Select Board - Regular Meeting

Board meeting on 03/30/2026 held in select Board Meeting Room at Town Hall, 10 Nicholson Avenue. We're being recorded by McCann for broadcast on Verizon and Comcast as well as the Taunton Gazette. It is 07:00. Our call is meeting to order. Please join me for the Pledge of Allegiance.

All right. Anybody on the board under announcements and recognitions? Brian? Mr. Chair, a few weeks ago when

we had our meeting over at the Nichols Middle School, I talked about a letter that I would be writing to well, I've asked people to get involved, and then, I was asked to get involved at the House Ways and Means Committee, hearing, which is tomorrow. But I've done a written testimony letter that I've personally written. I'd like to read it briefly. It's less than almost less than a page here. And it says, honorable committee members, my name is Brian Giovannoni.

I'm a member of the Select Board in Middleborough, the original author of the MBTA communities unfunded mandate letter to state auditor for the town of Middleborough and a former nine year member of the school committee. Today, I write as a taxpayer in support of additional funding for education. We have seen time and time again that education is grossly underfunded by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The FY twenty seven cherry sheet shows the Commonwealth of Massachusetts requires minimum net spending in excess of $15,500,000,000 yet only funds public school districts at $7,300,000,000 That's not even half of the net minimum spending, school spending mandate by the state and probably represents the single largest unfunded mandate in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. We can do better.

I suggest an additional 500,000,000 funding for education and the source of that funding should be a reduction in the MBTA subsidy from $993,000,000 down to $493,000,000 in FY 2027. The $500,000,000 in funding for education should be divided by a per pupil basis, which would elevate all districts across the Commonwealth for the million students that are currently going to public schools. Budget decisions are very difficult to make, but the education of our children shouldn't be should be an easy one to prioritize. Hard decisions need to be made and not on the backs of communities or the children in our public schools. I also challenge the Massachusetts Teachers Association to stand behind this 500,000,000 worth of funding or to withhold voting this year, this election year.

I wish you luck on your budgeting. Sincerely, Brian Giovannoni. I'm sending this to to the honorable Aaron Mickiewicz, who's the chair of the House Ways and Means. This was one of the pieces that I try to do. I feel as though if you're going to ask for funding, you should tell where it should come from and considering the subsidy went up to $680,000,000 last year to $993,000,000 this year for the MBTA.

I think we got a serious situation here. Either the MBTA needs to stop cease their operations and we should be funding the kids because I think someone said it to me best today. There's no such thing as a free ride and education shouldn't be the scapegoat of that. But I just want to let you know that I'm sending this as a taxpayer, but I am a selectman and I do say that. So I wanted to make that mention. You.

Thank you, Brian. Anyone else on the Board?

Mr. Chair? Tom. First of all, I'd like to thank you, Brian, for writing that letter. It was very well done. On a lighter note, our own Mary Standish is going once again for the Mary Samson award, Deborah Samson award, excuse me. And I've got some information, Mr. Chair, maybe we can get it on the agenda next week to discuss writing a letter of recommendation to the organization that does this. Steve Alderman has sent me some information about Mary and her background and definitely our hometown girl and we want to help her out, I think.

Absolutely, Tom. Thank you. Anyone else on the Board? Anyone from the audience under announcements and recognitions? Thank you, Steve. Appreciate it. Thank you. Good evening, Paula.

Good evening. Paula Fay on behalf of the Peter H. Peirce. Will begin with recognition. Our board of directors want to express our appreciation to Rebecca Mitchell and Kayla Smith from the health department for their outstanding work in organizing and hosting Middleborough's community baby shower held this past Saturday.

As one of the participating organizations at the event, we watched attendees enter the ballroom and be greeted by numerous service providers. It was gratifying to see the attendees interact with the various representatives and it was heartwarming to know that future and current parents are gaining knowledge that will make a difference. From municipal health and welfare offerings to diverse group of service providers, there were many opportunities for attendees to learn about resources available to them in our community. The baby shower also displayed the generosity of residents and businesses as attendees left with clothing, diapers, toys, and supplies to assist them as they welcome a new addition to their family. For our nonprofit, it was our initial opportunity to introduce the Dolly Parton Imagination Library program.

Having recently been selected as the Imagination Library's local program partner, we will oversee the program for Middleborough as it mails one high quality age appropriate book monthly to children from birth until age five regardless of their family income. The program which operates in The United States, Canada, The United Kingdom, Australia and The Republic Of Ireland has delivered over 200,000,000 books to children across these five countries. Imagination Library has been shown to significantly increase the likelihood of children being read too frequently with participate, participants demonstrating stronger early literacy skills. Again, we want to express our gratitude to Kayla and Becky. We look forward to the second annual community baby shower.

And now, I want to move to announcements. Our board is pleased to announce that the Colonel Peter H. Purse House will be opening its doors to the public beginning next month. After review by the Massachusetts Architectural Access Board, which consists of representatives from the Massachusetts Historical Commission, the Massachusetts Office of Disabilities, the Executive Office of Aging and Independence, the Executive Office of Economic Development, and experts in building design and construction. It has been determined that the closing the house to the public for the past sixteen months was not necessary.

Our first event taking place inside the house is a free workshop which will be presented by local fiber art expert Barbara Chadwick on Saturday, April 25. Registration for that event is now open and you will find announcements out on Facebook including on the town site coming up. Our board looks forward to hosting afternoon teas, additional workshops and community events inside the house. We are honored to be stewards for this significant historic asset and look forward to honoring the wishes of attorney William Deakis who desired to provide the community with the opportunity to share his brother, attorney George Deakis' love of history, the Perce family, and the house. I thank you for your time.

Thank you, Paula.

Thank you. Mr. Chair. Hi Tom. I was wondering, Ms. Fay, could I ask you a question please? You mentioned your board a few times. I know there's been some changes. Could you tell us who's on that board now?

Who's on the board? Yes. It is posted on our website. The board consists of myself, Diane Fay, Karen Freitas, David Pinkus, Jessica Pinkus, Barbara Chadwick.

Thank you.

Thank you, Paula. Anyone else from the audience under announcements? Okay. Hearing none. We're gonna have a discussion in a vote regarding the hiring of an interim fire chief amongst the following individuals that are listed in alphabetical order. They are Charles Doody, retired Canton Fire Chief and Town Administrator. They are Robert Ferreira, Middleborough Police Chief and Dana Fontaine, retired Middleborough Fire Captain. I'll turn this over to Interim Town Manager at Perkins.

Mr. Chair, as a result of the administrative leave placement of the current Fire Chief and the issues facing the lack of leadership in the fire department as with a department head, you requested some names to be put forward to you to act in the capacity as an Interim Fire Chief. During that time, I considered the some internal candidates. While I believe there are some very qualified individuals that do currently make up the command staff of the fire department, I felt the issue of divided loyalty might be a concern for a lot of people in the community when we're facing some budget cuts and I felt putting or asking one of those qualified commanders currently in the fire department to step into a role as an interim and to actually look at cuts to the fire department and then possibly go back into the union after serving in that role, I felt that would be a very difficult position for any person to be placed in. So after considering that, I came up with three, then four names.

Timothy Reed was one of the original ones. He withdrew today. And he asked that his name be taken out of consideration for the job. The three men that are on this list, I've known for over I've known two of them for over forty years and I've known one of them for over a year. I respect them. They all are excellent men of character. They have excellent leadership skills. There is one candidate that I believe has two qualities that the other two don't, and that would be their undivided attention to the job and intimate knowledge of the job. And that would be Mr. Dana Fontaine, retired Middleborough Fire Captain. And that would be my recommendation to you.

Mr. Chair?

Theresa?

Thank you, Joe. So I had asked for these three names and I think that these three names really bring a good amount of information as far as one would be somebody that is out of town, doesn't has to come in and doesn't know anybody. But with that, it would probably most likely command quite a salary. So we have to be cognizant of that for our current budget concerns. Mr.

Ferreira, while he is extremely qualified as our Police Chief, I feel would be asking a lot of There would not be undivided attention and I don't think it would be fair to ask someone to have a dual role right now, while he's also going to be looking at potential cuts. I do not know Dana Fontaine, but I do like the fact that he has that internal knowledge and that he could step into a role that would be immediate. So I appreciate your recommendation and obviously would love to hear from others.

Mr. Chair. Bill. Obviously, I know Chief Ferreira very well and I agree with Theresa. Think wearing two hats at this time is going to be difficult even though he would be a good choice. I do know Dana Fontaine and from what I understand, he is well respected. I was well respected in the force. I think the union people would also feel that he would be a good choice for an interim at the moment. So we'll see whatever people will say. But I do feel pretty confident and I do know Dana personally and he's a good man.

Tom? You hear me? Brian?

So excuse me, almost said Chief. Mr.

There's only one Chief in town

right now.

Mr. Interim, Town Manager. I highly respect your choices, as you know. I've been contacted today by two members of the fire department and I believe one of them is here to speak. So I have no disagreement with anything you said or Bill said on doubling or Theresa like doubling up on Bob, it just wouldn't be fair. That being said, my ears are open right now to the rest of the conversation. Brian, anything?

Yes, I have thoughts on it. The thoughts are, I'd like to take a deep breath this week on this. Like to find out a little bit more about two of the candidates or anything else that we can do. I don't think something that we should make a decision on this week right now. But that's me. I understand that we've got a lot of things going on. The budget is a big thing going on right now. But for me right now, I think that I wouldn't want to do this. I mean, how much is it going to cost us? I don't even know the answer to that.

So before I vote to put anyone in place, I'd like to know how much is going to physically cost the town to put each one of these people in place because if someone's $550 a day and the other one's a $100 a day, it makes me think twice about maybe I might want someone or the so I don't even I don't know that yet. So a couple of things I think I'd like to look at with regards to that is cost, come back here next week, maybe think about it and make a for me to make a better decision. And and and I love I love the our police chief. I would never wanna put more work on his shoulders because he's got his work cut out from already. And I and I like Joe.

I like what you put together. Not that, it's just I'm trying to figure it all out and I'm worried about certain things. So that's why I was I would like to I personally would like to take a breath on this for one week.

All right. Thank you, Brian. Joe, I kind of feel like Brian does, but I understand the urgency here. Would you consider waiting a week? Or do you want us to push tonight?

