##VIDEO ID:SUym2D7xXYM## evening and welcome to tonight's meeting of the lunenberg select board today is Tuesday September 3rd please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all just as a note selectman jeffri will not be attending the meeting tonight due to work conflicts in accordance with the requirements of the open meeting law please be advised that this meeting is being recorded and broadcast live over the lunenberg public access channel on Facebook live on the public access Facebook page and will be uploaded to the lunenberg access YouTube channel after the meeting the agenda list all the topics which may be discussed at the meeting and are those reasonably anticipated by the chair votes may be taken as a result of these discussions not all items listed May in fact be discussed and other items not listed may also be brought up for discussion to the extent permitted by the meeting law we're going to begin tonight with public comments are there any public comments from the board no no seeing none are there any public comments from the public uh Logan come on up oh sorry got him first get that there cool hi um I my name is Logan oconnell uh 7-Eleven page street I'm a lifelong resident of lunberg and more recently an employee of the Town um I started as an admin assistant to the planning board back in early June so you may see me on some meetings um I've watched some recent select board meetings and uh I saw the concerns that were being noted about um the rates of employee turnover and board vacancies in the town and I just wanted to see if I could provide some insight on that from the experience of a new employee um in my opinion the biggest obstacle at the moment is accessibility of information and this isn't a shortcoming of any individual employee or any Department um everyone that I've worked with at Ritter and at Town Hall has been absolutely wonderful uh Brian uh jingis and the previous admin assistant margorie have been phenomenal in just helping me with the learning process um I'd say rather it's a common systemic issue and over the past 3 months I've noticed two consistent qualities about the town's documentation Andor standard operating procedures they're either ethereal and contained primarily as institutional knowledge of long-term staff or they're highly obfuscated and difficult to find use and understand um on point one that it's contained as long-term staff knowledge that poses a danger of information rot and I believe is Central to the problem of self-sustaining turnover um relying exclusively on the knowledge of season staff or board members guarantees that when they leave or retire there will be a large knowledge Gap and those gaps often require extensive duplication of effort to remedy uh and speaking from experience the experience of patching that knowledge Gap is stressful um that stress directly influences turnover and resignation and that causes further loss of Staff or the board memb institutional knowledge which perpetuates the cycle uh Marjorie went out of her way to make a binder of standard operating procedures for me in my position and without it I would have been completely lost in the beginning of this job um but it still doesn't compare to what an actively maintain resource built up across the span of a career with the town would be um and I don't believe that was in her job description anywhere so if that isn't in people's job descriptions in my opinion they can't really fairly be expected to um curate that type of documentation my end goal is that if I were to get hit by a bus tomorrow whoever would be taking my place wouldn't be at square one uh and on point two that the resources are often obfuscated and difficult to use in understand um the internal difficulties we have with information also affect our ability to effectively provide external information which is very important to our constituents um I came into this job without a background in municipal government or land use and I believe that that's given me a decent insight into what the public can broadly experience when interacting with the town uh members of the public don't live these situations daily and don't have a lot of the information that might be top of mind for a board member or employee on hand um so while outside parties like for example in my case developers engineering firms uh Bill Hanigan from Hanigan engineering has been very helpful for me while those outside resources May retain some of the institutional Knowledge from their continued interactions with the town uh they shouldn't be the richest source of information for an employee or member of the public to go to in my opinion um and as an aside the town pays for tools with the capabilities to address these issues such as SharePoint um but the Val of those tools is not inherent if you purchase a tool like that and the end users aren't being trained and the relevant department leaders aren't being consulted to leverage those tools for their Town processes uh the returns that you get are greatly diminished you can you can buy as many fancy tools as you want if nobody how knows how to use them then that's all you have it's just a fancy tool sitting waiting for you um and what that will ultimately require is marrying technical knowledge of things like SharePoint with instit knowledge of town processes at a very high level um I believe that's it so thank you awesome thank you very much Logan any other public com oh sorry I just want to comment to Logan first of all I cannot thank you enough for coming forward we learn more in the three minutes or you spoke then we have probably for the past four months when this was going on there was other stuff going on in town obviously but we need people like you I I cannot thank you enough for coming forward because we need people from the inside to tell us this and not be afraid that what they what they might say would you know offend somebody or or the board this board or some other employee that's what we needed to hear so thank you and if anybody else is listening and you have a different perspective or something that Logan didn't touch on please these are the things we need to know thank you Logan Mr McDonald guys set my clock so I don't go over time I have a time to do that thank you we do have a lot of people here with appointment so oh no I I understand I gave myself three minutes and 10 seconds though good evening my name is Dave McDonald 155 Island Road I'm here to update on the recall I am the person who pulled the papers for the recall for the town uh I had people call me and say this is a personal thing between me and Mr Jeffers that's further from the truth now there are in is where Michael and I had some differences but I'm doing this for one reason I'm an American and live in lunberg it's our right to question the government leaders it's a civil Duty and people want to do that and I'm glad what what he just said tonight too but this has nothing to do about personality it has to do about performance about the town about tearing the town apart a lot of people tell me that you're tearing the town apart if you go ahead with this I feel the town's already torn apart we're just trying to put it back together and putting it back together means we all got to come together nobody should be calling names we shouldn't be called parasites we're Americans doing our civil Duty and that's the way it should be and I was kind of appalled last week when people were calling parasites and so on I understand there's emotions involved I understand there's friendships but the bottom line is that we live in lunenberg and we're proud to live in lunenberg so that was number one number two as people are asking me when are we going to release the paperwork if if I keep telling you this it keeps coming up there's more stuff every day it's not like what we had a couple weeks ago so I'm trying to get the final package but we do have close to going down to the next step and I just want to make sure we have all our everyone's questioning as far as are we doing the right thing but I do have some questions for Mr Jeff I'm sorry he's not here tonight one of them was last week he stated that he worked out a deal with a lawyer so that if someone couldn't pay their taxes that they gave you an extension that he did that I have no clue what he's talking about the investigating team never got back to us and I don't want to put Mr Lonzo on a top on a spot but you're on the investigating team was there a deal with a lawyer that if you couldn't make your payments it was deferred I I don't know and we don't have to answer it now these are questions I want to put out there the other one was that he stated at the last meeting because of the policy changes that you and Michael R you made that it save the town $4 million and that the policy was changed to do that but once it was done you guys reversed it and he said he would do it again and that's his prerogative and I thought that was the most dangerous thing I heard and everyone's saying he's not going to run I don't know if he is or not and at this point I don't care but he can do a lot of damage if you do that again the policy is quite clear Mr chair of of what happened and I just like to know someone explained to me what what is it how did he save the town $4 million so those are the comments I have tonight I want to thank everyone for helping us and I just hope that the personal attacks stop they stop immediately there's no need for that in this one I still got I still got I'm doing good here go ahead keep going the other thing is that I do want to hit the subject on why Mr jeffre feel that I'm personally attacking him I think it goes to a candle light visual that we had back on June 7th of 19 2022 and I was responsible for putting that together getting people together for the massacre the kids in uh vidali Texas um I know he wasn't happy about it he called my wife and myself and said nothing gets approved in this town without him I didn't have words with him I thought that was awful cuz you work for a five member board not one five and I just see things not happening right so if people want to see what I think happened go to the YouTube 6722 now we're explaining um but listen I hate it when people say don't say you love for the town I do love this town I've done a lot of work in this town every day we've done work and I think most of you guys know that so for what gets me upset is when they say that we're not Americans and that we're parasites and that's my time all right thank you Mr MC Mr chair thank you very much thank you guys good seeing again are there any other public comments Mr chair I want to just respond I know I don't have to but I've said it publicly before so when there was no ever a meeting of the tax investigation committee or the team so we never met on anything and as far as so I didn't have any knowledge of that and as far as the $4 million I'd like to know too what he was talking about as a member of the board I don't know what he was referring to all right are there any other public comments from the public Mrs Lucio Ronda lissia 181 Reservoir Road I wasn't planning to speak tonight but um I did send this board an email regarding something that happened at the last meeting and I think it should be addressed publicly um last two weeks ago when I was here I spoke about how um my support for the resignation of the vice chair or the recall of the vice chair was not based on my personal feelings and no sooner had those words left my lips I was sitting back there and someone approached me someone very much larger than me looked down at me acted like he I seriously thought he was going to strike me and I just wanted to say that cannot be tolerated because when you in my personal space then I'm going to take it personally and that's what this man did he was attempting to silence me and hoping that I wouldn't come back to meeting and speak and I think he has a serious self-control issue thank you thank you Mrs Lucio for your public comment and I just want to say I'm sorry that that happened and obviously everyone should have the ability to show up and speak and speak freely and say whatever they want safely so Rhonda I'm sorry that that happened to you are there any other public comments from the public this evening all right seeing none we will move on to announcements and I have several the lunenberg Council on Aging in conjunction with the lunenberg police and fire departments have developed a computerized system using my senior center software to give emergency Personnel easy e access to your emergency information should they need to be called to your home or to a vehicular accident this software will have all of your Vital Information along with a photo of yourself available to them in their vehicles and ambulances which could save valuable time if you are not able to communicate with them in an emergency situation where seconds count if you are interested in participating this program please stop by at the lunenberg adult Activity Center to fill out a form for the program Unitil is in the preliminary planning stages for two separate substation projects in lunenberg this summer Unitil will be holding public information sessions to let residents know about these projects and to solicit feedback join the public info sessions to learn about substations why they're needed what are plans include and what to expect in-person meeting will be held tomorrow Wednesday September 4th at 6:30 p.m. at the lunberg public library sorry hold on one second I lost my place and then there will be a virtual meeting on Thursday September 5th at 12:00 p.m. for more information go to unitil.com lunenberg DSS substation the lunenberg agricultural commission will be hosting an Agricultural Fair on October 5th from 10:00 a.m. to 2: p.m. at TC pasos there will be tractors hay rides games and vendors for more information visit the adcoms Facebook page and finally at least for me the second Town official meet and greet will be Thursday September 26th at 5:30 p.m. p.m. at Low Places Ranch it'll be a great opportunity to network with Town officials local businesses and enjoy some good food drinks and a DJ and Carter also has one announcement as well that is a uh letter of commendation I actually don't have that with me oh you don't okay do you want me to want me to read it or do you want I think it' be more appropriate if you did sure it's Staffing related so I want to give you the opportunity to do it all right so I'm just going to read this out this is a letter of commendation that the chief of police issued to of our officers dear officer Brock it has been brought to my attention by Sergeant John morale of two recent cases to which you were assigned it was explained that you provided a service that was extraordinary and the way you handled the cases were above and beyond what was required of you specifically the cases involved hoarding situations with two separate elderly parties upon conducting wellbeing checks you recognize the signs and behaviors that involved hoarding and self- neglect you reach out to various agencies including the Council on Aging the nooba valley Board of Health and the lunenberg fire department you were able to work collaboratively with the various agencies to provide the assistance the two residents desperately