Town Council - Regular Meeting

Hey, Patrick. I aliance to the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Sorry about that table, Jonathan. Didn't take it away.

Announcements. I see it. I didn't jump on me. Right off the bat, do we have any announcements? Yes. I have three actually.

So, bear with me. Um first one um was flagged for me by Denise Cosgrove, our tax assessor. The these uh handouts are in the back of the room if you're interested. It's about um Rhode Island's farm, forest, and open space program. Um, so there's handouts if anybody wants them. It talks there's going to be an information session about how to qualify and um what it entails. So if you're interested, grab one of those. Second announcement is that we have a uh on the town website on the homepage, you can click on a button there that will uh give you a form to put in your email address. And so as soon as we have our townwide newsletter going, you will get it. Um, and that will have all news, any news that's fit to print that's coming out of the town, you will get automatically. You'd be able to opt out. Thank you.

Thanks, Jonathan.

Um, so yeah, you can go to the homepage and click on it and put in your email address. There's also an iPad in the clerk's office there that you can, if you stop by town hall, you can plug in your email address there and then if you ever get sick of getting the emails, you can opt out. but it's a it's a way that hopefully we can share more information and be more transparent and do a better job communicating. So, that's exciting. Um, and my last piece is also exciting news, which is that yesterday we had sort of a surprise visit from the state elevator ex uh inspector. We'd been trying to reach him for uh many weeks and he called out of the blue and said, "I'm in Tibberan. I can be there in 10 minutes." And so, um, Patrick was, uh, painting in Middletown and I was working in, uh, in Adamsville and so I met him over here and he gave the elevator at the Oddfellow's building his blessing. Uh, so we now have a Noble approval on the elevator at the Oddfellow's building. So, we not only don't have to have a big expensive project for that, but we're one step closer to compliance and getting uh to be able to use the second floor again. So, we're working on it and that's an important step. That's all I got.

Y, thank you for being available. Then, the town thanks you. You're duty. Approval of minutes. Motion to approve the minutes as written. Unless anyone has any changes. Do I have a second? Yes. All in favor? I want to abstain and one abstension. Thank you, Garrett. Business one, vote to appoint vacancy on a little compent agriculture conservy trust to fill unexpired term ending July 1st, 2026. I'd like to move Taylor Johnston. I'd like to second that discussion. Two great candidates for the position. Yeah,

I would agree. We rarely find that we have such a thing. I believe that the right person at this moment in time is Paul Golves. I have no issue with the motion or the second. Thank you. Favor I I post.

That's four to one passes. Thank you. If there's no objection, I would like to move up new business six. Any objection? Not seeing any. Anyone following along? New business fixes. The presentation of the budget by the town administrator and finance director. And it says FY27 budget review by finance director and town administrator. These are in the back of the room. If you'd like to follow along on paper, I will give a minute and no longer for someone to grab those. Some there's not a ton.

There's a sum, not a ton from my understand. Time to share here a little ready. Okay. Uh S asked me to bring the mic closer and speak louder. Wow. Try to do that. So I expect some cheers and maybe the wave at some point. Y um uh so I am happy to present to you the town admin. I need to move

what is by town charter considered the town administrator's recommendation and for the fiscal 27 budget. Um in reality it is uh largely has been this year largely the work of my colleague here John Mcto who I cannot thank enough for how much he has worked to understand uh reconcile and make clean our finances and advise me as uh as I was pointing something.

I'm ask sorry I'm asking Jonathan to put it on that screen too just so other people can see it. Sorry to um

uh to give you a recommendation tonight that will uh undergo scrutiny by you all and then ultimately go to the budget committee although ultimately means by March 1st. So we don't have a ton of time. Uh in addition to John who's been absolutely um uh I couldn't have done this process without him. uh and he he as I said has done most of the work. I want to thank all of the department heads within town government who have been diligent about providing uh numbers to us um requests for budget items uh meeting with us individually and uh working through their requests and um they nobody got everything that they wanted which is um kind of what I consider to be in a sick way a good budget. Nobody is totally happy. Um, also want to thank Martha who I think is in the back of the room who has been a great Yeah, Martha has been a great support to us in terms of pulling together all the necessary information and we'll continue to look at committee works through this process. Uh, so budgeting is never fun. Uh, it's particularly not fun when you have to come face to face with the fact that you've been overspending. Uh everybody knows this from their own household budget. Um in fiscal 24 and 25, town exceeded town expenses exceeded revenues and we used uh reserve funds to fill that gap. Uh and we are now coming to grips uh in fiscal 26 and 27 with um with kind of the reality of that situation which is you saw a one-time increase in property taxes last year had to go to the legislature to get authorized for that. Uh you also

significantly scaled back capital investments last year. Um, and what we're trying to do in fiscal 27 with what we're recommending. Sorry, I do that. Oh, you're doing it.

Um, what we're trying to do in fiscal 27 is make revenues and expenses balance within the state limit of a 4% increase in property taxes. You have other revenues. You'll see those in this presentation. um other revenues that bring us a little bit above that 4% uh in terms of an allowable uh revenue side of the budget. Um uh but we need to stay in our minds that has been mine and John's goal to stay within our available resources. Um and our goal is to rebuild reserve funds over time, make strategic investments personnel. We'll talk a little bit about that and make strategic investments in capital uh and also continue to seek efficiencies. So we'll talk about a couple of fronts on which we're doing that uh tonight. most notably in terms of sharing services with the schools um and ahead with some important investments in uh IT infrastructure which are expensive but have been put off for uh too long. So that's our goal and um hopefully we brought you something that's good um a good basis for you to discuss uh actual expenditures. So revenues and expenditures in what we're proposing to you balance at just under $19 million. Total revenues increase at 5 a.5% over the fiscal year 26 budget. Um so again 4% increase in property taxes. And then there's a handful of other revenue sources that John can talk about uh that bring that up to 5 a.5%. Um we're proposing that we increase operating expenses by 3.8 point 3.86% over the fiscal 26 budget. If you add into that

what we're recommending around capital investments, it brings it up to match the revenue increase at 5 a.5%. some of the major upward pressures that we have seen as we've built this budget. Um, not surprisingly, most of it is on the personnel side. That is what makes the bulk of the budget in most organizations and we're no exception. So, um, we've got salaries, we've got fringe benefits, uh, we got pension expenses. Um, all of those are fairly significant upward pressures. um salaries not because we're recommending giant increases but because it's just such a budget. So we are recommending uh that for all those not covered by a collective bargaining agreement increase the salary at 3%. Collective bargaining agreements we just have to adhere to and those range from 3 to 5%. Some are at three, some are at four, some are at five. Um for health insurance, we've plugged in an assumption that premiums will increase at 10% this year. That's based on a recommendation for the interlocal trust, but we won't actually know those numbers until

