Select Board - Regular Meeting

on i'm going to go with a relatively good clip but as always we'll stop as needed i would just ask that if you're not in the direct line of communication uh please mute yourself until you are part of the conversation just to help avoid any background noise or delays as there are significant amount of people on and we have a lot of topics um to go over and and you know maya and um Amanda, please feel free to, if you hear any background noise from any of the participants, please feel free to mute them until they're in direct conversation with us. Okay. Excuse me. The time is now 630, and in accordance with Chapter 2 of the Acts of 2025... The Tuesday, June 16, 2026, 6.30 p.m. public meeting of the Rentham Select Board shall be conducted remotely. The public is invited to join via Zoom. The dial-in number, meeting ID, and password are all on the town website, as well as the agenda uh as a preliminary matter this is select board chair chris gallo please permit me to confirm that all members and persons anticipated on the call uh and on the agenda sorry our president can hear me members when i call your name please kindly respond the affirmative selectman jim's james anderson what was that mr chair president We're off to a great start. I said, members, permit me to confirm that you can hear me. And I said, we'll start with Selectman James Anderson. Here, present. That was perfect, Jim. Thank you. Selectman Bill Harrington. Harrington here. Thank you, Billy. Selectwoman Michelle Rouse. Present. Okay. Selectman Roy Lamar. I am back. And can you hear me, my friend? Yes, I can. Okay, thank you. You scared me, Roy, for a minute. Staff, when I call your name, please respond to the affirmative. Town Manager Michael King.

Present.

Assistant Town Manager Greg Enos.

He's on vacation, Mr. Chair.

Okay. Amanda Vazapolo, who is the Administrative Services Manager. Present. Excellent. Good to hear you. And Executive Assistant Maya Matarazzo. I'm present. Excellent. Thanks, Maya. Okay, let's get into it. We have a 650 public hearing, so we're going to have to juggle that in. But what I'd like to do is ask Selectman Harrington to start off by reading in the announcements.

Yes, Mr. Chair. The annual Stage 2 water ban is in effect starting May 1st to September 30th. Mandatory restrictions. Non-essential use is prohibited between 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. The Moonwhacker all-night trail race will take place on June 27, 2026 at the Rice Complex from 8.25 p.m. to 5.09 a.m. Check-in will begin at 7 p.m. at the Pavilion. Participants may enter as a solo competitor or as a team. The cost will be $25 per adult and $20 for children 12 and under. The concept The 2026 Concert on the Common series begins Sunday, May 31st and lasts until Sunday, August 23rd. All are encouraged to join on Sundays at 6 p.m. to enjoy live music at the Town Common. Sweat Beach will open daily from June 13th until August 23rd between the hours of 10 a.m. and 6 p.m. The Open Space Committee would like to invite residents to take a survey regarding open space events to find times and topics most desired by the people of Rentham. The survey can be found on the town website in the Open Space Committee section. From June 13th through July 9th, 2026, seven scheduled World Cup matches will take place at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, renamed Boston Stadium, for the duration of the tournament. Leading up to and during the tournament, expect large crowds, heavier traffic, and increased security, especially on match days. A full schedule of the game days, times, and road closures information can be found on the town website. Municipal office will be closed on Thursday, June 18th for the Juneteenth holiday. There will be no delay in trash or recycling services. Thanks, Jeff.

All right. I don't think the people going to the Gillette stadium would agree. It's Boston stadium, but that's my, that's my, that's my own two cents.

We'll talk about that later.

Uh, so at this time, let's go to, uh, let's get a few things done really quickly before the six 50 hearing. I'd like to go to tab two, please. The approval of the minutes, uh, in our packet, we have the documentation from the June 2nd, 2026 open session meeting minutes. Um, with all the backup. And at this time, the chair would entertain a motion to approve the June 2nd, 2026 open session meeting minutes.

So moved.

Motion made by Selectman Harrington, seconded by Selectman Anderson. Any further discussion? Being none, we'll do a roll call vote. Selectwoman Rouse? Yes. Selectman Anderson?

Yes.

Selectman Harrington?

Harrington, yes.

Selectman Lamothe? Lamothe, yes. Gallo, yes. Motion carries 5-0. Okay, under new business, I wanna make sure we allot enough time. So if you go down to, Mike, I'm gonna take a couple of these out of order. Like for example, if you go to tab seven, So this is a reappointment that the Conservation Commission presented to us. And per the bylaw, they present a member to serve in this capacity, which is the reappointment of Leo Eminen to the Community Preservation Commission as the Conservation Commission representative. So per the bylaw, the Conservation Commission appoints a representative, and Mike King, correct me if I'm wrong, Our job as a select board is just to simply approve that. There's really no vote of deliberation. I hate to use the word rubber stamp, but it's almost like a rubber stamp, isn't it?

That is correct. The select board is required to make that appointment upon the recommendation of the committee.

And not that we wouldn't, but I just want to set the record straight for the people listening. We have no vote or say to the select board members and anyone interested. So at this time, the chair would entertain a motion to appoint, and in our packet, by the way, we have an excerpt from the Conservation Commission meeting where they chose, recommended and voted to have Mr. Eminent act as their representative. And that's in our packet, just for the people that can't see that. I just want to make sure we're being fully transparent. So at this time, the chair would obtain a motion to reappoint Leo Eminent to the Community Preservation Commission as a Conservation Commission representative for a term beginning on July 1st, 2026 and ending on June 30th, 2029. So moved. Okay, motion made by Selectman Anderson, second by, I believe it was Selectman Lamothe, is that correct? Yes.

Okay, any further discussion?

Being none, we'll do a roll call vote. Selectwoman Rouse? Yes. Selectman Anderson?

Yes.

Selectman Harrington?

Harrington, yes.

Select Min Lamothe. Lamothe, yes. Chris Gallo, yes. Motion carries 5-0. Similarly, we're going to go to tab number eight. And now it is our duty and obligation to reappoint Charles Woodhams to the Community Preservation Commission as a planning board representative. So same thing. Planning board voted. They wanted Chuck to represent them on the CPC. And so we're... approving that right now. We have the documentation and backup in our packet. So at this time, the chair would entertain a motion to reappoint Charles Woodhams to the Community Preservation Commission as a planning board representative for a term effective July 1st, 2026 and ending June 30th, 2029. So moved. Second. Motion made by Selectman Anderson, second by Selectman Lamothe. Any further discussion? Being none, we'll do a roll call vote. Selectwoman Rouse? Yes. Selectman Anderson?

Anderson, yes.

Selectman Harrington?

Harrington, yes.

Selectman Lamothe? Lamothe, yes. Gallo, yes. Motion carries 5-0. And just a point of order, I would ask both of those applicants to make sure they're sworn in correctly with the town clerk, right, Mike, before their next meeting. Shekin has said yes. Okay. It's 638, so we still have a couple of minutes. why don't we go to tab number 10 and do the appointment of the election workers? So this is an annual housekeeping item that we do every year. This is a list of the election workers from the town clerk. It's in our packet. I don't think we have to read them into the record, correct, Mike King?

That is correct, Mr. Chair.

So pretty straightforward. Do any board members have any questions or comments before I ask for a motion? No? Okay, at this time, Chio would entertain a motion to appoint the election workers for a term effective, and by the way, we thank you for your service, for a term effective July 1st, 2026 through August 1st, 2027 as presented.

So moved.

Motion made by Selectman Harrington, second by Selectman Anderson. Any further discussion? Being none, we'll do a roll call vote. Selectman Rouse? Yes. Selectman Anderson?

Anderson, yes.

Blackman Harrington? Harrington, yes. Blackman Lamothe? Lamothe, yes. Gallo, yes. Motion carries 5-0. Okay. On that track, it's still only 639. We're getting a few of these things banged out, which is great. Mike, do you suggest tab number nine? That's one we could pick off, correct?

I believe that that could be done in this timeframe, Mr. Chair.

Do you want to give us just a quick summary, just so there's no confusion on why we're taking some of the boards and commission appointments and interviewing them and others that were not time manager Mike King?

Of course. So enclosed is a list that includes board, committee, and commission members who have expressed an interest in continuing their service by submitting reappointment forms. These positions were publicly advertised. and no applications were received. And therefore all of these reappointments are uncontested. And in that case, the board is not interviewing them for reappointment.

So Mike, just to clarify, they're uncontested in their reappointment. So they're familiar to the board on some capacity.

Yes, and this is the same process that was completed last year as well.

100%. I just wanted clarification. So what we'll do then is if we go to tab number nine, we have a chance to look at all of these. Any discussion from the board members before I ask for a motion? Okay. Share and obtain a motion to reappoint members of boards, commissions, and committees with terms expiring June 30th, 2026. That doesn't make sense, does it?

So Mr. Chair, specifically in this case, there's terms that end at different times. So some are one year appointments, some are three, some are five. So this is the motion we use to just clarify that they're all expiring June 30th, June 30th, 2026, and will be reappointed to the appropriate term.

Understood. Okay. So with that being said, thanks for the clarification. Motion, chair would entertain a motion to reappoint members of boards, committees, and commissions with terms expiring June 30th, 2026, as presented. So moved. Motion made by Selectman Harrington. Is there a second? Second. Second by Selectman Anderson. Any further discussion? Being none, go to roll call vote. Selectman Gallo is a yes. Selectman Lamothe? Yes. Selectman Harrington? Harrington, yes. Selectman Anderson?

Anderson's a yes.

Selectwoman Rouse? Yes. Motion carries 5-0. Okay. Making good time here. Mike, what else do you recommend? What do we have time to take on?

I could do my town manager's report, if you like.

Why don't you do that, Mike? Because what I don't want to do here, just so everyone wonders why I'm picking this apart, we have to start the public hearing after 6.50 or later. Some of these other ones might take a few extra minutes, so I don't want to cut them short. So, Mike, do you mind giving us your town manager's report?

Absolutely, Mr. Chair. So I'll begin with the special election results. Yesterday, Renfrew voters approved the debt exclusion for the Roderick Elementary School project by a vote of 957 to 164, which is approximately 85% voting in favor. Voter turnout reached 10% of registered voters, which slightly exceeds the 9% turnout recorded at the annual town election in April. With voter approval now secured, the project will move into the design phase with construction expected to begin in the fall of 2027. Thank you to everyone who participated in the election and exercised their right to vote. Update on the FY26 state supplemental budget. The Renfrew legislative delegation has secured three earmarks in the FY26 supplemental state budget. They include $100,000 for new flooring at the Delaney School, $25,000 to replace lunch tables and $25,000 to upgrade the telephone system. The town appreciates the efforts of Representative Marcus Vaughn and Senator Rausch in securing these funds, which support projects identified in the town's capital plan and help reduce future demands on local financial resources. Update on the FIFA World Cup. The first FIFA World Cup match at Gillette Stadium was held this past Saturday evening with minimal reported public safety impacts. Several upcoming matches, including tonight's 6 p.m. game, are scheduled during weekday commuting hours and are expected to generate increased traffic. The town will continue to use its $75,000 World Cup security grant to provide additional public safety staffing on match days, which includes enhanced shift coverage and supplemental traffic management measures, such as restricting certain roads to local traffic only. Also have an update that there will be a new MEC executive director.

Mike, hold on a sec. John Jackson, do you mind putting yourself on mute, please? We're getting some feedback. Thank you. Do me a favor. Stay on mute until we're ready to have your part of the meeting and we greatly appreciate it. Nothing personal. We just are getting a lot of feedback when you're on and off the mute. Thank you for your help with that. Mike, go ahead.

All right. So again, there's the new MEC executive director update. The MET, the Medicombin Emergency Communications Center, also known as the MEC, which serves Renfim, has entered into an agreement with the Southeastern Massachusetts Emergency Communications Center, known as CEMREC, to share an executive director. This is effective August 1st. Current CEMREC executive director, Rob Verdone, will assume leadership of both organizations. succeeding Bill Keegan, who has served as MEC's interim executive director on a part-time basis. This partnership is the first step towards a potential administrative merger of MEC and CEMRC, which will be the first merger of two existing regional dispatch centers in Massachusetts. This initiative supports the Select Board's goal of regionalizing services to improve efficiency, create economies of scale, and generate savings for taxpayers. And my last update is Renfim held its second annual employee appreciation event last Wednesday at the Rice Complex. Happy to report that it was well received by staff and a great opportunity to thank them all for their contributions to the Renfim community. I'd like to thank the Recreation Department for hosting us, as well as Greg Enos and Amanda Vasipola for organizing. And a special shout out congratulations to Sergeant John Calaflores, who is the champion of our inaugural Rock, Paper, Scissors contest.

