Town Council - Regular Meeting

You're still within the one minute like to call to order the work session for the town council of the town of Chesapeake Beach uh for May 12th, 2026. Um I'll note that uh John Evans is not here yet, but I believe is on his way. Other council members are all here. We'll start with the pledge of allegiance. Pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice.

Our first item on the agenda, um, uh, Susan Alexander is here to talk to us, give us an informal discussion on the tree board. Thank you. Thanks for being here.

Yeah. Um we submitted two amendments to the ordinance um for you folks for consideration. Uh the first one is very simple. It was uh I made I misinterpreted one of the clauses and in discussions with the town attorney, she clarified um what the meaning of that particular clause was and we just thought if we rewarded it, amended the wording, then any future volunteer who's not a legal person would not make the same mistake as I did. And the revision is for 2633E-3E. And I read it to mean that the tree board was the appeal board, but the clause actually reads that we the tree board itself will perform functions that the appeal board requires of us. So we just wanted to clarify that the tree board is not the appeal board for the tree permits that it actually will just perform functions if the appeal board asks us to. So that's the revision revision to 263-3E. If anybody has any questions on that one question

was that um you know that we had to get approval on every tree and then that's the second that's going to be our second. Do you think that was the appeal confusion and clarification on that? Um, no. We did have one issue that came before the board and we knew it was getting appealed. So, when I was reading the ordinance, I tried to jump in and perform a function and Alyssa said, "No, that's not your responsibility. There is a separate appeals board." I thought it was the function of the tree board to review all that stuff and she said, "No."

And that that's and it's just across the board. any appeals go to a separate any appeals of decisions on tree permits goes to a separate group of people not the tree board and we just wanted to have that clarified in the ordinance that it wasn't us. Yeah. All right. Any other questions on that one? Any questions? Um I will have a question for the attorney just to make sure that nothing in the tree ordinance um supersedes the critical area uh forest protection right laws. Um, so when the attorney is available for that question and the response, I'll ask that, but that doesn't have anything to do with what you proposed for your amendment. Correct. Yeah. Yep.

Anybody else?

All right. The second one will uh amendment that we're asking uh addresses the question that you have um and it's again rewarding the ordinance to 263-4D and the original mission or intent of this ordinance was to protect the overall tree canopy of the town. It was not to sit there and say the tree board is going to make a decision on every single tree that a property owner wants to take down. And what we found in actually working this ordinance over the lifespan that it's been for the last two, three years, most of the issues coming before us have been about one tree on one property. And almost across the board, we have said okay because the roots are digging up the driveway, the tree is leaning over, it's dead, it's overgrown its spot. All appropriate reasons for a property owner to to have the right to take down a tree in their their uh on their property. So, we wanted to clarify and update the ordinance to read that tree board will only review tree permit applications that apply to three or more trees. Because our intent is um we we wanted to be involved in any conversation with a a developer or property owner that wanted to clear cut land and make a significant impact on the tree on the tree canopy of the town. And so that's why we would like to still be involved in that, but we feel like we don't need to be making um addressing any tree permit that comes in where they want to take one tree down. We've spent a year with Smelia and her team developing processes whereby Jay and Sarah review all permits that come in. They know what our recommendations would be. If you're going to take one tree down, we ask that we replant with one additional tree on your property in a better location, a better fit for um tree species for your property. They all know what those procedures are. So between Jay and Sarah, they can make the decisions on a

lot of the applications that are coming through without having to call a formal meeting of the tree board. And so that is our intent with the second one to just add the recommendation that any application requesting the removal of two uh excuse me three or more trees will then come before the board and we will just say yes we recommend this or no this this is our preference of what we would like you to do on your property. Anybody got any questions? John go ahead. Previously, anytime somebody wanted to take one or two trees, they would have to come to the treeboard.

If it was a certain size, the ordinance says that the tree has to be over 78 in 54 in. Anything less than that, no, it doesn't have to come before the board. But if if a single tree was over 50 inches in circumference, it was coming before the board. Whether it was dead, whether it was, you know, leaning up against the house, whether it was perfectly healthy, it was coming before the board. And we were just finding that most of the applications we were saying yes to and you know move on. It's very tedious. Yeah. Tedious. It wastes everybody's time, our time, the homeowner's time. They don't need to sit and wait for us for three weeks to make a decision on whether or not they can take down one tree on their property.

Yeah, I remember that happened with Bayside Baptist. They had some trees that were kind of like dying and like threatening a house. And yeah, those are the kinds of decisions Jay goes out and looks at them as soon as the application comes in. And if it's dead, it's drying, it looks dangerous, it doesn't come before the board. Yeah, this makes sense to me. I mean, if if I may, Sue, because we met last night over a Bradford pair that outgrew its footprint in a 25-year-old neighborhood. And and really, if I'd have went on site, I would have said, "Take it down. Invasive species, replant it." So, to be clear, this doesn't stop the permit process. This just stops the review of the board. Does that make sense? They still have any tree in town. We cleared all the citizens because this

you still go through the permit process but wouldn't require meeting with these changes on every single tree. Just want to make that clear. This still the 50 in or above has to come to the town. Correct. Right. And then it does not supersede site plan review or critical area review. Correct.

Sarah makes critical area review before it even comes to us. So she's already made and see this is what we're talking about. she has already made that decision. There's so many processes in place now that we've put in place between Jay and Sarah. They can make all those decisions without it having to come before the tree board. We're going to look at big changes to the tree canopy. We will we will um

um speak for make an opinion on that. Make recommendations on situations like that. Like if you're taking that the Bradford pair down, it's invasive. we don't want it to be in town. Please replace it with a more uh native Maryland tree on a better location on your property. And it's, you know, it's this recommendation and we make that recommendation. Um, so we are ultimately replacing the canopy, but we don't we just don't need they have the lists of the the approved trees for our town that are appropriate for our town that would fit in the critical area. So, they're already looking at that before it even comes before the tree board. And just just for clarification, we as the board can be more scrutinizing or more restrictive. We cannot override any agency or board. We can't say, "Well, critic area said this, we're going to say this." We we have to follow all of those rules. We could add additional, but we cannot take any of those away. If that makes sense.

Yeah, that makes sense. And Sarah writes up a really nice report that she sends to us before any uh any board meeting that goes check one, check two, this is passed, this is correct, you know, this fits this clause. So we have all that in our heads before we even look at a tree par. Bet you'll like it better. Yes.

So one thing I I've actually have an opinion on it and it's sort of with this but the opposite. So everybody has to ask permission the restrictions and all this. But then you say unless you have this tree because we say that tree has a certain value but then what about the people that that have a tree like that wouldn't there be a maybe a process and this isn't about this but a process for the them to reach out and say hey we have English iive we our trees getting hurt and it feels like where do you go to help have help and for me when I think of a tree board I think you're supposed to kind of have both balances I know that the green team it does a lot. But I think there should be a process that says yes, this is an approved thing and and have some sort of mechanism because I mean who's going to be able to go take care of certain trees? I mean I have had a tree board do the work or

somebody Well, no. So us as a town, right, say we're a tree city and we get a we get a cool plaque, right? Yeah. But then we say that has you can't do something even though it's on your property. But then we don't want to hold any responsibility to help take care of the thing that we say we hold the value to. Okay. So it's the town if we want to claim, hey, this is makes us a town like this, we should say that we also have an obligation to help out, right? So it's if you wanted to take care of them, maybe we should help take care of them. May I chime in?

Sure. So I think that's a fair point. Part of that is like if we want to make that a requirement, then the council would need to propose adding that to the legislation. The biggest thing that Sue is trying to has been working diligently to do is to streamline the current legislation because it's not clear how you actually are can take action on it. Right. It was there was a lot of um hiccups when it came to actually doing it in a way that was efficient for the whole team. And so this what Sue was proposing right now was really more about streamlining what exists now. And what I hear you saying is that you'd like for the council to figure out how you can make the treeboard more more accessible. And I think that would be changing the the ordinance outside of what we're talking about right now.

Well, yes, but I was asking her because she's puts a lot of work into it what her opinion was and because if if she said that no, that wouldn't be something for us to do or that's not that that's not what it's about, then I accept that as an answer. I would say let me yeah I I have I agree with you. We have had many discussions between the tree board and the green team about dealing with some of the issues like invasives in town and all that kind of stuff. The tree board does have a certified master gardener on the tree board. We are happy to have any citizen come to our tree board meeting saying this is my problem. How do I fix it? And we can make recommendations on how to fix it. Whether or not the town incurs the cost of executing that's on you guys but we certainly anybody who wants to come before the board with a question a problem whatever or that yes that is part of my interpretation of what we are we're an advisory group

if there was a recommendation if there was a recommendation that y'all or shrubs or anything like that if there was a recommendation or something like that yes I' I'd welcome it yep we we can do that anybody just wants to get on the agenda for the tree board, the next treeboard committee. Thank you.

Um so we can do that. Y and I would also add Sarah has a list or we've created a list that Sarah's I guess managing of all of the um approved by the University of Maryland's department uh cooperative extension all approved trees and shrubs for our specific area. And Calvert County has a list too like trees that are noninvasive, trees that are good to plant. We've broken it down by trees that are good to plant in wet shady areas, trees that are good to plant in sunny dry areas. So, we have some guidance already prepared at town for specific issues, but if something individual comes up, we're happy to speak to it, address it at our meeting. Well, thank you very much.

We do have Jay's on the board and our master gardeners on the board, so we have people who can give good advice on how to fix problems. Okay. All right. Well, thank you very much. Okay. Appreciate it. appreciate the information. Questions. Thanks. Appreciate it. All right. Uh, next item on the um agenda is a budget discussion. Our treasurer Dan Bon is going to work us through this. You've got the documents in front of you.

Yep. So, you should have documents in front of you and hopefully my AV works here and I'll have the same things that you have in front of you up on the screen.

So, we have already gone over the general fund, the wastewater treatment plant mitigation funds last month. Uh this month or tonight, we're going to go through the utility fund and the water park fund. So, I'm going to start off with the utility fund with some general comments and then we'll get into the individual uh line item budget. So, in the utility fund on the revenue side, uh the rates and the uh dollar amounts that you see in the revenues are based on the study that was uh done over the last year and approved by the council. Um the 20% credit that has been provided uh to the uh residents over the past six quarters has ended. That credit went from January of 2025 through uh June of 2026. Uh we received a $600,000 grant uh from the state this year for through the bond bills and that is being included as a revenue for the Harbor Road Wellhouse project and you'll also see that on the expenditure side as a expenditure. Uh when you look at the revenues and compare it to the expenditures, the revenues will exceed expenditures by 566,144. Uh this was uh shown when we were discussing the rates in the five-year projection. uh you know we will generate a surplus early on but in fiscal year 28 and 29 there's some large projects that are going to take place in the treatment plant and we will need to pay for the

cost of those you know uh through the utility fund for the town share and I'll go through those costs as we go through the individual spreadsheets uh there are uh water and sewer connection fees anticipated to be collected on two properties on F Street. So, we've included 10,000 for each of the water connections and 20,000 for each of the sewer connections uh in the revenue projections on the Sorry, Dan. I just before we move on to the next slide, just one quick comment. The first one on revenues

just for clarity sake. Uh the coun, you know, I'm not sure what we mean here by approved by council. The council's not approving. You talking about the the professional study that was approved by council or you're talking about the rates approved by council. The rates that were Yeah. So there are no rates approved by council until we vote on the utility fund that has the rate schedule on it which so just technically speaking there the council hasn't approved rates.

Okay. you all voted on the rates uh you know that that is what we would incorporate into the budget but you're correct until you approve the budget you know technically those rates I guess would not apply but so they were the ones that you approved by vote at a meeting a couple

yeah well that's not really it's not they're not approved there it's a it's a that was not it was a I believe it was a uh work session so there's no real vote that occurred occurs um at a work session only at a at a regular meeting. So there's been no approval council approval of rates to this point. Consensus. There you go.

Clarification. Um the talked about cap uh they were on the expenses. So on the expense side, a update analysis of staffing costs was performed and allocations of the overhead staff uh was allocated appropriately. That was also discussed. At the same time, we were discussing uh the rate structure. Uh the utility fund allocation of the fixed and variable water reclamation fund was allocated in the amount of 892,655 for uh the variable rate and 359,938 I'm sorry the other way around the 892,000 for fixed and 359,000 uh for the variable costs. Uh the capital projects are budgeted 665,000 which includes 65,000 for uh repairs to a line on F Street and 600,000 for the Harbor Road Wellhouse project and then on debt service uh debt service payments will total.

So there was no other projects proposed just them two correct

as current as budget's presented. Yep. Um, debt service payments total 321, uh,849 and you know there is a schedule for that in your packets. Uh, fiscal year 27 is the final year for the 2008A water quality bond. So that will uh be paid off at the end of fiscal year. So, as we move on to the spreadsheet itself, which breaks down the uh revenue and expense into the individual line items, uh we'll go through the revenues first. Uh you're pretty familiar with the format of the report where we show some prior year's information for 23 24 and then the current year budgeted and actuals through uh February 28th. And then the final column is the budget that we're looking to um approve or discuss uh this evening. So the first item on there is the miscellaneous grants, which is the grant for the bond bill for the Harbor Road Well House project that I mentioned earlier in the amount of $600,000. Uh the rest of the revenue items are based on the rates that were discussed and you know approved by consensus a couple months ago uh for you know all of the different uh water and sewer usage and uh fixed costs for those. Uh there's also investment interest on accounts in or monies in the investment accounts estimated 150,000.

