Budget Advisory Group Meeting - March 24, 2026

Uh let's see 808 on uh March 24th we'll open up the uh budget advisory group uh meeting um we have a quorum today uh which uh so we can at the end of the meeting uh deal with minutes um but we'll open it up uh to the ongoing budget discussion uh I had a meeting last night with the school committee which I thought was being recorded uh oh yeah and we're being recorded also

um good discussion last night with the uh the school committee um about some ideas and and what the problems are and I think we're pretty well verssed in what the problems are but uh now it it it is getting to the point where we need to decide exactly how we're going to handle the problem. It's not uh it's not really why we're doing it. It's um how we're going to do it and when we're

going to do it. And I think there's uh uh there's a feeling in town that um we can't continue to uh push things down the road. Uh we need to get a budget in line that uh that works not just uh this year, next year, but um obviously moving in the right direction after uh after this year's budget. So um what are the feelings from the meeting last night? Um, anybody come up with a

kind of a consensus of uh of how things went, what direction we're going in?

Yeah, I can start. Go ahead.

Thank you, Chris. I thought the meeting was extremely uh productive. Um, I I felt having a joint meeting uh collaborative in that nature. Um and um you know the discussion with all the different moving parts uh was extremely um positive I thought um the first time I felt that way in a long time. Um so thank you to all the committees for uh coming together. Um obviously we're still we're still a ways apart with with

the numbers. Um but I think after the uh the joint meeting adjoin adjourned uh we had some ongoing conversations um and we we turned it back to the uh school administration um to come back to us with some some proposals. Um I think I made myself clear at least from my perspective that uh you know I think we really need to focus and target on target um student instruction and those forward- facing

positions. Um, however, um, you know, I can only speak for myself. There was some discussion around whether or not, uh, we really should push forward with trying to get as many positions, um, you know, that was built into the budget and our needs-based budget versus just those positions. So, um, yeah, I'm excited to see, um, where, uh, the school department's going to come back to us

with are. That's really all I have right now. So that would be a school committee meeting on April 13th.

So we're looking, correct me if I'm wrong, um I think we're looking to do a um a Zoom meeting prior to the next meeting um to have some more discussion before we uh approve before we vote on that um the bud the final budget. Is that correct, Mr. Kylie?

Yes.

Is the school committee required to have another public meeting?

I'm sorry. Is the school committee required to have another addition? So that was the only thing that they that was that was the only public hearing.

So what's the procedure? You vote yes or no or whatever amended then it goes to the select board or town administrator per the town administrator and then you do some sort of interface and Gary and I work with it present to the finance committee and then you know you we have to present a balanced budget. Yeah. Um, and so we we work through that. But yeah, per charter, the school the school committee submits it

to the town administrator and Garrett and Gary.

And then the ultimate say is the select board essentially decides what your recommendation.

Yeah. And the finance committee.

Yeah. Okay.

So it goes to you and then you say you have to present a balanced budget. Would you would you change the school budget or would you just advise yes or no? I would advise I mean I'm not going to change it but I would advise the what we can afford right you would come back with well this is the number that we can do if I could just throw in one more thing

one of the things that I would kind of caught me by surprise was the was the number of of 4 and a.5% last night cuz I thought going into this the last number that I heard was 3.5 so yeah okay and I you know um and I I thought maybe I was on my own island and I wasn't um I missed something. But I that was to me that's very that's a very positive thing

um to you know to c certainly come back to us w with you know that kind of increase. So that that doesn't that didn't go unrecognized.

Was that the uh customer uh student facing jobs? No, that's overall budget increase.

What the tow the 1% difference between 3.5 and the So, so where did the 1% come from is what I'm saying?

We we we essentially uh we made reductions. So, we pulled all the positions on the general government side. Um we tightened health insurance based on what we got. We tightened VO based on what you know VK's assessment was about 150,000 less than we anticipated. Um, but what I will say is we're kind of at the point where we need to start making decisions because I this is it right there. There is no there is

no more money. 4 and a half% is what we can do. And so there are going to have to be cuts somewhere whether whether that is you actually reduce other departments budgets to increase the schools a little bit more whether you um ask the schools to reduce their requests there.

I I just want to make that clear that there that the money is the money 113.2, you know, give or take based on revenues, but we're not going to come up with another percent.

I wouldn't anticipate that. No.

So, I I watched the rest of the meeting last night when the the committee was deliberating on the on the new information that you had uh were provided. Uh and I know there was some discussion on I think Chris had mentioned some positions that should stay, some positions that maybe some of the group um had wanted to take out. Uh and then the the I guess it was now the administration both Jim and uh Jun were

going to work on that. Uh so that that obviously needs time to to work on to come back with some kind of you know compromise uh if you will maybe on that.

So I guess what's the time frame for that? I um is that going to be like in the next meeting or is that going to be it's going to be before the next meeting. We are going to meet going to discuss budget and that will happen probably next week.

So that will change.

So Cody, um, so a 1% change from three and a half, which was, uh, kind of a hard line from what we knew up to that point. Um, we've gotten the information back, uh, enough information that you're comfortable on the insurance side. um in whatever credit we're going to get from last year to this year with a change, a potential change in carriers or brokers or whatever you want to call it, groups.

Um and then the VO assessment came back.

Is that hard? Do we know that's hard? Yes, that's going to be it, right? All right.

So, that's built into your 1% uh also. Correct.

So, you're basically tapped out.

We are absolutely tapped out as as you mentioned last night. We're higher on revenues where we even feel comfortable going. Um Gary and I have had a lot of conversations because we're not really comfortable going this high. But so I then that's why I say we are absolutely tapped out there.

So is the 1% 1% of the 113 million or is it 1% of the No, 1% of the school budget. Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah. And and it's for the main reasons that we spoke about last night. A lot of unknowns that are throughout mo mainly the state the state budget. I mean, we talked about, you know, this deficit they have to deal with. Um, the House budget hopefully is going to be coming out within the next couple of weeks. Uh, I don't I'm I'm thinking that they're a little late with that. Um, then it's got

to go to Senate Ways and Means and then conference committee. So, we only have I mean, we're going to be in April for for all sake, you know, intent of purposes, April, May, June, unless there's a supplemental budget that's signed to carry us through the rest of fiscal 26.

the the you know the they've done that before the state's budget until they figure things out but that's not going to go away. I mean that that's something that needs to be addressed at the state level and with declining revenues you know that it's it's an issue it's an issue that could filter down to the towns.

So that that was one of the concerns I had last night with me if if I made it clear at all. I was fighting a migraine and had a little bit of nausea going on in that meeting. So I was ready to bail out. But, uh, midterm cuts, um, obviously a major concern to to all of us. You know, it's going to be that' be set up as a surprise on us. Uh, is the

state budget later right now than than you've seen in the past or are they relatively on schedule or Well, typically around this time, the House budget will get released. Uh, and from what I've heard, uh, they're grappling with this with this deficit and it's from some sources that I've heard, it's larger than a billion dollars right now. uh they're looking at anywhere between a billion eight and

plus. So um you know that's that's that's a real issue to try to solve within 3 month. Now keep in mind this is fiscal 26. This is the deficit not for 27. This is a fiscal 26 issue. So what happens between now and June, right?

Which where the budget has to get balanced. They have to present a balanced budget. And the solution is okay, do they go to the st their stabilization fund uh and risk their bond rating now even being lower or do they cut programs that that's really the only two two solutions.

So I have a couple other questions. So state aid is a variable that might impact our budget.

Yes. Yeah.

There are others. There's like um I forgot what they call the taxes we collect on meals and all that stuff too.

Yeah, that's that's more economic.

That's more an economic.

I'm talking about the variables.

Yeah, that's all local receipts. And that's why when we talk about, you know, what we estimate for local receipts.

Well, but I mean estimation is an estimation. What happens if it comes in lower?

Well, that's why we build in a buffer.

That's that's why we typically don't go above 90% of the prior year actuals.

So, you're pretty So, there's state aid, local receipts. What else? That's a very those are your you know your your your levy to an extent. You don't know what you're going to collect. Um we you know the actual tax levy.

Yeah. So we know what we're going to tax. You don't know what you're going to collect. There's there's abatement exemptions. So we we we have to put money into an overlay account and that basically is what covers those abatement exemptions. So you you could have a big year with abatements. Um you could end up in ATB with multiple cases. That's a um the tax court essentially if you have

a disagree on what your bill should be or your assessed value. So when that but that's that's typical. We always have those um and we have a really we have a pretty good collection rate but if if the economy experiences a downturn you obviously have a downturn.

