 Good evening and welcome to the select board meeting of Monday, August 20th, 2018 We're meeting at a bit of an unusual time. We're meeting at 530 our actual call to order time is 532 Tonight we're going to have a fairly quiet meeting. I guess is best way to describe it. We're in the midst of doing the Town manager's evaluation and so tonight is when we're going to read each other's evaluations and then work on our composite Evaluation of the town manager. We also have some other business to take into account and so we may take that in in order first unless there's something anyone needs to announce or Or to mention regarding the agenda but once we finish with that then we will begin the reading which is a long period of people reading through five different evaluations so We'll start with our action discussion item, which is a notice of intent to convert use of land WD Coles incorporated MGL 61 section 8 parcel 3c13. We took this up last time There were three different parcels that were under consideration. I guess one is actually really ready for our action The other two I think needs more they're a little more Subtle in what needs to be done Relative to that Do you have anything to share with us on this? I don't think anything's changed from last time. I think it's just a matter of we have motion language that's Been run through the town council press as it were to to make it Appropriate for what our need is so if someone would like to read the motion Yes, I just read it quickly myself and it is Does it more information and more detail than last we struggled with last week? Okay I move that the select board not exercise the right of first refusal granted to the town under mass general law chapter 61 to purchase a 0.096 acre parcel of land Located off Leverett Road being a portion of property described in deeds recorded with the Hampshire registry of deeds in book 1213 page 346 and in book 774 page 411 and to be sold to WD Coles Inc. To Alexi and Svetlana Peshkov for consideration of $2,000 and to execute a notice of non exercise to evidence said release And we have a second Is there further discussion? Yes, I wonder I realize we had council work on it this time since they hadn't had A chance last time but I would like to insert the M for mass general law I know that in legal documents. They often skip it, but Is there further discussion Hearing none all those in favor, please say aye And our agenda is the town manager performance evaluation review of individual evaluations on your desk tonight and soon to be released to the packet are each of our individual Evaluation documents a The composite of just the ratings that we did and then a draft With the word draft on it. Thankfully of a memo that I wrote that's trying to bring all five of those into a Sensible hole which we will discuss but We'll start by reading Hopefully mr. Wall will be joining us soon Is there anything else anyone wants to mention relative to those? if not, then I think Thrilling television that is us reading just the only question is just to confirm the process that you've gone to in prior years I assume you've met with the time manager We have we have We met At the end of the week after these were due And discussed them a little bit and so, you know, he's aware of the content of all those he has had them Missed the same length of time I have Look through them Thank you Stray care each return That is the one advantage of being the chair it's the only one It's the only advantage to share when it comes to the eval process Providing plastic where Yes, I was confirming it was just because I have a word there and we're discussing pizza Wrong separate from pizza. Are you? You can keep eating pizza. I don't want to halt that process at all All right, so it's a seems like everybody's Managed to make their way through all of these So So I attempted in putting together the the composite in the memo to try to capture as best I could sort of as many of the ideas and thoughts that people had about the different goals that we had set forward and Accounted them there are 58 different things we were making ratings on So it's a pretty substantial number And tried to make some reference to almost every one of those In the summary I did find a typo on page 9 There should be an R Instead of a it's not you it's your Definitely get that corrected But I'd love to hear what what people think about The evaluation generally specifics the memo itself. I think any of those topics are Completely appropriate on page 9 in the paragraph that's Above the dotted line third one above the dotted line the board was evenly split relative to you performance It's a word but not the correct one for that spot in that sentence Possessive but yes On page 4 I just think you might want to substitute a different word just because it clanged when I saw it But that I swear it's the only word Smith anything else on page 4 paragraph 3 Previous to her retirement just sounds weird, but okay pick a different word or keep it another PR word And then just in terms of factually on page 5 Fourth paragraph from the bottom about affordable housing You phrase it differently in your while we all phrased it slightly differently in our evaluations, but in this text I Don't think it's really accurate to say that our a sage that our shi has increased by 26 units And I'm in fact not even sure that we only get to count 26 Because sometimes we get to count more. Oh, right that might we might count the whole and so I just think maybe you want to just use The phrase from somewhere else rather than trying to make it seem like It's that direct I could just take out that I could just take out by 26 units and just say increasing The block So I could just follow up. I I understand the words you're saying I think that we over the years worked really hard to stick with the same broad categories and have different things that we called out Underneath them very specifically Back in the day, we didn't necessarily call out the subsidized housing inventory at all as being particularly relevant or just buried it within the rest of it so but I totally hear I totally hear what you're saying in terms of Broadening it not not because the broad topic isn't therefore getting enough attention because the two underlying things are too specific We wanted to make sure there was something specific as opposed to just a broad topic But that then prevented that from being so I I'm starting to make notes on evaluation tips for the future And I hope others are too, but I put the shi is not and being that specific is not what We should limit the affordable housing focus to it should have more Able to be discussed than that fact Well, and just since we're going to talk about affordable housing I think there's there's affordable housing with capital a as far as measurable for things like shi, but there's lots of other measures of affordability that we can promote and Need in town as well Mr. Walde just on that and you know one of the problems is these things aren't always living in town managers control So it's difficult because they want the town to advocate for these things and to send us to the manager can't advocate, but there's very little, you know Producing mid-price branch houses not in his wheelhouse. So This is going to take up a second job. Yeah, which is actually a segue to general comment that I have sort of been On my mind all the years have done these valuations, which means all the years that I've been on the select board We set forth a very ambitious set of goals for our managers Which I've always viewed is to be our priorities things we would like to see accomplished and We'd like to see progress towards all of them But I think that it's unrealistic to expect that we're going to be able to make progress on all of them for Varieties of reasons one is that they are so ambitious and the second is that in the end manager over Manager may be there's only one person and there's a limit to how much can be accomplished in that and it's important Somehow that that gets recognized and I've always felt like in the end we really do recognize it But it's a fairly nuanced thing that we're doing as we're passing this torch on to the body Important that we somehow Engaged that conversation and I and so I wonder Whether there should be something in the general cover memo that Mr. Slaughter has written that Alludes to this general topic of whether sort of just recognizing the extent of what is there and the recognition that You do as much as you can and as many as you can and that is an important Measure for us, but that you can't do it all no one can do it all Yeah, I would say on that You know I wrote in in the sort of summary part of mine. It said every year Has its unforeseen challenges and obstacles which prevent us from reaching or even making progress on some of our goals So that was in a sense my one sentence attempt to sort of Recognize that there's you know, it's a lot of things we asked for I'm always impressed both from mr. Bachman and past managers and in How much you know for all the things we write down and ask them to do how much progress gets made on how many things? And it's it's really quite impressive in that regard the volume that gets done and I recognize and you you've said this in any of your In your self-review and your and you made your report to us that you know It's a team of people that are doing the work, but nonetheless, you know, you're you're guiding that group of folks through that process and you know delegating those tasks and and trusting them to get things accomplished and so I'm always really you know Pleased and impressed by the number of these things that get attended to in a pretty significant way Every year so well, I think you addressed that also in passing and several points in your excellent summary, you know because I'm not there's a quite a range of opinion you say and and the thing that would this that always strikes me about these things is that I mean Partly depends on how much caffeine you've had or how much sleep you've had or what mood you're in But that even if we give a different rankings according to the boxes We're often pretty much saying the same thing So it could be that something hasn't gotten done because we're overloaded because the staff aren't there or something isn't Happening or there's just too much on the plate And so depending on one's point of view one could write down Maybe not commendable. It's satisfactory needs improvement or not if information So that's I mean, I think that's a good thing that we're always pretty much on the same wavelength Even if we have different rankings if you look at the pros or if you have the extended conversation We're seeing the same kind of things and they be judging differently. I don't this is a point to talk about the general categories But one thing that strike you always strikes me like when I've done the thing and not the year before That either the number of the categories or the wording is problematic because you know To me satisfactory sounds like the greatest report card where you kind of showed up and did stuff But didn't really can a you know commendable sounds like it's good, but You know, it's it seems to be that if you know if we had five categories, you know, really You know outstanding Or whatever I could promise we expect good service and we get it from our town staff But some of the satisfactory commendable thing always seems a little bit difficult to me whether because the numbers of categories or the wording and More granularity would be helpful or would just complicate the whole task where there needs to be Wait, I'd afterwards made a couple notes Sometimes if one year something is like really a crisis, let's say student behavior You know and