwater and um of course that would that would back up the whole system so that was that was at least for January 10 there was 100% nothing to do with the pipe there was actually about a a foot of water flowing over over the the area that you were talking about behind House 2 behind house 4 um and it didn't subside until you know like I said the the the water table actually you know has to leech through the ground which wasn't very um it wasn't possible for it to happen previous to that event because it was the frost on the ground obviously and all that rain so it took the 48 Hours the water table lowered and it slowly had to make its way out of that outfall um the next rain event um where it flooded it was it had a lot to do with the runoff north of that drop Inlet if I could describe the system like I said the last manhole on barrows caught the lowest manhole is in between on the street in between house 4 and six from there it runs about maybe 100 feet uh West behind house 4 two and four it goes into a drop Inlet which is a shallow manhole and then from there it turned South so that whole manhole was getting inundated as of I think it was um Tuesday I was out there last maybe even Wednesday and um run off water from that whole water shed was continuing to fill that Inlet which again slows down that process so nothing's changed in that system I've been out there every day um I don't remember camera it like you said I was hair during that time I I do remember running snakes visually looking through it watching water out you know out flose through that pipe so it's it's clear it's it's at least nothing has changed since I've been here with the condition of that pipe but I know what has changed is the is the influx of Storms and rain water and almost a perfect storm as of January 10th with the with the fast melting and the um the increase of those rainstorms in that that short period of time but I don't remember if there's any other questions that I could address what's that to do the trenches on the yeah so I agree with your point um again it wasn't the cause there there isn't a plug on the pipe as far as I'm concerned but just to just to help alleviate the issue in the meantime I'd like to increase like you said the volume by um Excavating that pipe just to get it out of there it'll make it so I can inspect it easier obviously when I went out there last time two years ago to clean it it was during a a relatively dry time so when the dry season is there at least it'll allow me to visually see if it's clar of debris I can you know run a machine down there and excavate it so I I agree with you if you much more volume than 12 in it'll probably be something about 36 in deep and probably about 6 or 7 ft wide and it'll match that sale that runs past all right thank you jar y any further questions from May I add something again I will disagree with you and there's a reason why I disagree with you and I I took photographs of it that even though the water had backed up on the barrel courir and you could see the water level on the land around there the water coming out of that pipe was only 2/3 of the way up the pipe it wasn't full the water wasn't coming out and it was sping onto water that was lower than that if that water if the water was passing through that pipe without any restriction and the water's that high on Barrel's court that pipe would have been full of water exiting it wasn't it was only 2/3 the way up and I have photos of it so I would disagree with you respectfully yeah so um we're going to I'm going to have Mike read John Thomas's I guess it's his options that we're going to try to do here um so on Monday um this is from John Thomas um Barrow's Court was subject to a 1 and A2 inch rain event in 10 hours this past Saturday significant flooding within Barrow's Court was reported and since then the flooding has receded jar and I have looked at drainage condition this afternoon and the highway department will be looking to service the drainage area through available easements and town properties available options could consist of the following phases within the limits of the easements in town land phase one work will require creating a service access off Barrow Street onto town of Norton land trees and vegetation will be trimmed and removed with the drainage easement within the drainage easement and Town land phase two work will require removing the drop Inlet structure and existing 24in corrugated metal pipe phase three work will require addressing the drainage outfall location of removed drop Inlet structure near Four Barrow Court lot three on the plant with a repurpose head wall and flar end phase four work will require Excavating and reforming the outfall drainage area near the existing drop Inlet creating a vegetated drainage sale with embankments same location as the 400t plus length of pipe and creating a storm outfall Basin to capture sediment before leaving town property from what I can assess the drop inl appears to be the main restriction of flow in flooding issue removing this item from the equation should in theory and alleviate flooding issues in bars cour all site work to the structures and pipe will acquire dry conditions for Access and excavation purposes the work shall be under the guidance of the conservation department can comply with ms4 and conservation emergency procedures so so this is this is the available options and I think Jared had pointed to once the once everything is dried out and then we're get to dryer season um you can make more make these more confirm these options here may I make on that is that please inad instead of going up there I it's a question and a comment one they were be able to they were able to get out there today with an excavator that they can do the job and the second I haven't heard anything about a timeline to have this work completed okay so the the timeline from what I gather would be when when it dries up further but Jared you can speak um it keep some the core yeah no exactly yeah so we we started um two days ago now uh today completed the first phase of of trimming it exactly we could get out there that's why we're starting now um like I said initially we couldn't put a 10,000 PB machine inside of a swamp um so yeah so exactly to your point we're out there trimming the trees and the next phase under the under the guidance to the um conservation agent because you know the pipe is still there still there still active flow it's just that area we tracked in to trim the trees along that pipe is dry enough to to work on so yeah so essentially you know Mr unit just read on John Thomas's options you're already into phase one of this so it's already as long as conditions are either stable or improve and we'll just keep on doing what we can as we as we can okay what I'd like to hear is the saying that the work is going to be done and escaba within the next 2 or 3 days that's what I want to hear I mean I can't speak to that I have to work under the guidance of the conservation agent for all sorts of conservation reasons we well when you when you look at conservation rules there's a couple of three things that are caveats regarding health safety and wellbeing of the residents and that should supersede anything that they have yeah John Tom could probably speak to it I'm not an expert on the conservation laws only only the work