palmer reverse the compensation under the general manager for the substation transmission project update we do need to discuss the documents that we hope to execute or release approved to execute this evening specifically around of huge increase of the power cost not to increase the base rate for the customers so we are building the reserve and the reserve is equal to three months of power purchases we expect to reserve three point eight million and we're pretty close to this number right now the current balance is rate back in august and now it's a credit instead of being a charge i don't expect they'll being any additional cash will be able to reserve but that's we're pretty close to our goal so i don't see why we need to took the average and decided that's what our goals that was included into the again that's how we but when we take the money which we reduce the expense so otherwise we're balancing the purchase paul expands by taking the cash from the well i have the advantage of being in the permanent audit committee so i've covered this before but i still i know you're going to find this to be tiresome it probably will be you know but it's ok i think i'm going to take the chance because it hasn't been confirmed but in the last audit meeting we discussed whether the rate base included pensions and life and hope and the answer was they think so so in my opinion what we should be doing is we should be transferring monies from the like company to the pension fund into the open fund if we've collected it for that purpose and i i hate the i know it's tiresome but i also know but that's the correct thing to do for you know we went through this before it was never authorized to do that so why would we do that now no i'm saying it's in as you know we plan to roll out a cost of service study in two thousand and seventeen or understand but i'm talking about this year and she and i think i mean that in the current rate case we are collecting money for both terminology when you say rate base typically means plan in service is that what you mean or do you mean rate what i mean in the rates that are being the rates are great but it's being charged so what the correct terminology i think you would say in rates not in ra back in time in my belief is that you know based on the tape and everything else we've been through this a couple times already was never authorized to do that but if it isn't that somehow included in the rates we need to understand that ok ok very good thank you with that point thank discuss at some point which is the uses issue here that you've been working on that we don't have ready for us tonight right that there may be additional funds from this transaction that go into the fund or that was or is in that's correct here and if policy you change that and it went to you went to a flat six fifty we get you for until the proper until the project was done so ok i think a lot is going to happen in two thousand and seventeen because the project we were waiting for everything last time we had a meeting i told you that you know we used to the town used to take in that income and both you and me should not know that so i decided not to press the point but it's actually in the minutes of the meeting around the confirmation that town meetings approved the bond proceeds for use of decommissioning the existing stations and upgrade the distribution system but it's not the same distribution system that we're talking about with regard to transmission we're talking about you know the wires in town those kind of things and if you look at the certified copy of that you've been working and that's not really deceiving but something that we need to finalize right once we understand what if any additional monies are available that i think at that point me through yes a suggestion was that light department council would not not while we changed council since then but at the time when when we went for the bonding me yes yes it was done by remember this is your own town van was done by was done by it was a broad enough article i think jim jim's reading of it is that it does seem somewhat narrow i've read it and i just don't want to reach a conclusion deceiving unless we have time council and point and like department council review it to understand whether there's any additional funds to the left of as long as those funds they used for decommissioning and upgrading of the system they fall within the purview of the bond authorization dollars from the operating fund to the construction appreciation fund so much of second life they were finally to have a motion to approve transfer of of that discussion is jim's desire to perhaps for us to consider doing something differently than a direct cash bonus and reason for the bonus is jim as you know based on the correct and that agreement calls for him to be paid in advance for those courses and that we reimburse him up to seventy five percent or at seventy five percent if he attains a three point zero or greater  and jim would like for us to consider revising the professional in lieu of this cash bonus for us to consider revising the professional development agreement whereby we would pay the university directly rather reimburse him for the other twenty five percent that he had to pay i'm going to consider this an i think it's something that we can consider and work on between now and the end of the year if you join the real bone here to impose upon typically the holiday week after after the christmas holiday week of the twenty six we can convene i think mean we need to work with the human resources department need to understand the gym whether this is a taxable event and we did have an opportunity to look at section if you don't mind and like to work with the resources to petition the government she had she thought the meeting was a later get ok with her and also perhaps already tried me i'm not certain about the taxability issue him going to get this information as relates to what he's paid out of pocket the other twenty five a simple point and i think will have the numbers in front of us to consider a change and disagreement and i think it's something genet knew what we can do between now and the end of the year think we have time that's a reasonable to do when does the course and the program ends in june but this is really not much different i want to propose to