 should probably call the meeting to order it is five o'clock um recording in progress we do have guests and as usual i would ask you to introduce yourselves please okay okay and we have uh eveline on the zone eveline for him here okay thank you um so the first uh item is to uh review and amend and approve the agenda for the may second 2023 select board meeting action likely and you said you had additions sarah well actually you have to uh approve the minutes for the 18th i'm sorry you have to approve the minutes for april 18th first i moved that way yeah okay meetings the uh minutes of april 18th well second it all those in favor i any post okay now reviewing and amending and approving the agenda uh yes and i think here comes bridging um we have right in the nick of time yeah um i made it now last minute uh it's a new access permit for driveway access for david and barba car key you guys approved one before at least they're just putting in a little bit so that needs to be approved and this is a letter of intent for to participate in the municipal roads grants uh and an aid program it's not a commitment it's not a contract it's not an agreement it's just saying yes we want to participate it needs to be submitted by friday so you know this kind of that's something that requires a motion i just gonna get it in minutes because it's no it's not binding you guys do it every single year okay and all right morning give it to me also uh uh mitch dropped off some mowing bids he doesn't know if the select board needs to approve them or not but they're you have them there so that's that we have reviewed them in the past yeah so you just have to and then that's it i'm just gonna leave this for you when you guys this is the right way and then under other business i'll talk about the town hall meeting okay yep anxious to hear okay so with those changes is there a motion to approve the uh agenda for today's meeting tonight's meeting i'll second it okay uh moved by randy seconded by victor all in favor i need a post okay we've approved our agenda reviewing and updating the town's personnel policy action likely so we have been given 25 minutes there's no action it's just to start talking about it no no no i get it so that's what i was going to say so this is the beginning of the discussion not it's not the end of the discussion so what i would suggest we do is go through starting at page one and pick out the things that we want to start the discussion as they said so to my reading of this i don't think there's anything under title and authority we need to deal with section one nor is there anything in persons covered nor is there anything in equal employment opportunity conduct of employees so anything we want to do about that anything we had on that peter was social media i think it was deemed if i'm not mistaken that what somebody puts on their own social media is was there a section that we we didn't have them well there's nothing in there like section four is just a page for conduct of employees okay i i'm remembering that the same way vicar that the discussion was that as long as folks are not putting forth representation as town employees and expressing opinions as a town employee that that we were there's the freedom yes correct so we need to add social media language right the other thing i had on line notes and i don't know if it fall onto this but at one time you guys talked about reviews or discipline policies we get to we get to reviews further along here we do get to very separate so that would be a separate okay whole separate yeah section 12 is performance evaluations okay okay so here we go hours of service and pay periods we know we need to talk about that right or maybe we don't it is a correct representation of how we do payroll during the right the last line in section five that payroll is distributed by weekly yes payroll falls on a holiday payroll will be generated on Wednesday of the pay week and the pay period runs from 12 a.m on saturday to 11 59 p.m friday that's correct i think you know the big question in my mind is that we've talked about in the past is the the switch between eight hour days and 10 hour days and the summer hours conversation so the question is the question is is the language in here the correct language for the personnel policy and that should be discussed outside the personnel policy or should there be a section called summer work hours that talks about at the discretion of the select board kind of thing well so i mean it already discusses the says the regular work week and and you know how it is it's able to be varied upon based on the road foreman and road commissioners presentation to the select board so i would think that it falls under that it's just whether or not you know there's been a lot of conversation around how wishy washy that time frame is and if the question in my mind is do we just want to set any kind of you know is it memorial day week to labor day week or whatever and i think and for me you know having the extension be so long and constantly variable we've seen it i've seen it change and so i've participated in here three different times that feels like so i think for me that's that's the big question is do we want to address that or do we feel like the language covers it and you know the select board takes a stance at that at those conversations to provide direction say the issue the issue for me is that from year to year particularly in the spring time depending on the conditions for me it could be variable i mean when you think that mud season can last potentially until the middle of may that we may have substantial damage left over from mud season does that bother us that we then have people on summer hours or not i don't know yeah eric i will tell you how i handled it this year is from what i read in the minutes last year you guys said may first they could go to summer hours what i decided to do was switch two people for friday and two people on monday so we're working the greater five days to get the roads put back to shape before we switch to our normal vortex that gives the greater opportunity around the fall week long for the month of next well until they're put back together until they're which could be two weeks could be three weeks i don't know could be sir could be six so they're so you're you're saying that two people are doing ten hour days monday through thursday and then two people are doing Tuesday friday until it's all set up and then it will be friday's off say but that's that i think is a perfect example of how the policy is it's written works that's right that's what it might be was supposed to happen it's supposed to be flexibility for them to come make the presentation and have a select which they have that sounds good because i want to make sure the roads are put back together before we we do the official i think they should be and i think the other thing we talked about at some point through this discussion is inviting the road crew to come in and talk about this with them in the room which i still think is a good idea don't need to do that today or tomorrow or next week but i think it'd be good to hear from them and i think it would be good for them to hear from us but i don't think unless anybody disagrees that we need to change the policy as it's written i think it covers it the only thing we have to change is that it's not it should be discussed before you do it well approved by the select board well so that's what this says it says a regular work week for the highway department consists of 40 hours with times and schedules to be approved by the select board in consultation with the road foreman and road commissioner right so for those periods of time whenever there's a change in my mind this says that you too should consult and then come to the board with a recommendation the board can consider and approve or deny i agree with you 100 percent uh but we didn't do that and we should i guess yeah i didn't i wasn't aware we had to do that so i think the language for