TranscriptSelect Board Meeting ~ March 25, 2025

Heat. don't think my dad took care of that stuff. My husband doesn't. Obviously, I have that wasn't one of the things that like I inherited as a job that I'm supposed to do, but my husband's not my dad. Okay, I got to register my car. That's me. All righty. Call to order the March 25th meeting of the Durham Select Court here at 6:30. We have a quorum. Begin with the pledge of

flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. [Music] All right, we have everyone here. Do we have any amendments to the agenda? All right, seeing none. Do we have any public comment? I don't see any public, so that's going to be none. And uh we just need to approve the meeting minutes from March 4th, 2025.

Move that we accept the March 4th, 2025 meeting minutes. So we have a motion by Josh. Motion by Josh, seconded by Joe. Any discussion? I just wondered why it's not part of the consent agenda. Is that new? Don't our minutes? Yeah. Okay. I think it's because we we talked about it briefly, I think, last meeting because usually you approve the previous meeting minutes before you begin your current meeting and most most other boards that I'm on. All right. All in favor? Any opposition? Seeing none, unanimous. Old business. I don't have any old business on the agenda for

business. Um, we have a property abatement. So, we'll need a motion to move into the board of assessors. So, motion by Josh to move into the board of assessors. Do we have a second? A second. Okay. Any discussion? All right. All in favor? All oppose? Seeing none. All right. So, we have our abatement here. Donna wrote it

up. Uh, barn has been assessed on the lot. That's an error. Lot 78B was assessed as 48.92 acre parcel with an old barn prior to 2019 when the subdivision was approved and split into individual lots on records. uh property owner retained a parcel but had removed the barn prior to the construction to the subdivision. However, it was never removed from the record. And so this seems like a more or less straightforward uh abatement of $158 because they were taxed on a barn that doesn't exist. Do you have any other discussion on this? I move that we uh accept the abatement as proposed. Second motion by Josh, second by Joe. Any discussion on the

favor? Any opposition? Seeing none. All righty. And we now need a motion to exit the board of assessors. So moved. Motion by Josh. We have a second. Second by Joe. I don't know why I looked over at you, Joe. You guys have just been so quick with it over here. Uh, any discussion on the motion? All right. All in favor? Any opposition? All righty. So, let me put this over. We have to uh adopt our um general assistant ordinance which we voted to increase uh last meeting or the meeting before we had the public hearing. Um do I have a motion to adopt it as presented? So move. All right. Second motion from Josh. Do I have a second? I'll second. Delighty. Do we have any discussion on the motion?

opposition? Seeing none. Holy cow. I feel like we're cruising. All right. Review and discuss the town meeting PowerPoint. So, we have our attachment here. Um, the warrant first. Oh, wow. Yeah. We have to uh approve and sign the 2025 annual town meeting warrant. Uh before we get started on on I just want to discuss on this this uh really great work by all the committees and boards that were involved with some of these uh this warrant language this year. There has been a ton of public process, lots of opportunities for people to give feedback. And what's been really uh meaningful to me to see is that we started off this year with a goal to like address some of these things. And I watched these committees modify the the ordinance by including public feedback both written and in person. And we real we realized that, you know, we have a lot of expertise in town on a lot of different subjects. And you know, we're

we're greater than the sum of our parts. And everyone came together. I think this these articles reflect a lot of really hard hard work on on the parts of all our boards and committees. So I just want to and I'll say that again um at the town meeting, but just want to say thank you to all of them. Um, so we have a motion to accept the town meeting warrant. So moved. I'll second. All right. Any additional discussion on the motion? I just have a question and I should have raised it sooner, but by the time I thought of it, it was too late already. But by moving the uh um the town meeting to the second Saturday in June, does that allow us to uh to do the um town uh election uh with the school budget? Okay. Yes. I thought so, but I couldn't remember. Thank you. Awesome.

