hey how you doing good that was good news out of the uh amers last night yeah they they did the right vote now do we have any word about am or pelum I don't know what PM's gonna do I almost sent d uh John an email and say so what are you gonna do John I know he knows I'm sure he knows by now what happened I know he was paying attention yeah I well stay tuned yeah well this is when he's probably gonna say this is probably when he's going to say that line that you like to hear him say the one he didn't say this year yeah that one well um tellum as always will fulfill the our obligations yes oh he's awesome yeah he's good he's I like him yeah no he's so solid um and I understand why you know they stuck to the four it makes sense well his points are correct about you know what the future is looking like and how are we preparing for it yeah no it's and and I like that Doug was taking him seriously and trying to yeah yeah he's Doug is saying predicting a almost 9% increase next year yeah 8.87 and that's scary thought especially on top of the six but if it could write the ship um I don't know well in absence of other Revenue what choice do we have we have two choices pay up or lay off yep I don't think Peg's coming oh right yeah Peg's not gonna be able to make it so I should to Melissa yeah I mean we have a quorum at this point yeah you guys could continue on let me oh Ann it's so good to see you I haven't seen you how are you guys I'm not getting up into the woods at the same time as you are the wood are beautiful right now with the Sun so bright the woods are like illuminated yeah last couple days have been great or not yesterday but the Monday Tuesday and then yesterday today bright and sunny I'm so glad town meeting day is going to be bright and sunny uh it's supposed to change as the day goes on and it looks like a long meeting so you're probably going to start in the Sun and end in the clouds there's one good uh one article has that would have been could have taken an hour the um the stretch yeah the specialty uh energy code is going to have to hold till next year it turned out we did uh we are were required to hold a hearing and when um Michael DEA passed it off to the select board that wasn't clear when he said that I said well if we can reach to it but it was kind of I thought I didn't realize it was a formal hearing I thought it was more like when Miriam said we needed a hearing for concom it wasn't really required she just used that term um but it turned out when we went got all the instructions we really needed a full publicized hearing two weeks ahead and so talking about it last night didn't didn't cover that and that's all we had plans to do so oh okay um if we had advertised it two weeks ahead it could have worked but um right that didn't happen so it's off the we're gonna pass over it till next year well I still think those other bylaws are going to take a lot of time yeah and the citizens petitions yeah they're meaty too yeah that second and last one is going to be a real Humdinger I think oh solar everybody loves to talk about solar oh they sure do and they have lots of opinions the funny thing is it's at the end of the day how many people will there be I know oh I'm sure there'll be a lot of yeah the solar people it's going to keep them around the smart solar people yeah oh I hope we can work that out yeah me too well have to address it the town's going to have to talk we're going to have to get everybody together we're going to have to work it out as a community should be a barrel laughs okay so we better get on to I didn't get through to moment okay um so I guess I'll run the meeting I mean go for it okay good so my first my first thing I'm G to do is assign somebody to give the annual report on Saturday who's going to be there not you're not you gave it last year didn't you I did I did I did it last year I think no I didn't I wasn't at town meeting last year but the last time I was you were at the cape last year I remember that at the cape yeah that's right yeah so it was the year before you gave it yeah Melissa gave it last year so who else hasn't given it yet I wonder well I haven't in a while but I'm not going to be there oh right sorry I'm flying out first thing in the morning sorry where you you going somewhere good New Orleans jazz festival oh nice yeah for the weekend yep should be fun my friend's son lives there so we got a place to stay and his son loves music so it's gonna be the three guys hanging out it's gonna be fun we're going to You're Gonna yeah yeah so I'm not unfortunately not going to be here so you're I'm a maybe I I don't I my husband just had hip replacement surgery so I don't want to too I'm sorry oh no it's fine old knows all about it yeah I have one I have a new one yeah work it totally works it totally it does and it wasn't from any you know traumatic fall it's like a karate injury from his 20s that now when you're in your 60s is bone on bone so s up to him so I would be honored to give the Personnel Board report okay well April we're gonna buy you cookies I don't need cookies cookies well so to do that um we have to write one I don't have time yeah so why don't we put that down the agenda let's deal with the stuff we normally the agenda is very lean um I don't think it's going to take long so why don't we save that one for last yeah that way we can make we can kind of um what's the word brainstorm together and see if we can all come the truth is I was thinking about it today so I guess I knew what was coming oh you yeah was sort of think yes all right well so has everybody read the minutes that I sent out on Monday or Sunday yeah yes and they seemed okay yes all right so um I make a motion that we approve the minutes from March 21st and I'll second oh I think an did but she yeah no I was on I couldn't unmute yeah all in favor aranai Bram d i okay excellent um the next on the agenda um Peg asked that we ask about the status of the luse clerk