City Council Budget Workshop - May 20, 2026

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[00:00:12]Hey.

[00:00:24]Hey. Hey.

[00:00:26]Heat. Heat.

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[00:21:23]Good evening everyone. Today is I have the wrong uh May 20th 2026.

[00:21:34]My it says March here. So May 20th uh 2026. It is Wednesday. Thank you for your patience. Um we were a little behind on schedule due to um technical difficulties TV. Uh so this evening uh we're on day two of our budget workshops and I wanted to work welcome you all department heads, members again of the city council and of course the mayor caffo the solicitors with us this evening.

[00:22:04]Um, so tonight we continue the important work of ensuring that the city of Methuan has a budget that is fair both for our taxpayers and to our city employees. Over the course Yeah. Over the course of tonight and tomorrow, we will hear from department heads as they explain the requests they submitted to the mayor for their respective departments. After these presentations are complete, the city council will uh ask you questions as you come up. Um, I'm going to backtrack and my vice is going to take a roll call and then we'll go uh the mayor will take the floor and we'll start this evening. Thank you so much for your patience.

[00:22:42]>> Thanks, Madam Chair. Councelor Santos >> here.

[00:22:48]>> Councelor Samard >> here.

[00:22:51]>> Councelor Valley >> present.

[00:22:53]>> Councelor Daglio >> present.

[00:22:55]>> Councelor Drew >> here. Councelor McLaren >> present.

[00:23:00]>> Councelor Maran >> here.

[00:23:03]>> Councelor Pesh is here and chair Sodto >> present.

[00:23:07]>> Great. Mr. Mayor, would you I know yesterday you did a thorough presentation for us. I'm assuming you'd like the floor again this meeting.

[00:23:15]>> Thank you, Madam Chair. So, I think I covered u most of the ground uh yesterday. Uh tonight uh of course we're in for some uh presentations uh that are uh covering uh some of our biggest departments especially uh the school department, DBW uh etc. Uh and I just want to uh reiterate uh in terms of uh for instance our schools um you know this is an area that uh has seen significant underinvestment over the course of many years and you know we're now at a point where uh you know due to that uh we're still in the process of trying to catch up and make up for a lot of the losses that have been endured uh over time with uh cuts and and the like.

[00:24:05]And so uh you know, I think the challenge is uh trying to get to that point where uh we're able to maintain that uh catching up. But the issue that we're running into is that uh we have federal aid uh this year, as I mentioned last night, actually going down. Uh we've lost uh a great deal in the way of federal aid. And as I mentioned at a previous school committee meeting, I didn't get into this too much last night, uh, but state aid by way of, uh, chapter 70 funding, it's rising for Mthuan to the tune of 2.3%.

[00:24:41]So it is technically going up, but the challenge is that to maintain a level services budget, uh, that percentage increase is 11%. So when you have federal aid going down, state aid going up at a rate of roughly 2%. And to maintain level services going up 11%. We have this math issue that is uh difficult for Mthuan municipalities across the Commonwealth. And so my commitment is to ensure that we are staying above net school spending, ensuring that we are uh doing all that we can to drive as many resources as we're able into our schools. However, uh this persistent challenge exists. Now, um I want to mention that the school committee uh voted on a budget concept that was higher than the amount that I had given to the school administration.

[00:25:38]This is similar to what happened last year where I had given the school administration a number to work within uh accounting for uh $ 110.6 million in the budget book that was considered by the council. And so this year we're inching closer to uh 114 million. Uh the challenge is that as I mentioned the level service number is at 122. And so this is the divide that we are seeing in the context of the school budget. And so, uh, the original, uh, thought on the part of the district, and I know the superintendent, the acting superintendent will get into this tonight, uh, is to take into consideration the number that was included in the governor's budget when the cherry sheet was released earlier this year. Now, uh, when I say what happened last year is happening in again this year, uh, the Senate goes through this process of taking a look at opportunities to come in above and beyond the governor's budget in terms of chapter 70, in terms of the specialled circuit breaker and the like. And so, uh, we had an event here in Lthoon this past Saturday. uh the lieutenant governor uh as some of you know was there and her and I uh had a brief conversation and uh her um suggestion uh was of course without making any guaranteed commitments uh her suggestion is to take into consideration what we're going to be seeing from the Senate as in once the Senate actually passes uh their budget those numbers included in that budget uh the governor does not appear to be inclined to reduce them back to her original levels. So that means that we will see additional support above and beyond what we are currently anticipating in terms of chapter 70 and the special ed circuit breaker. Uh which is a very positive sign. We we're encouraged by that, but still uh it does not uh provide for the complete picture in terms of what the schools need to maintain level services. And so uh just to give a 30,000 foot view of the schools given that's the uh largest department on the agenda tonight. Uh so uh beyond that uh I'll invite Madam Chair if you want to begin the presentations uh we can do so and we'll take questions as we go.

[00:28:01]>> Thank you Mr. Mayor. So with that being said our first department up for conversation is health and human services and inspections. That's on page 33. Counselors, welcome.

[00:28:17]>> Good evening. Can you hear me? Okay.

[00:28:18]>> Yes, ma'am.

[00:28:19]>> All right. So, to start us off, I don't want to get too deep in the weeds with things because you already have a department overview in front of you. But just to quickly summarize that page, HHSI has a hardworking group of employees who wear a bunch of different hats and always go above and beyond to help constituents in one way or another.

[00:28:38]So, our budget is actually seeing a 16% increase. I know how that looks when cuts are being made across the board, but there are a couple of important drivers of this. Most importantly, this is this department is only a few years old. It's still being built up to what a health, human services, and inspectional services department should look like and adequately serve the community and meet state mandates. A lot of the department's functions existed under a different department previously, but even then they were never adequately funded. Our headcount is increasing by one, but we're not actually hiring anyone. We're moving a long time grant employee to the city budget after the grant that funded her position has ended. Um, so I really want to get into that because I know that it we did not take it lightly to add a position at a time like this when we're looking for savings anywhere anywhere we can. But adding this community outreach coordinator to the budget sustains sustains essential human health services without relying solely on limited time grant funding. This position provides a wide range of support to members of our community at a time where it's desperately needed.

[00:29:51]This position navigates health care and health insurance as certified application counselors.

[00:29:57]They work with people who are applying for SNAP and provide other food services while they wait for the application to be processed. They navigate affordable housing systems through applications and relationships with shelters for immediate placement. They work with people to see what other assistance they might be eligible for like raft or fuel assistance so that they can maintain their housing and pretty much anything else that someone might come into our center looking for. The COC's will either help them or refer them to somebody who can.

[00:30:28]When counselors hear from residents who need help, this is the person that answers that call. When someone couldn't afford their heating bill, she got them on fuel assistance. When a senior lost her housing, she helped gather all the documents and secured alternative housing. When the police department engaged with a homeless individual with nowhere to sleep, she made the calls to find them a bed. Our partners in the community agree with how important this role is. An engagement specialist at Beth Israel Ley wrote, "I wanted to quickly reach out to city leadership in regards to the Methuan Resource Center located at one Broadway. We recently collaborated to assist a mutual client.

[00:31:06]I can't express how lucky the city is to have that resource center. The level of commitment and effort that the office put forth for our clients needs to be acknowledged. Our habitually homeless client is now housed and secure going into the winter months. I've been doing outreach for close to a decade in Lawrence and surrounding towns and cities. The level of caring and competence shown by your resource center is a reminder of what can be accomplished by agencies that truly care about the public. I want to specifically acknowledge Jasmine Nunes for her dedication and tireless effort advocating for our client. The process would not have been as seamless without her.

[00:31:44]So, one of the many pages in front of you says that One Broadway served 1,575 residents in 2025. A very small team makes that possible and we have an opportunity to sustain that for our residents. Given the current climate with vulnerable families struggling with a variety of social determinance of health, our COC's service to the community is essential.

[00:32:09]With that said, I'll get into some of the other things that you're seeing that are a little bit different. Um, we're adding some funds to a weights and measures position. This will be part-time work to support regulatory compliance. This requirement has been overlooked for years and the state is looking for us to get those checks back into compliance. Uh we'll be working to adjust the fees to cover the majority of that cost.

[00:32:34]Um we also have several contractual obligations including mileage stipens, vehicle maintenance, and clothing allowances. Those first two are because all of our inspectors use their own vehicles to drive around town every single day.

[00:32:47]Um you'll also see a significant increase in our professional services line. So this is to support tuberculosis case management which was also previously funded by a grant. The city is responsible for case investigation and contact tracing for all individuals deemed susceptible to TB and they have to set up testing and check in with all related parties and contacts of those people.

[00:33:12]uh if anyone is found to be um sick with TB, she also has to uh watch them take daily medication to make sure they're adhering to the medication schedule.

[00:33:23]There's a growing need for this service in Methuan as a gateway city with a growing migrant population and not something we can decide to stop funding.

[00:33:32]You'll also see more funds being added to licensing and certifications. This is also a contractual obligation and the cost for these trainings are also going up and we need to make sure that all of our inspectors maintain their cus. Um some of this was also shifted from membership and dues. There was a little extra money in that line so we shifted some of it and added a little bit more.

[00:33:53]Um lastly I want to talk about the grant purpose um that we have. You'll see five FTEEs under grant positions. Um, and so I just want to reexplain for those of you who are new or haven't heard, the public health excellence grant support supports communities and regional collaboratives to increase public health services to meet the performance standards and foundational public health services codified by the legisl codified by the legislation in recent years. The state continues to add more duties to local public health departments and when our budget remains relatively stagnant, this helps fill in the gaps. Right now, this money covers our epidemiologist, a community outreach coordinator, a code enforcement officer, almost all of our supplies for inspections, nursing, and outreach, and all of the training, credentiing, and memberships of health related staff.

[00:34:46]We also have a couple of revolving funds that fund our Title 5 inspections and vaccine purchases. So, just so you know, because I know that's not um on the paper in front of you.

[00:34:58]Um so, lastly, I want to talk about managing the furlows. I know that's a question you're going to ask, so I'm just going to come out with it. Um we're super grateful to maintain our funding outside of these furls, but they'll still take their toll on my department.

[00:35:12]Most of the work we do is required by the state and fewer hours doesn't make that work go away. We'll experience longer wait times for permits and inspections and slower responses to complaints. We're a department of all relatively new leaders and we're we've been working on updating procedures and improving efficiency. We'll continue to do that, but with new faces, you also continue to uncover statutory requirements that have gone overlooked for a long time. and that takes time and staffing to address. We also continuously have conversations about bringing in more businesses and housing to the city, but that adds even more strain to this department.

[00:35:54]Um, so I think it's worth noting just as we wrap up that we're not a part a department that only provides services and protects health and safety, but we also generate revenue. Uh, we generate revenue to cover our costs in way of permit fees. In fiscal year 25, we generated $1.5 million and as of Monday, we've collected $1.3 million for fiscal year 26. So those figures meet what our department is spending.

[00:36:21]Finally, I just want to highlight something that is often overlooked.

[00:36:25]Inspectors often act as first responders. When a car drives through a side of the house at 3:00 a.m., we also respond to those calls. When a restaurant has a house, when a restaurant has a fire on a Saturday, we go immediately to check things out. When someone's heat goes out on the coldest night of the year, we still show up. I hope they can be afforded the same respect as other city workers who are critical to the city's health and safety. With that, I'll answer any questions.

[00:36:54]>> Thank you, counselors. Yeah, >> if I may, I just wanted to add a few words uh of support uh for Kaye and uh our department and add some additional uh perhaps uh context um and share I guess a couple of uh personal anecdotes as well. Uh so first of all uh in our city um we have come a long way in terms of our inspections team and uh the work that they do is phenomenal keeping our residents safe, keeping uh folks who uh come and support our local businesses uh safe. Uh and so they do great work. Uh Jasmine, as was referenced, uh is the person who uh is the one I call or share any of your concerns with uh whenever there is a resident uh who is uh sharing that they're living in their car and they don't have enough food or they need access to resources. Whenever uh there's a family that is the victim of a house fire and they are suddenly without uh their home without resources, uh Jasmine is the person who we bring all of those requests to uh and concerns to and she helps people and guides them by the hand and and sees them through whatever situation they're going through. And so uh this is something that I view as a critical function for us to maintain. Uh she also is quite helpful in the context of housing whenever there are seniors as Kaylee referenced uh who are looking to get on say the weight list at Engles Court uh trying to get into housing for our seniors and the like she is there to help them. Uh regarding weights and measures uh this is something that we are required to maintain in terms of a function as a city. We actually have not been in compliance with uh state uh statute as it relates to this and so this will allow us to do that as she mentioned. Um when it comes to uh public health, the way that this department is structured, uh the goal here is to ensure that we are always staying ready for, heaven forbid, the next pandemic, staying ahead of the curve. And so uh those are investments that I think are absolutely vital. And I'll I'll wrap with this. I have asked a lot of this department over the past year when we tackled uh the issue and tackling the issue of human trafficking in our city.

[00:39:29]Uh those uh efforts were really the result of course of investigative work from the PD but on the front lines uh it was tackled mainly through code enforcement getting after that issue through code enforcement. uh when we had this issue uh regarding critters in the schools, the schools were uh just a filthy mess to a a large extent uh in recent years. HHSI was there uh on the front lines leading that effort in partnership with our custodians and uh school administrators to clean the schools. And then last year when suddenly uh due to the federal government shutdown uh SNAP benefits were frozen for a time.

[00:40:19]Uh we don't have many nonprofits in the community that specialize in providing for food insecurity. Uh we do have for instance neighbors in Need. They have uh operation every Tuesday. uh the uh there's a church uh over in the west end that does a lot of work in terms of providing uh solution to food insecurity, but beyond that uh we really didn't have anything established. And so uh thanks to the senior center for hosting and for uh HHSI for really leading the way in terms of organizing the citywide food drive, standing it up from scratch so that we were able to collect donations and provide food uh for residents in our city who uh needed help. And so, uh, I've asked a lot of this department and I, uh, just want to share, uh, my own expression of support for the work that they do and for the ask that we have before the council so that we can maintain these crit critical services for our residents. Thank you.

[00:41:19]>> Thank you, mayor.

[00:41:21]>> Any questions, counselors?

[00:41:24]>> Councelor Dagwell.

[00:41:26]Oh, to piggy back on uh the mayor, I met Kaye, Heidi, and Darren uh two years ago with the mice issue that we had in the school. And I will say that Kaylee inherited a mess in that department, especially on the school side. Uh I don't want to go into details, but Kaylee and I know that the health inspections weren't being done properly.

[00:41:52]And Kaylee and her twoman team literally went into those schools every time we asked. I know I called her at 7 8:00 at night times and asked her, "Hey, we got to go into this school." She would call me for updates and I would say she has done an amazing job in that department and all the rest of our team. So she will have my support on this because that she is now picking up probably 20 years worth of work that needs to be updated and she's doing it within 2 3 years. So um that I can't talk more about that team. So that's all I have to say.

[00:42:33]>> Councelor Drew, >> thank you Madam Chair. U Kaylee, how are you?

[00:42:39]>> Hi. Um, so as you alluded to, your department, which is very different than most departments, is a revenue generation department. Y, >> so that's where a lot of my line of question is going to come to.

[00:42:51]>> Your you made a comment that you've brought in 1.3 and some change this year.

[00:43:00]>> Okay. So my concern is I'm seeing your expenses continue to go up, your revenues coming down. So, >> so I mean it is only May, so we expect in the next month and a half that it might actually get up to the same amount that it was last year, but I do understand your concern.

[00:43:18]>> Yeah, it it looked like in 26 we budgeted for $2 million, which sounds like we're going to we're going to fall short to what that projection was for that budget. Uh we're projecting the revenue in 27 to be 2.148 million, which means your department's going to come up with another $800,000 in projected revenues.

[00:43:39]>> Mhm.

[00:43:39]>> Um you know, and and looking here from 2023, your expenses were $835,000.

[00:43:45]Your incomes were 2.4 million. In 24, you were 993,000 on your expenses, 2.1 million in income. uh 25 was 1,268,000 expense. You brought in 1.868 million.

[00:44:02]Now that is also indicative of not as much building happening. You know, we understand that that's that's part of it. You know, when times slow down, I'm in construction. I understand the last couple of years we've seen a contraction in the market.

[00:44:16]>> What are we going to do to try to curve where we're heading? Because what what you're saying, maybe we'll hit 1.4 4 million in revenue this year and hit a shortfall of about 600,000.