being done all right do we have any other questions from the audience come on up please stay yeah just in so John John needs to St attending these meetings where we're going to just just come up come up and say your name and your address [Music] y so is John going to be attending these Pat 16 bars Court um conserv uh conservation member wasn't here last time we knew he knew we were going to discuss it he's not here again this is a issue where we're held hostage on our street at certain times whenever we are Mr chairman he's on vacation so sorry about that was that vacation last time I don't remember the last time so that was two months ago so I'm going to go back to that point now is that we've been sitting on our street without um active communication from the town for two weeks so any communication that we have with the town has been proactive from us and not from the town at all and that's disappointing coming from our last meeting where we had asked for the town to give us updates on a regular basis exctly so when is that going to start happen so we can discuss it so I mean as we do work we can let someone know so work it's already started and we didn't know so that that's a problem for the residents like we're we're upset because we feel like we're not being heard we're not being told what's going on and I don't mean to speak for all of us but job no keep Jared's work is dependent on the weather he doesn't know when the weather is going to be right so he can get out of there but he should be but we should be getting updates about when you're going out there or what your plans are so what we can do is we can work with Jared and John Thomas and try to provide at least uh an update is I me it could be they could have it you know in opening that morning um but I think you know maybe we can work together and get an email sent out to everybody just to let you know that they're going to be out there um it's a start it's not going to fix all the problems but it's I think that's that's a good start we'd like I'm sorry jumping in Mr chairman go go ahead yeah sorry no that's okay sorry I didn't mean to interrupt um I think what would be helpful too is I think what's happening is we're getting um we're getting um folks are reaching out to us like individually right and that's fine you know that's that's that's totally fine I know I've gotten text messages from residents and you know things like that asking for updates and all that kind of stuff I think it would be a good idea if we could try to get together I mean something simple just an email group together of of all the residents um and get all their email addresses and their text and their um and their phone numbers you where they can receive text messages things like that I think I think part of it is just it's just we're just getting sort of pece me requests from different folks and again that's fine but it's not really an effective way to communicate with a big group of people so if if if there was I don't know if it's someone in the community or if it's um you know if it's if it's a couple of folks in the in the uh other the residents if if they could try to pull together like an email addresses and phone numbers for everybody so we had that information I think I don't want to speak for the town manager but I think we could probably put together a you know just an email group and it would be a lot easier for us to to reach out so I think I think it's I'm not saying that's the only issue but I'm saying I think it is a big issue that there's no sort of coordinated communication going on and whatever we can do to help that I think would help the communication issue quite a bit so you have 17 phone numbers right now from a text chain so to tag on to Kevin's point there I mean would it be helpful if there would be a point person from the neighborhood that Communications go through or or like Kevin said have a have a group no it it needs to be group email I think like having one person so then so then let's let's I mean in the interest of of making sure everybody's on the same page maybe that somebody from the community can get that whole email group together and get it to the town manager we can we can start with that that's good you you had an Avenue the town had an Avenue before they didn't use it so through with 17 17 emails I mean text numbers that they let's let's let's let's keep going and let's get the email chain together all right we can start with that that's fine um yeah because I think I think you know if you're not getting any communication I think we need to start that so that's y that's a good start yeah just Mr chairman what I what I want to avoid is that we're communicating with five people you know five residents but not or 25 so um we just want to make sure everybody's getting whatever communication the town is sending just make sure everybody's g yep um two questions from last meeting um there was talk of the dam being the issue um has there been any applicate have there been any has there been any movement with the application for Grants of anything with the dam and then second question following up with that is there was an issue with the owner of 138 Bar Street who owns that Dam has there has the town done anything to contact him okay all right Mike do you want to speak that sure um so there's only certain times of the year that the Grants open up and so John is keeping an eye on that and the owner um of the property he he'd be fine signing on with us if uh we get a grant so I don't know where so you contacted him yes and he's been he's responding back to yes yeah previously he wasn't responding right only when it's good for respon yeah all right you have fin last question I have is um Joe in front of your street I'm sure you've seen the cracks getting wider and wider in front of your street um water sitting water and we've discussed this last time sitting water over the course of 18 to 24 hours that's 8 to 10 in deep it's not good for the street um are there plans to fix the street so I'm not going to speak for Jared but I can say because I'm in Property Management I can say the problem has to be fixed before you can attack that because if the problem with the water isn't fixed yet fixing the Street's not going to do anything it's just going to it's going to crack again so we got to fix this the the the main issue first and then address the additional but again I don't want to speak for you jck I'll just add that as a stop Gap I agree with you I saw that and I also agree with you that was part of part of my understanding plan to fix the problem but in the meantime I saw those those cracks on the road they'll be filled crack sailed just to make sure there's no further carrier of the road and then when when the main issue could be addressed obviously that'll be put on a put on a list if we do every year to completely repay reclaim that road okay so my expectation shortly is that there's some sort of timeline that's given to the residents on as far as far as fixing the issue you you listed out three or four different phases I'm not sure if there's an okay that needs to happen for that or if that's already been signed off on um I don't know where we are in that process but my expectation is that each resident has some sort of timeline that we're holding you guys accountable to cuz right now there's no