[Speaker 3] (11:13 - 11:51)
I think we're, I think we're live, we're going, okay, hi everyone. Welcome to the December 1st, 2021 select board meeting, we have a very full agenda so we are just going to get started as we always do with the Pledge of Allegiance. Pardon me, you did, hold on, can you hear us?

[Speaker 2] (11:51 - 11:53)
Can we just assume everybody knows the Pledge of Allegiance?

[Speaker 20] (11:53 - 11:54)
Yeah, yeah.

[Speaker 3] (11:55 - 11:56)
Pledge of Allegiance.

[Speaker 1] (11:57 - 12:09)
I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

[Speaker 3] (12:15 - 13:17)
Okay, sorry about that, I assume we're unmuted now. As I was saying previously, we have a really full agenda, so we're just going to get started, and we are starting with public comment. So, oh, I just should mention, if anyone is attending virtually, you can raise your virtual hand on Zoom, and while we're at the high school, people can comment in person here.

You can also watch the meeting online on Zoom or Government Access TV or Facebook Live, and also on the Government Access channel. But again, if you're on Zoom watching virtually, you can, joining virtually, you can raise your virtual hand. And if you send me an email at ptitcom, my first letter, my first name, and my last name at swamps.ma.gov, if you have questions, I'll check my email and try to answer those questions during the meeting. So, thanks. And so, there's one person here who I believe wants to make public comment. If you can just grab that microphone next to you, sir, or stand up if you don't mind, and just state your name and address, please.

Thank you.

[Speaker 4] (13:19 - 13:51)
My name's David Lawless, also known as Archie. 11 Ramsey Road, Marblehead, Mass. I represent the Swampskip DPW Union.

I'm standing before you not knowing the status of our contract. I don't know if the contract, if the Board has taken no public vote on the contract. So, we don't know if it's up or down by the Board of Selectmen.

So, I'm either asking for your support or an explanation. That would be my public comment.

[Speaker 12] (13:53 - 13:53)
Sure.

[Speaker 3] (13:55 - 14:28)
So, generally, during public comment, we don't respond, but... I understand. So, I was going to continue to say.

But, I'm happy to provide a response in this instance, briefly. The Board has not voted on the contracts yet. And, if you have concerns, I encourage you to reach out to our Town Administrator, Sean Fitzgerald.

That's correct.

[Speaker 4] (14:33 - 14:34)
Thank you for your time.

[Speaker 3] (14:34 - 14:35)
Thank you.

[Speaker 4] (14:35 - 14:35)
Thank you.

[Speaker 3] (14:39 - 14:59)
I don't see any hands raised, Ali. Oh, there's one. Sure.

Did you unmute her? Yeah.

[Speaker 16] (15:00 - 15:00)
Hi.

[Speaker 3] (15:01 - 15:07)
If you could just state your name and address before you start speaking, that'd be great. Thanks for joining.

[Speaker 16] (15:07 - 16:08)
Oh, you're welcome. I'm Jen Murphy. I live on Franklin Ave. I know that there is a licensing request for someone who wants to have a dealership. And, we're concerned on Franklin Avenue as to the changes this will cause, where a car is going to be stored. There's a parking problem down by Franklin and Paradise Road already. So, we don't want to see more cars there.

And, it's getting really quite dangerous to try and pull out of our driveways. Many of us have all, you know, been hit or near hit several times trying to get out. And, we'd just like to, I'm sorry to speak before the licensing issue is going up.

So, I don't have any other details. But, we are very concerned about that.

[Speaker 3] (16:10 - 16:48)
Great. Thank you for sharing, Jen. And, I'm not sure if you're staying on for that discussion soon.

But, you're welcome to stay on. We'll be talking about that shortly. And, if you have any additional comments, you can share them at that time as well.

Brilliant. Thank you. All right.

So, I think that is it. I'm just going to check my email. Okay.

All right. So, that's it for public comment. We're going to move on now to the Town Administrator's Report.

[Speaker 1] (16:51 - 24:11)
Okay. So, we continue to see increasing cases of COVID-19. We are watching very carefully the emergence of a number of variants.

And, this Friday I have a meeting with Governor Baker and Lieutenant Governor Polito and a number of the state's top epidemiologists to really look at how this Omicron variant is affecting certain populations. We're going to monitor this carefully. And, we just ask folks just to be careful and continue to get vaccinated.

The most important thing that we can do is ensure that we have all of our citizens vaccinated from this virus and, you know, continuing to increase their immune response. As a follow-up to our last meeting on infiltration and inflow, we did work closely with David Peterson, the engineer from Kleinfelder, and Gino Cresta, our Assistant Town Administrator and DPW Director. Did some outreach work to DEP, MWRA, and a number of communities to really look at their I.I. regulations. We will have an opportunity to have a follow-up conversation with both David and Gino at our next meeting. But, we've tried to get a sense of where swamps would fit within a peer group. We have significant I.I. needs, as we outlined in that last presentation. I feel strongly that we've got to start from a position of really addressing those needs. And, right now we're looking at creating a model that we'll show at our next meeting that looks at the revenue that we likely generate given the types of developments that we've seen over the last decade in Swampskate. That said, there's some additional information in here about the peer communities analysis.

We did look at thresholds as well. When we look at the thresholds between single-family units and multifamily units, we feel comfortable that the standard will really capture the larger developments and provide a reasonable fee for small renovations that families will have. So, happy to address any questions that the board would have.

Tonight we'll hear an update from our town assessor and our town treasurer, Patrick Luddy, to go over the 2021 tax classification. We have looked at the financial forecast and we'll be stepping through some analysis on free cash. Last week I met with the Retirement Board to discuss their vote to decrease the investment return for retirement investment funds down to 7%.

The board has had a goal of fully funding our unfunded liability, and I asked them to work with the town as we carefully try to meet broader needs. That adjustment would place an additional $100,000 increase in the retirement line, one of the biggest lines that we have in our town budget. I want to be mindful that we have a number of other increases that we're juggling, and we're trying to keep a careful handle on how we develop the FY23 budget.

I am pleased to report that Swampskate has signed on to the Commonwealth's commitment to achieve a net-zero emission by 2050. This is in line with a number of our broader policy goals about environmental sustainability and certainly puts Swampskate in a good position to take advantage of grants and opportunities that are coming down the roads. I have received a proposal for an HR assessment and audit that would include recommendations for reorganizing the HR role and really looking at a number of regulatory compliance and FMLA standards and review of job descriptions and other HR functions and areas.

Previously, I engaged CLA to do this three years ago. They view this as one of their professional auditing responsibilities, and they have a team of really expert HR professionals that can help us really just look at our existing policies and practices and establish a roadmap to help us build a 21st century HR function. I expect that this will kick off over the next two weeks and conclude over the next 60 days.

So last week I did have an opportunity to meet with the men's club at the Senior Center and the captains of the high school football team. We had a really excellent conversation with a men's club that hadn't met in close to two years. It was staggered, and certainly every member of everyone that attended, and we had over 50 or so individuals there, everyone shared a story or a perspective, and it was really nice to see that group of older residents engaging with our younger residents.

So a really special opportunity there. And just this afternoon I joined a couple of staff from Care Dimensions to light the hospice tree in front of Town Hall. Holidays are a wonderful time for a lot of people, but we do have a lot of people that are dealing with the loss of loved ones, and it's a nice reflection at this time of year to think about how important it is to reach out to those that are dealing with some of the challenges that the holiday season brings and just to remind everybody that we should be a little kinder and a little more generous in spirit during these days. And Happy Hanukkah to all those celebrating the season alike.

That's my report.

[Speaker 3] (24:13 - 24:50)
Questions about anything in Sean's report? I just have a question. On the HR assessment, is this going to include, from what I'm trying to remember from the letter that we read a couple of weeks ago, if it includes also a consultant that's going to fill the role or help hire somebody who will be permanently sitting in that role?

I just want to make sure that that's part of this.

[Speaker 1] (24:50 - 25:06)
It can. I didn't ask for that initially. I wanted them to come in and help us really just establish a baseline for the office, but I certainly would be happy to include that into the scope of work.

[Speaker 3] (25:06 - 25:11)
So the CLA, that's something that they could do also?

[Speaker 1] (25:11 - 25:12)
It is something that they have done.

[Speaker 3] (25:12 - 25:59)
Okay. Thanks. Okay.

I'll stop then. Is Marzi going to join us? The next item on the agenda is to discuss and approve.

Do we have to officially vote on this? I didn't think we did. We do.

Okay. To vote and approve and accept an easement between Stormscot Conservation Commission and the White Court LLC for a public pedestrian pathway at 35 Littles Point Road. And Marzi, who is the Director of Economic Development, is here on Zoom joining us to give us some more detail about that.

Hi, Marzi.

[Speaker 5] (25:59 - 29:08)
Hi. Good evening, everybody. It's my pleasure to be here this evening to request your vote on an easement agreement.

Allie, if you could, if you could, we have a very quick PowerPoint presentation for you so you can actually see the location of the easement and actually what it looks like. So as many of you might recall that as part of the redevelopment of the White Court project, the developer agreed to create or construct a path that would, that is joined together with the Bliswick Path that allows recreational access or pedestrian access to a lookout area. And actually what you see on the screen right now, and you can really see is this beautiful stone lookout area at the end of the easement, which shows these beautiful ocean and really allows our residents to have access to the ocean.

So again, this is something that the developer of White Court, they built out on their own and this document or the easement that Town Council requested that the Select Forge would be the signatory on it. Now, Allie, if you can go to the next page, I just wanted to share with you a couple of other images. So you can actually see this is the image.

The easement is located off of Little Points Road. So many of you might be familiar where the former White Court or Marion Court College was located. So the easement runs along the path between the Bliswick and between White Court.

And like I said, it terminates at the end by the ocean. What you see in front of you here is actually the engineering plans. It really shows a 10 foot path.

So you can see in this graph shows the easement that is a 10 foot easement that's delineated between the sort of like a dark line and the dotted line. And then you can really see kind of like the wavy area, which is the mandarin path and how residents are able to walk along it. And it really terminates at the end where you see the sitting area.

Could we go to the next page to the next photo too? And these are just some images of what the area looks like. The first image on your left is really the new structure, the White Court structure.

And you can really see the path as it meanders between the woods and the utility poles from here. And then the second image is taken from the end of the lookout area as you look towards Little Points Road. And then the final image is what I had shared with you at the very beginning of what the terminus of the path looks like.

I'm happy to take any questions if you have any regarding the easement.

[Speaker 8] (29:09 - 29:15)
Hi, Margie. I did have a question. What's the parking situation like at White Court for the public?

[Speaker 5] (29:15 - 30:02)
Absolutely. So, Ellie, if you can go back, maybe I had another additional image that maybe you can share with you on the expert page. So you can see this page is the Little Points Road is a public way.

But sort of if you were to take the driveway or if you go through the stone gate, that area is a private property. So the only parking available for the public will be on Little Points Road. We are working with the DPW staff and the DPW department to delineate and mark off parking areas, two parking spaces along Little Point Road for our residents that would use this path.

[Speaker 8] (30:03 - 30:03)
Thank you.

[Speaker 5] (30:04 - 30:25)
You're welcome. Other questions? I should also share with you that Town Council reviewed this document, and this document was also reviewed by the Conservation Commission, reviewed and approved by the Conservation Commission.

[Speaker 3] (30:26 - 30:37)
Great. Well, this is exciting, Margie. Can I just ask, what is the diameter?

It's hard to get a sense in pictures of that seating area.

[Speaker 5] (30:40 - 31:11)
I want to say at least ten feet, maybe a little bit more. And it's really nice, a couple of the bricks that are there, the developer took care and was able to preserve some of the bricks from the Mary and Claude College. I think there was a marker from one of the students that you can really see their name at the bottom of the lookout area into the stone path.

[Speaker 3] (31:12 - 31:16)
Great. Peter, you had a question?

[Speaker 2] (31:18 - 31:45)
Yeah. Is there anything in this easement that would allow us, if we wanted to put a sitting, the ability to have a seating area in the scenic overlook? I notice that it's completely barren of anything.

I mean, I guess people could sit on the wall, I guess. But I'm just questioning what under this easement rights do we have to amenitize it with signage and with seating?

[Speaker 5] (31:47 - 32:48)
So we are looking to put signage in there. We wanted to do some interpretive signage sort of at two locations, at Little Points Road that would direct residents to this area, and also within the sort of like the sitting area. At this point, I think the area is fairly small.

I think if you're thinking of putting a bench or something like that in there, the way that the stone wall is constructed, it's really a perfect height for somebody just to be able to sit there. I will have to double check in regards to our ability to bring additional, you know, benching if that's what your request is, because I did not see anything in here that would allow us to bring additional infrastructure or additional furnishing and things like that.

[Speaker 2] (32:48 - 32:50)
Is there anything that you see in here that allows you to put signage?

[Speaker 5] (32:52 - 33:00)
No, there was nothing on signage in here, but I feel confident that we can put signage on Little Points Road if that is a public way.

[Speaker 2] (33:01 - 33:06)
But not signage directing them once they're on the property as to where the actual easement is?

[Speaker 5] (33:07 - 33:08)
That's correct.

[Speaker 9] (33:13 - 33:14)
Okay, thanks.

[Speaker 5] (33:14 - 33:19)
Is there something that you would like to see included in this document?

[Speaker 1] (33:19 - 33:56)
So perhaps we can go back and just ask if we can include some language in there that would allow us to put some seating, you know, amenities and some signage. You know, I think those are important considerations, and perhaps, you know, if the board is interested in seeing that, we can come back at our next meeting and present whatever we can negotiate.

[Speaker 3] (33:56 - 34:05)
Marjorie, was that raised at all during the conversations, and was there any hesitation noted or anything about signs or seats?

[Speaker 5] (34:06 - 35:38)
No, we did not discuss it. We did mention, we did talk about signage because we are very proud of the history of this site, and we would like to share the sort of the history of Whiteford, the history of the area, and even actually, you know, be able to highlight some of the points of interest within the harbor or, you know, areas along the waterfront. So that is something that we did want to.

So I'm more than happy to go back to the developer and ask them to do that. The site as you enter Whiteford is really clear that, you know, areas or certain areas are marked as private property with no trespassing, but once you enter the gates on foot, you will see, you know, you can clearly see the path, and I think if we had really good signage over there, signage of Little Point Road, I think that would direct residents to the lookout area. But again, I'm happy to go back and request, you know, signage and or seating area.

My only concern would be that, you know, having any furniture on the ocean without that being secured, I would be concerned that that could be a public, you know, like a safety issue, but, you know, that it doesn't, you know, not fly away, but, you know, it's not windblown off the site or it could cause any potential damage to any property or person.

[Speaker 3] (35:46 - 35:53)
Any other questions? Okay, so Peter, do you have thoughts?

[Speaker 2] (35:54 - 36:14)
I'm okay with not having— No, I just—I guess—so I'm going to abstain in the vote. I'm not going to vote for unrelated reasons, but I guess my question is what— Margie, you might know the timing sensitivity of this, but typically we have two readings of documents, and this is getting a vote in one reading, and I'm just wondering why that is.

[Speaker 5] (36:18 - 37:14)
No, we—initially, it was our understanding that this being an easement, recreation easement, that this document only needed the signatures of the Conservation Commission. We went back to Council to seek their review and their sort of approval prior to come into— prior to going to the Conservation Commission. They suggested that the Select Board should be part of this, and you are correct.

Each of our documents that seek your signature, we do have two readings, so I don't see any reason to rush and have this signed today. I can go back and, you know, request or speak with the developers regarding the seating and signage, so please let me know if that is the wish of the Board, and then I can report at the next meeting in regards to their response back regarding those two issues.

[Speaker 3] (37:15 - 37:18)
Thanks, Margie. I think that makes sense. There's no harm in that.

[Speaker 2] (37:19 - 37:33)
Can I just ask, Margie, so you don't know— my understanding is that they were looking to close on units this month, and that they were trying to get this done first because of title issues that would need to be recorded before the Master Deed and other documents?

[Speaker 5] (37:35 - 37:59)
So my understanding—I spoke with one of the principals earlier today, and my understanding was that they needed to document the payment in lieu of— or document the payment in lieu, and that needed to be recorded. This could be done at a later point, at a later time. It does not have to be done consecutively with the closings.

[Speaker 2] (38:00 - 38:26)
So I just want to make sure that our Council is focused on the recording order of things and that we are getting S&DAs from lenders that get filed before this so that this doesn't get wiped out in the event of a foreclosure of any type. So we just need to make sure that we're just focused on the title priority of this document.

[Speaker 5] (38:27 - 38:28)
Absolutely.

[Speaker 2] (38:32 - 38:49)
So I actually—I mean, again, I'm going to abstain. Procedurally, I just want to know procedurally because I want to respect the integrity of things. If there's a reason to vote tonight because of that, I would hate for us to hold up a project for this personally, but I don't hear Margie saying there's a reason.

[Speaker 1] (38:49 - 39:01)
I don't think there's a reason. I think these are good reasons to go back and have a careful conversation with the developer, and we'll get back to the Board with any updates that we receive.

[Speaker 3] (39:02 - 39:05)
So are you saying that you think we should take the time or should not take the time?

[Speaker 2] (39:06 - 39:13)
No, I'm saying that if there was a reason that we needed to vote tonight, that I just want people to be aware if there was a reason that the vote needed to happen.

[Speaker 3] (39:13 - 39:15)
Sounds like we're pretty sure, Margie, but not entirely sure.

[Speaker 5] (39:16 - 39:47)
Well, you know what? I mean, why don't we—if it's okay with you, I will do my best to see if I can call one of the principals right now as the meeting goes on, and then maybe I can report shortly, and I can report right back to you if that would be acceptable. But one thing that I would like to receive from you at all is just a clarification on the seating.

So please tell me what your thoughts are. Is it just a bench or single benches? So I just want to be clear on that.

[Speaker 3] (39:49 - 39:54)
I don't have thoughts on seating, but if anyone else does— Margie, I think from time to time it may change.

[Speaker 1] (39:55 - 40:16)
It might just be, you know, accommodations. You know, there may be some need for ADA accommodations with seating, and there may be other needs. We just likely want the ability to work with the grantor to ensure that we have the ability to provide seating.

[Speaker 5] (40:20 - 40:23)
So it would be temporary or permanent seating?

[Speaker 1] (40:25 - 40:29)
I would say we just want the ability to provide seating.

[Speaker 3] (40:30 - 40:30)
Okay.

[Speaker 1] (40:30 - 40:32)
I don't know if it— Either one. Yeah.

[Speaker 10] (40:33 - 40:35)
Yeah, the more flexibility— Yeah.

[Speaker 1] (40:35 - 40:40)
Certainly temporary would be in there, but— We want it as broad as it needs to be.

[Speaker 5] (40:41 - 40:41)
All right. Thank you.

[Speaker 3] (40:42 - 40:49)
So, yeah, I think— Why don't we just hang on? Is everyone comfortable with that? And see if, Margie, you make any progress, and then— Is that okay?

[Speaker 1] (40:51 - 40:58)
Or do you want to just— Yeah, I think we can get back to the board if there's an exigency that is somehow— Okay.

[Speaker 2] (40:58 - 41:01)
It makes it impossible, we can— All right.

[Speaker 3] (41:01 - 41:05)
So let's just consider this a first reading, then, and we can put it on the 15th.

[Speaker 2] (41:05 - 41:19)
But the 15th, unless there's— Sorry, we—I think we're used to the chair. Are you—I think Margie wanted to reach out to a principal and say tonight to see if it needed to happen tonight because there was a timing issue.

[Speaker 3] (41:19 - 41:19)
Right.

[Speaker 2] (41:19 - 41:35)
I just think my understanding was Sean was recommending— If we want to do that, Margie, please— No, no, I'm sorry. I just heard you said if there's an exigency, then we'll do something, but that means tonight. Yeah, Margie can— That's why I misunderstood if you were saying delay.

[Speaker 3] (41:37 - 41:43)
Okay, then. I'm going to just say we're going to wait and see if you can reach them, Margie, and we'll decide later if you cannot.

[Speaker 5] (41:44 - 41:46)
Absolutely. So we'll circle back around.