[00:44:28]How are we going to change that trajectory? Because your expenses this year for that department is 1.3 million 1.4. Yes, it covers the cost, but if we need to see that income raise, what's your plan to help police that to to make that happen?

[00:44:43]>> Um, so we're actively working with the CAFO to update our fees across the board um and better represent the amount of work that that goes into the things that we do. Um, so our epidemiologist did a full workup of our board of health fees compared to like communities around us.

[00:44:58]Um, and we presented that to the board of health last month and they'll be passing a new version um, next month.

[00:45:03]And then we'll plan to do the exact same thing with the building department. Kind of use that same process to make sure that our fees are up to snuff with what they should be and the amount of work that these kind of projects take. Um beyond that I think there does need to be a recognition that yes while a large part of the department is revenue generating we do have the human services team and they do not generate revenue as much as they you know generate great things for the community. They are not actively like bringing in any kind of fees. So as we hopefully build that team you will see a little more in salaries without an additional increase in revenue.

[00:45:46]Yeah, I I don't want to take away from the human services component of I know it's completely different and the permit and the licensing is where you you're bringing in the money. Um, you know, because I'm looking at and and I'm going to speak to the plumbing inspector and I hope Jimmy doesn't get mad at me. You know, that plumbing inspector department is going to cost about $100,000 where last year we only brought in $88,000 in permits. So, I mean, that to me is just a red flag. Yeah.

[00:46:09]>> That our permit fees aren't adequate.

[00:46:11]>> Absolutely. They haven't been changed in quite a while. Yeah.

[00:46:14]>> Okay. So, I would hope that we'll see I think they have to come in front of the council to Yes.

[00:46:19]>> to raise the fees.

[00:46:20]>> Yeah. So, the board of health fees go to the board of health, but anything related to uh building our zoning will have to come to this body.

[00:46:26]>> All right. And we should maybe see those in the first month or two of the new year cuz I mean we have $800,000 to try to >> Yeah. Yeah, I mean I would I would want to talk to Maggie about specifics, but I would hope you know in the first few months >> I hope by like September 1, we should at least have something in front of us to try to push those revenues if possible.

[00:46:46]>> Great.

[00:46:47]>> Thank you.

[00:46:49]>> Any other questions?

[00:46:51]Councelor Marson, >> just a comment how now that this department has more staffing with inspectors and clerks, um it's come a long way because of Kaye too, uh with inspections and things. Um, so it's helped a lot. Um, and it's noticeable on the street and people are saying it that it is that we're more responsive and it's taken less time to get permits in most cases. Um, so it's working out with the staffing. So we can't, you know, it is a revenue generating department. So which helps us. Um, and they're doing a good job. That's all I can say.

[00:47:22]>> Thank you. Any other questions, concerns? Thank you. Thank you for your time this evening.

[00:47:28]>> Thank you, counselors.

[00:47:31]Next on the agenda, we have the Neans Library. That's page 41, counselors.

[00:47:42]>> Hi.

[00:47:43]>> Hi, everybody.

[00:47:46]Um, so Nevin's library, we are uh one line item in the budget. Um, that basically everything in there goes toward the building, maintaining the building, the the historic treasure that it is that I love. Um, it goes for our staff and um materials expend uh our materials expenditure, which is a state requirement.

[00:48:13]also keeping the building maintained that we can be open certain number of hours and certain number of consecutive weeks in a year. Um that's also a state requirement. So our entire municipal budget uh speaks to that. It speaks to supporting that for our residents. Um we do have other forms of revenue that help keep us going. Um but the municipal budget is about 75% of our budget.

[00:48:39]This year I did ask for a modest increase. Um the mayor given the times that they are uh did level fund us for to the same amount that we had last year. And I think that that is we'll be able to do that between our grant funding and our trust and all of those things so that we can keep keep doing what we do. I mean uh in the month of April we welcomed 9,000 people into our building. Um we I mean we do all sorts of programs and do and provide so many services. Work very closely with um Kaylee staff and and and different things to partner with different organizations in the library to in the city. I'm sorry. Um to help provide the services that we can to the residents of our town. So that's uh pretty much it. I'm not sure if you have any questions.

[00:49:33]Counselors, any questions for the library? Counselor Drew.

[00:49:39]>> First, I love the library. My my son goes there, plays chess on Saturdays every once in a while, and and it's an absolutely beautiful um building and and everything you guys do there is fantastic. Um what was the ask for that you were asking for an increase to your budget to >> Oh, sure. Um, so, uh, we're part of a consortium, as I'm sure you've recognized, part of 36 libraries in the Marramac Valley, and our, uh, membership fee and our fee for electronic resources are both going up, um, by several thousand. Um, I think it's like about $8,000 for the membership and slightly more for the electronic resources. Um, also, no surprise to anybody here, you know, our utilities are going up. Um I was just hoping to in my ask I was just hoping to kind of buffer that a little bit. You know the with the electricity, the water, the gas, all of that. Um and then salaries, that's all.

[00:50:45]>> Okay. So your budget last year was exactly what it is now, 1,929,000 and change. Mhm.

[00:50:52]>> Um what it looks like that you've spent to date, uh this was as of the middle of the month >> was 1.53 million. So it looks like trajectory wise you probably going to be underspent by about 125,000 >> give or take about 7% if that's Maggie you can.

[00:51:10]>> So uh we anticipate that they'll spend almost all if not all of their budget.

[00:51:15]That's usually what they come in with.

[00:51:17]um they submit their warrants to us weekly and they fluctuate greatly. So um but that's our projection is that they will end up spending the majority.

[00:51:26]>> So you think the whole line item is totally I'm just >> I'm not trying to cut anymore. I promise. I'm not >> I just wanted to know if it's if that extra money that you're looking for might be there with the uh what could be a projection of an overshot from last year, but obviously it's not. So that was my question. Thank you. You're welcome. Any other questions?

[00:51:50]None. Thank you for your time this >> Thank you very much.

[00:51:56]>> Veteran Services page 40. Counselors.

[00:52:07]Good evening counselors, Mayor >> Cafe Solicitor.

[00:52:14]So you have the budget in front of in front of you. It's pretty much the same budget other than the only difference is a decrease in uh personal services and that's that reflects the um possible uh furls.

[00:52:32]>> Any questions counselors veteran services?

[00:52:42]None.

[00:52:43]>> Okay.

[00:52:44]>> Okay. Great. Thank you.

[00:52:45]>> Thank you.

[00:52:49]>> Elder services page 39.

[00:52:54]Councilors 39.

[00:52:57]Good evening, Madam Chair, Mayor Boragard, members of the city council, and the community.

[00:53:04]Since taking role of the director of the Mthuan Senior Center, our first priorities were building a team that truly embraces who we are. where we've been and where we're going. Our focus has been on strengthening our foundation while expending while expanding services and opportunities will provide for the residents. I'm proud to say that we have made beat and full progress. We have hired two individual who embody that mission. Our activity coordinator Joanna Cordone brings fresh engage in programs to our center while honoring the long-standing traditions that have shaped our identity. Our building and maintenance staff member, Dominic Almo, is the thread that keeps the center clean, welcoming, and inviting for every person who walks through our doors.

[00:53:49]Alongside them, our dedicated staff and volunteer workers who work tirelessly to ensure that every visitor is treated with respect, warmth, and dignity. They make sure that questions are answered and that the center remains a place where people feel valued.

[00:54:06]We are currently working on the COA self assessment, a step that will open new doors for us and help make Methuan Senior Activity Center a household name across the Commonwealth. Our goal is ambitious, but it's achievable. To welcome at least 400 visitors daily, whether they volunteer, enjoy lunch, participate in nuts, crafts, music, or activities, or simply find a cooling space in summer or warmth in the winter. We are here to support the young at heart. We have also expanded services that we offer. We now host mass health enrollment, allowing residents to learn on the spot whether they qualify for their assistance.

[00:54:51]With the support of health and human services, we help individuals to apply for SNAP, complete housing applications and access raft and so much more.

[00:55:02]Greater Lawrence Community Action Council visits monthly during the application acceptance process for fuel assistance applications.

[00:55:11]PATH is on site to support those facing mental health challenges.

[00:55:17]We are more than an activity center. We are a help center for seniors, veterans, individuals with disabilities, and families.

[00:55:26]Every day, we extend our hand to the community, searching for answers and resources until we find them. We do not stop. Our center also services as a civic hub. The city councilors, the mayor, Congresswoman Lori Trhan host office hours at the center. This helps to keep our seniors engaged and connected to their local government.

[00:55:50]The Mthuan Senior Activity Center is growing, evolving, and strengthening its role in the community. With your continued support, we will keep expanding our reach, deepening our impact, and ensuring that every resident who needs us knows that the door the doors are open. But mostly our hearts are open. Now on to the budget.

[00:56:12]I have respectfully requested modest increases in several budget lines, including 5,000 in building utilities for the heat and air conditioning, $2,000 in food and related, and $250 in office supplies.

[00:56:28]These requests are not an expansion or excess. They are about maintaining the level of service, dignity, and support that our seniors rely on every single day.

[00:56:38]Our senior center continues to be a vital resource for older adults in our community. We provide not only programs and activities, but also connection, wellness, nutrition, information, and a safe, welcoming place for many seniors who may otherwise seem isolated.

[00:56:57]Like every department, we have experienced increased operational cost.

[00:57:02]Utility expenses continue to rise as we work to keep the building safe, comfortable, and accessible throughout the year. Food and related costs have increased significantly. Yet, our meal programs and social gatherings remain to be the most important service that we provide.

[00:57:20]Office supplies and day-to-day operational materials may seem small individually, but they are essential in keeping our programs organized, efficient, and responsive to the public.

[00:57:32]We have worked very hard to manage our budget responsibly, and stretch every dollar as far as possible. These increases that we are requesting are measured, necessary, and directly connected to the services of our seniors.

[00:57:48]I also requested a raise for one of our employees. But during these hard fiscal times, I understand that this is just not the time. However, respectfully, I ask that during the coming months, as we start to make revenue, we're able to take another look at this and the other areas that directly impact the people that we serve.

[00:58:10]I want to thank you each and every one of you individually for listening tonight. I want to thank you for your due diligence, your time, your consideration, but most of all your continued support of our senior center, but most importantly the res the residents that we proudly serve. Any questions, counselors? Any questions?

[00:58:36]The elder services.

[00:58:42]>> Thank you, Madam Chair. Uh Sue, >> yes.

[00:58:45]>> Thank you for everything you do at the senior center.

[00:58:47]>> Thank you.

[00:58:48]>> I know you put your heart and soul into it. It is a wonderful place. Prior to getting involved in in this, I had never been there. I didn't know that what what such a beautiful resource it is there.

[00:58:59]Um and everything that you have here, I think, is absolutely reasonable. Um, I know that the mayor's had to make a couple of small tweaks to it, but I I think everything here is completely fair on this line item and I think you do a wonderful job there and thank you for everything you do for our seniors in this community.

[00:59:17]>> Thank you. Thank you. I do want to mention that I want to take this time to thank uh the mayor. Um, I did ask for $5,000 more for our heating and our air condition, which is so important to our seniors. Um, and he was able to do that.

[00:59:31]So, thank you so very much. Deeply appreciate it.

[00:59:35]>> All set.

[00:59:36]>> Thank you, counselors. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

[00:59:38]>> Thank you.

[00:59:40]>> Information technology, page 27, counselors, uh can I uh I wanted to let you know you don't have to remain here and you have the department headset. Thank you. Just so you know.

[00:59:58]>> Good evening, counselors. Mayor Capital, solicitor through council president.

[01:00:04]>> Page 27, guys.

[01:00:08]>> The information knowledge department currently have six full-time employees.

[01:00:12]We service about 520 city employees um and over 25 municipal buildings. We also support the police and fire department, which makes my health support a 247 operation. There's no holidays, there's no snow for us. Um, the police is working and fired. We are working. The mayor recommended budget reflects a 6.24 reduction from my original submitted budget. This reduction includes eliminating one full-time IT specialy position, a 5,000 reduction in training, a 25 a $20,000 reduction in computer hardware line. Even with these reductions, the IT department remains responsible for supporting every city, every department citywide, including public safety, finance, communications, cyber security, infrastructure, and the daily operational system. One of the largest parts of the budget is the is the program and licing contract and licensing contract line, which represent approximately 50% of the entire IT budget. This year, the largest increase within this line is related to the yearly payment for a new Mark 43 police record management system, computer aid, dispatch, evidence, and jail management system, which is only one solution. It's probably one of the best offerers I have ever deployed in my career. The total annual cost for Mark 43 is approximately $156,000.

[01:01:39]Of that amount, roughly 50 56,000 replace the previous police software cost already budgeted, leaving a net increase of $100,000 added to this line. There is also an additional 20 $20,000 for a new police detail software.

[01:02:00]Combined these two additional increases the light item by approximately 120,000.

[01:02:06]year one and implementation cost for this project supported by CIP on year one. So we are able to charge a onetime fee for implementation the first year and that's why this software is coming on my budget for year two and three and from now on after applying these savings from other software and operational adjustment the increase for the other expenses category is appro is approximately $49,000 to provide a perspective nearly 70% of the program and licensing contract line is concentrated with it only five mayor system that includes MUNES, Mark 43, OpenGV which is our licensing software, Microsoft our emails and the public safety radio system which provides radios for the police, fire and the school department, DPW, water. These five system alone supports core system operations, public safety communication, financial system, permanent email, cyber security and emergency communications.

[01:03:06]In total, the city the city currently relies on approximately 30 38 software platform to operate to operate daily service. This line item also also includes a reserve annual contract eolation which continue to ratch every year. So I add like a 3% um to that item because the software are are not contracted that is a yearly payment.

[01:03:29]They always have like a two 3% increasement. I have to add that to my budget. Another big line is the communication lines to support all citywide communication services including approximately 30 300 wireless lines. Of those 300, 150 are cell phone lines and 146 are between data for the iPads, mobile devices, a field operations. Some of the public cameras we have, we can connect it with the local network. So we use data to connect them. The total communication cost is approximately $254,000.

[01:04:02]of that amount, nearly $100,000 is offset through Verizon and Comcast contract related funding, reducing the general fund impact to approximately $154,000.

[01:04:14]Another another big line is the copier line supports 33 citywide printed and mult and much functional leases including a paper print services um used across the department. Since Neil Perry's idea was to eliminate people that has small desk so the city contracted before me um to use common printers instead of having 100 printer laying around we have about 32 that people share the professional service lines is used for citywide fiber manage repairs along with projects recurring outside technical expertise assembled including the municip implementation projects and complex infrastructure deployment that cannot be completed internally with the current staff and resources. Um, another reduction was the computer hardware lines, phone citywide hardware purchases, repayment including desktops, laptops, servers, network equipment, public safety technology. The mayor recommend the budget reduce this line by $20,000 which will impact the replacement the replacement schedule and limit flexibility of equipment failures and emergency replacements. Despite these reductions, the IT department, the IT department remains committed to maintaining reliable city operations, cyber security, cyber security protection, public safety systems, and support services for all city department citywide. Uh, any questions?

[01:05:39]>> Counselors, any questions for the IT department?

[01:05:48]>> Councelor Dr. All right, um, so you kind of answered my question on the program and licensing contracts.

[01:06:00]It was a very specific number. Uh, so I'm I'm assuming you hit that right on the right on the button. So, I'm going leave that one alone. The next one down I have is um in professional services.

[01:06:15]You you kind of alluded to it. Um, it looks like as I'm looking at what has currently been spent to date, you're you're on a trend to potentially go over it a little bit of what you had this year. What is your plan to try to curb some of that in 27? Make sure that we don't go over because you had 90,000 last year. You're going to go over a bit. This year, you're gonna have 90,000.

[01:06:42]How are we going to >> So 2024 if you see there was an amount left there in 2025 there was a reduced amount and now I'm almost over that line and it's because this year I did about 50 pole transfers meaning when there's a there's a bat pole the utility will have to because we own our city fiber we have to move the cables to the to the other pole. So I did about 50 of those and um the public camera phase one and every phase come with a one-year guarantee or no hardware. Um so year one is covered with a warranty but then year two and year three uh we have to pay for any repair for the public camera. So this year there was a lot of repairs.

