Finance Committee Meeting - April 23, 2026

See what happens.

You name it. You're welcome.

I'd like to call the finance committee meeting to order on April 23rd. Please join me for the pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Amen.

Please note that this meeting is in person and is being recorded and I have a gavl. Thanks to Carrie Parson, I'm sitting too close to you.

That's why I'm glad I sat over here.

Yeah. You notice I'm all the way at the end just in case. Anyway, Gary, so uh thank you, Madam Chair. So, on the um war on the um excuse me, the agenda tonight, this will be the first review of the uh town meeting warrant. Uh we will go through uh the articles more high level. Uh next week, you'll have the complete warrant. The the schedule A is done.

Uh the capital requests are done. So, the whole entire package will be available next week. Now, that doesn't mean you have to vote on it all next week because you can take the next two meetings after that till the middle of May to vote on the on the and make the um your uh recommendations on the warrant. So, if you want to do them all next week at next week's meeting, we can

because it'll be ready. If you want to do half next week and then half the following week and in conjunction work on the letter, uh we can do that, too, you know. Um so, we'll go through this uh um the the warrant. So, obviously it's uh Tuesday, June 2nd, 9:00 at the high school.

Um then there's the index.

Now, um we start off with the community uh CPC um requests. As you remember, Buddy was here and did a real nice job uh explaining those uh requests. His administrative budget is here also. he had brought members in um that are spearheading a lot of these projects and going uh and seeing um which I think was great. It was one of I think one of the first times that he that the CPC did

that which helped out I think a lot with a lot of questions that the committee had um that that was really good. I commended Buddy for that.

So many you know so many uh projects.

Yes. Yeah.

Different years.

Yeah. So uh the first one let me see if I can make this just a little bit bigger here.

Thank you.

Yeah. It's that green highlighting. It's like, okay, that's way better. Thank you.

So, the first one was the um administrative budget. This is what they uh you know use to run their their um their funding source for their their uh committee.

Um uh the second one is the um housing reserve. Again, uh Buddy had uh spoke about this when he was here.

We're not going to read every single line, but we'll do that at the next at the next meeting when we vote on them.

Yep. Understood.

Sure. uh DCTV renovations. Pete um Peter Chase came in and spoke about that if you remember renovations to the building.

Um also the the the field uh the field spoke about that. Um Crapo Field. This was the uh the lighting. the gentleman that came in and spoke about the lighting and uh the cultural center renovations is there. Pauline had come in spoke about that along with the architect and then um the uh egg trust the uh funding the a trust potential purchases.

So then we get into some of the boiler plate I call them boilerplate articles uh the sale of lot funds where yet we're going to be confirming that amount that'll be ready for next week.

uh the revolving funds. If you remember, these are the like the bucket. Uh this allows them the maximum spending limit that we have to uh that town meeting votes on.

This is another boilerplate uh boilerplate item.

Uh planning, this is the capital planning committee. A matter of fact, I mentioned that to some of the members that were here. We actually met this morning. Uh we um I think it was a a good meeting. It was it it was kind of we already had already wrapped up the the uh requests. What we did was we met because there was some additional funding that we were able to free up uh

from free cash to allow um some more spending for uh the schools particularly the schools HBAC system to add to that.

Now remember this is retained earnings so this is not coming from revenues.

This is available free certified free cash. There was also um some uh a vehicle purchase for the waterways, a vehicle purchase for town hall. Uh, and uh, what we're doing is we we're auctioning off a lot of these vehicles and and property that we've had for ages and potentially going to make some money on that. Uh, there's some old Priuses that are out there, some old old items from like the water department. So, we

have that auction going live pretty soon. Uh, so that'll recoup some of the money, but that goes back into the general fund. So, all these capital purchases were already voted in about a month ago. We met again because there was some additional funds that we freed up namely from um uh you know working with uh the settlement for uh EPA and the project down at Bliss Corner. So that was how those funds were were

earmarked. So this this this is going to uh we'll have this live next week. So you'll have the the uh capital request live. So you'll see those.

Yeah. Can you the uh added capital projects for the school department?

Refresh my memory. Yep.

Where did we stand a few years ago? We were in trouble with the uh fire system and it ended up being a multi-year program. Is that all done now? Uh so what happened was uh if you remember we we established a long-term capital stabilization fund. We started funding it with 500,000. Then we got it up to a million. The schools came in with a request for about 500,000 for that

project. So that was done last year. I believe it's been completed. Uh and then we were able to put another 500,000 back at last town meeting to replenish that back to a million dollars. So that project's been done. If you remember the five districts were five district they were concerned about it and they were going to do it in phases. So we're up to snuff with as far as I know they don't need funds for

that that project's been been completed.

That was re refurbish of the uh well reinstall of the alarm system and everything.

So that yeah that's been done and they're phasing out the the use of the school choice. That was the other thing that's a process that a little bit at a time.

Um so again this is the elected salaries uh namely the town clerk um the other boards that they're really nothing this it's zero. Uh the budget so the budget is um uh schedule A is done. We'll have that next week. It's it's ready to go.

Awesome.

Yep. Um, sept sewer and septic benefits is another boilerplate uh item that we have on the uh on the warrant. Um, solid wa uh excuse me. Yeah, funding solid waste, enterprise fund. So now we're getting into the enterprise funds, water, sewer, solid waste, DCTV, and uh water waste.

So why do you have some of them coded different colors? Any particular reason?

We're confirming all this. This is so this is really anything color is not confirmed.

Next week we'll have next week it'll be finalized. So, next week you could we could vote on the entire as I mentioned, we could vote on the entire warrant if we wanted. Um, so I'm working on these now. This will be all the new the new dollar amounts.

Uh again water um, sewer, and then also we're going to, um, DCTV waterways.

Um, and then I'll stop there for a second. We're gonna um we're also gonna have a special. So, this this year we're gonna have a special. And if you remember when we if you go back a year or back in time when we had to uh appropriate and raise rates for the uh water bills, uh there wasn't enough revenue. The reason why we need the special now is because it wasn't that there was not

enough revenue. The revenue is there.

It's just the budget they didn't the budget wasn't there wasn't enough and the the budget wasn't appropriated correctly. So they should have had the budget um up to a certain dollar amount the they have enough revenues to cover that. So we have to make sure that we have those articles in place in a special so that their ability to spend up to those dollar amounts. So it's not that I want everyone to be clear. It's

not that there's not enough revenue.

It's just that we have the revenue. The budget at the time wasn't submitted. It wasn't high enough.

So revenue to cover it. special meeting happen first and then the regular meeting depending on how the moderator wants to um usually I think the special is done first or she gets up to the budget area and then she goes to the special and then cuz sometimes she'll put the budget last um depending on how fast we get through the the morning right you know um is this your working copy of the document yes

the um in article 19 the title collective um the O should be oh yeah yeah so we got to this is how to get through yeah it goes through one save you save you a step forward and then and then Anthony will look at it one more time and then it will it will come back to us so it'll be finalized next week. Um so so here we go. This so the the collective bargaining

stabilization fund uh if you remember we we have set aside about a million dollars in that account. And so what that is is for us when negotiations come up. Um I feel that we should make contributions to that account every single year so that in the past what's happened we go to negotiations we're funding this account at a large amount of money. If we keep up funding that account when it comes time for

negotiations there's at least a funding source there to tap into. Um this is in place of when we talked to the schools uh we felt it was appropriate to use some of the capital stabilization fund to bridge the gap to get them between the 4 and a half to the 5% along with the nexty of the um kindergarten stabilization fund. So I believe in that account they have about 300 to $350,000.

So they're using roughly half of that to bridge the gap. So both of those articles will get them to the 5% um budget that you know we know that they requested seven. So the compromise in between and the collaboration between both the town and the school was we can get them to to 5%. Four and a half on the town side this gets them to the additional half a percent.

And everybody was in agreement with that right. Yeah, we, you know, it's been it was a process. You know, we met with the schools, we met with, you know, meetings with with the superintendent and Jim.

Uh, and so, you know, we had several meetings.

Was it a unanimous vote from the school committee? Cuz we've gotten surprises from the floor before.

Um, it wasn't unanimous. I think it was wasn't unanimous. Was it six to one? So, we still was one person that voted against.

Yeah. But I think in generally generally speaking, I think the collaboration between it isn't what they needed. you know, they they needed the 7%. But it it I I don't want to say we it gets us by, but it it at least addresses the shorter term issue for this year, you know, and then we need to revisit other things.

And I think the way it was worked out like we we have had those times, but it's when people were not on the same page and people were being told to to do certain things rather than, you know, compromising like you said.

Yeah. So, this will get this will get them to a point where the the budget for FY27 is bal we're balanced at this point.

Uh then some personal bylaw uh changes um schedule A we usually do like the the SK we do schedule E and and things like that. We're changing some of the stuff uh uh to that. Um we don't have what they are yet. No, there's got to that's got to be filled in at the Anony's Anony's reviewing that right now. Uh this is the dog hearing officer. Um police office designated a select board

upon recommendation by the police chief.

Uh I think it I think what it does is it changes the um who the authority is. Uh you know, additionally the select board may discretion to appoint a hearing officer. So it allows the select court to appoint a hearing officer other than a member of the Dartmouth Police Department to hear and adjudicate such related matters to serve the hearing authority uh for the purposes of nuisance and dangerous dog violations.

So this is a new role for someone in the police or has it ex I don't know if it existed before.

I don't know if it's that's something we can confirm.

Um we've heard about you know select board have talked about this in general snow being removed from sidewalks.

Um I guess you know that the timeline that they were talking about was all you know you can remove snow between x amount x hour and next hour but most people are working so to impose a violation on something that can't be fulfilled by most of the people that can't do it because they're working. I think this this adjusts that.

And who is the enforcer?

Um snow shall be removed from the sidewalk within 24 hours. So, they give the 24 hours. Um, I believe it might be the select board, but who means who's going to be policing it? That's a police officer. I'm just It's not a select board member, obviously.