there's nothing and we have heard nothing so things need to change a little bit the the timeline in my I mean from what I understand is is a lot weather dependent so um I mean these guys would have been out there 2 months ago starting this had they been able to get their machines onto there um so I think I think it's all weather depended it usually in end of March early April there's a lot more rain and I understand that's going to be a frustrating thing too but they're they're going to be out there the second they can and I think getting that email list together and having communication is going to help I think it's going to go a long way I hope I got we're going to continue um and can can I just say if I mean if and I'll put myself out there too if there's no communication and things are happening and you're still not getting communication please let me know or like Kevin let let us know um because I I mean I want to hold them to account just as much as you do and and if if what they're saying is I'm not going to say it's not going to happen but if if that were the the case please let us know directly and and we'll we'll take care of it immediately and for the time being without a any timeline that that's going on there's going to be Transportation that's provided two cars because that did happen on Sunday and we had to do what we have to do to get through it but any it the water rises after the rain stops is what happens and so um we were left to either go through it or sit it home and kind of watch watch light Happ for the day yeah do you want to speak to uh deputy chief do you want to speak to that cuz I know I I drove by on I think it was Sunday too and it yeah um I guess a couple of things would be there has been communication right since the beginning of this you've had a number of town employees and volunteers from Nema that have worked hard diligently to try to get things done things do not happen overnight people are working hard there's nobody out against you or anything like that everybody is working together to get to the same common ground which is no flooding in the area as far as Sunday um or that last I believe it got to be about 6 or 8 Ines we did have um Charles working again by volunteers and stuff like that to do it we'll we'll absolutely help out the best we can whenever we can if um whenever we need it all right thank you for other questions from the audience the shut was Thursday I'm sorry I still go back to the same question we have this open-ended weather dependent to get anything done much M here some kind of time commitment to saying it will be done by this state I'm going to meet with the Conservation Commission this state we'll have a decision on this state I'll be able to do and go work on this state and there nothing unfortunately due to the nature of the work that needs to be done that that that's impossible to give speciic a suggestion get four people with four shuel and dig a trench it's there's a little more to it than that but I I would suggest and and Alec brought this up um I think it would be great to have a neighborhood Le aison um even if it's not the go-to person for everything um at least speaking to the neighborhood giving us the information you know the email list something like that so you guys can get together and and let us know who that's going to be that would be um that might help streamline communication as well so um I like I said I want to make sure the communication is open and everybody's getting all the information and I think we're all on the same page on that I can probably speak for everybody on that can I just and it has to be legitimate communication um I got an email one day stating at the roadhead side to flood there were puddles on either side of the road at that time that's the day I went and check it wasn't Flooding at the time so we need honest communication back and forth you know when it when it gets above 6 in obviously we know that's a problem and we'll work uh to have a shuttle and yeah I don't remember I don't recall the date that was but but I remember getting that email and driving over directly myself in that morning and and it was just on the sides which was you know I maybe the email was this is going to happen type an email so so that's part of the problem here is that we don't know when the Street's going to flood and so it didn't flood on Thursday when there was um transportation that was provided but then it did Flood on Sunday how are we supposed to know when to so I think I think what Mr was saying was that um if the streets flooded um then obviously an email but if the Street's not flooded we shouldn't be getting an email saying the Street's already flooded you know what I'm saying so I think I think that's what he was getting that email did say the street was flooded I remember that we don't know when the Street's going to flood either I mean this it handled one storm last week fine it handled the second storm last week fine the third storm the river fit was too high and it didn't handle um yesterday I was driving to work and the Taunton River hadn't crushed it yet so we don't know what's going to happen Upstream have thank you thank you appreciate it anyone else have questions they want to come up and ask I don't want my leg I'll just stand up Paul and I live with bar court and my question about the shuttle service and everything you know that's great that we have an email list we're all on it but if we send that email to the what do we call the manager Who's the who man no no who am I sending the email to is it the list of emails yeah yeah to the town manager and he'll distribute every what if we send that email it's on a weekend saying oh here comes the water it's not going to get looked at until that Monday I can speak for myself but but I can also speak for other I mean I know we all check her email all the time even though uh it's on the weekend I check it myself too um and I know the fire depart it's always check Kevin go ahead yeah and and I mean I think I don't think we should be using email for emergency situation right so there's if road is flooded and I I couldn't hear the the woman uh um I couldn't hear her name I'm sorry so um but um I think if it's an emergency situation then then you contact the fire department um yes is who it is um maybe Mike can can add some color to that but yeah if it's an emergency situation I wouldn't send an email I'd make a phone call and get someone on the phone immediately if there's flooding you need to and it's above 6 in or whatever it is and it's getting unpassable then then we need a phone call not an email I know these guys are checking it too when when there's a potential for it so I know that they're always sending somebody around there11 call yep or you can call the business line if You' like Okay can that information be sent out to this email list yep I can I can write it right on your email list phone number we have that phone number have that information you know easy for us to get it as our emails or text messages we're given to you I you know we need with you too thank you very much do we have any other questions all right well thank you all for coming we appreciate it and please um make sure you get together and get that email list together for us and and it would be preferential to get a phone list too for everybody just in case