all right so when don't we go a and get started it's uh 607 and I we have everybody uh in present so thanks everyone for joining so I'll go ahead and call the Halifax finance committee meeting to order at uh 6:07 p.m. today is Wednesday May 88th 2024 uh this meeting is being conducted remotely in recorded by area 58 in attendance from the Halifax finance committee is Michael Bennett Frank Johnston Jim Walters uh Bill Smith Cheryl Zera Burke EJ Bryan and myself Todd dargy um so first order of business as always is the acceptance of the uh meeting minutes so we actually have um two um two separate um you know minutes to approve so one was the April 22nd which I know was distributed and I think everyone said that they had a chance to review on the last meeting so I just want to reconfirm um everybody had a chance to review those no questions concerns or comments on the April 22nd minutes no right everybody good there yes okay all right and then the second um instance was the uh Monday uh April 29th minutes has everyone everyone had a chance to review those any questions comments concern on those no okay all right hearing none then I guess would somebody like to make a motion to approve the minutes of April 22nd and of April 29th uh I move for both thank you thank you Cheryl uh roll call vote Frank yes on the minutes for April 22nd and April 29th thank you Frank Jim uh yes on approval of minutes mil yes EJ yes Cheryl yes Michael yes and I am a yes as well motion carries 7even to zero all right uh so next up without further Ado is uh Mr s c league has um so graciously joined us here tonight to kind of take us through article number uh number nine which is the last remaining uh budget for the fincom to um to vote either to recommend or to not recommend so um so Jonathan will take us through the details of that and uh certainly um you know answer any questions that anyone may have so uh with that being said I guess Jonathan I'll turn it over to you if you're ready to go awesome thanks Todd yeah and I think I've told you guys just a little bit about the history with me and CPA um oh about 10 years now uh I started raising or looking into raising money for our playground for the friends of hops um and communities I spoke with would say well just use your CPA money uh and what CPA what's that so uh in investigating it um I found out that it's a state program that helps with projects similar to Hops uh but it's unfortunately we are one of the only communities in the greater area that wasn't a part of it so since that day um it was something that I was very very interested in bringing to Halifax and that's kind of how the ball started here so uh I'm going to start bear with me there I'm going to try and share my screen I don't know if that um if that'll work here do you need to give me access to this at all or no there you are we're looking at your screen you're looking at me now all right cool can you hear me now good all right y so let's go over here and this is a presentation that I'm going to be making um at the town meeting Monday so I think I told you guys if there's if there's anything that um doesn't make sense or you need more information let me know and if I can't get it to you tonight I will make sure that I uh bring it to your attention on Monday all right everybody with me yes awesome all right so uh Community preservation act essentially it is is what it is you are trying to preserve your community so uh as you can see here it's investing together in the future of Halifax what is the community preservation act um the CPA so the CPA uh allows communities to establish a fund that is specifically dedicated to these four things it's historic preservation it's open space it's Recreation and it's affordable housing so those are kind of the four I talk about buckets a lot those are kind of the four buckets um that that you you put this funding into okay so next question I guess is where does the money come from so the funds are collected as a part of an annual sear charge anywhere from one to three% uh to your local property taxes so what we're proposing here in the town of Halifax is a 1.5 % sear charge for the average Halifax resident the average assessed home value that is about $84 a year um what we're going to do to try to soften the blow for some folks we're going to include three exemptions uh that help with kind of offsetting things for folks that need it first of all everybody in Halifax will get a $100,000 uh decrease off their assessed property value and I can show you in the next slide what that means well also have uh exemptions for um qualified owners that are lowincome housing as well as lowincome to moderate income senior housing so again the idea there try to help folks that might struggle the most with this new this new program so uh the other thing too is that if the taxpayers is receiving a regular property abatement on taxes or exemption they're going to get a pro-rated reduction in the search charge as well okay so I know that was a lot but I think this next slide might help explain it a little a little bit so we're going to do some math here so let's look at over on the left side there the sample tax bill without CPA you'll see there in column A or I guess row a your average single family home uh according to the town the average value is $91,200 per th000 so you do some quick math your tax bill for the average homeowner in Halifax $773 now let's see what it looks like if we do this CPA program so you take that $491,000 and you take off your residential exemption which is in uh row d as in dog there your 100,000 so your new assessed value instead of the 491 it drops down to 391 227 all right so your new tax basis using that 14.4 is 5,633 as the basis so 1.5% is the sear charge we're looking to set each taxpayer on average would pay about $84.50 so if we do enact this program you're not seeing a super high jump in your taxes you're going from a tax bill without CPA to $7,750 if we did do the CPA program it's $715 7.50 so I put there on the bottom line uh it's essentially breaks down to a163 a week uh for this program so any questions on that I I admit I'm not a mathematician does that make sense to everybody there Jonathan are those are those exemptions specific to Halifax or are they standard for the program so they said it per Town EJ um and actually I'm GNA write that down I want to they have certain uh loow income levels and Senior income levels per town and that's something that I should include in the uh in the presentation so I will look and have that for Monday to see what are you asking like what level they set it at as far asome well yeah and I'm and I'm and I also want to see if the I'm just what's that just a Ty as the various exceptions correct yeah one more time I'm one more time so just just is it standardized as far as what exemptions yeah so so as part of the CPA um you know this is spreading across the state I will admit that those three exemptions we're using are by far in way uh a commonality across most of the communities that do this program almost all of them uh enact those three exemptions the 100,000 for uh business the 100,000 for