Who's going to go around and actually make sure they're not any reason?

Yeah, that we can confirm.

I know.

Yeah, we can confirm whether it's going to be an officer a law on the books forever. It's never enforced.

No, that's true.

At all. Never ever. I don't think anybody's ever been It's tricky to enforce it. No, it really is. You know, we create these bylaws knowing that no one's ever going to get found or in in force and usually the worst offender is the town.

So, we can confirm sidewalks in front of their facilities to go out and and and monitor whether or not somebody's serving on the sidewalk.

We can That's the same thing as contractors starting at 7:00 at 8:00 in the morning during the week and on weekends. I've never seen anybody checking in what time they actually start. They don't start.

Well, usually a neighbor will be the first one to say if someone started at 6:00 a.m.

Well, yeah. Well, yeah. Neighbors.

So, what I just out of curiosity, what was the motivation for this?

I think the blizzard and the not one could I think Brian I think namely was Route Six. It was the the the commercial.

If you think about that whole area, I mean that's it's a very dangerous area to water and some of the sidewalks get plowed, some of them don't. The state takes care of some. They don't want, you know, they weren't out there. So, I think what happened was the state actually hired a crew this year because of so much snowfall to actually remove that snow. So, they went all the way

down the left side of Route 6 from Walmart all the way to like the the pit area where uh the um the Capri is in that area and removed all that snow. So, they had a crew out there, but it wasn't getting done. So, I don't know if somebody made a phone call, if somebody complained about people walking, people were actually walking in the street.

Okay.

So, that's true. That's kind It gets to be in public. That's lifethreatening.

Yeah, we can confirm who's just a curio.

So, just a curiosity again. So, this will does this um cover sidewalks in front of people's houses.

I would say that it's it's all sidewalks because if you read it, it says street or public what it's supposed to be.

Yeah.

Road was the other place that people were worried about because kids were walking to school and there was no sidewalk.

It's very dangerous.

Yes, it is.

And then to go to the question, who enforces it?

We'll confirm that.

Okay.

The snow officer.

The snow officer.

Uh tree bylaw. The tree committee has been um pretty active with this over the last couple years. Um and uh read that if I mean I think we've had them in. I don't know if we've had uh the select had them in.

Yeah.

Talk about it. Uh the group the tree committee CPA has something. I remember asking a question about this. public shade trees throughout Diamond to provide a planting of new trees, provide high standards of care to all the town trees. Trees are valuable assets. They improve air quality um you know um storm help with storm water run bring forward and clarify some key features of Mass General law 87

to share them with the town residents and to create uh protections for public shade trees.

Is this a new bylaw?

I believe it's new. Yeah. But was there there was something in place because of the issue that happened a couple years ago in South Dartmouth.

Yes.

Yeah.

It was the planning board that I had a question about because I wanted to know if they had consulted the tree committee um when they they also have a change who's proposing. Let me see who's proposing. I think it's um the tree committee. I think there's a planning board article.

I know I know Tim Bob has been working closely. I know the DPW director has been working closely with them.

Yeah. uh over the last year or so to establish something like this.

There must have been a law in place. I only say that because of you were here for that meeting, right?

For planning board, the construction select board the select board is um uh recommending this are sponsoring it.

All right.

So, I can confirm um but I believe they were all involved planning and and uh DPW crypto ATM.

Yeah. So this if you've seen these ATMs out in um in the public with uh most mainly at gas stations um you're purchasing e well I don't know if you can purchase a diet cryptocoin but the market is so volatile with that they're either purchasing a portion of crypto and in a lot of states it's become fraudulent where those crypto machines are not really crypto machines they're take the money and run basically. So I I

don't know if there's actually been an issue in Diamond, but I think they want to get ahead of it.

Just sounds fraudulent, frankly. I mean, who goes to one of those puts money?

There are they are available.

Yeah, cryptocurrency is very scary. I my my stepfather-in-law lost $30,000 on one.

Oh yeah, that's a lot of money.

Also too, I think that back it up either.

Nothing to back it up.

Got to be really careful with that.

No standard behind it.

But they use these too for like purchase of like narcotics and stuff. you'll deposit crypto into someone's account so that way they can't trace it. So, I was just I was in Phoenix last week and I was at CVS and all these people were going to this crypto ATM and I was like they're going to to buy drugs probably because that's why this the only reason why you don't want to trade your money

and go pick it up. So, yeah, there's no there's no tracking.

There's no uh there's no upside to it. I don't know. There's no upside.

I think this just gets ahead of it. Uh so that you know it doesn't we don't hit it doesn't we don't read about it in the news. I guess um site plan review. This is uh what they had talked about last week. We're still waiting for uh Brian uh Cruz to weigh in on that. Um this is we're expanding the veterans uh this is being proposed by the board of assessors uh under Mass General Law

Chapter 59 section 5 uh on and then certain clause 22.

I think Jessica had already sent information. I'll get I want to get more information on this so we can state changed it and we're probably and we're adopting whatever change they Okay, remember last year we also did that too at there's a motor vehicle some also some motor vehicle and then there's a a couple uh petition articles uh Allen Street sewer extension see if the town will appropriate available funding

construct a sewer line from uh on Allen Street connect the existing sewer line to the corner of Sable Street and Allen Street Wesley to the existing sewer line at corner of Tucker Street Allen Street any action.

So question, having lived through that in a couple of properties, usually the neighborhood pays for it, right? So I guess the question here is what would the funding source be?

That's really what because if there's a if there's a if there's a um fee, I mean, if there's going to be some kind of fee for this, obviously there will be. I mean, reconstructing lines and it adds up. I guess you know the and I think Brian's still looking at this uh Attorney Cruz is still looking at this.

What will be the funding source for this?

Would it have to come out of the enterprise fund because it's sewer related?

Um it's a benefit sign to the people right is that's a sign to having had to pay. They want to run it down. It looks like they want to run it down the corner of Sable. The way it's written is west to existing sewer line.

So there must be a sewer line at the corner of Tucker Street. They're looking to tie in.

That's what it looks like. Tucker Street. Send this out cuz a lot of these I'm not It's either Tucker Tucker Road or Tucker Lane.

Oh yeah. Yeah. I'm going to Yeah.

Yeah. It's not Tucker Street. It's either Tucker Road or Tucker Lane. I don't understand how Tucker Street should be Tucker Road, right?

Tucker Lane cuz Tucker Lane's close.

He's looking at this.

We had to when they put in the cedar again. We tal, you know, this is former reuse of the police station.

Yeah.

Uh this has been talked about multiple times. Um, oh, right.

Reuse of the phone police station run from 21, you know, what's the makeup of the committee and what do they want to do now?

Uh, let me see. Goodness. Planning, building commissioner, planning board, town administrator, finance committee member, capital planning, and three residents of the town to do what?

Discuss the reuse of the police station.

Discuss the older police station.

Repurpose the old police station. three that have been like Sue and a couple of other people trying to turn it into I mean so there's there's different views on what that should be should be done with the police station. Some want to demolish it, some want to keep it, want to turn it into housing. And so I guess establishing this committee um is going to maybe talk about it and get into more detail. Um

I thought that was discussed two or three years ago. We were just hashing that out. It was this is a citizen petition. So somebody just wants to put it out there. It's not it's not select board. Citizen petition.

Mike G is the sponsor.

And how's that two? Is that the same one?

Yeah, this it just next page.

Mike Gagy is Mike G is the spokesperson for the Y.

And uh so let's see what we have here.

This is the asking it's like the same article the duplicated yeah that's going to come off is it like two citizens petitions on the older police station that's for the committee and the same thing committee something yeah this is I get this we got to delete this a repeat so 20 29 articles and then we have to interesting adjust it so oh that was that that I'll send this out to

so we have talking points but next week will be the final And um but I'll be sending that out probably Monday or Tuesday. We'll have that done.

You mean putting it in our shared drive?

Yeah, I'll put it in the shared drive.

Second week or third week in May.

Wow. So they can have it by me.

Oh, you mean you mean citizens petition?

Yeah.

Oh, no. That that's that's gone.

Okay.

Are you after everything?

Yeah. No. Uh what Terry was asking was um the citizens petition articles. M that's that's been that's closed a while ago.

Okay.

So, um I'll send this out. I'll send this the copy of the schedule A to everyone tonight and so have that and then next week we can discuss.

Are we going to have the selectman voted on these yet?

No. Uh May um May it's right before the deadline like maybe the May be voting on them before.

Yeah. I feel like we always do. We always do.

I want to say it's the 11th or the cuz it's got to go out in the mail.

June 2nd. I can confirm. I think it's May 11th.

It is I think it's May 11th.

It is May 11th.

It's the night before it gets They need two weeks.

Two weeks to um just two or three weeks to send it out to the public.

We have to. So when our letter when we do the letter um if that goes out the week of May 11th 11th or the end of May the end of May 11th let's say the let's say it goes out the the 14th or 15th they'll get that the week of the latest the 21st 22nd. So they'll have it in a good week over a week to read it week and a half to read it.

Good.

So that'll be good.

Okay. So, the other thing I had on now I didn't have a um I don't have a basis for the Tommy. I know Janine had some You want to switch?

Yeah.

Reigns, please.

Ideally, I can get this door.

Where are you? So many plugs.

took a few minutes last time.

It's

thinks it's displaying, but somehow it I remember last time I did this, it took a minute or two.

It did and then it just miraculously started to work.

Yeah, because it thinks it's displaying. I can tell by my I mean, while we're waiting for that to show up, um just to let the committee know, the budget advisory group has been looking working on a document uh that we're going to present next next week at the meeting. Uh it's in draft form, so the members of that committee will be able to look at that and and um you know, edit that. So, it's been good.

