August 28, 2025 – Finance Committee – Video & Transcript

August 28, 2025 - Finance Committee

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Unknown: Okay, so let's bring the Finance Committee to order at seven o'clock. And this meeting is not being recorded, so it's not going to be made available, but I trust people will do a continuing, great job in preparing minutes for the public. There's no persons public to be here, so let's just call to order our agenda, really is five items, status, review, the fiscal 27 budget preparation, the annual report to the Tom sent a draft around just an hour or so ago, a
further discussion on peer community benchmarking. And then the meat of discussion is around the MWRA and long term water issues. So as several documents were sent around in that one any other topics from any committee members that want to raise just the we sorry. We should probably publicly state that we had a resignation. Should it be part of the announcement? Has resigned, and so we have six
Carl Barnes: so imagine we actually record the date of that presentation. Unknown: How I can find it. There's an email from him to me into Carol Martin, remember what the date was, but officially it should go, I think, to the Tom manager, okay, I think went to the clerk. The clerk later, so that has happened the official rounds. Good, I'm fine with that. Okay, thank you for continuing to serve. But, yeah, all of us should think about other candidates to come on.
First order of business then to turn to is the fiscal year 27 budget Working Group Michael McCall with Brian o'turley, he's drafting prepared a memo to the Select Board that was delivered last week. We had a meeting yesterday with the working group, and kind of delved into it further. We're on the cusp of potentially not needing an override, or potentially needing an override, and there's many variables that won't be locked in for a while, but there's clear sort of appreciation that it would be a good idea for lots of different reasons to not do an override this year, if we can avoid it, mostly around other things that we are all going to need to be dealing with, like the long term water solution. Variables not needing an override, or for an override, include question about what will be the actual special education costs, the transportation costs and the health insurance costs, also all of the bargaining unit
that we deal with, schools, police, fire, are up for new contracts before fiscal year 27 so, and there'll likely be three year contracts, and that process needs to kind of work through for a while Before we know what the results of that all is all like, that's what I understand. Yeah, I'm surprised. I thought they were staggered. Thought there may have been one or two that weren't on the same or, yep, and fire hasn't been settled for the last Yes. So those are all factors, just for Bill. They're three year contracts, typically for collective bargaining. I don't know you have fire, so we did, obviously, 23 to 2620 Yeah, 2326 to the end of fiscal year, 26 so and we'll have to do fiscal 27 through 2029 in the next round. But we need to budget for that before the collective bargaining has been agreed upon. Three significant, there's both three significant that there are more like seven or eight police fire in schools, but there are others as well.
Carl Barnes: So you said the fire settled. We were thinking that was going to get resolved last Unknown: year. It, I mean, I remember, yeah, after week, it was. Still outstanding. Okay, so that normally wouldn't be on this cycle. I don't know. I think it would be on this cycle, but now we'll have now they're going to be working on two cycles. So okay,
there are two things that are going to be in front of Select Board on the fiscal year 27 one of which is taking a department Public Works building that was put into the general obligation fund, not into excluded debt, even though it was a $2 million or one point something million dollar project. The reasons for that have been explained to me, or had been inferred by several folks as to why at that time it wasn't, nonetheless, is looking at it now that could free up some tax levy if it was taken out of her General Obligation fund and put into excluding debt, and select board gets To make that call that does to propose it. That does require a town vote, and I think it's a majority needs to vote in favor it. So it's not a town meeting. It's an actual special election. If the slide board decides to proceed with that, that will be likely the first Tuesday of November 25 that would move that amount of capital out of the general obligation into this excluded debt.
This chair is just super so that's one. And then the second item is, instead of going on permanent debt for a number of different projects that are pending to go with what's called Bond anticipation notes. Yeah, and again, it's a Select Board decision if they want to proceed with that the bond anticipation notes do not require paying principal during the time there are temporary debt instruments and that that would reduce the burden on the town from a cash standpoint, so for all of fiscal 26 Yes. Okay, yes. Do not require principal, paying principal, like during the until the purchase period, until they get issued as permanent bonds. These the temporary bonds, so that option is being considered, and that again reduces somewhat a potential Levy. Third, thank you all the worst next year. It's not entirely clear, but yes, the fiscal year 28 start Carl Barnes: eventually the principal is going to have to start. Yeah, right, you just have that Unknown: big jump up. Yeah, yes. Fiscal 28 looks very much likely. But as I've gone through past documents, there was some consideration that fiscal year 26 was going to need to be an override, and didn't happen, and fiscal year 27 was was assumed to be needed for an override, and now it looks like maybe we're not going to be there. When was the last time we did it override? It's been about 10 years. Yeah, I've seen the numbers. I don't remember the specific. I was going to say 2013 Yeah. And the reality of overrides. I mean, if costs of operations go up more than two and a half percent a year, eventually you're going to be needing an override. It's just but you need a town vote to approve it.
So we'll see. Is the short answer. There's certainly motivation to try and minimize
it the not for locking in or anything. There's a new it head for the town, and looking at circumstances that practices in town, and surfacing possibilities for some better efficiencies, some of the software licenses and stuff, which isn't surprising, and that's kind of encouraging. There's consideration of joint dispatch with several towns, and so instead of having our town have to do dispatch by ourselves, that obviously has bargaining unit implications and other implications. It's not clear that there's going to be tremendous economic savings anytime soon, but, you know, there's definite motivation by the town to look for opportunities to be more efficient. Any questions,
I guess one of my the question, sort of one of the I. The questions I have just looking at this is just from the meadow. It sounds like 750, to a million and a half is sort of a likely,
you know, I'm just trying to find what that was exactly. That's, that's the likelihood of the override between 750 and one and a half billion. I guess, on its own, the DEP W pushing that to excluded debt offers us 700,000 so that doesn't even so that doesn't even prevent an override. So we need on its own, so we need, like, a good chunk of these other things that could help. Yeah, so we've got a lot of unknowns. Yes, we've been eating whatever every other week, every other week, the number changes a lot. As far as the gap. There was one week where it looked like the bus contracts were going to be driving things to be much more expensive. And then it got relearned that women were locked in on our bus contracts. Right now we don't have any bus contract that we have to deal with, so that lowered some of the costs substantially. Where we left last meeting was about $500,000.04 to $500,000 DEP. But I don't lock that in, because there's so many variables we don't know.
