it's Wednesday July 10th 2024 and I will call the finance committee meeting to order at 7 o' in the room we have from the finance committee de Mike BR pet Twi Andy Oldman Clayton we also have an attendance and Harrison from the select board Chuck director DPW in G School t that we go to the year budget stuff we have to do first get in trouble so the first item on the agenda is to approve FY 24 fincom Reserve transfers and does everyone have the spreadsheet that Andria sent out it looks like we have nine transfers which is up an entire 0,000 budget so the first one is Police Department overtime of 18,000 [Music] 700 the second is fire salary overtime of 43780 and that's in addition to overtime that was approved at town meeting that was, and then d w s Cola adjustment that's coming out of sum Reserve but 11,700 is for overtime the sumary TS so we started tracking that last summer because there's just a lot of burials that are all coming in on over time on Saturdays and Sundays you control those can you yeah so just had out of the norm so we started tracking it and that Wasing okay the next is selectman expenses down reports AG professional Serv andage on newes and notices and then the next item is tax Le expenses and finally electricity no not electricity and higher rates less credits and then we go down to Harbor throat repairs and safe boat boat fuel consumption then water expenses equipment and materials and then chemicals waste at the water treatment plant electricity walking 75 grand so do people have questions discussions on these various items I I got a question about those fire yeah well that's let's just round 44,000 right OT yeah but that's that's like that's above and beyond right like in other words if I'm remembering correctly there's like a regular salary budget line there a budget for OT out of gate and the list is on top of that and I think we had 30,000 in the OT budget originally because we backed it way down because we were not happy with a Fire Fire Chief and then I believe we approved 100 at time 100 Grand let me look it up because it should be in that quarterly report we just received the yearend there this is Andrea we approve the 100 hi uh we approve the 100,000 for the Legal Professional Services not for fire OT I think what you might be thinking of add to the okay so the total fire the OT would have been the 30 and the 44 okay yes the total overage or the total total OT 744 yeah so there's some initial salary budget amount which I don't actually care that's like a big number right yeah bud no no no I mean like legit normal salary like that's probably number like 600 Grand right so that number I don't care obviously we budgeted to get that right so then we budgeted 30 grand of V right we hit that and then we went 44 Grand above the third for a total of 70 how does that 75 compare to it was like 200 Grand or something P 150 plus and um I think he had overtime early right yes which was due to needing to staff up but waiting for people to get fully trained okay last last year at this time we have people in the academy Acy the Andrew have those numbers like the PRI one two three years yes [Music] and Andrea do you have information on prior year on fire over time um I do I'll just have to pull it up but it'll take me a minute okay thank you think the chief might have had the gra showing last three year average he's been very good about paying attention to overtime I feel this year more so than perhaps the last 10 years obviously the 44 jumps out and you think it's a bad thing but you put it in the right context it's actually fine and it's a good thing sounds we're doing better yeah I think we he purposly budgeted very low well part we added we added four five the but then the prior fire chief brought on par paramedics that then had to go to the fire account so they couldn't work shift I recall they couldn't work shifts at the beginning because they didn't couldn't do files in Inc count is the working to say overtime a little was it for shadowing the the ambulance in case there was another call or something something paramedic really the other time is really driven by who's who's able to do both so there's a there's a lag in getting people during that lag period that's over time the staff we've already work there are we now at the place where that we've gotone past all that correct so we're fully staff and was fully trained so he's actually for the first time long time in a very good position terms of being fly fully TR that that hasn't happened but I still think for next year's budget we should probably put like 80 grand over that's had something higher this year what do we have in this year's budget do you have the warant article no you don't it doesn't have doesn't have am initi was to cover that soar have to car well the last Chief was using overon to fully staff the shifts to staff up to four in the shift was huge and this fire chief is has a staff of four but only fills up to three if people are out over budget close to 995,000 we had got to first year so Bud okay so we went up I thought we we bu 100 came 143 no 100 for this upcoming year oh okay budgeted 30 and it came in that what we're saying is we budget at 100 and it's coming in at 140 no we budgeted at 30 and it's coming in 75 which which year you want yeah for the current year oh I'm sorry I'm thinking it's 25 30 current year we budgeted this year 24 30 came in 75 the next this year 25 budgeted 100 25 Grand I think the why can't find Public Safety oh there it is P9 budget book oh no I'm looking at the report she just sent us yeah I'd like to make a little clarification and some detail on the fire OT so we actually spent 160,000 in overtime for fire in fiscal 2024 but that was offset by regular the like additional funds that were left over in the regular fire salary line so the 70,000 is like a net and then it looks to me like in 20123 we spent 344,000 in O correct that was fun so that's why we dded 30 so Andrew what you're saying is to be totally detail specific we actually spent not 74,000 we spent in in 2024 it was 170 170 but it was some subtraction of 100 from regular salary correct I what is that well they have their actual salary over what was budgeted in fire for 2020 for was just 96,000 so down they didn't hire some people right away and somebody left yes transition period yeah transition so we fund Sal assuming everyone's going to be there every day okay that answer I'd like to ask about legal yes so can someone just give me the big picture so overall on legal last year what did we spend overall 24 yes 24 yes yes oh 295,000 according to the year end bu thank you and in 2023 we spent 23 so what do we anticipate given the transpire you know events as we go forward into 25 as we in 25 U signicant significantly lower like what would you estimate half of that half of 24 I mean I I keep getting confused yeah should be in that I mean 25 we finished the um 40b appeal violence which took a lot of time right that expensive 40 be legal drops off for fiscal 25 yes it should be pretty much nonexistent because HC is GNA be so small that's good to hear but I it's with AJC so it's dead in the water and that doesn't take a lot of ongoing Le well it's in their hands there's nothing to do they filed everything they could file yeah it's will it be a final decision at that point or will there be another round well depends who if somebody's going to lose in that decision yes and the question is whoever loses do they um file an appeal to the courts basic right and it's basically the only leg we have to stand on is if we had some shovel ready that wouldn't matter it's what was there when they filed the appliation the application yeah and we budgeted 150 or 25 Le that's what I see is that correct if I'm reading correctly I'm just trying to look forward from our past one of those areas that he has some control but not lot of control and I we're doing very well for a number of years when this two years well we had all sorts of issues with that recodification that became very expensive I look at the other way run what we can do we have we get stck in 40 GNA do right I mean with zba appeals we leave it up to property owner defendant to Court the town the appeal yeah that the town legal doesn't see I mean they represent us but they just they don't they're not proactive they're just reacting to paperwork this brought we just made that decision so we look to 25 Greg with 150 I think having been appropriated you should be under that those anticipations we should be in pretty good shape I I know I'm not ask I'm just trying to get a sense from the past what current events indicate about this year that's that's me is this out of all the legal fees in fiscal 2024 what percentage would Rel to ful more than that so then that drops then there you go okay that's what I'm driving thank you any other items under the in reserve oh um where did the salary Reserve account that that is [Music] approved special to meeting because contracts were not finalized when we had approved addition ,000 Reserve anticipation it made more sense to do that bring every line for meeting okay so if I translate your clothing sentence in your first par of your email no additional supplemental appropriation is needed that tells me that between the transfers within the various governmental areas plus the existing Reserve account balance we're covered with respect to I just want to translate that this we don't have to go before time meeting yes between all those pieces we are thank you I mean even in that case we wouldn't be in my opinion going for more money be going for approval to take C out of C right need more appropriation yes ta that's yes that's okay um legal again what is the uh the funding Health life insurance set up so the health insurance account we're basically unextended funds from the health insurance account recover y say talk about that later but give to but for example they so we are seeing a little bit of so all new hirers have to pay 35% so it was like 160 yeah can I can we appr transfers from on the casualty property what is this Mar so the so we added that the additional exens that's just like service first thing you said that's is what liability someone slips and Falls like not not why wouldn't that have come from the harbor okay let's not discuss that we're just talking about the fincom reserves and I want to make the most so we can approve the fincom reserves then we'll move on to salary reserves and then we'll move on to inter Department transfers is that okay yeah okay I'll make a motion to for $190,000 Reserve listed and the accounts listed second second any discussion V yes yes yes yes and yes okay and that was one two three four five six I have to write down the vote out okay so now we have the salary Reserve using for both Cola increases and for some additional outs corre so we didn't need all of the 50,000 for col increases and okay and the cola increase am I correct we had budgeted 2.5% for own department heads and for St and for staff but the actual percent came in was three three okay so this is the difference between the two and a half% increase and the 3% does that mean department head also got three and a half so first 24 3 50,000 was the C that ex% okay and just be sure I pretty great went from Two and a half to three and a half and the reserve was sufficient it's not sufficient to cover that increase um basic basically sufficient to cover that standard inre and then there are some additional funds used to cover the overtime ships okay that I yes yes but as to increase it was sufficient in in that self for increase and thank you and it also probably like I mean to pay the Lifeguard salaries more to higher lifeguard that's looks like appeal salary set up about 13,000 is that you anticipate that happening this coming year or is that an anomaly so we'll have a different arrangement for this coming year year that your started we have a new Arrangement not there yet we be Hing cler take care of both one of the problems I see is with the minutes that are being taken for meetings is people taking the minutes are not in the room and the audio from some people on the boards is very very so you can't really hear them so I think think it takes much longer to do minutes than it was before we went to hyri meetings and didn't have us I think the CLI should be I agree well we should speak up I mean is that solution or is that not a go speak up we ought to be a yes right yeah we're also experimenting with some AI techology for at least minutes oh yeah been having some success to P that out for everyone I mean there are some people who tend to mumble I appreciate nobody seems to complain about my voice I noticed the time I called in it was difficult to understand yeah yeah it is difficult Meetings online and it is interesting some people to don't transmit this yes it's mainly this the other oh Gils tell you Seven's worse I it it's it's extremely difficult for me to hear Greg when he's back