righty. Any additional questions on the favor? Any opposition? All right. Seeing none, that passes. All right. Now, we are need to approve uh meeting PowerPoint. So Jerry and Mark worked together to pull this pull this together. I think the graphics look awesome on it. Like you know Mark deserves most of the credit. Yeah. I mean my uh my uh PowerPoint tries to prompt me to make things look this nice and I never seem to be able to do so. Um but I I think this looks really good. Uh, one thing that is just a pet peeve of mine, which I I I'm happy that we did here, is often times a lot of people don't realize, uh, greens and reds get used a lot in presentations and like 15% of the population is green, red, color blind. And so, it's really good to avoid that because a lot of times when people see greens and red, one six, one in six people in the room can't discern it. And so, I'm really happy to see this color

tone. Blue is a really good neutral color. So, I really like seeing that. Um, I like the the way we've laid out the general fund balance and uh we've got our long-term debt laid out here. Uh, and then discuss like explanation for all the reserves, the current balance in in each one of the uh long-term capital planning. The only thing I didn't see in here is I want the opportunity to share if we had to make any purchases out of capital funds this year just to share with people like the this nothing was purchased out of capital this year because of good management by the department or you know we did need to meet that capital expenditure because I know that that's something that we have um on the website we have the schedule we don't have whether things were purchased or not um in in here. So, that's one thing I did want to add. Um, just because if if the first question is did we did we need to

buy anything this year, you know, and it's like before we even get to that, we can just say and and I think it also shows the this the process of this system working well because we didn't have to necessarily buy the things that we were planning on buying to show we can be more more flexible there. Uh just while we're talking about the reserves and exactly what you're talking about, I I don't know if this is still something that we can edit at this point or not, but I I do think especially given all the feedback that we had about the capital uh plan. Is that what I'm calling it? Yeah. You know what I'm trying to say? Capital plan. Yeah. that if we could print off one like the one page that

shows the plan and just put that with it like after the town reserve tab before the land use ordinance tab to be able to say this is what the 10-year plan looks like, right? So that even though we're not tying it to a specific thing, here's the 10-year plan included in the town report so that when someone wants to go back and look at it next year, they can get it right from the same document. Okay. Three pages, fire, public works, and Yeah, I think that's a good idea, Heather. And I think that putting it at the end there um is good because we're this is really clear communication of everything we have here. Um, is that me? Sorry. Are we going to be printing this out for everybody or is it No, I was just gonna have it follow up on the All I was going to say is whoever prints it next time hit the fit to Right. Yeah. But it will be if you if they if you add it, right? And then like if you go to

the website now and you go to the town Yeah. town meeting town meeting information, you can look at last year's, right? And so when they're when all the conversation comes up about I just think it's good to tie it to it. Yeah. The only other question I had too here is we only are including uh the select board budget recommendations here in this presentation. Correct. Mhm. Yeah. And I think that that is appropriate because that is what we are presenting to the community. Um and we then the warrant article will say whether the the planning board is in agreement or not. They're only out of sorry budget committee. They're only out of agreement on one of the things and that's the first one. So, it's not um I I think it's, you know, important that we just include our number here because we're not presenting somebody else's number for them. My one other piece of feedback regarding the long-term capital planning and I

know that there's a note down here at the bottom that says amount raised for fiscal year 26 or one and a half times the annual amount raised. Um I don't know. I mean, I don't want it to get complicated, but at the same time, if someone's looking at this online ahead of the meeting and they're looking at the warrant, right, those numbers aren't the same. Now, I complete I completely understand that we're saying the annual amount raised. And then we have that footnote, but that number, the annual amount raised doesn't match the 270. It doesn't match the 305. So, I'm looking at the warrant articles, right? and how we have um raise and appropriate for fire capital 270 and then when they're looking at fire and rescue over here that number is not the same. And again, I understand the reason why. I just feel like if somebody is looking at both of those, they might question why. But this this isn't going up until the town meeting

and is for Joe to talk about at the beginning. It is on the website right now though for people to see. Yeah, this Yeah. I mean, it doesn't mean it it the draft is living there. It doesn't mean that it's it's locked in. I mean, maybe we could just put the number that's on the warrant in parentheses ne, you know, or something if there's a way. Or maybe that's not maybe I'm just overthinking it. But I think people should come in with questions. I think that's good for him. If you could see how many people actually looked and Okay, Frank. Frankly, that's I I I think we're it's Because I understand what you're saying, Heather, is you're saying like when we look at the budget um numbers, it's hard to see because it got cut off, right? But see, it'll say annual amount raised and then I think what I don't know what the number is, but then when you look here um I'm going to go back to fire, right?