My issue is this. They're calling me. I am I have That's why I'm asking you. I have a lot going on. Understood. And they're looking to have their questions answered. Okay. I've met with every department head except one as far as going through the budget analysis and correction plan. I haven't talked to anyone from the fire department. So there's a lot of uncertainty there.

Again, the divided loyalties is a big concern for me. What's going to change between this week and next week? Nothing. It's still going to be the same three people. And I don't believe there's anyone who are qualified to be a Chief someday. In this instance right now, I think the Board owes it to the town to put someone in there that will protect the interest of the town and be able to make a decision.

Thank you for the explanation.

And I only want to just point out that Botfriere is only on there because Middleborough has done this in the past.

All right. Pleasure to Board.

Mr. Chair. I'd like to make a motion to approve Dana Fontaine, retired Middleboro Fire Captain as the Interim Fire Chief pending contract negotiations.

Okay. We have a motion. We have a second. Second. Second. Any discussion? Chair, including discussion? Go ahead. Discussion, Tom?

I've said what I had to say, but I think this we've got Okay.

Anybody else on board? No, Brian? Any comments from the public? Thank you. Good evening.

Hi, Mr. Chairman. I'll manage at Perkins. It's getting more and more comfortable. Just a little historical perspective. You said that Chief Herrera was not interested in the job, correct?

The quote was if needed he would serve. But as kind of it's really for someone to be there to answer questions, to lead. They've called me the last few days. There was a fire yesterday on Eraka Ave. They called me for it.

I went out. I have priorities in while their department is very important, obviously, and I do take it very seriously. I have all the things I have to do. And this is again, this is something that you can do it for a few days. This is going to be a process time wise, this interim role and I need someone who has that time and dedication to be able to answer my questions and hopefully be able to help guide the town through a difficult budget process.

And right now, there's nobody. I don't know what waiting a week would do and nothing's going to change but time.

So some historical perspective and you as whatever position you were in the police department at

the time, you're going to have the

same historical perspective. We lost the Chief, I should know it, fact anyways, the Chief was gone and now we need to replace the Chief. And at that time, Wayne Perkins as Chairman spoke with Chief Russell, you can fill in any gaps. And Chief Russell, from what I gather, he kind of gave the same type of response. The big significant difference here right now that I'm going to be talking about is the police chief I mean, the police department and the fire department were next to each other.

I have no idea how that matters in logistics. But Wayne Sweet talked to him, whatever he did, and then Gary Russell stood up and was willing to do both jobs. From my perspective, at the time it went very well. I can tell you one thing, State Fire Marshal was rip roaring mad and I got up in his face about it, into our thing. And then of course, after we made the final decision, which ended up being Lance Benjamin Nino, the same fire marshal came in here to tell us what a good job we did.

So, I don't know how well that worked, what his intentions are or if the other one was, but my sense is over that period of time it did work. Do I think it's fair to do it to Chief Ferrer right now? No. But whatever happened, we got through the process and it worked.

Thank you, Lincoln. Terry, good evening.

Good

evening. As a former firefighter, retired, I think that it'd be a wise idea to have someone that's familiar with the town, familiar with the department and its policies and procedures as long as this person will be unbiased. I'm not quite sure what the issues are. The other thing I would like to know is this a long term interim? Is this gonna be a replacement of the chief eventually? Or do we do we know what the situation will be?

Joe?

So because we don't know, that's why it's, I think, imperative that it be someone who can step in for an undetermined amount of time. Okay. Especially if you're asking a current command staff member who's part of the union, they have one union, to have that divided loyalties, I think is going to put that person in an undesirable position. I wouldn't want to be in that position. We shouldn't ask one of them to be in that position to give an honest evaluation of a budget and then still be have to be beholden to their brothers and sisters in the union in a bet probably have to walk back over to that union.

That's why I did not consider I considered them because I know that the command staff and there are excellent leaders in there. And hopefully, if we ever need another Chief someday, it will come from one of them. But not right now. It's too difficult of a time.

No, I understand that. And like I said, I still believe that someone that's worked on this department and is familiar with the procedures and policies. I would assume he knows a lot of the personnel also.

He's recently retired, just so you know. It's been within the last two years. Okay. Yes. No,

I think that would be a wise choice. Thank

you. Thank you, Jerry. Evening. Good evening.

Richard France of 705 Pheasant Lane. As a the retired fire chief from Brockton, I have a little institutional knowledge on this. I'll keep my remarks brief to say that I concur with the town manager that this is the way to go. That department needs somebody in there that can walk in, take over and take care of the issues that the town manager has. Thank you.

Thank you.

Any

other comments from the audience? Okay. Hearing none, all those in favor? Aye. All those opposed? Motion passes unanimously. Is that you, sir? Okay. Thank you. All right. Can I please get a motion to vote to enter Executive Session to return to open session pursuant to Mass General Law Chapter 38, Section 21A2 to conduct strategy sessions in preparation for negotiations with non union personnel? We will conduct negotiations with non union personnel and the Chair so declares this is the Interim Fire Chief position.

So moved. Second.

Motion second. Roll call vote. Starboard bill, please. Yes.

Giovanni, aye.

Yes. White, Farley, aye.

And the Chair votes aye. There were no votes taken in Executive Session. With that said, I would ask for a motion to authorize the interim town manager Perkins to enter negotiations with Dana Fontaine and to be brought back to the select board for approval.

So moved. Second.

Motion to second. Any discussion on that from the board? Any comments from the public? Hearing none. All those in favor? Aye. Those opposed? Motion passes unanimously. All right. On to our new business letter A, we're going to have a discussion and a vote on the Bridgewater water extension. Mike, you want to go first? Justin, do to

go first? Don't mind, Justin?

Evening, Mr. Chairman, select Board. We're coming here on behalf of the town of Bridgewater. You you've received my memo. We wanna reiterate our thanks on behalf of the town for our partnership collaboration with your superintendent, your former town manager, and your interim town manager. Essentially, what we're coming to do is ask for an extension. We'll take essentially whatever Middleborough is willing to do. We've had for the town. We've had a really good collaborative partnership with your water department and our water superintendent. We've been able to do the work that we said we were going to do when we came here last time and want to be able to continue that. That's our request.

Mr. I do have a couple of questions. Mr. Casanova Davis, have you completed the flushing that you had said you were going to do?

No, we haven't completed the flushing. We are going to complete the flushing. We had the opportunity to do well redevelopment. I think I identified that in my memo. So we've had the opportunity to double the capacity on one well and one well is going under well redevelopment right now. Okay. If that's complete, we'll flush.

All right. I do have one other question regarding building permits. You're currently under a water emergency in the Tonner Bridgewater?

Yes. We petitioned MassEP, yes.

Did you issue a building permit for 101 bedrooms during that water emergency?

Yes.

Thank you.

Mr. Chair? Good,

Brian. My question is, who's in charge of the water department over there? Who's actually in charge of it? Like whose day to day operations?

Have a water superintendent.

Water superintendent like our Mike Bumpus who you I think he actually used to work here. Mister Young, I think. Yes. Okay. Above him, who's who's who's in charge of that person?

We have a DPW director.

So all decisions are made by one person in town or the or another. For instance, someone does come in and ask for a permit for for something for for new water.

And

I mean, a water emergency and issuing permits with all due respect, dumb. I don't know who's in charge, but whoever issued that permit, will that's my quote. It's a dumb move. You don't have the water, you're asking us for water and you're issuing permits. Next thing you know, you'll be given a green meter so people can water the golf course.

Put a caveat on that. With the water emergency declaration, we did say during this period and we've collaborated with MassDEP, there will be no new tie ins for non approved projects. That project that the town gave a permit was approved project. It went through pretty much site plan approval, etcetera. So our legal team, we talked with MassDEP, That's the reason why. We were not allowing any new times for nonimproved projects.

I'm a no at this time.

I'm a And

the reason why is that is not a that is not that is absolutely not appropriate. DEP can say, yes. You can do it, but you don't do it. You tell the developer, I'm sorry. We don't have the water. We're paying $20 a 100 cubic feet to Middleborough, which is an obscene amount of money that you're paying us to turn around and allow 70 or whatever more units to be built? The answer to that is no. We don't have the water. Because my thing would be, there'd be a full outdoor water ban. If there if there's a sprinkler on, the water's off.

If there's any any permits given out at all, water's turned off. But you know what? I don't think people are serious. The people who are in charge are not serious. Because if I was sitting in the position oh, actually, it's it's a it's a it's 10 people or whatever in charge of that whole town, executive and and their and the legislative body. I would have turned around and and said, if anyone gives another permit out here, they're gonna get fired. I would be firing people right now. It's it's unconscionable that you're giving out water, and you got a tank that's how full. How full is your tank right now? Are you able to get it full to the top?

I would have my water super tight.

I can tell you what the answer is gonna be. No. No. If the if you can't fill the water tank, you don't issue any permits. I'd really hate to do a fire flow test on Vernon Street where my family lives.

My family lives on into Vernon Street, and I'd hate to run off hydrogen out there to see how much water flow we could get out there because I'm scared for the people of Bridgewater, which is as much as I wanna say no, I don't wanna hurt 33,000. Right. I just want the people in charge to realize they have made a grave mistake with what's going on and to turn around, issue any permits, and then come back and ask us for more water. As much as I'd like to sell it, I'm sitting here wondering whether I wanna do it. But I feel for 36,000, 38,000 people that live in Bridgewater.

I don't even know the numbers right now. I feel for those people because they all they wanna do is flush their toilet, take a shower, and get a drink of water out of their faucet. And I wanna help them. But, man, they gotta help themselves. The the the people in charge gotta help themselves. And I'm sorry I'm on my soapbox, but, man. Alright.

Thank you, Done?

Yes. I'm done for a minute. Hey, Tom.

Mister chair, I have a couple questions. Did you in fact report in one of your town excuse me, your select board meetings or council meetings, whatever you call them, that you already had an agreement with us from Moana because that's the No. Never happened. Never. Okay.

I think even when we came here, I think highlighted this in the memo, the whole time we said we'd have a three year excuse me, three month and review it. And that's exactly what we said, three month review. It's even in the IMA that we signed to set a review process. So that's exactly there is no agreement with Middleborough. That's why we're here.

