 Okay, we're opening session two of Arlington annual town meeting 2023. Again, please hold your applause so the meeting is resolved. I call this meeting to order. Just some announcements and updates. First, a reminder that Arlington's town meeting is a representative town meeting and the only folks allowed on the main floor of the auditorium and in the center balcony are elected town meeting members. If you did not win an election within the past three years from a ballot with your name on it under a section titled town meeting member or elected by town meeting members in your precinct to fill a vacancy, I kindly ask that you relocate to one of the side wings of the balcony. You will thank me. The seats are more comfortable up there. Monday night was, to be honest, a bit rough at points so we settled back into the hall and adjusted to some new elements like requesting to speak via handsets. And other elements of the meeting were a bit rusty, like getting the audio system properly tuned and folks were having trouble understanding speakers and the timer on the podium cut out at some point and so folks didn't know how much more speaking time they had. And so ACMI and town staff have been working hard over the last couple of days to address these issues. If there are still any issues going forward, please let me know. There was confusion last night when voting on Article 6 about whether we were voting on the main motion or the amendment. I haven't watched the video replay yet, but there were no notices of reconsideration offered last night before we adjourned, so that article is disposed of and it's not coming back. But going forward, there are two important lessons we should take. First, I need to make sure that what I'm saying we're voting on matches what the voting screen shows we're voting on. And second, if any of your 500 eyeballs and 500 ears notice that what I'm saying we're voting on does not match what the voting screen shows, please raise a point of order. That's the single best use of a point of order I can imagine. And if you're correct, I'll make sure you get a gold star sticker for saving town meeting from an embarrassing mistake. And if you're wrong, you'll get a room full of groans. That's the deal. Last item before we get started is the topic of the national anthem. Earlier this year a survey was distributed to town meeting members asking various questions about their experiences at town meeting and one of the questions was about the national anthem, whether it should be played every night as we've done in the past and 59% preferred that it be played only on the first night. As a compromise, we will skip the anthem tonight since this public service announcement is taking long enough as it is and based on the survey comments, I believe the meeting would benefit from fresh new performances so that the anthem becomes less of a methodical routine and more of a showcase of the rich, vibrant diversity of the town's patriotism. So if you know of any groups or artists in town, school choirs, for instance, who might like to perform the national anthem live at town meeting, please let me know. That's all I've got, so let's get started. Okay, we will now, if there are any newly elected town meeting members who are not here for the swearing in on Monday, would you please rise? Is there anyone? No one? Okay, then we can skip that. Mr. Helmuth. Thank you, Mr. Moderator Eric Helmuth, chair of the select board. It is moved that if all the business of the meeting is set forth in the war for the annual town meeting is not disposed of at this session, you never know. When the meeting adjourns, it adjourns to Monday, May 1st at 8 p.m. We have a second to Mr. Helmuth's motion. All those in favor say yes. Yes. All those opposed say no. It is unanimous. I now call for any announcements and resolutions. We have a hand. Coming up. I have a second to Mr. Helmuth. I have a second to Mr. Helmuth. Angela Olszewski, chair of the semi-quincentennial committee also known as monotony 250. The planning is underway for the commemoration of the 250th anniversary of the American Revolution. Primarily events in 2025. We have two programs currently planned. The first is Sunday, April 30th is coming. community room at Robbins Library. And we also have another one on Thursday, May 11th at one o'clock in the main hall at the community center. If you're not able to attend, you can go to either one of those on the town, well, May 11th will get posted soon. April 30th on the town calendar. We also have an online survey that you can fill out. So we're looking for people to solicit ideas from, volunteer for various working groups that we have and also partner with us. So please join us. Do we have any more announcements or resolutions tonight? Okay, seeing none. I now call for reports of boards and committees. Thank you, Mr. Moderator. Christopher Moore, Precinct 14 and Vice Chair of the Capital Planning Committee. I move that the report of the Capital Planning Committee be received. Before we take a second, we actually need to, Madam Clerk has reminded me that we need to take Article 3 from the table. I move that we take Article 3 from the table. We have a second. All those in favor of taking Article 3 from the table so you can receive reports. Say yes. All those opposed? Say no. And it is unanimous. We'll now receive reports. Mr. Moore, apologies for that. Do you want a new motion? Yes, take a new motion since it's actually... I'm still Christopher Moore from Precinct 14, Vice Chair of the Capital Planning Committee and I move that the report of the Capital Planning Committee be received. We have a second to receive the report of the Capital Planning Committee. All those in favor, say yes. All those opposed? It is unanimous. Any other reports from boards or committees? Seeing none, Ms. Deschler. I move that Article 3 be laid upon the table. Do we have a second? Okay, all those in favor of laying Article 3 upon the table say yes. All those opposed? No. It is a two-thirds vote. It is now on the table. Okay, Article 12 is now before us. Mr. Helmuth. Thank you, Mr. Moderator Eric Helmuth, Chair of the Select Board. So by the agreement of all parties on this issue, I move to postpone to date certain Article 12 to May 8th. The purpose of this is to allow everyone the opportunity to attend the turf, artificial turf forum in early May. And I'll point out that all parties that I've been in contact with about this article, those in favor of the no action, as well as those in favor of the substitute motion, the proponents of the substitute motion, have been amenable to a postponement to May 8th. So do we have a second to, Mr., we have a second for a postponement of Article 12 until May 8th. All those in favor say yes. Yes. All those opposed? No. It is an affirmative vote. Oh, right. We should test, let's do a test vote. Do we have a test vote ready? Voting is now open. So if you are in favor of the satellite room being allowed beverage and dessert service, press one for yes. If you're opposed to that, I think we'll get at least eight votes. If you're opposed, vote two for no. Okay. Let's show the votes. 143 in the affirmative, 49 in the negative. The motion carries. That permits them to have services. It doesn't mean they will be provided services. We'll cycle through the screens, verify that your vote was recorded as you intended. What is it? Can you come up with your point of order, please? The screens are not in precinct order. It's impossible to find your name. Do we know what order they are in? Is it by last name? Is it by first name? Okay. Can we switch it over to precinct number? Okay. This is why we do a test vote. Do we need to redo a vote or another vote? Oh, just wait. Okay. Okay. So it sounds like that's being fixed. It's actually fixed by the time we take a real vote. Okay. Great. Thank you. So let's move on to Article 13, which is before us. Mr. Helmuth. Thank you, Mr. Moderator. Eric Helmuth, Chair of the Select Board. The Select Board recommends that town meetings support a local ballot question on converting the office of the town clerk from an elected to an appointed position as supported by the founding findings of the town clerk study previously authorized by town meeting. Actually making this happen requires a town-wide vote. It would happen if town meeting approves this at the April, next April's town election. The article was requested by the town manager with the support of the clerk. The manager following me will present the rationale in full and the clerk is prepared to make additional remarks. In short, the Board believes that the arguments in favor of this conversion warrant at least putting the question to the town's voters. So we urge you to do so tonight. The job has become highly professionalized and technical. It's not a policymaking role anymore. It would allow us to hire somebody with the necessary professional and technical and administrative skills who lives outside of Arlington. Right now, that's not an option. There have not been any problems reported by the 120 cities and towns who have converted to an appointed clerk, including no reports of problems with elections or objectivity. And I think most tellingly, none of the 120 who have gone to an appointed clerk have gone back to an elected one. But for the details, I'll turn this over now to the town manager. Let's just take a brief pause. Do we have the speaker queue available? No. Okay. Mr. Warden, your point of order, please? Please come to the microphone. Thank you, Mr. moderator. John Warden, precinct eight. My recollection is that last year's town meeting, we voted the summer money to have a committee study the matter of the appointed town clerk. I have not seen that report and I don't think this article can go forward without the town meeting getting that report. Thank you. Mr. Puller or Mr. Helmuth, do we have a report that Mr. Warden is asking about? Thank you, Mr. moderator. I come to the select board. The report was included in the materials distributed to town meeting. It's attached to the annotated warrant and it's been available for some time on the town meeting webpage. It was pointed out with those emails. Thank you, Mr. Helmuth. So we will proceed. And do we have a speaker queue yet? We do. No. Okay. Mr. Puller, speak and can we have a look for an indication that the queue is open? Okay. Yep. Okay, they're working on the speaking queue. Mr. Puller, go ahead. Thank you, Sandy. Puller, town manager. I come to speak in favor of this article from my perspective as the town manager. The town clerk is a highly professional position. It is responsible for maintaining vital public records, for issuing licenses and permits, for registering voters, and in recent years for conducting our elections. All these activities, especially elections, come under every public scrutiny as they should. As town manager, I see a need for a professional town clerk when it was accountable to this office for the clerk's performance. Again, the town clerk is not a political position. It should be a professional position. In keeping the town records, your birth certificates, your marriage certificates, your dog licenses, you want somebody who's just doing the job focused on getting the work done. None of those duties require the kind of electoral accountability that one would see in an elected position such as the select port. There are other department heads who carry enormous responsibility in this town. I can think of the police chief, or the fire chief, or the DPW director, or any number of other department heads who might introduce the other day, none of whom is elected. We've had a lot of success in town, transforming from elected positions to appointed positions. When I first came here, the assessor had been hired by an elected board. The assessor is now hired by the town manager. The treasurer had been an elected position. It is now an appointed position. The comptroller had been hired by the select board. It's now hired by the town manager. And I think what we've seen is a transformation toward a level of professionalism that in the years I've been here has continually increased. I think the town's clerk's office needs to be subject to budget control, to performance evaluation, and to ongoing staff and training development. When we had an elected clerk, those things did not always happen. In fact, there were some severe deficiencies. And there really wasn't a sense of accountability from the voters in the past when there were some severe problems. So I think if you believe in transparency and accountability, I would urge you to vote for this. I will point out that the town clerk had requested a study by the Collins Center at UMass. They did produce this study, which is on the warrant, and it's been on part of the select board's website for quite a while. You will find 17 findings in this report and a recommendation that the town clerk be an appointed position. I would finally just say two things. One, I believe that having a professional town clerk would enable us to put a lot more resources and responsibilities on this office, I think including in the future at some point, having public records requests go through the town clerks as opposed to the town manager's office. I think it belongs in the town's clerk's office. I will finally just say I've heard that some people say that this is a power grab by the town manager. Let me assure you, that is the last thing in the world that I or I think any town manager is trying to do. We have plenty of things that we have grabbed or have been put on our laps over the years. We're not looking as town managers for more, but I do think in the town's best interest, it would be best to move forward with an appointed clerk. Thank you very much. Speaker Q is now open and we already have Mr. Wagner. Thank you, Mr. Moderator. I'm Carl Wagner, precinct 15 and trying out this side microphone tonight. Hold on. Do we have a point of order, Mr. Rosenthal? We can show that. Thank you. Mr. Wagner, please go ahead. Thank you. I voted for the assessor and the treasurer to become appointed positions, but I am concerned about making the clerk's office an appointed position because the clerk is uniquely in charge of the business of knowing who are the voters and also conducting the elections. Particularly, we have also seen the represincting process which affected a lot of my constituents and elicited a lot of negative comments about moving around of the voting places. There also were quite a number of problems in the process of representing, which I won't go into, but just to say that if we had a competitive election position for the clerk in the last election, I think that would have been a popular option among my constituents. And I think when we consider who we get to vote for as a population of 40,000 people, we only get to vote for five select board members. The town manager, as much as we respect him and that office of the people in the town manager's office, is appointed. It's an administrative position. We really are losing a very important control if we give up the right for the constituents and for us here to vote for the town clerk's office. I ask you to consider that. