[0:07] Good evening or good afternoon still I guess.
[0:10] And welcome to the Tuesday, September 22nd, 2026.
[0:13] Hopefully super short town Council beginning meeting.
[0:17] We'll start with the Pledge of Allegiance.
[0:19] Councilor Foot, will you
[0:22] Pledge, allegiance, flag, United States of America
[0:26] and Republic One under God.
[0:32] Justice.
[0:35] Thank you. We'll do a quick roll call.
[0:38] Councilor Mills here. Councilor Webb Present.
[0:42] Councilor Chase. Good evening, councilor Flood.
[0:45] Hello, counselor Foot. Good evening.
[0:47] And Councillor Healy, are you online? Yes.
[0:51] Yeah, I'm here. Can everyone hear me? Yep.
[0:54] Yep. Okay.
[0:56] I'm alone in the room and I'm on Zoom just
[0:59] 'cause I have a work commitment a little bit later on
[1:01] tonight and I want to be able to get there in time.
[1:04] Okay, thank you. And good.
[1:07] Anything from the chair as well? So we just have one item on
[1:09] our our consent agenda this evening.
[1:12] Item 26 89, ordinance 2026 dash 0 0 4
[1:16] to adopt chapter 40 of the general code
[1:18] regarding electioneering at polling places.
[1:23] This will, this
[1:24] ordinance will have public hearings on both October 6th
[1:28] and October 20th.
[1:31] Is there a motion to accept the consent agenda? Move
[1:34] To move to accept the consent agenda.
[1:36] Second. All right. A motion by Councilor Mills.
[1:39] Second by Councilor Webb. That's the consent agenda.
[1:42] So I don't, do I have to do all call?
[1:43] Oh, I do because we have Councilor Healy.
[1:45] I was like, something's telling me I have to,
[1:46] but I dunno why on the motion.
[1:48] Councilor Mills? Yes. Councilor Webb. Yes. Councilor ta?
[1:51] Yes. Councilor Flood? Yes. Councilor Foot? Yes.
[1:54] Councilor Healy.
[1:55] Yes. And Chair Boats? Yes. Motion passes. Seven zero.
[2:00] Excellent.
[2:02] I make a motion that re we recess this meeting
[2:06] until five 30 this evening.
[2:10] Second that. Alright, we have a motion to recess
[2:12] until five 30 when our workshop
[2:14] with the Dairy School Board will begin.
[2:15] We will still be in a public session at that point.
[2:18] And we have a second on the motion. Councilor Mills? Yes.
[2:21] Councilor Webb? Yes. Councilor Chase? Yes. Councilor Flood?
[2:24] Yes. Councilor Foote. Yes. Councillor Healy.
[2:27] Yes. And Chair votes? Yes. Motion passes. Seven zero.
[2:30] Thank you everyone. We'll see you over at the other table.
[2:33] Seven at five 30.
[2:37] Evening everybody, this
[2:39] Workshop started.
[2:40] We've got members of the school board
[2:41] and the town council here tonight along
[2:43] with our superintendent town manager.
[2:46] Why don't we go around the table for introductions.
[2:48] I'm Michael Field, chair of the school board.
[2:50] Michael Flynn, superintendent
[2:52] of the Derrick Cooper School District.
[2:53] James Jane Simard, business
[2:55] Administrator, dairy School District.
[2:57] Jack Webb at Large Town Council.
[3:00] Aaron Spencer, town Council Chair
[3:01] and District one Counselor.
[3:03] David Mills. Counselor at large. Raymond Chase.
[3:07] Council at District Four.
[3:08] Charlie Port Town Council. Douglas Flood
[3:11] Town counselor at large.
[3:13] Mike Fowler, town Administrator,
[3:17] I guess you matter.
[3:20] Brenda Willis. School board. Karen Ram School Board.
[3:23] Jamie Caru, school board.
[3:24] David Clap, school board.
[3:26] Jenna Paradise, school Board Secretary Jen
[3:28] Au. School board. Vice Chair.
[3:30] All right. Thank you everybody and thank you
[3:32] for taking the time to be here.
[3:33] We've got a few new faces since we met this past February
[3:36] prior to a council meeting, so we're happy
[3:39] to welcome you guys here tonight
[3:40] before our school board meeting.
[3:42] Plenty to discuss lots
[3:43] of developments in the last seven months
[3:45] since we've last met.
[3:46] A lot of these things get right to the heart
[3:48] of why we hold these workshops, which is coordination
[3:50] and cooperation between the town and the school district.
[3:53] So I'm looking forward
[3:54] to a good discussion over the next hour
[3:56] and I'll turn it over to my counterpart.
[3:58] Aaron. Thank
[3:59] You.
[4:00] Yeah, welcome everybody. Thank you for joining us.
[4:02] I'm actually very excited to see a turnout of the public
[4:04] behind us here, so welcome to all of you as well.
[4:07] I'm looking forward to catching up
[4:08] and talking through, think what's going on right now.
[4:12] I think with that I'll turn it over to the mics
[4:15] and see where we go from here. I'll let
[4:17] Mike follow, take the lead.
[4:19] Okay. So for tonight's agenda, superintendent Flynn
[4:24] and I had kind of just brainstormed a little about,
[4:26] about some of the ideas that are relevant coming up for
[4:30] both of the bodies here.