uh probably uh late March. It doesn't

So yeah, so that's an assumption right now. Uh it might sound like a a large increase, but I think uh given what's happening in the market, it's probably totally realistic to expect that that's going to be our increase. Um pension expenses, uh John will get into uh what we've assumed there, but uh that's something it's a fairly significant item that we have to build in uh as is debt surface service. So these are things that we don't have a whole lot of discretion around. we just have to pay those bills. Um, we did make some recommendations about reductions from departmental budget requests. So, we got a request from every department head um and looked at those and looked at ways in which we could reduce um those requests without doing uh undo harm. Uh, and you know, none of it's easy. Um but we tried to kind of spread the pain and um and not do such deep cuts that it would have uh a multi-year impact. But hopefully these are uh either cuts or delays in expenditures that we can um weather through this year with and come out the other side to um uh consider some expansion in department. So, um, first of all, I want to make clear that the, uh, we've we've recommended reducing the police department request and the town clerk request by one position. Those are not elimination of positions. That's um, delaying the hiring into vacancies in those positions. For the police department and the town clerk, for DPW, we've also recommended that we reduce the request by one position. That was a request for a new position. So, there's a little bit of a distinction there.

We're also recommending that we lease rather than buy some new equipment and vehicles rather uh yeah, lease rather than purchasing. Uh and again, John can go into that in detail if you want to ask questions. Um, other recommendations are that we continue to con that we consolidate IT expenses such as service contracts that cut across all departments uh within an IT budget um under Jonathan Gabriel um for better management of those contracts. Um and uh we think that there can be some real savings and uh and just better service to be had uh and elimination of duplication by doing that. Um I made I alluded to making some investments in IT infrastructure and security. Um you'll see in the budget that there are some uh rather sizable for the size of our budget uh investments. Jonathan's not getting everything he dreamed of. Um, so we tried to go through and make a distinction between uh what was nice to have and what was really necessary to sort of catch up and uh minimize risk for the town. And so uh hopefully that's what you are proposing that we combine the human resources function across the school and the town. the town at this point doesn't really have a well staffed human resources function and that's a weakness for us. Um, and so we're proposing that we uh uh piggyback with the school on what is a much more professional approach to human resources. Again, John can talk about that. We're proposing that we fund a townwide salary study. Um, I presented

you at your last meeting with a copy of the statewide salary survey that shows that um, Little Compton is way down on the salary scale. Um, and so we think that we should take a look at that sort of little Compton specific and see how we match up and what we should aim for in terms of making sure we're competitive in the market over time. Uh we also recommend that we look at all fees uh whether that be transfer stations, stickers, uh building permits or anything else that we collect uh for which we collect money and um and make sure that we are um sort of in line with our peers or at least not uh way below what other towns are charging. Um, we're also looking at uh ways of collecting those fees more efficiently through electronic means and that with the beach uh and the transfer station principally. Don't know how much of that is going to kick in in this fiscal year, but that is something that Jonathan's got underway. Uh, and then the last thing for consideration is uh outsourcing nighttime police and dispatch and fire dispatch to Tiveran. uh something we looked at but there were a couple of speed bumps in our way. Still think it's worth looking at in the long term. Um but wasn't ready for prime time for this presentation. I think that's presentation. Um unless if you want to go to questions I would welcome those. Otherwise, John John's going to go through uh the uh memo and packet that he gave you which provides a whole lot more detail.

Any questions from the council um to the town administrator? I do have something I'd like to say. Go ahead, Heather.

Okay. Um I have a note here that I'd like to read in regards to um the proposed budget. As the town clerk, I am addressing the council of this proposed fiscal year 27 budget. While I do understand the process and need for the budget, the difficult decisions that need to be made sometimes. Well, as I stated many times approximately six years ago when I saw the financial path that was being taken stating in about 5 to seven years, this is not going to be good and at that point we'll be seeing the true reflection of this path that fell on deaf years many times and here we are. So my statement tonight as the town clerk and the resident of the town is my concerns for those individuals who are served by the town departments for various reasons in multiple town services based on the proposed cuts. the two that I believe would be a direct negative impact to the town, the residents, and anyone that comes to visit Little Compton and has a need for town services. First, the reduction in the police department request by two positions for new staff. Chief Reigns, who's not here tonight, he could speak further on his reasonings for this request, but I state this being that the clerk's office is the main point of contact for the town. Based on regular calls throughout any year, I can assure you that both departments at the public safety complex, police and fire, provide much more to anyone in town than emergency services and anyone would believe their responsibilities to be. Just one example of this these calls received by the clerk's office of an elderly resident or someone in distress and the police department dispatching for wellness checks on those residents and those that may be housebound or ensure their safety of well-being for any type of daily life necessities. This too is a very important part of the safety of our town. Little Compton has a larger than some communities population of elders and they are our history and what has made our community in Little Compton what it is. Responding to these needs does draw away from the responsibilities they may have in the

police department or public safety complex fire department, but they always respond immediately when the town clerk's office calls upon them for such needs. Secondly, mentioning the clerk's office is the main point of contact for the town, which serves as much more than most would believe town business to be. For the elder population and others who may live alone or have no family in the area, we're the only voice that they hear sometimes in the clerk's office for days, even weeks. Besides all the state and local level mandated responsibilities that deserve to be recognized to the extreme volume in which that entails each day in the clerk's office, to lose such a connection to the town, to not be able to answer the phone to be the only voice that would be heard in a week is disheartening. To think that a reduction in staff in the town clerk's office at any point in time may cause to not be able to pick up that call or be able to know that the office is staffed well enough to do an at home visit for an authorization when needed for housebound or anyone. This is just a small example of what exactly the clerk's office does in any given day, week, or year. Besides the increased volume of workload during an election year, reduction of staff in the clerk's office could cause deadlines to be missed and the workload to pile and excess excessive taxing work hours on the staff. Both of these redu reductions would greatly impact the services provided by the town as well as cause a loss of the true meaning of the town to be here in Littleton as a town clerk and a resident. Thank you. Thank you.

There any questions for the town administrator by the council for what was just presented? Anyone? I see a hand in the front. Um, I appreciate what uh what John put together and uh in our comment good about that. Uh I saw uh I saw you you talking about leasing uh equipment in the cars. I just had a suggestion that we go to lease purchase when we do that so that we're not wasting the money in case we decide to keep whatever we're leasing.

