##VIDEO ID:Jgf54pNZx1M## for a few minutes okay good evening and welcome to the November 12 202 meeting of the eow Town Council I'll call order and ask that we stand for the pledge of allegiance alance to the of the United States of America and to the Republic for it stands one nation under God indivisible with li and justice for all and I would ask that we take a brief moment of silence considering it was Veterans Day thinking about everyone thank you in accordance with Mass General law this meeting is being recorded by C and if there's anyone in the audience recording if you could identify yourself seeing none public comments Genie I don't believe we have anyone signed up no is there anyone in the audience that would like to make a public comment seeing none Council comments is there any counselor that would like to make a comment Town manager report hi Tom hi good evening reezon right through um good evening everyone uh so we're going to start uh by thanking our town clerk jeie quagi uh and her staff and all the election workers uh for another uh perfect perfectly run election um and how many this year five uh over well the November vote and then so five and 12 months so uh obviously we show up and we do our thing and we go home and seems like a well-oiled machine but it is however a lot of work goes on behind the scenes to make that look so easy uh so thank Youk you uh Jackie I see you thank you um really the whole staff all the election workers um just really uh Kudos across the board thank you so much um and then uh by the time we went to press we didn't have some uh some information or or some comment to write down but uh it it was Veterans Day uh yesterday um the thank the Council on Aging uh they had a nice dinner here for veterans uh Friday night um raise some money for the veterans memorial um and then obviously um post 293 uh American Legion had their ceremony at Town Hall was very well attended uh a lot of uh counselors were there as well uh representative Ash a representative from J C's office um so uh it been stated many times over the weekend but um it's it's very important that we remember the the the sacrifice and the freedoms that we have all because of our um our our veterans and um and their families so uh thank you once again to our service men and women uh we've got the uh the last uh five reports here for the weeks beginning September 30th through November 1st uh for the new High School uh a lot has happened in five weeks it's very exciting uh there's major progress over there um from administr side the uh School building committee sent the 90% design submission to msba at our last meeting um and tentatively we have a groundbreaking ceremony scheduled Friday November 22nd at 9: uh they're still working out some of those details with msba so uh I'll update that uh everyone when I can um we completed the uh order of taking on 382 North Main Street Friday October 11th 2024 um so uh I I attached the order obviously you all signed after the meeting on the 8th um we we're working through all the logistics and um scheduling and uh haven't Dove too deep into we obviously have a lot of opportunity here and uh uh a lot of options for for how to utilize our space as the leases come off the rent roll um so uh I I think uh the sentiment was and hasn't changed that uh this is a sort of a historic thing for our town um and so again I thank you all for for supporting it uh I think uh it's going to be a wonderful asset for for the town for for many generations to come um shortly after I emailed you on the 11th uh about the good news about 382 North Main Street uh we received notification from uh the office of economic development that our One-Stop uh Grant was approved in the amount of 1. n75 million uh to upgrade the Chestnut Street water pump station um uh Felix our water and Felix vashan our water and sewer administrator and uh Deputy Town manager Rebecca Lei uh took a trip out the Wier to accept the did you guys get a big check did you did they give you the big one big I like the big check um there was a ceremony uh held by Governor Hy and lieutenant governor Driscoll um so thanks to everybody who put that uh application together obviously um grants are great there're a lot of work and they're even nicer when we get them um so thank you everybody at DPW um and anybody that had a hand in and helping to fill that out um we also received a $21,000 Grant thereabouts and change from the Department of energy resources green communities division um we had a qualifying $160,000 allotment that uh required a project be submitted that was that met all the qualifications in order to get that amount of money which we did Rebeca um worked with DPW to get that application in and we received the addition 21,000 to finish the project at the DPW service building uh weatherizing and um some HVAC kind of things it's probably one of our least efficient buildings obviously one of our older buildings but um so that's an exciting project and again thanks to Rebecca and public works for for all the work to to to get that project essentially paid for with with grant money so um Thursday evening here at the COA uh we welcomed uh Chuck morone uh founder of strong towns to give a presentation and promote his book escaping the housing trap the strong Town's response to the housing crisis um the event was very well attended we had plenty of food for everyone I'm I think people showed up for the presentation and not necessarily the food but it's always nice to have food um uh a lot of our local officials there um wilam had Representatives West Springfield and we had visitors from as far north as Greenfield and as far east as Worcester I realized I wrote West there we'll have to change that uh so the videos on elcat um well Jaime's done an excellent job almost anything you could want to know that's happened uh is on elcat uh what' you say including the the fire department uh skills competition at the open house or whatever um so that video is also on elcat um very very informative if if you weren't there I I recommend you you kind of give it a look in terms of the history of housing from say the Great Depression until now uh and and some there were some interesting I took away a handful of things that I really didn't I thought I knew and I I think they were either clarified or sort of dis proven um it's it's quite the uh it's quite the uh it was quite the presentation so um thanks Rebecca for setting that up uh and persuading Chuck to come and speak to us we appreciate that um I attended a groundbreaking ceremony at the new West Parish Water Treatment Plant in Westfield um middle of October um the Springfield Water and Sewer Commission which is our water service provider um is up creting their facility uh to serve Springfield and the surrounding communities uh we heard remarks from Senator Ed Mary Congressman Neil mayor Sarno uh EPA uh Deputy regional administrator Karen Maguire and masty EP commissioner Bonnie hyp um so this this facility um is state-of-the-art and sort of will ensure that we have clean drinking water for for many generations to come um we have a new officer in the police department Sabrina G uh Chief Williams uh our HR Director audre Staples and I attend in her graduation ceremony uh October 17th uh Sabrina graduated with distinction and won the staff instructors award uh in recognition of her outstanding leadership um congrats to Sabrina and welcome aboard um we also have a newly appointed firefighter EMT Craig presnell um Craig graduated from Mass uh firefighting Academy's career recruit firefighter training program in October uh Craig also re received accommodation as he was the recipient of the prestigious Richard and bangs award for outstanding performance in academics and skills um so congrats to Craig uh and and welcome as well um the town uh recently joined forces with Tom Pine Communications um to audit our communication techniques um I think I've been beating the drum since I've been sitting here and probably before that um I think one of our biggest complaints is always communication and how we get our information to the community um so Tom is sort of auditing our processes and systems to see how we can uh get our message out to the community uh even better or a little better or however you want to say it uh better I guess would be the operative word um we're just trying to uh reach more people more often um and let them know what we're doing so Tom's gathering information from our department heads um employees and the public um there is a um survey link on the town's website right now also our Facebook page and we're trying to set up some areas where where we'll have some posters and stuff there's a QR code and a link um and we really uh again like everything else um want as much Community impact or uh input as we um can get so that this finished product serves the most people um so uh upcoming events we have uh the meat detectives here Friday November 15 6 to 8 um Pizza I heard there's Pizza um and uh so that's a joint event with Long Meadow um just kind of talking about uh sort of preventative things crimes of opportunity and what you can do to sort of sort of protect yourself from that sort of thing um and then again like I said the groundbreaking at elhs sort of still to to be determined but it seems like it will be uh Friday November 22nd at 9: at the high school um and I'm free to answer or any questions uh but that's all I got for tonight thank you anyone have any questions through the chair CR um so first off the One-Stop Grant is absolutely amazing at 1.9 million um I know we were hopeful to get it um but realistically we didn't expect to at least I didn't expect to I think that's fantastic and much needed um as we're all aware we um tend to on a quarterly basis get uh notices from our water department um which goes right into the West Parish facility y so from what I understand the complete overhaul up there is to try and benefit all the towns so that um maybe we won't be getting those in the future that is correct um which brings me to my last thing that I've heard recently um I heard that the state is requiring us to test the water as it comes into the pump station before we do our treatment correct so in essence we're sending out these notices to people that we have these contaminations and all um but I haven't ever seen in there that hey the water's already been treated and chances are it's already been taken care of um yeah so the law is pretty clear that uh regardless of the um circumstances if the numbers are the numbers it has to be reported that's it so when it comes in the numbers are higher but we do treat PR correct right and so the the I don't want to get into the whole science of the whole thing of course but um that is the case we've asked numerous times to move that testing station okay right on the downstream side of the treatment plant uh to no avail um this is how it is that's why I'm bringing it up I'm hoping that the public would realize um or that some people actually hear this conversation and understand that um the test happens as the water comes in then we treat it then the water goes out right so there's a high probability that those contaminants are a lot lower going to the household than what the numbers are showing right and because we are working on it and we are treating the water so right and will continue to do so um and yes this hopefully this uh this project which is like I said state-of-the-art multi multi-million dollar project uh to filter that water and and um get it to the communities without such a high volatility of haa fives and you know I don't I don't know all the acronyms off hand but neither do I that's why I didn't use any but yeah like I said I was surprised um I thought those numbers were actually what was going into our residents houses no yeah come to find out it it's not it's a it's an average and then it's a running average so if if an average of the water that we're receiv but if you fill one quarter report you can have three quarters good in a row you still have to report because you've the aggregate is still failed I would guess if we did it Downstream after we've treated numbers would probably be uh quite a bit different without any empirical data I would say that you're probably correct um and and I guess I should say to your first point uh a lot of credit I think goes to the council we we put up a considerable amount of money to design that pump station in order to get the grant so thank you uh for for that sort of that foresight to say this is worth the investment and it paid off so you as a followup um the 1.9 million is that are those fund sufficient to do the whole the entire we had uh laid out the difference in capital it's already appropriated great any other questions for Tom all right thank you have communications correspondence first one is the November 5th 2024 state election update from our town fol hey um I'll read numbers first so there was 71 % turnout um for voters which I was surprised at 2020 we had 80% in 2020 was before even the by mail ballots and that was like a trend throughout the state that most towns and cities were 5 to 10% lower than 2020 so um Harrison Waltz got 481 votes Trump and Vance 4753 votes so that was close um the senator race Warren got 4579 and Deon got 518 