actions have been taken to mitigate and come up with new things Then you get a commendable But if nothing External is really you know all the systems have been put in place and everything's going along smoothly Then you get a satisfactory because so that's just that's the nature of the beast I mean I wrote in my narrative. It's sort of frustrating to make the boxes work But there aren't a lot of choices because so I realize some of the satisfactories are because The job is getting done, but there's nothing extraordinary to respond to and so you're not going to get a commendable because there's like not a big hoopla like a you know Some crisis where other things that have come up that weren't really even in our goals that I think we all mentioned like the health care trust and the zero energy by-law and Working on that marijuana, right? I mean, there's a bunch of things we couldn't have anticipated per se So this Goals are kind of our map of as Andy said what's important to us to track But they don't always work for commendable satisfactory. So it's there's always I'm always frustrated Doing it. I don't know what the that there's better ways, but I to Andy's point earlier Doug about Kind of was like your concluding sentence might want to in the preface to your This is really like a litter to the public as and to a future council thousands the manager to put something in about We recognize that nobody is going to do all of these all the time because It's a very ambitious Set of things and we're reflecting what we identify as priori priorities in a certain snapshot of time when we develop the So I thought you already did that in Paragraph three of your first page But if people want that beefed up, I don't object to that, but I thought that was exactly what that was saying if you want it Made ever more clear her feel free, but The third paragraph for the fourth Like word recognized Don't think it hurts to be but if you want it, I'm just not sure you want to repeat I'm not saying I'm saying don't put it somewhere else in here as well Yeah, it should be near the view you want to beef that up point. I went back and forth about adding Another sentence or so to that And ended up not but I will I'm hesitant to quote myself too directly You know, I could just give you mine and get a call of the day Not toward the the I think you should use the sentence you use to feel free to just Think that works perfectly well change the font make it really obvious I thought you did a really good job on the composite. It's really hard. I really don't have any issues You can say I won't miss doing it It's a valuable thing we do I really do and and I think it hopefully provides the manager with with, you know You know proper feedback and and help as far as you know framing is his work with being the coming months or years or whatever but but But it is not an easy poor fun thing to do but Actually, it's a topic. I think it'd be good to return to at the end of the discussion because it really segues into What is our recommendation for the council on the process that would work in a 13 person body and Across my mind a few times So I think we should return to it but not until we've finished Central business here. Yeah. Yes. So skipping over all those comments and And and I just have to push back a little bit. Mr. Steinberg on the unrealistic expectations and having been doing this particular form or format Twice as long as you've been doing it I've ranked. Yes. I did all those years that well we're gonna talk about all those years that I'm gonna double them And I do think that up until this point, although It's extremely hard to work with in many respects for the things we bring up every year. I Think it has been an Interesting point to get us to this point where five people can say here's the whole universe of things our community cares about Some years you're gonna be able to focus on some things and some years not and I think it's totally reasonable that we say Gee this needs more attention, but you know, obviously you're doing this other stuff over here That's doing really well But to just throw out a number of things in hopes that there will be this nice tight little four goal thing That will then meet everybody's expectations is something we can talk about process wise for recommendations for the next group Especially since there's so many more of them and we obviously can't use this format We would never recommend this format to 13 of them But I think that's part of where it came from is because well I know it's part of where it came from because when I originally got on the select board there were people who each wanted to write their own completely separate evaluation of the manager and Based on no shared goals and so that really wasn't gonna work And so in order to sort of encompass everyone's feelings about everything. We ended up with this giant Thing that Realistically no human being can do every aspect every year. It's just how does it ebb and flow over the years? So I think that's something that we'll want to explain to the council like Like that's how that happened, but you don't want to do it this way Find another way to try and address some of those things because this way and is not It's barely worked for the five of us to have this humongous Group of things and the amount of time that this town manager and the ones prior have had to spend To self-evaluate is also a huge investment of time in addition to doing the actual work itself I was not suggesting Anything about the goals themselves Because I think That you've stated already so clearly. I probably I don't really need to restate it why there are that number of goals It's the More public recognition is a part of our evaluation, but more importantly our Recognition to our manager That we have this large number of goals and we have to be realistic about our expectations and that Manager has to be realistic about His expectations So that there's not frustration built on either side by an implication that you could that Every one of them has to be in it, you know a top of the chart because I don't think that that's You know just not humanly possible and it's not possible because The town doesn't have the resources to do all of it We turn a little bit for what one of the things mr. Wilde said that Even though we may rate differently from our different perspectives I thought the issues and the topics and the challenges that we noticed Were really similar and and so in that way I felt comfortable with our course We all get the same slice of information, you know, we're here on Monday nights We get the reports we get the emails so we don't know You know, there's some things I shouldn't and wouldn't really know enough about to Evaluate and what goes on in the department level, but In terms of our role and vantage point it seemed like we did pretty much touch on the same things and so that was You might have noticed that when you did your composite The themes are really similar Right. There were a few cases where someone recalled a particular thing and others didn't or vice versa, but more often than not we're recalling similar things and using this as examples of of You know You know working toward a meeting goals So that in that sense, it's you know possible to sort of even do the composite because there is some alignment there If we were in five completely different directions, this would be probably, you know twice as long and Half as clear Were there other suggestions about content in the in the demo itself, I mean I do Want to take advice from you guys and make edits as necessary to clean that up. I'll certainly, you know Add a little bit to that front page to To enhance that paragraph a little bit, but I don't know if there were any other Comments relative to content or typographical errors or For that matter, I'd take any and all commentary on form and structure and content and Well, I don't know if it belongs in the intro, but Every time every year we go through this and there was a year we didn't which was the year that mr. Bach was started so Mr. Steinberg you didn't do this every single year That very few people have to have their personnel evaluation done in public on TV It's awkward for us. It must be I can only imagine awkward for the manager and I don't know if it makes sense to recognize that but it's particularly Challenging something process very few people. I mean personnel reviews are hard enough I never liked them either side of the table and this is just you know, we've gotten used to it We've formalized it. It's a particularly Precure your way to talk about somebody's job performance Yeah, at some point today I'd like to hear from Mr. Bach. I mean if any of this was helpful or resonated So I know that's gonna come up Interesting you say that this trigger because when I was Doing a little bit of assistance to the Charter Commission back in that days Actually had some conversations with people in elsewhere about Evaluation processes of managers because that was a topic that was a particular interest to the Charter Commission and I had a I have a friend who teaches in the Public administration program at the University of Kansas, which is a fairly large Well-known program that it touches a lot of states around the country I had the discussion with him and he was commenting without my having to prompt that he just knew about it That in Massachusetts is one of the few states that has this Anomalous procedure that it has to be in public that most states do not and That He did set a couple of examples, but he's that when I was talking about what would you recommend as a good procedure? For all of his expertise and his work in a number of different states He kind of threw his hands in the air because he didn't really have any grand insights as to how we Deal with this very peculiar set of circumstances that's thrown to us By our legislature And when I spoke with the member of the city council in another state Asked how they did the process Of course, I suddenly realized in the conversation that there was a stupid question to even ask because of this very fact Perhaps it's based in pre-tenical roots and putting people in stocks to embarrass them in front of the whole town or something But you know it has that feel does it? Yes along those lines Maybe we could maybe you could just insert a sentence and it doesn't even have to be long But in between on page one two three four five in between paragraphs four and five Because we talk about you can't get in paragraph three We talk about you can't get everything done then it's art and science and then by the way it's in public And and truly I don't know one else faces this I mean the president of the United States, you know It doesn't have a goal set that's agreed to by anyone that then he gets rated on I mean all kinds of crazy things happen But I mean nobody else This doesn't happen in front of shareholders. I mean, it's just it's insane when you really think about it So I do think it is worth because there are a lot of people out in the community who are newly engaged in learning about what we're doing here I may not fully appreciate that but that's just not how it works any place else Like you said with your friend who's experienced it elsewhere school superintendents or the that's it or the two You know town managers and school superintendents in Massachusetts and it is an extraordinarily public process I'm mentioning something about that. I think would be really valuable. Okay And it has its advantages in terms of transparency and public information, but it also has a downside This is an observation I was when I was putting the sort of you start with the easy stuff when you do this so I was putting the other sections near the back and the section