So it says annual amount raised. That number is not 270 because 270 is 18 months, but this number is 12 months. And I just think that maybe that might be confusing for people. But I'm not trying to spllay hairs. No, I understand what you're saying is that when it that that page is showing the annualized contribution to the reserves rather than all the contribution the the the total 18-month number that we have budgeted for this budget cycle. So in a nutshell, you want the 12-month number showing the 12-month number is what shows in the presentation, but in the warrant language, it's showing the 18-month number. And so I think we should put the 18-month number in the presentation and say annual and then underneath say annualized at that number that's currently on the numbers are the same on yeah so the amount to raise so I

have one that's the same second is that for example I think you could probably go either I mean, if it says annual amount, it does know it's an 18month uh budget. Some just make it clear so people don't see two different numbers. That's a trick to it. That that's my question. My thought process is if we on that sheet on the um

capital planning. It says current balance and then annual amount raised and it lists the annualized number. Yeah. As and right now we're looking when you look at the budget it's the 18month number. And so to Heather's point, someone's going to say, "Well, it's saying that you're only raising this much, but why are we voting on a bigger number?" Um, so I think that it could be beneficial to put the um put current balance and then put

the 18month budget number that we're voting on and then underneath that say annualized at and then show what the annualized rate is. sufficient to put people on notice? Right. That's what I'm thinking. I see the I see the footnote, but I I I I at the bottom it says annual amount raised for FY 26 or 1.5 times the annual amount. So I I see you can do either option says 10, but in the war it says and the footnote is there. I just don't think people are going to look at that foot little footnote versus they're going to look at that upper number and then when we go to the warrant it's pretty easily easy to explain too. I mean that that is true. We're going to explain I mean there there's going to be a lot of discussion about annualized in this in this town meeting and I I do think that to there is the the we have the footnote here but there also is the value here of putting that annual amount is showing that this is the plan that we

all agreed upon last year and so in that regard I've kind of talked myself out of the 18month. So can you just make a note to yourself that when you're explaining maybe address that? Yeah. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. The annualized discussion is going to be very prominent in this town in this town meeting. But when we get to this discussion when you're doing your Yeah. Yeah. I'm going to I'm going to say but and then refer to like when you get to municipal budget refer to whatever article it is and explain why it's different. First page is explained right there. Mhm. Yeah. I I'll I'll repeat it there because you don't want I think I think we're throwing too many numbers. the annual amount that we're we're asking the town to raise every year is are those numbers and this is just an odd year because we're going to 18 months for then the next annual budget it'll be back to that smaller number and

I do think it is important to show that we started down the path of a set annual amount and that we are keeping this in this budget and that's and that's showing that. So, I think I've talked myself out of it, but I think it was a good point. As long as you talk about it and address it like by mentioning the article and the difference in the numbers, I'm comfortable with that. I got I got one one thing. Yeah. Page seven and eight. So, when I first looked at this and then I realized afterwards it was Can you tell me what the header is? Sorry. It's property taxes, radio taxes. Yep. Go or do what do they do?

Um, so you got the same picture on both pages and with the table and I first looked at and says, "Oh, why they have two slides with the same picture? Which verbiage do they want?" um either bring the verbiage from down below the second page up to the first page and put it all in that one area and make it fill up that whole rest of the page and get rid of the second picture or put a second picture in and get rid of the table on the second page. It's just makes you think there's something different going on on page one from page two and it's really not. It's the same message. One of them are 24 and one of them are 26. 26 and 36. Oh, these two. Okay. Right here. I did think it was a duplicate until I looked closer. That's right. And I did the same thing and I said, "All right, what's wrong with this?" And that was my first thought. And I'm like, "Well, there's nothing wrong. It's just that they didn't come

