TranscriptSelect Board Meeting ~ January 13, 2026

Heat. Heat. [music] bring it for us. All right, we'll get this meeting started here at 6:30 on Tuesday the 13th, meeting of the select board. Uh call to order. We have a quorum, but we have one excused absence due to illness. Um we'll begin with pledge of allegiance.

United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. All righty. Do we have any amendments to the agenda? Uh, I recommend I recommend we move the um, whatever the heck it is recognition of the fire department new hire to uh, next.

I agree. Do I have a second on that motion? I'll second. All right. Any questions or discussion? All in favor? Any opposition? Seeing none, we will move fire department recognition to next. All right, chief. You have the floor.

Thank you, Mr. chairs. Uh we'll be brief. Um we're here for two reasons. To reintroduce our our newest full-time member of the fire department and honestly to thank the board for seeing our vision, uh for seeing the the need for it. Um our EMS calls are up in town and so are the seriousness of those calls. So to to take a and transition a part-time spot into a full-time status of EMS is not only appreciative, but at the right time. I I appreciate your uh um support on all of it. Um it's a positive step forward for the safety and the response to our citizens also. So that's why we're here. Uh Kevin should look familiar when you want a couple steps forward. He should look familiar. Not only a few years ago in front of the board, he was given a distinguished service award for his response into Lewon into the shooting two years ago. uh last year he was appraised uh with his partner Martin for obtaining his EMT

on one of the uh hardest times to do it on one of the hardest EMT classes I've ever seen in 30 years. So to obtain that and he's parlayed that not only to a full-time position but into two other positions on the amp. So uh you can't slow him down. Kevin started with Durham Fire in 2011. Uh he lives in town, he grew up in town, his family's in town. Uh he's been 30 years as a mechanic. Uh and I'm not saying I've had him change oil already, but he has been under the trucks. So um and talk about useful. Um

he's working on his engineer status being able to operate and drive every truck that we have and that's a promotable position. Uh and he's already made this place better. So So I wanted to introduce him again to the board, um to the citizens at home. Uh the department appreciates him. Tonight we start a new chapter here at Durham Fire. Uh, and if Linda comes forward, his spouse, um, she can certainly help. I don't want to stab him, but if you can put that badge on, it will start a tradition for all full-timers to to

have the badge put on. Make sure we get some push that pin. She's practiced. He's also the EMT on duty. So, you know, it's tough to work on yourself. So, I welcome Kevin Moss, our first full-time EMS position to the department. So, thank you.

Thank you. Congratulations. Thank you. Thank you. Well, we're happy to have more staff on board and appreciate the leadership of everyone on the department bringing this moment to fruition and the town is a safer place today that because of this. So, we really appreciate it. Uh we're going to dismiss the fire department to to the bay for some light fair and celebrations and feel free to stop in.

Yeah, I'll clean up the leftovers. Milt, if you want to lead us, we're right behind you. All right. Thank you. Congratulations. Thanks to all of you. move into uh public comment. Is anyone here for public comment? move into I would request a motion to approve the LA meeting minutes from December 23rd.

So, it's your turn. So, second. Motion by Josh, second by John. Any questions? Any discussion? All in favor? Any opposition? Seeing none, that passes unanimously. Now, we're going to go into uh old business. So, um we were supposed

to have Betsy uh the HR consultant and Mark, the uh our accountant here tonight, but due to illness, they're unable to make it. And so, we appreciate them keeping their pathogens at home and keeping us safe here. That being said, I do still want to take a little bit of moment for us as a board to discuss some of these policies. Um, I did have the opportunity to meet with Betsy and Jerry uh virtually late last week, I think it was or early this week. I'm that's all kind of melding together for me. But, um, I asked a lot of the questions that I thought might be on the board members minds and also uh, you know, got some more insight from Betsy. So um just to kind of give us a point of reference as where we are. Uh you can see here three points of discussion our retirement plan cash in l of health insurance and wage table. And so this all started last year when the

board determined a need for human resources to really services to really start looking at our town policies and just the future of our town in terms of our interaction with employees and planning for employees. and we had directed Jerry to uh put in the budget funding for um human resources, whether that be a a full-time position or consultant or contracting. And Jerry came back with a um a response that led

us to hiring a human resource contractor. And that's what we've been uh using is with Betsy. And one of the things she highlighted was the need for us to really address a lot of outdated policies or really create a lot of non-existing uh policies for because a lot of them were non-existing. And another thing that was highlighted by Betsy at that time and brought to the board's attention was our uh compensation structure and some issues that were found in that plan and also some suggestions to bring us into more of a modern um management from a fiscal standpoint for how municipal governments run their their financial policies. And so the three big things that Betsy had brought to our attention which we've discussed individually leading up to today at three separate meetings was um addressing concerns with the retirement plan and the fact that the current retirement plan lacks a a cost of living

adjustment in retirement. She also brought up uh discussion around cash in lie of health insurance for individuals who do not take health insurance and instead get a cash uh cash payment as part of their compensation. And she uh worked on helping Jerry develop a proposed wage table. Um, this is something Jerry had already been working on before we did the consulting with the human resources uh professional, but uh this is kind of the the draft we have now in front of us based off of the kind of going wage in the region for these uh positions, the positions themselves here in town, the scope and scale of the work. So, I want us to have some time tonight to discuss this policy knowing that we are going to get Betsy and Mark in at our very next meeting that they are available which hopefully will be the first meeting in February to um ask them some final questions. But, uh depending on how the discussion goes

tonight, uh if people are comfortable on voting on some of these items for approval, we can do that. or if we feel like we still need a little bit more information. My intent is for us to craft questions to send to Betsy or Mark today and we can get those answers both virtually and then in person at our next February meeting. Um I feel like that'll help save us a little bit of time at the next meeting when Betsy and Mark are here. Uh and we've just kind of starting to get into crunch time on some of these things. So we want to make sure we're mindful of our schedules. So the first point of discussion here is the um retirement plan [clears throat] and so

Mr. Chair. Yeah. Um because I missed the original part of the discussion. Is this whole HR plan something the town approves a town meeting? Is this something we approve? No. So, this is an employee handbook that was developed by Betsy working with Jerry and much of it can be um adopted from [snorts] by by the town staff and by us by Jerry and by us. But these are the three items items that would have a fiscal note. So, that requires more added attention. So, some of it we've already addressed were like how many personal days are offered um or you know, uh other elements in the plan might be, you know, work hours and those sorts of things, but these were kind of separated because they have a fiscal note. Um so, any other questions on how we got to where we are so far? Jerry, did does that en capsulate it pretty well?

Yeah, I just want to be clear. So, you're looking to have them come back the first February or January 27th. Oh, wow. Uh we do have a Janu another January meeting. So tell me when what day you January 27th would be preferable for me to get them in here right away if that works for you all.

that day? Um so on January 27th we have main DOT to talk about road safety and we have waste zero who um that's a big meeting develops the um who makes the uh pay as recoil trash bags that program. Let's judge how the conversation goes tonight and if we think we're in a position to have them in and it be brief January 27th, but if we think it's going to be a extended conversation, that's bringing a lot of outside people in that are going to have to sit around and wait for us to get to their topic. So, it could be beneficial to move that to the this to the February meeting if if we need more information so we can kind of play that by ear. Um so anyways, real quick here, we'll start with the um cost of living

adjustment in retirement. So for those who aren't aware, pension plans work differently than retirement plans. um you know rather than being getting an employee uh employees putting into a retirement plan with an employer matching it like a 401k or an IRA uh essentially the pension plan the the staff and the employer pay into it. The pension's managed by Maine PERS which is main trying to remember the acronym. Do you remember what PERS? Exact. But it's the main state retirement

main state. It's the main state retirement pension. And more or less the way it works is you get your wage uh looked at at at your retirement. You have a minimum retirement age and a minimum years of service. Generally, it's a 25 year uh service. And usually the retirement age for for most people depending on when they start working is now 65. They look at your three highest earning years. They average those to come up with your number and then you get a proportion of that wage. Generally, it's about 50% of your wage paid out through the rest of your your life. Um, that number can be a little bit higher if you work over your minimum retirement years. There's an equation that figures into that. But also, the uh the manager of the pension does an annual generally does an annual cost of living adjustment to uh for the pension recipients. The issue that was highlighted by our human resources consultant was that our um plan does not

include a cost of living adjustment in retirement, which is problematic because a lot of the staff were operating under the assumption that that that that did. And so there's two different types of plans that municipalities can be enrolled in. and we at the creation of

the employees uh compensation packages did not get enrolled into the plan with the cost of living adjustment and that's what Betsy has highlighted as a concern. The other thing to note with people who pay into um a uh a pension is they

become ineligible for social security. So, in the state pension system, you you stop paying into Social Security and so you lose the opportunity to get that benefit. If you were a long-term employee of a state or a uh municipal government and you didn't spend any very much time in your life working as a employee paying into Social Security in the private sector, then you really don't have any um social security to draw off. So, this is the only um retirement. Does anyone have questions about how pensions function before we continue the discussion? I think three of us up here are are pension people. So we we understand them a little bit more off

but I don't want to take time away from it. So well if it's a quick question I can totally answer it too. I just need to wrap my head around it. The big thing with the pension is it's a fixed benefit pension. Meaning that you are paid 50% of your salary

for the rest of your life. It's if the market's really good, you don't get any benefit from that. If the market's really bad, you don't get any benefit from uh you don't feel any pressure from that. It's uh generally considered a stable retirement. Um but that you you never get any of the booms or the bust because the pension is managed by an entity that in the boom years they take the extra to make sure that they have it there for the bust years.

So uh most pensions come with the cost of living adjustment. All state employees have cost of living adjustments. Federal pensions have cost of living adjustments. Most municipalities do. We don't. Um, we looked into the cost of moving into the pension with a cost of living adjustment and it's about 1% of wages. Uh, you know, last year that would have equated to about $9,000 cost to the municipality to provide that. So, that's kind of the uh fiscal note

total cost. I mean, all employees are in not just per that's total cost of all the employees. Now, if we are going to have a discussion about wage tables later in compensation as compensation changes, you know, that plan is based off of the person's compensation. So, what might have been $9,000 for last year could have could be $10,000 for this year or it could be less because we've had vacancies for so long in public works. Uh but ultimately the way I've been thinking about this and I want to get your all's thoughts is this seems more like a policy change that we then uh uh learn to adjust the fiscal side on rather than a a a spending change because um frankly a

lot of staff were operating under the assumption that this was already there. it was uh not necessarily made clear that there wasn't a cost of living adjustment and um I think that you would find probably over 90% of people who are on any pension in the nation have a cost of living adjustment. So it's kind of an expectation and so for that reason I would be comfortable on voting on this tonight um to approve the us switching to a plan that has a cost of living adjustment but I would like to open the floor for questions or discussion. And just to be clear, towns surrounding do have cost of living adjustments.

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. And Betsy looked into that. Um she was going to cover that tonight, but she looked into the surrounding towns. And there's essentially two codes that are used for for these plans. And one of them ends with a C and one of them ends with an N. N stands for no cost of living adjustment. C stands for cost of living adjustment. And she said that the preponderance of communities or majority of communities, vast majority are on the C plan. Okay,

Josh, did you have anything? I'll let John go first because I have I mean unless you want I have a couple of um I'm always concerned about increasing the cost and so you know at our level it's another 9,000 10,000 whatever it may be but I guess the the bigger question is we Betsy got watched the August meeting she also talked about a mission squared deal where you would get out of get out of main purse the individual and then there would be this mission squared which was cheaper for them, cheaper for us but I don't know what she didn't go into what the difference in benefits were so I'd really like to to dig into that uh not just because it's cheaper but uh my experience was 401k it it's whatever it is tends to have better results over time

then and I don't know main purr so that's maybe a cheap shot so I'm not really ready to vote on that because I'd like to discuss that option as well and I think she was going to come with a discussion about that, you know, based on the August thing. So, I'd like to throw that in there as well. So, those I think are my two biggest thoughts.