My second question is, so if I understood correctly, you needed the water to flush out so you could fill your tank and have clean water, correct?

Yes.

And what has stopped that from happening with the water you've received so far?

So we've once again, would say we would take advantage of we wanted to raise our tank levels. We also took advantage of well redevelopment. Once again, it doubled the capacity on one well. And then we had another opportunity to do another well redevelopment. If didn't have that opportunity, we would have flushed then, but we wanted to take advantage of that well redevelopment. As soon as that well redevelopment is complete, we will flush the system after that.

So you didn't

do The plan that we said

You didn't do what you told us you were going to do originally is what I'm hearing.

We did. We we still have hopefully till April 12, believe, is when they end, and we will hopefully The flush by

night we approved the three months, I said very firmly that I would not approve an extension. And I went further, I believe it was last week and recommitted to that. This evening, I once again, I'm all ears. I want to hear what Mr. Bumpass says about what we can do. And I, like Brian, wanted to help our neighbors, but I am not impressed with the way Bridgewater has handled this whatsoever.

Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Tom.

I have a question. If we do make a concession of your water, what are you going to do with it? Because we were told that you're gonna flush and you haven't flushed.

So we're gonna still flush. Remember I said I think

You're going to fill your tanks?

We will continue to fill our tanks. Our tank levels have risen since when we had this interconnection with you all. Hopefully, one, we're working on a long term plan, which is the treatment vessels and we're hoping those will be in place and we'll minimize our usage. We'll obviously collaborate with Mr. Bumpus and that's what the plan is. Whatever the town is willing to do we will navigate with that.

Are we part of your long term plan? No.

That has been a discussion.

Well, sounds like we might be and I don't agree with that.

Sure. Brian?

Are your tanks clean? Is the tank clean? Have you flushed this? Have you vacuumed the tank? Has anyone dove the tank and cleaned it all out? Because when you flush, you have to flush them a clean tank. If you don't flush them a clean tank, you pull all the garbage out of the tank back into your system. So I don't know if you have a clean tank yet. If we haven't even filled it. If you haven't filled it to the top, I can tell you haven't dove the tank because you can only dive it when there's a small difference. You don't jump into the tank and try to swim. People get hurt. But because that's a big thing. Mean, you're not going to if you haven't if you haven't got a clean tank right now, you're not gonna have it cleaned by the April 12. So one of my sayings is don't pee on my leg and tell me it's raining.

I I feel like that. I mean, I I wanna help, but I want to hear I think we should hear from Mike as what can we do to help the people of

We want to help and we'd like we do know that it will help our rate payers too in the long run.

Can I ask one question Mike, Justin, if you don't mind? Yes. If we say no tonight, do you have a plan for water or what's your go to for water?

Our plan is continue to be we want to have some treatment vessels in line, we can turn on 10B and 10A. So that's the plan. We're working towards executing that plan.

So if we say no tonight, 10A and 10B are going back online?

No, not until we get it treated. That's what the goal is. That's we want to make sure it's going

to be treated. And when was that? Excuse me? When will they be ready to go online?

Well, we're hoping that in June. We just had a rebid process to do that work for the treatment vessels and so June.

Thank you.

Sorry, what would you be doing between April 12 and June or July? Well, if we say no, those two months are no water from us. I think what mister Germain was asking is, what is your plan if we say no and those wells are not ready to go?

The town has navigated this before without water previously from the community. So we'll be prepared for it. In fact, because of your interconnection, which one we're very appreciative, we've been able to sort of mitigate some of those issues. As mentioned, well redevelopment on one doubled, more than doubled the capacity on one well. We're doing well redevelopment on another well. That would be helpful. We did repairs on another well during that same period of time. So we wanted to be strategic and be thoughtful about that and be prepared if you did determine to say no.

Mr. Chair, so if I understand you, you put this out to rebids, so none of this work is happening as we speak? You don't even have a contractor?

We do have a contractor now.

Is any work being performed as we speak?

Not at the moment.

Has any work been started?

Work has started, but in terms of that team is sort of constructing the vessels. It should be next week. NOI was

I guess my question is why has the why did the work not commence previous?

When we went out for bid for the timeline that we had, it wasn't sufficient. The bidder actually withdrew based on the timeline. So we went out for rebid and we had people bid and we're moving forward with that project.

Let me get back on point here, you don't mind, Tom. Can we hear from Mike? Go ahead, Michael. Keir, please.

Now we've got all that out the way and we've talked about the money, which was a great source of income. Everybody knows that, everybody talks about that. We've pumped 23,200,000 gallons over to the Bridgewater as of this morning. That's a lot of water, but my team, my group, I think we can handle this without a major malfunction, a major breakdown. I believe we could handle it. The biggest well in town has been offline for three weeks, and we had a major, major water main break on Plumbers Street last Tuesday. And we adapt. We adapt to overcome. And I know me and Mr. Giovanni had a conversation of pumping twenty hours a day.

I do not do that. The valve gets shut before the twenty hours comes up. So I'll make sure everybody understood that from maybe a week ago or two weeks ago. The little bit of concerns I have going forward in the next thirty days, I didn't think we were going to extend it. So I prepared for the mill of rehab and along with a major malfunction of paint on the interior of 5,000,000, which is warranty work. So the 5,000,000 will be starting to go offline on Wednesday. That doesn't bother me so much. Miller should be back online Friday as long as the contractor gets it up and running. But what bothers me is around the April, April 15, me and Mr. Young will be in heavy communication if you vote to approve.

We may have to open shut the valve a little more or shut off altogether around April 15, where we're filling the 5,000,000 gallon tank. That's a large demand on the system along with Bridgewater and Carver and the outskirts of Lakeville. So it can be done. The sources there, the communication is at some level every day. Every day, Saddies and Suggies included, me and Mr.

Young have some type of communication. So it hasn't been lost. We're up there checking it every day. We've had if East Grove was online, it would be without a doubt, we wouldn't even I wouldn't even have a worry. But our biggest well, what's going on there, we're not due to be up and running until probably July 2027. So we still got a good sixteen, seventeen months to go over there. But depending on your vote and I have control or we have control of the valves, I would recommend moving forward. I know I stay out of the rest of it, what's going on in town, that's your 5% is problem. I have my own problem with the water. So any questions, I'll be happy to take.

Mr. Chair.

Mr. Chair.

There's a saying, your lack of planning, not you, others lack of planning does not constitute an emergency on our part. And I have no doubt that you can handle it Mr. Bumpus, absolutely no doubt because you have planned all these years. What I hear in your voice, that's enough for me because what I hear is trepidation and some fears for these Middleborough residents who live in this town, including myself. And I made a promise to them in December that I would not extend beyond April 12. I'm sticking to that. I will not vote for this.

Mr. Chair? Brian. What is our current drought status with the state drought status?

I figured the question now. This is going to confuse everybody. We're in a drought. We're in a drought two that came out on March 17. That means regardless of the vote tonight, the sprinkles on are going on in town.

In Middleborough.

And Mike, who issued that order?

Who? DEP.

Who issued the order?

The DEP. Mary Tepper, our Secretary of Department of DEP. Any concerns, any don't call the water department screaming at me. It's above me. I went into litigation with this group. I spent good money on bad and when the fifth appeal came down, I stopped the lawsuit. There's other 18 other towns in the state of Massachusetts that I think six of us dropped out. So they're down to 12 to try and stop this on a state level. I know I'm going off on a tangent, so as right now, we're in a drought too. As of right now, the sprinkles aren't going on.

Oak Point, I'm in communication with Eric once a week. He asked my opinion, I send him this. As of right now, regardless of Bridgewater, no non essential outdoor watering will happen. What worries me is when we come out of the drought, if we come out of the drought and the sprinkles go on, demand goes up and then we have Bridgewater on the line. That's what worries me the most.

I know it sounds it does sound backwards, but it is backwards. So if we stay in a drought, we can give Bridgewater all the water we need, all water they need. But if we come out of the drought and the irrigation goes on, there's a high demand in late May, late or through June, where we may have to make some modifications to Bridgewater, of course.

And we have our mandatory by our DEP Water Management Act permit to withdraw water, our seasonal water restrictions, which go from May 1 to September 30. But to supersedes. That's even tighter restriction, which is not all non essential outdoor, whereas allows for handheld two days a week, Tuesdays and Thursdays, Monday, Wednesdays. Off, the weekends off. The reason why I say that is as much as I'm concerned about the things I think that we've got to help the people.

Yes. We've got to help the people that we can help. You help the people, you can help. With caveats like I think that if I was to vote this, would have a full moratorium on all outdoor use and Bridgewater. You're connected to the town system, no outdoor water use, no washing your cars, no washing your driveways and the reason why is you haven't got the water to waste.

Moratorium on all new services as long as they're taking water from us, no new services connected. I don't care if it's been approved twenty years ago, no new services connected. You tap the main, you lose the water, turn it off immediately and then fully at the discretion of Mike and those under Mike who might be acting if he's away or the water commissioners who are us. If the water is unavailable that we would instantly be able to let you know and tell you that the water was unavailable take care of so we could take care of our Middleborough people. And then I know you like you said, you'd work with Mr. Young. You guys know each other very well, which is great that when we have to fill the 5.5 because that's a slow fill, you don't want to fill it fast because you stir things up. And we make a dirty tank. We don't want to

do that. Or it will be clean.

It be

a clean tank again.

It be a clean tank, but we don't want to throw stuff in it. But that's what my thoughts are right now.

Mr. Chair, coincide with everything Brian said, I'm still not sure what is the length of time you were asking for?

We are going to give the length of time.

Think what we came to the town, whatever the town of Middleborough is coming,

we will give the length.

So with Mike at the helm, and we go back over forty years, so I trust your judgment. And as long as he can shut off that valve at any time, if we if we need it shut off for our own because I get this picture in my head right now of this little girl standing in front of a tap and nothing's coming out and that just tears my heart out. And I can't, as a human being, I can't say no water. I know I talked tough last time. I I eat my words. Shame on me.

You know you change your mind when you hear Mr. Chair. Mike,

through the Chair, we've given them a ninety day, which ends what April 12. And as a compromise or to put some heat on Bridgewater, I think we should shorten our length of time. And what that time especially where we're going into the summer. And for me, I think it's a sixty day rather than ninety day,

about June 30.