residential and then the um the possibility for abatement for lowincome and low to moderate El senior income so those are a pop those are those are nothing we said here in Halifax we're just kind of following the lead of the CPA program that they do in other communities yeah makes sense does that make sense yep any other questions before I go to the next Jonathan yeah so at 8450 what would the average what would the um amount received annually be for this program oh great minds think a light there Johnston hold on one second well hey hey John before you change it um I would just recommend that you change your bottom line to 23 cents a day you like that one okay yeah you want to reduce it to the ridiculous if you're gonna sell I love you know what Jim that's a fantastic idea fantastic idea y I'm GNA do that 23 cents a day so less than a quarter a day I love it okay so I'm going to go to the next one here so let's do some more math as uh J as Frank just predicted how much are we going to collect so we have roughly 28,000 tax bills in Halifax average tax bill we're pulling in about $85 per Bill even with the exemptions so our estimated available annually for investment projects is $238,000 but again the beauty of this is that does not include the state match that is just money that we ourselves in Halifax would raise for any of those projects in those four buckets all right does that make sense so far MH okay so we're going to go to the next here let's take a look at who's on board so this is a map of the state of Massachusetts um and of the 351 communities in the state 196 participate in this program that's 54% of the State uh you have cities like Boston you're down the cape in the islands you're in the south coast of Fall River you're North like peid you're out west of Springfield and Stockbridge and you're also in Central Mass uh in the Worcester area um I don't like how they did this map for some reason they put the orange they essentially mean the same thing the only reason it's orange is they're cities so it's I know the orange and the green might be a little confusing but um the only reason that they're yellow or orange whatever color that is is because they're designated it as a city that's participating so um it looks a little confusing in my opinion but um I kind of cleaned it up and I think this is the big slide that I really want to drive home with folks so I zoomed in on Southeastern Massachusetts and take a look here are our community preservation act committees um I'm sorry communities and those are the ones in green that participate in the program you could see there yellow old Halifax it's basically Us East Bridgewater Brockton and Avon and that's essentially it in this area so to me that speaks to how um popular this program is and how effective this program is that we unfortunately are are very late to this game um but yeah I I I really think this slide really sends the message uh what we've actually been missing out on here so you can see the communities I just listed a bunch there on the uh on the side there but both Silver Lake communities of Kingston and Plimpton have been doing this uh pmo uh you know almost all of our local areas here have been part of the CPA for quite some time so you know I felt it's time that we finally hopped on board here all right so again to kind of oh go ahead question um how much what percent does the state match so uh we'll get to that Jim in one second it depends on it depends on how much um money they generate so I I guess I can get it to it now so essentially every real estate transaction that happens in the state we are hit with a people are hit with a search charge and that search charge goes to the community preservation act um I think it's $50 I don't know if Cody's on he might be able to help me out but it's $50 um per deed I think um I I don't have the exact numbers on that but essentially it's the big the bigger and the busier the real estate market the more funds that are generated for this program and I will admit even though I'm a supporter the the real estate market has been a little slow lately so the money you know this year hasn't been as great as it's been in years past but that doesn't mean things could change you know so just because we the real estate market might be a little bit slower now doesn't mean things could change down the road and I I would hate to not jump in just because of a one-year situation so Jon I just had a quick question as far as us kind of being late to the game and just adopting this now as well as the neighboring towns that haven't adopted it I guess is there any reason why we haven't I guess or is just that we weren't aware of the program or was there any concerns or so we tried we tried I spoke with our Old Town Administrator we tried I want to say maybe 15 years ago um and it what was it 200 all right so not 15 17 years ago um and it just didn't unfortunately guys especially here in Halifax when folks hear a search charge and folks hear um you know a bigger you know a slightly bigger increase in their tax bill they they don't want to hear it so it didn't get any traction the last time they tried but I still think it's it's worthwhile to do to to check out so we get into reasons there okay sure thank you you guys ready for the next one let's do it all right so again to drive home the idea of how much money our communities have been taking in there's a list there on the leand side of some of our local neighbors that have been part of this program I've listed their search charge level because again each town can set it between 1 to 3% uh the next column is what the state has given for 2024 this doesn't include the money that the town itself has raised this is just State money on top of the town money that they've generated and then on the far right that is that is the amount of State money again no Town money on this slide it's all state money that these towns have pulled in since the Inception of the program so I mean as you can see uh Handover with almost $7 million uh Plimpton you know with almost 400,000 so unfortunately we've missed the boat on um a lot of it but it still doesn't mean I don't think we should jump on board so yeah wanted to share you guys with these numbers to show you helpful how much money we've we've kind of been missing out on sure oh you got a question Cheryl yeah so Jonathan the state CPA distribution since fy5 that's 20 years okay so by 20 years not a lot of money well no you know what it is Cheryl I should have included some of these some of these towns haven't been on for all 20 years some of these have only been on uh you know 10 years or 12 years and maybe I'll add that to the slide yeah I think that's an important should yeah because otherwise you divide that by 20 years that's not a lot of money right right to our tax rate that's a great that's a great point you know what I I'll figure out a way to redo that some of these towns haven't been on all 20 years some of them have been on shorter um I know Kingston ah I wish I remembered but they they no way has Kingston been on for 20 years so um some of them have been a little bit late to the game like