me the language provides flexibility at the same time as as you know giving input and approval from from the board um you know the length of the length of summer hours and things like that while it's on my mind you know is a different issue than than what the policy says specifically here unless folks want to take a more firm stance on that but my my focus is uh i would like to see us give eric as much leeway as we can on you know topics like that because who else knows better than he on what hours and who when they should be working we trust them all winter to be working when it's when to come out and when to go home so yeah that's all i was and i think we did bring it up in april but then we postponed it but now we all know i think i think this language you know i don't think every i mean the question is this sounds like every change every change in the regular hours needs to go from eric to vic to us okay and i think that's fun but in the wintertime with snow and in mud season with mud and when we have storms and when we have other stuff absolutely eric needs to have the discretion to call him in uh it doesn't say what regular work hours are i think that's 40 hours that's after that's outside of this conversation i think he's got the discretion to to you know create the work as needed uh or the work the availability of work for those guys as we need it's just the the normal work times right and that extra that extra duty isn't needed you know and he needs to manage sick time and vacation time and all that stuff so that there's coverage and that's definitely within his purview yeah and i guess i would only say from the perspective of um you know what the towns people perceive um is that in this all the only reason i know about this is because we have a facebook neighborhood group and everyone loves to complain about the only thing they can complain about which is the roads um and so like just from the perspective of you know there's a week of all rain right and then it's a beautiful sunny day on friday and no one sees the road you know the road crew out there i mean i think you probably already do this you probably already are like okay we know that there's something this week right there's just something weird going on with the weather and like things have to change your schedule has to change a little bit um because it's really about perception because no i mean i don't know what you yeah you know and i don't know what you guys do all day but i know you're not just sitting there when it rains right doing something and um and so you know but it's whether it's not so i agree whether it's winter or summer or whatever it is you know trying to manage trying to manage and take a look at the weather and do what makes sense yes absolutely but i don't think that needs to be addressed no it doesn't already isn't here can i can i ask what the uh normal hours of operation of that i feel like i know but just so it is captured it's been six to two three for the five days so should we say that in here i don't like nine o'clock is it well i don't know like what if you're a parent of a young kid you're not going to get in there at six maybe you're going to want to work from eight to four thirty i don't think we should put in that time well we're not going to make an exception for one member of the road crew i don't think well if you're family friendly you might i don't know and have him working by himself for two hours in the afternoon and come in two hours late in the morning i'm just saying i don't think we want to put it in here there may be some opportunities there may be some situations where the time changes i just think part of the problem you're talking about is people see members of the road crew stopping work at two thirty in the afternoon and they think what the hell's going on why are they leaving at two thirty in the afternoon when the roads are still bumpy or icy or and then they go to the office as they work eight hours a day five days a week well if if the roads are still icy we won't be going home anyway yeah well i'm saying is i don't think it hurts to put in with the regular hours it's uh is that i mean how many how many members of the community are going to be reading the personal policy anyway no but right no it's perception like it's all perception but but with that said i understand i questioned myself the six o'clock in the winter time well when you have got school buses it actually saves works perfect yeah it works it works we're able to make sure work out before yeah i don't i'm not so sure i and i know we have a couple of people that really maybe three maybe four i don't know uh that like to go to work at six instead of going to work seven to three thirty i don't know well it just seems to work especially in winter time and yeah but i mean you change your hours to 10 hours sometime during the summer would you change your hours from seven to four thirty instead of six to six to four thirty go seven to five thirty i wouldn't want to do that no because you're having but but i think so during you know one of the questions that comes into my mind is you know road condition in the in the shoulder seasons when you're not plowing when you're not having to maintain roads for buses so to speak you're dealing with mud mitigation it's still dark out if you're doing brush cutting or anything like that you know the some of the questions that i've fielded are okay what are they doing till uh till it's light enough out to get out working and then they're not out and the response that i've had thus far is though they're preparing for the day oh yeah there's plenty to do but i will you know that's the those are the things that you know um being in this position that that i've fielded questions on i don't know about the rest of you but it's like yeah okay so if it's if it's dark and they're not ready to get out working because it's not light enough out for them to see safely you know are they just sitting around drinking coffee you know whatever you know that's that's from the public's view you know that's the mentality for some folks coming through so um i you know personally um especially during the spring time when it gets light earlier once daylight the the time change has has taken place you know it's get out there nice and early and just start the day and go it's a lot easier so um i don't necessarily think it needs to be you know put into the to the policy uh what those hours are because they could potentially change if as a as a manager of those folks if you had a bunch of um those if the majority of the crew that worked better to start at seven o'clock having the ability to move that from six to seven i think that's in in the best interest of of having Eric have a little bit of wiggle room there so i don't i don't necessarily think putting in here i do i do feel like posting those hours once they're changed and maybe periodically for the town residents to know what they are is important especially during the transition between the five uh day work week in the four day work week um just so people know that's my thought on anything else rigid you're being very quiet over there i'm usually very quiet sometimes i break out of my mo i i have nothing further to add okay well i like the idea of eric and victor having flexibility to manage the road crew the best they can for the benefit of the town and from time to time we get from complaints from people we need to be able to deliver that message to them i guess is what i'm saying so we're going to leave it alone for the time being eric and i are probably the only one i want to get maybe no oh no maybe well we can uh we make major changes we can certainly you know i do think i do think having the hours on the town website and when they change posting them on front porch forum makes sense i mean it's easy enough to do you got to remember to do it i understand that one more thing you got to remember to do but um i think that makes sense and maybe you might stop some of the phone calls maybe i think