Can I make a suggestion, Bill? Yes. If Mike is comfortable with it, I would leave it up to Mike. If we have the water, if we take a motion of some kind tonight and I kind of feel like that's where it's going, I do want to help our neighbor out, the neighboring town. I want to generate some funds for the rate payers. I would ask for some kind of language that is contingent upon the approval of the superintendent as long as it will not have a detrimental effect on the quality of life in the town of Middleborough, some kind of language that lets Mike turn the valve on and off, maybe not to exceed a certain date, but I leave it up to Mike. If we have the water and there's a drought and they need the water, let's sell them the water. If they don't, you can turn it off.

Mr. Chair, do we want to have Mr. Town of Bridgewater can visit us in sixty days? Or do you want to just have me evaluate and report back to?

If we don't have a I don't want put words in your mouth, but if we don't we still have a drought, how much water do we have for Bridgewater?

I think easily 100 gallons a minute, easily. Like three months? Yes, three months.

Three months?

So months

from July, July 12.

Would you feel comfortable saying not to exceed three months or do you want to leave I the language

think we reevaluate in the heat of the summer.

So you're looking for reevaluate? That would be 90. 90 again?

Up to 90, but it's your discretion. Would be

right. Anybody off Linda? Four sixty vote. Discussion?

Brian, getting

a look? Think I'm with that. I think I'm okay with that. That would be ninety days would take us to July 12, I believe. July 12. You get in the discretion. Subject to. Subject to or us with the water commissioners if you're not available and we had to make a decision. Full moratorium in Bridgewater, your guys are going have to vote that somehow. If you really want the water, you'll vote it at the next meeting and then a full moratorium on new services.

Is that something you could work with Justin? I

can't speak for that. The council needs to speak to that. So obviously we can bring If it back to the

they want the water, they can do it.

That would be a condition.

Yes. I don't want to play hardball, but it will be subject to. So they can either have the water and agree or don't have the water, I guess.

So we obviously would bring that to the council and they can make a determination. Okay.

And despite my 60, I'll go along with what Mike is saying that we could maybe go to 90.

I want to refer to Mike because he's the expert.

Yes, I agree.

As well as Brian. Mike knows the system inside.

All right. Anyone else on the Board? Any comments?

Yes. And you cannot steal Mike from us to go to Brudeau.

Ever. Ever.

Absolutely not. Saw that.

All right. Are there any comments from the public on the discussion of the extension of the water main water agreement, I'm sorry. Jerry, good evening.

Good evening. Once again, I'm here to talk about the Middleborough Bridgewater agreement to supply water to Bridgewater during their declaration of a water emergency. Hoping us to pass it over or staying around, so I had a question.

It's right behind you. Excellent.

Thank you. My issue with agreement concerns a lack of truth, transparency and open communication with the residents of Middleborough. My wife, Dawn, recently asked for and received a signed copy of the Middleborough Bridgewater Agreement. Paragraph seven states, upon completion of the work constructing the interconnection, Middleborough shall furnish up to the maximum of two fifty gallons per day. It says it in black and white. It doesn't say anything else. Says two fifty gallons per day, 1,000 gallons per day. Last week, I was told there was actually no set gallonage. Well, there is. It's right in the contract, black and white.

From January 12 to January to March 17, Bridgewater Water Superintendent, William Young, said Bridgewater had used already over 20,000,000 gallons. If you figure that out, it's going around three zero eight million or a little bit above gallons, thousands of gallons per day. So we're already over what we allotted to them. That was during the winter period. It's going to start warming up.

In June and July, we're going to be hot. To go on from there, at the December 8 meeting, we were told that this would be a ninety day agreement. However, if you look at paragraph 13, it states that the agreement may be extended by mutual agreement of the parties provided, however, that the total term of the agreement shall not exceed two years, otherwise we'd have to have a vote our meeting. So it wasn't for ninety days. It was ninety days with a question mark at

the end.

That's not what we were told.

Yes. On December 8, when asked what would happen if Bridgewater came back requesting more time, Chairman Germain, you said that would be a Bridgewater problem, not a Middleborough problem. Well, it's a Middleborough problem. Also at the December 8 meeting, Mike Bumpus said that we could supply water to Bridgewater until the spring or summer. Well, spring is sprung, summer is just about around the corner.

Yohl Farm's Almanac for 2026 is predicting a drier than normal spring and a largely hot and dry summer across The United States with significant heat waves predicted for mid June and mid July. Temperatures are expected to be above normal with below normal rainfall in the North. Well, farmers do have a good sense about things. And a lot of what they say in the almanacs goes is comes true. December 20 on December 8, Jay McGrail also said, and this we went back and watched all the tapes, this is a three month emergency offer to help Bridgewater fill their tanks and that's it.

That's what he said. Also, Jay said, what Bridgewater is asking us to do is provide them with water so they can flush their lines properly. Lastly, I was told that our flushing program begins in mid March. It was also stated that when our flushing takes place because of the agreement ending in April that we would have our own water all to our self to do off commence with our flushing. Well, as of last week, when I asked, I was told that our flushing has not started yet and it's at the March now.

I am questioning how this will affect residents in our water supply system. I am concerned about Bridgewater's unrealistic timetables of accomplishing flushing of lines. And now it seems like they're throwing in ordering and purchasing and placing vessels where they used to be called temporary trailers, now they're being called permanent installations. So I'm not sure which way they're going. In the past, I was told that once the vessels are ordered, it will take time to receive them.

Once they actually arrive on the site, if the concrete pad is in place, that it would take up to four to five weeks get the elements, the different chemicals and stuff in place balanced in another two to three months before it would be up and operational. I just got a few questions. Mr. Bumpus, it's spring and summer's coming. Can we supply Bridgewater without affecting negatively affecting our own supply and capabilities? Do you, Mr. Chair? Sure.

With control of the valve undeniable, we will not have an impact on Middlebrook with me having the Water Department and the Water Commission having control of the valve. It's a day to day operation, and I'll determine it day to day. Usually, we have an in house meeting with my foreman at 07:30 in

the morning, and we have a quick discussion on Bridgewater every morning. Now at the current rate of that they're using the water, which is over what we agreed to, is that amount going to go up? Because now they're going to be demanding more water because it's hot and everything else.

If I knew you wanted that information, would have had it available. We started out at 160 gallons a minute. We went up to 200. I think for February, we were running two forty, two sixty gallons a minute and we're down to 160 gallons a minute right now. So it varies. And you can see that from day to day operations, communications. I wouldn't bore you with all my text messages every day from Billy. But they're on my phone right now, you can see where

the flow changes. Is there any way that we can limit the amount of water that we send over? We have metering valves, Yes. As the Board

sees fit, if they vote, so we put a limit on how much we can supply them every day.

So we could actually put it so that they couldn't get more than 250,000 gallons a day?

It's not that finite. It's an eight inches valve, 130 psi, you dial it in sometimes the system will tell you within a ten, twenty, 30 gallons what it is per minute.

Okay. But you think that we can do it

in July, June and July? If we don't, I shut the valve off. Believe me, I'm not shy about shutting that valve.

Okay. Now through the chair to Mr. Kaffanova. Kasanova Davis, I'm sorry. What work has been done? Actual physical work, not planning, but actual physical work. What have you done? What has the town got accomplished?

Please come up to the floor.

To reach the chair, exactly what I said before, the town has done well redevelopment on one well. It's working on another well. We've done repairs on another well. And yes, that's the work that we've done. And we've got the other work that we're going do with the vessel.

And you currently have a bid out for the filtration piece because you had a rebid because the original bidder somehow backed up your deadlines.

So

you have a bid out right now for that. Do you know when you're taking bids?

We execute. We've received the bids on Friday afternoon. So we execute on Sunday.

Okay. So you have an executed contract, you have a contractor and now the next step would be to have a meeting with a contractor with a schedule.

And

when you get done with that if you could get the contract to schedule and send it over to Mike, so Mike has a kind of idea what you're doing because the moment that thing gets up and running it's going to be a deep breath, you're to be able to take a sigh and say I think we made it through this.

Absolutely. And as Mike mentioned, they have constant communication. We've had a very good collaborative relationship. I appreciate the work that he has done.

Based on that, mean I know we're talking about maybe potentially a ninety day and then reevaluation at that point maybe, I don't know. I mean, that's the heat of summer. But to me, I think about what you're going through. If you started today and got the contractor going, there is a possibility. I mean I built two PFAS plants in sixty days. Actually, Barbato construction from Middleborough built them. They built them real quick.

All right. How many approved projects do you already have? What I read online, what I've

seen on the

I'd like to stay on topic on the extension, not really what goes on in

the We

have the

water to sell them.

If you don't mind. I know you have a lot of questions, but I would mean, honestly, with

regards to Bridgewater, honestly, I look at Bridgewater and I pretty much dare I say I kind of read a little riot act here tonight and I'm serious, I'm full heat on what's been going on.

Don't more improved projects, Brian.

I understand you can have as many improved projects. We start tapping mains, I'm going to tell them to shut it off immediately. You can't be telling people they have water. Tell them to put a well in. That's what you have to do. Again, we have got no water. Bridgewater is out of business for selling any more water than to its existing customers. I mean, if you if you don't say that, then you're you're doing a disservice and god, you might even get yourself sued by by a developer because you didn't tell them there's no water.

Well, the other thing is too that they don't even know who approves project.

Well, that's why I asked the question, who's in charge? And it sounds like Azu is in charge of everything. So I think if he's in charge, because he's the DPW director. Yeah. Because there's no water commission. There's no commissioners at all. The the the councilors are not commissioners. They just hire and fire people. I don't even know what they they have no authority at all over Azul. I don't know what's going on. I don't know how this has even got to this point in Bridgewater that you have nobody in charge to really be in charge.

Well, in act in actuality, Brian, they themselves, the town council and the town manager have already admitted that they don't know who pushed the button that approved it. So It's a button. You push this button.

Say that problem

It it doesn't record who said it.

That's their issue. That's their issue.

They got and they got big issues.

But my concern is when no one's in charge Yeah. That scares me.

Yeah. Very scary.

