TranscriptSelect Board Meeting ~ April 18, 2017

order. We do have a quorum this evening. Four out of five selectmen are here. Could we please rise for the pledge of allegiance? I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you.

Any amendments to the agenda? Uh, not for me. Okay. Um, public comment. Any public comment this evening? Yeah. Okay. Consent agenda. I move that we accept the consent cons consent agenda as presented. Second. Any discussion? All in favor? Motion carries. action in discussion. Uh the Royal River Conservation Trust. Yep.

the Royal River Conservation Trust Local Land Trust. Behind me, Tammy Jansen is one of our board members um who's been working on this project as well. So, I might turn to her for a couple questions. If you ask any tough questions, I might turn to um

I sent to you all some prep material which I can either make this fast and cut to the chase or I can warm you up and walk through some of it depending on signals you give me. Um, but I took the liberty of suggesting a couple motions that might be helpful if you want me to

if you want me to lead you down that path. Um, I read through it. I don't know if you guys had a chance to read. I did. I don't actually have the email that has those in it right here. I think I may have Yeah, sorry I didn't make copies of the email.

Just a second. Probably if for no other reason than the benefit of the people watching on TV, a little bit of a recap probably. Okay, so the good the good news is uh so first I've been in front of this select board twice in the last three or four years. Both time with a good give and take updating you on what we're doing. And generally the signals have been thank you and keep going. But I've never asked for a vote. Um that it's been my impression that we're really well aligned with the town. I know we're very well aligned with the neighbors. Um but I thought that for a variety of reasons today, I thought it might be good to do a bit more of a formal handshake. Um because we'd like to do more work in town and we'd like to really know that you're um that you're with us um as we as we talk publicly. The the news is that just a few weeks ago, we did close on a parcel um right across the pond

from the boat ramp at Runnaround Pond, a half mile of shoreline. Uh Diane Aki uh who owned the parcel with her late husband John uh sold it to us. And I've got several maps here if anybody wants them. But we're just building a bigger contiguous block of land around Runaround Pond for habitat hunting. um

mostly wet, so it's great for wintertime trails and not that great in the summertime. Um and uh and keeping the land open open and undeveloped. So that that's a good project com um continuing. Two years ago, we started buying some land out there. Duncan Chzley who's sitting behind us um and the Coulson's buying some land that set the stage to to get around to the Acriman parcel and more. Diane asked as when she agreed to sell it to us that we honor John um as part of this transaction. So that started the idea of having a plaque somewhere on the properties um both honoring John and also other land owners um such as Duncan and the Coulson's who have worked with us over the years. So formally I we thought the best place for a plaque like that would be at the recreation area in the picnic area where people are more likely to see it rather than putting it out on the edge of a snowmobile trail.

Um so formally the first thing that I thought would be helpful is if the selectman said yes, we'd love to have that plaque on the town managed land. Um before we go any further in terms of it. The idea we've I've looked at it. There's a there's a big ledge almost almost 5 ft high. One face faces the the vault toilet. The other face faces the pond. I'd picture putting the plaque on the back face tucked away. It's not in anybody's face. Some people will find it and sit in there's room for more. Uh that's where we'd probably put it. Um so that was the first possible motion I suggested that that you allow us to put a plaque on your land.

possible motion here. Um I I prefer to not make motions as chair but um um I will I will at times but I prefer not to. So would you would act take care of the installation and all that involved in that or would our public works department have to do that or that would be

it's simple enough to basically put bolts in and some epoxy and we'd pay for the plaque and we'd take care of it. Um the thinking is and I don't know where at some point the thinking is when we get it. We haven't ordered it yet just in case you guys have any concerns but in a month or month and a half we'll have a little little party down there and mostly use it as as an excuse to work on the trails and pick up litter but also also have a little ceremony at sunset or whatever it takes.

River Conservation Trust to install a brass plaque on town managed land at Runaround Pond and to commemorate and applaud the leadership and generosity of land owners and donors who have helped protect the pond and its surroundings between 1975 and 2017. Uh,

one second. Any discussion? All in favor? Motion carries. memo is we'd like to do more. Um we've followed a bit. Ruth has updated us on the comp plan recent work and discussions and questionnaires and and we've got a lot of members um who who live in Durham as well who are urging us to do a bit more. Uh behind me, Fred Fabre walked in after we got started. Fred lives in North Pel and he's the president of our board. So, he's got a lot of networks in Durham as well. Um,

our the only approach we take is to work with willing sellers. Um, we don't know who those might be. Uh, there are any number of land owners around Runaround Pond who we might want to work with if they're interested in working with us. Uh, we don't have any specific offers on the table yet. Um, but we we're always

sensitive to any we we don't want to get out ahead of the town if there are any uh concerns about um picking up another piece or two. That's that's really all that's on our horizon is a a parcel or so every every year or two. Um so the

other thing to point out is that we we work very well with the snowmobile club. It's effortless to work with them and just hang a sign up saying thank you for them maintaining our trail, keeping our trail open for us. Um, also a good working relationship with Main Forest Yurts, uh, Oldcore Ranch, any number of neighbors and businesses in town, uh, to keep our land open for whatever reason they may want it. So, I thought it would be partly for some grant applications. It's often helpful to be able to say the town does support where we're going just to just to be able to put it in writing that it's not just a vague impression, but an actual an actual motion of support from you all saying that you're comfortable with with the work we're doing in town. So, I laid out a a second possible motion basically saying urging us to keep working with you.

comprehensive planning committee and I know that in the public outreach work we've done so far, surveys and a and one um large public meeting and then several smaller ones that uh preserving [clears throat] open space, natural resources and recreational opportunities has been a major theme um that has come up several times. We haven't run into anybody that says they don't want those things. Um, so, uh, I would certainly support, uh, the organization continuing to

Is that a motion? Okay. Sure. I'll second it. [laughter] There you go. Jill will love that motion. Yeah. Right. Get a paper from you. [laughter] Yes. It's all nicely typed out, right? Any discussion on this? All in favor? Motion carries. So then the final thing we um we apply for a lot of funds from foundations and state funding sources. Uh the main outdoor heritage fund is a state funding source. It's lottery tickets um sporting

and the money goes into a pot and they and they distribute it. We've been applying for money from the state partly with a condition that we want to we commit to use some of that money to help the towns um in all the towns that we work with. Um, a lot of times water access points get to the bottom um, from a budget perspective. And if we can bring a few resources, um, it may be a boat access point in Yarmouth that then goes to land we own up river or just boat access points in New Glouester that we're glad the town owns because we don't want to own some fairly intensive places. So, we apply, so we have some money. Um, this most recent cycle of funding, we the state gave us $5,000 to work with a town, any town, to improve boat access points. Um, and it we had Durham in mind when we applied for it. Um, our thinking, our the commitment to the state is that we'd spend money to improve the town's facility. working

with Ruth and others. There's some 5000 doesn't go too far, but when I look at the the boat access point, there's a broken gate and it'd be good to have a kiosk so people can put up signs or flyers or rules and regs or whatever they might want to put up. Um, we'd like to do some doing a little bit of trail work might cost almost nothing. Um but

small minor improvements like that just to whip that place into shape and make it a little bit more inviting. Um and again before before we talking to Ruth we can we can install the kiosk so you might not even see the money we'll spend it. Ruth will say thank you for spending money on our property just for the accounting for the state. Um but but working with volunteers and others to get that done. So the third motion was just to let you officially accept that gift and or let us work with Ruth to clean up the property bit. In fact, from [snorts] what I understand, it would have uh unless we take it to the vote of the town, it would have to be something like what you said because we I think the town would have to accept it if the town were to spend it.

Becau from my understanding of the way it works because it hasn't been appropriated. So, the town would have to accept an appropriate. So, it's probably best if he just Yeah. Right. So if if if the uh trust were able to to spend like you mentioned and then and let give an accounting to the town and we we write a thank you type thing like you said um otherwise we have to actually bring it to the town to accept it and then appropriate it. Yep. The one thing I didn't mention, and I think you guys may have talked about this in the past, the sign that is there for the recreation area, the paint is flaking and the boards are rotting. Um, so that's one other thing that yeah, we'll we'll work with Ruth, get a design, and yeah, almost almost as easy for us to pay the bill out of this state fund than to give you the money for you to pay the bill using the state funds. Right.

in goods and services from the Royal River Conservation Trust in the main outdoor heritage fund and to direct the town administrator to work with the trust to oversee minor projects at the Runaround Pond Recreation Area.

Second discussion. All in favor? Motion carries. Wonderful. That's all I've got. Our next step, we're going to do some sort of event party in a month or two when we get the plaque done and get as many people in town as possible to pick up litter and clean up the trails and and have fun down at the pond. So,

thank you. Thank you very much. Draw. Yeah. [laughter] Thank you for all the uh the work that the trust has been doing um over there conserving the land and so on. It's it's a it's a very nice resource over there. Great. We appreciate everything that's being done.

Thank you. Thank you. stale. So, we have a piece of tax prior acquired property that was acquired this past December. Um, and enclosed in your packet is um the letter that generally I mail out to the previous owner of the property before we put it out to bid. Um, and then the notice of the the foreclosure sale and uh an accounting of the the min minimum bid amount. Um, and if everybody is is good with that, then I would go right ahead with it.