one of the only other pieces in this section that that catches my eye if we're not posting work hours or we don't have set work hours is the last sentence of paragraph three that says employees who are calling and are expected to notify their supervisor as soon as possible but no later than 8 30 a.m as a as a supervisor i would appreciate having a time limit from the start of the work day to say what that is because otherwise you're just just guessing you're two and a half hours in with this with this policy somebody hasn't showed up yet you don't know why before they haven't showed in or showed up or called potentially and they're still following the policy so i don't know what your feelings are on that but i'd rather see it something like it hasn't been an issue what typically happens now do they call you about the time they're supposed to be there oh no i usually i usually hear before yeah whenever they've is either the night before or that morning before like five four thirty five o'clock so does it make sense instead of saying no later than 8 30 to say as soon as possible but no later than an hour after the start of work or something like that that's where i was going with it that way it's not a set 8 30 i mean obviously there's some set of special circumstances like somebody's in the ER at the hospital or in dire distress or whatever of course hey you know it is whatever but if they've got a sore throat and a bad cough and you want it to the reason that you want to have something in there is because in the event that you need to do a you know personal corrective action you could say you haven't been calling within an hour that makes sense to everyone sure okay so you guys just to recap there's the only wording you'd like added is maybe the end of the third paragraph about calling as soon as possible no later than an hour into the work day from the start of the work day and delete the 8 30 so we're not putting in anything about summer hours right no okay just clarify fortuitaries and gifts sounds fine to me outside employment the piece that jumps out at me in this as i read through it is there's a the second sentence in the in the first paragraph that says employees may not engage in any outside business activities during their normal working hours um that's a problem it right i mean the problem is so if somebody's on vacation day or and i remember i remember this coming up in the past somebody takes a vacation day and they're conducting their own business when they're taking a vacation from the town on a on a on a good sunny day and it's there's the perception well that's so that's that's the conversation right is um when i read this i don't think about the person who takes a vacation uh takes a week off or something and goes and helps their brother-in-law who's running construction business or whatever you know and they're just doing their own things but i think about you know somebody who has and you know uh an official secondary business that they're operating on and if they're on vacation time they're out there during normal business hours that are out there within town doing their work and what does that what does that form absolutely right you know what does that look like um you know well at the same time allowing folks the ability to better their their situation so the question is though normal working hours does that mean including vacation time yes because it's during the normal working hours so what language do you put in there to fix that do you say employees may not engage in any outside business activity during their work hours for the town and you're saying vacation is also work hours for the time no i'm saying it's not well well if you say this is the way they say during their work their work hours not normal working hours their work hours so that's the proposed that's your proposed change of course she's yeah what she's saying is the way that this is worded now right now the way i read this is they would be excluded from any opportunity of doing any correct additional work i agree during that six to two two thirty time frame or whatever the published normal working hours are for that period of time right which are not published so but we hope they're going to be but all i'm saying is you know if somebody is taking legitimate time off and they're choosing to engage in their side hack job during that period of time that should be okay i don't see why it wouldn't be okay say that again please if somebody has a side gig okay they're mowing lawns for their mowing their mowing lawns evenings weekends whatever they're not working right and they take a week's vacation and they're out mowing lawns on their lawn mowing job during that week of vacation they should be able to do that that's all i'm saying yeah okay so how do we change the language so it reflects that my suggestion was to say during their working hours which means not vacation to me but i don't know whether that's enough or clear well i mean you could you could simply add excluding approved pto at the end of that sentence so that they've got an approved pto there you go i like that better from their supervisor it's documented that they're that they're off and during that period of time they can engage in activities that they want to engage it i like that and the other thing it doesn't do is what we don't want to have is somebody take a sick day and be out there doing their side hack correct correct well okay so approved pto time approved well you could approve sick time too and someone might be like i don't feel well but pto right but pto pto in here is different than sick time i believe we'll get there you have a definition in there particularly i believe we do well maybe you just want to say sick time cannot be used i mean you could add that but does the supervisor really approve sick time no the employee calls no they take the second they take the sick time so it's not approved right it's just done so but the pto is approved i mean you think you could specify that it's approved vacation or personal leave yeah and you could also say something about being it supervised that i mean that the approval so we have we have several categories of time off here we have holiday leave that's pretty clear we have vacation leave we have sick leave we have personal leave and we have parental and family leave which i had forgotten about to tell you the truth and then we have short term family leave i i would be fine with with specifying vacation and personal leave so that's specific to those two well they can also do it in their holiday sure but that's not their normal work time okay right i feel like we would be covered and it would be clear if you just added excluding approved vacation and personal leave yeah so just tell me that sense if you want employees may not include in any outside business activities during normal they're doing their normal working hours and then and then just add to that sentence yeah excluding vacation and personal leave yeah approved approved excluding approved vacation and personal leave yeah and then you then it gets dicey where you're like employees are prohibited from undertaking outside employment that interferes with their job performance or constitutes a conflict well a conflict of interest could be that you're you know well you can't you can't have a side hack working as a part-time manager for a paving company who might engage in work for the town no i know um but also like their job performance right like if you're doing it out there and chainsawing between having nothing and then you have to come and work a 10 hour day right i don't know it just gets a little it's it's not i mean you're at you're at a point where you're overstepping at that point though because i mean whether i'm building a house or whatever and i'm out there slaving away right on my own personal stuff and i come in dog tired the next day that's a performance issue that i think needs to be dealt with in a different manner yeah just to let you know you can if you if an outside