TranscriptSelect Board Meeting ~ December 10, 2024

surgy he's had four last but any be on probably 30 seconds just make sure you put your mic on they're up and you can hear us y you're on all righty Let's uh kick off here the meeting here on Tuesday December 10th at 6:30 the fire station and uh we have a forum and so we call me to order at 6:30 with the Pledge of

to the it stands one nation God indivisible liy and justice for all okay um do we have any amendments to the agenda um I think the Jerry if I'm correct the the pmla should be moved to Executive section yes uh we paid Family Medical Leave Act update from Jerry as tell me the number sorry number five under five and the new business a that's going to be moved to Executive session because it's technically about um Town policy related to personnel and so we have to have that discussion the exective session the front page see yeah sorry sorry I was looking at the minutes in number five and that was obviously not's gend this last week's minutes my bad no worries um but any other AD I'm loud mine's on is it sorry we're good y good all right any other amendments to the

comment up Heather just like I'm sure de Deb was picking up mine for sure but no public comment okay all righty old business um review discussion review and discussion of solid ways committee bylaws so I think we have them in our packet here we do um Deb do you want to kind of lead us on this CU I know you been the point person for that committee yeah so neither the chair the co-chair could make the meeting tonight but I said I would represent the committee um so basically um the committee had this drafted for some time but it never got finalized so my I think first meeting that I attended we had pulled it out talked through it and then modified it so I think what I should do is just read the purpose um out loud please do okay um so the committee shall recommend strategies to reduce waste tonnage through Recycling and composting programs number two determine a long-term Solid Waste plan by comparing

options in terms of environmental impacts and cost Effectiveness options not limited to those identified below maintain the status quo as of October 2024 we know the status quo is cassella continuing with cassella um basically a single Source provider um a transfer station facility owned and managed by the town of Durham C partnering with um neighboring communities for any of the options noted d town of Durham collects trash and transports it to outside facilities e residents hire their own roadside service town no longer provides roadside service so these are all options that the committee plans to discuss and um and then come up with a proos proposal to to identify to the select board the committee shall provide to the select board a cost benefit analysis of the various programs with recommendations on a TR collection program for the town of Durham uh the Committee in the next membership is the committee appoints

there are currently five voting members and there's only one Al alternate me member right now there's we really need another person even though this says two there's only one that um there's only one all right and I think the other information is just standard

me um the only thing I want to know and I'm sure they already know this but obviously a through e I'll have various um would have various implications for fiscal Noe and Staffing and stuff like that so understanding that um recommendations would still have to be approved um by the board and then put on for Warrant language and then you know if their recommendation involves adding additional staff or adding additional pickup or something like that that that's still not necessarily a guarantee and I I know they know that so definitely a lot of community involvement when when things start to uh one thing that I wanted to note that's not in this is any involvement of the solid waste committee on the transition to the automated uh process for cassella within this current 5-year contract so when you start talking about communication to the residents the problems we met with two uh Solid Waste committee members from panel

at our last meeting and they articulated some startup issues that they had a lot of lessons there that we can understand um so today the solid waste committee according to this and according to their understanding has no involvement with that transition for the town so I just wanted to note that because it's coming sooner than later we talked yesterday about you know when is that coming and you know how are we getting ready and communicating that so I guess that would be a question that I have is do do we want to utilize the solid waste committee for this but also for the way that the Conservation Commission does their education piece on resource protection and the way that the planning board does their informational hearings on the things that they do do we want to utilize a solid waste committee to do informational discussions on the transition to the automated system and if not the solid

waste committee like what's the plan for educating residents I'm not saying we necessarily have to answer that question tonight I think it's a really good question I think that's something that we need to figure out quick my answer would be no because we have less than 5 years before a decision has to be made that time goes faster all of these things take time um and uh it's not in the purview

of what we envisioned that committee doing uh and so I think that education part has to fall on us because it's going to be using uh Town resources the the website the email uh and some other things uh and some coordination uh probably with other communities about what happened and so I think that's better serve through uh through this board with everything that's inail and because it's not part of what we created this committee to do okay that makes sense do we know when the transition is happening uh right now that it is scheduled for July of 2026 oh so okay another year and a half you still got some time my to my initial thought was similar to that of Josh's but for a slightly different reason I think that um with any change there's a lot of frustration that can arise and I don't want the all Way community to be the brunt of that frustration while they're trying to work on some really collaborative hard um options elsewhere

and I feel like if we're having them look for those I can just Envision their scenario where the same meeting is them presenting all this really great work that they've done with the community to come up with options but at the same time receiving comments for what people don't like and then marrying them as that organ that committee's problem and I I feel like the town has voted to continue the direction we're going down and so if it's defending a decision that the town made or explaining the one that the town made I think it falls more on us as the elected officials than as the appointed official so that's just my thought process so okay D you can take that back to them yep Joe do you have any comments on that no no I think this is great and I I think yeah I agree to keep keep the roll out of the new process separate from the committee it's yeah keep these guys focused I think the committee will be happy to

hear that yeah I'm sure they will be yeah no I mean it's kind of set in stone where that's going to go and it's going to have some Road bumps along the way that we all have to deal with here but the committee shouldn't be bogged down in that okay with that Jerry had something sorry one thing that we're going to want to keep in mind um when we transition over is the tags will no longer be useful MH well that generates Revenue mhm so how are we going to make up for that Revenue so that'll have to I think to fall on us more so than it would a committee like that

else um just that the the committee now will put a timeline to this and you know make a strategy plan to get through this yeah my only other feedback I would give to them if you don't mind giving that is like if they're running into questions or concerns about these things to flag that for us sooner than later if they need to if they need to get in front of us for additional clearance or guidance or help or anything well one thing we do need to know I don't know who we need to reach out to but we need to understand the land that Durham owns right now and it's closest partial if you will to pel we're thinking about putting together a proposal with them and so Jerry would you suggest we've started to collect that already and it may already be put together I know uh we had a staff employee working on that I think we have a notebook in the office for those properties I think you think you could maybe uh um

get with Curtis and give him an update on on that oh absolutely the next time you meet that would be good yeah absolutely um our current our next step in uh the roll out of this Charter is we're outlining what a proposal would look like for a transfer facility just the outline and then we're going to meet assign sections to everybody because that's a big bulk of you know the work here yeah so and there may be outlines out there available for towns that have already done that so once we get going on that if I if I'm aware of that I can stop making some phone calls to my fellow Town managers that have uh built transfer facilities to see what they okay that' be great all right okay thank you yeah I just have one more thing if we're using our uh Clos the

loop or how we keep track of our task thing can we just add the pr piece of the automated roll out because if we're talking about July 2026 I think what we should do is like look at what our end date is and then back fill our calendar to make sure that we're not waiting until the last minute to do that that maybe that's a whole year before we start that conversation or maybe it's six months before but if we're no one's like putting that on our radar that could get fall off for another six months as we go into budget season and we go into all these other things that are going to come up you noing this Deb to add to the sheet thank you okay thank you yeah Deb Deb and I are going to together get that sheet up to up to snow and by that I mean Deb's going to get me up to snow then the next thing on this Jerry is I'll make sure this gets signatures and then it can be posted to the website for would you be

electronic um I do think we need to to vote to approve their uh minutes here so I feel like we've had a pretty good discussion is there a motion to approve the saw waste committee bylaws do we vote to approve it or they vote I think that we're voting to I think we vote to approve it because they written what they want to be their bylaws while they do work on a task for us and we're saying yes that's an appropriate set of

said our bylaws are to remove all trash removal and not explore anything else we'd say well we don't want the committee working we might say we don't want the committee working on that you know I'd like to make a motion to accept the charter as written for the solid waste committee I have a motion from Deb do I have a second second for discussion I'm not trying to be nitpicky can we capitalize by at the top yep please capital and is bylaws one word or two words

