[Speaker 13] (0:21 - 0:51)
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[Speaker 2] (1:20 - 3:03)
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[Speaker 10] (3:11 - 3:12)
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[Speaker 2] (3:14 - 4:11)
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. meeting is being recorded. We have a number of, we have a number of Swampscott Public School students here.

Maybe they can lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance. The pledge, come on. Before we get, before we get rolling, we are, we do, I want to welcome our newest select board member, Danielle Leonard.

Welcome, and and we will be starting with the swearing-in ceremony of our newest select board member.

[Speaker 7] (4:22 - 5:32)
Should we, why don't we, Danielle, yeah, over here, yeah, oh, go ahead, pick it up, there you go, here we go, come over here you two, you're going to read with me, thank you Michael, hi, Danielle Ferrara-Leonard, solemnly swear that I will faithfully and impartially discharge and perform all the duties incumbent upon me as select board member for the town of Swampscott, and in accordance with the bylaws of the town, the laws of the Commonwealth, and the Constitution of the United States of America, to the best of my ability.

[Speaker 10] (5:33 - 6:22)
Thank you, it is also my honor, thank you, can I give it back to you guys, okay, nicely done, Michael, all right, thank you.

[Speaker 2] (6:22 - 6:28)
That's my niece, and we will, we will also, we'll start with with public comment.

[Speaker 8] (6:41 - 8:50)
I'm gonna read my comments. Hello, my name is Anne Navon, my property is at 26 Virginia Circle, it abuts the new elementary school. The questions that I will be asking you tonight, I am not expecting for you to have the answers on hand.

I am here tonight to demand reliable answers to my questions in writing. My email address is ann.navon at comcast.net, and I would be happy to supply a copy of my remarks and questions to any of you. In June of 2022, at a site meeting, I was given a handout detailing landscaping that would be planted between my property and the town's.

I appear before you today to find out the following. Are the specific plans detailed on the handout dated June 2022 still in place? Have they been altered in any way?

If they have been amended, what is the current plan for that particular area, and when will the planting be done? My last concern is related to the same area, but behind the three-foot fence that remains standing. The area behind the remaining fence is full of debris.

The debris I would describe as branches, leaves, and rocks. Not boulders, but definitely rocks. The debris is on the town side of the fence, not on mine.

I do have recent pictures of the area, and if you are concerned about it, I would be glad to show them to you. The mess behind the fence is beyond my capability to address. Therefore, I need a firm commitment from the town before the final fence is removed, and that is before the final fence is removed, to remove the debris and have it thoroughly cleaned up.

In addition to that commitment from the town, I need a time frame for when that cleanup will be accomplished, and when the fence will come down. Thank you.

[Speaker 2] (8:51 - 8:52)
Thanks, Anne.

[Speaker 11] (9:03 - 9:55)
Hello, Joe Doulette, Precinct 3, Elmwood Road, among other things. I play trombone, and I just wanted to let people know about the Blue Big Band concert on May 18th. It's Saturday, 3.30. I mention it because it is a recipient of the Swanscote Cultural Council. We get money to support our director, Timo Schenko, who is a fantastic jazz musician, and he's been leading us through selections from Duke Ellington's Such Sweet Thunder. It's an amazing piece, really challenging to play. Mike McClung also plays trombone.

It's free for seniors. We partner with the Senior Center, and it's free for youth. It's $10 for everyone else.

There'll also be a trio and a flute concerto that afternoon as well, so if you're free, come on down. Thank you. Thanks, Joe.

Mr. Dooley.

[Speaker 9] (10:02 - 11:29)
Ted Dooley, Precinct 4, Magnolia Road. I'm also a member of the Planning Board, and I am here to speak in my individual capacity as a member of the Planning Board. Just to ask you, as members of the Select Board, as a board and in your individual roles, to spend the next week, week and a half to ensure as many residents are well-informed about zoning amendments, especially those pertaining to the MBTA 3A article.

Given the current events that have gone on in Marblehead and other towns, I think it's very important to ensure that everyone is as well-informed going into that to make their own decisions, but to understand the ramifications that can happen with approval or with denial of those articles. It's a very complex amendment, as you are all aware, one that probably is not adequate to explain thoroughly at our town meeting. As great as that would be, I don't think the format lends to a conversation that can be had to ensure a thorough conversation.

As a board, we've had multiple public hearings on it. Margie and her staff have had great public hearings as well to ensure everyone is well-informed, but given some of the attention this has been getting around the state, I think it's important to ask you to ensure that everyone is well-informed using your purchase, and I think we would all appreciate that. So, thank you for your time, and looking forward to seeing you at town meeting next week.

[Speaker 2] (11:30 - 12:05)
Thanks, Ted. All right, we have a hand on teams. Andrea Moore.

Andrea, can you hear us? Can you guys hear me? We can hear you now, yep.

[Speaker 12] (12:10 - 12:45)
I wanted to make public comment in favor of a potential re-discussion of the ARPA funds that were discussed at a previous meeting. There has been significant public outcry as far as, you know, the appropriateness of the funds, both, you know, sort of like on public forums, in the community, through publication, online publications. So I would certainly urge the board to consider further discussion of the usage of those funds.

Thank you.

[Speaker 2] (12:47 - 12:59)
Thank you. All right, seeing no other hands online or in the room, we'll move on. Town Administrator report.

[Speaker 1] (13:00 - 23:07)
Thank you, David. In a busy week, you know, staff are really gearing up for town meeting, but we have a lot of busy projects in the works. Last week, I met with Congressman Moulton and Representative Armini.

These are meetings that we have occasionally. We went over a number of the town's priorities. We talked a little bit about, you know, the King's Beach cleanup efforts and some of the work the town is involved in with the redevelopment of the Hawthorne site, the Hadley School Hotel, you know, efforts to really look at pedestrian safety and traffic around Vinton Square and the MBTA neighborhood.

We certainly discussed at length the Pine Street project and the rail trail. We did review the PowerPoint presentation that we presented at the last select board meeting. We discussed King's Beach, and we talked a little bit about the work to really collaborate regionally.

As I've stressed numerous times, I really do think it's important that our state and federal agencies, including the Army Corps of Engineers and CZM, DEP, all play stronger roles in helping us really look at supplemental strategies. We certainly are recommending a dramatic increase in how much money we are looking to allocate to asset management, but lots to do. Last week, we had a national prescription drug take-back day.

I just want to remind residents, if you have prescription medications, please don't put them down the drain and bring them down to the police station. We have a lot of opportunities to protect the environment but dispose of these safely. We had a really bumper crop of medicine that was turned in, and this helps protect our environment and, frankly, helps protect those that may be susceptible to addiction.

I was pleased to attend last Friday the graduation of our newest police officer, Officer John Posada. He graduated from the police academy along with dozens of other police officers. We currently have three officers in week 13 out of 24 at the Linfield Training Academy, and feedback on their training has been extremely positive.

We have started a report that our longtime firefighter and union president, Jim Snow, retired last week with over 30 years of service to the town of Swampskate. I want to congratulate him on his service and wish Jim a very healthy and happy retirement. We are gearing up for the next round of recruitments and entrance exams.

This week, I am holding promotional interviews for lieutenants and captains and certainly a busy time for our police and fire department. A public health nurse, Nia Illingworth, has been holding Narcan training. Certainly want to encourage board members, if you haven't been trained to use Narcan, it's a life-saving skill.

I really am impressed with our health department. If anybody wants to be trained or needs a Narcan kit, you can contact our health department directly. We have our next yard waste scheduled for June 3rd.

That's your normal trash pickup day. The health department has been asked by the state to do a small presentation on municipal planning for the work they have been doing on opioids. This will consist of individuals affected by opioid use and a representative from the school committee as well as local health professionals.

Last week was a busy week for Pine Street. We demolished the Pine Street building. This has been part of an ongoing effort that the town has been involved in for over a year to acquire that property.

I want to thank the neighborhood. This is a big project and certainly helps us move forward with our efforts to build a veteran's housing project for the town. We will be holding a neighborhood meeting in the near future to discuss the next steps.

We're partnering with the firm that helped us evolve and develop the school. I had a meeting with our veterans group and our DAV representatives last week along with other veterans. We talked about going to visit veterans housing projects that are in Massachusetts.

I would encourage members of this board to join us for a few of those field trips. Veterans housing is different and unique. I think we have to go and speak with some folks that are living in veterans housing projects and just help understand what works, what we can think about in terms of space and come back and work with B'nai and think critically about how this project evolves.

I did meet with B'nai today. They're very excited that the building has come down. This is a really important step in terms of how we are going to move forward with our application with B'nai to get housing funding.

This really speaks, I think, very well in terms of expediting the redevelopment of that site. Busy election. I want to congratulate our newest board member, but I also want to thank our town clerk's office and volunteers and our staff that help support a busy election day.

We're a small town, but we have a lot of busy responsibilities. Both Jared and Mike, I think, did an excellent job making sure that democracy was a success last Tuesday. We've been able to elect individuals for our select board, board of assessors, school committee, library trustees, board of health, planning board, housing authority.

So I want to congratulate everybody. Democracy is the worst form of government besides all others. It's not easy, but really appreciate that folks are willing to stand up and help serve.

Our community economic development department is busy. They're coordinating our Earth Fest and want to thank everybody who came out for that. We have lots of residents that are really active and engaged in committees, thinking about our environmental stewardship.

We have some advocacy for our Community Preservation Act. This is a critical funding program that I'm hopeful that the town will embrace. We had tables from the Northeast Marine Science Center and a lot of intertidal animals and children were allowed to hold and touch, and really a great way to learn about our responsibility to be more responsible with our environment.

DPW has been busy with the seawall project. We're on our last leg of it. It's a half a million dollar project.

Over the last four years, we've spent $2.7 million. We're going to follow up with our legislative delegation. Again, I would encourage the board to support a recommendation that we turn our Kings Beach area back to the state.

Back a few decades ago, the town actually took it over at significant cost. We're spending millions of dollars repairing seawalls that, frankly, the state should help us with. It's a wonderful resource area, but I just think people don't see a distinction between the town and the state when it comes to that resource area.

I would just like the state to help us take care of that. Once we finish this, the state won't have to touch the seawall for the next 20 years, and I think it's the perfect time to ask our friends over at the Department of Conservation and Recreation to just partner with us. Last week, I did meet with the chair of the library board and the library director to review a slide deck on the library's $800,000 capital improvement request at town meeting.

We are finalizing the presentation. Basically, it involves resetting the entryways to the library and really making the library that much more accessible. We have a few infrastructure issues that we have to address, and I'm certainly happy to bring that back to the board and invite the library board and the library director to come back and present that information to the board at our next meeting.

We have a busy facilities department. I did meet with the director of facilities and the director of our senior center last week to evaluate their kitchen and equipment needs. He's working on a number of improvements, including a new dishwasher and a new disposal, these things that we can handle in the operating budget.

These are ministerial things that we just need to address. We have a tight budget. We're going to hear from our finance director a little later tonight, but it's my hope that as we get to the end of the year and we can see where some tailings are, or unexpended funds in certain lines, we can shift a few dollars to help address some of these important priorities.

Let's see. I really want to thank Heidi and folks who have advanced the Forget Me Not Age and Dementia Friendly Initiative at Cafe Evelino. I know select board member Doug Thompson was in attendance for that.

It was another event at Mission on the Bay. These efforts are really helpful in terms of just bringing broader awareness to folks that are dealing with dementia. So that's my report.

Thanks, Sean.

[Speaker 2] (23:08 - 23:09)
Questions, comments from the board?

[Speaker 5] (23:10 - 23:30)
I have a couple questions. On Pine Street, could you send us just a timeline so that we just can stay focused on what that's looking like? And on the fire department and the police department, they're in the process of new hiring?

[Speaker 1] (23:32 - 24:46)
They're both in the process. I just issued a conditional offer to a new firefighter. She was a reserve firefighter for the town of Linfield.

The fire department is actually producing a recruitment video. I sent a draft copy of that to the police department as well. It's an awesome video.

Joe Gillette and our fantastic local origination department has spliced together vignettes of our fire department doing all sorts of community activities and different things. The police department is gearing up for another round of recruitment. That process is a little different in terms of how we sequence the application.

I think we did have a successful round of hiring last December. We do have a number of individuals that are eligible to retire, so we want to get ahead of that curve and not constantly be trying to fill four or five positions. We want to really get good at filling them when they pop up.

[Speaker 5] (24:47 - 24:52)
When do we have three officers in the academy right now?

[Speaker 1] (24:52 - 25:06)
We have three officers in the Linfield Academy who just graduated once. Once they are out, they have to go through field training for a number of weeks, and then they can pop into the rotation.

[Speaker 5] (25:06 - 25:07)
Great. Thank you.

[Speaker 1] (25:09 - 25:49)
Pine Street, I can give you a quick update. Getting the building down is helpful, but it's going to be maybe 18 to 24 months right now for the funding schedule. We do have some time right now to really think about how to scope out the project.

It's my hope that the next 90, 120 days are used to just learn about veterans housing and really work with B'nada to really refine the preliminary concepts for their redevelopment of that site.

[Speaker 6] (25:51 - 26:44)
I was literally going to say the exact same thing. It's a great idea, Mary Ellen. I do think, not only for our purposes, but for the public's understanding, if we can lay this out over the next— things will move, but just to give people a sense.

The land development agreement is going to come at a certain time. How does that relate to—it's fantastic that we're having all the interactions and meetings with the veterans, the neighbors. Hopefully that's going well.

I know I witnessed one that was fantastic. There's going to be rough patches to this. It's going to go up and down and sideways probably before it gets to the end.

I think just having a sense for everyone, what roughly is going to happen by when. People aren't always asking and wondering, and that's easy to find. It may even be there on the town website.

If that's there already, feel free to say, hey, great idea. It's already there.

[Speaker 1] (26:44 - 27:14)
We have a landing page. I don't think that we have all the information. I think we can get more information.

I'll spend the time over the next week with staff, and we'll get a few more updates up there and really give everybody a sense. I do think that a board also might be helpful to put on the fence around the property so people can actually just see that there's a vision for what we're going to be doing and just give everybody a sense that we don't just plan to fence off a foundation.

