 All right, you're all set. Okay. I'm going to call the finance committee meeting to order on September 1, 2020. It is now to 35 PM. And this meeting is being held as a virtual meeting pursuant to Governor Baker's March 12 2020 order suspending certain provisions of the open meeting law. The general law chapter 30 a section 18 meeting of the finance committee is being conducted by a remote participation. And so I would need to first go through the participants in the meeting. Just need to close out what I do have anything on the screen. You have to tell me, did it come up as of the agenda? No, and it came up as I'm just seeing the seeing the directory. Let me take it down for the moment. I wanted to do that because actually I want to welcome start by doing two things at the same time I need to go through each member of the committee to ask them to confirm that they can hear me and be heard. But I want to also take the opportunity to welcome for the first time to the council finance committee. Everybody who's familiar to many of us because he's done so much for the council and for the town. And is now on the finance committee as a resident member and a former member of the old finance committee, Bernie Kubiak, Bernie, welcome to the committee. Well, thank you. I'm happy to have a chance to do this again. I think I'm going to I have behind me a large monitor to display all of the documents so I can see them. But if I if I appear to be like looking off into space, it's because I'm looking at that large monitor. We won't call any for EMTs or anything. You're fading out. So, now we know we can hear you and you could hear us. So I'm going to go through and introduce other members of the committee if you don't know them already and I'll start with actually our other resident members present Bob Hegner. Hi, I can hear you. Welcome, Bernie. Okay, and then we'll go through the members of the committee who are counselors. Myself, of course. Here. Kathy Shane. Here. Here. Here. So all members of the committee are present can hear and be heard. So, at this point, I guess it would be helpful for a moment, at least to put up the agenda I can do it too. If you're unable to that. In any event I wanted what I wanted to do was quickly preview the agenda as to how we're going to go through it and then take the agenda here we go. By the way, once again that accidentally on top shows good community resources committee, which I think is a cut and paste thing that's been happening but many event. This is the finance committee just everybody is sure. Referring to that section and referring to Governor Baker's order. So what we were going to do is just get a preliminary report on where we are with FY 20 FY 21 from Sonya and Sean. I think that we're going to spend much time on it because we will be getting a year and quarter budget report for FY 20. And I think that at that point we'll have a more complete discussion and Sean had already sent us to the council which has been forwarded to all members of the committee. So we'll start on FY 21 so that we know where we are against our budget projections from the report that he had given to us. We will learn, I want to turn into turn very quickly to the capital inventory. Discussion, which is a matter that was referred to us last night by the council and is matter that was. It was requested by the town manager in pursuant to provisions in the charter itself. So that'll be the second part of the discussion and we're going to, I think be joined by counselor. Councilor Darcy demand, who's a member of the ECAC, the energy committee committee, and she's going to talk about their goals and plans. And it is going to have budget implications and she may talk about that some today this is intended as an introduction to get us. We're aware of what is happening. From there, we'll talk a little bit about the process we've just gone through in the process ahead. We'll start setting the goals for the committee over the next months and start working towards a meeting schedule. And one of the topics that will come up in that is the agenda number five water and sewer rates. And what we might be interested in looking at. And I noticed that Gilford is present at the meeting and I appreciate that in Gilford if you wanted to take a break and come back in half an hour or 45 minutes. I don't think you'll miss your item. So I just wanted to let you know that Kathy. Sharon emailed that she can't find the zoom link. So if Athena could send it to her again, I don't think I can just share mine. I think it's individualized. And Darcy emailed that she's in the attendee world because she didn't get an invitation as panelists. So when we get to her, someone will have to bring her in. I'll bring her in when we get to ECAC. Okay. And I'll send a link to Sharon. Thank you. Thank you. So I any questions about the agenda. For any change, any requests to change the order on the agenda. Lynn has your hand up Andy. Yes. And she, when you're muted. Were you asking for recognition because we still can't hear you. Okay. So let me just go on from there and why don't we take down the agenda then for the moment. And so we can all see each other better. So, I'm going to stop the sharing for a moment and I'll turn it over to Sean and Sonya to see if you have anything that you want to just briefly report about it by 20 and by 21 we'd appreciate it. Yeah, so, as you mentioned earlier, Andy, there'll be a full report in the very near future. I'm just going to hit some of the highlights of FY 20. And I might add a few things and FY 20 and FY 21, but Sonya, do you want to start with the highlights? Or can you hear me? Yep. Okay. So our estimates that we did earlier in the year are pretty much on we're looking at a revenue deficit in the general fund of under 500,000. And we're having returned appropriations of about $2.4 million. And that's due to a lot of the regular operations that we do. We couldn't go forward with this year with COVID happening. And we also put a lot of expenses, all expenses that we could, we put on to COVID for the CARES account. And that helped us return quite a bit of money on the appropriation side. So for this year's budget, we're probably going to be returning about 1.7 million in total towards free cash. That doesn't mean you just add it to the free cash number from last year. And that's what it is. It's a large calculation. And we also had quite a bit of money that was transferred some into OPEB and some into the stabilization fund. So the free cash number will be different. On the enterprise funds. Those were pretty grim this year, but that's no surprise either. We're looking at probably a $650,000 deficit in the sewer department. They're probably about 450 in the water department. Transportation is going to look like it came out even however, what we did, we were like $250,000 deficit there, but they didn't have a fund balance that could, that could net that out again. So what we did is we reduced some of the indirect costs that went into the general fund. So basically the general fund took that loss. And on the landfill actually made $6,000. So now are all the ones you're doing end of the year at June, June 2020. Yes. We're doing June 2020. But those numbers. They're not quite set in stone yet. We're still balancing out stuff out so things could change, but I don't see them changing drastically. From there. Did I miss anything, Sean? No, I think that's there's any questions on FY 20. We'll take those before we move to FY 21. That's okay. Anything else is your hand was up. Yeah, I just, yeah, I didn't want to just shout out. I'll try to behave. So my question with the end of the year and the cash balances and this will come up next week with JCPC. One of the things we discussed is if the end of the year turned out to be more robust than we thought some might be appropriated for capital. My question is, if that's a possibility, when would we be in a position to make that decision just timing wise? I guess I don't understand what your question is about some of fiscal year 20s money being available for capital for spending that we had more at the end of the year so we created this capital reserve. That's fiscal year 21 has nothing to do with how 20 ends. That money, that reserve money for capital and fiscal year 21 is there, the 700. Right. So I'll try to rephrase it. So if we ended the year with a plus 1.7 that will be in free cash, if we wanted to, meaning the whole town, appropriate some of that out of free cash. So FY 21 capital, what would be the steps that would be need to be done and when could that kind of decision be made? I will first you would have to exhaust the 700,000 reserve that you have on capital and it just a matter of bringing it to the town council to go and finding it. I will update you at JCPC on, you know, the status of any request that we've gotten so far for that capital reserve. But at this point, we haven't exhausted those funds so we wouldn't anticipate needing to use any of the, any free cash at this point. I'll note this, you know, this past year, the council did approve a using free cash or maybe stabilization for some capital projects and so that will net out against any money we return. What was it three or 400,000 Sonya was approved. I agree. Rich, standard eight. Yep. So. Sharon. Just want to make sure that you can join that you can hear us and we can hear you. I can hear you. And. Sorry for being late. I'm sorry about the committee and you missed introduction. Somebody who you worked with on the old finance committee Bernie, who's now joined this finance committee and we're starting with a review of the FI 20 and that's basically where you came in is to sort of preliminary report. Okay. So we'll go back to Kathy. That answered my question. I think Bernie had either a follow up or a different question. Yeah. Just a point of information for me. Does our city status still mean that we have to wait for the department of revenue to certify free cash. Yes. And that certification probably wouldn't happen until September, October, right? October, probably. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. And that's what it would take for that to become available for appropriation. Right. I believe they extended our current certification for a while, but I'm not sure when that deadline ends. Do you know, Sean? No, I can't see. No. I think that's a good question. It's a, it's, it's an exhausting the reserve and then at some point at the end of 2020, if we've exhausted it would be when we could if we wanted to look at that. I mean, there may be other needs that come up. I'm just using that as an example. Okay. Dorothy, your hands up. Sonia. When you said that you returned 1.7 million towards free cash, and then you said transferred some money to OPEB was that the money you had planned to return to OPEB or was that additional money to OPEB. So before we were fully, before we were fully insured, we were part of the Medicare D program, which, which we were getting reimbursements from and that would, that would automatically fall to free cash and this job on revenue. So we would let it revert to free cash. And then once, once we had a chance, we used to do it in the fall town meetings actually would always go in appropriation from free cash into OPEB just to transfer it over. So it wasn't spent, it's just sitting there in another reserve. Right. So was the amount, it was what you expected is all I'm asking. Right. It was like 382,000 that we transferred and then we transferred 2.5 to stabilization, because prior financial policies remove anything over 5% of the operating budget into stabilization fund. And this year it was 2.5 because the health claims trust fund paid us back the 2 million. So that's why it was so high. So what, what, where are we with stabilization fund then what does that bring us up to. Give me a minute. And I'll let you know. So what we're going to be having to confront as a finance committee and counsel will have to be considering what we need in the way of money for the five major capital projects and what should come from there. Other capital that has been pushed back because we initially started a process for a 521 that severely diminished the amount of capital from what was originally planned. So the lot of capital has been put off, which was with the JCBC question is, and then our uncertainties about FY 21, our FY 22, rather as we start building the budget. So we have multiple pieces. Do you have an answer that question. Just short of 12 million 11 million 996,175 dollars is what's sitting in our stabilization fund. And that's with the 2.5. Yes. Okay. Okay. Otherwise, just move from free cash to stabilization so total reserves didn't change. Yep. I think you want to just add about the year that just started. Yeah, quickly, I'll just add that, you know, we did, I sent out the memo on state aid so if there's any follow up questions but we were looking positive on the state aid front currently. So before that memo was information on what Washington is doing and with respect to the federal stimulus of some sort, our current funds that we have from the government the cares act. Those can be used through the end of December. That we don't really have anything at that point. So there's two bills that Washington is discussing. It doesn't seem like they made a ton of progress and I believe they're adjourned right now until September 8 or so. You know, we're hoping that there's some sort of bill that comes out of Washington in the near future that either extends the cares act beyond December or gives us new money. Preferably for revenue losses because