That sounds great. And the select board was represented by our own Selectman Anderson. And I guess it's clear to assume that he didn't do that well in the Rock, Paper, Scissors competition. Mr.

Chair? Yes, sir. So, truth be told, it was the first time I ever played. And I thought I held myself well, even though I got eliminated in the first round.

Well, I'm glad, you know, thought you think elimination in the first round is holding yourself well. I'm joking because I can't really talk trash. I wasn't there. So I really appreciate you representing our board, Jim. All joking aside, you do a great job of stepping up when the other board members can't make it to these events. So thank you for that. And Mike King, I want to say great job with... you know another successful employee event you know i really hope our employees know how much uh you know they mean to us as a board as a community taxpayers you know and i want to just uh give you a shout out in front of the you know participants tonight uh at developing um you know a really nice culture uh one that i'm proud to call um you know how we know how we interact with our employees so fantastic job thank you mr chairman do we what else do we have can we get through the um Tab 11, Mike, quickly before I go, right? Because I can start the public hearing anytime after 6.50, right?

That's correct. So you can start it late, just not early.

So why don't we go ahead and go to tab 11 Mike and see if we can get through this. This is a vote. So as everyone knows, we purchased the land over at not purchased but there's a conservation restriction. You know, on the land at 431 South Street. So Mike, do you want to take us through just what we're trying to accomplish with this.

Mr. Of course, Mr. Chairman. So before the Select Board this evening for approval are two conservation restrictions that Town Meeting appropriated $310,500 in Community Preservation Act funds for in order to conserve approximately 16 acres of forest land on South and Beach Streets. The proposed conservation area includes 13 and a half acres directly behind White Barn Farm. and two smaller forested parcels on Beach Street. The Medicom at Land Trust secured a state forest reserve grant to cover up to 50% of the conservation costs. The Beach Street parcels will be owned by the Land Trust with a conservation restriction held by the town, while the South Street parcel will remain privately owned and protected by a jointly health conservation restriction. And I will note that the conservation restrictions do require a majority of the select board to execute with wet signatures. And we would like to get that scheduled this week if possible.

Okay, so before I go to a motion, any discussion from any questions for any select board members for Tom Ange and Mike King about this? Pretty straightforward. This isn't new to any of us. We've talked about this at length. Good. Okay, so at this time, chair, obtain a motion to approve the conservation restriction on property located at 431 South Street from Elliot Raymond, trustee of... Ataxia Realty Trust to the Town of Rentham acting by and through its Conservation Commission to and to Medicom at Land Trust Inc. in the public interest pursuant to Section 32 of Chapter 184 of the Massachusetts General Laws.

So moved.

Second. Motion made by Selectman Anderson, second by Selectwoman Rouse. Any further discussion? Being none, we'll do a roll call vote. Selectwoman Rouse? Yes. Selectman Anderson?

Yes.

Selectman Harrington.

Harrington, yes.

Selectman Lamothe. Lamothe, yes. Chris Gallo, yes. Motion carries 5-0. And with that being said, we're going to go to tab number 12. Mr. King, would you say that your explanation on the prior tab covered this one? Or would you like to give us a quick explanation of this as well?

I would reiterate that my explanation covered both tabs, Mr. Chairman.

Okay, any further discussion from the board before I ask for a motion? Again, very familiar with this, okay. Chair, I'll entertain a motion to approve the conservation restriction on property located at 85 and 95 Beach Street from the Meta Comet Trust Inc. to the town of Rentham, acting by and through its conservation commission in the public interest pursuant to section 32, chapter 184 of Mass General Laws.

So moved.

Second. Motion made by Selectman Anderson, second by Selectman Lamothe. Any further discussion? Being none, we'll do a roll call vote. Chris Gallo's a yes. Roy Lamothe? Yes. Bill Harrington?

Harrington, yes.

Jim Anderson?

Anderson's a yes.

Cal Rouse? Yes. Motion carries 5-0. Okay, let's go back up to tab number three. So now we have a public hearing. This is a poll, a National Grid poll petition hearing on Green Street. This is pretty straightforward. We've done this a bunch, but to anyone who's new, this is standard practice when National Grid wants to add, move, or alter one of their polls. We have to have a public hearing. So in our packet, we have the public hearing notice. We have the petition for joint or identical poll locations. With us, we have some members from National Grid, either Kadeen Berry and or Andrew Allen and or Helton Lopes. And before we get there, Chio, can you take a motion to open the public hearing? So moved. Motioned by Selectman Innocent. Is there a second? Second. Second by Selectwoman Rouse, any further discussion? Being none, we'll do a roll call vote. Selectwoman Rouse? Yes. Selectman Anderson?

Anderson, yes.

Selectman Harrington?

Harrington, yes.

Selectman Lamothe? Lamothe, yes. Gallo, yes. Motion carries 5-0. Now, the chair will entertain a motion to waive the reading of the public hearing notice. So moved. Motion made by Selectman Harrington, second by Selectman Anderson. Any further discussion? Being none, we'll do a roll call vote. Selectwoman Rouse? Yes. Selectman Anderson? Yes. Selectman Harrington?

Harrington, yes.

Selectman Lamothe? Lamothe, yes. Chris Gallo, yes. Motion carries 5-0. Okay. Public hearing is now open. Who from National Grid is going to walk us through?

Felix is here.

Hi, Felix. Welcome to the meeting. Go right ahead.

Thank you, sir. How is everyone doing today? Good.

How are you?

I'm good, thank you. For this job, National Agri is petitioning to install one J.O. mid-span pole between poles 1 and 2 at house 30, Green Street in Rentham. National Agri is looking to install a disconnect switch, which is supposed to support a recloser at a conjunction pole 2.

Is that, Felix, are you still going, or is that it?

Nope, that should be it.

Okay. Board members, we had a sketch in our packet, but if that's not clear, does anyone have any questions or comments for Felix?

Mr. Chair?

Yes.

Yeah, through you, can I ask Felix a couple questions?

You can. Just so you know, Jim, I don't know if this is intentional, your screen's not on?

I'm not? No, it's not?

No, neither is Bill's. I mean, if you guys are having issues.

Oh, I'm sorry. There you go.

Oh, wow. There's that handsome face. Okay. I don't know. You might be having the same. Oh, there you are. Oh, there you are. Another handsome face. All right. Jim, go right ahead.

So, Bill, I had a hard time understanding you, but is this a single pole in a new location, or is this going to be a new pole supporting an old pole?

It is going to be a new pool supporting an old pool. So what we're looking to do is we're going to install a recloser at existing pool two. But in order for that recloser to function, we need to install a disconnect switch. The disconnect switch is what we're going to be installing on the new pool. So we do need the new pool to install a disconnect switch in order for the recloser to function properly.

So if I've got this straight, you've got to put a new pole next to an old pole.

You have a new pole in between two old poles, so a mid-span pole.

So you're not going to have a double pole?

No.

No, okay. Okay, that's all I was curious about. Thank you. You're welcome.

Any of the other board members have any questions for Felix? No? My only question is, you know, that we're not obstructing anyone's views from their house that isn't already obstructed Felix, correct? Like, that's just a concern. The location of the existing polls people are used to that. I don't know. I'm not looking at I'm not looking at Google Earth or Street View. So I just want to make sure like do you do you see any reason that a resident would have issue with this new poll location in between the other two poll locations?

No, I would not see that because from my understanding, these pools are strategically picked, these locations, to make sure that they are in a location where they shouldn't be obstructing another customer's view.

Okay, no, that's helpful. Okay, board members, last chance, any other questions before I open it up to the public? So being a public hearing, I have to open it up to the public. So at this time, I would ask any members of the public that want to make a comment about this poll petition, please raise your hand and unmute and state your name and address for the record. And we'll give you a few seconds if anyone has a question. All right, 54321. OK, so at this time she'll need to take a motion to close the public hearing.

Don't move.

2nd. OK, is there a second second? OK, motion made by Selectman Anderson, second by Selectwoman Rouse. Any further discussion? Being done with a roll call vote, Selectwoman Rouse. Yes, Blackman Anderson. Yes, Blackman Harrington.

Harrington, yes.

Selectman Lamothe? Lamothe, yes. Chris Gallo, yes. Motion carries 5-0. Now the chair would entertain a motion to approve the National Grid poll petition for Green Street as presented.

So moved. Second.

Motion made by Selectman Anderson, second by Selectman Harrington. Any further discussion? Being none, we'll do a roll call vote. Chris Gallo is a yes. Selectman Lamothe?

Lamothe, yes.

Selectman Harrington?

Harrington, yes.

Blackman Anderson?

Yes.

And Selectwoman Rouse? Yes. Motion carries 5-0. Okay, Felix, there you go. Have a great night.

Thank you, sir. Thanks, everyone. Good night.

Okay, let's go to tab number four. All right, so tab number four, again, is something that shouldn't be that new to us. This is a common victual license application for the kitchen at White Barn Farm. In our packet, we have a common victual application. With us, we have representation from White Barn Farm, either Chris, Sean... representing the kitchen at White Barn Farm. Mr. King, do you want to give us a quick summary before we turn it over to the applicants for any additional points? And is there a reason why this is a new application versus a renewal? Because I believe we've done this before.

Yes, the kitchen at White Barn Farm previously had a common victual or license last year, but it let it lapse. So I would just make a note that in the future it would be preferable if the common victual could be addressed during the annual renewal period in the future if possible.

Okay. That's fine. And so any other additional information before we turn it over to the applicant?

Through you, Mr. Chair, I had one question.

Yeah, go right ahead, Selectman Harrington.

So the current license is expired, but yet it's still in operation?

The food permit was approved. It's the common victualer, which would be allowing for seating. So the Board of Health approved for them to have food to be served to go.

But there are people sitting eating there. I've driven by there.

And that's what we're trying to address tonight.

So they're still operating without the proper license currently?

If there is seating, that is correct. Okay.

Thank you. Was that clear to them, Mike? I just want to make sure that was clear. So I don't like it when people, you know, something's going on and they didn't get notification or whatever. So was that was that presented clearly to wipe on? I know we're trying to resolve it this evening, but I'm just trying to I'm trying to make sure this doesn't happen again.

Yeah, it was communicated that. They need to take up if they need to obtain the common virtual or license. In order to have that aspect of the business, and they did submit 1. With the meeting schedules, they apparently they did open beforehand.

Okay. So, okay. Let's resolve that this evening. White Barn Farm. I see Chris on here. I see Sean on here. Guys, please work with us moving forward. Make sure that we get these things renewed so that they don't lapse because technically you're operating without a license. You know, this board's very, very gracious to not all, we think we're pretty gracious anyway, to White Barn and all of our small businesses. So we don't want to be heavy handed, but please don't put us in a position where, you know, we're in a bad position, I guess, is what I'm asking of you both. So at this time, I'll turn it over to who's going to take the lead and just give us a quick summary of what we're trying to do, Chris and Sean, or if you, we know what we're trying to do. Do you have anything to add? Chris or Sean or anybody else, by the way?

I don't have anything to add. I can, if needed, I can give some explanation as to why the license lapsed or why we've been operating, et cetera. But it sounds like that part is resolved. I have nothing else to add.

Okay, yeah, it would be my preference to agree that there was, for whatever reason, an issue. We're dealing with it tonight, and then moving forward, we're going to make sure that everyone's on the same page. Is that fair, Sean? Okay, great. Chris, do you have anything to add before I ask the board members?

No, I'm good with that. Yeah, I think it just had to do with some scheduling stuff and when this meeting was, so we apologize about that.

No, I appreciate that, thank you. And I will say this, in order for a common VIC to get to this stage where it's being presented to the select board as it is tonight, there's a whole internal review process where all the department heads, are the application sent around and department heads are to chime in if anyone has any issues or concerns. Mike King, is it correct that the only issue we have is there was a concern from the building commissioner, John Naff, that we'd ask White Barn to reach out to them regarding placement of the seating and discussion of either a possible barrier or trying to move the seating back slightly off of the main road. Because there was a communication in my packet that the commissioner was concerned that it could be a safety issue if someone lost control coming down Route 1A. And obviously, no one wants that, right? Mike, is that your understanding as well?