to the speaker because the speaker in the in the C in the yeah display it's not above your head thanks very word with table vers house again okay so do I have a motion to approve the transfer from the various account numbers on and your spreadsheet in the salary Reserve account $50,000 to have that motion make a motion do I have a second second second any discussion vote yes Mike yes Peter yes yes yes and yes hey Andrew can you find me what did we make the fincom reserve number for 2025 sure it's um I believe it's 150 but let me just verify yeah is50 150 so now we get what's this so now we get to these inter departmental trans follow any questions on any of those you have more questions on please a question just mechanically we're pulling from two of these on snow and I know how much you can decrease or increase snow removals function of pass to your history proba okay yes and does this put us in place next year no it doesn't what you appropriate what you you spent this a roll average it's I I think you spent what's on here so we're taking money out to whatever ABC and if we had hit let's say we hit 100% of the snow like obviously that's not a problem either other than the fact we would have this extra cash to pull out to right the only issue my understanding is like if you start lowering that no budget number and then you start coming in above it like year after year that's that's the problem right the it's the only budget you can roll forward into the next year so the state's concerned about under budget right right exactly and being able to roll it over where there no other you can't do that with any other account right but that's the other way that would be like if we budgeted 100 and SP 200 and then we just kept doing that that's the problem that's what the state wants the Gage sure so we're able to use that because we under spent the 5ye average we spent the P but what was budgeted for 24 we didn't it's just that one we're pulling from snow we're pulling from Health Care yep that right there is how much that's over healthare was 150 yeah 15 53,000 from 200 just um 35 415 from trash so what was the U unexpected front end oh we getting a new one no not this we got back run be right now itn't much so this is saying that we don't have May and June trash bag invoices yet so that means that's going to be in the 2025 budget because she doesn't have the invoices I think she's anticipated yeah I'm estimating have inves yes she's okay so was this say we estimated collection showing up in 3541 Grand dump want charge for the dumpster collection deal I don't think I can open the right file so just What's the total amount that we came in under adding a allall and then that same amount sh to other like 265 6086 okay so we came in 265 Grand on this this and this pushing over here to places that needed it because they came in high that's right so the 26 you said Healthcare snow Cash Cash collection Sal in all all it's a lot of money although there's a new contract soon right probably up I mean glass says these accounts over here came in 265 high but then over here these just three and 265 lower so right you didn't even have to SC More Than counts well there's a few work registration now I have a question if we had um a higher 10com Reserve budget would would that money have stayed in those budgets for future years no just go to the r go Sol one big yeah but I have a motion I'll make a motion to approve grer from various departments expenses for the LED accounts 5,6 and a second any discussion take a vote D yes yes Peter yes M yes Andy yes and S yes that's why I don't see the need for a high you got you know what I mean like you'd have to have everything go wrong end up in the spot okay next item on the agenda is the CST financial review very late today I sent something out yeah I didn't have chance I'm sorry um I think we still have a few open issues with um what yeah add fire issue I think one of the issues that sir um I know that the fire chief is pushing to have more staff to cover the two in two out have four people on duty all the time yeah um and my guess without talking to him is that he would feel that would become more important once we had CST up and running with all the chical when when would that be time they're they're planning they have a construction budget through um 2027 so occupancy probably is going to be end of 27 or beginning of 28 call for yeah that's phase one that's phase one at like 203 no I'm I'm just trying to say before four years right there's nobody working because the building is that's right just conru and and in talking to the assessor um she indicated that um they would do infm assessments during the construction phase on June 30th based on the portion of the construction that's um we reviewed the forer report we felt that their revenue projections were understated we did go to CST and get their construction budget so we're able to get more accurate numbers on the actual building perit fees just some independent yeah he's a they as part of the planning board filing they were required to do a financial analysis so we had to hire an outside consultant to do that financial analysis that's CST hire yeah CST H they hired to hire this firm to present a financial analysis okay the same firm that did the they didn't have to have financial analysis so CSD hired independent right high level finantial analysis just talking about objective property tax revenue to the town and then any potential increase cost so increase Services yeah that so the the report assumed an assessed value of $217 a square foot um looking at the report that seemed to us to be a little low um it was a reasonable comparable but it was New England biolabs which is in if switch like I think Manchester's assessments said to be higher than ifp switch and I looked at the assessments for the Harbor Point office condos and those range from 300 to 400 square foet um which 40 Beach Street so they the feeling is is that their report was under stating the revenue um they added um in that sense see for it's the forer report that we're reviewing right I just they did a calculation um based on additional calls for the fire in the police department but the sense what our sense was is that the number of calls was so low that we wouldn't have to have additional Staffing so they had assumed tax revenue of 597 and expenses of 35,000 for a net pos positive fiscal impact of 562 obviously anybody can get a consultant that's going to say ABC right but at the end of the day what is the final you know arbitrator decision maker judge oh no this is just this is just giving information to the planning board no no I don't I'm just saying what I'm saying is four years down the road when let's say the thing is TI them TI it's be employees the assessor determines the assessor yes but but has tight rails or no like State I don't know I'm going to talk to her again she was talking to her um commercial person at Patriot Properties because Manchester doesn't have anything like it's it's a little harder in this case because there one off right yeah 100% agree that's why I'm trying to figure out so yeah she'll she'll reach out to we have Patriots is our Consulting for that helps with assessing she'll reach out to other should talk to I switch was the New England Biol Labs where they already are yeah high level you're saying 40 be is 30 400 square foot is that you said no I said yeah 40 Beach which is which is office condos sure but but that's 3 to 400 right this 200 right so the Sens and and they said that only 20% of the space was for the labs the rest is office space and the parking structure right so office to office Apple to Apple yeah yeah so so therefore the sense was is that the forer report understated potential Revenue it's more of a financial benefit to the town than they're reporting to kind of I think from from the applican point of view they rather understate I didn't I didn't know if it's that you know better to whatever understate overd deliver or I didn't know it's more like trying to guiding towards combination of gu that they but that end point is not going to be influenced by SAR what do we think expense our objections I know you're talking about the that is increased expenses well we talked to Chuck and um the construction of the connection to the water and sewer is covered by the $3.5 million Grant and any additional is being paid by CST so we shouldn't have an expense there the water and sewer capacity shock has indicated that it's sufficient to include the CST project the SLV project and any additional new units under the MBTA zoning plan that was submitted to the state for ref for review so it seems like we have the sufficient capacity and the way the water and sewer rates are done is to set rates select what sets the rates and their past policy has been to set rates which will cover the expenses of the water and sewer Enterprise funds so we shouldn't have additional expenses for water and sewer that are not covered by the Water and Sewer Fe so the only additional piece that we haven't really honed down on is whether the fire chief is going to want more staff we think he wants it anyway the police police no five police doesn't a bigger thing with fires they might need some training some of these hazards right the bio hazards right we might need some well that's what we have we haven't quite did come is this um this is a manufacturing process did they estimate how much water they would need 20 20,000 gallons according to them they're they're used for most water sewer is mostly the domestic issu they're not discharging any chemicals into the S system right they're not using it in their manufacturing process it's just for the employ just it's literally for the office and have a gy can I go back to the property tax side so let's just I'll use their 600 just because I want that point right but so it do turn up 600 that 600 won't start until 4 years from now well we'll get incremental pieces but that's that's where my next question is so should I think of that incremental as like a hockey stick or like straight line linear or well the the 600 is with the end of phase two I thought that was end phase one no their calculation was for end of phase two so half of it is you know fiscal year 2028 and then the other half is f year 2034 okay so you're saying 300 Grand comes on in 40 days roughly if you use their yeah yep and we might have small increment along the way so you understand my you know is it this from 0 to 300 or is like this I think it's be regular I bu perms along the way start building permits and then we go to property tax a transition their construction budget is like a couple of million 2024 9 million 2025 um I think it's 56 million in 2026 and 49 million or 49 million in 2027 those are calendar yeah I got you so we we figured that we would get um the building fees of um about 400,000 in both 2020 6 and 2027 Howry 400,000 in building feeds in each of 2026 and 2027 which would kind of be before the tax revenue really kicks in and only a few thousand in 20124 and 2025 we our commercial residential rate is the same right right which Prett low right the no I mean comp yes oh yes yes so the select board has the option each year of setting different rates for commercial resal and they haven't done it because we haven't had sure you have to whack those commercials really hard for very small savings on the residential side yeah no where I'm going is if you just take our commercial R which again is the same somewhere between 10 and 11 right yeah and you compare that to commercial rates other places around us we look correct that's all but you got to figure in the value of the land is more here so you're still paying the rate to be down because like yeah for for residential I'm with you but for commercial depends how much it's assess for square whether it's higher than the rest of the market or not I Year sorry we're in 25 smoke in that 26 I can look at four roughly $400,000 no no no in fiscal year 2026 there's between 16 and 70,000 a bil FS okay somewhere in that room plus plus some taxes that might be some taxes depending on but they not going to be very far along so it's going to be minimal because the majority of construction is hting in calendar 26 and count year 27 I don't know front you know so might we see 100,000 yeah and that's what I'm taking away yeah that's helpful that's so it's ways out yeah I understand but I was trying to go back to your you know what can we look at as being likely saying 100,000 would be LLY hit in the next fiscal year and I think the good news was they did give us a construction B budget for phase two which would be in the 2030 to 20345 well that's assuming that yeah they finish it before [Music] year 35 I don't want to jump topics because I know get slam but just we talk about how many gallons of water they're projected to you so what what bucket does that put yeah I mean it's all at this point and not so sure that they're