good evening everyone this is the finance committee this is Tuesday June 18th 2024 it is 6:31 I'd like to call the meeting to order with a pledge of allegiance a pledge of allegiance to the flag to the flag of the United the United States of America to The Republic which stands one nation God indivisible with liberty and justice for all under Mass General Law chapter 38 section 20 F this meeting is being recorded this meeting is being held remotely in accordance with the governor of Massachusetts March 12 2020 order suspending certain provisions of the open meeting law GLC 30A section 20 and on March 29th 2023 Governor Healey signed a supplemental 2023 budget Bill allowing remote and hybrid meetings options for public bodies through March 31st 2025 well welcome everybody it's been a while since we've had a meeting welcome back um we have a full uh big agenda tonight we're going to start off we have some yearend transfers that uh the town accountant has asked us to do and so these are ones that have come in front of us after town meetings so we did a number of them on at at at the Town warrant but these have come afterwards um I do not see Nicole but Jim hartnet is here in case we have any questions hi Jim so the first uh the first transfer that we have is for uh and again for those of us who who may not know so the yearend transfers uh need to be approved by the department that's transferring the money from and then the transferring the money to and then the select board also needs to uh sign off on that and they have signed off on all of these transfers last at last night's select board meeting um so now the finance committee also needs to approve these transfers so the first transfer is $475 and that's going from the Police Department Personnel Services to the fire department General expenses um everyone can you hear me oh yes hi Chris Chief welcome thank you thank you thank you for having myself and deputy forell here with us this evening um so just to go over this transfer uh the police department is uh seeking funds to do seal coating and uh line striping kind of preventive maintenance for our our driveway here at the police department um the fire department was also looking to utilize the same service for the same company um by allowing this transfer the funds would be finan fiscally prudent with the crew and the equipment being present on site for the same services for the two Town departments um CH Balman is in concurrence with me where he doesn't recommend seal coding only crack uh repair and line striping so this is the reason for the request for the transfer thank you Chief does anyone have any questions on that transfer those approve you Morton I'll second that thank you uh no any other discussion no I'll do a roll call l l uh i h T Morton I Cindy Cindy Brown I Michelle if you can Michelle Orlando I thank you Gary yes Christopher Christopher threr I Zach saak La Brew I and Karen Rous I thank you uh the second transfer is $25,000 going from the fire department overtime to the fire department equipment is there anyone uh that can speak to that for us hi I don't have the exact um the exact transfer request but speaking with the chief previously it was um just for some supplies and equipment they had some additional money left in their personnel account great thank you uh Al go ahead you've got your hand up I this afternoon I I spoke with the chief as well uh after he spoke with with Jim and his being the liaison I I just wanted to get a handle on 25,000 it it is for things like they need new tires there's 6 or $7,000 for tires there is a repair and maintenance um at at at station two uh the do specifically there's $3 $3500 uh there uh the highway department and taking nothing away from the highway department and formed the fire department and I'm assuming the police department as well that they could no longer staff uh mowing so uh a a um you know a a mower had to be purchased you know so these are just three examples of things there's no there's no fat in it there's no you know there's no side door issues I mean these are these are needed things and um uh my after speaking with Dan and and knowing Dan as well as many of the other others of you that these are legitimate expenses that that need to be covered thank you Al Cindy go ahead you've got your hand up I'm only going to say three cheers finally the highway department is no longer responsible for the mowing at the police and fire station it would shouldn't have been their business in the first place so thank goodness for that I approve wholeheartedly a mower so good I'm glad they're not I'm glad the highway department isn't doing it anymore do you also wholeheartedly endorse somebody on that mower or just the mower itself I doesn't matter to me who's who's behind it as long as it's not on the highway department Pap all right if no other question I'd like to entertain a motion to approve this transfer please so so moved thank you do a roll call Al Al Le i q p Morton I Cindy Michelle Cindy Brown I Michelle Alando I Christopher christop Duncan law I Zack Zack Le Bru I counter else I thank you the next transfer is $218,000 $497 going from the Police Department Personnel Services to Police Department General expenses and I'll turn it over to the chief thank you madam chair just to give a little background on this in fy4 the police department has a surplus of Personnel Services due to three full-time officer positions remaining vacant throughout the fiscal year along with two retirements in January and one in April the budgetary transfer is needed to cover unanticipated expenses related to our police building Cruisers new unfunded e911 mandates and compliance with the public records law additionally to support our goal of 31 full-time officers we need to acire the necessary equipment to properly outfit them so this is also in a fact that we've been short at least one dispatcher throughout the year if not sometimes two just to kind of go over a few of the items that we're looking for um one is called the digital lodging recorder uh it's a state-owned e911 system um currently now it's on the on the town um where're where now required to record non- calls for service so this is one thing we're looking about purchase another thing is uh what's called redaction software as we know we have body waterer and Cruiser cameras um by having redaction software we actually put us in compliance with the public records law requests um regarding our 5-year-old station we need some up we need to do some upkeep to prevent small problems from becoming larger ones uh we have uh data on an old server which needs to be migrated to prevent the loss of archive data um in decommission the old server which is taking away from resources from my it Department um you know in my finance committee presentation I brought up how we're short staffed we we since that time we have um two Westport residents who will be attending uh Prest Academy in August um we're hoping to get up to a fully budgeted amount of 31 officers and with that this is uh the needs of equipment for our offices in our town so um if anybody has any questions I'll be more than happy to uh see answer go ahead um were any of these items presented to uh Capital I'm just curious no none of these items were presented in capital Gary I think one thing that could be said is the money sort of came out of nowhere because it was intended to be used for employment of officers that turned out either retire or not to be there it wasn't something planned it just happened through circumstances and I I would just like to to to wait te off on what what Hugh just said they were unanticipated and they're probably not going to be uh recurring uh in to that extent and lastly you know I want to commend the uh the the chief and the deputy and and the others within the department for forward thinking they're anticipating certain expenses that uh you know rather than every year kind of scrambling to get a b or c whatever it might be using this kind of one time I'll use the word these are my words windfall if you will to to boost up our um capabilities within the police department over the next three to five years or whatever it might be so U I just wanted to weigh in on that please the number of them I just add in of course the sheath has the details but are mandatory such as software to deal with camera uh pictures and so forth soft there are mandatory deletions or ractions that take place but the present software doesn't do that so it has to be acquired and this is one of the things that's being acquired is something that has to be done but couldn't be done without the revised software thank you Cindy you have your hand up um I would I would just add also that many of the items on the list although not all are not really capitalizable I mean they're really expense items so they wouldn't necessarily have come before the capital Improvement planning committee uh because they wouldn't have been of uh such um Capital significance and capital duration it wouldn't have a a livelihood that could be necessarily marked that um would be included uh necessarily in the cipc so you know some of these are just uh very badly needed expense items that um uh you know the chief finds finds himself in the St the the department finds himself in a position where you know they're not always going to have this much money left at the end of the year and um I think this is a good way to be able to uh to put some of that money to uh to good use because it wouldn't necessarily be um used for as I said is a capital expense I'll make a motion to approve it one oh go ahead one second um sure thanks so uh discussion so Zach you've got your hand up thank you I was just curious it looks like one of the items was a drone upgrade for thermal capabilities um just purely out of curiosity I was wondering um what you know what the thermal capabilities could be used for and secondly do we currently have someone on staff that can operate the newly upgraded drone or is this like you know a very specific I don't know um skill set to operate this Madam chair if I can defer to deputy chief rebell on this please yeah absolutely So currently I do have a uh part 107 license to fly the Drone the current drone we have we lost thermal capabilities we did at previously um Ed those thermal capabilities to find somebody that was uh suicidal and they had been lost in the woods um we just recently had an incident on Route Six with a cow we had to call in another Community with their drone because ours wasn't available um to do that we were are planning on having additional operators to fly that drone um besides myself so that that's in the plans as well to have people that are pilots that have the part 107 license to uh to fly that drone and have that capability for us so it's it's a very robust system um there is specific train that you need to fly it um but it does it does give us a quite a opportunity to uh utilize that in a situation where you sending I've said it before and interview before he sending in um hard assets instead of soft assets and identify what's going on and you get a lay of the land if you will to find out what's going on before you deploy Personnel into that situation we utilize it for uh search and rescue mostly um just to find out find people cover large areas at a at a quick Pace um the thermal is what helps us do that with just a regular camera that's on there it's very hard or it's very easy to miss people um and with the thermal capability it allows us to pick up things and um again we had dark help us at one point in time with something like that because we don't have that but having that on staff allows us to to play it immediately and rapidly so that way we can get situation under control more quickly understood thank you sure no problem Karen you're on mute I'm on mute I'm off mute now thank you the birds are chirping so I'm trying to keep my camera trying to keep my mic uh so any other discussions if not I'd like to uh do a roll call okay roll call Al um Al first yes Al is I thank you Hugh H Mor than I Cindy Cindy Brown I Michelle I think we lost Michelle uh for the for the note uh at 6:44 she dropped off uh so hopefully she'll be back on shortly uh Gary yes Christopher Christopher threr I Duncan Duncan law I Zack Zack Le Bru I and Karen Rous I um thank you Chief uh thank you very much we appreciate everything you do and um you're free to stay for the rest of the meeting but you're free to go thank you for having us we're actually having a budget meeting with Hillary Harris right after this but thank you and thank you to the committee for uh you know allowing us to do this we appreciate it thank you you good luck thank you thank you all right the next transfer is $1 17,860 and that's going from the election registration Personnel Services to election registration General expenses um Nicole you're here can you give us a quick synopsis of what that is please okay so this is just extra money that is uh in their personal services because the assistant regist was out on extended family medical leave app uh for medical issues and um we the town clerk discovered that were there was some uh a mass mailing that needed to be done that hadn't been done in a couple of years to update the voter registration um so this is to cover uh the expenses of the mass mailing and uh a couple of um she had a couple