TranscriptOctober 27, 2020 ~ Select Board Meeting

Thank you. Uh, good evening. I'll call this meeting of the Durham Board of Selectmen to order on October 27th, 2020. I will call the role of board members. Please uh indicate you're here when I call your name. Rob Panto here.

Rich George here. Todd Bolier here. Uh, we know Mark Farren is not here yet. We do expect him um later. And I'm Kevin Neto and I'm here. So, we have four of the five board members here. So, we do have a quorum. Um, do any board members have amendments to the agenda? And there was a more recent agenda just sent out late today. I basically took a two or three things that were in Roose administrator report, put them on the agenda as discussion items. But any other changes

online right now. I didn't I didn't see what you sent. Kev, what's that? I apologize. I didn't see what you sent. I apologize. This email it was in an updated version. Basically, it added it added um 4C the email hack update. 4 D we have to

u approve an election one more election monitor oath. Thanks. and uh brief discussion on the foreclosures. Okay. Board member Mark Fen is here. Mark, can you just say something so that people can hear that you're here? Yeah, present.

Great. Thank you. Okay. All board members are present. Okay. Um public comment. Is there anybody here um to make a public comment on anything uh to the board? can turn your camera on and wave your arms at us, whatever. I think everybody

here is on for an agenda item though, but so okay. All right. So we will move on to uh 4A action and discussion item which was the discussion of the formation of a committee to oversee the union church or also known as the old town hall. Um we know that currently the the town uh by town meeting vote the historic society has occupancy of that building to use um

for their for storage and display of their materials and and and so on. Um but the building obviously an old building needs a lot of maintenance and there maybe are some longer term projects that should be looked at. So, um, we had talked last year about forming a committee that would kind of look at and oversee those things and maybe bring proposals back to the board. We asked, um, I think prompted by Candi Descus, who's with us tonight, um, Ruth asked at our last meeting about maybe getting that committee going, and we asked her to draft up um, kind of a draft um, charter, if you will, or mission statement for the committee. And that's um, what we're going to review here. So, um, Ruth, do you have that

handy to share up on the screen? I [clears throat] believe so. if I do it anyway. [laughter] Yeah, I actually don't have it up right this second. Okay, hold on just a second. document um that Ruth put together now. Um fairly straightforward. Um talks about that um the municipal officers, that's the board, will appoint members to this committee. Um she's proposing that the committee consist of seven voting members. Um staggered terms of three years, which is pretty standard for a lot of our um standing committees. Um,

two seats reserved for members of the historic district commission, two seats reserved for the historical society, one seat for a select board member, and two at large not affiliated with any of those A4 mentioned uh groups. Um,

and then some uh language about what happens with there's a vacant seat. Um, Ruth, on this first one, I don't know if I don't know if the staggered terms of three years works while you also have dedicated seats to certain categories.

Okay. Um, so we might we might have to rework that a little bit so that um you maybe we stag so that the maybe the seats within the categories are staggered or whatever. And if there's um where there's only one seat like the board member, you can say well you know that you could we could that might be one we want to appoint annually you know because as board membership changes or whatever.

Okay. Well we can make them one years too because um a lot of the the committees are one year also. Yeah. It's really only the planning board and board of appeals that Yeah. I don't know. What do people think about that? just make it part of the annual um appointments or Yep. Yeah. Okay. Um standard officers,

they got to take notes. The meetings are public, you know, pretty standard stuff. Um talk about what's a quorum. And popping over to the second page here. Um it's really under mission that I wanted um that I think kind of like okay this is what we're looking for the committee to do. Um basically create a schedule of routine maintenance for the Union church submit a yearly budget that would be part of the budget process. So that the yearly budget would be maintenance type stuff not necessarily capital projects. Uh capital would come comes a little bit later. Um create a schedule of [clears throat] alterations or renovations uh for the union church. This would be some of the maybe some of the longer term stuff. Um, and then submit capital requests for the CIP process. Um, create requests for

proposals on all approved projects andor scheduled maintenance as outlined in the purchasing policy. Um, Ruth, on that one, we're saying this committee would would create the RFPs for like projects that would go out to bid for that building. Uh yeah, we could we could have them be approved, but um but they probably will have the expertise to to design the RFPs. Um and then of course we would add language that we always add as the you know, we'll accept the best bid for Durham type of

Excuse me a minute. My my dog is trapped in this room. I got to let her out. contractors like W9's and insurance and stuff. That one I flagged is that one seems like a should be more of an official town staff task than a committee task. I don't know what others think. Yep. About that. I put that [clears throat] in there because that is is historically the one that we have the most issue with. So people contract with contractors and they don't get W9's and insurance and then we get a bill [laughter] um and we've never gotten insurance or W9's.