[Speaker 5] (27:14 - 27:29)
I think one of the concerns that I have is that we are just doing everything possible to make sure we maximize the amount of applicants, veteran applicants from Swampscot, that understand how to get in there. I just want to make sure we expedite that.

[Speaker 1] (27:30 - 29:21)
Really good point, Mary Ellen. In the two meetings that I've had with the two different veterans groups, and I'm sure we're going to have dozens more, those conversations come up regularly. Veterans are really concerned that somehow this is not going to be a veterans project, and I, again, just keep reinforcing that we are going to go out there and we're going to try to make sure that veterans, and even veterans in Swampscot, get a chance to really qualify for affordable housing.

So the land development agreement actually is important because we'll put conditions in there that will help benchmark how accessible Swampscot veterans will be in terms of qualifying for affordable housing. You can have 30% of median income or 50%, 60%, 80%. We have a pretty high income, average income, and that's going to preclude some folks.

So what we want to do is make sure that we have bandwidth for the real need. That said, this is a veterans project, and so we're going to have to market this and really get ahead of this and work with Vinay and our veterans groups to ensure that we have a long list of veterans in need and let them know how much this town is going to wrap their support around them. This is a wonderful example.

There aren't others out there of communities building veterans housing, but there need to be more. We have a crisis with veterans, and this gives us a chance to really create a veterans housing center that is supportive and that is the best project that we can conceive of at this point in time.

[Speaker 2] (29:22 - 29:52)
And not to jump ahead too far, but later on in the agenda, we do have a discussion and possible vote on the establishment of a Pine Street Veterans Housing Committee. So I think that fits right in line, so we'll talk about that when we get to it. Anything else?

All right. We'll move on to discussion and possible vote on beach sticker fee increase. And this evening we have with us Recreation Director Danielle Strauss.

Danielle, welcome.

[Speaker 3] (29:53 - 35:59)
Hi, thanks. Diane, do you have that PowerPoint up? So we're here to talk about the Swampscot Recreation stickers.

These stickers are used for parking near the train station at Columbia on one side, Phillips Beach, Phillips Park for Osmonds Beach, and Preston Beach. I believe we've been issuing these beach parking stickers since the 1980s. It could be earlier, but our resident expert beachgoer, Whiskey Walensky, told me it's at least been since 1990 and probably before.

So I went with the 1980s, but it could have been far before then. And so the way we've issued these stickers is originally when I first started here, it was done in-house at Town Hall, and it just became a little overwhelming. We would have summer help there that would just sit there all day long waiting for someone to come in to get a beach sticker.

About 10 years ago, we decided to go with City Hall Systems. They came in and showed us their software, and we decided to have beach stickers only purchased through that system so that we didn't have people coming into Town Hall and forming lines to get beach stickers. So City Hall Systems, the fees over the year, when we first started, it was $3 per sticker fulfillment.

And when I say fulfillment, it's not for the sticker itself. We purchase the sticker separately, and we send them to City Hall Systems. And they are part of Kelly and Ryan, which is plugged into the registry so they can verify that the car is garaged in Swampscott.

And so they would verify that. They would put the registration number on the sticker itself, and then they would put it in an envelope and mail it. And in the meantime, they would send you a temporary sticker that you could put in your window of your car.

So that was in 2015 when we started this. It was $3 per sticker fulfillment and $0.50 for the convenience fee, which is a credit card fee. We absorbed that fee.

And fast forward to 2024, just this year, they raised it to $6 plus $1 convenience fee, which is a lot. So in 2024, we budgeted in the general fund $15,000 for the fulfillment of these beach stickers. And in order to accommodate the increase, the budget would need to be $21,000 this year, which is an increase of $6,000.

So we got together, and we talked about whether or not we wanted to continue with City Hall Systems. And when I said we, we got together, Amy, Patrick, and myself, and we proposed that we change the way that we do the beach stickers, and we offer them in Town Hall for people to come in and purchase them, or purchase them online if they're unable to come into Town Hall or they just don't want to come into Town Hall. So in talking to Patrick, which he will, his department will bear the brunt of it because they'll go through community services.

Customer services, thank you. Customer services, we will use senior help, senior work-off help, and customer service, only offer it during certain hours of the day when we know that we'll have the senior help there so it doesn't affect our staff, especially when people come in to pay the bills and we don't want large lines forming. So we worked out a plan to do that, and then Patrick was going to check in with Chrissy to see how things were working, and we may have to tweak things a little bit.

So the previous stickers for a resident was $20 in person, and online was $20. A senior resident was $7, and a senior resident online was $7. I should add, I don't know if it's on the next page, but we have not raised the price of beach stickers in over 10, 12, 13 years.

So what we propose is having resident in-person beach stickers at $25 per sticker, and online $30 to absorb that extra cost that it's going to be to purchase them. And then the senior resident sticker go from $7 to $10, and the senior resident online go from $7 to $15. So I'm doing this this way because I can't see the screen over there, so sorry, I'm just reading from here.

So the issue, so what we would like to do is propose to the board to change, I think there's another, oh, the motion. We would like a motion to increase the recreation parking sticker fees as presented. A resident sticker purchased online is $30, senior resident sticker purchased online is $15, resident sticker purchased in person is $25, and senior resident sticker purchased in person is $10.

[Speaker 2] (36:02 - 36:03)
Questions from the board?

[Speaker 7] (36:05 - 36:30)
I have a question. Go ahead. Hi, Danielle.

Hi. So how many stickers were issued last year, do you know? About 2,600.

Okay, so 2,600 stickers, and roughly if I'm calculating with my fuzzy middle school math here, these increases are going anywhere from 25 to almost 60% of an increase.

[Speaker 10] (36:30 - 36:30)
Yes.

[Speaker 7] (36:30 - 36:54)
Does that sound right? Okay. So I'm having a little trouble wrapping my head around that percentage of an increase, right?

Maybe 10% I could somehow understand, but we're talking 60% for senior citizens, for that senior citizens group. Where did you, like how did you come to these dollar figures for a percent of increase?

[Speaker 3] (36:54 - 37:23)
I think part of it was looking at what other communities were charging for stickers. I just did a quick Google search. I can tell you that Barnstable charges 50, Dennis charges 50.

I took like the Cape mostly because it's more like our demographics. Falmouth is 40, and Duxbury is 105 to 190 for those fees.

[Speaker 7] (37:24 - 38:04)
Okay, so roughly the increase to our budget is, I think the slide said $6,000 difference. So in theory, we would try to recoup that $6,000, right, if that's what we're trying to do just to stay level, right? And if we had 2,600 stickers that we issued last year, we're talking maybe a $2 increase, maybe a $3 increase to get back that $6,000.

That's kind of how I'm thinking it through in my head. So I don't, you know, just off the top of my head, it just seems like a very big percentage increase, right, with the smallest percentage being 25%. Typically, even though it hasn't been done in 10 or less years, I mean that can make up for some of it.

[Speaker 3] (38:04 - 38:15)
It's been a long time. When we did raise it for residents, we didn't raise it for seniors at that point. So that's probably been 20 years.

[Speaker 7] (38:16 - 38:22)
But the basic premise of raising it is really just to recoup that $6,000 or just to- No, I don't think it's just that.

[Speaker 3] (38:23 - 38:36)
I think that when we look at raising fees for anything, I'm trying to think of some of our fees that we have in town, because we just did a whole bunch of them, correct? And what were some of those?

[Speaker 4] (38:37 - 38:45)
We did amendments to vital records. We did- Congratulations, we did some building permits.

[Speaker 3] (38:46 - 38:46)
Mattresses.

[Speaker 4] (38:47 - 38:47)
Mooring.

[Speaker 1] (38:48 - 40:19)
I and I. I mean, lots of- Yes. We look at fees every year before we put the budget together.

Danielle, I appreciate your question. I think when we think about our seniors, we looked at these fees. I asked Danielle when she came to me and said, hey, we're seeing these increases from a third party that are staggering.

I said, why are we hiring a third party? Let's see if we can do it in-house. We have staff, and we've worked with our senior work office.

We started with four senior work office employees I think seven years ago. Now we have over 40. They're wonderful employees, and they do a lot of good work.

It's going to put a little burden on staff, but I think we can do this, and we want to try it. I don't think the increase is driving this. The big decision here is we're going to do it in-house, and it's helpful to kind of look at where we stand with other peer communities.

I think maybe there's a modest way to kind of increase the senior fee. I think the other increase, I do think it does help the town just generate a little bit of revenue. We have to maintain these beaches.

It is costly. We do have a lot of folks that bring stuff to the beach. We want to be a carry-in carry-out, but we constantly have to send DPW down there.

Sometimes it's over time. Just generating a little bit of additional revenue can help us offset some of those additional costs. Lifeguards.

[Speaker 4] (40:19 - 40:28)
Lifeguards too. Lifeguards are a big part of what the beach sticker revenue also covers because we have to staff those beaches with the lifeguards.

[Speaker 7] (40:28 - 40:43)
Absolutely. It helped for me because I'm a visual person to see what the actual, if we're adding a lifeguard, what the cost of the lifeguard is to offset, just to see it out as opposed to just kind of seeing random numbers. Sometimes it helps to see the tieback.

[Speaker 3] (40:43 - 41:14)
Just the cost of lifeguards these days. We're trying to stay in step with other places. We can't.

Lifeguards are getting paid $25 or more an hour, 16-year-olds, just to lifeguard a beach. So that I've had to pay my staff more just to keep them. That comes out of the general fund.

So that's offset by some of these fees that we generate. Yes, sir.

[Speaker 2] (41:14 - 41:19)
Danielle, are the costs of the bathrooms, the port-a-potties?

[Speaker 3] (41:19 - 41:21)
Yeah, it comes out of the general fund too, yeah.

[Speaker 2] (41:21 - 41:27)
Okay. And those costs have doubled in the last two or three years as well.

[Speaker 5] (41:28 - 41:34)
How many passes do we give away to town personnel?

[Speaker 3] (41:39 - 42:02)
DPW-9, Senior Center-7, Library-7, Police-10, Town Hall-23. And I will tell you, out of the 23, I'm the only one that goes to the beach. I did it last night.

I counted how many people in the building actually go to the beach, right? And I think, Mike, you go? Okay.

[Speaker 4] (42:02 - 42:05)
You're the town president. I mean, come on.

[Speaker 3] (42:05 - 42:15)
I think for some town hall staff, it was like, I like that sticker. Let me put it on my car. But they never went to the beach.

Fire Department-8, and the school was 151.

[Speaker 1] (42:16 - 43:25)
So for me, I gave those beach stickers out to town hall employees three years ago because I wanted them to feel like they belonged. And we hear a lot of this talk about, oh, geez, the beaches are overcrowded. But it's not town employees.

I do like the idea that town employees are not simply the help. They're part of the community. Employees do use that sticker for a sense of belonging and a sense of identity.

And I don't think that's the real challenge. I do think it's important for us to kind of just understand. These are wonderful assets.

We have to think about parking. We expanded parking last year. It's a complicated conversation, but I think it's settling in, and I think we're in a place now where things are pretty well established.

Folks really see that beach sticker as a sense of belonging, and I don't think it really is utilized by a lot of staff.

[Speaker 5] (43:26 - 44:09)
I agree with you. I like the fact that people who work for the town have access to getting a beach parking pass. But I also think maybe there should be consideration into saying, yes, you have access to a beach parking pass, but perhaps everybody should start paying for beach parking passes.

This way you are offsetting these costs that are coming up, lifeguards, DPW, parking. I think that everybody just chips in. You can also keep the numbers down.

I think that should be considered. Maybe not this year because it's a little late, but I think for next year that should be considered.

[Speaker 1] (44:11 - 44:28)
Always open to compromise on some of these things. I actually do think everybody has a responsibility to help us maintain some of the environmental resource areas. I don't think that would be a difficult task.

[Speaker 6] (44:30 - 44:38)
Is there anywhere in the budget that we would roughly see the expenditures that match with the revenue for this?

[Speaker 4] (44:39 - 44:44)
Because it's general fund, all of the revenue is one bucket to cover all of the expenses.

[Speaker 6] (44:44 - 44:45)
We've got 2,600.

[Speaker 4] (44:46 - 44:52)
If you look at departmental revenue, there's a line called departmental revenue-recreation, and that is strictly the beach stickers.

[Speaker 6] (44:52 - 44:55)
No, I'm really more asking about the expense side.

[Speaker 4] (44:55 - 45:05)
Under recreation general funds, you'll see an auxiliary staff line, which is the lifeguards, and then below that in expenses, the first line should be beach stickers.

[Speaker 6] (45:05 - 45:07)
Sorry, start again. Where?

[Speaker 4] (45:07 - 45:16)
Under recreation general fund in the operating budget. If you're looking at org numbers, it's 0163.

[Speaker 1] (45:16 - 45:21)
No, I'm looking at this right here. Yeah, it's not in the PowerPoint.

[Speaker 4] (45:21 - 45:24)
No, he's looking at the monthly expenditure. Can I just tell him?

[Speaker 6] (45:26 - 45:31)
You can just tell us the number, too, if you have any idea. 01630. No, not the number.

Oh, he's talking about the revenue.

[Speaker 10] (45:32 - 45:34)
The actual expense. Yeah. Yeah.

[Speaker 4] (45:35 - 45:53)
Oh, but that's just the processing fee. Yes.

[Speaker 6] (45:53 - 45:56)
I'm talking about, like, the lifeguards or the, you know.

[Speaker 4] (45:56 - 45:57)
Auxiliary staff.

[Speaker 6] (45:57 - 46:07)
Okay. All right. So, 22,000.

No, 24,000 just for the auxiliary staff. No? Yeah.

[Speaker 3] (46:09 - 46:10)
That sounds about right.

[Speaker 6] (46:10 - 46:11)
Okay.

[Speaker 3] (46:13 - 46:15)
And then where it says lifeguard supplies.

[Speaker 6] (46:16 - 46:18)
Oh, that's not. Yep, 3,000. Yep.