up with a second picture to put in the second page." Well, the second one's basically telling you that the first one is just estimates only. So, you can't bank on that. I I get I get it, but don't put the same picture in there. Or can you do can you make it like if you change the font size, can you just get this paragraph right here and then get rid of that whole second page? I would get rid of the second page altogether or get rid of the picture altogether. I get what you're saying. So yeah, so you want this all that move. Yeah, I understand. That's easy. I understand. Or omit this page and then just say, "Hey, bring that up. This this is where your money's going." But this isn't this is all an estimate because we have to estimate that education or hear me out on this one because it's a lot of words on one page for some people. How about if where do your property taxes go and then fiscal year 2026 page one and then page

two and that way you can see there's two separate pages and it's not so much writing on each page. I still because you don't I don't think you want to put so much writing because some people might be slower and you might be flipping too fast. I have one other thing. Yeah, it it Yeah, as long as you get rid of the picture, I'm good with that, too. Or if you just say page one, page two, I think just or you could do pi on this one. Or you could do a different graph on the other one. The Excel tab on the second one. to when I'm looking at these when I'm looking at these two the first one says fiscal year 26 and then it says estimated and so on the bot on the second page it's re it's reiterating that this is estimated where are you see oh fiscal year this is estimated yeah yeah and so it's saying it's estimated up here and then the bottom page is essentially reiterating the the message and saying that

homestead reimbursement will is is go comes into this education is determined by the RSU Um on this second page where it says these estimates only uh I would say just take that valuations are finalized put it underneath the county proportion is lower than all else that line here and then just add like you said add that text box underneath here and omit this page. I don't I don't think we even need the second page. It's a lot of text on the slide but we can I can just hit the bullet points there. Easy. Easy. Yeah. So,

reason why we don't put um slide numbers on it? I think it would be good because if people bring it up on their phone during the meeting, maybe, you know. Well, I would like to think they'd be looking at the screen to go, but I mean, we can. Yeah, I I think it would be good numbers

works for me. Um, I have a question while we're on this page that will probably get asked. Um, it's uh maybe it's when I looked at the No, it's in the budget. When I looked at the budget, wait a second. It's about county tax. Mhm. And I know that we've already gone through the budget at length. Um, where did I see it? Where am I looking? Somebody help me. Right here. I'm looking at budget municipal budget tax levy and then fiscal year 12 month county tax

$742,000 and then fiscal year 26 18 month the county taxes go this is negative 26.7 well we've been talking about how it's going to 9% and it's only getting only paid once during that okay see perfect there Look, everybody's right on it and I'm just not. Good job. Yeah. Okay, perfect. Yeah, cuz that's the that is one of the elements here where it's like, oh, this is down 26%. Well, no, it's

actually up 9%. But we're only paying it once. Um, so maybe on that one line, could you put in parentheses um the 9% that it's up to just be a visual reminder for me? Or maybe I'll just remember to to note that that negative 26.7% reflects only being paid once, but that county tax is up 9%. Yeah. Just do

later in the year. Yeah. Because I think you're going to say some of the some of this these bills are paid once, some are paid twice, and that's why there's a difference. I I don't know what your what your speech is going to be, but I think that needs to be included. I mean, annualized. And some of these things are paid once and some of these things are paid twice and some of these things are paid monthly is going to be said more than anything else at this town meeting for sure. Are you going to have a chance to come in and kind of go over this with me and we can make some of these changes are just real quick. We have 10 minutes. Yeah. And also just to go over like the how we're going to do things at the beginning when we discuss the scholarship presentation.

could just pop in sometimes. Absolutely. Yeah. presentation? I think on the slide with municipal budget where we say uh tiffs, the town currently doesn't have any. I bet a lot of people don't know what a tiff is. Is there a way we can spell that out? Yeah. Do you want to eliminate it? No. No. Say instead of saying tiff, say tax increment. You could say tiff and then maybe just put like an asterisk and then what the word what the initial I would just spell it tax increment financing and then in parenthesis but I wouldn't even put you know in parentheses put tips. Okay.