[Speaker 3] (41:46 - 41:50)
And you can just text one of us when you have an answer we can come back to.

[Speaker 5] (41:50 - 41:56)
And I'll be back on because I'm here. I will speak on one of the other items, so I will get back to you one way or another.

[Speaker 3] (41:57 - 42:53)
Thank you. We appreciate it, Margie. Thank you.

All right. I apologize. We're going to move on to the next item of the agenda.

It's scheduled for 6.30, public hearing pursuant to Mass General Laws, Chapter 40, Section 56. The select board will be holding a public hearing on Wednesday, December 1, 2021, at 6.30 in room B129 at Swampscott High School, 200 Essex Street, Swampscott, Mass, and broadcast on Zoom for the purpose of discussing an application from Hanley-De La Cruz, Euroline Motorsport, Inc., for a Class II automobile dealer's license for the premises located at 218 to 222 Paradise Road, Swampscott, Mass., Map 5, Lot 209. Anyone desiring to be heard, I agree that, should appear here, and you can share your comments at this time. So is there a motion to enter public hearing?

[Speaker 10] (42:54 - 42:55)
So moved. Second.

[Speaker 3] (42:56 - 42:56)
All in favor?

[Speaker 10] (42:57 - 42:58)
Aye. Aye.

[Speaker 3] (42:58 - 43:12)
Aye. Okay. So let's see.

Holly, do you want to have Molly? I believe Molly's. Yeah, she's going to be.

Hi, Molly. Joining us on Zoom, and you'll be giving us an overview.

[Speaker 7] (43:12 - 45:07)
Just a brief introduction. Yeah, so you have here tonight Hanley-De La Cruz and Chris Cannell representing Euroline Motors, which is located on 218 to 222 Paradise Ave. It is the former Silver Star producer. So back in the end of 2019, there was an opinion issued by the building inspector at the time that led Hanley to seek a zoning board opinion on the on-site parking and on the use of being able to sell used cars on-site.

The DBA issued a decision with their opinion that the use was valid and that Hanley could continue the use. That use was previously used by Silver Star Motors. They obviously recommended that the owner needs to seek a new Class 2 license under the new ownership name.

And then, of course, we ran right into March 2020 and the shutdown. So Hanley came in earlier this year to apply for the Class 2. His use permit granted by the DBA is still being valid because all of them have been extended.

So he is in front of you tonight seeking that Class 2 license after going through the process of inspections and providing all the information needed for that. He's seeking a license to sell eight cars. I've obviously shared with him our concerns about that number.

Our current license holders, the one across the street, the Sicko Paradise, is up to four cars. And I believe 460 Humphrey Street is a maximum of six cars. So he is here tonight to discuss his request.

And I see that we also have public comment as well. So I'll turn it over to Hanley and Chris, who are right in front of you, to answer any questions that you have.

[Speaker 3] (45:11 - 45:18)
Great. Hi. I wonder if you can just introduce yourself again, even though.

[Speaker 18] (45:18 - 45:20)
My name is Hanley De La Cruz.

[Speaker 3] (45:20 - 45:22)
Great. Thanks. Thanks for joining us.

[Speaker 18] (45:22 - 45:49)
Yeah. So I'm applying for, like, an eight-car use dealer license. It will ease my business, and it will help me in the future for my kids and my family.

And I want to move away a little bit from repair, more like selling, than anything else. Yeah. So.

[Speaker 3] (45:52 - 45:52)
What?

[Speaker 2] (45:54 - 45:56)
I didn't know it was on there. I don't think so.

[Speaker 3] (45:57 - 46:00)
Are you with? No, I'm kind of measuring him.

[Speaker 19] (46:00 - 46:00)
Yeah.

[Speaker 3] (46:00 - 46:02)
I didn't get this.

[Speaker 19] (46:02 - 46:03)
I'm going to share some.

[Speaker 20] (46:04 - 46:05)
More, you know.

[Speaker 18] (46:05 - 46:05)
Yeah.

[Speaker 20] (46:05 - 46:19)
It's an unbelievable mechanic. It's a massive mechanic without ease. And just trying to help him become more efficient as a business person.

Yes. From accounting to compliance to expanding. Yeah.

[Speaker 3] (46:19 - 46:22)
And can you just state, since you just spoke, can you just state your name and address?

[Speaker 20] (46:22 - 46:23)
Chris Scannell.

[Speaker 3] (46:23 - 46:23)
Okay.

[Speaker 20] (46:25 - 46:30)
I don't have any kids. This is my project. Y'all need something.

Yeah.

[Speaker 3] (46:31 - 46:37)
Okay. So, I just want to ask other board members if they have questions.

[Speaker 8] (46:38 - 46:52)
No. So, Molly, just a point of clarification. So, current license holders across the street and down Humphrey Street are four and six.

Is that correct?

[Speaker 7] (46:53 - 46:57)
The sicko is definitely four. I believe Four Seasons is six. Four Seasons is six.

[Speaker 8] (46:58 - 47:06)
Got it. Okay. So, the eight or four.

So, Mr. Delacruz.

[Speaker 18] (47:06 - 47:06)
Yes.

[Speaker 8] (47:06 - 47:12)
Where exactly can you put these eight cars that you're requesting?

[Speaker 18] (47:12 - 47:20)
Right in front of my property. Like, right in front of it. It's a big parking space in front of it.

So, I'd be able to show and display the cars.

[Speaker 8] (47:21 - 47:24)
So, how many parking spaces total do you have?

[Speaker 18] (47:24 - 47:29)
The whole property, I think, is 22 parking spaces. Yeah? Yes.

Okay.

[Speaker 2] (47:30 - 47:30)
Yeah.

[Speaker 3] (47:36 - 47:59)
So, one concern, I think, that we heard from a resident who lives in the area earlier, and traffic and congestion and on-street parking is a concern for residents in the area. And it's my understanding, also, that as much as it might not be enforced at the current moment, it doesn't seem, Paradise Road, which is Route 1A, it's a state road, prohibits parking on the street.

[Speaker 18] (47:59 - 47:59)
Yes.

[Speaker 3] (48:00 - 48:37)
And so, and I say, I want your business to be successful. Thank you. I want you to be able to fulfill your professional goals.

But, you know, there is a concern that the cars, the concern, I guess, from residents who live in the area, that there's already cars from the business during the day anyway. I don't know what happens at night, parked on the street. And then the additional concern that it's actually not technically allowed in that area.

So, I just am concerned how, if that's happening prior to adding four or eight more cars, how that issue is going to be addressed.

[Speaker 18] (48:37 - 49:02)
Well, I want to move my business more to selling and fixing. One, that's number one. And number two, some of the cars I've got in front of my business, some of them, they're not mine.

Some are up the street or across the street. So, I want to move more to selling cars. Maybe repair the cars for selling.

So, I want to move more towards selling.

[Speaker 3] (49:03 - 49:09)
So, you're saying that you're going to replace some of the cars there for repair.

[Speaker 18] (49:09 - 49:14)
Yes. I want to do less repair and more selling cars. It's much more profitable.

[Speaker 20] (49:14 - 49:16)
Yes. Especially with this background.

[Speaker 18] (49:17 - 49:17)
Yeah.

[Speaker 3] (49:18 - 49:21)
That transition might take a little bit of time though, right?

[Speaker 18] (49:21 - 49:22)
Yes.

[Speaker 3] (49:22 - 49:23)
Because you don't want to, yeah.

[Speaker 18] (49:23 - 49:24)
Yeah, I've got to.

[Speaker 3] (49:24 - 49:27)
You might do whatever your mentor is telling you, but it seems that.

[Speaker 20] (49:27 - 49:30)
And he does not leave cars on the street overnight.

[Speaker 18] (49:30 - 49:30)
No.

[Speaker 20] (49:30 - 49:31)
Ever.

[Speaker 18] (49:32 - 49:32)
Yeah.

[Speaker 20] (49:32 - 49:38)
And a lot of the cars are there for pickup or drop off or staging to get into the garage.

[Speaker 18] (49:38 - 49:41)
Yeah. I've got to always move cars around. Mm-hmm.

Yes.

[Speaker 20] (49:41 - 49:43)
Nothing's ever really parked there.

[Speaker 18] (49:43 - 49:43)
Yeah.

[Speaker 8] (49:44 - 49:51)
No, but there are cars parked during the day from 8 o'clock to 5 p.m. Yes. On the street.

[Speaker 18] (49:51 - 49:51)
Yes.

[Speaker 8] (49:52 - 49:54)
And I understand it's not just your business.

[Speaker 18] (49:54 - 49:54)
Yeah.

[Speaker 8] (49:54 - 49:56)
There are other businesses as well.

[Speaker 18] (49:56 - 49:56)
Yes.

[Speaker 8] (49:56 - 49:59)
Legally parking on and alongside Paradise Road.

[Speaker 21] (49:59 - 50:00)
Yeah.

[Speaker 3] (50:01 - 50:33)
Yeah, and that's why it does on some level seem unfair to say, right, you can't park in the street, but up the road we, you know, any, well, along the road we know that there's parking. So it's not to single you out in that respect. It's just that given that it's a concern to approve something knowing that it's a concern already.

Yes. And that there isn't a way to mitigate the concern separately or in conjunction with this is, I think, at least what I think what our intention is here. Okay.

So I want to allow other people to.

[Speaker 2] (50:34 - 50:35)
See if there's public testimony.

[Speaker 3] (50:37 - 50:55)
Oh, yeah. Is there anybody else that wants to speak from the public on this, Ali, just if, would we see? Okay.

And there's someone here that wants to speak. If you don't mind, sir, either speaking into that microphone or coming up to the stand and just state your name and address, please.

[Speaker 13] (50:59 - 53:01)
So these are not cars that are, you know, being repaired. Maybe someone drops it off early in the morning, picks it up the next morning. These are parked there, storage, long term.

Like I said, there's been cars there literally for months. And there was one car that had no tire on it for three or four days. It was jacked up.

I know there's been some disagreement on whose cars they are. I know that there are, and I don't know if they're employees, but people who I assume work at your place of business who get in and out of those cars. I've seen them moving them around when they do move.

So my concern is, I don't know what these cars are. I don't think they're repair vehicles because they sit there so long. So I don't know if they're being sold or not.

They're mostly, I would say, you know, not great condition cars, older. Sometimes there's some higher end cars there. So I don't really know what the business is, but I can tell you it's basically used as a storage lot.

[Speaker 8] (53:04 - 53:15)
Now, just to that point, is this cars from Mr. Dela Cruz or are these cars from the business across the street, or are you unsure?

[Speaker 13] (53:15 - 53:23)
So when I say across the street, I mean the former Silver Star Motors building and those people.

[Speaker 1] (53:24 - 54:52)
Okay. Thank you for clarifying. So Mr. Dela Cruz, you know, there's really, I don't think there's a person here that doesn't want you to be successful. Swansket's one of the most densely settled towns in the Commonwealth and we have a lot of neighborhood concerns about pedestrian safety and the number of cars that are just parked in and around the site. We've had a few, you've had a few conversations with staff about the number of vehicles that we previously allowed through this permit. It was four.

And so it's like you're looking for eight and that's a significant increase. We're trying to balance some of these needs and I think, you know, part of it is, you know, we've got a, you've got a business plan that you want to transition from working on cars that frankly you could have 20 people show up one day and say, hey, fix my tire, fix my alternator, fix my, and you have to sequence and schedule and you're going to be selling cars as well and it sounds like this could be a real busy site. And so the concerns I think are, are we going to make things worse without giving you a chance to kind of demonstrate that you're going to really be able to manage that careful sequencing of your business.

[Speaker 18] (54:53 - 55:15)
Yeah, like I say, I want to transition from like mostly repair to selling cars. So I'll be selective of my repairs that I do. So that's why I don't want to, I'm applying for this license.

I don't want to have too many cars because if I have cars sitting around, I'm not going to make no profit.

[Speaker 21] (55:16 - 55:16)
Understood.

[Speaker 18] (55:17 - 55:22)
So that's why I don't want to, I want to have cars to sell and it will be more profitable for me. Yes.

[Speaker 20] (55:23 - 55:27)
I think you'd be able to, you know, start out with less cars.

[Speaker 18] (55:27 - 55:27)
Yeah.

[Speaker 20] (55:28 - 55:39)
So start out with something comparable to what the other vendors have. True. And then come back and maybe ask for the additional pay if he is compliant.

[Speaker 3] (55:40 - 55:52)
So I just am mindful of the time here and I wanted to get to the public comment on the Zoom. We are joined by Zoom. So we have Robert Bartolomeo.

[Speaker 11] (56:00 - 56:00)
Yes.

[Speaker 3] (56:01 - 56:07)
Hi there. If you can just state your name, I apologize if I mispronounced it in your address, please. Thank you.

[Speaker 11] (56:07 - 56:12)
My name is Robert Bartolomeo. I live at 84 Franklin Avenue, Swampstead.

[Speaker 8] (56:13 - 56:41)
Over the past, I don't know, at least seven years, there's been a ton of parking from around Silver Star. Cars left one week, two weeks. I see employees walking around the corner, dropping them off.

I've had a couple of words with a couple of employees, left cars in front of my house.

[Speaker 11] (56:42 - 56:52)
The street is a mess right now because of a lot of speeding issues, cars coming around from Paradise Front to Franklin.

[Speaker 8] (56:53 - 57:00)
And a lot of the young kids now in that neighborhood and we have a lot of concerns about this.

[Speaker 3] (57:04 - 57:44)
Thank you, Mr. Bartolomeo. And then we have Jennifer Murphy who has her hand raised as well. Jennifer, I'm sorry to call you out.

If you wanted to subtly lower your hand, but if that was an accidental lower and you do want to speak, please just raise your virtual hand again and we can get back to you. Mr. Bartolomeo, you were finished, right? I didn't interrupt you?

Okay. Thank you. Other questions from board members?

[Speaker 2] (57:45 - 1:01:24)
Yeah, so I guess from my perspective, I have a couple of thoughts. If there is a zoning application, it would have been helpful to us to have the zoning decision here because that would tell us what the findings were of the zoning board. We're talking about a lot of things that have a proper jurisdiction of zoning.

And my concern is that these are legitimate concerns, but the zoning board, my guess is unanimously approved this use, which means they've thought about all these things as well. And so it would really be helpful to us to be able to have the benefit of seeing those decisions. Just because I think under the statute, things that we're talking about here are not actually what the general law is talking about when we're issuing class two car dealer licenses.

The stuff we're talking about tonight is actually planning and zoning stuff. So that's comment number one. Comment number two for me is look at, I think a lot of the problems that are happening in the neighborhood is because we don't enforce, just candidly.

We don't enforce. I mean, kind of hard stop. I mean, we can't cite a single example in the last 12 months of enforcing, I'm sure, candidly, and so that's why cars, if we looked at the Cidco special permit across the street, there's specific restrictions on how many cars they can have parked where, et cetera, et cetera.

You know, the parking on, I know exactly what Greg McDonald's talking about on Swampscott Avenue. It quite literally is an extension of a commercial parking lot. Quite literally is what it is.

And so there's not any enforcement there. And I hate to have this applicant, this applicant suffer the consequences because others before him, not him as well. And so I appreciate that we say, hey, we want people to be successful and we're a densely populated town.

We want to be here to help. But one way to help is actually to ask people to follow the rules that are set and enforce it. And that's why we have these things is to enforce them.

And when that's done, we are able to see a normal environment. Okay, well, with the rules implemented, we know this works. And so what happens is we're put in this really difficult position where the rules aren't being enforced.

People are not following them. And as a result, we're in this awkward situation where we're saying, well, we're not going to give him a permit to follow the rules because others aren't following the rules and we're, as a town, aren't enforcing the rules. And I just think as though it's a vicious cycle and it's very unfair to the applicant.

I would be open to a lesser number to start to see because I appreciate what you're trying to do here. And so I'd be open personally to a lesser number here. But I find it, you know, I find us ill-equipped to deal with things that I think staff, planning staff, you know, I want to empower Molly and Margie and the whole team to really, before the zoning board, make recommendations to address these things, to make sure there's compliance issues so that they feel empowered, because they're not the compliance staff by any means, right?

But make sure that they feel empowered as well to help us do these things because I don't think we're getting a true picture of what the rules are because the rules aren't being followed and, you know, we're part of that problem right now. So I hope that we can fix that because I think that's a really important thing so that when an applicant such as this comes forward, we can feel better about our decision whichever way it is, right? Because we have experience and just doesn't, I'm uncomfortable with it, but for the purpose of tonight, knowing the history of the site, you know, I can be comfortable with four cars with probably some conditions on it.

[Speaker 7] (1:01:24 - 1:02:43)
Molly, you have your hand raised. Yeah, I wanted to suggest a couple of things and maybe give some more context. So, you know, with the discussion, if you, if the board doesn't feel necessarily ready or wants, you know, condition recommendations, I'm happy to work with Hanley and bring back kind of a parking plan and have him walk you through that so he can better show you what he means and what spaces he's going to use and also recommend some, you know, conditions that would go along with that.

The building inspector and I have actually been out to that area many times and have been talking about enforcement. A lot of times he doesn't necessarily have any power. I have no enforcement power in this case, but I work with him a lot.

You know, it really depends on what the zoning decision is. It is a state road, and so I've been trying to work with the police department on how we kind of enforce this and coordinate this because while it is a state highway, I believe we do have, you know, jurisdiction to enforce no parking. So it's really got to be a coordinated effort on that front, and I'm happy to continue, kind of bring more information on that back to you if that would be helpful for everyone.

So, Molly, that's confirmed, right? Yes, so I spoke with Angelica at the police station.

[Speaker 3] (1:02:45 - 1:02:50)
Okay. We have to wrap up in just a minute, but I wanted to get back.

[Speaker 13] (1:02:50 - 1:02:51)
Something else?

[Speaker 3] (1:02:51 - 1:02:59)
Come on, sir, please. Thank you. There is Jennifer Murph is back on the virtual Zoom, and you wanted to make another comment, Jennifer?

[Speaker 16] (1:03:01 - 1:03:49)
Yes, I just wanted to say I agree with Peter. The whole enforcement aspect is really unclear, and it is. It's not fair to the business.

It's not fair to the residents, and we really need to know how we can work together and what the rules are because it is a mess right now, and it's a safety concern, and we don't want someone to be injured or killed with the traffic, but, you know, we are concerned. Definitely, like, eight cars seems like a lot, and we have absolutely seen cars left overnight on Franklin Ave, and that's all I have to say right now. Thank you.

[Speaker 3] (1:03:50 - 1:03:56)
Thank you. Okay, I can take if your comment is very quick because we just.

[Speaker 13] (1:03:56 - 1:04:09)
Yeah, just real quick. Maybe, you know, one thing is if the business really wants to move towards selling and away from repair, I don't. I think it's like a four or five bay garage.

They can correct me if I'm wrong. Somewhere in there, four or five, six.

[Speaker 2] (1:04:10 - 1:04:11)
How many bays do you have?

[Speaker 13] (1:04:12 - 1:04:14)
I got four bays.

[Speaker 21] (1:04:14 - 1:04:15)
Thank you.

[Speaker 13] (1:04:15 - 1:04:33)
So maybe shut down two of the bays for repair, and you could store cars, and you'd have interior storage. I mean, if that's really where you want to move the business and you really want to get out of the repair, maybe that's a solution or at least a factor to consider.

[Speaker 3] (1:04:34 - 1:04:40)
Thank you. So the zoning board approved four, right?

[Speaker 7] (1:04:40 - 1:04:43)
The zoning board doesn't get into licensing numbers the same way they don't.

[Speaker 3] (1:04:44 - 1:04:46)
Can you repeat what you said earlier about the four cars?

[Speaker 7] (1:04:46 - 1:04:55)
The four cars are the existing class two licenses for Sitco Paradise and for Four Seasons. Those are their class two licenses.

[Speaker 2] (1:04:57 - 1:05:06)
But the zoning board did issue a special permit in 2019 for used car sales at this property, correct?

[Speaker 7] (1:05:06 - 1:05:13)
Correct. But they did not specify a number. They said you need to get a class two license to get a number.