At some point we will likely be asked, do we support moving the DPW into excluded debt, and also, do we support, you know, these bond anticipatory notes? Yeah, because that would that seems like that could creep enough provide Is there a downside to moving over? It sounds like no. The only thing, and you know, we're getting bound counsel to weigh in. The only thing is, if interest rates seem to be lower now than it might be in the future, maybe it's locking it in now, but there's not anybody's guess as to what interest rates, but that's one thing To be considered.
Anything else on current budget status.
Just on that note, like someone could easily do some sensitivity on that for rates and various rates, and because it seems like my sense is we still make sense. It probably the swing factors aren't so big that it would make sense. Yeah, I agree, and that's my counsel to the working group as well. Select Board needs to get comfortable with the choices here. There were some concern that people might see this as gaming, and there was sort of like reassurance that, no, this is actually kind of prudent practice, but we'll see how those conversations continue forward. Yeah. I mean, I think using bands for a full year, it kind of is, yeah. I didn't even know that fans exist. Well, I mean, we use them. We use them periodically, yeah, regularly, yeah. And the bands, as I understand the language of them, can actually be used for up to 10 years. So it's not even like a lot and Moody's is okay with it, you know, sort of overall debt position. This is really about Proposition two and how to sort of collect the right amount of Levy. Yeah. I mean, that does seem like a good option. Yeah, yeah.
Second order of business was the annual report, which I made a very quick sort of cut and paste, as I understand it. It needs to be submitted by the chair, which will be Michael, but I need to confirm that, you know what? Actually like I looked at last year's and Brian actually drafted it okay. We all approved it, and I believe maybe I submitted it okay as the standing chair. But if it's drafted and ready to go,
so take a look at it. We. And feed me any suggestions or questions or anything you weren't there so you don't have to find if you have a comment the right place, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's actually a good sort of synopsis of what we did for the year. So yeah, it's good to me and drew on yours from the year before, and also from the annual town meeting report, sort of from a cut and paste. I mean, it's about 800 words, and the target is up to 1000 is it's
Carl Barnes: just, I think we can double check this, but I think we have room for that. So we haven't even drafted the agenda for the meeting after September 2, so we probably ought to put that on the agenda. Try to get you comments before then I Unknown: was we did put it on Tuesday night's agenda to the degree that there are comments that we even can bring together to that Tuesday night there we can discuss it. Then it shouldn't take a long time. When I first looked at this requirement, I thought, oh my goodness, 10 page report or something. I realized that he's simpler, and so I took her rough cut at it. But Pam has the most experience, I think, and so please take a close look, Carl Barnes: make suggestions. So I happen to be at the board what works meeting the last one, which I'll describe in more detail later, that they they saw George's draft and approved it unanimously. Unknown: Commented recommendations. We'll do better than that. We'll get there. And the next item of business is benchmarking, and this is one that Iris has raised multiple times in prior meetings, and I started sort of assembling elements, and I'm not sure what we want or need to do around benchmarking at all. The one example was circulated last year I would send to you bill was Sudbury, which is a 173 page report, and it's actually really well done, really interesting. And Wayland is one of the comparison towns in that with the report on what, just how we compared other towns from a finance standpoint. I don't remember the title of it, but that's effectively what it is. Was this prepared by their finance committee? I don't know. I asked Michael McCall to check with the Sudbury folks, and one could we get Excel spreadsheets behind it, potentially. But to go a little further, the school committee has a benchmark of 13 towns, and I think it was established upwards of 10 years ago. The school committee chair Aaron suggested that they finalize that list that are re looked at that list last year, and it's a good list. I've asked Dr Fleischman to provide any examples of where that is being used in their reports or presentations. Because I went on their website looking around for stuff, and I couldn't find it being utilized at all. Finance Committee in 2019 had an exercise to do benchmarking. They picked 13 towns which were not the same towns as the 13 towns that the school committee paid. I've been some have suggested reasons for those 13 towns? I'm not sure there were two overlap towns, but 11 different. I'm not sure what questions we can answer by doing the benchmarking. The things that are distinct, as I've kind of looked at this stuff a little bit, is Wayland has almost no commercial or industrial revenue base compared to all of the other towns that are in kind of benchmarks, we have more land per capita than many of the towns around which kind of is curious for open space. So we're different in some levels. It's all the school committee towns and Wayland aspire to have really good schools, so that's sort of a similar priority of those. Some of the finance committee towns may not have that as a high priority. It's unclear to me, so I think it's worthwhile, especially if we're going to get into overrides, as we expect, for us to be able to talk to how other towns are dealing with their financial situation. So I think it would be a useful exercise for some one or two of us to sort of take on as a project that sort of delves into it and. Sees what's useful, I think you alluded to the right question. In other words, how would we use it? And what are the questions? And then work backwards into finding the talents that can help us answer that? Yeah, the other way around, you could find all sorts of things to benchmark on that we would never use. Yes, right? There is at the Mass Department of Revenue, a division of local services that maintains a spreadsheet of 352, towns and 300 measures, or some number of measures. So from a data collection standpoint, at least, there's lots of sources that can be pulled upon. So Dr Fleischman is on tap to provide examples of how they've been using it, and so I'll circulate that when that comes back. And then or Michael McCall said that they've actually, because of labor costs, they've started another cadre of benchmarking to sort of benchmark our labor costs against other towns, and so there's a set of folks that are working on something there, so he is on tap to provide that to us as well. Maybe we have in the past, even FinCom, since 2019 I think just after like, I think they're finalizing our current peer group. So I don't really know what, what, what, composing it, but we have talked about sort of rate of increase, or average tax increases year over year, comparing us with our peer groups. So I mean, we have used it in the past for, you know, whatever seems relevant in our discussions, but I think now with overrides, I mean, that would be another discussion point, which of our peer towns have had overrides, and yeah, by how much and how have they managed them on an ongoing basis? Some observations I've had is we've had way fewer overrides than lots and lots of towns. And to my knowledge, as I've skimmed it, at least our overrides have all gone through other towns. That's not the case, and that's a great example of starting with the question like, What do other towns do with overrides? And then work back to finding some other talents and comparing it, yeah, yeah.
