00:00:00,680 S1: Thank you. 00:00:03,320 S1: All right. Good evening, and welcome to the Wenham Select Board for July 7th. It is 630 and we will get started. Um, first on the agenda is just our call to order and start to my right. 00:00:18,620 S2: Benjamin Tymann. 00:00:21,380 S4: Finn. Sprague. 00:00:22,260 S2: Gary Cheeseman. 00:00:23,220 S1: And Deirdre Pierotti. Peter Clay will not be with us this evening and we will go to public comment. If anyone would like to make public comment on an item that is not on the agenda this evening, you are welcome to come to the podium or raise your hand on Zoom. 00:00:42,860 S5: No hands on zoom. 00:00:43,700 S1: No hands. 00:00:47,060 S1: Okay, so next up we have Steve with the town administrator's report. 00:00:56,700 S2: Thank you, Madam Chair. Uh, couple quick updates tonight. Uh, firstly is, uh, a trash update. So as most are aware now, the town of Wenham is entering a new trash contract that was effective on July 1st of this year with Casella Waste Management. The, um. There is a. There is a change in the recycling. The way the recycling is going to be collected. It's going to an automated process where the truck will pick up the recycling and dump it. Because of that, there is now a required use of what, what have been, what have been distributed in the majority, a 96-gallon tote, uh, that all the recycling has to fit in. If you feel like you need additional capacity, there is the option to purchase an additional tote of 96-gallons. If you feel the 96-gallons is too large, there's an option to reduce the size to, I believe, 64-gallon tote. Um, so again, that, that is those, those changes are expected to go live into plan on, on the going live on Monday, July 13th. We are. Or Casella is finishing up the distribution of the 96-gallon totes through the end of this week. Although if you do not have one or you have any outstanding logistical concerns or problems with your tote, don't worry. They've assured us that if you can continue just putting out your recycling as you have done in the past, it will get continued to get picked up as we kind of work through the transitional phase, but the plan is to go live on that. July 13 date. Uh, payments for additional totes will be made through the town clerk, similar to other DPW related fees. Um, and Rich Sousa and Sheila will work with Casella to get that tote dropped off directly to your house. Um, and similarly with the, if you would like to downgrade or downsize your 96-gallon tote to a smaller one, that can be done free of charge. Uh, just alert Sheila. Enrich. Uh, we have a web page set up with all the contact information, all the Q&As. But, you know, obviously you can reach out to the Select Board office. Um, DPW generic web page landing has all the contacts, but reach out to Sheila and Rich and they will coordinate. We have about 50, um, smaller units ready to go and they will come swap it out, swap it out at your house for you, no charge. So just as an update to the Select Board, right now we have roughly 15 requests for large larger, so an additional 96 gallon tote and about 16 requests for, uh, to trade in their 96-gallon tote for a smaller tote. So it's about, it's about even as of right now, there was a lot of calls today. Um, not really many complaints or requests, additional requests, just confirming that, you know, the postcard is accurate and kind of what's going on. So, you know, Sheila was pretty busy today. We actually ended up having to direct her phone into Michelle to assist with the call volume. So certainly folks are aware. Um, you know, just being transparent and telling everybody what's going on. Uh, Route 1A so the traffic project here out front. So with the Select Board had just at its last meeting, um, or two meetings ago, voted to authorize the, uh, the, the takings of the temporary construction easements, uh, along Route 1A on the, on the, publicly, the one on public streets that intersect with the Route 1A and the state right of way. Uh, with that authorization, the state and our legal counsel were able to work towards finalizing the schematic plans. And that is almost complete. So we're expected before you meet again. The plans will be completed and submitted to the Registry of Deeds, and that step will be finalized. And the state still feels that they are on track to for a fall time advertising of the bid package. There's an economic bill that is, um, being run through by the state by, um, Maura Healey's office. Uh, it is expected that the House will vote on it tomorrow night, Wednesday. There's about 305. It's about $305 million borrowing. I worked with Senator Tara's office and also Sally Kerans office today to submit that we have both our economic development study done, that we have teed up, and also our downtown revitalization study, um, both funded, uh, in this to try to get an allotment. It's not guaranteed, but it never hurts to ask. So, um. And that is. Oh, another good news we have. We got our draft audit from our new auditors. Again, this is late in the cycle. We wouldn't typically get it basically a year after the year was closed. So it's been an entire year for the last. So this would be fiscal year 2025 close. But it was a new auditor. We're significantly behind when CBIZ or um Clifton Larson was bought out by CBIZ. It's kind of really put us behind the eight ball in the queue. But we have that, um, you know, kudos to Ernie and the finance team. It's been a pretty heavy lift for them to get that out while closing the books and working through. They've actually already completed pretty much all our testing for the 26 audit, and we're just getting the 25 now, so that's good news. Per the policy, we will review it, send it to FinCom. FinCom will report back to the Select Board. Any concerns? No. The only updates I have tonight. 00:07:02,760 S1: Great. That was a lot. 00:07:06,600 S1: I do not have updates tonight. Tonight I took time off for the holidays. Hope everyone else did too and enjoyed a happy Fourth of July. Does anyone else have. 00:07:19,520 S6: I don't know. 00:07:20,960 S4: Nope. Just happy for the rain. 00:07:23,000 S1: It is good news for the rain. Yes. Good. Glad we all took some time off for the fourth. Okay, next we have Superintendent Tracy who is present on Zoom. Thank you, Eric, for being here this evening. Who's going to present an overview of the recent release recently released draft Master plan for the school district. 00:07:47,120 S7: Good evening everyone. Thank you for the opportunity to present this. We are still working on it Just so people are aware, this is a draft. We hope to be wrapping up by the end of the summer. Um, but initially I want to thank the 29 people of the committee, uh, which included parents, teachers, community members, uh, that work together to ensure that the direction that we took with our new strategic plan shared the values of both Hamilton and Wenham. Uh, we really worked hard to tie it all to our portrait of a learner, which, uh, if you're paying attention over the next year, you'll see will become a very important variable within our school district as related to the changes the state making with graduation requirements. Um, and then we also align with our core values in, in a mission driven way where we look towards passion for learning, belonging, inclusivity, curiosity, partnerships, and integrity, sorry, throughout the document so that we have the ability to, to keep everything within the district aligned. Eric. The, uh, strategic plan itself is, is broken up into four focus areas. 00:09:00,590 S1: Eric, can you hear me? 00:09:02,270 S7: Yep. 00:09:02,790 S1: Sorry. Can you hold for one moment? We're having sound issues. 00:09:06,430 S2: Yeah. How's the sound, Eric? I got your text. Does it sound better now? We're trying to work. 00:09:10,790 S7: Still staticky. Very staticky on on this. 00:09:14,710 S4: And does he have any visuals that he's trying to put up? 00:09:17,590 S7: There you go. Whoever that is. 00:09:19,190 S2: Is that better? 00:09:19,830 S4: Can you hear? 00:09:21,710 S7: Got it. 00:09:22,230 S4: All right. And do you have any, uh. I was just wondering if you had any, uh, if you wanted us to put the, the draft report on the screen or if you have any visuals for us to follow along with here. 00:09:30,670 S7: Uh, no, I'm just I just put together some talking points. Not much time we had. 00:09:35,990 S4: Okay. Thank you. 00:09:37,150 S7: Uh, but I was, I can, I can send the final document once it's complete to both towns. 00:09:44,190 S7: So the, the strategic plan itself is broken up into four focus areas over a five-year period. So we just finished our first strategic plan, which was only a three year plan because we were trying to get our footing under us. This one is a five-year plan which includes four focus areas including facilities, operations, long-term planning, communication and stakeholder engagement, academic excellence for all students, and future ready digital infrastructure and learning. Within each of those focused areas. There are another, another, another a a number of excuse me, strategic initiatives that will drive this plan through the five-year process. One of the things I think was important for the group that worked on this was we wanted to look beyond five-years. So we have included some language to really push this out to as far as 2050, um, within our first focus area facilities, operations and long term planning, we're looking at transparent long range financial facilities Uh, planning that extends out to 2035 and possibly to 2050 to ensure our buildings are safe, healthy, and ADA-compliant. Uh, we're looking for sustainable capital improvement funding to develop a plan over the five-years that works within the bounds of each of the towns. And then we're looking at developing some operational efficiencies, including staffing analysis to eliminate redundancies, and then ensure that our resources are optimized to meet the needs of all of our students. Under the second area communication and stakeholder engagement, this two-way transparency was a big thing for our committee. Uh, we have committed to ensuring town officials and residents are informed and heard through consistent messaging regarding budget cycles and capital projects. We also want to open up opportunities for people to learn more about the school district budget and the process through the school district budget. So we're looking at hosting some workshops for people within the community. We're looking at developing our schools into connected community hubs, which we would share resources, um, and then expand our, our, our reach through digital outreach so that residents feel, uh, invested in our schools and the success of our schools. And then working towards real-world connections. We have learned since we've come out of Covid, that our kids really need to make connections with the real-world to help them make that decision of the direction they want to take, not only after they leave high school, but after they leave college. So developing a stronger internship program and building an internship library, working with our local residences businesses to develop opportunities for kids. Our third focus area is is really about academic excellence for all students. We're looking at opportunities for high-quality instruction for every single student in our buildings, consistently using data to inform our instructional practices across all of our grade levels. Continuing to close our achievement gaps. Really continuing to work on our multi-tiered systems of support, where for the last four years, we have built this support system that has helped us to narrow achievement gaps for high-needs subgroups. We want to continue to do that at a rate of approximately 5% per year. And then personalizing pathways, helping kids to create their own pathway beyond high school. Uh, no matter what they choose to do after high school. And that's, again, something you'll see that comes from the state and the new newly released state graduation requirements. And then the fourth and final focus area. It's really future-ready digital infrastructure and learning. There's a lot about sustaining technology and trying to keep up with technology. One of the things we realize as a group is it's impossible for school districts, especially public schools, to truly keep up with technology, especially AI and the speed that it's moving. So we're looking at being sustainable, keeping our multi year capital plan, uh, public and out in front so that our digital infrastructure remains robust and reliable for the district. Um, we really want to build an AI strategy and develop ethics along the way. During this past spring, we had a group working on establishing an AI policy and some direction for the district for AI through all grades. And this will ensure that our students can maintain traditional school skills while gaining the competencies needed for an AI-driven economy. And then the final thing would be digital literacy and implementing a K-12 technology instruction sequence. Believe it or not, we don't have this in every grade level, but we think it's important, uh, given the drive that technology is making now, uh, globally so that our kids can demonstrate proficiency, um, be ethical about it and then understand, uh, the realities of using technology. So so that's really in a nutshell, what our, our plan entails and certainly available to answer any questions if people have them. 00:14:50,680 S1: Great. Thank you Eric. Questions. Finn. 00:14:54,080 S4: Sure. I have a question, Eric. As I was reading through the the document, it really sounded like a plan for a plan. This was a kind of a establishing a framework with, with, um, you know, more details to come in a lot of decisions that are, that are really important, potentially expensive decisions to come. I was wondering if you could go into a little bit of detail about when some of these decisions are going to be coming down the pike, um, especially when it comes to, say, facilities. Right. Um, and when, when we can expect to hear more about those decisions. 