good evening welcome to the finance committee meeting of town of air uh Thursday March 21st 2024 at 6 pm. this is a hybrid meeting this meeting of the finance committee will be held in person at the location provided on this notice members of the public are welcome to attend this in person meeting please note that while an option for remote attendance Andor participation via Zoom is being provided as a courtesy to the public the meeting hearing will not be suspended or terminated if technological problems interrupt the virtual broadcast unless otherwise required by law members of the public with a particular interest in a specific item on this agenda should make plans for inperson versus virtual attendance accordingly this meeting will be live on Zoom the public May access the proceedings by joining Zoom meeting ID 860 877711 1519 9 or by calling 92925 6099 for additional information about remote participation please contact Carly antonellis assistant Town manager at ATM a.m. us or 978 7728 220 extension 100 prior to the meeting good evening um we call the meeting to order um the first first item is uh I'd like to propose two changes or excuse me additions to the agenda um the first being uh we are going to review and approve not only the March 7th meeting minutes but the February 15th meeting minutes and also uh we then are going to have a presentation by the police chief uh as a followup to his presentation from the previous meeting so those are the two additions to the agenda um I move that we uh make those additions all those in favor I I and j i very good I okay all right we will now move forward with the agenda again the first item is uh review and approval of the February 15th minute meetings and meeting minutes and the February 7 meeting minutes um are there any changes questions additions there's one typ on ah on the February 15th minutes okay the last line I made a motion to approve as opposed to approved the meeting minutes motion to okay so drop the D yep that good job Eric thank you okay it's a thankless jump well not anymore you said thank you okay all right I made that uh uh I've noted that on the minutes that'll be submitted um I would like to make a motion to approve the 15th and the 7th minutes second okay all those in favor I I I Jim I I very good okay uh we're going to move on to the next item which is a update 37 37 minutes pardon we did both oh we did both yeah the motion that was moved and second was to uh approve the February 15th and March 7th my apologies there was a tyo on uh page two of the February or excuse me March 7 that's too late uh I'm sorry oh which where is that was uh missing a zero two 2020 in the second page of the March 7th yeah too late no it's fine which paragraph oh I see that in the first paragraph okay so and I have made that change on the copy that'll be submitted to the town clerk okay very good thank you um Andrew okay uh next up we have a presentation by Chief Brian Gil uh welcome Chief good evening thank you for allowing me this very brief uh second presentation I promise um so when I left uh our main presentation the other day I didn't get the warm and fuzzy feeling that we all understood the uh mechanisms for uh how the dispatch was funded so I wanted to kind of really break it down to the most simplest Port Parts I don't know if anybody has the presentations are not everybody got them perfect okay so um really what we're we've all seen this we're talking about in our in our Command in our structure we're talking about the communications division um the next slide um and that hasn't changed this slide also hasn't changed um this is our overall budget um for our budget request for fy2 um and what we really want to talk about is the third and final slide so what I what I really wanted to highlight is how we have we have our total budget we have grants and then we have have the town of Shirley assessment uh that we we charge to them so the the top bullet that we have here that's our initial starting budget that we we worked with for the fy2 which was the uh 9 138,000 then we applied the three uh grants as you'll see that are under that and the the first grant the biggest one is the support incentive Grant the training Grant which generally comes out of our overtime but it also covers some of the expenses of training classes and our 911 Em drgrant which covers the expense of a service that we used to pay for outright so with the grants those can be um those can offset the budget directly so that's why when we take our starting budget and we offset with all the grants we come up with this 54,4 so that is our total budget that we're requesting through the Omnibus now we've been talking a lot about this uh the assessment so the assessment right now the numbers that we're working with is 145 um just out note that we are um working with the town of Shirley on negotiating uh the successor agreement so that number has the potential to change um the also the other important thing is that 145 so that doesn't get applied directly to our budget here so what the assessment does is that supports the budget through uh Town income so local receipts so that number uh in working with the uh the the finance director so that number is accounted for in um in the financials of the income of the town that they can predict that so they know that that money is coming in so then that is put into the calculation of money that's being brought in as part of the revenue so that's why it can't be directly done so but what I wanted people to to see is like kind of a visual reference as I have on the final bullet so that's that's the visual reference of what the budget looks like with the surely uh the assessment at 145 um so it's the so the shirely assessment doesn't really get applied directly to any line in our budget but it's part of all the money that comes in that helps support the entire budget and then that's uh that offsets that so that 395 is kind of just a visual reference of what that 145 looks like got it okay and and so part of what we did last time we kind of applied it to a line just so you could see it in a line but that's not exactly what happens but you have to request the full 540 to make it all kosher so we have to that's why we have to request the full 540 because it's that's what we need to operate that budget and of that that 145 helped support that 540 pretty straightforward perfect like I said I just wanted I wanted to kind of clarify that up a whole lot more and I didn't get that war and fuzzy feeling when I left the other day on this I appreciate it because again as as uh first year going through all this every single thing is new so thank you side question sure parking tickets sure where did that where does that money go um it the parking tickets we don't uh we issue them we don't collect them how's that sure um maybe Mr ppan can assist with that I'm just curious where like cuz that is some levenue level back Revenue right of like yeah I could get the exact number Mr chairman members of the fincom so the police write them um my office Miss antonellis collects them the parking tickets uh as all money that comes and it goes to the general fund and so when Barber does the revenue uh prod de projections each year she does factor that in okay and we can get you the exact amount I don't know it off hand don't need the exact amount just curious y so just just for clarification so the revenue from parking tickets does not go directly to the police department correct thank you all right any other question good okay great thank you for the time let me clarify all stuff thank you have good thanks Chief all right um moving forward we're going to have a presentation by the Department of Public Works Dan is joining us by zoom and is going to drive the presentation so to speak um so the I say the floor but I will