2026-10-14 - Select Board

00:06Good evening. I will call the October 14th Select Board meeting to order at 5.30. In

00:22terms of the agenda, we have one change. We are not going to be adjourning to executive

00:29session at the end of the meeting tonight to approve minutes. We'll be pushing those

00:33off to next week, so we will end with committee reports tonight. Other than that, I don't

00:40think that there are any changes, so we'll accept that as written, and I will turn it

00:45over to the town manager for announcements. Thank you, Madam Chair. This meeting is being

00:49video and audio recorded. The May 10th, 2027 annual town meeting warrant is currently open

00:55for citizen warrant article submittals through Monday, November 16th at 4 p.m. We do recommend

01:01that people get sufficient numbers of signatures, and as I've explained a couple of times currently,

01:09the state law is in effect for how many voting signatures are needed, which is ten signatures

01:19of registered voters registered in Nantucket. We always recommend you get a little bit

01:23more than that because sometimes people think they're registered, but they're not. However,

01:28we do have legislation pending that will increase that number to 25. It hasn't passed

01:33the legislature yet, but we do expect it anytime now, so you might want to think about getting

01:40more than 25 just to be on the safe side in case the legislation passes and you're in

01:46between signature timing with your article. We also have town council consultation scheduled.

01:54We have one today from 10 to noon, and we have another tomorrow from 4 to 6 that is

01:58on Teams. It's remote. You can contact our office for meeting links, and we have more

02:05executive session minutes that have been released at its October 7th, 2026 meeting

02:11last week in executive session. The board voted to authorize continued withholding or

02:16release in part subject to redactions under the public records law of 2021 executive session

02:22minutes dated as follows. January 7th, February 4th, February 11th, February 16th, March 4th,

02:31April 8th, May 6th, June 3rd, July 8th, July 14th, August 5th, September 21st, October

02:397th, November 4th, and December 2nd, all 2021. And that's it for announcements.

02:45Okay, thank you. Next up, we have an update on public comment from previous select board

02:56meetings. I have one from, oh, I'm sorry. Are there any opening select board announcements

03:03or comments? Okay. Okay, then actually next up, we have public comment from previous meetings.

03:12I have one from October 7th, where Campbell Sutton expressed concerns over when the citizens,

03:20the warrant opens for citizen petitions and when legal counsel is available, she feels

03:25that it's they're too close together and was wondering if there's a way to rethink

03:30that. The town's response, the concern is about the timing of the citizens petition

03:34process. When the filing period opens, the town provides information about the requirements

03:40and applicable deadlines residents considering a petition are encouraged to begin preparing

03:45early. And I would just also note that we do set the whole timeline for town meeting

03:50during the summer. So if people pay closer attention to that, that would be helpful

03:57to them too, about timing to get their article ideas ready for town council. Next up, we

04:06have public comment for items that are otherwise not on our agenda for this evening. I do

04:11have to limit each speaker to three minutes. And

04:16Hello, my name is Brian Borgeson. And I'm one of the charter captains on Nantucket.

04:22As of right now, today, yesterday and the day before, we have no marine diesel on Nantucket.

04:27There's zero availability. The boat basins pumps are down. And there's no way for us

04:32to put diesel in our boats. This this needs to change. The chapter 91 waterways from

04:39Great Harbor is in massive violation for 25 years. We've let them shame on us for

04:44let them go. That's supposed to be a working boatyard. It's not a working boatyard. There's

04:49no fuel. It's not fair for us. It's not fair for anyone. It's not fair for transient people.

04:56Something needs to change that the discussion needs to start now for next April permitting

05:01next May permitting next February permitting. We can't kick this down the road again till

05:05we get to next year and they'll be like, Oh, well, we maybe get Harbor fuel we maybe

05:08do this. We need a solution either from the town which I employ you guys to look into.

05:15Or we'll just go to the state and and just get the Great Harbor Yacht Club in violation

05:19of their chapter 91 waterways. You know, we're we're going to talk about, you know, people

05:24being in violation tonight. So probably a good lead into that, you know, so we just

05:30Pete, myself, Ray, Carl, all of us here like it's a it's a real issue. Like if there's

05:37an emergency and someone let's say Johnny Holgate is 50 miles east of the island and

05:42needs to get towed in right now and I have 110 gallons of diesel in my boat, I tell

05:47him no. Pete tells him no. Like that's not okay. That's a public safety issue. Never

05:54mind a convenience issue. So I just wanted to bring that up in front of everyone and

05:58get it on the record this time and make sure that everyone understands how limiting this

06:03is and and it's a real problem. All right. Thank you guys very much. Thank you. Pete

06:14Kayser fishing vessel Althea Kaye been getting fueled down by the boat yards for about 40

06:20years. Back when Penny had it when Drew had it everybody Mikey Allen and there's always

06:25a tank there. We would go over and fuel up especially if the boat basin was busy, busy,

06:31busy. Anyway, I went and talked to this guy Mike who runs Sun Island trans Sun Island

06:36fuel and I talked to him about it. He says I'm aware of it. And he said he couldn't

06:42get insurance until April. He said but he has to put that on the list if he's going

06:47to do it. He's very willing to do it. And I'm sure we're going to we'll talk with Gray

06:52Harbor Yacht Club and say look if you have certain hours, you know, but you have to

06:58this conversation does have to start now. They can't kick it down the road. And I think

07:03you could all be sort of embarrassing to say well, oh, yeah, I'm talking because I can

07:09will, you know, port in this in the country in the world. And here they are the young

07:15guys trying to get into the commercial fishing in something like no fuel and makes absolutely

07:21no sense. I mean, we're getting laughed at a little bit in there. Like Brian said we

07:25should have spoke up a long time ago and really, you know, said it's got to happen.

07:31So anyway, we'd appreciate we'll get together some of the guys and somebody else sitting

07:38up there. And we definitely need to do it. Okay, thank you. Good evening. Good evening.

07:55Just state your name, please. My name is Andrew Verani. I'm the owner of 13 West Chester

07:59Street. I came here today to address this. Thank you. I came here today to address this

08:15board about a curb cut application at my property. We're not here to ask anything

08:20of you today. I only want to apologize for a process that's been mishandled and offer

08:25some detail about my involvement and then inform you of the steps I'm taking now to

08:28make this right. I'm the owner of the property and I know the buck stops with me. But we

08:33thought we were doing this the right way. My wife and I closed on this house on October

08:3725th of last year. The property had no off street parking and we knew this was a project

08:41that we wanted to take on. We also knew this would entail permitting, so we hired local

08:45consultant to help us with that process. This was someone who came recommended to us and

08:50someone who we believed had expertise in this process. From the very beginning, the

08:54consultant confirmed that we would need approvals from the Select Board, HDC and the DPW. On

09:00December 9th, she confirmed we had received HDC approval. And again, on that date, she

09:04confirmed that the next steps were getting Select Board and DPW approvals. We next heard

09:09from her about a month later on January 15th, in which she confirmed that we were all set

09:13to begin construction. In that same correspondence, she even said that she had already gotten

09:18one quote for the work and asked us for payment on what she described as a final invoice.

09:23We made payment on that invoice the next day. This was all before any work had begun.

09:28It wasn't until this last Friday, October 9th, that I became aware that the permitting

09:33for this project was not fully completed. Until Friday, I had no idea that this matter

09:37was still in front of this board at all. This past weekend, I went through a video

09:41of your September 16th and September 23rd sessions where my application was being discussed

09:47without my knowledge in absolute horror. I saw a discussion of this curb cut being

09:52repurposed as some sort of patio. I almost fell out of my chair when I saw that. That

09:56sounds as preposterous to me as I'm sure it did to you. I can tell you today that

10:02that's not happening and I would never have authorized that claim. We intend to do this

10:06right or not at all. As such, I'm working through the feasibility of moving the fire

10:10hydrant to conform with this board's decision. That's ongoing now. Several members of this

10:16board also expressed frustration at applicants beginning work before the necessary permits

10:21are in place. I understand and I agree with that fully. That shows disregard for process

10:26and undermines the purpose of this board's oversight. And I can also understand why

10:30that appears to be exactly what we did. Again, I can only say we never would have begun

10:34the work if we didn't believe this was fully permitted. And my primary purpose here in

10:39coming today is to tell you that in person and to apologize. I have copies of the written

10:44correspondences between me and our consultant validating the dates and the substance of

10:48everything I shared with you today. Happy to share those with you now. I would also

10:52welcome any follow up questions you have for me. Thank you for allowing me to share

10:56this with you today. Thank you. I mean, just so you understand, we don't respond to public

11:01comment. Very good. Thank you. Thank you. Is there anyone else this evening wishing

11:15to speak? And when I say we don't respond, we just don't respond today. I don't see

11:23anyone online. So next up, we have no new business. We have approval of minutes, payroll

11:30warrants and treasury warrants. We can take those as one motion. If there aren't any changes.

11:38Move approval. Second. All those in favor? Aye. That carries unanimously five to zero.

11:45Next up, we have citizen departmental committee requests and reports. 2026 committee appointments

11:50round four, cannabis advisory, coastal resiliency, and town of Nantucket scholarship committee.

11:57And I'll turn it over to Erica to lead us through this. Sure. Thank you. So we had

12:07three boards on the agenda, cannabis advisory committee has still has no applicants. No,

12:15just wait a minute. I'll get to you because we have one that you can do. I'm going to

12:20do that one first. Okay, whatever. Um, sorry. Um, so we'll keep that advertised. You also

12:30have one committee where there's only one applicant and you can go ahead and take a

12:33vote on that. If you choose, um, by acclamation, you can do that first. If you would like

12:39to move. Second. Okay. All those in favor. Aye. That carries unanimously five to zero.

12:48Congratulations. Um, and now we're going to go to the coastal resiliency advisory committee

12:54to excuse recusing. Um, we have one seat available and four applicants being Jeffrey

13:01Clayton. And I'm sorry if I say this wrong. Um, I don't know if it's Alicia or Alicia

13:07Myers, Bruce Mandel and Ray da Costa. Um, I believe some of the applicants are present.

13:15And if you are, please go ahead up to one of the mics and introduce yourself and review

13:22your application. Hi, my name is Jeff Clayton. Um, I've been living on the Island full time

13:34for three years. I retired three years ago. I was a president, a professor at Louisiana

13:38state of astronomy. And so I'm very familiar with climate science, but also I'm a retired

13:45person who is paying property taxes. So I understand the limitations of what we're

13:52doing here on the Island. Um, so I think that I'm perfect for this job because I know

14:01the science and I also, as I said, I'm paying the property taxes. So, um, there's no way

14:08we can lift the whole Island out of the ocean. Um, I do think that, uh, the four of us would

14:15make a good committee together. Um, Alicia knows the finance, Ray knows the ocean. Um,

14:24Bruce knows conservation and I know the science. So maybe you should put all four of us on

14:28together. Thanks a lot for your time. Thank you, Jeff. Bruce members of the select board

14:37and staff. I'm Bruce Mandel. Uh, I've, uh, been an antagonist since 1969. I am retired.

14:47I submitted the interest form. I hope you've all had a chance to look at it. I live in

14:53Mattaket. Uh, I'm a member of the, uh, Mattaket conservation association where I'm a board

15:02member. Um, my, I've answered all your questions. Uh, one of the purposes of crack is to make

15:14sure, ensure that all areas of the Island are represented. And for the longest time,

15:22there have been no West end members of crack. And the MCA has discussed this several times

15:31and we reached out to our board to try to get someone to, uh, apply for membership.

15:40And as soon as an opening became available, uh, we discussed it and, uh, by default,

15:48my name came up and here I am. Uh, so we would like to have a West end person on crack.

15:56We have many issues in Mattaket. The CRP listed six Mattaket issues. Unfortunately none of

16:09them made it onto the capital projects list. Uh, some of them we feel are quite important,

16:19including access to Smith point, which unfortunately is not a priority. Uh, as much as a priority

16:27as we think it should be, we'd like to get it addressed. We'd like to address the other

16:32five issues and we'd like to sit in on these important meetings to get these issues addressed

16:40in a, in a priority that is significant to the folks in Mattaket, including the Ames Avenue

16:47bridge, better known as Millie's bridge. Uh, it's deteriorating. It needs to be repaired.

16:54It's on the radar screen supposedly in design, but it's physically deteriorating as is Massasoit

17:01bridge and the Ames Avenue, uh, Mattaket road intersection is deteriorating and we need

17:11to find an alternate access to Smith point, which is not only for the 60 or 70 residents

17:20out there, seasonal residents out there, but an awful lot of the folks who are year round

17:25here use that. So these are important issues. We'd like to participate in this important,

17:32uh, committee and I hope you'll find my application satisfactory. Thank you. Do you have any questions

17:40of me? Thank you. Thanks Bruce. Um, I think Alicia was behind. Hello. Uh, my name is

18:02Alicia Myers. I've lived on Nantucket year round since 2002 and I've raised my family

18:09here. Um, I have a master's degree in business administration from Babson college and I

18:17ran it around a tax and advisory practice here and I help small businesses, uh, with

18:24accounting and financial management. Uh, with my, uh, over 20 years of experience and expertise

18:31in this, uh, field, um, in my work, I look at costs funding and, um, the choices the

18:39businesses need to make to, uh, for their future. I'd like to bring that experience

18:45to the committee by helping think through the costs and benefits of projects, how to

18:51fund them and how to put them into action. I'm also a homeowner on the Island. Um, and

18:59I've seen the effects of erosion and flooding firsthand, uh, and I'd like to help the committee

19:06prioritize the projects that will make the biggest difference and help move them from

19:12planning stages toward implementation. Thank you very much. Thank you, right. Hi, my name

19:20is Raymond Acosta. Uh, thank you for your consideration. For those who don't know me,

19:25uh, I've lived here my whole life. I'm 36 this year and I've spent my entire life on

19:30the waterfront in Nantucket. Coastal resiliency, when you read their mission statement is

19:35about collaborating with the coastal resiliency coordinator. Pretty sure I'm the youngest

19:41one here, which is why I would like to get on this committee to help bridge the gap between

19:47my generation that is living and we'll continue to live on this Island and these projects.

19:52These projects are going to be life stays for my generation financially and also in

19:59terms of how we live day to day life on the Island. Um, the committee has a lot of big

20:06decisions I think to make over the next decade or so. Um, and I would love to help out and

20:14bring my own two cents to this committee. Um, in terms of my thoughts for the future,

20:23there's no doubt that Nantucket is slowly fading into the water and I think we need

20:29to have a really hard look at what projects can make sense for the future and what projects

20:36are absolute needs as opposed to wants. I appreciate your consideration. Thanks, right.

20:44So now the board is going to vote by paper ballot. If you could vote for one person

20:50and send your votes down to me, I will tally them. Okay. Um, Bruce Mandel received one

21:40vote from Mr. P and Raymond Acosta received votes from Chair Hill is more and this feet.

21:49So ready to cost it is the new member ray just make sure you'll get some information

21:55from our office but make sure you go to the town clerk and get sworn in.

22:00Thank you to everyone who applied. You all were great candidates. And to those who didn't

22:06make it the committee does take public comment and does include the public during its meetings.