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Wagner. I'll take Mr. Moore next. Do you have a point of... I saw that hand first. Can you speak into the microphone so everyone can hear you? I watch Mr. Warden. I assisted him. Name and precinct, please. I watch Mr. Warden press. I assisted him with requesting to speak. He pressed number nine and it was entered and his name did not appear on the list. Yes, we just pressed again, but he pressed number nine way before 823, so. Yeah, it's possible that he didn't even number of times that removed him from the queue? No, I'm here. I'm assisting him, so I've been paying attention. Okay, well we'll keep an eye on it and if it's a recurring issue or a widespread issue, we'll do something about it. Do we have another point of order in the back? I don't believe we can. Can we? We've talked about this before and they're going to try. Yeah, okay, so they'll work on it and this is the best we can do. Mr. Moore? Yeah. Thank you, Mr. Moderator. Christopher Moore, precinct 14. I'd like to hear if I could, Mr. Moderator, what the present office holder thinks about this potential change? Madam Clerk, would you like to speak to your thoughts? Yeah. Mr. Moore, do you have a specific question or just Ms. Brazil's general thoughts about this article? The letter. Julie Brazil, Town Clerk. I'm for it. I'm here tonight asking all of you to help me persuade the voters of Arlington to take away my autonomy because I do think it is best for the town. It's difficult to measure accountability, but previous clerks have not really been accountable outside of, you know, every three years. But if things are not going smoothly, decisions have been made in the past. An example, let me think, several years ago before I even thought about running, I know there were a number of complaints when impersonal voting was rolled out by the state, and Arlington Clerk didn't offer weekend hours. The state now requires weekend hours because that's what people want, and the legislators wrote that into the law. But there's no recourse. If the town clerk's office won't do it, there's nothing to do. You can go and complain to the select board and the town manager all day long, and they have no authority to fix that. If I were to choose not to mail postcards, personally, I'm in favor of postcard applications to increase ballot vote by mail. I mean, I think the more we mail and engage people, the higher the turnout, and that's good. But if I don't do it, despite the fact that the select board has authorized the town to have vote by mail in a local election, you can't make me. And I think it's really important to understand, if I don't care, if I'm tired and I don't want to do it, I don't have to. And I'm uncomfortable with that. I don't like that. It's not right. It's not fair to the voters of Arlington. So I'm going to stop there, and I'm sure other people will have other questions, but I think it's important to really think about accountability from the perspective of you can't change it if I won't do it. Thank you. Mr. Moore, anything else? Thank you, Madam Treasurer. I'm not Treasurer. Sorry, clerk. We did that before with the Treasurer, and it worked out quite well as an aside. I think we should go forward with this for two main reasons. One of them is that as the body politic voters are a really poor work supervisor. We hit them every three years, and a lot of the voters aren't paying attention very well to exactly how well the clerk's doing her job. By the way, I think she's great. So I think for the future, we need a situation where this position is professionally supervised, and the other thing is, if it's an elected position, we only have the town of Arlington as our pool of potential applicants. On the other hand, if it's a professional position, the town manager can select from the world of all potential applicants, and I think in the long term, the town will be better served by better supervision and a broader pool of applicants. Thank you, Mr. Moderate. Thank you, Mr. Moore. Mr. Kepline. Thank you. Mark Kepline, Precinct 9. First, I want to make a quick response to the comment about PowerGrab. We've actually seen this just in naming Magliosi way. You know, as small a thing as that was, the selectmen wanted to hold on to their authority. Yeah, that's not really within the scope of this article. I'm responding to, you know, PowerGrab. All right, so I'll continue. Okay, thank you. Okay. As far as, for example, the previous clerk, democracy doesn't function well when everything is kept secret in dark. So when you allow information about difficulties the previous clerk was having out to the public, then the people can vote accordingly. But that was pretty much kept under wraps. And in another case, with, as far as accountability goes, is the inspector's office. And much of the, many of the problems there under the previous inspector, the director. The, Mr. Kepline, was kept secret. The inspector is not covered under this article. It is an appointed position, right? It's not covered under this article. I'll also mention that other, it was about one third of the towns in the state may have adopted this change. That leaves two thirds who have not. And democracy is important that people get to voice their choice as far as, you know, roles in their own town government. Gee, I don't know what it's, what I'm allowed to say and not say, you know, or provide examples. Other towns allow far more elected officials than Arlington, for example, boards of health and Sharon and other towns. So I think it's important that people get a chance to vote and make their choice. And if they had known about the previous difficulties of the registrar and clerk, there would have been a change sooner. So I, I hope people will, the people in the government, town government will share more information with the public when there's issues and problems that concern that. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Kepline. Take Ms. LeCourt next. Annie LeCourt, precinct 13. It's so weird to say precinct 13. Point of order. Oh, thank you. Sorry about that. Sorry, Ms. LeCourt. Go ahead. It's all right. So the first thing I want to say here is the most salient point with regard to this article, which is that we are not voting on whether or not to make our clerk appointed. We are voting on whether or not to allow the residents of the town of Arlington to decide whether or not to make their clerk elected or appointed. And there will, I hope, be a robust campaign where all of these arguments are laid out when we, if we put this on a ballot and allow the residents to exercise their Democratic right to determine their form of government. Then I want to talk about a couple of things. And I want to note that I have experienced the member of the Select Board in dealing directly with some of these issues. So the first one is accountability. The Select Board and the School Committee are elected and they each meet every two weeks in front of the public and allow public input at most of their meetings. They're accountable to the people who voted for them. And we can all see what they are doing, what policies they are setting, who they're hiring, so on and so forth. The clerk is elected every three years and the only time that we have any input into what the clerk is doing or how they're operating is during that election. They don't hold public meetings every two weeks. This is the same thing that was true for the treasurer. It's a very important function. It's a professional function. It's not a policymaking position. And once the election is over, other than interacting with the clerk as a resident, there is no accountability. Literally, the Select Board cannot demand that the clerk attend a Select Board meeting to deal with an issue. There's just no control. An appointed clerk could be asked to appear in public to deal with particular issues, which leads me to my second point, which is collaboration. All of the collaboration between the current clerk and the Select Board and the other offices in town is voluntary on the part of the clerk because she is elected. And so there is no one above her who is asking for or requiring that level of collaboration. So in terms of elections, many election functions have been returned to the clerk's office under Ms. Brazil that were actually being operated out of the Select Board's office for many years. So I don't know whether you're aware of that or not. And that had to do with collaboration between those offices or lack of collaboration between those offices, the moving of those functions around. So I think it's very important to understand the difference between policymaking and operational positions. And I think it's very important to understand that we actually will increase accountability and collaboration with an appointed clerk. If this issue makes it to the ballot, obviously, I will be voting to appoint a clerk. Obviously, I will be voting to put it on the ballot tonight. But please keep in mind, this is a question of what we are going to allow the residents of Arlington to do, not a question of whether or not we approve of an appointed position. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. LeCourt. Before I take the next speaker, I just want to make a point about scope. My determination of scope on this article is that it would not be within scope to just enumerate other offices that are appointed or elected. But if you can draw comparisons, very specific comparisons that are relevant to this particular position, then that could be allowed within scope. Mr. Carmen, next. Thank you, Mr. Moderator. Dean Carmen, precinct 20. Well, first, somewhat apologies for the attire. I have late soccer practice at Thorndike, and then I have to come here. And then along the way, when I pick my attire, I have to pick who I want to impress more. You were a group of 13-year-old boys, and I picked them. So can you hear me? All right, good. So I rise in support of this article. I asked that you all vote to put it on the ballot. You know, one of the things I think we'll see tonight, so I'm going to spend time rebutting the counterpoint. One thing we'll hear tonight from opponents of this is they will say it's a loss of democracy. It's a loss of independence. There's no transparency. We need a guardian at the gate. If we allow the town manager a point, it will get a patron attire. This position is uniquely qualified. Now, I'm guessing those are it because six years ago, when we sat in this room to put the treasurer question on the ballot, those were the arguments that were made. And I think that is a very relevant comparison point because we don't have to worry about the hypothetical of what will happen in the future. Right? You know, one of the arguments made in for this is you'll have a better pool of candidates, right? When you move from an elected clerk to a professional clerk, better candidates. Four and a half years ago, we transitioned from an elected treasurer to an appointed treasurer. I can assure you nobody will say that the then elected treasurer was more competent than the person we appointed. Okay? I can assure you the then elected treasurer will not say that he was more qualified than that person. Okay? This is the truth, right? And when we talk about integration, right? Six years ago, after we made it, or five years ago, after we had the residents who were smart enough to appoint the position, we moved and created a consolidated and an integrated finance department where the treasurer, the comptroller, the assessor, purchasing all rolled up to the deputy town manager finance director. Okay? If we move forward with this, we have a new generation of consolidation and efficiency. And I should say, if you talk to people, nobody is going to say that that was bad. Nobody is going to turn on and say, man, I wish we still had all of these disparate groups out there. Okay? And this is important because, you know, this is no longer that, you know, the 1920s, 30s, 40s, 50s, where things are on paper and we're, you know, kind of doing our thing there. We're moving it, we're well into the electronic age, right? Things are digital. The job is more complicated. Okay? And, and I, so I urge you as you, as you think about this to just not be made scared or not become scared by the hypothetical, right? Don't be scared by some like abstract, like, like problems that may occur in the future. Okay? Look at this and say, the past represents our present. Okay? We had the department. I'll leave by saying this. Because of what we did five years ago, we have Anna Terrell, who was just hired as our treasurer. She's going to be great. Okay? If you didn't do that, you would be getting lectured by a guy in a sweatsuit, right? You don't want that. Okay? So I urge you to approve this article. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Carmen, please hold your applause. Mr. Greenspawn next. Thank you, Mr. Moderator. Andrew Greenspawn, precinct five. I move the question. Are matters in this article? Okay? We have a motion to terminate debate. Do we have a second? We have a second. Let's, let's, let's go to a handset vote. Actually, I have a question first before we do that. If we go to a handset vote, will that reset the speaker queue? Yes? No? If you're not sure, let's do a voice vote. All those in favor of terminating debate under article 13 say yes? Yes. All those opposed? It needs to be two thirds. I don't think that was two thirds. Let's, let's go to it. Let's, let's, let's go to it. I'll take a, I'll take a picture of the screen. Hold on while I update my Twitter feed. Okay. What we can go to a, let's, let's go to a termination debate, debate vote, please. Okay. Voting is now open. If you wish to terminate debate on this article, press one. If you wish to continue debate, press two. And a reminder that this is a two thirds vote. Point of order. Mr. Jameson, are we just not in voting mode? Voting is now open. I see votes rolling in. Are folks able to confirm on their handsets that their votes are received? No? Okay. Okay. So folks who voted yes, are you seeing that received on your handset? Okay. Okay. Okay. So we need to get this resolved. Yeah, those numbers don't reflect what we heard in the voice vote. So it sounds like lots of folks who did press one or two didn't, you did not get your vote received. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Let's see. Any, Mr. Foskett? Okay. We'll show the voting screens, but this is not the official vote. This is just to confirm. Charles Foskett, Precinct 10. Mr. moderator, I suggest we do a stand, you know, a normal vote that we did before we had the electronics. It might work. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Foskett. Let's see if we can just quickly get this resolved. Do we need more time to sort out the voting? I can't. Okay. Mr. Rosenthal, do you have a point of order? Mark Rosenthal, Precinct 14. Mr. moderator, they stopped displaying the list of the voting results before we were able to see the entire list. Yeah, I appreciate that. I mean, the numbers were clearly off. So let's go to a standing vote. I mean, it's either that or we sit here idly while the voting system is corrected. Okay. So can we, in the main hall, let's, on the floor, let's divide into quadrants. We used to have four aisles. Now we have two. So we can cut this in half by row. So somewhere near the middle, from forward to back, let's split those. Yeah. Mr. Slickman, can you take this front right quadrant? We have volunteer to take the front left quadrant. Mr. Oster, can we get a volunteer from the back to quadrants? We have one here and one there. Ms. Hansen. Okay. And so just agree on where the cutoff is between the rows forward to back. And similarly, the satellite room should be straightforward. I'll wait for the deputy moderator to give me the tally. And then in the balcony. Yeah, we need a volunteer from the balcony. Yeah. Okay. So we're first going to go through, and if you are in favor of terminating debate, stand. Okay. And then the tallyers will tally your sections. Yes. And 23 positive? 39? 26? 46. And can we get the vote from the yes vote from the balcony via microphone? They're still counting. Okay. Point of order? Yes. We can't, can you use the microphone? That's right. We're not going to do abstains because they don't affect the vote. Yeah. Oh, sorry. Okay. Yes. This is just the yes vote. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Can we get a number from the balcony? 21? 21. And from the satellite room. Mr. Maher, do we have an account from the satellite room? Ms. moderator, you hear me? It's 10 votes in the positive, not in the negative to 10. 10 to the positive and 10? Zero negative. Zero negative. Okay. Okay. And so now we'll do this all over again for the no votes. If you are, if you wish to continue debate, you wish to vote no on termination of debate, please stand. And let's do the tallys again. Zero. Diane said zero. Four. Okay. 10. Seven. Seven. Four. Four. And it was zero from the satellite room. And so it's just the balcony left. So that's one of the counts, right? Eight. That looks close. We still need the balcony count on no. Seven. Okay. We apologies for the technical difficulties and the delay. The final tally is, I don't really have an easy way to show this, but 186 in the affirmative to terminate debate, 32 in the negative for a total of 218 votes. The yeses have it with 85% of the vote, which seemed very similar, I think, to what we saw on the electronic voting screen. And so, so the debate is terminated. So let us, we'll now go to a vote on the main motion for Article 13. A vote on, vote, I'll describe the vote before we turn on voting. It's a majority vote. Yeah, can we switch this, well, we'll move over to the voting, but do we want to first show the, let's show the article text or the vote language? Can we switch over to that input? Okay, thank you. So vote yes. We have an open voting yet. The green light will come on when we're ready to vote. Vote yes if you want to approve of the town clerk becoming an appointed position or for that to be put before voters on the ballot, on the ballot. Thank you. To authorize the select board to put the question to voters on next year's town election ballot. And so when this green light comes on, voting will be open, but it's not open yet. It is now open. You may now vote. Okay, let's close voting. The yeses have it. 186 in the affirmative, 31 in the negative, two abstentions. It is an affirmative vote. Let's now move on to Article 14. Mr. Helmuth, do you want to introduce this? We have a point of order. Mr. Slickman? Oh, the screen for Article 14. Can we bring up the screen for Article 14, please? Mr. Helmuth? Are you going to see the scroll of the vote? Oh, can we show the vote to go through the screens? The margin was, yeah, sufficiently wide that we're not required to cycle through all the screens. But we're not going to show all the votes on all the time, unless there's several requests for it. Right. Oh, for this one. We're not able to show that at this point. 30 seconds. Okay, we'll wait the 30 seconds. Okay. Because of the technical difficulties to give confidence that this is working correctly, we'll do it. Thank you. I should sing a song. I don't think that's what he had in mind for the national anthem. You can sing, but it has to be in scope. Everyone, please confirm your votes. From the main motion of Article 13. Okay, that's all precincts. Okay. Mr. Helmuth? Introduce us, please, to Article 14. Apologies for the delay. Thank you, Mr. Moderator. Eric Helmuth, Chair of the Select Board. I'm going to introduce this, but I'm also going to speak and make the main presentation about it on behalf of the Select Board. So this is an unusual situation in that one of my good friends and colleagues on the Board, Mr. Diggins, recused himself from the Select Board and went to the other microphone and presented this in the 10-Vetish to Vota article on the Select Board. The rest of us left at Vote 4-0 against this idea, and I want to summarize why. I know that my friend and colleague will be up soon to tell you why that's not a good idea. So this was, I think, what we found persuasive in our listening to people and in our own thinking as this was first of all opposed by both the Redevelopment Board and the Planning Director and the Town Manager, and they are happy tonight if any time any member wants to rise and ask them for their rationale, they are prepared to provide it. The concern that the Board had in its discussions was of overlap and duplication of efforts. So this would propose that the Town appoint a study committee to study new growth. Really important topic for addressing our financial dilemma that we face, the structural deficit that drives a lot of the Town's financial crunch. The problem is in how we do it. We felt that more is not necessarily better and that the studying new growth, which is new economic development that allows us to increase the tax revenues above the two and a half percent, is part of the master plan and that master planning process revision is due for next year and it will employ the same Town professionals and many of the same volunteers to study that in depth and make serious recommendations to the Town officials about how we address that and how we maximize and increase our rate of new growth. So there's a concern about overlap and duplication and there's also the possibility of contradictory findings. What do we do if these two groups don't agree? What does the Town go from there? So that's something to consider. I think the Board is also uncertain and maybe skeptical that it's really possible to do this study without using any Town resources. I think that the idea is that it would be optional. But as a practical matter, research data that the Town has may well require the use of some Town staff's time and then with that introduce the possibility of that concern about duplication of effort and duplication of resources. We'll also question whether the group could do its work effectively without the use of professional staff from Town and folks in the ARB. So a little bit of a conundrum there that we may have some concern about. And finally, we suggest that the meeting consider if it's really the study group which, you know, we're all for volunteer efforts. That's terrific. And the spirit of this is fantastic, right? But if it really doesn't need Town resources, then Town meeting might ask itself, does this really need to be a Town committee? And in the light of the possibility of contradictory findings and a duplication of efforts, it seemed to the balance of the Board that we had some concerns. However good the intentions of this know and however important the topic that maybe we could just leave this to the process that's scheduled for the first half of next year and let that process take place. Thank you, Mr. Moderator. Thank you, Mr. Helmuth. Mr. Diggins, I believe you have a motion. Can we switch the presentation over to the substitute motion under Article 14? Mr. Diggins, you have the floor. Thank you. One of Diggins, Precinct 3. Town meeting member. So do I need to make the motion? Or is it just there now? Oh, you need to make a motion. Okay. So I'd like to make a motion. I'd like to make insurance that I have a substitute motion as a motion to replace the motion. A motion to introduce the Diggins' substitute motion? Yes. Okay. Do we have a second? This was posted on the annotated warrant. Okay. We have a second. So we now have two motions stacked pending. We have the recommended vote of no action from the Select Board and then stacked on top of that. That's also pending is Mr. Diggins' substitute motion. Go ahead. Thank you. This is going to run about three and a half minutes and maybe a few seconds to respond to what my colleague said. So as proud and as privileged as I feel to be a member of Parliament's Select Board, I stand before you as a resident who is also a town meeting member and, yes, a policy geek with a t-shirt to prove it. Thank you very much to a fellow town meeting member for getting me this shirt because she knows how much I like doing policy. To a large extent, I wish that the substitute motion had been the original main motion because I am much more excited about the possibilities of us gaining unexpected knowledge with this, a less constrained study committee. I also want to emphasize that I offer this substitute motion not in defiance of my Select Board colleagues for whom I have much respect and a warm spot in my heart. Chair, sir. You're welcome. So let me see a lot of plays. Yeah. Let me rip back a little bit. I also want to emphasize that I offer this substitute motion not in defiance of my Select Board colleagues for whom I have much respect and a warm spot in my heart but, and also because I think their recommendation of no action on the original motion was the correct decision. Those of you who know me know that there was never any desire to disrupt the authority of any person in the department or any entity in this town with the original motion. Whereas I had envisioned the original main motion as a collaboration with the Board of Assessors, the Department of Planning and Community Development, the Redevelopment Board, the Zoning Board of Appeals, and a group of residents to develop a strategic plan for responsibly increasing new growth that would lead the way to adopting and or changing policies and recommending changes to our bylaws. I certainly appreciate the concerns raised by the Planning Department and ARB regarding the next iteration of the master plan, even though initially there was a sense that the study committee could be a precursor to the development of that next master plan. Given the limited resources staff in particular, the original motion was meant to think about what we could really do in a practical manner to increase the creation of new growth and to build some momentum towards making the necessary changes, be they in policies, bylaws, or elsewhere. Though I could not bring myself to write a motion that would exclude anyone with this substitute motion that removes mandatory participation by the Board of Assessors, the Planning Department, ARB, and the ZBA, we can feel more free to explore bolder possibilities and scenarios. We can spend more time engaging residents in the basic education about new growth in order to build the foundation for exploring more options. We can spend more time discussing community values and goals adopted and eagerly embraced by the large majority of us, values such as creating more affordable housing opportunities, making getting around town safer for everyone and creating a more sustainable community both environmentally and socially. We would encourage staff to build on what we've found as they guide us towards a new master plan, and we could build on the goals set forth in the next master plan as the study committee continues for a few months after the resume release of the new master plan. There is no conflict here. There is just a desire to learn more by intensely studying a complex issue and engaging as much as we can as our community. Unless given a compelling reason not to learn something about any given issue, I would like to think that town meeting will always avail itself of that opportunity, especially when in this case the cost of that opportunity is effectively zero. I am confident that the study committee created by town meeting for the purpose of providing knowledge to itself and community at large about what we can do or avoid doing to improve the financial well-being of the town in long run will be seen as a gift to the town from its elected government and fellow residents. Thank you. So to the notion that this is a duplication of effort, the substitute motion is designed to avoid that. I feel that we have enough know-how in the town to get the data that we need. I mean, there is a mechanism that if we should need to get data, I mean, it would go through the select board designee to the town manager who could then regulate that access. So if staff just can't handle the load, it will not be passed on to them. It may just make it take longer for the study committee to get the information that it needs. I think if we were to get conflicting data or results, that would be a good thing, you know, because that would tell us that maybe someone isn't doing something right, you know, or maybe there's just a difference that we need to sort out in order to figure out where the truth is. I mean, should the results match, then that would give us more confidence mean in the results mean that has been acquired by either group. So I wouldn't let that be any concern at all. So I'll stop there. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Diggins. Mr. Jamison. Thank you, Mr. Moderator Gordon Jamison. Precinct 12. Could we set the thank you. And also Chair of the Board of Assessors. New growth is something that the Board of Assessors, the Director of Assessments and his staff work very hard on every year getting because I'll be back up when I first joined town meeting, I would often hear people talk against growth. And it took me a couple years to figure out what the other shoe was. This is a teeter totter or a seesaw depending upon where you grow up, I guess. And if you don't like growth, you've got to love overrides. And because the only way we can incrementally increase our tax base is through new growth. And our new growth is insufficient currently to cover the growth in our level budget funding for our services to town and school services. So Mr. Diggins' proposal has merit on one side that he brings the issue up for discussion so that people understand that this is an important part of potentially getting physically sustainable. However, because all the boards that are relevant to this, the Board of Assessors has not taken a position on this article, have suggested this is not the time to do this. And because we are in the middle of the MBTA community's planning, which is critical to us maintaining state funds that we would lose if we don't do that right, I recommend a vote against this to cite the importance of the issue. Thank you very much, Ms. Moderator. Thank you, Mr. Jameson. Take Mr. Lorette next. Thank you, Ms. Moderator. Chris Lorette, saying seven. Ms. Moderator, I'd like to ask you a question about this article if I might. Sure. Because you are the appointing authority for all of the required voting members. And you're the appointing authority, but the substitute motion says you're supposed to appoint in cooperation with the Envision Arlington Standing Committee. And I'm wondering if you can tell me what that in cooperation phrase means to you. And I guess if I could provide a concrete example, if the majority of the Standing Committee wants to appoint a particular member, would you defer to them or are you going to override them with anyone you want to appoint? We would cooperate. Actually, I did, I wondered about that word myself, about what exactly that means. Obviously, it's not technically spelled out. I imagine I would try to come to some amicable agreement if possible, but it's hard for me to answer because the term is pretty vague. Thank you. I asked about that because, indeed, if it's real close cooperation and it is going to be the Envision Arlington Standing Committee that is effectively making the appointments, then is it really necessary for town meeting to form this committee? Why doesn't the Envision Arlington Standing Committee just form the committee themselves? Is there any reason they cannot do that? Is there any law or anything that presabids them from forming their own committees? They can't form their own town committees, but they could have task groups, for instance. Okay. I mean, it seems to me that's perhaps a distinction without a difference because all this is a study committee providing recommendations. I'm inclined to agree with the Select Board on this and would suggest that if the Envision Arlington Standing Committee wants to form this, this study committee, great, but I think it does make sense to wait for the next iteration of the master plan because you really shouldn't be considering new growth and isolation from all the other issues facing the town and the way the town wants to develop. Thank you. Thank you. I just add a little bit to that I would say as far as like the word cooperate, I mean the only thought I've really done on that is that I would approach that as moderator in good faith communication with the Envision Arlington Standing Committee and I would hope that they would do the same. Mr. Hamlin, you're next. Hi, Guillermo Hamlin, Precinct 14. In reading the substitute motion, I've noticed that the town manager can temporarily suspend the work of this committee if the town manager so pleases. Why? Mr. Diggins. Why? Mr. Diggins, Tom and Guillermo, Precinct 3 is simply to allow that if there is some impact on what is happening in the town with respect to the master plan or anything else being then the town manager would be able to just suspend the work of committees really just meant as a stopgap in case for some reason in people feel that the study committee is interfering with something that's going on in the town. Thank you. And is there a master plan forthcoming? Mr. Diggins, is there a master plan? Well, this might be better directed to the director of the planning community development. We have the director of planning and community development. Claire Ricker, I'm the director of planning and community development. We will be starting kicking off the master plan process as early as January of next year once MPGA communities has passed and we have enlisted in the fossil fuel ban. Thank you. I have no further questions at this time. I was just seeking clarification. It was a little confusing to me, but thank you. I am making no affirmative or negative statements at this time. I'm still neutral. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Hamlin. Mr. Holman. Aaron Holman, precinct 12. I have some questions about the substitute motion also. I have mixed feelings. I like the idea of maybe a red team and a blue team, the idea of two separate teams coming to possibly different conclusions. At the same time, I also worry about duplication of effort. I have some questions, though. On one hand, the idea here is not to get in the way of the town. On the other hand, I'm reading in membership of organization that the members are going to include somebody from the select board, the board of assessors, the redevelopment board, the zoning board of appeals, and the department of planning and community development or designate. How can we prevent getting our feet out from under the town when all these people are involved? Mr. Diggins, do you have an answer? Mr. Diggins, tell me the member precinct three. Just to be clear, I mean, those are optional. They're optional. I mean, so they did not have to be a member of the committee. So I did not write them out because I didn't want to exclude the possibility of them being a member of being a part of it if they chose to. But in the substitute motion, they are optional. Thank you. Again, the point that was brought up about being temporarily asked by the town manager, there's also a provision. I'm looking for it here for the town to review it. I'm sorry. I'm looking for- Which item is this? And the substitute motion? This is all in the substitute motion. It's essentially what is that the town can ask for the information before it's reported to town meeting. It's simply a matter of just trying to be accommodating and as open as possible without finding as early as possible. Let's direct comments or questions through the chair, please. I'm sorry. Mr. Holman? I guess I'm also concerned about the unequal status of these two committees and also the fact that, as you specifically say, this is educational only. I'm a little bit puzzled. There is no attempt at making policy here. Is there a question? Doesn't these strike me as a little unequal? Is there a question in that or is a statement? Is the intent to make these two committees unequal in the way that I perceive? Mr. Diggins? Yes, absolutely. So what the town does with respect to the master planning process or any other process with Trump, this committee would defer its activities and pretty much anything else be to what's going on in town because by town staff, because the goal is not to interfere, is really to supplement. It really is an exploration, a kind of basic science in the realm of municipal finance of the town. Okay. And finally, your item, Jay. Though there may be recommendations, the study will not make explicit recommendations to town meeting or town staff. Again, I'm a little bit puzzled that we're being asked to form a committee from which we will not receive recommendations. Right. Can you explain that? Yes, well, when there are findings, we kind of implicit sometimes in findings or recommendations that didn't want to make people think that we wouldn't be able to deduce some recommendations from it, but we won't officially make recommendations because that would be in the realm of planning, the planning department, in the realm of either making a master plan or something that comes out of the master plan or maybe something that's coming out of a plan that we already have. Okay. And at your comment at the end, since the study committee will exist primarily for educational purposes, if this committee will not make a report to town meeting, precisely whom are we educating? Mr. Diggins? Well, it would make a report to town meeting. It just wouldn't be a report of recommendations. It would be a report of findings. And in the spirit of basic science, generally basic science helps you gather facts, which are pretty hard to come by. And those facts often help you get closer to the truth. And with that, you tend to make better policy because you are closer to reality and making policies based on reality is probably the way to go. Okay. Thank you for answering my questions. Sure. Thank you, Mr. Harlan. Mr. Newton? Sunday Newton, precinct 10. I move to terminate debate on article 14 and all items before it. Okay. We have a motion to terminate debate and we have a second. Can we bring up a vote please for termination of debate? And this is for all matters before the article, which includes the main motion and the substitute motion. So let's just wait for voting to open. And again, this will be a vote on termination of debate. Can we show the vote screen? Here we go. The voting is now open. If you are in favor of terminating debate, on article 14, vote yes. If you want to continue debate, vote two. And you can press three to abstain. Okay. Let's close voting. The yeses have it. 189 to 29. Debate is terminated. We'll now move on to voting on Mr. Diggins' substitute motion. And so this vote will be on whether to substitute the main motion with Mr. Diggins' substitute motion. When voting opens, this says terminate debate on my screen. Okay. Voting is open now on the Diggins' substitute motion. Vote yes. If you want to substitute, if you want the substitute motion to change the main motion from no action to Mr. Diggins' substitute for creating a study committee to explore possibilities for new growth. And if you want to leave the main motion as no action, you can vote two. Okay. Let's close voting. And the motion fails. 