[4:31] And, and again, I think the theme for all
[4:34] of this is coordination, collaboration.
[4:37] This is one town,
[4:38] not two separate governmental agencies
[4:40] we're talking about here.
[4:42] And I think the first item that is,
[4:44] is out there is just some discussion from an a higher level
[4:48] picture about for the public about what is pending in some
[4:53] of the recent legislative action.
[4:55] So obviously it house bill 1300, which is the
[5:00] going on the TA on the, I'm sorry, the general election on
[5:04] November 3rd, which there was a recent
[5:09] judicial decision which allows this to go forward
[5:12] for the November 3rd election.
[5:14] So essentially what's at stake here is a
[5:19] mandated tax cap for the school district funding only.
[5:24] That would not affect the Townside.
[5:25] The Townside is already under a tax cap.
[5:28] And I'll explain a little bit the mechanics in one
[5:30] of the later agenda items.
[5:32] So 1300 is something
[5:34] that the voters will have an opportunity to vote on
[5:37] coming up this November.
[5:39] Then you also have House Bill 1331, which is
[5:43] a local issue.
[5:44] It's an enabling legislation which allows for an action
[5:49] of the town council through a vote
[5:52] to potentially absorb the school district into the town.
[5:57] And the ideas of that,
[5:58] or the concepts of that would be a combined
[6:00] tax cap, if you will.
[6:02] So that's a separate entity just for full disclosure.
[6:06] But those would be working in that certain sequence.
[6:09] And so the town council would have some items
[6:11] that they would need to consider relative to
[6:13] if there were a petition to be received, how
[6:16] that would operate the mechanics of that.
[6:18] But I think that's for some later discussion.
[6:20] So I guess that with, with the backdrop, Mike,
[6:23] I don't know if there's anything else that you wanted
[6:24] to amplify relative to the school board
[6:27] and, and your side of things. Yeah,
[6:28] I think we're attacking it November and then March.
[6:31] Right. And two, two separate phase phases.
[6:33] More importantly, I think our board did a great job
[6:36] discussing it at our last meeting,
[6:38] more specifically on the lack of clarity
[6:40] that we're receiving both from the state,
[6:44] from DRA and then really with our legal teams.
[6:49] Some of that's becoming more clear.
[6:51] We feel like some of the math is coming into
[6:55] focus a little bit of the, of the baseline of that number.
[6:58] 'cause what we really wanna do and
[6:59] what we said the other night as a board is we wanna be able
[7:01] to provide the picture for the community on,
[7:03] on if this then that, right?
[7:05] So, you know, our board's been pretty clear on a target
[7:09] that's, that seems to be below
[7:11] what the anticipated number would be on
[7:13] that vote either way.
[7:14] But that's something that we're working on, on,
[7:16] on the administrative side.
[7:18] The 1331 is a, is a different approach, right?
[7:20] We, you and I have had meetings to discuss how
[7:23] that would look, what it would look like,
[7:25] but just to, to clear, to clear it up a little bit.
[7:29] That just proceeds with the next step, right?
[7:31] That doesn't automatically make that vote in March if
[7:34] that were to occur, it moves on to the next vote, right?
[7:37] The charter and so forth and so on.
[7:39] So that's kind of where we are on our side.
[7:41] But I think the board did a pretty good job discussing it
[7:43] the other night waiting for some clarifications on
[7:45] what the math would be more specifically on
[7:48] what that number should be.
[7:49] And then there were some other discussions on default budget
[7:52] if that's higher than what is voted on, what supersedes.
[7:56] So we're still trying to get some legal clarity
[7:58] as well. Okay. Yep.
[8:00] Alright. So I think that segues into the second
[8:03] topic in terms of town budgeting.
[8:07] So one of the things that the town has had a longstanding
[8:11] tax cap that goes back over 30 years
[8:14] and it's been implemented
[8:15] and I'm just gonna go through the mechanics
[8:17] of it real quick just so there's some basic understanding of
[8:19] how at least hours operates.
[8:22] So each year everyone's aware that the Bureau
[8:25] of Labor Statistics publishes data for the,
[8:28] what they call the consumer price index, the CPI.
[8:32] And so basically you look at the trailing 12 months,
[8:35] the difference between what there's an index
[8:38] and you create a percentage that you are allowed
[8:41] to go up on the tax rate, which essentially is your increase
[8:44] that you're allowed to go in your, on your expenditures.
[8:47] So for the town of dairy last year, that number was 3.3%.
[8:52] And so that drove us to how we calculated a bottom line.
[8:56] We incorporated all of our expenditures,
[9:00] subtracted out our revenues to arrive at a net number.
[9:03] So for example, as we go into next year,
[9:08] we set our baseline at $31,000,817 for,
[9:13] or $817,412.
[9:16] We're projecting the CPI probably is going to land somewhere
[9:20] between 3.7 and 3.8%.
[9:23] That could change in the final couple of months here,
[9:26] depending upon some of the world events.
[9:28] But essentially what our task is,
[9:30] when we set the town's budget, we will go forward
[9:34] and we establish a target of what we think
[9:37] that the spending is going to be based on.
