September 8, 2026 – Select Board – Video & Transcript
September 8, 2026 - Select Board
Good evening as chair I will call the meeting tonight's meeting of the select board to order
this is September 8, 2026 at 6 p.m. We are meeting it's a hybrid meeting in person and remote we are
in the town building and currently we are meeting in the select board meeting room.
This meeting may be recorded and if recorded it will be made available to the public on way camp
as soon as possible after the meeting. We are having an executive session tonight as part of
our agenda and public will be excluded from that portion of our meeting. Pursuant to chapter two
of the acts of 2025 this meeting is being conducted in person and via remote access
in accordance with applicable law. This meeting has remote access one may watch or participate
with the meeting link found both on the Wayland Town calendar and
on the select board agenda. When required by law or allowed by the chair persons wishing to provide
public comment or otherwise participate in the meeting may do so here in the town building or
via remote access as applicable. Public comment we wish please that you limit it to two minutes per
person. Before I read the agenda I'd like to acknowledge that joining me this evening is
Mr. Whitney, Mr. Fay, Mr. Reynolds and of course myself Carol Martin. I believe Mr. Levine will be
joining us.
shortly. We are also joined by the town manager Mr. McCall and I think that's it. Great. So agenda
times are approximate. Times may not be discussed in the order of the time listed and all topics are
subject to deliberation and vote. Please note Mr. Levine is joining us at 2 p.m. We're going to begin
tonight's meeting with a swearing in of a new officer that will be followed by a vote to award
commendations for first responders for the heroic
efforts during the Camp Chikamani emergency. We'll follow that with announcements and public
comment and we will move on to a discussion and vote to designate the position of a part-time
civilian traffic controller. Approximately 6 35 p.m. we will enter into executive session
where we will pursue into Massachusetts general law chapter 30a section 21a
2 3 to discuss strategy with respect to the way on firefighters local 1978 agreement.
We will also pursue into Mass General laws chapter 30a section 21a 3. We will discuss strategy
with respect to collective bargaining with the Township Union. And then finally we will under
Massachusetts general law chapter section 21a 7 review and approve the executive minutes of
August 31st with the intent to hold said minutes. Approximately 7 35 we anticipate we will return to
open session we will have a discussion of the possible operating override including but not
limited to recap from last week's meeting and our next steps followed by a review and discussion of
potential to vote an updated cable advisory committee charge a review and discussion of
our draft fiscal 2026 annual town report submission at 8 p.m we will continue our
ever source grant location of hearing for constituent road to install a new utility
pole and anchor guys we will have a discussion following that from arts whaling for the whaling
fest with potential discussion for a donation to that program town managers report which will
identify discuss a number of items i'll have appointments to committees consent calendar
minutes of august 17th i don't think august 31st are available they are we will review them
review correspondence followed by select boards members reports of concerns
and
and we are spending to adjourn at 8 50 p.m all right so um do we have any um no person we're
going to do a new plan we're going to invite acting chief of police mr hubert and ms reed
our town clerk forward for swearing in our new officer and we're also going to invite the
gentleman isaac barcelone and we'll come forward
to the conference isaac barcelone, officer, isaac barcelone, and you might have a chance to be here. Thank you, um, as you said. We're here to for the swearing in of oscar isaac barcelona. Have a couple of words about him, uh, officer, isaac barcelone graduated from the Randolph police academy in July has been participating in his field training program, which is about halfway over now. Uh, officer barcelone is already a valuable member of the department and brings local experience to the department. Having been born and raised in framing him, um, also barcelone is multilingual and speaks fluScene. zZ. Portuguese, which has already been valuable to the police department in many instances. He brings great real-world experience to the department, having worked in his family business and owned his own business prior to becoming a Weyland police officer. He's always enjoyed connecting with people from different backgrounds and values the meaningful interactions he'll have as a police officer and in his own personal life. I am proud to be able to welcome Dr. Barclone into the Weyland Police Department officially in front of all the select four tonight. I now invite up Weyland Town Clerk, Trudy Reed, to formally swear in Officer Barclone.
You solemnly affirm that you will support the Constitution of the United States of America, the Constitution and laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, the laws and the ordinance of the Town of Weyland, the rules and the regulations of the Weyland Police Department, and you will, to the best of your ability, faithfully perform the duties of patrolman and for the Town of Weyland, during your continuance of office. I swear it. Thank you. Congratulations. Thank you. Thank you. I'm going to go fix it and bring it back to you. Thank you. All right. I'm sorry. I was going to pin Officer Barclone tonight. As you saw, our officers had to run out to a call right at the beginning here, but congratulations. Thank you, Barclone. Welcome.
Rasheed. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And thank you for examining those ahead of time. Your question is stillup front. I really like the previous contribution. Great. Thank you. So, we're going to move into public spaces. Thank you. Thank you so muchlijk. It is very thinning and we'regraceful for our recurrence. Next agenda item. Next. Yes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. May I say so? Yes, the Chief. Yes. Thank you. Sorry. Thank you. My next agenda item. Yes, go ahead, Mr. Chairman. For the next agenda item, we also invite Acting Chair Mark Hebert to join us. I don't believe Chief McPherson is here. I think they will be on a call in my neighborhood. What's that? I saw the car going the other way, so I was coming this way. This is for my fellow board members. We are voting to award commendations for the first responders for their efforts during the tsunami emergency that occurred in August. I'm going to turn the floor over to Mark, and then I think, Mr. McCall, did you have something you wanted to add? And then I will read the commendations that we are issuing, and then we will sign tonight, and then they will be available to be awarded, I think, this week, once the office processes them. All right. Thank you. I just want to say thank you to the board for taking this meaningful step to recognize our employees who responded to the tragedy up there. It was a tough call for all of them to go to. I think a lot of them are still processing it. They still continue to show up every day at work and commit themselves to the town of Wayland, so I appreciate all the employees who participated in that. And, again, just wanted to thank the board on behalf of myself and Chief McPherson for recognizing what they went through that day. You know, they went through and witnessed a lot. And, again, yeah, thank you. Thank you. Mr. McCall, did you want to add something? Or I can... You can open it to the board.
Through you, Madam Chair. No, I want to thank the men and women of our police and fire departments who showed up. We even had members of our inspections. I reached out to the budding towns of Sudbury and Weston, thanked their town managers and their respective chiefs for their response. As was alluded to, this is something that was tragic. It has an impact on the first responders who see that. And I know they tried to let several of the officers and firefighters go. And I know they tried to let several of the officers and firefighters go out that day, and without the help of our mutual partners being Weston and Sudbury, we couldn't have done that. And they were also helpful, you know, giving guidance and support throughout that process. So I thank all involved that day. So the select board is going to award a certificate of recognition to one each, Wayland Police Department, one to the fire department, and then individual certificates to those who responded. I'm going to read just... I'm going to read just one because they were all the same. So, and then make sure everybody's comfortable with that. And then we'll have a motion to approve these and then we can sign them. So in recognition of the exemplary service and response of the members of the Wayland Fire and the Wayland Police Department during the tragic incident at Kanchi County on Tuesday, August 18th, the Wayland Select Board extends its sincere appreciation and commendation to all personnel who responded. In face of a devastating emergency, the members of our fire and police department... ...responded with exceptional professionalism, courage, and compassion, and dedication to duty. Their coordinated efforts prompt response and unwavering commitment to the safety and well-being of those at the scene exemplify the highest standard of public service. The select board recognizes the extraordinary demands placed upon first responders during such a tragic and challenging event, and acknowledges the skill, composure, and humanity with which the members of both departments... ...carried out their responsibilities. Now, therefore, the Wayland Select Board do hereby issue this public statement of gratitude for the professionalism, courage, and dedication... ...demonstrated by the members of the Wayland Fire Department and the Wayland Police Department in service to the town of Wayland.
The individual members receiving this... ...certificate... ...certificate... ...certificate... ...recognition from the fire department are Captain Doug Williams, Lieutenant Alexis Deschamps, Firefighter Paramedic Ian Wallace, Firefighter Paramedic Ryan Jakes, Firefighter Paramedic Claire Maloney, Firefighter Paramedic Daniel Sperling, Firefighter Paramedic John Bonowitz, and Assistant Chief Richard Ripley. Those receiving a certificate of recognition on the police department are Officer Rachel Poole, Sergeant Chris Custode, Detective Sienna Winner, Detective Sergeant Tyler Castagno, Officer Stephen Cavazzi, and School Resource Officer Shane Bowles. Thank you so much. I have a motion. I'm happy to move that this board... ...vote to award commendations... ...to first respondents for the reference during the camp particularly emergency. Thank you. Okay. So since we're all in person, I just... ...we can all say... ...all those in favor say aye. Aye. Motion carries 5-0. Thank you. So I'll just take two seconds here to sign, and there are some here. And if you don't get to sign now before I move to the next... ...and you can sign them before you... we've been meeting while the chair is signing these signatures and we sign them yeah i just make a comment that of course we remember the family of the youngster past and the pain they're going through you know 15 years ago this friday we remember what happened in new york city and one positive that came out of that tragedy was i think an increased appreciation for first responders deal with day in and day out and um the the impact certainly and uh the effect of some of these tragedies they need to be appreciated and that's one reason why we are studying these accommodations today so we appreciate all the work you do and the tough work you do work you do and that was that was clearly a tough event thank you thank you anybody any other comments from the board thank you madam chairman thank you mr whitney or mr levine tom said it well he did but i'm just you know equal opportunity here well the thing that i would add is uh i've worked with first responders for a lot of my career over the last 20 plus years and um it's always unknown what you're going to face in a given day is what i learned watching folks most recently in the last 10 years at the state police and it can be intense in a given day and unexpected and that people keep coming back and doing that job and it's very impressive um and so i hold folks in this profession in the highest regard because it's they do a job that a lot of other people would never do and so i'm grateful for all of you and um tom's right i'm still signing but i also want to say i unfortunately have firsthand experience it's fortunately not it's the level that is experienced during this incident but i'm real happy to see those folks come to your house when you need it thank you all right if somebody would be so kind to actually just give these back to tom we then can check to make sure everyone has signed all of them please and then we'll turn those in and they'll be distributed like i said in a couple days um from the officer who are in charge of this stuff so great thank you so much um mr hebert you're going to be on another item but i have to do the announcements in the public comment first if you don't mind okay i'll take a picture of either can you stay right there nice right okay so for announcement i'm sorry are there any announcements from the board um mr mcdonald no i did want to mention i knew alluded to it tom is that and maybe you want to speak to it is there is a ceremony this friday on did you speak to the 9-11 ceremony this week um i'm not as involved in that it's more of the fire department running that uh ceremony um so there is going to be one it's where is it a public safety bill the public safety bill and what time is it timing i'm not sure of that 10 a.m 10 a.m 10 a.m at public safety building is you know it's a if you will um um just make sure everyone's aware of that all right do we have any public comments any public vote in the room okay thank you we don't have any comments online please that's great thank you very much that brings us to the next agenda item which is to discuss in both uh to designate a part-time civilian act controller position you invite acting chief weaver to discuss it and the information starts on page six in the main packet so the floor is yours sir sure um so this is something i've been working on with town manager mccall and hr director katie ronald and i've been working on this since that moment uh the shooting of the northern east coast I am establishing a new position of the civilian traffic safety employee. We have a need for the department to fill traffic details. We've not always been able to meet the demand that we have. I think I went through for the last two months and we had over 100 details that were either filled by out-of-town employees or didn't get filled at all. So this is an issue that I felt needed to be addressed immediately so that we could fill that demand when we get requests from vendors, when they want traffic details filled in the town of Wayland. So one of the solutions that we've been doing is having firefighters work details as well. This is a necessary step to really do the last bit of that process where they'll be working under the police department instead of firefighters. They'll be working under the title of traffic safety. So the traffic safety employee for the police department will give me the ability to use other town employees as traffic safety officers and also bring in civilians who don't have any relationship with the town of Wayland to be traffic safety employees. Every time we fill a detail ourselves, we have an administrative fee that goes along with it, which helps from the program. With the over 100 details that went unfilled, that was about $5,500 that we couldn't. So that's what we use for other programs and help us administer the traffic safety details. Plus, it takes time for my sergeants to fill those details, to make phone calls to third parties such as the sheriffs or surrounding police departments. I would like to reduce the amount of time they're on the phone calling around and have them out there on the road supervising and participating in the police department instead of trying to fill traffic safety details. So we have a new software that we utilize that just fills it automatically. And the more people I have participating in that software, the faster. The more efficient we can build details. So this vote by the board, if necessary, in order to kind of build up those numbers and allow myself to supervise the traffic safety employees. It's another issue of taking people in from outside of town, not saying that people who come in don't care, but I have less authority over them than if they're my own employees. So I'm looking to establish them as employees of the police department where I can have all the authority to kind of fill and direct the traffic. So I'm looking to establish them as employees of the police department where I can have all the authority to kind of fill and direct the traffic. Thank you. So like I said, on page six in the packet, it is the information, the NGL chapter 268A that talks about special municipal employee. Thank you. So like I said, on page six in the packet, it is the information, the NGL chapter 268A that talks about special municipal employee. And then starting on page seven, I think there's a couple of pages of the actual job description and the duties, pretty detailed. Are there any questions for the acting chief from the board? Mr. Bay. Chief, do the firefighters enjoy being detailed? Do they enjoy it? There are some who participate and participate quite a bit. So I think it's something that they would like to continue to be doing as far as their personal enjoyment. I don't know, but there are. It'd be the wrong choice of words. What I'm getting at is, is it a popular post or not really? Somewhat popular post like that. There are a few who engage in it quite frequently. I haven't seen as many younger firefighters. I don't know if they're doing the details, but there's also was a level of entry as far as training that they weren't 100% clear on. And I kind of clarified that and made sure they know exactly how they need to be trained and offering to help them get trained. So we might see some more engagement from other firefighters as well. Explain to me this. If we vote to designate this position, is it one in one slot or more than one slot? If I may, Madam Chair. Please. For those. Who don't know, Mass General Law Chapter 268A is generally referred to as the ethics statute. It is the position. So it doesn't matter how many traffic safety employees, civilians we have. You're designating the position as a special municipal employee. And that allows a municipal employee to get more than one essentially paycheck from the town. Because normally you're not allowed to do that. But this is not a full-time position. It's a part-time position. So by designating it. Some of these folks won't be in any conflict by getting paid twice by the town. So as the Chief's alluded to, we want to use firefighters and have been. But it could open up the door to having DPW as well. Do you think what Mr. Fay is also asking now, is there just one slot or can you have multiple? No, he can have multiple people. No limit.
One second. If I just stop. I'll set the question. Go ahead. So have a second. You have this tremendous event coming up on October 3rd at the Wynwood Town Center. And if you estimate that you need a certain amount of details, if we pass this, you can, as a matter of law, hire 10 million traffic people. If you deem it appropriate. Yeah, makes sense. I mean, we just had one at the town center a couple of Fridays ago. We couldn't fill the detail for. So this will give me the ability to fill those details. Thank you. All right. I'm sorry. I am. Okay. Mr. Levine. Do you know if peer towns, neighboring towns have equivalent positions in smaller size towns? Yes. There's been a move towards that of having special employees or civilians doing traffic. I know Natix posted for it in the past. I know Sudbury runs a similar program where they have civilians. I think some of our, even our retirees have gone over to Sudbury and worked the details there. So I prefer that they come to us. So I would like to open this up. Is this something that we considered in previous years, but just never. We've kind of slowly worked towards there, trying to fix the problem at a slow pace. First, we allowed retired police officers to work details. And then we opened it up to the firefighters. And we're just still not meeting the need. So now it's kind of got to the point where, especially this summer. Next summer, we might not have that extraordinary amount of details. But when I look at 120 details not filled, that's significant to me. A town the size of Wayland. I'd like to be able to. Address. Thank you.
That's it. So I think.
If somebody had the experience, like they had the diploma and they had the CPR training. That some of these others, they don't necessarily have to be a firefighter or police officer, but to do the job. I think it's probably kind of was your question. Since no one has any other questions. Why don't we have a motion, please? Happy to move this board. Vote to designate the position of part-time civilian traffic controller within the way home police department as a special municipal employee as defined in Massachusetts general laws, chapter two 68 a section one and second. We have a discussion. Okay. All those in favor, say, all right. Motion passes five, zero. Thank you. Thank you for joining us this evening. Thank you very much. Thank you. Congratulations. Thank you. Thank you.
So I'm. Just give those to her. All this. Look at those back. We want to give them folders.
That's interesting. Delay. I'm going to go chase you down. No matter. Fast.
