 We're recording, you can get started when you're ready. Okay. It's February 28th, three o'clock, and therefore I'm going to call the finance committee meeting quarter that is scheduled for today. And welcome everybody. And start with the usual reminder that pursuant to chapter 20 of the acts of 2021 has extended this meeting. It's been conducted by remote means members of the public wish to access the meeting. We do so by zoom by telephone. No in person attendance of members of the public permitted, but every effort is being made to ensure that public can adequately access the proceedings in real time. Where technological means. And I want to remind everybody that the meeting is being recorded. And with that, we have a quorum. Of the committee present. I think that the other two members. One Bernie, I think said that he would not be able to be here at all. And Matt sent us an email saying that he was. Disrupted in his travel plans and was only getting on the plane for about. An hour ago or less. If there is wifi on the plane. He would try and actually join us. But we can't count on that. So with that, I want to go to the rest of the committee and make sure that they can hear. And can we confirm back to us. We've heard them so. I'm present. Lynn. Present. Kathy. I'm here. Alicia. Here. Okay. So. The group present does constitute a quorum. And we have an important agenda and with the uncertainty about. Other two members. And I. Likely have the. Sure. To be able to join us. I think that we should. Get the meeting going. There were three major, there were three substantive agenda items in addition to the very important public comment. For today's meeting. One of the ones that was on the agenda was written with words on the agenda. And the other two items were on the agenda. They were sewer regulations because we had no idea. With the council would do that tonight. But I don't think that there's any purpose in. Having that on the agenda and the other two items are particularly important. So. What I would propose to do if it's agreeable to the rest of the committee and let me know if you have. Reservations about that is to. As Sean to. Give us the update he was going to provide. On the FY 24 budget projections. Which I. May supplement a little bit because there was a. Mass mutual association fiscal policy committee meeting this morning. And then. Go from. Go from there to public comment. And spend the entire rest of the time. Which I assume hope is most of the virtually all of the meeting. On the elementary school building project that authorization. Issue. So. Seeing nobody who's raising their hands and objecting. Let me. I'm going to turn it over to Sean about the update. Thanks, Andy. So most of the updates going to be. Looking at the governor's budget that came out. Earlier this week with the local aid accounts and how that. I'm sorry, not the governor's budget. The governor's released some of the local aid numbers from her budget proposal early. So that we could start moving forward with our planning. So I wanted to review those with the finance committee and. I can highlight areas that will impact us specifically. And then if there's any questions, there'll be time for that. So. Let me know, is this large enough to see. Okay. So this is an online. Application that the state puts out it's where they post their cherry sheets. And they've posted their preliminary cherry sheet. That's what they've called it historically. And so what you see here. Is are the revenues. Local aid coming into the town. With what the number for FY 23 was. And then what is being proposed for FY 24. And so this is a look at the entire state. So that's why it's very large numbers. But one of the things I wanted to highlight. Is that there's some. Local aid accounts that are getting large increases at the state level. But that's not trickling down to us as a large increase. And you'll point out where that is. So the big one is chapter 70. You'll see there's about a 10% increase from FY 23. To the governor's proposal. Five point. One seven. Billion up to five point eight. So that's why it's very large numbers. But one of the things I wanted to highlight. Is that there's a big increase from FY 23. To the governor's proposal. To the governor's proposal. Billion up to five point seven billion. So that's a big increase. And essentially is fully funding. Some of the promises that have been made in the past around. Funding. For education and across the state. Charter to tuition reimbursement is going down a little bit. I think Andy, you know, I'm talking with you a little bit. It sounded like that was related to lower charter school reimbursement levels. And then the last one I'll point out here. Is unrestricted general government aid or aga. This is the money that comes into Amherst. That can be used for any allowable government governmental expenditure. That is only getting a 2% increase. At the overall level. So from here, you can drill down into any community, but we'll go to Amherst. And then we'll go to Amherst. And then we'll go to Amherst. Amherst specific situation and they. And the different formulas for allocating state aid. And then they produce a Amherst specific version of what we just looked at. So for Amherst chapter 70, remember there was a 10% increase globally to the chapter 70 pot of money. For Amherst, we're only getting about a half percent increase. And that's based on what we think is $30 per. And that's because the chapter 70 formula. It factors in wealth and ability to pay and student demographics and so on. And so. It. It. Allocates more resources to less wealthier districts. Based on the metrics that the state has built into the formula. So while there's a lot of new money going into chapter 70, there's not a lot of new money going into our specific school district. And I would say roughly two thirds of the school districts in the state are sort of in the same bucket as us. Where you get minimum, where we're getting minimum aid. Increases. Charter to tuition reimbursement staying pretty much flat. Unrestricted general government aid. We are getting about a 2% increase. So that's keeping pace with the. The. Global allocation. And we're getting a decent size increase in state owned land. Again, we think the state owned land methodology. Has some flaws to it. Based on how much we get versus some other communities in the state that have state owned land. But in terms of a year to year increase, it's a pretty significant increase. From what we got in FY 23. So all these numbers. At some point, I think that the next meeting of the meeting after we'll likely fold this into our projection that revenue and expenditure projection you all have seen. And bring it back to you. And at that point, we'll be able to confirm is 2.5%. What we can do for operating budgets. Can we do more? Do we still have a deficit that we have to close and anything else that's changed will fold into that projection. Kathy, I'm going to go over one more chair sheet, but do you want to ask while we're on this screen? Absolutely. Just keep going. The only other one I wanted to go over is the regional schools. They have their own cherry sheet because, you know, we do are connected to regional schools through the Amherst Pellum regional school district. So regional schools. Again, this is the global look. There was a pretty decent size increase in regional school transportation. A large decrease in charter tuition reimbursement. And I think that's something that we'll have to pick apart more. That's a 30% reduction in the funds allocated to it. So I don't know if that's fewer students at the charter school level. Again, this is global, not just Amherst. But that one looks a little funny. But if we go to our specific school district Amherst Pellum. So what you'll see is again, chapter 70, they're getting a very modest increase about $30 per pupil. Their charter tuition reimbursements dropping significantly. And again, I don't know if that's a factor of something being off on that first, that first page, the global number for charter tuition reimbursement. Or if there's something real there. So I think we're going to have to dig into that number to find out if that's just maybe a mistake. And then regional transportation is getting a pretty big increase, which is nice. I think I read somewhere around 90% reimbursement for regional transportation costs. So that would be a big boost for the regional schools. The other thing that's not shown here is that their, the governor's proposal included a significant increase in vocational transportation reimbursement, something we do have quite a bit of because of Smith vocational and Franklin tech. So if we're able to get a really anything in reimbursement for vocational schools, that'll be a big increase for the regional regional school budget as well. So I think the one takeaway I'd say from this is we have to look at this charter tuition reimbursement number and just see what's going on because that's a large drop. And the global number doesn't really make sense that it would drop by about $3 million from one year to the next. And so then Kathy, I think now's a good time for questions. You know, trying to absorb as you said, you have no idea what's going on on the charter lines. So that's a biggie and we do have. I think the council has a meeting coming up with our. Legislative representatives. So I don't know how much they went into the charter and fix the formula at all. So it's just a question for, since she said you don't know what. So, but I, when I looked at public libraries and schools, if. What the governor's budget has done is bringing more money into certain areas of our own budget. Would we, and this is probably premature, would we. Put all of that money into those budgets. And that might produce not a two and a half, two and a half, two and a half across each of the budgets in terms of an increase because of this, the state money that's coming in. So it's a question. And I know that since these numbers are literally just out, it's, it's a difficult one to answer. Yeah. I think that is your question because we're getting some additional state aid. Will that result in a bigger increase for operating budgets. Yeah, yeah. You, you said exactly what I was trying to ask. And you said it clearly. Yes. So I think, yeah, I think that's what either at the next meeting or the meeting after. We're going to take those numbers and we're going to bring it back in that format that you're used to seeing where there's one page on revenues, one page on expenses. And we're going to update with our most sort of a final pension numbers and any other numbers that have moved a little bit. The flip side of those revenues is there are some assessments as well that we pay for PBTA and charter school tuition. And so we'll put all the final governor numbers into that projection worksheet. And then we'll be able to see if there's room to increase operating budgets to a higher percentage. And then my second question that's related to that, you know, say that the answer is yes, you know, on net we think we're getting more revenues, but the revenues are particularly in the school area. Would that mean the schools might get. 2.8% you know, in other words, we've gone in with two and a half, two and a half for each. So you'll be coming back with that in terms of what it all looks like. Yeah, I think so again, our way we have budgeted is sort of a. And unless something is restricted