needed I have also witnessed firsthand your continued followup with the involved parties to assure they are receiving the help they need officer Brock I am issuing issuing you a letter of commendation for the efforts to assist the two residents in our community who were in need your efforts will have a lasting effect on their quality quality of life your efforts epitomize the community caretaker philosophy of community policing officer Brock you are a credit to the lenberg police department and the community we serve keep up the great work signed Chief Thomas gaml thank you yeah of course um I do just want to point out I think our Police Department truly excels at community policing um and it really is a point of Pride for me not only as a select board member but also as a private resident so I'm really glad that we can recognize that work all right are there any comments from select board members about that or any other announcements no just to Echo your statement Mr chair that I've always said publicly at any chance I have that the police department does an excellent job they have for many years they continue to do so and with the upcoming res you know retirement of the police chief I'm looking forward to that search and that continuing because that is obviously the key role in keeping the department on the same path so thank you yep I would also Echo those same sentiments you I spent many years working for the police department and I know all the officers very well and it's great to see them continuing their good work thank you all right moving on to Communications from other boards I don't have any um and I don't see anyone here that would be uh sharing one does anyone else have one all right so let's jump right into appointments up first we have a meeting with the DPW director and GW sha and Sun uh in regards to the municipal Solid Waste and Recycling contract so I will uh just invite whoever wants to come up to the table um looks like it's you guys want to but I'm going to pass it off to you Bill so uh recently we put out a irf request proposals for the new trash hauler so um we got three bids one from our current um trash hauler D hob second was from um waste management and the third was from George sh in company think might be the placement of if you want to just like turn yours off yeah just hopefully that helps yeah uh so part the first part of the review was the technical proposal so uh myself the for to manager and assistant to manager each independently uh ranked the technical proposals um Waste Management had the highest score being a billion dollar companies not too surprising um but Shaw and Harvey had the same score both smaller companies uh both acceptable scores and we did check their references and the references came back and very positive for all three companies and the next part was to review the the bids uh so we looked was it not working oh okay sorry I'd hate to ask you to start over but I'm going to if you don't mind the bridge version at least all right St at the beginning so we put out a RFB request for proposals for a new trash for a trash H and we had three bids um one from our current company y Harvey one from waste management and one from George sha company uh first we looked at the technical specifications which were reviewed by myself the former Town manager and the assistant Town manager um not surprisingly Waste Management being a billion dollar company had the biggest package that they had the best score um and hary and Sh our average were the same both all acceptable scores all right Bill I'm sorry to interrupt you but I'm can you go to the podium yeah you're going to have to go to the podium it looks like we're having issues with the microphones I'm really sorryy right no corre we'll get it right this time all right I apologize everyone at home and in the audience and Bill as well but the third time the charge always no mistakes this time ah you put too much pressure on it all right so third time's a charm all right so again we we uh put out a request for proposal for a trash hauler as our contract was coming to an end we had three bids um Waste Management elel Harvey and GW Shaw um the first part of the review was to look at the technical specifications with they were reviewed by myself the tpw director I didn't introduce myself uh the T the former Town manager and the assistant Town manager we each independently scored um not surprisingly Waste Management had the highest score being a billion dollar company and Sh and Harvey much smaller companies but they all had good scores um we looked at references we checked references the references came back very positive for all three companies then we looked at the bids so looked at the the municipal solid waste so trash so so I had the lowest cost for the town um very similar cost to what we have now uh Waste Management they were the next lowest but um a little bit outside of our budget and our current contractor Harvey they had the highest scores which was quite a bit outside of our uh budget then I looked at the uh recyclables um well just step back a little bit the solid waste is um paid for by the pays you throw system so people buy it the yellow bags that pays for the trash the recyclables comes out of the tax dollars so there's a budget for that um again uh Shaw was the lowest and um they actually it looks like they'll be under our budget so that's a good thing um waste management was a little bit over our budget and again Harvey was a little bit over our budget the other thing we looked at is um some of the items that um you have to make an appointment to get picked up such as uh free on Goods with free on um bulky waste construction demolition tires yard waste scrap metal you know appliances that kind of stuff and in general Shaw had the lowest prices of the uh bid proposals somewh some of the other companies had couple things a little lower but most of the prices that sh gave were were the lowest um I don't know if you want me to go into details on numbers that kind of stuff or uh we can just see if anyone on the board has any questions at this point okay are there any questions for Bill just for the people at home just talk about the techn what what is involved what are the criteria for the technical ratings just so people know sure all right pull up that page all right so technical criteria was a prior experience with similar jobs um the completeness of their proposals the quality of the services they propos qualifications of the provider based on an established professional credent credibility and financial strength so we looked at their um bank statements Financial records uh capacity to complete the project um they pass revenues and the proposed equipment they're going to have and we make sure they have the the right trucks that in that are in good condition aren't going to break down all the time and um positive references and there was you know a whole bunch of um forms that we had them fill that they have to fill out so that went towards the completeness of the pro process thank you any other questions for Bill go ahead cuz uh I just want to comment in the financial projections that you have do bear in mind they're all based upon uh Bill's best estimate of the tonnage that will actually uh be put through the system this year with respect to the recycling program uh we do get a rebate on the those goods they will calculate what kinds of goods they were what percentage what the value of those is or the the charge getting rid of the glass and um the debris that's left uh as result of the recycling process uh and we may get a rebate towards each ton however in terms of presenting the budget to you we assumed that that rebate not that it really will be uh but we've assumed that it would be zero just for making the projection so we knew we had a good safety uh level there so I just wanted to make sure that folks understood those projections are dependent upon some assumptions thank you Renee did you have something I just had a question did you only look at the pay as you throw program did you look at the the auto you know the bins that are picked up automatically you know with the arms on the truck right I don't know what you call that but right we kept the the pickup system the same so the people won't see a difference they put the same barrels out that they're putting out now yeah we didn't look at going with a cart system cart that's it yeah right okay may mhm uh you actually had one potential bidder withdraw when they came to realize that you were going to maintain the current system uh and if you have a chance to uh look at my memo after this the last paragraph I think that over the next 3 years you really need to take a step back and look at the program um I'm doubtful that you'll get someone to bid on the current program three years out there are labor issues there are injury issues um fortunately not too many but you do get breakage and spillage issues um so for the reasons I've laid out in that menu uh memo I do think it's something that should be looked at uh in depth over the coming few years so is it fair to say the reason why you didn't look at it this go around was the time was just too short to make that big of a change in town or time in in funds right you'd have to pay for the cards somehow right either tax dollars or have it's individual pay for their own right it's it's a transition you really need to plan for yeah yeah any other questions anything bill or Carter that you'd like to add um simply if you endorse uh the award of this contract we'll start pulling everything together uh and it would be deployed uh September 30 and uh in the initial phases people will not notice any difference the company's agreed to maintain the current route system uh we've got the pr firm that the company hired for this year uh ready to step in Cara's ready to step in uh we've talked with the company about how to get that information out um and I think we'll be ready um to go on on September 30 and um at least one element that I think I've spoken with each of you that I was worried about in this year's budget uh is uh is behind us for now so people's pickup day stay would stay the same when you say the routes stay the same it's their pickup day okay sounds like everything is staying pretty much except who's picking it up yep pretty much yeah basically the phone number if you want to get rid of lucky waste the phone number will change um but everything else will basically be the same great all right if there's no more questions I'll entertain a motion well I would before we make the motion I would say that I want to thank the DPW director and prior Town manager the assistant Town manager and our current interim Town manager for running this and doing these interviews and Gathering all the data and everything um I would like to see the final contract I I'm for making it go forward but I'd like to see it before we approve it just so I have a look at it well the board would actually endorse it I'll get it out before I sign it but we'll absolutely get it to you okay so with that Assurance I would uh make a motion that we uh what is the proper verb you're looking for Endor endorse I'm going to endorse the contract going to GW not George but GW Shaw uh and for the contract for the next 3 years of uh waste removal and recyclables second any additional discussion those in favor say I I those oppos no the motion passes unanimously so thank you very much and congratulations thank you guys and Bill a third time really hit it I know spot all right thank you Bill have a good night thank you all for coming in tonight all right up next we are going to invite up Josie Gilcrest uh for an update or several updates really from The lunenberg Business Association small towns economic and Community Development collaborative and the master plan steering committee so uh basically this meeting came out of a conversation that I had with Josie uh not too long ago about how the town can be more business friendly uh so I invited her in to allow her to give us an update on the work she's doing and like I said since she's involved in so many organizations we're getting several of them so where do you want to start which one do you want to start with let's start um well I have a lunenberg Business Association pres uh presentation but I don't see yep so you just so the booth is going to run that presentation I'm going to do the other one cuz it's a canva one um so when you're ready for let start with the small towns oh okay so never mind we'll do the small town one first okay so to the booth we're going to um do the one that I'm going to share first oops now I have to uh hold on one second let me please introduce yourself first oh my name is Josie Gilchrist do I need to tell you my address I always forget that part I live in lunenberg happy to be here is somebody after you I'm jie G I volunteer a lot with the town I serve on the economic development committee the master plan steering committee uh I represent lunenberg at the small towns economic and Community Development collaborative which we're calling small towns the last time we did not have a name so that's the last time I'm going to be saying that super long thing to you guys you'll just know it's called small towns um and after this presentation I'll tell you a little bit um but I'm happy to be here I really love lunenberg um got involved very quickly with volunteering here um but we're going to start with small towns today um if you want to do you have it yet yep okay oh I paused it hold on okay okay we'll just leave that first yeah that's fine all right so small towns like I said is an economic and Community Development collaborative um it was started by the um state representative Margaret Scarsdale and team um it's working with the six towns in the first middle sex District in the rural community so that's lunenberg Townsen Ashby dunable groten and peppol they all have different cultures um and we are all coming together to bring more economic and Community Development to the area with a Target on Rural tourism and appreciation um so when I say development I just want to be super clear that that means that we are supporting what's in existence already we're amplifying their presence in the region um we're supporting what is already present um as much as we can um Kim Craven with the towns and Business Association and Mark Matthews with the peol select board um have been elected as co-chairs for the small towns collaborative and I serve as the representative of lunenberg um for that collaborative um it's been a slowo process process um it often is when you bring six different towns with all different cultures and characteristics together to try to kind of see a vision for where exactly we're going um which is kind of why I put together um kind of a preview for a website our online presence and I did that more so for this collaborative so that they would have a vision of our common goal like what are we exactly trying to do um and I think that this may help this room um understand a little bit more as well but before we get started with the website and what that is I just wanted you guys to have an update of what lunenberg has done sitting at that table um I've worked with this collabor collaborative in organizing elections for leadership