and and I would pick personally I would say you know pick a leaz on for the for the neighborhood to to be the go between uh it would help with communication do you have all right I'm sorry was there anything else from the board before I close this topic Kevin go since you're on yeah just I just wanted to say I think Alex idea is a great idea to have to have a l on um in in the neighborhood and and even if that that person um and I know the gentleman came up before and had you know sort of his eyes on what was going on with the pipe and you know that's I don't think anybody wants to Discount what anybody's saying as far as what could be other options or other issues that are occurring so that leison could really be that person who you know um meets with the highway department you know and and and you know tries to figure out what the problem is I just feel like you know the the neighborhood has to be involved in this I think as much as possible um to to help our folks identify what the issue is and get it solv so that lison idea I think is is really really important and you know it's it's uh people I know people don't have a lot of time on their hands and you know it's something else that someone's going to have to do but I think it really would be an effective way to to help in the situation soe well said um Al do you want to add something what all right R out of the sales there all right thank you thank you everyone for coming we appreciate it and and we all I'm speaking for the board we all want the same thing here and as quickly as possible other def you know we we have we have received requests add the agenda you know that is always something that's available to AB conversation we are will to have continue this conversation as much as all right so um next up we have a discussion on plans to address the open oh oh jeez director of planning econom so just to give you an update on uh where this is gone so as you know in the summer we got a everybody we're still in a meeting here guys yeah can you let them know that we're everyone can we have conversations outside we're still in the middle of a meeting go ahead yeah so as you know we uh had a planner um that was hired in the summer who then was able to use that to get a $133,000 raise and stay where they were um we continue to advertise in the uh MMA publication there's currently 26 planner positions uh advertise there we advertise 626 right now um we also keep advertising in the American Planning Association Massachusetts chapter um to no avail we contacted um planners and a pinch who then responded back but they had nobody uh right now um but we've asked them to keep us on the radar um and right now what we've done is um Nick um has agreed that Nick is taking in all the own board applications his office is managing that and uh the conservation administrative assistant is now helping out doing minutes um with planning and I did have a good interview today with a uh a plan possible planner and U I'm going to talk again on Monday so so you're not just leaving it open no we that's that's the rumor out there that you just forgot about it I didn't think that was we also reached out to a former member of the climning board who retired from uh a Town Administrator position and uh so cuz I said I hear you I said so I hear you helping out in this town why don't you come to your own Hometown like I'm not getting stuck with that again cuz he went there and the planner moved to New Hampshire and he thought he was only going to be part time and now he's the only person in the planning department in that time would this be the same person that said um I don't want the chair anymore probably yeah okay so um hopefully uh we get someone in there soon and in the meantime we've got other staff that are uh stepping up and I think ni and Kathy and um you know for and Megan for helping out I know I know Tim was going to try to be on I don't think he's on see and and we've also told Brian um Nick myself John Thomas Chris um anything that comes in any any uh submittals to the planning board to let us all know we'll all come up we'll go through every help everyone will help them go through everything to make sure everything's in order before it moves on so questions Kevin any questions all right L did you want to say anything if you please of course come on up thank you for coming thank you I have a radical idea I don't know whether it's going to work but we're at a point where drastic measures need to be taken thank you thank you we're past that point I think yes I have one for Kevin and pass as well Laura can I look at that where your do you mind yeah no noad thank you um so Laura Parker for Island Drive I am on the planning board I've been on the planning board for two years I have had a planner for 6 months of those two years um which isn't ideal for a new planning board member um I'm not a quitter but I'm exhausted um it is a lot more difficult to prep for a meeting without a memo telling us specifically what we need to be aware of and things to consider um we're we're kind of Flying Blind to an extent we're inefficient our meetings are probably going way longer than they need to cuz we're talking about procedural things in the meeting that the planner would have sorted out way ahead we're talking about things we probably don't even need to talk about um we're susceptible to errors um in procedure and otherwise and it's it can be a liability Brian is doing a tremendous job fabulous I can't speak that highly um he needs more money um but he said that quite a bit yeah he doesn't have enough experience unfortunately and I'm relying on Tim as well as the most senior member of the select board but unfortunately you know he's also a volunteer and I don't want to burden him I think I'm already a pain to him more than he'd like um but I have questions and there's nobody to go to um so I was really glad to hear about Nick helping out as well with the zoning stuff um I had no idea there was 26 towns looking for a planner um and I think that even draws this um suggestion is being more important we're we need drastic measures um so I had a suggestion I have no idea if this is even allowed in municipal government it would be what we do in Corporate America um we not only need to incentivize applicants we need to incentivize them to day because with 26 other towns looking for planners you know they may come for a year or less and say this isn't worth it um and take the next best offer um so this is drastic I admit that but I'm looking at given the competition from the other towns um we've not had a planner for a full year I would like to suggest suest uh taking a portion of that unpaid salary and benefits um I throw it a number which you can see here um that would have ured to the benefit of the full-time planner had we had one for the past year so there's money in the budget um and towards offering a signing and a longevity bonus um using a scale that would pay them um 20% at hiring with the condition that if they leave within a year they have to refund it at the end of the second year of employment I would like to give them I foret the what's that 15 no it's 20 it's 30% at the end of their second anniversary conditioned upon having provided two years of full-time service they have to be employed still at the end of 2 years and it is not eligible for