That is correct, Mr. Chairman. The building commissioner would like to engage in a conversation process with them on that topic.

Okay. Is there any other board members that want to make questions or comments before I ask the motion?

One question through you, Mr. Chair.

Go right ahead, Selectman Harrington.

Seeing as that they're operating basically illegally and the building inspector has issues, wouldn't it be prudent that they get that addressed prior to us issuing them a license or issuing it only pending Correct?

So Selectman Harrington, as we do with all these motions, every time we do one of these, the motion to approve is pending on good standing with the Board of Health, the building inspector and public safety. So we worded into the motion that it's only approved pending any issues that they might have with any of those department heads.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Yeah.

Are you okay with that?

Yeah. So in the meantime, they'll only use it for takeout. until he gets straightened out with the building inspector.

Mike, do you have any input on that, Mike?

That'll be the correct process to Mr. Harrington's point. So they have Board of Health approval to operate. So they can have the kitchen open. They can do takeout. It's the seating that's triggered by the common victual.

So Sean and Chris, I would ask you to please get in touch with our building commissioner immediately and work through the issue of the concern, okay?

What's the best way to do that?

Mike, I'll let Mike King answer that because he reports to Mike King.

So just so you guys know, we are in communication with the building inspector. Correct, Sean? The building inspector came by and we talked about 40 feet, seating 40 feet from the road. Right. He can't eat our picnic table. So that seems like a pretty we talk to him and we will continue to talk to him. I just want to know that there has been a form of communication already with the building inspector. And he has addressed the seating with us. And he talked about 40 feet from the road. Again, our seats are picnic tables. We can do that. And then I think we wanted to meet more with him about some other stuff. And I think he gave Sean some suggestions. I believe that's correct. Is that correct, Sean?

Yeah, but he did not make it clear how to follow up with him. So we can make those changes easily. I'm not sure what the proper communication channel is with him after that follow-up, but you're correct, Chris, noting that he did come by. We had a conversation in person with him the other day.

And did he indicate that you were able to keep seating people there while this was in flux?

Yeah, he did not request or require that we stop or anything. He just noted it and said, Patrick, the, I believe, either chief or deputy chief of the fire department was there as well. They both noted it. They communicated their concerns. But there was no, Patrick did follow up in the official Tom and Vic license messaging process. portal, but I have not heard a follow-up from John Naff. I, of course, can reach out to him and continue that communication.

Yeah, so what I'm going to suggest then is we're going to read the motion in as it's stated here. I'm going to have Mike King follow up with John Naff to get confirmation and clarification if he's okay with you guys seating and operating with the seats while we work through these details, because I think that's to selectman Harrington's point that selectman Harrington's concern. Okay. So everyone's shaking their head. Yes. At this time, Mike and Mike King, you will follow up with John now for us on that and, and make sure that, you know, it's communicated if he's okay with white barn, continuing to see people until we work through this situation. Correct.

Absolutely.

Okay, thank you, everybody. This time, chair will obtain a motion to approve the common victual license application for the kitchen at White Barn Farm, pending good standing with the Board of Health, building inspector, and public safety.

So moved.

Is there a second? Second. Okay, motion made by Selectman Harrington, second by Selectman Lamothe. Any further discussion? Being none, we'll do a roll call vote. Selectwoman Rouse? Yes. Selectman Anderson?

Yes.

Selectman Harrington.

Harrington, yes.

Selectman LaMoth. LaMoth, yes. Gallo, yes. Motion carries 5-0. Okay, now that we cleared that up, let's go to tab number five, which again is nothing new to us. Special one-day license applications for White Barn Farm. There's the following dates in our packet, 625, 7279, 716, 723, 730, 86, 813, 820, and 827. That's 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10. Under the new policy of the select board, Mike King, how many are they allowed in a year?

The select board increased it from 12 to 16.

Beautiful. And they haven't used any thus far, correct?

Correct.

So they're well within their limit. Yes.

That's correct.

OK, so once again, this is the same process. You know, we go through this every year. Chris and Sean, I don't want to take words out of your mouth. Is this the same thing we do? We have we have some beer. We have some music to pick one of you guys. Go go ahead and address the board quickly as to what this is all about.

Yeah, so this is very similar to what we do every year. The only difference is instead of having a brewery come, we would like to, Kitchen at White Barn Farm is going to be having the one day brewery. beer wine license, so we can keep it in-house. So rather than having someone come from out of state, we will have TIP certified beer pourers, but everything will stay the same except for we run through Kitchen Out White Barn Farm, who has the ability, who is actually the one pulling the permit, I believe. Is that correct, Katie?

Yes, it would be under the CV of White Barn Farm or the Kitchen Out White Barn Farm.

So my only question is whose beer is it? Like who's, who's alcohol?

We will get, be getting the beer through the approved lists on the town, uh, website. There's an approved list that we can buy beer from and sell, um, retail. And so we have to work within that list. I, am I correct in that Mike?

It's a state list, not the town list.

Sorry, the state list that we can buy approved beer. And it will be from local Massachusetts breweries.

Okay, Mike, so this is a little bit different, right? This is a little bit different than what we're used to, but talk the board through it. Let us know if there's anything we should be concerned about. I know if it gets to this point, as I just said, it's already been briefed and discussed by all the department heads, but because there's a slight change here, I just want to make sure that it's nothing that the board members should be concerned about.

Yeah, so this has been reviewed. I even had a conversation with public safety just today just to double check and they're comfortable. I would kind of equate this a little bit similarly, just not in its form because it's a common vict. It's like James's breakfast will request as a common victual or holder to serve beer and wine in-house as a special one-day. They're not exactly bringing in an outside entity to do it. It's different for White Barn, but it's not necessarily out of the ordinary for a one-day license.

Yeah, understood. Just slightly different than what we've done with Wipe On in the past. Chris and Sean and who else was on here? Thank you for keeping us on our toes.

We appreciate it.

Yeah, Katie, thank you. Board members, do you have any questions or comments to anybody at White Barn before I ask? I think Selectman Harrington might. Selectman Harrington, I'll start with you. Go right ahead.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. So two things. First, on his application, it says rotating bears brought from authorized sources for one day licenses found online. Exact weekly plan can be provided if needed. I'd like to see that plan updated. just if it's even just in an email, notifying us what they're doing and with whom. And secondly, I guess this is a question through you, Mr. Chair, to Mike King, is does White Farm pay beverage and meal taxes to the town for their pizza thing and their beer gardens?

So that's a required state withholding tax.

So the answer is yes. Yes. Yeah.

So it's tax correct. Mr. Harrington.

Okay.

Thank you.

And speak to Mike, what's your comment on the, what did Bill want to see the plan? What plan was that?

Would you like an email each week of the beer or wine that we're going to buy in and what we're going to serve from the approved state list? Is that what you're saying, Bill?

Yeah, I'd like to see that. If you could send it to the BOS email that we have, just so we know what you're doing and where it's coming from. And maybe if it's one of my favorite breweries, I'll be stopping by more frequently.

Sounds good. Yeah, that's the idea is hopefully we can be working with more local brewers than just one. And we can totally put that together. That'll be part of our organization. And sending that on to your way is super easy for us.

Thank you. Appreciate it.

Yep.

Okay. Okay. So, with that being said, any other questions or comments from select board members? Seeing none, CHEO did obtain a motion to approve the special one-day alcohol license application for White Bond Farms Summer Nights at the Farm Series to take place on June 25th. July 2nd, July 9th, July 16th, July 23rd, July 30th, August 6th, August 13th, August 20th, and August 27th, 2026, pending good standing with the Board of Health Building Inspector and Public Safety.

So moved.

Is there a second? Second. Okay. Motion made by Selectman Anderson, second by Selectman Lamothe. Any further discussion? Being none, we'll do a roll call vote. Selectwoman Rouse? Yes. Selectman Anderson?

Yes.

Selectman Harrington.

Harrington, yes.

Selectman LaMoth.

LaMoth, yes.

Gallo, yes. Motion carries 5-0. Okay.

Thank you, guys. Yep. Thanks so much.

Good to see you. Yep. All right. Let's get down to tab number six. Okay. Tab number six is going to start our interviews and appointments and reappointments. Okay. First up, we have Conservation Commission. So as the board will recall. Yeah. He sent out the water. Roy, you're not on mute. Just so you know. Thank you. As the board will recall, last meeting, we had two applicants, Julie Garland, who's one of the incumbents, as well as Sean Dooley had interviews. Both of them, I think, did a nice job. My understanding is we have two more candidates that we're interviewing this evening, Brenda Aile and Brian Tufts. I will say, Mike, did you send out that email to the board updating us on the status of Sean Dooley's application?

I did have an opportunity to forward the email, but I can confirm that Mr. Dooley did withdraw his candidacy for the Conservation Commission this evening.

OK, which is a shame. He did a really nice job. I thought he would bring an interesting perspective. But, you know, people, things come up, things happen. So we wish him the best and hope to see him throw his hat in the ring for something else in the future. So what that means is now we have we have Julie Garland, Brenda and Brian interviewing for two appointments. Correct, Mr. King? Okay, that's correct. Okay, so what we're going to do tonight is we're going to interview Brenda, and we're going to interview Brian, and we're going to start with Brenda. Brenda, are you with us this evening? I am here. Hello. Hi, welcome to the meeting. Great to have you. So this is pretty non-intense. We just like to say hello. We'd like you to say hello to the board, maybe a quick summary of who you are, why you're applying for the position, maybe some relevant experience. And then I'll turn it over to the board members to see if anyone has any questions or follow-up comments. So again, Brenda, thanks for throwing your hat in the ring and the floor is yours.

Sure. So my name is Brenda Eiley. I was raised in Walpole and lived in Franklin for about 10 years before my husband and I moved to Rentham in 2003. We have three sons who had gone through the Rentham public school systems. My undergraduate degree is in biology with a chemistry minor, and I hold a master's degree in project management from Northeastern. I'm currently, I'm semi-retired from a, very long career in the biotechnology, biopharmaceutical industry, where I was responsible for ensuring that clinical and commercial products were compliant with regulatory requirements for the US FDA and other major global markets. I have skills in technical writing and review of technical documents. Granted, it's in a different industry, but I think the skills are transferable and I would endeavor to ask questions where needed. And I don't know what I don't know, so I'm anxious to be able to pick up that learning through the trainings that I understand the group goes through. And also extensive teamwork and collaboration for problem solving in the industry, seeking cross-functional inputs to ensure getting a drug to market through sort of a team approach using the regulatory affairs and legal teams to ensure drug compliance and logistics for import and export permits, packaging engineers to ensure the package will protect the product from physical and light damage along the way, and that all components are manufactured to specifications for the final product. The reason I'm motivated to apply for this position as a volunteer, as I said, I recently semi-retired and I want to be able to give back to the community. And I have a great interest in the conservation commission. And I recently learned a lot about some of the sort of the scope of the conservation commission given the most recent application that was in our neighborhood for the 55 plus community. And I learned a lot about what the Conservation Commission does and also being a steward of wetlands considering my property is about half wetlands. I'm very mindful of being a steward of the wetlands and ensuring that we care for our drinking water supply in a manner that is responsible and compliant with the regulations.

Great. I appreciate that, Brenda. Thank you so much. Excellent job. I'm going to open it up to the rest of the board members to see if anyone has any questions or comments. And typically, if you've ever watched one of our meetings, you know that I typically start with Jim Anderson because he does such a great job on asking questions for these application, applicant events. Jim Anderson, select me.

Yeah, thank you, Mr. Chair. So, Brenda, first of all, I want to thank you for submitting an application. My question to you is, if you were to get on the board tonight What's your goals and objectives going forward on the Conservation Commission?

I would endeavor to come up to speed as quickly as I could. I do know that there are a lot of training requirements for the position. I also have appreciated the the information and mentorship from the Conservation Commission for educating the public, I would hope to contribute in that area as well. Specifically, I have an interest in invasive species and preserving some of the wildlife that we have in this area that is potentially threatened.

