i've handed out the agenda and we've done item number one which is proving the minutes the second image on the agenda is discussing the final c p a project now floyd was here and i don't know if you want  one second if you don't mind i don't want to i don't want to make you stay longer than you need to let me on the start over do you feel like you can completely cover this and you don't need anybody else to be here to talk about the  dollar budget at least for now for the winter tennis courts and we had at least some discussion about that just to refresh your memory anthony francais who i thought was actually going to be here tonight but apparently is not at least the moment was here as a member of the rec commission and expressed at least some concern at that time about the project and had said that the recognition had not yet voted on it was going to do so so one of the reasons why we tabled the discussion was to give the recognition and opportunity to also voted three zero and the capital budget as well so i think that from that perspective i think we now have at least greater clarity where there was in the past some uncertainty about it i think we have some greater clarity about how others who are actually been looking into town i think if you use the numbers that we're talking about before in terms of the national reckon parks association numbers there you know there's on the order of a dozen or so thirteen fourteen courts or some like that might be might be the appropriate number we are rebuilding right so that with that would be kind of that ten to twelve number between those three locations with some degree of geographic dispersion the courts will be going offline completely as a result of the modulars that will certainly be in that space  and there's some reason why chance the high school courts of which there are running a total of ten but i think eight functional courts are not mistaken that those courts will be time potentially become unavailable relatively soon just because of the work on the high school assuming that that happens so i think you know at least at a high level from my perspective i mean there are some logic for the report courts representing kind of an appropriate number of where we're going to be and also kind of appropriate geographic dispersion so i just now kind of play the least of my cards on the table on the topic  but i'll let others you know open the floor for other discussion particular if there's anybody that feels that this is something that maybe we should not be doing as a town it involves collecting information from the state other towns about what they were going to do with this problem and of appendix with somebody information is a passion for you but our larger task was going tomorrow what are you tired health costs actually are based on cash flow and we learned fairly early in this process that the town does not keep cash flow information on retiree health cost it does not segregate the costs associated with retiree health from all other health care of boys so that doesn't exist nor does it exist as we found in most towns in the commonwealth put that to me was interesting rather startling finding but it also sort of stopped our work until we could actually get the data because of this actual facts in any given town about if you're tired one of the towns we wash closely was wayland because they set up a committee like ours about two years ago and they began going about finding out what retiree health costs actually were and wail and then after two years of work they finally did it and then they redid their actual wario test had c will rerun everything but using real data as opposed to assumptions and guesses and it reduced their outstanding liability by more than twenty percent so we think getting this real data is important and we decided to press forward and ask for done now the real work will begin at this one important conclusion though that shouldn't be a cover up and should receive some little attention is our conclusion accountant have saved a lot of money and i think that's very present this this savings really does have an important impact on our estimate of unfunded liability in the two thousand and fourteen natural reform which i think you all saw there was a very interesting item in it somewhere it said reduction in liability as a result of turn premium rates less than expected from the prior bad you ation and the savings to the town in terms of its future estimated liabilities of forty nine point five million dollars all that really means is that the actuary assumptions and also assume that whatever a policy was in two thousand and twelve that would never change and in fact we changed a lot and we saved a lot of money so i think it's a very important thing to get on the table so our job going forward is to model these costs using real data look at options that could be there to keep reducing health care costs particularly for the times and to suggest policies see actually do so the issue was that we were applying the average rate to the number of retirees and that cost is the amount the per the cost of the town is paying versus the individual and since they were looking at both retirees and active employees the same we were not able to get to the retiree costs and so they've gone to the health plans and the majority of health plans are ministry as we are self insuring the majority of it and they're going to give us the retiree buckets of spend for the last few years for us than the have the cash basis to run scenarios on who we buy has roughly coverage we do we actually have a stop loss plan for very large sure cases that com other questions or comments so just at a summary level my understanding is that there are in addition to actually coming up with a proper evaluation of what our retiring costs are because it is that using state averages really use our own numbers  they're essentially are i think as i as i understand it kind of two primary ways that our view