With all of that data available,
Tom sorry, Michael, Carl Barnes: so a couple of thoughts, one of which is that
we've been asking, for example, I don't want to jump ahead, but we've been asking for comparisons and information about how other towns are treating water, and every time the answer comes back is, well, everybody's different, so you can't compare ours. And I'm not saying that's wrong, but I do think that you have to be careful with data. Yes, right. So there's that. And the second thing is that I feel like it's actually very subjective. At the end of the day, when I think about our pure towns, I think of where, if I wasn't living in Wayland, yeah, and I wanted to maintain the kind of life I have, where would I go? So I don't need the data for that. I mean, ultimately I do, yeah, right, but yeah, but you kind of know it when you see it tomorrow, a phrase from power Stewart.
Unknown: My gut is I've skimmed around this stuff would be just to adopt the Wayland school system for your towns. I a
reasonable benchmark, but I would rather, yeah, I'd rather not try to decide anything today, other than if there's a volunteer here, and maybe I'll ask Iris to volunteer as well, because she's shown interest in it. To take this on bill you up for that? I don't think
370 or 173 page reports are what's called, from here, 10 pages subject to certain conditions. I'm willing to help. Okay, so April bill is going to take the lead.
Very minimalist. We
need to know what we have to
prove, right? Has April done some work on this? Or? Sorry, Iris,
I don't think she has. I know she has raised the interest times, and that was part of the reason going to AI and they'll give you don every.
Well, so to my knowledge, no, but yes, it has come up multiple times and stuff. So I think it would be a potentially good way for Bill and Irish to kind of work together potentially on this. And I think starting with questions to be answered is completely appropriate. Cool. Soon, the scope is Finance Committee, not town. That's right, yeah. I mean, like, what do we have to know? Not the what is the town? Well, our role is really to inform the town to make good financial decisions. So it's really down you get into school and fire employees. All of that is irrelevant. So this benchmarking, okay, again, I would wait for the question. I mean, why study fire if you're not going to have to know anything about fire, well, we're going to be studying the town like the whole budget spent. It is part of the town spent, and so it's our spend high or low based on our time. Yes, you know, I guess being a first timer, I'm not sure I'm the right person, I don't know what the questions are. Okay, you guys have been through the process, and so I say, Well, what wire is fire irrelevant? You guys all know that. Yeah, got it understood. You're still help out. I'm just not sure. No, take the lead. Willing to help. Yeah? Just curious, is everyone unable to come to Tuesday night's meeting with the Joint lead? Yeah? Yeah, correct. So let's revisit this then, and maybe any of us, or all of us, can even give thoughts to what kinds of questions we're gonna want to ask. But yeah, the finance committee is mission is to really help the town make good financial decisions. Across the board. You could do a whole project on the question, yeah, every single department. It could actually make it part of the budget cycle. Whenever you talk to somebody, find out what the questions are, and actually then do the benchmarking as a part of the whole annual process. Yes, yep.
Carl Barnes: Different from that, when we talk about the questions, I don't think we need, we're asking the questions of the people who work in the various departments. I think, I think we're anticipating questions from the public as to why we're doing this. And you know, okay, so you're having your first override in 13 years. Well, first of all, that's a good fact, right? I think you know it's very helpful fact. But if you didn't have that information, it had, and you didn't know that your five pure towns are making this up, as I call one, each had overrides in the last each of the last three years, that's Unknown: really relevant data. And that gets back to your override question, which I think is very relevant, but it's like, well, do we have to know, you know, what are we paying the fire chief here versus everybody else? And it's, it's not, it's not even on that sort of granular level, I think, like we're looking at the peer group to say, Okay, we view this group of whatever 10 towns, whatever we choose as our peer group, however we want to use it in the past X years, like, how have we compared in terms of tax increases year on a year over year basis? How do we compare in terms of overrides and in our peer group, we've had six, six of the towns have had overrides, but it's just, it's, it's, it's really benchmarking. I mean, the goal is, from a high level perspective, when we're explaining what Wayland is doing and how we're doing financially, people are like, Okay, well, how are you doing versus other towns? Okay, well, who's your peer group? So that's what we need to define. So it's, it's not necessarily from, okay, what are you paying their fire chief versus someone else? It's kind of the whole budget, how things are going to high level,
the so I saw on a Wayland community Facebook site, someone was saying, Gosh, Wayland schools or high school, whichever came in at 23 and that's lower than house, yes, yeah, and yet, our taxes are higher than lots of folks. And it actually got a little bit intelligent later on. It was someone said, you know, I can move to Lexington and have 20% lower taxes. Well, Lexus and property, at least as in this Facebook stream was, you know, 30% more expensive. And so their revenues per capita are actually higher than so your actual tax dollars would be. So all of that is sort of interesting, and it's really, how do you talk to our neighbors about what's going on financially? But that's the other approach. Is identify the towns, like you said, take the school and then identify our contacts there. So whenever a question comes up, we can say, Okay, I have my 10 contacts. I'll give them a phone call tomorrow and get the answer. So rather than have a report that presupposes all the answers, wait for a question and then have 10 contacts and call, yeah, I don't know that there's people that you can call that would have answers to these kinds of questions. That's what, for example, the your counter power in each of the finance committees. And if you've had a question, have you had an override? You call the 10 or five finance chairs, and then when's the last time you had an override, or send an email or communicate with anyway, just brainstorming processes, but I think it is high level, is what we're talking about. And just sort of putting it into context, the override, and one consideration of the override is we may go into fiscal year 27, or eight, whatever becomes the year, with a multi year override. So it isn't just a single, you know, year that we're going to have to come back to the time. So we'll see. I
Yeah, so those are the three agenda items that we got through very quickly, and now we're in the water. Carl, you want to start that process?
Carl Barnes: Sure. Conclusion first, which is that one of the many emails I sent in the last couple of days included the recommendation from board public works to the stock board, and maybe to nobody's great surprise, they're recommending taxation be the source of debt
Unknown: for the MWR, Carl Barnes: yeah, I'm sorry to be, to be specific, the numbers not move since I left. You know, since the last time we talked, they're still talking about a 30, $31 million of change for the project.
