Town of Acton Tri-Board Meeting - October 22nd, 2025

001Select. >> Okay, that looks good. I'll get I'll get us kicked off and we will pass it around. It is 7:01. Noting the hour in the presence of a quorum, I call the Actton Boxboro Regional School Committee to order. Members of the public who wish to watch the meeting online may use Actton TV's YouTube channel found at the top of the agenda. This meeting is being recorded and will be posted on Actant TV's website at actctantv.org. As a reminder, if you hit the button on your um microphone, that will help it get into the act TV recording. >> Not listening to the directions. Okay. I'd like to call the box for select board to order. It is Wednesday, October 22nd, 2025. at approximately 7:05 p.m. >> Noting the presence of a quorum, I call the

002box of the finance committee meeting to order. Uh, October 22nd, 7:05 p.m. Noticing the uh presence of a quorum, I call the act and finance committee to order. >> Noting the presence of a quorum, I'd call this uh October 22nd, 2025 meeting the act select board to order. All right, so we have passed our first test of whether we can all call ourselves to order in order. Good job, everybody. [laughter] Yeah, we got you coming right in. Well done, Kristen. [gasps] So, um, my name is Tori Campbell. I'm the chair of the school committee, and I just want to welcome everybody. It is incredible that we are all gathered here tonight, and I think it shows just, um, how seriously we all take not only what we do, but the challenges that we have ahead

003of ourselves. Um, just by kind of by way of getting us started, little memory experiment here. Take a moment and think back to when you graduated from high school. So, kicking off life. For some of us, this is longer than others. Where were you? Who were you with? And what was next? So, dating myself, for me, that was 1992. I was in Boulder, Colorado, graduating from Fairview High School, which has a lot in common with AB. It's a good place to graduate from. It has a good reputation. Helps you get into good colleges. Life is good. It was really interesting to be at my high school graduation and get to see my very best friend get out of his wheelchair and walk across the stage to get his diploma. He'd been in a head-on collision

004with a drunk driver um our senior year of high school. And the only reason he survived was because a police officer happened to be a couple of minutes behind him on that deserted road out on the edge of town and he saved his life. And for me, I went on to West Point a couple of weeks later and I didn't come back to Boulder much. And it's interesting to me because as I think about this, you know, I graduated my first duty station after West Point uh landed me in Bosnia, which was a hostile fire zone. I didn't pay taxes that year. And the next year I got married and I became a resident of another state. I never paid taxes in Boulder, but I got a lot out of living there. Now, our um

005our roads were always plowed. Even in 2 and 1/2 ft of snow, I had to go to school. Although, I also got to I also got to shovel my sidewalks at 5:00 a.m. So, that is kind of one of the nice things about living in Actton right now. Appreciate that. That gets cleared for us. The uh the fire department came when my neighbor's barbecue got a little bit out of hand. And the public works workers came and shrunk the size of the speed bump that the firetruck high centered on on its way to deal with the barbecue that got a little bit out of hand. We had great libraries. We had great rec centers. It was a great place to grow up. And what's interesting is I reflect back on that, you know, none of

006that was anything that I ever thought about growing up. It just kind of happened. I guarantee you that my parents didn't pay taxes in that equaled out the benefits that they got out of growing up of having two kids grow up in Boulder and living there. And that is the nature of a public good. We have things that we can do collectively that we couldn't do on our own if we had to pay for each one of those little things. And not only that, they're things that extend over our entire lifetime. You know, when you're in school, you're not the one who's paying for your school to happen. But all those taxes that we pay go for things that people need over their lifetime. And it goes for things that you might need at a

007given moment or something that your neighbor might need. but they are the things that make a community good and a place that people want to live. And that's really important because we are of course staring down one heck of a budget year after four really tough budget years. Um, I think what was most striking to me sitting in ALG this couple of weeks ago was recognizing that um the increases in health insurance alone may eat up everything we can get from Prop 2 and a half for both towns and school. That is a scary thought. And we all have things that we need. We're going to talk about those things tonight. So like that is why we are here because we are the people who get to figure out how do we get all of

008these essential things that we have to do as part of government done with the resources that we have even in the state of you know dwindling federal resources and dwindling state aid which puts more pressure on us at the local level to make all this work. So it's awesome that everybody is here. Thank you. Um before we get going here uh just kind of the format of the evening. It's going to be more of a discussion than presentations and we have the act and select board to thank you for that. They came up with the idea that maybe we should do some read aheads and have a conversation. So really looking forward to that. We'll pass it around among the boards. Every board will have about kind of 10 minutes to lead us in discussion

009questions that we have for each other and recognizing that we may not a have all the answers tonight or b be able to deep dive into all of them. It may not be the best use of our time. So we'll kind of have to play that by ear. But we can recognize where there are things that we want to follow up on later. And then hopefully at the end we can kind of think about where we see opportunities that we might be able to work together in the upcoming months and also where we see some of the tensions that we may need to work out together in the upcoming couple of months. Um before I hand this off to Dean to uh to lead us in discussion and the act and select boards first on

010our on our list here to to do this, why don't we go around and just introduce ourselves. name role on your your board or committee and um if you've got a liaison role or a subcommittee role, something else that somebody here might want to know about. Let's kind of figure those things out so that when we're done with this meeting, you can go find the people you know you're going to need to talk to and exchange some contact information. So, like I said, I'm Tori, um school committee chair this year. I'm an Actton uh member. I'm on AB forward, which is the strategic planning and reorganization effort. Um, ALG budget sub. >> Good evening. Welcome everybody. I'm Adam Klein. I'm the vice chair for Boxboro. I'm the chairperson of the budget subcommittee. I sit on

011AB forward and I leaz with the Boxboro Select Board. >> Hi, I'm Liz Folks, a member of the uh school committee and I uh am the liaison for the Boxboro finance committee uh and I'm also the negotiation subj. >> Hi, I'm Yian Schmidt. I am a member of the Actton Boxboro Regional School District. I don't know why I said that much. Um, I'm from Actton. I serve on the budget sub, capital sub, AB4, and I am also the fin liaison. Hi, I'm Lisa Adil. I'm a ACT for school committee. um the actton one of the actton representatives and um I am a CPAC liaison, joint PTSO liaison and on negotiations subcommittee. >> Hi, my name is Vick Periki. Uh I'm on the obvious the school uh school committee representing Boxboro. I'm also on CPAC and

012also on the uh on the >> what committee you >> with the what? >> JPTSO. Yes, JVT is so sorry. Thank you. >> Just pass this one. Okay. [clears throat] >> Sam Anderson, member of the Boxboro select board. I don't think I leaz any committees anyone here cares about. [laughter] >> I also don't uh so I'm Wes Folks from Boxboro on the select board and like I say, I don't either. I'm Priya Sundram, uh, Boxboro uh, select board member and I am a liazison for the uh, capital committee. >> I'm Bob Simple. I'm the clerk of the box select board. So I'm I'm the one that got the liaison. So I'm liazison to the personnel board, to the COA board, and to the reccom. >> I'm Kristen Hillburn, current chair of the Boxboro Select Board,

013and I am your liaison, and lots of other boards and commissions you don't care about. Somebody just pass. >> Hi, my name is Michelle Ryan. I'm a member of the Boxboro fincom. I lease for our economic development committee and community preservation committee amongst a few others. [laughter] >> Hi, I'm Tony Newton. I'm chair of the box finance committee. >> Hi, I'm John Connor. I I am the vice chair of the fincom and I leaz with the school committee and I'm also on the capital committee. >> Thanks. Yeah. Hi, my name is Joe Stalpin. I'm on the Boxboro finance committee. I'm also a trustee on the affordable housing trust. I liaz with the board of health consservation, steel farm committee, DPW, and some others. >> Hi, Maria Neland. I'm on the finance committee. I'm a liazison