for particular type of use, we, the revenues that come to the town, you look at them collectively and then we allocate a sort of balance percentage to all of our operating budgets. I think it's safe to say, well, maybe I won't say it, but the numbers look that first glance, it doesn't look like there's going to be a lot of money coming in for schools based on the getting the minimum per pupil aid. So I don't know if that would actually benefit them, but regardless, our approach has always been to take a balanced approach and support all of the operating budgets at an equal level. Okay. Thank you. So I was at the. As you know, I'm on, I'm a member of the. Massachusetts municipal association fiscal policy committee, which is a pointed by the board on recommendation from the MMA staff and consists of 23 members who are distributed by their role within municipal government and geographically. And it's my privilege to be in my second year. Service on the committee. We met this morning. The report. On the. Charter schools was. That the reason that the reimbursement had decreased is because the number. Of students. Has decreased statewide. In the charter enrollment. I find the percentage somewhat astounded. However, if they level funded it. And it certainly does not explain. Our. Numbers, because I don't think that. The Amherst participation in. Charter schools. Has decreased by. That percentage. So that does merit some checking. My conclusion. When I first saw this cherry sheet last week. Was that. This is going to make for a challenging year for budgeting. And the question of how challenging is what we're going to hear. When we get our next report from Sean. But. State aid is the. Second largest portion of. Funding for. Amherst and most other municipalities and. The 3% increase in unrestricted government aid. Are two percent. It's just not. Sufficient to get us to where. We need to be in percentage of increase. It's under the. It's under the two and a half percent. Of the. You know, but we're looking for, for overall in this bill, you know, the assumption on the property tax. So it's going to be a challenging year when you put that together with the. Minimal increase to chapter 70. Virtually all. All communities. That are not receiving more money because of the student opportunity act. Are. Sort of in the same position because. Any community that's. Not receiving additional money. Because of the student opportunity act is getting the $30 per student. And the last thing that I just want to observe about this morning's meeting is. To the extent we did around. Table of the. It was. Most of the full number of members were there. And. People who reported. On their. Rejections. Everybody said it's going to be a very difficult year. As a result of the system stands. Through the legislature. In developing the budgets on a local level. For the same reason that I pointed out that. It's. Unrestricted government aid number. In the $30 per student. Number. Is a problem. What I found most interesting was. From a municipality that is. A. Recipient of. Funds from student opportunity act. And they were predicting a big problem because. They were facing. A need to increase. The municipal budget. And they were seeing. A need to increase. The municipal contribution anyway, just to meet. The minimum required contribution from their community. Into the schools. And as a result. They saw that they were going to have a problem. Funding anything other than. Education. Their education was taken care of well. And so. Every other segment of the municipal government for that community. Who is going to. Be. Under extreme pressure because of what was happening. So when. Putting all of that together. I think that we just need to all of us. Recognize that. If we could. If the municipal council works to. Give us a budget on. May 1st, he's likely to be. Under a lot of pressure and that we should not assume. That. There's going to be. Buns to do much of anything. Additional. But that remains to be seen until Sean gives us nice report. So if there, let me just see if there any other questions. I'm going to take a go to public comment. And ask those members of the public. Who would like to speak on anything. Related. To the finance committee does not have to be an item on today's agenda. But. Anything that's. They would like to offer. Comment. Please raise their hands. All right, Andy. I had another quick question. Okay. So I don't see any summit. Just. Just second. Because. There is one. There is one. And. Do you want me to bring Tony? Yeah, bring Tony and look. Hi, Tony. So Tony can. If he could just introduce yourself and. Yeah. Three minutes. Those which you want to share. Is it my microphone working? Can you hear me? I can hear you. Okay. Great. Having some problems with my headphones there. Tony Cunningham own drive. Just a quick comment related to the motions about reserves. I am in support of both. I'm in support of the reserves. I'm in support of the reserves. I'm in support of the reserves. I'm in support of the motions. I think. They're very creative solutions to trying to reduce the burden on taxpayers. And I appreciate Alicia Walker's efforts to. Contribute substantially from the reserves and also. And Kathy Shane suggestion to use. Five million toward the sustainability measures that. Are being used for the cash payments later. It would replace a lot of that five million. So I'm just weighing in in support of both. And motions to use reserves. Thank you. Thank you, Tony. Seeing none, no others. Hands going up. Members of the public who are present. I think that it's back to Anna, who had her hand up. Yeah, sorry, it took me a minute to formulate my question and I'm, I'll just, I can email it to Sean. It's just a request for when we actually get the budget of something that I'd love to see. So not important. Thanks. Okay. So then. We need to. Get to the question today. Which is the elementary school building project that authorization. And. Of course, the amount that we're going to authorize. Relates to in the end, what maybe. But not entirely and. Others can explain this. To is to. It's what will be on the. What the amount of. Would be the effect of the debt exclusion, but. So I don't know if Paul, if you or Sean have any introductory. Observations that you'd like to share with the committee. Nothing specific, but I just want to point out, we did send out the memo addressing the various questions that were raised at the previous couple of finance committee meetings. So. You know, we tried to expand a little bit on specifically the use of reserves and some of the considerations that the, this committee might want to have when you have that conversation. And happy to answer any additional questions that maybe we're generated from those responses. Do you think it would be helpful to expand on any of your answers or just point them out the ones that are. Did you think significantly affect the question at hand today? Sure. Let me share my screen real quick. So. I think. Number three specifically relates to the conversation today. So how would a one million dollar reduction. In the amount of debt to be repaid from the debt solution impact the average single family household. So we went with a million so that you can extrapolate, you know, whether it's one million, two million, three million. That would reduce the impact down to four sixty nine. So you can use nine dollars to sort of that. That metric for. When you had your conversation later. We included. I don't know what else is in here. And then I think probably the only other one is number eight. So there was a question about how. The debt exclusion impacts related to the four building project model and planning and how using reserves might impact that. So I think the only thing I'll say here is just as of right now, the planning was to build up our capital stabilization fund. To hopefully. Pay for the fire station. And for. Five, six years without having to incurred that save the interest and also. Move that project forward at a quicker rate than if we wait for capacity within our capital fund or our capital. Allocation in the operating budget each year. So if we. Anything you take out of capital stabilization will obviously impact our ability to build up that fund. To the level it needs to be, which we estimate around 20 million. To achieve that goal of building the fire station without incurring debt. And I think the only other thing I'll say is we did. You know, this has been a conversation for a little while about using reserves for some of the sustainability components of the project. And what do we do with. What do we do with the energy related tax credit payments that come back? Not only for, for this project, but just in general, the town does spend quite a bit on. Energy efficiency projects. And I imagine we will continue, especially as we have other building projects coming up. So what do we do with that? And I think we want this committee to consider. Should those go into the capital stabilization fund? And from there, they can be appropriated to do a range of things where they be reduced the cost. The cost of a building project. You know, support the capital that year. So there's not as much that needs to be funded through debt. But we think that would be a logical place for these credits that come back. Would be to go into that capital stabilization fund because. In most cases, the initial funds that will allow us to get the tax credits are going to be capital funds. So it makes sense that there's a rebate that those would go back into capital. And I think I'll stop there. No. Kathy is questions. It's a question comment. And I don't want to delay the rest of the discussion, but, but I very much like Sean's. Suggestion that he just very quickly went over. And so I'd like to consider the. Finance committee making a motion to recommend that to the council and to the town that. You know, as these tax credits for. Capital expenses for solar or ground source. They also have them for electric buses. As. As these become real, you know, I mean, they're on the books. We just haven't done that. Nobody's got them yet. That they go into a capitalization. Stabilization fund. And just so people know, we've got. In joint capital planning committee, we were looking at some. Expenditures that I think could qualify for Crocker. We've got some for the old school up in the North. In North Amherst. And this is like. Changing out from a oil furnace to. A mini-split. So there, there are some pieces there. And needless to say this. Two or three law firms that are standing by to help towns figure out how to get this money. You know, it's, it's like, like everyone's saying, how's this going to work? What are the guidelines that we shouldn't all recreate the wheel. So we can figure out who's out there. But I like the idea of. Going directly into a stabilization funds or recouping those expenses. That's my comment and strong endorsement of that concept. So we had two suggestions of motions. And I think it. Might make sense if it's agreeable to the committee. And again, I. Look, if anybody doesn't agree, please. Just raise your hand or speak up. But to ask Kathy and then Alicia. To briefly explain their motions. Not necessarily to make the motion now. But it'd be good to. Have. Motions explained and have an opportunity. Just to informally talk about each of them. In sequence and then. See what information. We might be asking before a motion is