 This program is brought to you by cable franchise V's and generous donations from viewers like you Okay, Andy Okay Good evening. It's us 630 p.m. And it's June 8th of 2020 and I'm going to in a moment call finance committee to order What is happening this evening is that the Chart town charter requires the finance committee hold hearings on any budget that is going to be considered and This is a public hearing for two. Actually, it's two different public hearings for two different budgets the first one is the budget for the regional school district and After we call to the committee and the council to order we will Then proceed to the hearing and I'll explain the hearing process, but I'm not My name's Andrew Steinberg. I'm the chair of the finance committee and I'm going to turn This over for a moment to the council president Lynn Griesmer who's going to call The to order the council Okay Given that we have a quorum of the Amherstown council, I am calling the council to order at 631 we're going to now go through the process of making sure you can hear us and we can hear you and if at any Time during the process we have difficulty We will either stop the meeting or make note that somebody has not been able to continue So I'm not going to do this in particular order, but in order of my screen Andy Steinberg. Can you hear me? Yes? When grease Marie S. Kathy Shane. Yes George Ryan Yes, not de Angelis. Yes Sarah Schwartz Yes, Darcy Demont Darcy, can you unmute and confirm you can hear us? Yes, I hear you. Thank you, Dorothy Pam. Yes, Mandy Joe, Hanna key. Yes Okay, and then in addition to that we have two people two three people I Missed two counselors. Ah Shalini Balmilne and Can you hear me? Yes, and Evan Ross Yes Thank you And then we in addition to that we have three members who are non-voting resident members of the finance committee Bob Hagner. Yes Aaron Povinelli Okay, and Mary Lou Tileman. Yes Okay, and then since we have the school people starting first. I want to make sure that Mike Morris can hear us Thank You superintendent Doug Slaughter Yes, I can Okay, and I saw you earlier. Where are you? Allison McDonald Yes, thank you. All right, Andy. Why don't you start? Well first of all, I want to remind everyone that pursuant to governor's Governor Baker's March 12 2020 order suspending certain provisions of the open meeting law General law chapter 30 a section 18 this meeting which is joint meeting of the council and the finance committee is being conducted via remote participation and Having said that and We're convening now the meeting of the finance committee in addition to having already convened the meeting of the council So this is the first of two budget hearings as I just explained the hearing is required by section 5.5 of the Amherst home rule charter and Is pursuant to council rules of procedure rule 5.2? We are going to first have the hearing of the regarding the regional school budget and so this is the process that I'm going to proceed by Which is consistent with rule 5.2? It generally follows the outline But there is the provision in the rule for making appropriate modifications for budget hearings, which is what this is and So we're going to start with the presentation of the budget by the superintendent of schools with the Participation of staff that he's going to introduce to us and the chair of the regional school committee He can also introduce to us after his presentation I'm going to then open it up first to council members and members of the finance committee all eight members of the finance committee Of course five are also council members and I'm going to try and recognize from the council members and finance committee in order that I see hands going up in the raise hand function and after questions from the council and finance committee We then open it up to any public attendees who wish to either ask questions or make comments regarding the budget If the conclusion of that portion if any other council members have any other comments to make after having heard from members of the public or We'll entertain any final comments and that will conclude the first hearing and then we will proceed to the second hearing Unless it is not yet seven o'clock at which point we will have to recess because the second meeting which is regarding the town managers proposed July budget for the Town which is a one-month budget Is a separate hearing that was posted for 30 minutes after this one so with that introduction I want to welcome our superintendent Mike Morris and superintendent Morris Please make presentation and tell us a little bit about the budget that You're asking the council and its finance committee to consider So first I just want to acknowledge Chair McDonald's who's with us today, so thank you for coming on the call And I'll I'll her it over and I'm conscious of the time constraint that that Counselor Steinberg mentioned so I'll try to be brief in my comments as will dr. Slotter because we know there's other things in your agenda this evening so the regional school budget was passed in March and repatched repass again in late May and because of the situation with COVID and the financial implications and meant cutting a couple hundred thousand dollars from our budget and It's a particularly hard time of year if you watch any show Johns Hopkins had a really good presentation recently Asbo, which is a national association of school business managers or school business officials as well as my professional organization came out with a budget report today That suggested that doing school next year will be more expensive not less expensive given all the CDC precautions There was a very lengthy presentation last week So if anyone's curious about what that looks like, please I encourage you to watch the joint school committee meeting that was last Wednesday night Or go to our website which has that presentation from that and so what we tried to do is we knew that reducing staff It's not going to be a viable strategy because we're gonna need all hands on deck to make some sort of schooling work given the CDC requirements and so you will not see many reductions in staffing and that's Certainly we value our staff and that's part of it But the other part of it is in order to have school function next year We need as many staff as we can possibly have and so it put us in a somewhat precarious situation We think we've drafted a budget that well, we know we drafted a budget that met that the guidelines that was expressed. It's it's It's a challenging budget. It's one that we think can be fiscally responsible And hopefully be implemented with fidelity next year The other thing I want to be really clear about is is there to be unclear about is we don't know at school Look like right that that presentation last week was the beginning of a conversation We have a survey out with over 700 responses right now from staff and families about what school might look like given the CDC Requirements some of the questions you all have tonight will probably be great questions that are unanswerable unanswerable. Excuse me Because at this point desi hasn't yet to even release its guidance that won't come out till next week on What it's recommending let alone what we're able to do So we are in a very difficult situation as it relates to opening school We know how critical it is for students and frankly for the community That we're able to open school for as many kids as possible next year We know the long-term consequences of not doing this well and and with that that's where we we find ourselves as we come to the To this budget so we did have school unanimous school committee support in passing it I think the last thing I'll suggest before I turn it over to dr. Slaughter is how incredibly challenging this is for everyone for staff members administrators We're essentially trying to recreate what school looks like with wildly different rules And it's upended what we think of as education It's we've had to incur significant costs in different places because of that and the uncertainty is very hard We talk you know superintendents come to town councils every year and we talk about what changes and and you know To us and to educators that feels like large changes I know to members of the public that could be perhaps feel like smaller changes. This is Significant second-order change that we're talking about and first-order change and second-order change and third-order change It's really resetting what education is and so I think some of the uncertainty that may be felt in some of the responses Because we're still trying to engage the community to make the best choices in this case for the four towns as well as for the Amherst I'll speak to Amherst, but there's a regional budget How to put together an educational program that's going to be most effective for students given the CDC requirements again Because of time I won't go into them that may be interesting to you But you know went to them ad nauseam so to speak in a very long meeting last Wednesday night that people can watch so with all that those caveats in that context setting I'll turn it over to Dr. Slaughter who has a brief presentation before we open up for questions Thank You Dr. Morris. I'll begin and I'll share my screen here Hopefully I can do this without much issue just to sort of take you through a Few slides that I've prepared that you've gotten and so hopefully everyone can see this without issue This is a new slide that that was put into your packet this afternoon I believe and I thought I'd start with this because it it it helps to sort of frame where Where we normally are as far as a budget process and things we may need to Encounter relative to our budget process so to start with you know in in normal circumstances with the regional school Budget what happens is that the regional school committee goes and adopts and recommends it adopts a budget recommends an assessment method Then those go to the council in the town meetings of the of the three other communities and three of the four towns must adopt The bot the budget in order for it to be adopted But given that we use an alternative assessment method every single Town must accept the alternative a met Assessment method in order for us to have a full budget And so that hasn't changed that has been the status quo for us for