BOARD OF SELECTMEN
TUESDAY, APRIL 8, 2014
The regular meeting for the Board of Selectmen convened at 7:00 p.m. in the conference room at 29 Thompson Street in the Hillside Building. In attendance were Edward A. Maia, Edward S. Harrison and Dr. Richard M. Smith. Also present were Town Administrator Evan Brassard and the media.
The Pledge of Allegiance was recited.
Mr. Maia announced he has decided not to run for re-election for the Board of Selectmen, and noted nomination papers are currently available in the Town Clerks office, and must be returned by April 22nd; there are openings on other Boards and Committees as well.
Acceptance of Meeting Minutes:
Mr. Harrison made a motion to accept the meeting minutes for March 25, 2014 – open and executive sessions. Dr. Smith seconded and it was unanimously VOTED.
Ray Mansfield – Quaboag Riders Re: 4 X 4 Jamborees on May 24th and 25th:
Mr. Mansfield was unable to attend tonight’s meeting. President of the Quaboag Riders Association Bill O’Donnell, approached the Board of Selectmen and spoke on Mr. Mansfield’s behalf.
Mr. O’Donnell stated last year Quaboag Riders Inc. sponsored a two-day motorcycle event. This year they are sponsoring a two-day 4-wheel drive event.
Dr. Smith asked Mr. O’Donnell how the camping went last year at the motorcycle event. Mr. O’Donnell responded it went alright and noted there weren’t any issues. However, this year there will be no camping at the event.
The hours of operation will begin at 9:30 a.m. with the sign-up; the event will start at 11:00 a.m. and end before dark.
With no further questions, the Board of Selectmen wished the Quaboag Riders Club good luck with the event.
Kenneth E. Elstein, Electricity Aggregation Specialist, Hampshire Council of Governments:
Mr. Elstein approached the Board of Selectmen, and explained the major program they have is the Group Insurance Trust which provides Health Insurance for Town and School employees in about 70 cities and towns in Western Mass., and stated we are welcome to explore that program at any time.
Mr. Elstein said in purchasing, they do everything on behalf of the towns from road salt, asphalt, ice cream to the Senior Center, etc., with their biggest being school supplies.
Mr. Elstein explained the Hampshire Council of Governments got involved in electricity sales back in 2005 after receiving a supplier’s license from the State to provide lower electricity prices, as an independent licensed supplier, to about 70 cities, towns and school districts throughout the five counties in Western Massachusetts.
Mr. Elstein noted in the late 1990’s all of Massachusetts became deregulated for electricity prices with the legislature saying municipalities, cities and towns, were allowed to take over responsibility for the supply portion of the electric bill. The top portion of the electric bill is for delivery, from the power lines to the people who climb the poles, to the wires that go to the houses. The bottom half of the electric bill is the supply portion, the generation of the electrons through the wires. What Hampshire Council of Governments is proposing is for the Town of Monson to join 36 towns and cities in all of the five counties in Western Mass. who have agreed to pool their resources and become the default provider of electricity for the bottom half of the bill, for the supplier. Mr. Elstein
said they service over 150,000 people, and they will be using the bulk power of all these customers to get lowest prices.
Mr. Elstein said this will cost the town zero. The Hampshire Council of Governments will do all the work; they will hire the lawyers, they will fill out all of the paperwork, and they will do all the contracts. Also, nobody is required to participate in this program.
The first step is to get approval at Town Meeting by authorizing the Board of Selectmen to enter into contract to proceed with this program. Once Town Meeting gives its approval, Hampshire Council of Governments will provide the town with a contract to work with them and the other cities and towns. Hampshire Council of Governments will then do all the filings and get a petition to send to Boston. Once they get the approval from all the State agencies in Boston, they will get a bid for Monson’s residential customers who don’t already have an outside supplier, which would be over 90% of the residents and 50% of businesses that will qualify for this program. Hampshire Council of Governments will send out a mailing to all the eligible customers with the bid price stating here is the price
National Grid is charging and here is the price we are proposing. The switch is automatic to the lower price for the customers who do not respond. The customers who don’t want to participate would have to return the postage paid mailer or make a telephone call, or by going on the internet and stating they either want to remain with National Grid or they want to go with somebody else.
Residents will continue to get only a bill from National Grid. The top half of the bill will continue to say National Grid for the delivery and the bottom half will say Hampshire Council or it will have the name of the independent supplier they get the lowest bid from, but it is just a single bill still that is paid to National Grid.