prog rating if they leave anytime within year 1 and year two they lose it at the end of year three 50% of that bonus gets paid with the same conditions as year two again I don't know whether this person would be Union and whether a Union contract would allow for it I don't know if this is permissible under municipal government um it's a suggestion it's radical it costs us money but we're desperate I think we need it I I I like this um it would certainly attract now that being said if the person that you're speaking with turns out to be great if if make it a longevity bonus so I'm going to I'm going to say this if if what I just saw was right um I would be all in on that person yeah um I think I think um it's been quite a while and and I'm sure you most of you know I was on the plane Bo for quite a while and um and I was with I think it was Tabitha first was a planner and then Paul um and I was lucky enough to get on select for before you lost the planner so I can't imagine how even with the town planner it was two months in from my tenure we lost the planner and the me you know I didn't even know we were going to get memos when the memos came in I was like this is going to be great this is so much easier than I thought it was going to be the learning curve is high it's really high and there are people I'm like the third no fourth so out of seven there's still three more people below me who have less tenure than I do um which means they had a planner for a month maybe um and it turns people off from volunteering to it well and I'm not calling attention to anybody in particular but we had two seats up for um renewal this year and that you know for Reasons I'm not getting into and I'm not seeing it specifically because of this but two people chose not to pull papers for those seats and I was going to say there's a good possibility that not having a planner in there we spend more on legal than we would be spending on we have [Music] to so what I was saying is is you know I I think you're your suggestion is fantastic I think if it's feasible um yeah and is that he position so yeah obviously you're right it would have to through them what the complications are I don't know I think at this point any incentives are yes are going to be and I think it honestly I think it's probably even more important if we get somebody in there to make sure you know maybe there's a little stien as a signing bonus but the longevity bonus them for multiple years is yes and make it worth their while in year three to stay um let's at least get a threee I'm 100% up with that yeah that would be great thank you Laura it is that's private sector 101 yeah you know I don't know if this is you it is effective but I don't know if it's legal number one number two you know I'm more worried about slippery slope kind of you know in the future you would done under executive session we do have longevity for other positions we absolutely do police and private longevity you know uh that this is you know an existential circumstance I I think what you do is you have a salary range and you tell the person if you stick around next year youd get this if you stick around the a higher bu yeah yeah I think that is you know a a longevity thing is is much better the way every everybody's mobile nowadays they use everywhere else for stepping stones to get to the next level you know we have to as a town be better with a contingent plan when this sort of stuff does happen we're now implementing a contingency plan we're lucky enough to have people like Nick yeah and and Megan har up and and you know John that are stepping up to do it yeah um thank you Nick and nobody could have predicted that 26 positions are open right now for the scene I have no idea was that many that's just disheartening we have uh we we do have Tim we do have Tim the chair of the planning board on Zoom um Tim did you you want to say something can you hear us can you hear me I can hear you the whole time thank you so much La okay thank you yeah thank you I I had heard Laura's idea before I like it uh from a conceptual standpoint but yeah just from a a timeline perspective we've been without a planner for 15 of the past 21 months um which is pretty staggering um the one thing that I would add um potentially just to supplement some of the work that is being shared amongst Town staff I don't know if there's the ability to have some resource available to Brian to help with some administrative side of things or some other solution to assist with just the day-to-day operations um I don't remember the last time we approved a set of minutes um so there's a significant backlog of all of that stuff to get through um a lot of that stuff is not something which necessarily needs planning training um but I think any and all support that we can give to Bri um at this point um regardless of whether or not we get a planner in the door and Mike I'm glad to hear there was a promising discussion um I think there's a significant backlog of work um which means that the uh the pressure would not let up on on Brian for a significant period of time even after something was brought up so Tim that that brings up a great Point actually that's something I had in my notes to talk about too is there um is there any type of Mr un any type of admin support we can get I mean even if it's bringing a temp in to do some of the just the well as I to yeah as I said uh for admin work we have um the conservation Administrative Assistant working on minutes so uh that'll help Brian out and uh I'll look at if there's always available from our uh other Administrative Assistant that does um finance committee maybe she can help out at times two minutes just start tackle them them one at a time and get them moving but to to we just me the chat PPT or something I don't know yeah yeah I know that's I'm sure that's coming it's going to be Ed out perfectly yeah virtual planning virtual planning director just the minutes yeah um also just Mr chairman if you don't mind um you know there's another aspect of this of this job too which is the economic development side of things too so I know um when I was on the EDC you know there's a lot of there's a lot of really good stuff we' love love to do um from the economic development standpoint thing side of things as well and it's it's it's extremely difficult without someone in that position so um any I like bl's idea as well anything we could do to um you know try to get candidates or hopefully this candidate works out I think any idea is good idea this point anything else [Music] guys all right all right thank you Tim and thank you Laura very much appreciate it thanks I do appreciate thank you lot thanks for the consideration thank you everybody oh Nick yes thank you thank you all the days work guys God bless it all right next up we have let's see discussion and a vote on the request for extension of comprehensive permit for the property located at 253 Mansfield Avenue um just I didn't know if you wanted to um weigh in on that at all um that is um the 40b uh Down CrossFit used to be just be on elberto um they're looking for an extension in the zoning board just wanted to know if uh the select board had any preference from did the villing board V already what's that did the zoning board vote on they vote on the 40 BS yeah they already approved it we're looking for an