a number of years If we are to amend the budget during the fiscal year, which very well given the unknowns that we have could could occur I thought I'd just share with you some of the things that would happen process-wise for us Regarding that amendment process So first order our first thing that has to happen is that of any budget decrease or reduction in assessment amounts only requires The regional school committee to approve of those changes so anything that reduces the burden on the on any of the communities Or reduces the overall expenditure of the district is allowed by by regional school committee vote It is a two-thirds majority required in that circumstance, but But it doesn't require action by the the appropriating authorities in the communities, which is the town council in Amherst and the and town meeting in the in the other three towns If the budget itself increases and so the regional school committee recognizes that we need to increase the expenditure level of the of the budget three of the four towns need to Need to agree to that even if the assessed amounts don't change. So if if for some reason we have additional state aid than what we expect and We wish to expend that for the purposes of it, you know the programming in our schools for that for the coming fiscal year We can do that, but it still requires so three the four communities to say yes to that Likewise if in and maybe more importantly if we have a change such that the assessment to a given town or all four towns needs to increase Any town whose assessment changes or needs an increase must approve that change So we may have a budget that stays flat But we need to assess more of the communities if one of the communities Assessment changes in the others down that one community would have to to approve that assessment now the way our assessment works The recommended assessment method works if one town's assessment changes, they all change so it it could be an interesting circumstance, but if The assumptions we have regarding minimum contributions that communities have to make changes After we've sort of set this budget, it could be an odd circumstance where an individual community might have an assessment amount change And and then they would have to go back to town meeting and vote on that At the bottom of the slide I placed a little bit of context from a history standpoint on Amherst You know assessment over the last few years These are the budgeted numbers and then likewise the the overall budget for the regional school district And these again are based on budget numbers as we go to the next slide You'll see when we put some actuals in there for fiscal 18 and 19 those those percentages from the previous year change a little bit based on on The the actuals of the year But what you see in that in that slide is that you know, we've we've held the percentage change in assessment to Amherst Within the the guidance of the finance committee over the last few years But that often doesn't match or mirror what happens to the budget as a whole and so the budget as a whole Typically goes up a much smaller amount Year over year then then you might expect relative to a particular schools assess our town's assessment And that assessments, you know, it's you may or may not know it's a fairly complex Calculation it's based on a variety of factors the way we do it one of which is how many kids are are are from Amherst in the school district, but also based on a Factor of ability to pay based on what's called EQV Which has to do with a Wage factor in other words income basis as well as the property values within the community. So it's it's a fairly complex Calculation it's involved in in calculating those assessments And so it it it doesn't track smoothly necessarily although we try to put in and the assessment method We try to pick is is one to mitigate the large spikes both positive and negative to any given community within the within the region Slide the next slide So on this page, so we we generally start from us from a standpoint of a level services budget And then we calculate as best we can given that we usually do this in the fall And you know, we're only about a quarter of the way into a fiscal year We're trying to project our our level services for the for the coming year And then we take a look at our resources and and get some guidance from from the various towns about their ability Given their projections for revenue what they might be able to pay And we recognized even before the COVID crisis that we were going to have to Reduce the the budget from level services by a significant amount and so at that time We were taking out about three hundred twenty two thousand dollars worth of of Expenses in order to meet the revenue We thought we were going to get in what I've thought about today is the Halcyon days of January relative to revenue predictions for the for the Commonwealth Obviously since the since the COVID crisis kicked in we we've adjusted what we think Revenues are likely to look like and and what we've gotten feedback from the from the member towns about what they think they can afford and so We've tried to you know, take that into account and put that into place here And so a couple of things I'll point out Anything in yellow is something that we've done since since the COVID crisis hit In particular one thing I'll point out on the revenue side Which is the CARES Act so that that is an infusion of money I know it's showing as a negative number with the parenthesis around it But that's actually reduces your expenses essentially But like me but also immediately below that is it is an estimate of reduction in state support. So we didn't And don't have any particular Insight as to how or what will be reduced from a state support standpoint, but we do have an expectation of a pretty significant drop It could be chapter 7. It could be transportation aid to the to the region It could play into some of the other factors around Special education support and that sort of thing so we sort of left it in a bit of a block of of an estimate of Reduction and it didn't try to assign it to any particular category And then of course so those essentially the CARES Act is is prescribed and dictated by by the legislation that passed On the federal level and and you know the states using a title one distribution So our sort of slice for the regional school district is about $230,000. That's a fairly firm number So it offsets a fair amount of that that we were expecting to cut but we made some additional reductions and in in expenses to try to to meet the constraints that that the member towns are under relative to to the Revenue they think they have to fund the school and the rest of their operations And so we made an additional set of reductions of 494 thousand dollars on top of what we had already done coming into to the beginning of March and so what that results in is This more detailed budget here, and I won't go into too much detail, but but you know There's a number of factors even within this even you know that that are as with all budgets a bit of the circumstances as we understood them at the time we you know So we have some some areas of the budget that may look like they're they're rather large increases relative to to the Circumstances we find ourselves, but I think that you know some of the increases that you see in this column Are reversed by virtue of this reduction of 816,000 which is the 322 in the 494 so those kind of offset and reduce the overall budget So we actually have an almost level services budget. It's actually a little below. I mean not level services level Funded budget. It's actually a little below level funded From from the current fiscal year to to next fiscal year And so I'll slide to the next slide here and just to show you and and so we've had under discussion a number of assessment methodologies over the over the recent years the assessment methodology that that is is Currently being recommended by the school committee and is this one with this kind of a beige or I Guess a beige is there a tan sort of color It's the 45 percent statutory five-year average method That gets into part of how the calculation is done to to do the assessment. It was the recommended method coming into to the approval of the budget Previous to the COVID crisis. And so we've remained with that because it was You know the conversations we had had with the communities about our our shifting of assessment method over a number of years to a Slightly different model. This was another step in the process the the member towns were familiar and comfortable with that and and with the reduction in The overall budget what you see in this in the slides that that the recommended assessment framework since just a little below The the fiscal 20 number so the fiscal 20 number is here the fiscal 20 number 21 number is here at and it's About just a little about $40,000 less than the current year's assessment So with the exception of lever it each of the four communities actually having a lower assessment than they do in fiscal 20 I Think one other thing I'll point out and this is something I said earlier is that we've asked Rick the Chapter 70 and the transportation reimbursement. There's really some others in here that could be as well And that's just to know that we didn't know we left our projections from from pre COVID situation We left those projections in place and then we have by virtue of our our cuts required We've sort of factored that in so the the projections for revenue there on on The chart from from the state Don't reflect the actual Thinking that we have it's just we didn't have a place to sort of specifically put it And so we we kept it into these sort of cuts required section But it effectively will affect Will affect chapters you know chapter 70 is likely to smaller transportation reimbursement Guaranteed to be smaller almost almost guaranteed to be smaller and some of the others may be affected a little bit as well Our use of D&D and some of that will be will be as we have predicted and projected here So that lays out the the assessment methods and the one in particular that we're recommending for this year I Think at this point I'll pivot to the To the last slide which is a significant change in in our expectation around capital We recognize that the current