October 8, 2025 – Personnel Board – Video & Transcript
October 8, 2025 - Personnel Board
Unknown: Right? So everyone is
here, and I will call the
October 8 meeting of the
personnel board to order the
time is, I think it was 4:06pm,
we have in the room. We have myself, Mary Anne Peabody chair. We have the town HR manager Kate Orion, and we have the town manager Michael McCall and on Zoom, we have the members of the personnel board. We have Mary Ellen Castagno. We have Jill Superman, and we have Paul Morin Berg.
And in that's the end our our zoom manager is Robbie Bullard, and I will call the meeting to order, and the minutes are being taken by Paul Morin Berg, Thank you, Paul. Thank you, Paul.
First thing is call to order. Review agenda for the public. One may watch or may participate remotely with the meeting link that can be found at https. Colon slash, slash, www.wayland.ma.us/public-body-meeting-information-virtual-in,
person, dash and dash hybrid. Pursuant to chapter two of the acts of 2025 this meeting will be conducted in person and via remote means, in accordance with applicable law. The meeting will be recorded and will may be made available to the public on WayCAM as soon as possible, as soon after the meeting as is practicable. I'll read the agenda. The agenda is called to order review agenda for public first announcement and public comment, and then we will enter into an executive session pursuant to Mass General Laws, chapter 30, a section 21 to discuss strategy well to to have a a meeting with regard to the for the purpose of the meeting for grievance at step two, pursuant To the collective bargaining agreement between the town of Wayland and the International Association of Firefighters, AFL CIO local 1978 pursuant to Mass General Laws, will also review and approve the personnel board executive session minutes from five, 625, with the intent to hold said minutes, and then we will return approximately an hour after we begin to open session. And then after that, we will have a discussion of proposed amendment to personnel policy and for Dash 4.1 sick leave non union employees. And then a discussion and approval of Open Session meetings, minute meetings for five, 625, which we have, and 611, if available. And we do not have those available, but we will have those for our next meeting. We will then have personnel board members, reports and concerns topics not reasonably anticipated 48 hours in advance, if any, we have a next meeting date, and then we will, we will adjourn. The first order of business is announcement and public comment. The only announcement I was going to make, and I'm glad Michael is here, because maybe he could answer it is I heard on the Select Board meeting the other night that the there will be in the future, the building will close at 4pm and be locked until evening meetings start. So I just would ask, what's going to happen if we have a four o'clock meeting and some people are late trying to get in, can we make some accommodation?
Thank you, Madam Chair, we are going to work through this and come up with a communications plan to share with everybody how will intend to do this. I've done it in some of my prior communities. We just want to ensure that there's a safe working environment for the people in conducting the meeting, same staff that they go after hours, especially on the nights when we don't have meetings. We want to make sure the building's a lot building is locked so that staff aren't startled. That's after one on one occasion where we have people working late and they encounter somebody and you're here alone, we don't want those types of incidents. If we know there's going to be a meeting, there will be personnel here. So you know, Robbie would be here for the zoom, a lot of staff would be here. We usually have a custodian in the building. We can make sure that the doors are open in advance. My plan would, as I mentioned the other day, would be to open the building 15 minutes before the meeting starts. And since you start at four o'clock, we wouldn't close at all, but we would close immediately once your meeting is complete. And if it was later in the evening, obviously we'd start a few minutes earlier, and we'll we'll work through it and how we do the the doors opening and closing. We are putting in new security on the doors so that facilities can lock all the doors down and we could selectively open them up with an electronic key stroke. Okay, great. We have a device. I just want to put them on them being Select Board and the public on notice that we're going to start doing that. And there's a benefits, as I say, not only to the staff and anybody who's utilizing the building for safety purposes, but if we start pushing people more over to the coacc, which is our new council on aging community center, when we talk about having meetings, we could actually start turning down the AC heat and lights in this building there on a timer to go off at about 11 o'clock at night, start bringing that down to about five o'clock at night, and start realizing some minor savings and be consistent with a reference under the climate act, mobilization, climate action, mobilization plan, and just in general, as we're trying to move forward the next year's budget. So there's safety reasons, financial reasons and just efficiency reasons. Great. Thank you. Public comment. Robbie, is there any public comment? No. See no public comment. Okay, so then the chair moves to enter executive session pursuant to Massachusetts General law 30 a section, 21 a three, for the purpose of meeting for a grievance at step two, pursuant to the collective bargaining agreement between the town of Wayland and the International Association of Firefighters, affl cio local 1978 because to do so in open session would have a detrimental effect on the collective bargaining position of the town. So declares the chair. May I have a second so moved. Who is that? Mary Ellen, it is yes. I will take a roll call vote. Mary Ellen, yes. Paul Morenberg: Paul, yes. Unknown: Jill, yeah, me. Mary Anne, okay, so I will invite Taylor Ziegler Miller, president of the Wayland firefighters union, Lindsay Byrne Wayland, firefighter, I don't know if anyone else is going to be there from the union. Do we know yet? Lindsay burn No, that's it. That's it. Okay. And Michael McCall, Wayland, Town Manager, Kate Ryan. Wayland, personnel manager, fire chief Neil McPherson and Richard Ripley, Assistant Fire Chief. We will then review the after the the meeting. We will then review the executive executive session minutes from May 6, 2025 with the anticipation of releasing them. I anticipate that we might be an executive session for approximately one hour, and then we will reconvene in open session. I invite the public interested in amending the remainder of in attending, I'm sorry the remainder of the meeting to begin checking in. At around that time, I'll ask the personnel board members if there's anyone who thinks they have a conflict of interest in attending this session to declare. So now we are moving into executive session at 4:15pm, and do they have a separate link for that? Yes, I'm sorry, okay, and we will well, and then we'll be back in open session and we'll we will leave from open session. Adjourn from open session. Sorry, okay, thank you. We are returning to open session at 538, the camera needs to be adjusted, please. Well, hello. Is that us? That us? I don't know what happened. Oh, wow, that's really there we go, then turn it down. Thank you. Thank you Jill for noticing that. Okay, so we're missing Paul still. Okay.
