TranscriptSelect Board Meeting ~ October 29, 2024

going to call to order here the meeting of the Durham select board October 29th 2024 at 6:30 p.m. we have a quorum with Joe Tom being excused and we will begin with the Pledge of States of America to repic for stands one nation under God indivisible libery and justice for

to the comment all righty are you grabbing an agenda or public comment what is this it's public comment I wasn't sure if you're coming up for public comment or just grabbing the oh perfect perfect sorry any public comment all right seeing none old business uh we're going to jump right into updates and discussions on resource protection uh for Mr talet the chair of the planning board and uh Mr thear the town planner so just feel free to come up and turn on a pull up a chair turn on a

and first thank you for uh inviting us this evening um I am John talbet chair of the planning board from uh Durham my friend a member of the thank you uh and the reason Michael's here this particular resource protection is a joint venture with working group with the Conservation Commission and so they've been you know I think it's been a very good partnership might may or may not agree but I think we've gotten a lot done uh over the summer and into the early fall the uh I know George has talked to you about some of the specifics and details and kind of the goal this evening is to get guidance from you all our goal is to get guidance from you on what's ready to go before the public and we think that uh resource protection is ready to go we have a uh November 13th public information meeting where we'll discuss that with the uh present it out to the public and so that's November 13th 6:30 p.m. uh here at the

firehouse and if you've been last couple of years we've done the same thing so it's an opportunity for uh Town residents to come in uh we'll give them a presentation on what it is and then hear their comments on it I kind of want to emphasize particularly for the folks at home uh that's that me particular meeting is not going to be about what's happening on my property so if you have questions about your specific piece of property I don't we won't have time to go through 100 100 and something so if you have questions about your specific piece of property uh I would ask you to get with Mr thebarge who's here with us this evening uh and say hey what's happening at my house um several properties have come off resource protection uh part of this is based upon the state uh having uh produced new data if you will and so some properties have come off resource protection uh and so they won't show on the new if assuming

the town approves it won't show on the new zoning map and then also um working with the Conservation Commission uh the other thing is for those houses that are still in or structures or properties whatever that are still in resource protection uh we try to give some relief uh for that and have come up with what we think is a good compromise of a 100 foot buffer uh around the house so that if somebody wants to add a sunro expand a garage whatever it may be their their property that particular portion of the property would be off the uh uh resource

protection there are some areas where we couldn't do that and that's why it's important for people they have questions about what's happening at my property to get with the town planner Mr thebarge uh there are some cases where um what the particular resource that's being protected is so sensitive that we didn't want to just go 100 fet and we still believe that the the plan we came up with for that particular Pro property allows people to expand so it doesn't completely shut off any expansion of their home and so Michael or George if I and I guess they're here the smart guys are here to answer any specific questions but really not intending to get into any kind of real detail on this particular one uh and wait and do that on the 13th which you all are invited as well as the the general public so thank you um so just what I have here is 100 foot radius around the building in the RP District based on flood plan of forest

of wetlands ex extend expansions will be subject to federal state flood management and Wetland alteration regulations administered by code officer and D is that 100 foot radius from the center point of the building or from the edge of the existing building the edge of the existing building okay and then it seems like there's a suggestion is a directional buffer in resources that are

yeah and then some other things it would be the expansion can't be any closer to so in that might be like a half moon type expansion in those instances exactly and those are the two only two mechanisms that you're proposing streams and and bird Inland bird habitat we didn't want to have build closer to them because we thought they're sensitive in some in a lot of cases the houses are close to the yeah I I should rephrase my question those are the only two mechanisms you're using for the um

relief along those uh for those landowners there's not a third like oh and in this instance you do X okay perfect um does anyone else on the board have questions about that yeah Heather I read that we were going to send out um cards to the property owners that are impacted by the change and I'm just wondering if that goes out before the November 13th meeting should go out on Monday to get past the election so people will hopefully look at it okay thank you not get it mixed up okay a question is the meeting up for the public just general awareness or are you taking input with potential modifications uh good question we will take input and if somebody has a good idea well what happens is to kind of go down the process a little bit uh we've worked on this one in a joint workshop and with Mr thar has been a great asset as always so we've got a plan that we think is is a good one we'll present that to the

public we'll get feedback from the public so there may be something that we've missed or a good idea we then go in our December meeting uh and we'll go over those ideas and see if we want to alter that or make any changes and then the next step after that is to present to you all uh vote on and present to you all uh our recommendation on what the the ordinance change should be and then you all send it back to us and say this is what we want you tweak it as a select board however it comes back into us and then uh no later than no earlier than 30 days before or for less than 7 days before the town meeting we have to have a formal public hearing so that that goes by the formal public hearing rule so there's another opportunity for people at that one though there's not a lot of opportunity for changes and I'm not talking about the March time frame correct that last public hearing is led by the select board or the planning

board planning board for the warrant and then they bring the final warrant language to us for uh basically it I would suspect it's not going to change yeah other than it you know drop an R and addin is or something like that so it' be minor minor Because by the time it gets there it's ready for the town to to know more about so it's an opportunity for the town to come in and hear what changes we might have made in the in the November December process and then also they're ready to go on the first Saturday in April whatever day that may be MH to give them some information on thing and these are all televised and that information is out there perfect hether is what we have in front of us the intended um information that's going to be put out at that public hearing the 13th this packet is this what will be the reference material thinking to uh just present what is being proposed as opposed to all of that history okay and

so am I allowed to make one suggestion I think what they're saying is they're only going to be presenting here this option three and the explanation in the explanation so they're not even going to cover option one or two because they've been taken off the table okay and if I may just point a clar it's a minor point but the November thing is a public information meeting which is slightly different than a a formal public hearing yeah I just have one suggestion is that fine so um like I'm looking at close to the last page where there's the example and I and I just remember a resident referencing the red and like the the

science behind what goes along with red and and I don't know if we could propose a different color to do that but just to hear that feedback from you know the resident and then perhaps maybe just make that yeah I see what you're saying cuz I know that there's no intent here for the red to mean stop or anything like that but we do know that red can be a red flag red flag yeah so maybe ni purple or something like that cool and any other questions for John or Michael or George on the resource protection I don't have a question I just wanted to say thank you guys I know that you've all worked very hard on this and um appreciate it yeah well I think

it was really uh what I liked about this credit where credits do I was going to say what I like about this is it was showed a really good job of two boards a board and commission collaborating with each other and that good teamwork and then working with Town staff so really appreciate that process and seeing it play out the way it did and I would Echo what George did I also like to recognize julette camper who's the vice chair on the planning board and Roberto driver both of them also uh participated and with a lot of hard work on this particular project awesome that's kind of what we've got on resource protection well don't go too far because we 4 B thank you thank you all righty so