Yeah. Well, that's why I think with all of the all of the paperwork stuff with regard to hiring somebody to do a job [snorts] in my mind should be handled by town staff. I mean, I think we're I think we're looking for this committee to bring their expertise on the building and and to do some of the leg work on um

you know collecting the bids and um and may maybe grant funding sources or whatever. But then the board has to take that information and select a bid and then manage manage the process like we would any other town building. Um, if there's work being done on it, I would think.

contractor, you know, that that's going to be doing work at the church. Steer them down to the tall town hall before they get started. Yeah. Make sure that they get all their paperwork done. Right. that at the grain shell too [clears throat] just to make sure they get all the paperwork first before they get started working.

that? Um, you know, we can take it out. It doesn't really bother me. It's just that as long as they understand that we need to have that prior to anybody beginning work. Mhm. But you what what you're saying is you you and Todd, by the way, you've you've always done a terrific job at that. Um but you're saying that you want uh us at the town office or the select board to be responsible for collecting the paperwork.

You at the town office. That's what I thought. Yep. Yeah. Yeah. I know. Not I think I think it's like um you know it's it's similar to the fire station and public works but not the same because we don't have like a full-time you know manager that's working in those buildings. This is a volunteer committee and I think we would look to them for you know recommendations and leg work and things of that sort and maybe even you know initially starting the um bid collection process. But I would envision that, you know, if there's a job to be done and assuming it's been approved, like if it's a capital project, you know, it's made it through the CIP process or if it's something else, it's been approved um by the board that then the um then it's town staff that manages the paperwork and logistics and um things, you know, things of that sort.

Okay. So, do you want to take the fifth and sixth bullets out completely or I think it's more than just taking those bullets out. I think it's I think the I think we maybe I don't know we might need to articulate in here like what the um like what's the role of the board in approving and um or not depending on what it is. Um I don't know other board members please chime in because I'm I'm the only one talking here. Well, it would be fine if someone wanted to to collect the paperwork

um and and hand it over to the town office. I would think you know if the contractor had it available right away. [clears throat] do we want to think about adding the band stand to this committee? Well, why don't we work on this mission?

Yeah. Well, yeah, but add it to the committees. Yeah, we could always add it to um to hear from members is what are thoughts on, you know, like if if money is going to be spent on a project on that building, what do we want that process to look like in terms of, you know, approvals and whatever? Rich, did you did you have a hand up there? Yeah, that was the only thing that I was going to comment before Todd is I I don't understand the flow of of how this transpires in terms of they identify a problem. Do they just put it out to bid, hire contractors, etc. Do they identify a problem, come to the select board? It's to me it doesn't really give a clear path of what direction to take

if and when work needs to be done. Yeah. Well, everything everything would have to be approved through the budget process or through the CIP process. So, to to me, that's where it would have been approved because at that point, the select board would have been able to look at at any projects that they had um foreseen for the next year. Um and then it would be approved through town meeting. Um unless of course we had the funds available.

Well, I get like major issues and so forth of that nature. I'm just talking maybe potentially day-to-day maintenance and things of that nature. I'm sure they're going to be working within the confines of some particular budget every year that would give them some type of latitude of where that money is going to be spent. And if that is in fact the case, who approves if and when the money gets spent on that particular building? So, I mean, do they get that's where I don't understand or what I don't understand

and hopefully that correctly. Yeah. No, I think I'm I'm I think Rich articulated much better than than I was on, you know, I don't what I don't see here is the process path for, you know, how, you know, work is identified and then, you know, what's what's the process for getting bids? Do they then bring those to the select board for approval? Um, and then on spend like let's say, you know, if they have a a budget approved at town meeting for maintenance, right? And let's say it's $5,000 or whatever,

you know, um, if they need if if if that committee decides they want to spend, you know, um, $2,500 on, you know, something. I can't even think of an example. whatever it it feels like that ought to come to the board for approval before they go actually spend the money. I don't I don't I don't look at this as a department head like a like Calvin or Chief or you Ruth yet is managing a budget and you don't really need approval up to a certain amount to spend money. It's just part of your job. This this isn't somebody's job. It's a volunteer committee.

on this? Rob, did you have something? So I I don't I'm just trying to think about going forward. Do we just remove those parts from the mission and and improve the rest of this or what are you thinking? Um, well, I'm not thinking we're ready to approve anything tonight. It feels like the It feels like there's a little, you know, this is just a draft and it's a good it's a good start. It just feels like it needs another iteration that clarifies some of the stuff um we've been talking about in review at at the next meeting.

And the and the concept may change a little bit after the election as well. Okay. Yeah, it's a great draft. I mean, why would why would the concept change after the election? Because there'd be possibly a town manager who would oversee the projects.