she's doing great so she's been hired no we haven't replaced her so is she staying um she has been very flexible and has changed their a couple times um she's kind of thinking that as soon as we can get the admin secretary because she's you know we can I can focus in on this in May and June but um she's just been stabilizing the office uh with the new chair and getting things in order and things are going good uh are going well and it just they needed some time to stabilize after a lot of upheaval so it's a good okay so so for the minutes you're telling me you're saying that the search for the land use clerk is on hold because the existing one is remaining is it's been flexible and staying and um to through this transition period with a new chair for a concom okay I'm forb them thank you but you do anticipate that it will pick up at some point we'll have to go in we will have to hire yes yes okay and then uh status of the groundskeeper hired oh that's right oh is that right okay so so person was hired now we we were talking about various options um in terms of n a number of people and number of hours so they found one person who can work more hours I believe so I don't know if Walter is still looking for others and he might be um but he has one very solid person who is living in town so he feels very about that by uh a res Town resident yeah and he's experienced in landscaping has a lot of experience used to have his own landscaping company so it's good that's great probably going to be bored at our our little Cemetery hopefully no it looks good I mean I I walk there a lot it looks pretty good okay um and and so speaking of the administrative secretary what's going on there I had one nibble um um pretty solid I was pretty hopeful um but the person has daycare issues in the summer that they're trying to figure out so whether or not they'll be able to fully apply I don't know yet so right okay you know of anybody please send them my way I am over my fraking head here yeah wonderful to have a little support yeah it sure would Becky we know this we just had two uh another huge round of past testing which is going to require 80 letters going out which is one of the functions of the admin um secretary and I'm going to have to get him out I'm if we don't have somebody I'm gonna have to get them out because if we don't have somebody in a week how about Janette could Janette help I that's a good idea she did help in taking minutes and I think I'm G to ask her again um if she's willing to work the extra time and if we have money in the budget we do but it's no um no that one's not going to work okay um well the other thing is too um if you need somebody to do some labor there I you know I can come to town hall for a few hours Becky I can't until next week but next week I could help if you if you really want just give me a stack of stuff and let me know what to do wow you're awesome yes yeah oh yeah I mean we gotta help yeah anyways you let me know I'm back on Tuesday um and then I'm going to S Francisco the week after that he's gonna be in a really good mood Becky so take I am gonna be happy probably a little tired I'm definitely gonna be tired he's singing out loud really loud it's gonna be play some good music oh yeah we're listen we're going to hear a lot of music um all right so one person applied for the administrative secretary position um um working out um well it's not a you know she didn't put in the full application I just was talking to to her about it and then she was sorting out the different you know before you can fully apply you have to know you you're not abandoning your children in the street when you do it so y that's important yeah somebody called DCF and that would really screw things up yeah so really all we have is one person expressing interest at this point that's all I've had so I'm going to send it back out and try to get um the valley posting it's just this is such you know we really need somebody in town because of that evening um I think with the evening meetings I think even though the minutes can be done without attending I think it's really important to have the person um at the meetings if possible yeah so you're going to advertise again yeah after town meeting well after Tuesday well everything's after town meeting at this point well I have two emergencies that I'll take Monday and Tuesday yeah okay all right those are the other those are the only things that um Peg had brought up for this meeting I was wondering if we could ask about the school because I saw it on the minutes from our last meeting the school Union negotiations um they are active um we just set up two or three additional meetings for May into June mean is going wow this not doesn't sound like fun that's one of the things that's killing our school budgets is these salary negotiations is teachers are I'm yeah I'm not arguing that they shouldn't get a pay increase at all but clearly they are and we can see the impact it's there was a really interesting article on NPR two nights ago I don't know if anybody heard it about local schools and the funding problems and blae what's I forget her first name and Natalie yeah Natalie Natalie Natalie and Joe were both quoted in it talking about the need for Chapter 70 adjustments and the need for the foundation side to be stronger I just happen to hear that just after Becky and I you and I talked about this earlier in the week and it's good to hear that the legislators talking about it legislators talking about it so now time to talk about the annual report annual report will be presented by April Stein great and you'll do a great I wear we were G to wear bunch of us were going to come in formal attire we thought that would that would be a nice touch for town meeting well or dress in period I mean when was the first anual town meeting get those un outfits out that would be that that would yes we got to have fun with this we did that for the 250th yeah that's