um I pulled myself out of that race so that I could have a more unbiased perspective of the group as a whole um so that I could serve in more of an advisory position to them um and it's been great I've been able to sit down with a lot of people individually and talk about their individual goals um and how to incorporate that into the collective goal um I've created this mock website template to share a vision of what small Town's online presence could be I've created a sponsorship request form um when we get a little bit later into it you'll see how I Incorporated that into the actual website I've added Andrea harp a local realtor and social media influencer to the Lunenburg team on small towns um she also serves on the master plan steering committee here in town her Insight on how to get event and visitor information in front of people who may be interested in visiting the region have been extremely valuable um a very good addition to the collaborative she serves as a social media influencer she basically goes out to all of the uh storefronts and events and she posts about it and blast about it and does a whole write up on everywhere that she visits so that's exactly what we're looking for um lunenberg currently needs an agricultural representative to serve on small towns um I've asked several in the community but if anybody has any ideas um or anybody in the agricultural Community would be willing to um volunteer to sit at that table I know that's a different perspective that lunenberg doesn't have right now um and it's a great opportunity it is once a month um probably an hour and a half um that you're sitting at this table providing your Insight um I continue to Aid in shaping small towns mediating discussions and Advising on efficient effective and fulfilling systems for the collaborative um I'll be working with the web web developer to make sure that the website template that I have is executed properly and represents everybody equally and uh uniquely to their towns um and with that let's go on to the the visual so let's go all the way to the beginning to the beginning of the PowerPoint of the small towns yes because that's going to be kind of um the video part yeah oh I see okay okay so you get to the small Town's website oh I okay yeah I get it now gotta you want to visit north central Massachusetts don't really know where to start there's the visit north central Massachusetts through the uh North Central Chamber of Commerce you go there they have a list of websites for all of north central Massachusetts and what I like to tell people is that's kind of like a tree so you have Massachusetts and then you have north central Massachusetts and then you have a little um deeper into the first middle sex district and then from here what's next say your interests are agriculture you want to go to a farmers market and see whatever the local farmers in this area are producing say you're interested in mountain biking but you specifically want to go to this area and mountain bike where do you go so it's basically a tree with a lot of different systems um so if we want to skip to the next uh slide okay I didn't let me actually click it so oh good this one yep that's fine so those are the six towns again that are representative uh represented lunenberg towns in Ashby groten peil Dunstable and each one of those would be clickable you're in lunenberg what do you want to do in lunenberg you click lunenberg um same with all the rest so we can and oh and all of that is uh like 250 character description of each town so everybody sees kind of the general area like say you have family Vis family that's located in peil you don't really want to sit around the kitchen table and chat the whole time like what do we do um go to the next if you wouldn't mind so say you clicked lunenberg Massachusetts then it would bring you here you want to visit Open Spaces you want to go to a restaurant in the area you want to um see what kind of community events are happening are there fairs are there um markets what's going on uh and then again we have the agriculture are there going to be Farm tables um what sorts of um Farms actually have storefronts where you can go and buy each one of those would be clickable as well and then we can go forward then you have your location um and it would also be clickable to where it would uh sync with Google Maps or Apple Maps um but gives you a little bit more of a description of the area and we can move forward with that slide more reasons to visit we can move forward to the next all right there would also be a page just for General agriculture Community Open Spaces Urban Escape so you didn't have to just choose a town and go you could choose um the type of day you want to have go ahead and move forward oops I went backwards that's okay we would have an event page and that's where we would link back to the visit North Central we've already spoken to Roy naso uh who's the president of the north central Massachusetts Chamber of Commerce and they've uh said that they would collaborate with us and we could push any events with lunenberg over to them um and they would distribute it on their visit North Central website um it gets a ton of activity so even now we should be doing that um but what small towns is is an Avenue to where um it's just another step in the process uh somebody comes in and fills out an event application we would hopefully be pinged so that we could push that information to the visit North Central calender um and keep them updated and support the people in our area that are wanting to have events and we can move forward to the next slide but that was a really good collaboration that we did that we're really excited about because they get a lot of traffic already and it's not like it's something that we have to build up already um we're going to open it up to uh sponsors so local businesses could sponsor the maintenance of the website um and I think that's it of the presentation the visual that I have but what I'm asking for is a couple months ago I stood in front of the select board with a very broad idea of kind of what we were looking for um I don't know if you remember that or not but we really didn't have much solid information now we've got this mock website now we have an estimate um and I asked lunenberg to put in a sixth of the cost the startup cost for that website um we are now asking for $11,200 to romp web services for the initiative it's a sixth of the cost of the startup um for allowing us to have a userfriendly safe and aesthetically pleasing website just like what you pictured here and I'll be meeting with the web developer that make sure that that's what that looks like um but $1,200 is what each Town um is hopefully going to put forth to be a part of that website and so I would ask um the select board to consider putting that forward um I know that you would like to see a clear written up estimate and I would send that to you but $1,200 is not going to Pivot we we have the estimate I just don't physically have it with me today so that's what I'm asking for um to get this website up and running um I believe it's the next step in just kind of boosting this collaborative forward um and its efficiency so um I'm not sure the process and what you would like me to do next with that but I do have a number and now I've got visuals for you which is what you asked for last time so I do actually remember when you first came to us when this was an idea and now that I like see it and I like understand what your the vision was with it it's so much cooler than what I originally thought it was cuz at first I was just sort of imagining like a directory and it's not that at all um so it allows people to go and for lack of a better term you can find experiences in certain areas and you can narrow down to like a region and go to a town so there's like that Discovery option for anyone who's looking to try something new in Massachusetts I guess um and it also could potentially allow for us to better publicize events that are going on in town so that they're not just town events maybe they're like Regional events or something uh so I really like that idea it's really cool I do too I'm really excited and happy to be a part of it yeah totally so was this I have to asked did you include this in u the arpa requests no no okay the only request I put in was take off one hat put on the other The lunenberg Business Association got you okay so all of that has been allocated at this point we're not accepting new applications so arpa wouldn't be an option for funding so we would have to wait long longer and to see potentially if we wanted to fund it it wouldn't really be something that we could do ourselves uh but I will open it up for questions from the rest of the board first I think it's a great presentation exactly what I was looking for when you came the first time oh good I I do have one question sure before I lather on more praise but so you've talked about this site will link to other things what site are you looking to link to as a parent to get to here like where will you advertise that people will land here beside a direct search are there any other places you know like for instance we have the Johnny apple seed Visitor Center and things like that I mean you look are you communicating with them to say hey put our website on your site yeah every meeting that we have we bring in another individual to collaborate with um we have attended several Economic Development uh events through the north central chamber that provides a lot of great resources for economic development in the region uh just to Simply educate ourselves as a collective on what our next steps need to be um this is going to be our online face like this is what it is the link backs that I would love on there would be click lunenberg you have the option to go to the lunenberg ma.gov website and same with pet Pearl Dunstable and so forth um and then in that calendar you just link back to the visit North Central but each of those links work both ways um it's not going to be a oneway Street for us does that make sense yes okay so needless to say if you've ever developed the website before which it sounds like if you haven't you certainly are well on your way but if you have you know what I'm about to say which is you know websites are only as interesting as the updated content so getting it started is important but keeping it Dynamic and keeping it changing so hopefully you have an eye to that uh already as far as the money we've giv money to places that were far more money for far less return I think so you have my commitment to make sure somehow wherever we get it that you can get the funding to get this started I think it's great and you obviously your whole team and the whole group has a a very good amount of positive energy and traction I hate to stall that because we didn't come up with $1,200 and with that I'll say you're not going to because of the sponsorship request letter that I formatted for businesses too um because it's just as much for the small businesses in the areas that we're trying to get people to visit and appreciate um my business will be a sponsor on that website because I see the vision in it and I see the potential traffic that it'll have um I don't have a storefront I'm not um I'm not a bike shop I'm not a uh farmer with a really cool place to visit um but I have a construction company so I'm going to be putting money into this to get this website maintained that's going to be where the continuous costs are going to uh continuous funding are going to be coming from or the small businesses in the area that want their logo displayed on there with another clickable link back to their Business website that's great that's a great model I like I said I wasn't worried about the continuance of it I don't want it to knock it off the ground because we couldn't come up with $100 which would be the biggest shame I can think of right U so commitment to work to make sure you get the money if anything it's just your understanding of what it is um and your individual out Outreach for the cause if you will um just educating people and um finding an agricultural representative in lunenberg but with that are there any more questions for the small towns portion all right which one do you want to do next okay LBA sure all right so to the booth we are going to uh put a of the presentation that you guys have uh queued up you really missed an opportunity to bring three different hats you realize that I know I need to if anything to keep my own thoughts organized but I don't see it up yet so okay like will I see it or um all right I see it I don't know if you guys here we are okay all right so I'll introduce myself as the other hat I'm Josie Gilchrist the president of the lunenberg Business Association um the vice president Judy is here with us um we have recently formatted a board um a new board uh elected in to serve the lunberg community on their business side um this board is really energetic uh very thoughtful um very passionate about business in lunenberg we are a um 501 C3 nonprofit located here in town again we don't have a storefront um it's just a bunch of business volunteers coming together to work for other businesses in the area we can go to the next slide but the uh lunenberg Business Association is basically working for all of our members um listening to them and providing kind of a mediation between their needs and a solution to their needs um the oh my notes are stuck our mission is to empower local businesses by providing a platform for networking promoting economic growth and advocating for the common interests of our members we can go to the next slide but that is our board those Smiles are very genuine we actually get along quite well which is amazing your meetings once and I you know attest to that yeah it makes me very concerned that you had to say that actually well I'm sure you know why many board members still let's just we'll move on moving on um so I'm Josie the president Judy is the vice president we have Mike Matthews the tall guy treasure uh Michelle bizo at the Boys and Girls Club um is our clerk um Patrick Ellis with Enterprise Bank he is our director of community engagement Chris CI is our um with diligent digital is uh the director of digital marketing Judy um is the previous owner of lunenberg Diner and I'm not sure what your title is now but you're still involved I'm still still still involved U Mike Matthews owns pixelated Tech right next door we're all very tight in it in lunenberg very passionate about which one is Patrick and which one is Chris in this picture Patrick is far right okay by Michelle bisa yep okay we can move on the lunenberg Business Association has 34 active members and membership continues to grow as we have more um mixers more events um we are actually planning an upcoming event at Il Forno where we'll invite people that are interested in learning more about the lunenberg Business Association current members and those considering becoming a member to come and mix and mingle and it's a very positive experience um one thing that I really really loved about the lunberg Business Association when I first started my business here is I'm in I'm in the construction industry like I said there's a lot of people in the construction