[Speaker 3] (46:19 - 46:24)
And then the beach processing, and it doesn't take into account DPW, raking the beaches.

[Speaker 6] (46:25 - 46:25)
Right.

[Speaker 3] (46:25 - 46:27)
It doesn't take any of that into account.

[Speaker 6] (46:27 - 46:29)
I think that may have been what you were getting.

[Speaker 3] (46:30 - 46:30)
Yeah, that's helpful.

[Speaker 6] (46:31 - 46:50)
Absolutely, right. You know, are we just raising these just because it feels like it's time to raise them, or is there, like, some rough, like. Rationale for the number.

Yeah, right. It's an activity between them. And what you can see here, even without the DPW cost at all, trash pickup and raking the beach and everything else, you're pretty much using up all of the fee, even with these new rates.

[Speaker 10] (46:50 - 46:50)
Right.

[Speaker 6] (46:51 - 46:52)
If I'm understanding that correctly.

[Speaker 10] (46:52 - 46:53)
Yes.

[Speaker 6] (46:56 - 47:17)
Which is very helpful to me, because, you know, on one hand, it does feel like, gosh, it's been so long, we really should do it. But it also feels like, well, why do it if we're just doing it for the heck of it. So given that, this makes me feel much better about going along with your recommendation.

Not that I was against it before, but now I have a clear rationale for it.

[Speaker 2] (47:19 - 47:23)
Additional questions or comments from the board? Otherwise, I'd entertain a motion.

[Speaker 6] (47:28 - 48:03)
Happy to make a motion. Just giving people time to absorb that. Is there any other discussion?

So looks like we make the motion to increase the recreation parking sticker fees as presented. Resident sticker purchased online, $30. Senior resident sticker purchased online, $15.

Resident sticker purchased in person, $25. Senior resident sticker purchased in person, $10. Do I have a second?

[Speaker 5] (48:04 - 48:14)
So I will second, but I just want to make sure that there's an addition in here that we will be visiting, having everybody chipping in for stickers.

[Speaker 1] (48:15 - 48:16)
Happy to make that commitment.

[Speaker 5] (48:17 - 48:17)
Thank you.

[Speaker 1] (48:19 - 48:20)
All in favor?

[Speaker 5] (48:20 - 48:21)
Aye. Aye.

[Speaker 10] (48:22 - 48:22)
Thank you.

[Speaker 6] (48:23 - 48:39)
By the way, is there any process by which if someone came in and said, I really want a sticker and I really can't afford this, like, does that ever get, is there, I'm not encouraging it, but I also want to be aware that like, you know, there are people that really this will be impactful.

[Speaker 1] (48:40 - 49:01)
So, Doug, I appreciate that question. I will work with our director to come up with a policy where if somebody is economically disadvantaged, we'll come up with a standard and they just need some financial assistance that we can provide that. Yeah.

I think that makes a lot of sense. Great.

[Speaker 2] (49:02 - 49:14)
Thanks. All right. We're going to move on to a quarter three update, town financial update with us this evening.

We have our director of finance, Amy Sero. Ms. Sero, welcome.

[Speaker 4] (49:16 - 49:18)
Glad you guys can hear me this time.

[Speaker 2] (49:21 - 49:24)
Okay. No audio issues here.

[Speaker 4] (49:25 - 50:29)
In the room and I can yell out. All right. So, I tried to make this very short and sweet.

So, we're just going to go over the Q3 revenue, the expenditures, our steps to manage it, and then thanks to the delay of two weeks, I was able to throw in the updated end of year projection in here. So, if you want to go ahead two slides. So, the greenish one.

Thank you. So, this is just a high-level overview of our revenue after Q3. In Q1, you may have remembered our meals and rooms taxes were actually trending behind about 20%.

That corrected itself in Q2 and Q3. So, right now, we're actually trending ahead in both of those. Like I said, after Q1, we don't have much insight into this because it is done through the tax process.

DOR doesn't give us any insight on that, but it is a very pleasant trend.

[Speaker 6] (50:30 - 50:34)
I did make it a point to actually start going out to dinner a lot more.

[Speaker 4] (50:34 - 51:14)
There was a footnote on the last payment that said thank Doug Thompson. So, DOR did recognize your efforts, so thank you. Our short-term rental impact.

This was a newer line, so we have been exceeding this. This was very conservative. Since it is a newer line, we do trend very conservative on that.

Our cannabis. Patrick and I were also conservative with this. We weren't sure the impact with opening the second shop if it was going to cannibalize the sales tax of the first shop.

I'm happy to say that did not happen.

[Speaker 1] (51:14 - 51:18)
Were there any footnotes for the board or anybody else?

[Speaker 4] (51:19 - 51:21)
They did not even call anyone on this.

[Speaker 1] (51:21 - 51:26)
It's a legal activity shop. I just wanted to see if there was anybody we should give credit to.

[Speaker 4] (51:27 - 52:46)
But this one is 3% of the gross sales of those two shops. So, right now, even after including April's activity, we're at about 126% of what we had estimated for that. So, if we stay on trend on that, that should end up about $175,000-$180,000 in total for that line this year.

Our licenses and permits are up. So, there's a callout here specifically about the Q2 permit for Elm Place, which was a little over half a million dollars. We also have the select board receipts, which is the common BIC licenses, and the block parties has already exceeded its budget for the year.

It's at about 173% of what was estimated. And our investment income, we thought that the feds were going to be reducing rates. They did not.

And have not yet. So, as of the end of March, we're at $1.5 million of the $900,000 that we had originally projected. Right now, we're averaging about $169,000 a month in investment income.

Does anyone have any questions on revenue?

[Speaker 5] (52:46 - 52:53)
I have a question on the veterans' elderly exemptions, veterans' benefits. Yes. It's up 377%.

[Speaker 4] (52:53 - 53:15)
Yes, that is a timing thing. So, I had this called out in a Q2 presentation. We had prior year abatements that were not the applications were not submitted in time to DOR.

So, when the application went through, they gave us that money in FY24. So, it's kind of a catch-up year. Okay, so you won't be forecasting?

No. Got it.

[Speaker 2] (53:16 - 53:22)
Amy, how are we so well ahead of our projections for the rentals in town?

[Speaker 4] (53:22 - 53:38)
The rentals, we were conservative on that because T-Mobile had notified us that they weren't going to keep one of their cell towers. And then, after the budget was set at annual town meeting, they came back and were like, just kidding, we want to keep our rental and we're going to keep paying for it. So.

[Speaker 1] (53:39 - 54:56)
Thank you. The bigger kind of budget answer is we are always conservative with estimated revenues. We generally, we've been, you know, if you go back seven or eight years ago, the town was hyper-conservative with revenue.

And so, it generated free cash in, you know, the amounts of $6 million. And so, what we try to do is we try to be anywhere between, you know, 10% and 20% under some reasonable expectation. And reasonable expectation is like five years worth of averages and trend lines.

And so, we try to benchmark based on what we know. Amy talked about T-Mobile. We didn't think we were going to see that revenue, so we didn't budget for that.

But, you know, those are the kind of things we want to be conservative and we want to put a budget revenue together that's conservative so that we're not coming back and saying, look, we've messed up with the revenue, so we have to cut the budget midstream because balancing a budget is not simply living within the line items. It's actually comparing where we are with revenue every month with expenditures and making sure that we have a balanced budget.

[Speaker 2] (54:57 - 55:21)
So, my other question is on meals tax, which is fantastic. So, can we attribute, you know, the increase in the meals tax to just inflation or outdoor dining or a combination of the two? Are we in line with our peer communities?

Dockside helps. Dockside, certainly. But I'm just curious as to how this compares with other communities.

[Speaker 4] (55:22 - 56:03)
I do know that other communities also had the same dip in Q1 and saw recovery in Q2. They didn't necessarily see as strong of a recovery as us. So, it doesn't seem like it's a regional thing.

It doesn't seem like it's kind of any logic. Some communities had additional restaurants open up and did not, in fact, see the growth addition on that. I will say our rooms tax is actually driving a good amount of this.

Our rooms tax is already at, like, 170% of projected. It is a much lesser portion of the two in there.

[Speaker 6] (56:04 - 56:30)
So, you've pointed out all the areas where we're running ahead. But the bottom line is that, if I'm looking at this correct, we're, like, smack dab at 75%, almost, like, basically bingo on the budget, revenue-wise. Yes.

Okay. So, I don't know if you mentioned that headline. I missed it, but just the top line, the big nut, right, basically we're running a little behind.

[Speaker 4] (56:31 - 56:50)
Yeah. So, as of the end of April, our real estate tax collection is at 84.2%, and our property tax collection is at 78%. That's due to the timing of when those bills are due.

Okay. So, as of right now, we don't have any concern that we are not going to hit our revenue targets. Gotcha.

[Speaker 6] (56:50 - 56:51)
Thanks.

[Speaker 5] (56:52 - 57:15)
And then, just to recap, on the water and sewer, these numbers are a little bit down because of consumption. Which? So, you have sewer receipts are at 68.3, and water is 70.54. Oh, you're looking at the quarterly report.

[Speaker 4] (57:15 - 57:24)
Yes. Sorry. Yes.

That is due to consumption. Just consumption. And that's why we have the two articles for annual town meeting.

Okay.

[Speaker 2] (57:28 - 57:32)
Additional questions, comments for Amy? On the revenue side?

[Speaker 6] (57:34 - 57:34)
Talk about anything.

[Speaker 4] (57:35 - 57:37)
We can jump to expenses if you already have questions.

[Speaker 6] (57:37 - 57:38)
I assume you were going to do that.

[Speaker 4] (57:38 - 57:39)
Yeah.

[Speaker 6] (57:39 - 57:40)
I'm done on the revenue side.

[Speaker 4] (57:40 - 57:43)
Okay. Do you want to go question first?

[Speaker 6] (57:45 - 57:46)
No, I said I'm done on the revenue side. Okay.

[Speaker 4] (57:47 - 58:34)
So, on expenses, our areas of concern are the same as they were the previous two quarters. Our legal expenses are projected to be about a quarter of a million dollars over appropriation. Police and fire have been working to do the delicate dance between managing budget and managing public safety.

They have been able to curb as much as they are, and so we're still working closely on those. And then, I just have a note here that debt and employee benefits are showing as if they are higher, but it's just the majority of our payments are made earlier in the year, so it's more of a timing issue. That's mostly the only areas of concern right now.

[Speaker 5] (58:36 - 58:47)
I have a couple questions. I'm going to jump around a little bit. End of employment for school, I thought that was over on the school, that they actually carried that.

[Speaker 4] (58:47 - 59:01)
So, it's over in the sense that newer employees do not get it, but there are still current employees who have that entitlement. So, it is dwindling down, but while those employees still exist, we still have to cover it when they leave.

[Speaker 5] (59:06 - 59:26)
On legal, I really want to have a better understanding on why this is so over the top. So, I'd like the select board to get a breakdown, not tonight, but in the future, a breakdown of where this is going, where it's going, and why we're spending so much money.

[Speaker 4] (59:26 - 59:40)
So, twofold. So, we have town council, and then we have special council that's brought on. So, do you just want the list from the system that shows everything, or did you want the breakdown within our town council that shows the areas, or both?

Both.

[Speaker 5] (59:45 - 1:00:02)
With the, oh, I got that. On the deductibles for self-insured losses, can you just go over that?

[Speaker 4] (1:00:04 - 1:00:14)
So, for police or fire who are injured on duty, we cover the deductibles for those, and that's all that gets paid out of that line.

[Speaker 10] (1:00:15 - 1:00:15)
Okay.

[Speaker 5] (1:00:28 - 1:00:36)
On the police, are we up to date on accounts payable? Do we have everything in here?

[Speaker 4] (1:00:37 - 1:01:11)
So, we have a number of invoices from the police as well as other departments that they have come across that are above their appropriation. So, those invoices are sitting on my desk while we determine if and when we can pay them within the appropriation. So, Chief and I spoke yesterday as well about which invoices we are waiting on to see if we can pay them within the general fund appropriation, and that he's communicated with those vendors that it may be that they get paid in the final AP warrant of the year.

[Speaker 5] (1:01:12 - 1:01:31)
Okay, and then we do have a purchase order process, don't we? And can you just walk me through what that purchase order process is? Because if I'm a vendor, I think I'd have a little bit of a problem with somebody coming and saying to me, well, you're going to have to wait until the end of June to get paid.

[Speaker 4] (1:01:31 - 1:02:22)
Yeah, so if you have a purchase order, you do not have to wait. So, what the process is, is every department is supposed to put in a requisition request, which is kind of their permission to spend. Those requisition requests go to the procurement officer and myself.

The procurement officer obviously checks to make sure if it rises to procurement levels, that it was followed properly, and I verify that the funds are available, and that certifies it. Our purchase orders are printed with our signatures on it for the vendors that guarantee that they have that funding available for that purpose. When the invoices are submitted, they reference that PO number and get processed immediately.

If an invoice comes through without a PO number, it goes back to the department to follow the process. And that's where it runs into the issue, as if it didn't hit one of those marks.

[Speaker 5] (1:02:23 - 1:02:51)
All right, great. And then this will be my last question, is these overtime line items have me concerned as they will relate to our future budgets? And we can talk about that at the end of the year.

But we are within the line item. Everything is working. It's just that number, these are big numbers.

[Speaker 1] (1:02:52 - 1:03:20)
There are some extraordinary circumstances that have affected those, and so I think we have to see that in context. We've had a number of vacancies. And so with police and fire, when you have vacancies, you have backfill.

You have working out of grade. You have all sorts of additional expenses that you see in overtime that I don't think we'll have to worry about once we get to full complement. All right, great.

We may have other issues to worry about.

[Speaker 4] (1:03:22 - 1:03:49)
Mary Ellen, I think one of the things that my department has talked about doing for next year is adjusting within those line items the budget as the year goes on. So if we have vacancies that's causing overtime, kind of reducing the budget line for the salary item and conversely moving that to overtime so that when we look at these budget reports, overtime doesn't look as extreme. And then you just have this surplus sitting in a salary line from a vacancy.