that's really where we took a big hit was on the revenue side. Also on the cares front, we've been shifting staff around as best we can to utilize them to help with COVID related things like managing. We've just pond and, you know, we move some parking enforcement officers around some staff and our office help support some of that stuff trails, doing social distancing communications at trails and things of that nature so we are trying to be flexible and utilize staff that the best way we can so we don't have to incur additional costs, and also those things can be covered by cares because they're specifically related to COVID. So that's a good question for f-way 20 for f-way 21 we're doing the same thing in terms of everything we can buy from cares we are all the PPE that has been purchased for the town or for the schools that's all come out of cares money. There have been some small capital improvements that have been needed that have also come out of cares. There are several criteria but one of the big ones that we just have to be mindful of is anything from cares has to be before December 30. Again after that point it's no longer eligible to be used from cares. And I think the big thing up point out in terms of the budget itself. We're really trying to keep close tabs on local receipts that's the area where we're, you know, we have the, maybe the most volatility for the f-way 21 budget and going forward. And I include in that sort of the enterprise funds and water consumption or consumption with UMass, you know, their operation, significantly lower this summer, and also then obviously the fall, I'm not coming back fully. I've seen reduced water consumption sewer consumption and as many of you know that's, you know, those are what drive the revenues for the enterprise funds so that's an area we're monitoring closely and working with Guilford on to keep, you know, be up to as up to date as possible if there's anything that we have to do there. And that's that's sort of it for f-way 21. There's any questions. Any hands up over the recognized in order Dorothy Pam. This is simple one I know that the town manager said that if needed staff would be used to fill out the workers of the polling stations. And my husband Bob made a little tour today and found went to everything except the north and the south. Everything in order very few voters at that time but you know all totally under control, which is good because it gives them a chance to see if there's anything they want to change for November. But my question is do you happen to know how many staff were in fact used in this enterprise today and tonight. Um, several is my understanding I don't have the exact number but we can talk to Paul and and find out how many. But I know there are quite a few that staff from I think else to see in the senior center. The other areas facilities that have really helped with the election initiative so but we can get that information for you. Okay. I gather that it was also pretty intensive as far as just getting the male ballots out and I don't know if they need ended up having to use extra help to the clerk's office. Yeah, there was a lot of a lot of you know there's people who are helping today on election day but there's been a lot in addition there's been a lot of people who have been helping stuff stuff the ballots and the envelopes to get them out to people and that sort of prep work to make it work well. So that's happened over the last week or two there's been a lot of a lot of extra hands on deck here in town hall. So it's been a nice team effort. Has it required any additional expenditure by paying overtime or anything like that. I don't know about overtime. Again we've been able to shift people around pretty well people have been able to be flexible and do work during their day. I know there have been people here on weekends. I'm not sure if they were salaried or hourly employees but we again we can look into that and find out how much because I went to early voting on a Sunday at Bangs and it was staff there. Can those expenses be covered with some of the carers money? I mean besides the PPE. Yeah I mean I've got a that's a good question it's been asked a couple times. One of the criteria is it has to be something that's sort of unbudgeted. So I've got to go back and do a little more digging about whether we already had budgets for that. I mean whether it's sort of specifically driven by COVID so it's maybe and we're going to you know sometimes there's things that are in that gray area we just have to ask the state whether or not they'll make it eligible. Yeah so at least from observation again just on early voting they had masks available if someone forgot the mask they had plastic screens up so aside from these were staff we would have paid anywhere there was apparatus there. It would have been different than what would have been normally there. They gave you your own plastic tape to seal the envelope because they didn't want you to lick it and they didn't want to touch it. So it was, here's a dispensary. No it was very thoughtful on you know how to keep it hands-free but that was not the typical way you got your ballot. Yeah so I actually want to stay on the CARES Act for a moment. I actually drove around and observed a couple polls and there was absolutely no activity going on. So I think our early voting efforts really have paid off. Going to the CARES Act. I mean I'm assuming that this is treated like a very large grant and my understanding is that our grant is somewhere around three million is that correct? Yeah so we got three and a half million for CARES approximately. The piece about CARES that makes it hard to tell you exactly where we're at is that for anything that is FEMA eligible CARES is only covering 25% and FEMA is covering 75% and the FEMA the process to get reimbursed by FEMA is much more robust and intense. And so there's some items right now that are sort of in between where we're going to submit for FEMA and if they're reimbursed by FEMA then we'll get you know that's great we'll get the money from FEMA and 25% from CARES. If they're not approved by FEMA then all of it would come from CARES. So that's sort of where we're at. We've spent a good amount on PPE and clean supplies and we've gotten reimbursed already from CARES for that and we're waiting reimbursement on the FEMA front. I was just going to say is there a deadline for FEMA? So there's not a deadline anytime soon in terms of submitting the request. FEMA does have an earlier deadline in terms of its eligibility period. I believe it's the end of this month is actually the incident period for FEMA unless they were talking about potentially pushing it back. The last time we submitted our representative from FEMA or our liaison, we could only submit for cost to FEMA through the end of this month. So we're going to do a couple requests to FEMA because it is such a robust process and it takes a while to get reimbursed that we wanted to get an application in. So we're about to push go on the application for all of our costs up through June 30 and then we'll have to submit another request for things between July 1 and the end of the incident period, which would be the end of this month right now. So, I mean, normally I don't think we take on the responsibility of monitoring grants, but, and I think that that's wise that we don't. But it, we have had questions asked by residents regarding what kind of expenses the CARES money can cover. We recently had a question about the ambassadors and can they cover the ambassador program. And then they've gotten into issues of recruitment and social justice, but more importantly, I think what people are most curious about is, are we able to spend the CARES money down, are we, and what is it actually able to cover. So, at some point, without us saying, you know, could you please show us the books on the CARES Act. I think it would be useful for us as a council, and as a finance committee to have some sense of what CARES Act money paid for. Yeah, and I can send you the state put out a municipal sort of like their guidelines of potential municipal uses so I can send you that. I can tell you for us, majority of it's been spent on PPME cleaning supplies, making modifications to buildings for distancing purposes, additional E&T support, you know, potentially ramping up if there's going to be additional needs there. It helped with some of the, some of the rental assistance related to COVID that was a expense that was approved by the state. If there was a COVID specific, you know, rental assistance need. So there's been quite a few things and yeah we can provide a summary at some point of sort of the general categories or you know whatever you guys need for that. In terms of spending it down, the last report I saw from the state is, you know, communities, they gave a lot of money to communities and I think at the time they were thinking that eventually the state or the federal government was going to allow those funds to be used for revenue replacement as an eligible which they haven't yet so right now can only be used for expenditures. So the last report I saw from the state was that, you know, most communities if not all of them only spent, you know, maybe 25 to 50% of their CARES Act funds so far. And I think that was intentional, but there, so there is quite a bit of money still across the state in terms of CARES Act funds that remains to be spent. So you're saying that the question that's out there is, for example, could we use it to cover up the revenue loss on our various enterprise funds. And yeah, and the answer is we can't currently. Right. That's that's one of the things that depending on what bill is approved in Washington. It might be that might change but currently we can't. Right. So in the CARES money is administered through the state, but it's federal money. It's federal. Yeah, it's been administered. Yeah. Just say, have we tested? Or do you already know if we're doing a virtual learning for our school systems and have expenses for computer's wireless Wi-Fi connections. Can that be billed to CARES Act if. Yeah. So the part of the confusing piece with CARES Act is I think there's like 50 separate buckets of CARES Act allocations. There's the money that came directly to towns. There's money that went through health departments, fire departments, a bunch of different areas and there's also money that went directly to schools. And so the schools have gotten some money directly from the CARES Act. They've used for some things like that. We've also supported some technology purchases as well. But yes, that type of purchase in terms of remote learning. It's not FEMA eligible because it's not responding specifically to a health emergency, but it is CARES Act eligible. So would you be able, this came up last night when we were talking with Paul about COVID. Has anyone tried if we said we have senior housing or where they're isolated because they can't go out anymore and they don't have wireless access. And this is an unusual time in the pandemic. Has anyone tested that kind of use for it? Would it be, you mean like some sort of Wi-Fi? I haven't heard that yet, but I can, I guess I can have Paul on it. You know, I know in some communities there's a push to, you know, particularly on the student front to I think provide sort of free Wi-Fi or some sort of internet service during this time for families that don't have it. I don't know if that's been discussed. I think a combination of where we've got a lot of seniors living together, you know, and we'll end and or affordable housing units, which may not have cable access, you know, there may be a cable line, but no. So I'm just looking for a, it's expensive. And if this a way of jump starting, wiring up AirMers in a way that we haven't been able to do because we haven't had the money to do it. I'll connect with Paul on that one and get more details. And the nice thing is that the care of the state has set up like a CARES Act request hotline throughout this whole thing. So there's a specific email address around eligibility. So if things come up, we can just reach out to them and find out if it's eligible or not. Yeah, because I'm sure it's this you have the same inclination. If we can get as much as three try to get it, you know, so, you know, but for things we genuinely want, but try to test the waters. So I had a completely unrelated question so I'll wait to see if anyone wants COVID this link. Okay, so when you talked about grants from the state are coming in level or state aid. What about the amount of money we get for roads that 840,000. Is that coming in and that was a question mark as of June whether we would get as much any and do we know when we would know. I think we Sonya, I don't know if you remember this I think we got that confirmation of the number. And I think it's in line with what we were budgeting. You know, there originally was hope that there was going to be a big increase in that number this year. I think that originally was what the state was hoping to do was to increase that allocation but after COVID happen I believe they kept it level so I'll double check that. And I can send that out to the group what our number was for the year. Okay, and that'd be great to have that for next week's JCPC meeting because it was a, how much will we have to spend on roads and sidewalks and that was clearly a big piece of it if with the question worker we're going to get it all. Yeah. The budget we adopted is to level funding. Yeah. Dorothy. Just to follow up on the internet idea. So, talking about doing whole buildings and