Monterey Select Board
Minutes of the meeting of 2/2/09
Meeting Opened at: 4:00pm
Select Board Members Present: Wayne Burkhart, Chairperson, Scott Jenssen and Jon Sylbert
Also in attendance for parts of the meeting: Sue Protheroe for the Monterey News, Michael Storch (Fin Comm and E.C.C.), Maryellen Brown (Fin Comm) and Daniel Moriarity (Fin Comm)
The board met with Police Chief, Gareth Backhaus to review the following items:
1. Weekly report reviewed back to January 14th:
a. Two false alarms at the Town Hall.
b. MVA; One of the Highway Crew members was plowing Bidwell Rd and stopped the plow to allow a contractor to move his truck that was in the way. The contractor attempted to drive around the town truck but slipped on the ice (it was not sanded yet because the truck had been parked in the road in the way) and hit the plow. No damage was done to the town truck but the contractor wanted to file a complaint against the town.
c. DMV’s on Hupi Rd, Beartown Mtn Rd, Carrington-Battelle Rd.
d. Assisted with a medical emergency on Beartown Mtn Rd.
e. Suspicious vehicles investigated on Art School Rd and Mt Hunger Rd.
f. Two loose dogs were picked up during the last storm and returned to their owner.
g. Served 3 summonses for court.
h. Report of a possum in a trash can; the officer on duty assisted with releasing the possum.
i. A party on Art School Rd is requesting to file a complaint against National Grid and Verizon.
j. The Chief received a resume from an officer currently in the full time academy, scheduled to graduate in March who is interested in working for Monterey. The Chief will schedule an interview.
The board met with Building Inspector, Donald Torrico and reviewed the following items:
1. The new Electrical Inspector will start on February 9th.
2. The interim electrical inspector performed one inspection for the town and has since resigned; he stated he was only interested in the main inspector position not the alternate.
3. Don asked if his budget line items should be broken out further. The Select Board did not feel that it needed to be.
4. The past alternate inspector has been performing inspections and D. Torrico recommends that he be reappointed as the Alternate Electrical Inspector. A motion was made to reappoint Jim Kern as the alternate which was seconded and unanimously approved.
5. D. Torrico is currently reviewing the way other towns pay their inspectors and alternates and will come up with a recommendation for Monterey. The new system seems to be working with the permits and money being submitted to the Town Hall and then being scanned and emailed to the appropriate Inspector. Since the new policy went into effect one plumbing application and several electrical applications have been received.
6. D. Torrico, the Plumbing and Electrical Inspectors and their alternates will meet with the Board on Monday, February 23, 2009 from 5:30 – 6pm.
7. D. Torrico stated that there is going to be another large scale project (approx. 9000 square feet) on Eaton Rd. The contract has been awarded but no paperwork has been submitted yet. It was suggested that with large projects like these the Board may want to revisit the current fee schedules as inspections may end up taking a lot longer with the larger living areas.
8. There has been a slow down in permit applications.
The board met with Inter-Departmental Secretary, Melissa Noe to review the following items:
1. M. Noe provided the Board with 2 quotes received for printing the Town Report; one quote with a sample was from Select Print Solutions for $717.00 for 250 copies and the other quote was from Kwik Print for $945.00 plus an additional $400.00 for typesetting for 250 copies. The Board agreed to use Select Print Solutions to print the FY08 Town Report.
The board met with Town Accountant, Barbara Gauthier to review the following items:
1. Warrants were signed.
4:45 – 5:00pm Employee Compensation Committee Members Scott Jenssen and Michael Storch present a memo from the committee with their FY10 recommendations (listed below). The Committee’s goal was to match what other surrounding towns and villages are offering their employees. The suggested changes minimally affect the overall budget but will have a large impact on showing the current employees that their longevity with the Town is appreciated. The Committee agreed that with the exception of #6 below the only raises that should be given this year is COLA.
1. The committee recommends that the Select Board create a standardized policy, effective July 1, 2009, that health insurance is only available to full time employees and that elected officials (working less than a posted 20 hours every week) and part-time employees are not eligible.