[Speaker 5] (1:03:50 - 1:04:18)
I'm not worried about that because the number is we've got 75% of the year, and we're at 76.58. So we're close. I'm good. I'm just concerned about the future, and I've been around a long time on the Finance Committee, and this number is always a big number, and then proper budgeting for the future is something that has me.

I just want to make sure that we always have our eye on that one. Absolutely.

[Speaker 1] (1:04:21 - 1:04:26)
We watch those two line items as carefully as any in the town budget.

[Speaker 4] (1:04:26 - 1:04:27)
I watch them all.

[Speaker 1] (1:04:27 - 1:05:25)
Again, I think there's probably a lot that we could talk about those two line items a great deal. Those two line items are wrapped into two collective bargaining contracts, and we'd have to really get into just a serious conversation about what we've done over the last few years to try to negotiate certain changes that would help us manage some of those with a little bit more of an eye to ensuring that the department heads, the chiefs, can actually have a little more discretion when it comes to controlling some of those costs.

It's difficult, though, and I do want to thank the chiefs and Amy for working. They meet regularly to try to help develop that responsibility to manage the budget. It's one of the harder responsibilities that we have with those two lines.

[Speaker 5] (1:05:26 - 1:05:26)
Thank you.

[Speaker 1] (1:05:32 - 1:05:35)
Big picture, Amy, where are we? I'm getting there.

[Speaker 4] (1:05:36 - 1:05:37)
I just need more slides.

[Speaker 7] (1:05:39 - 1:06:05)
Just to go back to the legal insurance line, indulge me because this is obviously my first time looking at this. Our town council contract, do you know how long that contract runs for? I believe it's a year at this point.

It renews annually. Tell me, what is that property and casualty?

[Speaker 4] (1:06:05 - 1:06:20)
That is the property and casualty insurance for the entire town, so all of the municipal and school buildings, all the equipment, basically all the insurances except for workers' comp, which you would see in the employee benefits lines. Okay.

[Speaker 7] (1:06:21 - 1:06:34)
Part of that, too, with, as you say, the benefit lines, why the longevity cycle? For example, the treasurer's office, when is longevity paid? Is it paid upon the anniversary date?

[Speaker 4] (1:06:35 - 1:06:40)
It's based off the anniversary date reflective on January 1st.

[Speaker 7] (1:06:40 - 1:06:55)
Okay, so, for example, the treasurer collector, that amount is almost double what it was projected to be. So that particular position has a contract tied to it, I assume, right?

[Speaker 4] (1:06:55 - 1:07:01)
Yeah, so the longevity line for that is inclusive of the three employees that fall within that department.

[Speaker 7] (1:07:01 - 1:07:01)
Okay.

[Speaker 4] (1:07:02 - 1:07:04)
So it's not just the treasurer itself?

[Speaker 7] (1:07:04 - 1:07:13)
No. Okay. I think that was my only other one.

Yeah. Thank you. You're welcome.

[Speaker 2] (1:07:17 - 1:07:19)
Anything additional for Ms. Sarrow?

[Speaker 4] (1:07:20 - 1:09:10)
Okay, so next slide. So some of the steps that we're taking to manage the budget is we're regularly reviewing our open purchase orders. My department has sent out really fun spreadsheets the last week with all the purchase orders every department has to review them, let us know what we can liquidate.

Part of our process is at the beginning of the year, you know, put in a blanket appeal for what you expect to expend. If you've already spent everything to date, release those funds so that we can see where those can best be utilized. We're working with the departments to adjust and review their staffing to make sure that they're staying on budget.

All non-essential spending has been on hold for a number of months at this point, and we have consistent updates to the town administrator on those budget status and updates. We just closed open enrollment, so I'm waiting for the final report from GIC to see how that impact is, also so I can update the health insurance projection for FY25. I anticipate getting that report within the next two weeks, so I'll have a look at that before we get to town meeting night.

Next slide is a very high overview of our end-of-year projections. So, $125,000, which is essentially the reserve fund, if you really want to go that way. I do have about $89,000 worth of invoices on my desk in that, you know, they are above their lines appropriation, and we are trying to make that work.

So, as of right now, we are projected to end the year barely in the black, as I'm calling it, but it is at least no longer the quarter of a million dollars in the red that I had to present in the earlier quarter.

[Speaker 1] (1:09:11 - 1:10:59)
Look, it's a tight budget. When we built the budgets over the last few years, we've said it's going to be harder and harder to manage to budget, given the complexities. We've lived within a financial policy supported by the board and the finance committee and the school committee that said budget can't grow more than 2% plus new growth, and so every department head has worked hard to kind of cram in, you know, all of the services and programs that town residents want into 2% plus new growth, while we see escalations in health care go up, you know, by 6%, 7%.

We see escalations in insurance and legal costs, all these other things. Retirement all go up by many orders of magnitude over that 2%, so it puts more pressure on all of these other lines. Now, I don't want to give anybody an indication that we don't spend an awful lot of money per capita as a town.

We do. We spend a lot of money, and so, you know, I think sometimes we have to, you know, really kind of look at the budget and kind of see where are we comparatively in key categorical expenditures. Are we high in DPW?

I'm going to tell you no. We don't spend a lot of money on infrastructure. We're talking about infrastructure all the time.

There's a, you know, there's a, we've spent decades underfunding DPW. We've spent decades underfunding school buildings. We had three literally crumbling elementary schools for decades.

We're now finally building a new elementary school, so senior services underfunded, you know. We look at.

[Speaker 6] (1:10:59 - 1:11:02)
Despite the increases we've had recently.

[Speaker 1] (1:11:02 - 1:11:46)
Doubled the size of the budget over the last couple years, but we could quadruple it and still probably be short, and so, like, these are hard things to kind of grapple with. I do think, you know, we have a good budget every year, you know, even, you know, with the budget that we're proposing for FY25, it's still, you know, we're going to be at a point where we're getting to the end of the year, and we're just going to be looking at these numbers very closely. We froze this budget six, what, four months ago, and, you know, department heads have to really come in and justify, you know, expending money for things that ordinarily would be pretty reasonable, so it's tough.

[Speaker 6] (1:11:46 - 1:11:54)
A couple questions about that. So is this the tightest it's been? Yes.

Okay. I assumed you were going to say.

[Speaker 1] (1:11:55 - 1:11:58)
Pandemic year was pretty tight, but, you know.

[Speaker 6] (1:11:59 - 1:12:09)
And, therefore, free cash ramifications of this, which we kind of tend to rely on, not as much as other places.

[Speaker 1] (1:12:09 - 1:12:11)
We don't budget free cash generally.

[Speaker 6] (1:12:11 - 1:12:19)
I shouldn't say rely on. We don't rely on. What will fall to free cash.

What will fall to free cash. Let's just state that. We should expect that's probably going to be a lot less than.

[Speaker 4] (1:12:19 - 1:12:35)
Correct. So free cash you can estimate at basically the remaining amount that you have from the prior year certification, plus the revenues above projection, plus the unexpended expenditures, and that will get you your number.

[Speaker 5] (1:12:36 - 1:12:42)
And you're saying this says appropriations outside of the finance committee reserve. You haven't counted the finance committee reserve.

[Speaker 4] (1:12:42 - 1:12:49)
So this is inclusive of the reserve fund. I'm just saying it's roughly the same dollar amount. All right.

[Speaker 6] (1:12:49 - 1:12:56)
And it's actually less than that because you've got $89,000 of invoices. It's going to get subtracted from the 125. Yes.

So.

[Speaker 1] (1:12:57 - 1:13:13)
But we still don't know health care. We just had open enrollment. Things will shake up there.

There might be other, you know, encumbrances that, you know, are not expended. You know, there's a lot of things that can shake out between now and June 30th.

[Speaker 5] (1:13:13 - 1:13:17)
What about the insurance contract, our property insurance?

[Speaker 4] (1:13:17 - 1:13:57)
So we actually did shop around this year, and we're still in discussions with a couple brokers. We're actually having another conversation tomorrow with the town administrator and with one of the companies. So we will be getting the best possible quote that we can get for FY25, and that's part of our ongoing budget discussions.

I will say to end on a high note, we do have savings in health insurance projected for this year, and we have about $89,000 remaining in snow and ice. So those are definitely helping.

[Speaker 2] (1:13:59 - 1:14:01)
Thank you, Ms. Serra.

[Speaker 5] (1:14:01 - 1:14:10)
Thank you very much. Are you doing the I&I update? Do we have one tonight?

Are we doing the I&I update?

[Speaker 1] (1:14:10 - 1:14:13)
We're going to get that information, too. I'm sorry. We don't have it.

[Speaker 5] (1:14:13 - 1:14:13)
Okay.

[Speaker 4] (1:14:14 - 1:14:15)
Yes, that will probably be.

[Speaker 2] (1:14:20 - 1:16:34)
All right, so we'll move on to discussion and possible vote to establish two new committees. Committee one is the Veterans Events Committee, and number two would be a Pine Street Veterans Housing Committee. Just based upon conversations that I've had with our VSO, Mike Sweeney, there's some history here with our Veterans Events Committee, which had been on the town website but had not been in existence for a number of years.

Really, the scope is similar to what was there previously, which was a veterans committee which solely existed and worked on special events such as Memorial Day, Veterans Day, and would have worked on a special event like our July 4th celebration. It's my opinion that we should have a five-person committee that simply supports the VSO and the veterans for these events, coordinating, communicating, and marketing said events in town. We have had some very good turnout in past years for Memorial Day and Veterans Day especially, but I think we can do more, and I think with this committee that will just help us really expand our reach and get more participation from our veterans and from members of our community.

I would recommend a five-person committee there. Then we've talked about Pine Street for a number of years, and I really think it makes sense for us to establish a Pine Street Veterans Housing Committee, and this would include members of the VFW, the VFW Auxiliary, the American Legion, the DAV, a select board member, our VSO, two members of the public, and a member representative from B'nai B'rith, and the committee would exist through the completion of the construction of the new veterans housing project on Pine Street. So I think these two ideas will really help round out what we should be doing within the community for our veterans and really have a specific purpose and scope to focus on housing as well.

This isn't written down anywhere, right?

[Speaker 10] (1:16:34 - 1:16:34)
No.

[Speaker 6] (1:16:35 - 1:16:39)
Okay, just wanted to make sure I wasn't continuing to look.

[Speaker 5] (1:16:40 - 1:16:54)
The only question I have is the Pine Street Veterans Committee I'm totally fine with. The Veterans Events Committee, we had in the past a veteran. What was the actual committee we had before the Veterans Committee?

[Speaker 6] (1:16:55 - 1:16:58)
Like the thing that's referenced in the charter way back or maybe still is?

[Speaker 2] (1:16:58 - 1:17:18)
Yeah, I believe it was a veterans committee that helped with special events. It was not a policymaking board or anything. It was a committee that was established to support our VSO for events such as Memorial Day and Veterans Day.

That was it. That's my understanding.

[Speaker 6] (1:17:18 - 1:17:20)
Has this existed at all since you've been here?

[Speaker 1] (1:17:20 - 1:18:23)
It hasn't. So we had a Veterans War Memorial Scholarship Committee that has had some fits and starts, but I think we've added a few members, but we really haven't had a real active veterans committee. I've met with groups of veterans at the Veterans Crossing organization, so that's all the affiliated veterans, VSO, veteran service organizations down at the post a few times, but this, I think, will help formalize this into a committee.

I think you can expect once we find folks to serve on the committee, they'll have a charter. They'll have some expectations. I think I've heard from a number of veterans, a number of folks, that this is a committee that they need just to kind of keep everybody meeting regularly and talking about things that are important.

[Speaker 6] (1:18:25 - 1:18:26)
You're talking about which one, both?

[Speaker 1] (1:18:26 - 1:18:48)
Both. I just think we need more liaisons to populations. We know we have hundreds of veterans in this town that have never gone to the post, never get connected, and we've got to find a way to reach out to some folks and engage them.

[Speaker 10] (1:18:51 - 1:18:52)
Great.

[Speaker 2] (1:18:53 - 1:19:07)
All right, so with that, I would entertain a motion to establish the Veterans Events Committee as a five-person committee supporting veterans events, coordination, communication, and marketing of said events in town. So moved. Do I have a second?

[Speaker 7] (1:19:07 - 1:19:08)
Second.

[Speaker 2] (1:19:08 - 1:19:09)
All in favor?

[Speaker 7] (1:19:09 - 1:19:09)
Aye.

[Speaker 2] (1:19:10 - 1:19:31)
Aye. And then I would like to establish a Pine Street Veterans Housing Committee, which would include a member of the VFW, VFW Auxiliary, American Legion, DAV, select board member, VSO, two members of the public, and a representative from B'nai B'rith. The committee would exist through the completion of the construction of the new veterans housing project.

[Speaker 5] (1:19:32 - 1:19:32)
So moved.

[Speaker 2] (1:19:33 - 1:19:34)
Do I have a second?

[Speaker 6] (1:19:35 - 1:19:37)
Second, but I want to discuss a little bit.

[Speaker 10] (1:19:38 - 1:19:38)
Okay.

[Speaker 6] (1:19:42 - 1:20:11)
I want to make sure we get this right. I'm sure that that's 90% right, just because I'm not seeing it written down and don't really see the charter. I suppose my inclination is to say I'd love to actually kind of bring this back up in a week or two when we actually have the charter written.

The one thing in particular that I'm just hearing it for the first time, like B'nai B'rith being on the committee, I'm not so sure. So I would like to understand.

[Speaker 2] (1:20:11 - 1:20:22)
They don't necessarily need to be a voting member. They can be ex officio, but they should be represented as the developer. So I'm supportive of that.

[Speaker 5] (1:20:23 - 1:20:49)
Yeah, I'm good with that too. The reason being is when we were doing the Michon, they were very, very active in trying to make sure we were doing everything possible to reach out. And even though our numbers for qualifying people was very low, they were still very open to looking back and saying why was it low?

Did we not do enough marketing? I thought they did a lot of marketing. So I think they absolutely have to be at the table.

