good evening welcome to the meeting of the yarma select Board of June 25th 2024 um this meeting is going to begin shortly uh an executive session um and after that we will return to the public session without any further delay or Interruption because this is a hybrid meeting I'm reading the following notice into the record this is the formally advised that is required by General LGE chapter 38 sections 18- 25 and pursuant to chapter 20 of the acts of 2021 an act relative to extending certain covid-19 measures adopted during the state of emergency signed into law June 16th 2021 as extended by chapter 2 of the acts of 2023 the armor select board will hold a public meeting on Tuesday June 25th 2024 5:00 p.m. beginning with executive session and then opening to the public no sooner than 6 o'clock in the hearing room Yarmouth Town Hall 1146 through 28 South Yarmouth the public is welcome to attend either in person or via the alternative Public Access provided below and that public access information can be found on our website it shows you how to join by computer or um uh by telephone so I am going to make make a motion that the armor Board of Selectmen enter into executive session pursuant to generaliz chapter 3A sections 21 section 21 A3 to discuss strategy with respect to litigation involving Blue Sky Towers ran numeral 3 LLC 1044 Route 28 South Yarmouth and two Collective bargain which if held an open meeting may have a detrimental effect on the bargaining of the public body and the chair so declares do I have a second second I have a motion in a second let's do a roll call vote um Joyce I Tracy I I vote I as well so we stand in executive session um it will be till approximately 6:00 p.m. or shortly thereafter as long as it takes to conclude um those those particular those two particular matters and we will come straight forward to the public portion of our meeting thank you good evening ladies and gentlemen welcome to the public portion of the meeting of the Arma select Board of June 25th 2024 we're running a little bit late tonight we started an executive session at 5:30 with the expectation we would be done about 6 so we're a little bit behind we thank you for your patience um please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for Mr chairman I make a motion that we um we take our agenda out of order and do the scholarship presentation at this time and then go back to announcements and public comments after second okay we'll do a roll call Mark yes I Tracy I Joyce I on this end I vote I as well so we are advancing the uh yarma scholarship committee presentation of scholarships um my understanding that the gentleman that does this is unavailable tonight uh Dr Kerr and Tracy Post who uh I believe was on this committee for many years and he's a deep interest in this particular matter is going to stand in for him and um tell us about all the wonderful things um that that have been accomplished by our graduating class of 2024 and um we're really H happy to recognize these very deserving scholarships yes thank you Mr chairman I'm honored uh to do this Tom Kerr has uh been the chair of the committee for many many years and um he's unable to be with us tonight so he's really done all the work I'm just I just get to give out the checks how great is that so um he has submitted a letter that I'm going to read uh for the Public's benefit uh and then I'll go up to the podium with Dr Smith and we will disperse the scholarships on behalf of the town of Yarmouth we welcome all who gather to um of the award recip ients here it is indeed a very special event in the life of the town tonight we continue that great yarma tradition as we are Distributing scholarship Awards to deserving students that also represent many families who work so closely with them to help them achieve their success this is the 29th year for the town of Yarmouth that they've sponsored scholarship program for students residing in the town who are attending some type of post-secondary educational Institution as we note each year we can all be proud of the town for establishing and supporting this most worthy Endeavor honoring our students and so on behalf of the prior recipients and especially the class of 2024 we thank the select board and town residents for their ongoing support and look forward to continuing this worthwhile and impactful process the committee overseeing the program is comprised of five members select board member Peter Q Smith who's here tonight our new superintendent Dr markk Smith who's also here community members Sandra Rubenstein Daniel Hayward and Dr Tom ker we all want to acknowledge not only the important work of the committee members but also the support provided by the town administrative team Pam Barnes and anarie Ellis to be specific this year we were able to distribute $50,000 to the scholarship winners and the funds come from the Frederick e house scholarship as well as the town of yarm scholarship fund we are grateful for both and especially to the citizens of the town for their voluntary ingenuous support and contributions to the scholarship program each tax year we have a record number of 45 recipients and it's the largest and most accomplished group of applicants we have had to review congratulations to you and your families for your success thus far and we wish you continued success in the years ahead to date we have distributed $62,400 to 761 students again on behalf of all past and present recipients we thank you the select board and the residents the selection process and award awarding of various amounts of the scholarship fund is based on specific criteria personal statements need recommendation Community involvement and academic success this process reveals to us the substance and quality of the student that helps us realize the importance of scholarship on their lives and the students in their families each of the students fully appreciate and sacrifice the sacrifices their families are making towards their educational goal and you as family members should be especially proud of the achievements of your student we ask the applicants this year to respond to the virtue they found most significant in their lives powerful responses made us realize realiz how thoughtful and focused these students are as they progress along their Journeys we encourage each to remain curious and ask those questions leading in new learning and Adventures we know from their responses they are resilient after facing challenges from covid and F Financial burdens yet they have moved forward and thrived they all work at least one job and have had seever had three to contribute to their dreams each applicant was clear they wanted to contribute and give back to the community as volunteers mentors or coaches we can be proud of their interest in staying connected to the core values they so clearly cherish some of the examples of the of the applicants community service shows me we can make great changes in the world we live and make it better for everyone I hope I learn something new every day authenticity guides my interactions with every everyone and enables me to navigate through lives with Integrity being honest has enabled me to build transparent and trusting relationships respect is an essential virtue that transcends boundaries expectations are extremely high and pushing us all harder to our limits and humor is there to ease the tensions it works to bring us joy into people's lives and finally I ask you to continue with my family's unfulfilled dream that I carry on my shoulders and with your help our efforts will not be in vain this scholarship is more than financial aid it is the rain that nourishes the seed of potential within me in the spirit of great curiosity they all possess and work ethic so evident in their lives I would like to share a short poem from a great Cape poet Mary Oliver tell me what will you do with your one wild and precious life Mary Oliver we all can't wait to see and with that I ask Dr Smith to join no I'll get one picture from this angle all of you together we could we'll do it at the end we'll get everybody up here at the end with the board okay hi Peter how you doing good so our first recipient is Gabriel elves Liliana [Applause] Anderson congratulations Jillian ardan Alexa Barbosa Nora [Applause] betar congratulations congratulations congratulations Jacob [Applause] Bolan Hunter bullette [Applause] Aiden bulock are you mom is and Luke I'm sorry they could be here they're both working luk and Luke is yours too congratulations thank you thank you Antonio [Applause] Kell congratulations great Antonio La these might be a little bit out of order I have Delany Buell congratulations baby love Blanc Elena castano Allison Edwards Emily Edwards meline Edwards okay Ashlin [Applause] Enright congratulations congratulations and Sierra en [Applause] right Colin en right that's my brother he's at work he's at work good good good and Owen enri congratulations whoops throwing money around here thanks Peter Alexander Ferrera Frank Hernandez Cortez okay Rosanna jokim [Applause] congratulations congratulations all right Stephen Kelly Leona longabardi Owen [Applause] Lucy conations congratulations Nina Mako torian [Applause] methany Ryan nto okay Aiden O'Reilly congratulations thank you Isabella O'Reilly congratulations Shane liim Mia Rubenstein Stephanie shoner anak KAS Swanson congratulations thank you you Ellen Swanson Lucy Swanson Emily teera Ella [Applause] Terio wania Thompson the names correctly if I didn't I apologize Breen Vieira Henry [Applause] woo there you go Michelle woo okay is she working I'm just kidding it's okay Lucy [Applause] young culations congratulations thank you so much Anthony zanelli Z Zen Nelly did I say it wrong I'm sorry thank you and that concludes it if we could get a picture with all the recipients and Dr Smith and the board members up here like Dr Kerr requested it please just for everybody at home we'll make sure they get these and the thing about this scholarship is you can apply every year you're in school it's not just for the graduating class thank you thank you all for being here [Applause] very we have some Town Municipal job openings when you guys graduate from college please come back home thank you thank you for being here best wishes every time I go to it's okay are we ready for so move forward yes sir um thank you Tracy great job and uh thank you Dr Smith for your participation I feel to acknowledge former selectman Peter Q Smith who was here um he was the committee as well and if I knowbody was coming tonight I would have announced his appearance um next item is announcements we have any announcements no announcements no announcements okay I I have one okay I'm I'm going to be holding office hours but I don't have the um full schedule yet but I just wanted to say for the month of July I'll be here an hour before the posted meeting time and use that as office hours for July thank you okay thank you um public comment from the historic village of Bass River yes Mr chairman thank you very much Tom nielo from the very historic town of Yarmouth in this wonderful Village of Bass River uh Mr chairman it was just about a month ago that we had a very historic election here in town and uh it was kind of exciting I was able to participate uh I learned a lot and uh there was um we had a nice little for down the cultural center and there was a comment made by somebody that our town had one of the worst two Wells on Cape Cod well I disagree with that and I think we all know who owns the the label of the worst Wells and it's not Yarmouth we have 24 great Wells here in town we do have some contamination in them but that's to our own device cuz we allow that to happen so I just want to make sure that everyone got the message that our wells here in town are not the worst on cape card I also learned a a few other things Mr chairman as I was walking around the community talking to people and uh as you know we have a library issue uh Everyone likes their libraries uh we enjoy our liaries I think we're all in agreement that there's not enough Library space so we're going to be hopefully developing committee and I would urge everyone to come down here and come to the podium on uh selectman's meeting and make a comment maybe once a month you can have a library day I don't know but um we definitely need some more space we heard Mr Scott talk about 26,000 Square ft which is a great amount of space which we don't have and uh I think we need to close the book on the library so thank you very much thank you Tom I got your pun there that was good anyone else for public comment Norm has his hand up who Norm on on oh Norm hul Norm you with us we see your hand raised good evening good evening can you hear me G well thank you for recognizing me um first of all congratulations to Tracy and and uh Joyce um I know you both will work your tals off for the select board and U I'm glad to see you there um I have a couple of comments um first of all I'm delighted to see the investment policy on your agenda um and um I made a comment at the town meeting and I must apologize to Mr rittenau I based my comment about how much investment income the town uh get has uh on the 2022 um audited report uh he corrected me uh I said we had about $100,000 of interest in or investment income he corrected me in saying it was over a million he was correct the 2023 investment or annual report audited report is online now and it shows I think and Bob could correct me a million four or a million five of investment income uh so that's great to see uh one point regarding that yeah that is unscheduled income that income could have been applied to cover the override so we would not have had to have an override if the investment income had been used it could not be budgeted for because uh it was only one year's worth but had had the select board looked at that as a source of free cash it would have been a way to cover uh the override without asking the voters to approve one this year uh the second Point regarding the investment uh uh is that um what it seems to lack is accountability there is no way way shown in the recommendations to um uh to audit or check on what is being done the finance committee should be charged with the responsibility of receiving report report on investment income and on investments made and on uh how much um cash uh and reserves there are available that are not yet invested and why they are not invested there are tens of millions of dollars on the town's books tens of millions of dollars $20 million in various funds uh safety funds that could be invested that's an awful lot of money and besides that there are lots of other uh uh funds available in the general fund in the golf funds and and elsewhere that should be invested um conservatively but for the town's benefit and there needs to be accountability to be be sure that the town is is getting full benefit of of investing every dime that is that it can the uh second point I'd like to make is with regard to water quality um I sent the board an email this morning I'm not going to go through the details of that I'm sure that um a radio announcer will uh read that on the air uh but the recommend commendations that I made are something I'd like to State publicly um the [Music] town uh uses federal and state guidelines um to evaluate the quality of our water so there are federal and state guidelines that say for example the nitrates should not be over X parts per million uh of water uh of uh in our water system and um PF pfas or pfas should not be over another x amount of parts per million uh and but what that is saying is that those amount amounts are below that are allowable that to me is a sacrilege um what it's saying is that under federal and state guidelines it's it's okay to have uh some pollution in our water I think we need Zero Tolerance we need to say we want our water pure we don't want the federal and state guidelines they don't know what happens to our liver heart brain as a result result of the the additional things that are in our water that they say are allowable our select Board needs to take leadership on this um insist on Zero Tolerance ask our um uh DPW director to to develop the cost of removing all n nitrates and all pfas from our water right down to zero ask him to get that cost and then put that before town meeting give the residents a chance to choose what Quality Water they want it should not be a select board decision it shouldn't be a DPW manager's decision it should not be Bob ritten hour's decision it should be the resident's decision as to how pure they want their water secondly um look at all the the regulations that exist in town as to what the uh allowable um I'm going to call it pollution levels are for new developments you'll be surprised to find out that Health Department regulations allow substantially higher amounts of pollution to go into our water than even the state and federal regulations allow ask our town administrator to come up with uh all those regulations and to reduce those amounts down to zero for any new development of any new commercial development or multi-unit residential development that is not hooked up to the sewer system don't allow any additional pollution to go into our aquafer the last thing is with regard to our uh uh sewage plant insists again on Zero Tolerance no pfas should come out of that water no nitrates in excess in excessive zero ask our our DPW director Jeff Colby he's a great guy he's smart he's resourceful and ask him to develop the cost of getting those pollutants down to zero if uh if um if we know what the cost is then the town residents at town meeting can make a decision based upon recommendations from the town but it's not right that the select board sits back and allows some level of pollutants to go back into our aquifer from that uh sewage TR treatment plan it should be zero so those are my comments okay anyone else yes sir I don't know if I'm in the right Squad here but I have a public comment on the free free bir speak into the microphone I mean you you can say it now but there will be a public hearing okay soaring I'm going a b to the property and um we're just against the the uh noise that's can you identify yourself for the yes um my name is William warok William yeah William warok W and okay 49 inasia Road um we've had plenty of issues with the music room I don't think we need any more issues we're in a residential area and I would hope this board would consider the neighbors and realize that we have been inconvenience between the the park the the blow up thing for the kids when I moved here there was no park there was no music room there was no free bird it was nice and quiet every year it's getting worse and worse and I just want to have it on the record that we are against it and I know there's a few more people in this room that are also against it so thank you thank you sir anyone else [Music] te so I know you're dying to make a comment that you generally don't but had you taken the money to avoid the override this year we would just made it worse for next year all right the reason one of the reasons there's a problem with a school budget is you take temporary money and you create permanent expense out of it it's like the first rule of budgeting you don't do that and that's what happened I know they have many other issues and that drives their budget hard um another one is and I'm I know I'm way behind the curve this year but I say this every year like we should find a way to encourage the property owners on 28 to adopt their curbs right the properties that do that they look way better and I think the town should lead by example on their own owned properties and start taking better care of them there's a piece of town own land across the street from the first Cong the Congregational Church yam uh yeah West yamama the last time it got cut back I did it you have all this growth gr into the sidewalk you know if we have sidewalks we need to take care of them and you got to remember something that when people look at that they don't say oh the state's not doing their job the town's not doing their job they just know it looks horrible and it doesn't reflect well in our town to continue to have this going I know highway is short-handed and I'm going to make a suggestion obviously not going to get fixed this month or this year is maybe we look at reorganizing the DPW so that we can cross Trin people and not have a cemetery in a parks and a highway exclusively but we have people that can cross and you know if you can ride a lawnmower for the cemetery you can ride a lawnmower for another department whatever it might be and maybe that's the way we get more efficiency out of what we have to work with as a town so that's tonight's thank you Kur anyone else yes ma'am hi good evening I'm Donna broas Carlton I also am here for the Freebird Hotel uh I AB but the my backyard goes right to their hotel and Father's Day weekend they had live music playing and I thought that maybe at first it was a a radio and thought it was really really loud come to to find out it was live music so I absolutely oppose this Friday and Saturday from 2: to 8: no way I mean I've been here uh for over 50 years this we've been living here at the cape and like you my neighbor had said there was nothing the inflatable park the music room there was never anything here like that before and it's it is it's just you seem to just be uh more and more is coming in and it's you know we're in a residential area and I just it's I don't agree okay thank you thank you anyone else is anybody on the screen no one on the big screen oh okay we're ready to move on then next item is we have with us tonight district attorney Rob gallboys um it's going to give us an update coming up to the front Rob if you would um we know you asked to be put on the agenda early and you have a very compact schedule and we apologize for the delay oh no apologies not sir at all may I approach us to hand out an annual report thank you thank you see congratulations thank you again thank you thank you this was our pack okay to sit at the table is that okay the green light is on can you hear me okay um again I appreciate the time and I notic certainly that you have quite a full agenda that's going to go deep into the night so I will keep my remarks under 10 minutes um I just want to touch upon a few items that's been going on since I last appeared before you last year I don't want to regurgitate what I talked about last year um but I first an announcement I yes we're a little proud of this we have a new we have a website um it's the first independent website for the cap and Island DA's office it's Capen islands da.gov and I've been told it's described as a forward-facing website you can um interact with it there actually um it's also included in your packet um and you can do such things with technology now you not only sign up for emails from our office to keep updated so to speak but also text messaging um if you have that particular interest I played around with it for about 40 minutes couldn't get through all of it at that particular time so um it's Chuck full so to speak with some pretty good information that I think um your residents would find re uh relevant uh the first topic I really wanted to talk about was human trafficking um and this is a subject matter that candidly was not on my radar uh when I came into office um shortly after I was sworn in January 2023 an outfit known as Cap Cod path uh invited me to a an event uh at Great Awakenings in hyanis and it was a presentation by Jasmine Grace who is a survivor of human trafficking uh I went to this particular uh event cold Tuesday night in January and I walk in about 25 people there was only one other gentleman there uh it was a big strong guy in a dark blue uniform was Chief Scott McDonald from New Orleans Police Department and after listening to this compelling story from gra Jasmine Grace I went down to the chief McDonald's office about 2 days later just to ask him what were you doing there and he explained to me that he was trying to set up a human trafficking task force among law enforcement from the tire Cape wanted every Department to commit at least one detective or officer to start investigating and going after human traffickers and inspired me like I said this was not on my radar screen so I went back to my office talked with some staffers to say hey what can we do we F we formed our own human trafficking task force of civilians to promote awareness outfits like Cape Cod path or people against trafficking humans independent house children's Cove treasured life Cape Cod Healthcare uh all came together uh to start trying to figure out ways in which we can try to promote the issue of human trafficking as you know we're a Prosecuting Office so um I got with our Cape delegation and I'm going to use a term begged for some additional funds so we could uh get a prosecutor that to launch our human trafficking unit within our DA's office we were successful in those efforts and I want to give a shout out to the our two senators uh sier and Moran who got us the funds which allowed me to approach a woman named Vanessa m who was a prosecutor of the Attorney General's office in Boston we convinced her to leave the bright lights of the big city come down here to the cap and islands and launch our human trafficking Prosecuting unit shortly after Vanessa arrived she got with Daniel Whitney who's the director of our community programs and they filled in an filled out an application for uh Grant funds for $100,000 um the grant was offered by the Massachusetts District Attorneys Association uh every single year they offered these grants to the 11 DA's offices the pot was $1 million and each DA's office could apply to up to 100,000 that was the ceiling as they were in the middle of that process we learned of course they cut the pot to 450,000 so now you have 11d looking for uh up puts of 100,000 allegedly of Po perform 50,000 or less than 50% and originally posted two weeks later we got uh two weeks later we learned that uh we were successful and we received $997,000 what we did with the money is we gave 50,000 to an outfit called my life my choice who works with Adolescent and uh Teenage victims of human trafficking 10,000 to the independent house who works with the adult survivors of human trafficking