May 15, 2026 – Finance Committee Appointing Board – Video & Transcript
May 15, 2026 - Finance Committee Appointing Board
All right, well, let's call to order. It is 915 on Friday, May 15, 2026. And this is a meeting of
the Finance Committee appointing board. And we have a full contingency today with Carol Martin,
Miranda Jones, and myself, Cherry Karlson. We are meeting only via Zoom. There is no in-person
meeting. And you can on the town's new website page, there's a link that you can go through to
and it very nicely lists our meeting. We are the last one of the week. So just scroll down to the
bottom of the list. And you can join us. The meeting is being recorded and should be made
available to the public on Wacom when they are ready to do so. We will take public comment as
part of this meeting. And again, that will only be via Zoom. And I think I have cut we haven't met
since October. So I'm a little stale in doing this. But I think I've covered all of our items here.
I don't see that we have anyone here to make public comment. So I will. Okay, but we'll just let me review the agenda. And then we'll officially do get to that. So after reviewing the agenda, we'll do announcements from the board and public comment. We'll take a look at the minutes from our last meeting. We'll talk about the Finance Committee recruitment, which is our main reason for meeting today. We have a couple of pieces of correspondence related to that. We'll talk about our next meeting date and take any reports and concerns from the board. And I think we'll probably be done before 10. But I just try to be generous when I go through our agenda. So then we'll adjourn. I will note that based on feedback from the town clerk, our agendas no longer include topics not reasonably anticipated. If we did become aware of something, we would either amend the agenda or hold it until the next meeting. Doesn't mean we can't bring it up under reports and concerns, but we wouldn't take any action until the next meeting. So that is one change to our standard agenda. Any announcements from the board today? Anyone willing to do minutes? I'm doing them right now. Okay, thank you, Miranda. You're going to be done before the end of this meeting. You know, you are very good at that. I appreciate you. I'm actually handwriting them. I'm not typing. So Abby rescued me because I forgot to send one set of them. But she was double checking as we went to the new site. So I would have had them. I had them too. We're all up to date. Yeah. Okay. Okay. So I still don't see anyone for public comment. So hearing none, we'll move on to minutes. Oh, good. And we're seven minutes ahead of schedule. We approved the minutes of October 17, 2025. I think as written. Second. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you, Miranda. I didn't note anything. So if none of us saw anything. Okay. Okay. So then for the minutes, we have a motion and a second. Yeah. Um, and we'll call any other discussion. We'll do a roll call vote. Yep. Miranda. Yeah, I guess. Carol. Yes. Cherry. Yes. So we have a vote of three to zero. Thank you, Miranda. That just puts us a little bit more ahead of agenda time. Oh, look at it. Look at this cruise. We'll use it up now. So, okay. Um, as far as recruitment, I did, um, take a screenshot and include it in the packet of where FinCom stood going into town meeting. Cause I thought that I wanted to make certain we had the names associated with the dates of the term expiry. Yeah. And so just super helpful. Yeah. Just to walk down that, um, um, Phil did tender his resignation. So that will be an open seat. Um, Carl Barnes, um, is still, I'm going to say undecided. We, uh, I will follow up with him again. Um, Iris, um, let's skip Iris just for a minute. Rob is still serving. April seat is open. She's stepping down at the completion of her term. Pam seat is open now because she tendered her resignation effective at the end of town meeting as did Phil and, um, Bill is there. Um, so we have two people that are on the committee and I'm going to say we sort of have two who are, um, haven't, haven't made sort of a public decision yet. They, they have leanings, but they're, they're not ready. They weren't ready to interview today. Let's put it that way. So, sorry. What did you, what did you say about William House? Um, he's on it. So Rob Quimby and Bill Huss are within their, their terms. Um, Phil and Pam stepped down at the end of town meeting. Yep. April stated that she would not be renewing, but she'll complete her term to the end of June. Um, and then Carl and Iris who have terms that, um, also complete this year are undecided. And that's my board choice, not theirs. Yeah. Understood. So we had in our correspondence packet and, um, two emails, one from Brian O'Herlihy, who has been on the finance committee before, um, offering to do a one year term. Um, he then later reached out. Um, he did not send it to the board. He sent it to me and to Iris and to Carl. Um, rescinding that decision just based on things at home. Yep. And it taught me to. Yeah. Okay, great. And so if that changes, um, you know, he might be willing later in the year to step up to, to help get through sort of budget in town meeting, but right now he's not, um, not in contention. Yep. Um, because Iris and also in the packet is her email because she had submitted a willingness to continue given that Brian was considering joining. Um, I did speak with her this week and, and had just sort of given her the courtesy of where is she in that process. So, um, because her letter came out, her email came out the same day as Brian's and then things changed. So, um, so I think it is very good that we are meeting right now. Um, the select board will start their reappointments in June. So if we can do a recruitment statement and get that out now, as we've done in the past, where it sort of gets its own push, you know, we are right in the time when people in town might be considering volunteering, might be thinking about it. So we can sort of be in with that mix. Um, I do think that we'll get answers from Iris and Carl, um, you know, maybe even by the end of this month. Um, but I'm not going to predict which way those will go. Um, and I don't feel negatively about it, but it's just, it's not mine. It's their decision. It's not understood. Um, so that's sort of my report on where we are that I have. I don't know if either of you have had other conversations or have information to add. I don't, I just see can't talk to each other between meetings. So, right. Yeah, exactly. So I just see that we definitely have two openings right now, but between Pam and Phil. Yes. So, so that's it. We have at least two people, two positions we need to fill. Excuse me. I think we have three. Who's the third? Oh, I'm sorry. You're right. I have a third R, big R as of, yeah. Um, you're absolutely right. We knew we were going to have these three openings last year because all of them had the terms. I, and I say that not necessarily for the committee, but also I'm hearing like questions, like, why do we have three openings? Well, it's just how it timed out. We had some, um, you know, we try to stagger the terms, but sometimes it, things change and you have like we did last year. And now we have the same problem we had last year, which is we've got three openings. Yeah. And I mean, no one expected Phil's resignation a year earlier before his term expires. So it, it, life happens, you know, life happens. Right. And we knew that right. And we knew that Pam was just doing one year to bring some security to it. And I have to be honest and say that I don't know if anyone else had conversations with April, but I did last year. And she said to me this one last year, this time, it's my last year, Carol. I'm going to, my term is up. I'm going to, um, roll off. So, yeah. So I don't think any of these other than Mr. Surprise was a surprise. Um, but certainly it's, we've got some work to do. Right. Right. What's unfortunate is that the, there's, there's no, not a lot of people on left with a lot of historical knowledge, you know, there's, there's lack of experience. I know that's why Brian O'Hurley, he was, had considered coming back on, but I know his, you know, he's, he's got other issues. So, um, and I think that I don't want to shortchange Bill Huss. I think he has a lot of town experience, but it is from not on FinCom. So yeah, it comes in some unique, little animal. Right. Well, I don't know. I mean, I'm looking at, I don't want to get rid of my, my chair, our finance committee appointing board chair, but I'm looking at somebody with a whole lot of finance committees. I'm not certainly, I heard you, Miranda. Yeah, I know. Forget it. I withdraw it. I don't want you leaving this committee. So, um, but I do think that we should take a look at, um, prior members who might be willing to fill in a one-year term. Yep. Um, I know that members of the select board are very aware. And as they always try to encourage people to volunteer for town, this is on their radar as other boards are. Um, so short, short term, I think the action that we can take today is take a look at the recruitment statement and update that. Um, I guess my, my other, and this is just my, um, my feeling is I know, as we have interviewed people, we were very hopeful that the workload would be lightened maybe with the town manager act. And I think that we should maybe encourage the select board or that we should maybe do some exit interviews with some of these folks and see if we can get feedback. I don't think that it's our role to improve that process. So I, I don't want us to overstep. Um, but I know when we spoke with, you know, Carl and Iris and Bill, the people we interviewed in the last year, we were very hopeful it would be a lighter lift and I'm not certain. It has been, but it has been. Yeah. Well, I, I personally think it's a lot less, much lighter than when you and I served, Terry. I think to Miranda's point, the, there's a lot, um, the inexperience of having, like, I like to say around the bases once, once you do, this is what we do. And then we do this and we do this and we do this, do this. I call it going around the bases. Anyone in these positions, the first year you're always going, Oh, but after that, you've got, you're able to anticipate and be more proactive. Um, about four or five years ago, I think we were, um, you and I were still on select board together. The select board did change that, uh, code to increase the amount of words from 30 to 150. So the Finscom was able to use that toolbox tool in the toolbox to say negligible financial impact. And they did, they used quite a few of those this year. There was a land. And I, and I was working obviously on the finance committee liaison from the select board had worked with them on how to, you know, to do that. And then somewhere along the line, for example, midstream, they changed the format of that. So I think some of it is just to sit down here and explain, make sure those who are in the leadership understand this is the process. Um, I don't think they use a couple of the tools in their toolbox. And I, and I, that's why I do think exit interviews are helpful because it can be to pass to support. I don't disagree with you, Carol. So I don't think exit interviews are a negative thing. I think you can get, No, I'm not saying that either. I don't know what's going on here.