00:15:28,560 S7: Sure. The facilities, uh, project and process has been ongoing. As you know, we've taken a new turn and work towards developing an RFP that we're. We're going to. In. As soon as I have the opportunity to get information out to the Hamilton and Wenham communities to get some feedback on on the request. Um, we want to look at it as a multi-tier request for, for funding and for development of our fiscal plans for our facilities. And it will initially be, you know, step one will be okay. We're the communities agreed to do some basic repairs or step two, the community agrees to do some basic repairs and bring the buildings up to ADA compliance. Step three that might add, uh, renovation or rebuilding some of the infrastructure like HVAC, electrical, plumbing. Step four would really be looking at, um, trying to develop a plan for either remodel or additions where needed. So we're going to put that out to the community. And that still needs some time and probably a town meeting vote. So I would say we're about 18 months out from really coming to the towns with any type of numbers that are realistic. 00:16:50,390 S1: Thank you. 00:16:51,270 S4: Thank you. 00:16:52,710 S1: You're good. 00:16:55,910 S6: Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you, Superintendent Tracy. I don't really have a question, but more of a comment just to, um, commend you on the AI strategy, um, objectives that you have. Um, I don't envy you or anybody in public education trying to figure out, you know, how to, on the one hand, maintain a program that builds, um, excellent writing skills, problem solving, critical thinking amongst students that are in their formative years developing that and yet being able to harness, you know, the benefits of some of the AI programming to use in the real world and even, you know, to enhance their academic performance as well. So it seems like a really, really difficult challenge that obviously is being faced across all sectors of society. It's kind of like building the airplane while it's in flight too, with the way technology is moving. So I only wanted to mention that I'm glad. I was glad to see that that's in there. And, um, I would just encourage you and the other leaders in the school department who are going to be a part of that to, you know, to really, you know, as I'm sure you're planning to do, really tap into the most cutting edge research and expertise that is out there. Um, which I'm sure there's a lot of it, um, specifically targeted to, um, uh, middle and middle and secondary school, um, education in particular, but I just wanted to mention that. 00:18:23,490 S7: Yeah. Thank you. You make a good point that the AI piece is, um, you know, one of the, the things that all schools are wrestling with. And I think it's important that we have decided, you know, we're not going to ban it outright. It's always our job to teach kids about some of the new and upcoming things, how to use them, how to use them appropriately with integrity, and how to also look for issues that could be dangerous. So I think that's a good development that we've been able to grow out of. Uh, there was a separate committee that met all during spring to develop our AI guidelines that will lead us into some grade level guideline development, uh, for the beginning of the school year. And then we're going to pilot some classrooms to see where and how things are used, uh, currently, and then really push hard on the, the more important piece, helping our teachers to learn and to understand and use AI in in various ways, not only to support them as educators, but also, Um, to grow and expand their classrooms and the opportunities within their classrooms. 00:19:36,400 S1: Great. Thank you Eric. I agree, we're grappling with it at the college level too. Same issues. Sounds very familiar. 00:19:43,400 S7: Everywhere. 00:19:44,440 S1: It's a brave new world. All right. Uh, any other questions for Eric? All right. Thank you, Eric, very much for being here. We appreciate the update. 00:19:54,960 S7: Yeah. Thank you for the opportunity. We appreciate it. 00:19:58,240 S1: All right. Have a good night. 00:19:59,800 S7: Thank you. You too. 00:20:03,240 S1: Okay. On the consent agenda this evening, we have some additional board and committee appointments. Iron Rail commission, climate action and fire and police. 00:20:17,200 S1: And we have an exemption request for Bonnie Anderson. 00:20:28,050 Are there any issues or questions on the consent agenda? S1: Okay, I'll take a motion. 00:20:33,490 S4: So I move to approve items A and B as printed in this evening's consent agenda. 00:20:38,250 S8: Gary. Seconds. 00:20:39,810 S1: All right, we'll move to vote. Ben. 00:20:42,290 S6: Ben. 00:20:42,610 S1: Ben, aye. 00:20:43,690 S4: Finn, aye. 00:20:44,530 S1: Gary. 00:20:45,130 S8: I. 00:20:45,810 S1: And Deirdre, aye. Okay. Consent agenda passes. Next we will. 00:20:51,970 S8: Say thank you to all the volunteers. 00:20:53,890 S1: Yes. Thank you Gary. Yes. 00:20:57,330 S8: And we're fire department personnel. 00:21:01,050 S1: Yes. Gary is correct. Thank you to all the volunteers. And we will be discussing the remaining vacancies later. Actually delighted at how few vacancies we have remaining. So this is great news. And again some new people joining boards and committees. Um it's a great thing to see. Okay. With that for the regular business we'll will start with a. Which is to review and discuss a letter that we received from The Boulders Condominium Trust dated June 29th, 2026, regarding the Open Space and Recreation Committee's initial draft ideas for redevelopment of the tennis courts at Pingree Park. So we did receive a letter with supporting materials from the trust, with also a request that it be entered into the public record and placed on a select board agenda. So we're happy to do that this evening and to allow some time for comment. Um, so that's what we will go to next. Is someone, someone. Okay, great. Come to the mic, please, and just identify yourself for the record. 00:22:12,350 S9: Bob Frascella 13 Wallis Drive. Thank you, thank you. Um, I'm representing the Boulders Condominium Trust. I'm the chairman of the Board of Trustees, and we have several of our members in attendance. Our owners and residents in attendance. Um, The Boulders Condominium Trust represents the interests of 40 residents and owners that make up our community. Uh, thank you for the opportunity to present the boulders view of the ongoing planning for the redevelopment of the Pingree Park courts. Um, we all agree that something needs to be done there. The courts are dilapidated and, um, could be put to much better use. Uh, we also would like to make note of the attachments that we made to the letter, which provide examples of the types of issues such as noise, health, and other impacts that have been documented locally and across the country. Um, if you're not familiar with The Boulders, we are a 55-plus age restricted community immediately adjacent to Pingree Park and the Dodge Tree Farm Conservation Area. First, we'd like to commend the Open Space and Recreation Committee for its creativity in developing a list of options for the dilapidated tennis courts immediately adjacent to our property. Thank you. You've done an excellent, excellent job of creating alternatives for consideration. We are particularly concerned, however, about the noise impacts from two of the options under consideration by the Open Space and Recreation Committee, that being pickleball and a skate park. For context, the existing courts. 00:24:05,500 S9: Are located less than 100 feet away from our nearest resident. I can pass copies of this around afterwards. Um, it should be noted that this distance is vastly out of compliance with standards for pickleball courts. Developed by Weston and Sampson Consultants for the Town of Wellesley and the recommended national standards developed by the American Planning Association. The recommended pickleball court setback distance of 350 feet from adjoining property lines is more than three and one half times the distance from the boulders property line to the existing courts. Three years ago, the Hamilton Wenham Recreation Department installed pickleball courts on the existing tennis courts on a trial basis. We expressed our concern about noise at that time, and we were given assurances that certain restrictions will be in place to mitigate or reduce the noise impacts. These restrictions included no pickleball on weekends with nets to be locked up and ours restricted from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Which now have been extended to 7 p.m. Since that time, however, there have been has been little or no enforcement of these restrictions. Nets are not removed during restricted hours and play continues on weekends and after hours. We had asked to be part of the process at that time to review HW recommendations, existing use during the trial period, but no one has reached out to The Boulders to assess the impacts from the trial or involved us in the process. The impacts from pickleball noise that we are experiencing are real, and they affect our quality of life and our ability to enjoy the peaceful use of our homes. The noise, travels, and sound can be heard inside as well as outside of our residences. The Boulders values its close proximity to Pingree Park and considers the park to be a resource to the entire town. We as seniors embrace the idea of having recreation and open space within walking distance of our community. However, we believe that the skate park and pickleball options have inherent fatal flaws and should be eliminated from consideration due to their unacceptable impacts on adjacent neighbors. So with that in mind, we hereby respectfully request that the Hamilton that the Wenham Select Board consider instructing the Hamilton-Wenham Recreation Department to end the trial period, remove the existing pickleball nets, and prohibit pickleball at the existing Pingree Park tennis courts. 00:27:20,600 Second, we would also like to request that the Select Board instruct the Open Space and Recreation Committee to eliminate pickleball and a skate park and other high noise generating S9: concepts from the development of the renovated park. And third, as Abutters, the boulders request that our residents have a meaningful opportunity to participate in the development of alternatives for reuse of the tennis courts. Thank you for allowing us to present our views on the current options for reuse of the of the tennis courts. We look forward to working with you in developing reasonable alternatives that will serve our entire community. Thank you. 00:27:55,800 S1: Thank you. And as Mr. Frascella mentioned in the Select Board packet for this evening is the letter that we received, as well as a number of attachments. So anyone who is interested in reading all of the information, it is there posted on the website in the packet for this evening. Okay. 00:28:15,010 S10: Can I request that my discussion be entered into the record of the meeting as well? 00:28:20,330 S1: Yes, it will be part of the minutes and of course on the recording that will be posted publicly. 00:28:26,130 S10: Thank you. 00:28:30,810 S1: All right. Thank you very much. We appreciate the comments and the engagement. 00:28:41,090 Would anyone else like to add anything? S1: Okay. Just to be clear, there is no vote this evening on the agenda. So we will take the comments under advisement. I imagine that there will be a process going forward to think through the uses and cooperation, of course, with the Open Space Committee, as this is within their purview. Um, as we think about, as you said, excuse me, what to do with these dilapidated tennis courts? Are there any questions or comments from the board. At this time. 00:29:13,910 S6: Um, I had maybe a couple questions for, um, either Ernest or Kate. Um, where are their pickleball courts presently? At the tea house and at West Wenham Park, is that right? Or, um, you can just bring me up to speed on that. 00:29:36,150 S11: Hi. Thank you. Kate Mallory, land use director. Um, yes. And then also at the high school, eight more courts were created for pickleball. So there's four tennis courts and they're lined with pickleball courts. 