that thank you for that update um next we're going into 4B which is a discussion on the mor a moratorium ordinance suggestion and uh give it right back to you John everyone has a copy of it in front of them thank you I am still John talet from Durham um as we

we spent the T the summer again with a lot of help from George and Juliet and members of the planning board taking a look at um battery storage and for those of you aren't familiar with it battery storage is you suck power down off the dam uh Power Line whatever store it when U there's excess energy and then release it back into the system we're talking the big commercial scale stuff now um bigger scale than your Tesla battery whatever it may be um and so uh we did

some research on that we kind of decided late summer that we probably needed time to get our get into the details there's a lot of nuances solar arm solar panels have been around a long time and so that technology is fairly well proven the issues with it uh is fairly well proven

uh and known battery storage is a relatively new science uh and so we came up with a recommendation that to go with a moratorium and ask the town to approve a moratorium so the town meeting uh would approve a six-month um moratorium

in which case new um cases applications could not be filed and then uh they could also delegate to the select board another six months so that would give us a year to um do the research and come up with the best possible uh um solution or

not allow it at all either either one of those so we've got some smart people on the board juli another one he does a a lot of this kind of stuff in her uh real world her paying job um so she brings a lot to the field uh we've talked to a lot of people um if you're again it's new the Goram has five acres of this Rumford has a couple of smaller size plants that that have gone in and there's more going in all around the around the country so we prepared uh a moratorium and asked that and would are prepared to present that to the town um but I think you know in recent devel and perhaps there's more guidance or more you would like to see than just this moratorium and the timing of the moratorium so I'm kind of kicking the ball into your yeah um the way I see it

is kind of like with the solar ordinance we didn't have an ordinance we wanted to develop one to make sure that if anything were to come to town we could handle it appropriately we don't have an ordinance regarding battery storage I think that this just gives us more time to protect the town so we can develop something and uh have be better suited

you know in the future and I know that from talking with our lawyer you know a specific reason for moratorium being we need more time to develop an ordinance is is allowed so um does anyone have any questions for Mr talet uh my question is actually for Jerry or for Jerry sure or for anyone do we have an opinion from the attorney about whether or not this is something that we should wait until April to do or if this is something that we should be discussing to do in a special town meeting yeah I think I can answer that I think George can answer the question as to why better but yes she is uh advising

that we have a special town meeting to get this moror moratorium in place sooner than later because right now if they apply we have no standards to which to apply and you don't want that no I I don't want us to wait for April on this I think we need to do something very quickly um I don't know George wants to yeah the other issue that the attorney raised is that um she her opinion is that currently the land use ordinance

defines essential Services uh and she believes that this would fit a utility scale battery energy storage system would fit within the definition of essential services and therefore if one of these projects were proposed to the planning board the only standards that they could apply to it could not apply conditional use standards uh which normally deal with things like scale and intensity of use noise traffic and those sorts of things the only standards that could be applied according to the town attorney would be our site plan review standards which are really designed for like commercial Office Building Development don't even begin to address any of the issues related to uh this type of utility scale battery energy storage system so for those reasons uh and we have discussed and talked about the fact that there are companies that are interested in putting one of these in durm so it's something

between the potential pressure development pressure as well as the vulnerability of the Town exposure of the town uh the town attorney has recommended to do this ASAP yeah well just to move things along I'm going to make a motion that we have a special town meeting on November 19th to consider

uh to propose this moratorium for the voters are there is second second thank you all right do we have any questions on the motion my question is about timing but if is yeah you're sure like the time you want y does November 19th satisfy any necessary requirements of like notice and and that type of stuff is that like

how how has to get posted and I I'm not George you might know what the rules are uh both the Town Clerk and the town attorney have indicated 7 days notice okay yeah and that gives us three weeks notice also I know Mr thear is in the Planning Commission or planning board are having this discussion on the 13th so it gives the opportunity for people to uh ask questions and get informed there and we could then do a town meeting on the the 19th so I pick the 19th here because we already have a board meeting on the 12th and I think the fifth would be too soon because I'd like for your all's meeting to be able to take place and then if we did the 19th we could get a vote and then that should Gap us until if my math is correct November plus 6 months gets us until at least April right okay and then possibility go another six months if if we needed to but I think that this is a I think this is a good way to say

let's give ourselves some some breathing room and because it's an ordinance we don't have to have a public hearing because it's being done at a special town meeting we've been told by the town attorney we do not need to hold the standard public hearing for ordinance adoption okay that's all I wanted to clarify and is it is that just for my edification if it's a moratorium is that considered an ordinance yes so it's an ordinance against having an ordinance no it's an ordinance against any development applications been filed and so I think that our November 13th meeting was just be a little extra opportunity for people to have a public discussion so I because ordinance right normally we have to do the public hearing process and so that's why I was just making sure that we're covering all the bases as long as it's an emergency town meeting it sounds like our BAS are covered I just want to act fast on no I

agree I just want to make sure that we're doing the steps we have to well prepared so any more questions on the the motion which states to host a special time meeting on the 19th of November to vote on the moratorium that

we have here in hand I guess we need to establish time sorry on the motion we don't have a time set if we just have that date and location time and location yeah um well this is the only space we have for tell me right I mean unless we could use the School Eureka Eureka yeah well let's use Eureka then and then um what do people think about our meetings are board meetings are usually 6:30 what do people think about a

so I'll withdraw my motion and I'll make a new motion to have a meeting on November 19th at the r Center at 6:30 p.m. to propose a moratorium on battery storage for the town of Durham to vote on second second any additional questions a question but after we vote

yep is it Ballot or is it card like we do at regular town meeting does it matter I don't think it matters until we get there we can vote to do a secret ballot or we could do hands think defers to the hand raised but anyone we could vote at the meeting to do Secret P the 6:30 start communication session first the town meeting starts at 6:30 and we can make our presentation on this and then move into a vote this will be the only thing on the agenda so any other questions on the motion all in favor I'll oppos seeing none motion passes was your question for Mr T yes okay is it your intent I I I couldn't tell by your face is it your intent to discuss the moratorium on the 13th it

was and it will be yes I mean we'll still have it on the two things I it see on that agenda is uh resource protection and this moratorium and I guess following up on that is there any additional guidance that you would like us to work on um I other other