Uh we have the water and sewer capital connection fees which as I said were two taps uh two properties. Uh the sewer connection is 20,000 per connection and the water is 10,000. So those are in the amount of 40,000 and 20,000. And then the final revenue source is from the towers that are on the uh the cell towers that are on the uh water towers. So the total revenues as projected is at $4 million4,581. If you want to, I could stop there and see if there's any questions on the revenue.

Council, any questions? The ones on Epster Street, are those two new properties or why are they putting uh new taps there? I'll let Jay answer that question. They are. Uh it was a builder that built the two houses on Elm Street. So, one street up. It's possible. I know. I've met with him twice. Um so, I'm going to we plug those into the budget. It's possible he builds them in this next upcoming budget, but it may take a little longer with permitting. Any anything else? Okay,

I have a couple questions. Um, and I won't take too long because I I wasn't I didn't provide consensus last time. Um, so I will just point out a couple observations. Um I'm a little bit disappointed that all the tiers are staying within the residential um community and we are burdening residents without burdening commercial high users in the same way um with the tiered structure. Um, and then the 2829 Headworks project, does that involve a capacity increase of any kind?

Uh, no, that's not a cap capacity increase. That would be for the headworks improvements. It's just a quality increase. No capacity increase. Correct.

Okay. Um, thank you. I'm a little bit surprised that the actuals don't show a transfer in general fund in fiscal year 24. I'm not sure about fiscal year 25, but um I just remind everybody that we did a lot of utility improvements with ARPA funds that could have been used for anything, not necessarily just utility fund expenses. And then um I don't think we've ever seen the actual salaries. Um are we going to do that this budget cycle? Are we going to look at the staff salaries?

I think it's fair. Can you speak to the

Yeah. Um so as we get later down the agenda under uh the general fund there has been uh a uh addition made to the general fund ordinance which is approving the uh cost of living and merit increases for the employees. uh it was this when Smeilia and I uh discussed that you know the chart does say that salaries are approved by ordinance so that's why we added it in there um you know there is a separate schedule for all departments and all employees and all salaries that I believe last year we had a closed session and sat down and answered any questions that council had with that. So, I think the idea was is that we would go through uh you know the general fund changes in that ordinance and then uh you know if the council would like we could do the same thing go into a close session to discuss that. I don't know if we do it tonight or do it at the next meeting.

Yeah, that's something that we've always done and I think we should continue to do that. Okay. So, I don't know whether that would be tonight or at the next meeting. I don't

sure. And I think I think Eric and I are coming in different directions with that, but um my my concern is just making sure that our funds are stable and they're operating the way they're supposed to be. um because the utility fund has been draining the general fund and causing problems with general fund projects and the ability to do them. So I I do want to make sure that we aren't um continuing to have that problem. And then my second concern is that this does represent an effective rate increase for people that are paying one thing this year and then if we put this budget in place, they will be paying more and the entire burden of that is falling within our residential population and it's not being absorbed by our commercial population at the same level. So that's my general complaint about this. Um

yeah I mean I think one of the things is with with proactive approaches create so they don't have an emergency where the general fund I think in past times so not having like a proactive approach is I think where they've had to have reactive general fund supplements. Yeah I think a proactive approach is appropriate but it's not appropriately absorbed entirely within the residential population. So that is my comment. Thank you. Anybody else have anything? All right. Go ahead, Dan.

All right. Moving on to the expenditure side. U you know the salaries we've kind of just touched on. It's per the salary schedule which you know we'll have a close session to uh show you the breakdown of that. But uh we discussed that as well. You know, you know, we were looking at the rates and the allocation that was a whole another separate discussion. And you know, the percentages that we presented at that time are what is included in the budget currently.

And can we use like MML? I think they have uh structured guidelines for pay. Can we use their their information that's available for cross comparison for pay and salaries? Um I believe the MML survey you have to provide your information to them in order to share in the um surveys that they have and we've not done that. So I would say that's probably not readily available at this time. I don't know how quick that could be but you know obviously you know it can be if we participate in the survey and provide them the information and again I don't know the whole process of how long that takes you know for them to then provide us the information. I don't know if all the same classes of employees that we have are included in their survey.

All right. Well, it might be something nice to have some information when Thank you.

I concur with that. I think it's worth sharing information to have access to information of uh you know typical typical wages across the state. Okay, we'll work on that.

Um continue on down to the continuing education. uh just a slight increase there based on uh historical numbers and the cost of training going up. Uh the taxes and benefits is a percentage of the actual salary and wages and for the town as a whole it usually runs at about 50% that includes all the payroll taxes, health insurance, retirement and other benefits that the town offers. Uh meter repair and maintenance remains at 25,000. Uh water plant repairs and maintenance uh is at 40,000. Uh this is consistent with fiscal year current fiscal year. Uh engineering and professional fees has increased uh to 61,500 and you see the breakdown of the various costs associated with that. uh safety uh at 15,000 which remains consistent with the prior year. Interest and administrative expense for the long-term debt is uh actual figures as shown on the uh debt service schedule which is also included in your packets. So you can refer that. It's probably the last page of the packet and I put it up on the screen as well. Um safety um I'm sorry I just did that one. Pump repair uh remains at 50,000. Uh supplies has been reduced 5,000. Uh you know we've haven't been close to the 50,000 you know gone back five years. So we lowered that to 45,000. uh mailings has increased to uh 10,000 remains consistent at 10,000 and we are

using a service to mail those bills now. uh mis utility fees uh is at $2,000. Uh you know, it was trending over that uh the current fiscal year, but a lot of that had to do with uh parts of paint for marking for the fiber optic projects that were going on in town that uh should be completed before the next fiscal year. uh line repairs and maintenance increased to 80,000 again just based on uh current trends. Banking fees u $50,000 uh that remains consistent. The fixed and variable costs you know are just formula that comes over from the wastewater treatment plant uh you know based on the cost and their allocation of those expenses. utilities for Comcast, Verizon, uh gas for vehicles, uh BG&E, uh is uh increased 5,000. You know, energy is increasing. Miscellaneous remains the same. Uh insurance costs uh looks like it has not it's been coming in less than what we've projected. Um that includes workers comp and then the general liability and property insuranceances uh for legit uh also include a 10% increase on those costs. Uh still comes in at about 50,000 whereas 44,904 uh for the current year. uh generator maintenance. Um this is budgeted 20,000. Uh capital projects was 665,000

which was the Harbor Road project and the F Street uh line repair. uh the reserve for headworks is I'm sorry the uh reserve uh based on revenues being greater than the expenditures 566,144 uh and you know that was anticipated so that we would be able to pay for the headworks projects as we go forward in 28 and 29. The uh final numbers are the principal payment amounts for the uh debt service. Uh you have a copy of the schedule up on the screen. You also have it in your packet that shows you each of the three borrowings and you could see that the um first one is paid off in fiscal year 28. Second one as stated earlier is paid off in fiscal year 27 and then third one will be paid off in think that's 38 36 fiscal year 36. So if you add all those together, it comes to the uh $4,40,581 which agrees with the revenue figure. Um on the schedule of fees, everything remained the same except for the uh water and sewer billing rates. Nothing else was changed for any of the other uh items that you see on those schedules. I think that includes everything that was in your packet.

Any further questions? Yeah, I I had a quick question. Um, are you are we going to bill back IQ fiber for the paint that we spent? I was thinking that too.

No, but we're in discussions about some other things um about that. Um, and then the second question ties back to the mailings. If we if we added in the new mailing system, um, wouldn't that drop the the cost that we would be spending on future mailings or is it am I complating it with something else? Because it's $10,000. We introduced a new mailing system that does it that covers all those costs or covers all that action. Yeah, the current cost to date was $4,000 and you know was under $10,000 leading up to this point. So, um you know I I don't think that it's that large of an amount. I mean it was the postage I guess I mean we calculate what that is but you know the 10,000 should cover it.

I guess what I let me rephrase what I'm saying is that 10,000 covers the technology or the contract cost that we have to do the automated mailings. Yes. Okay. All right. Thank you. I thought it was an addition too. So, thanks. So, I see salary. There's $54,000. That's less. So, how many employees how many hours does that represent? Uh, we have a 20 we have $450,000 for salaries to 400,000 for salaries. Uh, two, I'm showing only $25,000 for maintenance on the whole system. And then I'm showing $20,000 on generator maintenance.

Correct. Uh those are the figures that are there. Yes. What about the salary? The salary question. Is there a question? So how much? So you have 454,000 in budget year 2026 and you have $400,000 this year. So

is it loss of employees? Is it salary got moved? Where's that what's a $54,000 deduction from? Where's where's that come from? Where's it go? I stated in my general comments about the expenditures, you know, based on the discussions uh council had earlier this year uh on allocation of employees to the utility fund. uh you know we came up with you know through different studies and things that we did uh you know a updated analysis of where they should be costed to and we shared that with the council before and those are the percentages that are used and when you look at the salary schedule we go into close session you'll be able to see each employee uh and where they are allocated. Uh, I just had a question about the reserves. Is that a is that a new line item that we added? The um or the 566 566,000. Is that a new line item that we just started doing?

I added in there in order to show the surplus. I mean, I could have shown it as a you know at the very bottom as a surplus or deficit, but I think you know saying that it's being used for for a specific purpose I think made more sense. that might help make sure that that's actually what it gets used for. Um, yeah, I think that's a good call because I think before we were having issues by getting blindsided by stuff and that's why they had to jack the rates up so quickly to because they realized they were they weren't uh lining up with the expenses. So, I think getting ahead of it is a good idea.

I mean, we did a lot of work and it's only $54,000. It seemed like there was a lot more than $54,000 in adjustments we made cuz you have what do we give a grant the general fund grant was $549,000 and now I thought that was supposed to be offset in there. So that doesn't seem like that adds up like the $549,000 right for the general fund grant that was a 20% reduction correct. Where you getting the 550? The general

grant general fund was 549,000. That's that 20% discount, correct? Yes. And then we're saying it's because of employees, but that's only 50,000 or 54,000.

It wasn't all employees. I mean, you had all you have all the other expenses. You know, they you know, the employee expense wasn't the sole amount. If you look at fiscal year 25 or 24, uh 255,975 was your salary cost, you know, and now you're at 400. So salaries only accounted for 145,000 of that 549. I mean, you had your expenses there regardless of the salaries. Yeah. We just

It wasn't all associated with salaries. So if we take you have you have to go back before FYI 24 you have to look at FI23 where there was nothing in there for salaries and benefits and then that's how you get to 24 then 25 you start ticking up in salaries. Yeah that's how you went from Yeah. You we had to pull some of that 549 from the general fund. Like it didn't all come from salaries. So 549 covered, you know, the the 20% credit, but there was more than just salaries associated with that.

So the rates are going to go up a million dollars because if you get rid of the 300 549,000, that moves that down to 3 million and then we're going to $4 million. So that's a million dollars. If if we have $3,581,000 on fiscal year for the revenue and then we have this and we're giving $549,000 from the general fund, right? That means our revenue is 3 million. Our our actual revenue is three million according to our bills, utility fund bills over the last 12 months. Then we have

$600,000 grant. Yeah. But the $600,000 grant is there. So you're saying it's $400,000 increase then is that we're saying what is the question Dan? Some of the discrepancies you can find one in deprecation. We didn't deprecate anything. I don't know if that's fiscally sound, but that's what we're not doing. depreciation depreciation or I'm sorry did I say deprecation I did say deprecate now that you said that I do remember

my error was is the 600,000 so so my mistake is the 600,000 so when we're looking through it Jamie corrected me so the 600,000 that's what I'm expecting it to be about a $400,000 increase because our 20% deduction about it's going to be about 10%. It's it's actually though if you look at it's not a it's not an increase because if you look at the if you look at the grant for the 20% it was $550,000 but the difference is $400,000. So correct so it's it's not an actual increase from on the rates. The rates are not going up there. It's a small increase or a decrease but that was the conversation is you're going are going up.

Well the rates inherently would go up because you removed 20% discount but the rate chart did not actually go up. So the discount got removed. Yes. But the rates did not go up. The effect will be a rate increase. If you take away a discount, then of course you're going to pay more. But yes, I mean I don't know how to get around. There's no way around discount. There's several ways around it. But um you could make a motion to propose a change. I could, but we see how my motions go. Um and we've got a ways to go on this discussion or we're going to be here very late. So uh unless there's a specific uh action.

No, I just have two uh comments on the work on this on this particular on the expenditures for the utility fund. We just went over uh whoever was commenting are you complete? I have two questions but you can go first if you'd like.