industry and what I like about the lunberg Business Association is that I think there's like four other construction companies that are in the lunberg Business Association and when we meet at these events we are all chatting about the projects that we hate the most projects that we love the most like there is not one ounce of competitiveness but it's all just full of support um and that's what I find with a lot of our members is that it's not a platform to be competitive it's a platform for collaboration hey do you like building stairs oh good because I hate it I'm going to push all those projects over to you you know what I mean it's building a network of businesses or business resources and organizations so that everybody can just take the next step higher um rather than pushing each other down down all the time um so we provide oh we can do the next slide I don't know what slide we're on got caught okay next one that one so we provide Community Connection advocacy and education and resources we can do the next one we provide collaboration Local Economic growth inclusivity ethical business practices we can go to the next one the lunenberg business Association aims to be a catalyst for positive change a resource for local businesses and a driving force behind the sustained economic vitality and Community well-being in lunenberg Massachusetts we can go to the next one uh couple events that we've done um organized by Judy here we did the Meals on Wheels where we collaborated with the um adult Activity Center uh we provided I think it was socks and cookies and puzzles um to their meals on s project um Judy do you remember exactly how many we donated I want to say about 50 50 yeah 50 so and this was funded by business sponsorships a lot of local businesses came together and funded this project um and that's another thing that the lunberg Business Association does is put businesses in front of um projects that really serve people not everybody has a lot of time but a lot of businesses have some extra money to give or some people have time some people don't have enough money you know what I mean and so we provide both opportunities do you want to serve do you want to support what do you want to do and we provide people an Avenue to do that and Meals on Wheels was really neat to see and go to the next one we had a mingle and meet the LBA which we'll continue to have it's one of those events that we um we're going to just continue to have for people that want to be educated about what the lunenberg Business Association is we had an ice cream social at Cherry Hill um and what was cool about that is we had this huge table of a bunch of promotional products and what typically happens is just the people that we invite to come and put things down take a little but having it at Cherry Hill there were a lot of families that came and played with our Co cornhole thing that we had set up there um there were a lot of families that came and walked around our table um so it was kind of an interesting thing that happened that we didn't really plan for is we were there to support businesses and provide an opportunity to mix and mingle with each other's families but other random people came and became a part of it and it was really neat to see um we had an idea we haven't spoken to Cherry Hill about it but if any business wants to sponsor frisbees or balls or a cornhole thing at Cherry Hill that may be cool because we got a lot of people to play with the boys and girls club cornhole and that's good sponsorship uh but these are the things that happen and a lot of creativity that happens in The lunberg Business Association we can go to the next one another event that we have coming up soon is the um third annual charity golf tournament in support of the boys and girls club and we have a lot of sponsors that have sponsored holes for this golf tournament we provide them an opportunity to get in front of people again and support a great cause um and that's coming up on September 8th um a lot of local businesses have supported Again by providing raffle prizes gift cards just regular gifts any merch that they have um and it's always a really neat thing to see that check provided to the Boys and Girls Club because it's actually a really fun event and all these businesses again come together to make that happen we have our trunker treat coming up um the date is not announced yet but we are working with the school to make sure that our dates kind of match with um I think it's homecoming around that time well I don't know I don't remember yes okay homecoming event uh that happen around that time we don't want to bump into them so we've actually formed more collaboration with the school department to make sure that our events kind of help each other so the trunker treat all these businesses decorate their trunks um they provide uh promotional opportunities to the adults that come through candy to the kids and it's another really great time and go to the next one more things in the works are fabulous fall cleanout it's a dumpster fundraiser to support the lunenberg business Association in the collaboration with B their dump that out of Fitchburg um people can fill up their truck um pay a rate for their vehicle size um come and dump their trash and it really helps people that don't have enough to justify getting a rolloff dumpster but too much to put in the you know dumpsters on the side of their Road um we have our holiday mingle with the LBA that'll be at Il Forno kind of like our mix and mingle with the LBA event we're collaborating with the nooba Valley Chamber of Commerce to have a lunch learn we heard from a lot of our me members that they needed to be educated on business taxes with their business um so we're providing an opportunity for them to learn about that and then the spring we are um collaborating with the parks department hopefully we had our initial conversation about that to have an all vendor fair um and what that is is it's not limited to just agriculture not limited to just Artisans it's everybody a an IT company could be next to a baker it could be next to a petting Zoo um but it's going to be big and it's going to be fun a really big Community event and that will again pair nicely with the small tals collaborative as well and with that ways that you can support the LBA is just educate people on what you've learned today about it um make donations follow us on Facebook Instagram and subscribing to our newsletter sharing what you've learned becoming a member hosting one of our mixers and offering more collaborations we're always open to that and that's the end of that one awesome are there any questions well great work okay all right we got one more right or two actually I think oh one master PL yeah okay the what master plan steering committee yes is it it's the no Economic Development oh that's right yeah there are two okay yeah I knew it was right okay so with the economic development committee we're having our second annual Town official meet and greet that's happening on September 26th at 5:30 that has an in time at around 8:30 that's again open to every business in Lunenburg people that have an actual brick and morar business in Lunenburg you work out of your home and you're trying to kind of get more off your feet um you are interested in business in lunenberg you're an organizational resource for small businesses in lunenberg but it's really to Again mix and mingle with those businesses while forming connections with Town officials um and what we're pushing for there is there's a lot of business networking that happens a lot of getting to know other businesses but what would happen to your business if you got to know your town officials and your town staff the way that you get to know those other businesses do you have that fa Toof face connection um do they know your name know your face and know what you're trying to do in lunenberg because that makes a difference to add that personal piece to it I'm sure a lot of papers fly through your desk you don't really know the person behind it and again I bring up that example of construction there's 's a lot of construction companies but what sets me apart is me um and so that's what we're trying to do with the town official meet and greet and we would love it if you all would support and attend you get free food good music drinks why not so September 26 it was a really great event last year it really so fantastic event it was really good um and again that's supported by small businesses um we're looking for more sponsors to uh support that event it covers food costs tent rental um lights ice drinks everything um everything is supported by small businesses everything last year was supported and put on by the small businesses in lunenberg and they deserve a lot of recognition for that I'm always amazed um yep second annual what we heard last year is please have it again so we answered and we're doing it again bigger better um much more attended cuz we have a bigger Head Start yep and I've been really plugging it in announcements it every single week so we'll see if that actually does anything yeah hopefully and I always tell people that's at the I think it's 441 Goodrich Street not the feed store location on lemonster Shirley Road um but I think that's it for that cool that's the 22nd is that 266 26th okay thank you yes any questions about that okay I think I'm done did you talk about the steering yeah master plan steering I'm not sure that was on my notes to on our notes Economic Development wasn't all right maybe they got we can we can give your pass three is fine yeah three is a lot master plan well okay I'll pull something out the master plan steering committee we kind of put on a little halt for our committee because everybody was traveling and we have a very large Committee of 14 members uh we're still looking for a member from the zoning board of appeals and that'll make a full Committee of 15 members it's very hard to get a quorum um so we kind of put a halt on it on the spring and summer we'll pick up again probably in next month um to get everybody a chance to review some documents that I sent out to everybody um come back more energized I I saw it kind of decreasing morale a lot of people showing up for meetings that weren't able to actually happen because a couple people didn't show up and things happen um emergencies happen and you can't hold them to it but it is a very big committee very hard to get people together but one thing that may be um beneficial for you all to know what we're hearing from people with the master plan process is that people really um love the sense of community that they have with uh their neighbors in Lunenburg um Community has come up a lot they really want that Community feel um so I would encourage you all I think it starts with the select board and starts with the town manager's office for that Rippling effect through um the offices in Lunenburg um to not lose that sense of community in serving and volunteering um and communicating with each other too because that's what the residents want and you all are residents um but don't forget that when you sit up there um and don't forget that when you go home too that your work here is very important um and I think allowing all these people to come in person and talk to you even though some of us are angry and maybe you go home and take a nap like I do because you can't handle it anymore that you're doing really important work and you're doing the community service that people are asking you to do so thank you very much for that thank you so much Josie was that a good any final questions okay I wonder how much how she finds all the time in the day I don't know I don't sleep very well and I also just I I do have I just one more thing to say um well first like my observation is that yes do a lot of work but you're also at like a really critical um perspective I guess where you're like really um uniquely qualified and you're working hard to bridge The Divide between like the public sector and like the private sector right so you're a town volunteer so you understand like that side of it but you're also a small business owner and you're like really involved with that community and that's I think is just like absolutely critical um but I also wanted to share so the real like issue that like initiated our meeting was um the Licensing in event application process because I was looking at it you know those forms look really old and it looks like they can be montiz so I wanted to get your perspective like from the business side like what is this process like and you know where can it be improved um and we're actually doing a lot right now this is Josie knows this so this is more so for the board and the public um we're really working a lot and by we I mean um staff to move all of that to open gov so that it can all digital processes and actually I'll shout out Brian cuz he's here right now and he's really leading that effort um so that you know it's really important too and I think making that um experience and that process easier for businesses is one thing that the town can do to be more business friendly to you know answer my original question to you um but I do want to ask you like other than that what else can like we actually do as a board in terms of policies practices that can just be you know make the town more well I did have a great meeting with Annie and Carter earlier today um where they shared their desire to put all the application processes towards open goov and we actually talked about the need for um what did what was the word that you called it the small group that comes to you're G me the face beta beta testing beta testing yeah um where yes you put that information up there and it totally makes sense to you because it come came out of your mind with a solution that you're task to solve but does it make sense to the people that are using it to and I got really confused with the application process and I'm really involved in the town the paper application process if I'm really confused everybody I think is kind of confused a little bit a couple times because there was one applicant who came forward I forget exactly what happened this was in like June or something but there was some issue where there was confusion over the application process and we had to send them away and they had to come back like a month later uh so you know that's sort of like where this originated from right and I think just having that small group to come and kind of um just politely nitpick at the wording on open gov whenever they're live um before they're launched would really help um kind of Remedy the attitude going into it um having a group of people that don't really know the process behind it but just coming in kind of with a blank slate of okay I'm in the mindset of I'm trying to host an event in lunenberg does this make sense to me um and just making sure that the wording makes sense so that it it's a lot less work on your end um and two when it makes sense to people when they're when they're spending the time sitting down after the kids go to bed and they're trying to finish this last task and it makes sense and it goes through smoothly they're going to be happier when they approach you and so that's like you said that mediation and that