014to the building committee, the council on aging, and a member of the fire station building committee. Uh Scott Sullivan uh chair of finance committee and uh couple other committees uh health insurance trust and uh select board liaison. Roland Bordon vice chair this year I leazison with CPC and Minute Man High School with their attended my first uh PTA uh school committee meeting last night via Zoom. I am Steve Non act and finance committee and based on my seniority I don't do liaison anymore. [snorts] >> Jason Cole, act in finance committee. Um I am the liaison to the uh capital improvement plan which I'm ashamed to admit I missed the last meeting of so you can come yell at me about that afterwards. >> Hi I'm Christy Anderson. I'm on the act and finance committee. I

015am liaison for um kind of co-leazison for the school committee and the AB forward. >> Hi Allison Jones. I'm a member of the act and finance committee and liaison to uh some committees that aren't really relevant here. >> I'm Karen Hogath. I'm on the actton and I am leazison to the select board. >> Hi Dean Charter uh chair of the select board for Actton. this year. I'm a liaison to the conservation commission, the council on aging. Uh I'm member of the actton 250 committee, uh community preservation committee and I chair the DPW building committee. Good evening. I'm David Martin. I'm clerk of the Actton Select Board and I'm leazison to the school committee. >> Hi everyone. Alyssa Nickel, vice chair of the Actton Select Board, and I am a trustee on the Health Insurance Trust,

016but we don't really care so much about that anymore, thankfully. Um, and I'm also a representative to the Actton leadership group. Hi there, Fran Arsenal. Um, I am on the Actton Select Board and Tori, I'm so happy. I thought we were all going to ex talk about our high school experiences. [laughter] So, I'm happy. and I have a lot of liaison positions but none relevant to here. >> Hi everyone. Uh Jim Snyder Grant. I'm a member of the act and select board um liaison to all sorts of irrelevant committees here and um I never graduated from high school. >> Hi everyone. I'm Glenn Cody. I'm on the actton school committee um rep rep from Actton. I'm the select board liazison for actton and u liazison for CPAC. That's a special education parent advisory council. >>

017Hi Lakshmi Kaja. I'm the uh school committee member from Boxboro. I'm just on the policy subcommittee. >> Thanks. >> Hi Schwarz, school committee from Actton. I'm a chair of the uncared for health insurance trust. I am on the [clears throat] negotiations subcommittee and sit on the budget sub lia with joint PTSD as well. PTSO sorry [laughter] >> uh hi folks uh vice chair from act on the school committee um I'm also the chair of the policy subcommittee um on ALG and one of the legislative leaison. >> Should we pass it? Yeah, let's uh send the store back row here. >> Well, this might be quicker. >> Sher Matthews, ABRSD, finance and operations director. >> Peter Light, superintendent. >> Hi, John Manerati, uh, town manager for Actton. >> Hi, I'm Tom Began, the assistant town manager

018for Actton. Ellie Anderson, budget director for Actton. >> Mike Mike John's, uh, Boxboro town administrator and chair of the capital committee. >> Rajan Hudson, assistant town administrator for Boxboro, >> Andrew Shen, deputy superintendent for the school district, >> and Gabby Abrams, assistant superintendent for teaching and learning for the school district. All right, with that Dean, first 10 minutes, all you go. Okay, thank you. Um, you know, and I would certainly like to extend my personal gratitude to Tori for setting this all up and and pursuing this. I think it's a great opportunity for all of us to get together and try to find some common grounds. Um, kind of building on what Tori set out to say, uh, I graduated from Action Park for 1968. More importantly, I was in the first group of fourth

019graders that attended this building here when it opened, which gives you an idea about how old this building really is. Uh my father graduated from the building that's now affordable housing in 1937 and my two sons graduated from AB in 96 and 2000. So um I've benefited greatly from the school system here as have my sons and my father always had fond things to say about the schools from the 1930s. So, I I don't have any particular questions uh to bring before you, but I've got a couple of comments that I'd like to start out with to sort of set the stage and let you [clears throat] surface some of the things that uh are concerns to us on the town select board. Um growth of town services and infrastructure has not kept pace with

020the growth of the town. For example, the last time staff was added to fire EMS was in 1986, other than new fire prevention officer this year. Since that time, there's been a significant demand increase for emergency medical assistance, and we're now routinely running two ambulances. Population of Actton has increased by 5,000 people since the large last major increase in fire and EMS staff. We are running a pilot program to see what is the optimum number of stations we should operate and we'll probably end up with either two or three. The new north station resolved a long-standing problem with response times and is now the busier station. However, the remaining stations are all between 50 and 70 years old and are undersized, and whichever ones we keep will need significant and costly upgrades or replacement in

021the years to come. Our storm water infrastructure needs significant maintenance and upgrades. Many culverts and bridges are well past expected service life. Changes in weather patterns seem to indicate frequent downpours exceeding the capacity of the system. We expect we'll need, it's been projected, as much of a million dollars per year to perform the upgrades. We have a committee working on some sort of a storm water financing program, like a storm water utility assessment, which basically will be another tax on our taxpayers here in Actton. There been, as we all know, health insurance increase uh costs um which I'm sure everyone will want to deal with. DPW building needs to be replaced. Design funding has been approved at two town meetings and alternatives are being proposed and we settled on one preferred alternative at our meeting

022Monday night. People move to Actton for the schools. Maybe some folks do. However, I challenge the idea that the town of Actton exists only to support the schools. There are many reasons folks move here. My niece recently moved here from Middbor. She has no children and probably won't. She moved here because of proximity to her employer and somewhat affordable apartments in Actton. My wife and I have paid everinccreasing property taxes in Actton for 50 years and only had kids in school for 16 years. 20% of our population are senior citizens. And that percentage is increasing faster than the number of families who have kids in school. I bring this up because the senior population seems to attend elections and go to the ballot box at a higher rate than the rest of the population. And

023I think these are things that should be kept in mind as we move forward. I told you about my experience here with the schools. I have a commitment to the schools. I think everyone wants their kids to get a good education, but there are limits and I caution folks against the idea of cutting the municipal services that are provided by either Actton or Boxboro for the benefit only of the schools. So, I think we definitely need a balanced approach. And this is key, I think, to the comments that Tori made and why I'm congratulating her so much for bringing this forward. I think some of my other colleagues might have some brief comments as well. >> So, it's your your 10 minutes that you want to spend it. Sure. >> Thank you. I I'll just

024make one brief comment. I don't know um where you folks in Boxboro stand. I'd be really interested to hear. You know, it's fairly early in the year for us. We're just trying to figure out, you know, the the amount of tax revenue we we expect and like generally um how it should be aortioned. That's the um you know, a major reason for ALG. Um and and you know, that's where we are in our uh cycle. other than um uh you know we have a a few big things like the DPW building, a new HVAC system for town hall um things like that um and then kind of regular uh uh smaller capital projects. >> Hi everybody again. Um, I just wanted to make a quick comment about something that you said, Tori, um, in your

025introductory remarks. Um, a, uh, information that was provided at the ALG meeting last week by the superintendent that the health insurance increases would be, um, eating up the 2 and a half%. We did not hear the same information from the town manager. Um, but I heard you say tonight that's both town and school. So, we haven't gotten that far into the discussion yet. So, I just want to make sure that everybody is aware of what was said and what wasn't said. Um, I also want to echo um what Dean has said about people moving to Actton and Boxboro. Um I think there is um an impression that folks come here for the schools and maybe it is true that the majority of people who move here are coming for good schools. Um but there are

026so many other reasons to move to Actton and Boxboro. Um which I hear on a regular basis from people that I'm interacting with. Um, I'm sure all the realtors here can can share um stories of people who are coming here because they want to get out of the city, because they're downsizing, because they want to be near grandkids, which also is related to having good schools, um, being close to to work. Um, and the final thing that I want to say before um, we get into any back and forth dialogue is that I'm hoping that we can shift among all of the elected and appointed officials who are discussing budgetary issues um, from a conversation focused on needs versus wants to a conversation about needs versus expectations because every person that we talk to um

