 I'm going to call the meeting of the town finance committee of Tuesday, March 5th to order and it's eight minutes after the hour of two and To I think the first thing we need to do is talk about minutes not for not though We have minutes to approve but we have to make sure we have somebody who's going to take notes today's meeting and we Need to have a brief discussion about what our expectations are for contents of minutes and Whether we have any ideas of assistance that we might receive so that we can Make the minute taking easier, but today we do need to volunteer Well, I think we're at full cycle. So I started okay today. Okay. Thank you. So I had been in communication communication with Dorothy who was the taker of minutes at our last meeting and Center a copy of the regulation from the attorney general about open meeting law and the requirements of minutes and It's a summary it's not a transcript of discussion that's basically required and so I was Pointing out that the taker the minutes Should feel free to exercise judgment on what that means That the important things are that we hit the all of the requirement points about People present actions taken and any votes That we may take it recorded So those what's in in the absolute requirements has to be done and So I think it's we're all trying to just figure it out as far as the extent of the actual summary of the Discussion to take place so I don't know if anybody has any comments or Things that they want to say on the subject or if we just leave it with each person taking minutes. I Have a question your report was really quite good, but I don't see you taking notes How did you do that? I? Did take notes on key points that I wanted to cover in the report and When So I Some of it. I just do it quickly After a meeting so that is fresh in my mind, and I use basic notes which correspond to the agenda for the most part and I did have a little bit of additional though We had one public comment. I did take notes on the public comment. You wrote that up separately So that the one public comment I could send you my write up on that if you haven't already done it but You know it we do have written reports When we can and I tried to do it because I thought it was an important meeting to get summarized Anything else so the the question was whether we could find somebody one of our other committees talked about It was mentioned last night asking somebody who's in the senior volunteer program Or other volunteers to who would be interested in doing that We have to make sure that we're comfortable with their doing it so I Guess that's the key thing At least speaking for myself. I Didn't I haven't found it hard to do the minutes because I kind of take them by the agenda item So it's not trying to do a verbatim and I think one of the benefits that we're now capturing this on film Is there's a video record of all the specifics so we can capture the essence of the discussion? It doesn't have to be everyone who said what? And then if there's a member of the public identify who that is and what they did but it's You know going this was the topic. This was the topic in a brief summary And I've been looking across other committees and what What we're doing, but also what the planning board does and Those are the minutes. I find the most useful. I mean I capture a sense of what the discussion was not verbatim so What a Kathy and who's been sort of Working closely to keep track of the minutes and what gets recorded And I work together see if we can work with our Community participation officers and see if we can find a solution in the meantime Keep going with other things So the first numbered agenda item I wanted to Really turn this over a little bit to Lynn and Paul which is Preview of the March 7 budget forum Which is of course a requirement of the Charter it's section 5.3. I was rereading it this morning And what it says is only a couple sentences not later than March 15th But before the town manager submits a proposed budget to the town council The president of the town council with the cooperation of the town manager She'll call at least one public forum on the topic of the proposed budget the form is intended for the town council and the town manager To present priorities Context based on prior years budgets revenue and expenditure forecasts and other relevant information And to solicit feedback from the public There's another provision the Charter which I'm not going to bother to look for and read that talks about public forums and requiring that at least Is it half the time be devoted to hearing from the public? And it seems that the interpretation is that this hearing falls into that category and I Assume that that's because it mentions budget our financial To two hearings minimum one on finance and one on Yeah, Paul so there thank you There are two animals. There's the public forum animal and the public hearing Their public forums required. This is one of the public forums that are required that's required the school committee I believe is required to hold a public forum as well So this falls into the former category You the finance committee will also hold a public hearing On the budget both for the regional school district Which was just voted last night by the town council by the town council and then you're the normal budget That does not have the requirement that half the time be reserved for public comment only the public forum does And that's because of the participation section of the Charter not the budget section of the charter Yes, that's because What strikes me is is that in this now to help turn this over to You for your thoughts about this and what feedback you're looking for the committee about today, but to Do what is required in the second sentence Takes time and you can't you know, how do we monitor that? time when it's We want to hear from the public we certainly are not going to cut off hearing from the public But there's no way we can be assured once we start a presentation No matter how long it takes that there will be speakers there to speak for that He'd at least that amount of time My observation is basically we sit there until the time has expired Which sounds tedious? But I don't think we have a choice I Agree because somebody might think I'll come after school. I'll come by it's still open and they will come in Near the end ready to talk and we have to be ready to listen This particular events at 6 30 at night, but for example the school committee As it turns out is meeting at 6 o'clock that night at the high school Somebody could come over after that meeting. So I think we sit there whether we have an audience or not