what I'm saying those outfits must still be around somewhere I had to give them back they were they came from you know a costume got it some theer TR lent them to us which was really nice yeah so interesting but that was the meeting that we were written up I still have the Articles um it where shuberry was um cited for being the most um shoot oh the most congenial town meeting theyve the person had ever attended that really wow yes that was a well and this will become the second most congenial town meeting we're g to have you know well that was so whatever you say April whatever I say we went straight from the most congenial to the most contentious it it was like the you know if the budget hearing is any I I think the budget situation is gonna probably go pretty smooth given you last night yeah well unless ammeron well all we can do is vote it and see what they do right yeah I mean well I assume that that when the school committee made the decision they did that it was in concert with you know conversation behind the scenes if not even in the open with the finance committee in Amber no I don't know that was the typically the way it it was happening um and I know they felt um the loss of sham Mangano as a bridge between between you know with um with Doug being so short-handed Sean was really the bridge between ammer and the Regional Schools um so they're really feeling his loss yeah having him having been in both roles yeah and and the ammer finance director yeah that's it the role of the finance director at both places and obviously being involved in all the finance conversations yeah yeah Sean was a big loss he was he was a pretty smart guy y still lives y yes hamers I think Doug has a wonderful way of presenting you know it just it it's it's clear concise you know and not bogg down in a lot of emotion but it's just he's he's a good guy he's really good at that he yes diplomatically he just he's Mr matter fact he doesn't have any inflection in his voice like you said no emotion no and and he doesn't try to sell you know he he tells you things without making it sound like he's trying to get you to do anything right no he's he's he's good in that work he's very good okay so the so April the things that um are you looking at your the minutes no I'm yeah I'm writing the minutes but no what I did was I got an email from Peg and the things that she wanted to make sure that were in the annual report okay so she wanted to a mention that we uh hired a fire chief all right was that this last year no that was two years ago all right well that's what she wanted us to say I'm just telling you you're right he's finishing his second year yeah I know we've T how many times we hired him Wicked well I think I think if we talk about it they're gonna think we hired somebody else yeah right no and actually she did the we did the highway superintendent yes that's right she she did say that in here I'm sorry she said or was that last year she wasn't sure so to check no you're right that was my bad okay so we hired a yeah a highway superintendent um um contract negotiations with the highway and the police is that true no we don't highway police negotiate with Highway only the police have a union and didn't the select board do the the contract with the highway yeah we should stay away from that yeah so didn't do that okay so no did they do the you know I me look at our minutes and I didn't I'm sorry they all online somewhere no was a there was there was a representation from three boards wasn't there and then the and then the the select boards um signed the contract with the highway superint I mean that they always have to sign the contracts but I was involved had was anybody regular negotiations I was part of the the highway the hiring committee for that oh it wasn't board it was a regular it was done correctly but they I don't remember if we negotiated his contract I mean we did we I think um the select board ended up negotiating the salary but the the hiring I mean he accepted the job and then the then I work through and the select board worked through the salary for yeah it was very straightforward though yes all right though it's I yeah it's too bad that it's not more I you know I understand this is what the select board's doing now but I no I liked having Representatives if or was maybe there wasn't time well no it it was just because the representatives had done all you know they did all the work to H to bring the person on and sometimes you know oftentimes the the salary piece yeah wases not negotiate in that meaning and I can't swear to you I I know I no yeah I can't tell you who what meeting that was in okay well I I do know I think now's the right time to say this is you know I brought it up in one of our meetings with Melissa after the select board has done its contract negotiations we would the Personnel Board would like to talk to her or even the select board about that process and is that really the right thing to do y we had brought that up but that's probably not something to present at the town meeting but no no yeah but we are you know the select board is certainly within their right um but I I feel like having somebody from personnel fincom and select board negotiates out the um contract yes I think that's important and so you know do they come please tell us why it's not yeah yeah see how they react they're pretty reasonable board they are very reasonable yes so class so the other thing I added here April um we did a salary study resulting in adjustments to two positions yeah we're using should we we're using the the formula that was developed three years well there's two that's no that's Cola I'm talking about the it's sort of a parallel process it's the um the salary Corrections we're still working on that project well well we did a we did a alignment study although I wouldn't necess call it that you can if you'd like but i' give it lay terms so that the town folk understand um we did