[9:39] And so at 3.7, 3.8%,
[9:42] that would probably allow us somewhere in the range of about
[9:46] 1.4, $1.5 million of new expenditures.
[9:49] Now that sounds a lot,
[9:51] but when you really think about some of the things
[9:53] that hit us in terms of, you know, health insurance costs,
[9:58] things like salt, things like fuel costs, things
[10:01] that sometimes you, you don't control.
[10:03] And obviously employee costs being one of the largest
[10:06] pieces of our budget.
[10:08] All those things have to be combined within there,
[10:10] including debt payments.
[10:12] So that we arrive at that number.
[10:14] So then that number is given to the council.
[10:16] Oftentimes we start with a budget that is higher than
[10:20] what the tax cap allows.
[10:21] And then that gives the council an opportunity to go through
[10:24] and, and make some decisions about what services
[10:27] that they want to deliver, what things that they emphasize,
[10:30] what they're hearing from their constituents on, on that.
[10:32] So we're working on that process.
[10:35] Obviously the town's budget process
[10:37] is a little different than what
[10:39] currently the school district does.
[10:41] But essentially we have our staff working on our capital
[10:45] improvement projects.
[10:46] Now as we're starting to budget for that,
[10:49] the budget will be delivered to the planning board.
[10:51] I mean, I'm sorry, the CIP P'S delivered
[10:53] to the planning board in February
[10:54] and we deliver the budget to the town council by April 1st.
[10:59] And we work our way through some workshops.
[11:01] We generally vote in May
[11:03] and then that new budget begins July 1st.
[11:06] So we're on a fiscal year as far as that's concerned.
[11:09] So that's how our budget would work.
[11:12] Should either 1330 I'M 31
[11:14] or 1300 be something in the future?
[11:18] That is typically how we have rendered.
[11:20] It doesn't mean necessarily that that's the way
[11:22] that it would happen in the future,
[11:24] but that is the general concept of
[11:26] how the tax cap has worked for the town.
[11:28] So does anybody have any questions or comments,
[11:31] Mike, before you go to to that?
[11:33] I just, I apologize, we forgot.
[11:35] We have our, our, our other counselor here,
[11:37] counselor here is here.
[11:38] He just had a work commitment tonight.
[11:40] He's virtual, he is in in ether.
[11:42] But just wanna acknowledge that he is online so as well.
[11:46] Okay. I forgot that part. Alright, now questions.
[11:49] Alright, so yeah, if there's any questions, let me know.
[11:52] Otherwise we can roll on to item C on the agenda.
[11:56] Sure. So we're ecstatic that, not this meeting,
[12:00] but our next meeting will be finally rolling out our capital
[12:04] improvement plan that goes out to 2033.
[12:08] We had to make some adjustments due to the savings
[12:11] of the bond projects that are occurring
[12:14] significantly on the most recent at South Range,
[12:18] in which we had two separate PO projects
[12:22] that were anticipated that were combined into one
[12:24] with windows, doors, facade, roof.
[12:26] I know that sounds like a lot, but
[12:27] that all ended up being one bid
[12:29] which came significantly under what was projected
[12:33] when you guys were putting that together.
[12:36] And with
[12:37] that we are now developing basically an excess bond usage
[12:41] planned, which is gonna help pull away from some
[12:45] of the items that were initially on the capital improvement
[12:48] plan, which is great.
[12:50] So we're gonna be able to do some more jobs that,
[12:54] that are needed to to get our buildings up to a baseline
[12:58] and then that's gonna shift our CIP plan,
[13:01] which is also a benefit.
[13:02] 'cause then you can move those items, it's a living document
[13:04] up sooner rather than later.
[13:07] So that's gonna be coming to the board next meeting.
[13:10] And that will be living on our website for the community
[13:13] to see what the targets
[13:14] and goals are at each rain each facility
[13:17] and anticipated spending.
[13:20] We this past year put a warrant article on
[13:23] to ask the community to approve continuing add
[13:27] to our capital improvement plan.
[13:29] So that passed unanimously.
[13:30] So we were able to add $500,000 to
[13:33] that capital improvement plan
[13:34] and we went right to work this past summer.
[13:37] We changed out nearly 20,000 square feet
[13:40] of flooring in all the schools.
[13:43] So we were able to chip away at some
[13:45] of those CIP plans earlier.
[13:47] So, you know, Mike
[13:48] and I have talked about ma,
[13:50] our capital improvement plan becoming a big part
[13:53] for the community so that we can have those discussions on
[13:56] not not having spikes with our community members in regards
[13:59] to being more predictable.
[14:01] I think that's our real goal that we continue
[14:03] to say in the school side is we wanna become predictable
[14:05] for the community so that it's not where did this come from?
[14:08] Why are we, why are we asking for it now?
[14:09] So it's a little bit of the overview of what we have coming,
[14:13] anticipated it being done a little bit earlier,
[14:15] but that the, the savings
[14:16] that we had at our last facilities meeting,
[14:17] we really wanna make sure we use the bo the bond fund money
[14:20] to full effect.
[14:23] Okay. So I do,
[14:25] I just have one question on the tax cap fraud town.
[14:28] Sure. Have you ever been in a deficit?
[14:30] Like you've done this for,
[14:32] you said 30 years you've been under a tax cap.