fiscal year is is had a rather significant alteration of plans and and So we knew that we would probably be in a situation where Revenues for fiscal 22 will also likely be challenging to work with and so I I Reducing our capital plan rather significantly and trying to anticipate some of the costs that we're gonna have to incur for COVID related expenses, we're trying to Formulate a capital plan that will You know keep the kids safe keep the buildings moving toward toward the direction we want them to but at the same time recognize that This the choices we make here in our capital plan also impact our our communities Relative to the assessment they need to pay and so one of the things also about about capital is that We don't have cash capital the way Amherst does So we're not setting aside a certain portion of our revenue for the purposes of doing capital projects Obviously if we have revenues above expectations or actually really expenses below expectations so that we have Resources available sometimes do a capital project with resources like that But in general we borrow the money for our capital expenditure and what happens is is that we Appropriate we we do the borrowing In January or February that sets your assessment for the next year And so that's why the assessment if you're looking at those numbers from earlier the assessment for debt From the region did not change even though we've altered the budget and we've significantly altered our capital plan Because the borrowing that we would do for these items on the capital plan that I'm displaying now will not be a part of the Assessment the debt assessment to the town of Amherst until fiscal 22 So that was part of the thinking as far as trying to mitigate The sort of out years and the longer term effective of the the difficulty will likely see in revenues for the state So what if I by reducing our our capital planning here? We're really sort of trying to think even further ahead into fiscal 22 and in some respects, and so that's that's part and parcel that Obviously on the COVID-19 needs, you know at the time we're bringing this together and even still we're we're trying to shape Our our idea of what we need to to purchase and and things will need to implement in our schools to make them function and safely and well for the students. There will be some aspects of this that will be covered by some Some money from the from the federal government, but I doubt that all of it will be and So that's the rationale behind putting in a placeholder about 75,000 for for the purposes of trying to meet the needs of some COVID related items Probably ones that that won't be covered by by federal reimbursement The other two projects the walk-in cooler freezer is a scaled back version of of that project and then the grounds improvement is really the removal of a A modular on the back the high school. It's been it is slated for removal. It's really starting to become unsafe and and a bit of a Problem relative to fire risk and that sort of thing. So we really wanted to take care of that before it got much much worse So I think at this point. I'll stop this. This has been the slides that I have and and I'm I'll turn it back to the superintendent case. He wants to add any additional Comments relative to what I presented to you and and be happy to answer any of your questions Given the time I'll I'll turn it over to the chair of these committees to see if there's questions, but thank you. Dr. Slaughter Well, thank you Dr. Slaughter and superintendent Morris So to remind everyone Who's Watching the meeting The next two steps that we're going to proceed through is that I am going to be looking for raised hands from members of the council and members of the finance committee So all eight members of the finance committee and members of the council and I'm going to do my best to try and Spot order, but if a bunch of hands go up at the same time, I won't be perfect and that's what I'm going to be looking for Spot order, but if a bunch of hands go up at the same time, I won't be perfect in that score and Proceed through this is the one presentation for the council of the regional school budget and The process that we're going to be engaging in next is it will be discussed again at the finance committee meeting tomorrow but without the superintendent or Dr. Slaughter being present and We will as a finance committee make a recommendation to the council Which is scheduled to take the budget up? on June 29 But this is for all of the council your opportunity to ask questions about the budget and Anything that's related to the budget that you think is important to bring forward. So Please take that opportunity and I see the first hand that was raised is from Councilor Shane Kathy Thank You Andy. Um, I think I'll just try to focus on making sure I understand The the numbers and because I'm on finance tomorrow. We can ask some other questions. So when you went through the slide dug that showed Cuts and additions and you had one was you were pre-paying the out-of-district so That you're are you able to do that because in this current year you had enough funds that you could prepay and Will you likely be able to have that again next year? So part of what I'm worried about is not just this coming year But the year after it so that seemed like you had a buffer there because you you got a hundred and seventy thousand out of that Being able to move it. So was that because there was You know what an accessor you had some money in this year's budget that you could do that So I can I can try to answer that one Doug So the short story is we froze our budget on March 13th except for a central COVID-19 related items because we knew we saw the storm coming the fiscal storm and It was a way to preserve for one year knowing the towns we're gonna have an incredibly hard time Preserve some of the staffing and other things that we knew we'd need moving forward So we can't bank on that moving forwards. We are we tend to budget conservatively So it's not the only year if you go back we prepaid Tuitions mr. Mangano could fill you in with more details and is wearing his former hat that's still dusty but I'm sure it's in the closet and But it is you're rightly noting that it's not something you can necessarily count on year and you're out But it is something that we got incredibly conservative on March 13th, and this is exactly why Okay, and then if I look at the amount of money for cares, which is a flow in Is that your best guess right now or is that you said it's fairly solid? So that is that money in your hands more or less So I'm just trying to get where is the uncertainty even on the numbers you've got on this table Yeah, so this is money that has been assigned to us using a desi calculation on title one it is the case that compared to the Great Recession where this inflation adjusted the federal government spent about a hundred twenty eight hundred twenty nine billion trillion dollars on Excision billion dollars on K to 12 education or plus K through higher ed so far. They've spent 27 and that was during a less challenging fiscal time without the Social distancing and other needs in the pandemic. So I think to your point this will help us for next year and I would urge US counselors to be advocating that the federal government play our larger role. I'm happy to send Slide deck after YouTube video of experts on this who are saying if the federal government doesn't stop Doesn't jump in schools will not be able to function in the future And so there is a bill that passed the house whether that passes the Senate Who knows but they are the only ones who can jump into this situation and again if anyone needs backup Please email me. I'm happy to send you more YouTube videos of experts or articles than you probably want to look at a read Then I'm just going to go down my list as quickly as I can so the the guesstimate of a cut in state aid about what percent Did you go ahead and take the leap? I know this is a guess so the dollar amount so You know, I was I actually went back and looked at some of the 2010 and 20 2006 like what happened to us last time So I just I don't know what you put in here. And if you don't have that right now, I can ask it again tomorrow I'd have further dug on that one. Okay, so I mean as a percentage. I mean this the state typically gives us Oh Little over $10 million. So it's it's you know, it's a small percentage That's a short story. Yep Then on When I looked at the payroll accounts and I realized when I went to the next page you had sort of a pre-covid FY 21 and then at the very bottom you subtracted out the things but the administrative cost central administrative and then the school administrative went up by About six a little over 6% but on the cuts page you took out a dean So if is that that's before you've done the adjustment on the top It just looked like somehow the administrative staff was increasing more than teaching staff was on on the as I said It's the FY 21 before you took out the pieces. So Yeah, and that's that's that's exactly it Kathy That was based on a level services budget and some things rolled over there were other administrative cuts even before the related cuts so to speak That cut into administration. There are new no new administrative positions That are proposed in this budget at all. And if you look at the cuts page We tried to keep things as way far away from the classroom In terms of riffs or reduction in force notices at the regional level all this resulted in a point four Riff and that was mostly based on someone returning from a one-year position. So we really kept things away. We're not reducing Sections or not reducing teacher load. This was purely based on someone who was in a coaching role returning to a teaching role But there were no program cuts. There were no offering cuts. There are no course cuts based on these this budget Hey, and am I right in assuming that? the non-union staff Got a 2% cola so that there is there is that built into this budget There is so the non-unit staff in FY 19 took a zero Just for background for people who weren't aware of that Things aren't optimistic in terms of that looking forward for FY 22 and to think of that happening three out of four years for people who are I can't get to take vacation as Paul and I have spoken Literally, I