last was like you i was disappointed that we couldn't find any comes because i think you know that would have been the way to go but presto this is the only substation project that's ever been built in the united the determination of the compensation is not related to the work that that's been done and you know i think ok it might be acceptable to everybody but if it is i understand that this project has been going on for six years the last three years of course have been pretty heavy i don't i don't i know that speaking for myself i could not build the substation there's absolutely no way that could happen and i can guess as i go around the mean so we've had him do really two jobs for a long time and even though i understand that you know this is a way out i'm not sure it's you know it's a it's a good basis for you know warding the bonus and then i'll just say a second thing and then i'll be quiet about this but we have no we have another series of projects coming up and i don't know if they're in the ordinary course of business or not i mean perhaps you know somebody who has more experience in this space than i do you know because if we're going to decommission three three substations is that in the normal course of business or is that another you know second job for the interim manager no i think you know i think your points are well taken this is something jim has requested a list of this stuff yeah and so i think what we can do you can we can very well decide or you might very well over command it within ten ten days or before the end of the year that move that you rather prefer to pay a completion bonus if you recall i think on the one that suggested i've always been that at some point during the year  we go through this and we can look at that plus we can compare that to what we were thinking about from a bonus point of view i'm sure we're going to we we may not have been the green on the number but you know what we do this is jim's requested and i think we're trying to get this done but you know let's leave you hanging to look at the somebody week for those of us that are celebrating christmas holidays probably of the week i think we get the twenty six makes sense that we can make a decision we can connect i think we should commit to jim that will have a decision that week before the end of the year the twenty it's just the only difference in this document here is really the reconciliation of the cost that i've encouraged to date is really the only difference it's right so it's really it's not really much different than what we talked about before ok topic i just don't want to discuss it with bob here we do need has he been part of the dialogue in the e mails that we've exchanged and assuming he'll be here any minute so your look at the future leading to yes let's look at i think we could your team here as well and call them to water yes and then we'll have to wind once part gets here we're recessed from you in and have you come back that's ok please come up yeah i'm all for it i just you know not that i want by its input that we need to get signed off but i think it's important that if we're going to move forward and we get an understanding and agreement with what all parties that's ok  some programs projects that we think we can be of assistance on i've got ten listed here which i know is a kind of a lot it's not quite the david letterman list of ten but hopefully if you missed letterman i like so i mean the first one just because it's on everyone's mind is the transmission substation project we know it's in the final stages and we do have sarah jackson on the committee now and she's very familiar with ice unknowingly cassella cation process and would be happy to as a committee and i think sarah for sarah to get it get involved in that issue if there could if we could be of any assistance on that and  i know we've seen some of the people reliability committee meeting reports and so forth so i think we could get into that although we understand that it is a project that's nearing is ation or perhaps it has been i'm not sure in the last couple days the second prize number on the list was energy per kerman i know the town residents are always very concerned about how to get into as part of the committee the number three on the list is energy efficiency programs as we know in many respects the best way to cut costs and help the environment is find a good way not to use energy  t my wife does have energy efficiency programs i know that been bandied around for a couple of years some additional programs i've talked a little bit too becca cain i'm not sure what's quite out there i know she's in charge of the energy efficiency area right now belmont light and i think if we were to look at that i think we could be of some assistance and maybe to maybe bring some of those energy efficiency programs to fruition we've got some talent on the committee to do that i know i've dealt with casa service such as before you can not that i'm the person that would be put it to putting one together myself and number five on the list is accounting  i'm not an accountant by any means but this is why i think it's so important that forster is on the committee he brings a really amazing amount of talent to that area i think he's been  morning we met wednesday morning that we met again to thursday morning to move forward we approve the asset purchase agreement with with every source who is prepared to wire us forty five million dollars in fines and the breakdown is in the documents that we've where three hundred eighty nine dollars because they will have a need ever source to enter our building to service the switchgear and other equipment of their penis for him is that correct  property taxes we don't want to in any way hinder or him cuff our assessing department in terms of assessing taxes and the tax we use of certain property that would be contained within that  read allocation of purchase price purchase price shall be allocated among the various components of the transmission projects in accordance with the allocation set forth and attach schedule two point five that is basically that he lists what you easements the personal property is non property p d f which is what we paid contractors personal service service contracts and then there's a credit in there for the component of switch gear that tax consequences