really going we're reserving 20,000 which would put them into the highest years okay so if people can take a look at what I sent out and just let me know if you have any concerns about anything that's in there um if not then we'll go ahead and fine-tune it with additional information and then submit it to the planning board or do we want another meeting to officially approve it it's necessary meeting I I agree high level with the you know analysis saying it's probably whatever under will overd deliver better that way than right exactly and and I think that when Mory Andy and I Andy looked at the construction piece to see if the prices were reasonable the the forer report was assuming what 350 per square feet no because constru was like just 100,000 well that was what they gave us in the construction budget but the forier report I thought had more like 300 to 350 yeah so that was way understated and that's why we went to them to ask for a construction budget just to get a better sense of what we may expect yeah I guess what I'm trying to say even if it's 600 in Revenue yeah and was 30 40 and increase service cost I'd still do it pay a weekend twice on Sunday right right so good thing if the revenue comes in higher which sounds to me like should no complain that's right logic of the report was really good and if you say Okay police and fire estimated Low by factor 2x and the revenue is budgeted low because they don't want to it's still worst case it's still win the only reason I didn't care about that J report is if somehow that report guided what will be the final which I don't that's not the case so that's the reason we looked at it is because we were asked to do a peer review of it so that's what was we didn't feel we needed to go into a great amount of detail because it was clear was yep when you do that y um next item on the agenda is the launch server status update we have an update on money how it's going with expenses yeah so there 80 or 81 subscribers season even number was1 or two 72 um so from that big picture it's it's solid things have gone fairly well um in terms of the actual service been able to meet the demand it's obviously busier than it was in previous years because there's 27 more subscribers that they're able to keep up with demand um they have done a few few tours in between that's bringing in CL exra 2000 so far A little pick up with the with the one that's been fixed so I think overall it's it's it's hitting the projections and exceeding them and the service seems to be functioning well the expense side of it is within Pro or how do we have time for just yeah he's got side really not being push don't mean he was working on getting something on and and there's a note that there are there thank you and what do we charge for haror $ a person that's on that was on the sandwich board three or four days ago right then then you can V it for a half hour or something if you do I don't know I just saw the 20 bucks on two different ways you by the person by time by the time how's the General Revenue yeah just the transit Bo yeah I think it's tracking a little above last year I don't know the exact number big week last is that you had a big week last yes high for summer for that yeah from both tying up dog one dirty Grand I think he talked about about 35 or 36 last year see it's on the I got a gut feel the marble Hood gu going to copy and did you carry that Harvest stuff on the separate line I don't see it separately on the local receipts no it's all included in the fees it's all lumped in with all the other fees I don't have it separated okay on that report you have the information but not on the rep I do okay okay so maybe in the fall we can get fromand that actual same after the season was order a debrief on how long went financially operation and on the transing to just next item on the agenda is water and silver rate structure um so sorry Mary Foley do you have a question hi Mary Foley one Plasky Drive um I actually have two questions one from the discussion prior if I may ask since Chuck dam is there though I can barely hear him um my question with the cell signaling was just that you had said 20,000 gallons of water and I just asking for clarity if that includes their irrigation system I haven't seen that they're proposing an irrigation system uh the I would have told them not to bother using Town water for Iration that 20,000 is based on other facilities that they have and so it would if I assume they don't have irrigation because I know they're in damers and they're not allowed to so my guess is that's just their domestic use for the facility and the occupants okay because at the last um planning board meeting they clarified that they were going to have an irrigation system so maybe if we could get updated typically it's just to you know get the plant started once they you know finish their you know site work and all they're gonna have significant plantings but I don't think it's their intention to do it in perpetuity but I I'll follow up and ask I don't I don't know be great that's just Allin round number and then I think just because the audio is so bad um with the launch update um I thought I heard Greg say that there was 20 more subscribers and I know at town meeting the threshold was 70 so I'm just trying to get clarity on that number it's 80 we have 81 or 82 subscribers okay thank you the break even was 72 but the 20 Delta is the point of Delta is is last year versus this year so 60 up to 80 but the crold was 7 exactly right perfect thank you thanks man um so the next item on the agenda is water and sewer rate structure um it's my understanding the S Bo recently approved Water and Sewer rates based on consumption and the question is is what we feel about an additional base fee flat fee being added to cover infrastructure cost that may not be related to consumption in other words do we get all the money for water and sewer through consumption rates or to consider adding a flat fee that would give a base stream of income for cap projects and if I understand L the argument in favor of that is stability of Revenue that the major argument yeah we'll let Chuck speak to it I just wanted to set the ground so we're not talking about what rates we're just talking about Theory R part is done right so R based on how much water you can that's what the board has established what is not what is Up For Debate and further discussions whether or not we should have a capital Fe right I guess that's why I said ra I call something else Capital Fe sorry that you want to see the whole screen so I think that pretty much you know summarizes where we're trying to go uh you may recall last January we started discussing this uh both with yourselves as well as the select board uh now we're kind of in the midst of our rate setting and so the question is you know when and how much if it all that Capital fee go into effect so you know rather than you know keep jerking around with the rates the structure you know get it all done now um I put together these slides if you don't want me to go through them I don't have to do but I can do it fairly quickly um I did it both for water and sewer But as Sarah mentioned the water is really where we're looking at the capital feet the sewer uh we I haven't proposed it and it hasn't been adopted by the select board it's that was strictly the volumetric fee which does cover uh 75% of the capital which has been the standard practice in town um so these are just kind of showing these slides I'll walk through real quick are just showing you know where the money goes when we collect Revenue uh in the form right now of volumetric rates and I laid out some of the kind of shortfalls that we're having uh as well as you know where we would end up with a capital fee um so just high level water system uh you know the picture on the right is actually from our last watermate break which is you know stamped on the side of the bipe Manchester 1891 which is the year is installed which as you guys know put on the screen before uh is uh you know 80 90% of all the pipe in town this this same vintage um and then the capital projects that both have you know ongoing but also you know coming up the meter system so we're looking at a new meter uh not only the meter that you know measures the water through your pipes but also uh you know sends that signal back to the to the town or right now we're in a driveby system which reads the meter this would be upgrading that to a uh either cell or radio frequency that would broadcast it back to town hall to you know the water sewer office and there then that's how we would generate the bills but it also gives the added benefit of letting users see their usage in real time uh then we have the you know ongoing pipe rehab and Rehabilitation this year as was mentioned for CST we are relaying the pipe on forestry as well as uh sewer on Forest and Mill which doesn't have sewer right now uh and then we also approved the Pleasant Street cleaning lining which is similar to the uh School Street work that we did a couple years ago which so we're not digging up the entirety of the street it's pits along the way and then the the big one is the past coming down the uh way we are uh we got approval actually yesterday for piloting of at grav pond so that'll be a 24 we process of piloting uh and then we will go into design and construction based on the results of that piloting um piloting means what here uh we're we're sending our specific water through the different media to understand what kind of treatment we will get and we need to pick the one that obviously gives us that's what we're looking at we also inform other decisions make on the design uh afterwards that is actually being paid for out of arpa fund left over a couple years so not out of the capital on the town side or the just a quick pie chart here showing the salary operating expense uh treatment obviously the big one on the water side which include chemicals uh also the electricity those are the big ticket items also the contract offs because that the treatment plan itself we don't have Town employees we have we higher out to third party we have the appropriated Capital which is you know that's just for kind of standard upgrades along the treatment plant replacing pumps every you know when they go down or various other you know oneoff kind of worky projects that and then we have the indirect debt which is transferred from the Enterprise fund over to the general fund for uh different salaries we all we hired the clerk of the works which was split up between the separate ones also for insurance for the staff that is on the uh you know so that's that's kind of where that money moves around um and then the salary operating and expenses our water and sewer collection system distribution system and the uh Town employees that are on the Enterprise this is just the water sign um so this is just a quick revenue and expenses line chart from the last few fiscal years um I will note that the revenue is not uh perfect because we don't build according to fiscal years and the rates aren't set exactly you know there's two months in the new fiscal year one month in the old so it's just based on the preceding four quarters of Revenue when we do the Big Bly Billings um so you see you know it does kind of Bounce a little bit all over the place but the bottom line is our expenses for approved in fy2 so we just started are you know roughly 1.5 million our preceding four quarters of Revenue were 1.3 339 therefore a short we do have some retained earnings in the Enterprise fund itself so for fy2 at least we will have drawn down what was there uh to pay the bills what what will the new volumetric rates generate is that am I jumping ahead slide yeah so so we did uh recalibrate the volumetric rates we do have ti so it's not perfect cross all tiers but the lower tiers were approximately 7% to uh make up that Gap so here's that slide um you see that this is the fy4 another uh recommendation that had come out of the task force and prior meetings with the select board was to consolidate the tiers a little bit because we had six so you can see for FY 24 at least if I had Consolidated to four I would have just combine the bottom two and the top two to make it a little bit clearer and there really wasn't a big enough spread in the usage and the and the rate to see a discernable difference and what is the average home typically used where do they fall in the the average home so that's a tough one to answer I do I do have a couple examples at the end so maybe I'll come back to that one um so this is what was approved for volumetric weights in fy2 so those four you know those those bottom two the 721 and 8 are roughly you know this is going back now that 682 and that 750 are what bumped up to be these so that's approximately 7% and I have another what's in the far right column so that's the cumul so this is a progressive rate Cube so no matter who you are what your average