22:12So if you're still interested, I would attend and it's you're going to do. Okay, next up

22:21we have the airport request to expand to their full fuel revolver from 8.5 to 13 million

22:30for FY 27. Do you think Maria said, you can put it up if you want. It's a good evening

22:44tilted up. It was a high enough Preston Herman airport manager. Good evening. I'm here tonight

22:56to request an increase in the airport fuel revolving fund purchasing limit from eight

23:01and a half million to 13 million for the remainder of fiscal year 27. Our current

23:08eight and a half million dollar cap was established in January 2026 before we experienced market

23:13wide price increases where Jedi has risen 66% from $3 and 46 cents to $5 and 75 cents

23:23per gallon compared to last year where it was $3 and 30 cents and last October and for

23:30100 low lead also known as ab gas increased 41% from 494 to 698 per gallon. We calculated

23:40our budget production projections using these updated rates together with our historical

23:45delivery averages, though we remain hopeful that prices will drop later this fiscal year,

23:51approving the four and a half million increased insurers that will have enough spending authority

23:56required to keep our fuel farm full and support ongoing operations through the end

24:01of the fiscal year. Do you need a motion? Yes, I do. Motion to approve. Second. All

24:11those in favor. Hi, that carries unanimously. Thank you so much. Thank you. Next up we

24:18have a request from Poseidon development request for a waiver of a building permit

24:23penalty fee for 20 sparks Avenue. I do want me to intro this real quick. Sure. Um, so

24:34we read you the board received a request to waive the penalty fee for work that had

24:41begun before building permit was issued. You have the communications between Poseidon

24:48development and the planning director and the building commissioner in your packet.

24:54You also have a waiver history for building permits. You'll note that this board has

25:00never waived a penalty fee in 18 years that I've been here. The building Commissioner

25:08Paul Murphy is here and he submitted a timeline from when the application was submitted that

25:14got into your packet a little late but you do have that. And Kelly and Chris are here

25:22to review. Good evening. Good evening members of the blackboard. My name is Kelly weigold

25:28and the project manager for Poseidon development apologize for my voice. I'm a little sick.

25:33I'm not an attorney. I just want to say that for the record despite some recent reporting.

25:38I'm just the project manager. I haven't received the timeline that Paul submitted. I have my

25:45own I'm hoping that they match up but just wanted to first of all apologize for starting

25:52the project without or the erection without proper permitting. I wanted to run through

25:57the timeline with you so you have a better understanding of why that happened. We meet

26:05the architect and I went to the building department to check in on how long the permitting process

26:10might take for this building. We were advised that it would take two to three weeks which

26:15is similar to what we experienced for the first of the two buildings building B. With

26:20that in mind we scheduled out our steel company to come out our crane operator operator to

26:25come out rentals for those individuals to stay on the island as well as rental equipment

26:33a lull in an operating lift. So it's a massive logistical operation to get everything in

26:39place for that. After two weeks from filing our submission we checked in and were notified

26:46that well since this is a large project we submitted all our documents digitally which

26:53is about 700 pages which was advised to us by the building department. We were advised

26:59upon the two week check in that we needed to submit one thing in hard copy which we

27:03did so on that two week mark as well as I believe an affidavit was missing. So those

27:08were provided that two week mark we then checked in I checked in on the 14th the 15th the 16th

27:16no update was given then came around this three week mark and we had our steel scheduled

27:24at that point. And so we were put in a tough place of whether to begin the steel erection

27:30or to continue waiting for the permit which we had thought would come in any day at that

27:34point. So we again apologize for this. We were between a rock and a hard place there.

27:43So yeah first couple things I want to say also is well first of all my name is Chris

27:49Fumara here I'm the the chief developer and owner of the project. Paul's been great working

27:56with Paul's been fantastic he's been really really good you know I want to make it clear

28:00we didn't just cowboy up here and say oh we're gonna start this thing without permits

28:04and no we these were submitted prior to this and we were gonna sit with building B took

28:10us two weeks policy said when you need it back we said you know two weeks we should

28:14have been more stressful maybe would Paul explain to him that we had all the steel

28:17and the housing and all the process in place these steel companies are they're very freckle

28:24they're big schedule the union companies if we miss this window it would have put

28:29the project back two months which would have screwed this entire schedule up on this whole

28:34project on the whole line here and the other part is we were ready to submit the permit

28:38way before this but there's a 18 month window with the affordable housing that we when we

28:43submit the permit we have 18 months to get that permit completed but we lose the affordable

28:49housing aspect of the state it's it's all documented how this works so we waited for

28:53as long as we possibly could to submit it so that we can stop the window of that time

28:58window for the affordable housing aspect of this whole thing as well too so there's

29:03a few different things going on here normally we would have submitted this permit a long

29:06time ago but because of the affordable housing aspect we couldn't do that so we were up

29:11against the time on this and you know the other thing to keep mention I want to also

29:15mention you guys know much about building permits especially commercially the engineers

29:22are signing off on this deal not the town that means that the town's not taking liability

29:28the engineers are my engineers sign off on this which is very important aspect it's

29:32so if anything's wrong with that and it goes back on the engineer not the town and they're

29:37talking and that's how we've been setting this up as well too and you know it wasn't

29:42trying to cover you up with trying to disrespect anybody it was strictly a time sensitive issue

29:47that was going on with the project and we just wanted to meet all the timelines and

29:52get this thing going we're trying to get this thing to operational both properties

29:55for August 1st where everyone's in March one's gonna be for building B and then August

30:01one right behind that for building A so that's where as I'm humbly asking this board to

30:06please wave these penalties so we can discontinue this process it's a very expensive this very

30:11expensive to get this thing done I could have easily don't want to keep this mention

30:14us both so I didn't have to do steel on this project I did this deal to make this building

30:18a white way way better by putting a concrete platform in between the second floor and the

30:23first floor the noise in the bar for all the tenants upstairs it penetrates that so

30:28they're not gonna be disturbed and they can have a nice place to live I could have stuck

30:31but still stick to the building what it cost me a quarter of the price to do that you

30:37know this deal is it was an extraordinary thing I went above and beyond so for the have

30:42a nice building for the community so I know thank you thank you for your time I just I

30:51forgot to note that the request in your packet is for the full amount the 125 528 but that

30:59also includes the actual building permit cost right if you are considering a waiver you need

31:05to make sure that the building permit is at least pay for I have a question isn't

31:12typically the building permit fee given when you put the application in now it's after

31:19it's approved okay Paul did you want to go over your timeline good evening Paul Murphy

31:29building commissioner so this is never easy and you know we have a fee schedule and in

31:36the fee schedule there's a requirement that work undertaken without a proper permit is

31:44subject to a fee of four times the original amount and I just want to say there's nothing

31:49adversarial here between Poseidon development and the building department nothing at all

31:54I'm just it's a it's a fee that I have consistently fairly and impartially had to enforce since

32:01the day I got here the fees are set by the select board and you know I had no choice

32:07but to assess the fee it came to my attention that steel was going up I know the board

32:13has my timeline and you know I I had to do it and this is the process that we have to

32:22go through I have to assess it but whether or not it's waived is beyond my office and

32:28I'd be happy to answer any questions do you have a recommendation if you were sitting

32:36on the on this side what would you do I you know that's a policy decision that I don't

32:40want to wait into I have a question yes on the 14th you emailed them that you didn't

32:51have the HTC approval at which point just became an incomplete document correct did

32:58you receive that email so that was a miscommunication you they already had the HTC document it

33:03was with the foundation permit so they had it all along it was just miscommunicated

33:08is that right Paul I'm not sure if that's right but when a building permit submitted

33:14the application that's requested has to have all the documents you know just included I'm

33:23trying to wrap my head around this and I've I've I've applied for a few building permits

33:29in my lifetime so I know the process and if on the 14th you said you sent an email

33:36out to me and said I didn't have the HTC approval I would just go to the HTC office

33:43on the 15th and get a copy of it and hand deliver it and you you state that you went

33:48in on the 14th in the 16th and again on the 22nd and ask staff the HTC was was reconciled

33:56within like two hours of it becoming it being brought to my attention and they realized

34:01they did have it in their files yes so there's two permits there's a foundation permit that

34:05was issued and with the foundation permit we submitted the HTC approval with that permit

34:11so we didn't think we had to do that again with the second permit because they already

34:15had it on the first period and then once they asked for it you got it within two hours

34:24we we never get they already had it I just brought it to their attention let's assume

34:27they had it no I spoke with the staff in person and they they confirmed that they

34:32did have it in fact and they were mistaken so that day you confirmed that the application

34:37was complete great and your expectation was that within two weeks it would be issued

34:42our patient was two weeks from the day we filed and I followed up on the 14th asking

34:46for an update thinking that we would be handed it within the day or two and then only to

34:52be to find out that they hadn't looked at it they were missing they thought they were

34:56missing stuff so did anyone go in and have a conversation with Paul or with someone who

35:02reports to Paul on the 14th I went in before the steel went up you you you put the steel

35:12in many multiple times you knew that there was no permit though yeah so you did make

35:17the decision without going in day before and say is there any way to get this permit or

35:23we're gonna be putting this in with not checked out of compliance the 14th 15th and 16th

35:29and that's in writing if you'd like to know that I I get that I'm saying didn't you didn't

35:34the steel start going in on the 28 the 16th okay sorry okay okay sorry I don't have it

35:40in front of me would you like a copy now I have it I just need to pull it back up I'm

35:48going off memory for the dates yeah oh Paul was your were you guys aware of the timeline

35:55for them having the steel scheduled no I wasn't okay you know people come to my office

36:02all the time with time constraints and I'm happy to accommodate them if I can if everything's

36:07in order you know and again I'm not at all pointing fingers here but this application

36:15was submitted the 10th it didn't have to be out until October 10th it's 30 days or plus

36:20or minus we submitted on the 28th of August that's where I got the 28th well that's not

36:28we don't take electronic transmission yet electronic submittals so those have to come

36:34through in a paper format with all the documents it's given a number put into the computer

36:41and then it goes through the building department process so yeah it's just and I think what

36:48there's a little communication on that one because there's so many doctors 700 documents

36:52complicated permit we were told to we were told it was okay to file it digitally we didn't

36:59know that the cover page needed to be a physical thing which we found out on the 14th after

37:05checking in to see if it was ready and so that was what was missing okay but so on

37:10the 14th that essentially started the clock because it wasn't complete until the 14th

37:16but we weren't made aware and about until the 14th yeah okay but still someone said

37:27go ahead and install the steel without going to Paul and saying we have a problem I guess

37:34essentially yeah it wasn't a choice I wanted to make at that point like I explained earlier

37:39that you know everything had been lined up timing wise and housing wise and rental equipment

37:43wise and getting stuff on the boat over here it was it wasn't a choice that I really wanted

37:48to make it was I was no we I completely get that I know all the logistics that go into

37:55this and the cost of them and I think that that's kind of why the four times fee was

38:01put into place as a policy so that people may had to make that would have to make a

38:06difficult call to basically go against the permitting I wish I wish we had been more

38:13clear to Paul of the timeline wasn't that was a mistake we probably made on our part

38:16that it explained him but you know where we were where we were on the timeline for

38:20us and that's you know I wish we had been and Paul's been like I said Paul's been fantastic

38:24Paul's great I work with different cities all over the place I love working with Paul

38:29he's very fair nice person he's great it's no adversary he's been fantastic you know

38:35so it's it's it's it's a little bit miscommunication it was a no malice no cowboy up here just

38:40trying to get this thing on schedule to get this thing operated when you're dealing with

38:43steel people you're dealing with iron workers union people it's a different breed okay

38:51it's not what I'm used to dealing with there are different breed of people and there's

38:55not a lot of leeway to deal with these guys it's like they have a schedule they have

38:58the map fabrication done the installations ready to go with it just believe me I didn't

39:03want this to go down the way down the down at all no I get it I understand why maybe

39:08you made that call but you didn't go ask like that day and say we have a problem and now

39:18you're asking for essentially for forgiveness after the fact for you know there's many

39:25good reasons this is this is a good project it's providing housing for a lot of Nantucket

39:31people but there's still that's where I think like the disconnect comes in is you knew that

39:38there would be a penalty if you started and you didn't go in and like beg on the floor

39:44that please issue my permit today I guess part of problems we didn't realize that the

39:50thing was even incomplete until the 14th right we thought it was complete right Kelly

39:55yeah I thought they would at least reviewed it so I was under the impression it would

39:58be any day now the next day the next day and so I didn't realize it would be through

40:02two weeks after I think it's really easy in hindsight to look at a chain of communications

40:14and say shoulda woulda coulda right so we act with the information that we have in front

40:22of us we make assumptions this time assumptions were costly right but I can see had a question

40:30that asked differently at any point in time along the way this would have gone very differently

40:35so I think you know I get it I get not everybody knows that you can go to the building commissioner

40:44and he'll be you know they think the process is the process and then asking for something

40:50to be different not everybody's aware that that option is even available right to go

40:54in and say oh my god we've got the steel scheduled is there anything you can do for

40:59us I can I can hear them saying well it's it's it's all to get it's it's done it should

41:05be any day now because you know we gave them a two week but we're operating from different

41:10starting points of the two weeks so I get where the disconnect was communication wise

41:18and I don't think that there was any mal intent I think this was a this was a difficult

41:22catch-22 situation I this isn't the case of somebody like not having any permits and

41:28starting to build a foundation it's steps along the process so I'm just sort of rationalizing

41:34my head what makes sense I feel like there were opportunities for communication that

41:38could have been better across the board so I'm kind of thinking split the baby a little

41:44on this both to hold firm on there are consequences to not following to the letter but also yielding

41:55a little bit to communication things go wrong and misunderstandings happen but then my

42:02other head says precedent precedent precedent and I'm sort of feeling like in some way

42:08I'm willing to be a little more flexible this unit is this project is adding a number of

42:13units to our shy list it we have invested funding in it it is a town partnership project

42:21and so that makes me think about it a little differently than I would a strictly private

42:25project so those are just thoughts for everyone to think about and look forward to hearing

42:30so what are you thinking you're thinking two times they pay the they pay the fee plus

42:36two times or what do you think I mean I think that's a reasonable way to say you know I

42:42don't know thoughts from everybody else it these are just ideas that's not I'm not fully

42:48formed I I was definitely thinking the way you were earlier that maybe there was some

42:56middle ground I'm just a little bit worried about us having a set policy and doing a

43:00one-off change to a set policy without having a broader policy discussion on penalties and

43:10I mean I guess to the point of the miscommunication I mean Chris how many projects have you done

43:15on Nantucket before yeah many parts of the Nantucket like this is a little more complicated

43:23like I said we submitted the HTC approval with the foundation permit which was already

43:27in the package for the permit we already assumed that was already in there on August 28th

43:31we didn't know we had a resubmit the same thing again that's that's a big it's also

43:37700 pages you never have a permit this big you know I'm also going to stress and you

43:42know Paul knows is to the engineer signs off on these things the town doesn't the edge

43:47of I if I made mistake if there's any mistakes many structural problems over there the engineers

43:51taking responsibility Talon it's not fake I'm just going more back to why didn't anyone

43:58go in and ask Paul this is the situation we're in what can you do before you did it is the

44:05problem I wish we could turn back the clock and we could we could have that conversation

44:12with him but we know given the fact that building B went so smoothly we got it within

44:15two weeks but everything went very fine on that one we didn't think we didn't foresee

44:19any issues of this at all we really didn't and we didn't think it was going to be a

44:24time when it showed off anything and we had submitted everything we thought we submitted

44:28this is a big project guys you know it's no way I'm going to cowboy up over here my

44:35insurance my liability the banks no one's going to you know go on with that I'm not

44:39playing that game here with anybody you know it's just it's just a little lack of communication

44:45on both sides of the board here there's some things that went on here I mean still someone

44:51made the call on that day to let those guys go to work if I did if I didn't make that

44:55call guys this progress and get done until next and that's why and that's why there's

45:00a penalty yeah I also was looking for the benefit is the whole community of this thing

45:04done and I couldn't I couldn't give up two more months with getting the steel guys there

45:09and then they were in the middle of the winter getting that done it's even more harder to

45:13do it's just it's just it's not easy like you know we there's no diesel gas on this

45:17island right now I mean things happen here you know it's unfortunate but things happen

45:21here it's not it was it wasn't now intended at all it's making a logistic executive decision

45:28I say listen and it's imminent any day we're gonna have this permanent he was you know

45:31we got it last time in a little time frame I like understand taking a fee guys you know

45:40somewhat of a penalty here but I mean a one-time penalty would be I think a much more appreciated

