e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e we set aside some money uh obviously for that but is it going to be enough we don't know so um that was a cost driver and then uh ultimately our utility uh is operating with excess exceeding amount of excess allocation that we're paying for and so we're addressing all these right now but we need the budget for what it's done to us last year that's sewer utility right talk about sewer utility so um and uh then just the uh overall cost of of everything uh last council meeting we heard about Sam and his grocery shopping and how food is going up energy is going up everything's going up uh you just turn the television on and you see the the the escalation of prices well it affects us as well and so we try to budget that we can you know operate within the current economic climate of of what's Happening that has a lot to do with it too um I I rub elbows with a lot of other Town managers and uh it would appear that a lot of them are all getting a requesting a bump in their budgets they have to in order to stay sustainable and and operate at that comfortable level cover all the wha ifs that that's what we're doing here we're trying to cover the Whata if in case because you just don't know what's going to happen but the good thing is is that Sam does have a lot of these areas that he puts money in uh to to address the the what is and if it doesn't happen we just roll it over into next year and we save it and use it the problem is if some of these things that we don't know go over yes we run a very real risk with only a million dollars left God forbid we have to use this and let's say legal costs go through the roof or we see an increasing decline in the businesses that want to do business here so either one of those two things worst case scenario based on this if we take six out and we have one there worst case scenario is if we need to use all those $6 million and we don't have the money because of whatever's going on to put it back and then things go over we run the risk of bankrupting our Surplus and going back to zero I have to leave I just want to to the Police Academy graduation a okay so um I just want to listen to this you let you go bankrupt we'll take a note out for the difference okay well I know that I'm just saying it's it's nerve-wracking it's it is all right wish I could saay for the rest bye thanks for do appreciate it wait is this the one our two officers graduate where is it at oh P County oh all right please convey our congratulations officers very exciting good because you got some going out the door so yeah good yeah thank you Don um we haven't gotone to any expenses yet but what is the net uh difference of the full-time and part-time employee count from last year to this year do you know do we add two or I have to I have to have Dawn work that out she that but as she leaves as thanks she'd have to look it up anyway because it varies but um again we you know we added at least what probably four additional staff net net additions yeah here and in just in the town hall right and these are net net new additions right not replacing existing people yeah so we have additional people at so the people that were here last year and left we replaced them we replac them and then in addition to replacing them so like Ed Haack debard um Diana all of that so all those people got replaced and then we hired more people on top of those just just you know but we replace some of those that were part-time to to a full-time to a full-time job okay so that not that's not n new we that's that's so it's not one for one not a half it isn't your your land use board the Planning and Zoning okay we that's another one that's for the longest time we only had two people it was Janice and Moren right obviously they've been replaced but we also have uh additional employees in that two additional employees in that department so net or exess there there's two right there in just the Planning and Zoning that we're talking about um the construction Department I think we did one up also um and the engineering I have part-time assistant here helping us uh basically uh work with Cory Stoner our outside engineer and uh but he's part-time he took the role of Ed hack right he did but was more of a consultant this Ralph is a part-time employ I mean he's our gatekeeper he took the so when I when I say that I should qualify when I say that I mean we like the business model of Haack of having a gatekeeper here right that was overseeing all the engineers that were needed to do different things so that's what this guy is we paid that as a as a consultant though right so this guy is an employee he's an employee but he's serving in the same capacity yes okay so about three and a half FTE maybe you want to talk about net new numbers right so doing some of our studies for the utilities and far rate studies and stuff like that so and how much have the budgets from the boards gone up so have the budgets gone up that are allotted for planning and zoning boards basically I just did the two and a half to two to two and a qu to two and a half% on their OE and then had to arrange for the salaries of the you know the right new staff that had come in over the last year as well too because but when we talk about things like master plans and things like that that could cost millions of dollars it's not Millions actually it's probably like 200 Bas it's going to be more than that Tom Collins has said multiple times more than he was incorrect he we have the quotes we have the incorrect yeah he was we have the estimates now Chris the plan would be something we did over a fiveyear emergency so the cost will be spread over five budgets you're going to bond separate so as a bond basically you're borrowing against you're borrowing against your cash flow but we're not okay what would happen is we do a we we would do an ordinance establish a special emergency for reow master plan whatever and then that cost that ordinance would be paid on deferred payments over a five year period so none of that is included in here no because we don't have firm enough prices right now to put them in the budget unfortunately well no we do have them now we just talked yesterday talked about the event doing it after the the until after this budget is that one of the one of the the Beauties too and I explained this to uh Dean the other day was with with doing it a large project like that as as a special emergency now you're spreading that cost over a fiveyear period instead of throwing a half million in this year and taking it out next year and making the budget allows you to keep the budget you know in a straighter line it' be like 40 or 50 a year over five years instead of one chunk up front right yeah right which is more pable than you got to figure if you put let's say for example it was a half a million dollars well you're already over the base of what a tax point would be so okay let's say just doing that emergency if was a half million or $600,000 now you're looking at your budget and you're putting your budget up two cents just to do that where if you keep it over a fiveyear period makes it a little easier to swallow yeah yeah Sam was there anything else on the revenue I know we were kind of still there uh with the other all the other conversations but is there anything else on there you wanted to point out before we move forward no just like I say the the biggest thing one of our saving factors obviously and I mentioned part of it was you know the collection rate that's achieved by the tax collector um and her staff um you know other than that most of the reeven there some of the um in her locals went away because uh they no longer wanted to have an inner local so that's why the revenues decreased there I'm sorry which one was that um the hardest Board of Education that went away they long oh stand up qpa stand okay so we no longer have agreements with them no longer have agreements so the salaries associated with those R away as that's why that's done yes okay so the um one of the largest increases in revenue of course you mentioned earlier is the interest right on investments and yes deposits does how much does the economic forecast and yesterday's fed all that has that change anything with the art forecast they've been staying pretty stable so far so about the same amounts uh com in Cuts I mean obviously our heaviest months are on the