will say when we get to the second to last page here, the lanyards ordinance amendments 19 2021, George has a really great presentation on all of these that he can um he's got it really narrowed down to like an elevator pitch type thing. He is very quick with it. My thought process is to have George give that presentation that he's not advocating for policy in the presentation, just doing the explanation of what what that is. Um it's been consistent as you you can you know as consistent as you can imagine um this whole time. It's the message that everyone's seen. I would just say we just have him do that and then if there's policy questions the board can answer those. if we don't feel comfortable answering them, um, we can then defer to the the planning board if necessary. But I, you know, I feel like we understand these well as well. And at this point, they're it's our warrant language, not a board or committee's

warrant language. So, I think that we'll just have George make that. Um, so you're going to have him you're going to do these three discussion just quick go through an overview and then at the end of your presentation you're going to roll hand it to George to have him do his presentation. Well, my thought was my I want to get your your all's feedback because if we do this all right here and then we go into voting on the on the uh the budget by the time we get through that

budget there it depending on how long it takes. I mean the first article is the only one that is different than the than the rest but that could be a long lengthy debate. I don't want people to have forgotten what was in the presentation as we go into article 19. And so I'd almost like to rather have us do all the budget stuff and then when we

go into the ordinance warrant articles, have George do the presentation. We can answer do the presentation just to get everyone on the same page. Then we go into the articles and that's where policy questions and debate can kind of come into play. Um, so you mean have George do his summary briefing right before we vote on these ordinances? Yes. So after we're done with the budget, before we go into the ordinance vote, then have George do that presentation and then we'll move into the warrant language articles. Okay. So even in your when we go over this PowerPoint in the beginning when you could get to this slide and say we're going to vote on three ordinances today and they'll they'll summarize them right before you. That's exactly I'm going to say you can just read off the title of each one. Exactly. And it'll say we're going to have a presentation from the town planner. Yeah. On the information right before we vote on

article 19 20 and 21. Yeah. Are you gonna do George does 19 and then we talk vote on 19 and then vote on 19 and then have George do 20? I think all three I was going to do all three right at the same they're not long presentations um and I think he's going to condense it even more. Yeah, I mean it is very much like here's the facts and figures here. Um, I think that it's gonna confuse people and people are going to have questions for each individual one. It should be separate. I think so. I really do. I absolutely think put doing it together is going to confuse people and he's going to come right back up for each one because people are going to have questions for him. That's a fair point, too. And I don't think it's going to be any more time consuming. It's going to have he's going to sit in the same seat and and answer questions. He's gonna just keep he's gonna be there anyways. So, I think there's going to be

people that have that care very much about individual ones, right? And I think that because they're all separate subjects. Yes. They're all very different from each other. And I think the people that are invested in each of the things is a different population of people. And I sure personally think that they should be separated. Works for me. Are you all fine with that? Yeah, I'm good. Yep. Either way. Cool. Um, I know we did discuss doing the warrant articles before the budget because the lawyers paid hourly and she's going to be there for the meeting, right? If you would like her there. Do we do we feel like we need her there? I think it's a it's a done deal at that point. I mean, I mean, we are getting the comments we do get is I don't agree with the lawyer's interpretation. And so, I don't necessarily want to have her paid to, you know, litigate it out there with because it's, you know, it's not it is

what it is. It's it's a whether you like it or not at this point moving forward. So, Mark coming to have Mark there. I think it's I honestly think it's more important to have Mark there than Kristen there. So, Kristen's off the hook. Yeah. Okay. I mean, is that the way everybody else feels? Yeah. There's legal questions. We'll defer to Josh. Yeah. And when someone says, "I don't I don't agree with the lawyer's opinion." Yeah. You know what your answer is? Yeah. Where'd you get your law degree? Yeah. Do you have insurance if you're wrong? Yeah. No. Okay. I'll leave that one to you, Josh. All right. Do we have any other questions on this? Nice work. Yeah, like said Mark did a lot. Yeah, little different than last year, but somewhat similar. I like it. And I think have doing it the way that we're talking about doing it, right? We get through the budget, Mark can leave. He does it, right? So, I

think Mark's going to be running out of there by the time we're done with the the budget. No, he did it went great last year. Yeah, I think it will this year. Yeah, I think it will. All right. Do we I don't think we have to vote on anything here, but just wanted everyone's feedback so we're all on the same page. Um, Jerry and I I can come in early next week um and sit down and get those edits. I'll have most of it done for you anyway, just for you to review and make sure it's all right. Um, I did

