Article seven, annual consent article community preservation act items sponsored by the community preservation committee. See the town will vote the following items. Community preservation funds FY26 annual appropriations from FY26 estimated revenues to committee administrative expense $72,747. from FY26 estimated revenues to historic resources reserve to community housing reserve and open space reserve 138,218 each and und designated budget reserve $967,528 Oak Street bond payment to appropriate $131,150 from the undesated budgeted reserve account. C to High School Fields bond payment to appropriate $292,600 from the undesated budgeted reserve account. The Warren Woods bond payment to appropriate $148,125 from the following FY26 reserve accounts. Historic reserve $47,400. Open space reserve $39,994. Undesated budgeted reserve $60,731. the Valentine estate to appropriate $45,936 from the following CPA reserve accounts. Open space reserve $6,564. Undesated budgeted reserve $39,372 or passing and vote or take any action relative to there too. The community preservation committee recommends the town so vote.
And we also ask questions about focus. You know, have you struggled to stay focused on only one task? Have you had trouble completing tasks on time? And if you look at the right two columns often and very often, those numbers are fairly high. Finally, we asked what students use social media for. You know, communication with friends and family is, you know, sharing personal updates and photos, entertainment, news and information gathering, joining online communities, other you know, well, we didn't break out. What we should next time is gambling. Okay. So, what have we learned? Alcohol continues to be the number one drug of choice. Digital gambling rates have soared. Zen has emerged as a com concerning tobacco trend. Onset of at risk behaviors, drinking in particular, can start as early as age 10 or 11. The concerning rates of mental health issues, especially eating disorders, depression, suicide attempts must continue to be addressed in a holistic fashion.
The finance committee recommends the town appro approve the CPC consent article as set forth in article 7. As with article six, due to the routine and recurring nature of this article, I will ask for a motion and then move directly to a vote. Uh entertain a motion that the town approve the CPC consent article as set forth in article 7. Do I have such a motion? Uh this will require simple majority. All those in favor, please raise your cards. Thank you. And opposed? That passes, but not unanimously. Article eight, appropriate CPA funds for the creation of the Ashlin Arboritum sponsored by the community preservation committee. See if the town will vote to appropriate up to $500,000 for the creation of the Ashlin Arboritum and that to meet this appropriation, the sum of $200,000 be transferred from the open space and recreation fund and $300,000 from the undesated account from the community preservation fund balance with unexpended funds as of December 31st, 2028 being returned to their funding source or passing vote or taking any other action thereon.
What else can we do? to increase awareness of the assets and behaviors in all constituent groups including parents, school staff, care providers, clergy, safety professionals, elected officials, community members, and more. Collectively work to identify assets that we can increase. Continue to listen to and talk with our children and neighbors. Work to lessen the stigma surrounding behavior and mental health issues. and do not be afraid to reach out for help and support. So, while we we certainly have much work to do, we're pleased to see positive movements. Efforts for the schools, the community, and families are effective. We need to continue to work for the positive. We want to give special thanks to the Brookfield Youth Commission who has helped us in a variety of ways uh including we're doing some follow-up uh focus groups with students who took the uh the survey to vet whether they think the information is accurate, but also to find out how we can better implement it in the future or what they think are good programs to help build assets within the community.
The community preservation committee recommends the town so vote. The finance committee recommends the town so vote. Mr. Go ahead. Uh, thank you. Aaron Lad, chair of the CPC committee. Um, I have a 2-year-old at home and when I come home, sometimes it doesn't matter what I do, he just wants to say no data, no data, I don't want to help you. And sometimes I get a warm welcome hug. I felt like hearing from the town manager and our school committee. It was the no data, no data, no data. Hopefully this evening I can be the yes data, I love you, want to give you a hug. So, I have some good news from CPC to present tonight. Article 7 really illustrates that CPC is uh we have two bonds that will be paying off the next couple years. Our revenues are exceeding our current spending limits.
You know, next steps, continue to update health curriculum in our schools where necessary, continue a series of meetings. And what Brookfield Cares will do is continue the series of meetings and presentations uh to keep the community engaged and educated, continue our presence and initiatives throughout the school and the community. work to continue to inform the community of relevant data, work to reduce the stigma of mental health, and ask for everyone's continued support. So, we are working on presentations for important constituent groups. We will have a community event this fall, a community discussion on the results of the survey where we have breakout groups and we talk with community members about what this means and how we can build assets within the community. Next steps again for Brookfield Cares, we will update the parents guide with the new information. We will make that available to all parents before school next year.