of um trainings um that she needs to send both the um assistant registra and the assistant uh town clerk to um you know um increased postage cost uh for everything that has to be mailed whether it's the census the uh voting um so uh that's what this was going to uh to cover great thank you Michelle does any um Nicole does anyone have any questions move to approve thank you second second you uh any further discussion Noe I'll do roll call Al Karen one thing um uh does Nicole know or does anybody know maybe for the fy2 budget have we increased this because we're going to have four we're going have multiple elections now in the budget in in the fiscal year as far as I know um the town clerk has adjusted the budget for this year's election okay thanks any other questions nope okay so back to our roll call Al Ali H H iy Bindy Brown I um Michelle is still not back uh Gary yes Christopher Christopher Thrasher I Duncan Duncan law I Zack Zack Brew I Karen Rous I thank you um the next trans is $2,500 and that is debt retirement interest for the campground going to debt retirement for Bristol Aggie um Nicole could you give us a quick one on that as well please okay so this what happened was the uh estimate that we budgeted for for Bristol Aggie's debt payment uh came in um slightly higher than we expected and um so we need to cover this $2,500 um from interest to principal thank you Nicole any questions all right I looking for motion motion to approve second thank you any further questions or discussion I see none so roll call Al Al i q h Morton I Cindy Cindy Brown I Michelle is still not not here uh Gary yes Christopher Christopher I thank you Duncan Duncan law I Zach Zack Lau I Karen Rouse I and we have one more transfer and that is 2,769 going from the library Personnel Services to library General expenses um Nicole if you could so the I'm so the new library director sent a list of items that she was um wanting to purchase I think one is a lawn mower as well um and this is due to the uh timing between uh when the previous director left and the new director is on and they still don't have an assistant director so there's extra money in Personnel Services thank you Nicole welcome any questions uh Gary go ahead did she say this was for a lawn mow yeah I think there is a lawnmower on her list of things to purchase um I think talk about the library right I I think the highway department used to mow at the um h i used think they used to mow at the library but due to short staffing the highway department is unable to um um do that anymore so who so who who mows at the schools the school department so I believe yeah the school has a contract with someone yeah so the school oh so the school maintenance does not mow no the grass School maintenance does mow um some of the grass I think around the new schools at the old high school they have a contract and I do think they contract some of the they may contract the fields out but they do mowing around so I guess this is more about principle than anything else why why wouldn't they just mow the library I I I guess I don't understand why we have to buy a purchase a lawnmower for the library they're already at the schools it's pretty much attached um I I just don't understand why it's not I mean I'm more of a principle than you know it's almost one continuous piece of lawn I don't know have we reached out to the schools to see if they would even entertain that or we had talked to the school about plowing when they plow their schools to plow the library parking lot sidewalks and they've agreed to do some of it but it gets complicated as Union issues there's two different unions there's one for the school one for the library um they're short staff as well I think they're down um three maintenance staff people right now so yeah common sense it should work but reality just doesn't work out good Zach go ahead I think that's a valid point to bring up and you don't just buy a mower whether it's $10,000 or $20,000 and your grass is just cut you know who's going to cut the lawn um where's the mower going to be stored who's going to do maintenance on the mower what happens when the mower breaks is it worth looking into um you know the person who's contracted for the old high school to mow the library as well or do we have a maintenance plan and uh you know a labor plan to actually cut and mow they're going to weed whack as well the weed whacker hedge trimmer um just just a couple of questions to throw out there I just see this like you know Cameron we we're going to have everybody in every department now um and and not the not and believe me I've been to the DPW facility the highway facility i' I've looked at all their equipment I've I've had a tour of the roads and everything else not but I'm saying because the facilities are so close to each other I I like Jim said the reality of it is that we may not have people to run this equipment but it being so close I mean wouldn't you think that the schools would want to maybe at the grass I'm just fearing that now we're going to have departments coming in looking for not only lawnmowers but other equipment well that you know that's that's the nature of what's happened now right everyone is cannibalizing for themselves I mean the sum of the parts is certainly greater than the hole here yes if we you know if we had a an overall plan to take care of all of the loans far less than what it is for each department to do so but everybody feel so threatened in their own budget as to what they can and cannot do for another department we we're way past that now we're way past where people can help one department or the other if it's going to be at the expense of their own budget so every man for themselves that's what it's turned out to be not just in town everywhere everywhere you go that's what's happened now uh because budgets are thin all over the place and I'm not saying that you know no one wants to help each other Jim raises a valid point you've got Union issues uh you know you've got Manpower issues do they have enough staff one place or the other I mean why doesn't the cemetery Department do it their primary job is to mow so maybe Cemetery should do it and not the highway department I don't know but I guess that's not up to us to decide but maybe there should be a a you know a larger plan and as Zach pointed out you know there there are are other issues there are tertiary issues that go along with buying a lawn more uh and that's why we use a lawn service and my husband's not going to cut the grass every week because of all those issues that he just described so it's that's what happens they would be better off just using a a service far better off I would be much more inclined to approve them using a mowing service employ someone from in town utilize a business in town and do it rather than getting somebody to cut the grass and weed whacking and fixing it and storing it they should just hire a service to do it before we U Nicole can you um do me a favor do you have any idea how much of the $20,000 that's in this request is for a lawnmower uh hold on let me and there these are all valid points but I I want to make sure we're um spending our time appropriately at this point well I know like I said some of it is for office supplies and work to the building I think um the all right I'm trying to see I know she sent me emails well while you look for it Hugh you have your hand up so why don't we keep going but um I just want to understand the material um it looks like it's a little over 16,000 for the lawn mower who who and I think also Zach's Point's very good you everybody's got a lawn mower where they going to get stored lawnmowers are used occasionally as it were maintenance repairs all that stuff so that uh if this money's already been spent that would not be good when we have approved it in advance if it's been spent it's probably a g a done deal but if not all these points are very valid I know go hire a service must be another way to do it yeah go hire a service $116,000 buys you a lot of lawn service right it does I don't think it would be spent Hugh because the transfer hasn't been approved but um go ahead uh Jim you've got your hand up so we've looked at a number of different options and I'm not I haven't been that involved with the library but um I was talking to the fire chief today and they were looking to contract it out and the cost was over $800 a cutting you know we still have to pay prevailing wage um it's expensive um it's actually cheaper for them to pay their own staff overtime to cut cut the um the fire department more um the highway department has been using a seasonal worker the last few years who's been cutting most mostly the library the police fire and some of the landing properties he he did not um he's not we did not apply again this year so they just don't have that staff person they have Union issues as well um we have two labor relation suits against us now for doing work outside what they believe is their Union contract so it's just difficult to move somebody from one spot to another um yeah I I'd love to just say okay let's hire a contract and you know the school is going to be paying I think $34,000 for them to cut the grass at the old high school for the year um gets expensive the library has a decent sized lawn the whole back you don't really notice it but the whole back of the property is um they must have a good acre over an acre of land that's um f grass behind the library so it's it's fairly substantial it's just not a good situation anywhere around I don't have a good answer for you ideally you'd like one Department to do it all right they could service they could maintain it they could store it um and you have one guy that does it but we don't have that luxury Jim did you say it's $34,000 they cut the grass at the old high school yes um last year when we were looking we were we were short Cemetery staff we were looking we actually hired um a couple of times to cut a couple of the cemeteries and you know was take them about a day to do it and you know we went up upwards of $800 per cutting um I think one was $1,400 it's it's it's expensive and and like I said you're paying prevailing wage it's not like you can just hire a kid down the street and have them cut the grass for you it just doesn't and this year has been tough right we've had a lot of rain when it rains you can't cut the grass when it rains the Grass Grows high so it's it's again there's no there's no good solution thank you Jim anyone else have any questions yeah Karen can we make a mo can we make a motion to um only fund a piece of the transfer or do we have to fund either fund the whole thing or nothing at all cuz you said there's other stuff built in there so here's the thing whether I mean the money is still going to be in that budget regardless of where it is and if we if they don't spend it it will still fall into free cash whether it's in personal services or um General expenses I mean Jim can probably have a conversation with the director as the procurement officer and see if you know we can work something out maybe something is a lesser cost um obviously we need to get three quotes for it and a contract um under chapter chapter 30b procurement um so you could just approve the whole thing and then we could you know have a conversation with the the director before any purchasing gets done so I I I guess the other question I have is why is this not a capital item why is other equipment that the town need uh Capital items and then this this isn't I just don't understand the I understand we got to cut grass but what's that in the priority of all the other Capital items that we have in town well I think this kind of came up more suddenly when the highway department no longer has that seasonal person to cut some of the grass at these other locations and that's why these things are popping up so it you know the the capital Improvement planning committee starts meeting in November of December of last year and they had no way of knowing to put that on their list for for this year but the other question Nicole that you brought up about procurement and three quotes and this that and the other we're at the 18th of June how are you going to get a lawnmower bought you know have the bids procured and everything in 10 days so if it's between 10,000 and $50,000 you just need three quotes whether it's written or verbal it needs to be documented um something like this could possibly be on a state bid list where the contracts and everything has already been um procured um okay V vetted through the state so um if it's over 50,000 then you need an RFP and you know all that kind of stuff but between 10 and 50 it's just um three you know three quotes under 10,000 it's just sound business practices so um something like this it I mean 16,000 seems like a lot but for it to go to Capital um it it it's kind of a a iffy situation where it is it a capital item is it not a capital item um you know what's the the uh life of the uh equipment you know whether it's you know a fixed asset or not so um but like I said um just because we're transferring it doesn't necessarily mean she has to to purchase like I said we can work with Jim and the director and you know see what we can come up with thank you Nicole Al you've got your hand up I I I do and you know in a 54 million budget 20 grand like a lot and is not a