tax quarters um you know usually like month of February month of May August we will'll be up to probably 28 to 30 million in the account okay but then as soon as we pay out the SCH Boy de back to zero you want to get to expenses but like I say other than not the budget's pretty uh the the budget itself going through the lines and a lot of you can look at them and and digest it a little better this is just your you know like you say your starting point the look at um most of the budgets stayed pretty pretty reasonable there was a couple um let me just explain what our largest increases are right off the bat the largest increase of the single line is 20 264,000 something like that it was the uh the deficit in in the sewer operating budget and cost you're talking about the revenue not the expense revenue or cost the cost cost cost cost increase and um again the the thing there and we we have uh I guess Ralph is starting to work at it um to try to get something in place where we do mandatory hookups and theer services we've talked about this along with the an increase in the utilities we're doing a study to address there's three components that I so the water increase the sewer increase and then mandatory hookups to the the sewer that we're already paying we're looking to address all three factors uh very soon um we're we're going to hire a company um and um get them to do a rate study to make sure our numbers are accurate and then um we'll be presenting the council with a a proposal on on how to implement this and put us in better standing as you know utility should be self- sustaining and that's our our real goal even even like I say the the the sewer was something that should have been addressed 10 years ago but it just got pushed down the road so how much of the sewer budget expense increas is due to it not being self- sustaining like how much did we dip out of our own $264,000 that's net difference over last year or that's the total that's the net difference over last so what's the total I mean that it's probably on here somewhere it was two 64 is the total for this year last year it was 117 so it's going up that's and that's the cost that we have to cover because the utility rates don't cover it that's big yeah and a lot of that's excess sewer allocation P yeah that that's we're just paying for it not using it it's just correct being something to way and and again it's something that you know offer it out to the lake obviously water conservation is a is a big thing and you know as many people as you can hook get hooked up to that sewer the better quality the water is going to be you know even though it goes back into the walkill up up to Creek a little bit but um like say it's something we need to do it's either sell the allocation or or get someone to use it right then where was that on what page I can't find the uh sewer utility can you help uh well the deficit itself actually shows up in the in the current budget in the current fund um that is sewer operating expenses on fourth page from the last page fourth from the last okay yeah like say it's very small right now we only have probably a little over 600 or so customers and I mean one one of the one of the thoughts would be is if we could uh you know we do the mandatory hookups we we put some incentives in place as far as like do like a fiveyear fiveyear plan to get everybody hooked up to sewer okay if you get hooked up in the first year we'll wave your sewer connection and then the second year okay okay you well pay 20% of the sil conect just something to incentivize the people to get moving and get hooked up so that we start using that allegation so we if we Sorry go ahead oh sorry the other thing to keep in mind is that we have other residents that did hook up to sewer and they are paying crazy wages because there's no offset well the rates never gone up though no but I'm just saying like um we've had residents in here multiple times from um Carriage House the condos by Carriage House there and they've always complained and said we're bearing the burden but the plan was years and years ago my understanding Sam you were here for that I think it was even before I got here the plan was buy all this so that people are hooking up and using it we want to make sure we have enough but the problem is no one is and the burdens being worn by the people the only people that are using the service in the town's paying excess too I you're right again the goal is for the utility to be self- sustained is really what you want it to do um so we can wave our connection fee but schuma won't we're working with schuma on putting a plan together to to help us incentivize okay the hookup um they have discussed possibly uh spreading out the payment over a fiveyear time period okay so it's not an initial hit uh we're we're continually to explore possibilities and the other thing that's light on the horizon with that is you know we're into this far enough now that we're actually starting to pay off the bonds we used to build it so you know within the next 10 years most of the bonds will be down very low too so at least then we could regenerate some of the income in there so if we priori I think we should the count like speaking for myself I think we should prioritize and you it sounds like we're going to uh this uh restructuring of our sore approach that you said you were hiring a a vendor contractor to come in to help us guide guide us through that process exactly if we get that done this year it doesn't sound like we can realize any gains this in this C in this budget year right this is probably going to be the next couple of budget years where you're going to actually see the realization of those that's the magic question depend how many people tie in there's a cost break involved there uh with the incentive of waving the initial fee to hook up their user fee that they'll be paying once they're hooked in and then you know uh how many can we get to hook in and that's part of the study that the the the company the vendor is going to do and we'll have a better answer for you once that study's completed sure but you're if you're giving them an incentive that that's incentive is coming out of our budget right only if they sign up yes right I think the back end of that has to be we will not issue permits for failing septics in these areas anymore you must I think that's already that's I think that's already in okay I remember pH came to us and gave us this presentation yes and this is the right and it just wouldn't okay I think that's already you still have to you have to people from the lake have been asking yeah they're not goingon to have any big hits I saw Ralph just get a sewer map he just got SCH map so we have a map now of all the SCH lines and it's an active project that we're working on right now I'm just saying I know that there are people that live around lakes in Sparta natural that are really asking and saying please give us sewer because the significance of the proximity to if there's a problem or whatever the other thing is if you own a Lakefront home in these places now I know I can only speak for Lake Mohawk but the cost for you if you have to replace your septic is through the roof because of all the refinements so I've had multiple requests from people that have lak fronts to say can we please we would gladly hook up rather than have to deal with $660,000 of a septic system as long as they have the line in the road right now our lwh hanging fruit is where the existing lines are that's a huge project aren't tied in and that's woodport Road Sparta the whole suit are right now we need to get all them tied in because we don't need to inst pipes or anything it's already there we just got to get them tie in whereas what you're talking about it sounds great and all but now we have install and go through those whole things lifs by the way we just had gas tear up the roads and put it in so I I I can appreciate the desire and the impact on it but that is a whole another go area it is because if you expand the s service area also affects your affordable housing requirements too right there's a whole impact sure sure and again the the amounts of money that was originally spent when that line was run you know I'm I mean you talking probably a couple million dollars just to run s connect huge just to run that fee that line because it it goes out by the high school up West Mountain