Paul took his models and went home.
ADU is for. If you're thinking,
Oh, period, this is me. I think I have a letter. I'm sorry. Okay, this might be my fault. Sorry. It's going to fix it right now. Thank you. Oh, no,
sorry, yeah, you got it. Oh, you have to admit everybody huh, noi to panelists. Everybody else got in on their own, but I don't know why he did wait. Is it working? Yeah, yeah, there he is. He should be able to to work now. He should be on. Oh, great. Thank you. There you are. But that was my fault, Paul.
So we are returning to open session at 540 we have a discussion of proposed amendment personnel policy for M for Dash, 4.1 sick leave non union policy. And I think you all got an email from me this week, but I didn't know about any issue with this policy, and it was on the Select board agenda. And I did send, try to send out some information ahead of time. I sent it to Kate and Michael ahead of time, earlier that day, I sent it to you that that evening, after other people in the public had seen it and had some concerns about it. So Kate, why don't you bring us up to where you are with it? Now? Sure. So part of why this went to the Select Board to begin with is that we had two non union employees who were just retiring. So we didn't this had to come up before just now. So in 2016 the bylaw was amended to basically put in this new language for the sick. Buy back when you when the town Union voted in 2024 it actually removed all of that policy language, and it put the new we can't hear you, Paul, I'm sorry you're muted. You muted. Okay, so in 2024 new by law in place all the policy language was removed. When I went to go process the payment for this retiring employee, I noticed that our policy, at least on the website, was from 2000 I did a pretty exhaustive search. I couldn't find any other versions that had been modified between then and now, other than that 2016 bylaw, which is no longer valid, so I brought this to Michael. He talked to council about that. They recommended taking this to the Select board just to fix this one piece so that we could then move forward and pay this to basically grandfather these two employees in. I would just appreciate in the future, Fay, if, if there's something coming up, there's something that we've been working on or might have some knowledge of, to just give me a heads up, because I knew we had, we had done that same policy in 2005 in 2016 and I was not, and I was not, I was able to find the policy because it was in the bylaw and it was voted on. And I found our notes from when we voted on it, and that was 2016 we had done an earlier update in 2005 and I found my notes of back and forth between the FinCom Johnson and I, but there are no minutes for the personnel board filed on the website in 2005 we can still find them, but it's a more point because it was amended in 2016 so I would just ask that you call it an amendment of the 2016 version, and make sure when, when, when, when, when amending 2001 it was very old. It was not, it was not even one, and the wording was fixed. After that. Policy was that was a looked like a work in progress, and I don't know who posted it. And we, we had several years after John left that things got lost and missing, and we've had to recreate our minutes for many of those years. We had to recreate them from 2017 to 2019 and it was a matter of the people that were supposedly caring for the documents that we. Had so but I think in in doing that policy, there were some things that were left out that were in the 2016 policy. So in a way, I'm glad it happened, because it means we have to check everything from 2016 I have some updates from other policies. I think I sent them to you when I became chair and check and if you don't have the updates, we did very few, but we did some in those 2017 1819, years, I found those as well. But we're responsible for keeping records for our Tom employees and keeping good files. That's what a municipality does. I just want to say that I actually went back through all of their meeting minutes for 220 16, because that's when this was originally passed at no meeting, and I didn't find any. All I saw was a vote on the bylaw itself. Not so the minutes that was from 2015 it was probably, wait a minute. No, it's February 2016 of the minutes I have them here, February 11, 2016 well, and it's in here, yeah. So, so what we need to do now is look at what you have and make sure that we didn't inadvertently leave out something that was in the policy in 2016 I would have just reaffirmed the 2016 policy because it's easier, but you've taken the time to work on it, so let's just make sure we have those. Those updates, let me find the one on 2016 because there were some that, some things that were left out. I also have a question. It still says, like permanent non union employee, right? So the distinction at the time in between permanent and regular employee in municipal municipalities was because it was a civil service. We were under civil service, and permanent meant a civil servant, employee, but regular meant you know somebody that was an employee of the town, so maybe we don't even need to put Herman into regular maybe we just say each non union employee who works a minimum of 20 hours. The other thing I noticed is that it goes from, are we writing it in the third person or the first person or the second person? Because some of it is talking about the employee, and then it says, when you are out