actually offered. If there's anybody who doesn't agree with that. Is the next step. Please let me know. Kathy. My only is as I'd rather have. I would like Alicia to go first. Not start with me, but start with her. Okay. I mean, we, we almost were at her last time. So I just would like to give her the opportunity to start. Okay. If there's no. Nobody's saying otherwise for raising their hand to say otherwise. Then I'll see Alicia would. You'd be willing to. Make a brief presentation. Or Kathy. Hi, yes. Thank you, Andy. I just have a quick clarification question. So. Am I presenting my motion now like reading. My reasoning behind why I am presenting this motion, or do you want me to just read what my motion is? Cause you said brief and. My explanation is not very brief. Yeah. No, I. Don't need to. You know. Precedes is makes sense. So what I was trying to do. Was avoid getting a motion and having to be discussing a motion. But to get the. Proposal out before the committee with an explanation. Opportunity to discuss both of them. And then what other alternatives. Right. Come forward out of that discussion. And then go back and try and move to motions. The lesson discussion first. So if you'd like to start. Telling us. About your motion and what you're thinking is behind it. In either by reading or by just. Telling us. In the words that you come up with the hazards. Okay. But it, can I just make my motion now? I'm not sure if I'm quite understanding. I was trying to. I thought it might be helpful for the committee to talk about. The motions before we have to deal with the mass motions on the floor. Well, I think I've, well, I thought the process was that like, I make the motion and then when I have a second that opens discussion. No. I think I'm just, I'm not really quite understanding. I was trying to suggest. That we. Try and have discussion. Generally about the topic because I think that. One thing that has to come forward. It will come either way, but it might be a little bit more. Free flowing if it's not. Done around the motions yet. I'll leave it to you to decide. Yeah, I think if I can just make my motion now, I would prefer to just make my motion and then have the discussion. There afterward. So. I can read the motion, which is that I move that the finance committee recommend that the town manage the town council request the town manager include use of $10 million of capital reserves in the funding plan for the elementary school building project. The motion has been made. And I'll have to see if there's a second. I'm seconding for the sake of discussion. So this motion has been made in second. I'm going to speak to your motion. Yes. Thank you. Andy. So I did include a short memo in the pocket. I hope you all had some time to take a look at it. I know it wasn't. Included until yesterday, but there are three main points of rationale that I would like to speak to very quickly and please bear with me because I'm sick and my voice is kind of going away. But I will do the best I can. So the first reason that I want to go over is that we have sufficient reserves available. Our current total reserves are approximately 24 million and all of the accounts. So almost about 10 million in the new capital reserve account. Using the 10 million would still leave 14 million in reserves, which is 16% of operating revenues. In general, I think the recommendation is that we have between five and 15% in operating revenues at all times. So this keeps us within our targeted range. So we're looking at the next capital project to come forward for a few years and that this allows us enough time to work on increasing reserves before the next construction project is ready. And so I just wanted to make that distinction in the difference between Kathy's motion and the next capital project. And so I just wanted to make that distinction in the difference between Kathy's motion and the next capital project and the next capital project. So I just wanted to make that distinction in the difference between Kathy's motion and my motion, because I think there was a comment at the last meeting that said, you know, one motion might prevent the other motion from moving forward. And that's not how I'm looking at this. I think they compliment each other and would be both smart investments for our town. The second rationale is that it would provide significant relief for individuals and families. And the third reason why I'm going to talk about this is the demand. The demand for the housing, lowering the exclusion override from 55 million to 45 million represents 18% lower impact to individuals and families. 40 million. Would be. Sorry. 27% less. That is a substantial to our residents, particularly those who are not able to afford this. And the other tax increases in upcoming fee increases, decrease in the amount that we will be asking our residents to pay. And I want you all to remember that this tax increase for the school project is in addition to the usual 2.5% annual increase plus higher water, sewer and electrical rates. According to the 2019 American Community Survey, there are around 2,139 families in Amherst who live below the poverty line. That is 10% of all families. And the rate is even higher for families who are single family head of household at 17%, multiracial families at 15% and black families at 21%. I've heard this project be touted as a social justice project because of the high percentage of minority and low income youth that are enrolled in our school system. According to Desi, in this current school year, 37% of our elementary school students come from low income families. We are discussing the funding of a school building for an estimated 575 students, where a large portion of those students currently live in poverty. And I just want to talk about what that means for a minute. By definition, poverty is not having enough money to meet basic needs, including food, clothing, and shelter. By definition, 37% of the youth in this community on a daily basis do not have access to enough money to pay for food, clothing, and shelter. A majority of these children are on the free and reduced lunch program, meaning that their caretakers cannot afford to feed their families on a regular basis. And we are sitting here as elected officials representing the needs of our community in discussion to bring forward a project that will raise the taxes beyond the regular 2.5% for the next 30 years, as if it is an insignificant small task. Maybe for people who have enough privilege to measure the increase in the absence of a morning coffee or latte, but this is not the reality for many of our residents. Without a substantial amount of relief for these residents, this is not a social justice project. And so let's not forget that social justice doesn't solely encompass education and the physical spaces in which students are educated. It is also about economic equity and accessibility. I have lived in Amherst since 1993, and I have seen low income families come and go over the years due to expenses in this town mostly related to housing and housing instability. And so I wonder who we are building this school for. These are the same economic disparities and discriminatory practices that have been causing our enrollment to decline over the years. The third reason is that the reserves were built for this purpose. The town has been building these reserves for years with the purpose of using them on the major capital projects, and it's time to take up on that promise. The school is the only project we know will be ready for these funds right now. And this project and the residents in our town, in our community, are deserving of this initiative. Our town urgently needs a new elementary school building, and our residents need to be able to continue to live in this town. And so I present this to you all today with the hopes that our town leadership will make this commitment and show up for our entire community. Thank you. I want to now invite comments, questions. All right. Thanks. Thank you, Alicia, for presenting that. One of the things that is my sort of half-formed thought and my many post-its in front of me, as y'all know, that seems to be my current strategy for better or for worse, is post-it questions. And I guess it's for Sean. So we, the last time that we got a presentation about the four building projects, which is included in your memo, you had given estimated costs of 20 million for fire, 30 million for public works. Is that still roughly true? I have 17 follow-ups, but that's the first one. I would say those are allocations that we've set aside for those projects. We haven't gotten detailed cost estimates for either of them. Would you say that there's still conservative estimates? I'm assuming they were? I would say with the construction industry, the way it is, we're going to have to make difficult choices on what we can include in those buildings and what we can, especially given the net zero elements. We've increased them from where they were originally. You may remember the DPW originally was 20 million and the fire station I think was originally 15 million. So we've increased them significantly from where we started, but given where the construction industry has been, I don't want to ever, at this point, I'm not going to say anything safe, given what we've seen with bid openings and just the market. So have we seen projects be constructed for those amounts in the recent years? Yes. Does that mean three or four years from now? There won't be changes that we need to make to those numbers. I can't say that right now. We might have to look at it again. Yeah, that's fair. And the reason I'm saying that is because we were looking at, if you look at that plan in your memo, you had mentioned option three. Oh, the tabs, the tabs. I have too many tabs. You had mentioned option three. Model three was kind of the one that would be most likely, which is 20 million of reserve usage. Correct? So yeah. Okay. And then three million of other capital funding, assuming that those prices aren't going to have it skyrocketed, which that feels like a really bad assumption to make. I think that my concern with funding this amount or higher from reserves is that it forces delay. I can't figure out the math to not have it force a delay in the other projects in some way or force us to borrow more for those projects, which I don't even know if that's a possibility that we want to look into. Right, Sean, because that would be using reserves so that we didn't have to borrow is the idea for fire? Yeah, because of a construction cost where we increased the cost of the project. So again, we increased the fire station, for example, up to 20 million, and then increase in our interest rates. Two years ago or a year and a half ago, interest rates are around 2% or less. Now they're in the 4% range. So the ability to borrow for all these projects has gone away. We had a really great window where if we could have done all the projects on a two-year span, it would have been ideal. But we've sort of passed that window. So this is kind of, this is really the root of my concern, right, is that we have a DPW that is just, I don't actually have words to describe our DPW building anymore. It's so shameful in my opinion. And we really need to move on that. And, you know, and same fires is brutal, that building is not not going to continue to work. It doesn't continue, it doesn't currently work. So for me, I'm really concerned. I