Lunenburg Finance Committee Meeting Minutes Bilotta Meeting Room Lunenburg Town Hall August 22, 2024 Present Members: Chair Evan Watters, Vice Chair Chris Menard, Board Member Tom Gray, Board Member Dave Passios, Board Member Jean Russell, Board Member Jay Simeone Absent Members: Clerk Tiffaney Tavares Guests: William Bernard – DPW Director; Chuck Patterson and Kathleen Glowacki – Bartholomew Call to Order The meeting opened at 7:10 PM. 2. Pledge of Allegiance 3. Announcements There were no announcements. 4. Public Comment Mary Foyle, 985 Flat Hill Road, was present and provided some comments. Mary Foyle is the President of the Teacher’s Union. A part of her responsibilities includes preparing for negotiations for health insurance. She has completed surveys of prior employees and learned that most of the people felt that the best contract benefit was specifically health insurance. Additionally, Mary Foyle is the Chairperson of the Public Employee Committee (PEC). The Committee is made up of bargaining units and unit representatives from each of those groups in town to bargain health insurance. Any changes that occur needs to be bargained. Mary Foyle suggests reaching out to PEC to obtain some answers to the questions from the last meeting. Evan Watters questions if PEC has inquired into a high deductible option. Mary Foyle confirms this will be reviewed in the next couple of months when the contract negotiations start. Mary Foyle is unsure if there are enough employees to switch over and create savings. Mary Foyle is worried that a substantial change in health insurance may take away one of the few benefits available. 5. Interim Town Manager Report The Interim Town Manager, Carter Terenzini, went home sick and was unable to make the meeting so there was no report to discuss. Evan Watters will follow up to schedule a meeting. 6. Finance Director Report This topic was skipped. 7. New Business a. Investment Strategy Discussion –Bartholomew Bartholemew and Company is an independent investment advisory firm out of Worcester. The firm manages roughly 5 billion dollars and works with 325 municipal entities. Chuck Patterson provided a presentation. Below is a brief overview. There are 3 buckets for Massachusetts municipal funds 1. MGL Chapter 44 Section 55 Similar to a checking account. 2. MGL Chapter 44 Section 54 Cities and towns have their main depository accounts, payroll accounts, and accounts payable. Those accounts are the money market accounts, and it is common to have 10 to 15 different banks. The treasurer’s job is to shop around for rates and then move the money accordingly. 3. MGL Chapter 203C OPEB Fund Bartholomew and Company find its prudent to increase our diversification. There is argument that more options and more diversifications reduce the risks. Bartholomew and Company sent the Committee a recommended draft language to be sent over for Special Town Meeting. The language is as follows. “To see if the town will vote to accept the provisions of General Law Chapter 44 Section 5 for b, c, d to allow town trust funds to be invested in accordance with General Law Chapter 203c the so called “prudent investment rule” to take any other action relative there to.” b. Chapter 90 Presentation/Discussion – DPW Director Bill Bernard Chapter 90 is money provided by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and administered by Mass DOT authorized by Mass General Law Chapter 90 Section 34. It provides funding to municipalities for the implementation in the capital improvements on local public ways. Every municipality in the Commonwealth is allotted a portion of the total program dollars. The allocated amount for the Town of Lunenburg is $418,227.26. In FY 24, the town received $418,064.75 in regular allotment as well as $240,503.00 from Fair Share and $21,979.00 from the Rural Roadway Program. Chapter 90 funding can be used for pavement, traffic, transportation engineering design, planning and analysis. Chris Menard asks if we can get an estimate of how much Fair Share the town will receive. Bill Bernard is unsure but will reach out to the Mass DOT district office. Evan Watters questioned why Chapter 90 funding hasn’t been utilized recently. Bill Bernard states he was originally unaware of procedures but have since learned. Dave Passios follows up about previous discussions about a stormwater department being created. Bill Bernard confirms that the Stormwater Task Force has been meeting regularly about establishing a storm water utility. This is anticipated to appear at a future town meeting. c. Review Budget Process/Suggestions for Improvement – Interim Town Manager There is discussion about tripling up instead of doubling up on presentations for the upcoming budget season. Evan Watters discussed creating a template for department heads with an outline and associated time limits. Chris Menard suggests having the meeting with Monty Tech in May before their budgeting in hopes of getting input. Evan Watters states the town side could at least be done in advance as that is 50% of the budget. Evan Watters will reach out to the Interim Town Manager, Carter Terenzini, to get his opinion and suggestions based on past experiences. Chris Menard suggests an improvement would be to obtain some sort of budget software. Tom Gray states that the town uses Microsoft, and the schools use Google. Tom Gray wonders how much trouble it would be if everyone switched to one software. Dave Passios is concerned about a migration because the software’s don’t automatically merge. d. DLS Financial Policy Manual Draft This topic was skipped. 8. Old Business a. Town Manager Search Committee – Update Chris Menard confirms that the Town Manager Search Committee met with all the chiefs and department heads. There was emphasis on the importance of leadership and management. Julie Belliveau put together a document that was sent to 4 firms for consultants. At the next meeting a firm will be selected and negotiated. b. Budget Task Force – Update Evan Watters states the Budget Task Force met and spoke with Bartholomew. There was a comparison of town and school budgets with other similar towns. Through research the town of Maynard was found to be very similar in numbers to Lunenburg. A big difference was that they were receiving 3 million dollars more in state aid and they are a split rate community. c. Grant Writing Services – Update Dave Passios made a presentation at the last Parks Commission meeting. He believes they may be able to be the first board to take advantage of those services and money. Dave Passios believes are a lot of additional grants available but there is not enough bandwidth for further research. He suggests reaching out to the Town Manager to obtain $5,000 to $10,000 to investigate further. d. Consolidation of Services/Departments Dave Passios suggests that the Select Board vote to seat a Review Committee to look at the town operations from different viewpoints. There needs to be a consolidation of power and review checks and balances. Evan Watters agrees with a charter review. 9. Minutes a. 8/8/24 There was a motion to approve the minutes from August 8, 2024, by Dave Passios, seconded by Tom Gray. The vote was 3-0-2. 10. Committee Reports Dave Passios states that Green Communities Committee met. They are going into the fall grant round applying for a lot less money than anticipated. There are a few grants that are anticipated to go through, but they are relatively small. Dave Passios asks Evan Watters if he should come to a Capital Planning Committee meeting to talk about what needs to be considered when contemplating projects. Any projects involving energy savings need to be in contact with Unitil as there are energy incentives. Jay Simeone states the Sewer Commission met. They are currently short 2 members and the Chair is stepping down at the end of the month. They are looking for volunteers to join the Sewer Commission. Chris Menard confirms the Capital Planning meeting was postponed. Rob Bowen has joined the Committee as an at large member. Evan Watters states that the Parks Commission interviewed 3 design firms and selected RDLA, Ray Dun’s Landscaping Architects. The contract is being finalized. The Committee is working with the Interim Town Manager to determine if they can bring an article forward 54d to 53e1/2. The Town Beach is closing Sunday August 25th. 11. Topics for Future Meetings There are no additional topics to add to future agendas. 12. Important Dates There are no important upcoming dates. 13. Upcoming Meetings a. 9/12/24 b. 9/26/24 – The Town Treasurer will be invited to this meeting. c. 10/10/24 14. Public Comment There were no public comments. Dave Passios shared that there is still an ongoing issue with Munis and Dave Passios feels it is destroying the productivity of the workers. 15. Adjourn There was a motion to adjourn by Chris Menard, seconded by Dave Passios. The meeting closed at 10:13 PM.