Board of Selectmen - Regular Meeting

All right, we will call the meeting to order for the board of selectman December 3rd. Um, we public comment any say that again. Ian was asking if I wanted Okay. Okay. Uh closing the public comment, we'll move on to the consent agenda. Motion to approve the consent agenda. Second. I have a motion and a second. All those in favor say I. I. I. Oppos? Nay. Eyes have it. Four nothing.

All right. So, we have to sign that. Moving into the budget review. So, may just, you know, we do this every year. I've looked over it. As a refresher tonight, I'm hoping from myself just to like get a I've read through most of the document, get a broad sense of where we're at, get a broad sense of the levers we can pull. Um with the understanding that um you know, there was a lot of talk about tax this fall in town. Sometimes because of confusion over the assessment, but sometimes very valid concerns about that. And so we just want to be very cautious about what we're doing throughout this process. So, um, we'll turn it over to you.

All right. Next slide. Thank you. So, we're just going to do a quick review of 2526 fiscal year very quick. Uh, and then we'll go over budget highlights and then wrap it up. So, we are doing kind of the larger view, the key numbers, and then we can dig in. Um, we had a good year in 2526. We're still having a good year. Uh, paved approximately four and a half miles of town roads. Uh, built a bridge. We didn't build it, but we put in a a very pretty bridge. A nice bridge. Good looking bridge. Yeah, good looking bridge.

Um, we've been building two of our trucks. Uh, public works has gotten really good at this and they really like it. They they put together trucks um with all the equipment they added on the hoses, the hydraulic hoses, and they build it uh to top quality. And we've had a company come in that does this and they've looked and just would like to I'm thinking we should set up a division for that company to do these on a regular basis because just the work is great. Uh our guys are very talented and we save some money on that. Uh we provided good customer service to encourage businesses to come to Bo. Uh we've realized increased revenues. Uh we did our cloud permit program which has gone over really well from in community development. Uh the contractors it's easy. They do it online and it's very efficient uh for employees and they're and again they could set up their permit and their um inspections and um so that's worked great. Our town clerk and tax collector department office continues to do a great job with fleets. Uh they do a lot of fleet registrations of a large number of vehicles. Um one one or two companies in particular you know they come in and they appreciate the good service. So they come to us they could pick somewhere else. This is that was a question I have on is it literally just Medulla is really and her team are really good at their job. There's no other thing that I'm not seeing.

Yeah. No, the fleets. Yeah. The fleets and they've gotten they developed some good systems and I know uh Tammy Martin in particular has some good systems and they they get it done. They carve out the time while still waiting on people coming in. They don't have to be based in bow. They can just Yeah, they could from anywhere. Well, in lots of them have a base in V, right? But they have bases in Portsouth and in other towns and they choose to come here. Um, actually, I heard tonight that one of our bigger um trucking interests just bought 50 new trucks. But and so they'll start and this we'll get into this maybe not even tonight, but on the revenue side, she we raised the numbers and she's always hitting them. Yeah.

Is the only limit the number of cars in the state. Is that like the only thing limiting us on this? Yeah. I I think they must have to have some contact with both like I don't you know we don't advertise for out of town business but word clearly gets around that we're a friendly town for this very specific thing. Think of everything negative people say about going to a DMV. Yes.

Right. Right. and and then find a person like Medulla and her team who, you know, loves to just get those big things and they do it right. They have an expectation for them to meet, but if you're going to come in here with the right paperwork, we're going to register those cars fast and we're going to make it pretty easy process for you.

They also go um you know the extra step to help people in general. I mean, they're just seeing um you know, phone calls that need to be made to the state that they absolutely could say, "Here's who you call," but they take the extra step and they'll make the phone call um and make the contact. So, they do an excellent job. Awesome. All right. Sorry to interrupt.