That's why I'm really asking uh so all things being equal that 7% left over in the could cover what you can foresee now. But if the economy took a right a dive if it were a dive a bigger dive than what you're anticipating that might require an override in the middle of the year.

So so it is a more complicated scenario because it's almost like we have to agree on some type of contingency. Um if that happens we have to set a budget. We set the budget but there has to be in my opinion some kind of contingency. So, if we get a midyear downturn like that and we get uh you know um the state basically slashing, how how are we going to deal with that?

Yeah, I mean we're we're we're set up in a pretty good spot where um you know, when we look at local receipts, you have there's there's various categories within local receipts, motor vehicle excise, meals, there's also non-recurring revenue. So, um, local receipts that don't reoccur year year after year, we can't count on those. So, we don't include those in our estimates, but but we do get various forms of

non-recurring revenue throughout the year. So, that can help with a buffer, too. And then if it were bad enough, we you know, we we monitor local receipts in our revenue regularly. um we would implement hiring freezes, spending freezes, and if if that weren't enough, then we would look to have to, you know, eliminate positions mid year.

Okay? Just so the general public is, you know, aware that that there are uh factors that may come into play.

But even in the even in the non-recurring revenues, uh we've seen declines in that. Solar for instance, yeah, uh we've seen that uh decrease uh as those age of those panels start to you know, those panels get older, they're not as efficient. So the the payback on those panels are not there. The weather conditions are another thing. So these are all things that affect revenues. I mean every every

one of our revenue categories is vulnerable.

Yeah. But most of most of those types of things you've already built in. Um yeah, Heidi.

So hearing that, thinking about what's happening in other communities, i.e.

Middle. Um and most recently we've had we had the storm and so that created a um budget impact and how are we this year with that budget impact?

So we I mean we're we are planning to submit for reimbursement to FEMA. Um that remains to be unseen. We've submitted what we need to submit to this point. Um but Gary has the exact numbers on on how far over budget we are from snow and ice.

Yeah, we um believe the storm cost us about 850,000.

No, that that storm all the storms. Uh and um we were able actually to uh give the schools 51,000 I believe it was Jim 51,000 to pay off the school cleanup. Um but what's unique about snow and ice is that that is one of the only cate categories that you can deficit spend.

The state allows you to deficit spend in that account. So if it was a million dollars, we could it's an emergency uh situation. So uh we're able to if in fact um we weren't to make a transfer at town meeting for from available funds, we could raise that on the recap uh and include that in the schedule A.

But we are we're over by 350 about 350,000. So I don't want anybody to think it's a million50.

I'm shocked that it's only 850 because that was incredible. Um and again a plug to Dartmouth doing a great job.

There was multiple storms too.

Yeah.

Today. Yeah, we've had a couple of big storms, right? Um that's one. The other thing that I because I really look at bag as being long-term like as Chris said, we can't kick this can down the road.

Last year we kind of said we were exhausted with revenue. We're saying it again. I mean, I think we're always going to be exhausted, but I think we have to look at all sides of this coin and say, how do we raise more revenue? So, are the fees that on the that we're charging on the town side are, you know, are the fees that we're charging for everything appropriate or should we increase our fees?

um school department. I know at one point you charged fees um for athletics and and programming. I don't know if you do that now. Parking fees. I mean at one point school department had a you know are we back to that? I mean, I'm just thinking like we need to, which is a hardship on families and a hardship on residents, but at the same time, um, we got to look at something and I think we

have to exhaust all possibilities before we we say we have to go for an override, an override.

I have a question. Have we ever considered in lie of taxes for churches and things like that?

I I actually looked at that. I I looked at the list of nonprofits in l of taxes were they pilot programs you're asking to pay something because they uh derive a benefit from our services.

I I looked at Yeah. So t typically the only um payment in le of taxes you get are you sometimes you see it with um with universities where they don't necessarily pay taxes but it's typically not public universities that you see that with you typically see it with private universities. Uh solar is another one that you can do payment in taxes for. uh we we typically do not because there's a

um you can just tax them and and you get essentially the same value plus your the increase in value or the 2 and a half%.

So um we're limited in what we can you can't do churches.

I mean if if they volunt if they voluntarily wanted to I mean have we asked them?

Sure. Sure. I mean, yeah, you can. I don't know of any churches that smaller churches um in the Commonwealth that have any pilots with any municipalities.

Yeah. Private schools also. Um when I was down the Cape, uh it was Taber Academy. And instead of doing a pilot program, they gave uh you know, they gave a piece of land for the uh that they had for the police station. They would give us equipment that they've deemed that I mean, it wasn't junk. It was not usable. So sometimes that's also considered a pilot program, but for them

to just willingly want to pay a tax, uh that's kind of it's kind of they're already paying the water and sewer bills, but they are drawing on the same services as uh everyone else. So I don't think it would hurt to ask.

We receive pilot for UMass Dartmouth.

No, we do not. We do not get a pilot for UMass Dartmouth. We we get uh stateowned land um very small amount on the cherry sheet.

Yeah, I look I looked at that uh maybe a year ago. Okay.

And the number of um of nonprofits that we have, I looked at the open space um and how to derive some kind of um you know, income out of those. It was minimal. Um it was an issue that that went back to when I owned property in New Bedford. Um, I was surrounded by about seven or eight nonprofits that, you know, the budgets were probably an average of a couple million dollars. Uh,

and the CEOs were all, you know, plus plus 200, um, or at least plus one and a half. Um, it made more sense in New Bedford to do it, but there wasn't the political fortitude to actually pull it off. Uh, Dartmouth, the numbers are so small that it really wouldn't make sense to pigeon hole them into uh, uh, I I am kind of fear.

How could the numbers be small on that um on the Catholic churches in Dartmouth and on the um uh the Quaker school? Got to be. I mean I mean so we would we would have to approach all all places of worship and not um discriminate you know a certain schools too private schools. So the challenge is is there's no legal requirement, right? And and they're not looking to come in. They're not looking

to get something from us. So there's no leverage from the towns and but they get they derive services.

Yeah. But we but but we have to provide those services.

I know. But you know, Brian, it's a it's a try. I get what you're saying, but but right from your from your point of view, if somebody knocked on your door and said, um, you're going to get the same level of services, but I'd like $1,000 a year or you don't have to.

It would depend what it was for.

That's a fine line, Brian.

So, very often all it takes is for someone to ask. Um, there are people, well, there are companies out there that will give money. I don't know that the schools or the churches would. Um just curiously when I pay my tax bill I have little flyers that says give to the veterans, give to the cemetery department. Does that generate any revenue for them?

Yes. Only for the only they have funds that they they they spend that money on.

So um so I mean there is a example of if you ask you actually get it. I when I was paying my bill in January I was like maybe the school should have that in there.

not that it would uh garner much. And I did wake up this morning thinking, "Oh, this is why towns um get casinos because there's really nowhere to tap."

Um and to your point earlier, yes, the schools do have fees. Um I don't know that we can up our fees because it does discourage students and it's an an unfair playing field. Although we try to allow for students who can't afford to have a fee waved.

So let me go back to something you mentioned before some kind of recommendations that are going to be due for submission to the select board. Uh could something like I don't know if I'm if I want to push it but in lie of taxes be on there to explore possibly doing.

Yeah absolutely. I mean if that's something the group wants to explore um and you know that might be something for the economic development committee to to undertake and maybe we can get some volunteers to to take that because as you know staff you know staffing is minimal so to to have staff go around and right reach out to these different um entities it takes a lot of time but I would think

there's enough money rattling around you get at least a half a million or a million. Well, one point on that, Brian, is that in New Bedford, they they wanted to try and get a group together to handle some of the things in the downtown business business district. And what they did was uh they they drew a circle. Any of the commercial entities that were in that circle uh would come

to meetings and they would discuss what kind of services they would get from a fee in lie of taxes. Not in lie of taxes, actually on top of their taxes.