so this it was close races and all the other results are on the website if you want to look at them we had 12 days of early voting uh two weeks excluding Sunday so Monday through Saturday on two weeks and the total there was 2,287 voters like 16% of the population voted early in person it was steady yeah steady every day the heaviest day was the last last day which was on a Friday where 300 votes came in so um that was pretty good number of vote by mail ballots requested was over 6,000 6200 people requested V by mail ballots and everyone had to be recorded right Jackie and everyone had to be labeled in mail twice right Jackie so of those 6200 sent out we got back 2,900 which is the trend we get back half of what is requested um so the vote by ballots 2900 plus the number of early in person 2700 So about 5700 were early ballots of all those votes so 5,700 early ballots plus a little over 4,000 election day so again the trend continues we get more early ballots and people walking through the door even though it was a steady steady day um it went pretty well we had a few people come in that tried to vote again um I dealt with one of them came in and he said you know one of the checkin people got me and so it was early in the day and and I had him check in and the poll pad said early ballot received which means I said SS like you requested an early ballot yes and it looks as though we've recorded as accepted well yes I said well you can't vote again well can I see my ballot and there was 5,700 ballots sitting on a team I had put together Jackie and Cindy um ran this team all day that opened and and checked ballots but luckily hours and days and weeks have been spent sorting those ballots every day so we bring them out of the Vault every day we we get in hundreds by the mail and we sorted them by precent by Street alphabetically so I was able to go in there and find his ballot and I answered some questions for him and he was happy but we had a few people doing that even in early iners voting they'd come in and vote and then the next week they'd come back and we tell them you can't vote just to I guess they're just testing the system but the vot day went pretty good um busy busy so we're still not done the election was the 5ifth we had until the eth which was that Friday to accept vote by mail ballots as long as they were post marked by the 5ifth we did get Dropbox ballots but we had to record everyone reject them because they received too late and then send each voter a letter that was re rejected and that's why we have until the 15th which is a Friday by 5 to count the overseas ballots which has to be done in an open Board of regist meeting so the following Monday I have a meeting scheduled at 9: to count those BS there's maybe what 15 20 25 25 so we'll count those then we have till the 20th to certify and then we'll be done so it's a long process it started this process started while we're still in the September throws the September election so we'll have a break generally the rule is every um even year we just have the local elections odd odd the numbers yeah so again I say every time I'm just so grateful for the support of the council Town manager my staff election workers we really work well together um because it's a long day we left the office at midnight the uh we're tallying till 11 o'clock at the at the gym because all those all those early ballots had to be checked in and fed in the machines that day so when the polls closed at 8 we're still in there till 9: processing the ballots yeah but we knew it' be a long night so um it's over now so so thank you for your support everybody thank you thank I would also just Echo Tom's sentiment from earlier that thank you to you and Jackie and of course the entire staff because you're welcome goes into all of that right next uh we have the update on the town council's planning matters subcommittee thank you Connor um just for the record since we have some people in the audience and are viewing public um the planning matters subcommittee is a subset of the Town Council and our responsibility is to review and advise the council any planning board material that comes before the council for future action so that's our goal whether it be zoning bylaws it's usually zoning bylaws we will review them um advise the council based on what we work we did and see what the council does with it um the planning matter subcommittee met last Thursday November the 7th um the purpose of that meeting was to review a bylaw that's before us it's the title of the bylaw is commercial Penal and the The Proposal suggests that this use be permitted only in the industrial Zone um there was discussion back and forth there is a recommendation that we're going to make and you have to wait until December 10th before we give it because the second reading of the bylaw proposal will be at our next meeting on December 10th I'm excited with our new committee I am happy to be working with with Diane Bishop assessing director Ryan Quimby informational technology director Anna Jones Town Council vice president I almost called you president and Ken Hancock who's a member at large so um I think it'll be a good year whatever we have to tackle thank you thank you Marilyn and uh next one was the citizens legislative seminar update so back at the end of October the last week there was a two-day seminar that I was invited to by our state senator Jake Ola um and that's essentially where I think our class size this year was 44 people so 44 people from across the Commonwealth went to the state house for two days to learn a bit behind the scenes of how the legislative process works as a whole but also how the Senate does does their work to kind of demystify the the process and see some of the inner workings and of course see the State Building all the different rooms and aspects of that so it was pretty informative and similar to what Tom mentioned about one of the other topics you know you think you know a lot of things but then there are things that are different than you expected them to be than how the local government operates as well that was it there I do have two other uh communication additions one is just a repeat from our last meeting so the stuffing the pantry 5K uh letter that we got that is happening on Thanksgiving Thursday November 28th at 8: am and then I also met today with uh Tom Pine for the communications audit so he had previously I think he's still finishing it up but met with the town department heads but to represent the council I met with him today to go through the survey and provide any feedback so I'm sure we'll hear more about that as the process continues you all right public hearings it is now 6:26 so we can start our hearing on the proposed zoning bylaw amendments for ground mounted volcanic installations for a second let so this one is a public hearing for a required second reading for the proposed Zone bylaw amendments for ground mounted photo volt installations council members from left to right are Jim Len uh Marilyn Richards Kathy Hill myself Conor OA Anna Jones Ralph paage and John torsa I will ask the clerk to read the legal notice into the record the East SL Meadow Town Council will hold a public hearing on November 12 2024 at 6:15 p.m. in the media room of the Council on Aging located at 328 North Main Street for the purpose of addressing proposed amendments to the town of East Meadow zoning bylaw article 10 round mounted pH photovoltaic installations these amendments would add the definition of a quote parking canopy and quote installation and add text to the definition of roof mounted installations add the exemption of smallscale ground mounted solar photovoltaic installations from the site plan review requirement REM and remove medium and large scale ground mounted so photovoltaic installations from the area dimensional and density requirements the public hearing may also be attended via Zoom webinar for the council G AR quag town court cler of the council thank you Genie at this time we can read the bylaw into the record for the second time so to start uh we received a memo from uh Rob waill the director of planning from on October 18th uh regarding the recommendation of bylaw Amendment so at the October 15th 2024 meeting of the easto planning board the board reviewed the proposed bylaw amendments to the town of EA Meadow zoning bylaw article 10 ground mounted photovoltaic installations the board voted unanimously to recommend that the Town Council review and adopt the Amendments as present text in blue indicates language to be included while red striketh through indicates language to be deleted the advertised public Hearing in the board's discussion on this vote is duly noted in the minutes and the recording of their October 15 2024 meeting it is asked that a public hearing before the appropriate Committees of the Town Council be scheduled on this matter respectfully submitted Robert Rella director of planning so through the chair sure um this was a bylaw that originally came forward um very limited and when we did the first reading on it um we were asked to uh send it back to the planning board because there was additional items and all that uh wanted to be added into this which um have been added into it which is great um but typically after the first reading we would have sent it to the planning matter subcommittee you so I would ask that we continue the public hearing at this time so that we can send it to the planning matter subcommittee and then do a reading at our next meeting um after the planning matter subcommittee's reviewed it I'm in agreement with continuing it so that it can be reviewed by the planning matter subcommittee but I think we still have to read it as the second reading tonight do we not no actually typically after the first reading is when the planning matter subcommittee reviews it so that way there they can make any additional recommendations on changes lot of this information new yeah right but we did you look directly under 45010 point2 in it highlighted that the removal of this section is subject of another zoning public hearing before the Town Council which it isn't because we've combined public hearings together to just this one because they added multiple things to this I mean I have no problems with it being read um but my thought would be it would have to be read again at the next I may oh I'm sorry a lot of the information hasn't been read so how can you call it a second reading because it was the additional information that came after the first reading which had minimal changes and then we heard there more were coming so we waited appropriately however um it's you know this I I look at half the stuff and it's not a second reading it's a first so however you want to handle it but yeah I mean the way I see it it it's still a continuation of the same initial process on this bylaw and the original proposal although there's different changes that have happened since so I see that it's still a second reading and we don't necessarily have to read it again at the next one if we're doing the second reading tonight I'll just continue make a this the first reading and the second reading was for the benefit of the people that's what the charter carved out that in the event these folks were not here and then missed the first or the second reading however then they didn't have a chance to weigh in on the potential changes um it doesn't hurt to read anything twice but to say this is the second reading I think is inaccurate for what we're dealing with unless you want to deal with the few pieces that we dealt with previously but this should be a first I just not to muddy the water too much but assumedly there could be a whole Myriad of other comments from planning matters which would sort of create a third reading at the next one right if if if you revise this again uh to the point where there's a lot of information that's not here now that then all of a sudden you have a whole other document which um you know I don't know I I'm not sure how it's always been done but um again the point being it doesn't hurt to read it however you probably would have to read it again if it changed a bunch does that does that make sense I mean I I thought we had done this before where the first reading as long as the topic didn't change even if the second reading was wildly different than the first reading it was still the second reading I thought that's how we had done it in the past but again that sort of your prerogative or how you see or how you interpret what these changes are I agree with that either way it's a long it's a lot of it's a lot of I'd prefer to do it once I think Rebecca wanta oh Rebecca sure I just want to add I do believe two separate orders so one was strictly for the planning board notification of uh small scale electrical hookups to be considered that went through the planning board process and then that came back to council I believe that was tabled so that you could take up this other item about the photovoltaic installations at the same time so you may be doing a second reading on one but a first reading on the other exctly thank you Rebecca it's a hybrid it's a 1.5 also want to point out that the um utility notification the way that's formatted being removed how that amendment was proposed as well could