No, that's all right. Uh we've had, as always, great collaboration across departments. We do have our department head meetings um twice a month after the selectman meetings and constantly they're constantly connecting uh with each other to see if they can help each other out or have some suggestions. Um so you know and when issues come up it's a great place to discuss a department head meeting because it may not be exact their topic area or subject area but it's they've dealt with similar things. Um and then last we uh the sharing of used vehicles has really helped uh in particular the facilities um vehicle. It was the retire one of the retired cruisers

and uh you know it's been put to good use and you know the department had looked if you remember for something larger with a plow and and it was a lot of money but this this meets their their needs. you know, they can the two or three of them can get around separately or to places they need to be. Um, okay. Thank you. So, the budget process, you guys know we're on step three of many uh departments submit their budgets into uh to the finance director. She looks them over, gets them all plugged in. Um, we actually start talking even with department heads at that point and Cheryl does a lot of the getting the highlights for me and then once it comes over to me, Cheryl and I continue to meet with um the department heads and we'll go through and and look at the numbers and kind of push back and forth. Um, and then as you know here we are with the proposed budget submitted to the selectman and then we go onward to town meeting eventually. So the estimated tax in tax rate impact of the budget that's being proposed at this point um is $4.91 which is an increase from 462 which is the current. Now this is just the town portion um and it's a 6.2% proposed increase. If you look at this slide, uh, you know, taking a look back at the tax rate history, the the board, the town, the employees, the departments have done a great job keeping the tax rate stable. Um, in fact, even with the reval, I did an adjustment, but it's, you know, 4%, 5%, 3% drops over the last three years. So, it's about 12 12%. So,

And then you'll see the just the tax rate history per thousand. Um town is blue, school yellow. Um so you'll see what's happened with the tax rate. Um that assessed value. We picked up a gross 37.8 million of property value uh from 24 to 25. Uh there you'll see under optional exemptions there was a large we did take a hit that was if you recall the um uh the solar exemptions that hadn't quite been for a few years hadn't been quite accounted for. So with the new company coming in there was an increase in those um and then also less the retained value. So ultimately with our net we end up with uh 1.9 million which is $ 31.2 million of value over 24 and it's breaks down. It's staying pretty steady or the percentage of residential and the percentage of commercial and and the utilities are staying pretty steady. um the percentages and then you have this is just a again a graph showing um the history of it our property assessments and I always like to note in 2018 2017 we started seeing the drop in the power plant value um through a lot of hard efforts and good efforts from many people you'll see the green commercial surpassed the utilities. So that's where we started to make up, you know, the loss to a certain extent. Um, you know, we didn't re get the benefits immediately of the increased commercial development, but it

helped really lessen the impact um for the power plant value. And now we'll have Cheryl go on to the operating budget. Right. So, we have a couple highlights in the operating budget that are um some cost factors, but there there's some details that um will warrant discussion. Uh the fire department has asked for a new position uh an administrative captain. The caveat here is this position combines several needs in the town. So, we have a retiring um firefighter part-time in December. So, those um wages and this this particular firefighter is also our health officer. So, those stipens will go to help offset this position as will emergency management. So the entire emergency management budget would be put towards this new um administrative captain position which is almost $35,000 plus 2700 that was in health officer budget from last year. So that will move into to help offset uh the the um impact for that. And um this position in addition to assisting the fire department in an administrative capacity amongst other things would take over and do the training for the emergency management piece as well as fulfill that health officer um requirements for the the town that currently our emergency manager is doing half and then the retiring firefighter is doing the other half. So it kind of takes those little pieces and puts it into into one person. It is a full-time position.

Um, Cheryl, on that, uh, why is it only um 2700 offset for the health officer position? That was that was funded at like 20 hours a week. I thought those are stipens, so they're both paid out quarterly. Um, and it's about $500 and some dollars a quarter. Um, it's it it is a stipend. So, Cap Cap was it Ferguson had he was only getting paid $2,700 a year. He was getting paid uh twothirds of that and then Lee Kimble was getting paid the other third. But what I know he was also a part-time firefighter. Yeah. I was just going to jump in that we had a part-time firefighter who

was getting a stipen as the health officer. Right. But the part-time firefighter position should be eliminated in this budget. And that has got to be more than $2,700. It is. Well, yes, it is. And also um the um the total cost of this position is around 140,000 with benefits. So um there are other pieces of the fire department that you'll see in their budget that are decreasing because Tom will not be there. So the call hours are decreasing. So that's that's an offset.