[Speaker 6] (1:20:49 - 1:21:09)
At the table, absolutely, totally great. Just kind of struck me as them being an actual voting member seemed a little bit off. That's fine.

And then like the two people from the public, you said, not representing a veterans group. So what's the membership again?

[Speaker 2] (1:21:10 - 1:21:24)
Membership would be the VFW, the VFW auxiliary, the American Legion, the DAV, a select board member, the VSO, two members of the public, and then the neighbor as an ex officio.

[Speaker 6] (1:21:32 - 1:21:34)
How do you all feel? Do you want to?

[Speaker 7] (1:21:34 - 1:21:57)
I think it's great, David. I'm glad you hit all the groups, and I think that's well needed. I mean, we've heard from veterans certainly their concerns and Commander Blonder and his feeling disenfranchised.

So I think it's a great effort towards that. So, yeah, it sounds wonderful to me. I think anything we can do would help build that relationship back.

[Speaker 2] (1:21:58 - 1:21:58)
Agreed.

[Speaker 7] (1:21:58 - 1:21:59)
I think that's great.

[Speaker 2] (1:22:00 - 1:22:03)
Agreed. So we have a motion that's been seconded. All in favor?

[Speaker 6] (1:22:04 - 1:22:08)
Aye. Aye. Aye.

I look forward to seeing the charter. Thank you.

[Speaker 2] (1:22:10 - 1:22:47)
And we will move on to a review and discussion of the annual town meeting warrant of May 20th. I know we have closed the warrant. However, we do have a new select board member.

I think if there are any opportunities for questions about any of the articles, I think now would be a good time to ask those of us as a board, as well as sort of looking at who will present some of these articles that are sponsored by the select board.

[Speaker 5] (1:22:47 - 1:22:57)
Did we have one or two articles that we were waiting on? We were waiting on from the school, because you needed the MOU.

[Speaker 1] (1:22:58 - 1:22:59)
Yes.

[Speaker 5] (1:23:00 - 1:23:04)
You did have the MOU, but whatever the deal is with the MOU.

[Speaker 4] (1:23:04 - 1:23:15)
We're still working on it. I met with the assistant superintendent of the schools this week, and we're still hashing out the final details of the MOU on the utility fund.

[Speaker 1] (1:23:18 - 1:24:06)
The idea is that we're going to be very specific about utilizing it for the schools. We have to make sure that it's going to go for energy and not be transferred out. But I think we should have that clarity within the next week or so.

I think we've had a pretty good MOU with special education funds, and I think this will model that same standard. The school finance director has been clear with me. They have no intention of using these funds for any other purpose.

I think that will help give everybody a sense that with a new school, we're not going to have to worry that we've underfunded it or we're going to have a real snafu with energy.

[Speaker 2] (1:24:06 - 1:24:56)
We've talked about this in tri-chair as well. This was something that was certainly brought to the attention of the tri-chair. There's an agreement between the three of us, the chair of the school committee, myself, and the chair of the finance committee to establish this.

We just want to make sure that we're putting the belts and suspenders on this. Really, this also benefits the town as well. The town is going to be taking back the Hadley School building effective July 1st.

So, Sean, we'll have additional clarity prior to our next meeting on the 15th? I believe so. Well, we kind of have to, right?

Yeah. Well, we do meet on the 20th as well, right before town meeting. But, yes, I would like to have that.

[Speaker 1] (1:24:56 - 1:25:13)
Yeah, I think we can get you an update probably as soon as the end of this week with a draft of what we have just so you can have some insight into the language and just get an understanding that it's going to model some existing MOUs that we've had with the school district.

[Speaker 5] (1:25:13 - 1:25:21)
All right. And there's absolutely no change in the special education reserve fund? Not at this time, no.

Okay. That's fine.

[Speaker 6] (1:25:22 - 1:25:40)
Can I ask, can we just go back, start from the top, and nail whether or not we need a vote or if there's a missing piece of information or who's going to prevent it? Yeah. Exactly.

And I will say, I think the- Just put Katie down for all of them. All right.

[Speaker 1] (1:25:41 - 1:25:45)
Previous, like, Flood Pool members have been absent. They've been assigned. Right.

[Speaker 2] (1:25:45 - 1:25:57)
Katie will be assigned. All the most difficult ones. Katie will be assigned to number four.

For the reports of town boards and committees, that's sponsored by the select board, but that's, I'll work with the moderator.

[Speaker 1] (1:25:58 - 1:26:04)
The moderator usually works with various committees, and there may be a few updates that some boards or committees will have.

[Speaker 6] (1:26:04 - 1:26:12)
As the liaison for the Historic District Commission, they may make a couple comments because it is their 10th year. So, FYI. Super.

[Speaker 1] (1:26:14 - 1:26:20)
So, generally, the protocol has been that whatever the town moderator decides would be acceptable.

[Speaker 2] (1:26:22 - 1:26:31)
I'll work with him to make sure that we have a list. The approval of bills of prior fiscal years, that's sponsored by the town administrator.

[Speaker 1] (1:26:31 - 1:27:05)
But this is a pretty, it's a housekeeping article. Every year we have certain, you know, bills. It's a violation of municipal finance law to pay a bill in one fiscal year that was expended in another fiscal year.

So we need town meetings approval for that. So we have a list of expenses that we have in the warrant, and if anybody has any questions, happy to answer them.

[Speaker 6] (1:27:05 - 1:27:12)
Got it. So you'll actually present that one, Sean? Actually.

No, the finance committee will. Finance committee will. Okay.

[Speaker 2] (1:27:14 - 1:27:20)
Income. All right. Three, appropriation for fiscal year budget.

Finance committee.

[Speaker 4] (1:27:20 - 1:27:22)
The chair of the finance committee makes that. The finance committee doesn't.

[Speaker 6] (1:27:22 - 1:27:24)
All right. So.

[Speaker 4] (1:27:24 - 1:27:30)
All of the financial articles, the finance committee is prepared to, and they've already assigned them.

[Speaker 6] (1:27:30 - 1:27:45)
Yep. All right. So, okay, now we have one meeting.

Each meeting we go, like, oh, past, like, the biggest part of the warrant, like, actually doing the budget. We say, oh, well, we'll get to that next week. We haven't really ever discussed this.

Are we ready to?

[Speaker 1] (1:27:46 - 1:27:52)
I'm happy to answer any questions and discuss anything in this warrant with the board.

[Speaker 6] (1:27:53 - 1:28:23)
Go ahead. I'm not saying that I have, like, a long list of questions or anything, but I just feel like every time we just kind of, like, whip by it, and we haven't really, you know, you've distributed the town administrator's budget. We've never adjusted one penny in this, any conversation thus far, and maybe it's perfect.

But each time you all have said, hey, well, we'll get to that later, closer to the meeting, and because we may have things that are still moving. So is this the right moment, or is next week the right moment?

[Speaker 1] (1:28:23 - 1:28:27)
I think this is the right moment, or any moment is the right moment. I mean.

[Speaker 4] (1:28:28 - 1:28:42)
I can tell you the only two pieces that I would say are pending and up in the air right now would be that property casualty insurance line, the workers' comp line, and the group health insurance lines.

[Speaker 6] (1:28:45 - 1:29:31)
So I'll ask a question. To the earlier conversation about this repetitive situation with police and maybe fire and overtime, have we – I don't really care so much about this kind of moving between the regular salary and the overtime line as long as kind of the net, you know, nuts out. We've really kind of examined that issue now and feel as though, you know, this wasn't just taking last year and moving it forward by a couple percent.

I mean, we feel like this is with the changing movement of how many kind of full-time staff we have now, which we've got to be pretty darn close in both places to being fully staffed. A lot closer than we were.

[Speaker 1] (1:29:31 - 1:31:25)
A lot closer. I don't think we're fully staffed, but I think, you know, we have – We're off by one or two people. Yeah, and generally you're always going to be off by one or two people based on – these are high-injury professions, and so somebody typically is always up.

And, you know, it's the reason why we have some redundancy or some flexibility with staffing. That said, there have been a number of anomalies over the last few years with public safety departments across the nation. And Swanscape's not immune from that.

And they have had to do with early retirements and folks that are just – you know, we've seen a real drop-off of the number of people that, you know, are looking to serve in a number of public safety professions. That said, I think it's – I think we've seen the worst of it, I hope, and now we're starting to fill these positions. And I do think that will help us address some of the budget challenges.

We actually – we spend pretty high on per capita expenses with public safety. That's not one of the areas that I think if we looked around and said, we actually have to spend more money here, folks would say that's where we're struggling most. I think, you know, as I mentioned earlier, DPW, seniors, health, you know, all critical areas that are underfunded, in my opinion.

We also – you know, we've added language that helps our chiefs have a little bit more flexibility with staffing that really drives some of the overtime costs. And so, you know, I think that we can expect that there may be some opportunities that will manifest that may help us, but all of those have to be discussed very carefully.

[Speaker 6] (1:31:26 - 1:32:06)
Right, and we still have – we're still operating under the same contracts, basically, when we just renamed DPW, but police, fire, teachers, et cetera, they're running through this fiscal year, so we know those parameters. So the bottom line is you feel like this has been examined and updated to the movements as best as possible, and we should be kind of a little bit less starting freezing, like, when it's freezing out and more kind of anything later in the year. Because I know that doesn't just affect their department, right?

It kind of ripples through everyone because everyone's kind of picking up that burden. It does.

[Speaker 7] (1:32:09 - 1:32:18)
And to that point, actually, Doug, so there are three contracts expiring 2024. The increases, I assume, are already calculated in here.

[Speaker 10] (1:32:18 - 1:32:18)
They are.

[Speaker 7] (1:32:19 - 1:32:20)
Okay, thank you.

[Speaker 10] (1:32:21 - 1:32:21)
No.

[Speaker 4] (1:32:22 - 1:32:25)
Three individual contracts. Are you talking union or individual contracts?

[Speaker 6] (1:32:26 - 1:32:27)
No, individual. Oh, individual, okay.

[Speaker 7] (1:32:27 - 1:32:33)
Individual contracts. Individual contracts. So there's an anticipated increase that's already factored in.

[Speaker 1] (1:32:33 - 1:32:38)
There's a salary reserve line, and it includes funding for those contracts.

[Speaker 5] (1:32:38 - 1:32:47)
So not on their line item, but under salary reserve, so then it would come out of the salary reserve line item and then get moved into. Okay.

[Speaker 7] (1:32:48 - 1:32:59)
I just want to make sure that we're thinking about the renewal of those and that we're anticipating X, whatever percentage you typically calculate for an increase, and that's factored in.

[Speaker 5] (1:33:00 - 1:33:17)
Amy, the one problem I do have with this warrant, and I meant to bring this up a couple weeks ago, is it shows that it's the 2024 voted budget. It's not the actual. And I just, going forward, I really want to see actuals over voted.

We used to have an actual line in there.

[Speaker 4] (1:33:18 - 1:33:21)
Oh, just put a year-to-date actual column in there? Yeah. Okay.

[Speaker 1] (1:33:26 - 1:33:31)
I always like the actuals as well, Mary Ellen. I demand to see actuals, ten years' worth of them.

[Speaker 5] (1:33:31 - 1:33:32)
That's why I was surprised.

[Speaker 1] (1:33:32 - 1:33:36)
Yeah, voting, that means very little to me.

[Speaker 6] (1:33:37 - 1:33:45)
But, I mean, it's a budget. I mean, so it gets a little squirrely when you're trying to show actuals because then you've got to do the computation of, like, what percentage and all that then, right?

[Speaker 5] (1:33:49 - 1:33:57)
No, pretty easy. We used to do it. Okay.

[Speaker 2] (1:33:58 - 1:34:00)
Anything else on Article III?

[Speaker 6] (1:34:04 - 1:34:13)
Douglas? Not right now. Has Finance Committee, they have not voted on this yet either?

[Speaker 4] (1:34:13 - 1:34:14)
Not yet.

[Speaker 6] (1:34:14 - 1:34:16)
Yeah. So, Finance Committee. They're waiting for that information as well.

[Speaker 4] (1:34:16 - 1:34:34)
Yeah, Finance Committee did meet tonight for, apparently, a very brief 25 minutes. So, I chose correctly on the meetings. They, I guess, scheduled meetings for Monday and Wednesday next week, as well as the pre-meeting before.

Annual town meeting. So, we just wait on them?

[Speaker 2] (1:34:35 - 1:34:44)
That's fine. That's fine. Article IV, Establishment of the Utility Civilization Fund.

This is sponsored by the Select Board. Do I have any volunteers?

[Speaker 5] (1:34:45 - 1:34:46)
We're waiting on that too, right?

[Speaker 2] (1:34:47 - 1:34:48)
Yeah, but we're still going to.

[Speaker 6] (1:34:49 - 1:34:51)
I understand Katie's very interested in this.

[Speaker 5] (1:34:51 - 1:34:52)
I'm happy to do this one.

[Speaker 6] (1:34:53 - 1:34:55)
Okay. Thank you, Mary Ellen.

[Speaker 5] (1:34:55 - 1:34:56)
Give her a harder one.

[Speaker 2] (1:34:56 - 1:35:18)
All right. Any additional? Anybody else on that?

Or just? Okay. Article V, Rescind the Opioid Settlement Special Purpose Fund and Approve Transfer to Free Cash.

Sponsored by the Select Board. Volunteer?

[Speaker 5] (1:35:20 - 1:35:22)
I can stay up there and do that.

[Speaker 2] (1:35:23 - 1:35:26)
Okay. And we also have Article VI too.

[Speaker 5] (1:35:28 - 1:35:30)
Yeah, so I'll stay up there and do that.

[Speaker 4] (1:35:30 - 1:35:39)
Five and six, I was going to make a single graphic to put up at town meeting that kind of shows this bucket, this bucket all goes here. Right. To try to.

[Speaker 1] (1:35:40 - 1:35:47)
Yeah, we also may work with town council to actually make this a single motion. So, there may be an opportunity.

[Speaker 5] (1:35:47 - 1:35:49)
Well, I'll just point to you folks.

[Speaker 2] (1:35:50 - 1:36:07)
Perfect. Okay. Article VII, Approve Transfer of Water.