recognize that the impact, I recognize that this impact on taxpayers is significant. I will feel this personally. And at the same time, I'd also really like fire trucks to be able to come to my house and have a station where our firefighters are able to do their work. And same with DPW. I mean, thinking about the trucks that were out there today, we need to be able to house those in a safe and functional facility. And I'm concerned that taking the amount from the reserves that's this high really does limit our capacity and our ability to do those other really crucial projects. And we're kind of borrowing from the future. And that's not going to, it's not going to work. We've seen how things are escalating. And I'm really concerned about that. So that's my, those are my post-it comments for now. And I'll try to get them a little more cohesive in a moment. Those are my initial thoughts, I guess is my point. Thanks, Thank you, Lynn. Thank you. First, I want to thank Alicia for bringing this forward. This is not just Alicia's discussion. This is a discussion that's happening all over town. People are looking at our various funds and saying, why can't we take this from reserves? And so Alicia, I just want to thank you for your heartfelt comments and for representing that voice in our town that is asking this very same question. So, and therefore it needs to be discussed. Anna has raised the two big projects that are on the books, but I'm going to raise a couple others. And this is me coming from my district. I think if I send one more email to Paul Backelman about the condition of the roads in district two, he's going to shut me off because that's all I'm hearing is about roads. And yet each year, right now, we're only putting about 2 million plus into roads for a $29 million bill that we're looking at. So there's big projects and then there's, and those cover various parts of town and cover various age groups of people. And in many ways also represent social justice. Getting to the hospital is social justice, having somebody come to your house and help when somebody's fallen is social justice. I really, really have to say we have other questions being raised, other demands being raised for our capital projects in addition to the ones that are quote on the books. There's, you know, the ongoing idea BIPOC led youth center. There's the ongoing demand for a new senior center. And if we at this point make the decision to dip into our reserves at for the school, we then have to just kiss those others goodbye. And I, those are tough choices. And we knew we were going to come to these tough choices at some point in our town, and we are there. So I again just totally thank Alicia for bringing this forward. She's one of many people who say, let's just spend it on this. But if we spend it on this, then when we need to do the fire station, we're going to have to go out for another debt exclusion override, because we won't have the money. So I'm feeling caught like everybody else's, but I'm not sure that this is the way to solve that problem. Andy, you're muted. Oh, I'm sorry. I hit, there was a lot of noise going on in my background, which is I forgot to shut it off. Let me let's call up Alicia, because her hand is up. And then we'll see if another member would speak otherwise. I have some thoughts about Alicia's initial presentation and where we're at. Alicia. Yes, thank you. If I can just really quickly respond to some of the things that have been said. Sorry. So I want to make very clear my support for moving forward the DPW and the fire station. I had the privilege or the opportunity of going on a tour of both buildings very recently. And I have seen the conditions and I understand the urgency of those buildings. And this initiative does not stop those other projects from happening. And so I want that to be very clear because it's, I think that is an attempt to stop this motion to say then it stops other projects, but it actually does not. It just changes the way we have to think about funding the projects moving forward. Because this would pass does not mean then we do not get a fire station. That actually sounds really ridiculous. It just means we need to think differently about how we will fund and achieve and accomplish getting the fire station built in a timely manner. And people will continue to come to your house again. Passing this motion doesn't mean people don't get ambulances. And that is a threat to social justice. That was also a completely inappropriate comparison. People are getting medical care and receiving calls and responses from fire right now that is not something that's going to stop if this motion passes. We are just going to need to think differently about how we are going to fund future projects. And that is the point is that their future projects. This project is ready to go right now. And so we need to think about how we are going to make this happen right now. It is not a sufficient answer to say we're going to continue to look into possible funding sources for this project that is ready to go. Now it is more reasonable to say that we will continue to look into funding options for projects that are not currently in front of us right this minute. And so since we're not even projecting the projects to come in front of us for a few years, we have a few years to come up with other options. This project, we do not have a few years. We are going out for the debt override on May 2nd. That is very soon. This is a very different, this is, it's just very different. And so I think this is not the time to pit projects against each other. These funds are not coming from the same project, the same pot that they would come from if we're going to fix the roads. This is not coming from the same pot. If we are going to make a youth empowerment center, we're talking about the capital reserve fund for the capital projects. This is not something to pit projects against each other. I support all of those initiatives. And I hope that we can find ways to fund all of those initiatives. We're looking at something that is in front of us right now as moving forward. And I think it's a no-brainer for me. I think the town needs to reevaluate its priorities and figure out how we're prioritizing our town and the people who live here and not putting those things off. All right. Thanks. So I guess, Alisha, I'm open to being wrong about this, right? Like, I think what's what I'm not comfortable with is kind of saying, well, we don't need to know that right now because we don't plan these huge capital projects on a year-to-year basis. We plan them looking out years and years ahead. And so, you know, I think that we've also been building the reserves for, I mean, I was just looking at the chart and I've lost it in my tabs. But yeah, I mean, we've been slowly building these reserves for years and years and years. And so, I think my concern is the idea of saying, well, we'll figure it out. Again, I'm not trying to say that flippantly at all. I would love to be able to figure it out, but I'm really not comfortable without knowing what that plan is because it's also not necessarily that far down the road that we'd be starting these projects, right? This is the timeline of paying for things and local municipalities comes up really quick is what I'm learning here. So I think that for me, I'm unclear on how that would happen. And I'd love to hear more because if it's possible, then that's amazing. But I don't see how it's doable. And I don't see it as hitting projects against each other when it's the one fund that is supposed to pay for all of the projects, right? And we've got the models of how to do that. It's really a matter of, you know, we pull the money from the debt exclusion now or we have to do it again for a fire station or for a DPW, right? Like that. It's not like we're going to get some huge, we're not going to win the lottery as a town. And so I think for me, we've been building and building for the purpose of funding all four. And I'm very I am concerned about depleting and limiting our ability to utilize those funds for all four as intended. But I'm open to hearing how I'm just I'm uncomfortable with the idea of we will figure that out down the road. And I apologize if I'm paraphrasing that poorly, it's not intended to be that like that. Thanks. So I risked my hand because I at some point wanted to speak. And first, I guess there's several points that I want to make gotten started along one of the paths that I was thinking about. But I've been involved in this municipal finance question back from when I was first appointed to the original to the old finance committee back around 2008, I believe it was, or approximately 2007. And the, you know, we've been talking about a fire station of the DPW elementary schools, these are these projects have all been there for a long period of time. And the building of the reserves has been a slow process over all of that time. That was one of the strategies to address not one project, but four projects. And it was not something that could be done quickly, because reserves were being built, not by allocating money to reserves in a budget, but by just taking advantage if there was excess revenue in a year, or if there was turnbacks of money that was allocated in a year and don't spend. So it was pieces of money on an annual basis over a long period of time, the loudest to build the reserves to that level that they're at now. Second thing is that reserves serve multiple purposes, they weren't just built for the major projects. And that was why the capital stabilization fund was split out was to try and at least enable us to better visualize the various reasons. But question of roads and is just another form of capital. And it is something that if we're going to accelerate the pace of road work, that is a capital station that we have to make. The other reason to have reserves is that there are good times and bad times in municipal government. And we've gone into several rounds of recession. And it was the reserves that it was the ability to keep going. And as I observed at the beginning of the meeting, after Sean's report on the projections for next year, we're entering a tough period. We don't know how long that tough period is going to be. But we know that the economy is very uncertain. And so there was a large piece of the reserves that needs to be held for the rainy day fund use and not for committing to expenditures. So both that and the length of time that it takes to build funds, I think are very much things that I would hope that this committee will consider. The other thing that I just wanted to point out is that, yes, there's been an enrollment decline here, but there's been an enrollment decline in all communities. And not all of them are communities that have all of the attributes that Alicia so accurately described for Amherst. It is demographic changes that have driven the enrollment decline to a substantial amount. And if it hadn't been for the number of students who have come into the community, who have come from outside and some of them have been people who have changed the composition school. And I think the diversity of the school is one of its strengths. But the whole decline in enrollment is really due to demographic changes in birth rates and the aging of the population as a whole. And that's a universal regardless of the nature of the community. So I am somewhat concerned about the fact that it is important both