Okay. Just by chance, have you attended any of those meetings, Conservation Commission?

Attended them? Yes. The 55 plus community was the series that we attended over a 12 to 18 month period. Is that what you mean? Like a routine?

Yeah, I should know if you had any experience like attending those meetings and have an idea with what they do.

Yes, yeah.

Okay, thank you. No more questions, Mr. Chair.

All right, thank you. Select woman, Rouse.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Brenda, nice to meet you, and I echo Select Board Anderson's sentiments and appreciate your applying for this commission. I have a question. In this commission, I know that you're going to be receiving different input, public input, different opinions. Can you give an example of how you're going to manage between residents, developers, and different commission members opinions and coming to an independent decision?

So that's a great question because I think it's easy to be influenced if you're new to a role and you're not so familiar with the regulations, but I think that's a key area where I would put my efforts in coming up to speed and ensuring that the application the points in the application are evaluated against what the requirements are for not only the state but our town bylaws as well. And evaluate that and come up with my own independent response but also be open to facts and opinions of others that may provide me with information that I may not have or may not have thought of.

Since we don't have the pleasure of doing a full on like long interview, just tell us, you know, why you think that you are the right person for the Conservation Committee?

Well, first and foremost, I have the time, energy and bandwidth to take on the education component and also the responsibility of the meeting attendance and the preparation for those meetings at this time. I also have experience with reviewing long complex technical documents granted in a different industry. So I would have to use that transferable skill and be able to comprise my questions for any applicant to ensure that I have sort of a full picture for areas where I don't have the expertise.

I guess just one more question. Sorry, Mr. Chair and everyone else. As you've been orientating yourself to this commission, what do you see the major challenges facing the Conservation Commission in the upcoming years in Runtham?

I think sort of balancing that the preservation of the of the drinking water supply with the development that will ultimately potentially impact it. And it's very, um, it's, it's, it's, it's a challenge that I, I see because I'm, you know, I have a well in my yard and every time there's, you know, a new development going in, I know that the groundwater is potentially getting contaminated by runoff or, um, the groundwater may be depleted. I know there's various times of year when we have a drought and I can tell that our water softening system has to work a little bit over time. So there is impact from the surrounding development on our groundwater. It's pretty apparent to me being on the well.

Great. Thank you so much. I appreciate it. That's all Mr. Chair.

Okay. So Selectman Anderson, Selectman Ross, Selectman Harrington.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. So thank you, Brenda, for volunteering your time. Selectman Anderson and Selectman Ross asked quite a few of the questions that I had thought of being your biggest concerns, wetlands, drinking water, wildlife. You attended various meetings to get yourself up to speed. My only last question would be, you know, what, what, What do you think you can bring to the table for idea-wise to improve the conservation committee and their processes?

Well, that's a good question. I have an extensive experience with process mapping. I think even going through a recent process that we had with a garage build-out being on Rutlands, the process, at least to us, wasn't exactly clear what goes to the state, what goes to the town, what gets registered at the registry of deeds. So I think maybe... facilitating public awareness for that type of information through diagrammatic process maps, if you will, to provide that information to the public to make it a little bit more clear of what the process is.

Thank you. I appreciate it.

Thank you.

Yeah, Brenda, I think those are all great questions and great answers, by the way. My only follow-up question to you is, I think you nailed it or someone nailed it earlier. There is a balance between conservation, but I sometimes, when I'm in these meetings, I sometimes like to hear people's thoughts on actual development as well, because development is essential part of our community. We need development in order to maintain you know, taxes, right? We have certain fixed costs that go up every year in our town. And if we don't have some kind of development, our taxes are going to continue to increase, right? So what is your thoughts on development? Are there certain types of development that you would favor more over others? And what I mean by that is, you know, do you, would you favor commercial versus residential or do you, you know, do you group them all the same?

I think any development, regardless of what it is, should be assessed with a risk-based approach. Meaning, for example, if we were to have something like a Thermo, which is in Plainville right now, but if they were a company coming to rent them, I think we would want to be careful about what their waste stream looks like, how it's managed to ensure that it doesn't contaminate as I mentioned, the groundwater and ultimately our drinking water supply. So that's the kind of where my approach to assessing a situation would be risk-based, like what development is the most risky to the water supply and the surrounding wetlands. And again, it was made very clear to me, conservation commission has a very narrow, narrow scope. It's development that is close to wetlands. It's not a decision based on, you know, if you put it in an area where there are no wetlands, there's really no conservation commission input to that.

Sure. Narrow, but a very strong and powerful board and commission, nonetheless, with a lot of control over development. So that's the hence the question, but I think it was a great answer. So thank you. Anyone else have any questions before we go to the other applicant? Okay, Brian Tufts. So the next applicant we have with us is Brian Tufts. Brian, very similar. We're going to welcome you this evening. We're going to ask you to just give us a little bit of background about yourself, any relevant experience, why you're, you know, going, applying for this position. And then I'll turn it over to the board members to ask any follow up questions or comments. So welcome, and nice to see you. Thank you for throwing your hat in. And go ahead, Brian, the floor is yours.

Thanks for welcoming me to the meeting. My name is Brian Tufts. I live on Lake Street in Rentham. I am a structural engineer. I live very close to Lake Archer. I was raised in Norfolk, came up through King Phillip, basically lived the majority of my adult life in Rentham and Norfolk. with a brief stop in Sharon. I am interested in volunteering for the Conservation Commission because I'm looking for a way to become positively involved in the community. Got a strong background interfacing with architects, engineers, civil engineers. That's what I do on a day-to-day basis, primarily building-related development. residential, commercial, you name it. I've got experience working on public projects as well as private development. And yeah, I've got a lot of skills that I think would translate directly to this board. And I've been looking for a way to become involved and serve my community. Got two young kids that are in the public schools here, putting down roots in the community. Obviously, being that I've grown up in this area my entire life, I have a vested interest in Water quality, certainly the health of our lakes that are, you know, right across the street from me here on Lake Street. Water quality, obviously a very big concern of mine as well. So, yeah, basically just looking to use my skill set that I have as a practicing engineer and learn more about the Conservation Commission and how I can really help the, you know, protect our natural resources while balancing with responsible development of the town.

OK, excellent. Thank you for that. I'm going to turn it over to the board members. I forget which way I went last time. So I started with Jim Anderson. So Selectman Anderson, the floor is yours.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. So, Brian, first of all, thank you for applying and welcome back to Rentham. Thank you. I'll ask you the same question. You know, if you were to get appointed tonight, what do you see your goals and objectives on this on this important committee?

Yeah, I think coming in sort of with an open mind and trying to, you know, interpret the laws and statutes that govern the protection of our natural resources, certainly leaning on the more experienced members of the commission coming up to speed with the regulations and how they apply in the jurisdictions. The invested parties that are involved, I'm interested in sort of learning more about it and leaning on the more experienced members to sort of show me the ropes to some extent, but also digging in on the code itself and how we apply rigidly to the letter of the law. Those are the things that I'm interested in. Okay. Do you have any experience with water quality? Not directly. No. I mean, as a structural engineer, I'm designing the building, making sure things are safe, right? There's, you know, water quality type engineering folks that I've interacted with that, you know, that's their primary area of expertise. I'm not an expert of water quality. So I'm interested in sort of expanding my view and learning more about it. Okay.

So do you think that your skills would translate

I do. Yeah, I think there's a lot of transferable skills, you know, certainly the ability to read and interpret the code. That's something that I do on a daily basis. I'm interested in sort of expanding my knowledge within that base and applying the skills that I've already learned into different areas and learning more about it. Okay, thank you. No more questions, Mr. Chair.

All right, thank you. We'll go Selectwoman Rouse.

Thank you. Nice to see you, Brian, and thank you for applying for this commission. From your perspective and what you've learned and witnessed on the Conservation Commission, I'll ask you as well, what do you see some of the main challenges it is facing here in Rentham?

Yeah, again, I think there's water quality concerns with our town wells. There's water quality concerns at the lakes with algae blooms and things like that. Those are the things that I'm aware of just from talking to my neighbors and other folks in town. So those are the things that are sort of high on my priority list is learning about those issues, how we can manage and mitigate those concerns, being a good liaison for the town, interfacing with residents concerns hearing, what my neighbors are concerned with and other folks in town and coming up with a plan to sort of meet the needs of the towns as well as meeting the needs of potential developments and balancing the two. I'm very interested in sort of being, you know, learning more and sort of finding a common ground.

Can you give us an example on how you've worked collaboratively with a group to achieve a goal?

Yeah, absolutely. Every single day on every ground up project that I've ever been involved, there's multiple stakeholders. There's the town that you're trying to develop a property. There's the permitting process that's involved with that. There's the architectural design. If it's a building, there's the civil design. How's the property being developed? What are the buffer zones? What are the appropriate setbacks? And uh what you know what's the storm drainage design uh need to be for a particular site you know i'm i'm involved in those discussions i'm listening in on those types of meetings literally on a daily basis so i'm pretty familiar with construction related terminology reading plans reading specifications um it's all you know in my wheelhouse i'm doing it every day excellent just one more question for you for me

I'd love to know from your perspective, what does transparency and local government and communication decision making mean to you?

Yeah, transparency is being open and honest about what the what the desired objectives and goals are being, you know, being OK to admit that I don't know. Uh, you know, and I need to do more research on something, uh, not always saying, oh, I know that the answer to this is X, Y, or Z. And I do plan on coming in with a very open mind. I'm going, I'm going to be learning new things and being able to admit when you, when you don't have the information, I think that's important. And then, you know, obviously being able to compute, uh, communicate that with the constituents and stakeholders in the town. I think that's a, that's a very important part of the job.

Okay, thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

You're very welcome.

Selectman Harrington.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. So Brian, nice to see you. Thank you for taking the opportunity to volunteer for a committee. It's really important to the town to get good, solid people involved. And so most of the questions that previously Jimmy and Michelle have already asked and answered. But one question, based off tax base and obviously the need for it to keep the town running, what would your future rent them look like with respect to development? What would your thought process be on something to the likes of future growth?

Yeah, that's a very good question, complicated question. In my mind, you know, I've grown up here, right? I'm about 40 years old, I'm 41. I've seen the evolution of Norfolk, Rentham and Plainville, you know, firsthand over that 40 years. It would certainly be my goal to maintain as much as possible the rural nature of the town. and preserve the natural resources so that we can continue to have, you know, good animal populations, clean water, good lakes, and, you know, free open space for the community to be involved. I'm thinking now of... you know, Sweat Beach and things of that nature. Like I grew up going to Sweat Beach. You know, that's an important asset to the town. You know, I want I want to continue to be able to serve or I want to continue to be able to have the town take take advantage and use those resources. Right. So I think any look at development needs to be, you know, have a critical eye to what's best for what's best for the town in the short term, but also balancing that with the long term and And, you know, making sure that the town kind of stays true to its roots and and continues to be the gem that it is. And frankly, the reason why I've stayed in this area is because because I think that the stewards of the town of Rentham have done a great job kind of keeping the town, you know, the way it is, frankly. Thank you. Appreciate it.

Yep. Selectman Lamar.

Brian, thank you for throwing your hat in the ring. My concern was with two kids and a great career, you know, there's a certain amount of training. And when we interviewed Julie Garland a week or two ago, she put in, I think, upwards of 185 hours. I'm sure that's not in the first month or two. But there's a dedicated amount of time that you're going to need to put into rules, regulations. I just want to make sure you're comfortable with the investment that you potentially may have to make.

Yeah, understood. Fair question. Thank you, Mr. Lamothe. Yes. You know, I'm excited about it. I see it as a real learning opportunity for myself. You know, I like I touched upon previously, I want to I want to be able to serve the town better. I want to be an asset to the town. And, you know, I certainly consider myself a lifelong learner. You know, no, no answer that I give is too rigid to back down on when I'm presented with better information. I'm very analytical in that regard. You know, I think of myself as pretty open minded and coming into this, I know that I'm going to have a lot to learn and, you know, being able to stay open, objective and take all the information in. and really dig in and learn and apply those new things that I learned to form an opinion. I'm excited about it. I see it. I do. I do think, you know, there's, there's a limitation to my bandwidth. No question about it. Certainly having two, two kids that I'm running around to different sports and activities and whatnot. It takes a lot, but, um, I think I'm in a position right now where I can take this on and, you know, hopefully I'll have a little bit of grace as I join the commission, if I join the commission, to come up to speed. And I'll certainly be leaning on those more experienced folks on the board for the interim while I get up to speed and do that education component. But I'm excited to dig in and learn more.