Yeah, they're structured. They're structured as a lease purchase basically. I thank you. Thanks. Do I see a hand in the back? Come on up. My question is, do you have the actual budget numbers for the council to be looking at tonight or is it only what you've got on this presentation? No. If John goes into his presentation, I have a draft of the uh of the budget.

Is that available for anyone who happened to be sitting here to be able to look at? Uh well it's it's in draft so it's kind of a working draft so I think it's going to be uh it certainly would to be available at the meeting and the council needs to vote to submit this to the town clerk for inclusion on the warrant before March 1st. That means you're going to have to hold a special meeting.

That's going to be Tuesday at two, but that's down in a little surprise for later. you're open for all to hear what's going on, but yet this is going to be something that happens Thursday night and then Tuesday morning. And how many or Tuesday afternoon, how many people are going to be able to be here at 2:00 on Tuesday afternoon to fuss over those numbers?

Yeah, I appreciate that. Um, today we're receiving the uh proposed budget draft from the town administrator and finance director. Obviously, we're not going to vote on it. Um, so we're going to need time to digest that. I'm suggesting little scribbly note that maybe Tuesday is a good day. That might not be a good day. So, there will be a day before March 1st that we have a meeting and vote on this budget.

My point being is it doesn't give the public much input on what those numbers are. if you're going to have to call a special meeting and this is will only be the second time that you're looking at these numbers. I know I've just retired and some may say I had my chance to have say something before I left but to think that you have gotten to tonight which is what February 18th 19 19th 18th 19th

19th Okay see I'm retired I don't remember the date um and this is the first time that the council is actually seeing a proposal draft budget I'm so disappointed and I I'm here to support Heather and that office because there are a lot of people that recognize the importance of that office and having it fully staffed. I can speak to the days when it was just two people in that office and I can tell you what happens is it's a lot of overtime by the clerk and as budget allows by also by the deputy. So you're not necessarily going to save money in that sense and without knowing what you proposed in the rest of the budget. I can't speak to whether or not you've cut somewhere or increased somewhere where I might have a comment on it. I will gladly comment at some point in time and given that I'm retired when you have that next meeting to vote on it, I'll be here. Thank you, Carol Wardell. Any other comments on the U town administrator's presentation? All right, I will go to the finance director.

Well, just one comment on the budget. this presentation of the budget then goes to the budget committee. At that point, there's a vetting of that budget series of public meetings where that budget then is open to the public to comment on to the budget committee. Their recommendation, which is my understanding, that they make to the for at the financial town meeting for the approval of the budget. This is just kind of the first step. So what what we're submitting at this point in time may not be the final budget that's being presented at the financial town meeting. So it's up to the budget committee at that point in time to to uh their um recommendations to the u for the financial tell me. I can Carol

need to make a correction. The budget that you're presenting a full faith is indeed something that will be considered by the budget committee, but not until after everything that's under this jurisdiction of the town council is voted to be submitted for conclusion on the warrant. And then all of those outside of the budget articles, departments, whatever you want to call them, are also bound to be submitted before the March 1st deadline. The budget committee only gets to make a recommendation based on what has been submitted for the warrant. Those are normally the numbers that are already submitted by the March 1st deadline. Although I have to say there have been some years that they've negotiated things and they've changed before they've gone to town meetings. But in general, what you're proposing, especially the town council's jurisdiction, is what they need to vote on now. The budget committee doesn't get a first fight. Their part in this is to review the full picture and make a recommendation. But but that's a public process.

It is. It is. But that public meeting is discuss the budget for this part there. There there is a public process now of what the town council is going to be considering for their articles and departments that they have jurisdiction over. The the ultimate decision is at financial town meeting. And there is a public process through getting from March 1st to when did we vote on what date in May it is? May 19th. May 19th. So that will have a series of public hearings, but this is the first bite of the one for the town council jurisdictions.

All right. So let's Can we start our bite? What's Are we ready? Uh, yep. Let me uh just go through for example uh I wanted to uh talk a little bit about the revenue and how that's being computed because in the past I think we've kind of focused a lot on the expenditures but uh one of the first steps we did was to take and say you know how much money do we have to fund uh the budget for the current year. So if you look at uh for example property taxes the assumption in the budget is that um again uh would be a a 4% increase in taxes. Uh there's a collection rate based on the FY24 tax collectors report which is saying that we collect 98.2% of that. So that number is shown in the property taxes along with the collection of um taxes from prior years which is estimated to be around $375,000 and on an annual basis we're normally collecting a little over $100,000 a year in interest. So that number which is the bulk of our revenue numbers computed based on on that formula. The next uh fairly sizable number is the amount of money that we get from the the state or the state resources. So included in that number is um a housing aid which is the money that we get to offset the school bond interest. That's estimated to be a little over uh $320,000 out of that $990,000 number. And then we'll get monies for

motor vehicle uh uh rebate. So when they eliminated the motor vehicle tax, the uh the state was reimbursing us for that. There's a tangible property reimbursement. is uh bills um the meals tax and then the hotel tax which also includes uh vacation rentals and whatnot. Uh we also have the library reimbursement in that number as well too. So that number from a budgetary standpoint is based on uh the governor's proposed budget. Um we're not anticipating any changes, but obviously until the budget passed, we're not going to know for sure. But those numbers have been provided to us by the department of revenue uh for the on the municipal side. So those are uh pretty pretty solid. Uh the um town administration fees uh Heather has provided the number uh in terms of the collections for tax stamps and other fees that they collect and that's estimated to be uh roughly about $280,000. Um the uh building uh fees are estimated by uh based on historical amounts. Uh we now have uh through open gov we get a lot of our permitting done online. So I'm able to monitor that on a monthly basis. And again that number is going to be reflected net of the monies that the housing trust gets. So, the housing trust will get 40% of building permits for projects over $10,000 uh per the uh the town council ordinance. So, that number of 235 is net uh is is that of the um housing trust. And again, they also show um monies that

we bring over from the cell tower uh which is roughly about 49 well is $49,000 in terms of the budget. One of the other items we show in revenue is the um ambulance reimbursement. So in that particular fund there's a lot of u the uh so for the fire vehicles are being leased through that. This money is has to be committed for um fire safety. So uh a lot of the vehicles are being leased through there including the the boat that we have. So that 190 represents the annual lease payments that we're making uh which are in a separate fund. They're not in the general fund. So for budgetary purposes, we show the 190 in revenue, but we also show an expense that's offsetting that that 190. So that that brings that really comes up with our total revenue number which was the 18 million76 7556 and uh obviously what we we did was we obviously wanted to match that in expenditures so we have a balanced budget. If you look at the the largest expenditure which is the school uh the school budget um is increasing by uh 3%. Uh that budget was um presented last week to the school committee. I have another meeting next Wednesday for the school committee. It'll be a budget workshop and then they'll vote to submit that budget to the uh to the town. That budget is 8,508972 which is only the town appropriation. So we have other revenues that come in there to fund some of the others. And as you know under state law that number