wanted to shut down the disher for a couple days because of how intense this process has been and will be over the summer And they're saying no, I'll just lose my vacation days because contractually they can max out I felt for morale and for what People are putting in and what they've been through as well as what they will be through it felt felt fair and equitable that they would Have the same cola as the teachers for next year. Okay, and I think my very last question is the substitute line in the Operating budget as you're looking forward It didn't go up very much and I did listen into your classroom discussion on configuration yeah, and it Including that any teacher who feels sick should stay home and so what do you do with the classroom? so it so just on that's one that I think as The year rolls out people have to look closely at because you may need to bring in more help than you had to before Because teachers would come in and teach when they were sick, you know, I mean they they weren't And they're being asked to absolutely not do that now You know, so it's just I was looking at whether that adjustment and it doesn't look like you fine-tuned that yet So hopefully there's some contingency funds or some ability to move around in the budget if you have to That's true. I think the only flip side or the only optimistic fiscal side I should say of it is that there's I did not see a scenario in the Fall where secondary students are in school every day I don't see that as being viable and so That might mitigate some of what you're talking about, but you're absolutely correct It's it's something we're aware of and we may have to use more internal staff simply from a sale public health and safety perspective Certainly, it's a hard job to be a substitute teacher to be a substitute teacher in a socially distant school We are going to have to do training for them and we may have to just literally rely on existing staff to cover Spaces and reconfigure things more than external staff coming in Not just for fiscal reasons, but from public health reasons as well And I want to publicly Sing the praises and I'll do it every moment I can of Julie Federman who is a rock star in terms of coordinating and connecting with us about this public health piece And how it connects the public education Thank you. I'm gonna turn it over to others because I get another chance tomorrow. Thank you very much For anybody who's just tuning in on Amherst media right now, I just wanted to or hasn't the last few minutes We have two hearings this evening. They were scheduled at 6 30 and 7 But the 7 o'clock meeting will begin at the conclusion of this hearing The hearing that we're currently doing is about the proposed regional school budget which has been presented to Amherst and the other three towns in the region and will require council action at the end of June and what we are currently in is questions from members of the finance committee and council and Then we'll see if there are questions or comments from members of the public So Mandy Joe, Hanna key Mandy your next person has to be recognized Thank you, Andy My questions all sort of go to the same thing, but I'm gonna try and ask them all together since they're somewhat related I appreciate the new slide about the assessment method and Decreases in budget and increases in in assessments and how that happens mid-year Because I look at a budget and I look at the unknowns and I foresee Budgets having to change so I just want to confirm that you know We've got a proposed budget in front of us that actually shows an increase in revenue from the state You've addressed that a little bit as to how I'm still confused as to how that is Calculated as a decrease when it shows an increase and it comes off the total operating budget And then you calculate the assessment required Once we pass an assessment of whatever that would be about 16.4 million if the state aid does not come in and where it's assessed Or in the budget, which is around 11 million right now And and change That would in theory unless the budget itself decreases the 32 million dollar budget decreases would require the way I think about it as either As an increase in the towns as assessments And so I want to confirm that if state aid doesn't come in where the budgeted numbers are the 11.7 showing on our budget on the fourth sheet of the slide that If the regional school committee does not reduce the total operating budget of 32 million in Response to a lower state aid that Amherst would actually have to affirmatively pass an increase in assessment above the 6.4 16.4 million. I just want to make sure I'm clear on that and the next question sort of goes to that issue which is I've seen I think desi came out with some sort of guidelines on Friday about PPE and state You know classroom sizes and all and some of that concerns me No more than 12 people in a classroom is one thing I read no more than 10 students in a classroom That has severe budget implications I can only guess how Is that manageable under a budget like this and is is this budget? I guess the question is is this budget Reasonable given the guidelines we're seeing from the CDC from the desi Are we going to be looking at instead of a decrease based on revenue from a potential decrease in revenue from the state? Are we going to be looking at a mid-year budget request to increase the budget? Or can you operate under this budget and CDC guidelines? I guess is one of my questions how how Reasonable is that to expect? Sure. Well, I can jump in a little bit and if Dr. Slaughter wants to add he can I mean I think the regional school committee have a number of tools that's disposable one of which you said it could re-engage the towns The region does have an E&D line So it does have reserves and depending what if there's a gap what that gap is It could think to use that also as a school choice line So I think there's a number of different scenarios that the school committee could use It certainly would want to keep all the towns elected officials connected to that and In order to make decisions in terms of terms of you know in terms of the desi guidance Let me clarify what came out was that the class size piece was about summer school If towns choose to have summer school, they have not come out and that won't come out till next week about Class size guidelines in classrooms. So we are analyzing class spaces. I think it's it's our estimates depending on the classroom 11 to 15 students can be in a class The high school particulars a Frankenstein kind of building that was built in three phases and you know So some classrooms have more space or different orientation than others I think as I said last week, there is no scenario that I foresee that all All regional students will be back in school five days a week any time with the current CDC guidance in place I think as a little preview to our Thursday school committee meeting. We have two school committees this week You know the survey that I mentioned has over 700 responses and I think for many people It comes as a surprise to them that the CDC guidance will equate to a pretty significant shift In the number of days in school their children will be attending and the options And I think miss mcdonald and I were pretty clear about this No one likes any of the options, right? And that's true across the commonwealth as well And so I think to your point the challenge will be how do we meet? The greatest number of students needs and all three districts. Um, sorry because my job is Has all three districts. That's the way I'm thinking about this and we're having a number of joint meetings for that purpose And uh, what's possible? What's advisable? But there's no scenario. I see where 950 students can be in the high school At a time it's just not going to happen, right? And I think the gazette got the headline, right? So whoever wrote that I think was scott well done that we need to de-densify the schools, right? It's not just about number of kids in a school. It's all the other factors number of kids in a hallway. How do we get kids to lunch, right? All those pieces Contribute to it. So I think what uh is going to happen and my my prediction is that we'll have to have a pretty thorough process And as miss mcdonald Has been great about we're engaging the public early and often both the public presentations and surveys and surveys that we just put out Is not the last one that we're going to offer Um to be able to come to hopefully a community consensus of what's the most important thing in the long term for our students in particularly as it relates to the Educational debt or our achievement gap that people use different terms That we have um that we have to weigh and so it's going to be messy. Um, it's not going to be clean I think that another preview of the data is I wouldn't say there's consensus on A model or an option. I think there's going to be lots of discussion that needs to occur But the reality is, you know, we're trying to be good fiscal stewards despite this situation We are not unique every district's going through it. Unfortunately, some of our space needs are more challenging For instance, the middle school has Classrooms that don't have windows which according to cdc guidelines is a big problem Because the ventilation doesn't it doesn't allow for an external ventilation with a window So we're analyzing all those pieces So long-winded way to say you're right. It's complicated You're right the amount of funds that we have to give is is probably inconsistent With what's needed to do the best job that we wish we could do Some of those are not short term fixes. We can't pop out and build a window when there's no Air on the other side of it. It's it's uh, there's the rooms that are back to back Um, but I think what we're committed to is engaging the public with realistic scenarios Getting their feedback and making the best decision we can For our students, but there is no wonderful scenario and I think comparing Mid-covid school to pre-covid school is actually something that we have to start doing a better job I have to start doing a better job Communicating it's not actually a helpful comparison It's really about what mid-covid school Option versus other mid-covid school options Do we have and there are fiscal implications as you note To all of those