Okay. Uh thank you. Um yeah so I wanted to to touch on the depreciation also um in 2023 uh 2024 2025 there are um line items for depreciation of sewer and also line items for deprec two two line items for depreciation of water. I'm not really sure. I guess it's really only could needs to be one cuz it's just uh they're blank when they um uh yeah when it looks like only one line item for water. But anyway, point is um can you explain to me why the previous um treasurer administration included depreciation and why we've chosen not to

I try to explain it. Um, so some items re in in budgeting you need to budget the money coming in against what you're spending out. Depreciation is a non-cash expense. So when you're budgeting to find out how much money you need to cover your expenses, to me depreciation doesn't matter. When we prepare the the financial report at the end of the year, we do record depreciation to show what the full operating cost is of in this case the utility fund. Uh but as far as generating money, you don't need money to pay for depreciation. So therefore to show it um in the budget and I don't believe the past budgets from past treasurers included that uh the way this got in for fiscal year 23 24 and 25 is when I went back to the historical data and just plugged it into the spreadsheet it shows up

because when you do the adjustments at the end of the year those show up as an expense right so if you don't include them here, but you include them in the audit at the end of the year, then you're going to then then it's going to show a negative even though it's a wash here, right on the cash. So, that would make sense. Yes. To include it to me. Um, so that these budgets match the audit and you know, but uh and then are so are there any tax implications? We're not taxing. We're tax exempt as a government. There's no tax. It's it's really just an accounting uh difference.

Yeah. Um and how do you know how they had they um calculated and how we intend to calculate depreciation for sewer and water? We have a full spreadsheet uh with all the assets that are on there. Anything that is a capital asset at the year. So if we spend the $665,000 in capital projects, that will all go over into the fixed asset spreadsheet and then we depreciate those over our fixed asset schedule. Okay?

And that's how they get into the audited financial statements and we do that once a year at the end of the year. Okay? So it's not just a schedule. We do it for all the uh uh enterprise funds that have to be depreciated so that the audited statements are correct. Gotcha. Um does anyone else have any questions about depreciation before I have one more question on a different topic? No, I thought it was a good explanation. Okay. Um and this is really just for you guys. Do you know when we have planned the close session for salaries? The next opportunity for close session would be Thursday.

Um regular council meeting. Oh, right. Yeah. Okay. So, that would be nice. I think it for me it would be nice because all of these budgets have salaries spread out in them. So to have that overarching salary picture uh while we're considering these other budgets for both the general fund and the

I mean I'm not sure if everyone agrees but I'd like to get that out of the way as soon as possible. Um when we do that um will they'll will there be information that um maps like where salaries or percents of salaries live in different budgets the cost allocation for the salary.

Yeah. So there would be the schedule that we have is broken down by employee what their in that individual employees projected increases are from fiscal year 26 to 27 and then their salary is then costed across all funds. So you'll see Yeah. what amount dollar wise percent and dollar-wise is allocated for each employee to each. Yeah. Because it's I think it's important for us to see to see and improve and and approve the salaries in general, but it's also really important for us to understand where this salaries or percents of salaries live in in different budgets. Yep.

Yeah. My my thing that sticks out to me is like the continuing education. Like classes are more expensive than $7,000. If we I don't know how many employees we have, but if everybody's getting properly trained, I know classes are pretty expensive. I don't know. I take three or four a year. Yeah. But you do have a continuing education budget within each uh general within each fund. So if someone is only allocated 20% to utility fund only 20% of their contining education is allocated there and the rest is absorbed in other funds and there's a lot of different individuals that are costed partially to the utility funds.

I'd like to speak a little bit to that. So we're members of Maryland Roar Water uh DJ and myself just attended their conference. So we host those classes here and that lets all of our employees attend them for free. So, by using this town hall and Josh's employees too, we get to attend those classes for free. Just FYI. Yeah.

Yeah. Because it turns into like a a web of uh for us to try to uh figure out um you know, where where where everything's going, how much is in this, what are we really looking at here, what are we really looking at in the in another budget and this budget and that budget. and they're all kind of so it's really important for us as a council to understand the entire salary picture as a whole and then understand how it's allocated into each budget.

Sure. And you know, I don't know if if uh Samria would want to do this, but we could provide that schedule prior to the meeting. And I would say have the close session before the meeting because at the next meeting, we are hoping if there's enough council members here to adopt the general fund and the wastewater treatment plant mitigation fund budgets at that meeting. Yeah, I don't know if we should do that, but I think that I mean I like the idea of the of the close session before the meeting, but I don't know about uh dispersing information prior to that.

I'll follow up with you all about it about how to get information. I will share it. And if if we're not going to do it before, then I would suggest maybe having the close session before the next town meeting. All right. At the beginning, maybe not. Yeah. Right. Yeah. All right. The last two questions. Sorry. Okay. Go ahead, Laura. Um the tipping fees went down significantly. Is there a reason for that?

We have 1,316,962 versus 89260. Oh, the the treatment treatment plan. Okay. That's not a tipping fee. Yeah. Okay. um that it's just based on our percentage from whatever the wastewater treatment plant budget is. So, we'd have to go back and look at that. I believe there are less capital costs um this fiscal year or fiscal year 27 than what was proposed. That's the main difference. No, that that makes sense now that I know they're not tipping fees.

Yeah. Um, and then appendix E submeters. Is there an appendix? Can somebody tell me what's in appendex E? Where are we looking here? It's the last thing on fire hydrants and meters. The very last line. It says C appendix E under other connections. No, right here on the the other connection fees. Other connection fees on the on the schedule.

Um, right on the page where where the rates are at the very end. I've had questions about getting submeters or different submeters. That's one shows the utility bill this page. I know I have a lot of highlights online, but the one with this these rights on it and then it's at the end here.

Um I'm not familiar with what that is. I mean like I said all of these have been existing. Maybe it doesn't apply. Are you familiar with any submeter rate schedule? Yeah, basically it's the cost of a submeter to the citizen. So if you apply for one, um it's on that schedule of fees and I don't know him exactly, but Fran has it. Uh that's what it is. But people can still apply for a submeter and there is a schedule of fees somewhere that we will be voting on. Correct. Or submeters. Correct.

And they reflect, I guess, your cost because you have to install them. They reflect actual costs because we have to provide the meter and time and it depends on the nature of it. Is it involve another pit? Is it indoor? Is it outdoor? So the schedule of fees has like a menu if you will and we choose it's this, it's this, it's this and that's how you get it. But the meter, the pit and the MXU are standard. Everything else you may need or you may not need depending on the application.

Okay? But you know what it is. You're comfortable with the rates. They cover your costs. Yeah, I mean personally I know what it is. I wouldn't say I'm comfortable with it because I wouldn't provide a submeter to anyone to be honest. I wouldn't that's my opinion. But um I'm comfortable with the process. Okay. Is there code that indicates submeters? Yeah, it was voted in uh long time ago. Long time ago. So it's it's existed. Okay.

And and I personally have a submeter. The reason I have a submeter is that I have an irrigation system and the irrigation system doesn't pay for sewer, it pays for water. So the submeter monitors the water that goes into the irrigation system and that affects uh my to the total amount. You know, it takes off the sewer amount for what's on the submeter. Okay. Don't take it personally, Bruce. Huh? Don't take it personally. submeters in town. I think there was like 20 or 40 when I went through the water and all the bills that were there, you could see who had submeters and who didn't when we did all that auditing of it.

It's in the data. Everybody submeter it. So, but it's only the problem is it's only if you're using water and you're not using sewer. Yeah, it's impossible to find a a plumber to do it. I was looking at doing it with my I call like 20 plumbers in the area and nobody does it. So, I don't even know how you get it done. Yeah. Well, you got to be a master. Can we move on? Can we move on? All right. Is there anything else? Can we move on? All right. Let's go to the water park fund budget.

Great. So, uh, as everyone knows, we're hoping to open the water park, uh, before the end of fiscal year 27. Um, so fiscal year 27 will be the, uh, first year of operation the water park since it closed three seasons ago. uh the water park, you know, based on uh you know, scheduled days open, it's scheduled to be open 72 days during the fiscal year 2728 season. So, you know, 30% of the days open would be during fiscal year 27 and 70% of the days open are during fiscal year 28. And I just point that out because a lot of the cost allocation is kind of based on some of those percentages. But you also need to consider there are startup costs in fiscal year 27 that include salaries, training of staff and marketing that you know would need to be done upfront and therefore there wouldn't be you know that type of split the 3070 split. Uh because of that uh in fiscal year 27, you know, a lot of reason because of the uh startup costs, uh there would be about $176,000 shortfall. So there would need to be help from the general fund to help fund the water park uh during fiscal year 27. And then if you look at the full season of operation, uh there would be a $79,000 deficit for the full first full season. And I'll try to show you how that um is calculated uh you know based on the spreadsheet. So on the spreadsheet itself, it's a little different than the the other funds and the way that I presented it because I

show fiscal year 27 budget and fiscal year 28 budget and then show the total operation. Now, obviously, we're not approving the fiscal year 28 budget, but I wanted to show if we were doing a full year, we would be budgeting, you know, the full amount over uh, you know, the the season. So, the costs that you see in fiscal year 27 are the costs we anticipate incurring fiscal year 27 up till June 30th uh, of next year. And then the 28 would be the remaining three months or so of the water park season.

Um well, one thing we could do is we could have another line in there and saying days not open liquidated damages and so there's a cost per day if we're not open. Um well, my assumption is just that it's going to be open. There are liquidated damages in the general contractor's contract that they will pay us, but hopefully we don't have to include that as a revenue. Yeah.

Um so, um you know, the first line item, you know, the grant from the general fund is, you know, what I just stated in my summary. In fiscal year 27, we need to have 176,380, uh, you know, uh, granted from the from the general fund. And then fiscal year 28, hopefully the water park will see a surplus and that, you know, they would be giving back 97,000 uh to the general fund um, as it relates just to those three months. But when you go and look at it for the full year when we do the fiscal year 28 budget, it'll probably be excuse me a um deficit anyway. But you know, this is for one full year of operation. You know, really dealing with fiscal year 27. Uh total deficit for the uh operating season would be 79,000. all of the

So that's based on the daily admissions being the fiscal year 2023 price or a little bit more than that. Um so all of the other revenue sources or all of the revenue sources I'm just saying the daily emission the daily emission it says on the 20 fiscal year 2023 almost 600,000. So that's that's what we're saying the emission is going to be based on the fiscal year 2023. I see what you're saying. I think I believe the capacity is going to be a little higher as well. So, it's not necessarily that the admission rates are going to be higher. Um, but if the capacity is higher, then the admission rates going to be a little lower. Is that right, Marilyn?

Yeah, I think that's what everybody's wanting to know what what we're expecting that to be. Is that what we're saying?

So, there is a rate schedule for each of the revenue items. uh you know and you know I've sat down with Marilyn and she's done you know a lot of the research related to the revenue and expense item items here uh she and she don't want to speak for her but she met with other operators of other water parks that are currently operating in Delaware and I think some other places and you know sat down with them and discussed rates you know for the different types of uh great structures that we have. So, um you know, the daily admissions, the group events, season passes, uh those types of things are based on her research. Um you know, so they're not necessarily fiscal year 23 rates. They're, you know, some of that was looked at, but also current rates, uh you know, that are being paid in the market now being used for that. Um, I don't know if you want her to comment any more on how those rates were generated.

No, but it's pretty much you did the research. We're basing this on what current rate practices are right now. It's not based on 2023. All right. I was going it should not like it shouldn't be as high as the 2023 prices. That's just leave it at that. Yeah, I think that's a very valid point because they discourage people from attending those prices in 2023. All right. Anything else on the uh on this Dan? Uh that's all I had to comment on the revenue side that was done you know based on analysis and you know rates and you know times capacity and days open.

All right. Um I I do want to call out like uh it it is hard to look at the some of the budgeting when we don't understand what the actual missions would be. And I do think I do think we should have an opportunity to weigh in on there a draft of some sort so we can at least understand what projections are the research they did so we could understand um just some of this behind this. Um, and then I had a question regarding uh um the professional fees that ties back to I'm assuming like the entry like electronic systems for entry and

Yep. Um yeah, I mean we we list three of them. Uh Facina is our IT company. You know there are systems there. uh Microsoft and Convergence. I'm not sure what the convergence system does. I'm up to the podium, please. Our our online system like our online payment system for um for for paying making online payments, you know, through the system. It was does that make sense? Yes.

Not coming to the window but paying online. So, that was one of the systems. We probably won't have the same ones. That's why it's really hard because I'd have to call every single figure out every single new professional that we're going to use. So, we don't know that for sure, but we just know it's going to going to increase. Um, also our Ellis, there's going to have to be a lot more people trained like to usually we would, you know, only have to train one or two because we lose one or two people, but it's like train the trainers that are going to train the lifeguards. So, there's more training involved. And the wages have gone up since 2023, I'm sure. Like the lifeguard wages and stuff.

Oh, yeah. That would be that's under wages for Are we talking about that yet or? Yeah, it's a line item on the expenses. Okay. So, yeah, that that's a I did a whole series of I'm trying I'm trying to recall from our previous discussions whether uh the number of lifeguards for example will be similar to what we had in the past. Very similar. Okay. Yes. Okay. Very similar. All right. Other question. Yeah. The minimum wage went has gone up to $15. So yeah, you know, so that's help.