Oh. Oh, well, that's Yeah, but that's that's several months away. But yes. Yeah, that that's a good point. steps, Ruth? Do you do you feel like you have um kind of an understanding of what we were asking what we're asking about? What we might want to have a little bit clearer in um in this document or

Yep. I think I think so. What I'm I'm hearing is that you want them to the the committee to um kind of decide what really needs to be done, but then bring it to the select board and then the town will administer um all of the the um

actual projects. Yeah. And I I Yes, I think essentially that's right with um and it's very likely that there'd be somebody on that committee that would be like the key connection between the town and and that committee and the project and whatever it is. You know, it might be the board member that's on the committee, Todd. Um we would see what uh

you know what that might look like. So, okay. All right. So, why don't we and Ruth, don't you don't you don't um if if you can maybe try to get a a draft um something out by like by the end of this week and maybe we could it's okay for us to do drafts via email uh back and forth as long as we send our feedback to you and you incorporate it. Um and then we maybe we can um get it to a point where it's ready to review and potentially approve at our next meeting. I I probably won't be able to get it out until after the election at this point.

Oh, right. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, good point. Yeah. Okay. Well, there's no there's no burning platform here. I mean, with we'll uh keep moving forward and um we can maybe review at the um at the second meeting in November. All right. All right. I'm going to stop the share on that.

discussion of the fire department um RFP for fleet assessments. a chance to um read through that um draft that the chief put together? my email. Yeah. I was afraid to open some, but you know, I have [clears throat] not seen that, but

All right, then. I think um because I have I actually sent this to a couple other people outside the board to ask for their feedback. Um, but I will, Chief, I will um just kind of give you my first impressions. I when you first brought this to us, I was I was under the impression that it was a a bit of um broader scope than what this document is. This document was really focused on look at our equipment and evaluate the condition of our equipment and let us know what's the next thing we should buy, you know. Um, and I had the

impression from when we talked about this last year that this would be more of a somebody would come in and they would kind of look at the town holistically, you know, the population, the geography, the type of buildings that we have and kind of do like um almost like a from scratch bottoms up needs assessment. like if if the town had nothing and we were going to put a um you know fire department in the town uh what's what's the minimum level of service that a town with Durham's characteristics would um reasonably expect and then look at you know what resources do we need to provide that level of service and then kind of balance that up against the resources we already have and identify any gaps or um maybe where we are over resourced if there are any and then what's the transition plan to kind of address the gaps in excesses and I am my expectations too high or or was that was that not what we were kind of talking

about last year? No, I don't think that they're too high, but I I think that that as you go through your as you go through this th those things are once again um the initial vendor that I looked at that that is included because I I did provide those other um I did provide the examples that they sent. Anyone doing this type of of an evaluation should be presenting that information with it. um that that's that's part of what what the fleet and the department assessment is. Um this what what I wrote up in the RFP is is that's making sure that we're not um missing some of the specifics about apparatus because that is the that is the larger chunk of our um of our CIP expenses for the department.

Sure. Looking especially looking over time. So, I wanted to make sure that we were very specific as far as what we were including in regards to the apparatus assessment, but that that's part of the the fleet and department assessment. If you feel like if you feel like that wording needs to be added or or

altered, I'm I'm fine with that. Yeah, I would include, you know, anytime you're sending because be especially since, you know, we're we're putting this RFP out, you know, to the public essentially and maybe some companies don't have the same understanding of what you would expect to be included. And so, I think we should uh it's safe not to assume anything and just articulate everything we expect. Like, we want you to come in and, you know, do a needs assessment. Um, look at what we have. uh look at what we would need for to meet the um needs of the town and and then where there are gaps or excesses what what's a recommended transition plan. So I would think something like that would make would make sense.

Okay. I can rework that by the end of the week. Yep. Great. Um and any other board members have comments for the chief as he may works on the next uh draft that had a chance to look through it? All right. Um All right. So, we want Yeah, Chief, when you're ready with the next draft, send it send it out and um we'll go from there.

Very good. Yeah. I mean, he doesn't have to wait for a meeting to send us a draft, right? So, we No. Yeah. Yeah. It's better if we can kind of keep it moving in between meetings. Yeah. So, you'll have it by Friday. Great. Um, okay. The email hack update. Uh, Ruth, would you like to give us a little update on where we are with the email hacking incident?

answering a lot of questions this week. Um, so just so everybody who doesn't know, October 16th, we determined that our offsite um, email server had been hacked. has nothing to do with the town office or our own computers, but whoever did this copied a number of email um emails and email addresses from people that we've sent emails to in 2019. And what they are doing is they are sending them from servers around the world. Um some of them were in Amsterdam and Chile. Um, and they are

spoofing it in that in the the the two line it has or from line it has uh either one of our addresses or our name or something to that effect and then next to it it has a completely unrelated email address and that's where that email is actually coming from. Um, they're all uh have re or R in the subject line. Um many of them have zip file attachments to them. Um other ones say archive and then some numbers. Um these are uh malicious emails and should be deleted immediately. So we are we've we've gone through our server. They've put um higher protocols in place. Um, and then we need to talk tonight about the possibility of uh transferring our our email over to a different uh um system.