us so they haven't been on for all 20 but I just wanted to include and maybe I can just take the fiscal year 05 off and just say State CPA distribution sense Inception or something like that you know so I would just drop the column entirely it would just be it's a point of confusion yeah okay okay so Jonathan I I in my opinion one of the one of the important notes to this is is somehow displaying for the for the community what the state contribution has been but I you know I I think that over a 20year basis this you know it it it does seem like it works against it a little bit but is there is there a way to at least does does it average out to be at least a onetoone match year-over-year that's the question we don't know that um help me explain that AG I'm so so that so for instance if you take uh Bridgewater yeah right their state contrib their contribution for fy2 24 is 18666 right yep did the state contribution and FY 24 is that going to at least match that 18666 or is it coming in less than that no no EJ that's that's the money that the state has given the town yeah so I think the question is the opposite way I guess how much has Bridge Water contributed to receive that 186 correct correct so in the early years of this they were giving a much higher percentage too because there were less towns who were were doing it so they brought in the money and then they were giving a higher percentage to each of the towns so the has actually gone down year after year but yeah it would I don't know what percentage we're at this year so in last year's number they're still working on this year's number last year's number I believe was 21% so whatever money we raised as a town the state would match 21% if it was last year so to sy's point the towns that got in early on this program made out like Gang Busters because there weren't a lot of towns and they made a lot of money but to sy's point the pie is being cut in more slices now because a lot more towns are jumping onto the program but it's still I would argue let's say worst case scenario let's say we're 15% you're still I don't know too many uh Financial programs where you're making 15% on your dollar right so worst case scenario I don't want to put out 15 as like you know who knows maybe maybe it's even less I'm not even sure um you know the state's still working on the number but I would again argue that you know 15 20% of of money we put away for projects that we're going to need to do without any sort of you know State ties or or fine print I think is still a worthy thing to do good interest so do we know what the average distribution rate was I guess over like say the last five years like that might be helpful just to for folks to frame it in their mind yeah hold on he sent it to me if it's like 17% or like whatever that number is because then that it could be a good estimate for just going forward as but you know you know what get too far into the weeds here um it be really confusing well you know what if you don't mind guys I know you guys have a meeting to do I'll um if you want I can Circle back to it uh either tonight before the end of your meeting or I will absolutely look at including that you know an average perc match um to kind of give you guys an idea of what it's been and what do you think the last 10 years last five years the whole five I think five is fine yeah more recent yeah it's more recent because there's more people involved so right right I I still support I still support just going with the 2024 column the more data you present the more questions you're going to get and the more unanswerable items you're going to have so just say here's what they're doing for this year here's the percentage that the towns are doing the search charge this does not include what they're getting from the residents this is State contribution only and then you're dealing with a right now in event that you don't really have to explain okay and should they work their way back to what you know what is the percentage we're gonna get from the state and it's going down every year sounds like a negative and don't want to go in that direction at all sure it's not the right message if we start talking going negative numbers but in Fair going up that's one thing but In fairness guys the the residents have a right to know The Good the Bad and the Ugly about the program right so if if I think I think the residents are entitled to understand what percentage of their dollar is going to be matched in a program like this if they're being asked to pay into it yeah that's a valid point too so on that other slot in that first slot uh can you go back a couple slides Jonathan real quick for that tell me when to stop where we had the 238 total uh where was that actually right here right here yeah so so then could we add it maybe into here say like uh based on an average only plus the expectation of maybe like uh whatever the dollar equivalent would be for the like percentage over the last five years that way they can see like okay this is what you guys are going to contribute as a town and then this is what we can kind of reasonably expect the the state to uh to give us as well right that way they have a view of the the full picture as to what this fund's gonna comprise of right Y no it makes sense I I just get a Time tiny bit nervous of me you know I I guess we could do with the average I wouldn't be comfortable trying to forecast what the percent's going to be this year because I wouldn't I wouldn't want to be held to a number that that isn't accurate you know so I'm much more comfortable going with an average than trying to you know project what this coming year is going to be yeah and maybe just a speaking point you can say that this is just a pure guesstimate but just based on historical averages like we could expect something in this ballpark type of thing for a match I be an important thing to communicate right just so people can understand how the dollar is going to work here right so yeah yeah all right are we good to jump forward a little bit yeah yes all right we're done here all right so yes it is a new tax but it is different so the adoption of CPA would mean a small property tax increase for Hala Property Owners but there are some differences between CPA and standard taxes like your funds raised receive an additional annual state contribution we just went over that this is big here the community decides how the funds will be spent um you know that's what I love about this program as I said there's really no fine print um we as a town of Halifax can decide of those four categories where we want to spend our money so that was GNA be actually one of my questions actually if I just may um is in regards to the spending of the funds like is this going to work as a typical fund where it has to go as to town meeting as an article to use the funds or how are we gonna manage Todd d Todd Dar you hold hold that thought because it is coming yeah I would think stay tuned stay tuned here all right so so it also can be used as matching funds um that are required by many state and federal grants the funds are this is a big one too the funds are dedicated