where it talks about the evaluation process information So, you know, I'd read this in the charter, but I hadn't in a while and I look and it's a single sentence about the evaluation The town council shall conduct an annual review for the purpose of assessing the town manager's performance That's it. And so I'm not saying that's good or bad. I just was shocked at how How brief it was relative to what we have which is, you know much more precise and you know Again, good and bad about both of those gives them some latitude to sort of form their own Methodology which we'll have to work with as many people as they have To follow up on that for one of the com and mr. Steinberg may have been involved in more of these conversations But one particular conversation I had with several members of the charter commission was that they started out longer And then they tried to say things that actually didn't comply with open meetings And so then it was like, you know what just make it shorter and then deal with whatever current rules There are moving forward. And so that's part of the reason whereas the town government act I still will say the town government act is like poetry in comparison to the charter town government act is much shorter. It was honed over many more years and So it's not surprising that you can't necessarily just draw an arrow from one to the other and have it make sense But yeah, they were trying to avoid getting in trouble Well, you know, it's it's like they talk about the sort of length of of different documents and sort of you know State constitutions generally have been revised a number of times, but they on average have 40,000 words in them Whereas the US Constitution has like thousand You know, Gettysburg address was less than 275 words, you know, so it's sometimes brevity is For the best in those things So unless there's other comment on this I'm happy to make those a couple of additions and try to have those Prepared for us for our Friday meeting Spock was did you have any sort of comment or you said two hours? On camera, yeah, I just want to thank you for your work. I mean, it's an arduous process. You're right about that It's I think it's by necessity. It has to be transparent It's important for the public to see you doing your work and for you you'd be holding me accountable I Think you've been considerate in how you've approached it You've been frank in your assessments And I and I and I found a lot of the comments very constructive and getting direction and more clarity about what you want to see me do better is helpful to me and when I was reading it I Found it oddly exhilarating and and Mostly because I was thinking oh, there's more opportunity here I think for like most people I tend to Concentrate on the things that I'm comfortable with that. I'm in my comfort zone So I keep focusing on that and then there's certain certain things that I think the board's job is to yoke around and say Yeah, well look at this too and you're and I you haven't paid enough attention It might be because it's outside my comfort zone or there's a lot of reasons why the things that you've identified I could we could go through them, you know timing wasn't right or whatever it was But I think that there's there's a conversation to be had there so It was it was nice to hear the things that you felt like I was doing well It's important for me to hear the things that I just missed that I might have a blind spot too And I'm just talking about this earlier today with some colleagues That we all you know have that and that that's it's useful to have someone say you got to pay attention to this So I think that You know while this may not be the model for the incoming council I think I think you you know in addition to the public as your your memo, which is really a lot It's a work of art to pull all this together into very few pages. You had to pull it into That you're able to that it's a conversation or it's a letter to the public But also to the incoming council because they're gonna go back and look at this and say how did they do it? How did how are we gonna do it and this is gonna be a real model for them? So You know it's it's it's it takes an enormous amount of time by a lot of people to pull this off and and the but I think the important piece of it that is that You take it very seriously and I said I think that really sets a tone for the entire organization that That you set a standard for how you want Performance evaluations to be looked at by your staff So I think that that's a that's a you're the seriousness of purpose you bring to this endeavor is really important Because it engages me in saying we need to ramp up our performance review because I think that that's Because you've set the example that this is a really high priority thing and you expect your expectations are high like that So I appreciate the amount of time that you put into I know it's It's the last thing you want to do when you when it's 10 o'clock at night you like now I have to do this thing But it's not something that any of you have dashed off. I can tell by reading your evaluations. So Just want to thank you for that and The one thing I Have found oddly clarifying not oddly but interestingly clarifying just clarifying Is when you say we really want this to happen that when you have fewer goals There's a lot of assessments on here. There's 58 different things as the chair said But if you as a board said there are three things we really want to see done this year Whatever it is or the council because there's so many you can't it's hard to say but you say like these are the things we really want done that would be really helpful because the board articulating that and having you know When you're part of an organization you should be able to to enunciate what your What your goals are for the organization and everybody in the organization should say that and we have lots of values that we can Can talk about but if we said you know, whatever the goal is that you said is these are our top three five Whatever it is priorities and everybody in the town can say it it really would give a lot of boost to our mission I think and And what we do here. So just basically thank you for the work that you put into it Samur, thank you. Thank you for your comments and there was one thing that we added in Because we head to this year and I was part of a large part of wanting to see it added was the transition If the charter passed and then the charter did pass Because I think this is important to us That the success of the town is what we're about not the success of the select board and Regardless of what happened. We want to see it going forward. I think that chair touched on it well, but I It did take a lot of time. I know it took a lot of your time this year and If anything it'd be if I was gonna be if anything up it would be along the lines of just saying even a little bit more about the amount of time that it took to Get the transition going as soon as the charter passed and to make sure that we were on the right path to Getting from our current form of government to where we're going To add to what mr. Steinberg said and I think it is worth in a way highlighting that near the introduction You know we knew that a transition was coming we flagged that that's really important But we didn't know we were going to have a bunch of legal Challenges, I mean each one of those things represents, you know, whatever efforts band with Hours and back and forth and town resources with council and others so It was actually in some ways more arduous. Maybe we were naive Because we had the dates challenged we had a special act to do we had change of A bunch of things that and I think we were clear in our meetings that it was really important to this board to keep on track with that in The manager and the other related staff did so it's more than just, you know The one line transition to charter there were a bunch of dramas along the way that we didn't anticipate And I certainly in my you know in in writing that particular piece You know, I I went back and forth about How do I capture that? You know without it being? you know 10 sentences But I can definitely make an effort to try to add a little bit more to that effect. I mean I certainly Wanted to touch on that and and that gets to that that idea of of what I had said in my own evaluation about You know things arising that sort of take You away from doing other work and I think that that is an example. There were a couple of things that came up That that Ended up taking time. It's time well spent, but at the same time it was time not spent on other things So, you know, it's want to acknowledge those things I think that's one of those things one of these areas where the board the board had the board listened to the voters the voters spoke the board Took a leadership role in that and did not equivocate. There was no like oh should we should we you know There was never it was like we know the direction that we're we've been told to by the by the voters And I think that that sort of strength of leadership was really important for the work that we were doing You know to figure things out because knowing that was the direction and Having the support and the direction of the board was really important to that I think That suggests at some point we go back through these 58 goals and star three of them at some point. I mean and not not So not to be difficult, but we did look at a draft of goals briefly already And we will look at that again tonight And that is exactly what that was is trying to pull out the things that we've talked about So when we get to that section, it's that is definitely Something that we had discussed as a group and then saw a draft of which is still not just three. It's more like 12 And so if it needs to be three, it's gonna be interesting Whereas I believe is the phrase therefore Here that's right. I do have copies of the most recent addition of that which I will share with us if but I do want to make sure that we have Completed talking about the evaluation so so as I believe you indicated aside from the Sort of beefing up a couple of areas that we talked about which are we still out to say with so many vegetarians at the table But okay beefing up sections at that and Then this will be available on Friday for us to review again and And our meeting is at eight or eight three. It is an eight o'clock and we will have I Think two liquor licenses So we'll start in this room and then we'll go into executive session at that point We'll probably discuss the edits to this and then just in case you came up with some brilliant other thing That is not similar to what we've already talked about Yeah, nice. I just want to make sure I had entered it at eight and I didn't write I wanted to make sure it also said a 90 30 because I wasn't sure it was it's not actually posted yet And so I wanted to be a hundred percent certain that my understanding was the adequate was the accurate one Okay So we'll get posted tomorrow Because otherwise Wednesday But yes, it will it will get posted Tomorrow just so we can get in those last minute liquor license. That's right We're being business friendly trying to get people, you know, sort of off the ground and and moving on with their With their with their businesses I think there was one other question I think I had for the board about this So I think you all for taking the time to read through it and your kind words relative to my Draft and so I will make the suggested edits and bring this Yes, so my question then is and I may just be Jumping ahead of what you were going about to say anyway Is would you prefer at this point that we talk more about the next set of goals or about the structure tips for the For the future