then back along um um Fork Hill Road in Franklin and and then to ties in over by Franklin um by where the B duck is there over so it doesn't go down 94 no no but there is one I think you're right schuma has one that goes right along right on the railroad track because we approved not long ago when votch septic went we approved them to tie in that's a project thought it was going to work that's an active project right but I'm just saying we so I mean ultimately that was the other thing when North Village went up there we were desperate to say tie in go to go to the Sewer like use the sewer but there was all these problems North Village did their own package plant but I'm saying before they did that the conversations were tie in we have all this flow we're paying for the allocation right you're right and that would have helped even further where we are right now right but it didn't work out that way it's all cost that package plant will die one day too so if these are the rules these are the rules I mean I'm just saying thank God is um I was in a pong I owned some property there when the H pakong did their sewers and they had a four-phase thing they did the first phase it was so disruptive hugely expensive that they never did the other three and these things are enormous for sewer the sewer just digging the lines and putting the lifters in in place and the rocks and it was it was it was a huge project very disruptive and boy Frank was when they did it and that was back in mid to late 80s yeah tons of money Sam I have some questions um about the planning board budget so um what page are you on uh let's see oh first page first page of expenses at the bot very bottom at the bottom yeah so not the not the department that's separate but the planning board itself um I see last year if I'm reading this correctly we had 124500 budgeted we added 175 to get to that 2995 right that was the net that was the eventual budget um it looks like to the right of that under the column that says paid or charged looks like we spent 225 however you go back to the left the second column over for 2024 it looks like we're only budgeting 103 was the 175 was the the special emergencies for the litigation that wasn't part of your budget they moved it in so you could but I don't see that for this year though is that because they're not it was emergency carry over hopefully we won't get sued anymore no it's it's money that was not there that won't just be a g that your budget is 103 it's starting place from we need to build it in now because we there's active litigation like not even worry about new litigation there's that's what the preactive litigation going on so I think well that's the the balance of any of that money that's left in there will go goes to that hopefully that Reserve was a balance left in last year of like 74,000 okay so that does carry over we can use against you know payments okay does anything have to happen now to make sure that's available because we have these active if it goes to the end of the year then I'll have to I would have to do like a resolution to put it in like a Special Reserve if it goes to the end of this year okay so right now that 74 was unused from last year but it's still sitting there waiting for this litigation got it okay so the 103 is 177 what's that sorry you add the 74,000 yeah yeah yeah and then take that and add it to the 1033 yeah so then you're going to end up taking if you take 103 and 74 and add those together that is what's going to be in your but that includes already a chunk of that money from the emergency appropriation so your base budget is 103 but you have this it carry over which is not to be spent I guess on anything else but the litigation yeah so I guess then my concern is why we're down to 103 when last year we're at 1245 um is there a way we can see how last year's money was spent to see part of that money was transferred in also from other lines that4 because we realized there was going to be a shortage in that line did you guys we had $65,000 to review your professionals which was not in there so it's artificially High the last two years we're saying they gave you additional money in the I think it was 60 something, for you guys to go through that whole review of your professionals remember you went out to bid you went out to RFP no that thing cost 65,000 it was that was what you asked us for no no that was that was not for that I don't think we paid anything for that I mean I think we paid um what's the gentleman the consultant guy we paid him a $2,000 paid him like two 4,000 um I know that Angelo might have charged a bill or two but planning board came to us and ask for $60,000 for something I'll go back in my notes and figure out what it was yeah I don't think that was that um so I mean we have to also be careful we know now we're financially very sensitive we cannot go on spending spree we have no I get that but this is critical work here and if you ask anybody in the public if doing some of this work is critical um I just need to know where that difference is because we have the PAC that's going on that's approved that's the plan endorsement advisory committee we have the ordinance review subcommittee they're still looking at ordinances that we need might need to change sooner than waiting a year for the master plan um so there's these professional fees they're all professional fees but that's still happening right now so I need I just need to know is that included in at 103 anything over and above like the normal process of the board that then we have to look at it to see whether it's something that you know like a revision of Master Plan type of thing where you would put it as a special emergency so well these are ongoing subcommittees they're not new right um I mean there was a new one just added but that's just to look for grant money that's not when you have ongoing ongoing ongoing ongoing in several different departments at one point you need to pull the whole price together so that you can get one one big nut I get it how how can we break out this 103 so we have a mutual understanding of what this 103 represents I'll have to pull out the detail unfortunately I don't have okay you know I got greater detail as far as the subs underneath but yeah so wait you have a a committee that's looking at Grants yeah so why not just work with the grant writer that we have we are we are it just started last yesterday um it's just a few members want to make sure they understand what grants are available from like Highlands Council so we have dory's going to be involved and uh Grant wrer think we also need to be very careful that we are being mindful of the fact that our land use board are they're all new and they have a lot of work to do and we can't flood them also they emplo yeah I'm talking about this well yeah but if this can save us money um looking for Grants it's I'm not worried about looking for Grants but there's a lot of other things going on here PX should be going away when it's over that's the the Crux of PX yeah but there's still probably $5,000 $10,000 worth of fees between now and getting to December on that for example right but I'm saying like that that shouldn't be an ongoing thing because that's going to disband agreed the um the ordinance review that's an ongoing thing you have with with the professionals that you have working with you obviously only on specific zones it's not going to be Perman I know I understand that so what other committees do you have that are working with professionals those are the two main ones the two main like pan waiver they don't Tom does it he just chines in now and for free um and obviously the planning board professional ones done master plan sub commmittee is separate so these are the two so these two together would probably be 55 is the master plan subcommittee have a professional tied to it well that's part of the master plan of course yeah all three of them but that's part of the master plan funding that's not special appropr we don't have funding right now for the master plan it's coming after we after we adopt this budget I told them what we have what have to do then is do an ordinance for um special emergency for the master so it doesn't affect this some part of this so the council has to approve that spending correct yes absolutely so there's two subcommittees that are ongoing now so I just don't know if that I don't know making