what the proposal is? So, there's there's two parts of the proposal. The first part um is that we actually transfer all the emails over to um 365. Um our uh vendor, our IT vendor be um would be the lead on this. They would set up the the emails and the the domain and everything. It would still be the same. It would still be durme.com. Um only we would be hosted off of 365. um that would have additional um safety and protocols and stuff in place uh with the thought that uh it would be much more secure and and hopefully the hackers wouldn't be able to get in. Um and then uh in addition to that uh they've talked about replacing three of the computers. um two are in the office and one is at public works uh because they are running Windows 7 which is no longer supported and also uh they're older computers that um are either an i3 or below um and so we would replace those computers with um adequate not really you know top of the

line but adequate um computers with the Windows 10 Pro which is what all of our other computers on. But there's a lot more than computers in this bid in this quote, right? Oh, yeah. Well, actually, yes. So, so the quote actually doesn't even include the computers because I would purchase them. Uh here, let me find the breakdown of cost.

All right. Yeah, if you could put the breakdown up and then kind of take us through like what what everything is for and then I' I'd be curious if you have the number um what what would our if if if this was all said and done, what does our annual

um expense look like under this plan versus what we're paying now? Okay. Um, so up at the top there's the expense for the new computers. So there's the deputy tax collector treasurer, uh, the assessing computer and the public works forin computer. Um, that uh price, that cost includes the computer and also a Windows 10 Pro and Windows um, Office. So all of those software is included in that price. Um the cost for BEK to prep

and configure the systems is there the 675 U that may be able to go down because I can do some of the initial prepping but the connection to the server and everything like that will need to be done by by BEK the mapping and stuff. Um so then the next is the email setup. So they would create the Office 365 portal and they would migrate all of our emails over to the 365 license. And you can see um that is the most expensive part of it. Um and then

is there hard sorry is there hardware involved in that? Like why why is that so much money? Um there is not hardware involved. It's a lot of time and and um it's it's hours that they're going to have to do use migrating everything over and and creating the portal and getting the uh domain switched over and and all of that kind of stuff.

Okay. Um and then the email recurring costs and we might be able to knock some of this off, but um you know I I'm not knowledgeable enough as to what really needs to happen and what really doesn't. the base business email is there and then uh the cost for monitoring, management and reporting. So that would mean BEK would would manage and report our emails for us. Um and then anti-PAM, anti-malware and email encryption. Um and then backup and and those are monthly costs. And so uh on a yearly basis that would be $49.92 which is about double what we're paying now. Um,

so you're just before your the yearly box y is including that. It looks like it's including that email migration license to 365. It doesn't. [laughter] Okay. I know it looks like it does, but it doesn't. The figure doesn't include that.

No, it includes the four the business email management anti-PAM and backup um added together and multiplied by 12 basically. Oh, okay. And how does that how does that compare to what we're paying now for that for the email service?

About double. Let me take a look at this. So here's our present um budget. And so our email expense this year is supposed to be 3,000. Okay. And is the other stuff allet one-time costs? Except all the other stuff except for the just under $5,000. Everything else is a one time cost.

Yes. Okay. And then there are optional services. Um they had a cost for them to deliver the workstations and install them at at the different locations. I'm perfectly capable of doing that and it was a substantial amount of money. Um and then the services to set up the anti-PAM additional anti-PAM and the services to set up the Office 365 backup. So, if we wanted to have a backup, although I'm not too clear on on what that means exactly because my assumption is that since it all goes to the cloud, it would back it up anyways. Um, so that's a discussion I would have to have with them as to what exactly that entails and um whether it's it's worth the towns. Um,

Ruth, I suspect that that's backing up server files, not just email files. Okay. Because your Office 365 account should come with a terabyte of storage. It does. Yes. So that should be enough to back up our entire server.

Okay. [laughter] Okay. That's what it should be. Rob, you know anything about that the anti-PAM optional service that you know anything about that app? Yeah, just Microsoft tacking on more expenses. Go with Google. You don't need it.

[sighs and gasps] That would be mine, too. This seems a little ridiculous. So, so when you say go with Google, which which parts? Well, if you go with like a G Suite option, you're going to get email and then of course you'll get um you know, we'll be able to do the meetings and you can also do all this backup of your servers. You you'll get the storage and so forth. So, it's very similar. The only problem is is that Microsoft is sucking everyone in to this 365 program because everyone uses Word and Excel. But, you know, the sooner you dump those and then then the sooner you can get away from Microsoft's products. So, but you know, BK, they they get paid to push Microsoft products. So, this is what they're going to try to sell us. But I would ask them for a quote on doing the same thing for goo with Google for our email. you you would ask them or is there somebody else we should be asking to provide like

a G Suite quote either or um they should be able to do it but again you know they're a Microsoft partner so that's that's going to be what they're pushing um but they we you know the sewer district I I set it up the Gmail but they do help me manage it um so they're perfectly capable of of doing that.