council, are we are we gonna get a chance to talk about both of those tonight? And I personally don't care when which one we talk about but I hope we'll do both just because we're kind of all Meshed in it now. I am open to either so I'm it's the boys pleasure as far as whether they prefer to since we're talking about this Structure and how that might compare to a future structure Maybe that will be the place to start and have a little bit of a conversation about and then you know Advice we would give and then we can come into the the goals because that's about where I think we go in the next few months with the manager so process a little bit, maybe we should continue that with suggestions for Coming council So if we're going that way then the notes I already made beyond the things that everybody not everybody may not have captured them perfectly just said But some notes I'd made prior to that are you know if you were using a form like this and you were making an X You would want to sort of force people to answer a question rather than letting it be like because we we all run into that sooner or later Because the format is difficult, but then I have point to don't use this format So problem solved which which also relates to the the conversation about if you do use something like this We talked about what is commendable really mean what a satisfactory really mean We talked in several ways about the fact that we might say the exact same thing in a sentence But come up with two different ratings So like what does that even mean and it would it wouldn't be any different if it was a four or three or seven or two point five if the words are the same and so maybe you know cautioning the future council that maybe on The one hand you don't want it to just be pros, right? You want to have some kind of categorization But even we who've worked with this for several years now in a row still struggle with it ourselves And like we're kind of all on the same page even though we interpret things a little differently So I don't really know the answer to that but one suggestion that I thought we might come back to and actually Mr. Rockland sort of touched on it is Now that we regularly do staff evaluations of department heads What rating system that uses I mean we have no idea We have no reason to know what that evaluation form looks like But if there are parts of that that are particularly satisfactory then maybe it makes sense for those to mesh to some degree in terms of just how Then department heads would hear from you the same way you would hear from the council in terms of Readings I don't like that word but evaluation terms So that might be worth knowing because that's we've talked about how other towns do it Which means which is actually nowhere near as well as we do We are way ahead of the pack on this but How do we do it internally that we could build on they can make just one quick comment on that You know turn up the ratings and how to make those categories sort of work for folks And you know in the education field they talk a lot about norms You know you you find operating norms or rubrics for grading select when they're evaluating writing samples of kids Or if you get into companies that do testing they often talk about you know, how do the graders of the tests? you know sort of Consistently evaluate those things some of the You know thinking that people have done over time around that could be very helpful as far as trying to get Consistency around what each of the terms mean in which circumstances what kind of terms are the right kinds of terms to even use to begin with but That's a potential suggestion and there there are folks in town that know about that stuff because There are businesses that have been in town and near town that that do that kind of work all the time You know you were gonna say about this work. Well, I went to Hampshire College And in graduate school I wrote an essay about for the Student newspaper about how embarrassing it was to be graded because it seemed to be You know reducing everything to a grade seemed to be irrelevant to my professional my coming out of the professional sector going to graduate school and then having to my grade me was Not was what I was about. I wanted to hear the feedback that people are giving me and so but I also understand that That the public wants to know, you know, and the press wants to say Good bad great average, you know, they want that little they don't want to Go through a Hampshire transcript. That's 47 pages long They want to know what's what's the headline and I think they also got something We'll I assume you'll talk about on Friday or whatever is the press release that will need to accompany something like this So I think that it's a hard one because you do the first choice the first choice method is one thing But then having a understanding of what that means because right now I think you're right satisfactory is that to me when I evaluate people and we've had this in my previous organization Everybody was excellent in one division and everybody's average and that next it wasn't like the divisions were that different It's just that the person grading them said I love everybody. They're great The other person was like they're all doing their job. They're fine, you know, and it's like They're all doing fine. So it's like If there's an agreement on what the metric is or the rubric is for doing that so Other thoughts at the moment about what we might offer to the incoming council. Well, I Think in some ways the new council is gonna have to come at this in a fresh way We can sign that works for us and I think it's building the goals that in some ways is as challenging or as important as You know eight to twelve months later a value to using them as an evaluation tool And I think as the council gets familiar with each other in their job They're gonna have to review the goals and kind of own them and make them their own otherwise So we've found a couple years back without Good goals, it's pretty hard to make the evaluation form work Or if they don't like one point ours didn't mesh So I don't know I mean this is a great sort of set of samples for them to build off of but I think they're almost gonna have to Take the Lego thing apart and rebuild it in order for it to make sense Have a couple of thoughts one is that it's really hard to devise a system because even if we were you know Continues a select board and there was not being a change There's two circumstances that can change this entire dynamic of how this goes on one is wholesale dissatisfaction with the performance of a future manager and the other is One or two members of the elected select board who have a totally anomalous view from everybody else and I think we've seen it in other boards and committees in town But it's not one that I've had to deal with as a member of the select board thankfully so but any System is gonna have to recognize that either of those can happen and The other thing that I Think we really need to Remind our future counsel of is that What works for a five-person board doesn't work for a 13 person council? simply because It's just a different Set of circumstances for to expect the chair to be able to pull together 13 Forms even if they're generally consistent Is probably an impossibility five is probably for the two of you who have done it? barely manageable and See five's plenty. I was thinking about the notion. I'm doing they're having 13 and We take them we take forever and a really long time to do and so you'd have to be getting less in order to Do it or have something different. I mean because you just You know the length of what we have done if you had trying to put together 13 of them is impossible and I think we should Recognize that for ourselves and for them I do think that's important to point out to them It certainly came up when they were talking about the number of counselors that charter commission meetings and people kept saying more more more And I said how are you guys going to do evaluations like five is really hard and Regional school committees really struggled to give a useful Evaluation given the handcuffs that they're already provided by the state, etc. Plus the wonderful public process It's really really hard and it takes many many many many hours to do it as it is One of the other things I think associated with that that I'd like us to also feel like we could communicate to the council And I'm jotting these notes down. I don't know who's writing this because this isn't part of the press release This is our separate, you know booklet of things to tell the future council We're not that we're on the same team right now They're not gonna be on the same team They're still on team Amherst, right? We talked about how important it what matters to us is the community not per se the select board But is a different literally a different relationship. They are not part of the executive anymore And so I think they need to think about that too and to keep that in mind To not just think I mean the few of some of them aren't familiar with tongue government at all So not a problem But for the ones that are to not think of themselves as one of a 13 member select board because they ain't there The legislature instead and that sounds just like well sure whatever But like how do you compare that? Well, we've never we've asked how meeting members for input to the evaluation, right? And we occasionally get some that's a very different animal and so that I think including that in our explanation of Why we also think that trying to reuse a form that was developed Together as part of the same branch Whereas I certainly hope they work very closely with the town manager on an appropriate evaluation form there The relationship is just not the same the herring relationship is very similar, but beyond that it's not the same the When I had the conversation with my friend out at KU We were talking about that when I had the similar conversation with the select know it with the council member in the city That was talking to which is about our size The Process generally runs along the lines that the chair of the body whether that chair being elected mayor or otherwise Has a little bit of a larger role in actually doing the evaluation and getting input from other members of the elected body Because you know most communities have a council manager form of government and whether there's a mayor who's chairing of the council or of an elected chair of the council since that's the largest Number of types of governments and percentage in the country I mean there's plenty of models out there, and I think that that I gather is what the common approach is and Then of course they have one advantage in most places that we don't have which is That the chair would then sit down with the rest of the council in executive session to talk about it So here's my Proposed evaluation and then they talk about it in an executive session Mulla that you know put come up with where they're going to be and then it gets put together And put out As the final evaluation But there is a role. I mean it ultimately it is a role of the entire council to in some way Participate in that even though it's done in that fashion So I think that it is something that The council is going to have to wrestle with how to go about doing this But they are going to have a role it sort of inevitable in the construct of the government Because who else is going to do it plus the as we say it's in the charter Yes, the other part I think we if we couldn't work in a sentence along Associated with that is also just as we touched on earlier when we realized the year that we had a complete disc We were having a disconnect between our form and the goals that we did for