Unknown: It's 38
I knew there's a two in there. See that's fire, which always kills me, the 30.2 I method. I
Carl Barnes: don't want to sound like I'm complaining, but since the meeting is not being recorded, this has been incredibly frustrating, because I feel like I feel like that board is talking in conclusions without data and and so I don't have, I can report their arguments, you know, in favor of taxation. And actually they're, to my mind, they're actually reasonably selling. But, you know, no one is able to tell us. You know, how other towns, I hate to say pure towns, but how they would have learned on this. So let me, you know, let me give you a little bit of the background here. Then there were, there were five options identified by the Board of Public Works. So the idea is, we're going to borrow this money from the state 20 year zero interest loan. And that service would start in 2019 Unknown: 29 I'm sorry,
be good. It's already in the budget. Yeah. If anyone knows Michael, it
Carl Barnes: would be about $2.1 million a year that would increase water rates over a five year period by about 74% in addition to 34% that's already been planned into the in between now and then. So they're looking at that and find, oh my gosh, yeah, that's going to more than double our order rates. That's unpalatable, so let's let taxation do it.
Unknown: There's some just to be clear, as I read their note, it's 74% over the next five years of rate increase. It includes the 32%
Yeah, that was, that was my understanding too. Carl Barnes: That was not, absolutely not my understanding. So you two agree with that. Unknown: Here it says, including the other capital items I had thought Carl, when George and I had breakfast three weeks ago that that yours was the understanding it's Carl Barnes: not what's written. I'm going to go back to him on that, because I may have heard this stated enough by that group, you know, a dozen times Unknown: the other like I was looking at the numbers too. Because if they're saying the debt service starts in 27 Seven estimate for this is for the other costs to be 1.1 to 1.5 A 32% increase over five years. Like it would seem that if you're doing twice that, it should be twice that. So it should be about 60 and 60 and 30 is about 90, which is in 74 so I'm not sure how those numbers hang.
Carl Barnes: I'm not either you can go into their 50 page water model.
So I'm going to, I'll dig into whether that 74% number is inclusive or not, because it makes, it makes a big difference. But to Bill's point, either way, it's been and part of their argument is, Hey, it's $110 million budget. What's another $2 million Unknown: of the town of the town budget? There's a
Carl Barnes: there's a there's another concern that they've got, which is that as water rates go up, water consumption will go down, but the the cost of service is fixed, so you you may not have enough money to pay the debt and run it, run the town's water supply if it's all in the water rates. To me, these are, I mean, that's not a crazy argument, but it's really hard to prove. You know, it's logical to me, but
Unknown: it's water rates annually. I mean, if they, I mean, if they got behind and they realized that was happening, they would have to adjust. Sure, they would, yep, they would have to. I mean, it's not like for a five year thing, you're locked in. So, Carl Barnes: no, I'm not defending the argument. Okay, so if we do that and we have to adjust rates upward again, that's going to put more pressure on water use. So we get this vicious cycle right? Unknown: Other context around this, apparently, water rates weren't increased last year to this year. Correct. Department of Revenue is not is concerned about eating into, Oh, I'm sorry, concerned about eating into earned or equity, I guess, in the system. And there's some conversation that these new meters that have all been put in across the town will actually report 12% higher volumes. And the old meters, they had
a decimal point off of mine that was 10 times. Okay, that's probably noticeable. Yeah, yeah, good thing. You're not supposed to be using your irrigation system. So there's a lot of variables here. The it's clear, from my standpoint, what I understand also is for not moving rates as moving rates as little as they can is easier for them. And so having, you know, whatever capital above and beyond gets borne by the town is just, you know, makes it easier. I actually think that with all of the financial circumstances of town, I don't know that the town votes in favor of a $38 million capital project and and I think that putting it into water rates is sort of in some ways easier to make sure it gets done. And I don't want us not to have potable water in the near future. So it's a combination of the two, and that has been presented or asked about multiple times, and there's no consideration that. Carl Barnes: There was consideration that the meeting okay of that but, but nobody has articulated a rational basis for the split, you know. And so then, you know, it's, you know, it's all capital cost, as far as I can tell. I'm not accounting, Unknown: right, yeah, no, it is project so, so which the water department does all the time, input into rates. I don't know the best time to insert this, but the you know, I also wear another hat, which is the Energy and Climate Committee. And if you go back into history, in 2021 the town, entire town, the county, voted for climate emergency. And then there was a climate action mitigation plan, you know, created and voted and approved by the Select Board. So when I started hearing about this, I went back and reread it, and it says that one of the goals is to reduce, you know, irrigation on a large Swan, because environmentally bad, that's what climate and it said to move the town and select. Board that signed off on this, the towns will increase the program progressivity, so in other words, increase the rates for the high users. Now that doesn't preclude also putting some of it in taxes, but this would seem like an opportunity to kill two birds with one stone, to at least in part address what was in the climate plan, in terms of discouraging lots of, you know, lawn sprinkling in high usage. And so that's why I brought up the hybrid thing. I'm not sort of saying all of it has to go into the people who use water for their lawns, but we did say, as a town, that that's something you wanted to do in eastern part. So anyway, that's, that's my climate hats, making sure that that gets in, because I was a little bit over minorly, you know, surprised and disturbed. And none of this stuff did the camp document that were called, geez, we're doing a very good job of marketing the plan, because nobody seems to know about it. So But anyway, I am curious, like I saw this week that the happy hollow well was shut down for a little while. And I'm like, okay, that's the well that's working. And we're looking at this project to be only 15% of our water, right? So it's such a small portion of the water needed for the town to suppress everything, but we have the like. We have the connection already that we're using an emergency consideration. My question on the whole water issue is, as a homeowner who doesn't water their lawn, abides by the rules, doesn't have a pool. That's a big thing, right? And I looked at, I've been wanting to add a pool, but I also now with this, I'm like, there's no chance moving bankrupt, but at the same time, that's one of the things that I feel as though, it's why you would put it in the water rates is to because you're going to have so much more pressure in town that you want people to start thinking of those things right, like, so I I'm like, more on the fence of hybrid as well, because I think you could have both. But I do think the water rate needs to be part of it, because otherwise, I don't think it's a fair, fair for out the town, like, for a lot of people, especially people that live in, like, apartments, right? Yeah. Can I just ask a question, though? Because my understanding of, I mean, I just wanted to respond to the happy hollow circumstances last week, I think was in the PFAS equipment that a pipe broke, and the solution that we put in place to deal with PFAS, with this canvas building was not great. So a big chunk of money is going to be the one that we did what five years