So, so you and I met with Jerry and the chief last was it last week? I can't even remember now. Um and uh and we had a lengthy conversation. I think I think it was fruitful. Uh, it kind of opened my eyes to things because I I really agree with you that we need to be responsible. One of the things that Jerry told us and I think he's kind of told us over the last few months, maybe longer, is that we're having trouble keeping employees. Um, is this one of those things that would help keep people? I to me I I don't know. But um I think it goes in with this greater conversation about the wage table. Uh and so I don't want to start talking about the wage table until we get there. But for me, um, you know,

Jerry's description of sort of how the chief is, uh, I don't know, I'm trying to think of, overworked, tired, stressed, and Calvin is beyond that and it's affecting them. Uh, you know, I it kind it kind of opened my eyes and changed things. Uh, and then we talk about some of the money that's coming off the books. Uh, and while it would be nice to take that money off the books and, you know,

one of the things I think everybody keeps saying to us is we want these services. Uh, and so how do we keep the services that people want? uh while also keeping our employees happy and healthy. Uh and frankly, from the way it was described to us, by what Chief told us and how Jerry described Calvin, we're not doing a good job of that. They need help. They're struggling. Uh and I think when the leadership starts to struggle, that trickles down. um uh you know and he didn't talk too much about you know the staff in the office necessarily but I think you know I I I think that

everyone that's working for this town right now that is doing a fantastic job and uh I I wouldn't call it reward them but I think we need to make sure we keep them because I'm afraid that if we don't they're going to go other places.

Yeah. Um and uh frankly, I mean, I it's the same thing in my office, you know, uh it's it's I I keep, you know, people in my office keep looking. In my office, we could go out into private practice and make two or three times what we're making now with less stress. Uh but we, you know, we do it because we we love the job. Uh but, uh you know, so I think

it's a greater conversation. I think this conversation dovetales in with the the um the wage table which I think when we first discussed it I was completely against talking about it now talking about it with the numbers with the money coming off the books this year and then in upcoming years uh where that won't have a a large impact on on taxes where it's going to be I think I think the biggest expenses are going to be the things we don't control the health insurance the paving

things. Um, you know, I'm I personally feel sort of torn between the, you know, the fiscal conservative and the, you know, we have we have these services and how important are these services uh to to the people. And um you know

we're down two plow drivers now or you're down a full-timer and a on call part-timer, right? So uh uh and that's they've left because of money for part of the reason. No, no, the part-timer is hurt and elderly, [laughter] older, so he may not come back. Yeah. And the full-timers Yeah. they leave,

they've left. We're losing out to bigger towns who can afford. We've had five applicants and it's just not working, right? Cuz because the travel to these towns that are paying more to Lewon, Auburn, Lisbon, Freeport, Brunswick is not,

you know, for for three or$4 dollars more an hour, it's worth that extra 10 or 15 minute drive, right? Uh and so I think you know I I I will say this next issue the uh the cash in l of health insurance I don't I think what she recommended is well I I won't agree with that. I think that's too much but these small things that don't have a huge impact but also have a huge impact on our budget now but will affect the employee later on in a positive way. I think that, you know, if that if that plays a small role, I think I think we should do it. Uh but I also, you know, hearing about the other options, uh I I don't have an issue with that either. But um I really do think uh we

need to decide whether we want to you know keep keep the services as we have them and expect them or roll them back because I think ramping them up is too expensive and I and I would not support that. But keeping them at this level is impossible at the at the level we're doing it at. And so, you know, 3 months ago when we first started talking about this, four months ago, not the response I was expecting to give, but uh, uh, you know, hearing Jerry talk about it, it's, uh,

upsetting might be the word I would use that that, you know, they're in this position and I don't I don't think it's good for them. I don't think it's good for the town. uh you know it's uh it's something that we need to change and uh so I think we as a board need to make that decision and and present it to the the towns folk. Uh you know nobody I think wants to recommend spending more money but

uh you know we have these expectations and I think it's I think what we're providing now is the bare minimum. Uh we need to be able to do that to keep people safe. Uh the roads the road safe, you know, the the people safe with the fire department does. So

I just want to add to what you're saying. It does cost more money to bring new people in to train them. And I think that's a very important point that we need to remember that if we lose people who know what they're doing and then have to bring new people in, the retention is not great.

Mhm. So it ends up costing the town more. So services like this, especially if other towns are doing it, I think we should I I have no problem to vote for this right now and say yes. Um John, one second. the mission squared option. Um Betsy didn't bring it up when I talked with her. I know that that is at times in addition to rather than instead of because it's like in the public sector you can then add a 457b in

addition to the pension. So then the employer can employee can choose to save in that manner as well. So I was I didn't wasn't under the impression that she was recommending a mission squared instead of a pension but that I was thought she was recommending as something that in addition to the pension there could be to add like a 457.

Well I disagree having listened to it today and maybe I misunderstood it because what she said is with the mission squared both parties can save. Mhm. But if they take main pers and they want to go nuance squared, whatever it may be, that's totally on the employee. The town doesn't contribute to somebody having a 401k if they have main purpose. The town is only contributing to main purse. And I got a very strong impression, and that's why I guess I'd like to if I'm wrong, I'd like to have her square me away, but I got the impression that both parties save. And I didn't hear that it was a lesser plan and it was and we also could keep it is you get to do main pers where your contribution is a lot

or you get to do this where your contribution is less but maybe your benefits aren't the same but it comes it comes with a cold and stuff. Yeah, we could send Betsy that question. Um the other issue that arises for me is we have people who are almost two decades into the pension system here and how does that impact them if we now say all right pension contribution is over. We're switching to a 401k you don't have

I would just say grandfather it mean that to me is an easy solution. Well, the pension is functioned off of you have to have a certain amount of years of service to get your full pension. And then if you're now starting in the latter five years of your career to build principal in an investment account, you have a missed opportunity.

When I say I'm sorry, when I say grandfathered, if I'm in main pers and I'm five years from retirement, I have the option of staying in Maine Pur. Yeah. I'm not sure how municipalities have handled having a split option. You either enroll in main pers or or don't.

It is. I guess I'd like to get the answer if we could. And the other thing is I hear what everybody's saying uh and I understand it, but we keep I don't want to say nickel and diamond because it it insults it, but you know, we're talking about this. We're going to talk about uh paying more if you don't take the health insurance. We've done a couple of,

you know, as a select board have done a couple of things to, you know, we're giving them an extra day off. There's a lot of things other than we just throw more money at the solution. So the question is are people going to stay for uh the just the retire the retirement benefit that big a deal? I mean I think the wage scale is obvious a much bigger deal. Um the we'll get into the extra health insurance or paying for the health insurance difference but right now that's four people. I I would just like to say something though about that because I think that showing that we do want to go into a pension shows that we care, that the town cares, and the town respects what everyone who is employed by the town is doing. And so it's more of an appreciation and honoring of their service.

So that's how I personally see it. I I just seeing my parents putting in their time and they're getting pensions. That's how they they saw it. I I that's just my interpretation of it. So, it's a matter of respect. But the other program that she was talking about was that the town either does that or does Maine PERS or you see you can do both. You can do the option. you have the option of saying if you want to stay in main pers because you're close to retirement or you've already invested a lot of money they could do that or they could switch to uh the 401k

that's I guess if I'm wrong then well no I that's that's how I remembered it was an either or you could ch the employee could choose I mean I would tell you that I would choose main pers because it's stable and you know you know what you're getting so I I almost think you'd be crazy to choose something else, but what do I know?

Well, regardless of whether we choose to go with Mission Squared or we're not getting rid of Main Purse for the people who have it, and so I think this is a vote to have a cost of living adjustment for people on main purse. So, I think that this isn't a we if we say yes to this, that means we can't explore the uh um um Mission Squared. I'm saying for the people, we are going to have staff on main pers. We have staff on main pers. They don't have a cola. And to me, it just seems like it was a failure of the initial or uh t the town. It was a failure of the town to not get the cola from the onset. I do think it makes a huge difference because if you figure someone retires at 65 and then for the next 20 years they don't get a cost of living adjustment, that purchasing power falls through the floor as as they age. I just think about if you're trying to live right now off of 2006 paycheck. It would be very difficult. And especially

cuz you know in the federal system you can still maintain a social security in certain federal pensions as as I know you're aware in the state system you stop paying in and then you no longer get access to social security. So your eggs are in this basket.

I think that changed. Yeah. So you if you have paid in for over five years you can get a pr-rated version per portion. But if you are a direct out of school into main uh into pension system and you haven't had five years of of payment into that, you're not going to get um social security. And so for a lot of our staff, this is just the the the path that they're in. So um I so that being said, I would be fine with voting on the cost of living adjustment for the pension and still exploring the um mission squared option

as as well. um should should we want to provide that option too? So that I I mean if if it doesn't cost any more money, I'd support giving the employees the option. Uh but I also I I don't have a problem waiting. Mhm. We're going to have the same discussion in two weeks or four weeks. So

Well, I've taken notes on your questions, John. and I can email those to Betsy and we can just table the um retirement plan discussion uh until we get answers back from her at our at our next meeting which will be either the 27th or the first meeting.

Do we have a deadline? When does if we vote on something tonight, does it go into effect immediately? No, this is so we can put it into uh so we can budget for it and so it's so in the end it would go to the town meeting. So the the the the we the way this would work is we would adopt this policy and we would say this is our policy. We have switched this. This is the cost. We now have to absorb the cost and that we would bud we would budget for that. If at the town meeting someone said well I don't want them having it. This you don't vote down one line. You say we want this whole department to be cut by 2%. Well then it falls on the town manager and us to find where that 2% is. So there isn't a veto from the the m the town body to say veto the pension um uh uh adjustment. So

any other questions? talking about tonight are policy decisions that we as the board have to make and then we will budget for them and whatever we the budget is approved by the municipality. If we've adopted this policy and they have cut our budget, then it's up to us to find where to make the budget work and um you know, we would likely not go back and change that policy. It'd be finding those dollars elsewhere either through decreasing other services or looking at fund balance or looking at other costsaving measures. So,

and there is a if we go with cola, there is an increased cost to the employee that it's it's shared. So, you're Yeah. Um but yeah to give an example I think main pers uh cola adjustment for this year was like 2.7% uh maybe 2.9 some somewhere around there. So I don't think it's generally too too different than uh social security or tries to track similarly. So all right well it sounds like we have a couple more questions on retirement plan. So what I wrote down was can Betsy please provide us with information on mission squared plan? Is this instead of or in addition to how does a a a person who's already decades into their pension continue if the town were to make a switch? Um, and we can

send that question to her. I'm sure she can get us an answer before our next meeting. Uh, we can share it with the board and then we can we won't discuss it over online, but we can share the answer online and then we can be prepared to have that vote when when she gets here next meeting. So um the next discussion we had was cash in lie of health insurance. So um this is a

little bit more of a mixed bag in terms of how municipalities handle it. Right now if someone chooses not to take health insurance and so I should caveat really quickly here. It's very important that with all these discussions we don't reference employees. We don't reference people. We don't say well six people would do this or two people would do this because we are such a small town that any of those sorts of statements can be construed as talking about an employee or or a subset of employees. So we should think about these discussions as just we're talking about positions not people. And so that's one thing that Betsy reminded me to remind the group is that we're always talking about the position not the person um in this setting. So right now the way it works is cash in l of health insurance. If an employee chooses not to take health insurance, um the town had bud would would have budgeted for that

person to take health insurance which has a cost to the town and since the employee chooses not to take it then in instead of getting health insurance at currently they get $1,200 in lie of the health insurance. Um generally speaking, municipalities in the area and across the state have different policies. Some give you no benefit for taking cash in l of health insurance. Some give you 50% of the cost of what it would cost to insure you as a self as a single individual. Um others give you a flat rate of 2, three, four, $5,000. Uh it's kind of all over the place. So the recommendation from Betsy was for us to look into how we want to handle this. if we wanted to say give them a percentage of uh what the self-insure is or to just maintain a flat fee of $1,200. This $1,200 flat fee was established a long time ago and that hasn't changed to my knowledge since it was established. But either way, this is

the discussion we have um about cash in lie of health insurance. Does anyone have any questions on how the cash in L works? Does anyone have any comments on what what they think should be our policy regarding cash and loom moving forward?