and Basically, we shouldn't talk because the more we talk the more we sit there But I don't know what else to say but the minute we start talking or deliberating or asking questions or debating We've added time to the agenda. I think that's right, but there is a presentation by the town manager and Presumably when whoever shows up from public will have at least a few you know what I'm reading is Priorities you know revenue and expenditure forecast so they'll have a context that they can Be giving feedback to Yeah, we'll get to the presentation I think the I think you're right Lynn that it's not us. It's it's whoever comes, right? is the we can talk between Paul and My and Sonia and myself We could talk for five minutes. We could talk for an hour if we talk for five minutes We have to stay for five minutes, which is pretty rude if we talk for an hour We have to stay for an hour and listen to public comment. That's the way it works Okay, so With that context, I think that what we're really trying to do if I Understand your purpose today is to get our feedback on what should be presented Yes, so I look at this is not a necessarily a public hearing but More akin to I think that the charter anticipated this to be a public forum They built in a 50% listening component purposely so that the Decision-makers would be hearing from the audience not talking at the audience and I think that that's It's been educational to go to some of the Listening sessions the school has put on because that's been a very listening environment There's a 15 minute maybe at the beginning presentation and then it's all small groups and listening and in fact I was thinking I haven't talked with the president about this yet next year We might want to think about it doing it a different way where we are More organized format like the schools did with listen small groups where everyone's voice gets heard It might be more interactive and more engaging For this one because it's the first one. I think we're gonna do it pretty straightforward Try to follow the charter as best we can and so That's how I'm approaching it that this is really a time for us to listen Give some basic information, but really to listen and This comes this is not a thing that we have done in the past. It's a new requirement of the charter previously previously the charter would have a we would do a financial indicators report in October and That was where the finance team would present Where we are in terms of a community Then the finance committee and the select board would take that information and then present Priorities from their perspective and Present those to the town manager the town manager would then go and build the budget come back in January present the budget to the To the select board in the finance committee and then that they would go along and do their process This puts a new meeting in there So that that says wait a minute. There's no piece in there that Says well, what does the public one is a priority? And so that's this sticks in a new meeting a public forum to really serve as a list listening device for the decision makers And I think that those steps next year will still happen. We'll do our financial indicators in the fall The town council and finance committee will establish priorities Then we'll do one of these forums to hear from the public and then we'll go build our budget and I think that the the thing they were trying to address is by the time the budget is presented and you hold a public hearing It's pretty much done. So why can't we get involved earlier? And I think that's the purpose of this listening. I think of it more as a listening session than a public forum so So I think so that's how I've been thinking about this and Sonia and Anthony and I've been working on a presentation that talks a little bit about the purpose of the session Talk about how priorities are set in terms of What what material I have in front of me today? IE the finance committee memo and the select board memo that I work from in terms of what are we trying to address in this upcoming budget? recognize that Municipal budgets don't change very much They really were our whole mission at this point is to Keep the services that we're providing still continue to provide them And then identify some of the priorities that I have heard and that has been articulated such as sustainability and resiliency roads sidewalks crosswalks You know age-friendly communities plan for the future I haven't really settled on all the terms we're going to put Forward and the big the big infrastructure projects. So we're sort of laying out what the Put up front what what I see is being the top priorities from the community and open to hearing from others Then we go into talking about where sort of a revenue How are might it are where our revenue comes from so people get a sense of what the constraints are on building a budget and Talk about expenditures and again talk about the sort of fixed pieces of the budget that That we just can't move around that don't allow us to do a whole lot of changes to it and Then talk about where we are in terms of FY 19 and in terms of how we're doing so far this year We're we're forecasting to go in FY 20 I'm summarizing these really quickly What are what's new on the horizon that we do know or or either know or don't know or or Know or coming but don't know much about them. So what we know is our health insurance increase for instance what we Don't know we know we know that there are new Revenue sources that potentially would come into the town like Airbnb and marijuana But we don't know much about how much they're gonna come so we're not building those into the budget But we know that they're out there And we know that we have union contracts that are unsettled things like that I would identify all the things that are out there that sort of status report on where we are and Then we go into Going where we are in terms of the budget time frame Talk a little bit about the time schedule So people know where else they can plug into as the time as the budget gets developed And then try to leave that over as much time as available to for public comment I don't see this as being a The normally we do the financial indicators report and it's about a 40 minute presentation. That's not what this is It's not the budget Presentation which is again about a 30 minute presentation. I don't think that's what this is It's sort of something in between that and so I don't think it is a super long presentation But I'm sort of Eyeballing this and trying to see where you think would be beneficial to the public to help them Make comments to us that would be