to maintain our reserves for the variety of purposes and not put it out for a single purpose all at one time. And that we really need to recognize that once spent, given the fact that we may be turning into a longer term trough in the economics that it may be a long time before we ever rebuild the reserves to the level that there will be sufficient to continue on with the projects. If we don't think of all four projects as being urgent and needing a path forward right now. So those are my comments. And I guess it's back to Alicia. Thank you, Andy. I appreciate everyone's comments and concerns. I had a couple that I wanted to respond to. And I guess just really quickly first, Andy, because I understand the demographic changes, the enrollment decline is due to demographic changes, but demographic changes are driven by what usually economic factors. And so all of these things are still very deeply tied together. And all of these things are influencing and impacting each other. And then just another response to some of the things that Anna brought up in terms of wanting to know right now, how will we be able to fund the projects that are projected? And that's why we work on these things ahead of time. I also definitely understand that. And that's where my concern comes from is how come we don't know right now how we're going to be helping our residents when this project is here and we have been planning it for years. Doesn't make any sense to me why we have not planned ahead, why we have not used this time. And I brought this up when we were talking about the timing for the debt exclusion override. I asked if, you know, Sean and Paul thought they had enough time between now and May to come up with remedies, possible remedies for residents like why have these things not been in the making for years? It is the same question and the same concern on the other flip side, flip end of it. And I know we're entering a tough period as a town. I understand that. And I'm asking you all to understand that residents live in this tough period in this town. They do not need to enter a tough period. They are already there. And these changes that we have authority over can completely change their lives. We have the ability as town leaders to be innovative and to be finding ways and solutions to address these problems instead of just continuously putting them off. We have time before the next projects. I know we like to have more time to implement solutions. And so then I asked why we didn't find more time to implement this solution, but now we're here. And we don't have a lot of time and we don't have a lot of options. We have more time and therefore we can find more options for other projects. And so while I really hear and understand all of these concerns and I didn't completely neglect them when I am presenting this motion, all of these things were in my head because again, I also am very much in support of the fire station and very much in support of the DPW and finding new places and building new buildings for those things as well. But I think it has come to a time that each of us as counselors really need to evaluate our priorities when it comes to the service that we are providing for this town. And it is like very much showing to me right now. Anything else that somebody from the committee would like to offer? Sean or Paul, do you have anything from the staff perspective that you would like to offer? Susan? I'll leave that to Paul if you want to. I defer to the finance committee members first. Please go to Kathy first. Kathy then. So, Andy, I don't know how you want to do with a motion on the floor, but it may be useful for me to talk about why I talked about five million in this context rather than talking about the larger amount. So, I don't want to change the flow of this, but so that is just a question. Go ahead. So, there are two different possible ways of using some part of reserves that are before you. I'm not going to speak very much to mine other than to say that it's five million and I never thought that being additive. Whether five is the right number, what I was looking for is a initially softening, moderating the impact. I'm thinking that the tax credits for solar and geothermal and as I said earlier, you know, I have to do a best guess. Solar is a little bit easier because I know exactly what the cost of solar is. So, I can get the up to 30% of it. But no one right now knows when we say geothermal is at the whole system or is it just the pumps, the wells, what part of it. So, I don't know what base number to use as an estimate. So, I thought of it as a way of paying back reserves quickly. So, it wasn't taking reserves and not having them be available because these are in theory. Once the building is open, they're very similar to the ever source incentives where we expect to get the ever source incentives when the building opens. And then there's one more part of them that we get if we hit the energy target. So, there's another 200,000 that's the end of the first year. So, it pre-bays this. Alternatively, I could see that if we're committed to using those tax credits and Sean can figure out how to finance the school in a way that we can pre-pay two to three to four million dollars of the debt that we've incurred. So, it's me pulling down the debt. So, we have less to finance over a period of time. And I thought if it is a package that we have Community Preservation Act, we have ever source, we have reserves with a target of getting most of them back is how I came up with my number. It wasn't to pull it completely out. When I look at the modeling for the two buildings and I, the tour of DPW is an eye-opener for anyone who hasn't done it. It's not just an old building, but the building is falling apart. And you can see it and I'm not an engineer. So, I can just see it with my bare eyes. It's a little bit like when I watched the back of my barn come off, no longer attached to the barn. I could see that I need better do something about before the roof came down. So, what I don't know is when those can actually happen. We still with DPW, I think we have to build on its current site. And I would like to have that building feel more real to me rather than somewhere out in the future. But I pegged my number much lower because of all of this, you know, on a quick payback to reserves rather than a pulling money out of reserves. And I will just stop there with the rationale. It's written in my piece. So, when it was $5 million for it. And I thought the optics of it makes sense. It's a package. I watched the way the Joan Library packaged them. They have some maybe not real historic credits. These are real credits that are out there on the federal books where I checked with the McGovern staff. If we had built last year, we could be applying for them this year because they went on the books in January and towns are eligible to come in for them. So, that is my lower number. The rationale was building up from a range of what I thought we could get in credits, not to pull out reserves that are for the other two big buildings because I think we need them. And I'll stop. Yes, please. I want to ask Paul and Sean a question or two. And that is part of the statement to tell me am I correct? When we start the construction of this building, we start borrowing money like anybody would for a construction project. And when we finish the project, we convert that to a long-term borrow. Is that the way the borrowing works? Generally, that's how it works. So, if we spend a million dollars on FY25, we would want to have temporary borrowing, which is called a bond anticipation note. We would want to have a bond anticipation note for a million dollars for that same fiscal year so that we have the revenue to match with the expenses. We would do that for every year while the project is being constructed. And at the end, we would combine all those bond anticipation notes into one large bond that would then become the basis that we'd repay the project. The only reason I say generally is, again, if for whatever reason interest rates are super low in the first couple of years while the project is going on, where we might want to take advantage of a permanent borrowing earlier, we would have the ability to consider that. So, again, interest rates have risen rapidly lately, which has made our challenge bigger. But if they were to come down as rapidly at a key time for this project, we might want to bond as many costs as we can at that point to take advantage of that lower interest rate. Thank you. If we received money because of credits, I assume things like the systems we're receiving the money for would have to be up and running. And I say this because when my husband and I put solar in, we had to show that it was up and running before the federal government would give us our very nice tax return. Yeah, that's completely correct. When this is not at the beginning, it's at the end. The building is open and you spent the money. Yes. Part of where I'm going is, as we move along, if additional money becomes available, even maybe in the form of a gift, okay, we can take that off of the bond. Is that correct? The final bond, the final cost. We would want to do it before we bond it. So, when we have temporary borrowings, we can always pay as much off as we want because those are only for one year at a time, those temporary borrowings. Once we do a permanent bond, I believe there's a period of time where you can't pay it down because, again, banks bid on that and they're expecting a certain amount of interest based on their bid. And so, again, if we were to get a large, some sort of donation or another funding source or something like that, we'd want it to be before we go out for that permanent borrowing. Okay. Or if we knew it was coming and we had a pretty good assurance, for instance, for the energy saving measures. We might do that as a separate borrowing instead of wrapping it into the big borrow. Right, yep. Now, I'm asking this for a reason, okay, and now I'm going to go back in history. We have been planning. We've been planning for years. I chaired a committee that made a report to town meeting in 2006. Andy, you weren't even on the finance committee yet. You stood in front of town meeting and said, here's your options for a fire station. Then the economy sank. I chaired another committee about DPW and fire station. That one finished up in 2018 and the cost has gone up and up and up. And during that time, we looked at another school and the cost has gone up and up. We have been planning for these four major capital projects for almost 20 years. And in this year alone, the cost keeps going up. And we don't have any control. And even now we're sitting here saying, okay, we've submitted something to MSBA. Great job committee. By the time we actually go out for bid, will the cost go up? Will MSBA give us as much money as we hope? We don't know. But what I will tell you is, working with our legislators, we already got an increase from MSBA just this year in the square footage reimbursement. By talking to Eversource, we're estimating a 1.2. By going to CPA, we've gotten money there. We've been looking and trying to turn over every stone to find the pot of gold to help pay for the school. And we've been doing the same thing for the library. And we've been doing the same thing, looking down the road for fire stations and DPWs by having legislators that we work with submit bills about funding other