Um, I have one question whether we want to postpone this a little bit. one of the you mentioned um before the meeting about goal setting goals and objectives and I know um one of our prior tax foreclosures uh we had some questions afterwards about the process and what and things like that and I wonder if we should maybe look at that

in regard to what well the the amount that came in was considerably higher than the amount And basically what do we do with that? And uh because it's a good problem to have. Yes. [laughter] Yes. And but I mean this one I don't is this I don't know if this is a residence or just land and it's being lived in.

It is being lived in. Okay. So I wonder if we should look at that before putting this out. Okay. Yeah. I think that's a good idea. Okay. Yeah. There was some ideas thrown around. I think made sense. Yeah. Okay. Table that.

Got to table that one. Okay. Next up, act on contract with town hall streams. Uh so I gave you guys all a copy of the town hall stream contract. Uh we've put it in the budget. So, you know, we've talked about this before. Um but this is a contract and it does go for 12 months. So, I just wanted approval before I actually sign it.

So, the total is $3,000. Yes, it's 3,000. So, it's $250 a month for 12 months. How How did that rate with what we were paying before with 4,000 for the other one? Okay. So, it's it's less. It's less. And we're working on getting rid of that process. We're in the process of switching it over from the electronics to the

streaming. Okay. Is this the entire contract? Yeah, it's the entire content. They don't have to list out the what the equipment is or specs or anything like that. It's all done online pretty much. We're actually already using their services. [laughter]

Yeah. Basically, this is kind of like a cloud service, I think. Yeah. Okay. So, one thing I'm surprised is I don't see unless it's an unlimited the amount. I don't see the amount of storage that we're allowed as far as um uh how much

how much Well, it says that the available for 5 years. Yeah. And unlimited usage. Um but that pro I'm not sure. Usage usually means how many times people view this will be streamed live and available. that's an interesting statement. We will allow for authorized persons to download one digital copy for any use. And does we're not giving up rights to it, are we?

That's a good question. I didn't think so. Maybe I wonder if we could just check into that and and what happens after 5 years? Do they just delete the file and it's not available anymore or well because we have I think we have something before the planning board now where they went back maybe more than 5 years trying to look at a film about what happened in a meeting. So

well and this is an issue that we're running into because a lot of our meetings now are are videotaped. Most of them are. So so we need to figure out how we're going to end up storing them in the long run. Right now they're on on DVDs.

Well and that's as they say one download a digital copy. Well, I would do that the minute it goes up. I'd Or either that or burn a copy to disk so we have it available even after the 5 years is out. I mean, yeah, that's been done.

Yeah. Yeah, we we actually burn it to disk as it's being Okay. So, as Yeah, as long as as long as we still have the hard copy. Yeah. Right. Yeah. I I will make sure and check on Thursday before I sign it. Is that a similar arrangement that we have now it with who with the current provider? Well, the current provider only does the television ones. Um, and so we

Oh, this is a new service. This is a new service that goes with our new website. So, it will be streaming live on the internet. It'll be streaming live on the channel. Um, and it'll also be available for playback on the internet.

Okay. All right. Thank you. want to have the motion to authorize Ruth to, um, to sign this for us. And I don't know if we want to put it contingent that she is is contingent on being satisfied on, you know, the rights and stuff like that, but cuz you said you were going to be looking at doing this Thursday.

Mhm. Okay. Yeah. You're asking for a motion. I am asking for So moved. So seconded. [laughter] Jill is really going to love you guys. Yep, she does. Okay. So, so it's been moved and seconded to accept the uh contract or to to allow the town administrator to assign uh to sign the contract contingent that uh we're satisfied that the uh the rights to this still remain with us.

Mhm. Any discussion? All in favor? Motion carries. Codes. Uh, next up is code enforcement proposal or position. Sorry, code enforcement position. So, as you all know, we right now have an interim code enforcement officer. Um, we have not made a decision yet what to do with the code enforcement position. Um, I believe

you all have um something that uh Ruth has put together kind of uh putting at least putting out uh three, four, five, five different scenarios that we could do for for the code enforcement officer. Do we do we have a posting out now? Are we advertising for

No. So, do we need to I mean, we could decide what we want now and then advertise for that, but I wonder if we might advertise more generally for code enforcement/planner and then kind of see what we get in the pool of applicants and because if you get a really really good applicant that's particularly strong in a particular area, then we might go a different way and that person might never even have applied if we if we focus the posting too much.

Yeah. And I mean, we could do that. We had been holding off on that until we kind of just determined what direction cuz it's it's usually better to do a more specific posting than a more general one. But I understand what you're asking.

Well, specific to code and planning, you know. Yeah. Well, that's pretty specific. Yeah. So really in general I think it's still worth discussing like in an ideal world where would we like to land if we had the right candidate. So

uh scenario four is this something we've talked to about um it had been suggested um by a panel that that they might be interested but I don't know if it's that feasible. Nothing beyond that. Yeah. No, there's no there's no commitment from Panel. Panel currently shares with um North Yarmouth.

All right. And uh there there was they were interested in knowing what what it might look at look like sharing with Durham. I suspect that might be more than they want to spend. That's my guess. It's pro. I think it's about 50% more than what they spend currently. But I they also I believe the town of North Yarmouth was was increasing the uh the cost on that as well which is why they were looking for us.

Well, Oh, I'm sorry. I changed the numbers after I gave you yours. Ah, that's why I'm having a hard time following [laughter] that. Oh, so is the email not right? The email I think is right, but Mark came in before I emailed you guys and got some paperwork.

After looking at his paperwork, [laughter] I realized I had done it wrong. Yeah, I think they're all same numbers. They were just different numbered on the scenarios. Yeah, they're the same. Oh, okay. I see. Yeah, [laughter] just she had scenario three and scenario three. Right.

So, um, and to be honest, I am I am I am very interested in scenario one or two as as um a possibility for cost savings for the town, too. Um, with doing we have we have somebody already on staff that is certified in it. And the position is likely going to be the position of road commissioner is likely going to be reduced because of um a panel wanting to step away from it. And um I think this this could be something

that we could look at uh as a way as a cost savings to the town. U making it making it a combined position. I do have some questions about Department of Labor. ho how how it would work and so on. But um that we need to get answered first. But that is I I am very seriously

interested in in that as a possibility too. Uh we can't get into too many specifics in in open meeting we uh but I did want to I wanted to put that out there as as as that I I would be very interested in that. Um, and I mean we can look at any

of these others. We could put it out and see what we, as you said, put it out, see what we get for offers. I I think we absolutely should do that. I I think or for Yeah, I think we should see what's out there. I think before we put it out there, one of the things we'd have to decide to do is what we think the hours might be. Right now they're they're what they are, but that doesn't necessarily mean that that's where they'll stay,

right? So, if we put it out there for X amount and after doing some more research, we find out it might be less, that might make the applicant say, "Well, that's not what I was looking for." So, maybe we should talk about this and decide which direction we want to do. if we want to entertain one of these two or a different direction so that when we do put it out there, we're putting out information that we're actually going to be reviewing on and interviewing on.

Code enforcement was 32 hours a week. It was it was um and which is for the town if it's 4 days a week, which it was, it's considered full-time and includes benefits. Um, I think we would have a hard time enticing someone to come here if it didn't include the benefits um and so on. The question is does it does it require that amount amount of time or not? And

I believe so. Um, do you think it requires that Todd with code enforcement alone or you thinking code and planning together requires that? Yeah, code and planning would definitely at least 32 hours a week especially where we are right now with the stage we're at in our comprehensive plan and um the state of the ordinances. I think there's

there's a there's a lot to do there. Yep. it, make that decision before we put something out. Yep. Because if we we put it out for 20 hours or for 32 hours or whatever we put it out for and then we changed our mind after we've done some more discussion, you know, like I said, applicants going to show up thinking one thing and it's going to be something else. So, we should we should should make sure we discuss this to see if this is the direction we want to go or if this is the direction we want to go and make sure that when we put it out there, that's our final decision.

So, that we're not getting people to apply, spend time applying when they may not be interested if if it was less. I think it's I don't think we should lock ourselves in though because we don't owe an applicant anything if we there's absolutely nothing wrong with having somebody come and interview and

uh and go through different scenarios. I mean I don't I don't think I think that's very common to do that. Um, and because you might, who knows, you might have some uh semi-retired person with great planning skills history that's just looking to work, you know, 15 hours a week, you know, but but if you don't put it out there, you know, you don't know, you know. So, I I I think we need I think we need to go into it with an open mind and and not box ourselves in. Well, I don't think we're going to box ourselves in if we make that decision up front. I think that's what we need to do. Uh I understand what you're saying. I've also been on a couple hiring committees where uh not too long before the interview started, all of a sudden the whole thing changed and and then when the people showed up for the interview, we explained what happened and that was the end of the interview. So, we kind of wasted their time and and

and ours in a sense. And I don't necessarily mean right here, but also if we do that, then that word gets out and people say, "Yeah, well that could change by the time you get there. Don't bother. I don't want that image out there." So I would rather be sure, you know, cuz if it happened to me, I wouldn't be real happy about it.

Well, they Yeah, it's it's how you frame it, I think. Yeah, we could try like we can try and look for people who have CEO and planning experience and maybe ask, you know, them to put down their availability and wanted salary and that kind of thing.