lot but having said that I I I really weigh in with Gary I mean this this 16 Grand from mower who's who's to sit behind the mower $800 I mean I have a six acre field out of my house that I pay a third of the price for what the numbers are being quoted uh right now and I look at the library and we we're talking about an acre and it it it it's not so much the money in the overall budget it is does it pass the smell test with the taxpayer that's what I'm going to propose you I I don't know I I can go either way it it just it just doesn't seem right it doesn't feel right um so that that's what I wanted to say thank you Hugh go ahead I'm just gonna say everything cost more these days thanks to Washington and what they've been doing the figure strikes me as very high but then you think about it twice thing that really goes through my mind is maybe we're going to have a whole bunch of lawnmowers everybody has one which is used on occasion maybe and maybe Jim already has this in mind coordinating the the hardware that's going to be acquired because if the police have one the fire have one and and the library has one and pretty soon you got a whole garage full on mowers I'm sure that that's not going to happen because I think Jim is probably on top of it but the the um I Mo without there's no good answer something needs to be done though the land needs the lawn needs to be mowed it can't turn into a hay field so do we do we know how much the lawnmower was for the police and fire station I don't off hand know I think I saw it was a cabota zero turn well over 16 if not if it was a base model it was at 16 I'm sorry to jump in and I just want to say like 16 from experience literally in the industry in my past 16,000 is a respectable number for a mower not trying to be labor at that point just trying to think in the long scheme of things like it doesn't mow itself and maintenance and longterm is this a sustainable solution or is this you know I just didn't know if there was an opportunity to hire a service while we could come up with a better plan and like like you said pretty soon you know maybe we'll have our own Westport Community Lawn Mower Service that uh we can start to generate some Revenue here with these mowers you know these are commercial grade mowers um it it does seem a little interesting that the library would request for a mower and what's their plan to to mow that's it I don't want to belabor it I know we've got a lot of stuff to go over yeah thanks I I don't want to weigh in too much more either I just you know I think about 16,000 and just curious why wouldn't we have the highway department have more seasonal pay pay seasonal workers and then they go and use the same equipment and hire it would seem to be more cost effective but it's it's a lot easier it's a lot easier to buy a lawn more than to find a body that's willing to take the job yeah yeah you know it's not easy so I will defer to um the Town Administrator feeling that this is the best of situation that we we have uh for this um but any other comments do we want to make a motion to well I do have a comment a question for then for for Jim for the Town Administrator I mean Jim who who do they have in mind to operate the mower do you know they have a maintenance staff person that oh they do they do okay all right do we have a motion so moved what's the motion to approve approve the transfer thank you all right if no further discussion uh Al I'm gonna Channel Hugh Morton from a couple of meetings before knows and and say [Music] I H I'd be consistent with all on that yes all right no other real option I think exactly right I'll join the I'll join the hold the nose Club but vote I oh thank you uh we still don't have Michelle with us so I will go on to Gary no okay thank you Gary no Christopher yes christop rer I thank you Duncan I'm available to drive the mower but um dunan law I thank you Zack Zack Le Brew I thank you Rous ey too thank you okay so that takes care of item one which is our transfers so thank you so the next item on the agenda is um similar so they're transfers from the reserve account uh to to different places and the only difference here is that uh the finance committee is the authoritative body for this so certainly the select board should be aware of transfers that are uh being requested but um the select board doesn't does not vote on these so these are purely at the responsibility of the finance committee um so the first item is to transfer TW the request is for $23,000 cominging from the reserve fund to the town hall Annex General expenses um Jimmer Nicole do you want to um give us a quick sure so about four weeks ago um we had notice so there was no water at the Town Hall Annex we hired a company to go in to see if they could Frack the well which is about $3,200 they pressurize it and they try to get new I guess new veins to support flow into the well but uh when they went to Frack it they realized the well had collapsed and it was no good so we had to get a replacement well put in um we hired a local driller from uh dmouth to put the well in he he put the well in it's currently it's functioning now we still have to go through the testing and privating process with mass D it's a public water supply so it's a complicated process we'll have to do a 24-hour pump test we'll have to we've already sent the water out for testing um The Well itself was about 13 or 14,000 and the permitting could go anywhere from10 to $166,000 depending on the requirements for Mass DP uh we have a price now I think to 14 for the permitting um with this transfer with some existing funds remaining in the accounts we' be able to cover that and we're getting another price and we're hoping that'll come in less just for your your benefit it's not benefit but is so you aware well drill when they went to put the pump in after it sat for a day or two um determined at the bottom 15 to 20 feet filled with sand uh so he believes this is a temporary situation um I asked him what temporary means and he said it could mean two weeks or it could mean five or 10 years he said but it's not a it's not he suggested we plan for a new well in a different location which opens up a whole another can of worms once you put a well more than 50 feet away from the existing Wells it's a whole other permitting process similar to what we did at the high school that is an expensive um and lengthy process so we're hoping this will last for a number of years and uh we're looking at alternative sites in case we have to but we're not looking to permit those sites at this time great thank you Jim I just want to um say one other thing on the reserves as well so Mass General law is specific that these reserves um need to be uh only for Extraordinary or unforeseen expenditures so um we would need to make sure that the reserve qualifies for for that I guess this one is right on the numbers sure is certainly very unforeseen uh Gary you've got your hand up where was the location of the well again location of the well is just outside the side door leading up to the conservation office okay at the Town Hall Annex okay that's the that's the exist well that's been there for decades so so there's actually this is the third well within about 50 ft so there's one right up against the building which is the old one um the well that we've been using at least for the last 15 to 20 years was probably about 40 feet away from that and the new well that we put in we kind of split the distance between the two all right thanks Jim Christopher you've got your hand up yes just I wanted to clarify so this um I noticed that this item was on the list of the action items for the select board to approve and they approved it last night um so I I just want to clarify this only of the finance committee or or it required would it requir uh the finance committee and the select board to approve these transfers it does not require the select board does not require the select board okay um so it I am correct in that they they did they did include I think it was on their agenda and they did approve but Jim it you can clarify it it's not um the it's it's a finance committee requirement so certainly the select board should and could and be responsible to for the whole budget um and the understanding of it but the requirement is for the finance committee to approve we don't need select board approval there is no select board approval on this the department falls under the select board so we felt that we should get their blessing as well understood and and the uh so the 23,000 there that is are these expenses that already have been incurred so for the uh new drilling or we've incurred I want to say it was 13 or 14 for the well itself um we've done some testing I received a bill for about $600 today but I'm waiting for another bill on the testing uh we have a public water supply operator who has been kind of working with us I haven't received a bill from from her and we're going to have to hire an engineering company um to do the actual permitting with the state to permit the new well okay thank that has not been curred yet Carrie go ahead um Can Nicole give us a balance in the reserve fund it's 100,000 we have it's 100,000 was funded and nothing has been to date been used okay that's prior that's prior to this transfer okay Al go ahead more of a point of information than anything else uh Jim if I can direct it through you Karen um this is a public water supply and it's the third one are we grandfathered or is every well is the original well grandfathered but the subsequent Wells need to uh need to have uh perimeters based on draw that it's a question it's not not whether or not we should should have a well it's it's it's a question so I don't have all the answers to this my understanding and dealing with it it's it's an existing approved public water supply um I think the state realizes that if the well goes bad um they need to come up with some alternative we do not have the land area available on this side to put in a fully compliant well with the protective radius um we were able to reduce some of the permiting requirements by keeping it within 50 feet of the existing well if we go beyond 50 fet the permitting process gets a little bit more complicated but you still would not have to comply with the um protective radius required for fully compliant well okay it wasn't a trick question I was just curious no so I guess the bottom line is we do get some grandfather protection car you still have your hand up do you do you have a question or was that from before oh it's down okay oh Sydney go ahead it seems to me that seems to be a pretty a pretty low price and pretty good price for all of that work I mean would that be typical of of the for uh for the redring of of the well or drilling a new well okay it was a good price um you know we had done the one at the school a few years ago it was a little bit larger but um this price was very fair how far down how far down did they go I want to say it was close to 150 feet oh so yeah not not that far it wasn't like 250 300 feet oh okay okay okay thank you thank you if no other questions I'd like to ask for appr thank you second I'll second you Morton great any other questions all right so we'll go to a roll call Al Al i q Morton I Cindy Cindy Brown I Michelle is still not back we I think we lost her Gary yes uh Christopher Christopher Thrasher I Duncan Duncan lot I Zack Zack Le brw I and Counter El I thank you okay so the second request that we have is for 75,000 from the reserve fund to Westport Community School general expenses um I'm not sure so I just want to just I'm still very unclear on what the 75,000 is for and I am still very unclear if this is a timing issue with credits or if this is a functional deficit issue with the budget and so I'm unclear if this is a even a reserve request so just having said that I this I'm still I'm myself I'm still trying to gather a lot of information on this um this came to us last minute as the agenda was putting being put together on Thursday and I wanted to put it on the agenda in the event that um it is meets all the requirements I wanted to make sure we had it so we can approve it but at this point I'm still questioning um some of this so um Nicole or Jim who wants to lead this discussion oh H you want to ask a question okay you already got your question in q okay um okay so Karen and I talked about this in detail yesterday I think it was um I did send Karen I don't know if you got my spreadsheet that I sent that shows over the past uh the last fiscal year and this fiscal year the credits that were for the um the new high school um so what this is is the net metering credits which I actually sent out what exactly the credits are um and what's happening is that for the past two months we have not received any credits at all from the solar farm um I've been in contact with eversource and um I'm so far I have gotten very little information as to why um I've been in contact with the uh SG projecto who we pay for the metering they're like the I don't know like the company that owns The Solar Farms um and they don't know why we haven't received any credits um from eversource so um the problem is and I know that Mich um Melissa Souza had sent out some information this is going to put the budget um very short um because not only are we going to have to pay these bills but we're also going