[Speaker 2] (1:05:15 - 1:06:08)
So how can the whatever. I can't imagine the zoning board can approve a use but then not put a number on the use. How could they possibly have known the impacts of the use?

If we went ahead and said do 250 cars, would the zoning board still say there's no impact on traffic, no detrimental effect on a neighborhood? They couldn't. I just don't.

I mean, it's not you, Molly, at all. You just happen to be on the screen with me. Hi.

It's not you at all. It's just sometimes mind numbing. And I agree completely with Jennifer Murphy's statement about this.

Sean, we've got to get out of the business of people calling Town Hall or calling the police station and hands going like this. Either the people answering the phone don't know who the enforcement officer is or the police station. That's not us.

You've got to talk to Town Hall. We've just got to get out of that business.

[Speaker 1] (1:06:08 - 1:06:09)
I can't tell you how many. I know.

[Speaker 2] (1:06:09 - 1:06:12)
I know you're frustrated by it.

[Speaker 1] (1:06:12 - 1:07:14)
This is direct patrol. We don't have 5,000 of these businesses in town. We have a few.

And we have officers that patrol this town 24-7, seven days a week, 365 days a year. We can stop and we can check on patrol. This is something that should happen weekly, if not daily, when we're out and about.

I have had these conversations with several chiefs. I do know that this is something that we talk about when we do kind of review these permits chronically. And it will always be a problem.

We have to really get this as part of a standard operating procedure. We will continue to reinforce this. I'll come back to the Board with monthly reports on statistics about enforcement.

[Speaker 2] (1:07:15 - 1:07:22)
I mean, please don't overpromise. I know. Just because I'm just saying it.

We've heard before that we're going to get monthly reports on things.

[Speaker 10] (1:07:22 - 1:08:31)
So I think I agree with everything that's been said about the enforcement issue. And I think that's a bigger issue. But I think I would be more comfortable with Molly working with Mr. De La Cruz on a plan and have some sort of sense of where the vehicles will go. I don't quite understand how moving from repair to sales reduces the number of vehicles. I think I'd feel more comfortable with a better sense of how that will work. Because I agree that there are multiple businesses or individuals who are parking where they shouldn't be parking.

It's not just from your business or necessarily from your business. But I'd rather see a better plan prior to approving anything. I think my understanding is, Molly, is there an ability to sell four vehicles now?

Or can you not sell at all right now?

[Speaker 7] (1:08:32 - 1:08:50)
So he needs the Class 2 license. You know, the zoning is there. But just in the same way a liquor restaurant will come to the Zoning Board for a few things, they come for the use of the sales of liquor, they still have to get a liquor license before they can sell.

If that makes sense.

[Speaker 3] (1:08:51 - 1:09:01)
Is it also true, Molly, that the prior owner did not? They were grandfathered in through some other way? They had a Class 2 license.

Right, but they were selling four cars.

[Speaker 7] (1:09:02 - 1:09:03)
I believe so, yes.

[Speaker 2] (1:09:04 - 1:10:16)
I think they were selling actually more than four cars. If you go back and look at the prior Class 2, Molly, you're going to see it's a different number. Yeah, last year when we did the Class 2 renewals, I had asked about Silver Star because they weren't on the list last year for us.

And it was because they were doing repairs, not sales. And that prior Class 2 license was a bit of a thorny issue, understandably here. So I agree with Neil.

And I think people are trying to find a way to be helpful here. And so I think I would agree with Neil to ask for us to table this and continue it to, I guess, our next meeting. And ask the applicant to work with Molly and team to see if we can get some more information and come up with a plan that maybe starts with four cars or something that Molly can come and say, I feel comfortable that this, you know, our staff comes back to us and says, we've looked at it, we've talked to whatever department you need to talk to, we feel comfortable that this is a workable plan and come with something to help guide our decision-making with some additional information to help us with that.

[Speaker 8] (1:10:16 - 1:10:40)
Would we also be able to do something and provide some relief for residents of Franklin Ave. and Swampscott Avenue with resident-only parking or something of that nature that would prevent these cars from being stored on the road overnight? That would help with our enforcement?

[Speaker 2] (1:10:41 - 1:10:45)
I'm sorry, that doesn't help with enforcement. That just creates another rule.

[Speaker 3] (1:10:46 - 1:10:49)
Well, I don't think it's part of licensing, that's number one, right?

[Speaker 8] (1:10:50 - 1:11:00)
Well, there's no reason a car without a wheel or without a tire would be sitting in front of Mr. McDonald's house for any period of time longer than, you know.

[Speaker 3] (1:11:00 - 1:11:03)
We can't condition his license on, you know.

[Speaker 8] (1:11:04 - 1:11:04)
No, understood.

[Speaker 13] (1:11:05 - 1:11:06)
But the answer is yes.

[Speaker 3] (1:11:06 - 1:11:08)
Yes, just not as part of it.

[Speaker 13] (1:11:08 - 1:11:12)
Not as part of it. Got it. Can I make a very quick comment?

[Speaker 3] (1:11:12 - 1:11:56)
I really, I don't think we can right now, but we will have another hearing, because we're supposed to start a different public hearing at 7, I apologize. If anyone objects to that decision, just let me know. But the only other thing I will say is, Molly, I, just having talked with you and getting ready for the meeting, you know, I do feel like you had come with data and a recommendation.

Do you, it's fine to postpone this, but I just don't want to put, is there more information? The problems that I've heard us express here aren't necessarily things, Molly, that you're going to know more about how to deal with in two weeks' time. So I just want to be clear.

Do you feel like you need, that you have more information that we don't have? Or is this, I don't know.

[Speaker 7] (1:11:56 - 1:12:31)
The only thing I'll say is that Neil's point on understanding kind of the parking layout and where things are going might be the only piece left to give you guys in regards to that. Okay. Obviously, in terms of, you know, the wider enforcement question, I will discover as much as I can and bring as much of that as I'm able to to the table, but that seems like a, it will be a broader coordination effort, but I know that the building inspector and I have definitely been talking about this and talking about how to, you know, get to a better place.

[Speaker 3] (1:12:32 - 1:12:49)
Okay. Do we want to limit this conversation to a certain number of cars? Because otherwise it just seems like, do we want to do that or do we want to postpone the whole thing and see what Molly or, it sounds like you recommended four, so that's why I'm wondering if we want to at least give the parameter.

[Speaker 8] (1:12:49 - 1:12:49)
Who did me?

[Speaker 7] (1:12:49 - 1:12:56)
I thought Molly had suggested. I had recommended four just based on the other licenses that we have in town. Right.

[Speaker 3] (1:12:57 - 1:13:03)
So do we want to limit it to that parameter or we don't want to take even that much right now? Table it all?

[Speaker 10] (1:13:05 - 1:13:15)
I think we continue, do we continue the hearing? Yeah. I think it's clear that that's the direction that we're heading in.

That's what I'm asking.

[Speaker 3] (1:13:15 - 1:13:18)
Yeah. Okay. Because we're not just, okay.

[Speaker 7] (1:13:18 - 1:13:53)
Are you clear, Molly, on what we're asking? I barely am, but I think I am. I will come back with Hanley with a parking layout and an explanation of how it's going to, how he plans to downsize and focus on selling.

Probably come back with some recommended conditions, although I think I gave you some draft recommendations, and just maybe a brief kind of update on the enforcement process, which may require assistance from the town administrator and you all in doing that.

[Speaker 2] (1:13:54 - 1:14:05)
Molly, can I just ask you also to come back to David's point, if you have recommendations about any changes to parking or roadway rules, can you come back with recommendations to us on that as well? Okay.

[Speaker 10] (1:14:06 - 1:14:11)
Yeah. And then do you want the ZBA decisions?

[Speaker 2] (1:14:11 - 1:14:37)
Yeah, if we can just get the ZBA. For example, the applicant said 22 parking spaces, but we have nothing in our materials that show 22 parking spaces or where they are or how they function. So it just helps us to have visuals to understand the property.

And then if you are coming back with a recommendation about street stuff, it may need to be an agenda item. So you just need to work with the chair. Otherwise, we're talking about something and not being able to actually really do anything about it.

[Speaker 21] (1:14:38 - 1:14:38)
Okay.

[Speaker 3] (1:14:41 - 1:14:48)
Thanks, Molly. Thank you, Molly. Thank you.

Okay, so we're tabling.

[Speaker 2] (1:14:48 - 1:14:53)
Are we voting to continue? To what's our meeting?

[Speaker 3] (1:14:54 - 1:14:54)
15th.

[Speaker 2] (1:14:54 - 1:15:00)
December 15th to 6.30 p.m. on December 15th, you said?

[Speaker 3] (1:15:00 - 1:15:00)
Yes.

[Speaker 2] (1:15:00 - 1:15:01)
15th.

[Speaker 3] (1:15:01 - 1:15:02)
Is there a second?

[Speaker 2] (1:15:03 - 1:15:03)
Second.

[Speaker 3] (1:15:04 - 1:15:05)
All in favor?

[Speaker 2] (1:15:05 - 1:15:05)
Aye.

[Speaker 3] (1:15:06 - 1:16:08)
All right. Thanks again, Molly. Thank you.

Thank you for coming. So we'll see you on the 15th. Thank you.

Okay, thank you, FinCom and Board of Assessors for your patience. Hang on, bear with me here for a second. Okay, so at 7 p.m., the Select Board was going to convene a joint meeting with the Board of Assessors and Finance Committee to have a public hearing pursuant to Mass General Laws, Chapter 40, Section 56, to conduct a public hearing for the purpose of discussing the various options available to the town concerning the FY 2021 classification of real and personal property according to its use and the possible adoption of local levy percentages among the various classifications. Is there a motion from the Select Board to open the meeting?

[Speaker 8] (1:16:08 - 1:16:08)
So moved.

[Speaker 3] (1:16:09 - 1:16:09)
Second.

[Speaker 10] (1:16:10 - 1:16:11)
Second.

[Speaker 3] (1:16:11 - 1:16:12)
Aye. All in favor?

[Speaker 10] (1:16:13 - 1:16:13)
Aye.

[Speaker 3] (1:16:13 - 1:16:15)
Aye. And hi, Tim.

[Speaker 10] (1:16:16 - 1:16:17)
Hey, how are you, Molly?

[Speaker 3] (1:16:18 - 1:16:21)
Do you need to call your meeting and do whatever you need to do?

[Speaker 12] (1:16:22 - 1:16:27)
Okay, thank you. Yeah, we have a quorum, sorry. But we'll call the meeting to order for the FinCom.

[Speaker 3] (1:16:34 - 1:16:35)
I'm sorry, I can't hear.

[Speaker 2] (1:16:35 - 1:16:43)
I thought you were asking. Tim, your audio is not great. Let me check here.

Hold on. He just called his meeting to order.

[Speaker 3] (1:16:44 - 1:17:14)
Okay, they don't have to open it the same way then? If there are public hearings? Yeah.

Okay. And then, sorry, the Chair of the Board of Assessors. I'm sorry?

Okay. Tasia, do you want to call your meeting to order then?

[Speaker 14] (1:17:17 - 1:17:24)
Sure. I call the Board of Assessors meeting on December 1st to order.

[Speaker 5] (1:17:24 - 1:17:25)
December 1st, 2021.

[Speaker 3] (1:17:27 - 1:17:49)
Great. All right, thanks everybody again for your patience. So I think we're going to start with Ben Strait, who is going to give us an overview, as you did, just a recap of what you did from two weeks ago.

Okay. Great.

[Speaker 2] (1:17:59 - 1:18:05)
Can I just ask, do members of the Finance Committee and the Board of Assessors have the information that we have in front of us?

[Speaker 8] (1:18:06 - 1:18:08)
They got it in email?

[Speaker 2] (1:18:09 - 1:18:13)
All right. So the material we're all looking at, just so you know, is the stuff that you all got via email today.

[Speaker 12] (1:18:18 - 1:18:20)
We got it about half an hour ago.

[Speaker 2] (1:18:21 - 1:18:28)
Okay. Well, you beat us by 25 minutes because we just got it two minutes ago. So can you tell us what's in it?

[Speaker 14] (1:18:29 - 1:18:33)
Can you tell me who the sender was? I didn't see an email.

[Speaker 3] (1:18:45 - 1:18:48)
Lara, just going to forward it to you and Lara. Thank you.

[Speaker 4] (1:20:08 - 1:24:33)
Reordered a little bit just for a smoothness of presentation here. So next slide. Okay.

So this is a LA4 comparison, which is comparing this year's values to last year's values. Got the individual class lines on the top, and then the totals at the bottom. Residential is up a total of 10%, with single-family homes being up about 9% on average, or as a total group.

The commercial properties are up 16.7%. Industrial are up 15.6% in value. And personal property is up 24.4%. These value adjustments are based on the market prices for these properties. Next slide, please.

We've got a little bit more breakdown here. Everybody okay if I take off my mask? Yes.

So this is the chart showing commercial, industrial, and personal property since 2017 to 2022. The overall increase in those three classes combined has been 70% since 2017, with the CIP, commercial, industrial, and personal property CIP, up 18% since 2021. You can see on this slide that all three categories have increased individually, as well as the overall total increasing significantly over the prior years.

Next slide. Same breakdown here for the residential properties, the majority of which are the single-family homes in blue. Next you have condominiums in red.

Green is the two families. Purple is the apartment buildings. And then the last kind of readable sliver at the top is three families in town.

Those have increased 10% since 2021 as a total group, with an increase of 42% since 2017. Next slide. And these are the percentages of the overall total.

The pie chart up in the right-hand corner is the breakdown of this year, or the snapshot of this year, with residential properties coming in at 92% of the overall value in SwampScot, and commercial, industrial, and personal property representing 7.62%. That has increased since last year. The graph on the left is the increases since 2017. So you can see the commercial, industrial, and personal property percentage share of the overall value in SwampScot has increased, although, of course, the residential side is still 92%.

Next slide. This is the new growth amounts and values applied to the levy limit over the past five years, and those vary each year depending on what construction is going on, what renovations are going on in the town. Last year, there was a large increase from condos going up at 71 Greenwood.

Next year, we're anticipating more condos, but this will fluctuate with new construction and renovation of properties in SwampScot. Next slide. This is the average values from 2017 to 2022.

The left group of columns is commercial, industrial average values, and those have gone up 70% since 2017 on average. And then on the right of the chart is the single-family average values, which have increased 42% in that same time frame. In the center, you have condominiums on the left and multifamily homes on the right.

Next slide. Same breakdown, but with median values. The commercial, industrial median value is about a third of what the average value is.

The percentage increase is roughly the same at 67% over the past five years, 52% for condominiums on median values, 61% for the multifamily homes, and then 38% on the median values for the single-family homes in SwampScot. Next slide. At this point, Sean will take you through comparisons with Essex County and our peer group.

Sure. Thanks, Ben. So this is really a spaghetti chart here.

[Speaker 1] (1:24:34 - 1:33:42)
I'm just going to call everybody's attention to the far left-hand side of the chart. You can see that blue line is the town of SwampScot's tax bill, and you can see there are just two communities that are higher than SwampScot. Back in 2012, as we go over to 2021, we can see that there are a number of other communities that now have risen higher than SwampScot.

SwampScot's average single-family tax bill is coming back down into a cohort of communities throughout Essex County. Now, all these communities are very different. You know, Essex County has 34 cities and towns, and certainly, you know, they have different real estate values and different demographics, but it just gives you a sense of where we are with our regional peer group.

So next slide. This is a chart that we've been tracking over the last four years, and you can see from left to right, SwampScot's average single-family tax bill from 2012 to 2021, 10 years' worth of how we stack up to Essex County single-family tax bills. And you can see we have gone from a high of 45% down to where we are today at about 15% higher than Essex County communities.

And so that shows you a trend that we're managing our budget and our average single-family tax bill in a way that kind of is bringing us back to an average, and that's, I think, been a goal that we've been striving for. Next slide. And so if we look at average single-family values over the last 10 years, you can see that our values have quite outpaced the average single-family values in Essex County.

We know that SwampScot's a densely settled town, and with limited land, you know, the prices of homes certainly reflect that scarcity. So we've gone from a high of 29% higher than the average single-family value to roughly 14% higher. Again, this is just market-driven, so we don't have a lot of influence on that other than, you know, we know that real estate is really becoming very expensive throughout the region.

And so the next slide is just a table that shows the 10 years' worth of variance between Essex County average single-family tax bill and assessed valuations and SwampScot. And so we go from a high of $2,600 variance down to a low of where we are today of $1,184. And so you think about 10 years of tax payments, a variance of $2,600, that's $26,000.

And so getting that down to $1,100, that's $11,000. It's a significant change. When we think about a quality of life, those are meaningful ways to kind of look at efforts to just, you know, become more fiscally balanced.

Next slide. This is a practice that we've really looked at. Peer communities, we want to kind of think about where, instead of just our regional counterparts, where can we look to other communities that have similar real estate, similar commercial residential real estate?

You know, we're heavily residential, and, you know, we came up with a peer group of communities, Rockport, Middleton, Hamilton, Winthrop, Ipswich, Georgetown, Hull, Newbury, Port Situate, North Reading. We had a longer list, but this is really a list that we've tried to benchmark against because these communities seem to have a little more in common. So go to the next slide.

This shows our historical trend against our average assessed value. You know, Swampskate has been up and down, but we went from a high of 21% higher than our peer group in assessed value to a low of 6% in 2017, and this year we were about 10%. And so that's just assessed valuation, market-driven, but it gives you a sense.

Swampskate still has properties that are valued a little higher than even those peer communities. Next is the average single-family tax bill. So if we go to the next slide.

This shows a 10-year variance between this peer group of smaller communities with similar demographics and similar real estate portfolios to Swampskate. So we can see we went from a high of 47% higher than the average of our peer group down to a low of 12% higher than our peer group. So we really have done a significant amount of work over the last 10 years to try to bring that variance tighter to the average.

So next slide. Similar table. This puts all that data into a table, and you can see the average single-family assessed value in the peer group and the variance between Swampskate, and we go from a high of $2,600 to a low of $948 this year as a reflection of some of the efforts that we've made to try to tighten the belt and strike that balance in Swampskate.

And so next slide. So this is a composite of the state family tax bill. This is the state average over the last 10 years.

Throughout the Commonwealth, we've seen about a 35% increase in the average single-family tax bill. When we looked at this same data for Swampskate over the last 10 years, we've seen a 7.5% increase. So over the last 10 years, in particular over the last five years, we've really established a practice of keeping Swampskate's budget tighter.

When we look at our rank in the Commonwealth, we've gone from having the 23rd highest average single-family tax bill to the 42nd highest average single-family tax bill. Now, it may not seem like a dramatic improvement, but it certainly reflects progress where we're really seeking to strike a balance. So next slide.

And so now we're going to turn to commercial and industrial values and quite the opposite trajectory. You know, we've gone from a low of 17% of comparison to Essex County to a high this year of 56%. Our commercial properties are getting more and more valuable, and that's, I think, in some ways, a positive reflection of the market.

We want to see our commercial properties be valuable. We want them to reflect a healthy and robust economy. When we look at the average commercial-industrial tax bill, we've gone from a low of 61% in 2017, or 58% in 2018, to a high of 89% this year.

We're seeing those increased valuations really generate additional tax revenue for commercial and industrial. And so next slide. This shows the table of the data that compares Swanscot commercial-industrial to Essex County, and you can see this one's a variance of a low of 14,300, or 14,071 to a high of 19,708.

And so this, again, reflects a stronger commercial sector. So at this point, I'm going to turn it back over to Ben, and Patrick will take us through how we compile the information to set the tax rate with the Department of Revenue. So next slide.

[Speaker 9] (1:33:53 - 1:34:02)
Thanks, John. Okay, so we have tax policy options here. These are five major levers we have to influence tax policy.

[Speaker 1] (1:34:02 - 1:34:04)
Patrick, do you want to take the mask off?

[Speaker 9] (1:34:04 - 1:40:21)
Oh, I'm sorry. So setting the town budget, estimating local receipts, electing to do a small business exemption or a residential exemption, which Ben will talk about later, transferring from free cash or reserves to mitigate the tax increase, and splitting the tax rate, which Ben will get to later. So next slide, Allie.