I'd be today. Um, having a little bit of a family issue, which is why I left my phone on. So, um, um, No worries. I apologize. So I do think that there's one thing that I will, we're going to talk about. We haven't done it yet. So I can't not at liberty to go off on the, Yep. The range here, but, um, the petitioner article situation this year really created an incredible amount of workload for no and only the finance committee, the select board, the moderator, the town manager, the town staff and town council. I'm sorry, town council. So I have, Miranda has seen these notes I've written to, to Carolyn. I'm going to have a conversation with the select board. I've got a couple ideas of how we can maybe reign that in. Not, we may have to make a code change on that. And I think that's an area. This was just a, one of these odd years. The second thing that happened this year that I thought was a little like a one-off was we created the committee, but because of the way the AG works, they weren't established until the fall. So the budget was a little late getting out. I can, I can sit here and probably guarantee you that's not going to happen again. So I think we'll have a smoother flow this year. How do we, how do you spell SIPC? Oh, see it's capital improvement planning committee, CIPC. Okay. Got it. Yep. Yeah. Sorry. Sorry. Sorry. Thank you for it. No, don't. I shouldn't be using acronyms on the, on the, on the meeting. So at any rate, that's where we are. I think with some of those, um, and certainly I have to tell you, Terry, um, I actually, I think I was going to offline, I'm going to recruit you to sit down, help me. Maybe we go to one or two meetings and, and talk, or maybe offline have a meeting with the leadership to really make them understand the, the basis, the process of what they go through. Um, but they did. And this year we had 52 articles to start with, but we just, it was a, what do you call this? An imperfect heart storm in that we've had all these things happen. We will not have 52 articles to start next year. We will have a capital budget out sooner. I'm sure SIPC would want to like to get that out sooner as well. And I think that, uh, select board will be undertaking, uh, the process for the petitioners article that anything that is that labor intensive needs of scrutiny as to how can we smooth out the process. Yeah. Because that takes time away from other articles as well. I get that. It was just, it was just perfect storm, except it was not so exciting, perfectly storm. So I think part of our problem. Um, so, and the other problem I have is and they meet Monday nights, so I can't always go to their meetings. So. Oh, SIPC? No, Fincom. Fincom. Oh, Fincom. Yeah. Is there, is there a designee from a liaison on select board to Fincom? Carol. Oh, it's you. Yeah. Yeah. I've got SIPC and I've got Fincom, which makes sense. But the thing is if, you know, sometimes I could listen in if their meetings are on, you know, a Wednesday. Yeah. But even if, even if it were somebody else on the select board who was the liaison, they would still have the same content meetings on Monday. And the thing is, I'm the one that has the history of how the processes work. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Understood. That's so. Is there some way to change the, the date that the day of the week that one of these committees needs? Yeah. So, I mean, it's, it's, it's, I don't know that we need to do that, but I do think I need to have them have a couple of meetings pre-season, if you will, and kind of let this out. We are going to have some post-mortems from town meeting. This is one of them. There's got two or three in my mind. Like I said, I've had this family emergency the last couple of weeks. No, I get it. This is a volunteer job that you devote hundreds of hours to a year. So sometimes it feels that way. No, you do. I would suggest that you actually do. I know. You know. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So it's on my radar screen. And then after we meet Monday night, I'll, um, we'll see if we can't get. Okay. You know, we don't want to have any committee to have so many problems, you know, any committee it was, you know, if, uh, although the select board does not appoint the finance committee, it is an integral committee. So anytime it's the initial, that's part of our job to just go back and say, are there some roadblocks here that we need to look at some bottlenecks? So I think we'll, we'll have a smoothie here next year. So yeah, I am. I do. Um, I can, I don't know if we're on this. I would like to make some suggestions on the, on the, uh, statement here. Yeah. That's where I wanted to go next. Um, no, no, no, it fits very well. I just, I had pulled that out. That's where I am next. So it's good. Um, the, let's just go through it from the top. Obviously we need to rework the last sentence. Um, but I think that we need to say right now that we have five seats, um, because Iris and Carl do not own their seats. Well, when we do recruiting in general, even when we, uh, there are folks who are for reappointment, you know, on the select board level, we list them all as we list. Exactly. Until the select makes the reappointment. Exactly. So we'll list five. Yeah. Um, yeah. Could I, can I make a suggestion in the top here? I don't, I would like the tone to be a little, the wrong word is lighter, but this reads like, Oh my God, this is such an overloaded workload. So Wayland finance committee, because it's of seven dedicated individuals, maybe not hardworking. Mm-hmm. Um, just something like that. All right. Yeah. So that was my one comment on that, but if we could, you know, so then do I just keep going, Terry? So I think just, I'm not going to write the sentence now, but I'll change it to say something like, um, that there are two openings now because Pam and Phil, so two openings available now that will expire in June of 2027 and three openings available. No, no, Iris is serving through the end of her term. April. I'm sorry, April. So, and then there are three positions that are potentially open on June 30. Okay. So I just want to show, I mean, I don't need to do that. I guess I don't need to do that. It's probably too many words. Let's just say they don't need to know that we're just, let's just say five with two expiring in 2027 and three expiring in 2029. Okay. So a quick sidebar just occurred to me. Maybe we should, I'm just going to have a quick sidebar here, Terry. Um, maybe we should have you or Miranda or someone, uh, be interviewed or, uh, to the post to explain, you know, that do lose some unfortunate time and we have this many vacancies that we, you know, so that, so we get that out to everyone reads that so, or gets that to their home. So, um, yeah, so I guess, Sherry, going back to that last sentence and then I'll go to the post the last sentence you just said, how do you want to phrase it? Or do you want to revise it and send it to me? I'm just trying to think about the meeting minutes here for this. Um, so no, let's, let me just, um, let me do it now. Cause I can't really, um, yep. So what if we say, um, instead, instead of, as of June, let's just say this year, there are two openings, there are five openings, Jesus. Yep. Probably dash two expiring in 2027 and three with terms expiring and three full terms expiring in 2029. How about if we say the, what are we? The F camp, the finance committee appointing board is looking for five, uh, five, five, five, five candidates or five, something like that. And then, yeah, I think this expirations of 2029 or if they're expiring and then why do we need people now? I hear what you're saying, but, um, we've already explained that it's a three-year term. I just, I agree. I said there's, there are five openings they're looking for. Okay. Yeah. Um, for five, for five individuals to fill, um, terms, are they all three going to be three years, Cherry? Or should we stagger these? No, that's fine. No, no, they're fine. That if you look at the term, okay. Yeah. On this chart, yeah. Two and 27, two and 28, and it just happens to be three this year. So you have to have one year with three. Again, that's happened the year I can't one. They had three. So it just, but there are, there's always going to be. Right. Okay. One year that has three because there's seven people. So if we said currently there are five, there are five candidates. We're looking for five candidates to serve two year term, uh, two year term and, and, uh, three to serve three year term, something like that. Does that, does that soften up? Two for a one year term. Two for one year terms. Yeah. Okay. I got it. The F camp is looking to fill, um, two positions for with a one year term and two and three positions of three year term. Yeah. So I was just writing. Oh, is that so? Yeah. Okay. Everybody likes that? Good. Yep. So I'll say this year. Yeah. Or currently this year. Yeah. Whatever. Yeah. Five cabs. I don't know if we even have to say this year. We're saying we're looking for five people, but whatever. Well, yeah. Um, it, it, I think it just follows from the information above it because it says rotate. And so it's just this year. So looking for five candidates, two for a one year term and three for three year terms. Okay. And then up the top again, the second, that for seven, seven, instead of saying seven dedicated individuals, how about residents? Well, residents, they have to be voting residents though, don't they? So seven volunteers. Yeah. We covered the residents down below. Okay. That's fine. I remember when we did this the first time and, um, Pam and somebody else helped write this. Yeah. They did want to get across the sense they, they didn't want to be too soft on what the expectations were. They wanted to be realistic. So I think taking, taking out hardworking, just saying dedicated still gets that.