job does deplete from this job you can they can people you can restrict that yeah that's what it says yeah it's already restricted here okay yeah it says that yeah political activity it sounds like a lot of moment moment but it sounds okay i think yeah nepotism everybody's favorite well i think you guys changed this no i don't think we did i think we just i think everything we didn't do it i think you guys felt like you you addressed the issue that right wasn't really addressed and became a bigger issue but i don't think it was there was changed to the policy itself um leave it alone i think we leave it alone too see it or we ran out of time we've got one minute is the 2016 tad of middle six drug and alcohol policy still the one we're using i believe so does that have to be changed at some point no because i think it follows on the uh virtual vehicle okay yeah those guys okay so as victor points out we are out of time so i'm going to say we got through part 10 right good work i'll put it on the agenda again in 18 sure yep just start picking up at section 11 section 11 oh we talked about summer hours too okay that was fun highway department report update of conditions of 10 roads and possible discussion of parameters for road cruise summer hours if not a part of the personnel policy discussion i think we've beaten the summer hours to death but anything else road crew no uh let's see i pulled the chipper in to do some more investigating on that to see what the actual issue is with it it's pointing towards the block is the problem i pulled the head off it wasn't the gaskets for the coolant being in the oil so that's not looking good in the process of trying to figure out an option for that uh let's see so the option would be to try and find a used motor or rebuilt or yeah cleaned out a culvert today with the fire truck so we're able to utilize that um basically just trying to get the roads put back together they're all hardened up so so as the rain stops we can really go to town on where was the worst play i didn't have any problems on so we had we had issues on center road uh right below zed on right we had an issue on software swamp right by the first culvert just before and then and then french road oh right yeah french road had some yeah that was portal had a few of those big rocks put down and we had some uh fun spots on good old uh you still wrote yes we did it was so much better than last year oh definitely oh my god yeah i have to do the thawing i think so like just i don't think the winter was we had as deep a frost climate change wasn't as bad right no we were fortunate we're never going to have a bad month season again right let's see if there's a report uh i am not going to comment just for fear of but how did you think remember how last year you moved out you took off the tops of the roads and you put them on the side you carried it away did that help not to do that we don't want to do that oh really we did it a little bit on you did a little bit a little bit but i'd rather have it a last resort but did that help i think it might have no let's assume it did okay let's assume it did i think that's pretty much i don't know what else any news on the trucks are equipment uh freight liner i pulled that in i'm just going to start building some repairs on that that haven't been done yet that's that carrier but inside the differential uh-huh but uh everything else is working so i'm not going to even the old part of the cloride truck yes i got that running yet that's ready to go you got that what was wrong with that one uh batteries batteries did you want to say something sir uh just to get into the minutes that it's okay with eric to submit that application to intend to apply for aids and grant program for the highway for fiscal year 24 you want to do that yep good idea so this is just a letter of intent to participate in the SFY 24 municipal roads grants and aid program which of course we want because we want that money right it's for the municipal the you know water roads thing that permit yes and eric you want to do that right yes okay that's basically saying we're going to meet the middle standard SFIA and our uh that allows us to supply for the grants to do so there's actually a list of about 10 things here that we say we're going to do yep yep i'm happy to pass around the people want to read them yeah i'd scan it i mean it's basically what we've signed in the what we've signed in the past it gives us money yes it allows us to apply for money to to do that yeah we actually post clean water project signs i've never seen this post any i've been here in the past to do so so i can't answer the answer you know the time is running out where you're going to be able to use that excuse well you know i still can use it hey eric i i remembered a question i wanted to ask you have you seen any of the um the elm trees is that what it is no the ash trees have you seen them fall around the road if they've been a problem uh not so many ash no the popple trees are falling like popples are falling like everywhere left and right yep why yeah oh just because they have a very limited next to white pines they probably have the most limited root structure and when the ground soft and the wind blows and they're big and tall over they fall i would appreciate it if when my neighbor's trees fall across the road and the tops of the trees fall on my land that you drag the tops back over to the neighbor's side of the street i hit the chipper going i could clean up a lot of that brush i might wrap one too if we have to i i want to see what i can get yeah that's what i was wondering if we should ramp on because there's there's oh i need yeah stuff all over there's everywhere that needs to be picked up yeah are you guys um have you been looking at uh replacement costs for excavator or anything like that i know that uh i started to uh they're not that far out so it's pretty much when we get close to when we're going to want to do it we can just go ahead and check them out and then it's not like we're in a truck and if you guys had i know there's been some conversation around like the the size of excavator that we that we're going to be looking for if you guys like really hashed that out to figure out my personal feeling i think we should stick with the same size if we go much smaller it gets hard to as it is sometimes it's hard to load the back of the trucks with that one just because you can't see but if you go too big then you can't and then you're fighting power wires all the time so it's try to find that happy medium but no we haven't really like and i really haven't talked too too much about i mean i mean isn't it true that for the most part that machine when it's been working in a good shape has done what we needed to do absolutely i mean you know if we have a super deep culvert or something like that when you do subcontract well yeah we're not going to do a super deep one anyway because we don't have the trench box right but i'm just or whatever it is or it can't reach far enough or down far enough or whatever it is correct no matter what you do you can level your way down yes you could you could step it yeah but it's a cost effective to do that all i'm all i'm saying is i think for most of the work we do no that machine is not what we intended it to do what is that that's a 135 class it's a 140 it's a 30,000 pound machine so uh just backing up a little bit and we got off track is there a motion to approve this letter of intent randy second victor all those are approving the letter of intent to participate in the sfy 24 municipal road grant in aid program please say aye aye any opposed thank you yep okay another favorite subject considering reimposing a penalty of eight percent of the education portion of future tax bills belonging to taxpayers who filed their hs 122 late per 32 vsa 5410 i just want to clarify that's up to eight eight percent you don't have to yeah it's a penalty up to right what did we do in the past sarah five percent yeah and we we paused