[14:35] Have we ever been in a deficit from that?
[14:37] No. So to my knowledge there's never been any
[14:41] opportunity for an override.
[14:43] One of the interesting things that is a little nuance
[14:46] of the tax cap, let's say we have a benign inflation year.
[14:50] So we only only had, and we have had these
[14:52] where the tax rate can only go up by 1.2%, 1.4%.
[14:57] That sometimes strain your ability to do some other items
[15:01] for, for example, if you had
[15:03] a collective bargaining agreement where you had made a deal
[15:06] that you're paying 4% to each one of the members of
[15:09] that particular unit that continues on, that's a,
[15:12] an agreement that's been made,
[15:13] but your tax cap only allows 1.4%
[15:16] that has some issues within the rest of your budget.
[15:20] So fortunately for the town we've been able
[15:22] to put certain designated funds.
[15:24] So we have the ability in certain situations
[15:28] to utilize those funds as, you know,
[15:31] basically rainy day funds
[15:32] or un unrestricted fund balance to cover that.
[15:35] But you don't want to go to that well too many times
[15:38] because you deplete the fund balance.
[15:40] But to date we've been able to manage, and I,
[15:42] and I say this often, sometimes the town, you know, has
[15:45] to do without, there's certain things
[15:47] that maybe we don't have as many staff members as,
[15:49] as other peer communities would have.
[15:51] And I'll give you a good example.
[15:53] In the code enforcement department, you know,
[15:55] many other towns of our size have seven or eight inspectors.
[16:00] We were two up until July 1st, 2026,
[16:04] so we just added a third inspector for the town.
[16:07] So there's examples like that that maybe you have
[16:09] to be a little bit more lean,
[16:10] but overall we are able
[16:12] to deliver those services without going over the cap. Thank
[16:16] You.
[16:20] Okay, so to segue on what Mike had said, we,
[16:23] we were talking a little bit about the CIP project.
[16:27] So the town's process, again,
[16:30] we project out six years as well.
[16:32] So we will be looking, believe it
[16:34] or not, into fiscal 33 with our next next view on projects.
[16:39] A lot of what the town does,
[16:41] it's projecting a lot of equipment.
[16:43] So things such as, such
[16:45] as a fire truck might be $1.3 million
[16:48] with a three year lead time.
[16:49] Some of that has really stretched out
[16:51] because of some of the equipment difficulties.
[16:54] A dump truck might be, you know,
[16:55] a quarter million dollars now that we use.
[16:57] But we try to keep that rolling stock replenish so
[17:01] that we don't catch a year that if a truck is on year 11
[17:05] or 12 and it's starting to be a problem mechanically
[17:08] that we don't have a replacement in the line on that.
[17:10] So we rely on our department heads to look at that.
[17:13] Same thing with police cruisers.
[17:15] As far as major building projects we're, you know,
[17:19] we just finished the fire station at approximately
[17:22] $21.5 million.
[17:24] We have a 20 year repayment on that.
[17:28] The parking garage at Abbott Court
[17:30] that is also in a 20 year principal and interest payment.
[17:33] That project had a $23.3 million bonding
[17:38] issue or bond issue.
[17:39] And that was also, that's within the TIF district.
[17:42] So that is covered within the captured values of one
[17:46] of the two TIF districts that we have in the community.
[17:49] At some point we're gonna be looking at
[17:51] perhaps a, a police station.
[17:53] We haven't worked out any of the details on, you know, when
[17:56] and how, but I think that would be an example of
[17:59] how we would want to coordinate discussing
[18:01] with the school district what are your big projects when,
[18:04] how, and, and what those impacts were so that we could,
[18:08] you know, figure out where we would be
[18:10] and where we would want to be relative to that.
[18:12] Otherwise, most
[18:13] of the large projects are under the enterprise fund,
[18:16] so they're water and sewer projects.
[18:18] So those are generally covered by the rate payers as opposed
[18:21] to the tax levy.
[18:23] So that's just a general idea, but as we move forward, Mike
[18:27] and I, you know, are committed to talking
[18:29] through the various items
[18:31] and the timing of that just for the purposes
[18:33] of the confidence that, you know,
[18:34] we are coordinating those items.
[18:37] So. All right. Any questions on that? Let's go.
[18:40] Good. Just quick,
[18:42] how much is in your reindeer fund, just outta curiosity?
[18:45] So as it stands right now, we are forced to retain
[18:49] by our policy $13.5 million.
[18:52] I think we, the last audit,
[18:54] which was June 30th, 2025, we had about
[18:59] 18.5 million.
[19:00] So about 5.6 million over the, over
[19:03] what the retain percentage.
[19:05] We're gonna have a new number for June 30th, 2026.
[19:07] As we're going through the audit, I do expect that
[19:10] to grow a little bit, we probably will be somewhere in
[19:12] that 21 to $22 million.
[19:18] And that's just to remind people the importance of that
[19:23] unended fund balances in capital projects like this,
[19:25] this building was built using those funds.
[19:30] So it's, it's, we think of it of as being a big number,
[19:35] which it is, but it helps keep our bond rating down
[19:38] or bond interest costs down.
[19:41] It helps fund the CBA trust, which is one of the ways
[19:45] that he was alluding to, to prevent those spikes,
[19:49] particularly if we have a lean year to fund the contracts.