a salary study um a market analysis even you might want to call it and we determined that two positions were you know needed to be adjusted to market the accessors clerk and oh boy treasure that's right yeah treasure right and we didn't even bring them up to Market we just brought them closer to Market 50% I think only halfway this time we're still using the rolling average Cola um with guard rails yes uh and this and we're coming up on the next next round we are going to reexamine is that really working because we want to be able to we don't want to lose uh ground with our salaries yeah and we don't have to find out every three years when we do an analysis that we're behind and we have to adjust everybody y did you see that lever is giving 4% increases wow that was in the paper because their annual town meeting is also Saturday wow yeah I know that's what I thought too H and that doesn't make us look good but um yeah well maybe one of the analysis we should do is go back back to the analysis we did and see how we compared a lever every in every position they've they've made serious increases to their police and to their Highway departments so I guess it would make sense that uh other people in town should catch up a little bit too right okay we're still working on the job classification I feel terrible about I feel like I've just dropped it and I promise I will get back we're so close to being done um I feel like the uh my taking return to work has taken more than I had expected is the truth and and life life the other part of life life life I um life for retired people it's it's hard it's hard to be it's the semi-retired I find I've got two days a week that aren't mine anymore and um and it's it's it's more and then there's all the other stuff that still has to get done which I don't even know what I do no that's not true no that's I got another one for you by the way you've got a what I got another thing for the and I if everybody agrees um where am I I was just looking back at minutes and I was looking at our February minutes and we had a we replaced the recycling coordinator yeah yeah I was wondering about that George because I was looking at them too do we also in I'm sort of confused about what the Personnel committee blams but what about the highway department those hirings happened right there what didn't that was the first topic the highway superintendent no this was two part-time that's right oh that's true well yeah those were replacement of positions right this is also this is um December the department hired two part-time as needed employees for PL plowing oh your father back then I am all right well the good thing is and and one of them is really panning out to become uh a full-time employee he wonderful close to completing his CDL has the other um so it's great um they've had three guys on instead of two for about a month now and is this the person who had been an intern when he was in high school oh that's fat are we are we going to be a he did the internship out of when he was at Tech last summer uh with shoot sparry and it yeah it worked out very well and he lives in Leverett so he's close that's great yeah even bad weather that's great cessor highway so I think the focus that the Personnel Board should have is more on like what job descriptions did you review because you don't do the hiring okay yeah know you make recommendations or you work on committees hiring committees but you you there's never a time when you actually do any hiring so November 16th it was the job description for the highway and superintendent which included the tree Warden and then the job description we did also look at the one for the recycling coordinator Y and he's working out really well I saw his first his first email about the truck broke down it's like oh well in the long run that'll be easy for him because all he has to do is take cut and past this this text it only happens once every three months I once a week for about three months oh I know feels that way doesn't it that's huge awful I can't you know we haven't had this happen since we used to so Trucking you know it's it's really well not gun wood but April I feel like monu Road gets picked up every time and then oh you guys are picked up first thing in the morning we really we are really special all right so I'm not putting this stuff in the minutes you're just I'm taking I'm jotting down notes good good good okay uh recycling coordinat Highway superintendent uh ground keep yeah we've yeah we folded that in recycling coordinator uh um grounds keeper that job description was redone yeah and I think Walter has made further addition since we saw it um should probably ask him to give us a let us know what have official one on record yeah yes it needs to be approved by the select board too so yeah how far back should we go back to last May is that what's no July 1 July July okay year unless there's something really good in May yeah so I've looked through September's um and I saw the same thing youan I'm looking at July's now yeah July's pretty light yeah it sure is yeah i' say so it seems like our main work is still around you know the making sure our Municipal employeers are being paid at a rate that's comparable to the rest of Franklin County that's something that this board really values um we did decide that we would do another analysis next year y so you know I I'll do that in January February when it comes out I can and lever is already throwing that off for us maybe you know if you want I can pull it up real quick and just tell you how we compare them in most categories I think police and Highway were slipping behind all right probably that's new Becky do you think we were pretty comparable before they did the increase I think they've done more than one increase yeah yeah go back like every years or so it's usually we're yeah we usually come close and then one or the other is aggressive and then we try to Reign but um and we