say the screen is yours Dan thank you Mr chair been and I apologize I couldn't make it in person today um let's see Cindy around poost to disabled screen share oh oh boy she left hold on hold on you just got to hit the little tab next to share screen and and collect multiple participants can share try it now look at that Dan Acton as support see here it com everybody see that it's it's loading I think oh yeah loading yeah I I hope fing just make sure I didn't miss it so you have that open on your screen Dan yeah okay is the USB still in there is that interfering sh cool interesting what's going on here let's see just try one more time Dan yeah hang on I'm kind of Frozen up over here okay Frozen it could be me yes Xfinity has been uh hit or missed the last days few days days or decades paulan has a hand range no if if this doesn't work do you have the presentation there yep yep and I think we could pull it up uh from the town website also okay okay give me a minute I'm spinning here I can change the screen Kurt Pauline has her hand up just let's let's get the presentation sure PA do you have a quick quick uh observation while we're pulling that up yes Kurt just an observation it's a very large document I looked at it today um it's really large so that might be taking the time gotcha um and I just want to share that with you um and nothing else thank you for letting me say that you're welcome thank you yep that one deep Di okay Dan we're we've got actually pulled up at our end here where's my full screen option okay hold on okay give me a second oh your your your yours pulled up D oh mine pulled up no no that's me is that okay no that's him yeah we're Vie we're viewing his screen yep all right all right I think we're good to go okay okay very good good uh quick Jin I I saw you're clapping but you can see the presentation I yes I can see the F okay very good I assume I assume Paul and you can see it also very good all right Dan yes I can thank you very much okay technical issues as I go all right so finance committee meeting March 21st 202 Bo a presentation of the DPW budget so just to start out definition of Public Works from maram Webster dictionary work such as schools highways docks instructed for public use or enjoyment especially when financed and owned by the government so some examples down below we have storm water Bridge Culvert on the left our water um treatment system in the middle we have our roadways sidewalks and all the infrastructure underneath in the town wounds so here's kind of a general list of assets maintained by the DPW roadways Bridges culber storm water we have two water treatment plants and the Associated Water distribution system a wastewater treatment plant with the collection system transfer station uh two landfills they're both capped and closed Municipal and sledge landfills woodlon Cemetery um public shade trees through the tree Warden the tree bu is in DPW and street lights so here's Department of Public Works there's the following divisions admin Administration engineering Highway Water waste water solid waste and I'll get into each one and what we do so some of our significant buildings the DPW administration building most of you probably been there 25 Brook Street in the photo that's uh that was constructed in about 2018 we moved in May of 2018 fairly new also on that premises Highway garages there's two uh the maintenance and storage garage on the left built in 1970 and the new um storage garage built in 2018 which also has an overhang um fuel uh canopy as well for our fuel station that's the town's fuel station in the background here where I'm kind of circling with my mouse so Dan real quick question so we purchase most of our oil and hold it in the tank ourselves and and fuel the uh Town Cars from equipment from there yeah so okay um gasoline and Diesel are both uh there's a dispenser here and it's located in that above ground storage tank the fuel is and all all Town Vehicles will fill up there police um every everybody in town okay well that's that's good to know so we don't go to the local gas station so we okay and I assume we have Sav through bulk purchases correct y thank you uh Grove pond so these are our significant buildings in water we have our Grove pond water treatment plant which is shown in the left here um the P fast treatment Edition is this building with the white roof our um original plant from was actually upgraded in 2013 as well as a garage out in the back um a spectacle Pond the water tree plant that's the satellite plant doesn't have the main office um so we have our original treatment plant in the background of the photo and the new past treatment in the Forefront of the photo and there's Al also two storage tanks uh 1 and2 million gallon Washington Street storage tank that's up by the school the high school and paig Hilltop and our pingry Hill storage tank it's a 1 million gallon tank over in the pingry Hill Neighborhood waste waterer uh the treatment plan is also located on the 25 Brook Street campus it's further if you were to drive past the highway garages it's further out back from uh from the admin building and Highway uh that was built in 1982 we've been doing many uh Capital upgrades as part of it was a 5-year Capital which we stretched out to be kind of palatable for us to take on um and you'll see that in our capital budget also there's 19 pumping stations so there quite a bit for a small town um our main and Central AV pumping stations there's a picture of central there our largest stations I'll get more into it later um the transfer station many you've probably been there but there's a tipping garage tipping floor um there's a big structure there as well as other vehicles equipment structure question Dan yeah if you're going to go over this later uh feel free to answer it then but you mentioned 19 pumping stations is quite a bit for a small town why do we have 19 I think just over time um you know in the past maybe a private owner could have owned some of them but just the way things were done the town took ownership um so typically now for example Panther Place subdivision they're going to have to put in a pump station but we're not taking ownership of that and HOA will manage it so we have a few small stations like that where we we have to maintain um Winterberry Lane for example it's a very small station but it it is a pump station Tech way the town owns it but unfortunately now we have to maintain it I got you thank you yeah uh vehicles and equipment we have a significant amount of vehicles and Equipment as you could imagine for maintaining the roads and and especially a snow removal um I'm not going to go through this list but these are you know in the presentation which is is on the website if anyone wants to go through but you know quite a bit in Highway and then also in our our other divisions as well um the organizational chart so this is the way DPW is is uh set up in the town select board is the ultimate in charge followed by the town manager and then that follows U the direct the director of Public Work falls under there and then down to the various divisions um so we have our engineering on our left town engineer civil engineer one our business manager with our administrative assistance as well to to do our water and sewer billing and and serve the um front office the tree Warden um the water sewer and superintendent in charge of water and wastewater divisions and then the highway division foreman and Sal waste Foreman who report to the director so General Administration in general provides customer service um sells stickers and bags for uh the transfer station administers Water and Sewer billing uh payroll oversees day-to-day internal functions of of the DPW and there's five employees myself the director business manager water sewer and superintendent Department