Yeah, that's so that's a big consideration when I did all the computations and for all of my research, I used mostly fiscal year 2022 because that's what I was most familiar with. And I think that was before things started to get like a little bit weird. So I I used that like a technical term research that you did somewhere that you can just shoot out to get a mountain full of stuff or do you do you have anything summarized that that you can just send out to us so we won't you know ask you a bunch of questions where you can just say read on this.

Yeah. Like the two biggest items admissions and wages I spent the most time on. Um, the marketing line item is pretty high. I see that you want to remarket it because it hasn't been open. How do we Yes. plan on doing most of that? Like social media, mailers, a combination of a lot. And I think we're going to need to use some radio, too, especially out of county. Okay. Um, I think in county is a little bit easier, but I mean out of county there's certain markets that we used, you know, that were better than other markets. And I think we should put a big billboard right at Six Flags entrance. Yeah, speak beach water park this way. Yeah. All right. Thank you. Thank you. Any other questions for

Will will it be okay for us to get a summary from you so that we can, you know, just be on the same page? Yeah. You mean just send something out? Yeah, just first what I send.

Can you include in there? The thing that I'm intrigued with is when we talked about this water park is the the entry process. And I know between the two fiscal years, it's 125,000 for the the technology fees. I just I'm I'm intrigued to see what route we're going. That's that's a lot of money for uh tech uh is like software. Um so I'm intrigued to see what it looks like because if we're going to have this beautiful water park, I would hope our like entry process is not clunky. I know you wouldn't do purposely do that obviously, but I just I'm intrigued with the software aspect. Okay.

And them fees are so tricky depending on if you use like the Bluetooth and then the whole different combinations of them. Some fees are like super expensive versus if you scan your car. So I know that's uh that's a whole thing into itself. So I I don't know. I guess some of it just yeah you have to pick the middle ground or whatever it is. So yeah. Thank you. There's a lot that goes into it.

Marilyn, before you head off, um have you had any discussions or have you put into your calculations uh what whatever the plans are for um citizen discounts? Do we have any details on what we're going to do for the citizens? Are you talking about for Chesby Beach residents? Yeah. Or I mean, we have a rate sheet that I used. I don't know. That would be in the summary, right? And I think we discussed um like maybe going back to the after 3:30 p.m. on Tuesdays, make it free, like th those kind of things. Yes.

Because you know my you know me, I'm always worried about you know what it costs to do stuff. This is a big huge budget item for us. We spent $18 19 million to build this. And it's not just the town's money. It's the people's money. the people were paying for this to be built. So, they're already paying for it to be built. They shouldn't be paying anything near the same rates even at peak times as uh other people from out of town, out of county. In my opinion, it's a double whammy if we're hitting them twice with the cost to build it and then again with full admissions.

I agree. Oh. I'd like to know what you know in more detail when you get a chance. I'm sure you're still thinking about this and developing strategies and so forth, but um when it's all when it all settles as far as rates go and what and how the residents are going to be interfaced with and what they what they'll end up looking like. I'd love to have that information as soon as you know it.

Sure. One one thing that might be nice for us speaking for next year is like uh I think it was on Black Friday it was like a good sale and if we had that then we would know what we would need for offsetting for the general fund for upcoming. So right now it would be before the water park opens next year. So we would be in that conversation and you say, "Hey, we had 500 Ches Peak Beach Town residents apply for their family uh season pass cards and then that's the number we use as a general fund."

Yeah. Because I mean it it like everybody said like the taxpayers spent a lot of money for this park and they should have an opportunity to have it enjoy it. I think you'll be real happy with the discounted rates for the season passes cuz those Jonathan I shared them with the water park committee just to kind of see what they felt and I think they thought we were really in line. They had a few adjustments that made sense. So, I think that summary will help us all out a lot so that we won't have you up here and just keep saying stuff in front of you over and over again. Let's get the summary when you get a chance. Sure. And um throw in our retina scans for entry and we'll be all good. Okay.

Yeah, there's some facial recognition. We can do that. I'm just joking. Thank you. All right. While we're on the water park, can we have an update on the status of the construction progress? That'll be included in my report next week. Okay. So, there is an update and movement. Yeah. Right on schedule. I was thinking everybody was going to be saying that same thing right about budget time. It was going to look like nothing was getting done. That's just it'll once that's how it is. once things get started to get started. So, it'd be nice to hear an update, but I imagine once the permits are

I'm just noticing it's nice out and I can recall uh Mr. um I can recall Paddock Pools um putting up the pressure on us to get things approved by this time last year for that reason. And it's it's nice out. I think it's uh love to see some construction, not just demo.

All right, let's move on. All right, next item on our agenda is discussion on ordinances 026-3 and 026-8 fences. You've got um the ordinances, draft ordinances in front of you. Um I'm Sarah's going to speak, right? Hi.

Okay. Sure. Um, so on your fence ordinance, um, I I wanted to draft you something you could look at and refer to to just recall like what we're doing and why we're doing it because we are doing a lot with zoning. Um, so you have a a new piece of your packet that has a picture on it. Um, and it says fences. Yes, that one. Um, and so we can we can kind of refer to that as we go along. Um, because I think

why we're doing it, what we did, and then did we do it the way you wanted us is is the question that's out there that we need to resolve. Um, so I just want to remind like the Y is because right now it's in the building construction and that means it's for Jay to review every fence. Um, there's a couple of issues because there's not a lot of clear guidelines for Jay. There's not a process for variance or appeal. Um, we actually have a couple of applications in right now where the lot is kind of short and the house is moved to the front. The actual regulation says that fence has to be can't come before halfway down the property line, which in one case is actually like behind the back of the house. And there's no way for us to allow that if they want a sixoot fence right now. Um, and so we want to resolve those issues to make things easier for folks. Um, and so there's a number of concerns regarding fences that aren't being addressed as well that staff had. Um, and when you have a fence without a gap under the bottom, even just a little gap, then you have storm water kind of collecting and flowing along that edge in certain places, and it can lead to erosion and damage to the fence itself. Um, not all contractors are installing fences in the same way. And, um, Jay has some pictures of the the middle panel of those white vinyl fences kind of getting blown out and flying around in a way that's just unsafe. Um, right now you can't construct a fence in a town right of way, which, you know, makes sense. If public works needs to get into that right of way, they need to get into that right of way. But it also doesn't make sense when you have a right of way that public works doesn't use

frequently. There should be a way to resolve that so you can build your fence, maybe put a gate, whatever is necessary so that public works can get in. Um, and so we wanted to address that. Um, there are a number of fences in town that have been constructed without a permit. They've been in place for a long time. They're not compliant. the town's gone through a variety of different uh code folks, zoning folks, and imple implementation and enforcement hasn't been consistent. Um, and so that's a part of why we wanted to move it to the zoning ordinance because in zoning you can you can change the regulations at any time and then everything behind it can become non-conforming and moving forward, we do things the right way without having to have people remove things that have been there for a long time. Um, and there are some streets where like the fences have been constructed either with permits or without permits in a way that like kind of creates a tunnel tunnel effect. Um, especially sort of across 261 over here. Um, and then there's lots that have like a really unique situation where they might not have a backyard or their backyard is really steep and so they can't use the backyard so they may want to fence the front yard. And we certainly can make an allowance for that where they can fence the front yard, but maybe it's open so you can still see and communicate with your neighbors and have that great Chesapeake Beach like hanging out feel as people are walking around. Um, and that's what the board of appeals can offer when fence regulations are in the zoning code. And so that's that was what we wanted to provide for folks. So those were the why we tackled this. Um we brought this to the planning commission because it is zoning so zoning has to go through them um on some level and um we discussed with you all whether you

wanted to repeal the building code or just make the zoning code consistent with the building code and you said let's repeal the zoning code and put everything in zoning. Um and so that's why you have two ordinances. Uh so when we put these in zoning, we allow people a variance process through board of appeals. We we actually raise the height of front yard fences um to 4T instead of 3 and 1/2 ft. We um align the where the fence can go with the house instead of the property. So you can fence in I believe it's 10 ft from your the front of your building line back. then you can fence in from there backwards um instead of your property line. Um we required that fence allow emergency access to the property um clearance for free flow of water under the fence, set some standards for installation that require the contractors to do right by the residents here, which doesn't always happen. So um we prohibit the use of barbed wire, which was prohibited anyway, but we're explicit about it. Um, we've it it reads a little complicated, but there is a legal method for allowing you to construct a fence over a right of way. Now, um, and then it also says like if you've had a pl if you've had a fence and it's been placed for like more than 10 years, even if you don't have a permit, we're not going to ask you to take it down, but when you replace it, it needs to come into compliance. Um and then it also provides clarity and increased flexibility for residents with corner lots. So those that's what we did. Um but you all still have some questions and so is the how the way we did that meeting your expectations and how can we adjust to

I had a question just the ordinance. Yeah I had a question with on the how number 10. How would you enforce the 10year rule? So like like are we just kind of setting ourselves up to have a an enforcement challenge? Unless the house was built in less than 10 years, you're just guessing, right? There's some level of guessing, right? There's some level of you look at a there's GIS. There's also, you know, like a wooden fence, it's going to be you're going to know when things are over a certain age. Yeah. But we can't hold people accountable just by we're going to know though. Well, what

I mean the 10-year thing really puts us in a predicament by we're saying you're allowed to have a 10-year rule, but then that's on a neighbor's property, but then they said we could have it like 17 years is like a Maryland rule. Why are we getting involved in a dispute? I think the 10-year rule creates issues.

Well, I'm okay with grandfathering. I just I just I just I'm I'm not a big fan of inserting ambiguity into code because I don't know how you enforce and grandfather, but putting a timeline that we have no way of knowing. It's either from the date it is on and we accept it the way it is and the material and the way and the way fences are allowed and they are present in town on this day. Is the material allowed to be used? You know, you're suggesting just start from the day we sign ordinance on

there it is. And and then also if you have properties like if this house has a property and has a fence and then this property has a fence and the neighbor in between just puts a fence between them

that kind of has their backyard fenced in. But then if this person wants to take their fence down and then they're not allowed to go into it, it creates a whole So it's it's I think it should be a broad view. If it says this street and there's a like a a structure to a street or something like that. So you're not saying if somebody had there's so behind me at my house, I had a neighbor that put a beautiful fence in and he worked with his neighbor and their fence is like this far apart, right? And good fences make good neighbors. if they wouldn't have worked together, which they had. No, they didn't have to, but everybody wants to hold back 6 in from the property line. And I think there's this whole big argument about spike fences and all this other like people are just fighting about it. They create a lot of things. At the end of the day, we're getting involved with this rule and how it is. And we have to think that good fences make good neighbors and we have to sort of legislate a path to think of how many arguments were going to be in between.

So I want to I want to ask more questions about that because what you said I want to pick out is that there's people who have disputes about the location of the fence. Is there a situation where there's fences that were constructed on the neighbors property that we weren't aware of when we drafted this legislation? I just want to make sure I understand. So, what I understand, and we don't have an attorney here to say yes, you understood that or no, you didn't understand that, but what I understand is if you have like a shed or something like that for like 17 years or something like that, I was thinking like 20 years, uh, Anna Ronaldo has a 20-year rule.

Okay.

But it's 17 years. If you are taking care of property and then you're like, "Oh, that's on my my yard and it's been seven more than 17 years or something like that and they didn't dispute it between a time like that." I think they can go to court and it resolves property drift kind of disputes. I I you can't quote me on it. I know I've read a few things on it, but I don't know how it pertains to us. So, that's where my objection on the 10-year rule is. But with fences, when I've built fences in my houses, I've held back a few inches so I'm not over my property neighbor's property cuz I don't want to build a fence at the 4 in of my property line in there. But then if they want a different kind of fence and they put a whole big fence in, now you have battling fences and then that creates fights. So I

interject for a moment. Yeah, go ahead and I'm typing to take notes and make sure I get everything right. It's okay. Just want to make sure you guys understand. Um Jay, can you explain more how GIS would help with um with understanding what fences would go over the time limit?

So on Google Earth anyway, Google Earth Pro, you can go back in time and drive the streets. So if someone said, I have this fence, you can go back pretty far and drive the streets. It doesn't go back as far as aerial views. So you can go back to aerial views from satellites to the 70s, but you might not look down and see a fence from 30,000 ft. But you can go back pretty far, at least 10 years, and drive the streets so you can see if they had a fence or not. It has a calendar. You can go back in time, if that makes sense. Is that a way that you've been looking currently or

not for fences, but well, I'll give you an example. Someone claimed our asphalt contractor two years ago took out their fence. When I went out there, I said, "Looks old to me. Let me and I went and researched four years ago. and it was the same way and showed it to the homeowner. So that was just the way that and and I saw the year before Snow actually did it. But anyway, I don't use it in this case because it hasn't been an issue. There are no grandfatherings yet. And I will say there are streets in town that are not driven by Google Earth, right? Dead ends and alleys. So 90% of the time it will probably work for 10 years, but there's always going to be a case where someone's in dispute and we have no way to defend it or recognize it.

Okay. And this is for the town administrator. I know that we're looking at some new software for the town. U would that software actually be able to give us that information to make these um decisions easier to to aspects of it will be easier. Yes.