to have to pay for the net metering credit when they do come in when we finally get everything settled um and in our approximation is anywhere between 68 and 70,000 um the summertime like April May June tends to be higher cost because there's more sun so we have there's more kilowatt hours that are produced by the solar Farms um so like the bill that we just received for the other solar farm was $14,000 um so that's higher than the previous month which was like $7,000 so Nicole before um before we ask go into questions I'm trying to understand so we talked yesterday or today you're right I don't remember when that was um is this a temporary issue where the bills need to get paid and the school doesn't have anything left in the budget to pay and so the the reserve would be used to pay the bills but then when the credit would come then the town would get reimbursed for that is it a timing issue or is it a real budget issue so this is not a budget issue this is a it's something with eversource we don't understand why this solar far say we have two solar Farms that we have um contracted with to buy the um the credits so the other solar farm is fine we've been getting the bills no issues for some reason like I said for two months now we haven't gotten anything from this solar farm so it's something that we if if you look at the spreadsheet like I Karen I don't know if you sent it to everybody but every single month we've been getting credits which just about completely cover the bill that we do get for electric so where we're getting bills now with no credits with no coverage that's something that was not budgeted for right so the question Nicole I'm looking at your and I'm looking at your what you sent to us earlier the credits are7 to $10,000 so if there's two months worth the credits that hasn't come through that's $233,000 I'm not understanding 75,000 no actually if you look back a year year right so if you look at Maye we had 30 31 30 22 so we had like $30,000 in credit that's what I'm saying so they produce more we get more credits in the summer months so that's April May June which is what we're hitting now and um the bill if you look at the the electric bills are are pretty steady but without those credits that's something that's not budgeted for at all we're bud in at with the credits in mind and by not by eversource not sending those that's putting it into a deficit so let me so and I know there's some questions coming I just want to follow through on this so again if it's time so you're saying it's not a permanent def it's it's a timing that the credits have not arrived yet so if the town were to fund $75,000 to the school so the bills could get paid how does the town then get reimbursed that money back when the credits come because if that doesn't happen then the school has received $75,000 to fund to pay the bills and then later the credits are going to show up and then the credits then also get applied to the school now the town is out 75,000 and the school's been given the 75 and then they get the credits later so how how do you address the timing because that's my question so this is something that I did discuss with Melissa earlier and unfortunately Tom Aubin is not available but um her and Michelle Raposa were on board to say that if once the credits come in what we can do is we can hold their budget they can do it on their end so that they'll turn back that amount of money it's not something where we can say oh we can take it from the school and fund it back to the town because transfers like that are not um we're not allowed to do transfers like that but if we were to get the bills the the credits um because we're gonna have to encumber the July the June bill so if we were to get those credits coming in in um hopefully in the June Bill since we're trying like I've been contact with eversource saying hey we need these now um then it would be in their incumbrances and the money would come back and fall into free cash for next year okay so then I'm just gonna paraphrase then I'm gonna let the next four or five people in line ask to ask questions so so if the town were to pay the bills through the cash and do a transfer then the credits would come through and that would be kind of a surplus plus to the budget so the the school would turn back $75,000 at the end of June and that's then that would fall back into free cash just as if if it was in the reserve and the reserve wasn't spent that would fall into Free Cash correct so we could make itelf ho whole as long as the school did turn over 75,000 as a turn back back to the school so if that's the way that it'll work I understand now and I'm going to allow the next level of questions to go through can I just ask a question but that would only be if it happened before June 30th of this year in the next 12 days correct what you're saying is true if only it happens in the next 12 days no because we will the June bill so the like just like anybody else's electric bill the electric bill will end June 30th and we won't get the bill until probably this second week in June uh July so we will so we you know we've got that little bit of leway where the bills come in and we encumber the money so it's a June Bill we're paying in July so it's part of the it'll be part of their incumbrances um okay I do have I do have eversource online so I will be checking to see when the bills come in I can like go on to eversource and pull the bills as soon as they're available so I'm I'm trying to keep on top of this to to you know make sure that this gets done okay great thank you so so um I think uh we have a whole lineup of questions so go ahead I'm going to start with Al and then Hugh next I think somehow you lost your position I'm not sure that I I'm not sure was first so I'll defer to my Elder and okay thank you I got a simple answer don't pay the bill yeah that's exactly right is the source of the bills every source is the source of the right it's their bookkeeper talking left or right why do we put money into that system to get refunded we just don't pay the bill while they sort it out internally so the only issue with that is that the school department is afraid that we'll get a shut off notice and they will completely shut down I doubt it I would think we would tell them up front you better damn not do that because this is your mistake and if they were by some chance to do that right to the Herold the go whatever you want to go to because it's their problem that they are creating on one side of the other of the business you can start paying the bill on July 1 you can start paying their July 1 Bill even once they have a documented Bill and as long as they've got money as long as they have money flowing they can't shut you off screw them sorry Al did you want to go in then couple couple of quick points and I and and it was um uh Nicole brought it up and I'm looking at the spreadsheet right now in the three Peak months of and I have a pretty not not huge but a good siiz bank of solar panels so I understand generally how this thing uh does work and if you look at uh May 1st May 31st and the end of June we got about 91 $92,000 worth of credits makes sense I mean it's three of the biggest Peak months of the year I had about a month or so ago I for you know for mechanical reason I lost two weeks of um of of of solar you know I mean just a mechanical failure and so my my my credits went down so one question I have is is this a an eversource issue which I don't like eversource any more than anybody else or is it a mechanical issue with one or both of the solar panel Farms that are not producing or registering back to eversource um you know the the usage I don't know that that answer but I think it it's a question that needs to be answered well that's one of the questions on on my list of things once eversource the gets back to me okay good because because it it it may be horrible but but let let's take this one step further if there's a mechanical issue with the solar farm and you know we're tapping into that for credits and there's a legit mechanical issue we may well be out those credits so I you know I think we do need a solid answer you know for that the other thing too is if it if it's a bookkeeping issue or whatever I totally agree with with Cindy and Hugh and I'm sure or other people to tell them don't pay until they pay us they're not going to shut us off I mean we we we do have some clout at the State House a regulatory among other things and I would strongly suggest that we look at all the nuts and bolts make sure that we are in line that the the the power transfer has gone through the um the reverse metering system that they have and that we're that we're entitled to I mean my God at the end of the month if last year is the same as this year it'll be $90,000 in credits and then make the adjustment and go from there yeah so that's that's that's what I wanted to say great thank you thank you Al Zach go ahead yeah I was just trying to look at like the the billing terms to see you know typically if if you don't make a payment on time there's a certain amount of interest that occurs and I can't see it being a very high interest till this gets sorted out um I think it would be crazy to pay this I would totally agree with you um if it's on their end it's on their end but I do want to understand there's two parties here right are these credits going to eversource and eversource is billing us or is there a third party that monitors and deals with the credit and these solar for these solar panels so the solar farm reports to eversource uh eversource distributes the credit to the accounts that we tell them to uh with the percentages that we tell them to but they also report to the um the company uh SG projecto and then they bill us based on the contract how much we pay for these credits okay and it from your description earlier it sounded like you haven't really been able to get a hold of anyone from either of those companies to give you an explanation or to work through the whatever the reason I have been in contact with SG projecto because I just received the May bill for the um other solar farm and I spoke to him and I said hey what's going on with the other farm and he doesn't know he you know he's looking into it on his end with eversource as well as I am contacting our contact at eversource to find out what the issue is yeah yeah I I mean it just doesn't make sense to me that when you when you have an issue and it's it's not completely on our end that you solve it by just paying it out of fear I feel like it's going to be so much harder to get it back I think it makes sense to not pay anything at all or pay what you typically would you know shy of of the credits and if they ask where's the remainder say where's our credits and then go through the dispute for there I don't personally fear if we don't pay net 30 they're going to shut down the power at the schools No period no they're not yeah thanks Zach uh Christopher so just a couple of things here um I uh I to to Mr Lee's Point here um if this is something of a mechanical issue or if there is some if there is a a a reason these credits aren't being applied that is that is more than just a bookkeeping error um then then again you're looking at some significant unexpected unanticipated costs that aren't budgeted for um it it would seem to me I I I do understand the sentiment of telling ever source to go kick rocks for the the time being um however what I you know it's been as Nicole mentioned the school department is is willing to figure out a way to uh turn this back if if it's not needed um and if if the credits do come come through I am concerned if there is something if there is more than just a bookkeeping situation that's preventing these credits from being applied uh and so my you know my my recommendation here is this is clearly an unanticipated unexpected cost uh this is what the reserve fund is there if if the uh transfers made and then it's not it's not necessary to to use the transfer then you know it there's ways to bring it back but I uh it the risk it to me is not not paying the bill the risk is what if this situation is something that is uh is a permanent situation as far as the credit goes even if it and and it would be completely out of out of the town or the school department control perhaps even ever sources control so that that's my concern that's why I would certainly recommend uh approving this transfer with the caveat that if it is not needed uh the you know the uh the turn back happens either at the end ofal year or however uh however it can be done uh in accordance with with all the the regulations as far as Town Department transfers go thank you Christopher just a quick comment in that I'm just not sure that this is meets the criteria of a reserve because it's not a real cost to the town so we're we're using the reserve we're asking the reserve to pay pay a bill that's not really a cost of the town so I'm not sure it's it's I'm not sure it qualifies but um I appreciate the sentiment and I I'll I'll also put out to the committee we also have the ability to call another meeting next week or before the end of June if things haven't taken been taken care of um if not tonight and Nicole can you just clarify I know regular transfers you have until July 15th to do that do we have the same date with Reserve transfers as well yes