Fast. He's Mr. Prado. I move the Select Board enter into executive session a pursuant to Massachusetts general laws, chapter 38, section 21 a two three to discuss strategy with respect to the William firefighters local 1978 agreements number 2026 dash zero zero zero two step three and be pursuant to Massachusetts general laws chapter 38, section 21 a three to discuss strategy with respect to collective bargains with the following unit. We on police services union. New England. Please. Benevolent. Evaluant Association, Local 176, International Association of Firefighters, AFL-CIO, Local 1978, Weyland Department of Public Works, DPW, Association, Teamsters, Local 170, and the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees, parentheses, AFSCME, Local 690-1 and 2. And C, pursuant to Massachusetts General Laws Chapter 30A, Section 21A-7, to review and approve the Executive Session Minutes of August 31, 2026, with the intent to hold seven minutes. Is there a second to the motion to enter into Executive Session? Second. Thank you.
The Chair declares that a public discussion of these matters may have detrimental effect on the litigating, negotiating, or bargaining position of the town. We'll have a roll call vote. Mr. Levine? Yes. Mr. Whitney? Yes. Mr. Fay? Yes. Mr. Reynolds? Yes. Ms. Martin? Yes. Motion passes 5-0. The Chair invites attendance by Michael McCall, Town Manager, Kate Ryan, Human Resources Director, and Neal McPherson, Fire Chief, if he is available. The Board will rejoin the public meeting from the Executive Session, and we will return to open session in approximately one hour.
The Select Board is back in open session at 7.13 p.m. Thank you. Thank you. All right. So the next item is to continue our discussion on a possible operating override, which will be including a recap of last week and our next steps that we might want to establish. I say possible because, again, we have not received a request, but I think it behooves us to continue to have a parallel discussion until such time is decided whether we will be or not be receiving a request. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Oops.
Does anybody know? Page 12 is this slide that was on the screen, the share screen last meeting. Last meeting we had one slide, and there was a last-minute adjustment. So Mr. Keveny provided us this for tonight, and you can see where this shows right now that estimating that as of last week, I should say, Mr. Keveny is a very, very good leader. estimating that we have about $831,000 shortfall for the FY27. Can you just remind us what line 14 represents the additional $200,000 in each of the three columns? Is that just like a contingency? I'll let Michael speak to that. Ryan puts the plug in there for a number of reasons. Would you like to speak to it, Michael? Well, in part, there's a couple of reasons he does that. There can be some changes and fluctuations in the numbers. We don't have all of our numbers until February, and we have to put together a budget before the end of the calendar year, and we try and deliver a full budget in early January to the finance committee. So if there are some minor fluctuations in our numbers, he tries to put that in. For me personally, I look at the number up here where it says the new growth, which is at $600,000. I don't know if it's in here, but he has mentioned the number he has plugged in for new growth is $600,000, but the best report we had from the assessor was at $370,000. They are still processing, and we'll refine the number. So for me, should $370,000 end up being the number that $200,000 carried, so we wouldn't increase the deficit, but we'll know that number in a few weeks. I think the assessor will have a better number. Also, if there's other numbers coming forward, there's the cost of the borrowing, which do we know what the schedule is for when we're going to be meeting with bond counsel and putting those out in October? Well, Mr. Kevin, he actually meets with Hilltop to get numbers and things. I don't know when the next, I will get that date for the board, and if we don't want to wait until the 22nd, I'll have him email it out. We can get it on the 22nd. I think the big numbers that we are looking for is at the last meeting, and I did, we had the joint meeting. I thought it was very, very productive. I thought everyone did a really good job presenting their thoughts. I did receive an email from the superintendent saying that, you know, they wouldn't be able to give us their school numbers for the budget, you know, for tonight because it was only one week, and I apologize. I said, you know, at the time, I was thinking we're on the two-week cycle, and certainly with the holiday and school starting, you know, so I think it's anticipated they will have those numbers up by the end of this week, right? So those should be in the next spreadsheet we see, which will be at our meeting on the 22nd, and that will probably give us a clearer picture. Maybe we can get an update from the assessor or he'll talk or something. Is there still an opportunity, Michael, for the number to fall below 830, if numbers work out in our direction, or is the 830 the best-case scenario? My recollection is Mr. Keveny said that's kind of the best-case scenario. Yeah. I don't think we would get any major numbers really until after the first year. That's when all of the state aid numbers come up, the insurance numbers. It would really be new growth, and I know the assessor is working on that. Might the school come in at a lower figure than forecast?
I'm not sure. In my limited conversations in the last week or so with Dr. Fleischman, although they gave out higher COLAs, which was a concern for both Mr. Keveny and Dr. Fleischman had indicated that they have had some people not return, so they feel that through attrition they'll be able to make the numbers work, at least for this year. Whatever we do in collective bargaining on our side will also impact the numbers, not only last year for anything retroactive, but going forward. Right. So we're still trying to keep... We're still trying to keep those numbers in mind. Well, continuing that line of thought, is there a number below which you think we could avoid an override and above which you think we need to... We're being asked to estimate it without the right data, and now we're being told we're probably not going to get it for a while.
Let's say hypothetically we did put a question in the ballot, it didn't pass. You always have to make do. So if either someone doesn't ask... For an override or an override's asked for, or the board either puts it on or doesn't, we always have to prepare for that fact. Cuts are never easy, so we don't have a number in mind. Right now I've talked with Mr. Keveny several times about this. It occupies our conversation quite a bit, but we would make do somehow if we had to work with that number. I mean, we're looking at that if that's a possibility for this year. If I may go on just for a minute, Madam Chair. I mean, your policy says the board, if it so chooses, can call for one itself. But to Madam Chair's point, I was going to wait until Dr. Fleischman has his numbers out, and then we're having a meeting tomorrow, a follow-up discussion with Dr. Fleischman and his team. And then once he has his numbers, I asked him, I said, we should sit down and decide whether or not we're going to make a phone. And he said, we should sit down and decide whether or not we're going to make a phone. And I said, we should sit down and decide whether or not we're going to make a phone. So the only reason you may not have seen something, we're waiting for him to finish his numbers and us to see if we can get some of these MOAs done so that maybe by the next meeting you might get a written request from us. Because part of me feels it would be prudent just to make the ask so that we further the discussion and start a timeline in the event something breaks the wrong way now, and we may find ourselves in a position needing one. I wouldn't want something to... To go wrong late fall, and we haven't put anything in place in terms of having an election. So part of me wants to just make sure that if something changes, we're positioned to respond. You want to be prepared. Yeah. So I think... Go ahead. So a couple of things. Mr. Town Manager used the phrase, make do. But just so we're clear, when you use that phrase, make do means address the situation and have... Have to make cuts on the schools and the towns. Yes. Right. And as you may recall, we instituted a hiring freeze except for non-essential employees. So some of these offices are short-staffed. They reach a point where if somebody leaves, I have to fill them because, you know, I can't have one person in the clerk's office or just one person in the assessors, but most of them are down a person or two. We want to continue to provide excellent services. And I think that's a good point. We want to continue to provide excellent services. And I think that's a good point. But if we wind up having to make some cuts, something will change. Madam Chair, is there a date that is a deadline for us to make this decision to take a vote? What's that date? Well, I kind of mentioned a timeline last time, so that's on my notes. Are you reading my notes? I think that the biggest... And I mentioned this last time. I think the biggest issue for us last year was being able to have time to communicate. You know, with residents, whether that's how we do it, you know, whether it's things to the home, or forums, or multiple meetings, or at the very minimum, being able to have a yes vote means, a no vote means written on the ballot. And we've gone to the efforts to have that legislation accepted for Wayland. And so I think we had mentioned this, Doug and I were in this meeting group that Michael's referring to tomorrow morning. The, you know, we said, we'd like to have not the 45 days that the town clerk would like, but more like 60, 75, maybe even 90 days, which 90 might be a little much, in order for us to say, from the time we take the vote, to the time the residents or the town takes the vote, and have that time to do not only the due diligence that you do need to have an election, but also to get that information out. So in my mind, if we wanted to have a... With that... With that concept in place, if we want to have an election in, you know, middle January, for example, I think we need to vote by the end of October, if not the 1st of November. But we do need, what we're running up against, as Mr. McCullough has said, there's some numbers we need, some pieces to the puzzle that are still available that we don't know that we have. So we need to carry on with that. I am going to mention that on the meeting on the 22nd, I think, I'm thinking about talking out loud now here, Michael. But Marvell had put together an agreement that Mr. Hurley sent to me, and it's between the Board of Select. The Finance Committee and the School Committee, and it lays out if you have a multiyear override, I think it's quite a nice document. So I think I'd like to put that in the packet for the 22nd for our discussion for us to look at it, because that might be to your point part of our timeline of what we want to do. So that's one thing. I'm going to go back to the questions. Okay. I do think we need to also decide between now and when we take a vote, what we consider is the threshold, the minimum threshold, you know, for, for an override. I have heard, I haven't heard the board discuss it. We can do it now. If we like, we can wait till next meeting. What do we think is the minimum threshold? I've heard it say, you know, below a million, we should try to work it out, if you will, and then come back the next year. I heard Mr. Kevin, he say, well, you'd be looking for more. Does it make sense to go and ask for an override? That's total and making this a five or 6 million versus you wait another year when it's eight or nine, what we really, you know, so that I think the board needs to have that conversation. I will tell you the finance committee is having that conversation and they may in fact be having it as part of their agenda again tonight. And they, they are really questioning, you know, you, on a hundred and let's talk about a hundred and 100, $510 million budget, not under 20, because those are the enterprise funds. You know, how do you, how do you find like basically a half a percent to do? So it's a lot of money. So they're having that conversation as well. And they actually recommend not only to us, which we would take that information and have them come and present to us. So we'd want to make sure the finance committee could come in and, and present to us as well.
And then the last thing I want to point while I'm here is that Tom and I had this offline conversation about the agendas. And when we got into this item, he suggested, and do you want to speak about it? You know, I, I personally would like to hear from the public on these, on these that, you know, where's the head at it, maybe have a public forum, you know, before relatively soon. Right. Yeah. So I was thinking, just hang on a second. I was thinking if the board was amenable as part of the next steps, I would schedule, I felt like the October 5th meeting. That would give us a chance to get a little more detail on the 23rd from the, from Brian and the schools or what have you. And then on the 5th, we could just have an open forum talk to us about how you feel in advance of our potential vote. And if there were agreement to that, then I will have Jalen, you know, advertise, start advertising that. Mike was shaking. I said, yes, I know you're in agreement because we talked about it and it was everybody think that's a good idea. Do you spend an hour or so listening to everyone? Well, you know, to your point, Carol, I just ran, and it numbers quickly. The A31 is about slightly less than 0.7% of the budget. And, but that includes debt service. It includes some things that we really can't touch. So it might be well to try to understand what, what the percentage is of the kind of variable versus fixed expenses. Also, I think for a public meeting, it would be important to understand, you know, the implications of not having an override and specifically, you know, can you cite, can we cite positions? Can we cite programs? You know, that is, that's the kind of compelling information that I think people need to make an informed decision. And if we're going to have a public forum, I think ideally we would have that from, from the schools, from the town, just to talk about. You know, we hear about diminution of services or some programs. You know, we, we hear about music and poker school. Well, geez, Louise, that ain't nothing. Yeah, Bill, that's a good idea. And the only flip side of that is you'll hear Dr. Fleischman say, you know, what if we say, if it doesn't pass, if we don't go forward, we have to eliminate X, Y, and Z. And then the numbers work out and we don't have an override, but then the folks who, who hold those positions have now found other positions. So it's a challenge, but maybe we could speak more on a high level as if this 800,000 represents, you know, I'm going to make this number. I'll just say it 300,000 for the town to cut it 500 for this. I'm going to make an up and up. It's four and four. Let's just don't get myself involved. Phone calls tomorrow. I appreciate the superintendent's concern, but if, if these things are tangible, people can really point to something, a specific program, what's everybody else think about that? I think that that's absolutely critical. I was going to say the same thing because $800,000 in what to somebody, when they look at the numbers is 120 plus million dollar budget. It has no meaning unto itself. You have to make it tangible somehow. And I understand that you don't want to name specific positions, but you can potentially say this will mean the cuts of five full-time employees across the schools or three, or four or full-time employees on the town. Like you, you have to give some kind of meaning to the numbers or it, you know, when I look at it just in a vacuum like that, yes, I feel like we should just be tightening our belts for $800,000 for more than a hundred million dollar budget. And the other point that is what I said last time is the numbers have changed significantly in our favor just since June 15th. And here we are on September 8th, less than three months ago, we went from 8.9 million for the three years to 7.3 million in mid-August. And now we're at 6.8 million today. And our number alone for the next fiscal year started at $2.7 million and has come all the way down to $830,000. So if I'm paying attention at all, and I'm seeing that, I don't want to vote on a three-year override because how much more are they going to change in the next year? How much more are they going to change in the next two years? And if it starts trending in the other direction, I'd be interested in seeing that. But if this is about where we're ending up, I'm hesitant to bring the override vote. But at the same time, to Bill's point, I want to hear what it means if we don't bring that forward as a vote. What are the cuts looking like? Right. So I think,
I'm just concerned about the appearance of chaos. And we, I would just repeat what Doug and Bill just said, that the numbers seem to be flying all over the place. Remember in two recent meetings we've had, well, what's in the packet and what are you bringing today? If we run into an optics problem with the override, we're contemplating for the next year, that's going to impact the subsequent year. And so when you say zoom out a notch and get the big picture for the forum, zooming out a notch means we get a really crisp story with no timing excuses, from the school committee know which sheet did I mean from the finance area. And that really is our job. I sense right now that I'm very worried that if it looks chaotic and it isn't chaotic, people are doing a good job. We've just got to present it with where we're going to get an adverse decision. It's just hard because we have to forecast. And we're just trying to forecast just for this year without having the numbers, much less the next two years. That's very difficult to forecast, but what it seems like as we're getting, we're getting clear numbers is it does so far keep breaking in our direction. Right? It's a significant jump down in the last few months. Given what you just said, I'm a newbie. So part of my inchoate question, but why are we getting stuff so late? Is this the norm? Well, I mean, we don't even have, we won't get everything until the beginning of next year. I guess a fair characterization is late, right? Information is changing. Numbers are changing information, you know, and every month, every three weeks, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's evolved. Information is not available at certain times and comes in kind of drips and drops waiting all the way into next thing. We need to crystallize this. Do you want to say one thing that Chris point is very, I don't ever, we talk about app numbers at this form. We need to say, this is what's being forecast. This is the forecast. Cause again, we don't have the final budget until well, the preliminary. So it's like December do a preliminary in December. And then generally the final one happens in January. Usually after the governor releases of what are called cherry sheets, short chapter 70, 90. And then it goes to the finance committee who might make some. And while deliberating is usually when we get the health insurance numbers. I think we need to label everything. Forecast forecast. The forecast right now shows that we are projected or projecting. Right. To be 800 different. And to your point, when we get closer and closer, that 200, maybe our comfort level improves with us. And we only need a hundred of it or something, but right now the 200 needs to stay. So, you know, as to the timing, maybe it makes sense to wait a bit until some of these things get nailed down. But last year we did the, the bands refunding and we did the reclassification of the debt and things were better than expected. And in hindsight, we may not have needed to do one or both. And I just think it's important for credibility. We can say we need an override that we have a, I have as few variables in there as possible. Maybe that argues for pushing out the election, recognizing that, you know, off the budget, if the override, if that's the way we go, it doesn't pass. Yeah. There's a lot of scrambling, but. I think the issue is because it's on the line between maybe, and if we want an override, maybe we don't versus if you look at the next two years, it's nowhere close to the line when you're talking like two to $3 million, you're not going to make up for that shortfall, but here we're now in the hundreds of thousands of dollars and moving down. We're on the line. So Michael wants to speak, but I'd like to just address this calendar thing. So originally, if you remember, even Michael mentioned that there were three options. One was to vote the 1st of August so that we would make, make the ballot that just went out. We said, no, no, because again, we want to have time to communicate. We want to have time to deliberate. That's it. We want to really make sure we haven't had an override since. Oh, nine or nine or seven. So maybe we really have to think about this, do some due diligence, as I say. So then we suggested that we would have it, you know, in January. So what really is the lever here is, is when does, the warrant go to press and the budget has to be, you know, voted in by the finance committee. Am I going to give you my guesstimate is they have to be done by March 1st. So we don't want to vote too, too late to give them a chance to make adjustments. If it passes, it's one thing. If it doesn't pass, they have to make those, those adjustments. But we probably could maybe go to end of January or something. If that helps, I don't know if that would help. That would help us get the, the, the borrowing numbers that would help us get, pretty good idea of the health insurance. Cause Westerberg would probably given an indication, then new growth would, but the main date is January. She's in that usually tell them bounces are slightly in our favor, you know, like up 25,000 or something. So it's, I think Brian does a really good job on those numbers. So if we had a forum, could we begin it with a certain number of minutes that you would pick, but I'm just going to make up a 10 minute summary of how the process works. Cause I love what, just adding up what you all just said, it's not as chaotic as it looks. Chris is what I just heard. We actually, we knew the process and it would do public. We would of course tell everybody, they already know the problem, the process, because they're all perfect citizens, but we would remind them and have it fresh in mind. If you will, that might be a really good way of shortening the process. So I think what we've done in the past on the forums is we've kind of given, we really were gathering input more than, than whatever. So we, but we do give, a little explanation as to, you know, the issue that we're facing and the issues and why we're looking at the particular item or whatever. And I certainly think we would have to give, show the slide and show where we are and talk about, this is a, a you know, a forecast and that, you know, we are hoping that the numbers continue to go our way, but if they don't, we are going to have to face voting for an override and it would mean high level tightening our belts. You know, perhaps losing some positions, but then I think we really want to open it up to get input. Don't we? Would it include a timeline so we could show that we're not behind the eight ball? Oh yeah. You can also give a little history. I found an article in Metro West daily news that Wayland passed five overrides between oh two and oh eight. And the last time an override vote failed in Wayland was in 1990 when Tom was on the slack board. I hear that. Wife, Mr.