can't increase by more than 4% over the prior year based on m maintenance buffet calculations. One of the items that came up in in the in years past and and I I looked at this year as well was that historically the town has funded the um town pension portion of the expense pension expenses applicable to the schools. So our um teacher assistants, our custodians are in the town pension plan. Um, so what I've done this year is I pulled that expense out so that we're not showing the the full pension expense on the town's books. It's only going to be for police, fire, and the town employees. And any expense that's applicable to the school employees will be put on the school's budget. So that pulled out uh some expenditures um onto the school side. Just staying with the pension expense. Um I know that the uh prior to the actuaries report coming out, I think the pension committee uh met and they were looking to try to fund 575 575,000 which would be accelerating the ammonization rather than using 30 years using something a little bit less. Um and talking to Mr. Russian I think in the past when things have been good they try to fund that a little bit better than they in in one year than than in and than in others. The actual expense for the actuaries report was um about 337,000 of which uh 65,000 of that was going to be funded by the school. So, if we were to fund the um actuaries calculation of the pension expense minus the school pension, which will be going over onto

the school side, it's roughly a little over $200,000 of savings from the prior year on the pension expense. So, that's something that we've recommended in our budget uh at this point in time. um some of the other areas uh specifically of um concern. We talked about some of the other cuts, but in order to balance the budget in in last year, we didn't have anything in for capital. So when we came to a point where we needed to kind of cut the budget last year, even though I wasn't involved, but the um there was 250,000 that the town would normally put into uh a capital line item. And what happens on that capital line item is it gets charged to the general fund. Then it gets moved over to a separate capital fund. So once it's in there, decisions are made to spend that money in accordance with um approval by the town council for specific capital improvements. In some cases, for example, what we have in that fund right now is a little over $680,000. Um 425,000 represents monies that were voted on at the financial town meeting specifically for pickle ball. So of that 48 683 425 is sitting in that fund uh available for pickle ball. The remaining balance of a little over 200 some odd thousand dollar is available for capital. At this point in time, we know that we may have some fire code improvements and I believe the council has voted on uh funding those for the um property next door.

So those expenditures would be taken out of that capital uh fund in order to meet those um fire code improvements uh next door. So basically we would not have anything in the budget for capital unless we put some some monies in. So basically when we went through the capital we had uh a number of different items uh for uh lease expense for certain vehicles uh new truck for um uh DPW with the plow. We had uh police and fire radios that needed to be purchased um which if we didn't do that within the next year their radios would become obsolete. So, we needed to do that. What we've done is we've struct structured a lease so that it's a three-year lease with payment in a re so that when we put the uh assuming it's approved by the financial time meeting, that lease would go into effect in 27 in the summer 27, but a payment doesn't have to be made until 28. So, we're able to kind of push that into the next year, but still get the capital that we need for the uh for the police radio. So the the other big the other big item in that would be the road work road works uh paving and Ana has been been involved with that. So there have been approvals to do some additional road work in town. The state's going to be reimbursing us roughly about a third of our expenditures. So, we have approved uh which goes back to it FY25 approval of a little over $400,000 of which we're going to need about 275 out of the budget in order to do that work.

And so that's included in uh the capital improvements on this. So that makes up the bulk of the the 425,000 um of expenditures uh that we need. 450 I believe is the the the total. So we we can only do 300 in order to balance. So we are looking at potentially looking to free up some of the previously committed powerball money to use at least to get some of the road work done. and then at some future years we can obviously replace that when we're in a position that we can uh support that expenditure for for pickle ball. It's when you look at it now, it's it's it's also a concern I have from a cash flow standpoint. In the past, you know, we've taken, and we've talked about this in the past, a few million dollars out of our operating cash flow with losses that we've incurred in 24 and losses that we'll have in 25. uh we are looking at at least a balanced budget in uh for 20 for 26. We may do a little bit better than that but uh it's a little early to project that at this point but um I'll have some better numbers over the next few months on that that end. So so um that decision has to be made

on the pickle ball. We should clarify that that's not the donated funds. Thank you. Oh yeah, that's those are in a separate cash account over at Bay Coast and

um and and separately invested. So this these are just the funds that were committed by the town at the at the financial time, not the donated funds. Those are in another separate fund. Uh so that's a decision that that has to be made uh as to what we do. But in the budget that we're presenting to the town, we've got the 300,000 in there, which allows us to keep the the budget balanced. We also had an increase in our debt service. We did refinance the school bonds and uh we got a little bit of a savings on that. Um I think it was a little over a couple hundred,000. They were able to use that to reduce the debt service in FY26. So when we put the budget in last year, it was at a lower number than we were at in prior years. So in 27, that debt service is jumping up a little bit. So it's increasing by about 193,000. There's not much we can do about that at this point. So that that's why you can see a little bit of an increase in the debt service line item as well. One of the items we did talk about was salaries. And I did go through and kind of summarize the salaries and all the departments. And uh right now with the uh salary reductions that are included in the budget, we'd be uh without fringes, we'd be at $4.3 million in the 27 budget versus uh 4,089 in the 206 budget. That's an increase of 211,000 again without benefits. That's uh a 5.16% increase. So when you're looking at the larger number, especially when

you're looking at um any budget, salaries certainly are a big driver uh for uh any budget. And of course with that you'll have increases in uh payroll taxes and um and and we also uh as Ana mentioned uh we're looking at a 10% projected increase in our healthc care costs. Uh that's on top of a 12% increase that we had last year. So 22% in in two years. and we're in with the Rhode Island Interlocal Trust, which is kind of a hybrid self-insured model. So, um we we think we do have I think a good um a good plan. It's just the cost of healthcare um is just uh is just skyrocketing at this point in time. That's the uh overview I have, Mr. Chairman. Any

questions from the council? Yes, John. I got one question on info technology. What's the other other ones that I'm looking at go up a certain percentage and they're all pretty equal, but the uh if I'm reading it correctly, last year's budget was 169 and now it's 48 46,000. And I know we we hired a tech person, but can you tell me why that? So that adjusted budget last year was probably closer to 280. Okay.