[01:07:23]Um, you know, there was one down uh at on Lawrence Street that a car hit a pole and we had to pay for that and we did charge the insurance, but you know, it also takes all the cameras down. Um, and we have to break front line. I'm not expecting next year that I'm going to have to do um that much of poll transfers because they were never done here. It was the first time that the city did p transfers in since we put the city fiber probably 20 years ago. So I think this year I'm not going to go over the budget because I'm not going to do that much of P transfers. Of course, if there's an emergency that comes up, there's a big storm that takes out our fiber, then we come back and revise that line through the CFO, but that's what I'm projecting right now that I'm not going to do as much as because there is not much of transfers left.

[01:08:10]>> Okay. Um to the same kind of thought process as I look further down into communications. In communications this year, you're spending close to 65,000.

[01:08:21]We've now dropped that line to 154,000.

[01:08:25]So you've you've come down uh $10,000 and what I would assume is going to forecast over 165 the way it's trending.

[01:08:36]So how are you going to be able to to curb that?

[01:08:40]>> Talking to the CAFO um of how we use and how the data was used there before. So to give you an example here before it was like a user would get an iPad and a phone both with data. So now we're going to reorganize that and be if you have an iPad you need for work and you have a cell phone you need for work instead of have data in that iPad what we're going to do is we're going to use your cell phone you're going to tether the data to that iPad. That way we can eliminate that. So I'm projecting that's going to eliminate about 30% of our data line. So that's where the where that cost come and we get funding from Comcast to Verizon which I'm on this line I'm always over but that that line that Verizon get to the citywide contract that Verizon pesos that is specifically for IT um items I offset of that line.

[01:09:28]So I'm I'm always over on the general fund budget but that line always covers it.

[01:09:36]>> Okay. Thank you.

[01:09:39]>> Any further questions?

[01:09:42]Seeing none. Thank you, director.

[01:09:48]Next, we have vocational vocational schools page 34 counselors.

[01:10:00]>> Hello.

[01:10:01]>> Welcome.

[01:10:01]>> I'm the aggra I'm representing Essex Northshore Agricultural and Technical School and not Greater Lawrence Technical School. Is that correct? only because I do not have your page of your budget book through the chair. May I just drop off the budget book?

[01:10:15]>> Absolutely.

[01:10:16]>> To each of the members.

[01:10:25]>> So that's uh the first line item for Essex North.

[01:10:34]Thank you.

[01:10:41]Thanks.

[01:10:44]>> I'm sorry.

[01:10:48]>> I I'm sorry. I couldn't hear.

[01:10:52]>> Nice printing department at the school.

[01:10:53]That was >> Thank you. We do have one. Um, thank you. The instructor came to us from Greater Lawrence Technical School who I worked with him for several years before moving on to Essex Northshore.

[01:11:06]So, thank you for inviting me to this budget meeting. My name is Heidi Richio.

[01:11:10]I'm the superintendent director of Essex Northshore Agricultural and Technical School. We serve over 58 communities across three counties, including Essex, Middle Sex, and Suffach counties.

[01:11:23]We serve 17 sending communities and an additional 41 surrounding communities, which include Methuan, Massachusetts.

[01:11:31]the 41 surrounding communities are able to take advantage of our eight agricultural programs. And at that time, I'll just kind of give you those that data from Mthuan at this time.

[01:11:44]So, we currently have 10 students that come to us from Mthuan. We have one senior who is graduating. That senior is in the I'm sorry, we have two seniors that are graduating. one is in the natural environmental resources and then the second is in veterary science.

[01:12:04]At this time we have one incoming student from Methuan Massachusetts.

[01:12:10]As far as applications you may recall that we the state did through regulation passed a lottery. So all acceptances to our school much like your sending school of great technical school is done through a lottery process.

[01:12:28]We had 13 applications from within.

[01:12:32]We had three students that were accepted, but they declined acceptance.

[01:12:38]We have one student that did accept, and that student goes to school at Marsh Middle School. And then we have nine students that are currently sitting on the wait list. And the weight list will continue through October. we will continue to pull students from the weight list. So that number of one may rise.

[01:13:00]I can't anticipate it rising more than one or two students um because it really just depends on where they sit on the weight list. All of the information including the agricultural lottery can it sits on our admissions dashboard on our website. So you can actually kind of track where the next Mthuan student is in the body of that lottery weight list.

[01:13:27]you may recall from last fall when we came here is that the commissioner of education is the one that determines what that annual rate is for the agricultural school because we do not receive the chapter 70 funding as an public school for our agricultural students or our surrounding community.

[01:13:48]you receive that chapter 70 funding and then we bill Mthuan as an outofd district student um receiving agricultural education.

[01:13:59]So for next school year and this also can be find found at the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education. It is posted for all agricultural and career and technical education, regional vocational school districts as well as comprehensive vocational school districts of what that out of school tuition is. It does tend to change annually. Sometimes it goes up, sometimes it goes down. And they determine that, the commissioner determines that through the per pupil expenditure in the endofear report that we report to the department. So, for next school year, the tuition rate is $21,933 with an additional transportation cost of $1,750.

[01:14:46]The only additional cost for that or an additional cost for that is special education services. Those special education services, as you know, are required um to meet the standards and to support those students who are receiving special education services through an individual education plan. So, that gets determined when the student has their annual IEP meeting. So, I cannot answer what that will be for next year, but I can say for this school year, we did bill Mthuan an additional $15,342.

[01:15:23]And again, that was based on those students that were receiving special education services.

[01:15:29]On page 47 of the budget book, this bud budget book is created each school year primarily for our sending communities.

[01:15:38]So there is a lot of information in there that relates to the 17 sending communities. But what is our agricultural students is on page 48. You will see a bit of information about our school.

[01:15:54]On the bottom side we have 395 students currently that are receiving agricultural education and coming from the 41 sending communities. You can see currently that that number is steadily in increasing. The demand for agricultural education in the state of Massachusetts has increased much like career and technical education. And so therefore we have needed to meet the demand. And so at this time we have 120 agricultural students but we do anticipate approximately 150 next school year.

[01:16:30]I am happy to answer any questions that you may have at this time.

[01:16:34]Any questions? Councelor, Mr. Mayor.

[01:16:37]>> Thank you, Madam Chair. I just wanted to share with you, you'll see uh this reflected in your budget binder. Um I I think the world of Essex Aggie, I think the world of uh career technical education, and I I fully support it. Uh but given the challenges that we're having this year, I am of the mindset that we really need to focus on investing everything that we can into our own Luan public schools. And so in fiscal year 27, we're going to have to have a cap at 10 students for Essex A.

[01:17:10]Uh so I just wanted to share that uh for additional context.

[01:17:16]>> Questions?

[01:17:21]No questions. Thank you, ma'am. There are no questions for you.

[01:17:25]>> Okay. I can just um I understand that you're stating a request of a cap.

[01:17:30]However, that is through legislation. Um students in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts have a right to an agricultural education. So, I cannot guarantee that there will not be additional students on top of what is currently there. I would like to just put that in the record. Thank you.

[01:17:48]>> Thank you for the clarification. I I think uh it also should be noted just uh I know this isn't exactly relevant to uh that here but um we are not uh represented on the school committee for Essex AGAI. Uh I think that's structural of course but uh just to uh share that as well. Uh thank you >> and just to reiterate um that you are represented by three agricultural representatives.

[01:18:17]So Methuan is represented much like the other 40 communities on top of Methuan by three agricultural representatives whose sole point is to represent those agricultural students and those three representatives are appointed by the governor of Massachusetts >> and they're on this list ma'am.

[01:18:37]Are they on that list or >> Yep, they are on that list. You will see them as Department of Agriculture.

[01:18:43]>> Okay. Thank you for that clarification.

[01:18:46]Mhm. I don't see them there. So, I guess I guess I have a question and maybe you answered Mayor. I was uh a little distracted at first. The $25,000 reduction, does that affect the attendance of those 10 students that are going to be minus two?

[01:19:02]Uh so, the original number that we had estimated uh we had in an a higher number set aside for special education.

[01:19:11]Uh but once we were able to see some of the numbers that were current um like the superintendent said was about 15 a little over 15,000 we were able to reduce what we had estimated to begin with. So that's what that 25 is.

[01:19:23]>> Okay. Thank you for that. So it's not like we can say you're giving me a bill per student but I'm I'm going to discount myself to 25,000. No, we have to pay the bills.

[01:19:33]>> Okay. All right. Thank you. Thank you for that.

[01:19:37]>> Yeah. Council I just wanted to thank Dr. reach for her presentation. She's always very informative and uh we miss you in the Lawrence area. Thank you.

[01:19:45]>> Thank you. I miss being in the Lawrence area.

[01:19:49]>> Thank you for >> But I'm in Salsbury, so it's like Lawrence by the Sea, so we're good.

[01:19:54]>> So, thank you all very much. Thank you for having me. I really appreciate it.

[01:19:58]And again, the offer is there if you'd like to tour. We did have some baby calfs that were born and some twin sheeps. So, they were delivered by our agricultural students. So, please feel free to reach out to me. We would love to have you on campus.

[01:20:13]>> Perfect. Thank you for your time.

[01:20:15]>> Much appreciated.

[01:20:17]>> Okay.

[01:20:18]Is the vocational school here this evening or >> I don't see them represented tonight. Um I do have their budget binder. Um it's it's like 65 pages, so I'm going to email it to everybody. Um happy to print it if you'd rather that, but I just thought I'd start with email.

[01:20:33]>> Okay. They usually do show up for the hearings, correct? Yeah. Okay. So, moving on to Missin Public Schools. I think that's next. And we have a separate binder. Oh, I'm sorry, Council Drew.

[01:20:47]>> Do we have a reason why Greater Alliance Tech isn't here?

[01:20:51]>> So, I don't. Uh, but I will say the number that is budgeted there was given to us by them. It's on their assessment.

[01:20:57]So, that's an actual number as well.

[01:20:59]But, no, I'm not sure.

[01:21:01]>> Interesting. Uh, if we're going to put a cap on things, we should look at Greater Lawrence Tech, which is way more money than sending kids to Essex North.

[01:21:09]Why don't we cap that if they're not even going to show up to this body?

[01:21:17]>> So, we're at Methan Public Schools. Uh, and that's your separate binder. It's white binder.

[01:21:28]I do.

[01:21:30]Thanks.

[01:21:55]Good evening.

[01:21:56]>> Thank you. Good evening, Superintendent.

[01:21:58]Thank you for being with us.

[01:22:01]>> Thank you for having us. Mr. Goslin, our assistant superintendent of operations and finance, has distributed packets of slides that I'd like to walk through this evening. Um, and you already have the the binder in front of you, which I'll refer to throughout the presentation. I also have with us tonight assistant superintendent Gina Bozac who oversees student services and will be able to address any particulars you have regarding special education since I've heard that topic come up um previously.

[01:22:33]So to begin, I would like to say that we have been on on a journey um with the school committee working through our budget and the challenges of which I know that you are aware financially. I hope to detail some of those this evening to make it clearer to you as to why we are facing challenges.

[01:22:53]My understanding that we were against um certain barriers, we came initially to the school committee with a preliminary budget that was a level service budget, meaning that we wish to simply maintain the staffing and programs and services that we offered during this school year FY26.

[01:23:13]At that point, we did come with a few small asks or requests that weren't ever built into the preliminary budget, but were presented to the side. um which have since been eliminated.

[01:23:27]When we proposed this budget, we did so with our strategy plan in mind for our district and we are heading into year three of our three-year plan. And part of that plan focuses on accelerating literacy development, language acquisition. Um, we're also fixed on shrinking or eliminating gaps between student groups both in terms of their opportunity and achievement. And finally, we've been working hard on building a stronger sense of community and sense of belonging among all of our students within the district. So, our preliminary budget aligned with those objectives. While we are also proud of over the course of recent years reducing class sizes, providing our students with necessary high-quality instructional materials and supplies and supporting the academic, social and emotional needs of all students. So we were pleased and comfortable presenting the le level service budget.

[01:24:29]One of the barriers that we were um against this year in terms of funding dealt with enrollment. So over the Commonwealth, there's been a decline this year of 15,000 public school students. So Mthun public schools is not immune from that decline. We do see um from the 2425 school year to the current school year a decline of approximately 200 students.

[01:24:57]And at the same time, we've seen shifts from 2020 to present day of an increase in our students whose first language is not English, our students who have been identified as English learners, students with low income designation, students with disabilities, and an overall increase from 2020 of 10.8% of students with high needs. And I mention that because sometimes students from these select groups come with additional needs that we need as a school district to meet um in order to provide students with a free and appropriate public education. And so sometimes that comes at a cost depending on the students needs.

[01:25:44]In terms of the state and the chapter 70 funding, we get funding from the state and also funding from the city and then the difference is made up in what they call foundation aid and that aid is determined by the makeup or the composition of our school population.

[01:26:02]years ago, seven years ago to be exact, the Student Opportunity Act was enacted to help communities like ours who have particular populations of students that come with additional costs to meet their needs. Um, and that S SOA, Student Opportunity Act, seemed to be doing its job for several years. We noticed a marked difference in the classrooms in terms of class sizes, as I had mentioned, supplies and materials. until last year we hit a bump in the road where the formula did not change but the inflation rate did so whereas it had been um in the four 4.5 I believe percent range years prior last year dropped to 1.8 and so that greatly impacted that additional layer of support that the districts were provided although the formula didn't change this year in the final year of SOA which we're heading into the inflation rate is around 2.6 six, which is better, but not what we had been enjoying in years prior. So, looking ahead, we don't know what will be in store for our district in terms of that um additional aid going forward when SOA falls off. So, that's something that we have top of mind.

[01:27:19]So I'll speak first about the the level service budget that we presented as our preliminary budget and why we did so and then we'll move through um the budget that you have in front of you and then also address um the third budget number that we have. So I aim to be clear in this um this iteration or explanation of of all of these numbers.

[01:27:44]So you have in front of you the slide um budget summary non net and non-net level services and you will see that initially the ask that we we went to school committee with was for 123 million which would cover those level services.

[01:28:07]Recognizing that we were far away from the allocation that was given to us to fit within the city budget by the mayor, which was slightly under 114 million.

[01:28:19]Um, our team at the district and building levels got together and looked at places where we could potentially reduce. Um, this was a difficult task because in years past we have gone through a similar exercise. Um, had reduced in several areas. Um so we noted in a previous school committee meeting that we are among um the bottom 10 districts in the state in terms of the administrative costs per pupil um because we've eliminated so many administrators over the years and had few to begin with. Um likewise in terms of the unit A positions that are deemed leadership or coaching positions, we have none within our district in terms of instructional coaches, whereas cities such as Malden um and Haveril may have 30 or more rever among them. So we we had a difficult time looking at that but made some difficult decisions knowing that we are we are in the the situation that we are in with the rising costs of out of district tuitions um about an $800,000 increase in busing.

[01:29:30]And so when we made those choices, we were being mindful of vacant positions that we had posted and we knew were necessary for some of our special education services. We were mindful of positions where we had people retiring or maybe moving on and where a reduction might not impact a staff member. So we looked at those those populations of of staff members. We also unfortunately had to look at class size. So whereas in those most recent years we had enjoyed and worked hard to reduce smaller class sizes, we raised the cap and looked at what it would what it would take to um have our classes capped at 30 and what the impact would be. So, I tell you that story um so that you know that there was a lot of thought that went into these decisions to ultimately arrive at the $118 million figure which when we presented to school committee seemed like a place where the committee felt as though we should perhaps stop. Um and we were in agreement yet understanding the challenges. So, I'll pause there to to let you know that at that $118 million budget, which is the one that's in your binders tonight, um that would have class sizes at K2 across the district, spanning between 21 and 27 students, and in grades 3 through 8, 24 to 29 students. The high school we typically cap at 26. It's harder to calculate due to all the choices that there are at the high school and paths what those um increases would be, but we would anticipate them being about that range. And the reduced positions would include um general education teachers, special education teachers, English learner education teachers, specialist teachers, school counselors, program assistants, and um our evaluation team facilitators known as ETFs at the grammar schools who assist in chairing um special education meetings and helping to organize the paperwork there.

[01:31:47]So we had we had looked at those pieces The complication with our timing is that we've been hearing wonderful things from the state in terms of support for schools and additional aid coming our way. And I, as I explained um to the counselors that were kind enough to come by to to learn about our budget and those who have attended our meetings, we do feel that some relief is coming. The challenge is we're unsure of the exact figure. Um, and we're unsure about the number of positions or roles that we would be able to save with what because we're unsure of what that figure is. Um, we had this discussion at school committee where we discussed it might be logical to wait and see what the figure is.