00:29:48,030 S6: Okay. As part of the new the high school field. I see okay. Um, and as far as like, and I know that we've had these conversations and, um, and we've had some excellent presentations from the, um, rec committee on these plans. what would you say is the sort of the best case to be made, the best case to be made on sort of the constituencies within the town who would want pickleball or or skate parks? We, we, we have clear information from the residents of The Boulders about how they believe this will impact them and the harm that they believe that, you know, would continue from pickleball and if the skateboard park was put in. And so I'm just sort of wanted to maybe a refresher on. 00:30:57,280 S6: Where we think the demand on the other side may or may not be as it hypothetical. Is it specific requests on the part of citizens of the town that you know, we'd like a skateboard park for our, you know, for our kids. And the same with pickleball. So just trying to kind of get a sense of the, the other side so that we can take all that information on board when we are trying to balance these interests. Yeah. 00:31:23,420 S11: So, um, it depends on who you ask for. If you talk to the recreation department, those courts are very important for their pickleball activities. So they do have a large demand right now of people playing pickleball. So they would be important for that. Um, when we did a survey, we did kind of a preliminary survey and there was a lot of interest of keeping the tennis courts and pickleball courts. I'll say going back now, we need to probably do another community survey because our survey was not very specific. We've come so far since that beginning stage. Um, so I wouldn't really trust it as much as looking at the different options we've been looking at since, um, for the skate park. This is a smaller group in town that for a few years has been trying to get a skate park in town. So it's a very, um, passionate group. They've been coming to all of our meetings, um, they're willing to fundraise to try to support doing a skate park. They tried to get a skate park at West Wenham Park. Um, topography wise that didn't fit there. That's why we did the pump track. Um, I don't know of any other space in town where we could do a skate park. So if we kind of say no to this, we won't more than likely won't have a skate park. Um, so it really depends on what group we really try to bring Sean Timmons the recreation director in to most of our meetings, uh, and update us on anything that's happening on his side with the recreation. But I do know that he has mentioned that if pickleball is taken away from that area, it's going to be harder to have as many courses that is being demanded in town. 00:33:08,970 S6: Thank you. I appreciate that information. No problem. 00:33:11,570 S1: Thank you. Kate. Gary. 00:33:13,690 S8: Yes. I think if we look back to the request for the skate park is a long standing request. I believe B.J. Brown came in 2 or 3 years ago. Initially, yes. Presented to the board as well. So there's some history there that we could look at again. 00:33:29,770 S11: Yes. And I do have to say they come to most of our meetings as well. They've been very engaged. 00:33:34,170 S1: Oh. So they are still engaged. Oh yeah. Okay. 00:33:36,570 S11: For years. 00:33:37,970 S1: Yeah. That's been, I think even longer since Covid, I believe. 00:33:43,170 S4: I was wondering, you were saying earlier in the meeting that you're going to have a list of open committee positions. And I was wondering if there are any open, um, rec committee positions. 00:33:54,290 S11: Um, we're full now. We did have one open space and we just got it filled. Bianca Hanson. 00:34:02,780 S1: Has a hand up. Okay, okay. Um, let me just finish questions from the board. Comments. Okay. 00:34:09,820 S4: I just want to make sure I'm clear. It's my understanding from the last meeting that we're in an information gathering stage right now. Correct. We're expecting that, um, you know, this will kind of culminate with probably the beginning of the school year or the end of the summer that there'll be surveys and, and, um, collection of information and interest. And, you know, if there's a whole lot of demand for pickleball, we'll hear about it and try to figure out if there's any way to mitigate any of these concerns that we have in order to, you know, balance the needs. So if there's if there's anything else about that schedule that is important, I'd love to hear about it. 00:34:46,780 S11: Yes. And we're also planning a community event on a Saturday in September. We haven't picked a date yet. Um, what I'll do is send out notices to abutters within 800ft of the park and we'll put an article in the Hamilton-Wenham News. We'll put it on the flash board up on our socials to try to get as many community members as we can. We're going to work the time around the sports schedules for the fall, and try to get as many community community members in and get their thoughts, and we'll also have a more comprehensive survey. 00:35:18,120 S4: Great. Thank you. 00:35:19,720 S1: Right. So just to echo that, we're not here this evening to rule anything in or out, but there is still a process to go through to collect comments from the community. Um, we, you know, we have yours and you will have more opportunities to bring these comments forward. Also as we go into sort of the public information and community, um, comment gathering that Kate's talking about. What I would like to ask, though, specifically out of this evening, if there's no objections from the board is, uh, Steve, if you could connect with Sean Timmons and ask about the enforcement of the parameters that we put in place, because I do think that's something that should be addressed expeditiously if the nets are not being taken away and so forth, and the play is outside the hours that the Select Board set previously, that needs to be taken care of. 00:36:14,370 S4: I agree. 00:36:14,970 S1: Agreed. Okay. 00:36:18,690 S1: All right. Joe. Someone on Zoom would like to comment. 00:36:21,970 S5: Uh, Matt Smith, if you wish to speak, you can now. 00:36:35,490 S12: Oh, sorry. I just accidentally raised my hand. No comment. 00:36:41,810 S1: All right. 00:36:47,010 Any other comments? S1: All right. Thank you all for coming. We appreciate the input and for coming in person. It's always nice to see people. live and in person, and we'll be we'll be seeing more of you. As I said, this will be an open process. We'll spend some quality time together. 00:37:07,670 S10: Thank you. 00:37:08,750 S1: Thanks. Thank you. 00:37:13,150 S1: Okay. 00:37:15,950 S1: We'll give everyone a moment. 00:37:22,710 S1: Okay. Next we have item B discussion and review of our current required vendor insurance levels. Our current standard liability level used by the town is problematic for small vendors operating under small contract amounts, where the insurance premiums can exceed the contract cost. We'll discuss potentially establishing a lower threshold for certain smaller contracts. 00:37:50,870 Steve, are you presenting? S2: Yes. Me and Margaret and I. Just a quick overview of what's going on is this is this is kind of this is showing up a number of times, at least since I've been here about 4 or 4 and a half years. So we have, um, a certain level of standard liability that the town covers itself for. And MIIA's policy is to always recommend that vendors mirror the town's liability policy. Similarly, uh, our legal consult, uh, doesn't comment on liability, uh, amounts. And, you know, the reason for that is because I think likely that if you said, oh, you know, you don't need that much and something happens, you know, maybe you should have had that much. So, but so the problem that we run into is particularly very small contracts that don't, you know, lend themselves to have a very high liability exposure, such as, you know, one of the ones you're probably most familiar with is, um, when we had the town logo designed, that was $3,500, $4,500 contract. So the cost for a small sole proprietor to match our insurance amounts exceeds their premium would exceed the gross total revenue they'd receive off the contract. Um, so Margaret, you can come up and add some more color, but you know, another one that's kind of front and center right now. So there's been a few more in the past, but one that's front and center right now is with the 2A Dexter Lane, which is the recent acquisition and, um, uh, re refurbishing of a, an affordable housing unit. Um, is that now that we own it and we want to rent it out, we have to. There's a very strict lottery policy that you have to follow state law to find a suitable renter to inhabit this property. Um, so Margaret has done her due diligence and gone out to the market and got some quotes. And they've really ranged from 5000 to 30,000. And the companies that are big enough to have our insurance as standard, whereas about $30,000. And similarly, the small ones, which are, you know, we believe to be appropriate in this situation and suitable and have the experience to run a successful lottery of about $5,000. So and then Margaret has gone out to her colleagues in the planning world in small businesses and asked, like, how are other communities and businesses handling this? And the general consensus is that, um, they reduce their rate. They said that ours was extraordinarily high. Um, but in either case, you know that they have a reduced um insurance amount. A couple of folks voiced in and it reduced insurance amount that's itemized up there for you. And we're not asking for a vote tonight. We can just gather more information or just kind of gauging your level of comfort. But from a staff recommendation perspective, it would be to lower to the smaller insurance amounts for small contracts, maybe less than $10,000 or less than $20,000 on specific projects such as, you know, non-building related non site, you know, on site type of contracts that would lend themselves to have high liability of injury or things like that. But also add that, you know, I have this board has delegated to me signing authority of contract is up contracts up to $50,000 per vendor per year. And, um, you know what we would defer. So generally, I would be the one reviewing and signing that contract. But in the event that we would be looking to reduce the liability insurance, you know, the Select Board would authorize that specific piece. And then we could reduce to writing the rationale as to why the insurance has been. And it would go, you know, it would go in the procurement file with that contract. Um, that's just some ideas that we had internally. I don't know what if there's a comfort level, if you'd like to see some more analysis or study, um, you know, the insurance amounts are still the reduced amounts that are more, you know, you're still talking a million professional and what was it, a million, a million umbrella with a $2 million aggregate. 00:42:36,500 S4: How's that number that you just gave different from the current requirements? 00:42:39,700 S2: Uh, we're at one one per incident in $3 million in the. In the aggregate. And what's our our professionals also 1 in 3. Right. Yeah. 00:42:52,040 S4: So this would drop it down to one and two. 00:42:54,640 S2: Yeah. 00:42:55,440 S4: And that's a material reduction in the premiums for our. 00:42:59,400 S2: Yeah. Let me if you can scroll actually you can open. Yeah. Scroll to Margaret's attachment. Just just so this way I'm not guessing. Um. 00:43:13,560 S2: So general liability is one. All right. So our umbrella is 2 million. So it would cut the umbrella policy in half. Um and if you scroll down to the bottom of the bulleted we have the professional liability insurance is 1 million per game and three. So we would be 1,000,002 million in the aggregate which was um. 00:43:38,560 S2: Which was suggested in the forum, right. Um, that we, we use to source the information and the feedback we got that that was enough that these thresholds are much more expensive than a traditional. I think that sounds like a traditional professional liability was just $1 million flat. Um, so we could try there. I guess it's, you know, maybe, maybe we, maybe we run across a small vendor and they need some more wiggle room, but that would be up to the Select Board to decide or find a happy medium where they have to up their insurance to work with us. Uh, but not to the extent of to match the town's, um, kind of standard requirements. 00:44:25,210 S4: Uh, my reaction is, is it sounds like it makes sense, but I think we'd want to be pretty clear on when you'd go type one or type two. Um, and so that you would feel like you were in complete, you know, confident ground when you were kind of giving guidance or making a decision, you know, whatever language we put into this policy, you know, you, you feel completely comfortable that you're clearly in type one or type two. 00:44:51,030 S2: Yeah. And I think that's why the, um, like it would, the Select Board would have each contract would come before the board. 00:44:59,590 S4: Unless it's less than $50,000. 00:45:01,830 S2: No, I'm saying even if it's less than 50. Okay. So like, even if we had a $5,000 contract, like in well, so if this is a $5,000 contract or a contract under $50,000, we're going to we're always going to lead with the town standard. Our standard liability requirements. Right. So we're always going to lead with that italicized text up there. That's the one that has been stated a couple times that it's just simply too high and too expensive for small businesses. Um, in the event like this lottery where they come back and say, you know, we'd love to do the project, but we just, it's simply not worthwhile for us to pay the annual premium to match this insurance basically equals or close to equals what the total fee is on this project. So at that point, it would come back to the select board for authorization. Nobody has the authority to change. At least in this current proposal. Nobody would have the authority to change, including me, the insurance premiums other than using our standard template. If anything reduced from that, it would need select individual select board approval per contract. And that's not I don't think it's overly burdensome for administrative perspective for the board or the select board's office, because, I mean, we're talking 4 or 5 and 4 or 5 years. Um, you know, this is just we have one that's just recent and ongoing and they continue to be interested in doing the project, but this is kind of what's holding us up. So the option is either go with them or go with someone. I think the next one was, was it 19 or 20? Yeah. 00:46:38,060 S10: Uh, MCO Housing Services. 