assistant and billing and admin assistant uh just a general on engineering um engineering this is a little bit of what they do but provide in-house engineering to support division and capital projects for example almost every year when we're doing water main Replacements we designed that in house uh the upcoming Sandy Pond Road complete Street project was designed designed in house but we also work with Consultants uh for projects like the Main Street bridge for example um provide professional engineering review for various committees and Boards um there's one PE and one junior level engineer and also um the director is a has a p me okay DPW admin let's get into some budget so the DPW administrative operating budget is shown here I'll just get into the differences um compared to last year so we did increase our utilities and you'll see this across the board um due to the electric and gas set rate increase so that the town was locked in with electric and gas and those are set to expire so we'll expect to have to pay more those utilities and then also in here um we we are working on implementing a townwide permitting software smart go and that's going to get put into the DPW budget so that's where it's shown here other than that we're out level funding um except for wages and salaries which go up by contractually and by yeah contractually uh Dan a quick question so the uh permitting is that for um building permits um yeah that type of thing yeah it's more than just DPW it would be um for several departments and we're still kind of working it out by building will be part of it and then uh probably a few other departments and I'm working with Robert on getting that um going okay so point so I'm I'm glancing at Robert real quick um so this this we're including this permitting budget under DPW for right now for right now yes okay yeah for now so kind of DPW has actually already implemented it kind of soft implemented it we're kind of the the first ones to do it just to see how it works and then other departments are soon to follow suit and I know building is probably next so um so that's that's mainly why it's landed here okay yeah good thank you yeah thanks um highway summeran highway so the highway division maintains the 45 mies of roadway storm water assets our pipes our structures our best management practices so for example if you see a storm water retention Basin that's a management practice a rain Garden things like that that treat storm water um it's the primary division for snow removal so if there's ever just a salting event it's Highway if there's salting in plowing Highway they're in charge they all report to me ultimately um there are six employees uh shown here I won't go through them all and they are on call for emergencies this is just a map of the town of air it's it's a little bit of older one but gives you an overview of uh the you know amount of roadways in town uh they're all listed down in the bottom here but you know this is the infrastructure we're looking at the highway division maintaining and then this is our ms4 storm water map so Highway also maintains the storm water system you know through working with engineering and the director as well um but this is just her for map it's available on the website and I won't get into too much info on it right now uh Dan just a quick question so this storm water map would be tied into again just an overall question on um sewer and again we have sanitary sewer and this town has separate storm sewers correct yeah the systems are totally separate right and this storm water map would be sort of tied into the storm water um system correct yes yes so what this is displaying is it displays you can kind of see real close here the orange that's the storm water pipes and the manhold and catch Basin so that's this is our mapping of it so these ultimately go out to these little pain dots which are the outfalls so you know the the storm water lands in the road enters the catch Bas and goes through the pipe and then it ends up in the Waterway gotcha okay yeah yeah no it's just I mean with the sewer and storm water always on our mind um and I just think it's always important to note that those are separate systems and um so this is this is good just to give you give us a fuel for that great thank you y okay the highway operating budget so uh changes from last year the wages and overtime those change with the Union contract for the employees in there um Highway utilities we are also increasing as I mentioned due to the electric gas set rate increase and then DPW line painting so these are based on our La our quotes from last year the price has gone up significantly to about uh $30,000 so um we have to increase that budget excuse me to do a long line paintings which we refresh every year for the entire town those are you know our yellow center lines and our fog lines um so that's our big increase there equipment repair this is the mechanics operating budget so this one has been level funded and you can see the wages are actually zero so we actually uh the position's actually open right now we haven't filled it so that's why um there isn't an employee there um getting an increase in accordance with the contract um so we're working to fill that position otherwise we've level funded this based on our current trends and I don't see any reason to to increase the funding uh snow removal operating budget so the only change here from last year is increasing the contract slightly um for the services that's the contracts with private Cloud drivers we have uh four four or five depends how many we get uh how many we can get on board a year of private Cloud drivers and um it's been harder to get them and and we've had to increase the pay to to retain them so that's the increase recommended here question yeah so um so the for that budget for the the snow removal and whatnot so let's say you have a winter where you know there's really no snow um would that be a situation where you don't use the entire um proposed budget if you will or or you know set budget um yeah and then yeah sorry I was going to say so then as an example you know FY 24 budget 358 660 let's say you only use 300,000 cuz it never snowed um what happens to the other 58 so um Robert correct me if I'm wrong but at the end of the fiscal year it would just go back to the general fund right Mr chair yes Robert just really quick because it's a great question on the snow removal whatever isn't used at the end of the the year would revert back and would be reflected in when we talk about next year's free cash so whatever he doesn't use okay and another interesting point if we have a winter um where there is lots of snow this is one of the few accounts where the town can actually deficit spend not just not just the town of air but in Massachusetts the Department of Revenue if you had a huge winter cuz it's a matter of public safety it has H happened Dan in in several years but if he had to if there wasn't enough he could deficit spend and then we have to make that up um in the next year so it is a unique account so good questions on both both fronts thank you I want to say I came when I was first came in a director it was I was getting a little worried because the cost of salt and sand and fuel kind of jacked up you know in the middle of the season so I was like uh oh but we ended up still being under budget um storm water the operating budget uh the changes here from last year um Services we've added $10,000 for attachment investigations we're going to need a consultant to help us with our ms4 permit and uh the requirements and our our I think it's year six of the permit um investigating our our storm water catchments so those are kind of our small watersheds that feed into each outfall um um so we've increased that budget here for that um catch Basin