certainly the easiest ones to justify would be and Whelan and what's the other house right next to it, the two to senior buildings downtown. Because you know when you when you dependent on a patchwork of when my mother was in a home was a very nice home. Okay. But they didn't have wireless for everybody. So it was just those people who other had felt it was necessary or had money for it, which meant that most people didn't have it, and it was expensive. But the question that I'm, I started to talk about this with Paul once. There's a question of staying within the system we have, and then somehow paying for buildings to get wired or and treated, or there's some other system or some other way to deal that maybe some people have been thinking about. So I want to know that Sean has any idea of what that could be. This Sean probably doesn't the other Sean might have more information on that Sean Hannon can probably, and we can talk to him later. He probably has a better thought on that. So the turn of to try and move us along to the next agenda item the second the course we're dealing with the INET installation now. And the question is as we install a new INET. What additional can we do with it. And I think that is a question for the other Sean because there's questions of what it is we're permitted to do with the agreements that are necessary in order to use the polls that belong to the current carriers to place our INET. And if we start using the INET for things other that they don't view as specific town purposes the current connectivity of town buildings, whether there will be that would add to the cost, whether they would start charging us for use of the polls, which I think that they're not using doing now. So it's really is a question that we would have to ask IT. Anything else on this because what I'd like to do. Athena, I think it's okay to actually be helpful to bring Darcy into the meeting for the next agenda item, because it has a piece that is connected. So Darcy, you with us. Andy, I just want to mention I seem to be having a great deal of difficulty with my computer and so I'm not sure I'm going to be able to bring up documents. Okay, then I will take over if I have to to. It's harder to do it on chairing because then I lose sight on who's got hands up as you know. Andy, if you want me to do it I can do it as well. One piece that I'm going to, that only live and I have because we didn't prepare it in advance. Darcy hello. I wanted to just acknowledge that Darcy is present for two different agenda items today. I asked her since he was going to be here anyway to talk about ECAC. If she wanted to be involved in our least present for the discussion we're going to have briefly about the capital inventory. Just as a reminder, and you've received Paul Bachlemann's memo to the town council that then was referred last night to us. And what he's asking for is that we as a council make a recommendation on the topic and that is what's been referred to the finance committee to do the thinking and development for the council. And what it has to do with is the section 5.7 a of the charter that includes the town manager and consultation. Let's see if I could to the right sentence. But it has to do with the inventory. So the town manager and concentration superintendent schools library director shall establish and update an inventory of significant capital assets of the town, including those assets under the jurisdiction of the school committee library trustees, such as buildings infrastructure for water sewer, stormwater as well as roads, vehicles movable equipment, and such other property is determined by the town council. The town council shall establish the requirements for the inventory, such as age condition, maintenance and repair history, remaining useful life and other features of the town council may deem appropriate. So that is the key section of the charter that we're Paul has asked for the council the council has asked us to assist in developing a response to what should be in the inventory. I've discussed this with Sonia and Sean. We recognize that the We don't have to do it all at once. It may not be able to do it all at once. The inventory that we do in this next year may not hit on all items, but we at least want to think broadly, as far as where we're going in the long run, but we definitely need to be mindful of what the staff is capable of providing to us. So that's, this is a very preliminary part of the discussion. I don't know if you had anything else you want to add before I give it to the process. Now I actually think of this is you've hit it that this may be a multi year process, so that we go for the large items and the large picture first and then work down. So what I'm going to try and do now. It's always a challenge to get this right is to do a share screen of see if I can get to the right piece on the screen that I want to share with you and Given some consideration to the question of what is process we might want to consider and how to go about doing this. So, you should now see on your screen. What I have developed and is an addition is an initial discussion item to help us think through what the steps would be that we would need to go through in order to implement. To actually do what has been asked of us to do. You make it larger Andy. I certainly can try. Lower. Is that better. Yeah, marginally. It's better. It's much better. Yeah. Okay. So I think that. You can see it all and if your faces are not in the way which it is on my screen. What we're, we'd be talking about is. They have the committee start the discussion in general terms to see what we want to include. And then as a second step, that we would ask other multi member bodies, which would include JCPC and ECAC about specific suggestions that they would have about information that should be considered for the inventory. And ECAC, I think has been giving a little bit of thought to the subject and when, if we, if we go ahead and ask them last for more, since Darcy was going to be present for the next, for another agenda item. I think that she might have some comments that you would offer to us as we got into that part of the, got into the discussion. And what would of course happen later is the finance committee would put together an initial list of the information that would be sought. Then we would ask the staff for their comments on feasibility of the time requirement in order to be able to process what is really a feasible request for this year. And what might be desirable, but to be placed into future year inventory requests, and then to use all of that information as a basis for. So, with that in mind, that is the suggestion that I thought would be worth starting with. So, because I'm the one who's sharing I cannot see now participant lists to see if there are any hands. So, Kathy, who has hands up and she is the first comment in any event so I'll let her start and then she can recognize other hands. Kathy. You know, I can see I've got three columns here yours. So I'm, I'm chair of JCPC and we meet next week on Wednesday. And I believe Sean is planning on at least giving us the preliminary look at the capital inventory next week on where they are. So I thought the way you've set this up makes a lot of sense to start a discussion today in finance, bring up preliminary, you know, just a simple bulleted list of what's already included and then have people start to add to it. So I started thinking about this a while ago and look at the list that was in the charter, you know, to think of what else we might want to have and just a few things that I had, and I don't know whether we want to generate a list today. So we take some notes, and then feed it back to the committee next time we meet so I don't know what your process is but I'll just give you the kinds of things that I thought of is make sure we have a dollar value. So we normally do it on vehicles so we have some evaluation. So we do it on vehicles to want to know how many miles it was driven in the last year so not just how many miles are on it. If we can start doing that so we can see heavily used less used, whether it's an electric vehicle slash or hybrid vehicle, one more of it. And then the other one that is, I think it's part of the capital inventory but when I thinking of buildings, to the extent we have buildings that we're not currently using that we own a column that would be comments on any plan for disposition of it or if there's nothing, it could say no plan for disposition so the ones I know, for example would be the old kitchen center that's sitting there empty, and his own so own this are public buildings just a list of the buildings one we are the East Grete school. So it's a different category of buildings that not being currently used. So those are the kinds of things I started thinking about that might not be in the same category that the charter list them in. They might be a separate, I think of spreadsheet pages or whatever. Since vehicles clearly are a very long list, but then when we get to buildings and equipment. So I'll just stop there but I didn't know what process you were thinking of like those are several ideas, I could be typing now if people throw out other ideas or we have everyone to send you a list, and you compile a list so whatever you had in mind, and then I'm signing off, because I'm sure others who have their hands up, have also been thinking about this. Okay why don't you go ahead because you have the participant list in front of you. I think Lynn's hand was up after mind and I have Lynn then Dorothy then Darcy. Do you know about raise hands on the. Yeah, I've literally been raising my hands but you were but you know what I'm looking at is as the blue hand comes up on the raise hand, which is on the either bottom left or bottom right. I can see the order so that's it. I don't see I don't see raised hands on my have to go to participants under participants yeah okay. Okay, so I'll do that. Okay, then Bernie, and it's just hard otherwise because I can't see a physical hand and figure who's came up first so Lynn Dorothy Darcy Bernie. Right. I want to just be straightforward doing an inventory is something we should not be reinventing the wheel on. Large institutions like the universities and any other institution that has to account for their inventory have ways in which they do this, and they have measures by which they do this. And I'm sure there are other towns as well. And so for us to sit here and say, well we should look at blah blah blah blah blah, and I'm trying not even to get into it. I think is not the best use of the full committee's time. I think there are ways in which we can look for models to do this there may even be software out there that already allows you to do this. I've certainly in my years with the university was regularly asked for any part of the inventory I had in my own personal possession, like a computer etc. I really wanted to discourage us from sitting here and essentially trying to create an inventory from scratch. Dorothy Dorothy. I think that's a good suggestion but I do think maybe some things might have changed. I thought of this inventory and I thought what an incredible device would be looking back over time to see how things have changed so that when you mentioned a vehicle, I think you should include the horsepower and miles per gallon when you enter a technological device. And of course the date of its purchased the size of the memory or whatever is the most some of those units, because, and then you should have energy cost in there. And we would see I hope a great change in a progression as we go through it. You could have and I'm sure that Lynn is right there's actually probably formulas on this, but estimated time of replacement which of course is, you know just guesswork, but there's some better guesswork than others. So, I just think it makes very important to have certain details of the technology and of the energy costs to be included in the inventory. Dorothy. Yeah, thank you for inviting me. I'm here kind of speaking on behalf of ECAC I had brief conversation with Andy, and at the last energy and climate action committee meeting. I brought up that that the town is going to be looking at the capital inventory and it sort of dovetails with the process that we're going through with our climate action planning and also with our, you know, like we're going to be regularly needing to do a greenhouse gas inventory, which will involve looking at all those different things. I believe it's every two years. So I did talk to Stephanie because of not wanting to reinvent the wheel and of course she already does some of this stuff through green communities requirements. And that I put a couple things in the I asked Andy to put a couple things in the packet that she had provided including that list of vehicles that she needed to gather because of green communities requirements. So, I did talk to ECAC about it and they are going to probably be suggesting a few additional criteria that we might use that would be things like, you know, lifetime energy usage or what year the plan is to transition whatever it is to off fossil fuels, if it's a vehicle or something like that. So we don't have it right now to give you, but I will be talking more to Stephanie about it and and I believe that I'm interested in knowing what your timeframe is here. And when you would need to hear from ECAC to get input from them. Okay. For calling on Bernie, just a couple of comments and things that we've heard. The plan raises a good point about what the purpose of the inventory is and need to be cognizant