===PAGE 1=== LUNENBURG BOARD OF ASSESSORS MAY 6, 2024 BILOTTA ROOM, LUNENBURG TOWN HALL 17 MAIN STREET Present Members: Chair Brian Laffond, Vice Chair Sarah Cammer Clerk John Rabbitt, Assessing Consultant Rena Swezey Absent: Principal Assessor Lynda McQuade CALL TO ORDER The meeting opened at 6:33PM. OPENING COMMENTS  Board John Rabbitt questions if there are any services that we offer to help people with their abatement. Rena Swezey says no, and the abatement must be in their own words and the office needs to remain impartial. Brian Laffond confirms that residents are welcome to come to the office to get the provided paperwork and Rena Swezey will provide the resident with a copy of their property card.  Public There were no public comments. STATUS REPORTS FROM PRINCIPAL ASSESSOR Lynda McQuade and Rena Swezey have been working on 2024 real estate abatements and have completed 24 files. Since the last meeting Lynda McQuade and Rena Swezey have completed 6 inspections. Rena Swezey and Brian Laffond were looking at a property today that had a site index of zero. There are a few parcels that have a site index of zero which is not a site index. Rena Swezey is going to run a report from Vision with all site indexes that are zero to address.  Status of Abatement and Exemption Applications The Assessor’s office is still receiving motor vehicle and real estate abatements. Sarah Cammer questions how long it takes for someone to file an abatement, get an inspection, and have the documents provided to the Board. Rena Swezey states once the inspection is completed the documents are reviewed at the next Board of Assessors Meeting. Rena Swezey states the Assessor’s office has 30 days to either approve or deny the abatement followed by a 3-month period to appeal to the Appellate Tax Board (ATB).  Omitted and Revised ===PAGE 2=== There were 2 commitments for the board to sign. The first was for personal property for the solar project that is under a 20-year agreement with the Town. Due to nonpayment this year there was a revised assessment of $21,493. The second commitment was a real estate omitted assessment of a house that was completed but not picked up. They will be getting a bill for the structure.  MUNIS Error on bills There was some difficulty getting all the bills out in time due to a communication issue between MUNIS and Vision. Vision has all the information correct. Exemptions under MUNIS were applied correctly to the bill amount, but incorrectly reduced the Valuations. After speaking with the Town Manager there will be another round of corrected bills for those affected. These need to be sent out prior to the new estimated quarterly bills being sent out on July 1st. CURRENT BUSINESS  Review and Approve Minutes of April 22, 2024 The minutes for the April 22nd meeting have not been completed.  Review and Approve Invoices, Expense V ouchers, Payroll, Billing Errors, 2 Motor Vehicle Excise (MVE) Commitments, MVE Abatements, etc. Commitment number 9 of 2022 totaling $77.98 was reviewed and signed. Commitment number 2 of 2024 totaling $285,816 was reviewed and signed. Motor vehicle abatements totaling $10,623.24 were signed.  Review and Approve Neighborhood Review Team proposal (schedule, membership, charge) Sarah Cammer put together a brief outline for the Board to review. Brian Laffond suggests reaching out to the people who were looking to volunteer to get confirmation. Brian Laffond suggests between 8 and 10 neighborhoods be created. Neighborhoods should be no smaller that ~ 400 parcels and no larger than 1200- 1500 parcels. Once completed, a copy of the drafted document will be sent to our representative from DLS to review. Rena Swezey is going to contact local towns to get their neighborhood counts for comparison. This may be an 8-to-10-week process and Sarah Cammer will make up a potential calendar with dates. ===PAGE 3=== Sarah Cammer will make an announcement at the next Select Board meeting stating the Board is looking for volunteers to be on the neighborhood review team. The team should consist of: - Board of Assessors member (Sarah Cammer) - A lake resident - A non-lake resident - An active Realtor - Outside Assessor (Rena Swezey) The Board intends to have the members identified by the next meeting.  Discuss details and development of Assessing Calendar The Town Manager proposed a baseline calendar that the Board intends to use as their format. There is also a recommend baseline calendar that DLS provided.  Update status of investigation regarding Exemptions: including 17C, 22,37, 41C, (and potential 41D) The Town Meeting passed the suggested change in amendments for the age and the amount for the exemptions for the elderly under 41C. Brian Laffond wants to review all exemptions in the next coming months and have this completed by October. John Rabbitt wants a better understanding of 41A thus he will be researching that exemption. Brian Laffond will research 41C and 41D for possible recommendations.  Status of Roll out of Website o Design Improvements: Insuring Links are Active/Current, Test Plan, Release Schedule John Rabbitt has routinely been meeting with Kara McCarthy. Her suggestions include consolidating emails. There have been roughly 15 changes to the website per week. Process for Potential Content: e.g. Assessors Office Organization Chart, “Work Breakdown Structure”, “FAQ’s from Citizen’s Questions”, Assessing Calendar, etc. All new content should be vetted by the entire Board before implementation. John Rabbitt provided a printed-out draft to the Board for review and discussion. Sarah Cammer suggests reducing some of the topics as it is overwhelming. Rena Swezey recommends adding the tax information on the main page. ===PAGE 4=== John Rabbitt and Kara McCarthy have added a link that brings you to the meeting videos under the agenda and minutes link. John Rabbitt will consolidate and confirm the Board’s changes before asking Kara McCarthy for further changes. John Rabbitt suggests creating a site map. FUTURE TOPICS  BOA Policies John Rabbitt looked into information about open meeting laws and disagrees with the policy. John Rabbitt suggests creating a big list of topics and adding them to all agendas in case a specific discussion occurs. Brian Laffond states if you bring up a topic at a meeting we can communicate at the next meeting once the topic has been added to the agenda. Sarah Cammer likes the policy and agrees that if it’s important enough that we need to write about it to each other then it’s important enough to say we need to make this an agenda topic. Brian Laffond suggests if John Rabbitt has a suggestion or a way to have this run differently then he should run it by Town Council and then return to the Board with that info. There have been several “emergency” requests from Attorneys for signatures on non-standard documents. When an abutters list is requested, the Assessors have 10 business days to respond. Brian Laffond suggests adopting a similar policy for response to requests for signatures. UPCOMING MEETING/EVENTS SCHEDULE Brian Laffond proposes meeting once a month for July and August.  May 20, 2024 - Determine June Meeting Schedule  June 3, 2024  June 10, 2024 - Tentatively scheduled.  July 22, 2024 - Tentatively scheduled.  August 19, 2024 - Tentatively scheduled. CLOSING COMMENTS  Public There was no public comment.  Board John Rabbitt shares that the pancake breakfast at the Senior Center is being discontinued due to lack of attendance. EXECUTIVE SESSION ===PAGE 5=== There was a motion to suspend open meeting and enter into executive session not to return to open session after executive session by John Rabbitt, seconded by Sarah Cammer. The meeting closed at 8:47 PM. ENTER EXECUTIVE SESSION – Suspend open meeting and enter into Executive Session, not to return to Open Session after exiting Executive Session. Motion to enter executive session under Purpose 7: "To comply with, or act under the authority of, any general or special law or federal grant-in-aid requirements".