decisions You know for instance, and then I'll stop because I could go on for this forever It's a good question. And it's obviously what I'm breathing these days You know people are saying well, why don't you rent? You know a building or use the bank center or things like that, right? So every school building we use to has to have a nurse has to have an administrator in this So it's not just simply about the spaces and getting more It's actually the staffing that would accompany those spaces That makes it even more problematic Than just can we get a couple classrooms here there? If it wasn't a public health crisis, maybe we could make but we could get by with being more flexible That's not in the cards for us this year. And so I think we have to live within our means both from a space perspective We're going to do our best financially the PPE the personal protective equipment email that you referenced that came on Friday You know the number of materials a neighboring district similar size district Estimated there'll be 400 pieces of PPE needed in the first couple months And that isn't free. We are working with the town and I want to publicly suggest in state that the town has been wonderful about partnering with us on that and and I feel very fortunate to be working with town staff and with the This community values education so much not everybody has that luxury so long winded. I apologize. I'll I'll be quicker next time And they can just It's not 400 is 400 000 pieces of Sorry. Oh my apologies. I was so worried about timing. I lopped off three zeros. Um My apologies. Thank you. 400 did sound a little low No, no notes I have a quick question. Um, we've changed the way we do health insurance We've been self-insured, but I just wanted to be sure that if Um, a number of teachers did catch cove 19 and had extended and expensive hospitalization Would that affect our budget or would since we're now part of a bigger system would we Keep our what's in the budget as our estimate I'll defer to dr. Slaughter on that. I can answer that. Um So the the short answer is it it wouldn't really uh, it would likely when we go to renew our rates We renew our rates each year. It might have an impact on our rates in fiscal 22 To some extent, but that's also going to be our experience In combination with everybody else's experience and it's a much bigger fool than we used to have so I don't think it'll be too too bad in that regard You know, it's if if we had a significant draw on our insurance by virtue of a number of people being in in expensive hospitalization or Healthcare circumstances. Yeah, I would have a negative impact, but it'd be mitigated and to some extent relative to the others that are in the group with us and They recognize that there's some peaks and valleys to things in some respects there's one other thing I wanted to point out in in talking about just back to to Manny Joe's question around The revenue picture the thing to keep in mind is in that revenue section of that slide the fourth of five and It has it has a number of revenue sources not all our state revenue sources. So the total is 11.7 But you know END and END for contingency or both money we've got in hand in reserves We have additional reserves on top of that that we will also Could potentially draw on it would require you know action by Each of the four communities to do that If we were to utilize those those funds those reserve funds Interest revenue is also not a state aid piece But charter reimbursement some aspects of Medicaid that depends on how much service we provide Those all have variables and and have state components to I think if I could add one last thing is the other thing we've really slowed down filling vacancies And so we're waiting to see more state guidance Because we do know there's uncertainty there. We've heard really I've heard personally different really different things for different state legislators on what to expect And i'm not alone in that regard. I think that the municipal side is is probably in a in a similar space So I think we've we've tried to be conservative on things that we could be moving forward as well Mandy you have follow-up Yeah, um, I just wanted to to track back I had two parts to sort of my question on the on the revenue and then on the assessment So if I could get maybe an answer to confirm the assessment understanding that I have That if we pass this budget and state aid decreases by 25 or 30 percent And so the budget at 32.1 million is If your state aid isn't subtracting your 11 or 10 per 10 million out. It's only subtracting eight million out Do we have to if the School committee does not reduce the budget by that two million say Does amherst have to Revote and approve an increase above the 16.4 million dollars in assessment in order to be assessed higher Even if the budget funded budget 32.145 million does not change The short answer is yes However, I think if if if the state a drop by that larger percentage I think the school committee. I mean my my suggestion You know as finance director I think superintendent suggestion perhaps the way the school committee would would take action would be to You know review if there were any other and and we would be into the fiscal year a little bit We would have a lot more clarity on exactly what Uh, the program we're trying to execute is is looking like and so I think uh, We would have a much better idea of how we might be able to reduce our expenditure even more We'd have much better numbers on exactly what our staffing looks like, you know right now we have Uh projections on who and how many you know people we are Anticipating meeting and that sort of thing will have much greater clarity on all of those types of things So we'd look to obviously reduce our expenses and lower the overall budget as best we could Before we went back to any of the four towns and asked for more. Um, and we also factor in the fact that you know, uh There's only so much capacity among the four communities to to take on additional expense And so, you know, we we don't live in isolation here. We're trying to recognize that You know, each of our four member communities are are affected negatively as well when we are and so we recognize that and and we'll take that into account And I'll just add to that and I don't mean to be flip about it Um, and hopefully this isn't perceived that way But if if chapter 70 drops 25 or 30 percent no one's running school next year Across the commonwealth. Um, this school year is getting incredibly more expensive Towns across the commonwealth do not have the capacity to make up that gap And um that you know, you think of us you can think of larger districts And what it would mean for 25 loss in chapter 70 for larger urban districts that are much more reliant on state aid than we are So I think the state will have and that's I know that's a political statement But it's the truth and so Any advocacy that we can have from the town council both the state and the federal government We'd appreciate it. Um, just because we know the economy of the town isn't going to function if the schools aren't functioning Hey, well, thank you. I don't see additional questions right now from other members of the council the finance committee If there are additional questions, we'll have one more opportunity for counselors and the finance committee members to come back at the end I want to make sure that we now take the time for those members of the public who are watching who um wish to offer public comment by way of questions Or comment or comments that they have we ask you to limit your comments to three minutes and That you indicate if you were participating on the zoom Call you can use raise hand to ask to be identified and If you're participating by telephone, you can press star nine on your telephone so I'll just give it a moment and President grizmer is going to let me know if there's anybody I don't think that there is who's asked to be recognized There's nobody at this time Okay, so um, thank you. And is there any um additional questions from members of the finance committee or members of the council so seeing none then I think that We can Well, I have noticed the just just in time. Mary Lou talman has asked to be recognized. Mary Lou Yes, we're talking about this as a plan And that's great. But are we talking about it just for the fall or is this for a whole year? This is the whole year from now and much has changed within the last three or four months So between now and january We may know far more and maybe schools will be in full session So my question is is this plan for the whole academic year or just for the fall semester at this point in time All right, louis. I know the answer to that question I'd be going on tv left and right. I'd be selling the answer to that question I would love to know and I don't mean to be ingest I'd love to know that the answer to that question I mean, I think, you know, some of this gets to vaccine and and timelines for vaccine The reality is we don't know The cdc guidance my clear answer and I apologize for the poor attempted humor But the cdc guidance has three steps step one is schools are closed Because the data, you know, and there's a whole chart on page nine of that document The data shows that schools can be closed step two is that schools are open with enhanced social distancing Step three is schools are open with social distancing. There is no step four until there's a vaccine So your guess is as good as mine. I tend to be a pessimistic person on these kind of things There are those who are more optimistic than me. I like those people. I hope that they're right I pray that they're right honestly for in terms of people's lives But I it's not something I can predict The challenge at the secondary level is that once we go down a road We don't really have a great way to undo it. So let me give you really specific So at the high school level, it's likely the case That we will have to adapt the schedule to reduce the number of sections that students attend a day And so when students are in right now, they attend six classes a day. They have seven classes total and there's a drop schedule That's not going to happen next year There'll be fewer classes a day to reduce the number of opportunities that students are mixing with one another You can't go back once