Thank you. Appreciate it. That's all.

Thank you. And just a reminder, Select with a Moth, I'm actually your chair, and I have two small kids and run a small business, and I'm on other boards and committees, and I think I do a good job. So I think it's doable. Great. You're going to be sleeping in the Conservation Commission. That's not the intent here, but I do respect the fact that there is a level of commitment, Brian, and to Roy Lamoff's credit, he just wants to make sure that you understand that there is a level of commitment. And then the other bad thing about going bad is going last is my friend Selectman Harrington stole my thunder and asked you the question about development. So as I asked Brenda, and it was different, Bill, so I'm joking. But Brian, as I asked Brenda, I mean, the town has costs that continue to go up every year. I think if we could all have it our way and taxes weren't a recurring issue for us that go up, we'd all want to have no more development in the town to rent them and we want to have as much green space as possible. Unfortunately, that's not realistic. We need a certain level of development to offset tax growth because, as you know, Proposition 2.5, we can only increase taxes by 2.5%. But, Mike King, is this a fair statement? our costs continue to go up more than 2.5% every year.

That is correct.

Okay. Hence, there's one to two things we can do. Find sources of revenue, development being one of them, or increase taxes for us, the taxpayer. I think I pay enough in taxes already. So I'm just curious, Brian, what you're, you know, what you think about, and I'm being a little bit facetious, but I'm serious at the same time. What are your thought processes and where are you at with common sense development versus no development at all versus give us your opinion.

Yeah, absolutely. So, I mean, I think every development needs to be looked at with a critical eye. I'm not going to say, you know, oh, residential is the way to go versus commercial, but I think everything needs to be done thoughtfully and with purpose, right? And the weighing the benefits, the cost, the benefit, the pros and cons of every single development need to be evaluated, certainly with the tax base in mind, as well as the use of natural resources and the impact on our our natural resources. Right. So, you know, I think we need to we need to look at things always openly, objectively and in a transparent fashion and make sure that we're we're, you know, within the bounds of the Conservation Commission's purview. Right. That we're making sure things are done responsibly and that we're that we're you know, allowing for the right types of development to happen that aren't going to necessarily really have a huge negative impact on our natural environment.

All right, thank you very much. Thank you for your time. I think you both did a fantastic, I think all the candidates did a fantastic job. So now we have the very difficult job, my fellow board members, of choosing, let me just go to the motion here, the two appointments. So as you recall, we heard from Julie Garland, At the last meeting, we heard from Brenda Aile tonight, as well as Brian Tufts. We do have some letters of recommendation in our packet from the Conservation Commission Chair that we've all had time to read and review. So, you know, I want to get the board talking. You know, what's the will of the board? Does anyone have anything that they, you know, an idea that they're, any leaning additional questions?

Mr. Chair?

Yes.

Yeah. So first of all, I want to say I'm very pleased to say that we've got four very quality candidates. And I thought that they all interview extremely well. I think it'll be a difficult decision. I'm disappointed that Sean Dooley has has withdrawn. But if I'd be more than happy to make to make a motion. But if you'd rather have the other members talk, I'm fine with that as well.

I mean, listen, Jim, do you want to give the board some kind of inclination what your motion would be? Then we can talk about it. We can feel free to have some dialogue and then open it back up for a formal motion.

Sure thing. So I would recommend, again, I think they all did a tremendous job, but I would recommend Julie Garland and Brian Tufts.

Okay. All right. I could see why you would do that. Hal Hallstein, And it does any of the board members want to add anything to that before I asked for a formal motion does they don't have opinion they want to discuss. Hal Hallstein, To want to make sure everyone feels like they have been heard. Okay.

Mr. Chair, I'd just like to say that I think that Select Board Anderson eloquently stated that we had great applicants, great experience. It's good to see people coming forward. This has been something that we've been working towards to increase awareness. And I think that I would second Select Board Anderson's motion if it's appropriate at this time.

Sure. And I just want to agree with you and say, you know, the level of the level of resident that's been stepping up since we've been and it's not us. We as one of our strategicals and initiatives, this board has tried to do a better job of communicating civic engagement. You know, we're trying to communicate when these boards and commission opportunities come available. And I want to thank the residents for stepping up and reaching out and filling the need. And I would agree with you that we've got a lot of qualified candidates. And I hope that anyone that's not chosen to be on one of these boards of commissions this evening, I strongly encourage you to, you know, obviously, you know, go out for another one, go out for another board or another need as there are ample. And there's plenty of boards that don't have enough. So if you're wondering what boards and commissions, you know, we really need help with, you can feel free to reach out to us at SBOffice at RentThem.gov and we'll get you that information. I would tend to agree with Selectman Anderson and Selectwoman Rouse on the two candidates. Does anyone have any other comments before I go ahead and ask for a formal motion? Being none, Selectman Anderson, if you want to feel free to go ahead and make that formal motion, go right ahead.

Sure thing. Thank you, Mr. Chair. So I make a motion to appoint Julie Garland to the Conservation Commission for a term effective July 1. 2026 and expiring June 30th, 2029.

Mike, do we have to do them individually or can he?

They should be made separately, Mr. Chair.

Okay, so we'll start with that one. Is there a second?

A second.

Okay, motion made by Selectman Anderson, second by Selectwoman Rouse. Any further discussion? Being none, we'll do a roll call vote. Selectman Gallo is a yes. Selectman Lamar?

Yes.

Selectman Harrington?

Harrington, yes.

Selectman Anderson?

Yes.

Selectwoman Rouse? Yes. Okay, Selectman Anderson, you had a second one?

Okay, Mr. Chair, motion to appoint Brian Tufts to the Conservation Commission for term effective July 1, 2026 and expiring June 30th, 2029.

Is there a second?

Second.

Second by, so motion made by Selectman Anderson, second by Selectman Lamothe. Any further discussion? Being none, do a roll call vote. Gallows a yes. Lamothe? Yes. Harrington?

Harrington, yes.

Anderson?

Anderson, yes.

Rouse? Yes. Motion carries 5-0. Congratulations to Brian Tufts and Julie Garland. Please make sure that you go see our town clerk before you attend the next meeting, okay? We're going to move on. As you can see, the process is a little bit lengthy. So now that we've gone through one, I hope to speed it up with the remaining boards and commissions. Next, we have Cultural Council. Okay, so Cultural Council should go relatively quick. I believe there's one applicant and one appointment, correct, Mike?

That is correct. There is not multiple applicants for this position this evening.

Okay, so with us, we have Gene Lightbody. Gene, are you with us?

Hi, good evening. Yes, I am.

Hi, good evening. How are you? Good to see you. Good, good. Great. So really quickly, so you just saw how the process works. We are going to try to speed it up, but we're not going to rush you. I'm just going to speed up. I'm going to talk less, which is a good thing for all of us. So Jean, welcome to the meeting. Can you please address the board? Let us know why you're interested in the cultural council and a little bit about yourself and why you think you'd be a great candidate.

Sure. Well, for everybody who doesn't know me, I'm Jean Lightbody, and I'm actually a zoning board member. And in the last, we just elected three alternate members, any one of them, which would be a great full member. So I feel like now I have an opportunity to participate in the community in the arts, which is where I'm an artist. So it's my passion. I would like to be part of bringing arts to our community. I know they do a good job of it, but I'd like to do like a plein air event where people come and paint our community. And I'm connected with artists all over the seacoast. So real professionals who would really enjoy our beautiful community. And so what I want to do is be connected with the council, with people who already know what they're doing. And I can learn about that and about, you know, issuing grants and how we interact with bringing young people, young artists up. And so they become somebody like me who, you know, follows their, what they like to do. And maybe working with White Barn Farm. I've done some stuff with the Foxborough Art Association over the years and know those people. So I'm networked and connected with different art associations and different types of events I have real experience with. I think I'd be better suited to serve our community and the cultural council than the zoning board. However, I would stay with that if it's allowed as an alternate member. and ask one of the new alternate members if they would want to take over being a full member because they're great. We have a great zoning board now. I'm really thrilled with the new people.

Great. Well, thank you for that information and the plug for the zoning board. We appreciate that. Mike King, can you speak to how that would work just so we know? How would that work? Would she have to... Make a change from her responsibilities in the zoning board or.

So those positions are specifically appointed. So, right.

Yeah, I mean, like, she wanted to resign.

Yeah, she, she would, she would resign and then it could be filled. By 1 of the alternates.

Yeah, that's sort of the way it's worked in the past couple of years. I actually started as an alternate, and then a full member resigned, and I took his position as a full member. But that was the cultural council didn't have an open seat, and I've always sort of wanted to get involved in that. Great.

So what we'll do is we'll deal with the zoning piece at a separate time. Jean, you can work with myself and Mike King on that. Okay. Let's get, let me ask any of the other, I mean, thank you for that. That was a great intro. Great to hear about you. Clearly passionate. You know, you know, did you, you are, you're an artist, correct?

I am. Yes. Yep. Okay.

Great. Great, great, great. I'm going to ask the other board members if they have any questions or comments for you, starting with Select Women, Russ.

Sure, Mr. Chair. Very nice to see you. I'm glad to see that you put your name into the Cultural Council. I appreciate all your actual thoughts and ideas for getting art more here in town and the awareness. So just one question, were you featured during the local artists that the Cultural Council presented a few weeks ago? Was any of your artwork in that?

No, I haven't. My, my artwork was over in the Norfolk library, if that's the one that you're talking about. And yeah, and I received awards in it too. Not that it was a great, great big field of entries, but all the same. Yeah.

Yeah. They did one similar here around them a few weeks ago when local artists displayed their work and it was, it was fascinating and just amazing to see so many talented individuals in town.

I was not even aware of it. I had no idea of it. So that's another area where I can participate of how do we how do we help people like me know about it?

Sure.

Yeah.

Thank you. No further questions. You're welcome. That's fantastic. Selectman Anderson.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. So, Jean, you actually presented to us a pretty well thought out plan. And so I appreciate that. And I've got no further questions.

Thank you. All right, great job, Gene. Selectman Harrington.

Yeah, thank you, Mr. Chair. So yeah, Gene, thank you for being on the zoning board and willing to resign from that to pick up your passion in the cultural council. I think you'll do really well there and look forward to meeting with you and working with you.

Great, thank you.

Selectman Lamar.

The same as Mr. Harrington. Thank you very much for making this, volunteering for this role and your time on the zoning board. No questions.

Thank you. Great. And Jean, the only thing I'll say is maybe you could help me get my stick figures a little bit more artistic. Drawing lessons. Yes. Yeah, that'd be helpful. So with that being said, I think the board thinks you have some great experience. You had a lot of value. So with that being said, show and entertain a motion to appoint. Gene Lightbody to the Cultural Council for a term effect of July 1, 2026 and expiring June 20th. Don't move. June 30th, sorry, 2029. Don't move. Seconded by Selectwoman Harrington. I'll second that. Seconded by Selectwoman Rouse. Any further discussion? Being none, roll call vote. Selectwoman Rouse. Yes. Anderson.

Yes.

Harrington.

Harrington, yes.

Lamothe? Lamothe, yes. Gallo, yes. Motion carries 5-0. Congratulations. Please go see our town clerk and get sworn in.

I'll stop up.

Thank you so much. May I drop off? Yes. Oh, yeah, you do. I mean, it's such a riveting meeting. I would hope that you wouldn't, but of course you can drop off. I'm kidding.

Go right ahead.

Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Okay. So now that we've done two of these, we're going to try to pick up the pace. We have Economic Development Commission, number of appointments, two. It looks like we have two openings, two appointments, new to the board. We have the applications and supporting letter in our packet. Is Matthew Gray with us? Matthew Gray. Oh, Matthew, hi. It doesn't say you're muted, but I can't hear you. Can you hear me? You can hear me, but I can't hear you. Am I the only one? Can anyone hear Matthew?

No.

You and Selectum the Moth have the same issue.