So Betsy did not provide a recommendation percentage versus flat. I think she initially threw out something like 50%. In the handbook she the draft she sent the end of December 8th it's 50%. Yeah. which would be 50% of what the town's cost would have been for that person should they have taken individual only, not family or spouse individual.

Um, and the thought process there is is Jerry, do you remember off the top of your head what an individual plan cost the town? 1228989 $12,89. Yeah. And so the thought last year's rates they did it did go up. Okay. Um, I'm trying to think what it is. It's

e either way. So, if we use the whole number of $12,000, the 50% thought process is if we're budgeting for a position fully salaried plus the $12,000 for health insurance. And they come in and they say, "I'm not going to take any health insurance." That position now costs us the full salary and $6,000 for the payout. And the town saves $6,000 on what was budgeted for that position. That's the logic behind the 50% is we were already budgeting to pay you that as part of your compensation. That's not a benefit that you're interested in. So, we split the difference between you um and the town. The town walks away with a employee that costs less than we would have had to pay for that employee should they take insurance and the uh employee gets to take the benefit of cash um instead. And so that's the concept I think the reason why Betsy suggested 50%. We're currently doing $1,200, which would be about 10%. And so the

discussion is, do we want to stay at 10%. Do we want to go to 50%? Do we want to go to something in between? And so, do folks have any thoughts or opinions on this? I would go with the 50%. 50%. Okay. Josh, do you have any thoughts or opinions on it?

I would not do the 50%. Mhm. uh the the money goes back in the fund balance, right? That's not used. Well, we don't So, let me just clear. So, we don't actually budget for Yeah, that's that's the assumption is that we would be budgeting for full insurance. Yeah.

The assumption is if they all took it, say you have four and it would cost the town $12,000 if they took it. Just do 12,000 times four and that's what you'd be facing. So racially, right now you're the town is getting 90% of that savings and you're giving the town 10%.

So that's really where is the the discussion. If you're good with that, then keep going. If you're not, and I think when she was going to show up, she was going to bring data and and show you what other towns are actually

doing because that's that's how they're roping them in. Yeah. Yeah. And that's a really good point, Jerry, is that operates under the assumption that when we designate funds for a position, we're designating it for, you know, a fully insured position, assuming that the person's going to take family insurance, which is the most expensive. And so that if that is say, you know, now means that that position has a $80,000 budget, even though the salary might be $60,000, splitting the difference saves us money assuming we had budgeted for that full fully. um insured position which is not how we have currently been budgeting for positions. Uh so my initial or sorry

John did you have initial thoughts on this? Is Josh done or not? Well I guess I thought we had changed it and we started budgeting within the last year or two for the full amount. No we don't. We're still budgeting the person and not the position. Mhm.

But a lot of jobs do do that. When you say budgeting the person, not the position. What do you What do you mean? So if that person does not take health insurance, then for the fall, but but I say like if we're posting a new position, the budget is just assuming that that person is going to take whatever the previous person,

right? So that's that's a wrinkle, right? So if we don't budget for it, which we don't, and a person leaves and they were on [clears throat] like the cash in L and they're only getting 1,200 and we replace that person and they take family which is up around 27,000. We don't have it in the budget. We're going to just we're going to have to give them, but I don't know where we're going to get the money from.

So we don't we don't do it that way. But yeah, it's assumed we don't know what they're going to take once we hire them. And part of that is because before we had a lot of turnover. You just carried over the previous year's expense plus, you know, the wage adjustment and said we're assuming that everyone's staying the same. This whole policy is helping us start develop a forward facing vision. And right now when people leave, the only thing that's budgeted for and had been approved was that position at whatever it had cost previously. Like Jerry said, if someone came in and took family insurance, that now cost more than what's budgeted for the position. Um, but John, did you have any thoughts on the cash in L?

Yeah, I I cannot support 50%. I mean, right now, I've heard a number of that we have four employees that are taking cash in lie of. So, that's $4,800. It jumps to 24,000 if those same if we give them 50%. Oh, sorry. Let me clarify. It's cash. The cash in L is 50% of the single insure level, not the family insured level.

Yeah. Well, if single is 12,000 something $6,000 per times four. Yeah. So 24. So that's a fairly big jump. And again, we're doing individual kinds of things that without any real idea of what the fiscal impact is. I we keep saying, "Hey, it's only 9,000. It's only 24,000." But those 9,000s, 24,000s add up. So,

one thing to remember though is if it were to jump to 50%. And then incentivize people to say, "Never mind, I take cash in L," it would actually be a savings for the town. Because if someone left their family insurance, which cost us $25,000 a year, and switched over to a $6,000 cash payout, and they just hop on their spouse's insurance at a different job, we're now saving $18,000 on that employee. So that's where the 50% comes from. I get you. But that same person is, if I'm understanding the logic, what you're saying is, well, I'll leave my spouse's insurance and and take the cash in lie of but she

now he or she no longer has any insurance. Right. And before they if if if we were if we I think I think No, I think you you as drafted you have to be eligible to have outside insurance. Yeah. So, you can't leave the insurance and go uninsured. You if you leave the insurance, you have to show that you're eligible for outside insurance. So, like if I was an employee of the town and I was insuring a family and it was costing $25,000, that's what they cost the town for me and this policy came in and said, "Well, if you want cash in L, we'll give you $6,000, which is half of the individual rate." and I said, "All right, well, I'm going to hop on my wife's insurance and we're going to switch insuranceances because that that household economics benefits me." I'm now only getting $6,000 in cash. The town previously was spending $25,000 for my expense. So, they're only spending $6,000 now. So, it's a $19,000 savings by me leaving

because I've now been incentivized to potentially incentivized to leave because that cash in L is a better uh deal for the town. And that's where that 50% comes from. Because if you were to offer over 50%, it's now to the detriment of the town. If you offer 50% or under, it's a break even at 50%. It's a uh a benefit at under 50%.

I I I understand the logic, but there's a couple of things that again, we just keep adding things that you haven't convinced me really. Is that a benefit to somebody that they're going to come to us or stay with us? or we could throw all the benefits in the world, but if they may still go elsewhere.

I mean, that's we kind of say, well, we'll solve the the silver bullet is this, the silver bullet is that. I guess if Betsy has the information on who else does it, I'd like to see that again. We can definitely I'd say kick the can down the road. I mean f for me the wage table is what's really going to push us push the envelope and based on the discussions we've had with Jerry well Joe and I have with Jerry looking at the numbers we're saving off the debt service this year that almost covers it. So, you know, like I said before, like

saving money, you know, it's, you know, where you're saving money from the debt service, you know, that's 160,000 this year, I think, or next year, the next budget is coming off from the debt service. I think it's Do we have to spend that?

No. I mean, do we have to spend it on these things, I guess. But but this is that's how I would spend it on these things because that's not I mean that's keeping a sort of a status quo in the budget and and and for me so for me it's one step at a time like let's let's see I I agree I I don't to to me

I think it's too much all at once. M so for me in terms of hierarchy of what I think is most important um I'm 100% convinced EA on retirement plan I want to adopt the wage table cash and loo is the the one that I'm not as concerned about um in terms of making an adjustment there uh I'd rather focus on adjusting the wage table personally um and then keeping cash and loo the same in my opinion I'm just explaining Bets Bets's recommendation and where that comes from when we look at the towns because we do have a spreadsheet. When we look at the towns, um our cash in Lu compared to a lot of other towns is is low compared as as a as a whole.

And so that for when we think about benefits, some benefits are more um different employees, different perspective employees value different benefits differently. Um some people might not value money nearly as much as they value days off. Or someone who has rockolid insurance with the spouse who's never going to leave that anyways might say, "I want to go someplace that has good cash in L cuz I'm never going to take it." you know, or I'm retired from another job. I already have insurance. I don't I don't need that. Um, and so when we that's why I want to be cautious of just saying, well, maybe it's just for people because we also have to think about the positions and about the future of positions. The the people who are sitting in the roles right now aren't going to sit there in the future. We have two roles open right now. We don't know what's going to necessarily be that cherry on the Sunday for them. And so um

[clears throat] but with me in terms of hierarchy of what's important the cash and loo is the least important of these three adjustments that that we're discussing making. It sounds like we don't have consensus and we still have questions though and so I think if Betsy is going to have to come in anyways it's a good time to to answer those. But I do want us to be prepared to vote on this after we meet with Betsy and and Mark next meeting too. So

um so what I have here for Can I just speak Yeah. I am I want to get out out there that just because we are going to pay less in a particular area doesn't mean we should spend that money that $160. I mean I'm agree I'm pretty adamant on that. So I I agree but I also think that uh we need to do something for the employees to keep them. uh and we're losing them and there's been talk of a number of employees leaving us because of more pay elsewhere.

And um we have to decide. And I should say that the salary that we're talking about isn't just in the area. It's also for municipalities of similar size in different areas as well that she's looking at. So we're not just looking at Brunswick, Clsome, Lewon, Auburn because those really aren't comparable. It's looking at other 4500 5,000 PE person towns, the Jay's, the the Livermore, the the Wiltons, stuff like that. Um, and so it's not just our little circle that regardless though, whether we want to admit it or not, we are competing with those towns because that's the commuter distance from here. So we might not want to have to think about Topsum and Brunswick because they're so different than us, but Brunswick and Topppsum's thinking about our staff and going, "Hey, you're underpaid, overworked, and you're getting a lot of on the job training. why don't we just farm you from Durham and and move you into our shop? And

that's what we're seeing and we're trying to figure out how to avoid, you know, um I don't I do not disagree with the need to to think about retention and other things. I I don't think that this A is at B and the way scale make a difference

because I truly believe most people and I do not mean to insult any but a lot truck drivers others in my experience they'll leave for 50 cents an hour more. And so we need to be competitive on that wage. Well, to give you an example, our EMT service, we pay $5 an hour less than the surrounding communities. And that's why we have 22 open shifts this month.

Um, and so like it's not 50 cents we're talking about. We're talking like dollars on the app. My my point is they will in fact leave for that. And uh but that's the point is I don't know that how many are going to leave because they only get $1,200 for uh not taking the health insurance.

I mean I really think that we're increasing the budget in in an area that's probably not a major impactor. M it. So anyway, yeah, I I just do want once more want to say though, not that I'm advocating that we need to change cash and loo, but changing increasing cash and loo could also have a net decrease in in expense because if cash and loo went up to something that incentivized people to leave the insurance, we're now getting that savings from from their budget position. So cash and l isn't necessarily an increased expense. It could, but that's again a gamble cuz we don't know. Does 50% have three people hop off family plans? Probably not. I don't know. But I just want to point that out. Um, all right. Wage table.

know that we do have a quorum, but also knowing that Deb isn't here and this is a big policy. Making sure that we try to get the whole board here before we vote on it is a good idea, too. So, I don't mind waiting, but I just want us to make sure that whatever we talk about tonight prepares us to vote next meeting um because we really have to make some motion on this. So, wage table that we have presented in front of us here, this is uh a lot of work from Betsy, a lot of work from Jerry. Um you know, luckily main municipal associations maintains a um a service where you can look up the wages of staff uh in different towns. tells you the town, the staff, their roles and responsibilities, if they have other roles and responsibilities, and you can get an idea of what the wages are. And so what we have in front of us here is a wage table for each position.