75 in the affirmative, 142 in the negative with one abstention. So the main motion is not substituted. We now, we are back to having a single pending motion, which is the main motion of no action. It is not substituted. So we'll now take a voice vote on no action. If you wish, if you wish to do nothing under Article 14, vote yes. If you wish to vote, if you wish to not do nothing, but not do anything in particular, vote no. No. Okay. We will do no action carries. And we will do nothing. That brings up Article 15. Mr. Helmuth, do you want to introduce us? Thank you, Mr. Moderator. Eric Helmuth, Chair of the Arlington Select Board. Article 15 was requested by the very body who's the work, sorry, was requested by the Board of Youth Services, and they asked us to make some substantial administrative changes and updates to the bylaw that defines their work. It's worth noting that this body came into existence 61 years ago. A lot has changed since then, but one thing I'm very proud to say is that what that board now does is the board for the Arlington Youth Counseling Center, and it is one of the best things about Arlington. It provides amazing mental health services to youth and to families regardless of their ability to pay, and I encourage you to value yourself. If you want to know more about that in the context of these changes, we have Christine Virginia, our fantastic director of Health and Human Services who can explain that work, again, within the scope of this article. But for an explanation of the bylaw changes and why they're so extensive, I'm going to turn this over to Attorney Doug Hyme. Doug Hyme, Town Council. Thank you, Mr. Helmuth. Still a little bit of my thunder because I wanted to talk up the Board of Youth Services myself. I have the pleasure of giving you some of the details of the Select Board's motion on Article 15, which is really a request, as Mr. Helmuth mentioned, directly from the Board of Youth Services. They really drafted these proposed changes, which they put in front of you, because they were established in 1962 to assist in the prevention, treatment, and control of problems relating to children and youth of the town. We might have updated that original charter language, but the point is, is that the Board of Youth Services evolved, as Mr. Helmuth alluded to over the last 60 years, from an entity that really provided a lot of direct advice and work to one that provided some specific programs in more recent years is really focused on supporting the Arlington Youth and Counseling Center. I just want to highlight that the Youth and Counseling Center, due to the terrific work of a lot of folks, provided, to my understanding, somewhere around 5,350 hours of counseling for Arlington Youth in a single year. So they're a terrific organization, the Board of Youth Counseling Center, and what the Board of Youth Services would like to do principally is rename themselves to reflect their current mission, Arlington Youth and Counseling Center advisory board. Second, they'd like to give their membership some more flexibility, so that they first have the ability to have fewer and greater number of members between 7 and 11. And I think, as a lot of town meeting members are aware of, part of what this reflects is sometimes the challenge of obtaining the right folks to want to volunteer for the body. Oftentimes, a lot of you volunteer your time in a lot of different committees, commissions, and other places in town, and there's only so many volunteers to go around sometimes. So they want a little bit of flexibility in terms of the membership. Next, they want to allow for up to five members, and this depends on the number of total members at any given time between that 7 and 11, to be non-residents of the town. So these are professional staff, people whose course of study or experience is related to youth services, and might also bring some fresh and different perspective and diversity to the Board of Youth Services. Third, they like to basically have turn limits. No more than two consecutive three-year terms. Folks could come back on, but they want to make sure that they continue to get new, and as I said, fresh ideas. And lastly, they're just a suite of administrative changes and updates, things like removing language from their charter vote of town meeting that appropriates $3,500 for their operation back in 1962. So those are the four things. It's renaming, giving their membership a little bit more flexibility, adding term limits, and some of the administrative updates. I know they take up a lot of space, but they really just attempt to clean up the charter vote. Thank you so much. Thank you, Mr. Heim. Is the speaker key open? I don't see any speakers currently. Mr. Grunko? Zach Grunko, P.C. 13. It seems to exclude residents that are not registered to vote from being on the committee. Is that intentional? Mr. Heim? Doug Heim, Town Council. That is part of the charter vote. I don't think it was intentional in any update to exclude folks who are not registered voters. But I think what you'll find is that most committees, commissions, boards in town have appointments from registered voters. There's only, I think, a handful that don't contain that kind of language, probably because they're of a more modern vintage. Thank you. Okay. Okay. Mr. Rosenthal? Mark Rosenthal, P.C. 14. Given what Mr. Heim has described, this sounds like a good idea, but there's something I do not understand, which is that the list of things that are being proposed do not include what, one thing that's listed in the article, which says to see if the town will vote to amend or disband the Board of Youth Services Organization. If we vote in favor of this, will we give some governmental body within the town of Arlington the ability to disband this organization? Mr. Heim? Doug Heim, Town Council. Thank you, Mr. Rosenthal. That's a good question. No. The only action before you is the vote, not the worn article. When the Board of Youth Services was discussing its options, one option was to consider whether the Board of Youth Services should transition to being a non-profit organization that supports AYCC without being an entity of the government, but to my understanding they opted to take the course of action. So the only thing that's, the town meeting is going to vote on is what's in the language after voting. Thank you. Thank you. Ms. Boyle? Lauren Boyle, P.C. 16. I just wanted to quickly mention that I am a previous Board Member of the Board of Youth Services, and this to me is just kind of a common sense to vote for this. This is something that the Board for years really, the focus has been on AYCC. So it kind of just only makes sense. So this is something that has been long coming and definitely needed, so I encourage you to vote for it. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Wagner? Thank you, Carl Wagner, Precinct 15. I move to terminate debate on the article and all measures before it. Thank you. Okay, we have a motion to terminate debate and we have a second. So we'll now take a vote on terminating debate. What's that? Voice vote? Sure. Hold on. All those in favor of terminating debate vote yes. Say yes. All those opposed? Okay. The yes have it. Debate is terminated. Let's move to a vote on the main motion for article 15. Okay, voting is now open. Vote yes to rename, if you want to rename the Board of Youth Services to the Arlington Youth Counseling Center advisory board, grant more flexibility in its membership, change the requirement of being a registered voter of the town, and adding term limits. If you don't want those changes, vote no. Okay, let's close voting. It passes. 217 in the affirmative, one in the negative, three abstentions. It is 9.34 p.m. Why don't we take a 10-minute break, come back, be ready to go at 9.44 sharp. Thank you. We're starting now with article 16. Mr. Helmuth. Thank you, Mr. Moderator Eric Helmuth, Chair of the Civil Act Board. I want to explain to town meeting, there's going to be a series of a few votes where I had to recuse myself as a member of the Board and I will do the same tonight. So in a moment, I'm going to hand this off to my vice, to our vice chair, John Herd. But the reason is simple, that my day job, I work for the Massachusetts Senate and to avoid a conflict of interest with my employment, any articles that refer to special legislation or petition legislators, I can't serve in both capacities. So I'll recuse myself, not saying anything substantive or indeed at all. So in the future, if you see someone else rise, that's why. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Herd. Mr. Herd? And do we have the speaker queue open? Can we show that initially just so folks can see if they're being added? Thank you. Mr. Herd, go ahead. Thank you, Mr. Moderator. John Herd, Vice Chair of the Select Board. Article 16 asks town meeting to endorse a change to Town Manager's Manager Act relative to how we fill vacancies on the Select Board when a town manager leaves in the middle of their current contract term. As some town meeting members will remember, our last town manager left approximately or gave notice approximately three minutes into his current contract, which left us in a little bit of a bind because under the current rules, we are required to fill a permanent replacement within 90 days to fill the balance of that contract term, which was almost the full three years. So we did so. We were lucky to have Mr. Poole to step up and help us in that capacity. But this particular language written at really a different time when there was a residency requirement for the town manager, and it was a much quicker process to go to interview and find qualified candidates. So the board through subcommittee worked with some of the language, and that's how you got to the proposal that's in front of you today. One of the main differences is it allows us to appoint an interim town manager for a period of no longer than 180 days, which we weren't able to do before. And then it gives us 180 days to conduct what is a modern town manager search with candidates outside of the town of Violington. And it gives us the amount of time necessary to find a qualified candidate to take over for either the balance of the term or more likely once we find the candidate to enter into a new three-year term. So that is what is before you when we ask positive. Thank you, Mr. Herd. I don't see anyone in the speaker queue. Are we sure it's open? Mr. Moore, could you test it? There you are. Seeing that there are no requests to speak, we'll move straight to a vote. So let's open voting. So let me first describe what it is before we open voting. A yes vote would, let's see, I see Mr. Leone actually is on the speaker. Mr. Leone, do you want to speak? Is that a pass? Okay, pass. So a yes vote would authorize the Select Board to file home rule legislation to change the rules in the Town Manager Act for appointing a new Town Manager, giving a little bit more flexibility to the Select Board. So let's bring up a vote screen now for the main motion, which is the recommended vote of the Select Board. And so voting is now open. If you're in favor of this authorizing the Select Board to file this home rule legislation, vote one for yes. If you're opposed, press two for no, or three to abstain. Okay, let's close voting. Okay, the motion carries with affirmative vote of 213 and the affirmative one and the negative one abstention. Let us now move on to Article 17. Mr. Helmuth, we're going to go straight to Mr. Herd for the same reason as the last article. Thank you, Mr. Herd. Thank you, Mr. Moderator. John Herd, Vice Chair of the Select Board. Article 17 asks Town Manager to endorse a request to allow the Town to publish legal notices through digital means. As of right now, we're required to run legal notices, all legal notices through a local print newspaper in the event that we no longer have a local newspaper, which is more of a possibility now than it's been in the past. Apologies, Mr. Herd, for the interruption. I just want to let everyone know that the speaker queue is open. It's not showing right now, but I can see it. It is open. Go ahead. Sorry. And so this would bypass the requirement to put legal notices in print form because if we lose our local paper, we'll have to do it through a Boston-based paper at a much greater cost and less likelihood to be seen by local residents. And so that is the request before you. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Herd. So let's start with Mr. Ruderman. Thank you, Mr. Moderator. Michael Ruderman, Precinct 9. I'm also a member of the Board and Treasurer of Arlington Community Media, Inc., ACMI, which is carrying tonight's meeting and all of our annual town meeting sessions, special town meeting sessions, live through cable access, TV, locally produced, locally staffed. And it would be a great boon to ACMI to be able to get a piece of the business because the posting of legal notices is a business. There have been many newspapers that have seen their ad revenues dwindle, all but for the mandatory postings that towns are obliged to put into a print source. And let's just say it, the advocate's dead. It really is. There's almost no local content and no local reason to read it. So this would not only be a more effective way of reaching the public, but it would give established digital providers and digital entrepreneurs in the future a reason to prove themselves and show that they could inform and educate the public as the print media has done in the past. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Ruderman. Oh, I'm sorry. I felt to bring up Mr. Slotnick, who filed the citizen's petition. Apologies, Mr. Slotnick. Go ahead. Yeah, can we bring up the slide presentation for Mr. Slotnick? Apologies for that. Thank you, Mr. Moderator. Larry Slotnick precinct 7. Article 17 is designed to allow the town to eventually print legal notices digitally, or publish them, I should say. It's going to provide us more options for satisfying mass general law requirements. Next slide. So what are legal notices? Currently, the state requires various municipal actions related to elections, zoning, construction contracts to be widely published in the form of a printed legal notice in what's called the newspaper of general circulation. Next. So how are we affected currently? By statute, we print these legal notices in the Arlington Advocate Winchester Star, it's owned by Gate House Media, Gannett, as the closest newspaper of general circulation. So the Select Board, Town Clerk, DPW, Planning Department, and occasionally public schools are required to print legal notices. Next. So just some background on what Gannett has been doing with the Massachusetts Weekly newspapers that it owns. According to a recent report from last year, they terminated the print editions of 19 of the weekly newspapers in Massachusetts. The Bedford Minute Man was one of them. They were required to, the town of Bedford was required to then start printing legal or publishing legal notices in the Lowell Sun at a much higher cost. And of course, the Lowell Sun isn't widely subscribed to by Bedford residents. That's just one example of what happened. In that same announcement about the closure of the print of 19 weeklies, nine were merged. And so that included the Arlington Advocate and Winchester Star coming together into one newspaper. And if you've been listening to the news about local newspaper activity, Gannett is planning to close even more weekly newspapers. Next. So the hard costs. Typical placement in the Advocate for legal notices about $190. That was as of last year. If Gannett pulled the Advocate Star out of print, but continued doing, you know, printing, you know, publishing on the web, we, without changing anything, we would be forced to publish legal notices either in the Globe or in the Herald. The same size notice that costs $190 in the Advocate would cost over $900 in the Globe. I didn't research the cost for the Herald for a similar publication. So that's a fourfold increase. During a pandemic year 20, fiscal year 2021, the town spent around $10,000 on legal notices. So that would increase to an excess of $40,000 a year if we were forced to publish them in the Globe. Next. The soft