what that really is storm water catch Basin it's it's catch Basin cleaning so we're required through our ms4 permit and just through good practice to clean the catch basins annually I get all the sediment that's in there out of them and So based on last year's quote I've increased the um request here cost is going up a little bit and then the storm drain upgrades and Culvert improvements the changes here I move those to Capital these really are Capital Improvements it's similar to like our water main upgrades where we we upgrade our storm water system um our our pipes and our catch basins and certain areas like Third Street last year when we did our big project out there um and it's really difficult to to spend it in the in the operating budget also because we have to spend it by June 30th each year and we can't really do the work in the winter so we kind of find ourselves scrambling because you have to b a project get it out and you kind of get stuck up on time like I can try to spend my storm water you know upgrade money before I lose it and then uh so in the capital budget that you know we would have that those funds over FAL year year another reason to have there okay um Dan I'm just going to um use this is this sort of a followup to my uh on the question of the again sanitary sewer and the storm water um sewer which is again separate systems the important thing is that sewer and water which you are going to touch on are in their own Enterprise funds correct that's right right storm water is part of your budget and is part of the general budget it is paid from the general fund correct that is correct so okay yes so the storm water operating budgets paid from the general fund which comes from the tax base correct the wad and Sewer budgets are Enterprise funds and those are not funded from the tax base they're funded by uh the mainly by the Water and Sewer rate Revenue that we receive okay so um you know we did give that presentation a few meetings ago that the town does have a storm water utility advisory work group in that group is um evaluating potential storm waterer Enterprise funds you know there is a website Avail or there's a dedicated website on the town website for this this group which has a lot of information that that the group's been looking at okay and that and that's why I was asking the question so depending on which direction we choose to go to go in as a town theoretically the storm this storm water budget then would be removed from this budget and go into its own Enterprise fund if that was just that's right that's right okay okay again just just trying to since that's sort of on on a back burner so to speak uh I just wanted to make sure uh that we're aware and uh everyone is aware of you know how this is impacting the budget so good thank you yeah that was good good all right what is next um Street Light operating budget um I didn't have any reasons to make any changes here um and what you know what this as far as maintaining the the street lights in town and we have a third we have not third a contractor come out when we have some lights out and he'll um fix them usually it's not the actual light bulb itself but it's it's part of the um operating inside the unit um and so no reasons to make any changes we did we talked a little bit about the fueling station so it is at DPW and services all Town vehicles um and no changes to the budget this year you know I think last year we made some significant changes when fuel had increased um significantly and uh at this time I think keeping it level funded best ceter budget uh woodon Cemetery the town took ownership in April of 2022 and so there are wages here changes to those so right now there we have a part-time employee at a cemetery super intendent and he may possibly be leaving us uh this um or in FY 25 so I put an increase in here as a as we're determining on what we would do next just as a placeholder excuse me for those wages and Services I increased slightly based on our our last year's bids for the maintenance of the woodon cemetery so we have a a a landscape contractor who comes out and uh takes care of all the grounds up there as well as spring fall cleanup as well excuse me uh tree warding so the tree Warden budget is within DPW um the only changes here is we reduce the services so we you know we felt that we could you know excuse me especially working with the uh the current difficulties with the increases with the schools and other parts of the budget we want to reduce things and I think the services of the tree Ward could reduce without losing much level of service we're in the middle of operating are trying to implement a 10-year management plan which is kind of shown in the picture here the town has a tree management plan so that's why the budget was up around 63,000 I think we'll still be able to to get a good level of service while helping to save some uh funds for the town question I did put an increase oh yeah go ahead what what are tree Wen services so that's actually having a contractor come out and remove trees um remove stumps prune trees maintenance items like that Left Bank make the contractor okay so St the stien being for the warden who then says okay hey this needs to be taken care of the services then pay for what needs to be taken care of yeah yeah so the town and every Town's required to have a tree warden so he has paid a stien and that's his wages um right and then the services are the contractor that he hires but we also I work with him and we have a a bid every year to kind of work on this 10-year plan we're doing but you know we'll have certain things come up during the year that need to be addressed that you know were unknown that you know as things come up every year so so having that that budget there is is where it would come from thank you and I I was going to mention yes so an increase for the annual software renewal so uh you can kind of see the bottom right here we have um the um um I don't what do you call it the inventory of all the trees in air that are publicly owned and so we use a software to monitor those update that soft software we you remove threes etc etc so just to main to have that software put an increase in the budget uh water and sewer so now we're moving on with uh past general fund past tax basee we're getting into Enterprise funds so Water and Sewer Enterprise funds um both the divisions are funded through those Enterprise funds so not through the tax Bas um just in general communities establish these Enterprise funds for business type Services uh and it's essentially funding is based on the services provided as opposed to coming from the tax base I was mentioning um so the way we do it with the water and sewer is water is needed by the um and the property owners build for the at the current water and sewer rates based on the water usage it's assumed that the sewer goes down the the sewer goes down the draam or not the sewer the water goes down the sewer draam so that's the Assumption there so we use the water meter to also um uh pay for the the sewer each year a rate model is utilized by the rate Review Committee to review and recommend rates to the select board um in March 19th just the other day the select Court had a public hearing and uh with the vote to recommend FY 25 water and SE rat so that has been completed like5 quick summary for water um there's three licensed water operators five employees uh listed here put through them um they operate and maintain the treatment plants the storage which are the tank water storage tanks and the distribution system and they are certainly on call for emergency sees excuse me here's a a general map of our water system The Grove Pond treatment plant is down along the dev border to the South and our specon plant is in the East near Littleton and so those are two plants pumping