it so discussion one one of the reasons I said I don't think we should be we need to approve this so if you look at the last line it could be amended by three fifths of the committee M so if they can amend it they should be approving it and I don't think that so would would you want that lint line Struck from the their bylaws I wouldn't because I I don't think it's appropriate for us to to do it I think we said this is what we want for this committee and they set their bylaws and

if they don't do what we're doing we change their purpose or we disband it um but that's just me that's that's Theo I I think they should be the ones approving it not discussion I'm actually somewhat in agreement with that my only concern is if we're if we're tasking with a committee to be formed and then saying they're going to make their own bylaws and go their own way if if if that committee's bylaws are out of line with the task that we intend I think that there's value on us saying here's we're approving the bylaws that you've brought to us I think that the purpose is what the select board actually wanted them to go do and that their bylaws are the rest of it that they're going to go and do all this these these things

so you can kind of say that the the purpose the committee you know a through e is what their what their what their task was from us but even with like committee membership like we dictated when we appointed them five voting members and two alternates so like yeah and we haven't yeah in the past we haven't voted you know to accept these bylaws at the yeah I don't I haven't been here when we've created a new committee so I'm not sure just do the one for this area in town and you didn't approve I mean I mean it doesn't really matter yeah but I don't think that approving bylaws for the committee is able

and have the um town look into it Council look into it so we have a don't think it's worth spending money on an attorney to what if I my assumption is that the solid waste committee feels like they want this from us that they want us so rather than us saying we approve like approve this it could just we could acknowledge that we are like it has our stamp of approval for them to vote to an act and accept in their committee I'm I'm comfortable with that like I completely hear what Josh is saying I also hear what you're saying I don't I agree that I don't think I want to spend money on the attorney well looking at whether or not we because like we didn't do the solid waste committee like Josh is saying the historic district commission is part of ordinance language we don't have a uniform way that we go about doing this right I understand that but just because we haven't done it doesn't mean we we

should have and so I I don't what if as long as I don't care what we do tonight and if people want to retract the motion we want to vote on it that's fine but I I am going to request that we get clear uh guidance from legal counsel because I do think that there is an implication between us saying we want a committee formed and then we're not going to tell you what to do you create your own bylaws and those could be completely counter to what we want them to do and then we're disbanding them and or versus us saying come up with a set of bylaws and then we'll we'll approve it I know the ad committee presented bylaws in in writing to us as well so I just want to make sure that we're consistent and we're doing what we're supposed to and if we if we have a difference in opinion I think it's important we just get it clarified so if just for now we just need to say things for the bylaws were good um that works for me I just have it

part of the meeting minutes that we agreed content withdraw your motion can I just make one other comment one other thing that we could say if what our intent is is the purpose right that's the part that we want to govern and then the way that they handle their meetings we feel less strongly about the way that they handle their meetings the it there could be a provision that says can be amended by three fifths of the voting membership to exclude article two because that's the part that we establish their task right again this but this only is relevant if we're supposed to vote to approve them and if we don't know if we're supposed to or not I would just ask that we ask um the town lawyer to get that answer for us so yeah I will actually call MMA on this one so we don't okay yeah cuz I I I understand Josh's point I understand my point I don't know the right answer and so okay so for tonight let's

retract just acknowledge that we're in agreement with the content of the you withdraw your motion that works for me and then if we have to we agree with the content and if we actually are supposed to vote to approve it we can do that at a later date so good works for me um we've move all right so any other old business I don't see any moving into new business we've already moved that agenda item um old business oh no new business sorry we're going into new business we've moved that agenda item to Executive session and then now we just have a discussion on replacing the town server um Jerry sent us along the paperwork for the town server uh and we briefly talked about it last week and then or yeah last week no last meeting um and then he followed up by email with the recommendation from the uh IT company as to the implications of not replacing the server sounds like it's 7 years old yes yeah and that there's some

some issues here um and it's beyond its useful life at this point and it's also the operating system itself is nearing the end of support which means that once it gets the end of support there would not be tech support for issues with it and so um that's why they're recommending the replacement um Jarry did you have anything you want to add on it no so essentially well yes so essentially what I'm asking we're going to have to replace this server at some point so we have a little bit of oper funds left to help supplement the cost of this if you want to use those oper funds I need to have authorization to sign to replace the server and we can do it at any point from this point forward so and then we can supplement it with your Telecom reserves that you have um yeah which is you know plentiful yeah Telecom reserves is a little over 88,000 right now essentially what you're doing is if if you don't authorize it we're

going to give that money back to the feds and I don't think that's what you want to do no so to not give it back to the feds we just have to have something signed before December 31st I'd make a motion that we uh purchase the new server as recommended using the ARA money uh primarily and then supplementing it with the telecom's budget line I'll second that I have a motion by Josh and a second by Joe any other

favor of the motion any opposition seeing none it passes unanimously and we are done with that okay um next on our agenda is the Duram historic district commission uh discussion uh and update regarding the architectural survey would you like to come on up and we all know you but we need you to say your name and and who you are for the for the people at home and you just got to press the button so you get the light turned on there where it says switch uh yep and feel free to have anyone from your board that's here tonight answer or participate in this um if we have questions and you want them to answer to as well thank you my name is David M Vice chair of the dur historic district commission sitting in tonight for Lo she's usually here but she's unavailable so happy to jump in help and happy to just connect with this group um Joe do you want to kick this off you want me kind of give a brief i' love it if you

gave a brief status quo uh or status quo status update uh and just let us know what you're looking for from us and and the work you've done so far absolutely um so as you know there are some questions that we sort of posed and I recognize more detailed and there to dive into so we've done some work to try to fill into those gaps of best practices and the recommendation um my goal for this conversation is really just make sure we're all on the same page I think a fear of the group is that we would do a lot of work just to find out the research we did in the line of the goals that we select for for this uh architectural survey um simply put there's a lot of

questions around scope because this could be this could be as big as you want it to be or as narrow as he wanted it to be part of our research since our last historic district commission meeting has been to talk to some contract at least one contract in area that I personally have worked with through my business here in dur was a historic home advisor and has worked with the towns of Yarmouth and bodm doing similar architectural servings and I'll give two examples of scope um one Yarmouth had about 800

properties to look at uh that were at least 50 years old that's the industry standard is a 50e Mark um which maybe isn't what someone would expect but as I point out to someone in 25 years so 50 years ago it be 1974 doesn't seem that old right now but if you do an activity like this say every 10 or 25 years 1974 actually starts to feel kind of old right this is just a snapshot as we go along that particular project that erth did using volunteer base to get the work done odham had a smaller number of properties and they contracted the professional to do all of the work currently with main historic preservation this work is archived at the state level through a application called karma c a r m a is the acronym

and I have it in my notes Here what that stands for but for all intent purposes is an online database you can research it right now you can actually see a number of properties in Durham that are already registered there but it's pretty clear when you look at the map that Durham has not done the work that other towns have done to keep a regular AR of our historic problems so um forgive me I want to make sure I say this right because our group did have an opportunity to put some language forward that our group over emails able to approve all agree on simply

suggest is a budget of similar to a yarm did and this is with the knowledge that Durham currently according to our town assessor has approximately 340 properties homes that are listed as 50 years old or older scale question that's about half by the way of what um yarn and that budget is based on sort of a

building a building can be a home a barn it could be a historic marker it could be a pound it can be a number of different things and so I think that scope and scale we want to make sure that your interests are being roped in with this also Geographic interests we wanted to make sure that we weren't just looking at the durm historic district as an example right that's a very different project with the very few number of homes in our current District versus looking at the town as a whole so what I've suggested with that number I just threw out on the table here will the whole town There's a quick status update I encourage uh I should check in group thumbs up close enough we get three thumbs up from the two of them okay we're making four thumbs up