Yeah. to your question that with Tom one of the things was the health but the bulk of what he did was the plan review fire inspections that position is gone it's going to be it would be folded into this new position for the next time we talk about this slide yes we need to have because we tal last year they asked us for the deputy chief position yes and we said we we couldn't do it last year we'd consider it next year yes with the understanding that it would be offset by Tom Ferguson's position which was a big number Not 2,700. I don't remember. Oh, no. No. Yeah. No. That's just a piece of what Tom does. Yes. But that position that Tom was filling going out and and doing fire inspections is going to be eliminated. There's not going to be a person for that role. No.

And so we should I want to be able to when we pitch a new deputy administrative chief. Yes. Captain. Mhm. Um I want to be able to talk about the we've been planning this for a number of years from the transition of uh Captain Ferguson retiring to creating this part-time position to train to plan three years for this and now what that number is. Okay, I can get that breakdown. Um there's also that the emergency management that's offsetting. Yeah, that's new to me. I hadn't heard that before, but that makes perfect sense.

Yeah. Yeah. Um okay. Uh and then so the the tax rate impact of the net cost of the position $102,000 is six cents just so that you know. Um that's the impact on the tax rate. Uh personnel details continued. There is a 3% cola built in as we did last year. Um health insurance as we reported to the board last month is decreasing by 3.4%. the town was moved into a smaller pool uh because we based on our active number of participants. So uh so we benefited from a 3.4% decrease this year. Dental insurance is increasing by 5%. any open positions, and you'll see this in the police department, are budgeted for family plans for both dental and for um health because we just don't know who's going to take those plans and there is a significant difference in those those premiums. So, we wanted to do that. Um

Cheryl, can I just ask you a quick question on that? If the police department was to hire someone that didn't need a family plan, how would we see the change in what was budgeted to what is actually spent, where do we see that? So, you would see that in the health insurance line. They would get an insurance buyout if they if they chose to if they had a spouse that had a plan or they needed a twoerson or a single um plan, you would see savings in the health insurance line at the end of the year. So right now what we have is a essentially a placeholder just in case. Worst case scenario. Worst case scenario. Placeholder. Yes. Thank you for that.

Are we so is that are we factoring in the police department with four positions? Are we factoring four $24,000? Yes. I think that I think we all should note that that's probably overkill, right? Four 20. There are four open positions in the police department in this budget, which is four family plans. And right, so it's four $24,000 family plans. And you're saying we're not all going to have My guess is if we said, "Hey, Chief, for the last five guys you five per people you've hired, employees you've hired,

what has the uptake been?" Much like any other estimate we're putting in the budget, you know, that's between these five positions or six openings. If we split the difference, that might be $100,000, right? That's a big potential savings though it could go either way. And for the police department, just so you know, um two be where there are so many open positions, two of the positions are budgeted and you'll see this later as certified officers because the chief could get a certified officer and two are non-certified. So they start a couple steps down. So non-certified started a step one on the the grade scale till they become certified. Yeah. So I have two and two. Just kind of hedging my bets to see.

He doesn't have any There's not a new officer at the police department, is there? No. No. Current staff levels. Yes. Yes. So he's down four right now. A couple of those are in in Is that including the ones that are in at the There was uh No, there's no one in the academy right now. Who's the woman I met with the young baby? Um that uh that she's no longer in the Well, they're not. Yeah, it's not uh they won't be working for both. No. Um that maybe that's a non-public um Yeah. Okay.

discussion. Um I'm wondering if just kind of going off this idea of if we were to split the difference as we're looking to make adjustments to this budget. Um what is the risk there? How would we if for some strange reason we hire four police officers that all require a family plan and we have only budgeted for two to have a family plans with difference. How would we make up that difference and um yeah how how would we handle

we would have to find it in in the budget. Um, I will tell you that in in the police department there are a fair number that have family plans and then there are some that take the buyout. So it it's it's kind of mixed for for the department. So in my view that would be one we would have to make it up just like anything else that we budgeted an engine blows up in one of our trucks. But reasonable calcul and we have had open spots in the police department for all of them

and we are not going to fill them all before July 1 and have them all filled for 365 days of that budget year. Now some of them will get filled before July 1. Some of them will be back open. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. I just want to make a note of that because um I know we usually tend to make some adjustments to our proposed budget and that might be and that's one we've never I don't think we've ever played with before. Right. Right. Because we've always just said like worst case scenario move on. But worst case scenario now in this budget is 25,000 a position. Right. It's a lot of money and there's five positions.