and the balance we use for trainings for both our law enforcement partners and prosecutors in our office office um so after that continue on start meeting with stakeholders across the cape in the islands uh alits like kod Regional Transit Authority the Chamber of Commerce Community College YMCA all were receptive to our offering saying we created a hotline and a QR code um and they were willing to put it on websites documents that they would hand out to their various clients and uh about two weeks ago we re received uh a thousand magnets that hopefully you'll start seeing soon in the back of Taxi Cabs the buses for the ccrta I want to give a shout out to Tom cahir um and back of bathroom stalls and restaurants all across the cape in the islands and this again just helps us promote awareness to the issue the data suggests that it takes six times for a woman to leave the life and with as much uh awareness that we can possibly put out into the community hopefully we get to bring that number down um moving on to another unit in the office human rights um the explosion of hate incidents uh on the um cap and islands is a little mind-boggling uh we create a new unit that's head by headed by Courtney sciss Courtney comes to us uh with a unique background she was a prosecutor in New York City for a number of years uh then in on Guam uh and then Anna Rundle County in Maryland uh in all three of those DA's offices she prosecuted major felonies um why all that movement her husband's on the Coast Guard so she's originally from Massachusetts and she they're returning back um we met with her incredibly impressed and she agreed to lead our human rights unit um she's conducting investigations at a lot of high high-profile and not so high-profile matters uh going on across the cape and the islands uh some of you may remember we had an incident last summer at a pond in chattam we had some uh matters on Martha's Vineyard and O Bluffs where a white supremacy group tagged uh postings on top of telephone polls outside of blackowned businesses uh and more recently we've had things like uh writing on the uh exterior walls of the mash B wampo language Reclamation office so Courtney's leading the charge in those investigations and will be announcing the uh results of those investigations in due time um almost done sensitive to the time uh campaigning and running for this job I would say with great confidence that two subject matters resonated where I went first had to do with mental health uh we spoke often about how the cape in the islands was the only part of the state that did not have a mental health court and I want to give a shout out to Judge John Julian the presiding judge of the barville district court um who recently launched a mental health court last September um and we were asked at that time uh to appoint a special prosecutor or a prosecutor in our office to handle the mental health court session I asked the staff a woman Qui quickly raised her hand her name is Shauna suve uh she has a bachelor's degree in Psychology and she comes from a law enforcement family her dad being a a longtime bronville police officer so the uh specialty sessioned opened last September it's growing organically as you might imagine uh and we've been told so far that it's uh quite successful just as a friendly reminder for those that might not be familiar with what a mental health court is um Professionals in the field come right into the courtroom to work with that struggling defendant to identif if the core issue and as we all know once you make that identification you have a opportunity to uh treat it and therefore reduce recidivism making us all safer the other topic that um resonated well was the need for the DA's office to engage in deeper Community engagement and I spoke about creating a new position a community engagement officer we've done that her name is Kelly quy and and she's been tasked initially uh with creating a Community Coalition we gave it a cute name it's called The Da and us and what we're looking to do is get anywhere from a half dozen to a dozen folks in each of our towns across the cape and one for each island uh to get together on a quarterly basis uh and share with us what's going on in their respective communities uh a staffer pointedly uh noted that when you look at Cape Cod from a satellite you see one Cape Cod but as we all know down here we have at least 15 different cap cards if not more so when when you look at all the villages so um this is just yet another way for us to keep our our finger on the pulse as to what's going on uh to wrap up uh I'm going to ask this I hope to come back before you in the fall for the following reason when I took office fiscal year 23 uh our budget was $5.5 Million shortly after taking office I learned that the Northwest DA's office uh that's where their big city is Northampton um uh is of comparable size each of us have approximately 260,000 annual residents obviously our summer population explodes upwards towards a million but annual residents about 260,000 and again our budget was 5.5 million theirs was 8.5 million so you can imagine the level of services that DA's office is able to provide that I am unable to provide in my short time in office that discrepancy if you will of 3 million has now grown to fiscal year 25 suggestions 3.4 million so I've certainly been working with our Cape delegation um this fall I hope to come back before you with some specifics as to what exactly what we would do with additional funding and the additional funding that we're looking uh to receive uh and I will be looking for support so when we make our pitch to the powers of being Boston thank you thank you you have time for a few questions um I'm here yes no I don't think I have any questions I think that was very clear thanks okay thank you well I'm excited to hear the programs that you would put in place if you had that and what you know what we always I think when we bring our County Partners in it's always great because sometimes we work in isolation as a town but we have a lot of similar issues and one of the things that we don't do really well at is sharing our successes and one of the things that um I'd be interested in knowing is what you see in terms terms of um what you're Prosecuting for Yarmouth what's emerging what we need to be aware of um and I'm interested in your diversion um specifically with um I was on your website with youth diversion with um drugs and what you have found to be successful and what um maybe Yarmouth could take advantage of in terms of um you know drug prevention um it's c challenging in in yth where the opioid crisis um is post as the da I get notified of every what they call unattended death um and th that could be the result of a suicide a medical reason but also including overdose um and without knowing the exact number off top of my head I can say with confidence that the percentage wise the highest percentage of Overdose deaths due to uh overdose is in yth um um and almost exclusively somewhere along that route 28 Corridor so whatever we could possibly do to again promote uh awareness to uh those that are in that particular quarter that you know there are services available to try to help as best as possible um what are they though like that's what I'm trying to get at like what what what are what's available to usly we need more now can we need a lot more available than now can and that's being told to me by things uh entities like Duffy peer Recovery Center law enforcement um so we we need uh naram boxes up and down the route 28 Corridor boxes other communities are doing that yes they without training because it's been uh typical in the past that there's been some small training that where they I think if you go to I think on T actually Tuesday nights they do a uh learn to cope and I they used to first and train people so that's that's an interesting we've met with L cope and they I know they would be they come down you've probably familiar with them as well they they would come down on a heartbeat to offer trainings right but so but other communities are just putting it out in the community without trainings what they're they have yes there are lock boxes I guess for lack of a better description there's another term that I'm just forgetting off the top of my head for the the the actual physical box but it's available yes okay well that's to me that's um prevention is going to stop those cases that you see and we um I feel are continuously trying to find ways to do that but obviously we're not being successful so um I'd be interested you know if you were able to get more funding what types of programs you could put in place what we could put in place uh to make Headway in in that regard because it's uh it's terrible I I would agree um I would like to offer that we are making some progress and I have some numbers uh and reasoning hopefully there a correlation but I can't be scientifically sure on this yet um when I came into office we started doing what other DA's offices were doing over the bridge um and that is moving for a dangerousness hearing on every single case where someone's charged with trafficking in fetanyl uh and we are certainly grateful that the courts seem to be listening to that and far more often than not those folks that charged with trafficking are held without bail pursuant to the dangerousness statute from jump and therefore they're not getting out and being able to apply their business again having posted a bail now when I take that and that's been in play since January 20123 when I started working we looked at Kelly research and Kelly research has come up that's an entity that the police department's work with has come out with the numbers for 2023 saying that nonfatal overdoses are down 10% across the district fatal overdoses are down 7% now obviously I would like to move that needle a lot greater in that particular direction but it's something that I'm looking at saying okay this is a policy we started in January 2023 and the overall numbers for 2023 seem to offer that it's going in a positive direction now can I say that you know with with a with certain level to of scientific knowledge I can't it's just an observation that I've made well it's I mean if if there's a correlation to I mean there's nothing more frustrating than our police doing the work and having them released on bail I mean it it is it is just a smack in the face to law enforcement and we're it's unless you help to change it which it sounds like you have um we're never going to make any progress we really have to hold them accountable I um I was somewhat critiqued by the Kart times about two weeks ago because of it was kind of interesting in the sense that they said uh pre-trial detainments are up under your watch good thank you I appreciate you there are times when and I'm not trying to say that everyone needs to be detained but there are certain cases like the fanol like the gun possession charges those are cases that that need to be agreed um and I apolog I don't mean to avoid your question about um uh diversion about uh you said the the Juvenile Diversion program uh we do have as you all know a a diversion program both in the juvenile side of the house and the adult side of the house um the adult diversion one thing that I think is a little unique to our DA's office is that we didn't set a limit an age limit a lot of other DA's offices will cap it out at 22 I think it is that just didn't seem rational to me you could be in your 30s your 40s or 50s and make your first you know misjudgment and you know we have a level of confidence that you're not going to come back in to the system we're willing to divert in those particular cases so um it is it's robust both on the juvenile side and and the um the adult side and admittedly I don't have the exact numbers on me as to what 2023 was or where we are right now in 2024 but I can let you know that nor Zeno who's in charge of our um diversion is is busy that's all I can really offer I'm sorry okay thank you Mark you have anything I want to thank Rob for for joining us tonight and I very much appreciate the update uh the issues that he talked about are very important in Yarmouth and uh Yarmouth police and so thank you for uh your attention and and your advocacy on our behalf uh most welcome Mr Force I didn't realize you were there I didn't hope I didn't have my back turned on you sorry not intentional I too would like to thank you um and as Mark said there are a lot of OB obviously a lot of issues important in this town that are also important to um the District Attorney's office and uh feel free anytime to come in and update us we're always happy to hear from you no I appreciate that and and an invitation I I will petition you in the fall and I will say this it's referred to as a hot bench in my line of work uh with the court asking a lot of questions referred to as hot bench this is my sixth or seventh presentation as I go on the circuit you guys have had the most questions so thank you very much thank you so much thank you so Catherine we said hi okay um comprehensive Plan update is next and then after that we will have the Riverwalk Park update side do you want me um I'm going to get up once she presents and you can come back uh good evening chairman Stone members of the board uh thank you for this uh opportunity uh to present um our first update to you uh on the development of the local comprehensive plan I am join Carley chair of the planning board and I'm joined here this evening I think Jim Sabin is still here here he is my vice chairman um and of course our town planner Kathy Williams our consultant uh Heather gold and uh Jeff bag are here from the BSC group um in your packets for tonight's meeting um you'll find a memo from Kathy Williams summarizing our efforts to date and next steps as well as a summary of the public Outreach plan and schedule for us that's coming up both of which the BSC group will elaborate on in Greater de detail this evening why is it important to prepare and update a local comprehensive plan uh it is through the local comprehensive plan that Yarmouth defines its vision for how to plan for the future prepare for Change and protect our shared natural resources in addition to articulating a vision which we have done we spent a better part of 18 months creating that portion of the plan um we're now moving to an action plan where we will have a local comprehensive plan that includes actionable items and a growth policy to achieve it the L LCP we hope will be a source of information about existing conditions as well as expected uh changes and conditions in Yarmouth in the future preparing and updating an LCP helps ensure that Yarmouth will be able to respond to changing needs in a sustainable manner it also can serve as a guide and a resource for you um and other committees and board members and residents of our community um on future decision- making and the allocation of resources so I'd like now to turn the um the presentation over to Heather Gould who's going to run through um a PowerPoint presentation on all the work that they have accomplished for us so far we just started in April we had a kickoff meeting at the April planning board meeting and a lot has been accomplished um already and we're looking forward to um a very successful partnership with them we're we're very pleased to have them on board with us Heather thank you um just to quickly go over what we're going to talk about tonight um we'll introduce you to our project team the main members of our team who will be contributing to various aspects of the the LC P um Kathy is going to speak to the vision plan um and we'll just give a general um overview of the the purpose and the process um the consistency with the regional policy plan as well as our approach to the project and our community engagement strategy um and wrap it up with this project timeline so the the the main four members of our team and we have other people will pull in as needed from our our group um I'll be the project manager I'm joined by Jeff bag um who is a senior planner um has municipal government background and we'll be able to help contribute to a lot of the the conversations and facilitations and kind of finding themes throughout the process um AXA is our um public engagement specialist and her specialty really lies on that online public engagement as well as like presentation of visuals and infographics the display of information uh and Jeff fasser is our our VP our project executive on this and he has been involved in a lot of different Master planning projects throughout the state so I think all of you are familiar with the 202 2021 vision plan where we really reached out to our community to see what was important to them and what they wanted to see Yarmouth look like in the future what they came up with is we really wanted to have a great place to live work Play and Learn we're looking to have an attractive and an affordable and inclusive community want to make sure that we have a clean and healthy uh environment we also want to have a strong economy with a lot of different types of businesses we want to have a lot of places where we can have fun and Recreation which is Cape is known for and then we're really looking for educational excellence so we took those ideas and we dug a little bit deeper and came up with some ideas of way we can preserve promote and provide for the Gen uh 11 different categories that you have over there on the right and that's detailed in in the vision plan it's really our launching Point uh so that we can identify those as Joanne mentioned those specific action items that we can undertake to meet these objectives and goals over the next 10 to 20 years there's a lot of other plans that we've been making a lot of progress on that play a very significant role in the local comprehensive plan in June we received a approval um from the division of conservation services for our open space and Recreation plan which is a very important component for Water Resources Wetland resources wildlife and plant habitat open space uh and Recreation June was a very good month for the town of Yarmouth because we also received approval for our housing production plan which is a important component for the Housing section of the local comprehensive plan we also have um a very strong Capital Improvement plan uh process now with Town staff and and Bill Scott leading the way and that's going to play an important role with the capital infrastructure plan that's part of the local con comprehensive plan so we can look at the infrastructure that we need in order to grow to meet the goals that we've identified uh we also uh Karen green and Bill Scott are working on some economic studies soliciting some consultants for that one of them is a market study in order to identify uh what additional businesses we need or want in the town of Yarmouth and how we might be able to actually get them and attract them to come to the town of Yarmouth we're also looking at different strategies to promote mixed use so that we have both commercial uh and residential maybe within our uh Route 28 Corridor taking another look at our Village Center uh overlay District zoning maybe looking at a 40 hour smoke smart growth uh and also taking a look at what other communities are doing for mixed use and what those mixed use uh developments might look like we've also made some uh progress on the climate resiliency and mitigation with the climate change vulnerability and adaptation plan where we looked at all of the municipal infrastructure and evaluated our vulnerability uh to climate change uh one of the projects that came out of that was looking at packet Landing Marina and what can be done in order to do some Coastal resiliency there I believe that's on a future agenda item uh for the select board and we're also starting uh an update on our Hazard uh mitigation plan for emergency preparedness and that's something that's going to start next month so in talking about the purpose of a local comprehensive plan and the process to update it um the vision plan has been a very important first component of the process um and there have been key goals identified within that plan that we are going to um dive in in more detail um the purpose of the plan is to guide Yarmouth over the next 10 years even 20 years uh there's a lot of effort that goes into the comprehensive plan uh it's a bit overwhelming the amount of information that's put into it um and one of the goals is really to reflect what the community wants what are the priorities how can the town get there and so the public participation and public engagement component is a huge piece of this um in addition another main goal is that the plan is consistent with the Cape Cod commission's Regional policy um and that the Cape Cod commission is involved in the process along the way so looking at that uh Regional policy plan goals uh the Yarmouth Vision plan addresses natural systems built systems Community Systems um and addresses the the RPP Place types which may require a little more focus and emphasis in certain areas um related to certain categories however it is an all-encompassing plan that will take in various elements as required by the the state in terms of having a local master plan um and it will involve housing and open space and Recreation natural resources historic and cultural resources Transportation um there is various components and elements more recently a lot of municipalities have Incorporated a chapter on climate resiliency and sustainability um you know it's in the trend of all of this Municipal vulnerability preparedness and planning and and mitigation and all of that I jumped ahead um So within our document that we will be preparing we will include existing conditions we will include um goals and objectives within an action plan those will be prioritized over a certain phase approach timelines considering who will be involved on the town side um and responsible for helping to achieve those actions they'll talk about funding sources or potential funding sources all of that will be comp contemplated within the local plan we'll discuss potential land user zoning regulatory um recommendations in terms of looking at different um different results that have come out of the public engagements some of the challenges that have been identified some of the opportunities that have been identified um and really create a framework for the town to to make progress from um moving forward into the future we've just started the process um we're a couple of months in now we've gathered a lot of information the town has a tremendous amount of plans that have either been completed or are now underway um and in coordinating with Kathy and and others um it's been um a a process to get through that information and to try to pull what is important and what is relevant and how we can bring that into our overall process right now um we are in the process of working through Kathy to talk to stakeholders different groups different parties that have um I don't want to see an influence over the master plan but have a lot of information to give us that we can then take take and um and digest So within that we also have this public engagement component and our plan is to have a series of public engagement events where we are getting the community to come out and and tell us what they want us to hear um that first public engagement event will be in September after the summer season is over um and then we will have also established an online presence we have a project website that is up and running um we will be adding to it as we work through the process we will be creating more information and more infographics and more kind of visual components to that but that will be a regular thing that people can look at and see the updates that are being made uh and we are um going to be providing regular updates whether it's through Kathy um or us in person as we go through the process and in terms of our public engagement plan we really try to meet people where they're at knowing that not everybody has the time or the availability to come out to some kind of community event that may be a couple hours long we want to give everybody the opportunity to provide feedback um to provide their thoughts in a way that is convenient for them we have done opportunities for people to provide feedback whether it's through an online crowdsourcing map um through an online survey through the project website just to be able to to kind of offer what they think we have done in person open open house style meetings where there's really no set agenda there's several different tables for information gathering purposes and we allow people to just roam through and provide the feedback they want to feed provide the feedback they want to give um and really just make it what they want it to be we try to make it fun knowing that um some of the information can be a little heavy but try to make it as understandable and relatable as possible and try to really use storytelling through our maps and graphics and imagery as I mentioned we're using different tools for our online presence we have the project website um we have draft materials that will be posted on there as we develop them we will use arcgis applications so in terms of mapping we can create a story map which also helps to tell stories and in a very visual display um and providing links to all of the the meeting videos and surveys and anything related to the local comprehensive plan it's really going to be the hub for people to go to I think the only thing I would add is that we do have a a town of Yarmouth web page that you can easily accessed it's just yarmouth.ma uscp and on there you also have an opportunity to sign up for notifications directly via email we already have almost 330 people signed up um it's a good opportunity um for people to get those notifications and letting people know like I sent one out about the meeting this evening if you were interested uh in an update and we'll also update that and get the um link to the hub on there as well uh and then put out a notification so all the people who've signed up will know what's the address for this Hub and they can go and take a look themselves and just to talk a little bit about our public engagement plan we've created a document that gives more