extension sorry they Haven it they haven't voted on the extension the the applicant was in front of the Z board on Monday at our most recent meeting yeah um but there was a miscommunication so ultimately it got continued to next month's meeting um he's got a couple months left on his approval initial approval but he's just looking to get ahead of it and get it extended so there's no um proposed modification to the plan as of now it's literally just an extension request um as the expiration date is coming up I think it's either June or July don't don't we do that but next couple months um that that set to expire do you need us to vote on it or should we just defer to the only I if you can just let me know and I'll let the board know if you have any preference I preference will not to approve the extension I'm personally okay approving it and and um as this just my opinion um as long as the zoning board's okay with it I was going to say just make it contingent on the voting the zoning Bo yeah Kevin what do you think anything it's frozen good um no I I agree yeah as long as the as long as the zoning board's okay with it then we we could I guess we're we could approve pending their approval of it what that is that right yes that is correct is that a motion is that a motion cuz uh I don't know you make a motion I'll make a motion go for it all right hang on I will make a motion to hold I'm just getting the wording up here all right I'll make a motion to um request an extension of the comprehensive permit for the property located at 253 mainsfield Avenue pending approval from the Z zoning board of appeals yes yeah I'll second you go there's your motion sorry all right motion a second Kevin yes tenise yes Al yes and I'm a yes not really sure what that's for but yes all right um so next up we have a discussion discussion or vote on posting meeting materials um do you want to discuss this tonight or you push to the next meeting I know till you're in person [Music] Kevin um if we have a few minutes I I think it's um it's just something um you know I haven't talked about this in a whole year so I have bring it up again um but um you know we're in budget season again obviously and um uh I had brought this up about a year ago just to uh try to put some requirements on what is available for meeting participants for public meeting participants um uh for um especially when it you com to budget time um it's very difficult to participate as C when you don't have the same materials that the uh boards do whether it's you know whether it's select board or incom or um or any of the other boards so I know um what I had proposed way back a year I think it was about a year ago because it was budget season was um you know could we make um you know obviously redacting information that this private um and um could we you know make the meeting materials that we use for select board meetings and also uh for fincom meetings could we you know make that available on the town's website prior to the meetings so folks could more actively participate and I think it would be also it would help with uh with transparency of the town government so um so that's why I I wanted to put it Mo forward again you know just it it it happened again with me the other night I was I went to you know join the fincom meeting and there were no materials available so I had to kind of uh I I don't want to make fun of Mike again but I will you know like Mike puts it up on the screen and it's super tiny and try two Ines for my scen you know um so um you know so you know that's where it's that's where the you know that's why I wanted to just talk about it again and just get the board's thoughts on it and see if there's a way maybe we can find some some way to just get some of these materials um out there so folks can can see them and and obviously I think would help with transparency especially you know given the budget issues we have I think it's it's it's especially important yeah I know last time we talked about this um one of my concerns was you know some of this stuff um especially when it comes to to permits and things there's know there's bank records and things like that and so to take the admin time to redact a lot of that stuff would kind of be unfeasible in my opinion um but I do think that um anything like budgets or you know Maps things like that that are um not really needed to be heavily redacted I think I'm all for it um but the hard thing is we don't even get these still about 48 hours before the meetings anyways so that's that's a huge time crunch and that's just my opinion on it but I do think I right now we have a a budget estimate here um that would be helpful for everybody to see so I I definitely agree with you partially on yeah I agree uh wholeheartedly more information better um as a matter of fact I think I when I was quickly going through the Articles they was one that was uh changed to something in our chter maybe or something like that and I said for for the uh changes to see the town park that shouldn't be the way we we propose changes at town meeting you should at least post them if it's large and too large to include in the town meeting warrant we should at least post on the town website well beforeand we can see those changes uh in advance without having to submit a formal request to the town what do you think I agree with you the same reasons the the time and redacting in for most you know it depends on it depends on the packet it depends on what's up there's leases there's I don't know the the the time is there for things of that nature but as far as budgets I 100% agree especially you know I mean all the like items all departments going to have to submit everything um you know they they have breakdowns in the whole n y is that is that just a whole another level of it yeah you know I think I think so you know and as far as budgets absolutely 100 100% transparency we always see it after the fact and yeah in the town report we always get it after so why not get you know everybody doesn't know these line items um I mean especially the big number ones um you know that's I mean can they be digital they got to be digital somewhere right yeah um you know yeah problem scanning the budgets and and putting up you know online but I mean that that's everywhere we're going to be able to get it from all departments right well we get all the budgets um the problem is when you stop posting stuff that isn't final yeah and then then it becomes confusion people become confused they say what are you talking about it was x amount of money well that was before the the budget was cut well that was before I would I would even do something right across the middle draft so that so that everybody knows and that was actually what I was thinking when you were saying that is that we have proposed town meeting articles and that's not the final version of this so that's part of our packet but it's something that we could have discussed changed um so having that out there people might take that printed from this meeting and bring to the town meeting and be completely wrong about what's actually going to be on there so so even if we do put that stuff up big draft right across the I agree I'd rather have I'd rather have an early draft version of something and be able to have an intelligent conversation and ask good questions then not