There seems to be a perception that the workload is horrendous. And it, you know, the bottom line is SIPC is now doing the capital. So they're not interviewing everyone. Like we did. They're utilizing that tool of the non-negotiable finance. And when they did it this year more than they've ever done it. So I think that'll be kind of in the flow next year. So I, I think that the difference is that, um, many of our people on the finance committee now also have full-time jobs and that historically was not. I mean, I think it's great, but I think the capacity for work is a little different. Okay. So in the next paragraph, I want to talk about the primary responsibilities is to make recommendations to town of Whelan's financial matters. I'm not, I think I would like to suggest, and I don't think they regularly interact with all the officials on the fiscal items, um, because the budget comes to them as a recommendation from the town manager. That's how the code works. School committee gives theirs to the town manager. Everybody else gives theirs to the town manager and he makes one recommendation and off it goes to the finance committee. So not a very high level of review. Unlike when you and I were there, we met with everybody, but I think I'd like to say, suggest that we say their job is to review the operating budget, the recommended operating budget, uh, review and recommend an operating budget, review and recommend a capital budget. And then again, you say with the, uh, that flows to them from SIPSI and the town manager, prepare article recommendations and present their recommendations at town meeting. And I throw that out for thoughts now. Just writing it all down. I'm sorry, I didn't type it out. I would have sent it to you. Okay. No, that's okay. Don't worry about it. So basically you're the second sentence, you're rewriting the first and second sentences. Yeah. Because they don't do that. They don't hold these. Um, I'm fine with that. I'm just trying to look at this. Yeah. The concept. Well, I just was making up the point. You'll figure out where you want to actually, it actually takes care of the third sentence to four town meeting. FinCon presents it. You've already, you've, you've, you've put three sentences into one, which is great. Anyway. And then we do need to leave the one about the override, right. But they, their job now is to, and it's, this might not be the right phrase review and recommend. Yep. They don't develop the member. That was a big conversation. The only thing that I would like to get into that Carol and sorry, I was listening, not writing down is who their staff interactions are. And so maybe it should say the finance director. Um, that's a good, one. So I just want to make certain there's. Yeah. That could be, so I have the first sentence written down. Okay. So the first sentence. I can type these and send them to you afterwards if you want. Okay. But here's what I got. You tell, you tell me it's, it's accurate. The FinCon's primary responsibility is to review and recommend an operating budget, a capital budget, prepare article recommendations and present recommendations at town meeting. You summed up everything. Now you want to talk about the interaction. It's their recommendation. That's the code is to represent their recommendations. They get a recommended budget from the town manager. They get a recommended capital from the town manager and they get a recommended. So this is another thing. They get recommendations from SIPC as well. As they did this year, they took those two recommendations and then created, uh, made some changes. I want to rephrase that made some changes to the capital budget that was then recommended to town meeting. So that's the gist of that. Um, so they interact with the town manager, the finance team, which is the town manager and the, uh, but their staff person is the finance director. So I think that's an excellent point to put in there, Jerry. So how do you want to phrase that? They working with, working with, or sponsors working with. To accomplish this, the finance committee works with the finance director and town manager. And town manager. Cause SIPC will come through that. Yeah. So and town manager. So it was interesting because, and, and I don't think it's wrong maybe until we get more established, it might change, but SIPC actually presented as well. So they could discuss differences. So they didn't actually go back with the one exception to the, the recommending or the requesting department. They work mostly say 95% through SIPC and their finance team. So I think that's, I like putting that in there though. That's a good idea. Okay. And then keep the last sentence about the override for an override. Yeah. Okay. Next paragraph. The logistics one's fine. Okay. Fourth paragraph, the word scheduled should be schedule. Yeah. The FinCon meeting schedule. Yeah. Oh yeah. That's what I want to say this. I'm not sure. Well, it says from January, but you know what, Jerry, the warrant articles close on the 15th and we don't have that workshop until at the earliest, the next week's around the 20th. So it's really mid January. We'll say until mid-month. The budget is due to them by year end. So technically they should have it by year end. Yeah. But they're not meeting like twice a week until we get into the articles. And because technically, right, if the, if the process works, and again, we made a lot of changes to the process this year as well, that smooths itself out. They'll have capital in the fall. So they can just do that in the regular meetings. They'll get the budget by the end of December. They'll have a couple of meetings to look at that before the articles come out, but then they have to pull it all together while they're working on the articles. To me, it's January 15th until the warrant deadline, not when it closes. So that's March 15th, say, because if we're going to have a town meeting in May, it's around March 15th. So I would say that's the busiest time. That's my opinion. But what about the second sentence there, Carol? Yeah. The effort to review and recommend a budget and prepare a tax and recommend a budget can be challenging. I don't know about challenging. I think it'd be rewarding because it's really, they really can come up with some. But you say, but is rewarding and critical. Oh, it does say it. Yeah.
The effort to review and is, I don't think it's, I think I like critical, maybe not challenging because you know what? I think if you spoke with the people coming off and you look at Pam's letter in the post this year, the timing was very challenging. And I think there were growing pains on both sides of the equation this year. And yeah. And so. But is that going to always be the case is the question. So this, because this, yeah. So anyway, I don't know if it's, they're pretty smart. And I think they understand things pretty quickly. So I know, but I just was hoping we'd lighten it up because we don't have this such, this is a lot of work committee. And then I've heard people say that it gets put off by, because they think it's so extra amount of work. Um, and I think if you were to talk to some of the people that are considering whether they want to consider continue, they would tell you it's a lot of work. Yes. Because this year was, like we said, this was the perfect storm of issues. I can guarantee you, we're not going to have no sleep problems next year, but what if you want to put that fine? I'm just hoping to get people interested to apply. Yeah. I want to. That's all I'm doing. Um, the paragraph about that starts residence. I thought, um, we should add the words or an interest in municipal government. Are we on the one that says it residence? Mm hmm. Yeah. Do we want to, um, do, would this make sense to kind of put that up at the, in the top paragraph on the first paragraph talks about what it is. Okay. Registered. All right. Do we need to say you have to work collaboratively in a work group setting? I think that's kind of a given for all of them.
I don't feel strongly about that. I think that was put in when FinCom was a little bit, um, years ago, contentious. And some of the prior members had asked for that language.
I will leave it up to you whether we should soften that or whatever you want to do with that myself. Um, and then the last sentence, rather than say all residents, just start with, oh, you say residents again, we're interested. Now, my other question here is on this, it says to send the resume to the, um, to the chair. It'll go to Abby and I'll check out your email. Well, I want to ask if it should be, if they should be going to the chair, but this committee is different. It comes to me, but the select board does them just through the town manager's office because we are very committed to having an inclusive process. So I I'm just throwing that out. If this is a separate committee, it's under the moderator. Then she makes the rules of the road on this, but that's how we do it. We have it go just to the town manager's office and they say have candidates. And then they just, we just, there's no prior review by any of the candidates for the select board chair. Yeah. And here it's not, um, I think that's part of the reason why I'm trying to answer both parts of that question, Carol, because we are not under the town manager's office for any of this. So, but I don't want the things to only come to me so that it looks like there's any pre screening. So they come to me, but care of it'll be Abby. So he gets everything. So if someone ever wanted to say Carol Martin applied and Cherry didn't forward her resume, Abby has it as a. Right. So you can just leave that out and say resume to Abby and that's it. Cause then she'll, she'll know to send it to you. Yeah. I don't care. I just, I, I do want to make it clear that it is not the town manager. Do we say in here? Yeah, we do. It's the very first line we say appointed by us. Yeah. Yeah. I have no issue with the, with that all residents who are interested just submit a letter of interest and resume to the FCA B chair in care of, we just switch it over to Abby Warren. Right. And that to me seems fine. It's just a process of getting it to us. Well, okay. Yeah. I don't, I don't, I can't imagine anyone would have an issue with that. I'll just leave in right now that we'll schedule interviews in start. I'll just say starting in June. So our major rewrite is of the first, well, the last sentence of the first paragraph, but I think we have, I have that. And then Miranda, I think you have most of the text that takes care of the second paragraph, except for the last sentence and others were just like little changes that I can make in the document. Yeah. So, um, I think so. So how do you want to work this here? I mean, I could send it to you. I'm sitting here trying to think about, um, if you, because we've discussed this in an open meeting, you send the text of that sentence. Um, I can plug it into the document along with the other changes that I've made note of. Um, I can't send it back out for review unless we want to do a quick meeting. Um, but I can then put that together and ask Abby to distribute it, you know, today or Monday. Yeah. Cause it's gotta go out. Um, I'm fine with it, not coming back out. You know, the thing is we're not writing a, um, policy, if you will. Right. We're just up a bit to be a little clearer. Yeah. And then we can always at our next meeting, but we can always tweak it at our next meeting. If you know, right. So Miranda, I think because we've discussed that sentence and you are the one who documented it. If, if after the meeting, you can just send that with no commentary to Carol and to me so that we both have it. And, um, I will then insert it into this document along with the other changes to the term and the email and the D and there was one other. Well, yeah, I, I mean, I do also find, so not only did we rewrite the last sentence of the first paragraph, we rewrote the second paragraph. Yeah. But you have that, right. I do have it all. So if you send me both of us, the rewrite that we have gone over of the second paragraph, we've discussed that in this meeting, those who want to watch the recording can hear it. We still don't have anyone watching or joining our meeting. I'm sorry. I just had an idea. This Wayland finance committee volunteers need it. Could you send that to me in word form and I'll just put it in track changes. That would be the easiest. Okay. Okay. If you don't mind, that would be helpful. Um, yes. And then if you just make the changes that we discussed, that's great. Yeah. And, um, um, and then I will add the changes that we discussed. Yeah, I'll do it. Should we have, if, since it's, if we're going to have an attract changes, it's still, it sounds like it's a document in process. I'm comfortable with just whatever you come up with. If we do that, perhaps we should send it to Abby and then have her send it out to the board as an FYI doc.