More of a survey type thing sort of. Yeah, that might be the better way to go. See what you go see what's out there and then make that decision which way you want to go. I'm I'm just hesitant about putting out uh a request for applicants for jobs and we haven't really decided which way we're going. I just I think that's kind of putting the cat before the horse again. That's just my thought.

somewhere with this because um we're we're marching down the road and we still don't we don't have a full we don't have a we have an interim codes officer who's basically doing the uh what needs to be done and but nothing extra at this point. And uh we need we need to kind of nail something down. I I

guess I wouldn't be opposed to putting out a um putting out a posting looking for a um code enforcement officer slash uh planner. Um but we really kind of need some sort of job description that goes with that, I think. And I don't know that we have that yet, do we? Did we ever decide on something?

No, we we all we have is Paul's um job description as of right now. And that was that doesn't include any planning. Could we just add in the plan? Yeah. But then we have So [laughter] So what would happen then is is is I have several different examples of planning job descriptions of code enforcement job descriptions. And so we might be able to meld some of them together. Um, so if you guys wanted me to, I could probably work on that before the next meeting and come before you with a melded job description and do it that way if you guys want to wait for another two weeks. Or we can I don't know. I don't know what you guys want to do.

I'd like to have something a little bit more firmed and just kind of going because right now we're we don't have anything firm. We're kind of going off ideas. Yeah. Yeah. So, if I'm going to put it in the paper and spend the money, we should have something well for

I don't think we should do I'm surprised to hear that we don't have job descriptions. Well, we had a job description for code codes. We never had a planner before. Right. So, Paul Paul did kind of did some planning stuff, but it was not part of his actual job description. So, we we've never had a planner.

So, what kind of planning stuff are you guys looking for exactly? Like, what kind of things do you think you might want a person to be able to do? future vision. Yeah. Well, that's that's what I'm kind of help guiding the town

in in some sort of a future vision that would basic that would align with the comprehensive. So, initially it would be helping the comprehensive planning planning committee to come up with that vision but then then helping move the town along that vision.

Yeah. I well I I think it's I think I think developing the vision is something that the committee and we have contracted with greater Poland Council of Government. So I'm I'm not worried about the plan itself. It's it's what it's once the plan is done and the implementation in the of the plan that I think is where planners come in because the comprehensive plan this is an example. I'm not seeing it's going to say this, but it could say something like, you know, the town of Durham, you know, wants to see its its [clears throat] future housing grow in a manner that um allows for smaller house lots and more concentrated development to preserve open space. You know, that's that's about as far as a comprehensive plan will go. And then it's really up to the the the selectman and the planner and the code enforcements officer to put meat on the bones and and really detail, okay, how's that going to happen? And

that's that's where the planner comes in is is really in the implementation side of so maybe you don't need a planner now though and I mean I mean you miss there's a lot of ordinance work that you well see that's that's not the planner either that's the planning board the planning board is supposed to be moving a ahead with the ordinances

from the code with helps from the codes enforcement officer but but the the so ordinances are supposed to basically originate with the planning board, at least from what I understood. Um, we haven't seen much, but yeah, but uh it's I I know that they've been working on trying to align some of our ordinances and so on, but we we're also going to need a probably need a rewrite when we get the uh comprehensive plan.

But doesn't that fall more under a code enforcement officer than a planner? with the ordinances and Well, they deal with the ordinances that have been passed. I think I think what you are looking at the planner and the planning board are looking or should be looking at what should our ordinances look like. This is what they look like today. This is what the code enforcement has to act on today.

Right? So, the planner is looking ahead. What should and the planning board, they're looking ahead and saying, "Okay, based on our comprehensive plan, what should they look like?" and then they should be proposing the changes um that would go before the town if I if if I'm if I think that's supposed to be this.

Yeah, you understand that much better than I do. So, so I had gone to a meeting in uh my town is doing a a comprehensive plan now too and they're um looking towards um uh what is it vision based codes or something to that effect. I have a a pamphlet about it. Um, so, so if I I'll send that out to you guys because I'm wondering if maybe what might be an option would be to try and find somebody who works with those kind of it that basically takes the comp plan and and writes the codes to match with the comp plan to make whatever happens in the comp plan happen because if the codes don't don't correspond with the comp plan, then then whatever you guys want.

That's the whole idea is that they would do that. Like what most towns do at this size is they have a code enforcement officer who works with GP COG or or AFCO to help. They have plans. So they just contract like which is what we're,000 a year or whatever,000.

They can give you as much as you want. So you can tailor that to whatever your needs are. You can get more of their time, less of their time. But they will do the same thing they're doing with you on the on the comprehensive point. They'll do they'll work with the code of certain implementing ordinances that will align with

so they can work for you on an ongoing basis and maybe that's what we actually so right now we're working with them on a comprehensive plan maybe right now what we need is a CEO code I'm thinking the same thing and when we get to the point of implementing we do maybe we look at it do we do we beef up this job description do we have somebody that can do it we beef up the job description or do we contract out

planner or contract Yeah. In in the meantime, so if if I'm I'm on board with you there. We do we think we need a 32-hour a week person just for the code piece? I I I don't know. I'm just asking the question. I don't know.

I I my my um thoughts on this have changed over the last few last two to three months. Um if you would asked me a little while ago, I would have said probably yes. I'm not so certain right now. Um I'm I don't know that we I think we would need to discuss some of that um in in executive session because we'd be getting close to

but um at this point I I'm I'm not I'm not certain um and I'd like to I'd like to dig into that a little bit more. Agreed. Yep. Because all of these these first three they when they have for the planner for the just the paperwork Ruth put out they're all 10 hours is just is so

well that's just for the planner right that's what I mean that's why I was getting back to what Kelvin said about GP cog and how they operate and and maybe maybe contracted that part out when the time come you know if in fact that is the actual amount of time may not be maybe more than I don't know the 10 hours a week.

I I I don't know about either. I think it was a guesstimate. Well, that's what I'm saying. I I think the the contracting of that service makes a lot of sense. The planning piece. Um they they'll give you some guidance. They'll tell you what they do for other towns of this size and let you pick or choose what you want. They can say, "This is what we do for this town. Here's what we do for this town."

And I I think maybe to begin with that might be the the direction to go. Um because I mean we are a small rural town. Um now there are a number of towns similar size that have planners. I believe I believe Bowdenham has a planner.

Yeah, she evolved into the planner. She started as the code enforcement and then evolved into both. Right. But um I think I think we need you know we kind of need somebody in that direction role but it might be better off at to begin with as a contract. And

so should we ask uh Ruth to come back to our next meeting with a a uh an updated job description for a code enforcement officer? [cough and clears throat] Well, if we're not going out for a slashcode enforcement planner, then I don't really necessarily see an issue with with the description.

Okay. I thought you were I thought you said that we had Paul's, but you Well, we do have Paul's was for a code enforcement officer. Okay. Um and it included the meetings that he was supposed to attend and and ordinance work and that kind of stuff.

That he was the E 911 officer and he was the dressing officer. Dressing officer. And so do we feel like that's ready to um put out at least start getting a pool of applicants? I think what I would um suggest maybe we could put that out, but um maybe

have uh Ruth email the description to everybody so that that you can look it over rather than putting it out without you knowing what we're putting out. Okay. So, I will email everybody the description and then if everybody gets back to me and lets me know what they think, then [music] I want me to put something out or just to see what's out there or what do we want to do?

Yeah. I mean, I don't know. I don't know what's proper procedure and something like that. Um I think at this point what would be proper is some sort of motion that would um allow allow Ruth to put out the um put out a posting for the job contingent that there were no um issues with it. If you if somebody has an issue with it, then we need to bring it back so we can discuss it. If everybody's okay with it, then there's no discussion going on. you know, you look at we're okay with it. If somebody has an issue with it, then then we'll need to bring it back.

don't even know how many. You know, you need to know what the job's going to entail first if it's 20 or 32. Yeah, that was I believe if we're putting it out, if we're putting it out, I believe it's going to be 32. Because I don't we're not going to be able to get somebody to come here for less for for less than full time. I I I doubt.

Well, have we looked at other other potential sharing arrangements beyond Panel? Um, not at this point, but I don't believe there's really um as far as surrounding towns, most of the other surrounding towns, they've got their hands full with their they they wouldn't have the cycles to share.

Okay. Certainly not the time that Durham would require. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, if you're looking at 32 hours here. [laughter] Yeah. Well, who else you going to look at? I I'm I'm guessing it could be done for for considerably less, but if we're if we're putting it out for somebody if we're putting it out for somebody um I'm guessing that we're not going to get anybody of of any quality without a full-time position.

I I just I don't know. I just I just think you can't presume that because like I said, you you just never know what's out there. You might have somebody that is really good, like I said, you know, semi-retired or for some reason they don't want any more than 20 hours a week. So, I don't

Well, with that thought, if you put it out there, are you going to put it out there with about hours? Cuz if you do, and then then they show up and then they go, you tell them that, well, we've decided it's only going to be 20. Then what do you do? Why why not put it out there um uh 20 to 30 hours a week or something like that? I mean, or do you do we have to put an hours thing on it in the uh

Well, most people looking for it are looking to be whether it's going to be part-time, full-time. Yeah. They would want to know whether there's benefit, but if it's [clears throat] if it looks like it's a part time and they've got another town, that might work good. If it's if not, then it may not.