the water treating it into the system and that water goes into the system goes up to our storage tanks at pingry Hill and Washington Street and that helps that'll pressurize the system and provide water storage to meet them in um water Enterprise operating budget so I'll kind of briefly go through changes salary and wages changes again in accordance with the Union contract Water Services we recommend to increase this year with some upcoming items this year um scada issues that we need to address so those are our computer systems which monitor our our water um our our water treatment plant and we and um and it communicates with us um when there's an issue at the plant AC pipe transportation and Disposal with that is aestus cement pipe so we actually probably 50% of the pipe in air is as Festus cement and so when we remove that it has to be disposed of especially um this should be outdoor outdoor lighting at specon Washington Street tank and then also a connection to our new trailer mounted generator water utilities so we've increased these again across the board like I mentioned for the electric and gas and you notice it seems like a significant increase here 53,000 um all the pumping we do the water in the water and in the sewer division or Wastewater division there's a lot of pumping a lot of energy used so they they'll be your most the biggest energy hog so they'll use the most electricity um and have the you know highest change so Dan just cuz I'm I'm being dense I'm so this is the actual electric and gas bill for the for the water that is correct okay expense okay okay yep um this says level but we did increase the funds for maintenance of Wells we found the cost has gone up to to maintain our wells we like to do a cleaning we have um five Wells we like to clean one a year and kind of rotate it around um so that they they operate efficiently and also some other increases in the water fund supplies lab supplies plaing bit meters at spec Pond after the green sand these are some items that have gone up in price and that are are necessary and then there's some items down here which are related to the finance which have gone down excuse me this working oh there we go Wastewater summary so there's three licensed Wastewater operators that are required for the plant and six employees they operate and maintain the wastewater treatment plant the collection system and also the 19 pump stations we mentioned and they are certainly on call for emergencies as well here's a map of the Wastewater system um and just in general you know we have the treatment plant it's not actually identified it's down in this area on here this is an older out up deep now the sewer is collected throughout town and it goes to our main pumping station just on the DPW grounds near the admin building and from there it gets pumped either to devons or to um the dev system or to Air's wastewater treatment plant we actually have an agreement with devans to um have Reserve capacity in their system uh Jen has a yes oh sorry I just the previous slide so the uh water budget did that come from uh the one before that yeah so this water Enterprise so the um so this is funded by the Enterprise fund right that's correct do you always get it just balanced do you have problem of not having um enough on the Enterprise fund well most of the time we we uh come in under budget last year we did need a reserve fund transfer so the water budget does have its own excuse me basically savings account or water retained earnings so if if during the year we're going to spend budgeted we'd have to go to town meeting to get approval for more funds so last year we actually had Spring Town Meeting we had to get a reserve fund transfer U because we had some significant costs last year but most of the time we we have coming within our budget so the rec committee had done a good job 7 yeah thank you very much okay yeah it's a little more Dynamic than that like um when we set the rates we're kind of modeling and seeing what's going to happen over time but having that retained earnings in water is really what's you know the safety net for the Enterprise fund um uh oh you're the chair you got this okay Jen are you um you all set with that question I have a question too oh Andrew now Jor you set okay she seems okay okay uh Andrew hey Dan I had a question sorry back to the water Enterprise yeah um I see the the the debt principle went down but the interest went up did we we issued new new debt and paid off old debt is that what that is um I believe that is correct and but I don't know if bar is Barbara there I don't know cuz these are items that she um calculates but I believe you are correct I will we'll write a note and ask later okay Robert would you would you have any be able to shed any light on that we should follow up with bar okay we'll check without okay because I think actually that comes up with the um under the sewer also see that okay and I know that would that have anything to do with her with the west and I don't want to go too far off on WE we'll ask bar for more details okay so okay all right waste water okay uh similar um budget line items to water are in waste water uh let's see changes to the wages and salaries are based on the Union contract uh sewer fund Services um more suck out I don't like that where it's really they're vacuuming out the wet Wells they're called for our pump stations and so we need to do that periodically in order to properly maintain our station sediments will build up in there um and other other items so we we we uh need to do some more of those we fall them back on our schedule other things we got to do is inspect and paint our our terti tertiary tanks so those are Downstream of our our treatment increased cost for regulatory sampling so there are some increases this year we have to sample for PE baths now at the Wastewater Plant it's just a a sample right now there's no regulatory requirement or limit uh filter feed pumps need to be pulled so we need to pull those and address them um the sewer sewer for Devon services so this is the budget the town has for um being able to divert sewer flows to devans and have reserved capacity at their Wastewater Plant which is required by our regulation the state in our permit essentially we're level funding this we just increased it to be a round number of 250,000 um we will hope that the the infiltration inflow II repairs we're doing will start helping reducing the flows we're seeing at our our um treatment plant which would help help reduce what we have to send to devons a great item here the sludge removal is going down 125,000 so last January we installed a gravity belt thickener gbt I remember yeah so what it does it thickens the sludge in our um in our uh waste waterer so we used to have like like 1% sludge um within a water mixture now it's up to three or four or 5% so what that does is reduces hauling reduces Trucking costs um and and saved us a lot of money on our Sledge removal so so we've reduce those funds here out funing request um Dan back to the Devon Services is there ever a world where we never need that flow um I do not see it the only World we'd have is if we if the town were to do a capital upgrade and increase the capacity of our existing plant and that'd be a major cost I'd imagine a cost benefit analysis it wouldn't be a good idea that's why we are going to Devon so so right now the town is already at its 80% design flow for our for our treatment plant the air treatment plant so when you reach that point you have to have a plan or another option for additional Capac City according to DP regulations so devons is we've connected to devans for that okay I assume they now have plenty of uh available in inlit whatever inflow de yeah um right they'll take as much as we want to give them kind of thing um we we have an