All right. So what do you, what do you think? I think you said it well, madam chair, I think we have a plan. We have a plan. So we're pretty good. And, and to your point, bill, I think we, when I gave him the timeline, of course I'm that's my job to lay it out. And I certainly personally, I, I, I think we can be a little flexible on that, but I think we have to also focus on the later we vote. How does that impact? The rest of the process, because we do have to have that warrant out. So Mr. McCall, I didn't let you finish. Sorry. Oh, no, I was going to say, I think great minds think alike. I think we're all thinking the same thing about making sure, regardless of what we ultimately do with regard to an overnight, that the public get some information in these forecasts. So before you mentioned that a select board member of Fay wanted to do that, I was going to suggest that we have a public forum sometime this fall showing the forecast, so people are aware so that they won't be caught off guard. If we decide to go for one of the wild cards, people asked if you recall earlier this summer, you gave me authorization to vote on energy contracts. I've been talking with Mr. Fay and we are, I check in with him regularly. We have not exercised some of those options yet because of what's going on in the Middle East. And it's having, it's having impacts on the energy that we need to lock in for this coming winter. And those numbers are up much higher than they are usually. And it's not just the actual units of the energy, all the delivery costs and the how it's delivered to the US, natural gas and other things has all gone up considerably. And he's concerned about that because we have to heat all these public buildings. They have to provide electricity, everything. So we are waiting. He said, you know, if we get a day where it drops, you know, their consultant is notifying them almost daily of the fluctuations in the market. And we're waiting to see where it comes down back to a normal range we're used to. But right now it's up fairly high. So then that if we were forced to lock in, you know, if the trend keeps going up, it's going to be considerably higher than previous years. So that's the type of thing that could fluctuate. So anything in the next steps that I've missed here? Anybody else has any points? I've got some notes here and we'll schedule that for October 5th and that'll be part of the October 5th meeting. It won't be a separate meeting. Could I underscore a bill? Bill mentioned it might be later than that, though. It might be later. When would we hold the forum? October 5th. You went to the forums earlier, but it's the voting is later, right? Well, I guess the question is, will we have a reasonable story to tell about this is the impact with and the impact without? Well, we have two forms, right? We can have two forms, one on the fifth and we have one in January when. Oh, yeah, no, we definitely would do when the pitch is clear. Yeah. Yeah. Well, this is when we're meeting in October meeting on the fifth and the 19th. I picked the fifth because again, I'm thinking if we were if we were going to schedule this vote for mid January, we would probably want to vote the end of October. That gives us 70, 75 days beginning in November. But if you want to have the forum later on the 19th, we can do it then as well. Madam Chairman, I'm just concerned that given what I've heard in recent meetings about. One person began a meeting by saying we don't have a formal report ready today and things like that, I think October 5th is suddenly going to seem really soon. And if credibility is our number one. But I will have to have those numbers by then. Then I withdraw. Thank you. I just think this forum its primary purpose is to educate on the process. And and the general appreciation for the fluidity of the situation. So it puts it on people's radar. No clear answers will come out of the forum, come from up. It's too early, but it educates people. And what we're thinking and what we're considering. But I do think that if we're going to take a vote in October and whether to schedule a hearing or an election, we need to understand the implications of. Moving and not approving. Yeah, yeah, I agree that. I mean, we can we can vote. I think we could vote as late as beginning November, particularly if we hold a public forum in October because we're starting the education. Communication process. And what's what's everybody going to do? If we vote to pursue our question, you can always withdraw it if the numbers are all of a sudden approved, right? And we could vote to withdraw. You listen to this every month. So if we meet on the 19th and then two weeks is like November 4th or 5th, we could vote that, you know, this is not a surprise what we're doing now. It's not like, OK, we met and then the next week we met and we took a vote and then we're having. The. Election work. If we have this form, just like to Tom's point, to explain the fluidity of this and that we're watching this and, you know, we've been watching this since. Well, I think the board's been watching this since July. This is the first time we had it as a full board discussion. That there's a possibility of an override and we're watching it and we want people to be aware of what we're watching and what we're considering and that. You know, listen, as the chairman facilitator, we don't want to vote till December. We're not going to vote till December. But I will. It's my responsibility to say if we don't vote till December, this is what happens. And we may end up having to create two by this, which actually creates more work and maybe some other issues to try and not do that. If we have to, we have to. But if my preference would be not to create extra work for the people, I'm really not big on that. But.
So. Are we comfortable with October 5th? For a forum? Yeah, I'm fine with it. No, no, no. I like the idea of doing two forums, and I feel if it's more of a listening session and just talking about process, that's fine. And I think people are going to want to hear some specifics, though, that we may not be able to share with them. I was looking at this article again from the last override vote was 1.9 million and they talked. About what those cuts would mean at the schools. They were specific, like we have to lay off this many teachers, phys ed teachers, and they they had kind of a menu. And so people became very real for people, I think, at that point. So that's what we were doing. We have the second form once we've actually taken the vote. We've made the decision. We've committed ourselves to having a vote in January, February, whatever it is. And now this is how much we're asking you to vote on. And if we don't take that. Vote and we say we're not going to have an override because, say, it's 700 or $800,000, that will necessarily mean cuts. So you have to explain to people this is how the reduction is going to happen. So how would you like to do it?
I mean, day wise, we have to. Yeah, because we have to we have to put a stake in the ground here. We have if we're going to communicate where we are, that's what I I think that's what Tom and I are saying. I'm like, we're in agreement here, aren't we? So that we're in a fluid situation. We have to ask the schools for their input, too, because that's what more most I assume most of the cuts are coming to us. So we can have for the 23rd meeting. We can't go anywhere on any of this without those numbers. I'm going to do you think it's premature to have a tab on the town website relative to override that we could we could populate that with information, including, by the way, this article that that Doug just mentioned, say an example. Of how it was done back in 19 minutes. One way we were down the road before, you know, just educate, educate. I think we could start and do something specific to the FY 20 budget and then talk about the other years of putting the forward out there. And, you know, not to confuse people that we are having an override. But here's where we are. This is what we're looking at for FY 28. And this is what could happen. And trends keep going this way without, you know, putting the label. Override on it. But I think it would be worthwhile to start publishing that information. So we have to be prepared to answer the first question, which is what happens if there's no override, right? Well, one thing that could happen is some of these numbers can get a little closer to where we'd like them. And that's one thing maybe if I'm not sure.
Do we want to have this? We don't want to have a forum. We do want to have a forum on the fifth. The other option is I was going to plan on inviting the Finance Committee to. Come in and they could also speak and talk a little bit about their thoughts about this, or we could meet with them or we know what you like to do. I'd like to have them down the line. OK, there's there's and there is an unclear the final numbers as we are. So the 19th is more preferable to me, but I don't feel strongly about it. I'm not being intrepid. We should do it when we're ready. Yeah. And if we're not ready, you know, in fact, I think I was on the board. You were. You were the chair.
It was successful. It was successful. I obviously. We said, I mean, they had to do them quite frequently, as I recall. And and and there were really fairly specific examples of what happens if we don't do this. So and you know, the and I don't think the successes can be attributed to the board of selectmen as much as there are a group of parents who got very motivated to talk to PTOs and have coffees in their houses. And it was it was quite an effort. And, you know, a big postcard list in those days. And in those days, to your point, we did say this is what's going to be cut. And we sent people we. But you see what happened. After the vote was taken, this is kind of what this was. This was, I think, to. After the Select Board had voted to take to put it on the on the ballot. I think that's what happened. Perhaps go back. Yeah. So what we're talking about is having an informational discussion and getting feedback before we take a vote. And then after another one, after we take a vote, the after the vote would say. It's X dollars. This is where the cuts are going to be. And this is what happened in Lexington. I. Think they passed the budget, the debt exclusion for the new high school, $650 million. And I don't think the Select Board then took the vote to the town for an override. So they just made cuts because they thought we just asked for $650 million. We can also come back now for an override vote. And they and they made cuts and people were frustrated about that because they didn't they weren't even given the option to have an override or not. But that's what the. Select Board did. There's. You share that story. Yeah. Your name text kind of twirled. I'm just trying to get in on the camera. We're getting shot here in the corner. Are we are we doing something on the fifth? We're just going to wait till we see what happens in the next minute. We're waiting. We're waiting. We're waiting. All right. I think we have finished this topic for tonight, but we'll be up in the morning. We'll be up in the next minute. I'm sorry we decided that. But inside that one. Now we're going to move to the supplemental packet and this is
the updated Cable Advisory Committee charge that Mr. Levine was working on for us. And that came out earlier today. Whoops, I don't think so. Doug, would you like to do this? Basically, we need to reform the Cable Advisory Committee because one of our. Contracts with one of the two providers is coming due. And we usually form this well in advance as it is a 12 plus month process to renegotiate the new license. And I appreciated this time the input from Mr. Doug Stotts, who has made us aware that there are other municipalities and he sent a link to one from the town of Greenfield that have created their own municipal broad. Band service for Internet streaming TV and phone. I didn't even know that was an option. So I wanted to add that to the charge just to be able to explore that option instead of just focusing solely on the two cable providers. And the reason is, as folks know, more and more individuals are cutting the cord. And it's the revenue that comes in, which is the maximum of 5% of the revenue from the. Town from the cable providers that goes to the town specifically to wake him. That number drops as more and more people are opting out of the cable service. And so I think we're hoping the legislature acts at some point to bring in streaming services into this discussion. But that has not happened yet. And we are going to have to be negotiating something within the next year to 18 months. So it would be nice to look at other options because way. I'm just feeling the brunt of it year after year.
So in the packet, we have a red lined version. And then we had. You can just look at the clean version of the. Versions on page four. Yeah. So I just want. And it's only the charge is that the other is just background information that those bullets are just only voting on the top. Just that top paragraph. So before I open it up to questions, I just want to make one suggestion. Do we want to match the title to the first? Yes. Yes. I say. Broadband. Okay. So anybody have any comments? Appreciate Doug doing this. Yeah, I do, too. So do we, you know, this is a committee that. I know the answer, but I'm going to ask this anyways. This is a committee that we utilize just for the negotiating of the contracts. So do we want to add that in there that they. That it sunsets once the once the negotiation. Is concluded. Sure. Although it sounds to me that you're advocating that that that our board establish a committee that can. Right. Look at. We can do both of those things in that period of time. See if I don't need to go beyond. I don't think that's a long period of time. So that was that was basically my question as well. So I didn't know. And then I think we're pretty good. So based on that, any other comments or questions from the board? Otherwise. I'll entertain a motion, Mr. Doug. I move that the select board approve as amended with the additional change regarding the sunsetting of the committee at the conclusion of negotiations, the charge for the new broadband and cable advisory committee. Thank you. And if we have a discussion, otherwise, we'll just go to the vote. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Passes five zero. All right. And now we are going to talk about back to the packet. This is the draft of our 2026 annual report submission. Thank you, Bill, for doing this. And that starts on page 13 of the packet. And would you like to walk us through that, please? Sure. So the reporting period is July 1, 2025 to June 30, 2026. And during that time, we had a member, even another member, join us to try to, and frankly, of course, I don't know when you subscribe to the oath of office. So I don't know if that data is accurate.
It's it's basically the day after the town meeting, so. That's one question. So I don't know, it's a. I use the. Standard format. I think I am something like four words over the maximum number. So for. You get rid of a couple of comments. No, I can't.
I'll take your name off, Carol. But I get rid of discussion draft that I'm halfway there. So, you know, I. Came up with this financial management. Category since I think we spent a fair amount of time on that.
And of course. This involves Michael's efforts as well. Merely the board goes up saying. To say that the board secured the FEMA grant is.
Anyway.
So I don't know. There's a couple of things to say. I'm not sure. The data. The data. Is pretty straightforward, I think. So if I've missed anything. If you think they're. Things that can come out. Jaylin has the original, so. Section that says objectives. That's also going in the report. They specifically asked for objectives. For the coming year. All right. We supposed to put anything. On the end. That says. for the forward thinking statements or any of that. I'm supposed to, this is just the end here, right? After the- It's typically respectfully submitted, Carol B. Martin, Chair. Ma'am. Well, does anybody have any comments, edits, questions? First of all, thank you very much. It's lovely. Thank you for doing it, Bill. Yeah. I had nothing. No one has anything. Why don't we just go to the motion here? Would you like to make a motion, Bill? I move that the Select Board adopt this draft document
as its report for the period, July 1, 2025, through June 30, 2026. Second. Any further discussion?
No second. Okay. Let's go to the vote. Please, all those in favor, say aye. Aye. Passes 5-0. Happy to move this to the- Hang on a second. I got the consent, I got, is consent next? No, it's not next on the, we have comments for you. Three minutes. Thank you. All right. Happy to move the consent calendar for, today's the 8th, September 8th, 2026. Okay. Further discussion? All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Motion passes 5-0. I think I'm okay to go to the, the hearing. Isn't that next? 8 o'clock. I can do . So I'm going to reopen the hearing that we're continuing to add a source.
I declare the whole, the, our official account. Okay. Thank you. And I declare the whole, the, our official account. Madam Chair, do we need anybody to join us? You're going to find out in one second. I thought they need another one, Mel.
That's why I can start now. Okay. So I'm going to declare the hearing open, and I declare this hearing open for the purpose of continuing the consideration for the application of our grant of location from Eversource Energy and Verizon to install a full number 4-73A on the easterly side of Cotillo at approximately 107 plus or minus feet north of Yeager Way. This hearing was posted in the Metro West Daily News on Friday, August 14th. We heard the hearing at our last meeting on August 31st. We asked for some additional information, including a recommendation from the DPW and the Police Department. And Abby followed up on that. She received an email that said that Eversource would like to withdraw their application because it turns out that they have... They have other poll work on the site that they need to do. And so they'd like to get the plans together to have everything on the same request. In addition, the DPW is not prepared to make a recommendation until they have a site plan visit with Eversource. So based on that information, I am going to move the board take no action on the application for grant location for Eversource Energy and Verizon to install and maintain one full and any necessary anchors and guidelines. And I'm going to move the board take no action on the application for grant location for Eversource Energy and Verizon to install and maintain one full and any necessary anchors and guidelines to be installed on the public right-of-way on the easterly side of Cotillo Road at approximately 107 plus or minus feet north of Yeager Way, as the applicant has withdrawn their application with the intention of reapplying at a later date with an expanded scope of work. Is there a second? Second. Thank you. And then we'll have some discussion. Do we need to take such a motion if the applicant doesn't go forward? No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. Well, we opened it, the hearing, so I have to close the hearing. You can close the hearing, certainly, but I don't want you to have to. So I'm willing to close the hearing, and this is the reason why. Let's see, the motion is withdrawn. I'm willing to close the hearing because the applicant has withdrawn their application with the intent of replying at a later date with an expanded scope of work. Is that better? Okay. You like that? Sorry. Okay. So you got knocked out, Tom. That's quite all right. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Excuse me. Do you need to, you need a motion to close the hearing? No. I did it the same time. I moved to close the hearing because I put them all in the motion. It's in the same motion.