00:46:39,740 S13: Um, so we've had a few different projects that have come up like this for planning purposes. You know, we're contracting with an organization that's going to help us create a plan like our subdivision regulations, or this is for to do the lottery for that small unit. Um, we, you know, we got this one bid for $5,000 and this was great because they'll do what we need to be to have done. Then we got another bid from a larger company, and this was into the 18 to 20,000 because they were going to include other um, other items. There still was a little bit of issue with like automobile insurances, you know, how much they had to carry on that. Um, and I think what they're questioning us saying, you know, I'm, I'm not driving for, for the town in most cases, they're not even coming here. It's all done online. Um, you know, so there are different projects that I think require different insurances. I would imagine if they're out doing work on a building. Of course you need certain liability coverage in case someone gets hurt. Um, but I think maybe if we could do a little more research on what kinds of insurance is really needed for these types of projects. I think we've just been telling some of some of the companies come back and say, yeah, you know, we have that already. A lot, a lot from what I've heard, some of the federal contracts require higher insurances. So some of the larger organizations or companies will that do federal contracts carry this kind of insurance? But for our purposes, we're we're dealing with more smaller companies. So, um, and I think what Steve's idea of when we get, when we want to enter into a contract and they can't match our insurances. Then we would just determine what kind of insurance really is necessary and whether what they have is sufficient for what we need. Then we would bring it to the select board for approval. 00:48:47,730 S2: Yeah. I mean, you know, that was just an idea. I think in general there have always been alternatives to get the insurance level we require. It's just you have to, you know, pay for it. So I guess it's just this is one that the discrepancy was, is pretty large, like four times the cost. And it would be funded by the Affordable Housing Trust, which is a good cause in limited funds. So it was just kind of like, I think this is probably a good time. We've talked about having this conversation. Probably this is the fourth or fifth time. So, uh, you know, why don't we, why don't we bring this before the board and see if there's any appetite, um, to consider something like this. 00:49:29,140 S1: Gary. 00:49:29,980 S8: Well, I think I'd be comfortable because I think part of the problem too, is, you know, when it's always done, just a we're small with just one size fits all and certainly would not want to cut us out of the small business vendors as well as I think, get to realize that perhaps if we look at what we buy has certainly changed from pick and shovel to it stuff, so that perhaps we need to reflect in our insurance requirements, the changing industry standards. But I shouldn't be comfortable on these coming on a one time basis, each case to the select board. 00:50:26,020 And I would ask one question, does MIIA have any statistics that would reveal what what sort of activities result in lawsuits in the past? You know, how many how many dump trucks versus IT installers, you know? S2: Yeah. I mean, I think that's a that's a good question, a fair question. I don't know the answer. Yes. They they may be able to provide statistics on that. I know as far as like recommendation for insurance amounts, this doesn't answer your question, but they, you know, they have a pretty standard answer. It's like we our policy is to recommend you maintain, you know, the town's liability insurance. And that's what that is. Right. And that's in all our standard contracts. 00:50:51,640 S13: Yeah. We can look into that a little more, Gary, to. 00:50:54,960 S2: See if they have any stats. That's good information to have. 00:50:58,160 S13: Yeah. They may have a recommendation for smaller service contracts as opposed to construction contracts. You know. 00:51:06,240 S6: Ben um I agree that this makes a lot of sense. Um, for the reasons that both Gary and Finn have said, um, I'm wondering whether the policy would limit this discretion to lower limits or maybe even eliminate, for example, an auto insurance policy, whether that would be limited to professional service vendors or is it sort of potentially open to everybody? Because I could see where it might make sense to have certain categories of things that involve heavy equipment, you know, heavy vehicles, life safety issues where we're probably never going to say that the limit should be reduced. So why even necessarily make those types of contracts eligible for this type of relief? Um, so that, I mean, that's a thought, but I don't know whether to, to, if the policy were to say for professional service, um, contractors or bidders or what have you, that that would be the world where this discretion could have, whether that would be too limiting, whether, you know, the examples that we've heard about the housing lottery, the logo, Those obviously are both professional services and both, you know, very good examples of why this makes sense, what you're recommending. Um, but, um, so anyway, that's just a thought. Whether there's some sort of, uh, categorization that maybe would be done on the front end that, um, would limit the, the number of cases that would need to be brought to the select board to decide. 00:52:51,350 S2: That's a good point. 00:52:52,590 S4: Yeah. That's why I was, I was initially thinking this was a type one or type two, where if you, I would be comfortable. I'm comfortable with what you're describing now, where you come to us on every single one. But if you put in more, more planning on this, I think we could probably come to a policy that said that if you meet these criteria, then, you know, we would happy to authorize you to say, yes, this meets criteria, whatever it happens to be, which means no automotive insurance is required because they've signed something that says that they're not going to drive ever for this thing or, you know, whatever else you say. You know, I think we could probably come to some policy that would reduce the amount of time you have to come to the Select Board to get special permission. And you would also be able to include that in any sort of RFP so that you you could suddenly discover that some of these contracts could be cheaper than we're getting now. 00:53:43,880 S2: Yeah. No, I see what you're saying. Um, yeah. Why don't you let us take a stab at that policy that tries to carve out some, um, you know, kind of what ifs and limits the amount they get before the select board and just kind of standardizes it. Yeah. I think, I think we can put together something like that. 00:54:02,760 S13: Yeah. 00:54:03,120 S2: For the next meeting. 00:54:03,960 S13: Put together a proposal on different tiers. 00:54:06,880 S6: One just follow up on. So so you raised auto insurance, Margaret. Which makes sense that that is something that wouldn't seem to be applicable for certain contracts, certain vendors, I think in my understanding is that solo practitioners or sole proprietors rather, um, don't usually don't need to get worker's comp if it's just the, you know, a sole owner, um, at least in the professional services world. So that might be another one that would be easily waivable depending on the situation. 00:54:42,940 S13: Yeah, that was another one that came up. Okay, good, good. 00:54:48,780 S1: Sounds like we're all in agreement and yeah. Good. Thank you for bringing it forward. To be continued. 00:54:57,540 S1: Alrighty. 00:55:00,460 S1: Okay. Item C discussion and potential vote to approve required budget transfers as authorized under general law. Chapter 44. Section 33 B addressing year end budget transfers for the last two months of the fiscal year May and June, and the first 15 days of July of the new fiscal year being the statutory period for closing municipal finance records for the fiscal year. 00:55:27,990 S2: You zoom in just a little, zoom in just a little so I can see it. There you go. All right. So this as what Deirdre, just read these. This is something that the Select Board and the FinCom do every year. The FinCom statutorily has, um, all the authority over this and they ultimately make the transfers, but um historically in Wenham. And to maintain that tradition, the select board has always, always been a two vote, um, thing. So, uh, different years sometimes select board votes first, sometimes the finance committee votes first, just kind of depends on how the meeting schedules fall. So this year the select board, um, there before the select board, first, the Finance committee has a meeting tomorrow night where they, they'll weigh in on this. I know Ernie has been working with them closely over the past week answering questions. So I think we're you know, everyone's pretty much on the same page as far as what's going on. So nothing here is a surprise at this point. So but I'll run through, uh, you know, just quickly, the reasons for, for some of the transfers, most of them are pretty straightforward. The first one being, um, are we just simply underbudgeted by about $1,500 on our payroll contract this year? It was an increase that we didn't capture in our budgeting. So that line item ran over. And additionally, we've done a number of, um, tax takings and also the, uh, advertisement and auction process through the two town parcel disposals, uh, is more than much more activity than we do on a very minimally funded line item. So those cause those to be expended. So the combination between the two amounted to about $2,500. 00:57:21,060 S2: The next four are, you know, really the reason why we set up the utilities reserve to um to begin with. So that is a pot of money that exists to backfill, uh, utility line items in this environment where energy costs has become volatile and difficult to plan with. We plan for we started with a large utility reserve, I think. I don't want to quote the exact dollar amount, but we started with about $100,000 for 3 or 4 years ago, and that has been reduced down to a much smaller amount, maybe 15 or $20,000 that we've left in there that we continue to budget for each year. And, you know, last year, we really didn't need it at all this year. Uh, you know, we do need it. So it's good that we have it. So that's what those are for. Six and seven. So this is to backfill buildings and grounds contractual services. The reason for that is the town hall relocation if you remember um we did not originally plan to have to vacate the um or clear the building to the extent we had to with the installation of the HVAC. It was supposed to be done completely occupied, um, which I guess it was occupied, but we had to, um, the temporary heat and all the construction costs were picked up through the TELP agreement and the total cost of the project, but we were forced to incur, uh, some moving costs, storage costs as we moved, you know, all the staff, additional IT costs as we move from, uh, you know, like we had to vacate the first floor, move down to the Select Board, you know, then vice versa. We moved everyone upstairs so that, And then there was also some significant repairs and damage that needed to be. 00:59:18,130 S2: Corrected for both the fire and Police station garage doors. Um, so eight is you'll see there's a number of, um, there's a number of transfers that are being or pots that are being pulled from to fund this or to offset a significant large, uh, overrun of expenditures in police overtime. The reason for that is, as you're aware of the 111F, which is the permanent disability from one of our police officers where he was injured on duty and is permanently disabled from being a police officer. Uh, we also had a, the first in a long time or any recent history, certainly a deployment of a military personnel over in the police station, which, you know, creates a very large overtime situation. And the police department also dealt with a number of, um, long term injuries that took place that were un, um, unusual for the department. It's not something that we deal with every year, but it was kind of a perfect storm last year and there was a lot going on that created a lot of overtime requirements and the need to backfill these shifts. 01:00:43,190 S4: If I recall correctly, that, um, the bringing on board of the two police officers is supposed to mitigate this as a risk going forward. 01:00:51,150 S2: That's that is the plan. Yep. 01:00:56,110 S2: Uh, let's see. So we have, um. 01:01:01,030 S2: So number nine is a combination of, uh. well, two things is, as the select board is aware, we, um, are contracted with MRI to do with, you know, the, in, uh, to get ahead of any retirements that the fire department, we went ahead and have contracted with MRI to do an operational study to help the select board when it's ready and if needed to, um, kind of reorganize the department and help it with its recruitment efforts and structuring the department in the most optimal way possible given, um, the potential for two. Jeff Baxter the deputy retired and the possibility of the chief retiring, um, at some time in the near future. And in addition to that cost, there was um, benefit costs with Jeff's retirement, where the town owed him some sick time buyback and also his vacation accrual. Excuse me. 01:02:04,220 S4: When do you expect to get that study back? 01:02:06,820 S2: Um, we are probably within a couple weeks. It should be ready to distribute. 