That doesn't, we still can't talk about it. We can't talk about it, but I'm, um, generally speaking, what I do is to send them through the office, send them out. Do you, do you want to, um, um, and that does not get rid of open meeting law violations to have staff send them out. Um, this is not an open meeting law violation, but so why don't, should we just do a meeting for, um, sometime on Tuesday to look at this? Nope. I'm good with whatever comes up. I'm just concerned about getting it because as you, it's not, I said, it's not policy. Miranda, what I'm going to do so that we're not dealing with the entire document is I'm going to send you the second paragraph in an email. Okay. And you can play with that. Okay. What about the last sentence of the first paragraph? I'll, I'll, I'll, I have that too. I have that one to change. I have that one. Um, I will read it to you again. Um, um, let me just get back to you guys. Um, so the first, the last sentence of the first paragraph I'm changing to say, I don't know if I'm going to say this year, but this year five cab is looking for five candidates, two for a one year term and three for three year terms. Yep. Yep. And we're not putting the years of expiry in right now. Um, and then you, the rewrite of the second paragraph includes Carol's, uh, very nice weaving together of sentences to come up with one that says operating capital and articles in one sentence. Um, and then working with the finance director and town manager as staff contacts. And then we're keeping the last sentence about the overrides. That's it. And then we're getting rid of the D in the schedule. Um, we're going to add text that says an interest in municipal government in the please apply paragraph. And then we'll update Abby's and I'll confirm with Abby that it is she, and I'll confirm the email address, but we'll update that. And that we'll start interviewing in June. Okay. And we, we did change the busiest time of the year from January 15th to March 15th. Um, so do you, the, the FinCom is still working on their report. I guess, no, when the warrant goes to print, it all has to be done, but we don't know that that's going to be March 15th. Do we? It's around then. I mean, it was March 17th. This year was March 12th. So mid-March, how about mid-January to mid-March? What if we just say, yeah, mid-January. Mid-March that covers us. I mean, if we get the idea of a hotel meeting in June, it'll be later than that, but that's the gist of it is there's a two month period where we're going to be really busy and that much time after that, where, uh, it'll be less busy if we hotel meeting in June, because you'll have a little more time to get stuff done. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Got that in there. Okay. Thank you. Um, okay. So Miranda, I sent you the text. I'm sorry. It's not in word, but that way we don't have a whole document floating around, um, being edited and you'll update that way. And then I'll put it all in the document and get it sent out. Okay. Great. Um, I will follow up with Iris and Carl, um, regarding decisions and, um, I'll just keep you post. Well, I'm sort of moving into, um, if we're meeting again, but I can keep you posted if we have people that want to, um, interview. Yeah. Because we have to work around their schedules too, to, to schedule the next meeting. Okay. Understood. Um, anything else on the recruitment right now? Okay. Of course, anything on the correspondence other than what we talked about, both related to recruitment, um, next meeting date, I will keep open right now until we know what's, until we see what, until we see all the resumes that come in so that we can take a look at them and interview people. Yeah. I suggest we pick something like towards the end of June. Um, so we have a placeholder. If you could just send out a couple of dates, we can maybe agree. They would have it on our calendars because someone comes along, we would probably want to interview. Yeah. Uh, that's a good idea. So if you want to look at your schedule, get my book here, folks. Yeah, I'm pretty, um, I'm pretty wide, wide open. I said June 30th and July 1st, I've got my closet installation. So yeah. Finally. Okay. What do we decide? What day? We didn't decide anything, but I mean, I'm pretty good. I mean, I've got, I can make chunks of time work between the week of the eighth, the week of the 15th and the week of the 22nd. Like I can't do every day, but there are certainly times. You too. So my point is I would recommend more towards the end of the month so that we don't have to. To get the resumes in. Because we're only going to put this out and then it's going to, hopefully that gives us a month for something to come in maybe. Yeah. That week of June 22nd, my schedule is, is pretty wide open. At the moment, mine is too. I think we should pick, why don't we pick Friday the 26th? I can't do that. I can't do the Friday. Okay. All right. About Thursday the 25th. Yeah. I think if, if, if we have, yeah, let's hold that. And if we, if we, um, want to pick a time, what this one's a good 950. Yep. This is fine. Works for me. Um, I can't do it Thursdays. I. Oh, that's right. Or until noon. 10. Yeah. Oh, 10's fine. When do 10. Okay. It's just a placeholder. Yeah. I have to tell you, I really think it's a good idea to meet it and Miranda as well. I'm sure to get a placeholder in there, even if it moves. So that we don't fill up our calendars. The calendar fills up, but then if I see that's a bad day, then I can say, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, yeah. Um, can I just go back to something that I cut Carol off on? I think it was Carol, the Whelan post. You said something about the Whelan post. Oh yeah. Do we want to, um, get an article in the post? Oops. Oops. What happened here? Dropping stuff, you know, about the openings. Yeah. I mean, in, in a positive, I'd say that, you know, due to, um, uh, whoops, um, um, um, some unanticipated resignations and just general turnover or whatever we want to say, um, maybe because it might reach a... Why wouldn't we put the recruitment statement on itself in the post? Yeah. Good. Right. That's what I'm saying. Do we want to like do that to increase our reach if you want? Well, well, well, where's the recruitment statement going otherwise? Um, what we have done in the past is it gets pushed as an individual email to anyone who subscribes to town alerts and it gets posted on the, uh, I don't know what the new format exactly where it will go, but it used to get posted on the front page as a like current happening until something else would, you know, push it out. On what though? It's a webpage, but on the webpage, I don't know. It used to be like in that box on the front page. I'm not certain there's anything being pushed on the front page right now. Okay. But, but also what about the town's, uh, Facebook website? How about the newsletter? The newsletter? Yep. Can do that. Yep. My husband always complained that he complains that he never knows what's going on. You're like, because in the post is doing a wonderful job. I really think they are. But since we've lost the town crier for whatever reason, my husband feels like I didn't even, I don't even know when these things are occurring. So the news, the newsletter, their Facebook page, the site, and they'll send it out via their email push. Yeah. So the email group, I'm going to be wrong here. Somebody like Abby will know. I think that goes to about 3000 people. It might not even be that many, you know, the, that blast, which is whoever has signed up for whoever has signed up. So the newsletter, I think also you have to have signed up, but I think it has a wider reach, but I think the post will pick up a few more. Yep. Maybe the Facebook page. I don't know. We'll talk about that the next time. Um, yeah, I'm happy to, when the reason, when we have finalized this recruitment statement to send it to David Watkins and ask him to put it in the post. Okay. All right. And they may just rearrange it a little bit, which is a perfect thing, you know, in terms of no problem with that. Right. Bridget, I should say not rearrange it. Okay. Good. Good. Good. Um, reports and concerns. I have one is that, um, um, well, two, I won't make an announcement here. As a select would, uh, will not be taken their leadership vote probably until June 1st this year, because next Monday, uh, they're only going to be three members present. And, um, in my current capacity, I like to have key votes, you know, uh, as full of membership as possible so that we won't be taking our, so, um, you'll see if you get a new member hook, we keep me after that. I was actually one of my, and then, and then I know that we have to do the same thing here. So go ahead. So, okay. Yes. So, so, okay. So it was not until your June vote. Will there be a, um, okay. Yep. You also, do you have Chris Reynolds coming on this, this coming Monday? I'm sorry. Chris Reynolds, since he's just been voted on his, does, does that happen this Monday? The first, he is already, uh, I believe sworn in, but he is one of the two members is unable to make Monday's meeting. So, um, but yes, this would be his first meeting Miranda. So yeah, got it. Yep. But not till June 1st. And then the other thing I was just checking my term goes until September. Oh, good. So, um, so you, are you looking right now to re-up? You want to reappoint? You're so funny. Um, I think that's where I was going with that is I actually, looks to be a Carol pending. I'm here. I'm just going to keep going, Miranda. I'm here for now. And so I don't think that we should, um, reorganize this committee until we know who our select board person is, and then we can figure that out. Right. We have to wait for these official votes here. So, okay. Okay. Yeah. That's, that's for a future meeting. Um, do we want to vote on the recruitment statement or are we comfortable? I don't think we need to, we have, we need to vote on it. Yeah. We have agreement. No. Yeah. Miranda. Yeah. I don't, I don't think we need to vote. Yeah. Um, any reports and concerns, Miranda? Nope. None for me, not for here. Just, we got to find the bodies for the finance committee. All right. We actually did not meet our agenda after being so far ahead. Yeah. Okay. I move. We adjourn at 5 a.m. All right. So motion to adjourn. So moved. Can you have a second? Oh, now I'll be the second. You have a second. Okay. So Miranda and Carol, thank you. Um, hearing no other discussion, we'll do a roll call vote. Carol? Yes. Miranda? Yes. Carrie? Yes. So 3-0 to adjourn. All right.