of our liability or unfunded liability might actually change so it's currently as i understand it one hundred seventy one million dollars it's perceived to be so way number one that it might change is that as we look at the actual cost as opposed to state averages that may actually cause us to have a different perspective up or down in the case of wayland had a twenty percent reduction when they looked at it is that correct correct ok so that's that's one thing the second thing is the thing that you referenced earlier around the two thousand and fourteen actuary report which lowered our liability overall from i think in one hundred ninety two thousand million dollars range to well yeah but i think there was some there were no changes so there was some drops and i think some increase and that's right that's right so i think if i'm not mistaken he was somewhere in the one hundred ninety range but i could be wrong but nonetheless that change came because the they factored in actual health care growth that was lower than had been previously forecast right now as i understand it one hundred seventy one million dollars liability still assumes that health care costs will grow this year i believe by eight percent next year by seven the following year by six and then forevermore at five percent if our average is point one percent which is not to say that it's going to stay a point one percent just to be really clear but if our average for the last six years has been point one percent that's potentially an opportunity for that number to change in some meaningful way is that a fair statement in his i think that greg r are definitely going to be helpful in reducing that liability and i think the thing we're most likely to come up with a policy recommendations do this and you will save ex do that and you'll say why and keep and these things will take time we're talking about you know thirty year projection for liability so will probably be talking about ten or fifteen years to implement changes but the direction should always be to try to keep that so are there other questions or comments there is some data collection that has already started in terms of gathering actual data on retirees and that they work will continue all that i think is great at least from my perspective and then what i was saying from a summary perspective was that i think there are two primary ways that we may find that our health care costs are different than the current one hundred twenty one million dollar number one is that as we look at the actual cost of retiree health care as opposed to the state  averages that that may actually cause a change in and way one that had a twenty percent reduction and that may or may not have a similar impact here we'll find out but that's number one and number two that when we saw actual results in the in the two thousand and fourteen actual reports into twenty million dollars reduction so i far be it for me to disagree with greg mess who is far more of an expert on a than i am but there is potentially i think an opportunity for he will change in terms of if we continue to realize you know health care growth like we have that could lower our liability  discussions after they've reached they did their interim report i stayed away from the committee but now that they've had there in a report on the liaison from the border selectman and i expect to work with them going forward so i'm also concerned about the way the  the number is calculated because fundamentally i i don't see how the number that they that's that shown this is a practical number these are the costs that are estimated which it over yes because you know if if i took a ten million dollars liability and i'm in a five percent environment you know i need two hundred million to cover that right so in the thirtieth year of this forecast we have a fifteen million dollars normal cost and they're showing that we need six hundred fifty five million to cover that a four and a half percent and i'm asking myself why is that you know because five percent times six hundred fifty five million is thirty million plus so you know i've been talking to david about it i'm talking to ralph i'm talking to other people about it collegially to try to see if if this calculation is practical because it doesn't make sense to me so if i were sitting in a credit committee which i did for a long time and somebody brought a projection that looked like this i would say gee i don't think your numbers are any good you know now whether that's true or not is another question and it's not my place to answer that but certainly we need to we need to figure that out one of the things that david suggested was that the projection reset itself you know every time they did it but i checked that today and it looks like two thousand and fifteen starts with one hundred seventy one million dollars liability as all of us know we pay as we go every year so there's no there's no you know we're paying our bills question is what is it weird that one seventy one come from what is it that you know it should be the net present value the future estimated of cost what's required today to satisfy that thirty years and so i don't see where the one thing comes from actually from a practical standpoint now there could very easily be some kind of actuarial rule that you know you have to do that i have no idea but i but i'm highly confident that the town of the month does not need six hundred fifty five million dollars in the bank to cover fifteen million dollars liability i'm almost i don't you know we agree and we do we do now the question is you know how do you manage that well what i'm proposing is let's put a modest amount against that a year and that number for me and i get i'm not insisting is a million bucks a million dollars let me be more formal ralph's approach which i think we can probably do both is to come in let's let's figure out what our costs ar first right and then look at the calculation find out what's