I logged off and back in. What's that? I logged off and back in on my browser.

Matt, do you want to try to log off and log back in? And I'm going to go to the next person. I'm going to go to Kate Duggan. Kate, are you with us? I am. Hello. Hi, how are you? Good. How are you? I'm doing fantastic. Nice to see you. Thank you for your interest in the EDC. Can you please just give the board a quick introduction and why you're applying for this position?

So I grew up in Foxborough. I have lived in Rentham since 2010, and I've had my own real estate company since 2002. And I have developed property and I help buyers and sellers negotiate deals to move property.

Well, that's a lot of good experience for the Economic Development Commission. So I appreciate that. I'm going to turn it over to the board members, see if anyone has any other comments or questions. We're going to change it up and start with Selectman Lamothe.

Well, I know that you've met with Ms. Zitterman, and she recommends you highly. I mean, what was the discussion you had with Rebecca when you met originally?

Right.

So we talked about taxes in our town and we're all, you know, with our residential tax base kind of getting sick of the amount of taxes we all have to pay. So we need to work on, I think, generating more revenue for our town. And obviously we don't want to do that through our residential tax base. So where do we look? We've got to get more people interested in our community on the commercial side. And so I think there's things that we could do to help help generate more revenue.

A couple of examples that you might be thinking about.

So there's areas in town that currently have no development that I think would have little impact on our neighborhoods. And if we were to kind of explore some of that and try to get people interested in our community and maybe even create some type of a, you know, I wouldn't say a geographic zone that would be beneficial for people, but we have to kind of look at some of these things to just get more revenue generated in our town through development of these areas.

Okay, Kate, thank you.

Mr. Chairman. Thanks. Sorry about that. Selectman Lamar. Selectman Harrington.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. So, Kate, that's a really great idea. I'm not sure if you were at town meeting or not. but the planning board proposed a couple of changes for that very purpose of generating additional tax revenue. And they got shot down through town meeting, which the beauty of town meeting is the whole process, which is awesome. So what would you do differently or what would you propose differently to develop areas to generate low impact commercial development?

So one thing that I think Rebecca and I mentioned or discussed was looking at our zoning maps and seeing where we currently have commercial and industrial undeveloped land that doesn't need to have an override from the town. And let's see what we can do to develop these areas. I think that would be starting point number one. And another thing we discussed was just looking at our, you know, our tax, our commercial tax rate and where we stack up against other towns. Are we where we need to be or are we low? And, you know, without destroying our tax, our commercial base that we currently have, we don't want to drive anyone out of town. But we definitely need to kind of look at everything, I think.

Well, through the chair and through my king, there's a lot of effort put into the tax and the tax roll and how it's accounted for through this board and through the assessors. And we do have a dual rate, always keeping in mind for our residential folks, trying to keep it as low as possible. And competitive in the tri-town and other areas. Through you, Mr. Chair, is that accurate?

I mean, if you're asking me, it's 100% accurate. Mike King can answer, but we have a split tax rate. We're very competitive from both a residential tax perspective and a commercial tax perspective. Clearly, we're not as low as some people would like to see us on the commercial side, but we're definitely lower than a lot of the other surrounding communities. The biggest issue that we have, Selectman Harrington, as you know, is the fact that we don't have municipal sewer, and that keeps a lot of the commercial development away. But there are areas, to Kate's point, to Becca Zittimore's point, and to your point, in my humble opinion anyway, I'm only one member, that we can identify, find, and do common sense development, low-impact commercial development that doesn't affect the schools, it doesn't affect public safety, you know, but it definitely brings tax dollars that we desperately need into the community. So I'm not trying to answer for anyone. You asked me a question. That's my opinion. Mike King, would you agree with my assessment of our residential commercial split tax rate?

I agree. There's about a $5 difference between the residential and commercial. So the residential is $1,167. The commercial is $1,689 per 1,000. And then annually, to your point, Mr. Harrington, and recap by Mr. Gallo. The Board of Assessors do a presentation to the Select Board. They look at wherever communities are at in the area in terms of the tax rate, and then they provide recommendations and they can show what the impact would be for certain tax rate settings on both the average residential tax bill and the average commercial tax bill, and then the Select Board votes accordingly.

All right, thank you. Thank you both. I think that answered your question, Selectman Harrington.

Yes, absolutely. I just thought it's important that going forward with this, she has a good understanding of the tax base and how we come up with it.

Yep, agreed. So, Selectman Anderson, you're up.

Yeah, so, Mr. Chair, I actually like Kate's experience, and I've liked her interview so far, so I've got no further questions.

Great.

Select woman, Rouse. I have no further questions at this time. Thank you.

Excellent. So, Chair, let me go back to find my spot. So, at this time, oh, Matt Gray. Do we have Matt Gray with us? Oh, Matt was still having sound issues, I think. Right? I'm not the only one here. Right, guys? Correct.

Thank you.

Okay. Sometimes it's me. Matt, I don't know what's going on, but I will say this. Under this circumstance, I've looked at your resume. You've got a lot of relevant experience, BA in finance, UMass Amherst, economic development, industrial corporation, EDIC of Boston. You have experience at CVS Health, Pharmacare subsidiary, director of finance. We did a lot of interesting things relating to acquisitions, ranging from 20 million to 800 million. There's clearly, in my humble opinion, fellow board members, there's clearly some business acumen here. There's some tax growth acumen here. I think Mac Gray would be a fantastic candidate. Couple that with the recommendation letter from Chair Becca Zittimore, and I think you have a very strong application. Do the other board members want to make any questions, comments, or concerns? Because we are having sound issues, and I do want to keep this moving.

I agree.

Let's go through the list just so I can say I did the process fairly. Selectwoman Rouse. Yes. No issues. You're not voting.

Yeah, no issues, no questions.

Okay.

Selectman Anderson.

Mr.

Chair, I concur with your findings.

Okay, thank you. Selectman Harrington?

Yeah, absolutely, Mr. Chair. Great resume. I concur.

Okay, Selectman Lamar. Likewise. Okay, great. So at this time, we're going to take two motions. The first motion, we need a nomination. So I'm going to make a nomination to appoint Kate Duggan to the Economic Development Commission for a term effective July 1, 2026 and expiring June 30, 2031. Second. So motion made by me, second made by Selectman Harrington. Any further discussion? Being none, we'll do a roll call vote. Selectman Monroe? Yes. Anderson?

Yes.

Harrington?

Harrington, yes.

Lamothe? Lamothe, yes. Gallo, yes. Motion carries 5-0. Kate, congratulations. Please go see the town clerk and get sworn in. We're lucky to have you. Thank you. Very welcome. Matt Gray, based on your excellent interview this evening, I'm going to make another motion to appoint Matthew Gray to the Economic Development Commission for a term effective July 1st, 2026 and expiring on June 30th, 2031.

Second.

Motion made by me, seconded by Selectman Harrington. Any further discussion? Being none, we'll do a roll call vote. Selectwoman Rouse. Yes. Anderson.

Yes.

Arrington.

Arrington, yes.

Lamothe.

Lamothe, yes.

Gallo, yes. Motion carries 5-0. Congratulations, Matt. Please go see our town clerk before your first meeting. Okay? Maybe other people will do the sound thing and we'll buzz right along. Just kidding, Matt. Next, we have historical commission. So let's go to the packet. And... For the historical commission, okay, it looks like the six A, B, and C is, here we go. If you click on the tab, it actually drops them all down. I just figured that out, so shame on me. Historical commission, we have a total number of three appointments, everybody. It looks like we have two incumbents. Ray Rose, and Leo Baldiger. And we have two applicants, Greg Stahl, who's no newbie by any stretch of the imagination. And we have Paul Bender, who I had the pleasure to meet a couple weekends ago. Seems like a really nice person. So we also, in the notes, you're going to see that the current member, Lisa Bailey, has resigned effective May 26, 2026, allowing for three appointments in total. Okay. So with that being said, why don't we, let's start with the incumbents. Do we have Ray Rose with us?

I'm here.

Ray Rose. How are you, sir?

I'm doing well. How are you tonight?

I'm doing great. Thanks. Thanks for being with us. I would ask you to address the board. Give us just a brief, a brief, you know, understanding of your involvement in historical commission and why you want to be reappointed.

Sure, I'd be happy to. Thank you. My name is Raymond Rose, and I've been a Rentham resident since 1968. I have a deep passion for the history of our town, the preservation of our town artifacts like our cemetery headstones, the organizing of volunteer projects with both the Lions Club and the Boy Scouts for the cleaning and the raising of headstone monuments. I love solving mysteries, you know, like our skeleton I was still waiting to hear about. And the Boston Post cane that I'm still currently researching. And the dedication of the Walker B. Mason Memorial on the Common. And right now I'm doing a chronological research of our town reports going back to the 1870s. So I got a lot of stuff still going on that I'd like to keep working on. And I feel like I can really, you know, donate a lot of passion to the commission.

You're muted. Mr. Chair, you're muted.

Wow. I never do that. So rough day. Thanks, Ray. I appreciate your service. Thanks, Michelle, for calling me out on that. And I'm going to turn it over to the board members to see if anyone has any questions. Starting with Select Woman Rouse.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Nice to see you this evening, Ray. I'd like to hear from you in terms of you reflect on your experience on the Historical Commission. What do you find your greatest impact on being in this group?

I would say the preservation of the town's resources when it comes to the cemeteries and the headstones and um you know just going helping with um basically going through all the artifacts that we have and and the attempt to you know um preserve them you know like the gristmill wheel from down in sweat park and you know the uh get getting the walker b mason sign back out there on the common um and you know doing research into some of our archives you know to try to um figure out if there's anything that's been forgotten that needs to be readdressed. So I would say that that would be the case.

Thank you. And how do you think that the Historical Commission can increase the public interest in our local history?

I think the 250th celebration was a great example of, you know, opening up the museum and you know, allowing people to walk through there. And we fortunately have a great relationship with the cultural council. So we also open up the museum when they have their displays that they want to put on. So I would say advertising and, you know, opening up the building and reaching out to people and you know, newsletters and email, you know, electronic mail, all those things I think are valuable assets to, you know, increasing the people, their knowledge of what we have as far as the artifacts go and, you know, where they are and where they can be accessed.

Okay, thank you. No further questions, Mr. Chair.

Excellent. Selectman Anderson.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Well, first of all, I've known Ray for many, many years. He's filled a lot of different roles in town. Everything he does, he puts his heart and soul into it. So I have no issues at all as far as him maintaining his status quo on this committee.

Thank you. Selectman Harrington.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. So, Ray, nice job. That little presentation for the 250th was quite nice and well thought out with all the members, I guess, of the historical that put their effort into that. And it was great to see the Walker B. Mason dedication found and restored. Thank you for your service. Thank you.

And Selectman Lamar.

I echo what Selectman Anderson has to say. Ray, you've been dedicated to this town and look forward to you continuing with everything you do for us. Thank you.

Thank you, sir.

All right. Great race. Stay tuned. We'll be back in touch in a minute. All right. So next, the second incumbent, we have Leo Baldigger. Mr. Baldigger, are you with us this evening? Mr. Baldigger.

Can you hear me? Can you hear me now?

I can hear you now.

Okay. We're on board. I can see you.

Great. Thanks for being here, Mr. Baldigger. As we did with Mr. Rose, you're one of two incumbents. We're reaching out to you to see, you know, tell us a little bit about yourself. Tell us about quick, you know, some of your experiences on the historical commission and why you want to be reappointed as an incumbent.

Uh, let's see, I moved here in 1973 from Boston. I got on the historical commission in the mid eighties, 1986, maybe seven. Uh, Richard Ross had resigned. I picked up his seat. Earl Stewart was, I think, chairman at that point in time. Uh, gave me the opportunity to join and I have been a member ever since. I've been involved in numerous projects of the commission. Well, let's see. We'll start off the restoration of the horse trough, which people call a fountain. Okay. The commission was partially responsible for it. And I took it upon myself to rebuild the top of it. And I spent about 100 hours brazing it and getting it back into shape, getting a light put on it. and making the trough functional, so to speak. At any rate, that's only one of them. But my biggest concern is the preservation of the town's historic architecture, meaning the old Fisk Museum. And I'm kind of disappointed on the dragging of feet from the I'm going to say I'm not sure who to put the finger to, but it was in regards to the survey that was done.