I don't see that we have anyone here to make public comment. So I will. Okay, but we'll just let me review the agenda. And then we'll officially do get to that. So after reviewing the agenda, we'll do announcements from the board and public comment. We'll take a look at the minutes from our last meeting. We'll talk about the Finance Committee recruitment, which is our main reason for meeting today. We have a couple of pieces of correspondence related to that. We'll talk about our next meeting date and take any reports and concerns from the board. And I think we'll probably be done before 10. But I just try to be generous when I go through our agenda. So then we'll adjourn. I will note that based on feedback from the town clerk, our agendas no longer include topics not reasonably anticipated. If we did become aware of something, we would either amend the agenda or hold it until the next meeting. Doesn't mean we can't bring it up under reports and concerns, but we wouldn't take any action until the next meeting. So that is one change to our standard agenda. Any announcements from the board today? Anyone willing to do minutes? I'm doing them right now. Okay, thank you, Miranda. You're going to be done before the end of this meeting. You know, you are very good at that. I appreciate you. I'm actually handwriting them. I'm not typing. So Abby rescued me because I forgot to send one set of them. But she was double checking as we went to the new site. So I would have had them. I had them too. We're all up to date. Yeah. Okay. Okay. So I still don't see anyone for public comment. So hearing none, we'll move on to minutes. Oh, good. And we're seven minutes ahead of schedule. We approved the minutes of October 17, 2025. I think as written. Second. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you, Miranda. I didn't note anything. So if none of us saw anything. Okay. Okay. So then for the minutes, we have a motion and a second. Yeah. Um, and we'll call any other discussion. We'll do a roll call vote. Yep. Miranda. Yeah, I guess. Carol. Yes. Cherry. Yes. So we have a vote of three to zero. Thank you, Miranda. That just puts us a little bit more ahead of agenda time. Oh, look at it. Look at this cruise. We'll use it up now. So, okay. Um, as far as recruitment, I did, um, take a screenshot and include it in the packet of where FinCom stood going into town meeting. Cause I thought that I wanted to make certain we had the names associated with the dates of the term expiry. Yeah. And so just super helpful. Yeah. Just to walk down that, um, um, Phil did tender his resignation. So that will be an open seat. Um, Carl Barnes, um, is still, I'm going to say undecided. We, uh, I will follow up with him again. Um, Iris, um, let's skip Iris just for a minute. Rob is still serving. April seat is open. She's stepping down at the completion of her term. Pam seat is open now because she tendered her resignation effective at the end of town meeting as did Phil and, um, Bill is there. Um, so we have two people that are on the committee and I'm going to say we sort of have two who are, um, haven't, haven't made sort of a public decision yet. They, they have leanings, but they're, they're not ready. They weren't ready to interview today. Let's put it that way. So, sorry. What did you, what did you say about William House? Um, he's on it. So Rob Quimby and Bill Huss are within their, their terms. Um, Phil and Pam stepped down at the end of town meeting. Yep. April stated that she would not be renewing, but she'll complete her term to the end of June. Um, and then Carl and Iris who have terms that, um, also complete this year are undecided. And that's my board choice, not theirs. Yeah. Understood. So we had in our correspondence packet and, um, two emails, one from Brian O'Herlihy, who has been on the finance committee before, um, offering to do a one year term. Um, he then later reached out. Um, he did not send it to the board. He sent it to me and to Iris and to Carl. Um, rescinding that decision just based on things at home. Yep. And it taught me to. Yeah. Okay, great. And so if that changes, um, you know, he might be willing later in the year to step up to, to help get through sort of budget in town meeting, but right now he's not, um, not in contention. Yep. Um, because Iris and also in the packet is her email because she had submitted a willingness to continue given that Brian was considering joining. Um, I did speak with her this week and, and had just sort of given her the courtesy of where is she in that process. So, um, because her letter came out, her email came out the same day as Brian's and then things changed. So, um, so I think it is very good that we are meeting right now. Um, the select board will start their reappointments in June. So if we can do a recruitment statement and get that out now, as we've done in the past, where it sort of gets its own push, you know, we are right in the time when people in town might be considering volunteering, might be thinking about it. So we can sort of be in with that mix. Um, I do think that we'll get answers from Iris and Carl, um, you know, maybe even by the end of this month. Um, but I'm not going to predict which way those will go. Um, and I don't feel negatively about it, but it's just, it's not mine. It's their decision. It's not understood. Um, so that's sort of my report on where we are that I have. I don't know if either of you have had other conversations or have information to add. I don't, I just see can't talk to each other between meetings. So, right. Yeah, exactly. So I just see that we definitely have two openings right now, but between Pam and Phil. Yes. So, so that's it. We have at least two people, two positions we need to fill. Excuse me. I think we have three. Who's the third? Oh, I'm sorry. You're right. I have a third R, big R as of, yeah. Um, you're absolutely right. We knew we were going to have these three openings last year because all of them had the terms. I, and I say that not necessarily for the committee, but also I'm hearing like questions, like, why do we have three openings? Well, it's just how it timed out. We had some, um, you know, we try to stagger the terms, but sometimes it, things change and you have like we did last year. And now we have the same problem we had last year, which is we've got three openings. Yeah. And I mean, no one expected Phil's resignation a year earlier before his term expires. So it, it, life happens, you know, life happens. Right. And we knew that right. And we knew that Pam was just doing one year to bring some security to it. And I have to be honest and say that I don't know if anyone else had conversations with April, but I did last year. And she said to me this one last year, this time, it's my last year, Carol. I'm going to, my term is up. I'm going to, um, roll off. So, yeah. So I don't think any of these other than Mr. Surprise was a surprise. Um, but certainly it's, we've got some work to do. Right. Right. What's unfortunate is that the, there's, there's no, not a lot of people on left with a lot of historical knowledge, you know, there's, there's lack of experience. I know that's why Brian O'Hurley, he was, had considered coming back on, but I know his, you know, he's, he's got other issues. So, um, and I think that I don't want to shortchange Bill Huss. I think he has a lot of town experience, but it is from not on FinCom. So yeah, it comes in some unique, little animal. Right. Well, I don't know. I mean, I'm looking at, I don't want to get rid of my, my chair, our finance committee appointing board chair, but I'm looking at somebody with a whole lot of finance committees. I'm not certainly, I heard you, Miranda. Yeah, I know. Forget it. I withdraw it. I don't want you leaving this committee. So, um, but I do think that we should take a look at, um, prior members who might be willing to fill in a one-year term. Yep. Um, I know that members of the select board are very aware. And as they always try to encourage people to volunteer for town, this is on their radar as other boards are. Um, so short, short term, I think the action that we can take today is take a look at the recruitment statement and update that. Um, I guess my, my other, and this is just my, um, my feeling is I know, as we have interviewed people, we were very hopeful that the workload would be lightened maybe with the town manager act. And I think that we should maybe encourage the select board or that we should maybe do some exit interviews with some of these folks and see if we can get feedback. I don't think that it's our role to improve that process. So I, I don't want us to overstep. Um, but I know when we spoke with, you know, Carl and Iris and Bill, the people we interviewed in the last year, we were very hopeful it would be a lighter lift and I'm not certain. It has been, but it has been. Yeah. Well, I, I personally think it's a lot less, much lighter than when you and I served, Terry. I think to Miranda's point, the, there's a lot, um, the inexperience of having, like, I like to say around the bases once, once you do, this is what we do. And then we do this and we do this and we do this, do this. I call it going around the bases. Anyone in these positions, the first year you're always going, Oh, but after that, you've got, you're able to anticipate and be more proactive. Um, about four or five years ago, I think we were, um, you and I were still on select board together. The select board did change that, uh, code to increase the amount of words from 30 to 150. So the Finscom was able to use that toolbox tool in the toolbox to say negligible financial impact. And they did, they used quite a few of those this year. There was a land. And I, and I was working obviously on the finance committee liaison from the select board had worked with them on how to, you know, to do that. And then somewhere along the line, for example, midstream, they changed the format of that. So I think some of it is just to sit down here and explain, make sure those who are in the leadership understand this is the process. Um, I don't think they use a couple of the tools in their toolbox. And I, and I, that's why I do think exit interviews are helpful because it can be to pass to support. I don't disagree with you, Carol. So I don't think exit interviews are a negative thing. I think you can get, No, I'm not saying that either. I don't know what's going on here.