We're working with Brian and uh um going through some of those those items. So, right. So, uh it's about a six-page document and what it does is talk about what we've considered so far and uh what the major issues are the structural deficit uh and then um possible solutions possible solutions to that. Four options uh possible solutions um and then the idea is to finish that up with the group

and present it to the select board and then start executing. And so the idea also would be to make presentations on that interim document to this committee, school committee, select board and then make um as we proceed to make uh additional presentations to let people know what what's going on.

I know Terry would ask about it last week or the week before about the progress on that. Um and you know, usually we have a joint meeting with the select board. Uh, and I think it it'd be probably valuable to have that joint meeting when we talk about the budget advisory group and then because I have a joint meeting with the select board now and then and then have another joint meeting maybe a month later

maybe encompass all this into into the budget process like I mean obviously some of the stuff would be executed into fiscal 27 and beyond but have that joint meeting with and discuss as part of the budget the budget advisory group. I think that that like kills two birds with one stone if you will. It makes sense because everybody has purposes that'll kind of overlap, right? Yeah.

Yeah.

Can you just uh click through the displays, please?

Didn't you have to um Didn't we shut that thing off while Rob?

All I know is last time it took a few minutes and I just plugged and replplugged a few times.

Something orange just lit up.

As I said, when you see a screen like like it almost like almost pops the laptop think it's changed and it thinks it's displaying because usually this is like it'll pick it up. Um yeah. Oh, that'll be annoying. I hate to do this by theory.

No, no signal. So, something's not Is that two HD? Yeah, I tried. Maybe try the other one.

Well, there's only one on here.

It's recognizing it on your computer.

No, sometimes just reset the computer.

Yeah, sometimes we reboot it.

No, mine works.

Yeah, mine works on the screen.

You want to try?

Yeah, try.

Oh, you can't email. I said um you haven't I didn't send it to anybody.

Uh, I wonder if I can put it into the drive.

Share it that way.

I don't know if you can, but you can you email it to me? Oh, you can't email, right?

Yeah. Not from my laptop.

Signal.

Um, hang on a second. I'm just saying. So, I can't upload a file into the share drive.

Uh, I don't I don't know if you have access to Okay. I can only download.

Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah. So when we do the the letter, we'll have to do it on our own laptop.

One of us because this is signal.

I don't think it's this. I think it's the um

good. We got help.

Bring in the reinforcement.

It's a It's a PC.

It's got Yeah, it's got But it's worked before with this setup.

Yeah, it has. I tried that and I tried the um change of inputs.

It was on one before originally.

Yeah, it stayed on one when I was using mine.

Let's really quick just try to plug in yours. Make sure there's wires still.

Y if it if you think it's I have one of those connectors like you have in your if you need one. Um Janine, excuse me.

I have a connector if you need one. an Apple. Yeah, an Apple adapter. That this is a PC.

Yeah. So, it picks it up. So, the wire, the projector, the source should all be fine. So, theoretically, it could be a driver, a graphics driver on your computer.

You haven't I've switched back and forth between the two.

You want to try this one? So, it's drivers get updated all the time. That's true.

Do you want to try this one?

Very true.

It's the same as yours, but it's just a different one. Maybe yours is Yep.

Maybe yours is not working. The same.

Yeah. That's what I use at work all the time. So, could be that.

Yeah.

The end, the tip. There you go.

What's going on there?

I think I think it's upside down.

Yeah. Is it right side up?

Might be hard. Some torque on the It doesn't fit. It looks I know.

You try it. There you go.

There you go.

There's a dongle.

Wait. Well, no, not necessarily.

You think so?

At least. Yeah, it's attempting.

I could go into your settings directly in your your laptop.

Go wild. I have no secrets currently in a meeting. But anyway, what I did, it seems like it seems like it wants to pick it up, but it's not.

It wants to. So, I looked at all the charts and the graphs that we' used in the past, the past couple years, and I can show you what that was um on our letters to the town. Yeah.

Just so you can see the differences and also because it's nice to show something new.

Yeah, I agree.

I mean, a couple will be repeats, of course. Some information is, you know, has to be shown again, but I wanted you to see what we've done in the last two letter cycles. So, I made a little chart that shows that and then I went through and looked at some other um charts and graphs that I thought would be you got it. Whatever you did, it's working.

What was it then?

I'm not actually too sure.

It was Don't say that. Don't say it's your skill. It's your mad skill.

When you share screen, it's just going to duplicate exactly what's on your screen, but I was able to circumvent it by making this like a second screen for you. So, you just have to drag whatever you're working on over to there.

Unless you want to try a different Well, okay. Except how do I do that?

Sorry. Yeah. So, the mouse is going to have go up to this monitor and also your laptop screen. Yeah.

Oh my god. Are you kidding me?

So, the mouse you got to open the doc.

It's okay.

Open the document.

So, open the document and drag it over.

Drag it over to What am I dragging?

We're dragging it to that screen. It's the second screen. other ships. Uh, so you're just going to grab just like you're moving the right now. So I have the agenda.

You're generally going to for these screens, it might be to your left. It might be to your right off screen. So drag it off screen and then look up here when you're dragging it off screen.

I just dragged it all the way to the left.

Oh, there you go.

Okay. So it likes it to the right there.

Okay. That's it might have to go. Let me open up the other door.

All right.

Get some closeups. What's he going to do?

Film switches cameras. He said, "I'm going to get some close-ups of you guys."

Go running out for a drink.

This is going to be impossible.

Good job, Janine.

Not really.

I'm confused.

We're not in yet.

Oh, this is going to be for it on her screen to mess with it. It'll only be up on the big screen.

I have no control over that.

No, you don't.

You can't minimize it or maximize it, can you? No.

No.

Yeah. This might not be a good workound.

Well, I think it's hard because it's not on her screen. It's hard to display it.

I can't I can't move it. I can't computer isn't liking doing the the uh dual display, but it does it all the time. I've used it many times and now I have carries. I'm not sure.

Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. driver or such if you could share theoretically to someone else on try on their laptop.

Can you email it to maybe um Carrie? Yeah, but our email doesn't generally work in here.

First of all, I need to get Can you get my display back for me?

Seriously, cuz this I can't get into Well, shut off your Where's the Wi-Fi building anyway?

Oh, but you can't do that.

My mass email is working in here. So, I wonder if it has to do with Google and it doesn't work. See, that's the problem.

Yeah. Why? I'm able to send you mass email.

Well, we have Wi-Fi, so it went through the signal for a moment, but it's really slow.

Yeah, but it's better.

Used to always work, Janine. So, I'm not really sure.

What happened?

Not without a signal. She can't.

Don't forget, she doesn't have a signal.

If you had Wi-Fi, you wouldn't have a problem. And she could email it to you.

I mean, in worst case, I got the Wi-Fi off my phone. the the Wi-Fi works, but it's just the emails get blocked because they're getting used to work. It's not working anymore.

They can't use it for some reason with the network and I think it's because of security.

Yeah, he's a security limited lot of these websites. You guys are all right. I have aid meeting.

Well, so I have an idea that I think I can do because if I can get on my phone to do it, I can put it in my Dropbox and then email it from my phone.

Yeah. Yeah, but please we can't get emails.

I can't I can usually do it for So Janine, if you want to email it to me for next meeting so that if your computer doesn't work or email it to both Terry and I so or out to the whole group if you want.

That way one of us can pull it up and edit it.

Double check something.

Excuse me.

So you're saying you can't just email it to me, right?

No, it's another signal.

I'm trying right now.

Okay. Ironically, my UMass email works here, which is it's the only one that works here.

Wow.

I don't know. Maybe because it's a government email. I don't know. But that one's going through.

Well, a different s for sure.

Interesting.

Well, I'm trying something else, but Okay.

Put that meeting on pause, right?

What' they do in their final meeting?

Watch Janine on her computer.

Closeup, zoomed in on you. No pressure.

Very impressed. You have like four screens open.

I'm copying to my Dropbox and then maybe from my Dropbox I can email this to Gary.

Find out.

All right.

Is it there?

Oh, it's in my Dropbox.

Okay. Well, then that matters to everybody.

So, if you click on it in your Dropbox, can you send it out?

I'm working my way towards that.

Working my way back to you, babe.

Everyone all together now. Sing that on the air.

All right.

Well, the easiest one is going to be to start with the letter that I started to write.

Well, let me know if you get anything, Gary. I just sent you something box. Let me turn off Wi-Fi on here.

Okay, I sent you the letter.

All right, let me check. See,

which means you should probably take this back to it once you get it, Gary.

No. Um, went through Good.

Funny how paralyzed we get when technology doesn't work the way we want it to.

So, I'm now going to send it to Aren't I sending it to me?

Yeah, I it said it sent, but that's okay. We'll do it again to see if it shows up.

Are you sending it to Gmail?

Turn off.

Yeah. Nothing really.

No, that's the point. We're blocked.

Well, if you're slow, it's a large document. May take a while to It's not It's a word doc.

Okay. Well, it should be as an attachment. There shouldn't be a problem with this.

So I'm guessing in the meantime that did anybody look at charts, graphs, previous letter?

No. I don't know. That's a no.

No.

I do not care.

So Gary, in the meantime, I know Cody's not here, but do we have a update that you can share of any kind?

Tell administrator say a couple things about the capital meeting this morning. um in that the process has improved over the years from um you know at one time there were vehicles all over the place that weren't really being tracked that might still be being insured. um that's been cleaned up and there will be an auction to take care of some of those vehicles and to kind of firm things up and there's discussion

around in the future what vehicles are really needed and what could be shared between departments.

Five minutes.

So um so when they replace vehicles they're for example one one thing right now is the conservation department has a truck. Do they really need a truck? Do they need one all the time? as possible to share that with other departments.

So, they'll look at Cody and Gary looking at that. Um, and the the capital committee itself has really taken over the discussion on what's needed for capital. It used to be that somebody would just come in from the administration and say this is what we recommend and there wouldn't be a lot of um investigation into that and that is not the case. I think the committee feels pretty good about knowing what is

being recommended, what's, you know, being able to make decisions about what is a priority given the cash that we have available.