sick, that's second person. If we write in the third person, we'd be saying the employee is so that language I I appreciated that the language is less stiff in the rewrite that you were doing, but there were some things that were left out. Let me see if I can find where can I just ask a question while you're looking at it? I'm just a little confused, what it historically, what has been the process for this? Because Mary Anne does have the history behind you know the policies here and when they were changed, and I know that she wanted the heads up, but would it come to the personnel board first to see what the changes were, if they were different, because I know that this went to the Select Board before it came to the personnel board. Yeah. So the reason they went to the Select Board that was Council. Town council advised us to do that under the town manager act the slack board is now the policy setting bio for the town, and they felt that we should take it directly to them first, just to fix this one piece so that we can move forward with these two employees that was really all trying to do, and then we could bring it back to the personnel board to fix any other language that needs to be modified. I think they think they thought they had an emergency situation. But if they had looked at the 2016 policy, they would have seen that they were covered. It was, it was the policy that had been approved in 2016 and been operational up until today. I mean, we no one's revised it, so it still is in effect. That's my position. I don't know about you guys, but that's the way I see it. The unfortunate thing is that usually, the personal policies were either kept in. And back and forth from being on the on the website and on the, well, we didn't have a website before 2005 we didn't have a website. I think we began to have a website in about 2008 so personnel policies were written, and they were and they were on paper. And so when you made a change, you had to do the change on paper. And when there was a when there was a rewrite, it got taken to town that there were some town council who said, you don't need to bring them before town meeting. You can make the personnel policies. And then some town council said, Well, you should put it in the bylaw. And so it went back and forth, adding to why there might be confusion. But generally, if it went before town meeting, it was put as a policy, a written policy, in the policies and procedure section where we got it. When we got a Tom website, someone was charged with moving them over and didn't move them over properly, had only old policies up, and we still have that situation.
Paul Morenberg: I'm not sure I understand what we're doing here. I mean, are we looking at the policy, or we just talked, sort of talking about the this all, it seems like it's all background about, oh, Unknown: so the Select Board made a revision, but they didn't review the policy. They didn't read it. They just said, and Michael McCall explained the situation, explained that he had gotten information that identified the 2016 policy that was, in fact, in effect and the and the language, and said that they would get something back In writing and the and, and we now have. Kate had revised the 2001 and felt that it had to go to the Select Board. The Select Board do have policy authority, but are they going to want to read policies? We're supposed to work with HR and and the town manager to work on policies and review them. Because what I think the question is like, right now, what are we doing? Right? I think we want to look at that policy that's in our packet and compare it with the 2016 policy so that we can make sure there's nothing missing. Can I interject for a moment? Be a better use of your time. If I've worked with Marianne to make sure we go through both of those policies and combine it into a red line version, so that you can review it and maybe move forward next time would that be? That would be a great idea. That would be fine. That would be fine, yeah, because I found two areas. But, yeah, okay, um,
well, that's so bad. Well, at least we know, we know we have a Paul. Well, we know we have a policy. And no, no, I follow you, Mary. And I don't mean to interrupt you. I follow you. But what I'm also hearing you say, or maybe, is that it would have been helpful to have this up front, to do it up front before it went anywhere. And then we wouldn't have Paul, we wouldn't have to have this discussion here, right? But, I mean, I think Mary Anne's making a point to the public what's going on, and I think that that's important, but I do understand, you know, how hard, you know, difficult it may be to follow, but I will. I think that, you know, I think that the the issue of not knowing, and the Select Board of not having any experience with policies, they didn't, they didn't vote on it, but they made a revision to get the thing fixed that they needed fixed, and that's what we're about to do, but it, but who knows if there's more fixing to be done because we don't have the correct Well, that's what I think with our other policies. We worked on one, I think it was vacation time or or sick leave in the we haven't worked on a lot since then, Marianne and then we worked on the old one, because the newer version, in 2005 let people take it for two hours as opposed to four hours. So we need to go back and look. And each time we take out a policy, make sure that we have the most updated policy correct.