you've gone down that path completely students could be in school more But you can't undo what you've set up and you might be a model where students are taking Almost like more like a block schedule whether in fewer classes more time If you look at the beloy model a lot of colleges are looking at they're looking at having students take two classes at a time I'm not saying that'll happen at our high school But that's that's a common model that colleges are looking at to again reduce it to promote containment And so once you go down that model, uh, you can't it's not as easy to undo what you've started So, uh, the short answer is it's complicated. We don't know. I hope the vaccine comes sooner There are some commitments that will be made In the fall that may not be completely reversible even if students are in more often And so that is one of the vexing things of the situation Not only do we know what not know what state funding is Not know what the state model is that they're going to at least promote to us We actually don't know how long this will last and and that makes an additional challenge. It's exactly the right question to ask Unfortunately, I can't give you a very satisfactory answer Well, a follow-up then would be how does this impact the extracurricular for children and the sports the mia So that's another thing we're waiting on. I mean the the cdc guidance is pretty clear that They're really talking about sports that can be played with social distancing That eliminates some and it does permit others. I looked at Connecticut. They have released their sports plan for fall You know a great video if you've just google cdc foundation. They have The uh, they have the public health director or doctor from mississippi as well as their school committee Head of their school committee association And the public health doctor said essentially, you know, I can tell people not to play football. I want it's mississippi People are going to play football. I was talking to Doug about this earlier I think what we have to do is we have to be very cautious And I've been very conservative and some people like that and some people don't and I get that That we're going to follow the public health guidance That's going to drive our decision making and we're going to make the best public health best public education decisions Based on public health and not the other way around because I think when it's a slippery slope once you go down Well, I think it'll be okay. And so mia and the state will come out with that information And so, uh, I think it is a concern. It's also a concern for before and after school programs We do have an after school program at the middle school as well as many many as you know Clubs and after school experiences But the key one of the key principles in the cdc guidance is that students stay are in as few groups as possible You don't want students mixing with other students and some of that's Around uh, how they go every spreads. It's also around if the sprayers sprayers comes Do you need to shut down a classroom or do you need to shut down the school? And for how long? Um, so there's a lot of different reasons, uh, you know I tend to like some sports that would be contact sports. I like watching them I'm not sure how likely it is that we can do that Football is a good example. Dr. Slaughter knows very well I like watching football games. Our team had a historic season this year is fantastic I'm not saying there won't be football, but that is the sport that's hard to play in a socially distanced manner Well, thank you very much for all the answers. Thank you for the questions And and if there's no others if there ends up being no others Thank you very much for the council for for having us and engaging us and you know a really uncertain time So I want to remind my fellow counselors that um as last year There was one presentation at the The equivalent of this hearing which was much earlier in the budget cycle year Where the superintendent and Finance director from the school was present to present the budget and answer questions for us and Again, this is anticipated to be that meeting that hearing and We will be taking up the budget after discussion in the finance committee at the june 29th meeting Which is about the time that the town meetings in Um, the other towns will be taking place um, there is a process that Would allow for a 112th budget, which would be only used if we fail to get the three town meetings in the council meeting About some time. I don't know if my superintendent Morrissey have something to add Yeah, I just wanted to comment I think as the council knows that we did have to submit the request for the one-tenth budget the way it works under state Guidance is that we we submit that to desi to the state If we don't have all towns agree on a budget by june 1st We did indicate that that we believe there's support for this budget and as long as the budgets pass in all four communities by july 1st It's not something we'll have to manage But the state feels like they couldn't wait till june 27th when two of our towns have town meetings If if it failed at one of those meetings that would give them a very short timeline to set up a one-twelfth budget So we did submit that document and just wanted to make sure the council and the public were aware that we We were asked to do that Okay, so with that decided to see no other hands raised and President has to Advise me that there's anybody from the public who's asked to participate. I want to thank superintendent Morris Dr. Slaughter and school committee chair mcdonald for having Spent the time with us in the public hearing this evening and For having participated in the hearing on this budget, which is as I noted earlier required by our homeroom charter, so Thank you very much to the superintendent and The others who participated this evening and with that I am going to declare the first of our two hearings regarding the regional school budget to close and Convene so that we can convene the other hearing and I'll ask stop for just a moment to ask the president of the council if she wishes to have us Take a recess before going to the second hearing or so we move Straight into the next hearing. I think we should move in straight into its past seven o'clock at seven thirty five and so let's just keep going okay, so with that, I will You can convene the in color of the hearing for the one month budget and just to remind everyone of what we agreed to that there is a The town manager Is working with his staff on preparing a FY 21 budget but in order to give more time until June 29th for The preparation of the presentation of that budget. We need to do one month budget which Is to allow for appropriations to be made to allow for operations during the month of july and It will then be incorporated and become a part of the full year budget So with that, I'm going to turn it over to the superintendent And we will be following exactly the same procedure as with the last hearing with the same sequence presentation from the town manager and staff that he wishes to introduce and incorporate into his presentation and then questions from all counselors and finance committee members And again, I will try and recognize people just in order the fans go off and See if there are any members of the public who wish to Ask questions or make comments. So with that, I turn it over to the town manager Thank you. Thank you, Andy So first I want to say, you know, thanks to the superintendent and finance director for the schools dr. Slaughter terrific job They do a phenomenal job and like they the work they have cut out for them. It's just immense I I'm communicating with mike seven days a week every day They can't they think of a day that we didn't communicate that something during the last three months So and it's you should know that that's an unusual situation He's a high communicator and It doesn't happen in many towns where the town side and the school side work so closely together So it's a history for the town and I think that's that's a terrific thing I think mike and dug and the school committee for the way they conduct this I also want to recognize that we are being staffed by Athena O'Keefe and Serge Fedorovsky who are doing the staffing for this meeting So if people see those names on on the screen that's there are this town staff supporting the council and the finance committee during this meeting And tonight i'm joined by shon mangana the finance director and sonia aldridge our comptroller who will do the bulk of the presentation This is one of our public hearings as The chair said and you know, we had the region. We have the one month budget We will have a public forum on the capital Improvement program then we'll have another public hearing on the f y 21 budget and that will be followed by About eight individual finance committee meetings where we go into that budget in deep detail So this is the beginning of the one month budget This is permitted as the chair said By virtue of a vote of the town council on april 27th that Actually directed the town manager to create a one month budget along these guidelines Um So with that, I think uh, shon mangana is going to take the lead. He has A few slides. This is going to follow very much the same format that That we made to the town council um a week ago. So shon Thank you paul. Hello everybody So yeah, this is going to look pretty familiar to the presentation from a couple weeks ago We did add a couple new slides To respond to some questions that came in So some of this will be a refresher So a little bit about why we are going with the one month budget We do have a quite a bit of uncertainty this year probably more than any other year. I've been involved with We need more time to gather information on some of our revenues and expenditures and some of those major Items that we're looking at are what the colleges and universities are going to do in terms of reopening And what that means for our local economy and the expenditures associated with the colleges and university What the k-12 schools library and other town services do you just heard a great presentation from the superintendent and school finance director Um, there's a lot going on there and and may have some additional costs Um, so we have to keep an eye on that The state budget