45:47here than a two time or three time or four time you know it's it's very expensive to

45:52get this stuff done it's it's heavy gym way over budget as it is any way to get this

45:57thing done like I said the steel brought this thing to another level I didn't have

46:00to go with the steel I could have stuck there this building it would have been a lot cheaper

46:04for me I'm doing a really really really solid building in the community that's gonna last

46:08there for way before any of my lifetimes are over God you know God you know I'm sort

46:15of where I'm kind of where Brooke is I would think I would say 62,000 you know split the

46:22difference and instead you know don't go just the 31 because people do have some concerns

46:27but I would say he's 62,000 whatever the double is and then that's I think that's substantial

46:34this has you know says municipal preference it has it's shy we don't want to lose that

46:41I think it was an honest mistake you know and you know that may have been met may have

46:46been rectified if it had been caught earlier or had they gone in like you're saying Don

46:51that's easy to say so that's where I am I'll make that as a motion so two times the

46:57fee yeah I'll second that 2,764 yes good math sorry I'll just anything further on

47:17the motion sorry Jill did you second that no I'm Brooke did mr. Khmer this is tough

47:27it's really tough I appreciate your project I appreciate what you've done I appreciate

47:32you're working with the town I do and but at the same time you also you were building

47:38with at your own risk and I'm just really surprised that you would do that because you

47:45are a very experienced developer I know you are and so this is a hard one for me but

47:52I think I'm gonna go on with what Brooke said I'm willing to reduce the fee but I also

47:58want to make a point that I'm not doing that because we have an agreement with you for

48:02affordable housing that's not why I'm doing it I can appreciate that you said that but

48:09I think that actually makes us look worse to do that for that reason this is just a

48:13very costly fee this is the first time I address this issue by being on this board so I hope

48:18that we would look at these fees going forward but um with that I'll support your motion

48:24but for different reasons I just realized I had a hand up online I should allow her

48:32to make a comment before we vote Mary Longacre thank you Don Mary Longacre just requesting

48:39a clarification noting that the amount is the building permit plus a penalty it is the

48:49motion to reduce the penalty and the building permit fee remains or is the motion to make

48:57the total just two times the permit which would include the permit plus the same amount

49:03as a fee the penalty would be one time the permit or two times it's the permit okay you

49:10know double the double the permit fee double the permit it wouldn't be one time then correct

49:18so yes it's the fee they had to pay anyway and then it's adding one I thought you were

49:25saying four times permit plus sorry no so right so what has been charged is the permit

49:36times four that includes the permit so there's so so there's three extras I'm I'm I'm going

49:45from the 94,000 right that's what I was operating someone you said 62 that's how I thought

49:51can you come closer no I don't think that's what Matt said I think he's having the permit

49:57fee including the penalty from 124 and change to 62 and change is what the motion is eventually

50:04the penalty is about 31,000 yes it's so it's double it's doubling the fee yes okay let's

50:16clear on this Mary is that that answer I wanted to make sure that you knew what you

50:24were voting for thank you thank you we appreciate you I'm not sure we do know but we're trying

50:32we get there okay do you guys want to go to a vote all those in favor aye aye any

50:39opposed I oppose I have to oppose as well until we have a broader policy discussion

50:46on these fees good but I appreciate you guys read it too thank you very much and believe

50:52me this won't happen again probably should have thank you if it does don't even come

50:58in front of us is this I know what this is this is exactly a bean counter thing where

51:04he looked at how much it was gonna cost him if he delayed the steal and he looked how

51:07much the permit fee was gonna be and he begged for forgiveness and we gave it to him so

51:11it's on you guys well I I'm sorry we just we can't continue to talk without people

51:21at Mike's but can we agree that we were we will address this I think we're gonna need

51:28to have an agenda item to talk about this a little more broadly in terms of fees thank

51:37you plus department next up we have planning and land use services planning board the

51:47draft master plan presentation and yep I do just want to note that we're getting a presentation

51:56a kind of a pre-presentation of this tonight because we're more broadly televised and so

52:02forth but the they're going to dig into this further with a lot with a lot more public

52:07participation at the meeting on Monday at four and written comments from the public

52:15are due tomorrow by the end of the day so if anyone really has some stuff they want

52:20to talk about after seeing the presentation tonight you can submit in writing tomorrow

52:24or you can speak in person or online on Monday alright Leslie Snell director of planning

52:31we have our consultants here Barrett planning group Judy Barrett I believe will be giving

52:35the presentation this evening I just wanted to say that the planning board has been working

52:39on this for about two years we've had a lot of community input we've had a lot of different

52:45participation sessions throughout the process and you know I think here at the end we have

52:50a good plan I hope it you know incorporates a lot of the things that the community wants

52:55to see in the master plan and this is just meant to be informational for the select

53:00board tonight and the planning board as Dawn said we'll be discussing this in detail on

53:05Monday night and we'll be taking public comment and I'll hand it over to Judy good evening

53:12Judy hi everyone nice to be with you again are you going to run the slides from there

53:19Erica or Libby okay super so you can go to the next slide a little bit of preview here

53:26for everybody just to refresh everyone's memory this is a master plan that is guided by state

53:33law that directs planning boards to prepare and adopt a master plan and periodically

53:39update it it is primarily focusing on the sort of physical evolution of a town but those

53:47things are never divorced from the sort of economic and community needs that need to

53:51be addressed as a town kind of grows and changes so there are physical and cultural and social

53:58and systems kinds of issues involved in the plan and tried to the whole goal is to sort

54:04of try to bring all those pieces together in a coherent way the implementation plan

54:09in this master plan assumes a 10 to 15 year implementation cycle that is standard I mean

54:16we worked with some communities that are we actually just started working with a community

54:20now that's updating a plan that was done five years ago and at the same time we're working

54:23with a community in the west suburbs from Boston that is updating a plan that was last

54:28done in the late 1960s so the practice is kind of all over the lot you're you're really

54:34kind of in sync with the typical you know 10 to 15 you're kind of horizon next slide

54:40please the state law requires certain elements they are all in this plan elements are sort

54:48of the chapters if you will of the plan or the components of it and so those typical

54:54pieces are land use which is really a analysis of zoning and an assessment of the physical

55:00development pattern of the town housing economic development natural and cultural resources

55:06open space and recreation services and facilities circulation and implementation program which

55:12I said which as I said is sort of a 10 to 15 year kind of horizon this is our sort of

55:18foundational pieces that are set forth in the law towns are at liberty to add other

55:23elements if they wish Nantucket did by including sustainability and community health we see

55:29these as pretty common additions now in the master plans that we work on elsewhere in

55:34the Commonwealth next slide please as Leslie said there was a lot of fun engagement for

55:43this project I actually was pleased to see how how things came together there was as

55:50some of you probably recall we had strong towns Chuck Morone in town for kind of a kickoff

55:58for the visioning and goal-setting process that was followed up shortly thereafter by

56:04a visioning weekend that our colleagues at Dodson and Flinker led there were three days

56:10of in-person stakeholder interviews and literally weeks of zoom and telephone interviews that

56:16followed that we did a community survey there were kitchen conversations which was really

56:21an opportunity for local volunteers to say hey I'd like to help gather community input

56:26for the master plan so a number of people participated in that and provided their notes

56:31to the planning department which we've sort of distilled and tried to put into a summary

56:36that we drew from in looking at concerns and issues and desires that people have in the

56:42community we did to we did planning board of course process but we also talked a lot

56:48with the town staff and I need to just say this because I sometimes think town staff

56:53don't get enough credit and that's not an Nantucket issue it's everywhere I work your

56:57staff were absolutely fabulous we met with at some point or another every department

57:02head and or senior staff and really just learned a lot about how the town operates

57:08and where the sort of pain points are it was just they were incredibly helpful I can't

57:13stress it enough we did a project called a six word story at the library people had

57:19a chance to fill out a card they sort of talked about their aspirations for the town

57:24and six words or less and a lot of interesting insights came out of that we did a couple

57:30of tabling events tabling is where you basically set up a table outside of a business or a

57:35public space and ask people questions and try to get input from folks who wouldn't otherwise

57:41show up at a meeting probably might not even respond to a survey but are part of the community

57:47we spent some time on the ferry interviewing people in the afternoon leaving Nantucket

57:52just to try to get a sense of you know why people were going of course many of them

57:57were workers and that gave us a lot of insight as well we did a survey at the high school

58:02and a focus group with some high school students and then we did implementation plan listening

58:08sessions toward the end of August we spent a couple of days talking to folks in person

58:14one day and on zoom another to try to get input on what at the time was a draft implementation

58:20plan and based on the input from that we made some revisions to the implementation

58:24plan as well next slide please the plan structure is fairly straightforward and we introduced

58:33the concept of the plan that introduction kind of covers sort of five key issues that

58:39we think the town will need to contend with and address over the coming years there's

58:46the vision statement of course that came out of the visioning weekend there's a description

58:50of the community engagement process and we then looked at the elements of the master

58:55plan both those required by state law as well as those added at the local level and divided

59:01them into what we call systems of development so there are natural systems which no surprise

59:08involve things like open space and natural resources sustainability built systems how

59:13does how does your land use your kind of zoning your traffic and circulation systems

59:18public facilities how did those pieces come together and then what we call community systems

59:23which is everything from housing to community health and economic development and kind

59:27of look at those components not just as in isolation but actually the way they sort

59:31of relate to each other from that we then drew what we heard largely from people in

59:38the community but also our own observations I've been in this field almost 40 years so

59:41I've kind of learned a lot along the way and we saw a number of issues that are addressed

59:47in the plan and use that as a springboard for the implementation program and the implementation

59:54program no surprise is kind of organized by the plan goals as well as kind of key actions

1:00:00And it talks about who would be the most appropriate key players in trying to implement various items in the plan.

1:00:07And then there's a set of appendices. We have some community engagement summaries there.

1:00:12We have an assessment of 15 years of zoning efforts that went to town meetings.

1:00:18We were trying to understand how much of the previous master plan was actually implemented.

1:00:23So there's an appendix where we literally went through 15 years of town meeting warrants and pulled everything out to try to understand

1:00:29what had happened in town. Next slide, please.

1:00:33So the sort of introduction to the plan tries to focus on sort of five key things.

1:00:44The implementation plan at the end of the master plan has much more detail, many, many actions.

1:00:51As I said, it's a plan for 10 to 15 years. You would not expect it to be just a few items.

1:00:57And I would say many of the items in the implementation program came directly from consultation with staff and local officials in the community.

1:01:05So as I said, everybody was very helpful.

1:01:07But sort of standing up above all those actions, there were sort of five things that jumped out at us that we think are going to be important for the town moving forward.

1:01:17One of the things that made it a little bit challenging doing this plan is that unlike most master plans I've worked on, we did not have a master plan committee in this case.

1:01:25So when you have a master plan committee, there's a lot of engagement types of activities you can do that without them you really can't.

1:01:33So one of the things I would say is that on a kind of going forward basis to be using a tool called scenario planning to help people with very different points of view about the islands long term future, try to come together and at least be able to assess if these certain things happen.

1:01:52Well, what would be the consequences of that positive or negative. Do we need to shift gears and the questions that you answer you ask and try to address in scenario planning.

1:02:02I know that not only just straight numeric but also geographic. If we assume we have a certain amount of future development that's that's likely to happen here.

1:02:12Is it going to happen in the locations where we think it makes the most sense what kind of community do we want this place to be, and does our development future align well with that and if it doesn't, then how through scenario planning can we kind of identify

1:02:25where there might be some tipping points that we need to, to know when to pivot to sort of shift policy shift gears and look at perhaps some other other types of direction that may not be obvious right now and scenario planning is fun, people enjoy it and I would

1:02:42just say, it has a way of giving people who have very different points of view and different opinions, be able to be in the same room together and have a constructive conversation about a community's future.

1:02:56So I think you have, you know, many opportunities to think about using scenario planning and Nantucket on a going forward basis.

1:03:03We just think as a structure for conversation, it's a good one to consider. Next slide please. Another thing that we think is going to be important, especially for your town is to think about how you can strengthen the, the tenor of public discussion in

1:03:25your community. I don't think it's any surprise to anybody, either in the room right now or perhaps, you know, watching this later, or listening online.

1:03:34There are a lot of conversations in Nantucket tend to get very contentious, and it makes it hard for people to sort of communicate and reach some type of, of an agreement, or at least be able to agree to disagree and do so in a, in a way this respectful

1:03:49and supportive of a positive community culture. There are a lot of models out there for instituting civil discourse. We recently worked with the town of Wellesley they have one they've worked with

1:04:03at Harvard University and trained a series of local volunteers who are very good we actually worked with them on a project about a year ago, trained to sort of facilitate community conversation.

1:04:14There's an interesting model in Lexington, urban county government in Kentucky as well, a different kind of model, but they're out there and many of these are led by local governments that are trying to actually build a better culture of communication

1:04:30in their community. In some cases, they're done in partnership with nonprofits. In some cases, it's the nonprofits themselves kind of really at the request of a municipality coming in to try to help establish a more kind of healing basis for people

1:04:44to have conversations about difficult things. So we just listed some examples here, community heart and soul the National Conference on citizenship.

1:04:53Council of state governments and National Civic League they all have programs to help communities like yours, where conversations tend to get very difficult, sometimes a little bit too personal, and how to help people kind of step back and be more effective

1:05:08in the way they communicate with each other. I don't think it's any, any surprise that Nantucket has a lot of really difficult issues facing it and getting a handle now on how people speak to each other.

1:05:20People speak to local officials and speak with each other and the community could be very beneficial to the town. Next slide please. Putting the year round community first. I think this is a, this was just a, an ongoing thread for us.

1:05:38I don't think this is a big surprise either. We think that the town needs to really put all of its possible efforts that it can into putting the year round community first, whenever you're developing adopting or implementing public policy and so that

1:05:53is a graphic that's on this slide. It's just an example of a community in Rhode Island that the commissions, what we call pre approved plan sets, essentially say if you build this kind of structure in this neighborhood, then you can go straight to

1:06:07the building department and get a building permit. You don't need to go through a lengthy review process because this is a pre approved design for this particular neighborhood.

1:06:15If you're thinking about tools like that, you would certainly not be the first community that did this, but ways to sort of increase predictability for people and trying to get approval to do something for the town.

1:06:29In this case, being able to create year round housing so I just think everything you can do to look at legally defensible land use regulations to require year round or workforce housing will be important for you thinking about

1:06:44calling unit restrictions and pre approved plans and so forth. A modified inclusionary zoning bylaw that focuses more on workforce housing than income based restrictions is another possibility.

1:06:57Strengthening or continuing to build on your relationships with the nonprofits that you already have and thinking about what does it take to have a year round neighborhood it's not just about housing.

1:07:07It's also about what kind of place is this for people to live if they're here year round, instead of being in a neighborhood where everybody leaves and you've got one house that's occupied.

1:07:17How do you have a whole neighborhood. It's not just about housing. It's also about sort of neighborhood level commercial services and mobility, so they all sort of come together and it's complicated.

1:07:27Next slide please. I'm improving the effectiveness of island wide planning. I want to just make sure everybody understands what we're saying here. This is not a comment about any particular board staff person department.

1:07:43It's really about centralizing planning. I think one of the things that became really obvious to us early on in this project process.

1:07:52One of the things you do in any master plan is you ask the town, well, tell us what you did in your last master plan. Give us the, give us a sort of a picture of what you accomplished.

1:08:01And all by the way what other plans have you done, and how is implementation been with those. And there was no efficient easy way to get an answer to that question, because planning is very decentralized in Nantucket so you have a lot of different apartments

1:08:16that are working on planning and everybody's doing a lot of really thoughtful work. So this is not a comment about wasted effort. It's about how do you get the best that you can out of the investments that are being made in planning, both at the

1:08:29staff level but also volunteers and committees that are working hard on these projects. How do you, how do you make sure that the system you have for for doing planning and implementing planning ensures that things are simply not going to sit on a shelf.