developed nine months before then and then went to fill out the form and what we would um is As they adopt a goals which you know, we're gonna hand them one set and say This is what we asked for for the last couple months while we were here. You guys do what you want, but They need to be thinking about those two things at the same time So they don't necessarily have to come up with the final format while they're thinking about the goals But they need to be thinking if we're setting this goal How are we gonna figure out they pair who's gonna measure it? How does it pair? How did they measure it? And so I know I hope they will listen to you explain that to them at Mr. Rockland because I know you understand exactly what we're talking about And I think that a lot of them because of the limitations of open meeting law and maybe having served on a board before where you're Just sitting in a quiet room talking to your executive director a very different scenario. And so I think that would be super helpful to recognize that they should definitely be talking about It's one thing to say we have a goal and that sounds really pretty But what are we gonna do with that when it comes time to do the evaluation? To perhaps a segue to goals from that last point I've got copies Which I'll hand to you guys I'm gonna put these away for Because I sort of collated them in a weird way. We don't have enough clips So what I'm handing to each of you is a small packet of on top is the Changed version and then underneath is a red line version of the most recent So we had a conversation last time I think subsequently that was sent to Subsequent to our conversation. I think it was last week the following day This brewer had made some additional edits. I think based on our conversation and sent this They're in the blue. So if you pull out the red line version, there's like It's blue lines that we just got so we got the red line before and now there's blue Yeah, the top one is the And so if you we take a few moments to look over the red slash blue line version For Showing great discipline Over in November one quarter of the year So if I could just Reiterate something I said mostly last time which is that as you noticed There's no red after page two because I didn't touch the rest It's just the same as it was and that's just FYI sort of thing Part of the reason I chose the things that I mean I mostly chose things we directly talked about and others I just inserted in the in the first page of the half is That I wanted to make sure we captured things that we knew were likely to happen like oh look We've already done the Massworks grant application. Yay But if we didn't call them out here probably wouldn't get Potentially would not get captured by the future council and were too late for our evaluation So sort of you know hit the ground running in terms of look at all that's already been Accomplished in these in these ensuing months in between Because I know these are things that are being worked on and are probably going to get done Anyway, as opposed to us saying whoo here's a brand new thing you never thought of before I'm hoping that that's what this mostly captures In fact, I even thought about saying something about four boards and then I was like man I'm gonna go there because we're so used to that plus the budget process does change under the charter and however That's part of the transition plan But I wanted the things I called out were things that I actually largely thought could be accomplished Even though some of them will just be telling us this is how far we got on this and then it'll be up to the town manager and the council to work out What the next Definition of that goal will be December Yeah, I have several thoughts but first of all I want to thank Ms. Brewer for doing the work on Keeping this going on this Thank you Also, I have to say as a matter of some humor as I was going through it's again got to relationships with select board Almost was willing to put in an asterisk Maintain a professional relationship with us despite the fact, you know, you'll never be evaluated by us again Not to put too But Aside from that getting back to some of the things The And I'll just go in order now on Page two under a Are you working from the radar though? I'm working from the the red one That's where I took my notes H3 which is on page two You put in including updating select board after the regional school district planning board That seems superfluous because everything we're saying should be Keeping us informed I was wondering if we're gonna pick one of the entire group out why that one so So the first one under long-range planning says update select board on continued implementation of the charter transition plan That's because that's what we want We don't want a charter transition plan that includes four items in it that somebody tells us has done We want to know Tell us some stuff that you're doing associated with the charter transition plan that you're glad that we're making progress on or You're frustrated that we're not making progress on and so then ensuring coordinated planning is basically There might not be anything to do and it in one of these upcoming months prior to December Associated with that particular thing so it could just be you know what nobody's working on this Everybody's taking a break until January on this and that would be fine Whereas if we just left it at inch as ensuring the part with out including updating select board It would just then the answer would be well no news is no news So my idea most of these are in fact I'll say some variation on updating the select board propose something to select board tell the select board something Just kind of so what we know what's going on and then other things are more like actually do it so I saw it is more similar to a then then not and Be same thing Fort River School feasibility He could say I'm doing staff is there and they're doing the work they need to do well I think we've already made clear in the evaluation that we need some more information so that we can help the community come Along on that process and that may just be a simple verbal update or maybe a memo or something at some point in the next three months So that's how I saw what those words meant so if they need to say something else or mean something else That's what I was trying to get at I guess that In a not perfectly fine with leaving it, but when you get to on page Three using this version After fiscal management in relationships with select board number two Number one providing regular communication select board about matters relevant to their responsibilities and concerns Doesn't blanket but see these aren't our goals. The only thing we're asking him for is the short term We're only going up to page two We're done after pay after 5g The rest is just of the current select board for consideration by the new town council That's why I said what I should have said is stop reading after a turn It stops being read because I didn't expect us I don't think those things any longer apply to what's happening with the town manager over the next three months I think the things at the beginning And yeah, I know you have a list but just on that point Maybe if this really is in a way It's a working document for us for the next three months But it's also sort of a letter to future council Maybe where that break is there needs to be And maybe that isn't this red be For consideration by new town council. Maybe that just maybe it's just hard to read because it's red underlined But some way to make it clear that these are what we already had and we're hoping they could be useful, but They're really not The focus of this document is really the short term for use by the select board Does say less applicable to town council Expectations do the different nature. I don't know just make sure that that's really clear kind of what you just said in plain English like Stop reading unless Some guidance from us. Yeah, or I think with what you stated first is fine Though it does then beg a question that I Have on one other section If we've recognized as we did the evaluation that there was a weakness in the way we worded goals before If we're not gonna pay any attention to the wording that we're putting forward after After the dotted line so to speak And we don't get there and I'll give you my very specific examples so that you know and that is when I was doing the evaluation and We were on the community intergovernmental relations about and then there was Wait a minute. Let me just make sure it was the right one Yes, and then we had Developing partnerships and strategies through regular meetings with the Amherst College in Hampshire College We didn't treat UMass the same way. We kind of Put UTAC in there. Well UTAC is kind of It's only as useful as UTAC turns out to be and it seemed that there was a missing piece that Something along the lines of the way that B and C are stated should have been also included for the university I don't disagree. I will say that the reason my I didn't ask for that sort of Parallel in those is because a applies to only to the university It doesn't have anything to do with Hampshire and Amherst College to a huge degree except maybe from when Amherst College brings in their Reunions and We were trying to be and so I see what your point is though to make it to make it clear that that that some are talking about UMass some are talking about all three and some are talking about them separately and so I wonder if Could what what would be the best I Don't want to change this document and so I'm wondering I mean from that for that purpose I'm thinking maybe that makes more sense Does that make more sense in our cover where we're talking in the composite? We were just talking about in terms of the limitations We realized we faced as we did the ratings or does it belong in our evaluation tips for the future sort of document? because I'm loathe to go in and Touch the 18 goals, but I also want us to show our learning of what we just realized about our 18 goals, too So there are two two sections that I was wondering about as well on the five See in five e where you're asking for the manager to propose appropriate relationships between the town in UTAC and then propose relationships between the town council and the CCC yeah, and I was really not clear if you want it sort of like oh what should what? Like for the five e that would seem actually more logical to come from the board members who are serving on CCC In some ways, then then town manager saying this is what it should be I just needed more clarity on what you meant by that. I think I was the one who added that just For example, the CCC has scheduled meetings through I think November We just set out a schedule for November 2018 and then starts up again in January Well, I won't be representing the town on the CCC So working with the council to decide how the council if at all wants to Be represented on the CCC Mr. Steinberg, but our our membership there is as representatives of the town on the select board And so we in a sense disappear. So what would be the process or the relationship going forward? We just wanted to flag These other memory that we're members of so we could give point, you know, we'll pick somebody like this or Send someone so they'll make them crazy whatever but um, so we might give advice, but we won't be that representative In that way yeah, it's gonna be interesting questions to have some of those things This is a good example, and they're probably gonna be many They're gonna come along On the CCC though, you also have The captain police department Understand you have somebody from the fire department. You have the public health director who are also members of the