informative to the council and to the manager Didn't start recording what you were saying fast enough You would I'm sorry, you would start with the financial indicators or guidelines Yes, the guidelines that have already been developed by the finance committee in the select right But abbreviated Well, those are each of those are very long documents, so I would just sort of identify them and highlight what the key points from each of them is Separate document on an indicator separate document on guidelines They're both guidelines one from the finance committee one from the select board, okay Are you going to have copies of those available? We can will be post copies so that they're available Maybe we post them but not have them handed out. I think posting is probably better I think we have they've been online on the budget page forever So yeah, we could post them as part of this meeting. Oh, absolutely if we refer to them We should so it's financial guidelines and the financial guidelines from the finance committee and from the select board and I also have my Goals the town manager goals from the select board that I referenced as well Those were the three Guidelines from the finance committee guidelines from the select board and then town manager goals I just Paul The the other one I heard you say when you went through your outline is you've got a Where we are right now an update on current fiscal year and Forced cast the best forecast we've got right now for FY 20 You know, so we saw those but they were still November, you know where we are so one of the Things that I think might be helpful off those two documents if when you present is I mentioned this to you the other day what I'm Realizing is that people don't understand how many things have to draw on the slice cold capital budgets that that's where roads are That's where a roof is that's you know, just you know, somehow saying, you know when you were talking about what are our constraints You know this Everything a whole Types of things that draw on that so you understand that it's the other things are Operating it's been useful when I draw people to that understanding that every hundred and fifty thousand dollars actually matters You know I think we need to I think we want to talk about the overall financial situation in the town the operating budget which Again, I don't know if there might be people coming in with with initiatives. Well, you heard some last night for Transportation or human services or community services things like that. I would assume we would hear from people who have those interests in mind You could have people come in saying I want more I think you should give more money to the schools and things like that whatever it is more money to please more money to fire whatever it is So I think we should we are our mission that night is to listen and Take it back to with us not to respond to everything There's a request from Amherst media that we not forget our microphones Thank you Yes Yeah, what would be helpful for I think me and everyone else would also to get the breakups of you know we have these broad categories of Operational but you know what are the main categories of expenses, but where they're going because that would allow us to see versus last year, you know, like this extra resources Services or you know, where do we can we find those? Categories the categories in terms of like public safety that category public safety within that, you know, they go specific allocations being made whether you know the So we have the broad categories right now, but could we see the breakup within that where The money is going to the different so under public safety. How much is going to police? How much is going to fire you want to get a little more detailed is what you're asking? Yeah, I mean That's where you really do need to look at the F-19 town managers budget Because that's where the breakout occurs and I think that what we want to do it Over the next couple of meetings is to find a Place where we can Really work on one or two sections of it how to read the budget If there are questions that come up about how do I read that budget? What does this mean or we just want to walk through a section we do that? Yes, Andy if you could divide it up I'm would be much would prefer if I would study before we do each section Because we're talking about from the big book, right? Yes. Yes. Okay. So if you would indicate what sections that we're going to talk at which session which meeting Then I would make sure to read that before we come to that meeting and discuss it And I think that it would be certainly more understandable that way. Yeah We will be talking about the future schedule in the moment and so we're going to jump her And this is jumping around a little bit but with this smaller group. I don't mind jumping around Because we talked about one of the things that is on here is review the finance committee meeting schedule and work plan I've kind of leaving that on as a placeholder so we can always talk about our schedule One thing that we do know about is the next week Mr.. Mongano is going to come back and make an additional presentation About aspects of the capital budget that we had previously discussed both the major building and the school building questions that we had posed and So that is now planned for next week. So I think that That it will probably take up a Significant portion of our allotted time and we probably will need to limit the amount of time we spend on the budget We will do a lot more of the 19 budget on the 26th Which will Yeah, no the 19th I meant I guess so that's correct You're like 26 we're doing the region so We'll have to figure this out, but if there are sections of the budget departments that particularly interest you Really doesn't matter because we really just need to Get you to look at one of you know the sections that are appropriate was as indicated and then Be prepared for Sunya to go into them in more detail So if you have any departments or Functional areas that you're particularly interested in This is a good time to suggest it So Andy so so I think we sort of peck mapped it out as being like Public works public safety the sort of functional areas that we have and Sequentially go through them is in as much detail as the finance committee would like us to so you understand more Details about how those but what's in those budgets and why they look the way they do if Sonya after this meeting can just show me where to find the document that you for current year that you've been working on I Can put I we've got this section in SharePoint called reference materials So to the extent people you