real what's not real and i think as long as we do that before these numbers hit our balance sheet that's ok and we need to do it in an expert way it can't be you know one person's opinion against the rest of the world it has to be it has to be worked out but david told me today because i'm wondering ok hold myself out to be an actuary so i think we really have to get that nailed down we need to have a meeting you know with with our actual worry and say ok what is the story on this house how how practical is this and then i did mention another thing me of something but i won't go into it the it comes from the rate setting in two thousand and eight by the like company where apparently the ark was put in to the rate and it's generated three million dollars some question about how that happened and so we're going to have to go we're going to have to talk to either like company or town council in figure out what do we do with that three million dollars you know the life board deal and yeah i them right so that might have to answer your question we're getting the cost you know we need to know what our cost is we need to know why the calculation is so in realistic when you look at it from a practical standpoint and we need to figure out what to do with that three million dollars now that's not going to answer all the questions but it will get through that round then we'll you know will be at the next round well i got have a standard sense that we would understand the nature of the  but i don't think the money in the open stabilization you know what we're what we're doing every year asked my is the president yet again well there's like a million three in there but every year we put in three hundred thousand so i think that contribution is a token but you have to worry about trapping money in the trust fund and so you don't want to build it up you know because you can only be used for open and so we really need to have the answers that we've discussed in order to figure out what we should be putting away but as time passes you know you lose the the impact of the compound and so this is not a five year decision this is this is something that we should decide i'd say within within the number it's going to be seventy five and just about the time of going out to vote on the high school well i think i have read a recent report from moody's though that indicated they have an interesting way of looking at ok they know it's not required you know that you can change your policies as we've done already you know you can affect the total of if you have it's not our fast like pensions are which are the property right health care is not  so their idea is can you handle it every year is it a fairly small percentage of your total budget and we don't know what the actual number is but i can assure you that as a if you're saying that even the five million that's reported for two thousand and fifteen is not real that's that's based on an average number someplace that's not our number sorry the normal cost that's in the actuarial study as we know that's completely yeah it was  you know now to the war committee hearing how hard you've worked over not that long time period and you know your recommendations are welcomed and and your insights and i encourage you to continue larger packet which is the annual town meeting where articles will see that articles one through seven are designated to be segment a which is made town meeting and then articles pete through nineteen are scheduled to be in segment beat which is what i'd like to do just sort of walk through this relatively quickly and just talk about whether or not we should actually go down these articles and and just hope we arrive at some conclusions about that and then the any article that involves an appropriation we are bound to provide a recommendation to tammy that's part of our charter that is there is an appropriation we are providing a recommendation time the next standard is if the warner tical has what we deem to be a meaningful financial impact on the town then we weigh in on it so for example articles wanted to have neither appropriation nor have any financial impact on the count and that's the reason why we are not only are three is not an yeah so basically if if i may have the recommendation of the historic district commission we did pass and i think adam worked on it off at the time we did pass a demolition delay by law and  list of some close to two hundred properties that would be subject to the demolition of the late maybe two hundred ninety properties and it was it had a sunset provision to allow it to expire in a year at this annual town meeting and the purpose was to give the historic district commission the opportunity to do a survey to update that list take some properties off at some properties on to the list of homes that would be subject to the demolition today my understanding is they have a consultant who's doing that who's probably about seventy to eighty percent complete but they've requested an extension of the current buyout with the current list for an additional year in order to allow them to complete their survey and presumably reach out to the homeowners and advise them so he's a worker he did vote on this if i recall correctly the last time around and part of the logic for that is that  by by essentially restricting the ability of one hundred ninety or so homeowners to sell their homes that that is actually an impact on these those homeowners and meaningful way and therefore potentially nationals as well i suppose but so i would assert that this would time extension yes i mean it's already been approved by town meeting right so it's we're just leader we want to throw up a roadblock so i'm not suggesting that this is necessarily a controversial book but i think that this may be an area where we would be expected to comment but again i'll open the floor discussion so does it have an effect if we're going to extended another year and we should act so that is that