Um but I think right now there's no um money allocated or being requested for like a full scale GIS for the town specifically. the the software that we're getting now will be helpful in at least compiling all of the information that the town has because right now that's part of the challenge, right? Like there's the work has passed through many different hands, but there was no central um repository for it. So then when you're trying to review these cases, you have to dig from lots of different places to find it. So, new software will absolutely help streamline that process, but I don't know that it's necessarily going to solve everything.

And Councilman Duval, are you thinking that 17 years would be better than 10 or we just grandfather going forward without any backtracking at all? Um, so I don't want us I don't want to put us in the middle of a conflict. And so if there's a rule about like encroachments and like neighbor or somebody has a shed on your property and taken care of, there's some rule about that. I don't want to put us in a contradiction to that rule.

Right. Well, let me let me look at the year thing first. Should we keep do you think the 10 years works or should you what would you do? So the 10 year I would either put from this moment forward or something like that and have a like a whatever period or say 20 years to me. I've proposed reviewing and and having discussions for the 20-year rule in regards to something that's in line with Anaonda County of like let bygones be bygones kind of thing. And if it ain't been an issue in 20 years, it whatever that is, but that's down the road on this. But I do not like the 10 years, especially not being able to clarify if that puts us in somebody else's argument.

I agree that I don't want to be in anybody's argument. Um, and I would say it would be very helpful. We have five that we're looking at today to have the attorney here. Um, my question is about this uh four B. And it says, um,

withstanding the provisions of paragraph 4A of this subsection, fences may be constructed in a location that restricts access to an easement or rightway, provided that the property owner executes a declaration of covenants to be recorded in the land records of Calvert County in favor of the beneficiary of the easement or rightway in a form prescribed by the down. Um, do we have all that figured out?

So, the attorney does. Uh, the way this kind of happened was the planning commission said, "Yes, we agree people should be in certain situations able to build fences over a right of way, but we don't have the legal knowledge to know how that works. So, when we send this over to council, can we say, "Hey, council's attorney, can you draft the section that achieves this goal?" And so, this was drafted by the attorney to achieve that goal. I can explain it.

What what I don't understand is if somebody can go and get permission to build a fence in a rightaway and now the the standard rightaway laws don't exist anymore. Is that what happens? Like I I would not be for this code if that's what this is doing. It's a legally recorded deed. Like it's an amendment to the deed. So it goes with the title. Um and it it says that the fence can be removed by the town as needed. Um okay. So it it's so the right of way still exists.

The right of the way still Laur is actually so important because when we were campaigning there was a house that we talked to and their house it happened twice. It happened a couple times, but two houses try to connect a fence or two houses are next to each other, but there's a easement that goes through for uh sewer or storm water and you can't go over the top of it. So, one house can't put a fence up to connect in. So, they can do their entire house except for like one corner of it. So, then the piece is like, no, they should be able to do that. But as a homeowner, you understand that if Jay or the town or the county has to come in to do maintenance, they have the authority to pull that out and it's the homeowner's responsibility to then fix and repair.

Yes, I'm for that. I'm not for I've I've read a lot of things about easements and right ofways and um in this packet and I just want to make sure that we're not taking away right of ways. Yeah. But to have to file some thing with the title and all that other stuff. I mean that's that's that's a lot of burden. Like now you're making it more like jumping through hoops. Why are we trying to make people jump through more hoops? I don't know.

Yeah. And I think you're you're right. Right. It feels like hoops is why can't I just put my fence up here that this is stuff I mow. Public works is never here. But the bottom line is it is still a right of way. And so what we're trying to do is say instead of saying no, this three feet you can't fence in and so you have to build a whole side fence, we're going to give you a way to fence in that 3 ft. Yes, it is legal hoops, but at least it's a solution that you don't have. That's your own risk.

I mean, everywhere I know, if you put a if you have an easement to storm water, you put something there and they come there and they got to get in access, you got to cover the cost. I mean, everybody I'm pretty sure that's the rules that everybody lives by. I don't know why we're having to make hoops to jump through on something that everybody knows that's the rules. It's because we can't sign off on a permit that goes over a right of way. So, people would have to build fences that are illegal and then we would have more issues of illegal fences. So, we want to give people a way to come to us with their fence for us to be able to sign. We can't not permit. Why are we getting involved? Like like that's

like why do we have fence right? Like why do we do if if you're saying that you can't do it but then you can do it if you go through all this big complicated thing. Why we say it needs to be open if we ever need to get to it. We need to get to it. We can't say you can or we can't say you can't but we can permit from here to here and that's it. Oh because the attorney advised we can't do that. So that's why it is the way it is. But what we could look at administratively is ways to make that process less cumbersome. Right. Could we look at I mean could it be a memorandum of understanding or agreement with the town versus and it's just on file here versus I have no clue what the legal process

and so that's something well that's something through with the attorney. And if I can weigh in just because I'm going to be the one going out there and believe me you don't want a free-for-all. There's more right ofways and stuff in this town and you just because you may think I'll tell you what I'll do. You do whatever you want, but when I take down their fence, I'm gonna give them your number. And I'm being honest because then we have it solved. Put that in the ordinance. Um, appendix E.

Not to interrupt you. All kidding aside, these so a developer comes in, you have rightaways, you have easements, you have storm water, you have to have stuff going to these houses. They have to pick someone. If you pick a house, look at your plat, you live by storm water easement. Well, you probably got a discounted rate that so you can't just come in and the town designated it and now all of a sudden I'm going to build my fence. I get it. And I have actually signed off on two in Chesig Village where it made sense. It's all underground utilities. There's no manhole we have to access. They came to town and reviewed it. Yeah, it's across a stormwater easement, but it made sense just like you said, it was one corner. So, I had the authority in that case under my Yeah, you can do it. Here's your thing. They also sign it as part of the permit. It's on record. So, might not be me, might not be you, but someone's coming one day. The other side of it is they put up a fence and that storm line fails, right? Who's liable? So, it's I I get the handshake and let's move on. That's not today's world. There'll there'll be an attorney involved if something fails.

So, it's my understanding that the town of Chesapeake Beach does not have a storm water like we don't we're not in charge of our storm water management thing. It's the county that adopts that. Is that like how how is where's the the where's the where's the storm water? Got you. Um, so when it actually hits the pond, that's the county. Up to it in Richfield is HOA, but we are own and maintain our own storm water systems. The actual settlement ponds that you see

that's in a in Ridgefield station and and not in not in uh developments throughout the rest of town. How does that work? That's the towns to own and maintain, not the county. If I could, I think the confusion is so the stormwater manual we've adopted is the county stormwater manual. So when you want to develop on a parcel, you have to comply with the storm water the county stormwater manual, but the actual infrastructure is the towns. So it's just the the regulations are the counties and the county is the one who reviews those regulations and make sure development is consistent with it. But the infrastructure then comes back to us.

What does the county's regulations say about it? about the fences.

So, the county I I don't know specifically what the county says about rights of way and fences. I'm sure they don't permit them in rights of way. Like, normally if it says nothing, it they're you're you're not it's not permitted. You just can't build. Um, what I think might be possible, right, with the attorney is for her to have like a here's the boilerplate of what you're going to agree to. Um, it will have to be adjusted for different types of rights away and different types of properties, but I don't think it's as painful as it sounds in the writing. Like it it's painful to read, but I don't think the actual process is going to be as painful for residents. And and I hope people understand that like there's so many arguing that that all this back and forth with us is just trying to take what other people's disagreements are. I mean like I I hope you don't

No, I hear what you're saying. You know what I mean? Like I I see that behind me. That was a great example that they work together. There's not always that way. and and it's and it's and it's challenging to think about. Yeah.

Yeah. I hear so I hear what you're saying and I think because this is why I wanted to write it down because I want to go back to the concern you have like what if you know what if you agree and then the fence goes up and then your neighbor takes the fence down. What if your neighbor has actually constructed the fence on your property line? And I think that's where the 17-year concern you have is coming in. And so I think that's where, you know, you're right, our 10-year, like are we really are we allowing someone who's constructed a fence on the neighbor's property line to to allow keep it there? And so maybe there needs to be a caveat. If if your fence was constructed on your neighbor's property, then it is not going to be permitted through this. But we're also not going to get in that, right? If you have a permit for the fence that showed you were going to build a fence on the property line and then you didn't, that really becomes a civil dispute. Um, so we can say if we can obviously see, we can say you're in violation of your permit, but if it's like it's 3 in over and I know cuz that's harder for us to deal with. Um, so we don't, you know, that becomes more of a civil matter or in getting the surveys, but I think that there's room to kind of expand that to make sure that we're not supporting people taking property from each other. Is that meeting your concern?

Exactly. and in having these conversations and stuff like that is is just kind of looking ahead to to prevent and did we cover this scenario because as Jay said a hundred times if not more I mean even there was somebody came up once had some things to say fences it's a it's a it's a it's a touchy subject.

Hey Sarah, can I can I just make sure my my point is captured. I I like number I'm good with 10. I just think it needs to be a point and like call it. That's my personal perspective. And then I I appreciate the easement piece. If there's an easier way to do it, I'm for it. If the way it's written is the the right way for the attorney, I'm for that, too. I have three things. You're only allowed two. Oh, all right. Go ahead. All right. Well, one of them has already been mentioned, so doesn't Okay, so that one doesn't count.

No, but I just want to uh say that I I think that it's a little sloppy here with the not not that your work is sloppy, but it's sloppy to execute the 10-year thing. Um I would be for ex grandfathering existing to the day of it passing and anything beyond that, new or rebuilt, is subject to the new code. It's just clean and simple.

Um my other two questions are um so why why do we prohibit and I think I'm pretty sure we are here, but correct me if I'm wrong, but why are we why do we prohibit front yard fences?

Two things. I I do just want to go back to your previous statement and make a request. Okay. I think if the public right knows you're going to grandfather every fence from once you pass it, there are lots of people who are asking us for permits for fences that they can't build, they have a lot of motivation to just go build those fences without permits. Um, so it might be best to say maybe a month ago or two months ago. Um, so that people don't have an incentive to build fences without a permit until it gets passed. That's just my two cents. Well, when was this for when was this first introduced? We could do that date, right? I just wanted to put that in there. But I do mean like where's the line in the sand? The lines in the sand is sand. I mean, you No, no, she's saying

because with 20 days, you can put a bunch of your fences up if the line in the sands when it goes in act now. Yes. There's already a process in place, right? Has to go through Jay. Yeah. But yes. So if they if they build without a permit then right legal fence anyway. That's true. So then your qu second question is about prohibiting the sorry I I got I wrote prohibiting and then I think it was about the limit on the front yard

the front yard fences. Right. So um you know you you've said a couple times that good fences could make good neighbors and I was curious about that. So I went and I saw that it was actually a poem by Robert Frost and there was followup like the the author is contemplating like why do we have this sense like what is its purpose like what am I walling in and what am I walling out and I thought that was powerful as a planner because the reason planners tend not to like front yard fences and communities don't like front yard fences is because they prohibit this conversation. Right? So, a front yard fence that's four feet, three and a half feet, you can still see your neighbors, communicate with your neighbors, and and community gets built in this front yard. A front yard fence that's six feet. Well, now

it's I agree with that. So, this does allow a front yard fence, just not one that's over four feet. Okay. So, we're increasing from three and a half to four. Just for clarification, that's the way it's always been. Okay. Okay. Thank you. tell you tell you that that that kind of really really thing you know the furnace on zoom is a welcoming thing you know and and and preventing and blocking and all that stuff and everything. Yeah, that shouldn't be allowed. All right, my my this is my last one. So, um, talking about the, um, easements and right of way, um, and we're, I think we're specifically talking about, um, town right ofways, correct?

Yes.

Okay. So, what about a situation where you have a flag lot and there's another person that branches off the flag lot down and they have an easement to use that other person's drive to get to their secondary flag lot. If the person who actually owns the initial drive wants to put a fence across the front, can they is there a is there a procedure or some type of way for them to do that with the permission of the other person who already has an easement there in the same similar style process that we have outlined here for the uh town to do so?

I would say no. And I would say no because everybody doesn't always live in their house. People sell their houses, new people move in, new people have different arguments. And I think closing off somebody's access to their lot is a problematic for that, but it's also problematic from a emergency access standpoint. If there's a gate over your front yard and fire, you know, these are reason. Like both what if both residents say, "Hey, you know what? This guy wants to build it and he wants to put a gate there and he's going to

give me the code and I'm fine with it. Is there some way to codify that? Is there some process if they they want the gate? They both will have access the right of the easement is still there that can be codified between them." Yeah. Right. But I guess it's I just wanted to bring it up because it came to my mind. And I'm like, I don't think this situation is covered here. What are we going to do? Yeah. From a health and safety standpoint, I just don't think it's a good idea because there's just there's too many factors, right? That fence could never be built.

They would have to just build it on the other side of the driveway access, right? And I think we've all been down those uncomfortable little flag lot driveways where you're surrounded by fence um because people wanted to fence in their yards. But yeah, I think that's the safest thing. So we couldn't have I mean it couldn't be it couldn't be covered by any type of variance process or anything like that. I I just don't think I think I think ultimately like health code and safety rules would overrule something like that. I don't know. You you maybe know more about that than I do. Only question I would say if it moves to what we're talking about would they have the right to appeal it? Could they sit in front of a board? That's my question. Because right now they can't. Yeah. Yes. They could go to the board of So there is an avenue. There is a way.