The main motion to your point, Bill, is to close the hearing. I agree with you. That's the main motion. But can the chair just close the hearing with that? Is that a vote? Is that a vote? No, she's not. But the motion on the table includes closing the hearing. We have to vote. We vote. We usually vote when I close them. Do you want to read it? Let's vote, and I'll find out if we have to do it. How's that? No, no. I want to hear Bill's point. Sorry. So are we voting to close the hearing? Yes. Yes. Do we need a vote to close the hearing? Yes. Because we opened it. Yeah. Because we all opened it. Yeah. It's not something the chair does. Doesn't the chair open a hearing and close the hearing? Oh. It says on here, move to close the hearing. Did you move to open the hearing, too, originally? You clear them open. Well, you've declared open, but you moved. I take a motion to close it because it was usually a motion. And the motion here is because they've withdrawn.
I have a comment to make. Do I make a move? Wait till we get a motion. And you can discuss the motion.
But there's a motion on the table. This is maybe angels on the head of a pin. But it seems to me that when we advertise it here, it's a motion to close the hearing. You open the hearing. You don't, the board doesn't act to open the hearing. And I think you're typically, chair typically closes the hearing. We opened it and we continued it last time. That's true. So now it's. I think, I think you as the chair have that ability.
I don't know. Just. I'm going to move. Are we creating a precedent where we have to. Here we go. I move to close the hearing because the applicant has withdrawn our application. We're temporarily applying at a later date with a second hearing. Okay. If I need a second hearing, can you call the hearing? I think the applicant has withdrawn the hearing. I don't think I can call it a second hearing. I think it's a matter of time. Okay. Okay. That's what it says. I'm supposed to say. That's what I said. Go ahead. I recall. That's me a second. We've covered on that and I'll second the motion. Thank you. I just had an innocent question. I recall a distinguished citizen asking about double poles. And given that what we're talking about here, we give the utility more time. Has somebody mentioned to them, we wouldn't. name is that part of the scope i did mention on me on the recap from the meeting to abby who reached out to eversource that we not only would like an aerial picture we would like to have some input on a strategy for removing double poles broken poles and poles that are on private so i guess if you don't mind management it's just a very good comment i would like for the minutes to know there is a double pole on route 30 that is just east of mel's yes that frankly looks like the entire contraption could fall over into the boat it's not can you put that in your reports and concerns that's not part of the scene well it is i think i beg to differ i i it is we brought it up i think so that has to do with closing this year okay well i see you i'm sorry it's about the motion on the table i'm sorry if i try to raise it later you'll say it's out of water but what have we decided? Are we going to vote this or not? Aye. The MMA says we should do it. Thank you. Even though in my memory, I don't recall ever taking a vote to close hearings. You did hearings. I have drawn the lucky hearing badge. I have done about 50 of these, I think, in the last year and a half. Okay. All those in favor say aye, please say aye. And those opposed? And those opposed? I just don't understand. Okay. Vote 401, correct? Correct. Okay. I'm going to circle back to you on that, please, if I may. I would just follow up, though. We've had, Chris, maybe before you joined the board, we had counsel for Eversource in here, and we talked about double polls. And he said, yeah, we hear that a lot. And there are other utilities that are on. There are other utilities that are on there. And, you know, we're sort of, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I realize you're sorry, I'm making a squeaky wheel argument. Oh, I think it's fine. Just that. Okay. A photo of the contraption I referred to might disfell some illusions. Yeah. If you have a picture of it, perhaps you could forward it to me, and I can forward it along so that we can say. If you would like this addressed. I will do that, and that's all about this work. I'm worried I'm protracting things to your dismay. I will get you a photo. You're not making any dismay for me. I'm just doing this. I think Bill is trying to make me not be on time, and I'm trying to stay on time.
I would like to see why the is Ms. Gray, Robin Gray, and the attendees.
No? No. Okay. I move that the board. For the request of $7,000 for the Wayland 2026 Festival. Second. How about if I open the topic first? Okay. So we are discussing a funding request in parts of Wayland for the 2026 Wayland Festival, the potential to vote. The request is in the packet as indicated. It is for $7,000, and we have a motion from Bill and a second from Doug to support that. I want to ask you one question, though. Do you know the funding source? So I think we need to have a little conversation and discussion about the funding source. What was it last year? I'm sorry? What was the source last year? I think Mr. McCall is going to tell us this. Yes. We used some of the remaining town center gift funds. We gave $9,500 to the Wayland Festival. So we have, I would like to take this opportunity while we're talking about funding, because we're going to get a couple other requests in a couple more weeks, we have a grand total of $32,000. So we're going to have to spend for the entire fiscal year in our budget. We were very lucky that we ended up picking up some, let me say it right, guaranteed payments, which we used to fund the constructive dialogue program, and we used to fund the external accounts for the Route 20,000. I think we have committed 38 plus or 40,000 of that. We do have probably 10 left of that. We could use this. I think Mr. McCall has looked this up, because I think he felt we should be consistent, because this has been an ongoing request, so would you like to speak to it? No, I think we've tried to use these. I know that the Arts Wayland is looking to phase this out, and so it was initially some seed money to help with this. So it's not going to be a reoccurring expense in the future, so I don't want you to take it out of the board's expenses. We did it last year from the Town Center gift funds, because I think it's relevant and related to Town Center and the monies that were donated by the developer. So I think it would help, because it helps stimulate the growth and the activity over there. So would you mind, if everyone's comfortable with using $7,000 of our Town Center funds, would you mind redoing the motion to include the funding source, please? Yes. Thank you. Thank you. And second? Thank you, sir. We accept that friendly amendment. Thank you. And would you like to friendly accept the second? Friendly second. All right. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. One abstentions. Opposed? And one abstentions. Opposed and one abstentions. Okay. That brings us to the next item, which I believe is the Town Manager's Report. So Michael, the floor is yours, please. Just making notes. Okay. So the Town Manager's Report. Thank you, Madam Chair. Just a couple of things. I have them in order. There will be a hazard mitigation plan update meeting with the public. It's going to be a daytime meeting on September 23rd from 10.30 a.m. to 11.30 a.m. And the town of Wayland is inviting residents, business owners, community members to help shape its hazard mitigation plan. And this is a critical document that helps identify natural hazards facing the town and how we will respond to those to reduce property damage, injuries to people, infrastructure, and the environment. There'll be a link posted, if it's not already there, on the town's website for anybody who wishes to participate. Just a quick legislative update. Tom. Holder and I have been working with our state delegation to get the enabling legislation to amend the MWRA legislation and add Wayland as a member community. And that's been going along. We've had great participation from Senator Eldridge and our two representatives, Gentile and Linsky. And I've been working closely with Representative Linsky on the liquor license legislation that we passed. We sent Home Rule up. And Representative Linsky is confident that we may get it through this session. So it's going before the hearing, the licensing hearing tomorrow. I've already submitted everything they've asked for. Robert Hummels assisted me. We've submitted maps. We've identified where we would issue these 10 licenses within the town. So we targeted Town Center, East Route 20 in the Kichichewit area because they wanted a breakdown. They just didn't want to give us 10. They wanted to make sure they were distributed equally within our business districts. And I've supported, excuse me, issued a letter in support of this for written testimony. They didn't ask for live testimony. So I had to submit that already. So, again, Representative Linsky and all of our members have been helpful in all of these endeavors. Update on open positions. Today we posted the assistant town manager position. We've already received inquiries. I've had some people reach out to me. So that's exciting. We are working on a timeline to do the chief process. I've been trying to talk to some current and retired chiefs to get their participation in an assessment that we will do here in-house. Hoping to get that posted in another week or so and build the timeline. I'm just trying to schedule people in for the participation on that. Mike? Yeah. Okay. So I'm going to start with the city council. We've been working on this for a while now. So we've been working on this for a while now. So we're going to start with the city council. We've been working on this for a while now. So we're going to start with the city council. So we're going to start with the city council. We're going to start with the city council. Town manager office hours will be on Monday, September 14th in this room, unless otherwise posted from 530 to 630. And just a couple of reminders. Since we last met, we went back to regular business hours, which means we will be closing at 4 on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. And we'll be open until 1230 on Friday. One of the other efforts that we've been working on, I've been meeting with staff with regard to the historic district parking initiative. initiative we had a meeting with stakeholders from the various boards the the depot the historic district commission herd house we had some residents and we fleshed out some ideas we wrote those down so i've since had the town engineer the town surveyor dpw and our public safety and which of those ideas are feasible some we had to strike out because they're in the uh within the wetlands buffer we just couldn't find enough land so we've narrowed it down to a handful that the town surveyor and the engineer are going to go back and try and draw up an actual parking plan and then we're going to go back and meet with the residents and go over what our options are and then our plan is to bring a proposal to the board about parking signage and potential new locations i should mention when we talk about parking lot it came up the ribbon cutting at terrain and it's come up more than once terrain would like to talk to us about potentially licensing some parking spots on the weekends in the back uh i've been working with town center on a couple of things we're working on the wayland fest licensing agreement how we do that for touch a truck and and the whole festival we did something similar with alta oxbow for one day uh we got certificates of insurance but that was one day in may um had a shuttle service for an event they had but they're looking for overflow parking over here so i will follow up with terrain and i may have a proposal to you from them while we were discussing parking in historic district the conversation of ellam island road came up recently and i've received some complaints from folks about parking in historic district and i've received some complaints from folks about parking in about the cars that come off of Route 20 as cut-throughs, and they fly down, and oftentimes they come right down the middle of the road and they've almost hit staff. And now that we're going to have terrain and employees there starting to park in the back and take deliveries, I said to DPW, you know, do you think we could ever strike that road because there was no center line? And Joe just said to me, as a matter of fact, the striping crew is in town tonight. And wound up, I had, because we had the public safety there, I had the two chiefs, they said that would be a great idea. So we took it upon ourselves. I reached out and had them do that. Nobody's complained, but I think it's good because so many people are looking at the traffic in Route 20 for their opportunity to cut, and they're not focused on where they're entering that road and where they're coming out. So I thought I might get some feedback, but so far I haven't. I'll let you folks know. And just the last thing, we are continuing to meet regularly with our regional dispatch. I told you we had the meeting, so I remember Whitney was there with State 911, a small subset of folks, the executive director and the Natick town manager were able to get a meeting with Senator Karen Spilka, the Senate president, and the State 911 and the Undersecretary of Public Safety came back in. And the senator really pressed them for a commitment to ensure that this would open on time next July, and they gave a verbal commitment that they would do that. So we are still following up, working with them. I have my IT director engaged with them now as we want to try and get a project plan for how we're going to connect our networks. So we're still continuing to move forward, trying to make sure that opens next year because that could, be helpful in the whole override calculus. One of the main reasons, as you may recall, was joining up with them. The state is trying to move people to these regional dispatch and they're putting more grant money in there. And it would help us if we could shift some of our dispatchers over there. Our assessment is based on the number of calls, so we don't pay the most over there, but it would also help us to have a better system. And they would take care of the equipment. There's so many benefits that would happen, have happened to us that we want to make sure this happens as soon as possible. On that, I don't have anything else to add. Matt and Jared, entertain any questions? In your discussions with Terrain, are they suggesting that they will close their garden store when they have events in order to assist themselves in accommodating the people? I can ask how they'll do that. I think, yes, I'll ask that. What I foresee they're asking is if they could have some dedicated parking if they need for overflow. And I want to talk to REC and everybody on this side, because if they had a Saturday wedding, we're having soccer matches here. I'm not sure how that would work out. You know, and they're going to say, oh, we have the back row. I don't need police. That's fine. I don't need police. I don't need police down here. So I have to work through the departments to see how that'll work. But I'll ask about the. Could that be customer parking or employee parking? All I know is they've reached out now, so I will inquire. I would think employee, because they probably wouldn't want their customers, because I actually talked, when we talked about the historic district parking, we were talking about how, if at all, we could put a crosswalk at the end here because people may, at some point, you know, we have the Bistro, we have terrain, people may find themselves parking here and trying to walk back. And you have to have something on either side. So without putting sidewalks all the way up and down both sides of Pellebrown Road, we could put an area where it has to be ADA accessible. There's a lot to it. And so I would share your concerns about customers walking across. Not that I wouldn't have any less concern for employees, but it's not well lived. They're at night. So I think these are all ideas we have to push out. Any other questions for Michael? In terms of your topics, did you want to add anything to that? When you had the meeting about the dispatch, did you get a verbal commitment to open on time? Did we get a more positive read on the grants? So that was the conversation. The previous meetings, we had Representative Linsky there. We had a representative, some staff member, I think, from Senator Spilka's office. But they actually got the senator to meet with them and got a renewed commitment. So there's a couple of million dollars that we need to come up with. Still getting the translation. I'm awesome. Anybody else have any other questions? All right. I think on number 14, we have two reappointments. And then we also have one confirmation appointment. So maybe we should put the two motions here. Do you want to do that, Doug, please? You mean make them separately? I think we do the two reappointments. Oh, I see what you mean. I think that makes more sense. Please. Move that the board reappoint Mary Ellen Costagno to the personnel board and Amanda Sciaccio to the historical commission, both for a term ending June 30th, 2029. Second. Thank you. Any further discussion? Michael. So I'm going to challenge some people's memories here. But there is some level of conflict with Ms. Costagno's position. And I think she had to fill out a form, declaration form with the Ethics Commission about family members being in collective bargaining units. OK. So it needs to be redone because she's being reappointed. It happened when I first got here. I am also there was it was something. So let's say, you know, she should do that. Excuse me for one second. I'm having a sidebar. We just need to have it redone, right? I think that's her obligation. It's her decision to do it. I think so. So we just mentioned we so we should remind that that needs to be done. Is that a minor that of the of the law? She just she chooses herself. OK, well, I'm sorry. I'm listening. There's an ethical obligation on public employees like ourselves, even if we're volunteers to notify the Ethics Commission if there's potential parents of a conflict or that to be done by filing a form at the time. Yeah, but it's the point is that we can't tell her to do it. Well, she just says we can remind her of it. So we have to remind to be mindful to accuse of topics that you want to do that. Mary Ellen, I guess I was not a rookie to to to volunteer and volunteer in town. And I think she's aware of I'm confident she'll do what she needs to do. Yeah, right. Me too. She's done already before. So. All right. So thank you for that reminder. So any further discussion? Otherwise, I'm going to go straight to the vote. All those in favor, please. I have zero. And since they're not here, you don't have to give the speech, Dutch. And I also vote. I move that the board confirm Sean Fair of the Conservation Commission to the Community Preservation Committee for a term ending June 30th, 2029. All right. We have a second place. Thank you. And you can further discussion. Otherwise, all those in favor say aye. Aye. Motion passes 5-0. We did consent for a few minutes and the minutes are on page 16 of the packet. And it's August 17th. Okay. Do I have a motion? Approval of the minutes as amended. Do we have a second? Second. Any edits here? A couple. Okay. On section A9, 10, and 11, it should say W. Whitney moved in A9. It should say W. Whitney moved in A9. It should say W. Whitney moved in A9. It should say W. Whitney moved in A9. It should say W. Whitney moved in A9. The word moved is missing. Likewise, under A10, we have D. Levine moved, and under A11, W. Whitney moved. I think she has it written. W. Whitney, seconded by D. Levine, moved. So you want the moved, moved? Under A11, I want to add the word moved after Whitney. Then it says, seconded by D. Levine. Then it says, seconded by D. Levine, moved. So you want to take the moved out of there after Levine? So you want to take the moved out of there after Levine? The typical way these are done, I think, is D. Levine moved, seconded by C. Reynolds, that the select board. So the word moved is missing after the maker of the motion on A9, 10, and 11. So we just need to add the word. Anyone else have anything? I had a question under. A15, the Community Preservation Act appointed its member. Is that right? Does the CPA committee have? What does it say there? Under A, Community Preservation Committee, appointing body, committee, conservation, conservation, I'm sorry. I have to withdraw that comment. OK. Anyone else have anything? So I have two from the minute taker said, we didn't do our motion exactly accurately. So we need to amend these. So on the number A15, reappointments, it should say, oh, yeah, here's your moved. W. Whitney moved, seconded by C. Reynolds, to reappoint A. Are we reappointing this woman tonight again? I guess this was the question I had. W. Whitney moved, C. Reynolds. Yeah, yeah. It's supposed to, in the minute, what we moved was the Historic District Commission, but it technically should be the Historical Commission. So we're amending that now to read we did this reappointment to the Historic District Commission, or Historic Commission, see it? Follow me? Anybody follow me? We moved to appoint a Historic District, but the first. Person should have been appointed to the Historical Commission. So that's the amendment. OK. And then in the next one, we voted to, these are the same ones we just did tonight, aren't they? It looks like there's some overlap there. We moved to appoint Sean Fayette to the by, and it should say, Conservation Commission here. So we have to make those two edits. OK. Now I want to know why we've done. Well, we've been appointed twice to the system. He's worked. He got. That's not the use. Exactly. He's with. What I'm saying is it's a very good point. All right. We took care of that. So based on that, those amended. Does anyone else have any other edits? No. OK. I'm sorry. I got one under 16B. 16. 16A, 16B, Historic. And I could just say District Parking Update. Oh, very good. Good catch. That's big. Yeah. New. Are we all set then? I'm done. Me too. Otherwise, we could be talking. All those in favor say aye. Aye. All right. Passes 5-0. That brings me us to correspondence and comments. Otherwise, we will move to select boards, reports, and concerns. We've only separated for a week. So Mr. Reynolds, would you like to start? I have no comments. I have lots of concerns, which I'll keep to myself. Thank you. Thanks. I'm concerned that one of his concerns concerns me. Exactly. I'll talk them offline. I have two items. One, remote participation. I continue to work with the chair of the Ellis Committee, Dave Bernstein, as well as the town moderator, Mariana Jones, in pushing for legislation, remote participation. Dave Bernstein is a workhorse on this topic. And I'm going to leave it at that. I hope to have further updates on this. I may come before you with a suggestion of another one article as we have before on the topic. Next, I anticipate that the 212 committee RFP will be published ideally an earlier than a week from today. And actually, third item, Michael McCall and I were in a Zoom meeting today with DCR representatives. They confirmed that they're hoping to have a meeting. And I'm hoping that they will. I hope that they will. I'm hoping that they will. start construction on the remaining portion of the rail trail between sudbury and the wayne library in the spring of next year wow good job good yes i'm good and you know what i am too so happy to move the motion to adjourn have to move to adjourn 28 28. yeah please take note okay all those are favorite all right all right well she has just five days here too
to the conference isaac barcelone, officer, isaac barcelone, and you might have a chance to be here. Thank you, um, as you said. We're here to for the swearing in of oscar isaac barcelona. Have a couple of words about him, uh, officer, isaac barcelone graduated from the Randolph police academy in July has been participating in his field training program, which is about halfway over now. Uh, officer barcelone is already a valuable member of the department and brings local experience to the department. Having been born and raised in framing him, um, also barcelone is multilingual and speaks fluScene. zZ. Portuguese, which has already been valuable to the police department in many instances. He brings great real-world experience to the department, having worked in his family business and owned his own business prior to becoming a Weyland police officer. He's always enjoyed connecting with people from different backgrounds and values the meaningful interactions he'll have as a police officer and in his own personal life. I am proud to be able to welcome Dr. Barclone into the Weyland Police Department officially in front of all the select four tonight. I now invite up Weyland Town Clerk, Trudy Reed, to formally swear in Officer Barclone.