have been in competition with them because they have I know when we hired a highway Chief 10 years ago when we hired Tim it was an issue yeah we had to outbid them over 20 years what are you what did you say George when Tim hunting when we heard Tim hunting what we in a bidding war for him no um no not when we hired him but they tried to um hire him out from under us about seven years ago oh and then we gave him a bump and we gave him a small bump and right right um so they pay their fire chief better than we pay ours they pay yeah how but they're yeah they're like 75,000 yeah I um let me roll up here they just moved to fulltime yeah there's 76,000 we're 52 there's a very big difference in experience not experience but yeah yeah experience I mean I think he's part um he's got experience in the with the Amber fire department and he's um works with a UMass um um students and brings in trainees from UMass as firefighters so they have very few local people on their fire department I understand so you know they're they're Outsourcing to uh Franklin County for the accountant so that doesn't really count their admin secretary is paid less than ours Assessor's clerk I don't know what's going on there we don't have information I have to dig deeper they they have uh rrg so the clerk position was part of the assessment by rrg so it should be they have a clerk and their well the whole they had a clerk and an head assessor like U David Burgess has been working over there okay through RG so are their numbers High uh I don't have one so I might not have taken it because they said contracted or something I have to look back to the the survey we got from the from the Franklin Co from fock to know what what was really going on I'm just looking at my spreadsheet where I accumulated all this data um assistant town clerk um I don't have anything for leverate collector their collector is a lot higher than ours $36 versus 2850 this is wow oh Ryan's their collector Ryan yeah theel Everett yes well he's their Treasurer and they forced him to be the and I I think if you put those two together yeah because their treasure is $5 an hour less than ours oh interesting is that funny that I got two different rates for the collector and the treasure when he's doing both I'm gonna have to look into that did it temporary and they hired somebody I don't know because when him they were like you have to do collections too you know what it is the salary is this almost is a little higher than ours but the number of hours work per week is lower than ours by two and so the hourly rate gets kind of morphed if you know gets a little warp it goes higher yeah so that's probably not a fair comparison then to say that they're way overpaying their collector than ours because it's not that significant um their custodian is pretty much the same as ours their equipment operators are about not quite $2 more than ours but I think ours are going to change right yes well they did last yes I think it happened before the survey was done or during the time survey was got it done in the middle of the year around January so that means ours are probably a lot closer than they were yeah and then um their librarian um is ahead of ours by almost two bucks police officers by how by how much George $2 per hour I'm looking at per hours I've converted how many hours though yeah and how many hours and what's the salary um full time and she that Leverett is not that's right that's right you're 100 per right yeah so you know a lot of these numbers I'm just looking this is I'm just doing this real quick you know quick and dirty if you will and um so yeah I mean if we want to do a real analysis we need to look a little pull the cover off these things and Becky you obviously can see you know the intangibles here um police 2240 versus 2291 and um that is an hourly rate there's no salary or hours things going on with that was they were now getting 27 well this is you're looking at FY 24 and if they're giving a 4% raise that's GNA really bump it up the the Gap is going to get larger because of our 3.3 yes you know the irony is that in fact the the municipal employ employ salaries are not huge that's not a Hu these increases you know making increases in wages for our employees is not a huge slice of the budget you know it's it's relatively small we've got you know the other places that take more and and without our Municipal Employees we'd be screwed yep so the police negotiations basically are over I have to get we have I'm waiting to get a final copy of the the agreed to contract from the union um but there will be a significant increase in the first in FY 25 okay that's good and um the other one we didn't talk about was the town clerk their town clerk um salary-wise is getting paid $3,000 less than hours 3,300 but also works fewer hours um 25 and shsb 16 and Leverett so the hourly rate tips towards Leverett so again you know smok problem in that position as well because she came on board for about she came on board to potentially be our land use secretary um but it it only lasted a week or two she does like the whole newsletter that she does is not part of what she gets paid for okay she's been she's a long-term employee and she does a lot of additional work um we and we are working hard to try to employ I mean pay our people for all their time yes we should um I think part of the difference there okay so that's those are the positions I have where there's you know a comparison between shutesbury and Le okay so it sounds like basically you know we were very involved in the hiring at the hiring committee for the highway superintendent and uh upgrade updating that in that uh job description as well as the recycling coordinator groundskeeper you know upgrading those positions what about the assistant town clerk that was this year too but I think we did the prep for it the year before yeah it wasn't in the minutes yeah what it must have been before it went on forever