he can table we can't yeah Rob come up in the back um you so uh nice to meet you all Rob Billa director of planning um so the way that the utility notification part is formatted here is how it's going to be presented in the bylaw just gone so there's not really any discrepancies between those two public hearings per se and it wouldn't do any harm to combine both because they pertain to the same section so so C the chair sure um I think we didn't do a public hearing on the utility one I believe the planning board did but it came to us for a first reading yeah and this is the first public hearing we've held on this so my thought is this one document encompasses everything yeah does and also the changes in this document are what's going to go into the bylaw so even if the section here is crossed off anyways that's still going to go into the bylaw during this public hearing process so even though we've opened a public hearing um it would be my suggestion you do this as a first reading read this send it to planning matter subcommittee when it comes back uh in December read it again and that way there everything's C yeah that works for me I suggest Anna does the [Laughter] reading all right here it goes I was joking if you want to do it great fine I suggest you can do it okay so we are going to correct R I think and read the the as well or just we only have to read the the blue and the red yeah but we don't have to read the higher thing Genie yeah I would suggest if there's a section with no changes you would say no changes in this section then go on to no changes in the next section because the last three pages there's no changes who's counting I want to point out there's a lot of sections where I added the word and parking canopy I noticed that so you could just keep using that as a as a reference if you wanted to just to save your time so okay so Brown mounted volic installations we have 450 10 um -10.1 purpose no changes uh section a uh section B no changes then we have subsection 450-1201 ction B we are adding and parking canopy um SE section c is I'm sorry what oh sorry look at me okay so this is a whole new section so roof mounted solar photov voltaic installations are exempt from the site plan review requirement such installations shall be designated in a manner as to not create significant ific reflection and or glare to the street and public right away section D small scale ground mounted solar photov voltaic installations are exempt from the site plan review requirement that's the new section um and must adhere to the following design and operation standards okay so then we are getting rid of all of section uh number one of section D correct yes okay section two no changes I'm sorry number two of section D no changes number three of section D no changes now we are at subsection 4 50-10 point1 on number four no changes uh number five accessory use if installed we are getting rid of in a residential district and we're adding on the same parcel as an existing residential dwelling is that enough do I need to keep going no that's fine right okay all right subsection 450 10-3 definitions um we are adding parking canopy oh hold on yep you're right no I just gotta get down here I don't have a printed copy that was okay uh parking canopy uh solar photo voltaic installation is a solar photo voltaic installation that is mounted to a parking canopy structure which is more than 7 I'm sorry 972 ft in footprint and covering at least six parking spaces okay okay we are now down to roof mounted solar photov voltaic installation I think I need to name all the uh definition that okay okay so roof mounted solar photo voltaic and theate oh boy right maybe I need that as I lost it it's gone it's gone okay so a solar photo voltan system that is structurally mounted to the roof we are adding solid roof and not an on material of a we're getting rid of structure and then we're adding building which includes residential dwellings commercial buildings and garages roof mounted solar photov voltaic installations do not include solar voltaic installations mounted to parking canopies or similar struct uh structures okay we are down to zoning enforcement Authority The Building Commissioner and we are adding or his designate is charged with enforcing all zoning by laws of okay subsection 450 10.4 no change subsection 10 uh 450 10.5 compliance with laws bylaws and regulations we are adding and parking canopy I think we're adding that to the next one two three four sections that's good great yeah we could just say we're adding that to 10.5 10. 10.6 10.7 fees 10.8 site plan review okay is that okay subsection 450 10.9 ples and maths no changes for a B or C or D the for the whole subsection y okay then we are subsection 4510.111 we're getting rid of A and B for the area dimensional and density requirements um in C we are adding and parking canopy um section one of c 2 and three of C no changes section D and no changes e one no changes E2 adding in parking canopy um three of e for all other ground mounted solar photo voltaic installations the height would be limited to your changing it from 25 to 20 ft okay subsection 450 10.12 section A we're adding and parking canopy section B no changes subsection 450 10.13 just adding and parking canopy um subsection 450 10.14 like any changes for the whole subsection correct yeah right yes subsection 45115 no changes section 45016 no changes section 10.7 no changes that's it and that's it R then simple enough it now an opportunity for the public they have any comments they' like to make see no one in the public no one online Jamie no okay we'll close the public question this and any questions ORS from the council I just have if I may through the chair ask um rob a question hi hi um I'm sure you're aware that we're going to be as a town reviewing the entire zoning bylaw after the first of the year is there a reason why this is happening now so as the opportunity to bring this section into compliance because there was already another section that was going through the public hearing process um which was the utility ification for small scale freestanding structures um the playing board I pitched this idea to them to update the rest of the bylaw where it need work they seem okay with it that's why I moveed forward with it um even though there is that overhauling change to the byw coming up for 2025 I I don't see any harm in updating the language now because we can use this even if the bylaws updated again after the fact and one thing that's probably be add to this section anyways is battery storage which don't currently have in this byw but you're starting to see that pretty much in every other locality throughout the state so if anything that's probably be the biggest change coming up in 2025 is the addition of battery storage thank you makes sense yep I think Rebecca has right oh Rebecca I just also want to add sorry foring  the room but I just wanted to add that um we had an applicant come forward trying to make sense of the bylaw in the spring they wanted to a medium scale installation they couldn't figure out which rules applied because they were in the way that it was written and so this item is before you because of trying to sort through bylaw because this applicant was having trouble moving forward thank you is there a motion I make a motion to continue the public hearing for the proposed zoning bylaw amendments for ground mounted photovoltaic installation to December 10 2024 at 6:15 p.m. second motion's been made and seconded is there any further discussion okay in favor please say I I any opposed motion passes to of the day we have no licensing matters financial matters we have a tax classification hearing to determine thanks Rob thank you rob the percentages of tax levy for fiscal year 2025 hi guys hello we just having one reading um that's true uh Martin Gruden chairman Board of assessor with d am Bishop the director of sessing uh we're back here again to uh class tax classification hearing and uh just to start off with the general stuff uh values five and a half perc uh some will see that their values went up six or seven but residential went up five and a half percent and we base our values on MLS arms length sales no family sales no non-armed link sales no estate sales so it did we do use MLS sales um and our average values for uh the assessment went from 372 691 to 3929 so we went up about $20,000 and we're seeing beginning of the year we still see rising and kind of soften uh last month or two we look at the ASR assessment sales ratio and we had man into 70% last year and the year before we're and that was to 80s now we're seeing 90s so the market might have softened a little bit and we had we didn't have much New Growth but we have a couple subdivisions so next year plan on more new growth for 24 and 25 we have three subdivisions being erected right now I hand it off to Diane hello so I also want to um acknowledge we have two board members we have Marilyn gini and Hayden Smith in the audience and we also have our assistant assessor Kenne wiel who put a lot of input into this presentation also um this year is probably one of the first years we do not have to have a newspaper legal notice publication because the Department of Revenue has started changing the way that we have to advertise so my first thing I want everyone to aware of is it has been advertised on our town website and this presentation that we have right now is on our front the town website if anyone wants to look at it as we're um discussing this or just to look at it a little bit later so the purpose of this hearing is to um determine the percentage of tax levy to be borne by each class of real and personal property for fiscal year 25 and if we go on to the next screen and I don't know if I if Jamie caught up with me but thankfully Jamie knows how I'm not good at sharing my [Laughter] screening that I always start to say that we have not set a tax rate we believe the tax rate that's in this presentation is what will be approved but once the Department of Revenue reviews all of our information if they find anything it could change a penny or two here or there so this um meeting is not to determine what our tax rate will be approved at but if the Town Council would like to have a factor of one or a split tax rate uh and they do have two other options and that would be if they would like to consider adopting a residential or a small commercial exemption so I'm going to skip right on to the fiscal year 25 tax rate calculation and you will see that we always start off with the prior fiscal year as our basis to start our new one and fiscal 24 our tax levy was 51 m3700 757 and our tax rate was $18.54 per thousand uh by law we're allowed to add 2 and a half% to our um last year's tax levy a lot of people remember that prop two and a half comes into effect but they do not realize that prop two and a half is two and a half% over last year's Levy it's not 2 and a half% that their taxes can't be raised raised each and every year so that question comes up a lot and we also are able to add in new growth and our new growth came in at uh5 51,3 59 so outside of the levy limit we are able to add any debt exclusions and we still have our school modules that we are paying debt on but this year which is new we are starting some of our high school construction debt and our Natatorium construction debt so this year our total Deb exclusion that we can add to our Levy is 1, 12,820 9 uh I do want people to be aware that our fiscal 25 real and personal property approved assessment came in at 2 bli 846 N9 098 700 sorry those commas started tripping me up there so if we move on to the next screen and to the summary of tax rates this is really the key part of when we get into this allocation of taxes so you will see three columns or three major columns within subsections and so you can see in the tax Factor under residential and the next one is CPI which stands for commercial industrial and personal property if the town decided to have a a factor of one or one tax rate for all types of property it is projected that our tax rate would be $18.48 per thousand Town Council could vote to uh change this factor from a factor of one as much as a factor of 1.5 so if we were to shift the full tax burden to the commercial industrial and personal property the residential property could possibly drop down to $16.67 the commercial industrial and personal property could go as high as $27.72 so when we look at the average single family homes uh we have as Marty just mentioned $392,900 with an average commercial industrial property at 9593 if we were to shift to the tax um the tax burden to the commercial and Industrial properties it their tax bill could increase on that average assessed value 8,800 $64 where a single family tax bill could potentially go down $711 so I do bring this to everyone's attention because do also notice the Residential Properties are the largest class of property in our community and our commercial industrial and personal property are the smallest grouping and so when we do shift the taxes it really affects smaller um grouping that they have a much bigger impact on taxes and the larger group and gets a much lesser decrease um we were actually reviewing the total tax increase if our tax rate was $18.48 and for