Paul Morenberg: Let's table this and move on. I mean, Unknown: okay, okay, open session minutes of, oh, we forgot to do, we forgot to do the executive session minutes in our executive session meeting, but I can tell you that the the second. State Attorney General's office told me I can decide if they can be done in open session, and because they are, they are minutes that are just voting to voting on minutes that would be something we can do in open session and release some type of thing. I think we can. So let's look at the minutes from May 6, right? Because then they have to leave, so that will give us enough time to look at the minutes. Okay,
anything on page one? I'm sorry I didn't number these. It was very hard. I had to take it from a PDF, and the numbers don't show up. I don't see anything. Anybody see anything? Okay? So page two starts with discussion and review of several personnel policies for non union employees. I see one error myself on annual leave. Paul Morenberg: Is this in the packet or not? Unknown: Yeah, yes, it's in the packet. Paul Morenberg: What page you on? Unknown: It's page 2624 of 28 Thank you, Jill, I don't have I just have the policy. It's the third policy down, annual leave, and that's the one Kate that we did from the old we updated that from the old one, and not the more recent, 2005 one doesn't matter, because it's now been 16. What's the version we use? Oh, okay. Was it okay? 2016, in the 123, 4/5, line. I said, Paul morn Berg questioned how the annual leave policy. It was merely Mary Ellen, because I went back and I watched the the meeting. So that was one era. Anybody else see anyone? Anything else in there? No.
No, are we frozen? Are we still on? No, we're still on. So go to the next page, which is starts with same towns on the median household scale. After that, the word consultant. I then asked, so I have MP asked if consultant would provide a tool for the HR manager to use when adding a new position, and KR said they will, so I'd like to add that part in there. Okay, and I had a question at the bottom, which is in red, because I had a question and I couldn't find the documentation, but I Kate sent me a download or a link to the meeting, which is not up yet, on on WayCAM, and it and it said, she said the information is available through open the books and on the town clerk's website, under public records link request Freedom of Information Act okay. Like to add that anybody else see anything else on that page? Nope. The next page, discussion and approval of open session. Meeting Minutes, 1210, 2024, anything on that page?
No, okay, and then the end is the last page. I don't have anything on those, so I will make those corrections and get them to to Kate. Kate, when will they be posted?
Okay, good. We have to vote to approve them, right? Or do we already? I will I, I will take, can someone make a motion? I make a motion that we approve the minutes with the suggested amendments seconded. That was too quick. Jill, that was scary. I'm on it. Mary Ellen, yes. Jill, yes. Paul, yes. And then I'm going to excuse myself and so, and we still have, we still have a quorum for anything else. Okay, right? So thank you all, and I will see you on the at the next meeting. Thanks. Mary Ellen, okay, bye, bye. Paul Morenberg: Do we really have to do anything else today? We've been here for two hours, and Unknown: this is, I know I just want to go through that. No, no. Not much more. I just wanted to remind people ask if there are any personnel board members, reports and concerns. Paul Morenberg: No. Well, yeah. I mean, I will not to pull up, you know, to be label this. I do. I think it'd be helpful to have have both open and executive session zoom links in a single email, because it's call to kind of go search around for the right zoom link. Unknown: Yeah, that's it. That's a good suggestion. Paul, thank you. I also would like to remind people, if you had minutes that were approved, did everyone get their minutes to you? Okay? Because I had minutes from that I got to you in August from the January 7 minutes, and they're not posted yet. So if you could catch up on posting on minutes that would be appreciated,
topics not reasonably anticipated, 48 hours in advance, if any, none, I have none. Next meeting. Is we scheduled it for November, the first Wednesday in November, November five. And is that everybody okay with that? I'd like to make that one a Zoom meeting, unless somebody wants to come in and hold it here. Is it okay for a Zoom meeting?
Okay? Paul Morenberg: What? What date are we talking about? Unknown: November 5. November 5, which is our next meeting, and so hopefully, Kate and I will have that policy fixed and Paul Morenberg: done by them. Was that a date we agreed on before? Or that's our standing date, right? The first Unknown: Wednesday? Yeah, the standing one, we thought it would be easier if we made a standard one, is that okay? Paul, yeah, Paul Morenberg: I may have, I may have a conflict that day, but I could have a quorum without me, right? Let me, I don't know, and I don't know for sure yet, so I would just keep a date for this as is, okay, yeah, Unknown: because we're, we're finding if we if we had to change the date, then it was a long time before we could get back and and so it was best to just try and see if we could have a, you know, the same date each month, same day of the week, and people agreed on that one, and if it's a problem, I mean, I don't love that date this time, but that's okay. I think we'll try and stick with it. And if we can't, we can't, so hopefully we'll have a quorum if, if we need you for a quorum, would you be available? Paul Morenberg: Well, right now I have a work, work conflict, but it's one of these things where I don't know for sure if it's if the event is going forward or not. Okay. Unknown: Do we want to change the meeting date? Mary owns off, but Paul Morenberg: let's hold let's hop off for now, let me talk to you. I should I show the better sense and in about a week? Unknown: Okay, okay, that will give us enough time to if we have to switch it, to switch it. Thank you. Can I have a motion to adjourn seconded? And what time are we adjourning? We are adjourning at 603. Okay, so three, okay, roll call, vote. Jill, yes. Paul, yes. Mary Anne, yes. And do we know what what time did before we turn it off? What time did Mary Ellen leave? For the minutes? Do we have that? Paul Morenberg: When did she leave? She I mean, I think she logged off at like six o'clock, Unknown: yeah, okay, Paul Morenberg: or 558 or something. Unknown: I was gonna say 558 558 Okay, let's go with that.