And as you can see, there's steps one through eight. And what that is intended, and this is very, very common with all government um financing, to have a wage table, both at the state and federal level. At the federal level, you hear it referred to as like the GS uh uh uh pay scale. Um this establishes a

salary for the job and then establishes that salary based off of years of experience in that role. So if we use an example of a uh a deputy clerk, BMV agent or IT liaison with Z starting on year one with no years of experience, that would be $23. And after eight years of experience, uh that would go up to $26.94 per hour. Uh recognizing that as people spend more time in that role, they become better at that position. After 8 years, there is simply just cost of living adjustments which we would as a board we could either set um to be automatically tied to a certain um index or we could set that annually um for for staff. Those cost [snorts] of living adjustments are only for staff who are over year eight. Other staff would just get the adjustment that is shown in their wage table. And so what we have here is roughly 4% change annually. And that 4 percent number was determined uh re is recommended by Betsy because in

normal inflationary periods of about two and a half to 3% that gives you a increase in wage that covers inflation and gives you a little bit of a extra buying power recognizing your your increase uh in experience and uh ability to do your job. So what Jerry has done and and Betsy have done is prepared this entire wage table for every position we have. Um, also, uh, Jerry has gone through with Betsy in following human resource, uh, laws and and guidelines, um, come up with a, uh, assignment for where each staff member, which we're not going to talk about tonight, but where each staff member would fall in on this wage table to understand the total fiscal note of this, um, policy. So, does anyone have any questions on the wage table? And one thing I do want to say here is I want us to think about this wage table as it's presented as a as a adjustment uh a salary adjustment um because we are very very very below

market value uh uh market rate sorry and we are [clears throat] struggling to fill positions because of that. Our applicant pools are very shallow because of that and we are constantly at pressure of losing staff. And so when we think about this expense, one thing I want to remind people is that there is a fiscal note with action. Uh but what's even more damning at times is the fiscal note of inaction. And so a perfect example is right now is we have uh two positions or one and a half positions open at the at the planning at the um

public works at a time where we are having plowing. So, we now have a situation where our public works director who should be in his office working on uh or who should be in their office working on uh budgets, working on on uh their public their director jobs is is plowing. Um just like a a regular a CDL driver working hours on end, unable to do everything that needs to be done. [clears throat] We're charged from our community to provide a certain set of services. And right now we're barely providing that because we're so understaffed and it's because of uh compensation. Some of what what Betsy is looking at here and Jerry are looking at here is that uh municipalities and governments generally aren't going to be the highest paid wage. They're not going to compete with your your private sector in the same way. Um but that's there's trade-offs there for the employees. Usually the pension is what uh it

elevates that job as one of value when you're compared to a uh a private sector. Um also the type of work that you're doing and so that is adjusted in here. So for example, if you look at um the mechanic job, truck driver mechanic starting at $26 an hour and maxing out at $3421 an hour. A diesel mechanic can go get more than that any day of the week at a private sector job. But what comes with that private sector job is working on bigger equipment, working on um on call hours that you would not normally be expected to work on at a municipality, dealing with emergency type scenarios that you wouldn't be dealing with here. So there's a trade-off there. So this is not trying to take people from the highest wage um uh businesses locally. This is trying to put our [clears throat] staff for each classification in the uh median income of the range that could be expected both between uh public and private. So does

everyone follow what I'm saying there? Cool. Is there any questions about this wage table? Josh or Rebecca or John? Okay. [clears throat] A couple of questions is um so if you're the issue right now at hand seems to be hiring a truck driver. two truck drivers, I guess, or truck driver and a half. Um, does $25 an hour do it

for if you So, talking with Betsy. So, that one thing to know here too is uh if we're hiring a truck driver who's been a who has had their CDL and been working for 5 years, they could start at that step five when when hired. So, if you look at like most uh government jobs, they're they're um advertised with a a range, and that range is the low end being step one, the high-end being step eight. And then when hired, it's saying, "What's your experience?" Okay, you just got out of tech school and you got your CDL, and this is your first job. You're starting at one. Oh, you've been a truck driver for North ARTH for six years. We can start you at at step six. So Betsy and Jerry think that that is competitive enough to compete with people commeurate with their experience level. Yeah.

Yeah. That that [clears throat] so if you could offer them using your example 2925 you think you would be competitive if they have that experience. Yeah. Yeah. I mean they would somebody come in and say I've got five years experience with the Armouth. uh you would be competitive and if it they didn't if they were brand new CDL 25 bucks I guess what I'm saying is if we're going to do this let's fix it let's fix the issue and is this enough to fix the issue I'm not saying let's jack them way up

right u I think Betsy will speak to that because they're still lower and she'll talk to you about that but you know we don't want to come in here give you all sticker sh but let's understand the people that left for over $10 more an That's how low we are

and [clears throat] this is not what people are getting paid right now. This is what we're we're recommending. Um don't understand. So, but I guess the qu So I guess the question is if we're going to we're going to approve this then let's fix the problem with it

because if if it needs God forbid it needs $10 more it needs $35.95 that may be an issue. But would I like to give a what tool that that's out proven a tool that will help us hire people. Yeah. Don't don't if I I see what you're saying is that this is not the time to cut down. If we need to make sure we're competitive, we need to figure out what that number is. And

Betsy can answer that more. The discussion I had with Jerry and Betsy was that they presented these as kind of the beginning competitive wage and we could go up from there. Other discussions is we could say, well, we'd like to see that step increase be 5% every year instead of 4%. Like those are things that we can discuss more and get some feedback from Betsy. Um the other thing I should say with this table is the recommendation from Betsy and this is pretty standard uh across uh public sector as well is that there's a periodic reevaluation of this. So every 3 to 5 years you look and say is this still competitive? Because if we find ourselves in an inflationary period of sustained 5% inflation after 3 years

we might say we need to adjust the wage table because this isn't cutting it here. Um, this is our first stab at that to to do that. And that I think that's a subnote underneath. Yeah. Uh, and then it does not include uh firemen.

Yeah. Um, this is just including the full-time employees right now. So, not the uh the PDM and the volunteer staff. Could it or should it? I guess if you're trying to hire a It sounds like pdeiums are an issue and then they all do a good job.

Um, but wouldn't it be good for a fireman to come in PDM to come in and say I'm going to I don't know what your starting wage is now, but you know, I'm going to start at 20. We can give you the 23 or 20 or whatever it may be,

and then in next year I'm going to get 20, you know, 4% raise and so on. Why would should we include it? I guess why wouldn't we include it? You comfortable with chief answering a couple questions there. Chief, could you

So, it'd be great for us to know what you start fire one, fire two folks off EMT and what that looks like or or my opinion, what would what would help you hire them within reason? Appreciate the opportunity. We have the fire department, our own wage table. Not that it's complicated, but EMT basic regardless of years, $18.

So just an EMT 18. If you have your advanced 20, if you have paramedic, 22. I I assure you that's 7 to $10 under the lowest ar. It just is. If you have firefighter one, two, that's $2. So in theory, a paramedic firefighter would be $24 for us.

Mhm. They're they're all north of 30. It is a $7 difference just in Lisbon just for basic EMT. I was going to request and it just depends on how you want the budget to look that the fire department budget increase. I haven't set an hourly wage for that because I can't tell you how many b I mean I can but not how many basics we have, how many medics, that type of thing. We would attract more at higher level, right? If if we gave higher level pay and service, we'd attract more paramedics. A lot of what we attract is brand new EMTs, Bates College students, someone with no experience. Um, that's just what we're attracted and that pool is shallow. So, under the fire department budget, I was going to again during budget times, which we're in, discuss how much we'd like to raise. I think it's a great idea that you put a line item in because you know we have 22 per DM sort of that that

are employed with the town. They're part-time. There's no benefits. You know they get sort of that emergency paid time off. They acrew that um but there's no benefits. There's no sick time. There's no vacation. There's no main purge. None of it healthcare. Um so they're looking at a dollar value. And and if you included it in your wage table, I think that helps, right? That that's the town setting the tone uh for for what we offer.

Well, and also one it hopefully it helps all the departments hired, but public works and and fire seem to be the big issue, but it also kind of puts it out there and says, you know, you're a one, you can in a year you go to, you know, level two and whatever. And if it's different, it obviously is different. hopefully for a paramedic versus a straight fireman or a straight EMT or whatever.

But to list those here, I think would be beneficial. So right now, just to clarify with with the EMTs, there's not a annual adjustment. It's just correct. Like if you are a if you are an EMT firefighter, that's 18 plus two. You're 20 bucks an hour. And if you've been coming here for five years, it's 20 bucks an hour. If this is your first year, it's 20 bucks an hour.

Correct. only if we budget for that increase in pay. Uh last year I think it was a dollar. We would literally went up from 17 to 18 and from yeah 181 18 went to 2022 type of stuff. So everyone got a dollar that was sort of negotiated in the budget the fire department budget. But yes it it's not a percent every year. So if there was a cola they don't get that.

Mhm. And it would help for retention, John, not just I mean we get the new people uh but the retention would be like at least there's some type of promisary for an increase. You know, if you give us your time, you'll at least be rewarded. Currently, there's not that.

I I guess I'd ask that we take a look at that. Yeah. The way I I don't know how to break it out, right? The way I think about that is we could just in here add um you know because if we were to add firefighter EMS then you start adding in all those you're building another line you're building another block of text there whereas right now what's happen which which is an option right now which is happening is every year chief says can this be the pay for this this um

this position all right next year can it be this so there's know it's it's set annually and so if we're looking at those blocks it could be beneficial for us to look out there uh where it would become more complicated for you is if you've got 22 PDMs and some are coming coming in with three years of experience some are coming in eight I would gather depending on the wage if people start looking around say oh that's what Durham's paying for eight years experience I've been doing this for 20 years I'll just start picking up PDM shifts at Durham as long as they give me that eightyear wage that can be that can have a fiscal note. And my understanding with your um PDMs is even now, you know, you have EMT basic um advanced and paramedic. You don't know who's signing up next month until they sign up. So you could have 60 shifts all paramedic or you could have 60 shifts all EMT, right?

Yes. Yeah. I think there's a nut to crack there, but I think that you're I'd like to see us try. I mean, I've seen It's you got great guys. They're all and most many of them are not doing it for, you know, 20 bucks or $18 an hour. You know, you go you look at some of the names in Christ. They've been in the fire department forever and it's, you know, father, grandfather. So, there's there's it's not just money and it probably is not the same is probably the same in public works. So, but in some ways it's almost to me insulting to say I got eight years experience and I'm making the same much as my son who just started. It

it would certainly help the town and the department heads to have a range. We'd have to fund that range, right? And currently how I do that is the average. So the average between a paramedic and ENT is roughly 2022 and that's what I've been budgeting for and we've been pretty close with that. That's why there's always, you know, a little left over.