check in and I have some notes here just to check in on sort of like more detailed questions but that's the gist of what we have right now um so you said that Yarmouth did theirs volunteer so the Prof price go to I should I should clarify that the professional organizes the volunteer Corp to go out and do the more labor intensive work of taking photographs so so this particular contractor I talk to she trains everyone on the photography the paperwork how to fill it out the right questions to ask I should also note this is a reconnaissance survey which basically and for all intent purposes we're looking for the outside no one's going into anybody's home we're not looking at insides of homes it's just outside photograph and there's a formal document that's filled out that takes time the professional takes all that information organizes it and inputs it into car that's where their time is being paid for they it would be way out

of scope to pay for their hours to go to all 350 properties F out and frankly she's not interested I want Crystal Clear we did not ask for quotes we did not ask for bids this was simply just conversations and this is one person so I do believe there's a step here where we need to be talking to more people is is 50 years the average threshold that other towns use the industry standard industry stand as defined by main historic preservation as defined by national registers hisor places the point that which a property could become eligible for the historic um register okay so then Duram would have a register of all historic or mean they're on the register it means that we're aware of it so to be on the national register requires a much bigger threshold so in effort of work so the the benefit of doing the survey is that we would have a database if you will of all of these 50

year an older so do you mind if I respond no go for it so one thing I have up here is a piece of documentation from Main historic preservation and it really says why do an architectural survey all and the bullet point list is to document the built environment of the town at a particular point in time so imagine taking you know the 10,000 foot view of time you're taking a picture of in 2025 this is what Durham is 2050 this

is what Durham is we look back you know that in 1975 this is what Durham was so a historian has a formal record to understand the longitudinal view of where people lived worked and built the community to identify um built environment from previous time periods to identify properties and Landscapes that contribute to the character of the town so that's part of the paperwork is was the stepen king house right is that relevant do we care if the answer is yes then you might want to take future action but now there's a formal record of that story and that old

property with the record commission does not talk about step King's house brought that up on top of my head as um to identify properties or areas worth of preservation either through owner encouragement Town ordinances or financial support to identify properties or District eligible for listing on the national register to help prioritize and plan for Town growth and development so that last one is where we want to make sure this group is getting what you need because as we understand this has been referenced in town planning documents yeah so that was actually the point that I was going to bring up when we're talking about the why of this in 2018 when we did the comp plan it was identified as a gap in our planning um tools that we don't have a

historical or architectural survey um so right out of the comp plan it says the lack of adequate prehistoric or historic AR archaeological surveys in durm means that there may be significant historic and archaeological resources that may be dis disturbed by new development before they can be properly identified and protected and then it goes on to say that you know in in terms of and then pages of all the reasons why if we don't have a database of the information we have no way to move forward like planning and protecting if we don't even know what we've got so very welome thank you yeah

but I didn't think we were doing ar ar archaeological survey which is a different part of karma are you doing all of it or just the architectural so that's part of our question right so is it both or just one I me this is huge task I'm just looking at their forms you're about to go fill out at 350 locations that see that's exactly right hug huge I also want to clarify that the durm historic district commission has not express an opinion or taking a vote on who the volunteer core would be we are not assuming that our small position would be this identified volunteers because it is a big undertaking um it is labor intensive it's why you hire a professional to organize it it's not like I can just I wouldn't know how to do it personally and you need someone that's done this professionally and has the qualifications to do it right so that you do it right the first time and that 25 years from now you have a good sound

product you look back and know what it do are you aware I'm just and this could just be one of the many crazy ideas I have but are you aware of anyone ever integrating this into their Town reevaluation cuz in a year there's going to be someone looking at every single building in town and taking photos and figuring out how old they are and all that sort of stuff but I'm not necessarily saying prolong that but I wonder if just there's a way to marry this because it's like if we're already going to have a company that's out there doing it and how do you say that too like if they're going to go to a 50y old building can we just slide that piece of paperwork I mean not that I'm trying I know we have a scope of work with them but it's one of those things that I'm just like if I have to imagine they're Gathering a lot of same information that you're going to we would need for this and they're taking photos and they're

going intense and if it's just like if it's from 1964 74 or earlier can you can you gather this information or can we see that and discern that from from the I just I'm a great brainstorm here the answer is I don't know yeah and I think it's a great question I think it would be worth our commissioner's time to research that question and I think it's possible to do so hether I think the purpose that I think that it's important for the historic district commission and also for our board to be on the same page about what it is that we're asking from them right now and so my understanding is that what we are trying to do is have a number or

numbers um to be able to go into budget season with so that we can plan for that accordingly yeah I get that and then Teeter out what the what the what particulars of how this is going to be done and that type of stuff is so I I get that but my the reason I was asking that question is because if the if it's a simple call to the the people who do the Ral and they say oh yeah we've done this four people at the same time it's no extra work for us I wouldn't want us to budget money if we're we can already get it or if it's a yeah we can adjust the scope of work and we it wouldn't be that much more expensive so I just want to get that information too before a budget typee thing if something you all can so a question that I like to have that person that told you about yarou 800 properties Bingham with volunteer B you know whatever if the leg work was done by the reval company this person still has to

compile all that information enter that into the karma database I'm assuming that that's what the fee is if the volunteers are the ones that are doing the field work and the training in the organization of theming and that's organization is a big piece because the way she's done it in the past is bict the town by neighborhoods and identify volunteers tied to that neighborhood so that's a process that seems like a task in itself um I think it's a good question yeah I

don't this is what I wanted to achieve from this meeting ideas like that because you're right you don't want to double the labor double the cost well I just hate for us to budget for it do it and then the very next year someone goes on and collects all the same exact information that we've already budgeted to pay for elsewhere I know it could potentially move the timeline and we want to be sensitive of that I think it's just a useful thing to figure out before what is the expectation of timeline to to actually execute the architectural survey yeah go ahead Josh I don't think there is one I think so the email says that the select board identified this as a top four priority but it was presented to us as a commission's priority and so well it's in our Charter to oversee it over time and so our expectation was the commission would go out develop a budget which entails developing a plan yeah and

coming to us with that plan and that we could then say this is something cost effective we should include in the budget or this is cost prohibitive we need to figure out something else and send it back to you so we don't I I mean this list of questions I think is outside the scope of what we we can do I my just to be clear you're talking about like do we include barns like that was the question like is this inclusive of reconnaissance or my expectation was we would be presented by from the commission a this is the budget we think is appropriate and needs to be budgeted for this work here's the scope of the work and where that money's going and here's what I can say industry standard what I see across these other towns what I've heard from Main preserv historic preservation is this architectural survey 50 years or older it's inclusive

of homes barns out buildings so that we or School houses right would be an example in our town um and the number I put down that approximately 10,000 is an appropriate number when not receiving grants by the way so I should Circle back on that in a second that would be a total cost for that scope of work for dur as it is right now to the best of our knowledge and that at least answer your core question like there's other stuff we could suggest but I don't that's not my expectation was you would come in here with a budget and explain the budget so that we could then include it in the

town budget that we're proposing okay and use your explanation of that budget to present it to the the towns people um at our budget meetings at a public meeting at the town meeting and so I expect to see you know I I had expected to see that in writing with some some details um but I think I think

generally it it answers the question so what I said verbally if that was in writing on paper would that meet your expectation I were you expecting more or less detail I'm expecting a detail for us to go to be able to justify the town's people because you know there are a number of people who don't want to see the budget go up this is not something that's been budgeted in the past so it will increase the budget unless we like like for example we have addressed the why of someone why any town does so from

from my read of it um you know initially I thought we you were going to the the meeting tonight was going to be we need you to answer all these questions so I'm really happy that you're coming in and saying based off of the homework we've done and based off the research we've done we think that this is an appropriate scope cuz we don't we would have to go through a whole process to determine that I think what would be important though and I think from my take of what you're doing is just verbally make sure we're on the same page and then you can compile what we would want what would be important for me to see is you know just this explanation out on paper you know this is what other communities have and what other communities have done 50 years is the industry standard cuz like when I hear 50 years I'm like that's not that old my House was built in 1965 and it's covered in vinyl sighning it's got solar