to projects that are typically underfunded or unfunded and that's a big problem here in Halifax I'll be honest we have great history here in town we we don't set aside any sort of funding for preservation at all you know I talk with our building facilities guy and it's you know John I love our old buildings but we don't we don't really put much of a priority in in keeping them you know and you'll see some of the pictures that I've taken here it's um I essentially feel like our history is crumbling around us so that that's a big part of it as well as well as some of the fields and some of the recreation areas that are in pretty rough shape so uh I'm hopeful and excited that we can get this going and then CPA facilities knowledge of and participation in commun uh proposed Community projects so in doing this the CPA will kind of help guide us a little bit um through the process so that's an asset as well next slide all right so here we go how can we adopt the CPA so the easiest way is through town meeting on Monday we vote to place the CPA on the November ballot and that's a big distinction if we vote for the CPA on Monday we are not voting to activate it it's not like we make the vote at town hall and then poof we have CPA we are voting to put it on the November ballot okay so so I would even argue even if you're a little hesitant on the program I think the Democratic reason I don't want to get on my soap box here but even if you're not a huge fan of it I think we should let the town decide you know so a yes vote at town meeting doesn't mean that it's a definite for the town of Halifax it just means that we're agreeing to put it on the November ballot and let people decide so if the article passes on Monday um we would need to form a a CPA ballot question committee um and that is if folks are interested in um you know seeing this P um we can have a committee formed and again that can't be any Town involvement because it's a ballot question um I you know we town has to have minimal involvement because as technically as a town we can't get behind um you know can't fully get behind yay or nay on on a ballot initiative um so if if residents of the Town wanted to start a ballot question committee um to try to promote this article um or this ballot question I guess um that is something we can do they would have to register that with the secretary of state to be an official ballot question committee uh on the books all right if the article does not pass on Monday you can still do a citizen's petition to get it on the ballot so let's say there are enough folks in town that are really passionate and want to see the CPA go through but for one reason or another it doesn't pass at town meeting they still have the option of um a citizen's petition and I forget how many signatures that would need to be um but they have essentially one last step even if it doesn't uh pass at town meeting but they would also need to follow the same step for the CPA ballot question committee all right sorry it's a mouthful and then uh the next bullet down there it goes to the ballot and it would be during our presidential election as I said Tuesday November 5th um if it passes then the town is on the hook to form a community preservation committee uh we would do our research see how we want to set up our community preservation committee and then that committee uh construction would be voted on on the May 2025 town meeting and they would be in charge of coming up with a community preservation plan each Community that's part of the CPA is charged with coming up with a draft with a document that kind of outlines the goals of the town and how they see CPA being used and adopted so that is something that the community preservation committee would begin to work on everybody good yep all right all right so how are the funds dispersed so we've collected our money we have our money from the town we have our money from the state so we again as I said we need to form a CPA committee um and the CPA committee is the one that takes in all the proposals for projects so any Resident in town that would like to see a project done they can submit that to our community preserv preservation act committee they collect all our proposals from our residents and they go through them and they um let me see here so all of the money we would be raising a minimum of 10% of that money has to go in the three of the categories they lump open space and Recreation together so we would have to leave 10% in historic presid cons a 10% in open space Recreation 10% in affordable housing and then that remaining 70% we can use on any project of those three or four we'd like but as a rule though we we can't empty the kers on one project we would need to leave at least 10% in each of those buckets um but then be allowed to use the 70% remaining on whatever project we like out of those buckets if that makes sense Jonathan the 10% is on an annualized basis has to be added to the um historic open space and affordable correct correct so who can be on the community preservation committee so as it stands now uh your traditionally your members on a community preservation committee is one member of your conservation committee one member of your historical commission one member of your Housing Authority one member of your Parks one member of your planning board and then up to four at large members from the community it has to be at least a five person board it can be no more than a nine-person board so the state gives us some flexibility as to how big or small within range we want to make our committee all right so how are the funds manag in dispersed well the community preservation committee that we would set up takes in all the proposals like I told you about but then once they make their recommendations it's not a final say they bring those recommendations to the town meeting and we as a town meeting vote for yay or nay on the proposed project so I don't want folks thinking you know who who gets to make this decision is it is it five people in a back room somewhere you know making the decision on how we spend the money that's not the case Halifax residents control it by bringing it to town meeting and we either vote yay or nay on what the town wants to do with our money so we could add six proposed um articles for that then or six proposed projects six proposed help help me out that you go to town meeting you could have a list of six proposed projects and in the residents get to vote on one of the six correct correct or if we have if we have enough money for two we can do two as long as we keep you know as long as we keep that 10% in those three buckets we could do one big project we could do three smaller projects we really have a lot of flexibility about how we want that money to be spent you wouldn't Frank you wouldn't typic you wouldn't bring forward projects that you could so like you wouldn't say here's five projects to pick from we only fund two of them whatever comes to town meeting would be a there would be available funding for all of them I see so the committee is the one that makes the recommendation okay let's say we re the committee receives 10 