And if I was a resident of Bridgewater, it would scare me that that I've got two people in charge. And and and one of them is fantastic. That's why he worked with us. The other one, I'm not passing judgment on, but I don't know if he's a water guy. I mean, I'm a water guy. And that's why I get full heat when I hear what's going on, because I want people to really there should be somebody in charge to say no. So that's why I was very hot on this.

All right. I won't ask any more questions of Mr. Casanova Davis, but I do have one for the Board. Is this truly a case of Middleborough helping Bridgewater? Or is it actually being considered as a source of income by the town of Middleborough? Let's call it what it is.

Both. Both. Right. Now

isn't this an enterprise fund? So the money that comes in goes to the water department, so it does not help with the deficit.

Nope. Nope. It goes right to the water department. And will help your Years past, because when a town makes a payment to another town, it typically goes to the general government unless it is specifically directed to a specific location with the enterprise account, we were able to do that. Because I wanted to make sure I really was adamant about it, because I wanted to make sure that we didn't take a $1,000,000 payment like we've done in the past in the early 2000s. We had that Shaw's thing over there. We ended up getting $1,000,000 which the general government didn't go to developing new wells or building a new tank, which is what we kind of want to put this money to it. If we have to do maintenance, we want to be able to do maintenance that he'll have that money to do the maintenance.

I just hope that it's made clear to the residents of the town of Middleborough that this money is not a salvation. This is not gonna solve the deficit. It's not. It's not even gonna count towards the deficit.

You're absolutely right. So this is

this is not salvation. This is not a great day.

Honestly, Jerry, it's not about the money. It's about helping our neighbor.

Well, I'm a little concerned

I would

hope that they would help us if it was the other way around.

What's that?

I would hope they'd help us if it was other way around.

And and and I do too. With

their track record, I don't think they could ever help. They could. This is going back This problem is going back decades. So I don't think they could have helped us.

But one more point, Gerry, the money that's coming back to us goes to the enterprise fund, not the general fund. So this will not be taxpayer funds, this is rate payer funds.

And in the long run, it will help the water bills.

Lincoln? Yes.

Water bills.

Mr.

Chairman, I have a lot of thoughts on this. If you want to shut me down or stop me, feel free to. But first of all, I would like to introduce everybody to Kelly Sullivan Meehan, who I acknowledged at the very first town council member, town council meeting at Bridgewater that I attended. The only reason the public of Bridgewater understands what's happening with their water system is essentially because of this woman and her determination, and she knew absolutely nothing about town government. And now she's understanding what she does, and she never publishes anything, never makes false accusations unless she publishes the receipt.

And unfortunately, somebody within the town government decided to insult her and called her a board's housewife for her activism. And Mr. Johnny Loretta, I want to give him a nod and as well as the other town councils, I have been speaking with them. And now on to my comments on this. There's two water professionals two true water professionals in this room, Mr.

Giovanoni and Mike Bumpus and Billy has his certifications, but as near as I can understand, he does not have the certification levels required for the town of Bridgewater. I'm sure you can speak to that very proficiently, mister Giovanoni. I I do support this. And now first, want to get to the good neighbor policy. Chief Perkins was kind enough and to allow me to sit down with Mr.

Bumpus and Chris Peck today and we had a discussion and a lot of that has been been covered and I came out, you know, we hire professionals to do their job. We do not hire professionals of his caliber to second guess him, question him, to learn what we can from him. And when I sat down and Mike started talking to me especially about the drought thing, my head started to spin. That's going to be a biggest challenge in all of this I'm convinced. Leaving that aside, Chief Perkins said, I'm going back to Chief because it's kind of from a public safety standpoint and he's talking about helping a neighbor.

And we were just having casual conversation. I said, would you help a neighbor if he took a bucket of gasoline spread it all over himself and threw a match to it And we just kind of left it at that and we moved on. And then as I was driving down the road heading to my next appointment, it dawned on me, if there's kids in the house, we're all running in to save the kids regardless. These Bridgewater residents are the kids, the town administration, are the parents that threw the are the people that threw the match on the house. And how did we get here?

Because I've been involved in Bridgewater for a long time, and my integrity has been called into question. And and so first of all, why do I support it before I get on to the other issues? I support it for the working class people of Middleborough. Mr. Bumpass has and you Brian Brian gave an explanation about firm capacity.

It was the second time I heard it. And that's when I finally understood about not running wells at full tilt, leaving capacity, recharging and and I texted Brian afterwards because the light bulb went off in my head and I know more than the average citizen does about this because I've been at it for a long time. And then Mike explained it to me again and I'm convinced that we have it And in some cases as I understand, Mike actually would prefer to have a little bit of that outlet. And so now I look back, now I look to the working class folks of the Middle Middleborough who are struggling to make their water payments. So people are living literally living paycheck to paycheck, paying their tax bills, great citizens, they don't have time for this.

And I went over the numbers and we and Chief Bergus made a joke because I rounded down. He said, geez, I wish Middleborough been doing that for a while. But I'm

supposed to say that. That was a private joke.

I made it public because it's a very pertinent joke and and that's the reason why I I said it and and because it is important. And so I rounded the numbers down and it comes out to a conservative $1,000,000 windfall for our enterprise account. And then we have to ask our questions, who is the beneficiary of that $1,000,000 And then Brian at last week's meeting, you didn't give any of the praise to Middleborough's water condition to anybody on this board. You gave it to all the planning that had been taking in the past and the continuity of it. And as I was sitting down today with these gentlemen, the first thing Chris Beck and I'm a capital planning member and I this one went over my head really quickly.

And the first thing and this is what Bridgewater doesn't have and this is why I'm so proud of the form of governance that we have here in Middleborough versus what the residents of Bridgewater are experiencing. So we get in there and I forgot my thought on that on the water. Oh yeah, for the and so then for that resident, then I asked, do we have any more water fields coming up to purchase? What are we going to be doing with them? Because again, why are we in such good shape?

Because we've taken care of our infrastructure going back decades and I've talked about back we would long ago when we had no money, we were bonding projects to keep ahead. Then I find out that geez, this amount of money that we're going to get from Bridgewater will essentially pay for the new water field and help our water improvement and structures going forward into the into the thing. So at that point, it becomes a middle borough issue. And then helping Bridgewater is definitely a plus. How did Bridgewater get into this position? Well, what I was going to say with Chris when we were talking the first thing and I'm speaking a language and I got and I got lost and he said, know, a five year plan, a thing and I'm saying, wait a minute, know, what are you talking about? You're you're fighting. He says, a capital

plan

Lincoln. So it's like, know, wake up dummy. And I said, yeah, well, so here here is our Middleborough Water Department and they can concisely go through step by step every plan that they have to increase our water infrastructure, maintain our water infrastructure over the next five years because we are as a town are organized in all of this process. None of that, absolutely none of that and I would love to hear somebody challenge it exist in Bridgewater. Every time a new strong manager and their strong managers are more like a dictator in Bridgewater.

Every time a new town manager comes in, a new plan starts. There's absolutely zero continuity of planning across the process. So then you step into me and ironically, I happen to have and I, you know, full disclosure, I've been offering Bridgewater this parcel of land, which is irrelevant to me and for since Troy Clarkson was there and you've seen the letter before and I actually posted the first time I decided to to associate with Kelly, I dropped in their thing a letter that I sent to Bridgewater town town manager Dutton two and a half years ago. You got a water problem, I got water. No reply.

And now here we are rolling around. So now we're in the full blown crisis is is is rolling around. Hey, I got water. And that happened back in December. And you know what kind of communication I've had with town manager Casanova Davis?

First of all, he said it was my responsibility to show where all the water mains are in association with the property and with the aquifer. He made the decision to say, we're not going to use our GIS system, GIS system, we're gonna force you to hire an engineer to show us that you have water available for us. Now, to make the big kicker, and Brian, this is one you're really gonna kick, wanna chug, and you're gonna kick. This is right along the Taunton River across from the Mazaras Well. And I have to prove and then they they pulled in Apex Engineering, a firm that I sitting on your side or anything would no longer allow to be in the employment of Middleborough.

They gave absolutely the worst power press PowerPoint presentation. None of the town council members had seen this water presentation before it was given to the town. At the end of the meeting, the town council members didn't understand what was was said. So how could the how could the people of Bridgewater possibly understand? But now I'm listening.

And I've already I was already told that I, mister Casanova, directed my lawyers from Washington DC who I did not hire to deal with the municipality of Bridgewater, believe me, but they got tied up in all of this. And he told my lawyers that I had to show all this mapping of aquifers and where they are. Well, guess what? It ties in it would perfectly tie in the not only across from the Zara's well, Brian, the there they it's their their water supply dead ends on Route 18 right near where my property is and then on the other side across where South Street is, getting around to a jury area if I understand it right, it's a connection of the power lines in between and there's a connection to make the water loop. Now, if anybody in Middleborough was approached with the type of offer that I'm making, we all know that people would do backflips, let's get it set up.

None of that happens. Mr. Casanova Davis says that he's in contact with my team, never happened. I'd be happy to go ahead and do it. They've lived it. And here we are. I'm in this point, I still haven't heard. Mr. Loretta has finally picked up the ball along with this wonderful activist in order to get the ball moving. And so I went ahead and produced all this mapping for Bridgewater on the land right across from the Mesares Well.

It cost me $10,000. Then they roll around this apex hearing, and this was literally the worst presentation I have witnessed in my public life. They got up there and then somewhere along in there and I can only assume it's directed at me and I had mister Loretta check this for me because I didn't want to have to do a foyer request. Apex said something to the effect that if Bridgewater is going, it's town policy that if Bridgewater is going to investigate using a private party's parcel that they're responsible for everything right down to the hydrology test before they even going to consider it. Once again, this parcel is right across from Missouri as well.

And and so and so then, of course, you know my persistent nature and I'm sitting here as the oldest business in Bridgewater and probably the oldest heavy manufacturer and certainly in Southeastern Massachusetts. And mister Casanova sent this to my partner in a Washington DC law firm. Hello, Nicole. I hope all is well. I spoke with the council president, Johnny Loretta regarding how we will move forward.