So Rob, how much does that cost? Um I well it depends on which level you get. Um anywhere from 7 to 12 per month per user. Okay. So that's actually fairly except for the extra stuff. That's that's fairly equal. Yeah. Yeah. The difference is is that it works.

inherently difficult. You can't go in and make changes. you you'll have to call them every time you need to upgrade or or modify anything. It's just I don't know, you know, it's just just like that. The anti-PAM, anti- mail malware, email encryption, that's all Microsoft stuff because their products are terrible. So, I hope they're not listening. Some are probably on their way to my house.

Oh, they probably are. [laughter] You know, this is that's my personal opinion, Ruth. And honestly, it doesn't matter to me if you, you know, I don't want to be managing the town. That's why I hope we get a town manager at some point. So, whatever is best and easiest for staff is okay with me. I'm just sharing my personal thoughts. [clears throat and cough]

Yeah, my only thought is I mean it's no matter which direction you go, I think it's a lot of money and I I I hate doing a a a one bid proposal for that type of a system and something that's going to be a long-term project. I mean, granted, it's technology. It might only be a one or two or threeear project, but we might have to switch sooner rather than later um for other reasons, but it just seems like a lot of money. And I think at least at minimum another opinion should be given on what direction we need to take in terms of what platforms and so forth that we should be using,

right? What about I mean is should we look at Comcast again, Ruth, for I mean because we're really only talking email, aren't we? Yeah. No, you don't want Comcast. Um they actually migrated all of our uh Comcast Biz emails over to 365 anyways.

[laughter] I I like the I like the Google option that Rob proposed. I use it in my company and it's just, you know, they they seem to be up on, you know, stuff like this doesn't really happen because they Do you work with a vendor, Rich, that helps you kind of set that up?

I'm small enough. I I do have a guy got a guy [laughter] I do have a guy that um that I do use, but I don't necessarily I have an IT guy that is out of New Hampshire that I use, but I I traditionally go like for my emails just right through Google. Um it's very easy to set up. It's not hard as long as you own your domain. It's it's

I've I've gotten a lot of offers. I could give a couple people calls and see what they have to say. Yeah. Why don't we let's do a little digging on the Google option. Um, and I guess we just, you know, we just I don't think we have much choice but to kind of live with this like it is for a while. I

It's pretty bad. Yeah. I mean, I'm getting like I [clears throat] get I'm getting something like every four minutes. Yeah. Yeah. I I don't think that switching it over is necessarily going to stop that. What it'll stop is from this happening in the future. Well,

I think some of it could be stopped because they're not coming directly via per se. I'm getting a lot from Kevin today seems to be the lucky winner, but it's not Kevin's email address. It's disguised as Kevin and it's somebody. So, I think you could block those particular domains from from doing

Yeah. You know, and I I you know, with all due respect, I think our current vendor is definitely in the minor leagues of this um I would agree type of thing. And I don't I think they don't know what they don't know um in terms of stopping um stuff like this.

Yeah, that's a good point. That's what I was going to say. It seems like they're kind of struggling with it a little bit. Yeah. And [clears throat] so I would um Yeah, there's Yeah, do a little digging on the Google thing. And you said you have some other people that have offered some assistance. Um I'm going to email you another name.

Okay. that works in is security lb that happens to be a resident in town. It's a friend of mine. Um and um see if he might be able to offer some uh some insights on on what's going on. So, okay. So, good uh next steps on that one.

there's one more person that um has come forward and volunteered to help with um elections. So, I'm going to move that we What is the term What is the actual term for the position? [clears throat] Uh poll pole worker. Election clerk.

Election clerk. Thank you. I'll take that. Yeah. Okay. All right. I'm going to move that we um approve uh an oath for as an election clerk for uh Taran Kelly. I'll second it. help us at the polls and help us run the elections. Do we have an equal amount of uh Dems and reps?