of the purchase and sale on the plated here by an american system with such allocation i think that was the problem problematic because of how this sort of sets and such a stone if you will so much time has agreed just to drop that sentence which of if i may just outline the magnitude this could impact the town by hundreds of thousands of dollars annually in property taxes  know we had expected that we'd get in the total of two to three hundred thousand and property taxes you know from and star they are paying us a total of forty five million dollars and you know our share of the bonding that survives is about twenty six or twenty eight million my concern is that if we as the town fathers execute this asset purchase agreement with an allocation of the purchase price being approximately four million towards personal property bill of sale and bta easement at which wouldn't be taxable  techno ok and the belmont easement ok then out of that out of that forty five million we may be agreeing with and star that the taxable portion is about two point seven million dollars which is which is ridiculous and i fiscally not sound ok irresponsible of us as as a board of selectmen this specifically says what what we are being advised to sign says non property p t f forty two million dollars for non property non property means nontaxable right and no in agreement with and starr that the numbers and the asset purchase agreement are not binding on our board of assessors are we in agreement on that with n starr they can't use these numbers as a basis of applying for a tax abatement and they can't use these numbers as high for the public tax court we haven't said anything in that respect by removing that language are we in agreement over that concept with and star no i don't think so ok then we have an issue because we don't want our assessments hands tied if you are the fact personal property is more than just nuts and bolts that are on the installation of a product is considered part of the personal property tax  assets the personal property which would be under mass general or is taxable the contract price and we have we've pa be able to use it that it's for taxation purposes you know if i may you know forty's plays well i just see this agreement and the allocation of purchase price just as a contract contractual matter between and star and the miss will light partner this is how the parties themselves are allocating the cost this agreement has just is not evidence or binding on the assessor is not correct this is no way purports to the town is entering into a contract with someone i think a court of law would take a different opinion of the town said that this wasn't taxable non property taxes stayed in there it's not this is a different allocation it clearly states and on property taxes is not the benefit of the town to be signing an agreement that clearly makes it look like this is a non taxable event yet this is a material issue for us it's either go inevitably whenever the assessor goes out there in the terms of the value of their property and it's likely that ever source will contest that and they can go to the politics where that's where it's going to be several completely so we're not in any way i think preventing them from doing these anon write so if we would seems to be an academic discussion if we include that in there would you say it's not binding they say it's not acceptable the only reason they could say that you say that they're saying it's unacceptable is that they want to be binding that that's where i would get a converse like they said we don't want that in there we don't want to be binding because we don't we don't want it to be binding and i would say well geez ok then you are going to use the language of the us purchase agreement contest and yourselves been so by putting that in there doesn't in any way i think diminish their rights to contest any the what and star is concerned about is that about the binding language is that it wants to be able to produce this document as one evidence of this now exactly the right to my real sign we're going to sign it and they give them evidence to just through t assessment i'm not sure how we're minding us i mean this is contractual obligation between and star reconstructed this is the cost and this is what you pay this in no way in my opinion assess it you know ties assessors hands in doing the determination and then the they'll go at it but we don't want to give them we don't want to give them any document that we signed is a white board that they can present to the public tax board judge to contest that assessment why would we do that if the proper we had asked for information we try to get this information long before this we've never been provided with this point again this should be an on binding of allocation because again they can't we're not going to have in any way to contest the assessment if you file an abatement claim they can take this to court how does that language in there in any way prevent them from doing that was ok and it makes us sleep at night project that people have been talking about here before and i don't think it's relevant because because no one knows what it was that we're we're dealing with it levy and so it's just the totally irrelevant point and i think i think we should drop our discussion about it the second thing is that i don't think it's unusual to have a problem like this in transactions like this we had what we had the starbucks lease and in  the cushing village project that we had to extend in order to get that done and i think that the point that bob reardon is making even with consideration to yours what he's saying is that the rules of assessing include engineering consulting it's not just the nuts and bolts so for the those kind of expenses to be classified as has been for advocates well the only other choice is to send walter and in sharon out to say the same thing i don't know if that's going to break bob do you see any other way of breaking the gridlock i mean  put any value on it but if they go to court and can produce this document it could work adversarial lead to us because they could hold up and say we didn't impede the assessor from doing their job but the assessor was wrong this was only worth a million dollars that's why i want to say it's not binding either party to be able to show that as