and what our state aid sources look like um state and federal government aid program So aside from our regular state aid that we get from um the government. What else is coming in? We have the cares act. We've got a pretty good handle on what's available right now But there is talk about the scope of some of those funds Possibly being brought in so we can use it for revenue replacement. Um, but that hasn't happened yet so We're keeping a close eye on that And then just keep an eye on our local economy and the local receipts Since the last time we presented this we've been able to dive into our enterprise funds quite a bit more and gauge the impact on water sewer parking And solid waste to get a sense of what's going on with those revenues and and forecast those into the future So a lot of unknown around these different areas and for that that's why we're putting forward a one-month budget Um, the total one-month budget is on your left and it'll be the same on every slide The total is 11 million five hundred and seventy thousand and forty six dollars And it's broken into the different functional areas and then enterprise funds Um, it is a one-month budget It's not a one-twelfth budget because it does include some large one-time expenditures Um, we'll really one want large one-time expenditure. Um, but it also factors in actual spending patterns as well So I will scroll down So this budget gives us the authorization to expend funds in july if we didn't do it and we would have to have a full budget by july 1 We came up with these amounts by using our accounting system to see what has been spent in the past And also consulting with department heads to get a sense of whether You know the historical spend day in aligns with what they think they need for the coming year Um, the hampshire county pension assessment is the one Sort of the single really large expenditure that is paid during the month of july Um, it's paid during july because the pension system gives us a discount if we pay it all up front And it's a pretty sizable discount. So most most communities in the pension system do pay it all up front Um, this is not intended to replace our full f y 21 budget document. You will still get the nice 200 300 page document electronically at some point Um, it does not include any additions or reductions. So there's no programmatic or operational changes in this one-month budget This is just to get us through to the full budget. Um, we'll get to much more conversation around the Any proposed additions or reductions during that time? And the hope is that the 12-month budget will completely replace this one-month budget So we're not going to bring forward an 11-month budget to you Which kind of you know, you can't really get the historical context for that We're going to bring forward a full 12-month budget, which will replace this one-month budget. Um, during the month of july So as I said, it's not a one 12th budget and I will you pull call upon my experience at the schools to explain why um, so The schools are a good example that the salaries go way down during the summer because some staff at the At the schools are only paid from september through july So you'll see salaries go way down for july, but you'll also again get that pension assessment that hits during the month of july So that's why it's not exactly a one 12th where expenditures are equal every single month um, we really did look at actual spending And then take into account, you know a little bit of an increase for for the inflation things of that nature Uh, there was a question on the retirement assessment, which is a separate item in the one-month budget You'll see it's there at uh, six million 192,108 That's just the general fund portion of the retirement assessment Um, the question that we received was what is the amount for those other areas? So we did include those here so you can see the different amounts, um, which are included in those other enterprise funds And there's a question about what are the most significant one-time expenses So really the pension assessment is the really significant one-time expense There are a few other little ones that will vary by department Sometimes there's maintenance agreements that are paid in july that you pay for the full year Subscriptions or sometimes longevity payments that come up But those are very small relative to the to the one large expense that I described So there's a question about whether capital is included in these enterprise funds budgets It isn't currently it will be part of the 12 month budget conversation But right now this is just to keep the enterprise funds going for the month of july And the last question that we received was What I mentioned a little bit before, you know How we looked at the impact of cova 19 on the enterprise fund revenues and expenditures and we have we've been looking at consumption of water and and sewer consumption and particularly the impact of the college not being in session on those enterprise funds because it Water consumption sewer consumption went down Also parking the fact that there's not a lot of Usage of parking right now and we have been collecting Women charging fines and things of that nature So parking revenues also went down. So we are looking at that for the 12 month budget conversation And we'll have much more to present for that 12 month budget on enterprise funds And with that I will turn it over back to the chair Andy you're unmuted still You're still muted Andy So I think now we're here um, so thank you very much for the presentation and Some of the questions that I had posed in advance have been answered but This now becomes a time for members of the council and the finance committee To ask questions. So I will be as I said earlier and did in the first round Be looking for raised hands and respond and then try and recognize people in the order in which they I see the hands are being raised and the Other things that I'd like to remind you of is that there is a series that it goes on because we really have a capital budget There will be a separate forum that's required by a different section of the Charter that requires that there be a forum on the regarding the capital plan And that's required to be a council forum And so it will be Called by the president of the council In accordance with the charter provision There will also be a second hearing because Though if you look at the charter it requires that there be a hearing on the fy 21 budget Which is the finance committee is tentatively scheduling for july 13 and the in addition To to this hearing about the one month budget and The council vote is anticipated that we will be as finance committee reporting back to the council In order to be able to take a vote on the one month budget on june 15th The annual f by 21 budget to be presented on june 29th Um and A series of meetings for the finance committees have been previously noted so Turn to my colleagues on the council the finance committee. Does anybody have questions? I see Kathy you have first question. So I just jumped in when I didn't see other hands I have One that's more general about what we know already as you When I looked at the one month Sean you just explained and it was very clear why some of these one months are less than a 1 12th of the budget guidelines The regional school is I think exactly Do we have a sense now? Or when will we will we have it early july? Were there savings on this year's operating budget because we had less overtime? some You know with with staff that could if state aid is down if some other things are down or When we come back So it's not so much this one month But is any was any of that figured into this one month that you know that you've got Some money that if expenses come in more than we expected for the town is that town services as people start to come back That that helps buffer and so that's question one one and the other one is pretty easy I I Paul gave me an answer to it But I'll just ask it here is is the 2 cola figured for all the non-union staff in this budget and if yes When we go to the full budget Does any decision we make around the one month budget affect decisions? We might want to make later on the full year budget So and that would be just an example. Um, but also on staffing and other things that we'll see in the full year Yeah, so I'll start is that okay paul if I start Um, so I think your first question was about looking at this year and what expenditures look like this year And has that been factored into what we're thinking about for next year? Um, I'll let sonia speak to that a little bit. She is working on projections for what the rest of this year looks like To determine if there's any savings this year or we're pretty confident. We're not going to need any additional funds at this point And anything that does get turned back this year will go into our Planning around the use of reserves going forward Sony do you want to talk a little bit about the process you're doing right now? After you want to get yourself I'll figure this out eventually. Um, yes, I was looking at it quickly today Um Our revenues are coming in better than I expected So I don't think we're going to be we might have a small deficit But not as much as I thought it was going to be remember. I said about 500 000 So and then we have um, we have lots of savings because we had vacant positions for quite a while on the operating budget Which will offset any deficit in revenue and whatever is left would fall to pre cash. We can't Commit it for next year's budget. It would just fall to reserves I don't have figures right now. Everyone's handing in their carry forwards. What's out there committed that needs to get paid It's going to be a process before I had final numbers And normally just to add to that a lot of that we don't find out the final number until the end of july or even into august when everything has completely stopped And we can reconcile everything Um, your second question was about the cost of living adjustment increases. So that was factored into this one month budget Those have been rolled forward at the 2% um, paul, do you want to speak a little bit about the If there's any changes after that? Yeah, so um, we did put the 2% in this just as the schools did and um, that would go into effect on july 1 um, the 2% is what