You solemnly affirm that you will support the Constitution of the United States of America, the Constitution and laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, the laws and the ordinance of the Town of Weyland, the rules and the regulations of the Weyland Police Department, and you will, to the best of your ability, faithfully perform the duties of patrolman and for the Town of Weyland, during your continuance of office. I swear it. Thank you. Congratulations. Thank you. Thank you. I'm going to go fix it and bring it back to you. Thank you. All right. I'm sorry. I was going to pin Officer Barclone tonight. As you saw, our officers had to run out to a call right at the beginning here, but congratulations. Thank you, Barclone. Welcome.
Rasheed. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And thank you for examining those ahead of time. Your question is stillup front. I really like the previous contribution. Great. Thank you. So, we're going to move into public spaces. Thank you. Thank you so muchlijk. It is very thinning and we'regraceful for our recurrence. Next agenda item. Next. Yes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. May I say so? Yes, the Chief. Yes. Thank you. Sorry. Thank you. My next agenda item. Yes, go ahead, Mr. Chairman. For the next agenda item, we also invite Acting Chair Mark Hebert to join us. I don't believe Chief McPherson is here. I think they will be on a call in my neighborhood. What's that? I saw the car going the other way, so I was coming this way. This is for my fellow board members. We are voting to award commendations for the first responders for their efforts during the tsunami emergency that occurred in August. I'm going to turn the floor over to Mark, and then I think, Mr. McCall, did you have something you wanted to add? And then I will read the commendations that we are issuing, and then we will sign tonight, and then they will be available to be awarded, I think, this week, once the office processes them. All right. Thank you. I just want to say thank you to the board for taking this meaningful step to recognize our employees who responded to the tragedy up there. It was a tough call for all of them to go to. I think a lot of them are still processing it. They still continue to show up every day at work and commit themselves to the town of Wayland, so I appreciate all the employees who participated in that. And, again, just wanted to thank the board on behalf of myself and Chief McPherson for recognizing what they went through that day. You know, they went through and witnessed a lot. And, again, yeah, thank you. Thank you. Mr. McCall, did you want to add something? Or I can... You can open it to the board.
Through you, Madam Chair. No, I want to thank the men and women of our police and fire departments who showed up. We even had members of our inspections. I reached out to the budding towns of Sudbury and Weston, thanked their town managers and their respective chiefs for their response. As was alluded to, this is something that was tragic. It has an impact on the first responders who see that. And I know they tried to let several of the officers and firefighters go. And I know they tried to let several of the officers and firefighters go out that day, and without the help of our mutual partners being Weston and Sudbury, we couldn't have done that. And they were also helpful, you know, giving guidance and support throughout that process. So I thank all involved that day. So the select board is going to award a certificate of recognition to one each, Wayland Police Department, one to the fire department, and then individual certificates to those who responded. I'm going to read just... I'm going to read just one because they were all the same. So, and then make sure everybody's comfortable with that. And then we'll have a motion to approve these and then we can sign them. So in recognition of the exemplary service and response of the members of the Wayland Fire and the Wayland Police Department during the tragic incident at Kanchi County on Tuesday, August 18th, the Wayland Select Board extends its sincere appreciation and commendation to all personnel who responded. In face of a devastating emergency, the members of our fire and police department... ...responded with exceptional professionalism, courage, and compassion, and dedication to duty. Their coordinated efforts prompt response and unwavering commitment to the safety and well-being of those at the scene exemplify the highest standard of public service. The select board recognizes the extraordinary demands placed upon first responders during such a tragic and challenging event, and acknowledges the skill, composure, and humanity with which the members of both departments... ...carried out their responsibilities. Now, therefore, the Wayland Select Board do hereby issue this public statement of gratitude for the professionalism, courage, and dedication... ...demonstrated by the members of the Wayland Fire Department and the Wayland Police Department in service to the town of Wayland.
The individual members receiving this... ...certificate... ...certificate... ...certificate... ...recognition from the fire department are Captain Doug Williams, Lieutenant Alexis Deschamps, Firefighter Paramedic Ian Wallace, Firefighter Paramedic Ryan Jakes, Firefighter Paramedic Claire Maloney, Firefighter Paramedic Daniel Sperling, Firefighter Paramedic John Bonowitz, and Assistant Chief Richard Ripley. Those receiving a certificate of recognition on the police department are Officer Rachel Poole, Sergeant Chris Custode, Detective Sienna Winner, Detective Sergeant Tyler Castagno, Officer Stephen Cavazzi, and School Resource Officer Shane Bowles. Thank you so much. I have a motion. I'm happy to move that this board... ...vote to award commendations... ...to first respondents for the reference during the camp particularly emergency. Thank you. Okay. So since we're all in person, I just... ...we can all say... ...all those in favor say aye. Aye. Motion carries 5-0. Thank you. So I'll just take two seconds here to sign, and there are some here. And if you don't get to sign now before I move to the next... ...and you can sign them before you... we've been meeting while the chair is signing these signatures and we sign them yeah i just make a comment that of course we remember the family of the youngster past and the pain they're going through you know 15 years ago this friday we remember what happened in new york city and one positive that came out of that tragedy was i think an increased appreciation for first responders deal with day in and day out and um the the impact certainly and uh the effect of some of these tragedies they need to be appreciated and that's one reason why we are studying these accommodations today so we appreciate all the work you do and the tough work you do work you do and that was that was clearly a tough event thank you thank you anybody any other comments from the board thank you madam chairman thank you mr whitney or mr levine tom said it well he did but i'm just you know equal opportunity here well the thing that i would add is uh i've worked with first responders for a lot of my career over the last 20 plus years and um it's always unknown what you're going to face in a given day is what i learned watching folks most recently in the last 10 years at the state police and it can be intense in a given day and unexpected and that people keep coming back and doing that job and it's very impressive um and so i hold folks in this profession in the highest regard because it's they do a job that a lot of other people would never do and so i'm grateful for all of you and um tom's right i'm still signing but i also want to say i unfortunately have firsthand experience it's fortunately not it's the level that is experienced during this incident but i'm real happy to see those folks come to your house when you need it thank you all right if somebody would be so kind to actually just give these back to tom we then can check to make sure everyone has signed all of them please and then we'll turn those in and they'll be distributed like i said in a couple days um from the officer who are in charge of this stuff so great thank you so much um mr hebert you're going to be on another item but i have to do the announcements in the public comment first if you don't mind okay i'll take a picture of either can you stay right there nice right okay so for announcement i'm sorry are there any announcements from the board um mr mcdonald no i did want to mention i knew alluded to it tom is that and maybe you want to speak to it is there is a ceremony this friday on did you speak to the 9-11 ceremony this week um i'm not as involved in that it's more of the fire department running that uh ceremony um so there is going to be one it's where is it a public safety bill the public safety bill and what time is it timing i'm not sure of that 10 a.m 10 a.m 10 a.m at public safety building is you know it's a if you will um um just make sure everyone's aware of that all right do we have any public comments any public vote in the room okay thank you we don't have any comments online please that's great thank you very much that brings us to the next agenda item which is to discuss in both uh to designate a part-time civilian act controller position you invite acting chief weaver to discuss it and the information starts on page six in the main packet so the floor is yours sir sure um so this is something i've been working on with town manager mccall and hr director katie ronald and i've been working on this since that moment uh the shooting of the northern east coast I am establishing a new position of the civilian traffic safety employee. We have a need for the department to fill traffic details. We've not always been able to meet the demand that we have. I think I went through for the last two months and we had over 100 details that were either filled by out-of-town employees or didn't get filled at all. So this is an issue that I felt needed to be addressed immediately so that we could fill that demand when we get requests from vendors, when they want traffic details filled in the town of Wayland. So one of the solutions that we've been doing is having firefighters work details as well. This is a necessary step to really do the last bit of that process where they'll be working under the police department instead of firefighters. They'll be working under the title of traffic safety. So the traffic safety employee for the police department will give me the ability to use other town employees as traffic safety officers and also bring in civilians who don't have any relationship with the town of Wayland to be traffic safety employees. Every time we fill a detail ourselves, we have an administrative fee that goes along with it, which helps from the program. With the over 100 details that went unfilled, that was about $5,500 that we couldn't. So that's what we use for other programs and help us administer the traffic safety details. Plus, it takes time for my sergeants to fill those details, to make phone calls to third parties such as the sheriffs or surrounding police departments. I would like to reduce the amount of time they're on the phone calling around and have them out there on the road supervising and participating in the police department instead of trying to fill traffic safety details. So we have a new software that we utilize that just fills it automatically. And the more people I have participating in that software, the faster. The more efficient we can build details. So this vote by the board, if necessary, in order to kind of build up those numbers and allow myself to supervise the traffic safety employees. It's another issue of taking people in from outside of town, not saying that people who come in don't care, but I have less authority over them than if they're my own employees. So I'm looking to establish them as employees of the police department where I can have all the authority to kind of fill and direct the traffic. So I'm looking to establish them as employees of the police department where I can have all the authority to kind of fill and direct the traffic. Thank you. So like I said, on page six in the packet, it is the information, the NGL chapter 268A that talks about special municipal employee. Thank you. So like I said, on page six in the packet, it is the information, the NGL chapter 268A that talks about special municipal employee. And then starting on page seven, I think there's a couple of pages of the actual job description and the duties, pretty detailed. Are there any questions for the acting chief from the board? Mr. Bay. Chief, do the firefighters enjoy being detailed? Do they enjoy it? There are some who participate and participate quite a bit. So I think it's something that they would like to continue to be doing as far as their personal enjoyment. I don't know, but there are. It'd be the wrong choice of words. What I'm getting at is, is it a popular post or not really? Somewhat popular post like that. There are a few who engage in it quite frequently. I haven't seen as many younger firefighters. I don't know if they're doing the details, but there's also was a level of entry as far as training that they weren't 100% clear on. And I kind of clarified that and made sure they know exactly how they need to be trained and offering to help them get trained. So we might see some more engagement from other firefighters as well. Explain to me this. If we vote to designate this position, is it one in one slot or more than one slot? If I may, Madam Chair. Please. For those. Who don't know, Mass General Law Chapter 268A is generally referred to as the ethics statute. It is the position. So it doesn't matter how many traffic safety employees, civilians we have. You're designating the position as a special municipal employee. And that allows a municipal employee to get more than one essentially paycheck from the town. Because normally you're not allowed to do that. But this is not a full-time position. It's a part-time position. So by designating it. Some of these folks won't be in any conflict by getting paid twice by the town. So as the Chief's alluded to, we want to use firefighters and have been. But it could open up the door to having DPW as well. Do you think what Mr. Fay is also asking now, is there just one slot or can you have multiple? No, he can have multiple people. No limit.
One second. If I just stop. I'll set the question. Go ahead. So have a second. You have this tremendous event coming up on October 3rd at the Wynwood Town Center. And if you estimate that you need a certain amount of details, if we pass this, you can, as a matter of law, hire 10 million traffic people. If you deem it appropriate. Yeah, makes sense. I mean, we just had one at the town center a couple of Fridays ago. We couldn't fill the detail for. So this will give me the ability to fill those details. Thank you. All right. I'm sorry. I am. Okay. Mr. Levine. Do you know if peer towns, neighboring towns have equivalent positions in smaller size towns? Yes. There's been a move towards that of having special employees or civilians doing traffic. I know Natix posted for it in the past. I know Sudbury runs a similar program where they have civilians. I think some of our, even our retirees have gone over to Sudbury and worked the details there. So I prefer that they come to us. So I would like to open this up. Is this something that we considered in previous years, but just never. We've kind of slowly worked towards there, trying to fix the problem at a slow pace. First, we allowed retired police officers to work details. And then we opened it up to the firefighters. And we're just still not meeting the need. So now it's kind of got to the point where, especially this summer. Next summer, we might not have that extraordinary amount of details. But when I look at 120 details not filled, that's significant to me. A town the size of Wayland. I'd like to be able to. Address. Thank you.
That's it. So I think.
If somebody had the experience, like they had the diploma and they had the CPR training. That some of these others, they don't necessarily have to be a firefighter or police officer, but to do the job. I think it's probably kind of was your question. Since no one has any other questions. Why don't we have a motion, please? Happy to move this board. Vote to designate the position of part-time civilian traffic controller within the way home police department as a special municipal employee as defined in Massachusetts general laws, chapter two 68 a section one and second. We have a discussion. Okay. All those in favor, say, all right. Motion passes five, zero. Thank you. Thank you for joining us this evening. Thank you very much. Thank you. Congratulations. Thank you. Thank you.
So I'm. Just give those to her. All this. Look at those back. We want to give them folders.
That's interesting. Delay. I'm going to go chase you down. No matter. Fast.
Fast. He's Mr. Prado. I move the Select Board enter into executive session a pursuant to Massachusetts general laws, chapter 38, section 21 a two three to discuss strategy with respect to the William firefighters local 1978 agreements number 2026 dash zero zero zero two step three and be pursuant to Massachusetts general laws chapter 38, section 21 a three to discuss strategy with respect to collective bargains with the following unit. We on police services union. New England. Please. Benevolent. Evaluant Association, Local 176, International Association of Firefighters, AFL-CIO, Local 1978, Weyland Department of Public Works, DPW, Association, Teamsters, Local 170, and the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees, parentheses, AFSCME, Local 690-1 and 2. And C, pursuant to Massachusetts General Laws Chapter 30A, Section 21A-7, to review and approve the Executive Session Minutes of August 31, 2026, with the intent to hold seven minutes. Is there a second to the motion to enter into Executive Session? Second. Thank you.
The Chair declares that a public discussion of these matters may have detrimental effect on the litigating, negotiating, or bargaining position of the town. We'll have a roll call vote. Mr. Levine? Yes. Mr. Whitney? Yes. Mr. Fay? Yes. Mr. Reynolds? Yes. Ms. Martin? Yes. Motion passes 5-0. The Chair invites attendance by Michael McCall, Town Manager, Kate Ryan, Human Resources Director, and Neal McPherson, Fire Chief, if he is available. The Board will rejoin the public meeting from the Executive Session, and we will return to open session in approximately one hour.
The Select Board is back in open session at 7.13 p.m. Thank you. Thank you. All right. So the next item is to continue our discussion on a possible operating override, which will be including a recap of last week and our next steps that we might want to establish. I say possible because, again, we have not received a request, but I think it behooves us to continue to have a parallel discussion until such time is decided whether we will be or not be receiving a request. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Oops.