I'd be today. Um, having a little bit of a family issue, which is why I left my phone on. So, um, um, No worries. I apologize. So I do think that there's one thing that I will, we're going to talk about. We haven't done it yet. So I can't not at liberty to go off on the, Yep. The range here, but, um, the petitioner article situation this year really created an incredible amount of workload for no and only the finance committee, the select board, the moderator, the town manager, the town staff and town council. I'm sorry, town council. So I have, Miranda has seen these notes I've written to, to Carolyn. I'm going to have a conversation with the select board. I've got a couple ideas of how we can maybe reign that in. Not, we may have to make a code change on that. And I think that's an area. This was just a, one of these odd years. The second thing that happened this year that I thought was a little like a one-off was we created the committee, but because of the way the AG works, they weren't established until the fall. So the budget was a little late getting out. I can, I can sit here and probably guarantee you that's not going to happen again. So I think we'll have a smoother flow this year. How do we, how do you spell SIPC? Oh, see it's capital improvement planning committee, CIPC. Okay. Got it. Yep. Yeah. Sorry. Sorry. Sorry. Thank you for it. No, don't. I shouldn't be using acronyms on the, on the, on the meeting. So at any rate, that's where we are. I think with some of those, um, and certainly I have to tell you, Terry, um, I actually, I think I was going to offline, I'm going to recruit you to sit down, help me. Maybe we go to one or two meetings and, and talk, or maybe offline have a meeting with the leadership to really make them understand the, the basis, the process of what they go through. Um, but they did. And this year we had 52 articles to start with, but we just, it was a, what do you call this? An imperfect heart storm in that we've had all these things happen. We will not have 52 articles to start next year. We will have a capital budget out sooner. I'm sure SIPC would want to like to get that out sooner as well. And I think that, uh, select board will be undertaking, uh, the process for the petitioners article that anything that is that labor intensive needs of scrutiny as to how can we smooth out the process. Yeah. Because that takes time away from other articles as well. I get that. It was just, it was just perfect storm, except it was not so exciting, perfectly storm. So I think part of our problem. Um, so, and the other problem I have is and they meet Monday nights, so I can't always go to their meetings. So. Oh, SIPC? No, Fincom. Fincom. Oh, Fincom. Yeah. Is there, is there a designee from a liaison on select board to Fincom? Carol. Oh, it's you. Yeah. Yeah. I've got SIPC and I've got Fincom, which makes sense. But the thing is if, you know, sometimes I could listen in if their meetings are on, you know, a Wednesday. Yeah. But even if, even if it were somebody else on the select board who was the liaison, they would still have the same content meetings on Monday. And the thing is, I'm the one that has the history of how the processes work. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Understood. That's so. Is there some way to change the, the date that the day of the week that one of these committees needs? Yeah. So, I mean, it's, it's, it's, I don't know that we need to do that, but I do think I need to have them have a couple of meetings pre-season, if you will, and kind of let this out. We are going to have some post-mortems from town meeting. This is one of them. There's got two or three in my mind. Like I said, I've had this family emergency the last couple of weeks. No, I get it. This is a volunteer job that you devote hundreds of hours to a year. So sometimes it feels that way. No, you do. I would suggest that you actually do. I know. You know. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So it's on my radar screen. And then after we meet Monday night, I'll, um, we'll see if we can't get. Okay. You know, we don't want to have any committee to have so many problems, you know, any committee it was, you know, if, uh, although the select board does not appoint the finance committee, it is an integral committee. So anytime it's the initial, that's part of our job to just go back and say, are there some roadblocks here that we need to look at some bottlenecks? So I think we'll, we'll have a smoothie here next year. So yeah, I am. I do. Um, I can, I don't know if we're on this. I would like to make some suggestions on the, on the, uh, statement here. Yeah. That's where I wanted to go next. Um, no, no, no, it fits very well. I just, I had pulled that out. That's where I am next. So it's good. Um, the, let's just go through it from the top. Obviously we need to rework the last sentence. Um, but I think that we need to say right now that we have five seats, um, because Iris and Carl do not own their seats. Well, when we do recruiting in general, even when we, uh, there are folks who are for reappointment, you know, on the select board level, we list them all as we list. Exactly. Until the select makes the reappointment. Exactly. So we'll list five. Yeah. Um, yeah. Could I, can I make a suggestion in the top here? I don't, I would like the tone to be a little, the wrong word is lighter, but this reads like, Oh my God, this is such an overloaded workload. So Wayland finance committee, because it's of seven dedicated individuals, maybe not hardworking. Mm-hmm. Um, just something like that. All right. Yeah. So that was my one comment on that, but if we could, you know, so then do I just keep going, Terry? So I think just, I'm not going to write the sentence now, but I'll change it to say something like, um, that there are two openings now because Pam and Phil, so two openings available now that will expire in June of 2027 and three openings available. No, no, Iris is serving through the end of her term. April. I'm sorry, April. So, and then there are three positions that are potentially open on June 30. Okay. So I just want to show, I mean, I don't need to do that. I guess I don't need to do that. It's probably too many words. Let's just say they don't need to know that we're just, let's just say five with two expiring in 2027 and three expiring in 2029. Okay. So a quick sidebar just occurred to me. Maybe we should, I'm just going to have a quick sidebar here, Terry. Um, maybe we should have you or Miranda or someone, uh, be interviewed or, uh, to the post to explain, you know, that do lose some unfortunate time and we have this many vacancies that we, you know, so that, so we get that out to everyone reads that so, or gets that to their home. So, um, yeah, so I guess, Sherry, going back to that last sentence and then I'll go to the post the last sentence you just said, how do you want to phrase it? Or do you want to revise it and send it to me? I'm just trying to think about the meeting minutes here for this. Um, so no, let's, let me just, um, let me do it now. Cause I can't really, um, yep. So what if we say, um, instead, instead of, as of June, let's just say this year, there are two openings, there are five openings, Jesus. Yep. Probably dash two expiring in 2027 and three with terms expiring and three full terms expiring in 2029. How about if we say the, what are we? The F camp, the finance committee appointing board is looking for five, uh, five, five, five, five candidates or five, something like that. And then, yeah, I think this expirations of 2029 or if they're expiring and then why do we need people now? I hear what you're saying, but, um, we've already explained that it's a three-year term. I just, I agree. I said there's, there are five openings they're looking for. Okay. Yeah. Um, for five, for five individuals to fill, um, terms, are they all three going to be three years, Cherry? Or should we stagger these? No, that's fine. No, no, they're fine. That if you look at the term, okay. Yeah. On this chart, yeah. Two and 27, two and 28, and it just happens to be three this year. So you have to have one year with three. Again, that's happened the year I can't one. They had three. So it just, but there are, there's always going to be. Right. Okay. One year that has three because there's seven people. So if we said currently there are five, there are five candidates. We're looking for five candidates to serve two year term, uh, two year term and, and, uh, three to serve three year term, something like that. Does that, does that soften up? Two for a one year term. Two for one year terms. Yeah. Okay. I got it. The F camp is looking to fill, um, two positions for with a one year term and two and three positions of three year term. Yeah. So I was just writing. Oh, is that so? Yeah. Okay. Everybody likes that? Good. Yep. So I'll say this year. Yeah. Or currently this year. Yeah. Whatever. Yeah. Five cabs. I don't know if we even have to say this year. We're saying we're looking for five people, but whatever. Well, yeah. Um, it, it, I think it just follows from the information above it because it says rotate. And so it's just this year. So looking for five candidates, two for a one year term and three for three year terms. Okay. And then up the top again, the second, that for seven, seven, instead of saying seven dedicated individuals, how about residents? Well, residents, they have to be voting residents though, don't they? So seven volunteers. Yeah. We covered the residents down below. Okay. That's fine. I remember when we did this the first time and, um, Pam and somebody else helped write this. Yeah. They did want to get across the sense they, they didn't want to be too soft on what the expectations were. They wanted to be realistic. So I think taking, taking out hardworking, just saying dedicated still gets that.