consumption is your first 1,700 cubic feet in fy2 are going to cost you 721 and then so that 721 time 17 gets you your $122 but that if you go into the next year depending on where you're at you're going to pay 814 and if you get all the way to the top that 5700 it's the Delta between the two so 5700 minus 17 is approximately 400 cubic feet so it's 40 times 814 not the full 57 right here's the number I'm looking for and I don't know if this is going to be an off the top but I'm looking for the Delta of like you know you collected this much at the prior rates in that fiscal year and now with the new volumetric rates assuming the same water usage you're going to yeah so you can see that 1,700 this is fy4 is approximately $114 for your bill so if you use just and this will come up later but if you're a family of two and you're using a regular amount your bill is going to be $114 get this year it will be 122 so if you're a family of two that Ed the 1,700 in a corner you one up 7 and that's across every and so I don't have the slide for may require a review um so you know I'm looking for number like 100 Grand or something 50 Grand like I'm talking the aggregate right yeah so we have approximately it's a big number I don't yeah I it's hard to say time so in but uh so the quarterly commitment that we get every year when we or every quarter when we rebuilds fluctuate quite a lot true so in uh the two winter quarters are it it cuts in half so we basically you know we might bring in on the water side 200,000 in the winter quarter I'm sure October to January and then that next year the preceding quter you know July to August or September uh that would be you know triple or double so so 200 now is 600 and so at the end of the year it's 1.3 Milli so the estimate the instead of 140 1.4 million yeah we hope to be closer to the 1.5 that's that's what I'm looking for Grand same usage which changes all over the place I get it but I'm just for budgetary estimation purposes you just look at you know prior to multiply times a new race you end up with the next but you can see and this was another recommendation that the select board uh wanted was to penalize if you will the top tiers more so it's not just a strict 7% of pross so we actually may depending on the year in the summer time especially see even if we went from if we were double before it might be triple the revenue we don't we don't know so we see people either conserve or not based on so given that I'll plug like a 100 but to your point you could actually be considerably more if people don't change their water based on the higher rates correct so got so so that's the story on the volumetric side this is what I think I've shown you guys before and what I presented the select board was uh this is just several different ways of doing it uh based on meter size so the idea is that there's a flat Bly charge based on your meter size uh that is IR irregardless of what you use on Vol volumetric size uh generally uh the total by size that you see across top uh that breakdown uh is you know barly accurate from you know nobody's really changing out their meters on a quarterly basis but so it's it's kind of static in that respect uh the two smaller ends that's your regular single family home okay there we they nothing special about irrigation or uh you know their number of that's I mean as you can see that's 2,000 of our 2600 is roughly those two sides the first two the first two 58 and 34 from there you get up in the one inch that's indicative of more use uh but does have to be it's just a work of somebody's plumber or what they what they've done if they if they do have high irrigation you do need a bigger meter if you have much higher volumes on an intermittent basis so you know those things all come into play it's it's not an age of the home thing though it's more just like you said what your plumber if you built a brand new Big House 8,000 foot you could so like TST at 20,000 gallons a day is likely going to have a 2in meter measuring their domestic slow um they might have multiple Le depending on how they how they do it so again uh there there's no magic to any of this I presented you know as you can see here if we just did a flat charge across all meters of $50 a meter yeah quarterly that would roughly in annual revenue terms be about a little over 500,000 uh if we double that double the revenue it comes up to almost a million or over a milon we could also uh do a gradiation across sizes so like I said the 58 3/4 that's your typical uh the the larger meters larger flow more expensive meter therefore you could reasonably say that's a higher uh quarterly fee uh so then you could leave the 58 3/4 that to 50 and then you know work your way up from there um it doesn't really you know kind of change the story uh until so you you know depending on you know where where you want to go on the on the upper end side like you have you have to really raise the because we only have a certain you know 100ish 1.5 inch and 2 inch meters to really you know generate a ton of extra Revenue by that you really have to jack up the quarter shap so that's all we're doing here um my recommendation you know just for a starting point with the with the select board was uh the kind of radiation across the sizes uh you know 50 seem reasonable at the 5834 uh you know low end but then you know it does seem reasonable to me to increase the higher end um and that would you know result in your million bucks the the idea of a million again no magic it was just roughly 12.5 million uh Bond payment uh again roughly because we don't know the rates in the term but you know generally speaking not seem like a reasonable number and as I've said before the peace fast streaming could be up to 27 million there will be there be some assets with uh you know hopefully state grants as well as settlement money but I don't know that number where we sit today um and so you know that 12.5 is not paying for 27 so once we find out where that final 27 comes we can adjust or not the 12.5 number so if we wanted to pay for the entirety of that Bond if it you say was worst case7 million you know we would have to double this fee we'd have to do something more drastic with the rat uh but we also you guys all know we have the general fund we have um you know other other means of our disposal I guess you know different what you guys want to look at it I was just putting out a number to kind of start the discussion and start somewh I do think that this is a reasonable you know this is very typical across you know take out of it just a as a way to generate Revenue in your Enterprise for so why are we doing because we have many capital expenses that are coming up and so this is a capital fee to pay those expenses within the Enterprise I misunderstood but I thought we found that the usage was a very variable number did I misunderstand that no is but this gives a stable piece of income well it does it it all goes to the Enterprise fund but I think we are hoping that the adjusted volumetric rates cover the expenses it will also this fee would stay the Enterprise Fund in general so you know if we have another draw down year of 100 200 Grand the shortfall then you know it's covered but this is generally so that we can appropriate the funds in every fiscal year to either authorize these larger capital projects or pay down bonds that are authorized so the metric is intended to meet the operating cost and Fe is intended to be some Capital am iing I would say it's that precise this is a general attempt that what say I I I think that you know we're getting to the point again where we're talking about accumulating money in advance of needeing that which has been somewhat contrary to what our position has been regarding the budget and tax rates well that that's not 100% true in this instance or this case because we have approved the bond town meeting and schal year this year we have to pay for the meters we we approve that before any of this now we're going to add on top of volumetric entri so that's going to raise additional Revenue whether it's 100 Grand whatever I mean it's it's more but it's G to cover the short that you saw in the last I Haven quite finished what I was saying sorry um I'm not opposed to having a flat fee because because I get that but if if we're going to say we're imposing a flat feed because it's expenses that are not impacted by volume of usage that it makes no sense to me to have a different flat feed for different size meters you if you're going to say it has nothing to do with if if you're going to say it has something to do with volume of use then you include it in your tier ring if you're saying it's not related to volume of use and it should be the same across the book I I agree I was going to say the same thing a different way like if you told me that the meter for the big pipe cost 10 times as much as the meter for the little pipe then then maybe I could start to agree that but other than that I agree with what you said it is on 5x difference five legs different about 200 for the small ones about th for the big I I have a little bit of a contrary view which is that you know for the for the larger Services happen to in particular which tend to be the larger commercial uses the the cost of providing any owning that system that supports their use to me you know there's maybe a bigger piece of pie there but it doesn't the p is expense is going to be the past expense right it doesn't matter whether you have a 2in water made or 5 in cost of the system and have what in case of CST they going to take a 2in wi size coming into the facility it's and it's a outside use but they're going to be paying that in the usage we're get I mean we're getting them a lot in the usage right they're going to pay for the usage I get it but but you know it's it's Capital costs versus operating costs it's and and and the capital the system size that you need to own in order to support the various users which are mixed of residential and commercial but take all right take an extreme example you have someone with a big house but they're snowbird so they have very little usage but they're going to get dinged for this big Capital amount just because they happen to have a big pip fight you're right on CD because they're going to be a big right so they're a big right it's it's the same as the electric utility if you are a large user even if you go away for the L and for half the year utility still needs to own the production power in order to support that usage part time you're respecting charge what seven bucks in count or something very minimal fee I'm just but I I'm concerned too about what determined what size pipe of person has for all I know I could have a two in P I wouldn't have a clue so this has come up in terms of you know execution of the the our change out program and you know I'm I'm willing to you know as predominantly we're looking at five8 three there's not that many that are the inch and a half and two I don't think that just my general feel of the system and as these projects develop I don't think that there's a reason for a lot of these inch and a half and two inch meters like the snowboard example or just looking at their General usage so I'm I'm fine with during the project we will uh ask the you know the users that have the inch and a half and the 2 inch if they wanted down um I think it'll be you know on that that does add a little bit of complexity to the project but it will be um something that we see coming and it'll be something that we can allow the home owner to correct if they so choose so they would be responsible because we're not hiring a plumber for them they would be responsible for hiring the plumber to downsize their piping accept a different size meter but we would still provide the meter you know it's it's a benefit to the town going from supplying them a 2inch meter to an inch meter or 5/8 is it the piping from the street to the meter but that's irrespective of the size meter you need you you can downsize it in your house so you have a two inch line coming in your house maybe that doesn't necessarily mean you need a two inch meter okay do a lot of other towns already do this a lot of other towns around do the adding a flatal and having it by size I'm in wam I'm on the waterboard in WAM and we have a flat feet on the size we're looking at doubling it or tripling it for the in the interest of paying down defense what which which so 58 meter is $10 right now currently but that's without any Capital project on that's what they've been collecting every it's important but that's with no Capital that's okay we're gonna have that's one at a time go ahead well I just think we're gonna have a lot of um grant money for these P pass PLS I mean they funded 100% of the design they it's 100% of Lincoln we're not there well it's a good chunk of it expect a lot more for the I totally disagree that was a onetime earmark in the federal budget that we have not