well and the we had the job description it you know Grace was the assistant town clerk five years ago so it hadn't been that long that's right and we didn't make a lot of changes to it and that thank God we got that uh that we we're continuing for Grace's office yeah say that again it's been a tremendous help for Grace's office I can't imagine how you know just how much work the Town Clerk has had these last years yeah I'm glad we were able to help her a little um which brings me to a point that I'm going to bring up before the end of the meeting that I'm glad you brought her up because I talked to her Monday and I actually ended up getting a project from her but sorry about that in a second it's not my project it's our project but um okay put that on hold I'll put that on hold because is there anything else then I I mean an you look through the minutes I look through most of the minutes I didn't see anything George yeah and so the other part is the we've the ongoing job salary study and comp you know comparing our salaries wages and salaries with uh the rest of Franklin County uh so and and some other re in some other towns in the area but that's right of comparable size yes we're trying to do comparable sizes because P sham was on there and I think Williamsburg and weightly I no not weightly I forget the other one no what's it there was another one Ashfield Ashfield usually that's right is a good comparison to shoot SP they have more commercial base but yeah their downtown has more stuff going on than ours but yes that's true but through our studies this year the assessor clerk uh Treasurer and oh Peters Shon planfield right and the highway and the highway part-time you know the the new highway employees not what do we call them highway equipment operators operators yes okay and job descriptions we've done and we have a new member we have a new member member we have fresh blood no it's real it's wonderful because you know we're off the Baton it's nice to see new faces on boards and committees you know people are getting tired of looking at the same old people we're getting older you know those crazy bald heads who you know been doing the same thing year over year you used to have hair didn't you when I first met you did I was I had hair when I was first on you know finance and wherever else I was yes that's true I ALS yeah I also have don't put that in the the advertisement to get people they want T I started on this board had a full head of hair yeah you want to lose your hair join a committee that's right and and the gray has come year after year after year right all right so you got a report yeah it'll be fun I'll wear my formal gown nice I wish I was here to see it um so I'll take a picture if she does George all right that yeah that sounds great future business yes what would um I have I think I was talking to Lenny about it and um the police have like this seven or 800 page manual and now they have the post system they've got regulations dictating everything they do um the fire department we don't have so much um we don't have anything in place really as far as hiring uh hiring process and the town has a hiring process um but it's I think because the I'd like to spend a little I'm hopeful the Personnel Board would look into other how other towns hire their um police and fire I mean just the fire because I think the regs are very solid um for police um just because it's more involved with background checks it's involved in you know Public Safety is it's you know you usually a little more intense than when you're just hiring the a new land use clerk um you don't really go into their backgrounds deeply um but the land use clerk typically is not going into people's homes and saving lives so I think anyway so I was wondering if maybe we that could be a thing for the Personnel Board to look into is um hiring policies for fire department um and whether our manual you know look at our our Personnel handbook and see if that is sufficient or if we need to be um doing more than we are in support of our fire department so so yeah so that means that um you know how how you're to like talking about our call firemen um well everybody in the department right everybody yes the fire chief you know he went through a regular hiring process and like our Public Safety people had a detailed background check done on him um just like the police chief did um those are yeah typically the only two that have that but when we do hire um fire and police officers background checks are done okay that's really important I mean you be mandated by the State well they are for police but I don't they aren't for fire I I mean might be it might be that our you know it might be that we don't you know we need to learn more and do more about the fire department because Ry did not inherit any any policies that go any further than um Town employees so um so that's what he's working with natural um and he is getting the background checks done but I think it it would be a good thing for us to do some research on and see um if we should be updating our policy there so Becky I'll put it under a future business and when I send these minutes to Peg I'll include a little note that says you brought this up and maybe Peg can decide to even make this um and and I'll suggest to her that we make it an agenda item for our next meeting okay I apologize can I take a quick call sure and so George you sounds like you were talking to our town clerk about some yeah and I I I want hoping Becky would be in here but I'll tell you what it is um wait I'm just gonna write this down um next meeting agenda I just want to get this down so I don't forget yeah so I I was reappointed to the finance committee and so I had to go by and be sworn in again and she handed me Miss balder this folder of reading materials I've read every page right right this is you you've all had them it's fragrance free guidelines recommendations for emails for governor