What's that called? We have an equal amount of Democrats and Republicans. We do. And we also have a number of independents. So, um Becky has been working very hard at at equalizing it out. Yeah. All right. All in favor of approving the oath for Taran Kelly as an election clerk. Actually, I got to call your name individually, so let me know when I call your name. Rob Panto,

yes. Rich George, yes. Todd Buller, yes. Mark Farren, yes. And I am also a yes. Okay. Okay. 4 D. Um, foreclosures. Nothing for us to vote on here necessarily, but we do have um six properties in town that have reached the point um of non-payment

of 2018 property taxes that they are now subject to foreclosure and that process will start. Um there's still multiple opportunities along the way for the property owners to essentially, you know, pay the bill and prevent it from be actually being foreclosed and then eventually um sold. Um but so Ruth has

sent us that list. She has said there's um there aren't any of the the six where she feels that we need to consider waving foreclosure like there there is with some other properties like the Emerson city, the Old Emerson junkyard. Um so mainly I put it on the agenda to um for transparency sake mostly and to um provide board members any opportunity if they had any comments or questions or concerns about that.

All right. So, we are into department and committee reports. And uh Chief Moore, you are first tonight. Well, good evening. I'm sorry I did not get this emailed out to you. Um we've honestly been still consistently very busy. We're still more than 30 calls ahead of where we were last year. Uh not missing any calls. It's just continues to be really busy for us. Um, still dealing with all of the CO 19 issues both within the department and as the town health officer. Um, fielding fielding complaints, dealing with things from the state as well as some other individual complaints that I've addressed. Uh, also working on a couple of grant opportunities and I'm going to be forwarding the information to the board um ahead of time to hopefully discuss and approve at the next meeting. Uh, one is the annual forestry service grant that we usually go after. uh and get the other one is an uh is a FEMA grant. It's an addition to the fire act

grant this year uh strictly focused on uh volunteer and part-time departments and their expenses related to um PPE or personal protective equipment in regards to CO 19 responses. We've spent easily 2500 to $3,000 on additional equipment this year on on it's all disposable. Um, but it has to be done. Um, so I'm going to be putting together a draft to submit for that as well. Uh, because we would be able to recoup all of that money. Um, be Sorry, go ahead, Kevin.

I was going to say, Ruth, was that were those were fire department expenses not part of or eligible under that the other grant where we submitted for um COVID related expenditures? No. Okay. All right. No, to to my recollection of that that was that was all cleaning and and kind of process driven stuff. This is this is focused specifically on um fire department EMS responses and once again specifically on volunteer departments. Um so um so I'll be I'll be prepping to

submit for that. Um continuing to work on the 2021 budget. I should have that done by uh by the first week in November and prepared for that. And that's all I have right now. Okay. Any questions for the chief from board members?

Thank you. Um Calvin, road commissioner report, please. report. Um we u we've been ditching Evergreen Lane. Uh finished that today. Um moving to Wyers Hill uh tomorrow with a machine. Uh we've uh continue to clean up leaves acorns. They uh they fall as fast as we clean them up. We're going back at that again tomorrow with a couple of people. Um Kirker has got u a lot of the hand work done on some of the smaller box cuts. um pavement repairs on Rangdale and Deervale. They're next week. They tell me they're going in next week to pave the box cuts and [clears throat] set back and do the shim and overlays. Winter sand bid went out last week. They're due, I said here Friday. It's actually Thursday. Uh which is on the bid. I just checked the bid before the meeting. It's Thursday at 11 o'clock. We got one in today. Uh they usually show up the day before the day off.

[snorts and clears throat] Um, we received our first first salt delivery today, yesterday. Um, just in time. Well, we have salt that was left over, but I like to pull the trigger. I always put an order in in October just to make sure if there's going to be any any quirk in the works that it uh shows up now rather than later. They say, "What do you mean? We don't we changed our program or our system." And so, I always just put a load in just to see how it goes. Um, [clears throat] we have uh three new plow drivers uh to drive the one tons and wheelers. We got Mark Blake, May, Brandon Wilkins. So, looks like we're pretty well staffed for driving this year or going out. Uh, we've been out a couple of times practicing with the new guys and we'll be going out Thursday with a plow on. Uh, so I'll put that on Facebook so if anybody sees a plow going by, they'll know. It won't be on the ground, but at least they'll know why

we're driving around. Uh would that be former selectman Mark Blake? Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Go Mark. We've recruited him. So u we um uh so I I attended a Zoom meeting with uh GP COG to discuss sharing of plow trucks and we had a lengthy discussion about it. um they're still working out the the details of legalities and contracts and all that uh insuranceances and all that stuff. So, they're going to discuss it again at the early December meeting. Um I've spoken with our immediate towns and talked about what we would do and we all seem to be on board that we would be okay with giving each other a truck if needed.