additional parts of this I think that what we have in front of us here these three pages just explaining the why and then sharing the language and then I think that the intent for that would be if people have questions why are we doing this you can explain the select board agrees that we should do this to give our more breathing room to develop more comprehensive ordinances in the light of potential pressure for these sorts of projects to to arise so you know it's pretty straightforward it's not there to discuss the merits or anything like that you know this is the discuss the why and the language here every time I say it should be a no-brainer well go straight forward but I I agree I I think it should be just ass simp this is the moratorium this is why we exactly what you said yeah and the if that I I would encourage people to ask clarification questions but if there someone wants to debate the merits

of it the town meeting is the space for that you're I want your hearing here to be to explain the reason why and then what this means you know it gives 6 months and then there could be an extension and those sorts of things Heather ahead of that meeting can

we get that on the website so that people can see that ahead of time and the whatever the edits will be for right and then righty if I may ask a question while we're still on this topic MH is there any additional um articles or whatever that you would like us to work on that are related to this for the November 13th meeting no sorry for the uh to meeting in April uh we I think we want to get our the we have to see how the town votes on the moratorium first and then that will dictate how we how we proceed in the pace that we proceed at ahead of the April meeting because there's we cond it's it's probably doable but it's condensed in terms of putting things together getting you know the word out the planning board this is all cold to them so uh I think that if it's available on your your meeting schedule to start you know if the town approves the ordinance we're going to have approves the moratorium we're going to

have to develop an ordinance if they don't we're still going to want to develop an ordinance but then go to April so if if you have schedule within your meeting to begin the process of getting the board up to speed on what battery ordinances look like drafts things of that nature I think it would be wise to and we've been working on that we have a meeting November 6 next Wednesday uh so that this Stu will be on

that agenda I don't think it would be inappropriate to start considering what ordinance language would look like at your next meeting with Juliet and George's how they we've been doing a lot or they've been doing a lot of research and talk about it's just the voters who decide on the 19th on how quickly you need to get that stuff together so um I don't think you get to move because you're c as well um and this one I don't have a lot of uh We've not had the pine board has not had a lot of involvement in it but I'm certainly willing to to sit here I would refer to uh George on I think we were talking about historic district commission I've read your letter uh from your attorney and happy to throw like two cents worth in but it not py board has not been overly involved or involved in all this process happy to stay here does anyone have I I think that we need to have a discussion about this but does anyone

have uh questions for Mr uh thebarge I mean sorry for uh Mr talit or I guess or Mr thebarge regarding the Articles 12 in uh section 5.14 which is the historic district commission yeah I have a question about whether or not they feel um given the fact that we're doing the moratorium and the other things that are on your plate a realistic assessment of whether or not with this information from the attorney this is something that would be able to be ready for April whatever changes and all of those things are however this shakes out is that doable in your timeline depends on you know what I the long poll on the tenant most of the stuff is George and George is time to be honest but so and I know he's put a lot of time and effort to this I'm going to defer that final question um but depend the answerers probably yes um depending upon what that

involves I mean if we're given a we being a planning board given this is this is what we'd like your article to say uh or at least some kind of guidelines and this these are the things we want you to to say and the attorney makes some recommendations in there so the ically if you go with those recommendations we'd like you to do this and that and the other thing it probably is it is one that um so two things one is George's time and his availability and then the other one is on all of these we want to get him out to the town and get enough information out there that they can make an informed decision uh at I would assume this one would go to the town meeting not spe special meeting yeah no I would my thought process on this is tonight I want us just to formally recogniz that we've received this memo which was in our packet and available online regarding the district and the in the uh historic

district commission the Articles 12 section 5.14 we have legal opinion on it and so at this point I think that we have received recommendations from the historic district commission we have received recommendations from legal I think it kind of Falls in in our work plan now to think about what we would like to see a warrant look like for this for this and so I think that that's something that we need to work on at a meeting in November and then come up with some proposed warrant language and then bring that have that brought forward early next year for consider for a public hearing and then and bring it to so we can just try to button this up with a with a draft in November knowing that we can then pick it back up in February or Mar or February February or March for whenever the public hearings are but I don't Envision this is this is definitely not something we're going for at the special town

meeting so and I I don't think we would want to do it at November 13th I think with those I'm saying that one of our meetings in November we will take into consideration the comments from the uh historic district commission and then the comments from the lawyer and we need to figure out what what recommendations we have for for Warrant language does that sound right to the three of you look pensive I am um so where we left this office we had a markup of these two articles submitted from the we have a that and those are the recommendations from the Durham historic district committee and then we said in order to proceed we need to get some based off of the existing ordinance we wanted to get some recommendations from the lawyer and so now we have the recommendations of what the lawyer thinks about the ordinance what the historic district committee thinks about the ordinance so at this point I feel like we've done our

homework and now it's time to do the assignment so we need to go through and figure out what we think warrant language needs to look like to make this land use adjustment next year and so the process would be us developing some draft language then that gets goes forward to a public hearing ahead of the town meeting to get public input and then we can bring the warrant language to the town to vote on in April okay I just with us just getting this and without with us um having a lot on the schedule tonight I don't think we could go through this in the draft markups and then come up with an idea right now so I want to give that its own space because it's an important topic and so I wanted to consider that for I just handed you it's right here yeah I wanted to consider that for a meeting on uh November 26

got too many pieces of paper going over here there it is I had another question and I was trying to remember where to place it did you see my brain going the question yes it's not here okay perfect than um any other questions

about the historic um District commission and articles 12 section 5.14 for anyone here does that time frame Josh Heather Deb work for you all really focus on that as our big task on the November meeting and I'm just thinking it seems impossible but we're coming into budget season already and then holiday season and December gets busy so I'd like us to button this up and then have something ready rather than trying to do it in January at the same time as budget stuff and so I think that it would just be good to be the last non-budget thing we we do cool all right well thank you thank you uh John or Mr talet for all the questions today and answers and thank you Mr Barge thanks George and planning board and Conservation Commission and keep keep up all the all the good [Music] work I know this one meeting where they come to give us update really Flex dozens if not hundreds of hours of people's volunteer time so it's really

appreciated it wouldn't be possible without without our volunteers all right AG the next thing on the old business is agricultural committee appointments now I know you all had I know you all had a meeting on this in my absence did you determine a number of people to be on the um agricultural

committee yes and what was that five hold on six I can't remember I feel like it was seven and two alternates does that sound right it does so we have seven applicants in front of us here I think it was seven in two alternates

make a moot I make a motion that we approve all seven applicants to be members of the Agricultural committee second any questions I just not I spoke with Joe Tom today we talking about something uh and he supported everybody too so out there that's good to

know all right any no other questions thank you for that comment Josh all in favor any oppositions seeing none congratulations to Steve seni David Coulson Eric Goodrich Claire Ross and Megan Grimes and Jonah ferdig bird more volunteers for town will never turn them down

if people are righty we next have election worker applications and have one two 3 four five seven how many do we need to approve all we need all seven all right um do we have to separate between reappointments and new appointments or can we it just says appointments here I just saw two reappointments in the stack but if it can just all be in one then that's fine I think it can all be in one because whether they're appointed or reappointed it's still an appointment so I think we can do it as a slate um so I make a motion that we accept all of the applicants to fill the role uh for election worker second any questions on the motion I'll just we we have uh Ann wear Wayne Clark Julia Johnston David Harris Barbara lelly and Colman and Lois Kilby