applications totaling request of a million dollars and they feel that you know they only have 500,000 to spend and they would recommend if there's five worthy projects of 500,000 they'd recommend those projects but they wouldn't recommend beyond what was available and then say okay you can only pick these ones okay thanks Cody what I have a question go ahead bill this money cannot be used to supplement the operating budget correct corre Town correct yeah can't correct that would be nice but no that is not the case the only thing you can do with it is that through CPA you can have an administrative budget that that's approved at town meeting annually and that can be used um to fund the administrator functions of the committee so if they had it uh part-time support staff that could be paid out of that administrative budget or if they were to do some sort of administrative study to do with CPA then you could use that administrative budget but you if it's not related to CPA you can't yeah it wouldn't be like an operational expense you could use it for right I I think I think the town of Bridgewater has so much CPA funding that they actually have a full-time CPA um person whose job it is is just to manage and oversee the CPA funds and projects so to Cody's Point yeah that's that you could use that for CPA related um Personnel so Jonathan I have two two quick questions um uh the first is when when is the money awarded um each year so I'm assuming it comes in at the beginning of the fiscal year to be spent at some oh that's that's a great question EJ and I got to admit I'm not sure when that Cody do you know is received I think it's November so they do a preliminary figure they basically they look at the trust they do a preliminary figure usually in November and then uh at the toward the end of the fiscal year when the State closes out they budget um they look at the trust again and if there's also legislation written in where if the state has a budget surplus part of that goes toward the CPA and then is distributed toward um the communities so you get that you get the initial amount in November get the ini initial amount do you do you mean that you just have awareness as to what that amount will be because I thought Jonathan said earlier on we still don't know what the 20 what the 24 contribution is from the state so fiscal fiscal 24's contribution was 21% okay I don't anticipated it being adjusted because you know the Market's a little slow and obviously the state budget has had some uh constraints we don't know fiscal 25 number yet I think that's what Jonathan was referring to we'll know that okay um and then my second question is um Can the funds be carried over year over-ear so if we saw a project that was maybe two years down the road that we wanted to use CPA funds for could we carry those funds for the two years or do you have to use it each fiscal year no you can you can carry over okay you can you can carry over if if if the town wants to sit tight and uh you know hey we we we don't have anything now but we'd like to hold for a bigger project you know the following year uh that's also an option as well okay okay thanks Jonathan yeah and just to be clear that's a Perpetual carryover right so if we want to hold on the funds for 10 years we can do that right there I mean I can I can double check Todd but I'm I'm I don't know if there's a maximum length we can hold on to it um but I I will double check and get back to you guys okay no you can continue carrying it over uh um you know until there's a use for it like a my previous Community you know they they had CPA and there was probably four or five years where they didn't have a housing project so they just kept putting money aside for the housing project and then a almost $2 million housing project came forward um that they allocated the funding to all right so let's get into some of the projects that we could have used uh CPA money for um obviously the big one there uh the headliner there is the Hops playground as I said it took me and our committee six years to raise enough money to rebuild our playground so that's six years of kids that didn't have a town playground there um and and if we had this CPA if this program was enacted we could have had it in a year so um that one is near and dear to my heart obviously uh walking trail if if those of you been around our walking trail it's in believe it or not it was actually in worse shape than it is now um so we used money to fix that that would could have been a CPA project we also built a GaGa ball pit um and that could have been um a CPA project as well so just projects that we're you know kind of done that we could have leaned on the state a little bit for all right so what can we do for future projects well we can help with Our Youth Athletic Field Renovations um you know as you know we have giant uh Fields here in Halifax um that are a lot of upkeep a lot of Maintenance so we can use that for um you know helping our Fields get in better shape if any of you have been to the tennis or basketball courts lately those are looking really rough um you know I try to play tennis with a friend you hit you hit that crack and there's the ball doesn't come back so um these these Pro you know that tennis whether we do CPA or not we really got to take a hard look at that but again it's a perfect prime example of um you know a project that we could really into this and and help make it a reality and then believe it or not that walking trail as much as we've worked on it as you can see there in the picture uh it's it's right back to looking really rough so uh any future you know work we wanted to do on that that is CPA eligible all right other thing for open space and Recreation uh if we wanted to um we could look at improvements over at the Halifax town beach um to kind of clean up that area make it more um you know user friendly for our residents here we could also look at land acquisition through chapter 61a we could exercise the town's right at first refusal um if there's a you know a property that we as the town would like to own um you know I know some folks get a little nervous about development here in town if we wanted to proactively look at purchasing a parcel of land well the open space uh CPA part that's essentially what that's for historic preservation so these are projects that could have qualified with CPA um we recently did repairs on the blacksmith shop that could have been a CPA project and also when we relocated the Brockton store I know that was a while ago but um that as well could have been a a project that we could have dipped into CPA funding for um Jonathan iation on these things yeah sure so on each of these projects where you're listing out that may have qualified is it is it possible to add a dollar value as to what was that what these projects actually cost the town to do sure to kind of share the like I just think it gives it more more impact yeah more teeth all right uh let me write that that that note down to project okay good idea all right and then preservation what we can actively do um again we have a lot of historic building here in Halifax um and I'll