1:08:46I just comment a lot in any community we've worked in people will say at some point, we don't want to have a plan that sits on a shelf and the true answer is that the only time plan set on a shelf is when a community doesn't implement them.

1:08:59But it's really hard to do implementation if you don't even know what's out there. And there's no real easy way to kind of compare plans and say do we have any inconsistencies here.

1:09:08There's no conflicts between these plans, because things are all sort of being handled at the individual department or committee level, things are not things don't come together easily and I think that's something you're going to want to work on is how

1:09:20do you, how do you do a better job centralizing this as a core responsibility of local government, so that your investments in planning provide the maximum benefit to the town.

1:09:32Next slide please. And then thinking about partnerships for plan implementation.

1:09:42I would say over the last, maybe nine months or so, different nonprofit organizations and Nantucket have said you know we can we would love to help on something, we would like to be more involved in something, whatever action and different things that people are interested in.

1:09:58There's so much capacity and local government and as good as really, really excellent your staff are and your house as sincere as your boards and committees are.

1:10:09There's just too much to do. And thinking about how can you perhaps involve nonprofits more directly and carrying out some of the master plan recommendations the civil discourse item is a classic example.

1:10:21First thing to think about first of all you have them their constituents, and they have resources, thinking about having a master plan for the annual retreat kind of like you do your strategic plan preview now, thinking about how do you make them give

1:10:37you a master plan, given that it's a 10 to 15 year project that much attention and that much structure, so that in the end everybody sort of understands their role understands where they can step into help and be able to look back and say gee we actually

1:10:51got all these things done in the past year or why were we not able to accomplish certain things, building your capacity through that, those wonderful nonprofits that you have in Nantucket I think would be very helpful to all of you and, and I think help to ensure that some

1:11:05of the things in this plan actually get done. And next slide is simply a reminder to everybody that this has been out for a 30 day comment period that ends tomorrow.

1:11:21We are eager to look at the comments that come in what the position of the consulting team at this point is we've done our work. And so if there are comments that require kind of a factual corruption or something of course we will do that.

1:11:38There may be comments that come in that are more policy based we're going to have to sort of defer to the plus department and the planning boards to how they want to handle those.

1:11:46So the comment period ends tomorrow, and we will be talking to the planning board again on Monday night, hopefully to be able to bring this project to a close. And that is my presentation.

1:12:05Thank you Judy looking for members questions or questions who's going to run, I think the scenario planning is a good idea. Who's going to run that once this comes to a close is that going to run out of, you know, like I think it's a great idea but how

1:12:19do you do that. So that was one. And the other, similar in this the idea of centralizing planning and being more, you know, more aligned. How is that it's one thing to say we have to do that.

1:12:34The question is who's responsible and how are we going to do that. I don't know if that's for Judy or for the staff. I'm not sure. I'm stepping back because I would like to give your planning board and planning department an opportunity to respond or anybody else in the room.

1:12:51But I think it's probably not appropriate for me to do that yet. One of the things I think that we could. We've already talked about doing is at least twice a year, we should have a joint meeting between the two boards, so that we can talk about these kind

1:13:05of things that we all have in common, so that we're not contradicting what we're doing, you know, we need to be on the same page with each board, instead of one board doing what they want to do and us doing what we want to do and sometimes

1:13:17it ends up with each other. So you started having those meeting. Yeah. But I've been on the board since May. Hopefully we have one soon, at least, I'd like to see one a quarter, actually, especially with the, you know, after the summer's hard but now in the next

1:13:33month, it'd be good to have at least one before the end of the year so that when we get into all the different zoning articles and stuff about that town meeting we're kind of all on the same page.

1:13:42Yeah, I think it's really important that we meet jointly, particularly in regard to any zoning articles to support your own housing that we that we're where this board is on your own housing and we're, you know, what we're asking the

1:14:00board or asking the planning board because there will be specific details of the warrant articles that will be dictated by policy in terms of prioritization and I am hearing different perspectives from this board as it's constituted

1:14:15now and I really do want to make sure that we are rowing in the same direction as we head into town meeting I agree with you Bobby completely so sooner, sooner is better I, you know, as your affordable housing trust member have had some meetings with planning

1:14:31staff and the chair of the planning board to start noodling around ideas to support your own and affordable housing from a zoning perspective but that conversation needs to get broadened to this entire board in short order.

1:14:47One of the comment is, you know, is how we going to pay for it, that seems to be a, you know, we're going to be talking about that later tonight, you know, the numbers aren't attached, the implementation, you know, says it's going to need money or it's going to need this person or that person.

1:15:03Everyone is in charge of the size and number of vehicles parking emissions and etc concerns, you know, but, which I think should be traffic to like Mike should be involved and he is but, but I just think that, you know, how are we going to pay for

1:15:20what are these things going to cost, how are we going to who's going to own it, how are we going to pay for it. Like I think that has to be attached, you know, it's one thing to have this and it, you know, and I've said that I've said that consistently

1:15:29for 20 years, 25 years so it's not a surprise. The other thing I wanted to highlight is the opportunity for community dialogue community conversations has been something I've been on about for a couple years is those of you have been on the board

1:15:47with me. I would like to see that happen in the private sector space and not be a government, government effort, largely because I think there is a resistance to engage with government under, you know, for some folks that are just frustrated

1:16:03with government in general or they don't feel safe engaging with government or whatever. So I, I have already begun conversations in the private side to maybe utilize one of these firms to start having conversations about our future that aren't that

1:16:22aren't asking for input on a particular project that they're more general, and that we can maybe coalesce around priorities within what's in the master plan, what, what needs to come first and, and, and that also is the how we talk to each other

1:16:39and how it gets woven into that. So, sort of want to work, working on that already on the private sector side but I, but I totally agree that that's worth, because broader community engagement makes for better government, eventually.

1:17:04Anybody else anything else to follow up from planning. Okay, well, this will stay tuned for Monday at the planning board, four o'clock. Thank you. Thank you Judy appreciate it.

1:17:22Yeah, take care. Bye bye. Bye town managers report. Thank you. First off we have an update on sewer enterprise fund budget projections and our finance director Alicia is going to come and review this with you she's taken a deep dive into the sewer enterprise

1:17:41fund. And I would say, in summary, it's not as dire as was perhaps viewed when you last discussed this when you were doing rate sewer rate increases about a month ago.

1:17:55But there are some things we definitely need to keep an eye on Alicia and good evening on both select board and we should only Benjamin finance director. And next slide please. So at a glance for three years we've had revenue shortfalls in the sewer enterprise fund.

1:18:1223% since 2023 in our certified retained earnings. When we look at our actual revenue collected versus our revenue projections were down every single year since fiscal 24, our expenditures have exceeded revenue but they've stayed under the estimated budget.

1:18:31And when I looked at collections they're closely tracking billing. So we definitely have a revenue rate issue.

1:18:38Next slide please. Here you can see the revenue shortfall, where you can see where we estimated our projection at 12.8 million and 24 but we only collected 10.8 13.9 and 25 again at 10.8 and then the former finance director restructured those rates.

1:18:56And you went to that tier structure and it rose to 12.6 but still shy of the 14.5 revenue projection that we had. Next slide please. Here it's showing again, the revenue shortfall based off of our expenditures.

1:19:13So we expended 11.9 million, but we only took in 10.8 and the next year we expended 13.3 but we only took in 10.8 and the following year we expended 13.7, but we took in 12.6.

1:19:30So this is a direct correlation to our retained earnings because if we're not taking in enough revenue, it's getting hit to your retained earnings. Next slide please. Here it's showing your spending staying under the budget. So your actual spending you were authorized to go up to in the sewer 13 but they spent 11.9, 13.9 they spent 13.3, 14.5 they spent 13.7 and what's driving this is nine vacancies in the sewer enterprise fund.

1:20:01So if they were fully staffed, we would have had a much bigger problem on our hands. Next slide please. The core user fees are really what's driving the revenue shortfall so we needed 10.6 we took an 8.2 we need 11.4 again we brought in 8.6 we needed 12 we brought in 10.6.

1:20:24So we're down on our revenue. Next slide please. Here's our connection related fees as you can see the declining so you can see in fiscal 24 this the more of the light blue shade, it's going, it was much higher than 25 and declining again in 26.

1:20:42So 31% of the capacity connection privilege fees fell from 2.57 million 24 to 1.76 million and 26. The privilege fees those are going away they're old, these are just from lean agreements that are being paid off.

1:20:57Those are flat fees, and then below and I put a little note, I put in the amount of fees that have been waived. So we can see fiscal 24, primarily Richmond fiscal 25 Tacoma green fiscal 26 very, very limited.

1:21:15Next slide please. Cash and retained earnings are nearly depleted so you can see we're almost at 8 million in our cash and our return earnings were almost at six in the following year fiscal 25 we are down to 6 million in cash and 3.3 retained earnings to 26 you're down to 2.5 in cash and 420,000 in retained earnings.

1:21:38Next slide please. So what reduce retain earnings. So you'll see steady that black box at that 1.1 million there was a reserve a privilege fee reserve set aside in 2013 it's accounting it holds aside the money that privilege fee has been taken in and paid out the shimmer projects done and completed was borrowed.

1:21:59And that privilege fee just stayed on the books, I'm going to reserve that take that reserve and reverse it out. So that will take that 420,000 and make it a 1.5 million in retained earnings by getting rid of that reserve.

1:22:13Time meeting appropriations from retained earnings in fiscal year, 25 versus fiscal year 24 fiscal 25 was 1.43 million versus 535 the year before, and also gets reduced by capital project deficits this is just timing, based off of grants and borrowing the revenue doesn't

1:22:31come until after the year end close, so that will get reversed out the next year. That was only 726,000. Next slide please. Collections was the next thing I looked at and it's definitely not your problem you're doing excellent collections.

1:22:47I mean 99.9% fiscal 26 is pretty amazing you build 10.6 and you got in 10.58 so your collections are not your issue it's definitely a rates generating problem.

1:22:59Next slide please. Billing follows a seasonal quarterly cycle so you can see in the fiscal year 25 and then fiscal year 26 when those rates were adjusted to the tiered level how that made such an impact on our revenue we're not where we needed to be but we're

1:23:15getting there and as you voted the last large increase recently, that is going to bring us back to where we need to be for our revenue and we will be looking at that monthly and quarterly.

1:23:28Next slide please. Here's just showing the rate structure before in fiscal year 24 the base fee was 33 then 36, then you had your tiered rate structure change and fiscal 26 and most recently, you increased the fees, and we had that new fixed fee which

1:23:46was reduced from 20 to $10 to cover the budget. Next slide please. So our key takeaways. It's a revenue issue. Our collections are excellent between 97 to almost 100% rates have not been producing our projected revenues.

1:24:03Retained earnings has dropped significantly from 6 million down to 420,000 but we expect that to be 1.5 fiscal year 27 rates will cover operations only and is not designed to rebuild retained earnings, and we're going to watch our reserve close out for that 1.1

1:24:21million privilege fee reserve to fund balance. And next slide. Thank you very much and any questions that you have.

1:24:33I've got one. The privilege fee that was in a reserve when we originally did it was either the privilege fee or the capacity utilization fee. The idea of that was people that were not, not in the sewer but we're going to be adding additional capacity that money

1:24:49would be set aside. So when we had to expand the plan to do something someday we would have the money. If we're doing this, I'm assuming that's taking that reserve away. And, and it was also what I thought we had our reserve balance in the early

1:25:05years was growing and I assumed it was growing. So we were putting money aside, but then the last couple and I wasn't here the night you guys all talked about it. But then the, you know, the last couple years clearly that's not what happened.

1:25:18So, you know, I think the if we had nine more staff, you'd be adding, you know, ballpark at about a million million and a half to that, and you'd be in a lot you know over three years, you'd have you know another 4 million, let's say, and we'd be in a

1:25:36large shape. But the question that I have is when when I talk about sort of segregating the part we have wages, but we also have you know the bonds and we have the maintenance. And when one of any one of those starts to take away from the others, we end up being

1:25:54tax it doesn't, it doesn't work. And so I may have some concerns from a fiscal perspective of how do we ensure that, you know, that what is set aside for wages is for wages and what we have for everything else, you know, for, for the other

1:26:08maintenance and repair and building repair and other things is actually utilize for that and not one of the other doesn't go there, you see what I'm saying.

1:26:16Yep. And so I've learned a lot about the sewer in a very, very short time. So the sewer capacity fee phased out that privilege fee to make it more fair and equitable based off of the sewer flows.

1:26:32They said so that was what phase out the privilege fee but I know the former finance director was tracking what was coming in and going with that against the debt and tracking that for the capital purposes. What I'm finding in my analysis is a lack of analysis on adjusting

1:26:48fees, adjusting rates, adjusting flat fees, looking at collections, looking at what we are collecting versus what we're not collecting, looking at our, our waving what we're waving, we're doing that you want to waive those fees you want to do affordable

1:27:05housing but at the same token, we should be factoring that into our, our rate structure. So I think those were kind of things that weren't factored in that need to be factored in and I think once those are factored in, and I can meet with the rate setting

1:27:19consultants, it would be a different picture, and I think that's kind of the missing pieces was it's this has been taken into pieces and fractured instead of looked at as in one whole big picture and how each feeds into each other.

1:27:33And I think we'll be able to solve that for the coming fiscal year.

1:27:38In, in 26 that's when we changed the rate structure right when, what, when did it go into effect like did we actually have a full year at the revised rates, because it started to come back into better balance.

1:27:55But I think that we had, we had a relaxed, a reluctant not this one this was when this was when we switched to the tiered system based so it looks like they started November 2025 and again in January 2026.

1:28:10Okay, so it was just just my thought that we didn't have a complete fiscal year at the new structure. So that, that should be looked up.

1:28:21And then the water. So, I'm gonna start. What is this.

1:28:31That's in your appendix. And what I had done was, if you wanted to look at your authorizing on issue debt service, I had broken it up between sewer debt service and general fund.

1:28:43So some of the sewer is general fund funded it's an exclusion, but also I found that storm water was coded to sewer. So I backed out the storm water, I gave you an updated back out of the storm water.

1:28:55And I also broke out for you because the column says issued retired and rescinded. I gave you what has been rescinded in sewer debt versus what has been bonded in sewer debt.

1:29:06So you could see what is actually your authorize an unissued amount in total bunch of these things have been authorized but haven't been borrowed for that's correct because there's three things on here that just jump out of me maintenance garage facility design that's 325,000.

1:29:26Sewer garage design that's 500,000 and design for suicide maintenance and administrative facility that's 1.5,000 that right there is 2.35,000 2 million 325,000 that we haven't borrowed yet.

1:29:41So, maybe we need to go through this list and we, we are doing that internally and that that is all one project.

1:29:50And it started out unfortunately as we think we're going to need x for this design for the project and then it was more. So we asked for additional supplemental funding for design.

1:30:03And as the, as the project progresses, it needs other types of services to make it continue down the line like an owners project manager, and that's where we are we don't have a construction number for that particular project yet but we are definitely on our current work plan

1:30:25is to go through all of these and determine where they stand. And then there's no one here from the sewer department to answer these questions but I'm going to ask them anyway.

1:30:34I would like to know between 2425 and 26, how much sewage we actually process through the plant has the number been going up has the number been going down.

1:30:44Are we, are we, are we level is, you know where, how much we only can bill on what goes through the plant, and it's based on the water bills, and everything got blamed this year on the drought because they said well the water use is down so we're not

1:31:01we're not billing as much on the sewer, but the reality is, it's not most people have deduct meters on their, on their sprinkler system so it's really not that money's not getting built to the sewer.