it during coven yes paused it during coven and then you resumed it 20 21 for 20 we only approved a single year at 21 but but don't we do it every year you could make a motion to say from now on five percent or you can discuss saying we want to review it every year if we want to read i think it should be our policy that we do it and then if we want to change it we can change and we don't have to do it every year what's the problem is so can you describe for us again so we remember the problem that occurs when people do do it late during did you want to do this well i mean there's no problem it's we spend a lot of time resending out tax bills and things like that and um this is uh people having to file their hs 122 on time so the people that are not filing their taxes are late you know if they're not filing their taxes within april 15th deadline then sometimes their accountant is unaware of it or whatever but you would think by now you would think by now people will be on to it and we have um i mean by the time we get done reissuing all of these and it's not just us it's the listeners have to go in it's a lot of time on s i to update the records um so it's postage everything right because what it what it really means is you have to reissue the tax bill and then do all the accounting that backs up the tax bill and correct it so it's a lot of work time and effort for the town yeah it's not a money making situation no and it won't be a money making situation we collect five percent either but at least it will defer some of the extra cost so why for one of them in favor of doing this in heaven forbid if somehow i don't file mine but uh anyway i don't know why everyone else feels i'm fine with the five percent so i would move that we uh reimpose a penalty of five percent the education portion of future tax bills until we're until such change is made until yeah until they'll read in perpetuity until such change is forever some yeah you can just leave it just reimpose a penalty of five percent yeah that's good okay is there a second to that victor all those in favor of imposing a five percent of the educational portion of future tax bills as a penalty for people who late file their HS 122s please say hi hi anybody opposed we have done it and when when will that take effect or end next year this year for that come at the bills i'll be going out yes when the when the bills go out right the letters come in like july don't they or something i'm sorry the letters come in july you guys set the tax rate for the beginning of july and then the yeah right 23 24 yeah so everybody's favorite subject welch park update you know you can never retire from the select work because you're the only one who's got what's happening at welch park well so i actually for the first time in a long time i have news on welch park i spoke to john riley two or three different times and he has been out of town for a week on vacation but he's coming back tonight and he has promised me that tomorrow he will be working on revised documents to do away with welch park so that's the good news he's ready to go here's the bad news don't ask me how i didn't know this don't ask me that because i'm embarrassed that i didn't know it but our sprinkler system at the fire hall is connected to that sprinkler system i knew it well i wish you would you i'd say that you said oh no it's not so now what it is so we've got a little negotiating to do um with benderson uh a little maybe a little horse trading maybe maybe who knows what um in thinking about it and i've had now six days to think about it um if they are not willing just to say we're willing to be good citizens and we'll continue to take care of the fire pump which they might do that would be ideal um then i think the only fair way to do it is to say whatever the cost of maintaining that fire pump is we pro-rated based on the square footage of the two buildings in which case you know our percentage of those bills would be very small probably less than 10 percent it really it really supports their sprinkler system okay there's their building is much larger than ours it's going to be three times the size so carl's building is not tied into it no just ours no just ours and the alternative which would be mega expensive is to put in our own storage tank our own pump our own whatever and i don't think it makes sense to do that so anyway that's a little hiccup on the trail i'm sorry i didn't understand you were here when you said that dorin because honest to god i was so sure that there was no sprinkler system in there well you weren't the only one that didn't think it was but what if i mean we're going to take over the maintenance of the road is that part of this discussion right yeah so why can't it be like a nice exactly right exactly right oh so we plow for them and they pay for the water no we plow the road we maintain the road and by the way there's painting that needs to be done on that road so um there's some expense there's some deferred there's some deferred maintenance on the road let's put it that way very much so you know my position i mean they now want out of this situation so the simple way to do it is to say you guys have to maintain that fire pump for your building anyway yes we've got our little six inch pipe hooked up to it and we obviously are going to maintain our sprinkler system and the line to our sprinkler system but not the fire pump itself but uh i wanted to talk to john riley about that before i reached out to the the benderson people but that's where we stand on that one and i am embarrassed dorinda that i did not know i mean i'm just saying i'm i can't believe that i didn't know well i mean all the times i've been in the fire station too he was not under the impression that the fire took off he was really not under the impression when i first talked to him right he saw it and i and i kept saying carl i'm telling you you know it seemed reasonable to to say you you deal with that we'll deal with the road and if that's not appropriate then uh correlating it my square footage of building or something to that effect seems reasonable um but at that point i would suggest that it's they're maintaining the road costs at that same prorated amount as well of course i don't know how you do that but by the building square footage or road frontage or something but well let's see let's see i think i think i'm hoping i'm hoping that they say you know we have to do it anyway right you know whatever i mean when it would be when it would be a big expense as if all of a sudden that pump had to be replaced i mean it doesn't run that many hours but it's been there a long time i will say i was pleasantly surprised when we went in to look at that fire pump that everything in that building was an apple pie order painted out i mean the last time i was in there which was probably four or five years ago it was a disaster in there so they are they are or their or their contractor is but i mean everything would you agree eric yeah it was that everything was an apple pig apple pie shape in there wow it really was yep love that one so much more news to follow on welch park but i'm still here and so is welch park so dorinda treasurer's report i don't really have anything to report um let's see i filed our offer report for the past year that had to be done by angle 30th and i'll tell you that it and i'm not suggesting we do this but it's because we're under that threshold we really don't have to give them a lot of detail as to how we're spending that money so and we have spent a lot like in the past for you know employee incentives and wages and things like that that if we get down to it and we have to use that as something that we spend the money on even though we've already paid for it out of our pocket we could reimburse ourselves for it so but i'm sure well we just need to keep track of those dates and keep you know a lot of it has to do with you know this delightful building right sitting in right now but we could probably spend every penny of the