National Grid will still be responsible for maintaining the wires in town, just as they have been in the past, nothing changes except who supplies the power through the lines.
Mr. Elstein said Hampshire Council of Governments will have someone at the Town Meeting to answer any questions.
Mr. Elstein noted Hampshire Council of Governments is a non-profit group that has been here for over 350 years and is elected by the people, and up until 200 years ago, Hampden County was a part of Hampshire County.
Mr. Elstein noted how often it goes out to bid will be based on the prices they are seeing at the time. The initial contract for the 36 towns is five years for stability, but any customer who wants to opt out can at any time without any penalty fees, or the town as a whole can opt out, even for just a year, if they don’t want to participate in the bid if they feel it’s too high. It will cost nothing to leave National Grid as the supplier and it will cost nothing to sign back up with National Grid if they wish to go back to National Grid as the supplier. It also is not a requirement that the Town switch over, and since the Town of Monson is locked in already, the Town is ineligible for this program. This program is only for the customers who are not locked into something else, since there
are often penalties for leaving a different supplier.
Mr. Elstein explained there are three regions in Massachusetts that National Grid services; Western/Central Mass., Northeast and Southeast and National Grid seeks bids for each area. National Grid then blends the prices for the three regions, which isn’t essentially fair since the prices for Western Mass. is slightly lower than the prices for the other two regions. Therefore, Mr. Elstein said the Western Mass. region will start out with a small but significant price advantage through this program.
Mr. Brassard noted this has been added to the warrant for the Special Town Meeting, and if the Board wished not to go with this it could be skipped over.
Set COLA for Non-union Employees:
Mr. Harrison made a motion to set the non-union COLA at 3% for the period of July 1, 2014 through June 30, 2015. Dr. Smith seconded and it was unanimously VOTED.
Special Town Meeting – Closing of the Warrant:
The Board of Selectmen each read pages of the Special Town Meeting warrant into the record, as attached.
Following the reading of the warrant, Mr. Harrison made a motion to add the 26 articles attached to the May 12th Special Town Meeting warrant. Dr. Smith seconded and it was unanimously VOTED.
Dr. Smith made a motion to close the Special Town Meeting warrant for May 12, 2014. Mr. Harrison seconded and it was unanimously VOTED.
Finance Committee – Budget Discussion:
Finance Committee members Robert Finnegan, Peter Fimognari and James Pennington approached the Board of Selectmen.
Mr. Fimognari said the Finance Committee was looking at possibly cutting some of the funds requested in Town Counsel and Legal Fees. Mr. Maia responded that given some of the current issues they are working on right now, he felt it wouldn’t be a good idea to cut any funds in this account.
Finance Director Deborah Mahar approached the Board of Selectmen and said she will check into how much she feels will be needed in the Legal account for the up-coming fiscal year. Mr. Brassard said either he or Ms. Mahar will email that figure out to the Finance Committee Secretary Brenda Payette for the Finance Committee to have for their next meeting on Wednesday.
Mr. Finnegan said the Finance Committee would like to give a little more money to the Library since they are below the State minimum for certification, to at least show the town is trying to give them something to close the gap for the waiver. Mr. Finnegan said they haven’t come up with a figure yet on this, but somewhere in the area of $10,000.00, $15,000.00 or $20,000.00 if possible.
Also being considered is the possible reduction of a new school bus, going from the requested two new buses down to one new school bus, for a savings of $40,000.00.
Mr. Pennington said the gap they are working with this year is slightly higher than $118,000.00, between how much money the town has and what the requested total is. Mr. Finnegan said they also don’t know what the 3% for non-union employees or the union negotiations amount will be. Mr. Brassard said he believes it comes to about $36,000.00 and said either he or Ms. Mahar will get that figure to the Committee as well.
Mr. Finnegan said one other option is to use Free Cash on one-time expenditures. For example, a one-time only in the Police Department budget dealing with firearms and technology, totaling $4,400.00. Mr. Brassard noted he thought the technology account was meant to be recurring. Ms. Mahar said she wasn’t sure about the Police Department’s. Mr. Maia said he thought it was recurring for three to five years. Mr. Brassard noted that might be something to look at as well.
Mr. Finnegan said another item was in the Board of Assessors, who have in their budget request a stipend that totals $4,487.00, and the Committee said that likely wasn’t going to go. Mr. Finnegan noted no other Boards are getting a stipend so it wouldn’t be fair to give to one and not to the so many others.