There seems to be a perception that the workload is horrendous. And it, you know, the bottom line is SIPC is now doing the capital. So they're not interviewing everyone. Like we did. They're utilizing that tool of the non-negotiable finance. And when they did it this year more than they've ever done it. So I think that'll be kind of in the flow next year. So I, I think that the difference is that, um, many of our people on the finance committee now also have full-time jobs and that historically was not. I mean, I think it's great, but I think the capacity for work is a little different. Okay. So in the next paragraph, I want to talk about the primary responsibilities is to make recommendations to town of Whelan's financial matters. I'm not, I think I would like to suggest, and I don't think they regularly interact with all the officials on the fiscal items, um, because the budget comes to them as a recommendation from the town manager. That's how the code works. School committee gives theirs to the town manager. Everybody else gives theirs to the town manager and he makes one recommendation and off it goes to the finance committee. So not a very high level of review. Unlike when you and I were there, we met with everybody, but I think I'd like to say, suggest that we say their job is to review the operating budget, the recommended operating budget, uh, review and recommend an operating budget, review and recommend a capital budget. And then again, you say with the, uh, that flows to them from SIPSI and the town manager, prepare article recommendations and present their recommendations at town meeting. And I throw that out for thoughts now. Just writing it all down. I'm sorry, I didn't type it out. I would have sent it to you. Okay. No, that's okay. Don't worry about it. So basically you're the second sentence, you're rewriting the first and second sentences. Yeah. Because they don't do that. They don't hold these. Um, I'm fine with that. I'm just trying to look at this. Yeah. The concept. Well, I just was making up the point. You'll figure out where you want to actually, it actually takes care of the third sentence to four town meeting. FinCon presents it. You've already, you've, you've, you've put three sentences into one, which is great. Anyway. And then we do need to leave the one about the override, right. But they, their job now is to, and it's, this might not be the right phrase review and recommend. Yep. They don't develop the member. That was a big conversation. The only thing that I would like to get into that Carol and sorry, I was listening, not writing down is who their staff interactions are. And so maybe it should say the finance director. Um, that's a good, one. So I just want to make certain there's. Yeah. That could be, so I have the first sentence written down. Okay. So the first sentence. I can type these and send them to you afterwards if you want. Okay. But here's what I got. You tell, you tell me it's, it's accurate. The FinCon's primary responsibility is to review and recommend an operating budget, a capital budget, prepare article recommendations and present recommendations at town meeting. You summed up everything. Now you want to talk about the interaction. It's their recommendation. That's the code is to represent their recommendations. They get a recommended budget from the town manager. They get a recommended capital from the town manager and they get a recommended. So this is another thing. They get recommendations from SIPC as well. As they did this year, they took those two recommendations and then created, uh, made some changes. I want to rephrase that made some changes to the capital budget that was then recommended to town meeting. So that's the gist of that. Um, so they interact with the town manager, the finance team, which is the town manager and the, uh, but their staff person is the finance director. So I think that's an excellent point to put in there, Jerry. So how do you want to phrase that? They working with, working with, or sponsors working with. To accomplish this, the finance committee works with the finance director and town manager. And town manager. Cause SIPC will come through that. Yeah. So and town manager. So it was interesting because, and, and I don't think it's wrong maybe until we get more established, it might change, but SIPC actually presented as well. So they could discuss differences. So they didn't actually go back with the one exception to the, the recommending or the requesting department. They work mostly say 95% through SIPC and their finance team. So I think that's, I like putting that in there though. That's a good idea. Okay. And then keep the last sentence about the override for an override. Yeah. Okay. Next paragraph. The logistics one's fine. Okay. Fourth paragraph, the word scheduled should be schedule. Yeah. The FinCon meeting schedule. Yeah. Oh yeah. That's what I want to say this. I'm not sure. Well, it says from January, but you know what, Jerry, the warrant articles close on the 15th and we don't have that workshop until at the earliest, the next week's around the 20th. So it's really mid January. We'll say until mid-month. The budget is due to them by year end. So technically they should have it by year end. Yeah. But they're not meeting like twice a week until we get into the articles. And because technically, right, if the, if the process works, and again, we made a lot of changes to the process this year as well, that smooths itself out. They'll have capital in the fall. So they can just do that in the regular meetings. They'll get the budget by the end of December. They'll have a couple of meetings to look at that before the articles come out, but then they have to pull it all together while they're working on the articles. To me, it's January 15th until the warrant deadline, not when it closes. So that's March 15th, say, because if we're going to have a town meeting in May, it's around March 15th. So I would say that's the busiest time. That's my opinion. But what about the second sentence there, Carol? Yeah. The effort to review and recommend a budget and prepare a tax and recommend a budget can be challenging. I don't know about challenging. I think it'd be rewarding because it's really, they really can come up with some. But you say, but is rewarding and critical. Oh, it does say it. Yeah.
The effort to review and is, I don't think it's, I think I like critical, maybe not challenging because you know what? I think if you spoke with the people coming off and you look at Pam's letter in the post this year, the timing was very challenging. And I think there were growing pains on both sides of the equation this year. And yeah. And so. But is that going to always be the case is the question. So this, because this, yeah. So anyway, I don't know if it's, they're pretty smart. And I think they understand things pretty quickly. So I know, but I just was hoping we'd lighten it up because we don't have this such, this is a lot of work committee. And then I've heard people say that it gets put off by, because they think it's so extra amount of work. Um, and I think if you were to talk to some of the people that are considering whether they want to consider continue, they would tell you it's a lot of work. Yes. Because this year was, like we said, this was the perfect storm of issues. I can guarantee you, we're not going to have no sleep problems next year, but what if you want to put that fine? I'm just hoping to get people interested to apply. Yeah. I want to. That's all I'm doing. Um, the paragraph about that starts residence. I thought, um, we should add the words or an interest in municipal government. Are we on the one that says it residence? Mm hmm. Yeah. Do we want to, um, do, would this make sense to kind of put that up at the, in the top paragraph on the first paragraph talks about what it is. Okay. Registered. All right. Do we need to say you have to work collaboratively in a work group setting? I think that's kind of a given for all of them.
I don't feel strongly about that. I think that was put in when FinCom was a little bit, um, years ago, contentious. And some of the prior members had asked for that language.
I will leave it up to you whether we should soften that or whatever you want to do with that myself. Um, and then the last sentence, rather than say all residents, just start with, oh, you say residents again, we're interested. Now, my other question here is on this, it says to send the resume to the, um, to the chair. It'll go to Abby and I'll check out your email. Well, I want to ask if it should be, if they should be going to the chair, but this committee is different. It comes to me, but the select board does them just through the town manager's office because we are very committed to having an inclusive process. So I I'm just throwing that out. If this is a separate committee, it's under the moderator. Then she makes the rules of the road on this, but that's how we do it. We have it go just to the town manager's office and they say have candidates. And then they just, we just, there's no prior review by any of the candidates for the select board chair. Yeah. And here it's not, um, I think that's part of the reason why I'm trying to answer both parts of that question, Carol, because we are not under the town manager's office for any of this. So, but I don't want the things to only come to me so that it looks like there's any pre screening. So they come to me, but care of it'll be Abby. So he gets everything. So if someone ever wanted to say Carol Martin applied and Cherry didn't forward her resume, Abby has it as a. Right. So you can just leave that out and say resume to Abby and that's it. Cause then she'll, she'll know to send it to you. Yeah. I don't care. I just, I, I do want to make it clear that it is not the town manager. Do we say in here? Yeah, we do. It's the very first line we say appointed by us. Yeah. Yeah. I have no issue with the, with that all residents who are interested just submit a letter of interest and resume to the FCA B chair in care of, we just switch it over to Abby Warren. Right. And that to me seems fine. It's just a process of getting it to us. Well, okay. Yeah. I don't, I don't, I can't imagine anyone would have an issue with that. I'll just leave in right now that we'll schedule interviews in start. I'll just say starting in June. So our major rewrite is of the first, well, the last sentence of the first paragraph, but I think we have, I have that. And then Miranda, I think you have most of the text that takes care of the second paragraph, except for the last sentence and others were just like little changes that I can make in the document. Yeah. So, um, I think so. So how do you want to work this here? I mean, I could send it to you. I'm sitting here trying to think about, um, if you, because we've discussed this in an open meeting, you send the text of that sentence. Um, I can plug it into the document along with the other changes that I've made note of. Um, I can't send it back out for review unless we want to do a quick meeting. Um, but I can then put that together and ask Abby to distribute it, you know, today or Monday. Yeah. Cause it's gotta go out. Um, I'm fine with it, not coming back out. You know, the thing is we're not writing a, um, policy, if you will. Right. We're just up a bit to be a little clearer. Yeah. And then we can always at our next meeting, but we can always tweak it at our next meeting. If you know, right. So Miranda, I think because we've discussed that sentence and you are the one who documented it. If, if after the meeting, you can just send that with no commentary to Carol and to me so that we both have it. And, um, I will then insert it into this document along with the other changes to the term and the email and the D and there was one other. Well, yeah, I, I mean, I do also find, so not only did we rewrite the last sentence of the first paragraph, we rewrote the second paragraph. Yeah. But you have that, right. I do have it all. So if you send me both of us, the rewrite that we have gone over of the second paragraph, we've discussed that in this meeting, those who want to watch the recording can hear it. We still don't have anyone watching or joining our meeting. I'm sorry. I just had an idea. This Wayland finance committee volunteers need it. Could you send that to me in word form and I'll just put it in track changes. That would be the easiest. Okay. Okay. If you don't mind, that would be helpful. Um, yes. And then if you just make the changes that we discussed, that's great. Yeah. And, um, um, and then I will add the changes that we discussed. Yeah, I'll do it. Should we have, if, since it's, if we're going to have an attract changes, it's still, it sounds like it's a document in process. I'm comfortable with just whatever you come up with. If we do that, perhaps we should send it to Abby and then have her send it out to the board as an FYI doc.