[01:32:38]Unfortunately, the city's on a timeline and we're also obligated to abide by the contractual obligations to distribute the the reduction in force notices which is June 15th for teachers um and all other units June 1st. So to air on the safe side, we also took a look at what it would take to get down to that 114 figure and how many notices that we would need to perhaps distribute um until we do find that relief from the state. Um and so that is on the second last page in your packet. um an overview of positions in addition to those that I had listed that we would need to reduce in order to get to that figure.

[01:33:28]Um it would be 119 positions in total and 77 total employees.

[01:33:35]What's challenging at this point is that on the list are vacant positions that were absolutely obligated to have um due to special education services. So, it's a bit of a risk knowing that we're putting a vacancy on this list. Um, but understanding that there's money to come and that we would be able to to replace that role. Um, what's also very challenging is there's programmatic structures that we are trying very very hard to protect because we know that they the students enjoy them. It vastly increases their educational experience.

[01:34:11]Um, and because we would be forced to eliminate those positions, the those programs would in essence cease. So those programs that would be on the docket to um potentially eliminate moving to that $114 million number would be our upper school band program that's offered free during the school day to our students, our lower school STEM teachers, and that's a specialist program. They do coding and technology as well. Um all clubs and activities K12 our high school in school suspension program. We have teacher leaders because we don't have administrators in certain categories that help us oversee um and communicate with different teacher groups. We would no longer be able to have those. Um and unfortunately reading specialists would be on the list as well along with um on the other side we have a list of positions including additional roles of some of the groups I already mentioned custodians um bilingual parent leaison at a couple schools our substance abuse coordinator administrators secretarial staffs BCBA.

[01:35:26]So, the way I've communicated this to our our teaching staff and our staff at large today was to understand that many of these positions listed on this page that I just referenced will hopefully not come to fruition with the aid that we are expecting to receive. But nevertheless, it's our obligation to notify um our staff members of potential programmatic changes.

[01:35:53]So on the final page I do address um very briefly that we are waiting on the good word that we've heard in terms of that relief from the state and also we have been asked over time um if there were any free cash one-time cost considerations although I know we're trying to stay away from that. We do have a population of students who are um about to exit the special education program out of district, meaning that they're about to age out of our program.

[01:36:25]So, their tuitions would no longer be on our books the following year. And with those tuitions comes the cost of the out of district transportation. And so for the tuition and transportation for those students, the cost is $860,898, which would be very helpful and helping us um retain positions and programs within our schools. Um tonight, I know we're focused on the FY27 budget. Also, we do have some long-term plans that we've been discussing to help keep our our students within district to avoid those out of district tuition costs and also provide them a high quality local experience which is likely to be favorable to students and families. Um, and I believe at the school committee meetings I'd been keeping a list of I think we're up to 42 different ideas for restructuring that had been pitched about understanding that our needs um need to be addressed not only in the short term but in the long term as well. We need to start initiating some plans so we're not in the cycle. Although our district is certainly not unique across the Commonwealth this year in its needs. Um, I know that Mr. Goslin wanted to address um the element on the budget where last year, I believe it was a meeting similar to this where the mayor um got a phone call and we had a windfall of money from the state. Um and so the disparity between last year's budget and this year's may look more sizable because we did get that um that last payment at the end. if you wanted to.

[01:38:05]>> The mayor kind of referenced it earlier that uh at the last second state came in with about $3.2 million in circuit breaker funds last year. So in the budget I always back out what we project for circuit breaker. So this year it looks like it went up 12 million but you have to take into account I couldn't count on that 3.2. So it was closer to nine the actual increase in spending um and a 3.2 decrease in anticipated uh revenue. So, she likes me to point that out.

[01:38:37]>> I will say too, just one more quick note and in terms of our federal funding from grants, um, we are due to be level funded for most, a slight decrease in title one. Um, and so we are able to carry over 15% of those monies into the next fiscal year. So, I've been careful to do that. Planning to allocate the majority for positions. We do have many positions on there, but also use that funding for other interventions and supplies, but we're trying to be wise um and manage the the funding that we have appropriately as well.

[01:39:13]>> I just to add an additional point regarding uh free cash. So, as I've stated, um, in terms of, uh, covering the recurring ongoing operational expenses, it is deadly for any municipality in terms of its fiscal health to get into that habit year-over-year of using free cash to cover the recurring expenses. However, as I did last year, uh when it comes to these one-time expenditures that are uh taken into account here, I will be coming to the council with an ask to draw down free cash to cover these onetime expenses, uh which will help the schools and alleviate some of the pressure uh with the goal of once we do get that additional help in all likelihood for the LG, no guarantee, but the indications that we're going to get the additional help from the state that would allow them to uh more easily fit within the 114 number that uh we're working with here.

[01:40:08]>> Thank you. Uh any questions counselor to or I'm sorry councelor Sam.

[01:40:15]>> Thank you madam chair. Dr. Gleski, thank you for stepping into the hot seat this year. You you did a great presentation.

[01:40:21]I know you got a great team with Miss Bozac and Mr. Goslin. And I just want to uh just thank Dr. Kuang for her dedicated service to the city of Maduno.

[01:40:30]Also, as she, you know, uh, moves on, um, this is the toughest thing as a counselor is cutting the school. When you see all the the school cuts with the teachers, the aids, and all the staff, this is a tough budget for us to do. Um, so moving forward, you know, I have kids in with school right now, and they've got all gone through the school, but I'd be in total favor of that one time expenditure for the free cash. I'd be smart on that. So unfortunately we can't add to the budget but uh thank you for your hard work you and your team. Thank you.

[01:41:00]>> Any questions counselors? Councelor Dagio.

[01:41:03]>> Thank you. Hi everyone.

[01:41:07]I miss you guys over there at the school committee. Um but for the public I because I know it but I would like people to in at home or in the audience that might know there was a big significant increase in contracted services. Can you explain that to the public? Um, why? Because I got phone calls regarding that.

[01:41:27]>> Yeah. The se the seventh page in your packet sums up a lot of it.

[01:41:32]And that's exactly what I was just talking about. The um 3.2 million less in revenue. Um, it looks like this with the yellow stripe on it.

[01:41:43]Those top numbers of FY 26 and 27 is after I've backed out the anticipated grants and circuit breaker.

[01:41:54]So if you you can see at the top the difference is 11 million. Okay. If you get down to the bottom before you back out circuit breaker and the grants the difference is only eight. The vast majority of that comes out of um special ed tuitions, which is a contracted service. Um as well as busing, which is a contracted service, utilities is a contracted service. Those are all the items that are driving up that contracted service line. So, it's a good question.

[01:42:25]Also, um just um on um some of the um cuts that you guys are going to make dur everybody knows about the teachers, but again what I was frustrated on the committee last year was of cutting custodians. Well, our health department said you cannot cut any more custodians.

[01:42:51]The reason why our schools got so bad over the time, we reduced our workforce in the last 10 years, 12 years of our custodians down to barely keeping up um with it. So that along with all of our teachers getting cut, custodians, we spent all this money cleaning up the schools and now we're going to have to keep possibly hiring outside people to potentially clean the buildings because it just seems like we're going back down that slippery slope again where we're cutting custodians and we're going to be again hiring outside help which is going to be an expenditure.

[01:43:34]And we all know once you go to outside resources, it eventually increases in cost over time. So I just want to be adamant about that. That's that's one of the things I defended last year. Plus cutting special ed, we are outsourcing so much. How are we supposed to bring anybody back in if we don't have any teachers to fund those classrooms? Uh, so this is where I'm looking at things and I know we have to get down to a certain number, but again, you're putting strains on teachers and I will know because I am a teacher and right now my classroom sizes are 27 and we might get new students in the next couple of weeks and our teachers and this is not at the fault of administrators or anything. We are bogged down. we are teaching especially in certain classrooms where we're we we're we're trying to fulfill IEPs.

[01:44:38]We're trying to fill doing our due diligence as a teacher. And I'm telling you this right now, having classroom sizes up to 30, those teachers are going to get burnt out if they don't have any help, especially from a program assistance. I get no assistance in my room at all. So, I hope the teachers know as they always do. I am in full support of trying to fix this budget, but we have to start again, as the mayor has said, and we probably are going to have things brought to us in the next few weeks of programs. I'm I'm pretty sure those are going to be essential to getting us revenue and bringing back students to reduce this load on our schools. But I'm just saying 27 to 30, I know how it feels and it's my teachers are going to have a hard time next year.

[01:45:31]That's all I have to say about it.

[01:45:34]>> Any questions? Councelor Drew.

[01:45:38]>> Thank you, Madam Chair. Um I mean I I don't think anybody can say that I don't care about the schools. I mean the whole reason I'm sitting here was because a year ago I was sitting there. Um, I want to do everything I can to fix this. So, Mr. Mayor, Madam Cavl, I I have a question when it comes to the unemployment insurance. So, when when it comes to the fact that we're going to have to lay off initially 45 employees right now as it stands and an additional 32 human beings, how much of an impact are we talking about are we going to see with that unemployment insurance? It's like how much of a hit are we going to hit? Is that Are we paying that? Is that out of their budget? Where does that go? Does that something that we're going to want to take a one-time expenditure here to help them cover that?

[01:46:32]>> So, right now, we are paying for this.

[01:46:34]The previous to this year, the schools paid their own. Last year, as part of the budget process, the city agreed to do just that, and we took on uh so the fiscal year 26, we took on unemployment.

[01:46:45]I believe this is inclusive of that continuing for 27. Correct. I I did not assume that the city would continue.

[01:46:54]There is $250,000 in this budget for unemployment. At these numbers, that would not be enough. I'd have to um shuffle it somewhere and uh to find it.

[01:47:03]But um it was very beneficial last year when the city was willing to do that for us.

[01:47:08]>> That that'll happen again this year if we need to.

[01:47:11]>> What's that?

[01:47:12]>> That'll happen again this year if we need to. So back out that 250 >> as long as it cost. Well, granted, we need I'm sorry.

[01:47:19]>> I don't know whose call it is.

[01:47:20]>> I don't want to speak for the council, but I'm going to ask I'm going to ask for uh that so that that can be backed out for them.

[01:47:28]>> So, if I if I could just finish real quick. Um so, what we have been doing, and I mentioned this, I think at the meeting on Monday, is that at the end of a fiscal year, we do an analysis of where those funds are. It's not just unemployment, but workers compiled. and we come to the council and say, "Okay, we would like to put x amount of money into these funds uh based on usage and what we're projecting uh and we would like to include the schools again in that conversation this year."

[01:47:56]>> Okay. So, I mean the way just quick math, each person is roughly $5,500 in unemployment cost if you're 250 is that round number. So to go to 77, you're looking at $427,000 in unemployment costs. So if we lay people off, they don't have to come back. We know that. But if they if we lay them off, they have a certain time they can just continue to collect unemployment through the summer and so forth and then still come back. So I'm not sure how to how to word this properly. Is is there a way for us to put money there to say we don't want to have you lay off 77 people because we we're going to hedge our bet and say we think we're going to get an extra at least a million and that might lower the amount of money on the unemployment cost cuz we'll just take 10 people out of that line and we're not going to pay that money on it. I I don't know how that works. I just don't want to see us go and become, hey, there's 115 people on the block, which by the way is is just disgusting. That I I have children in the schools and and it is gross that we even have to have this conversation. Um I don't know how to fix it completely, but I think we we may need to as this whole budget I I think it's kind of the theme is we have to get creative with it. So if figuring out the $250,000 to give them, all right, that's going to put back three or four teachers, right?

[01:49:31]So that may pull that off. Do we say figure for 500,000 and that pulls another four and we're not going to pay that on the unemployment insurance? I I don't know what that fully looks like, but I cannot in good conscience I don't even know how to fix this. the how did it get this bad is probably the the best question and I know that we've had discussions about the the CTE program and and trying to expand that because that becomes like a revenue generation component and I I know that there's one of those positions that's been uh reduced. So I feel like that might be a cutting your nose to spite your face kind of a a move that's on the the school committee. they make those decisions along with you and and you guys all work together.

[01:50:27]I want to support you in any way I can.

[01:50:29]You guys have every support from me that I can help you with. Mayor, if there's something that we can do to try to help fix this, I'm all on board.

[01:50:37]>> Uh councelor McLaren, >> uh I echo much of councelor Drew's comments. I'm just as devastated by this budget as everyone else. I went through the Mthuan public schools, my entire education. I graduated literally three years ago. Um, and I firsthand witnessed the impact both to the educators and the students of a larger classroom size.

[01:51:01]Just three extra students really transforms the learning experience and not for the better, I'll tell you. Um, I like counselor Drew said, I don't know the answer. Um, but I guess my first question is just do you have sort of an estimate on what additional funds you're expecting? You have just absolutely no idea what that might look like.

[01:51:25]>> I mean, I'm hopeful, but I I have no real I mean, it'd be great if they even came in with what they had last year, but I mean, that's just a hope and a wish. Um, I keep hearing the higher Senate number, but I need to know how much higher than Mthun and no one's telling me that, you know, so uh I I don't want I don't want to say, yeah, I want we're going to get 3.2 and end up getting one, >> you know. So, it really there's no way to tell how it's going to flush out.

[01:51:53]Usually, um the gateway cities do a little better. Um and some of it will come through circuit breaker and we have, you know, a bunch of kids who qualify for that. So hopefully we'll we will be on the better end of what does come out, but I I I'm not going to venture a guess.

[01:52:12]>> Thank you. I was hoping maybe there was a guest, but I certainly can't blame you for not having one. Um that's kind of all I have for now. I don't know what the answer is, but I just know that our kids are our future, and if we're not funding them, then really what are we doing?

[01:52:29]>> I I will uh I I will add it's at least hopeful from this side of the podium that you guys are willing to look at the onetime costs of the uh tuitions as well as the unemployment. That alone in my head is I can almost back out $1.2 million in positions knowing that at least you guys are I'm not hearing anyone say no, but I know you haven't voted but um I'm I'm not getting a a negative vibe, so I appreciate it.

[01:53:00]Councelor Marson, then I'll get back and then I have a question. Counselor, go ahead.

[01:53:05]>> Thank you. Are there any other places that we have onetime cost expenditures that Right. Cuz that's what it is there for and that's what I hop about all the time. So, if we have more spots that we can do that, right, that that's just going to help us along the way. So, you know, we've already um identified two or three. So, you know, >> well, I I think one of the pro in the past, we've always taken all our all our projects that we want to get done, those onetime projects, you know, and we'd put them in um extraordinary maintenance in the budget. And I want to say the last time I actually put money in there, it was started out at $900,000, you know, and then through the budget process, we cut it. Actually, I think last year, you guys funded us about $900,000 for onetime costs. Um, and I was able to use that to do some of those projects. I didn't even put them in the budget. So, I could tell you a whole bunch of one-time costs that would help the schools, but it's not going to specifically help this budget cuz I know there's no money to do them right now.

[01:54:08]>> Do you know what I'm saying?

[01:54:09]>> I do. So, I don't mean the projects. How How do we save more teachers? How do we are there costs there that we can say are onetime costs, right? That 860 you're saying is one of them. Are there more things that we can identify like that that say that they are coming off the books? You know, even if it's two years down the road, if we can say we're not just kicking the can down the road, we're this is going away. So, if we fix it today, it's going to help. And in the future, it's not putting us back.

[01:54:38]>> I We can go back and shake the trees. I I was looking and at some point I have to come to you again, believe it or not, um for iPad leases and Chromebook leases, but you know, those are, you know, they're four year leases that we we like the same payment every year, so it's consistent. I mean, but those are like I mean, that would be a onetime cost, but it's only going to relieve you for 4 years, you know, things like that.

[01:54:59]So, you know, if that's something you're interested, one of your next meetings, I'm coming to you with a a request to do those leases. If um you'd rather do it as a onetime cost for this one time, you know, that would free up it would free up probably about maybe $200,000 this year, but $200,000 next year, $200,000 year up.

[01:55:23]That that's up to our capital and how we do that, you know, but administration how we do it. But I just I I guess if that's what it's going to take to help, you know, and help us in the right direction, right? We keep saying we're in going in the wrong direction. We have to fix it. We all know that. Um so just doing the bare minimum every year isn't working, right? So we all know that, too. So um I think we have >> Well, I I'll take those one time trees some more and uh see what we can do.