is actually my view this was a one year impact last year and we voted no this is a one year not this year and so i would mind my opinion have a vote on it but you know i would agree with you and i would say also  we want to see what the store just a commission has done because last time members of the up crowd was why are all of these buildings being put on the list if they have to consult working out to be nice for us to get an update i don't want to spend a lot of time on it but i think i'd like to hear from them as to what they're doing and how they're doing it because we may have a problem with what they're doing or how they're doing it i don't know what the  look at it again this time is anyone that disagrees with that size of homes that were being built in that area what this is is this is the formal planning board actually covering the same area but this is the formal o i law so it's the same area this is the planning boards work over the last y disagrees with that approach ok i have it you so we will vote on that one and i have also reached out to liz allison to join us next week and i will make sure that that can happen i'm pretty sure she said yes ok so we don't i'm assuming that that's something that will happen in a subsequent meeting and we of course will vote on that yes yes i think all of the articles if i'm not mistaken in statement be all involve appropriations thought i saw i think we should have is more like a comment explaining the meaning of the building committee is still paying for things more in ordering things and making some changes based upon the shakedown from last year when it was open for a month and we got comments and complaints and things that needed to and addressed it's costing extra money and we had extra money in the project as we were under budget and that we fundraised on things no more than we thought so the project isn't fully done yet so i can't tell you that we're not done spending money on the new we're not going we're under budget but we need more articles or discuss any of these articles next week with the possible exception of assuming you're not going to radio on elected official salaries or would you think you will be i need to have some conversations about ok no problem so so we won't put on any of those things the budget already and we were view that next week on the thirteenth so as we you know we as rick oh yes so in other words the that david has done the analysis of the sources and uses of free cash there's been some discussion amongst  smaller group about that and we will talk about that this group will talk about that next week on the thirteenth so we'll talk about the starting with seven point six million and how that goes down based on your recommendations for use which includes the one point six and i guess that's that's permanently i just want to be clear that the two systems petition articles are in addition to the articles that are coming out of the general fund or that are above because they're yet each of these have to another decision i'm not sure what it's talking so i think that's an excellent question just to be clear i'll come back to one second so article levin if i'm not mistaken has actually a carry over from last year where we put the one point seven five i came into the exact number there was the sort of the leftover money from the override that we put into the general stabilization fund and so the fact that article levin appears again may in fact mean to your point jenny that article nineteen is is completely redundant with article levon so we may want to from existing free cash as opposed to zero what does it say is to raise an appropriate this was not an issue of raising funds yet there is about one hundred fifty thousand dollars of excess lobby capacity which we could just let go ok or weekend lobby it and then appropriated and the talk was at the time at the time when these articles were drafted let's take that hundred fifty thousand and overlapping but so i sent this material out to everybody electronically which was the analysis that floyd had recently done of using the formula that we've now used for the last several years the there is a total appropriation of three hundred forty three thousand six hundred eighty two dollars that is meant to go into the open stabilization fund which includes money from the town which is from free cash money from the white sure and water  done that consistently over the last seven years on that and that is represent an article fifteen and that article eighteen i believe is jim's attempt to put it initial that potentially million dollars to get some additional math is over money which may or may not actually go into that fund i'm not sure be eight through seven a through nine hundred clicks which we just talked about will be in june tell me so just just to give you a high level overview we have seven point six million dollars in free cash right now certified as of july first two thousand and fifteen  current the current draft thinking is that one point six million dollars will be used for the operating budget in fiscal seventeen which we've talked about before the three hundred sixteenth out through and sixteen thousand as we just talked about three hundred five thirty would be used for the open stabilization fund and one point four five million would be used for the module classrooms so that would take us down to three point four roughly million dollars of free cash which would leave it around if you're using the fo of memory of three to five percent guideline right so if you use a four percent guideline that's that would lead to another twenty five thousand dollars to be allocated potentially if you use the three percent guideline that would use one hundred one point two to one point two to eight million dollars to be allocated so depending on where we want to live within that guideline you've got as much as about one point two to eight million dollars to still work with now the one point seven five