027every person that we hear from is going to have a different idea of what a need is um residents and staff. So, I think that we should focus our conversations about what kinds of services um are expected by our residents and how we can provide those services rather than getting hung up on a need versus want because that takes us into territory um that is really subjective um for you know depending on who you're talking to and and it also you can you can make sort of different criteria Like there are a lot of things that our schools provide that are not mandated by the state, but do we want to focus in on eliminating things that are not technically needs? I don't think so. Let's look and see what um the families who are

028using the schools are expecting. And the same with residents that don't have kids in the school system, what kinds of services are they expecting? I'm happy to be here, Dor. I don't have anything to add that they haven't even said already. I just think we need to find a balance because there are, you know, townside needs as well. So, >> what she said. >> All right. So, who's next on our list? Kristen Boxboro select boards next. >> So um so first off we're very grateful for the school committee pulling this all together. We think it's really important to get to know each other. We live side by side and honestly if I stood next to you at Roach Brothers I would not necessarily know who you are except for Fran and Dean. [laughter] Um I

029had to laugh Dean when you were kind of giving your history because I'm a total towny born and bred but I graduated in 85 not 68. Um I have um I went through the entire school system. I did very well for myself. I feel my children did well and my I have grandchildren now. Three of um three grandchildren in three different No, I'm sorry. Four grandchildren in three different schools. I I know this. Um so yeah, I I really appreciate getting to know everybody a little better. I think box, you know, we have to recognize that the entire Commonwealth is dealing with what we're dealing with right now. This is not unique. And I think that having a meeting like this is that opportunity to really understand where we're all coming from and what our

030needs are. And and same thing with what Alyssa said. There is definitely a an issue between needs and wants. Boxboro is traditionally very conservative. We don't tend to act on our wants. We tend to only manage our needs. You know, there really isn't a lot of fluff in our budget. The finance committee keeps us um on track. We, you know, we also have a diverse population with a significantly um larger group of people over the age of 60 now than we have had in the past. And part of the reason is nobody moves out. People house hop. Um people move into Boxboro and love Actton in Boxboro, love the area, and they stay. And so that's reflected in our aging population. So that brings us back to our goals as a select board is that

031all of our constituency, our residents, the businesses that operate in town are afforded, you know, the same level of services. And while we love the school system, you know, you are 60% 61% of our budget. What is it right now? >> It's it's significant. It's significant. and and [clears throat] you know when when we look at what our needs are going to be um coming forward, we don't have the new growth that you have. We don't have the tax base that Actton has. So, we are definitely up against our levy limit. And we're looking at, you know, some various solutions for for managing that this year, but it's going to be tight. And if we have to make significant tight um cuts to our personnel, our staff, and our services, there really isn't much there

032to cut. we would be making significant cuts to police, fire, DPW, um, everybody. So, so for us, it it is definitely, um, we also have to build a fire station, similar to your DPW. We've been working on building a fire station for more than 15 years, and we're finally at the point where we'll be asking for design funds um, in January, hoping to be able to move that forward. We've got to buy land, we've got to design a fire station, we've got to get it funded. So, we've got the really fun challenge of asking for a fire station at the same time as we're asking for pretty a pretty significant budget increase driven by our population. We understand. Um but but it's going to be it's going to be tough this year. We've also deferred

033quite a bit. Every year the poor DPW gets deferred. They are holding that department together with duct tape and superglue. Um, and that is definitely something the select board is concerned about is is our roads, our culverts, our drainage, our vehicles. You know, there's just a lot. And again, we know we're not we're not unique right now. Um, all right. Let me see. I think I pretty much hit everything. So yeah, echoing what the actton select board says, we could almost say the same thing but just at a different scale, at a smaller scale for our town that we are looking to make sure that whatever decisions are made throughout are fair to everybody and and that we can continue to manage the services as well as we all have. I mean this it's a

034great place to live. That's why we don't leave. So I'm going to pass it down. >> I don't really have much to excuse [clears throat] me much more to add than that. It's really interesting. I'm glad this meeting came together because and the actton started off so the same comments are are for box and as Kristen said it's just on a smaller scale. You're saying actton's concerns are our concerns. One of the things that Kristen also mentioned is the, you know, the the um b business opportunities in Actton. There's a lot of business opportunities in Actton. If there what whatever it is, how whatever it is, we have very limited. I mean, ju just the land the size alone and then the um culture of Boxboro is a a lot of residents don't want to

035see um business growth in in Boxboro. And we have small little businesses that are coming up. We're not having any large businesses coming up in Boxboro. So everything's in scale. you know, you you have more businesses, more people and and and and you're able revenue is bigger and where ours is the same thing. It's all based upon the budget. I think one of the things that Kristen me mentioned was the the aging population and it's the same thing you me you you mentioned that the aging population is growing and and they do say and I'm and it's really one of the things that I find and I think Actton I'd like to hear how they they see it. Whenever you have a town meeting or you have a meeting, then the pe the people that

036come to the residents that come to vote are are it's really interesting because you'll see if if it has to do with the school and we put it as article one, the the the auditorium, the the building will be overflowing with parents and they'll vote on article one and then article two and then then it's all done with the school and 50% of the people leave and it's like wait a minute. I mean, so, you know, we are you already get less than 10% of the of the of the box residents coming to the meeting and now you lose 50 and now you lose 50% of that because it whatever it was for the school, the parents make sure that whatever it is, whatever article it has to do with for the school, they they're

037there to support it and they're there to rally behind it to make sure it passes with the school. And then after that, they don't care and and they get up and leave. And I just find that's really interesting and that the residents who have kids in school don't care about whatever their taxes are paying for else. So I'm I'm sure it's a concern of yours and that's really what I have. >> Thank you for um doing this. I think it's important that all of us get together. To me I move to Boxboro for the schools and the diversity and the inclusion. And when we talk about diversity and inclusion, it also includes our seniors, our low-income population as well. So, it's important because every time I've talked to many of my seniors in Boxboro, they

038say, "Please make sure that we are not going to be priced out of this town. We have lived here for 50 years and let it not become so high taxable town that I have to move out of here to leave everything that I have built so far in this town. So it's important that all of us take into consideration give and take compromise. I think that's what will help us to get to a solution that everybody can be can put up with or like can stomach. Thank you. >> It may not surprise people. I'm probably going to be the contrarian here. Um but I do think like while it is important we do have a rising senior population. We have uh the schools we're like I think last year they paid the teachers less of

039an increase than like social security increase got. Um and so it does suck like right at the end of the day it sucks. Prop 250 is probably why I think we're in this problem. Uh because we're really kneecapped at how much we can raise um without it. And so it's not it it then forces you to choose between do you put it to the schools, do you put it to the seniors? And like we've had a whole bunch of senior housing go in Boxboro like right behind my house and they're great. I love them. Um they're really nice. No, they are they're like wonderful people. [laughter] But at the end of the day, it's I I do think that we I have seen the cuts that we've made at the schools for the last four

040years. And while I do have kids in it, I also see the need for the firehouse. the like we don't even really have a somebody's probably going to shoot me for this, but like a stable place for the seniors. Like it would be great to have a community center for them, but um I just think that it's a bit unfair and I'm really against Prop 250. Thank you, Wes. Thank you, Tori, for bringing us together. Um I'm the newest member of the Boxboro Select Board. I'm still getting to know my friends and colleagues and I'm looking forward to getting to know all of you. Um uh I want to push back on one thing that my friend Bob said uh which is that um the parents only care about issues when they're at the school.