ago that it was like we had to do this emergency. We spent a ton of money temporary solution, and it sounds like it wasn't well enough engineered. So a chunk of this money, I don't remember how much is going for a permanent PFAS with a real building on it, and metal pipes and not plastic, and sort of better equipment there. So it the, it was lucky that we have the MWRA that we could tap into on an emergency basis, but, but, yeah, it's not indicative of the happy hollow aquifer having a problem. It was our equipment. So the other, the other thing that still bothers me about this whole water situation too, is that we can never go 100% to MWRA, even though we're spending all this money to get the connection, we're only spending it for a very small portion of our needs. Yeah, but to be clear, in circumstances that our well fails, we can go 100% MWRA, which I didn't think we could go 100% I thought they said, well, well fails. So there is an organization called the Water Resources Commission that is responsible for having folks use what water resources are available to them, and they won't let us, is assumed by the folks have been in front of them. They won't let us leave our well water completely because it's economically and that's the part that I understand, but it's like, the part that I didn't understand is like, we could still never go under percent, and our water restrictions will still, even with this huge investment, will still never be lifted. Yeah, I will see on the water restrictions. I've encouraged Tom holder in the water department at bpW folks to get out in front and communicate. And I thought the communication around what happened last week was really bad, because it sounded like this is an emergency, and it was basically saying, Do what you're already doing. There was no change in practices for any. It was being asked for, but so I think we need better communication on all of this. Hopkinton is moving down a path, or has been for some years now, to go 100% to MWRA, but they have wells, and one of their residents is one of the commission members and circulated around. I don't know if you've seen YouTube where he's basically long half hour videos. Basically, that comes to the conclusion, if you have a viable groundwater source, you have to use it. You can use MWRA as Augment, but you can't give up a viable groundwater source, right? Because that's what I was doing to say, is, I thought that was what we learned in the last one of those last meetings with our public works, is that we have to maintain like we can't percent because we have wells and yeah, therefore, we haven't tested that. We haven't gone in front of the water resource. The commission is saying, economically or technically, there are reasons we can't rely on our wells anymore. But there it's just, I guess it's like, it's more of like, for such a small portion of our of our water needs, we're making such a huge investment, yep, $20 million of it is for the MWRA 15, or whatever it is for the PFAS, better solution. So, yeah, Carl Barnes: well, the other way of looking at that is, you're, you're buying, you're buying an option for the future, right? If that well does fail, Unknown: and we have it right now. Sorry, we have that option right now, emergency water on an emergency water? Carl Barnes: Well, yeah, but I'm talking about an utter failure where it's not going to come back online, right? Unknown: I think we would still have emergency water. Would be not a
million dollars for permanent connection. There has been some, including Select Board members, that say this doesn't make sense. State, from the engineering standpoint, we have an emergency connection. Why? Why do we need to spend $20 million to get a permanent connection? So there's been answers provided for that. I haven't, I don't know. Is the short answer that surprised me, but it is, you know, I can't remember what it is, a half a mile long, you know, new conduit to tap into the MWRA instead of what we have right now. And I don't know why that's necessary, but I guess it is so there may be Select Board, may actually be looking to hire review engineer to come on board, to look at the engineering that has been done, to give some level of comfort to that, but there is no budget for that exercise, and it's not clear that it's going to come up with anything new. Sorry. So I'm just trying to understand what their recommendation is, because when I read this, my and I obviously concluded something different. I thought so, the MWRA interconnection the 20 million, and then the replacing the happy Holly hollow treatment facility 14, for the 14. And then, in addition to that, they've got all the other
other projects, or that, or the happy Hollow is the other projects that will increase water rates by 32% over the five years, so that those other projects include The new water tank that we put into the budget, and yes, a new pump station and some amount of water mains and other normal capital projects. Okay,
that it's the 32 and the 74 are separate. That's there's always my understanding. So, okay, so and they want to do all of that, the 74% increase, if they were to do that, which they don't, they're recommending not doing. They want to put that all into tax. So that's the 34 million, right? Yes, is that everyone's no so just this bullet says water rate increase to finance the dual source project. So that's the 30 plus million, including the other capital items, above which I thought that meant these capital items, the water tank, the pump station, water mains, okay, as written, that's what. So they want to do everything. Recommendation, yeah, the recommendation page, two papers, whole bullet, or I.
The water source project and other anticipated cost, other capital items, I don't see that, so it's the it's the first full bullet on the second page, the water increases to the finance, to finance the dual project and other anticipated cost, including the other capital items would be 74% so it does sound like that's everything altogether would be the 74% increase. It
just this is where benchmarking would really come into play. It can be really useful information. The one challenge with benchmarking is people pay all kinds of different things around their water rates, including sort of a per customer fee. So that need to be really clear about how where water rates are being collected, and if we don't pay per customer, Fay, like, you know what? I mean, like, the average water bill. Like, it'd be interesting to have that comparison, because we might be in the ballpark, even if we increased, because we're actually our cost. I saw one page which I don't know what Paul was under Wayland was in the upper tier of costs already. Can I ask a question about this. Sorry if our wells are technically free water. Where is all that money going? Like, that's my biggest like, that's my biggest meters. Yeah, well water mains. I'm not saying, Where has that money gone all these years, right? Because it's like, that's a lot of money to be spending if our rates are already high and we technically have free water, right? We pay the pumping, yeah, it's Carl Barnes: PFAS mitigation and replacing water mains. Unknown: But like, PFAS is a seven and a half percent adder on our bills now. So how long has that been true? Though, two years, I think two or three years. So whenever the projects got approved, I think they put an adder on the bills to pay for that. And the average bill for a semi annual bill is $900
so 1800 per year, yeah. And, you know, average tax bill, I can't remember, is like 15 or $20,000 so doubling your average water bill to, you know, $3,000 or something, to look big from a water bill standpoint, but you know, it kind of gets small from your tax posting. Right when I first read this, I guess that why I brought it up, I was thinking that they were recommending, like the 20 million for the MWRA hookup would be tax, and then the remainder, all the other ongoing capital projects. Capital projects would be in water rates, which I was like, Oh, that kind of, I can see how you could defend that in terms of, you know, PFAS, and you need another pub, you know, as a public good. And it's just sort of a cleaner way to separate it. I think that's a very, you know, for a hybrid solution. That's a very viable possibility, but