Chesley and seeing no additional discussion all in face any opposition seeing none we are voted all righty next old business is um fiscal year change and I think we've talked about this a lot and I think with uh everything we've heard from the assessor everything we've heard from accountants we we really need to get align with a fiscal year and we um

should do it now as a opposed to doing it at a time where the reassessment will be kicking in and so it's really now or wait until after the reassessment and that would be far too long to wait and one thing I want to note is like right now with without being on a fiscal year we have to make an estimate on the school budget and an estimate on the county tax the school budget is like 70% of our budget so we're making an estimate on our biggest biggest thing and I think this can just help us get in line so uh for those Reasons I'm going to move that we officially move to a fiscal year do I have a second a

second any questions I've looked over here as soon as said any questions someone's like I um I fully support this change I I know that as a board we had talked about um bringing that to I know we don't have to bring it to a town vote and so I just wanted to just just ask why yeah yeah why I think it's just I'm not saying that I'm against it so the reason I think I I I know we talked about and I really like the direct democracy in getting a town vote part of the reason why I think we need to do this now is because if we wait until April it gets voted into the town meeting we're then waiting until January uh or December of

um 2025 to begin the process and so then we're moving into a fiscal year with an 18month budget into 2026 and we know the timing of our um our assessment would then be kicking in and that's just a lot of moving parts and that's going to we just want to make sure that I'd rather see these um apparent changes in your

tax bill or the way your taxes collected happen distinct and separately not at the same exact time and so we talked about with the fiscal year we'll have two collections um and so we'll have two collections over the 18 months but if we're trying to do that at the same time that you have your reevaluation for some people the number might not be very different for some people it might be very different so I just think we really need to do this before and I think that it would just be too much of an administrative burden if we waited until April of 25 to get approval to do it and then start the process going into the 26 budget and so for that reason I just think expediency is the the key here to to making sure that this administratively goes well so

how we'll communicate it to the residents um you know I like the news blast but I think it would be beneficial even if it was like a link to a little video or something of someone talking about it why we're doing it because it'll be a change for people to get yeah two tax bills yeah I think that that will be a big part of our um Outreach with the the budget planning this year and I think we can probably come up with some sort of um explanation if I don't know what exactly that would look like but we can we can look into it you have any thoughts J yeah we can put together some questions of why a reevaluation what it's about we can put that on the website we can have it at the counter so folks can pick it up when they're coming in to register Vehicles you could we could do a public information meeting on it too that wouldn't be a bad idea um said that they have helped other towns communicate this

type of thing you could reach out to them yeah the the town I live and Brunswick's doing it and they have like a nice little sheet of questions of why we do can we copy and past and we can is that the is that related to the reval I know we're doing well I'm talking about the the making I think Deb's talking about the fiscal year change explaining what the process look like like the timeline of when they'll get their bills and why you know that type of thing that I don't have a someone else to steal from but we we can come up reach out to GP C because I think I'm sure they I bet you they would have some sort of fact sheet this is we can we'll get some help and we'll get it out there I think that's important whether it's in a brochure type or something well we have the news blast we have the you know we figure we'll figure we'll do something yeah but I do think think that it gives us the opportunity next

week prob see more people next week then we will the rest of the year well that's we had talked about that for a few things that like using the election as a as a way to reach as many people as possible and I know that we're I need to sit at the polls with the sign that say ask me about fiscal year I know I know we're way too close short of a timeline for it but I I do think it's important for us to like really do some Outreach with these big things that are going to be changing I I I think even if you put like a big poster board and said make sure to look for to look for more information on yeah oh you I'm happy to like try to pull something together if like you feel like staff is like cuz I mean the election is like huge right that's the thing is I think it's a great idea but they are so swamped leading into election that I don't even want to ask him to how looks so de might not look his eyes okay let me and I can look for

some stuff okay even if we like Josh said if we had a a whiteboard and had we'll just put a we'll put a QR code and it'll just be your phone number and then you can answer the calls Yeah well yeah we can look into that but either way um it's just it's just it's a big thing yeah yep and I think I think one thing it will be communicated a lot when we start having our when we start having our we propose our budget and then but I think getting ahead of that like to your point saying in advance what a fiscal year looks like even if it's just simply we're going to have to do 18 months a collection date is going to be here and here it's it's going to be a little different and then explain well what happens if I you know have a um escrow account how does that work for my uh you know mortgage and we we have those answers and I know that um if I remember correctly the accountant and the assessor both had

those answers already for us we just have to write it all down right answers I'm sorry like um what happens if you have an escrow account paying your yes yeah so cool and then will the residents get like one bill that has like youus on

this state like in Lichfield we get yeah I get one bill in at one time but there's three submittal sheets and that you pay three times I only land in L field so I'm just wondering how we'll handle that thinking about staff capacity I think we had talked about an example I think we had talked about that you would get one tax bill but it has this much to do on this day this much to do on this day as opposed to mailing a second very right and so some people are going to have it automatic and the people who have to come in are going to come in twice I mean I guess if you want to come in and pay it all in one fell soup I don't think anyone's going to stop you I just haven't met many people super eager to pay pay their taxs in advance so um cool we seeing no other discussion here on that motion um the motion was to move into a a fiscal year motion by myself seconded by Josh all in favor um can you just clarify in the

motion a fiscal year from what date to what date uh fiscal year for the next budget budget cycle which would be um October 1 through September no sorry January 25 through June of that July going to June so then be July to June

the put it on the website or whatever yeah all right so all in favor any opposition see n that's a big item off the list yeah but I I I I know that this motion felt pretty like we went through it quickly but we've talked about this this a lot and it's been in the in the books for a while so um all right new

business we have um a tax abatement so we need to move into the board of assessors so I would accept a motion to move into the board of assessors so that's going to be I'll give Josh I heard Heather first so I'll give Heather the motion Josh are you the second

into the board of assessors all in favor of moving into the board of assessors any opposition see none okay so now that we're in the board of assessors we can go through uh as you can see here Donna has prepared um a quite lengthy report for us the vast majority of this is just the um um the municipal valuation return it's what we need to send to the state just to highlight all things tax and Durham she's already I believe already sent this in um this is more for just this oh she needs to sent that in so it's really is more of a a formality this is more of a formality this is essentially saying we've done everything here's this is as you can see it's a form you just fill out with the state saying you know this is the town of Durham here's our certified ratio valuation of all of our land our buildings total taxable it really just lays out all of the tax uh base and tax commitments and this is

just a um a filing that she has to do every year so we just need to vote to approve the municipal valuation return prepared by Donna hay so move I have a second second all right uh any questions on the motion I just don't see a place for us to sign is there one for us to sign it says it requires our signatures I have the one for your signatures okay oh thank you yeah we'll do that while we're still in the board of assessors but we'll vote on it now but thank you Devin all right all in favor any opposition seeing none and then we have um a property abatement map 2 lot