Mr. Brassard said, also in the Assessors budget there is a request in technology for $3,000.00 which will be held for this cycle as a new Principal Assessor will be starting very soon and might not want or need this item.
Mr. Pennington said Free Cash will be needed or cuts will have to be made, as there aren’t any more options available.
Mr. Pennington said this winter was horrible and the roads took a real toll. Therefore, he wouldn’t like to see that money taken away. Mr. Pennington said with the condition of the roads now, they need to be taken care of so they don’t get any worse with a higher price tag later on to repair them.
Ms. Mahar approached the Board of Selectmen and noted using Free Cash is an issue with bonding and said the town will be bonding $3 ½ million for the new Town Office/Police Station facility. Therefore, we want the best bond rating we can get to keep the interest rates down on behalf of our tax payers. Ms. Mahar said we have to be cognoscente about using those funds. Ms. Mahar stated if you are using Free Cash in a structured way, it’s looked at as favorable that you’re using your reserves in ways that make sense, and not using them for things that will be year, after year, after year; which is what we did for years and we finally got away from of doing that, and she doesn’t want to get back into that cycle again.
Mr. Pennington said the Finance Committee doesn’t know the amount that is looked upon favorably. Mr. Maia clarified anything that is a one-time purchase such as the firearms.
Mr. Pennington said cuts will have to be made across the board to every department, or they need to use some of the Free Cash. Mr. Maia said as a Finance Committee they will have to determine what is necessary and what is more necessary in the requests, but felt top priority is public safety and education, with everything else up for grabs. Dr. Smith added any departments looking for a large increase, in his opinion, should be looked at more carefully.
Mr. Maia explained people have to understand there are only so many dollars, and we can only do the best we can.
Mr. Brassard said in the past few days, he has spoken with both Mr. Morrell and Michelle Loglisci, and suggested inviting Mr. Morrell in to the next Finance Committee meeting to speak specifically about bituminous and what his thoughts are on that, and also recommended inviting Ms. Loglisci to speak about the school transportation and just what the specific needs are there. Mr. Brassard said he spent the afternoon looking at buses and noted there is a definite need for replacement buses since the biggest portion of their fleet is 2005. Mr. Brassard noted the transportation department is having failure issues based on age rather than miles and added they have some big rust problems going on as well, and found it enlightening to him to go and look at the equipment. Mr. Brassard explained they have
school buses with 190,000 miles and another with 167,000 miles; and the bus they were repairing today had rust holes on the steps where the children step up, and added there were some pretty major repairs taking place when he was there.
Mr. Brassard questioned if the town delays the purchase of a new bus, what does that do to the maintenance costs.
Mr. Harrison noted he wasn’t in favor of a 3% cut across the board as a way to make up the $118,000.00 shortfall. Mr. Harrison noted a 3% cut in some budgets could result in not being able to perform the function, and therefore felt you really need to target the line by line items.
Mr. Pennington stated there’s going to come a time when we are going to have to have an override.
The Board of Selectmen thanked Mr. Pennington, Mr. Fimognari and Mr. Finnegan for coming in.
Approve Auctioneer and Pool Table Licenses:
Mr. Harrison read the auctioneer and pool table establishments into the record, as attached.
Mr. Harrison made a motion to approve the licenses as described. Dr. Smith seconded and it was unanimously VOTED.
Discussion Regarding the Parks and Recreation Storage Shed:
Mr. Brassard said the 30 X 30 Parks and Recreation storage shed is currently planned to be built in the same vicinity as the previous storage shed, just slightly offset from there. Mr. Brassard said recently there has been conversation to see if it is feasible and prudent to relocate the storage shed here to the Hillside Building property where the Parks and Recreation rental containers are located, for a couple of reasons. There are drainage issues in the Veteran’s Field location and it will get it away from the public view; also moving the sheds location will free up more of the park space and solve some of the concerns on the layout for the Police Departments parking area.
Mr. Brassard stated the insurance company has said they would be willing to pay for the building even if it were moved to the Hillside property, but it was just a general discussion to see if it made sense to do it.
Mr. Brassard said the negatives are if the school bus transportation office were to move from the Hillside Building, there wouldn’t be any access to the restrooms, and there’s always the potential once the Town Offices are out of this building, of what happens to the building in the future.
