Capital Planning Committee Present: Mike Benjamin
January 8, 2007 Jim Bilancieri
Frank Chiodo
Kerry Hoffman
Barry Joseph
Bob Minardi
Liaisons: Panny Gerken
Burt Shnitzler
Anita Scheipers
The Capital Planning Committee met at 7:30 p.m. at the Town Hall.
CAPITAL PLANNING MEETING ORGANIZATION – GETTING STARTED
The meeting was called to order by Panny Gerken. The members introduced themselves. The committee discussed the objectives of the group and what we would need to get started. Ms. Scheipers discussed setting up internal policies, the need for long and short term priorities, and the tools that the committee would need to do their work. She stressed the necessity to understand the specific requirements of the town departments and suggested setting up liaisons to the departments within the committee to meet this goal. She also stressed the need for a good working relationship with the Board of Selectmen & Advisory Committee.
The usefulness of a financial "primer" for the committee to fully understand town finances was discussed and Burt Shnitzler offered to put together a presentation for our next meeting on bonding, taxes, the indicators that show Bolton's financial condition, the town's financial capacity, how we compare with other towns our size financially, how our tax bill breaks down, what's available for capital expenditures, and other information that would be helpful to the committee.
Mike Benjamin and Jim Bilancieri stressed the importance of developing a way to communicate information to town citizens in a variety of forms that would be effective in helping them understand the impact of capital projects. This will also help build credibility for the committee.
Ms. Gerken will have the debt schedule distributed to each member by email, look for a town comparable to Bolton for a copy of their capital planning information, and send around a summary of the Community Preservation Act (CPA) before the next meeting. Ms. Scheipers will start on a five year capital schedule from the information we presently have in hand.
All members will email Mr. Shnitzler with respect to the financial questions that they would like him to cover in his presentation. They will also write down their ideas on the processes the committee should develop in order to meet the goals of the committee.
At the next meeting on January 29th, Mr. Shnitzler will give a presentation and we will use the remainder of the time to get the committee's ideas for developing a process on a flip chart that we can then pull together into operating procedures.
The members felt that they needed more time to decide on voting for a chair/chairpersons so that decision was delayed to a future meeting. The members will rotate the job of secretary and taking minutes. Bob Minardi will act as secretary for the next meeting.
Meeting adjourned at 9:30 p.m.
Respectfully submitted, Panny Gerken
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