1:31:13What is happening is that we become much more efficient at using water, we don't use water the way we used to this has been a discussion that I've had with numerous people about septic systems and, and, and I may have these numbers all wrong but I'm gonna throw them out there anyway and I'll, I'll, I believe it's

1:31:3630 gallons of full of water per bedroom per day that's what you need to calculate your, your, your field for when you do a septic system so if you have a three bedroom house you have to do 1200 1320 gallons of flow per day, but a washing machine

1:31:52used 30 gallons of water to wash your laundry, and now it does five, your toilet used to need seven gallons of water to flush now it uses to you dishwasher everything in your house you have, you have restrictors on your showers, everything that you use in your house

1:32:06now uses a quarter of the water it used to use so if we're billing on water, I want to know where we're at, are the numbers going down, are we actually processing less sewerage than we did in 23 or 24.

1:32:21Last time we have a sewer discussion here there's never anyone from the sewer department answer these questions now. I know these are specific questions and I'd be happy to get them later on but you know, I guess that's, well we do have a person out on medical

1:32:34leave. Okay, so that is why the sewer directors not here, but, but we can work to get this information. Absolutely. Your number, and the number is 110 gallons, and there's a 330 gallon a day minimum for.

1:32:50So it's 110 gallons bedroom for bed hits a 330 gallon minimum. So, Bob, I'm really interested in hearing about that and since you're chair of the Board of Health, this is excellent that you have really been doing your homework I love it.

1:33:04I mean, when you look at the number that jumps out at me as is the hookups hook up fees. Yeah, where they drastically gone down to where I think most everyone who can hook into the sewer is hooked into the sewer I mean we did the last big project we did was Shimo,

1:33:19and that's when I was on the board, you met 10 years ago so it's not like we're getting a lot of new connections, maybe some, some housing and you know there'll be connections when some of these different housing things are done but it's not considerably

1:33:34it's not big numbers so, and we and we had some massive expenses with when the sewer line broke on C Street and we had to redo all the those hundred year old line so you know, I just want to know where we're at with with capacity and not capacity

1:33:50usage, and the same for Wisconsin Wisconsin numbers level or it'd be interesting to know where we're at. It looked to me like Alicia, not to stop us from we said Bob but it looked to me like about 1.8 million was spent on equipment, and I just wonder if there's

1:34:08a lesson learned here that we shouldn't put that into borrowing. I know I can't believe I'm recommending we borrow any money I do not want to borrow money but in this instance, it seems like that would have helped protect their retained earnings

1:34:22a little bit over a period of time for enterprise borrowing, not necessarily well not general fund. Well, if you borrow it's not hitting retained earnings if you, if you, for the enterprise fund retained earnings is like free cash for general fund so either you

1:34:37would use retained earnings or you would borrow. Yeah, but they didn't I mean they just spent the money right. I think that was some of the problem from wasn't that coming from their operating budget.

1:34:50Their operating budget in their debt service. I mean, their debt service exploded. Yeah, their debt service and I'm curious how they're going to pay it this year. And if you think that they that yeah, it's fact, it's fractured into the rates.

1:35:02So, we gave them the debt service, they know what the debt service was so that's factored into the rates along with their operational budget, so that they know it's going to be tight.

1:35:13It is, I mean it is going to be tight. It's going to be tight budget but I think we're going to we're scrubbing it right now so we're working with the town manager's office right now scrubbing and looking at what's been authorized and unissued, what potentially

1:35:26needs to be rescinded. Yeah. And I know that we're really taking a deep dive into sewer right now. I know these, these numbers are very detailed I appreciate you going through it all I'm sure that was not easy.

1:35:41But thank you. I've gotten three checks in the last five minutes it's 110 gallons per bedroom per day, so just want to make sure he gets that I was way off.

1:35:56So I apologize, but it's a multiple you at least you got correct it's a multiple you had it in your head.

1:36:02Okay, so I mean I guess the general takeaway is that we have to continue to look at our rates for the future.

1:36:14And that's why I want to know what the yeah if it's stagnant, and our expenses are going up then obviously the only way to do it is to raise the rates if if there's, if there's been a drop like, I'm curious to see what the, what the usage was during coven to

1:36:32what it is now, because, you know, we had a lot more people here, a lot more year round, and I, you know, did we, did we get an exaggerated amount of money and during those coven years and now we're, we're paying for it because

1:36:47that's maybe what built up but at the end of the day, they borrowed a lot of money, they did a lot of projects and costs went up, they did.

1:36:56So I would love to see how many more customers they could have. And I would love for us to keep discussing these waivers because that was $1.3 million like we just can't.

1:37:09The water department doesn't waive these fees for people to hook up by the way, only the sewer department does so I'm very concerned about that. I know that Brooke has, I mean, I know they're two fees, so the sewer department does not leave the fees, yeah that's what we do.

1:37:26Excuse me, but I'm just saying it's only available that way that I know I don't think the water commission does it from what I understand, but when we what we've recently done is we've tiered them more, more substantially. So what we put in place was charging more

1:37:40for the larger, you know, larger, larger houses larger hookups to the house. It became based on bedrooms and fixtures and the size of the pipe going in.

1:37:52And so there's ways to adjust that if we if we do what the finance director saying we look if we are going to give waivers of any type we have to make sure that we're making up for it on the other side, and we have to find a fair way to do that if we're

1:38:08going to do it. I think we were doing it without understanding the other thing I wanted to comment on is part of why we had so much money at the beginning was we were doing areas where there were substantial charges going to people, and we still

1:38:22have hookups, but they're not at the, I don't believe that they're at the rate that Shimo and some of those others places where they were very expensive.

1:38:30And so we are now so so I think that we will find that the amount is still the hookups are slowing down a little bit. The amount is probably about the same, but we don't have some you know some of the large costs that we had large payers.

1:38:47Okay, so stay tuned for more information. Thank you, Alicia good. Yeah, excellent, excellent detail in here. Thank you.

1:39:04Oh, Amy Eldridge. Yeah, Amy, you said a question about the sewer and water. So if you have a meter put in with the sewer with water company, and you're not at your house using any water there's a minimum fee.

1:39:20Going to sewer for all these houses that are sitting empty that are tied into the sewer. Do we know what that is. Okay, thank you. I don't, but there is.

1:39:35Next stop there's there's a flat fee. I don't know what it is off the top of my head either I don't know if it's in the presentation, but it should be online.

1:39:50Next up continued capital, Madam Chair, before we go to Rick, I just want to really commend Alicia for this hard work spent hours and so did a lot of other people on preparing this presentation and really diving into these numbers.

1:40:07And I think it's been a little bit enlightening as to some of the things that we need to dig into more, and I jotted down a bunch of the stuff that you all have just asked for so maybe if you want to we can come back with some of that information to a meeting as an

1:40:23opportunity. Once, once we have it, just as a follow up. Yes, definitely. Thank you. I think it also highlights our highlights the importance of looking at the fees on a regular basis, and not being afraid of doing a cost of living increase on them.

1:40:40And I know I say that every year, but I think it's important because if we do a little bit every year then we don't have then we should have good retained earnings and we and people are used to paying a little bit more.

1:40:51You know, it's really hard when you go from 1000 to five, but if you went from 1000 to five over 5000 over 15 years, people would probably wouldn't even notice it would be the cost of living.

1:41:02So it's that, you know, anyway, good evening. Here's deputy town manager. So we've done six of these so far.

1:41:19And I think we're coming to sort of a natural pausing place on the general fund, because in order to actually make final determinations on general fund we're going to want to see the enterprise fund as well, enterprise fund requests as well.

1:41:36So, Eric, you can forward the page. So just, I just want to take a couple couple minutes to go one more Erica to just talk about where what we've done so this slide was in the very first presentation we had here and I just wanted to.

1:41:54I was asking people feel like what we're developing is a primary planning document that aligns long range planning with fiscal with financial capacity, and is a more transparent roadmap to what we have and I think, I think we've gotten to some of that not all that particularly

1:42:11the long range financial capacity but that still something we need to work on when we have the full set of requests and then hopefully this.

1:42:21I think, almost by definition, better reflects a select board priorities. And so, Erica if you just go to the next page just a quick brief so we said we've done this six times.

1:42:32We've moved 10 projects beyond the 10 year SIP horizon so they're parked in in FY 38 right now. We eliminated coastal resilience in town, new build town employ housing from FY 28.

1:42:47I think throughout the course of this some some of the projects have been a little bit better sequence by the departments and pencils have been sharpened and some numbers have been refined.

1:43:00You've told us which projects you want to go to Capcom, and then tonight, what we need to do is to review the school projects that's the one sort of general fund area we haven't done.

1:43:13I think Martin and ship blue near on online for that, and then just just in this I'm not saying this is anything to be proud of but we have, we have reduces the SIP by $563 million it's still $705 million though.

1:43:3220 FY 28 was reduced to $97 million from 216 and just kind of building up to the 97, two of the big ones are the DPW facility and facilities maintenance so that's 70 of the 97 that remain in the FY 28 plan.

1:43:51Eric you can just go to the next page. There's three slides here that I don't really want to talk about them but they're intended here to just sort of set the scene for what we've been doing in the town historically, this slide you saw in the very first presentation.

1:44:04We average about $80 million of general fund enterprise capital each year, Erica you can go to the next slide. This is, this is here for just for you to understand or look at.

1:44:16And as some of you talked about, well, how much do we have, how much should be in article 10. And how do we finance article 10 so this kind of explains it so in just in 2026, we had 18 and a half million dollars in article 10.

1:44:31We used 8.9 million that free cash we raised an appropriate 3.9 and we borrowed 5.7. And then that, that separate little box out there is just those are just help you scale debt exclusions over the, over the last five years so we've averaged, if I leave

1:44:49out 26 because obviously it has our island home in it, the average is 23.6 million dollars of debt exclusion.

1:44:58Go to the next slide Erica please. And then this is just where we, this is just where we started and where we where we are today. So the 10 year sip on July 22 had $580 million and it now has 155.

1:45:12And so you can see how those who all changed as we have gone through this process and I, again, I just put these in your for a little bit of food for thought.

1:45:22So, Erica, if you could put up the that and scroll down to the school. It's going to be yellow, and it's going to have a yellow bar by it, and Medicare if we could ask ship Clooney and or Martin I think Martin's probably left already.

1:45:48They're going to go through, to the extent that you have questions. They're here to ship is here to answer.

1:45:58Good evening everyone. Good evening. I guess, I'll just make it. Go ahead, go ahead ship sorry. No, I mean we're for grounds and equipment I mean we're looking for new equipment all our equipment is out so we have to replace equipment, building improvements,

1:46:27certainly roofing we're doing anything, we have lots of roof at the elementary school doors, it's the same things that we've been doing.

1:46:38As far as the tech improvements I can't really speak to those I know we've improved with the PA systems and all that so we are we are moving forward on all of these projects and they're important.

1:47:00Yep, it's Jill. I was wondering, I think you were getting about 250 a year and it looks like you bumped up to 300 but you do ask for it every year and I always ask the same question. So forgive me, but is there any way to just put this in your budget.

1:47:18Or, for the, for the equipment and improvements the grounds equipment and improvements right to put it in building improvements. The building improvements is a little different because you have identified projects in there but I mean, your grounds equipment and improvements

1:47:36like, that's kind of a regular number every year it seems right. Okay, I mean it just seems like something that doesn't necessarily need to go to capital if you're, it's kind of like the baseline data study that natural resources does they ask for the same

1:47:52thing every year I feel like that could get worked out through their budget. Okay, that's a makes sense. Just a recommendation. Yep.

1:48:04120,000 for radios, is that that for 40 radios. Yeah, Bob that's in that was over a three year plan. That's $3,000 a handheld radio. It is. That's ridiculous.

1:48:20I mean, we've had those radios for 600 bucks. Right. I can't believe that they have to have that type of security radios. I have scrambler radios on my boat that have, I can talk to NASA with, and they cost 300 bucks a piece.

1:48:34I mean, somebody's taken advantage of us here, but we've had those radios in with the men talking PD so those are the radios we're using Motorola and we had a three year project with that so we've been doing it over three years, they age out.

1:48:51Our idea was to break it down over three years to replace them, as we, as we could. And how do they age out. They stopped charging they just wear out. They're used every day I mean we use them quite a bit we, I think you'd be surprised.

1:49:10I think that's a long acre has a question. Yeah, Mary, thank you. The last line there that it replacement is staff laptops. It would be good to know is that 100% of the entire school systems laptops, because there's no budget here for the next 10 years.

1:49:32It's just not realistic from an IT standpoint. So, I'd like a better explanation of what that 325 is for, and how the school plans to handle technology replacements over the next 10 years when there's no budget for it.

1:49:50Unfortunately, our tech director is not with me tonight. And I can get that information for you, but I do not have it. Mary that's the kind of thing that we'll talk about it, the Capitol committee so we'll make sure that you understand the answers to that.

1:50:11All of this stuff here except for the four million, four and a half million, which is the administrative bill that would obviously be an override, everything else could go to capital and be looked at by capital as far as I'm concerned.

1:50:26I, I don't, I personally can't support the four and a half million at this point, going forward for this year. I think we're gonna have enough trouble with what we got already.

1:50:36If that can wait another year or two. That would be my recommendation but the rest of it could all go to capital. I mean main thing for me is if they want to try and push it forward.

1:50:50I want to make sure that they have a firm bid in hand, but not a bid, a firm construction price. Right. That is our plan to put it out to bid and come to town meeting with a hard number.

1:51:02Okay, but maybe we do need to talk about, and with different different priorities whether this has to happen this coming fiscal year or whether it could wait a year.

1:51:16Well, we've we've we've rehash the reasoning I mean, we are trying to move people out of any s we have office spaces so it opens up classroom space but certainly, it is a lot of money.

1:51:33Yeah, I mean, the superintendent was here and explained how they're you, they've converted teaching space into office space, and now they're running out of teaching space, and so it is a constraint with a, with a, you know, what has been a growing

1:51:54student population so I don't, I don't want us to be unrealistic about what our schools need our, you know, our schools struggle.

1:52:05So, you know, I get it, we need to know what we're asking the community but we also need to be really careful not to put the quality of education and space for kids in the buildings at in jeopardy.

1:52:19So, I'd like to have a deeper conversation about that before we write it off. Yeah, I would like capital to review it and I would like them to move forward with getting a solid number.

1:52:34Thank you. Right. Did you have a question. Yeah, hi, my name is Raymond Acosta, speaking as private citizen, just as you go along through this.

1:52:46If you're looking for four and a half million from the voters I think it'll be helpful. If you explain the situation, a little bit like in terms of who's in a certain office, what that's taking away from the children of the school, so on and so forth.

1:53:04I'm sitting here I have no idea. All I hear is you want four and a half million for a building.

1:53:11And it'll just make it, I think, easier in terms of people that the superintendent does have a narrative she just couldn't be here tonight but she did get into that and I don't know meeting a few weeks ago.

1:53:25And once they were, I would like for them to refine the number and really back back up then the need all these things will be standalone capital request anyway they're not going to go all up together whether it's the 10 million for the improvement

1:53:39to facilities or the school or the DPW so the voters will have a chance to ask questions and get answers and make a decision on each one individually.

1:53:50So, if you want to send this all the capital go ahead, I know. I'm not saying this shouldn't come to capital capital it should and the school has a school committee so I respect them if this is something they want to put forward and the superintendent.

1:54:04But I don't want to, as a board, sit here and do kind of what I've been watching for the last number of years where people say well we'll just let the voters decide, you know, what goes into the warrant comes from this board, and we have to make hard decisions

1:54:19and I even think four and a half million dollars is a lot of money right now especially when the school has a project on but I'm very open to list I've actually seen pictures of this base constraints they have so I'm super sympathetic to this one.

1:54:33It's tough, but I don't want to say, Oh well, yeah we'll just see what the voters say about this or see what the voters say about that that's just not how I think we ought to function as a board, we have to say yes no this goes on the warrant.