Because when we when we did uh hire in house, we did allocate some of the budget from um lease. Um they were able to fund that. We did

I'm flying in the beginning was uh was able to absorb some of that. So we allocated that over uh to technology but clearly the the investment in technology hasn't been kept up. Uh and some of what we did with uh with technology is rather than dispersing it unless it was specific for a particular department, for example, like public safety, if it was uh a program that was specific to that, we would put it in public safety. But it was something that was more generic for the town as a whole, we left it in uh John Gabriel's budget so that we can kind of track the expenditures in there.

Okay. And I think uh cyber security which is on everybody's mind right now has also um had us increase that budget a little bit so kind of protect the resources that we do have. Okay. Thank you John. It just kind of jumped out at me that big 169 to 406. Thank you. Anyone else on the council? Not seeing any. Lar Anderson, you're closer to the microphone. Go ahead. You're up to the council. Good. Looks like they're okay for the second. You're up.

Larry, I am going to speak in my capacity as time moderator of the process. I'm not going to comment on the proposed Um but I think the issue that that Harold raised about process um it's uh where the situation and I've I've been in every I've been on the budget committee. I've been on the town council. I've been moderator before. So I' I've come at this from different perspectives. My observation is that for the last uh 20 years basically and that in influenced all the time that either I or Scott Henderson had presided over the financial town meeting that period from around the early around 2005 2006 was when the 4% tax levy and the state uh requirements for dealing with that really took hold with with teeth and as a result of that um I think some of the uh situation we partly because some of our procedural muscles have to say that for for all of that time 20 years with my experience especially as kind of moderator in Scots is which the town of boards the council school committee and others had come in uh with the exception

say of the year we had to exceed the cap to refinance the school to refinance the school renovation and we went through the procedure with the state to get prior approval to exceed the cap. We do that for a year. But the result is that are that the officials have come in with the credits that stay within the 4% tax levy uh which uh is attractive to voters at tax town meeting generally. So, we're just slamming through the uh the town meeting in 25 or 30 minutes as was presented. But in in recent years, one of the ways we've kept we've we've met that 4% is um by uh this sort of backdoor way of uh using the general fund to make up to to get there to get to the 40%. and a a flaw in our system as far as I'm concerned which is one of these habits we've gotten into in terms of the format is we put something that's not a board article but something in our we've called this case different things in the in the report something called the general fund appropriation that just simply just depended up in the general fund the voters never vote on that it's called an appropriation we don't vote on that number it's just put over on the states that it's the default it's the default amount we make to get to 4%. Uh so that's that's an issue that I think has to be addressed in different ways both in the budget perhaps that town meeting by having if we're ever going to do that and as I understand you're proposing not to lose anything from the general fund

to make this budget balance. So it's not an issue that would come up necessarily to take a vote to for the amount that we might lose from the general fund. That's what we should have been doing all along. We should have been voting on that which frankly all other towns who who do who do this certainly in other states rep they vote on that. Uh but so the challenge we face with regard to the u the u recommendations preliminary recommendations that are made tonight which the council will decide whether they're going to to actually recommend and the school committees budget which hasn't been voted on.

Good by by March 1st. I hope the council will have a meeting where the public has some some but the it does go to the budget committee which by charter is that the budget committee shall have primary responsibility for the evaluation of all requests for appropriations time meeting and for presenting a proposed budget to the annual financial time meeting. So the budget that gets prepared is the budget committee's proposal is this the request and and the presented budget is going to be the budget committee. Now I'm going to assume that whatever they propose whether it's what your recommendations are or not is going to come in at that 4%. Uh let's assume that and they're going to come in with a budget that may differ from yours, but we're still there. It's going to be um the property tax is still going to be at 4%. So what I'm saying is there's a period until town meeting when the voters get to decide finally on all these recommendations which will be recommendations that um the voters have a chance both the budget committee it's time left for the school committee excuse me with the town council but certainly with the budget committee to weigh in not just a hearing but every meeting of the budget committee for example about pros and cons of the of the of the recommendations. But finally, and this is a challenge that I think the town libraries have not had to face because it's not a thing that existed for that long is the voters at town meeting don't have to make the recommendations. But the legal challenge we're going to have if there are recommend proposals that are different from what has proposed that we have to get out of it

still legally with a 4% attached for the proposal at the end of the town meeting. That's my that's my working assumption. So voters have to do some work and be prepared at town meeting if they want to change the recommendations. You might want to raise something but you're going to have to propose something else to cut. was my goal as town at town meeting is uh the voters have a lot of ability to do that. Uh but we can't get out of there and exceed that 4%. So I'm just I'm just sort of urging the voters themselves to be thinking about that and uh and I hope between now and then because moderators didn't really have to deal with this issue procedurally at town meeting very much in the since the tax le has been in effect. So it presents a challenge at town meeting how to get there if voters want to have different priorities in the budget. So anyway, part of the responsibility falls to all the folks who left the last say on this at time.

Thank you for hammering that point home. Any onion

just wanted to thank Larry for that point because I don't want to represent that what John and I have presented to you as a draft recommendation is magical or 100% right. But I would hope that whether it's at this stage or at the budget committee stage or at the financial town meeting stage, people understand the need to balance. So, if you're going to add something back, you got to take something away. There's not a lot of discretionary room in this budget, unfortunately. Not a lot of room to move. Um, and so I appreciate that uh concept. Thank you.

I would only add that the comments that the moderator has made are applicable regardless of whether or not we were in a tight situation. In other words, every time something is proposed to be added, which is a very uh recent proclivity of the public and that's certainly their right, but it is not typically accompanied by and to pay for that I propose that we do this. That's that's the key. So we'll we will need to be insistent on that and it sounds like the moderator is gearing up for that as well. So I think that's

Thank you for that young man. Use your microphone next time. Yes, I will.

Thank you S for your three minutes. And just uh when they were going over the numbers and the the budget and the propo proposals and the clerk's office, fire department, police department, uh I would suggest and I uh everybody knows I'm around the town constantly. I mean, I go everywhere in the town and we have a busy little town. Fly the coffin is busy. Police the department is busy and his office is busy. Uh I I would propose that we really look at raising our fees immediately for the dump stickers for building permits. I I I suggest we do that as quick as possible so that we don't have to take that direction with those departments because u I mean I know that our fees are ridiculous. I mean for what we charge I mean I also know our building fees are low. So I think we should take a good strong look at that immediately adjust them so we can make that adjustment in the Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you S. What else from the audience? Uh yeah Patrick I'm not sure who this should be addressed to Anya or John but on page 18 on the planning board department expense. I just need an explanation that's all. 2026 was 18,500. Now it's jumped up to 50,000. Bet you Victorian Taba could do this one. Okay. I don't know that I can actually. I've heard you do it before. Thank you for your confidence, but I don't actually know that I can any word on that.