agreement with them and the reserve capacity we have is the maximum daily flow we can send is 350,000 gallons a day so there's a limit they would likely accommodate us if we were in a pinch but um but that's our maximum daily but there's also part of that agreement we have to send them a minimum amount a minimum amount each day to you know as part of that so um be that's how it kind of works okay question y something I want to uh propose raising taxes or spend more money but um we still have you know building in town and building will continue in town um and we will use more water and devans will likely continue to grow and you know if they're going to turn um Pittsburgh square into housing as an example is is this truly a viable long-term solution the you know cuz I'd imagine a quar of a million dollars I don't know how much a new treatment plant would cost obviously a lot but I mean that's a that over a decade that's 2 and2 million at the current rate so yeah this I I'm just slightly concerned about the future that like you know might be something we we need to plan for yeah so currently we're in the agreement we have with devans is a 10 10year agreement and then kind of as we're approaching that we would reass reassess what we're going to do excuse me my throat's a little dry um but the 350,000 that we have with them it was based off of future projections of future growth in air of what the needs are with for the town of air so that's how we got to that number so we're kind of in good shape through 20 35ish and then we'll have to um you know reassess as we're approaching that time frame I mean those are good points and similarly with water we do um capacity projections as well um and Supply projections and address that through a master planning project or master plan I should say um I'm almost okay yeah um and actually Eric this is Kurt Dan I'm just going to sort of um follow up on um Eric's observation do we know is what is Devon's capacity you mentioned that we're operating at around 80% capacity correct for for yes what is how is do we know what devans is operating at follow um I don't I don't know those numbers what they're at now I don't I don't have those with me now but I could get back to you on it okay because I mean I mean theoretically to get back to Eric's observation if as growth continues we would if we're using devans we would hope that devans has capacity to handle extra also that right yeah yeah and I you know another thing to note too is I think about 30% of our flow is II so what that's infiltrated oh that's non-waste water getting into our pipes so as we reduce that we are actually adding capacity to our own system so we got to continue those projects too which you know the capital plan comm's been good about so it's kind of you reduce that and obviously you got to plan for for the future um no so yeah those are those are good points and good thoughts good questions oh okay so you just answered so when we're you know you have that one picture where one of the sewer pipes is leaking and there like there's water coming into that like groundwater going into the sewer pipe that's what you're talking about so we're because of that sewer pipe leaking we're paying to treat groundwater exactly so if we have good sewer the sewer pipes are that decreases the amount of water we it all comes together correct corre okay good thank you Dan this is probably beyond the scope of this conversation Dan but what is there someone looking at what happens if the air part of devans gets reabsorbed into air um I have not we have not at DPW begun looking at that I mean they are our waste water our water systems are completely separate so I I would imagine they would probably remain that way I I don't know though but um that would be I mean Robert it would probably be the Committees that are working on those items that would would start looking at that right yeah I assume that was the case I didn't know maybe maybe their water treatment plant is in the air part of town and we get two treatment [Music] plants all right it's in it's in the Shirley part oh okay regionalize it yeah okay but yeah as then just um Dan if you could just check on that what um devans is operating at as far as their capacity that would be good to know since we are using them okay good thank you but I just another final observation this the uh the sludge removal thing is uh great yeah I know was expected from the project and it's it's awesome to see that realized yeah is this going to affect Rhode Island's budget there's not many places to bring sludge so yeah that's where we bring the Sledge is cranon Rhode Island so they'll probably still be okay how yeah um now the solid waste um budget so this is an Enterprise fund as well Sol waste um this the Solid Waste division operates the air transfer station maintains the air brush dump that's over on the uh 25 Brook Street parcel way out back in the woods off of MC pearon or Fisher Road I should say I'm also maintaining the municipal closed landfill and there's two employees Forman and an operator so the budget here again wages are um increasing in accordance with the Union contract utilities also increas ining again in accordance with all the other budgets with the electric and gas set rates uh solid waste recycling removable I reduced that um the last over the last year the recycling markets are more favorable the Commodities market so we're spending less to remove our recycling um which is good and also police details I just remove that from the budget it's not required so um just some uh reductions here okay and then I won't go into all this but just some significant projects that two dpw's BN um what we did if I'm if I may uh I'm going to take a quick moment here to to sort of follow up on these um because essentially we've just looked at the three Enterprise funds water sewer and um Solid Waste SL transfer correct y okay um and uh I think Eric's or someone asked um so real quickly again it may may not have the amounts on your at your fingertips but for I think you mentioned water we took a little bit out for the Enterprise fund we took a little bit of out of Reserve fund last year correct that's correct okay however and I'm I'm going to look for Robert or we may need to get more detail we did not have to pull anything from the general fund for the water Enterprise fund no it it came from the water retained earnings okay basically water Savings Bank water savings account okay uh how about the sewer then do you you know that if did we uh yeah last year I believe we also had a a small reserve fund we did for the sewer as well and that would that came from the sewer retained earnings so you know they have their own savings account accounts basically is what I call them the retained earnings okay um and you know working with Barbara and Robert we we work with you know Financial policies and procedures to try to keep those at a healthy budget so then with the things happen you have money right so on the sewer though we did pull some from the sewer Reserve funds retained earnings but nothing from the general fund all also I'm get no okay and then I'm going to and I know the answer to this question with the transfer station we do pull some from Reserve fund and we do in the transfer Solid Waste ater prise fund we do pull some from the general fund yes I did I think I forgot to mention that on these slides so essentially the solid waste Enterprise budget is subsidized by the general fund they it's roughly $180 to $200,000 uh given the year um but as those budgets are created um there yeah there we there has been general fund money used um for the solid waste Enterprise fund um to subsidize it okay there was no Reserve fund transfers or anything last year okay good no I just I just think it's good that we get a sort of a snapshot of