[clears throat] Um, so I'm going to talk with uh with um you know, if this GP COG thing doesn't come through, I'm going to talk with Pete Coughlin at the main local roads and see if he would have any input on how we would how we would do that. [clears throat]

When you when you say give them a truck, what is Tell me I I know I know you don't literally mean give them a truck, but are we talking about a truck with a driver or a truck without our driver or what what are we talking about? Well, we would send a truck with a driver to their town to help them out if we had a CO outbreak. Uh so if each town, if we had a co-op of say five towns, if each truck was going to give one, if if say we had a complete disaster, COVID wipe out here and everybody was out, uh each town would give one truck to that town if need be. If we had just a couple out, you know, we just would of the towns would would would send a truck and it would be an hourly rate. And

there's a draft that your county is working on. Um, so we would steal some information from there. But, uh, if the GP cog we there was a lot of talk and I just have some hesitation that perhaps it's going to get talked and talked and talked and resolutions may not come. So, I'm just preparing a little backup plan. But, of course, I would have to go through it would have to go through main local roads to see if we could get some assistance. We have to go through legal and see how all that would come into play. But,

I'm assuming that this board would need to approve partic happen in any program like that. All all the boards would have to be, you know, it would be something we would work with the and it would all come back to the to the various boards and go through. But it's just, you know, in the in the worst case scenario, what would [clears throat] we do if we had a co outbreak and all of our drivers were quarantined? You know, it's

right. Do you have um have you thought about do you have a list of like kind of your own drivers? Even people that have driven for us in the past but aren't driving now that you say, "Geez, you know, if I lost three guys and I needed a body, I could call so and so." Do you do you have a list of your own?

I do like that. Yeah. Yeah. But there there are other questions, you know, I mean there there are other questions. Is the truck quarantined? Is the facility quarantined? And different different things like that. in one town said, you know, what do we do if this guy's been driving and now we got to have another driver come in. Can he get in that truck? Do we got to uh

they are way overthinking this? Those meetings to tell you the truth. They're gonna quarantine a truck. [laughter] People are freaking crazy. If the person was in it was sick and had CO, I mean, how would we get that cleaned and so

Oh, you clean it. discussions right now and uh okay, just trying to be proactive. Just don't commit us to anything. Okay. No, I don't think any town's going to commit to anything without getting, you know, board approvals that would have to go through the board first. So, um

uh so the road bond, we've got that work completed for the season. [clears throat] um after after putting aside uh $20,000 for um day road surface paving next year and some miscellaneous work on that road, that leaves us uh we should have right around a $35,000 fund balance. Um so we'll see how the u work for this

year's maintenance paving goes. I there may be a few overruns there and some [clears throat] of it may be needed there. We'll have to we'll have to see how that that comes out. If not, there are a few intersections we could do or that's a discussion we could have in another.

Is that is that $35,000 money that we haven't borrowed yet? Ruth, Sorry, I missed that. The uh Calvin is the last point in his report is that um he's talking about a $35,000 fund balance in the road bond money. Is is that is that money we haven't borrowed yet? No, no, it's money that we've borrowed. It's just we can use it towards um probably be best just to use it towards our b paving line this year.

Right. Right. Okay. All right. And but that doesn't necessarily have to be all spent this year. Right, Ruth? Some of that could be carried over till spring next season. Yeah, we could carry it over till next season if you wanted to.

Okay. Yeah. I don't think we're doing much more paving this year. Right. getting running out of time on that. So, and Yep. So, that's what I've got. Okay. Any questions for Calvin from board members? or are you good for the season now?

We're always always advertising. You can't have too many. So, the signs signs still out. I'll take any and all. You know, the more you got to relieve drivers, uh, the better. So, are you interested? No, but you picked up a couple of good experienced guys, so that that's good. That's helpful.

Good. Okay, great. Thank you, Calvin. Yep. town administrator report. Ruth, did I leave you anything left to talk about in your report? Not much. Um just really the office stuff. You know, we've we're in the process of uh doing absentee ballots, people voting in person, people still requesting ballots, and then we've started actually processing uh the first batch today. Um and we'll process some more on Friday, we'll process on Sunday, and we'll process on Monday because uh

that what does that mean? That means that we So we have a specific batch of of ballots. So, say you returned your ballot um December 15th to December 19th. So, we have a number of ballots, maybe 150 ballots. Um we go through, we check off all of the ballots, make sure that they're there and everything's good. Um and then what we do is we open the ballots and separate out the the envelope from the ballots and we run them through the machines. And so, this is going to be an ongoing process. Uh we do about a batch a day. Um, and then of course you don't count them because we we we don't run the total.

So when you're running them, so you're so you're counting them. You're just not running a total. We're running them through the machine. We're not counting them. So unless you push the button that says give me a total, um, you just you run them all through and then you shut down the machine. And then the next day you open the machine and you run them all through and you shut down the machine. Okay. All right. And that's that's okay under main law.