so we have plenty of time so if not tonight and not under an urgent thing to where where we're unclear we have time at our we can call another meeting at the End by the end of June if the bills are need to be paid or we have until July 15 to make this decision so I want to also make sure the committee understands that too okay so uh Gary you've got your hand up next so I'm guess I guess I'm a little confused here if the schools are saying they're going to have 75 turn back to the to um to the uh to free cash at the end of the year why are they asking for a reserve fund transfer to begin with they have they should be asking for a line item transfer just as we just did they shouldn't be asking for a reserve fund transfer that in their budget somewhere they must have $75,000 to turn back to the town quote unquote they're going to do in the fall for free cash so so why didn't we why can't we do a line item transfer moving it from one of their accounts to pay this bill I I'm I guess I'm just confused about the whole the whole issue so they don't have that ability they they don't have it in any of their other line items uh they don't have it in their electric heat um you know Melissa and Michelle have gone over the budget and so right there I guess Nicole how how will they turn back $75,000 in free cash in the fall they don't if we transfer this to them and they don't need it then they will turn back this the the 75 we gave them so that's the 75 that they can give back they don't have it anywhere else to give back last year they turned back $55 from their budget so their budget's tight I I would suggest that and I'm only making a suggestion that we hold off on this until we can get clarification from uce uh whe whether they're not going to come down here and pull the switch um I don't think that's ever going to happen especially to Municipal especially to municipal buildings I mean I haven't heard of it so I I feel that we should have more clarification on this we should figure out you know if in fact bring uce down if we have a rep I know we got reps that handle these accounts um and just put the pressure on uce you know it's the balls in there is this is actually probably an accting FL accounting flub on their end so I would make a motion right now that we uh table this until we can get more information second thank you Gary um so we can go into discussion here we've got a bunch of hands back up um I agree with you Gary I think there's it there's too many questions and and part of my question to Nicole is we've talked about there's a lot of credits there have been generated that aren't being used so if we'd actually pay cash and then you're going to even have a bigger issue where they're not going to give you the cash back they're gonna just apply the cash credit and then the credit comes and now you're out the cash and we'll never get it back so um I I agree with you Gary but um well let's uh we've got Cindy Al and then Hugh have hands up and then we can go to a vote um or so go ahead yeah so you you you brought up exactly what I was going to say is that it's it's difficult to get it back in the form of cash and I'm sorry a 21 million plus dollar budget I know last year they turned back $55 there's a reason for that there's there's an accounting reason for that why it gets spent down I'm not saying that I'm not saying that it's wrong for them to do that but no differently that we've seen with other budgets tonight that have had year- end transfers because they do not have the Liberty to be able to take things from a salary item to an expense item the school department does they have complete line item flexibility throughout their whole budget and Karen had mentioned earlier in her commentary you know why is it $75,000 why is it why aren't we paying it it just the small amount that would have been the difference if the credit had been applied so to apply the whole amount um and coincidentally so to be the balance of the reserve fund and the fact that they have school has complete flexibility I guess I would like to see how it all washes out at the end of the the end of their school year and if you know maybe then apply some of those items to What's Left pay the electric bill and then come back to see perhaps what the reserve fund could you could be used for in unforeseen expense items uh I just find there are too many too many conveniences here and too many things that I think could be avoided if somebody did some hard work with the pencil and looking into some of these other accounts every other budget is draining their budget the schools have in the past maybe they can use some of that money to apply to this budget to this payment if they're concerned uh about the electricity being shut off if it's a if it's a valid expense fine we can deal with it at some point but there's no there's no necessity to deal with it tonight thank you Cindy uh Al and then Hugh excuse me I yeah I would I I would agree I'm I've been spending a lot of time looking at the spreadsheet and there's a lot of numbers here that that don't quite Jive for me going back to August of 2022 not necessarily just the usage which were up 20% in usage at the uh at the high school in two years but at the same time our credits seem to be I don't want to get into the weeds of this but our credits seem to be fairly normal I would I might suggest that that uh we either table us for tonight and come next week Andor uh kind of go with what Gary uh not Gary but Zach was saying earlier we have a bill right I mean let's face it what we're doing is niggling around right now with do we pay don't we pay do we pay don't we pay and the school department has cooked into their budget an electric bill whatever that number is what what what we're dealing with right now is are we getting the credits pay them something send him 10 grand I don't care you know whatever it might be to keep the cash flow going while we while we bore down into the numbers and have Nicole get some more detail of what's really going that's that would be my my suggestion uh so I'll leave it at that all right I think they should have money right they should have money in their budget to pay for what they normally would have paid for those two months I think we're ready for a vote right no I'm waiting very patiently you sorry and I would Jack him anyways but a little more of it if eversource gets paid for this that and the other thing everyone there is then no urgency in their bookkeeping Department to sort anything out they got the money oh yes we'll look at it and see what we could do sort of thing they much better to discuss negotiate with a guy that who thinks you owe him money rather than the other way around so that goes a push it over yes but B don't pay it the issue right now Al is absolutely right others are right if there were a defect in the solar panels and in fact the credits were not earned then we owe them the money because there aren't any credits that are mrack they don't exist we don't know that and ever Source seems to be in the position to get that or the other guys they work with but they're the guys who who have the information not us and if they've got a bookkeeper or others that have a boss asking how about that bill we haven't gotten paid are you working on it much more uh likelihood of spending effort working on it then oh those guys want to refund don't they well we'll get around to sending that when we have a chance so number one don't do it now see what happens but my view is we talk about it get stronger don't pay it while getting sorted out they AR going to shut it off that's no not a possibility great thank you so uh we have a motion to uh on the floor in a second to not approve this is that correct correct I believe that's incorrect Madam Madam chair I believe the motion was to table it to table it yeah the motion was to yeah until we get further information right to not approve it at this time but yes to table it um okay so that is the motion and there's a second so I think we are ready to uh roll call Al Al Lei Hugh Hugh Mart I Cindy Cindy Brown I and I believe Michelle has lost permanently so I will go Gary yes Christopher Christopher Thrasher no Duncan Duncan law I Zach Zack Leu I Karen Rouse I thank you okay so we will uh we'll Nicole we'll wait and see what happens you keep us posted if something urgent happens and we need to call a meeting to do something we can uh we certainly I think our next meeting is scheduled for July 9th anyway which would be our normal July meeting so we would be within the 15th so we'd be able to address it so you just keep us posted if something comes up okay I will thank you okay thank you okay so um I just want to skip ahead so we've got minutes to approve we can skip over that uh we can do that at the end um I wanted to so we've got some committee update meetings but I wanted to um just put on the agenda for just if anybody wanted to say any comments about the annual town meeting or the process that led up to that um I know right after town meeting I think a couple of us were in one sense wanted to have another meeting so we can kind of debrief each other because as time goes by you kind of lose some of the uh the the the things that you were thinking about but I just wanted to put it on the agenda if anybody had anything that they wanted to to comment on um Cindy go ahead um first of all um I think it's um it's a it's you know it's a shame that Steve fors is going to uh move on at this by the same token and I I applaud him he runs a very tight meeting and I understand the reason behind it but sometimes you got to have a little bit of room for people to understand what sometimes what they're voting on or the ramifications of what they're voting on a a good point is the short-term rental issue when Jim whiten stood up he he explained now he does not have a towering voice uh but he did explain I heard him explain that absent and approval of some of of the of the bylaw that short-term rentals in town would be illegal all existing ones would be illegal and I've heard nothing but people talk about the fact that they had no idea that voting it down meant that they could have zero and I think that sometimes some of those things get lost in translation in the rereading or the re um uh the reedificando I think sometimes the passionate people get up and you know they get one side or the other and I'm not rooting for one side or the other and it gets lost in the Amendments and in this that and the other so I I think there just needs to be a better way to to communicate with people that that was really going to be become a problem not not that it's a earth shattering problem but a lot of people had bad feelings about that and also what the true what the effects are of the no vote on the borrowing for the sewer so a lot of people think that means that they were against the plan but was it truly a vote just against the borrowing and not also against the plan so I think that sometimes you need a little bit more clarification as to what's you know what what what truly the ramifications are that was really my take yeah without going too much into warrant articles again so um anyone else have anything I just want to make a quick comment and then and we'll talk I think more in July I think to to to some Cindy's point I think there's so much confusion there's that never that time for the educational element which is the non uh tone meeting has it specific structure right where you can't have a conversation and ask questions and we never we always talk about we never can get to that point where we want to have that informal session to allow people that opportunity and I'd like us next year to think about is that possible and how can we make that happen and so it's not a conversation for now I just want to put that out there that that's a goal that I would like us to think about um there needs to be something but that's just my comment on the on the town meeting um not a conversation to go into now in detail but um that's just my my thought um Hugh go ahead very brief I don't have much enthusiasm at educational sessions we had what two or three years ago I think four people came I mean it's a matter of the degree of knowledge that people wish to acquire is really I think the hurdle Jim whiteon had hearings that they're specified to have I think that the sewer people did a terrible job of foring it Etc it came out out of nowhere and every had to vote on it within a month I W go into the details into the Merit but just in terms of having a chance to educate people it wasn't town meeting it was just a lack of any time at all so I'll stop with that thanks you uh Christopher go ahead so I just kind of wanted to follow up on on something Miss Brown and actually Mr morn there both I think there is unfortunately there is a situation we town meeting where there seems to be it's hard for the moderator to to be in a position to allow uh not just facts to get out but also when there's there's questions of interpretation so you know I I would not not not to rehash the whole AR the whole Warren article but there there's a question of I think there is a valid question of inter ation as to whether something if something's not in the zoning bylaws does that mean it's automatically illegal now the reason I bring that up is because it it it goes back into this this idea of trying to educate uh and and