[19:54] So it, it helps smooth things out
[19:58] and it's one of the things that I'm glad
[20:01] to see you're putting into a capital reserve fund
[20:04] and having this, 'cause I can, I can remember
[20:07] not too long ago, it was
[20:09] before all of you were on the board
[20:10] that there was a major mechanical issue at the school
[20:12] and you didn't have a, a fund balance
[20:14] or a capital reserve to draw to repair it.
[20:18] If we, god forbid, wreck a fire truck
[20:21] or something like that, that's a million dollar
[20:22] expense. So
[20:27] Yeah, I mean the options that the school district has
[20:30] for this are very limited.
[20:31] Right. You know, we can do a, you know, a trust fund, which
[20:35] of course requires a town vote in March.
[20:38] Yeah. You know, even to move money from the unreserved fund
[20:40] balance into a trust fund requires a vote of the town.
[20:43] Correct. And
[20:44] and we do have, you know, we can create a contingency fund
[20:47] where we can move money from the last year's unserved fund
[20:50] balance into a contingency fund.
[20:51] That was something that is from way I understand you
[20:54] explained is something that's fairly recently only
[20:57] allowed by the law.
[20:59] It was fairly recent. Yeah.
[21:00] And there was actually a law that passed this year
[21:04] that would've eliminated the contingency fund
[21:06] and it took a veto over the governor to save it.
[21:12] Just outta curiosity, how, how I assume
[21:15] that $18 million took a long, took a while to build up.
[21:19] Right. It's not something over years.
[21:22] Yeah. And the council has set a,
[21:26] by their policy, a percentage of retained costs.
[21:31] So essentially what you do is you take the total tax levy
[21:35] from town plus school plus the county.
[21:38] I think we leave out the swept on that part of it.
[21:41] And we've determined that 9.5% is the retained percentage
[21:46] and that's just a, an accounting standard.
[21:49] You can take different standards.
[21:50] There's a range of like between five and 17%.
[21:53] We've talked on the town council level, do we want
[21:56] to increase that to 10, 10.5%?
[21:59] That's on the table. But
[22:00] that's a decision that they're going to make.
[22:02] But you're right, it, it's been a slow, you know,
[22:04] process to build up to that.
[22:05] And as the budgets have increased, what we've had
[22:08] to retain has also increased.
[22:11] Gotcha. Thank you.
[22:16] Okay, so we put in the agenda
[22:20] future legislation, state legislators.
[22:22] So if that's a topic that anybody wants
[22:25] to jump on, feel free.
[22:27] Can I speak to that before we get going? Yeah, yeah.
[22:29] I do wanna be mindful before we go down this road
[22:31] that there is a candidate there, there candidates present.
[22:35] It is election season and we do have to cross that line.
[22:39] We don't wanna cross that line
[22:40] to electioneering in this moment.
[22:42] So asking things about the future
[22:44] of legislation may not be appropriate at
[22:47] this moment in this meeting.
[22:49] Okay. So if barring, if there's anybody that we can,
[22:53] You can try to ask question, your answer may be we can't
[22:55] talk, like we shouldn't talk about that right now.
[22:58] I mean if the consensus is that there's really nothing
[23:00] to talk about here, that's okay too.
[23:02] We can move on to, to f
[23:05] Ready?
[23:06] Yeah. So Jane's just gonna give a brief overview of
[23:10] what we already know and what we are still to come
[23:15] in regards to adequacy.
[23:17] So when we're looking at adequacy, the,
[23:20] Sorry Jake.
[23:21] That's okay. The swept account is where we expected
[23:25] and adequacy actually came in
[23:27] just within a couple thousand dollars of
[23:29] what we had budgeted.
[23:30] Now it's still over 400,000 less
[23:34] than our current year,
[23:37] but it's pretty close to what we had estimated.
[23:39] So at least there's not a huge shift in in our estimations,
[23:44] but they just released that number just
[23:48] maybe two weeks ago, somewhere around there.
[23:52] So we're right on target where we thought we would be
[23:55] With The loss direction.
[23:57] Yes. Yeah.
[24:01] And are we anticipating it decreasing again next year
[24:04] with the way the formula is working?
[24:06] The whole harmless, right, the whole harmless end.
[24:07] Yeah, yeah. That's phasing out, chipping away at our numbers
[24:11] and I mean that is a, a cause
[24:12] to be concerned about this tax cap question the way
[24:14] that it's constituted
[24:16] because the, you know, there are two methods
[24:19] that were already in state law for a tax cap.
[24:21] You had a local tax cap
[24:23] and then a school district budget cap.
[24:25] So this question
[24:26] that's gonna be on the ballot November is
[24:28] gonna be a tax cap.
[24:29] So it would, you know, it would limit the tax assessment.
[24:33] We don't have a ton of funding sources.
[24:35] You know, the core of our funding is the local tax
[24:37] assessment and the state adequacy
[24:40] and there's a few other, you know, much smaller,
[24:42] you know, sources of revenue.
[24:44] But that's the bulk of it.
[24:46] And a lot of years when the, the state aid goes down,
[24:51] you're making up for that in a local assessment.