I just think to do it properly needs to be done properly, right? But that's what I'm saying. I don't think we I don't think we have come to that decision at this point that we know exactly which way we should go. I know what your thoughts are. I know what Jeff's thoughts are. Uh I know what mine were at one time and and they have changed a little bit. And you know, if you you look over the last couple years when Paul was here, um each time we kind of he took on some stuff on his own, so he must have had time to do that aside from uh permits and stuff and inspections. And then we' asked him to do a couple more things and we didn't give him any more time. So we had to figure out how to manage that. So he must have figured it out. And then we was potentially looking at another part of it. It wasn't going to give him any more time. So when I started thinking about all that and what he was telling

us, I'm thinking, well, all right. Now, how much time is the code part really got? So that's why I said, you know, maybe at one time it was a certain way, but maybe it's not that way anymore. And that question was asked at at one of our meetings. What happens if we don't need a code guy at 32 hours? He said, well, if it comes to that point, we'll have to reevaluate. It's that simple. I mean, it ain't no different than any other companies that when they rightsize, downsize, or do things, they ask other people to pick it up and 90% of the time, they don't say, "Well, you're going to have an extra 20 hours this week to do it. You're just going to have to manage it differently." And it might be, you know, with the with the increase in interest in building activity, you know, recent history may not have been 32 hours, but you know, signs point towards uh more activity, you know, in the near future here, more building

activity. So, absolutely. Would it make sense to have Ruth check with GP and get some ideas of what you can get for planning services and how much so that you know how many hours? Maybe that would help establish the hours that he would need.

We're we're right now though we're kind of we're kind of looking at just this codes enforcement. Um so I mean we know what there's probably 10 10 hours a month in meet just in meetings, right? um and what what's actually needed for

um for doing permits and for doing inspections um and keeping your records straight and things like that. And that's kind of what I think that's kind of what we're looking at is what's what's really required. If if we're going to do the planning part through GP COG or something like that, then what what is the co what is the actual required time of the codes officer?

And I didn't know if you could determine that until you knew what GP cog what you could forward from GP would be. We already have a contract with GP COG for the comprehensive plan committee. So they they char they contract by the hour. It's anywhere from um $30 to $75 an hour depending on which level planner you you get.

And right now that's all we need for a planner is to get us through this. And then once we get through that then we Yeah. As a builder Todd, what kind of hours are best for builders to have somebody in the office during the day?

As many hours as you can really, you know. So Paul was here all the time, but like five hours a day or something like that. And then do you do you typically need him mostly for inspections or for doing the uh Well, and because I mean inspections you can you can set up a time for and so on. But um and yeah, I'm just trying Yeah. And if you only got 20 hours during the week to go do inspections and a guy's waiting on an inspection, you know, if you don't make it there, you don't make it there. And I just don't see I hate to see us run backwards. My only thought and part of that is is it 20 hours every week or is it 10 hours this week, 30 hours next week? You know what I mean? I mean, because every week isn't going to be the same because it's going to depend on what comes in and how it does.

During the winter, it should slow down, but it should. Well, yeah, we don't really, you know, but to stay on top of it. Uh, and there's a lot more building code. There's a lot more energy code that you everybody should be looking at. Uh, other towns do blower door tests that we're not doing, you know. Is it required?

Mhm. It's energy code. we think too. That's what I'm that's what I'm trying to say. I don't want to throw out something that have the option of doing that where it is didn't adopt that. So, well, I thought we I thought we do adopted the whole MUI or

there's precautions at the energy code that you don't have to do. The towns can do if they want to like Scar Bro has a 3-ft separation on their septic systems, which most no other town does, but there are certain things you can do to be more restrictive.

There are parts you can choose. See, for me, it's kind of like with the Panel Durham thing, everybody's kind of got set in their mind what 60/40 means. And between the two boards, what 6040 meant was basically the pay scale. 6040 didn't mean that Durham was had 25 hours of out of 40 and Panel had 15. It could be depending on the project and the flow of what's going on. It could be 30 hours in panel and 10 in Durham or it could be 40 in Panel and zero in Durham that week or vice versa. So the 6040 was North.

Well, that's what I was thinking. [laughter] That's reaching out there. But I'm just saying so that people aren't confused about this 60/40. Uh that's it didn't mean that they were specifically 2515 all the time. That's not what that meant. It all depended on what was flowing through each town, what the project was. I mean you could spend four weeks at 30 in Pano and four weeks in 10 and it could switch depending on how it goes. So that's one of the things that people don't know. They come here with assumption of a lot of things and they really should find out what the facts are before they start assuming a lot of things. And I'm finding lately that people are assuming a lot of things. They don't have all the information. So

well certainly certain yeah certainly over the course of a long period of time to use your example it should be 6040 of the work too. I mean if we're paying 60% of the cost and we ought to be getting 60% of the benefit over the course of like the whole budget year understanding that there's variations you know week to week but because I

it's a lot of work. It's a lot of work. just keep telling. Yeah. So, so I don't know. That's kind of We're kind of off on a tangent on that one, though. But I think uh so I think the if there's there's no way to know for sure, you know, sitting here exactly what we need. I think I'm with Todd. I'd rather heir on the side of, you know, put it out there as a as a full-time code enforcement officer and which is kind of, you know, where we were. And uh as you said Mark, if we have to evaluate that down the road and make an adjustment, we we we can do that.

Okay. So if we go that direction, just that opens up the other the other question. What do we do at the road commissioner position when panel drops out? Yep. But I I think I think that's a separate question and we we shouldn't link the two together.

I don't think so. I because we I think it can be but they are they can also be linked. We have we have the option to link them and if we if we are deciding right now or if we decide that we're going to go down the road of looking for a full-time codes officer, we've got a we've got less we've got less than two months basically or about two months to figure out what we're going to do with the road commissioner position. And um

so the road commissioner position re is very is actually very deeply linked with this because if we decide to go if we decide to go down for a full-time one, we need to make a we need to look right away at what we're going to do with the road commissioner position. How how are we going to do that? Because um our our

budget doesn't allow the way our budget currently is. that doesn't really allow us to pay the the what is really a full-time road commissioner and a full-time um and a full-time codes officer. So, we would need to look at okay, how do we how do we make things how do we make things meet?

And and if unless I'm wrong, I don't think we've ever had a full-time road commissioner in this town. I don't think so. No, never have. Not since I've been here, we have not. So, it it's not been a requirement. However, um I mean, there are some options that we have. Um one one of the things that was in the budget was for a a fifth employee. Do we pull that back? Not do the fifth employee make and and put the money that was going to be intended towards that towards the road commissioner and make the road commissioner position um also a working position. So you know that so that he's also at times helping out on on roads uh more than in the

capacity today or you know so that's that's an option. do we go with a part-time road commissioner and cut out benefits and things like that? Um, which I mean all likelihood means we're looking at a new new road commissioner uh because we're we're changing we're changing what the position was. Um, so we but we if we go down the road of looking for a full-time codes officer, we need to address the road commissioner um with within the next couple of weeks to um to be able to be ready for the end

of June. And that's why I that's why I say even though they aren't technically linked, there is a big linkage here. Well, we know that this has happened in Po. I didn't know. Um I mean panel has for all intents and purposes told us unless unless town meeting it gets vote

what they're putting in for recommendation gets voted. [laughter] No no well he's he's he's he's not on the board and he's not a on the board in panel. He's not the road commissioner but unless unless it gets what they're suggesting gets voted down in panel at their town meeting. uh that is defin we

were given very uh clear that that that's the direction they're headed in right and the only thing I would input my input I know was a bias but u most towns would salivate the opportunity I mean everywhere you go GPCO YCO talks about collaborating and combining resources and having you know sharing [clears throat] positions so you're only paying one set of benefits you're cutting the cost a you're you're trimming and you're you're um convincing and you're putting things in u you have the opportunity most towns don't have. So just saying that that's where the state is telling everyone to go. GPCO among is telling everybody to and I want to do that

if [clears throat] if it works. I don't want to do that if it doesn't work. But consolidation is what every town is after. That's why they're looking at sharing positions. And so I mean you have an opportunity here and that's my simply my take on it.

[clears throat] Um, one other thing to consider and I don't know if we could have the one of the things that we mentioned at the budget committee that before we start hiring we we wanted to take a look at the benefits uh specifically healthcare before we started hiring new new employees to see whether whether it made sense to change the percentage formula or not uh based on where we're at now and what similar towns are doing and things like that. and we haven't we haven't looked at that yet. Um, but we would probably want to if we're going to go the way of hiring a full-time, we probably want to look at that.

We've got a salary in uh which 2017 budgeted uh salary at 355. How many hours is that? That would be a 30. That's the 32 hours, right? The No, that he's That's the road commissioner. Oh, where where are you looking? The road commission. I'm sorry.

It's a 6040 split. So, I believe that the whole salary is 57,000 or something. Yeah, I think it's Yeah, it's a it's a 6040 split, which and it's a salary not based not based on hours per se. Yeah. Um and actually seller. Yeah,

that's a that's a right. Yeah. And the original split was based on miles of road, right? It wasn't based on time. It was based on they figured, oh, Durham has x amount of miles, panel has x amount of miles. Um, and we felt that was the fairest way to to divide it. And basically the road commissioner for the towns were supposed to put in the the time needed for each town to to give each town what they needed for a road commissioner. And it was there wasn't a a time split really factored into it.

And they kept track of the time so that at the end of or whenever we'd meet, we'd go over that and and for the most part they were always pretty close. Well, not not for the road commissioner because the road commissioner was south. We

well it wasn't Yeah. Not for the for his salary. It was for when when we shared when we shared u labor and and and equipment. Yeah. Okay. So we have 105 budgeted basically. Yeah. For both the full-time both of them full-time with the planner is 129.