that average single family home of $392,900 it looks to be an increase of $353 per household for a fiscal year and we did mention that the school debt and the natatorium is adding a additional amount and we've calculated just that portion to be $133 of that 350 to so we typically saw the average increase that we normally would see and then because of the school debt um we're seeing that additional but I think that people were well aware as we went to vote that we would be seeing some additional taxes based on um getting our new high school and Auditorium uh the next page is just a historical perspective uh from 2ou fiscal 2019 straight through to uh fiscal 25 you can see that we've been pretty consistent in our Residential Properties in comparison to our commercial industrial and personal property uh it's been anywhere between 82 to 84% for residential and 16 to 18% for the CPI the next screen will show us the neighboring towns and uh I usually use the same communities because they are similar to our and we fall number three out of the six when it comes to our annual um single family tax bill uh we are looking at Long Meadow being the highest and L low being the lowest but you can see that we kind of fall right smack dab in the middle that's basically the allocation of tax part so I want to an opportunity if anyone has a question before I jump into the residential and the small commercial exemption do anyone have any questions or comments okay so we're gon to move into the residential exemption and we have discussed this in past years that you do have the ability to adopt a residential exemption it doesn't change the total amount of taxes that the residential uh group would pay it just reallocates within that group people will pay a higher tax rate if you have rental properties or higher end homes if you have owner occupied and you have smaller less value you will see a reduction in tax uh we could vote anywhere between 5% to 30 5% this type of um exemption is really used in municipalities that have high rental properties and I do show that there are um in fiscal 24 the communities that adopted it were all outside of the Boston area and along the cape on the cape and along the cape area because that's where people are getting rentals fees and so they can afford their taxes more than an owner occupied um person and it is true that some properties would receive tax relief by adopting this but the tax levy Remains the Same and it's only Shifting the burden um East Long Meadow taxpayers most likely would not see a benefit if this was adopted and then jumping into exemptions again this is another um adoption that the Town Council could um certainly do uh the value has to be less than $1 million for a commercial property and that property has to be um solely occupied by a business or businesses that have no more than 10 people that the um Division of Unemployment could certify sadly this list is really not always up to dat so there is a lot of room for um errors and omissions we have done our best to determine that there are approximately 36 properties within our community out of the 396 that may qualify um but due to having multi- tenants and additional verification being needed it's really hard to to determine it again all you're doing is you're shifting commercial value amongst commercial and Industrial properties so if you reduce the the value of 24 properties the remaining commercial and Industrial properties will be picking up the additional tax burden um it does not benefit the small business that has that those 10 people it does benefit the owner of the business and again to show how many communities who have adopted this in the past in fiscal 24 there are only 14 communities out of 351 who have adopted it and I'm not sure if that is um if East Long Meadow really wants to be shifting their commercial and Industrial taxes to save a couple of people and putting the burden to others that's what I have if I have any questions I can answer do any counselors have any questions this is also an opportunity for members of the public any comments or questions that they'd like to provide I don't see anyone in the audience is there anyone online no okay so there's no more public input for portion so this time I'll entertain a motion I make the motion to approve that the town of East Long Meadow adopt for the fiscal year 2025 tax rate a factor of one a single tax rate with no residential or small commercial exemptions second that been made and seconded is there any further discussion seeing none all those in favor please say I I any opposed motion passes thank you for ending and providing the presentation I'm wondering if I could just take two more minutes of your time sure talk so I know that I'm I'm sure that everyone is aware that um Governor Healey uh voted in the heroes act in August and the hero's Act was to help our um veterans with exemptions to get an additional amount of a veteran exemption um I have been in conversation with our veterans agent Jason and he is also looking to see that the town um look to increase our exemptions so I'm not bringing this forward today but the reason I'm bringing this forward is budgeting season is going to be coming up the heroes act if we vote it in and it is a local option option will take place in fiscal 26 and I want it to be on the Forefront of your mind that if we do move in that direction we are going to have to fund an additional amount in the overlay account which is the account that funds all of our exemptions um I have done a quick calculation that you could do anywhere between 1% to 100% and if we were to do a full percent because we don't know where we're going to um you know balance out that and I do have the total we would need approximately um an additional $128,000 in our overlay so it's something that I will be coming back before the Town Council to discuss to see the direction they want to go but I know that budgeting season is like starting immediately and so as we're starting to put things into different buckets this is something that we may seriously want to consider okay great I I have a question through approximately how many veterans take advantage of the exemption so at the present at the present time we have um 135 veterans um we that would receive this type of an exemption we also have um what they call a clause 22d which is a spouse of a veteran who has passed due to a service connected or a disease or injury and those are full exemptions that's not included in this number but if somebody's is already getting 100% Exempted there won't be any additional need to raise anymore but it is for the veterans that are getting the Clauses that we have one that's 400 we have one that's a, and that could go anywhere between 500 750 800 uh the th000 could go as high as 2,000 so I just want to make sure that whatever the town may vote in the future we're we're able to fund it because it is a local option and as we all know local options is funded by the town and not by the commonw thank you the chair sir so that um overlay account um the 128,000 goes into it that's what um we're projecting it wouldn't go above 128,000 that would be additional but doesn't mean that we are definitely using all of that we just or do we use all of it we we use that more uh so our overlay account that we budget is for exemptions which is blind senior and Veterans it is for our senior workof program and it is for any abatements at the town for Real Estate or personal property and I know that we've been being very conservative due to the change in I think it was the 2016 the modern the municipal modernization act they allowed us to now instead of having one fiscal Year's overlay and then the next one we can combine it all into one bucket so because we've had some excess we haven't been raising as much but eventually that excess is going to be depleted right so but again it it's just to please keep in mind because I know the veterans agent and um the board of assessors we would like to be able to see if we can accommodate a little bit more of an exemption dollar amount and it will require additional budgeting okay thank you all for your time and uh thank you for your vote and we're going to get our tax recap turned in tomorrow and hopefully we'll be approved shortly thanks Marty next under financial matters we have reallocating remaining funds uh for fy4 Capital plan police Cruis uh for 9,447 7 to the fy2 capital plan controls placement is that's something you chief chief you wantan to compad your [Laughter] case oh no is lot of commotion there oh good evening evening uh so this request uh is to bring last year's Capital into this year's Capital um what I'm planning on doing with this money if it's approved is buying in a a an additional modem and tablet not additional a modem and tablet for the new Cruiser that's being bought with this fiscal year um that money would normally come out of the it budget so I'm just looking at this as a way since it's still left over from last year and fits it's the same type of project as going on this year I figured I could save the IT department that money and that that would cover most of the that would cover all the purchase for for the modem and the tablet would leave about $ thousand dollar left over is there any questions Ralph I have questions so I'm assuming when the cruiser um was allocated and you requested it that the original tablet was just going to be transferred from the cruiser to the N yes is there a problem with the tablet is the tablet outdated does it not like it no there's not a problem with it um what I'm wanting to do is this would allow me to have a seventh marked Cruiser Frontline Cruiser um right now we have six and we're finding that six available Mark cars is just puts a real strain on the use that we have so if I can get an additional modem and tablet uh this will allow me to have a seventh Cruiser fully upfitted uh for Frontline use which I think will help with overall usage and when we experience long delays and repairs and body work and whatever else keeps a cruiser down so so typically when a new Cruiser comes in one comes out correct typically yeah and so is that what's going on with the marked Cruisers right now I mean I'm I'm just wondering otherwise if you buy a new modem you have one from this Cruiser that's no longer being used now you have two and we're just hoping that when we get the next Cruiser that it's going to go in yeah well it'll allow me to have basically a a seventh setup available so I can keep rather than maybe putting another transferring to another new car I can keep hopefully a a usable car that maybe has a little bit of useful life left in it uh available and fully equipped because typically when we push when a new Cruiser comes in and we push an old Cruiser down to just be like a backup car we strip the computers and that type of stuff out of it so this would allow basically another car to be available okay and just a followup um so typically it wants control over all the purchasing of all your computer stuff yeah um I thought what we were doing under our plan was to put everything into it so that it would come out of its's budget so we have better tracking of sus spending on the modems and all um instead of basically taking from the police and moving and then you really leav track of what you're spending it on I mean I'm not against the new modem or anything but my thought would be that this money goes back to free cash if it doesn't have it in their budget for the modem then we allocate from free cash to it through it so that we still keep control of where it's coming from I I think the original purchase and the upfit is in the price of the capital right so the software and all that still runs through it but when the when the cruiser is uh uh purchase for Capital it's the cruiser plus the upfit that's all in that price so the original purchase is with police or fire or DPW and all the back cost is with it you know what I'm saying so the this is basically an extra unit because we have one that would normally be transferred over and you're looking for an additional so wouldn't that be through it I mean I guess but it would be upfitting a vehicle because you're not down you've already down fitted a vehicle and now you're just upfitting again instead of transferring of the cycle of the fleet instead of transferring that out of the vehicle you're buying another one sort of like buying another computer it goes through it I don't think the computer and the modem gets bought through it when they upfit a vehicle I don't know I don't know it gets it typically gets transferred from a different car when we buy new it typically handles the purchase but we did consult with it to get the quote for the one you know what should we buy which model is the one you're recommending so what we have quoted to spend on is the recommendation from it so if you don't mind through the chair we have our Guru in the audience um as I know whenever the police vehicles are purchased through the capital plan the upfitting is included in that amount I I I don't know why there's 9,000 left over from the prior year but because and and I know like in previous years that everybody started increasing their quotes because it took so long to get vehicles and then the vehicles came in and then they were