Definitely. I just got this tonight. I mean, I am aware that we we're up for a comprehensive uh plan review process, and I'm assuming this is hiring a planner to help with with that, but that's the major uh input for that increase. And then on page 29, service contracts uh for $40,000, which we haven't had service contracts before. So what that is is um plenty of that is for the payroll clerk in town. So the HR director for the school currently does the school payroll. Okay.

We're going to be taking that over to free her up. So she does HR work. So that's uh basically going to be the uh payroll clerk doing both the town and the school. Okay. And then on page 32, Valerie for the director of social and senior services. I know we just hired her part-time for 312. Uh now her salary is 54,600. Anybody can comment on that for me. Are we Yeah, I can comment on that. We had uh two um appointments. Oh, we had two jobs.

Yeah. And so one job is 30 hours a week and one job is 10 hours a week. So we combined the $60,000 salary and broke it up appropriately. Okay. So I thought the salary for senior activity coordinator that's not part of that $13,900. So we have two senior directors now. Is that what you're saying? Martha, would you like to speak on this? Um I think John probably speak to John better. Sure. Go ahead John. Uh so they they do have a senior activity coordinator. Yes.

And uh then the salary director which is combining both social and senior services into one account. Right

now I I believe that number might have been 16,000 for the uh social services or senior service. I forget which one was at 16, but so they combined that. I do have to, and Martha brought this up to me, that I missed under the senior uh services under that line item um which was 16,000 a year before or expenses for the senior um for various expenses. And uh we also got a $9,500 grant. So instead of 16, we're going to add 6,500, which would be expenditures for the uh uh senior center on on that particular line item.

So the senior citizen services of 16,000 from last year goes into that 54600 year. Uh yeah, that's already that's already baked into that 546. Yep. Okay. Like I said, I just this tonight, so I'm just looking at numbers that are jumping out to me. No problem. Anyone else?

We're going to go to the calendar now. Got it up on my phone. You like to take your phones out, counselors, and look at your calendar. I'm proposing the 24th and I'm happy to do another meeting on the 26th or the 27th for the public to uh talk about this budget for us to take all the time we need to be immersed in it and then vote on it before March 1st. Do I have a taker for the 24th? It's Tuesday. Tuesday the 24th.

I think I think to be appropriate for the general public it'd be good to have it a little bit later in the day. 5:00, 6 o'clock, 7 o'clock at more like a normal meeting. Budget committee meeting on Tuesday. There's other things going on in town. Is there anything on the calendar? Do we have the calendar here? Yeah, Heather does. Thanks, Heather. What's going on on the 24th? Uh, budget committee at 7 o'clock. Budget committee at 7 is We do. Andy Andy did say he communicated with me today that they could bump that later if you were going to have a special meeting. Do we want to do six? Six is fine.

The 24th at six. Andrew, are you free? Sure. Victoria, yes. Yes. Would we like to add another day? The 28th is a Thursday. Happy to do it. I'm free. 26. Thursday is a Thursday. That's right. He said 28. Oh, I think so. Live. He filmed it. Someone said, "What's going on the 28th?" Heather, Saturday, so is it that was on purpose. 26 is nothing.

Nothing. I'm free for another six o'clock meeting on the budget for anyone who wants to come. Any other takers here? I got a taker here. I got two. Yeah, I got a third. Sure. Five. So, it's block 24 and 26. 24 and 26 and six here. Right. Thank you for that.

Can I have a question? Thank you. Um, will this budget, this proposed budget, I understand it's not real, be available online where we can see it where people can go to the first page and it'll bite them in the ass, so to speak, so to speak. I mean, one of the one of the problems that I I have and others that I've spoken with is we get all this great information, but it's a pain in the tail to find it. Mhm. And it's a challenge and I think that it would behoove us to not just have it under news like something flashes so that people understand what's happening.

We do have the list serve that's been born that's all not next week. Not soon enough. There you go. Go ahead. I'm wrong. We do have limitations on our website. So when you say flashing, I don't know if it flashing, but we can certainly make it very fun. Yeah. Thank you. All right. I'd appreciate that. That's why it filters into the news. That's just

anyone else. Okay. We'll get back to our agenda. Old business two. Letter from Tom Clark requesting the council approve her decision for home rule charter section 602 to hire Abigail M. Wilkey as deputy town clerk effective February 23rd, 2026. I'm excited to make this motion working with Abby. I think she's outstanding. Second. I I haven't made the motion yet. Motion to approve the appointment of Abigail Wilky as Deputy Tom Clark. second

with the offer that she applied for the CMC certified municipal clerk designation with the courses to be paid for by the town when she's ready. Do I have a second? I'm You have a second. Do we need to discuss? And you're ready. Go ahead. We're going to discuss. All in favor? I.

Any opposed? None. All right. I would just like to say that I am very pleased. I have a lot to say tonight. Um, congratulations to Abby on her announce achieve a achievements as a very quick learner and continues to learn as we all do in the town clerk's office with the everchanging laws and processes to complete the voluminous tasks every day throughout the year in the clerk's office. Abigail has shown very quickly her deep dedication to the responsibilities of the town clerk's office and specifically the town. I am very pleased to have Abigail as my deputy town clerk and look forward and proud to serve with her by my side. Outstanding. She's really She's awesome. Thank you. Congrats to Abby. Yeah.

Yep. U further requesting permission to seek application to fill the office clerk vacancy newly created by Mrs. Promotion. I would make a motion to table this uh for the budget discussion. Um that's going to come. I have a second for that. Second. Any further discussion? I mean, I don't think it's I don't think it's fair to tell somebody they may be hired if we're not going to have the money to do it. I think the clerk's office does need three people in there. That's why we put a third person in there. How long ago? 15 years, 10 years? The lady in the back of the room could tell me how long it's been? 25.

Okay. So 25 years ago, we we decided we needed a third person. So I think it's behooves the council to try to get that person in there to better serve the public. Thank you. Thank you, Gary. I have a motion to table uh dependent on budget discussion for FY27. I have a second. I think I have a second. Yeah, I second it. Further discussion. All in favor? I opposed. Old business 3, town administrator's update on the community van town administrator.