see a comment that people were asking about the are these out and available and Yeah, we just found them today. Okay, perfect. week that the they're available in print to for people to pick up? It's part of my manager's report. Oh, sorry. Sorry. Oh, sorry. I'm stealing your thunder. Sorry. Jeez. All righty. Well, we'll move into manager report. You ruined manager report. Oh, good. Um, a few things here. So, the trifold that we did that we put together that mailed you all get yours. We got it. Y. So, we haven't had any really feedback from anyone. No questions, no nothing. So, um, that's

good. I think so. Which begs the question, do we, if any questions and they understand it? Is a video even necessary? Yeah. I was like, I didn't get one in the mail. No, we didn't mail them to the SL board. We saved this. We saved I got money. But my my husband got got it. It was probably because Yeah. his name. I do. People did get I appreciate you're saving money by not mailing it to him as I saw.

My ex-husband lives in town and he doesn't pay attention to any of this kind of stuff. This is not his thing. And he got that. And when he came to the house to drop something off for the kids, he was like, "What is this all about? I got a pamphlet." you know, so people did get it and they read it and they need he had questions, you know, so I think we will get questions at town meeting. Um, but I know that at least he read it and he doesn't normally engage in this stuff. Yeah, we haven't had many calls at all. We haven't had any. So, I think that's good. Um, few bids went went out. We did pretty good on those. Um, the only thing that went up was propane by 10 cents. That's not a big deal. Um, everything else went down as far as fuel and all that stuff. So, that's good. Not by much, but a little. So, quick question about that. Do we lock in a price for the year? Yeah. That 12 or 18 months? 12. I think we're going to

want to lock in while it's low. Yeah. Yeah. I I locking in is better than rack plus because it's got better budget stability that way. You can estimate. So, um, paving bids went out today. Um, those came back good. Interesting. Um, we certainly know who's going to end up getting the bid. Um, the lowest price per ton was 84 and the next lowest was 102. Wow. So,

and there was five biders, so that's good. Oh, and um, if you didn't know, the annual report is out that came in today. Um, so residents can come pick it up. Um, they work hard on that. The awardwinning annual report. We have to say that when we mention the annual report, a lot of effort goes into that for a lot of people. So, that's a that's a um shared um effort by a lot of folks.

So, good job to the staff for putting that. Jerry, I'm going to say my favorite is the dog issued license with the little dog paws over the top of it on uh on page 11. Um, another thing is I did get a call from uh Paul first. He no longer wants to sit on the appeals board. So, we have he's up in April. So, we have an opening there that we'll have to advertise for and try to get somebody on it that's no longer select maybe member. Definitely thank Paul. Yeah, definitely think thank

Paul for his uh time commitment on that. He always managed meetings extremely well. Yeah, very professional. Um so the facility study update is coming. Um GP Cog will come here on our May 13th meeting and give us an update on how that process went. Give us some feedback and possibly next steps. So 5:13 25

they'll be here. Um I attended a conference last Friday up in Bango, the Maintown City Managers Association. And uh one thing that I like about that conference is well every time I go to one of those conferences they talk about the uh legislation that's coming down and there's a lot of talk about finding a way to have property tax relief. Um I think Joe will talk maybe a little bit about something in his board report, but we're on a little um I don't know you call it a committee, but there's this like group that's getting together to discuss ways of of doing that. really interesting, you know, through sales tax and some other types types of stuff. So, good good program they put

together. Um, codification. So, update on codification. So, the legal and the editorial reviews are done. Okay. So, there's about 139 discrepancies or questions that we have to go through. So, what's going to happen? And some of those 139s are typos and some of them are actual policy questions. So the first step in this is going to the planner is going to go through it and he's going to you know make the simple um and what do I got here? He's going to fix the simple and small errors that are in there like throughout the land use ordinance it refers to select men that versus select board. So he'll make those kinds of mistakes. And then the second that he'll package together the minor and the major like policy and administrative discrepancies and then what we'll do is we'll bring them to you folks to present and then we'll make a plan from there and how you how you want to handle that and we'll probably do that at the May

27th meeting to give him time to get because there's a lot there's there's a lot there but still um so figured May 27th to kind of get a presentation on what's the discrepancies are in the land use ordinance that Georgia put together. We have to get back to geocode by July 25th with all of the edits that we want to make. All right. So, I would expect that June, our meetings, we'll have to have some workshops and really pound this out to see how what policy directions you want to go. But as we as we dive through it and get into it, we'll know more how it's going to unfold. It's almost like kind of a design build type thing. Um, so that's that's where we are with um codification. And I think that pretty much um concludes my report. A lot kind of going on and but uh we're doing good.