Well, that got interesting because he muted himself. But I was very interesting to see who the finger should be pointed at.

We wait with anticipation.

Mr. Baldigger, if you can hear me, you muted yourself.

How's that? Better? Better.

Okay. Something about pointing a finger now.

I don't know really whose responsibility it is to carry out the recommendations of this survey. I'm very concerned with the condition of the building. We have water invasion, which is detrimental to a structure, whether it's town or not. The foyer needs some... Immediate attention, I would say. Steps are pulling away from the building, things like that. And I'd like to see something done, maybe with a long-term plan through CPC funding for a three-, four-, five-year long-term project. Everything is outlined in that report. from the immediate recommendation to address it or to postpone it. Heating systems outdated by 30 years. There's a lot of different things. There's probably about 45 items on there. I spent the whole day with the engineering firm that did the review on it. They did a drone survey of it and everything. Everything was addressed and the recommendations are there, but I haven't seen any action. So that kind of perturbs me a little bit after spending a lot of time and volunteering my time with the Commission to this point in my life. I'm 80, so I don't know how many more years I have left, but I'd like to see some action done. And we used to have a liaison with the Board of Selectmen every year to come to the Commission, and the last one that was on that was Jennifer Firth. All right, so I'm dating myself. And I haven't seen... anybody come forward, nevermind, you know, um, a lot of participation. So, so those are my beefs. I'd like to stay on. I'd like to fill out, uh, some more time on that. Um, We also enforce a demolition delay by law. And our main interest is preservation and restoration in town. So that's it in a nutshell.

So Mr. Baldiger, let me just address two of your points. The first one being you and your commission, Gina Solaris knows this firsthand. She has an open invitation to come on the select board whenever she needs something or whenever there's an update for us. So the need of a select board liaison, I don't think is needed. I think we have a good relationship with your chair woman. And I think there's very good lines of communication there. So I would push that back on you. and to say, if you think that you need to be in front of the select board more often, talk to your chair and get to a select board meeting more often because you're openly, this board is probably one of the most available boards in town's history. We never say no, we always say yes, and we're readily available to help all the boards and commissions. That's my point number one. My point number two would be, This document that you're talking about, the condition of the building and your concerns, you know, based on what you're saying, I too would have some concerns. So my question to you is, if reappointed, how will you take that document and be the lead liaison between your board and ours or whoever needs to be involved through Town Manager Mike King to possibly get some of those concerns addressed?

I would love to be the representative for that. I can't think of a better issue to address as far as I'm concerned. I don't know. I'm limited as far as what I personally can do. Most of it is funding. So I can't fund any of this. There's a small grant that's being... pursued by Cultural Council. And I was told that we can't do anything until this grant is fulfilled from the Cultural Council. We went before CPC three or four years ago to address the paint issue, paint the woodwork and things like that. We said, no, no, no, you have to prioritize your things first. This report came out. It's all prioritized. And we still haven't got out. We're still sitting there.

So what I would suggest, Mr. Baldigger, not to cut you off, but what I would suggest, if reappointed, you bring that up to your chair, Gina Solaris, and ask her to follow up with town manager Mike King and myself, and we can see what we can do to help move those projects forward. And the last thing I want to say to you is, God bless you being 80 years old. I hope we have you for another 80 years. Okay. And with that, I'm going to turn it over to my other board members for any questions or comments that they might have, starting with Select Woman Rouse. Go ahead.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Leo, very nice to see you. Bye, guys. Can you, since you've been on the commission for a bit, can you share with us what you've done or your ideas around increasing awareness with our school age residents, our high schools, our other communities or groups in town? to increase awareness about the Historical Commission?

Yeah, we've worked hand in hand with the Cultural Council and they've been wonderful as far as keeping the building open, putting in a lot of displays. We've helped them do that. We also have some packets and things like that that were done for some of the teachers in the Rentham Public Schools. I know there was an issue on Cesar Chela Plains and there was a program that was implemented We put the planes out so that they could be brought into the schools and shown to the students. And I just think that's the key to getting any interest is with the parents first. So we have tried to do that. And we're always open to that. any kind of requests, besides genealogies and things like that, that a lot of individuals come to us looking for information for. We're also archiving all our collections, which has been going on for about four or five years now. And we still plan on doing more archiving. making all that information available to the public and to anybody that wants it through a one-word access system. So that's kind of like what's in the pipeline now from commission-wise. We've had a few turnovers as far as people leaving, people dying, and that type of stuff. And we just lost our secretary, and she was very, very, very helpful. So anything else I can help you with, let me know.

Love to hear why you believe you're the right person to continue serving on the commission.

Well, just my background and experience. I own a 1760 Center Entrance Colonial. I'm into preservation and to restoration, just on living here and living in my house. And I think I could help a lot of people along their lines of doing the same thing. with all the properties or anything that comes along like that. So that's a resource for questions. We've gone in and looked at houses for people and answered questions before they buy and things like that. So I'd be helpful in that if somebody was interested in it.

Okay, thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair, for the questions. Selectman Anderson.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. So Leo, first of all, God bless you for willing to serve at the age of 80. Thank you. But going forward, what change would you make that would make the commission better and also be more beneficial to the town?

What change would I make? Well, I'd like to get a little more cooperation as far as the selectmen talking us up and saying, hey, guys, come in. We've got this. We've got that. We did the Rochambeau monument. It's still not completely finished, but the select people were very helpful with us. So was the town's 350th committee with funding for that. We worked along... well, let's see, two-deacon stone and all that type of stuff for plaquing and that. Any other projects I'd still like to finish off, Rochambeau, we have the signage ready, but we've been adjourned for the last two months or so with no meetings. So it's kind of hard to fabricate a plan without a meeting. But we're working on that.

Okay. I just want to clarify. You said you'd like more help from the select board? In what ways? Because I know the Select Board, I think they attend just about every event that's available. So what exactly type of help are you looking for?

Well, I'd like to see in-person meetings start again with the Selectmen. I know Zoom is convenient, but if you don't have a computer... you're out of luck. You used to have meetings in person pre-COVID, and a lot of other towns did the same thing. We Zoomed our commission meetings. Now, just about, and I'm not saying everybody, but there's quite a few people that have gone back to in-person meetings. The end of the meeting was opened up to the floor for anybody with questions and answers, and I think the availability of that would make it a lot easier for people to get their information back to the board. I'm a non-technologically person, okay?

Yeah, well, perhaps I can help you with that. But Mr. Chair, I get no further questions.

Thank you. I'm not going to – yeah, we're not – yeah, that's fine. We're not going to get into the specifics that we have showing that Zoom participation is – quadruple 10, 10 times more, you know, people with disabilities, people with children, people with, you know, we've asked the questions and I think Mike, a lot of our boards are still, uh, I don't know all of them, but a decent number of our larger boards with a lot of activity is still conducting business via Zoom. And I will say that this board does a lot of in-person events. Every event we do is in person. So we can address that at another time, Mr. Baldiga, if you'd like. That's not the purpose of...

Okay, well, I feel better now, so...

Well, listen, my job is to serve you, so as long as you feel better, I guess I can go to bed tonight. With that being said, I'm going to move on to Selectman Harrington.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. So, Leo, nice to see your name on the screen, seeing that I can't see you. Actually, it's not you, it's Joyce, but at any rate, it's nice to hear your voice. I do appreciate all you do. I'd certainly be glad to talk to you about that report, uh, anytime that you want, uh, along with through Mr. Chair and Mike King, uh, with things that have been going on with regards to the report. Uh, and if you remember correctly, um, when you came to the CPC for some money for paint and some, uh, small issues, uh, there was one of the select board members that suggested that we move forward with a, a deeper dive into that building. Uh, so that, that all being said, I appreciate all you do for the commission and, uh, Appreciate your comments. Thank you. Thank you.

Select him in the moth. Where are you? He's muted and his camera's off. Select him in the moth.

Sorry about that.

No problem. Your camera's off. Now it's on.

No questions. Thank you for your years of service and your dedication and keep getting it on. No doubt about it. You're doing a good job.

Thank you. Thank you, Selectman Lamothe. Now, thank you, Mr. Baldiga. Stay tuned. Now we have two additional applicants, Greg Stahl, Paul Bender. I'm going to start with Paul Bender. Paul, please introduce yourself to the board. Give us a quick understanding of who you are, why you think you'd be a good member, some maybe relevant experience, and just help us know just a little bit about you quickly.

Sure. Thank you, Chairperson. So my name is Paul Bender. I live at 10 Martin Lane. My wife, Jamie, and I have been in Rentham for 30 years. And both of our children have gone through the KP school system. And being newly semi-retired, I'm looking to get more involved with the community again, now that I have more time. And my interest in the Historical Commission purely is from the passion that I have for history in general. I'm an avid history reader. I enjoy learning about history, whether it be revolutionary, civil war, World War II history, et cetera. And so with that interest, I saw the opening here with the Historic Commission and with the charter that they have on the website. You know, I'd like to be more involved in preserving the history of Rentham, but also extending the awareness about the history of Rentham within the community. and preemptively to Chairperson Rouse's question earlier, and it may be now different than when my kids went through our luncheon school, but I'd like to maybe see field trips, and I say that in quotes, much like our kids would always go to Plymouth Plantation or they'd go into the city. why we can't do that within Rentham itself, whether it be going to the museum that we have, creating greater awareness there, and getting them out into the community and learning more about Rentham and hopefully creating greater pride about the community and interest in the community with the hope that perhaps maybe they want to stay in the community as they grow older.

That's great. I appreciate that, Paul. I'm going to open it up like I did with all the others to the other Select Board members, starting with Selectwoman Rouse.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Paul, good to see you. It's been quite a few years.

It has. You too.

Just to tag on to that, I think that's great information about the schools. Tell me from your perspective why you believe the historical preservation is important to our community.

Well, I think like anything with history, it's all about kind of where you came from, the roots and both learning from the positives that came from that history, as well as the mistakes to hopefully avoid recreating them again in the future. But also, I think facilitating a greater pride within the community itself. So as you feel as though you're part of a community and with that, that, you know, again, you have kids that want to stay within the community. have a fondness for where they came from and the people that preceded them and what we've created here within Rentham. I won't mention the person that I'm friendly with, but he grew up in Rentham. And every time I see him at a cookout or a party, I'm always asking questions and he's providing me all this interesting detail about Rentham, which I never knew. So all that does is deepen my roots within the community, which hopefully would be extended to our children as well.

Great, thank you. No further questions, Mr. Chair.

Yep, that was great. Selectman Anderson.

Yeah, so Paul, good to see you again. If you were to get on this commission, how do you see your role going forward?

I think it's kind of a balance to the diverse industry. group of people that are on there currently. The cursory research I was able to do on LinkedIn beforehand, I see somebody that has a teaching background, somebody that has an arborist background, somebody that has a background from project management. So I think just bringing my background of, which has been entirely sales related over my career, but also I have a law degree and practice for a while. So I think it's just bringing a different perspective, complimenting those other folks that are already on the board. And again, just utilizing the passion that I have for history and for Rentham in general.

Okay, thank you.

Mr. Chair, no further questions.

Thank you. Selectman Harrington.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. So, Paul, nice to see you. Thank you for your willingness to volunteer for a committee, which, you know, it's very important. The history of Rentham as it's passed and the history that's being created today is very, very important to ourselves and the folks that are going to be here when they open up that time capsule. What role would you see, and I'm sure you're not familiar with the building plan that the infrastructure worked on, but what role would you see yourself maybe taking in that building improvement plan, working with the other committees, the DPW, maybe the cultural council, and even trying to seek some grants? Would that be a role that you'd be willing to look at?

It would be, and to be fully transparent, Bill, I'm not familiar with the building plan that you're referring to, but obviously it has some relation to, I think, of a historic significance. So, I mean, my thought would be to keep the historic integrity associated with the building, but also obviously ensure that it's within line with current codes and things of that nature to preserve this building going forward and ensure that it's intact and prevent any potential catastrophic damage issues with it. So being fully transparent, I'm not sure the building plan you're referring to. So if you can invite me a little bit more, I might be able to more intelligently answer your question.