I mean, it's it's going to this is going to have a fiscal and and maybe a fairly significant one. And but what's the difference with that in a a fireman and a truck driver in terms of uh Calvin's got to say I got a you know I'm a two-year guy now uh but my I really want to hire a fiveyear guy or you know I'll get less complaints about knocking down Talba's mailbox and and uh you know I think that's

that doesn't until year six John the missing your mailbox it does fix it the opportunity is there to to get the best candidate with the highest level of of lensure which is always the best and don't forget though you know you're talking budgetary which is always important we can charge more for paramedics so if we just have an EMT that you know we only bill out EMT rates but if we have a paramedic and we do the extra you can bill out for that and the town recoups that and again that 125,000 goes back to the town's undesated

and so in John's example Example, if there was a a table scale 1 to eight for EMTs or advanced or paramedic and you were budgeting, it could be all right, well, I'm going to budget for year four of of of advance in every

PDM and see how it shakes out. Cuz one thing I will say is we do have really great volunteers and we do have you know grandparent parent child volunteers but when push comes to shove when they're filling out that schedule they might volunteer here once once a month when you can get $7 an hour more in Lisbon they're filling it up and I know Chief shared a story with me even like great people who've been working at the department for 25 30 years on the schedule to work get the opportunity to go plow for time and a half in their day job and say, "Hey, I'm going to have to pull my name out because I I just can't give that up." Um, or one thing I think I've noticed too kicking around the department is chief does a really good job of getting young people in here. They get we get them trained up. They do a really great job filling in per DM shifts and as soon as they hit that threshold where other people will hire

them, they're they go over there and they say, "Oh, we'll be back. Don't worry." And then, you know, well, it's the same as snowplow drivers. That's that's why the sea dogs to the Red Sox over here, you know, I kind of beat that horse.

So, and we are just talking about the EMT component, right? So, we're running a full-time ambulance. Durham Fire has in the town has a full-time ambulance. We're doing it with one person, but we have a full-time ambulance. And that's what we're talking about, the EMT side. The volunteer fire department side is [clears throat] minimum wage. If that's what they get paid, minimum wage if you're a lieutenant. You're okay with that? I mean, when I say you're okay with it, you're hiring firemen to do that or finding volunteers to do that?

Yeah, we're still running just just information. We're still running a volunteer fire department at minimum wage. You know, 50 cents for a driver, extra 50 cents for an officer. There is a little component, but it's still minimum wage. It's the same group dedicating. They bring their sons on. Yes, we're holding our own and the town has value. Well, I got to beat this in death, but if we need to fix the fire the fire, I mean, let's do put that in here, too. So,

well, we're going to have chief in the hut seat uh in the department head meeting with budgets in the next next month or so. So, I will do John told you to come in and ask for more money. So, well, in this crowd, I don't know. Well, that's what he said. He said get creative.

I just don't just Anyway, I've said my I'll let someone else speak. Does anyone else have questions for Chief while we got him in the in the chair keeping him from his snacks in the other room? All right. Thanks. I don't disagree with you on so much, but at the same time,

Well, one thing I do think that we didn't mention the value with this table and if it were to be expanded across all positions is it gives us planning for the future, too. Like right now, Jerry has already gone through and identified where all the staff would fall on this table. So, we know what personnel wages would be if we were to adopt this right now. And we can tell you exactly what personnel wages are going to be um every year moving forward. And from a budgetary planning standpoint, that takes a lot of um extrapolation and puts it right on the paper. So, we we kind of know. So it from what your point, John, is it sounds like you're saying if we're doing that for one cohort, might as well expand it to the others.

Yeah. All right. Thanks, Chief. Um, well, it sounds like we have questions for Betsy on these numbers, but ultimately, um, I am in favor of this wage table as minimum as written. Um, uh, I think that it's a necessary adjustment. And when I think about the cost associated with it, we talk a lot about the cost of of actions, but there's a huge cost of inaction. I know I've already said that. And I feel the cost of inaction is just going to be a situation where we are taking taxpayer monies for positions and then those positions are going unfilled and we're not providing the services that they're asking for. When you get 22 shifts open in in the month of January, you're not really providing everything you need. when you've got two people down during the plowing season, you're not really providing those services that we've been asked to provide. So, I like the looks of this table. Um, we went

over Jerry and I uh and Josh some real preliminary numbers. At the current table as is plugging in where each person in these roles would land, it would be about $126,000 difference to the p to the budget across every department. um which is about a 1% change in the budget. Uh it happens to be very similar to what's coming off for debt services. So while debt service is coming off doesn't necessarily mean spending has to increase. Functionally um debt services coming off do open up opportunities to be in a maintenance situation without being increase. also early numbers with um uh fund balance are suggesting that we're really not using the fund balance that we had planned on using last year due to increased valuations. So I think that if we were to adopt this now there would be an opportunity for us to still pull together a budget that showed very little if any increase. It's definitely not uh in on the municipal side

excluding school and county which we have no control over. And so um my just I'll be fully transparent here. I could vote yes on this today. I can vote yes on it in two two meetings. And if we were to get a different number back from budget committee and back from the town, I would suggest we cut um uh funds elsewhere rather than from personnel and that we as the select board own the policy of adopting this this uh wage table and that we are the ones who make sure it happens because we have lost staff and we're going to continue to lose staff if we don't do something. And I think that this is the biggest biggest um lever we have when we look at where we're at. So, do we have any specific questions I can email Betsy in advance about the wage table before next before we meet with her?

I I'm just I'm trying to figure out how I feel about John's proposal. right, EMTs? Uh, I think I think rather than voting on it now, I'd like to see what that would look like. Um, because I just hear dollar signs, which you know, uh, but at the same time, it's the same issue as retention and and the services and just uh Well,

I did a 180 on the other two, you know, for the other two. So, right. No, I I I agree. I agree. And I guess seeing it in here rather rather than the heart for budget. Oh, the sticker shock of seeing it all in one place I think just just hit me. Uh I I

will say when we think about fire department, we think about EMT. When people call 911 and everyone shows up and takes care of their problem, they're not going, "Oh, are we really paying these guys a dollar over minimum wage?" They're going, "Thank you so much you're here." You know,

I I agree. I just like to see it all. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. And that's and so that's why we've been doing this in this step-wise process. That's why we're having the conversation in its totality now. And that's why we'll have the final conversation with Betsy and an approval. Um because we want to see those pieces. And asking to see those pieces doesn't mean that you're signing on to wanting to increase spending a ton. It's just we got to see it on the on the on the paper. Um, but at the end of the day, some of these questions, I think of them more as a policy uh uh question rather than just a fiscal fiscal question because it's like it's in some ways, you know, making sure we fill the positions as much like, you know, a utility cost. Like we've determined we want electricity, we got to pay for electricity, you know. So, all right, we can move along here, but I think I got some questions to send

to Betsy and we can uh get answers for those hopefully in advance, which I can share with the board. Reminder, if we get answers in advance and I share them with the board, we're not to discuss the merits of that via email. It's just for your information and we will then bring that information to the meeting. Um, it just gives you all a chance to be prepared for it. All right. So, moving into new business. Uh, we have already covered the recognition of the fire department and now we are moving into an update and discussion on land use amendments. So, give the floor to the two of you.

spec board. My name is Brian Lo. I'm the chair of the planning board here with town planner, Mr. Tharge um to um go over um some of these proposed changes. We appreciate the opportunity. We're not going to be talking about budgets,

talking about efficiency, all of that. I'm sorry I'm putting over a bit of a cold here. Um but hopefully I'm clear and you can understand what I'm saying. Um so the planning board's work this past year has focused on um separating policy decisions from technical cleanup um while positioning the land use ordinance for long-term success um through codification. Over the past several months, uh the board has held two public informationational hearings. one on proposed minor policy changes and the other one on administrative changes based on staff input, public comment and our own deliberations. We've refined the draft amendments to ensure that nothing controversial is embedded in the codification itself or proposed minor policy and administrative changes. One exception is um um affordable housing uh where the town's hands are tied to some of the state's legal requirements and we must follow that state law. Um

codification is not about changing uh codification. It's not about changing a land use ordinance, more making it um transparent um uh and organizing and clarifying information so it's easier to administer, easier for the residents to understand and legally consistent um with state requirements. Uh the ordinance overhaul provides opportunity to address outdated standards um and issues that come up to the board frequently. Um to keep clear separation between minor policy issues, the technical work of codification, the planning board and staff are recommending three separate war articles. One for minor policy changes, a second for administrative changes and the third for codification of a land use ordinance. Uh this approach uh allows voters to um clearly see what is policy, what's administrative, and what is the reorganizing format. Um it's important to note that the board also reviewed several other issues in addition to what

we've sent to you today. Um through the process, the board intentionally deferred policy questions such as noise regulations, private road maintenance agreements, and agricultural use standards so that they can be addressed separately after codification um rather than complicate the process and afford the [clears throat] time uh needed to go through those intentionally contentious issues.

package is transparent and positions the town well for future land use uh challenges. Um and with that I'll turn it over to George to go through the uh the details of what's before you. Thank you Brian. Mr. Chairman, members of the select board. Um I'm going to cover uh as quickly as I can three basic categories to discuss with relationship to this topic of land use. Uh the first is the changes that have been recommended by the planning board that uh Brian just uh listed or indicated. The second is a couple of added items that have come up. Uh and then finally, I'd like to give you an important update on the strategic planning initiatives with relationship to a major change in state law on the uh comprehensive plan front. So, as far as the uh draft amendments, as as Brian indicated, uh it's important to recognize that we're really here just trying to close gaps within the regulations as opposed to

setting new policy direction for land use. Um I did we did provide a summary of the administrative changes and the policies and uh in that memo to the to the board it uh each individual policy or administrative change is cross referenced in terms of the page numbers. So you can look through all of them to your heart's content or if there's one in particular that you're interested in one or more you can really focus right on those uh individual components. So to list the uh minor policy changes, those include backlocks and private ways, the uh process for expanding nonconforming residential structures, uh adding a provision for the planning board to be able to require a road buffer along existing homes when a subdivision is put in. Changing the current requirements for fire uh water supply protection. Um and

then also closing a current loophole on uh cannabis cultivation facilities that's uh in the state law. Uh and then finally for the minor policies uh as uh Brian indicated the state is requiring changes on manufactured housing which includes accessory dwelling units, individual sighting of mobile homes as well as mobile home parks. So uh these are the town does not have any flexibility on these. However, the planning board in the process thought because those are significant policies in terms of uh how these things are handled. They felt it was uh the consensus was to pull those out of the codification. Even though the town doesn't have flexibility and they are legally required changes, at least put them before the voters in terms of this is policy. even though the town doesn't have the uh the flexibility to do anything different. So, that was the sixth one. As far as the administrative changes, uh updating the subdivision

road standards, the driveway standards, uh clarifying which board interprets the zoning district boundaries if there's a question. uh adding a provision for solid waste, a solid waste management plant for subdivisions to indicate where the uh solid waste container is going to be located either in the within the subdivision or out on the main road. Uh clarifying the planning board's scope of review for campgrounds, RVs. um updating the the submission requirements for the planning board in terms of the timing and the number of printed copies. Uh providing the select board with an administrative capacity to make corrections when we find errors in the ordinance such as just simple things like numbering. Uh [clears throat] requiring developers and conditional use applicants to prove that their taxes are current uh submission requirement. And then finally, uh, putting into the ordinance the conditional use, uh, submission

requirements that are currently in a set of instructions. And we've been advised by the talent attorney that should be in the ordinance, not just in those instructions. So, those are all included with a summary as well as the draft amendment language. And those are pretty much ready to proceed to the public uh, review process, the formal public review process. Uh, as Brian indicated, we did uh receive input both from staff as well as members of the public and the planning board processed all that input and made changes as Brian mentioned pulling off the proposed changes on noise regulations. Uh, the town attorney advised that you could not reduce the notification requirements. When the board of appeals makes a decision, the code officer asked to be relieved of certain uh notification of all boards and committees by certified mail, but hand delivery. The town attorney said it's in state law. You have to do it is

is [clears throat] overus as it is. She also advised that all of the design uh rehirements of your ordinance on accessory apartments probably won't fly with the new state law. So she advised taking out those design requirements such as requiring that uh no outside stairways on apartments uh accessory apartments uh those types of design things. She said you really need to remove those. Um as I [clears throat] mentioned we did at her recommendation add a conditional use submission list. Uh the town uh