041Uh I think last week's town meeting showed that if you turn the parents out on an issue that's important to the town, they can they can influence town meeting. Parents don't come to town meeting because town meeting is inaccessible to parents. uh which is something that we're grappling with and that feedback that we've gotten. Um we made a concerted effort to turn out parents uh uh on our on our uh public safety uh p zoning bylaw change last week and and and it prevailed. So I I do think that um you know there's there's [clears throat] more that interests parents in our town than just than just the schools. And I will say uh just to close, I moved to Boxboro for the schools. [snorts] Our timing is amazing here. Um I am valuing this

042p this discussion because I noticed that we talked to different groups of people. um having just been through a number of the um community forums dealing with AB Ford the we so we're looking at reorganizing our school district completely like uprooting potentially everybody and moving things around closing school buildings moving school communities there are nine different variations out there you can go look at it that's not a very popular thing to do we've gotten to hear a lot from and actually it's been incredibly thoughtful feedback back from our community, but very often it is led with we moved here for the schools and we moved here for this school and why are you talking about changing something? Um, so we [clears throat] talked to a lot of parents and we hear a lot about their

043choices and coming here and I think this goes back to my initial remarks, right? Our taxes pay for not just what we need but also what our neighbors need. And so as we're thinking about an increasing senior population, we also have to recognize that our student population has needs that none of us had when we were students and that those needs are really hard to meet right now. Did you know that 41% of our third graders are not meeting grade level standards on the ELA MCCAST? It's not just our high need students. We are talking about all students. And so as we're looking at this reorganization effort, it's not going to solve the budget hole that we have that is developed from this overwhelming insurance. And also, you know, we have a lot of employees.

044So there's there's dealing with the contracts and the HR requirements there. We are looking at a tremendous reorganization effort that isn't going to solve our problem. we're still going to have challenges and we have cut staff for four years running not just in parallel with what we needed to do to reduce enrollment. Um but in addition to that um we are we are in a place where we can't meet the needs that our students have and so that's why we're here. We are all looking at things that we don't have the resources to meet and you know as Wes point out Prop 2 and a half isn't going to help us. It's it puts a lid on what we can do and the state's in trouble and the federal level's in trouble. Um, so maybe

045I'm going to pause for a moment. So since we've kind of gone around our boards and see if anybody on school committee wants to jump in, but um, I do have a question that I'd pose to the group if we have time to do so. So, okay, Adam, um, they're after us. >> Uh, again, thanks everybody for coming. Um three years ago we had a very similar event um at the new boardwalk school with all of the the boards. Um and you know I think it's really important to have this opportunity for all of us to get together. The thing that strikes me um having been at that first one and this one is that um you know it the the school becomes the center of the conversation, the center of the community, but that's

046never our intention. You know we always work really hard to um sort of collaborate with our finance committees with the select boards. Um, and so I I never want this to feel like the schools are coming and saying we need more, we need more. I think we're at a point now where we recognize we all need more. And for me, the goal of tonight is really to understand how do we create a joint narrative for our community so that they understand that. So, you know, I have two questions and I don't think they're questions that need to be answered now, but I think they're questions that we should sort of think about and begin to form our narrative around. Um, the first is we all live in our bubble. We live in the school bubble.

047You live in the municipal bubble. You live in the sort of finance bubble. I want to know what are the things that you're unable to do because of these constraints. What are the things that the finance committees are pushing back on so early that it never gets out to the community? What are the things Dean? Thank you so much for talking about the the the public safety sort of limitations that you've had over a long time. Um because we all talk to different constituencies as well. And so, you know, when you're talking to seniors, we want you to be able to share what are some of the challenges not only that you're that they're handling, but the flip side of that, what are some of the challenges the schools are handling? Um, you know, again,

048Dean shared a great example of someone who lives in one of the housing developments in Act and he says, I don't need anyone to plow my roads. I pay my HOA fees for people to plow my roads. We all live in that bubble. And so I think it's really helpful if we can all share in simple terms what are the things that we've deferred that we've cut that we've stopped doing that we never even started doing because we've been keeping our budgets tight to keep taxes low. So that's my first wonder. The second one is again Dean you are just full of great conversation starters tonight. So thank you. What does balance look like? Um, and I think back three years ago when I presented to this group and I talked about what is the

049difference between the operating budgets of the town and the operating budget of the school and then how does that flow into an assessment to the two towns um because we ultimately in the end we're always looking at what is that increase percentage and I want to be really clear here I you know we struggle as a school committee with balancing what is our operating budget percentage increase versus what does that mean to the towns and I recognize the towns really all you care about, rightfully so, is what is the amount your assessment's going up by. And so I think, you know, I I struggle with that because that assessment number varies based on a whole host of things, particularly around the the change in balance of of enrollment. And so I I challenge the towns

050to sometimes look at where our budget is, where the school district's actual operating budget is, and not what the assessment is that's delivered. And when we talk about balancing, there's a there's a struggle there for sure. But are we talking about balancing an operating budget increase or are we talking about balancing the assessment to the town's operating budget? Because that can be a very different thing and it can mean different things to us. And in the end, it just all boils down to what do we have to cut in terms of services to our specific cont constituencies. And so again, I sort of I want to close with that. We all talk to different people. We all hear different things. I want to know what you're hearing from your constituencies. I want to know what

051you're having to not do. And I want you to hear about that as well. Because it's not about the schools saying, "Come to our building and we're going to tell you about everything that we've had to cut for the past four years." It's, "Oh my gosh, we're all facing a very large fiscal cliff." And we're not the only ones that are. Thank you to for for um Alyssa for joining us at the the MMA and and hearing that report. And I think you've all seen that report. This is not an isolated incident for us. We fall between the cracks. I think and a lot of what the Commonwealth provides for gateway cities versus highwealth cities, we're in the middle there. Um, but we're all in this together and I really just want to get us

052through the next few years because I think we're all sort of at this breaking point. >> School committee, we have about three minutes. Do we want to ask uh >> do we have comments or do we want to ask a question? Go ahead. >> Yeah, I just want to echo a lot of what I'm hearing from Adam. I think what I'm hearing from all of us is a shared sense of service on being able to serve our respective communities, being able to help provide the services for making sure that everything from the roads being safe and secure and um the snow being plowed. And I think just remembering that we're coming from a good place here and that we can have disagreements about what the balance of these resources look like. Um, and for me,

053what I'm coming from this is I just want to help make sure that given the restraints we're working with, given the given the fiscal crunch we're in, when really it should be the state and the federal government that's helping us out more than just asking us to squeeze taxpayers more on this town level. Um, I think it's really important that we're helping our kids in schools live happy and fulfilling lives. I don't think it's acceptable that we talk about the cost of services. I don't think the cost of a kid not being able to read is acceptable in any society. So, that's where I'm coming from with this. I think remembering that our shared sense of service to the mission and our constituencies and our communities can help us moving forward through this. The only

054other thing that I would add um is around the Prop 2 and a half piece and this kind of just naming that at the state level um and at the federal level, but I think most closely to us at the state level that Massachusetts is not funding local communities as much as kind of other states do and even the country as an average provides local aid. Um, and so I think stemming from Adam's question around what are kind of our collective things that have been deferred or pushed off or we just have never even investigated. Um, I wonder how we could all collectively engage in an advocacy campaign about like what is Actton and Boxboro missing out on entirely because we haven't received money. Um and then I think also just wanting to flag that

055um starting tomorrow um there are listening sessions um to review the K to2 school finance formula that some of us from the school committee will be going to um and would love to know from municipal sides whether um there are kind of advocacy alerts or hearings that are coming up around how to improve um local municipal aid. Um would love to just speaking for myself like show up to some of those. Um, but also happy to to share out some of those opportunities. So, thanks all for being here. >> I think we're passing to the finance committees next. >> Can I make an announcement? >> Yeah. Just springboarding off of what Leela just shared, there is a hearing on Tuesday next week at 1:00 at the state house for the Municipal Empowerment Act, which is

056the municipal side of financial support from the state. So, you can go to that. Must be time to write ourselves a shell letter to get going, too. >> Scott. >> All right. Thank you. Um, I don't have a uh consolidated prepared statement from the finance committee. Um, so I'm going to lead with uh some of my own thoughts and I'll I'll pass off to the team. Uh, so the objective of the finance committee is to inform the residents of Actton at town meeting uh about town budgets, school budgets, and whether um they are represented correctly and accurately and we should support them. I'm imagining at some point in the future there's going to be an option on AP Forward that we have to provide the same information on. So looking at some of the numbers

057that are driving costs and also driving decisions. Uh for example uh the health insurance cost. I mentioned at the ALG meeting I I that I asked a question and I found that there was uh two different approaches to projecting the health insurance cost and the long-term forecast. I I feel like school and the town are probably almost to pennies and projecting the next year. But when you look out to 2031 and you see a $20 million shortfall in the town of Actton, uh, you start panicking. I think if you're a resident or someone that works for the town or a representative of committee. So, uh, I had a request to get some a different uh, projection out on the health insurance and I'm sure I'll get that, but I don't know the impact of that.