[01:55:57]Thank you. I appreciate that.

[01:56:00]>> The mayor had his hand up. Did you have something about the onetime cost? Well, uh, I just wanted to share, uh, some thoughts briefly about, um, some of the challenges that, uh, Mthun and municipalities across the Commonwealth face and some thoughts about how we can try to tackle them together moving forward because this is, as I've referenced, as council Marson just referenced, uh, this issue of, you know, we have the tendency in Mthoon to kick the can down the road and not truly address some of the challenges that we have and they just get bigger and bigger over time. Uh, and so, uh, one thing right out of the gate, and it's largely out of our hands to an extent, uh, but I think it's something that we need to collectively advocate for at the state level. This system where, uh, school districts are having to absorb these costs going up 5, 10, 12, $15 million year-over-year.

[01:56:56]uh when uh in municipalities across the Commonwealth, you're limited at taxing at 2 and a half% right with Prop 2 and a half. The math, as I've stated previously, simply does not work. And so we have this broken system uh literally across the Commonwealth, we have the uh issue of the Student Opportunity Act uh and uncertainty about where that's going next. I think that's an area that requires tremendous advocacy. Uh there have been opportunities uh that I have uh been able to uh kind of uh work with the teachers union on advocating at the state house for some of these reforms.

[01:57:35]Uh right now there are various calculations for instance for inflation that are just not even coming close to keeping up with the actual rate of inflation. Uh and then beyond that uh there's a conversation that the school committee has been having uh regarding the prospect of taking uh some of the services that we are paying to send students for out of district uh namely uh thinking of students with autism. Uh and there's this program and I don't know this might actually be a great opportunity to at least introduce the constellations concept to the council.

[01:58:14]This is something that we've been discussing extensively as a school committee. Uh member Bayz, who is here, has been a strong advocate. Member Keegan as well in past years has uh suggested that we take a look at this. I know Dr. Kang had actually included this as uh something that she was pushing for as a reform as well. And we just have never had the capacity to get it done.

[01:58:37]Uh but the thinking is that if we're able to make an investment, especially this year in a system where we're able to at the very least prevent students in the future from having to go out of district for some of these services.

[01:58:53]We're able to provide them in the district. Uh that could potentially be a significant savings for our city, our schools, especially over time. Now granted, that doesn't solve this year's issue. it doesn't solve the problem that's in front of us. But I think as part of addressing uh these challenges this year, we really need to have uh and this not to sound too uh aspirational or pie in the sky, but we really need to have an intergenerational mindset in terms of planning for our city, our schools, so that we can stop kicking the can down the road and actually address uh some of these challenges in more of a structural sense. Uh but it really does require an all-encompassing uh strategy where okay, we're doing what we can here at the local level. We're going to utilize portion of free cash hopefully with the council's uh support uh to add additional funding for the schools, continuing to intentionally stay above net school spending and try to build on that over time. uh but also working with our delegation, working with state officials to ensure that we're able to have uh the structural support that we need from the state uh because right now the system is fundamentally broken from uh top to bottom in terms of the way that we fund our schools.

[02:00:18]>> Thank you, Mr. Mayor. The the reality is the systems we create create the results we get. So unless we innovate in what we're doing, we're not going to get a different result. So you're 100% correct. That investment has to be made whether we like it or not because if not, every year we'll be back year after year with the same result and the same conversation. By the way, night and day from 2024 2025 school presentation. I appreciate um the delivery today. I'm going to go to you councelor Daglio because I know you've been patiently waiting. Then I have a question. Councelor Dario.

[02:00:56]>> Thank you, Madam Chair. So, how how much money are we paying for outside agencies for like VR program assistance? How much are we paying for agencies to come into our schools >> this year? I'll have to get that number for you exactly cuz we we do have some of them coming in covering vacancies where people we couldn't fill. Uh but I get have to get the exact number for you. So quickly >> not not to the level that we did last year.

[02:01:22]>> Okay. So it's decreased like because we were I don't want to quote the number but it was >> six 7 million a little bit. Yeah I don't in total but um the question because what again yeah I know I know I know stop >> ridiculous. Okay I deal with that with sixth graders all day. Um so the quick question I'm asking with this one instead of because we have also seniors uh volunteer programs here in the city for their taxes depending on there would it be beneficial to bring them into volunteer hours for to get tax reductions off their property taxes?

[02:02:06]Would they be positions for them to fill in those areas that you are right now having outsourced?

[02:02:15]>> A number of the current positions that we are outsourcing require a specific level of certification and lensure. So that might not >> in union affiliations >> that's I was just trying and also we have um an auditorium and I brought this up on school committee many times when it was built it was supposed to be made to for outside venues to come in in use and then CO hit and right after we got out of CO no it seemed seem to be we can't have that being rented out. I think it is time to think of ideas now to open that to public because the 300 uh the orchestra that came it was packed and I thought it was awesome how we used that auditorium and it was perfect for that performance. So, it shows it can work for types of things like that. And it's time it's time to now open up the ideas.

[02:03:24]We can't say, "Oh, well, you know, this is being used." It's we have to put money first to make sure our kids have our programs. So, that's one of my suggestions. Open up the theater, especially during the summertime when there's no kids around. That's >> Thank you. Great idea. Uh my question is so there's a rumor in the streets and maybe you can clarify that for me. Are you is this department participating in furloss? Yes or no? And if you're not or if you are, how does that work?

[02:04:04]>> Want to know if we're participating in furlows. No. No, we are not. U majority of our school department doesn't work during the summer. Um, so I don't know how we would furlow them while they have kids in class. So, so no furlows I don't think would be an option for vast majority of the school department.

[02:04:20]>> Thank you.

[02:04:23]>> Any other questions? Oh, sorry.

[02:04:26]>> Just one more quick question. Um, first of all, councelor McLaren is a fine example of the product that the Madura schools puts out, by the way. So, did a great job with her.

[02:04:35]>> Thank you.

[02:04:36]>> I mean that. Um my question is last year we were in a similar situation. Free cash bailed us out. Pink slips went out.

[02:04:43]They went out this year too. Or they might go out by June I think 5th I believe you said up. What was the collateral damage last year with with dedicated employees that had less tenure that actually left and didn't come back?

[02:04:56]Do do you know the percentage or how many? Because that's that's the real damage that occurs with this crisis that we have every year.

[02:05:08]I'm glad you brought that up. Um because I think one of the the byproducts of having this crisis every year is it's such a significant distraction to the staff both professionally and personally and it brings up a lot of um emotions.

[02:05:24]And when you do receive a pink slip, whether the person handing it to you or not assures you'll be rehired, there's an element of self-preservation where you need to start looking around. Uh I will say that we were very fortunate last year where we were able to retain most of our staff. A couple did look elsewhere and move on. Um prior to being in the situations where we've had so many to hand out um we have very fortunate to have I believe it's an 87% teacher retention rate. So when when teachers are able to stay, they generally do and are happy. And we very much prefer that because of the investment that they put into kids and what they mean to the community, but also we invest in other ways in our professional development. They know the curriculum. They know the structures of the school. They know where we need to improve. And it's really difficult to lose a staff member, start over, and have to explain when there is that learning curve while we're trying to make progress.

[02:06:25]>> Thank you for that. And I hope the state comes in and and helps uh loosen that gap somewhat. Thank you.

[02:06:31]>> Okay. Any further questions?

[02:06:36]>> Thank you for your time this evening, for your presentation. Thanks.

[02:06:40]>> Just one quick comment, Madam Chair.

[02:06:42]>> Uh Mr. Goslin, >> just wanted to say thank you. That's all.

[02:06:49]>> What's that?

[02:06:49]>> Just wanted to say thank you.

[02:06:50]>> Oh, you're welcome.

[02:06:54]>> Thank you.

[02:06:59]All right, moving on to Mthsuan Public Works and that includes the recreation department. You're on page 35, counselors.

[02:07:08]>> Good evening, everybody.

[02:07:10]>> Good evening.

[02:07:11]>> So, every year I follow the schools and that's never easy. Um, this year I got to sit next to Council Daglio's brother who's claiming that uh Council Daglio was stealing all his ideas. So, that was Um, so very difficult budget this year.

[02:07:30]Obviously, we know that. Um, I was watching last night. Uh, I just want to say I support the mayor's proposed budget for DPW. I realize very difficult. I don't think there's been a year as long as I've been doing this that we haven't started with. It's a very difficult year this year. I have never seen a budget like this. However, this is extremely difficult. So, kudos to the mayor and to the cafo for putting this together. It's uh a lonely job. Uh and I think they did a good job sort of getting this all together. I was watching last night, you know, Madam Chair, you asked for some percentages and cuts and things like that. So, I did some quick numbers.

[02:08:05]>> Uh director, I appreciate that. But, uh today I noticed who watched and who didn't. So, thank you for that because a lot of the department heads did give the give that information.

[02:08:15]>> So, you all know that um DPW is broken up in two separate budgets. One is funded by the general fund and the which is you know funded through taxes and the other is the enterprise fund for water and sewer and the water treatment plant which is funded by revenues from our water and sewer bills. So what I'm talking about right now is the general fund and I've done some analysis.

[02:08:38]>> We have about 118 positions across both budgets. 74 and a half I mean I'm sorry 76 and a half positions are in the general fund portion of the budget. So, um, again, I want to say that I support the mayor. Everything I say is just to give you an idea of what we're up against. I'm going to make a, you know, a request at the end here that um, uh, that reflects on what I'm about to tell you. So, there's there's, you know, fairly significant cuts in the DPW budget. Most of it has to do with staffing. The mayor called me on a Sunday and said, "Hey, listen. We got a very difficult budget here." I had a number of empty positions. He said, "My goal for DPW is just leave those positions empty so that we don't have to lay anybody off." So, not so that there's a person who doesn't have to leave his his his role.

[02:09:31]I had a number of a number of empty empty position empty positions that uh you know, we've struggled to fill over the course of a couple years here. Um regardless, staffing in in DPW on the general fund son side is down about 16%.

[02:09:46]That's number of people. The budget is down about $900,000 which is about 14%.

[02:09:54]And I and I'm I'll be happy to answer questions about specific lines after we just go through this and I'll try to be as concise as possible. In other expenses, we're relatively level funded. So, you know, a little bit here, a little bit there, a little bit of give and take.

[02:10:10]When you get on to the third page, and my numbers aren't I mean my page is aren't numbered, so I don't know what number uh we are, but on the third page of my budget, you see utility expenses there. And that includes fuel, electricity, street lighting, etc., etc. Those are things that sort of are in my budget. They have been historically, but it's really not in my control. It's electricity. You know, we pay all the electric bills for the for the city uh that are outside the enterprise fund.

[02:10:37]So, I just did a quick analysis. I I I think from an operational standpoint, my analysis of what the reductions are really only include personal services and other expenses. And I think the total what I found the total reduction in just those two sections are about 12%. So what I'm saying is the increase in the utility expenses um you know the funding increases because we need to meet that. It sort of artificially reduces the percent decrease. So that's the engineering side of me that's sort of overanalyzing that.

[02:11:11]So um I'm happy to answer any questions about specific lines. Um I just want to reiterate I can make this budget work.

[02:11:19]Um and what I would respectfully ask is that I've talked to every council member here numerous times about constituent issues and things you like to get done.

[02:11:29]In this budget, we're going to need a little bit of patience. You know, because what happens is I end up with some some positions that are empty, then you have vacations, you have sick time.

[02:11:39]So, there may be things that have to wait an extra day. There are things that, you know, we're obligated to fill a pothole within 24 hours upon notification of that. Those are the things we'll, you know, we'll endeavor to uh to to maintain our our service level on that. But you can't lose, you know, 12% or 14% of your workforce and expect the same level of service. We will of course endeavor to do that throughout the year.

[02:12:05]>> We I got a pothole uh text just now. 40 Sarrento >> 26 Sarrento both of them right here.

[02:12:14]>> They don't go to a lot of events because this is what happens.

[02:12:16]>> Yeah. Start the clock.

[02:12:17]>> Sarrento a director. Thank you for that.

[02:12:20]>> STO you said >> uh 26 and 40.

[02:12:22]>> All right. 26 and 40. So they're they're probably wa my people are probably watching right now. They're already on it. Thank you. Uh uh counselors, any specific questions uh for any line item or to the director?

[02:12:39]>> I'll start. I the the one of your your department is one of the departments that I deal with a lot.

[02:12:48]>> We do hear from you a lot.

[02:12:49]>> Yeah. And I'm very pleasant with DPW.

[02:12:52]I'm very pleased. That's the one that's the work. I appreciate I appreciate all the patience your you and your team give me. I truly do. My thing is with this furlow um are they participating in furlows too?

[02:13:05]>> That's that's the thought right now.

[02:13:07]>> Yeah. And and so like when I look at fire, police, and DPW, to me they're like the same category because they have to be on all the time, right? So with with the furlows and um the one person you lost, correct? You said you lost one position. Is that what you said?

[02:13:27]>> So we have one person that was a layoff.

[02:13:29]That's right.

[02:13:29]>> Okay. So with that and you stating I need I'm going to need your patience.

[02:13:36]How how do you how do you really see that functioning? I I feel >> so it's going to be we're going to have to do some things differently in DPW which is going to involve you know what's historically what's happened in DBW which I've always sort of scratched my headers about is our divisions become very separate. We're going to have to join forces on some things and maybe get some people trained to do things that they don't typically do. This is the first year actually that I've had people not respond to an emergency event like a water mane break or or even I had people leaving uh snowstorms. This never happened to me and now it's we're getting into um you know frankly people are taking a second job. I have people that do Uber >> and um you know Door Dash and things like that. And so now they're conflicted because they they're not making enough as a DPW worker. That was something I brought up last night with the morale in the building when it was we were notified of the furlows that I I felt it I felt that energy here when I walked in >> and that we were going to lose people because now >> you know but I know you guys are still working on those numbers and potentially we'll bring it down to less.

[02:14:41]>> Um >> so I'm council I'm already working on ways that we're going to make this budget work and I'm also working thinking about things that you know it's it's morale is tough. you know, these are guys that are on the lower end of the scale as far as pay goes. Every year we print out uh you know, the wages for for the entire city, and my guys know that. They see that. But, >> um, you know, we have really good people here. Um, I'm thinking about ways that we can work on morale and, uh, look at the future. And that's, you know, what I mentioned was I I want to respectfully ask you that if we do find um, you know, some extra money here or we find different ways to make these work that you don't forget about DPW. I know you have a lot of challenges here and you hate to to see or lose a teacher or anything. And I don't want you to do that either. But I just, you know, I want you to remember that DPW is is taking a hit. Um, and please don't forget them if we do find ways to uh, you know, to to reinvariate the the budget here. When I was looking at the budget, there are two interesting positions and I just want you to educate me on them.

[02:15:45]>> The tree surgeon and the tree climber.

[02:15:48]>> So, the tree surgeon is basically the foreman on a tree crew. I don't I don't know why the name surgeon came up, but he's the he's the lead on a on a on a tree crew.

[02:15:57]>> So, and then a tree climber is exactly that, someone who climbs a tree. We don't climb trees. Um, very dangerous and difficult job. So any any of the tree trimming we do is from uh from a vehicle.

[02:16:09]>> Okay.

[02:16:09]>> The tree climber position that we had we have two of them. The one we had filled uh we have filled now is someone that we moved internally. We've advertised it several times and we just can't get that's why it was empty when you know when the issue came up is we just can't get anybody to take that role. And actually um I have a family member who is a tree climber and they do very well on the outside.

[02:16:30]>> Oh yeah. They pay that very well.

[02:16:31]They're just not competing with with actual tree climbers. So, but are we actually cutting? Not not that I want to cut them. Say, do they actually cut trees every day? Like when they're not cutting or when they're not doing surgery on the tree or climbing, what are they doing?

[02:16:45]>> So, they do a whole bunch of things. So, we take trees down. We have problem trees that we take down all the time.

[02:16:50]But, uh, when we do paving, they raise the canopy for all the roads. We do stump grinding. Um, that's a, you know, it's a very specialized, very dangerous, you know, function. And we need somebody in there that's skilled and we have that in the tree surgeon now. And our tree surgeon is actually the tree warden as well. So he goes out and inspects trees as we have calls um for dangerous trees and things like that. And then frequently they're out u during emergency operations. So if we have like we had the windstorm yesterday, things like that. Uh they're out, they'll be out for days at a time just cutting trees and making sure that uh you know that the the residents can get around.