trying to have at least facts and or again facts or something where where maybe there's there's interpretation uh to have it available but also uh Mr Bon's Point people will be educated to the or to the point that in which uh you know in which they they want to be and no further so that is that is a a continual uh issue to try and to try and uh triangulate and uh I I I like the idea of having an education session but I also realize the the reality of it and you'll probably get two people there so yeah it's kind of a tough head2 yeah thank you Christopher um if no other comments I just wanted to make sure we uh held a little space for the town meeting before we uh keep going okay so uh the next item five is our committee and lus on updates um so generally that's always a topic on our agenda and we go around um this time we have some pretty good updates from uh three specific committees and there could be other committees that uh we didn't list but I did list uh some discussion some updates from the long-term building committee there's some things happening there uh we have the audit committee that um the auditor reports are available and the Personnel Board has a compensation and classification study draft that uh is is circulating so we've got three committees that uh we love to hear um I'd love to talk about the long-term building committee first if we could um and I know Christopher's here and Cindy is also on the committee um to give like we should give the finance committee an update if everyone's not familiar with the recent uh School uh decisions that have been made so Christopher maybe you can or Evans here too I think so whoever would like to uh give the committee an update on what's Happening Christopher is the chair of that committee I would defer to him okay sure thing so uh yes and as a matter of fact it's worth noting here that there is a discrepancy in recordkeeping as to who is the fincom representative on the long-term building committee and who is the who is an at large between myself and miss and Miss Brown uh still have not figured that out because I believe the town clerk has it in one one way uh it's in it's has uh s Cindy being the rep I believe the fincom uh internal on the on the share Drive shows uh me being the the the fincom rep so still trying to figure that part out but Cher did you get a letter didn't you get a letter to get sworn in I did in my and it and it says at large so but it's still I I remember having the conversation the very very first meeting well anyway we'll straighten it all out and we can re uh and my my letter says nothing it just it just okay appoints me as a member it doesn't say We'll redirect all that in July we can reappoint and kind of set everything straight but go ahead Christopher uh so there the school committee and I of course I am a member of the school committee as well um there has been long running conversations about the School administration offices being moved out of the old high school building uh with the budget approved for fiscal year 2025 uh that uh that decision has has been made to move forward because if there is there is a saving attached to uh the administration moving out of the old high school building uh there is also a uh a a kind of a Personnel uh situation where by adding or by moving Administration to the schools that Administration is actually in a better position to support the uh the the administration that's that's somewhat understaffed at other schools as well so uh as opposed to being in in the the uh the old high school building so that that decision is has come about there is a continual uh dialogue and conversations between school committee uh chairman gendro uh the uh superintendent Albin as well as Michelle Raposa and and several others in the uh school office have have been having conversations with Mr hardit and and other uh town uh other other individuals on the town side to try and figure out the smoothest transition there is still some question uh on from the town side as far as exactly what type of uh numbers are going to be additional costs incurred for insurance or for uh other other issues um there are there are ongoing conversations about uh the school department still being responsible for for example the uh the fields mowing the fields I know that's been a topic today here uh and and maintaining the fields there would still be use of the building at least until such time as a decision has been made uh for for storage uh on some of the I believe the garage and and some of the uh the basement for storage um this this decision decision uh having been made by the school school department uh also kind of I guess jump starts a little B the question that's been been kicked around for years now as to what to do with the the building uh I've had I've certainly had many conversations within the committee and and within the long-term building committee and Beyond about uh many different options for this building and the bottom line is that all the good options cost money they cost money that the town uh nor the nor the town nor the school department have in their budgets uh and and it is it's my estimation that whatever decision is reached even if that is to demolish the building even that will incur significant significant costs uh it is my intention to uh have or we'll be having a long-term building committee next Wednesday night uh it is my intention to entertain motions uh at that meeting uh with several several options one of which being um to mothball the building entirely one of which being to uh demolish the building uh the third option being uh recommending that it be uh money be allocated to uh create a uh t a centralized town office uh building so all of these all of these questions uh will cost will will in cirk cost there's no way around that um so it will we will see what the uh again that's that's gonna be on Wednesday night and we'll see what the recommendation is that that committee makes uh to be passed along to select board uh perhaps there may also be a recommendation for um either worn articles or perhaps even overrides uh ballot questions about funding whatever option is recommended uh so Christopher can I ask you a few questions Ely fire away yeah yeah so the first part of what you said and I know you're new to the school committee so um you said the school committee's been discussing moving out of the building for quite some time so that's surprised to hear because the that hadn't been discussed publicly that hadn't been discussed with the select board that hadn't been discussed with the finance committee it hadn't been discussed so where those discussions happened because they don't appear to be in public because the when when when the email came out and you know to the to members of the select board to myself and to uh the Town Administrator it was very much a surprise for Jim as well it was one week after town meeting and that's the first that everyone heard of it so I'm just I'm just trying to understand that process I think there's there's two things worth noting here first off I I will say that I I I recall a a joint meeting with the finance committee the uh school committee and I believe the uh I believe at least uh a couple of the select board members were there as well where this was brought up by the uh the then chair of the of the school committee um and I I recall this very vividly because I was I was taking back because it did surprise me then right and that was but just to not to interrupt but the the reason that was brought up that the school was considering leaving was because they had concerns that UMass Dartmouth was going to come in and the storage boxes were going to get in the way so that that that was the discussion there wasn't discussion that there had been talking of leaving well my understanding that that the UMass situation was the Catalyst to bring it up then however there had been all there had been continual conversations I I again I recall that particular meeting talking about the cost the maintenance cost the the additional I mean the school department is taking care of you know more right now they're taking care of more buildings with less staff than they than they had before the uh the new the new school uh open so I uh the other the other thing is that when the budget came in and there was a necessity to uh absorb a about a $400,000 cut in the budget Orly and and that's where every option that would would uh incur some savings uh was considered and so this this had been you know this this this was presented as one of the options prior to my time on on the school committee this was presented as one of the options for savings uh including some other you know not a palatable uh options as far as cutting uh all there were all sorts of of possibilities including cutting teachers this this the school committee and the school department the savings that is uh that would be incurred from this move allows I mean the bottom line is it allows uh teacher teacher positions to be saved I mean it is it's not an ideal situation but the bottom line is that it it it is it was made uh there's a lot of good Arguments for it to begin with and with the the uh budget as approved and with the cuts necessary to be made it it made this a uh you know it brought this to the Forefront of of something that need to be done you know I think you know I think some of the consideration that needs to be it may save the school money but it's going to cost potentially the town as a whole more money so the town as an entity it will cost more so that needs to be considered because the reality is if it costs more to the town then the school's going to see that 54% split come right back at the school and and so I'm not really sure where the savings necessarily come in especially if it's costing the town more well this is the thing this is this is the thing that is worth noting here is that the logistics of this are continually being worked on and we actually don't know you know I know that the school department has provided Jim and the town with the breakdown of all the maintenance costs of all the all the costs incurred from the building and there's still a couple of questions outlying questions on on the on the town side as to where for example what the insurance cost will now be um there there's estimates but no no hard number numbers um you know so so really trying to figure out where that actual what that actual number whether it's a an additional expense or or in fact a say exist we we don't know that yet but the other thing that I think is really important to consider here is that this is not something that's being done okay by by Fiat all right the school Department's getting all their their stuff out of the school and then saying you you you know the town Town deal with it it it is a collaborative effort being being worked on to figure out the best way to to I mentioned this in the school committee meeting tonight before I logged on here it's it's not about trying to take a burden and throw it at the town or throw it at school it's about trying to figure out the way to make to to to either you know eliminate eliminate or at least decrease the burden so I you know okay no I appreciate that so I I I want to ask a second question and then I'm going to open it up because I think there's a couple of people that uh have here so I know the long-term building committee uh over the last five or six years so many committees before you and Cindy were on the committee have been discussing what to do with this building for quite some time and I understand that with the school now moving out of the building that makes this more of a priority to to figure out what to do my concern is and I mentioned this to you is that I think the the long-term building committee should do a presentation to the finance committee and the finance committee should be weighing in I mean you are you and cindia are the finance committee lons and part of that is you're taking our advice and discussions and questions to the committee and you bring that the committee back to us to discuss we have not discussed the long-term building committee we have no presentation we haven't seen any presentation a lot of these decisions are really Financial in nature and I would appreciate if the finance committee had a presentation that allowed us to help help you frame a recommendation in some way so if if I were a select board member and the long-term building committee would make its recommendation to the select board my first question would be well what does the finance committee say what were their question questions and concerns and you're not going to have that if we haven't received a presentation to understand what the numbers are to help to help along with that process and so I feel like we've gone five years or six years without making a decision and now we're going to rush into a decision without bringing all of the the you know the elected and and appointed officials that can help in the process I think I think we're just we just put it into gear a little too fast and we're going to make a decision without discussing it um with the rest with this committee so that's that's my concern so I think I appreciate the the need for wanting to make a decision as quick as possible but what's another two what's another month at this point um that's that's my that's my comment