Thank you. Uh I wish I had more to tell you on this. Uh but um my bad. I haven't made a whole lot of progress. Um I have talked with uh Mike Grocha about uh meeting to discuss how we implement the policy that was developed and agreed upon by the committee and then adopted by the council and then uh sent to me for implementation. Um we talked before the holidays and uh he was very busy. We agreed that we would meet after the holidays and uh haven't been able to schedule that until uh this week. We scheduled it for next Thursday. So now it's probably going to be uh bumped because of your special meeting, but we will get it done soon. And and uh in that meeting, we will address such things as how um how we're uh letting the town's people know about the availability of the vans. uh in particular making sure that for the van that has been given to us by RIPA that that's available not just to seniors but to all citizens um that we have appropriate um in place with anybody who's using the vans other than the uh the volunteers who who now um staff and drive the vans. uh improving the way that uh again one of Jonathan's uh minor tasks improving the way that uh people can sign up for service uh and making sure that we're advertising appropriately among other things. So

thank you. Can you uh uh add me to that meeting when you have it? Absolutely. And it's my understanding there was a advertisement in the paper that that said senior van. Is that correct? Um yeah. Yeah. In the section of the Sakcon Times that lists senior services, we have a ad for senior transportation and we probably should make sure that at least we put that somewhere else in addition to All right. So, we'll rectify that. Thank you. Okay. New business one, requests from Cystic Fibrosis Foundation, Mass Red Island chapter to conduct a cycle bicycle ride for 2026 on Saturday, September 19th, 2026 with rain date on Sunday, September 20th. Have a motion.

Motion to approve laws is approved by both the police chiefs and all local and state laws are adhered to. I know that on the back page it said something about Westport Police, Tivan Police, and Little Compton Police. Um, so they might been notified, but I'd like to have it on record that we asked it to be uh yeah, the chiefs are away, right? I just want it on record that uh we said we wanted to notify them. Discussion. All in favor?

I post two contract with Jansen use Jensen use regarding fire suppression system for 32 and 34. I'm going to make make a motion to table this. We're not ready for this discussion. Do I have a second? Second. All in favor? I I thank you. Three, receive FY25 pension actuarial report and the pension committee's FY27 budget request. Bob, would you like to discuss that?

In your packet, you have um new business three, a unanimous vote of the committee. They did not have in front of them the actuarial report which I have given you and have given them since then which we've received. So the request that was that was made for a total contribution of 575,000 as you are aware from the budget commit uh from the uh finance director's report um on the budget. This number has now been distributed across all of the departments of the town in which there are pension eligible persons. And so it is a divided number rather than a single number. It also is nowhere near 300 575,000 even including the distribution between the school and the town being separately funded. That said, uh this constitutes a requirement as we were reminded earlier in the meeting that the pension committee is obligated to make such a a recommendation which it did in a timely fashion and that number then will be debated as part of the process of uh developing the budget. I would only point out to you on page 14, and I'm sorry that everyone in the audience doesn't have this to look at, but page 14 is the development of our alternative pension costs. Our pension in Little Compton as a locally administered pension plan is highly regarded in the evaluations that are made every year by the treasurer. He receives from each city and town uh their information and then develops a report that is basically

a scorecard. We are seen as a very um uh well-funded capable pension plan. We're also very tiny compared to most everyone else. So, our process has been to be careful to ask the town to fund a uh 30-year amortization figure. We on the pension committee are interested in making that smaller as the finance director also pointed out, but of course that figure then only increases what is what is due. So this is another of those items that uh is a budget item that comes up every year. It's commonly uh funded at the right level. We are suggesting that we ought to be more ambitious in order to save our pension plan from the scrutiny that results that some towns had, which then takes away the pension plan, moves it to the state, and then all we have are pensioners and there are no longer any active employees supporting that pension. So, we believe it's worthy of our as a town uh care and we'll make that point in the deliberations with the budget committee.

Thank you. Thank you. You need a motion for that? I don't need a motion. Again, new business floor request from the finance director for town council approval to designate Anita Pudo as the interim deputy tax collector in accordance with RGL44-7-2 and 44-7-6. Do I have a motion? So moved. I'll second your motion. Any discussion? Not seeing any. All in favor? I. Any opposed? That's unanimous. Thank you. Five. Receiving consider the following request for budget funding in FY27.

Might I suggest that this be moved forward to one of our future meetings because these constitute things that are I'll call it optional in the sense that we may find that we need change that

I can yeah I concur with Bob. This is what we generally do on budget committee. all these uh little cop celebrates America Wellness Center Village and Improvement Society, Rhode Island Conservation District, uh East Bay Community Action Program, Little Compton Prevention Coalition, Little Compton Community Center, Food Bank, and Stay at Home. This is our purview to put in the numbers we think are appropriate and then get it to the uh budget committee. And this is why we have to have these meetings so that we can do this by uh put it in by month. Would you like to continue us to our next meeting of the

I would so I would suggest that we uh take these up at the uh February 24th town special town council meeting and the 26th if needed. And the 26th if needed needed. Okay. Uh is that a motion? I'll second it. Any further discussion? I have a quick question for Heather. There it is. Heather, is would it be possible and I'll apologize if you've already shared these and I would maybe just have to go back to older packets, but to get whatever documentation you have for these requests and and I guess I'd follow that up by saying were many of these did they have substantial documentation or was it typically just a line item? We would like $20,000.

Um, these were included in previous packets, not all at the same time, but sporadically. And um based on the additional requests from the budget committee for their uh template template um documentation, some instead of just a cover letter, we got thick like this. Others we might have just still got a cover letter or two sheets. So they vary. I'm just thinking it might be helpful if we're moving specifically to that meeting to have some some info to go along with it. Please, they'll all be copy. Thank you very much. Then you're going to give those to all council. Uh I know we did brie in the past, but No, I'll do them all as as one thing.

Okay. Thank you. And I believe the budget binder will show the last four years or some number of years looking back that now a new applicant wouldn't have that history. I think I have a motion and a second. You seconded it. You did a second. Favor. I town council sitting as a board of licensed commissioners one response from Little Compton Game Club 5 class F1ed one day beverage license at the John Dier road facility March 14th April 15th I'm sorry April 25th June 7th September 20th and November 14th

motion to approve with all state and local ordinance adhered to second any further discussion All in favor? I. Any opposed? I see. Two. Request from the world's shortest St. Patty's Day parade for bus F1 day beverage license located at 26 Main Street on Sunday, March 15, 2026. Do I have a motion? Motion to approve with all state local uh audience adhere to and notification to both the chiefs. Second. Discussion. All in favor? I opposed

communications hazard mitigation and flood management plan advisory committee annual review reporting period August 7th 2024 plan approved through January 21 2026 we make a motion to put this on file there's no action in it no action thank you communications request from Charles Kane to temporarily close a 200t section in front of 26 Main Street on Sunday, March 15, 2026 from 12:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. for the world's shortest St. Patty Day parade and formally inviting the town council to join and march in the parade.