01:02:16,940 S2: The, um. Let's see, ten and 11 is, you know, we had a pretty crazy winter, so we were able to we can run a deficit in snow removal if we want and fund it next year at town meeting. However, we have the funds to offset the, uh, over overrun this year. So that is wise to do so. We won't have to re raise it next year. Um 12 is um well, it says to cover a special election. That was an unanticipated cost to the town clerk's office. Uh, 13 is, um, you know, this is just, it's, it was an under budgeting on an estimation of the FICA and Medicare. So that's a transfer. That's pretty common. We have group insurance kind of serves as kind of the a big chunk of money amongst the benefit line items. And we typically transfer out of that to cover any benefit shortfalls at the end of the year. 01:03:24,150 S2: So again, this is more tax title cleanup out of the finance on 14 second 14 or so town meeting was, um cost $25,000 this year. We, uh, we upped, we increased it. A part of that is because it was at the, um, uh, Gordon College, the Bennett Center because of the increase in, um, uh, patrol officers, both police and fire for additional details. So more details than we would typically have at um, and, and there is some additional set up costs in the audio visual for Gordon College. The, the toss was to the amount was about $25,000, but we did for FY 27, we did bump it up to $20,000. So we believe that to be closer to what we're will incur next year. 01:04:25,690 S2: Uh, this is number 16 is a transfer for utility costs from the, uh, this is again, this is a utility cost, but it is not funded by the utility reserve. Reason being is that the library is a shared service. So we try to try very hard to contain all costs, um, and not kind of commingle other budgetary funds in a shared service budget where Hamilton is ultimately billed for two thirds of the total cost at the end of the year. 01:05:03,060 S2: And um. 01:05:06,740 S2: So highway, highway refuse. So this is really, um, ultimately it was just a under, under, um, under budgeted amount for the, uh, refuse collection contract. As we were finalizing things, uh, we just slightly under budgeted. So it's a large budget item for about $500,000. And we were about, as you see, 18 grand under on that. So we were able to pull it from partial utility reserve and partially highway salary. 01:05:37,820 S2: With that, that ends the the transfer request. 01:05:50,100 S1: Okay. 01:05:52,500 Any questions? S8: No questions. 01:05:53,260 S4: I cover them during it. Thanks very much for. Or entertaining those. 01:05:58,640 S6: None for me. I'll make a motion. Move to approve. Required budget transfer is authorized under GL chapter 44, section 33 B as presented contingent upon Finance and Advisory Committee approval. 01:06:11,880 S8: Gary. Seconds. 01:06:13,320 S1: All right. We'll vote. Gary. Yes. 01:06:16,320 S4: Finn, aye. 01:06:17,480 S1: Ben. 01:06:18,560 S6: I. 01:06:19,160 S1: And Deirdre, aye. All right. Motion passes and we are on to uh d a discussion and potential vote to authorize the spending of the town of Wenham opioid settlement funds to pay for opioid-specific training for the town of Wenham police officers. 01:06:37,880 S5: Can I take this? 01:06:38,600 S2: Yep. So Joe will take this one. 01:06:40,560 S1: Excellent. 01:06:41,040 S5: Yeah. Thanks, Madam Chair. Um, so in Massachusetts, there were several opioid settlement funds that came through from national lawsuits against opioid manufacturers, distributors, and pharmacies. Um, these were these companies were accused of helping fuel the opioid epidemic. So they were settlements that were reached. Um, so currently the funding is a 6040 split in Massachusetts, 60% goes to the Commonwealth through the Opioid Recovery Remediation Fund to support statewide programs. The other 40 to Delta, the 40% goes directly to participating municipalities, cities and towns in Massachusetts. Um, Wenham currently has, um, just under $16,000 in opioid funding. And there was a request, a request from the police chief about a month or so ago to send its officers to a training program that is, um, in Bridgewater State University. It's to help officers, um, learn more about overdoses and how to prevent them, how to deal with mental health troubles while on the job as well. It's a good program. Um, it's $450 actually. The chief thinks he can get it down to 400 with this contract, but he wants to send approximately 13 of his officers over there for the training. It is actually online. It's self-paced, about four hours long. And so in order to release the funding, um, there's three criteria that have to be met. The first of which is um, it has to be basically there has to be a special revenue account created and that's already been done by the assistant accountant and finance director. The second criteria is that the Commonwealth itself has to approve the training, which they've already done. Um, I was in contact with a couple members of the state and they said, you know, training purposes is totally fine for opioid funding to be released. And the last is the select board, as the executive authority of the town, have the vote to release the funding. Um, as a side note, the Board of Health met last Thursday, um, to recommend unanimously recommend that the funding be released for the purposes of this police training. This is not a requirement, but just sort of a best practice. Um, that, you know, we were advised that it probably should happen again. It's not required. But the last step to release this funding would be for Select Board to vote on it tonight. It just so like I mentioned earlier, it would be 13 officers, um, 400 to $450 per officer. So we're looking at like 5200 to $5800 total. And again, we have just south of 16,000 currently. And um, we might get more as well, more funding. Um, this is the payments as I understand it will be going until 2038. So this is currently what we have is just about $16,000. Um, so tonight we're just looking, the Board of Health is hoping to get a vote in the affirmative for the police training. 01:09:33,280 S1: Sorry. Just clarify that one more time. So the total that we're authorizing tonight is. 01:09:37,240 S5: Yeah, it'd be about depending if it's, you know, it's between 400 to $450 per officer, so about 5200. 01:09:43,320 S1: Per officer. 01:09:44,320 S5: Yeah. Total would be $5200 to $5800 depending on if you can get it, you know, 400 or 450. Um, I'm hoping that he thinks he can get a knock down for $400 per officer. 01:09:55,340 S2: And just do the total, do the higher amount just in case. 01:09:58,820 S1: Like 6000. 01:09:59,580 S5: 6000 threshold, probably just to be safe. Yeah. 01:10:02,940 S1: All right. Appreciate hearing from the Board of Health. We are part of a public health consortium. And yes, I think this is one of the topics that gets discussed is pooling and use of the opioid funds. 01:10:13,460 S5: Yes. 01:10:13,860 S1: Correct. 01:10:14,420 S5: Um, this would be the first use, I believe, from the town using these funds, I believe. Yeah. 01:10:18,100 S1: But it's unanimous from the Board of Health. So that's great. Yeah. Okay. Excellent. Sounds like a good program. Questions on this. 01:10:26,060 S4: I'd agree. I'd be interested in in hearing about. I agree with this specific use in the remaining say $10,000. Would be interesting to hear. What kind of alternative um you know, uses we could we could actually get from that. I mean, having first, uh, first responders trained, you know, I don't know if it's materials or Narcan or, you know, whatever. Whatever else ideas we have, I'd be. Sure. If that's going to be board of Health is looking into those uses or you know, who's charged with trying to figure that out. 01:10:56,190 S5: Yeah. There is a list of allowable uses. I will say I don't I don't have in front of me, but I think one is student awareness, you know, through education, public education. Yes. And some of it is actually Narcan as well. Um, and, you know, uh, materials that can help in that situation. But there are, there is a list that the state has. And again, training is one of them, but there's, there's like maybe 8 to 10 uses. You can, you can have for this. 01:11:18,390 S2: And in general, the boards, other committees, boards of health have kind of led the charge as far as making the recommendation for appropriate uses. So we'll definitely, we'll connect with that. And yeah, I'm pretty sure there there. Mr. Ting seems Doctor Ting seems to follow this pretty closely. So. 01:11:36,510 S1: Right. And they discuss it at the consortium meetings as well. 01:11:41,350 S4: Great. Thank you. 01:11:43,790 S1: All right. 01:11:46,930 Can we get a motion? S8: I can do this one, then. 01:11:48,130 S1: Okay. 01:11:49,010 S8: All right. Move to authorize the spending of town of Wenham opioid settlement funds in the amount not to exceed $6,000 to pay for the opioid-specific training for the town of Wenham police officers. Second. 01:12:02,530 S1: All right. We'll take a vote. Ben, aye. 01:12:05,970 Finn, S4: Finn, aye. 01:12:06,650 S1: Gary. 01:12:07,130 S8: Yes. 01:12:08,210 S1: And, Deirdre. Yes. Okay. Motion passes. Thank you, Joe, for that. Appreciate it. Okay. Item E vote to sign the proclamation as part of Wenham designation as a Purple Heart community to acknowledge the town hall, flag raising and the flying of the Purple Heart flag through August 7th. 01:12:30,850 S2: Yep. So this Bill Wilson is here with us tonight that I think he's going to kind of go over it. But I think, in short, that it's part of if you remember, uh, two, I believe it was 2 or 3 meeting cycles Yes, ago you. The board was approached and asked for permission to submit an application on their behalf for Wenham to become a Purple Heart community. And, um, you know, as a. And to honor our Purple Heart veterans that we have here in the community as part of that, uh, the, the board will need to make a proclamation to that effect. Uh, an additional, it's, it's in addition to this is, um, the flying of the Purple Heart flag until August 2nd. The select board has a flag raising policy for raising, um, flags on town, town hall land. Uh, and, uh, one of, one of the exemptions to that, meaning that it's an allowable use for the flagpole is, um, for, for military uses like this, but we figure it'd be best where we do have a policy that Select Board just acknowledges that the Purple Heart will be flown, um, on town hall property through whatever the August 7th. 01:13:41,280 S1: Excuse me. Bill, would you like to add comments to that? 01:13:46,040 S14: Uh, no. I think you've accurately described it. Um, um, we did meet on this on the 14th of April in the select board voted unanimously to approve this. So tonight is, uh, I'm not sure if Dean's there on the floor. Dean. 01:14:01,840 S1: No, he's not here. 01:14:03,800 S14: He's not there. Okay. Um, yeah. So tonight would just be the signing of the proclamation. And to set a time of Friday, the 31st of July, 930 in the morning for flag raising. 01:14:29,480 S1: Okay. 01:14:33,000 S1: All right. This is great that this is happening. Anybody have questions for Bill. Before we vote. 01:14:41,370 S6: I just have a question, bill. Um, so this would the the flag would fly from July 31st through August 7th. Uh, as I understand it, under this proposal, um, do you know whether the intention would be that, that roughly those dates would be the same dates each year, that there would be a flag raising specifically for the Purple Heart flag, and then it would fly for a week. 01:15:07,610 S14: Yeah. It's an annual thing as a part of our community. That's one of the things we're signing up to doing. Yeah, doing it once a year at this time and coordinate with, uh, um, Gloucester as well. We're doing this year, we're kind of doing, they're doing it after we do ours there. So yeah, it's an annual event. To get back to your question. 01:15:28,050 S6: Thank you. 01:15:31,850 S1: Anybody else? 01:15:37,070 S1: All right. Can we have a motion? A motion? 01:15:41,110 S8: So move to approve the signing of the proclamation designated as a Purple Heart community, and to also authorize the flying of the Purple Heart flag, beginning at ceremony at 930 on the 31st of July through August 7th. 01:15:57,070 S6: Second. 01:15:58,670 S1: Excellent move to vote. Gary. 01:16:00,790 S8: Yes. 01:16:01,470 S1: Finn. 01:16:01,870 S4: Finn. 01:16:02,190 S1: aye. 01:16:03,470 Ben, S6: Ben, aye. 01:16:04,270 S1: And Deirdre. I thank you very much, Bill. 01:16:08,190 S14: Okay. Thank you. 01:16:08,830 S1: Appreciate it. We'll look forward to the ceremony and seeing the flag flying. 01:16:13,030 S14: Hope you all can attend. 01:16:14,710 S1: I hope we can. Yes. Thank you. 01:16:16,950 S14: Thank you. 01:16:19,670 S1: Okay. 01:16:22,750 S1: All right. We are at item F discussion and potential vote to approve the Community Preservation Committee's request to place a Funded by Community Preservation Act dollars sign on the Civil War Memorial Restoration Project across from Town Hall on town owned land. I'm not sure that part's correct, actually. 01:16:45,400 S2: And you correctly pointed out that it is not town owned. 01:16:49,120 S1: Not town owned, land. 01:16:50,320 S2: Owned by the church. However, the town manages the memorial and the maintenance of the property. 