costs. So as Mr. Ruderman just pointed out, I'm not going to say too many negative things about what the Advocate Star is right now, but few and fewer Arlington residents subscribe to that. Local interest legal notices aren't being seen by the people who should see them. So they really know less about what is going on in their town's government. And some feel that this deteriorates our local democratic processes. Next. So the proposed solutions that I work with attorney, you know, town council, Doug Hyman, the select board to come up with would give the select board five options to choose two from. So two out of the five you see listed, I'll just enumerate them. In the print edition, publish in a local newspaper of general circulation or on a newspaper's website. Websites reporting, local news, or opinion which satisfied all criteria for digital legal publication. As Mr. Ruderman pointed out, ACMI could possibly qualify for that. Yourarlington.com would qualify for that. Or number four, it would be a statewide website that maintains a repository for legal notices or a townwide website such as ArlingtonMA.gov could also set up a section of that website specifically for legal notices. Is that my last slide? So I'll stop there. And I'll be happy to take any questions. Great. Thank you, Mr. Slotnick. We'll take Mr. Holland next. Mr. Holland. Yes. This name in precinct, please. Rot Holland, precinct seven. I rise in support of this. It brings the legal notice process into line with the actual publication process now and may as well do it. Thank you. Mr. Loretty. Thank you, Mr. Wattery. This is Loretty, precinct seven. I rise in opposition to this article. And I'd like to explain why. I don't necessarily disagree with any of the facts of the current situation that the previous speakers have listed in regard to the situation of local media and in particular the paper that serves Arlington. Though it's not entirely clear to me that if that paper went out of business we couldn't place the ads in another, say like Cambridge Day that might expand into the market and get a lower price. But the reason I'm opposed to this article is that there are, what, 350-something cities and towns in this state. I would venture to say at least 300 of them have the exact same problem. And yet we are going as one town to file special legislation that only applies to the town of Arlington to fix a statewide problem. Do you expect or do you support the 300 other towns that are in the same boat to do the same thing with their version of the legislation? That doesn't make sense to me. I think the town of Arlington and our leaders should be, they should be working with our local officials or perhaps even like multi-member organizations like the Mass Municipal Association to come up with statewide legislation to solve this problem and not not imposing the burden on the legislature and our representatives to create and promote legislation that is unique. And I would appreciate it if people don't interrupt me with calls of scope. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Loretty. All right. Okay. Can we briefly show the speaker queue because I'm going to do something out of order for the first time this year? Are we showing that? So I'm going to take Ms. Thornton next because I don't believe she's spoken at this town meeting yet. Thank you. Barbara Thornton, precinct 16. I just rise very briefly as you did to support this. I think that we want to see one, we want to be able to find out about the notices pertaining to Arlington in the organizations or the sources of news that we read. And two, we want to use the town's money to support the organizations that support us like ACMI and Your Arlington. Thank you. And I do appreciate that the statewide opportunity was also mentioned there, which I think is good. Thank you, Mr. Ordin. Let's take Mr. Hamlin and we can remove Mr. Slotnik from the queue here. He spoke already. Thank you. Guillermo Hamlin, precinct 14. I fully support this. I bring with me the experience of having worked in the city of Malden for their peg access station as their government affairs coordinator and seeing how they were struggling with legal notices in what would be their last remaining paper. I think it's common sense to do this. And I ask that you move to vote this swiftly. Thank you. Thank you. Mixed Pretzer from the conference room, please. Thank you, Mr. Moderator. David Pretzer, precinct 17. I move to terminate debate on this article on all matters before it. Okay. We have a motion to terminate debate. Do we have a second? Second? Okay. So let's let's take a vote on termination of debate. Do you want to do voice again? Okay. Let's try voice. Let's see if we can get through this. All those in favor of terminating debates say yes. All those opposed. Okay. The yeses have it. Debate is terminated. Let's move to a vote on the main motion for article 17. And while we're waiting for that vote to come up, I'll summarize. Vote yes if you want to authorize a select board to file a home rule legislation to allow the town to satisfy legal notice requirements entirely by digital publication. Voting is now open. Vote yes to authorize that home rule legislation through the select board and vote no to not authorize it. Voting will be closing soon. Okay. Let's close voting. And the results. It passes 205 in the affirmative, 10 in the negative. The main motion under article 17 passes. So let's now move on to article 19. Mr. Helmuth or back to Mr. Herd. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Moderator. John Herd, vice chair of the select board. Article 19 and I envision Mr. Schlichman will come up and give a much more in-depth presentation than I will. But it is a request to repeal a somewhat archaic and arbitrary rule that was implemented that says that you can't build an MBTA station within a certain amount of yards from Arlington Catholic High School. So the select board voted 3-1 with one recusal to support this article. Thank you. And can we just show the speaker queue? The speaker queue is open. Mr. Schlichman, did you file this through a citizen's petition? Do you want to introduce this? Thank you, Mr. Moderator. Paul Schlichman, precinct nine. What is the key stuff, the heart and soul of the transportation policy for the town of Arlington? The answer is the MBTA may not build mass transit facility, including but not limited to a rapid transit station and parking garage within 75 yards of Arlington Catholic High School. Now, why is this the prime directive? It's simple because it's a state law and state law prevails over anything we do, anything the MBTA can do without any act of the legislature. I've been reading the archives of the Arlington Advocate, which are wonderfully provided by our friends at the Robbins Library and they're wonderful. Back in 1976, opponents of the red line targeted the initial proposal to build a parking garage replacing the Russell Tommen parking lot. It wasn't the only objection, but it was a significant point of contention. The MBTA planners were responsive to the opponents. By the time this law was enacted, the MBTA already removed the garage from the plans it submitted to the U.S. Department of Transportation. The law was a compromise. The original version would have set the limit at 150 yards, which would have extended onto Broadway Plaza and into the Kickstand cafe parking lot. The compromise cut that distance in half. I note the dissenting opinion in the Select Board report recalls that Governor Dukakis signed this into law because it was viewed as a compromise that would allow for the construction of the red line as a neighborhood stop, albeit without a parking garage. Unfortunately, the compromise did not hold and the opponents intensified their opposition until the red line was stopped at Ale life. Blocking the red line from entering Arlington is the second most consequential decision in the history of our town. The first was Arlington's decision to separate from the town of Cambridge in 1807. The only people in this room who had a say in this decision were born on or before March 1959 and were residents of the town at the time of the 1977 election. Arlington deserves the opportunity to reexamine our relationship with the MBTA. Chapters 439 of the acts of 1976 exist today as a remnant of Arlington's effort to obstruct the red line. Our current residents should have the opportunity to consider our transit needs and our values without this law dominating this discussion. I urge your support for this petition. Thank you Mr. Selectman. We'll take Mr. Fiore next. I think we bring up the speaker. Can you just momentarily so folks can see? Apologies if it's found size. Mr. Fiore, go ahead. Peter Fiore. Peter Fiore, precinct two. I'm both blessed and burdened that I inherited a former long-serving town meeting member's private archives that include every government, every piece of government literature she received from any agency, federal, state or local. So I actually had my own copy of the red line extension report and the 1977 annual report. So I just rise to, I feel correct some of the statements, some of the information Mr. Slickman has put out and then to ask a question and then to tell you how I'm going to vote. But when I look at the, excuse me, the town managers report from 1977, Mr. Marquis says that immediately after President Carter took office it became clear to us that the proposed extension of the red line underground through Arlington was endangered. The President talked less about redesigned subway extensions and more about extended bus services and one-way streets to meet our transportation needs in Arlington. In the Selectman's, the select board's report, they make the statement in late October and of course this would be 76 because this is a 77 report. In late October the town received word that the Urban Mass Transportation Administration had approved federal funding of the red line rapid transit extension from Harvard Square to L. Y. Brooke. This proved to be not only surprising but disturbing because environmental impact studies had never addressed the issue of a temporary or permanent terminus on the Eastern Arlington boundary at the city of Cambridge line. Representative Cusack wouldn't be the first politician to take credit for something someone else did. My own opinion after reading this, and you can find copies yourself, a really good digitized version is on the Maldon Public Library website, Internet Archives, and it includes correspondence from Arlington residents about the plan, some names you'll recognize, Jackie Harrington, Stuart Sanders, Dr. Herb Meyer, Mr. Warden who's here this evening correspondence from him. But this plan really stank and is for the parking garage in Arlington Center. The Cambridge City Council passed a resolution that they didn't all want a parking garage and a bus depot in Port of Square and the same concerns that Arlington had in Arlington Center. The environmental concerns residents had in East Arlington were mirrored in North Cambridge where they actually sued the MBTA for the possible environmental damage that we'd done done by the station being built at El Wife. So there were a lot of reasons that people opposed the plan and a big one, and I read the correspondence from Jackie Harrington, was the parking garage and the traffic at the Arlington Heights station because originally these were not going to be Davis Square and Port of Square style stations where it was pedestrian mostly. They were going to be kind of miniature El Wife stations with parking garages and bus depots. I'd like to know if any of the proponents spoke to anyone at Arlington Catholic High School administrator staff students about this. Mr. Slikman? Paul Slikman, Pre-Signal? No. Mr. Moderator is a town meeting member. I don't know if they're a proponent or not, but they have their hand up to answer my question. Are you a proponent of this article? Okay, we'll come to the microphone. Joe Babiar's Pre-Sign 15. At an open house of the Arlington Chamber of Commerce, I spoke with the principal of Arlington Catholic. She was very concerned that the bus route would be taken away and that most of the students who depended upon the bus route to get to school could not get there. She also pointed out that there were teachers depended upon the bus route, and she's concerned that the bus route would be eliminated at this time. That's what she was... In 1977? No, this is this past... This is... Sorry. No. I'm talking about 1970. Sorry. This is more... My apologies. I was talking about this past month. Okay, so... I'm sorry if I misunderstood. Okay, so Mr. Furrier, you're asking, is there anyone present who spoke to the principal of Arlington Catholic High School in 1970? Are there anybody? No, now. Now. About this plan. I'm sorry about your warrants article. I'm sorry I wasn't clear about your warrant article. Did you speak or ask anybody you're talking about the warrant article? And the answer is no. Ms. Babiar's? Again, Joe Babiar's Pre-Sign 15. At the Chamber of Commerce meeting, I did not sign the petition. I'm not one of the 10 registered voters. But the principal of Arlington Catholic High School mentioned to me... I said, you know, what's going on in your area? And her concern is that there would be a removal of the bus stops because of certain MBTA cutbacks. Okay. So, yeah, that doesn't appear to be in scope, and it's not clear to me that it's answering Mr. Furrier's question. Can you restate the question, maybe? My apologies. No, apparently nobody brought this article to the attention or spoke with any administrators, teachers, staff, or students at Arlington Catholic High School, and it does affect the school. I realize it's 45 years removed, but here's why I'm voting against this, and now I'm definitely voting against it. I'm not going to vote for something that's just being pulled out of the past unnecessarily and run the risk that some student goes to school Monday morning wondering about it and wondering if the reason that we did this is because we hate them because of their religious beliefs. Okay, well, time is up. Thank you, Mr. Furrier. Mr. Loretty? Thank