So it was a voluntary fee but they you know they would go to these meetings and um I was surprised at the number of nonprofits when we started to talk about payment in lie of taxes. So that brings in all the nonprofits in that in that circle. Uh there were a lot of them that had agreed that if we can have one maintenance person going around cleaning up the downtown that would be paid out of this

group. uh if there were a person yellow shirts walking around downtown. I can't remember the name of the group that does it, but they've done it in New Hampshire and in um in Vermont and other states in certain towns and they um they have maybe a security person um a tour person and they pay the salaries out of this group. Um and there were a lot of uh commercial entities that actually pay

taxes already that were willing and contribute to that group and also the nonprofits stepped up and said that we would contribute also. So, it's a valid point. Um, I think, you know, maybe it's something that we we continue to um to look at because, you know what, we're we're at the dregs in this town and we have to look at just about everything.

Um, but what I don't like to do is I don't like to go after certain uh demographics um or certain um pockets of either fee payers or taxpayers and put the onus on on one group. um you got to try and spread it out as much as possible to make the impact as low as possible um across the board in my opinion. Um but um but but a valid point because u you

know other communities do it and and I think we're probably at that point.

Heidi.

Well, the reason I brought up last night at the school committee meeting the um item that's going to be on the ballot about reducing our tax, the state tax, is because people need to be educated on the fact that that may feel good like yes, I'll pay less um or they'll take less from me, but it will then impact us. Like you you can't you're biting off your nose to spite your face. also the

fact that town um the town as a whole employs a lot of town residents. And so when we're talking about the need to find more revenue and that perhaps being raising taxes, it's pretty much the same thing.

You know, the school department needs more money. I'm just using the school department as an example. And so we do find we do raise taxes and it's the school department employees that are paying them. So it's it's kind of you know robbing Peter to pay Peter a little bit.

But um I think we have to exhaust all possibilities and so I'm I'm looking at all the other fees that we charge. You know trash. One of the things we have to be mindful of is with the fees um there was a a Supreme Judicial Court case um in 2009 and any fees have to pass a three-prong test in Massachusetts and that is is the charge for a particular service is the charge

designed to compensate the government for the cost in providing that particular service and not raise general revenue and is receipt of the services and payment of the charge voluntary. So you can't raise, you know, so for instance, we can't raise building department fees to generate revenue for the g for the school department.

But you could say the value of what you get for police, fire, and all this other stuff is I wouldn't pass the three-prong test. It has to be it has to be directly related to the cost of providing that service.

Well, then how how do other places get away? I'm not ask in Massachusetts. They don't they get challenged. my previous community, we we had a um a fee for basically if you were doing a large scale soil remediation project, removing soils from the ground, we had a a tax, a fee so many so much per cubic uh yard of material removed, got challenged, and the court said exactly that. Didn't pass

the three-prong test. What service was the municipality charging charging for in that fee? We said we had engineers, we were overseeing the project. And they said, "Okay, you can charge those costs, but anything beyond that, you cannot use it to generate revenue for the town as a whole."

I guess I'm thinking about specific departments, the beach stickers for parks and wreck, like what, you know, um the fees at, you know, like the trash fees, revenue for DPW to pass to pick up our trash. like I'm looking at, you know, specific and not general government. Um, and I don't know if the fees that we're charging have passed the three-prong test in the building department, then we can't look at those.

But fees in other departments, could uh that help? I mean, and I guess we'd have to look at what do we what does it cost us to use the beaches um or the other recreational um areas we have in town. And I mean I'm you know is there a cost? I'm just thinking we have to just look at every possibility and also that then sends a message to the people that even though

we are so consumed by this topic have no idea, aren't watching our meetings, aren't reading the paper, you know, are just living their life and um don't know that we're really h, you know, have a conundrum. Gary, can we get um a list of fees currently service directed fees um that the the departments are charging right now uh to um at least have a discussion about exactly what they are, how you

know how long has it been since they've changed.

Um and um service directed though I I agree uh Cody that um you know blanket fees are not going to be uh are not going to work uh to help us out of this.

Chris, go ahead Chris. I certainly see the, you know, the point with fees and having and opening it up, uh, and looking at exploring all possible areas, but at the end of the day, you know, in the back of my head, are fees going to fix our structural deficit?

They're not, you know, so it's certainly worthwhile.

I agree. Let's put it on the table for the public to see and um, for us to discuss, but at the end of the day, I I don't personally see fees as as a fix.

Yeah.

To to the problems that we're facing.

I don't either. I do remember though when we shut street lights off and the outrage Yeah.

that came. though.

Brian, yeah, I was just going to point out that um if you look at the overall, which I did using 351 form out of uh uh Department of Local Services, the structural deficit is running, if you add both schools and non-schools, if you add those together for the whole town, it's running at 3.3% per year compound average going from 2014 out to a projection of 2027.

None of this stuff is going to things like fees, they're all going to be incremental.

They're not they're not going to fix the problem.

Uh I think ultimately what's going to have to happen is we're going to have to increase taxes either this not this year, I guess, but maybe next year or maybe we're going to have to increase through a Proposition two and a half. Um and maybe a second Proposition 2 and a half two or three years down the down the pike. Uh, but none of these things are gonna fix that structural problem.

Problem.

Yeah, Gary.

So, so um I think last night when I talked about sustainability, I was talking about um revenue sources that would either hit our cherry sheet for the long term or um us being becoming more efficient. If you look at the cherry sheet, and we'll go back to stateowned land for as an example. Um, back in uh we're getting about 800,000 I think it's stateowned land. Uh, and I'll only give

you this as an example. Uh, the town of Westport back in 202 um 4 petitioned their state legislature, the the senator to relook at Horses Beach. Now, they were they were getting around 7 800,000.

He petitioned the legislature. he got an additional um our now it's up to 1.1 million. So the difference of two to 300,000 forever on the cherry sheet coming in. We have a 500 acre preserve Lloyd Demer that we're getting $800,000 for. If anyone here owned a 500 acre preserve, you can guarantee that the value of that property would be more than $800,000.

484 Gary for 27 for 484 for stateowned land, right? That's all stateowned land. Right.

So you're talking about transportation, not just you're talking about the transportation pieces on Route Six.

You're talking about Lloyd Deism, you know, UMass Dartmouth has some facilities. Uh so my point is I think that, you know, our representatives need to now stick up for Dartmouth and go, you know, we did it for Westport. What what's the difference? you know, we're sitting on a lot of stateowned land in this town and that we're not, in my opinion, getting reimbursed for and these are permanent increases to the to

the to the cherry sheet. So, the difference, we're talking maybe two 300,000 that adds up after years.

What's up?

So, so you know, I think that's something that we need to, you know, address with them.

It and and the example is it was done for Westport for the for the beach and they added an additional $200 to $300,000 on the cherry sheet just because it was reassessed.

How long did it take? How long did it get them to get one year?

It only took them a year to get the money.

I love that idea.

So, I mean, these are the things I think that need to be be brought out and and I, you know, it's great that we want to feed people and and and we need to look at that every single Yeah, I agree with that. You know, and be part of and be part of the group that, you know, maybe a subsection of this group is a revenue um component where we look at fees across the town.

We make that, you know, make that a priority. But there are other ways that I think we can address permanent increases to the cherry sheet and that's only one piece.

Well, let's include the stateowned land then and we can we can definitely do something about what would you call that? State state owned land. So it includes Lloyd Demeris. It would include it include what's what's the financial term for it though? State owned land.

State own land.

But what are you asking them to do?

Reassess the values of our stateowned land. They they also have uh properties on Route 6.

I just wanted to clarify if Brian might have asked it. So that was done on reassessing the value based on what?

Based on the value that the state sets on on their properties. We get reimbursed for that.

Have to set up some I don't know what the formula I don't know what the formula I don't know what the formula is. We can that's what I'm trying to determine how they why they should pay.

Well, why did they do it for in one town and not for us?

That's my that's my argument. You know, why was Parson Beach reassessed? So, so we can let's add let's add that issue to the uh to the list of fees being charged, but I agree with Chris. Um, some of these things are going to take a while. Some of them are going to be uh low hanging fruit, which is fine, and we should be picking it at any point that we can. However, let's get back to the

discussion about uh this year uh the fact that we've uh you know, we we've um gotten into the middle of uh the request now at 4 and a half. Uh Jim's uh gonna go back take a look at the uh the priority list again to see if we can get um his his number uh closer to the four and a half. Uh at the end of the day, we

we all agree and we can all see that there is a structural deficit in this town and it's not going to get any better. Um we can deal with the contingencies on the smaller pieces. um if something happens midterm where the state comes in and uh and you know we get a referendum that changes the state tax then that's that could be catastrophic but we'll deal with it and

and we're going to have to deal with it as a town. Uh every single department will have to deal with that. So it it we're cognizant of it but we have to move on as if it's not going to happen and we've got to get this thing fixed.