panels on the roof like that's that's not an old house you know um and so highlighting what that would include two things I want to know is do you count a structure if only part of it is 50 years or older so I have an extension that's from 2000 so does my whole house count like those are the things that I think would be important for us to see because those are the questions we're going to get and then um the the whole why uh you've explained it to us tonight but I think a written proposal as to to why and then where a number like $10,000 comes from and um how and like you've

said to us you know this would involve hiring a contractor who does the volunteer coordination who does the training and that sort of thing those are things that having them like laid out for us to like tangibly hold and go over when we're doing a planning or or asking people to include I think is important for me to see um but I appreciate the verbal description tonight for sure if I just respond quickly yeah um yeah great I think that's achievable I wanted I love your example of the 1965 house with solar pan on it I think what you could imagine the volunteer would take a picture of your house it would document okay built in 65 but it has solar panels it has an extension and what so what value is that well 50 years from now when the historian comes around and is trying to figure out you know valuing different properties on a historic nature they can quickly see okay wait it's built in 65

but actually it's a 2018 installation and what we've done is we've taken you off the list of consideration because I just quickly looked at the karma thing here and one of the things I just clicked on is like they're like this is a house but it was siding was updated in 2020 and the roof was done in this so I read that and there it sounds like they're saying this is old but not special you know and that's important right cuz that informs when you have to do a development to make a change okay yeah it's old it's not special yeah like someone Somebody went through and took the picture and documented it at the state level so that there's no question because I think a big red flag is where people get concerned and I expressed this from things I've heard from other people is the idea of like someone's going to come to my house it's my house is old they're going to take a photo and then all of a

sudden I can't you know put my solar panels on or I can't fix my windows the way I want even though my doesn't look old and so that's these are the things that we just need to make sure are communicated in the intent and scope yeah sort of almost the national register versus like our register different right you don't just end up on the national register by accident you you no it's totally fine I just want to make sure that every know talk okay oh I know what happen I see they gave me the M now it's a whole new um okay so we

were talking about things that would be important for when you come back that we would like to see and what I would like to see is you talked about Yarmouth with the volunteer base and you've given us a a number attached to if volunteers are doing that and I know um from conversations with other commission members uh pitsburgh did theirs and they had a very strong core of volunteers that made it possible for them to do this right and so what I would like to also know vo time did theirs with just the professional doing it and it would be important for me to know what that would look like um and that could potentially become a reason why your recommendation as a commission may be to go volunteer base or to go professional it's important for us to know what those point of references are to be able to know where we stand in terms of what we're going to present so I'd like to reiterate I've only talked to one

contractor this much depth if that one contractor I can question on their perspective bham had less than 100 properties she is unwilling to do money couldn't buy you couldn't pay her enough to do more than 80 to 100 properties simply put that I see so it's not an option with that person to go professional they're just they're just not interested I mean just frankly they get enough work doing more interesting things a waste our time ter opportunity cost too I'm sure yeah exactly it's just not it's not the right choice for that one individual I need to look in the PSB I think you said they were volunteer that was my and can I just bring up one more point so I'm bringing everything back to the comp plan right and so to U when we were talking about whose responsibility is what and what the timeline looks like I think it's really important for people to keep coming back to our governing document which is the

comp plan 2.2 seek fun comprehensive list of potential sites who's responsible for that taask GP Cog and the town planner time frame midterm that's a 3 to 5e timeline that was from 2018 the challenge with the comp is we do have to acknowledge that covid for two years does extend some of those um those work with the main historic preservation commission to assess the need for a comprehensive Community survey of the community's historic and archaeological resources who's responsible GP Cog historic district commission short term that's one to two years no 3.2 if if the need is confirmed

which I I think we're I okay we're discussing if there's a need I mean in my brain there is because how do we make proper planning documents if we don't know what we have who's responsible GP Cog midterm so I think this is a wonderful resource and tool to recognize

what the town voters have voted on and who they feel responsible and what the timeline is that they voted to put on these things I do think the caveat of Co is appropriate when adjusting the timeline on some of those things because yeah not the comp plan kind of got put on doing things get put on hold when we're just trying to figure out how to exist for two years so I think but I think that that means it's an appropriate time to consider it now because of the the you know that little lag there um my biggest point in all that is that GP cob is listed on all three of those as the responsible party and I'm wondering what conversations have had been had with GP cob in terms of what their resource is available to us I'm sorry GP caner Port

Council of governance it's the town of Duram PID dues to be part of GP very and they they were the ones who facilitated our compant and they're listed as the responsible party on all three of those tasks so I think that's worth a phone call G engagement with them they may actually ask a contractors they yeah and I think that that's an important thing now obviously no one's going to engage with GP Cog without us saying hey we got to go engage with GP Cog but I think flagging that as a potential um you know we've been leaning on excuse me GP Cog for a lot of stuff because that that's what they're there for so they're really have they're a location where they have people with tons of Municipal experience a lot of like former managers um planners stuff like that and there's just a set of services that they can provide to us um facilitation services and then a variety of other things that they already provide as part of their

dues but also then and they have access to some Community grants that as individuals we wouldn't be as an individual town we might struggle to get so I think it would be important to connect you you all with GP Cog to discuss this survey more um Jo for

clarity you would reach out to GP Cog I I I will send an email Jerry and I will send an email to gpcog saying we want to make the connection with you all to facilitate discussions around these surveys cuz they usually have a lot of contacts on and it may be the same person you've already talked to but they have a lot of context on who does what and who can just service things you know perfect can talk about plant yes please I want just mention that uh in our in my research um Augusta does grants for towns just

like us you have to apply for them applications I believe are due by October so we've missed it for this year as we thinking about timeline it could be I think they're 703 GRS so so reasonably we have a $10,000 budget Durham may only have to pay 3,000 for that type of work if we get one of those GRS and so it's I think another piece of this puzzle that our historic district commission needs to disc has been discussed in this process but that might be part of our suggestion of time line this happens and I don't know how that works with budgeting from proposing it in the budget if you have to propose 10,000 hope for a grant or if you want to propose assuming we get a grant I

don't think we would prop budget something assuming we would get a grant it would be a budget item for the cost and then the hope would be to off to to offset that and then if you get the grant then at the end of the year there's 7,000 kind of coming back into the town's um coffers there but that's an important important thing to think about um you know in a perfect world you know you're going to get the Grant and then we can budget just for the matching amount but right um it's not a perfect so yeah um my question to you mentioned

something so obviously when you say um it could include pounds you mean like old cattle pounds yeah and then I thought you said something about markers does that include any old historic markers like those are and and if we don't know about those it's not like someone's just driving around and taking a picture every granite rock that they see and asking there a marker it could be a and that's what I'm trying yeah yes that was part of my reason bring this up that's part of the reason the questions came out in the first place was this question of scope you know by by the

facto you asking a question I think it means we're thinking about these things from a town planning point of view it's probably important we are considering this so that could change the budget scope I need to go back and do a bit more research right this was based on just basically houses and bars I would have some more work to do and I could figure out some range of Heather my so this is where our board relies on your recommendation as the Professionals in historic preservation right that if your commission feels it's important for more than just farms and structures to be

listed or to be cataloged then you would make that recommendation to us and we have a discussion and decide if we agree or not but what we're looking for from you is what your commission's recommendation would be on whether or not it should include everything or just structures and bars well that's what I was just about to say so like what I'm hearing tonight is like we we have this sheet of um main historic preservation commission and it's got all these points about what a survey is and all that sort of stuff already questions you've answered for me is it sounds like you're talking about under D under Section D it says you know there's reconnaissance survey or an intensive and it sounds like the recommendation from the theam historic district commission is a reconnaissance survey and so that's exactly because like if if you were asking us to say answer all these questions for us the response is go home