Yes. And then it then that would that would rest on the will of the board at that the complexion of the board at that time and whatever they think. So which can change from time to time and I'm not trying to say but there could be a very specific one time unique example where they can justify they do have an avenue is my point and currently they don't. Okay. Yeah. I don't know of any situation like that. It's I'm not thinking of a particular situation. We're thinking I was thinking of having fire nightmares.

This ordinance came to us uh last meeting or the one before and we kicked it back to this work session. So, do we have enough um discussion tonight to be able to vote on it at the next meeting? Well, if anybody has any motions to make, they can make the motions. We can pass it or we can fail. I think there was a bunch that we were waiting on the lawyer for a lawyer to weigh in on a bunch of it. So I don't think we're ready because like I mean look how many what have we been on this for that many? So the 10 year thing do we have consensus to go back to the date of introduction? I think it sounded like fine with the date of passing because it's they still need a permit. They need a permit.

February 4th, 2026. Right there written February 4, 2026. We will have to make a motion to change that to grandfather existing to the date of passing because you got to remember we also have to take one or one ordinance off. You got two one thing comes off and this takes its place. So we have to vote on both of them to make sure that we have something to replace it what we repealed because that was which is why we said before we need to put the passing ahead of the repeal in case the right might want to take it away if we don't have anything to take

and I think Sarah or I think Sarah was cautious she's like oh no like everybody in the world is going to go for it. So the line to sand is just on February 4th, right? When we flushed that out, we we decided that they need they still need a permit to this day with Jay in order to build a fence. So if they do not if they do not seek a permit and just build a fence, it's an illegal fence. Then we'd have to go through and take all the fences that are in out. That's the problem because there are so many people that have six foot fence in front of the house, which has never been allowed. The point of grandfathering is so you grandfather all the fences that don't have permits. Ali aliop.

Yeah. So it's a separate point like B1 is that it has a valid permit. B2 is that it's been there for 10 years because we know people built them without valid permits. There wasn't code enforcement to enforce it. Okay. And we don't want to go and send code enforcement all over town telling them to take down. Yeah. I mean I would agree. But if it passes next week, hold on though. If it passes next week, nobody, first off, nobody's going to rush out to go build a fence in the next.

Hold on. We haven't made the motion. So, it's in this public. Yeah. Like the six people on YouTube. So I mean I just tell you if that man you can't say we was back before we even said that that works for No we vote and move. All right. I think we're I think we're done with this aren't we Sarah? Thank you sir. Okay. Wait. We're not doing anything like this is the exact ordinance that we're going to see. We have to make the motion next week. Yeah, this is what's already been produced. Yeah.

Oh, yes. So, this is what we're going to see. We got to make supposed to I thought we were supposed to combine it with the other one. What Lori said. As long as we pass the replacement before we pass the repeal. Um, should be fine. I think that makes sense.

Yeah. I know you guys want to move on and I don't I have my other meeting to get to but I want to make sure that so that when we're prepared for the motions you might make and we can help you get them there. The changes that you want to make is that you want to look at this 10 period of 10 years for the enforcement action and either move it to a shorter period of time or eliminate it altogether. Um, and that's something you're still sort of deciding on. And then not make not make a determination on

just making a determination that it's there. Not make a determination that because we don't want to say it's a it it's authorized on somebody else's property. So whatever the tricky legal language of that that's where where my caution about not being ready for No, she's talking about she is talking about that's what I'm talking about. We're talking about the same thing. We're talking about the same thing. arms of I just I just Yes. So understand Dan speaking

the motion that that Dan I'm sorry that council member Duval would be making is that B2 would be amended so that it's existed in its current location and configuration for a period of 10 years or more 10 or more years and is without enforcement in action and is fully located on the property of the fence owner, right? You want to make sure it's that's not on somebody else's property. So, it's not exactly that language, but it's something like that that has to go on there. Yes. But I also think he wants to eliminate the 10-year.

Yeah. I any and all language of the 10-year. I don't think we should have anything in opposition of what when it comes to that kind of stuff. That that's a tricky thing. So, I don't think anything referencing 10 years. I don't know why we picked 10 years, but it should either be whatever allows for that state law to be there and us to be behind that. But whatever the lawyer says in regards to that, I don't want us to be involved in an argument. Yeah. What? Okay. So, what we're trying to do with the 10 years is allow people who have illegal fences and have had grandfather.

So, I thought the idea we we get rid of the 10 years and then we pick a date. is either the date of it was introduced or the date of the passing and I think that's what we're all to be introduced. Okay, there you go. Date of the you remove the 10 years date of the introduction and then there be an amendment we will be correct to discuss. Yeah, we'll make that amendment. You want to make an amendment to the date back to the date it was introduced. I I have an administrative question about how this would work actually when the staff has it. So that grandfathering seems to work well when the people who've lived in the house live in the house. But if someone if new people come Yes.

and they say this doesn't align with code, right? Is it that they well you bought the house before 2026 or after 2026 so you just have to deal with what you have right so this is this is a point and the planning commission actually spent a lot of time talking about this on another matter it's like things don't get disclosed when people buy houses so they buy a house oh it's got this beautiful deck find come to find out the previous owner had a stop work remove order on it and now they have to remove this deck that that they just bought house for and they didn't know there's an existing file on it,

right? And maybe it's not safe, right? So, there's all sorts of reasons this happens. And so, if you're a new homeowner, you come in and you buy a house and the fence has been there for more than 10 years, but it's a little old. So, you're going to fix it up and you think you're going to put the fence in the same place. That's the question, right? And you're not going to be able to because

your fence was grandfathered. Now, this is what you have to do. And I wish that I had a solution for this problem because it's so prevalent with so many things. Flood plane regulations, non-compliance, interior and exterior, and there's just not enough disclosures when people buy houses. Um, but when someone goes to get a permit to remove and rebuild a fence in the same place, they'll learn before they do any demolition what's going on. So hopefully, well, that's on them. That's not our responsibility.

But it but it's like this. you go in and you and you'll put a a fence and and then you say it's oh well your neighbor complains and you have to move it back and you're expecting to put the fence in and then you say oh well you can't replace it. I didn't like how you couldn't even replace panels like so you're just going to let things deteriorate like it's I think thought it was a 50% um rule that we have in here but I'll have to like a grandfathered fence if you have to do it then it has to go away like there's not a percentage thing at

right it is it's if more than 50% of the linear length of any single fence line defined as a continuous run of fence along a single property line is removed replaced or altered within 12 months, the entire fence line shall be brought into full compliance with subsection J. So that's that's typically the 50% is the threshold typically for substantial improvement of to things and that's when it triggers it. So you can replace those panels, but if you're replacing more than 50% then you need to bring it into compliance. So

what is altered? How we how are we defining altered? I mean, it's it's just going to be when it comes in, right? Or or it's someone's doing the work. Um, and I think the the real issue is going to be fence fences in the front yard that are more than 4 feet, right? Those are problematic and they're not permitted and so they don't have a permit. And so, that's really where you're going to see it. someone replacing the back part of their fence, they they might they may come in, right? They should come in, but they might not come in.

But when you say 50%, is it 50% of all the fencing or just the front yard fencing?

Oh, it's 50% of any So, it says the linear length of any single fence line as defined as a continuous run of the fence along a single property line. to the side, the rear, and the um other side, but not these two pieces that connect it. Those pieces you can replace fully really. Um, and so that's, you know, it it's it will be challenging, but we already have a challenging situation. Um, that I think we want to, you know, people who come and ask us for fences, it's awful to have to tell them like, you can fence in your backyard, but it's not even going to be connected to the back of your house. And we do want, we do want residents to be able to do these things,

right? So that's the example I've been trying to So my neighbor had a fence, but he like he had the fence and then the other one put a nicer fence in and he has another neighbor that has a nicer fence. And so by him just trying to do the right thing and be a good neighbor, then he would have been in a jam. That's that's what I'm saying. Like there's like So you're saying linear foot, but in with his situation, he wouldn't have had the linear foot. And so then if he had something happen.

So you're saying like if a sideyard is defined as a sideyard that's fenced and this neighbor has a nicer fence, then he can say, "Yeah, you can and do your whole yard and put a nicer fence in instead of having battling fences." Yeah. So if you connect to your neighbor's fence, right, you can do that. Connect to your neighbor's fence because it's on the property line, but it's your neighbor's fence. So if they decide to take it down, then you have to build the section on your property line that's yours if you want the fence to continue. That's just, you know, correct. But

if they weren't allowed to have a fence on that yard, but the other person was grandfathered in, right? And so you're saying that's a grandfathered fence line, but that other one's not a grandfathered fence line. So you can't replace it with a nicer fence because it's the greater than 50%. Well, you'll you will eventually have to replace it because it will deteriorate and be non-compliant with code. There's a lot of problems and no resolutions coming out of us right now. Unless we got a way to solve it, I think that we need to just get it up, make our motions, and vote on it when it's time to do it.

Agree with you. and we've we've now spent 45 minutes of this meeting on this particular topic. Uh and we've still got quite a bit left to go. So, I think unless somebody objects seriously, I'd like to just move us forward on the agenda and we can uh you know vote on this at the next meeting and uh if anybody has amendments that they want to propose, they can bring them up at the meeting and if the council agrees to the amendments, we will we will include them. Uh but at this point since uh we're really in my mind way behind schedule and like I say we we started talking about this at 7:15. Uh Sarah, thank you for your patience and u

let's move on to the next item, the discussion on O-26-4 taxation. Um and Jamie, I believe you're taking the lead on this.

Yeah, this one was just uh actually he's here in the back. uh was brought in because there was a question regarding um uh the time or like if you had to be a resident or Calver County because the the way it was written was Calver County. We went back and looked at it and in the county's application it's in section it's 136-59 eligibility uh B says that was and has remained doiciled in the state of Maryland. Uh so it's not Palver County. So because of that uh Alyssa had sent a revision to make it match uh the county exactly. Uh so so we're to so that was the remaining question. I like you guys can debate it all you want if you want but I think that was just puts it in front and then the council can make a a vote yes or no in support and it'll either pass or fail.

This is the same uh issue that we've been discussing for quite some period of time. We pulled it off because there was a good question because the ours said Pacific Calver County, the counties in the state did not explicitly say that. So we were trying to only match to make sure it's succinct doicile from the date a judged. Um so the date that you were judged to be Yeah. So that's that's in Maryland and in Calbert within 10 years after the judgment. So, state of Maryland when you had the adjudication and you can move to Calbert within 10 years after that and then that's what makes you eligible.

Yeah. And it goes through a state has a process. I I don't I don't know what that looks like, but there is a formal process that you have to go through with the county and the state. We saw um we had some public comment from somebody at the fire department um about getting the tax credits. So this it looks like that's covered under u that's tax credit for their home. That's a different thing than this right here. This is only for disabled. It's only for disabled but the one state. So does this mean that we would not have to administer it then because that was the so

well there was a there was a requirement that civilia I think this was correct that the there is a requirement for us to administer it internally. However it's only a handful of residents that that meet it. the fire the volunteer fire tax credit that's a different that's separate because this is tied to right disabled disabled that's a home like it's disabled like in the line of duty

so this is I think we're moving so this is I think what we were all trying to say through all this but there was something where the Alyssa was saying we we have to still administer it or do something about that But here that burden of all that work is done. Correct. Is that that's what I'm understanding what I was trying to get to is that the bulk of the work is certified from someone else and we accept the certification, right? And there may be additional questions that we have to ask. Wouldn't have to reertify what's already been done. All right. Good.

Okay. Any other questions? Is this a mirror image of the county code or not? It is. And that's that's why we that's why we pulled it out to make sure it matched instead of it previously was not because it was explicit to Calvert County, but it is now. Yeah. For all law enforcement. Yes. And she did have to she did Alyssa and I don't want to mean to speak for her, but she did uh say that there was some nuances she added in that ties back to how the state says you're supposed to do this. Uh but that's like legalities.

Yeah. So the nuance that I see is the was the principal residence of the fallen law enforcement officer or rescue officer and his or her spouse or cohabitant at the time of the fallen law enforcement officers rescue workers death. I just I don't see anything in this and I did read it quickly because it was a revision that came later. Um, I don't see anything that requires it to be a principal residence. And I think that that is important that we're not giving tax credits for any or multiple second homes.

So, if if there's no principal um residence language in here, I don't find this appropriate. All right, that's a motion that we can look at next time. I should be a primary residence. I'm I'm going to double check. I agree 100% with you, too. That's the same way the veterans uh get theirs. It's principled residence. Yeah. All right. That's a great call out. Looks like that's under 257-14 A1. Is that principal residence? See, right, John?

Yeah. A1 right here. is the principal residence of the disabled law enforcement officer. That's the that's the first sentence. Yeah. Property that is subject of the application is the principal res. This is on the revision on page three. Right. But then you have two was the principal residence. Well, it's fallen if you have a fallen right. So that mean that person can still stay there and be underneath that until they So only this house. Yes. Yeah. One at the time. Okay. I think that's covered. Yep.