[24:53] So if we have a year possibly where we're anticipating
[24:57] the state aid going down
[24:59] and then we're also capping the assessment, you know,
[25:02] you're being squeezed from both sides.
[25:06] So just to give you an idea, as far as revenue
[25:08] that we receive from the district, there are really
[25:11] probably four areas where we would collect more than a
[25:13] hundred thousand in revenue.
[25:15] Revenue. And one of them would be our tuition
[25:17] for our preschoolers
[25:19] and also Medicaid reimbursement,
[25:23] special education aid reimbursement and adequacy.
[25:28] Those are our only areas of revenue for the district
[25:32] and local taxation swept and local taxation.
[25:41] One other thing that I think for, for the good
[25:43] of the public to talk about is one other avenue
[25:47] is looking at new growth within the community.
[25:50] One of the things that we continue
[25:51] to talk about on the town side is growth.
[25:54] And, and again, when you have more valuation in your system,
[25:59] you have more ability to meet the needs
[26:02] of the school and the town.
[26:04] So we've been growing quite well over
[26:07] the last couple of years.
[26:09] In the last year, the tax year 2025, we grew by $55 million.
[26:14] We had projected $20 million
[26:16] and we had a much better year than anticipated.
[26:19] I don't have the new numbers yet for 2026,
[26:22] those are gonna get a little skewed
[26:24] because we did a revaluation in 26.
[26:26] So most, for example,
[26:28] single family properties went up about 10% on
[26:31] their valuation.
[26:32] In theory that's just a balancing exercise
[26:34] between all the properties.
[26:37] But we were anticipating, again in our budget $55 million
[26:42] of new valuation.
[26:44] So prior to the revaluation
[26:48] we were at about $5.7 billion in valuation.
[26:54] That represents a 1% increase.
[26:56] Doesn't sound like a lot, but
[26:57] that does create some opportunities for meeting
[27:01] future cap meeting some of the needs
[27:03] that we have within the community.
[27:05] And that's the whole concept by behind some
[27:08] of the developments that you're seeing going on, you know,
[27:13] regardless of your opinion on four A
[27:15] and some of the other, you know, projects that we have,
[27:17] we've got a lot of construction going on in the community,
[27:20] but the whole idea behind this is the infrastructure's going
[27:23] to drive opportunities for economic development.
[27:26] So when you see an apartment complex
[27:28] that goes up on Rockingham Road, well
[27:31] that project is generating a loan $34 million in
[27:35] new valuation.
[27:36] I just looked it up, I'm not sure that's the full valuation
[27:39] because that was as of April 1st.
[27:41] But that's an example of a project
[27:42] that again will contribute to new valuation.
[27:46] So we're gonna continue to see these projects,
[27:48] the economic development staff, the planning staff,
[27:51] the planning board, everybody's been on board with trying
[27:53] to find the right type of development for the community.
[27:56] And I think that continued growth is going
[27:59] to give us opportunities to meet the needs of both
[28:02] of our, both of our entities.
[28:04] So, you know, that's just an important point
[28:06] to put out there regardless of the, you know, the tax cap
[28:10] and some of the other items that we talked about
[28:11] that math growth is gonna be a key component to continue
[28:16] to keep this wheel moving in the right direction.
[28:20] And of course we wanna make sure that
[28:21] that growth is balanced between residential, industrial,
[28:25] commercial uses.
[28:26] It's like, you know, if we focus too much on residential,
[28:29] more housing units there are in town, the more of a stressor
[28:31] that that is on the school district,
[28:32] the more money it costs to operate the schools.
[28:35] So really when you have more commercial,
[28:39] more industrial development that is going
[28:41] to benefit the taxpayers more
[28:43] because you know a commercial business isn't putting
[28:45] kids in the schools, right?
[28:47] Yeah, unfortunately I think the way
[28:49] that this town is developed, the land available
[28:55] is for what we view
[28:57] as industrial development just isn't there.
[28:59] And we have to look at,
[29:00] like I don't look at exit four A as a development project.
[29:03] I look at exit four A as a redevelopment project.
[29:07] There are some sections of land that
[29:10] hopefully we can develop commercially such as
[29:15] the stuff across
[29:16] from Rockingham Road.
[29:20] But just going north, there's a pumping station
[29:25] just north of clam aven that's, there's potential for there.
[29:30] I think what we really have
[29:31] to look at is not only develop a land,
[29:34] but we have to look at demographics
[29:36] because in essence we are, we've provided services to people
[29:41] and our primary cost is people, you know,
[29:44] municipal budget is 94 to 97% personnel cost.
[29:48] Yours is gotta be very similar. Yeah, we have other things.
[29:53] So when we have to look at our expenditures, we have
[29:55] to also look at the demographics.
[29:58] What is the population growth in town
[30:01] and what age groups our population?
[30:03] Because that's gonna drive where you have
[30:05] to target your services and we have to sort of predict those
[30:09] and look at them
[30:13] with a five year look ahead.
[30:15] Because if you, if you don't,
[30:21] you just get behind the curve.
[30:23] So if you're looking at a, at an aging population,
[30:25] then maybe we have to begin looking at
[30:27] what services we have to provide for that.
[30:29] If we're looking at now we're having influx
[30:31] of younger people, are they having two
[30:33] kids or are they just having one?