be quite Frank they're they're looking rough um I sometimes feel like our history is kind of crumbling around us so if it's something that the town wants to make a priority this is what the CPA is for uh we have some great historic buildings we have a great historic Cemetery we have a lot of history here so if we don't want to lose it we have to make it a priority in my opinion so um that I think is one of the drivers behind this program for H facts in my opinion all right affordable housing as well uh we could look at as part as part of this program so I do have to update these pictures these aren't in Halifax you caught me uh unawares here so I'm G to put some different pictures in here but um we could keep existing uh affordable units and prevent losing the market rate upon the resale but we could also rehabilitate existing vacant housing as well um you know there's a bunch of different housing elements to this program we could look into uh and I know housing can be a hot button topic here in Halifax um and I in talking to the CPA folks they will admit sometimes that of the four buckets this one is depending on the community can be the fourth bucket of the four um but at least it's an option if it's ever something we want to look into uh here in Halifax so uh we could convert vacant space into senior housing if we wanted to do that but we could also develop new units with good design and positive environmental stewardship so again whether we want to use the housing aspect of this program or not is up to the community but those are there if we'd like them uh and again Cody was gracious enough to help me here with um some future Capital plan purchases that we're looking at as as in early stages of our fiveyear Capital plan um that would be eligible you're looking at a toon Hall exterior restoration siding Gutters Etc everything that's about $750,000 uh the recreation courts as I said the basketball and Tennis Courts that's anywhere from 350 to 500 um the town needs to update a have an updated open space and Recreation plan on the books so to do that would be about $35,000 and then as I said the restoration of the blacksmith shop um that again as if any of you have been to holidays and Halifax recently it's not stable for folks to go inside um you we were able to look appear in the door but structurally it's it's not safe for folks to enter so uh if we wanted to make that possible we would have to look at doing that as well so just some of the projects there's a bunch but wanted to kind of drive home what we could use all right so basically I put this in there for the folks at town meeting what community preservation projects would you like to add you know my my homework for people talk to folks that live in communities that are part of the plan that are part of community preservation ask them you know what what's been going on in their communities and I think you'll be surprised to see how much has been done in the towns around us through this program um you know and I hope that people educate themselves my goal ideally is for this to pass Monday and then people take the time between town meeting and and November to do some homework on on the CPA program and just see how successful it's been essentially all around us so that's kind of my idea with that one uh all right so how can folks help pass the CPA if they're interested in helping pass talk to your friends and other communities as I said about their CPA projects in their towns and if you want to you can help publicize it in advance of the presidential election on November 5th and then after November uh if it does pass if folks are really interested in this consider being part of the CPA committee you know depending on how many at large positions we want to have um fill out a talent Bank form and make it known that you'd like to be on that CPA committee um to help select different projects so that's um essentially it and then I will say guys if I don't know a ton about this but the people at Community preses dog do they're fantastic and this website is awesome the information that I might not have had tonight it is absolutely on this page so if there's a little more digging that you guys want to do um by by all means have at it it's a Soup To Nuts breakdown of the program so it's really really well done if anybody has any more questions uh and I think yeah I think that's it anybody have any questions for me yeah just I have an item Jonathan and thank you for taking charge on this I think it's a great idea um and you know we're looking forward to supporting this the one thing I would just kind of mention is um you know just kind of putting myself in the uh in the seats of the of this town citizens right is like kind of going back to that except exception process I guess maybe it might not be a bad idea to add a bullet point or some details just around like what's that process entails right because sure some folks may be like yeah I support this however like I um you know qualify for an exception based on you know XYZ type of thing and them understanding what that impact is to them to uh get out of it right so I think that's important to just highlight to them I agree I I was I was debating on how number heavy I wanted to be on this presentation to Jim's Point um but you're right it probably doesn't hurt to at least have the levels of of what part of this project that the state deems as low income and as low to moderate income for senior housing that probably um you know outlining that that exemption plan is probably makes more yeah just more just more of the steps I guess too like you know what's required if somebody need to fill out a form and then this have to be approved and then who approves it and what's the timeline and you know that kind of thing just from our they are not they are not proactively Exempted it is much like for those folks that remember our trash abatements or recycling abatements um you know you have to it is a form that you do have to turn into the to town hall whether electronically or paper we haven't got that far yet okay yeah I think that would be one of the questions that I Envision people asking right to um sure what that looks like but that was that was my question I guess our suggestion I guess but um anyone else I guess on the committee have any other thoughts or questions for Jonathan all I think and this is just my opinion Jonathan but go for I would I would spend a lot of time on each slide reinforcing the point that we are not voting to tax tonight we are voting to put it on the ballot for November sure because there's a big you know it's going to be um an interesting meeting based on what we already have in the warrant and through the budget and um other areas of concern of the of the citizens um sure if we can stay away you well we can't stay away from it but if we can minimize the impact of saying this is going to cost you more money which is basically what we're saying sure um you know but that's not what we're here to vote on tonight we're here to vote on tonight to put it on the ballot for November sure yeah and that's and that's my thing Jim like it or not like it I don't see