Okay, so this is a table of all the appropriations that were made since we last set the tax rate. Total appropriations is approximately $71 million, and I'm going to walk through how those are funded. In addition to the appropriations that are voted, we have state charges that we have to fund.

This is part of what the state calls the Cherry Sheet, and this is set each fiscal year. Our largest item on state charges is education-related. We have about $1.1 million in education-related charges. Total Cherry Sheet charges are $1.493 million for this fiscal year. Total revenue to be raised, we have $71 million in appropriations. We have a $31,000 Cherry Sheet offset, which represents state aid to our public library, and we also have an allowance for abatements and exemptions.

That gets added into the total amount of tax revenue that we have, total amount of revenue we have to raise for the year, which is $72.7 million for fiscal 22. To fund that, we have state aid, totaling $6.2 million, $4.7 million of which relates to education, and this is up $63,000 from last fiscal year. Next, we have local receipts, totaling $4.6 million estimated for fiscal 22. There are several different categories on here, the largest being motor vehicle excise tax, meals tax, interest, and fees on delinquent bills. New this year, we have cannabis excise and impact fees, and we have our solid waste fees that are resulting from our new waste reduction program. We also have various departmental revenues and building permits that all add up to this total for the fiscal year.

Next slide. Okay, so this page here summarizes the total revenue to be raised that we just walked through. Added in here is the estimated water and sewer enterprise fund receipts as well because those were factored into the appropriations we saw at the beginning.

And this all works out to our total tax levy, total gross tax levy of $52 million, $660,000, which is 74.2% of the total appropriations made by town meeting. Next slide. Okay, and this is just a recap of how free cash was used last year.

Our prior year free cash certification was $4.7 million, $1.55 million of which was used to reduce the tax rate, and then $966,000 of which was used for other uses, which I'll detail on the next slide. And I have for reference at the bottom here the 3% to 5% guideline. Our financial policies prescribe that we maintain 3% to 5% of our operating budget in free cash for the M4C.

Next slide. Here we have just a more detailed breakout of how free cash was used last year. The $966,417 of free cash used for other uses I mentioned before included $500,000 transfer to Capital Stabilization, $250,000 to the OPEB Trust, $157,000 for collective bargaining agreements last year, and a capital item and a smaller transfer to the Conservation Commission Trust.

Next slide. Okay, considering free cash this year, our current estimate is $4.15 million for free cash. Anticipated uses, an amount to offset the tax levy here, I put $1.55 million, $250,000 to General Stabilization, $125,000 to Capital and OPEB, and $120,000 estimated for collective bargaining agreements. Free cash has also historically been used for funding for certain capital or for unforeseen and emergent operating costs. These uses up top will keep our range within the 3% to 5% of our operating budget. $1.98 million would be the remaining from our estimated free cash certification for this fiscal year if we use these estimated appropriations. Next slide. Next slide. This is a snapshot of what our 10-year financial forecast looks like.

We're constantly updating this to react to changes in the budget, changes in revenue estimates. So this has been updated. This includes estimated debt service for the new school, estimated uses of free cash.

You can see in the yellow here. We have estimated free cash in future fiscal years is tapering off because there was an interest in reducing the use of free cash to offset the tax rate in future years. So that's reflected on here.

[Speaker 2] (1:40:21 - 1:40:47)
Can I interject for a second and ask a question, please? Can either Patrick or Sean please contextualize what this 10-year forecast is? We just went through several months of residents viewing a prior 10-year forecast.

Sure. And characterizing it as something that it's not. That's right.

So please just explain why is it that our expense growth, for example, is higher in your forecast than it is in our past?

[Speaker 1] (1:40:47 - 1:40:47)
That's right.

[Speaker 2] (1:40:47 - 1:40:55)
Why are you assuming very conservative assumptions and showing significant deficits? Because I think it's really important that people understand what that is.

[Speaker 1] (1:40:55 - 1:42:57)
Absolutely. So I actually would not advise that we actually show a financial forecast during a tax classification, but I've been asked to present some of this information because we want to talk about free cash. And so it's important to understand that this is a planning tool, not a financial.

It's not a really empirical budgeting tool. It's used to help us kind of prognosticate and say, hey, our past behavior will in some way determine our future behavior. We have 10 years' worth of actual expenditures, 10 years' worth of actual revenue.

And so this data is empirically sound, but our behaviors change from year to year. And while we project some information, the world is always changing and the town's budget is always evolving and contracts are always being negotiated and renewed and it becomes very difficult to use this as a financial tool as opposed to just a planning tool. Our tax classification typically is all about our actual numbers and that real solid empirical data.

This has history that's solid, but the future is very uncertain and built on assumptions. And most of those assumptions have changed dramatically over the last four years. And so we've weighted the way we forecast empirically in this forecast to help balance that sense that we're not looking at our recent behavior in a greater context.

With that, I think we have a slide that's coming up that describes this not in that many words.

[Speaker 9] (1:42:58 - 1:44:15)
Yep. So just to recap kind of what Sean was getting at, there are different assumptions that go into this model that are informed by history. So when we're looking forward in future years, it's not necessarily what we might be able to expect based on what we've experienced, but things change.

So when we do our budget, there's lots of different considerations to put in that will create perhaps dramatic variances from what you see here in the forecast years out. And through conservative budgeting and spending and different economic growth and local receipts and changes in fees over time and using reserves strategically, we can have a better outlook each year compared to the forecast is our goal. Next slide.

This slide just provides an overview of historically the last five or six fiscal years of reserve fund balances for our General Stabilization Fund, Capital Stabilization Fund, and OPEB Trust. And I've also included the free cash certifications historically, including this year's estimate, just for reference.

[Speaker 4] (1:44:32 - 1:58:26)
So the residential exemption is the exempting up to 35% of the owner-occupied residential property values, and that exemption is paid for by shifting the tax burden onto the non-owner-occupied and higher-value residential properties. Next slide. So this is using 2021 numbers, the residential tax rate.

If it had been adopted last year, it would have been 1,979 versus the 1,380. The break-even point would have been the $683,849 mark as far as the value of the home. So anybody below that mark would have seen a bill reduction, and anybody above that mark would have seen an increase to their bill.

And next slide, please. So this is the number of properties that would have been affected. On the plus side, on the homes below that mark, 4,000 homes would have seen a benefit and had a reduction in, on average, the numbers across the top in green there to their tax bills.

170 single-family, two-families, and condo units would basically break even, 178, that is. Seventy-three of those would have actually seen slight increases ranging from $1 to $118 across the year. So while they're essentially breaking even, there still would have been some additional costs to some of those homes.

On the higher end, 833 single-family residences would have seen a significant cost added to their tax bills. These are the averages of the values at the bottom, which are a little bit hard to read, I apologize. But any home over the $2 million mark, which is that column all the way to the right, would have seen an average increase of $11,839.

Within that group, there's 24 single-family homes that would have seen over a $12,000 increase to their tax bills based on this residential exemption. And there's one home that would have seen a $38,000 increase, multiple homes over a $20,000 increase to their annual tax bills. These are single-family, owner-occupied homes that would have seen those increases.

Next slide. Oh, so the recommendation on that would be to not adopt that provision in Swampscot. Next slide.

Thank you. So the small commercial exemption, this was exempting up to 10% of the value of the commercial property that houses a small business who qualifies, having less than 10 employees on average over the course of a year and where the commercial assessed value of that property is less than $1 million. Next slide.

So the questions were asked last... Oh, I'm sorry. So these are the 27 potentially eligible parcels.

Kind of the same process on the residential side. You would shift the tax burden over to the rest of the class and increase the tax rate on the other commercial and industrial properties to cover the exemptions on the eligible properties here. Next slide.

So last meeting, there were questions asked about are the small businesses aware of this exemption? Have they been using this exemption for the community benefit? Are the exemptions actually passing on to the small business that occupies the properties?

And what are the other impacts of this policy? So I went around to the 27 potentially eligible properties of those. This was on a Monday, on Thanksgiving week, so I had pretty good respondent percentage, but there were some that were closed, some that did not return the survey on time.

But out of the 15 people who were basically available and responded, none of them were familiar with the exemption. Two of them had vaguely heard of it in the past but weren't really sure about what it was. And of those respondents, seven of those were the property owners as well as the business owner, and eight of them were the tenants.

The property owners, because they're on the list this year, doesn't mean that they got it last year, but if they had been eligible last year and received the exemption, they would have benefited whether they knew it or not. Of the eight tenants, six of those pay a rental amount that would include any taxes, so they don't pay a separate rental amount to the landlord. And then two tenants pay the exact tax amount to the landlord, although one of them said he never actually checks that amount, but no reason to think that it's anything but straightforward.

So two of those tenants pay the exact tax amount. Six of them, they're just paying a rent amount that would include any taxes. And the other concern is that other commercial properties that house small businesses that would otherwise qualify would not receive this exemption if they also house a business that doesn't qualify or if their value is over a million dollars.

So if you happen to be a small business and you're in a building that's worth more than a million dollars, you would not qualify for this, the property would not qualify for this, and your tax rate would be increased to offset the exemption for the other properties. So there would be a negative impact on those small businesses. So the recommendation for this year would be to not adopt the small commercial exemption and perhaps, if the board wanted to, do some more research in the coming year.

Next slide, please. So this is the small commercial exemption and who pays for it and the breakdown of the additional cost to the property based on values. Next slide.

Okay, so this is the calculation of a single tax rate and taking the overall tax levy with no allocation of free cash of $52,660,560, dividing by total value in SWAMSCOT of the $3.77 billion, multiplying that by 1,000, and getting the tax rate, the single tax rate of $13.96 per $1,000 in assessed value. This would increase the median and average tax bills on single-family homes by over 10% each, each median and average. So the residential percentage value is 92.3766%, and the total commercial, industrial, and personal property total percentage share is 7.6234%. Next slide, please. So that's important when you're shifting the tax rate, which is increasing the burden on the commercial, industrial, and personal property side to more than what their natural percentage of the overall assessed value in the town is. So the shift on the right here in the pie chart would be a 170% shift. SWAMSCOT is limited to doing a 170% shift, which is actually a 170.311% shift to the commercial side this year because the commercial, industrial, and personal property percentage increased, and because we cannot go below the floor established by the DOR, which is 87.0165% for the residential share of the levy. That's the historical low that has been paid by the residential side since classification began. So a shift of 170.311% this year would match that historical low for the percentage of levy paid by the residential properties. Next slide, please.

So this is last year's tax rate recap. There was a 170% CIP shift and a transfer of $1.55 million. That made the average single-family tax bill $8,999, the median tax bill $74.73, average condo and median condo $55.08 and $43.72, respectively. This last year's shift to the commercial side made the residential percentage of the levy that was paid 87.8596%, which you'll note is higher than the 87.0165%. The 170% shift this year would put on the residential side. Next slide, please. So this year's recommendation is to shift that 170% over to the CIP and also transfer free cash in the amount of $1.55 million. That would make the average single-tax bill increase by $79 to $9,078 and the median tax bill increase $53 to $75.26. The average condo and median condo tax bills tick down ever so slightly to $45.95 and $43.65, respectively. That would make the residential percentage share, as I mentioned, 87.0165% equal to the historical low. Next slide, please.

So this is a big table, but it's a few additional options to what was presented last week. It's broken down in the next few slides, but highlighted in blue is the recommended allocation of $1.55 million and the 1.7% shift and the effects on the average and median tax bills, both on the residential and commercial sides. Next slide, please.

With no free cash and no shift, you would have line one here, which would increase the average tax bill $933, or 10.4%, or the median tax bill $761, or 10.2%. And then you have the other, you know, potential free cash amounts and the resulting value or bill increases to the right. And the no shift option, obviously the commercial tax bills would go down significantly. Next slide.

This is the 1.65% shift and the various options there and the effects of those options. Next slide, please. And the 170% shift here with the highlighted recommendations.

So we can come back to those slides if you want to discuss those. Next slide. This is the excess levy capacity.

This is the amount that could be legally levied to the town and collected. There is an excess this year. Assuming that 1.55 million shift, there's an excess levy capacity of $6,076,939 with the actual levy being 51,110,560. Next slide, please. So this is a single-family average tax bill history in Swamp Scout over the past 10 years. This is assuming that 1.55 million free cash allocation in the last data points for an increase of that $80 on the average single-family bill and $53 on the median single-family bill. Allocating $2 million from free cash would level out that average tax bill and that line would just go across. There would actually be a $1 increase to the average single-family tax bill. Next slide, please.

This is those single-family tax bills in comparison with the values and the value increases over the past same time period, 10 years. While values have continued to increase significantly, the tax bills have been offset by budgeting and free cash allocations over the past six years there. Using that, 1.55 million in free cash would increase the average tax bill less than 1%, and then the other allocations at the bottom would increase the tax bill. With no free cash, the average tax bill would go up 4%, $750,000, 2.5%, and so on down to the $2 million, which would level out that tax bill for an increase of 0.01% toward that $1. Next slide, please. So these are the potential motions that could happen tonight, which is the motion to adopt that minimum residential factor for the shift of 170.311% for the fiscal year of 22 and to not adopt the residential exemption and not adopt the small commercial exemption. And with that, and then, of course, a special town meeting has to occur for that allocation of free cash. And so I'll open up to questions. Any questions?

[Speaker 3] (1:58:31 - 1:58:45)
It's really helpful, Ben. Thank you. And Patrick.

FinCom and if this is your first time joining for the presentation, so I want to give you guys a chance to ask away.

[Speaker 19] (1:58:54 - 1:59:34)
This is Eric Hartman, if you guys can hear me. I just had a couple of questions from the slide. So when we, I forget which slide it was, but when we were talking about using the $1.55 million of free cash and it kept us within our, you know, our policy guideline of 3% to 5%, can we just, can someone just reference the budget number that we're comparing that against so we can, you know, how much, you know, where we really would be, what is the percentage?

I know it's between the range, but what's the true percentage? And then similarly, if we decided to use $2 million of free cash, where would we be? Like what percent of the total budget?

[Speaker 3] (1:59:38 - 1:59:41)
I had you that first question, Eric, so thanks for asking.

[Speaker 19] (1:59:48 - 1:59:51)
I think it's probably in the slide deck somewhere. I'm just not sure which number to look at.

[Speaker 10] (1:59:53 - 1:59:59)
Patrick, it was, well, it's like slide 32 is where you talked about being within the range. I think the question is where would we be in the range?

[Speaker 9] (2:00:00 - 2:00:21)
Yes. The 3% floor is $1,932,181. And if we use the $1.55 million that we discussed, that would leave $1,980,000.

[Speaker 3] (2:00:23 - 2:00:25)
Can you just repeat that because I was like just.

[Speaker 9] (2:00:25 - 2:00:26)
That's okay.

[Speaker 3] (2:00:26 - 2:00:27)
Didn't go in my brain right. Thanks.

[Speaker 9] (2:00:27 - 2:00:57)
Yeah, so if we apply $1.55 million to offset the tax levy and we use these other assumed appropriations for the rest of the fiscal year, the remaining estimated from our certification is going to be $1,980,000. What's the floor? The floor is, it's on the other slide, $1,932,181.

So it gets you right there.

[Speaker 19] (2:00:57 - 2:01:03)
So Patrick, can I take that number and divide by 3% and get the budget?

[Speaker 9] (2:01:03 - 2:01:03)
Yes.

[Speaker 19] (2:01:03 - 2:01:33)
$1.55? Correct. $64.4 million. Okay. Another question was on the 170% shift. It seems like we're recommending we do the same thing that we did last year, which was also 170.

I guess I don't have any context. Is that something we do every year? Is that been a regular practice?

I just don't know the history there.

[Speaker 1] (2:01:39 - 2:01:51)
It has been something that we've done over the last few years. It was as high as 175, I think, four years ago. In the last few years, we've been at 170.

[Speaker 2] (2:01:59 - 2:02:17)
Eric, I would point out that I think the most, a further very important fact, though, is that this year we couldn't do 175 if we wanted to. Under DOR guidelines, we are now capped at the 170.31 or 13, whatever the number is.

[Speaker 3] (2:02:17 - 2:02:18)
Right.

[Speaker 2] (2:02:19 - 2:03:08)
And so that one question that we've asked is to better understand the behavior, assessment behavior that causes a further decrease in the cap so that we can anticipate that and understand fully what those decreases in the cap, because it's not all necessarily bad news, because your residential base is increasing. Sorry, your commercial base is increasing. And so you make up some of that.

But just to understand it, we were trying to get ahead of this by three, four years ago, reducing it from 175 to 17, which was the first time I think ever we did that. And so the question is, at some point, is there a further reduction that we do to again stay ahead of this so it doesn't push us somewhere involuntarily?

[Speaker 1] (2:03:10 - 2:04:35)
I think what's really helpful is that the town has some financial tools in its toolbox, and we have to continue to be mindful about, you know, what our free cash levels are and what our stabilization levels are, because as we see our efforts of, you know, really increasing community and economic development, it is putting pressure on this split. And so, you know, it's not all bad news, but certainly we don't want to see a dramatic shift to the residential without having some ability to mitigate that as the markets do change, and they change in ways that are different from each other. The residential doesn't move at the same rate as commercial.

And, you know, one of the things that we didn't talk about that we talked about as we put this presentation together is if you step back 10 years ago, every one of the bar charts would look the same, but they'd be inverse. They'd all be going down at, you know, in that same proportion. It was a dramatically different economy, and we had dramatically different experiences.

And so times will change. Right now we're seeing some very positive, you know, information about real estate trends in Swampstead and budget trends, but we've got to be mindful that, you know, that won't always be the case.

[Speaker 3] (2:04:43 - 2:05:06)
So can somebody walk me through what getting ahead of it would look like so the shift, like, for example, in either direction? I see here the 165, I guess, but... So if something shifted to...

I'm just trying to... If we can use a concrete example for that. It helps with numbers in my...

[Speaker 4] (2:05:06 - 2:06:20)
Yeah, so the shift is really a result of the commercial CIP, the commercial industrial personal property, percentage of the overall share of value increasing. So that shift then gets limited because we can't go below that 87% floor on the residential percentage side. One of the good ways that it was explained in the past that I thought was helpful is that's somewhat of a self-leveling equation.

So as the CIP shifts upwards, that burden is already shifted over to them just naturally because their values have increased and it's shifted away from the residential for the same reason. So if the commercial continues to increase, the shift would be limited potentially further, but that burden would already have shifted to the commercial side. If the commercial side goes over 13% of total value on its own just naturally, then that would then decrease that floor that is the DOR's limitation.

So there is, in your packets...

[Speaker 3] (2:06:20 - 2:06:25)
A negative impact would start that.

[Speaker 4] (2:06:26 - 2:06:27)
There are no real negative impacts.

[Speaker 3] (2:06:28 - 2:06:31)
When would it not? Is there an example when it would not self-level then?

[Speaker 10] (2:06:31 - 2:06:35)
That floor would go down 87% to 85%.

[Speaker 3] (2:06:35 - 2:06:36)
Right.

[Speaker 4] (2:06:36 - 2:07:45)
Yeah, so as long as commercial is increasing, that's a positive impact on the residential side. And so I did include in your packet, I apologize I don't think it was emailed around, but there is a calculation of that shift. It's good bedtime reading.

If you're feeling energetic and you want to get yourself worn out, you can read this a few times and that should do the trick. But essentially as that commercial value increases, the shift gets limited, but the burden has already been shifted over to the commercial side. Okay.

So I guess the negative situation, which you can then shift more, but the negative situation would be if the commercial side was actually going down in percentage to a smaller percentage where it wouldn't matter if you shifted 175% of the burden because the residential side would equal too much value. But none of those things are going to really happen. The commercial seems to be outpacing the residential at this point, but like Sean said, that change is based on the market.

Right, not the case in 2008.

[Speaker 3] (2:07:45 - 2:07:51)
But what are we getting ahead of then? I guess that's where I'm... I'm sorry, I just...

[Speaker 10] (2:07:51 - 2:07:58)
You mean if we didn't shift 170 and if we shifted 165? I don't know.