1:54:46It's not just about respecting the taxpayer which is really important to me, but it's also about protecting the taxpayer. Every time we do it override, it is adding to the debt service.

1:54:57Every time we see the debt service payment go up. That's a new tax on you. That's why you see your taxes go up, we aren't fully borrowed. You have no idea how much your taxes are going to go up because we aren't even close to being fully borrowed

1:55:09yet of what we've authorized. So that's what concerns me. And I just want to be clear, my understanding and correct me if I'm wrong is it's going to go to capital and capital is going to decide if they can fund it through either free cash or the, or through the general fund wait, let me finish.

1:55:27And then, if, if they can't, then it would have to go to an override. Before we go to the warrant, I wanted to come back here and say, do we support an override for these things, because I don't just want to send it to capital and capital

1:55:41and say yeah we need this but we don't have the money so we're just going to have an override without us having a final say, right well that that one of my concerns about the capital committee the years I have been on the capital committee we don't get to decide and we don't see how it's funded.

1:55:54So we don't know. So when we approve, you know, equipment for the sewer department over the years. I don't know how that's getting funded, you know now I found out it got funded through the sewer department it wasn't borrowed it in the now they're retained earnings

1:56:08and they plummeted $1.8 million so we're kind of flying blind at Capcom, which I think is why we're going through this exercise. But yes, we can.

1:56:17We don't have a number of Capcom to say we want to keep article 10 to $22 million although Rick I really appreciate you putting the number together because that's actually very helpful.

1:56:27Article 10 was low as $6 million in 2019, you know, now keeps creeping up along with the debt exclusion so that's really kind of, you know, my concern again we can look at the projects and decide if it's the right thing to do but if we don't put a number

1:56:41on it that we're comfortable with and, and that can be debated after the Capitol report, like, we don't have to decide that number tonight, but it is something to keep in mind because I don't know how much is coming from free cash and I don't know how much is going to get borrowed.

1:56:55And I don't think they know some of that until later in the season to charity beds. Thank you very much. I just want to compliment the select board on its analytical approach to budgeting and not taking anything for granted so kudos to you.

1:57:25Thank you very much. Thank you. I mean I think it is a year that we really need to be have harder discussions about priorities with what was approved last year, and the school needs to think about it the school committee and the school administration

1:57:44about they brought forward a very expensive athletic facility project last year. And if they wanted to bring forward another debt exclusion for the administrative building maybe they should have free thought, maybe we don't do the concession, so that we can fund the administration

1:58:06of the classroom so we just we all have to be a little bit more cognizant of all of all of these pieces and how they impact each other when it's adding to the total tax bill.

1:58:22So, so where we are with items that I'm just going to talk about fi, fi 28 for a minute because that's the next cap count capcom cycle. So where we are with that is in our six sessions, we have moved some things out.

1:58:39We've left some things in FY 28 and we've sent in addition to which we've sent a bunch of stuff to capital. Okay. So, collectively, we've gone from as I said $215 million to 97, which is still a very very large number.

1:58:57So, we, I get. So, what we're kind of proposing here is we just draw a line under this for now, you have, did you hand the pages up or not.

1:59:10Okay, you, you, you have that and I guess I would encourage you all to think about what number you'd like to have in FY 28 at this point in time and see if you can actually get to that number by making even tougher decisions than we've already made.

1:59:31And I don't want to presume what that number is and maybe it's different for everybody but at this point in time, you all still have $97 million in FY 28.

1:59:42So, so what I'm so we're going to kind of leave that for now. And if you all agree, Erica, maybe you could put the last slide of the PowerPoint up.

1:59:56we're gonna switch gears to the enterprise fund.

1:59:59So maybe.

2:00:00Maybe come back in two weeks, 'cause it takes a little bit of time, and I apologize that you get these documents so late.

2:00:05It's just really hard on a Wednesday to get something to you much earlier than I've been able to do that.

2:00:16So, here's what I'm suggesting. Staff will continue to refine.

2:00:21For instance, we're looking at whether or not we can split the Loran Barracks work into two years so that we take a few million dollars out of FY28.

2:00:34Drew sharpened his pencil on the facilities piece and took about $800,000 out of that since we last met.

2:00:44And so we'll continue to do that.

2:00:46I'm hoping you'll continue to think about what you really want in and what you really don't want in.

2:00:52We're going to go away and do the Enterprise Fund stuff, and then we'll come back to you, go through all the Enterprise Fund,

2:00:58and then finance along probably with Hilltop Securities, our financial advisor.

2:01:02We'll share the financial forecast that falls out of all of what we've been talking about and deciding on for the last six weeks.

2:01:12And then that can all go to Capcom. So that's what I'm proposing.

2:01:17Sounds like a plan. Sorry, in that, are you going to show us what our debt schedule is, what they are existing borrowing,

2:01:27and then include what it could be if we add another $100 million, which I already know I don't support.

2:01:33Okay, thank you.

2:01:34A couple of the questions. Will we know potentially what already borrowed but not spent could come off the rolls?

2:01:42Will we know that number?

2:01:43So we're working on that. We have the list, which is not the hard part.

2:01:50The harder part is just making sure that we understand what the money's been committed to,

2:01:54and we'll have that in a couple weeks' time.

2:01:58That would help us whether we justify maybe bringing DPW or not, or whatever.

2:02:06Yeah, that's one. What was the other thing I had?

2:02:11Oh, I had one other thing.

2:02:14Yeah, go to someone else and they'll come back.

2:02:19I think Ray Dacosta wanted to say something or ask something.

2:02:23Thank you, Ray Dacosta. You kind of, I think, just all hit it.

2:02:28But I've watched this process here for a bit, and I understand it's more of an exercise for you to look through all the potential projects that are, you know, in front of us as a town.

2:02:39As we do this, and I could have missed it, so if I did, I apologize for this.

2:02:45It would be nice as someone who lives here, a taxpayer, to have an understanding as you go through this as to when you're talking about a certain thing like the school we just talked about.

2:02:57Is it an override? And then also, how much debt's on our books right now?

2:03:03What does, what debt's coming off our books this year, next year, five years?

2:03:08How much more debt are we going to take on with each project, and what's the actual end number?

2:03:16We always hear construction costs, this and that, but if we're borrowing the money, what's the end number in terms of the interest?

2:03:23I would just like to see a higher breakdown in terms of the actual hard numbers that are going to be facing this town over next year, five years, ten years, twenty years, as we, you know, discuss these projects and borrow this type of money,

2:03:39which I think is what you all were speaking of here in the last moment or so, so I appreciate it.

2:03:47The other thing I think we want to know is what of these on here have opportunity for grants or other funding?

2:03:56You know, the school has money from the state or something else. We need to know that, you know, we don't want to be dropping something that might be 80, 90 percent funded by someone else, you know, sort of.

2:04:08And then the other part, just the way I was thinking about it, what we're doing when we look at these things, we're doing kind of a micro view.

2:04:16We're looking at, do we want this fire truck or do we want this, you know, this office building?

2:04:21We do want whatever. And what we haven't done is the macro view of like, what's the total picture?

2:04:28And I think this is like the first time I can remember that we've really tried to look at the big picture and how much is the total.

2:04:35And then once we get the total, then maybe we can start backing into the other part.

2:04:40So this has been really helpful. And I think it's, you know, some is long overdue. And so I think we've got to stay on the macro.

2:04:50And then the macro partly because the macro will lead to things like, OK, how else can we raise revenue?

2:04:56You know, what other ways can we raise revenue fairly, you know, and help sort of move this along?

2:05:05Because we do have a lot of this stuff that has to be done. We can't say, well, we're just not going to do it.

2:05:10So the question becomes, how do we do it in a way that's equitable to this?

2:05:15I meant especially for the year-rounders, the people that are here, especially that are struggling to stay here.

2:05:22So how do we do that? And that's, you know, we have to look at the macro to get to that.

2:05:26If we just let this every different special interests come in, they're going to be arguing it's the most important thing in the world.

2:05:33They're one thing is the most important thing. And we, you know, we might we might believe that or the town might believe that at town meeting.

2:05:40But if we don't ever back out and look at the big picture, which I think Jill is asking us to do very, you know, and it's important that we do that.

2:05:47I think we won't get back to the right decisions. So I'm glad that we're doing it anyway.

2:05:53Thank you. I appreciate you saying all that, Matt, because you have a long history on this board.

2:06:01The one thing that's been so hard about us spending a lot of money in recent years is that now we're at a point where it feels very uncomfortable to pit one department against another.

2:06:15And that's what I don't like about where we are. Right.

2:06:18I just don't feel like you got to pick a winner and a loser and public safety in the schools like they have to go first.

2:06:27They just do. And so it's anyway that part of it is disappointing to me, but I'm sort of glad that it's forced the conversation and we're having it and and I appreciate appreciate everybody bearing with me.

2:06:39And Rick, I really appreciate you going through all this because it's very difficult and very tedious.

2:06:50I'm done. Thanks, Rick. Okay. Next up, we have select board reports and comments discussion regarding payment in lieu of taxes and the residential exemption.

2:07:02We're going to start by discussing the residential exemption before we discuss pilots payment in lieu of taxes. Good evening, Rob.

2:07:13Good evening, Rob Ranney, the town's assessor. So, Erica, if we could start.

2:07:21Yeah, right there. Sounds good. So to continue our discussion about funding and where money comes from for the town. So we have.

2:07:32So, let me back up. So in fiscal 2026, through the property tax, the town raised $131 million and of that 89% came from residential class properties.

2:07:47The commercial industrial class properties paid approximately eight and a half percent and personal property taxes made up the remaining approximately two and a half percent.

2:07:56The tax rate which has always been mysterious to people is calculated by taking the each class has a share of the total value of the island.

2:08:06And so the residential share is the 89% is then taken from the, the tax levy to that's where the 117 million comes from that number is then divided by the residential value which is the 37 billion there.

2:08:23That is after we've subtracted the amount of the total residential exemptions. When you do that division you come up with point 00312 which you then multiply by 1000 to get 300 $3 and 12 cents per thousand thousand dollars of value.

2:08:42And you as you can see Matt might point this out. There is a typo on this slide where mill is actually only has one L in it because it's short for 1000.

2:08:53It's a Latin term short for 1000 so next slide please. This is what that looks like the big blue Pac Man is the residential share 89% and you can see the personal property the industrial share and the commercial share there as well.

2:09:11Next slide. So this, this is what the tax rate has looked like over the last 15 or so years. And on the far right you can see the residential exemption.

2:09:23Going back to 2018, it is remained constant at 25% but you can see the value of it because the values on the island have increased the value of the exemption itself has increased as well without doing anything at all.

2:09:38So, you all have approved a 25% exemption for the last number of years, and that is most recently translated to a tax savings for people in 2026 of roughly $2,800, and the exemption, the amount that's deducted from your value is just under 900,000.

2:09:59But that's what so that's sort of a historical look back and prior to 2018 the exemption amount remained at 20%. And even so, that group organically by itself as values increased over those years.

2:10:16Next slide please Erica. So the residential exemption itself was enacted by the Commonwealth in 1979 it was adapted local adopted locally in 1981.

2:10:28It allows a community to provide an exemption to taxpayers who both own and occupy their dwelling as a primary residence. You have to do both you can't just simply own it you have to occupy it at least one more day than half a year.

2:10:44This exemption may not exceed 50% of the average value in the residential property class in 2026 the average residential value was just under $3.6 million and a 25% exemption last year, as I mentioned was just under 900,000.

2:11:00That's 25% of the, of the roughly 3.6 million. So who benefits from the residential exemption, primarily the lower to moderately valued owner occupied parcels are the primary beneficiaries.

2:11:14Parcels that are valued below the exemption amount will not get the full benefit of the exemption, because under state law we cannot reduce the properties value below 10% of the other otherwise full market value.

2:11:28You know, otherwise we'd be giving money back to people and we're not in the business of doing that the residential tax rate is calculated on the net value of the entire residential class.

2:11:39So the greater the exemption amount for all qualified exemptions is subtracted from that value. The residential tax rate increases to cover the cost of the exemption so the more exemptions there are the greater the reduction in the in the residential class

2:11:55which then impacts the tax rate and raises the tax rate.

2:12:01Okay, so this is a snapshot of what it looks like per various value levels so across the top you have a 1 million a 2 million a 4 million and a $10 million property and if these properties do not receive a residential exemption.

2:12:18This is a little simplified but that is their tax bill. So the $1 million properties facing a $3,000 tax bill. If that property qualifies for the residential exemption, the number below you got the $1 million we're subtracting the exemption amount at 25%.

2:12:37You're left with just over 10% of the value so this these people are getting the, the full exemption, and they're paying only $314 and 26 cents savings of the 2800.

2:12:52So they're paying 10% roughly of what they would have paid, had they not gotten the exemption property number two is paying 55% of what they would have paid, had they not gotten it, and so on across to the right.

2:13:07Go into the next slide please Erica Thank you. So if we increase the exemption to 30% that has a couple of impacts, it's first of all it's going to raise the tax rate because now we have more exempted value coming out of the residential class.

2:13:21So you can see what happens property number one is maxed out at this point because they're already 10% of what they would have paid property to is now coming down to paying only 46% of what they would have paid.

2:13:36Property three is at 73% and the least impacted at this point is property for the highest value property is paying 89%. And if we take one more step.

2:13:49We'll go one more slide please Erica. So at a 35% exemption.

2:13:54The tax rate increases again. So the property number one without and without qualifying for the exemption would be paying 3200 because everyone else is now pushing the tax rate up with the 35% exemption.

2:14:08If that property qualifies for the exemption. You can see it's still only paying 10% because we can't go any lower property to now is taking a bigger chunks so they're only paying 37%.

2:14:20Everyone across the board and property for is still paying 87% of what they would have paid without the exemption. So this is this is food for thought when I come back in a few weeks to do this for real when we talk about the tax rate.

2:14:35But these are things to consider. Next slide please Erica when when we, when we do talk about this in a few weeks. Can we see the breakdown at like 26 and 27 and 28 because I think if we're going to really be discussing anything.

2:14:51It will be somewhere between 25 and 30, not up to 30 or over 30 is my perfect Mike that's information I need. Perfect, perfect. Yep, I can certainly do that.

2:15:04So next slide please Erica. So this is the breakdown basically value ranges so the property there. If you're a million dollars or less we have right now or this was last year 334 exemptions which is 14% of the total.

2:15:21The value range from 1 million to 2 million is a big chunk we have 969 exemptions in that category. And then you can see the rest there. So the average assessed value of all the exempted properties last year, out of the 2341 of them was 2 million 200 and 175.

2:15:43That's, that's pretty much the, the exemption portion of my presentation, Rob, it. It's kind of interesting that I feel like the qualified exemptions number has been the same for like decades, it's not just the last five years, it might have gone up 100 120 in the last couple

2:16:05of years but I find that fascinating. It doesn't change as much as you think because we have people that are selling and moving.

2:16:13People that are changing their ownership structure which then potentially disqualifies them for the exemption then we have new people coming on so it doesn't change as much as people think.

2:16:23So for those exemptions the thing that concerns me is that we know the year round population is increased, the exemptions stay the same, and that tells me that people who are not owning and not maybe able to take the exemption, maybe they're renting, right.

2:16:47So, they're the ones who, to me are going to be picking up a lot of the costs when we use this exemption, and I have concerns about that with increasing the exemption.

2:16:53The tax rate will go up. It's always been my concern is that they're just going to pass it on to the renters. This is 76% is one to 4 million, which is, you know, so that's the, that's pretty, pretty, pretty amazing.

2:17:14Yeah, yeah, especially since this was designed for the lower, so our values are through the roof obviously so the lower people are getting the maximum benefit they can get.

2:17:25And then now because of the, the tier of values. You're right, there's a big chunk is now sort of in the middle truck. Well, the interesting thing to me is raising the exemption a lot really doesn't benefit the people who have been hit by what you've called

2:17:40gentrification or property value increases like substantial ones like the ones that have gone from two to 4 million aren't capturing that much of a benefit, if we raise it a lot so I think that's really important.