every city found that was something we asked for specifically for Manchester otherwise otherwise we would asked for M we would receive who who who has to approve this at the end of the day again voters or just board asked us for input that's what we're trying to get so that's that's the other reason that I don't like this because it feels like a an end around yeah right I mean look at the end of the day you're Pro you expenses pipes you got all this guy cost and they got to be paid for in one way the other right whether it's a user fee or taxes right they got to be paid for but at least taxes like you know everybody votes on taxes right particularly yeah but we vote we vote on the appropriation put spend out of the Enterprise fund now meeting does so that's on the spend side but then on the on the revenue on the tax side we we also approve that right at to meeting particularly if it's going to goove two and a half right you actually don't so you you just approve the expense then assuming it's it's tax funded and it's a simple bank you take the total appr values a 10 do the bank as long as it's below two and a half right so so the more we have in the Enterprise Fund in cash the lower the tax rate increases we either paying with a tax rate increase I agree I agree you got toay I'm just saying it's a different I think it's more transparency if it's going P to tax so in the past you've always used general fund General taxation to pay for one account so this is a discussion about the potential of changing whether or not you want to consider softening the the burden on on the property tax but picking it up on the utility fee it's coming out of the same pay so it's it's it's just it's a different pathway collecting the rest and that's the discussion that that's need whether or not you want to alter that path or not so one of the reason one of the ways to alter that path would probably be to met start metering the town water research right the the storage treatment plant the meter flushing all our facilities but but this is unmetered water that everyone to uses only the people on the water system will pay for but I think that's that's different it just quick piece of information everybody in town is on the water with the exception of loading Place Road and suction of forer Road total about doz maybe doesn't it is exactly the same par so problem as I see it is we have a big expense coming up Def and we're looking at where the revenue comes from for that and on one end if you do it totally on water rates you basically have what we call a variable Revenue source which depending on how much water people use year to year to year to year and if we have super wet year we don't sell as much water so we don't collect as much revenue and we get ourselves the other hand you have a fixed Revenue which is essentially this meter prod and how do we balance those two together and I don't think you want to go totally one way or totally the other I think you want to blend both um but one question is how is this Revenue coming out of leaders what do we think of that is a percentage of what we anticipate total Pas Capital cost Fe we've talked about P like 7 million you know roughly half okay assuming we're in that in the 20 million mid 20 million range yeah we don't know we don't know the other revenues that we may get it's it's a half for 30 years right you're talking about paying off a bond yeah so it's not half of The Upfront right chu could you repeat for me why we have a higher fixed fee for marer p what is the logic of that again so the like I said the the single family home standard would be a 583 um so that's the smaller that covers most de um as you get to the larger side pipes that's typically associated with larger D you get more more head loss through smaller pipes and therefore the larger bikes you tend to be able to get more flow that's just the way it is so defly that results in a larger meter what's the logic I understand there a large through understand that just trying to understand why the fee is set larger for a larger pipe I I understand having to fee for I think just what Mory was saying we need a standard Revenue stores because we've got standard Debt Service or but I don't understand why you have a lar I think what said like yeah so I think it's partially and it's also in my mind the like I said the 2in meter cost significant it's about 5x so it's about what does that have to do with the objects that this is going to find it seems reasonable that a larger upfront cost should be recouped over a larger for it's the meter cost that you're trying to recover well initially but then and I believe after that it goes right I was say you got to be careful there because you know 10 quarters and that guy even the expensive guys paid off to me yeah basically right so you got to be careful tying this so specifically to the actual cost of the me because it's because it's much bigger than that right so hand up I was asked to put together a presentation slash proposal on what a meter fee Capital fee could look like this is one way to do it I told you I live in one I have a 5 meter it's $10 a quarter forever there's no opt out there's no we're not paying it it's not 10 quarters are not paid it off it's what do they do for the higher I'm not done on the higher they go to 50 so it is a higher thing forever not just because it's Lear and I you know I don't have a perfect answer for you it's they decided that's the way they wanted to do it and voted it and did it you don't have to I'm not attacking you I don't no I know I'm just it like it seems like yeah so that's they're a bigger user so they're pay exactly that's a simple as that yeah is it perfect no yeah absolutely not and there's a different way to call it you don't have to call it it doesn't have to be related to meters at all it could just be a base Fe and that could be uniform across the way so then that takes all this out of it absolutely that's 100% reasonable way to do it take a flat Fe or base Fe and we could we could do it that way um I just it it just seemed log the logic in my mind as we were working through is we were asked to Institute a meter program where we change our meters and that Capital cost is being drived by the side of meters and therefore that's where we started but again that was one of four or five scenarios one of Being John R yes yes we green by so I I've followed all of this discussion uh the truck has presented here one thing I think you got to put in context here is his typical user that he put together that was two people and the vast majority that is to say probably 75% of the people here have water bills that are less than [Music] $100 they're probably closer to $50 or $75 a quarter okay so of course when they get their water bill they're not only seeing water they're also half of the people are seeing sewer but when you start to put a $ bill on top of what is the $75 Bill some people and a lot of people will see their water bills doubled okay so there's going to be some noise I think about that and not just from a few people because the majority of the people are in that category as you can see the number of people that are up using tremendous amounts of water the 2in pipes you know there are 10 20 30 people and as chuck had mentioned some of those folks probably have these large pipes but they're not irrigating for whatever reason they've got a 2-in pipe there and they'll make the decision bring in a p plumber for a couple hundred bucks I'll shrink it down to 58 and I'll pay the 58 fee which is right now he's suggested being $50 as opposed to 400 that absolutely pays you are you talking about charging both for each meter a person has yes oh they've got an irrigation meter yeah so an irrigation meter that they only use half a year so this so I didn't get to these slides but as John was saying so this is a family of two general usage uh their FY 24 water bill would roughly be you know annually 400 bucks or 32 proposed on the volumetric that's only going up roughly $30 for the year if it was a 58 meter at $50 a quarter that is the 200 bit so yeah that a you know 50% increase in their in their bill for the annual and then I for the purposes of illustrating the FY 24 sewer uh you know that's the 7% increase that uh was approved uh roughly 70 bucks for the year um so I I do appreciate that uh again only enough I don't really have a strong preference uh I would just say that that 22 to me as somebody that's in the water industry in some way that uh sees you know firstand the you know the implications of past treatment and looks at it in a different light maybe than you all uh $50 a quarter is less than a Netflix like that's not a significant amount of money for free water and that's what the end goal is so that's what the end end situation will be and I think most people from when they talk to me at my office about you know what are you doing about the P thing it's like well we'll get there eventually we'll do the treatment and then in between here and there we need to figure out how to pay for and this was one way to pay for it uh that didn't totally burden uh the tax there's time to ramp it up you could you could start at half of it yeah you could start at 25 and then with the goal of getting to 50 by year three because that's really one the full Bond p and then you can dat it on 100% whatever the bond is or not like that seems reasonable to me as well what I'm trying figure is Cash is cash right so whether I PID 200 bucks more a year in my water bill or I PID 200 bucks more my property tax it's still 200 bucks out of my pocket do do do I care I don't like well I pay $100 a quarter fo water I have two meters so now I'm going to be paying 200 right but I'm just saying you know the extra hundred here versus the extra hundred in taxes the difference I guess it's here the money has to go towards water stuff right right whereas taxes it could go to all kinds of stuff right I certainly L yeah I think this is a major change I have no problem with the concept of it that we have a fee just think the fee I think John's comment a moment ago is very powerful I'm a $70 a quarter guy I'm a $40 quarter okay that I just think that is just just think very rapid very big bu can be ramped up over time I understand but I would start this concept without did you something yeah um as other people have have commented ratting up face on the size of your water meter is kind of cude particularly for people who have two water meters or um for people who don't know what the size of the meter um whereas if you put it on the property tax we have a board of ass you figure out what the relative bills are going to be for people and and this if we follow our former procedure and paid for Capital Improvement the bonds on Capital Improvements of the water system then it goes on it goes on the tax rate and you don't have these silly jums um that that show in in this point you don't favor the concept at all I would be perfectly to use this concept to pay for the water meters specifically the water meters are in fact something that only people who have water use and the cost of the water meters goes up with the size of the meter so I would be perfectly willing to put this in um I'm sorry I'm talking as if I'm and this is my feeling um that we instituted to pay for to water meters and then look at it again and decide whether we want to put the huge burden of the P Street on water bills or cash bills but that's a later decision that would be a later decision um I can I can imagine that if you know over the course of the year you're pay to pay some amount of money as a as a homeowner toward cost of keyas project um 500 bucks as additional cost of my water pills might more objectionable than 500 bucks property taxes because they're kind of accustomed to thatty is very specific particular federal government Chang tax policy yeah that's us dedu the salt comes up to 10,000 yeah I'm curious Trum you know from a being responsible for DPW you know ultimately we don't care which pocket the money or you know how it gets paid for necessarily but conceptually is there any issue that you have with see f one way the other uh no I I really don't um I think the um the bottom line is I'm hopeful that as we find out what the design costs are and the subsequent construction costs that the lag between to meeting and needing the money and like I I see that as the potential issue that I will have in terms of hitting the hitting the points that I point and that's not say it can't be done at time I think it can I'm just that's more worrisome for me if there's a potential issue whereas if we had the money in hand in the capital fund War coming to record as part of the Enterprise funder fund then that seems like an easier path forward for me but you can't spend it unless town meeting appropriates it so it's not like you can just use it I I totally agree but I do see it as a if it comes on the tax rate as a vote and sub Bond vote and