So there was an infrastructure report that was done through you, Mr. Chair. Mike, was it a year ago or a year and a half? And it just looks through the building as its needs and roof windows doors siding that type of thing so someone's gonna you know kind of need to take champion that the projects so are you referring to a specific building or buildings in general just that fisk the old fisk oh okay oh the old fisk i didn't know if you're talking about the the the

the old range hall or no no no just the old fesk okay i understand now yeah so again i'm sure the folks that uh currently on the commission have done a wonderful job it's just a matter of mike coming in bringing a different perspective and as they say ensure that it's in alignment with the charter of the historic commission and preserving and maintaining that charter but also uh expanding awareness around what's there and maybe having, as opposed to waiting for the community, come to us, maybe come to them, whether it be going into the school, actually as part of presentations, et cetera, or again, maybe having them do field trips, much like they go to when they go to Plymouth Plantation or other locations.

Nice. Thank you, Paul.

Bill, is that it?

Yes.

All right. Great job. We'll go to selecting them off.

Paul, nice seeing you again. Nice seeing you again. I really enjoyed what you were saying about field trips and building pride and community and going into schools. To me, what rattled through my head is, you know, someone that's coming in with some new ideas, fresh ideas about best practices. We need someone like that. What other things might be different than what you may have observed that you could bring into this group?

It's a great question because the people currently on the commission have done a fantastic job. I did participate recently in the 250th anniversary celebration there. So not to knock on anything they've done, they've done a great job. I think it's more to your point, maybe bringing new ideas that might be a little bit fresh or different. From my background experience, being in sales and marketing, there are different ways to promote things that perhaps others maybe haven't thought of. Again, realizing we have teachers, arborists, and project managers, they don't necessarily have that sales and marketing background much like I do in terms of promoting events or promoting projects. commissions, in this case, what we can offer. So nothing really specific at the moment, other than what I alluded to at the beginning of maybe greater outreach within the community, both in the elementary and high school, but just utilizing my background of sales and marketing and what I've done over the past 40 odd years of selling and promoting not only myself, but companies that I represented.

No further questions, Mr. Chair.

Yep. That's good. Okay. So we had Paul Bender and the last person we're going to interview is Greg Stahl. um greg stall could you unmute yourself give us a quick uh yo quick say hello uh address the group why you're interested in current in the historical commission and just a quick you know intro update and then i'll open it up to the other board members like i have with everybody else greg okay yeah uh

Good evening. Can you hear me? We can. Oh, perfect. A lot better than the last time. Anyway, my name is Greg Stahl. My name is known pretty much to everybody on the select board, I'm pretty sure now. The only reason I'm applying for this position is because my application for... re-upping just kind of fell through the cracks in my office. And sorry about that. Once I figured that out, it was too late to do everything in a timely fashion. So I just said, well, we'll deal with this down the road. Everybody's got problems and I've got some. So anyway, here I am applying for a position. I have a lot of similar story that Leo Baldiger has. We both came on the commission probably within a year or two of each other. I think I might have been a year or two before him, but I'm not going to look it up and find out what it was. But, you know, I knew all of the town historians because, you know, I went to school with their kids and all that stuff. And Sunday school, they were my teachers and everything. I knew every one of them. I listened to their Anthem stories because they were full of Anthem stories. I developed a love for history. I've been a history fanatic all my life. My GPA in school was a lot higher because of my history records, my history scores and things like that. So anyway, I'm a historian. I love doing research. I'm a people person and I think I developed a lot of that because I grew up next to a cemetery in Pondville and I would leave the house and I would go to the cemetery when I was six, seven years old. My grandmother and my mother would chase me down and I would be talking to the people who were in the cemetery and they were telling me stories about their children that are buried in there. So that's how I get here. Anyway, I got on the Historical Commission. We'll call it 1983 or 4, something like that. Completely sandbagged by Doris Dooley, but that's another whole story. That was the right thing to do. Immediately, I started researching what the town of Rentham had, what the Historical Commission had, and I came up with two projects that I could clearly see that I could do some work on. I have said both of these in proposals and dissertations I've done, like on the Washington Rochambeau Monument and things like that. Very early on, I wanted to know why Rentham didn't have a monument to the French Army encampment, because almost every other place where that happened, they had some kind of a monument or plaque or a city block named after the Rochambeau March, the French Army stuff. So I kept that in my mind all the time, and the whole thing just came together. Somebody said something to me, and I said the right thing, and with a lot of work from other helpful people on the Historical Commission and some help from other people, we got that monument up, and we did it last year. We're very proud of it. Probably my finest hour in the historical commission up to this point. And the other thing I did, well, Earl Stewart and Gogue Woodhams were our chairman. I took on the project. We found a box that, in the DPW garage behind a file cabinet that was full of copies of Rentham Selectman's records. And what it was, somebody was trying to solve a lawsuit or something that was going on in the town. They had to figure out whether a certain street or road is abandoned or not abandoned, and nobody knew. So they hired somebody to go through all the Rentham Selectman's records and copy everything that had anything to do With streets and roads. And of course, they didn't have street names. Then the road went from, you know, Farmer Smith to, you know, Farmer Miller's and, you know, turn the corner by the big red oak tree. That's how they described roads back then. But I said, OK, I'm going to take this thing home and I'm going to figure out where every one of these roads is. And they laughed at me, but I took it home and I started reading it. And I am the first person ever to compare all the street and road information to the 1790 census, to school district lists and surveyor's lists and early maps. I put everything together and all the names started making sense. And I figured out, what every single street in Rentham, Norfolk, Plainville, Foxborough, and Franklin was with that about a foot high pile of papers. So I've done that. I have shared all that information with our local towns so that they know what I figured out. It helped them a lot doing research. which I love doing by the way. I have an archivist license in the Massachusetts State Archives building next to the JFK Center at UMass South Boston. I am an associate member of the Norfolk Historical Commission and I do a lot of research for them and they're very helpful I'm very helpful to them, and they're very supportive of me. All good things. I was a major player in the old Fisk Museum becoming a reality. And I will address some of the things that Leo Braudiger brought up, which he is absolutely correct about, okay? when we took over the building committee, when the building committee took over that building.

And Greg, I don't want to interrupt you because I honestly could listen to you all evening. You're a wealth of knowledge, but we do, we have a lot more appointments. So could you, is there any way to sum up just your vision and, you know, why you think you should continue to serve? And then we could go back, like, like, like Greg, Greg, Greg, Greg, hold on a second. I know you're not used to this, but this is my meeting. So let me talk, okay? Thank you. So what I said was, like I offered to Mr. Baldigger, we'd love to take follow-up offline and see how we could collaborate with you and your board and help achieve some of this stuff. What I'm trying to do tonight is go through these commissions and boards and get people reappointed. So can you sum up in the next 30 seconds why we should reappoint you to the historical commission?

Sounds great. I'm a people person. I want to finish up the stuff that I have been working on for 40 years. I'm in the middle of a lot of projects. I love the people that are on the Historical Commission. I want to keep on working with them. I feel a lifetime Rentham resident, King Philip graduate. I just love the town of Rentham. I am Rentham. A lot of people have told me that. And that's it. You know, that's it. Anybody has any questions, come on and ask me. I'd be happy to talk to anybody anytime.

I appreciate that. And like I said, you're a wealth of knowledge. I thoroughly enjoy listening to you, but I do have to keep it moving. So thank you for that summary. I'm going to turn it over to the other board members to see if anyone else has any follow-up questions or comments for Mr. Stahl. Starting with Selectwoman Rouse.

No, I think, thank you, Mr. Stahl. I think you did a great job giving us all the information at this time. No further questions.

Excellent. Selectman Anderson.

Yeah, no further questions, Mr. Chair.

Okay, thanks. Selectman Harrington.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. So, Greg, I mean, obviously you're a walking encyclopedia on the town of Rentham. Appreciate what you do. And it certainly seems, even though you're not currently on the board, that you're still certainly going to be around and very actively involved. Appreciate what you do.

Great, is that it, Select Minute?

Yes, thanks, sorry, yeah.

No, no, that's okay. I just wanna make sure you were done. Select Minute, I'm off.

Gregory, thank you for all you do. Thank you for volunteering for this position. No further questions, Mr. Chair.

Okay, great. So, Board, similarly to the other commissions that we had to appoint, we have to get to a place where there are three appointments. And so far, we have two incumbents, Ray and Leo, and we have two applicants, Greg and Paul. And we know the history with Greg. So for, I'm doing some basic math here for applicants for three appointments. Let's start some deliberation.

Through you, Mr. Chair, if I may. Go ahead, please. So, I mean, obviously you've got the wealth of knowledge between Ray and Leo and Greg, and you've got new life and into the historical with a Paul. And I, believe that Greg, in or out as a member, will be an active participant, similar to what he was in the 250th celebration down on the Town Common. So I'd like to make a motion to reappoint Ray, Leo, and then Paul.

I second that. We're not ready for that, though. So like we did with the other one, we're going to have a quick conversation with the board members, and then we're going to go to a formal motion. So I appreciate that. I think that's a great suggestion. I'd like to hear from the other board members what they're feeling as well, Bill, if that's okay. So I appreciate you saying that. Jim Anderson, what are your thoughts?

So, Mr. Chair, do we have a recommendation from the chairperson from that committee?

So I'm so glad you asked. We do. In our packet, you'll see that there's a recommendation letter from the chairperson, and the recommendation says, I believe it was, hold on one second. I have it right here. Okay, here it is right here. Her recommendation would be to go with the two incumbents, Ray and Leo, and then Greg. So as you know, we, you know, obviously we weigh recommendations from the chair people, we weigh them very heavily, but ultimately we're the appointing authority. So if we think that, you know, a change could benefit the town and the commission, we're well within our right to propose a change.

Yeah, now just curious, I couldn't find it in my packet, that's all.

Yeah, there's a lot in there. It's on page 53 of 133.

Yeah, that doesn't do me a lot of good.

Sorry.

So as I said, her recommendation was Ray and Leo and then Greg.

Okay, thank you. I have no further questions.

Okay. Do you have any comments?

I do not. I do not.

Michelle, do you have anything to add?

No. Again, I think we've got people that have experience, but I am very impressed with Mr. Bender's interest and ideas and fresh perspective for this commission.

So I too share that sentiment. I think it's been said a few times, the board, we have such a wealth of knowledge on that historical commission. Everyone's so overly qualified, it's ridiculous, if I could be blunt. But I also do love the idea of blending new ideas as well. So how do we do that? I guess I support that. And Bill, so I'm coming back to you in one second. Roy, what are your thoughts before I go back to Bill for a formal motion?

Well, I think when Bill said new blood and that it's likely Greg would continue doing what he has been doing and contributing effectively, everything that he has, I think adding additional resource, new blood, gives that group even more depth and more, it strengthens it. So that's why I second that motion when he said what he did.

And Bill, just to clarify, go ahead and make your motion again. So now we can take the formal just because- All right, so through you, Mr.

Chair, Mike, I have to do it individually?

Yes. But before you do that, I just want to understand who you plan on motioning, just so I can make sure that I agree. Or if I don't agree, I at least want to have the opportunity to give you my opinion.

Okay, so it would be a reappointment of...

So you have two incumbents, Ray and Leo, and then you have two applicants, Greg and Paul.

So that would be a reappointment of Ray Rose and Leo Baldegar. and the appointment of Paul Bender.

With the understanding, Selectman Harrington, not to speak for you, with the understanding that Mr. Stahl will still be a vital part of this organization, whether he's officially a member or not.

Oh, absolutely. No question.

Okay. So why don't you go ahead and make the first formal motion, and we'll see if we have a second.

Okay, so the first motion would be to reappoint Ray Rose to the Historical Commission for term starting July 1st, 2026 and expiring June 30th, 2029.

Is there a second?

Second.

Okay, motion bid by Selectman Harrington, second by Selectman Anderson. Any further discussion? Being none, we'll do a roll call vote. Selectman, I'm off.

Lamont, yes.

Selectman Harrington.

Harrington, yes.

Selectman Anderson.

Yes.

Selectwoman Rouse. Yes. Chris Gallo, yes. Motion carries 5-0. So that's the first one.

The second one would be the reappointment of Leo Baldiger to the historical commission effective July 1st, 2026, expiring June 30th, 2029. Is there a second?

Second.