[30:34] Are they having three kids? And how is that going to find
[30:37] the population in five years when they're six?
[30:43] So sorry if I talk a lot.
[30:47] No, and I, and I think, you know,
[30:49] we all share the same goal in terms
[30:51] of responsible developments
[30:53] and we want items that are going to enhance this community
[30:57] for quality of life
[30:58] and also areas that it will create a good tax base for us.
[31:02] So again, it's been incremental.
[31:04] We haven't obviously had the same scope of development
[31:08] that you would see in London Dairy or Salem
[31:11] and I'm, I'm not sure sure that
[31:12] that would be necessarily an answer for dairy just
[31:15] because of the way that we have been built out in the past.
[31:18] But I think it's careful development.
[31:21] I think we are trying to target the right types
[31:23] of development
[31:25] and with that we are seeing, you know, incremental growth
[31:28] that we're gonna continue to, to prosper and,
[31:30] and move forward on.
[31:32] So I think that's something to put some confidence out there
[31:34] for the public on that.
[31:37] Alright, wanna talk about
[31:41] item G on the agenda?
[31:42] So town and school collective purchasing opportunities.
[31:45] So one of the things that when we talk about budgeting and,
[31:49] and what we do on the town and,
[31:51] and obviously I've coordinated with Jane on numerous years,
[31:55] numerous times on various projects and,
[31:57] and we talk often about, you know, various commodities and,
[32:00] and so one of the concepts that we've always gone
[32:03] with is averted costs, right?
[32:05] So some of the things you can't control, such as
[32:08] electricity costs, natural gas costs, fuel costs,
[32:13] but where we can, the town
[32:15] and school where possible have collaborated on these larger
[32:19] collective purchases.
[32:21] So we've always had a very long history
[32:23] of combining our electrical use
[32:25] and usually the, the answers to that had been, you know,
[32:29] we'd get a rate that was 7 cents
[32:32] and the market rate from Eversource was 9 cents.
[32:34] So you would be saving money by virtue of combining those
[32:37] and there was no impact to your service.
[32:39] We've done that on, on natural gas now
[32:42] for probably about 15 years.
[32:43] Matter of fact, back in the day the school district,
[32:46] how many gallons did, did you used to have a contract?
[32:49] We were up around 180,000 gallons a year for fuel, for oil.
[32:53] So imagine at $5
[32:55] and 50 cents a gallon
[32:56] what you'd be paying right now for oil, right?
[33:00] Instead we have a great, you converted over all
[33:04] of the buildings to natural gas where we could
[33:07] and those facilities are now burning natural gas.
[33:11] I believe the market rate
[33:12] for the supply this year on a three year contract combined
[33:15] with the town is 74 cents per therm.
[33:18] The rate that the
[33:20] default utility from U Liberty is a dollar 74, right?
[33:24] It's a dollar per therm.
[33:26] I think we burn combined about 80,000 thes per year.
[33:29] That's $80,000 that was averted that we don't have to spend
[33:33] and can be used elsewhere.
[33:34] So there's a number of stories like that
[33:37] that we continue to work together.
[33:39] We work hard to try to, to stretch every dollar
[33:42] that we can in these fuel commodities in a market where,
[33:46] you know, prices continue to grow.
[33:48] You know, we talked about heating oil on the Townside,
[33:51] we still have some facilities that we can't convert.
[33:53] It's a much smaller contract now.
[33:55] We locked in at $4 and 39 cents.
[33:58] So we're doing better than probably
[34:00] what the market's gonna be this summer.
[34:02] Again, those costs are things that we're not having to shell
[34:05] that money out and make concessions in other areas.
[34:07] So, you know, we've had a long history Jane and I
[34:11] and looking at, you know, ways
[34:13] that we can collaborate salt purchases looking at, you know,
[34:17] formally I think the, the school district used to go out
[34:19] and buy its own and paid more
[34:21] because it was a smaller contract.
[34:23] Now the trucks just come over, we fill 'em up and,
[34:26] and so I think there's been a long history of,
[34:30] of collaboration that maybe the story hasn't been told well
[34:33] enough, but I think we're gonna continue to do that,
[34:36] you know, where possible in many of those commodity areas.
[34:39] So just wanted to kind of put that out there as far as,
[34:42] you know, we are diligent about that.
[34:45] So Janie, do you have anything else you
[34:46] wanted to add on on that? No,
[34:48] And I think we looked at other areas too.
[34:49] Yeah. But the, the ones that
[34:52] made the most sense were the ones
[34:54] that you've mentioned mostly utilities.
[34:56] But we worked together on a lot of projects where we can,
[35:00] excuse me, we've called the town when we, if we needed help
[35:03] with equipment so the town's come over
[35:06] and whether it's digging out a hole
[35:08] for a pro maintenance project, it's a cost saver for us.
[35:13] We've been able to collaborate with the town.
[35:15] So vice versa, we've had a really good working relationship
[35:19] on trying to find any area for cost savings
[35:23] And you know, I think that's a credit to the people.
[35:26] It's a credit to you Jane, in terms of, of you know,
[35:28] your long tenure here and,
[35:30] and we've always had that great relationship.