Um, and there were two new members on the committee, too, which was nice to have.

Who are the new members?

Oh, I knew you going to ask that, Janine. A man and a woman. A man and a woman. I can tell you that. I'm the worst. Is it Maria?

Maria Freda.

Yeah.

Yep. There was an interview process which was nice to see and that's who people who appoints requested um the the committee recommends to the board the select board and the select board appoints.

Okay.

Recommends to the board.

Okay. Uh Janine, did you want to uh do you want the laptop or No, I'll I'll type on my own. Can you just make it big?

Sure.

If we bigger.

Ah nice.

Okay. So, first of all, it's preliminary.

Sure.

Not married to it. Um, but the main thing that I wanted people to see is I wanted to come up with the what I call the key budget initiatives. Mhm.

And that's so aside from the text that's here, the key budget initiatives that I highlighted for this is obviously the creation of the budget advisory group, the budget transparency portal that'll be done via clear gov software, I guess it is.

the economic development committee that's coming, the gas utility contract renegotiation, the health insurance steering committee, the department of public works business manager, and you the wording on this can obviously be changed on any of them. And then the improved legal council process, I called it, because I we saved considerable money with how that's being done.

So anyway, those were the key budget initiatives that I identified as a way to start out with a positive statement.

I think that's that's a good idea, Janine. And I would add to that the Citizens Academy because although that's not directly related, it's a way of getting the um residents uh more educated on what we're doing, you know, what how government works etc.

Yeah. I didn't want to That's a good idea. I'm not disagreeing. I was trying to keep it to financially related.

Yeah. Yep. Which makes sense. And if people don't think that that needs to be in here, I just thought, you know, um we're always thinking about how to engage uh people.

Correct.

And the reason I highlighted a couple of those and I don't know Gary, you might know some of this information off the top of your head. So, for example, the gas utility contract renegotiation. So, there was a specific dollar amount that we saved I can get you the exact number I want to put. So that's why that's why I highlighted that because you know whenever we can put something very specific down.

Yeah.

We want to put a dollar amount. We don't I mean if we say that oh approximately whatever, right?

Yeah. We're not going to say, oh, we saved 71 on a third. Nobody's going to understand that. We have want to quantify that to a dollar amount, right? Because I've heard and I didn't go back through all the meetings. I listened to enough meetings and looked at enough meeting notes to get some of these as ideas. Um because I know it was mentioned.

Yeah.

Because I know I think it was in the joint school committee uh meeting where you and um Cody did a presentation before we got into anything.

Yeah.

That um mentioned some of those dollar savings. And the other one that probably needs um because Cody mentioned it last week, but I didn't feel like watching the meeting again. Um the approved legal council process. He mentioned a dollar amount.

Yeah. Again, um I think it was like 100 to 150,000. We can I I'll quantify that, but that's important.

Yeah. Also, on the health insurance steering committee, we talked about you have it in there, $2 million. So, that's important, right? I did have that one because it's been said enough time. And the wording is probably not That's the other thing I want to get people's just to jump around a little bit. We'll look at the health insurance steering committee text. So, it says, "A major cost-saving initiative

is underway with the transition to a new regional health insurance provider projected to save approximately $2 million annually for the town and its employees." I mean, I guess that's enough. I don't know. I would two million maybe. Oh, sorry. Maybe two million shared between its two million annually shared between the town and its employees. That's really I wonder though if it makes more sense

for both the town and its employees.

Yeah. I wonder if it makes more sense to not identify 2 million annually because that would change but to make the point that we've been trying to increase health insurance to 7525 and this might allow us to do that because I think the numbers are going to change as as we go along but that was kind of a goal that people how about $2 million initially.

Well, you could state that too. We said you could save $2 million for now and then going forward it may change.

But I think somebody may ask a question tell me what's the actual dollar amount and somebody says 75 and 25 or whatever it just doesn't really save us money.

It's just reallocating. Yeah, I think to that point after employees and say naturally um in the in the attempt to retain uh and and um attract and retain Yeah. Yeah.

employees, it does save us money, but it's really to let us do different things with it.

Yeah.

In an attempt to say it again, attract and retain employees. Retain I know you can't see it because I'm typing on my laptop. I'm I'm I'm losing because I I'm like, "Wait a minute. I forgot I had this on here." I'm like, "How come on?" So, you need to type We're looking at two different You're doing on on that version, right? Okay.

Yes, I am.

Believe me, I'll be sending this out or having Gary share it on the share drive after so you can all read it better in more detail. Attract and retain. And what did we want to say about the 7525 split? Did we?

Um I I I don't know if I would get too specific again like because that might change. I mean over.

So we don't want to say the $2 million.

I had I changed it to projected to save approximately $2 million initially.

Yeah, you can say initially. Yeah.

For both the town and its employees.

Yep.

Okay.

Some I know somebody's going to ask that question.

And then obviously I And then the gas utility contract. I know Cody had made a statement about what that savings was because it was ahead of the market increases, right? Yeah. Before what happened in the conflict. So, we'll get that number.

We want to say under health insurance a more equitable split between the town and its employees because that's more of the goal. We don't know what the figure is, but we're working towards a more equitable split.

That's much better.

Yeah. And that can go right before, you know, to attract and retain employees.

Um because that equitable split is what is going to attract. We're not being specific, but we're stating what Yeah.

the goal was is to get a more equitable split there.

Okay.

All right. I'm sorry. So, rolling back up to the top there, the budget advisory group. I took this right from our charge that's was given to the budget advisory group when first um initiated established to support long-term financial planning and enhance transparency. This collaborative group provides guidance and recommendations to the select board, town administrator, finance committee, and school committee.

This group in the group includes two members each from the select board, school committee, and finance committee.

That's fine. I think that's that is what it is.

Yeah.

Yeah. I said that's right from its sure.

And then budget transparency portal. The town is implementing a userfriendly online portal that will allow residents to clearly see how their tax dollars are allocated, including funding for public education, public safety, and employee benefits.

Do we know what the um estimated um launch is?

We'll launch that. What's the launch day? It's nice to give. Yeah. I would say before before June, before town meeting, we'll have that launched, but I do know because we asked that he's not going to show it at town meeting.

No. No. Uh so, right.

Anticipated launch. La la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la launch around June.

Yeah. Before before June 30 before June 30th. Right to June 30th. Maybe we put that in there.

You could write on here TBD to be determined.

It'd be better that way something happened. Anticipated launch could be midy year now just in case there's a hiccup in the launch just to clearly see how then we're not held to some date.

Well, so you can be vague anticipated launch mid year.

I mean I don't know if Cody speak at least some idea what people can expect.

I don't know if that we're going to be speaking about it but we might bring it up uh while we're up on stage. I think that to put something in here that says I mean I think that yeah we should have something in there that that I said anticipated launch mid year.

Yeah.

Yeah. There you go. As you can get the middle because right now we're in draft mode with that. Um and uh we had to do some tweaks to it. So uh we'll we have we're making some additional changes to it. So we'll we'll have it ready for and then the economic development committee this this committee to be formed later this year. There's my vagueness because I heard it at the select board

meeting about when uh will be formed later this year. Will focus on balancing Dartmouth's high quality of life with thoughtful economic growth and work to diversify and strengthen the town's tax base.

Yeah.

Thoughts?

I think it's good.

Okay. Hang on.

Gas utility contract renegotiation. Uh, the town secured a long-term natural gas contract ahead of significant market increases, resulting in only minimal annual cost growth and avoiding what could have been substantially higher expenses.

Yep. Yeah, that sounds good. And then we'll we'll throw it we can incorporate the uh whatever the dollar amount was.

Yeah, we talked about the health insurance steering committee, uh, Department of Public Works, DPW business manager.

The town has made key operational improvements within DPW, including the addition of a business manager in fisc year 27's budget focused on financial oversight. Hang on a second. That should be business manager focused on fin Let me switch that sentence.

um including the addition of a business manager focused on financial oversight in fiscal year 27's budget. This position supports better management of the water and sewer enterprise funds and addresses ongoing reliance on water from New Bedford.

I think that might be a little bit too specific at the end there from with New Bedford. I think uh maybe town has made key operational improvements including of I haven't even mentioned it before.

Yeah. This position supports better management of um the of water, sewer and solid waste.

Yeah.

Oh, right. Sorry.

Also solid waste enterprise funds.

Just end it there. Yeah. I mean that I think that's good.

Okay. So, oops.

And then the last one, which probably needs some help for sure, is improved legal counsel process.

Uh, enhancements to the process. I I know it needs more. Enhancements to the process for procuring legal services have resulted in reduced overall cost.

So maybe we explain in that sentence about how um the majority of these well majority the what we can do in house we're doing in house and then on the circumstance where we on the on the case where we have to talk to legal we talk to legal uh whereas before it was pretty much everybody was calling legal on an ongoing basis.

I mean I know what you're saying but how do I put that?

Yeah. Yeah. Um so he the process has always been there. What's changed is the enforcer, right? We tighten, we tighten the He's tightened it up.

Yeah. So, nothing's, you know, there was always a policy.

Yep.

Correct.

For the administration to sign off um still under enhancements.

Yeah. Enforcer. Well, it's improved legal counsel process. It's not an improved process. It's strict adherence to the existing process. Right. That's what I'm trying to get.

No, no, that word is wrong. But what what would you call that heading? I would say enforcement.

Enforcement. Yeah.

Yeah.

Yep.

Or monitoring. So maybe not as harsh as enforcement, but monitoring.

Monitoring. Yep.

Improve legal council monitoring.

Oh, okay. Yeah, there you go.

Yeah, that's a good point, John. I mean, yeah. No, that makes sense.

Yeah.

Monitoring.

Monitoring.