I I I understand the the urge to have a the urg and in fact the need to have a presentation on on options to the finance committee but the the fact of the matter is if if such a presentation was to be created right now there would be no numbers except for numbers that were perhaps you know I think there's there's a couple studies from 2019 there's something from 2022 none of these things would be none of the numbers would be relevant at this point in time um what what would be relevant also I I guess it it it's once a once a recommendation is made then yes I you know I I would certainly be be more than happy to to present something but I guess that's not the point part of your present part of making a recommendation is getting all of the information from as many people as you can so you have the ability to make a recommendation so I don't want a presentation after and if I may as a as a member of of the committee I mean I think what it comes down to is you know degrees I mean really the money doesn't matter because all of it is going to cost money and none of which we have so it really comes down to State your preference and then we can tell you exactly how much it's going to be because either it's a little bit of money a lot of money or a whole lot of money so I mean that's really what it comes down to either you moth ball it for a little bit of money which is still a lot of money you bulldoze the building for a lot of money which I can only imagine going to the town and saying we need a $4 million override to knock down a building and you get nothing in return for that it's a $4 million override and all you're going to see is a pile of bricks being removed or it's a $40 million or $35 million override potentially but if that's the option that people want to go then we can get real numbers because we've gone through numbers you know there's 35 million there's 30 million it it's very difficult for a committee like this to go through that kind of effort to really pencil down into numbers it's degrees and it's really saying okay we feel as a committee this is the the direction it should go then we're happy to come and get real numbers but getting real numbers close is very difficult and I appreciate that and and it's not all about getting real numbers it's really understanding all of the options and asking Financial people to help weigh in on that to ask the finance committee that's my comment I I okay that's that's my comment back to the finance to to the long-term building committee if the finance our first charge has always been to the select board not to the finance committee but you guys are our lassons to the committee so you're lonning back to the finance committee correct of what you're going to do and my comment as a finance committee would be I think you guys should wait and and do a presentation back to us that's my personal opinion I think we owe it to the select board first well that's the question would this does the select board want a recommendation without having they may after they hear it maybe that should be a question to the select board to say would you like the finance committees weighing in on on this or not I you know I mean it's not a chicken in the egg again there's a group of us here that have have very good opinion on lots of things and to not to not ask the committee to ask for their opinion that weighs back to the committee I just I I don't know well I I I don't think it's ever gonna it was ever the intention or is the intention of the long-term building committee to exclude the finance committee but our our first report and our first recommendation would be to the select board if they feel they want the finance committee import then we can't I've been happy they you know report back we haven't had anything to report back okay there really has not been anything truly until this this meeting that occurred a week ago that we're finally going to come to some decision because every meeting is going around the toilet bowl every meeting because we can't come to some decision right three years ago when I was when I was on the committee was Prior prior to when before Christopher came on the long-term building committee made a recommendation to the select board to pursue having that building renovated fully renovated up to code and to and to determine whether or not um the town's people felt the same that perhaps there should be a um uh a a survey of some type or a poll of some type and the select board did nothing with that recommendation so it was sent back to the committee and at that point I mean you know where do you go from there so selling the land has certainly is a unanimous no from the committee members as it it is a public water supply much of that acreage is wet there's only about 16 buildable Lots out of that whole piece of property if you sold them on a wholesale basis we'll say $200,000 a lot that's $3.2 million and they have to take tear the building down I don't think you're going to get very much money for selling that land it's not very buildable and then the school would lose their fields which would require 188 to20 million to um excuse me8 to 10 million dollar to fix up at another location yes I suppose we can put all of those things to paper but that's why selling the land has never been an option and all three of the options that we're putting before committee next week are inclusive of keeping the land in various degrees mothballing it to me I think is not an option but anyway that's for next week it's also worth noting that frankly the consensus to not sell the single largest piece of property that the town owns uh left that the town owns it that's really been the only thing this committee has come to a consensus on correct so it's it's it has unfort been uh a long a long year of lots of repeated conversations and so it is it is my hope that out of this next meeting there will at least be a direction uh for you know for that recommendation to come out and then to as as Miss Brown mentioned here there's no intention to cut out the finance committee it is just that the charge is with is to the select board and it would and and I again would be happy to to include the finance committee after we know what direction we're heading in but right now there's no numbers there's as Cindy said I could I could put together about a three slide PowerPoint that would tell you the entirety of unfortunately what we've accomplished in the last year so it it's I I am hoping that we will at least like I said have a direction after the next meeting and go from there great thank you I'm gonna open it up I think Gary's got uh his hand up for quite a while so you know I sound like a broken record with this and you know I apologize but when they moved into the new schools the new school I immediately said that we should do something with that building and my recommendation was to level it because can you imagine the tax revenue and also the expense side what we've lost in the last three four years th this has become uh you know a huge problem as far as the budget is concerned we 16 homes okay what does that generate you know in Revenue 10020 $300,000 a year um you know the money that we've we've spent to keep that building going why now why now are we deciding which what I recommended four years ago to move the administration over to the school that was built why why have we taken so long to decide this this could have been done four years ago but yet now because the budgets are so tight we're deciding to do this I think and this is only my personal opinion that this has gone on too long I think that we need to they need to make a decision that it's great to own land but the problem is once we own that land we're giving up a lot of tax dollars and I get that there's services that need to be provided against those tax dollars but we've gone on four years and my recommendation if I was on the committee is to level it sell it I don't even care if you get a dollar for the thing let it be developed we need tax dollars we need Revenue in this town not to keep spending money to have 10 20 people sitting in an Administration bilding that they could have been in if years ago thank you Gary anything else up [Music] next Al go ahead oh I'm sorry yeah I'm clicking my unmute and whatever and you know G Gary there's a there's a lot of wisdom in what you said I just want to bring up two or three quick points and this is probably a discussion for a longer period of time I've been looking at the report that was put out in 2020 by what was the name of the company Christopher U utile what tell yeah all right so so this is a 2020 report where according to their their estimate at the time it was plus or minus $30 million to rehab the high school now Googling and is as as somebody said the other day ping Google you know you can always find everything whether you like it or not in Massachusetts for municipal buildings since 2020 there's been about a 5 and a quar to 5 and a half percent per anom increase in in um uh increase cost so let's just go with that and say that that's this is four years later we're now at about 3536 million when we go to page six of their report there are a fair amount of of exclusions uh within this so I'm just going to throw in $2 million just for sake of discussion so by the time and we don't even have a shovel ready project I mean this thing will be well over $40 million by the time that um you know we we get it approved designed dug etc etc and it could be more who who knows the other thing that I found interesting in the report is is on page six and you may want to just take a look at that uh item number one the building will be used for office use but certain existing assembly spaces will be maintained in parentheses Auditorium gymnasium CA cafeteria no other assembly space anticipated but when you go back to page four uh and look at the schematic of preferred reuse scheme uh the cafeteria is being demolished the auditorium is being demolished and I believe the gym is being demolished so there's some some discrepancy within the 2020 report that needs to be cleaned up one way or the other I'm not I'm not making value judgments here I I'm just saying that is they just don't match up um and lastly and I and I'll just throw this on the table and and I think it's an extension of what Gary was saying and other people is we've got a play as as a town we have to play three-dimensional chess here we're talking about an individual building let's just make the assumption that everybody loves the idea of of relocating all the uh the offices the council and aging Etc to this building there'll be people clamoring to go into this to you know everybody wants this shiny new shiny new object what do we do with the others what do we do with the old school what do we do with the old High um not high school but Town Hall what do we do with the Council on Aging uh as only three examples then the question becomes which is which is probably a workable solution but is still a bit of a dilemma the the uh CPC has put a lot of money into these so-called historic buildings they're not supposed to be torn down according to CPC regs that's another workaround so you know I I'm not sitting here I'm I'm making value judgments one way or the other but the I believe that the long-term building committee needs to play a little bit more three-dimensional chess rather than and and maybe that's not your mandate okay I you know and and and I will accept that but I think that there needs to be a more holistic View and I think mentioned this a few meetings ago it really doesn't matter of the overall Financial consequences to the taxpayers of the town and not just an individual building um I'll table it from there I I'm done for for tonight I'm sure I would agree with you Al and I think that's in part where where I was saying if the finance committee could have its discussion then I think there can be a financial analysis that should be done to say there's three options option A here's the pros and the cons there needs to be more and I'd like to see it and i' we we have addressed many of those issues I'll just say this one one thing quickly Christopher that you know just based on the events that took place at the Annex in the last week we know that something is going to have to be done with municipal offices and this town in the next five six seven years something is going to have to be done and and in various reiterations of this Committee in addition to the existing Town Hall has been discussed at roughly about the same price when all was said and done that it would cost to renovate the other building the problem with the you know the current building the current High School the old high school is that it's 155,000 166,000 square feet it's way too big and if you have to renovate it and bring it up to code you have to bring the whole thing up to code unless you start tearing some parts of it down so yeah you start going you know back and forth with some of these issues if the committee has given a direction to save the building add on to town hall do whatever then we can develop a financial plan for one of those directions but first we need first we need the direction I I I now I'm repeating myself I'm like being on the long-term building committee so I'll I'm done so I I just want to respond real quick just to to something Mr Le you pointed out exactly