you, Ms. Moderator. Chris Loretty, precinct seven. I have to admit I'm a bit baffled by this whole thing. Can somebody explain to me, is the town currently being harmed by not changing this old legislation? Have, for example, during the past 20 years, we not receive grants or grants opportunities? Are we not receiving them in the future? Just what harm is this causing right now? Mr. Schlickman, as a petitioner, do you have an answer to that question? Yes. I have been an advocate for better public transportation in Arlington for a considerable amount of time. One of the things that I encounter all the time when I'm advocating among folks from outside of Arlington is like, why are you complaining? You guys killed the red line. And I think that having our prime focus of our public policy being this state law, the most permanent and governing part of our public policy towards transit is the state law. A remnant of the opposition to the red line hurts our ability to advocate for better MBTA service. And by passing this, we will be making a statement. The values of this town meeting in 2020, yeah, go ahead. This is your time, Mr. Lerner. Yeah, I appreciate that, because I was really asking the question of town officials of whether there were any grant opportunities that we were rejected from because of this, and I'm not interested in who Mr. Schlickman's spoken to. So let's leave it at that. Okay. Do you want to hear from a town official or do you want to move on? What's that? Do you want to hear from a town official or do you want to move on? Let me move on and then maybe come back to it if I have time. Okay, go ahead, please. Because I feel the same way as Mr. Fiori. I'm not really interested in re-litigating the past. Frankly, I didn't live in town, and if this isn't causing any harm, and I don't think it is based on what Mr. Schlickman said, I don't even want to consider it. It's not a trivial matter to get home real legislation passed in the legislature. I've done it over the objection of the select board in making the assessor an appointed position. It takes work, and we shouldn't be burdening them just to make one person or other feel good about correcting a mistake they believe was made in the past if it's not really causing any harm. So is there a town official, Mr. Moderator, who can state any concrete examples where Arlington didn't get a grant, well, you're not environmentally good enough to get this green funding, because it seems to be the town's done very well in getting that sort of funding. And I am certain that if having this on the books prevented us from getting that funding, we would have heard of it a long time ago. Mr. Herd, if you could answer that. Thank you, Mr. Moderator. John Herd, Vice-Chair of the Select Board. I'm not aware, nor are my colleagues aware of any grants, as Ms. Leroy already asked, that this particular law prevented us from. Your argument, I can say, is similar to what Mr. Degorsi said, is that for the majority of the Select Board, we passed this because it's a law that doesn't really make sense, and it might have had some dramatic effects back then. And we're just cleaning up a law that to us didn't really have. I understand what you're saying, that there is a burden on the legislature to correct this, but we also, from my view, at least as an individual Select Board member, we have a law that isn't an existence that we don't need, and so we corrected that on that basis. But I think that answer, is that answer. Yeah, it does. Thank you. And I guess, you know, Mr. Moderator, I'm kind of troubled by, as a recycled town meeting member, I'm kind of troubled by the amount of effort and time the body's spending on symbolic actions, and that's all I consider this to be. So I really'd ask town meeting to vote this down. It has no effect. You know, if we made a mistake in the past, we made it in the past, and history is history, let's move on. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. O'Reilly. Let's take Mr. Revilak next. Good evening, everyone. Do you have the time of? Good. Good evening, I am Steve Revilak. I am a town meeting member in precinct one, and I wholeheartedly support Mr. Shlickman's article. Now Arlington's decision to block the red line years ago was clearly the sentiments of the day, but as someone who's moved here since then, I honestly think, I think it was a mistake. We talked about the need, a study for new growth and the general lack of new growth in town. Had Arlington accepted the red line, commercial growth around mass transit is a thing. If you've gone through Union Square lately, Somerville is going to be doing pretty well in the new growth area for several years. That's an opportunity that we effectively discarded back then. And like Mr. Shlickman, I have had the experience where a number of occasions where I'd meet someone, they're not from Arlington, or I'd meet someone in Boston and I'd say, oh, I'm from Arlington. And their immediate reaction was, oh, you guys killed the red line. People still remember this. I don't think it is, although it may not be doing any harm to have this half century old legislation on the books, I don't think it's doing us any favors. And at least I would like to hope that at some point in the future, we could have mass rail transit in Arlington. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Revolak. Mr. Gibson, next. I'll just remind folks, if the point you're about to make has already been made, it's always okay to pass or to trim down your comments. It's not a knock against Mr. Revolak. I'm just saying that in general. So Mr. Gibson, go ahead. Chad Gibson, precinct four, have lots of thoughts on this, but I'm moving to terminate debate. Yeah, so that's unfortunate because your request is noted and denied. It was not properly formed because you made a comment before it. I did that once, exactly once. Mr. Jalcat? Daniel Jalcat, precinct six, I move to terminate debate. All right. All right, all the applause. Do we have a second? Okay. All right. All those in favor of terminating debate on article 19, say yes? All those opposed? Okay. It is terminated. Debate is terminated. Let's move to a vote on the main motion of article 19, which is to authorize the select board to file a home rule petition, a home rule legislation to repeal the act that prohibits the MBTA from locating a mass transit facility within a certain distance of Bronx Catholic High School, chapter 439 of the acts of 1976. Voting is open. Okay. Let's close voting. The motion carries 169 in the affirmative 41 in the negative one abstention. The main motion under article 19 passes. So that brings us to article 20. Mr. Helmuth, do you want to introduce this for us? Thank you, Mr. moderator. I come to chair of the select board. This is one of those moments where I'm glad that we have an able professional town manager with a lot of financial expertise who won't mess it up like I would if I try to explain this. I'm going to turn it over to Mr. Puller. Mr. Puller. Thank you. Sandy Puller, town manager. This is a piece of the acceptance of a state law relative to how we handle our OPEB funds. OPEB is the funds that we set aside to pay for health insurance for our retirees. I'm sorry, Mr. Puller, I'm just going to interrupt for a second. I'm sorry. Can I just confirm the speaker queue is open? We're good? Okay. Thank you. Go ahead, Mr. Puller. Sorry. Thank you. So we have this OPEB fund. Arlington has been sort of the head of the game in setting money aside for retiree health insurance for many years. And we set up our own system for handling that money by turning it over to the retirement board. Because of various changes in state law, we're now in the situation where we need to accept this state law to create an official OPEB trust board. The great advantage of that is it would allow the retirement board to then invest our OPEB money in the same state fund that where we invest our pension money. It gets a superior return. A lot of other communities put their money in there and it is relatively safe. Without adopting this state law, our retirement board is not allowed to invest in the state PREM funded as it's called. So this is sort of a technical thing to have us sort of keep doing what we're doing except doing it better. I will note that Ken Hughes from the retirement board is in the chamber and if you have questions, I know that he is available to answer the questions. As am I, I urge your support for this article. Thank you very much. All right. Thank you, Mr. Poehler. Let's take Mr. Jamison. Thank you, Mr. Moderator Gordon Jamison, precinct 12. As Mr. Poehler noted, we were very proactive on this at the past treasurer. Mr. Billifer provided legislation that we filed with the state. When it came time for us to enact that, I asked a question on the floor because the process of putting the money because the OPEB fund is iterated in that legislation, our current legislation required the fund to pay for the retirement costs. By the way, the OPEB is the other post-employment benefits basically. It's a healthcare pension fund for our retirees. And so there was no mechanism to pay the actual costs. And so on the Fincom budget every year, in the insurance budget, there's a line that says we have to be allowed the comptroller to transfer what funds is needed into the OPEB fund. Is that going to go away with the new legislation where we actually are going to appropriate into the OPEB fund or will the past process continue? Mr. Poehler, do you have an answer or we could bring up Mr. Hughes? Sandy Poehler, Town Manager. We will continue to make appropriations into the fund from the general fund. And we have been transferring $300,000 every year from the healthcare trust fund. Those transfers, there's a different article here today to actually move all that money from the healthcare trust fund. And in the future, we'll continue to appropriate general fund money into the OPEB fund. So that's for funding the OPEB fund, for paying the retirement cost, the problem, the reason on the Fincom budget and the detail in the appendix. So I understand that we appropriate money into the OPEB every year and there's a special addition to that of taking the rest of the trust fund and putting that into the OPEB fund, which is good. What I'm worrying about is the annual cost, the annual turnover of monies. We appropriate into the insurance budget. Currently at the bottom it says the comptroller can transfer what funds are needed into the OPEB budget because our legislation says we have to pay the retirement costs, healthcare costs out of the OPEB fund. Is that going to continue or does the new legislation change that so we can, we'll be appropriating into the OPEB fund to pay the retirement, the healthcare costs and retirees? That's an excellent question and I wish you would ask me that before. Can I see you in the back of the room? If you, if I may, Mr. Moderator, ask Mr. Hughes to come forward. Yes, Mr. Hughes, you can approach a podium. Just, and Mr. Hughes, you are a resident of Arlington. Is that correct? Yes, I am. 20 Webster Street, chairperson of the Arlington retirement board. Yep, you have the right to speak. Go ahead. Okay, basically. Can you speak into the microphone? Okay, basically nothing is going to change if we adopt this legislation. The reason it came to pass was that last year the retirement board was looking at different alternatives to see if we could increase the funding opportunities, investment opportunities. So when we went to prim, they said that our document plan was inefficient and, like it was said before, the reason we didn't have 32B section 20 is John Billiford wrote the, special legislation, we were leaders in the field, which everything else is based on. So we were before the curve and what we're asking now is that you reaffirm the board of trustees as the retirement board, the custodian as the town treasurer, and keep the same fund. Nothing else is going to change. We're just basically adopting this, but we can go out and get better returns. Okay. And just for the benefit of the meeting, prim is pension reserves, investment management. But I must caution, if we do not do anything on this article, everything remains the same. We can't do prim. If we take this article, there are three different boards of trustees that could be in place. One is the town custodian, which is the town treasurer. The second is the board of the retirement board. And the third is a committee that you'd have to set up between five and 13 members. Okay. And what we ask is that you affirm us the retirement board. I'm going to vote for it. I just have some questions for clarification. Can I get on? Yeah, yeah, sure. Yeah, Mr. James. It's very important. Okay, okay. But I have another question. Through you to him, I have another question. Okay. The current membership of the retirement board is consisted of members of what unions, and I assume it includes no teachers. That's my real question. No unions. No unions. But members represented by unions. No. Okay, retirees, retirees. Are there any teacher retirees eligible for positions on the retirement board? If they're elected as a fifth member, or if the town designates the person. Okay. So the reason I'm asking this question is, is my understanding of the retirement board, it does not represent the teachers. Yet the OPEP fund pays, I believe, pays the post-retirement insurance cost of the teachers. So while I'll be voting for this legislation, I think in the future we need to consider, if my supposition is correct, changing the board to that other type of board. Well, can I address that? Mr. Jameson, that's out of scope for future discussion. No, this sets the board, and I'm debating the board. Well, I could give him the answer if he'd like to hear it. No, I think we've heard enough. Thank you. I'm fine. So I've raised two questions. One, how the money flows on an annual basis, and two, who the proper representation should be for all the people covered by the OPEP. I hope those are addressed in the future. But I will be voting for this as it stands. Thank you. Thank you. I'll take Mr. Hamlin next. Guillermo Hamlin, PCC 14, a move to terminate all debate. Okay, we have motion to terminate debate. Do we have a second? We have a second. All those in favor of terminating debate say yes. All those opposed say no. Debate is terminated. Let's bring up a vote for the main motion of Article 20, which is to adopt a local option statute to allow the retirement board to invest OPEP funds with prim pension reserves investment management board through state retiree benefit trust fund. Voting is now open. If you're in favor of adopting that local option statute, vote yes. If you're opposed, vote no. Okay, voting is closed. Motion carries. It is unanimous. That brings up Article 21, Mr. Hamlin. Let's open up the speaker queue while Mr. Hamlin speaks. And can we show that so everyone can see the filling up? Go ahead, Mr. Hamlin. Thank you, Mr. Moderator. Eric Hamlin, Chair of the Select Board. So, Articles 21, 22, and 23, surprisingly educational. When I first joined Tom meeting to 12, 13 years ago, I wondered why does the redevelopment board have custody of these properties? And now we have an answer. That's outlined a little bit in the Select Board comment, but to comment, I believe on all three of these articles is our town manager. Mr. Poole. Thank you, Sandy Poole, our town manager. These three articles need to be voted on separately, but they each do essentially the same thing, which is transfer control over properties that are now under the redevelopment board to the town. The properties are 23 Maple Street, which is the White House that's on Maple Street. 