so expensive they needed more money but now the prices are coming back down so they have a little bit of money left over from the previous years so I think the thought was that he would use that extra money to upfit the um the fiscal 25 purchase um but I I don't I guess I don't understand I understand what you're asking whereas if if the plan was to just move it from a different vehicle now you're using the extra money to buy an additional one and I think he wants to take the opportunity to rather than moving that one leave it in the other car that they can get as much use out of that car as possible and then upfit the new one I think that's what's yes thank you and and we and we I'm foreseeing kind of a a upcoming challenge here too uh not just that we're kind of fully staffed now and um the cars are getting more use but another challenge I see coming is that because of covid delays and um delivery delays on vehicles we had two basically two years of capital purchases the vehicles all arrived within a very short time frame so unfortunately what is normally kind of a natural cycle of typically one to two Mark cars a year and they kind of age I won't say gracefully but they age the way age in a cycle we we right now have a glutton of like 2022 Ford Explorers and the they're going to age together and I can see a Time coming when um that that natural Cycle's uh in it yeah so that's another reason why I kind of I'm just kind of trying to get ahead of what I see as a challenge coming with that too so just to make it clear this is not an additional vehicle we're not buying an extra vehicle that we don't have we allowing an existing vehicle to remain in service longer if this is approved that's I just want to be clear to the everybody so when you upfit a vehicle it will include the modem computer everything so if we approve let's say next year's Capital it's already in there that it's going to be getting a modem in a computer part of the upit i' I'd have to look at the Cote again but I believe it's part of the it's that's consider that that's quoted to be a transfer of existing equipment for next year for the capital that I just submitted but I'd have to look at it again to see so if there's no need for a new modem we just transfer what we have yeah so this is just interrupting that transfer process and adding a new one to add a new vehicle to the fleet essentially and the leftover money to explain why that's there it's probably because because of price rapid price changes uh with supply chain issues and stuff we have been at in capital requests in the last couple years I have been asking for a little bit extra to adjust or you always do that for unknown price changes or you assume a piece of equipment's going to transfer and all of a sudden they tell you nope this won't fit Ford redesign the the vehicle just won't this this cage won't fit anymore now you have to buy a new cage so there's always this push bumper won't fit there's always little things like that that happens that you have to account for so I think we've had a a couple of good years where we didn't have to dip into that that excess or at least last year we didn't that buffer covered us well so I think that's where that that money is from so needing another vehicle on the road um I know you requested and were approved for a pickup truck uh the pickup truck was not supposed to be a continuous marked vehicle um you know in daily use it was basically an extra vehicle right that one include an upfit with a modem and everything that that will not have a computer in it no even if it's put into the the daily uh it's I have no plans to put that in Daily Patrol use that's that'll be just I'm thinking that you're basically having a difficult time right now with the extra uh employees and all that I mean a new truck coming just seems to make sense that they're going to want to drive that every day well that's not their choice I have a quick question obviously I have no problem with you know the purchase and all that but I have a quick question about I'm a little confused so at first you guys said that the upfit is included in the price then you said most of the times the modems are transferred so they usually not upfit with the modems the trans go ahead so we say upfit what we mean is that's basically putting everything making a car a police car lights cage radio you know all that stuff so sometimes we have to buy new radios that's another reason why I've added the capital request to last couple years to add get new radios some years we don't need to like this coming year I believe I think we're going to be able to transfer existing radios um so sometimes you're buying new equipment for that upfit sometimes you're just transferring okay a car that's going out of service so usually the transfer still has a c cost there's a cost Associated yeah Gotta Move It you're having an installer deal with it so okay typically we haven't had to um in fact it just I think in the this year's Capital or last year's Capital they just bought us all new tablets and modems so for the existing cars that we have so so in terms of that technology that's actually you know we're doing well in that um so um so the the ones we have now should should yeah they should all last another Cruiser or two I hope be able to and those all went through the it budget yes which was my point exactly so I think the point so it should go through it is what I'm saying which again I think it's more of an accounting aspect um rather than rolling Capital over to Capital whatever's left in capital which has been normal gets returned back to preash and then if need something we allocate the money for it um that was my that was my whole thing in a nutshell so and and and not that I'm against it no I I understand just a process more it's just another right and and and you're right if that's the way we do it and that's more comfortable then let it roll the free cash and then move the money from it it still has to get re the money has to get reappropriated so to speak because it's only it was right over the last three or four fiscal years has had an excess that they've returned I don't know if they'll have it again this year I think the only consider got a question I can see a comment but of the department as a whole not as general expenses because they technically needed a transfer but no I don't understand what you're saying well and then we run into our other new thing which is appropriating money immediately for non budgeted items which this would be so we wouldn't wait to see if we don't need to appropriate money we would want to put it in right away and again just from an accounting standpoint we try to make it all happen at the same time so either we roll it back and move it by Vote or we just vote to reappropriate it it still has to move and but I see your point because we did make a big deal last year during the budget process about it doing it things right so if that's the case then this can roll back and we'll just have to do another vote for right do the chair gu ask a question Chief in regards to your equipment when you're going for a cruiser and everything that that entails it it's a capital expense yes it's a package deal for the most part yes start talking about tablets going to the school department talking about individual tablets that cost a couple hundred bucks it might be packed up together you purchase 100 computers at once when you're dealing with a police cruiser you're you're dealing with a capital budget and you're saying hey all in expense cage lights computer we need 40 grand for a new Cruiser I wish to be yes but but this is essentially this came down it's left over you're being I think some foresight into what your Department's needs are you're putting an extra cruiser out there hopefully you know the new Cruiser you're buying extends the life of some of those I mean I don't see a real big problem with it no but even in terms of the process it's it's the cost was allocated for a capital expense and he's asking to take Capital dollars and it's still and again your tablets in t i I would what I would guess is they're specialized they're expensive yes they are not like you're buying a a$1 th000 Macbook or it's about an $8,000 tablet and the modem together it's $8,000 it's still pretty much a capital expense am I correct on that or not quite it doesn't quite reach the level we're at 20,000 or 25 yeah but it's still but it's of as part of the cruiser like you said the capital request wasn't just for a cruiser it was for the upfit so so it is part of the capital request that's my point it's all capital requests which would be outside of it to begin with and I think In fairness I've seen it having been on the capital committee for the last hand years that we've actually done it all three ways so it's not just been that we've put everything through it we have done it where if you were asking for a new vehicle and it wasn't exactly replacing one out of the fleet that wouldn't come out of the at budget when we funded it through Capital it would come out of just that total lump sum that we allocated for that Capital project so we haven't exactly moved everything to to it I think think we have no but I'm saying I think that was the whole process and that was there was a coned effort to to do that that's why he purchased all new modems for the Cruisers and all we didn't say heyy when you get a new Cruiser we'll replace that one knowing that tried to do it on a three-year two vehicles two and two so um so the modems though that was a capital request from it as well right yes yeah so I mean I see what you're getting at and and most of our most of our concentration was on that software line line item specifically because the the the tangible things the capital things weren't as uh nuanced as the software and that's why we wanted trying to have his hands on all the software not necessarily the capital expenditure I suppose is is sort of the difference there so if I may from an accounting standpoint Kim does it make a difference to you it doesn't really to me I mean the money has been appropriated from free cash it was for the purchase of a vehicle with upfit he's asking to transfer the 9400 to a vehicle this year to cover that additional um modem so I mean I don't see an issue with it if you return it back to free cash then he's just going to have to go to Ryan and see if he can spend some of his money in his budget to to help him with it so it's either way the money's been appropriated it's just determining what we're going to do with it return it back um or just use it to to do the fiscal 25 purchase and tracking of costs and all as far as for modems computers Hardware um I'm assuming it keeps track of all of that so that way there we have a general idea okay okay any other discussion fa a motion make a motion to reallocate the remaining funds in account 342001 for FY 24 Capital plan fleece Cruisers in the amount of 9,477 to account 3422 07 for fy2 Capital plan Patrol vehicle replacement second motion's been made in second it is there any further discussion seeing none all those in favor please say I I any opposed motion passes thank you Chief thank you thank you Chief thanks chief chief thank you I'll be hanging around next up we have a transfer of $1,188 uh from full-time salary wages to plan zoning and conservation full-time salary wages to cover 40% so the afor mentioned uh salary moves and making those um votes official immediately this uh money was all appropriated but uh at some point at the beginning of this year we realized that um after a retirement and before filling a slot we realize that uh the the building department clerk uh there was not a quote unquote enough work or traffic because of open gov coming online and all the permiting stuff being done online so uh and we realized that planning had uh a lot more um minutes and meetings and right planning has zoning board concom and and uh planning board and so we separated the building clerk into 40% planning 60% building so this is basically this position was 100% uh appropriated to the building department and now we're just moving the salary 40% to planning and 60% will remain in building so that uh so that the numbers work when we go look at the budget again like like our conversation from last year so no new money uh no new positions just two departments paying for the same person got it right and it's full-time position it is so when we get the budget it shows one full-time position but it's split between two correct okay yeah yeah I know that's annoying but we have the salary worksheets now that show everybody that's in every department and so that's a little easier now but yeah you'll it'll look like 1.6 people and 1.4 people that's what it's going to look like yeah right is there a motion I make a motion to approve the transfer of $1,188 from account 012 411 5110 building full-time salary wages to account 01751 5110 planning zoning conservation full-time salary wages to cover 40% salary second motions been made and seconded is there any further discussion seeing none all those in favor please say I I I any opposed thank you right so next up we can listed as a bunch of different agenda items but financial matters B4 through uh B7 are essentially all the same topic that we can here so at one of our