Same motion. I'll approve with uh all state laws adhere to. Second. They've already they've already uh said they would coordinate with both the chiefs, so that doesn't have to be part of the motion. All in favor? I post it. My comment on the previous one was a question as to whether that is a go back to it. We have to we have to approve something. What do you Heather on on communications. Agree. You should you should accept it and place it on file. I will place communications upon file. I have a second. Second.

All in favor? I above three requests from the little cops community center for a 2026 Easter spree at Veterans Field area on April 4th, 2026, remain 30 to 10:30. Motion to approve. Second. All in favor? I I electronic time. Request from Salosi for discussion on 30 common old fire station. Everybody has old fire station building

which is now the maintenance building. from the four years ago to do a drawing of the old fire station building and presented Moring as something of a community center meeting place called Thomas Center and to be used by the seniors. And it was a simple simple enough drawing with uh a patio in the front. Uh an open area inside the building that was quite large. Uh a a a place for a kitchen, an easy kitchen, not a kitchen where you would do heavy cooking where a wood was required, etc. uh a place where you would have uh bathroom facilities that would be handicapped accessible, etc. And also a place to have a grill out in front with some picnic tables and umbrellas. And everybody loved the drawing. Everybody loved the idea. But we ran into a problem when we didn't have a place to take a DPF building operation out of that building. And truly the problems we've had with budget etc the last couple years it was it was looked upon as this is never going to happen. So I took it upon myself. I went to a couple of the council members Gary and Bob who I see often and I didn't know Patrick as well and Victoria or Mr. more as well as I do now in the

beginning. And uh I just took it upon myself to contact the state and ask them if I would take their builder. Of course, everybody laughed at me and said that's never going to happen. So when somebody says that to me, not forget. I contacted Peter Alvidi, had numerous discussions with him and he finally said to me, listen s, if I can make that happen, I will. I said, well, thank you. I further contacted our senator Palmer who said, s I'll help you. I had two breakfastes with him. in fact the exper and uh we sat down and put together a plan where he could help me and uh we would keep in contact and he would put some pressure on his side. I got a call from Peter Alabidi and he said we're going to have a Zoom call for you and we had a Zoom call where three of us were involved Mr. Peromomas, Bob Munchin and myself, and we explained what the operation would be and how we would be using the building, how long we would like to have it and how much of it we would like to have. At first, there was a little pussle about how much they would give us. They wanted to give us half. We ended up with three uh we think and uh actually it was the the office and two garages, but I made a picture of the third garage today and it looks like we're done. Well, anyways, they we had two Zoom meetings with them, went back and forth. We met them on site and uh they sent us a proposal.

The proposal states that we're going to pay $2,000 a year with electric and gas included. And we're going to pay over portions of the a great deal of the building. And we're going to use this site to put out work there and we're going to do some work on the building. Uh it's we're working we're going to all blind this coming Monday when you need to do EOP and uh they're going to help us understand schedule for the slight of renovation we have to do there and we're going to move our operation over there if the council votes on and I sat down with Gary Valonas and Bob today and then I went over and I talked Patrick and Victoria and uh they seem to like the idea. It has merit and uh I think we got ourselves a building. So I just like to announce we're going to have a DPW building on that. Thank you. So absolutely right. He has uh he grew up in Providence. He has a lot of connections up there. He's the one that initiated this after he spoke with Bob and I. We've met with the uh DPW director over there. He seems to think it's a good idea because he's too cramped over there with these three bays. Hopefully all all the equipment can go inside. Um, so my hope is, as everybody knows, I've been pushing for a senior gathering center for a long time, and the sketch that S made out a few years ago

kind of led into that. So, I'm hoping the bottom floor of the old of the maintenance department, the front of it can be used for uh a senior gathering spot and the back of it can be used for municipal offices because we need something for the uh social service director and the uh coordinator down there that'll be with the seniors. I mean that it's good to have her at a joint area where the people are going to be at. So that that's really my hope and I hope the council will um see it my way hopefully.

We talk about today. I think what we could do is we put together a coalition of noncontractors and try to get not only good numbers but volunteer service. This would be a good way to get the town together and put together a coalition of contractors that do the things they do all day and possibly buy into a a project for the the seniors of the town. So, let's hope. So, if there's any local contractors out there that'd like to help support their town, we're going to need some of your services, please.

Thank you, gentlemen. So, I look forward to seeing how this progresses. Okay. So, I do help. After the last Zoom meeting two weeks ago, I was sent theou to send it to the solicitor. So, he says theou is good. So, we have to meet with them Monday and then we got another Zoom meeting next Thursday and hopefully we're going to be able to bring theou to the council to sign. But it's a win-win. It's $2,000 a year for that building that's just sitting over there.

Okay. I'll move for the state. Uh S came to us anecdotally today. So there's no quorum issue here. Yeah. Um just to make that clear. Um I didn't know anything about this. Victoria, I don't think you did. No. Until S skipped on Wolver today and anecdotally told us about it. So I don't know anyou or anything that was was going on.

It might be helpful that I provide some perspective on this. Years ago, we approached DOT about the facility and were given a sense of no, you're not a we don't want to enter into any kind of relationship, but if you'd like to to buy it, we'd like to sell it to you. And then when we talked to DEM, we were reminded of the fact that the adjacent property is condemned. And so we tempered that discussion because that was the only thing offered. So I I'm I will say on behalf of the group which consisted of the two of us and the the two counselors and uh and uh the energy man that uh brought it forward. Um, we did not come up with this idea and attempt to figure out how to do this and spring it on you, but I know it must seem like that. This is a windfall that I think

spring's coming has some real good opportunities. In fact, Patrick, I I think you remember we had a meeting at the site when you came by and I drove by and seen people there. Yeah. And you asked me about it and I said I'm looking to talk I'm talking to them about the build. Yeah. Oh, okay. Some good things come to that. Have recollection. Thank you. Sounds exciting. Thank you. Consent agenda. Motion to place consent calendar on file unless anybody wants to pull anything for discussion. All in favor? I payment of bills. Motion to pay the bills as second.

All in favor? I a motion to adjurnn. Second. All in favor? I. Thank you all.

Yeah. It out.