All right. So, the sentence under it though, the what's a better way to say that? enhancements to the process for procuring other than the fact it resulted in reduced overall costs and then there'll be some type of dollar range or amount how we want to say I don't know it's really an enhancement it's more yeah that's what the sentence is not why I say more more efficient something like the town is making a the

town is focusing on solving matters in-house before going to outside counsel and then if outside counsel is warranted um an approval process um is in place to I don't know something how to Yeah. Oh, the approval process and is is enforced.

Yeah.

Now you have to repeat that slowly while I type.

They rewind the tape and remember word for word.

Rewind the tape. Um what I said the town is focused.

Yeah. You said the town is on sol was solving matters in house.

Mhm.

Yeah.

Prior to conferring with outside counsel prior to engaging in outside legal services.

Sure.

Something like that.

There you go.

Right. Because it's more than just town counsel.

Yeah. Labor council. It's it's the whole process. Right. So we're not singling out council. Right.

even though that's where the bulk of the expense is. But so I'll just read I know you can't see it on the screen but the town has focused on solving matters in-house prior to engaging outside legal services and this has resulted in reduced overall costs and when we get some numbers I'll add it.

Sound okay?

Yeah.

All right. What do we want to say, Terry? You brought this up. So, Citizens Academy, what do people think about that? The reason I think it's important is we're always talking about how to get the word out.

Even though it's not a f may not be a financial accomplishment, it's an accomplishment. I think that Yeah, it's important.

Yeah. And we've heard it from a lot from, you know, town meeting members, you know, want to be more informed and uh like Brian's mentioned a lot, you know, getting notification out to town meeting members. some of the people I believe that were there. I'm not sure if there any town meeting members might might have been, but um they may become town meeting members, right?

After they if they have an interest in this.

Yeah.

But I just wor I mean should that be uh we did not I know come up with that, you know. So we're tooting these and it's not ours. Yeah.

Really? I mean but it's financially related. That's not financially related.

So, it's proper to bring up anything financially related.

That's financial. So, how can we bring that up and Okay. So, hang on.

Step on anybody's toes.

May not be a budget initiative.

Right.

Well, let's go back. Gary, can you scroll up to the very top?

Yeah.

So, once again, this is just a rough draft of an opening. Um, the reason I made elected officials and department heads is because someone had suggested that we make sure this letter goes to elected officials and department heads.

We still in agreement on that. Let us not just tell meeting that we make sure that select boards, school committee and department heads get this.

Yes. Why not?

I Well, I would say no because our job is to report to town meeting. I mean, our process has been to report to and that's fine. I just remember that it was brought up as a suggestion.

Yeah, I can see why because they're all there and they all get the packets, right?

Yeah.

Elected officials.

No, but this is this is not in the packet, right? So, I guess one of the uh members had made an suggestion that this gets sent out to all elected officials. all um you know so but all elected official mean also means all the all elected officials everybody it's not just board of assessors it's everybody does well no it could be more I just use the example of select board and school

committee because they're so closely tied to the budget yeah I kind of agree with Terry I mean we we this is focused for town meeting and town meeting members I think when you start I mean there's there's nothing to say that we can't forward this this letter to the board of selectmen and you know um other members of of the uh staff and everything else but I think the focus of this letter is for town meeting

correct you know and for town meeting members.

Yeah. And these other folks are CC.

All right.

Yeah.

Okay.

Gone.

So anyway I this paragraph I thought set the stage for those points that came underneath just to address the citizens academy. As we approach our June Springtown meeting, the finance committee wants to provide an overview of key financial actions and initiatives that impact the town's fiscal health.

Our goal is to advise and support informed decisionmaking by highlighting efforts focused on transparency, long-term planning, and the sustainability of services valued by our community. These initiatives reflect a proactive approach to managing Dartmouth's financing finances prior prioritizing efficiency and long-term sustainability for the benefit of all residents.

You could also include in that about the uh academy say although not financially related as to that point.

Well, you talk about it during transparency.

Yeah. I mean that that to me implies that everything under this is in one of those categories which puts the citizens academy into it.

If you just want to mention that up there, you could do that too.

Maybe change the word budget key budget initiatives. Maybe change that to key some where we encompassing all of what we're talking about in paragraph one.

Oh, I see. That way we can just key initiatives.

Right. That way we can include the trans the citizens academy.

That's right. Yeah. All right. Good. Do you have a night focused on budget during the academy?

Yes, there's a whole section on finance.

Okay. So, I mean you you are educating well it has to do with you know whatever financing obviously but also the proactive approach in general, transparency in general and it's very much so in involving the residents.

Yeah.

So that was the setting of the stage. So now we can slide back down to citizens academy and say something exciting.

I like that first paragraph. I think that Okay, good. I mean, it's open to whatever. I just, as I said, and and like I said, I am fine if people think it's not necessary. I just thought of it because we're always trying to think about how to engage, you know, people who live here as well as town meeting and that that certainly met that goal. I was happy Cody decided to move forward with that idea.

Well, I mean, it engages residents. It gives them a background, you know, transparency, of course, that's part of engaging the residents. Um, it teaches them about all the different things we're talking about.

But what do other people think? Do you think?

Yeah. I just don't want to step on toes that we can do that. The town administration implemented.

All right.

And described the citizens citizen academy. So, credit is due. You know, we're giving credit where it's due.

We're not trying to steal that thunder.

We're just Mhm.

We didn't do any of these.

Yeah. No, no, I just informative.

Really?

We didn't do a single one of these things John.

It's just highlighting.

We're telling people it's highlighting what was done over the correct Yeah.

And I don't feel like we're trying to steal any good thunder on it. I feel like we're just trying to communicate.

This is why we're voting in this way.

Just making statements.

Yeah. Just initiatives.

Oh, no. That's why I tried in the beginning to make sure it didn't sound like we did it. And I used the word advise.

Yeah. because I know that's a popular.

It's actually good because I I mean just the if we when you add citizens academy it's really a good mix in here budget non-budgetary items.

Uh I think it really tells the whole story of like you know and it tells a good story.

Right. Right. That's kind of you know when when Nate left he I mean the biggest thing I think that he had talked about was try to set off some bullets.

Yeah. To keep it simple to start versus getting into people's attention and stuff all kinds of other stuff at the beginning.

Okay. Good. Um, unless somebody has some specific thoughts, you'll end up with my thoughts before I share it.

Well, my thoughts are on anyway. So, in in no particular order because there may easily be other ways to move this along.

I only wrote one other section that the reason I wrote this other section was because of once again how Cody presented that to the school committee and others that night. So I wrote a section Dartmouth financial policies and why they matter.

Okay.

Once again it's short. I tried to keep it short because, you know, we have obviously many other important things that will be addressed in this letter that I didn't touch. Um, yeah. And if it's too long, nobody will read it.

No, it's it's, you know, it's not it's only a few bullets, honestly.

Yeah. No, it's good.

Um, because, you know, we all get questions.

I don't think and people lot of we have a lot of new town meeting members. We've had new folks come here that don't understand these basics. So I think it's important given the challenges that we're going to be facing over the next few years that people get a basic understanding of how the money is managed.

You don't have to be the finance director. You know, we have a finance director to dig into the weeds. Anyway, so I just made it into bullets. Um, and just says Dartmouth follows a set of common sense financial policies that keep the town on a stable footing and plan responsibly for the future.

You know, the town adopts a balanced budget each year, meaning expenses are fully funded with reliable revenue.

Mhm.

Is it reliable revenue source or just reliable revenue?

Your choice.

I'm just asking.

Fully funded with reli I with reliable revenues.

Revenues.

Yeah. Okay.

You want it plural? Yep.

Yep.

Okay. Everyday operating costs like schools, public safety, and town services are paid for with ongoing revenue, not one-time funds.

Usually, well, you can also put you can also put comma per the per the financial per the adopted financial policies of the town, something to that effect. Okay.

Is there anything else that we future plan for other than OPED that that is part of our policy? Really, not any. We don't have a policy about long-term capital.

Well, we've got financial policies. We got investment policies. We have uh policies on spending like with with town credit cards, procurement policies.

Well, so we have a a lot of different just thinking about the things that maintain our our ability to borrow at a low rate. That's pretty much the AAA piece right?

Yeah. That's not really that's not really a policy. That's the result of good financial policy. Yeah.

So, in terms of why they matter, that's what I would say is because we have a lot of work to do capitalize and um it'd be great to be able to get a low interest rate for it.

Mhm.

Um, okay. So, Dartmouth plans for buildings, roads, and equipment through a 10-year capital improvement plan and regular maintenance to help avoid unexpected costs.

Can you scroll down?

That's not No, it's on Gary's.

Oh, he's trying to read it, too.

Where should you get that from.3?

Do we want to say 10 year or just say through a short term long-term capital improvement plan?

I thought it was a big deal when we we started doing a 10-year capital.

I think 10 years better.

We went from a fiveyear when Greg was here to a 10-year short-term I call it short-term. It's not really short-term, but a 10ear short-term capital plan.

Then we have the long-term capital plan, which is 10 plus years.

So 10 year considered the short term.

Yeah. Okay.

Yeah. But but we've been placing those larger items like the schools and all that within the 10-year plan because we're thinking that those schools, if in fact they need to be rebuilt, need to be done within 10 years now where before it wasn't even on the the radar, you know, was way off uh you know 20 30 years down the road.

I think that that's a major thing to have people to understand that we've planned out far ahead.

Yeah, maybe Damoth plans for how do we want to say this? Um I think we should mention I think to John's point a long I mean we have the short-term which we talked about maybe combining both at one time uh the short-term capital committee I mean the CIC CPC and then the long range capital planning committee. So in this sentence, do we want to say that both of those committees uh are addressing both the

short-term uh items and then longer term items like we can mention school uh water sewer treatment plant. We can mention those items in one sentence. I don't know if that's so hang on through a 10-year capital improvement plan managed by two committees and and put their names.

just 10 years and beyond rather than add committees.

Yeah. I mean just it doesn't have to be that specific. We're not we're trying to educate but not you know bury them under the financial policy because it's more than 10 years.