of how we're doing with those three and then that was just the uh um with the transfer station we do currently have the outside um firm doing a study on the transfer station correct yeah that's correct so through the rate Review Committee uh time bond is uh conducting a third party evaluation to look at the operations and finances and look at reducing costs in the solid budget terrific great thank you very much for that summary Dan question thanks good good point question um what is the solid waste indirect cost reimbursement uh reement it's 134,000 I don't know if that is for is that for our fringe benefits yeah yeah yeah yeah so that's for our fringe benefits for employees um and I don't know if there's something else bued in there I know without Barbara here she would probably have a better answer than I can provide I I believe I'm looking for Robert for confirmation I believe this is in other words the benefits for these employees are um taken care of by through the town and then these um each Enterprise fund has to reimburse to town for those costs okay so for like health insurance health insurance and and other benefits and everything like that okay for me kind of PR just for fringe benefits because the wag is only 125,000 and the benefits are more than wages so there may be something else you do I think yeah and I'm I'm going to and maybe we can make a note but I'm thinking that includes pension um any other Town cost but yeah that I'm going to make a note on that uh because I've got two notes now for Barbara actually the town accountant carry the indirect cost don't want to the indirect cost is not just the health insurance benefits it's also administrates it's a percentage of their annual budget that has to be paid out of the general appropriation okay so that indirect cost will directly go in to the general appropriation for not just health benefits but every like some of the benefits that barara does of her salary some of the benefits of um of the account position it's a percentage it's not just fringe benefits not just for those two people it's for everyone that touches it it's anything that could be it could be affili affiliated with the whole project uh the whole Enterprise fund not just Fringe of benefits go it would an analogy be sort of if I a large company I work I run a department in part of a large company when I do my Department's budget for the year I get a note from the large company's accounting department saying by the way you're responsible for x amount of general cost exctly that we provide to your department from the general from the large exactly it's an it's basically an indirect cost that we have to have a percentage that is directed to the people that approach anything to do with that Enterprise fund so it's not just the fringe benefits of insurance and so forth got it thank you does that make sense then do you have this line item on the other two Enterprise fund to I wasn't pay attention yes the line item is the solid waste indirect it's basically Revenue coming into the town and it is it's not on it's basically considered a revenue so it would not show up in your line item budget because it's Revenue that comes into the town it's a revenue source and it's basically just a it's it's balancing out the Enterprise money that is directed for it's it's kind of like a wash so you have your indirect cost and then you have your subcity that goes back in got it and Jen I'm just glancing at the budgets for the three could you see that the that the you know water at the store those two tables do they have this on here yes they do they do yeah okay sorry thank you and there actually in the ambulance fund as well it's all the Enterprise funds have an indirect cost got it great we our education continues too thank you very much Carrie okay um Dan I sort of jumped in on your presentation I apologize um any other questions out before Dan continues with significant okay keep keep us rolling here as I get as I get got us too far off track significant projects I don't think I'll get into to these um but they're you know in the packet here in the public works really we we get a lot done um I would like to to think and say says a l going on all the time so um ongoing Capital here's a list as well so you know we go through the capital planning process and and um and work on those projects those get also get factored into the water and sewer rates as well um so here's a list here I don't want to get into it to just in the interest of time um some of the other things we do we do assist other departments as well with our expertise having professional engineering here is you know especially helpful as well as our our um operators and laborers who have special licenses as well and can operate heav equipment um but for example parks department we help them with their garage office at Perimeter C currently helping them manage the playground on project management for that the senior center um the site selection committee we're supporting there uh we work well and support uh fire and police and they support us too um we also help develop GIS plans for the Departments our engineer ing Department um does uh have GIS capabilities which is great and we do support for local events some of the ones named here uh the DPW in the uh spring summer has a youth Works program I guess it's a summer program we start advertising in the spring so that'll come up again this year and get some um students on board to have their their first job and then we do attend and sometimes present that as you seen the photo here I had a presentation at industry Society event this was New Year this past January on on Race water presentation and that's it so I thank you and you have any more questions we can um Dan just could you just maybe just on the ongoing Capital page did you touch on can just hit uh I guess main did did you cover that page or mhm um I did but I kind I didn't mention any of them okay so I guess I guess well I guess the big thing is is the West Main Street bridge is our biggest I think Capital um project that's outstanding right now not outstanding is in the works right is the West Main Street bridge I'm just looking at you okay and then the biggy okay all right so that's that's the big thing and that that's all been covered through the last few years and everything so that's ongoing and then and then is there anything else beside on here that's um let's see and I think that's I don't know anything else you have questions on but yeah these are some of the ongoing this was as of last I think November I can't see my screen okay yeah November yeah so these are the big ones West Main bridge to I gave it update to the select board at their Tuesday meeting um but just in short the bid current bid schedule is to get it bid in May so then we'll start construction this uh this construction season but it's a very complex project with the utilities involved yeah okay all right so um any other qu questions for Dan from the group here no thank you very much Dan thank you all right thank you very much Dan um I just in the interest of public comment is there any other public comment while Dan we have Dan I have a comment sarahah oh yes Sarah yes um I just want to say that well first I want to say I saw the capital presentation from the DPW in November and it it was informative when they went to the capital planning committee on the other question I just wanted to ask both the retained earnings versus um I'm sorry just just give me just a second uh what's the difference between retained earnings and Reserve funds when you're talking across the water topic okay um that's my last question thanks yeah thanks SAR through you Mr chair um yes retained earnings so basically those are the the savings that we have in our water um in our water account so I want to say we have around 