2. The committee recommends that the Select Board revisit the separation/consolidation of the Board of Registrars Clerk and Town Clerk line items as they are related to a single position. We also recommend that the parameters of the job description and salary for that the position be clarified. Maryellen questioned whether or not the Board of Registrars Clerk has to be the Town Clerk or if it has to be a separate position/person. It was noted that of the surrounding towns surveyed by the Employee Compensation Committee, Sheffield is the only one that has this as a separate position and is not done by the Town Clerk. B. Gauthier also researched the MMA salary survey and found only 1 other town that had the Board of Registrars Clerk as a separate line item. W.
Burkhart asked who would be the one to appoint the position. J. Sylbert asked if it was necessary to have this separate line item. M. Brown reviewed how this is currently done in West Stockbridge (paid out of the elections line item). B. Gauthier suggested that this was a good time to make these changes since the current Town Clerk is not seeking re-election. The Board is going to research the job functions and person responsible for the Board of Registrars Clerk with Town Counsel.
3. The committee recommends that the current vacation policy be changed from 2 weeks at 2 years and 3 weeks at 6 years to 1 week after 1 year (for when new employees are hired), 2 weeks after 2 years, 3 weeks after 5 years and 4 weeks after 11 years.
4. The committee recommends that an employee be given the option to cash out up to 15 days of sick time earned but not used at the end of each fiscal year after their maximum of 90 sick days allowed to be banked has been met. Note: if an employee didn't take any sick days, it takes 6 years to bank 90 days. Only after the full 90 days is banked would an employee have days to be paid out if unused. (See attached payout chart) The Finance Committee and Select Board had questions about what the current policy stated. The Board felt that accruing 90 days should be treated as extended time for an “extended leave”, which would be a special circumstance (i.e. injury, illness, etc). The current policy was read aloud. Jon and Maryellen didn’t feel
that an employee should be paid out for sick time unless they were leaving or retiring from the Town, Wayne did not comment.
5. The committee recommends that the Select Board formalize, standardize and schedule the review process. The recommendation to review merit based raises will be visited next year.
6. In light of the current economic situation the Committee would like to address any inequities in the Highway Crew salaries. The Committee agreed to recommend the following for raises in the Highway Department:
*Raise Highway Member #3 to the current salary of Highway Member #2 ($40,891/yr).
The Board will review the recommendations further at future meetings while working on the budget.
5 – 6pm The Finance Committee (all were present) met with the Board to discuss the following:
1. Dan asked what approach the Finance Committee should be taking when reviewing the budget requests that come in this year. The Board and Committee discussed this and felt that requests should be conservative.
2. M. Brown asked if the Town is able to request that the school committee vote per pupil instead of statutory. A letter will be written to Deborah Mielke and the other elected school committee members, the surrounding town Select Boards and the Dr. Michael Singleton requesting that they present the FY10 operating budget using the alternate per pupil assessment method.
3. The Finance Committee, Accountant and Select Board review items that would be coming off of the budget from last year and items that are going to be added.
4. Chief Backhaus came to ask the Finance Committee about some talk he’d heard concerning the full time officer position. In case there were any questions he wanted the Committee to know that this line item is being used presently for the officers that are currently covering this vacant position and will be needed to fill the vacancy.
Miscellaneous Select Board Items Reviewed:
1. The minutes from 1.26.09 were approved as written.
2. Mail was reviewed.
a. The current Veteran’s Agent, Peter Saunders is retiring and applications are being accepted for the position. Please call the Veteran’s Agent for more information.
3. The Board reviewed the Planning Board’s request to hold the Special Town Meeting in the first two weeks of April on a Monday – Thursday. The Select Board has set it for Thursday, April 2nd at 7pm at the Firehouse pending the moderator’s approval/availability.
A motion was made and unanimously approved to adjourn the meeting at: 6:22pm
Submitted by:
Melissa Noe, Inter-Departmental Secretary
Approved by:
Monterey Select Board
Select Board Members
Minutes Book
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