public works director asked for some changes in terms of the terminology on gravel spec specs which we did uh and the fire chief who was just uh here uh asked for flexibil more flexibility on those fire protection systems. So he advocates allowing a developer to put in a fire pond uh hydrant on an existing pond or on a stream or just if a developer wants to put sprinklers in all houses do that uh as a as an equal option. Right now ponds are the are what is mainly called for but he thought that it's appropriate from their needs to have the option of just allowing sprinklers. He also asked to be removed from uh inspecting back lot driveways uh or subdivision rows. There are current pro current provisions that require uh before the code officer can issue permits. The fire chief has to verify that the access is is acceptable. He doesn't want anything to do with inspecting roads or driveways. That'll

have to fall on the code officer or the or the public works director. So, we did accommodate that. And then finally, the town manager asked that the position of town planner, which is not recognized in the ordinance. Uh I'm doing all of the processing for conditional use permits and subdivision applications. The ordinance still says the code officer does that. Haven't done that for seven years. So he felt that that shouldn't really be accurately reflected in the ordinance. Just clarifies what my role was. Um, and then the companion piece to

this is the anode annotated uh hund 183 page digitized lay news code. Um, and I did take the time to go through and take the uh consultants report uh narrowed it down to 100 editorial changes and again we've taken out anything to do with policy out of that codification. Uh so we I think we can fairly say it's things like changing select board municipal uh board of selectmen municipal officers to select board consistently through the ordinance. Those types of editorial changes are what's involved in in the codified version that'll be put before the voters. It it'll go to a digital format like our tax maps now. uh it'll be cross referenced within the ordinance as well as tracking whenever changes are made with cross references. Uh it'll be consistent internally as well as with the state legal requirements. So two additional things have come up. I know that the agriculture committee has contacted the select board and the

planning board proposing eight new agriculture definitions to reflect the the changes in agriculture that occurred occurred over the last 40 years. Things like agurism are not at all recognized in the ordinance and it's caused real confusion for them and the planning board when they have to review applications. Nothing fits in the ordinance that they're doing. So they proposed working with the main farmland trust a complete list. Uh but we looked

at it and said well you can't just adopt new definitions. You have to say where are those things going to be allowed and will they be permitted outright or will they have to go to the planning board for conditional use? Some of them are going to go both ways. So they have not really gone through that process of of defining and giving standards for all of those things. uh nor have they done a public participation process like the planning board and conservation commission have done for solar and everything else. So, they've agreed now if they they just contacted you, Joe, to say they they accept that they need to do more on those fronts, but they would like to come in and at least make a few definition changes just to get the ball rolling in terms of bringing Durham's regulations that relate to agriculture into the 21st century because they're not they're stuck back there. And then the staff has the code officer,

road commissioner deal with this all the time where there the ordinance currently requires them to build the prover proverbial road to nowhere. So right now the ordinance requires 300 ft of road frontage for a a back lot or the last lot in a subdivision. Three subdivisions are before the planning one right now where the applicants are saying, you know, we don't need to build this extra 300 ft of road for that last lot. So, most towns, many towns allow uh taking the the the combined frontage of a turnaround to make up the the road frontage. This ordinance isn't clear and I've looked at the property maps and if you look at all the subdivisions that have been approved, some require the full 300 feet. Some allow that frontage of the turnaround hasn't been consistent because the ordinance language is not clear. So, I've put together a summary for that with uh the draft amendments and we'd like to have consideration of

that as a second add-on to this. Uh [clears throat] so if you want I can stop there and we can you can uh discuss those uh administrative changes the minor policies and the codification or I can give you a quick summary of this uh issue with the strate the uh comprehensive plan law and then open both up whichever you prefer.

Let's talk about the uh what you presented so far and we'll talk about comp plan after. Does anyone have any questions for our guests today? No, thank you for going through that. It's very It's a lot. Yeah, looks great. Looks great. Super thorough. Um I really

like even looking at the minor policy. I think that you did a good job your committee and you Mr. barge of highlighting these cuz they do seem like pretty minor and it's like things that are are perennial thorns in the side of your committee and and you. So, I think that that's a good way we can address them. Um there's nothing here that stands out to me um with any sort of questions that I need to ask for for you regarding them. Uh so, I'm good. I think they look great. And then as as for the administrative changes, um, [clears throat] all makes sense. I the document you provided did a really good job of explaining it because like when I saw proof of payment of taxes, I was like, "Oh, is that on the current lot or existing lots?" And I think this in particular um that section answered that question really perfectly. And that's an issue that a lot of people have brought to our attention, especially when you

start flipping through the who owes taxes in the front of the tax book um at the at the town meeting. So, I think that addresses that. Um the the road to nowhere, I had heard about those and seen some of the schematics and I'm glad that that's being addressed. Um so, you don't just have 290 ft of road heading into the middle of nowhere after the last lot. Uh, and my question here, I

guess my one question when it comes to the buffering along the uh, new subdivisions, is that along the just the road that accesses the subdivision or is that uh, between the lots that are going in and adjacent home lots?

Why don't you talk about the sidewalk you just did? I'm not sure that answers the question. Um it it it [clears throat] creates a buff between a new road into the subdivision and any adjacent property owners. Mhm. Okay. But it won't create a buffer. Let's say if the road comes in and then turns and then you have a house lot, that house lot can be falls under the standard buffering between them and and the adjacent um house from the adjacent property owner, right?

An existing house. Yeah. It's only for the road. Only for the road. Okay. Because right now the ordinance requires a 50ft buffer between like uh Royals Road and the subdivision. Mhm. But the the new road going into the subdivision can be right on the property line with for the house next door that's there.

Mhm. And so this this again doesn't automatically require it or discuss whether there should or not. Uh but just giving the planning board if there's a need and this last sidewalk that they just did, the house goes very close to the neighbors uh the new road goes very close to the neighbor's house. So that would be an example of where in this case the developer should be required including some sort of screening because a road goes so close to their existing house.

There are some examples in town now some recent subdivisions where if we had a buffer along this road it would have definitely benefited the homes. And what about in scenarios where the rightway that the road is going in is extremely narrow and just really big enough for the road itself. How do you is there anything language in there to address that concern?

Well, that it's discretionary and uh what on this sidewalk uh that the plane board just did, you're in that situation where going in um there's not a lot of leeway to move the road right away from that property line 50 ft, but they can put in curbing, which they're doing for a wetland crossing. um they could put in curbing on that section by the house and use that area within the road right away to do buffering and then it could be a combination of uh fencing and uh plant. So again, it'll give the planning board on a case-bycase basis the authority to number one determine is it an issue and if it is have a tool that they can work with because right now the ordinance gives them no authority to deal with that issue.

Yeah. which comes up frequently. Yeah. The best we can do is ask the developer in good faith to try to come up with a buffer. It doesn't always happen. Yeah. Perfect. And and just finally, we're not asking you to make any decisions tonight on any of this. Yeah. Yeah, just trying to keep you up to date and pretty much just get the go ahead to put this before the voters in terms of drafting the um the warrant articles and getting that into the town report, scheduling the public hearings. Yeah. We just want to make sure you're comfortable moving forward with these before we go to that next stage.

Yeah. Um, another question I had was, you know, the ad committee had reached out with just one issue hoping to get it in for uh particularly the high tunnel um structures for for growing crops. Uh, is that something is there still time if we worked with them to come up with language and they had a uh got public feedback to to bring that into this uh this or would you want that as a separate uh would you suggest that's a separate warrant article?

Well, I think you should process it first and you decide whether you're comfortable either putting it into the minor policies uh depending on the scale of it like we're doing with the road frontage. Yeah. uh or if you know worst case scenarios put it as a separate bill and have them make their case at the town meeting

because I do know some of those agricultural definitions are kind of falling into the same category of since our ordinance was created department of conservation agriculture and forestry the state has adopted definitions and recommendations and language as it pertains to farms like particularly the agroourism and high tunnels and stuff like that and so they're definitely is like we're not ref we're not speaking the same language there. So some of that to me and we can get to this later. Some of that to me does seem to fall in that minor where some of it is a decidedly uh policy change. So just wanted to see you're you kind of some it's like you're saying figure it out and send it back to us

or just take a look at it and see what you think. Then we'll process whatever whatever you I'm planning on having them in at one of our first meetings in February so we can talk about that. So cool. Do we have any other questions for

just what is kind of the deadline you I mean this for getting the you know all this put together and getting it on the thing because you can you know you have you have to hold public hearings no more than 30 no less than seven days which put you in that early May thing. So you know

I think all of this is really in the best shape it's ever been terms of timing. Uh you know the road frontage is I've got it all drafted. We can easily put that into it if you're good with it. Uh and then the A is the one question that that uh but there's time to fit it in

either either as part of one of these or as a separate article. Um to your point with that question, John, my thought pro this looks good enough to me for you all to start drafting language and then we can separately talk with ad committee figure out whether that's going to get plugged into these minor policy changes or separated at its own law and article. And so if you're looking for a thumbs up from us for those sorts of to just say let's move forward on on policy uh development of the warrant language, I'd give the thumbs up today. Does anyone else have any concern with that?

No. So I'd say you're good to go. Um I don't think we need a Yes. Yes. uh you recall back in July you got together with the leaders of all the different boards and commissions and talked about what are the strategic planning initiatives to work on came up with uh kind of seven that we've been running with the uh those are the uh

agriculture which we talking about the energy component housing which we're kind of holding other than these required changes as in some more legislative uh change that we have to deal with after the modification. Um the

economic development initiative that you folks are uh strongest interested in the community facilities study uh the open space plan that the conservation commission is working on and then the last piece of what we talked about back in July with the codification which we pretty much got that ready to roll. The only two that are not currently um in active consideration right now are the community facilities and housing. Uh so those are things all of these where we're talking about rolling them into the next comprehensive plan which is slated to be was slated to begin in 20 uh 27 for enactment in 2029.

This past June, the legislature passed uh LD1751, which made a bunch of changes to the comprehensive planning laws on uh housing and energy and those sorts of things. But one of the benefits for Durham is it extended from uh 10 years of valid uh certification of your comprehensive plan to 12 years. So they gave intentionally or unintentionally the town an extra two years to to deal with this. So it just gives more flexibility in terms of your budgeting process because I know you were concerned about putting a major investment into this at this time with the revaluation and everything. This gives you flexibility uh to either go ahead at this time to get that comprehensive plan started with this other stuff or to hold off until after the reevaluation and and do that. Uh and and even if you do put it back to uh the two more years, you can still make changes to your comprehensive plan. Like say you wanted to adopt a new

economic development district plan as part of comprehensive plan to give it more support for funding and legitimacy. You could still do that. Your your plan will still be certified just not that component of it. So we've got with this law, you've got more flexibility in terms of timing,

more time to set aside capital for the high consulting fees with that too. Well, that's good news. Um, did you does anyone have any questions for George about that comp plan process? You know, some of these seven items that we've addressed here that we're working on, we're our our intent is that doing those on their own will then make kind of a copy and paste scenario when it comes to actually creating the comp plan. So, we're we're kind of picking away at some of that comp plan responsibility. I'd like for us to at some point have a discussion on setting aside uh some reserves annually between now and uh the future to help cover the cost of that comp plan like we did with the uh setting aside funds for reevaluation, but that's not the discussion for tonight. Um any questions for George? Any questions for Brian?

Sen great job. I know a lot of long hours on the planning board and and George, you're part. So, thank you. So, George and I had a conversation today about economic development and moving that forward. And we discussed, you know, if if that's the case, we don't necessarily have the capacity in house to to do all of that. So it was recommended to maybe put some uh planning consult in the planning codes and funding some sort of

consult because otherwise you're not going to move any economic development forward without it. Yeah. We are still we're supposed to hear from the state this month on whether we got the uh resiliency we've got the open space resiliency fund uh funded and now we've applied for an economic development one through the same program uh and that was for 75,000. So if that 75,000 comes through that'll give a real opportunity to move forward uh with that economic development planning. if it doesn't come forward having something in the budget GPCOG has submitted proposal to provide some u level of of consulting for you they do economic development uh so that would be a kind of fallback or or a supplement

to to what the state grant's going to be but we're trying to move that forward awesome well I'll put that on a list of things for us to remember to discuss in the budgeting process um do you know the timeline is for that award notification. Is it just sometime this month?