I don't know that's actually what was it isn't what they're proposing, no. And, you know, from a body language standpoint, I could my sense from DEP w is they just want to have someone else take costs, and they do have responsibilities to set the water rates, select board for taxes. They don't want all the complaints. But yeah, but yeah, I wondered about that too. If we were in a well water system, for you, would think we would have a fund, right? A huge and so that would what does that mean for repercussions once this goes through of how much money that we're not accumulating? You know what I mean? Like, if we went to 100% MWRA, because we had to, where's that? Like, there's going to be a huge sweep of additional expenses coming to the budget for the town. I would assume you might bring me to pay for the water to if we're using the money, that's technically free money kind of thing that's coming in or the water's free, we're utilizing whatever fund that generates on a consistent basis. If we went to 100% MRA, we no longer have that free fund, right? So then it could be a significant additional cost coming out the town that we were using to pay for. Are utilizing that fund to pay for Yeah, I hear you. It has been explained to me. I don't, haven't seen specifics. Some towns that have gone to MWRA have tried to go back to other sources because it's so expensive, but I don't know. So just sort of a bit of a tangent, but the DPW is independent of the Select Board, who do they report? Oh, no, so they bpW, yeah, has responsibilities. They basically set the water rates right. But don't they have somebody who is over them? So not over them. Select Board has other responsibilities. And select board does set, you know, taxes and alike. Well, and I don't know if you're what you're getting at is so Board of Public Works is making this recommendation on how this should be financed, right? Ultimately, Select Board will make that decision. But Select Board considers what Board of Public Works thinks, what the town manager thinks, what FinCom What if select board doesn't like the rate structure. Well, I think the rate structure is determined. The rate structure itself, the tiers, the tiers are determined by Board of Public Works, right? So that's my question is, why do they have ultimate authority? Or rather than the Select Board? We think the Select Board would have a higher authority, different areas of authority. So rates, water rates, set by DEP W and they have responsibility to make sure they're collecting enough, but the rate making is internal to them. Nobody above them, other than the voters, I guess. Yeah, okay, interesting, yeah, a little bit like the school board, yeah, yeah. But I guess if you're saying, ultimately, if you're taking on this big debt project, you know, what I'm getting at is back to my original appointments, that the, you know, the camp was approved by the Select Board. As far as I know, it's never approved, and it was never approved by the DEP, by the Department of Public Works. So the Public Works people said we didn't agree to progressive rates. They have more progressive rates. Yeah, these are some of the highest progressive they never read camp the Select Board is what, yeah, but they will say that this is some of the highest steepness of rates of any time the camp, which has got the Select Board approval, is to increase the program. It's not enough. These aren't enough. $17
that's what's in the plan that was approved. So that never, that's, I mean, you can agree, never agree with visible but yeah, no more progressive than they currently I didn't know that. Yep. So anyway, yeah, but the responsibility to select board, they've actually gone to town council to be to be clarified about their responsibilities. And that's this note that got sent around. It looks good to know for the other committee, because we need Department of Public Works into it. Yep, but Carol Martin sent to me after it got cleared by town council, so it is very clear what the Select boards responsibilities are, at least to me. No, no, that's fine. I didn't realize that the climate claim got into that specific of increasing water rates, whether anybody read it before they approved it, but it did that. How much higher it didn't say it's just more progressive. Okay, so are
they more progressive than they've been? Oh, maybe they already are. 21 Yeah. 2022 probably, yeah. When I asked George about it, why can't we make them more progressive? Says artists are the steepest progressive of any Tom that he's aware of, but so I don't know. Yeah, the overall objective isn't the progressivity of the race. It's discouraging large you could do the same thing by just banning, you know, like we do in the summer, you know, you can't sprinkle your wands that wasn't in the camp, but that would be another way of achieving the same objective.
So for Tuesday night, anything, I encourage all of us to ask whatever questions we have in you know, there will be time for that in the meeting. I think that there will be town council will be there, as I understood, and maybe Abrams will be there the economic consulting folks.
Carl Barnes: So do I do? We seem to be coming slowly to a consensus that we want some kind of hybrid approach. Unknown: I'm not sort of, I would love to look at what a hybrid approach would look like, which doesn't seem like they have done I don't Carl Barnes: think they have done that. One of the other ideas that would. Thrown out quickly, had this bump to the table quickly, and then never talked about again. Was just a connection fee. We right now we have a $60 minimum and administrative fee on every bill. You could change that to $300 or $700 or pick a number, and that was a that was thrown out, that that was never discussed as a possibility.
Unknown: I'm personally real concerned about the low income folks, and, you know, not putting excess burden on them. And then there's Tom basically and doesn't pay for water. They pay the lowest rate, yeah, the lowest rate, no matter how much they use for rec fields or whatever. And then non profits, which aren't a big deal, but they don't pay any taxes. So if we put it into the tax base, they don't pay any of that. Carl Barnes: You so we've got two principal projects. We have the connection. We have the upgrade to the happy hollow wells. I still think it's all capital, but that might be one way to separate, yeah, yeah, yeah. Unknown: It is all capital, as is the tank and all the other things are are paid for with rates Carl Barnes: that the that they've discussed, and this was with with Carol. Carol Martin was at this meeting too. Is everyone seems to be looking for a simple answer. Now, I'm not sure that's a bad thing, because you kind of then explain it to the voters, and there was concern articulated that, you know, if we if we split it, then it's going to be a, more complicated, and B, the conspiracy theorists will think we're trying to hide something we the town. Something. We the talent, yeah, and so, you know, and we've got to get it passed by Tom meeting. So that's, that's one of their arguments for. It does an argument for in favor of taxes versus water rates, but it argues for a very simple approach. And I think you'll hear that from probably both groups on Tuesday.
Unknown: My gut feels like town leading would be easier if it's just rates increasing people's tax bills, but I don't know. Yeah, I think I understand. I'm just thinking like to spread it over. I don't know it's, it's the same amount you're paying, the money, fungible. It's just how you look at it. But it just seems like that the incremental increase, percentage increase in your tax bill is is much smaller than than when you look at the water bill and it's like, oh my god, yeah, this gets high. It just seems like that's another reason to kind of try to balance a little bit a hybrid as an attractive feature. Tom me, because it's satisfying both, yeah, we're putting some in taxes. We're doing what you want. Well, yeah, we're putting some rate, we're doing what you want. What's the argument? I mean, most people aren't going to say, well, it should be 100% one way or the other. Most people are going to say, Hey, I see a good compromise. I think you need to kind of, and that's, I think it asked for that before. But just to kind of show the pros and cons of diligent approaches.