million dollars it would follow road money which is proposed for article two to the special town meeting that's not free cash that's money that would become free cash next year but is not yet free cash and is being suggested to be deployed it directly the high school physics feasibility study so it's money that never was free cash and then it is you specifically for that specific purpose so that's that i just sort of told you what the answer is for next week that purpose and other purposes related to bicycle well so they would be appropriate to the belmont high school building committee to be used for the belmont high school project fair enough so i don't know if that i just did that quickly but is that and we can do it in a more physical form we can look at the numbers next week but is at least give you a preview of were going yeah and if i may yes relationship and the reason why it's a special town meeting in the first half of the town meeting is because these are time sensitive items you know so  to hold up the building committee you know we're under a two hundred seventy day clock that's ticking and so we didn't want to lose a month another month on the work of the belmont high school building committee so that that that is for that appropriation kids you know that the intent is that the module first be installed the goal is around november very difficult to have them ready by september because every other school that's every other school in every other town that order of marketers wants them installed place of temper so so we thought that was a difficult time and it would ease pressure if they were installed and controlled moved in i say november in order to meet that timeline we needed to have the appropriation and then in the joint meeting with the with the with the budget presentations then i think i remember some conversation back and forth about whether the answer was an option for the comics i mean i can respond briefly because the question's been asked ok and i get you know specifically it's the recommendation of the town treasurer you know and in his conversations with free cash to fund approximately fifty percent or some percent and then some money from borrowing so that was the case with the belmont center improvements you know for example we did something similar with with the the superintendent of schools is forecasting that we may need additional modulars at one of the elementary schools in the next fiscal year or two and i think it was the intent of the treasurer to say ok this half of the project will fund from free cash the second half will do some short term five year bond funding so that's the rationale sound or not that's the rationale million to fund the building the high school building project is article two and appropriation and then article three well three of them are appropriations so we're going to weigh in on what all three of them just to be clear we have currently on the schedule in part because of the school vacation week we have two meetings of the war committee april thirteenth and april twenty seventh between now and may town so unless we have another meeting that is not law change will get discussed next week on the thirteenth and my hope would be discussed to discuss all of articles one two and three discuss articles one two and three from the special town meeting next week now i think the most complex and most controversial is the minuteman project so i would not surprise me in the least if we did not vote on that article until the twenty seventh i think it's it's reason we likely that we can actually successfully vote i think on the other articles meaning four six approach is in fact going to be the best thing for the town to do in terms of responding by thinking you know what if the need in three years is very different and three of those my views really serve us well somewhere else so is this a is the best way to go  us for some time is no longer the school committee chair nor is on the school committee susan were scots will be with us for the remainder of this fiscal year is that correct and at the next school committee meeting which is next tuesday this week many w burbank is reconfiguring for next year and using different space for a classroom so that the other four elementary schools have now used all their interiors the middle school did that a while ago another location if we need more to ministry or indeed at the high school i'm simply saying let's just part of the think you ought to be if we have a changeable problem live let's be sure we where the questions would be something like ok so i do want to spend time actually on the air and so is there any other discussion people would like to have about article two or three at this time if we voted against well first first of all i mean without getting too detailed here right now they're proceeding under so called section sixteen and which isn't to do all the town meetings once one town meeting says no then they're go and i will vote which is very interesting they're going to vote to try to send to a district wide election action if you read the amended agreement which has been approved that vote has to be two  by weighted voting and the dream they have determined that since we're voting is calculated as of july one of each is they don't have waited voting yet so this is an interesting question whether or not they can even vote to send it out but then that as you point out the clause the so called scape clause if it carries district wide by a majority vote then if belmont vote is any other town voters vote against it really in march when dessie approved it they have decided to interpret it by not saying you take a look at last year's july one they take a view that it's to be calculated july one of two thousand and sixteen so right now we don't have what we did vote yet the provision as to how you could debt calls for a two thirds vote of the school committee by weighted voting so  conundrum the agreement is silent as to what