there's a issue with that because we're paying for it through the general fund that's different and if we say the the boat is coming out of the the revenue will beid I don't think it makes any any difference to people the town meeting they're looking at the total cost they're appropriated they're not looking at which bucket is coming out of they don't have a clue I'm sorry we get confused the way it's it's it's too many numbers and I don't don't think I don't think people think about oh do I care when this comes out of the Enterprise fund or I don't tax I don't necessarily think that they care but I do think if you're able to say at count meeting and sub that this money that this 27 million that were p is coming out of the rates already you will not see an increase on your tax bill order number one in f27 that's that's a powerful state or it's only 50% from on your tax bill and 50% on the Enterprise I think that is a valuable thing to be able to say if it if we don't if we're not able to say to say I understand I do think that at the end of the day it will be voted on and approved so any it doesn't bother or you know s my preference but I do think that's a legitimate thing especially if it's up on the same War as a elementary school or potential PW fac that's one difference when you have those was competing up against each other one difference between funding the Enterprise and the general fund is is the general fund not restricted to 2 and a half% increase whereas the Enterprise is it or is it all together the water and sewer fees any account fee is not subject to the proposition that's corre so traditionally we have always approved outside of we need override de exclusion VES voted on in that way but that's that's a big difference advise me again yes I think we need to come to a consensus if we can okay of what direction okay we would prefer as a board thank you one thought on this I think Ann's comment is an interesting one that sort of sets one side of the stage here which is put it on the tax rate and then the other side of the stage is cover it through water cost meter cost solve that and it it seems a little bit like we're kind of on this Continuum we hear in politics World about flat tax rate versus progressive tax rate it seems like a blend of both would be a good way to do this and to say okay how much is could be put onto the water and the logic there is that everybody needs water you know that's across the board and um and then then take some portion of that and put it onto the tax rate so you do basically both here because just seems a little illogical to say okay people who are snowbirds who aren't here or whatever are going to pay most of most of this or large percentage of this but we all use water every s day and that seems logical to me so do you have a specific suggestion so specific suggestion would be let's say we looked at the 27 million and we said okay maybe over life of this project we look at roughly third of it um 25% coming off water meter water usage cost and the balance coming off the tax rate or if somebody argues with it they could flip those numbers around are you talking but are you talking tax Water and Sewer volume rates so you talk or you talking volume rates this is a flat fee so I think that's what we're trying to get to okay is right do we support a flat feed on the Water and Sewer or should it continue just with the teer rates that they have and so hearing what Chuck hearing what Chuck saying about um quarterly fees for meters it sounds to be like Manchester's low and we should have a higher orderly fee and yes people aren't going to like that to John's comment but we're also talking about investing in a whopping infrastructure thing here and the money going to come from somewhere so so add that to meters up the water rates and then on the differential we both from the tax rate I mean we just I agree with conceptually what you said but we just made a move in that direction by increasing the Vol metric rates right like that that just happened right mean when my water meter breaks I have to I have to buy a new one I have to do it twice because the the new one has plastic parts and so if it freezes blows out the plastic parts and you have to buy another meter or you saying that should be cost mean a bird a bird flies into your window no I'm saying that today everyone who needs a water meter pays for outside of any rates you just build it well not when not in this program and not like there are instances where is the freezing is I would say more the home if there's a malfunction of meter we would place it so I don't want to get into you know each individual I thank for I think I like that idea I I would say I'm not married to the sumers I would I think I kind of did what you're saying I just went maybe a little to far so the 12.5 in my mind was you know more or less when you factoring the money we got from the federal and you know potential settlement money that's roughly half so that's where I started you could dial this back you could make it a flat fee instead of progressive you could do all that and you could come to some point what I was worried about in past discussion with the select board is what I do not want is to Institute a $10 fee now and then three years from now because the p comes in the settlements are what they are and then we're you know qu drling that overnight or something like that to do the same thing if you're saying that we'll just take that future problem and solve it with the tax rate I think that is fine and it's up to you guys I don't particularly care I just was worried about chasing this this number and need you know so people can't count on a $50 bill or $10 bill or $100 bill it's you know this year my water bill was th000 next year we're not paying for meters anymore so it's 200 then the year after that we're paying for p and it's 1500 like that doesn't make any sense to me I think that would cause a lot of problems and so what I would like is to similar what like saying earlier nice gradual wherever we want to end up is where we'll end up uh it can always change like this is not voting on the next five years right now or when the select board votes on it it's voting on this year and a path forward and we will evaluate that next year when we set one or two rates if we have a overage in the retained earnings from the volume ex rate we will not raise rates next year uh but if if we are still projecting shortfalls based on last four quarter of Rue it's only right to raise that volumetric rate and that's what we do every year so I'm not trying to change what we do every year but there are significant issues that we need to address and I just want to make sure we're all on the same page as we address them so I like Mor's proposal i' make it 5050 I would start this system of having this I would start at a lower number than $50 might be 10 or 20 something in that range note to people that as we get more clear on the cost that this will change but I would do a lower number and I was shoot 50/50 is cing between the rate tax and so you we totally use this to build up funds as we go towards the costs yeah well so that's another this where I don't I don't want to give you guys the impression we're building up lot I say for the general I'm not asking to get caught in the corner I want to just come up with a general proposal I think the concept of balancing is a good one I'm just suggesting that it 50 as opposed to 1/3 2/3 or something else just my personal View and that we start this as a concept but we do it lower amounts so we don't end up with t water bills going from $75 a quarter to 25 or whatever me and we would build over time to try to get that change that you're bringing about which is a change but I don't think it's dramatic I think it's understood because water is critical to all us and the cost for getting good water changing yeah totally so this is for FY 26 we already raised it for 25 do it at any time we don't control when they do it well I would favor putting this off because we just had a overide we've had three rate inre what we over we had one no that's a debt exclusion okay Deb exclusion anyway and we raise rates three times in the past years I would favor that Deb exclusion over we don't necessarily have to pay that in our tax rate and so part of the theory is is if you're collecting from this account then less of that's coming out of the tax rate so even though we passed it as a Deb exclusion we don't have to have 100% of that debt exclusion made from the tax no but it has increased our tax rate this year not yet you authorized it you haven't paid for you won't see it in your tax bill this year Well when the bond is that's when we execute the bonds right that's going and they determine how much Bond they need based on how much money they're going to take out of the Enterprise fund but that's what it will cause the average annual person's tax rate to go over the 2 and a half% at that point I'm saying high level conception that the saying is correct even though yes it hasn't kick in but it's GNA K in so where's the finance committee coming out do we have a consensus kind of in the I think about this more comment Mak me think that um I think there's going to be bit of a reaction toward any sort of flat F that isn't you know clearly and well explained and understood by folks and I think the idea of you know I can get my mind around pretty easily the idea of funing water R this finite cost I could possibly I could get behind the idea that we need some sort of a flat feet to supplement the water rate to give us a little bit of flexibility for the hots and tankes for what what's actually consumed versus what the what the the costs are for water but terms of funding the F project I think that should just tax rate to like another gion yeah I'm I'm either a 100% opposed to any of this or B I'm okay with like a little diin so you go do 10 bucks to everybody just flat like okay like sure but I'm definitely against the gradated and I'm against some big dollar like 50 bucks on a $70 water but I that's crazy got to go to taxes gradation especially given the quantities of those larger meters that just out there than suggest we start with a fe that will pay for the water meters over two years and that would be gra that would be graduated based on cost of the water of the side water that would give us a feeling for what the what the reaction of the to is going to be to adding a capital Fe to water and and I think that's worth experimenting with before we launched into TR a third of the F which we don't know within a factor two what that cost if the meters have a 20-year life should we break that Fe over 20 years well because the town has to pay for them off front we don't want to be in effect loaning cash to people interest free for stupid water but at some point to avoid this in the future um if if meters last 20 years and we have 2,000 people we should be we're placing 100 me a year or something like that if I respond directly to that yeah we poor history the leaders change in capabilities and it's a really good idea to move the whole town into a yeah but I don't think they change that they do I me these meters these current meters we drive around and and read meter me pleas report in whether it's hourly or to a to a computer system in at the DPW which tracks usage will will leaks will you beol out of that because I'm sorry this conversation is going off the board the expenditure was approved by town meeting I did we're not here to question it we're not here to discuss it we're discussing Pap we're discussing whether we want a flat be added to the water and sewer bills and that's all we're discussing instead of taxes the idea of paying for the meters over two years um basic on size fight flat Fe makes a whole lot of sense because water meters are probably like way cell phones have gone in Dean's point 10 years we're probably going to be replacing water deal with that somebody else course and then we we take temperature of the of what people think about the higher bills and you know whe it's done on the tax rate or through a blend of fees on water um it got a $27 million some VAR n to deal with over the next bunch of years to yeah just a comment it's an easier sales story and I heard that from several people up there say it's meters and that's where we're going to leave it for now and in two or 3 years if things evolve and you want to introduce peot you can do that at that time but really right now I think just be meters um and I think probably ought to start at a lower number just because I've spoken with the number of people about $50 on top ofal usage and that's that's a number that people will see R but is two years based on a $10 fee or payback variations on this because is it the meter is it the end point is it some portion of the fixet system so these are all costs that are that we have a budget but they're get to be determined until we solicit the RP response