up 45 55k it'll it'll be there I understand how you want to see that I I know it'll be there okay and you exemplify why that land use department is is just why it's bigger why we do have more staff there uh the focal point of all the land use work that that we're doing right now is is yeah it's important the master plan the open space all that the grants are going to help help offset this though a lot of them are are matching or reimbursements got to front the money on that but you know I think everyone's trying to get to the right point in in the least cost costly manner so it works out real well but it it'll be there okay I know what your your concern is on that um Sam is good at at making sure that's there and he has the flexibility at the beginning of the year and the end of the year to to transfer move money around and stuff like that and he's he's a chess player he really is can I just see that like what was charged last year there's not a lot of detail on this it's difficult to to really yeah it's just more summary but yeah of the actual lines looks like we spent 125 last year based on these numbers not including litigation um right because we had we put in 175 for litigation we have 75 of that left over so it means we spent 100 on litigation perhaps and if we look at what we spent all together was 225 so we take out 100 for litigation that means we spent about 125 for the professionals right for the other planning board activities so that that that's the Gap I guess I'm focusing on the 103 versus that one 25 spent last year so it's what 18 19,000 bucks yeah because I think there might have been some money from a prior year that actually was into that so that was 22,000 oh we been a reduction out okay so it might be not clear on these getting it back in line to where it had been previous years years oh unfortunately that department the last two to three years has been constant change with personnel and you know it's been pretty tough over there yeah know so at least now we've got some consistency and it seems like we have fairly decent working staff yeah very very decent looking at the um wages and salaries I see that police departments going the salaries are going up 200,000 and the road repair is going up 306,000 are we hiring that new police officers um as far as I know the Staffing levels are going to stay the same um basically is this the the budget the um bargain the bargaining agreement that um that will be coming up well no I'm talking about the reason for the increase of half a million dollars between those two departments and salary yes part of the reason what's part of the reason the CL because I know with the with the road department we um we gave them a significant bump with the especially with the CDL also correct and and the numbers are aren't changing there this is just to sustain the the bargaining contracts that were negotiated the good thing is is for what is worth the DPW is fully staffed they're they're right where they need to be and churn is stopped right and EXC is the churn stopped or the turnover yes the most I mean you're never always going to have a healthy amount of turnover but um uh yeah right now it's pre- stay he's got a young group there so we haven't had like uh any retirements lately um it's pretty pretty steady with the way they have it set up uh also um our our largest uh problem like year and a half two years ago though was we weren't consistent with the with the starting rate of a of yeah our Market in the market understood yeah and the problem we were losing people to towns actually were paying more money than we were and we're you know we're losing quality people so we we had to look at that when we went into that last but there's no net new people in those two buckets right which just is just Again part of the the union bargained um correct the CBA Y correct okay so the wreck department parks and wreck is that only so I know there's DPW and then there's parks and then there's Recreation right and there's a buildings and grounds and buildings and grounds okay so my question is um I know that with the amount of new fields and all that kind of stuff that we've been putting in I know that there's a need for additional people I don't know where they would go in this you know I don't know if they would go to Browns or DPW or Parks or recck like I don't know which one of these things they would go in but is there room in here to hire those additional people so that we can properly maintain all the things we're building all the new things we're putting in there new newer things come down the pike we'd have to look at it evaluate whether we needed additional Personnel I think right now we're carrying the same size number of Staff um we do have some hard people out there that come in and assist which which help out greatly um and I think it seems like the load is pretty good right now I haven't heard any complaints as far as not getting things done and the Sam I see the the public grounds public buildings and grounds salaries are going up16 000 we actually have three staff people on there now so actually Four it was 120 now it's oh yeah I forgot because half a t goes so are those new employees uh no he re we have a cleaning person or uh the Candace who cleans uh all the buildings she's in there uh we have Jean and Gunner which are are building and grounds facility maintenance group and then we also have a animal control coming partly out he he helps empty garbage cans so why help me understand why it would go from 120 last year to 236 an increase of 116,000 would they additional staff and stuff like that and moving I thought it was the same staff though was the same staff but we didn't have Candace I mean Candace just got kind of matriculated in midy year for $100,000 no no are they also covered under a CBA uh yes yes okay so that part of it yes yeah so it was 120 but now it's going up 116 more it seems almost double I think what he's saying is they move people around in the organization so they're not new people they're just now in a new place oh is that the case I think that's what I heard they would you know they would come out of used to be two now there's four so we should see a correspond realignment elsewhere yeah and a lot of what was done in the past we're trying to get more to the actual Department was you know just the they would start splitting salaries out and charge part to Recreation charge part to here problem of it is it's building and grounds it's building and grounds and it includes all of the buildings and grounds it shouldn't it shouldn't be oh no we got to charge part of this to Recreation we that part right right yeah so the um the pages don't have numbers it's hard for me to tell you what we're on but it looks like total wages and salaries are going up by 1.4 million from 23 to 24 and we've got a net new of we said four fiveish people yeah sounds about right I think well we hired a dispatcher downstairs uh that I'm aware of this year um the other ones that you you were talking about um took uh the part-time engineering I think I did a an inspector in construction and then we did the land use so you up around five five and a half six there and then with the cbas uh and then the overall two and a quarter increase it adds up U but there's no line it's a significant bump I when I that I I studied that too so you know it is significant um for the staff the good thing is that I I don't think we're really anticipating any uh more additional staff so much um we are uh anticipating some retirements especially down in the police department some uh veteran officers are are uh in the process of retiring right now John John L is going out at the end of the month um there's how many there's four right yep there's a couple more that's why we have four new officers coming in yeah so that salary is going to drop drastically it will but we still have to pay their retirement so it's additive then right in a sense okay it's it's there but um we need to be cognitive of all of it and and knowing looking at those numbers uh I'm with you I mean we're all with you on it so the the big ouch is 7 and a half% tax increase right I didn't even know we could do 7% I thought we were capped at two and a half as long as our overall it's on our Appropriations and our overall Appropriations aren't over the 2 and a half% SAM weren't you thinking I thought yesterday I could be a mistaken you