a doctor or they have to change exhibit two forty five i mean that's the end of it maybe the best thing to do is to work with town council to see if that there is something that we can come up with that makes sense that they can give us the opinion that they feel a couple i mean i'll be more than happy go that i've been a revenue with this issue i mean wherever it goes i just want to make sure this does not come back to haunt the town might be taxable i mean in terms of the transaction itself if this turns out to be a three month discussion you know there's there's no harm done well the line has to go with service because every source and it it's projecting that something might happen despite sharon's assurances in unless unless this document is somehow changed to eliminate that possibility it's it's not something that we can right so we can we can you know we can ask george hall to work with the bob and take a look at it and you can contact the department of revenue what does that is that a phone call like on open meeting which i i to ask another one of the other one of these we should comment is walk to work on this all day thursday so appreciate your efforts for doing this but i think it seems to me based on your comments as well that there were one you wanted to use this document yeah how about if we just eliminate list those things we have lists of no but i mean in the schedule instead of saying instead of you know putting a name to it if if if if if we just make a list of six or seven things  binding because they really want to use this argument why would they care why would they care about that link which if they didn't want to use it that's a purchase agreement and what that's my conclusion at least what are you saying you have to know i was saying that this is the the  to more than you know we can have an a but what i would have been in a situation where on the e mail came back and said they were going to use it against us it confirm my worst especially with this deal that's exactly right they said they were going to use it against us in the at and see if it's you know it's really want to raise the money so if it's something we really ought to be able to do it tomorrow night attach it's got to be if it if we're breaking up the purchase price if we get a break at the part i think we need to know that there's something we can actually so that you comply with that open meeting law because we can always cancel yeah right but time time is of the essence i mean it you know time marches we take care of this and recap real briefly so the five that mentioned previously energy procurement energy efficiency programs cost of service study accounting and transmission substation project and that you know you say about the well what we said was we know that there's issues with getting p t s status we've looked at the november fifteenth reliability committee meeting notes you know it's kind of a mute point it's not even under a rock our control of the it's ever sources problem ok ok it was three hundred thousand dollars that's right but i mean that is three hundred thousand dollars which i think you know looking at some data suggests that the the contractor and given a majority ok or endorsement but that was predicated on getting you know looking at the debt as the program progressed and we assume we can would like to continue would like to do that and we've been assured that we can be able to do that there is another topic would be comparison with other utilities there's been interest in the past in lab and you to see how our rates reliability metrics safety metrics perception of the community compares with the other utilities there are a couple things that could happen in the future and  certainly we're not suggesting that this would happen but at some point jim may decide to leave and if he does maybe his life would be a lot better i'm not sure but we could we thought we could be useful in the search for interim o energy storage in our of p and it's too early to know if it's going to be suitable for belmont but it could be cain is already on top of this but we thought we could be some assistance perhaps and then the last thing which  may be a little bit of an overlap with that energy committee but being able to step back and provide a holistic vision where where we are energy wise come out like a then perhaps a town why in order to get you know delve into these things and obviously you're not going to delve into them all at once and it's going to be over a period of time but i think based on last meeting would like to like to get into these areas and perhaps others as they with i think right now it's oh it varies right but i think right now we're looking at the program is going to be is going to be very important also the other thing that steve didn't mention that  needs to be looked at will be all the big really big data is really what it comes down to so we finished rolling out the smart meter project so now we're collecting all the information if you profiles those folks would be interested in different energy efficiency programs and it really comes down to try to help folks to reduce their energy consumption and change their behavior so that's one way that big data we're gathering all this day we like to gather all this data related to when people charge and how many you know where where they're charging how do we optimize many utilities are now putting together programs around all these types of data to kind of get that in a central place so they can start to think about a dashboard and how do we hold the stick we look at both the revenue side and even the cost side of our of our utility so that's what we are talking about big data that's kind of what i was saying i hadn't thought of that it's kind and that's exempt so i don't know how that fits with the committee you know i mean the one thing that i think we were talking about and we started to talk about whether we have renewable port portfolio standards for that type of or whether we have seen it in terms of and i know there's something else that's come up and it's my being part of the energy committee as opposed to back but it's just and i met with back earlier this week to about community solar and other types of programs which could be involved with that it's related to everybody you know mr chair as i look at the list the ones that