Okay. Good. Excellent. Now we're moving forward. We did that in five minutes. Yay. All right. Next. Um, right away an easement uh discussion. Who's got that? Damn. hand of all.

Oh, is that this? I think we uh maybe push this to another work session. This is a little long in the tooth of a conversation for being 8:00 at night. What do y'all say about that? Second that. That's your heart, brother. Hey, uh six new friends or more. Okay, we're going to defer. So proud of him right now. All righty. All right. Next. Um, field concept plan. I'll say we probably just do the same with that.

Well, this this one I know Similia has got to update. I'll be I'll just be really quick. I we did get some initial cost estimates back. um based off of those cost estimates though, I think it's I I think um it's owed to the council that we come back with alternative options because it was higher than what we said. So I I want to understand with Wayne like what can you know is there like alleart that we can do or can we just have multiple options so that I'm not because what I don't want to do is just say here's the only one here's the cost because it is fairly higher than the the an estimate that came in. So, um I but I can't give that to you guys right now cuz I

I like the idea of having like different concept plans like we did with the water park even though that was only two options but yeah, if you could do something that would be good. Yeah. So, we're we're we're going to work that with Wayne and Silia to to have that conversation. So,

do you do you think it's still fruitful to have a discussion about the Mahoney's diamond or table that too? I don't need to I don't think you even need to. Uh because um and I was looking at that that reference um if you go back and look at it, it actually doesn't state what it is. It just says it's Mahoney's Diamond. It doesn't actually reference anything. And it actually says the if you look at it, none of those parks in there reference anything. So in theory, we could move those parks wherever we want in the entire town because they don't say it's this exact location. It's kind of like a part participation trophy kind of thing, you know.

So, I get the intent. I mean, there is the there was the intent of the previous council, so I get that. But, uh, I don't think it actually holds a lot of weight. I think it'd be worth thinking about what to do with at least the black or maybe. Yeah, but I would only want to do that like after we've like agreed we're going to do something because otherwise we're spinning on we're spinning on changing something that we haven't even agreed to. There's no looking at any change or anything right now.

I'll keep my update really short. I just wanted to give you guys uh more context to the resolution that you would be receiving on Thursday um for adoption uh if you so voted that way. Um so we received the funding, the grant from NFC, National Fitness um campaign for the uh studio fitness court, which is like the adult activity um workout combination exercise um addition. It's a stu they call it a studio. It's like an kit type of build

um to be added to the Kellumfield complex area. So, they have awarded $35,000 in funds um for the installation and construction of that project. Um they ask, however, that the council adopts some sort of well completes in the resolution of adoption for the the intent to put it there before they as a part of their award process. And so that is what um will be on the agenda on Thursday. Um and you can read through if you have specific questions. Um I'm happy to answer them, but just wanted I didn't want it to be a surprise on Thursday like why do we have this resolution here um and they ask that the town council adopts it?

Where would this um workout equipment be physically? Yeah. So, we're working with Wayne and his team to figure out the best footprint to place it there. Um, they were brought into the conversation earlier on just when we were rolling through what the options were. So, they're confident that there's a place for it to go. Um, and part of the award process once you have the resolution adopted is to work with uh the town engineer to work with the uh manufacturer to figure out how to

on the on the concept plan. It was behind the bleachers next to the pickle ball courts. And this was the item that was in the council meeting. Remember last week you saw like a blue court that was split half exercise and half a open space for uh fitness, outdoor fitness. That makes sense because there's a fair bit of space behind the bleachers that fundamentally it's not used for much as long as the council agrees to take the fence down. I mean that's a Lor's favorite thing. I will agree to take the fence down. Did any did you write that down? Okay. that

very really quickly is that I mean this project um if everything goes according to plan could be like ribbon cutting ready in October it is a court and some equipment is that what it is I don't think of it like a pickle ball court like you like just just for notional reference think of it like a a open pickle ball court put a divider in the One half of it is outdoor exercise equipment that folks can use and then the other half of it is an open space that could be leveraged for yoga

a yoga class or some kind of fitness class and and that's where we talked about maybe we start introducing like town functions. I know Anthony talked about bringing in folks to do like town organized exercise classes and and part of that like the parks and wreck does at a smaller scale right now like they'll have people who come in and do yoga um and it's open and and free to the public during the summer. This would give them a dedicated space to do that. The town does tumbling and stuff. Yep. Tumble Tuesdays. And you uh also have an app that goes along with the court. And so when you're trying to navigate through the equipment, you can download the app for free and then be able to have like be led through um the activities.

And the app was free. Yes. Yeah. And the idea behind it, the heart behind it was we're we're going to have this water park and it you know it's open for all, right? But a lot of people who don't have children or may be more mature in the age um have had, you know, comments about the fact that, you know, there's a lot of investment that goes into making sure that families are served, but not as much investment that goes into older adults. And so there have been requests for um fitness facilities um as an suggestion. And so this would meet some of those.

Yeah, I would just say poll something like this because it's a little bit different than I thought. I originally thought it was going to be like a course that Yeah, we're still there's still talks about a walking path and stuff, but then then there was this discussions. Do you put a workout station at like throughout the walking path? Yeah. Um but then this one we got some feedback, Nick. No, they actually would prefer it. So you walk, you just literally go from this exercise machine to this machine and you have it right there. I've seen the playground. My point. Yeah. Yeah. that that was one of the top items actually in the uh the survey that we did. So yeah, great. I got a question. Is this

uh resolution that we're talking about? Is this severed from the overarching redevelopment of the park? So even if we decide not to do anything else at the park, we're we we will do this because we have a grant if as long as we agree to that. Is that is that correct? Yeah. Okay. And that grant has soccer. That's what people want there. That's my that's my only question. I don't know if it has to be in that exact location like behind the bleachers. I mean, it could go wherever at Kellums, but but yes, the thing itself. Yes. Yeah. I mean, yeah, that there are people that want it. Raise your hands.

I know because I'm one of them. I'm one of them. It's our citizens and we want it. So yeah, people want it. Let's move. Let's go to the next thing. Listen to you. All right, let's move on. Okay, next. Uh we had on the list rental subcommittee recommendations and that was Dan D standal that one.

Nope. So I would like to say thank you to the people who participated and it was uh we've had no shortage of opinions and when it comes to the different items uh when it comes to our rental policy and a lot of different narratives I set out for a goal. I was like, "Hey, I think if we make too many changes, then it'll create an uncertainty." And I was just trying to make some adjustments. And we went through and started um I had written up some stuff from different conversations I had with Miss Deborah Montgomery Buckingham. uh she uh she's very knowledgeable and and she uh I'm very thankful for everything that she kind of explained to me that I had no idea about. So, uh I I have to really acknowledge and thank her for a lot of the information that goes into it. She's a realtor and she deals with a lot of rental people and I don't know it was uh I had some really good participation in the committee. It was a lot of work. I gave homework. It it was on a three-week schedule. It and we had a deadline and and I I really wanted to say thank you to the to Anthony, to Cheryl, to Wes and De and uh and staff. You know, it's uh

at the end of the day, it was just a few little problems. You guys can read through it, ask me questions all you want, but it was just a few little things that were creating the I guess the little conflicts, little small adjustments like uh in our inspection report, the vagueness of other on the inspection report. the vagueness of other could be left open to any interpretations. So we went through, we had assignments and I mean we we took a survey. I did an evaluation like you know I I didn't think I was going to make such an improvement but I guess some of the things we had already put them in place but this is the sort of the overview of the work that went into it. I think we have a few hundred pages of transcripts if y'all want to listen to it. Well, thanks Dan. This uh I'm looking at the reports that you've submitted here and

this looks really very good. It looks like good work and thank you for your hard work. Anybody got any questions or any comments on this before we move on? Go ahead Jamie. Yeah, I so I know the accessory dwelling unit modification that is a it don't have nothing to do with us. We can't do it because the state we have to match the state though or we have to remove the state has a new rule. I'm sorry that ADUs are being addressed by the planning and zoning. Okay. Make sure that we're uh in accordance with the state mandate that goes into effect October 1. So they will have their recommendations for council in the next month or two and and the state changed the rule in March.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So that's why I didn't update with what our opinion was. Well, the the Well, the reason I would ask though is that planning and zoning will give a recommendation. It's a state. I mean, you can always surpass the state as long as you can't reduce, you can't just you can't make it more strict, but you could probably No, you have to watch the Okay.

Watch. Is there any I guess my question would be is there legislative changes that we should anticipate uh out of this or I I do like I appreciate this is actually really well put together. Um a lot of it is obviously administrative actions that the town takes through checklist and stuff but is there any legislative is there any I think there is I think there is some res uh legislative things that we have to do. Uh I think we had written up a resolution or something like that Anthony that

uh and this is sort of the framework that has gone into that resolution but with that update that came from the state in March. It's sort of I wanted to present this for us so that we all have a chance to look at it, discuss it and and then when we have the resolution, I think we have to we really have to hear the the impact. But this is to show that we are going to be ready and align come October for the state's rules. you you like we were in almost finished with the session and something changed so that's where we just

Okay. So this isformational more to follow with legislators. Yeah, there will be like short-term rentals. appreciate this. Come back with time to talk about it because

the the International Property Maintenance Code is basically being circumvented by this and there are quite a few protections in that for people that we might want to consider adding um to the bare minimum uh as a standard for landlords to me is not appropriate. it. Um, and yes, and so what I would say is that I think what would work best from a process standpoint is for you you all to review what the recommendation is of the subcommittee. it's a recommendation and then if there are legislative activities that need to happen as it pertains to the ripple code then you would make those changes there and then the staff would acquies to whatever the updated code says. So if that is something you want to have or not have the code should say if it's something that's mandated for the town to follow. So I'm just saying that the next step is for you all to figure out what your proposed changes to the actual code is and then discuss it amongst yourself and then someone introduce it at a time

whatever the changes are. So, if we're proposing code changes, then I think we need time to talk about them because there's Yeah, there's definitely and I for the record, I tried to insert myself into this process before it got to with you, Lori.

Um, but yeah, removing protections for people is not a small thing. And um you know there's there's nothing in here for rodents. There's a whole suite of things in that international property maintenance code that protects human beings and I think we should be considerate of that. These are recommendations to look over. Look over it and if you see something you want to come out of it, you present that. That's it. That makes sense. Here we go. Proof means that it was a majority just between us. He was like, "Yeah, let's move forward." We think that's a good idea.

And then the two that are listed as council decision. That wasn't a decision for us to make, right? Because there's code now. There's livability code. We're not voting anything in. It's just recommendations. That's it. Just like planning it. It makes a recommendation. We make a choice. Great. So continue to move on. Next item uh and you know number eight here items for awareness uh the general fund treatment plant fund mitigation fund and uh Dan Ben. Thank you mayor. Thank you. Um

so since the general fund and the um wastewater treatment plant fund ordinance were submitted last month, there's been some updated changes that have been requested within the budgets for those two funds. And so I've laid them out in the documents that you have in front of you and also on the uh screen. So the first and I commented on it earlier is under the general fund which is ordinance 026-9 um you know we had talked to the town attorney about how to incorporate salaries into the uh budget and she recommend adding a another section to the ordinance and that is shown as section four which uh states that staff salaries include a 2.7% cost of living adjustment and merit increase of 3 to 6% % uh as we discussed earlier, we'll have a um close session I guess hopefully next week to uh show you the salaries and then you know the attorney recommend this how we incorporate them into the budget and approval by the council. Um so then when we get into the spreadsheet itself um the first column shows what the uh new uh revenue and expenditure line items would be. The second column is what the original ordinance has as the uh revenue and expense accounts. And then the third and fourth column show what the changes are and uh what the uh reasons for the changes are in the memo section.

So if you start with the uh first page under the revenue there are a few revenue adjustments. Uh first one being a increase in the use of uh fund balance or reserves of 300,831. And as we get through the uh you know expense side, you'll see what attributes to those. Um the state bond bill for the harbor well when originally proposed, we had it in the general fund, but after looking at it and thinking about it, uh we felt that should be in the uh utility fund budget versus the general fund. So we move both the revenue and capital expense associated with that which I uh summarized earlier when we went over the utility fund budget. Uh the program open space grant uh originally we had it at zero after conversations with the county and how they are handling their program open space program. Um, you know, the way way that it has been working is we submit an annual program to them. They include heirs with North Beach in the county and submitted to the county commission for approval. Uh, what we didn't realize is that there was never any specific funding for all the projects that are submitted. Um, and they're just requests and that as money comes available, you could possibly move forward with your projects. Um, I had in in the conversations I had with the county, I I I reiterate that I didn't think that that was uh an equitable way to share in the program open space funds at other counties that I'm familiar with, especially Prince George's County. The individual municipalities,

I'll back up. The program is administered from by the state through the counties. And if there are municipalities, you submit to the county and they will go back up to the state with your projects for funding. In Prince George's County, the uh Maryland National Park and Planning Commission allocates a certain amount to the municipalities based on a formula, I think, population. Uh so I recommended that to the uh Calvert County uh POSOS people and they took it back and in this um in their budget for this year they have allocated 10% of their budget to Chesapeake Beach. So it amounts to about 120,000 and they said in subsequent years they intend to do that as well. So of the allocation the county gets from the state, we will be getting a proportionate share uh uh of those funds. So we will actually have an amount that we could use from year to year. So for us uh it's 120,000 uh that doesn't necessarily allow you to do you know a full project. It will help fund a project. You know, under our plan, we submitted for four plan four uh four projects in our program this year, and it's the trails, Kellum's Park, the kayak launch, and uh the other beach elementary school trail. So, it's the two different trail systems and the Kellum. So, if we want to use this $120,000 to go forward with any of those projects, we could uh do that during the year. If we don't use it, these monies will roll over to next year. So if we want to save our money from year to year

and then do a project when we have the monies available, these monies will stay reserved for the um town and then we can still go out for program open space grants in addition to these monies.