[Speaker 3] (2:07:58 - 2:08:07)
Peter and Sean were kind of describing, worrying about it and getting ahead of it, but I'm not quite understanding what, with what you just said, what getting ahead of it...

[Speaker 4] (2:08:07 - 2:08:18)
I don't know if that was basically overall discussion of budget and free cash allocations and getting ahead of, you know, just planning ahead for that or if it's...

[Speaker 1] (2:08:18 - 2:08:59)
I was speaking about macro financing, like when you show up for classification, we look at our financial tools and we look at what's happening with the average single family or the median single family tax bill and what are the influences, whether it's a split or whether it's changes in, you know, the annual budget or revenue position. You know, we can use these financial tools to stabilize the living. We talked about that, you know, with how we modeled the debt service for the school.

These are opportunities that few communities have that Swampstead has worked hard to put in place.

[Speaker 17] (2:09:00 - 2:09:54)
Jill? Yeah, I just wanted to say, I mean, it's... I was the chair of the board with the 175, and the part that's getting missed a little bit is that a lot of communities are a single rate.

This is how businesses want to be in that community. So the other part of it is business development. So, I mean, we keep focusing on the balance and the control of the single family tax bill, which, you know, I've been around for 25 years, so believe me, I understand the importance of that.

But the other part is just the business development part. So shifting as much as you possibly, possibly can, a business could look at that and say, I'm going to go to another community. That's all I wanted to say.

And can I just add to what Jill said?

[Speaker 14] (2:09:54 - 2:10:21)
This is Ticia. That is incredibly important when you're looking at that ratio that allows us to have the split. So in our last meeting, we discussed that that ratio is so tight right now and keep adding residential value.

We keep adding residential properties to town, but we're losing commercial properties, and that's putting us in a really precarious position. So, you know, I just wanted to echo the business development piece of that is so critically important.

[Speaker 3] (2:10:24 - 2:10:52)
Thanks, Ticia. Other VINCOM members have questions, concerns, thoughts? Okay.

Board members.

[Speaker 2] (2:10:56 - 2:12:49)
I would appreciate a little bit more clarity on our reliance on free cash to understand that how much the cumulative impact of recent years' use of free cash to offset levy, how hooked we are on the use of the free cash such that if we get to a point in time where we can't do a million, five, five, or two million, or a million, what that impact would be. And I think your 10-year budget kind of foreshadows some things, right, which is it foreshadows a, I guess I would say a spike in the amount of spike in tax growth in the immediate years that we can't maintain this. And so I guess that I just, I'm interested in understanding the thought process from the financial team on this because I appreciate the desire to continue to lower taxes and to get us to be, you know, a more and more affordable community, for sure.

But I used the analogy last time to our water and sewer rates, right? For years, we kept on saying, look how low our water and sewer rates are, and we said that as a positive, right? But now we have a reckoning with that, which is we underinvested, right?

We didn't do the things we needed to do in water and sewer for generations. This is not a current problem. This is a generational problem.

And now we're having to accelerate those rates, and people have sticker shock, right? They're saying, what do you mean it's a double digit? But for us using retained earnings, we would have been a very significant double digit, right, increase in water and sewer rates this year.

And so increases, we want to minimize them, but we've been sustaining a long period of no increases. And at some point, you know, the free cash thing gets too big of a beast for us to continue feeding every year. So I'm just wondering, like, where you all think we are, and how do we prevent that problem from happening?

[Speaker 1] (2:12:49 - 2:16:36)
Peter, I appreciate that, and we've talked long and hard about when is the right time to strike that balance. You know, using free cash to adjust the levy is not generally what you want to have to rely on. You want a balanced budget that grows incrementally.

But for generations, Slomskit has had a real pressure on its average single-family tax bill and the median single-family tax bill, and that's demonstrated through the analysis that we've presented. And so as we've looked at, you know, our financial position, we've modeled, you know, a tapering off of free cash. Just like the financial forecast, you know, showed deficits, that's going to be our challenge over the next couple of years to try to figure out how do we grow local receipts, how do we manage budget in ways that help ensure that we don't just simply pass that significant increase to Slomskit taxpayers.

You know, the town's got, as we've gotten better at budgeting, we'll have less free cash. We had $6 million in free cash a few years ago, and now it's really tightened up right around $4 million. And again, we're estimating the 4.1. It's not certified yet, and so it could be a little higher, it could be a little lower, but we feel comfortable that 4.1 is going to be sound. And so we're going to have to continue to be careful and tether off that free cash. We've looked at dropping that use, you know, from $1.5 to $1.2 to $800 to $400,000 over the next few years, and as we ramp up strategic use of stabilization. We put these funds aside specifically for these purposes, though.

We wanted to make sure that we could stabilize the impact to the taxpayers. By having financial reserves, it puts us in a position to have these types of strategic discussions about how we place the burden on Slomskit taxpayers. We know that they pay one of the highest burdens in the Commonwealth for local taxes, and we've tried to always be mindful at this time of year how we shift those burdens.

That said, there's no magic wand. There's a list of projects that continue to grow. We've got a new school that we need to build.

We have infrastructure that we have discussed that we're still grappling to get a hold of. All of those challenges will always be true. We'll always have more projects than we can possibly deal with, but most of the bigger projects that we have are actually marvelized within our budget.

That's where we lost sight of a lot of our financial responsibilities that we can control, and when I think about the issues that we face over the next couple of years, I think about specific lines in the town budget that are higher than peer communities, that are higher than where we need them to be to help sustain our annual operating burdens.

[Speaker 2] (2:16:38 - 2:20:02)
So let me just... a couple quick responses. So our free cash increases have been slowing in recent years, meaning our refilling of free cash has not been as robust in recent years, and I think that's a byproduct of the fact that we have more integrity in our budgeting process, meaning that you and the financial team have gotten the budget assumptions tighter.

They can't ever be so tight that we have a deficit, but tighter, whereas in a prior life and prior people running things, the assumptions were not nearly as tight. But that's just a new reality for us if we want to keep this budgeting functioning, is that we're going to have less free cash because we are being truer to the actual budget, right? We're raising revenue truer to the actual budget.

And so just to be aware of that. And I just think as though it comes to a point when you're looking, there is a slide 52 of Ben's presentation, which is the free cash options, the 170% shift, I think just throws out the percentages, if you will, year-to-year differential, depending on how much free cash we use at the 1-7 split. And the question is, is there a number where we say, I want to talk about commercial because I think it matters, but staying on residential right now, and this is single-family residential, is there a percentage increase per year?

And again, I despise that we're using average. I'm just going to say this again. I think it's great when we compare it to state stuff because that's how the state compares stuff, but we're talking about Swampscot here, so using average again is not the right vehicle for us because our average is so far off from our median.

But anyways, using average because that's what's in front of us here. Is it, is it, I'm sorry, do we have both? Sorry, we do have both.

Never mind, I'm going to use median. So using median, thank you. Using the median then, which is the right three columns, thank you, David, is a 0.71% tax increase for a median single-family bill an unreasonable thing for people to understand and to expect, even in a community that historically has been high?

Or is a 1.82% okay? Or is a 2.29% okay to set expectations for people that that is just realistically kind of the growth that has to happen? Because the reality is, Sean, your growth, you've said in previous conversations with us that our budget expenses can't continue on the townside, never mind the school, but the school aside.

The townside has been anemic, right? Because you've needed it to be anemic to balance, right? We've been less than half of whatever the school increase has been, and I think we've been under 1%, right, over the last two or three years.

And that's not sustainable. Because at some point you're going to run out of fat in the budget, if you will, or things that you can carve down. Then you have to then say, how do I pay for those 2% COLAs and those 3% COLAs or whatever?

You know, all these things that happen here. And it just feels like we're getting too close to a time where I feel like we should be creating a discipline that decreases reliance on free cash on this. So anyways, if you look at commercial, we're not talking about 0.71%. We're talking about 12% and 13% increases. And that's when values went up disproportionately to residential this year. But that's also a pretty big hit.

[Speaker 1] (2:20:03 - 2:21:39)
It's a pretty big hit, but it also reflects the market. And again, I look at that and I think that's healthy, and that shows a strong commercial strength in the market. I get the points though, Peter, and I think it really is.

Look, it has been a very difficult challenge to come in and try to restructure budgets and to restructure how we build Swampskip's financial position to think short-term and long-term. We've got long-term financial tools here that the board can think about from a policy perspective. I still go back to that peer community analysis and just being a little bit higher than the average.

And I was thinking, should we get to the average and then try to continue to be careful about how we manage the burden that we place on our taxpayers? We know that we have a lot of seniors. We know that we have a lot of folks that are paycheck to paycheck dealing with the financial realities of living in a town that has one of the highest tax burdens in the Commonwealth.

And I do think that these are the times where we try to strike that balance.

[Speaker 2] (2:21:42 - 2:22:24)
So I guess to the chair, I'm interested, because tonight we have to vote. The select board needs to vote tonight or before December 13th. And it will require a free cash warrant article, which then gives the FinCom a formal role in recommending free cash.

And so there's some codependence there. So I'm interested in FinCom's initial reaction about free cash, if you're okay with that to hear, just if people are willing to share to kind of give us, feed our thought process, because our tax rate setting is going to be predicated upon how much free cash we're also going to recommend. We can't disassociate those two things.

[Speaker 12] (2:22:28 - 2:24:26)
I'm happy to chime in and start with my thoughts and then open it up for the rest of the finance committee as well. But, you know, I think the issues you're discussing on the longer term reliance on free cash are ones that we need to continue to have dialogue about, I think, with a very short term view. The, you know, the fact that we stay within the financial guidelines with the 1.55. It's helpful. And it is generally, you know, a positive guidance for us. I think. You know, it gets us with the other uses of free cash that have been mentioned or that are anticipated for later in the year.

It does get us down to the sort of closer to the lower end of those guidelines. So, so I do think. You know, if anything, one, you know, the 2 million.

Wouldn't something I would support. The 1.55, the reasons I stated. I would support.

I think the other thing I would just state is. Yeah, we need to keep in mind. You know what we are going to be doing over the next.

You know, decade also with the use of stabilization funds, which we talked about in connection with the school project. Have those stabilization funds. But, but I think that that will also be part of those longer term discussions on how do you use free cash and what is the impact of.

Of that. Of that. Plan that we have in place to leverage the excess stabilization funds over the next decade.

So shorter answer is. In the, in the short term. Because the free cash would stay within the financial guidelines.

I have a level of comfort with the 1.55. I'd be interested to hear other perspectives.

[Speaker 5] (2:24:29 - 2:25:19)
So this is Mary Ellen. And I agree with what Tim said. Originally.

I was more inclined to go. Oh, one 75, 2 million. But after looking at the presentation again tonight, I think the one five, five.

Is definitely the way to go. And I think looking into the, looking further into the future and. Just tweaking it a little bit more.

We can get a little bit tighter later on, but for right now, I think the one five, five is the way to go. This is Cinder. I feel the same way just to weigh in.

I like the presentation was very thorough. Thank you.

[Speaker 17] (2:25:21 - 2:26:13)
I agree. I mean, I'm, I'm okay with the one five, five. I certainly wouldn't go any higher, but I, I just want to reiterate what Peter said, which is that to me, the notion of like reliance on, on free cash is a little bit of a straw man argument because if the closer we get to budgeting properly, the less we'll need.

We've already taxed. We're just returning it. So to me, I, Peter.

I would love to see going through. This or not analysis, but even maybe financial guidelines. A target tax increase without.

Or, you know, whatever. This kind of overtax and give back overtax and give back. I mean, that's why it feels weird.

It feels.

[Speaker 5] (2:26:18 - 2:26:18)
Sorry.

[Speaker 3] (2:26:27 - 2:27:14)
Does anyone else want to say anything? So I guess one thought, Sean, that I'm, I'm wondering is to just, I guess, the end of the year consideration that Tim was mentioning. I think we touched on this last meeting, but I'm wondering if it makes sense, just putting it out there.

Let's just say, for example, if we applied a $1 million from the slides, like 51 and two pages, 51 and two, the 1.7 shift for this one. And then a $1 million and, and then apply some of that other. So school's going to hit an FY 24.

[Speaker 2] (2:27:17 - 2:27:19)
Yes. Yes.

[Speaker 3] (2:27:19 - 2:27:50)
Okay. So. Even if we ultimately got to, I mean, we're going to.

So putting more towards stabilization, again, towards Tim, Tim's point. Or reducing it and or reducing it. Now this year, but then keeping it the same next year, as opposed to lowering it.

Starting next year. It seems like that's like a double. It's, it's just hitting double.

So that's, those are two thoughts.

[Speaker 12] (2:27:51 - 2:28:18)
Well, Paulie, Paulie, can I just jump in? I wasn't, I wasn't necessarily suggesting that we increase the, the contribution of free cash to stabilization, because I think what's anticipated here, I believe I need to look back, but I believe it's in line with what was projected in those discussions around the school. So I don't, I'm not, I just want to be clear.

I'm not suggesting that we increase the free cash to stabilization this year. I'm just saying that the longer term discussion.

[Speaker 21] (2:28:18 - 2:28:19)
Yes.

[Speaker 12] (2:28:19 - 2:28:30)
Around free cash. We just need to keep in mind that we are, we are, we are looking to do some fairly unique things over the next decade. Yeah.

[Speaker 3] (2:28:31 - 2:29:06)
Sorry. I did understand that. Thank you for the bill for clarifying.

Cause I wasn't making that clear. So, but to that point that as one option, considering what's left at the end of the year, if we apply the higher number and then also with the consideration of the school hitting in the next cycle not reducing it that year. Cause I think you're suggesting, yeah, with this forecast and I know you don't want to use the forecast.

[Speaker 1] (2:29:07 - 2:30:16)
I don't, but we, you know, for prognostications here you know, we, we start with a million dollars in 24 to offset the debt service in the school and that drops off precipitously over the next 10 years. And so, you know, there is going to be opportunity to kind of think about as we wean the town off of free cash in terms of how we stabilize the tax levy, we can take some of that free cash and, and seed stabilization or seed, you know, some of the capital stabilization and continue to, to really think carefully and strategically about, you know, how we balance the needs of the town. This is, you know, this is the macro financing that we're, we're developing as a institutional memory and it follows a policy, but it also, you know, in practice, I think, you know, you know, we'll be supported by, you know, looking at this 10 year forecast and thinking carefully about how we plan.

[Speaker 3] (2:30:18 - 2:30:31)
So you're so in terms of why it doesn't make, might not make sense and it might not make any sense, but I'm just wondering if we're lowering it, it doesn't seem like it's a much, what is the amount of difference for us?

[Speaker 1] (2:30:31 - 2:30:54)
It is actually quite a bit, but it's still, it's a, it's a really great conversation. Polly. I just think given the fact that, you know, we have a little bit of a careful dynamic here with trying to mitigate the increase of the average single family or median family tax bill, but it would lower it next year.

[Speaker 3] (2:30:54 - 2:30:55)
It would help.

[Speaker 1] (2:30:55 - 2:31:22)
It would stabilize it next year. Next year the economy could change dramatically. We could see a dramatic change in commercial and residential, you know, and so there's still a degree of prognostication.

And I think right now, I think we, you know, it, the market's already dropped to one seven. We were at one seven. I think we can, well, the one seven, I'm not touching for this example, right?

[Speaker 3] (2:31:23 - 2:32:24)
I'm just, anyway, but I'm just going to keep going here. It's an important decision. So with respect to the 1.65% just in terms of peer, what you were saying with the hit to the commercial at 1.7% at the 1.65%, it seems not much more to residential. I'm just trying to compare the two at the same time, but a bigger savings to commercial. But I understand that's probably jumping the gun. I just, I'm just surprised by how much that shift in percentage actually, yeah, the commercial compared to how much it impacts residential.

But I don't feel like I'm not sensing that that's on the table, but anyway, that's all. Those are my thoughts.

[Speaker 2] (2:32:26 - 2:33:37)
Well, again, I just, and this is, I'm going to speak Ben's world here a little bit for a second here. The commercial has to at some point be on our table, which I appreciate that commercial values from an assessment practice, outpaced residential values this year. And I appreciate that.

And that, so no one should be fooled to think we have more commercial parcels. We don't write, we have less commercial parcels, just greater value. Right.

And, but the truth is at 10, 15% tax growth to a tenant, if it's passed through to a tenant, that is only going to decrease rent. It doesn't, if you will, right. There's not an infinite amount that a tenant is going to pay.

So a tenant, landlords ultimately have to adjust it to say, I can't pass through a 15% because those tenants are going to say, no way. Right. I can't, I can't afford that.

And so the only thing that the landlord can do is adjust rent. And when you adjust rent, you start playing with values. Right.

And you could potentially now that's the long play. Right. But the reality is if you're doing 10 and 15% growth on taxes, this is going to happen.

Right. I mean, just because we're already at the top, we're not even talking about you. I appreciate we talk about single, single family.

We don't talk about commercial. We're already at the top on commercial. Right.

So I'm just, I just, at some point, I don't know. I don't have a clue what the solution is. Right.

[Speaker 4] (2:33:37 - 2:34:13)
I'm not even pretending that certainly landlords will pass along a tax increases, but they also typically are charging the maximum rent that the market will bear as a practice as well. There's some managerial decisions, right. You might have a good tenant and you'll charge them a little bit less or something like that, but it's also market driven on what they can charge.

And right. And so you're right. That either eats into their profit margins or it gets passed on.

[Speaker 2] (2:34:14 - 2:35:01)
Every tenant, every tenant looks and they're all in cost. Right. They don't care about the actual rent number.

It's the all in cost. Right. I'll pay a lot of rent if I don't have to pay a lot of real estate taxes.

And conversely, I'll pay a little rent if I have to pay a lot of real estate taxes. Right. And so, so there's not an infinite market.

The reality is at some point those tenants say, I can't afford Swampscott. I've got to go across the line, literally 50 feet in bidding square to a different shopping center because that's $5 a foot cheaper just on real estate taxes. And I'm making up that number, but that's a big number for, but it is also five feet.

Yeah. So I mean, it's just, it's just that again, I don't, we don't, that is not on the table because I don't think we have a solution. It would be great to have a solution.

We don't even have, we don't even have a tool yet to even address that to be honest with you. We've got to build a skyscraper in the quarry.

[Speaker 1] (2:35:03 - 2:36:03)
I think, you know, we talked a few years ago about creating, you know, a community and economic development department and really thinking about how do we, how do we really grow commercial? And how do we think about, you know, what's the future of Binning Square? What's the future of Humphrey street?

What's the future of the MBTA station and neighborhood? And how do we, how do we make the most out of the commercial property that we have? And again, from my perspective, you know it, it's encouraging to see some commercial growth in valuations.

We do have to be mindful of how that's going to affect the small business development in Swampskip. We still see some small businesses thriving in Swampskip, but you know, it's, it's arguably a lot more challenging in Swampskip than over a municipal line in our bordering communities.

[Speaker 3] (2:36:06 - 2:36:31)
I might've missed this. Sorry, this might, I think my last question, I might've missed this, but in terms of trying to predict fluctuations and that floor that we can't go beyond, we don't think we'll run up against that like next year. Cause it would be really a shame for the school to hit.

And then for us to have to like shift to like one point.

[Speaker 2] (2:36:32 - 2:37:35)
Can I take a stab at something? Cause I took, I, well, after you said it, I was just looking through that sheet that you gave us on the calculation to the self leveling. When we're forced to that number, it's almost painless between commercial and residential when we're forced to that number.

When we switch it ourselves, we, we inflict pain, so to speak. Just like a minute ago when you looked at the one 70 to the one 65 and you saw the differential, you saw all of a sudden there was commercial and residential, you know, shifted, right? Like the percentages, right?

Better for commercial, worse for residential. When we're forced to do that, it's only a marginal differential. Cause what happens is there's just been a self equalizing about that.

So, so the force isn't the thing that causes the pain. So that's not the thing. It's, it's, if that helps you make sense, it took Ben explaining, saying it and for me to actually read that really boring thing.

No, he, he hinted at it and it made me read this thing, which is honestly like brain damage. Um, but, um, no, it's, it's, it's yeah.