Um in my opinion um we we have the structural deficit. We have to figure out exactly how we can get as close as we can to fixing that um given the um the cushion that our finance people need to have um and is a is a red line for them. Um so if that's the case, how are we going to prepare this town?

And um I I think one of the issues that we have is communication with town meeting. Last night I asked the question uh how many members of this parent group are involved in town meeting and a great majority of them probably 90% of them were town meeting members which is different from what I remember anyway and and correct me if I'm wrong but that's uh that's an important thing um it's an uphill battle to get the

overrides done. I completely understand that. However, th this is about our town. So, let's talk about the communication that we're going to have to have with the public about how much.

I think it has to be dollar specific to get us at least into the next couple of years. Uh, and they they understand the reason why. And but I think most of the town needs to know that we're keeping as much pressure on all of these other things as we can possibly uh keep on them and we're not spending the money um willy-nilly. We're making sure that these these budgets are

as tight as they can be obviously. Um but what what kind of town do we want to have? Um, let's open the discussion with town meeting and in the in the pre-town meeting that I think, you know, we're still on on schedule to have. I think that's going to be an important time for us to bring this information forward to those people and invite everybody, invite anybody in the town that wants to hear exactly what the

reasoning is behind our goal. Our goal is to try and like Brian mentioned um at some point we're going to need to get us back to a point where the budgets are steady. We're delivering the services that the town needs and we're not going to have to go back to the well every couple of years because it's not going to happen. We need to make sure that the number that we pass at a town override

for operations is set. They know exactly what it's going to be and this is going to cost them to get this town on a much more solid footing knowing that we're going to have uh those uh those debt exclusions coming forward also. Um so we need to we need to get to the to the heart of this discussion about how we're going to handle this going forward.

Brian, so I think u along those lines, what we first have to do explain to the town what a structural deficit is in some sort of presentation. And I think the second thing and and it's composed of two things. it's uh school services as well as non-school services.

And the second thing I think what we have to do so that states what the problem is and then I think flows from that how you plug the gap over what period of time and with what sort of uh tools but I think one of the things that we have to avoid doing it is presenting it as uh who the biggest driver of those of that uh structural deficit is. So it has to

be non-school services as well as school services and Dartmouth as a whole that needs to be uh some sort of remedial action taken to mitigate. So I think one of the biggest problems we we we would have is if it came up with like looking for culprits and the schools are the biggest culprits. I think the thing what we have to do is to say this is a Dartmouth problem and we have to look at

all aspects rather than trying to hit somebody with a let them carry the can, right? So Cody, are there specific examples of other communities, right?

Why why reinvent the wheel? That have been successful uh at dealing with the structural deficit. Also giving the town enough cushion to go forward um while keeping pressure everywhere else. Uh making sure the town people know exactly how we're we're approaching these budgets. Um and that there's not a lot of fluff in them. Um, are there other can we get other examples of communities

that have done this successfully? Uh, communicated it properly and got it done because that's what in my opinion what we need to do unless somebody has we can look um the the challenge is is you either do a multi-year override in one ballot initiative or most communities are facing exactly that.

they're going for an override and if it passes within three years they're back facing the same challenges and and they're either going for another override or they're facing the challenges and making cuts.

You could do a multi-year override at one one election.

Yep. One election. You could do you say in year one we want this in year four we want this and and explain the whole um financial aspect of doing it that way.

Exactly. Yep.

And then the actual the actual overrides kick in on the years that you specified.

Correct. The impact isn't all at once.

It's all has.

So Jim, I mean obviously you're in the the thick of it, right? Um are you hearing any examples from other communities that are faced with the same types of situations that have been successful?

Yes. Yeah.

All right. Um can you expound on it?

Yeah. I mean, there's there's more and more communities that have been undertaking overrides. I think we've talked about that before. Um, you know, I think from there's there's has to be some some sort of base in the community that um helps promote the override because you can't use public resources to promote an override, right?

So there's very specific um like this group cannot use any public resources to promote an override. They can give their opinion about um supporting an override, but we can't make copies and hand out flyers. We could we could publish information on websites for people to to view. Um, but it it's strictly we're limited to strictly as a body strictly uh information. So the the most successful uh overrides tend to be the

ones that have sort of a grassroots group in the community that that help um promote the effort. And that's and it's a lot of work and it's, you know, got to be from people who, you know, they're not getting paid to do it. there that just want the community to be uh you know a better place to live. So So do you guys concur with that that there there can be no public funding

for the communication? Okay. So just so the public and I want this you know I've got an audience that needs to know this stuff. Um we can collaborate with groups in town. I would assume we can make available um a information information well actually not even the information but we we can uh provide venue for discussion I would assume uh I i.e. the pre-town meeting get together, right? We can do that. Um, so so there

needs to be a grassroots effort basically, not just for the school department either. And this this is going this is going across every single department in this town. Um, so it includes the schools, but it also I'm I've got a major concern with the with the debt exclusions and what it's going to cost the taxpayers in this town going forward, but we need to get them done.

Ryan.

So, I would just point out too, I mentioned uh 3.3 as the total for the town, but if you break it out into school and non-school services, uh schools are 3.8 compound annual growth.

Uh but all but uh non-school services are 2.65 according to DL Department of Local Services. So, that's still that's part of the structural deficit too. It's not just schools.

So, that's an important it's a very important message to send to the town that it is not just the school department who is above the two and a half%. Uh, it's just about every it is everything else.

It's it's everything else. It's every department in the town. Um, and then you send the debt in exclusions into it and forget it. This is just operational.

This this debt uh this uh this structural um deficit is just operational. Um, it does not include some of the other capital projects that we have to go through and like feel like I'm beating a dead horse with that, but it is what it is. Jenny, I think the timing has to be incredibly careful given the um tax increases that people are going to face with these capital projects. You

can't It has to be clear. I'm not suggesting that it hasn't been clear, Cody, but I think they really have to understand what that's going to cost them as a individual. That's the only way it hits home. Um is what it's going to cost them to do these um different debt exclusions that will be proposed in the very near future before you start dangling an override out there because you'll just get people will just put

their feet down firmly and say, "I've had enough." They have to know they have has to be a little bit more gradual, I guess, to put it in a nicer way. They're not going to like it all at once at them.

All right. So, so let's talk about the timing of it, right? Uh if we can get through this budget cycle, um with whatever cuts we need to make in order to get it done on top of the savings that we're getting from the insurance side, um then what is a what does an override schedule look like? How how much time do we have to communicate this properly? Make sure that people are all

aware of exactly what we're up against.

What are the values? Well, we don't really know the values yet. We wouldn't know what the the dollar amount of an override would look like and how it would translate to the individual tax bills yet, but talk about that.

We did see the presentation on long-term capital plan, right? And it is going looking for a debt exclusion in FY27.

So, next year we're looking at going in that and that's the school roof. There's three things.

Um I can look back at my notes.

The school roof, potentially the stadium, and the high school track, right?

And the high school track. So, we already as far as some long-term capital, long-term planning, they gave us this group of projects.

Um and the school department submitting the school roof project to SBA. We're moving in that direction. So, we know we have to build the case for to the voters for that.

Get a dollar figure on what it's going to cost all those projects and figure out whether we're going how many years we're planning out the debt exclusion.

So, what are the options on I don't know which of you is putting that up on the screen. So, what are the options for a debt exclusion? How many years can you say we're going to carry this debt or is it told to you? No, we we choose the term, but you know, this is like the first project is estimated at, you know, 13 million. You'd probably do a 10-year

term. You're not going to do a 30-year bond on on a $13 million project.

And keep in mind, the longer the term, obviously, the more you're paying interest, right?

Yeah.

So, when you uh make a statement like that, I was thinking as we were talking, there's a lot of Q&A uh sorry, FAQ stuff here uh that I think uh towns people will have to know. Mhm.

Uh so you just said one like okay we'll go for 10 years rather than 30. I think people have to know that why because your average person wouldn't know why.

Yeah. As we get closer to these we will it's it's we say about an FAQ.