We're growing our uh available funds. So hopefully this is the good news of the evening, some of the fun projects we can do. Um because of those proposed uh outlays and inlays, uh the three projects we have for tonight hopefully are some exciting improvements for town. The first one presented here is the arburitum. So, what you're looking at on uh the blurriiest PowerPoint I've ever seen um is a locust area of what used to be the Cadillac paint site. Um so, along Elliot Street heading toward Sherburn about a quarter mile from the Sherburn line. Uh there's a piece of property there highlighted in green. Uh the town has cleaned up the property. Uh we put in some parking spaces. You can see in the aerial image that a rough um clean up of area has commenced. I don't know if you can go to the next image or not.
work with the schools to get a copy to every school as we have in the past. But we want to close by just thanking the schools for being so supportive and the community for being supportive. And it's a lot of information.
That's uh the image on the left is what it used to look like. I think that's five or six years ago. The image on the right is somewhere between 2020. Um so that's a few years ago. If you went there today, you'd see somewhere between. It's been kind of uh loosely cleaned up. If you go to the next slide, 2023 again, walking trails been inserted. Um some basic cleanup of the site. And the next slide, what we're planning to do, uh, make our first Ashlin Arboritum. Uh, it's a really exciting project to put in gazebo seating, uh, tree species. Um, I feel like Ashland is getting more Instagrammable, maybe because I'm a millennial, but either way, uh, the bridge downtown, an arboritum. These are really exciting projects where people can really enjoy town. Um, and I hope for your approval. Thank you, Mr. Lad. To dis allow discussion, I'll enter a motion the town vote to appropriate $500,000 for the creation of the Ashlin Arboritum.
Um, but I if you have any questions or or comments or ideas, I'm happy to uh to answer what I can. But thank you very much for this opportunity. I had a couple questions. Um, sure. Um, have you shared this presentation with us or could you share this with us? Absolutely. Okay. Absolutely. No, this this will be sent out tomorrow. Okay, great. And then another one. Um, and and it is also for the community. It's it's uh it's available now as of today on the Brookfield Care's website. It can be downloaded. Okay. We will also be presenting this at the uh the next at the June board of selectment meeting. On those slides, we're comparing the 2022 and 2025 whisker data. If I'm remembering, you said that 2022 was both seventh and eighth graders. So technically, you surveyed half the number of Right. Okay. I just wanted to make sure I was reading this.
That to meet this appropriation, the sum of $200,000 be transferred from the open space and recreation fund and $300,000 from the undesated account from the community preservation fund balance with unexpended funds as of December 31st, 2028 being returned to their funding source. Do I have a motion? discussion. Seeing none, we'll move right to a vote. This will require a simple majority. All those in favor, please raise your cards. Thank you. And opposed. That passes unanimously. Article nine, appropriate CPA funds for the dig digitization documents for the historic preservation. Steve, the town will vote to appropriate up to $110,000 for the digitization of the town of Ashlin records for historic preservation and that to meet this appropriation sum of $12010,000 be transferred from the historical resources reserve account from the community community preservation fund balance with unexpended funds as of December 31st, 2028 being returned to their funding source or passing vote or take any action other action relative there too.
No, no, it's it's the grade. We're we're actually I think if you go back and look at the the slides, we may be comparing, you know, grade to grade. Okay. We tried to be as consistent as we could. Oh, yeah. I was just then my last thing. Um, in terms of the students taking the surveys, was it in a home room? Like were there was there encouragement to be as honest and possible or is there any type of proactive um in terms of being as uh A couple things, you know, we you know, first off, there was a uh a video that was done by students in the uh the youth commission who um you know who have taken the survey in the past, but that that video was shown to students you know beforehand uh you know they were you know it was explained as much as possible.