Yeah. GP Cox said it was going to be they respecting it in December. They're saying now they're probably going to get it not get until January. All right. Well, we hopefully should get that information before our our February meetings in our first budget discussions.

Cool. Well, I don't have any other questions. Uh thank you so much for this work. This is I think not only is it a huge lift on your all's part, but just the um the way you presented it here is very easy to understand which is much appreciated. So,

and we will get all the stuff on the website. Awesome. Back to you. Perfect. Well, thank you so much for coming in. Hopefully, we didn't steal the rest of your voice from you there as you're recovering. is reviewing the uh holiday schedule. Um Jerry has proposed uh Jerry and I were talking last week and one thing that we talked about last year was that um

how we want to go about recognizing holidays in in town. Um and so with our town office only being open Monday through through Thursday, how do we recognize holidays that fall on a Friday or on the weekends? also um how are we mindful of the fact that we you know those Thursdays are really important because those are our late opening days and so how do we limit Thursday closures as well uh when it comes to recognizing the the holidays. So, one thing I had recommended to Jerry after talking with the HR consultant was just coming up with a policy where we figure out how to recognize holidays by possibly saying if a holiday follows on a Friday uh of a week to recognize it on the following Monday rather than recognizing on that Thursday. Um same if the Friday falls on Saturday and Sunday. That wasn't my brilliant idea. It's just I've seen like working as as a state employee, they release a holiday

schedule a year or two in advance saying here's the days that we're going to recognize these Christmas on a Sunday, we're going to recognize it on Monday, yada yada. So Jerry has a proposal here for us right here. Anything you wanted to add, Jerry?

No, this is the uh holiday schedule. It's Yeah, we just pulled it off the internet and um so you just have to decide how you want to handle those holidays that fall on a Friday. Yeah. And so, uh, my recommendation is to recognize Friday holidays the following Monday.

And I'd be open to hear what other folks are are thinking. avoid the whole Thursday Yeah. conundrum. Yeah. And I I just know that we've got a lot of feedback that that that's the day that people want the office open. Um but uh when I look at here like you know we're never going to avoid Thanksgiving being on a Thursday and in this instance you know Christmas Eve is on on a Thursday as well. Um but other than that those are the only two two Thursdays that I'm seeing here. The question about holidays are those Fridays which is the day after Thanksgiving and Christmas Day, Independence Day and Junth which all are I I would just say recognize the following Monday.

Just a question day after Thanksgiving that's not a national holiday. Is that something that we recogni that we would push? So Monday would be closed. That's my recommendate recommendation. The day after Thanksgiving. I wouldn't support that one. Yeah.

I wouldn't support that one. Yeah. I mean, th get Thursday off and Friday is your normal off. Not again on Monday as well. I'm not sure why we're giving Monday. I'm sorry. Yeah. No. Go ahead. I'm not sure why we're giving them Monday off. I mean, it's

that Monday. Yeah. No. Any Monday if it's a Friday holiday. I mean, it just it fall it falls where it falls and you know, it's going to be Well, you get the week. You get holidays off if they fall on Saturdays and Sundays

in the state. If Christmas is a Sunday, we get it recognized the following week. Well, I mean, what you do and what we do for the whole town are going to be two different things. But I mean, but I'm I'm also open f five days a week. I mean, I think with a four I I think there's limited hours. That's just me.

Yeah, I could go with that. I I see what you're saying. follow the state schedule. Whatever the state does, we should follow. Let me see. Potentially the only problem with that is the state doesn't care about Thursdays. Yeah, that's that was the point. like cuz like the state will there's generally not a lot of Thursday holidays outside of uh this year the state's recognizing Thanksgiving Day and given Thanksgiving Day off on Thursday and giving Christmas Day off on Thursday. Um so those are two holidays that I would imagine we would also recognize. Well, um

we were I was we open Christmas Eve, New Year's Eve. We were open till I think they let us go at two. Yeah. Well, I I didn't mention Christmas Eve. I was just saying Christmas Day. holiday. Christmas Eve as a holiday. We could say we don't want Christmas Eve as a holiday.

to get at here is by proposing and adopting a holiday schedule. Now, it can be advertised all year long. It can be right on the door. So people know if I was planning on Christmas Eve being the day or Christmas Day being the day that I want to register my snowmobile, it's not the not the good day to come in. I think that there's going to be a lot of push back from the town for

like Junth and Independence Day if the Mondays are off. I'm just I think there and definitely for a day after Thanksgiving. Um I just think that's So does our handbook specify the number of holidays? Yeah, it counts some but yeah, right.

Well, I know for example like in in my employment they advertise 13 holiday days a year. It does too. It's 13, but because the old one still does not have Junth because that was added Mhm. fairly recently. Mhm. Um and so it's 13. It's a number. It's 13.

Yeah. So in the old days and we're trying to establish the new month. Yeah. We have 14 days here. Yeah. Which is which is a lot for me. That's a lot of days. And the reason why the 14 why you have 14 just so you're clear is because of June.

Yeah. June. Well, and also we rec this this schedule is recognizing Thursday recognizing Christmas Eve as a holiday, but that's not a state holiday. No, it was in your previous policy. Okay. And day after Thanksgiving was also in the previous policy.

Day after Thanksgiving is a state holiday, too. Is it? Okay. Yeah. Everything by June 13th is in your old policy. So, I can just tell you the state holidays here. New Year's Day, Martin Luther King Jr. Day, President's Day, Patriots Day, Memorial Day, Junth, Independence Day, Labor Day, Indigenous People's Day, Veterans Day, Thanksgiving Day, Thanksgiving Friday, and then Christmas Day. That's what's in the state's holiday schedule.

And that's 13. Um, and that's 13. They don't include Christmas Eve. I'm sorry. No, Christmas Eve is not included in the state holiday schedule. Um there have been times where like if Christmas is on a Friday on a Thursday um in the past the governor may have used executive privilege to give that Friday off knowing that everyone's going to be gone anyways or whatever. Um but I think we just need to adopt this and I mean I would say to act Christmas Eve and keep as a day off and then keep the rest of the days off here.

I don't mind giving I just don't think giving the Monday. Yeah. If the holiday is on a Friday, giving the Monday. If it's on a Sunday, that's a different story. I think that's what the state does. That's what the federal government does. That I'm okay with. I think following that, but just because we're closed on a Friday, I don't think we should then extend it to that Monday.

I agree. I agree with So, if we're if we're in the employee handbook awarding 13 holiday days this year, there's four Friday holidays. So the the only other option if we want to continue to award those 13 days would be to um provide them as floating holidays.

Um or just say my thought process with floating holidays is now everyone is taking those extra days off. That's just more days to be understaffed. Maybe it's just better to have a closure of the office rather than set yourself up where you're going to be understaffed four additional or 20 additional times throughout the year if all five people have four floating holidays. And so again, we don't even have to decide this right now. If we need to ponder on it more, my thought process would just be to carry if you you have the day off, if it's a scheduled day that not to work, we carry it over to the following Monday. For example, at the state level, if you're if you have a Saturday, Sunday holiday and the state decides to to have it on a Monday, there are some people whose state job requires them to work Saturday, Sunday. So, that was a scheduled day that they have. And so, the reason I came up with this idea was

just that it's e equitable across everyone because like public works has a different work schedule than the town office, than the fire chief who's here Monday through Friday. So, but if people need to think about this a little bit more, we can absolutely punt this to to next meeting.

I think it's a hard sell for bound. There's going to be a lot of push back years then they get every single holiday? You know, it's like, well, that's what this is intent is to always establish 12 or 13 days off. I get it. It just it's just

so if we're comfortable if we're comfortable with the employees getting 13 days off, why are we uncomfortable with it them getting 13 days off every year? It's not it's it's more of how the perception is going to be when when

people find out that it's going to be the following Monday and already there's a limited amount of days that the town office is open. It's it opens a can of worms for people. I mean, I just I see this spreading and complaints and

that's all. Mhm. So I the way I thought of it, we get 13 13 days when they fall on days that we're open. I I guess I hadn't thought about it as if it's on a Friday and we're not open then you get you get another day. I I just you know Yeah. Whereas I was basing my thought and comments on based off of other public employers like the state and the federal government and the days that they recognize even when they fall on weekends and that's considered a non-b business day.

And if we were open five days a week like the state that would be similar but it's a different situation. But if if Christmas Eve is Saturday and Christmas Day is Sunday, the state's still giving people Christmas recognizing the Christmas holiday even though the state is closed generally across most sectors on Saturday and Sunday,

which is why I I said follow follow the state holiday schedule. It's simple. It's up there. It's a year or two in advance, which I totally get. But we do have co if we're following a state holiday schedule that schedule is if the holiday falls on a nonwork day, it is recognized at a later work day. And our non-work days happen to be Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. So if we're following their framework, we would also carry those Friday holidays over.

Then let me rephrase it. To to me, Friday is considered a work day and the office is closed for budgetary reasons and staff reasons. Well, so but the fire chief is open and what's public works Friday schedule? They're closed. They work full tents,

right? So, but the the fire chief and the EMS director at work Monday through Friday. And so then you would in a situation where it's like, okay, fire chief gets two extra uh gets one, two, three, four extra holidays compared to the public works director and compared to the the clerk because their schedule uh is different. And that's where recognizing it all at the on the at the same time or giving floating could be two options in my mind.

We pushed everything off to Betsy shows up. So yeah, have her come in and show us what others do. We can totally hear listen to hear what Betsy has to say, but I just wanted to raise my thought process on it for people to digest a little bit more. But at some point, we're going to have to vote on something because we keep punting things to the to the next meeting.

I'm ready to vote next time definitely on all this stuff. So, all righty. Um, let's check. Is there is there a holiday scheduled between now and our next meeting? No. So [snorts] are the the to me it sounds like the point of contention here is how to manage Friday holidays. So can we approve this now with the exclus exclusion of the Friday holidays to be uh discussed in a policy developed at a later date? Are people okay with that?

Well, they're going to get Monday off anyway, the 19th. So, if we don't adopt the SK, so if we're trying to adopt the schedule, there's a holiday between now and our next meeting, right? And so, if we're saying we're not comfortable adopting the schedule, how does Jerry handle Monday?

I'll make a motion that uh the office be closed on the 19th and February 16th. It's already in it. Yeah, you already have a policy. Oh, sorry. Yeah, you already have a policy that we have. This is for really taking effect.

Yeah. for pretty much after like once you adopt the new policy moving forward it'll change but right now you've got a handbook that is still in existence and we have on who came day off yeah okay cool as long as we're covered for before we vote on the future policy I'm fine with this

you're probably covered all the way right up until uh July 4th because uh that's when the new budget starts man the the the the the policy, the handbook for the employees doesn't have to start July 1st, but the budgetary applications will have to stop. So,

and the handbook currently gives 13. Yes. Paid holidays. Yes. The only one that's not currently in there in the new part is June June. Well, we'll do that. Yeah. I hope but because it's a federal state holiday which you all recognize. That's why it's in there now.

Yeah. All right. Well, we So, what I hear is we have until June to figure out how we're handling Friday holidays, very much. But let's deal with it. I don't want I I don't want to, but I just want to make sure we're squared through the through the next few meetings. But cool. All right. I'll move this to the next meeting uh discussion then. Uh All right. Next, we have manager report. Jerry,

thank you. Um just an update on public works. So, we have a full-time person in the works. Uh, we're going through the process right now with background checks and that sort of thing. And, uh, keep you posted. We'll find out if that comes to fruition or not.