[Speaker 3] (2:37:36 - 2:37:59)
Okay. So that answers that question. So good.

So we're at 1.7 and then, all right. Other thoughts, does Fincom want to, I mean, do we, we have to vote, right? So I guess I don't want to pick anybody out, but I think, so let me just ask, is it, so for us, I mean, we're going to do a solid one.

[Speaker 2] (2:38:00 - 2:38:33)
Does anybody have a problem with the other recommendations? The one seven from staff, the no small commercial exemption, which would be repealing something that for the last three years we've done and no change otherwise from fiscal year on the exemptions, no change and the split, no change otherwise from last fiscal year. Is that, so really what we're talking about is the use of free cash.

Okay. Does Fincom, I guess we can ask them if they, although that's our vote on these things, do they have opinions to the differ?

[Speaker 12] (2:38:34 - 2:38:56)
So I have a question as to why, like that, that small business benefit was given for a reason, right. Or with a hope in mind, presumably, like why, why don't they know about it? Why don't they take advantage of it?

Why, or is it just not, is it not working? Is it not working?

[Speaker 4] (2:38:59 - 2:39:46)
So I think, I mean, I don't, I don't know about the, why don't they know about it's a portion, I guess, you know, these, these hearings aren't so exciting that lots of people tune in, but I think the, well until then the dollar, the dollar amounts aren't so large to where you might just pay your tax bill and you might not notice. So on the exemption side, you, you, some of the dollar amounts are $200. And so over the course of the year, you might not notice that difference as a, as a small business owner.

So I think the whole, I think the reason it was given in the past is because it was something for the small businesses and everybody wants to help small businesses. So I think that was kind of the thought process in the past years.

[Speaker 3] (2:39:47 - 2:40:09)
And in past years, if I remember, there was only like two, I'm not good at timelines, but there were like two businesses that had taken advantage of it. And then the following year they didn't. So it could have been a, you know, oversight, but it obviously wasn't.

So to Ben's point, I think, you know, we've reached out. Positive impact that we made sure to reapply.

[Speaker 1] (2:40:09 - 2:41:11)
We've also reached out and we just really didn't hear that this was a real need. This is a program that, you know, do our offers. We've tried it out for the last three years.

I think Ben physically went out and try to engage all of them. And it just, yeah. Margie has also gone out and we just didn't hear that, that it was providing that need.

We had thought that, you know, if, if this was, you know, helpful, maybe we'd see investments in building a property, maybe the property owner would see this as a real benefit. That's not really materializing. And we also, frankly, we've thought more about, you know, what happens if you have a triple net in a, in a, you're a small business in a building that doesn't qualify.

We don't want to inadvertently place any additional burden on a small business that, that may be struggling with just keeping their business afloat in Swampskip, given all the other circumstances we discussed earlier.

[Speaker 2] (2:41:15 - 2:43:05)
Yeah. So let me, I'm going to say, Tim, let me just, as I think I probably suggested it three years ago when we first started it, to be honest with you. And I think the thought process of that board at the time was to see, I'm not correct, Sean, but I'm going to say, I think a little bit.

I think everybody appreciates every dollar they don't have to pay in taxes. Right. So period.

Right. But I think we are interested in saying what are these properties and do we see, we were actually not thinking about savings as much as who's getting the savings or are we seeing improvements in properties that are benefited by these savings? For example, is there something of creative back?

If we invest back into these properties, are we seeing something right? Either tenants are getting the benefit. And I think Ben's slide showed you that by and large, no.

Well, kind of, but but also are there things happening different with these properties? Right. And when you really look at what these properties are, they're not, they're not the ones that you instinctively would think of.

And I don't think we have a good answer on the, on the things improving generally about the properties that are putting money back in. I don't know if you're seeing differences. I, I'm not notably anyways.

So I just think as though given the fact that just the larger commercial tax payers pay for it anyways, right? It's just reallocating commercial taxes. And again, those are some of the small, there's a lot of, frankly, more small businesses are getting hit with this than benefited with this because we have more, you know, we have 26 properties, but we have well more than 26 small businesses if you will.

And a lot of these businesses are buildings that house contractors or, or things of that nature that aren't what you would think as, you know, mom and pop retail or something like that too. So a lot of them that are in bigger buildings like on Humphrey street aren't getting the benefit of those, even though there are small mom and pop shops. They're actually paying more to pay for that exemption.

[Speaker 3] (2:43:15 - 2:43:21)
Okay. Other questions before you guys sign up or don't.

[Speaker 12] (2:43:28 - 2:43:30)
Do you, anybody else?

[Speaker 3] (2:43:37 - 2:43:39)
So do you all want to adjourn your meetings?

[Speaker 14] (2:43:39 - 2:43:54)
Is that, and then we would. This is to see, can I ask a question actually? Of course.

If you, if you, could you go back to that slide where they showed the excess levy capacity?

[Speaker 5] (2:44:13 - 2:44:14)
Thank you.

[Speaker 14] (2:44:15 - 2:44:46)
So this, this is an amazing slide because it just shows how stable our, our levy has been. But the levy capacity keeps growing and growing. And that's, you know, concerning to me.

So I was just, I just wanted to put this out there since we're all together here, Fincom and select board and the assessors. At what point do we start discussing an under ride to limit this? It's just going to get bigger and bigger year over year.

[Speaker 2] (2:44:48 - 2:45:02)
There are actually some conversations that have already begun with Fincom and this board about creating potentially a guideline relative to that. So it's a good question. And I think the, the conversation is percolating.

[Speaker 14] (2:45:04 - 2:45:05)
Great. Okay.

[Speaker 3] (2:45:06 - 2:45:33)
And I think if that part of the, you know, we just a year ago, whatever created the financial guidelines. So I think just the possibility discussing the possibility of including some kind of range in that guideline, just to your point to see, yeah, I've actually researched this a little bit and tried to find out what the under, what the access levy capacity is and other municipalities in the state.

[Speaker 14] (2:45:33 - 2:45:47)
And I haven't found any that have anything this high. So I think it's, it's a very good thing to consider. I haven't looked at Peabody's.

What is Peabody's?

[Speaker 2] (2:45:47 - 2:46:05)
Yeah. Cities, cities are oftentimes their excesses. Their cities, excess capacity is traditionally higher on average than municipal than towns.

So he's, he's pointing to a city and he's right, but it's not a fair comparison. It's little apples and oranges a little bit. I just want to just throw out there.

[Speaker 1] (2:46:06 - 2:46:41)
This is something that rating agencies look at as a sign of financial strength and to simply come in and say, cut your excess levy capacity, because you're worried that somehow, you know, a future board might come in and just spend it all like you're you'll, you'll do more to hurt your financial footing. And it may, it may be a Pyrrhic type of victory from some financial discipline perspective, but you will, you will pay a price for it with rating agencies.

[Speaker 14] (2:46:41 - 2:47:21)
Yeah. Well, so actually that's interesting because I did speak with Ron Mendez about this maybe last year. And he, he did explain to me where that, that point is where it impacts your bond rating.

And I remember it being significantly lower than where we are now. So, you know, I'm not suggesting that we eliminate it completely, but definitely bringing it down. It's great.

It's just growing exponentially. And I mean, we've been in a great place financially, like with our bond rating for some time now. So I think it's a, I think it's just time that we really look at it and get that conversation going.

[Speaker 3] (2:47:25 - 2:47:25)
Thank you.

[Speaker 14] (2:47:26 - 2:47:26)
Thank you.

[Speaker 3] (2:47:29 - 2:47:33)
Okay. Then motion to adjourn.

[Speaker 17] (2:47:34 - 2:47:39)
Well, Tim, you do what you want to do. You have a motion to adjourn.

[Speaker 12] (2:47:40 - 2:48:00)
Do I have a second? Cause I can't see everybody. Can you, can you get rid of the excess levy capacity?

I mean, not, not women in underwrite, but just get it off the screen.

[Speaker 3] (2:48:03 - 2:48:05)
Good thing you clarified Tim.

[Speaker 12] (2:48:10 - 2:48:15)
And I as well. Thank you.

[Speaker 19] (2:48:20 - 2:48:21)
Thanks everybody.

[Speaker 14] (2:48:22 - 2:48:45)
Good night. The assessors. That's right.

Sorry. Laura, do I make, Laura, can you make a motion? Make a motion to adjourn for a second.

Laura, are you there?

[Speaker 2] (2:48:46 - 2:48:46)
I think I heard her.

[Speaker 14] (2:48:47 - 2:48:47)
All right.

[Speaker 2] (2:48:48 - 2:48:49)
Very good.

[Speaker 14] (2:48:49 - 2:48:53)
Well, good night. Okay. Thank you.

[Speaker 4] (2:48:53 - 2:48:55)
Thank you. Thank you.

[Speaker 3] (2:48:57 - 2:49:07)
All right then. So well, I don't want to make a motion.

[Speaker 8] (2:49:41 - 2:50:07)
I moved that the board select a residential factor of 0.941976 a CIP shift of one 70.311% for the fiscal year 22 tax levy. And in order to implement this policy, the board hereby authorizes to Duplin town clerk to certify this vote on the Massachusetts department of revenues gateway system. I just do them all.

[Speaker 3] (2:50:07 - 2:50:07)
Yeah.

[Speaker 8] (2:50:08 - 2:50:21)
Okay. I moved that. I also moved that the board choose not to adopt a residential exemption for fiscal year 22.

And I also moved that the board choose to not adopt a small commercial exemption for fiscal year 22.

[Speaker 3] (2:50:22 - 2:50:22)
Is there a second?

[Speaker 2] (2:50:23 - 2:50:23)
Second.

[Speaker 3] (2:50:24 - 2:50:26)
Any further discussion?

[Speaker 2] (2:50:26 - 2:51:51)
Yeah. Thanks. So I just want to talk a little more about free cash.

This is our moment to do it because it's not otherwise on our agenda tonight. Cause the warrants not on our agenda. I just want to hear people's thoughts.

I mean, cause I think it's, we got to solve it. So I, I, I wouldn't make a motion for one five five. I wouldn't.

I just think as though it's time to start. What's what's happening is frankly is in some ways we are not using free cash at the time that we're budgeting to balance the budget, not using free cash. But then we get to November knowing that damn well, we're going to use over a million dollars of free cash.

And so it's, it's maybe there's, there's chronological separation, but I don't know if there's intellectual separate separation because we're so, we so know that we're going to do it every year. Like I just feel like I frankly think as though for us, the ones who kind of have to anyways, I support a 1 million, not one five five. Again, someone else wants to make a motion at one five five.

I'm, I'm, I will probably go along with it, but I also would be okay if income ultimately decided they wanted to recommend to town some town meeting something higher. That's their prerogative to do that as well. Right.

I just feel as though it's time to have that discussion.

[Speaker 3] (2:51:51 - 2:52:14)
So anyways, I've just thrown that out there as a conversation because I think there's, well, I mean, I think I expressed the same thing or if I didn't, that's why I was pointing that out earlier. So I'm not, I, I, I get that. I mean, I agree.

I agree.

[Speaker 8] (2:52:15 - 2:53:12)
I'm all for, I'm all for keeping our taxes as low as, as humanly possible, obviously. So I take this decision very seriously. I just think we have so many needs, so many infrastructure needs in our town.

And we also have this, this structural, the structural issue that we're, that we're facing. I, I support a million dollar use and I, and we can reserve that $550,000 for another, another use another day. So I, I would, I would support the million million dollars.

I still think that the, the increase to the median single family tax bill is sub 2%, which is unheard of in, in in times such as, as these, I think that's very manageable and very doable. And so that's, that's kind of where, where my head is.

[Speaker 3] (2:53:13 - 2:53:15)
So are you revoking the motion?

[Speaker 8] (2:53:15 - 2:53:23)
No, he didn't make a motion. I didn't make a motion for free cash. There's no motion for free cash.

I thought you were saying to, no, this is just the residential factor.

[Speaker 3] (2:53:23 - 2:53:31)
I just want to reread the motion. Oh no, but I don't, I can't, there's a light like right in the middle. So I can barely see that.

Thanks.

[Speaker 2] (2:53:34 - 2:53:35)
This is the reader's digest version.

[Speaker 3] (2:53:35 - 2:53:38)
No, I'm sorry. You're right. Okay.

That's I just got size.

[Speaker 2] (2:53:40 - 2:53:41)
It's like the large print edition.

[Speaker 3] (2:53:42 - 2:53:43)
Okay.

[Speaker 2] (2:53:43 - 2:53:44)
So I am.

[Speaker 3] (2:53:44 - 2:53:48)
Oh, you mean you're talking, I get, I get it. Yeah.

[Speaker 10] (2:53:48 - 2:55:23)
So I share the concerns on the use of free cash and appreciate you raising it, Peter. I, I guess I'm just struggling with like, when you start to do this and I guess there's never a good time. Right.

But I think this year is still particularly hard year. I'm just wondering if, if now's the right time, even though it's a, it's a relatively minor increase, so to speak. But if, if we, you know, if we do it now, or if we decide that it can wait another year before we start to, to wean ourselves off, so to speak.

But I, I don't disagree with what you said, Dave. And I think that free cash can be used for other for other purposes. And I, and I, I also think that like water and sewer rates, we need to start getting into a habit, if you will, of, of people, of being accustomed to not just a level tax rate, but I just, I guess I'm struggling with whether this year is the year to do it given the increases in costs and essentially everything else for residents.

[Speaker 3] (2:55:27 - 2:55:35)
So we can't. So we, regardless of that, we're still comfortable with David's triple motion.

[Speaker 2] (2:55:35 - 2:57:13)
Yeah. The only reason I'm bringing it forward here is because someone's going to write an article about what we just did for taxes and there has to be an assumption of free cash to write that article. Right.

And so I know when I say that, I just don't want people to be misinformed because if there's no free cash talked about with this, then they're going to, they could argue and say that we just raised it 3.79% for a single family because that's what this chart says. And I just want to dispel it, whatever the percentage, whatever the free cash is, just dispel it and foreshadow what we're recommending. And then FinCom obviously has to recommend a town meeting and they could recommend something different.

And yeah, I think there's something, so let me, let me say it differently in a way. And I guess this is what I'm thinking. I think there's something that if FinCom seemed to like 155 and I'm a little bit posturing off of that, not for any reason, except for the following, if they decide to go to town meeting with that and select board was less than that, it gives us an opportunity to maybe even in a sentence or two, start narrating this to town meeting, to share to town meeting the considerations, something that they wouldn't see if we're all in harmony. It's not like there's a violent disagreement here, but they wouldn't see it if we're all like, yeah, let's spend 155. They wouldn't, they wouldn't hear the drumbeat.

And, and, and in fairness to them, they shouldn't. I hope they have better things to do than sit and watch us right now and hear this discussion. And so they wouldn't hear this.

And I think it's important for them to start hearing this because they'll start feeling it and they may not know where it's coming from in the future. And so even just that discussion, even if it's two sentences at town meeting, I think is a healthy thing. And so the juxtaposition of us being at a number and having, and, and, you know, et cetera.

[Speaker 3] (2:57:14 - 2:57:15)
So FinCom is sorry.

[Speaker 2] (2:57:15 - 2:57:21)
Sorry. So that's, that's a bit in my thinking here because I think it's a healthy dialogue to bring forward. It's a unique dialogue.

[Speaker 1] (2:57:22 - 2:57:26)
There won't be many communities that have the ability to have that type of conversation.

[Speaker 2] (2:57:26 - 2:57:31)
Yeah, no, I, I agree with you on that. Oh, you were going to ask something.

[Speaker 3] (2:57:33 - 2:58:08)
When is FinCom's next meeting? Does anybody know? Monday.

Okay. So they'll, anyway, maybe they'll vote on, I don't know what their plan is for voting on the free cash Warren article, but we'll have more information the next time we have to decide. Sounds like what their recommendation will be.

So, okay. All in favor of David's motion. Seconded by Neil.

[Speaker 21] (2:58:09 - 2:58:11)
All right.

[Speaker 2] (2:58:11 - 2:58:49)
All right. So did, do we have direction that we're using for ourselves on the free cash? Because again, I think we need to articulate our opinion on free cash tonight.

Oh, because we just said a tax, we just said a tax rate, if you will, that doesn't, isn't based on a, a net number, if you will, at the moment. So we have to, to staff anyways, I think to the public channel where we are on free cash, even though it's, it doesn't, you know it's not our recommendation to town meeting, but for the tax rate setting, we, it's not, it's FinCom's recommendation at the end of the day, the way for town meeting works strangely enough.

[Speaker 8] (2:58:54 - 2:58:58)
I will make a motion to recommend allocation of a million dollars.

[Speaker 3] (2:58:59 - 2:59:05)
I don't think we can though. Is this what you wanted? Is this what you're suggesting?

It's not, nothing's on the agenda.

[Speaker 2] (2:59:06 - 2:59:23)
Well, we're, we're setting the tax rate and I think as though the tax, this is, this would fall under the tax rate. I'm just saying we're not making, we're not, we're not recommending on the warrant is what I was saying. So I think you can, but again, you've got to be comfortable with it.

I think this is part of the tax rate setting.

[Speaker 3] (2:59:28 - 2:59:35)
I just thought I was getting at that with David earlier, but that's fine. Go ahead. So what are you, go ahead.

Whoever's making a motion.

[Speaker 8] (2:59:35 - 2:59:44)
I have a motion to recommend allocation of a million dollars of free cash. Second.

[Speaker 3] (2:59:46 - 2:59:52)
Any further discussion? Okay. All in favor?

[Speaker 1] (2:59:53 - 2:59:53)
Aye.

[Speaker 2] (2:59:54 - 2:59:54)
Aye. Aye.

[Speaker 3] (2:59:57 - 2:59:58)
All opposed?

[Speaker 2] (2:59:59 - 3:00:04)
No. You want none? Just joking.

[Speaker 3] (3:00:10 - 3:00:14)
Okay then. Is there a motion to close the public hearing?

[Speaker 2] (3:00:15 - 3:00:15)
So moved.

[Speaker 3] (3:00:16 - 3:00:17)
Second.

[Speaker 2] (3:00:18 - 3:00:22)
Second. Second.

[Speaker 3] (3:00:23 - 3:00:25)
Second. Okay. All in favor?

[Speaker 2] (3:00:25 - 3:00:25)
Aye. Aye.

[Speaker 3] (3:00:26 - 3:00:29)
Aye. All right. We're moving on to the first.

[Speaker 2] (3:00:29 - 3:00:33)
I'm a no on that. And what?

[Speaker 3] (3:00:37 - 3:00:41)
I'm like really exhausted by losing it.

[Speaker 10] (3:00:41 - 3:00:41)
Yeah.

[Speaker 3] (3:00:44 - 3:00:48)
We're having a first reading of the I&I policy.

[Speaker 1] (3:00:54 - 3:03:50)
So as I mentioned earlier in my report, we we've been analyzing peer communities. You have a draft of a policy before you that contemplates establishing a regulatory framework. Thank you, gentlemen.

That would help really address some of the significant infiltration and inflow. The team that is reviewing this have looked at really where's the right balance. I've argued that we should we should actually start off in a pretty aggressive position.

We have serious needs and we don't know where they begin or end. We're in the middle of a significant asset assessment that will help us determine the extent of the condition of all of our sewage and drainage pipes. And once we get that done, I think we can come back next year and and dial in as other communities have done as they have started to address some of the I&I issues that impact their system.

We're not under a compliance order. However, most communities that establish this type of infiltration policy are forced to do this under a consent order. We're doing it because it's a best practice and we understand the environmental stewardship responsibilities that are before us.

I do think that the thresholds may seem high, but we really did look at what a single family home would generate in terms of flow. We tried to establish just a couple of tiers that would really trigger that multifamily approach. And the more tiers that we do have, I think the more we may see folks come in and try to change the scope of that development to try to fit a square peg into a round hole or try to argue that their development might not trigger that significant threshold.

So that said, I'm happy to answer any questions I can or get back to the board at the next meeting when we have Dave Peterson and Gino available to answer any technical questions you might have. Sean, do we have an idea of what this is costing us?

[Speaker 8] (3:03:51 - 3:04:05)
I think we saw a number where 58% of our wastewater was from I&I. That number has been decreasing over the years.