Community Preservation Committee recommends the town so vote as does the finance committee. Mr. Lad, I wish I had as good a pretty a pictures to show for this, but working with the town clerk um on um ironically a motion after planting trees of working on removing um paper records to make them digitized. Uh this is something that a lot of towns have done. Um, this is really a a saver for, you know, long-term recordkeeping, reducing of paper waste. Um, you know, this is something that probably been done a long time ago and hopefully it will help Cindy for a long time to come of digitizing a record so people can look them up, know them, um, in a digital format to allow discussion and a motion. Yes. Wait a minute. Oh, you weren't done. No, I didn't start. I wasn't told it was a two-part.
uh you know but you should also know that search institute you know what we get reported to us you know if for sake of discussion just to make the numbers simple if a thousand students took the survey we may get results on 925 okay and the reason you know there are several reasons the reason that search institute asked questions variety of ways is because they want to see is the student spoofing us. They will if a student is just zigzagging, they will eliminate those. If a student hasn't finished, you know, hasn't answered a certain number of questions, they won't include those. There were one or two students who for some reason entered the wrong grade when they logged into the survey and those were not counted. So again, you know, search institute does a pretty good job of making sure that what they're reporting really is good information.
I apologize. Uh Curtis Hoffman, 58 Hillale Road. Um I, as a recovering archaeologist, have provided the town planner with a series of records of pre-Uropean archaeological sites within the town. These records are not to be available except on a need to know basis. Uh, and so I don't see that those would be included in what gets digitized for public consumption. Dr. Hoffman, this isn't discussion. Yeah, it's not discussion. We haven't haven't gotten there yet. Oh, sorry. So, I thought you were part of the presentation. So, just erase that from your memory banks. Don't go too far, Dr. Huffman. To allow discussion, I'll enter a motion to see if the town will vote to appropriate up to $110,000 for the digitization of the town of Ashlin records for historic preservation and that the me and that to meet this appropriation, the sum of $110,000 be transferred from the historic resources reserve account from the community preservation fund balance with unexpended funds as of December 31st, 2028 being returned to their funding source or pass any vote or take any action thereon.
That just answers my third question. Thank you. How many Yeah. How many questions were there? Because I in the past it was very lengthy. How many questions? It's it's 140 160 in in that range. Is that less than the past or it's the same? It's it's the same surve the survey itself is the same. The basic survey hasn't changed. The questions that we ask which were maybe I don't know 18 20 questions not significant. Uh those are in addition. Okay. Um but again you know last time we did the survey was done in a very short period of time based on student uh feedback. uh we gave them a full period this time which certainly falls in with search institute guidelines as well. Yeah. And we again we worked very closely with the administration. We had a a we had a uh session beforehand where we talked with search institute and we were were all on the same page about about data about security.
Do I have a motion? That's your queue, Dr. Hoffman. Thank you. Uh Curtis Hoffman, 58 Hill Road. As a recovering archaeologist, I have You really want me to do this, right? Okay. I have provided the town planning office with a uh series of paper records of pre-Uropean sites within the town. These are only available on a need to- know basis and therefore should be excluded from the digitization project. because that's the conditions under which I obtained them from the Massachusetts Historical Commission. So, is there a question there or a statement? Uh, it's just to advise the project managers of this very worthwhile project that there are certain records that should not be made digitized and available to everyone because they are more sensitive records. Thank you, Dr. Huff. or not. You could travel. Those would not be included. We We're doing archived uh vital records, meeting minutes, town meeting minutes, stuff like that.
you know, even security, you know, the, you know, the availability of the survey was only literally for the hour that it was being given in the schools and not available afterwards. So, no opportunity to spoof. Okay. Um, you had mentioned, you know, you'd appreciate any advice or, you know, direction. I think that, um, I really appreciate the posters. I think that's one good cares does because I see it when I use the restroom in the high school posters. Um they're right there. They're kind of like forced to read it right if you're in stall. Um and I think they've been really good through the years. Um has Brookfield Cares ever like really taken like a deep dive into like the current systems in place like I'll just say specifically at the high school like um because I agree with you. I think we need to have more conversations at home and get parents involved but unfortunately they're not involved.
Important stuff. No, I'm only kidding. No, I don't. I mean like stuff that people would want to look up online. So, yours is very important, but it will not be included. Thank you to our town clerk despite her snark. Did you have a comment, Mr. Herbert? Okay, I thought you did. Uh, any other discussion? We'll move to a vote. This will require a simple majority. All those in favor, please raise your cards. Thank you. And opposed. That passes unanimously. The clerk said she'd vote for it, too, but she's not a resident. Article 10, appropriate CPA funds for additional funds for the dog park site improvements to see if the town will vote to appropriate up to $60,000 for the Ashlin Bark Park site improvements and that to meet this appropriation, the sum of $60,000 be transferred from the open space and recreation account from the community preservation fund balance with unexpended funds as of December 31st, 2026.