2:17:52I know this question has been asked, is, is there a verification process or once you're in.

2:18:00You stay in until you come until you sell the property or voluntarily remove yourself because I know when I lived in Vermont I had to verify every year that I qualified.

2:18:10Good question. There is no requirement under state law to verify every year or verify at all. Once you apply you stay. We have a system where we are now.

2:18:21Sending letters to people, we're starting with the oldest ones first we have people that have been in the program since you know the early 90s, that we are sending letters to saying you need to fill out this application and re prove that you live here full time.

2:18:37Thank you, that's really great. Mary Longacre. Thank you, Don. This might be tangential but I was wondering if the breakdown evaluation of all property is comparable to the breakdown evaluation of properties receiving the residential exemption.

2:19:04So for instance, if we look at all the properties on Nantucket are 14% of them valued at $1 million or less.

2:19:15I do not know off the top of my head. I have 14,000 parcels to keep track of and I do not know the answer to that but I can find out. I think it'd be interesting to see where the year round residents fall in the value spectrum, as opposed to all the rest.

2:19:34I did this probably eight years ago, Mary, and the, the average value of a year round with an exemption was quite a bit less than the average value of all the house of the others, you know, it's low it's lower than the average, and it's much lower than the average

2:19:52of the people that were, you know, not residential exempted, and it was substantial six 800,000 back then it's probably, I'm going to guess a million two or something now, but it's a math equation.

2:20:06Thank you, Amy.

2:20:12I live in Wisconsin have slightly higher valued home than most year round residents here. But my question is is when people put in, like, I'm having a subdivisions being put in next door to me that's going to probably sell out at $25 million for four lots.

2:20:28It's available in Wisconsin is driving the price up. How does, how do you guys take the amount value from the subdivision that goes in and then equate it to the gentrification of the neighborhood where we don't do anything to our property, but we're

2:20:43going to have a slight or a major increase on our assessments that has nothing to do with me, other than that I, unfortunately for 25 years have lived next to a vacant lot that's now prime real estate.

2:20:56How do you guys figure out that determination because for me, I'm, I'm okay with the residential exemption staying where it is but where people are getting clobbered is on the assessments as well as what's being voted on at town meeting so there

2:21:13are some people who are paying way more than others. And it's, it's, you know, I'm sorry that my family bought out there in the 60s and left us a house when my mother in law passed away but like, like we're getting to the point where I can't afford

2:21:28to live in Wisconsin my family's grown up there, their entire lives, and long term family natives and we're talking about having to sell out and leave like because we can't afford it anymore.

2:21:40Thank you.

2:21:42And the simple unfortunate answer to that is that values are market driven, and they tend to impact different neighborhoods at different rates. So if you're in a neighborhood that has a bunch of $5 million sales that doesn't mean you're automatically

2:21:58paying $5 million but it's going to have an impact on your value and more on your land value, because that's your land your land is your land and it's easy to do your house could be a small house and not as valuable, but it's the land is going to get correct, but

2:22:15the house, it does have value and the cost to replace it does intend to increase over time so that goes into the equation as well. And also if you've like pulled a permit and made an improvement and you know that and then it's all captured now.

2:22:36Hey, now, thank you for talking about this. And this net all yes, sorry. That's okay. I am excited about this conversation. This has been five or six years in the making, at least in my digging into this and realizing what's really going on.

2:23:01So I want to ask Rob a question that I've asked numerous times but to talk about what Amy actually just said. So, the residential exemption in my opinion because I've got that going on with two different properties now and I see what this does.

2:23:18It actually works for normal houses, but it doesn't work for like covenants, and the way they have been devalued the increase in value of everybody else has made the covenant, almost like a free tax house, even though it's taxed a little bit it's not tax, in my opinion what it

2:23:41should be, because of the system that's in place with the state and how this all works. So what I wanted to just say to, to rob is and this is something that we've been talking about as a community we just voted to allow restrictions on relapse subdivisions

2:23:58and we have a year round restriction, what would, and I don't know if you've even figured this out yet Rob, but what would a year round deed restricted property that's now can't be sold to just, it would be like market Nantucket versus market, the people that are just lined up

2:24:23to use here for whatever, as Matt said for the land, essentially, how is that going to work on paper for you because that has, I bet you haven't really, is there even a formula for this, because putting your property in a deed restriction

2:24:41for year round market rate let's just say should make your house, worthless, in the sense of how the system is set up. Yeah, and it does because those are those are resale restricted so you can.

2:24:56So, you know, there are there are benefits to community wanting to have affordable housing and one of the benefits is that for the community is that we encourage people to be here right to own a property don't want a house to live here.

2:25:11However, if you get into one that you can't sell in this year it's 854,000 if you can't sell for more than that. The benefit to you isn't great because you can't turn around if your neighbor sells for $3 million and all of a sudden your house is now worth, you know, something

2:25:29close to that you can't sell for that because your deed restricted. Right, but you're, I'm speaking to year round market, not the covenant. That's different saying like say that's 1.8 it's so that's the most you can get.

2:25:46That's it. But where do you come up with a number in the tax structure, if the town, if people start doing that to their property, because that is coming, you know, at some level, it's it's based on the market.

2:26:02So if the market is saying that year round people are paying two and a half million then it's two and a half million. Okay, so we would be able to establish a different market price for a property in a particular neighborhood as a year round market versus the

2:26:19open market, theoretically, and it would fluctuate from year to year. Okay, as the market goes up or down. Okay, that's good. I mean, that's what we need. That's one thing we need. There's a lot more things we needed than that.

2:26:32But that feels the sales, the sales will dictate it in Aspen, Colorado, though, that is the one segment of the market that hasn't gone crazy, though, though, some of the covenant section, you know, the 80% and stuff have all gone up, but the year round.

2:26:50When there has state has has gone up cost of living, because that is more closely tied to wages and the top wages in the town. And so that is the one that hasn't really, you know, hasn't gone up as much. And maybe it's different. I haven't looked at it in a few years, but

2:27:07well, and that makes sense because who can afford a $3 million mortgage if you're working for the town and you're trying to, I don't know what else you're doing on the side but that's that's a big chunk.

2:27:19So just so I'm clear if if it's a covenant house and the max amount that house can be sold for hypothetically is 900,000. That's the max is tax debt.

2:27:28That's the value of the property because you can't we have to value at market value. So if you can't sell it for more than that, that's what the market value is.

2:27:36So you pay 10%. So, but I know my three minutes is probably flipped around the clock a couple times. But I know this is the first meeting of more. And I'm excited about this conversation because we have to talk about it.

2:27:52Because it isn't the 80s anymore, where you have 50 lot subdivisions going from a big huge chunk of land to all this new tax that's not happening anymore. And Nantucket is basically about 34% of the islands paying taxes.

2:28:12It's about 34 ish, I don't know where you get that number. Well, where it's it's low. A lot of it's I'm talking about the landmass. Well, we're gonna get to that in a minute. Okay.

2:28:24So, I guess, so I just want to thank you all for having us on the agenda. Thank you. Okay, so we'll, we'll stay tuned on the residential exemption for next time, let's just break down the numbers, a little bit more, and Brooke is going to I'm going to recuse the pilot discussion.

2:28:45We'll go on to. Alright, so pilots pilots are is an acronym in an acronym for payments in lieu of taxes. So, next slide please and we'll discuss what those are.

2:29:24So under state law, there are certain parcels that are exempt from paying local tax. These are generally parcels that are owned by conservation entities charitable entities, health and social service entities religious and educational organizations.

2:29:38They do have to fill out an application on an annual basis that has to be approved by me in my office.

2:29:46They are required to use the parcel as whatever their, their charitable purposes.

2:29:55And as long as they do that they are taxes tax exempt under state law. There, there is a trade off to that these groups do provide real community benefits, but they're not contributing to the local tax base like other taxable part like taxable

2:30:11parcels do pilots could theoretically let them help cover the cost of public services, although there is no mechanism to force these groups to do that to enter into a pilot program because they ultimately are exempt under state law.

2:30:25Right now on Nantucket there is one pilot is the Nantucket Housing Authority, my common village off of my common road.

2:30:34That has been in place since the mid 1980s, and they are paying roughly $7,500 a year based on a 36 bedroom agreement that was signed in the 80s, out of how many organizations have filed for the exemption will get in the next slide.

2:30:57You're jumping ahead of me. Sorry. Next slide please Erica. So pilots can offset lost tax revenue through a voluntary agreement because like I said they do not have to do that.

2:31:09The pilot could take the form of a donation or a gift to the town in some communities that does take place pilots tend to be very individualized depending on the organization, the organization's financial health, the value that it provides to the community

2:31:27the community's fiscal needs, and the cost of services and infrastructure the community provides a theoretical good example of this would be the hospital, the hospital provides huge benefit to the community, but they are exempt for from local property

2:31:46tax pilots are generally negotiated to contribute to offset cost of services or infrastructure provided by the community. And as the bottom notation is the property taxes pay for local services and all properties regardless of their tax status do consume local

2:32:05services so that's something to keep in mind. If you all wanted to discuss or negotiate with any of these entities on offsetting some of the costs.

2:32:15Next slide please Erica. So in FY26 there were a total of 14,132 parcels on the island with a total taxable assessed value of just over $41 billion.

2:32:29Of those 14,000 parcels 2,442 were tax exempt with a total tax exempt assessed valuation of just under 5.9 billion, that is not included in the 41 billion above the 2,442 taxes and parcels total approximately 17,500 or so acres, or roughly 60%

2:32:54of the island based on a 30,000 square or 30,000 acre island size. The majority of these parcels are owned by the Nantucket Land Bank, the town of Nantucket, the Nantucket Conservation Foundation.

2:33:10There are approximately 70 other tax exempt organizations that own real estate on Nantucket and have been qualified as tax exempt. So I think does that answer your question Jill, about how many.

2:33:24Yeah, the 2,442. Okay. Yeah. Next slide please. This is a graphic of what that looks like the taxable residential parcels make up 78% of the parcel count, the tax exempt parcels make up 17% and the taxable commercial parcels make up 5%, just based on

2:33:47the parcel count alone. And then that's it. I have a question, sanctity head Nantucket golf course, pay taxes, my comment, and scanners don't pay taxes, correct, to either of them avail themselves of the state law for golf courses, same both sanctity

2:34:21and Nantucket golf do. Yes, so they pay taxes but they get some correct if I get it wrong but I think they get well they're not that they pay on the land at a like 50 or 75% less.

2:34:35Yeah, like an agriculture example. But they also are private so they're, they're not open to the public. So that's, that's part of it.

2:34:44Yeah. So if a, if a nonprofit has a commercial business on their property like the Wisconsin Trust has the market, they pay taxes on the Scots and market correct. So, those Bartlett's and the brewery pay commercial taxes, even on those even

2:35:02though they're agriculture Yes, other. Okay, so there's no, we don't have any businesses that run as a business other than the golf courses that don't pay taxes really that you can think of, not off the top of my head now.

2:35:16Well, I said besides the golf courses, I thought you're talking private, just the land banks know no differently about like the restaurant as a commercial and today.

2:35:25Yeah, but it is also a public, the courses open to the public, both courses were the private, the other golf courses are private so I guess that would be the benefit to the, to the public.

2:35:39Yeah, because anyone can go out there and play golf, or go have dinner or have a drink at the bar, or you can't do that at a great harbor, you know any of those places so.

2:35:48So the private clubs like the yacht clubs and they pay commercial rate taxes and all those. Yep. And periodically they argue with me about that but yes.

2:36:05So, Rob have any of these organizations ever come to you and said we would like to somehow work with you about a payment loan of taxes, I mean, ultimately really, to me it's breaking down the acreage that's I think what interests me I know you, you, it's a little confusing to do with parcels because you see

2:36:25the 432 and it doesn't look like it's amounting to as much as it is. But does anyone ever talk to you about this I mean one of the things I read about it that I was interested in.

2:36:34There was a conservation organization in Maine on deer isle. I think I shared that with you.

2:36:40And they pay up to, you know, 50% of their I think assess value, their cumulative assess value in property taxes through pilot, I don't want to see property taxes through a pilot.

2:36:53They also serve as the de facto parks and rec department for their town. And this is a big conservation organization I mean they have 1300 acres. And one of the things they cited that I thought was interesting in terms of shared resources which you mentioned

2:37:09here is a talked about groundwater. That was one of the shared resources they mentioned so it's not just roads and electricity. There are other things to consider here.

2:37:20And so there are places that are doing pilots, and I don't know how many but that one really stuck out to me as being an interesting model.

2:37:29The simple answer is no. Nobody has come to me and asked to enter into a pilot, although I will say that the one pilot that we do have has talked to me about getting out of it.

2:37:43Is that renegotiated year to year every five years or no, it's never renegotiated it's in place and that's it. Oh, I thought that you, I thought that they could come back and like change the terms or something, they can try but that's not up to me, that's up

2:37:56to you all so you all would have to negotiate with them on that but my answer has been no up to up to this point.

2:38:03If, and if we want, I don't, I'm not in favor of starting this right now would be a huge project to do this and who's going to be responsible, and who's going to negotiate and how you know how are they going to identify who you negotiate with.

2:38:17I think the one of the advantages we have with not having, you know, having golf courses and having open space is we don't have to run sewer and roads and police service and everything else into the hinterlands like that that that is that if we had had to do

2:38:38it like people always talk about, oh, we're, you know, if it wasn't for the land bank, you know, we would have plenty more housing here we'd have plenty more. What we would have is we'd have, we would have a budget that was blown up five times worse than we are right

2:38:53now we're struggling. But imagine if we ran roads and had to take care of all that property in the middle of the island and all the way into the hinterlands, we would be underwater.

2:39:04Yeah, they do that. They do rely on public services, you know, the police do have to go out and break up the bonfires at my account at beach at the land.

2:39:13Sorry, I'm not sorry, so I'm not saying stuff while then. What I'm talking about is we haven't had to subdivide that and put in water and sewer and roads and all those utilities, which you put them in and then you don't have enough money to care for them.

2:39:29And then it costs, and then you're running behind. And so that's the, you know, it's a blessing that we have those. We don't have all that developed.

2:39:38No, nobody is saying that we wanted to be developed in this conversation. That's no I understand that but they are providing a great public benefit I don't disagree with you, but they still rely on our town services.

2:39:51A lot of these nonprofits, they have bought employee housing, they have people that live in employee housing, they have children that go to the school, and that costs money.

2:39:59And so there's a lot, a lot of residential out there example the Athenaeum we as taxpayers give the Athenaeum I think I always get this wrong I think it's $750,000 a year.

2:40:10And a lot of towns do that they provide money to their library and I think that's great.

2:40:16But the Athenaeum they needed employee housing, they went out and bought a home. They have their executive director live there. And then now that parcels tax exempt I'm just saying there's, and there are many many different issues.

2:40:28Yeah, it's not because you would still have to do a pilot not not with the Athenaeum but you'd still have to do a pilot with the nonprofit that has these residential homes that they're using for employee housing the land bank they have a lot of housing actually.

2:40:42I use them as the example, because they're the obvious one. Rob, I think it's something to think about there's also town owned parcels were rents.

2:40:54They're being developed and rents for being collected, and now they're 100% tax exempt. Maybe we should have considered this it wasn't something that was really brought up in terms of our leasing out land if we were already doing it for from my comment along

2:41:13Madam Chair, if I may, yes, Wiggles way and Tacoma green or apartments, they're gonna be rented out to those buildings pay real estate tax Wiggles way does not, but Tacoma green will at this point.

2:41:28So we'll just lay way was built with trust money. Correct. Yes, people rent their housing the entire collects the rent money keeps the rent money and they don't pay any taxes.