No, these are the program open space grants. So each county is allocated a their allocation from the state. Yes. So the counties alloc the state allocates it to the counties. The counties determine how they are going to administer it. In Calvert County, there was no real set way. They just we submit our program and if they wanted to fund something, they would. But last year, they used all their money to fund a park in Calvert County and we got nothing. And so, you know, they felt that, you know, we should get some percentage and be able to proceed with our programs based on their schedule versus them making that decision. And so, this is the first year from my understanding that they've actually given Chesapeake Beach and North Beach a uh their own allocation from what they are getting from the state. And is there a Senator Miller annual amount that we get as well in addition to that?

No, not that I'm aware of. Is this separate from the the pickle ball court money that we got though? I thought that was open spaces as well. Yes. Pickle ball court money was bond bill. Bomb bill. All right. Okay. So, we're we're good with we're still good with that then. Okay. Yep. And the county commission I think met today to approve that annual program the allocation. Not sure how that went but I believe they made Tuesday's right. So that they met today if I understand correctly. Okay. Dan, good job guaranteeing us some money. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. And with this when you got that section four highlighted, I'd like to have to make sure that there's a with in this one right here. Right. There's section four highlight. I like to make sure that we have comparable charts. So the pay is based on it. I mean, I spent nine months previously trying to track down the previous some pay and $500,000 that was paid to the previous town administrator. There should be guard rails in place and we should have some sort of mechanism so we don't have a mess that we have had to clean up. All this that we're talked about, if we don't have pay based on something just this person is worth that much, there should be a structure. We're a government agency. The county has a structure in place what they pay. We should have a structure of what what our pay is determined.

You're referring to pay scales. It says right here, section four, staff salary includes a 2.7 cost of living adjustment and merit increases of 3% to 6%. So that's what I was saying. We should have an understanding of what our pay is based on. There's a there's a consensus of if you're a a certain employee, there's a salary range and we should have a salary range that determines it. I

I I fully agree with what you're saying and I believe it's what Samia said, it's pay scale and we do not have any pay scales that are currently being used. uh you know there have been pay scales in the past but with increases and things that have been given they are no longer relevant. So I agree with you that we do need to implement a pay scale and the actual charter I believe says that uh you know there will be a uh salary structure set up might be in the code it's in the charter I've read it somewhere. So I believe we do need to get to that point. Um, you know, I don't think there's time to do that because that is a very detailed uh survey that needs to be done to come up with comparable salaries for comparable positions. It, you know, I do not have time to do that before a budget's hopefully going to be adopted next Thursday. Uh but that is something that I would be more than willing to work with and get in place during this next year as a project to work on uh and bring that forth to the council before the budget for fiscal year 28 so that you all approve what the scale is where everyone's going to be slated on the scale and then um you know I I think things would be smoother because I brought that to the Samaria's attention said how are we adopting salaries when we don't have a pay scale and so this was the conversation we had with Alyssa that prompted um you know the insertion of that one section in to get through this budget year

and just just so you know that was one of the first conversations Dan and I had just because when we were trying to make sense of the way things were done historically there was really no basis to do that so it's It's a conversation that we've been having. We're aware of. So, you're right on on point about it. It's just about the timing of it. Yeah. I mean, it's there's been a lot of items that have cleared up. So, I think it's we've identified that it's something that we should do. Agreed. And and and I appreciate that. Thank you very much.

All right. Definitely. I have one question on the uh revenues, Dan. Um, can you further define the third line item labeled state ANA tax distributions? The 300,000. Mhm. Um

that that is a specific amount that uh through legislation the town has been uh allocated on an annual basis and it's it's a little different than the first line item which is a percentage. The first line item I think is 2 and a half% of the revenues collected by the state for the gaming or video lottery in Chesapeake Beach. The third one is a uh more of a grantbased um amount, but it's in legislation and therefore uh provided year-toear and we have to provide a reporting uh of how we spend those monies on an annual basis. And

yeah, I know what it is. Uh Lori, I was just bringing this up because you were asking about Mike Miller the and that's what this is. Okay. Thank you. Miller fund. All right. Another name for it. All right. Let's uh good history. Are we ready to move forward?

Um the last last other item on the revenue was the fitness grant that we talked about. So we've added 35,000 which is the grant amount under revenue and then under the expenditures we add 220,000. Um so that leads us into the expenditure side of things. So there are you know a number of items that have been adjusted there. The first one is grant to local organizations. uh that is increased by $16,000 with $1,000 going to the NAACP and $15,000 to the Bayside History Museum. uh under new items been added for grant water park operations uh to show the $176,380 grant that I talked about when we were going over the water fund under trash removal service. Uh that is actually decreased 31,549. I think uh council member Evans had asked about this at the last meeting and you know questioned the 8% increase and that was uh you know uh incorrect. It should have been 3%. So um you know 3% is really the cost of living for the you know DC Maryland uh area. Uh so that lowers that by 31,549. Uh debt service on the water park bonds instead of 500,000 it's 545,000 and I will provide the council and their packets for the next meeting the actual payment schedule that shows how that fund is sheet went and I'll review that

with you at that time. Uh but basically the uh interest rate ended up being 3.94%. Uh and the bonds sold at a at a premium. So the buyers paid more for the bonds than what uh the face value of the bonds were because it was favorable to them. So instead of uh $5.9 million in bonds, the actual bonds come out at 5,446,000. And I'll provide you all with the breakdown. You know, seeing it on paper probably will uh be better, but under the payment schedule, the payment schedule for the next fiscal year is 545,000 instead of 500. Uh and as I said, that's based on actual costs after the bonds were issued. And then the capital expenditures uh decreased 350,000. That was because we moved 600,000 to for the Harbor Road Well project, the utility fund, but we also added in the fitness cord at 220,000 for the full cost of the cord, even though 35's covered by the grant. And then um Jay has asked for 30,000 for a I don't know if it's new or repairs to the public works garage heater. Uh it's currently where we've submitted for insurance on it. Um you know there's been some uh delay in getting that approved by the insurance company. Uh so we wanted to make sure that if uh it isn't covered by insurance that at least we'll be able to get that replaced uh next year before it gets gold again. So we may or may not need that. Uh but we want to put in the budget now just to be

safe. So that's the changes to the general fund. Well, with with that um the what I was proposed with the water power, I don't even think that's permanent and zoned to have some garage there. I want to make sure we are allowed to put a structure there. I think we're just allowed to have a water tower there and not build a a garage. So, I'm not sure about that. at a separate quot separate item that this about the heat at the current garage that uh caught on fire a couple months back. Okay. This isn't the additional

whatever that other structure is. Want to make sure that we're following the zoning rules for that. I don't think that's allowed. Yeah. Well, that's currently in the budget as a separate line item and I don't allow Jay to answer signing that permit. Oh, Jay, I got a make a motion that we don't approve that budget. Um, I can't think of a code. Is the is the piece of equipment uh that Les was talking about needing to support the uh like some of the fields and stuff. Is that included in this?

Uh, that was included in the existing budget. So, it's been purchased. Uh, there's a couple modifications and it's going to be here shortly. Okay, cool. I know you just kept mentioning reliance on the county and a lot of restrictions and stuff. Okay. Thank you. Agreed. And now we'll have our own and it's it's good. All right. So, my question is, uh, we have an introduced budget, a general fund budget, and we're going over plans. How are we going to address all these changes uh legislatively next week

or a guide for you all in terms of what to what needs to be motioned? Um we need to we need to we need to uh do a motion to amend and that motion to amend will include all of these changes. Yeah. Okay. We can do it just like capital improvement budget change from our last time 300 decreased 350,000 because we pulled out the Harbor Road project, but we included back in there 220,000 for the fitness uh court and 30,000 for the garage heater.

So the net effect of that was a 350,000 decrease. the other things we saw on there were not nothing else. Yep.

Um and then comment that I see saddle replacement in the general fund budget. Um I've already said my piece about that. Um, there was one more question about the does the ANA tax that we charge automatically get charged if it's not written in this budget? And then there was uh I think you included the operating tax in here which was something that you did last time. I request

personal property tax, the utility tax for the utilities. Yes. Yeah. And that rates that rates in the uh ordinance as well. Yeah. Does the ANA rate automatically stay the same? Yes. That's through if we don't adopt it within this ordinance. Correct. That's set by the state, right? It's not set by the state. It's set by us. Uh it's in state legislation, I do believe. the half of a half percent. That's right. It's not set by us. Are we not charging that at all?

It I'll double check, but I do believe that is under state law as well. I believe that it is too. Yes. Well, I think that's something we should know for sure. Um

Yeah. I believe it's two and a half% and it's paid for uh through state legislation, but I will double check that. You and I talked about this last year. Yeah, we did talk we talked about last year that somewhere in the code there was a whole there was a whole thing that happened last year and it's in the code as a half a half percent. I made a motion so everybody could understand what was in the code and what we were charging. And I sent out a whole sheet about what we aren't charging that other people are charging. And I will say I don't have a problem with that except that we're crashing projects that have been on the books for years and saying we don't have enough money for it. So if somebody can figure out how to not crash those projects, I don't need to talk about this over and over again. But if we cannot build sidewalks and connections to neighborhoods in places where they're dangerous, we need to talk about this.

Time. Nobody crashed new projects. What we got left? Handrails. You're awfully dismissive. We didn't do what you say we did. Let's just keep moving. You did do it.

Right. So if we're done with general fund, I'll touch base treatment plant which there were um I think I'll start on the expenditure side of things because the changes in the revenue is really based on the uh changes in expenditure because the revenues the fixed and variable revenues for us and our partners are based on a percent of expenditure. So you know all the revenue items change based on one change to the expense but we have about three or four of changes. Uh the first one is under salaries and wages which increased 10,885 and that was based on uh final calculations on the salary schedule which again you'll get a copy of next week. Uh on the administrative side, uh previously the fringe costs associated with that were not included in the first draft of the budget. So that increases it when you put that in there at 67,233. Uh the first draft did not have the policy manual and agreement update which is to update the interjurisdictional agreement. So has asked that we put that back in the budget for consideration. Uh chemicals based on new cost. Um Josh had estimated that they you know would increase uh 10,000 from 180 to 190,000 based on new estimates that he has. And then the capital uh reserves uh increase 30,908. And again that's a formula based on the budgeted expenditures. So as expenditures go up the reserves go up

and then the individual partners pay their share of the reserves which is how the revenues get adjusted. Um, so those are the changes to the uh treatment plant. Total $167,026. And again, these would need to be all approved either together or separately um next Thursday hopefully. Right. Any other questions? All right, let's move on to the next item. Thank you.

Thank you, Dan. So the last item is a uh RFP that is out for well we've already closed it. We've made a decision. So that's what the memo represents and you all would be voting on it on the recommended awardee um on Thursday. So if you have questions about it, um Josh is here for you to to ask them so that next Thursday we can move through it relative relatively quickly without a lot of hiccup. Uh the TLDDR when it comes to this particular project is that we need to have this is a reissue. So we had done going through the process for this particular process or um project before and the bids we received were um astronomical compared to what was budgeted. Um and so we had to reissue it because we didn't budget for that amount and it and Josh was not comfortable moving forward with what was being proposed. So, we reissued it and we got more reasonable bids that are um are things that we're comfortable moving forward with and the money is there. Um we need to put these uh handrails in. However, um it's timesensitive because there's work that is scheduled to be done for next next fiscal year that um the safety would be called into question if we didn't have these

there in place. So, it's pretty straightforward. It's not a controversial project. Um, but I just wanted to put it before you now so that when we get to Thursday, we can move forward. With the bid, is there uh for the material? Right. This is for the entire project for the design, do the work to install, labor, and the material. When's the price is good for certain date? When's that date? I would have to look back at the bid to confirm that. I would text and check just because if it's Yeah. fluctuates all over the place right now. Yeah.

So, um what did we budget for this? Uh this project was budgeted $40,000 based off of a proposal uh we had received in January of 2025. And you we so we've gone through a process. We received bids much higher than that and now we have gone through a second RFD and we want to uh you want to award a project in the amount of 4970. There's 49 49700. Is that correct? That's correct. Okay.

Okay. Thanks. Any other questions? All right. Thanks, John. There's only um there's only one thing left on this agenda. Is there a motion for adjournment? Motion for adjournment. Second. All in favor say I. You have to say no. Say no. Thank you all. Good meeting. We got a lot done. We beat nine o'clock.