of not one go farther without at least without good cause that is currently provided an inventory. It is tied to the capital section of the financial part of the charter. So, I would suggest looking at the charter is in its entirety in that financial section. And where the inventory fits in, because I think that it really is tied very much to JCPC and to assist the capital planning process, it has to do with the capital plan, initially. But there is the question of, as you develop a capital plan, and what it is you want to put into the equipment list. It kind of gets back to some of the things that ECAC has been talking about, which is what the town can do to reduce its carbon footprint. If I don't have this right Darcy is going to come in and tell me that. In order is we talk about reducing the carbon footprint and that is something that JCPC is going to be encouraged to start to think about. Then you get into the question of what information that is needed in order to make that application. So, JCPC makes a recommendation to the town manager and then the town manager is ultimately the one who puts together the capital plan based upon the recommendation from the joint capital planning committee. So that's what the process is. And I think we're, we're this fits together and with that Bernie, you had asked you had something. I mean, the first task is to define what significant capital, significant capital asset is. I don't recall my head what you know what the definition JCPC is using and it may well have changed since I said on the committee, but that might be a place to start. I agree wholeheartedly that a capital inventory and a capital improvement program just is absolutely essential, but I would second lens point that there's probably ways to do this that other organizations have come up with that we could crib rather than create our own. And I'd be careful not to layer on too much, at least on the first pass because if you do that, it's going to become an onerous task, it's going to be an onerous task to begin with. But if you if you layer on too many requirements, how many watts does each PC the town owns draw, for example, you're going to you're going to really discourage people. And I think there are other ways to make that to bring in the energy conservation, the green communities piece. You know, one of the things that come to mind is you set a floor as to what you know, you know, minimum standards that a piece of equipment has to meet in terms of energy consumption, for example, rather than worrying initially about how what each one is. So that's that's a couple of points. The other thing is, speaking from experience, it would be real helpful if we have a structure to know if it's included on the town's insurance and what the insurance value is frequently gets overlooked. And I think that's an important piece of information. I will ask town I was in we started this process, and they were shocked, shocked, shocked to find that their insurance value or their buildings didn't come anywhere near close to recovering replacement value. So you want to, you want to take that into account as well but where you start is what what is what's significant. I'm sure Guilford, if he's still listening or he's going to jump in, can tell us about what software they use to manage the town's fleets and what information is already on hand in terms of of mileage and other factors that we'd all find important. Yeah, Kathy. I totally agree, Lynn. I didn't mean to start out with minutiae. And I also think, you know, what everyone is saying is the decide what significant and then ease of keeping it up to date. I want to have a lose all of Sean McNano as he every year tries to race to update this thing, you know, so to the extent we could automate that the information is in one database, and it just populates this so we've got it in insurance or I'm thinking with car inspections. My insurer knows how many miles I drove every year because every time I get the car inspected it's something that's getting reported so there's probably some ways that other towns have figured out how to capture things without making it labor intensive and time intensive. And that that would be because the charter says do this updated annually. So we're not in a like do it once in five years later come on and do it so we have to have something that we can maintain and that provides use to us. So what you're looking at and I'm about to take off the screen in a couple or take it off in a few minutes is really a process that involves multiple steps that we do need to assign dates to, because to get back to a question of Darcy and just step two is that the committee asks multi member bodies, if there's specific suggestions about information to include in the inventory. We have to agree that we're going to take that step and set a due date, but on the first step, we're discussing general terms what to include. We're starting that discussion a little bit now. But I think that what I'm hearing is is that it would be very helpful. Okay, but it possibly the next meeting or the meeting after tasks, Sean or Sonya to do a presentation of what the current inventory consists of and provide that information to us in whatever format, they think is most useful. We see what is currently done and we can move forward, building on that, because that's a system in place. John has his hand up and that's all part of who does John does so I think yeah I'm just letting you know that, you know he is hearing you. Yeah, his hand is up. Lynn was up before me I didn't know if Lynn wanted to go first. Oh, you know I, I think we need to start with what we have. And then we need to decide some additional parameters. Not be relevant in a town operation, but in a grant and contract operation for example, we always had to keep track of what did the federal federal government actually own. What was the federal share those kinds of things, but I think we really need to start with looking at our professional staff. What do they want to recommend to us in terms of what we have and how we move forward. I just had some thoughts on the timeline I think that was brought up. I think one way to think about this is that this inventory supports the capital improvement program, or that informs the capital improvement program each year. So, I would want it to be done before we really start digging into the capital improvement program so we can use this as a basis. So in terms of timing. I feel like the December, January would be a good time frame to have this inventory updated each year. Again, that would give us all the data in terms of vehicles how old they are their condition the buildings all that would be in place so that when we start from the capital improvement program together and early late winter early spring, it'll be together. If they kind of go hand in hand this inventory in that program so that would be my recommendation in terms of time and would be trying to whatever work the committee does try to have a recommendation that we can go forward with by, you know, late December, so we can get it together for January. So it seems that let me test this out that what we would want to do is get the report at the next meeting on what it is that's in the current inventory. What you would, what you do already now. And, but we go ahead and ask JCPC ECAC and any other committees that might be recommended which I'm going to come to his next topic, and then start to get to step two of the process of getting that request out. So what we want to do as quickly as possible is come into a conclusion about whether there are any high priority issues that would need to be considered for this next round, which Sean was just referring to to try and limit any additional requests above what is currently being done, because it's going to get late in the year and get into the middle of the budget process and to do major changes. Right now, as Sonia pointed out to me once before, is going to be difficult. Any comments on that. If not, then I think what I would suggest is that when we get to the next agenda items farther down on the list that we come back to this question so we get everything. So we as we develop our schedule. It is placed in its proper, proper location. And in the schedule so that we can get the work done this year, or trying to do out of today's meeting is, to some extent just develop our work plan for the next six months, as we get through the beginnings of the budget development process. That's all part of it. Anything else on that, because if not, I'm going to turn to the next agenda item, which is the ECAC question and what we had been trying to get to where my pieces. We. Was a present. 98. So it was presentation by ECAC on its goals and plans was what this was about. And the basic. What it is is that Dorothy had come to me some time ago and Stephanie Chikarala, and this goes back to pre COVID days, asking to make this presentation. And then we quit having in person meetings except for essential purposes. And we got into the current budget crisis so that we didn't get to it. And so really back to ECAC and what I'm thinking is, and with that I turn it over to Darcy. Thank you. I would just start by reminding everybody, I guess, not everyone is might be aware of the fact that the council that the ECAC was formed, you know, very soon after the council started in. And we, we were formed in May of 2019. Actually had our first meeting in May of 2019 and then we were able to come back to the council with proposed goals in November of 2019 and the council adopted. Pretty, pretty aggressive goals of 25% emissions reduction by 2025. 50% reduction by 2030 and carbon neutral by 2050 so. Of course, the job of the ECAC was to try to come up with some a plan for how we're going to do that. So one of the big focuses of the climate action planning that we're doing right now is to be able to come back to the council with a plan to get us to have a 25% emissions reduction by 2025 and also a number of different actions so that the town can be more resilient. So I'd like to kind of pull up the timeline if should I do that or. I can do it if you'd like, I think you said it was one of the documents that you sent to us. Actually, maybe I should do it because then I can manipulate it. If, if, can anybody, has anybody invited to do this. You have to go in the bottom and do a share screen. The bottom of the black. Sure. Your cursor over the bottom, and if it's there it'll show up. It's on mine. It's a little green button that says share screen right between participants and record. So you don't see it right now. You have to do share screen then you have to pick the screen you're sharing. Right. No, I thought I did that, but I guess I'll forget you. Okay. All right. Sorry. I think. If you let someone else share it, Darcy, you can cue them to how fast you want them to go. Okay, I think if you should, it should be on your screen now what you're discussing. Correct. All right. Okay. Thank you, Andy. So, um, Uh, this, uh, timeline started with, um, Um, one thing that needs to be explained is that we kind of have two parallel processes going on at one time. The ECAC and its charge is required to come back with a climate action plan to the council. Um, and at the same time we have our municipal vulnerability preparedness program. Um, has been the way that we've been able to fund, um, having consultants to help do the outreach and, um, help put the plan together. So we're working with Linnae and solutions. Uh, to do that. And that we got started with them. Um, Just at about the time that COVID hit. Uh, you know, we, we initially thought we were going to be able to get everything done by the end of the last fiscal year. Uh, but COVID really got in our way and also some of the timing of the funding deadlines did. So we are, we sort of got pushed into FY 21. And, um, so this whole timeline is pretty much in the next fiscal year. So, um, right now we're in the middle of doing our, our, um, Outreach, uh, and we created four task groups and the, some of this you heard when Stephanie and Laura came to the town council. Uh, but they didn't, they didn't take much time. It was at the end of a meeting and no one asked any questions. Um, but, uh, so we have four task groups going and we've invited people, stakeholders in the town to participate in one about electricity, which is focusing primarily on community choice segregation. One on buildings. Um, one on land use and zoning. And the fourth one is about transportation. And the last group is about waste communications and public health. So that's quite a, quite a mix in that last group. But those groups. Are going to be each coming up with. A set of, of action plans. And, um, you know, we've been looking at plans from other towns. And, uh, what they have been proposing. Um, is that they, um, they, um, they just finished their plan with a plan just recently is conquered. They have a comparable population and they are, um, they just finished their plan. They also did it through the MVP process. Um, and so there's, there's, um, we'll probably inform ours to some extent. Um, although it doesn't have as much of an element of. Um, Incorporating now. So, um, our, our task groups are including, uh, not just the local experts on the subject areas, but they also have included, um, they reached out to community members of color. Um, who are participating in each one of the task groups. Um, and they're actually pretty cutting edge as far as the way that we're going about it. But anyway, each one of these task groups is going to be coming up with a separate set of plans