Okay. Thank you very much. All right. Good night, everybody. Bye.
we have in the room. We have myself, Mary Anne Peabody chair. We have the town HR manager Kate Orion, and we have the town manager Michael McCall and on Zoom, we have the members of the personnel board. We have Mary Ellen Castagno. We have Jill Superman, and we have Paul Morin Berg.
And in that's the end our our zoom manager is Robbie Bullard, and I will call the meeting to order, and the minutes are being taken by Paul Morin Berg, Thank you, Paul. Thank you, Paul.
First thing is call to order. Review agenda for the public. One may watch or may participate remotely with the meeting link that can be found at https. Colon slash, slash, www.wayland.ma.us/public-body-meeting-information-virtual-in,
person, dash and dash hybrid. Pursuant to chapter two of the acts of 2025 this meeting will be conducted in person and via remote means, in accordance with applicable law. The meeting will be recorded and will may be made available to the public on WayCAM as soon as possible, as soon after the meeting as is practicable. I'll read the agenda. The agenda is called to order review agenda for public first announcement and public comment, and then we will enter into an executive session pursuant to Mass General Laws, chapter 30, a section 21 to discuss strategy well to to have a a meeting with regard to the for the purpose of the meeting for grievance at step two, pursuant To the collective bargaining agreement between the town of Wayland and the International Association of Firefighters, AFL CIO local 1978 pursuant to Mass General Laws, will also review and approve the personnel board executive session minutes from five, 625, with the intent to hold said minutes, and then we will return approximately an hour after we begin to open session. And then after that, we will have a discussion of proposed amendment to personnel policy and for Dash 4.1 sick leave non union employees. And then a discussion and approval of Open Session meetings, minute meetings for five, 625, which we have, and 611, if available. And we do not have those available, but we will have those for our next meeting. We will then have personnel board members, reports and concerns topics not reasonably anticipated 48 hours in advance, if any, we have a next meeting date, and then we will, we will adjourn. The first order of business is announcement and public comment. The only announcement I was going to make, and I'm glad Michael is here, because maybe he could answer it is I heard on the Select Board meeting the other night that the there will be in the future, the building will close at 4pm and be locked until evening meetings start. So I just would ask, what's going to happen if we have a four o'clock meeting and some people are late trying to get in, can we make some accommodation?
Thank you, Madam Chair, we are going to work through this and come up with a communications plan to share with everybody how will intend to do this. I've done it in some of my prior communities. We just want to ensure that there's a safe working environment for the people in conducting the meeting, same staff that they go after hours, especially on the nights when we don't have meetings. We want to make sure the building's a lot building is locked so that staff aren't startled. That's after one on one occasion where we have people working late and they encounter somebody and you're here alone, we don't want those types of incidents. If we know there's going to be a meeting, there will be personnel here. So you know, Robbie would be here for the zoom, a lot of staff would be here. We usually have a custodian in the building. We can make sure that the doors are open in advance. My plan would, as I mentioned the other day, would be to open the building 15 minutes before the meeting starts. And since you start at four o'clock, we wouldn't close at all, but we would close immediately once your meeting is complete. And if it was later in the evening, obviously we'd start a few minutes earlier, and we'll we'll work through it and how we do the the doors opening and closing. We are putting in new security on the doors so that facilities can lock all the doors down and we could selectively open them up with an electronic key stroke. Okay, great. We have a device. I just want to put them on them being Select Board and the public on notice that we're going to start doing that. And there's a benefits, as I say, not only to the staff and anybody who's utilizing the building for safety purposes, but if we start pushing people more over to the coacc, which is our new council on aging community center, when we talk about having meetings, we could actually start turning down the AC heat and lights in this building there on a timer to go off at about 11 o'clock at night, start bringing that down to about five o'clock at night, and start realizing some minor savings and be consistent with a reference under the climate act, mobilization, climate action, mobilization plan, and just in general, as we're trying to move forward the next year's budget. So there's safety reasons, financial reasons and just efficiency reasons. Great. Thank you. Public comment. Robbie, is there any public comment? No. See no public comment. Okay, so then the chair moves to enter executive session pursuant to Massachusetts General law 30 a section, 21 a three, for the purpose of meeting for a grievance at step two, pursuant to the collective bargaining agreement between the town of Wayland and the International Association of Firefighters, affl cio local 1978 because to do so in open session would have a detrimental effect on the collective bargaining position of the town. So declares the chair. May I have a second so moved. Who is that? Mary Ellen, it is yes. I will take a roll call vote. Mary Ellen, yes. Paul Morenberg: Paul, yes. Unknown: Jill, yeah, me. Mary Anne, okay, so I will invite Taylor Ziegler Miller, president of the Wayland firefighters union, Lindsay Byrne Wayland, firefighter, I don't know if anyone else is going to be there from the union. Do we know yet? Lindsay burn No, that's it. That's it. Okay. And Michael McCall, Wayland, Town Manager, Kate Ryan. Wayland, personnel manager, fire chief Neil McPherson and Richard Ripley, Assistant Fire Chief. We will then review the after the the meeting. We will then review the executive executive session minutes from May 6, 2025 with the anticipation of releasing them. I anticipate that we might be an executive session for approximately one hour, and then we will reconvene in open session. I invite the public interested in amending the remainder of in attending, I'm sorry the remainder of the meeting to begin checking in. At around that time, I'll ask the personnel board members if there's anyone who thinks they have a conflict of interest in attending this session to declare. So now we are moving into executive session at 4:15pm, and do they have a separate link for that? Yes, I'm sorry, okay, and we will well, and then we'll be back in open session and we'll we will leave from open session. Adjourn from open session. Sorry, okay, thank you. We are returning to open session at 538, the camera needs to be adjusted, please. Well, hello. Is that us? That us? I don't know what happened. Oh, wow, that's really there we go, then turn it down. Thank you. Thank you Jill for noticing that. Okay, so we're missing Paul still. Okay.