all the other unions all the unionized employees are receiving So to single out the non union employees I thought was not fair and also they're the ones The ones who are doing the bulk of the work right now Getting through this very difficult time. So again, you know an alignment with what the school department has done That's what we're proposing as well I just just want to make sure People understand my question on cola. I wouldn't you know, I would completely agree that the Moderately or lower paid staff and I'm just looking at what some other entities have done not towns necessarily where the very top people have said We can forego that small increase this year or for part of the year So it that was the question But I think you also had told me by email paul is that All these decisions can be revisited with the 12 month and I mean, there are no furloughs in here now I mean, we don't really know much about staffing here if If things go south Right. So the tool that we would use is sort is the same tool the university would use which is is using now For fy 20 actually, but we don't really compare ourselves to the university Our situations are totally different. Our pay schedules are totally different We do compare ourselves to other communities and you know, our neighboring communities are doing the same thing We are here so and in terms of Implementation of that. I think that we would implement them on on july 1 as I said Oh, and then what I want to add is the tool that we do have in our possession is the furlough tool and that it can have the same impact as a Not including the cost of living and that's a better tool in my mind and from, you know, sonia and shan's mind Because that's something that we can apply across the board. So if we have to if we have a big deficit and we have to cut it We can and we have to reduce our expenses We would ask all employees to say take a little bit of a cut instead of a small number of employees taking a very big cut So we can do that In the course of the year when we need that tool. So it's The use of furloughs is something I think is much more understandable to employees as well If if we show a deficit and employees understand that we have to cover that deficit through Reduction of cost and everybody's sharing the pain in essence And they're not working. So there's a there's a Feeling like oh, I'm not working. I'm therefore I'm not getting paid and so I find that that's a much better tool It's more flexible and we can we can call it to order When we need it And if that happens and if we find out in november december, whenever we need it we can we can pull it pull the trigger on that Sonia, did you have something? Yeah, I just wanted to add that we've used the um The cola method before where we've not given cola to the union or we've cut pay like 1500 across the board Or for the lower paid non-union employees and stuff and it throws our pay scales off We just we just actually recovered from the last time we did that last year. So it really throws everything off So the most efficient way to do it is with furloughs across the board Well, I'm not seeing any other question people who have their hands raised right now. Um, I just Before asking to see if there's anybody from the public who wishes to speak We'll ask one thing which is confirmation There is a difference between of course, um level services, which was the measure of the budget that we originally had thought we would be asking in there was in the First set of guidelines that the council issued and then level funding, which is what the current level is by whatever increase in amounts was And usually when you go between those two their adjustments that have to be made in either staffing or programs um, and We'll get into this discussion in greater detail with the Full fy 21 budget But i'm assuming that you have that there are no Significant changes in staffing or programs that are built into the one month budget at this point and that Just want to get that confirmation if that's correct assumption Yeah, I can speak to that. It's not from a budgetary standpoint. There isn't Um, there may be operational because of COVID-19 and you know things that happened last summer might not happen the same way this summer Um, just as we all would expect, um, but there are no budgetary programmatic reductions built into the one month budget So anyone else from the council who wishes to ask any questions at this point or from the finance committee Uh, because again, this is going to move fairly quickly with the Schedule we have, um, this being before the council on June 15 Seeing nobody who's asked from the council, um, for members of the public again, mind you that, um, this is a public hearing and So we welcome questions or comments As if to try and limit anything if you do wish to comment or ask a question The three minutes that if you're participating by zoom, you can use the raise hand function If you're participating by telephone Uh, you can use the star nine on your telephone to indicate to um Us that you wish to be recognized. So um, I will um Pause for a moment And ask the president who's going to monitor this to make sure to let us know if there's anybody who's asked to be recognized Nobody at this time so there Is not nice to see one council counselor who's asked to be identified and I will keep an eye or Um, president will keep an eye on the attendees list to make sure that nobody's come in late um, but I'm gonna recognize Now there's two counselors, but counselor Pam first and then counselor Brewer in that order So Dorothy, okay I just want to make a comment that I have heard from a number of people That they would prefer in the future if we had a Meeting and not a webinar So that they could um Be seen and participate feel that they're more in the room with us I know there's technical problems But I think that there's an attempt to work on that. So I'm just making the point now Because it's been spoken to me. I've been it's been passed on to me a number of times recently Andy I'd like to Yeah Dorothy, thank you for bringing that up and I just say that Not related to this hearing but separately today. We had a conversation with it To see whether or not we can figure out some kind of registration system That allows people to come into meetings and be seen. So we're working on it. We're very aware of it It's a comment a comment that came up regularly during our district meetings and also now periodically during council Okay You have one other comp hand up. Yeah, I do Alyssa Thank you. I just wanted to mention since I know the finance committee will be meeting tomorrow that I completely support the Schools and the town's approach to colas and future furlough considerations using that as a tool Either potentially later in the year or hopefully not until the following year because we have no reason to believe following year is going to be great and You know recognizing what was said clearly about we work to be both an employer of choice and to be comparable to our peer communities And we're not in any way shape or form anything like the UMass athletic department And how it's talking about Little teeny tiny give backs from certain people. That's not the way our salaries are set up But I had either the school or the town level So I I'm very appreciative of the thought that went into that and looking at what we did in the past when we did make a straight dollar figure cut and it was A mistake as many people suggested at the time and it created ill will And it also didn't help us in terms of getting to our other goals So thank you for thinking through all those different possibilities because I know a lot of different people are doing it different ways Thank you anybody else Mary Lou This is said But whatever we do it needs to be consistent across the town and the schools and the library So if we're doing colas, it's for everyone and not colas here and something else there And the I have a second question about The budget in terms of is there anything in here for summer programs For children or are we not going to do lsse this summer? I'll let paul weigh in because he spoke in with barb about this There is a budget for the community services for lsc in here But paul can talk more about what that might look like Yeah, so the guidelines came out for how to do summer camps in there so onerous That we've determined that we cannot do municipal camps this year And we really feel terrible about that because I know a lot of people depend on it but the types of Camping experience a children would experience under the the guidelines that the state has put down would not make it doable for us So we will not be offering camps and we will be making an announcement about that tomorrow Okay, thank you anything else members of the council If not Then I think that we can Call her hearing of the finance committee to a close finance committee. We'll be meeting tomorrow afternoon at 2 30 We'll have a discussion about the One month budget We have a couple of Days that we can do a couple of meetings where we can do that But it will be before the council and of course council will have the opportunity to Ask additional questions of the town manager at that time since it is a regular council meeting and Town manager is at council meetings So that there is one more opportunity unlike the Region budget for I kept driving home the point that we made it might not have the opportunity to Directly as counselors ask questions of the superintendent But we certainly can't have the town manager. So it has seen no other hands being raised either from members of the council and finance committee or members of the public. I think that we can conclude the hearing for this evening for the one month budget and I want to thank the town manager and finance staff mr. Mangana and miss aldrich for their participation this evening and I will enable us to adjourn the finance committee meeting and I turn it over to then to president grease were to Conclude whether there's any additional business or whether she wishes to adjourn the council meeting I just want to remind us that next week at 5 30. We have an information meeting about the capital budget At 6 o'clock we have the public forum and at 6 30 we have our regular council meeting with a very very full agenda Other than that meetings adjourned