to go forward. Um, and as we go, if you, um, see in phase three, we're going to be doing in once the community meetings are over. We're going to be working on priority setting, uh, looking at the actions that, um, appear to be priority actions and figuring out trying to narrow them down to see, uh, which are the ones that make the most sense to be putting forward. Um, so that we're hoping to have happen in October and November, and to have it coincide with what's going to be the ECAC's annual report. The annual report is supposed to include, uh, a funding, um, aspect to it funding requests. So we're going to try to combine that this year with the initial piece of the climate action plan where we hope to have already gotten through the prioritizing part and to be able to come up with some kind of a, um, a draft budget request, uh, in, in November, December area somewhere around there. Um, and, uh, obviously this year we're going to be looking a lot at, I mean, we're going to be trying to put together, um, actions that can be, you know, that will be prioritized according to how fat, how soon they should be done. And this first group of trying to get things done before 2025 will, will be, um, you know, priority actions. One of them, you know, one of the big emissions reductions actions that were really optimistic about is the community choice aggregation. Obviously that is moving slowly, um, partly because it's, you know, the first step is to put together a joint powers agreement. And that we hope is going to be. It's being put together with some lawyers with the aggregation plan. It has to be submitted to the DPU. And right now the DPU is not moving any faster than six months, uh, uh, in their approvals of any of these applications. Some of them have some of the more innovative ones like ours is going to be, um, have taken as many as 18 months to get through the DPU. So, um, we're, we were looking at CCA as being a major emissions reducer, but we're, we're seeing that it may take a while to, to get it up and running. So, um, we also want to look at every possible, uh, you know, grant application possibility, um, for emissions reductions. And, um, and like I said, each one of the topic subject areas is going to be coming forward with, you know, actions in buildings, actions in zoning, actions in, um, in, um, uh, transportation, especially. So, um, then, uh, if, if you scroll down, Andy, um, the, the final, final, final plan is, uh, not going to be submitted. Um, the plan is that it's not going to be submitted until April. Um, so that it will coincide with. The budget process for, for, uh, the town. So, um, uh, I can also talk about our, our previous budget request. That we made, um, in February, um, if, uh, if, um, if, um, if, um, if people have questions about this, I could take them now. Kathy, uh, keep your eye on the hands up for, um, uh, Yeah, I see. Lynn has her hand up. Um, so. I. It. Knowing the budget process. Um, I want to make sure that. Um, your budget request is in long before April. Um, and, um, Sonia can give a much better sense of when they start building the budget. And it's going to be useful to know early on what categories, what departments, uh, and the kinds of requests you're going to be wanting to make. Uh, but to wait until, um, Uh, April. Um, Um, Um, So we're the, the intention is to, to have something in draft. Um, When we, when we submit our annual report in. Okay. Okay. Thanks for that clarification. And I guess I want to go back to Sean and. And, uh, Sonia and just say, is that sufficient time? I would, Sonia, I can't see you. So I don't know if you were going to add something. I was thinking the same thing as you, Lynn. I would like to add my last comment to this. And then I would like to add something here. I just want to add something here because then it could be part of the finance committee's budget guidelines. Um, or the budget guidelines of the council. That come out of the finance committee. If that information. You know, the finance committee had that information that would help them consider that when they issue those, um, those recommendations to the council. been suggesting to them. So maybe I'll take a moment on that and then I have get back to Kathy. It says if I may. So the traditional budget process that is built into the charter and into state statute, which we didn't follow this year because of the exceptional circumstances and you know it's a coming agenda item on today's agenda, but it basically gets down to the fact that if we assume that the governor's emergency order will be lifted before we get to the budget process, we have to adhere to state statute and state statute is tied to the charter. So going back to what that is make that an assumption. What we normally do is in roughly November, October, November that the finance director and town manager present projected revenue projections for the year ahead because the budget gets built on what resources are available. We as a finance committee go over the revenue projections, the revenue projections which are presented actually to the council as a whole as they were every year and they were last year twice as it turns out include suggestions about sort of the broad allocations which really are the major buckets of municipal schools and library at capitol and what's needed for debt service, sort of the very major pieces and all of that gets used by the finance committee in developing the guidelines and we put forward the guidelines with her with our suggestions as to what are the highest priorities in the FY 21 original guidelines in which you've seen many times because the council ultimately adopts the guidelines only recommended by the finance committee. The ECAC recommendation was bundled with that for other time and along the lines of saying to the town manager, we want you to think about these if additional funds become available and what costs would be required. So it's much less specific than I think that you're looking to include this year and but we try and get those guidelines done for December and January and that includes council action because by then Sean and Sonia and Paul are meeting with the department heads to try and actually structure the municipal portion of the budget which doesn't come back to the council until May 1st and then after May 1st we're into the races where we review the budget and can subtract but not add so if we want to include something in the budget or or want to ask the town manager to consider something for the budget we try and get those in the guidelines and you know that's the same process that is used in all cities across the state it's not unique to us so that's basically the overview Sean or Sonia if you would add no that was good only and I think there's also a budget forum right sometime in November or December is what the council started to do November okay we did it last year was done on the same night as the projections meeting okay so that we did the projections meeting and then we followed the forum the same evening yeah I really that I Darcy I think that it would be useful for me to also meet with Laura and the vice chair and you as well because in order for you to come forward to the council with something that they're going to buy into we're going to need a lot more sense of where the plan is going and so we need to start backtracking to even get to the point that by November or so the council is ready to buy into costs so and concepts that go into the guidelines so let's just put that aside that's not part of the finance committee but it's part of the overall approach of how you bring something like this up through the council and get the buy-in that needs to happen right okay okay and I just remember there are at least one other timeline and potentially to the other timeline is the capital projects and capital requests there is a vehicle as you know that's a resident capital request that can be submitted jcpc will start meeting probably February but Sean can tell us when the opening is for resident capital requests there's a an earlier submit your requests now but there are if they're specific that could come through a department you know so rather than be a resident request that they could come because it's coming from police or fire about a car you know or schools getting that in much earlier because those requests come up through the departments you know so we get we get a wish list of capital needs that's prior prioritized so you know thinking in terms of there's a different stream and it's going to depend on how much we have we we just slashed it um severely the for this current fiscal year so then the other one um is the community preservation act and I think right now there really aren't any categories that these kinds of initiatives fit naturally into unless it was an affordable housing project wanting to retool for energy purposes it might fit you know so trying to think of it's another part of money and they will start doing requests for proposals very soon they're going to open up for um allocations and my final thought this is more on the policy legislative front I'm not sure why um we couldn't start thinking of approaching a Mindy and Joe and other leaders in Boston level saying if we're talking about community preservation could sustainability be one of the categories because it's not one right now it's got housing public lands recreation and historic so it fits with the notion of preservation but I think it would take it's not like you get it tomorrow but I think there'd be a receptive ear and multiple ears at the legislative level that would open up that part of money to have another purpose over time that could be drawn on it's taxpayer money and it's something that we all benefit from so it fits naturally so those are just there's something different than the operating budget that's working on a different timeline with two two allocations to be thinking about and large and small they can be pretty small um awards or grant requests though the any change was really a long-term multi-year out question because it requires a substantial change in the existing legislation and one that is not going to be without enemies who are going to argue against changing that list of purposes yeah I don't think I didn't think that was easy and it may be that going just to an allocation for this purpose will be easier it's just it's money that in some years we probably spend it on things that there were would have been higher priority projects if we could have spent them on and they just didn't fit in the categories so it's it's I think of all of this is long-term thinking so I want to get back to the people whose hands are up yeah I'm not no longer sharing so I can see Tim. Yeah I think the suggestion of looking to add sustainability to the CPA is a great plan and one that may be an easier lift than we're all thinking given that the CPA is running into limits in terms of the larger communities in terms of what they could spend the money on so having a preservation component or a sustainability component would be I think welcome in a lot of places the other thing I was reminded that Mark Twain said that continuous improvement is preferable to delayed perfection and that we could have had a community choice aggregation plan in place by now and that that really sort of a garden variety of CCA that gets us green energy should be considered while we're waiting for that whole process of the joint powers agreement and creating another Cape Light goes forward because that will that will take a long time but a you know a sort of plain and all a community choice aggregation can happen in months relatively short relatively shortly. So Doris, your hand is up. Yeah I just wanted to I don't know whether we have time for me to to pull up the other document that was our budget request but the main thing that I wanted to talk about about that our request that we put in February of 2020 was to support the the last year's resident capital request for a solar study at the middle and high school and to study all the rooftops of all the municipal buildings for solar capacity and part rooftops and parking lots so at one point well I guess my question is and I asked Sean at some other meeting that I can't I can't remember when but whether the resident capital request that didn't get granted in the last fiscal year is that automatically carried over or and is there any possibility of the that money that you said that it's has been carried over from the reserves from last year into the FY 21 budget is there any possibility of that being something that could go forward because it's just a study that is you know a precursor to a bigger project but it would be just being you know it would be able to get it started and it isn't that expensive. Yeah so I think it can be carried over I don't think they necessarily have to resubmit you know if it takes till the next round because it wasn't I don't believe JCPC rejected it it was just sort of delayed and I sent an email to the requesters which you know essentially said I think it's it's too early for us to look at allocating any of those funds because we still don't know what the federal government's doing we don't really know our local receipt situation yet until we get the first quarter in the books we don't know what UMass is going to look like for the second semester so we're trying to hold a little bit on that until we have a better picture of this year. Do you know if there if there was a way to to raise money that wasn't municipal or state money to do a project like this like matching funds similar to you know