So that's a that's a lot. Four in the place and one and five. One and five. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So we can do the numbers and just kind of look at what the if we did that what the impact. Yeah. I think just that is a more palatable place to be hedging a bet than saying no to a position that we've been planning for for three years. Right. Right. And we did increase police overtime by 25,000. They have I know they have um they have maxed out they their their overtime is done now and we're hitting the holiday seasons. There's quite a bit with four openings. So we that budget line will be very much over this year. It will be over. Yeah.

But there but the salary line is going to be so far under. We're going to be like we've we I appreciate that that's going to be there but it's going to be there because we have openings and we can't keep saying let's and we say this every year. Can't increase that and then pretend like we're not lapsing $300,000 in the salary. Okay.

All right. Um yes the solid waste effect. Okay so our new contract with Cassella management um the effect on the budget for this coming year is 100 almost $170,000 $1694.84 or 9 cents on the tax rate. We do collect about $49,000 from the school district for their pickup. So that will help offset some of the cost, but you will see a significant increase in that as we expected when the new contract was signed. Um is does that number include both um regular trash and the the single stream recycling? Yes. Okay. Just want to make sure. Thank you.

And it includes both the trucking and the Yeah, it's the hall. It's collection. Each of those are three three um cost codes. the trucking, the dumping, and then the recycling processing. Yes. Do we have we ever received I know we talked with the recycling committee, the solid waste and recycling committee uh any numbers about the difference between the single stream and um and then separating it, right? Then the separated I think I think they did mention it when they're in here and and it just it gets so contaminated that and a lot of it just gets rejected anyway. So it cost us.

Yeah. So that's the thing with the single stream is that so much gets contaminated, so much gets turned into trash and then so how much are we actually saving and like is there an opportunity to maybe recycle better, cut our costs. One of the biggest lessons for me and I attended a few of their meetings was like my default is I was putting recycling like I try to put it recycling. My default is recycling. And we're actually better off to not do that. We're better off, if you have a question, put it in trash and make sure what's going into recycling is actually recyclable. Yeah. Because we're paying way more, right? And so like to to pay way more for stuff that isn't recycling.

Well, and that's what I'm saying is that with such a huge increase in the cost of waste management through Cassella and the new contract, I wonder if we can find a way to cut costs. Isn't that Isn't that contract locked in? It's locked in. But if we get people to make better decisions on trash, we get people to make better decisions on No, you don't. That's not recyclable. It should go in your trash. Yes. We will have instant savings. Yes. Um and so maybe we think, you know, this is kind of we maybe all want to do this around is making a little bit of money available as a one-time kind of aotment to the song committee to do some education. They talked about doing that before, right? or

like a campaign of some sort. Yeah. And even even hedging a little bit of what make $4,000 $3,000 available, you know, assume that people will listen and respond with it's okay to throw it away. Um we, you know, we can't bury our head in the sands for a million dollars a year. What's the total trash? The total trash for that year is uh for 1.2 1.2. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Uh I have it broken up. Curbside pickup uh recycling if you'd like to know what that is as well.

Pink bags like conquer purple bags, right? Conquer. Yeah. That was sarcasm. We've also we've also been doing this long enough that we know now. Yeah. Yeah. Facebook already. So, not not to get in the weeds too much. So, with the trash though, it's it's a with the recycle, it's variable almost like if So, it's it's variable on two factors, right? It's the trucking is a couple hundred 300,000. That is not variable. We're going to pay 300,000 for trucking. We have a rate for our trash that goes to the incinerator per ton. 10 103

103 roughly for the trash it goes to the ton. The recycling is variable in its price per ton based on what it cost them to to bring it to a recycling yard. And so it's what it costs them plus a fee. Uh that would go up and down based on the value of recycling. And so when China's taking a lot of recycling, that number goes way down. When they're not, it goes really really high. And then the real factor is how many pounds of each there are. And what is what are we paying for recycling today? October 2025, the rate was 144.35 per ton for every every ton that we put into the recycling over trash, right? We That's 40 $40 a ton.

Yeah. And we do have incredible programs uh and opportunities for people to reduce what they're putting in the recycling bin by separating it out through some of the things we have at the community center like for the plastic bags and for uh a number of other things. And so maybe the recycling committee can help us by advertising that option as well.