know when we pre inauguration we got the super thick Document in our folders, so we have a print document too, but just people know Yeah, we also got the thumb drive Yeah, right. Yeah, right. It's on the thumb drives You know so I'm just that people should know that they have some of this material that just might not remember Where it was and when they got it Yeah, I just found it on the website. It's the financial the download Yeah, so I just want to suggest that everybody check out the accounting website There's a lot of information there, too There's the quarterly reports that we used to do in the past and I'm still doing them and posting them on the website So if you want to see what's happening right now where we're at at certain points That's where you would look and that will show you the allocations to all the different departments individually within the functional areas So I think that's a good start Good summary Yeah, I mean the other place to look is obviously and this is for anybody who's watching this meeting at home, too on the website under the first tab for as you go to the Home page of the town website at Amherst MA gov Under government there's a section called budget and for each year You'll see then listed below the budget documents for that year so that you can go back and find prior year's budget documents and For the purposes of the current year, it's FY 19 the year. We're working in right now as we develop the budget for FY 20 so the FY 19 one is populated with things like the budget that we'll be talking about which is for sort of Laying groundwork purposes the FY 20 budget won't be presented to us until my first Yes So I did find it on the website and I just googled it fine town manager's budget Financial year and it came up but so I guess my question was In terms of the public forum to what extent do we want to give details like exactly that under community services, you know This is what we did last year and this is what we're doing this year So are we going to that X to that? Detail extent so the people know where we shift if there's any shift in priorities or what we Or is it going to be just major categories public works community services? You know what I mean? So I think That will come when I present your budget, but I think the purpose of this meeting on the on the 12th is or whatever the what a Thursday 7th is To listen first before saying here's what we're doing next year because we are don't want to put out What we're doing next year until we've heard feedback from people And so we'll have that I don't think I think when I make the budget presentation that level of detail is appropriate But at this forum, I think it's more for us to be hearing from the public in terms of What where should our priorities or do we have our priorities misaligned in terms of what you your expectations are? so As you look at your presentation It's kind of setting the context for how people think about the budget. It's Here's the guidance Ungiven Here's You know the budget we're working on right now. Here's the operating side of it. Here's the capital side Okay, I am going to suggest that I Pick up and do the budget time frame and schedule at the end but then I have a question and seeking advice of Is there a logical way to For have people provide comments within a certain Copic area for example I'd like to take comments first that pertain to X Doesn't mean you won't might won't have an opportunity later, but in order for us to have a Informative discussion. Let's do X then we'll do why Etc. Is there a logical way to do that? Well, that's how town meeting did it when they considered the budget for approval Right, that might be how the council would do your budget hearing or the finance committee would do your budget hearings do it Okay, it's sort of mimic what town meeting did I Think just hearing what you some of the members of the finance committee said earlier What if someone that comes in late they're at another meeting and they come in and they miss the opportunity and we'd still have the opportunity but You know, is there anybody who needs to go back to a topic? We can give the opportunity later for people who come in but you know, suppose we do have 50 people in the audience Okay, my I have I don't have any side bets on this But I have a theory about who's going to show up. Okay, and I think we could have 50 people in the audience We'd like to hear your thoughts about the budget as it pertains to X Then we're going to move on etc. So I need some Refresher on how that was done in the pack So I think that's really interesting if you if there are 10 people in the audience That's one way you can say you just ask them each one of them what they think But if you have a hundred people in the audience or 200 people or 50 you might need to organize that I think that's really wise to pre-think that and probably the way to do that would be let's talk about public safety Let's talk about community services. Let's talk about school, you know education. Let's talk, you know, those different major I'm not sure if you'd talk about education necessarily because they have their own public hearing system But all the things are on the town side of the ledger Oh Just in again listening to what people's concerns where I think that might be a good way to manage it Sort of like how we organize the budget in general those large categories Okay, so I'll just go back to a former town meeting Schedule and okay, and and when I get to the schools I'm just going to say given that the schools have had their own hearing we are not going to Do the schools at this time And what one thing we might do in addition to that? If you do those big topics You might say and after we get through that, you know, just give them a preview after we get through these topics We'd love to hear anything that's specific to your neighborhoods You know, so it goes from you know the big topics and you can hold that till later if you know There's dead silence in the room You know, but it's a way of getting very local Versus very large and it might be do the large first and then Local depending on how the flow is going Yeah, Dorothy. I have a question. I've noticed the room was awfully full. Was it last night? Yes, so how many people can be here? How large if you take the chairs out and everybody stands We're in the middle school. Well, we're at the middle school fine. I this speak. This is because I Believe that the people who are most likely to come are either the people who have become town council Watchers, okay, and Former town meeting That's why we moved it to a larger venue. Yeah, the one thing that's important to At