2:41:44So yes, do they at least have to do all the maintenance and everything on the buildings from this point on we don't have to give them any more money because they used to come when I was on CPC they came to CPC every year and asked for money to fix all their buildings.

2:41:57I'm not saying they're not a good organization, but the way I think the way to him for them, and for the time if the town owns property. I think the way the town should be thinking about it is putting a percentage of that away and housing, and Tucker should be putting percentage that run away, especially in the early years so that they have the money

2:42:17for these, they shouldn't be turning that into wages or into more housing if they and then coming back later. So you know, whether we did a payment in lieu or not, it'd be a way to segregate a portion of the rent every year for maintenance and repair so it doesn't

2:42:32cost. So there's a way to do it but and what you're talking about is different than what I was talking about. If you would, if we were to go out to the land bank and to some of these entities, they would someone would have to identify the parcels identify which ones would be, you know, appropriate

2:42:49to approach, and then you'd have to have someone own it and do that, and it would be a major project major project. This is a much bigger conversation, but I think it's a very interesting thing to start to talk about.

2:43:03Mary Longacre online. Thank you, John. I understand that the category is that the state has set up for agricultural or golf course and I think forestry might be another one.

2:43:18Do we have any ability locally to create categories of property to be taxed at different rates, or are we limited to residential commercial nonprofit and the state the categories the state provides.

2:43:34The simple answer is we are limited to what the state provides. Thank you, that. Yeah. So, this, this is, this is it right here. We are at the nuts and bolts, the state system is pre World War Two.

2:43:55It's when doctors were like volunteers and people are, you know, being dragged in the hospitals and wheelbarrows like this is, this is just not that time, but that is still in the system, we have stuff at the steamship like this drop, it's like we talk about

2:44:13things all the time it's like stuff that's so antiquated, it just doesn't make any sense but on Nantucket, unlike other places, we have this gift of essentially free land in the 60s being given away to the conservation foundation, which, which Matt, I agree with you, I wouldn't bring

2:44:38up good stuff in the middle of nowhere, we're lucky that everything is, is separated we're not like the venue with six different towns and all the mess they get. We are lucky that we're set up this way, but we're at the end of that now.

2:44:54Okay, so when Bobby brought up wiggles way. Thank you, Bob. I didn't say it first. That's good. So, all the problem is how I'm looking at this and this is the first meeting, all the properties that people live in, just like us, they have children, they have

2:45:14wives, they have cars, they have everything that we complain about every day, they're having all the same stuff for free, not them paying rent, that's not what I mean. I'm talking about that property is not generating tax base revenue for the town.

2:45:33If there was a way in my this is, if I was, you know, could just snap my fingers and fix all this, I would say take 100 bucks a month out of the rent and put it in the tax base automobiles that come here that we complain about that are parked in garages when the

2:45:48anti-cut license plates that are registered here and now pay excise tax to the town without us even blinking. No one even talks about that. And then on the boat anymore and we're losing tons of money on those cars. But anyway, which like the water, it's just putting in wells and they're not paying for any water.

2:46:05I mean, these things are happening. I mean, we're at the end of the, the, the 3M subdivisions and the amazon mass and, and all of that is gone there is one lot subdivisions maybe a two here or there but that's it, the land is gone.

2:46:24And that's good Matt, I'm happy that the land is gone, but we have to fix this anomaly. That's almost 100 years old that we're dealing with. So, I don't know how we do it, but we got to fix it.

2:46:40It's just going to take some serious thinking to figure out how to collect more money from the people that live here and benefit from this, and we haven't even talked about home insurance that's killing us. Thank you.

2:46:52I think that this is a big discussion that's probably more worthy of a workshop at some point but possibly in conjunction with some of the organizations that the benefit from the exemption on just, I would like to do that, how it could work for the broader

2:47:16community as a whole, and what the pros and cons are. Sure. Right. Yes, please.

2:47:36Not speak twice but I want to say, this is one of the most straightforward discussions on the future of Nantucket that I have heard in 30 years, and I just simply want to reiterate my compliment to you all for taking the islands future, a little more seriously than it's ever been done before.

2:48:02And you're peeling the onion here on a lot of things, and good for you. Thank you.

2:48:13Well, I don't know if it's never been done before, but we really appreciate your statements tonight. Yeah, wow. Amazing. Right. Hi Raymond Dacosta, do you mind going back to the slide with the numbers and the parcels.

2:48:35The other one with the graphic of the one before. Yep.

2:48:45Yep. So, it seems like you're going to talk about this for a while which is great. Thank you.

2:48:52The question I have is what Mr. Lowell just brought up, like he said we're at the end of the line. I would love to know in all the land left. How many acres are untaxed how many acres are tax.

2:49:09How many open acres are left that could be built for housing and taxable. And then in terms of of parcels. Are we going up, or are we going down in terms of taxes and parcels.

2:49:24What's the trend like over the last 510 years has it risen or declined, and what's that done to the taxes I know obviously our tax revenue must have gone up due to the skyrocketing of home prices here, but if that leveled, let's say over a five to 10 year period,

2:49:45and we kept going on the trajectory of either an incline or decline in terms of taxes and parcels, what would that look like in terms of a tax revenue.

2:49:55So, as the values go up the tax rate goes down, because we can't have a prop two and a half, because it's property.

2:50:04But I would say that one of the reasons this was brought up was because tax exempt parcels are being added, and a lot of it's attributed to not only large, like tracks of land, but also a lot of these organizations are now buying employee housing in the like two plus million dollar range,

2:50:30and those houses then go off the tax rolls, so it's, there's lots of little pieces, eating away.

2:50:35Yeah, so then it decreases the whole tax base but we could get, we have definitely all these figures and a build out analysis. So all of that is available but it's a matter of putting it all together and this is a conversation that could go on for days.

2:50:53Yeah, that would that's just the information I would like to see that where's the trend going, because everyone can see that these organizations are buying housing because it's possible for their employees to find rentals, I think we could, yeah, could put more of the picture

2:51:08together and I think that's what we're just starting to touch on bringing it all into one place.

2:51:14Yeah, I'll make a point while there isn't like more seeking hours or more rugged roads while we're not subdividing like that. What is happening is we are, you know, we are changing our zoning and adding more, it's going to be infill.

2:51:28It's going to be more density in the state is is putting more density and so if someone takes a lower priced house and puts a big house and, you know, a pool and another big house that it's going to be more valuable, that's going to change that changes.

2:51:41When we add the infill that all adds to the tax base, and that actually a lot of that will be positive, because those are adding in places where we already have sewer and water, etc.

2:51:51So those actually will be a net positive. We're not having to go out into the hinterlands and add it, and at huge expense, as we just saw the costs on Surfside Road.

2:52:01And so I think, you know, we are, I agree with that that we're kind of finished on, you know, sort of the subdivisions that we remember our parents did, you know, 30 years ago, and we're changing into a different mode and it's going to be infill.

2:52:16And so how do you infill it in a way that is desirable that you'd want to live in that you know where the cars are not piled up everywhere and where people have green space and where there's sidewalks to walk like that's going to be the challenge, you know, that's sort of the planning challenge over

2:52:33the next, you know, number of years is how do you do it. So it looks like downtown, and it doesn't look like some of the places that we have all the complaints about.

2:52:41And then it's how do we pay for it, right, with the limited tax base. Well, or you, you give the you, you can do some of it by saying, if you want to do this, you've got to put up, you know, you've got to do this sidewalk you've got to do this you've got to do that like

2:52:56we can. There's ways that we can do it, that doesn't necessarily hit the taxpayers, you know, someone's paying for it. So it is a taxpayer is paying for it. You mean for the sidewalks it's like a betterment.

2:53:06Yeah, well, but well, yeah, but that's still a tax. It is. Well, it is. There was back in the day when we started putting the brick sidewalks in, you had to pay extra if you wanted to brick sidewalk.

2:53:18If you didn't the town would put a concrete one in for free. So we so we've been doing betterments from the beginning from the one we started doing sidewalks, so it's, it's not a new thing.

2:53:30And those are just still unforeseen costs for those voters doing developments can pay for benefiting are paying some.

2:53:38I know I'm really glad those people come instances I'm glad those people put the brick side in town.

2:53:44Enjoy the great discussion Campbell Sutton. So, it would seem like for sidewalks or multi use paths and things like that, even if there isn't a specific plan but let's say, I guess I don't know quite how to say it, but if.

2:54:03If something like New Town Road were, I'm just going to use that as an example, and, and it was planned to have a sidewalk when lots in there are subdivided.

2:54:21They are asked each. They're asked to give a certain amount of money I think is 2500 it's probably be 3500 that goes into a fund that's supposed to help local infrastructure, right.

2:54:41So, it would be an area where you could at least start to have a savings account for for that, that was going in, so that it wouldn't necessarily have to be burden on the taxpayer it could be more of a burden on the developers within that area because

2:55:01if you have 5000 square foot lot and you can put three structures on it, you know, at $3,000 you've got $9,000. I don't know how far that gets you might get you a foot, I don't know, but it's something anyway.

2:55:16Okay, one more comment. Yeah, I just want to wrap this up for a couple more. Yeah, I hope that we talk about it again because I think this could go on for a very long time.

2:55:24Yeah, I just want to say that I don't think anyone's probably going to call you tomorrow Rob and offer to enter into a pilot but for the first nonprofit that does boy I think they really have an opportunity to make a name for themselves.

2:55:39Are you offering to donate to them the very next day I will. Yes, totally. My doors always open. So, thank you this is such great information I've learned from you over the years Rob it's a real pleasure.

2:55:54It's about getting more into this and putting together some more information but inviting more players.

2:56:01Next up, we have discussion and potential vote and supporting advocacy efforts regarding proposed amendments to section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act.

2:56:17I'm going to rely on Holly to back to back me up on this. So, there has been legislation proposed at the federal level to amend the National Historic Preservation Act in a way that would gut section 106, and for the public's information section 106 is,

2:56:40is a required review in permitting processes across the federal government that seeks to provide organizations and communities that have historic access, the opportunity to have input on that permitting process.

2:57:00The most obvious example for us would be vineyard winds offshore project that the good neighbor agreement was only arrived at because the developer had an obligation under section 106, and the permitting process at the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management

2:57:21required them to consider Nantucket's historic landmark status and the impacts of their project on our status as part of that permitting process.

2:57:33So, what this legislation proposes to do basically is eliminate our voice in federal permitting, and we're not just talking about offshore wind we're talking about offshore oil platforms we're talking about anything the federal government does that impacts Nantucket's historic assets.

2:57:52Our voice that we have which, which, mind you, none of us think is enough of a voice as has been seen in some of the other offshore wind permitting and so forth, but it has been the only leverage we've had in these projects.

2:58:11And so, that leverage disappears. If this legislation passes. So what is being asked of us is to join our, our wind farm attorneys cultural heritage partners have built a coalition of of its, I believe the current count is 945 organizations that have signed on in opposition to this legislation

2:58:41and by the way it's, it's Senator White House from Rhode Island is one of the lead sponsors of this legislation.

2:58:52And I believe the motivation is to expedite permitting of offshore wind at some point in time. So it's very critical to us. And, but it's also anything else, it doesn't just apply to offshore wind so I feel as though there's a, there's a rationale for doing this,

2:59:14that makes no sense in the, in the, in the small scope of offshore wind but it definitely doesn't make sense in several permitting as a whole. So, Holly if you want to add anything to my summary I would very much appreciate it.

2:59:30Thank you, Brooke.

2:59:32You Madam Chair to the board, Holly Backus preservation planner. First of all, Brooke Thank you very much for bringing this to the board's attention.

2:59:40This is something that first of all, the National historic Preservation Act turned 60 years old tomorrow, coincidentally, 60 years that they have that this law is been able to make sure any adverse effect to any local and national historic districts

2:59:56um, are, are actually being, um, upheld and,

3:00:00Most Section 106 reviews are completed with little controversy. I will say that the Wind Farm was an exception as far as being a 110F under the NHL status of Section 106 of the law, but first it started in the summer with the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation proposing changes that would radically gut the law.

3:00:29And there's been a lot of different discussions in the preservation world. CHP has been a big fight in this, and I give them props. I actually wrote a letter to our representatives this summer, which I did share with the board and our CHP.

3:00:48Now this bill that both Senator Henrich Winehouse are completely going to strip the law. It's worse. They wanted to pretty much take it upon themselves.

3:01:02So we must be a part of a coalition of other historic districts, tribal nations across the country to make sure that this doesn't move any further.

3:01:16I think one thing to understand with this 106 Strong, which there is a draft letter, I did send it to Libby, that this organization, which is being run by CHP and also the National Historic Preservation, excuse me, the National Trust for Historic Preservation has been involved.

3:01:37All sorts of preservation advocacy groups across the country are really looking to this discussion.

3:01:47And their letter that will go out tomorrow has a couple of things that I think is very important to look at.

3:01:57This reform that they're putting it under the, what they're calling it, the Bipartisan American Affordability and Jobs Act. It sounds fancy, but it will include the complete eradication of Section 106 as we know it under the National Historic Preservation Act.

3:02:15I just wanted to let you all know that while you're not involved in Section 106 as far as with the wind farms, the Nantucket Historical Commission is actively involved in small Section 106.

3:02:27That's anywhere from an ongoing project right now that the US Coast Guard is working on on Brand Point, where they want to replace a couple of their historic towers, their navigational beacons.

3:02:39That's something that the Commission has reviewed. It's being reviewed also with the Massachusetts Historical Commission, the SHPO Office, for their involvement as well, and hopefully we'll come up with an agreement on that.

3:02:52There are co-locations from cell four towers. We see those are on the island. That's actually a Section 106 review.

3:03:01We do see them for obviously milestone road, any of those type of projects that are funded by or being created by the state and federal government.

3:03:15Again, it's not just the wind farm. It's these larger projects that come into compliance. The fact that Section 106 was put into place to make sure that our historical and cultural resources are not being eradicated.

3:03:32With this, in the eyes of making it easier for renewable or just energy projects in general from the federal government, it has that trickle down effect to our little island 30 miles off to sea.

3:03:47I would encourage you all, hopefully, to sign on with what CHP is doing. Thank you again for this conversation.

3:03:57Yeah, I think that this would be extremely detrimental. The entire island is a national historic landmark.

3:04:04We've put so much effort into maintaining the island through the HDC and through the Historical Commission.

3:04:11So I hope that someone will make a motion to support this.

3:04:14So really, the actions that we're asking the board to take are to sign on to the coalition. They're going to do a big press conference tomorrow. It is the 50th or 60th anniversary and announce the coalition so we can add our name to that list right away.

3:04:36And then draft a letter to Senators Markey and Warren and urge them to vote against, and Keating, and urge them to vote against the final bill that includes these provisions as it comes through.

3:04:51And then I think, you know, maybe we could ask Holly to help me just send that letter to island preservation organizations, and that own our cultural historic landmarks and ask them to duplicate to the federal delegation.

3:05:07So those are the three actions that I would ask for from the board. Is that a motion? Yeah. Is there a second? I'll second. All those in favor.

3:05:17That carries unanimously. Thank you. Thank you. It's really important.

3:05:25Next up, I just need a quick vote from you all because we didn't finalize the MOU with Sherbourne Commons. There was some back and forth and then a holiday weekend, but I think we're pretty much there.

3:05:38And just wanted authorization to sign it by like Monday or Tuesday to give us. So it's just a request to extend the deadline that we established. Okay, so I just didn't want to do it without the word.

3:05:52I move we extend the deadline. Why don't we just make it Wednesday next week. Perfect. Yeah.

3:06:00Second. All those in favor. I that carries unanimously. Can I make a motion to what. Oh, four to zero.

3:06:11Okay, board is zero. Committee reports. Okay, then tonight is our motion to adjourn. Motion to adjourn. Second. All those in favor. I know it carries unanimously.

3:06:30Look at executive session nonsense. Alicia, thank you. Super helpful.