and do the homework and then come back and make recommendations so I think what would be important for me in terms of seeing a budget rough budget you've done some really great work coming back with all of this document all these questions answered as in like you know you know we already have the why we already have the who but you would fill in you know coordinated by a professional done by volunteers or if the option to do it with the uh re-evaluation people is an option that's where it would come in there um what can be recorded that's going to be really important and then when we get over here on the other side here you know identifying the geographic area the recommendation from you whole town that's what it sounds like um defining the goals reconnaissance survey figuring out what's 50 years old and older and if that warrants being considered historic is what I'm hearing but we want to see that written out um

time period letting us know what your recommended time period is level of survey sounds like this reconnaissant survey but if you just bring us back a document that mirrors this and says here's our recommendations and here's the cost and then you know there's also maybe these grant opportunities maybe that that's that's what I need to see and the why why the front the front half so we can defend that can you give me some boundaries of size of this recommendation why two pages or less five pages or less it doesn't matter it does it doesn't matter got real long real fast careful it doesn't matter all I'm based and off of cuz I I am not a historic preservation commission person is this document that was sent to us um I think it was back in September it just says planning the architectural survey in your community and it's Parts one Parts two yeah I'm familiar this has this has the outline just

answers to these and so if it's just looks like this and it provides the answers that's the kind of thing that I'm I'm looking for I Am Fam with this got right here so we've all agreed this is important and our next budget our recommendation is going to be for 18 months right starting January no what's the start of starting starting January 1st 2025 running through June 30th 2026 is our recommendation uh so um if we're going

to put this in our budget quickly so we need you to get all this worked up quickly can you give me a deadline so well we're starting we're starting our budget conversations to be in January well next week December 17th is when we're going to have our initial sit down with Jerry and the department heads to say here's the direction we want you to start planning and things you want to start including uh into the budget planning process and then starting in January we're going to start um framing out what a budget might look like with the goal of handing a budget to the uh budget committee the first week of February for their review so it it is admittedly a very tight turnaround time but if this is one item in one line plugging that in is is something that we can discuss and doing up until we hand it over in February so it would be a very quick and I'm also in support of putting this in yeah uh but if

we put it in I want to make sure that the commission gets us this information because I'm not going to create it MH uh and we we found it important it was presented us to us as important to the commission we've agreed we agreed back in in May and here we are December so you know I'll I'll I'll put

it in and I'll ask for it if if Jerry doesn't put it in um but only if you're going to say we can get this to you by you know mid January so that we can mid January was what I was thinking is probably reasonable and then ultimately after we adopt our budget and present it to the budget committee the budget committee will put us kind of in the hot and ask a bunch of questions of us and and that's where we need to know the why and so if if we don't know the why it might get to a situation where the budget committee doesn't have this recommended and the select board does and then it we don't like having those disagreements when we get there um I'm inclined if this is all put out well to include it on the budget because it's something that the community has identified interest and ultimately this the community as a whole gets a vote on this come April um but yeah we will need that mid January yeah I I will tell you

that I will support it 100% until we vote on our recommended budget at the end of January and we don't have the information from from the committee that's at which at which point I will I I won't support it Jerry did did you have I saw your hand go up yeah I just have a couple questions I mean this has been a great conversation um but we do have a district so would this include properties in the district because I don't think a lot of us know what's a contributing property in the district now and what is what we propose is inclusive of the district by default of looking at the whole town okay is that a good place to start so when because the concern is when an application gets pulled in the district the left hand doesn't really know what the right hand's doing in that case so two separate discussion right so the the archaeological survey architectural sorry architectural trust me I miss up M up words all the

time it says Arch it's AR I think it's Tech I've been saying architectural but this is part comp plan in well in the comp plan it says historic and archaeological yeah because it's inclusive of buildings but also includes other nonbuilding structures yeah but the key I think to your point what we're not discussing right now is the bylaws around historic district that's not even the discussion right now this is separate where we're just identify properties across the town and by default you'll probably find the district properties are all going to come up as they already a lot of them are showing up on this thing already because of their protected status within our town is I I think they're already there I think I think I agree because I think the contributing resource in the historic district is a gigantic question I think that's a policy question that

right now the way the ordinance reads says everything over there is a contributing structure and we have to figure out through what the attorney is doing in terms of the ordinance I think these are two totally different conversations yeah yeah know I'm saying I think I think it's different because there is ordinance language that I already identifies them as contributing structures and if that's going to change I don't think it's the I think the information leads to the planning documents of whether or not that's I think that these are separate and they can be treated totally separately because if anything were to come out of this and with the suggestion of adding or removal of a status that would modify our land use ordinance we regardless of these results we would have to have a separate land use ordinance vote absolutely to to do that so I I'm not I'm not thinking I'm thinking that these

are totally different things and we just we focus on whether we want the architectural survey we budget or not separately we're working on the issues with the the ordinance you know cuz we right now we do know is just it's messy with the ordinance side of things but this I think this is just a different story but that's another reason to do this right to be able to create a planning document around that conversation we can't have that conversation without the information so that's another why as to why this is necessary would actually show you that District compared even Steven with everything else in our town you would have some some apples to apples comparison through the karma program I recognize I've taken a lot of your time that's right say thank you for this um this was a really productive conversation so I just want to make sure we're clear we're doing an architectural survey I think actually it's here

iological is the word we should be using but I would say let's hold on that until I actually write it down the formal recommendation I think our group can better research exactly what we suggest and we'll just want that language right cuz this document here says architectural survey but it sounds like what you're saying is if the scope might include import markers or something like that maybe it's called there might be two numbers right there might be exactly there might be two numbers that and then we can decide we can decide at that point based on their recommendation Does it include everything or is it just buildings and structures I agree so it's a tight turnaround January is crazy for us because we are in full budget swing and so the the not that I wouldn't

expect you all to be prepared but the more you know dotted ey eyes and cross Tes you have the easier the process will go for us and so we can tentatively put you on the schedule for our second January meeting if you if you run into issues before that and you're like this is going to be preventing us from being able to talk to you about that um let us know and we'll get you in sooner but we have two meetings in January right now I don't think we might have to discuss adding an extra because of stuff but the sooner the better on this so um and if you're done if you're ready to go our by our first January meeting even better um and I don't know I know if you have nothing going on on Christmas morning and you can crank this out that's worse um but I get it you know that also means that you and Jerry have to send an email quickly yeah we we'll do it to we can I just this doesn't have to be a discussion okay but what Joe is bringing

up and is important the main historic preservation commission this says planning an architectural survey yeah and then our document says historic and archaeological so I think defining what that means through them versus what GP Cog meant by this is important

yeah and that's what they're going to do I think I think the GP C link is important Jerry we can email GP hog think that's probably the counterbalancing resource we're going to go to for quick results and and input on that um yeah and we we're going to try and make it work for the next budget cycle if hiccups pop up they pop up we'll figure how to best proceed so well one of my best takeways from this is that I didn't say anything that made anyone think we were crazy so that's really good I hope we didn't say anything any either so what I mean by that is like it sounds like we're relatively on the same page when we put this forward we we're not out of scope from your expectations no I actually find it very helpful that you brought some you brought some scope in tonight because I thought we were going to have to tell you come back later you know sure so appreciate that do you have what you need from us yeah

we have a meeting on Thursday okay our team's going to debrief on Thursday no doubt I imagine Lois is probably watching from the eye in the sky which is important and that the whole group understands what was said I'll let you know after we have a chance to debrief if we I do plan to attend the meeting so oh lovely yeah good to have you

think that are we going to connect with the reevaluation um folks just to have a conversation about this effort and whether there's some connections there at least make them aware get their input the folks who are going to do the reevaluation that a question to Jerry yeah I I mean that wouldn't be appropriate for Dave to call them that would that's I'm saying right right kind like I think as much as important as GP Cog I think just having that conversation with those folks because they could bring up yeah we did that in three other towns and we just added new form and let me talk to your commission and we can you know that would be great I think that would be really beneficial so we only have three points of contact at this point already independent contractor greater Portland and our um what do you say they were call not re re the reevaluation and what you're really looking for is the age of the building