Does anybody know? Page 12 is this slide that was on the screen, the share screen last meeting. Last meeting we had one slide, and there was a last-minute adjustment. So Mr. Keveny provided us this for tonight, and you can see where this shows right now that estimating that as of last week, I should say, Mr. Keveny is a very, very good leader. estimating that we have about $831,000 shortfall for the FY27. Can you just remind us what line 14 represents the additional $200,000 in each of the three columns? Is that just like a contingency? I'll let Michael speak to that. Ryan puts the plug in there for a number of reasons. Would you like to speak to it, Michael? Well, in part, there's a couple of reasons he does that. There can be some changes and fluctuations in the numbers. We don't have all of our numbers until February, and we have to put together a budget before the end of the calendar year, and we try and deliver a full budget in early January to the finance committee. So if there are some minor fluctuations in our numbers, he tries to put that in. For me personally, I look at the number up here where it says the new growth, which is at $600,000. I don't know if it's in here, but he has mentioned the number he has plugged in for new growth is $600,000, but the best report we had from the assessor was at $370,000. They are still processing, and we'll refine the number. So for me, should $370,000 end up being the number that $200,000 carried, so we wouldn't increase the deficit, but we'll know that number in a few weeks. I think the assessor will have a better number. Also, if there's other numbers coming forward, there's the cost of the borrowing, which do we know what the schedule is for when we're going to be meeting with bond counsel and putting those out in October? Well, Mr. Kevin, he actually meets with Hilltop to get numbers and things. I don't know when the next, I will get that date for the board, and if we don't want to wait until the 22nd, I'll have him email it out. We can get it on the 22nd. I think the big numbers that we are looking for is at the last meeting, and I did, we had the joint meeting. I thought it was very, very productive. I thought everyone did a really good job presenting their thoughts. I did receive an email from the superintendent saying that, you know, they wouldn't be able to give us their school numbers for the budget, you know, for tonight because it was only one week, and I apologize. I said, you know, at the time, I was thinking we're on the two-week cycle, and certainly with the holiday and school starting, you know, so I think it's anticipated they will have those numbers up by the end of this week, right? So those should be in the next spreadsheet we see, which will be at our meeting on the 22nd, and that will probably give us a clearer picture. Maybe we can get an update from the assessor or he'll talk or something. Is there still an opportunity, Michael, for the number to fall below 830, if numbers work out in our direction, or is the 830 the best-case scenario? My recollection is Mr. Keveny said that's kind of the best-case scenario. Yeah. I don't think we would get any major numbers really until after the first year. That's when all of the state aid numbers come up, the insurance numbers. It would really be new growth, and I know the assessor is working on that. Might the school come in at a lower figure than forecast?
I'm not sure. In my limited conversations in the last week or so with Dr. Fleischman, although they gave out higher COLAs, which was a concern for both Mr. Keveny and Dr. Fleischman had indicated that they have had some people not return, so they feel that through attrition they'll be able to make the numbers work, at least for this year. Whatever we do in collective bargaining on our side will also impact the numbers, not only last year for anything retroactive, but going forward. Right. So we're still trying to keep... We're still trying to keep those numbers in mind. Well, continuing that line of thought, is there a number below which you think we could avoid an override and above which you think we need to... We're being asked to estimate it without the right data, and now we're being told we're probably not going to get it for a while.
Let's say hypothetically we did put a question in the ballot, it didn't pass. You always have to make do. So if either someone doesn't ask... For an override or an override's asked for, or the board either puts it on or doesn't, we always have to prepare for that fact. Cuts are never easy, so we don't have a number in mind. Right now I've talked with Mr. Keveny several times about this. It occupies our conversation quite a bit, but we would make do somehow if we had to work with that number. I mean, we're looking at that if that's a possibility for this year. If I may go on just for a minute, Madam Chair. I mean, your policy says the board, if it so chooses, can call for one itself. But to Madam Chair's point, I was going to wait until Dr. Fleischman has his numbers out, and then we're having a meeting tomorrow, a follow-up discussion with Dr. Fleischman and his team. And then once he has his numbers, I asked him, I said, we should sit down and decide whether or not we're going to make a phone. And he said, we should sit down and decide whether or not we're going to make a phone. And I said, we should sit down and decide whether or not we're going to make a phone. So the only reason you may not have seen something, we're waiting for him to finish his numbers and us to see if we can get some of these MOAs done so that maybe by the next meeting you might get a written request from us. Because part of me feels it would be prudent just to make the ask so that we further the discussion and start a timeline in the event something breaks the wrong way now, and we may find ourselves in a position needing one. I wouldn't want something to... To go wrong late fall, and we haven't put anything in place in terms of having an election. So part of me wants to just make sure that if something changes, we're positioned to respond. You want to be prepared. Yeah. So I think... Go ahead. So a couple of things. Mr. Town Manager used the phrase, make do. But just so we're clear, when you use that phrase, make do means address the situation and have... Have to make cuts on the schools and the towns. Yes. Right. And as you may recall, we instituted a hiring freeze except for non-essential employees. So some of these offices are short-staffed. They reach a point where if somebody leaves, I have to fill them because, you know, I can't have one person in the clerk's office or just one person in the assessors, but most of them are down a person or two. We want to continue to provide excellent services. And I think that's a good point. We want to continue to provide excellent services. And I think that's a good point. But if we wind up having to make some cuts, something will change. Madam Chair, is there a date that is a deadline for us to make this decision to take a vote? What's that date? Well, I kind of mentioned a timeline last time, so that's on my notes. Are you reading my notes? I think that the biggest... And I mentioned this last time. I think the biggest issue for us last year was being able to have time to communicate. You know, with residents, whether that's how we do it, you know, whether it's things to the home, or forums, or multiple meetings, or at the very minimum, being able to have a yes vote means, a no vote means written on the ballot. And we've gone to the efforts to have that legislation accepted for Wayland. And so I think we had mentioned this, Doug and I were in this meeting group that Michael's referring to tomorrow morning. The, you know, we said, we'd like to have not the 45 days that the town clerk would like, but more like 60, 75, maybe even 90 days, which 90 might be a little much, in order for us to say, from the time we take the vote, to the time the residents or the town takes the vote, and have that time to do not only the due diligence that you do need to have an election, but also to get that information out. So in my mind, if we wanted to have a... With that... With that concept in place, if we want to have an election in, you know, middle January, for example, I think we need to vote by the end of October, if not the 1st of November. But we do need, what we're running up against, as Mr. McCullough has said, there's some numbers we need, some pieces to the puzzle that are still available that we don't know that we have. So we need to carry on with that. I am going to mention that on the meeting on the 22nd, I think, I'm thinking about talking out loud now here, Michael. But Marvell had put together an agreement that Mr. Hurley sent to me, and it's between the Board of Select. The Finance Committee and the School Committee, and it lays out if you have a multiyear override, I think it's quite a nice document. So I think I'd like to put that in the packet for the 22nd for our discussion for us to look at it, because that might be to your point part of our timeline of what we want to do. So that's one thing. I'm going to go back to the questions. Okay. I do think we need to also decide between now and when we take a vote, what we consider is the threshold, the minimum threshold, you know, for, for an override. I have heard, I haven't heard the board discuss it. We can do it now. If we like, we can wait till next meeting. What do we think is the minimum threshold? I've heard it say, you know, below a million, we should try to work it out, if you will, and then come back the next year. I heard Mr. Kevin, he say, well, you'd be looking for more. Does it make sense to go and ask for an override? That's total and making this a five or 6 million versus you wait another year when it's eight or nine, what we really, you know, so that I think the board needs to have that conversation. I will tell you the finance committee is having that conversation and they may in fact be having it as part of their agenda again tonight. And they, they are really questioning, you know, you, on a hundred and let's talk about a hundred and 100, $510 million budget, not under 20, because those are the enterprise funds. You know, how do you, how do you find like basically a half a percent to do? So it's a lot of money. So they're having that conversation as well. And they actually recommend not only to us, which we would take that information and have them come and present to us. So we'd want to make sure the finance committee could come in and, and present to us as well.
And then the last thing I want to point while I'm here is that Tom and I had this offline conversation about the agendas. And when we got into this item, he suggested, and do you want to speak about it? You know, I, I personally would like to hear from the public on these, on these that, you know, where's the head at it, maybe have a public forum, you know, before relatively soon. Right. Yeah. So I was thinking, just hang on a second. I was thinking if the board was amenable as part of the next steps, I would schedule, I felt like the October 5th meeting. That would give us a chance to get a little more detail on the 23rd from the, from Brian and the schools or what have you. And then on the 5th, we could just have an open forum talk to us about how you feel in advance of our potential vote. And if there were agreement to that, then I will have Jalen, you know, advertise, start advertising that. Mike was shaking. I said, yes, I know you're in agreement because we talked about it and it was everybody think that's a good idea. Do you spend an hour or so listening to everyone? Well, you know, to your point, Carol, I just ran, and it numbers quickly. The A31 is about slightly less than 0.7% of the budget. And, but that includes debt service. It includes some things that we really can't touch. So it might be well to try to understand what, what the percentage is of the kind of variable versus fixed expenses. Also, I think for a public meeting, it would be important to understand, you know, the implications of not having an override and specifically, you know, can you cite, can we cite positions? Can we cite programs? You know, that is, that's the kind of compelling information that I think people need to make an informed decision. And if we're going to have a public forum, I think ideally we would have that from, from the schools, from the town, just to talk about. You know, we hear about diminution of services or some programs. You know, we, we hear about music and poker school. Well, geez, Louise, that ain't nothing. Yeah, Bill, that's a good idea. And the only flip side of that is you'll hear Dr. Fleischman say, you know, what if we say, if it doesn't pass, if we don't go forward, we have to eliminate X, Y, and Z. And then the numbers work out and we don't have an override, but then the folks who, who hold those positions have now found other positions. So it's a challenge, but maybe we could speak more on a high level as if this 800,000 represents, you know, I'm going to make this number. I'll just say it 300,000 for the town to cut it 500 for this. I'm going to make an up and up. It's four and four. Let's just don't get myself involved. Phone calls tomorrow. I appreciate the superintendent's concern, but if, if these things are tangible, people can really point to something, a specific program, what's everybody else think about that? I think that that's absolutely critical. I was going to say the same thing because $800,000 in what to somebody, when they look at the numbers is 120 plus million dollar budget. It has no meaning unto itself. You have to make it tangible somehow. And I understand that you don't want to name specific positions, but you can potentially say this will mean the cuts of five full-time employees across the schools or three, or four or full-time employees on the town. Like you, you have to give some kind of meaning to the numbers or it, you know, when I look at it just in a vacuum like that, yes, I feel like we should just be tightening our belts for $800,000 for more than a hundred million dollar budget. And the other point that is what I said last time is the numbers have changed significantly in our favor just since June 15th. And here we are on September 8th, less than three months ago, we went from 8.9 million for the three years to 7.3 million in mid-August. And now we're at 6.8 million today. And our number alone for the next fiscal year started at $2.7 million and has come all the way down to $830,000. So if I'm paying attention at all, and I'm seeing that, I don't want to vote on a three-year override because how much more are they going to change in the next year? How much more are they going to change in the next two years? And if it starts trending in the other direction, I'd be interested in seeing that. But if this is about where we're ending up, I'm hesitant to bring the override vote. But at the same time, to Bill's point, I want to hear what it means if we don't bring that forward as a vote. What are the cuts looking like? Right. So I think,
I'm just concerned about the appearance of chaos. And we, I would just repeat what Doug and Bill just said, that the numbers seem to be flying all over the place. Remember in two recent meetings we've had, well, what's in the packet and what are you bringing today? If we run into an optics problem with the override, we're contemplating for the next year, that's going to impact the subsequent year. And so when you say zoom out a notch and get the big picture for the forum, zooming out a notch means we get a really crisp story with no timing excuses, from the school committee know which sheet did I mean from the finance area. And that really is our job. I sense right now that I'm very worried that if it looks chaotic and it isn't chaotic, people are doing a good job. We've just got to present it with where we're going to get an adverse decision. It's just hard because we have to forecast. And we're just trying to forecast just for this year without having the numbers, much less the next two years. That's very difficult to forecast, but what it seems like as we're getting, we're getting clear numbers is it does so far keep breaking in our direction. Right? It's a significant jump down in the last few months. Given what you just said, I'm a newbie. So part of my inchoate question, but why are we getting stuff so late? Is this the norm? Well, I mean, we don't even have, we won't get everything until the beginning of next year. I guess a fair characterization is late, right? Information is changing. Numbers are changing information, you know, and every month, every three weeks, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's evolved. Information is not available at certain times and comes in kind of drips and drops waiting all the way into next thing. We need to crystallize this. Do you want to say one thing that Chris point is very, I don't ever, we talk about app numbers at this form. We need to say, this is what's being forecast. This is the forecast. Cause again, we don't have the final budget until well, the preliminary. So it's like December do a preliminary in December. And then generally the final one happens in January. Usually after the governor releases of what are called cherry sheets, short chapter 70, 90. And then it goes to the finance committee who might make some. And while deliberating is usually when we get the health insurance numbers. I think we need to label everything. Forecast forecast. The forecast right now shows that we are projected or projecting. Right. To be 800 different. And to your point, when we get closer and closer, that 200, maybe our comfort level improves with us. And we only need a hundred of it or something, but right now the 200 needs to stay. So, you know, as to the timing, maybe it makes sense to wait a bit until some of these things get nailed down. But last year we did the, the bands refunding and we did the reclassification of the debt and things were better than expected. And in hindsight, we may not have needed to do one or both. And I just think it's important for credibility. We can say we need an override that we have a, I have as few variables in there as possible. Maybe that argues for pushing out the election, recognizing that, you know, off the budget, if the override, if that's the way we go, it doesn't pass. Yeah. There's a lot of scrambling, but. I think the issue is because it's on the line between maybe, and if we want an override, maybe we don't versus if you look at the next two years, it's nowhere close to the line when you're talking like two to $3 million, you're not going to make up for that shortfall, but here we're now in the hundreds of thousands of dollars and moving down. We're on the line. So Michael wants to speak, but I'd like to just address this calendar thing. So originally, if you remember, even Michael mentioned that there were three options. One was to vote the 1st of August so that we would make, make the ballot that just went out. We said, no, no, because again, we want to have time to communicate. We want to have time to deliberate. That's it. We want to really make sure we haven't had an override since. Oh, nine or nine or seven. So maybe we really have to think about this, do some due diligence, as I say. So then we suggested that we would have it, you know, in January. So what really is the lever here is, is when does, the warrant go to press and the budget has to be, you know, voted in by the finance committee. Am I going to give you my guesstimate is they have to be done by March 1st. So we don't want to vote too, too late to give them a chance to make adjustments. If it passes, it's one thing. If it doesn't pass, they have to make those, those adjustments. But we probably could maybe go to end of January or something. If that helps, I don't know if that would help. That would help us get the, the, the borrowing numbers that would help us get, pretty good idea of the health insurance. Cause Westerberg would probably given an indication, then new growth would, but the main date is January. She's in that usually tell them bounces are slightly in our favor, you know, like up 25,000 or something. So it's, I think Brian does a really good job on those numbers. So if we had a forum, could we begin it with a certain number of minutes that you would pick, but I'm just going to make up a 10 minute summary of how the process works. Cause I love what, just adding up what you all just said, it's not as chaotic as it looks. Chris is what I just heard. We actually, we knew the process and it would do public. We would of course tell everybody, they already know the problem, the process, because they're all perfect citizens, but we would remind them and have it fresh in mind. If you will, that might be a really good way of shortening the process. So I think what we've done in the past on the forums is we've kind of given, we really were gathering input more than, than whatever. So we, but we do give, a little explanation as to, you know, the issue that we're facing and the issues and why we're looking at the particular item or whatever. And I certainly think we would have to give, show the slide and show where we are and talk about, this is a, a you know, a forecast and that, you know, we are hoping that the numbers continue to go our way, but if they don't, we are going to have to face voting for an override and it would mean high level tightening our belts. You know, perhaps losing some positions, but then I think we really want to open it up to get input. Don't we? Would it include a timeline so we could show that we're not behind the eight ball? Oh yeah. You can also give a little history. I found an article in Metro West daily news that Wayland passed five overrides between oh two and oh eight. And the last time an override vote failed in Wayland was in 1990 when Tom was on the slack board. I hear that. Wife, Mr.