detail into our approach to this um but in discussing inperson public engagement events as well as stakeholder interviews interviews and focus groups which we've we've held a whole dayong series of conversations today with several different stakeholder groups um and organizations and and town officials and um working through those and we'll be holding more of those in the future um looking at communication methods and how to get the words out talking about social media and digital marketing creating different Flyers that can be used um to help make people aware of the opportunity to provide their feedback um info infographics and branding having a recognizable design that people can automatically associate to the LCP process and know as they look at it what it's about this is reflective of the LCP process I should keep an eye on it um and then even just at certain special events whether it's tabling or having a display information available even just a postcard with a QR code that can be picked up helping to direct people to the project and information that's available this is just an example of some of the infographics we put together for other projects um trying to display the information in a clean way that has some some color to it um and helps to give out data and statistics and um you know other types of information and then in terms of our project timeline the end goal is to have the final plan available at town meeting in the fall of 2025 so there is a lot of information to um pull together before then we have outlined our approach is very small it's hard to see on this um but looking to have as I mentioned the first public engagement session in September a followup one in January um and that's really when we pull together all of the goals and objectives and actions within all of the elements of the local comprehensive plan and having that draft document into early 2025 to really be vetted through so that we're ready for that fall meeting thank you anyone the board have any questions or comments Mark I'm fine no thank you that was a great briefing thank you than Tracy uh this is great I feel like it's Groundhog Day I'm not going to I'm not going to get into it but I'm happy that we're making progress I'm happy that we're aggressive because unfortunately we've been at this for so long the information is only as good as when you collect it and it changes so quickly so I'm hopeful that if we aren't 100% we still bring the chapters that we have um to town meeting and get get as much of it approved as we can we need the full thing done so we can get um any type of relief from the commission and we've been waiting on this for years so I'm excited to have you here I'm excited to watch the process uh when I first started volunteering with the town 20 years ago I was on the growth policy advisory Council it was a committee just for the local comprehensive plan we worked on the chapters we got them approved we work with the commission I'm hopeful that the commission will help be helpful in um moving this along and helping us um but I'm excited I'm excited so thank you Jo well I'm delighted that we're doing this um I'm really trying to conceive of like the best brand for Yarmouth and I love the Yarmouth Within Reach but I also think we can do so much to be a fun place um especially along 28 where there's room to do things in a different way um and I love the idea of educational component that that will combine with things that are potentially fun I personally although not a pirate myself was inspired by the talk of the pirate festival a few weeks ago where they were going to have a whole educational component in the middle of a pirate Fair that's the kind of stuff I think we would all love to do and as long as you don't set an upper age limit on it I'm [Laughter] there thank you I have no fur further U questions or comments other than to thank you for your hard work and your continued efforts and keeping the board advised of the progress of the plan which I understand ultimately he got to be consistent with the cape guide commission and approved by them correct correct so we got to deal with that too as we go so thank you very much you're let loose thank you thank you chair I have to recuse myself for the next conversation let me know when we're finished oh okay thank you good evening good evening next we have the Jim Sabin and other members of the drive-in site utilization committee and our Tom planner Kathy Williams Jim has filed a memo dated June 18th which is in our packet and the floor is yours Jim well I'm going to uh do the real hard part of this and hand everything over to Kathy Williams who has done an excellent job in preparing this and we have promised ourselves that we will be out of here within 15 minutes because we know you have a lot to do tonight so um without further Ado Kathy Williams thank you Jim um I am going to be providing a general update on the project but there are two items which we really need input from the select board uh this evening and if it's okay with the chair I'd like to stop at those particular slides everything in the slides was included in your I just tried to put it in a format that might expedite uh the situation um so where where do we stand um we have the phase one contract was executed with Robert B hour Marine Division for about $9 million and the phase one work includes the majority of all of the site work the boardwalk the kayak launch the play area all the different walking trails and then the uh special event space there's a second phase which is going to be the restrooms that's bid under a different Mass General law so it's bid as a separate package we're hoping to open the bids in August and award that in September so we'll have a construction time of June of 2024 through August of 2025 uh we have over $13 million available for the for the project through CPA tourism Revenue preservation funds uh the Department of Conservation Recreation land water conservation fund seport Grant Park Grant and town Appropriations um so we do have the potential to construct both phases within the current budget but we're going to be a little bit dependent on the bids that come in uh for the phase two for the restroom and then whether we need to use all of the 5% contingency uh for the phase one so we'll have a better understanding of that uh in September uh when that information's done and we have a little bit more of the site work has been completed um Robert B hour is going to go very very quickly and they're hoping to have the vast majority of the site work done by actually by October and then they'll be working on the boardwalk over the winter because there's certain time of year restrictions on the salt marsh so one of the things that we really are looking for input from the board this evening is the actual Park name uh the phase one includes the park entrance sign we've been using you know kind of the Riverwalk Park as a nice descriptor placeholder as we've gone through design and permitting and grant funding but there's never been a formal uh official vote on the name of the park uh so the select board could vote to Simply formalize this uh informal placeholder Riverwalk Park or if you're interested in having additional um input the drive ins sight utilization committee could could conduct a really short naming uh contest to solicit names to review them and then provide their three top recommendations uh to the select board so if possible is it possible to get the input from the board on each item chairman or would you like us would you like me to complete the whole presentation Mike do you want me to do okay so the the other thing has to do with the sale of the boardwalk planks we have over 2,000 Boardwalk uh Planks on the boardwalk that could be engraved uh so we did include about the engraving of 200 of them within the actual bid for phase one that did give us some prices for actual engraving and you can see the sources there and they they varied a little bit with regard to the amount and we also got a uh quote from Mike at Plymouth sign for $125 so we're looking at an estimated amount of maybe 150 the cost for the board itself is 75 it's going to take a little bit of effort um once we get past construction for the DPW to coordinate all of this get it to the engraver uh and then actually install them uh once they come back back in and then since we're trying to create some type of fundraiser we put in a donation of $75 which kind came up with a total of 350 so the drive-in uh site utilization committee was recommending plank sales at for different categories of 350 for individuals 450 for nonprofits and then 550 for local businesses um excluding any logos or or web addresses we'd also be looking for some type of authorization from the select board this evening to um sell to start actually a plank sale campaign at whatever prices you guys endorse and then also be Shing that these funds get directed um to an account for construction maintenance and operation of the Riverwalk Park Boardwalk uh and event space of less importance for this evening but something that we were trying to get an idea is gauging the select board's interest in any type of naming rights for various areas within the park the restroom office building the playground area we do have a really cool uh pirate ship uh that might be interesting if it was named after a local Museum or the event space itself the kayak launch the different Boardwalk overlooks or even the boardwalk entrances themselves could have some naming opportunities there is an existing uh select board naming policy for town properties that's in your packets and it does allow for a bidding process for private companies and organizations to name a portion of the of town property it can be for specific duration it might you also want to set um minimum values and those are all the different parameters that the select board would Set uh in the town solicitation might have the opportunity for disect members or other community members to help publicize that solicitation to get the word out that the town is looking for naming rights to facilitate this the town uh did move forward with modifying the zoning bylaw to take out names naming signs plaques and sponsorships from the zoning uh bylaw and making it via a select board policy there's a draft uh in your packet of that policy but there needs to be uh more details need to be finalized and the actual sence sides as need to be developed and other future consider ation for the park um even once it's constructed we're not 100% done uh we have a interim use policy for the park but we need to update that event use policy and also come up with some actual fees to charge for use of the U periodic event space we might need to tweak the license agreement to include some of the permit requirements specifically related to to sound management um and then we're also the Chamber of Commerce has commissioned an event venue study to look at the different types of events that come to town the different venues that we have and helping to identify ify uh the best opportunity to maximize that we're also hoping that they might uh also include some fees from other venues so we can get an idea of what other communities are charging uh for their venues another big component I think that would be important at the Riverwalk Park and elsewhere in town is some form of public art on town-owned land um so we have drafted a public art uh committee charge and that's something that's coming before I believe the select board in August and we're working to coordinate with the chamber uh and the cultural center uh on that details and then there's also the artist shant and the kayak uh vendors there's pads and electricity to the artist shanties are there but we need to procure the shanties and develop a program uh still needs to be completed and of course we need to have a future solicitation uh for any kayak vendors at the kayak launch there and that's it so the the the two things we're really interested in this evening is input on the park name and and selling ourselves some planks so Mr chairman um our committee's had some discussions about the naming um we're comfortable with River Park Riverwalk Park um the majority of us are I don't happen to be part of that majority um but it's the coolest thing that selectman gets to do is they get to name stuff all the rest of the stuff you do on Tuesday nights is pretty boring I know that cuz I sat there but get to name stuff is is kind of one of the fun parts of being a selectman um this is something our committee has discussed the last four or five years uh um as far as the naming of the of the park it it falls right to your feet to decide who what whenn where and why um and one of the things that we suggested is you could either stick with the Riverwalk Park uh you could do a a naming where we could do a survey monkey uh I'm sure the chamber would be willing to participate where where the dissect could review those and bring back some recommendations to the board uh or the board could just get together and say hey let's name it the you know the American flag Park I mean you could do whatever you want you're the you're the the town's policy maker so you get to do that but it's critical that we start coming up with an answer um we've already broken ground that we and I really wish we did have a groundbreaking ceremony we've been working on this for 40 years and uh I know it's a lot of work but I think the people in this community should uh get an opportunity to see that yeah we're spending their money even if we put a great big sign out on on Route 28 that says coming soon or something but um you know the people in this town have been waiting for this park for a long time and uh you know I just drove in there today and I was very excited to see that they share my pictures with you if you want to see them later go over and take a look but they've actually started scraping ground so we're you know I'm I'm big smile on my face to say that we're making progress Kathy has done an amazing bit of work with this with beta uh to get us to this point uh and I think I think the people of the Town um will be very happy with the end results but the key things for tonight is the issue of naming um and the issues of the fees for different and it's not just the the the boardwalk planks I mean that we have opportunities um you know while we're going through this whole process of developing this park and creating the idea and the concept one of the quick questions common commonly came back and it came back quickly was how you going to maintain it who's going to pay for that so some of these opportunities the 2,000 planks the 15 or 20 park benches the the playground ship um there are so many opportunities for us to to use with some naming rights that um can put a account together that can maintain this property without having to continue to go back into the town cof to and we think we can do it in a way that could almost be self-sufficient but again it starts with you so we need some feedback from you so that we can now move forward so um that's kind of why we're here I still have four more minutes um if you want to talk to us about any of that uh we'll be glad to answer those questions that any of you may have so it looks like this project if I read the materials correctly and hear you correctly is going to there's a very substantial chance it's going to come in within budget and maybe then some so in terms of the um planks for example would that would those funds be dedicated more to ongoing maintenance of the facility that anything that would deal with the initial construction that would be our preference but again we don't get to make that decision I guess I would have one caveat um I'd like to have it be for construction maintenance and operation that way if for some reason we're a little bit short and we sell a bunch of planks we might have the opportunity to just finish the project um there might be some other opportunities like I said with the shanties where we might want to dip into that be similar to what's going on at Big gra breach more or less with the planks yes the boardwalk whatever yeah the boardwalk at the bass hole those boards been sold out for a couple years now so the other thing is in in terms of naming rights it's uh that's an interesting question and and naming the park um the fir the first thing I would want to see is is there some historical connection between Captain Parker's in that particular location was there a captain's Park was there a captain Parker and if so who was he Jerry Manning and and no I'm talking about Captain Parker one not the 10th Generation but um I I think some historical information might be in order that's where I'd start I hate to see a name of a facility that's pretty much going to stick for a very long time just based on you know something that's easy or convenient or somebody's willing to throw a few bucks at it um and also I think you got to take into consideration does it have geographical significance for example if you renamed the Bass River Bridge and there was an effort to do that at one point in time one of the major um push backs was well you know everybody knows what a b River bridges but people aren't necessarily going to know where this person after whom it's named um I think you got to keep I think you got to keep that um but my understanding is that there was a a real honest Guard Captain Parker that remains to be seen but I think I think that certainly should be looked into yeah Bob Kelly from the Historical Society did take a look at the history of the site and I think some of the names that they were coming at were more like Indian related like matachi or or messet and I think it was SE view uh and then um maybe C related to CW's pasture um so there was some there was some history that had been done there he didn't mention anything in my recollection about cap about Captain Parker no I know whether David remembers David Reed member of our committee as well chair M David Reed I am a member and vice chairman of the of the committee that's working on this two things I don't think we were suggesting that the naming of the park should be put out to any commercial Enterprise but the naming and sponsoring of individual components within the park such as benches and signs and and in the playground I I agree with you that I think the park should be named by something that we decide on that you decide on that is appropriate for the whole town not by some commercial bidding uh there was in fact an a captain Isaiah Parker who was a CA captain of the uh ship the lavender uh in built in Yarmouth uh and was in fact a prisoner of war in the War of 1812 uh he after that retired from being a sea captain and decided to become a farmer thought that was much safer than being a sea captain those days and he had a farm on the West Bank of what's now called Parker's River his home was just north of where the Captain Parker's Restaurant was it's described in historical documents as 15 rods north of the county road on the west side of the river uh it's obviously long since gone but he was very well connected with a lot of the uh original families in Yarmouth uh the lewises and the Matthews families in particular as I recall uh and and the river is credited the name of the river is credited to him in in honor of Captain Isaiah Parker um one of kind of disjointed comment that I wanted to make in response to Kathy's comments earlier frequently in her presentation she made reference to what we have done and what we have accomplished in the last several years working on this project uh she should have said in many respects what I have done uh while our committee has done a lot of planning and a lot of decision making the hard work of getting the funding and the permits and the contracts has been done by Kathy Williams uh and lot and Karen green and the other staff in the town who have worked on this project for the last several years and I think the credit should go to our town staff who have done the real work of bringing this project to fruition thank you couldn't have said it better I'm going to go to Joyce Jo comments oh thanks um yes um I was very interested in the whole concept and it seems to me that one of the things that you're looking for with asking about naming for the park I mean understood that it's not you know going to be IBM park or something like that um do you want to name quickly so that you can put things up coming soon coming in 11 months coming in 10 months or do you want to uh excite Community interest by some big public naming uh um Endeavor I hate to call it a contest but um some some um Community naming um and of course always if you if you want the second realizing that um you may get a name like bod mcboat as happened in a a an English naming contest but um I'm I'm interested I guess it depends on your timeline um which way you want to use that so if I can I'll jump in quick on and then let Kathy help me out um we don't anticipate the park actually being open for another 18 months well two years the thing is is they're doing shop drawings for this sign right now and they're just waiting for us to to come up with um the the name to put on it it's going to take a little while to fabricate and I do think that they were hoping to install it probably by October uh at the latest but they need to fabricate it and get it out there so there is some timeliness to this and I'm sorry that we brought this to you uh at a later date but there will be a construction project signed and it's staying with the Riverwalk Park because that's kind of what people have become known even Mass mapper the state's GIS calls it the Riverwalk Park um so it's really kind of caught on in the last seven years that that we've been using it so there is a little bit of time when I say contest I don't mean that somebody gets to win it it would just be a case a way of soliciting um names and that you could then have the D suck look at and then present to you some options Maybe there'll be some more historical information we could find out and include that uh as well I think if we do that fairly quickly we might be okay but this isn't something that we could decide like three or four months from now I think that would be too late okay I I for one like the name Riverwalk I might maybe make it all one word but it describes what it is it it hints it nature to be seen to lure in tourists right San Antonio has a I can see we have a division at the table there so I will stop yes we do have a division at um and that's okay I um you know that's what committees are all about having discussions and and coming to some compromise and some conclusions that that uh we can all live with and I'm one of those people that can live with whatever this board right there wants to name it um we just want to see it open um and if I can fall back quickly on on something that you said earlier fun and education two things that this park is going to have is the ability to have fun and it's going to have an ability to be educated because we're going to be having um display boards along the the boardwalk that will explain the nature and the his the the marsh and all that so there are going to be opportunities to get both of the things that you're looking for fun and education but we got to get it done and we need to know about those two items tonight if we can thank you hey Mark thanks Mr chairman can you hear me okay yes sir great um thank you um Jim and Kathy for the uh the update the presentation and I Echo the comments by others um about um all the time and energy and work that's got into this and clearly Kathy you've made this uh a real priority and uh you've done a great job um we really want to give you some direction tonight on on naming and on the um the planks and I think we I think we should do that um on the naming I'm very comfortable with the idea of a committee uh working with the the drivein sight committee uh and maybe utilizing the help of the chamber to get feedback from Yarmouth residents and uh coming to the board with three recommendations um I'm also a little biased like the chairman um I think history is very important um and I think that needs to be at at the core of this I app appreciate Dave Reid's reference to Captain Isaiah Parker um so if there's a bias on my part it would be to have uh Captain Parker or Parker or Parker's River somehow that needs to be in the name it would only make sense because we need to designate a place that people are familiar with and want to come to but also I think we need to always uh draw attention to the town's history um I appreciate the work that Bob Kelly did but I think in this case Parker Parker's River somehow uh connect making the historical connection um to Parker and Captain Parker in some way I think makes a great deal of sense so that's kind of where sort of I mean I might as well get my bias out in the table so I share the Chairman's interest in focusing on naming that the respects um the town's history um but again I think the idea of having a committee work on it and then come to us with some recommendations I think is a great idea so I'm all in support of that and on the planks I think you've done you've done I think great work at least in teeing that up for us and I'm I'm happy to bless what you have sort of laid out for us uh you know with the chart and the and the graphs and the suggested dollar figures I I have nothing on my own to to sort of go up against it and uh if those if those figures are figures that the committee supports and the Town Administrator supports I I certainly will support them as well and I think it's important that we give the green light to move forward on that um I don't think this has to be a long exercise on the naming um but I also appreciate the updates on the other items because we got a lot of work to do we've got to make some decisions about the finances and the management and making sure that revenues associated with aspects of the use get dedicated to the appropriate places and I think that's a discussion uh that we need to have um you know you know once we get Beyond these two items so I'm all in favor of a committee and having the the dissect committee uh come to us with a few recommendations I like the idea of working with the chamber on it and uh I'm I'm prepared to uh endorse