CCC Is the town gonna in the future be represented by Staff or we are Somebody from the council also beyond it and does that become a volunteer thing For two members of the council to raise their hands Whereas it's something that you should take a larger leadership role in doing it. It's probably is worth some yeah some thought Is what we were talking about it. Yeah, well, and I think also I mean there's others You know who represents us at PVTA is another example or the MPO which you know traditionally It's been either the manager or someone from the select board being an executive branch person You know the for example PVTA you don't you know, you're a designee so it doesn't matter You can you could pick somebody literally anybody up the street if you chose to but but It's beneficial to have people that are there that also then are Plugged in regularly with the right, you know town government and budgets and things like that We probably missed a few so You were on you were on your list mr. Some bit there was one Area that I thought we missed and maybe I'm just not seeing it after after reading all of these and then reading the goals again But in our evaluations tonight, we all identified the need One way or another to deal with the fact that there's Four maybe five capital projects on the horizon and needing to do that But I don't see that in the short-term goals now It's not not going to get and I don't see it in the long-term goals So we said it's really important to start working with the You know Some kind of strategy to approach that but I just don't see it in the long-term goals So which were our goals that we just worked right so and I looked for it I did just miss it's under fiscal management but I Would I would say to move that To short-term under physical not because it's going to be done But to make sure that that stays as an active item under That's being worked on even as we speak So I made a conscious choice not to put it there because I'm making a conscious choice to ask because put it there because we These I mean you can decide that other things need to go away But these 20 odd things that are here already are things that I thought we communicated or we'd indicated over other Discussions were things that needed to be done before December. That's not going to get done before December They're not going to stop thinking about it before December because we don't mention it in our 24 things because it's kind of like the overriding problem But you can't do anything staff cannot do anything with that Project other than coming up with some new spreadsheets before the council comes on board Because they can't just come up with a whole plan on how to get the council on board with what they decided to do I mean, it's gonna be a joint effort from day one Whereas to me these things are things entirely up to the town manager to do So it's good to appreciate your thinking, but you're a person who authored this and now we're all commenting on it So I think we're bringing different vantage points Mr. Bachman earlier said it's really helpful to differentiate the things that are really our priorities and There are I believe other things in here that probably won't get completed either So in the in the interest of trying to underscore what we select board think are the priorities I think that's one of the maybe three to five things I pull out of our evaluation. You can leave it over there in the long term Don't need to read this part. It was ours forget about it But I don't think it it serves that goal well to leave it there But um other people on the board might have different opinions. I Guess what I'm not understanding is I perhaps I did make I did in fact say that phrase earlier But I don't have any intention of it being true that they're going to ignore it because they're gonna If they are useful town counselors, they're going to read our evaluation which includes the goals Which also will include this document as part of that and You know beyond the fact that everyone knows that these are the four focus I guess I would ask you then if you do want that moved or copied into it's not taken away from but it's Copied into then the answer is not what the current goal is the current goal is develop strategy and provide Leadership to implement funding. That's that's not gonna happen between now and December So what's another way of indicating that it stays in front? But it's not that whole picture It's on page three of the red lined under to II And so we've been carrying it in one variation or another age three to age three to be Are you looking at the red line version? You're on page three. Oh, okay. Wait a minute. There's it. I was looking at more minimal, too. Sorry. I'm sorry Yeah, just regular number to develop strategy improvisation implement funding Because I what I'm hearing is you're suggesting that if we if we bring That into the short term that it needs to be more what do we call finally articulated to make it something It can be actually accomplished So maybe more something some particular aspect Proposed approach so that for working on this. I don't know but I just Too e it sort of Looks a little lost. I think that's I mean if we're really gonna kind of Try to pull out what we think of the highlights So, I mean one of things that the council needs to decide is is there agreement that these are the four major capital projects? Or might the council say We don't care about DPW facility or a fire station or whatever it is that they don't care about and so Don't develop a plan with that in play right now We've the town through the select board has articulated these as the four major and sometimes we say there's a fifth or six But the first conversation is do we have an agreement what the what are the major capital projects in the next decade? That we want to address and that's the big issue It's I mean it flows from the capital improvement plan, you know, so we do have a process that's been involved But you sort of read want to reiterate those values from this from the council. I think Then where we talk about Transition planning Does the transition planning have something that says what you know, what are the top three things? That need to be brought to the council, you know Early because we think or we all agree including the major that those are and the most you know Those are really important because there's a lot of bureaucratic stuff that they have to do and how are they going to do Appointments, but to me that that's such a seminal question for that group. So Maybe that's where it goes which So does it fit more under on the red line version on page to where it says long-range planning and A says update select board on continued implementation of the charter transition plan specifically Three things under there what we we think are the most important for transition planning The council might not agree with us As opposed to the kind of transition planning that's make sure we know how to set the tax rate given the timings off Yeah, but you know That's to me that's not as important setting the tax rate, right? No, I didn't say no And maybe that maybe that is one of the three things that come up first in the transition What I'm saying is that's already called out in one So do you want to call it out as a separate thing under fiscal management then instead? Or I mean I don't care obviously Where the things are I guess what I'm trying to understand is what? is it Reflecting back to what I said earlier and and mr. Slar tried to say what is it that we're that we're instead of the wording Develop a strategy and provide leadership It's more along the lines of one of the very first things You're surely talking to the council about is and then as mr. Rockham and said he you know they have to all agree that those It's obvious to us those are the projects, but that may not be obvious to the council Maybe part of my confusion is 3a updates like board on continued implementation of the charter transition plan We don't actually have a charter transition plan. We have because we haven't seen it doesn't mean we don't that doesn't exist Well, maybe the agenda, okay, so maybe we doing maybe then it's charter transition plan capital T capital P Yeah, they didn't know what it was called. I just figured there was one well You can that's generic enough charter transition plan to and you know to include Identification of priority issues include a capital planning and if you guys have some other ones And so yeah, you know there think it fits. Yeah, so we're saying yeah We want to see that transition planning in that identify priority if policy areas, you know, not the nitty-gritty transition plan that identifies Priority policy areas policy and planning areas. I just thought of that one, but that probably is brought it up to cover all of it So they had to change something for example Okay, mr. Timber, did you have other things that you wanted to offer I mean well there are two things that I know that need to be worked on and I I believe that mr. Bachman is gonna work on these whether we state them or not Why were Whether we disappear from them Until we got a business is the question. What is the beginning of the FY 20 budget process? Which is going to happen with a meeting which we are a part of October when projections are spent are sent out and a Process is engaged with the soon-to-be defunct finance committee to establish Guidelines for the libraries and schools as far as their budget Expectations so that there can be work that begins similar to all prior years the other one is that We've been informed about and we would hope continues is the first-floor administration staffing planning I don't think but that is Managers responsibility. It's not our responsibility in prior years. We just say go forth and Keep us informed So I have more to report on that at the next meeting, but it does lead me to the question on 4a Where it says while planning for new hires to be confirmed by the incoming town council? I don't understand that phrase. I understand the words, but Review our policies and procedures to promote hiring retention practices I guess I'm not really sure what what that while planning for new hires means exactly So I tried to pick that up from our current goals where we all said in one fashion or another some variation of We don't have any written plans that we that we're aware of around diversity hiring and how we might more creatively address diverse hires and Different people brought up different issues associated with that but given that we have major hires that are about to happen just like we already had a couple of major hires and we're we remain unaware of Substantial focus on how we're going to improve the diversity of our hiring process that It seemed like the right moment to mention that as an ongoing goal because we asked about diversity We didn't necessarily feel like we got it thus far and that's why it's in there because there are new hires that are The ones that you're going to be doing probably very short term because they're ones that you've identified for a long time And we're waiting for the former government to change on various issues But then any other additional new hires you're going to have to be It's it's part of the being prepared for the fact that Right now you hire whoever you want whenever you want to in the select board has nothing to say about it That won't be true with the council So given that we've identified here the need for some focus on How we can address diversity in different ways because the things Generic towns are doing isn't working to increase diversity. It's not certainly just an Amherst problem It's just an Amherst value To be prepared not for the fact that that's going to be a much more public discussion