Last year, this time, we were really looking at three or four or five different water solution options. And they kept on kind of going down that path until whatever March ish time frame, ultimately everything. And it was like, have to vote for we don't have any options not doing it. Yeah. We have to do it. Yeah, just
Carl Barnes: well, if they vote against any taxation increase, I think that means the it automatically goes to race, because they don't put that population doesn't vote on that. Okay, all right, so it's gonna happen. I guess Unknown: that's when we'd solve it.
Yeah. I mean, I guess that is the easy answer. When, when it comes up on the town floor, like, well, we'll just take this out. Well, okay, then it goes on a percentage rate so, but Tom meeting in the capital budget that got approved, voted for things like the water tank rebuild. So water capital projects go in front of town meeting, even if they're being paid for in rates. I think yes, the capital Yeah, as opposed Yeah. The capital budget. Well water went separately, yeah, enterprise funds were separate, but they were but they're aligned as part of that follow up on coral for it doesn't necessarily mean we have a consensus here that we want hybrid, but it sounds like we have a consensus that we want hybrid to be considered. Yeah, there's one of the options. Yeah, that's fair. Carl Barnes: Definitely true, you know. And one of the things that you know, again, they haven't done this Unknown: yet, but, but Carl Barnes: the argument seems to be, well, you just did the math. Very back of the envelope, you know, 34 million divided by 5100 meters in town gives, you know, 66 $6,700 $6,700 a household to pay that money back over 20 years. Whether it comes out of your left pocket or your right pocket, it doesn't really matter. And so one of the things they, I think, they intend to do is actually demonstrate that with better math. Unknown: That's a good point. That's a good point. Now it Carl Barnes: ignores all the people that you were talking about, all the rate payers, or, you know, not for profits, the town low income, you know, should somebody who's using 10 times the border pay? On average?
Unknown: Yeah, that'll be a question. I would think that'll come up under either option is, how much are my rates? How much more am I going to pay every year for water? How much more am I going to pay every year in taxes?
Sure, curious that this didn't get any debate at the Board of Public Works, they just read it and said, Yes, we approve. But which one we look at George's recommendations Carl Barnes: did get some when the vote, the preliminary vote was taken, it was one vote for all taxes, one vote for all rates, for hybrid. Okay, further discussion, and that's what you saw, okay? Unknown: So, yeah, I
Carl Barnes: mean, one of the gentlemen on the committee is on board is really concerned about conservation and therefore wants to the race. And others, I think, are just trying to do the best they can. A lot of competing interests.
Unknown: And I think the Select Board has varied interests as well on this topic. So when are they going to make the decision? What's Is there a time frame? I don't, I think you know, this is all in preparation for next annual Tom sometime before. I don't know that there's a specific deadline between now and then, Carl Barnes: there's actually a procedure which I'm only beginning to even appreciate exists, and it's the code references cited in their their in their recommendation, although it doesn't explain it. The idea is that if you put it all to taxation, then the Select Board each year could decide how much needs to be offset by water rate increases. So in theory, you could put it all in there and select board to come back and say, well, at least $2.1 million we want water rates to cover Unknown: half a million dollars. Pick a number. You know, any number that may be where
Carl Barnes: you know that was what was actually described in the vote taken at the board meeting, you know, the meeting on the 18th that didn't make it into the written recommendation. I'll see
Unknown: if I can learn. So ultimately, it's the discretion of Select Board. How much should go back to Carl Barnes: water rights, effectively? Yes. So this Unknown: idea, that's what you do, hybrid in year two. And you know, in other words, each year, I guess the Select Board could decide how much of a hybrid. Carl Barnes: I think in theory, that's right, how right, what the mechanism is, especially in a world where we just all agreed that Board of Public Works sets the rates right. There are, there have to be offsets here and there. I don't know how it works. Unknown: There is some language that I think responds to that in the Select Board responses from council that basically we want to take it up every year. Yeah, yeah. Once it's in place, it'll just go but. DPW sets the rates, but Select Board can shift a portion the debt service pursuant to mass log chapter 15. So yeah, I can point that out, but they get to revisit as much as they want. I
But yeah, as far as Tuesday goes, please ask all the questions, including, like, where's all the money gone for this free water we've been pumping for decades? Where physically is that needed here? I don't know. Maybe in this room, I would assume ability to the large. I thought you said you kind of gave a little synopsis. We start here and we meet, and then we come back here. I think we'll probably what you tell me, that's what I don't think we'll be coming back here. Yeah, he did.
Yes, that, right? No, I think that's the large meeting room. Okay, well, you know where that has to all this. Carl Barnes: I kept word, got two meetings that night. Let me look at see what, what it actually says. I
Unknown: it digress a little bit. So if you have the you said, like that big matrix of 300 towns and 300 items, be nice to know what the items are. Yep, we'll do, yeah. Can you circulate that? I mean, if you don't have to look at once. Okay? So, yes, we convene at seven, right here, council lady je room, and then we adjourn to the large meeting room, which is where the platforms so and when do they when does Select Board convene or the joint meeting to meet? Is it 710 or 720 20? Carl Barnes: Okay, I have us adjourning here. 715 yep, that's fine. You know, just to give us a little leeway to get over there get settled, but i
Unknown: Anything else on water. I
Carl Barnes: think the only other information that came out of that meeting is really, I think, just confirmatory Unknown: that
Carl Barnes: the application for the I might not be quite right, the word word for it, but the project, project evaluation form, which goes into the state to get us in line for the State Revolving Fund loan, was submitted on a timely basis, and the plan right now, we should hear something more in the fall, when the state publishes what they call, what's called, an intended use plan, and then we should get formal approval, or formal notice that we're in by March, sometime in March. And Tom holder at that meeting had said that in their discussions with the state, nobody had it, and they're high at the numbers go all seemed fairly reasonable to people on the other side of the table, so they're pretty optimistic about Unknown: that. I've heard anecdotally that several towns are in this sort of 30 to $40 million water capital projects related to PFAS and the like. Think that's all I got. I
the last item of business for today, I think, is minutes. Thank you for getting them out, people. Yeah, I'll be faster as I get situated and understand the process. Forget these tonight. Quickly.