Well then why even bother me the year just say capital improvement plan because it was a big deal when we changed from 5 to 10.

If you don't want to if you don't want to be pinned down to well I'm pinned down by what John said naming the committees 10year capital.

We don't need to name the committees.

No. Do we want to say 10 years and beyond?

Yeah, I don't mind that.

Buildings and roads.

So, that covers it all, right? Whether you got a 20 or 30 year long term or just, you know, when just not looking at 10 years.

Think about what you're trying to get people to understand.

Yeah, it's planned.

Maybe after 10, right? Maybe after 10 year capital plan. Um, put to address regular maintenance and help avoid unexpected cost.

Okay. Yeah, that's good. That was kind of a bad Yep.

Okay. All right. Free cash is maintained at a healthy level 2.5 through 5% of the budget. Now, some of the things you can't see is I highlighted certain words so people could look at it and go, "Oh, free cash. Oh, healthy level." Anyway, healthy level of 2.5 to 5% of the budget with an average of about 5.5 million in recent years.

Yes. That's Do you want to uh I wouldn't like healthy. I mean that's that's up to somebody's opinion.

What's our opinion?

Not.

Well, whatever. I'm just saying that can be questioned. What's healthy? You know, maybe would say no.

Well, I mean that per our financial policies, right? We have a financial that says 5%.

It doesn't say two and a half, does it?

Yeah. I believe it does say two and a half to say two and a half to five. Yes, it does. Per the So, and this once again, the heading is Dartmouth's financial policies.

Mhm. Meaning that I don't think we have to mention it in every point that it's per the financial policy.

No, no, you don't. No, you don't.

That's the only reason I say that, Carrie.

No, you don't. You just take healthy out. You just put We not want healthy.

I don't want That's That's a subjective termain level of Yeah.

Well, doesn't that help us out in our bond rating?

Yeah. You can just say it. So to our bond raiders, that's a healthy number.

So it is an accurate statement.

You should say that as far as a bond rating goes is healthy or something.

Yeah. Uh but to be consistent with the financial policies, I mean it doesn't reference a healthy level. It just says that it's recommended that at the recommended level.

Free cash is maintained. We could put recommended level because it's recommended in the policy.

Yeah. Yeah.

Recommended at the recommended. Yeah. Right.

Got it.

At the recommended. Good. And when you do do you want to put another word for free cash? I think your average person reading this is not going to know what free cash is.

Uh free cash retain next to it. The year end it says it later.

Surplus.

It says it later.

Yeah.

The pound uses free cash year end surplus for one year retained earnings rather than ongoing.

Yeah. You know I think I think it's capitalized. The more we talk about it, if we take it out, it might disappear, but the more we talk about it, people will either ask questions, want to know about it.

I think if we remove it or call it something else, it's really not You could just put You could just put in brackets free cash.

Yeah, you could do in brackets. You could make it year end surplus the first time you use free cash.

Yeah, but free cash is a common financial term.

No, it's not.

In municipal governmental government. Well, that's what we are.

That's true.

We're not Your average person reading this isn't going to know what free cash is.

Well, it says year end surplus. That I know. So, move it up to where you mentioned free cash the first time at the top.

No, down here. You uh will Well, I can change the uh free cash and then put in year surplus.

Okay.

Is Yeah, that's better.

Yeah. And then you don't have to mention it anymore.

Yeah. Then don't mention it anymore. So the first time I use it in that other bullet. Okay, got it.

English 101.

All right. So then next bullet we'll read, the town uses free cash for one-time expenses and capital projects rather than ongoing costs.

Yeah, that's good.

That's good.

Any next bullet. Any free cash above this target is used for capital needs or added to the stabilization fund.

parenthesis, the town's savings account.

There you go.

Beautiful.

Okay.

User fees are reviewed annually to help offset the costs of services where appropriate.

And borrowing is limited to major capital projects that are too large to pay for upfront, helping control long-term debt.

Very nice.

Excellent.

I was trying to keep it simple. Maybe on the on the bullet where it says the town uses free cash for onetime expenses and capital projects rather than ongoing rather than reoccurring operational costs.

So you want to say because because we're going to make we'll have them understand that the difference between operations and like what we just talked about um capital capital items it can be used for capital but can't be used for ongoing operations.

That's per the financial policy.

So change cost to operations basically.

Yeah. rather than ongoing uh operational costs. Yeah.

Yeah.

So, hang on. Let me make sure I understand. You want that to be the end of it rather. So, saying not reoccurring operations replaces rather than ongoing costs.

Yes, that's what I would I mean that's my suggestion.

Okay. No, that's fine.

Good.

Sir, I have a question.

You're going to use the first section and then this last section as part The way it's laid out, it's part of the letter.

This layout is irrelevant.

All right. So, this I just happen to think should be in it someplace easily.

I think the first part is the opening though. I will say that.

Absolutely.

But the financial policies and why they matter can be somewhere elsewhere.

Yes. No, this is not this is just a part where I thought could be anywhere could be added. Okay. Now, I will say and I'm sorry that I don't have all the a way to display the charts. I was considering um hang on because there's no visual.

Sorry.

You had a metrics that that we saw up on the screen though, Janine, about putting in chart and not putting the remember maybe remember you had it up there, but it was with the double screen when we had the double screen up there. You can't show that again, right? remember you had something up there that showed like a little boxes of add the chart, the name of the chart. Is that old or raw?

No, that was the um that was the chart that I made that told us what we used in the last two years for charts and graphs.

Oh, okay.

Um which I'll make sure everybody gets to see. Um so you can see. So I will say in 2024 we were very chart heavy. We had 10 and then in the 2025 we brought that down to six.

Well, yeah.

Okay. Which as I said, you can you can look at that after the fact. But what I was some of So actuals I think should be repeated.

Did we finish this? Did we talk about borrowing is limited? User fees are reviewed annually helps us. Uh okay.

I'm sorry. Did you have something they want to add? Borrowing is limited to major capital projects that are not that are too large to pay for upfront helping control long-term debt.

Um, borrowing is limited to major capital items.

Um, let me think about the last one there. Borrow.

Okay.

Yeah, we're obviously still a draft.

Yeah. Yeah.

You may want to put capital projects exceeding a certain amount or larger. Well, it does say to pay too large to pay a Let me think about the wording. Yeah, I think you may want to specify what you mean by larger capital projects. And as far as the user fees and and reviewed annually, um this is a side note, uh I gave a proposal to um uh to Cody to look at what I'm calling a

revenue uh review group uh which would meet um probably initially quarterly and um bring in uh most of the major departments that charge fees and look at how we are competitive with other communities and uh look at that on an annual basis. and we do it now but to make it more formalized uh and meet um even if it's semiannual every year to talk about that can point you're going to do that guy

because we've had the discussion before is I don't think it's appropriate to be I you can certainly look at other uh communities but doesn't mean they're doing it right because the DOI has a document out there saying you you can't charge fees at seed exceed the cost yeah of and there are departments in this town that are doing that now and That's against the rules of the DOI. So if

we're doing it, then other towns are doing it. So you know, say, oh, look up for Haven's charging for their border of health fees. You know, we need to catch up with that. Well, they're probably doing it illegal like we're doing in some of our department. So be careful of that.

Yeah. We want the study should be what does it cost?

Yeah. I mean provide that. So that would cost us you know our cost because we have different border health here looks much different than for haven uh and our departments look much different it's yeah we need to find obviously the comparables we talk about the comparable communities again uh so uh it's something I think that we need to we need to look at uh and as part of that

we should be looking at that um more so initially every quarter than maybe semiannually every every year so that's something I proposed hopefully we can get that off the ground I think also based on the bag stuff you should include the schools with that too.

Oh yeah.

Additional fees.

Yep. Look at the what? I'm sorry.

Fees that the schools could be charging.

Y.

So it's not just the town side.

That's right.

I think this is just me personally. I have real issues with fees in general only because in my opinion it's taxation without representation. Years ago you didn't see these exorbitant fees and the town ran fine. you know, two and a half comes along and all of a sudden towns got creative and started charging fees with no input from your residents.

It's it's a tax and I didn't vote on it.

I wasn't represented. So, it it it bothers me to see these fees just go go go.

It's a dilemma and they're skirting two and a half.

No, I agree. It's a dilemma because I think that the the fact that they exist tells us that two and a half is not what it should be.

But nobody wants to address.

Exactly. That's a whole another problem.

So we're we're solving the problem and in many cases illegally going to do and the real problem is is two and a half.

But again taxation will represent the the commonwealth said I want representation. I want you to limit it at two and a half. and governments, you know, towns are skirting that by adding it to their fees creatively. Oh, we'll find another way to Well, I mean, as far as with the B with the budget advisory group, that could be a talking point of where, you know, this is what it's come down to for a lot of

municipalities in Massachusetts that are trying to push these overrides because of the limits of two and a half and and now tapping out on fees. And you know, we've heard that one of the initiatives from the governor would be tripling the excise tax, you know. So again, yeah, these are all circumventing and trying to get raising the meal tax.

Exactly.

Trying to have I think it will be important though that what whatever reference we make to these is the same problem. They're different ways of solving the very same problem.

And I think that's it all goes back to wherever we're going in the future, whether we're looking what we're looking at to deal with the gap. I think it's very important to tell everybody factually there's a gap. It's not it's not that government's, you know, not being managed well. It's not that there's fat in the budget. You know, people have a lot of ideas and I think the document that we're

putting out the budget advisor group does just that. It's really factual.

It's not we're not taking a position on really, you know, it's we're trying to, you know, eliminate this or add this.