Mr. Maia asked if the new storage shed is going to be a metal building. Mr. Brassard responded it’s not going to be metal. It will be a 30 X 30 building architecturally designed to go with the new Town Office Building.
Mr. Maia said the part that concerns him is Parks and Rec. is going to be based out of the new Town Office Building, and felt there would be a supervision issue with having the storage shed located on the Hillside property, as well as the constant back and forth.
Dr. Smith asked if there was a plan for the drainage at the planned site of the storage shed behind the new Town Office Building. Mr. Brassard responded there is a plan for improved drainage.
Mr. Maia said he didn’t like the idea of having the storage shed relocated to the Hillside property. Dr. Smith agreed he too is in favor of keeping it in Veteran’s Field. Mr. Harrison said it makes the most sense to keep it close by to wherever Parks and Rec. are going to be located.
Discussion Regarding Town Computer Needs:
Mr. Brassard said right now there are close to 22 computers in town that are running on Windows XP, which as of today, Microsoft is no longer supporting.
Mr. Brassard explained there is some money in the new building for technology. The thought is to look at replacing those computers early, and ahead of moving into the new building. Mr. Brassard said he would like to approach the Building Committee at their next meeting on April 14th to see if they would be willing to fund the purchase of that hardware now. One computer has been purchased so far, as the electronic check depositing was no longer going to be supported by the bank if we were still running on an XP machine. This was purchased and there was no loss of service.
Mr. Brassard noted the new computers will operate on Windows 7 Pro. There has been some concern with Windows 8, especially if people aren’t tech savvy. Mr. Brassard said they will be purchasing Windows 8.1 licenses with a downgrade to Windows 7, so in the future if we wanted to go to Windows 8 we could bump back up.
Mr. Brassard explained he now has remote access to a server, allowing him access to everyone in the town building’s computer. Mr. Brassard explained from this he can see what operating system they are running, hard drive, etc. Mr. Brassard is pooling this information and building a data base with it. Mr. Brassard said he is also going around and labeling the computers with a number that relates to the information on his data chart, so he will know when the computer should be replaced. His plan is for the heavily use computers to get tech quicker, and then filter down, rather than the computer that sits on the counter in the Assessor’s office, for example, that is only used by the customers being a top priority.
Mr. Brassard said there is money in the new building for this in technology and said the cost would be a rough estimate of approximately $15,000.00 to $20,000.00 for mid-line computers with a five year warranty. This really depends on what licenses from Microsoft Office are purchased; a Windows 7 Pro cost $229 per unit; and if it’s Ultimate it’s $378 per unit. Mr. Brassard said there are only a few users who would need the Ultimate license; and there are some units that don’t need it at all because they work just with the State data base.
The Board of Selectmen agreed for Mr. Brassard to speak with the Building Committee to see if they will release the funds early, as it does make sense.
In New Business to Come Before the Board:
- Ms. Mahar approached the Board of Selectmen and informed the Board, a Principal Assessor has been chosen to fill the vacancy left by the resignation of Ann Murphy. Ms. Mahar said she would like to bring forward Alyce Johns for appointment. Ms. Johns is currently the Assessor in Rutland Mass. Ms. Mahar noted they had an interview committee with Mr. Brassard, herself and Cristina Pedro where they interviewed five candidates, narrowing the field down to the top two applicants who were brought forward to the Board of Assessors for further interviewing. As a group Ms. Johns was chosen to fill the vacancy. Ms. Mahar said her recommendation is to appoint her effective April 22 through June 30, 2014, at which time Ms. Mahar will do up a letter recommending a three year appointment.
Mr. Harrison made a motion to appoint Alyce Johns to the Principal Assessors position effective April 22 through June 30, 2014. Dr. Smith seconded and it was unanimously VOTED.
- Mr. Brassard noted he received a letter today from Bill Gallagher, Resident Project Manager for Daedalus Projects, Inc., who is working on our new Town Office/Police facility. The letter stated over the weekend, John Morrell and his Highway Department crew screened over 2000 yards of material to be used for backfill around the new building, saving the community quite a bit of money. Mr. Gallagher wrote this letter thanking Mr. Morrell and the Highway Department for doing this, and for doing it so promptly.
Correspondence was read and completed.
At 8:55 p.m., Mr. Harrison made a motion to adjourn from open session. Dr. Smith seconded and it was unanimously VOTED.
_______________________________________
Dr. Richard M. Smith, Clerk
| 