I guess the the first step of the process was at our last meeting when we had finalized The Taking of 38 main street we had already previously had the funding of $3.3 million to finish that acquisition but when it comes to actually doing the financing aspect of it we had a few options as far as that so we have remaining arpa funds which I think as we all know we had deadlines that we have to appropriate the funds and then the deadline to actually spend the funds but of course those two deadlines don't line up so if we appropriated it but didn't spend it we're potentially leaving money on the table and that doesn't seem like a good use to not spend every penny that we got we previously at a different meeting um we had the point-to-point van for the Council on Aging for $445,000 that we released of arpa and so that's no longer allocated had that remainder $1,000 $42 for the Ford R we allocated and then we have other projects that we previously committed to funds totaling $783,000 33 for ongoing projects so the total arpa funds that we have remaining to to spend before we lose them $836 2895 so I think the idea here was of the 3.3 million for 382 North Main Street we could relinquish the existing commitment for those projects that we previously committed to the arpa funds along with the amount that we already deallocated to give us um the 836 th000 or so to take off of the 3.3 million and then if we add an additional $500,000 42 from free cash the total amount that we would actually have to finance would be 1,963 7 $110 so I think that's the brief explanation if Tom or Kim want to well let me fumble it around first and then Kim can can bring it home um she'll correct every once yeah right um so the big thing is is the arpa piece here obviously um you know like for instance we just moved the money into the MLP um it seems weird that we're now moving it out uh this whole arpa pie uh has caused much angst uh we have to have everything allocated by December uh of this year and spent by December of 26 which seems like plenty of time to spend except for after December of this year we can't appropriate the money anymore meaning if it's appropriate to something and we don't spend it all it's gone we have a unique opportunity where we can just bundle all the rest of it and throw it at one purchase uh one one acquisition this will uh release all that angst thankfully as well as reporting there's a huge lift uh reporting to the state spending this money and sort of um so that that'll be gone as well um and we can say we spent every single penny of our arpa money and we can be done with it right now um and the second piece um the additional 500,000 of free cash uh was sort of a happy medium between a whole host of things the AF for mentioned all the balls in the air and all the options but um we we also have a huge uh project going on that you might have heard of the high school uh we're set to borrow a bunch more money for for that to to have enough cash flow uh to to pay pay the project as it's being constructed um and we want to keep our uh we've been advised to keep our um our uh reserves greater than what they were at the end of last year um meaning it could hurt our bond rating if we were to dip below that and obviously uh borrowing somewhere in the neighborhood of aund million is not something we want to mess around with so the the rather than uh there was some talk when we first saw the free cash number which was you guessed it 3.3 which was exactly what was left on the building uh that we would just pay it off and not have a note and be done uh but that would put us too close to that Reserve number and eight months to go or seven months to go with no use of free cash or any of our reserved and just hoping the budget makes it which uh would not be great we we typically use quite a bit of free cash to supplement the budget throughout the year um so this is a happy medium of uh putting some of that money towards the purchase of the building to bring the purchase price down even more uh rolling this $1.9 million note into the note for the high school uh at a 10-year which first payment uh of approximately 260,000 uh will get paid for by our tenants uh with money left over to upate the building obviously um and so on and so forth as as the years go by In This Bond obviously that payment will decrease uh our rent roll will naturally increase even as we start to lose our tenants uh we will never get to a point where the tenant as the as the leases exist now the tenants will always pay for the note for this building as we set up the account for that before so that 1.9 number puts that uh Bond payment at a point where we can use the revenue from the building to pay it and no more money needs to come out of the budget did I miss anything well I mean I guess the only thing show Court I did just the one benefit of even even if we had rolled the 3.3 million into the bond it's no longer taxable there's a dominous rule that allows us to borrow put it in with the borrowing for the school so that we pay less for that borrowing so it's no longer considered taxable it will be tax exempt with the other bonds that's the only thing okay the accounting to the chair um I understand from uh Connor you made this graph graphic I did yeah that was a summarized version of the complicated one that I I get the notion of releasing the funds for those uh identified capital projects to do exactly what you just described so how then are we're not releasing the project the notion of the project we're just going to take free cash to fund those correct got it replacing sor I that I could have said that better replacing the arpa projects money with free cash okay so that those projects will still be completed but the arpa money will be gone it's just a funding source you're speaking correct so rather than using free cash to reduce the borrowing on the building we're using the free cash to fill in those arpa projects and then allocate the remaining arpa to the building so our last report can be in March and it'll be completely over with mostly like the shell game of just the buckets around BR so through the chair a couple different questions um one I understand as far as paying down the building um we had a worksheet was done up as far as what expected the cost to be and stuff like that can we just update that knowing that this will be our bonding yep and that way there we can actually see the numbers on feet absolutely and then um because we voted for a $3.3 million to bond 3.3 million do we need to uh revote to reduce that or did we vote up to 3.3 I can't remember you voted to authorize 3.3 and because we've actually banned for 3.3 you shouldn't have to resend anything when we go and just borrow the 1.9 and bond that peral I just wanted to make sure good another vote that we made sure that we took care of it um I had multiple questions I had too many I can't think um bonding um I guess the last one is more of a comment that we had our bonding um people in here when we were discussing the school and at no time did they tell us that we were going to have to keep um reserves higher than what we were in order to get the rate so it through that at all and and say they looked at us and said hey you guys are in great shape and now all of a sudden we're expected to keep more in reserves I think it's not that we're expected to keep more the concern that we had is that if we had allocated the 3.3 out of free cash which is what free cash went up and then you allocated throughout the year any money our reserves would be going down so it's not that they're say we just want to make sure that we keep our free cash at the number that it was last year which was the 7.6 million so you're really just trying to get to a point like clearly you always want to build your reserves you want to build OPB you want to build stabilization um there's interest in a capital stabilization fund you're always trying to you're always trying to build those reserves there somewhere um C sorry but you you just don't want to decrease your reserves and when you're in those meetings they ask you do you plan on using your reserves in the next year and when you say no they anticipate that your free cash isn't then going to plummet because you've used money for something that wasn't anticipated I mean isn't our free cash way above I mean what what a normal Community would have I mean there's a concern and actually I've heard it from a few different people that if we have that much in free cash it means we're over taxing our citizens well you could say that the money that's been sitting in free cash you normally would have start putting that into a stabilization fund so that you could increase the percentages in the stabilization fund because we haven't reached those limits yet so honestly and I think there might be some discussion soon where we start talking about like we might want to move some of the money out of free cash to increase those other reserves and that was sort of part of our uh initial sort of action items for this which would have been like five more things but uh after Connor and I talked before when we were talking about the agenda that's why number nine came in which was the discussion of free cast because it there is a lot and and I think it requires a pretty good discussion uh from all of us on what we think is the best where where to put all this stuff like Kim said uh you know one of the one of the things we talked about was the capital stabilization fund and do we put some more on opab and uh so I think our suggestion was to just take a bunch of this free cash and just put it in our other accounts and uh go from there and that that's sort of it's a good point and the reason we're here right we we know why we're here we've been collecting $2 million from insurance for the last four years at then the year so I mean that's eight right there right so we like to think that we've tightened that up right with with this year's budget we we we we didn't put that number in there like it's always been there so that's a great point take it another way is we're not going to have this type of uh like in like U um turn back into free cash we we are tightening up the budget which means this number is not going to jump by 3.3 every year right it's just not going to happen because more eyes are looking at the budget we're our process are getting better our policies are better and we're we're tightening up that number so our bank account here is pretty close to what we're going to be looking you know we're not hopefully not turning back three five anymore and certainly hoping we're not missing the budget so this number we got to be smart with what we want to do because there's not going to be the we're not going to we're not going to get to bring this much money in from here on out so I through the chair again sorry I do agree um I guess my point is that more than two years ago we had the same discussion hey we've got you know $6 million do sitting here what are we going to do with it and a year went by and now we're at 76 and we at 76 what are we doing with this now we're at 10 and we're having the same discussion again and I guess that's that's my main point is if we're going to move it to stabilization and all Let's do let's do it I mean three years is a long time to decide to move funds from preash to stabilization and again it's nothing person I'm just saying um no that's again that's why the discussion needs to had you know one month turns into six months turns into a year turns into three years and right I can wrot write those up for you whenever You' like that's up to the president no so again we we there there was another allocation here because of of this money and our policies and the numbers and the benchmarks we want to hit in all these accounts do we want to create this capital account how do we want to spend that how do we want to fund it uh moving forward um these are all questions that you know we have ideas um but we wanted to sort of round everybody into the conversation and and what what what was everybody else's thoughts because we certainly have plenty of projects to do uh we certainly could take whatever number uh at Capital we're looking at again and add another million dollars of free cash on to it I I mean we can we can do that we have projects ready to go um and I think somewhere in the middle there with both of those suggestions is that Capital stabilization fund and free cash in the in the capital plan uh as as long as we're not taking out that that that appropriation for capital in the general budget right as long as we're enhancing with free cash and not decreasing what we're budgeting for Capital and I do like this I think the other thing I would add is use as much ARP as we can penny that they give us the other thing I would add is um of course longterm I don't think it's any of our intention to not put some of that free cash cash to use but it's I think it is of us to not jeopardize the funding of the high school by doing a lot with it at the immediate moment but have it having it just sit there has made us a lot of money with interest rates being high so it's not like we're losing out in the interim so that has been a positive side effect of it y I mean I guess that is the other thing the money is sitting in the general