28 and discussion is primarily about um a question pertaining to uh 05 Acres that uh may or may not be part of the taxable lot Tim Donna's recommendation um is to Abate uh $319 73 cents for that error stating you know they were over taxed for that half acre and so there's some uh information here regarding whether the Halfacre is included or isn't included but based off of the fact that it's it's a half acre and a relatively nominal amount I think Donna's recommendation is is to uh go in favor of what the uh landowner understood to be their um tax commitment based off of what they understood of their property property

so um do I have a motion to approve the abatement as prepared by have a second I second I'll second it all right any questions on the motion does the motion need to include the map and lot number I feel like the last time we did this it did sure uh I will withdraw my motion I have a motion I will move to approve the abatement for map to lot 28a do I have a second second uh just put Josh or down

for the second and I I'm down for the motion there all right any questions on the motion motion any opposition saying none and that I move we leave the board of assessors and reenter the select board do we need to sign the papers that while oh yeah sorry Devon could we sign those papers while we're still in no no that don't apologize

just make it all the autographs 50 righty did you get all the signatures you need Denis okay perfect all right I make a motion to leave the board of assessors and return to the Durham slck board second all in FA any questions all in favor any opposition seeing none so we're returning into the select board at n uh

seconded by Josh all right manager report Jerry okay thank you Mr chair first thing I have for you is that I applied for a risk reduction Grant and we were awarded $3,000 and that is to help with the purchase of a generator at the Town Office okay so I want to talk about that so we have two quotes for a generator we got one from electrical systems of Main and we got one from uh Milton cat all right those are the only two Chief and uh Calvin have worked on this um pretty well a lot so I can share one of the quotes and we don't have to make any decision tonight CU it's really not on the agenda but I just want to share with you Milton cats quote

come in at $ came in at 22,800 a significant difference yeah mhm okay so uh I mean when they bought the one that's in place that's been there for 20 years back back then it was at 26,000 so we have these quotes you have money in um your buildings Reserve account that you could use to help pay for this like I said you don't have to make any decision tonight but that's kind of like what you're looking at so can we put I I don't want to make obviously don't want to make a decision tonight because it wasn't on the agenda for new business but I think we should add that Pronto because it's not getting warmer winter is coming tomorrow sorry Josh Winter's coming so that's all I have to say so I think it so at least we got three grand to help pay for it that through an MMA Grant does the grant amount matter if we go with the cheaper or more expensive one it's still it's full 3,000 which would be over 10% of

the lower cost one cuz it's 27,000 are is it Apples to Apples the systems one system is a 38 and the other one is a 45 38 and 45 watt so um electrical systems have made water kilowatt watt 38 watt um so electrical systems main spec that one out and uh thought it would work fine for the size of the building what's our current one 45 so a current one might be larger than we need could be it work but it's I mean I know you've mentioned this before but I just want to reiterate the the repair repir option was explored for the current one and that's a dead end yes electrical wise bad you can't get parts um yeah I looked into this and like manufacturers don't have to maintain replacement parts after like 10 years and this one is 20 years old and Milton cat charges to come fix it or repair it where well they all do but the warranty the electrical system the main will come service it um for a lot less it's it's it's defin the better

I would recommend going with electrical systems main when you get that opportunity put it on the agenda if we put it on the agenda we can just ask some followup questions at that point okay thank you it would be good if you have questions to email them before the meeting that would be super so everyone want to take out their paper paper tracking taking paint Debbie's Debbie's management style and let's put on for November 12th for uh new business we'll put the uh J erator and just to

remind folks um with the changes in in this year in this year's town meeting giving the select board the opportunity to spend money out of the um Reserve accounts for needs we would be able to make this decision and spend it out of the reserve account for that building without waiting until town meeting and I think that we've all heard significant feedback from the community regarding General generator needs and expectations at the Town um and I don't know if it was well it definitely was just the way the wind blew last this last year it seems like the lost a lot of power so just something to consider for next week uh next meeting when we T talk about this okay anything else in man I got a couple things so the state of Maine just passed a Paid Family Medical Leave Act that's that will affect us I'll hand you out this right here so basically what happens is is that there's a half a% contribution from

wages um from both the EMP employee and employer this is going to take effect on January 1st 2025 all right so this is going to cost the employees about five grand and the town about five grand based on our wages um the town could decide to take care of it for the employeers if we wanted to that's up to you we can have that discussion um but this is going this is going into effect sorry real quick five grand per employee or five grand total total okay it's a half a percent that's why I was like wages yeah so

to you that's so I am familiar with this legislation because I read up on it and essentially the way they will it will function is like Jerry said across the board if your company does not offer paid leave which we don't which we don't you your company pays 05%

payroll tax and then the everyone in the company pays 0.5% and then that um goes into account so when someone takes leave they can get compensated they're not compensated at their normal wage it's compensated at some there's a calculation at that so it's not designed to say this person can take a paid family leave but they get their normal wage like employer might offer which we don't this is just to provide some level of Paid Family Leave yeah uh I have thoughts on how we should proceed on this but I think that it might be something again we want to put on a meeting for future discussion because there might be public input on this yep just my inclination is I think Paid Family Leave is an important thing for people to have and so I would be inclined to at the next meeting suggest uh personally just suggest that the Town cover the full one% for staff but I just want to throw that out there for you all

consideration but again where we should just do this at another meeting uh when it can go on um uh a new business so so people are aware this it gives us all time to if you're not as familiar with this as I am to read up on it and we and we'll post us on our Bon boy Forks to see too so papers out pens out can we put that on November 12th as well Jerry