least have in reserve to remind people about if it doesn't get into an introductory piece is that The bottom line of the library and schools budget is something that is within your purview, but that the details of how the what the priorities are and how that money is expended is a matter that belongs to the library trustees and director and to the school committee and superintendent and that It's one of those realities of municipal budgeting that we All understand but we need to remind people of they always had to remind town meeting of that Just since now I'm in the town meeting frame thinking of the middle school Would you have reports on the table people who went in for the town meeting? We're used to being able to get written reports on the table. I think people would appreciate that What reports so we won't various financial documents, but not everything up We did not anticipate doing that just because we like trees And we don't know how many people will be there Everything is online anything that we would print is already online So if there was a particular document, you thought would be very beneficial to people We'd be happy to do it But even that we never printed multiple copies of more than we needed of the finance committee Report because we gave enough to the town meeting members, but didn't have a lot of extra copies for that The I mean, I think also to Kathy's point. I think that a lot of times people This is a public hearing a public forum on the budget, but I think you're right I think a lot of people think about their neighborhoods or their personal circumstance and they would appreciate the opportunity to make a statement about that and I think it's President I have not talked about this. I mean it is you're the one calling the meeting, but I think it's totally People want to talk about service levels and things like that I think we is the This is for many people the only opportunity They'll have to speak directly to the manager and the council about this type of thing And I think it might be wise to say we're happy to listen to anything you have to say on these things I'm not sure if you have the same thoughts on that I like that So one of the things we also One of the things we want to ask them to do first of all I will lay out some general guidelines, okay? But one of the things we want to ask them to do is their name where they live and their district Okay, do you do you think you're gonna want the countdown clock from town meeting? I don't think so other thoughts about the Forum no, I I think it sounds great, and as Paul knows Sarah and I have jumped in with trying to do a district meeting on Sunday So we're going to do just a little if you weren't at the meeting on Thursday Here are the big issues and ask again, you know be there to listen on these issues So using some exhibits you do so we'll have a second round that's district one focus But at this in the same way you've just described be there more to listen then to be promising And I guess the only other thing that I would suggest at least be prepared to respond to a little bit is the question that we frequently get asked which is I'm not so much interested in the total amount of money going into roads I want to know what's happening to the sidewalk I'm interested in and how is that decision made and how can I influence that decision and I think we're hearing a little bit through JCPC process to and We're Probably need at some point to have a firmer understanding of How that works with the transportation advisory committee and what's an executive function on those kinds of decisions In what's a legislative function? It's sort of a distinction that we've never quite had to make in the way that we're making it now and but I think it's Just from the comments. I'm getting and seeing it seems to be a Issue that is there anything else Yeah, go ahead So we're not doing any printouts and I agree with that Good bill of trees, but is there part of your presentation initially? Will there be anything that you're sharing that we could provide a link to people ahead of time in all our Messaging that if you're interested look up this information before coming. I think that I Want to second that so that even an agenda that has the links right in it that Is available electronically available in paper and How do they get on the guest website? for ARPS just So that they can sit there and electronically look at the budget if they want to So you're seeking a sheet that shows the agenda key links that they can find electronically during the meeting or prior to the meeting and post meeting Yep, so Anything else on this topic? I was going to move it along and keep an eye on the time Yes, so when we sort of scope this out, it's not a long presentation It's like 15 minutes or something like that maybe 20 by time we get through through it but I think that that's probably an appropriate length of time because It depends how much People want to comment on the other side because I again I do frame this in terms of it's us Sitting there listening versus us sitting there telling you what's going to happen. Are you going to do this with slides? And Will you at the end of the slide put key dates for the schedule? Okay I guess the other question that you just have to sense out at the time is that if people ask questions That beg for a response. They're not What are you going to do but how things work or something like that? Whether to respond really needs I would suggest Madam president has to make a determination as to whether it seems appropriate to try and see if our response is appropriate or not Do you think I should start with clarifying questions? I'd say Yeah, I don't know either Yeah, and the other thing is without being sounding dictatorial nor trying to Not prioritize the counsel we really don't want this to be a time that counsel spends Asking questions We want like the school listening sessions. We want this to be us listening Okay, yeah, I I very much like I agree totally agree Lynn and I I really liked that Jumping right into the 15 minute or the 12 whatever Here's some information the first time we've done it. We're here to listen to you and get as quickly to Other people in the room talking as possible would be great You know because it's the first time we've had a kind of a dialogue about this I Think I think what's why that's important is that it sends a real message to the people that you're in listening mode and I was influenced by this way the superintendent and the school committee set up their listening sessions because it was designed to enable people to speak and to be heard and I Think that was a real interesting model