All right. So what do you, what do you think? I think you said it well, madam chair, I think we have a plan. We have a plan. So we're pretty good. And, and to your point, bill, I think we, when I gave him the timeline, of course I'm that's my job to lay it out. And I certainly personally, I, I, I think we can be a little flexible on that, but I think we have to also focus on the later we vote. How does that impact? The rest of the process, because we do have to have that warrant out. So Mr. McCall, I didn't let you finish. Sorry. Oh, no, I was going to say, I think great minds think alike. I think we're all thinking the same thing about making sure, regardless of what we ultimately do with regard to an overnight, that the public get some information in these forecasts. So before you mentioned that a select board member of Fay wanted to do that, I was going to suggest that we have a public forum sometime this fall showing the forecast, so people are aware so that they won't be caught off guard. If we decide to go for one of the wild cards, people asked if you recall earlier this summer, you gave me authorization to vote on energy contracts. I've been talking with Mr. Fay and we are, I check in with him regularly. We have not exercised some of those options yet because of what's going on in the Middle East. And it's having, it's having impacts on the energy that we need to lock in for this coming winter. And those numbers are up much higher than they are usually. And it's not just the actual units of the energy, all the delivery costs and the how it's delivered to the US, natural gas and other things has all gone up considerably. And he's concerned about that because we have to heat all these public buildings. They have to provide electricity, everything. So we are waiting. He said, you know, if we get a day where it drops, you know, their consultant is notifying them almost daily of the fluctuations in the market. And we're waiting to see where it comes down back to a normal range we're used to. But right now it's up fairly high. So then that if we were forced to lock in, you know, if the trend keeps going up, it's going to be considerably higher than previous years. So that's the type of thing that could fluctuate. So anything in the next steps that I've missed here? Anybody else has any points? I've got some notes here and we'll schedule that for October 5th and that'll be part of the October 5th meeting. It won't be a separate meeting. Could I underscore a bill? Bill mentioned it might be later than that, though. It might be later. When would we hold the forum? October 5th. You went to the forums earlier, but it's the voting is later, right? Well, I guess the question is, will we have a reasonable story to tell about this is the impact with and the impact without? Well, we have two forms, right? We can have two forms, one on the fifth and we have one in January when. Oh, yeah, no, we definitely would do when the pitch is clear. Yeah. Yeah. Well, this is when we're meeting in October meeting on the fifth and the 19th. I picked the fifth because again, I'm thinking if we were if we were going to schedule this vote for mid January, we would probably want to vote the end of October. That gives us 70, 75 days beginning in November. But if you want to have the forum later on the 19th, we can do it then as well. Madam Chairman, I'm just concerned that given what I've heard in recent meetings about. One person began a meeting by saying we don't have a formal report ready today and things like that, I think October 5th is suddenly going to seem really soon. And if credibility is our number one. But I will have to have those numbers by then. Then I withdraw. Thank you. I just think this forum its primary purpose is to educate on the process. And and the general appreciation for the fluidity of the situation. So it puts it on people's radar. No clear answers will come out of the forum, come from up. It's too early, but it educates people. And what we're thinking and what we're considering. But I do think that if we're going to take a vote in October and whether to schedule a hearing or an election, we need to understand the implications of. Moving and not approving. Yeah, yeah, I agree that. I mean, we can we can vote. I think we could vote as late as beginning November, particularly if we hold a public forum in October because we're starting the education. Communication process. And what's what's everybody going to do? If we vote to pursue our question, you can always withdraw it if the numbers are all of a sudden approved, right? And we could vote to withdraw. You listen to this every month. So if we meet on the 19th and then two weeks is like November 4th or 5th, we could vote that, you know, this is not a surprise what we're doing now. It's not like, OK, we met and then the next week we met and we took a vote and then we're having. The. Election work. If we have this form, just like to Tom's point, to explain the fluidity of this and that we're watching this and, you know, we've been watching this since. Well, I think the board's been watching this since July. This is the first time we had it as a full board discussion. That there's a possibility of an override and we're watching it and we want people to be aware of what we're watching and what we're considering and that. You know, listen, as the chairman facilitator, we don't want to vote till December. We're not going to vote till December. But I will. It's my responsibility to say if we don't vote till December, this is what happens. And we may end up having to create two by this, which actually creates more work and maybe some other issues to try and not do that. If we have to, we have to. But if my preference would be not to create extra work for the people, I'm really not big on that. But.
So. Are we comfortable with October 5th? For a forum? Yeah, I'm fine with it. No, no, no. I like the idea of doing two forums, and I feel if it's more of a listening session and just talking about process, that's fine. And I think people are going to want to hear some specifics, though, that we may not be able to share with them. I was looking at this article again from the last override vote was 1.9 million and they talked. About what those cuts would mean at the schools. They were specific, like we have to lay off this many teachers, phys ed teachers, and they they had kind of a menu. And so people became very real for people, I think, at that point. So that's what we were doing. We have the second form once we've actually taken the vote. We've made the decision. We've committed ourselves to having a vote in January, February, whatever it is. And now this is how much we're asking you to vote on. And if we don't take that. Vote and we say we're not going to have an override because, say, it's 700 or $800,000, that will necessarily mean cuts. So you have to explain to people this is how the reduction is going to happen. So how would you like to do it?
I mean, day wise, we have to. Yeah, because we have to we have to put a stake in the ground here. We have if we're going to communicate where we are, that's what I I think that's what Tom and I are saying. I'm like, we're in agreement here, aren't we? So that we're in a fluid situation. We have to ask the schools for their input, too, because that's what more most I assume most of the cuts are coming to us. So we can have for the 23rd meeting. We can't go anywhere on any of this without those numbers. I'm going to do you think it's premature to have a tab on the town website relative to override that we could we could populate that with information, including, by the way, this article that that Doug just mentioned, say an example. Of how it was done back in 19 minutes. One way we were down the road before, you know, just educate, educate. I think we could start and do something specific to the FY 20 budget and then talk about the other years of putting the forward out there. And, you know, not to confuse people that we are having an override. But here's where we are. This is what we're looking at for FY 28. And this is what could happen. And trends keep going this way without, you know, putting the label. Override on it. But I think it would be worthwhile to start publishing that information. So we have to be prepared to answer the first question, which is what happens if there's no override, right? Well, one thing that could happen is some of these numbers can get a little closer to where we'd like them. And that's one thing maybe if I'm not sure.
Do we want to have this? We don't want to have a forum. We do want to have a forum on the fifth. The other option is I was going to plan on inviting the Finance Committee to. Come in and they could also speak and talk a little bit about their thoughts about this, or we could meet with them or we know what you like to do. I'd like to have them down the line. OK, there's there's and there is an unclear the final numbers as we are. So the 19th is more preferable to me, but I don't feel strongly about it. I'm not being intrepid. We should do it when we're ready. Yeah. And if we're not ready, you know, in fact, I think I was on the board. You were. You were the chair.
It was successful. It was successful. I obviously. We said, I mean, they had to do them quite frequently, as I recall. And and and there were really fairly specific examples of what happens if we don't do this. So and you know, the and I don't think the successes can be attributed to the board of selectmen as much as there are a group of parents who got very motivated to talk to PTOs and have coffees in their houses. And it was it was quite an effort. And, you know, a big postcard list in those days. And in those days, to your point, we did say this is what's going to be cut. And we sent people we. But you see what happened. After the vote was taken, this is kind of what this was. This was, I think, to. After the Select Board had voted to take to put it on the on the ballot. I think that's what happened. Perhaps go back. Yeah. So what we're talking about is having an informational discussion and getting feedback before we take a vote. And then after another one, after we take a vote, the after the vote would say. It's X dollars. This is where the cuts are going to be. And this is what happened in Lexington. I. Think they passed the budget, the debt exclusion for the new high school, $650 million. And I don't think the Select Board then took the vote to the town for an override. So they just made cuts because they thought we just asked for $650 million. We can also come back now for an override vote. And they and they made cuts and people were frustrated about that because they didn't they weren't even given the option to have an override or not. But that's what the. Select Board did. There's. You share that story. Yeah. Your name text kind of twirled. I'm just trying to get in on the camera. We're getting shot here in the corner. Are we are we doing something on the fifth? We're just going to wait till we see what happens in the next minute. We're waiting. We're waiting. We're waiting. All right. I think we have finished this topic for tonight, but we'll be up in the morning. We'll be up in the next minute. I'm sorry we decided that. But inside that one. Now we're going to move to the supplemental packet and this is
the updated Cable Advisory Committee charge that Mr. Levine was working on for us. And that came out earlier today. Whoops, I don't think so. Doug, would you like to do this? Basically, we need to reform the Cable Advisory Committee because one of our. Contracts with one of the two providers is coming due. And we usually form this well in advance as it is a 12 plus month process to renegotiate the new license. And I appreciated this time the input from Mr. Doug Stotts, who has made us aware that there are other municipalities and he sent a link to one from the town of Greenfield that have created their own municipal broad. Band service for Internet streaming TV and phone. I didn't even know that was an option. So I wanted to add that to the charge just to be able to explore that option instead of just focusing solely on the two cable providers. And the reason is, as folks know, more and more individuals are cutting the cord. And it's the revenue that comes in, which is the maximum of 5% of the revenue from the. Town from the cable providers that goes to the town specifically to wake him. That number drops as more and more people are opting out of the cable service. And so I think we're hoping the legislature acts at some point to bring in streaming services into this discussion. But that has not happened yet. And we are going to have to be negotiating something within the next year to 18 months. So it would be nice to look at other options because way. I'm just feeling the brunt of it year after year.
So in the packet, we have a red lined version. And then we had. You can just look at the clean version of the. Versions on page four. Yeah. So I just want. And it's only the charge is that the other is just background information that those bullets are just only voting on the top. Just that top paragraph. So before I open it up to questions, I just want to make one suggestion. Do we want to match the title to the first? Yes. Yes. I say. Broadband. Okay. So anybody have any comments? Appreciate Doug doing this. Yeah, I do, too. So do we, you know, this is a committee that. I know the answer, but I'm going to ask this anyways. This is a committee that we utilize just for the negotiating of the contracts. So do we want to add that in there that they. That it sunsets once the once the negotiation. Is concluded. Sure. Although it sounds to me that you're advocating that that that our board establish a committee that can. Right. Look at. We can do both of those things in that period of time. See if I don't need to go beyond. I don't think that's a long period of time. So that was that was basically my question as well. So I didn't know. And then I think we're pretty good. So based on that, any other comments or questions from the board? Otherwise. I'll entertain a motion, Mr. Doug. I move that the select board approve as amended with the additional change regarding the sunsetting of the committee at the conclusion of negotiations, the charge for the new broadband and cable advisory committee. Thank you. And if we have a discussion, otherwise, we'll just go to the vote. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Passes five zero. All right. And now we are going to talk about back to the packet. This is the draft of our 2026 annual report submission. Thank you, Bill, for doing this. And that starts on page 13 of the packet. And would you like to walk us through that, please? Sure. So the reporting period is July 1, 2025 to June 30, 2026. And during that time, we had a member, even another member, join us to try to, and frankly, of course, I don't know when you subscribe to the oath of office. So I don't know if that data is accurate.
It's it's basically the day after the town meeting, so. That's one question. So I don't know, it's a. I use the. Standard format. I think I am something like four words over the maximum number. So for. You get rid of a couple of comments. No, I can't.
I'll take your name off, Carol. But I get rid of discussion draft that I'm halfway there. So, you know, I. Came up with this financial management. Category since I think we spent a fair amount of time on that.
And of course. This involves Michael's efforts as well. Merely the board goes up saying. To say that the board secured the FEMA grant is.
Anyway.
So I don't know. There's a couple of things to say. I'm not sure. The data. The data. Is pretty straightforward, I think. So if I've missed anything. If you think they're. Things that can come out. Jaylin has the original, so. Section that says objectives. That's also going in the report. They specifically asked for objectives. For the coming year. All right. We supposed to put anything. On the end. That says. for the forward thinking statements or any of that. I'm supposed to, this is just the end here, right? After the- It's typically respectfully submitted, Carol B. Martin, Chair. Ma'am. Well, does anybody have any comments, edits, questions? First of all, thank you very much. It's lovely. Thank you for doing it, Bill. Yeah. I had nothing. No one has anything. Why don't we just go to the motion here? Would you like to make a motion, Bill? I move that the Select Board adopt this draft document
as its report for the period, July 1, 2025, through June 30, 2026. Second. Any further discussion?
No second. Okay. Let's go to the vote. Please, all those in favor, say aye. Aye. Passes 5-0. Happy to move this to the- Hang on a second. I got the consent, I got, is consent next? No, it's not next on the, we have comments for you. Three minutes. Thank you. All right. Happy to move the consent calendar for, today's the 8th, September 8th, 2026. Okay. Further discussion? All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Motion passes 5-0. I think I'm okay to go to the, the hearing. Isn't that next? 8 o'clock. I can do . So I'm going to reopen the hearing that we're continuing to add a source.
I declare the whole, the, our official account. Okay. Thank you. And I declare the whole, the, our official account. Madam Chair, do we need anybody to join us? You're going to find out in one second. I thought they need another one, Mel.
That's why I can start now. Okay. So I'm going to declare the hearing open, and I declare this hearing open for the purpose of continuing the consideration for the application of our grant of location from Eversource Energy and Verizon to install a full number 4-73A on the easterly side of Cotillo at approximately 107 plus or minus feet north of Yeager Way. This hearing was posted in the Metro West Daily News on Friday, August 14th. We heard the hearing at our last meeting on August 31st. We asked for some additional information, including a recommendation from the DPW and the Police Department. And Abby followed up on that. She received an email that said that Eversource would like to withdraw their application because it turns out that they have... They have other poll work on the site that they need to do. And so they'd like to get the plans together to have everything on the same request. In addition, the DPW is not prepared to make a recommendation until they have a site plan visit with Eversource. So based on that information, I am going to move the board take no action on the application for grant location for Eversource Energy and Verizon to install and maintain one full and any necessary anchors and guidelines. And I'm going to move the board take no action on the application for grant location for Eversource Energy and Verizon to install and maintain one full and any necessary anchors and guidelines to be installed on the public right-of-way on the easterly side of Cotillo Road at approximately 107 plus or minus feet north of Yeager Way, as the applicant has withdrawn their application with the intention of reapplying at a later date with an expanded scope of work. Is there a second? Second. Thank you. And then we'll have some discussion. Do we need to take such a motion if the applicant doesn't go forward? No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. Well, we opened it, the hearing, so I have to close the hearing. You can close the hearing, certainly, but I don't want you to have to. So I'm willing to close the hearing, and this is the reason why. Let's see, the motion is withdrawn. I'm willing to close the hearing because the applicant has withdrawn their application with the intent of replying at a later date with an expanded scope of work. Is that better? Okay. You like that? Sorry. Okay. So you got knocked out, Tom. That's quite all right. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Excuse me. Do you need to, you need a motion to close the hearing? No. I did it the same time. I moved to close the hearing because I put them all in the motion. It's in the same motion.
The main motion to your point, Bill, is to close the hearing. I agree with you. That's the main motion. But can the chair just close the hearing with that? Is that a vote? Is that a vote? No, she's not. But the motion on the table includes closing the hearing. We have to vote. We vote. We usually vote when I close them. Do you want to read it? Let's vote, and I'll find out if we have to do it. How's that? No, no. I want to hear Bill's point. Sorry. So are we voting to close the hearing? Yes. Yes. Do we need a vote to close the hearing? Yes. Because we opened it. Yeah. Because we all opened it. Yeah. It's not something the chair does. Doesn't the chair open a hearing and close the hearing? Oh. It says on here, move to close the hearing. Did you move to open the hearing, too, originally? You clear them open. Well, you've declared open, but you moved. I take a motion to close it because it was usually a motion. And the motion here is because they've withdrawn.
I have a comment to make. Do I make a move? Wait till we get a motion. And you can discuss the motion.
But there's a motion on the table. This is maybe angels on the head of a pin. But it seems to me that when we advertise it here, it's a motion to close the hearing. You open the hearing. You don't, the board doesn't act to open the hearing. And I think you're typically, chair typically closes the hearing. We opened it and we continued it last time. That's true. So now it's. I think, I think you as the chair have that ability.