That's town administrator. Eight, Sewer Enterprise Fund, Retained Earnings. Town administrator.

Questions? Comments?

[Speaker 5] (1:36:07 - 1:36:10)
Well, the finance committee presents this, right? They do.

[Speaker 1] (1:36:10 - 1:36:23)
Correct. Typically, all financial articles to town meeting, the finance committee has a charter responsibility to present to town meeting. Town meeting should hear from the finance committee on everything related to finance.

[Speaker 2] (1:36:23 - 1:36:32)
Okay, and then the approval. Okay, so for Article IX, you approve transfer of free cash to a special education reserve fund. Are we also going to hear from the fincom?

You will.

[Speaker 5] (1:36:32 - 1:36:35)
So, wouldn't the finance committee be doing.

[Speaker 1] (1:36:35 - 1:36:35)
Number four.

[Speaker 5] (1:36:36 - 1:36:39)
Yeah, finance committee will be making all the motions for the financial articles.

[Speaker 1] (1:36:39 - 1:36:45)
They do. Got it. The way I think it works best is, you know, these are the select board's warrants.

[Speaker 10] (1:36:46 - 1:36:46)
Right.

[Speaker 1] (1:36:47 - 1:37:11)
I know the board can decide who to delegate to speak to these warrants, but they're your warrants. And if you feel, so town meeting needs to hear from the select board on these warrants, you can get up and share up one or two sentences and then invite your colleagues from the finance committee to get up as well. So, you know, there's a, that's a prerogative for the board.

[Speaker 6] (1:37:12 - 1:37:22)
I do think the special education reserve fund should be known as the Mary Ellen Fletcher, AKA special education reserve fund. So yes, you might, you might want to introduce this one.

[Speaker 4] (1:37:24 - 1:37:31)
Mary Ellen's just going to sit at the podium the whole night. I'll just stay up there the whole night. You can share the table with me, Mary Ellen.

[Speaker 5] (1:37:35 - 1:37:52)
I just, I would like to make this town meeting go as quickly as possible and say less. Like my feeling is saying less is more and letting the finance committee go. Go on.

[Speaker 2] (1:37:56 - 1:37:57)
You're not? No, I am.

[Speaker 5] (1:37:57 - 1:37:58)
Oh, okay.

[Speaker 2] (1:38:00 - 1:38:01)
One night town meeting?

[Speaker 5] (1:38:02 - 1:38:02)
Yeah.

[Speaker 6] (1:38:04 - 1:38:05)
I'll hold you to that, Mary Ellen.

[Speaker 5] (1:38:05 - 1:38:06)
Okay.

[Speaker 6] (1:38:06 - 1:38:17)
Okay. So that means four through eight, four through nine, three through nine, two through nine. Basically we just have the finance committee just ripping through these, right?

Okay.

[Speaker 5] (1:38:17 - 1:38:26)
I would say so. Maybe Katie's going to have an opinion on that. Maybe somebody can change their opinion, but that's how I'm looking at it right now.

[Speaker 2] (1:38:26 - 1:38:38)
Great. All right, article 10, bylaw amendment for the revolving funds for Andrews Chapel. Think, Tom?

[Speaker 10] (1:38:39 - 1:38:39)
Yep.

[Speaker 2] (1:38:40 - 1:38:55)
All right. Same thing with 11. Article 12, adoption of the CPA.

Douglas?

[Speaker 4] (1:38:57 - 1:39:03)
So finance committee is making the motion, but they were anticipating someone from select board would speak on this more broadly.

[Speaker 6] (1:39:03 - 1:39:16)
Yep. Yeah, I anticipate doing a brief presentation about this, five minutes or so. I've coordinated with the moderator, started to coordinate with the moderator about that.

[Speaker 1] (1:39:17 - 1:39:25)
Douglas, happy to help you think about that. I think there's a lot of finances for the town that might be helpful.

[Speaker 6] (1:39:26 - 1:39:40)
It's basically repurposing the slides we've already used. Oh, and while I'm on it, and I'll do it again later, we do have another CPA informational session next Monday night, 7 o'clock. Right here, B129.

[Speaker 1] (1:39:40 - 1:40:48)
Some of the information I think that would be helpful is just going over some of the historic levies over the last 10 years, just to get a sense of how much we've actually deferred in terms of tax levy. You know, the town went through quite a few years of conservative budgeting, and I think that kind of proves out, and we can kind of show we've been careful financial stewards. And while, you know, the CPA does require an investment, certainly the return is so many more times the magnitude of that investment.

And we can demonstrate that over the last seven years, we've actually built in the capacity to afford this because we have the reserve levy that demonstrates that. And I think people need to hear, look, we haven't taxed to the hilt over the last seven years. We've actually been fiscally disciplined, and that's important when we talk about asking folks to make additional investments.

They have to really see, you know, that we've tried to be as careful stewards as possible.

[Speaker 2] (1:40:48 - 1:40:59)
And we have a number as to if we maxed out our levy, what that would be to the average single-family tax bill. We can run that.

[Speaker 1] (1:40:59 - 1:41:33)
Yeah, we have about an $8 million reserve levy capacity, and so kind of think of that in order of magnitude. You know, we could be taxing another $8 million this year. If we didn't change our behavior seven years ago, we could have $8 million.

We're not doing that. But it's just important to kind of get a sense, like, how do we do that? We actually created a very tight budget.

We just talked about how tight this budget is. But we want to invest a little bit more money, and I think without context, people are going to think, oh, you're just asking for more. And the truth is...

[Speaker 6] (1:41:33 - 1:41:40)
Yeah, the presentation we've been using for the CPA information sessions lays that out very clearly, I think, but we can talk about that more. I think so, too.

[Speaker 2] (1:41:42 - 1:41:46)
We've got Article 13, Appropriation for Chapter 90 Roadway Improvements.

[Speaker 1] (1:41:51 - 1:42:01)
It's FinCom, but, you know, we have our DPW director and Assistant Town Administrator Gina Cresta that usually speaks to bituminous pavement questions.

[Speaker 2] (1:42:08 - 1:42:13)
Article 14, Appropriation for Fiscal Year 24, Recommended Capital Projects.

[Speaker 4] (1:42:15 - 1:42:19)
FinCom will make these motions, and CIP will speak on them. Mm-hmm. All right.

[Speaker 2] (1:42:21 - 1:42:31)
All right. Same thing for Article 15. Article 16...

[Speaker 14] (1:42:33 - 1:42:37)
FinCom's out at this point. Hmm? I said FinCom's out at this point.

[Speaker 2] (1:42:37 - 1:42:43)
Yeah, yeah, FinCom does not have anything to do with the zoning articles. So those will be presented by Pete Kane.

[Speaker 1] (1:42:44 - 1:42:51)
Planning Board Chair, probably Angela Ippolito and Pete Kane. Yeah. Maybe Margie Galasso.

Yeah.

[Speaker 5] (1:42:52 - 1:42:53)
I don't think Angela's the chair.

[Speaker 1] (1:42:54 - 1:42:55)
She's not the chair. I'm sorry.

[Speaker 5] (1:42:56 - 1:42:56)
Yeah.

[Speaker 1] (1:42:56 - 1:42:57)
Who is?

[Speaker 6] (1:42:57 - 1:42:58)
We don't know. Michael or Margie?

[Speaker 5] (1:42:59 - 1:42:59)
One of them will do it.

[Speaker 6] (1:43:00 - 1:43:02)
Yeah. All right. Mike just...

[Speaker 5] (1:43:02 - 1:43:04)
He just resigned, didn't he? He just moved on. He just stepped down.

[Speaker 7] (1:43:05 - 1:43:06)
He stepped down? Michael?

[Speaker 6] (1:43:06 - 1:43:11)
Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I don't know.

Maybe Ted was vice-chair, so... Yeah.

[Speaker 1] (1:43:12 - 1:43:18)
I met with Angela today. She did say that Ted was available, and he may get drafted.

[Speaker 5] (1:43:18 - 1:43:20)
Is Ted still? She offered him up.

[Speaker 1] (1:43:20 - 1:43:24)
I'm not sure, but Ted's name did come up, and, you know, in the kindest possible way.

[Speaker 10] (1:43:26 - 1:43:26)
Whoa.

[Speaker 2] (1:43:26 - 1:43:48)
Okay, so we'll have... So the planning board and our planner slash community development will be 16, 17, 18, and 19. Correct?

That's correct. Okay. Article 20.

Amendment of the general bylaw, gas-powered diesel blowers.

[Speaker 5] (1:43:49 - 1:43:52)
Hmm. I think David...

[Speaker 1] (1:43:52 - 1:44:00)
Yeah. I'm happy to speak to this, but I'm also happy to have the health department weigh in on this, as well.

[Speaker 2] (1:44:00 - 1:44:04)
All right, so we could have our director of public health, Jeff Ballin, speak to this.

[Speaker 4] (1:44:05 - 1:44:07)
We would need someone to make the motion, though.

[Speaker 2] (1:44:08 - 1:44:24)
Yeah. I'm happy to make the motion. Okay.

Article 21, acceptance of easements for public parking and sidewalks at Elm Place.

[Speaker 5] (1:44:28 - 1:44:29)
You're up there. Do you want to stay up there?

[Speaker 2] (1:44:29 - 1:44:44)
Not sure. All right. And Article 22, appropriation for land and water conservation fund grant.

[Speaker 4] (1:44:45 - 1:44:46)
The finance committee is going to make that motion.

[Speaker 2] (1:44:47 - 1:44:56)
Okay. And Article 23 is a citizen's petition.

[Speaker 5] (1:44:58 - 1:44:59)
We don't need to do anything.

[Speaker 2] (1:44:59 - 1:45:04)
So, yeah, we don't need to do anything. Any additional questions, comments regarding the warrant?

[Speaker 6] (1:45:06 - 1:45:13)
I don't know. Just having gone through it now, I think maybe we could get it done one night. You think?

Yeah. I'm optimistic. I'm optimistic.

[Speaker 1] (1:45:14 - 1:45:21)
We'll practice again. I'd be very skeptical. I know.

Okay.

[Speaker 2] (1:45:23 - 1:45:41)
We will move on. Thank you. We'll move on to the consent agenda, which is designed to expedite the handling of routine and miscellaneous business of the board.

The select board may adopt an entire consent agenda with one motion, and at the request of any board member, any item may be removed from the consent agenda and placed on the regular agenda for discussion.

[Speaker 5] (1:45:42 - 1:45:45)
So I would like all of these placed on the regular agenda.

[Speaker 10] (1:45:47 - 1:45:48)
Yeah.

[Speaker 5] (1:45:49 - 1:45:50)
I'm sorry.

[Speaker 6] (1:45:50 - 1:45:52)
Because we're getting out of here too early?

[Speaker 5] (1:45:52 - 1:45:55)
No, no. I'm not going to be voting yes on all of them.

[Speaker 2] (1:45:56 - 1:46:06)
Okay. So you can just take these one by one. Discussion of possible vote to appoint Cheryl Levinson as a new member of the Council on Aging to fill a vacancy with a three-year term expiring in 2026.

[Speaker 5] (1:46:07 - 1:46:07)
So moved.

[Speaker 2] (1:46:08 - 1:46:09)
Second. All in favor?

[Speaker 5] (1:46:10 - 1:46:10)
Aye.

[Speaker 2] (1:46:10 - 1:46:22)
Aye. Thanks. Discussion of possible vote to add one additional seat to the Master Plan Committee and appoint Tammy Fey-Menead to a one-year term expiring in 2025.

Is that June 30 of 2025, Diane?

[Speaker 5] (1:46:25 - 1:46:25)
Yes.

[Speaker 2] (1:46:26 - 1:46:26)
Okay.

[Speaker 5] (1:46:26 - 1:46:41)
So I just have a question. Is this coming from the planning board? Did the planning board approve this?

And since we're adding additional spaces, did everybody have an opportunity to add? Like we're adding additional. How does this actually work?

[Speaker 1] (1:46:42 - 1:47:03)
You know, I'm making this recommendation. You know, I've worked with Tammy Fey-Menead over the last couple of years. We need a diverse committee.

We need representatives from diverse groups. Tammy has worked with us on a number of initiatives, and I think she'll add a perspective that will be invaluable.

[Speaker 5] (1:47:03 - 1:47:06)
Okay. So my only question is, is that supposed to come from the planning board, though?

[Speaker 1] (1:47:07 - 1:47:12)
No. It's the select board's prerogative to appoint members. I'm making a recommendation to the select board.

[Speaker 5] (1:47:13 - 1:47:15)
Okay. I'm good with it.

[Speaker 1] (1:47:16 - 1:47:17)
Yeah. I'm good with the motion.

[Speaker 2] (1:47:18 - 1:47:38)
All right. So moved. Second.

All in favor? Aye. Aye.

Thanks. Discussion of possible vote to allow Reach Arts to hang a banner on the porch railing at 89 Burrell Street from June 10th to June 29th to promote their annual garden walk event. So moved.

So moved.

[Speaker 5] (1:47:39 - 1:47:39)
Second.

[Speaker 2] (1:47:40 - 1:47:40)
All in favor?

[Speaker 5] (1:47:40 - 1:47:41)
Aye.

[Speaker 2] (1:47:41 - 1:47:57)
Aye. Thanks. Discussion of possible vote on one-day liquor licenses, Far From the Tree, 108 Jackson Street, Salem, Farmer's Market Sundays, June 9th through October 27th, 2024, from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. So moved.

[Speaker 5] (1:47:58 - 1:47:59)
Second.

[Speaker 6] (1:47:59 - 1:48:10)
All in favor? Aye. Aye.

And just for clarification, these are all basically just vendors at the Farmer's Market, right? Just for everyone's understanding, this isn't kind of like a drinking fest on Sunday morning.

[Speaker 5] (1:48:11 - 1:48:14)
I just want to make sure everyone's clear.

[Speaker 2] (1:48:15 - 1:48:29)
Okay. 1634 Metery, LLC, addressed to Lakeman's Lane, Ipswich, Farmer's Market Sundays, June 9th through October 27th, 2024, 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. So moved. Second.