That doesn't benefit. Yeah. I think that I think that includes benefits. That doesn't include benefits. That doesn't give them. Yes. So yeah, the 105 So the road commission. Yeah. The salaries. you're looking at a full-time CEO on the scenario five. You're looking at a full-time CEO planner at 32 hours a week.

Yeah. CEO and planner being the same guy. Right. Right. Right. Not just feel we need like one and a half guys [laughter] the split scenario is you know 20 hours as road commissioner 20 hours as code enforcement. I I worry we're shortch changing them both.

So so I I did actually I was thinking about this some as well. There is what what about the possibility of you do the split position and if if we find that we need more time on like the codes, we hire a part-time an assistant codes officer that works under him, but it's a it's a part very part-time position. Um they're not going to be getting paid as much as a code officer and they won't be getting paid the benefits. You're looking for somebody that's looking just for a

pdeium code enforcement officer and but this is Bowdenham I believe has a part-time one. I I believe I believe a bunch of them have it. Entire for for assistant code. So So you have so you're only paying the one set of benefits for the full-time person who covers both. And if if if we find that the there's more time that needs to be, we'd actually still have money in the budget um to be able to hire a part a very part-time for whatever hours we needed. And and when you're looking at a very part-time, then you're really looking at somebody who's just looking to make a little extra money on the side and not somebody that's trying to make a livelihood. But um

4 weeks since I've been here yesterday on vacation, but so I will say one of the things that I'm that we need to get settled from the Bureau of Labor is right now the road commissioner is a salary position because he is a supervisor which means by salary we don't have to pay overtime. um we don't have to pay extra on the hours over 40 which is I mean it kind of short it kind of short changes them but if we if we go and add the codes how does that affect that position at the from the Bureau of Labor perspective do do we end up having to pay overtime um on hours worked over 40 and and how do how does that work

you pay one as a stipen to maybe right and that's that was like scenario two or something like that. Yeah. Have we Have we asked them yet? Have we um She We've tried with MMA and she got I didn't get a really straight answer and then I tried with Jack but I haven't heard anything back.

I I suggested going straight to the Bureau of Labor. Typically you don't want to do that because then they start saying what what are they doing? But we haven't done this position yet. And so we're asking what's the right way to do it.

Calvin, how you you did this in another town, right? How did it work there? The code. Okay. Right. probably. Okay. So, so road road commissioner was salaried, right? Okay. So, and you did uh I did it the opposite way. You did it the opposite way, but um but I just want to make sure that it's it it passes the muster with the Bureau of Labor because I don't want to get hit with Bureau of Labor fines.

Yeah. So, maybe by all this extra information, maybe we should wait till our next meeting and find out some more of this information, then try to narrow that down. I mean, I know it's two weeks away, but you know, it is what it is. There's a lot a lot more questions than there is answers right now.

And it would be I mean, in some ways before we make a big decision on this, it would probably be good to have the fifth selectman being able to weigh in on it as well. Yep. And but it's also I still think it might be worth starting to put something out there to um you know build the pool of applicants because we're not locked into anything or we're not we haven't violated any labor laws or anything until we actually offer somebody a job and they take it. You know, there's there's all kinds of stuff that we could do.

But what do we put out? You know, do we have to put it in the paper? Does anybody read the paper anymore? Well, so we do MMA. Yeah, it's the same thing. We usually start with MMA. Um, you know, cuz people around here, the the ones where you go online, they're very expensive. Portland um does a a combination of the paper and online. Um, and the last time I asked them, they wanted like $450. I I know this was kind of my reaction to we didn't do that one.

We used to do Tritown. They were they were somewhat reasonable, but they're gone. That's the Sun Journal's reasonable. The Times records reasonable. Um the forecaster is reasonable, but um you know, like you said, do people read newspapers?

Have you ever looked at any of the um online like I I have not description that you have to, you know, jobs in Maine or whatever that is. Um which we used to have, but MMA is probably our best resource overall because you that's where the people that want the positions go to look. Anybody that's certified is going to go to MMA somewhere.

I would think we just put it there and see what's going on. See what kind of feedback we get. Can it hurt? Do do we put it out as a full-time or a part-time position? Cuz that's that's the question I have. If you're going to put it out with the questions that we got tonight, I would put it out. If you're going to put it out, I'm hesitant on that because I hate doing it like that. But if you're going to, I would put it out between 20 and 30

hours a week at this point. I wouldn't put it out 32. I wouldn't put it out 20. Pretty hard to go backwards. It's easier to go up and up than it is to take it away from somebody. Personally, I don't like doing it that way. I think that's putting out bad vibes in my opinion, but that's just my opinion.

at anybody's interested. All right. I need a motion if that's what we're doing. And I believe Mark kind of made some sort of a motion at one point. I have no idea. It was a so moved type motion. I have no idea what it was

to allow Ruth to put out the posting for job description contingent select have no issues with the current job description. That was Yeah, that was the other thing that that was uh well the other thing you was going to verify on the IT stuff. I think I don't think that was a job.

No, it was it was that was the one. That was the job. Yeah, that was the job description. Um I don't think it ever got a second though. I don't think so either. So it didn't get a first. I just [laughter] Well, actually his was the fir his was the first was basically saying what I had said but I'm putting it out. So

you can use that as a motion. I'll vote accordingly. Do you want to add the 20 to 30 first 20 to 30 hours? I will add that on there. Where do we put that? What are you going to put for a deadline? Uh we don't typically we we do we say until filled.

Um so that's a motion. Um, I'll second it. Okay. So, second it. So, basically, um, along with the motion, it's basically saying that the position would be for 20 to 30 hours is what we'd be putting it out for. Okay. Any further discussion? All in favor?

Opposed? Motion fails. Um, I would suggest tableabling this until next meeting. Good. Yeah. And And um I I I and the only the reason why I voted against it, I'm kind of in the same boat with Mark. I don't like putting out something that's kind of squishy.

Yeah, I I disagree strongly with that. I think it's very common practice and it's very generally accepted and it's I don't see it as an issue. But we should common practice. I don't think it's very good at [laughter] all. We'll come back to this uh next meeting and maybe we'll have a little bit more information on um it request for proposals.

uh proposals for IT support and you're looking for contracted hours. Basically, we're not looking for a a new employee. We're looking for contract, right? And um I think it's very needed. Um we've been we were limping along um with Josh as selectman doing a lot of it. And before that we had John um in the PIT role and he was able to do quite a bit but I think it's come to the point where we need we need help.

We we need somebody who can tell me what I need to do. I mean, I I have some IT experience, but I need somebody to say, you know, this is what you need to do and this is what you need. We're and we put in the budget, we know we probably need a server this year, but we want this we would like this person to go through what we have and make recommendations. And

so, do we need a motion to authorize Ruth to do that? Is that what we're looking for? To put this out for bid, basically. I move that we authorize uh town administrator to put the IT request for proposal out to bid. Okay, you can second that.

Any [laughter] any discussion? All in favor? Motion carries. Well, every year our auditors tell us what we're doing wrong. And every year our MMA people want us to tell us tell them how we're going to fix this. [snorts] Um, and so we actually [clears throat] don't have very many. There were only two recommendations this year. Um, one is the segregation of duties, which we have an incredible issue with anyways because we have such a small office. It's very hard to segregate our duties. Um uh but uh we had talked about this last year having one of the select people come in and and uh sign any manual postings that I do into the general ledger so that you guys understand anything that I manually put in the general ledger. The rest of it comes directly from receivables, payables, and payroll. So it's it's not something you really can mess with. Um and then the second thing was that we didn't have any

payroll documentation as far as um the amount of money that people are supposed to be paid and so I took care of that this year. So we will have that documentation and then also um they want us to adopt a formal health insurance policy meaning um put in our personnel policy that the town pays 80% and the uh

individual pays 20% and obviously we would change that when as we wanted to do it but I I put in here that we would do that by May 31st because that gives us time to determine um if we want to make any changes to the policy and then and then do that. So, I don't really need anything from you guys. Um, unless you have any questions for me.

so was this the uh general ledger stuff did you you said that that was being done last year too or uh [clears throat] we had talked about it last uh beginning of December and we did start doing that. Mark's been coming in and I've been explaining any of the uh general ledger ones that I do and he signs off on it.

Okay. So, at least somebody knows, you know, what I'm doing. Would it make sense just to include those into like the uh consent agenda just so that we so that all the selectmen would happen would be able to see it? We could. Yeah. Yep.

Would you guys like that? I think it would that way that many. No, that way we'd all have an understanding of it. Not I mean Yeah. Most of it's the end of the month um bank reconciliation, direct debits, that kind of thing. And then every once in a while um if we get a bond payment or something or if I'm switching between the supplies account and the mechanic account, you know, sometimes I do those, but other than that, there's not really a lot of them.

Yeah, I think I think that would actually be helpful for our understanding. I when I first started doing that, I asked Ruth fair amount of questions the first three or four months because I needed to make sure I understood that too, that I wasn't just signing my life away. Sorry. And and if you included this in our in our email package ahead of time so we we'd have a chance to look at it

and ask me questions. Absolutely. Okay. Um do you need us to approve this? No. Okay. Um, we have an application for appointment of Alden Allen to the telecommunications committee. Um, Alden is our assistant. Is it is it assistant pit?