Paul took his models and went home.
ADU is for. If you're thinking,
Oh, period, this is me. I think I have a letter. I'm sorry. Okay, this might be my fault. Sorry. It's going to fix it right now. Thank you. Oh, no,
sorry, yeah, you got it. Oh, you have to admit everybody huh, noi to panelists. Everybody else got in on their own, but I don't know why he did wait. Is it working? Yeah, yeah, there he is. He should be able to to work now. He should be on. Oh, great. Thank you. There you are. But that was my fault, Paul.
So we are returning to open session at 540 we have a discussion of proposed amendment personnel policy for M for Dash, 4.1 sick leave non union policy. And I think you all got an email from me this week, but I didn't know about any issue with this policy, and it was on the Select board agenda. And I did send, try to send out some information ahead of time. I sent it to Kate and Michael ahead of time, earlier that day, I sent it to you that that evening, after other people in the public had seen it and had some concerns about it. So Kate, why don't you bring us up to where you are with it? Now? Sure. So part of why this went to the Select Board to begin with is that we had two non union employees who were just retiring. So we didn't this had to come up before just now. So in 2016 the bylaw was amended to basically put in this new language for the sick. Buy back when you when the town Union voted in 2024 it actually removed all of that policy language, and it put the new we can't hear you, Paul, I'm sorry you're muted. You muted. Okay, so in 2024 new by law in place all the policy language was removed. When I went to go process the payment for this retiring employee, I noticed that our policy, at least on the website, was from 2000 I did a pretty exhaustive search. I couldn't find any other versions that had been modified between then and now, other than that 2016 bylaw, which is no longer valid, so I brought this to Michael. He talked to council about that. They recommended taking this to the Select board just to fix this one piece so that we could then move forward and pay this to basically grandfather these two employees in. I would just appreciate in the future, Fay, if, if there's something coming up, there's something that we've been working on or might have some knowledge of, to just give me a heads up, because I knew we had, we had done that same policy in 2005 in 2016 and I was not, and I was not, I was able to find the policy because it was in the bylaw and it was voted on. And I found our notes from when we voted on it, and that was 2016 we had done an earlier update in 2005 and I found my notes of back and forth between the FinCom Johnson and I, but there are no minutes for the personnel board filed on the website in 2005 we can still find them, but it's a more point because it was amended in 2016 so I would just ask that you call it an amendment of the 2016 version, and make sure when, when, when, when, when amending 2001 it was very old. It was not, it was not even one, and the wording was fixed. After that. Policy was that was a looked like a work in progress, and I don't know who posted it. And we, we had several years after John left that things got lost and missing, and we've had to recreate our minutes for many of those years. We had to recreate them from 2017 to 2019 and it was a matter of the people that were supposedly caring for the documents that we. Had so but I think in in doing that policy, there were some things that were left out that were in the 2016 policy. So in a way, I'm glad it happened, because it means we have to check everything from 2016 I have some updates from other policies. I think I sent them to you when I became chair and check and if you don't have the updates, we did very few, but we did some in those 2017 1819, years, I found those as well. But we're responsible for keeping records for our Tom employees and keeping good files. That's what a municipality does. I just want to say that I actually went back through all of their meeting minutes for 220 16, because that's when this was originally passed at no meeting, and I didn't find any. All I saw was a vote on the bylaw itself. Not so the minutes that was from 2015 it was probably, wait a minute. No, it's February 2016 of the minutes I have them here, February 11, 2016 well, and it's in here, yeah. So, so what we need to do now is look at what you have and make sure that we didn't inadvertently leave out something that was in the policy in 2016 I would have just reaffirmed the 2016 policy because it's easier, but you've taken the time to work on it, so let's just make sure we have those. Those updates, let me find the one on 2016 because there were some that, some things that were left out. I also have a question. It still says, like permanent non union employee, right? So the distinction at the time in between permanent and regular employee in municipal municipalities was because it was a civil service. We were under civil service, and permanent meant a civil servant, employee, but regular meant you know somebody that was an employee of the town, so maybe we don't even need to put Herman into regular maybe we just say each non union employee who works a minimum of 20 hours. The other thing I noticed is that it goes from, are we writing it in the third person or the first person or the second person? Because some of it is talking about the employee, and then it says, when you are out sick, that's second person. If we write in the third person, we'd be saying the employee is so that language I I appreciated that the language is less stiff in the rewrite that you were doing, but there were some things that were left out. Let me see if I can find where can I just ask a question while you're looking at it? I'm just a little confused, what it historically, what has been the process for this? Because Mary Anne does have the history behind you know the policies here and when they were changed, and I know that she wanted the heads up, but would it come to the personnel board first to see what the changes were, if they were different, because I know that this went to the Select Board before it came to the personnel board. Yeah. So the reason they went to the Select Board that was Council. Town council advised us to do