so if it's you know if we're allowed to ballark it then you know I would actually probably closer 50 that would be over eight quarters that would be uh 400 box that's that's probably the meter and point not the installation so that's we're looking at a 1.4 to$ 1.5 million project so if you divide that over yeah if it's the people with two meters it's roughly 2600 meters if it's just the accounts that's 2,000 roughly so lots of different number that you can pull to make the end number come out where you want you know I think I think we're we're probably not going dial it into the nickel it's more you know if you're comfortable with $10 a quarter for the next eight quarters that's something if you're comfortable 20 that's probably closer um all the way up to 50 which I'm hearing is July so let's not start there let's start somewhere else it seems to me today you're charging people for news so it seems to me if the New Media are good people are going to pay for them charge should reflect what the cost of meters of years over two years I that seems reason I think we won't have done you you said 400 bucks is the cost of me just high level ballar right what he's saying plus installation he's saying 800 installation it's be so 400 over two years to your point is 50 a quar right yes so well you do it over three years yeah I there four have you pulled together the parameters of RFP have you pulled together the parameters of the RFP uh I mean I I have done these in the past so I know generally does it have a timeline involved oh yeah so this going to be two two part RP so one to cure all the materials the heers on then a separate installation contract be a different over what period of time so it would have been one year but can easily make that two orely you know there's got to be ones that are harder to get into there'll be some punch list that you know even if I set it at one year it will take a little bit longer than one year but General time there's there's no reason we can't do 2,000 houses in a year but there's no reason you can't do a year for two years don't stretch it out yeah well the issue with stretching it out then we have half the old system the new system right that's an issue so the whole idea is we try to get to a new system that benefits the users as well as the how does it benefit you just they more accurate you get to see it oh it gives people ability to understand their own usage so that was one of the issues with the volumetric rates and going too high on the volumetric r people don't know what their bill is until three months later what the usage is even though it's it's not an unknown thing but it's fine that's the primary Ben of the new is to use get to see how much they're using on an ongoing basis it's like my solar system every day I can look at my app and see how much electricity I'm using and if it tight speit spikes up sometime you kind of see what in the we there will be leak alerts and stuff like that somebody mention Leak Detection that's part of it there's also Leak Detection benefit to the utility so the system potentially that's not you know not not everybody's doing it exactly the same way but there are some El software host allow do flag so we will get that alert as well as the customer if I think I think that would be fin okay well we need extra internet security or anything um with all these accounts being online I mean water utilities are the number one target of identity over and I'd hate to see someone lose their Fortune because of $500 so is there some kind of way to um mitigate that exposure well so you know these things are to some degree they're going to be hosted by a third party like the all based so I think most of them are like they're not their own cloud they're services or something so that's something that we're paying for and you know I can make part of the RFP process you know information on that security um you know again you as a user don't have to walk into the to the internet on your end if you don't want to be but that's not that's not opting out of the meter that's opting out of you don't need to make your own username and account right but you know we will have access to you we will be given given the data to alert you that there's a leak and if we can push that information to you and you can't fix it you can't really justify you're not worried about the I think the leaking is more the uned use unmuted uses from the storage treatment plan which we're going to mitigate year the the water the hydrant flushing um and I know I'm going to digress that's not new water but that's not the same thing that I'm talking about the leak detection that we're talking about is for the customer after the meter right no I get it I just don't think I mean we're doing a 20 system pilot three leas yeah so there are to relase okay let I think the water man over the at Summer Street over so do we have a consensus of the board that we would support some type of a flat fee that paid for the leers over twoe period over a period of time yes and just capping this amount at the cost of the meter then just dividing it over 24 months 36 months 4 I don't care we got to pay for something yes says yes so that's our consensus I just think it's important [Music] C well it's taken the it's the question of dividing by concept we've got a concept guidance around enough for you yeah I appreciate the time that you put into considering all of these Alternatives it's a complicated it's a parts of it are a big change for really appor next next item on the agenda is Harbor Master reclassification so there's some talk about changing the classification of the harb Master's job to makeing eligible to retire earlier and I think that in order for us to give any input um was my understanding the bo wanted input from us and not for us to give any input we would need certain pieces of information and the question is what type of information would we want classifi what are the benefits that come that classify it there different choices there what's the contrast does that change as a result of him coming an enforcement officer I don't think there's some enforcement is here how do that affect the cost of town law I it's contrasting today versus what's being proposed and and seeing what the implication is why we're doing it I think the other issue is is how does it impact the calculations performed by the state retirement system 55 instead of 65 maybe 20 years of service and or 55 it's it's the Harbor Master is not in the same classification as public safety officer the request had been made to change it to be in the same classification as Public Safety job Chang in such fashion that to that but that's part of the information is there some change have a choice because state may require to be trained as as officers right to go to the academy and therefore automatically be in group four in group two discussing I mean if it's being required I guess that's that's I think that's wor going but you know that's a that's conjecture a little bit of my that's reading the teams but at that point if that happens then part of the police department correct conver if what you projected could happen if that does at that point it's just so we don't the police department have time okay we're not gonna do anything else so I have one one comment one thought yes one is I would find out what our peer communities do on this and if our peer communities are all l out toose this or to support it and it's federal or state I think St yes so I think it'd be good to see what our postal PE are doing and I would just say I think AR who's not directly part of law enforcement is a good thing um having traveled around a lot of different communities there particularly in Maine and places like that there a lot of harbard Master school not par law enforcement and I think it's better to find a person who's focused on the water and focused on relationships on the water rather having somebody comes out of law enforcement Shuff into a maritime issue and having the police do I would agree only only if there is in conjunction with that non-law enforcement har Master a marine police unit that can be called upon if the har Master gets into a jam that they right like but I think if you look at what goes on here my current model was that right like that before we had that it was a big risk because like like I love har and I'm a good guy I'm about you know but you get the knucklehead coming in drunk from wherever they're not going to listen and now doesn't have you know and before we had the on like the logistics of trying to right come on like that just is not really you the coard Tails it seems like 80% of it 85% this relationship building and 15% of it is doing you know where you need to up the level of force AG you've got plenty of force on land that be apply to that but that 15% can cause a lot of damage true right I've seen I'm sure you I've seen it out there go very far to find it the part of the police department I remember getting in this debate a l pack with another everybody loves buy I'm like I'm not talking about people live in Manchester we all know buy like I list about you know I'm talking about person from not Manchester that doesn't give aank and they're not going to listen this actually because you w need to the resource officer down the road we not talk it's late okay so we're we're differing somebody can come back to us in three years and we're not here um the next item the agenda is to discuss the fiscal year 24 budget review process and changes for the fiscal year 25 budget review process and G us some ideas the reason you're raising this is longm I think more time needs to be spent longes I think we could start the process by starting with the 10e capital PL and then once that's developed get into what the actual projects are for the curent projects but I am not in support of putting more responsibility on the Le font I I I think that we can't have one person on the finance Comm think it needs to be I was going to say the same thing a different way if you were going to go down that road putting more responsibility on the lay then we got to take more seriously the allocations that stuff just five seconds got have to be more rigorous discussion I feel like our model of having big Departments of school but police fire and DPW come in with us is really good because all this for ideas but it's just we're sitting around here all interacting together I think bests come out of that yeah and I I strongly support Sarah at least a fiveyear capital plan 10 years I mean I think we need a 10 year I think five years let's look at the multi-year and it's like one meeting and then and frankly that's fine when we were doing capex and doing about three million a year for years and years now these numbers are getting big looking 10 12 15 years out of the is really big we just need to be looking forward and planning you know instead of having x million a year for water infrastructure have an actual plan what you're going to do what you know what areas you're going to do so it's a little more specific so you kind of see okay this is everything that needs to be done and this is kind of the plan laying it into the capital plan of when it might be spent outside of yeah yeah just me have everything in this large Capital PL you know because there's going to have to be some shift TR Point things take PL you know anticipating planning spending 1.8 million on of engineering Advance takes time in advance infity all these things up so so how would the um Capital items be broken down I mean would they be separate stages for each project that's over a certain amount of money or something so so you would identify your large facility needs yeah that's really but then you break each one down into the components yeah the dis you know so there was an agreement that we need to spend more time on that so how do we free up that time we're meting more office just start to get a sense of how we going accomplish if you want to keep the department very similar to what you've been doing you're adding the element of more detailed on C so often times we we we touch Bas in octob We Touch based in November and it's more like it's like what do we want to do in the year ahead and then you to get the budget everybody pulled together on holiday times so what if we looked at a multi-year capital plan in October and November so we were starting to queue up on that before the budget process rather than tacking it on to the end and then I think it may want to be an agend periodically like a quick touch as we go through the budget year so Chuck's talking about DPW it's like okay this is what we're looking at for capital in coming fiscal year and oh by the way let's take a couple minutes to think about what this what the implications are for the next five years for this you still might these silos for various 5e projects or you might say I'm having a really hard time getting skill pipe let's shift this out two years and