bridge together um but I do think the idea of having that group together to go go through and um fine-tune the wording um and add a little bit more education maybe to those sites whenever they go live will be really important awesome well thank you so much for this uh brainstorming session that we had and I'm glad that this is the result of it and that we were able to share all this with the community so thank you Josie you all the good work yes have a good you too all right up next we are going to move to to a meeting with the Building Commissioner uh for Earth removal permit renewals um so I remember last year we had the applicants up for this and this year was scheduled with the Building Commissioner just want to ask is that okay if we uh just meet okay cool all right so Brian coming up Brian Jing Building Commissioner of town of lunenberg um this year we have two renewals that are before you one is 780 Northfield Road for the sand removal operation for James latanzi uh the inspection out there was done on August 29th around 130 um it's a clean site it's a small pile of sand at this point um when you compare it to the other operation we have going in town there's not much there at this point um it's cleanance and compliance not really much to it all right is there any questions on that or do we just want to cover all of them at once unless unless one of them is going to come up we might as well do all them at once if they're going to be recommended for approval instead of one at a time is the other one going to be recommended for approval as well yeah um so I visited PJ keing July 25th um 24 actually that is the wrong date um anyway the memos get a little mixed up Carter caught on I had town of Lancaster on one of no actually I I have to give it credit elsewhere but it's okay it was it it was a rush process things came in late um anyway I did go out to all the sites actually had the conservation administrator go with me because she had never seen an operation like that it's good to have that department in particular see what's going on given they can be controversy with this type of scale of Earth removal um all the permits were in compliance some of these sites they haven't been on their own Parcels in a long time they're not removing anything from they just keeping the licenses active um the pit was clean a lot more had been removed than had from years past they they do seem to be accelerating their operation a bit on the removal from the uh the pit side both Lancaster and lunenberg side of it um but the individual locations dust control was in order they've got some more water trucks out there than they've had before um roads were in good shape there wasn't really anything to complain about out there all right any other questions all right um I have the permit numbers in front of me I don't know how important it is so I'll just make the motion to specify them so I move to um approve the renewal of Earth removal permits number 15 16 17 27 3057 for PJ keing and number 61 for 780 Northfield Road second any additional discussion those in favor say I I those appr those oppose no the motion passes unanimously thank you thank you thanks to the building inspector for doing the inspections all right up next we're going to move to interviews appointments reappointments and resignations so I'm going to pass this off to Carter uh we have before you tonight uh two proposed appointments subject to your ratification uh the first is the position of administrative assistant in the Conservation Commission the position's been vacant since August 2nd uh we received actually 80 applications according to the assistant Town manager uh 10 were narrowed down to um with relatable experience and That Was Then narrowed down to five which were interviewed uh Madison berett uh has the administrative and accounting experience uh that we believe is necessary in this position and is able to start later this week subject to your ratification and Brian um you SED on those interviews uh and is able to answer any questions that you might have cool are there any questions for Carter I guess did anyone on Conservation Commission get a chance to uh this happened before I was able to start implementing okay that I guess I'll take that opportunity just to say if I'm hearing that your intention is to implement talking to the the Ed and appointed bodies that would work with these people I know that was something that has always been a sore point in the past that we should address so if you're looking at addressing that I commend that uh you'll and you'll hear about that in the next um nomination all right we didn't rehearse this for people at home I do want to be careful about you know there is the separation between policy bodies and staff so that's a delicate Balancing Act uh but um we certainly do want to uh involve as many stakeholders as possible right I mean again nobody is doubting The Authority rests in the town manager and whatever department head that the department might be working in however we also want to be very careful and mindful that we talk about collaboration and we talk about teamwork among elected and and appointed bodies who don't have any say in anything and aren't even aren't even asked to even meet the people who will be working with them and that's like right out of the gate is a bone of contention and we're just trying to eliminate that yeah and and I'll speak to that on the next um nomination all right is there any more questions for this current uh nomination or is there a motion I move that we uh ratify the appointment of Madison berett to the position of administrative assistant in conservation second any additional discussion those in favor say I I those oppose no the motion passes unanimously all right on to the next one uh we're submitting the appointment of Christopher Riley to the position of land use director I do note an error in the um report from the um staff it was October 13th of 20123 um it's been advertised and read vertis in multiple uh websites and Publications um and from uh the original publication October through May you received 11 and since then we received um two more out of that group we had three applicants interviewed in total uh Chris holds an aicp certification uh Masters in program policy planning and policy development and a masters in program geography uh and uh additional uh education he has approximately uh 25 years of experience in this field uh the initial interview is conducted between the assistant Town manager HR Director uh and the Building Commissioner uh land use manager uh Mr jingis uh and then um I interviewed him uh and we invited the chairs of the Conservation Commission and planning board uh to attend uh they did uh attend and um towards your point Mr Lonzo um we did ask if there were questions they were texted to me they were written down so that I could pose them uh in a manner that was legal and wo into the other questions that uh were asked uh and before a final decision was made uh I did have a discussion with those that participated in it so they had an opportunity to weigh in um and again we'll we'll try to refine that uh to uh hit that right balance between involvement and and separation of those uh those Powers uh if you will that are spelled out in the the charter uh pending year ratification Chris is prepared to start uh Monday September 16th and um we think it'll be a great addition to the to the team awesome are there any questions for Carter and again uh Brian was in on those uh interviews cool any questions just one I don't see I mean I'm not looking to to see the president's resume but there was no indication of what towns he's done his previous work in sure um he's just recently left sagus uh he's also been in Lincoln and we'll get you that out in the next day or so okay well I mean that's that's fine all right cool any other questions or is there a motion I move that we ratify the appointment of Christopher Riley to the position of land use director second any additional discussion those in favor say I I those oppose no the motion passes unanimously this will be this is I mean both of them are good to fill but this one is really important I'm so glad after almost a year that we will have this uh I hope Mr Riley works out well y hope both of them work out well sorry here here all right on to the interim Town manager report uh so let me start with um some uh additional good news I believe on the front and uh Bill bills out the door before I get a chance to inform you uh that the Sewer Commission uh the Sewer Commission did ratify my nomination of the sewer business manager um and they are prepared to start I believe later this week I'm leaving that to Bill and Monday Monday great um but and Paula has agreed to uh provide some training there'll be some split shifts for the new person coming in uh given Paula's availability uh but I'm really pleased that that list that I first got here Julie and and Brian and Bill and everybody kind of working to whittle it Whittle it down so uh these are good things and um um is that a ratification appointment as well not by this B it's by the Sewer Commission okay got right it um and I I wasn't sure given the other wording in the charter so I did run it by Mark uh Terry and he confirmed that it was just the Sewer Commission excellent thank you Bill um thanks rman with respect to board committee and commission vacancies I do want to let you know and I believe we sent you a copy of it uh the Sewer Commission uh with a minor tweak here and there which I thought were good improvements um uh approved a letter that went out to all the folks in the sewer district uh telling them about the important work that that commission does um and encouraging one or more to uh submit applications and you know to give me a call and I'd be happy to to chat with them I um now we're good until roughly early November uh because the Sewer Commission had delegate some functions uh processing of weekly bills that kind of thing uh to the staff uh but come November we'll be getting the bills from lemonster and Fitchburg and the Sewer Commission had reserved that un to themselves uh so I have talked with uh Town Council uh about you know what happens if we get there and we still only have two members um we do have a course of action it would be we'd have to uh petition the court to authorize this board to act as the Sewer Commission in the in the short term I want to be clear in the very short term uh but we're certainly hopeful that uh folks um uh get a chance to read those letters from the office of the Town manager and uh perhaps uh um step forward for the Sewer Commission itself uh for the balance uh we have the agricultural commission and um you know if uh if you're interested in that um and you uh uh are attending their um October event find one of the commission members and chat with them uh the architectural preservation District commission uh Board of Health conservation commission cultural councils um green communities historical commission uh open space Personnel committee uh remains um bereft of any membership at this point uh the Sewer Commission which I've just spoken to the storm water task force uh the zoning board of appeals and I have made a note uh to talk with um uh Brian and some others about the master plan uh steering committee 15 members is is quite a bit we do have that vacancy so I want to revisit that um I think you know when Chris comes in that would really be a a a prime meeting for him to start and kick off with um and again if anyone out there has any questions give the office a call send me an email be happy to chat with you one onone um now despite having made some real good progress on some of the uh employment positions we remain with the seasonal Cemetery labor administrative assessing assistant uh assistant sewer business manager network administrator um we have narrowed down a group of uh I believe four folks to interview and Julie's in the process of doing that and we'll want to include uh some users uh in that as well um and my understanding from the chief is uh that he anticipates uh submitting the name of a public safety desk clerk later this week um now uh with respect to current bidding activity uh the roof on the adult Activity Center came in um over bid by about 5k and uh we would probably want to make sure we have another 5K for contingency uh awarding a contract especially on a roof uh without any contingency in hand is is simply something I don't think we we want to do uh historic property survey uh bids are due in September 12th uh something uh of keen interest to me of course is the the town manager recruitment Services those bids are due this Thursday we can hopefully have them under contract next week uh in time I'm not sure when your next um screening committee meeting is is it the 11th ises that I don't off the top of my head I can look it up while while you're well we hope to have uh you know that contract done and and that party in front of you by your next your next meeting um we're in the process of uh finalize the contract at Marshall Park um and the municipal building Design Services um that 250k Julie got a draft template off to them there has been quite an influx of um scopes of work related to the arpa projects um and uh Julie's hard at work trying to get those pushed out uh I want to update Manager just to fill in that information so the town manager screening committee is due to meet Wednesday September 11th we we hope to have the contract done like Monday Tuesday and have that party in front of you that that's why we put it on the Wednesday y [Music] yep um I do want to update you on the uh special town meeting we at this point have only eight warrant articles we have two for revolving funds one to result resolve the uh Parks revolving fund uh issue that's been hanging um for a bit now is my understanding uh also uh one for the Council on Aging meals program currently as those payments are made they we need to do a better job of accounting for them in accord with statute uh the schools the uh 32,000 that extra Chapter 70 money uh you directed me to put on the the warrant um we do have a uh subsidized ridership program in town you may not be fully aware of it uh we're giving about 400 rides a month to 70 Unique Individuals those are subsidized uh the Riders do pay something towards it um and I'm have reached out to uh Evan Waters with the finance committee because if we did fund it at the town meeting we still have to bridge that Gap and so I'm trying to work through with Evan how he might want to see us do that these rides is this through Mart yes um and they go up to 20 miles okay I I know which one I just wanted to make sure which one we were talking about yes it that that's exactly it um the the pricing would go up a little bit um I push down what they proposed because this will be a a shock to not a shock but it's it's an increase for everybody and some of these folks are using this to get to work so to tell them we're going to charge them more to get to work so I Tred to keep it down so we could have a reasonable balance between what they had to pay and what the town needed to come up with um uh we will most likely be bringing you some amendments to the Personnel bylaw um it was it was great to hear from Logan I'm certainly hopeful