um the recommendations on the planks I make a motion to uh endorse um recommendation to proceed according to the discussion we've had oh wait sorry can't do that because oh we are a with Mark right we are y okay we would like you to make the motion to support the 350 450 and $550 numbers and the then the separate account for construction maintenance operations so the plank sale money doesn't go into a general fund to support the plan as presented by the planning committee and the town planner for currently named possibly to be changed in name r uh Riverwalk Park maybe they're two separate yeah motions yeah I yeah I'd like Mr chairman if we could just get the pl get the planks squared away first and I and I would if if Kathy sort of laid out a motion for us Kathy could you repeat it because I'm gonna basically move that motion right um and I withdraw mine to authorize plank sales at $350 for individuals 450 for nonprofits 550 for local businesses and authorize the initiation of the plank sale campaign at the prices endorsed by the select board and then direct funds from the plank sales uh to an account for construction maintenance and operation at the Riverwalk Park boardwalk and event space still moved second okay all those in favor say I I hi hi oh yeah we'll do a rooll call Mark hi I I vote I so three in favor one exstension that's Tracy and one absent okay step now on the other item Mr chairman I think what has been suggested is that um we endorse the formation of a commit I guess we request and and again I'm going to go back to Kathy on this I think uh if we wanted to follow your recommendation we would be asking the dis committee to assist the board in facilitating a um I'm not sure I want to call it a contest but for the lack of any other word I think that's what it what it is with or maybe recommendations that involve a survey of the public on the naming of uh uh this place and uh and to involve the Chamber of Commerce you support a separate committee yeah which would include the chamber okay so in your packet I think again um I have a name for my brother-in-law who does all kinds of wonderful stuff for me I call Mr Wonderful um and I got to tell you that the town of yamas Miz wonderful is is sitting right next to me cuz uh in our packet there's a sample of a Survey Monkey um that she's even got us prepared so if you want to take a look at just a general idea we could work with the chamber get something done quickly I think we have to get something done quickly you could use the cham chamber's great in helping us advertise things they get the word out to a bunch of different people in addition to all our venues and avenues for getting the word out so they're very very helpful and then and I'm sure they may also have some some ideas so is my motion sufficient enough to get you going or do I need to reward it that's good for us anything more no I think that's great oh okay it's okay if it's okay then I second it all right all in favor I oh you and I Mark I I enjoy spot I so it's a three one exstension one absent motion carries thank you thank you thank you thank you very much thank you thank you imperfect progress it's better than no progress at all and we are having progress I think we got it all we got it all that's uh walk you do what I do you check off each item as we go we got a number of things left um next item is um introduction and designation of temporary manager Cape Cod Farms Roman num 3 LLC doing business as cape card Farms 601 Route 28 West jth Massachusetts good evening good evening how are you good do you want to introduce yourselves for the record please yes my name is Richard naum and um my understanding is that your dad was the manager of the business yes but uh he recently had an accident um where he was hospitalized and uh he's no longer able to fulfill his duties as manager so we wanted to replace myself as a temporary manager for the time being honestly it' be probably more prominent to replace it permanently since I'm the person who's there on site most often and you met with Sergeant Hennessy went over all the yes sir so you're Richard right yes sir and you you went over all the um local and state rules and regulations with you um and he's satisfied that you're a suitable person to be in you know in a management position really hope so um and your dad was khil my dad is khil yes okay and he's he's still going to be the manager you're going to be an assistant is that what's going on uh if that's what is is suggest then yeah that's what we will apply to as first if later on that we want to do it as a permanent thing we can switch it later a later time as a permanent thing but for now whatever allows us to you know run is fine so this is simply just adding him on as a as a an assistant manager he not removing the dad no that worked perfectly yeah so your father can still you know subject to his health and his availability he can still be the manager you you also can be the assistant manager however however it works that's fine will you be covered is that okay how if we can if we can operate under that way that's absolutely fine it's just wanted to make sure because like I said he's he's then you want to be the manager of record he he Sergeant hennedy C does say in a June 11th um email to PM Barnes in our administrator's office I met with Richard who will be taking over as manager so could is there a way we could switch over 28 West J the checklist has been completed is attached it's my opinion he can be considered a suitable manager so is that what you want to be the manager yeah that that would be that would be the best case scar since I'm on I'm on site more like I'm on site the most so it'd be it'd be the best for because what Sergeant Hennessy say suggested to us whoever whoever is on site the at the most can oversee the most should be the manager on the record so I think me switching switching over to me should be the the more um appr so we just simp we need a motion to accept as a manager as a business huh do we have any discussion or if you have anything if you have any questions okay just like to say I uh have gone by the newly renovated station and it looks wonderful thank you very much um and on the uh question of the the title I find that something like ameritus like manager ameritus always works if somebody is downsizing their role oh sounds good thank you okay I just have a procedural question how come we don't get the actual application anymore we only get this checklist we used to be able to see you know now it's it's check there's not much to this actually no there isn't but but on the actual application we used to be able to see their citizenship whether or not they're tips trained what what I've done all that I I'm specifically it's just checked here so I guess we' take his word for it I can bring in certifications about you I'm sorry no no I'm just saying about Sergeant Hennessy we we don't have an application we used to get the appliation we don't he's just really being a substituted manager so but isn't there requirements for the manager doesn't the manager have to take the class so that's the difference that's why I'm asking like yeah usually there is an talking about clear there's an annual class or every two years be the manager of record if if I may I did take that class the you're speak come before the board and get it approved oh yes no I'm wondering what course Tracy's referen there's a course that's by anually or two every two years that you have to take with the uh Sergeant with Sergeant thing and I have I have I have taken that class yes good the Town has a requirement that any new managers have to um we have an annual course that you have to go to I think it's once every two years one one of the two years and that is for people that are owners and managers I've as opposed to staff they have to um attend this it's usually put on by Phil Magnuson who's who both an attorney and um retired police officer does a really good job and he gets up and talks about all of the different legal aspects of responsible um management of liquor establishments both with pouring licenses and package stores and um every every year we get we get a good voluntary resp bonds but there's four or five hold outs usually and we have hassles with them and that's a violation of their license not to attend those courses did you go this year yes Sergeant Hennessy held the class this year uh me me and my cousin who's uh they keep records who's there who's not there um I signed in and everything so you as a manager of record would have to I went to the class already yeah so it's once every I think it's every two years you have to go at least once yeah well I make a motion that we approve the new manager of record oh I have a second second C second okay let's take a roll call Mark we'll pass our Mark for now I okay Tracy I Joyce I I vote I as well so that passes by a vote of um 4 to zer with one member absent I'm happy that you did take the course and thank you as long as you do that and follow the um guidance that you got from Sergeant Hennessy and going over those um a lot of those materials are included in the course as you know yeah uh and then there's a um there's a separate program Joyce it's not mandatory he has to tell me this cuz I'm the newest member on the board I beg your Indulgence just problem um the Yarmouth Restaurant Association and most of the businesses in the cape I mean in yarm belong to it they have their own program um and they do it every year for the service sure I knew about that one so they're not the management they're the they're the Frontline people and they teach them about how to stay out of trouble what's expected of them F fake IDs they go over that um how to detect intoxication or some of becoming intoxicated stay you know not serving alcohol to miners reporting certain incidents to police they go through it A to Z and they have someone from the DA's office come down and they but that's voluntary we don't require that M but um most of the businesses send people there for that okay so it's good thank you okay you're all set thank you very much you thank you good luck thank you all right you're right Tracy we usually do have an app with that so this is a hearing annual weekday Fridays and Saturday this is an entertainment license sh sh R IIM shrink shrim I'm sorry Inc doing businesses Freebird Motel 553 rout 28 West sharmas um good evening good evening you want to identify yourself for the record my name is par Patel I'm the manager on record for Freebird Motor Lodge I'm going to read this into the record just legal ad and then we can go from there the armor select board acting as the local licensing Authority has received an application from shrim Inc doing business as Freebird Motor Lodge parth Patel manager 553 through 28 West chouth for an annual weekday Friday and Saturday entertainment license for live and recorded music to include up to five musicians or singers possible amplification system and or disj jockey all music to be outside only from 2: p.m. to 8:00 p.m. these hours are for both Friday and Saturday hearing will be held on Tuesday June 25th 2024 in the hearing room at the Town Offices 11:46 route 28 South yarma the select board's meeting begins at 6: p.m. written comments will be accepted until 4:30 Friday June 21st 2024 in the town administrator's office at Town Hall verbal comments will be accepted at the hearing um so if I read your application correctly you're not seeking any indoor entertainment correct yes you are I am correct you're only seeking your outdoor entertainment but you want to be able to do that with um live and recorded music up to in the case of live music up to five musicians or singers change that to maybe like maximum three not even five all right up two says that's a Max uh um a possible amplification system and or a dis jockey no D jockey now usually and I'm going to let you give me your presentation momentarily usually when we have request for licenses when people request an outdoor license it's usually not Amplified music it's usually like one or two acoustic acoustic pieces something like that um this is a little bit unusual in the respect that it's not seeking any indoor um uh license it's all outdoor and it can be Amplified so why don't [Music] you so tell us what you want us to do and why so as you guys know we were former Hunters Green our family owned the place for last 10 11 years um we are not really into entertainment business so I didn't know what's Amplified or what not to be so we are pretty much going with two maybe three a couple singing and Acoustics nothing loud nothing show no concerts nothing it's more of an Ambiance for our hotel the hotel is more of a music theme a' 70s rock Theme Hotel so we are trying to create an Ambience for our guest and it's going to be during the daytime between 2: and 8: we don't even expect it but it's just there pretty much from 3 to 6 is what we are looking for that's where we are going to be uh because most of them will be gone for dinner by then we're not a dinner service nothing it's pretty much just for entertainment for our guests while they're in the pool why Outdoors why not we don't have room for indoors you don't we don't okay can I ask you how large your lot size is the lot size it's uh not large it's less than 2,000 square feet it's a small outdoor area where the bar is so there'll be like a one singer or two singer with an acoustic okay we did get some uh written written uh commentary on this to me did receive a letter yeah here's a couple of letters here's a letter we got from on June 20th from uh Donna yes deitar Ivanov and Daniel yordanov um they say that homeowner at 9 Ruby Street in West Yarmouth can't make it tonight um they oppose the granting of an entertainment license for live music or DJ performances our community has already uh had negative experiences two times with the nearby Music Room fall of 2021 and fall winter 23/24 and the drive-in concerts in the summer of 2020 considering the previous non-compliance issues of the music room um with Town regulations and very loud music and bass I'm concerned about the Firebird motor L's adherence to noise ordinances furthermore the armouth police are already busy and calling them to address potential noise disturbances would further strain their resources both myself and numerous neighboring households are increasingly burdened by disruptive noise at all hours of the day for instance reindeer Lane where many elderly and disabled residents reside is in a very concerning situation situated directly behind a motel's pool it's unlikely they would welcome regular poolside parties in their backyard and then he talks about my objections stem from past experiences such as the Fourth of July by at the nearby Mariner Resort where excessively loud music and bass disrupted our peace while such occurrences may be tolerable once once a year and during them twice a week would be untenable moreover our area is already heavily trafficked with numerous bars restaurants and the recent addition of a water park um and he compares the um Route 28 becoming similar to the Jersey Shore eroding the character of Cape Cod [Music] um it's pretty much what he has to say and then there's a letter from a Anna baroas Carlton dated June 21 received on that date my house is situated behind the fence at the rear of the fire bird motel lodge the house bisb been in the family for over 50 years we enjoy spending time in the backyard typically during the summertime the loudest thing you would hear is people playing shuffle board the weekend of father Thursday June 15 16 2024 they were playing music at an elevated level if this is an indication of what is to come for 6 hours each Friday and Saturday I would prefer it not happen and raise my opposition to this entertainment request those are the only two letters I have I don't know if there's anything else there's also a correspondence from the chamber that was filed this afternoon oh yeah can I see the chamber letter I think you have one there let me give you a chance to respond to this so we got letter from the chamber dated today who supports your request um says that you contribute to the local economy and enhance the vibrancy of our town talks about your recent Investments and facility improvements um demonstrating your commitment to providing high quality service services and amenities for our visitors from what we understand the Free Bird Motel has never had a complaint from Neighbors regarding noise or other disturbances this speaks volumes about their dedic ation to maintaining a peaceful and respectful environment the addition of live music at Freebird promises to offer a new entertainment option enriching their cultural experience for their guests and giving them the opportunity to hire local musicians we are confident that the management of Freebird will continue to um uphold the high standards that have earned them the trust and respect of their neighbors in the business community and is signed by Mary vbr president and CEO of the army Chamber of Commerce um is there anybody here present in the audience that would like to be heard on this yes you in favor or you opposed sir I am opposed okay tell us why you're opposed okay and identify yourself please my name is William Wok I live at 49 Anastasia Road um just so you you the lady's not here but we've gone through this before there is a child that lives just left of where this hotel is this child is UN under 24 hour supervision has to have a nurse there 24 hours a day we pay for it with some of our tax money this child is in really really a sad situation that music room has drove that family absolutely crazy they are so disgusted that they because the way we were treated the way they were treated with the music room when they when they brought this to them they were ignored somebody should realize who your neighbors are and nobody has seen this child the child is there 24 hours a day it's a very very sad situation they do not need any more aggravation neither do I need any more aggravation from the music room or the water park the Water Park it's kids what are you going to do the kids have to have fun I understand it goes away at night this was named a different place and that is totally wrong what this chamber lady said because I live right there they have had parties every year I don't know if it's a military group or a school group that's absolutely outrageous I know that she's heard it everyone's heard it in the neighborhood don't believe anything these people say it's all about money they only care about money they don't live here when you live here then you'll realize it I should not have to be put neither to my neighbors and and I can tell you right now that four of them were disgusted and they said it doesn't matter what we do we're not going to win because this is in the bag it's already corrupt these officials they don't care that's that's not that's not what I'm saying I'm saying I'm pleading to you people to give us our peace and quiet back this this music room has been nothing but a disgrace when they did that let's forget about the m music room it's just it's just terrible and we don't want to keep calling the cops every five minutes it's ridiculous they have more important things to do many times at night I hear this music room I'm not going to call I would call almost every weekend because they wake me up it's not right and these people did did they've l in the past theyve they've been so outrageous at night that old name it's just ridiculous the place looks good as far as you know they did spend a lot of money they're sprucing up and I understand that but from their past record it's been very very disgraceful comment we get there a second is there anybody else that wants to be heard on this are you in favor or against against okay you tell name my is BST I live at 43 Anastacia Road um I'm about three houses away from the music room that has become a a very very bad subject um it doesn't make any difference if you're having a cookout if you're trying to read on your porch or something of simple of going bed to bed at night we hear background music all the time this fac isn't that far from it it's only about I'm going to say three houses yeah between the music room in this facility um and just because of the disruption that's why I'm opposed to it anasia we've got a tight neighborhood of about 50 homes that AB but both of those properties and that that's it how come you didn't get a letter all right I just found out about this 4:00 this afternoon I never received a letter of this hearing you never got a notice never got a notice okay thank you anyone else this mayor hi I'm Donna baroas Carlton I'm um my backyard is right to the their hotel um in the past uh I don't know exactly what they have over the fence but it's either a sitting area um where their guests you know can sit and relax but I uh there has been radio playing um and I can hear everything I can hear conversations you know when they get a little loud it's that close so this enti tainment is just not going to work I love my backyard I have flowers everywhere we enjoy it and sitting you know having cookouts and this would really be a disruption thank you thank you no sir I'm going to give you an opportunity to respond to these letters and these um oral comments that have come that's what we want to focus on right now good Mike could I could I interrupt for just a minute I'm um a little confused about what we're actually being asked to do here now DJ was DJ was but but I mean the details DJ was mentioned but no DJs now it's now going to be acoustic music sophisticated acoustic music okay just so so that's very different from what we had in the packet that's that's no he said well the packet he says possibly Amplified but and now he says no amplification yeah we're not going to go any of those higher decel levels at all do you have the green cards have you turn the Green Card you said recorded music right no recorded music but that's live music just live music with the artist or a couple Acoustics so you're looking for only live music live music up to what five pieces no maybe like two people or three at the max so you're you're backing off with your I'm I'm back it's way too many I when I read it when I did it I was we never we are never into entertainment process we don't know what we want to do thank you we'll get to that momentarily sure tell me what your response is to these criticisms and objections let's go to number one the kids parties that was 2022 when we were old Motel we had that for last s years 8 years when we were since 2015 that was once in every 4 weeks weeks I mean sorry once a year 4 days in May that's when it was for last two years we have banned that because we don't want that type of crowd in our hotel number two we are not music room we are a hotel we have other guests we have 74 rooms we have 150 guests a lot of times we are there to entertain the guests not be a nuisance it's more of pleasing the crowd creating the Ambiance they there for vacation we don't want to have a party it's just let people sit hear music number three entertainment is far away from the houses and we are not asking late at night we are not asking we are pretty much asking during the daytime in the afternoon not even not that many not every day it's Friday and Saturday and maybe only Saturday sometimes mhm but Friday and Saturday comes on a weekend that's why we are just asking for it okay so back to Joyce's point now you're not seeking any recorded music right no you you skip you're taking that request out right yes okay and in terms of you had you had originally up to five musicians or singers how many do you want now three at the max it's always going to be three at the maximum three yes so three max um musicians or singers right yes okay and no dis jocky no dis shaki it doesn't fit in 7s theme she had a juk box no and same hours 2 to 8 Friday and Saturday and and um he's CR pass ing out the possibility of amplification as well which sounds to me like that that would mitigate some of the concerns they're going to have whatever the artist brings that small speaker while they're playing it's going to be there that's all there's no Amplified music or anything it's more of an Ambiance kind of yeah he had possible amplification so no amplification right yes bless you bless you okay So based on where we are now which is no recorded music three maximum musics or Andor singers no disc jockey no amplification So based on that re I guess kind of amended application if you will um I'm going to go to the board for any questions or comments starting with Tracy yes do you have the green cards that you've I town did you submit those I don't have them no I had to get I had to do it myself because I think Pam hand so you either have submit him to her or submit him right now without the a Butter's notice is it's not um hearing so do you have them no I don't have it right now I have it in my office I think because I had my brother mailed out all the packets through the USPS but but they they are in your possession yes so we we'll need those to verify that they've been sent out we have the evidence that it has been um placed in the Cape Cod Times we do not have the evidence that the ab is no I can get the I can get the proof for you that it was sent out and do we give him the list of which is set out the we don't we don't have any um did you did you advertise this in the cape C paper yes yes it was we have that evidence is is here from the Cape Cod Times 613 oh yeah published on 61324 um I guess um well is it true that you've been having outdoor entertainment we heard that in public comment we have not we had a we have so we have a music team so we have a lot of musicians from Symphony from music room from other music venues staying over so they are there sitting they're playing themselves that's what we have we didn't have them we never paid for anyone we never hired anyone we didn't do any of that sort they're hanging out by the pool sometimes they're just playing a guitar or something so I mean I'm I'm glad that you've amended your your wish I don't I don't not even sure three is three might be too many and you know I think it's and I don't know the policy may have changed over the last few years but I don't think the music room should have any effect on you