And it's just like if you don't know, throw up the trash. Yeah. If you're confused. Um, and so I think that's real. Uh, I hope when we put this out to bid again, it was funny after the bid happened, it was issued, I got contacted by someone saying, "Oh, I would have bid if I knew." It's your job. You have a trash truck. Follow the bits. But I think there's a possibility that maybe next time it'll be better. But it's mostly tipping fees, right? You're not going to save a whole lot of money being more efficient with trucking over another. Um, has there ever been a case um where a community uses two different companies where someone's

someone's trash bid comes in and someone's recycling bid comes in and you might utilize two different companies. I bet it has. But you know, for a town the size of Bow where you can run separate trucks, one crew, separate trucks and do all of the town, I find it hard to believe that you could find the efficiencies. But we could put it out to bids separate. Um, and you know what, how many years ago now, we looked at the cost of just putting everything in the trash again. Uh, even someone is, you know, kind of budget conscious as I am. I understood then if we unwound it, it would be impossible to ever get back. Right.

Right. If you took away and just had a trash bin and threw everything away because it's $40 or $50 a ton cheaper, like you would never divert aluminum cans again. Yeah. Um but I think ultimately that's a decision for the town to speak up to us on, you know, is you do you want curbside pickup and do you still want both? And I've had a lot of people complain about a lot of things to me. Having recycling at the curb has not been one of them. We get a lot of complaints about the budget though. Yeah.

But you think, you know, having this is going to this year we're going to have whoever gets this topic, whoever gets the kind of general budget over is going to have to spend a good minute explaining how we got to where we are. um and how few levers we have, right? Tip.

Um all right. So, if we if you're all ready, we can move on to revenues. We have some variances from last year. So, our taxes have gone down 10,000 because a lot of the properties that were getting interest um and penalties interest on the past due amounts and penalties have been sold and have new owners. So, in consultation with Merdoula, so that's actually a good minus 10,000 because you'll get the property taxes on time. So, um so in in consultation with Merdoula, she said that won't be realized this year. So, so we reduced it by um $10,000. Motor vehicle fees, David and Roula and I talked and we um we increased it by $100,000. Uh she has met um her department has met the goals and and met the revenue levels the last few years. So, we've decided that was a a good number to add for this year. uh building permits. Again, due to the ease of the uh permitting software uh and the new building happening in BO, we decided to increase that by 10,000 federal and state. That's our meals and rooms and our highway block grant that was uh published on the state website. So, we we put in the actual numbers. So, that's about an $11,000 increase. the income from departments went up by 23,700. That is um partially due to the um have that in here. That's partially due to uh realizing some of the extra little permit pieces. Uh we did keep ambulance fees and interest flat. We don't know what's going to happen with interest rates. We're assuming they will decrease. So, we kept it at the 500,000

and in speaking with the fire chief. Uh he said the ambulance um activity is really unknown. So, he felt comfortable keeping it where it was. Uh he did not uh recommend increasing it. So, if if there is an increase, if the board decides to do that, we will do that. But just so you know, that was his feedback. The activity was unknown. Where did we end up end of last year on fire? Uh uh for the ambulance. Um I'm sorry. I I mean so end of last year total number compared to what we're budgeting is what I'm um a second. I can get that for you.

I thought it was up there. I just can't read it. Yeah, it's okay. I just need to get the glasses on. Oh man. No, I can't read it. Anyway, thanks. I also got a new prescription from Strao. Uh, no, the fire. So, the ambul keeping ambulance is flat for our budget last year. But how did our budget last year do verse the actual ambulance? Um, we had it at 295. I will get that um information for you where we ended up. That would be really helpful. Absolutely. Um, and same with interest. I would be interested to see did we end up making making the

We did we did go over for interest. I I just I I hesitate a little bit because it's not guaranteed and it's not starting for another six months. Six months and I don't know where we're going to end up with that. But I will get you the numbers for We are doing a little better with money in the bank too. I think I think the cash on hand has continued to go up a little bit. Yes. Um we're going to have to make some tough choices here. We always do, right? And so I think I don't want to leave easy money on the table if if it's there, but we certainly don't want to budget for money we're not getting.