November 12th already already would say same thing if anyone has questions about it would it be easier for people to email you individually questions first so you can come prepared yeah so I can prepare to answer them at the meeting that would be and if you could at by any chance just get some feedback from surrounding towns as to what how they're handling this it's just I think that I think we've learned from like our MMA guys like considering what other towns around us are doing is is part of the decision making process yes I can do that

to talk about so we could only get you how we talk about putting doors on the E and that's been kind of ongoing for a while so we got an estimate we could only get one estimate some folks just don't even want to give an estimate so we have one and we need to really decide if you want to do this uh before December 31st cuz uh the 9130 the 9,130 that we allocated in the

budget and obligated means that you got to have a contract in place or something like that to spend it so we need to decide if this is what you want to do um so sorry can you clarify these are for arpa yeah this is the left the of the arpa funds yeah the 9130 was the kind of the last we still have some left over uh from it upgrades to and we'll talk about that a little bit uh later um but the parts for the

doors the doors and cson parts is 12,758 the labor is going to be 5800 for a total estimate of have rods that go off and locked and commercial type doors um so you'll have to decide if you don't want to do that for the entrance entrance just the one no no no back door the front door and and uh I think the side door well so three doors three doors yeah so yeah two two doors the front and the back but the front a double door quotes are right here yep and then the back is that a single or a double a double they have the rods in the middle and did this go out for an RFP and only one person came back or you just we just tried calling around folks to to do to do that and uh we couldn't get anybody Calvin was going to do it with his crew with Mark Blake because we couldn't get anybody but we have a uh a carpenter

that that's in town I think he might live in town yeah sure yeah that said he would do it so it is three doors just in terms of the sticker shock I went through this with one set of double doors on a commercial building in Oro and it cost us $6,000 for one set of commercial doors and that was um repairing and not even replacing the doors themselves so it's super expensive but Commercial Door work is super expensive and so if I know I've paid 6,000 for one set three doors this doesn't seem I'm not saying it's cheap but it doesn't seem unreasonable it's yeah to to what I've seen this price be before now we could apply 9,000 130 to that so my question was I I

I thought I remember that if we were doing something with arpa we couldn't mix the way that it was paid for you can't use another Grant with that Grant you have to use Town funds to supplemented and so where are you recommending that that out of the Eureka Capital fund okay now if that's now if

that's something that you don't like the price of and you don't want to do that you're having another special town meeting you could ask to take that 9130 and put it towards it CU you're going to need some a new server soon that sort of thing so always be able to spend it on it before

could do that too what how much is balance is set aside for it from the arpa funds so we have about 7500 roughly left over from and is that only set aside for it and it can't be used on this door no you can't use that cuz the town voted for that to be used for it and that um and the town voted for us to fix the door too right or voted for us to allocate funds to fix up Eureka well the 9130 to for Eureka upgrade so it doesn't necessarily have to go towards the doors it could go a new furnace or a new heat my thought on this is it needs to be obligated by 12312 yeah you you saw that you need or 24

like obligated what obligated means is a contract in place a purchase order or something like that and it's November and it's yes and so my just I'll get to you here in a second but my thought process on this though is um running out of time so the idea of waiting if we decide to go with fixing the door the idea of waiting to try to get wait till the town meeting and then try to figure out a way to get more bids you're then having a contractor try to turn around a job in four weeks that that's not happening you know and so I I just don't want us to lose out on those arpa funds um if we don't commit obligate them by the end of the year so that's just my thought process just has been trying to get someone to bid on that for all Sumer long could couldn't really get it we could only get this person to do and so I think we have a real quick and I'll get to you I think we have a responsibility to obligate These arpa

funds by December 31st because the town voted and asked us to invest in Eureka upgrades so I think no matter what we need to invest These funds obligate These funds by the 31st on something to go with the upgrade to to fulfill our our commitment to the voters whether it's this door or something else we can we can discuss but you know we sign this right say okay yeah this is good he doesn't have to do it this one or he can do it next but we have a signed contract we this is in the works yep Heather um I sat on the budget committee for two years and then I've been through two one I don't remember I've I've been

involved in the budget for four years and every year the doors at the Eureka have been an item in the budget that's been discussed and added to get done and it hasn't gotten done it's and so then that goes back into the general fund because we didn't end up ever doing the work and it comes up year after year after year and so I feel like this is a very expensive

fix but at the same time I I specifically remember that every time that I've been through the budget process this has come up and so my opinion would be to do this especially given the fact that half of the cost will be covered by arpa um and then it would just be a matter of deciding if the remainder would come out of what the voters voted to go into the Eureka fund to well I think the only way we could do it is if without waiting till the town vote would be to allocate it out of the Eureka Reserve account oh I didn't know if the building if buildings would also be an option if you wanted to look at that you have both and you have you have enough money in both accounts so you can look at both of those Deb did you have a question no so I mean when we look at this quote

materials so it's that's that that number right there is not going to change in any meaningful way contractor to contractor if we were even able to get another contract in there and but but with I'm not denigrating the work ethic or skills of the public works but like framing work around doors is as much as a science as it is an art it's a real skill and taking that stress off of them I think is important and the other thing I think about is your point the town's asked for this over and over and over again and especially with us having our reor organization over at the town office we the only spaces we have to host anything are here and the Eureka and so if we're going to have to use their Eureka even more so than we already do we got to have functioning doors there and people have asked for this over and over again I mean I'm I'm for it do we need to move this to another meeting for new business or

that's up to you that's up what do you all think I think we do yep so let's move this to November 12th as as well can you just come in with the amount that's in the two accounts you figure out where it comes from the budget yeah

both of you oh no no I agree with you as well I didn't take offense and even if you didn't agree with me I still wouldn't be offended I was going to say I agree I agreed with you and then Joe started talking and I was like I agree with both of them and I didn't say it I think this is nice too if we're already going to talk about trying to be nice we know you're nice Josh if we're if we're going to talk about spending money out of these um uh these Reserve accounts for the generator already I'd rather have the discussion about both and then it's also highlighting the skill set that the town the tool the town just gave us we're showing it to use it doesn't require a hearing but I do want to make sure that we get the chance to hear a public comment before so someone comes in and says something that completely might change output we can we can still get that so I think it's important to have that on on the new business um so if

just in the if in the next agenda packet something in the new business language indicates vote to um approve and pay for out of Reserve fund so people know that if they're looking at our agenda that this is being voted on to to spend yep and I'll you know I'll pass the quote people be able to see that too