[02:17:27]>> Okay. Questions counselors? Councelor Samard.

[02:17:31]>> Thank you, Madam Chair. Director Ba, thank you again. Nice look, by the way, with the blazer.

[02:17:35]>> Yeah, I was going uh Miami Vice, >> you look good. This is my fifth budget, >> and it seems like every budget I've ever done, the DPW takes the biggest hit.

[02:17:45]Yeah.

[02:17:45]>> And you're always very candid about it.

[02:17:47]You never make excuses. You do what you have to do, and it's much appreciated.

[02:17:50]And your men and women work hard. It's tough because I think as counselors we gone to the most complaints about, you know, potholes and beautifification and all that and and you're always responding and I don't expect you I called you about the potholes on forestry recently.

[02:18:05]>> Yeah.

[02:18:06]>> And I didn't expect you to have it done the next day, but you did and I appreciate that. And if you didn't have it done, I I understand because you're always short-handed, always out of budget. So, you know, and I know your men and women, they they complain the least to me, by the way, as a counselor because they just do it and it's much appreciated. But moving forward, like you said, if there's a transfer, a line item transfer or that you need, >> you know, I'm receptive to that because like I said, you guys take the biggest hit and and I think you work, you know, as far as uh labor, you guys work the hardest in the city. So, I appreciate that.

[02:18:39]>> It's much appreciated.

[02:18:40]>> They do understand. Um, and it's, you know, it's always been the way, but I really don't have to stress to my guys the importance when we get a call from a counselor, it's because a constituent is having an issue. And it may seem minor to us, but it's an issue to them enough that they went out of their way to find their counselor, call their counsel. So, we address it right away, and they I don't even have to say it. These guys know that by now. It's like, stop what you're doing. If you can address the the resident concern goes a long way. I appreciate that, Council.

[02:19:09]>> My chair.

[02:19:11]Yes, counselor.

[02:19:13]>> Thank you for you to director Bower. I see here a line for the superintendent vehicle maintenance 116,000.

[02:19:24]Isn't it cheaper to buy like a new truck?

[02:19:28]>> So that's a that's a that's a that's a person. So >> Oh, it's a it's a person.

[02:19:34]>> Yeah. So on the first page, those are all those are all um >> I would rather have a truck than him.

[02:19:39]Um, but we'll stop with them at this point.

[02:19:42]>> Okay. All right.

[02:19:43]>> It would be a nice try for >> Thank you for the clarification and I want to say thank you for your quick responses, leadership, and commitment in addressing the residents concerns. Thank you very much.

[02:19:54]>> Welcome, >> Councelor Drew. And then I'm going to go.

[02:19:59]>> Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm going to take a line from councelor Marzen la last night. I'm concerned about your overtime.

[02:20:10]>> You you spent $500 and something thousand in overtime this year.

[02:20:14]>> Yeah.

[02:20:14]>> Your line item is $250,000.

[02:20:17]>> So, I'm going to I'm going to I'm going to have to expose my own secrets here.

[02:20:21]And so, what I what I do is, and this is, you know, this is unfortunate, but this is where we're at. The reason I had so many open positions near the end of the year is because as positions, and I I we regularly have positions open and we fill them and open and fill them.

[02:20:34]It's just the nature of construction and what we do. What I do is I get through half of the year or the second half of the year is if I have open positions, I leave them open because I never have enough money in my overtime budget. So, I can transfer. I make the request. I generally have success with that and I and I use the available funds in those lines to uh fund that overtime budget.

[02:20:55]What this overtime budget means is I'm going to have to start the year by saying there's no non-emergency overtime. And I've done that throughout the years. We have trouble uh with the budget. We get towards the end of the year and I stop any non-emergency. But also besides non-emergency, you have burials every weekend and we're going to have to potentially look at what that means to those things. We have people manning uh all of the high school athletic events, things like that that people don't realize. I have people on overtime at those events. So, we're going to start the year off that way.

[02:21:27]Again, to be perfectly frank, I'm probably going to lose people because of the furlows, because of the the morale issues, and then when those positions open up, unfortunately, this is the way I have to think, I'm going to have to leave those positions open in order to use that money to supplement the overtime.

[02:21:44]>> Okay.

[02:21:46]I mean, I I fully trust you. I mean, every time I've called you, you you're very informative. You you give me straight answers and I've asked you for a few things and and you've followed through on them. I mean, power included, some of them.

[02:21:59]>> I know you're waiting on a few. I apologize.

[02:22:00]>> All right. I've learned more about turtles throughout my time as a counselor. Uh I did get a text about another pothole and it's pretty much the street behind Walmart at the loop.

[02:22:11]>> Believe it or not, there's a history about that, but I'll I'll uh that's that's a rough section.

[02:22:16]>> So, a po just so you know, a portion of that road, it's called technically Maul Road. portion of it is a city roadway and it's on our list for uh paving treatment along with Forest Street, along with Milk Street, along with a couple of the trouble spots. Just to throw that up.

[02:22:31]>> There's been much debate over that section throughout the years, but yeah, we'll we'll address it.

[02:22:35]>> Okay. And then just on the uh you know, I know you have a wonderful employee who works for you who does a great job with all of our events and everything. Um you know, I I hope he gets some training in here. Maybe he can learn how to tie balloons and things like that to maybe help curb some of this. I know he would love that.

[02:22:53]>> Yeah.

[02:22:53]>> So, uh, >> Director Angel is a great guy.

[02:22:56]>> Definitely work in progress. Um, we we uh we continue to work with him every day.

[02:23:02]>> Thank you, >> Councelor Davio.

[02:23:06]>> So, um, thank you, Madam Chair. I I I commend um Pat for saying that he's going to manage this budget, but you guys take a hit every since I've known about DPW, you guys take a hit every year.

[02:23:25]>> Yeah.

[02:23:25]>> Um and I'm sorry. I I think with all the things you guys do, and I know a majority of your employees, I grew up with them. I grew up with their kids and they they do so much for us and to see even the overtime getting hit not filling in positions. I'm going to be honest with you, I do not know how you guys are going to function. And I I think one of the ideas that we need to do is cuz I'm sorry I can't in good conscience look at this budget and I know the mayor did the best he could and I'm not saying that he's wrong in doing this but I think when we get money back from the state on things I'm just requesting Mr. mayor that you reappropriate some of the money that you're going to fill in back to DPW.

[02:24:23]I'm I'm just giving that opinion because I see the roads. I see everything that we're doing here and every progress we're going to try and make is going to go backwards.

[02:24:35]And I'm sorry, you can't do it to these guys. I know them. I I know how much they they work hard. And I know you know them, too. And I'm not trying to put you on a spot because I know you're in a tough position, but I see where this is going. And you know, Director B is is is being gray about it, but as the counselor in my constituents that constantly call me for issues, and Pat's dealing with me every day and John about other issues like bird sanctuaries and stuff, right? Um, and Steve on top of it. These guys do so much and if we lose them along with these other guys, this city's going to fall apart.

[02:25:19]And I'm just being blunt about it. And police and fire could do all they want, but if they don't have roads to get to where they need to be, what good is it?

[02:25:30]So, whatever we can do, and I can't say we'll see this say we need to make that decision when we get money back to reappropriate If not, we got to sit down, have creative ideas because I'm very concerned with this budget on this one.

[02:25:49]So, >> yeah, I I couldn't agree more, council.

[02:25:51]Just so uh the public is aware, uh when it comes to road fixes, uh thankfully we we get support through chapter 90 from the state. Uh Governor Healey has increased that for us and I'm grateful to to the governor for that. Uh and then beyond that uh we have allocations in our capital improvement plan. So in terms of fixes to roads uh for instance the council uh thank you just approved uh a contract uh that's going to allow us to proceed with full depth reclamation of several streets in our city. Uh that's funded through chapter 90 the CIP. Uh and so there's going to be other contracts coming before you in the coming weeks as well. Uh so in terms of our paving program, just keep in mind that that's technically outside of the operating budget that's funded through the CIP. And so we're going to continue uh to make those investments and catching up on uh road fixes and the like. Uh but you know, I couldn't agree more. And now I think especially tonight with the second night of the workshops when you see the situation that the schools are dealing with when you see the situation that all of these departments collectively are facing add into that the concern about laying off uh people. Now I think you might be starting to see why we're looking at things like furlows, why we're looking at things like trying to tighten up overtime. And I I walked the council last night uh through uh the challenges that we're dealing with uh in terms of health insurance, in terms of all of these different factors that are uh causing, as we've referenced, this perfect storm of pressures that are on our city. And so, uh I think the picture I hope is now abundantly clear of uh the situation we're dealing with. But at the same time even though uh this budget is something that is not uh good ultimately it's something that's very difficult it's very painful uh you know when we look at municipalities like gloal when we look at municipalities like New Bedford municipalities across the country and mainly the Commonwealth but also across the country um you know we're doing the best we can to manage with what we have also understanding that our residents are tapped out they're taxed uh enough uh right now already and so we're trying to achieve a very difficult balance uh considering all of these pressures but I I couldn't agree more this is not easy >> yes counelor >> so one of the suggestions that the roads is just one thing but when you see weeds growing out of your sidewalks they come and clean those out so one of the suggestions I I was actually talking to the sheriff a few months ago, and I know I I know that people don't want to hear this, but to do some of the groundskeeping, we should be getting um some of the prisoners that are trying to get hourlys to work off things to be bringing them in, cleaning our sidewalks, doing uh maybe possibly doing certain things to clean up the city to help reduce some of that burden so they could go and do other things that are desperately really need it. That's one suggestion. I know people look at it.

[02:29:16]>> We do that.

[02:29:17]>> Yeah. Go ahead.

[02:29:18]>> Yeah. We just buy them lunch.

[02:29:20]>> Yeah. See, >> yeah, we get them as much as we can, but we we're competing with other communities, but we get them we get them quite a bit.

[02:29:27]>> It's it's there's a trade-off because you have to stay with them.

[02:29:30]>> Mhm.

[02:29:31]>> But we buy them lunch. Yeah. So yeah, we we we've kind of tapped into all of those sort of little things we can do to help, but it's yeah, it's an available resource for us. Another um suggestion just seeing from fire, police, and DPW and councelor Drew and I have talked about this is looking at the rental enterprise um idea where we rent our vehicles um from them. And maybe councelor Drew can, you know, follow up with it because you know more about this than I do how because your company does it as well.

[02:30:09]So, if you could carry on that idea that like what you guys do. Yes, I am putting you on the spot.

[02:30:15]>> Yeah.

[02:30:16]>> Thank you for putting me on the spot.

[02:30:17]>> Yeah. Madam Chair, can I >> Yeah, absolutely. Council.

[02:30:19]>> Yeah. Thank you.

[02:30:20]>> Sorry, Madam Chair.

[02:30:23]>> Uh, yes. I I think we've spoken a little bit. In the business I'm in, we rent our vehicles. We lease them. They all go through that enterprise program.

[02:30:32]Enterprise is the actual business, like the rental car. uh that you are able to kind of lease your vehicles and it helps the maintenance and that kind of thing.

[02:30:40]That's definitely something that's that's a larger plan that would have to be put into place and implemented. Um I'd love to sit down with the the director and even the police and fire chief and the mayor and try to kind of pull that all together a little bit better than trying to do it right here on the floor. So I could explain there is there is cost savings that can can come from it and I understand where you're heading. It's just it gets convoluted. I don't really want to bog everybody down while it's 95 degrees in this room. So, >> wait to you, Madam Chair. I don't care about the 95 degrees. I just saw a budget that I'm not happy with, and I'd rather throw the ideas out there now so the public knows that we're coming up with ideas instead of seeing many council meetings in the past that people go, "Oh, this is a terrible thing going on." And they sit there and they just pass the budget and then nobody's throwing ideas around. I want to know. I want the public to know with this bad budget that we have ideas. And I'm sorry if that, you know, makes people smile, but I think this is actually really bad.

[02:31:41]And being here tonight, I want ideas.

[02:31:45]>> Counselor, I appreciate the heart you're putting into this and I and where you're going. I wanted to because we still have >> No, no. Excellent. We still have um we still have to talk about solid solid solid waste which we just had the 850,000 tobacco. We have to you know so if you could humor us we could do a special meeting just for that if you'd like. But right now let's focus on this is if if that's okay. Did you have your hand up councelor Maran? Okay. There you go.

[02:32:21]>> Yeah.

[02:32:24]We'll make it work >> with the >> with the with the um with the burials on the weekend. If we just implement the charge if we want to bury one of our loved ones on the weekend and it happens to work out and there's an additional charge for the weekend rate and we just have to implement that. Whatever that is, that's an easy, >> right?

[02:32:44]>> It's just part of it, right?

[02:32:45]>> Um it just works out that way sometimes.

[02:32:48]So, we have to do it and um just say thanks for all you do. Yeah, those are the things that we were looking about. I just, you know, I'm concerned about, you know, people are at the worst time of their life and you don't want to say like, yeah, you can't we can't see it till Monday. So, right, >> for whatever reason, the burials keep popping into my mind. You, you know, but there's things we can do. We can incorporate that into our fees or something like that or keep burials to Saturday mornings or Sunday mornings or do those types of things. I just use that as an example of those repeating overtime things that aren't emergencies, you know.

[02:33:20]>> Yeah. I I think that's that's a great idea, counselor, and something that we'll get to it. Granted, when we get to the uh enterprise uh fund, but uh the overtime line and the enterprise fund budget largely matches actual usage, there's less of a drastic hit to that and that's what we tap into for like water main breaks and things like that that impact the water sewer system. So, uh just keep in mind that >> we can shift all that cost to the enterprise fund because it that's where it belongs, right? Stick it there.

[02:33:49]>> Yeah. So, just keep in mind when you think of uh one of the biggest drivers of overtime, those calls in the middle of winter, in the middle of the night to address a a water mane issue, uh that's something that we are accounting for being much uh less drastic in terms of cuts to overtime in that context. We'll get to that separately, but I just wanted to mention that it's separate from the general overtime budget for DPW.

[02:34:14]>> Okay. So, are we moving on to solid waste? Is that is that okay? Okay, >> that is on page Oh, I need my glasses.

[02:34:24]Hold on. Page 38, counselors.

[02:34:33]>> Thanks.

[02:34:38]>> Good evening.

[02:34:40]>> Okay, >> so I don't think I need to explain anything about this section of budget.

[02:34:46]Yeah. So I'll I'll chime in. Uh so uh last year in an effort to identify some additional funds to for instance help add to the school budget, right, with a lot of issues that we were dealing with in terms of uh fiscal crunch last year.

[02:35:04]Uh there were adjustments made to this um additional adjustments made to it. uh this is reflective of the projection for fiscal year 27 with no reductions to it.

[02:35:19]So that is an area where if my mind set last year would like to be applied this year where we could hypothetically use free cash next year for any overruns that option exists but given the recent uh situation I have not touched it.

[02:35:36]>> I appreciate that. I think I think these are line items we should never play with because they never come in less. They will come in over usually. So, councelor Drew.

[02:35:49]>> Thank you, Madam Chair. Uh I think all of us have learned more about trash and tipping fees and solid waste in the last 18 >> days or or month and a half, whatever it's been. Um, I I know what the mayor is saying that there there is money there if we needed to make adjustments because we do have this position that we're trying to now implement.

[02:36:12]In your revenue assumptions, you're assuming that we're going to raise the additional barrel fee. That additional barrel fee assumption is being raised from $100 to $250.

[02:36:25]Now, again, this just goes back to a process. Have we figured out the process to ensure that we're going to collect this fee? Is it the July 1, you're getting a a betterment attached to your your property on your property tax bill, uh utility bill, whatever it may be, just to ensure that we can receive that money. Because I mean, you send a guy an email and he goes, "Hey, I need your $100 barrel fee." You're going to send it six times and he's probably just going to spam and you don't get it. I I think we've seen that over the last four years where we haven't collected every barrel fee that that's needed and we've left hundreds of thousands of dollars on the table that I hope would eventually we would be able to recuperate. But if we're going to do any sort of cut to a tipping fee, which I know is a hot button issue to everybody at this table, I I would say that I would need to know how many barrels. And I don't think we can actually properly know that amount of barrels that we could educate educate ourselves to know what that offset should be. So we may want to like you said not touch it.