and what the this board has done in the past is try to find a balance between making sure people live in peace and that our businesses are successful and that's what our job is to to do and um I think with the reduction of what you've requested and perhaps maybe um a reduction in hours and here's what I have to say I think we can we can try it for a year you know and then come back if we've had any complaints that's on you and it may not be renewed but um I like I said I think we need to put these things in place maybe two musicians and and from maybe 3 to six which is what he's asked for instead of the 2 to8 and make sure that it works for them and see if we can make everybody happy and then again check it in a year I'd be I'd be in favor of supporting that with the with the reduced requests so you would um I think two is enough personally I don't think you need out there I i' say he asked he said 3 to six would work I think we 3 to six is usual time the reason I'm asking from 2: to 8: is because if there's a long weekend we want to do 5 to 8 depending on when the crowd's coming when the guests are coming in that's why we are asking for the leeway from 2: to 8 would you suggested our he had before he had said 3 to 6 I think 3 to 6 is the usual time in a on a Saturday afternoon I don't I'm just I'm just saying that if he's willing to reduce it that we should we should try that again I think we're trying to find a balance that will make the neighbors not have to have disruption in their lives so as much as we can try it in a limited amount you know those parties that were there for many years those were crazy parties and you own that at that time you I mean know invested it but you were the owner at the time that allowed that and I know there were a lot of police presence at that point in time because we hired them to be there to make sure the kids were safe we had security 24 hours during that time as well and I didn't sleep for two day two to three days for those time periods we understand thank you I'm glad that's over yes um what are your thoughts on this well my thoughts are that um it doesn't seem he should be responsible for the music room which has clearly been a a a source of aggravation to people and and no one in this room is responsible for New Jersey I mean no we just can't take that on um I I would think um concerning Tracy's thought on this with reducing the musicians the only thing I would think was um if you had a a vocal duet because it seems like this is shading much more toward vocals yes live artists then then if you wanted one musician to accompany it that that would require three three so he's already come down from the up to five I guess I think you know that the um the three might be artistically necessary otherwise some kinds of performances would be ruled out um but the given that they're going to be acoustic I think um you don't have to worry about that really loud um instrumentation that you can get in some in some places I was at a a coffee house in hyenas last week having breakfast with someone and they were giving a a lovely uh local musician a chance to play um but she had the big amplification on and we finally we just gave up we just nibbled carbs and and had beverages cuz we couldn't hear each other yeah that's not the EXP that's absolutely eliminated and I I actually thought the amplification was the biggest biggest concern here okay but otherwise you'd be comfortable with the hours I guess I'm I'm thinking that um some of these hours are going to be limited as days get shorter anyway that so I I I guess I would feel um that it might be wise to allow like a little bit more time in the summer and then naturally around the pool in October it's no one not much is going to happen and we shut down on on Columbus a weekend right after Columbus say we can be shut down so October is going to be really dead yes Mark any um I'm still a little confused on what exactly okay we're voting on um I I I'm I'm glad that there's been some amendments and modifications um I think that's that's a big help no amplification and the limitations that have been expressed I think is all movement in the right direction I just before we vote on this let's just make sure we're clear on what exactly it is all right so where he's at is um there's not going to be any recorded music at all no DJ no amplification of the music and there's going to be three maximum musicians Andor singers and um those hours would stay the same which would be 2:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. on Friday and [Music] Saturday Tracy has suggested perhaps considering limiting it to two musicians instead of three shortening up the hours from 300 p.m. to 6:00 p.m. and having a one-year review date uh um I can see the point of a one-year review date that that makes sense I agree yeah I think that's a good idea zoning board of appeals does that all the time with a lot of their um so I defin I definitely support that oneye review as well okay um I have no expertise on making judgments about two two musicians three musicians I have I have no expertise on on any of that so I I'll defer to others let me let me um let me go to Mr Patel for a minute are you and this is not a trick question of trying to get you to do anything sure I'm just trying to see if there's a consensus that can happen and and I don't want I'm not trying to lead you or direct you in any any way how do you feel about two musicians instead of three number one um and shortening the hours up um to 3 to 6 Andor whatever other hours you you would could live with uh subject to a one-year review how do you you feel about that with respect to my application I when I learned everything about how many musicians are sometimes needed I have pulled back from five to three for a reason if there's couple like Acoustics or something they're playing and there's one singer that's the maximum it's always going to be that provides the Ambiance and the level of Music we need at the max and that's not going to be every time that could be only one person that could be two people there could be three I'm just getting a leeway on where I want to be at and regarding the timings from 2: to 8 I'm happy to reduce to 7:00 because after after 7:00 even my guests would like to sleep at 8 sometimes I'm okay with that but 3 to six is very limited sometimes I need two sometimes I need three sometimes I need 5 to 7 depending what artist is available when we are not doing two three concerts a day it's not a Content it's just a performance sure you're willing to scale back if I'm 2 to8 to 2 to7 I'm willing to do so but you still want to stay with the three it's is that all right yes please okay um and and then you would have no recorded music no amplification no dis jockies none um okay excuse me so do I have a motion to to close the public portion of the hearing I thought we already did that yes a motion to close the public portion of the second we have people that still want to speak I don't know if you want to no I'm not going to take any more commentary Mark how do you vote to close the public portion I Tracy I choice I I vote I as well um we can still talk about this but I'm not going to take any more public commentary we have to have some other business and we have to put some limits on this so um here here's my question do I have let me try this first I I'll I'll try to do this in form of a motion so somebody can just say yes or no terms of a second um I move to Grant the request um for an annual weekday Friday and Saturday entertainment license for um outdoor entertainment only with a maximum of three musicians and or singers with no recorded music no dis jockey no amplification for the hours of 2 p.m. to 7 p.m. subject to a one-year annual [Music] review do I have a second second all right so we have a motion in a second so that's what we're going to be voting on now if the vote is unsuccessful and somebody else can make a motion to do something different if that's what the board wants to do all right can you also got that again this going to be acoustic subject to the return of the don't forget the returns that we need those that it yeah and it's subject the license is subject to returning the um the Blue Notes F's notices evidence certified receipts correct you'll have it tomorrow in um again just for sake of clarification it's going to be acoustic music only yes not to exceed three people yes all right nothing's going to be Amplified none no recorded music is going to be played your your hours are going to extend from 2: to 7 p.m. instead of 8 and one year from now you come in for a review and if things are fine should have no problem going from there but if there's complaints or whatever the board could either eliminate uh you know any portion of that license or fail to renew it past the oneye anniversary date I understand you understand that yes all right can I just ask some more questions then what is any discussion before we vote Yes I have discussions I just think five five hours is a long time to have to listen to music outside if you're in your backyard a couple hours I could understand anyway I'm not going to get hung up on that if that's what the board chooses to do but do you have any um Shrubbery or what what is your what is your lot line I mean I'm I'm looking at the assessors map you're very close to a neighborhood do you have any um Shrubbery fencing what do you have to contain the noise we have shrubs we have white fences we have uh in the back we do in the front we have uh some hydrangeas we' have planted around we don't have shrubs that covers the whole property no we do have white fences all around the whole property like 8ot 6ot 6ot 6ot whatever is legally required is what we have put it on you make a motion to make them put strawberry in the back for to help us know excuse me if I may it's my 8ot fence in the back and my neighbor's 8ot fence which he has put shy there it's not his I don't know what's on the other side but on my side it's not his all right we ready to vote on the motion Mark hi Tracy I Joyce I chair votes I as well so that passes by a vote of four in favor one absent member and um keep in mind this is subject to review so as long as you respect your neighbors rights and um try to be an accommodating neighbor um I think that'll go a long way sure thank you sir thank you I think next item construction and demolition CND fee second hearing we went through this um and in Fairly um lengthy terms last time and um but what I I simply would ask you to do roie and Jeff is just to give us a um brief overview of what [Music] the um fee increases will be and the purposes for which um it'll be used and um I I don't expect you never know but I don't expect a lot of public input but let's see what's out there but let's give them let's give everybody who may have missed the last hearing just a brief overview of what this fee request is if that's okay uh certainly I'll just quickly introduce us um Jeff Colby the Public Works director Roby White House our assistant uh DPW director is here as well and she can cover very quickly uh the fees maybe if you wanted to put up that uh slide that had the fees and there you go and what the changes are that would be great absolutely thank you for having us um one thing that I didn't really discuss last time I just want to touch base on it real quick is what is construction and demolition there may be some confusion out in the public with what that is construction and demolition material are basically um items that are considered wasteband in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts some of the items on that waistband list so things to consider are your wood your clean your gypson wallboard any plaster toilets it also includes bulky Furniture such as um sofas or chairs that are upholstered um I I just wanted to kind of touch base on that because there may be some people who didn't really understand what construction demolition is and as regards to the fees I think it's important to note on this spreadsheet that our neighbors to the East and the West are substantially higher than we are um and and they are in proximity for the construction and Dem demolition business the most um Regional locations in order for these people who have construction and demolition material to go to so they are much higher as you can see the town of Dennis is 225 and the Town of Barnstable is 235 Yarmouth is currently 165 and our proposed increase is to 205 I'm not sure if you're looking for more than that but that that's that's it that's good that's for the um 165 and 205 is per ton and then there's a mixed ton that will go from 190 to 230 correct okay um the last increase took place in fy22 so that was April 2022 when this board awarded allowed the rate to be increased to 165 and on the next slide I can say that um when we talk about the fees that are paid the fees that are paid by the people who come in and bring the materials that's that fee of 165 but the town actually pays a vendor the current vendor is called wind waste and their fee that the town pays in order for that material to leave our property is currently $144.90 and on July 1st that fee will go up to [Music] 15215 and these costs are supported um solely out of the fees that are charged correct they don't come out of the tax base so we have to have enough Revenue to pay these increases correct um okay I also want to point out on that same slide I referenced next year when the contract is due again we have heard that there are potential increases up to 25% on that's cost that needs to um be considered and will be coming back to see you again I'm sure to review those numbers okay all right does anybody in the public want to be heard on this issue in support of it or an opposition to it okay does any board member have any questions or comments I'll start with Mark no comments Tracy just whether or not we got any any uh comments since the last any written commentary anything no no written comments oh um I thought the presentation last time was really thorough so I think I'm I'm all set but I thank you for the uh the uh little definition of what would be considered construction materials because I think that does confuse people when they think well this chair wasn't holding up the roof so good all right do I have a motion to approve these so moved opposed fee increases so moved a second we have a motion is second okay all those in favor we'll take a roll call vote Mark I Tracy I Joyce I I vote I as well passes by vote of four Z One member absent thank you so much thank you I'd also like to say my express my appreciation to the staff at the disposal area they keep that facility open seven days a week and I'm very grateful for all of their abilities and their friendliness in terms of answering people's questions on site and should there be any questions please don't ever never hesitate to reach out to the staff or myself thank you thank you thank you Roby request for endorsement paint stewardship program legislation Thomas B Edward via Zoom have a zoom presentation here hands up good evening good evening good evening um thank you for this opportunity to speak about paint stewardship the bill it's presently being considered by the ma House of Representatives my name is Tom Irwin I live in Dalton and I'm a retired chemical engineer and primary care physician while I was a member of the Dalton waste management and recycling committee we were facing the same daunting waste crisis that yarmis faces no uh landfill space and dealing with rapidly ever increasing falling cost and tipping feeds and we were looking for a solution um after a careful study of ways to address this issue paint stewardship seemed like the perfect first step and after confirming it was working well in the eyes of customers and or consumers and retailers in Vermont New York and Connecticut I became an advocate for this law paint stewardship is a program where unwanted paint can be return to any participating paint retail store any day they're open without a disposal cost and without regard to where the paint was purchased this program is voluntary for retailers and transfer stations as you can see in the first page of I hope you have as handouts uh the retailers in Vermont freely come and go from the program that suits their business the cost to Consumers is 75 cent to a dollar fee per gallon paid at time of purchase the collected latex is hauled to reprocessing plants re Blended to like new condition and sold for most 50% of the original cost the oilbased paints are most often burned as a co-fuel and cement plants that are outfitted with state-of-the-art effluent gas scrubber systems to prevent pollution and this program has been working well on 11 States including our neighboring states of Connecticut Rhode Island Maine Vermont and New York the key benefits that Yarmouth are going to see at first it's going to be a service that your residents will value this is imp parent by noting that between 40 and 60% of latex return to the nfield Connecticut Sheron Williams store each week comes from Massachusetts president this is also true of all paint retailers close to the m of any ma board also notable 91% of 932 Massachusetts residents dropping items off at household hazardous waste days signed petitions encouraging their legislators to become Bill supporters this suggests that 91% of Yarmouth residents with unwanted paint in their basements and likely there are many would support having this law second it will present no cost to municipalities and will decrease household hazardous waste stay costs freeing RDP money for other important Solid Waste issues and third and probably most importantly it will be a model for future product stewardship legislation that will address additional larger items such as mattresses solar panels rechargeable lithium batteries and packaging the resolution being considered is consistent with the state's plans there is no arm twisting as highlighted in your second exhibit the MMA is a support this is the testimony they had before the enr your 30 exhibit is the Residential Waste section of the mass DP 2030 Solid Waste master plan where product erpr in general and paint epr in particular are called out as contributors to moving the state towards its goal of zero waste a particular note this master plan using 2018 as a baseline calls for 30% reduction in waste by 2030 and a 90% reduction by 2050 and without stewardship uh program S I can't imagine how this would be possibly uh achieved in addition to the state there is Broad support paint manufacturers and paint retailers who help craft this lot uh support having this lot they the are 3,200 Massachusetts residents that have signed in petitions including the 932 people dropping off items at household Hazard Way St and the embarrassingly large number of mass residents bring their unwanted paint to our neighboring states clearly support this law in the legislature 28 reps and 12 caters from both parties sponsor or co-sponsor this bill and are clearly supporters and there is support from 70 municipalities today across the state that have passed similar resolutions or endorsements with more expect so what is our what are our next steps house legislators have commented that significant Municipal support through 40 resolutions by mid April was critical to demonstrate sufficient Municipal priority to compel serious consideration of pain stewardship by the Ways and Means Committee fortunately we achieved this goal but as of yet Ways and Means has yet to act on this bill hence to in further improve the odds as we must that this bill is not only seriously considered but also favorably review we must strive for as many resolutions as possible therefore with this need in mind and since Yarmouth residents will appreciate this Law And since this law will Ser save municipalities money and reducing waste is critical to our future tonight I respectfully request the Arma select board add their valid endorsement of paint stship by passing their supportive resolution and I thank you for your attention and your consideration of this request and would' be glad to answer any questions all right thank you does anybody have any comments or questions I I have a question I want to know if our uh recycling Solid Waste committee has reviewed this proposal who whether who has our Recycling and solid waste committee have not they have not I don't believe so I think he just very recently asked to come on um the way I read this and my understanding of it is um this is kind of like a um it's like a deposit he's trying to get a Statewide initiative to get this before the mass legislature um and you're going from town to town to try to gain gain support for this um uh close I the bill is already in the legislature it is okay Bill number number I see yep um how long have you been in the legislature uh it was this is the seventh session of the legislature that uh the bill has been brought forth this however is the first time that there has been as as we're discussing for Yarmouth today a clear indication of Municipal priority uh so that the legislature is uh taking it far more seriously in fact because of the degree of uh interest um the this legislation U made it out of the environment and natural resources committee uh one month ahead of the deadline which is the earliest that it's ever made it out usually it's after the deadline and uh I do wish to note that um The Cooperative Extension for barn stubble county is endorses this and of course they're in communication with uh all of the uh Waste Management folks throughout uh the barnable County anything else Tracy no I just I I mean I think that this would be this is pretty brand new stuff for us I don't think any committees have reviewed it it's interesting that later on in our packet is some information about hazardous waste collection and it goes from July till October so that's problematic I always find like what do people do in the mean time they don't want to collect that stuff so if we can get it recycled properly at any given time I think that that's always a good thing Mark I want to thank Tom for um joining us tonight and and hanging in there with us at our meeting um you know obviously we need we need to sort of review this um but I I I applaud you for the the initiative I think it's all it's it's all with the right Spirit and the right direction and um let's just give our some of we've got a really good um group of volunteers that are very much on top of uh the collection of hazardous waste and other material and recycling um and I'm sure we would very be very interested in their feedback as well so uh thanks for joining us tonight um I'm I'm not going to be able to vote on this uh this evening and for the rest of my colleagues um uh given my medical situation I have to leave the meeting so I'm going to say thank you once again to Tom and the rest of you and uh I will have to sign off for the rest of the meeting all right thank you Mark Mark take good care of yourself TR uh thanks I I strongly support this I mean Tracy made a very good point about where does that stuff go other than the uh hazardous waste collection days I would actually say it's also much better for the latex paint if you've ever had a third of a bucket of paint and it's still good and you you just wish you could find someone who loved that color and could use it um and then of course the only way if you live in a small house and you can't keep all this stuff is to let it dry out in the backyard and then take it to the dump I mean this seems like a much more practical approach if you take it to the paint store they're going to know local art groups that might have a use for both kinds of paint and it seems to me um a great thing to be able to divert from our our uh our dump okay thank you all right we appreciate you coming in and um we'll take this under advisement we may end up referring it to our Solid Waste advisory committee um but I don't think we're in a position to take any action on it tonight due to basically short notice uh but we will we will return to consider it I I thank you for your consideration of the matter I do appreciate it and please know that it's important for as many municipalities to speak their voice uh as possible and the deadline for this particular session of the legislature is July 31st all right thank you what I was going to ask thank you so can we ask this this be referred I'm not sure if they'll meet between now and then but if they can and give us their report and if they're if they're supportive then I would I would vote to uh you know based on well I'd like to see their recommendation but yeah I'd like I'd like to see what they have to say so we don't need to vote for that I send it to them tomorrow and hopefully if they can have it okay last thank you Tom will they wish me to be present for their consideration of the matter well we don't know that but Tom um Bob RIT now are here uh we've been helping you in the office um if you can stay in touch with us have your contact information um we'll refer this to the recycling and solid waste advisory committee and then ask them if you know potentially you know they could have a hybrid meeting where where you could uh participate as well so I'll help you coordinate that beautiful thank you so much have a good evening next item is a discussion vote Regional emergency communications center intermunicipal agreement now we have Elizabeth lion um from me talerman and Costa Our Town Council that worked on the intermunicipal agreement um to help develop it to um help us walk through and um evaluate uh any of the aspects of this agreement and I'd also like to invite we have our um Public Safety team here Chief and Enrique Aras Chief Kevin Lennon um and and the team to come come on up to the front and we have Mr Simon who um has presented a recommendation from the finance committee okay good evening even good evening fellow want to introduce yourselves to the record Kevin lenon Chief of Police Scott Smith Deputy fire chief hi uh Enrique rasque fire chief Richard Simon chair of the finance committee okay thank you we have Town Council good evening um we had been over this several times at um various meetings and my understanding is that the chiefs of all three towns are in support of this inter Municipal agreement um for reasons that have been discussed over