the matching funds for the North Amherst library if there was a way to raise funds to do this study would would that be something that that the town would be interested in? I could talk it over with Paul I mean we do receive donations all the time for sort of specific purposes you know we can receive gifts and so yeah I think you know if there was a donation or if there's money raised it would be definitely something you know the town would want to consider. Yeah I mean basically it would mean that you would be interested in the larger project that was studied so. My reflection is the the region had it in their capital plan as well to begin with and then the the regional schools and then they had to pull it out when everything COVID sort of happened so same thing with them I don't think it necessarily was sort of rejected by them I think they just had to recalibrate once all the fallout happened. You just picked this up with Darcy and she's talking Paul because we probably need to move on to the next agenda item okay is there any other comments or anything else Darcy in conclusion I really appreciate that you gave us the overview. Thank you for inviting me and I'll probably talk to you more about the capital inventory issue since ECAC is probably going to give you some input about that. So I'll sign off. Okay thank you to our own committee I would encourage you to look at the other documents that Darcy sent to us in the calculation including the report that they did last year that had some information about their initial thoughts as of then about budget issues. I don't want to get into that now but I think that you should look at it for so that lays the groundwork for what we're talking about but what we need to get on to is the rest of the work plan and one other thing and I'm going to ask Kathy again to come back on this which is I'm skipping down for a moment to agenda item five which is water and sewer rates potential options to assess initial discussion because as you recall on May 1st a presentation was done that was arranged with the assistance of Guilford and Amy or Secchia the Department of Public Works so that we'd have a better understanding of the different ways the rates are structured and then one of the questions that I think Kathy asked as a matter of fact that the time was if we're going to look at block rates or other mechanisms what is the schedule that we need to be on in order to get the information developed for that purpose and I think that the answer was think about it in the fall and so Kathy let me turn it over to you. Okay Andy I don't know whether you had time I did two powerpoint charts but I can also just talk people through them if you don't want to share a screen I don't know whether you got a chance to look at them. I have not had a chance if you think that they would be helpful to you and you can share a screen I would say. Okay so let me see if Kathy can do this does that screen stop? Yes well yes it does. Okay let me just get back to zoom here so I can fix it. Okay I don't want everything to show right? Okay so I want to do it on a slideshow so there's only one. Okay so I looked at what had been sent to us and I tried to look at what kinds of variations we have to choose from and so right now Amherst has one single rate that doesn't vary except for agriculture on whether you're a small home or a major volume user such as UMass and it doesn't vary by how much water you use either. I mean it varies you spend more if you use more water but it's one water rate so the things that were laid out the options that were laid out to us going from sort of simple concepts to more complex is you could have a uniform rate divided by type of customer or type of user and so the in other towns it's residential versus commercial but they said you could do this by you know a small user versus a volume user with the examples being UMass colleges or so it would be thumb some threshold pays a higher rate per amount of water so that's one possible variation from what we now have. A second would be within whatever category whether it's the same for resident or high volume or not you can set up block tiers where the rate goes up if you use more water and this is an incentive to conserve and in the presentation we had we had several towns that were doing that so both for residential and for the higher volume and there were a lot of variations in there that were interesting in some cases they did it just for residential and they had one uniform rate for commercial and said they had a variable rate by use levels of these block rates and then another piece that was noted is that many jurisdictions do a fixed quarterly charge that doesn't vary with the amount you use and it's basically I think of it entrained as an economist I think of it as covering fixed costs so even if everyone stops using you still get some revenues and we were given examples and so the town of Hadley has this and so by a fixed quarterly rate if a big user uses less so our example this year would be UMass you're still getting a quarterly payment that's based on they were doing it based on the meter size bigger meters got charged more so these are the variations that we were told are out there and clearly you can do combinations you could say we want to do ascending block rates to encourage conservation and you could do it just for small residences just for high volume or you could do different tiers and we had in the slide chart higher tiers for the big users than for residential so it was an interesting set and then again with the fixed fee that we were given several towns that do this and what you could see is by the fixed fee going through to all users that it meant that the amount you paid for use of water went down you were covering part of your costs so I I just thought that out of the finance committee we might want to think of what a handful of options or five to ten that we would talk first to Guilford and Amy of course you know what else are they thinking about that we'd like to see analyzed so what difference would it make if we did if we did a b or c or combined a couple items um and I um if I go to my second chart um I started thinking about what variants I might want to see but this was just purely as a suggestion you know that start with what happens if we do a fixed quarterly charge what happens to our home on earth rates and other rates and that fixed quarterly charge seemed to vary by the um the meter size of the user so bigger users got a bigger fixed quarterly charge um and we have examples from both Hadley and Northampton then looking at this higher for volume and I'm sure Guilford has already been playing for a lot of these and I was thinking a couple variants for each of them and then the last two were suppose we did fixed quarterly with a sending block or we did fixed quarterly with a uniform rate that varied by size so I'm I'm I'll share this with everyone after the meeting this was purely for people to start thinking about what variants we might want to see and the only way I can think of um I'm I have never done modeling of water rates but I used to have to think of healthcare expansion options and we usually had some subcommittee getting to the smallest set we want to think about talk to people that say well have you considered this or that and then come back to committee saying what do we want to see and then have Guilford give us some answers that would purely be um what ifs what happens if we did this what happens if we did that so that was my beginning thinking having having seen how many towns are doing something different than what we're doing so we have all these real world examples where we can say do something similar and I guess it was also sparked by watching what a huge impact UMass shutting down had for us on as the volume of water use went down we had difficulty we had to increase the variable rate the the user rate for all residences because we weren't covering fixed costs you know the cost didn't go down very much so that is why I think many places have moved to a quarterly charge that is helping them do that so that there aren't these big swings it's a more stable revenue soon and I'll start stop there okay I see that Sharon's hands up and then I'll see if Guilford has any follow-up initial comments that he'd like to make but Sharon Kathy thank you for that I just have a I just want to be clear um when you talk about on the second slide so you can have the residential rate be like a tiered option and you can have the commercial or like the you know the university rate be a fixed quarterly option so you can combine those different things or does everybody if you've choose a fixed rate do you have to have a you know does everybody have to be under some kind of fixed rate okay so maybe I should you know I should make sure Guilford's not going to correct me the fixed quarterly charge doesn't cover use rate you always have a fixed charge so like you say I'm going to pay this much per quarter and then as I use it I'm going to pay this much for my use so it's always combined so it's not like you get just one use it's in and in the slide we had that gave an example of Hadley they had a $35 a quarter based on something and that meant that your actual rate per cubic feet of water use was lower because they were getting that other stream of money yeah I get that but is it can you can you do that fixed rate for one category and whatever but then for the other category of residential have a completely different way of assessing it or is it if you choose to do a fixed rate do you have to do it in all of the categories you have along with whatever else you're doing um I think I should turn this over to Guilford to do that so as I heard this it was like a user a user charge just for the the pack pack that you connected you know so it's like you're connected and then we're going to also charge you for how much you use we have a small user fee now in all of our bills so it doesn't go to complete zero so the your question is could you do it for just one category and not for the other um I have no idea all the towns that did this did it for both so Guilford should come on for all of these andy Guilford do you want to say anything at this point uh yeah I can definitely think anything but it doesn't fix charge on your server or it's just the reason like it doesn't need a charge in there need a charge Guilford your mic's a little funky is the is it funky for other people it's funky for me definitely yes definitely building oh hey now that is this another uh ploy to you know talk about the dpw building is that better better oh yeah can you call in and maybe I will come back again okay uh while he's dropping out uh when it was uh for a moment Bernie uh yeah I'm I'm very familiar with the uh the Hadley options because I was the administrator when we put that in place uh so we're going back sometime I would encourage people to go to the Hadley website and look at their explanation because it's somewhat more detailed than what's in the TNH report the slides the TNH slides that were we're seeing uh but um and Hadley's got a little bit more of a complicated uh the fixed charge the attachment fee uh varies by meter size and then there's tiers for water usage a residential tier an agricultural tier and a commercial tier the commercial tier was really aimed at looking at the malls and what they were what they were using it does it doesn't necessarily increase the water bill that a homeowner has there might be some increase but it doesn't actually do that because as Kathy correctly pointed out you're covering all of your fixed costs with that user fee attachment fee whatever you want to call it so I I think it's um um I'd endorse it because I helped such a I guess the difference okay I know I know Gilford is back now okay well you guys can keep going okay Lou I guess the difference is first of all we don't have enough commercial property property to talk about what we do have though is some very large rental units that and I think this is you know again where Gilford comes in and says you know either they are individually metered units or the water and sewer are part of um you know a rent charge or something but the thing that you're going to hear from the council when it gets to some of that is that those will be costs that will then be passed on to in many instances more lower income people and so there's resistance against that and yet those apartment complexes um many of you know are actually some of our other bigger water uses and so in many ways they almost substitute for not having commercial property per se and so I think as we look at this we have to look at the issue of how many units is considered to be part of a resident as well and then another piece that I want to just keep in mind and that is that there's all there's two complications one is at some point in time over the years UMass has periodically said something about you know drilling their own wells and becoming their own water supply and Gilford I'm sure you know a whole lot more about that but then there's also the problem of what happens if Hampshire college goes down and the whole issue of the water that goes through there so I just want to make sure people understand the various um nuances of how we're different if you will from Hadley and some of the other institutional issues since they are they are our biggest single water user one of the things you might want to do is go back and look at North Hampton when they set up their split water rates because North can you hear me better now yes okay um what North Hamptons did