[02:37:30]>> But um >> so oh no no so my my next question I guess is to the director power. Um, we approved the position of trash >> sanitation >> sanitation education coordinator, ZAR, whatever you want to call it. Um, that position works what hours? 6 to 2:30.

[02:38:01]>> Well, it' be it nor she would follow the normal DPW hours. So, in the summertime, we do 6:00 to 2:30 and we do 7:00 to 3:30. So, my concern to that is I think we have an ordinance on the books that says we can't put our trash out before 4:00 the night before, >> right?

[02:38:19]>> And trash gets picked up at 7:00 in the morning.

[02:38:21]>> Yeah.

[02:38:22]>> So, how are we going to implement fines or ensure that people are doing the right thing if the person that we have doing this job isn't there during the times that the trash is out? So, if there's a particular area that Harvey's going to pick up 7:00 in the morning, they're not supposed to be picking up before 7:00. If there's an area we need to address that gets picked up first thing by Harvey, we can say, "Harvey, we need you to change your day and we're going to go through at 7:00 in the morning and tag barrels." So, it'll be coordination with Harvey. Harvey's already committed to send a person out with Karina who's in the in the new position. Uh, so we'll have that direct coordination, you know, every day that she's going out in the field to tag those. So I don't expect, you know, there's inherently going to be some overtime in that, you know, with this budget. We're going to keep that to a minimum. That was kind of where I was going.

[02:39:12]>> It has to be. Yeah, there has to be here and there. I don't expect that she's going to be out every single day. I the the pilot programs that we ran were instantly successful. We like we turned certain streets right around. So I don't expect that we're going to have to go back and go back and go back to the same neighborhoods. I think we're going to be uh largely successful. Maybe we go out one week a month after we, you know, after we get some momentum.

[02:39:36]>> Okay. I I just I I want to make sure that they I I don't know how this role is is working if you're going to utilize this position to get a grasp around what added barrels are out there.

[02:39:50]>> Sure.

[02:39:50]>> I know that's been something that has been a a hot button. So, we know for sure. I know we've heard from, you know, Harvey was standing there and they said 4,500 and I think that was a little high and then we heard a number of 1300.

[02:40:02]>> We we obviously don't have that hard number, >> right?

[02:40:06]>> So, I mean to me step one of that position is to identify that >> and that to me you should be able to do in a month and a half. Yeah.

[02:40:14]>> Of just working >> every night. I mean they put them on the street for you. You just got to go around and count the numbers, >> right? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, we we have someone in the position who's very motivated. I you know, I just almost to the point you she she'll call me, text me every day. Um we need to give her the tools to be successful. So, she's driving around in an SUV. We need to find her a truck. She's, you know, she's going to um to address a call for, you know, garbage dumped on the side of the road and she's loading it into the back of the of an SUV. She's using an old, you know, an old desk from the dump. You know, not complaining, but um She's great and I don't want to have to keep pulling the reinss on her because we're not giving her the tools to be successful. So, that's on me and and we'll get there with that. But, she's got a lot to do. Um, and she is really I'm excited about her in the role because she is uh not shy.

[02:41:08]>> Thank you.

[02:41:09]>> Welcome, council.

[02:41:11]>> If I could answer one of the questions.

[02:41:13]Uh so uh when it comes to the uh collection of fees and and the like uh first of all I think uh this came up uh during the recent trash kurfuffle. Um the uh concept of the renewal system isn't contemplated in the actual ordinance. That's something that I think we need to get after in short order simply because there isn't any type of framework actually built in for us to implement. Uh but uh in terms of what we have uh hanging out there uh for fees that need to be collected uh the thinking that we have one of our own internal revenue assumptions that wouldn't require a vote or anything is to collect what's owed right now after July 1st and that would be revenue for this budget if that makes sense. So we're a little creative in terms of the timing. Uh but that is one of the assumptions built in here. So, we'll hit it July 1st.

[02:42:09]>> So, when I I believe councelor Daglio, and I'll put you on the spot, uh is working on an ordinance to try to put together the trash barrel fee re getting paid for. Uh I would hope that councelor would put a solid hard date of just the entire city is one day and we're not going like, "Oh, you got it on May 1st and you got it on the 17th of June." It's just so I I'll let you speak on that one there, counselor.

[02:42:38]>> So, from my understanding being in this role for only 5 months and seeing the process of the trash when it was put in, um, not to be want to be blunt about it, it was just put together. There was no process. You had DPW director suspending barrel of trash if you didn't have overflow or you littered you overflow or you contaminated your trash bows over a certain amount of time. DPW director had to hold a hearing to see if you have your trash, which right off the bat would be awful. Pat is DPW plus engineer. So him holding hearings about people keeping their trash barrels, their original trash barrels is absolutely insane. That's one. Two, are you really going to take away two recycling bin in a trash barrel so then illegal dumping would start occurring all over the city? So, and this was approved when you guys came up with the trash program. Second of all, you're right. Your fees are under I've actually contacted Harvey. You We should be at 175 cuz our barrel by tonnage is 170 to be good because of the inflation and the current environment that we're in right now. to go to 250.

[02:44:14]People are not going to probably pay for that right now and you're going to get rid of that barrel and they're going to start illegally dumping that. So, I would suggest the mayor to start slowly.

[02:44:26]All right? Be ahead of it, but not break the wallet for them. Go 175, 195, and 205. That's what I'm proposing. And also though, you need to start hitting fines with people contaminating these barrels because you also when you recycle and you put trash in it, you get penalties against you for recycling. So with the tonnage is including penalties as well. This is Is that me? Probably someone's calling me telling me Ryan.

[02:45:00]I don't even know where my phone is. But um but that we need hit the button.

[02:45:09]>> Oh, it's an alarm.

[02:45:14]>> Somebody's calling about a pothole.

[02:45:16]>> Yeah, probably a pothole.

[02:45:20]>> Sorry. Anyways, um but to continue this conversation, we could continue more because the whole ordinance itself should be scratched and redone because it was put together and you have no process. In the last 3 years, you guys were collecting fees or you weren't.

[02:45:40]>> We weren't.

[02:45:41]>> And there was no penalizing of those people. So, you should be penalizing people for late fees as well. So you uh with the 13 also I'm sorry guys I I did do all my research on this topic for this budget hearing.

[02:45:56]>> Your 1312 barrels that you brought up was the original 1312 that was initiated over time. What Harvey was saying the 4,000 barrels he mentioned include extra barrels. Also if your barrel was broken they did a replacement. So they actually that is a correct number but it was in the wrong format.

[02:46:18]So to to make clear up what it is. So since then you have a list which went through your office or nails office first and now it's in your office. So the last two years you had someone collecting that money. We should have had a notification sent out for a late fee. Also, DPW should have been notified when people weren't paying the light fee or paying the fees, and you should have been driving around taking balance.

[02:46:49]That would have lowered the tonnage, not by a lot, but it would have done significant.

[02:46:55]And right now, it's in with Haley and we're currently going piece by piece of it to hopefully bring it to the floor.

[02:47:02]>> Yeah, I think we need a special meeting just on that ordinance >> or work for Harvey now. So this is all this these are all things that really should be in that uh ordinance. So I think it's a great idea.

[02:47:17]>> Councelor Bal, >> I just have a quick question for director Bower. Uh councelor Dugio mentioned the trash contamination.

[02:47:25]>> How is that going to be determined? Is the sanitation coordinator going actually >> through the trash?

[02:47:32]>> Yes.

[02:47:33]>> Yeah. So that's that's >> what about the privacy the resident's privacy like >> Yeah. So, actually, um, she'll she'll open the barrel. She's not going to dig her hands in there. But, you know, honestly, we're at a we're at a stage right now where people aren't hiding it.

[02:47:47]They're putting trash bags full of trash, right? They're filling the whole barrel full. So, at least in the beginning, it's not going to be difficult for her to recognize the contamination. And one of the things we talked about was having her come and visit the council at some point. She's going to go to where our recycling goes and show you um how they, you know, how they they dump all the recycling on the ground and they make an assessment of, you know, what is the contamination.

[02:48:11]We've had trucks turned turned back. You can't even dump it. There's so much contamination in there. So, uh and we have to pay we have to pay a fee to Harvey for that for that contamination.

[02:48:21]And you know, honestly, we I I think you heard me say it before when we started this program, we wanted to we wanted to be so easy for residents that we didn't enforce that. And I that was a mistake.

[02:48:32]Now, you know, hindsight, uh, it's 2020.

[02:48:35]We should have been we should have been really strict right from the beginning.

[02:48:38]You know, we wanted to make it a soft landing for everybody and it just got away from us. So, now we have to put the horse back in the barn a little bit, but we we've already talked about it extensively with the crew. Okay. Thanks, Oh, they and also a council will also um be able to tell me as well when your barrel hits the um street, it's no longer private. It's public and people can actually go through it. Correct.

[02:49:09]>> Yeah. Yep.

[02:49:13]>> I'm keeping that on my property line.

[02:49:16]Just joking. All right. So, we're good on uh waste. Uh I I feel Do you guys feel you have more questions or concerns?

[02:49:25]Okay. Uh next on the agenda, it is uh legal services.

[02:49:32]>> Oh, water and sewer enterprise.

[02:49:34]>> Enterprise fund. Yeah.

[02:49:35]>> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

[02:49:36]>> So, the enterprise fund, as I mentioned, is the other part of DPW >> 43. Page 43. Sorry. Thank every everything that's in this budget is funded through um water and sewer bills. So, anything you see on here is not reflected on our tax bill. Unless of course, worst case scenario is our water rates get to a point where we are unable to cover the expenses here. Then it would go to we would be covering the enterprise fund with the general fund. It's never happened. It's never going to happen. We just got to be aware of that.

[02:50:09]>> Yeah. because we are talking about addressing our water and sewer rates. I think we've done it twice since I've been here in Mthoon. I've done it a number of times in my career. It's uncomfortable because the rates go up.

[02:50:22]This budget, however, I'm here to talk about this budget. Um the personal service is down just a couple of a couple of positions, only 4%. The the remainder of the budget or the budget as a whole is essentially level funded. Um this is a budget, you know, this these are positions where we're continually trying to find people. Um we are on the lower scale uh as far as pay goes.

[02:50:44]People are going to other communities for $6 more per hour uh for some of these positions. In future years, you will definitely be hearing from me about, you know, working on that wage and salary scale.

[02:50:58]So our our um enterprise fund our balance should be um a a good rule of thumb thumb is 12 to 15% of our budget. What we're seeing is we're having requirements from D regarding lead and copper. We have to address those. Um just briefly, you know, we have to go through the entire city and any water service where we're unsure about what material type it is, we have to replace it. So we go and we've done potholes throughout the city and I can't tell you um Dorenza Megan Winter who is the acting superintendent of the water treatment plant did a fantastic job when it comes to these type of programs. It's something that DPW and the city can be proud of because we're generally ahead of the curve. We're ahead of many other communities when we're addressing these D, you know, mandated programs. So, we've been out um we're going to catch up on this, but part of the water um I'm sorry, the lead and copper rules is going to be uh you know, the first year in order to meet that we have an estimate from from our consultants is going to be a million dollars. So, right away we're looking at a million dollar increase in that. You'll see that on the CIP side.

[02:52:07]The water rates in the enterprise fund also fund the CIP portion the of the enter of you know, so anything CIP related from the enterprise fund. So all of their trucks, all the equipment at the water treatment plant, everything, all of everything that qualifies for CIP is paid for through the water and sewer bills. So we need to make sure that we're analyzing the water and sewer rates because what you'll find by the time you figure out that you're in the hole, you're in so deep that you're going to have to have we did this the first time I was here was before the cath was here. My first day in Mthuan back in 2014, the town of accountant came to me and said, "You're in the hole in water and sewer. We looked at it. we needed a 50% increase in our rates and that doesn't go over very well. My recommendation and your brother was not was against me was that we look at this every year as part of the as part of this process and that we can continuously because you're going to get a 1% increase or something like that. If we continue to wait three, five years, you're coming up on these huge increases on the water rates. But so we're due for one right now. um the analysis they put together, we've used a consultant who does only water and sewer uh rate studies. They do a fantastic job. They don't leave anything out. It considers everything, but I can tell you that it's going to go up. And uh you know, that's that's uncomfortable when we have to do that to a residents on top of a year like we're having now.

[02:53:31]>> U Mr. Mayor, >> uh thank you, Madam Chair. Um completely uh agree with what the DPW director's been saying. I've been trying to plant this seed now uh going back I think a couple meetings just talking about how this is something that we need to keep up with so that we don't have this issue of sticker shock when we don't make changes and it's drastic all at once and nobody likes that. Nobody likes increases anyway but especially when there's sticker shock. I want to mention that there are two new investments in the water sewer enterprise fund. So uh as we all know the source of our drinking water the Samar River and up until now we have not had a couple of things that I think are really important especially considering the fact that the river is the source of our drinking water. Number one, uh the river, especially during the summertime with Boers and the like, tends to turn into the wild west and there is minimal opportunity uh to have patrols of the river, especially within the Mthuman uh section of the river. And so in uh the budget in uh professional services, we're including uh additional funding to allow us to get out there on the river and provide for uh patrols of the river to a of course ensure the safety of people who are out there trying to enjoy it, but b keeping in mind again this is the source of the very water that comes out of the tap that we rely on in our city. Uh there is also a new line item in here for environmental ri and uh general river cleanups. All right, this is something that has never been included in our actual budget. Uh we've gone to uh free cash in the past. We've gone to the DPW professional services budget in the general fund uh to cover uh this type of initiative. And so this year it's in the water sewer enterprise fund because again we're addressing the very source of our drinking water. Uh something else that we are thinking creatively about I don't have any formal announcements to share but just so you get a sense of some of the things that we're discussing internally is that uh we provide a portion of Drake's drinking water to them. I think that we have a uh a great opportunity to generate revenue uh by engaging in uh establishing connections with other municipalities that neighbor Mthuan. And so uh right now uh I have been in contact uh with Mayor Melinda Barrett in the city of Haveril. I know uh Director Bower has been in touch with I believe his name is Bob Ward, the uh DPW representative uh from Haveril and they're dealing with issues relative uh to their water supply. They rely I believe on Kenosa Lake uh for their water and the lake has been down and it's anticipated to be down over an extended period of time and uh I believe roughly a decade ago Pat when we started the process of trying to establish a connection with Averil >> longer than that. Yeah, it it just never uh came to fruition. This year, we're actively in the process of work on establishing those connections so that we could potentially uh sell our drinking water to the city of Haveril at times when their water supply is down.

[02:57:08]Something else, and actually this is something that I think I called you last week and I had a thought in my mind and it escaped me and it's back in my mind and I'm going to share it now. You haven't heard this yet from me, but one of the other municipalities in the greater law and sanitary district is Salem, New Hampshire.

[02:57:24]>> Yeah, >> Salem, New Hampshire is dealing with a water shortage as we speak. And so I don't know if that's even a possibility.

[02:57:32]Maybe connect offline. Uh but again uh this could be an opportunity for us of course to invest in our own drinking water supply which is the Marramac River but also explore revenue generating opportunities with our neighboring municipalities to alleviate their own water issues while uh providing for uh some financial relief for us. So nothing is official, nothing is formally established. However, this is an ongoing conversation I'm having with Mayor Barrett and uh something that I think we should really consider uh getting after.

[02:58:08]Thank you.

[02:58:09]>> Is it all that AI use that's taking our water?

[02:58:14]>> I don't know. I I I think that Haver was having an issue, but we're in a we're in a great spot. We're we're above the Lawrence Dam, >> so we have we have more than enough water. Um really the restriction is via our permit with D and our ability to to treat it at the water treatment plant.

[02:58:31]But um you know we have the ability to sell that water and over the over the years we lost I think it was the the yogurt company was a million gallon a day purchaser of water and we lost we lost them years ago. that would be some, you know, the we had uh heard from the owners of the new facility at the top of Old Ferry Road and they had a a buyer or someone who wanted to lease or something that was also a million gallon a day user and something like that, you know, that can completely offset all of the increases to our residential users. So, um something like that and the opportunity in Havville is just, you know, that's fantastic.

[02:59:05]>> That's great. What's that position called that patrols on the water? I didn't I couldn't find it on the list.

[02:59:11]Oh, so we we simply put in the professional services line uh not identified uh separately, but the funding's in there.