that could all happen in the fall rather than the winter and then in the winter we could just spend the budget itself uper Capital all finished I mean I know that people want to push things closer to town meeting because it's closer to when the projects have to come in but it just seems to me with capital just we didn't do a good job of nailing it down this year we started talking about didn't actually it was a very painful process because we circled back around um the same thing kept Revisited right and and so I don't know if it's possible to get all of the capital completed before December well we're talking long range years you just have to di in 5 years 10 years talking about October November April no but I'm saying you start with a 10 year plan and you work down towards the current and if you have a good plan then you know what all your Capital items are for your upcoming budget year you don't have to wait till the winter that I think it's you done yes right I think it's going to be a struggle the first few years because you're deing get we have year plan five years ago that we but we're talking about developing no but I guess what I'm saying is if you have a 10year plan then you're starting to schedule things out and then when you get down to the current period oh I can't do a big thing now because I need to do all this other stuff currently and therefore my big stuff has to to move out a little bit that that type of thing the the the sort of run-of-the-mill count I can say it that way the three three here that's that's that's not the issue right the issue are the big the DPW garage school it's facilities but it's also apparatus okay but okay well the big the other big one is critical roads and sea level well I think that's driving facilities I mean for instance cies and infrastructure where where are people cut off when the road floods like Beach Street this January was a wake up um the water basically came up through the drainage system to flood the road it didn't come over from the car it came up so a burm isn't going to help that what we need to look at is slowly trying to get some of like I don't know GES on alls with pumps or just but Dean I don't think it's our job to solve the problems right no our job to to help f ortize a new cost area which we have not been budgeting that any projection to are those resilience me they're going to Mo large right and that we need to get into plan I just think a fiveyear plan is too short I don't think you you cover enough big stuff in a fiveyear plan I guess my point is years 6 through 10 it's not so critical to have nail down to three and a half million right I'm talking about the bigger stuff the bigger stuff that's the that's that's right but I think in due diligence to to presenting it the town in a town meeting it's a little disingenuous to say we're trying to pass a capital plan this year of $7 million but next year we're going to come at you with 20 because we think we might have a school to build a water treatment plant I mean we need to get in front of this and look at it from a 10-year plan and because yeah just do do we have any idea hit 2027 well we'll deal with that when we talk about the capital plan I mean probably the beginning Parts your question sir is what items are on that Capital plan and what level of probability are are they A B C or D priorities and you know Elementary is on there DPW plant station Water Treatment Plant we went we went through this about years number was big the table get the land which are want to Hales which are must haves which are yeah out of our control and how do they fit on the time frame can't say yes to everything all the time s to the intro something to keep the water out of the police budget and Fire so we can come up so when are we going to start it do you have information say November oober dep proposals got typically receive you talked about these pieces moving around is that such that it Remains the Same sort of moving the capital planning around the so I need to get started now with department leaders the capital have got ready by first of October and then they can focus on their operating budget for October November for December presentation so we separate the two things and so when we meet with the departments in the winter we're talking operating budget we're not talking capital I don't know I'm trying to fit the human beings here their time you know should be a change that's bumps in the road but but I think that around the time frame here that that's it's doable be a little bit of pain but it's doable I'm afraid of oh that sounds like a plan and what we probably need to meet every other week or something a thinking of the Fall yeah yeah yes to's point to get ahead of Steam on it this year next year will presumably be easier but um we also have another week or two for town meeting which pushes that schedule I'm not advocating to use that but if we go through the regular budget year on op rating um there's there's probably one more meeting week to tie up Capital before it goes to press I prefer to do things earlier there a safety every moment we have if we're doing the capital and the then when we do the operating budgets in the winter we should be able to go through them more only once each that's so much more efficient trying to do it and we're trying to remember what we said DPW why is fire doing this we talked about this but now they're asking for it's like we do Capital up front and then revise it each operating me we go through by the time we get to the end of the operating we have a meeting tomorrow CPC and we're going to discuss possible products too oh good anything else to BU to say from the fin well I think you know the thing that irritates me when I things is that CPC is coming up with this list of stuff that's never hit any of our Capital plans and I think that if it's going to be important enough for CPC funding it needs to have been on a list of town capital projects just yeah true I away the CPC it's be be for the big land conservation a big affordable housing project or major historic renovation should be fing a lot of small us maintenance I mean parks and W is going to CC for all their projects instead of coming through the town budget AG how do we make how do we make that happen tomorrow we should be looking at some of the Town lists want the that's not on there we should try to put it on there first CC legy projects do you riew what goes to the CPC from your department leaders before it gets to CPC not all the that is one suggested stock Gap if we think that things that are inappropriate are to CBC has got to be some gatekeeper whatever that is I think this discuss should involve the CPC I just think it's time for a step back and reevaluate rule that they have to spend all their money every year right there's also thing that we can't I mean we have to approve what they have but we can't really tell them what to do and gr can't really tell them it seems like guidance from GRE and the board of Select particularly on what we would like CPC to become in the future it's important yeah it's important right now the return forecasting the year is 14.4 for sech for State matches yeah State matches myself you go it doesn't accomplish what we want in the state reimbursement isn't enough to jusy it's G keep going down because what towns are coming up they've got they've got to correct that it's just yes plus it was worth doing 20% way they do have a pretty impressive fiveyear that's place to start State yeah they have which is an eye open I'm learning yes okay go um so we'll have a meeting start second so prior to that yeah I think it would also be beneficial to have you identify the key concerns or areas of interest of operations are there there is that we want a deeper down be helpful few to identify that by really SE and net operations I the select board they a green light to doing some operational audits both in preparation for the new budget season State consultant to help us do some reviews of processes and services that have beenis doing as effici as we can services that we don't need to be doing that's already been action yeah they could reli to that we have INF yeah yeah going um okay so do you have any other Financial updates for us minutes anybody look at the minutes I one question um sorry Mark getting onto the housing register has there been any progress on is it on our end or outside of our end it's both it's both I think that there some members of the affordable housing TR are trying to figure out exactly what going there's change in staff the CDC so yeah of a long list of okay minutes okay you want to any discussion all in favor okay next meeting oer well no no we got to meet before then if we're going to give them input on the operations area can we meet in August does like to you got board issues this summer kind of Trin in what you can do not me bre the 5th through the 9th okay oops the 14th is not good 21st 21st is no good Z are we going for Wednesdays yeah I think that's is that is that the consensus of the best day for people the 28th 20 August 28th yeah oh I can't do maybe not when when do you need your stuff gr so if you did it first September 4th okay that would work September 4th yep okay and so people before September 4th people need to think about the operating budgets and as we think think what kind of efficiencies of uh St staff reassignment framewor thinking so are there are there areas of concern in terms of operations are there areas where you think could be more efficient there areas where you think we services that we no longer need to provide is there service that we should be providing that we're not my my general feeling for a town the size it would be nice if we get have more people doing multitask and we're that tonight right we're going to discuss that on September 4th yes yes okay something and I don't like I think you asked about it there's something that we were hoping Andrea could put into the next budget book and I'm struggling to remember what it was it was like revenue from the primary year or something because we kept banging up against that question a lot but can't remember what it do you remember yeah I have a note um for the next budget book to put in like a higher level um like budget summary so like having like the revenues at top and then like expenses in the bottom like really really really high level um summ from year to year mention me that I mean this is my thing that of course I'm always looking for which is analyzing total revenue versus total revenue actual the budget and then total EXP expenses actual and we're we're receiving that in every quarterly report and we received it this week for the full um yep FAL year 24 right but I like to see it and Andrew's created a great cell file for me where it does it on an annual basis and then and then you can track year by year right right Andrew yeah you put that together it's awesome I love it I just want to keep keep seeing it getting updated I don't know if that's the thing no I think Andre hit the nail on the head it was it was the revenue the total revenue for a particular Department while we were looking at it because we like shoveling backwards and forwards through the book trying to remember what what came from where what went from where so that would be very helpful but and so since I got me going on that one when when do you think that one could be updated maybe in a couple weeks a month I think I need to understand what spreadsheet this is we talking about I don't know what you're talking about it's just I think we need to be careful about the amount of extra work we're asking Andre to do so we need to make sure that everyone on the finance committee feels the need for various reports well I can explain it to you you give me a chance it's just total revenue for a fiscal year compared to the total forecast for that year and the total expenses for fiscal year compared to the total forecast for that year and she's got it already in place so it's not adding additional work it's just updating something cu it shows how big that Gap is it shows that we're like pulling in an extra million bucks a year just do the forecast and that's a big deal like we're sand baging forecast so it's a big deal if Andrew wants to tell me that that's a huge lift that's fine too but I haven't heard that I was gonna say thank you Sarah but I do have that spreadsheet and it's a a couple of lines and I can send that out before your next meeting on September 4th okay thank you anything else I was remissed that I didn't get on the agenda so we can't do it is is voting for chair and vice chair so we'll have to do that September 4th seconds all in favor I'll bring these things in tomorrow okay I sign them all and I don't sign after 9:30 you you want to take them here I'll take them with me and tomorrow it'll take me 15 minutes to do it because I have to put in the number approved on each one the DAT meeting sign I sign build any the oh