well we know the ages of the building already Town assessor has that she already sent it to me which is great it's do are they willing to do the karma paperwork or a minimum gather the information needed go into the right at least so they understand what it is that this side the only reason I brought that up is I would imagine it's they're Gathering that I would imagine that they're Gathering the information already based off of their description to us of what they gather during the reial CU they're looking at what the roofing is what the siding is what the internal whatever is um so I'm I'm guessing if they do do this it'll come at a cost and you want to know it it might just mean it might just mean that when they're looking all the paperwork if the building is 50 years older it meets the criteria they put that stuff in a bin and then all that over it over if they know we have 350 buildings and they just say all right

this coordinator we just hand you our files for those 350 bildings we're not doing anything else we're just sending you a copy of them and they say all right yeah we're seeing here that it's metal roofing from the last 10 years it's you know siding that's new right so the is there any way we can take advantage let me just make sure I'm so the assessor would already know the age of the buildings right right right so she could file she could have that the assessor sent me a spreadsheet of the ages of every building in this town that's how I got to 340 and you're just looking for somebody to fill out the paperwork no so let let me I'm trying yeah so the they the karma paperwork you have to fill out the paperwork and then enter it into the the web page for the viewer um what I was just noting is that the paperwork that they're going to need to fill out there's a pretty good chance the information that goes into that that

populates that is already going to be collected during the assessing process so rather than asking the assessor to fill out anything in karma or whatever if you just have the 350 properties already listed that are 50 years or older and we just say when you write your assessing report can you just send the copies of your report for each of these 350 properties to the Durham historic district commission and that fund fee funds that we generate might just pay that person to then fill out the data sheets and put them in and you're okay with getting that in 2027 it would be it would be later but it would be very my thought processes I I would hate for us to budget to do something now and then in 2027 someone else goes out and takes the exact same measurements exact same photos and all that sort of stuff and that's and your recommendation might come back and say that's too late but I just wanted to put

that out there cuz we got to be mindful of the fiscal note here because we know we're not going to get that from the reevaluation until 2027 right we know that right now tonight right yeah and so if you're comfortable with a 2-year weight right and knowing that a building professional of some sort is taking all those measurements and all that stuff that's just something to think about it's just the art of the possible like what what criteria are they capturing part of the possible what maybe there's May question before right right right maybe there's two three other pieces of information that you need for this that they could just tack on it's just having a conversation with them it's a timing thing really it is that's all it is I just hate for your volunteer to be out there taking a picture of the building as the assessor out there taking a picture of the building Runing everything down you know

right so we just need to know if they're willing to identify and then pass that information on I'm sure they will in 2027 and if that will come at a cost because that is one more step they could say that they'd have to pull those files out there'd be a nominal cost or whatever we can just find out and so I want that to be an option because it's also important for the the community who has to vote to pay for all this to know well if we want it might be an option of if we want it now it's $10,000 or we can get it for $5,000 in two years and that's an important option to put out there J could you add the question of do they offer a service line for for archaeological survey okay like perhaps it's an off-the-shelf thing they can do that just comes at a cost I would have to imagine that it's it's something in there you know right because it's like you said it's not moreth they could they could charge $7,000 for that service and

then literally just make an extra $7 they already did the work but it's cheaper for us right don't have to go through all the I I want to wrap this up because we I think we've got a lot of enthusiasm and we've answered a lot of questions is there anything else you need from us I'll tell you what we're going to do is we're going to email GP Cog tomorrow and then get an email out to the assessing company to figure out what their option is knowing that that's a 2027 option that's what we're going to do is there anything else you need from us or do you feel like you understand your charge from

right awesome thank you so much for your time thank you this was really helpful looking forward to getting something to you by MH that's perfect thank you and if you run any issues just shoot us an email we'll do all right um we don't have any other old business on here um we have a couple and it seems like or any other new business that it seems light but we do have a couple things we're going to discuss in um executive session so I wanted to just move into manager report if there's no other new business just reminder if people had new business they are allowed to introduce it from the floor we've learned that from our lawyer but we're going to try to avoid doing that but I just wanted to make sure people still remember they can so manager report maner report all right well thank you for that um so there is a Christmas tree in the town office that we actually call The Giving Tree MH so there are tags on it for uh folks

residents in derms where you can buy gifts for their children so just want folks to know that it's in there and they can walk in anytime and pick a tag and and go shopping and and help when do people need to have those uh gifts returned by 16th the 16th yeah about a dozen tags still on the street all right perfect okay so there's that

um on the 19th we are having a 2hour holiday launch staff so we'll be closing the office from 11:30 to 1:30 and uh you all are welcome to join us if you would like to show what time 11 from 11:30 to 1:30 on uh Thursday the

like last year you made a note about that about the congregation of Select board members at something like that if is that something that we need to no you you all can go as long as you're not all gather over in the corner and discussing stuff you can mingle with so that's just one thing I just want us to always be mindful cuz like I know there's been times where three or more of us have been at a me meeting and we've always sat separately which I think is important so just a reminder if we get there we don't want there any to be any perception that it's a a board meeting happening or or discussions amongst board members outside of that so not that I think anyone would do that but I just want to make sure we all are on the same page yep um the Eureka doors have been ordered um they're supposed to come in sometime in January and they're going to try to get them in as soon as possible give you an update on

that um junkyard hearings have you all ever done the junkyard hearings you don't have to the way it's written in the um ordinances that you may so Allan's already renewed them but he wants to know if you want to have a hearing you can have a hearing you do that as part of your regular select board meeting and you'd open up the hearing and if there were people then to to to say something you could hear it out and I'll get you but I have a question it's up to you folks if you want to do it so clarification question on that this is just people have a junkyard and they've received approval on it and this would this would be if we wanted to to have a hearing where if anyone had something to share right but an issue with a junkyard or something they could come in so this would be like if a Community member I'm sure there's times where they just say I don't like the looks of it or whatever okay come in and then you can

you know their concern might not be your concerned or I don't recall ever doing one since you don't have to but Alan wanted you to know if you wanted to have one we we need to schedule it okay anyone have any thoughts on

to have that opportunity um for people to be able to come in I think that sometimes you know maybe they were approved to be of a certain nature and as time goes on they expand or maybe fencing gets dilapitated or you know whatever and I know that people can always go in and talk to the code enforcement officer but I do think having that opportunity to voice their opinion or their concern um I I think that it should exist and we have never really had a conversation around the policy regarding jump yards um I think it gives us an opportunity to do that also my my question about this I just want to make sure we're respectful of people is what if there's a situation where someone comes forward at a public meeting they're like so and so's junkyard is terrible and we find out that that's not a um permanent junkyard and now that person's kind of been put on blast in front of the community I I understand that that's an issue if we

have unlicensed junkyards but I just don't love that presentation of it so I don't know if we have any you know they're only going to be discussing the ones that we set so it's only hey now it's open discussion on this one boom now it's open discussion on this one boom and I'm assuming it's all of them not just singular ones there you know so

if we're going to hear on one we're going to hear on all of them I think I think that's up for us to two of them there's only two of them only two there's only two junkyards in town according to Allan yes and and he's already approved them he right that's up to you folks he just wants to know that you are that you have that say you have that Authority you can hold a hearing if you want if you don't don't wouldn't those generally be held before approval though is he asking about going forward since he's already approved them for this year he he has felt like you haven't had junkyard hearings so he has time frames every year to get this sort of done so he so he has not approved him yet and he wants to know if we want to have a hearing before you approve I think what he wants you folks to hear is if people have complaints about these junkyards and then you do something about he's already approved them then no sense in having a

hearing because you don't want to hear what other people have to say about J well that's what the hearing is about but we can't revoke it after he's approved it they only get a year approval though we had the hearing then the next year you have the hearing before he approves and then that's more valid if you do it after the fact then save this till next year and don't do it right that's I mean why why why why I

think it's an important thing to do but I do think that the time of it is yeah backwards yeah but at the same time I I I think it's better practice for us to be doing these than than than not even if we haven't done them in the past um put it on the list next year I think it's something that we want to discuss um but at this point you know if we've already approved them I a hearing if we had a hearing in March I would not remember what was said when it comes time to approve those again later next year and so I do but I think so but I think it's personally I think it's an important thing to have okay and so if we want to just flag for Allan um on his calendar that he maintains maybe where he has the day of when he approves him come back a month and a half in flag to remind that he wants us to give hearing but I appreciate him bringing it to us and recognizing that we we haven't done it but that it's something that we might be

interested in so I think it's important to like make sure and I don't know what the noticing requirements are but that whatever the date is that he's going to hold the he you know that we're going to hold the hearing that it meets the noticing requirements and all that ahead of whatever date he's supposed to approve them by right yeah we follow all those all right