money on this came down to it well and that's and that was an example in the thing where one town just put they were putting uh doing a fire department and they allocated the whole amount to the fire department it wasn't even complete yet but they allocated the whole amount it was like nine million dollars or something but so yes so that might be you know because easily you could spend that doing this right we just need to keep track of those dates which i know you are and we are yeah well we've got till next december yeah to allocate it so and it sounds like they actually encouraged us to and they're and and that's exactly what they're doing they're encouraging you to just take it and be done with it yeah yeah that's december 2024 yes okay thank you so um lis yeah tell us about our wonderful building in your meeting yes we're down we're excited to hear from you yeah so and sir feel free to to chime in so we had a meeting yesterday with uh two folks from via megan and jason i think his name was um and um they're both architects and they came to the town hall and in attendance was uh were sarah uh sandy dav maghita and me um and they presented to us two drawings um the first drawing was um taking the existing building and basically redesigning the inside of the existing building um moving some things around um making it more handicapped accessible um having uh they would be digging out a little bit of the um the back um out there to make it so that it's a one-level entrance for someone in a wheelchair for example and then there'd also be sort of a little patio type area out on the side there would be area for parking out here the entrance would be this way it would be a one-way entrance um it would require it the elevator would be um in a different location it's like a specific type of lift um and basically we really liked the design it had sort of a had a regular vault plus an additional vault for sort of that stuff that we don't need to get at that sarah doesn't need to get at every day but that is that is still in a vault so it covers sarah's needs for a vault um and it has a nice open sort of plan um with with plenty of sort of space for for moving around and as client guests come into the building sarah can see them from her um position um and and then the second drawing that they gave us was with an additional 1200 square feet addition which was 600 on each floor um and sort of right away the consensus was that um we felt that 1200 square feet was expensive real estate that really didn't serve a purpose that bettered the the needs of the folks who work here at town hall it's still you know addressed the it addressed the handicapped accessibility it changed things a little bit it sort of put an addition over here in this area back over here um and um and we really felt that for the best interests of the town's people it didn't make sense to go with with an addition it just seemed like a really costly minimum 300 000 dollar um build that that wouldn't necessarily improve um in the ways that the first drawing did and that met all of sarah's and and what she believes meets the needs of the other workers in the town plus us as town's people it gives a nice space up here that allows for a meeting of you know 40 people sitting in chairs and tables up front it has over here a side a private office like meeting space for folks if they need to have a smaller meeting space it's got a little sort of foyer over here it allows for um there'll be space um you know when we're not having chairs and things out for doing voting so people would be able to vote here um they would climb the stairs that sort of came out over here to get up here or the lift would take them directly up here um there would be two bathrooms there'd be a bathroom up here and then there'd be a handicapped accessible bathroom downstairs as well and it just really had a nice flow um and I think um we all you know said this is something that we think we can with the addition of all these you know fundings this is this this is a good um this is a good product that we think will be able to educate our town's people on um and while being fiscally responsible for the needs of the town and so then sort of the next steps in what happens next is that they take back some of our thoughts you know because we had a few little thoughts on things that might need to get changed or around on the drawing and the next steps um is a meeting um on May what is that meeting Sarah May I think it's May 20 um 20 agreed May 25th is that right yeah I've got my notes done okay yeah and um and then what is going to happen at that meeting Sarah that's the meeting where um I believe that's the meeting where they uh they come back with the revisions and then they come back with some money right okay yeah so so between now and then they're going to have um a civil engineer come to you know assess the other parts of this project sorry it's May 30th May 30th okay um and so that they can add whatever they need to for for the civil engineer um and then um then the the next meeting is we'll have one more meeting as a subgroup right and then we'll have a meeting to present to the town on June July I mean July 18th is it I believe it is July 13th no they're going to meet July 13th 3 30 to 5 30 and then you guys are going to have to have two weird meetings in July that's part of the project right because July 4th is a Tuesday so we're not meeting on that date so we'll have the 11th and the 18th I think is what they are yeah so in the 18th they'll they'll come for about a 45 minute presentation at that point they'll have cost estimates and what they'll have to present to us is um you know a report on what they found about the building um they'll have a drawing of the recommended um renovations that meet the needs of Sarah and the vault and everything else that we want to do um and um and then um they'll have a cost comparison of a brand new building and that's just plugging numbers right they're not going to they're you know they're just going to say they're going to say that many square footage whether they're building this is what it would cost right so just thinking about the future because there's a lot of like moving pieces as we know and they're related to funding opportunities um so the Merck funding the municipal energy resilience program funding being the most beneficial funding that that's probably going to be the highest level of funding that we may get is related to all of the work that would be done in the renovation that is related to weatherization and energy efficiencies and moving away from fossil fuels so that would be insulating the walls the ceiling the at I don't think we have a basement um it could be it would be new windows potentially for um for the building it would be new heating system and cooling system for the building it could be um I think also you know like charging stations or things like that for the outside of the building um and so when we present it to the town the way that they describe this to me because it's it's to me it's like well how do we do this like how do we know how much it's going to cost and how much you know so so basically what they do is they come back with a price and they say this is our estimate plus a contingency price like 15 percent or whatever it is that we decide it's going to be um and then this is what we say to the town it's going to cost us um 650 000 to do this renovation these are the funding sources that we have available and this is how much we think we can get from some of these funding sources and so first the town has to buy in to do we even want to do this right do we want to go ahead with a renovation of the town hall um because we can't necessarily guarantee that any of these fundings are going to be there that that we're going to get these fundings I can pretty much guarantee we'll get some of that murk because they they want to just give it away right and it's not a difficult thing but to come up with that what is that price going to be like what is it