2019 Town Meeting - Night Five

(I took a break after the end of Town Meeting before writing my comments.  I am writing from my notes taken during Town Meeting.  At least I was before I let a year go by.  Now these are only partially complete, but they will need to stay that way.)

Welcome to Night 5.  No new members tonight, but there are still buttons awaiting pickup at check-in.  Jane Howard played the anthem. Several announcements about community cleanups, and Al Tosti, the chair of the Finance Committee is to be the Rotary Club Citizen of the Year!

Moving on to reports:  the Dallin Museum's report is in the town's report; the Recycling Committee discussed outreach and education and reducing waste at Town Day and the Beer Garden; and the School Committee presented their report.  We then tabled Article 3, although I don't recall taking it from the table.

Per an earlier decision, tonight is school budget night.  We opened with Article 63, th Minuteman budget with their superintendent, Dr. Bouquellan.  He opened with an update on the new building.  The project is a year ahead of schedule and still on budget.  The ribbon cutting is scheduled for October 4, but it will be open for the fall semester.  Additional fields will be developed for the former building site, and those will open fall 2020.  He also showed an updated fly-through video pausing in completed portions of the building to show how the plans came to fruition.  Very nice.

Diane Dupont had a question about custodial staffing.  The budget calls for outside staff.  Dr. Bouquellan confirmed, noting retirements lead to search for cleaners experienced with a building of this type.  They have bid out for this service.  Roderick Holland spoke in support, noting his son attended and he was very engaged.  He is now a practicing engineer.  The final vote was unanimous, 209-0.

Articles 57-58 off table

Deist: Question on process, don't vote on vote both with and without override, sends bad message, we can come back
Tosti:  Coming back would be worse

Karden:  School report, five year budget plan, 600+ additional students, accompanying faculty and staff, additional funding, still below state average
Dr. Bodie:  thanks for support, could begin next summer, state house recognition of green initiatives, improve cultural competency, FY20 level budget

Which to discuss:  2 3 6 7 9 11 13 17 20 21 22 24 26

Select Board:  Mayor's Coalition membership - remove funding, not a city (Worden)
Paluso:  How does override work?  Tosti:  some funds directly to schools, seniors, and DPW, remainder goes into stabilization

Town Manager:  No one

Comptroller:  Jameson - process and comptroller report

Treasurer / Collector:   Trembley - no warning card for late excise tax, cards did go out, Ed "I'm totally wrong"

Assessors:  Yantar - Concern about increases (Kathleen Maloon) Control rising tax burden on residents, maintain an affordable community, 40 year resident, 6% last year, 16% this year, others higher,  dramatic land value increase, applied for abatement, told would need a building inspection, why if only a land value increase, abatement denied, increases are higher than people can absorb, no double-digit tax increases (Stanley O'Connor) denial of abatement, law requires reassessment of building and home, denial of entry is legal basis for denial, use sales to set rates, certified by Dept. of Revenue
Fisher - Does a rise in one neighborhood lead to a decrease in another (Tierney) No, tax rate reduction due to higher overall value of property in town, no link, Fisher: taxation without representation
Tosti:  2.5% cap is across entire town, not individual properties, overrides and debt exclusions, four exclusions all hit last year, alongside reevaluation made a big impact, our expenses are just increasing
Revelak:  big division problem with multiple constraints to set tax rates, land is just more expensive
Dave Reedy:  are LLCs handled differently than residential owners, for teardown's - final sale price is used
Holland:  rising values nice, people sell houses, neighborhoods don't sell houses, if you are not in the market, you don't see the value, can we assess long time residents differently than speculators (must use Mass standards for assessment, assessor only values the property, doesn't set the rate  (Heim) looking for other legal methods for abatement, needs state special law
Friedman:  where does land valuation come from - (O'Connor) sales
LaCourt: tax rate is much lower now than in 1982, but values are so much higher now
Schlictman: term debate (voice)

Town Clerk
Revelak:  any thought of digitizing the town's records (yes, but no action), good to preserve history and make it accessible
Muldoon:  is registrar of voters still in budget, separate budget, no remnants under clerk

Parking:  Fuller - no longer a parking clerk, who performs this function (TM) still figuring that out, still in Treasurer's office, under Treasurer line item
Yantar:  parking fines (TM)$426K, $390K previous (Y) chalking not allowed as trespass (TC) ruling does not apply to our circuit

Public Works:  Tremblay - how much salt? (Rademacher) 6,600T ($450K) (Tremblay)  why are employee salaries rising higher than 2.5% (Sandy) FinCom report does not realistically portray increases, shows two-years at a time, so actual is about half
LaCourt:  how does DPW determine where to spend money and how much is needed (MR) TM tells us our budget, look at previous years for direction, seeks to keep budget as tight as possible (Lacourt) town employees' costs go up when yours do, raises are important
Schedule for street sweeping

Fire Services: Fiore - concern about propane delivery trucks, house across from Hardy has propane tank (FC) cannot answer question, state regulation, town employees are trained for dealing with propane fires

Inspections

Education:  Jameson - read the annual financial plan, do a good job containing increases
Deist - Arlington schools among the top schools academically, spending per student in the lowest third

Health:  Stone - who is diversity position (CB) ADA coordinator is retiring, will take on that and coordination with town diversity committees (BS) Schools? (CB) 3/4 position, CB is on school diversity group, really exciting group, strategic planning
Mendel - on parent-led diversity group, coordination with health (CB) DIGS is a part of the discussion at the school level, town liaison would overlap

Insurance: pass

Deist motion:  don't vote on budget second votes depending on passing of override (TC) contingent budget is OK, voting this down means meet between June 11 and June 30 to change
Vote:  no (29-175)

Vote:  yes (207-2), contingent budgets: yes (198-11)

Art. 58 Capital Budget - Foskett:  3 projects, still well within state borrowing limits

Mustafa:  regarding $750K, reallocate from Lake Street Signal funds to flood mitigation west of Lake Street, never seen him stop at that intersection anyway
Patricia:  historic preservation good, culvert too small, leads to flooding, epitome of arrogance...