going forward and Also right now are if there are things when we talked about the charter transition plan There may very well be things you're doing right now that we don't necessarily know about But they haven't come out as part of the evaluation process and we've said maybe there's growing people in house Maybe there's advertising a different way. I mean kind of all the standard things people always throw around is We don't know how to solve this problem, but that's what I was just trying to capture that moving over because It's not if you weren't planning to hire anybody right now Then who cares but you've got a new hiring process coming up and you've got the hires You're actually probably going to make before the council shows up So they won't be subject to that and just Not losing sight of the diversity needs we've identified. So maybe I Pulled over the wrong wording, but that was what I was trying to accomplish I guess what I was trying to understand is while planning for new hires to be confirmed as it felt like it was saying Why you put everything on hold until the council gets I wasn't really sure what that while planning for new hires to be Confirm, but you're just saying Don't forget to pay attention to our goal about diversity and that's a value Right, and like if you have anything See as far as I'm concerned You might not hire anybody else until after the council comes in because even if you really want to you might not find the person you're looking for and so That's part of what it is is that we're just in this awkward place where we we feel like we haven't really met that goal yet But we don't really know what it should look like I'm not sure we know how to evaluate when we've met it or not except we know that our workforce will look slightly different than it does now And so we could certainly come up with different wording there if that's too focused on future council thing But what I was trying to get at is I don't know when these hires are going to be made and they might be before and they might be after and There's going to be something new anyway I think on that one maybe a little just to tighten the wording up a little so it's clear But I reminded me that I did want to say something about the diversity Issue it's in the evaluation And I think it's it is a community Goal value, and I think we all share it, but it's also a very difficult one every Institution that I've been part of Organization, I know the academic institutions the ones I'm familiar with around here struggle with this and It's often not for lack of trying not saying the trying has been perfect, but to just lament oh the composition of the town staff doesn't look like the composition of the community and then sort of Flagellate ourselves again and again because we haven't Made it look that way I'm not sure how I'm not saying that's what you did in writing this but to Get into a more constructive place like maybe getting some help with coming up with Specific diversity and higher best practices. Maybe we already do that and I just don't know and that's you know Of course what HR has been doing all along but to articulate that to the community and to the council But this is how we try to Have a workforce that reflects our community We may not succeed from this a variety of reasons why That happened hasn't happened even in these other institutions where they sometimes devote many resources to making that happen so It's hard to not get defensive when you're in a meeting or in an event And they say well look at the town and it's not doing this or all the people in the rumor of this composition And you said but I I did a B and C and it didn't get me the result. I wanted so maybe Part of this goal is coming up coming at it from a different way Whether that gets success or not but a way to articulate it to the community so they understand I think how seriously we do work at that I think one of the things that organizations struggle with is that the the supply side of the Of the equation doesn't have at present The number of candidates, you know, that's that's that's not to say it's a you know That can be a cop out on on you know why you didn't do what you did But at the same time it's it's also real and so that's also understanding what the market is for candidates You know is is an important part of that conversation to say you know we did x y and z but also we've also looked at sort of You know in the broad context, you know, what is what is the actual pool of capable people and and Interested people and etc. Etc. So that's a part of that as well. And so that's you know what some organizations are doing is actually working on the pipeline process in other words engaging with with you know Universities to promote and you know fostered, you know more people coming out of school with excredentials kind of thing but I think that's a what I'm hearing out of both of the Both folks here is is that we want to articulate that in a way and and I think that With regard to what's on the on the page there. I think the The difficulty is is right the timing is one But it's also that given that there are things in the new charter that require confirmation by the council I Think Having a sense of that as part of the transition planning, you know, it's like oh we're Here's how we're preparing to you know Put these kinds of things in front of the council Yes, I mean I would suggest that you start with the word review because I think it's a high enough value that you've articulated Both in my evaluation, but just general just cut out that and say we wanted an update on this before we leave office What do you do? What's your plan? What's your what are you doing? I mean one thing, you know? Within the last three weeks. I've had a conversation with the library director and she was bemoaning You know we talked about diversity and she says you think you've got problems libraries are notoriously bad on divert and so she We talked about what she could do and one thing she did is went over to the school district and talked with the people in The school district because they're really good actually. I think pretty good at Attracting and recruiting a diverse Work diverse applicant pool, so she's trying to take tips from them on things that they could do so I think What this does is it elevates it to a primary part of our conversation For the select board before you leave office where you want an affirmative conversation about what are we doing with this? I bet that answers it for me that answers my question at least so would it work to say under for staff and personnel relations? Hey Just cross out that first line all together and insert update select board on Policies and procedures to promote because that scans with everything else. Yes, so you're updating us on hey Sure, we've been talking about it. We're gonna keep talking about it Just um, I had flagged a while back just when I was making notes on under 5g Similarly's proposed ways of increasing diversity in committee membership as you will be appointing most committees with confirmation by town council and They're a kind of maybe I was like overthinking but we we use diversity a Lot and it doesn't always mean the same thing. So are we talking about diversity in racial background? socio-economic different identities or opinion because I've I've seen a number of candidates make statements about diversity in meaning diversity of opinion, so I It I mean I like the word diversity, but I think in that one increasing diversity in committee membership Then it still means different things to different people where I think in hire we're probably more talking about racial Well, so I look at language diversity too, so we can serve more people, right? Mm-hmm So maybe we want to spell out, you know, e.g. The 20 I don't I don't know just I got hung up on that one So I'll give you my document if you want to write diversity of thought on it because I am not putting You're gonna have to put that in purple or green or something because I am not writing diversity of thought That just it makes me insane, but I hear exactly what you're saying There are people who say that and I think part of the reason I went ahead even though again We tried generally not too much to refer to the council in these goals is that what's different as it has been the select board appoints a ton of committees right now and It's been on us to find more ways of managing that diversity Which we have, you know done to the degree that we've done, but it's it's like totally not our problem anymore It's really problem now at this point and so Any ideas that have been perking now would be a good time to hear about them I just in that instance about the committee Diversity did you mean it in the same way as when you're looking at the goal for? Absolutely younger people if it's an older committee you're talking about racial and no, I'm talking about I'm talking about all I'm talking about all the issues race all class Yes, all the things the select board and you we're all looking at already in committee membership to be a I mean Partly some again. This is taking credit for things we're already doing But maybe being able to articulate them a little better that we've been able we've been trying We will continue finding new ways to try but that we appreciate that this is an ongoing issue especially at you know as the whole process changes So make some yeah I have notes on those two Basically on those two to part the part about long-range planning with the Charter transition plan that identifies priority policy and planning areas for example major capital projects and The staff and personnel relations a just cutting off that first line and saying update select board on Where the two that I finally came to the conclusion about in the other one was Just to go back and take a look at what is really this the paragraph that is the last in red whether What the transition is Yeah Dispatch it We might be able to confirm it because soon is better in some respects because the clock's taking right and we should probably call it out Specifically in the list of topics that we're gonna try and approve the goals If people feel ready to approve them after they look at them again I don't know that I'm gonna be able to come at the Google again. How did make yet another color shop? You know, I was I was gonna recommend. We just do a final copy based on this conversation I don't think we need to get into the weeds on redlining, you know, you might want to say if you you know go to these three places That's what I did based on our home. Let's let's not go through this level of own detail I think we're done with it with our comments. So final a final black and white Yeah, we'll let her head if you like first Jason Thank you appreciate the work on that Because it seems so simple, but it's not I'm just trying to copy some things over Think a half a dozen things we can get done in the next month or two. That seems like it. All right, but thank you again and So actually just speaking of that, I think Was there anything you wanted to mention to us this evening and we didn't really sorry any member reports that anybody had to share with us If not, I'll just touch base. We are meeting at 8 a.m. I believe in this room Because we have a couple of liquor licenses that are before us before we finish the manager's Evaluation and Then after that our next two meetings are on Wednesdays The 5th of September and the 12th of September just a little out of the ordinary But the holidays of varying kinds and are coming into play in September so that impacts our schedule And so Unless there's something else I think we're Ready to adjourn unless I actually have a question about and I am imagining that Mr. Steinberg is more familiar