All in favor?

[Speaker 7] (1:48:30 - 1:48:30)
Aye.

[Speaker 2] (1:48:30 - 1:49:22)
Aye. Granite Coast Brewing, 77 Main Street and Peabody, one-day liquor license requests, totaling five. First, Pride Day, Town Hall Lawn, Saturday, June 1st, rain date of June 2nd, 4 to 7 p.m. July 3rd, Fireworks, Town Hall Lawn, Wednesday, July 3rd, with a rain date of the 5th, 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. Summer Concert, Town Hall Lawn, Wednesday, July 17th, 2024, no rain date, 530 to 830. Summer Concert, Town Hall Lawn, Wednesday, August 7th, no rain date, 530 to 830. And the Swampscot Block Party, Humphrey Street, Saturday, August 10th, with a rain date of August 11th, 1 to 5 p.m. On the rain date, 12 to 4 on Saturday, August 10th. So moved.

[Speaker 5] (1:49:24 - 1:49:31)
Second. So I have a question on this. Do we have a limit on same-day liquor licenses?

[Speaker 7] (1:49:33 - 1:49:35)
How many you can have in a day, basically, is what you're asking?

[Speaker 5] (1:49:35 - 1:49:39)
Well, how many we can give out total? Total, general, yeah. Is there a limit?

I don't believe so.

[Speaker 1] (1:49:40 - 1:49:44)
There's nothing that I've received from the ADCC that says so.

[Speaker 5] (1:49:47 - 1:50:19)
All right. The reason I'm asking is because on the block party, I just want to make sure that if we have businesses on Humphrey Street that want to have a liquor license to bring their products outside. So, for example, we have a couple vendors who have, you know, we have great restaurants, and maybe they want to put a couple tents out, and extending from their businesses, I just want to make sure that we have enough same-day licenses that they can also get licenses.

[Speaker 1] (1:50:20 - 1:50:27)
You know, we'll look into it. I do believe that we can issue as many as we would need for events.

[Speaker 3] (1:50:28 - 1:50:42)
I will tell you most of those, the restaurants that want to do that, usually have them stay on their property because of just liability. Because they would have to then go out and get additional insurance.

[Speaker 2] (1:50:43 - 1:50:47)
To meet the town's requirements, which can cost several hundred, if not up to $1,000.

[Speaker 1] (1:50:47 - 1:51:04)
We heard great feedback from small businesses about the block party. We're bringing thousands of people to their front door, and if they're open and they're busy, it creates a real synergy.

[Speaker 7] (1:51:05 - 1:51:26)
I will say I have heard some feedback from some of the non-food restaurant vendors that have difficulty because it's on a Saturday. You know, like the local barbershops and things of that nature don't have that ability to really, you know. So, maybe next year we look to see if a Sunday is an option because they're not open anyway or whatnot.

So, I have heard that.

[Speaker 1] (1:51:26 - 1:51:43)
Danielle, I've heard that too, and I did talk with Margie about, you know, is there a way that we can actually do like a small business kind of Saturday or Sunday too that would help, you know, just say, we're not going to have a block party here, but we're going to really drive small business, you know, shopping.

[Speaker 7] (1:51:44 - 1:51:44)
Right.

[Speaker 1] (1:51:44 - 1:51:53)
And try to incentivize that somehow with some focus on some of those businesses. That's a good idea.

[Speaker 2] (1:51:54 - 1:51:57)
All right. So, we have a motion that was seconded. All in favor?

Aye. Aye. Aye.

[Speaker 5] (1:51:58 - 1:52:08)
So, I need to abstain or vote no because I'm just not in favor of summer concert series. I'm in favor of the others, but not summer concert series. So, I will abstain from that.

Okay.

[Speaker 2] (1:52:09 - 1:52:25)
All right. We'll move on. Notch Brewing, 283R Derby Street, Salem.

One-day liquor license request, totaling one. Summer concert, Town Hall Lawn, Wednesday, August 14, 2024, 530 to 830. So moved.

[Speaker 7] (1:52:26 - 1:52:26)
Second.

[Speaker 2] (1:52:26 - 1:52:28)
All in favor? Aye.

[Speaker 7] (1:52:29 - 1:52:30)
No.

[Speaker 2] (1:52:30 - 1:53:09)
No. Okay. All right.

Coastal Mass Brewing, 95 Rand Tool Street, Beverly. One-day liquor license request, totaling three. July 3rd, fireworks, Town Hall Lawn, Wednesday, July 3rd, 5 to 9 p.m. with a rain date of July 5th. Summer concert, Town Hall Lawn, Wednesday, July 10, 2024, no rain date, 530 to 830. Swamp Scott Block Party, Humphrey Street, Saturday, August 10, 2024, from 12 to 4 p.m. with a rain date of August 11th from 1 to 5 p.m. So moved.

[Speaker 5] (1:53:10 - 1:53:10)
Second.

[Speaker 2] (1:53:11 - 1:53:12)
All in favor? Aye.

[Speaker 5] (1:53:13 - 1:53:15)
Abstain because of the summer concert series.

[Speaker 2] (1:53:15 - 1:53:38)
Okay. East Regiment Beer Company, 30 Church Street, Salem. One-day liquor license request, totaling three.

Strawberry Festival, Town Hall Lawn, Sunday, July 23rd, 2024, 4 to 8 p.m. with a rain date of the 30th of June. Summer concert, Town Hall Lawn, Wednesday, July 24th, 2024, no rain date from 530 to 830.

[Speaker 7] (1:53:39 - 1:54:37)
And the Swamp Scott Block Party on Humphrey Street, Saturday, August 10, 2024, from 12 to 4 with a rain date on August 11th from 1 to 5 p.m. I just want to say on this one, you know, the Strawberry Festival, just because of all the kids that are there and the fact that the high school football team really puts on a big piece of that. I would prefer to not see liquor there for that purpose, just so that we're cognizant of not promoting that type of atmosphere to our high school kids. I think that sends an important message.

You know, that's the only one that I would say is really, it's something for the kids. And I think that, you know, as much as we all like to have a drink and a beer and whatnot, I think it's really important for the high school kids to really understand that we don't need to have drinks at everything. So that's just, that's my two cents there.

And I'll certainly go along with it. I just want to put that out there. That is, you know, just something I had a feeling about.

[Speaker 6] (1:54:39 - 1:54:50)
Okay, reading the room, I'll make a motion to basically for East Regiment Beer Company to incorporate just the summer concert in the Swamp Scott Block Party, since I don't think we have the votes for the Strawberry Festival.

[Speaker 3] (1:54:52 - 1:54:58)
I will tell you that that's a funding source for that, for the music, is the beer vendors.

[Speaker 6] (1:54:59 - 1:55:06)
So we can come back to that. I'm not sure how Katie would feel about it. But for the moment, we could, you know, approve the two.

[Speaker 1] (1:55:07 - 1:55:18)
There might be another opportunity, though. Well, I think there may be another opportunity to think about when we have that event. There may be another.

[Speaker 3] (1:55:20 - 1:55:27)
That's the parade. I know. It's the parade, the Strawberry Festival.

There's a concert afterwards.

[Speaker 2] (1:55:28 - 1:55:35)
In East Regiment, this would be year three of their support for the Strawberry Festival.

[Speaker 3] (1:55:35 - 1:55:55)
And they pay for the concert, the sound engineer. That's how we make that work. We don't have money in, like, the budget for these things.

I try to work around, like, getting money from vendors and trying to make all of that.

[Speaker 5] (1:55:55 - 1:56:19)
Well, that's interesting, because I really would like to know more about the revolving account and what that budget looks like. I think there's some money there somewhere. But I am not in support of having alcohol at the Strawberry Festival.

And there are a lot of kids. And I do get people complaining that, why do we have to have alcohol at every single event we do?

[Speaker 6] (1:56:21 - 1:56:25)
Which we don't now. We don't. But still, I hear your point.

[Speaker 3] (1:56:27 - 1:56:33)
You do have the Harbor Festival. There's no alcohol at that. And there's a concert, a kids' concert.

We don't have alcohol at that.

[Speaker 6] (1:56:35 - 1:56:47)
So just say a little bit more, Danielle, since you're here. You just had me think. Are we getting...

Say a little bit more about East Regiment. I'll just be specific.

[Speaker 3] (1:56:47 - 1:56:50)
Okay, so the beer at all of these...

[Speaker 6] (1:56:50 - 1:57:01)
I just see them there, and you're actually paying for it. So I'm thinking, like, is this just... It's a nice thing for them to be involved with.

But I'm not seeing that we're actually getting some kind of net benefit. Right.

[Speaker 3] (1:57:01 - 1:57:40)
So for the concerts, that's really been new for us, to have them at the concerts. I have noticed that there's a lot more people at our concerts now that we have not just a beer vendor, but food trucks. So there's a lot more people coming to it.

Which is great, because where I fundraise and get sponsorships for the concerts, the town doesn't pay for the concerts, so I have to get sponsorships for all of them. And those sponsors have their names on there. And where was I going with this?

Well, just understand...

[Speaker 6] (1:57:40 - 1:57:47)
Be very specific. You're just saying sponsorships. It sounds a little vague.

But basically...

[Speaker 3] (1:57:47 - 1:57:48)
So this year's...

[Speaker 6] (1:57:48 - 1:57:50)
Vendors are giving us enough money to actually pay the band?

[Speaker 3] (1:57:51 - 1:57:54)
So for the concerts, no.

[Speaker 10] (1:57:54 - 1:57:54)
Okay.

[Speaker 3] (1:57:54 - 1:58:47)
For the concerts, I get sponsorships from Eastern Bank and from Sagan Insurance. Not Sagan Insurance. Sagan Realty.

They're our premier sponsor this year. The food truck that's there and the beer garden that's there do not give us anything, because it's new for them. It's new for us.

So I'm thinking a couple of years into this, because we're only one year into this, a couple of years into this, we've proven that you can afford to give us something. And maybe it's... For the farmers market, it's $20.

So for some of these other things, we've kept it the same. It's $20. But maybe at some point we can change that fee structure for everybody and...

[Speaker 5] (1:58:47 - 1:58:50)
Well, these are 50, aren't they? The one-day liquor licenses are $50?

[Speaker 3] (1:58:51 - 1:59:34)
Well, yes. So they have to get a one-day liquor license, but that goes to the police department. So the recreation department doesn't charge a fee for that.

But for some of these special events, I do. Like East Regiment at the Strawberry Festival gives us $1,500 to be there. The block party, the three different beer gardens all gave $500 apiece to pay for the bands.

The same thing for the Strawberry Festival. I have two... Not strawberry.

I'm sorry. The Fireworks Festival, I have two beer gardens there because I'm expecting more volume of people, and they're going to split the cost of the bands.

[Speaker 7] (1:59:35 - 2:00:17)
So I think that... I mean, at the Fireworks Festival, for example, I've been to those events, and I'm in line for beer, and the line is pretty long. So I have to think that they're making a decent amount of money off of our events, right?

So I don't think it's unreasonable for us to increase what they pay or to somehow see a piece of the proceed, or however you want to work it, so that it can compensate for other things, maybe like the Strawberry Festival, when we don't have their presence there. It just seems to me like... I mean, I've been in a lot of events, and those lines are always long, right?

So they're definitely making money, and it seems like we should be able to capitalize on that to fund the rest of this stuff.

[Speaker 1] (2:00:17 - 2:02:50)
I totally agree, Danielle. I have talked so many times to our rec director about just creating these types of events. We haven't had these events for a long time.

Ever. So when I first started here, I was like, why don't we have more events that really can bring people together? And part of it is, I know everybody thinks, oh, jeez, alcohol and all these events, but even parents actually want to show up and have a beer or a cup of alcohol and enjoy music.

And for me, I remember a few years ago, probably during the pandemic, we had kids' bouncy houses, and I got a call from a couple of select board members, like, why? And I was like, because parents need to get out too, and they have children, they want to bring them. It's not unheard of.

I travel around, I go to Port Smith, I go to Gloucester, I go to Beverly, I go to Petey. These communities are all celebrating events responsibly. Now, I know that there's concern about folks that overconsume.

We haven't had those problems in Swampskip. And I would hope that we wouldn't, but it does bring people together. Danielle, I'm really proud of the fact that we have all these events now.

I know people think that they're just fun parties. They're not. They address mental health issues, they address isolation issues, they address so many things that we need people to really think about.

They build community probably better than most of the other things that we do. And I want to see more of them. I would love to see more summer concerts and more people just coming down, walking down, and just enjoying being in this town.

We do have to kind of think about money. I'm always pressing Danielle. Every time we have so many wonderful rec programs, I'm like, we've got to generate revenue.

We need to get more people to help sponsor, and we need a piece of the action. We have folks with their food trucks here, and they sell out. Wonderful.

But we have costs. We have staff. We're pulling these places together, location, location, location.

We've got the location. We should be able to generate some additional revenue, but we needed a proof of concept. Now that we have it, I think we can lean in a little bit and say, all right, how do we actually get a little piece of the funding that can help us do more?

[Speaker 2] (2:02:51 - 2:03:33)
No, so as someone who started a lot of these events back in 2019, there was no proof of concept. I mean, when I talked about water back in 2019, they were like, well, how many people are going to show up? They have like 100, 200, 1,000, I don't know.

But we had the first event, and really the only rule was let's do this event, let's do it safely, and let's make sure that we can do it again. And so that's worked well, and that's resulted in these additional opportunities. But for every summer concert series that you have on Wednesday nights, I mean, it's $1,000-plus, depending on the band.

[Speaker 3] (2:03:34 - 2:03:35)
Well, it's more than that.

[Speaker 2] (2:03:35 - 2:03:51)
It's at least $1,500. It's the band plus the sound. Yeah, so these don't come at a...

We love to have these events. We love to do more. We don't do enough.

We should be doing more, but... Stop. No, I know.

[Speaker 3] (2:03:51 - 2:03:53)
You sound like my boss.

[Speaker 2] (2:03:53 - 2:04:37)
Well, I mean, look, I've taken it upon myself. This year when we do the Bentwater Day at the Beach, this is going to be year five. So that's incredibly exciting for something that was just an idea, and we weren't sure how many people were going to attend.