it over um so Bob um says discussion SL vote what action are we looking to take tonight on this um if possible in in the intermunicipal agreement it it does provide that um it requires a vote by uh um July 1st now I don't know if that's an absolute drop dead date but if it's not approved as of July we'll have to go back to the other communities um because they've already voted to approve it so um the idea was that um since meeting last with the board we've conducted some public Outreach sessions we had a very nice session over at the um Senior Center facility um we've promoted uh the idea through the social Med media the website and the video content that we've been playing over and over we continued to study it with the public safety Team U the finance committee has reviewed it um and has made a recommendation to move forward and um we also has have Elizabeth Li on on hand to address uh some of the any issues and questions that folks have and I I think that the key part of this process that is critical for us is that um it looks like the state is on the cusp of U making a major Grant award to this Regional entity if it does in fact exist um and it would be under the e911 system the the first feasibility steps at designing how a Regional emergency communications center U would work and in order to be eligible to start that process which really ticks off it's probably a four to five year period uh that we need to to study this and work it out we need to have an intermunicipal agreement and some of the the the key elements of the intermunicipal agreement are that it requires the team of the three communities to develop true two transition plans so it has to be a written transition plan that comes back to the board of Selectmen and is approved before anything moves forward and the um the transition plans govern number one the operation of the center how exactly it would work and number two it covers the um transition of the personnel and the staff and it requires a written transition plan that takes into consideration the agreed upon goal of ensuring that current employees will not be adversely impacted and um what that means for us is that all of the dispatchers must be automatically transferred in and not have any risk of um you know losing their jobs but but that is a process that we need to work with our regional Partners to develop those written transition plans which come back to the Selectmen and are approved before we move forward those are uh two items are are drop dead items and uh the um one one of the the key items that we feel a level of confidence if I can speak for the um for the Chiefs and I know they can speak for them eles perfectly well um one of the key Provisions in the intermunicipal agreement is it um has the operations committee that is set up to make recommendations on the budget the equipping um the Staffing and also the protocols for the actual dispatching that meet the needs of our community and by having an operations committee with the direction of the two Public Safety Chiefs representing the town I I think there's a level of confidence that we can make this Regional system uh be a true Improvement for our community and that we're not going to lose uh any of the Integrity of the system that we have now and we're also going to protect the staff so um I I think that the um what what we'd like to do is maybe with the help of attorney Leon is um you know walk through some of the elements of of how this agreement works it does provide that um if the town determines that the transition plans are inadequate or wishes to pull out um a written notice just needs to be given terminating it and the town will have no further responsibility for any payments um under that and you know based on that we don't think that there's an enormous risk but I I think that the um the major item is the the chief's feeling after study that this will represent a major Improvement in the way that the dispatching for all of the public safety emergencies is handled for our community and so that sort of where we're at at this point um I don't know if I'm left anything out I so I think it's um you know for the questions of of the board on on how the intermunicipal agreement works or whether you know we're interested in pursuing it is is really the point we're at now okay good any questions from uh board members Tracy no I want to I want to hear from you want to hear from her first okay go ahead so we're want to hear Liz your thoughts on the uh the intermunicipal agreement how it works what maybe potential risks are out there or benefits the Elizabeth Liden Town Council um I worked with Town Council from sandwich and barnable to come to a mutual agreement um we went back and forth with several iterations of the draft and finally met and agreed upon all the terms that you see in front of you um one of the things that was concerning in the beginning was you know just to make sure that Yarmouth had a say in the decision-making process resulting from that conversation we put in the governance section in the draft whereby all of the decision making um of the rec director is upon recommendation of a committee formed by all of the towns that includes the fire and police Chiefs and if there's any um disagreement about the decision that is made by the rec director then it would go to the town managers and town administrators for further um resolution and so that's one of the concerns that we had that was addressed in the draft um another issue that we had was just making sure that the term was long enough so that where the town is investing significant time energy resources into creating this District we want to make sure that we have a long enough term that we are recouping the time and money spent in doing so and so we've adjusted the term so that um not only do does it consist of a longer term for the agreement but there there's ample notice given for termination and if the the town of barnville obviously terminates then the agreement itself is not in void but they have to give even longer notice for termination because it impacts all of the town so those are some of the things that I had raised as a um a concern in the beginning of the drafting process which I feel has all been addressed in this latest draft um the costs are split amongst the towns based on um the volume of calls in the population so that it's fair and most of the funding is coming from State 911 and um the purpose of this agreement getting signed right now is so that we receive the funding to to move forward with the project because without that agreement in place um they won't give us the funding but the other uh benefit of that is that state 911 will be reviewing this draft and pointing out any issues that they have or that we've possibly missed that need to be addressed and so then it would come back to the towns for further review if there are any further issues as identified by a state do you see any unresolved issues or any pitfalls for the town of Yarmouth with respect to where this draft stands now candidly the only thing that I could see being a potential issue issue is that sometimes when these are created as a regional district um you create it as a um under a specific statute whereby um all the towns are actually creating a district not signing on to um a re Center itself where the town is the host but all mutually kind of building this facility together together and having a joint stake in this barnville is taking the lead here which has its ups and downs um some of the benefits are that they are the ones taking on a lot of the risk and they're the ones taking on the the leadership role procuring the um Construction and building the facility itself um the downside I saw to not following that process was that similar to a Regional School District if you um create a district under that statute under 6A if any of the towns don't appropriate the money that's required then there's kind of an automatic um provision in the statute that says it's levied upon the town anyway some towns don't like that and so I can see that as being a positive or A negative um but my only concern there there is um if the town chooses not to appropriate it's an essential service and so you know we have to explain that at town meeting that this is something that we need and um although it's you know discretionary where whether they want to appropriate it's really a necessity and so it it needs to be appropriated annually so so that was one of the concerns that is kind of still out there but is addressed in the draft is um you know you appropriate by a certain date and then you have the option to terminate I don't even know where to start I I like that um the governance is in there and it's a police and a fire chief which doesn't make sense to me if you have a town that doesn't have their police or their fire in there but they get to have a vote by both that's what it says that's what this says the police and the fire chief from each town so sandwich doesn't have both police and fire in there but they get two votes so that I I um I guess I come at this a lot from what you said Liz from you know dealing with the Regional School District and there's a lot of unforeseen to me that we have to think about potentially in the future and I get concerned with things like a very small town coming in having equal say as with maybe 5% of the calls that we have 27% and they have equal say because that's what's going to happen not that I want a weighted vote but I'm just saying down the road we could really lose control of any say whatsoever and the numbers though um I'm I'm still stuck on the opep thing and I'm going back to the Collins report and if you look at the Collins report on page 36 and their their potential budget for year one there's $981,000 in there for OPB in the first Year's budget which concerns me because it seems like the dispatches of Barnstable are going to their OPB requirements are being put all into this budget so now we're going to be responsible for their years $981,000 is a lot of money I don't think that that's just for this year so I mean where do we start I are we starting with having that ownership on us and again the the longer time to to move from this if you wanted to get out of it is great the problem is they don't have the ownership of the oped benefits when they leave those are going to be reassessed to us they get the benefit for 10 years of service and then they walk away with no responsibility I don't I'm I'm not down with that at all when you leave and you have U had an employee that you got the benefit of you should have the responsibility of their oped benefits after they leave it shouldn't be transferred to another town that's I mean I just can't get past that that's and and the numbers here when when you look at the numbers have um another question have we looked at the Union uh are they going to go into a separate Union or they going to keep the same Union with Barnstable the dispatchers that are in Barnstable are we joining their Barnstable or are they going to become a new Union um my understanding is that the employees are going well first that's going to be worked out in a separate agreement um as as part of this agreement it it states that the towns will um work that out in a subse agreement um but my understanding is that they'll give first priority to existing dispatchers and um the employees will be subsumed by the Town of Barnstable I'm still uncomfortable with that wording that they get first priority like it should just be a transition it's I don't understand the process I don't understand why there's a process it should be written into the agreement that our dispatchers will have a job period I I don't I don't know why we would even you know mince words on that it's like they deserve to have a job I don't I would love to look at their Union agreement to see how it aligns um and what that looks like for our employees I'm not sure I know that you were in the midst of um looking at that I don't know if you got into that kind of detail the finance committee so we we did not fully get into that level of detail uh we do understand that it would be a at this point would be a new Union okay that's sort of the the last bit of information we had okay that it would most likely also be a uh Enterprise um organized U org operation so the town of Barnesville operates 10 different Enterprises already this would be modeled on that type of approach okay I'd just be concerned what what got bought into that Enterprise and you know all of the retired dispatchers if that probably would be brought into that which means those costs for the already retired ones would be dispersed to the new people again that's why the I think the agreement is very good in allowing for that subsequent uh because in addition to yeah that issue that doesn't happen I'm just looking at what was given to us here the 35% of the overall budget that is for pensions it's not oped yeah that's all fringe benefits you see the the thing with the OPB I I really don't see that as a negative in in fact you're quite frankly reducing your oped liability um by um if if the the town employees are transferred into a unit in Barnstable which and one of the reasons why it says in the agreement that you have to do a a transition plan that comes back and is approved by the towns is because there is a collective bargaining obligation under Mass general laws 150e for both our community barnable and any other communities and and they need to have the time to um fulfill that obligation determine is it a new Union is it going to be this the same Union and that's part of the transition plan but um it's going to take a little time to complete those negotiations and what we're saying is that um the deal breaker for Yarmouth is all of our people are going to be automatically transferred in Period they will not be hurt so so we just need to allow that to be done under the appropriate law and then come back and say are you satisfied with this does it work and we've had those discussions and we've let them know that look the standard is that we're going to transfer our people in now when you get to the the OPB situation um first of all you know with our finance director and and so we operate ourselves a large number of um Enterprise funds there are best management practices that in in order to determine what what you're talking about are the quote unquote indirect costs which are things like the OPB you can't assess someone OPB for previously retired employees it's it's highly regulated so what will happen is that we take our employees they automatically transfer into Barn along with their OPB liability so we take a we we take a big cut right off the top of our OPB liability it's gone but it's not really gone because now we're operating in an Enterprise where they take that same liability right and and now it'll be a little bit less because we don't need as many dispatchers for um you know the town there'll be some of those dispatchers will be attributed to the regional system so it's it's not as many people in the towns individually as it is in the entire unit so they take their entire unit what they have and then they determine actuarially based on the same system in the actuary report seagull does them um that that we use now and and they determine what the total annual OPB liability is for all of those people going forward um going forward none of the passive and now now then they're authoriz they can assess us what our share of the total OPB based on our percentage right that so it goes back to that right now we're 27% of the calls so so we only pay 20 7% of the total annual going forward OPB liability and if we at some point in the future leave the agreement we don't take that any of that that OPB liability with us we would have to go somewhere for instance we if this thing in 25 years goes away we would have to either get a new Regional Center that has similar OPB similarly assessed or we go back to our system where we get the employees again and then we start with a whole new crew and then that OPB liability is is less than when you have the people that have sort of aged out through it I'm I'm fine with the going forward piece if that's that's the ACT what's going to happen what I'm not fine with is us being assessed for a town that would leave so so you explained a piece of it but like say sandwich leaves okay you just said it's better off for us if we leave and we walk away from it but but if we did that then it would be dispersed to the other towns all right so the scenario whereby you got three towns right and then one of them pulls out that would increase costs for all of the towns and and we would have one or two options at that point we could if if the regional center goes forward we could either add someone to replace those calls right and then maintain the same budget or we'd have to go back and renegotiate this situation um so that their costs are cut but what what we wouldn't do I I don't foresee us doing is we take a three town system three towns worth of employees three towns worth of equipment and costs now we split it among Two Towns I don't think that that that is is anticipated that we would have to if if it say for instance evolved into a two town which it's it's a lot more likely that it involves into a say a four town or a five town but in the event that it that it shrank we would have to shrink the operations or else redo the the numbers and evaluate are we better off in the um the regional system or back on our own and and I think that looking at the risk it looks like that there's less risk in the thing shrinking than than it is having it grow and trying to manage that and and I would say is that nobody can join this without um under the agreement without the vote of the towns that are members so um it's not like you can um just join you have to come back and get a vote of this board and you could set conditions depending on who it was um and it and it may not even be like there there's another option there it may not even be just a town it it may be additional duties that um are going to be conferred to the regional operations center on behalf of a third party that we would charge for um to help defay the costs of operations um so the the two different ways that the intermunicipal agreement can be changed to expand it is is units can be added or Services can be added um that are you know more entrepreneurial how do you for oh sorry go ahead that's okay um there's also a section that addresses termination or withdrawal section um is it 12 10 12 um and it says that following of notice of termination the remaining towns shall address the impacts caused by termination by either encouraging other parties to join the agreement or by reducing expenses of the barn R um and that no town uh any obligations or expenses incurred before terminations still have to be paid by the town that's terminating or withdrawing so that leads me to my next question about capital and they building out of um the recc in the transition time while they build it and we still have to maintain our own operations how does what does that look like in terms of the capital expenses does do do those get dispersed at a at a level while we're still doing our our own operations or do they not get dispersed until we're all in I think this is maybe Chief lenon they the the grant will fund everything until we until over the first three years so the grant will fund the entire building of it the purchase of the equipment the hiring of the director so until we get into the phase where we're where we would be running dual we be running dual operations because we can't just cut the cord and say everybody's moving over there so there's going to be that transition period where Yarmouth PD and fire will still be up while the wreck is getting spun up 911 pays for everything until we move over and then there's that three-year period that they pay for everything as well great the only other question I have is with the numbers here um maybe it's just because the Colin Center is a little bit older the numbers from the presentation are are newer would you say that's fair which numbers are you talking about so just the the the number to cost here is 1.15 and then back in the Collins it says um our budget is 1.1 no wait a minute so we we provided the so before we uh we put that budget together the fire chief and I provided the Town Administrator with current dispatch salary so that's why that's why it's higher so Collins was using 2022 salaries and we were using 2023 or 24 so but what is interesting is the older the older uh Callin Center says that the savings is going to be 803 a year and yours is 970 and that's with adding um those two positions so I don't know I can't I was trying to follow it but just like the 18288 for three years in a row chances are that that's those are not made with inflation or or they're not adjust for the 2.5% normal okay there's a couple of things in there that you would have done a little bit differently I think you know during our review for we raised that as a concern um but if you go back through the math uh it's it's on the margin there's still a huge potential benefit I think just from on a financial standpoint and then the flip side is the operational improvements yeah I'm I'm I mean I don't want to sound um I guess I'm skeptical I and I am sorry to be that way but um anytime you get into these agreements it's very important to have I mean everything you know later we'll fix that later we'll fix that later in reality sometimes they don't allow you to fix it it's based on a vote and when once you're in it it's really hard to change it and that's what that's what my fear is um you know again you know we've we've had this these situations before with the agreements and you try to project and foresee all the potentials but it doesn't always it doesn't always happen that way um so I'm I I know I sound skeptical I I do worry about I'm you know not to go back to 2022 but when I left here I was very um happy that we finally had an agreement that we all realized that the best course of action was to have one Dispatch Center in Yarmouth under our control and the only thing that had to be determined at that time was where I don't know what the cost would have been we knew it wasn't going to be a savings but it was going to be more efficient you know what's what's happening now is especially you know at the fire department they have one dispatch they've got a lot of calls simultaneously it's not a good situation so that needs to be rectified no matter what happens here I mean we have to do better I still am uh um a fan of sticking with Yarmouth um unfortunately I think that you know the ship sailed in terms of you know we don't have we don't have a cost analysis at this point in time to even know what that would cost what that would look like so we're kind of backed up you know against the wall and it's I'm late to the game I just got back here and you know I'm trying to get all this information and um I'm very hesitant to say um you know we'll work out the details later but will sign it now you know so that's just where I'm at um I obviously the savings is great but there's there are a lot of benefits not only the savings like I said the the having more people there are uh you know I I think one of the things that happens now especially at the fire department is we have high ranking officers often that cost us a lot of money too that will be a savings to the department I don't know if that's been um factored into this but because they fill in for the dispatchers at a higher rate um so that it's going to impact a lot of things and um you know they they need to have more people there for sure but I just don't know if this is this is if if I'm ready to to get into this that's all I have to say if I could just add real quickly so with the the combining of uh Yarmouth police and Yarmouth fire we know that we do not have a facility right now that would be able to do that so none of the fire stations can do it and if the police department can't do it because of the configuration of our desks our computers actually they they sit back to back so the noise would be projected from one into the other and there's not enough room so the only option would be to do some sort of study and figure out where we can build out whether that's at the station or someplace else and once you get into that there is no 911 funding available able for a combined municipal center so that would be completely on the shoulders of the town of Yarmouth by going to the regional center as the the study shows that they pay for the majority of it they pay for everything up front and in talking to uh to Joe Ken up in ducksbury he's used the grant to pay for all the Capital Improvements to the center there's been no cost to any of the any of the municipalities the other thing that we're looking at is a couple years down the road we have to replace our records management system which we pay $32,000 a year in maintenance right now the estimates that we got two years ago was upwards to 150,000 per year for the service because they're no longer doing uh server based it's all it's all subscription based now so it's all going to be in the cloud so that's something that we're that I've been working with Bill Scott on trying to put that into uh CIP to figure out where that fits somewhere down the road because that that is going to be coming so the the savings that we're going to see over the years are are going to be tremendous uh they're going to help the town shoulder the the the responsibilities that we need to maintain the public safety service that we have now um I am I'm in support of this because I think it's the best thing for our department it's the best thing for our employees to go back to the study in 2022 one of the very first things that we spoke about back then was where do our employees land and how do we help them this is going to give them the benefit we've disc discuss this before this is going to give them the benefit of promotional opportunities more training better work environment and these these uh Regional centers are successful throughout the Commonwealth and it's not as easy for someone to just jump out because if Yarmouth gives up their paap to go into the regional center we then just can't turn around 10 years