jump out at me ok because you know they can really impact climate change and you know belmont's awareness of what it can do to help the environment is number one energy procurement policy i think that's an important one i like energy efficiency programs especially as that doveta with all the data we're getting from the smart meters you know so they're you know we could we could learn a lot of neat things on usage and what's going on in belmont and then and then the other one to me is electric vehicles because there is a program you know that that is being worked on right now by energy committee and and a group of residents so that's you know electric vehicles are a thing of the future and if we can what rate should be charged each customer but it it it's intended to divvy up the costs of serving the whole high and determine what costs for instance should be borne by commercial cut or could be allocated to commercial to residential i don't know if we have any industrial but to industrial customers and then once you have that you sort it you have a sense of who should be what is the fair share of everybody to be paying now that doesn't necessarily mean you automatically jump to the fair share because you may want to do it over a period of time so there's a continuity issue but it does give you a good sense of what classes of customers should be paying what we're only maybe a handful maybe one or two or three we know civil like the park instead are governed by the board of selectmen rather than the point of commission or an elected commission so maybe at some point in time we need to think about  ask this question to mean that we should we govern instruction in the right way to be as effective as we possibly can i don't know the answer to that but it may be something i don't know and do relate or try but certainly the way it's structured puts a lot of long term point you know sort of think about yeah when i did the restructuring of like the pov and quite frankly that was the one thing that was identified through the consultants that i was working with that the governance change would be because at the time when that was all going on and the structure review committee was getting to the point where even ed celebrate had put together some special legislation to actually make that a reality so at that point time they were saying yes that's what you need so it's not just us anonymously it's all going to be commissioned by this substation was the biggest risk that the town faced when i first came on board and i think this is worked out pretty well you also remember that town meeting wanted us to sign the documents on the substation and as it turned out that's turned out to be a pretty good thing to do because we have the you know the reach over to the assessor's and you know there are a lot of things that are important from a town standpoint with regard to the like company i think a lot of the confusion around the light company had to do with the the debate over us so we're which was really kind in my opinion as an outsider it was out of control you know there were just two opposing camps and finally got that straightened out and that took a lot of time for the board you know that it was or isn't it i mean it really did take a lot of time for this board and and so then we turned to the substation and that has proceeded to the point where it's proceeded but i think instrumental i worked with that boy to day and night to develop the presentation before tom meeting all of the public outreach that we did for that program and like i said you know bob with the accounting most of this stuff that bo one other project you know that the incinerator site is going to be addressed i think in the relatively near future that's to say within five years instead of in this indefinite future that we that it's been in for a while and as part of that i think there should be a serious assessment of putting a solar farm as as a low cost i think is a relatively low cost way of making use of that space because other types of development on the incinerator site may be in either infeasible or just extremely difficult from an engineering point of view but a solar farm i think would be compatible with a portion of the site and then there could be other uses that could also share it and in concord right now they have about they have at least a megawatt installed in a former landfill yes so if there's a good potential that's a wonderful idea i've brought it up before and i think we've fully got it that just this board will need to make some decision fairly soon as well as here because there is supposed closure there was talk of a post closure study something i think is it funded but i'm not sure it was actually ever done but that's got to come up they presented we have a report it's available and he was opposed closure uses potential think that's just not feasible and any kind of deal that you would put the permanent structure in that becomes more complicated more expensive but if a solar farm can help us from a renewable energy point of view and  project are you going to be silent on that are you going to that's it seems to me that has it that we ought to we ought to have you guys on board some time now we have to do delve into that i think it's a little bit more of an engineering yeah i think so well that project but be happy to certainly hear what the proposal is and you know i think you guys who would be great to have that on your list the other thing is i'm  little curious about the succession planning idea i mean you didn't actually say that you're considering to do a search did you know more so i guess i'm thinking and thinking oh my god authority to determine that he's going to be driving i think i think what my understanding is this list was things that this new constituted committee l back to work or pretty possibly work on over say the next five years can brainstorm more yes we brainstorm things that we thought we could contribute basis and then the other other topics agree as well that makes sense i'm sure that things will come up from time to time but we've got our marching orders and everybody's on board i think before i mean so need to lean on you with that so we we defer discussion of a bonus payment in lieu of trying to accommodate his request to others to to in lieu of a cash payment to consider altering the current