that he uh brings those same ideas to the two listening sessions we've set up one down at the public safety building uh for uh Public Safety employees police fire the dispatch you know the clerks that are there anybody that works in that building uh and then what here uh at town hall for the others uh We've also um told them you know if you're not the kind of person that likes to stand up and speaks in public or you're just not comfortable send me an email I'll talk with them um and we'll do that I did do the interview the exit interview last week that I told you I was going to sit in on and and that was very productive um uh also in addition to some uh things with respect to the Personnel bylaw uh we may have to have a few budget adjustments you budgeted $3,000 for salary for the sealer of weights and measures you don't have and aren't going to get a sealer of weights and inspector of weights and measures I'm showing my age uh when I say sealers so we have that proposal from the the state so again I reached out to Evan saying you know how do you want to do this do you want to bridge this with a transfer do you want to wait till you know so we might have a few things like there uh beyond that I truthfully have been trying to discourage anybody looking for money uh at the fall town meeting cuz I I think we dodged a big bullet with the trash and I would just feel a lot more comfortable if we could keep the budget intact moving forward and are the tax is is the assessor department on track for getting it certified by that time um I I can tell you better after tomorrow um I had asked for the end of September or excuse me the end of August um based upon an email I saw the other day I think we're looking more like the middle of September um and Izzy uh myen you may recall had covid for a while uh but the reconciliations are looking good uh Izzy spoke in terms of having the trial balance uh by the middle of September so I'm comfortable at this point that we should be able to know what our free cash is uh and our Levy capacities uh by um October 1 to October 15 thank you um just so you'll know I'll be in the office next Tuesday Wednesday in the afternoon I have a commitment in the morning uh Thursday and then I'll be here Friday morning um as well to get my time in with you um and I do just want to go back and follow up on Mr Alonzo's comment uh the weight uh of the municipal solid waste and your chair has learned that mssw is Municipal Solid Waste uh he'd what the heck is that stuff uh your DPW director former town uh manager and assistant Town manager really carried the bulk of the weight on that process and I want to add to your comments thoughts to them for the work they did and that is all I have for you unless there are some questions I just have a request Mr chair through you to the interum town manager if we can that report I I I don't know if you did you email that what you just gave it's in the it should be in the drive ah weekly report sorry I didn't scroll all the way down never mind okay I'm I'm still trying to get in the path of you know getting all the right documents to you as one single package in out I'm just I'm I I need to be better synchronized I'm just learning your ways yep no worries any other questions for Carter all right thank you very much moving on to Old business so the first thing we have is arpa so I'm actually going to pass this back to you Carter if you can uh do you want to start by going through committed funds and providing up so uh as soon as we got your decisions we sent out to all the boards and uh nonprofits and committees you know here's here's the money tell us what's going on uh so the first thing that we did double check um the finance director informs me that the sewer Department's request for it assistance is not needed so that can flow back to your bottom line and that was around $6 $200 if I recall uh which will bring your uncommitted funds up to around7 $500 now um the flip side of that is that the Council on Aging uh informed me that their final estimate was actually about $500 above where they were so what I've uh asked you to do in the memorandum I gave you was to take the money from the sewers push it to the bottom line um and the $22,000 um I yes ma'am I I'm I'm only I'm only working with the materials I'm sent uh the $2,000 estimate on the sun sales was off by a factor of 25 to 30 so we scrub that one completely uh take care of the Council on to 30 times yes sir 50 to $60,000 that's uh what exactly what they're looking to do it's it's it's a what I would call one of the biggest orders of magnitude error I think I've ever seen but well it's that or the air condition is for the school which also came in at 7even 17th uh the the request was 17th of what the actual proposal was or something it was for um just the shades for um The Patio where the how I mean just a fabric sh know doesn't make sense to me but I'm missing something I'm I'm missing something I told them it's sewn with gold thread um you may well be right um but um I'm just pushing for trying to get money spent yeah totally so what I'm suggesting is that we give the Council on Aging that extra $500 494 I can't remember it's in the memo and we push that down to the bottom line as well uh which will give you something on the order at that point um of around 8 no excuse me not around $9,000 I don't have the exact numbers uh so FYI the thing about the um why the Council on Aging cost was more expensive for the kiosk and the chairs it was just because we weren't accounting for fees shipping and tax Etc um so if we're talking about reprogramming now if you open up the spreadsheet final updated median arpa with September 3rd reprogramming um all of this is um summarized I think pretty succinctly uh in Red so you'll see under amount allocated I highlighted red what we would potentially be changing tonight right so Council on Aging uh s shades it's now $0 in red right instead of 2,000 um for the kiosk and the chairs for Council on Aging I actually just combined them into one request and I did this because I saw um the quote and they're going to order it together as one anyway uh so I thought it would be easier to just put that number there in one request so that's kiosk and Adder onac chairs with updated number uh and then the Sewer Commission consultant uh fees for munus you'll see that's zero the actual dollar amount for that was uh 6,413 and then uh just going based off of uh our algorithm that we've discussed previously um the total amount of unallocated funds going down the prioritized list until we find the next one that we can fund that will give us um $7,500 for the lunenberg Historical Society tree removal so if that is what we want to do for the reprogramming tonight it seems to be the most straightforward option to me Mr chair if I may so I'm not against any of these uh I I don't I can certainly be puzzled like many of us well how we can put in a proposal for money and then be off by you know orders of magnitude beyond that but that being said I'm fine with this I want to add that although it was not added and I don't know if that group was approached or not but when we heard from Miss gilr tonight I'd like to put that 122 $1,200 is nothing in the scheme of things I think that that website and the energy that that group has will will more than pay for the $1,200 to get people into town and I'd like to keep that on get that on the list somehow so we did rank um requests from the lunber association um but uh like you said it was not included or like Josie said um it was not included um I do want to be the voice of caution and and I'll I'll say what the exception is for this case in a second but we shouldn't just be accepting new requests after we went through this process and we created this list but something that I thought about after we were talking to Josie we just like we pulled the um village of FL Hills out because we had that quote unquote gentleman's agreement we sort of said yeah we'll fund this without actually committing to it we did the same with Josie too if I remember correctly I remember we had that meeting with her and we all sort of vot voiced um you know support for it so I want to be clear in my consy I'm not asking that we do that yeah I'm asking that this that that 1200 not get lost and I don't I don't know where we can come from but we should find a place to do that yeah I agree whole a big amount and I'm sure it's in the budget someplace yeah and whether it there may very well be space for it with our oh sorry I didn't see I mean if it's if it's the will of the board to find that money we've got a couple possibilities frankly I would probably suggest arpa as the last because you got to get five other towns to buy in yet um and if you program the 7500 you're still going to have a little bit there right now and quite frankly these numbers are going to move around over the next hopefully only few weeks uh but we can look within our own budget uh I can add it to my list of items to talk with the chair of the finance committee we can look to the fall town meeting I think there's ways to get it done and in the end it may in fact be the arpa money if but um just to understand if there's a direction from the board that I find those dollars somewhere that would be helpful to me I'm a drop hole I'm certainly I I said it out loud I am certainly for it right so as I yeah and I want to be clear because the consistency I am not trying to make anything jump I I I want that to be absolutely clear because I'm a stickler for things like that but I don't want the money to I don't want her request to go unnoticed they put in a lot of work and that kind of energy needs to to be perpetuated especially at that lower cost I just like to feel comfortable that I'm working at the direction and will of the board um and not misinterpreting a comment of one or two members that's fair all right so what do we want to do in terms of arpa allocations tonight do we want to do what I presented I think what you presented makes sense yeah I'm fine with are we confident in the other the cost of everything else on here we're not going to have another fivefold difference or something that's going to wipe out that preal that's something I want to bring up too like a lot of these if I'm not going to name names but if you go down you know you see some that have exact numbers and you're like okay those are the ones that have the quotes then you see some that are like very obviously estimates you know maybe there's an update maybe they have received an estimate at some point so I did want to ask Carter like are we like in constant communication with these people like um or departments Etc organizations further down the list that um have subed these requests to see if there's updates we we've told them all to buy a bottle of their favorite headache medicine cuz I was going to be a pain so um it'll be on the staff meeting again tomorrow we will be tracking this um on at least a bi-weekly basis a number of these things uh we have got to get firm bids on there so no I'm not comfortable to 100% the other wild card uh is for instance the the money for the Historical Society uh is it subject to the Massachusetts prevailing wage rates statute I don't believe it is I've had a discussion with Town Council about uh the precedent that's established in the community preservation act that says when you take money by the town and you give it to a nonprofit for these kinds of construction related activities it is not subject um Adam seemed to be uh somewhat in agreement but like all good lawyers wanted a chance to take a squint at that decision and give me a firm uh result so I think that if um you do what you're contemplating tonight and that's as far as we go that in two weeks I'll have a better handle on it and that's the best answer I can give you I'm in agreement or do we wait the two weeks to get for instead of having put something on only to have to pull it off because well yeah cuz once we get to October that's going to be our time to review everything and potentially start doing that so that could be around the corner anyway we we also have a few things uh that are fungible so for instance the 25k on the trees if you discovered you needed 2500 those are going to be hourly rates okay that DPW does so we can say Bill sorry but you got to hold it down to 225 I'm just using that as okay uh but we have some some leeway here um and we have some funds that haven't got out for proposals yet you know the the municipal building committee that's a big nut I I don't know if that's the real number yet well to me I we hav't dropped dead the last meeting of this month so the last meeting of this month I am I think we've talked about it if there's no movement on that I will bring up a motion to remove to resend that and distribute it elsewhere they did we did talk about this you're right but I do remember that like Jeffrey said that with conversations with Julie they're confident including Julie who I kind of tressed with like procurement that they can have someone um for like mid October have to have the bid and to have it selected and they think it could be fulfilled the committee hasn't even met to approve the RFP and I I I know and I and there's none on there's none on the calendar through the end of the month so far they're organizing a meeting supposedly for next week so I'm this is an important project so like I'm willing been an important project for I know you know there's not been a meeting since last November am I saying I'm not willing to pull those funds no absolutely not but I do want to see at least an effort made sure here so that's where I'm at well I think some members have been you know harping on this for at least i' say two months that's probably liberal for we've been saying when are we seeing any progress on this thought we started this two months ago and we're here two months and they haven't even had a meeting so again I I'm not I'm not as confident as other people but again as I said uh come the end of the month that's the motion I'm going to make it may fail it may not one issue I'd like to bring up and that was raised by a member of the apdc which is a serious issue the pre prior Town manager had put in the replacement of the Wind windows at the Ritter that was a contentious issue that went through multiple uh apdc meetings and after months and months finally they approved it it went out to bid once I think and it came in with inadequate funding at that point and the member of the apdc in his email to me said this is an envelope issue that the windows that need to be replaced are severely uh you know rotted and damaged and why aren't we re why isn't the facilities director rebidding that so I think he makes a good point that we should look at what does that need to be and if we have money that is something that should be preempted because that's a project that already got approved that we don't have the money for because the money got approved so early on that when we rebid it we didn't it was not enough so that building needs to be protected we have have done a very bad job at protecting other buildings TC Paso is notable among them this building and the Ritter we have to take care of so I am in concurrence with that member of the apdc and we should look if there is