Yeah. Yeah. Um, and he's the one that records our meetings and so on. And he is at the meetings already and so he's uh requesting to join the committee. So moved. [clears throat] Second discussion. All in favor? Motion carries. Um departments and committees. The fire chief is excused. He's um tonight uh road commissioner.

Okay, I will do that. Two pieces. We've got everything else. out uh full-blown uh patching season. Patching pretty much non-stop. probably noticed when you came in, the place is looking a lot better. We got more to do and um working on the fire station and they'll be heading out this week to around the town to get all the the had a lot of tree damage from that storm in January with the heavy wet snow and there's trees down all over the place. That'll take us a couple of weeks to get that cleaned up.

[clears throat] Um, so the 2017 paving RFP, uh, we opened that on April 6, and you have a copy of the, uh, bid sheet. The total, uh, was a combined bid, combined RFP for Durham and Panel. And the total for both towns was $470,

$77.95. and of course with that we have we have shouldering and we have u cross culverts and ditching and other work that's got to be done. was? Well, we're going to have we're probably got about 75,000 left that but I had no idea where the numbers were going to come in. I mean, asphalt liquid ass I just got a notice today from Pike that liquid asphalt's gone up and yet these prices actually the chip seal went down uh to 227 from 232 last year and

the and the um cold mix went from 58 to 55 [clears throat] 33. So even with prices going up, okay, they actually went down. So we did pretty good with this bit. So but I had no idea where it was going to come in. So So we will uh I'm going to be looking at some options. We'll see what we run into with uh the cross culitz and the ditching and how much that's going to cost. And I'm thinking we're probably going to have about 75,000 left to put into another road somewhere. So that'll either be Bowie Hill or Country Lane off from Cedar Pond.

[clears throat] So, are you looking for us to approve this? Yeah, I'm looking to get them a letter. They need a letter that just says that they are authorized to move on so that they can get we can get in their radar and on their in their computer system as a job for the year to do. So,

So, it was a was a combined bid. So what roads are those for Durm? Ceda ponds and ceda ponds 1.83 miles and stack pole 1.6 miles. You're doing stack pole from boyhill road up all the way to A. Yep. company you said. Mhm.

Um did we So we don't have any any bid for anything from like a crooker for we did an we included an alternate uh bid and the only one that gave us the alternate was all states. Okay. But which I'm really not interested in. So okay.

so he said this gets us approximately just under four miles. Yep. Which is actually kind of our target, right? Well, I think we'll probably end up close to that. We'll probably end up at that by the time I get done with what we've got left.

Okay. Well, we'll be over four miles. I thought five was the target. Well, between four and five. So, if you go on a 10-year plan, we've got 46 47 miles. So yeah, it's between four and five. Yeah, we get up to four. more important than

say Bowie Hill? No, these are preventive me. These are m these are maintenance preventive measures. We're just trying to save something that's already that's still salvageable. Bowie Hill's gone. That's there's no fix. That's going to be that's that's going to be uh

be careful with that. Well Well, I'm I'm still trying to come up with a solution. still trying to come up with them. Yeah, it's and to be honest, this is one of the hard things. It's it's very hard to explain because we we know we have a lot of bad roads, but those bad roads need to be fully rebuilt, which costs a lot more money, but we can't stop maintaining our roads.

I understand. I just wanted to ask a question. Yeah. Uh the first part of Boy Hill. Oh, yes. Be careful. Well, I'm taking Yeah, I know. We got stuck in it with a plow this year. So, we're we're I'm looking to see if there's extra money here that that we can maybe do some shim do some type of shim.

And unfortunately, that's almost throwaway, but it needs something has to happen. It may be inevitable cuz I got a feeling you're going to have this room full here if we don't do something pretty quick. Is there is there a long-term plan like that over the next five, you know, plus years to, you know, to get the roads up to standard? about the best you can do was a three-year plan. That's about the best and then that ends up changing. Uh

okay. Do we have one [clears throat] of those? Well, this year and next year I have uh next year was well we didn't really didn't really know whether we're going to get another bond or not. And so right up to the last minute it was I was hoping to do [snorts] if we had done another bond it would have been David Davis and uh uh but yeah we have a plan of next year being Davis and Shiloh and

but [clears throat] so I mean we have everything basically he has a program that's assigned priorities to the roads uh what needs to be done on them when it needs when it needs to be done and a lot of them it need a lot of them say it needs to be done now

but Um and it's a matter of now presenting, you know, coming before the town and saying, "Okay, these are the next ones that we're trying to bite off. We have all these other ones that are in the wings, but these are the So, I mean, cuz we we know Shiloh, Davis, Bowie Hill, Meadow, Old Brunswick. I mean, we Yeah,

I think we have a you you gave us a list last year before of and which order they are and obviously depending on the weather they may change a little bit. That might be something. I'd love to see that. Yeah, very helpful.

I gave it to you guys at the budget committee meeting. I left them I left I'll buy at the end of the meeting. I passed them around. Yeah. But did it was that the one that nobody picked anything them up or did? I gave them to each of the members before they left. But uh yeah, so I can give you another one. Yeah,

I can't remember there seems like there was I don't know I can't remember how many but you had a list of them all the way down and there were those in the re category those in the maintenance category those in the so definitely would be helpful helpful

I have a one of those lay person questions [laughter] you know we obviously here in the office get a ton of complaints and questions about the roads and my question compliments and compliments sorry Calvin yes and compliments too we do um but my question is that some of these roads that are horrible and really aren't we aren't going to have money to slated to repave them for you know a couple years at least

is it is it almost better to take the hot top that you know shots back there shaking his head [laughter] grind them up and return them to gravel. Yeah. Uh sometimes once you do that that backfires and they never come out of that category. [snorts] Yeah. So but uh uh there are some Yeah. Bowie Hill is getting close to that uh getting close to that uh and they'll love you until dust and the mud and mud season and but that's that's always an option. [clears throat] Uh it it from what I remember what I understood and a lot of questions I've asked over the years is it's actually costs more to maintain a gravel road than it does a hot top road once you get the road hot top. If if I is that correct still? I mean problem with Boy Hill turning it into dirt. And and I've thought that myself and I've had people ask me I said, "Well, that's a great not far from that now." But the problem with that is once you take what little bit of

binder you got there now off, it turns into a soup. Yeah. Cuz there's so much water on both sides. What that needs is it needs to be brought up because there's no place for the water to go. It just kind of feels that feels

you'd find the bottom, but I'm sure you'll find the guy. [laughter] us for thinking about for next year. So, this year we decided not to put another bond out uh for a couple reasons. Number one, with the other projects that we're planning on doing in town and finishing up uh the uh runaround pond road, rabbit

road projects, and so on. our crew wouldn't have the time to work on a major project like they did last year and which saved us approximately 40% off the cost. And so we if we put out a bid if we put out a big project this year, we'd be spending approximately 40% more on it. So that was one of the reasons. Um, next year I'm thinking, do we put out for a bond for a couple of years worth of work rather than rather than mini bonding everybody to death, do we do we look at, okay, what are the what are the worst roads and what can we do it for in the next couple of years? And um because yeah, doing a bond every single year gets old and it get it gets expensive.

Yeah. But we we I think we need to maybe look at that cuz we can't do 8 miles of road in one year or whatever. But we did last year. Well, eight eight miles of complete rebuild. Yeah. [snorts] Pond Road held up through the winter?

Good. Got that one. There's a spot down by the park there that I've got to look at. And uh people have told me that there was always an issue right there. I might have to put a drain. put a drain or something in there, but um there's a spot that's lifted.

[clears throat] So, I will we're going to look at what we're going to do with that. We need to cut that piece out, put a drain in before we go over it, and then uh patch it back in before we go over it with the That's why you like to do your binder coat when you so you find that stuff and you can fix it before you put your surface on.

So, he's looking for a um basically approval to send a letter to all states is what? Yeah. I move that we give Calvin the approval to send the letter to all state. We'll second that. Any discussion? All in favor? Motion carries.

questions. So, okay. Thank you for coming. takes care of that? Um, so the next good news, I guess. I was going to say, are you going to do a happy dance for this one? [laughter] I never dreamed in a million years we would get both of them. I thought maybe we had a slight chance of getting one of them, but to get both of them was quite uh highly unusual. So, um

but the letter that came back from D said they scored highest in the we were up toward the top of the list. So, good job. I guess I uh [laughter] I guess I told them some good information. So, that's you say the estimates that's this sheet here.

Yeah. The what I originally sent to D was 195,000 because you always want to inflate that number because they feel a lot better about giving $95,000 on a $195,000. So you everybody inflates their numbers but uh um I think as of

today going over these numbers um this is what the engineer has given me for numbers um that our share would be about 76,720. He's suggesting we just go for 100 and promise that whatever's left over will turn back into the roads. But [clears throat] just in case, you know, unforeseen things, but um this is his breakdown. [clears throat] Now, this is a grant for a smart stream crossing u allows safe fish passage and it's um uh it's quite a uh

state-of-the-art modern um project. Um so, it's uh wouldn't be just a round metal cover. It'd be solid concrete with an open live bottom that fish could travel through with a uninterrupted [clears throat] And it's uh quite a I just I never dreamed we would get two of them, but uh unfortunately uh this would have to go back to the town for special.

So the question I have on this, what is the time frame that this has to be done in? Well, I'm still working through all the final details with D. They're supposed to be getting me some more information about I believe it two years.