that under the town manager act the slack board is now the policy setting bio for the town, and they felt that we should take it directly to them first, just to fix this one piece so that we can move forward with these two employees that was really all trying to do, and then we could bring it back to the personnel board to fix any other language that needs to be modified. I think they think they thought they had an emergency situation. But if they had looked at the 2016 policy, they would have seen that they were covered. It was, it was the policy that had been approved in 2016 and been operational up until today. I mean, we no one's revised it, so it still is in effect. That's my position. I don't know about you guys, but that's the way I see it. The unfortunate thing is that usually, the personal policies were either kept in. And back and forth from being on the on the website and on the, well, we didn't have a website before 2005 we didn't have a website. I think we began to have a website in about 2008 so personnel policies were written, and they were and they were on paper. And so when you made a change, you had to do the change on paper. And when there was a when there was a rewrite, it got taken to town that there were some town council who said, you don't need to bring them before town meeting. You can make the personnel policies. And then some town council said, Well, you should put it in the bylaw. And so it went back and forth, adding to why there might be confusion. But generally, if it went before town meeting, it was put as a policy, a written policy, in the policies and procedure section where we got it. When we got a Tom website, someone was charged with moving them over and didn't move them over properly, had only old policies up, and we still have that situation.
Paul Morenberg: I'm not sure I understand what we're doing here. I mean, are we looking at the policy, or we just talked, sort of talking about the this all, it seems like it's all background about, oh, Unknown: so the Select Board made a revision, but they didn't review the policy. They didn't read it. They just said, and Michael McCall explained the situation, explained that he had gotten information that identified the 2016 policy that was, in fact, in effect and the and the language, and said that they would get something back In writing and the and, and we now have. Kate had revised the 2001 and felt that it had to go to the Select Board. The Select Board do have policy authority, but are they going to want to read policies? We're supposed to work with HR and and the town manager to work on policies and review them. Because what I think the question is like, right now, what are we doing? Right? I think we want to look at that policy that's in our packet and compare it with the 2016 policy so that we can make sure there's nothing missing. Can I interject for a moment? Be a better use of your time. If I've worked with Marianne to make sure we go through both of those policies and combine it into a red line version, so that you can review it and maybe move forward next time would that be? That would be a great idea. That would be fine. That would be fine, yeah, because I found two areas. But, yeah, okay, um,
well, that's so bad. Well, at least we know, we know we have a Paul. Well, we know we have a policy. And no, no, I follow you, Mary. And I don't mean to interrupt you. I follow you. But what I'm also hearing you say, or maybe, is that it would have been helpful to have this up front, to do it up front before it went anywhere. And then we wouldn't have Paul, we wouldn't have to have this discussion here, right? But, I mean, I think Mary Anne's making a point to the public what's going on, and I think that that's important, but I do understand, you know, how hard, you know, difficult it may be to follow, but I will. I think that, you know, I think that the the issue of not knowing, and the Select Board of not having any experience with policies, they didn't, they didn't vote on it, but they made a revision to get the thing fixed that they needed fixed, and that's what we're about to do, but it, but who knows if there's more fixing to be done because we don't have the correct Well, that's what I think with our other policies. We worked on one, I think it was vacation time or or sick leave in the we haven't worked on a lot since then, Marianne and then we worked on the old one, because the newer version, in 2005 let people take it for two hours as opposed to four hours. So we need to go back and look. And each time we take out a policy, make sure that we have the most updated policy correct.
Paul Morenberg: Let's table this and move on. I mean, Unknown: okay, okay, open session minutes of, oh, we forgot to do, we forgot to do the executive session minutes in our executive session meeting, but I can tell you that the the second. State Attorney General's office told me I can decide if they can be done in open session, and because they are, they are minutes that are just voting to voting on minutes that would be something we can do in open session and release some type of thing. I think we can. So let's look at the minutes from May 6, right? Because then they have to leave, so that will give us enough time to look at the minutes. Okay,
anything on page one? I'm sorry I didn't number these. It was very hard. I had to take it from a PDF, and the numbers don't show up. I don't see anything. Anybody see anything? Okay? So page two starts with discussion and review of several personnel policies for non union employees. I see one error myself on annual leave. Paul Morenberg: Is this in the packet or not? Unknown: Yeah, yes, it's in the packet. Paul Morenberg: What page you on? Unknown: It's page 2624 of 28 Thank you, Jill, I don't have I just have the policy. It's the third policy down, annual leave, and that's the one Kate that we did from the old we updated that from the old one, and not the more recent, 2005 one doesn't matter, because it's now been 16. What's the version we use? Oh, okay. Was it okay? 2016, in the 123, 4/5, line. I said, Paul morn Berg questioned how the annual leave policy. It was merely Mary Ellen, because I went back and I watched the the meeting. So that was one era. Anybody else see anyone? Anything else in there? No.