that we're going to have to bond because we will have to bond some amount and the town is going to have to vote on it but before we even do that we have to get buy in from the town that yes they want to proceed Sarah did it sound like that was a vote even or was that more that was just like a so when you think about when you think about this when Romney school was uh renovate when they were doing their renovation the school board made a decision to renovate the where the town weighs in is in the funding do we want us do we want to vote on this so the board I mean whether or not you decide to go out because you think that gathering the most support and traction is best way to do it that's your decision but the board could make a decision to go ahead with this where the public input comes in is the money so right do you fund how you do that right but before we do that we do want to make sure that we're being transparent with the town they understand what's coming and that they feel like they've been educated on what the work that we're doing and what our funding sources potentially are because there's going to be more than the murk funding there might be preservation trust funding there could be um arpa money arpa money right there could be other ways in which to to fund this um but what you know one of the jobs of our of the select board is is going to be though regardless because they there will be some there will be an ask to pay for this is that you know if if we're gonna we know that the town hall needs renovations right and now really is the time to do it because we have this federal funding we have this murk funding so we you know we could use the murk funding to just buy a heating system right and say okay we're just going to do a heating and cooling system without doing anything else right but that doesn't that doesn't seem logical it's not forward thinking it's not planning for the future so so that's sort of where we're at right this moment so we're looking at um randy tell me again the murk money had to be spend by the end of 2026 or allocated by the end of 2026 right now spent spent but that could change yes there's there's lots of conversation about whether they're going to be able to switch to just being allocated by the end of 26 but right now the the read on it is that it's going to be spent okay so that could be a big ask because you know all these towns doing this not enough workers to get all the work done they may extend it right but that's the way it is right now so meanwhile in order for us to even get to that point we do need to we've done one thing already which is that we applied for the four thousand dollar grant we haven't heard yet but the assumption is that we're going to get it that was a really super duper easy application that basically just said i might use it for this i might use it for that i might use it for this right and just basically related to oh we might use it for a community event we might use it to help with grant writing we might use it um to pay for a consultant right so if we ran out of money for this grant to pay bia you know we could use it for that too so that we expect to get the next step will be that they're going to announce that the portal is open for us to submit that we want to have walkthroughs of um of our buildings and so then what will happen is they will i believe reach out to us to schedule those walkthroughs now randy what i might want to get a little help from you on is um when we talked with bia yesterday they said that they thought it was pertinent for us to have the level two walkthrough that did the more comprehensive weatherization like i think it does the lower door and all that even though that's not required for the most funding but i think that we want to do that because otherwise absolutely and we have to do it for this building in particular and we don't have to pay for that and we don't have to pay for it correct right so um but i think we need to make it clear that because we're in this process of a renovation um exploration that level two is going to be necessary for us for this building in particular absolutely so those are supposed to come out any day right because they need to start doing this because then in the fall is when the portal comes out now the next question there's nobody oh you're here from the fire department so i know that your heating system is failing i asked the question after that webinar that we have that randy and i attended the webinar on the on the murk um was um we have a fire department that's their oil burner is broken and it needs to be replaced before fall and so can we spend this money we i said we do not want to just buy an oil burner because we missed out on the time frame of this whole project which is to get us they want us to move away from point burners right so they said this sounds like this sounds like a situation where we might consider retroactively paying back for a heating system that we bought before we got the murk funding so um because again this is not about like they just want us all to switch and they certainly don't want us buying an oil furnace in 2023 when two months later we could buy a different system however in order for us to get that system we have to have the walkthrough and that walkthrough wouldn't necessarily have to be a level two walkthrough but it could be a level one walkthrough within look at that heating system so they make recommendations and then if we're following those recommendations that's what we get reimbursed for so yeah so that's what i i think that way sir do you want to add anything no i was just kind of amazed that they could actually use this space and create what i think is a really workable town hall it addresses the addresses the issues that people in the community have expressed which is frustration and not having an accessible building and those front stairs are going to go and this lot there's going to be kind of a little foyer right here so that when we run elections people can come in they're not the lack of smokers left to learn but you know people in the winter or november they're stuck out there and have that horrible little portico it's backed up but this way people will be able to come in check we can have enough room for voting and you can have enough room for meetings and to make susan clark happy there will be a tiny little kitchenette in the back yeah and there's even a little space for a food shelf if we want to reopen a little space in this lobby for the historical society to play a few objects so everybody's happy and the listers will be separated from the financial department listers will be with planning but there will also be a small meeting room so that should you when you hold grievances or something even though they're public meetings it's much easier people feel more comfortable having a small office where they can meet a small you know little table and chairs and the same thing that can also be used for you know when kevin's going over plants and people so it's surprising to me that it works this well i think yeah i mean it is sort of i think there's a lot of gutting of the whole thing downstairs you know so what you see downstairs isn't and you're welcome to you know take a look sarah has a copy of the plan to look at well sarah this is this public um sarah doesn't want anyone making changes just like no no no no the via had just asked that before everybody that they were able to make a few changes before everybody's off but that's okay yeah so um so that's where we are right now it's kind of exciting um and i do think that it is um you know if we are able to communicate it properly um and i know dave micita has has offered to sort of help us communicate that to the town um in language that is both professional but also understandable right because he understands how to read these things um and so i think um that'll we're going to get the minutes of the meeting um up on the what's next middle sex website and um i'm not sure about the plans he he sent us