public projects. And every time we bring in more money, the cost just keeps going up. And so we've seen a fiscal plan at the beginning of my term on the council where we could do all of these projects in a period of five or six years. And now we're looking at, we're lucky if we can do them in 10 or 15. And I'm not here in a conversation about DPW. I'm just hearing maybe we can put through the fire. So I don't want, I don't want to sound like the old person in the room, but I will tell you not only have we been planning for this by accumulating reserves, but we have been working hard to get as much other funding in as possible. And in some cases we've had little successes here and there, but that doesn't mean we stop. So I'm very concerned about this coming year's operating budget and the following year. I'm very concerned about this project and whether or not we're still looking at the final cost or whether we're going to have to go into our reserves just to cover something we didn't anticipate. So we talk about reserves as if it's, you know, spend it today and refresh it tomorrow. But what I'm pointing out is a scenario where what was our reserve and our plan, was going to allow us to do four buildings. No longer is allowing us to even comfortably say we can do four buildings. So even in that period, the picture has changed. Thank you. I think Alicia might be responding to Lynn's comment. So if she wants to go next, I'm happy to switch spots. No, it's okay. No, it's okay, Anna. It's not going to be. Oh, okay. Thanks. So I think I'm trying to look at the numbers and kind of think back and looking at Kathy's proposal, it looks like the school could be eligible or is eligible for somewhere between 5.4 and 6 million back. And so I'm not comfortable combining the two. I know I'm not comfortable combining the two and saying 15. I'm curious about, and Kathy, I'm curious if you've come across this in any of your travels, what possible credits there might be for our other buildings that we'd like to build, recognizing that it still might mean financing if it's something like a credit once it's complete that still might mean financing it and getting a credit after. But I'm curious if you know of, and I was trying to do a quick search, but I couldn't do it or couldn't get an answer right away. If it would make sense to do the 10, knowing that at least 5.4, if not 6, would come back. So ultimately the hit to the reserves would be 4. And then if there would be a way to seek those credits for the other buildings that we're hoping to build as well. I'm not sure if this makes sense. Yeah, Kathy, I'm hoping you got that. First, I'll have to look at the memo I sent because I think you're on the high side, it's an up to 30% on it. So and the variation I have is if it was at the low end, it would be in the 2 million range and at the higher end, it would be nearer to 4. And it's just, it's again, it's not my bad. I added them. Sorry. Okay. Yeah. You know, so just I just want to correct that. And so the code, just so everyone, these are odd because nobody's been eligible for them. We're not a tax-paying entity, right? So what is on the books, and I sent a description of it, is that it's a direct payment to an otherwise tax-exempt entity for up to 30%. And there's a slight discount if we finance it with municipal debt that's tax-free. So quite as much back. But you also get a bonus if you somehow know you bought the steel locally. It's been done in the United States. So it applies to all a full range of someone is taking, it's taking the oil burner out and bringing in a, or, you know, a heat pump in of some variety. There is some for charging stations. There's definitely some for storage. And so there's a list of what qualifies. This is federal. And what we don't know is whether the state, and it's one of my questions for our legislators, the state doesn't have anything on the books like this. Although it's been talked about for a while to do an incentive to help you pay. The state has a program that helps pay after you've done something and all gives you a little extra check. So that's where we, we don't know yet. And I know Stephanie Ciccarello, our sustainability person, but in several towns, everybody is looking for, okay, it looks like, and some of it is, if you spent it last year, you could get the credit, this direct payment this year. So it went on the books. So it's goes forward. And, and there's a variation on how many megawatts you're buying. And we're well under that. So we're in the place that it's easier to compute. So, so that's all. So I just didn't want you to exaggerate my numbers. I appreciate the check that that's super helpful. I think I had been looking because the, the information that you had included from the Aspen Institute was specifically for schools. And so I was curious what, how it translated for other municipal buildings. And if there was an opportunity for us to stake similar credits for these other buildings to offset potential reserve use. They wrote it so school, because they're the, okay, through 12 Google. Yes, no, I understand. Think of it as any public building. This is, you know, a tax exempt church that wanted, that's tax exempt, that wanted to convert its oil furnaces. I mean, it's opened up a major incentive program. Absolutely. That, so it's, they wrote it just for schools should know about this because public schools have never thought that they were eligible for anything from the federal government that wasn't requesting a grant. So that's the big difference here. You don't have to ask for it. You can just fill out some kind of weird tax form because you're not a taxable entity. So those guidelines aren't there yet. So, you know, that's why I want to be really careful just to say that, that, that it's been confirmed. They're on the books and the, the guidance from IRS is not yet. Okay. Thank you. So I think where, where I'm going with this is I'm curious, Sean, I know that's kind of a weird wrench to throw in this, but I'm curious if you have any thoughts about whether, you know, how much we'd have to kind of make back into reserves to not be damaging these, these other projects. Is there any sort of hit that or any flexibility and how much can the credits make up that room? I guess it's, I don't, I'm not sure if that makes sense. And then second, and if not, I'm happy to try to keep talking and see if it clarifies itself. But then the second point is like Kathy said, these are new. And so my, I, I am really excited about Kathy's motion and what I would want to add in some way and some commitment is dedicated staff time to pursuing these credits. I think that that would be something that's going to be critical for us is to know that these are, it's now part of someone's responsibility to realm of responsibility to be, to be chasing these down. Because like Kathy said, they are there. We just have to get them. It's not necessarily and it's not like the application and we have to be selected as the lucky recipients. It's, it's just a matter of can we follow through as a town on getting these. So I'm really excited about Kathy's and I'd like to know kind of where's the how, how much, how high could we go in dipping into reserves knowing that we maybe would get credits back in the future, if that makes sense. And I recognize credits are still taking from a project cost. But yeah, sorry. Yeah, so, so I don't have a definitive answer for you. I think the goal was to get the capital stabilization fund to $20 million. So if we use all of it, that means we have to come up with $20 million. It took, you know, quite a few years to get it where it was. As Lynn and Andy pointed out, it's been, it's been years building up the reserve. So do I think there's lots of potential with the tax credits payments? Yes, I think as Kathy pointed out, it seems like it's available for all municipal buildings. The DPW, the fire station, those are going to be net zero buildings as well. So they should have significant costs associated with that component that might be eligible. And we also, we spend quite a bit on energy efficiency measures just generally, you know, whether it's pursuing charging stations or electric school buses or, you know, replacing our gas burning heating systems with electric systems. So there's, there's lots of potential there. I think the big thing is we haven't done it yet. We haven't seen anybody get it. We don't know if there's going to be anything like annual limits on how much, you know, a town can get. You know, I know with, with like a personal solar, there's, there's a limit sort of in how much credit you can get and you've got to carry some forward. And so we haven't seen the rules, the IRS rules around how this will all work. So leaning on the side of being conservative, we're not, we're not going to project that until we see those rules, which hopefully will be out. I mean, they got to come out soon, as Kathy pointed out, there's going to be some municipalities that are going to be seeking them pretty soon. So there's a lot of potential there. But until we see the IRS rules and know how, you know, how the eligibility criteria will work and how much, you know, what's counted, what's not counted, I won't be able to answer that question. Thank you. I'll be sure. Thank you, Andy. So I respect and understand the enormous amount of planning that has gone into the financing and the figuring out of the capital projects and how we will see them to fruition. That Lynn was referencing my reference was in response to what the town has done to plan to support the residents through this possible tax increase through the debt override, which we have anticipated, not the projects itself. I know that there has been a lot of planning that has gone into those projects. Part of that planning, however, has been the creation of these funds to support the projects. And one of those funds is the school project that is in front of us today, the funds. These funds were created for literally this exact reason. They were not created to be committed to one or specific projects they were created for to support all of the projects in general. And so that's why, again, I think it is completely appropriate to be using these funds for this purpose. I did want to say a few things about Kathy's motion, but I also am feeling deeply troubled by the fact that my motion is on the floor and there has been a huge effort to talk about everything besides my motion and my intentions of helping low income residents. And I feel like the discussion has gone astray from that purpose, which is deeply troubling to me. But since it has gone all over and it has been allowed to go all over, I will talk to Kathy's motion in that I support the credits going back into these funds. I know that's not part of the motion that she made, but she did speak to that. And I think that that sounds great in that if these funds that would be used for Kathy's motion are then being replaced, it becomes a non-factor. And so I'm not understanding why we would not be supporting one, why we would say we can only support one motion and not the other if those funds are going to be replaced. We are even, we're not going to see the impact of using them in the end. And so why we are not still willing to commit some of the funds, which were saved and compiled for this exact reason to help offset the impact on families and individuals who are financially hurting. I have heard a lot of discussion about