down the road and say this isn't working out for us hey 911 we want to go back there's going to be a lot of work CU they pay for all the infrastructure so I I I'm not as concerned with the other agencies just saying hey we're not interested in doing this we've had some very candid conversations with the Chiefs we are all on the same page of trying to make this work as as efficiently as possible but without the IMA signed we're not going to get any more grant money so that the program is not going to move forward we ask for 800,000 we're at about 600 now so Barnesville can start working on some of the the efforts that they want to do but the IMA is for three towns and without it being signed 911 is not going to give us any more money so we kind of we have to we're at that point where to move this forward we need to we need to make a decision so that we can actually get it going because so what happens if we sign the IM IMA and we are not able to I'm just playing out we're not able to get to a Something That We're comfortable with in terms of a transition plan then what we haven't given up our 911 at that point okay so that's going to is to the the town administrator's point that's years away that's this is going to take this is going to take a long time the grant process for a regional center the grant applications are doing March and they're awarded in July so the funding that we have now is inadequate to do everything that we need to do so we have to write another Grant if if in perfect world The IMA has signed 911 will now look at us as a real entity and they will award more money in March if the IMA is not signed we're not going to get any more funding from them until we get to that point we had to to get the additional funding I had to draft a cover letter to 911 explaining what our process was and how come the IMA wasn't signed yet and it was just because we were reading the imas that July 1st was was the the deadline it was actually June 14th for the grant and Barnsville submitted paperwork showing that sandwich and Barnesville had agreed to it but the IMA isn't signed by them yet because it's a three it's a three municipality IMA so they won't sign it until everybody's on board so you're comfortable with the fact that if we signed it and we didn't work it out out we would have no nothing lost correct correct okay that's it for now yeah yeah thanks Mike well I was very impressed with the uh very first uh presentation of this and I'm now feeling more reassured because we have Elizabeth Leiden here and chief lennin um explaining how we're protected because this is just the first stage and then there's a transitional plan there are many points to negotiate there are many points to say no we need this rather than that um I can't see how this this would not work well unless the parties in this town and the parties in Barnstable sent terrible communicators um to be on the board that governs it but I I just don't think you're going to do that because you care greatly about this and you think it's a big Improvement um I remember being very touched the first time you presented this I wasn't even on the board then um when uh the uh the savings were indicated yes there were savings um but that you emphasize both Chiefs um how much this would in improve um response times and how response times and the weight of people for whom minutes might be crucial would get help sooner and I think that that's a a major consideration especially I say this as an old person in a town with so many old people um I think it's a really good idea um and it seems to me that with the research that um the finance committee and the financial director have done in terms of what happens with benefits and how they get allocated I think this I mean some more um um eyes have been dotted and tees crossed I mean some things we won't know about this until we're further in the process but I see that we seem to have a guarantee that we're not irrevocably in a process that will go on for the next Dozen Years and we can't get out of it it seems the transitional agreement will be very important so I'm strong supporter good um I go way back on this where even within the town of arms we couldn't reach a consensus between our two chiefs and that went on for a very long time and I don't think that was productive for anybody really and there was a lot of um political forces that worked behind that which is understandable um you know who's going to make the calls what buildings safer for um what if this what if that and um so it really is refreshing to see that we have our um our local Chiefs trying to get a resolution to this and to try to gain efficiency and save money and to um make it make the operation more professional so I commend you all for for that hard work and I I'm sure there's forces pulling and pushing at all of you as well as the rest of us involved in this process and I'm encouraged that the finance committee's looked at this and um relying on their expertise to some degree that this is a good thing for the town of Yarmouth um in any kind of new entity whether it be a school District or something like this there's going to be nuances that very frankly even perhaps have not been thought of or haven't perhaps been vetted in great detail but I think the way this is structured and with the transitional agreement and with um expertise of our Council um we'll be able to work through those things I think everybody has got to look look at not not only what each town has to lose but more importantly what each town has to gain by working cooperatively um so I mean the best way to keep an operation successful is is everybody acting good faith everybody acting for the common good everybody acting in in the mutual interest of not only themselves but the part their Partners um treat your partner fairly and respect respectfully um I think you can expect the same thing back in this situation so I'm encouraged by the personalities that are involved also in this process um so that th those are my comments I don't know um you looking for a vote on this yes Poss need it by July 1st July 1 is it okay do we have any U proposed language or anything like that or do we approve the um intermunicipal agreement revised 3524 say that again the to approve the intermunicipal agreement for emergency communications and dispatch Services I and among the towns of Barnstable sandwich and Yarmouth final draft just just to approve the agreement that's all we're looking to do that's all um that's a lot yeah it is a lot that's all yeah it is um but I'll just say too as a footnote look look how long the Dy Regional School District agreements been kicking around yeah we can't get it changed M no in the various iterations it went through and it still needs work yeah but we can't we have no leverage to get anything one of the reasons for that is because the school committee has got to uh initiate any amendments to the agreement no that's another story not responsible for the schools so um thanks for and I I think the towns were last discussing that if both towns agreed to amend the agreement that should be enough and we shouldn't really need the school committee to do it but that that's really an obstacle a change in the agreement huh that's a change in the agreement it is the change isn't always bad Tracy no it's not always bad um Mr chairman I make a motion to uh approve the Regional Emergency Communication Center intermunicipal agreement as presented okay is that good enough yes okay do I have a [Music] second I wish we had a full board tonight I will second it I really do I will second it to take some of the pain away that's all right um as long as there's no let me ask you this question could if it were to go can we can we pass this with a two to one vote or do we have to have a majority of the board which should be three you need three we have I think we probably need a majority of the board but that's majority of the board of the board that's present so it's a quorum of the board are you sure it's the majority pres no I wouldn't say that we've never done that before that would be a that would be a TW member vote well let's try and see what happens well you know I'll I'll vote for it based on the fact that we have we still can we still have you still got that say but it would have been nice that our members who aren't here would have had had submitted their comments and you know their opinions before so I don't know where they stand and I don't want to be the one to hold it up if it's something I know I think Dorcas is in favor of it so um and she only got sick in the late afternoon so yeah it would be nice though to know where convenient she looked at the agenda you're not you're not suggesting she's playing hooking she looked at the agenda and called 911 we all okay so we have a motion in a second I'll do a roll call only because this is a very important vote Tracy I I vote I choice I all right so it passes by a vote of 3 to Z two members absent thank you for all your hard work I I I I mean that from most sincerely yeah no I'm I I appreciate your hard work please don't take it that way I just like I said I have I have hesitations on on on making sure we H you know do our due diligence and cross our tees and Dot our eyes and um I just it's just a lot of loose ends so I'm uncomfortable it's not a reflection of get the answers we want I think it'll I know there's there's reluctance or skepticism I think this allows us to get those answers okay good so thank you thank you gentlemen thank you very much we have great trust that when bumps come up in the road you'll be smart enough to work them out yeah I know Tracy it's not easy one it's not remember you cited that old provision you cited a page in the Colin report you it was page 37 37 but it's I think it's it it's the current 35% of the benef 37 okay I just wanted to review that okay thank you Elizabeth we're moving forward here thank you Elizabeth nice to put a a face with the name attorney Li I really appreciate you're being here and your help with this you're welcome everyone have a good night okay next item is discussion SL vote investment policy for Town um Town funds special Revenue Town General funds special Revenue funds Enterprise funds and capital funds we have here our finance director Jennifer Mullen who is going to present this to us good evening good evening Jennifer thank you for having me um there was a copy of the investment policy in your packet so I'll just um briefly just give you a rundown um there was an existing policy from years ago and it was very lengthy um and there was a well I'll walk through through with the investment of our funds you have to excuse me I'm much better at 8:00 in the morning than I am at 10:00 so I just have to get that out there so just bear with me um so we are governed pretty strictly by Mass general laws with the investment of of our funds and I look at it in really like two different ways you have your general fund revenue and then you have your trust fund revenue and so your general fund Revenue you have to keep it liquid um you know the best practice is the the prior priority is safety liquidity and then yield you don't put interest rate first so you're not um investing in high-risk Investments it has to be safe it has to be liquid and then you look at interest rates particularly with the warrant process and with the bills we pay so we that's why we need to keep it liquid um and then we look at interest rates and so and the investment policy in front of you is um it was vetted with our investment advisors it's investment policy General that you know a lot of communities use because we are so highly regulated and it does site Mass General law so that's really the investment of the general special Revenue in your Enterprise and capital project funds if you if you look through it really with your um I do want to say that our town treasur has done a phenomenal job with um our investments as you know the last couple years the um interest rates have increased so we have gained um really good investment in income in our general fund and that's estimated on our local estimated receipts um with construction um there's a section in here basically what it says is that we have to be careful of Arbitrage and what is arbitrage we can't borrow money at a certain interest rate and then earn higher than that interest rate we can't make money off our money that's Arbitrage again we're highly regulated so we want to make sure when I come in front of the board and we um borrow I've done a lot of work of where we are in the project how much are we going to be spending in the next year to make sure that we keep you know that we have enough cash but we that we don't have too much cash and that's really what this policy states um and then we get into um your trust funds and your stabilization funds so our prior investment policy had a cap on our stabilization funds and essentially what it said if I could read through it I didn't quite understand it I wasn't here when it was voted but our investment advisers have it is that in our stabilization funds we needed to keep $4 million um not invested as a trust fund but in an escrow account kind of like your general fund Revenue um because they wanted to keep it liquid and that's what the old investment policy stated but when you invest in your trust funds which is you know some Perpetual care um in your stabilization funds you can invest them for a longer term because you can gain a better market value because you don't need for them to be liquid because they're savings accounts the only way you can really tap into them is if you go to town meeting so you don't need to keep them liquid and so that's why I changed the investment policy I simplified it um I took off that $4 million cap the other issue is when you invest in trust funds we only can invest in what's a legal list that's approved by the state so we're not you know investing in cryptocurrency and things like that you know we're very very conservative and we have to as we site Mass General law so that was the main reason that I wanted to get this in front of the board and have them vote the investment policy because what I found is as we're funding um we're prefunding the Wastewater we're putting the money into a stabilization fund because we want to be able to gain better market value because it's for the longer term when we start paying back those bonds but I was kind hamstrung because I had to keep 4 million in escrow and so we're not we weren't you know the money that we were making on that 4 million was really nothing so that was the main reason for the change and plus I wanted to simplify it um and really talk about um like here like I said we talk about construction debt where we didn't bond proceeds Arbitrage and and the original policy didn't do that so I remember I remember I was here when we did that original policy and one of the reason that we did it was they were working rich and um Ed were working with um S&P we after we put those policies in place we actually increased our bond rating so it had something to do with the bonding um I'm not sure if the 4 million was part of that but we I think what it is is is that you need to have the complete Financial policies including the investment policy and if you don't have one they downgrade your bond rating so um I I think this addresses some of the needs we have but it it's not it it's going to be viewed um very positively by the Municipal Credit risk agencies um it's a it's a a conservative policy it's in keeping with the Mass general laws but if you don't have a policy that's when you get in trouble well I think we we didn't have the money in stabilization at that time we were coming out of a a really bad time and we had really uh used a lot of our reserves so maybe that was just so I think maybe the rating is based on a percentage of your budget to the reserves that you have anyway so yeah I can comment on that um in my prior Community we had a AAA Bond rating and um I was there when we gained the AAA Bond rating and I wrote those policies and so this is the policy it's kind it it's you know changed to really gear towards Yarmouth but it was the same type of policy I used in my other community and um and Bob is Right standard and pores wants to make sure that you have policies written adopted policies that you adhere to um and they do and they do look at them our policy that we had I did run it by a couple people you know a couple colleagues and really hadn't seen anything like that before it was very lengthy it talked about certain Investments that you really can't do any anyways in municipal government um so that's why we want wanted to simplify it but Bob is correct with standard and pors they want to make sure that you have a policy and so when we go in front of standard and pors again they're going to look at this favorably because we we'll be reviewing our policies this year and then having um if we make any changes we'll have the select board you know requests to adopt it and so then that always will help because they know that we're reviewing them we're just not using a policy from like 2015 great the other um I don't know if you were here when Norm hulum spoke in public he talked about about the investment of Enterprise funds and the responsible the who's responsible for it I don't know if you want yeah I did hear his public comment um so Enterprise funds so the money that we have in the bank that we have that we keep liquid because we're paying bills like with the golf course right that's just um an Enterprise fund is a separate business entity so we just restrict those funds we put it in a different um accounting account if you will right right so it has it different General GL number and all that and so we do invest that and that stays with the fund so we are earning investment and we've earned very good investment income over the last couple years now I will say that I was around and I'm just going to talk a little bit about that is um back in 2008 and 2009 if everybody remembers how you know the market took a huge dip and people were estimating their investment income on their you know and using it to balance their budgets and what happened was the interest rates just went down and then we had to cut our budgets because we had to decrease our interest the interest rates so right now we're in a high interest rate environment so we're super conservative the way that we estimate our investment income and um and it should be that way you don't want to um I will tell you that last year we did takeen a little over a million this year we're on track we're over a million and a half and this is just for general fund um and so but if we if the interest rates go down then that goes down right so you just have to be careful um you don't want to estimate that full amount to balance your budget because then you're running into oh we have to cut it and it goes to free cash that's really where it goes so any your actuals over your estimates but um yeah we um our treasur is doing a phenomenal job she has a good relationship with the banks um our financial advisors are doing a great job we use Rockland Trust for our trust funds um we do get um I do want to say we do have monthly reports that go out to the boards and the finance committee on our investment income it's on our Revenue trending report in terms of the responsibility um he was mentioning about the the finance committee having a responsibility to look at that I'm not sure if that's in a charter but I just don't know if you wanted to speak to that sure will um the responsibility of this really in the Mass General law Falls with the treasurer so the treasurer has the responsibility to invest funds really can't give that to anybody else we in government we have a separation of the treasur and the accountant and there's very strict controls where they they can't overlap um the finance committee um and I've been working with Finance committees for years they're really looking to make sure that we're spending our money you know correctly and that it's affordable um they usually don't review policy especially investment policy because it strictly lays with the treasur just having this Pol and again we're we're highly governed by Mass General law so sometimes when you start talking about it they want you to do things that you can't you know um it again it's it's very restrictive and usually the finance committee does not get involved in policy it's the board that votes the policy and that you know the select board makes policy and then we make sure that policy happens but the finance committee usually is just looking at you know our funds and our Appropriations making recommendations from town meeting looking our Capital plan looking at our budget um they get all the monthly reporting but when it comes to policy it's a lot different thank you you're welcome um thank you I appreciate the explanation and I think it's great to have this in writing for transparency purposes it should be something you can give to people who have questions or who want you to invest in something that would be illegal um good job thank you J for our investment practices in the past since you've been here has our finance director been consistent with this policy or have they been um have they fallen short of of this policy well the old policy I will tell you the the prior policy which our financial advisers have which really they're just in control of our trust funds adhered to that policy as much as they could but there were things in the policy they couldn't because we're stuck we have to adhere to the legal list so the state comes up with the legalist and the legalist is what we can invest in they tell us what we can invest in our financial advisors you know tell us what percentage it should be and whatever that legal list is um I do believe that they probably adhered to it a lot of times um with general fund and special Revenue fund and Enterprise funds Investments um you always want to make sure again you go back to the policy of safety liquidity yield so you want to make sure your money's safe so you want to make sure it's collateralized so we will take a lesser interest rate to make sure our money is collateralized and it is a note in the financial statement so you can kind of read that and we look at that pretty closely every year um so yeah for the most part because it's so restrictive we have been adhering to Mass General law but again the policy that we had before which was governing us they they were holding to it as much as as they could is if that makes any sense and does that answer your question I noticed some of these Investments are I believe if I read it correctly it's kind of condensed the writing but are covered by FDIC and other forms of insurance right and others it seems are not well like they're collateralized so even though like FDI see I think it's like 250,000 right per bank but we have millions of dollars in the bank so what we do is we collateralize them in other words the bank gives us the letter that ensures those funds more than the 250 but what they'll do is we'll get a lesser interest rate on our money so we want to make sure that the money stays safe so they'll ensure the funds at and then probably reduce the yield yes by an offsetting cost yes yeah I remember years ago probably not too many people realize uh remember this but I'm trying to think of um her title I think she was the town um accountant she bought these subordinated Capital debentures from centry Federal Savings Bank that went upside down the town lost I know was over a million bucks I I've run into a couple of issues that was elected office yeah so I've run into a couple issues in my career where you know the treasurer and it's the treasur really might you know buy some they can't really do that anymore it's just I mean they could but they're not if that and we balance cash and you know we have it all pretty pretty safe but I've run into a couple issues in the past where you know they might have done something like that we might put money into a CD for 3 to 6 months you know with our general fund Revenue with a a reputable bank that we have you know contracts with when when Norm hul spoke earlier at U public comment he in terms of the way I interpret his comments I think he was saying that there's millions of dollars to be had that aren't and again this is inferential on my part that aren't being um taken advantage of right is what's your commentary on that sure so when you look at your past investment income and I'll talk taken advantage of when your trust funds when they're invested in um you know the legalist and and you get a market value and we post that market value monthly um we so your Capital stabilization fund so your Capital stabilization fund will just grow and grow so when we get ready to spend it the money is there right so that's how your trust funds work there's nothing you can do the only way you can get that money that that you're earning your investment income from your trust funds is if you go to town meeting and appropriate it so I think what you're talking about is your general fund Revenue with the millions of dollars right so we estimate investment income every year so next year in FY 25 I invest I we estimated it at $350,000 now we brought in a Million last year and we're bringing in a million5 this year so yeah the it the money is there however if I increase that estimate to a million doll and the interest rates go down now we have a deficit now we have to cut the budget so we want want to be conservative with those and that's what happened back in 2008 and 2009 the community I was in I think I was estimating I can't remember I just remember there was like the interest rates just started going down and then we were like we have to cut the budget by $400,000 because we can't estimate that much so it is getting rolled into free cash um we did Inc I will say we did increase it this year but we've had two fiscal years of high interest rates and that's because we're doing a really good job with our investing um and you don't you just have to you know the philosophy usually is just being conservative and not estimating more than if I estimated a million dollar in the budget and we were spending a million dollar in the budget and then your interest rates go down which they will go