having information at all and winging it at the meeting and trying to scramble to figure out what you know what questions I need to ask here yeah especially when it comes to because that's that's the biggest contention in the town right now is fun so I 100% agree with that yeah Kevin yeah so yeah so I mean we don't have to vote on it tonight I mean I I I I you know maybe it's maybe it needs a little refining and conversation with with um with Mike and Jen and and all that but if if we're all at least on the same page that we'd like to see um you know we'd like to see some meeting materials whether or not it's I I don't think it's got to be all your meeting materials but um key meeting materials um you know on the website available um you know maybe maybe you know I can I can sit down with Mike and Jan and and talk about you know I just I don't want to zoom out to like 100,000 ft but I just feel like there's got to be a way for us to be more transparent and more um encouraging of people to participate um you know by giving them more the information that they need to to participate so yeah um so I don't think we need to vote on it tonight but you know maybe um if Mike's you know you know amendable to it sit down with Mike and maybe with Jen and just try to based on this conversation with the with all of you guys you know try to figure out a way to to get something out there that's valuable for course but also you know um like I said transparent so so you know like I said we don't have to take a vote on it now it's I'm glad to hear everybody was on the same page yeah we could make a list of what things we want to make exceptions for right the you point we see a lot of licenses right maybe the application is okay but the restac right I think Kevin I think Kevin's hit it right on the head and sit down with Mike and Jen and see what's feasible and what's not and come up with a list of what we think I mean I again I I go back to the budget I mean this is something that for years before I was on the select board I always want to know what these numbers are and like you said you're relying on the screen you got to try to zoom it in and it's it's very difficult to follow along yeah it it turn it turns people off from for being involved right so yeah we want more people involved I don't know the people that want to be involved are involved the people that don't it doesn't matter what you do you know you can have free cup coffee and donuts here they're not going to show up Mr chair there's be here thank you so I thought this was going to be more of an argument um I'm thrilled to hear that you're all on board theoretically to some extent um I actually did do a bunch of stats but I'm not even going to bother to show them to you um I would just like to point out that um Brian carmichel is the admin for two different boards that are very paperwork and document intensive and a single person is able to get all of those documents posted to the public in time for the meeting every single meeting so I would hope that with the select board having an admin the town manager having an admin that we might be able to achieve um I'll settle for Budget I'd like to see some things like the Elm Street presid things along those lines that are important to the public things like that and I completely understand the redaction comments um would love to see that posted in advance of the meeting just I'll run through some quick stats I went through 35 towns um I picked the towns that were closest in size to us that have open town meeting and five select board members Norton is the mem we were hit right in the middle of those 17 provide their full packet and in some cases they're not redacted I I looked at them some of them are but some of them are not um four of them provide budget town meeting articles Capital Improvement plans the fiveyear cap um um forecasting that type of thing um and then 14 including Norton provides nothing I also thought it would be important to point out of the those 35 towns 31 of them are using the same website platform that we are there is a capability of doing it and I've seen it done some of them provide a second link so the link first link has the agenda the second link has all the meeting materials and in some cases I saw one it was 203 pages but it's all digital that's an easy day for us it is Pages um so 31 of them are using Civic plus uh four three of them have their own custom website and one of them has another type of platform um but even then some are using a link some are using a there seems to be some other separate area that you can go to for documentation that's a little bit more robust on Civic plus than what we presently have to post agendas some of them put the links under each agenda item there's a link you hit the link and you can get those exact meeting materials on the web um and then one toown uses a Google Drive so there's there's a bunch of ways to skin the cat um it it can be done if Brian can post two meetings worth two boards worth of meetings every single meeting we we can get it done I know we can thank you so that I'm glad you pointed that out to the um presentation that's we got 10 or 15 pages of slides in here that should be easy and there should be a link under the meeting well I can't tell you how many times I'll watch it on Zoom I literally screen print screenshot screenshot screenshot screenshot or I do the same thing I'm taking Furious notes to try to make sure it gets everything down just so I have it to refer to again at some point all right excellent thank you thank you do you want another point or you got enough if you want you can come up and something well no I said I'm going to support K I'm going to back the same thing they said you had enough all right meeting proceed so um wait who was that that was that was Rob Rob green with you Kevin thank you I can't see you so I I was there was a voice out there so I just wanted to know who it was I work hard that all right so nobody going to answer me on this but are there any other uh topics not reasonably anticipated good okay next we have all Town interest report right slide those around and that around so just to give you a budget update the first page yeah the first page I I showed you just to go over um some of that um so our Revenue increase this year the increment is 1,141 693 I love local receipts our estimate is that they'll increase $188,200 so our total available is 1,329 n1177 so expense increases and revenue reductions before we even start talking about budgets Bristol County Retirement increased health insurance $354,700 and then some reductions um overlay Surplus last year for the budget we had 100,000 this year the assessors said they're not able to supply uh any money they're concerned about cases they may have last year we used 1,235 536 of free cash the stabilization $77,500 New Growth 48,000 um the free cash we're using proposing now 700,000 last year we used 1,935 th000 so the reduction if we use 700,000 is 1,235 536 so the total reductions are [Music] 27529 121 so we have Revenue increase of $1,329 n1177 we have expense increases and revenue reductions of 2,752 200 2, 75291 so a total revenue available is a negative 1,423 4 as opposed to last year so if if we look at different scenarios uh on the budget process if the budgets were to incre increase 3% would have a 2, 