Absolutely. Yeah. We have to be strategic about not just the information we get out. We want to get everything out but the timing because if we start sharing information on a debt exclusion now when we don't have necessarily nothing's been voted, nothing's been planned when the time comes it's going to lose merit because we touched on it six months ago. So, right, the FAQs, right? It's a great idea. It's

a great tool we we plan to utilize for a lot of these things. Um, as we get closer that we're there because, you know, if someone gets that now, there's no vote, there's nothing impacting them, it's going to go right in the trash, unfortunately, for most people.

Yeah.

I think too, a big piece of um trying to do a successful override is what are the ramifications if it doesn't pass? you know what what are the results of you know less teachers less potential um you know police officers on the street so there's an impact and I and it's not really a scare tactic but I think the residents would need to know that you know that that the services would get

reduced if in fact an override doesn't pass and that's usually a component of uh successful overrides the town of Hingham I just looked at the town of Hingham had a successful override in FY24 and if you go on their website you can see exactly how it was all laid out but I agree with Cody I think there almost has to be an override committee if you will, I want to say like another committee, but a committee

that's set up to to discuss specifically and override the time frame and but that can't be done with grassroot people doing that, right? No, it's going to be its own.

But I think I think one of the issues we have here is to make sure that uh if we appoint a bunch of committees, they report I'm going to say it to us.

Well, grassroots, you wouldn't be able to tell them to report to anybody.

Well, but that's going to be that's going to be a problem. We got to Well, you got to figure out we can invite them.

If we had a grassroots group right now that said, "This is what we like to see on an override in 2027 or 2028."

I'm talking about appointing committees to do work.

You can't have no just talking about who was talking about appointing a committee to I mean, I think this this group a lot of communities will appoint select boards will appoint an override study committee for for factual information. Here's what we need for an override. here's what the impact to residents will be, so on and so forth. I don't think you need that here. I think that's what this group

essentially could do.

Yeah.

Um and then and then you just share the facts that that is essentially what this group does.

What I'm afraid of is I don't know the right words obviously, but what I'm afraid is if you have a bunch of different community uh committees operating and they're all spewing out information, it's going to be a dog's breakfast in terms of what people understand. A lot of times you see that. Yeah. we can provide is data for questions that are asked.

Unfortunately, you see that overrides more often than not. You have you have a committee that's usually for un these are unofficial grassroots committees.

You usually have a group that's for it, a group that's against it, and they're spewing out information. Some of it may be true, some of it may not be true, and we can't get in the middle of it.

Well, this is one of the nuances, right?

You in order to make it successful, uh what have other communities done? How did they do it? If it's grassroots, then I got to go.

All right, Chris. Thank you, Chris. Um, you make it you make it as succinct as you can. Um, you provide them the data that they need in order to get their ducks in a row, report back to the bag committee, and then we can bring it to the town.

All I'm trying I I don't care about who they report to. All I'm all I'm trying to avoid is spewing out information all over the place with no coordination. And that invariable will lead to like things that make absolutely no sense.

Yeah. the town can only get into factual information data right?

Uh some some communities put on their website like a calculator what the impact of that override would be.

So that so what I'm I'm asking for is not that they report to us but that there's some cognizance of spewing out information that may be contradictory and confusing to the people that actually have to make the decision which are the residents of the town.

Yeah. I think one of the things that we push now and we'll continue to push through an override would be, you know, we can't guarantee the information from other outside sources is factual, but we can guarantee you that the information that we're giving you, the data that we're providing is is the facts. And so we would advise people to if they want to rely on factual information, get it directly from the town.

Yeah. Okay. Some way just be cognizant.

I think we're also up against it with social media. Between the letters that I've received on the regarding just the school department budget and what I've seen on social media, both have misinformation. Not all letters, but some have misinformation of how we um craft a budget. And on social media, there's misinformation. And unfortunately because there's no factchecking um it's out there and people read it and

people share it and it just perpetuates um this misinformation which is unfortunate and and will will be the death of us.

I mean, unfortunately, like Cody had mentioned, there are groups out there once that decision is made that are pro and that are for for an override and against an override and the push is usually somewhat equal in those um in those realms, but we have to remain neutral. We have to remain just fact driven in.

So, you said the town of Hingham basically laid out how they did it. They they they no they didn't lay out the well on their website if you go on their website it shows um why what the need was you know it showed uh all data driven uh a calculator that shows um what you know what uh what the impact would be on the tax bill because that's really what people want to see they want

to see what the impact is going to be to me or to a to the residents and then uh they were successful I think in FY24 they passed maybe uh but there are other successful communities well I was just going to say as we get further into this it might be possible to go talk to them or ask them to come talk to us about what they did the town because we had we had some guy

from Franklin show up one time uh who was Franklin Mass who u I for what the subject was it's the charter oh it was a charter yeah and he came in and gave us a a talk about what their experience was so Jenny when uh can't remember when it Last fall, the uh statewide finance committee group, Gary, you probably remember the name and I only remember the acronym that Terry and I went to. There was a

session on different towns and their experiences with overrides. It was interesting. It's easy to get someone to come and talk to us. I will say in that particular presentation, I think they had four people on the board that talked about the overrides in their specific towns. And I think um pretty much all of them had failed sadly. Um but you know they gave a big long discussion about it

and there was one town and actually the woman sat at the table that I was at that they had been very successful. It's not surprising though the town of Brooklyn because apparently they like to throw money at things um and have it I guess. But other than that, it was very informative to understand the struggles that these towns had taken to put forth an override in their communities. So

anyway, my point being, Brian, it is easy to contact someone to find out those towns and contacts.

Some some communities do annual overrides just for capital. They'll go to town meeting, get the override pass.

No, like the Andos of Andoveros of the world, those sections around uh you know, Boston, they do that as a cost because the residents are used to that.

The struggle is with an override that hasn't happened in since 200.

What do they do with that? They they use the override if they need to.

They put capital items.

Oh, they actually use it specifically for you can do what we use free cash for.

There's there's three there's three forms of overrides in Massachusetts.

There's a debt exclusion, there's a, you know, Prop 2 and a half override, and then there's a capital exclusion, which is a one-time cap um override essentially to pay for a specific product. So, we need a million dollar high school track. You can do a capital exclusion as a one-year tax to buy that one thing or do that one project.

There's a website, Gary, you might know it or Cody, you might know it, that lists all the overrides.

Oh, yeah. Yeah.

Done by the state, you know, successful revenue and specifically what they were for.

Just for information. So, I just want to also mention that right now as a town, we're kneedeep in this 40B projects and there are groups and you can see signs as you're driving up uh either direction to the town hall, you know, stop this growth.

Um, and the situation is one, we cannot stop these 40B projects. Should we deny them outright? They go to the state and the state historically has supported these projects without looking at the concerns that we might have. We anticipate that ZBA will provide comment and provide some um conditions conditions upon building this structure.

what they we want them to do and then they either take it or appeal they would appeal appeal that decision. Um on the one side this these projects will give us um some new growth tax money on this side. What will these projects cost the town for infrastructure?

How many students will enter the school system based on these projects? Um what will be the impact on the DPW, the sewer system?

And there's a balance there that um will quickly be out of balance because they will be built sooner than we will have figured out this override information and what we need. Um and we can't really anticipate um either one, but they're coming. And so while we have this discussion today, a year from now, should one of those go forward, it probably would not be completely built, but we would have a better understanding

of how else that will impact us. So without these projects, here we are sitting here saying we have some concerns.

Yeah, I I think it's it's probably a draw at the end of the day with with some of these projects. Like you said, uh like I had mentioned last night, they a lot of these uh are approved, yes, but a lot of them even after they're approved aren't built. Uh and then there are approved and then appealed that can last three, four, five years and then there are straight out denials. Um so

you can't even you can't we you know, you have to keep an eye on them. Um, but from a a budgetary standpoint, I I think at the end of the day, if one is built for say 300 units, the the cost is going to negate any income that we get on the tax base because of schools, uh, safety, um, you know, police, fire, all all the stuff that goes along with it and what

the costs are. So, and may even even a loss. Um we've got the cost of uh services study that um you know maybe we'll the um the grant will be approved and uh and we'll get a better feel for exactly what those types of projects actually cost the town uh versus the revenue that we're able to bring in. Um but you know it's something to to keep an eye on but again completely out of

our control. So th this year you know um we still we you know Jim's going to go back we've still got to get through this year. Um, so I I don't know what we can add at this point uh other than the fact that in my opinion, we need to get through this year. We're not going to get an override done in the spring.