the town's financial constraints and everyone is continuing to stray away from talking about the financial hardships and burdens that are experienced on a daily basis by the residents that live in this town right now, before even raising anything. And so I would hope that if we're all just going to vote no, we can just go to the vote rather than continuing to avoid talking about the exact purpose of my motion. But I think that this discussion has gotten a little bit carried away. Yes. Thank you, Alicia. I realized that it has, but that was kind of what I anticipated was going to happen regardless of whether we had a motion on the floor or not because we both knew that there were two motions out there. And that we were going to take them sequentially and kind of discuss them together. We ended up discussing them together, even though you are correct. There's a motion on the floor and I'm going to move to it quickly. As I look over the number of years that I've been involved in this process since its inception and more recently, during the council years, because Sean took over and presenting the model from his predecessor, Sandy Cooler, about the same time as the council became the form of government in the first council was appointed. And so we've been talking about this for a while. And I think that we all recognize and have for many years before that, back into the select board time meeting days, that we were very conscious of the impact of taxes in a very high tax community, which is high tax because of decisions that were made that have commercial development from helping to balance out residential development over time. And what we tried to do was to avoid seeking an override of two and a half in order to try and live within those limits and still build up the reserves that we have because I think we also knew that eventually the debt exclusion was going to be a necessity and the school was going to be the biggest project and that's where the most logical place therefore for debt exclusion was going to happen. So I feel like we have been for a long period of time done the best we can under very difficult circumstances of trying to maintain the lowest level possible in the asks of our residents knowing that this was coming. But I don't think that we can avoid it, avoid that reality now. I also want to point out that the efforts that Lynn talked about that have been successful in trying to control the amount of the cost so that we could control the amount of the ask from voters has been also a concerted effort for the same purpose. So those are my concluding comments and if there are no others then I think we do need to come to a vote on the motion that has been put on the floor in second and start to give staff one last chance. If they have anything to say, look to see if there any hands that go up from Big Sean or something. Yeah, I'll just say at the general level we need to get these buildings built. I think that's the number one thing when we look back at the last 30 years, building projects have come up and they haven't been built for whatever reason they've been kicked down the road and that's why we have this really large challenge in front of us and so the most important thing I think all of us can do is we got to start getting these things built and then get them off of our queue because there's going to be other buildings that are going to be coming up right behind them in the next 20 or 30 years and if we haven't cleared this batch then we're going to have that much greater of a challenge. Okay, so seeing all the hands going up in the committee and keeping an eye out and don't see any I think we do need to come to a vote on the motion that is on the floor which is Elisha's motion and there's no request to have her or somebody else read the motion again and then we'll just go to a vote. I think we all know what the motion is. So I'm just going to go alphabetically so my last name so Anna? No. Lynn? Regrettably no. Bob? I don't support. Matt is absent and obviously was unable to join us. Bernie is absent and had told us in advance he'd be absent. Kathy? You need to unmute Kathy? No because I think it's too high. And I'm going to also for same reasons vote no and Elisha? Yes. So the motion fails one in favor or opposed one resident member not in support and two resident members absent. So I think they need to turn it over to Kathy to make a motion if she wants. Just one thing about the wording of my motion Elisha got guidance from Athena that we couldn't just say use of reserves we have to recommend that the town manager proposed to us the use of reserve. So Andy's mine is not worded in that way. If you want to put mine up on the screen I didn't I didn't get any guidance. I just wrote it so I don't want to have a motion that's got wording that that wouldn't be the way we would normal. So I had it that we were recommending allocating 5 million contingent on a positive vote and then my intention you know as I think someone pointed out my intention was that all the tax credits that were big up would be go back in so it was a replenishment on my explanation. So I'm not sure my motion is as well worded as it should be. So I you know I'm this was drafted a week ago as I as I thought about pulling this amount of money and I came up with the five because as Anna pointed out I could get fairly close to that amount of money and with tax credits if I assumed the higher level for geothermal and the other thing Lynn when you were talking about how we financed it I thought maybe we can have one as a short term bond so that we're paying off the bond right away you know that we were using the tax credit so it wasn't a three paying a long-term bond so I had behind my thinking was a way of financing this that we the reserves stayed whole. So I'd be happy to rework this to an up to 5 million you know assuming that this would be offset by tax credits which is what my intention was with this wasn't to just pull down reserves I just need guidance on it. So Kathy I have to recommend the town councilor request the town manager allocate up to 5 million of the capital reserve to fund the new elementary school building to support initial costs of geothermal and photovoltaic systems contingent on a positive vote for the school project on May 2. Does that sound right to you? Yes and can we put at the end and that as an anticipation of federal credits the credits would replenish reserves no Lynn you're saying no you can't expand it that much just stop. Keep it clean. Okay so so Athena just rewrote my wording for everybody. If that's okay I can read it again to make sure you're okay with it Kathy. Yeah no I'm fine to it I'm fine to it and the up to 5 so people understand what my intention is here that's all. Okay I see Bob's hand is up. Yeah I just wanted to I don't think we can put this in the motion but if we pass this and it goes to the council on his pass I think the instructions to the town manager should be that we should not allocate more than we actually get back in tax credits or we can reasonably assume we're going to get back in tax credits or in credits in other words I don't I we shouldn't be over optimistic about how much we can get back I mean we're going to get back what we get back and that's going to reduce the cost right. And Bob I'm comfortable with that as as the instructions you know it as I said I'm I'm I'm doing my yeah so you know we don't unlike the ever source incentives where they give us a precise number for you do this many wells you get this much credit for it and then you hit this number you get this much more we don't have that yet so I'm comfortable with that is the intent. Kathy are you making that motion? The up to language it helps. Yeah the up to. I think the up to is fine I just think it would be helpful to have instructions to the town manager that are more explicit. And let's have to indicate there wasn't an easy way to do that in the same motion but but I don't see how we can do it. This discussion clearly is giving those instructions so we can write that in the finance report right? Yes okay. And I don't know the other thing I was going to ask Athena and Lynn's opinion on this whether we could also do second do an additional motion afterwards to cover other topics is we're trying to avoid listing two topics in the same motion. That's I always prefer separate motions. I would too so Lynn I think separating them the second motion should be the tax credits go back into the stabilization fund which would be fine with me so I'm I meant I'm not going to I've said enough about the concept so I'm done. So I am making that motion. You are making the motion as Athena has suggested wording. I'll second that motion as the suggestion as the wording is undone. So motion has been made by Kathy is suggested with the edit suggested by Athena and it's been seconded by Anna so it's on the floor and Kathy I'm going to offer you the opportunity to speak to the motion or otherwise. No I wave that. I think I explained it and we had a good discussion of it. Alicia. Yeah I just need some clarification as to exactly what the motion on the floor is. Like were we editing it or were we what is the motion? The motion is as Athena put it up by can you. It is to recommend the town council request the town manager allocate up to five million dollars of the capital reserve to fund the new elementary school building to support the initial costs of geothermal and photovoltaic systems contingent on a positive vote for the school project on May 2nd. So are we not including the language about the percentage of the refund? I was unsure about that decision. I think it was we do those were separate did out Alicia as I understood and we could come back with a second motion that as we receive those credits they go back into the stabilization that is what my understanding is to the advice wise that it was two different subjects in the same motion and therefore was inappropriate and needed to be done as two separate motions. So. Yeah I just wonder whether we in the motion we could should call up the capital stabilization fund just to be precise. I think we call it the capital reserve fund just I think we all know what we're talking about but thank you that's I that's a good good wording change. I agree I do okay so the motion has changed in wording so any further discussion on the motion which your hand is still up I don't know if that means you still in speaker. No sorry it's a lingering hand but I'm still confused as to what the motion is I'm so sorry I'm having a hard time understanding and following and there's not I don't know you said Athena has it on the screen but I don't see anything. Yeah I don't know you have to put that we're okay with the motion. Alicia. Yes thank you that is helpful. I would prefer this is just my preference I know this is Cathy's motion to just leave it at five million and not. Alicia you muted partway through your sentence I think. Oh sorry thank you I would prefer to leave it at five million and not have it listed as the up to five million. I think that the reason that the up to you can speak to it Cathy. Yeah I Alicia I changed it to reflect Bob's concern that we are as much as we can trying to match the credits we get back so my the intention was replacement so if we only got four million dollars back for example it wouldn't be five so it's trying to to match it so that we're not depleting it and I was willing to make that change. I don't