[02:59:18]>> Okay. Question councelor Drew.

[02:59:21]>> Thank you, Madam Chair. Uh Mr. Mayor, thank you for all the ideas. I appreciate you coming up with ideas during this time. And at least somebody's coming up with ideas. Thank you.

[02:59:30]>> We have we have we have more here, too.

[02:59:31]>> There's a big idea board over there.

[02:59:33]Okay. Um, Director Bower on the water services going to the houses that you were kind of talking about. Are we putting those back? We end up trenching like the homeowner ends up putting the main in. Do we put the main in? How does that work?

[02:59:48]>> So, uh, Arlington neighborhood project for example, we replaced all the water manes and then all of the services from the main into the house. So that was because we wanted to complete that project and and I wanted to end my presentation with uh an update on APA because I wanted to end on a high note and and all of those projects are beginning to wrap up now. It's $30 million of infrastructure projects that we wouldn't have had any other way.

[03:00:12]These projects would have never been done. But anyway, what for the for the water the water service, the city is responsible for um the service up to the corp. So the corp is typically at the back of the sidewalk for example, you know, somewhere in that area. And then the homeowner is responsible from the corp into the house. And we've always and that's just the way we've always done it. For the sewer, the homeowner is responsible from the house to the main, which is counterintuitive, but that's that's the way we do it.

[03:00:42]>> Okay. Um I I think the the idea of somebody patrolling our rivers is a phenomenal idea. I've had a lot of people call and complain about that. So, I hope that we leave that in there. Um, and as you said, uh, committee member Daglio didn't like, uh, increases like that, then I am 100% for it.

[03:01:04]>> Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. I never got to talk to him about it. I wish he was still here, but yeah, he was he was an opponent.

[03:01:10]>> So, thank God we have the other Dagio.

[03:01:12]Now, >> you're going to be getting a call, Councelor Drew. I have a sneaking suspicion.

[03:01:18]>> Any other questions for the director?

[03:01:24]I spoke with the water department and she did say we must do a increase because we were at one point at the lowest like you stated then we were with surrounding communities then we were at the higher tier and now we're going way down to that lower tier again. And when you see car washers trying to come to the community as somebody that's in the field of real estate you know we have low water water rates.

[03:01:46]>> That's right. We also sell bulk water at the water treatment plant and we'll get people that'll drive two hours to get a container full of water just because it's it's you know pennies on the dollars the other community. So that's something we can bring uh as we do the water you know the water rate analysis we can bring those types of things because we want to we want to raise those rates as well.

[03:02:04]>> Perfect. Thank you. Thank you for being here this evening.

[03:02:06]>> Okay. Thank you very much >> for your time.

[03:02:09]>> Legal services page 25.

[03:02:11]>> Madam chair you make a motion to just take a fivem minute break. I know.

[03:02:16]>> Why didn't you ask for one last night? I was dying.

[03:02:18]>> I know.

[03:02:19]>> Thank you. We'll take a motion for a 5m minute recess.

[03:02:23]>> Second.

[03:02:24]>> Uh motion um motion by councelor Drew, seconded by councelor Samard. All those in favor?

[03:02:30]>> I I it is now 8:53. We'll resume by nine. Thank you.

[03:12:31]Thank you for your patience. We are coming back to the workshops. Today is May 20th, 2026. It is 9:03.

[03:12:41]Madame Vice, could you please take the role?

[03:12:43]>> Sure. Councelor Santos, >> she's back.

[03:12:48]>> Councelor Samari here. Councelor Valley here.

[03:12:53]>> Councelor Daglio >> present.

[03:12:56]>> Councelor Drew >> here.

[03:12:58]>> Councelor McLaren >> present. Council Meran >> here.

[03:13:02]>> Councelor Pesh is here and Chair Sodto >> present. Thank you madame vice. Next on our agenda it is legal services and that's page 25.

[03:13:16]>> Good afternoon madam chair. Um, so what I will say as well, the legal office falls under the jurisdiction of the council and I'm appointed by the council. Um, the mayor graciously worked together with me and I've been able to make uh voluntary significant but necessary cuts to the legal budget to help balance the budget. Um, primarily through personnel services. Um, all of the employees of the legal department will participate in the furlow. Um and um that eliminates 81,74691.

[03:13:49]Included in that figure, uh we're also eliminating the inhouse part-time um council in-house council part-time position/hering officer position. And I will say just um addressing um councelor Daglio's concerns about that. So nobody in the city will be needing to do hearings anymore. There is a function in the city municipal ordinances for a city hearing officer and that function will now be fulfilled by my office and by the currently existing legal staff. So whatever and that that position is intended to do hearings of of all issues regarding the city consolidated hearing issues required to have uh hearing times at night for the convenience of the public. So we'll be restructuring and organizing to make sure that that's covered. So, as we issue trash fees or other things like that or fines, um, we'll take care of that. We have been more proactive in that area already with inspectional services. Um, although inspectional services has levied fines over the years, uh, there's been sort of a breakdown of them being able to collect them. Some people of course pay right away because they're upstanding and they want to clear their account, but many people don't pay them. And so now we're having a flow of those cases to us. we try to get them paid uh um nicely. Um and if that intervention doesn't work, then we go to court and take that option. Um and we also have an option um to add a lot of these fines if they go unpaid for a period of time to the tax bill. So, we're working with the tax collector to make sure that we have that part process in place over the next year. So, we're maximizing the ability to collect revenue. It doesn't happen instantly, but if it's on your tax bill, eventually it gets paid if you owe it. So, and that doesn't mean people don't have the ability to appeal these. They can appeal them to the hearing officer. If they don't like the hearing officer decision that we issue, they can go to court.

[03:15:47]We'll defend all of that. We have sufficient staff and we're staffed up to do that. So, I just wanted to speak to that since you had mentioned it. Um, also, we've reduced professional services outside council line item uh by 20,000 additional 20,000 from last year's 60,000. As legal is now fully staffed, it continues to expand the cases we're handling in house, saving money not only by um not hiring outside counsel to address issues, but also by assisting the treasurer, the assessor, the retirement board, as well as others with cases and various issues that used to go outside. Not not doing all of them yet, but we're doing a lot of those. Um and some of those cases weren't being addressed at all because there wasn't money in their budgets for those. um in many of those cases with the tax collector assessor and others result in revenue that we can bring back into the city. And so we're trying to focus on that. Uh in addition, we're decreasing our request for damage claims by 25,000 from last year. We've had a a decline in claims and we're more judicious about the claims we're paying. People in the public are sort of under a mistaken impression that we're responsible for everything. There are certain things we're responsible, primarily potholes that have been reported, things like that. Uh, snow plow incidents, but we're also making a concerted effort working with DPW to make sure that like all our plowing contractors are up to date with their insurance. So, all those claims that come in, we shift them off to the contractor's insurance and they get paid that way so they don't have to get paid out of the city accounts. Um, and so we're doing a better job with that. Um, so overall the legal budget for FY26 was 67420918.

[03:17:29]For FY27, we've got it down to 61676245.

[03:17:35]And that that represents an approximate 54 57,446 reduction year-over-year, which is about 8.5% reduction from FY26. we don't see any um issue with providing service um to uh and even expanding service with our existing staff. Um and so I think that's good and um we will be able to do that and as I said we will be taking the furlows um you know in a way that makes sense for our office as well.

[03:18:06]>> Thank you. Um Mr. Mr. Solicitor, I have a question. I think it's for the CAFO.

[03:18:12]Uh based on the percentage that you just provided uh for legal on the what you gave me, Madame CFO, it's um negative 5%. Are we are we capturing?

[03:18:22]>> So I think we should just use >> the colas or doing my percentage.

[03:18:27]>> Yes. So I was doing my percentage just straight what what what what I was allotted for this year which I think I think there'll be some left this year that will return to the general fund but the bottom line last year approved was 67420918 if the mayor's budget is approved it's going to be 61676245 which is approximately an 8.5% reduction to in total from last year. So, >> so I don't include incumbrances. So, in that 674, this $25,000 incumbrance that I wouldn't have included in my number.

[03:19:02]>> So, but the these percentages you provided to us, do they include the um you know how we did the math yesterday and some departments were reduced, let's say 4%, but it didn't account for the cost of living increase. This doesn't or it does. This does include the cost of living. It does. It does.

[03:19:22]>> Okay.

[03:19:23]>> Yes.

[03:19:23]>> Yeah. And my my budget includes includes the the increases. This there's a couple step step increases in the middle of the year. They're included in my budget. So, >> thank you. All right. Any questions for the legal department? Councelor Drew.

[03:19:40]>> Thank you, Madam Chair. Uh, couple of quick ones. So, briefs, recordings, fees, etc. We have a line item of $10,000. Um, last year it looks like he used to date uh about 422.

[03:19:58]I'm just wondering why are we seeing a a so >> huge increase like that. The increase for that line is directly related to two cases that we have on appeal and I won't mention what they are but I'm happy to discuss them with you and they're rather significant cases at the appeals court that could result in a lot of liability for the city and we will need to spend that on those briefs.

[03:20:20]>> Okay.

[03:20:21]>> I mean not all of it. Whatever we don't spend will return to the general fund or it can be transferred for another use.

[03:20:27]So >> yeah I it just I I look at it was a 10x.

[03:20:30]It's like usually substantial increase.

[03:20:33]So the reason >> we usually don't really use that much.

[03:20:36]It's usually folded into professional services or something else. But in this case I um you know we could see that that that was headed that way those two cases. So >> okay I did want to also mention just um something that I didn't mention. So our office although we do provide a lot of service and save money that way it is a revenue generating office and we've generated a lot of revenue last year.

[03:20:59]So, so we we brought in 600,000 from the Murphy's Farm mediation when they were offering zero. We uh did a lot of facilitation of the Oakland Avenue school sale um which is bringing in as you know $2,680,000 or if it's refinance $15,000 a month for 5 years over $5 million $500,000. We're working on a couple tax cases where there's a half a million dollars or more owed um by corporations or individuals, not that's the total, not by both. Um and we're pretty confident we'll be able to recover those in the next fiscal year, which will bring in additional money to the general fund for the budget. So, a lot of the work we do does also generate revenue, and I don't want people to lose sight of that. We're not just writing briefs and and not collecting any money. We try to collect money uh where we can and correct systems um that enable the city to collect on a lot of debt and things that um sometimes have not um run so smoothly here.

[03:22:04]And just to finish, my last one was the expenses line. You have 16,000 up from your budget from last year, which is 13,000. So about 20% increase, but what I'm seeing is you've only spent to date about 9,000, which is about 69% of your budget. So again, why we're increasing that by another $3,000 when in reality I mean, would that >> Sure. And so that that increase accounts for primarily our move to the e-code system. So we are already under contract to move the city municipal code and charter to the website. Um and so that'll be a really welcomed change for everybody because it will be live updated um you know monthly after the council meetings. So the ordinances will be automatically updated. The um resolutions and orders will also be on the site and searchable. We did have another system a while ago um and and it was abandoned because it was getting too expensive. It worked. I mean, it did work, but this system will work better.

[03:23:11]It's the code it's the e-code system that's in use in many municipalities around um and you can go online and see it. It also allows you to like pick a a section, search, you can download whole ordinances, but the most important part is it allows us to um on the fly live update. So, the code will always be updated. um the zoning code in particular uh people ask for that a lot and having it up todate and available on the website will be very helpful to people in the building trades um and other and other places as well. So and we will also um it we also have the ability to have them print hard copy um that can be sold to people that want that um especially the the the zoning portion of the building code people like to get in hard copy. So that's primarily the additional expense. Some of it some of it a little bit of it is an increase in WLAWR expense which is the legal research tool that we use. Um and we we really do need that to keep that. So okay just those two things are kind of driving that up a bit. So okay thank you question.

[03:24:18]>> Who had their hand? I'm sorry.

[03:24:23]No, I have a question.

[03:24:25]>> Sure.

[03:24:27]>> Uh, let me see. Where was it? The >> damages and incidentals. What is that line item?

[03:24:37]>> So, damages and incidentals covers uh the claims that people file for mailbox getting taken out by a plow. Um they it also covers utility poles that might get taken out by DPW or lines. Um it covers uh um uh city vehicle collisions with people when they're below our insurance deductible. I try not to file those claims if they're below our deductible because it doesn't really do anything for us except increase our insurance rate. So, but we're we I will say we generally do a very good job of of settling most cases for less than their value. So, we we're not you know people in the public just a note the city is not an insurer. So, we you know we're not necessarily responsible for a lot of things that happen unless the city is negligent and in many cases we're not but we still try to work with people if we were responsible for some kind of damage. I will say DPW is fabulous about we have a close relationship with them.

[03:25:44]If something happens and the DPW folks can fix it, then instead of paying a claim out of damages and incidentals, we'll send them out and they'll fix it.

[03:25:53]Um, and we just did that with a a fence, a couple fences and things like that.

[03:25:58]And people are generally amendable to that. They just want it put back the way it was. Um, and so we try to do that as well.

[03:26:06]>> All right. If there are no further questions, I can I can move on. We don't have uh uh reserve fund. The CAFO explained, Madame CFO, if you if you'd like just for the record to state about the reserve fund. Sure. And you could see on page 42 um we did include the line just for transparency and uh historical. Um you can see where is it?

[03:26:33]Uh it's about middle of the page. You can see that in 24 and 25 we did budget for funds there. Um that is something that historically has always funded something there. The idea being that um it would pay for one to two of the deductible. So if we have a liability insurance, a deductible is $25,000.

[03:26:57]And so we would put it there and be ready in case we needed it. Um, and you can see in fiscal year 24, we didn't actually use it for damages. We transferred it for another use elsewhere. And in 25, we didn't use it.

[03:27:10]So, in 26, we decided not to budget for that. Um, the the solicitor kindly pays for pieces of that from his damages and incidental line. Um, and if anything were to come for the full amount of 25 or larger for any reason, we would come to council and ask for funding that way via transfer or something. So, this year in 26, we did not um need to budget that and so we've decided that seems to have worked. Um, and knock on wood, I shouldn't have said that out loud. Um, and so we are doing the same 27.

[03:27:47]>> Perfect.

[03:27:48]And as um you may have heard or not, capital improvement uh is not 100% ready because that can be delivered after the budget. Correct.

[03:28:00]>> Yeah. So, like we had talked about on Monday night, and I won't go back into it, but we put a pause on part of fiscal year 26 CIP. So, that's kind of affecting what's 27 CIP looks like. So, there's going to be um some work to do there as far as figuring out what we still need to do for 27. So, we're working on that, but we really wanted to get through this first. So, the CIP is just going to also be paused for now.

[03:28:22]>> Okay. So, unless you have uh any other further questions, concerns that you'd like to discuss now, I will take a motion to adjourn. Uh I'm sorry.

[03:28:36]>> Yes, of course. Briefly, I just want to um I was able to watch last night's budget workshop today on YouTube and um just want to thank all the department heads that presented. Uh I want to thank the careful for a great job, the mayor also and I thought uh the chair ran both um workshops uh very well. So, thank you.

[03:28:54]>> I I appreciate that counselor from one of my hardest uh toughest counselors on me. I do.

[03:29:00]Madam Chair, uh I just wanted to uh take a minute to um recognize you as well for your leadership during this process uh leading the council uh through a difficult budget season. And I just wanted to uh take a minute to acknowledge you and thank you and express my appreciation uh for your partnership.

[03:29:22]>> Thank you. I appreciate you both. I appreciate the council. It has been two intense days. We last night we were here. I was fried 5 hours. Today it's all we're at 4 hours and and change.

[03:29:35]Tomorrow you can make it 20 minutes or four more hours, but tomorrow is the day you it's a first read, so come ready with your numbers or or your comments.

[03:29:47]And we and I'll give you an explanation of how that's going to run at the beginning. Um there'll be obviously some announcements. Um but yes, tomorrow is day one and then after your holiday is day two of the budget hearing second read. Okay. Well, thank you again and we will see you tomorrow. We do have public hearings tomorrow. So 6 they start at 6:00 6:15 and then you have the 6:30 is the first read. Okay. So plan at least for an hour or more.

[03:30:17]>> Yes. Motion to adjurnn. So moved >> by councelor Samar, seconded by councelor Drew. All those in favor?

[03:30:25]>> I.

[03:30:25]>> It is now 9:21. Good night.

[03:30:30]>> This meeting is adjourned.