That's for sure. Um, and but but we we have to start marching down that road. I I personally would um we we'll make a couple of calls to see if um you know grassroots effort is something that uh there's an appetite for um but uh you know you have to you have to find the the right group and and they have to use the facts.

I think grassroots we already have a constituency that spoke last night at school committee that I assume would be on the pro side.

Yeah. But they have to be organized.

They have to be communicative. They have to use facts. Um, and you know, in in my opinion, it can't be just from the schools. I I think there has to be a level of um, you know, um, representation from uh, you know, a higher level from from the town level. We we as a town are in control of how much money we're going to assess our taxpayers. That's it. Um that includes the schools, the DPW, the

police, and and everything else. Uh we have to include the fire. We've discussed that. Um you know, all the other services that people pay for. We can look at the fees. We can look at the assessments on property. They're doing that now. We're making sure that we can get what we can get fairly out of every single taxpayer. Um that's something that, you know, maybe was overlooked uh

a little bit. Um, we need to tighten up those ranges on uh on assessing uh some of the property owners. We need to look at the commercial side. We need to make sure that the commercial base in this town is paying what they should be paying fairly. Um, a lot of people have gotten away with with a lower number and it hasn't been challenged. We're here to say, and I'm here to say that we're

challenging those values. You know, something uh Randy brought up a while back uh which we can include in the in the fees and the open land um uh protected land uh survey or stateowned land survey um is is something that he brought up. I don't even know if we're looking at it now, but um you know, Home Depot and Lowe's, they bring their product out on the sidewalk um in

they're not assessed a fine a fee or or a tax on that space. you know, we've got the box tax, uh, but are we getting what we can get out of, uh, the sales from all of this other open space? Um, you know what, that could be a considerable, um, amount of money, but again, it's not going to it's not going to impact our numbers this year. Um we we need to get

these numbers as close together as we can possibly get again in range for their uh level of comfort in a finance area uh to make sure that we're not crossing the red line. Um and then we need to communicate properly with the rest of this town to make sure that an override, an operational override is is um is going to be good for the town.

What kind of town do you want to live in? Um I think we're all kind of moving in the right direction. and it's just a matter of pulling the trigger and getting things done and getting them on way. Um, so, so how do you visualize uh this conceptually? Uh, there's the operational point bit that's going to affect the residential tax bill. Then there's the debt exclusion things that's going to impact I don't know how you

build that.

And then what else? There's a third one, isn't there?

those.

Oh, sorry. The um enterprise fund funds that's going to impact how much people pay out. So, I think at the end of the day, I'm sorry I haven't got everything. I think what we need is a number that has the operational budget, what supports that, uh what how that's going to affect my tax rate. uh how the debt exclusion is going to affect my tax rate on an annual basis and whatever else is going

to affect uh what it costs me to live here in town and enjoy the services.

Yeah. And then in the interim, we're looking at all the fees that are being charged in the town and and anything that that is a fair uh a fair value um charge for the services that are delivered. Um and then we make the presentation. If it fails, it fails. But I don't I don't think it's going to fail. Uh honestly, I I think, you know, if if you present it properly, uh it's done right with the

right numbers that people are fair in this town and and they know I we can't go to the state and ask for extra money in chapter 70 or 90 because they they all look at our tax rate and they say, you know what, you know, you're not taxing your people high enough. And we we've kept it down as much as we can. Um but you need to run the business also.

And if you explain that to people, I think they I think they step up and they realize it. But they need to know exactly what the cost is going to be for them individually. That's an important thing. Uh getting back to what Brian was kind of alluding to, they need to know what the what it's going to cost them.

Yeah. I mean, you're you're up for a challenge particularly where it's all hitting around the similar, you know, same same five years or so. I mean, this is just the debt exclusion portion for general government. So this doesn't include um an operational override. This doesn't include any fee based enterprise fund projects. So this doesn't include water, sewer. Um so that you can see the

projects funded would be potentially a recreation center, the high school roof, COA renovations, memorial stadium, high school track, replacement of the middle school, whether it's the new middle school or a high school, and then as you work over the next 20 years or so, replacement of the elementary schools.

But what you see is, you know, there's a peak in 2050 when you have um the debt from essentially a middle school and two or three elementary schools and the average taxpayer is paying an additional $1,400 a year on today's dollar just for debt of general government.

And even even if you look at Sorry, that's for when you say that's not operational. That's no that this is just debt for for those projects on the right, primarily made up of school building projects. But I think the the biggest piece is when you look at 2030, $617.62 is the average impact. Um that is for pretty much the the high school roof, the high school track, Memorial Stadium, and a middle school replacement.

My first reaction to that is it seems reasonable.

Yeah, but you're you're right. six, you know, $620 approximately based on the average tax bill isn't terrible, right?

Taxes are already low. Now, I add in $5 million operational override. I'm just throwing numbers out there. That's going to cost the average taxpayer um right around $350, $400 a year. Now, if you have P water and sewer, you're looking at 30% rate increases around that same period to pay for those capital projects on top of your trash bill, on top of your fire tax, which is separate and not

included here. Well, but I think you have to we have to provide the Oh, absolutely. That's all we can do is provide the information.

The facts are the facts.

So, Corey, uh, good data in 2028 where it says 9856.

That's just based on um the high school roof, the track, and Memorial Stadium.

That's that $13 million bond.

Okay.

To based on a 10-year term, um, it's it cost the average taxpayer that about $100 a year. So would you uh conceptually do you when we do something like this uh do you present each one of those projects separately with a number or do you lump them and we'll have to talk about how we want to do that because we we also need to be strategic about how we borrow because if

we borrow for uh we wouldn't be able to find a decent term for any a million dollar project right so we're not going to be able to borrow for that the the larger the dollar value the better terms we're going to get when we borrow So we would we would look to probably lump them together.

Jenny, but what happens? So the reason behind my my question on this Oh, sorry. Did I No, go ahead.

I was going to say how there's no way for a if you if you didn't lump them together. Sorry. If you separated them, there's no way for the taxpayers to decide, okay, I want a stadium, but I don't want a whatever.

Yeah, that's one of the challenges. will need to look to but then you then you face the other challenge where if when some pass and some don't pass um it could throw off the whole debt schedule right yeah so and if they vote against the roof more buckets and more problems I mean potential of mold sorry lots of problems later um I just wanted to make a comment that

I think we have to be sensitive to these tax increases we can't be casual when we say it's only. Maybe everybody in this room is can say that. Oh, it's only whatever. But there's a lot of people in this town who live on the edge and we must be sensitive to their needs, wants, and the fact that it's struggling for them right now to put food on their table.

So, we have to be cautious and concerned for these people in this town. And it's more than you may think.

It's a third. Yeah, it's a third. I I completely agree. I mentioned last night that in my opinion, what we need to do is at the end of this try and figure out exactly what the exemptions are going to look like um for uh uh for seniors especially. I don't know if we can build in some kind of protection for um a lower income. Um but the average uh you know the more

wellto-d do I have to have to take more of the burden than uh than the bottom because I I completely agree with you that it's raised it thin for a lot of people in this town a third of the town.

So, so I I know I've brought this up before, but from the a different perspective, I've I've said that I wish we could uh tax second homeowners more, and I've been told no. But if we do an override and we're looking for exemptions, you could have exemptions for yearround residents versus second homeowners, and it wouldn't be a tax specifically.

I don't think we can do that. Even the exemptions that Mr. O'Neal was talking about you can do that it's controlled by the department of revenue.

Yeah. So even Yeah. Even the exemptions that Mr. O'Neal was discussing. I don't think we can do most of those. Um because all the ex municipalities can't just come up with their own exemptions.

They have they have to be approved by the department of revenue. And so a lot of those are so maybe an expansion of the ones that we currently use potentially. But and even those we the department of revenue only allows so much on those exemptions. If we're maxed out of those, we the town can't um Okay.

We would have to go through a petition, a home rule petition act to petition the state legislature to essentially create special law for us to allow for additional exemptions.

So, just a question. So, the exemptions that we do have on the books, I know there's one for seniors and for a couple for veterans, those are all state-based before we adopted them.

Yeah. So, we basically just select we we vote on that option that the state offers the uh if we wanted to do anything beyond that, which which you may recall when the um exemption first came up, not at the fall town meeting, but when it came up in June, we we held off on it because we it wasn't the state exemption and we were trying to do something beyond what the state offered

and so the way it was proposed was incorrect. It wouldn't have done anything. If we wanted to do it that way, we would have had to propose special legislation. And so that's why we brought it back in the fall and adopted essentially what the state allows, which I'm not opposed to.