I don't know. Just. I'm going to move. Are we creating a precedent where we have to. Here we go. I move to close the hearing because the applicant has withdrawn our application. We're temporarily applying at a later date with a second hearing. Okay. If I need a second hearing, can you call the hearing? I think the applicant has withdrawn the hearing. I don't think I can call it a second hearing. I think it's a matter of time. Okay. Okay. That's what it says. I'm supposed to say. That's what I said. Go ahead. I recall. That's me a second. We've covered on that and I'll second the motion. Thank you. I just had an innocent question. I recall a distinguished citizen asking about double poles. And given that what we're talking about here, we give the utility more time. Has somebody mentioned to them, we wouldn't. name is that part of the scope i did mention on me on the recap from the meeting to abby who reached out to eversource that we not only would like an aerial picture we would like to have some input on a strategy for removing double poles broken poles and poles that are on private so i guess if you don't mind management it's just a very good comment i would like for the minutes to know there is a double pole on route 30 that is just east of mel's yes that frankly looks like the entire contraption could fall over into the boat it's not can you put that in your reports and concerns that's not part of the scene well it is i think i beg to differ i i it is we brought it up i think so that has to do with closing this year okay well i see you i'm sorry it's about the motion on the table i'm sorry if i try to raise it later you'll say it's out of water but what have we decided? Are we going to vote this or not? Aye. The MMA says we should do it. Thank you. Even though in my memory, I don't recall ever taking a vote to close hearings. You did hearings. I have drawn the lucky hearing badge. I have done about 50 of these, I think, in the last year and a half. Okay. All those in favor say aye, please say aye. And those opposed? And those opposed? I just don't understand. Okay. Vote 401, correct? Correct. Okay. I'm going to circle back to you on that, please, if I may. I would just follow up, though. We've had, Chris, maybe before you joined the board, we had counsel for Eversource in here, and we talked about double polls. And he said, yeah, we hear that a lot. And there are other utilities that are on. There are other utilities that are on there. And, you know, we're sort of, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I realize you're sorry, I'm making a squeaky wheel argument. Oh, I think it's fine. Just that. Okay. A photo of the contraption I referred to might disfell some illusions. Yeah. If you have a picture of it, perhaps you could forward it to me, and I can forward it along so that we can say. If you would like this addressed. I will do that, and that's all about this work. I'm worried I'm protracting things to your dismay. I will get you a photo. You're not making any dismay for me. I'm just doing this. I think Bill is trying to make me not be on time, and I'm trying to stay on time.
I would like to see why the is Ms. Gray, Robin Gray, and the attendees.
No? No. Okay. I move that the board. For the request of $7,000 for the Wayland 2026 Festival. Second. How about if I open the topic first? Okay. So we are discussing a funding request in parts of Wayland for the 2026 Wayland Festival, the potential to vote. The request is in the packet as indicated. It is for $7,000, and we have a motion from Bill and a second from Doug to support that. I want to ask you one question, though. Do you know the funding source? So I think we need to have a little conversation and discussion about the funding source. What was it last year? I'm sorry? What was the source last year? I think Mr. McCall is going to tell us this. Yes. We used some of the remaining town center gift funds. We gave $9,500 to the Wayland Festival. So we have, I would like to take this opportunity while we're talking about funding, because we're going to get a couple other requests in a couple more weeks, we have a grand total of $32,000. So we're going to have to spend for the entire fiscal year in our budget. We were very lucky that we ended up picking up some, let me say it right, guaranteed payments, which we used to fund the constructive dialogue program, and we used to fund the external accounts for the Route 20,000. I think we have committed 38 plus or 40,000 of that. We do have probably 10 left of that. We could use this. I think Mr. McCall has looked this up, because I think he felt we should be consistent, because this has been an ongoing request, so would you like to speak to it? No, I think we've tried to use these. I know that the Arts Wayland is looking to phase this out, and so it was initially some seed money to help with this. So it's not going to be a reoccurring expense in the future, so I don't want you to take it out of the board's expenses. We did it last year from the Town Center gift funds, because I think it's relevant and related to Town Center and the monies that were donated by the developer. So I think it would help, because it helps stimulate the growth and the activity over there. So would you mind, if everyone's comfortable with using $7,000 of our Town Center funds, would you mind redoing the motion to include the funding source, please? Yes. Thank you. Thank you. And second? Thank you, sir. We accept that friendly amendment. Thank you. And would you like to friendly accept the second? Friendly second. All right. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. One abstentions. Opposed? And one abstentions. Opposed and one abstentions. Okay. That brings us to the next item, which I believe is the Town Manager's Report. So Michael, the floor is yours, please. Just making notes. Okay. So the Town Manager's Report. Thank you, Madam Chair. Just a couple of things. I have them in order. There will be a hazard mitigation plan update meeting with the public. It's going to be a daytime meeting on September 23rd from 10.30 a.m. to 11.30 a.m. And the town of Wayland is inviting residents, business owners, community members to help shape its hazard mitigation plan. And this is a critical document that helps identify natural hazards facing the town and how we will respond to those to reduce property damage, injuries to people, infrastructure, and the environment. There'll be a link posted, if it's not already there, on the town's website for anybody who wishes to participate. Just a quick legislative update. Tom. Holder and I have been working with our state delegation to get the enabling legislation to amend the MWRA legislation and add Wayland as a member community. And that's been going along. We've had great participation from Senator Eldridge and our two representatives, Gentile and Linsky. And I've been working closely with Representative Linsky on the liquor license legislation that we passed. We sent Home Rule up. And Representative Linsky is confident that we may get it through this session. So it's going before the hearing, the licensing hearing tomorrow. I've already submitted everything they've asked for. Robert Hummels assisted me. We've submitted maps. We've identified where we would issue these 10 licenses within the town. So we targeted Town Center, East Route 20 in the Kichichewit area because they wanted a breakdown. They just didn't want to give us 10. They wanted to make sure they were distributed equally within our business districts. And I've supported, excuse me, issued a letter in support of this for written testimony. They didn't ask for live testimony. So I had to submit that already. So, again, Representative Linsky and all of our members have been helpful in all of these endeavors. Update on open positions. Today we posted the assistant town manager position. We've already received inquiries. I've had some people reach out to me. So that's exciting. We are working on a timeline to do the chief process. I've been trying to talk to some current and retired chiefs to get their participation in an assessment that we will do here in-house. Hoping to get that posted in another week or so and build the timeline. I'm just trying to schedule people in for the participation on that. Mike? Yeah. Okay. So I'm going to start with the city council. We've been working on this for a while now. So we've been working on this for a while now. So we're going to start with the city council. We've been working on this for a while now. So we're going to start with the city council. So we're going to start with the city council. We're going to start with the city council. Town manager office hours will be on Monday, September 14th in this room, unless otherwise posted from 530 to 630. And just a couple of reminders. Since we last met, we went back to regular business hours, which means we will be closing at 4 on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. And we'll be open until 1230 on Friday. One of the other efforts that we've been working on, I've been meeting with staff with regard to the historic district parking initiative. initiative we had a meeting with stakeholders from the various boards the the depot the historic district commission herd house we had some residents and we fleshed out some ideas we wrote those down so i've since had the town engineer the town surveyor dpw and our public safety and which of those ideas are feasible some we had to strike out because they're in the uh within the wetlands buffer we just couldn't find enough land so we've narrowed it down to a handful that the town surveyor and the engineer are going to go back and try and draw up an actual parking plan and then we're going to go back and meet with the residents and go over what our options are and then our plan is to bring a proposal to the board about parking signage and potential new locations i should mention when we talk about parking lot it came up the ribbon cutting at terrain and it's come up more than once terrain would like to talk to us about potentially licensing some parking spots on the weekends in the back uh i've been working with town center on a couple of things we're working on the wayland fest licensing agreement how we do that for touch a truck and and the whole festival we did something similar with alta oxbow for one day uh we got certificates of insurance but that was one day in may um had a shuttle service for an event they had but they're looking for overflow parking over here so i will follow up with terrain and i may have a proposal to you from them while we were discussing parking in historic district the conversation of ellam island road came up recently and i've received some complaints from folks about parking in historic district and i've received some complaints from folks about parking in about the cars that come off of Route 20 as cut-throughs, and they fly down, and oftentimes they come right down the middle of the road and they've almost hit staff. And now that we're going to have terrain and employees there starting to park in the back and take deliveries, I said to DPW, you know, do you think we could ever strike that road because there was no center line? And Joe just said to me, as a matter of fact, the striping crew is in town tonight. And wound up, I had, because we had the public safety there, I had the two chiefs, they said that would be a great idea. So we took it upon ourselves. I reached out and had them do that. Nobody's complained, but I think it's good because so many people are looking at the traffic in Route 20 for their opportunity to cut, and they're not focused on where they're entering that road and where they're coming out. So I thought I might get some feedback, but so far I haven't. I'll let you folks know. And just the last thing, we are continuing to meet regularly with our regional dispatch. I told you we had the meeting, so I remember Whitney was there with State 911, a small subset of folks, the executive director and the Natick town manager were able to get a meeting with Senator Karen Spilka, the Senate president, and the State 911 and the Undersecretary of Public Safety came back in. And the senator really pressed them for a commitment to ensure that this would open on time next July, and they gave a verbal commitment that they would do that. So we are still following up, working with them. I have my IT director engaged with them now as we want to try and get a project plan for how we're going to connect our networks. So we're still continuing to move forward, trying to make sure that opens next year because that could, be helpful in the whole override calculus. One of the main reasons, as you may recall, was joining up with them. The state is trying to move people to these regional dispatch and they're putting more grant money in there. And it would help us if we could shift some of our dispatchers over there. Our assessment is based on the number of calls, so we don't pay the most over there, but it would also help us to have a better system. And they would take care of the equipment. There's so many benefits that would happen, have happened to us that we want to make sure this happens as soon as possible. On that, I don't have anything else to add. Matt and Jared, entertain any questions? In your discussions with Terrain, are they suggesting that they will close their garden store when they have events in order to assist themselves in accommodating the people? I can ask how they'll do that. I think, yes, I'll ask that. What I foresee they're asking is if they could have some dedicated parking if they need for overflow. And I want to talk to REC and everybody on this side, because if they had a Saturday wedding, we're having soccer matches here. I'm not sure how that would work out. You know, and they're going to say, oh, we have the back row. I don't need police. That's fine. I don't need police. I don't need police down here. So I have to work through the departments to see how that'll work. But I'll ask about the. Could that be customer parking or employee parking? All I know is they've reached out now, so I will inquire. I would think employee, because they probably wouldn't want their customers, because I actually talked, when we talked about the historic district parking, we were talking about how, if at all, we could put a crosswalk at the end here because people may, at some point, you know, we have the Bistro, we have terrain, people may find themselves parking here and trying to walk back. And you have to have something on either side. So without putting sidewalks all the way up and down both sides of Pellebrown Road, we could put an area where it has to be ADA accessible. There's a lot to it. And so I would share your concerns about customers walking across. Not that I wouldn't have any less concern for employees, but it's not well lived. They're at night. So I think these are all ideas we have to push out. Any other questions for Michael? In terms of your topics, did you want to add anything to that? When you had the meeting about the dispatch, did you get a verbal commitment to open on time? Did we get a more positive read on the grants? So that was the conversation. The previous meetings, we had Representative Linsky there. We had a representative, some staff member, I think, from Senator Spilka's office. But they actually got the senator to meet with them and got a renewed commitment. So there's a couple of million dollars that we need to come up with. Still getting the translation. I'm awesome. Anybody else have any other questions? All right. I think on number 14, we have two reappointments. And then we also have one confirmation appointment. So maybe we should put the two motions here. Do you want to do that, Doug, please? You mean make them separately? I think we do the two reappointments. Oh, I see what you mean. I think that makes more sense. Please. Move that the board reappoint Mary Ellen Costagno to the personnel board and Amanda Sciaccio to the historical commission, both for a term ending June 30th, 2029. Second. Thank you. Any further discussion? Michael. So I'm going to challenge some people's memories here. But there is some level of conflict with Ms. Costagno's position. And I think she had to fill out a form, declaration form with the Ethics Commission about family members being in collective bargaining units. OK. So it needs to be redone because she's being reappointed. It happened when I first got here. I am also there was it was something. So let's say, you know, she should do that. Excuse me for one second. I'm having a sidebar. We just need to have it redone, right? I think that's her obligation. It's her decision to do it. I think so. So we just mentioned we so we should remind that that needs to be done. Is that a minor that of the of the law? She just she chooses herself. OK, well, I'm sorry. I'm listening. There's an ethical obligation on public employees like ourselves, even if we're volunteers to notify the Ethics Commission if there's potential parents of a conflict or that to be done by filing a form at the time. Yeah, but it's the point is that we can't tell her to do it. Well, she just says we can remind her of it. So we have to remind to be mindful to accuse of topics that you want to do that. Mary Ellen, I guess I was not a rookie to to to volunteer and volunteer in town. And I think she's aware of I'm confident she'll do what she needs to do. Yeah, right. Me too. She's done already before. So. All right. So thank you for that reminder. So any further discussion? Otherwise, I'm going to go straight to the vote. All those in favor, please. I have zero. And since they're not here, you don't have to give the speech, Dutch. And I also vote. I move that the board confirm Sean Fair of the Conservation Commission to the Community Preservation Committee for a term ending June 30th, 2029. All right. We have a second place. Thank you. And you can further discussion. Otherwise, all those in favor say aye. Aye. Motion passes 5-0. We did consent for a few minutes and the minutes are on page 16 of the packet. And it's August 17th. Okay. Do I have a motion? Approval of the minutes as amended. Do we have a second? Second. Any edits here? A couple. Okay. On section A9, 10, and 11, it should say W. Whitney moved in A9. It should say W. Whitney moved in A9. It should say W. Whitney moved in A9. It should say W. Whitney moved in A9. It should say W. Whitney moved in A9. The word moved is missing. Likewise, under A10, we have D. Levine moved, and under A11, W. Whitney moved. I think she has it written. W. Whitney, seconded by D. Levine, moved. So you want the moved, moved? Under A11, I want to add the word moved after Whitney. Then it says, seconded by D. Levine. Then it says, seconded by D. Levine, moved. So you want to take the moved out of there after Levine? So you want to take the moved out of there after Levine? The typical way these are done, I think, is D. Levine moved, seconded by C. Reynolds, that the select board. So the word moved is missing after the maker of the motion on A9, 10, and 11. So we just need to add the word. Anyone else have anything? I had a question under. A15, the Community Preservation Act appointed its member. Is that right? Does the CPA committee have? What does it say there? Under A, Community Preservation Committee, appointing body, committee, conservation, conservation, I'm sorry. I have to withdraw that comment. OK. Anyone else have anything? So I have two from the minute taker said, we didn't do our motion exactly accurately. So we need to amend these. So on the number A15, reappointments, it should say, oh, yeah, here's your moved. W. Whitney moved, seconded by C. Reynolds, to reappoint A. Are we reappointing this woman tonight again? I guess this was the question I had. W. Whitney moved, C. Reynolds. Yeah, yeah. It's supposed to, in the minute, what we moved was the Historic District Commission, but it technically should be the Historical Commission. So we're amending that now to read we did this reappointment to the Historic District Commission, or Historic Commission, see it? Follow me? Anybody follow me? We moved to appoint a Historic District, but the first. Person should have been appointed to the Historical Commission. So that's the amendment. OK. And then in the next one, we voted to, these are the same ones we just did tonight, aren't they? It looks like there's some overlap there. We moved to appoint Sean Fayette to the by, and it should say, Conservation Commission here. So we have to make those two edits. OK. Now I want to know why we've done. Well, we've been appointed twice to the system. He's worked. He got. That's not the use. Exactly. He's with. What I'm saying is it's a very good point. All right. We took care of that. So based on that, those amended. Does anyone else have any other edits? No. OK. I'm sorry. I got one under 16B. 16. 16A, 16B, Historic. And I could just say District Parking Update. Oh, very good. Good catch. That's big. Yeah. New. Are we all set then? I'm done. Me too. Otherwise, we could be talking. All those in favor say aye. Aye. All right. Passes 5-0. That brings me us to correspondence and comments. Otherwise, we will move to select boards, reports, and concerns. We've only separated for a week. So Mr. Reynolds, would you like to start? I have no comments. I have lots of concerns, which I'll keep to myself. Thank you. Thanks. I'm concerned that one of his concerns concerns me. Exactly. I'll talk them offline. I have two items. One, remote participation. I continue to work with the chair of the Ellis Committee, Dave Bernstein, as well as the town moderator, Mariana Jones, in pushing for legislation, remote participation. Dave Bernstein is a workhorse on this topic. And I'm going to leave it at that. I hope to have further updates on this. I may come before you with a suggestion of another one article as we have before on the topic. Next, I anticipate that the 212 committee RFP will be published ideally an earlier than a week from today. And actually, third item, Michael McCall and I were in a Zoom meeting today with DCR representatives. They confirmed that they're hoping to have a meeting. And I'm hoping that they will. I hope that they will. I'm hoping that they will. start construction on the remaining portion of the rail trail between sudbury and the wayne library in the spring of next year wow good job good yes i'm good and you know what i am too so happy to move the motion to adjourn have to move to adjourn 28 28. yeah please take note okay all those are favorite all right all right well she has just five days here too