What's the I don't have the date on this, it wasn't that long ago. How we will move forward. Considering mister Andrews is having his own discussions with him meeting mister Loretta, I think it is best so that there is no confusion that Lincoln continues his discussions with him and then ultimately the council can schedule a discussion and discuss amongst themselves if they are interested in moving forward with any discussion regarding purchasing the property. I do not have any information on timing that is something the council will have to determine if they are interested in acquiring the property. Have a good day, exclamation point.

Does that show any commitment to try and improve your water supply when it's right across from there? Now I'm going ask you guys another question because everybody knows me. If I tell somebody I have a complete team ready to rock and roll and help the town, do you think I have that team ready? They didn't. They did absolutely. And so now on Kelly's page Bridge on on Bridgewater thing, you have people literally begging them to talk to me and I know city councils are as well. So right now, you know, if I was in this position and I'm gonna speak because he called my integrity into question. He said this he said this policy was in place where I would have to pay everything by Apex. That's stupid. It's just flat out wrong and to say that's insert, I would love to see that language.

I didn't bother playing it. And, but it was what the message is very clear. We don't want to hear from you. You know, you're the only water field available. So, I want to help Bridgewater. I want the money for our rate payers that are struggling and I hope that Bridgewater itself will heed mister Giovanoni's advice. I hope that town council members will take a look at this form of government that's being practiced before you right now and have more respect from input from people like Kelly who who is the one that's actually providing the information. This is information that in Middleborough, if I walked into any single office, someone would immediately hand me the piece of paper and show it to me. No questions asked. She has to fight for every piece that she gets on behalf of the Bridgewater residents. Thank you.

Mister chair Thank you. Brian.

To what mister Andrews was just saying, if I can throw on my engineer's hat for a minute to the council out there, my advice to you is if somebody actually gives you the opportunity to do what's called exploration on private property, Towns do this all the time. You explore to whether or not there is actual capacity out there. Pay for it because when you get a chance, if you look around Bridgewater, there isn't we have the saying, land. They're not making any more of it. And I got to tell you when towns start running out of land and you have to protect Zone one and Zone two and if you don't have Zone two protected, you're going end up with contaminants within your wells.

So if you have an opportunity and I happen to know what you're talking about on the river, the worst thing you're dealing with is the river, which isn't bad at all actually like he said, Mazares is actually pretty close to the river. 40 acres. Yeah. 22 is what you need minimum to get your square for your Zone one. But that's just a bit of advice. Use town money to find these locations and then buy them, lock them down. Because if you don't, they're they're just gonna disappear. And at some point, we're all gonna be drinking septic water that's being coming out of two treatment plants. I'm not giving you it's we're gonna have to start doing at some point. It sounds gross, but it's at some point we may be doing that.

And not us in Middleborough. We're doing our job, knock on wood.

Nancy, good evening.

Hi, Nancy Kefalos, just a concerned citizen. I've been watching a little bit here and there and getting a lot of the stuff from Bridgewater. But my suggestion and it's just a suggestion to help the residents of Middleborough, I would like to ask you to consider a thirty day extension and hold off on a longer period until Bridgewater Council meets or has a special council meeting where they discuss a water moratorium to at least a minimum until the date provided by our water superintendent Michael Bumpus of July 12. I would also hope that the Bridgewater town manager asked their counsel to allow the Bridgewater public to voice their concerns for longer than three minutes each because they need answers. That's it.

Thank you. Thank you, Nancy.

How you doing? Brad McKinnon, former town councilor. How much percentage of Bridgewater do you think the state owns? Because it's about 22 to 25% of the town and you five have helped the town of Bridgewater more than the state, which is kind of kind of how it goes, but Sorry, Tom. Sorry.

It's weird on this side compared to that side. But like I said, I wanted to say thank you for that. I mean, Brian, you have really good points, but I'll be honest with you, you're yelling at the wrong guy when it comes to him. There was a meeting where who signed off did say he signed off and he's in this room too. And I mean the biggest problem with Bridgewater right now causing all these water problems are the fact that we've bent the knee twice to the MBTA community guidelines and all that.

We did a form based code too and projects can go up without planning board even having a decision on if things are feasible or not. And I mean, Bill when I was sitting down over there, I mean she just said it too, but I thought probably the best thing you guys should do is do a thirty day and then hold their feet to the fire, have them come back and reevaluate. And like Mr. Bumpa said over here, yes, we're in a drought. I mean it's level two and all that, but I just Bridgewater needs it.

The one well getting redeveloped is very important because all our wells were very weak in town like some of them are ridiculously low and I don't even know why we use them, but I'm not the engineer like you and Council President already are. Can I ask Mr? Bumpers one question? Sure. Have you guys flushed yet Middleborough?

Say it again?

Have you flushed in Middleborough yet? Sections. Just targeted flushing, yes.

The section I'm concerned with the old point in the future and way down South Middleborough, Cowen Drive, you're familiar with it, but the extremes, the Northeast section and the Far South.

I was just wondering because usually I'll drive around and I'll see towns flushing when they haven't, I haven't yet. I know the ground could still be frozen and stuff, but I'm just asking because I mean, me and Councillor Murphy back there, we've been asking for a while, why aren't the hydrogens getting flushed? And it's kind of just passing the questions around here and there. But like you guys said, you're upset we didn't flush it flush. I get that. But the fact that we did help one of the wells is major and it was very needed in our town because like I said, these wells aren't in good shape beyond just 10A and 10B. You know what I'm saying?

Yes. And I have to say that Mike and the entire water department with our flushing program, they've got it down to a science with their unidirectional flowing that they don't flow more than they have to.

I

get They keep track of every gallon that they flow with out of the HoseMonster. I've seen what they do. I've seen because they keep track of it because you actually have to report that stuff to DEEP.

Yeah. No.

It's And he's fantastic at at the the whole team down there is fantastic. Yeah.

No. I appreciate it because like I said the last time, my nieces and nephews live right there and their water's cleaner than mine. You know?

It's it's it's a It's a situation where in the clean the cleaning of these wells, the problem is if you let them go too long, you'll get them back only to 60%.

When I was on the council, we got new filters and that and all that for some wells in the Carver Street. And I don't even want to tell you how long it was since those government placed prior. I will say standing here, I was under two different town managers and this guy has done more than both of them and I was with Dunt for a year and a half. We had the same water problems back then and just the fact that the water emergency even happened was a ginormous step for the town and you guys helping out is great too. Like I said, I'm not trying to talk against Bridgewater, but if I were you guys, I'd go for the thirty days.

I'd hold their feet to the fire, make sure they continue to keep processing. I mean, two wells being redone sounds phenomenal to me right now. I know he just said we're working on another one, but definitely need more work than that. But I mean we did see the Apex projection and they had certain dates that have already moved around. I hope May and June are when 10A and 10B can be put on. But at the same time we'll see. I just really wanted to come up here and say thank you guys for helping us more than the state does because I mean we got exploited if we didn't do anything we'll get no grant money, right. That's just my opinion. It could be some of yours, but I just want to say thank you guys for everything you

do before. You.

Evening. Evening. General Ready, President of the Bridgewater Town Council, thank you all for having us tonight, and thank you for being wonderful partners up until this point. And I really look forward to hopefully continuing that relationship as partners with both of our communities. And I stand before you confident that we do have a great plan moving forward.

I've had some great conversations with Mr. Andrews, who's been a pleasure to get to know. And we also have some other ideas in place for other wells in town, Verdant Street and some other identified locations as well. I'm really excited that we're going to be turning what was going to originally be a piping project into a temporary project into a permanent treatment solution at those Putnam Street wells, and I'm looking forward to hopefully getting those done by the June as our town manager indicated. So I want you all to know that the efforts that we've made over the last ninety days and hopefully moving forward will be done in good faith, and we will be proceeding forward with a clear plan.

And we're not going to worry about what happened previously, but we could always we could only worry about how we could lead moving forward out of this situation. So I want to thank you all for your time and your community commitment to helping us and we hopefully will continue that partnership with you all.

Thank you. If I might, will you have any issues with us if we put some of these restrictions that I've talked about with moratorium on outdoor use moratorium on new services and at the discretion in up to ninety days is what I I like the idea Mike even said it, as long as he's got discretion on that. Do you think you're you'd be putting that on the council, the agenda to be voted on quickly?

Absolutely. You have my commitment that will be on the agenda next Tuesday.

You. Sorry? Which is next Tuesday?

Yes. Okay.

Yes. The next meeting. You have my commitment. I cannot guarantee that the council will pass it, but it be on that meeting. And if that's what we need to do, then that's what we will do because that's what's going be best for our citizens.

Absolutely. Thank you so much.

Thank you. Thank you.

I hope your council does pass it and shows good faith.

Alright. Diane, good evening.

Diane, good evening. Diane Fay, 8309 Oak Point Drive. I'd like to get back to having an if there is a vote to have an agreement with these people that it'd be very strict. You know, I was at the meeting when they did the presentation first. And I thought it all had to do with a well that had to be flushed, nothing about two other wells and doing work on them.

It does concern me that we did have a vote from this board to do one thing and then it was like, good, we got that. So now we'll go back home and we'll make some other things happen before we get to what we asked for. That is concerning. It's it's like a, I don't know what I would call it.

Fate and switch?

Fate and switch. Thank you. I don't feel I that well, no.

I know. I know how

you feel.

It just sounds that way to people that are sitting here that are concerned about our water. But what I would like to ask is, if we're drawing up an agreement, and I know Brian says have some strict regulations, shut down all the other use, that and I don't know when towns put moratoriums on water services like that. Does it just go to the residents? How about the university? With the infrastructure there and all of the students that are in there?

You know, get up in the morning, take a shower, come back from the classes, going out tonight, take another shower. You know, there's you know, if they were home, mom or dad might say, hey, you know, knock it off. We're paying that bill. But there's lots of things. Can that be put into it that the other organizations in the town be notified to curb their use too? And the same things, I don't know how many car wash places they have. I know we have a bunch. Can those be made to lower their use of water? I don't think they recycle the water. Oh, they do?

Yes. Okay.

I don't

want a cow wash.

You can sip maybe we can send the sewer water back up

the hill. You know, it's what do they call it? Sorry. They call it Reused water. Or something.

No. I I I may say, I I I feel like I'm not against giving the parent. Know, but parent. Yeah.