to me So I think that it really even if you didn't attend you got the message that was a listen as an opportunity to be heard And I think that's that's a real important message for the council to be communicating that we're here to listen to you And you know counsel is doing a lot of things, you know with your district meetings and stuff to Engage with it the community So I think that it builds on that narrative that you've already started to develop anything else on the forum Okay Next item on the list is I Put down discussion in March to four towns meeting on regional budget I reported on that last night and everybody was present last night so that I don't feel a need to Repeat what I said. I just didn't know if there were any questions or follow-up discussion that You're anxious to have Feel like you're okay at this point the budget will be presented to us So that it wasn't really about the budget yet. It was more about the assessment method How to Get that method down and Just the fact that we had agreement amongst the four towns. Yes, Paul So this would be for the school budget and probably the regional school district budget, but also the town budget. I would assume I'm trying to figure out where is the Time to make a budget presentation that would be in the public realm and is the public hearing is being held by the Finance committee. So is that when you would expect the budget? Presentation to be made because I think that it makes sense for the you know school superintendent And me to be independently making our presentations to you on this topic. I just don't know where that exactly fits in Yeah, we Lend is just doing some thinking about that subject And because we don't want to Ask Key staff from the schools to do it multiple times Think that the first discussion we have Certainly wouldn't want to expect the superintendent to be there In the give us the budget we'll look at the budget see what questions we have but Since there's multiple pieces that are going through here and if we're not if we don't ask them to come to too many meetings I just sent In reply to Superintendent Morris's request to us I did send the four key dates and of them identified to where I thought it was important that they have someone there This is for the general budget for the school budget Not the SOI and But did state in the others that in the past They would have come before the finance committee Prior to town meeting So I really leave it left it up to them you can see it Yeah, I mean usually I mean they would always have some pretty good presence at town meeting because it was quite A vote, you know That was when the largest number of people were there But they also came to the finance committee and did a more detailed and earlier presentation and sort of Enabled the finance committee to put together a report Though it go to town meeting in advance. This is a little bit more of a Experiment to see what works. I don't think we know yet. Well in fact They bring the budget Not to the finance committee. They bring the budget to the town manager Now they submit the Well, they submit the budget and then they send it to the council The council has just voted that it automatically comes to the finance committee This is the regional budget, right? I'm sorry. Yes And then the regional So the first take I mean the question is who do we want to have present on Our first meeting where we're getting it after it's been referred to us and we as a finance committee are looking at it I think that's what the first question is and Recognizing that we really don't want to ask Superintendent to attend four different meetings, which ones are the most important ones for the superintendent to attend That's what the Discussion was about and of course the dates were the 26th of March when the budget is presented The April 2nd hearing public hearing The April 9 when we do our vote on the budget and then the meeting where the Council is voting so those are the four meetings And How how many times is it right to ask the superintendent to be there and Which are the most important points? Yep, so my sense is that the public would expect the presenter of the budget You know the superintendent or me or whoever to be at the public hearing making a formal presentation About what's in the budget and why you set those priorities and based on the information you've had at that time So you might get it for it. You might have it for one meeting that you sort of go through it That but that he should have on his calendar that April 2nd Public hearing and then whatever the day in May is when you have the town manager budget public hearing that that's where you would expect a formal presentation With slides of summary and the budget will be have been out in the public realm for a few weeks by then as well And then people can He'll make you know ask questions or do however they want to engage with that So I would Get back to the question of March 26th meeting. I don't know if Mr. Mangano is intending to be here for that meeting in whether that would suffice and Then the forum we know The April 9th discussion I think at that point other follow-up discussions questions that are likely or Do we feel like we're Going to be in a position by then to know enough that we can just make our own judgment and I one other thing I'm going to just throw out there just to Irritate people is that even though we voted last night to schedule an extra meeting doesn't mean we have to use it and Seems to me that by the time we go through the public hearing process And to prior rounds of discussion It's gonna be a lot of familiarity with the budget and the pre-encouraged the Council to attend the public forum It Strikes me that the actual final vote may not be that There may not be that many questions left and you may be able to go ahead and do it on the earlier date And not use the additional meeting date because I'm not sure that there'll be questions left at that point I Think we make that call as we get closer. I agree. I just think that we shouldn't Feel like we're bound to have that use that 29th date. I think you that's a judgment call For the president and who's part of this committee and this committee to have Yes, it does speak that we For that series of meetings you want those to be meetings of the whole Or just the public hearing via meeting of the whole no, I'm glad you asked that because One of the suggestions last night Was that we call them all is or we select which ones But it may be that we want to start with The only April 23rd That's the one where we're doing the actuary in debt What about the budgets? The only caution is that you have to get a