It's it's very factual. I think it um yeah, we hear a lot of times, oh, call your representative. Well, I think the representative more of the same stuff that we've been talking about all along through the whole process. More than that, the uh the the bag documents going to ask that the um the uh select board uh join Mass the Mass uh was it Mass Municipal Association in uh attempting

to uh raise the two and a half to another level and then also uh to talk about revising the state aid formula uh for Dartmouth and other towns. towns as a joint group with these other towns but approaching the state to redo all that and that that will I guess on some level uh relieve the use of fees if they actually go through but the fees I think are important because it's an interim step

while all this other stuff is going to get done and we need the money yeah the bag I think is addressing this and putting it all bringing everything together to to present I think that's what the goal was at the beginning so anyway anyhow back to the charts, which I'm sorry there's no there's no display.

Um I was thinking and because I think it's important for people to understand what the fixed costs are and I have an example that can't be shared but it was done by another town in their financial letter and it ultimately shows a fixed cost summary year over year for a couple of years. So people can read us some of the can some of the topics on fis fix fixed cost.

Well what fixed costs are you know what I mean? Uh insurance pension employee benefits.

Yeah. Yeah. We we we we presented that.

Correct. So anyway this is one that shows it was the town of Marshfield actually.

Um they did a chart in their uh financial letter that shows what they were from year to year so people can understand how those costs aren't really controllable but they go up every year.

True.

So anyway, that was just one thing that could be an example.

Yeah.

And could easily have some type of written summary with it. Another one that I thought was interesting and it sounds similar to what Cody said the um that new portal will do, but it it shows the breakdown of your taxes by budget transparency. The budget uh the budget portal, correct? But it shows the breakdown of your taxes by function. So if you use an average of whatever it's 5,000 something

per property in Dartmouth I think is the average and then take that and split people could see once again this is another town that in this case education was 34% of the budget public works was 11% of your taxes public safety was 17% of your taxes what's the stat um that's a good point because a lot of um a lot of the stuff that we've been talking a lot of these fixed costs that

that we have no control over.

Um and uh that that's maybe something that we want to include.

You know, even if it's a paragraph, it doesn't have to be basically a chart, but you know, we we said that as a paragraph.

The people I think, you know, only because of having to educate people what fixed costs are. We might have to list a few things so they so they truly understand what they are. Um the other one was and these were in the it was a debt presentation that Cody did and it showed in this case the sewer enterprise fund and the water enterprise fund and it might have showed solar waste I don't know but it showed

predictions of what's happening with those over overlapped on each other we did that I think that's a good chart to show yeah what it does what it does is show it what it what it attempted to show was that um at a certain point in time x amount of dollars would be spent or and also what the impact would be to the residents.

Correct.

You know when all those at one time potentially meet because there's a point where if we borrow and all those are borrow uh at some interval they will meet on a graph you know 15 to 20 years from now and what that means and then that graph starts to go down and those costs start to decrease. So that's what I think what that graph stop you know was trying to these were separate graphs they weren't

overlapping each other but yes I would have them so they overlapped each other and you could see yeah I think a section does have to be it's important that we put a section in there because we've been talking about it so much about the long-term capital yes about how maybe maybe a section of how that you know what the what the development has been with that group what we've presented and then maybe show a graph

right the graphs don't have to be lumped together I kind of pictured it being there might be a graph and then the explanation that supports it in more detail.

So I mean this is what we did last year just to refresh people's memory. So you would think that maybe this piece that we talked about today would be the beginning portion of this. you know, we we've got this we did include a chart of the actuals, right?

I I would say that, you know, it is important, but this is more important for us to discuss internally, you know, for us to present this internally when we update these numbers, not necessarily to have it on because this is not really a f this is not really a financial statement. It's more of a we can mention what the actuals are, but I think to put this really takes up a whole page of something we

may want to take a whole page, put something else.

It's very I disagree. It is a very nicely laid out and it it's just a really it's easy on the eye. It's not like you have to read a lot and it just kind of gives you a way to track what have we actually been spending and bringing in over the last few years. I really like this page. What if we could do it in a prettier format?

Okay.

Or we can or we can or we can make it prettier. You know what I'm saying?

Yeah. Right. I think when it starts to get to my only point is it is good information but it is it's a lot of information and it would take somebody to have to like read. I mean this is really not it's not an audit. It's Yeah.

So it's more high level.

It also opens itself to more scrutiny too.

Uh well it does. Yeah, it does in a way.

Um, but that's part of the transparency.

Yeah, I was just going to say I was going to say that welcome that you want to be you want to be over encumbering then put something like that up there.

I I don't think we have any I agree with Carrie. I mean I just simplifying it. That's all. Yeah, I like the idea of simplifying it.

Not eliminating but just maybe maybe a graph.

Correct.

A graph a pie chart. We have pie charts for this already.

Yeah, exactly.

I think I think a visual Yes. people are attracted to it.

It's a lot easier on the eyes.

People do love pie.

Yeah. So, that's where we were with this.

Financial sector loves the pie chart.

Yes.

And then we talked about we had sector outlook the you know what we looked at at the outlook. Uh that's kind of some of the stuff that we just talked about today. We can mention the the um dollar amount to 113 300,000.

Um we've talked about the capital budget that breakout. Uh, and then this is where we work with Brian on the some of these graphs um on the expenditure.

Some of these graphs a no offense Brian get repetitive or they're not as necessary anymore. I mean, okay, because I could do the same thing. Okay. Yes, of course it's going up and then we have a population one that's going down. You know what I mean? They don't Well, we have here's one state funding goes down.

you know, it's not an exciting could be an educating and I don't think people truly understand or retain that.

So, I think we may think it's repetitive, but I think the average person it Well, I mean, the fact state aid agreed is is not what it used to. Well, that's that's the thing that I think is important. what we what we saw in the perfect storm report. The fact that because people are great for saying we're mismanaging funds. The fund, you know, even somebody running for select board was saying we need to cut the

budget. We need, you know, not realizing that our increases have been so small.

Yeah.

And the state un what is it? UGA un uh unrestricted.

Thank you. is has gone down down down down down down every single year.

Yeah, true. But it's I mean we can say it. We absolutely should say it. There's no way this letter gets written without talking about state aid, right?

Um you know the chart looks not that exciting because it doesn't it's not that dramatic a change from year to year is my point. It's down.

So would you rather would you rather put that in a narrative as opposed to the graph?

Well, that's not the state aid. Um, no. I'm just saying Janine, would you referencing referencing referencing expenses that are increasing or revenues that have been stagnant and and local aid? I mean, that's Can I make a suggestion? Uh, I think the uh this letter as they all should have should have a focus that would dictate what sort of charts are in there.

Now, having said that, I have absolutely no idea what the focus would be for this year. I I think the focus needs to be that the that the budget is being well managed. I think the focus has to be what has been done to show that um the town is doing the best they can with the revenue.

So I think the process we've started you start so if we use that opening information we started off with all the positive items that that you know initiatives we get into like the the nitty-gritty of it. They know like what what the facts are. Can I just make sure we make a recommendation? Oh, not recommendation because BA bag will do that, but we make a we we do a synopsis of the of the year

like like a year in review. So, so where I was going with that is if if if we have a focus on the letter, then maybe and we state that this is the focus and includes those points that we started off with.

Y then maybe you don't need the general fund expenditure chart. You can take that out. But can I just check out do people sitting here feel that that's true that the that the budget is being managed to the best of our ability?

Absolutely.

Yeah, I think so.

I I definitely think so.

I think we all would have to feel comfortable with that to put that in there. But I I feel like we spent enough time looking at all the ins and outs in this budget, learning about how people are managing things to see that it's not wasted. There might be a piece here or a piece there we can improve, but I feel like it's being managed.

Focus B.

Well, absolutely right. The town's managing it very well, but we're getting closer and closer to the cliff.

Yes.

And we need to start ringing the bell and saying start talking about Yes.

what alternatives we have. Either we reduce your services or we have a combination of two and a half. And you know, we need to start presenting those options. And we're not. And that's where I think the focus should be is yes, we're doing a good job and every year we say next year is going to be and we seem to patch it and get through it, but we're still getting closer to that cliff.

The rain predicting when we're going to fall, but we're getting closer is not sustainable.

That we need to focus on it and that it's not sustainable. And I have I have data that is going to be in the bag report that talks about uh uh the budget exceeding 3.3% annually compound annual growth.

Uh the fact that that's over the two and a half limit and that this year it'll be roughly a million bucks will be short. Uh so I mean is there any reason why we couldn't take any of that data? Oh, I stick it in here.

I don't want to be repetitive of what two two groups that say the same thing.

We need to have an not to say it's not important and gets mentioned, but that report having no I'm just saying use the data.

Yeah.

Yeah. But is the budget advisory group in Israel?

Okay.

So, and and if it comes with two groups, what's wrong with that?

Again, no, but you don't want to you don't want to No, you don't want sound a little bit.

It doesn't have to be word for word. We could present it differently, but both have the same message.

Well, the message.

Didn't Doesn't the copy I don't remember from last year, but maybe the year before last. Didn't the copy talk about We were getting close to the cliff.

Yes, it does. It does.

Talking about this year.

It does, Brent, because I remember something about sustainability that it mentioned in the last one we did.

Yeah. So what so what what was the section on that?

Yeah.

Yeah. I mean I almost feel like we need to end with the the idea that we're squeaking by again. We keep squeaking by. We keep Well, but it's we have we're we're asking our finance director to perform miracles every year.

And every year he's coming through with one. But next year might be the year that we don't have one. But I think this year we could reference the fact that we knew when whether it was March, I forget when we knew that was there was going to be a million or a million and a half uh gap and that the school committee has had to work with administration. Uh there have been a lot of conversations

and that collaboration has been phenomenal.

The last section of this of this document really addressed it well. I mean, if you look at here, we talked about the schools. Now, I'm summarizing because we read this, but we're talking about the schools, how, you know, uh, we're facing issues with the funding message and I think it should be a similar message and in the conclusion, right? I mean, updated, but similar, we're really repeating the same exact

Well, the message hasn't changed, right? The message kind of I think everybody agrees with that. Uh, and then these were some of the maybe items that we looked to look at. um you know uh well you've we've actually addressed number one right Gary you addressed number one which is fantastic so we could write that in our conclusion right so we did we actually that was part of the uh the summary so some of

these come off new things come on you know it and I think referencing the fact that the school committee is accessing their kindergarten um yeah the kindergarten stabilization change this year because that's been worked out that that's one of the ways they're helping to bridge the gap.