2016, 639 deficit if the budgets increase 4% would have a 2,518 2 43 deficit if the budgets increase 5% 3, 20,000 $327 deficit and if we went with the Department requests as submitted would have a 5,583 29 deficit for this year's budget um so if that all being said um right now that would mean um a reduction from what we appropriated FY 24 of $136,400 on the school sign that's not a reduction in request that's a reduction for fy2 from what we received in fway 24 so I I did meet with the superintendent today we went over all this information and I told her that I would ask you tonight if you'd be willing rather than have the joint meeting on Monday the 25th but to have it next Thursday if you had the meeting on Thursday and the decision was was to have an override um the deadline is that Friday to get it on the April now like you had talked about I was going to say didn't somebody have that idea a few weeks ago and got scen de for it was that me so okay that deadline would be that Friday so if you met next Thursday a joint meeting you can go over this and decide what you want to do I'm I'm fine with that um you guys it's the 21st I'm fin with meeting Thursday if we can get a more comprehensive budget look at as for each department line by line we can get to that but I I don't understand what that benefits at this time CU I'd like to see the the detail to be able to digest what's changing from year to year between these different different departments the the the big number the big buckets is fantastic I I want to see what's changing year over year on each department all right Kevin are you available next week okay with that um yes I I am available next Thursday yes all right so yeah we don't have to vote on it but yeah I'm okay with that okay I I'll mik hey Mike yeah oh sorry Steve you yeah um so can we get aside from what Denise just asked for which was sort of the detail on the budget um is it possible to get an idea of what we would be looking at for service reductions on the town side um if if uh we do not have you know if if we're not able to uh get more Revenue y okay sure we'll bring that because because I think I think it's helpful to see you know that this is real you know these these are real things that could be going away if we you know and and the town will ultimately leave the side but I think it would be good to see that that meeting Happ thank you thank you all right what we next um just on the cleanup day um Jared um and Joanne Jen uh Melissa and John um they've been working hard on uh developing a cleanup day they want to stay away from the April vacation because they're um looking to work with the schools to get some of the seniors that need uh community service hours to be involved so right now they're scheduled uh to wide clean up day on Saturday May 4th um check in will be at 9 to 10:00 a.m. and clean up 10:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. uh they felt that gets the teenagers there if they do it a little later so people would rather get there 8:00 in the morning and be done by 10:00 my question is do we get permission to use Dar theator on this so uh yeah they're looking at uh the DPW will get the um bags and U as was always done in the past people will go around and collect trash leave the bags and the trucks on the highway come around and pick them up um so uh they will have um they've got uh these the E so they'll get all the information on online registration um will be on the town website and uh people can sign up to volunteer so the way it usually works is you check in that morning but a lot of times people um will get in touch in advance and say look I want to do my street I'll come get the bags on Friday I'll just go out Saturday whenever I can to do it so whatever people want to do excent and uh next is the town Comm and damage um so you may have seen I love the police report where it said the truck didn't was not able to navigate the leftand turn I don't think they even tried a left hand turn I told Bob Kimmel I said so the Traffic Safety Committee decided that was the best option putting straight through the common uh so we we talked about that traffic safety it's true the driver wasn't an aiat or anything it was no influence it was just yeah asleep yeah yeah it was 2 in the morning or something like that question came back if we paid him 50 bucks took out the State sign took out part of the uh fence a lot of the electrical too right and the pole that had all the electrical all the electric all the electrical yeah so uh fortunately he did have good insurance so safety insurance will be send in adjuster out and uh um Jared's working on getting Bartlet out there to get price on some of the work and Cliff will work on the electrical work and also we'll get a price on fence repair the insurance company um just if anyone's available on uh March 26 at 3:30 there'll be a walk through of the uh New Town Hall we want to have it after at 3:00 so most of the workers are gone but they'll still be there so is that open to the public I I don't think it is unfortun it shouldn't be no it's it's the permanent building Committee in the select Court I believe okay thank you so it's coming along good I have pictures here of the work going on at the C Center in the town hall if you want to look at them but they're doing a great job on that so um so for select board report mail I was going to announce that I was going to do office hours next week but I gu we a meeting you can do that's what that's why we're doing it so yeah I'll be by the flag bullet three um okay um anybody else have Mr chairman I do want something oh go ahead which is rare for the select Bo reported mail section um so um uh Mike and I received an email earlier today from the chair of the economic development commission and this is this is a good story um as Steve knows we've been working for a little while on trying to get um kind of a business community group together in Norton um and um uh the EDC put together um a flyer that they're going to be Distributing to businesses where they can go in and scan um uh just scan a QR code and then it takes them to a survey on the town website where they can sign up for a uh uh to be part of a uh community group a business Community um so um uh more C on that but um something that we've been trying to do for some time is to just get contact information for for the business owners in town um so uh Steve Steve and Alec you should be getting it as well um and um please sign up when you do get it so so so to tag on to that um I'm part of the Norton Business Association we're going to be having I I don't have the dates set right now but we are going to have a a soft launch for um uh for recruiting new members and I think we're going to work in coordination with the DC on that too so as soon as we have that we'll be in touch with them but yeah good good stuff and a positive uh positive development so we want to try to attract business to to town and we want to help businesses succeed and and U both the nor Business Association and and the EDC working together I think is uh pretty cool stuff so yeah that's all I have all right if there's nothing else I I approve the warrants that has written and my favorite motion of the evening make a motion to a Jour Sor all right ah Kevin yes the yes Al yes and I yes thank you guys thank you every the game