Two years. So we could They want quarterly reports. They want quarterly reports. Okay. So, and is this one of the callers you like you like you might worried it may not make it till next year? Yeah. Right. These are the two that are already giving the roadsaving.

Do we do we get this money ahead of time or do we have to front the money? No. No. Uh well, let me cuz some I know some grants you have to front the money and then they they reimburse you afterwards. No, no, no, no. This is they give us the money.

Okay. I mean, that's the way I understand. And then and then you account for it. Yeah. They just want a quarterly. He said, "This will be the easiest grant you've ever gotten." He said, "As far as there's no strings attached."

So, if we if we did one of these, there is a string somewhere then. Oh, yeah. Just wait [laughter] for that news somewhere. There really isn't this one. It's just there's just money was put in this. Do we have enough time this year to do both crossing?

It would be preferred to do both. You're not closing the road twice, inconveniencing people. Um, the engineering would be cheaper to do it all in one shot. The administration, oversight. Everything's just I think you would a better price from a contractor doing it all in one fell swoop because they're right next to each other. So,

and we have enough in the uh public works capital project fund, I believe. Oh, yes. Oh, yeah. So, so um so we're not raising it. We'd be we'd be we'd be appropriating it. Um it's it's going to cut that down lower than I want because lower than I would have liked because we didn't put anything aside this year. But

um the I mean say yeah $80,000 to to get 100 thou 190,000. I mean this is probably more than if we had done this ourselves. It's more than what we would have you know a bigger project than what we would have done but we would have just thrown some pipes back in there. But I mean this is the right way to do it.

This is the right way. So, um I'm thinking that we will need we do need to do a special town meeting. Um but even just throwing the pipes back in there, we would have been at least uh 60,000. We would have been 60 I bet we would have been 100,000 just putting the pipes back in there. So, it's still cheaper and we're getting a better product.

Yeah. Is this is this where the beavers block up a lot too or sometimes? Yeah. Yeah. We haven't had any trouble this year or last year. A little bit early we had, but they're not bothering so far. So, I guess we need to start looking at when when's the best time to do a special town meeting to put an appropriation. We we don't have to wait. We don't have to do it before tax commitment because it will be an appropriation rather than a um rather than raising if I'm not mistaken. We don't need to do do it before the commitment, but um probably sooner than later so that we can get started on get started on this. But um

Do you want me to get a timeline from um Shannon as to how long it would take her to put it together? Yeah. And I'm I'm thinking an evening an evening uh Yeah, not a Saturday. Not not definitely not a Saturday. So I think typically we've tried to do uh like a Monday evenings or something like that for this type of thing, but

yeah. So here in this bit of a problem I'm having is that I need to get the engineering done in order to have a final figure or to get okay out to bed and the engineering 16720. Uh um but I need I I kind of need I don't really I won't have a final figure until I have the engineering done. But [clears throat]

are you going to get any of the any of the money? Do you know when you or do do you know when when the money will be available to you? I don't know yet. He hasn't gotten that information back. He's supposed to be getting all the information. I just found out this past week. So, [clears throat]

how much do we have in grant match? I don't think we had this much, but how much do we have in grant match? I mean, I could take it out of my professional development fund. I mean, I have and then and then have it reimbured when we

reimbured when once we have once we pass the article. that that's probably the cleanest way is take it take it out of your budget if the article and so we can get started on it when if the article passes at the special town meeting then we can reimburse your budget.

Okay. If if it doesn't then we just won't do any other professional we just won't do and [clears throat] you can only go as far as the grant money can get you basically at that point. Yep. Or you take the extra $75,000 left in your roads and it goes to that.

Then we end up putting pipes in. Yep. I mean, [laughter] that's not what we want to do, but that is an option. Yeah. Yeah. So, so that's what I have there. Um, so if I could, I guess get an okay to move forward with getting the engineering going. Um,

so moved, second, uh, any discussion? All in favor? Motion carries. So this was the the the motion was to uh allow the road commissioner to go ahead with the uh engineering for the project. Thank you, Jeff. emailed them and I've called them there. I'm just waiting to hear back from Menace to um now meant to bring

that picture and I meant I meant to bring that picture but on the bottom where I had put uh where life is a little less hurried. I actually did get that off the Durham website. If you go on to Durham's website, it is on an old photograph that's right in the front.

Thought you said it was pound. Actually, it was Durham. I went and looked again. But uh but anyway, if you don't want that, that's so what I need. Have we seen I haven't seen a Were we supposed to have seen a sample of the sign or text?

Well, he he he presented it uh to the board a long time ago and I meant to bring it with me again tonight just so I could show you and I guess didn't include it in here, but uh email it. Yeah. Okay. You you might have it. You probably have any.

Yeah. Anyway, um the um the uh on the bottom of the sign I guess I was hoping to get some input as to and I guess I don't need this right now but um what do you want do you want to put instead of just saying welcome to Durham big in the middle is on the bottom

incorporated incorporated 1789. So I have two after I have I have incorporated then I have settled which one you want incorporated 1789 that is the year. You sure that's the right year? I know that's the year [snorts] 1789. It was um Royalsboro was

I think 1770 or something like that, but Durm was incorporated in February of 1789. Uh where were we putting the sun? Uh across the bridge. Um as you come AC it's it's going to be straight in front of you as you come across the bridge. on at Lisbon.

Yeah, I I took a photo of it and had them I did a photo simulation, had them put the sign in the photo standing in the middle of the bridge and then actually So the the thought is every year to to do a a new sign at each of

the major entrances Auburn and Freeport Auburn Freeport Pound here um uh based on any of the major state routes. Now the question is whether we is do we have the available space to do it at each one? I had the I had do go down and give me their written approval to put it there.

To put it there. Yeah. But I'm I'm thinking are we going to be having to do it on somebody's private property anywhere or something which we get an easement if we need to or something. Yeah. I think that property belongs to the state, doesn't it?

That one. Yes. But I'm talking about the other different other entrances. So, uh 125 also. So, seems like we used to have one at Auburn. Um at the boat launch maybe or something or No, right up at the lawn. Yeah, it seems like I remember seeing one there too.

It wasn't a big one though. No, I don't think I remember. But I don't remember the D sign. No, we used to have one a town was town I used to work in. They used to have one that was the town started like 15 miles out and they put the sign that came all the way down like say 136 and put it just before you got into the town center. And I'm thinking when you say welcome to blank here, what does that say about all the people? [laughter] It's like you guys don't count and it was like I I always was offended by that.

So yeah, if you can find that and just email it out. But so if that's what you want to put, is everybody okay with putting that at the bottom of the sign? Incorporated mail. I think it's I think it's the thing that makes the most sense.

1789. Okay. So, that's what we'll put on it. And before I order it, I'll get a proof and I'll email it to you guys so you can look at it. And it's going to be handcarved with the uh the one with the public works is just painted on. There's no This one will be actually carved in. And

who you looking at doing? Is it Is it sand blast or carved? Bon. What's that? L. I don't either. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I've called uh today. Never got an answer. All they get voice me. I don't know. I don't know. That's what they get going.

They must be busy. So yeah, you can if you hear from them, let them know that we are ready to go with it. So and that was with a 18 karat gold what do you call that stuff that gold leaf? Gold leaf paint that goes in there. So it'll be very nice. Okay. Um the line

striping bid from GP COG was awarded the Toria guidelines of Massachusetts, same one that got it last year and they went from 7 cents to just under 8 cents a foot. They'll be contacting me at some point to schedule. So obviously we got to have our final pavement down and run around and rabbit before we

Yeah. And is that that's all we're looking at striping right now is um I got to figure out how many miles that we had in there, but we'll have enough to do Quaker meeting around Rabbit all the way to Brunswick. Those that makes sense. And probably the next one would if if we have any left over, probably the next one would be like Swamp and Soer and Y.

Yeah. Shiloh or anything anything that goes to another. Don't bother putting it on Shiloh. It won't stick. [laughter] the leadership in public works. Um, was was Ron able to attend, too? No, I had emailed Ruth right after that last meeting we had that they emailed me back and said I never heard I put in originally in January right when it first came out and then I never heard anything from them. So I thought somehow they must have just didn't get my application or something. So I reapplied again with me and Ron both on there and they kicked back and said the class was full. So okay,

Ron's on a waiting list. All right. But uh but I have plenty of other classes for Rowan. We're going to be doing a lot of webinars and things that hopefully we can combine with maybe the town staff and maybe the fire department and we can do them all one location. So okay. So that's all I've got. Um the road postings I'm looking to pull those Thursday evening

really Friday evening. Somebody else said the free point some of the other places pulled. That's kind of early. Well they free did it early last year too. I didn't agree with them. So I they pulled theirs last week and I I held off and I'm still holding off till the end of this week and I if we can that's fine. But

in my opinion if there's still snow if there's still snow in the ditches in the shady spots at 80° if it wouldn't melt that snow sitting on the surface how much hotter would it be melt something down 2 ft under the ground. Obviously there's still frost on the ground if it's snow in a snowbank. So that's my take on it. So I've held off I've held off longer than most but [clears throat]

Okay. Any questions for the road commissioner tonight? No. Um, anything from a codes thing that you need to because No. I know. I mean, typically we had codes report, but I just want to make sure. One of the big issues that you guys I don't know how you want to deal with this, but um that's coming up repeatedly is people want building permits on roads that are not up to standards. And this is one in particular I feel kind of bad about, but it's it's it's um because they were given information from my predecessor that they could get a building permit with no problem. And now it's like, well, you know, and I can't really bend the rules because I got people here, there, there, everywhere all over town from both ends looking to see if they can. I've got people at the end of Bowen Road that want to know if they can get a building permit. And my are per our ordinance. Uh people on the old snow road at the end that goes up

through. I mean, you've got to bring that road up to standard for, you know, 28 ft of gravel. Unless it's a single back lot for the first lot. You could probably get away with 20 just a 20ft back lot. But once you get beyond that, if there's already three or four houses in here, in fact, I've got one now that's going to come in for the application. But I mean, at least they were already aware of that because, you know, Paul had already set the stage that that road's got to be widened to get your permits. But

so these are basically private roads that that are old discontinued town roads which are you've got one you've got if they're discontinued, they're no longer They're private. Well, you've got one in the planning board. You've got uh there's just things all over town that are very

But are they discontinued or abandoned? Well, some of them are discontinued and some of them are discontinued by virtue of abandonment, which is the 30 years of no public funds cuz cuz one of them has a little bit more rights than the other, doesn't it?