harm in putting it on a ballot right you know like to me that I don't want to say unamerican but to me let's let's give the town a chance to at least decide whether we want to do it or not I think to to stop it prematurely before it even has a chance I don't think is very fair in my opinion but yeah but uh you know goes yeah I agree with with Jim on that I think that um the more emphasis you can put on that point that this is just to get it on the ballot for everyone as a as a community to vote on it I think that's extremely important um the other the other thing is that I would mention is just kind of a I guess a formality or a um guess a little bit nitpicky but the word the mention of the word tax right is this officially a tax or is this just a like considered a contribution uh I think the word they like to use EJ is a is a search charge okay a Tex take that as you take that as you take that as you like they don't like t word they don't say the t- word at CPA it's a SE charge I don't know what you're talking about Cheryl tax Jonathan for us old people that are Onix oh you're gonna be exempt it's ax be exempt Cheryl sure no you're gonna get Exempted no I I mean the the reality of it though is if if take the Hops playground I mean think think of the amount of years that you have the committee that that you know very well about um for obvious reasons but you know the community year over year and month after month there was a fun raiser that everyone had to contribute to you know and if you have a fund like this set up that minimizes the amount of work that you have to do outside of for the for the fundraising right so there's a there's definitely a benefit and I know for everyone there were there were times where fundraisings for for an effort of that size um got to be a lot right and so this is a way for the the town to be better prepared for these types of expenses down the road so you've got to recognize that though and kind of think back to what the experience was to get the money that we needed to complete some of these projects that you mentioned in the presentation which is why I said kind of putting a dollar figure on on those on those bullets would be meaningful because it really sheds light on how much effort went into really making those things happen and I don't s that short yeah I mean the Hops playground was quarter of a million dollars $250,000 and it took us and it took us six years of 5Ks and meat Raffles and trivia nights and not if it rhymed with hops we did it we did chops for hops we did flop for hops we did a cow plop for hops you know it was exhausting so and with this program you would have had it in two years TOPS oh maybe a year a year to two years tops you know so again like I say by the time that playground was done my kids were too old to play in it you know so it's it's a true story so we want to have we want to I don't want to say want to have nice things but we want to have things that are that are represent the town of Halifax well we need to we need to make it a priority you know if uh the town wants to have a track that you can walk around in a a tennis court you can play tennis on yeah um reality is that's what that's what this is for right and there's and there's other things in the pipeline like the you know if the the pickle ball courts go into the 55 plus right we're going to have to maintain those I would assume that this is something that could fund that as well absolutely absolutely yeah that's Town owned land and it's a recreation spot absolutely so one thing to know with CPA you can't use it to maintain anything and so you can only yeah installation yeah you can't use it to maintain anything though but C's the question would it be able to be used to repair the the tennis courts if it's a full restoration yes not just annual maintenance so and that's the same with like hisor building so you can't use it to you know the annual maintenance on historic buildings but if there's a historic building that needs a full rehab full restoration then it can be utilized for that okay project driven it basic it basically goes back to they don't want you utilizing it to supplement your annual operating budget sure right sure all right any other questions for anybody all right I thank you guys for uh allowing we'll see you guys uh Monday night and uh again if you guys can think of anything in the interim between now and Monday and you have any other questions feel free to pass it along thank you so much Jonathan go get the water out of my uh my room here I don't know what the heck happen good night thank you Jonathan thank you all right so brings us to the next item on the agenda which was the vote of the Town articles so again just this last remaining one um that Jonathan just took us through which is article 9ine in the printed warrant uh so any other discussion from anyone before we move into a vote no okay uh hearing none then I guess would somebody like to make a motion to approve article 9 Jo moved thank you Michael thank you EJ uh roll call vote for Frank uh yes on article 9 thank you Frank Bill yes Jim yes Cheryl I'm a little hesitant but I will say yes just so it gets on the ballot so yes EJ yes Michael yes and I am a yes as well motion carry 7 to zero um not on that real quick okay all right great all right so that was that uh moving on then uh so the reserve fund transfer request Cody we had talked about um one potentially coming for the roof there I guess any progress or update in regards to that I think they were still trying to get a good Cote or something like that right was that the latest or uh no they run into some even more uh issues there so we're we're still evaluating it apparently the framing isn't up to code um either oh jeez so it's beyond just the uh plywood that um needs to be replaced we're talking maybe you know structure whole new structure roof structure so uh we have we've had some meetings with our engineer and Scott V Steve haward and the contractor to figure out the best um best option to move forward okay so this is going to be probably a couple weeks away then so right nothing inent I would think so yeah yeah okay all right fair enough and so we did have a couple line item requests on the uh agenda at s it specifically States Reserve fund transfer so it sounds like those line item transfers aren't urgent right we can delay those until Monday till Monday yeah is probably the best approach is because we were too specific I think in the agenda uh so Kati about this well sorry apologize one that's right I was just gonna say if you could um hold off posting them on the meeting agenda until tomorrow I have one more Department I want to talk to to make sure she's going to make it um we might need to do an line item transfer for for the election registration account so um I'll let you know early in the morning I'll send Todd you and Katie a message whether we have to add one to it okay all right yeah thank you for that and then so I think what we're going to do for going forward to is just make this I I think it's good just to have a general placeholder on the budget right because these kind of pop up and sometimes