you do between now and july one and i saw that i wrote to the board of the council and i see now he is provided a letter that there's another section of the war that he thinks  belmont and the total and and annual cost of the month and that of course has a really complicated question because it depends a lot on this utilization of the school and how many towns are there sorry how many students come from let's say a me there is if a school the school is fully utilized cost total cost across the government and then there is if only the member towns send students and even then it really depends on how many students get sent but i guess assuming the same the current ratio but only member towns there so there is the borrowing for the new school and then if it's project if there are repairs that need to be made and i know that was a large estimate of what was going to need to be made and i was hoping that maybe we could impact that a little did they the so so i'm going to send a template around it's going to have article four and six which is segment a and articles one two or three from the special town meeting those are the only five articles that will be in the template i'll send  t is that the belmont high school building committee did meet monday during the storm my in this role our very own loughlin is a member of the committee that we got from the appointed the chair very good choice much experience particularly with wellington with a lot of work there still i think we are off to a good start the board of selectmen did vote to approve the we were approved for you to come up with a plan to replace your high school is coming nine to twelve you know how that's we're looking for you i just know there's no restriction of weight which they may very well come back and say that because i think with the wellington we originally requested a task force and what i have heard discussed is that they are very motivated to help us deal with our in romance issues and so nothing is off the table we don't have any definitive idea at the moment of what they will and won't permit i think part of it is how we make the case i think  smith legacy partners which is the current owner has signed a purchase and sale agreement with toll brothers which is a publicly traded national development company specializing in residential of you know the land routes the special permit which runs with the land added it would include an assignment of our purchases sale agreement with the current order to buy the parking lot  two years the closing date which they exercised month by month the first year was twenty thousand dollars a month the second year was thirty thousand dollars on have to be applied towards the purchase price at closing one half but if there was no closing then the entire amount would come to the town if they didn't if they didn't actually close under the new purchase and sale agreement we are soon to be receiving an additional one hundred fifty thousand dollars  option payments through april which will carry us to april april they're paying forty thousand dollars for and it includes some reimbursement for attorney fees which we insisted on was our attorney's fees increase option payments for may june july one half would apply to the purchase price credited one half or come to the town just walk that's a parking lot and instead we just said ok don't make the option payments but the price increases to a million dollars so that's an additional hundred fifty thousand and there's some some reimbursements in not in legal fees as well for the second phase of the review and then finally what  smith legacy owner has done in the current developer is he said ok under my purchase and sale agreement with toll brothers they are placing a five hundred thousand dollar deposit under the purchase agreement if toll brothers gets by the due diligence period the deposit becomes hard but doesn't close for any reason they have assigned two hundred fifty thousand dollars of that deposit to the town we get to keep the parking lot remember they wanted to close months ago and we insisted no calls and until we see the mortgage documents recorded at the same time so we get to keep the parking lot and of course or road a portion doesn't get the square revitalised so it won't help you leaving in the towns already taken in but say that wouldn't be a matter totally understand how much of what we've taken in is applied or not applied but there is some excess cash that we've close we retain you know if they close we still get the penalty that they pay the half it came to us right yes yes yes so if if they close i mean there will still be an additional three to four hundred thousand option payments that we get out right and then the other half will be applied to the purchase price something if they exercise their right to withdraw to all of the sixty days i assume of that's  and doing whatever i mistakenly did and formatting i am very pleased with the idea that i like to do is write it and put it in a cell in an excel spreadsheet so we have a lot of communicating to do among the subcommittee the administration has done an excellent job in cutting number of quests down to what are appropriate and urgent requests and we don't have enough money to fund them it's tough we have a big bike taken out this year because the fire station litigation has settled from the fire station leaking ever since they were built and there's been litigation pending on getting a settlement from that between david's team and john failand team including tony because euro on the numbers that are in there i think share that with a handful of folks in the room that tend to be nerdy like me in terms of looking at lots of numbers  single year to kind of update a color for your forecasts so we have an ongoing basis a kind of a view into the future and you are going to be getting our training wheels on is about that but you know what my suggestions would be that if you would are not going basis do that more