[Speaker 1] (3:04:05 - 3:04:53)
It could be from weather, it could be from other things. What is this in hard dollars? I don't have that number offhand.

I know that we had that number in that PowerPoint presentation. I'll go back and take a look at that. That came up as part of some of the analysis that we did.

They were projecting upwards of 50-60% of the flow goes to Lynn Water and Sewer for treatment during a major storm event. Gino had mentioned to me that he doesn't believe that we get charged for that additional flow because during those events, all communities inundate Lynn Water and Sewer and they don't bill us with that same fee.

[Speaker 2] (3:04:54 - 3:05:02)
Maybe not dollar to dollar at 58%, but 43% because we have more inflow and infiltration.

[Speaker 1] (3:05:03 - 3:05:20)
That's a question I'll get back to you. We did do some of that analysis. During these rain events, there's a significant I&I cost element that we bear.

[Speaker 8] (3:05:21 - 3:05:31)
Are we looking at setting up I&I banking or something similar to that? Is that what we're talking about here with this type of plan?

[Speaker 1] (3:05:31 - 3:05:44)
These will be special funds. It will be a dedicated fund that can only be used for infiltration, inflow, mitigation.

[Speaker 8] (3:05:44 - 3:06:22)
I just meant, are we expanding the sewer users to offset the amount of new flow they want to add to the system by reducing a greater amount of existing I&I? What exactly are we looking to propose? Are we looking at offset ratios and costs?

The information that was in the packet, some of the information was based upon 2007, the Ponset Watershed data. 2007 was 15 years ago.

[Speaker 1] (3:06:23 - 3:07:52)
That's why we've looked in and adjusted our fee structure to be 2021 vintage. It looks a little different than the 2007. These are impact fees.

The way you establish the impact through case law and through promulgations of regulation is to borrow what has worked. The Ponset I&I was a best practice. We've looked at other communities and we've tried to model what makes sense.

What makes sense is get in, start it, learn, and start addressing those critical needs. We went through that presentation. It's all clay pipes everywhere.

The infiltration into those pipes over the last 80 to 100 years has really created an environmental impact that is going to be costly. We're going to have to figure out how do we solve that. This will allocate a small amount of funding.

It's not going to solve everything, but it's going to be another tool in the toolbox that can help us address these long-range goals.

[Speaker 8] (3:07:52 - 3:08:04)
It's going to require us not only collecting these I&I fees, but also making an investment in our infrastructure as well. This is just something that will help us supplement.

[Speaker 1] (3:08:04 - 3:08:33)
We're under a consent order to make investments already with Stacey's Brook. There likely will be additional responsibilities as state regulators continue to look at these types of responsibilities. I think putting this in place will help us check a box of best practices that many communities are being forced to do through compliance.

[Speaker 8] (3:08:34 - 3:09:30)
I agree with your assessment that we should be very aggressive initially. Just from this light reading that I had from the Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs watershed improvement from the Ponson, it talks about how an NWRA community adopted an offset ratio of 4 to 1 and set the base mitigation fee equal to the MWRA transport and treat cost, ignoring local operating and capital costs. The resultant fee would total $45.60 per gallon of new sewage. Perhaps not surprisingly, none of the municipalities interviewed said the I&I fee, even with the application of an offset ratio, fully covers its I&I mediation costs. This was 2007. Obviously, costs have increased since then.

I just want to make sure that we're going to be as aggressive as possible.

[Speaker 1] (3:09:31 - 3:10:08)
I'm happy to be more aggressive. I actually would welcome some thoughts about whether or not we have the right structure. Based on the peer group that we looked at, we were coming out ahead.

My thought was, let's get some experience under our belt and let's come back. Once we get that asset assessment, I think we can come back and try to match our rate structure with the needs that are identified.

[Speaker 8] (3:10:10 - 3:10:22)
Saugus had a 10 to 1 ratio. Once progress was made, they were able to step down their offset ratio, just per this information that I researched.

[Speaker 1] (3:10:23 - 3:10:57)
That's something that we would consider, Sean? It is. Saugus is at $5.00. Framingham's at $18.00. Burlington's at $12.00. Somerville's at $14.00. Waltham's at $12.00. I think as this gets adopted and implemented in various communities, they do change over time. I think Swampstead has to start. We'll modulate and we'll follow that same trajectory of how we incrementally solve these challenges.

[Speaker 8] (3:10:57 - 3:11:10)
Are we going to be able to set this prior to the analysis and the report that's underway right now, a consultant report?

[Speaker 1] (3:11:10 - 3:12:19)
I hope that the board will. I hope that we'll be back on December 15th and we can have a conversation and potentially vote this for adoption. The goal was to get this in place and we'll course correct it as we go forward.

This is a best practice model. If board members have questions, you can email me or Gino, and I'll get it off to Dave Peterson, happy to come back and discuss this in a more technical manner. My thought was we'll come back on the 15th and we'll go through the presentation again and we'll talk about the policy and we'll model, based on development over the last couple of years, what we anticipate to generate for revenue.

We tried to do that over the last week, we just couldn't pull all the building permits for today's meeting, but it's in the works and you should see that sometime soon. I had one other question regarding the structure of the policy.

[Speaker 8] (3:12:20 - 3:12:24)
Do certain projects receive preference over other projects?

[Speaker 1] (3:12:25 - 3:12:48)
We thought that once we get that assessment, it may be important for the town to determine where priority work goes forward because of the sequencing of other municipal work or other opportunities. So we wanted to retain some control over that.

[Speaker 8] (3:12:50 - 3:13:02)
Are water conservation efforts also in consideration with this I&I remediation? Doesn't that sort of work hand-in-hand?

[Speaker 1] (3:13:04 - 3:13:20)
Water conservation is always in order, and we'll take a closer look at water conservation. I don't know offhand if water conservation is driving the I&I regulation.

[Speaker 10] (3:13:21 - 3:13:26)
You mean can we pay for water conservation efforts? Is that what you're asking? No.

[Speaker 1] (3:13:27 - 3:13:58)
I'm just saying, are we trying to use less as well? Water conservation has not come up in any of the conversations I've had associated with this policy. This is the first time that it has come up.

I'll bring that back to the team and we'll talk about whether or not conserving more water would help ensure there's less flow and less impact. Maybe there is a connection that we can strengthen from that.

[Speaker 10] (3:13:59 - 3:13:59)
Thank you.

[Speaker 3] (3:14:04 - 3:14:05)
Other questions?

[Speaker 10] (3:14:08 - 3:14:52)
Sean, you touched on it, and maybe you can bring it back on the 15th too. In the tiers on the flat fees, I just wanted to have a better idea of the flow rates for those tiers, where those numbers come from, and just also slightly concerned of the jump between if you have a flow rate of $999 and then if you have a flow rate of $1,000, you're paying $15,000 more. So if these numbers are somewhat arbitrary or have context for certain projects, and if those tiers can maybe be, maybe not more tiers, but capturing more so that maybe that jumps.

[Speaker 2] (3:14:52 - 3:15:02)
It may just help you. You can reverse engineer to choose 110 gallons a day per bedroom, and you can reverse engineer what buildings, for the purpose of this, are in those tiers.

[Speaker 10] (3:15:03 - 3:15:03)
Okay.

[Speaker 2] (3:15:05 - 3:15:21)
The $999 one is a nine-bedroom development. Just to give you a sense. After that, we're getting into this bigger.

It's arbitrary in the sense that at some point there's a cutoff and you go to this.

[Speaker 10] (3:15:21 - 3:15:34)
You use that 110 gallons? I don't know if there's a way to do it where it's less of a jump or if that matters necessarily, but it just seems, if you're building a nine-bedroom or a 10-bedroom, that's a difference of $15,000.

[Speaker 1] (3:15:35 - 3:15:40)
We thought that would be pretty reasonable. That's a nine-bedroom, 110-gallon project.

[Speaker 2] (3:15:41 - 3:15:46)
Going to nine bedrooms, I think we're being, just from my perspective, we're being sui generis.

[Speaker 1] (3:15:47 - 3:15:47)
I agree.

[Speaker 2] (3:15:49 - 3:15:53)
No one's not going to build the 10th unit because it's going to cost them $15,000 more.

[Speaker 10] (3:15:54 - 3:15:55)
No one's not going to.

[Speaker 2] (3:15:56 - 3:15:58)
That's not the reason they're not going to build the 10th bedroom.

[Speaker 9] (3:15:58 - 3:15:59)
That's my point.

[Speaker 10] (3:16:00 - 3:16:30)
Maybe it shouldn't be $5,000. Maybe it should be $8,000. That's what I'm saying.

Do those numbers make sense? It could be either way. But like why, if that top tier is five and then jumps to a $20,000 fee, I'm not saying that a higher fee is not in order.

Maybe it is. I just wanted to have a understanding of that. So if we can provide more of that on the quicksand.

[Speaker 1] (3:16:30 - 3:17:44)
We will. Helpful conversation. We did talk about it today.

I met with Dave and Gino. We talked about where's the tier that will generate a significant amount of revenue. We thought let's just draw the line where we're going to capture a significant multifamily.

Nine bedrooms is that. Three family. Or larger.

We wanted to be a little bit more careful with some of the smaller projects. Just because we have a reasonable number there that I think applies some obligation. But not something that would be overly difficult.

We'll come back with a tier and a few options. Again, the concern was everybody might try to, if we have too many, they might try to package. I get you.

Fire off any questions or concerns as we finalize the policy.

[Speaker 3] (3:17:46 - 3:18:26)
So we have a second reading on the 15th. Yes. So it'll be our next meeting.

Do you guys have any other questions before we move on? Okay. All right.

So next up, Sean, you again. Or is it. Yeah.

No, I know. But Margie. Sorry.

Okay. Hi, Margie. Which is why you're right there on the screen.

I'm just going to walk away now. Okay. So we're going to have an update on C&L liquor license.

[Speaker 5] (3:18:27 - 3:18:58)
Before we do that, could I just let you know that I did follow up with the developers of a white court. And they, the, the item is not needed for their, for the closing. This is the easement is a, is a post-closing issue.

So we can wait and we could do a second reading of the easement on the 15th. Thanks. So great opportunity to follow up with town council and, you know, regarding the seating signage and obviously the lender issues.

[Speaker 3] (3:18:58 - 3:19:08)
All right. That's great. Thanks for the update.

You're welcome. So we just continued the hearing, but I don't think we said till when do we have to say till when? To the 15th.

We already did that. That's right.

[Speaker 5] (3:19:10 - 3:19:11)
Okay. Excellent.

[Speaker 2] (3:19:11 - 3:19:13)
No, that's the auto dealer's license.

[Speaker 3] (3:19:14 - 3:19:29)
Yeah. I was. Oh, yeah.

I honestly, David, I'm just handing the gavel to you right now. I'm getting it all wrong. Okay.

Go ahead, Margie. Fill us in. And we appreciate the update.

[Speaker 5] (3:19:29 - 3:22:00)
Absolutely. All right. So on the 15th, we'll do the second reading.

And then so obviously I am here to just give you a brief update on C&L Liquor Store license. Shortly, you will hear from Angelica and Molly on the liquor license, entertainment, and common victuals renewals. As you know, C&L Liquor Store has been closed since September of this year.

They are a liquor license holder. They will be looking or they will be requesting this evening to renew their liquor license. We had seeked Town Council and Alcohol and Beverage Control Commission's guidance in regards to how do we proceed or how do we deal with an establishment that is not currently in operation.

The advice that we received is that most towns or most licensing authorities would give a formal written to the applicant or to the liquor license holder or the individual seeking renewal and will provide a time limit, a limited amount of time in regards to how long the license would be in effect. So shortly in front of you, as I stated, Angelica and Molly will be here. We'll be talking about the renewals.

So again, I just wanted to preface that, that you will the request, I should say, and guidance from Town Council is to provide a written notice to the applicant in regards to the time that they will have to perform. Because obviously the request or the guidance is not to hold a liquor license if it's not being used. I'm here to answer, if you have any questions, I'm here to, I'll be happy to provide it to you.

I have been working with the current owner to assist him in finding additional, a new relocation or a new suitable location for his establishment. But unfortunately today, a new location has not been identified. Okay.

Questions for Marzi?

[Speaker 8] (3:22:03 - 3:22:12)
Marzi, as far as a new location would be concerned, the former Baker's Daughter location in Humphrey Plaza, is that something that?

[Speaker 5] (3:22:14 - 3:22:34)
There is a potential restaurant that's looking at that space. I think that the property owner, as well as the Baker's Daughter, who actually has an existing lease, they are working with somebody to bring a new restaurant to that location. I think they're very close in formalizing the agreements.

[Speaker 8] (3:22:35 - 3:22:36)
Fantastic. Thank you.

[Speaker 3] (3:22:39 - 3:22:44)
So Marzi, sorry, it's as of September 1st then, the six months that you're?

[Speaker 5] (3:22:45 - 3:23:16)
No, what I meant to say, I'm sorry, is that the CNL closed on September of this year. Historically, just to let you know that the sort of other municipalities, what they would do is they would give a potential applicant six months time to renew the license, or just put them on notice that if they don't have a physical location within six months, then the license would be reverted.

[Speaker 3] (3:23:17 - 3:23:21)
Okay, so it's just standard application, okay. That's correct.

[Speaker 5] (3:23:22 - 3:23:42)
I know that I did speak with the owner, I'm sorry, Mr. Peralta, I'm not sure if he is here this evening, but he did say that he was going to call in. I don't know if you have any questions for him, or maybe that you can take that up when the discussion focuses on the liquor license.

[Speaker 3] (3:23:42 - 3:23:43)
No, he's not here.

[Speaker 2] (3:23:50 - 3:23:52)
No, I think she said if we had questions for him.

[Speaker 15] (3:23:52 - 3:24:04)
No, I know. I actually don't know that he's on. I think there was concern about his potential technical ability to speak, but we could certainly ask him if you have any questions specifically.

[Speaker 5] (3:24:05 - 3:24:15)
Yeah, I'm happy to also, if I can assist you in any way, we're here too. And I did speak to him and I provided him the dial in number as well as the Zoom login.

[Speaker 15] (3:24:20 - 3:24:45)
So I could work with town council on issuing an official notice to start that six month clock, I think is what the next step would be. So I could work on that and then pull you in, Polly, so you can take a look at that and if it makes sense putting your signature on it to send that out if the board feels that that's the right way to go. We can get that out by the end of the week, provided I get the comments from town council in a timely manner.

[Speaker 3] (3:24:48 - 3:24:52)
So I don't think we have many options here.

[Speaker 21] (3:24:52 - 3:24:54)
That's fine. Yeah.

[Speaker 15] (3:24:55 - 3:25:02)
Okay. So we maybe I don't know whether I don't know if it requires a vote, but maybe good measure is just make make a vote to put them on notice.

[Speaker 3] (3:25:04 - 3:25:30)
Is there a motion to approve? To renew the C&L package store liquor license with the condition of the six month timeline to utilize the license. Or else have it canceled.

Is there more I should say that's technical language in there.

[Speaker 19] (3:25:31 - 3:25:33)
So move. Second.

[Speaker 3] (3:25:34 - 3:25:39)
I'm sorry, use or transfer the license within six months.

[Speaker 10] (3:25:39 - 3:25:40)
So move. Second.

[Speaker 3] (3:25:41 - 3:25:41)
All in favor.

[Speaker 10] (3:25:42 - 3:25:42)
Aye. Aye.

[Speaker 3] (3:25:43 - 3:25:45)
So you'll write.

[Speaker 15] (3:25:46 - 3:25:46)
I'll get a draft.

[Speaker 3] (3:25:46 - 3:25:57)
We'll be in touch and then. Yeah, exactly. And then I'll share it with you.

Exactly. Okay. Thanks.

Okay. Thank you. Thanks, Marcy.

[Speaker 21] (3:25:59 - 3:26:00)
Okay.

[Speaker 3] (3:26:00 - 3:26:31)
The fun continues here. Presentation and renewal of 2022 liquor license licenses. Sorry.

Just generally licenses. That's the next item on the agenda. That includes liquor licenses, common victual or licenses and entertainment licenses.

And we have Angelica noble. I think Molly's going to go first. Yeah.

Okay. Here and also Molly joining us and you'll be walking us through the different licenses. Thanks.

[Speaker 7] (3:26:32 - 3:26:47)
Yeah. I'm just going to cover common Vic and entertainment renewals and a couple of new ones tonight. And then we will be back on the 15th with the rest of them.

These licenses are in process of inspections are ongoing. So this, the things that are in front of you tonight are ready to go.

[Speaker 15] (3:26:48 - 3:26:57)
Allie, do you need me to screen share or I have it if you need it, but if you want to do it, that's fine. It's only four slides. So either way, if you have it up, that would be great.

I can pull it. Yep.

[Speaker 7] (3:27:07 - 3:28:10)
So I'll just start. Well, we're waiting. The common Vic licenses are for seating and these licenses are renewed annually.

The fee is $125 and they are inspected by Jeff Vaughn from the health department. It's required for any businesses that serves food. We are currently coordinating those applications and we renew them at the December of each calendar year.

So the next slide has a list of the businesses that are on deck with their common Vics that have been inspected and signed off on, on tonight. The one in bold is Nordhaven and that's a new business going into the Titani location. They're getting ready to open shortly.

So they've got their common Vic application in to be ready for that. And the rest of the businesses are the rest of the businesses, or I would say in the case of some of them, organizations are new rules. So that's, I can answer any questions about common Vics.

It's pretty straightforward, but I'm happy to answer anything before I move on to entertainment.

[Speaker 2] (3:28:12 - 3:28:23)
I would make a motion to approve the 7 or 28, 28, 28 common Vic licenses shown on the screen. Second.

[Speaker 3] (3:28:24 - 3:28:25)
Any further discussion?

[Speaker 2] (3:28:27 - 3:28:27)
No.

[Speaker 3] (3:28:28 - 3:28:29)
All in favor.

[Speaker 10] (3:28:29 - 3:28:30)
Aye. Aye.

[Speaker 7] (3:28:34 - 3:30:06)
Thank you. So moving on to entertainment licenses, entertainment, live entertainment covers everything from having a TV that's playing to having hosting pub trivia to having live music and dancing. Obviously the past couple of years have been a little different than, you know, than we normally have.

And so we haven't really received any kind of complaints over the past year about these, about these businesses, which is normally what we look to if we're going to recommend any changes to their licenses. Again, all these licenses that are recommended to you today also have common Vics that have been signed off on. Many of them also will be serving liquor as well, and those get additional inspection.

The ones highlighted are the new ones there. It may have had one in the past, but they didn't have one last year. So that was just new to me.

The Swarmscot Senior Center is looking to do more entertainment. And those hours reflect just looking to do a night event maybe once a week. So I'm kind of covering that time.

And then Zest Friends, which is another new business that opened on Humphrey Street where Nguyen's used to be. I think the only note I have is that permission on the bay on their license, it actually specifies certain decibel levels, and that's been in place for a while. And that will just continue to be in place on their license for that.

If there are any questions, I'm happy to take them. Again, these are not all the licenses. Some of them are still in process, and then we will bring the rest on the 15th.

[Speaker 8] (3:30:07 - 3:30:13)
Hey, Molly, is there a reason that there isn't uniformity between these entertainment hours?

[Speaker 7] (3:30:14 - 3:30:51)
Yes. So the CV has to cover all the hours that the establishment is open and serving food. The entertainment obviously can't or isn't necessarily all of those hours.

It can't obviously be greater than those hours. Some of them are looking to offer different things. Again, for example, like the Chuchis, having TVs on is basically what their entertainment is considered.

So the TVs are on when the restaurant is open to serve food. You know, something's kind of variable. Thank you.

[Speaker 3] (3:30:51 - 3:30:56)
They can choose an earlier. It's some of them asking for the earlier time, right?

[Speaker 7] (3:30:56 - 3:31:22)
Yeah, some of it's them asking and us checking on their background. You know, Paradiso doesn't open until the evening, so, you know, obviously they're not going to have entertainment earlier. So, yeah, it kind of varies in between what the establishment is looking for, what we can consider, and what they have going on.