Um, and you say that may not be available next year because it's going to be Exactly. Bill. Exactly.

And we also may want to mention the runoff of the school choice.

Yep.

That's something that these are one time funds that are probably going to end at some point.

A lot of temporary temporary fixes for a long-term problem, long-term solution.

So, my recommendation is I think that we had a good uh set today, a good start off today with that. Maybe I can send this out to the group and relook at this and trying to, you know, enhance this a little bit more. Yeah, I thought this was wrong.

Maybe maybe you could take it. We said it all last year.

Maybe maybe take um you know the uh bul the good bullet points that we started off with and then instead of calling this conclusion well that would be up here somewhere. We want Yeah. Instead of calling this conclusion, you could put in some copy about we still work on the still working against the same issues that were in the conclusion section of last year's letter.

You want to call it onward what onward. Yeah.

Yeah. Um yeah, the I mean the budget advisory group was was a lot if if you remember like I know that we talked about there were graphs in this presentation. There were a lot of less graphs than the p previous one. I think the previous one had 12 pages, 13 pages.

Yeah, it was a lot. That's what I I I would say that we we were more I in my this is only my opinion. People will want to read it.

They want to read a document. You know what I mean? And the more graphs well, you know, it's great, but they want to read it can't be convoluted too. At the same time, I think this is this is a message and it should include some graphs, but it should be more you could put the information in the form of bullets and give. So what so so we could agree that the graph should support the

message that we want to get to is good and this year this year it'll be a continuation of the con something that was in the conclusion section.

Yeah.

Uh and then graphs will support that if it's reasonable. But Brian and Janine, I think it's going to be important because you know what's going to be in the budget advisory group report to make sure that there's like not a lot of redundancy and if Well, that's what I that's my fear. It's not the message. The message is going to be well what it is.

Yeah.

Yeah. Right.

But you know what I'm saying rather well there won't be redundancy. I I think the issue on this in my opinion should be the structural problem that we have and then you know talk about the progress that's been made but then the tassel has this structural yeah this tells the story bag the budget advisory group is more factual you know this tells this is a more narrative yeah this is a narrative this is more

point in time and and talking about we can assume that some of the challenges are going to be in that report I would think right what in the budget advisory oh no Okay. Okay.

I mean like I think a couple are nice to break it up.

27 budget. If you said 27 budget summary, we continue to face challenges.

That hasn't changed. Challenges. So my recommendation is I forward this as the final copy from last year and include the first piece, take some points out of here, update them, and then come up with a conclusion.

Exactly right.

Next meeting we can have a good a really good draft.

That's exactly right.

Good discussion, guys. This is good discussion.

I don't my point is I don't think you want to keep changing the narrative.

You want to keep it consistent because the more and more people that hear the same narrative Exactly.

that's really sells what we're going to do.

And for the future when we think we're going to have to come up with some kind of plan we say in this narrative well we you know we we we um were able to accomplish this. That's great. But the the the the basis is we still have potentially a problem in 27 28. So it's something like making progress but we still have the basic problem.

Yes.

Yeah.

No, that's absolutely true.

We dodged a bullet this year.

Yeah. And then and then let do the research of all the factual stuff.

Yeah. Mhm.

So yeah. So what So you're going to send this out and I'll send this out to everybody tonight and then I think everybody Okay.

Yeah. In combination with this. I'm shocked. But in combination with uh what Janine we put together today, I think next meeting we can have a a good draft.

Absolutely.

That would be great. Yeah, that's that's a great foundation that Yeah. I mean, I think this was well written last year.

It was really well written.

Great foundation.

Yeah. And it really has.

It gets hard.

It gets hard to change things when it continues to be factual every single year.

You just have to change some of the points.

Make things seem that what they're not when they really are.

You just some change some of the points that are relevant to this year and right move on. Yeah. Because you're hammering the same message home.

Exactly.

What the goal is.

Mhm.

So, okay. All right. So, the plans, you're going to send this thing out and then we can all take it.

Thanks for your hard work on this, by the way.

Good.

You want it in Word? We have it.

Yeah, send it in Word.

Word is the best.

Yeah, that'd be great.

Don't So, send it out. Don't put it in the share drive.

No, I'll I'll send this before there's some more.

Yeah, I mean, you don't like the share drive? I love the share drive. I just want to make sure everybody has a get in it into it.

Gary worked hard to get us a share drive. we get both for these next couple weeks so that you know and still log in and maybe not put still haven't proven that it's working yet problems.

Oh no, only PDFs.

Yeah. Well, yeah, like have the final version in the share drive, but nobody can nobody I think we can you can't upload to the share drive.

Nobody can change anything in there.

Yeah. So only I think putting it will only be PDF. Yeah, it we're working on the budget. My my intention was that if we have like three different draft versions of the budget, I put that in there and then put the final. The final will always be in there.

Um Gary, just a question on the budget advisory group. Has there been a meeting since March?

Uh we have meeting on uh next week, but not but not since March. They have No, we've been working on the docu.

We've been working on the doc.

We were supposed to have a meeting last week. We canceled it because we were re revamping the document. So, okay.

Tuesday evening.

Yep. 4:00 late.

4 o'clock.

Well, it's usually at 8 8 o'clock in the morning.

Oh, that's true.

Yeah. Yeah. 4:00.

I should have coffee and orange juice.

Yeah. The budget.

Pizza.

Pizza.

I think I got Cheers. I got one moldy piece of pizza for No minutes for this meeting.

Okay.

For approval.

Okay.

You are doing a fine job here, Gary.

Well, you know, I think we've made a lot of progress this year with Cody and trying to get a lot of these initiatives.

Yeah.

So, we don't have a time. We did you did an update that replaced what Cody normally does. Anybody have a liaison report?

Well, council on Asian was supposed to have a meeting this morning, but unfortunately the order did not get the notification into the town clerk, so we had to cancel this morning's meeting. So, we won't have another one until May.

Okay. Anyone else?

I talked about capital. Does anybody know anything new with the DPW? Is there anything urgent or Nope.

No. Okay.

Phew. We dodged our bullet.

Just like the major.

Um just a quick uh Gary, I noticed the um you signed a new contract with the select board.

My my contract. Yes. Yes.

Um are you happy with the results? How did that how was that process? I don't know. Was anybody I wasn't even aware involved or were we asked Oh, that was done in executive session, wasn't it?

Most contracts that are are signed by um uh for uh you know, department heads that are non that are contract, it's between the board of selectment and the um I understand that, but there's compensation involved in that contract and you're happy with the results. Uh but I just want to point and at least I wasn't. I don't think anybody else was asked or I wasn't and I think that is a good point that

what was your experience with Gary's performance? We weren't uh we weren't consulted. No, and I'm saying we should have a part in the contracting but not even to get it's good to hear from the department.

I don't know if they do that for any department head.

Okay.

Even like like for for instance like planning. Oh well planning is um planning is uh through steel workers. Uh I'm trying to think of another I'm trying to think of another position.

I think he's just trying to say that you have a lot of input with us and we have a lot of input with you. Right. And we should and we should somebody should be asking us are we happy with what you're doing. Exactly.

How is that interact? This is a big part of your job.

Yeah.

Uh and uh you know to not even any of us well is is it adequate? you know, is the board.

We've never been asked, as you know, from previous conversations in other roles.

That's right. Doesn't mean we should be nominated for saying you're right or wrong. I'm just saying we've never been asked.

Yeah. I'm not looking to take over the role, but at least, you know what, Capital never interviewed committee members before and they are now. So, I think, you know, suggest I think that, you know, it's a perview of the select board that's between the select board and anybody that they're negotiating contract with longer like the union contracts. Uh there's a you know they they present to uh Cody Cody

and I now we're working on those contracts for schools of settle but uh all the major unions are up for negotiation. So and then that's presented to the select board in executive. So, no department heads get feedback from their departments on I'm trying to think of a committee where a department head serves and the select board um is weighs in on the contract. Uh planning board always did a review

veterans. You can think the veterans agent uh veterans agent has a board and then that contract is settled by uh the um the uh select board. That's the library director, the board of trustees does a review of her performance. They have different categories.

Correct. But I'm just saying they do a performance review. It's given to her and I know it's shared with Cody.

Yeah. But I have a performance review too with Cody Kohl's. But I'm just saying so she is, you know, that is reviewed. That's the only one that I know of.

Well, I think at least for you to know that if you feel like you ever need the support of the finance committee, obviously we would like to be supportive.

Yeah. I think that we work as a team. I mean obviously we do.

Yeah. We try to we try to present as the most clear accurate information that we can and and I would say also the select board, you know, knows that the the committee works hard and tries to give them as much information as they can along with budget advisory group. I think that that's been really a a good pro process. I don't see that going away. I think that that's going to be

something that continues on, especially in times where these budgets get tighter and tighter to try to find solutions and at least again bring that message out to the public.

But you in particular, Gary, are open to feedback from people. You're absolutely available if people have questions, need something to be explained, you have no trouble with that. You're very efficient and disciplined in getting the meeting set up and and we appreciate that. No, Joe. Yeah, I absolutely do. Thank you.

Definitely true.

Yeah, definitely.

Motion to adjourn.

So, I'm sorry. We have no calm down.

Oh, I thought we were near to calm down.

Brian, I just remotely started the car. I'm ready to go.

That's right. Ready to go.

Wow.

Shut it off at $3 a gallon.

That's fair.

$4. Would somebody like to make a motion to adjourn? Oh, all right. I'll make that motion.

Do we have a second?

Yep.

All in favor?

I adjourn. Okay.

With my new gabble. I love the gamble.