So, oh, and uh I will be on vacation April 20th. So, I won't be at the second meeting in April, but the first one if that's okay. I hope so cuz I already got a plane ticket purchased. Hopefully, you're doing something fun.

start off. the circle of chairs event that Dev and I went to uh budget and uh taxes was a really big uh discussion for every municipality there from Portland to uh to Durham to big to small. There was no one who didn't have an issue. And I was actually um really felt pretty good about where we're at compared to some of our surrounding communities in terms of the the what we have how we've been able to kind of mitigate those uh increases where some of the other communities are looking at you know three years straight of like 9% municipal budget increase not including county attacks. So, what came out of that uh meeting, and I just got this email last week, was an invitation to myself and Jerry to serve on like a task force on um uh tax policy and tax

issues for municipalities. And GPCOG is working with main municipals association. and they wanted um Jerry and I there as a representative for a rural town because we're one of the more rural towns in um in GP. I think Harrison's the most rural in in there, but uh it's we're like they want to hear our our voice because uh you know when Deb and I were there, some of the solutions that some of the larger municipalities brought up, you know, we vocalized that really would not work well for us. And so happy to be part of that. Um, nothing's been scheduled yet. Just today I followed up to ask if anything else has been moving along, but uh, nothing's been scheduled yet. So, as more information comes through, I will keep everyone here here updated as well. Uh, also I wanted to say Joe, it's your last meeting on the board. Um, we really appreciate all your time. Yeah, cuz he's not running for reelection and we don't

and after this this is our last meeting before the town meeting. Well, shoot. I would have made a cake or something. Well, I just want to say thank you for your contribution to the board. It's been amazing, especially with all of your background and history with being on the, you know, planning board and and all those sorts of things. It's been really uh really great to have you here. We're going to miss you next year, but we're hoping you'll there's a new spot open on the appeals board. So, I think the budget committee is always looking for new members, too. So, it'd be great to see you stay involved, but hopefully you have something fun planned. So, um very much appreciate it. Yes. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Jeff. And I don't have anything else for board member reports today other than I'm really appreciate everyone's feedback on on this. So Josh, uh, I was just going to thank Joe, too, but now that you stole that

thunder, I we'll embarrass him another time. So, uh, and and I would reiterate what you said about the the great work that everybody did putting in all this work for the town meeting. It all looks good. And, uh, I know that people are not going to like some of the things we did, but I think what we did is best for this town and that's all we can do.

Great, Joe. No, thank you very much. Uh, no, thank you to everybody on the board. I've had a good time. Been a fun three years. Um, thanks to the public works, fire department and, uh, town staff. They supported all of us along the way and done a great job for the town and they continue to do so. So, keep up the good work and sure everything will go fine moving forward. So, no, thank you again. Has been a fun time, Heather. Um, thank you, Joe. And I would have made a cake if I had thought about it. Um, and again, same as everybody else, this is all awesome. I think everybody did a really great job. Um, I am the kind of person who reads this cover to cover multiple times. So, I love a good town report. Um, award-winning town report. A what? Award. So, one of the things that I do I don't know where we landed on like what the rules are about it, but I feel very No, not that. I'm not going to bring

that up. I feel very strongly about um our election/pole volunteers. Is it in here? Oh, good. Okay. Because I was going to say where tell me, Jess, what town court page 11 and then I think it's the paragraph above the See, I haven't had a chance to read it cover to cover yet. Election page. That's great. Town report. Wait, where? The election workers. It's right here. Page 11. Mhm. Right above. Right over here. Right below the Oh, good. Good. Good. Okay. Okay. Good. Good. Um Okay. Anyway, I was going to say if it didn't make it in there, thank you for doing that. I appreciate so much that you did that. Um, if it didn't make it in there, I was going to ask that we read a a list and ask them to stand so that people could recognize in a town meeting, but we don't have to do that if people don't want to do that. I just think given the world today, you know, people that really deserve to be recognized. So, thank you, Jessica, for

