Trustees of Trust Funds November 16th 2015 Meeting (unapproved minutes)
Meeting called to order at 9:30am
Attending: Helene Matesky, Martha Benesh, Linda Terry, Chris McAleer
Minutes of both August 24th and October 28th 2015 meetings were accepted
Bonding; Linda reported that elected officials are covered for E&O (Errors and Omissions) for up to $5 million per occurrence.
Surety Bond: Required under RSA 41, each elected Trustee is covered for up to @$310,000 as specified by statute. Under RSA 35-10 the question what asked what specifically does the surety bond cover. This question would be raised with Terry Knowles, Assistant Director, Charitable Unit of the State Attorney General’s Office. Martha asked what might not be covered, adding that ”acting in good faith” would be covered but embezzlement would clearly not be covered.
Helene advised that she had two requests for funds from the Bridge Repair Expendable Fund (Trust 0034) in the amount of $298.11 . Copies of the requests with invoices were reviewed and the Board voted in favor of approving the requests.
Mackensen and Company which is vying for a roll in investing the Funds for the Jackson Trustees of Trust Funds was brought up. Their experience and credentials were questioned in that they have done Trust Fund investing only since 2011 and have only one investment officer so may lack backup.
Martha brought up the subject of realized gains versus unrealized gains meaning booked gains versus gains in investments that are imbedded in an investment return but not as yet recognized as such. Need to uncover these possible gains as in many cases they could be expended without going into principal that is otherwise restricted.
Additional research needs to be done on potential investment advisors beyond Mackenson and Chris Eddy of Northway Bank though neither of these two have been dismissed. TD Bank, Stiffel Nicholas, Randall Investments as well as Cambridge Trust, which manages the New Hampshire Charitable Trust were all mentioned. If we did our own recordkeeping that would broaden the possibilities. Having some previous contact with Cambridge I offered to make an initial contact. It was also decided to go ahead with a Warrant Article to obtain the towns permission for hiring an investment advisor for the public funds even though one was not yet in place. Linda was going to draft the Warrant which is needed by February. In addition, Linda will draft a revised investment policy that would cover the objectives in increasing returns and the need for outside
direction to this end. It was also discussed that the concerns of the selectmen and voters need to be addressed and writing up a less formal proposal(s) outlying the effort prior to a vote would be advisable. Again, the emphasis would be focused on getting higher returns.
Helene mentioned that the Jackson Cemetery Trust had some spendable funds and that this was not previously known. Helene said she had just gotten $10,000 in water district funds and was waiting on $30,000 in school funds.
A date for the next meeting was set for 9:30am Monday, December 14th and the meeting was ended.
Submitted by Chris McAleer
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