Yep. Yep. We've signed up. We actually had a um a poll watcher today in the office watching us do this. Um so it it was the first time I've ever seen a poll watcher personally. [laughter] Um and that was very interesting. Uh we have almost upwards of 1700 ballots now requested. Um, Thursday at 6:30 when we close is the deadline for taking ballots out of the office. There will still be inperson absentee voting on Friday until five o'clock. that um yeah, that that might be worth a couple of extra emails this week, you know, to remind people of that stuff, you know, so that somebody doesn't walk in to the office on uh you know, on Monday look, you know, looking for something that they can't get yet. So,

Right. Yep. Um so really that's that's what we're doing. It was that in the email this week. All right. Are you uh are and Becky, you may you can answer this if if you want, but are you feeling um feeling good about next next Tuesday? You guys ready?

I think so. Um you know, I was saying in July it was so unknown not knowing with COVID and lines and spacing and how it was going to go and and having gone through it now, I think that we're we're very prepared for next week. I've got a huge staff. Um, I've separated out and I have people coming in specifically to do the counting. Uh, because I know, you know, some people I'm going to be tired come eight o'clock. It'll be a long day. Um, we're going to try and process as many absentee ballots. Uh, so we're not quite as bogged down because we're going to need to be managing sanitation and counting people in and out. I still expect a fair amount of people coming Tuesday. Yeah.

Um, to the polls. it wouldn't surprise me to see 750 to a,000 people um still on Tuesday. So that would put us somewhere in the 60 70% for voter turnout on this election. So that's huge. Um so yeah, there's a lot of little tasks still to do, but on Sunday when um the crew is working hard at the bulk of the ballots, that's when I plan on doing a lot of that stuff. Public works is all set to help us um set up and tear down. Um so I think we're good. Talked with the school today. Okay, they've got their list, so they're going to have the gym ready.

Okay. Yeah. Ready. Awesome. Good job. Thank you. Thanks. Okay, Rich, did you have something? Just got a quick question for Ruth and I I think I've seen it on the agenda or in an attachment or something, but unfortunately these emails have been especially with uh I use Mac a lot and they're really tough. Um, there was supposed to be an appointment for for an individual for the board of appeals. I saw it, but I didn't see it on the agenda.

That's that's the executive session. That's an executive session for that. Okay. Yeah. Any It's not just because of that person. It's a an appointment to uh, you know, planning board, board of appeals, you know, any of those types of committees. That's essentially a personnel decision. and personnel decisions um can be discussed in executive session because you want to be able to talk about well do we think this person is a good fit for this committee or not and you don't really want to have that type of a personnel discussion in an open meeting. So that's what the that's the executive session is for and then so we'll have that discussion and then if there's a vote to be had afterwards we'll we'll have that.

Anybody want to make a motion on the consent agenda? agenda. Second. Rich seconds. All right. You're in favor? Say so when I call your name. Rob Panto, yes. Rich George, yes. Todd Buller, yes. Mark Farren, yes. And I'm a yes. Okay.

Um so comments for I actually have one other comment. Um I did speak to Ruth briefly today just as a heads up and asked her to start putting together a schedule or plan if you will um under the possibility that April's town meeting would have to be a referendum style town meeting again if we're still not able to have large group gatherings. Um, so it's really kind of a failsafe plan. So she'll back up and identify key dates, you know, like when decisions need to be made and time for, you know, absentee ballots to be produced and public hearing to be scheduled and, you know, uh, you know, budget decisions to be made, like all that stuff. Um, and if it ends up we can have an in-person town meeting, then we just have a schedule that we have stuff done maybe a little bit earlier than we normally do. But we want to make sure that if we if we're not able to have an in-person town meeting in April, that we um have done

everything in a timely manner to allow for a referendum town meeting, which because of the absentee ballot piece kind of backs everything up several weeks. So, um, we need to account for that. So, just let you know that I asked her to put that together. Our next regular meetings are Tuesday, November 10th at 6:30 and Tuesday, November 24th, also at 6:30. I already mentioned to Rob, I will not be here for the November 10th meeting. Um, so he will um he will be chair for that um for that meeting. Okay. And at this point, I'm going to move us into executive session pursuant to one MRSA section 4056A personnel um discussions. And I need a

second on that. Second, Rich. Rich seconds that. Um all in u in favor of executive session, when I call your name, say so. Rob Panto, yes. Rich George, yes. Todd Ber, yes. Mark Farren, yes. And I'm a yes as well. Um, Ruth, you'll have to hand turn off the live stream, the recording, and hand host to Kevin.

Yes. Yep, I got that. Kevin, do you need the department heads to stay for afterwards? No. Okay. Thank you. Oh, thank you. sign off. I got to make you co host. Yeah. And I will um I will text um Bob and tell him to sign on too. Okay.

Okay. I wasn't I was Yeah. I hadn't seen him. I wasn't sure if you'd had a chance to get Yep. No, I talked to him today and um uh and I told him I would text him when when you guys were ready. Okay. Okay. She'll set you up. I am out of here. Have a good night, everybody.