058So, there's that number. Uh, and I'm sure there's others, but the other one going through the AB forward package that jumps out with me that if I wasn't on finance committee, I wouldn't ask this question is that seeing the uh the $17 million future cost for Conan. Um, I no longer believe any number I see that I see in the town. So I'm always asking to verify, validate, justify, prove because I need to be able to when I go to town meeting and I'm presenting a budget, I need to be able to say honestly that I believe all those numbers are accurate. So the first thing I do is I try to get justification. So I would like to see the details, the breakout of the 17 million. I mean, if we're looking if it's,

059you know, if it's an HVAC system, I would imagine that this building probably needs one. And there's other buildings that probably need one. Probably the only one that probably doesn't is probably the boardwalk building. So, if we're looking at repairs that are in other buildings, that's not necessarily a reason to abandon a structure. And I just want so numbers like that validating figures so that when we have to advise or to the town on a decision that's made by AB forward financially that we have all the information in front of us so we can inform accurately. I'll pass to anybody else that wants to talk. Steve. >> Sure. Um thanks Scott. So I'll I'll be a little bit more historic and philosophical. uh two and a half never made any sense. Um in the early

0601980s, uh inflation was running rampant. I had a mortgage at 13%. [snorts] In 1981, um now good news, it was a $60,000 house, but [laughter] but nevertheless, I wasn't making that much money at the time. Um, so it never really could possibly cover um the increasing cost. I learned that first time I was on ALG and I won't even mention the year. Uh, you can't cover employee compensation increases and capital improvements on two and a half% a year. You can barely cover one. [snorts] Um, so as far as acting goes, we spent many years, uh, deferring capital [snorts] and we paid a price for it. Um, and so, um, yeah, I think about 2016, I was on a joint task force with the select board of the schools [snorts] and the finance committee to look

061at the capital needs. And as one was the boardwalk, what turned out to be the boardwalk, then the North Actton fire station. And yes, Dean, the DPW was on the list. Um, but in the end, we always have too many good things to spend money on than we have money to spend them on. That's the nature of government. It's the nature of economics, allocation of a scarce resource. Um, and we have a scarce resource and it's our taxpayers dollars. And we don't get many data points uh as to when we've pushed them too [snorts] far. But in the last couple years in acting, we got two new data points and the answer was we're right about at the limit. Um, and the escalation in costs, and I've been on the finance committee for over 20

062years, uh, is not nothing I've seen before. Uh, whether it's health insurance or sped or, uh, employee compensation. um needs of um the town, residents, needs of the students, uh they're all escalating much more rapidly than 2 and a half%. So, it's not about needs and wants anymore. It's what's absolutely essential. What can we not do without? [snorts] What do we have to have to perform the level of service delivery that is expected? [snorts] Uh, and that's a good education for all the kids and that's a safe environment for all the residents. And we really have to start looking at the allocation of our scarce resource taxpayer dollars in that light. Um, I have two kids in the district. I've been very happy with their education. I moved here because a good school district would

063support my home value. I didn't know if I was ever going to have kids. Didn't know if I'd be here when it happened. Um, but I formed a good community, especially around the schools. That said, I've been on school committee for I think coming up on 10 years, and I have argued against a lot of aspects of the school budget and a lot of aspects of the town budget over time. Um, one of the big sticking points that I've seen that I know gets my dander up every time I attend a different committees meeting is this idea of what is essential. And when I heard I think it was Glenn talking about every kindergartener needs to learn how to read, I agree with that 100%. Every senior needs to be able to eat. We need

064to be able to ensure that a baseline is met for everyone. And um to what Adam was saying about silos, we are in our own collective ones. And I would love through processes like this to have more hearing of what other people's are because that's the only way, especially with the division in the country right now. It's the only way we're going to get forward. I also want to say I'm so happy that we are addressing long-term change because too many years it's a fight. I mean, it comes up often in ALG. It's how do we just balance next year's budget? And as someone who's not coming very quickly, but coming up on retirement, I can't just think next year. I need to have my 20 years out understanding to know that I can pay

065the bills. And it's I've heard people callously say, "Well, just sell your house and move." And there are many reasons I think that is inhumane. Um but you can't just do that. It's not quick to sell a house right now and it's really expensive to move somewhere else. There have been a few articles in the Times lately about how downsizing can cost you a lot more right now. So, um, we need just think about keeping this affordable for everyone in every way. And please, everyone try to listen. Scott, I want to answer your question. If you come to our meeting on November 20th, we're having a presentation by our capital committee that will go through some of those costs around the facilities and what's needed. So, it's kind of an answer, but it's a non-answer.

066>> Where's the meeting and what time is it? >> This room at 6:30 p.m. on November 20th. Um, >> thank you for not scheduling during the day. Appreciate >> Excuse me, Adam. >> Yes, >> it's November 6th. [music] >> November 6th >> is capital. >> I've been corrected by someone. >> You did that intentionally, so I'd missed the meeting. I [laughter] know. And if you come tomorrow night, we will talk about the multi-year financial model from uh the school district's side. So yes, Tony. >> So I'm actually fairly new to the finance committee. I think I'm this is my fourth year. Uh but what I've noticed, what I've observed is that Box's been pretty tight on budgeting over the last few years. We've uh had an average operating budget increase of 5.6%. Um, obviously building

067to that is a school budget which I think has increased more than that. I don't know how much but it's actually increasing uh it's an increasing amount of that. Um, we're in a town with limited new growth. Um, and we're now operating very close to our levy limit. Um, so we have a, you know, a challenge with that. It's challenge number one I think we're facing. Um we also have some some uh although we've managed our debt quite quite closely in town um we have some future needs with the fire station which will significantly increase our debt servicing costs. So that's level that's that's issue number two we're facing I think as a as a town. Um so we're going into a budgeting cycle now where we we see we've seen our levy limit increase

068by 4.3% a year on average. So we the levy limit has actually met the increase in in the levy o over time. Um so we're going to go for an operational override next year. The messaging we want to give with that override is essentially that we're living in a prop two and a half world. Clearly inflation and all those other factors are much higher than that. Everything everything increases. So every town needs to do an override every number of years. And in fact, Box hasn't done override since 2006. Um, so we would like to have a message for the town that this is a normal um event that takes place in towns because of Prop 2 and a half. Um, we have managed very carefully and we will continue to manage very carefully our budget

069increases each year, but they will increase with inflation um and increased costs. Um and we want to have an override that will give us some capacity for another 10 years at least of of of space to actually have some headroom to to move in. Um we need to demonstrate that we are taking steps to do that. I think so the challenge is going to be that if the school budget increases dramatically within that number that will give us a challenge you know going forward. So, you know, we're sort of making a promise in a way to the taxpayers that we're going to sort of hold the line and make this make this a make the overrides sort of a non-event if we can ideally um >> it's a goal [laughter] we but it should be

070sort of a matterof fact thing I think in terms in terms of where you know where this where we are in terms of the the law and you know we all have to do this. Um so in terms of the questions you you posed for us when we started this process here we think there's sort of two things we're sort of working towards as as principles. One is we need to have a sustainable budget year year on year sustainable budgets year on year for the for the town. Um we don't want big up increases and you know and uh and fluctuations. We also think it's important that we have a consistent approach between the town and the school district in terms of what how much pain we share as we have to come back on

071on our budgets uh for different things. What that means actually we've been has some debate about within within within the fincom actually because you know does that mean that the school budget assessment should be the same as increase should be the same as the town operation budget assessment operating budget increase or should it be based on the school budget itself being the same. So and we haven't actually resolved that difference actually between us yet. So I mean that's a that's an open question I think about how we how we think about consistency between the school and the town. Um but you know we're we're in the process now we're starting our budgeting cycle. We are planning for um an operational override. We have a we have a a financial model we're looking at very closely