making sure that that made it. I appreciate that very much. And that's all I had to say tonight. Thanks, Heather De. All right. as I wrap up year one on on the board. Jill, thank you for all your help and your service to the town. Um, I just want to mention that the solid waste committee picked a new chair. Juliet um was voted in as the chair at the last meeting and the uh committee is needs to have uh one working member and two alternates. So, we need to put out a notice on that if we haven't already. Did we do that yet? Okay. Yep. So, I think Todd was your alternate. If you want to boot Yeah, if you want to bump him up and then So, I think that leaves. Does that make five? We need one.

minutes because I wasn't at the meeting. I was at the budget meeting. Um, I corresponded back with um Oh, okay. Juliet, I think. Yes. Okay. Or Milt? I don't know. Maybe Milt. No. All right. Well, just if if you could just do the followup and whatever we need to do to get the the membership squared away. I'll you guys are going to reappoint like the staff and then new committee. So, um do you want me to just highlight the um openings for the committee appointments for when we're going to reappoint in April? Yes. Yeah, I think that would be good. Um Yes. So, there's vacancies on the historic I think what we should do is do like Yeah. uh audit of what who

where vacancies are and then maybe you could also announce those at town meeting. Right. Right. That and that's a chance for us to be in a room with hopefully more than 200 but at least 200 residents that we might be able to get. And it would be maybe helpful too to just have um forms printed out there so if someone leaves feeling motivated to volunteer, they can fill it out right there. Yeah, it's a similar thing about, you know, publicly thanking people for their service to committees and boards.

there's no PowerPoint slide on it, but uh and we should confirm with each chair. This is what we have. We're we're looking at you need one more member or two alternates or whatever and just get them to sign a line. All right. Thank you.

something else on the agenda. This feels like the easiest meeting since I started. Well, I think what's really Joe out for a drink. I think what's really uh reflective here is that we managed our workload, our colossal workload really well this year. And so we're just now, you know, dotting eyes and crossing tees today, which is what you really should be doing, the meeting before a town meeting because now's not the time to be doing big policy changes like we've done all that. I feel like we sprinted a marathon this year. Um, all righty. Do I have a motion to approve the uh consent agenda? So move. Gosh. Is there a second? Second. Go. Any

discussion? All in favor of the motion? Any opposition? Seeing none, that's approved. Uh, upcoming meetings, planning board meeting, April 2nd at the fire station. A committee meeting, April 2nd at the Eureka Center. Municipal elections, April 4th, at the Eureka Center from 8 to 8. Annual town meeting, April 5th at the Durham Community School, starting at 9:00 a.m. sharp. Select board meeting, April 8th, um, 2025. That will be the first, uh, select board meeting after town meeting at the fire station at 6:30. and solid waste committee's meeting April 14th at the Eureka Center. Don't adjourn yet. I have to ask a question. Yeah. Thank you. Um the poll this is that what we're calling it? Yes. That's happening right now for early voting. Yep. And then that's going to So that's not part of this because we don't know the outcome, but maybe you should just make yourself a note that you're going to talk about that.

the have the results of by Saturday morning? Yes. Do you need help? Potential. Okay. Okay. This year, no. Like it's not contentious. Nobody's running against anybody. So, we should be we should be okay. Okay. Last year hand counting. I will say one thing I want to just tell you all now is I need to I will be like leaving the second the town meeting ends because I have to go to a wedding. So if if the uh town meeting goes past 2:00, I will be leaving the second after it ends. If it's done before 2 o'clock, I can stay and help clean up. But I don't want anyone to think I'm being a bum and just getting out of there. So anyways, um do I have any uh reason for executive

session? All right, seeing none, a motion to adjurnn. We I want to give Joe the opportunity to make the motion to adjurnn on his last meeting. So, don't make me cry. I'll make a mot a motion to adjurnn. All right. And I'll second it. So, any discussion? No. Any opposition?

Oh, sorry. All in favor? Any opposition? Seeing none, you're journal. And that is by far our shortest meeting ever. How you guys did that?