01:16:57,400 S1: Correct. Okay. 01:16:58,440 S2: So, um, you know, the motion could be amended to reflect that or maybe to also request maybe a dual authorization is needed here, given that the town kind of manages the landscape and the memorial itself and the church owns the land, um, that both would need to be in agreement, which I can coordinate the church part if the Select Board wants to authorize me to do so. Um, given in assuming that the Select Board is okay with this signage going up. This would set a precedent because, um, uh, although they have, the CPC has put a plaque up on the non one, uh, wasn't part of that or, you know, I didn't catch that when it was being done, but, uh, there's a plaque up on there, but there is going to be, um, generally there in recent times, the most recent round, they're starting to request that the inclusion of a clause and a grant agreement to, uh, other folks that are not the town that are receiving CPC funds that they, they allow them to display some sort of signage or placard that advertises that this, this project was made possible by your CPC dollars. Similarly, that question is going to come to put it on the front lawn of town Hall when when we do the roof, because that would be funded by CPC dollars. They did not make the request for the HVAC, which was partially funded. But this is kind of a new, um, a new initiative that they're taking up in the most recent round of grant funding so that the board can anticipate that request. Just understanding that, you know, the decision here may set some sort of expectation or precedent if that changes anything. 01:18:55,310 S4: Yeah, I think the Madam Chair, the thing that I was thinking about here was, you know, permanent versus temporary. Um, you know, I'm not sure that we want to become a town of billboards, but they certainly do spend a lot of money. I guess it's our money or our money on these things that we all see great value in. I don't I don't see any problem with acknowledging that, but, um, you know, while they're doing the work on the, on say, the town hall, I think it makes sense. The question is, you know, how many more signs, uh, you know, for the roof, the HVAC for the landscaping, for the windows for the, you know, a separate sign on each one of those is going to get kind of, um, ridiculous. So, um, I think it's just something we probably want to consider. 01:19:40,490 S8: So I think that would be a no on this particular case, I think that, uh, I recognize the need for the CPC to showcase the, where the funds are spent and that counters any questions about the taxes. But I would say that one, that the sign should be temporary in nature and more specifically in this case, I think there are some places in town that, um, you know, just advertising is not appropriate. And I'd put that, uh, you know, in the case of a cemetery, the case of War Memorial in case of the Civil War Memorial that, you know, those are places that, you know. yes, we know you contributed to it, but I don't think that's a place for advertisement. There's other venues that could highlight the committee's achievements other than those kind of sacred places. 01:20:39,820 S14: Interesting. 01:20:41,780 S6: I agree with that. I think my initial thought was that I would, at minimum, want to see what the sign looks like esthetically, size wise, if anything, were to go next to the Civil War Memorial, um, that we would definitely want to know what it looked like. Um, but I agree with what you said, Gary. I think that that particular location on the others that you mentioned, I think aren't really, I would agree, appropriate for that type of advertisement. And I think that while it's true that CPC dollars, um, you know, were approved for the restoration project and everyone is grateful for that. Um, and it's everyone's tax dollars. So it's, you know, they're grateful that someone took the time to seek to channel everyone's tax dollars to that particular, um, project. Um, it could also be a little bit misleading in the sense that, okay, what was the entire installation of the monument, a CPC thing, which isn't the case. Um, so, uh, I, I agree with Gary that, um, at least for this particular location that I wouldn't support the sign. And, you know, it's probably invites a broader discussion as to whether there are certain other locations where CPC funds were deployed that were assigned might be appropriate. 01:22:13,320 S1: Okay. I guess I'm more in favor of it than the three of you. Um, mainly, I think to me it's it's not so much about crediting the committee, but it's about crediting what these funds are and what they do for the community, which is from the taxpayers, essentially, and to to sort of showcase that work throughout the town. However, I agree that the I mean, I was envisioning more of like a brass plaque that's discreet, um, not billboards as you're saying, and certainly not multiple on the same property. I think that would become excessive. And I do appreciate what you're saying about the war memorial, but I guess my in my mind, I was picturing something small and discreet that you see when you're up close, not driving down one a um, so, you know, maybe we could ask for some additional clarification or, or bring the comments from the board back to CPC to consider whether there should be some tearing of it, because I do think it should be in the contract if this is what we want to do going forward so that people understand, you know, other donors require it, like AARP, if you get their grant money, you need to put a sign. But should some signs be temporary while the work is being done? I think in all cases they should be discreet. What would they actually look like? I thought I saw a sign on the garden actually, which was relatively large. 01:23:46,670 S2: That's my understanding from my conversation with Tom, is that it's not a permanent placard. In this case, they would like to put one of like a big, almost like a political sign. 01:23:57,190 Right? S5: Yeah. And if it was permanent, I think I would if you're in the historic district, that might create potential. 01:24:02,150 S2: Right. And actually that's another that brings up a good point. I wonder if the historic district needs to weigh in on that side. 01:24:08,030 S1: So is there a request for a temporary sign? That's not sort of how I read it. 01:24:13,870 S2: Well, I mean, the request was not temporary. I mean, I guess I assumed it would be temporary, but the request was not, for it was from the committee through Tom Doorley, who was their admin coordinator. And the request was just simply they want to put a sign up there like the one at the garden. Um, again there. And so I said, well, I can't answer that, but the Select Board, you know, probably can and, you know, probably would make sense if the board is looking to go that direction, the church as well. 01:24:47,920 S2: But given this one's a little different because in the sense that the grant agreement on, say, the museum in theory, the grant agreement will say once we sign it, you know, that they have to display that, um, a sign, a temporary sign out there that says, this is your CPC dollars at work or it's, you know, I don't know, but the, um, with the town, you're not granting the appropriation was made at town meeting for a town project. So it's not really it's not a grant, it's an appropriation. So that that's the difference as a grant is not a town project. And, you know, for, I think most importantly, doesn't have to follow procurement law, which is the a big differentiator in, in the project. And that's why we want to grant the money and not be part of the project for entities that are not part of the town, but in a town project specifically, we do have to follow procurement law. And this is an appropriation. And in this case, we have to follow procurement law and prevailing wage where appropriate, which we did so in this project. 01:25:55,540 S2: But I guess managing the project in all the churches. Sorry. No, sorry. 01:26:00,820 S1: I was just going to say in all cases, I think we would want the signage to be discreet and a little bit less visible from a far distance. 01:26:11,780 S2: Yeah. And I think that that is certainly right. So the CPC's involvement in these projects has been very clear by with this is that is that once their process, their involvement in this really ends at town meetings recommendation. So they make that recommendation at town meeting. And in our case, historically they do the motion which isn't required. But we they they make the motion meaning they someone from the committee. Um, but then once the funds are appropriated or the authority to grant the funds are given by the townspeople, the attendees of the town meeting, it's now Select Board. It's a Select Board project, for lack of a better word. It's your it's your initiative. You grant, you grant the money on behalf of the town. The authorization to grant that money was given to you at town meeting. It's your grant documents, your grant agreement. If you remember the the CPC petition, the select board, um, You know, uh, and they started actually including some in the wording in their motions was that, you know, only that the motion included that the Select Board, um, I think it was the term, uh. 01:27:26,090 S1: Keep them apprised. 01:27:27,050 S2: Keep they appraised. Yeah. There was a kind of a little fight about how that wording was going to go to keep them appraised of the process. So, you know, in Lauren's opinion, that the agreement to include that in the motion was non-committal on the select board's part as to, you know, giving them any authority over the process other than the fact that we just have to inform them that we're writing the grant and they submit their comments. And I think one of those comments is going to be the inclusion of these signs, but it's totally within the select board's authority to be like, we don't want signs at all, or we want signs, but we want them to look like this or we you know what I mean? It's not really a CPC thing at this point. This is their request. 01:28:10,610 S4: I think that the topics that the Madam Chairperson has talked about, we need to address. One of them is while something is being done, clearly being done, a roof or HVAC, you know, to have a temporary sign that's very visible to people driving by your tax dollars. You did this. This is how we funded it. This is when it's going to be, you know, when it's going to be completed, that sort of stuff. I would be, um, that's one aspect of this. The more permanent signage, you know, um, you know, if you, uh, if they, if CPC funds a particular thing and it's going to be there for an extended period of time, but we're not going to, they're not going to be continuing to fund it all, you know, the entire time, that's kind of a different situation where you might need to be more discreet. Um, and, you know, so both the type of signage and the permanent or temporary nature, I think we need to kind of have addressed. And then this second kind of split of granting versus ownership. I think we have to understand that that's a little unclear to me yet still. So those are the three aspects that I think I'd I'd want to understand a little more before I could come to an opinion on it. 01:29:24,360 S1: Yeah. So can we ask them to sort of rethink it a bit. 01:29:27,840 S2: Yeah. Well, why don't I do this? I think I've heard, you know, a general sense of where the board's at, at least for the most part. I will take a stab at a policy for next time that covers CPC signage. And then maybe after that, the select board, if it wants to ask the CPC to take a look, because I feel like it probably makes sense for the select board to have some sort of document with your preferences and then maybe have them comment. 01:30:00,480 S1: I see. 01:30:01,800 S2: Right. Or I mean, certainly up to you. 01:30:04,400 S8: I would agree with that. Yes. That, you know, it should originate from Select Board slash. Town administrator. 01:30:14,650 S6: I agree. I mean, that's sort of consistent with the the other policy language about keeping them apprized. This would be keeping the CPC apprized of the Select Board's. 01:30:30,010 S6: Views on what maybe is and isn't appropriate as a condition and a grant agreement. 01:30:37,250 S4: That's the fourth one was the, you know, war memorials and cemeteries versus other sort of things would probably be another a fourth category for us to be clear on. 01:30:47,730 S2: And I can spend I mean, I can spend as much time as you want. The one piece that I probably did a bad job explaining is, um, the difference between a grant and a town project. And it's, it's really no, no more than is, is, is the town doing the project or is some other private entity. External external party doing the project. And that's if it's external, like the tea house or the museum or the church or, you know, whoever else has received CPC grant funds in the past, that would be a grant because we don't want to make it a town project. We don't want to be the oversight authority because then that triggers procurement law. Uh, if we run the project like this one, we're actually, you know, we're just funding ourselves basically because our facilities manager and Kate Mallory, the land use director, have worked together in making this happen. So that's it's all our effort. We've managed it, we've procured it, we've done everything. We're you know, the music was was the museum. We write the grant document that says, you know, all, all the requirements that they have to fulfill and some clawback clauses if they don't do the project that they promised to give. But so once we the select board signs that and they sign it, we just send them the money. So we've granted you the money. Here you go. Go do the project. But you know, the grant agreement is kind of the contract that outlines how what they have to do to fulfill their end of the bargain to get this money. 