Okay. Go ahead.

[Speaker 2] (3:31:22 - 3:31:29)
A motion to approve the entertainment licenses as set forth on the screen. Second.

[Speaker 15] (3:31:31 - 3:31:36)
All in favor. Is that specific enough? That's fine.

It's good enough for me. I'm going to list the businesses and the meeting minutes. Okay.

Great.

[Speaker 3] (3:31:37 - 3:31:38)
All those in favor?

[Speaker 8] (3:31:38 - 3:31:39)
Aye. Aye.

[Speaker 3] (3:31:39 - 3:31:44)
Aye. Okay. Hi, Detective Delano.

Welcome.

[Speaker 20] (3:31:46 - 3:31:47)
How are you? Good evening.

[Speaker 3] (3:31:49 - 3:31:54)
Great. So we're moving on to the last item with the renewals, which is liquor licenses.

[Speaker 15] (3:31:57 - 3:32:09)
Hi, Angelica. Hi. I think Angelica's got a really iffy internet connection.

Okay. Do you mind just sharing your screen? Yep, no problem.

[Speaker 6] (3:32:09 - 3:37:37)
Thank you. So I'll just go over the renewal process quickly, and then we can get into the specific businesses and any questions that you might have. So in late September, you can go to the next one.

Sorry. So in late September, that's when I am sent the renewal form from the ACC. And then sometime in October, I send those packets to all the active licensees.

And then I also send a list of the active licensees to the police department, the fire department, and the building inspector. The reason I do it in October is because for some technical reason, the ABCC requests that those forms are signed in the month of November. If they're signed on October 31st, they will deny it.

And then so in November, the next slide, there's quite a bit that goes on. So the fire safety, there's a fire safety and building inspection that Rich Baldacci and James Potts do. And so after those are completed, they would let me know.

And so Diane did let me know that those were all completed and all the businesses were in compliance. Then we connect with the town accountants to see if any active licensees have outstanding balances. And so if so, they are contacted and they are to pay all outstanding balances by November 30th.

The next thing is the fingerprints. So all of the managers, the appointed managers have to come into the police station annual for fingerprints. And so the chief would sign off on that.

And then we also request them to and require them to give their liquor liability insurance. And so all licenses, all paperwork has to be in by November 30th. And if it is not, according to the ABCC, their license is deemed like not invalid, but they have to apply for a new license.

And so then you can flip to the next slide. And then so that brings us to today. So I'm here today to present to you all of the license and the select board would vote on them.

And from there, we would submit the renewal forms to the ABCC and then the establishments are mailed or hand delivered their new liquor license. And as I had said before, no license can be renewed or granted if there are payments due and sections outstanding or fingerprinting. But I'm happy to announce that there is none of that.

So all licenses are totally in compliance with everything. So you can skip to the next slide. This just is a little overview of the fingerprinting.

It's just a Swampscot bylaw and it shows the annual fees. So $70 goes to the town and $30 we submit to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. So this is the types of licenses.

So here we have Section 12, which are on premises licenses. That includes the restaurants, clubs, and veterans clubs, all alcohol, wines, and malts. And I won't go over it, but you can see the different fees.

We also have the Section 15, which includes the package stores, all alcohol and wines and malts. We also don't currently have any, but we do offer the brown bag license, which means that patrons can bring their own beer and wine so long as they're ordering food. And then also a one-day permit.

And I wanted to let you know that we had four issued in 2021. So that was good for those numbers there. You can flip up.

It's loading. Did it? Mine just froze.

But this is just a diagram or like a graph of all of the active liquor license here. So the red is the restaurants that offer all alcoholic beverages. The orange there is the one restaurant that offers wines and malts.

And then we have the clubs in blue and the veterans clubs in dark blue. And then the package stores that offer all alcohol and green and so on to the wines and malts. What I did do, because it is very confusing to understand the quota.

So I put little stars on the special legislation. So it would be Cafe Avellino and Mexicali. And I believe that those were special legislation in 2019 and 2018.

And obviously, the VFW is a veterans club, so that's also starred. You can skip to the next slide. So this is the quota for Swampscot.

So I'm going to do my best to explain it. So we are allowed 17 license total. We have issued 14.

But if you jump a little bit over and see that we actually issued 17, that's because the license approved under special legislation in veterans clubs are exempt from this count. So we're allowed 17, but also allowed the three exemptions. So that brings us up, which is why we have three available.

Does anyone have any questions about that? Does that make sense?

[Speaker 3] (3:37:39 - 3:37:41)
No, that makes sense. It's helpful. Thank you.

[Speaker 21] (3:37:41 - 3:37:42)
Thanks.

[Speaker 6] (3:37:42 - 3:38:22)
Okay. It's a little bit confusing. And then similar with wines and malts, we have four that were allowed.

There's one currently issued. And so we have four available. And then the next slide is the off-premises license.

So these are like our package stores. So we have three allowed for all alcohol, which all are issued. So we have zero available.

Wines and malts, five allowed and two available. So we currently have 24 licensed. So I'll go through these really quickly.

And I'll stop if there's any like particular comments I want to make. But like I said, they're all in compliance. All the managers came in for fingerprints.

Fire safety is all set.

[Speaker 15] (3:38:24 - 3:38:42)
I'll just read through them really quickly. I just wanted to stop for a second. Do you have a desire for her to go through them one by one?

Or do you want to just do what Molly did and just kind of show them all at once and see if you have any questions? It's up to you entirely. She can do it.

We'll get back.

[Speaker 6] (3:38:46 - 3:38:52)
It's totally up to you. There's only like four things that I want to mention. Why don't you highlight what you want to mention?

[Speaker 3] (3:38:52 - 3:38:55)
I think that's helpful. Yes, thanks. Okay.

[Speaker 6] (3:38:56 - 3:41:52)
Sober 2Juice is all set in compliance. Cafe Avellino, same. She also, same.

G Restaurant is all set. Gourmet Garden is all set. Hawthorne by the Sea is all set.

Mexicali, all set. Mission on the Bay, all set. So North Haven, Molly did touch on this, but they're not open yet.

And so he will notify me once he opens. And then he already has his 2021 license. But once he opens, he'll let me know and we can bring down his new license.

Paradiso is all set. So UNO, everything is all set with UNO, although they have a new manager. And so there is a pending change of manager application that we will talk about in the next item, but I just wanted to touch upon that.

Yams is all set. Zest Friends. Zest Friends, this is something I just want to mention.

So they would like to submit an application to change their hours of sales. And so that will be hopefully submitted at the next select board meeting, but just so that you're aware of it. And then the on-premises retail.

So Chipotle. Chipotle informed me yesterday that they are not going to renew their license for 2022. She had said it was a last-minute decision and it's what's better for their business.

And so with that being said, we would just let the ABCC know that they're not renewing, and that's really all we have to do on our part. And then these. So St. John is all set. Swamp Scott Club is all set. They're really all all set. I think the next one, the Yacht Club, is good.

The VFW is the last one I wanted to touch upon, is they have a change in manager. Their past manager, George Fitzhenry, I believe, he passed away in 2021. And so Malcolm Malone, who is involved in the VFW, has submitted a change of manager application, which we'll speak about in a little while.

And then I believe that that's all. Everything else is all set. You already voted on CNL.

Yep, already spoke about CNL. And then the only thing is the last slide. Oh, little g provisions.

Just to touch upon that really quick. So they are one of our new license and they are, you know, their business is up and running. And so I just wanted to point that out.

And the next slide is where I'll pass it on to detective Ted Delano. He will explain the compliance checks that we do and other. Administrative things that Ted does.

Okay.

[Speaker 11] (3:41:54 - 3:44:02)
Hello. Just quickly on an overview. That the notice that's on the screen right now.

It's posted every year by law. We have to post that. It's stamped in with a suit.

It's at the town hall. Publish it in the newspaper. And.

In the lobby of the police station. And then we proceed on that. We monitor the establishments.

For any type of events that could arise from any disturbances or. Questionable conduct that may actually follow up. Face to face with the manager.

One thing that is also provided quarterly is. When district court provides us with the names and. Of the.

The organizations where someone. If they had a. A motor vehicle infraction.

And we're arrested. For operating under the influence. In that establishment was in small.

We would get notified. Throughout the year, we do a straight of checks to make sure they have. Proper signage for.

And. For underage. Service.

Serving someone that's intoxicated. And. Making sure that license is.

Posted. Once we post that minimum age. Compliance check that covers us for the year.

We have a positive relationship with the. We do do the. Minimum age compliance checks and there's a set of.

Documents that are produced that are. Signed off and we. Have been doing it for myself.

I've been doing it for 20 years now. And it's an educational tool for. The establishments to.

Ask for identification.

[Speaker 15] (3:44:13 - 3:44:15)
Detective, are you all set?

[Speaker 11] (3:44:16 - 3:44:18)
I am. I am.

[Speaker 6] (3:44:21 - 3:44:29)
Ali, should we touch upon what. What normally happens if there is someone who does serve under age. Did you want us to touch upon that?

[Speaker 3] (3:44:29 - 3:44:32)
Yes, please. Okay.

[Speaker 11] (3:44:32 - 3:46:07)
So. The process is that. We grab a, a minor.

That could be from the community could be from contacts. Maybe an intern at another police department. They come to the station.

They sign a release. With the parent present. And the investigation is a confidential investigation at that time.

Go over the process of entering into the establishments. During this process, the minor is one of us in the detective unit. The other 2 detectives are also deployed.

There was a, a field observation report. That's done for each establishment. Basically, it lists the establishment.

And it breaks down into if identification was asked. Who who. Was served at the description of that person.

And then. We always ask. The minor grab the receipt.

If there is a sale. We go back in right away. We identify the individual that had sold it to the minor.

Never consumes any alcohol at any time. We speak to the manager. And we advise them that we are the.

And the hearing. From the boys.

[Speaker 3] (3:46:11 - 3:46:29)
So, I guess I'm a little confused what. And I mean, this. I don't understand.

And I'm sure there's a reason. I don't understand the minimum age purchase compliance checks. Relationship to what we just were introduced.

Why are we hearing about? It's just.

[Speaker 11] (3:46:29 - 3:47:04)
I believe. I was asked just to give you an overview of how it is posted. To make sure that we do post according to mass general law.

And the police department is. The ones that. Underage purchase purchases.

And that's just a tool that we use. To make sure that we do not have minors. Purchasing alcohol within our community.

So detective, is this, I'm sorry.

[Speaker 3] (3:47:04 - 3:47:05)
No, no, I was just going to ask.

[Speaker 1] (3:47:05 - 3:47:14)
Is this something that we typically do? Right around the fall, or is this something that we do all year round? As part of a compliance enforcement.

[Speaker 11] (3:47:15 - 3:47:26)
Most of the time it's done it in that November. Bracket that Angelica talked about. We have done it in the past.

In the. March.

[Speaker 1] (3:47:27 - 3:47:41)
July. Labor day weekend. Memorial day weekend.

The big. Big times where we might see. You know, activity that.

Would be. A risk. Yes.

[Speaker 3] (3:47:41 - 3:48:00)
So I guess. I'm now associating compliance checks with. Licensing, isn't that what we're.

So why? That's what my question is, I guess. I think.

If we're talking about license renewals. How does compliance? How do compliance checks fit into that?

[Speaker 11] (3:48:01 - 3:48:23)
I believe it's it's, it was. It's being. Presented to you tonight as the overall.

The overall. System that we do. The gods to at the police station, whether it be.

Angelica. Doing her work or our ongoing endeavors throughout the year. For the establishment.

[Speaker 6] (3:48:25 - 3:48:44)
So there's not any sort of relationship between like, if someone was compliant or not, like, should we not. Push their license through. I think that historically it's been spoken of the presentation that the person gives is a whole overview of the whole process of the liquor license, not just.

Those being approved or denied.

[Speaker 15] (3:48:46 - 3:48:59)
Compliance does not have any bearing on renewal of the license. What Angelica outlined as what is required by the ABCC is the fire inspection, the liquor license, the signed form. And then we have some of our own requirements.

Compliance is not one of those requirements.

[Speaker 8] (3:48:59 - 3:49:06)
So someone could. So. So someone or everyone could be.

Not. Could not be in compliance.

[Speaker 1] (3:49:07 - 3:50:02)
I think what issue. Yeah, I think what's probably important for us to share is that we've done the compliance assessment. And information will be.

Provided to the board likely in January with. A number of. Firms that likely will have to have a hearing.

That said. You know, that's part of our annual compliance responsibility. And the police department.

You know, has conducted it this year. And. It typically is not linked to the.

Approval of the license. This is not a. You know, there's a due process associated with that.

And there's a public hearing that we have to. Provide and. You know, it's, it's just a.

A formal part of ensuring that these establishments adhere to the law.

[Speaker 3] (3:50:10 - 3:50:10)
Questions.

[Speaker 8] (3:50:15 - 3:50:30)
No, I mean, I, I just had some, I just had some other issues that, you know, some other. Questions that came up that are not going to be resolved tonight. So my request, my motion is to table this.

For our, until our next meeting on December 15th.

[Speaker 3] (3:50:33 - 3:50:46)
Does anyone. Have opposition or. Don't speak at once.

[Speaker 10] (3:50:46 - 3:50:55)
Is there any reason. Chabling it to the 15th is problematic in terms of the process. For you Angelica or.

[Speaker 6] (3:50:55 - 3:51:00)
I just, I work two jobs. So I can't be at the meeting on the 15th.

[Speaker 15] (3:51:01 - 3:51:10)
But. From a state standpoint, no, they just need to be voted on by December 15th. I'm sorry, by, by December 30.

[Speaker 3] (3:51:11 - 3:51:11)
Yeah.

[Speaker 15] (3:51:12 - 3:51:13)
Okay.

[Speaker 3] (3:51:14 - 3:51:53)
So it sounds like you're saying that. There's some concerns with compliance that we might be hearing about in a new year. But as they relate to licensing.

And renewals. And all of these businesses are. Compliant that you've introduced tonight.

Yes. Okay. All right.

Thank you, Angelica and detective. So I guess we'll. Table this until.

The 15th. Well, that's your request. Otherwise.

Okay. Okay.

[Speaker 13] (3:51:54 - 3:51:56)
Seconded by. Do we have to second?

[Speaker 1] (3:51:56 - 3:51:57)
No.

[Speaker 15] (3:51:58 - 3:52:00)
It wasn't a hearing or anything, right?

[Speaker 1] (3:52:01 - 3:52:04)
Yeah. We'll just continue. We'll continue to hear.

[Speaker 15] (3:52:05 - 3:52:11)
All right. Yeah. I don't think it's not a hearing.

We'll put it on the agenda.

[Speaker 6] (3:52:12 - 3:52:16)
So are all of them being tabled or just all of them are being tabled.

[Speaker 15] (3:52:16 - 3:52:21)
Yep. Okay. Okay.

You and I, we can talk Angelica.

[Speaker 1] (3:52:21 - 3:52:23)
Well, I'll take, but it was a great presentation. Angelica.

[Speaker 15] (3:52:23 - 3:52:24)
Thanks.

[Speaker 1] (3:52:24 - 3:52:25)
Thank you.

[Speaker 15] (3:52:25 - 3:52:27)
Thank you, detective. And detective.

[Speaker 3] (3:52:32 - 3:53:25)
Okay. The next on the agenda is votes of the board. The consent agenda is designed to expedite the handling of routine and miscellaneous business of the board.

The select board may adopt the entire consent agenda with one motion at the request of any board member. Any items may be removed from the consent agenda and placed on the regular agenda for discussion. Tonight, the consent agenda items are voting to approve meeting minutes from 11, 17 and 11, 22.

21. And a vote to approve the change of manager application for your swan Scott mass LLC doing business as a Uno Chicago grill and vote to approve change of manager application for Joseph L. Steven's BFW post 1240 located at 8 Pine Street.

[Speaker 8] (3:53:26 - 3:53:28)
Motion to approve the consent agenda.

[Speaker 3] (3:53:29 - 3:53:31)
Second. All in favor.

[Speaker 8] (3:53:31 - 3:53:32)
Aye. Aye.

[Speaker 3] (3:53:33 - 3:53:34)
Okay. Select board time.

[Speaker 8] (3:53:35 - 3:53:44)
Just want to acknowledge swamp Scott. Big blue is currently leading as we enter the fourth quarter, 14 to nothing in the state finals.

[Speaker 2] (3:53:48 - 3:53:51)
Oh, what sport is that? Football.

[Speaker 3] (3:53:51 - 3:53:58)
Oh, anyone else?

[Speaker 10] (3:54:00 - 3:54:01)
I don't have anything.

[Speaker 3] (3:54:04 - 3:54:48)
No, I do. And I'm trying to find it. I'm sorry.

I'm so unprepared. Why would I be ready? All right.

We I got a letter yesterday, I guess, morning informing the town that the property at 40 Archer street or 54 Foster street. I think that's the bond place property. They have submitted a 40 B application for 160 units of rental housing.

[Speaker 8] (3:54:49 - 3:54:49)
How many?

[Speaker 3] (3:54:50 - 3:55:02)
160 units of rental housing at that site. So I just wanted to give you a heads up about that letter. I can send it to all of you.

[Speaker 1] (3:55:02 - 3:55:16)
Sean's already reached out to mass housing to request an extension. We have a 30 day period of comment. So we can respond.

All of our concerns about public safety.

[Speaker 8] (3:55:19 - 3:55:22)
How large, how, how large is the lot?

[Speaker 3] (3:55:23 - 3:56:26)
4.8 acres. So we have 30 days to submit a letter of concern. And Margie has reached out, as Sean said, to request an extension of time.

She's hopeful that that will be granted. But in the meantime, so I think we're going to ask Margie to come back at December 15th, shaping up to be a very, oh, hi, Margie. Dense meeting, but to come back and kind of talk more details about that.

But in the meantime, I think if one or two members are willing to help Margie kind of take a first stab at that letter. I think Margie and I would appreciate the help. So if anyone's interested, please, you can say so now or reach out to Margie.

But one or two of us would be helpful. Did you want to say anything, Margie? Feel free to add or correct me if I misspoke about anything.

[Speaker 5] (3:56:26 - 3:58:08)
No, I think that you covered it. So as you stated, the common period, the town does have 30 days to respond regarding the project to mass housing. I did the request that I put in that did the time request that I submitted to mass housing is to grant us additional 30 days to go through the end of January.

You know, we're entering the holiday season. So obviously this is a serious project. And at the same time, I want to make sure that we do two things.

Once again, seek grant funding to have a consultant to really assist our ZBA through the process, really guide the process, and also to allow us the time to take a look at the way we calculate the subsidized housing inventory. There are obviously two ways to count subsidized housing. I'm sure you're aware of one of them is just to look at the number of actual units that are in various levels of subsidies that are on the record with the Department of Housing and Community Development.

And the other way would be to look at land area and compare it to the, once again, the number of units. So I had reached out to the Department of Housing and Community Development to really assist us with that process, to fully understand it, and to really look at the calculation to see if our actual number is higher than it is right now. So again, I'm happy to work with you.

We do have some time to draft a letter.

[Speaker 2] (3:58:09 - 3:58:16)
Margie, do you mind just e-mailing the board or through the chair or Sean just the package from DHCD, please?

[Speaker 5] (3:58:17 - 3:58:21)
So this is going through Mass Housing. They're not going through DHCD.

[Speaker 2] (3:58:21 - 3:58:24)
Okay. Mass Housing. Whatever package we have with information on the project would be great.

[Speaker 5] (3:58:25 - 3:58:29)
Absolutely. I'll make sure to forward it to you. Thank you.

[Speaker 2] (3:58:29 - 3:58:29)
Thanks.

[Speaker 3] (3:58:36 - 3:58:41)
Thanks, Margie. Well, on that high note, does anyone have anything else?

[Speaker 8] (3:58:43 - 3:58:44)
Motion to adjourn.

[Speaker 3] (3:58:45 - 3:58:47)
All in favor? Aye.

[Speaker 1] (3:58:47 - 3:58:48)
Aye. Aye. Good night, everybody.

[Speaker 3] (3:58:49 - 3:58:50)
Thank you, everyone. Good night.