One of the things we've uh the chief and I have been kind of knocking around for a little while is uh one of our neighboring communities has kind of thrown out a balloon to see if we would provide ambulance services for the EMS and how would that exactly work and there are communities that that do it. you know, larger community was smaller and but there's a lot to be looked at. I just wanted to give you a heads up on that. I mean, I think the chief threw some numbers around like 40,000 income, but annual. No, if you figure what? So, we have cost us.

We we are running a $2 million fire department and we're running a $500,000 fire truck and we're having two people on 24 hours a day. Um, and we have a limited number of double calls. Like it it would be 40,000 a month to be able to take a full burden of another town. My understanding is that that's the kind of thing that is shared between more than one town, but I'm I'm not sure. I appreciate that the chief is looking into other options, other opportunities for us to generate revenue that might be able to help us save in some other places. And um

yeah, it's very early stages. I mean, no, and if it doesn't, you know, we end up with doing the math and everything and it doesn't make sense. Yeah. In my view, it silly not to take a look at it, look into it and look. Yeah. so that we just so we know we have all the facts and we can make informed decisions. Yes, I will happy to get those for you. Uh the transfer from capital reserve, we just don't have that many CIP purchases this year. We had a lot last year. We just don't have that many. Uh and the transfer from other funds, we did transfer $150,000 from the recreation revolving fund to the community center last year and that is not planned again to be proposed this year. So that's that minus 150,000 and then water

Did we do that two years in a row? Yes, we did. 150 each of the two years. Yes. Um and what's on hand at the record roll? Uh I will get you that number if Now that wouldn't affect the budget anyway because that would she self-sustain. So there's more. Yeah. It wouldn't affect it wouldn't reduce tax rate either because it would just prepare for the future. All right. No. And then water and sewer are enterprise funds. So they have to be self- sustaining. So

yeah, I don't think I think I covered most of that. Oh, the SRO.

Oh, yes. So the so some of the department revenue um our SRO, our student resource officer, um is uh becoming certified. She's getting a new certification. So she will be um moving up uh grade in step and so that's reimbured through the school district. So we get um we get a little bit more from the school district and then their solid waste collections as I mentioned. So I believe that that was the only other thing in revenues. Okay. What um do we know uh has the chief looked at the end of or the effort to end the balance billing uh with ambulances

and um yeah we talked about it today what that could do to the revenues and increasing the revenues it will have a drastic posit positive effect on ambulance revenue. Yes. My only question saying that yes, it's good news for it's it's bad news for health insurance rates. It's great news for I just want to make sure we're not missing an opportunity to review the rates and look at where we're sitting. Absolutely.

The only question I have around the revenues, it doesn't seem like we have a lot of levers there either. is that you're showing for um motor vehicle a decrease growth rate, right? Last year was 100 up 150k. This year you're doing only 100k. You you don't want to ride it too hard, but you do ride your winners to the degree. Is there and I want MDU to give us the a real honest look of it but if that number was 150k

my math is that every percent of this budget on the operating budget is 125k so if we get 50k more out of motor vehicles we are we are lowering the tax rate by 50 basis points. Yes. So maybe I would just like I'm not saying at all raise it, but I would just stress test that it's been done at this level, but I also know the budget committee has done it. Yeah, you've done it every year. Um, and they get the benefit of, you know, two more months, two more months from now. My guess is if you threw those numbers in an Excel spreadsheet and said plot this over five or six years, you may find that you're right, that we're that 100,000 is is too little.

Okay? And if it's going to be changed, we might as well do it. Um, I'll be candid. This is not a bad budget. This is one of the better starting budgets we have had without really digging into it. I think this is a a really workable budget um that there's, you know, I think historically I we typically see we try to have a budget that's a 4% increase and that's going to be hard or impossible to do with a cola and trash,

but I think sub five is doable and maybe maybe low parts of course. This is this is doable budget. Am I understanding the total budget number, dollar amount, dollar figure to be less than it was last year or am I looking at the wrong number? Yeah, it's because of the the capital and the the the bridge and the trucks, it looks like less money, but it's offset with less money coming out of the CRF. I think when you look at actual town spending, it's up good amount of hundreds of thousands.

It's 700 up the town operating budget lines if you if you go further back in the book.