money we should look at that and we should have the facilities director you know shop putting together something sooner or later we're going to need to get that done and if we can use money that may come back and I say may uh it would be good to have that ready to go M again if I may Mr chair um I'm not sure the gentleman you're speaking of I got an email from someone who she remain nameless uh around some of those themes yep um and I met with the director of facilities last week on TC pasos um I asked him to bring in the floor plans and some yellow Trace paper and talk about his ideas for how we can maybe set segment it so it it can be managed better given the roof and some of the other issues uh and I've asked Chris to bring me what the capital projects were um the MoneyWise what the projects were and we'll you know it'll be an afternoon of building chat but um I I understand what you're saying and it is it's it's on the tick list to try to get done frankly I suspect given some other things and the loss of yesterday it'll probably be mid to late next week before we can have that kind of in-depth conversation I just want and for your uh background information this was a very heated exchange between the select board and the apdc uh who didn't want to initially approve our request they kicked it back to us because they wanted to make sure that the replacement windows were're we preserving the historical look of the building so there was a whole back of forth and we press that this is an important issue that needs to be done for energy conservation for building conservation they on their in one of their further meetings you know acquiesced and agreed with us but now it's just been almost a year since and they're looking at it like well everybody was so hot to trot on this and now we're not going anywhere and the windows aren't getting any better so we we we have a few more icebergs than I thought there might be but we're doing our best Mr on so no no I I I just I'm providing you background information to it uh that is on our list and and I like I said it probably be a week before we can really do that in-depth look see yep all right cool good conversation uh but I forget where we left off in terms of uh actual reprogramming these requests are we okay with doing uh what I have in red here what's been suggested and then uh funding the the tree removal for the Historical Society since that's the next one I am in favor of it yes yes if you would like I'd make a motion okay uh I would ask in addition to this chart just to make it easier can can we put a column in the front the left hand side that as numbers so we can you know identify a yeah it is hard to find yeah all right so I would I mean I'll just notify I'll just read out the five changes so I I move that we make the following changes to our oper distribution as follows counts on Aging uh s shades for the backyard patio will be reduced from $2,000 to zero the couns on Aging kiosk and adarand de chairs will be modified from $3,495 9885 to $534 one second can I just cut you off right there um can you specify cuz I combine those two can so can you say um 4 3,000 whatever for the kiosk and Adder on deck chair and then go down a couple where I cross it off 1,000 for the two Adder on Jack chairs and then say total for both of those two things oh well I was going to get to the ader on Jack chairs I mean okay okay fine never mind sorry to interrupt your no no anything read I was just going to read getting it all right go ahead uh that for the Sewer Commission their consultant services from Unice uh are not needed they were included in another uh arpa Grant or funding so the $6,400 uh $ 6,413 is being reduced to zero uh the next on the list that is of available funding that has been freed up the lunberg Historical Society tree removal will be funded at the full $7,500 and the Council on Aging as a separate line item had two Adder on Deck rocking chairs which was included as the chair has already stated in the kiosk and adarand de chair so that uh separate funding of $17.70 will be reduced to zero those are the five changes that will be made second all right thank you very much any additional discussion those in favor say I I those oppos no the motion passes unanimously all right thank you very much anything else we want to talk about on arpa for tonight all right cool moving on draft Financial policy manual is there an update on this both items two and three are being held I told you that I would spool items out one at a time um I've spoken with two of the members on the item that's in front of you um I've uh arranged some time or tenative times with Miss M Mr Alonzo and um I'll get Amanda's phone number and chat with her about a time when I've finished those discussions then we'll get the next document out okay any questions on that and uh board and committee handbook uh same same same situation yep cool all right up next uh fiscal year 25 select board goals so I put together a draft that uh is at least a starting point so I'll just go ahead and open it this is like at least where uh my thoughts are at and obviously we can modify it add new things remove things Etc all right goal number one conduct long-term budget analysis that balances the need to deliver quality services to Residents and the various Financial challenges the town and residents experience through the creation of a multi-board budget task force objective One review operating budget and receive a report in time for consideration during the budget process objective two research potential Revenue sources to decrease Reliance on property taxes objective three conduct analysis on long-term growth in the cost of services such as health insurance Municipal Solid Waste and Recycling and school transportation objective Four review Financial policies and enhance the town's financial position objective five ensure arpa funds are appropriately allocated and under contract by the end of the year goal number two Implement changes to improve the quality of the town as an employer addressing the issues of recruitment retention and overall work environment objective one conduct listening sessions and Implement changes in policy and operating practices as applicable objective two Implement in annual climate survey policy for regular feedback on employee satisfaction and Implement changes in policy and operating practices as applicable objective three ensure the town has a functioning Erp enterprise resource planning software so that would be munice an example that meets the needs of the organization and assists the town manager in efforts to mitigate and resolve related issues objective four identify and bring forward to town meeting any Personnel related warrant articles in the absence of a Personnel committee and then goal number three continue to address the needs of our aging municipal buildings by finalizing a long-term Municipal Building plan objective one continue meetings of the municipal building design committee as necessary to ensure the allocated funds is under contract and the work is completed and objective two bring forward to annual town meeting any reports or warrant articles as applicable so I know it's a lot um what do you guys think well you want to start I don't know I will say that goal number one and certainly goal number one and goal number three are already covered by committees that this board has already established well well I I hear what you're saying but I don't fully agree with that because part of it is that they are bringing information back to us for us to consider yeah but that's the goal of those particular committees I think those committees I just I just want to add I've done a lot of research on what other towns and select boards are creating for their goals and I generally do think we do things a little weird with our goal establishment those are multiboard task forces that we create because we want to see either a study we want to see work done uh you know this board does have the authority to delegate and that can be one of our goals it doesn't feel right to me I mean I think the only thing with Goal number one is objective five the arpa funds um goal number two so you don't think that we should take into consideration anything the budget task force has to say no just the opposite what if I was going to paraphrase if I was going to paraphrase I would say objective one through four are the direct those are the direct goals of the budget task force so if I was going to paraphrase this whole goal it would be like make sure the budget task force does their job like that's what we're saying yeah I kind of saw this coming I'm not going to lie because I've I've recognized the pattern of how lunenberg creates Lio goals and I've also looked at other communi and I don't know there's I'm not saying we have to do something different but I wanted to add a lot to it with the recognition that we would take away from it um do you guys want to add anything to it I I mean what are we talking about goal on I mean because I think goal number two is you know mostly Town manager and HR director related goals um except for maybe objective four in the absence of a Personnel committee um well I actually disagree with that so one can I can I go on and finish thank you um and goal number three is is are the goals of a municipal building design committee that's been a long-standing committee I don't I don't think this board should be like the boss of other that doesn't sit right with me I think it's up to to those individual committees and whatnot to have their own goals all right so what would you like to I think the one goal that's that's missing is um hire a town manager yep I completely agree with that I had that but then I was like well to go back to what s Alonzo said there's some things that we kind of just do right doesn't need to be a goal well I think that's going to happen regardless of whether we set it as a goal or not I think it's it's so obvious I think not having it listed as a goal it's such an important objective of this year um I think not having it is is um a glaring absence mhm um Can anyone provide some history for me on how goals are normally set by this board I mean do we talk about them we have any last year it's um yes did IDE right so it's a collaborative process um historically the board just sort of puts everything together that we're all sort of thinking and then we refine it to about three goals and then those goals are broken down into like sub objectives uh that are achievable so could we looking at this this would be what what you've brought forward as your goals so maybe we could propose that we all put some time into putting together our own goals and come back and put it on a further meeting yeah of course mhm I mean we definitely can't finalize it anyway we don't have all our members here tonight but at least like when I think about like priorities facing the town right now right number one is budget number two is Staffing number three buildings and that can be debatable sure but like those are like top three issues right there they are but some of it's out of the jurisdiction of the select board and we have to respect our boundaries like what some of these Personnel the municipal building uh design committee I mean the the listening sessions that the town manager and HR Director are doing those for no but it's on us to implement policies that come out of the results of those things I'm just saying hey like we're recognize we recognize that this is something that's going on it's going to be a priority to pay attention and if there's anything that comes out of that that we can Implement as a policy change we're we should at least consider it two goal number two is the one I have the least objection to MH I don't know that I have any I think the wording of it needs to be clear because because the town charer clearly says we can't be in involved in day-to-day operations So when you say Implement changes that's an action word not recommend changes or work with the town manager and the HR Director to improve the quality like that's a wording we have to make sure that we're going through the right channels because we certainly don't have the ability to bartter to implement these on our own or conduct listening sessions it's not we're not the ones conducting them we can change the wording on that but like what I was Focus on is like implementing changes in policy as applicable that's totally our role as a select board but it's not our role to conduct listening sessions oh I'm supportive of these goals as the town um but I would personally just like some more time to go over and look at you know how how this board has done it previously and and do some more research like you did and to some other boards um and maybe you know coming up with my own ideas too but I do appreciate you you bringing it back up cuz it sounds like we didn't have goals last year we discussed them I I don't actually remember I guess we didn't finalize them or something we didn't they were never established last year we got to like this phase and then they disappeared yeah well I mean so I'm glad we're here and we're talking about them what I what what to me a selectman goal and this is my own personal perspective is something that we actively have to pursue we have to do the work to do MH and if doing the work of number one and number two means reviewing the work of another committee that's not really a goal that means our goal is completely tied to the success or failure of the committee itself and that's to me we don't have real control over that goal so that's not something we actively work to do number two I can see with again just with some minor rewarding about how it would be channeled i' say we meet with the town manager and we meet with the HR Director and discuss that's who the listening session should be they should have a listening session with the employees is a bad idea for the select board to have an open meeting with employees I just not when I hear lessoning sessions yeah I can understand how you're interpreting what I wrote that way right so that's why like that's why I said I'm not against those it's just the wording the other two I I don't think from my perspective as what I said so so what would you propose that we have for goal number two or three and what I think about I have not really thought about it to be very honest yeah okay I mean the munus issue is a a big it's number one on on the list I made at the start of the year um yep that's under and the town manager I think is I think it's so obvious if it wasn't there it's so obvious that's why I didn't put it there but you could argue the counter the flip side of that is it's so obvious why isn't it there you're not even putting something that is one of the most important things things that the select board does because I specifically remember we had a conversation about this last year when we I guess failed to established goals but nonetheless discussed it that we did say that just because we are going to do something in the year does not mean it should be a goal I specifically remember that so I thought that if anything falls under that category it would be hiring a new town manager but I think the importance of that elevates it to it's a it's a different thing then uh we're