quorum then of the council not just the finance committee to operate If we call a committee of the whole and the council doesn't show not show up Enough to call a meeting Do we need to if we've also called a fin-com meeting? Can't we just go ahead with a fin-com meeting? I hope so. I don't know the answer for sure. I don't know if you can start Schedule simultaneous meeting. I don't know. I don't know the answer to that question Say you're saying council or default to finance committee, right? So it has to be posted as Both how did Northampton do it? They posted they post as both And when I've been looking through how some of the other towns do it They often post as both where they know that you know if it was another town seven is a quorum They're expecting seven counselors to come up. So they just posted as both although it is the key topic so I read Attorney general opinion on this and they said that if it's clear the discussion is about what the committee is talking about But counselors can be there having announced that they will be there It's perfectly fine to have seven eight, you know, have her ever many show up, but it has to be posted as both Thank you Is there a downside to doing that? We should but I suggest that we do it so it saves a whole line of inquiry So when do you want to start that? So I'll jump in I think you'd want to do it on the April 2nd, which is the public hearing on the school budget and Then during your May meetings that when you have when you go to two a week during May meetings You don't think we should do the 23rd as well of April probably yes because those were we actually did announce those to the Council as a whole so So I've got April 2nd April 23rd May 7th May 9th May 14th May 16th May 21st May 23rd Well, that's when the committees can actually discuss the budget, which is not informational It's not like I think that what was the reason that Councillor Buur brought it up is that If we're expecting for example on the 9th that the Department of Public Works staff Will be present to explain how the budget works in their side that that's something that Previously would have been presented twice once at the finance committee and once at the town meeting And because there's not going to be an equivalent presentation at town meeting that that's the only time that Councillors could Possibly attend something. I think that's what she was thinking so So we stop with the 21st I Unless we start seeing a groundswell and people we can see we can see if we get a request from the Council to be more present than we can do it for the we can add that date so I think It's everybody comfortable with that discussion of schedule But I think then we've because we've been talking about schedule So we've been talking a little bit also when we talked about the F5 18 questions on budget information materials and discussion of committee learning needs I Just want to make sure that on that second one that would get back to it to see if there's anything we're missing other than the Presentations that have previously been described during this meeting. Can I also ask that we just one more time? And then I'll edit the email back to superintendent Morris and that is that on March 26th for the regional school budget If it's self-explanatory there doesn't need to be anybody there Yes, I think we're saying mr. Mangano if he's available would be there. Okay and for the April 2nd definitely need to have someone there Superintendent I think that's the intent my understanding is that when if he would make a presentation In public about the budget Okay, I think that's right and then the question is whether Two other the two other meetings are the ninth whether if there's follow-up questions that come up before we take a vote and Who might be there and? But we certainly don't expect A large grouping and then the the last one is when we take the Budget vote itself But I think the answer to that is and I probably will incorporate this into my next Report written report to the council as a whole Emphasizing that the time that's most valuable for them to come is to be there for the public Hearing on the April 2nd and because there we're not working under the forum rules They can speak and they can ask questions so That sound right Seems to be agreement nodding around of heads which is as close as we get to voting on anything in this group But that's okay So April 9th only if there's questions raised at the hearing Yes, okay, and on April 29th. Are we expecting a presentation? That's to the full council Paul my news So I think the way that worked at town meeting is the finance committee presented to the town meeting So that would be basically the finance committee saying we had a hearing on this. We considered it Here's our recommendation to you the council You might need someone from the school department to answer questions, but typically it was the finance committee who introduced Items to the town meeting which is what your role would be to the council. They're saying what is your advice Andy would have better? Yeah, I think You know we're guessing now because this is the first time through the process But the kinds of questions that would come from the floor of town meeting There was no other forum that most of those people had to ask those questions Because we have and if we encourage people to come on the 9th we've actually provided that forum already and So it may be that it's not necessary This actually might be an interesting question if Kathy or I Just sent an email to Dave Murphy and asked him How the school budget presentation happens and How many times do they have the superintendent come might be interesting to see what he responds to us so That said Getting back to the question that I was Raising before because we've really been sticking with the agenda pretty well, but jumbling things together, which is fine but Is there anything else in the way of information Material or learning needs that you found as members that you think you need more understanding about and Would like to ask Sonya to try and see what she can do to to address Do you think we're beginning to get there? Okay, and I don't think there's anything else on Any of the items that have been listed on the agenda No public to make public comments and we have no meetings minutes of prior meetings to approve Was there anything else that wasn't on the agenda that is not an anticipated item Okay so just going our next meeting we know is the Primary purpose of the meeting will be to get back into the capital questions and information that will help us to understand the various options and in consequences of the Request to support