And part of the offset too was our estimate uh for overlay. You know, we had done the 600,000 last year. Um we talked to Steve Hamilton again, the assessor, and we're looking at 282 282,000. and our fund balance. You know, we we I we'll show you more on the where we're sitting percentage-wise with our policy that we have and we did designate the 100,000. We could designate more of that and still, I believe, stay within our 8%. Or above our 8%. You know, we set aside the million. We could do more

of the things we've just kind of tossed out in this first goound introduction of the budget. It seems like getting under that six and getting much closer to five and maybe sub five is entirely possible. Just when you math these couple items, the overtime that something with the health insurance

fast looks like you know without having any kind of pain pain. Yeah. Yeah. But this has a lot to say about whoever put these budget books together. It's it's like they've done this before. Um and I, you know, I I never am one to hire an extra town employee uh without seriously consider considering it. The fire with the fire captain. Um but this is how we do it. We tell you no for three years and tell you to plan and find a way to make it not cost us a full amount. I think between some of the balance billing with those two positions rolled in. Yeah, it's a perfect storm. Yeah.

So, my takeaway from tonight is there sort of three immediate ask which is to give us a little bit of a more holistic look at the fire offsets. Um maybe go back and revisit the family plan issue for new employees. It it because we've taken the most conservative stand possible. And then third is just to get a little more clarity around the ambulance revenue. Those are the three things. I'm just keeping notes so it's there's clear follow-ups. Does that miss anything?

Um I didn't want to distribute my questions to the board because that would have started a meeting. But if you want to send those out like someone wants to send them out, I've emailed um questions to the chair and vice chair. I can send them on if you want. Whatever is not going to start a meeting. I just I'll BCC everyone on I just didn't I didn't want to double up on questions. Yeah. And you know when we go through this I'll have some questions because it it seems like the salary items went up more than just cola and so I I guess some of them would be step increases too. Um but y

a 100,000 police of of salary increases seem like a lot if there's not a new position and we're going to have at least a couple starting at zero or one. Right. Right. Right. Uh and so I will have some questions about stuff like that. Okay. Can Mrs. Vice Chair, you had Yes. Can you repeat um what the request was regarding the family plan um for the new employees or the potential new employees at the police department? Is this a request to ask the chief to look at um like the history of it or because there were a couple of things and I just want to make sure what I'd love to know is yeah like how often

you know it's it's small sample size so it's not going to be stat statistically significant but how often do they use it and then from a budgeting perspective as Chris laid out earlier there is 0% chance that all four of those roles are filled right for the every day of that fiscal year. Yeah. Even if you do the two and you're I think that's I think that's I think that's a smart way to I think you just put a couple of two and even the fire department. Yeah. This year because we are we're going to have to wait till July then we have to find the person right

and if we find a person who's already there we then have to find their replacement. And so I think for this year those are an easy place. Now I don't think our new policy should be let's not factor that in. I think if we only had one job available in in all the department, we probably would have to budget closer to the worst case. Um, yeah, we can knock those. What are we missing, Dave? What secrets in here I haven't seen yet? Well, anybody behind? It's good. There a lot of cutting blades over at Tim's DPW. Uh, again, we we did cut some of the police chief's overtime request. Timid asked for some more. We cut that out.

Yeah. Paving. Paving's one where the CIP committee 6 656 or 665 and we cut 100,000 to 565. What is Tim? Oh, for that what was Tim's request? Oh, he what was it? Did he put what what was his request into the CIP committee? His request um was it that amount? paving plan was 100,000 more than what we have in there. It was but I know like 665 and we're going to have to make up some of it because histo say that one more time. The budget committee has a number of people who are concerned with preserving the quality of our roads.

The upet.com and so I think we need to be as we're kind of thinking our numbers we need to be prepared that that may come back to us. Okay. But there's there's plenty of work here. So, what's the next step, David, just to remind me and anyone watching as well. Well, usually uh now the board will start I know you've dug in and have maybe specific questions and we'll get the answers back. We did get a good head start on that and and I would gather the questions you're asking are similar to what

Yeah, I historically we've we've had all the department heads come in. I don't think it's necessary. I think we should start I was gonna ask you that start thinking through and do targeted questions if you know my guess is we can get through half of these departments without needing the department head to answer any questions. Let's do that. It seems way more efficient. Yeah. I don't um this isn't new game for anybody, right? Yeah, I know. I had uh the fire chief. I had him at least on Well, he's winning. He's winning. He's winning right now. Yeah, I know. So, I had him on to if there was questions and to come in on that, but um yeah, really not.