their split tiered rates they actually got a lot of pushback from the industrial side which you're going to get from your industry which we only have one industry so as you think about what are you what are you really trying to do here are you trying to reward people who conserve water are you trying to reward people who use a lot a lot of conserving are you trying to the real people who are the real residents are you trying to give them a break are you just trying to make sure there's the transient population you cover that cost them being transient are those really what you're trying to do that's really probably the first thing you need to think about before you start talking about how to split the rates up I mean we're being we're being pushed to have a per capita use in the water do we want to use that per capita use people who use in their household or at their residence whether it be a commercial residence or whether it be a single family home if they use the water within that per capita use they get a certain rate but if they abuse that and they're above that then they pay another rate those are kind of many of the things you really need to think about and what you truly are trying to reward and what you're trying to disincentivize by having a higher rate Sean and Kathy and Dorothy in that order Sean I would echo what Guilford said I would also just say keep in mind again these go these month the consumption drives the revenue which ultimately goes into the enterprise fund and a lot of the costs of the enterprise fund are fixed so you know depending on what model we use if it you know we have to just consider if it's increasing revenues decreasing revenues and and how that would impact the enterprise fund and we have seen and Sonia and Guilford I'm sure I've seen more than I have the consumption at the colleges has actually gone down quite a bit over the last five to 10 years we're seeing significant drops in consumption there so again if we're looking at you know what Guilford was saying in terms of what are we trying to achieve we are seeing reductions in consumption at the at the college level and of course the university put a lot of money into water conservation on campus putting in new piping new fixtures Kathy you have something else uh yeah I just um you know I totally agree with Guilford on what are we trying to achieve and I think um one of the things I was struck was and where Lynn said we're a different animal than Hadley in terms of that's why in my little simple chart I called it large users versus commercial and residential just on a I'm assuming if we wanted to set up a different tier we can do it by the cubic feet of water the whole entity used and it'd be some threshold so we wouldn't have to get narrowly by that's one of my questions we wouldn't say an apartment building with 10 is exempt but an apartment building 20 it could be just how much total water is used or we could exempt apartments so I think at least what I heard the consultants is we can set up categories and um and then the the when I think about if the advice we had was to do differential rates to encourage conservation you know so that if you use a lot more water you'll go to a higher tier so you can keep yourself on the lower tier um and if we do that then and we get lower use then we don't cover our fixed costs so that's what was attractive to me about if we started to go that we we should think about this quarterly charge where I think ours Guilford in one of the slides I think we were $10 now would be the minimum we would pay um I'd have to look at my own bill um you know we're very low users of water so we don't come close to that annual fee that you know we're not on the sewer system either so we're just we're just town water but but I think that that interaction between them and um so you don't know if you go to higher use rate if I water my lawn every day or take a thousand showers that I'll get hit with the higher rate versus I'm a low water user um if I cut back are we have a shortfall in our enterprise funds because of everybody's cutting back um and so how do we cover so I think they're interactive when we're thinking about what if anything do we want to do um and I did the modeling in that is really tricky because you have to kind of start with static assume all the water is being consumed and then do something about suppose the water consumption went down by three percent you know what happens so that's just been my thinking on what if anything do we want to do what categories do we set up who do we exempt from something um that it wasn't a jump right to oh let's take a look at this or that it was probably something designed for Amherst with a lot of thought Dorothy well taking residences as an example um keeping costs low and encouraging conservation is I believe more important in the long run than keeping enterprise funds uh where they have been because we have to convert conserved water increasingly so as we move into the future I mean everything I read says that so we don't want a sudden loss or mess up with the enterprise fund but I think I really do think a fixed fee and increased fees for usage or higher rates for higher usage in residences um because if that would encourage conservation and it would encourage people would in order to keep their costs low they would do it so that would deal with length of showers um it would do with watering lawns um and also in New York City they had a very successful program in stopping leaks they turned out to have been lots of leaks every place and if you don't have to pay for it or if it's just leaking into your backyard you don't go around getting it fixed necessarily so I I understand Kathy's position of not of wanting to keep the enterprise funds from going down but I think they will they're going to have to we have to use less water and we have to work I think the residences haven't really been the screws haven't been put on my husband is starting to talk to me about water conservation now um I know I have work to do in being a better use of water we're actually doing really well in water use and consumption we don't tend to use an awful lot there are the houses that and the larger institutions that irrigate those people are probably the people who use the most water but we are pretty good at keeping our water uses down we've been having a building boom in town I mean if you walk around there's new buildings just about everywhere um those buildings aren't using the same amount of water as the older buildings the same size so we we as a community are actually doing to the detriment of the water enterprise we're they're doing much better at conserving water and not not wasting it it's um it's quite interesting yeah just to reiterate when he had to put the system in place we had lost one of our wells so conservation we're in the process of building a water treatment plant so conservation was one of the goals the other goal was to make sure that there was enough revenue being raised to make to operate that that water treatment plant so um again folks are quite correct that how you how you set the rates are going to make or break this in a lot of ways I you know so choosing that looking at Northampton is another example the other thing is like I said Hadley's um operations are a little bit more complicated than what's displayed in the slides we got so I'd encourage people to go to their website and look for example if you have a house residential unit and you're irrigating your you have a sprinkler system for your lawn that requires a separate meter and that gets billed at a separate rate because the intention is to uh drive down where you is that is that in Hadley or is that in Amherst in Hadley I'm not sure I'm really not sure what we do with the second second meter you can also do you can also have the metering system you have can also do leak detection so that if you know water usage starts to creep up at your house the software will send you up a note or give you a phone call and say hey we've noticed a spike in your water use you tell it may be leaking the one thing uh the way you have to always remember is that we're running enterprise funds we're running our own businesses and so if we have a goal that we're trying to conserve a lot the question is can we also then cut out some of our water system and cut out expenses to match it because if you cut revenue and you don't cut expenses you got a problem it's it's a freestanding business would we ever be able to conserve enough to be able to shut down some part of our system and Guilford is willing to probably can best address that question we uh when I first got here in 2002 that was a big question you mass kept asking us and kept telling us well if we do this and conserve this much water you're just going to turn off this supply and you won't need that supply so you'll save all this money but the regulatory side which is another issue that comes in the water and sewer industry is you have to meet regulatory requirements so if you have it and it's permitted and it can be used it has to be it has a fixed cost for maintaining that in a in a ready to use situation if you want to take the chance to mothball it and put it into reserve that's another category to bring it out of reserve that's another cost you have to add in so as you as you look at what you have for sources and what will be required in the future and balancing those sources that's kind of the as you talk about rates that's kind of the other thing that goes into it I mean we're the regulatory people are asking us to take less surface water during the summer so there's more water in the streams for the aquatic life and the fishies that means you have to take more from the wells and you have to balance it out so you we're there's lots of things that will play into it that are regulatory and are those are costs that are also have to be looked at as well so there's fixed costs the pipe fixed cost of the plant and fixed costs of meeting regulations that make up that whole fixed cost and then there's how much water you use so I think that it's important to and this is the follow-up to that gilford is the anxiety that the council members have had who have thought about this is if we go forward and complete the process of building a new centennial water treatment plant we're making a long-term commitment to using that water and to the expense of building the new centennial plant and then what's that going to do to residential water rates with Dorothy's water bill are going to be just on based upon her current water usage will it how much will it go up and is that something that we feel comfortable with and but then if she goes into conservation because we've either structured it to encourage conservation or just the increased cost encourages conservation and then where does that put us economically and I think those were the anxieties that this committee was sort of grappling with which is why we're where we are in this conversation. I agree and we don't have all the answers and it's you have to just kind of one thing in the water side to realize is it's harder and harder to get a clean water source approved and permitted if you have them they're like gold so you should keep them as long as you can and keep them in use as long as you can because getting a new one we we decide we want to take something offline and totally mothball it we may never be ever allowed to bring it back by the regulatory process so you are you are it's a balancing act and you have to figure out how to do it and make sure you're okay which is getting into guessing our future uses so your hand is still up is that a new request? I just want to say my mantra water is the most precious thing and that a town without water is not a town and that I remember our discussions on centennial and I feel very very strongly that we should go forward because not to go forward could put us in a very bad place in the future that we can't even anticipate that's all so I think we need to probably at our next meeting try and pick up on this conversation because it's getting late tonight and try and decide whether we really want to go into an intensive analysis of order rates and what we want to look at but back to the initial question what would be goals of doing that I think we probably need to start with some clarity Kathy one suggestion Andy might be for the next meeting you know if there are a couple people who want to work on this interactively with Guilford with that what are our goals and what two or three things might we want to look at bring it back to the full committee to say are we interested in actually asking for this analysis before we ask staff to do a lot of work and I don't think we have to think of this goes in place next January we can think this might be one year from now two years from now it's the time horizon doesn't matter it's just the getting some information on what might happen if we did the following with these goals in mind so it might be good to I threw this together just to stimulate people's thinking and then Bernie jumped in saying I've done this in at least one other town and Guilford knows a lot about so I don't know whether we might want to next time say do we want to go as far as saying a couple people a subcommittee sit down with Guilford come back with and it might be another person from the council and not just from finance come back with here are three things or four ways we might want to look at this or do we want to just stop because it's too much to bite off right now I want to encourage that weighing of is this the time to do this I