The only thing we probably could change is the age. Uh believe right now it's 70. Some towns reduce that to 65, but I think that might need home room petition. So uh that's something that we maybe could think of.

Uh income based and lower the age.

So the a town can determine the age versus something we'd have to research.

if it's something that can be done at the town level or needs a home petition.

Well, I I think it's something that we really have to look at. Um, you know, however we get there, I think it has to be built in whether it's not maybe it's not the year that we do the um that we do the override. Um, but I think it's something that has to be on the table because uh the pressure on on the lower income people in this town is significant right now. Never mind, you

know, another $200 or $300 a year or, you know, with some of these capital projects up to 14. Go ahead, Brian.

Uh, I'd just like one statement. Maybe we could consider going forward. I don't know when the time is to do this, but uh, we have to think, I think, uh, since we mentioned people that are lower income folks, there are other constituencies in town, seniors, empty nesters uh property owners, young professionals, whatever. Um and I think what we have to do is uh develop uh what the ROI is for

them. In other words, why is it important for a senior to have a decent um school system? Uh and it can't just be that your value of your house goes up because also your taxes go up.

uh and it becomes and for the community as your value of houses go up it becomes less affordable for people to move in here. Um so I think it's got to be each of these constituencies has got to have an ROI that's plainly stated why it's important for them to vote yes.

What is an ROI?

Return ROI return on investment. So in other words, why is it important for me as a senior to give an extra 600 whatever that was 656 bucks on debt exclusion for those school whatever those projects were. Uh um why should I do it? What does it do for me? Uh, one of the side thing, Jim, was um when I was looking at the um the open lots and recreation area and and uh pilots and

all that stuff, I was thinking I was looking at different properties and I landed on some in South Dartmouth uh on the water and did a little bit of work on exactly who owns those properties and I think we'd be absolutely shocked at some of the the wealth that we have in this town. Um, we have uh we have uh there were a couple of family trusts that I noticed um Boston hospital people

uh museum of arts people uh a lot of family money that either summers or full-time in in this town. Um and I thought of the Bronze Spiegel um thing uh gym at the high school, New Bedford High School, you know, a naming scenario. I know some schools do this. I know that uh some towns do it and um I'm just throwing it out there. You know, if we ever looked at uh naming

rights in this town, you know, uh the stadium, uh the high school, the gyms, um there's a lot of money in this town and a lot of people that have been successful uh that came out of this school system in this town in general.

Um I'm just wondering if there if there's would be any appetite for something like that. We do have things the it's the memorial stadium, the veterans memorial stadium. It was veterans when it was first built. It was the veterans that contributed to the stadium. So I mean some things are named.

Y we have the Carllin Lynch Athletic Center and the basketball court is for coach Steve Gasper. So, we have some things that are named, but I mean there there's certainly we could be looking for other places in town. Um, the school department has particularly I mean other than naming a school, which you know, the elementary schools were named after primarily people who were on school committee and um gave of

themselves. Um, I don't think there would be an appetite to change school names, but um, I mean, we certainly can look at other, you know, you know, not not to round, you know, at the end of the day, uh, you know, when you look at this this capital list, um, and these these projects going forward, we need we need significant funds in this town and and there are people hopefully that'll see this

meeting or others uh, that may step forward. I I don't know. If they're not asked, uh then I I think it's a mistake not to ask the people in this town that um that gain quite a bit uh if they would not step up. And I'm not above uh graveling. I'm graveling because we're in trouble. Go ahead, Jenny.

I certainly understand asking people for for money. That's fine, of course. But when it comes to naming public spaces, buildings, whatever, I guess I lean more towards after community leaders or those who have made significant contributions to the town versus someone who may just have been incredibly successful in this world. Of course, you can ask them for the money, but I guess I lean still

towards how we name our local stuff to those who have led us. Yes, I definitely willing to hit the lottery and willing to give back.

Yeah, I I definitely agree. I feel like we should name something after you fundraising for our capital projects. I think Westport did tons of fundraising and reaching out to Yeah. You look at DNR, Buzz's Bay Coalition, there's quite a bit of money that that is tapped and that could reduce some of those figures up there.

Yeah.

Um I think well worthwhile. Yeah, not only to those water adjacent property owners but yeah the upper tier of our community and oddly you know people who don't have money actually give a lot to charity. Yeah, they do.

And as a percentage of their wealth, they give more. Right.

Within our within our town, we have a number of um nonprofits, philanthropic organizations um that throughout the summer are having gallas or bashes or fundraisers, and there's a lot of Dartmouth residents that are participating in those. Um and we're asking them to support that and us. Mhm.

And I think there's a way to do that.

9:26.

What else do we have?

So, uh, net net of having this meeting, what's the next step?

I mean, yeah, I pull the rabbit out of the I go back to we these are great conversations to have. Um, it still doesn't fix the problem we have this year. And I I recognize Jim and the school committee are going to work on, you know, their request. However, and Jim, correct me if I'm wrong, I still anticipate it being above 5.5% because 5 5.46, I think, is your level service budget. You're looking for level service

essentially, plus those studentf facing positions. So, I anticipate you're going to come back with something between 5.46 and 6.85.

That's less than the 6.85.

I I don't know. I I mean I think that we understand the situation and um you know we're going to bring it back to the school committee and and try and work through it. And so I I I wouldn't assume that but um I think there are varying opinion opinions on the school committee. So, I mean, I certainly can't speak for them and we haven't done the work yet because, you know, we're only a

few hours later than when we had this discussion last night. So, um but but we're going to do it and I'm hoping we're going to do it um early next week and then we'll we'll keep you posted, but we're going to we're going to try and work through this.

Right. So, go ahead, Brian.

Uh I was going to say maybe what um when's the next meeting? On the 14th.

14th.

And when when do you have to when do we have to do something with the select board? What date is that?

The select board is going to be voting their budget the first week of May.

The whole war I get. So we have to put something together to show the select board that we're doing we're going to consider certain things certain things will be accomplished by the school budget but uh going forward we want to look into various areas. So is that that would be so maybe we have to have a meeting on um things like we were discussing generally today like funding uh having um

like the Brian O'Hare Memorial Stadium uh and all that and all that all that stuff have all that have all that have like lists of all this stuff we're going to explore going forward if yeah in and if in the interim if Gary could put together the um uh if he's got time between now and then a list of the fees being charged uh listed out um that would be helpful also we'll take a look

at that I mean some of these things we can do uh in tandem I think but I mean so the next meeting we would what well let's see between now and the next meeting so our next meeting is April 14th school committee will have voted on their budget April 13th.

FINCOM will you have met with all departments?

Yes, correct. So, what we'll do next with the fincom is uh we're actually waiting uh on Thursday Cody will update the group on the debt. We haven't we haven't had that for the fin.

That's Thursday the 26th. So, March 26.

I'm just thinking timeline. So, March 26 fin meets and discusses what we're doing the debt schedule that's been presented to the uh select board.

And then and then the next meeting after that now we're in April. Typically the the so April 2nd because you're meeting every week at this point every Thursday. So we'll we'll now typically go over the budget start reviewing the budget. Uh not to say that we can't review other departments. We can um and then they'll be looking at their uh also their putting together their uh letter to town meeting.

So but that's really what's holding it's really not holding up, but that's really what we're waiting for is for this conversation to to wrap up.

Yeah.

If you will.

But that how does that Well, sorry. I know that's part of it, but I'm envisioning like a list of this is what we're going to investigate.

Communication with town meeting.

uh an opinion on uh what the um what the total cost will be for oper operational budget going forward. Uh not solutions but a list of things that we will investigate that lead to a solution and probably uh fiscal year 28 or lead to a but but I think too I think I want to credit best. I'm not sure if it was best but someone mentioned the other thing.

So we have um rates going up um water and sewer because of the work that they need. I think we need to look at that as well. But we need to get sorry we need to get as I understand we need to get a list potent potentially a list to the select board with some kind of statement about the budget for for 27 what we agree it's essentially we're going to agree uh and

then what we're going to be working on going forward into 28 by some sort of categorization.

That's what I And then that that seems like it's manageable for the time we have to get something to select vote.

Yeah. Yeah. But then after that, we have to get into the nitty-gritty of what we list to give to the select board for this go round.