know whether we want to vote on this and then come back to my original which was five where five was my guesstimate so I was looking to gain votes on the committee for an idea that I know was not palatable when I first came up with it. I get the reasoning for the up to five million but I think in reality the town manager you know if he accepts the recommendation he's gonna have to pick a number soon that he's gonna bring back to the council and you're gonna vote and we're not gonna know what we're gonna get and credits for this project or other projects you know for potentially years so so I kind of get I get Alicia's point of the up to in some ways maybe helpful cleaner just saying five and then I think so yeah just because because again that gives the town manager specific guidance at the number you're uncomfortable with five if you if you need a hard number say up to out up to school and you're agreeing to time it so the words up to have been eliminated from the motion any further discussion seeing none then we'll go alphabetically again but go down one as you do during council meetings which puts linda's first I bob the pork matt and bernie are absent Kathy yes I will vote yes lisha yes even though this is not enough and I don't know yes so the motion is five to zero with support of one president member and to the president and loving members absent but the I guess the next thing is is there an additional motion related to what is the overall proposal when has it I recommend that the town council and ask the town manager to do that when in receipt of any tax credits for the elementary school building that those be placed back into the capital I wouldn't say reserves and that's not right stabilization stabilization fund thank you okay yes okay I have what I think is a friendly amendment when if you say for the elementary school building project or other such capital credits so in Sean's memo he he had a suggestion that if we're getting it back on a school bus if we're getting it back on another building that is going back into the stabilization fund and I like very much like that did you want to keep it just to the school is what I asked I want to be clean with the school okay I'm fine any further discussion seeing none and then I'll go ahead and go to a vote I have seen no requests uh watching the screen so uh stay in same order I'm thinking now one Bob support news okay and matt and bernie again are absent Kathy yes I'm a yes lisha yes I I So it's five to zero one resident member in support and two resident members absent so I think that there were the agenda item listed was elementary school project debt authorization and and to get to that number of course we have to have an estimate of what's the amount that we need or construction good the arithmetic that follows I don't know Sean and paul would that you have on that on the column Lynn Mr. Handesup Yeah go to Sean please Yeah, so I wouldn't change the not I don't think the number should change um actually that we don't have the exact numbers yet we're still waiting for those numbers to come from the msba um in any case even what was just a um if a five uh five million dollars is appropriate from reserves I still don't think we're going to change the overall project cost because it's still part of the total project budget we just wouldn't fund it through debt we'd sell the authorization but we wouldn't fund it that way we'd be we'd pull it out of a separate appropriation so I think the total project cost is going to stay at the 98 million dollar number and we're still waiting for a final uh final figure from the msba on their grant share so is uh The debt authorization recommendation would be 93 um, I think it's 98 for the total um for the total project cost but the amount that we're anticipating you know the amount that we're anticipating coming from uh the stabilization fund right um You still generally have to appropriate the full project cost um as part of one single vote for the msba What I would suggest is if you're thinking of voting on the language today We may want to wait one more meeting um because the msba is still fine-tuning their reimbursement rate every year they update their reimbursement rate and I know they're in the process of doing that right now so it might make sense to wait one more meeting to This was the struggle with voting this before the msba board meeting is that we don't get a definitive number from them until April 26th, uh, we think we'll get a good idea of the numbers ahead of time so we can get those inserted into the the vote language So you can vote something um, but we don't have that definitive guidance yet from our from our project manager So I don't I think you should wait on voting I think you could the language is worth reviewing But I wouldn't vote the numbers vote the authorization recommendation yet um because we don't have the definitive numbers yet And andy this doesn't come back to the council the public forum on this Is not until the 20th Of march and we don't vote on it until the earliest april 3rd So we have meetings between now and then to get to as firm a number as possible Yeah, I mean you may want to add it andy to the next meeting agenda as of In case we get that between now and then We might have it by next week Okay I think that we've done as much as we can today More than anything else Go ahead and call and Kathy Kathy Okay, it's just a question. I mean you all will figure this out between now and when we next meet But what I'm remembering with jones Um, we had a big number and then we had A townshare number we had a this number and a that number because you've also got underneath this the cpa's 700 thousand dollars and the um ever source shone so You're the wizard at figuring out how that all you know, and then and you know our dead authorization msba's the way they pay For theirs is it's a continuous payment as the um eligible costs are incurred is what I understand So, you know, they're it's not like a third at the beginning a third in the middle and a third at the end So you'll just have to figure out what it is They need us to vote on. Yeah, their process is a little different than the mblc They're they're a little more strict about the the language so anything we bring to you will we have to make sure they approve it first Otherwise, we'll be back in front of you again for a second time. So, um, they're definitely more strict in the way we structure the votes Okay, that was my only point is that that that underneath the 98 isn't that's not all The dead exclusion. There's a big chunk of money that's coming at so Thank you Of course, we need to make sure that the public understands The total package said We have valid language that doesn't even have a number in it Um Lynn you know, this is actually pretty consistent with what you're all saying and that is that We need to recognize that Since we got the most recent estimates The building committee cut about five million plus Um We uh msb um mass school building authority Um Up the gain increasing us by about three million We just talked about five million here We just uh also Proved the cpa vote just last night And we still have the credits out there. We're not done We're just looking just turning over every rock to find what we can Because lisha, I hear you Thank you It's not anything else to be said on The topic of the elementary school building project that authorization so being done, I guess under um topics not considered But at 48 hours and they are not available to consider 48 hours in advance This is the referral was made to this committee At the meeting last night for um Has to do with compensation for service on the town council and It requires a report back on the For the first of april So I will add it to the agenda for the next meeting Which was to do the audit presentation and still is the audit presentation Any discussion about OPEB In status of OPEB Those were the two items that were on the meeting plan and this is uh Now added to the agenda for that next meeting Lynn Do you want to wait until the next meeting? to Ask for specific information That I think the town manager and the finance director may have to do a little homework on Or do you want us to raise that now? um I guess it's a brief informational questions. Yes I think that I don't want to have discussion on topic itself Because it was not opposed to the agenda item I'll look to Athena to tell me if I'm going out of bounds in The two responses of saying yes to getting information but No discussion I think it's a good idea to hold off until the next meeting considering there was some public interest in this topic at the council meeting last night and We saw some emails So I think in order to give the public The most amount of notice before the committee begins discussion including questions. It would be best to hold off Good hold off on the entire discussion Including posing questions I think questions might be okay, but it's it's just a slippery slope to get into a discussion Okay, uh Sean Athena would it be okay if Counselors just sent questions to Andy and then Andy distributed them to Paul and I Absolutely That might be the most efficient way to do is just have questions sent to you Andy That's exactly what I was going to ask Sorry Kathy No, no, but it's the same as when we do the budgets We've been someone gets schools and they send the the questions through so if we could do that and And I'm just I think you're just doing fact information finding, right? Yeah Thank you Okay, so we will do that and I'll make enough fruit to reach out to Matt and Bernie to let them know That this topic has been added and Make sure that everybody has the What was distributed I think I already May have sent that out of what was distributed the last time being I'll make sure that it was to the Resident members and then By questions and I'll let you try and bring Bernie and Matt back up to speed on this next issue text issue Do you know when we'll be receiving the audit because that's usually helpful to Have the ability to look at it to advance Yeah, I think we have it so we can post I'll send an email out, but I think we can post the audit and the OPEP report in the packet Probably tomorrow. I think I saw the packet was posted so we can get that put in tomorrow Okay So and I can't bring forward any minutes on my part There are some minutes that were distributed and I would encourage Given the fact that we're This has been a drag is to try and Bring them up to date for Others to take a look at them to just look at the minutes If you think that there are significant changes Uh then Send me an email so that we can figure out how to deal with it If not, just be prepared to make suggestions So that we have the next meeting can just can try and move some of those along So Anything else Kathy? I was just gonna say I looked at the minutes that were in this packet and they looked great So I will be prepared to just try to move them next time that they were one one set of minutes That's it. I don't I'm not trying to prolong today's meeting. I'm willing to get them off our list though Next week next time we meet. Okay Let's see what we can how much we can move along So anything else that somebody wants to raise that was not anticipated And Seeing none then I think that we are Adjourned to five minutes after five. Thank you. It's been Very productive difficult but productive meeting and Appreciate everybody's participation Thank you