the SOI statement of interest for the MSBA and I'll talk with Sonya about whether we want to have one portion or two portions of the Operating budget, but you won't be here right at the next meeting Yeah, so we may not want to hold that anyway And I am sending and an email asking the finance committee to review our charge Yeah, oh that is a unanticipated item You are correct, and I but we don't need to discuss it. I just need to put you on tell you about it is that The request as I understand it is that we review our committee charge now that we've begun to delve into Actually operating as a committee and see if there's anything That we might recommend back to the council to consider regarding the charge And to the governance committee so you know one Topic that was raised at the last town council meeting So it's in addition to this within 48 hours is the Non-resident members of the council and the rules committee will be discussing that this afternoon and Hopefully come back with a recommendation on How that might be done so to the extent one of the issues that was raised when that Discussion happened and actually Andy raised it on whether we might want to consider a longer than one-year term For the non-residents so that they can come on and stay with the committee and that would require an amendment of the charge if we did that You know so I mean that just that that one item would so it would be on the when we review the charge We're also talking about that piece of it Andy do you want to do you want to just take this as a Unanticipated within 24 hours 48 hours and have it now Because there's actually a couple two other things that I want here I guess What we should what I would suggest is that we list we go ahead and list the items is was just done and talking about terms for the Non-council members or citizen members if there are other things we want to put on the list We should go ahead and do that and then we'll put it actually as an agenda item for next time So the here are the other items one is two-year terms Another one is that they be appointed effective July 1st 2019 and Third one is that the finance committee chair or his designee from the finance committee do the interview process as being developed by the outreach communication and Appointments committee and That the recommendation then for the residents be forwarded by the finance committee To the full council for approval So Lynn you're suggesting those are issues to be discussed next time Do you want the rules committee also to focus on those? We're meeting in about an hour and a half, you know, I I'm under I understand you are and I was actually planning to come Do you're meeting for about 15 20 minutes? Okay? so you I mean the problem that I'm having in thinking about this is that if we ended up with citizen members who were very familiar with the budget and they would For example somebody who served on the prior finance committee They'd be able to get up to speed really quickly if They were talking about people who are interested in the budget have really good sense about Financial matters, but have had not not had that kind of experience to drop them in on the process late is going to complicate our lives not make our lives more informed and better and It's very difficult to give feedback on How to do it with that because that's sort of the vagueness that's out there We can't we don't want to make policy around who we hope is there So I don't know what to say My other my other logic for suggesting the two-year terms is that under normal circumstances that group of four people would then Be holdovers to the next elected council, so they actually bring with them some useful memory that You know may not be there among the council's counselors who return My question is when do you think new members could come on where it would work Where's a natural breaking point dividing line? I think what was just proposed that we consider is July 1st, so I Heard that but then Andy said he still had a problem with them coming up to speed So I'm wanting to know when he thinks what is the ideal time? Well, that's I said to come on July 1st Obviously would would work well because then people will be on the committee Sort of in its more quiet period of the year and then build up to speed as we develop the budget Process and we can and so we'll have plenty of time To work with somebody who's unfamiliar If it was somebody who had previously served on the old finance committee That's not necessary, but as we said we can't build life around The possibility that one of them might or two of them might fall into that category So we're kind of stuck Where we are but just think about how much you've been learning already and What's going to be the effect of dropping people into the process and they're gonna have a lot of the questions And start us all over again going back and working with that That's I think what the challenge we're facing is I Think Andy's comment was if we brought them on now, it would be a challenge Because July first is the beginning of the next year, you know, so so I just when we Consider this I think two years is reasonable and we can talk about it I even thought three years might be with staggered terms for the same reason Lynn that More continuity building up knowledge will serve the town well So we can just when we convene to talk about it It was the term that used to be for the finance committee And I don't think everyone went off at the same time, but it's I think it's worth at least thinking about Andy I was actually gonna ask that question. What was the three-year but staggered there were three years in staggered. Yes Yeah, I mean we do in the When your committee meets later today, I mean one of those things that you have to consider is that It's likely that some members of a council will run for re-election When councils come up for re-election and some won't and that there will be some continuity, but you can't Guarantee that there won't be an entire turnover in council either because of decisions of counselors or decisions of voters And those are the kinds of difficult issues that we're going to have on lots of things Is what kind of institutional memory will be forward and I guess that Melissa and I haven't thinking about that a lot because we've been carrying institutional memory from the select board in kind of Realize the value of it realize the value that all of you are bringing to the to this group because you don't You ask them good questions and don't get stuck in the past So anything else we need to talk about now not all your suggestion of adjournment Okay, we turn We are adjourned at three twenty five