fund so any Revenue that's earned off of that is going into the general fund and I think we had said there was like 900,000 um $900,000 in interest last year which went into the general fund which was part of free cash so once you start moving that money out the interest will stay wherever you put it so if you move say you move 250,000 to oped you move 250,000 to stabilization that money then sits in those funds any money that's earned and it's just going to increase those funds to try and get you to those percentages where you're trying to get to so for instance that was our sorry Kathy go ahead all right no so that we had I forgot what we we had 500,000 this was our first draft we had 500,000 to start the capital we had 250 in stabilization and 250 in OPB for another million which left us a million in free cash to sort of get through FY 25 in case anything happened without going below our our our fund balance Reserve balance from fy2 so these are the the ideas that we were talking about and um you know there's obviously a ton of options and and again I'm not just saying it I don't just keep saying it because it's one of my goals as Town manager to create a capital stab stabilization fund I promise you that if it's not a good idea because we have a conversation then let's not do it we don't have to do the goals just because we're there if that account makes sense well let's put some money into it and and get it rolling so I guess my point would be that in the course of the explanation for this agenda item we've naturally migrated to number nine which is discussion of free cash my bad no no it's kind of like a twofer here I would recommend that uh all of the last 10 minutes of discussion is is very necessary um but I would recommend that instead of uh further discussion tonight about how to what how to use prudently the the amount of free cash we have that for the next meeting or the December meeting that Kim and and Tom you know create that uh executive summary of where we could put things so we have a picture to look at versus the seven of us going home and writing down okay I think they should buy this we should put it there no I I'm trying to you know be serious about it um if you're paid and hired to look and see all those needs um we're uh elected to react to it and be prudent about how we allocate it so um I think we saved oursel item agenda item nine perfect and unfortunately giving you to a task love it Kim will have it done in the parking lot and I've got might have already I just wanna kind of mention something that is obvious but I think I just GNA mention it anyways so originally we were bonding 3.3 and now it's obviously the 1.9 and we've already taken you guys have to refresh my memory4 out of free cash for this building so I just want to make sure us as a council are okay with the extra not 1.3 being taken out because I know we're taking the we're using the arpa funds but then we have to replenish the arpa funds and we're taking out the extra 500 so I I don't want to go unnotice that to go un notice that we're actually taking out extra 1.3 free cash and just to make sure we're all on the same page with that sorry guys just so just to make sure I'm not misunderstanding this 2.4 in free cash that we spoke about and voted to yep use for that purpose is not included in this 10 point something million it was already already gone I don't want to say ESR but you know set aside for that so yeah so the ically 2.4 and 1.9 is.3 three 419 43 oh well no not doing one nine left one nine is what we're going to B gonna Bond so it'll be one three right it 700 in arpa plus the 500 right so and I think it makes sense to actually spend the arpa funds on something that we know right going 100 have to back it with the free cash so I just want to make sure we're all aware that we're spending additional free cash and we're okay with it just a quick clerical question the um so the MLP the police patrol vehicle the Birch window replacement and the DPW when when would we need to backfill those approximately so that they're not like so far off schedule would this be something immediately that would be yeah there's a vote for that yes vote for it tonight just want to CL okay that's we jammed all these agenda items together on you we're moving yeah and then of course there is the potential so we would vote on that tonight to essentially backfill them but we'd be doing this all okay yeah yeah but then in the future when those projects are done say like the police patrol vehicle that happens like similar ones that just happened that it doesn't spend the full amount then we would end up returning that not lost to the ARP of Fountain can I ask one more question sure um why are we taking the additional uh 500,000 out of free cash so that was to get the bond number to the point that we can afford to pay the bond and run the building with the rent roll so we won't have to pay for anything else right okay do the chair sure um when I first got the agenda one of my reactions to was this was this was pretty meaty yeah and the only thing i' I'd really I would just really like to see it's more like a balance sheet of what are we actually I I understand the concept of it at the the high level but just how much interest are we saving you know tax exempt versus non- tax exempt kind of like the the backstory and putting it all into context because this is kind of I mean this wasn't on my radar when I got the agenda it's kind of just thrown at me and why I'm pretty supportive of it I kind of just wondered what the the benefit to it was and obviously we SP spilled a lot of that out here but really just kind of like the numbers behind it and what it actually means to the town in terms of a cost savings measure so again and without giving you exact numbers obviously the amount that we would save from say bonding 3.3 and 1.9 is nothing compared to bonding a100 million at a a lower B rating because we spent all this free cash I get I get that I get that part but just from the general just what this says like compared to the agenda those are some decent Siz numbers yep and just like outside the school outside the high school bond ratings what that means for other projects but just like what this means from the overall just so I'm you know kind like what Kathy s here doing scribbling in the air 1.9 2.4 this carry the one here okay you left with it just be very helpful so like you know even even walking in the door here kind of knowing what we're looking at a little more in depthly than kind of doing the calculations we're doing sitting here okay so sorry uh that that I I suppose could be clear um the with all these votes uh free cash would be at 9656 and the prior year balance was 7.6 so you're we're we got $2 million overlap without impacting right and and and again uh obviously an abundance of caution because the amount of money that we're trying to borrow it was you know your bond rate could go down there there's no guarantee that they were going to be like oh you're a penny under that's it you know slash them uh but rather than even take a chance take a chance at that right this this is this is a large sum of money so I I I see your point Jim and so a little more backup data in terms of it's a good story I mean it is a good story just you know hey I just as a counselor I want know hey I'm saving that town a half a million dollars in interest payments it's it's good stuff so you know we run into people outside of these meetings we can we can tell that story just so we have just so we're armed with the facts that's what I guess I'm kind of getting okay so sh one last um you had said that if we bond this at the same time we do the school it becomes tax exempt which the bond is usually at least a half a percent more if it's taxable right yeah I so we'll be saving at least a half a percent on the 2 million dollar yes by grouping it all I can we did have that I know the spreadsheet you were talking about earlier that kind of showed what we expected the costs to be what the borrowing would be we did it at 1.8 which we're close to with 1 .9 we did it at 3.3 what that would look like um we can update that and yeah I was just thinking along with the maintenance of the building and now that we have um the leases and what the payments are and stuff like that just just an updated version of it yep no and that's and we'll have we can put that on there too because that that's all the numbers and and sort of laid out you know 20e note 10e note this much that much and and so we Just Adjust that uh to show those numbers absolutely and I apologize I was looking for it but I'm not I brought it any other questions or discussion seeing Nan motions I'll start with what B before I make a motion to appropriate uh $500,000 42 from free cash to reduce the 3.3 million borrowing for the purchase of 382 North Main Street second motion's been made and seconded any further discussion none all those in favor please say I I I any opposed please say nay all right the motion passes B5 motion I make a motion to reallocate 53,0 $42.25 from unallocated arpa American Rescue plan act funds to reduce the 3.3 million borrowing for the purchase of 382 North Main Street second motion's been made and seconded any further discussion be none all those in favor please say I I I any oppostion passes number six I make a motion to relocate the remaining 78324 7.33 in arpa American Rescue plan act funds in the following project projects to reduce the 3.3 million borrowing for the purchase of 3 to North Main Street 630- 34216 Pound manager Municipal Light and Power project 621,000 we have 34227 police patrol vehicle 27,800 um 34229 burland Park Middle School window replacement 53891938 second motion's been made and seconded any further discussion see none all those in favor please say I any opposed passes or seven make a motion to appropriate $783 24733 from free cast to replace the arpa American Rescue plan act funding used to reduce the 3.3 million borrowing for the purchase of 382 North Main Street second questions second any further destion see none all those in favor please say I I any opposed motion passes okay now we thank you then we are on to a transfer of $31,800 free cash to update the pavement Management program data Tom hi um so this was just to expedite what in all likelihood would be a capital project and uh recommended at some point for this year's budget uh which would put the scheduling into timeline out at least another few months to to get this vendor in uh so I kind of wanted to FastTrack that uh knowing uh all that's going on with our pavement Network in the next year or two or three uh I wanted to sort of re the the existing pavement Management Systems data is almost 10 years old now um which um the underlying soil and and our town has changed three times in that 10 years uh water table and such um so I just thought it was a good time to update this data uh and and get this vendor in here faster than normal uh certainly not necessary and we can talk about this in six months um as it I like I said will undoubtedly be on the capital plan um but I kind of wanted to move this and and get this vendor moving so that we can possibly get this updated this winter and um have all that new data for pavement season in the spring to Echo those sentiments I thought it was a good idea when you suggested it given that one of our goals for the town manager this year was to come up with some sort of Road Improvement program and figure out how we could better improve the the roads in town but it's hard to do that with 2016 data and knowing where to allocate funds to best through chair this data um discuss like pavement thickness and what's the base material and what what the recommendation is to improve the road or is it just hey this is the condition of the road I mean in that case for 10 grand I'll just tell you all the [Laughter] roads come on um no there is a full scientific process here uh including pavement cores um and so that's all sort of listed in the um in the material for the backup material for this the the scope of work and such uh but yeah no it's more than driving around saying this one looks worse than it did in 2006 this is going to help us when we decide going through the pavement process whether or not we can just do a light grind and a new Cod on the top or whether we have to do the whole base over or reclaim correct um yes no that this is a full new set of data to to sort of push that plan forward if you will whatever that proposed plan is for for the pavement thank you y any other questions okay is there a motion the motion to transfer $31,800 from free cash to account number 04212 d537 to update pavement Management program data second motion's been made and seconded any further discussion seeing none all those in favor please say I I opposed motion passes thank you R discuss [Laughter] recap but we will discuss it again at a few yes and we are on financial matters B10 so we have the acceptance one stop for growth Mass Works motion I uh I make a motion to accept the community One-Stop for growth Mass Works infrastructure program Grant in the amount of 1,975 for Massachusetts General Law chapter 44 section 53a second motion's been made and seconded any further discussion none all those in favor please say I I any passes 11 the acceptance