did um hire a sheriff to hang out the school on Election Day from 12 to just just in case you know it's better that I want people to feel like they're safe to the perfect into their election um me give you the town Cloud which update which they're really called Trifecta okay so these are the new software that we um So we' Gone from to Trifecta right okay okay that's not confusing at all right so the chart of accounts and vender list have been uploaded they hopeful they will have something for us to look at and try in a couple weeks so they they're moving along on it pretty well so that's that's really all I have there I know Mark's working with them on a few things um and so the the assessing data that's in uh our current software that's going to be migrated to the software that comes with our re-evaluation that'll be done January 1st so that's the moving in the right direction so I was able to kind of nail

that down for folks so things are things are moving along in that direction pretty good there's always snafus with these sorts of things too so they might be a little bit late we'll get there um the only other thing that I want to really report on is how hard the staff is working this month where elections they are smoked and I mean they're really

they're up against it even with some volunteers going in there they're really they really deserve a big Applause for what they're doing because it's stressful elections are under microscopes so there's a lot of stress with that all by itself so they really need a a nice pat on the back and some recognition for their hard work and patience and still you know uh processing

registrations and this that and the other things I know they hear it from you but I think it's important that they hear from us too and I know Devin you're here tonight so we'll just oneon-one say thank you to you especially stepping into this new role as clerk at a very busy time for clerk um you know I think

that sometimes everyone can take for granted that the town office is just it's this thing that operates and not not realizing that like you said you have all your normal workload and the election is on top of that and so I for one I'm just very appreciative of all the hard work and I know I can the board is as well very appreciative so if we can make sure that they get that message from us too I think that's really important because uh it's just they're under a microscope they're working super hard we and they're just keeping keeping on yeah we received an email from our resident on it as well I'm going to read out go kudos to the town staff on outstanding on the outstanding job they are doing with early voting they are running an efficient and very importantly secure operation the large turnout has not phased them Jerry has assembled a great crew thank you yeah I

think what is it that 1300 process so far B out um we have 900 received back in person as well as mailed back in I didn't realize that many people did it ahead of voting day well we only have what 4,000 people in Durham 900 of already well hopefully that indicates a little less work on Election Day so then when people come in to vote or I heard was seeing on the news there were some problems with mail I don't know where it was but if they were mailed a ballot but didn't return it and they come in to vote I mean where yeah that gets checked yeah when you if you because you can request an absentee ballot but then if you don't actually need to use the absentee ballot you can still come vote in person but they check to see have we received your absentee ballot we haven't you can vote if we have oh sorry you forgot you already mailed it in we' received it go home you know so there's no no concern there I

did it in person at the Town Hall a week ago or stressed but that looks cool as a cucumber over there he seems wait did you say everyone was stressed or looks stressed it's stressed I think it's stressed it's they've done a great job awesome thank you to the town staff and that concludes my well I just saw on our list for tonight that it says it services and is that a different agenda item or not happening or no it is an executive session oh I'm sorry I apologize

it's 7:45 the meeting's almost over it's reports uh Deb you got anything for us I do perfect I wanted to just a public acknowledgement of the chief's report where he was um that appointment to the Fire Marshals committee one in eight people across the state awesome so that's that is awesome so congratulations to him um we had um Solid Waste committee meeting and recognized that there were no lights at the parking lot of their Eureka center right and that's that's been discussed in the past so just I wanted to acknowledge that and I think the um notification for the apparel impact bins that was included in the newsletter was well done and I don't know if anyone's using them yet but but we're good to go right on that topic um Jerry you sent up a communication policy to us in the email and I think we need to is it on an upcoming agenda coming like it included I think it was about the text push it

was a push notification policy right portion of a communication policy but clearly we need to have a communication policy that includes some things that we've been working with so just wanted to mention that mhm um also the text that we did get so far in the uh notifications were

great yeah and then I just want to talk a moment about the policy when residents email the board or the board and Jerry or the board and Jerry and other people are we all to assume um that you're responding back if it's something that we're supposed to respond on I I I'll respond uh on on behalf of the board um

some of the emails we receive the best guidance is to just be quiet observe or confirm email received um okay and and not engage because um I I can think of one we received recently there's really not a role for us in that in that and so um any engagement would not be overly

appropriate especially considering it it has the whole board on it and and there would could be if anything we say can then lead to a further discussion it just becomes easier to just kind of say you know your email said that you just want us to be observant of this communication we'll just be observant of the can we also assume that we'll like always just respond by you the select board acknowledges the receipt yeah we can set something up like that think that' be good I I was going to I would just to piggy back on that even if it was an auto reply that an auto reply gets sent that says your email has been received that's super easy to to set up yeah it's just like it's like a way message oh yeah um the only challenge with that is that then if Jerry's emailing us this something it would be like we received it yeah so it's a little impersonal too yeah so what I can do is if if people think that that's a good idea I'll just

start responding received yes I would appreciate it if you de um just to make the point um I can set a difference between inside the organization emails and outside the organization emails so if you don't want that auto reply to go for internal messages we can have that off yeah that's this is worth talking about but you know to make a decision I think if you just want I I'll start in the short term just apply replying we have received your email and then if the volume increases to a point where um we

uh especially because sometimes we as we've seen in the past there'll be like um email efforts where people will copy and paste and several people will copy and paste the same email that's where just having that auto response would be be good so I can I can get some P together for that though okay it's a good idea and then I know we've been talking a lot about what policies we have in place where do we have gaps in policy that type of thing and I just want to say that I would be happy to volunteer to participate in the or helping with that the organization of what we have how they're templated where are we where do we have gaps however a select board role can fit into that eff i' be happy to participate yeah yeah that's definitely been on our to-do list for a couple and I did some myself did some homework with what do we on the website so far how would we evaluate that against other towns so the Challen

different policies the challenge here is we have a pretty full schedule in November already and I would be inclined to maybe say we can have that just like have a discussion about what policy needs we have in in December but we're about to kick off budget season at that point and so my concern is I don't want to put any more to-do list items or steal any more brain waves from the staff on this until after budget season even though I we've talked all of us up here have talked about it's really important I think that we need to try to get the budget going first and I always have these like Grand aspir we always have these Grand aspirations for what we're going to accomplish in December and between the holiday season and travel and then the budget stuff I think it's just one of those things but I think that at minimum if any board member wants to go through and just categorize what we think we need

for policies and and start getting the list going I think it's a good idea so that when we take it up maybe early early 25 we can be starting from somewhere cuz right before you join even just getting that you know normal the the board meeting policy was like a big goal for this year and then progressing from there I think is important so is this about policy yeah my question is just Jerry if you don't know off the top of your head it's fine but are the policies that are on the website the only policies that exist for the town we there's not a lot um there's there may be a few more in in the black binder that in the office um but there's not a lot of policies okay sorry I don't mean to keep k i just like I would say that if if you want to tackle the policy issue and gather information that works from for me I just don't want it to turn into any more work for you all because it sounds like you all are

slammed so if it's like hey that's on the website and you want to categorize them and and come up with ideas of what we might need I think that's perfectly good I just maybe we could fit it onto a December meeting depending on how budget stuff goes and that might just be a completely our board stuff where we don't in involve the um office staff so