work you all know about that conflict of interests open meeting laws and sexual harassment and she hand me the sexual harassment I just going to shuffle here so I don't forget so she hand me the sexual harassment thing and said you guys really out think about getting this this is typed up from 30 20 years ago and I just handed to everybody it looks really crappy so I took it by myself and I brought I typed made a Word document out of it I'm going to send it to her and say here you go here's a Word document do with it what you like um didn't take me that long I listen to the news while I'm doing it but um I was reading it I'm wondering if it's something that maybe I should sense to everybody and we as a committee can read it and think about is it up to date it was dated April 15 1997 you just had a birthday didn't you I did yeah April 20th that's right ail yes I decided to go to the fourtown meeting for that that was I it's a crazy birthday yeah I did sorry I digress it's okay so April 15th 1997 but then amended June 20 2000 so this thing is 24 years old wow to date yes so I'm thinking we might want to go online and do a little reading um what the state's current mandates are or whatever you know another item that I think we should review so I'll send a copy I'll send a copy of it I think to everybody and um before the next meeting and just I'll suggest that the peg as well is something we should we should talk about I'll put it on the future agenda so that's all I'm going to surprise um Grace by sending it to who are say here it is but the Personnel Board is going to review it if you have any concerns or anything you think we need to focus on on it please let me know um there was yeah I was just wondering are there other documents that are handed out that that she's seeing or like outdated I could ask her that question as well I mean I really Personnel Board related documents right right no like racism inclusion yeah you know I didn't I don't know if there's something about that in there I'm not going to read them I mean I know I I've read them all before and I do have to do I got a notice that I have to do a um conflict of interest oh uh training by the end of the year the the webinar yeah I'm not sure what it is but yeah yeah takes a while so Becky I was just telling everybody Grace handed me a whole stack of documents for my reappointment to the finance committee including the sexual harassment policy and she made a comment about this is a tight piece of paper that's 24 years old um and this is what's so frustrating because part of the manual we H you know we got a new sexual harassment policy we have it available I think the select board but it hasn't because the manual hasn't been pulled together um all our policies are just sitting there and we got forward this isic you know the manual has to get done and all the attachments that I've been collecting you know some of them my you know for five years six years are just sitting there and and Grace is handing out crap you're talking about the manual the the personal handbook yes because there's in the back we've been collecting and approving all these um you know things that go with the manual but it's all those policies the um um you know the the women's rights uh around pregnancy um and nursing in the office and get you know there's all kinds of stuff that yeah because laws have changed right but we have it all we need to get it out to the employees this year so I'm going to push um Melissa and and just say we just wherever the manuals at where we need to we need to select board to I need what yeah I if she can please just send it to everybody or send it to me and we got to get done and get the updated stuff out so where's the personal where's the Personnel Board and all this I mean we are we waiting are we just going to accept what they do or do we also have to vet it it's been approved by earlier Personnel boards I mean all the policies went forward to the select board you know like six years ago sorry Becky let me just make sure I'm understanding correctly so so the personal handbook has been in the works for several years yes and so it could be that some of the things that you put forth might now be outdated well you've been Gathering them for like six years so yes but the stuff that's in the old manual and in Grace's office is 30 years old okay so and the stuff I don't believe you know most of the state stuff and those RS are are not out they haven't been updated yet I mean they're not outdated we just need to get them in circulation they need to be in all the department heads Master book they need to be available and the crap Grace is handing out needs to be updated yes so let me ask you this Becky if we could FastTrack that right and get it approved D is there anything that would prevent us from then still taking another look at what's approved and saying hey this has been updated right I mean we could still like if you got the per if we got the personal handbook approved right this committee go ahead and look at some of the policies just to see you don't have to worry about approvals right now I think we need to review where we're at with and the select I mean the Personnel Board needs to decide if it's ready um I think in I got it the Personnel Board is in charge of the updates to the manual unless there's things that are significant I mean regular updates like replacing the old sexual harassment um with a new one this the Personnel Board can do that they can on once the select board has approve the policy they can do that and I think a number of these were approved by the select board and but if we don't remember we'll just take them all back and get them all approved again and then get them in circulation okay thank you for clarifying that so in the context of the this conversation about the sexual harassment you're saying that there is a new sexual harassment policy it's documented in that handbook and it's different