20 Academy, which is previously known as the Central School Building. We now refer to as the Community Center and 611 Messages Avenue, which is the Jefferson Cutter House, which is the building right in town center where the Dowling Museum is. I would ask you to allow this transfer because the should not be having the Redevelopment Board Act as the landlord and entity maintaining buildings. We have a facilities department to do that. We set up a facilities department a number of years ago. It was an excellent idea. The facilities department actually plays a great role in supplementing some of the work that goes on in these buildings, and really it makes sense to have the facilities department run these buildings. The buildings now, the Central School is made up about 50% of town offices on the first and second floors. You have the Health and Human Services department, including the senior center, the Council on Aging Center, and then we rent out to non-profits on the upper floors. Because the Redevelopment Board doesn't raise enough from the rented collect from those non-profits, we've been having these town departments paying rent to the Redevelopment Board. So it's basically taking money out of one pocket and moving it to another and then having the Redevelopment Board do things like pay the electricity bills and so forth. The Redevelopment Board wasn't set up to pay rent and electricity and so forth. They were set up to redevelop things and that's what they should do. The facilities department should be the one that is actually running these departments. The one thing that the Redevelopment Board has done over the years is thinking about development. And in that regard, I have agreed to enter into a Memorandum of Understanding or Memorandum of Agreement with them about to whom we would rent out these properties in the futures. So for example, right now in 23 Maple, we have the Department of Public Works and the Inspection Department there until they can move into the new DPW building. Once that building is empty, we'll have to rent it out to somebody else or maybe use it for other time purposes. But in any of those cases, I would certainly converse with the Redevelopment Board about what those uses are. Fundamentally, however, this is all about making sure that things like the Redevelopment Board and the Planning Department are focused on their core missions and having the facilities department run these buildings, which is what they're there to do. I'd be happy to answer any questions. Thank you for your time. Great. Thank you, Mr. Puller. Can we just show the speaker cue? I'm going to take a speaker out of order again. Someone who I don't believe we've heard from yet, Mr. Howard. Mr. Howard? Pass. Mr. Blandy will take him out of order. Pass. Mr. Loretty. Thank you, Mr. Moderator. And I hope other people will decide to speak sometime. I rise in opposition to this article. And I want to explain why I used to serve on the Redevelopment Board. And frankly, these buildings are not something that the Board spends a whole lot of time on. In fact, they are run largely by town staff, and they could continue to be run by town staff, regardless of under whose jurisdiction they are. The reason they're under the, and as I understand it, the reason they're under the jurisdiction of the Redevelopment Board is the Redevelopment Board has the powers of a redevelopment authority under state law. And that gives them certain benefits in how they operate, sometimes set up redevelopment authorities just to deal with private property, in particular dispensing of land they've taken under tax title. It makes it a more efficient process when you're disposing a property or renting a property. The problem I have with this change relates particularly to the tenants and to the income that the town is receiving from these buildings. One of the benefits of having a written transcript of town meaning is if you go back and look at the debate in the discussion when these buildings were first turned over to the Development Board, and in particular the Central School, which is the largest building, the intent originally was the town to sell that building to a private developer. And in return the developer was going to devote a certain amount of space or give a certain amount of space to the town to use. They didn't get any takers and therefore it went to the Development Board to redevelop as an urban renewal project. I think that's probably expiring. But one of the plans was that a significant fraction of that building would be rented to commercial tenants. And the reason the town is not getting enough income to run the buildings is that's gone by the wayside. And I would suggest that has happened due to lack of transparency in the way the renting of the buildings has occurred. And that's really not to say anything about the Redevelopment Board. They frankly have been pressured into renting more to non-profits at very low rental rates so the town is not recovering the amount of money that was originally intended. When I was on the board the state rented a significant fraction of the building for a social service agency. No longer does that. And in part that was because the town is now renting to a non-profit. My feeling is that by keeping these buildings under the jurisdiction of the Redevelopment Board it'll be much clearer about who they're being rented to and what the rents are. Before this meeting I did a public records request to find out who all the tenants were, what the rents were and how much in order to calculate how much each one is paying per square foot. I couldn't get the information. When I was on the board that information was kept by the Assistant Planning Director. I still have the spreadsheets. Now everything's aggregated and you can't find out who's paying how much and how much they're paying per square foot. And I think that the problem isn't so much whether the what problem isn't that these boards under the jurisdiction of the of the Redevelopment Board is that the town is not running them in a sufficiently transparent way in order to ensure they are running efficiently and economically. So I'm gonna vote no on all three of these. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Loretta. Mr. Borden? Thank you, Mr. Monterey. John Borden, Precinct 8. I was there, I was here, so to speak, when those three buildings came in to the we're assigned to the care and custody of the Redevelopment Board. And I have a lot of disagreement with some of the things the Redevelopment Board has done, but I think one one thing they have done quite well, very well indeed, is the management of these three buildings. The Central School, which was which was the actually the second high school for Arlington, the the Krumah State, which is now called 23 Maple Street, which was moved from the corner sideways on Maple Street to make room for building the Central School back in 1890, I think 94, I think. And the Jefferson Cutter House, which originally was up towards Arlington Heights, now the site of the Myrak automobile dealership, and that was moved to something I discussed with Mr. Myrak, John Myrak, to put it in the the front part of the Russell Common parking garage. I don't want to say that, but the non parking the parking lot, actually the rail, well anyway. So I think they've done a good good job and I don't think we have any any problem with the fact that they've rented the Jefferson Cutter House to the the Cyrus Gallon Museum. It's a wonderful institution, a local artist who has international reputation. The 23 of Maple, some of those tenants were not so great if anybody lived in the neighborhood. They had a few issues with them, but I think they're getting that cleaned up now, I trust. And certainly the Central School, which is the senior center and the the the the the the the arts people upstairs and some town offices, I think that's a pretty good arrangement. And I'm also, I mean, the also thing, some people object to this, but the members redeveloping board are and must be by law, of course residents and registered voters in the town of Arlington. The town manager, who is now would be in charge of you pass this this law or this make this change. These these three changes are someone who could live anywhere, since we no longer require our town manager to live in town, which I think is a mistake. A mistake was made early early in this. Let's scope, scope on that. Let's keep it to this article please, thank you. Well, but the point is that these these three buildings are important historical structures in the town of Arlington and and I think it's it's it's important to have them under the jurisdiction of people who actually live in this town. Thank you. Thank you. Uh, uh, Mr. how much right? Thank you for your indulgence, Mr. Moderator. I have a chair that's going to point out that with full respect to town meetings per view here, it is your vote. The redevelopment board did vote to do this, so they they're very comfortable with with this transfer. Thank you. Thank you for so much. We'll take mixed pressure for it. Can we switch the video over to the conference room, please? I move to terminate debate on this article on all matters before it. We have a motion to terminate debate. Do we have a second? We have a second. Let's try a voice vote. All those in favor of terminating debate on article 21 say yes. All those opposed. It passes debate is terminated. So let's take up a vote on the main motion, which is to transfer 23 that we talked about three properties, but this is specifically article 21 to transfer 23 Maple Street from the Arlington redevelopment board to the town manager. Voting is now open. Okay, let's close voting. Motion carries 184 in the affirmative, 24 in the negative and one abstention. Let's take up article 22. These should be 22 and 23 should be very similar. Mr. how much do you want to take us 22? Thank you, Mr. Moderator. I come chair this like or this like board urges positive action by a photo by the way. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. how much? Let's see. I think we're resetting the speaker queue. Dr. Allison Ampe. I move to terminate debate on this article. Normally, normally I wouldn't allow that as the first speaker, but since we've covered basically these three in in aggregate, I'll allow that. So all those in favor of terminating debate on article 22. Second, all those in favor of terminating debate say yes. All those opposed. Okay, debate is terminated. Okay, so let's bring up a vote on article 22, which is voting is now open. So vote yes if you want to transfer 20 Academy Street known as the central school building from the Arlington redevelopment board to the town manager. If you're in favor of that transfer, vote yes. If you're opposed, vote no. Okay, let's close voting. Voting is closed. It passes 183 in the affirmative 25 in the negative zero extension. Let's take up article 23. Mr. Helmuth. Thank you, Mr. moderator Eric Helmuth, chair of the select board. Unsurprisingly, the select board also recommends a positive vote on this by a voter factor. Okay, let's open the speaker queue. Thank you, Mr. Helmuth. Is this the same? This is a new speaker queue? No. Okay, the queue is now open. Ms. Saunders, Mr. Landy. Charlie Belandi, precinct six, move to terminate debate and move the question. All those do we have a second? Okay, all those in favor of terminating debate on article 23, this is the just so you know, we're voting on a vote we're terminating debate on where all those in favor of terminating debate on transfer of 611 Mass Ave known as a Jefferson Cutter House from the ARB to the town manager. If you want to terminate debate, say yes. If you're opposed, say no. Okay, debate is terminated. Let's take up a vote on article 23, please. If we can keep this pace, we'll be out of here in no time. voting is now open on article 23. Okay, let's keep it quiet. Let's keep quiet. Okay, let's close voting. Motion passes. deja vu 186 the affirmative 21 in the negative. It is now 10 59 p.m. Oh, before before we take any motions to adjourn, remember to please return your handsets to the bins on the way out the plastic and please drop off your handsets. Is there any motion to adjourn? I'm sorry. Before I take that, thank you, Madam clerk. Are there any notices of reconsideration on any votes that were taken on motions that you were on the prevailing side that you want to reserve the right to reconsider at a later session? Are there any notices of reconsideration? Last chance. There are none. Do we have any motions to adjourn? We have a motion to adjourn a second. All those in favor say yes. All those opposed. See you Monday.