of the Energy Efficiency and conservation block grant I make a motion to accept the Energy Efficiency and conservation block grant in the amount of $2,685 per Massachusetts General Law chapter 44 section 53a second motion's been made and seconded any further discussion seeing none all those in favor please say I I motion passes for 12 we the acceptance of the green community's designation Grant I make a motion to accept the green community's designation Grant in the amount of 16,170 per Massachusetts General Law chapter 44 section 53a second been made and seconded any further discussion um further discussion didn't we already do this we could I couldn't find anything so we're doing it again so I wasn't sure if we did it or if we had just talked about that's how much we were gonna get and that we had to we had and it just in my mind it sounds so familiar it was what we were qualified for right so we had right Rebecca and and DPW had to put a project in that qualified for that money before we got it so I thought we had to I went back through all the minutes you drove out to Summer with Bailey to get our plaque I mean I remember it vividly but we never took a vote to accept the money because we didn't have a project in there so under our Capital plan didn't we have a list of projects I'm pretty sure under Capital we had basically allocated money that we were getting from the green communities because what was left over was roughly $5,000 which wasn't enough for an electric for the police department I so I I think typically when when we do those votes for Capital they say contingent upon if it's if we're planning to get a grant it's just contingent upon the grant funding so it could have been there okay but if we didn't get the gr let's take the money that way there we can do the C already approved I'm good further or did we already a second there was a second y okay yep okay motion's been made and seconded any further discussion all right seeing none all those in favor please say I I any opposed appr minutes is there a motion I make a motion to approve the October 8th 2024 Open Session minutes I'll second that motion's been made in second in any further discussion all those in please say I I any opposed obain one abstention motion passes we have no old business so new business we have proposed zoning bylaw amendments for accessory dwelling units isn't slated as a first reading but more as a starting the process um so I think in the the scheme of the process we know we have that February deadline to try to meet our best before it's out at the state level uh so we have an we'll say 80% draft of the bylaw for accessory dwelling units tonight we received the copy and that could get sent to the planning board for their recommendation so that they can start the process F any public hearings as necessary and then when it returns to the council then we'll have our first reading and and then we can do our normal process Beyond there so we don't necess unless anyone has any immediate comments or feedback on it we aren't necessarily taking action other than asking the planning board to now take action on it okay it's one we're gonna have to do yeah right we're gonna need a bulaw on it so I would uh I would like to make a motion to refer the proposed zoning bylaw amendments for accessory dwelling units adus to the planning board for recommendation to the Town Council second made and seconded any further discussion seeing none all those in favor please say I I any oppos I motion passes thank you thank you for that for that ad in the paper tomorrow no probably THS hey the next uh new business item is authorizing the town manager to execute the collective bargaining agreement with the police department unit like to just provide a brief overview to yep so um it had been I geez a couple meetings ago anyway when I mentioned that things went so good and um we had a a couple of clarifications that we were making until we could figure out what the uh you know appropriation was going to additional appropriation was going to be for this year uh retro this kind of thing so uh all squired away um we didn't because of the way the agenda fell and payroll fell we don't have the exact number for appropriation which we will have next week uh but it will be between 50 and 70,000 somewhere 75 80 okay which is like 81,000 which is somewhere between 1.4 and 2.1% of the police budget that's already been allocated uh so that would be that increase the reason that there is that disparity is uh we're going to have to try to uh figure out the overtime uh and and what that we have we have the Retro sort of figured out and then we have to sort of push out uh the new rate of overtime pay across the rest of these seven months so it it's going to land in there somewhere um but that that was the outcome of our negotiation somewhere and there for an additional appropriation yeah okay go an additional appropriation on top of what we had already calculated within the budget yes contract we had basically put a percentage in there yep the only calculation that we included for police was a cola which was equal to whatever um the other units had so it didn't for call5 was cross the board this year okay but it it wouldn't have included any other changes to so there won't be any change to the Sal line item say because we've already accounted for that it'll be the other benefits that we negotiated in the contract uh the rest of the salary lineups Quinn longevity uh over time overtime I forgot what else is there's a there's there's there's more than most departments and somewhere up to 81,000 yeah I I gave you the highest number yeah he might have given the low so yeah 50 to 75 I didn't have a chance to read the entire contct I guess point being uh there may not be any need to make all that appropriation to overtime if we're just estimating what it's going to be or do we want to just whoops I guess that number was right we can backfill the overtime and may we don't we don't necessarily have to put the money in now for something that may not happen right is we're the the the identified costs is 51 yes the low number and the high number is the likely cost I'm always gonna give you the I appreciate that out of you so through the chair but there is there's funding in there and all so chances are as we come towards May that's when it'll be like hey we're going to run short because of this of course and of course there's already been an appropriation for overtime in the budget yep how much more we're going to need is is anybody's guess okay thank you yep and this was more just for awareness if we proved Tom finalizing that contract that there may be some future Financial slight implication right which is the the point of the whole thing right um it's not a contract over three years so but it's because of the implication of the the the M the money but all contracts are contingent upon the appropr appropriation funding correct so so if we don't appropriate funding there's really no contract we've had that once before well even when they go well we never seem to start early enough to have these done by July one so that we don't have to Retro it's just how it goes yeah but we're not two years behind that no yeah correct was there a motion made yet no I think that was just giving the overview of make a motion to authorize the town manager to collect the bargaining agreement with the police department Union second motion's been made and seconded any further discussion seeing none all those in favor please say I any opposed motion passes thank you thank you Tom next we have thank you Kim proposed bylaw Amendment for a bylaw Review Committee you want to be on the bylaw review commit rning all right uh so as you know when I put in our Council calendar at the beginning of the fiscal year um it's hard to believe but that time is already almost upon us that for article 9 section three of the charter we have to conduct a periodic review of the bylaws and all General bylaws of the town and so that process has to kick off sometime in 2025 but before July 1st or June 1st one of those two summer dates of July ideally given the comprehensiveness of how many bylaws there are and how much time it's going to take I'd like to get it started as soon as we could in in January um but the charter also requires that we form a bylaw for this committee to kind of govern how it operates similar to the Charter Review Committee that we previously established a bylaw for uh chapter 17 so that leads to this bylaw which I modeled just directly after chapter 177 and certainly I there will be future discussion but this at least starts the process for us so is this a bylaw just the general or is it for all our bylaws which would be General and zoning bylaws so I think I think it says for our bylaws correct so the charter says general bylaws but as I interpret it since our zoning bylaws are part of the general bylaws Encompass everything oh God and you're only giving us a year I think as we did the Charter One before if we start in January and we can change we can put whatever date we want in this bylaw but we had said for the charter that it has to be by March 15th of the following year but if we need longer we can make the bylaw longer um do do a bylaw Amendment halfway through change thew in February yeah so uh I guess since I created it I'll read this one uh chapter 178 bylaw review of 77-1 authority to establish a special bylaw Review Committee as mandated section three of the Town Charter shall be periodically established as provided below section 1772 when established report the Town Council shall establish the committee in each year ending in five and no later than July 1 of that year the committee must submit a written report to the Town Council on it before March 15 Section 1773 powers and duties the committee's charges as described in article 9 Section 3 of the charter section 1774 membership the committee shall be comprised of up to seven registered voters of the town with the following restrictions a no more than two members can be current Town councilors B members can be former Charter commission members C no more than two members can be employees of the Town D at least two members shall be persons who are not current Town counselors or town employees nor former CH members section 1775 appointment of term members term the Town Council president will appoint committee members under the authority described in Article 2 Section 3 of the charter each appointment expire as of the end of the calendar year in which the committee's report is submitted okay that's our first reading um is there any questions comment further discussion super granular but I'm just looking at that last sentence each appointment shall expire as of the end of the calendar year in which the committee's report is submitted instead of the end of the calendar year would we want to maybe just tie it to when the report is submitted because there wouldn't be anything happening after the submission of the report to the end of the calendar year there may be I so there could theoretically so we're opening that just as the possibility that after the report's submitted we may need to come back and as as a bylaw committee we might not necessarily do it but it could be possible that the council at that time decide you gave us this report but could you look into something else or what about this okay further action items all right no it's good i' I've seen in the past with other ones um they usually tie the term date to the submission report for like these special committees that you know pop up every so often so but that's that makes sense so we could tie it to the fiscal year instead of the calendar year we could there ends um June 30th because the reports due on March 15 March 15 April May June I mean 90 days after just a thought yeah is there a motion unless there's any other discussion sure I'll make a motion I make a motion to refer the pro proposed bylaw Amendment for a bylaw Review Committee per article 9 section three of the charter to the Town Council bylaw Review Committee for recommendation to the Town Council second motion's been made and seconded is there any further discussion favor please say I any opposed motion passes all right and I did schedule with um Genies we do have that slated as a uh second reading for our December 10th meeting so that should give us about a month hopefully to have that reviewed and we end up needing more time we can continue it but at least we'll have it on book and not run out of time okay action items two that I wrote down from this meeting as we were discussing was the updated version of the North Main Street financing spreadsheet some really cool stuff for Jim yes thank you anything you want and then a continued discussion on free cash which next meeting agenda looks like or have any other items Miss think it was the last meeting or curious contact with with recards no okay oh that on there please sorry I apologize that's okay don't expect to kick the bucket anytime soon we're good for a while okay down the road is that that'll be I will I will bring that up next meeting is November 26 yes the Tuesday hey action items our next meeting will be Tuesday November 26th I believe a seced any further discussion hi opposed passes and we are adjourned 822 thank you