I'm not against giving them the water, but it's something that we have residents that are very concerned about that we're giving up our water to other towns. And I think in good faith to our own people, we should show that we are asking them to really toe the mark. We tell people at Oak Point, you can't water those grass, the yards. And personally, I don't think we should be watering it at all because we don't own it. And we're paying the water bills when they turn it on.

But I think if done and structured to the point that they understand it, and I do want to point out it was nice to see the chair of the selectman or counselors say that they are he will put it on the agenda. But I didn't like the comment if they'll pass it. He better go back and lobby it or it can be turned off as easy as it's turned on. It isn't a case of giving us some mouth work here. It's selling it to the people that he has on the board with them. Thank you.

Thank you, Diane. No problem. Lincoln.

One quick comment. We had all this debate thirty years ago about Oak Point. Everybody was concerned about supplying water to Oak Point. Oak Point would not be there if we listened to the residents and not to our water professionals. Thank you.

Thank you. Good evening.

Adeline Ellenberg, I'm a current counselor in Bridgewater. And I wanted to say you're absolutely right that we have dropped the ball. Very quick piece of history, we gave up Open Town Meeting and that has been the problem. When we gave up Open Town Meeting, we gave up our water and sewer board. Uh-huh. That's why there's no one in charge. I have been personally advocating that we return to Open Town Meeting. I would be happy to give up my vote as a counselor to restore Open Town Meeting. Thank you.

Mr.

Chairman, I think now is perfect time for you to explain to the Bridgewater residents that you are selects, but you are also water commissions in that power dynamic.

Sure. We have a very powerful charter here in Middleborough. The select board, the five of us were also water commissioners, sewer commissioners. We are the Rent Board and the Board of Health and the Earth Removal Permitting Authority. So it's the same five people for all those in our charter.

We're actually the Public Works Commission, even though we have a DPW Director. We are actually the Public Works Commission as well. There's like all these hats we wear, but we take it seriously and the big thing is there's no three minute rule.

And every single week, the public can come up here and talk to their selects and their water commissioners on separate issues.

Mr. Chairman? We'd like to We'd

We'd We'd like to Quarterly water sewer commission meetings, which I know will probably do for one soon. But that's also an opportunity for Mike, Mr. Bumps, Mr. Goldman and Mr. Peck to come forward and bring up any concerns as well. So that's these are all public meetings.

Great. Dawn, last comment.

Dawn Boyce snuck Chris DeWay. If I didn't feel bad enough coming here, I want to puke. I want to throw up. When you tell me that they approved, when we're helping them and they damn well approved and gave away water, are you kidding me? You're helping someone and they spit in your face. I asked you before December 8. I said, okay, ninety days. Assure me. Ninety days. You did assure me. Mhmm. But now, they basically slapped you right across the face. Thanks for the water, Middleborough. Whack. Okay? And it's not just this. This has been going on. I printed out Bridgewater water department. It's on the town manager from April 2024, okay? Two years ago.

Now this has been going on for more than that because I lived in Bridgewater. But one of the things to meet 2025 demands in a firm capacity scenario, the department will either need to complete the Vernon Street Wells project or establish an emergency interconnection with the neighboring community. Guess what? The Vernon Street Wells, last I heard, they're not going to be ready for five to six years. So that leaves the interconnection to the neighboring community. And what? Another ninety days is gonna solve that? I think not. These first ninety days didn't solve it, and you damn well saw it. You know?

And then I got a couple other things. They're a mess. Okay? It didn't happen recently, but going on for years. They don't take it seriously. They have kept building and expanding even when they knew they didn't have enough water. They knew in 2024, two years ago, we don't have enough water. Ride through that town and look at those projects and those apartments and the college that has perpetually grown from a state college, it's now a university. Okay? You requested ninety days, you received ninety days.

And I don't see that they've really done anything to really rectify it. They have not ordered their vessels. Even when they get their vessels, it's going to be quite a while, you know, not ninety days. I say no. I pray for the citizens of Bridgewater. I really do, and I pray you can get your shit together with your town because it's a wreck, it's a mess, it's appalling and I wouldn't even want to live there. Maybe you should think about moving to Bridgewater to Middleborough because it is better run. But now for you, I have a couple of things. Okay, so it's good for the tax payers, right Bill? Didn't that what you say?

Rate payers.

Okay. Are we going to reduce the rate for the water payers?

That's not how it works.

But if it's good, how is it good for the rate payers if Would you

you like an answer? Yes. Okay. The profits we make from enterprise fund go back in the infrastructure.

Yes.

That's how we buy more land and get better wells and have the water that we do have. Money isn't just ratepayer money to go to the monthly bill. It's infrastructure. We're buying a piece of land right now for 1.2 to ensure we have more capacity, hoping to. Will come from Bridgewater, 1,000,000.

I'll give

you that.

But you know

what I see too, being a good neighbor? Good neighbor doesn't charge 1.5 times. A good neighbor charges exactly what it costs you. Because I don't consider it my neighbor, if I asked to borrow a cup of sugar and she said, yes, sure, but I want a cup and a half back. That's not being a good neighbor.

Would you like to answer that one?

Go ahead.

We are good neighbors, but my priority is Middleborough first.

Well, that's our to say, but here we go with extending.

What would you like us to do? Shut them off and have no clean water for the town of Bridgewater?

It's not the town that I'm

That's what they had, Mark, before we stepped in and gave them 90.

You're upset with the town of Bridgewater and rightfully so, but not the residents of Bridgewater.

No, I'm not. But you know

what? The town

is mismanaged. When's that gonna change?

I'm not defending the town. That's their

problem, not Middleborough's problem.

That's Yeah. But it

is Middleborough's problem because of the mismanagement there. It's it's directly affecting us.

Actually, if it was affecting us and he told us we couldn't do it, I would say no. Yes. Exactly. It's fine.

He just we got plenty of water. Right?

Don, please.

So don't don't tell me I can't water my lawn this year. Don't tell me I can't wash my car.

It's not us. That's DET.

The state

That's the Department of Environmental Protection State. Who authorizes us in our water management act permit to do certain things. One of them is the drought the drought program. The drought program is the moment they go to three, it is nothing. Absolutely nothing.

And we're at two?

We're at a two. Two is you can't go out and use sprinklers and all that. It that's that's what automatically is done. That's the state. The state

I know it's

a state.

If you watch the

TV far as I've heard from here, we have plenty of water.

But but but that's not us saying us saying you can't do that. It's the state's telling us Hold on, Brian.

What Mike said is we have plenty of water right now.

Mhmm.

The moment we don't have water, we turn the valve off. It's the Middle Borough first. Yeah.

That's what I said last time.

Thank you, Don. Mr. Chair. Brian.

I would move that we extend the current agreement up to to ninety days.

I want to put the date in there please.

What's that?

I want put the date on

that.

Which would be 07/12/2026 with the understanding that there is a full moratorium in Bridgewater and all of outdoor water use and a full moratorium on new water services in Bridgewater and completely at the discretion of the Middleborough Water Commission, Mike Bumpus or who is acting in his position if he's not available.

Okay. We have a motion. Do have a second? Second. Discussion. Discussion. Go ahead, Tom.

Does that motion include that Mike has the ability and the right to shut that valve at any time? He deems necessary.

At his discretion. Absolutely. Thank you.

Any further discussion on the board? Are there any comments from the public? Hearing none, all those in favor? Aye. All those opposed? Nay. Motion passes with one nay.

Good for you, Theresa, for keeping your word.

All right. Thank you, everyone. Come on to our next item. Yep. I'll take a minute. Thank you. Sure. We'll do five minute recess with the room clear.

Five minute. Slide out. Five

minute. Five minutes. Reset? Five minute recess. Yes.

Sounds good to me.

Laurie, five minute recess, please. Hey, everybody. From a quick recess on the new business letter B. Can I please get a motion to vote to approve the Memorial Day Parade and ceremony request for 05/25/2026 starting at 10AM and use of the town roads as indicated?

So moved.

We motion the second. Discussion on that, Steve?

Yes. How are doing everyone? Good evening. I'm Steve Adelman, Veterans Agent in the town of Middleborough, Massachusetts. The Middleborough Veterans Planning Group and I would like to have a Memorial Day Parade and ceremony on 03/25/2026. We would like to formally invite the members of the Select Board and the Town Manager to the Memorial Day Parade, which starts at 10:00 and the ceremony to be held at the Veterans Memorial Park starting at approximately 11:00. This year's ceremony will honor Revolutionary War members from the town of Middleborough. We'd also like to have a Poppy Drive from May 18 to 05/25/2026.

Thank you, Steve. Mr. Chair? Brian?

I would also on that motion, that did include the Poppy Drive, right? That included the Poppy Drive?

You can add it, Brian.

I'm not sure. '25. Yes.

Thank you, Brian. Motion is second for the discussion on the Board or any comments from the public.

Is this the I'm sorry, Mr. Chair, is this the standard route that we're going to be taking coming out of the parking lot?

Yes, same the same parade route that we've done in last

I think started about my second year, three years ago. I know people would like more discussion at our Board, but I don't think I need to go through the parade route. Would you like to Brian? No.

Right. We have motion and second. All those in favor? Aye. Those opposed? Motion passes unanimously. I'm going to skip over C for a quick second, so we can get to Steve again. Can you please get a motion to vote to approve the request from the Veterans Department, the Holdy's Pitleborrow two hundred fiftieth celebration of the Town Hall lawn on 05/02/2026 from 10AM to 2PM.

So moved. Second.

Motion to second. Stephen, you want to add?

Yes. I just want to say that, yes, that the middle of residence department with the help of the PS trustees and the Tourism Committee that we would like to hold this event. We have this is a free event to the public. Refreshments and lunch will be provided and that's while supplies last. That the Massachusetts National Army God Band is going to come out and play that day for an hour, which is very hard to get them. So it's going to be great to see them out there. We have the Hengen Militia that will be doing some reenactments. And we have a local resident Mary Stanis, who's going to portray Deborah Sampson. She's also a distant relative of Deborah Sampson. So yes, I'm looking to have that event on May 2.