said it was going to be more like three or four is that am I reading that wrong or I remember four four cents I mean percent um percentage wise see I don't think I he's he's looking at this oh yeah 7.45% yeah increase on the tax rate 7 what 45 so if you so this is what your basic homeowner is going to do your basic homeowner is going to say 7.45% for the municipal seven what whatever the school was that was almost 7% right so that's 14% the county is three that's 177% so uh and the library also went up over 100,00 ,000 well it's we can't add them because is already part of the rate though well I mean I know that's a mandatory thing we can't control but what what I want to just make sure is so just so I understand are we are the taxpayers of this town going to see their bill basically go up 177% overall no you you can't add the percentages together it's but the school because the school one's higher isn't it right but relatives right to each other right it's example says on on the mid assessment it's 372 uh right and you put all those increases that's what would go up with toal town is 16947 so the tax bill is going up higher than the school Bill well that's what it says Municipal Taxes percentage wise but the school is still a larger chunk but the percentage of of the tax bill the school is but the increase from 23 to 24 is that that's oh that's why because he said half of it was already implemented last year and half of it gets implemented this year exactly that's why that's why it's never a true figure with school when you do it on that fiscal year here it's I'm just looking through this through the lens of how we are going to you know I think we better be prepared I'm not saying we don't need to do this I'm saying we better be prepared um you know I want to I know we're having another meeting after that I think we all just need to look at this thing and like digest it a little bit and then come back to you guys individually with our questions before we meet again so that we can just sort of roll through it again maybe but um that's why we're here I no that's what I'm saying exactly I mean it's hard to I know Sam you're in this thing 247 so it makes perfect sense to you um and Jim you're in it with him um I'm learning every but you know for us I think looking at this some of the things just are like take your breath away sort of without you know again and I'm also concerned about you know other departments so Department the process is the department heads meet with you right Jim and they meet with Sam they meet with you both and they say this is what we want this is our wish list this is what we need did anyone get told you're not getting your wish list like did anyone get told Santa's not coming to you this year um or that's the capital discussion honestly most of the operating was relatively two two and a quarter per that the usual of what we do every year okay uh it's the bigger items equipment and stuff and cap Capital uh I know the fire department has a an appreciable wish list on this and I told the chief that I I may bring him in to basically explain and and his requests for the council to consider because that that that's the these are the capital items and that's where I think you're going to see where we're going to have to so where's the capital in here what is earmarked uh 2 million two million so that's less than we've done in the past year less done but what also means is that we would have to look at going out and doing notes or bonding and we haven't had to do that in years well we're all our bonds are paid off I know that's what I'm saying it's like the feeling you get when you pay off all your credit cards the last payment of our bond is in here 500 $515,000 and then all of our current fund if you have it debt is is done I mean obviously we still have the debt for silver and water utility but um so it's time to to compile some project yeah and go out and and send them out the bond the only part of it is I wish we'd gone out for Bond a couple of years ago when they were at 2% instead of you know four or 5% that they may be at now you could almost argue too that because we've done that which is wonderful we've had less our Surplus is less right because if we had used more bonds and we had a big a bunch of bonds out there now we would have had more cash at the time earlier bonds to P off one more example if you look in here you look at the line for Capital Vehicles okay I saw that 12 125 the jump on that is is unbelievable I mean we were we were used to picking up the um you know the Fords for probably $50,000 a vehicle 50,000 with the upfitting the cost upfitting plus we can't get the Fords anymore they're a year out when you order them so we switched over to the Taho taho's vehicle is 70,000 and the upfitting is 25 so it's $100,000 vehicle that's why you see 300 there it's for three vehicles that's three vehicles is that common to do three a year yeah that's what he needs in the fleet down there because man we're we're put you know large Township we're putting a lot of miles on these vehicles and now he's he's staffed so the the the cars are even more important but it's just that type of thing that that's G up I mean I can remember a time Heck if you paid $10,000 for a police car this is like when I started that was a lot of money well the other thing to keep in mind is that there was a seven-year period perod or six or seven year period where they did not get new cars they've always got so the problem was it didn't come through I know there was a couple years when Bill was here they did not get new cars they were and they were pooping them together in the DPW garage and trying to there's a time when they ordered them it's just they didn't get delivered and you had a long lapse in getting to delivery and then we really had to milk the old cars and and put them together and keep them running and that was a that was a challenge I wonder get pickup trucks well we got the one it doesn't it doesn't work very well for us it doesn't I mean it's good for like a traffic type of vehicle whatever Bears out of the woods so we're asking for about um $1.4 million more in taxes for the municipality which happens to correspond and I know there's a you get how you get there is is is is complicated but that number happens to also be about the amount of salary salary increase that's just probably happen stance um so if we're asking for another $1.4 million from the taxpayers um where is it coming from uh we're we're increasing our um our services because we've added four or fiveish people and we're going to provide better service because and and we have happier employees because they're they're not a stressed and we've got um the staffs are are or the Departments are fully staffed um we um uh yeah that's that's really what the argument is right and plus we've had U just general cost increases of insurance and the cost of keeping the lights on okay so that's so that's on one side of The Ledger um on the other side of the Ledger um if we were to try to scale this back where would it come from well it would would it come from the department heads I mean the Departments being staffed probably not we just we all realize that there's there's a need to keep the staffs at that level and and to play our employees we had to bump in the cbas and the employees are now happy with that um so that's probably off the table right um could we cut Services back I mean it's a possibility I'm trying to think of like how do you so how do you how do you what's the if if if it's what's the alternative to 1.4 million more taxes I don't really see any that's kind of where I'm getting to the other problem is $500,000 Less in Capital minimum that would be like the past couple years it's been 2.5 and0 well again then you're going to have to look at bonding and taking it out over a longer period no I mean I'm just saying the past several years the capital uh projects that we've done have been like 2.5 2.3 2. whatever and we were able to do that without an increase because of good market conditions good business scenarios a lot of money coming in whatever the other big issue we have here that we can't Overlook also is the this litigation that we just don't know how much it's going to cost it's already cost a lot of money and it's going to cost a lot more so that's another thing we have to be mindful of and there's no way for us to control that so