going to you know I don't know put a warrant for something you know for annual town meeting um yeah I think it's I think it's too important to ignore but that's just me all right so if everyone can uh you know give some thought into what you all would like to propose then we can revisit this um and also just say like to clarify what I was saying I noticed the difference in select board goals setting from lunenberg and other communities where I guess other communities other select board set their goals in terms of the town as a community I guess we like to focus our specifically on this board even if it doesn't have to do with collaboration with other boards Etc so I can understand the distinction there Mr chair if you may um you know my lens is small in terms of knowing what go other other select boards do um but in you know the town of I'm working in now um their select board sets goals that are more Town specific um but I do know that the town manager there as well as the staff look at their goals directly and how what they can do in their day-to-day operations to directly support the select board's overall goals so that seems to be a different approach than how we right we do things here and that's why I was saying I'd like to do some more research in terms of you know what we have done historically and and maybe what we might want to do yeah totally to answer one of your questions about what I would think I did write something down from the opening comments the public comments so one of the things and I I brought this up to the prior Town manager on on several occasions and actually some department heads and that is what the gentleman said about institutional knowledge being centered in a person instead of external to the person that is critical and we need to write down how things work so that if we get if a whole department gets ill with you know some covid or some other terrible thing or something happens or key people leave on mass that anybody who comes in has a Playbook to say okay this is what we do instead of oh my God I have to invent this from the beginning so so that would be one goal I think we need to have there should be an operation for every role yep an sop for every role in this town outside the school which has their own procedures and policies ever but anybody in town you know I know the police in the fire have Sops for their for employees so really it's town hall and DPW because as an extension of town hall land use they all should have standard operating procedures for this is how you do a building permit this is how you do this I mean just so we know yep I like it all right any other discussion on this tonight all right moving on to current business so we um covered this already uh so we don't need to do that one uh reprogramming of arpa funds we um between Carter and I we tried to separate out action items uh potential votes from discussions to list them all out uh and I think makes sense but we sort of covered it earlier under old business so we just did the votes then so whatever um discussion on flath Hill Road speed limit is there anything we want to say about this uh we have not heard from the DPW director uh so he is probably still conducting his field work and research all right nothing added may I ask what the question is with respect to that my understanding was uh that a speed study had been done um and I've heard uh you know comments from the police Chiefs that I guess you got some sort of bridge on there that's being replaced the chief thought it would be appropriate to wait until that is done I've heard this idea of perhaps taking the measurements in different locations if I could understand the issue a little bit better we might be able to I might be able to help move it along a little bit have you seen the actual petition of What the residents were looking for I have you have okay um so I guess I don't understand so Bill in particular is looking at places where he could install advisory speed limits and more signage and he's also condu in um field workor specifically to determine whether or not it would be a good idea to add a four-way stop sign at the intersection that was requested but I don't know if that answers your question we can get it it does we can get to the answers on that right depends upon whether or not you're going to apply the the basic standards the 85th percentile is it going to meet warrants or are you just putting a sign up CU you want people to to appreciate that there's a sign there right I mean there are processes laid out in the uniform right man that that has been that is the open question and every everything so far that has come back from the people who apply those standards has been that it doesn't meet warrant the criteria that would warrant the lowering of the speed limit since we are actually having this discussion I I will share uh something uh that is really informing my opinion on this uh so I have been driving around town a lot and going on roads I don't normally go on looking at the speed limit driving the speed limit and literally the day after it was on a Wednesday the day after our last Sight board meeting I was driving on Arbor Road the speed limit as posted there as 30 and the person behind me passed me and they did so while there was a pedestrian walking a dog right in front of us so I was going the speed limit and then this person like just took off was going probably like not that fast but definitely 40s 50s so the real concern and by the way last time we discussed this I said that this is State guidance I looked further it's state guidance but it's actual Federal guidance about the 85th percentile the reason why you follow the 85th percentile when you're setting speed limits is because if it's too low then drivers who drive fast are going to be really aggravated with people who drive the speed limit and it makes the road even more dangerous because now all of a sudden instead of people driving 40 mph but it's safe you know just driving down the road there might be a road rage incident which is going to be so much more dangerous to Residents so I think we need to be very judicious with this um that's where I'm at you know at first I was sort of in favor of it I looked it up I was like well maybe I could go either ways then I saw that happen and I was like all right that is exactly what we need to avoid because it's possible for us to make the situation even worse right which I hope that people fully understand I I agree with you Mr J I speak it has long been the understanding from what I've read is that speed differential is what causes problems it is right and you and you are very clear and I agree with what you're what you just explained the first thing that's going to happen is if you reduce the speed is that you're not people are not going to not go what they go on that road you're just going to have more people breaking the law and then people will say well then there's no police car here enforcing it so then they want more policing there because you have to understand people's driving behavior you know if you drive along you know some World roads it's it's a common it's almost a joke that you on in Road you know in Vermont or New Hampshire if you're running back roads the speed limit changes four times in like six miles because every time you go into a town it's something else you can't drive like nobody can drive like that you really need to keep it as constant and that's why we have the standards that's why we have professionals reviewing the standards and I have said publicly I'm looking to The Experts to tell me with the data does it reach that Mark yeah so I I what can we bring you that would help bring this matter to resolution so Bill in an email to us said that he was going to conduct fieldwork to see exactly where signage could be installed where that it can be effective um so that I think is the real alternative here that can actually be helpful um so whenever that's there you know that I will seriously consider cuz I think I don't think we were talking about lowering speed signs it was just advisory signs and as I said I'm perfectly fine with putting Adis signs I am not okay with the data that I was given and the and the analysis given by the professionals that we should lower the speed limit I I agree I'll bring this up at the staff meeting all right uh tomorrow morning and bring you a report next Tuesday evening cool if that's agreeable it is that'd be great any more discussion on this tonight all right minutes we have minutes from November 7th 2023 I was not here for this meeting so I will be abstaining and so will you so it look like that isn't a u majority to vote on it so never mind so if I can Mr chairman yeah absence from a meeting uh particularly around election time does not mean you can't vote on minutes I understand um it's sort of our little tradition that we have um whether or not we need to stick to it I'm you know not strongly opinion make sure you're aware of the statute that's all yeah understood thank you for pointing that out I did actually I was a little frustrated with that when I first got on the board because I was like well I watched these meetings I read them I could vote on it it's come up it's come AC it's come up enough that I'm perfectly fine if we want to just publicly say that we should dispel that I mean that's fine I you know I think we can cuz I'm I'm going to be honest when I first came on as a select board member and you know someone told me hey like you should obain from this vote it did actually kind of bother me it did I mean in a way in a way the ition makes sense because you're approving what happened at the meeting and if you weren't at the meeting how are you approving that know so it has some basis although it may not be a legal basis it makes logical basis especially when things weren't recorded I'm sure now we have them recorded so people can review them and everything but but do you honestly remember what happened November 7th of last year are you going to go back and watch the recording well the fact that the fact that we're going fact are so backl the backlog is is aside is aside the point it should not be the norm and we should try to get away from this yeah for sure I have no problem with you know as long as we all watch the meetings to doing that I would still abstain since I wasn't even on the board at that time I feel like that you're not on the board yeah I'm not going to vote on a meeting I wasn't even I'm comfortable I remember this specific time period too so I'm comfortable voting on it as well so is there a motion I move to approve the minutes from the November 7 20 23 select board meeting second any additional discussion those in favor say I I I I those oppos no extensions I the motion passes 3 0 to one all right warrant uh I believe this will be the last warrants payable I can't sign um see that one that that one is more of a tradition that I don't understand like saying not by having the the conf of Interest people tell you that you shouldn't pay you shouldn't sign these because your mom is on the payroll it's like you're not approving her hours you're just approving her getting paid like her supervisor already approved the hours it's kind of a weird we have um accounts payable warrant in the amount of $442,000 15.93% while we pass that down are there any action items I have just one question none if I may through you Mr chair to the in drum toown manager um just a question about the listening sessions the what the listening sessions thank you so much for doing that I think it's great that you know you're listening to our concerns and moving forward on that um have those has those sessions been communicated to the employees yet uh it's in the employee newsletter and my understanding is if it didn't go out this morning um it' be going out tomorrow morning to a um the broadcast network that you had I've also asked uh the finance director uh you get paid and you get this lovely you know your pay stub is ready and you put in um in some programs I've worked with we can also have other messages for people so yes by the end of this week they'll all have gone out at least once and we'll remind okay the staff meetings too you could have the department heads bring it back to their staff too just absolutely cuz I know some people don't always check their emails or see those things so having that word of mouth communication absolutely sure great too we'll get the word out as best we can awesome thank you these these are not mandatory sessions these are voluntary sessions absolutely just want people to know that they're there and we need to let people know we're listening we'll do what we can this is not a private Corporation where you can just snap your fingers and a suggestion does not necessarily mean an action that satisfies the person with the suggestion but certainly I think you know in the short time I've been with you we've shown a willingness to try to uh listen to all the sides and and accommodate to the extent that we can while respecting the charter yep are there any other action items committee reports school committee meets tomorrow as I said earlier Town manager screening commission meets next Wednesday and both of the Committees that I report to Josie gave great updates on today great Point um Council on Aging hasn't met uh the planning board met last Monday um the storm water permit for 255 Sunny Hill Road which has been in consideration for what it feels like almost a year now um they finally voted on it and they voted 220 so it was split so there was neither an approval nor a um um denial so they had to talk to Town Council a bit and I got this update um earlier today um and the advice that they got effectively obviously is that it is denied so they're um collecting reasons for why it was denied from the members who voted that way so that they can provide that to the applicant so that they could apply again uh which I thought was very interesting um and they also discussed the uh water protection bylaw um warrant article and they uh approved draft language at that meeting all right upcoming meetings next Tuesday September 10th and then the following Tuesday September 17th public comment is there any public a comment from the interim Town manager I'm pleased to report that during the course of this meeting I have an email from someone that would like to talk to me about the Sewer Commission excellent oh that's awesome there's a long ways there between you know that and swearing them in uh but I do hope that anyone in the sewer district who has received that letter should they have any questions whatsoever do please reach out and um happy to chat with you either Bill some of the existing commission members myself um uh I'm sure even Paula would would help us out uh doing the best we can so um uh I'm I'm hopeful that that letter does have some impact awesome thank you very much are there any public comments from the public see all right doesn't look like uh Mr pasio has a public comment on Zoom I was waiting to see if he did any public comment from the board hearing none is there a motion to adjourn so moved second second any additional discussion those in favor say I I those oppose no it is 9:22 p.m. and the select board is adjourned thank you very much for tuning in tonight and we will