072in terms of looking at all of the the you know the future costs in the budget in terms of warrant articles potentially capital items fire station um as well as the operating budget and the school budget and figuring out where you know what this looks like. We we have asked the town to present us with essentially A and B budgets and A budget being an override budget which will be you know managed tightly but will allow us to you know continue our existing increase you know say 5.5% something like that um and a B budget which is no override what does that really mean for the town and that's going to be pretty ugly I think in terms of what the what the what the cutbacks have to be because a lot of our operational

073budget is mandatory increases in you know health benefits and pensions and all all those things as we as we all know um so the impact on the discretionary stuff which is essentially people is going to be significant if we have to do you know on a B budget so this it won't be it won't be a pretty picture um so the questions I think that we have as as a as a finance committee for this you know broader group are you know what What is that impact on services and staffing with with a you know the A and B scenario both for the schools and for the town because they both have to be treated equally I think in in that in that situation you know we don't pass an override we can't fund the

074schools to the level you know we would like to um what's the long-term budget projections for the school district in terms of the next five years say because you know we we can't go forward with a surprise every year in terms of what that number looks like. That that doesn't work for us. Um we would like to know what is the impact of the restructuring exercise and when is that going to take place because that's what that's sort of part of the messaging for us is that look the school budgets increased. It's under pressure but we're doing something about it in terms of you know thinking about some significant changes like you know you know condensing schools for example. I mean that we have to do something like that to show there's a there's actually

075a um you know that there's there's activity taking place here. Um and the other thing which is sort of an overlay to this I think for for us is the enrollment the enrollment projection for both the towns because we've seen boxers increasing year on year on year. I don't know where that goes in the next five years. I mean can is that going to increase continue to sort of swing in in boxwood direction or is at some point is a plateau in that with Actton's increasing a bit and ours leveling off you know I don't know so I think we it'd be nice to get some more data on that I think from you know whoever understands this stuff to help us in that in our in our budget projections. Yeah, actually. >> So, there's

076there's always a kmagin in every crowd and that's me. Um, so Adam, I I'd like to challenge you on one thing. You asked us what what are we not spending on? And what if my karmogyny answer was nothing? Then I I think we need to have a serious conversation about the balance of service cuts between town and school. Okay. So if you know I think and and they're decisions that I would hope that we make as a as a group as a Boxboro leadership group around where do we want to spend our money and I think many of you can recall you know what I was saying at town meeting last year as the town voted to add more things um and really put that >> you weren't very subtle about that. >> No no

077I didn't. [laughter] I'm glad my message got across. Um, but I I mean I think what I learned out of that process is that I think we need to have more information in advance of that. So I think telling the town if you vote in favor of these things, our operating budget's going to go up 5%. What does that mean? What does it mean for all of these these other things? >> I mean, it was kind of a facicious question, but the reality is there's always stuff that we have to fund. I mean, our capital plan right now, I think it has three million maybe on it for this year. I don't know how long it's going to stay that way, but you know, that's for just this year out. Um, there's always things like

078that. But one of the reasons why that, you know, we haven't had an override in 20 years is because we, I'll be brutal here, we say no a lot to people. And that's what keeps our tax rate relatively low. Not as low as I'd like it to be, but you know, I've got two kids in the school system. I want to see them excel. I want to see all all abilities funded. But, you know, I I think we you you need to use this opportunity to really radically change the cost structure of the school. You really do. Um and and I and I've met with the consultant and you know those look outstanding, but it's going to come down to how much guts you guys have to make those changes. And Tori is kind of

079already kind of saying, well, they may not solve all of our problems. And I'm not expecting them to either, but to kind of pour negative light on it already, that's seems strange. I mean, they haven't even done the cost calculations on them yet. I mean, I'm a little bit surprised by that. Um, the whole reason why we're doing this is to avoid meetings like this in the future, correct? To some 80% maybe. Right. So, I I just, you know, it's always a trade-off, but, you know, we've been making very very tough decisions, and I'm not saying that you haven't been. I' I've seen the numbers, but, you know, it's I I just disagreed with your premise. Just because we're not spending money doesn't mean we're not making tough decisions or we have a lot to

080spare. >> Yeah. I want to clarify. So, the question is, and you know, it's not an us versus them. It's I want to know what you're not spending money on because I want to be able to articulate that clearly to to my silo. >> Okay. >> So I I think that's [clears throat] that's that's the part that's important to me. And then I think when it comes to cost structure, John, I I would challenge that we do the same on the town side because this is not, you know, this is not an organizational problem. This is an overarching municipal funding problem. This is not a Boxboro or an Actton problem. This is a Commonwealth problem. >> It's a national problem, actually. >> Yeah. Yeah. So I I you know I hear what you're saying and

081I agree, but I also just want to sort of mirror that back and say that our towns need to be looking at that cost structure as well because you know like we've said our ability to tax can basically only fund healthare and maybe salary increase. So you know short of cutting people which equals cutting services there's there's there isn't much to a structure that we can change. >> Yep. And and just one other point, it's it's the the volatility of these budgets that is really killing us. I think I mean that that's just so the the sustainability of these budgets are I think are what are key. So I don't think we should just be talking about the numbers. I think we should be talking about the processes to that would establish said um stability

082or sustainability. >> Removing that volatility from the system. >> That's what kills us. >> I think the request on enrollment data is really a good one and we'll we'll look at that. Um because I think there's again there's the difference between assessment and operating budget from our side and we could have a fairly stable operating budget and that can be pretty well known but the thing that's outside of our control is the rolling enrollment numbers and so you know a swing of and I think one of the things that I'll I'll start to look at is a swing of two or three students in either direction. How does that change the assessment knowing full well that that is a much bigger swing on the Boxboro side given our size than it is on the Actton

083side. Um but there are the things that we can control right and those are the things that are in our operating budget and then there are the things that we can't control and so I want to be careful about you know what is when when we provide our our forecast of the budget that is at the operating level and then that three-year rolling average of student enrollment is what then affects the assessments and that is somewhat unpredictable. The the best predictor we have are the enrollment trends and the enrollment reports. Um but as we've seen even in my seven years tenure you know kindergartens we could have 30 more kids than we planned um you know in in October. So it's that that's out of our control. >> So again like to invite especially our

084finance committees to attend our meeting tomorrow night because we're going to go over that multi-year financial model. Um and you're going to be able to see the pressures that are allowing us to look right now at AB Forward and go I'm not sure this is going to fix the problem. Um, and it really adds up to we have a pretty good sense of what the cost of educating students looks like. Um, and a lot of it has to do with recent inflation. You know, the reason we didn't have overrides for years and years and years also has to do with the fact that inflation just wasn't anywhere close to 3%. It's been over it. And on our end on Chapter 70, Chapter 70 is capped. It doesn't keep up with inflation, which means we have

085gotten less and less and less from the state every year. and it falls on us, the taxpayers, to deal with that. Um, so I think that'd be a good opportunity to hear where we're coming from. And, you know, it's really been probably over the past couple of weeks that we started to kind of look at each other and go, "Ooh, um, we have to do AB forward and our timeline may be affected by this next budget year because these health insurance numbers are as steep as they are." So, Scott, good. It's sorry to just I just have a only because Anthony said the word override as frequently as my daughter says bro. Um I just want to state that any reference to override is strictly boxboro in this session that we're having tonight unless it's

086specifically identified as a discussion point for actton. So there's no confusion when people listen back to this. question. >> Yeah. >> Hi. Go ahead. >> Yeah. I just I just wanted to double down as maybe one of the the members of the FINCOM desperately asking for more detail because some of the the justifications that we make as a fincom aren't just in town meetings. You know, we serve the community. We talk to the community. We're members of the community. So, a lot of the explanations that and I'm relatively new to Boxboro. Fair game. I don't have children. I am just happy to be able to feed myself and have a house. Like I grew up in a very different economic situation than a lot of people in Boxboro did. So for me, bare minimum is