I mean litigation is something Staffing to Dan's point is something um inflation on stuff we need we that like you said the police cars the equipment maintenance oil I got my oil change the other day I almost fell out of the car it was $136 $136 so so so but I'm saying like just basic stuff to run all this equipment has gone through the roof so so what could it if we were to lower the expenses what would it come from would would come at the expense of the staff and the services okay let's rule that out for now the other sort of Ledger is how can you offset that okay we're going to offset that in part with the solar with the brown field right so that's going to cut into this a Chun lips to God's ears Dan okay well anyway I'm just okay where else could where else can we gain um gain revenue to offset this nothing comes to mind the sewer okay right the sewer may not realize this year but that's going to blunt future expenses uh future cost increases um do we have any other Revenue generators that are foreseeable property sales I can do that we have a lot of Bots that we own maybe we look at what can we sell to offset I don't know if it would even put a dent in it because I don't know what all the properties are but if our um bonds are going to be paid off wouldn't we see a drop in the servicing of the debt in our expenses here or that's just not that's not in this part of The Ledger he said the last payment though is this year okay so we don't see it till next year but is that in this budget here or is that a separate oh and that's only half though normally we were paying about million dollars a year in bonds and this year we're only paying 515,000 but that's in this budget here that's not a separate line item okay but so it's almost antithetical when we say we need to start uring some more debt and we're also asking for $1.4 million more in taxes it's hard to it's hard to reconcile those two numbers and you certainly don't want to acrw debt to pay off your operating keeping the lights on stuff you want to try to keep it to something substantial like okay I know one of our projects is or one of one of the WIS we are hanging out there that's still in a note is the um the conversion of or the fields over at White Lake so maybe pull that pull that um note in and you know maybe the one for um but we more work going on oh the one for the salt Mark pull that note in and and take some of those that are you know good sturdy type of project something that's going to last a 20e period and go out and throw them on a bond we could do that you know and spread so you can spread those payments over 10 15 20 year period whatever instead of you know what I've done with them in the past is usually I I'll I'll try to make it so I can pay them off in a 10-year period to keep them undergo out the permanent but okay we take them at permanent and take them up to that 15 or 20 year period just to spread the debt out so that way by spreading the debt out yes the payments may be higher and stuff like that but it'll allow you to do more projects if if you follow me is it common to have a spread out a a municipal Bond over 20 30 years the tops I've seen is 20 and that's usually usually 20 would be like you know if you build a new municipal building I was going to say what was it on this one when like an airport might be 20 right this this one was hard because it went I don't know it was so screwy I think we all together when we when they built this was about 7 million as near as I could tell because it went Bank the the contractors went oh that's right okay so this is not a good example but different things that we want to do for Capital plans what you're saying is we could pull in some of the existing notes pay them off take the money and fund it through a bigger bomb that we would take that would include those the notes off the books and take the money in and then pay it and you'd advertise it over a longer period so your expenses your servicing might go down yeah and like I said I wouldn't not I if if we're buildings or structures that have that sticky life expectancy then you know maybe you go out a 15 or 20 year tops and then like you know if it's just more F field maintenance or a dump truck or something like that try to keep that shorter term like you know like a five or seven year bond I'll tell you what if you want to get things like I I understand your pain with the police cars because the fire trucks are even worse how long have you been waiting 3 years we put the order in three years ago yeah we're still waiting for it and I just talked to someone the other day bumped into them at 7-Eleven I said where is the truck and they're like we're going to be lucky if we get it by the end of the year wow was Boeing building it for years it's it's a mess and then they need another one there's another one that's past its life it's natural life there's another one past its natural life now um and so Sam the amount we paying per year if I see this correctly for debt is I don't know how short page it is but it looks like 1.1 last year it was like 1.4 million now we're down 1.1 million we're [Music] paying okay yeah so essentially if we didn't have those debt payments which I know is not a real real scenario that would have a big impact on the need to increase taxes so much right 1.1 Mill ion right so so say the same thing differently if we were to foro debts we would take the debt service out of the budget we would save money that way would offset it that way the downside of that is now we've got we put our credit rating in at Jeopardy because exactly so you got to look at this basically the way you would look at your own finances it's an investment in your credit you need you need a well balanced portfolio yeah I mean you need some credit card debt you need maybe a mortgage something that shows that you got to show that you have credit to get credit and to get a better rate on your bonds if you can the other thing to keep in mind is that our bond rating affects the school and they're going out for referendum next year so we just have to understand that when they go out to get funding and all that kind of stuff it's our credit reun oh yeah it's not theirs it's ours so it's very important for a lot of different reasons I agree I agree is there is there wiggle room here like is there still flexibility to not affect our rating but maneuver this our rating is fine I mean again Honestly by the time we P off the debt though they got nothing to rate is on so we need to it'll drop yeah we need something we can't just pay it and be done is what you're saying right we cannot just pay it and not have something else there I'm saying opposite we think about increasing it slightly to free up some well we've talked about different capital projects that we want to do like recreation community stuff we've talked about all that kind of stuff as well so I think this is what we need to have those conversations to say okay what could we do where could we do it what could that look like and that is where we look at if we decide okay we're going to pull in note these random little notes blend them into a bond Bond and then in that Bond do all the things that we were you know we've been kicking around doing for a long time now it just spread out um and spread out the payments so that the impact because some of the things that we've been talking about doing are actually going to be money generators so if we're smart about it the things that we put in if we build these things out in a you know um in a staged process we could be generating money to make the payment of the bond right so it's null and void to the taxpayer even to think of it in this way when you look at the sewer utility now if we were to go take a bond out just say theoretically to pay for the hookup fees to every resident in a sewer service area in the long run it probably would generate US money if we put it on a bond paid it off over that period because the the increase in the revenue that we were collect users Point that's a that's a good idea yeah now so another thing you know you could do the the fiveyear phasing of the hookup or you could you could just say okay look you know we'll hook you up for free just for the thought of getting the getting the bond user fee in to start CU most of our bonds are pretty much paid off on that there may be like four or five years left on the bonds but we we've paid for