something but anyway sandi had asked us to put up some certain parts of it so that people can you know see what's going on if they so choose to so that's the update good report thank you sounds like it was a good meeting yes it was great we were very impressed have did they reach out and respond at all about the four contractors yet have they released that uh murk yes i don't think so no okay so the last fall that was the last follow-up was the one i forwarded after that meeting with um yeah and then you said that they were um gonna issue who the contract yeah i didn't know if they reach out to you to issue anything okay right so there's going to be specific contractors that they're working with that are doing this going around to the various towns we're going to do the walk-throughs yeah yeah they basically have four pre-selected pre-approved vendors to uh issue these audits um yeah that they're paying directly yeah so just quickly so it's the the select board makes um the decision between the two options of refurbish versus build new and then makes the recommendation to the town is that one option two falls away um in my description of option two uh just is um just a general question that doesn't have to be specific um so what will end up happening is um we as a subcommittee will decide on the sort of layout that we think is the best thing that we want to present to the um to the select board um but we'll also select side by side um a um new building and yes you're right so we we're not going to say to the voters you have to vote you want a new building or do you want an existing building we have to make that decision based on what we know and then we will present to the and and then we may say we're going to go ahead and do this we're going to build a new town hall but we're going to um eventually the town is going to have to vote on whether or not they're going to pay for that town hall and then have they included conversations about what happens to town activities during the I mean it's a little early to discuss but where would Sarah move yeah we have not gotten that far yet yeah I just know that the other other town clerks who have done dealt with this so you know but I especially in after tropical storm Irene who was a strange but common problem so there are ways of getting maybe she'll work at rum me because there's going to be all these empty classrooms or a nice National Guard tent out in the parking lot with a diesel trailer here yeah the most important the most important I always did I feel like we're violating those select board rules but the most important thing is you know making sure that all the documents are safe and and you know the and and in terms of like what you're saying we want to make this as transparent as possible so you know you invite the public to these meetings to weigh in so that we make a decision based on what people are telling us if everyone who came to a meeting said we think this is a terrible idea we do not want you to build a new we don't we don't want you to renovate the town hall um you know we might think differently and say well maybe this isn't the time to do that maybe we do just want to you know instead of going through the whole steps and paint all this extra money to then present it to them and have them all voted down right but I think the point you made earlier is a very important point this is a very special time in terms of all this funding being available I mean if we were looking to bond for a hundred percent of this cost I think it's important for them to see the benefit and the savings of doing it now versus doing it later and you know who knows what the future might bring there might be more funding coming down the road but you know this is certainly an exceptional time in terms of all this money being available so we need to take advantage of it thank you Liz any other questions or concerns anyone okay so we have a a revised uh access permit for David and Barbara Carkeet is that how you pronounce their name Carkeet Carkeet okay um and of course I don't have the previous one in front of me so I can't compare so I can tell you they they moved it the entrance to actually on their driveway it's actually on our road it's actually off their driveway so why do so why do we need to even give them an access permit it's right at the end of their driveway right as you go under their driveway it splits right at the end it does so technically so here's your order of it will be in our right away too close to call it's it's really yeah I mean it makes sense if it's right if it's right at the end yeah but there's there shouldn't be any issue where they're going there as long as they put their call right there which is it states that you have to anyway so yeah it just makes it don't gonna be wrong it's what they want to do but why would you want to create all this road why wouldn't you just do it there um they can I speak yes yes I'm just born today a drv hearing they have they're creating a two lot subdivision and because uh there is a right of way issue and our bid it has to go before the drv so I think that that's what's causing that's what created this issue probably they have to have them or they can't move forward so that hearing is on well this is what they want to do you've approved it Eric yeah I don't see a problem with it so I think we should approve it is there a motion it's pretty cut and dry I move that we accept the permit for the drive on the day is it David David car key yep is there a second brandy okay it's been moved into a second bid to approve the highway permit for David and Barbara car key all in favor hi hi hi any opposed okay thank you continues what's today's day we have and I believe in the past we have approved these we have two uh mowing beds uh thank you Eric thanks Eric one from cm and one from mv who are cf and mv sorry I don't know I mean I think that might be Corey Michelle who is now are who's mowing the lawns now yeah yeah I don't know the other one is I'm not convinced you're not you're supposed to know are you I don't know I don't know either so so cm who we believe is our current uh mower his bid is sixty three hundred and ten dollars and b's bid is eighty three hundred and fifteen dollars that's a no have we had any issues with no past performance you know mitch said no issues with that yeah mitch said it's a pretty much a no use bit forwards exactly it's a no-brainer okay yep yeah so I'd go with um moving cm and I'll second cm okay so who moved thick so wall is in favor of giving the middle sex town mowing bid for 2023 to cm who we believe is our current mower hi hi any oppose okay so uh correspondence Sarah and we're busily signing the orders over here is there anything else that should come before the board but we are adjourned nice I'm sorry what oh oh I'm sorry I just wanted um there was just a itty-bitty teeny tiny little difference between the invoice and the jack yeah we can just show dorinda so dorinda there was one and there's another slight there's another small one there were a couple that had some heavy written stuff on the invoices that I had looked but this one was much to all aluminum anybody that's the one for the fire department that guy just laughed I don't know what it is here it is the check was 759 um a 79-59 but the balance due was 79 65 so as vendors an invoice late she spoke to Eric I don't know it's just off by a few cents it's just a few cents I just didn't know what I thought and then this one here for some reason I can see what the 1313 is but why it was added in I don't understand the description is March 2023 fuel use 295 per gallon 131.2 60 gallons plus 10 cents added charge right we pay 10 cents over the cost that's through the city of law it's cost plus 10 so we have to just hand write it in yeah but because they bill us whatever there okay gotcha that's weird pay 10 cents down for the use I'll just put it like this so that you know that that one has it okay so we are adjourned we're finishing up the orders but we are adjourned