Um, though there's a lot of chatter right now on municipal business, treasurers, tax collectors about the penny because the penny is going away. So, I don't really have any answers for you. I don't know what folks are going to do, but you may have to write a policy one of these days regarding that that penny because there's, like I said, there's no definite um solutions that towns are adopting.

You know, they talk about, well, if something's $102, you round down to 10. If it's $10.13, you round up to 1015. Some some are talking about well if there's any additional money sense left over we can apply it to their taxes or whatever. So just be prepared. I I it's a it's a little bit of a mess. Matter of fact, when we when I go to Andrew Bank to get change for them, they're not even doing out any more pennies. So it's going to be an issue we're going to have to address. I don't have any real good information. Nobody does. So, just keeping you up to up to um

[clears throat] just letting you know about that. Um the other thing is I think GP COG is going to have a chairs in a circle next month. I was going to touch on that. Okay. [clears throat] It would be good if someone or could go to that.

Yeah, I was going to cover that in my board report. So, there's that other Yeah. Sorry. Sorry. No, go ahead. No, that's the thing on February 5th. That's what you're talking about. No. Yeah. So, other than that, um, things are good. I mean, I don't really have really much other to to report other than those those three things. So, that concludes Oh, sorry. Yes, I do.

So, you saw probably I don't know if you looked at the news blast or not, but we started putting um some information about the transition to solid waste. So, we're also putting this trifold out. We're not going to mail it because we don't have it in the budget. Um, but we will be putting those on the counter and uh they will hand them out to the residents when they come in to put their to do their registrations or whatever they're coming into the town for the business and it'll also be on the website. Uh, it'll also be in the news blast.

You put it at different like the get and go and other places. Um, we have them. We can we can make a bunch and trifold them. But we've been really shortanded. We got a person out sick right now. So that only leaves two people.

One of those Wait, hold on. One of those people had a dentist appointment. So then we was only down to one. And I was surprised that you guys actually got your agenda packet last week cuz I didn't think we were going to get to it. We're we're that strapped. When when someone's out sick, all bets are off on reporting any of that sort of stuff. Um, as we get more subdivision puts more pressure on that town office, too. Just so you know, just so you're aware, it's

we're we're maxed to the, you know, just let you know, Kimberly was going to be there much more later last Thursday trying to get this stuff done. And I said, "Don't worry about it. Don't worry about the warrant. Don't give it to him. I don't want you here until 7 o'lock at night. It is what it is. We're doing the best we can, and it's what we're faced with." And what we've supported you for. So, it's it's our own fault, right? So, I got it.

So, it is what it is. And I this illness that's going around, I guess, is kind of brutal. So, Jessica, uh, that one employee could be out for the for the week. I I don't know. And if it's and if it and if it spreads through the office, it we may we may have to close it down if we don't have the help. That's where how short-handed we are.

Just just keeping you up to date. Not trying to scare you or anything, but I mean this is reality. I want to face it. So, well, you scared those two. Yeah. That uh Can you Can you stabilize to any trash tags that go out?

Yeah. And you know, and have a good night. There will [clears throat] be a transition period with this with this trash. It's a lot of work. uh Kimberly and I that it's been working with Donna to get the um addresses to Cellar and when Cassellar I mean and they're busy too and Cassella as far as roadside pickup is the big gorilla in the in the room because they're the only ones that do it. So we're kind of, you know, on their schedule as well when they So it'll be a transition, but as we get more information, we'll try to keep people updated as much as possible.

Is anyone from Cassella going to come in and maybe talk and possibly answer? Well, Cassella went in and met with the solid waste committee and I think someone from the solid solid waste and Deb's liaison so she answered forcefully but I do know either the chair or the vice chair is going to come in and make a policy recommendation on the 27th uh which is basically the pay as you throw program like I I'll spoil it now but that's what it is that's why I have waist zero makes those bags coming in to let you know about how that program works so you can make a decision on whether whether that's the way you want to go or not. So, there's a lot of balls in the air right now. And like I said, we'll try to we'll try to keep you updated. The last I knew, Cassella wanted um the how many households we

had, the addresses, so because they want to start knowing how many bins they need to buy and when they deliver the bins, there'll be information on that. So again, it's we're working with Castellan on that and once we get the information, we will keep sharing it as best we can. Um, now we can always share it through a news blast and on our website, but it's only hitting the people that sign up for it and that sort of thing. So, it's going to be just a repeated customer. So, I get the word out best you can. Like I said, if they if they have questions, they come right to the town office and we can update them there, too. But, uh, be patient. There hasn't been a town yet that I have talked to, whether it be Pan, North, Yarmouth, all those, that when they go through this transition, there aren't people that get upset. So, we're going to have to deal with that.

Trash is a contentious topic. Yeah. So, we're doing the best we can. I And I think we're doing pretty good, actually. So, that's all I got. The other policy discussion we'll have to have is um how we want to handle outstanding trash tags. That's one thing I've had people reach out with concern is like if I buy trash tags and then by the time you switch I still have all these trash tags. Do I get any credit for the trash tags I've bought? We're not having that discussion now. But that's one thing is like we might want to consider can you trade your trash tags in for bags? Do you get a refund for your trash tags? We want to make sure we don't make a black market for trash tags either. So, um either way, just something for us to think about in the future. in terms of uh other reports here. So for my report um as you all know I've been participating in this like uh tax

uh uh committee within GP COG essentially trying to figure out what GP COG can do to help address uh [clears throat] municipal budgets and the impact it's having on taxes. Everyone's going through re-evaluation issues. Everyone's seeing their county tax increase. everyone seeing their school tax increase, what can be done to help manage that. And uh I'm on the

committee working to address that. We have another meeting on the 9th of February, mostly for the rural uh towns within GPCOG because one of the conversation pieces that's coming up is some of the larger municipalities want to establish a local sales tax that would generate um income at the local level. uh myself and people from like North Yarmouth and stuff pointed out like that really doesn't affect the town of Durham at all. Um and one of the things that got thrown out there was maybe there could be opportunities if a local sales tax were to go in into large municipalities within the GPCOG area, a percentage of that could be distributed to the smaller municipalities to help offset their expenses, too. So, we're having continued meetings on that and I'll continue to report back. The other thing I was going to say, uh, Jerry stole my thunder a little bit. The chairs in a circle meeting, uh, is on

February [clears throat] 26 from 5:00 to 7:00 in Portland. This is like a facilitated conversation on, uh, where all the communities from GPCOG get together and talk about challenges of running municipalities in in the region. That last year, that meeting is where this tax workshop stuff that I'm participating in came out of. And the meeting is open to the chair, the vice chair, and the town manager or mayor. Um, I am going to be able to attend it. Josh is unknown at the moment, but if Josh can't attend it, in the past, I've opened it up for another board member to attend. Uh, last year Deb attended, so if Josh can't attend, I would open up to Rebecca or you, John, to to join me. Um, but we'll need to RS I've already RSVPd for myself, but we'll need to figure that out sooner than later. I know you're working on schedules, Josh. Jerry, are you planning on attending?

I can attend. What? What day? February 26 from 5 to 7 p.m. What day of the week? Thursday. I don't even know what day. Thursday. Thursday. Yep. Yeah. So, um, so, well, I should say it's two officials per community, actually. Sorry.

Okay. So, it would be better. I think if one of the other board members could attend, I'd defer it at one of them. I should be able to go. Okay, cool. I'm just waiting for one more confirmation. Either way, um, last year I came out of that meeting feeling pretty damn good about what we were dealing with when in Durham when they go around and they talk about challenges and most the other communities, their municipal budgets were going up 9%, not their county, not their tax, just their spending. um and year after year. And so I think people were kind of like in shock and awe on the situation that we were in in terms of how uh respon how how flatlined we've been and and we're also uh I was happy to hear there's a lot of issues that other municipalities are dealing with that we aren't dealing with which is just nice to find out we're we're not alone in some of our challenges. But um either way I'll

report back after I attend that meeting. So Josh, you have anything? Um, just I don't know if it's good news or bad news, but I sent Joe and Jerry after we had our meeting last week. Yeah. You know, WGMA had an article about the highest uh property sales in each county

and the highest sale in Andrew County was out of Durham at 1.2 million. Uh it was the only leading highest sale in in any county that didn't have either water access view or uh within a mile or so of a ski mount, one of the major ski mountains.

Uh so, you know, as much as we're hearing about how, you know, I want what it was like, uh we're not what it was like anymore. Things are changing and we have to 1.2 1.2 too one acre parcel. It was part of a subdivision subdivision. Yeah.

Uh so you know there were I mean like I think every other every other county had higher amounts but they were you know on the ocean. They were on the ocean overlooking one of them I think in Ponovskot or somewhere was like overlooking the water. It just sounded

amazing. And then you have Durham and a new subdivision in Durham on one acre lot and everything else is uh so you know uh you know we're I [laughter] you know I came into this meeting feeling good about the wage table and I feel like John's just just talking about more [laughter] like and it was and and so we have to do something but we also I think we really need to I think John's like you know the every little bit adds up and we have to figure out a way to kind of mesh the two. And so that's um you know

uh I I think I think I think Joe's mentioned a couple times you know we do the the wage table and if you don't like it and we're going to take the money out of somewhere else. Uh, you know, I I think I think, you know, the the the ideas that Jerry had are are good and he's working to keep the budget at a at a low rate and I applaud you for that because it doesn't sound easy. Uh

uh and and you're doing you're doing a good job and what you're talking what you're bringing to us. Uh, and I think, you know, if we're going to spend money, I think this is the the way to spend it on these employees. They deserve it. Uh, and we need them. So, uh, you know, I I throw that out there, Jerry, as a kudos to you, but also as a, you know, I want people to come start coming in and talking to us about this because it's a topic that I think needs a lot of discussion. And uh you know I think John you and I are in sort of the same boat as and maybe others are too but I know you and I have expressed it more you know and don't want to do it but I think it's necessary. Um and so I want to hear what people say think and say and you know if we need if they want us to cut something else let's have that discussion. You know it's like there's not much to cut and it comes down to paving and you know what road's coming

up on on the paving schedule. bumper than hell. So, uh, uh, you know, um, but that's what we Exactly. not probably my turn. But, so anyway, anyway, that's what I want to say because it's I I just it was a good conversation last week and Jerry, I'm really glad you got Joe and I in there to have that conversation. Um, and it's just uh I think tonight kind of just has reinforced it. it my it just it hasn't changed my commitment to doing that but it's you know I think we need to take a look and be so

uh Deb's absent Rebecca okay John I'll just give my spiel which is we do need to take care of our employees but you know we're elected to look at the entire town budget and all the parts of the town so the things that we do we not want to save money for the fire trucks do we not want to Those are decisions we need to those are the trade-offs. I mean Jerry can find the money but what is not going to get done.

But I will also close with saying Jerry and everybody did a good job putting that HR handbook and the wage scale together. So thank you. Thank you. All right. Do I have a motion to approve the consent agenda? All right. Motion by Rebecca, seconded by

Second. John. Any questions? All in favor? Any opposition? Seeing none, unanimous. All right. Upcoming town meetings. Plan aboard meeting the 14th at the fire station 6:30. Con commission 21st at Eureka at 6:30. Select board the 27th at 6:30. It's going to be a doozy. AD committee meeting February 4th at 6 p.m. at Eureka. Fire station is having a meeting with the planning board on the 6:30. Wow. On February 4th. And we've

got salt waste committee meeting February 9th at the RE dinner at 6:30. Uh, any executive session needed? Looks like no. Do I have a motion to adjurnn? So moved. Rebecca, do I have a second? I'll second. Josh, any questions or discussion? All in favor? Any opposition? Seeing none, passes unanimously. And we are closed. 8:49.