Well, they're the same. They're just two there. There are two forms of discontin. One is by abandonment, which is 30 consecutive years of no public funds being spent. That's abandoned. Yeah. Um and then there's the that's discontinued by virtue of abandonment. And then there's by uh town vote by select board. And then you got to go back and find the records and see what the date was. And then you find out what the rights were.

And most of those weren't actually by select board. Most of those were by county commissioner. County commissioner before the select boards. Um but I thought there was a difference in where one kept actually kept kept the right of way available, but the town just didn't just didn't take care of it anymore. Isn't a range road a different animal?

No. What it is is 1967. If the road was discontinued, it gets complicated because if the road was discontinued before 1967, there is no public right to use the road retained. There's no there's no public easement if it's after 1967. Unless the select board or the county commissioner stated there was to be one in the written document, and sometimes they did. If it's after 1967,

then there's an automatic easement retained to the public to use the road. Um, if it's after 1970, there's an easement for the public and an automatic easement for utilities. So, it gets very complicated. So, I I think most of our um our abandoned roads were prior to prior to 1970 anyway. I mean,

some of them get I mean, I had one in Auburn. One in Auburn. And I had to go back and actually look at aerial photographs every 10 years to see where the crown grew in. And me and the city engineer actually determined it was 1970s. So it was after

67 Peter Ver um to the west of Davis or to the north of Davis Road or what uh is is an oddball one cuz that one got discontinued and then recontinued and then [laughter] it was that one was an oddball. But most of them I think happen happened before my lifetime. What is sad is every town, I should say every town, most towns, many towns have a person who kind of undertakes the shephering of maintaining records and they're the go-to person for ancient records and things like that. And it's apparent that we had one. And fortunately, I have the file with a lot of stuff in it that she had done. And it came in very handy over here on the old ferry road where it used to loop out and come back to Route 9. Mhm.

And I actually I had the family come down there and used the file in my office with me there. And uh they found the old ancient records that Mrs. Footman had put in there and actually signed a tested copy 1970s. I mean, and when we lose people like that, it's sad because things [clears throat] just get things just get handed out. Nobody there's nobody really at the ship uh you know, at the helm of the ship.

And it's sad. It's like I was saying to somebody, you know, it ought to be maybe the historic commission or somebody. It's too bad we didn't have like another county that would step in and [clears throat] and kind of take over that. Once you start losing those records, they're gone. [clears throat]

So, I don't know. We had talked about at some point having things scanned. Do you know where that ever went? Old documents. We we we never went down that road yet because just the money isn't available for it. I mean, that would be great to be able to do, but um it's and I don't know that the road records were actually included in that at to begin with, but

I don't think they were. Do we have those roads records in the fire safe? Nope. I have them in a file. I have them in a file like this and they're in my top drawer. Roads. What are we going to do if we lose those? When I got here, Paul handed them to me. He said, "Here, this is for you. It's not mine."

How big is the file? It's just the one I got. just a file like this with just a little bit thicker cuz that wouldn't be a problem to scan and then you know if you wanted to keep it in the the back room I'm assuming that's just some of the stuff. I don't know where the stuff came from. I don't know the file could already be jeopardized. I mean half the stuff might already be missing. I don't know.

Do we have a fire safe file somewhere? The back room is uh the back room is fire. Oh the back room's all it's got a the door is is on a magnet. If if a fire is detected, it closes to our door. The stuff probably ought to be copied and brought back here.

Probably that stuff come back. [laughter] [snorts] Yeah, that should be here in the bar. Um, but yeah, lose it. If if they're decent enough, it might not be a bad idea to to make your own scans so that you have I mean, she has all the old newspaper articles from the 1930s and 50s. Well, I I've seen some of them some of those articles online before and it's uh it's actually hard to decipher what they mean because they say uh discontinuing this road from this person's house to that person's house and and the road may have a different name than what it has today and [laughter]

but a lot of that leg work she had already done and determine who owned that property back then. Be nice to maybe meet with her and see pick her brain and get what information she does have. She she was here for how many years? 30 some 50 years.

I think last year was her first time meeting she'd ever missed. Connie, she was here for a long time. She been living in that house for over 60. Yeah. So she was she was town clerk for probably 30 years cuz she retired in 99.

I think some somewhere around there. Chan's been here 16 years. So maybe in the 2000s and Okay. So and she I think she started in the 60s. Wow. Jim Panel has one. What's what's her name? Sherry Dietrich. Sherry Dietrich. And Panel has one. And where I came from, we had Charlotte. She was Every town seems to have one. And you hate to You see when they when they go, you don't find the

find the fountain of youth for them. Yeah. Well, you don't find anybody else. [laughter] You don't find anybody else to come in and take over that. Okay. So, that's all I've got. All right. Thank you. Administrator, I just have this one. This is um every year the cemetery does a contract for mowing

and they have approved this contract. The the committee approved the contract today and I just would like a motion that I can sign the contract. Move we have the town administrator sign the cemetery mowing contract. Second. Second.

Can I see it? Absolutely. Thank you. [laughter] I I mean I actually talked to the cemetery committee a little bit about it, but I just I actually had a question for them because I um the last couple of years I it seemed to me it was being mowed on Memorial Day weekend which seemed a little late

on that weekend. Yeah. So So but but there it specifies a date and actually the date was before the 25th. So if it's an early Memorial Day then that actually that actually would be allowable. allow the administrator to sign the contract. Any discussion? All in favor? Motion carries. Okay. Um, anything else that uh needs to be brought up at this point before I go into the selectman's comments? Um,

if we want to do something in the future like towards, you know, a goals or like two or three big projects, you know, for the year we need to work on, how how do we approach that? Do we just try to get it on the agenda and we talk about it at the next meeting or how do we do that?

Um there's there's a couple ways. You can either put it on the agenda on a regular agenda or we can schedule a workshop. I think I'd prefer a workshop. Um right. Yeah. Yeah. Which we typically we do it on the off Tuesday like or something like that. But that's completely up to the board when we do it. um it's perfectly

fine to do it um on a regular meeting or but sometimes something like that it's nice to have a Yeah, I agree. I'd follow your lead on that. That way you get more dedicate more time to that. Do you want it as early as next week? Um

I will uh if if it's not next week, it's going to be closer to the end of May. um if I if I'm going to be able to attend. It looks like I will be away the um second and third week in May. so that have it have it after he comes back. I mean

oh either either either either one's fine with me. I don't care either way. The 25th April 25th. That's fine with me. Sure. Uh, do you want to do it at 6:00 or 6:30 work better? 6:30. Yeah, 6:30. Yeah. Okay. So, we'll set a workshop up um to look at goals, etc. for this for the coming year.

Um, I will send you the information that I received from the class so you guys can look at it. Yeah. And all right. Um, anything else? Okay. Upcoming meetings. There will be regular selectman's meetings held here at the town office on Tuesday, May 2nd at 6:30 p.m. and Tuesday, May 16th at 6:30 p.m. Uh there will be a comprehensive plan committee Monday, May 1st at 6:30 p.m. There will be a planning board meeting Wednesday, uh May 10th at 700 p.m. Uh note that the

uh bulky waste day is Saturday, May 20th. Um, and I believe that starts at 9:00 a.m. usually. I think it's 9:00 to 3. Yeah, starts at 9:00. So, goes from 9:00 to 3. Um, also related to that, uh, there are clear bags here at the town office for people who would like to pick them up for roadside cleanup. Um, you can put put trash in the clear bags and leave them alongside the road and, uh, Pine Tree Waste will pick them up.

Mhm. Um, still doing the show your ID thing. That's a bulky waste. Oh, probably you should. I think it went pretty smooth on it. Yeah, you you pro it. That's the best way that you you have your license or a piece of mail or something. Yeah.

Did you actually have to turn anybody away? No. I mean, when you Well, when you know you got somebody up there that knows everybody in town, you Yeah, that's I can tell you about him putting your license up here. He don't live here. [laughter] I don't think we I don't think we have yet.

There's been some concerns of that cuz it seems like some people have the same amount every year. I can't imagine where they finding it, but Well, they might be bringing it for their buddy, but they're bringing it. You know,

I've actually followed some from across the bridge. It showed up in the line, but I don't know if they went there, got their coffee first. Do you do you know if the Eureka is doing a pickup? Uh I they did last year. I think they are again this year.

Yeah. Okay. Um, I believe that's it for comment. Um, I move that we go into