3 or 4 million Maybe more I don't have the number in front of me in the water account so if we're going through a fiscal year say right now March 2024 I'm projecting my water budget and I realize uhoh we're going to end up spending more money than we budgeted for so what we would have to do is is go for a reserve fund transfer at town meeting this spring so this is hypothetical um and so that's what a reserve fund transfer is so you basically transfer funds from the retained earnings um Mid fiscal year to add more funds into your budget so that you don't deficit spend I'm gone thank you oh sorry well if you want to meet another town I can probably show you Sarah just let me know oh no no no thank you I'm just having trouble with my audio but I I heard you thank you okay okay uh any other question uh Pauline I I think I'm un muted um thank you Kurt couple of questions for Dan um as I watched your presentation the orc chart shows that the Selectmen have oversight over the transfer station ultimately is that am I correct in understanding that that is correct they are my well Robert's boss too y well I knew that but want to ask it that way okay thank you for that and you know where I'm going with that so I'll leave it up leave that alone um the tree Warden is he is he still on a stipend I believe he's a DPW employee now um a good question there Robert I maybe even I don't know very might know how that is set up if it's cuz we don't have a specific contract like we do with the DW Union yeah Mr chair members of the so up until 2018 the tree Warden was an elected position of the town uh through town meeting uh there were some changes made to some aspects of the form of the government one of them was that passed by town meeting that the tree Warden became appointed so um Mr Dixon was the elected free Warden after that change he was retained as the appointed um tree Warden and he works um in the DPW and reports to the DPW director um he is not covered under the collective bargaining agreement for the DPW so he's sort of a unique employee in that sense he is part of the DPW but not under the con under the DPW contract and I wouldn't say a DPW employee like the others in that sense but he reports to the to the director thank you thank you Robert okay um sorry Dan I'm not going to bring this up right now but I would like to talk to you about what Robert just said that Mark is not covered under the collective marketing agreement so we'll let just leave that later okay okay because he should be covered if he's an employee of the town so let me move off to who is the woodlon cemetery superintended this is tonight was the first time I heard that phrase yeah so the cemetery superintendent it's a temporary position at DPW he's the the current position holder was with the previous uh Cemetery company so you know using his knowledge and and and um and his you know abilities it was great to have him on board to help us get started with with um you know maintaining the the um Cemetary so that's what that is for so he's just a temporary employee there's you know not a lot of work he has that's why the wages aren't very high but fair enough but I think I think that should be a little clearer for others who may not have the same questions I have um I have two more questions and I'm struggling because I can't see in the dark very well um I want to talk with you Dan about the crosswalk study that I brought up last year during the budget cycle I purposely left you to do what you needed to do because you were doing a study and we were going to find out what what crosswalks in town needed to be flashing signs versus the signs you put up on Central ad I will say I thank you very much those signs have made a difference but I still have to wait a number of times for cars to pass that's okay you know what I'm used to it it's okay but what about not why are we not funding in your budget the flashing crossw signs that are clearly going to save people's lives so based on the criteria Matt the town engineer and myself along with our consultant did look at this and I think there are approximately nine locations that meet the criteria of which eight of them have a project Associated to them in the future and one of them is on the state highway so we have to work with them to get it done so at this time it doesn't seem appropriate to put in any funding specifically for an RFB since we have the projects kind of lined up with them okay okay let's just hope nobody is hurt and your last item Pauline CT thank you I said let's just hope nobody is hurt okay now you mentioned you had what happened in gron a couple of years ago you mentioned you had two more items one I I assume number one was the crosswalks and so then that that's it yes thank you okay I appreciate it very good evening good thank you Paulie so okay um just a quick um sum summation uh Dan on your presentation uh one thank you very much for your time and the detail on that um I did make a note that um we are going to follow up um with Barbara on The Debt interest and principal splits that we see under sewer and water um and then also um on Devon's uh sewer [Music] capacity yeah okay got it all right I any other questions from our group for Dan or nope okay thank you very much Dan for your time um uh appreciate that and uh the finance committee will now move on to the next item in the agenda uh which is the uh FY 2025 budget process update um I'm just going to real quick touch on I gave everyone a calendar at our last meeting and the next item for for the finance committee is next Tuesday excuse me Wednesday March 27th at 6 p.m. we are having the joint uh meeting with the select board um on the 2 FY 2025 P public budget Forum that's easy for me to say so um just um uh as a remember uh that we should U uh be there um the next thing will be that Friday the March 29th the warrant uh will be sent out by email for us to review and then on Tuesday April 2nd at 6 PM we have a joint meeting with the select board where we will review the warrants and approve those okay and then um just for our uh purposes uh April 4th and April 16th we are uh set up uh uh excuse me April 4th and April 18th Thursday at 6 PM will be our regular finance committee meetings and I um uh Andrew had a great suggestion is that April 2nd we will pretty much be done with the warrant for uh 2025 and we can uh our meetings in April 4th and April 18th start to look for forward um make well two things make sure we're ready for the town meeting on April 22nd and then start looking forward to uh 2026 is budget and how we should start looking at that any questions or on that no okay um outside committee updates um I think those are uh Robert we with the rate review was pretty much finished at the select board meeting on um last two days ago when they approved the rate review um the buy board uh we had our meeting and that came up with some funding what were the rates te do you remember the rate increases two and 5% two and 2% water and 5% sewer every time um the buy board um and this was also um covered in the select board meeting on tues uh pre Tuesday two days ago was uh uh some funding for the 71 uh Sandy Pond Road and for a u the health insurance um and so there's details in the select uh board meeting minutes and um so that's for our outside committees uh schedule next meeting I think i' sort covered that M got to our schedule for the rest of the year um and then that brings us do we have any other questions for from the group here and I also open for public comment on any other items nothing for me I'm good okay in that case do I have a motion what you do today kurk okay I I make a motion to adjourn the meeting at 7 11:22 p.m. seconded okay all those in favor I I I Jin I I very good the meeting is adjourned thank you very much and thank you everyone for attending