Great. Thank you, Further discussion on the Board? Are there any comments from the public? Hearing none, all those in favor? Aye. Those opposed? Motion passes unanimously. Thank you, Steve. Thank you all. Appreciate it. Back to new business letter C. Can I please get a motion to vote the acceptance of the resignation of Doctor? Edward Braun and vote to appoint Sandy Abin as member of the ZBA to fill an unexpired vacancy with a term that ends on 06/30/2029. So moved. We have a motion. Do we have a second? Discussion? Second. Mr. Chair. Nancy, yes.

There's a letter here. The Zoning Board of Appeals has received a letter of resignation from Doctor. Edward Braun. Doctor. Edward Braun has served on the Zoning Board of Appeals for forty nine years.

Amazing. He will be greatly missed. Amazing. The Board respectively requests Sandy Abbond, 142 Rivers Edge, Middleborough Mass to be appointed as a regular Board member to fill this vacancy with a term to expire in June 2029. I just wanted to read that only because forty nine years, I think of Norm D'Agele in the years that he I mean talk about people that have served this community, Bill Garceau, I mean the names just keep coming of people who have served almost forty plus years. It's amazing, sorry.

Yeah, you stole my thunder, but that's okay Nancy Kefalis.

I'm going

to say it anyway. Ed Braun had committed himself to forty nine years on the Zoning Board of Appeals. I had the pleasure of working with him. Ed became an associate member in 1977 and became a regular member in 1981. Maybe one day he can be honored in the future for his commitment to the town of Middleborough. Thank you Ed for your service.

Thank you, Ed. All right. We have motion and a second. Any further discussion on the Board? Any comments from the public? Hearing none, all those in favor? Aye. Those opposed? Motion passes unanimously. Under our new business letter E, can I please get a motion to a discussionvote to approve a secondhand junk old metals license for Vivien and Anthony LLC, DBA Metal Bar Recycling?

This is a renewal. The application is filled out. It's Monday through Friday 7AM to 4PM Saturday from 8AM to 12PM. We have an insurance binder named the town additionally insured and a core recheck on file. Pleasure of the Board.

23 employees I believe they say.

Yes, sir.

I have motion to approve.

Second. We have motion to second. Discussion on the Board. Are there any comments from the public? Hearing none, all those in favor? Aye. Those opposed? Motion passes unanimously. On to our new business letter F, we're going have an update on the Tom Major search, please.

Mr. Chair, the Board requested an RFP. We I looked at the process and I have made the determination if this is the path the Board intends to go down that I would recommend that Tara Preglia, the IT Director, who is a procurement officer, I asked her if she could continue the process. I think having it be in the town manager's office itself, I don't want anyone in the community to think that there's anyone in that office involved in the process whatsoever. So I just would like to recommend that to consider that alternative.

I believe some of the paperwork is almost completed and Tara will issue it and it will be posted in comms buys and the mask weekly. Once it is finished, it will be up for two weeks. Think I mentioned question was last week, thirty days of two weeks, it's two weeks.

Mr. Chair.

Theresa?

I think it's important for the public to understand, Joe, the difference between an RFP and getting a quote. So my understanding is under 50,000 changes what that looks like. So if you could explain.

So there's only three consultants really in the state. And you can go out and request them to submit their best request or best proposal, you can go out and solicit those. The problem with that is, with that process, you have to take the lowest bidder. Again, I think it's more transparent if you don't want the town manager's office going out soliciting If we do the RFP and you allow the IT Director to carry out that process, I think for the citizens of Middleborough, it's the optics are better.

Okay. Thank you.

All right. Sounds good. Anybody have any objection? No. No. It's a good idea.

Thank you, Tara, if you're willing to do this.

I've talked to her. She thinks that she'd taken on.

So we'll continue forward unless there's any objections? No. Okay. Thank you, Joe.

As best as we can, Joe.

Thank you, Bill. On to budget discussions, anything for budgets?

The budget update is as follows. I met with most of the department heads Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. I couldn't meet with all of them. I obtained a 5%, 1020% cuts to their department in number only based on the 27 proposed budget book. We discussed the impacts, the documented potential impacts.

Again, these are just considerations at this moment. The process of collecting input from the department heads, I think, is probably it is the best place to start this process. Unfortunately, the process is very long. I want to commend each department head for their due diligence. I was brought not just numbers, I was I was brought position papers, I was brought, you know, reasons why certain things are important in each department, not just a wholehearted number.

And again, I think that's important based on other conversation I'm going report back to the board. Once I did collect two Tuesdays and Wednesdays and Thursdays department head numbers, I met with finance committee on Thursday night. The finance committee meeting, I shared the numbers. The conversations I had with each department head, I'm looking for serious consideration in addressing any budget shortfalls and those conversations, I think, will help me make an informed decision or at least be able to pass on the correct information to members of this board, members of finance committee to be able to sit down and discuss an appropriate approach at making any cuts. And I understand that as soon as I provide information to the Finance Committee, it becomes public record.

So I know a lot of employees were a little concerned that there were some data that was put out over the weekend. Again, I just want to reinforce its data, its collected data. There are no decisions being made yet, but we need to have all that information. It's a jigsaw puzzle that has to be put together, looking at how you figure out how to approach or close the shortfall. Once I have all the data, again, I'll provide it to FinCom.

At the FinCom meeting, before we got into the data, I asked for some input on guiding principles. I expressed my concern that this process is going to create a lot of anxiety with town employees rightfully so. This is a shock to many of them. Many departments have expressed there's a lot of concern not only for what's the number, but what's the process because many people haven't been through this in their tenure. That's a lot to a lot of information like to gather and round up.

I have met with the superintendent, interim superintendent I think he likes to be called acting. I've met with Mike several times, talked to him on the phone. There's some back and forth between us and the school. Again, it's difficult to tell a department head what they're looking at without having the bottom line number. And I think based on the conversation with Fincom on Thursday night, and I appreciated all the input and discussion that we had, we really can't do anything until we figure out what cuts look like in every department.

And that's when we sit down and you start reasoning back and forth. And I think applying those guiding principles and types of examples of those guiding principles would be looking at, okay, we're looking at necessity, is this specific job role a necessity? Are we looking at is it a revenue generator impacting a cut in this department, would it decrease our ability to collect revenue. Looking at vital programs and departments that provide service to people that they won't tolerate being cut. So there's a lot of input.

And again, taking that input from the department heads, sharing it with Fincom and members of the select board and trying to put it all in a box and figure out how many pieces we have to figure this puzzle out is really difficult, which I would also address or remind the Board that we do need to a timeline would help. And I think the town meeting, I'm not sure if this is a good time to talk I about would have been at the point when we talk about rescheduling town Like I said, I felt the back and forth between I appreciate the back and forth between the department heads and obviously not a good position to be in as a department head, but the candor that I received from them, I felt that I provided as much information or what I had to operate with back to them. But again, there were no promises or guarantees made. It was just sitting down and talking what ifs. And yes, there will be data exchange that will be public record with Fincom.

That's data. That's just the impact if and people need to understand that. Impact if and we're not saying it's a percentage across the board for every department. Some departments may bear a bigger burden. Again, I would go back to the guiding principles and that's why I kind of charged or requested from the finance committee that they give me some guidance in that because I don't think it's really one person's opinion on what the principle should be.

It should be an elected body sitting together. The elected representatives of the town of Middleborough, they represent the people. We sit together and we come up with some, like I said, mission statement or guiding principle doctor in that. We look at making these cuts. Because unfortunately, the employees, if they did hear that they're going to be cuts over the weekend on social media, I don't know why they didn't know about it two weeks ago. You do the math, dollars 3,300,000 is a big number. People will get laid off.

What do you think? Yes. Do you want to talk about May 18 as a placeholder?

So I looked at the calendar and I just again, I think the public needs to know what the process entails. So they understand why we're going to work backwards. So the original meeting was planned for the twenty seventh. That is three weeks to gather the information and present it to board a budget. And then we have to then address the warrant for town meeting.

So discussing budget cuts and then going over the warrant, that could be a long night. Because if we would have it on the eighteenth, it needs two weeks to be published. So that puts us back to the twenty seventh. It will be close. I don't know what the will of the Board is. I know there's some conversation with different people in town talking about May 18.

I only mentioned that because Town Council is only available on that Monday.

Yes. If that's the date and that's the timeline.

May 18. Yes, I have

a lot of meetings between now and then.

The next week would be Memorial Day,

which is out.

Yes. And then the following Monday would be June 1. Correct. We could go there

if you have to.

You want to see if Town Council don't

want to

push this as much as I want to get through, we want to make sure we have the time to do the right thing on every piece. And I know you feel we all feel this way. We'll make sure we have the time to do it right. I'd rather see a June 1 and get it right. Would like to ask if

The school department, yes, concern would be that's graduation week festivities with Paul Brannigan and they have something typically every night. So I

think June is bad. I think the eighteenth is the date. That's what I'd recommend. May 18. It's going to have to be a lot of hands on.

May 18. Fincom.

Eighteenth

doesn't. No. Of

May.

I don't know where the chart assists.

Great. Trevor says we can move it. I don't think it says we have to move it to a Monday, but

Any date. I'd love to spend my anniversary there. You too, Mark?

I don't know about that, Brian. May 18.

All right. That's it on May 18.

Anything else, Joe, on the budget side of things?

It's budget all day, every day.

Mr. Chair.

Theresa.

I do have some questions and concerns. Joe is focused on going forward. So am I. We have to. We have no choice but to go forward. But we also really need to be going backwards a little bit here and we need to understand how we got here and not allow it to happen again. That's just the plain truth. So how did we get here? I don't know. But what I know is that we still do not have an audit because I asked this question earlier.

We don't have an audit from 2025. I'm not sure why. I'm still not clear on that, but that is a concern for me. So I am making a motion that since we do not have last year's audit in hand, along with some growing concerns that we pursue a forensic audit over the past year's audit finances for the last three years.

We have a motion. Do we have a second? Second for discussion. Bill, discussion.

Go back three years you want to go, Theresa? Just not quite sure.

Yes. I mean, I'm willing to discuss that timeline. But I would say at least two years because we still don't even have a 25 audit. So I would say at least from

that Why not?

Why haven't we? We?

Why don't we have the audit?

I don't know. That's a question I have. So if we don't even have those to remember numbers.

If they've completed it yet?

So I asked today and I was told that the audit was not complete and the expected completion is the April.

April.

Could they say why it's not completed?

I believe as they change vendors.