DHHS has has uh increased their maximums so by law you have to have a hearing on that okay even though they've already approved it there's nothing you're going to do about it but you so they increase it and they want have get Fe right you just have to have it and get feedback M so general assistance is maximums on like how much help we would give to help bury a loved one or cremate a loved one or something to that effect so they've up their maximums the law is that you have a hearing you have does it dictate the timeline for that hearing can I ask a question yeah a clarifying question go ahead what no it doesn't but if you don't have a hearing and accept them then you won't be in compliance and we would be accepting these in the budget yeah right and because we do general assistance and we get reimbursement back from the state so if you don't have the hearing and you're not in compliance what I'm

hearing is we need to have a hearing you have to have a hearing regardless if it's done or not before the town meeting we need to have a hearing so no not well yeah because if we're accepting them in the town no no no you know T me doesn't really have much to do with it at all it's just recognizing that you recognize that the maximum have now increased we typically budget like 600 we don't get a lot of applications um but when we do we're under a tight timeline to process those things we only like budget like 600 bucks for a general assistance most people in Duram don't qualify but sometimes they they may so we have to we have to yeah we have to act on that had a clarification question so my question is are we having a hearing on a specific application it's just in has increased the amount that they pay out we have to for just have a hearing it's it sounds like we probably have to have a hearing just so people

are aware that it's increased and then if people say that's too much that's too little that's just you know sharing of their opin yeah and you're basically accepting it as a as a policy we follow their policy I think we can for maybe a March timeline um it

probably doesn't have to be terribly long um that's I I I don't recall us ever doing it in the past but maybe they haven't changed the amounts very much J Jessica so um technically we're supposed to do this in October so I don't know I I might need to do some research we might need to do that before the end this year so let's do it next week yeah yeah it's only a five minute thing yeah well then let's put it on the 17th a long subject um does that meet the notice though because we're seven days out the notice requirements for public hearings so we going to post the

agenda tomorrow yeah because you're we're doing another meeting next week next week so my only question is if we do this public hearing if we post the agenda tomorrow it's a 6 day notification you could just post a public hearing agenda not because we don't know what our agenda is yet right so still get it out in time just post public days but it it needs to be seven days before the meeting and right now is 7 days before the but we're not really sure that it has to be I'm not sure we're guessing yeah let's just do it and if we need to do the no we can do it again y right so that works for me if that works for folks but we can add it to next at we'll put it on the 17th agenda I mean I yes and no I mean we know we have to if we do a hearing we need 7 days notice so if we put it on the 17th right now we're not giving the town 7 days notice so what day is it today is the 10th Wednesday so we would have to it

would have to happen after 8:00 p.m. next on the 17th if if Jessica posted the notice right now I don't even know that you you all have done this in the past anyway so you you you didn't get in trouble I yeah know we're all set we just we just got to get it done when the best time we can get it done yeah well let's just find out that information about October and then we can just schedule one after next meeting if we if we need to do one at the beginning of the year and if we do one in January and we're a few days over they can slap our hands so we're not going to do it next week we just can't we I just I'm not in good faith I can't feel like we can I I guess I don't know how to count days because Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday Sunday Monday Tuesday is 7 so right but if we 7 days from right now is 8:00 p.m. on the 17th and if we have to do a public notice more than seven days before we have a public hearing that

means that if Jessica posted the public notice right now the soon as we can do that I'm just counting like tomorrow's Wednesday and then you count to Tuesday that's seven but you're saying it's like has to be 24hour Day Count yeah so okay

we can do it for 7 24hour periods from right now is December 17th at 7:54 so unless Jessica can post it right now and we do it at 8:00 p.m. on the 17th we can't do it so but we can post and do it real quick on January 14th

compliance we just will be happy MH all right that concludes um my report all right so board member report um can I ask Jerry a question sure his so um I'm just because we're going into the budget we start that next week um did I wanted to make sure that committees and boards were sent the

option to be able to request budget if that hadn't been done I don't want to like okay so I I need I just want clear clarification on the historic district commission did it because of the union church and it was more Capital related what are the other committees like the solid ways what what's what's well like if they want to if they want to do PR material they need a budget to do I think we talked about that would come out of the like the the um offices budget for like Printing and stuff like that but what we talked about was the reach out to all of the leads of those areas to say hey it's budget time and do you need to put in so do you want I mean do you want that Solid Waste committee to have their own postage line is is that what you're getting at we just keep it by the by the end of this next budget if it's the 18-month budget we're proposing it'll be two and a half years into the 5year contract right so they're

not going to be doing the pr yet that's the point where I'd be expecting to have here's our recommendations and the select board is that say so right but we're talking about one committee we have multiple committees we don't know what the agricultural committees you know what there what I just think it's important to ask the committee so that we don't end up in that situation where somebody's coming up to the microphone at town meeting trying to get $10,000 approved because it didn't end up in the budget and they need money that we didn't know perfect example we used to have a budget for like the Conservation Commission back when they wanted to build Bridges and P paths and stuff like that but we we moved away from that and since then like you know Public Notices the printing of that came out of the town's budget so we didn't have a separate postage buttline for them and we didn't have a separate printing

budget for them and stuff like that and so that's where I thought we landed in our last meeting's conversation was that since those committees aren't expected to expend funds annually outside of printing and online notification stuff that we weren't expecting them to develop how do we know that the Conservation Commission doesn't want to build any Bridges and that they don't need any money if we don't ask them and they they're not used to that I I feel like practice they've done it in the past and they haven't okay done it the last couple years so that's why I'm not concerned well you can throw a contingency line in there and if they need it there you go also you know the

recommendations they came to us with and Men didn't have a fiscal note if any of them had a fiscal note they should we would be prepared that they need to present it I mean that's that's where I'm at with that yeah I I also think that not everybody in very few people know that we're moving to an 18-year budget and their next time to ask 18 months their next time to ask for money is you know July of for July of 2026

it's fine we don't have to do it but right I get it I know but as the as the board with the pur strings you can put money in the budget for them if if you would like I just like to be able to justify why the money is there because that's the we can ask them if you'd like we can ask them to come to the meeting next next week the 17th where the department heads are going to be here to give some stuff we can ask them and say if you have budget requests or you anticipate budget requests for the next 18 months um please flag that for us here if they come and say nothing no big deal if they come and say well we're kind of thinking about some budget for printing or a big poster board or whatever we can then decide what to allocate for them would that work yeah or form so that that doesn't turn into a lengthy conversation sure does that we'll just add them to the email list for or to invite to next

week's meeting for um budget planning okay because it gives them the chance it's just when they when we all got together earlier this year there wasn't anything that had the fiscal note in any of their priorities they didn't have any anticipated needs then maybe something's changed I haven't heard anything from any of them on on that front so we can ask them to say hey December 17th if you have a financial need you expect come show up and I think it's I I feel like in terms of planning it's important not only for them not for us but also for Jerry especially if we're not doing individual lines for the Committees and it's going to come out of the administrative budget that he's not coming to us 9 months into his budget and telling us the Conservation Commission is asking for money to do this if you know that ahead of time going into the budget isn't that like information that you would want to have