down eventually at some point now you have a deficit I don't think his comments were about um the projections or the estimate his was more about the the dollars that we he didn't think we were were investing like we weren't um and I'm just guessing but I got the impression he was thinking that we weren't investing all of our funds to to the degree that we could well again we are I mean cuz the and and the best way to put this really is um so the money has to stay in a bank right your general fund revenue is in a bank that's an investment in and of itself I don't have the percentage rates but we do every year we do a report for the Department of Revenue and it'll tell you every Bank we have and it will tell you what our interest rate is so we are investing it does he think we can get more I'll go back to the policy which is adopted from Mass General law is that you have to keep it safe you have to keep it collateralized and because of that you will get a lesser interest rate than if you just went out and it wasn't collateralized so we are required the first thing we have to make sure sure as their taxpayers money and that it's insured right and a lot of it is incumbered so I don't know how you could there's a portion of your overall general fund that's encumbered so I'm not sure how you how you could invest in that I he said Enterprise fund which you've already discussed the same yeah so the money's in the bank it's and it gets posted to your accounting and you'll see investment income and it goes at the end of the year when you close it out it goes to your undesignated fund balance or it will go to your pained earnings so that's where it flows into and eventually goes into general fund yep General yep the general fund and then your Enterprise funds that becomes part of your retained earnings for appropriation and then in the general fund at your undesignated fund balance which is the basis of your free cash I make a motion we um endorsed the investment policy in our packet have a second second all those favor I I anyone oppos pass by a vote of 30 Z two members absent thank you thank you Jennifer you got to hang around I think we got another one with you I get the next one too um poor Elizabeth though she worked on this also we got a um she did Elizabeth did adop order for construction for phase one of the sore project sounds exciting yes so um I did write a memo for this so we're in the process of going you know so as you know we're do we're doing construction right now for the sore project right so everybody sees the roads are closed and so you know Jeff's got his hands full of managing that construction project and so what I'm doing is more of administrative so I'm you know looking over the sore project administra ly bills and all that but another part of that is um sore assessment betterments so there's a whole process that you have to follow in order to assess a betterment for um you know commercial and homeowners and so it was started and I started here in October so there were some things that we needed to do so in our calendar of events um right now we have to well yeah we kind of do if you want to assess betterments um The Board needs to adopt the order for construction for phase one of the sore project and so really this is just an administrative um exercise and what it what this does is it lays out and this was written by um Elizabeth lden I worked with her on it and we actually worked with a couple attorneys from the Department of Revenue um so it's been you know well vetted and so what we want to do is well this lays out you know all the um the roads that are affected with the the um sore project um for contracts two through 1 through six 2 through six and it lays out on the map that's attached so and we have to do this in order to eventually assess a sore betterment and this will be filed at the registry of deeds um and it gives you all the list the it gives you the list of all the roads um not just the roads but the addresses that are affected so we're able to we'll file this with the registry of deeds and then what we will come back to the board we'll have um the board is acting as sore Commissioners um and you're acting as sore Commissioners with this exercise we'll come back to you um for a betterment policy we still have a lot more to um look at particularly with waiting for the bids to come in for with the um the collection um with the the plant with the wastewater treatment plant but this is the next step in the administration of so we will be able to assess a a betterment at some point is it typical to do this prior to actually having that done I'm I'm taking harch as an example sure because Howard put their bid out saying all these things were going to be the bids came in different these they they connected half the houses so why would we file the registry of deeds to a house that potentially won't no that's a great question um I want um I want to point out that we don't have a money amount attached to this so this isn't going to be filed this is just going to be a general filing with the registry of deeds just so they have it on file um it's not going there's not a money amount that's going to be it's not the estimate that's usually filed so what usually happens is you do have a a good question so usually what happens and you have a wastewater treatment facility and then you go to lay the sore the soord down you know either the main road with commercial or residential you go out to bid you get an estimate for that bid and so it's easy to um have an estimate that would be filed with each property at in that it's filed at the registry of deeds it doesn't have to but it usually does that's usually the course of action and then once the project is completed and we look at all the final costs then those costs are leaned on those properties but it can't be more than the estimate so I think that's what you're talking about this is preliminary this is even before the estimate because we don't have the bids in yet so we don't know how much it's really going to cost that's why I'm asking what what what the impotence of doing it now is at all well it is because it's in Mass General law that we have to do it it's why wouldn't we do it at the same time don't do most communities do it at the same time that they that they put the assessment on it um well I I don't know what most communities do usually this would be filed before the estimate so why wasn't this you asking why they didn't do this last year is that your question I don't think it should be done at all until we know that they're getting a betterment okay so this preserves the town's right to assess a betterment on these properties because when the financial plan was when the whole plan was went to town meeting there is a portion of betterments that are going to be assessed because it's going to help pay for that $27 million because it's not a debt exclusion so we have to get that you know we have to receive that money so this just preserves our right to do that we're probably not going to assess the betterment Pro probably in well until the wastewater treatment pl's built because they have to be able to take you know um it has to be working um but this just protects our right to do it under Mass General law we don't have an estimate so that's why we're not filing estimates we're just filing the plan with the registry of deeds which is laid out in Mass General Law chapter 83 section each one of these people we just it's not going to be attached because we don't have an estimate okay so that's when it gets attached I just want to make sure the home owners don't see their paperwork on their property and wonder what's going on if they may not even get it right no you're absolutely right it's a great question I want to make sure I'm answering it correctly because that was my question as well plan the plan overall is on record but it's not attached to a particular exactly we we did put the list of properties we took out the owner's names um but it there isn't a money amount here we're just filing this whole plan with the registry to say hey at some point there's going to probably maybe be a betterment we you know on this property this is the only thing that gets filed because you can't you know um you can't assess it without it being on record I understand that I just don't know why I just don't know the timing and why it's done so far in advance why it's not because construction is started so that's why because it's called only on only on a couple of these contracts we're doing contract seven and we may never even get there right but that's what my that's where I get nervous okay so let me back up a little bit we're looking at this project so even though you're right we've started on con construction on contracts 2 and three we're looking at this contract we're looking at this project as as as one for the purpose of assessing betterments we can't really break it up because we don't know how much the wastewater treatment plant's going to cost so in order to preserve our right because we need an order for construction to start con to have construction that's why it's done this way so tell me and I don't know I don't I don't not I don't know the answer to this I'm just saying the purpose of having this on so if somebody were to purchase a home right and somebody did some research on that piece of property right would they know that a betterment is going to be assessed based on what you're filing no it's not going to be filed by property that's what I was talking to the attorneys about we have the list but it's not going to be filed as per property because we don't have the only way you can look it up with the town because we do have a list right anybody who's in Phase One um I guess I'm just stuck on the why why right now and I just want to say that a part of the process that we went through on with the vetting is is we sat together first and our first sense was look we we've got all of these bids that have to go out to get the final amounts can't we just wait on the whole thing and do it later and the answer to that was under the Mass general laws you have to um do the advance sort of a notice that you're working on it or else when you get to the end now you no longer have the right to do it so it's a preliminary step we thought you know why can't we just avoid it it seems logical but they said no and we work this out with between attorneys Department of Revenue and our own Town Council and um this is the way that U like Jennifer says it preserves our right when we do get the amounts then to go in and follow through with the financial plan otherwise we'll have to come up with a new financial plan because we won't be able to do the betterment part of it so it's and and the other thing I would just say is that you know part of what you're dealing with is that these betterment laws yeah are so archaic I don't think they've been updated in like 50 years no it's true that's what they were saying convoluted okay yeah thank you I've seen betterments recorded I mean not current betterments but older betterments like Road improvements and um ultimately they do have a specific cost per property and how much per year it's going to cost you on your taxes and so forth I think and I'm no expert in this area believe me but it sounds too like in addition to preserving your right um it's identifying the particular properties that are going to be assessed I think that's that's another benefit of having this document approved because um if you're on the list you can expect that there's going to be a betterment at some point in time and I think I think Tracy's Point's well taken the law doesn't always follow the Practical path through the woods obviously what would make more sense is to do it all at once where you have your cost and your your you know your property but if the laws require us to do this is a preliminary step and I don't see any other option for us but to do it I will say we did spend some time on this and with the same question that you had in trying to and working with Elizabeth lden and then bringing in the do and even the do was saying you know like Bob was saying these laws are are very old they haven't been updated but this is the process okay so there is um and for you to sign it I don't think you need a vote you just need to adopt the order and sign it because there's a place for your signature but I think um Mary Alice has a lot of that right when you you should vote to adopt and approve it that's the that's what you're signing that you've approved the order and Mr chairman I I vote uh I um move that we adopt the order for construction for sewer phase phase one um it seems like it's the next thing after this that will involve all the details but this seems like a simple procedural thing tonight okay I have a second second so Jennifer when this gets recorded it's going to be get recorded in this form it's going to be this incomplete yes it will be no I'm not trying to rehash anything or create issues but this is pretty much what's going to go on record is what's here right that's correct Point yep and that's to preserve our rights to assess these properties that's correct upon completion of the project of phase one yes phase one which would include the treatment facility exactly okay we have a motion a second all those in favor I I I okay it passes unanimously by a vote of three in favor none against two members absent thank you thank you Jennifer thank you CH okay administrator Merit pay I think we're going to have to pass on that one we don't have Mark and Dorcas um what that involved really is um a merit pay based on Bob's last evaluations um a question though Mike isn't there a formula depending on whether you get one two three or four isn't there then a pay formula there's there's a range um the the early years of the contract had a specific dollar amount and then I believe the Year we're in you correct me if I'm wrong Bob I don't have the contract with me but I think they say that that's negotiable and then we have um we have some guidelines in town for department heads and so forth based on evaluations and I think he falls in like the again Bob correct me the 56 category for percentage and um we appointed a subcommittee and me and Dorcas and Bob's request was 5 % Dorcas and I were in concurrence with that um we wanted to get the avows done so that the people that did them were here for a full year because we said we could deal with the board later um we would need three votes and I think we've got them and if we don't even I mean either one of you could vote to in favor of it even though um well looks like we're holding the fort tonight so yeah so um I don't know if Bob doesn't mind it would be retro to April 10th I believe yeah I want him to get anniversary date you get it and and and the uh and I can bring this stuff in if you wish the evaluations were exceptionally High Stellar yep okay I I make a motion to approve the Town Administrator Merit pay increase according to previously worked out Arrangements that the chair understands I think we should wait TR she wants to wait we'll wait we can do it but I appreciate your willingness to do that because if we need a vote then we'll be all set all right so we'll pass on that we'll put that over to the next uh next they it's not like they had the information in advance so I I didn't have any information in advance on that so they would be hearing it well Mark would be hearing it for the first time so okay um all right you anybody want to do the minutes well I wasn't here so I'll only vote if you need oober 10 23 you want to pass let's pass on that we'll have to I don't think either one of you guys were here then upcoming agenda review is anybody want to pass on that well uh I actually have something i' I'd like to suggest that we put in um and that's um introducing the problem of the golf Hazard with people getting hit with golf balls on high Bank Street High Bank Road um we've obviously had you know a person who was hit but it turns out that there are many people who um avoid that route during golf season just because they don't want their cars dented so I'd love to see that on a a future agenda okay um the other thing I have a question about so I think this is not an agenda item but I think we need Bob's advice on this um and that is the person who wrote us um about the uh being denied the veterans discount um that's for the U that's for the beach and dump stickers and that person was qualified to get it but it turned out that there was some like odd little thing that said um person the um recipient must have a veteran's plate but he doesn't have a veterans plate CU he doesn't want to pay more money CH they just changed the LA license plate but that's our policy so I mean that's the they're following our policy and now veterans playes are free so maybe he'll get one so you'd have to bring up a change in the policy yeah I'm I'm asking how to do that although with veterans we had a a a few different issues sort of the veterans was was one of them and then there's also uh the issue of the commercial vehicles and the size of them and uh another Beach issue was the um the people with their homes in trust and and I know that um they're working right now on some updates to the policies for the stickers and that um those items there's a handful of like just little points that need to be sanded down and so um I think that that's a process that's Ong going now and we will have that on an upcoming agenda to review those okay with you I wasn't sure it seemed to me it probably comes to board of Selectmen but on the other hand I'm aware it's in a department as well so I I'll look for that on a future agenda item and I I feel bad this this guy was a um civil servant after being um a veteran in some very bad times and I just felt terrible that we were asking him to pay a vanity plate price we don't ask him to pay a vanity plate price the RMV does what he's saying is that he doesn't want to the the actually until the most recent um bill was passed at the state legislature if you wanted a veteran plate you had to pay more for it is what he was saying that's a state thing at the registry not that wasn't us but now now it's that's no longer well it just it just seem like it was maybe an improvable policy on our part but I'm delighted to think that the uh the veterans plates now won't be of extra cost to Veterans whom we're trying to help okay anything else on agenda review well I just want to make sure July 20 everyone is got that locked and lo see that in there um we're all set for that's 9:00 isn't it 9 yeah usually we have coffee at 8:45 is and um well the upcoming agendas look better than the past two because I have to tell you um the past two agendas have had way too much stuff on it and I'm I personally am in favor of meeting on a weekly basis instead of having meetings like tonight 10 minutes to 11: and unfortunately these things take time they deserve diligence and time and sometimes I feel like we're rushing through so I agree I think we got to look at I know for example zba they passed the rule they were here forever they said they're not starting anything past a certain hour but it's that's unfair to like that's hard because you have people come and they sit here for three three hours and they we to do something because I agree with you I mean we've been here since 5:30 and it's what it's 10 minutes to 11 11 that's 6 and a half hours fine for me but the these employees have to get up and come back to work tomorrow too long it's a lot I remember when I first was elected back in 2013 we met at 7 yeah Eric tally was the chairman Eric said let's move it to six we'll get out earlier we didn't how did that work out half of it worked the earlier part not that getting out earlier just starting early was it a curse of Eric that's exactly my point so uh you're right Tracy but I I think what happened too is a little bit like the last couple two meetings um we we did the agenda review and it was like I I think we should put this on I think we should put this on it we just did it tonight for the next one we just took two things off your Merit and the minutes that no I understand your point what we might be able to try to do Bob and this is just talking off the top of my head is to try to when we get a lot of Licensing request Trace says have a separate meeting and knock out four or five licenses oh that would work cuz you never know where those things are going to go yeah I think those are hearing things that specify a time so that way the time wouldn't be messed up I think that's that's good we advertise them we'll talk about that but your point is more than well taken Tracy I'm 100% in agreement with you um we got through a lot but volume isn't the only indicator as Tracy appointed some of these things deserve a lot of time and attention so anyway we're off for the second and um the 20th we have an extra meeting on Saturday 9:01 and um we have a meeting the 23d the 9 we have a lot of stuff coming up in July so let's uh Bob and I work something out and bring it back to you um only because of the lateness of the hour and I just want to check as a newbie our next meeting is July 9th our next dat [Music] is nth yes July nights so uh Bob I the consens agenda and I'll explain this I would like to pull out the first item Chamber of Commerce annual request for approval of special entertainment license for the summer concert series and for fee waiver I'd like to act on that separately and I'll tell you why what I'd like to do is add to that motion on that item that the licensing licensing share would have the discretion on um rescheduling events directly with the chamber without having a full Board hearing and I started that last year because a lot of times you get have a Tuesday concert it'll rain and they'll say can we do it Thursday well I can't get the board together by Thursday and generally the answer is sure no problem but technically I think it would be better if we added that that sounds good that just shortened some more meetings well I need to pull out um the Riverwalk a resource easement I'm not sure that I need to but again the company I work for has the contract with the Riverwalk so I don't want to vote on that what do you want to do with that I need to pull I can't vote on that what staying on that one yes so we'll pull that one out too we're going to have like two votes on consent item so i' I'd move item c d and e on the consent agenda what's that I will move items c d and e the division of Natural Resources the fire department donations and the recreation donations second okay all those in favor I I anyone opposed so C D and E are approved by a 30 vote I don't know about the eversource how important that is can I uh have an amendment to item a with again allowing the um licensing chair to share to um what's the word I want to say authorize any reschedules without a full Board hearing okay um I move concerning consent agenda a that the licensing chair uh be approved flexibility about date changes right without the necessity of a full here yes oh without necessity of a full board meeting okay have a second how does that work for the Neighbors though like this is this how does that work for the Neighbors though I'm just wondering I mean I mean it's really it's not a public it's not really the worst problem I had was once there was a rain out and then they called and said how about Thursday I said fine and then they called on Thursday said the B can't make it can you do Wednesday that's the most ah you know that that's the kind of thing I'm talking about I'll second the motion okay so we have a motion is a second all those in favor I I anyone oppos so a passes with that [Music] Amendment we're going to um do they need that today what are we going to do with I I don't they I know they need it it's it's very important um I think it's related to the cont contract at all even though it's the same property we have a deadline to the contract it's related to getting electricity to our park I just don't want to it's independent from the contract totally it's it's it's payment to ever Source okay I just want to make sure that I'm yeah I think you're fine on that this has absolutely nothing to do with the um contract with our okay then I will okay oh joy you're going to move uh Item B under the consent agenda I I just want to consult with Tracy first so it's okay to to Bob thinks it is it it isn't related it's just on the same parcel so I didn't know if it was connected I just wanted to make sure um I moved to approve uh uh consented agenda Item B request for approval of Riverwalk Park ever I'll second that all in favor I anyone oppose passes by a 30 vote so I think we got everything we're going to defer in a minute um do we have any important Town Administrator um updates we got I know it's late and um I can just do a couple real quick I I want to tell you I I have a report that I'm going to be providing um you that was from the hyenas Park civic association on some of the um they have a a grant to study posos in the mil Creek area um and we're also working with with the the town's water posos consultant uh to help track uh these point source um from the airport and the barnable training facility so um look for that report and I'll I'll send it to you and then we're going to have additional discussions of that in the future and um I wanted to let the board know too that last week the affordable housing trust set aside those funds we had discussed this for uh the study of the impacts of short-term rentals in Yarmouth on affordable housing and there's a meeting on July 16 if any it's at 3pm um and the trust is going to be meeting with the Collins Center who performed that similar study in Provincetown um and any board members if you're interested um can zoom into to that or or attend and and we'll um try to move that along and um I just also for the sake of the public wanted to U make sure I sent a a note along too um from our Public Safety team The Seagull Beach lot um again this year is going to be closed the 4th of July weekend at 8 p.m. to protect the nesting shore birds and keep the fireworks and parties off of Seagull Beach um that has been a source of problems in the past and that's it for Town Administrator short and sweet good so motion to adjourn to Second all in favor I I who adjourned