they're urgent so so it's good just to have it on there as a placeholder so but I think we just need to be more generic in our language right so um think what we can do going forward uh if everybody's agreeable to it is we'll just reframe the line item to funding transfer requests which is more generic in the sense that the funding transfer request could either be you know Reserve fund transfer or a line item right it's comprehensive of both um any questions concerns with with M forward with that approach Cody will that work do they have to list is an emergency no you know if we know about it in advance we will let uh Todd you and Katie know so we can specifically list it on the agenda like for Monday we'll want to specifically list each one um and then we'll do that in the future as long as we know about it unless it's something emergent you know that came up within the 48 Hours as long as it's you know Lineum transfers is listed that'll cover it it's broad enough to cover anything we didn't know about okay and you guys are all right with the way I did that form so rather than having you know six different ones I did it all on one form and you just have to sign that one one page is that okay yeah I think that works yeah good to me and I guess you'll bring that that copy I guess Sandy to the meeting on Monday okay so people can physically sign it while we're in person yep yeah okay what if we don't agree with one of the items on on there and it's all on one form and we're going to sign the form then we take it off we just strike through it we can strike it and initial it absolutely okay that that's acceptable yeah it's really whatever you guys vote whatever you guys vote we can amend the form if it's you know if it's a line through it it's it's you know if if there's ever a question on it you could we could refer back to the minutes or the meeting recording okay okay all right anything else in regards to that discuss no all right um so then just moving on I guess Community liaison updates I don't know anything from anyone to share how's the uh how's the town accountant search going not very good Cody um so uh it's looking like we are going to uh transition to a consultant um as of the first of the year and utilize them until we can find someone to fill the role uh in person permanently okay so the other candidate you had in mind a potential candidate is no longer a potential candidate a second person yeah we've had um two um the the um committee the applicant committee uh interview committee has we've interviewed several people and we have identified we had identified two individuals who we thought would be you know good fits for the position unfortunately um when we got into negotiations prior to kind of making it public to a meeting we weren't able to um we the board selectman didn't feel comfortable offering them what they were looking for yeah yeah we weren't able to reach an agreement okay good all right and then correspondent and as may arise um so was brought to our attention there was uh for the April 8th uh fincom meeting that was that actually never made its way uh onto YouTube there was a delay it just got posted today so uh which is was a bit of a concern just given that that meeting was um review the budget line item so um I don't know how many people the town actually you know watch our our our meetings and such but um but it was kind of like somewhat of a worst case scenario I guess that was probably the more important one to have posted if any out there so um we are going to make some changes just in the oversight of that so I don't know Cody is there is there an opportunity I guess to have area 58 I guess to confirm back as well like when things are posted yeah I'm gonna talk to area 58 I think one of the things we need to do is have them start setting up these zooms and then it's their video we're not having to send it to them they've offered to do it it's just not you know how we've done it in the past because right now what happens is we have a a town Zoom account and typically Caesar will set up the zoom or or in this case it's just a reoccurring one and then he actually has to download it and then sends it on the cloud over to area 58 then they do their editing and then they post it so I think it makes more sense for them to just host the zoom meeting and then when it's done it's you know it's theirs um so I'm going to talk to them about that okay yeah and then there's an interim or an additional check as well like I talked to Kitty about this earlier and so she'll start to um just you know validate that they've been posted and I think we'll do that in conjunction with the voting of the minutes as like a good reminder and so go to check like that next week to make sure that the video is actually posted as well and so that'll be like a nice control check and then like for the rest of us as well including myself if we can just try to be mindful and and take a peek out there to see if the videos get posted and if anybody notices one missing certainly you know raise it so we can get it addressed you know sooner than possible as soon as possible all right so I think that will be a good way to solve for that so just um fortunately was a one-off um any questions on that at all or anything comments no okay public participation is oh sorry before we move on I guess the one other thing too is I want to just make sure it's not lost because it uh was a relative L sensitive uh or is a relatively sensitive topic amongst the committee in regards to the um the Opera funds there Cody is is there been any update I guess to that as far as um a the communication of the recommendation from fincom to the selectman and then the selectman's decision on usage of the remaining Opera funds uh yes so the board uh met and discussed it yesterday I uh I did pass along the message but also uh Jim and Frank were actually at the meeting and to share the sentiments of the committee and um the selectman ended up agreeing with kind of what the committee fell and they approved the additional funding for the uh fire department gear rather than the wood chipper okay all right great thank you for the update and thank you uh Jim and Frank for uh your participation there as well um okay all right so then public participation uh there was somebody on but it looks like the person dropped so we don't have any uh public participation so I guess we can skip over that um and then next meeting planning so obviously uh you know is the town meeting on Monday 6m so we me to uh review the line items and any other uh items that come up and the maybe the minutes from this meeting as well if um if if we're able to um get the recording in in the the document um completed by Monday if not we'll just uh vote them in the following week so um all right so I think that brings us to a closure for today um would somebody like to make a motion to adjourn so I move second thank you Michael thank you Cheryl roll call vote Frank yes to ajour please uh Bill yes Jim yes to a jar EJ yes car you talking to me yes yes thank you Cheryl Michael yes and I am a yes as well uh motion carries 7 to0 uh meeting is adjourned at 7:10 p.m.