087like my house is on fire. I would love a fire station. And that's pretty much it. Like I'm happy happy to be alive. Um so that's a very different perspective. But something I find myself explaining frequently um besides why are we still talking about a fire station? um is >> it's only been 20 years >> is is is truly what what's in the budget like what are we spending our money on over and over and over again and a lot of what I've been able to say is the bare minimum um except when it comes to the the school system um so and whatever the new plan for the school system is. I'm very much looking forward to I will definitely be tuning in tomorrow because that granularity helps us uh kind of navigate this

088trust but verify uh feeling that I'm getting from people. It's a really it's fearbased questioning right now. So I think the best way to combat fear in my experience has been I can tell you to calm down. I can tell you anything I want but the numbers really do speak for themselves. So thanks for that opportunity. Um, and just to share a little perspective from maybe someone who's newer to town, who has who's far less context, but who's facing like a very different um, economic situation, I think, than a lot of people, a lot of my neighbors for sure. Um, yeah. Thanks. So, I'm [clears throat] going to pile on to what, pardon me, a little bit of what Michelle said about um the the detail that comes in the school budgets. Um, I feel

089like we give way more attention to what's in line item detail in the town and we should be giving twice as much to the schools because it's getting twice as much of our money. Um, but the information we get is either too summarized or way too detailed. Um, and it's really hard to pull out. It's really hard to use the information that we get to answer questions that we have. So, that's one thing I would say. Um the other this is a question and I think probably a lot of people can answer this but I don't know how are health insurance benefits baked into union agreements are they I mean like are we handcuffed like by percentage like what we're paying how does So yes, in terms of two things, one is the split, the

090rate split. So right now, um for our three unions, the teachers union, uh ASME, which is custodial staff and office staff, OSA, uh the rate split is part of negotiations and plan design. So those two changes have to be negotiated [snorts] >> and is it the same for the towns? Okay. So that's if you want to include something in your templates for something to the state that's something is that a state requirement that's another question. >> Is that a state law that it has to be that way? >> Yeah. It's a condition of bargaining. >> Okay. So those things locking us into those um constraints for three years at a time like if you want again if you want to bake this into a template that's what I want to see the state release us

091from that obligation. Nobody else gets that. If my my husband works for the federal government, we don't get that. When the the insurance company's, you know, options disappear, you know, co-pays go up, whatever. Premiums go up, uh, deductibles go, all of it. We don't have any guarantee that that's that that as health care costs rise rise that our employers are going to absorb that or make cuts elsewhere. I think instead of when when we see health insurance putting such pressure on the school and the town budgets that you know that's something that's a I feel like we need to be freed from that constraint or else you know we need to be able we're just going to be in this problem all the time. We can't have 15% increases in health insurance and not have

092any way to deal with that. >> So I I appreciate that [clears throat] there are two things you're talking about. The one is the annual cost of service which is not set by us. It's set by when we even when we owned our own trust and were self-funding. It was set by the insurance providers that we had. The cost of service to us was X and we split that as part of the paying compensation that we gave to those who work for us. That agreement for the split is contractually mandated legislatively mandated for us to be able to operate. The annual changes you're talking about are changes that come to the cost of service. And there are two things that have hit this community over the course of the last four years. The first was

093the the medical debt and insurance debt of people not going to the doctors during COVID going back to the doctors and having our health insurance trust as self-funded hit primarily with unexpected costs which hit our corpus which caused the problems that we had which caused us to owe more money to pay for these things. Over the last few years, we've moved over to non-self-funded. That means we now pay a flat split of cost of service to Mia, which is our new insurance provider system that gives us Blue Cross Blue Shield for the folks that are part of this. Blue Cross Blue Shield and Maya will change their rates on an annual basis, and we'll be able to move what they have within those rates as designed by our contract. We have contractual obligations to the

094amount of time that we stay in these systems. But we're talking two things. You have the agreement that we've got with our unions, with the folks that work for us and work with us and some of the folks in this room. That agreement says X amount is covered as part of your compensation. X amount is co-pay for you. But whatever those two amounts come up to are set by an outside entity. and that commerce-based outside entity is going to define what they're going to do. They'll make their changes on an annual basis. And those are the things you're talking about. So, we can't go back on the compensation split per our agreement without going through a full negotiation, which we're about to enter into now. The cost of service for these insurance things are skyrocketing

095right now for any number of reasons that I don't think we want to get into today, but the cost of insurance is going up across the board at least 16 to 18%. Outside of our obligations and with the stuff that's happening with federal government, some of these they're going to be healthcare marketplaces costs are up 116% coming in November 1st. These are things that are not things we can control because it's simply it's like the cost of gasoline or the cost of a of of kilowatt hour from the electric company. And it's it's hard for us to be able to look forward and see where things are going with un instability inside the entire marketplace. I'm talking about both. But what I'm getting at is that when premiums go up, they say, "Okay, we're going

096to we're going to change the package year over year. This happens to people in private industry and in federal government all the time. um that you know the split changes the uh you know I said the co-pays go up all those other things change and are the I mean if those things if we don't have the flexibility to it's like the difference between you know you blue cross blue shield and a high deductible plan like to move from something like that one to the other to lower cost which they have lower cost for everybody but um I said to me having having that stuff baked into three-year contracts handcuffs us and then when you have 18% increases or 15% increases is you have to cut something else. >> The three-year contract that we have with

097our unions or three-year contract for their employment with us, the changes that occur from a cost of service point of view, the rates that are set by the insurance company will happen on an annual basis per the arrangement that we have or Maya has or their insurance companies have to provide this out. Every insurance policy you have is an annual or six-month policy. Those things change in the insurance company. We don't have a say in what happens with that. And more importantly, we're passing through this information. It would be fabulous to be able to say to the insurance companies, you can't do it. Insurance companies will offer multiple products through agencies, through organizations like us to be able to offer PO, HSA, HMO, whatever. Those products as offered as part of the plan design that

098Andrew was talking about. those pieces have some uh uh flexibility to them, but you're still offering three different rate plans that are going to be based on the same basic insurance rate. It'd be fabulous to be able to find a way to be able to curtail health insurance costs. They're only getting higher. They're only getting worse. There's only more profitability inside of it for those organizations. We're stuck at a position where if we want to hire people, we want people to work for us in the state of Massachusetts, we have to be able to have the arrangement with those who work for us to be able to cover this. And because of the way that we work with the people that work with us, we have a three-year term on those arrangements. We can renegotiate

099every 3 years or renegotiate inside those like we had to do a little bit when we were dealing with the health insurance trust piece. But it's not a silver bullet for solving this problem. >> I I Okay. Okay. That's a long answer. And I'll say I don't I just think that it should be part of collective bargaining bargaining. The other thing I will say is I think that we should be able to have more of an incentive to encourage employees town and schools to take their spouses health insurance when it's available because otherwise we're taking the mom, we're taking their spouses into retirement, their kids until they're 26, the whole thing. >> Can Can we Yeah. Can we maybe put this as something to follow up on? Awesome. Um, so we have about 10 more

100minutes. Um, do we want to think about some things that we could do that, you know, we've identified a lot of the challenges, a lot of the places where we're all figuring things out, learning about each other. Are there some things that we can identify now that we want to do as next steps? Um, sorry, I just kind of beat the dead horse here, but uh, for the AB forward um, items and I know there are some numbers thrown against them. Um, there is I have some questions on those numbers, but I think tightening up of those numbers um, even if they're hypothetical, uh, would be helpful, um, across the board. uh because if this is a financial situation that can't really be solved, it would be probably not wise to pick an option that

101doesn't even do anything towards it. Now, I'm not saying that we're going to solve it, but if we can find or if we're going to make a drastic change and then it doesn't save much money and then all it does is disrupt everybody. So, better numbers is what I'm looking for. Scott, just to clarify, um, now that we've seen all of the options that our consultant has, you know, provided, we're actually going through now and creating detailed versions of all of the budgets that go with that. Um, I I want to be clear, you know, there's there's impact of reorganization which may or may not also then coincide with impact of budget changes, right? and they they have to work together, but they're also somewhat independent. And so, you know, I think the the reality