That doesn't, we still can't talk about it. We can't talk about it, but I'm, um, generally speaking, what I do is to send them through the office, send them out. Do you, do you want to, um, um, and that does not get rid of open meeting law violations to have staff send them out. Um, this is not an open meeting law violation, but so why don't, should we just do a meeting for, um, sometime on Tuesday to look at this? Nope. I'm good with whatever comes up. I'm just concerned about getting it because as you, it's not, I said, it's not policy. Miranda, what I'm going to do so that we're not dealing with the entire document is I'm going to send you the second paragraph in an email. Okay. And you can play with that. Okay. What about the last sentence of the first paragraph? I'll, I'll, I'll, I have that too. I have that one to change. I have that one. Um, I will read it to you again. Um, um, let me just get back to you guys. Um, so the first, the last sentence of the first paragraph I'm changing to say, I don't know if I'm going to say this year, but this year five cab is looking for five candidates, two for a one year term and three for three year terms. Yep. Yep. And we're not putting the years of expiry in right now. Um, and then you, the rewrite of the second paragraph includes Carol's, uh, very nice weaving together of sentences to come up with one that says operating capital and articles in one sentence. Um, and then working with the finance director and town manager as staff contacts. And then we're keeping the last sentence about the overrides. That's it. And then we're getting rid of the D in the schedule. Um, we're going to add text that says an interest in municipal government in the please apply paragraph. And then we'll update Abby's and I'll confirm with Abby that it is she, and I'll confirm the email address, but we'll update that. And that we'll start interviewing in June. Okay. And we, we did change the busiest time of the year from January 15th to March 15th. Um, so do you, the, the FinCom is still working on their report. I guess, no, when the warrant goes to print, it all has to be done, but we don't know that that's going to be March 15th. Do we? It's around then. I mean, it was March 17th. This year was March 12th. So mid-March, how about mid-January to mid-March? What if we just say, yeah, mid-January. Mid-March that covers us. I mean, if we get the idea of a hotel meeting in June, it'll be later than that, but that's the gist of it is there's a two month period where we're going to be really busy and that much time after that, where, uh, it'll be less busy if we hotel meeting in June, because you'll have a little more time to get stuff done. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Got that in there. Okay. Thank you. Um, okay. So Miranda, I sent you the text. I'm sorry. It's not in word, but that way we don't have a whole document floating around, um, being edited and you'll update that way. And then I'll put it all in the document and get it sent out. Okay. Great. Um, I will follow up with Iris and Carl, um, regarding decisions and, um, I'll just keep you post. Well, I'm sort of moving into, um, if we're meeting again, but I can keep you posted if we have people that want to, um, interview. Yeah. Because we have to work around their schedules too, to, to schedule the next meeting. Okay. Understood. Um, anything else on the recruitment right now? Okay. Of course, anything on the correspondence other than what we talked about, both related to recruitment, um, next meeting date, I will keep open right now until we know what's, until we see what, until we see all the resumes that come in so that we can take a look at them and interview people. Yeah. I suggest we pick something like towards the end of June. Um, so we have a placeholder. If you could just send out a couple of dates, we can maybe agree. They would have it on our calendars because someone comes along, we would probably want to interview. Yeah. Uh, that's a good idea. So if you want to look at your schedule, get my book here, folks. Yeah, I'm pretty, um, I'm pretty wide, wide open. I said June 30th and July 1st, I've got my closet installation. So yeah. Finally. Okay. What do we decide? What day? We didn't decide anything, but I mean, I'm pretty good. I mean, I've got, I can make chunks of time work between the week of the eighth, the week of the 15th and the week of the 22nd. Like I can't do every day, but there are certainly times. You too. So my point is I would recommend more towards the end of the month so that we don't have to. To get the resumes in. Because we're only going to put this out and then it's going to, hopefully that gives us a month for something to come in maybe. Yeah. That week of June 22nd, my schedule is, is pretty wide open. At the moment, mine is too. I think we should pick, why don't we pick Friday the 26th? I can't do that. I can't do the Friday. Okay. All right. About Thursday the 25th. Yeah. I think if, if, if we have, yeah, let's hold that. And if we, if we, um, want to pick a time, what this one's a good 950. Yep. This is fine. Works for me. Um, I can't do it Thursdays. I. Oh, that's right. Or until noon. 10. Yeah. Oh, 10's fine. When do 10. Okay. It's just a placeholder. Yeah. I have to tell you, I really think it's a good idea to meet it and Miranda as well. I'm sure to get a placeholder in there, even if it moves. So that we don't fill up our calendars. The calendar fills up, but then if I see that's a bad day, then I can say, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, yeah. Um, can I just go back to something that I cut Carol off on? I think it was Carol, the Whelan post. You said something about the Whelan post. Oh yeah. Do we want to, um, get an article in the post? Oops. Oops. What happened here? Dropping stuff, you know, about the openings. Yeah. I mean, in, in a positive, I'd say that, you know, due to, um, uh, whoops, um, um, um, some unanticipated resignations and just general turnover or whatever we want to say, um, maybe because it might reach a... Why wouldn't we put the recruitment statement on itself in the post? Yeah. Good. Right. That's what I'm saying. Do we want to like do that to increase our reach if you want? Well, well, well, where's the recruitment statement going otherwise? Um, what we have done in the past is it gets pushed as an individual email to anyone who subscribes to town alerts and it gets posted on the, uh, I don't know what the new format exactly where it will go, but it used to get posted on the front page as a like current happening until something else would, you know, push it out. On what though? It's a webpage, but on the webpage, I don't know. It used to be like in that box on the front page. I'm not certain there's anything being pushed on the front page right now. Okay. But, but also what about the town's, uh, Facebook website? How about the newsletter? The newsletter? Yep. Can do that. Yep. My husband always complained that he complains that he never knows what's going on. You're like, because in the post is doing a wonderful job. I really think they are. But since we've lost the town crier for whatever reason, my husband feels like I didn't even, I don't even know when these things are occurring. So the news, the newsletter, their Facebook page, the site, and they'll send it out via their email push. Yeah. So the email group, I'm going to be wrong here. Somebody like Abby will know. I think that goes to about 3000 people. It might not even be that many, you know, the, that blast, which is whoever has signed up for whoever has signed up. So the newsletter, I think also you have to have signed up, but I think it has a wider reach, but I think the post will pick up a few more. Yep. Maybe the Facebook page. I don't know. We'll talk about that the next time. Um, yeah, I'm happy to, when the reason, when we have finalized this recruitment statement to send it to David Watkins and ask him to put it in the post. Okay. All right. And they may just rearrange it a little bit, which is a perfect thing, you know, in terms of no problem with that. Right. Bridget, I should say not rearrange it. Okay. Good. Good. Good. Um, reports and concerns. I have one is that, um, um, well, two, I won't make an announcement here. As a select would, uh, will not be taken their leadership vote probably until June 1st this year, because next Monday, uh, they're only going to be three members present. And, um, in my current capacity, I like to have key votes, you know, uh, as full of membership as possible so that we won't be taking our, so, um, you'll see if you get a new member hook, we keep me after that. I was actually one of my, and then, and then I know that we have to do the same thing here. So go ahead. So, okay. Yes. So, so, okay. So it was not until your June vote. Will there be a, um, okay. Yep. You also, do you have Chris Reynolds coming on this, this coming Monday? I'm sorry. Chris Reynolds, since he's just been voted on his, does, does that happen this Monday? The first, he is already, uh, I believe sworn in, but he is one of the two members is unable to make Monday's meeting. So, um, but yes, this would be his first meeting Miranda. So yeah, got it. Yep. But not till June 1st. And then the other thing I was just checking my term goes until September. Oh, good. So, um, so you, are you looking right now to re-up? You want to reappoint? You're so funny. Um, I think that's where I was going with that is I actually, looks to be a Carol pending. I'm here. I'm just going to keep going, Miranda. I'm here for now. And so I don't think that we should, um, reorganize this committee until we know who our select board person is, and then we can figure that out. Right. We have to wait for these official votes here. So, okay. Okay. Yeah. That's, that's for a future meeting. Um, do we want to vote on the recruitment statement or are we comfortable? I don't think we need to, we have, we need to vote on it. Yeah. We have agreement. No. Yeah. Miranda. Yeah. I don't, I don't think we need to vote. Yeah. Um, any reports and concerns, Miranda? Nope. None for me, not for here. Just, we got to find the bodies for the finance committee. All right. We actually did not meet our agenda after being so far ahead. Yeah. Okay. I move. We adjourn at 5 a.m. All right. So motion to adjourn. So moved. Can you have a second? Oh, now I'll be the second. You have a second. Okay. So Miranda and Carol, thank you. Um, hearing no other discussion, we'll do a roll call vote. Carol? Yes. Miranda? Yes. Carrie? Yes. So 3-0 to adjourn. All right.