Good. We can prove them. On Monday, people have a chance to look at them, comments or questions, just, you know, I have Do you want me to tell you the ones I made already sure one, it was the list of people I just noticed that is that it's still listed chair as Michael and Carl are and Brian. So I changed those, and I removed Brian and Michael and added William. Do you like William or bill? So Bill Hus, okay, and then so. I will change that in minutes then, because I have it as w, Hus on everything, the way, is fine, but informally, okay, so I'll keep William for formal, but I'll call you bill Perfect. Okay, sorry. And then one other thing that I added, that I realized after I had sent it is the review the calendar. I just made a note about that it was attached and that we needed to we review dates in the short term to make sure we had quorum on meetings. Any other comments? Carl Barnes: Sorry, I have two small ones under the proposition two and a half override, which is Unknown: middle of page two. Okay, so it's item three on page two. Carl Barnes: Yep. I have a feeling this is a an AI problem, yep. But I've never seen half spelled out, not substantive. But the only other one that I would I have is now on the next page. First item number one, project costs, okay, once there is technical, technically correct. Confused me. Can we add after the 38 point 2 million, the phrase comma, including the contingency funds described below? Because, as I look at those numbers, you know the two, the 20 million of the 14 don't add up to 38 points, right? I just think it invites too many questions.
Unknown: Just I also have the two and a half. So that's on that two places on that spot. And I would combine three and four and just go with after still uncertain there's a possibility of excluding some debt to free up lively capacity. Specifically, that's just a continuation of that. The two and a half override, just on that one, the debt exclusion piece, the second sense, specifically the DEP W garage, I'd say the remaining debt on because it's just, just to clarify, it's like it's just a piece stub of what was left. Okay, and then on Item five, the next one it would be required. So it's not might be required. Thank you. That's it
for me. One more. Yeah,
I'm not offended. Know that. Thank you guys. Carl Barnes: We're still on page three, taxation versus water rates. You know, there you gave one completely accurate argument that they made. But I think that I wouldn't say that their, their their preference is due to concerns about ability of the water rates to cover debt. Certainly true in part. So I would add the words due in part, and the other one that I think is sorry. Tell me where that is. Unknown: Second line item six in that list, right? Thank you. Carl Barnes: Sorry I said that part. So second sentence, this is due, I would add in part. I it okay, and then end of the sentence I would end it with and to the need to fund other projects through water rates.
Unknown: Okay? And I really have done now, thank you for that. I'll go back.
So I had more on starting on the first really the second page discussion with Kelly. Call that and join the meeting for you. Zoom call is being considered. I have just for appointment by FinCom, because it's not, it's sort of like the way it sounds, sounds like it's just select board, and it's like, why do we have this in the minutes? Just to it just makes it a little bit more clear that she is our appointee. So Kelly lab and join the meeting via zoom. I would insert So Kelly is being considered. I am include for appointment by the Finance Committee, right? And then I take out, like the full to the board, yeah? Just like, cross that all out. So for one year term by the Yeah. Of to a one year term on the soon to be formed. CIPC, yeah, okay. And then the last sentence there, Kelly, did I think I had, you know, it's funny is I think I had copied the note from the beginning. Yes. Sorry. I just thought it like, I think that was probably from the agenda. I just thought it's like, if we kind of agreed, yeah, a little clearer. If anyone was curious, Kelly developed, I said, the five year capital model. Thank you. Capital planning model. Does anybody know if that committee has met?
And then the next section update regarding the fiscal 27 budget. You have the first sentence, these points highlight the major areas of focus. I just say school budget rather than school budget focus. So just take focus out.
Thank you. Sorry.
And then I guess it was all I have. That was a question, all labor the second point, labor agreements. All labor agreements, I don't know if I'd say across the board or just all down, agreements are set to expire. I'd say by June 30, 2026
I guess the process of engaging with various, I think should be labor groups not engaging with agreements. So the process of engaging with various labor groups, and I just say for fiscal year, 27 to 29 contracts, and then I cross out and closing them appropriately, like, well, just will begin this fall. I
I'm good. Bill, got any comments? I
will make sure I do a little bit of job. You'll have it fresh this round, not three A month later, with that, can we have a motion to approve the minutes as modified? So moved second, I second, all in favor, and Bill, you can abstain. Yeah, I think I was at the Oh, you were at this meeting. Sorry. Carla, read the minutes of the detail that you guys did. I will do that in a piece. So all voted in favor.
Any other business for tonight. Was going to say as an aside, because I know you do a ton of work on the minutes, whether you like doing it or not, in the Energy and Climate Committee that the town will now do the minutes for us. So the town rep, you know, Abigail shoot, does our minutes now, okay, you don't have to do so. You don't have a staff person. I was just saying, I think that there's, like, an AI version that they send me, and I'm like, why don't we just post this online, like, because it gives you everything, and even the time stamps of like, what people are talking about, yeah, that you would think, but we'll get there someday. But apparently, other committees, because Abby was telling us that she checked, and the other committees all have staff people that do it. So why are we doing it? So anyway, we should ask about that too. Again, most of the other committees do. I don't know why, and that's very recent at all, but for us, that's just been, like three or four months ago. Person we made, Brian, Kevin. I'm curious, though, what time of day you do? You guys meet during town hours same time as you guys, seven or 730 interesting. We've moved it now up a little bit more, sort of 430 so maybe that has something to do with it, because they know they had like, don't they have an allotment for like, and we've never utilized that, right there is an allotment I've seen, but didn't know that. I thought that was like hiring somebody to do like. In the past, we, we did have someone do the minutes. One of the problems was they it was, there was a lag several meetings. So then when Brian over like he took it over, he volunteered and was out the next morning. We didn't need anybody, and they were more timely than they'd ever been. But April, you usually don't have a person. It works. I can always look into it and. Yeah, that's worth asking. Most of our most hard meetings are hybrid meetings and zooms. Ai function is pretty good. I mean, nowadays, like someone, even if we had a minutes taker, they use the AI and then they kind of did a little massaging Exactly. It's not as big a job as it used to be,
you know, we used to before we rotate. So each one of us would each mean different person, which has some issues, because then the consistency is always right. The they and the test for minutes is higher bar than corporate minutes, you know, there. The intention is that reader will understand the context and the nature of the deliberation, very different than corporate words, what decision who was there and what decisions are being made. And so it's a bit of a but people feel free to check in. But if you want to, like, find other options, I just, I feel like, right now, I've been relying so much on AI that it's like, not necessarily working the most for me. So now I'm going to try to do a hybrid approach. So I'll let you know if it becomes like, Okay, I'm done with this.
I mean, it is a lot of work, yeah,
and with that, motion to adjourn, motion to adjourn second, second, all in favor. Thank you all. We can be a second at 827, we got a board to have.