102of it is that there's no reorganization model that we could propose that's going to fully solve the budget gaps for the town. Um, it's going to necessitate further changes beyond just reorganization. And so, I think what is likely to happen is we're going to have to combine and be clear with the community about like this is what reorg potentially does for us. And then there's going to have to still be budget work that happens beyond that. >> Yeah, I do think that we have to whenever this work is done, we should pick a time timeline four, five, whatever the time frame is because uh one of the scenario is there's a savings of a couple hundred,000, but that's actually an annual savings is represented as a one-time savings. So I just So we have complete

103apples to apples comparison across the board over a fixed timeline. Granted, the farther you go out in time, the less accurate it's going to be, but you know, four or five year time frame would be good to have everything reflected. Thanks. Yeah, you'll have we'll have more information probably for November 18th is the next iteration of information that goes out or whatever the steering committee packet is before that. So, you know, we're working on that now, but we need to follow kind of the process we have around collecting community feedback before we start sending out next rounds of information. And my own personal request would be any material drivers to the numbers like uh health insurance should just have like strip them out independently so we can just see them by themselves. So that would

104be helpful. Thanks. I have a next step to suggest and a next step that needs to be continuous is um I I loved hearing Michelle say that she's going to tune in tomorrow night to the school committee meeting to hear that financial um plan presentation. I think that as elected and appointed officials, we need to um do more than receive liaison reports. Um it's a very important role um and it really um helps us manage the time commitment for these um offices. But paying attention to the AB forward process, paying attention to school committee meetings, paying attention to finance committee meetings, um box leadership, acting leadership, and many of them are recorded. So to save yourself time, you can watch them at one and a half speed or even faster playback. Um, but it is

105definitely going to be helpful for all of our residents if we are having discussions that we are coming from a well-informed place. It's going to be more effective, more thoughtful, and we're going to make better decisions if we know what's going on um in our counterpart um part bodies. Actually, I want to highlight something that I learned watching the materials that that you provided and watching the select board meeting. I didn't realize that Actton is a leader in taking care of our seniors. Well, no, taking care of um tax relief. Um and so if you if you just watch the slides, it is worth watching the voice over and and hearing the explanation that um that the town manager gave because that's kind of cool. Tori, is the expectation that this group will continue meeting

106throughout the budget process? Well, well, okay. At the risk of the collective groan, okay. All right. Collective grown. I really appreciate what Alyssa is saying. Um, but I can tell you I don't have time to watch all of your meetings. There's just not a chance that I can do all that. So, I found this meeting very valuable. Not only do I have faces now for everybody, but I have a much better understanding of what Actton is going through. And honestly, it's a little comforting because I thought you were in much better shape than we are. and you're not. So, [laughter] yay. No, I'm being facitious, but um >> that's a good thing in a way. >> Yeah. Well, no, but I I um again, I I would love to see this happening maybe once or

107twice more before our town meetings where every town gets a half or you know, each entity since there's three entities here gets a half an hour to say, "Here's where we are. This is what we're doing. This is what our expectation is." If that's not the the sense of everyone here, so be it. But I I found this really really helpful. Let let me just um follow up with some other options. Meeting minutes. Um also Boxboro News and Act and Exchange. Tom Beiel's back there is our select board beat reporter. His articles have evolved over the last year and they are exquisite summaries of actton select board meetings. So there are more ways than attending meetings and watching meetings on one and a half playback. >> My brain doesn't work that fast anymore. I cannot

108do one and a half. [laughter] >> So I also wonder I don't know if anybody looked at the graphic that we stuck in in the packet but we tried to kind of draw out the critical path for the school district between the budget development and AB forward. Um so it's got on there the dates of the meetings and the key topics. So that capital presentation is on there the the multi-year model is on there when there are information briefings when we are taking votes. I wonder if so one I wonder if that was helpful and two if it was helpful if maybe that's something we can all kind of take back and think about where are we each doing these things that somebody else might want to know about it. >> So we also need

109to be thinking about the B budget I think because um part of our messaging for the town is going to be if we don't pass an override we have to do other things to actually uh figure out a way forward. Um so we don't want to scare monger but we also need to be realistic I think to to uh be able to message what the situation is here. Um and I think that sort of underpins I think the AB forward discussion a bit because we need to be thinking about significant ways of reducing costs based on that um and a timeline for that because that's part of the me part of our messaging is going to have to be we are trying to fix this and we're taking steps to do it. We're not just

110rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. We're actually going to do something about it. So, so I I would, you know, I think we need to start thinking about that Budget scenario. We'll be doing that in Vox in the town budgeting process. Um, but we need to do it at the school level as well. >> I just wanted to ask the Boxboro folks a question. How do you normally integrate the AB assessment into your budget planning and how do you intend to do it with the A and B project budgets? You have too many A's and B's in that sentence. But >> [laughter] >> um um >> A and Budget Aud >> Well, so the school assessment is is is one line, you know, one block item, one line item on on our overall operating

111budget. >> Can I interrupt? So, I'm always wondering, do do you set >> is it chicken or egg? Do you set goals for that when you're doing your your budget layout? Do you start with some proposal from the school district or how do you do that? >> Well, it's a d it's a dialogue, isn't it really? We're having dialogue typically with Adam, you know, previously about >> what you know what we would like to see and what and what we're hearing about from him what his what is happening at the school, you know, committee level. So, we're having that dialogue and there's a question of what can we fit into our budget to make it work. Um, it's, you know, we we we can't, you know, we don't dictate that, I suppose. But in this

112situation now where we're in with an override potentially or or a potential no vote on an override, then would that would be a question of, well, we can't we can't accept that assessment. we would need to have a much lower assessment and that would throw it back I think to the school committee to actually rethink everything. C >> can I make one? >> So that actually culminates in if we disagree it culminates in a joint town meeting where we decide on the assessment. >> I agree. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. we separate from the rest of our you know the the town budgets and then we have to work around whatever that um uh the joint town meeting does for the schools assessments and then >> it can be a very messy process. That's why we we

113would like to pass an override and make it an easier um option for the for the voters to go for. Um and part of that messaging is consistent budgeting. Um you know addressing some of the issues with the school budget. Um and being able to sort of present this idea that this is a normal process and we'll will be you know we'll be a part of a multi-year process. Um if I can just add one thing first of all uh really appreciate the opportunity to be here. Um, I also want to thank Tony for articulating what I think our board feels in a way that I don't think I could so succinctly. Uh, one thing I've heard a lot is Prop 2.5 and it's definitely a problem. I just wanted to say one thing about

114that is that one thing we can do to fight against Prop 2.5 aside from cutting budgets is welcoming new growth. And while it's not really the purview of a lot of people in this room, you know, maybe talk to your nimi neighbor, maybe talk to your planning board, maybe, you know, voice that welcoming new growth is one way that we can drive revenue to the town and, you know, at least hold off some of these changes that we have to make and and, you know, limit some cuts. And I do love the rural character of Boxboro immensely, but I think some parcels we can develop in order to keep people's houses from being lost um to the fight. So, thanks again, second what Joe said. >> All right, so we are at 8:30. Um, everybody

115know who they need to go get contact information from? Okay. Um, so now I guess we got to figure out how to get ourselves all adjourned in sequence. >> Move to adjurnn the school committee. >> Second. >> School committee. All in favor? >> I. >> Any opposed? Any abstensions? Great. >> Sure. >> I move to adjourn the act and select board meeting. >> Second. >> All in favor? >> I opposed. Extensions journed. I'll move to adjourn the Boxboro select board. >> Second. >> Wes lives for that. [laughter] >> All those in favor, please say I. >> I. >> Opposed? Abstain. That motion carries. >> Move to adjourn the actin finance committee. >> Second. >> All in favor to >> I. >> Wejourned. >> Move to adjourn the Boxboro finance committee. >> Second. >> Uh, all

116in favor? I I >> opposed >> adjourned. >> And for the record, we all adjourned at 8:32 p.m. Thank you all so much. >> Thank you everybody. [applause]