it but we still are not using it and it's already still going to be expensive for the resident because they still have to pay schuma right but that 10,000 I mean even if they have to pay I think it's more how much what does it, what does it cost it's not it's not a whole lot but the problem of it is we own the allocation so we're paying for it even though it's not getting used right right and the problem is once we give it up we can't get it back yeah so if something like a North Village or some big development or like for example the high SCH school right if we would have thrown away all that usage we can't buy it back once that's why they overbought it to begin with yeah yeah and remember the state at one point had promised they were making Route 15 four lanes so there was a lot of what I'm saying that was what they were supposed to do you guys remember that they came in and said we're going to make this four lanes so that's why you see a lot of that big stuff so the planning at that time was much different with that promise because that's a game changer um but it didn't happen but still we own it all we're paying for all of it right but we're just not utilizing it we've got to get people on it's been this long we're going to wait for them more they haven't done it yet I mean whoever's done it has done it like we can back to Chris's point on maximizing Revenue um is are there more opportunities for C Renewables to come and find more like solar generation like you know we have the new salt Barn that's got a huge roof on it um are there other things I I showed you like the wind turbines just a great location and as you know we went out to bid on that and we had over 10 12 bids so it comes down not trying to cover spart with allation on that the transmission line was right there for them we really do need to find it and as we oh oh Dan I'm I'm sorry you weren't with us last night night but we actually talked about the the solar panels and uh cashing in on srex when you own the panels you have that ability to cach in on srex um except uh right now you've got the the situation that where where you put the solar panels you got to have to use it on site um and the DPW uses very little electricity it already has panels on the on the the building roof itself uh just like we do here um it's a it's a NE neat idea uh I've heard the uh suggestions of the uh car canopies that you see is popular around with the solar panels on them um you know we could put them out here um the advantage of doing that yourself is then you're you're cashing on your your rrex whereas the cups it's more like a power purchase agreement you're just leasing the property and they're doing it y but if you had the funds to to put the panels up yourself and administrate it like we're already doing you get the biggest return on your investment and those turbines I think are could be really really interesting you can hide them in a place I wouldn't put a turbine on top of this building but maybe over in the DPW or you know it's interesting I I it was a cool link that you sent on that so just to for the rest of the group um there's a new type of Archimedes screw or whatever they call it the T turbine so rather than having the huge wind Mills um it's more compact that's probably the size of like a VW Volkswagen Beetle type of thing and it's it's conical so it's a it's it's it's a it looks like a screw and it always faces you know it actually captures the wind from any angle and uh it supposedly generates four times as much as a comparable solar array on your roof these these engines these wind turbines so you put solar you don't put any solar panels up at all no you could put this on the ground somewhere if you wanted to um like in the field of the DPW you send me that yeah I'll send you a link I mean I think that because I think the other thing is with srex it's volatile right sometimes they're hot sometimes they're not more stable now but yeah go ahead I felt good about the fact that and learning about um I think Tesla has a system I think there's different systems out there where you can actually install this thing and power your house just like a lot of times I don't know if you guys watch these shows yeah we looked at Alis Frontier like all that kind of stuff so I pay attention to you know a lot about what they're building in to be sustainable on their own and I think it's one thing when you can have the power capture it and bring it directly into your thing versus having to capture it and then sell it you know what I mean I don't know if there's any benefit for us of doing anything like that but I mean the people that that are doing it literally in the middle of nowhere are powering like their whole house or I mean it's amazing what's being generated and they're literally not near a power line for 500 Miles um but they're not they don't have to sell it to anybody it's actually being stored in the battery packs and then that's plugged into their power panels and that's just you know doing everything so I don't know if that is also something for smaller site or something that we might be able to offet I mean the bills the Bild to run all the lights in this building cannot be cheap you know electricity to run all this stuff can't be cheap so maybe we could also look at what can we or is there a way for us to be able to put that one of those systems in but you've already maxed and the wind doesn't stop blowing whereas the sun stops shining at the night but you know the wind you'll generate you don't have to worry about storing it it's it's already running but that's what I'm saying it I guess I guess I should have been more specific though it could be anything any Alternate Source where the power is yours yeah where you don't have to worry about storing it in something and then going to Market and and selling it I guess is my point we've got the panels here that pretty much already push the meter backwards on on this building but that's because we sell them I don't think we sell them in this building oh we do both you do both you sell the srex and you also collect electricity so you do them both perfect are we selling srex from the generation here I thought we're just at the water department all of them okay it's everything okay council meeting coming up you're GNA approve that I I look forward to it um anyway I'll send you the link to the I think they're um it's an interesting technology and anyway to frame it with this discussion as another way to offset expenses um if we can cover more of our expenses sell more back to the grid um if we can install these in other locations where we have uh like maybe the Live Well I don't know we have Town property we are very proactive in in trying to operate as efficiently as possible I know we've already gone through two State energy audits where these lights have been changed out to LEDs uh the motion sensors um uh the boiler upgrades in all our buildings we've had these energy audits done we've done it twice now so we've tried to be proactive on on being energy uh uh efficient along with the the solar panels and whatnot so you know and then we all keep our eyes open and we share the ideas and see see see what comes of it I think the other thing also that's important is for us to be very mind [Music] that we do need new business coming in here we do need offsets we do need ratables you could it could be rable XYZ ABC D EF it doesn't matter what it is but we have to have a healthy amount of ratables coming in our escrow I if if you can confirm for me but I believe our escrow is the lowest it's been in 20 years is that true the escrow is low oh in Surplus you mean the escrow that's coming in from businesses that we normally have that are offsetting half the cost yeah the r because the other thing to understand is escro accounts and all that kind of stuff is also offsetting a lot of the money that we are paying right now for engineers and all kinds of stuff like that and we don't have it so now we're footing the bill for it um the other thing is ratables in the form of taxes you know I know we're going to be looking at different types of businesses moving forward but it's very very important that you know we that we be aware to Dan's point when we're looking at offsetting these things one of the biggest way to offset these things is to get businesses in here and keep the rateable machine going so again it's about balanced