don't think we want to do that today but I really think that needs to be the question one of this key questions on our time is is this the time to do this right and or are there other areas where we need additional assistance that would take up the same people in the same energy and I I just want to say that you know we just saw the whole trade-off where the council said go with the master plan and then last night we voted and said stop so I don't want to be in a situation like that again yeah I I totally agree Lynn and I don't think using any staff resources if we don't want to get into this now and certainly if this isn't the right time to do it do you want to say over the next two years we should look at it or do we just want to say leave are simple to understand system in place because we've got bigger issues that pull the same people I think it's a very good question yeah the easiest approach to take right now is to just say that for the FY 22 water rates which we would establish in June of next year to take effect on July 1st which is next round of water rate structuring that we don't make any changes and but that we continue this discussion so that we just build in a lot of time to think it through for the year after totally agree said a recommendation that we want to just report back to the council that this is what we've concluded and if there are any council comments then we can get a time we present our next committee report and one question Centennial we voted on that that is going forward we don't have to make any decisions on that now is that correct we took step one Wilfred can tell us on timing step one was we're going forward with the design of the new facility and we had the request in there that they look at one aspect of it but that process is underway and then they would come back to us when it's time to actually issue bonds for construction and that's when the big decision is okay thank you you've already issued us permission for bonding already so there's we'd only would have to come back if we have a project which is more than what was authorized in that bonding which is 11 11 million yeah that was one of the orders for that was part of the budget process provided me and I think the council may want to take a look at the connection fee piece maybe implement something along that line and hold off on the rate because rate the setting the rates is a complicated task and it's something you're likely to have to bring in a consultant to do I don't have any doubt about the capabilities of Emra staff but it's a complicated matter and there's all kinds of software that you can use to do this stuff so you know it's with the new water treatment plan coming online you may want to be gradually slowly building up a revenue source not so much that you're going to really pinch people but do doing that in a in a more gentle way to help pay the cost of that plan wait are you suggesting that we look at a connection fee as a possibility for as early as FY 22 that I mean that could be but I think that's going to depend on this what what sense of urgency there is around funding for the for the water system and again I you know a small increase in the in the connections they wouldn't would not have I don't think it would have the impact that jumping the rates that Andy we should make sure Bernie gets the chart that we had in May June that shows where our water rates are going as the new plant comes online you know we had we added out five or six years Bernie it's a 50% increase in the rate yeah jump up but the but the projection given purely uncovering costs so but that would be a good thing for you to have it's it was part of one of our packets yeah that's information that I don't have thank you so we'll get that so I don't think that we have anything else so we need to deal with on the water question right now I'll get that to Bernie and I think that we come to the conclusion unless somebody wants to actually make an emotion but I think I can report it as a sense of the committee yeah I thought you worded it well Andy I typed it more or less but yes but we'll just report that if there's no objection Lynn had her hand raised it's actually for the next item okay um yeah I want to try and go through where we are and get on to the last items because what we wanted to do actually was looking at the process ahead which was I labeled was review of the FY21 budget process but I think we all know what it's about I think I had described it earlier in this meeting is when we were talking to Darcy about the FY22 process so it's then a question of what other finance committee goals do we have for the year that would plug into our timeline that we work forward to in the process Lynn the major capital projects yep that's the obvious one and Bob you can really tell me stuff yeah I think we ought to build into our schedule a review process of where we are in the FY21 budget given all the uncertainties which is maybe more than what we would normally do just because I you know we might have to do some things and you know mainstream so um Sean or Sonny might speak to that because I think that what we were afraid of originally was that there would be a large problem that might come along because the state would fund less than we anticipated which did not happen and as far as monitoring revenue and expenses to say go through is an ongoing process to report it quarterly as it is yeah I mean similar to you know like with state aid you know as things happen and we become aware of them you know we can report that at these meetings or give an update you know briefly at these meetings as thing you know like example the enterprise funds and and you know tracking water consumption sewer consumption how that impacts the revenues we can give those updates at these meetings if that would help you know just keep people in the loop on that stuff Sean I just also want to bring up that we we do quarterly reports yeah mostly in the first and second quarters whatever revenue is doing and stuff so we're right on top of that and get that to the committee in the quarters so anything else because I think I appreciate Bob's suggestion I think that it's built into our process so Sean oh just it was another goal I know we talked about this and we may have to figure out what the right order of events is but I am looking at our financial policies that are on the that the town has and trying to update those I think the last time they were updated it was maybe eight years ago or five five years ago and some of them just need to be updated because we changed our formal government and some of them I think we just want to update because times have changed a little bit and so that's something I'm working on that I would want to get maybe feedback from the finance committee on. You just talked with Paul about the process that he envisioned. Yeah I mean the last I knew we were thinking that ultimately it's a Paul it's sort of a management decision about the policies themselves and that we would get feedback from the finance committee on those but I think we still have to double check that and now that we're under the new form of government because I think in the past the select board was the one that adopted the financial policies. No actually that's not true. The finance committee? The finance committee did and they were adopted by the finance committee which was a committee of the legislative body. Okay so we can so we'll find out the answer to that and see if it's the councilor or Paul but either way that's something the project we're working on that we would want finance committees and put on. Yeah I think that I was hoping that Lynn and Paul would have that discussion include me to the extent if they thought it was appropriate because I was on the finance committee that adopted the current policies from the beginning. And many of them are still very good. We're not reinventing the wheel when it comes to policy. Some of it's just updated them for the new form of government. That's because we used the finance director who's then John Misanti and he did most of the writing for us. Let me set up a meeting that Sean and Sonia and Paul and you know would do that. Okay so anything else? So what I was thinking is that we had been trying to meet on the day after each council meeting but for various reasons probably do not need to meet and should not meet on September 15th which is the day after the next council meeting. But I was wondering if people could let me know if September 22nd is an acceptable date and the second piece to that is whether you want to look at changing our practice of meeting on generally on Tuesdays following council meetings. You want to answer us now Andy or just we should all email you. Why don't you email me on those two questions and I'll try and do a follow-up on just to remind you so that the two questions are do you still want to generally say that we're reserving the Tuesdays after council meetings at this time in the afternoon and that we meet if we need to and the second is skipping the next council meeting would you be available for the date that follows two council meetings at September 22nd. Okay the only question I would have then is the council then meets on the 28th so if we meet on the 20th we don't that's gone at an end. That's the second that's the break fast of Yom Kippur. Okay so that's gone okay so I just need to fix my calendar. Right I'll be getting an email out to you with the two dates we have definitely secured in September are the 14th and the 21st. Okay the only thing that we are trying to look at is whether or not we're going to schedule a public forum and maybe a joint maybe at the same time a hearing on the master plan but we haven't made that decision yet. Okay I have a question so instead of the Tuesday following the town council could it be the next Tuesday so one week you have council the next week you have finance or just to kind of spread it out. Yes let me just tell you why we ended up there and then but make that part of your comments that you offer when you respond the reason that we had done it that way is people who are planning travels that they are like taking a trip most of the council members are present in town for council meetings we hopefully will not be meeting by zoom for the rest of our lives though it's beginning to feel like we probably will in that way we were getting we were catching people while they were in town but actually because of zoom which could be lasting for another year for all we know it might be something to consider it's actually a good point you raise the only advantage excuse me I had my hand raised yeah I really would like to see it on the an opposite day from the town council meeting particularly when we have the kind of meetings that we had last night which seemed to be a leitmotif of this group so I I know I would be have been in a better place at this meeting today if I hadn't been up as late and slept as little and I think consistent and that's not going to change so I think we need to be more honest and with zoom you can be anywhere yeah and we're not going anywhere okay um I don't disagree with you pat the only issue has been that that we have more time if we have to write a report between meetings if we meet the day after but as long as we can be efficient in whatever right there's no reason not to do it on alternate weeks yeah that's a good point we who write the reports do benefit from that extra week when we got placed in a position in that last finance committee report of turning it out so quickly if was uh murder but we survived barely so anything else that people believe we have no public so we do not need to do public comment we can look at part Kathy I just had one question on you know scheduling future things Sean at one point you said you were looking at uh parking fees and rates or fee permit fees and things um I don't know whether that not on the policy wise side but on the finance side of it if there would be a point where you would want to come and give a preview of what you're thinking of changing um or the ways you're thinking of changing or whether you want any thoughts from people so it's it's I don't know what that schedule is like you just mentioned that I think sometime in the late spring that that was one of the things you were going to focus on yeah yeah we're actually gathering all the data right now um we're kind of compiling a couple of comparison districts or comparison municipalities um so yeah I can you know I can talk to Andy about maybe where that makes sense to fit into the finance committee schedule for the year thank you I assume that it's also a TSO committee question and we don't want to get caught into two committees going in opposite directions but we do have to worry about the effect of any proposed change on the enterprise fund I'm worried about that enterprise fund anyway and I'm hoping that you guys keep us up to date on what's going on because of the bus service and whether our revenue projections from what we're going to be receiving from the five colleges and the university will change um as a result of reduced ridership and whether the if the bus service is the same and the ridership is in contribution from them goes down those kinds of issues we need to understand because of the effect of the enterprise fund so anything else seeing nothing uh then I'm going to say that the committee is adjourned and I appreciate it it's been a long meeting but I think a productive one god did you have anything else lead okay so good bye thank you well thank you and uh we're adjourned in three minutes after five