up front and we can decide yes or no but send them the CIP form and just have them fill it out it's a scope and a cost on the name of their Comm yeah exact but it's up but are they right it doesn't matter if it's capital or not just tell them to just send them a capital form don't matter just get it over with and and they can say their piece and if they don't need anything great if they put in they want ARA paper great we can reallocate it to your budget and be done with it I think that's a great idea the form is very the form is the form is what I had in my mind yeah the form is self-explanatory fill out what you what what the reason is how much you want and why I mean it's really not that difficult but just take the word Capital off it then because it's more operating than it is capital it might be you don't know until they fill it out need to budget as a for a of paper I just don't think that's but if if we want them to

have the opportunity it sounds like there's some desire here if you can you just send them the form and say if there's a budget request for uh the next 18th the board chairs right not every just the chairs yep so it'd be the solid

waste committee the ad committee the um Conservation Commission so send the form but no not invite them here or do you want they can tell tell them if they have a a financial request to attend next okay you will avoid at that point you can say hey you didn't fill anything in if they show up at the microphone okay so we do them both yeah

huge conversation um so Jerry you have any other manager report no I don't no I'm think I'm good I think that's um just for board member reports was going to say um we've connected with the a committee uh to make sure that they all have their emails they have to get that all signed up with I spoke with one of the members a couple week a week or two ago I sent them all the first introductory email saying like thank you for agreeing to participate to their personal emails because I know that that's what they're collecting right now but I did highlight that um from moving forward to use the ad committee emails and then I sent an email to the ad committee group itself so as they get logged on they should have access to that email and just ask them um to I said that I can serve as the liaison for the next couple the first couple months until we figure out who wants to be the liais on but that just want to make sure

that they're getting signed up with with Devin and he's got their group built out and their email addresses and then um told them that we'd want to have them in you know at a meeting in the short short term starting next year to talk a little bit about you know their Charter and their goals and objectives and what they might need from us so they received that correspondence um like last week or or the week before I can't remember i' have to check my date but either way um they have been connected um ask a question

can we ask uh Devon maybe to just do a within a couple weeks do a followup and I know when I came on board someone had to help me get my Outlook mail on my computer so I could get in it wasn't really that easy I was just doing Gmail so I'm thinking there might need to be some proactive yeah that's why I emailed their their individual one and then Devin emailed them and it's an online thing now but they have to call our Our IT service if I didn't I hav't no one responded to me this week or last week so I was going to loop back with them next week to say as long as someone's Loop yeah to say hey is how how are we sitting here and then just say please confirm via email when you're when you're logged in because I understand how it is cuz when you try to especially you already use Microsoft products on your computer and you start trying to log in on a different Outlook it gets a little wonky sometimes but that's on my

to-do list for following up next week um the other thing I wanted to say um can't read my hand scratch here um I uh we don't have to talk about it tonight but I have written down here developing a uh Outreach plan for the fiscal year and explaining a public Outreach of I think someone sent me an email with a video where someone talked about how it works in their town I just think it's be really good for us to kind of like that memo I sent out a while back if we did a video or something like that to just say here's what the budget's going to look like at minimum it's 18 months here's why and those sorts of things so I'm open to think ask you all if you think it's a if it's a something that you think we should accomplish just with a memo with a video or just have a public information session like here where we just explain what the fiscal year changes and why and we can have it recorded just so people understand what

what the what that means you know um you know things like there's going to be a two billing periods for your taxes instead of one but you're not paying more you're not paying double right you're paying half of it and just to get a try to get ahead of some of the questions are going to come along um I want to know what your all's thoughts were on that J so we're working with GB Cog to do that very thing perfect so do they have an idea for when um yeah we're got to we're we're meeting and we're hope to have that all done the brochure information and a video which

one of you folks is probably going to have to be involved with along with me or two of you could do the video and tag team it where I think it's important for you to be in the video that that's fine I can do it but I want one of you where we'll have we'll explain it it'll be a scripted YouTube video where we'll talk we get hair and makeup before and the and the and the GP Cog director of communications is going to help us put that together it's great perfect so hopefully our Target date is to be done by the end of January let just let me know when I'll yeah once I get more information and stuff I'll let you know y mm um and then again one thing that I

want to just note that is on my radar um and it came up in conversation today I noted here is to your point de a land inventory this is a process that we like the Conservation Commission started probably three or four years ago and then it kind of fell to the Wayside there was at one point a map floating around it's something that I know that a staff member had started to kind of dig into what Parcels the land H Town has I just think that's an important component for us to have just a map of what's Durham owned Parcels or dur manage Parcels as we're exploring anything moving forward because there's a lot of moving parts right now and at minimum just having that inventory so we figure out what potential there are for Parks or if there's any potential for um you know I don't know we might have a small parcel in that we want to put a dry hydron on to make better firefighting potential or a place where a plow truck

can turn around I don't know but it's just good to have that sort of information so um something I'm going to bring up a little bit later I would is there what you want to look at is to sell it get it on the tax Ro well that that too is we have a bunch of stuff that's not on the tax R you know and so

I mean there must be a list now Town own land yeah we just putting it together was one of the I had Devon do it with yeah within the first few months I got here yeah oh is it together yeah B yeah it's in a binder yeah if we could can we just scan it and put on the website I I suppose we could well could we just start by um sending it to us you know could you send that to the board just so we can have it to look at um and then we or or you board members you could just stop in we'll give it to you okay cool we could do that awesome or we can make we can make five copies and put them in your mailbox I whatever you want yeah I I just think whatever works I think it'd be good for us to get is it three or four pages or well it's a b there's a fair amount of proper yeah there was more I remember when we were talking while you were working through it there was more than I thought we were going to be in the single low

single digits of of things based off of what the Conservation Commission had found a few years back and it seems like there's it's disperse and quite a few so um just want the flag that we're going to I want to talk about that next year it's not something we need to do right now but anyways that's what I have for um for M report myself Josh do you have anything no uh Joe no Heather no Dev

nope cool all right so um now I we uh just need a motion to approve our consent agenda um Jo any questions on the motion all right seeing none all in favor any opposition seeing none passes unanimously um you know upcoming town meetings we have special planning board meeting tomorrow at the fire station at 6:30 to discuss land use policy there's not public input being taken at that time but we just want to call out that that meeting is occurring so people can attend to be informed um that's uh

related to the uh direction that the planning board received from the select board after the b s moratorium went into play and then we're going to have a pyboard meeting on December 17th here at the fire station uh again we'll take Normal public comment there but it is a meeting where we're going to start discussing uh budget so if folks want to pay attention to um what early discussions of the budget are going to be that's the first meeting we're going to be doing that did you invite the yeah i' I've spoken to them and I'm sending official written correspondence this week um uh and so yeah I've spoken to the chair of the budget committee and I spoke to them two weeks ago and then we're sending an official written correspondents to say come join us and and and and watch but it's not open for uh back and forth between the two committees at this time just just good time for people to get information uh

town offices are going to be closed uh December 24th and December 25th for the holiday and then the planning board meeting is the next one after that will be January 8th 2025 at 6:30 p.m. Durham historic district commission has a meeting 1212 at 6:00 durm historic district Mission 1212 6:00

um executive session which one are we on first Jerri um oh they're both Personnel matters so um yeah let's go executive session uh pursuant to 4056 a Personnel matter um we will begin that now at um 6 611 if we have a motion 811 8 well 811 sorry so moved uh Josh is Mo moved uh de seconded

go did you second never mind I thought I heard that Joe seconded I was second do I have uh any questions on the motion all right all in favor and the opposition scene cool microphone's off