I think it would be better for him to look at uh Sman KBY's question of what are the impacts of the new balance billing and in light of that because he is a member of the fire chief's association who ve very strong in the lobby on that. Um there's 20 or $30,000 there which should not be hard to find.

Let's get that. Okay. Also, uh this year I would really really like if we could go through um more thoroughly the wreck revolving fund and the wreck budget. We tend to take a quick peek and move along because it's self- sustaining. I I would prefer if we would really take a look because there's been some fluctuations over the course of the last couple years. um that I think we need to just get a handle on. Yeah. Look at the revenue of that. Carve out some time for this.

I mean, I'm mostly concerned because the way this program was, which Oh, this Yeah. Five years ago, it was a $250,000 program.

If you look at the net income on that first sheet, um it has varied widely. over the course of the last couple years. Um, and I know she's had to make some adjustments with staffing and making the programs work. Um, but it's I we're down to 0. So 2324 we were at 15.63%. in 2425 9.68%. Then we're projected at 11.2 for this current fiscal year and then all of a sudden next year it drops to 5.46%. So I'm just wondering, you know, maybe a little look over wouldn't hurt

what percentage I figured out the percentages on the side. That's why you don't Percentage of what though? just so I have context the percentage. So the expended versus the revenue. Oh, okay. So what? So I will tell you with um with Darcy's sections of her uh revolving fund, she has four sections. Um she and I worked last year because Darcy likes to know what each program is making and what each program costs. So, prior to a couple years ago, she didn't really have that. It was just in her fund and it was just one set of accounts.

So, what we've been working on, you will see some fluctuations in salaries and program expenses because as Darcy tweaks um where she wants things to most appropriately go. And this is working with me, this is working with David, it's working with Chris for facilities when there's repairs and things like that with her contractors. you will see fluctuations from last year to this year. So if you see a big swing, it probably means that this, you know, this expense should have been here and it it was put somewhere else. Yeah. So, and it's they're just so dramatic. Yeah. Some of them are. Yes. Just knowing how we got from A to B. Yes.

Would be fabulous. And again, we don't have to do that tonight. That is just That's no problem. and um she she and I work together to to figure out where it's most appropriate to put these expenses and then to account for the revenue. So um and I know she she works with David as well. So So when we look at 24 that the net was77,000 25 wasative 94,000 is that inclusive of 150,000 that's why it's negative. Yeah. You see the 210 and then there's negative the net is a negative draw on the so I'm just using those top numbers. I'm not using the capital underneath. Um

I think that's a great idea. Yeah, I think especially considering some of the questions we had last year about this budget having a night where we get into detail and I think we don't necessarily even need Darcia just way more detail on last year's spend. Any other questions or requests for getting us prepared for the next session from the board? Good. Cheryl David, thank you. Yes. Thank you. Thank you. So, we're on the ninth. It's a regular meeting, but I'll try to keep it we'll keep it light. I don't I know we have a couple of things, but Okay.

Um and I that's our usual Did you want to start earlier because I know this was our workshop five o'clock second Tuesday, first Tuesday of the month, but whatever whatever works for the board. Um we're good with whatever works. Would you like Yeah. Yeah. No, they I I think at this point we're going to dig in and then we'll call department heads for um questions. Yeah. All right. And as we make decisions, they tend to hear them and then want to let us know and stuff. So um so you're saying we don't need to start we don't need to start early. We can still make sure that I put in my calendar correctly. Five hours of work here. Yeah.

Love it. Yeah. All right. Right. Thanks. Thanks. If you have anything in advance, let us know. We can bring it Tuesday if you have questions. Sounds good. Great. Thank you. Thank you. And we need to go into non-public. So, can someone make a motion? Uh, we can go. You don't know the RSA by heart yet? I don't know what section of it there is. U make a motion to go into non-public session. Uh RSA 91A- 3 uh two personnel. A roll call. We need a roll call vote.

I'll second them. Thank you. Thank you. Colby I

care votes.