No, are we frozen? Are we still on? No, we're still on. So go to the next page, which is starts with same towns on the median household scale. After that, the word consultant. I then asked, so I have MP asked if consultant would provide a tool for the HR manager to use when adding a new position, and KR said they will, so I'd like to add that part in there. Okay, and I had a question at the bottom, which is in red, because I had a question and I couldn't find the documentation, but I Kate sent me a download or a link to the meeting, which is not up yet, on on WayCAM, and it and it said, she said the information is available through open the books and on the town clerk's website, under public records link request Freedom of Information Act okay. Like to add that anybody else see anything else on that page? Nope. The next page, discussion and approval of open session. Meeting Minutes, 1210, 2024, anything on that page?
No, okay, and then the end is the last page. I don't have anything on those, so I will make those corrections and get them to to Kate. Kate, when will they be posted?
Okay, good. We have to vote to approve them, right? Or do we already? I will I, I will take, can someone make a motion? I make a motion that we approve the minutes with the suggested amendments seconded. That was too quick. Jill, that was scary. I'm on it. Mary Ellen, yes. Jill, yes. Paul, yes. And then I'm going to excuse myself and so, and we still have, we still have a quorum for anything else. Okay, right? So thank you all, and I will see you on the at the next meeting. Thanks. Mary Ellen, okay, bye, bye. Paul Morenberg: Do we really have to do anything else today? We've been here for two hours, and Unknown: this is, I know I just want to go through that. No, no. Not much more. I just wanted to remind people ask if there are any personnel board members, reports and concerns. Paul Morenberg: No. Well, yeah. I mean, I will not to pull up, you know, to be label this. I do. I think it'd be helpful to have have both open and executive session zoom links in a single email, because it's call to kind of go search around for the right zoom link. Unknown: Yeah, that's it. That's a good suggestion. Paul, thank you. I also would like to remind people, if you had minutes that were approved, did everyone get their minutes to you? Okay? Because I had minutes from that I got to you in August from the January 7 minutes, and they're not posted yet. So if you could catch up on posting on minutes that would be appreciated,
topics not reasonably anticipated, 48 hours in advance, if any, none, I have none. Next meeting. Is we scheduled it for November, the first Wednesday in November, November five. And is that everybody okay with that? I'd like to make that one a Zoom meeting, unless somebody wants to come in and hold it here. Is it okay for a Zoom meeting?
Okay? Paul Morenberg: What? What date are we talking about? Unknown: November 5. November 5, which is our next meeting, and so hopefully, Kate and I will have that policy fixed and Paul Morenberg: done by them. Was that a date we agreed on before? Or that's our standing date, right? The first Unknown: Wednesday? Yeah, the standing one, we thought it would be easier if we made a standard one, is that okay? Paul, yeah, Paul Morenberg: I may have, I may have a conflict that day, but I could have a quorum without me, right? Let me, I don't know, and I don't know for sure yet, so I would just keep a date for this as is, okay, yeah, Unknown: because we're, we're finding if we if we had to change the date, then it was a long time before we could get back and and so it was best to just try and see if we could have a, you know, the same date each month, same day of the week, and people agreed on that one, and if it's a problem, I mean, I don't love that date this time, but that's okay. I think we'll try and stick with it. And if we can't, we can't, so hopefully we'll have a quorum if, if we need you for a quorum, would you be available? Paul Morenberg: Well, right now I have a work, work conflict, but it's one of these things where I don't know for sure if it's if the event is going forward or not. Okay. Unknown: Do we want to change the meeting date? Mary owns off, but Paul Morenberg: let's hold let's hop off for now, let me talk to you. I should I show the better sense and in about a week? Unknown: Okay, okay, that will give us enough time to if we have to switch it, to switch it. Thank you. Can I have a motion to adjourn seconded? And what time are we adjourning? We are adjourning at 603. Okay, so three, okay, roll call, vote. Jill, yes. Paul, yes. Mary Anne, yes. And do we know what what time did before we turn it off? What time did Mary Ellen leave? For the minutes? Do we have that? Paul Morenberg: When did she leave? She I mean, I think she logged off at like six o'clock, Unknown: yeah, okay, Paul Morenberg: or 558 or something. Unknown: I was gonna say 558 558 Okay, let's go with that.
Okay. Thank you very much. All right. Good night, everybody. Bye.