materially different from what we have right here oh yeah well then I'm not going to send anything to Grace and let's just try and get this pushed along yeah so then what's the next step we send to Grace they up items yeah that's she needs not not a a new version of this because she had she said this is typed and I said well that's fine I took it and I said I'll just type it up on a Word document give her the word document but then she could just put out a nice because she says this looks crappy when I reproduce it but that's not even the issue you're saying no it's not the issue that's outdated it's garbage and need okay okay that's why I said what I said yeah okay so so um I'll pull Melissa kind of I don't have any copies of what she's done I haven't seen anything um so it could be all done I don't know but I'll talk to her and then try to get and and then I'll bring all the copies of the different policies um let's try to do that for the next meeting or in or in May and if I if I'm not too buried but if I am then you know it we just got to keep on it yeah so that one so that in the hiring practices for the fire department and police department are really two items that need to be at the top of future business and then at sort of to later on is making sure we look at our Cola formula is that working and I'm thinking it's probably not giving I think we're getting behind but we'll find out I think you're right and think we have to be careful how we transition because we were lagging with inflation and so because we do three-year rolling we still got high inflation in our calculation whereas everybody might have been giving the current years's inflation we were a little behind but now we're peaked and that average is going to stay higher and I I would have thought we'd be higher than the other towns so yeah there's a I think we got to be really careful with how we do that I think the 4% guard rails is what kept us from being higher yeah because it knocked out what was it seven six and a half or seven oh yeah yeah yes one of them was at least six I think two of them were were guard railed would have both two years would have been higher than 4% yeah back to back now we had one year that was below 1% we gave one you know but somehow that just doesn't seem to cut it no no yeah to me it's got to be in for inflation otherwise we're always going to have those you know those those conversations that we are happy we don't have anymore where we got everybody in a room and half the room wants to give increases doesn't um and this way we had something solid to hook hook our wagon to but I think a rolling average is probably not the right way to go it's just got to be I don't think it's working but be doing better than you think we should really look at well we'll do it next year practice is yeah how they're addressing it because they seem to be like as they seem to be responding to the squeaky wheel and I I'm not certain if it's across the board that their wages are keeping up if it is then I'm wrong yeah and we're trying to avoid that well we saw in our analysis that you know we were competitive in many positions there were a handful we found two that were way below and there was a handful that were were below for sure and you know compared to lever it looks like the gap's going to get bigger um but compared to everybody else we'll just have to see next year yeah they that analysis usually comes out January right yep so February we should be able to talk about this more and hopefully in time for the the budget if we do make adjustments all right I think that's everything sounds oh June 20th would that be our June meeting we didn't have that in the minutes I thought I'd add that what what in May is it 16 these are like Target dates yes yes they are oh I got it 16 so the 20th of June is yeah yeah 20th of June is a Thursday yep yeah first day of summer or I don't know yet um so I'll put those down in the minutes so may 16 um is our next one I can make that so right now it looks like so if somebody else take a week not to travel it's crazy I got I'm like flying three times in the next three months and I have flown since Alex my youngest is getting married in July San Fran so oh that's so nice yeah we're pretty excited we really like his um Partners we think she's great no but they have to move East no never going to happen when he moved to San Francisco I looked him in the eye and I said you're going to meet a San Francisco girl you're going to get married in San Francisco you're never gonna live here again called me up one day said dad remember that conversation we had oh that's so sweet wow yeah no it's wonderful she's great she's an ER doctor wow wearing a doctor that's she's a high yo she's high energy they traveled they were just in the Caribbean sailing for 10 days yeah she's a sailor she's part of the yacht club in San Francisco does she need a crew does she ever need crew has she got a yeah no kidding she's getting one in a couple weeks you ask us Marty George do you guys want to come in the on the sailboat sure it's not her sailboat because she's a member of yach Club she has access to sailboats so they sail around the bay a lot so very cool yeah kind of fun and we're looking forward to forward to that so that's my travel after that I'm home I'm grounded things are good well I wish you good luck on annual Tom meeting I think it will go well it'll go well you guys be fine everybody runs a good show andan I hope your husband heals well oh thank you yes he's progressing as you know I don't know him well but you know he just seems like when I've met him on the street he's just he's a good guy and you know he's a nice guy yeah you did good anyway as I'm sure you were April when you got yours right it's like really does bring Mobility oh immediately absolutely yeah that pain went away yes well good for you guys that's okay okay thanks everybody thank you everybody good night April yes I mean just