So I'm incredibly excited to see this. It's great that we're doing these events. I think it's great that we've done these events safely.

I think it's great that we've built these relationships with our public safety officials so we can make sure that it's safe for the public. But I just want to thank you, Danielle, for working hard, and the REC Commission for working hard and supporting these events.

[Speaker 3] (2:04:37 - 2:06:42)
It's really been my pleasure. It's what I love to do, and that is building community. And that was what I was asked to do years ago, is can you build community here?

And we found a way to do it, and with the concerts and with all of these things. But I have to tell you, the beer gardens and the food trucks have been that add-on that we needed, and I see people coming down by themselves, just coming down by themselves. And you talk about mental health and isolation and all those things.

They come down by themselves, and they may see someone they know, and they end up sitting with that person. And they wouldn't normally maybe call that person up and say, hey, you want to go take a walk? People are insecure, I think, about those things.

But I see them come down, and I'm at every single concert. It's Wednesday night, so it works for me. And we work late that night anyway, and I go out and make an announcement of whoever the band is, and I kind of mingle with people and talk.

And I see the people that are just walking down with their own chair and kind of sit by themselves for a few minutes, and then they see somebody, and then they're like, oh, there's David Grishman. Hey, how you doing? And end up sitting with him and his family, and that is so, so important.

It's so important. And it's the same way with all of these things. I've got to tell you, the block party, how amazing that whole thing was.

And we did it the first time, and I've got to tell you, I walked to that block, and I thought, how am I ever going to fill all of this space? How am I going to do it? And we had people that were on a wait list.

So this year, we're going to extend it down even further, down to Nordhaven. I'm going to get Don out there selling his Swedish meatballs and see how great that restaurant is. Doc Sy is so excited about participating in it.

[Speaker 7] (2:06:43 - 2:06:54)
It's great. You're doing a great job. Thank you.

It's a stark difference from what it used to be, in keeping with tradition, with the Strawberry Festival and all that.

[Speaker 3] (2:06:55 - 2:07:05)
It's helpful that I have Jackie in my department. I think next we need an event coordinator in my department to help with events.

[Speaker 1] (2:07:06 - 2:07:19)
Again, for me, I'm like, great, all these things are working, but we've got to generate revenue. It's important for us to kind of just keep in mind at some point, we have to fund these.

[Speaker 3] (2:07:19 - 2:07:27)
And I'll say again, East Regiment, for three years, has funded the music for the Strawberry Festival.

[Speaker 2] (2:07:27 - 2:07:36)
Yeah, I reached out to them in 2022, and we had a conversation, and they said we're more than happy to help.

[Speaker 3] (2:07:36 - 2:07:37)
And they're veterans.

[Speaker 2] (2:07:37 - 2:07:38)
And they are veterans.

[Speaker 3] (2:07:38 - 2:07:38)
Those guys.

[Speaker 2] (2:07:39 - 2:08:44)
Yeah, they're two special forces veterans that operate their brewery. They did it through the pandemic. They barely survived.

And we gave them an opportunity to really engage with the 15,000 residents within the town of Swampskate. And they took a chance on us. We took a chance on them.

So I certainly appreciate their relationship with the town and their support of our events. And just to that point, we have all these events on Wednesdays that run opposite to our meetings. I think we can't change the dates of the Wednesday concert series, but we can change the dates of our select board meetings.

So I would propose that during the summer, July and August, we meet on a day other than Wednesday evening. So the five of us, as well as the public, can attend these events. So we can have even greater attendance.

[Speaker 5] (2:08:45 - 2:08:46)
We have our meetings there.

[Speaker 2] (2:08:48 - 2:08:49)
At the beer garden.

[Speaker 3] (2:08:51 - 2:08:56)
I also think it's good that the public sees the board out. I was only kidding.

[Speaker 1] (2:08:58 - 2:08:59)
You guys can introduce the bands.

[Speaker 3] (2:09:00 - 2:09:00)
Here we go.

[Speaker 1] (2:09:02 - 2:09:02)
Okay.

[Speaker 7] (2:09:03 - 2:09:05)
So where are we?

[Speaker 6] (2:09:05 - 2:09:20)
Where do we leave it with that? East Regiment. And maybe this doesn't matter to people that have concerns.

But in terms of where the parade comes and where the kids are, I think there's other things for kids there.

[Speaker 3] (2:09:21 - 2:09:23)
So that's the other point.

[Speaker 6] (2:09:23 - 2:09:24)
Versus where the beer garden is.

[Speaker 3] (2:09:24 - 2:09:52)
Where I put the beer garden for the concerts is way in the back. There's a reason I do that. It's not in your face.

It's the same thing with the festivals. It's in the back. It's opposite of where the concert is and where, say, the football team is selling strawberry shortcake.

And it's just opposite ends. Again, I do it on purpose to separate that.

[Speaker 4] (2:09:54 - 2:10:15)
I will say that the Strawberry Festival is a concern. But still funding the band is not. The Pride and Juneteenth events that are under the Selective Budget for this year are coming in under.

So you do have it on the band if you want to put your money that way.

[Speaker 5] (2:10:16 - 2:10:19)
I'm also interested in knowing what's in that revolving account.

[Speaker 4] (2:10:20 - 2:10:22)
That's not the revolving account. That's the general fund.

[Speaker 5] (2:10:22 - 2:10:27)
I know. But you also have a revolving account. I know the accounts.

[Speaker 1] (2:10:29 - 2:10:55)
We'll get you the revolving account information. I think we can balance a lot of these priorities. I appreciate the concern about too much.

I think we have to kind of ease into some of these things. For me, it's just trying to strike that balance. There's a lot of good things going on.

You and Jackie can feel great about that.

[Speaker 3] (2:10:55 - 2:10:57)
I can't wait for movie nights this summer.

[Speaker 2] (2:10:59 - 2:11:02)
When are you taking delivery of the new screen?

[Speaker 3] (2:11:03 - 2:11:18)
As soon as possible. I contacted the company. They were excited for me because when I first called them and asked them about it, I was so enthusiastic about the whole thing.

I'm like, yeah, but it's got to get through capital improvement and finance and the board. I know, it still has to go to town meeting.

[Speaker 6] (2:11:18 - 2:11:19)
And it's for FY25.

[Speaker 3] (2:11:19 - 2:11:37)
And we're getting there. It's going to be a game changer. It's a very cool concept.

So wonderful. We talked about it at our rec meeting. I think our first movie is going to be down on Fisherman's Beach.

And the movie is going to be Jaws. And then we can do a kids movie.

[Speaker 1] (2:11:37 - 2:11:38)
I think you can use it for karaoke too.

[Speaker 3] (2:11:40 - 2:12:00)
And then we can do a kids movie, the same thing, Finding Nemo. And you can do the movie at like 7 o'clock at night when it's still bright out. And the kids can still go to bed early.

That's the biggest complaint I get. It's like, why are you showing this movie after 9 o'clock at night? Because it doesn't get dark.

So you can't. I'm looking forward to it.

[Speaker 2] (2:12:02 - 2:12:07)
Do we have a motion, Doug? Do you have a motion?

[Speaker 6] (2:12:07 - 2:12:12)
Do you still want to kind of stick with Strawberry Festival, no alcohol after that conversation?

[Speaker 5] (2:12:13 - 2:12:15)
Well, I'm still on Strawberry Festival, no alcohol.

[Speaker 7] (2:12:15 - 2:12:21)
I mean, ideally, that would be my preference. But I don't want to sacrifice your band or any of that. I really don't.

[Speaker 6] (2:12:21 - 2:12:28)
But if there's a way to make it. It sounds like Amy has an idea. And then we can see.

We can come around with Katie or whatever. But for now, we'll get the other two done.

[Speaker 3] (2:12:28 - 2:12:34)
I want to make one more point. And that is that East Regiment has supported us every year.

[Speaker 1] (2:12:34 - 2:12:38)
There may be another opportunity to schedule them for another event.

[Speaker 3] (2:12:38 - 2:12:48)
I'm just making my point. I know. We're going to find a compromise here.

So, I don't know. They're good. They've been veterans.

They're veterans. I just think that.

[Speaker 6] (2:12:49 - 2:12:49)
We love them.

[Speaker 3] (2:12:50 - 2:12:53)
Yes. I don't want them to face any difficulties.

[Speaker 7] (2:12:53 - 2:12:55)
We're just trying to balance it.

[Speaker 6] (2:12:56 - 2:13:08)
Okay. So, yeah. The motion is to approve East Regiment at the Summer Concert and Swanscott Block Party.

For now. Second. All in favor?

Aye. No. No.

[Speaker 2] (2:13:08 - 2:13:23)
Okay. All right. And then we'll move on.

Vote to approve minutes of the regular meetings of 4-3, 4-10, 4-17, and 4-24. I want to strike 4-17 and withhold that for now.

[Speaker 5] (2:13:26 - 2:13:27)
So, is that a motion?

[Speaker 2] (2:13:27 - 2:13:27)
Yeah.

[Speaker 5] (2:13:27 - 2:13:28)
So moved.

[Speaker 2] (2:13:29 - 2:13:35)
Are you making a motion? All right. Well, no, no, no.

I. She made the motion. I just read.

[Speaker 5] (2:13:36 - 2:13:38)
You read the motion. I said so moved.

[Speaker 2] (2:13:38 - 2:13:42)
Second. All in favor? Aye.

Aye. Aye. Thank you.

Select board time.

[Speaker 5] (2:13:44 - 2:14:42)
I want to thank Nathan Kent, Daniel Moretzky, and Joe Dulette for another fabulous job of broadcasting the select board meeting. I want to announce a rabies clinic that Dr. Arthur Friedman will be doing on May 29th. I think this is our, I think this might be our sixth rabies clinic.

It will be alcohol free, but we could look into other things there. I also want to, I received a couple phone calls from some residents yesterday asking me if I would just remind everybody that yesterday was Holocaust Remembrance Day. So, if we can keep that in mind.

And, you know, with anti-Semitism on the rise, these are really serious issues. We need to be mindful.

[Speaker 1] (2:14:42 - 2:15:08)
Mary Ellen, I'm happy to draft a proclamation or some, you know, official, you know, acknowledgement for the board. And if the board's okay with that, we'll attach your signatures to it just to remind people that, you know, we should never forget the Holocaust and we should all speak out about anti-Semitism for this time.

[Speaker 5] (2:15:10 - 2:16:26)
I want to thank the town clerk's office. I wanted to send you an email, Sean, but I received a number of calls about the efforts that came out of the town clerk's office and how wonderful those three gentlemen are. Jared, Neil, and Mike.

They were really patient and, you know, over the top. You know, this was a big election. Danielle, congratulations.

I am just so happy you didn't run when I was running. A 24% turnout, 72% of the vote, and over 2,000 voters. Congratulations to you and the town clerk's office for handling everything.

I just think that was great. And just that'll add some more info for the 16 and 17-year-olds to come out. And then last, I did hear what Andrea Omori said on there, and I would like to bring up a conversation about the ARPA funds on the next agenda.

So that's my request and my opinion. That's it for me.

[Speaker 6] (2:16:28 - 2:16:36)
I made the CPA announcement earlier, so that's all I had. And what's the date one more time? The 13th.

[Speaker 5] (2:16:36 - 2:16:37)
Next Monday.

[Speaker 6] (2:16:37 - 2:16:42)
Next Monday the 13th at 7 o'clock here in B129.

[Speaker 7] (2:16:46 - 2:18:06)
So I just wanted to thank Sean and Diane for your warm welcome. David as well for reaching out. You guys have really – Diane, you do a tremendous amount of work, keeping everything in line and organized, and I really appreciate your diligence.

And both of you, thank you for welcoming me as much as you did. Mary Ellen, of course, Katie, we've had numerous conversations. Really, thank you.

It's nice to be done with campaigning and at this point where we can just get to work and move forward. I'm very excited to do that. I did want to mention I have heard from some of the residents of the Mason Road area with their concerns about the traffic and the anticipated issues with the new school opening.

So I think that it would make sense at some point to get a meeting on the books with that community just to kind of go on the offensive and really explain what's planned and how it's going to affect them, their homes, their area. We're all excited about the new school, but with that comes anxiety as well. So I have heard from a number of those people in that neighborhood, and I do want to sit down and certainly be part of the conversation.

But if we could get something in place.

[Speaker 1] (2:18:06 - 2:18:44)
I've been looking to having our public safety and DDW and our school building committee kind of coordinate a meeting. I do think a few neighborhood meetings, especially in June, school gets out, it would be helpful to get down there and just talk a little bit about traffic patterns. Traffic patterns are going to evolve over the first couple of weeks of school, and we're going to have to really think about how we address traffic patterns that are going to be a concern in some of those neighborhoods we know already that there could be some complexities.

[Speaker 7] (2:18:45 - 2:19:28)
They've heard bits and pieces about speed bumps and permit parking, and then someone else heard that they didn't have a budget for traffic anymore, so there's all kinds of rumor floating around out there, and I just think that leads to more apprehension and anxiety. So if there's something that we can tell them, I think that they deserve that, and they certainly deserve to have an update. I did speak to the superintendent of schools about it.

I spoke to the school committee chair about it, vice chair also, and they kind of are of the mindset that it's a town select board issue. So, again, I'm happy to be part of it or be a select board representative for the community. But I would like to see if we could get those scheduled in the near future.

[Speaker 1] (2:19:28 - 2:19:28)
Absolutely.

[Speaker 2] (2:19:30 - 2:19:31)
Thanks.

[Speaker 7] (2:19:31 - 2:19:32)
That's really all I have.

[Speaker 2] (2:19:33 - 2:19:38)
I don't have anything additional, so I would entertain a motion to adjourn.

[Speaker 5] (2:19:38 - 2:19:38)
So moved.

[Speaker 2] (2:19:39 - 2:19:41)
Second. All in favor?

[Speaker 5] (2:19:41 - 2:19:41)
Aye.

[Speaker 2] (2:19:42 - 2:19:42)
Thanks, everybody.