with this section of the charter than I am I actually don't know why we're having a four boards meeting associated with budget and I mean, I love the four boards meetings. They're wonderful, but I'm just not sure why we're having one Given how much of the budget process has changed in terms of its timing. Is it because We is it more for The public education aspect of it or I mean it doesn't feel to me like it should be the same as previous year So I'm just trying to understand what we're doing. I would suggest and maybe mr. Steinberg if you don't mind Oh My thinking was is about that was that we still want to so there's a couple of things that we we do at that meeting one of the primary ones though is is Make our best guess is what we think the revenue for the coming year is going to be So I think that's a good thing to have out there as early as we always do Do I think that you know the finance committee will make budget guidelines and that we'll have our own budget policy guidelines? No, I don't think we'll do either of those that have traditionally followed that meeting but I do think painting the picture of what the You know state of affairs is Relative to what we think our Budget might look like from for a revenue standpoint and expenses standpoint. It's a good thing to sort of frame Even though the election won't have happened yet I'm gonna take the next stab and then turn to mr. Bacchum and add to it if he feels he needs to but We're we are in a Transition period and but at the same time transition means you want to keep going you can't stop and so you need to have the superintendent in the library director begin to develop budgets and The town manager has to begin to develop a budget for the municipal departments for the next year and So you need to get those projections as you would on a jet generally the same timetable because it has to do with the state fiscal year in the end when it comes down to we're still you know a year as a year it's going to go on and the So then there comes a question is well, how does the superintendent for example know how much money to Put into the budget. What's the bottom line needs guidance and the You know, I've talked with mr. Bacchum about this and he's given some thought about how that process Can go forward in an orderly way and the guidelines from a finance committee Probably will look nothing like they have in previous years because they're very different function but on the other hand they have the expertise and They can play a valuable role and I think that's what's being thought about so that sort of gets you back to All the boards except us So if you want to have a three-board meeting have us not participate that would be an option but it'd be good for us to give guidance and to be able to Sort of speak to the municipal needs even though we're not going to be here when the budget is presented See I'm seeing a real disconnect there because Normally we just are get talked at at the four boards meeting. There's not any discussion There's three questions me and two finance committee members one or one of which didn't hear the answer the first time and then I asked Something crazy and then we're done and we walk out of the room. So there is no I mean, so if we're gonna do it differently this year, I just think we need to understand that I Understood I assumed the part about finance committee Really doesn't give guidelines. This budget process is different moving forward. Yes, it's a budget. Yes, you have talked to department heads Yes, people need to know what portions they have but the reality is the process is different The finance committee isn't gonna give but guidelines unless they were weirdly doing that for a budget They don't have any control over in the future, which I don't think meets with the transition provision The budget coordinating group I could see having a role in Discussing and and that is largely those same bodies, right? Just representatives from there and so I could see potentially having a meeting of that before the transition takes place But I don't see how I Do get the part about presenting What the trends look like that totally makes sense to me in terms of it's a thing We always do at that time of year. It's a good thing for everybody have going on But it's not feeding the same machine that creates the budget It's on a very different timeline with a different process And so unless we're going to encourage this to be kind of like people's last to write putting in Goals or something. I think I just heard we aren't gonna be doing select board goals And we don't normally do them and that setting at the four boards. So I'm gonna take my own shot at it I think partly for the continuity to continue with the budget development process and I think the Four boards meetings in my experience is it's partly public education and educates the members and whoever You know might want to listen in and if I were running for counsel Maybe one of that might be a meeting I might want to listen to either on tape or be present for so I think it has a public education function We get some press and it starts to put out some of the thinking about the budget has the departments and others are preparing and then Hopefully that helps the council to transition I Even never felt like that meeting had a whole lot to do with the guidelines per se It's mostly presentation with a couple of questions, and I I think it's important to kind of keep that Form going for now, but maybe it's superfluous. I don't know. The other thing is is that It was been important in prior years that the library trustees and the school committees Be there to hear the presentation about the financial realities Because otherwise They're going to get to the point where the development of the budget takes place and is presented by Their chief executive the library director of the superintendent And they're gonna say why isn't there more money? Why aren't you asking for more money? And you need a process that explains this is the reality and Sort of gives some imprimatur to the amount of money that they're that is being Put in is the bottom line of that budget so that they understand at least what goes on and I think if we're going to Not do this process we better come up with another one that is going to have equal credibility Or I think that there could be a problem That is going to be Have to be dealt with by the council in its first year, and I'm not sure that that is particularly a Healthy thing to happen either So I my intention is to follow the sort of path We've laid out previously because I don't know how quickly the council is going to ramp up a finance committee and be ready to go And also it fits into our timing. We're going to be doing our budget preparations along the same time frame anyway I think they're already rumblings in different departments that aren't under the select board about That same question about money, and I think having that shared Expectation and also it's sort of an external discipline on us to get that work done and to share it out So that that's an important piece for it piece for us to do That's and but just in general We've been sort of following our same path for budget development. We're following our budgets guide our budget schedule is Similar to previous years. We're not saying. Oh, we've got three more months to Play around with we might Upfront we're not going to use that time up front It might come in later when the council is educating itself and maybe we're doing more stuff with the council But at the beginning our budget development is going to happen this calendar year in terms of the internal staff hearings and things like that So what I'm still trying to understand then is I'm totally good as I think I said the first time With the educational part of it for the community. They watch the tape. They know what's going on and absolutely Having that be four boards. So they're all here rather than if they so happen to watch it So they're all really hearing the same source of information. I would just like to Understand how we're making clear to those other bodies Meaning mainly the finance committee and the public that the finance committee isn't writing guidelines this year And that the select board isn't writing guidelines this year because doesn't finance committee sometimes meet right After the four boards meeting to start working on their guidelines, except they're not gonna this year And do they know that and so that's what I'm trying to understand too is I mean during this transition period It's like who who tells them that you know exactly because All the information you're gathering is the critical part their part matters But it matters differently this time from here on out So it sounds like a chair-to-chair conversation Well the finance committee is gonna have to act differently when the finance committee has always written guidelines in the past It has been we would like you to develop a budget mr. Superintendant or Ms. Superintendent with this bottom line for the elementary schools who would like to have you develop a budget for the regional schools with this bottom line with the assumption that this is what our Contribution is going to be by assessment This year they can't really do that because they're not going to be the ones who are going to put the budget back together again at the end on the other hand they could say that We're going out of business, but based upon our experience This is what we suggest might be an amount for you to consider You in the town manager to consider to give some additional guidance and in reality the Guidelines are Always been the same as the dollar amounts that have been put forward in the Projected budget is presented. That's gets discussed, but it never varies and I wouldn't expect it to happen this year any different than it has any other prior Yeah, I think that in what I'm sort of thinking is that the finance committee if they offered guidelines it would be Advice to the to the council It's really what it would boil down to which the council might ignore much like our advice to them I Think it's valuable to to sort of articulate it though because they do have that sort of experience of having gone through budgets for some time So if that's true and we're not going to try and convince them not to issue guidelines Then should we put a copy of our last set of guidelines in an upcoming packet? So we can be thinking about whether or not we want to do some variation of it one last time Since the finance committee might be doing something one last time and it's currently format or and then we could at least look at it And then tell ourselves nah our goals cover it or and that's close enough or yes Actually, this brings one particular issue to mind that we want to give future advice To the town council on it could maybe be an easy way of addressing some of our future letter to town council stuff What are the difficult things that the council is going to have to confront and deal with? As well as town manager going forward Is that the regional budget? Still has to coincide with other town meetings of other communities otherwise you have Three other communities Developing a budget passing it and then it's binding on the largest community without the largest community ever having a chance about the process we didn't think about that when I was working with the Charter Commission and So it's not like you can make all of these other realities disappear and that being a big one Not to mention the assessment method which we've already talked about it So if there isn't anything else Which I don't think there is I would take a motion to adjourn to adjourn Ever please say aye We're adjourned at 858. Thank you all very much. We'll see you on Friday