01:32:24,840 S4: So if I understand you right, I guess there's two-ways of interpreting what you just said. One of them is that we in those cases, whatever policy we have internally is completely not applicable. And whatever they're deciding to do with the CPC, money and signage is up to them as opposed to as part of the grant language, we would say. And here is the guidance on what we want you to do for signage. Those are the two-ways that this could go. 01:32:50,480 S2: Because with the grant, you know, I think it could go a couple a couple different ways. The way you propose it and we put that in the contract. But it's also, you know, I mean, the contract, the grant is the grant. What they want to have is a clause that requires the receiver to have signage up. So, you know, we could either, you know, say even if we said no signage, I'm not sure, as long as it doesn't, um, you know, go against any existing signage, bylaws or anything or the historic district that they probably could put signage up anyways if they wanted to advertise how they got the money to do it. But the, the Select Board could certainly in the clause that requires them to put signage can require, you know, time, look, esthetics, all that type of stuff the Select Board could do. Um, you know, it's, it's whether it's permanent or not. 01:33:48,580 S1: All right, so you're going to take a stab at drafting something and we'll come back to this. Mhm. Okay. Good. 01:33:57,140 S4: Sounds good to me. 01:33:57,660 S1: Thank you. Alrighty. 01:34:01,430 S1: Okay. Item G an initial discussion on FY 27 financial related goals and initiatives, and how the board would like to prioritize balancing internal capacity and time constraints for FY 27. Steve. 01:34:18,670 S2: Yeah. Thank you. So Michelle, I'm just going to I'll start introducing this topic, but can you I sent you an email about 630. 01:34:33,070 Can you open that document and just scroll to the last page, please? S2: So this I thought it would be good. So we're right now, the way, you know, I'm looking at the summer is I'm trying to be ready for our August meeting. If it's still the desire of the board to have one meeting in August to kind of go over our the recap our goals and objectives that we set last fall as, as a group. So kind of where we are, what we've accomplished, what we didn't accomplish. And, you know, in part of that is also be bringing up, I don't think the Select Board, you know, we won't be this meeting will continue in some form into September as we work through and establish what our goals and priorities are going to be for the upcoming year. Um, so I've kind of in my weird way of organizing my lists and stuff on my desk, I've started to jot down ideas and things that a, that we didn't get to that we said we were going to try to get to last year. Uh, and then also things that have come on my radar. Um. 01:35:40,170 S2: And, uh, use word to open it. I don't know why it saved as that. 01:35:47,090 S2: Um, you know, in, in what's, what's become clear is that the go to the last page. I didn't save it. All right, you know what? Never mind. We don't have to. I'll. I'll send it. I'll send it out, and I can go just off the top of my head. Um, so what's become clear is that there's a very high there's going to be a lot of finance related work this year that needs to be prioritized, because I think it's greater than we're ever going to be able to get to in a year's time. On top of that, the Finance Committee has raised concerns a number of times about, you know, feeling not included or feeling like they get the information at the at the 11th hour and are forced to make a decision. So I think that they also have, um, some priorities that they feel like the town should be working on. Um, and, you know, in how we have a very, you know, pretty finite financial staff in town that has, uh, their daily operational duties and accounting and payroll and AP and all that stuff, you know? And also, part of Ernie's job is to help staff and support the finance committee and help them and help them in their well in the town's analysis, but also help make sure they get the information they need and help, you know, help them through the through the analysis. So I think it's going to make some sense. And you know something, I'd like to ask the board if they would like to consider maybe inviting the Finance committee in. And I have a pretty comprehensive list that I can email you to, to you that I was working on up to the last minute right before the meeting, but clearly I didn't save the right copy. So, um, but I can send it to you in, you know, I think they also have some additional concerns, but I feel like in this situation, like where they're kind of feeling not heard that we kind of bring everyone together and help come up with a prioritized list of, you know, where we're going to go. There's a couple large projects They're like, you know, we've had some significant turnover in the fire department. So are we keeping the ambulance or are we not? That's going to be a pretty deep dive. Um, you know, we've talked about regionalization efforts and public safety. That's going to be a pretty big project. We've talked about moving from the Maya to the GIC insurance. That's going to be a huge project. You know, we're publishing for the first time our budget document this year in August. But, you know, so I'm anticipating and we've got some feedback about me trying to build out the narratives and some performance metrics by department, which is all a good idea, but it's also laborious. Um, uh, benchmarking ourselves against different communities, uh, in our, you know, service delivery costs on a per capita basis or, you know, maybe gross gross amounts based on community type or similar budget sizes. And just look at, you know, where we where we are in that and kind of analyze what that data is telling us. And, you know, there's a number of other projects on there, but it's just these are big projects that are going to require a lot of staff in an environment where, you know, Belinda is retiring in December. We have a strong internal candidate. Um, you know, who's a complete rock star, I think, and, you know, will likely end up in that position. But that creates basically a two seat shift that we're going to be hiring, you know, hiring for and kind of helping them get up to speed. On top of having a finance director who's doing a great job, um, you know, but also is, is very new to the town and also very new to municipal government. So there's just a really lot going on in there. And I think it would help that, you know, the Finance Committee to be understanding and heard if they can work with the select Board and understand your priorities and you understand their priorities. Um, as we kind of move forward through this year and into the, into the budget cycle, which, you know, is basically a couple months away when you think about it. 01:39:58,720 S1: So my, I'm perfectly happy to have the finance committee in to meet with us jointly. I think that's a great idea and a good precedent. I guess my only concern is in segmenting sort of the financial projects. There's still ripple effects to everything else that the the all the other goals and objectives, because in large part, you know, your time is also finite and I imagine is going to be consumed by the financial projects as well. So I guess it's more of a chicken and egg question. Should we have the larger discussion and then meet with the FinCom to narrow it to the financial priorities because there they impact each other, right? Because you're a finite resource. 01:40:50,980 S2: That's fair. And I have my own priorities as well. Not I mean, if I was to look at the list of finance stuff, you know, I have some rationale of things that should bubble up to the top. Um. 01:41:03,060 S1: Right. So when we discuss the list, it would be inclusive, right? Of what you see, what FinCom requests and sort of what's emerged. 01:41:10,100 S2: Yeah. I mean, and I've tried to capture what FinCom has, I've heard in the meetings that have been a number of quite a few since Jeff has left. Um, you know, but I'm not sure I've captured them all. I know Sarah has ideas. Bob has a lot of ideas. Um, you know, I think it'd be worth hearing from them and getting to a, you know, or at least agree to understand if. 01:41:35,740 S4: It would make sense, at least from efficiency point of view, to have us all here in the same room rather than having one meeting and then another meeting, them having meeting, and then us all having a combined meaning. I think we could just have one. One group discussion I think would would make sense. I have plenty of thoughts on all the ones you've listed, but I won't go into them here so that we can have that meeting then instead of now. So. 01:41:58,710 S1: Sorry, can I just add one thing just you may know this, but in case you don't. So typically we do have a goal setting workshop for the Select Board in the summer at some point. So that encompasses all of sort of the goals and objectives for the coming year, particularly for the town administrator, but also the rest of the staff to be focused on. So my point is that those two things need we need to make sure we're looking at the big picture. Do you know what I mean? And not just carving out and discussing the financial aspects, but that's the part that's relevant to FinCom. So it's sort of an order of operations thinking, okay, just to make sure you're clear on all that, Who was next. 01:42:44,410 S8: So perhaps what you can perhaps what you're saying is two meetings in one so that, you know, the meeting starts off and we take the look at the big picture of roads and everything else, including finance. And then we take part of the meeting to sit down specifically with finance FinCom to see their concerns and goals and objectives to you. 01:43:13,690 S6: I don't really have anything to add. Okay, thanks. 01:43:18,410 S8: Let's start at six. 01:43:20,050 S1: I know that could be a long meeting. 01:43:24,810 S2: Yeah. I mean, well, in the spirit of joint meetings, if let me just. Do we agree to have them in next meeting or we're going to have an interim meeting? 01:43:33,850 S1: Well, where are we? Where are you? I guess with sort of the larger list of goals and objectives. 01:43:40,820 S2: Well, my my internal timeline has been to have the kind of the big day usually every year. Well, as hasn't really been going on that long, but the last couple of years, we've kind of landed on a process and we've been building off of that each year. And what seemed to work well was to deliver a kind of a recap on everything in our successes and failures or, you know, and, or an ability to get to if we want to phrase it. And then at some in the meeting or two meetings following that, although I think we drag it out until like December last year, trying to figure out exactly, um, what we were going to identify, what we were going to actually vote on to be our goals and objectives. But basically I'm thinking August make the delivery of where we're at based on last year. That's going to, that's going to highlight things that are going to be pushed forward to this year. Because if they're a priority last year, I'm assuming they're going to continue to be a priority until they're completed. And then, you know, any other ideas that the select board has that will work for additional goals and objectives? And, you know, also my own ideas that I'll share with you in both meetings of September with I with, you know, trying to finalize the town administrator's goal and goals and objectives for the end by the last meeting in September. And my review process, you know, would start because it kind of all ties together once I give the overview in August, that would kind of complete the final grading criteria on my review so that the select board could start that then, um, and you know, then we'd be kind of setting the new goals and objectives for the year for FY 27. That would be on my review process done in the summer, in a year from now. 01:45:36,010 S1: So your preference would be to have the financial discussion sooner? 01:45:41,530 S2: Yeah. Well, I'm not sure I have a preference. 01:45:43,770 S1: Okay. 01:45:44,170 S2: I just I want the, you know, my my preference really is, is I kind of feel like what you're saying makes a lot of sense. And this is kind of the chicken before the egg or the cart before the horse and like where, you know, we're kind of maybe we should look at the big picture before we go into one subcategory of all our goals and objectives. But what I also am concerned about is just the timing, um, and how close we are to the budget season, which, you know, up until December, it's not super busy, but once middle of December comes, it's in through up through town meeting, you know, getting the warrant ready and the warrant articles, you know, there's a lot of financial articles in any town meeting, but that's, you know, the budget is really just a small part of that, but that's pretty much all encompassing for most, you know, staff's capacity to get ready for that April town meeting once December comes. Uh, so you have that, you know, now we have August to the extent, you know, you get a lot done during the summer vacations, but you have August, September, October, November. Right. To the extent the FinCom has some high priorities that align with the select board's priorities that they want to have done, which I know for a fact is a finding this financial model that Bob wants to have and I think have done for future expenditures, which I think makes some sense. And it ties into one of my larger priorities is to have the FinCom review our, you know, our free cash balance and come up with, you know, maybe a recommendation for free cash usage before we go into the budget cycle instead of, you know, late in the budget cycle, because there's going to be a couple things going on this year. We're going to have, uh, you know, an, an inflated free cash number this year because we have collected about $700,000 in back taxes that are going to be reflected in the in the free cash balance. There's been a lot of discussion about what to do with that. You know, do we give it back to the taxpayer as a one time rate offset? It's