progress but what we do not want to continue to do is have people think there's no spart is closed for business that stops I'm not hearing that you might be hearing that but the planning board is really busy uh with applications the site plan waiver is very busy I mean there's lots of activity so I don't I don't see that I mean that there's tons of vacancies out there I think we're you know we're open for business and we're busy well I don't know whatever's happening or whatever kind of businesses are coming in it's negatively we're having a negative effect we're not seeing the money we saw before is there a big change so there needs to be a Reconciliation because I like to know like to know those numbers when you say the escrow you mean the applicants escrow the escro and the fees and all that kind of but if there's if the applicants if there's no applicants or if there's less applicants those professionals aren't working on those applications so they're not getting paid anyway so the accounts we've closed out that were stagnant for 15 20 years too I mean yeah you had the money there but nothing was happening okay some out send the money back if we couldn't yeah think I'm still waiting on my escro money my my it's in the mail yeah yeah in the mail yeah it's in the budget here I think the other thing we really I I have another question so I don't know how it's going to affect this but um I think it's on the governor's desk right now um we've been getting lots of correspondents about it which is this new we we talked about it the new Kaa COA um and everything and you know I'm very apprehensive to believe it's going to be better for us because I haven't seen and obviously it's not approved so we don't know if what actually they signed it he signed it when did he sign it today yesterday yesterday yeah so I think um I don't know how we get a copy of that but I think we need to look at that because we had negotiated that deal with Tom Collins I just want to really see if it did really go lower um because I think we need to to also be mindful about the kind of Housing and the types of Housing and the different things if we're not tied to the COA obligation that we were tied to before yeah the first impression I got from Tom is that everyone's numbers are going up but the from last time I thought the whole point of it well one of the points of it was to relook at places just like Sparta that had huge Highlands preservation percentage and whatnot to really look at what could you put there and to reduce the number because you even if you built on every Square mhm you know mile that you had with the highlands and the wetlands and the this and the that lands and lakes and everything running through you would never be able to meet that that quota which is why we had Tom go there in the first place and negotiate something yeah so I would really like to see that and have a conversation because that might be something else that we could leverage in here somewhere to meet some of the new demands that we have and to um maybe do some offsets and some planning in our bonds and whatnot I think Tom I talked to Tom last night and uh yeah I think the Tom Ryan and Ur I think we're going to talk to them to have them come and talk to us okay and kind of get us up to speed and prep us on that we actually have a lot of good resources between Tom and Tom and Glenn Kings and we also have our third party agency C gp& they're you know they're running our our sales and rentals for affordable housing and um I've spoken to them twice and they seem very I mean their business they're very knowledgeable of what's happening and I know that they're following everything that that's going on with the state yeah um I even ran into a gentleman and I was asking him I'm what about the towns who already have agreements right what and he couldn't answer nobody could yeah because Co is so CO's going CO as it before is gone yeah so the problem that's the problem anyone who has a contract with an organization that is no longer even in existence by default you would think yeah I'm not sure how they're handling that I'm sure they're carrying it over to the next numbers come out but I think it's going to be sooner than next middle of next year we need to know that I think yeah yeah so if we could get some update Jim on on like what the impact of that is going to be as well I think that would be helpful de just enlightened me it looks like Tom and ursul May okay yeah that's what Tom Collins and I talked about he thought was best plan I said Tom do you want to come to talk to us he said well Tom Ryan and Ursula they're in touch a lot and that would be a good plan if we want to I I'll stay on top of it and let you guys know okay so uh yeah we have like seven minutes opens the public yes okay all right so Sam we'll get our feedback how do you want to handle our thoughts and feedback once we have time to dig in do you want it in the interim though we could do another meeting um you know the introduction I would if we want it let's have if we can have it like within the next week week and a half I'm looking at the introduction probably to be the first meeting April yeah I think Josh and Neil should have opportunities to make comments in public as well I mean if if we got to push it off and do the second meeting we could do that but um if we can get it together to have it introduced on the on the what's the deadline K April 2 that's the next council meeting well the nth nth I'm sorry the nth would be the introduction well have to have another meeting next week and then you got to have the second reading 28 days leave but then it has to go to the state before we can have no we're self exam this year so we still what we're self- examed doesn't have to go to the state oh it doesn't have to go to the state right okay so we might have to do this again next week say which is fine okay yeah I mean like I say this was just more or less to everybody where we're at for obviously amongst yourselves you could probably get a copy of this to the other two Council and I'm going to send it to let let let the well you know they got any questions that or they can call in stop him whatever so just to be clear right now is this public information no right now this is confidential not to be shared outside of council yeah it just keep it among yourself I mean this is a public meeting they can't have this no but that's what I'm I just want to be clear because I think it blurs the lines when you have a public meeting but what you're talking about is confidential so I just want to be clear that for everyone here and everyone to understand that until this until this gets ined that's why that's why I did it on my Excel worksheets instead of on the state budget form because it's a draft okay okay I mean the the budget form is the legal paper that's yeah yeah or whatever to get the books yeah okay let me uh let me move on to the open it up to the public for any input questions comments seeing no one is here uh we'll close the public session part of the agenda and with that yeah we're ready to adjourn uh make a motion to adjourn we have a just quickly we have a council connect tomorrow at the library at 11 oh yeah so I think it's Neil you and Neil right I think yeah um I don't know if Neil is going to make it but I'll be there I'll be there till 12:20 because I have an appointment at 12:30 I took a vacation day tomorrow so um I have an appointment at 12:30 but I will be there from 11: to 12:20 awesome oh I can't I can't take if anybody would like to take uh Neil's not there I can't take off what I can't make it if Neil's not there if Neil's not there busy you can't make it yeah you're saying if Neil can't make it you'll be all alone I'm just saying I can't fill in okay all right well I know it's sort of it it's last minute but he got pulled into something I guess in uh a court or something I'm not sure but anyway so but I I'll still be there I don't want to cancel it so I'll still go and if anyone's around that would like to to join bring soku yeah I said bring sodoku or or a book well last time we had we had really we had like six or seven people it was great I mean it was it was really great we had the ideas about the um update to Main Street which are the upgrades and the beautification so that was great but um yeah all right uh just a wrap so we have a motion to adjourn have a second mov all in favor I I