I think I think that if we want to take that on it's fine I just want to make sure it's just the five of us working on it you know because it's important because we've been talking about the policy this has been a busy year and that's one of the things we had for a goal so so yeah an inventory would be great I think thank you thanks D Heather did you have any board member I don't have a board member report other than a question that I have um regarding the Visionary process survey and so I

don't want to talk about it tonight because it's not an agenda item I'm just wondering the timeline for that based on what we read in our packets about the survey that's going to go out and when it's going to end and when there's going to be a public hearing I I feel like I'm I don't know no yeah so anyway if we could just at maybe at our next meeting you could just report on that can they come cuz you can either update us now or if we want to push that till the 12th and have someone come in and update us from yeah I just I just want to make sure because but when we get to the meeting on the 12th we're in the middle of November already and it said the survey was going to conclude in November and so that just feels like a very short timeline and I didn't know what the like PR process for that was going to look like or you know whatever anyway so that was what my question is and I don't expect you to talk about it tonight okay

let me yeah because there's some dates F but maybe we can talk I'll talk briefly about this at the next meeting what the expectations mark it on your sheets people 12 oh yeah 12's G big what is the actual name of that project it's kind of like the uh Municipal uh Visionary there's been a couple names floating around so that's why I'm kind of a that that George and Emmy I've been working on unipal Center Vision yeah

I've also heard like the municipal Village right something it's really looking at this property and you know what what's the vision for it going down the road and with buildings and that thing you know from what I understand it's going really good but I mean really Your Role here is to just get the recommendations from the staring committee I mean you're not going to have any other rle and you should have and I think Christina will come in and and share that with you when they're done way they get the recommendations from them or what come out of it but I don't think there's really anything that you need to do or no so I was just going to say the process I think this is analogous to is like when the um Conservation Commission pursued the um resiliency partnership stuff they came and said we're going to we want to pursue this they came back to us and said we've done this big survey here's the direct actions we think we should

pursue we said sounds good and then they went for it so I think that um letting that board do the survey then come back and tell us the findings because if I recall I don't think the select board approved the conservation commission's questionnaire yeah yeah no I don't care about that I'm not trying to like my I just I was very active I was at the here I was at the sticky note board thing I did the survey online like and if if it was concluding in November I just haven't heard anything about it so I just wanted to know what the stat I think it's a slightly different process cuz I don't know if they're doing those Cafe style public yeah participation so I don't the staring committee like they designed and talked about what they wanted their survey questions to be I mean they're really handling it and Christine is doing a nice job guiding them through that public process okay thank you yeah

[Music] awesome Joe Tom is not here Josh do you have any board member report no I I I was just going to Echo uh all the positive things about the town staff and not just in the town office but every worlds yeah and then my report was going to Echo that as well I know it's really easy for us to say good work keep going but like this is huge like I I just look at everything we've accomplished this year already and I feel like the other day I was like oh man I feel like I've been on the board for 5 years already I feel like I've been Sher for a lifetime and it's like oh no it's been 5 months and I was like we've got a lot done um and a lot of that's just a reflection of how great and how quick our turnaround is for our staff to get these things done at our committees and I think that we're really fortunate with the effort put forward by both staff and committees so everyone needs some extra cake or

something at Christmas time I don't know all right um um do I have a a motion to approve the consent agenda so move I have a second agenda all right if we could get those to sign Devin because we're g to uh I know we're going to have to go into a executive session so we get those from me now um upcoming meetings general election November 5th uh 2024 at the

durm community school from 8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. the planning board will be meeting November 6th 2024 at the fire station at 6:30 p.m. for their regular scheduled meeting the select board will be meeting on the 12th and the 26 at the fire station at 6:30 p.m. there will be a public information meeting on resource protection changes and batter battery storage moratorium on November 13 2024 at the fire station at 6:30 p.m. and there will be a special town meeting November 19th at the Eureka Center at 6:30 p.m. to vote on a

moratorium anything else there's a solid waste meeting in November I'm not sure how it get on okay um do you know the date agriculture committee appointments and election clerk appointments thank we uh do need a executive session yes Jerry yeah pursuant to 4056 a and

pursuant to 4056 F correct so and uh 4056 will stick around for that too yeah would we like will will yeah he will okay do we want to do 4056 F first then yes yes all right so I uh at 8 p.m. I make a motion to move into executive session do I have a second second that's a second from Josh uh any questions on the

motion all in favor any opposition seeing none we move into executive session at 8:00 pm oh e to move out of executive session at 8:37 so moved Josh and second by D all right all any questions on the motion all in favor any opposition seeing none all right um I based off of our discussion in executive session I move that the town hires uh Burgess for

our new IT services using the Burgess 2 off option which has a total annual cost of $ 36,6 n660 do I have a second on the motion a second Dam any discussion so just for folks to know um we are terminating our contract with our current uh it provider they're terminating they're sorry the the it provider is terminating uh their contract with us and so we are exploring new we had to explore new IT services immediately um we talked about several different quotes here that have been received and we are selecting one that uh not only serves everything that we need uh that we were having done previously but also provides significant upgrades in our security which was uh lacking in the prior uh plan which was just kind of a fix it in repair and and could expose the town to some significant risk so we decided to go with a package from an local IT company or we're voting ongoing with a package from local IT company that will um

better prepare us for the current environment we live in when it comes to data um protection in the digital space any questions on the favor of the motion all right all oppos seeing none motion passes back into executive session pursuant to MSA 456a so move have a motion from Josh do I have a second second second uh any discussion

oh I'm sorry can we extend the meeting first oh sorry will we retract the motion I yes I will y I can can I I make a motion that we extend the meeting until I'm going to say 9:30 hoping hoping we don't need that amount of time uh I'll second that so Josh has made a motion to extend the meeting till 9:30 uh seconded by myself any questions on that all in favor any opposition seeing none passes unanimously I will accept a motion to move into an executive session pursuant to MRSA 456a so uh so Josh has moved do I have a second second seconded by Heather any discussion all in favor any opposition seeing none we're moving in at 8:40 and I just want to clarify for folks at home we will be um shutting the camera off now and taking a when we come out of executive session after this we will note the time and the motions and if any action takes place after those will be written notes and then submitted to the

town clerk after tonight's meeting uh and updated in our our notes but we won't be coming back on camera so thank you