like, how do we acknowledge we've received that? Like, what are we going to do with that $700,000? And then we have there's always a lot of discussion with the FinCom and then the select board at the, you know, at the 11th hour about, you know, I feel like we're just spending money, you know, the communicate, the messaging, you know, the last two years from FinCom has been like, I feel like we're, you know, we have the money. So we're spending it like we've established a, we're spending a capital spend of $800,000 because we have $800,000 to spend, or we're putting $250,000 into the ambulance and $250,000 into the building stabilization fund, because we have extra free cash that we're looking for places to put the money. So, you know, and so, okay, we hear you, but let's maybe do the analysis in the work before we get to the warrant hearing or one of the final budget meetings. And we're finalizing town meeting, you know, so that we know going in like, all right, you know, we know and we know going into the budget cycle how we're going to disperse the, um, the free cash. And, and part of that is, you know, we're building our capital expenditure for the year. So, you know, what's, what's the appropriate spend. And I think that's where it kind of ties into the financial modeling because and really the finances, you know, I don't know how long we want to stay here, but this goes into the financial policies which all tie into, you know, what, what is we we've we've cited industry best practices for, you know, the, the reoccurring, uh, free cash and, and as a percentage of revenues and what it should be. But again, these are, these are kind of industry standards and part of it's community Specific. So we've never you know, we've had the draft financial policies, have been with the FinCom for two years, has been turned over. So I understand like they've never gone through. But a big part of that is to really look at it and be like, all right, well, for a Wenham, you know, uh, a capital spend of 1% of our budget, you know, we feel would is suitable and we can, you know, and that's what we should target every year. And, you know, our free cash regeneration of 2.5% instead of the 4% because, you know, we're going to spend 1% on capital, we need a quarter of a percent on, uh, kind of discretionary needs on old bills and things that pop up inevitably every year, you know, so we're not, we have, there's a lot of comments about we have too much free cash, we have too much free cash. We have to draw it down. Like, I don't necessarily believe that that's the case, but there is there is a sentiment out there that we hear that. So it's like, these are all the things like if you would ask me my priorities, like before we get to any of, you know, even like the insurance and all that. We can start on the back burner, but I feel like we need to get our ducks in a row on that stuff first and then work. But I know I could, I could go on forever on this. 01:50:38,850 S1: I think I'm going to stop you there. 01:50:40,730 S2: Sorry. 01:50:41,530 S1: You're clearly your head is in this. I think I'll give you a chance in a second, but what it sounds like is that we should have a joint discussion to make sure that we have a thorough list from you, from FinCom, from whatever else is bubbled up, from wherever else, and at least sort of frame the list so that we can then take that forward into the overall prioritization exercise. 01:51:11,050 Sound good? S2: Well said. Thank you. Okay. 01:51:15,050 S1: Any other comments? 01:51:17,010 S6: I do not. I'm on board with both the expanded version and the summary. 01:51:26,140 S6: Both very helpful. 01:51:29,460 S1: Oh, Steve, you crack me up. 01:51:34,340 S6: Both passionate and knowledgeable. 01:51:38,260 S1: Oh, gosh. Okay. All right, so we clear on the way forward? Sure. 01:51:45,060 S2: Oh. 01:51:46,700 S1: Oh, gosh. 01:51:48,420 S2: I don't know if that's a. 01:51:52,580 S1: Getting public comments. 01:51:55,460 S2: I think it was a compliment, but I'm not sure. 01:51:59,740 S6: I found a meme or something. That's the scenario. 01:52:03,260 S2: No, I can tell you what it is. It's funny. I think Roger would appreciate it as well. But I sound like Roger when he gets talking about town meeting. Yes, exactly. 01:52:12,540 S1: Oh, that is very true. We we are clear on your knowledge base. Steve is extensive, but you're losing us. Okay, so let's go to the last item that we'll revisit that topic at an upcoming meeting. Something to look forward to. The last thing this evening is an update on the remaining vacancies on boards and committees, following all of the recent appointments and reappointments. So I actually thought this list looked very good overall. This is not a huge amount of openings except in a couple of places. I don't know if we can do this without a vote, but I mentioned previously, I think I would like to try to move forward with reducing the number of seats on the Cultural Council, and maybe we need to agenda it specifically, um, basically for the board to agree to approach Hamilton, um, to look at reducing the number of seats. So what I mentioned previously is that we are two small towns and we are at the maximum number of seats, which I think is 11 per town, 22 total, which is an enormous, enormous committee. And we always have vacancies. I think we're not right sized with the number of seats for the size of the communities. We're not a city, we're not large towns. I think we could easily come down to where we typically fill seats at, whether it's 7 or 8 or somewhere in there. 01:53:57,810 But would we need to bring that formally at a next meeting to discuss and vote to approach Hamilton? S2: I think I don't think the general sense or. 01:54:01,210 S1: Consensus. 01:54:01,930 S2: If you guys, you know, general sense is that you're supportive of the exploration of that idea. I can certainly just reach out to Joe and have a response, whether maybe he wants to ask his board, you know. 01:54:14,490 S1: Is it at this point, it's an exploration. It's not Inclusive. 01:54:20,830 What do people think? S4: Yeah, I'd agree with just have the conversation, see where their their heads are at and come back. 01:54:29,630 S8: I agree with Hamilton have vacancies on the cultural council. 01:54:32,710 S2: I don't I don't know. 01:54:33,630 S8: The answer to that because I'd say 22 is huge. 01:54:36,910 S2: I would expect yes for. 01:54:38,950 S8: A committee that just hands out money. 01:54:40,310 S2: That is. 01:54:40,590 S8: A lot easier. 01:54:41,910 S1: Yeah. And I think only a certain time of year. So it's it's a predictable committee. I mean, it's great committee. I just think we're not at the right size for the towns that we are. That was my main comment on this list. We definitely excuse me need some volunteers for the Human Rights Committee. Um, so maybe we can do some advertising and we definitely need two more people for the FinCom. We would like to have a full board there. 01:55:11,110 S4: If you have two more people, that's a lot more requests for additional data. But yeah, that's a pretty dangerous level. 01:55:18,600 S15: A lot of work. 01:55:20,000 S1: For three. 01:55:20,440 S15: People. 01:55:20,760 S4: Somebody has to drop off. You're going to have it is. 01:55:23,080 S2: Yeah. We're already we were running into that. The quorum thing is real. Yeah. There's a lot of busy folks on that board. 01:55:30,680 S8: Also, we need to reach out. Zoning Board of Appeals, especially if we get some big, uh, construction programs going in town. 01:55:38,040 S2: Actually, yeah. We've had, we just had. That's a great point, Gary. We, we just had some issues with getting ZBA quorums for Gordon College's music center, and they were not thrilled. 01:55:49,480 S6: So are there are there three regular members of the ZBA in place and one associate slash alternate? Is that the. 01:55:59,360 S8: Three, three and two. Right. Three with two alternates. 01:56:03,400 S6: Oh, so there was no alternates. Right now we just have the three regular members. 01:56:07,600 S5: Yes. 01:56:08,360 S6: I see one. 01:56:08,840 S16: Person that is interested. 01:56:10,320 S6: In becoming an alternate or associate. Yeah. Okay. So that would give us a total of four, which would um, you need two for quorum because there's three that would be sitting on a particular application. It sounds like the Gordon College situation must have been with only one person. 01:56:27,180 S5: One person wasn't. 01:56:28,980 S2: Oh it happened. I just remember Margaret and Kate were saying they were pretty big. Yeah. 01:56:37,620 S6: I have a question about the Human Rights Committee. 01:56:42,260 Do we know whether Hamilton has one? S1: They do. 01:56:43,140 S6: Okay. And am I right that the Pride Picnic is sort of the main public event that both town human rights committees run? 01:56:58,060 S1: Um, I would. 01:56:58,820 S6: Say. 01:56:59,660 S1: It's the flag raising. The picnic is actually the Human Rights Coalition, which is the non-governmental. Okay. 01:57:06,740 S6: Yeah. Yeah. I was wondering whether, whether, um, the Human Rights Committee might be one that would be well served by a regional um, committee. I only say that I say that one for efficiency's sake. And the fact that there are four openings, and also because I think it might um raise the profile of the Human Rights Committee if you had a sort of a two town, um committee that was working together and, and moving forward those issues for both towns, but I'd certainly be curious what not only what my colleagues here think about that, but also members of our human rights committee and whether Hamilton would think that was a sensible thing to do. 01:57:51,230 S1: And we've we haven't had this many vacancies for a long period of time. Some of this is the turnover. We had members who have been on for quite a while who have now rotated off, basically. So we're sort of at a transition point. So I think before we move to Regionalize, I'd like to see if we are able to refill personally. 01:58:20,130 S1: All right. 01:58:23,450 Any other thoughts? S8: Are we advertising for the students in high school starting in September? 01:58:27,730 S1: That's a good question. 01:58:29,570 S16: Do you have an advertisement? We can do that. 01:58:33,730 S1: Yeah. I think that's a great opportunity. 01:58:35,770 S15: For students. 01:58:36,330 S8: With great support from Eric on those positions. 01:58:40,610 S1: Yeah, maybe even teacher nominations would be great. 01:58:45,370 S4: I wonder if there's any other things like that that would allow us to have more engagement with the high school kids. These sort of committees, you know, I think that kids are always looking for that sort of experience, especially as they're looking at colleges. Right. And so where else might they. 01:59:02,210 S8: Well, we have students on the Human Rights Committee, right. And on the climate action. Um, we might look at cultural. 01:59:13,180 S1: I mean, I actually think Open Space and Rec would be a great one given all of the topics that we're looking at right now. 01:59:27,060 S1: Yeah. What is it? What would it take? I guess it would be board and committee specific if we were to add a seat or transition a seat. 01:59:37,660 S2: Yeah, I mean, I think that I mean, unless they're governed by bylaws, the makeup, I think most of these up there. 01:59:52,940 S2: Um, at least not maybe most, but probably half of them are. The select board has the ability to set the charge and change the makeup. Um, you know, finance committee I think is, is by bylaw. Zoning Board of Appeals, I'm guessing, is a bylaw. Climate action. The select board can do it. 02:00:13,120 S15: Yeah. 02:00:14,080 S2: Uh, cultural council. I believe you guys can do it. Um, HDC is likely statutory or bylaw. The makeup. 02:00:23,800 S5: I think the remaining seat has to be, I believe part of wish or wish member. I can confirm that. That's. Kirsten Alexander. 02:00:31,000 S2: Human rights is Select Board wish is Select Board. 02:00:37,520 S1: Human rights already has a student seat. 02:00:41,520 S2: As far as like the right. The ability to. 02:00:43,480 S15: Change the charge and. 02:00:44,800 S2: The makeup of the community. Got it. Yeah. The committee. Excuse me. 02:00:54,240 S15: Okay. 02:00:56,720 S1: All right, I think that's it. Any requests for agenda items in the near future? 02:01:06,130 S1: And the next meeting is. 02:01:11,090 S1: Two weeks from now. 02:01:14,850 S5: We did have. 02:01:15,450 S1: 21st. 02:01:16,330 S5: We did an interview panel. We had interviews for the full time firefighter position. We did recommend someone. So that'll be on the agenda for. If you're okay with it for the 21st 21st. Yeah, great. 02:01:27,090 S8: And I'll attend to anybody else for the represent the board at the Eagle Court of Honor is about the 17th. 02:01:34,450 S1: Yes, I will be there for sure. 02:01:37,010 S4: Do you know what time that is? 02:01:39,210 S8: 7:00. I think it. 02:01:40,370 S15: Is. 02:01:41,130 S1: You should have an invite. Also electronic invite. 02:01:45,410 S15: Okay. 02:01:46,490 S6: I'm not able to go. Sadly. I've got two tickets to something that starts at seven. 02:01:53,330 S1: It's a good reason. Yeah, it's a great event. The Court of Honor, I enjoy them. I'm looking forward to this one particularly. 02:02:02,870 S1: Okay. Any other reminders? If not, Peter's not here. So somebody do the honors. 02:02:10,310 S8: Can I look at the clock? Yeah. I move that we adjourn the select board meeting at 8:33 p.m. 02:02:16,430 S4: I will second that. 02:02:17,510 S1: All right. 02:02:18,910 Gary? S8: Yes. 02:02:19,470 S4: Finn, aye. 02:02:20,430 S1: Finn. Yes. And, Deirdre. Yes. Thank you everyone, and good evening. 02:02:24,390 S15: Thank you.