the first time I took a look at that study I said hey wait a minute we got some serious discrepancies here between what what it's saying here but at the same time you want to spend the money to to knock down parts of the parts of the building um there's a lot of flaws you go deeper and there's even more flaws in that report for um and I I also agree that a holistic approach is exactly what's been needed um I I will say unfortunately it's been very difficult to get that uh that holistic approach uh to be uh shall we say Ad adopted by by many you know by the committee and it is um so I I just I I but again you you hit you hit the nail right on the head as far as what uh what these conversations should be and and also the flaws in in some of the studies that that had been done previously um again I I guess I'm getting into the repeating myself as well but I I to Miss Brown's point the a direction is necessary before we can even get to the to to reporting any kind of real concrete numbers and that's where we're at right now so you if I can just jump in for a half a second Christopher as as the old saying goes a camel is a horse designed by a Comm so I we all know how difficult you know working committees in years and years and a Direction has to be made at some point in time so I'm taking nothing away from the people in the past or the work but now is time to to take that V if you will you know the the broad and and start narrowing it down and I agree completely with Karen that I think there needs to be a a a hard and fast Financial perspective on this for the enre and you know come up with the best solution for the taxpayers and then I'm Hugh it's all yours thank you I've been waiting very patiently I'm sorry you have you have been tonight you thank you first of all moth Bing the property is insane all it does is push the can down the road cures nothing and the same issues come along whenever they come along next to that put all the town offices and buildings into it is not quite as insane but quite insane Al made the right point now you have half a dozen obsolete buildings to deal with maintain security Etc some are eyeing the library and other things there those very fond of the library as it is and would fight tooth and nail against doing that basic problem is it's an isore and not an isore it is a white elephant none of the programs of doing something with it in any Financial sense whether it's 3 million 40 million it goes up and Gary's got it on the number you rid of it you reduce the expenses you don't put in 30 or 40 million into nothing Etc holding on to land because you got it people have done that for years and regret it it doesn't have a use then it is is an expense not an asset the other thing I would say is this is eerily like the sewer kicking around for years with nothing going on nobody pay attention and then suddenly it jumps out of the woodwork ready to go and do something right now people in town have heard nothing about this for years and years sounds like the sewer and a program comes in a recommendation after the fact that nobody's putting input into except the committee which has its own ideas I don't s like a rock the only recommendation has an ability to be focuses there has been a lot of input beforehand and it is a consensus more or less that comes up so people have been educated education sometimes sometimes propaganda but I let that go it has to be the recommendation has to be out of a consensus of things not an idea that a suddenly out of the woodwork and is asking for a whole bunch of money from the towns people there isn't there it won't happen end the speech Hugh you uh you made the point that I wasn't going to make but um it is a parallel to the Sewer right so the Su the the infrastructure committee had had made its decision or I think was intending to in November to go talk to all the Stak holders one of which should have been the finance committee to say hey what do you guys think 8 million 30 million and they didn't do that and it was clear that if they had come to the finance committee and we had a discussion maybe maybe it would have become apparent that we support eight but not 30 and maybe that would have been the direction it took I don't know a tale from my pth of T lived in years ago large property loved by everybody was going to be developed into some kind of housing for those Le empty nesters so so a lot of concern about what it would be in terms of is it going to be Condominiums is it going to be this and that how many bedrooms are going to be school children all that stuff Highway controversial discussions went on for about three years my figures may be off a little but for a long time time it was debated and debated and debated and plans were brought in and plans were rejected this and that my point is went on for about three years by the time it got to the third year of town meeting approving various zoning changes it passed unanimously because everybody was sick and tired of hearing about it that's another way of saying they're fully educated but when it pops out of the W workor I think Westport anybody is but Westport actually something is new that come out of the woodwork the first reaction is no and that if you're going to do something you got to get past that persuade people that there's something good in this rather than just a surprise that somebody you know nothing about is trying to spring on you thanks you anybody else have any comments All right so um thank you so that's the update on the long-term building committee so we have two other uh I know it's at 8:34 here and uh for the record I want to note that Zach left at 8:13 p.m. and Gary left at 8:26 p.m so both have no longer here go ahead Cindy we have a quum right yes okay yes um so um audit committee I'll do uh I'll do audit committee first uh it's pretty pretty quick as many of you may recall in the past I put my camera back on my husband was on a zoom call at the same time and we were sharing bandwidth and I kept getting dropped off so I can he's done with his call he started after me and he's done before me um so uh the um audit committee many of you will recall uh several years ago uh and it with a prior um prior to having a combined uh treasure collector uh we had some difficulty with our Audits and uh the audit committee was formed uh for the purposes of uh being somewhat of a watchdog to see that uh we were staying kind of on track with some of the um items that were recommended U through the management letter of the uh of the audit committee I am happy to report that we no longer have any material weaknesses in the um in the current audit um one page pretty much across the board of um uh pretty much observances that have been become standard boilerplate uh with the exception maybe of one or two things that um uh continue to have uh issues that we that we that we look at uh one of the items being you know we're in very good shape in our uh in our OPB our um our opab account is funded at 133% and some people may think that that's not a very big number but it's almost double what the state average is and almost double what um uh what most of the communities around us have so an OPB of 133% uh they felt was uh was very strong our pension through the Bristol County is funded um at roughly 60% it had been a little bit higher but investment returns at the end of the fiscal year of 23 um brought that number down you will note that this is fiscal year 23 ending 620 uh 63023 that I'm referring to uh so that number has now uh rebounded uh back up to the uh roughly 70% range with a targeted um full fully funded date I believe of 2037 uh issues that that always get covered are um things like network security uh in fact the IT director has uh asked for some um funding uh has been granted funding through cipc for uh additional malware security uh to be installed and um he continues to work on the overall net network security uh fraud risk making sure that we do Contin continual um tests in our system to uh detect any fraud that may cross over our borders um discussion about uh oper funding and making sure that we are aware of the uh expiration dates of some of the uh items on the Opera funds uh that we have um uh we're still we still continue to work a little bit on the closing process and tax leans uh the town accountant and the and the treasurer collector have made great strides in both of those areas and but there's always some a little bit more work to be done uh and also there was a notation about the special Revenue balances from items that were left over from prior town meeting um uh town meeting warrants from annual Town meetings of the past or special Town meetings of the past and we have certainly addressed some of those in this most recent meeting so uh the audit committee I think has done a good job and continues to do a good job of being a watchdog if you will over the uh Financial um reporting process and just the uh Financial uh uh connectivity between all of the Departments in their receipts uh in Booking their receipts and reconciliations Etc and we now get a very clean bill of health from the uh from the Auditors uh uh this past year so thank you for that update so Nicole congratulations uh thank you for all you do um I think you're doing a terrific job and it's great to see and I don't know if um I don't believe our Treasurer is on with us but I would um forward that sentiment to her as well as a thank you to both both of both of you in your departments for um doing such a great job that we don't have management letter issues as we had in the past so thank you Nicole well thank you for those kind words and I appreciate it um I have a great assistant and you know treasur collector has some some great people down there you know and uh you know we work every day to make sure that everything runs like a smooth engine and it is duly noted so thank you so much absolutely yeah Mr Mr roselli is very very pleased with the progress that um uh the town has made but most specifically the relationship and the progress that both the uh accountant and The treasur Collector has um has done terrific congratulations thank you thanks for that update and so you you're still meeting quarterly and you'll go through each of those point in specific and kind of dig in and and all of that so you you can update us as the year goes along with with all of those but from what you read it doesn't sound like there's anything of clearly no material weaknesses which is fantastic right some of those seem very boilerplate I'm sure I'm sure roselli on every single letter that he writes to every single town is to talk about arpa funds and make sure you're doing it right the fraud risor right all of those things right so these were these were things that are pretty much boiler plate for the most part um uh almost across the board uh right just a couple of exceptions but nothing nothing that he was concerned about anyone have any questions on the audit before we move on to the Personnel Board nope I see none um so the another um update for you again Cindy you've been very popular tonight with your committees yeah um so the Personnel Board um and I would and I know you can do a very good cliffnote version of of it here so if anybody's after Cindy speaks if um there was a pres a pretty detailed presentation that was done till last night at the select board meeting uh by the consultant and I would encourage uh if anybody wanted to really dig in um to to go ahead and listen to that part of the meeting so there was a lot of information that came through Sydney maybe you can give us the 8 8:41 PM cliffnote version yeah I'm gonna I'm not gonna go anywhere near the detail that she did last night I will just note there's a copy of the audit and the management letter in in our Drive in our share drive as well as the uh classification and compensation study uh it is a draft form um and that's how I will really preface other remarks the Personnel Board has not had the opportunity to meet as a board uh to review the contents of the uh classification and um compensation study the uh consultant did go through some of the uh really the uh the process and how they arrived at um the the comparables uh last night through a very um uh you know arduous process that they go through with uh determining what are good uh comparable towns and they use many many factors to determine that none of which I we'll go through now but uh you know they have a good um uh methodology to make sure that we're being compared to the right uh to the right towns and to the right uh types of of pay scales uh so some of this is just a little bit premature um and once again I won't I won't identify position yet because the Personnel Board has not gone through this there are some outliers um unfortunately you're not I I can't think of maybe more than maybe one that might be a little bit on the high side but they I've got to dig we've got to dig through the numbers to see if there's some uh additions that are included in that salary uh we've got a few outliers certainly on the low side uh that we have to um uh that we have to address one of the items and I I brought this to the attention of the select board last night as well brought it up with the consultant in their report they do indicate that um Westport really does have a need for some professional uh HR Support I mean we have a sizable budget we