But having said that, I don't even know how we would we have to break it down into headings for each of those columns unless what we're going to investigate.

Well, I think it but you rais a great point though. It would be important for town meeting to know what bag is doing, what we're looking at.

Yeah, I think that has to be part of the game.

We're not looking at ways so we can spend more money. We're looking at ways how do we raise more money internally and you know how do we mitigate this structural so I think that would be important for them to know well what is this group doing right because we represent the town and the school department the fincom select board we're working together to solve this so I think puzzle

so I this is on the top of my head I think what we have to do first is uh ident say what the structural problem is to town to some kind of town meeting and we say and having said that that sets the problem and then when we do talk to the town meeting we say uh we give all the implications of either what we're doing what we're going

to do not do the options if you don't do anything you wind up with things deteriorating and whatever if you do uh a couple of other options things get better net it mitigates some of the problem and and to do that mitigate some of the um of the uh structural problem. And then that's what that's what our charge would be going forward is to investigate all under each of those columns fees

whatever uh what how they would we're going to investigate how to mitigate that structural problem and then come back to the town at at the end of fiscal year I get confused 27 28 six or whatever it turns out to be here's the which would include the things like having uh two overrides or one override and you know it has a number of different overrides in it going forward or what the more refined solution

but we have to do that that's I think manageable the select this will go around with the select board I think it's important too to to talk about the things that we have done right because I and I think you heard that last night that the the general public feels like there's been a lot of talk but not a lot of action when in contrast I think there has been a lot of action

and we need to make sure that people understand what that has been and this group in particular I think has actually done a lot there hasn't been necessarily a ton of tangible items but just in the topics that have come out in these discussions I think are are worthwhile um and I even look at you know fees we review fees annually with every department so something something that we can highlight is right we we've

reviewed fees we identified that can't just raise fees to cover general operating expenses, right? Because I I think that is the general public. That is something that a lot of people think just raise the fees for building and cover more cost of the school. Well, legally we we can't do that, right? But those are the things worthwhile us mentioning that we we have looked into that. We because that's people feel as

though there's just been not a lot of action and not a lot of true investigating. The there was the discussion on um you know the personal property for second homes, right? Gary and I met with a couple of people about this. There was a thought that we could could charge a flat rate on based on their assessed value. We looked into it, did a lot of research. It's it's not that simple. And so, but we investigated

it, found out that it's not feasible.

Those are the things I think to Brian your point forward is good, but then also what exactly what have we done?

Right. So what I'm trying to do is figure out how you could present that in the short term to the select board I and then through that to the rest of the town. So it would be a communications like okay first thing is explain the structural problem then explain what the potential solutions might be and then to say the rest of what we're going to do in the following fiscal year is explore each of

those potential things that might mitigate and come back and report what's needed to mitigate and hopefully have a grassroots committee that will come forward board that we can give uh factual information to and they can come up with a plan uh along with the town uh to try and figure out exactly how we're going to fix this uh so we don't have to come back every other year to try and fix the structural

deficit. Um Janine, you had something.

Um yeah, I got slightly sidetracked.

First of all, I did want to say last night, Cody and Gary, I thought you did an excellent job setting the stage for what's happening in this town because, you know, the folks that attended last night's meeting and and I don't say this in any derogatory way, were very school focused, of course. Um, and I'm not sure that they necessarily knew everything else that goes on around making a

budget. So, you really you really did a great job with that. Um, just to go with what Brian's been saying, are you anticipating something like that that's ready before the select board votes on the So, what I was thinking is if we could like the first thing would be a communications program that would include why we have a structural deficit. then explain how budgeting how the budget works

and maybe the sources of funds to to mitigate against against the structural deficit.

While you've been talking, I've drafted a sort of a column. I'm always thinking of the visual of how it goes out very much like the how the strategic plan those bulleted discussions because unfortunately I don't think people read paragraphs. I think they read sort of sound bites. So, um I have a meeting later this week with Cody and also I'm meeting um with Rachel Jessica, our new communication

person. And um want to talk about how do we get that as a visual? How do we get that to be something that goes out in the town meeting packet? What the bag has done? What we're looking at, what are the sort of debt exclusion capital projects? What are the enterprise fund projects? Um how are they funded? What are we exploring to mitigate the cost?

But we can also talk about in that what else have we explored the second homes the health benefits fees schedules and how do they how do you get involved with the QR code that they can you know I think it's it's almost a presentation that you guys made last night and we we dovetailed the work that that's being done here uh and some of the solutions that we're talking about. Uh just maybe

one last thing, Chris, before we leave.

Uh you know, these groups when they're set up in communities, the first year is pretty much exploratory. You know, um we're not going to solve all the issues obviously between now and town meeting.

But I I think that even with some groups, they don't include this information in town meeting. is like a separate mailer, a separate discussion after town meeting and getting the community engaged with like a newsletter with like um you know some kind of flyer that gets sent out so that it's really separate from town meeting because right now I mean they're getting a lot of information at town meeting. They're

getting stacks and stacks of paper. We see it sometimes they don't read you know what what they're getting. uh this is like a standalone um almost like in your face here's the here's what the issues are and I think that that's more effective you know when we do that and I think we we knew that this was going to be exploratory the first and getting information out but I think that um

having it as a standalone leading up to potentially an override or whatever that fix is uh is more um it's more visual you know you see it's it's more effective and that's only one my opinion you make a great point we are overachievers. That's why we're thinking, what can we do and what can we fix? But and I always look at the people who when they get mail from the town,

they go, "What did this postage cost in addition to?" That's why I'm always thinking, "What can we put it in?" But we could put something together that goes in to the excise tax bill.

Well, I we could we can give them information. We can't promote like again, we can't use those funds to for information. What do we do?

Yeah. We could just think we got to be cognizant. We've developed a lot of boards and committees recently, which I'm not saying is a bad thing.

Um maybe from Gary and I's perspective it is because we're here for one night.

But uh we need to work on maybe a centralized messaging because I'm just thinking even with town meeting. We want to have a letter from BAG. We're going to have capital planning information.

We're going to have a letter from the finance committee. Um so it's a lot of different Yeah. So maybe maybe the way you do it is separate this issue from the regular town meeting and go through the procedure we normally go for the regular town meeting and say, "Oh, by the way, we have to have another meeting to talk about the structural debt problem in town and whatever else we're going to do." any

so either before I suspect that we're going to not have enough time to have it before this I have like two nights left between now and that's what I was going to say. So part of it would have to be a communications plan with bullet points to whatever we give to the select board to say okay step one uh is explain the um structural debt step two uh explain potential sources of income

whatever it turns out to be. Go ahead.

Well, I think Chris and I can take any message back to the select board just like the two of you can take it back to Fincom and Bess and Chris can take it back to school committee. So, right now we may not even need something so formal.

But we but what we need I'm hearing we need something to give to them. Don't sorry what?

Yes. Imagine the fun I have at the finance committee.

I don't talk as much.

Um I just want to talk a little bit about the fact that and remind everybody that the finance committee does send out a letter to town meeting and what we've done over the last couple years, Gary, I think it has is that we our letter is separate. We decided it was best not to put it in the town meeting packet because it's a lot of paper and a lot for folks to read. So, they actually get

that mailing a few days before that in the hopes that they read that separately. But my point being is a lot of these uh items that we're discussing will be in that letter. Uh when I saw the presentation last night, Cody, it's I'm sitting there going, hm, I like this presentation. There's pieces of that that we can just turn into a letter. Um but anyway, that's that will be communicated to town meeting members

ahead of time. And we talked about a section in there being of the what the maybe the accomplishments of this group too. Yes. Just to highlight it again.

But we're still back to the point of what do we have to give to the select board um in writing and how do how are we going to draft it in the amount of time time that we have.

Yeah. I think that'll be a good topic um for the next meeting. We can really dive into that and it doesn't need to be um like Gary said, this is a a new group.

This is the first year we've done this.

So, it doesn't need to be a super robust, you know, kind of recommendation, but I think a general plan. Here's what we've done. Here's what we're looking to do going forward.

Okay.

All right. So, next meeting 4:14. Um, here's what we've done and here's what we're looking forward.

4:00.

We've got minutes to approve.

No minutes, Chris.

No minutes.

No minutes.

All right. No minutes.

Motion to adjurnn.

See you next week.

Second.

Second. All in favor? I. I.