[35:32] So I just wanna make sure that the public hears that
[35:34] that is something that, that goes on every day and,
[35:37] and there's always discussions about
[35:39] how do we save collectively money across the board
[35:42] and commodities utilities are, are one way that,
[35:45] that we have collaborated heavily over the
[35:47] past number of years.
[35:48] So, alright. Ask
[35:50] A quick question.
[35:51] Sure. So I know you guys are studying health
[35:53] insurance costs, which is great.
[35:56] One thing I'm not up on and I don't have the answer for,
[35:59] and maybe you guys do when it comes
[36:01] to our collective bargaining agreements,
[36:03] can you switch out health insurance
[36:05] during a bargaining agreement as long
[36:06] as you provide the same services and same employee cost?
[36:10] Or is that something you have to work?
[36:12] Is it a rope have moved
[36:15] Through?
[36:16] So it's, it's probably, it's a complicated question.
[36:18] I think it would vary between the unit,
[36:20] but typically the asset we put together
[36:24] with Health trust is what if we took the school district
[36:28] and the town and just give us a combined number.
[36:30] So what I've been told is October 7th is the date
[36:33] that we are gonna see the release
[36:34] of the health trust numbers,
[36:37] and then within probably 10 days
[36:38] after that we'll get a what if it's,
[36:40] it's just a pricing quote that we have.
[36:43] History has kind of proven, not dairy specifically,
[36:46] but across the state when when bargaining units are faced
[36:50] with any changes to their plan
[36:52] that they feel are substantive,
[36:53] that puts them into the impact bargaining.
[36:55] So you might have to talk to them on that
[36:59] if you can simply just do
[37:00] what we're asking is if the school district keeps theirs
[37:03] and the town keeps theirs, does that improve the pricing
[37:06] for either or both or not at all?
[37:08] So that's really the question we've tasked them with.
[37:11] So we didn't really get into the nuts
[37:12] and bolts of let's, you know,
[37:14] eliminate this prescription drug,
[37:16] let's eliminate that service.
[37:18] That wasn't really what the ask was.
[37:19] I mean, that's a, a larger question maybe
[37:21] that school district would handle on its own
[37:23] and the town would handle on its own.
[37:25] But from a pricing exercise, it's just current situation.
[37:30] I've been on that side of where I have both
[37:33] worked on changing health insurance while
[37:35] as a union member town wide.
[37:37] And this was back in 1995.
[37:40] And and the best way to do that is you have to get
[37:44] your union involved at ground zero.
[37:49] If you're looking at doing a major change.
[37:51] And a major change, for instance, could be going
[37:54] with a self-funded health insurance
[37:56] where you have a third party administrator, you have a,
[38:00] a gap insurance or umbrella insurance
[38:02] that covers both major personal expenditures
[38:05] and major costs to there.
[38:07] But you still need to get your employees involved
[38:12] and, you know,
[38:13] health insurance is probably your second largest
[38:16] expenditure next to wages.
[38:18] So it's, it's a way
[38:20] that you can have a real positive impact in your budget,
[38:23] but the, the hidden cost is vacancies.
[38:26] So if you're got all these vacancies
[38:29] because people says, I don't want to go there
[38:30] because their benefits suck,
[38:33] that drives up costs on another end.
[38:35] So it's a really fine balance,
[38:38] but the best way is get, get you, they're, you're,
[38:43] they're vested in having as good a health plan
[38:46] as they can get, but they're also invested in the balance
[38:49] of, well, if I have the Cadillac health plan,
[38:53] I can only afford a fiat.
[39:01] I hear you. Yeah, Thank you.
[39:02] Yeah, we, we had some rates last year that
[39:05] for a family plan, total cost employer
[39:08] and employees share that are approaching $50,000 per year.
[39:14] That's unbelievable.
[39:15] We're, we're trying our best to try
[39:17] to mitigate those cost increases,
[39:19] but I, I don't know that there's any easy fix
[39:22] to reducing health costs.
[39:24] It might be a function of just trying to, to
[39:27] slow down the rate of increase on, on that going forward.
[39:30] But we'll have a better idea at least on the townside
[39:33] October 7th when they release those rates.
[39:35] And, and that'll obviously roll us into some
[39:37] of the other calculations that we need to have
[39:40] as we go into our next fiscal 28 budget.
[39:46] Okay. All right.
[39:48] So the last item on the agenda that we felt was
[39:52] relevant was other topics, open discussion.
[39:54] So this is an opportunity for anybody to,
[39:59] to throw out there any questions, any statements
[40:01] that they'd like to make for both sides and,
[40:03] and obviously, you know, I think we've covered a lot
[40:05] of various topics tonight on the financial side.
[40:12] I'm just, can I go briefly?
[40:15] I, I just want to thank the dairy police department
[40:20] in their partnership over the past
[40:22] 15 months that I've been here.
[40:23] Now it's been really phenomenal to work
[40:27] with Chief Foli and, you know, captain Breen there,
[40:30] but they've been so responsive
[40:33] and I know they're dealing with staffing challenges, which,
[40:35] which then impacts our s
[40:36] so SROs we do not have any currently,
[40:39] but at the same time they've been doing drive-bys
[40:42] and walkthroughs regularly,
[40:43] so it doesn't feel like we're missing a beat.
[40:48] I just think that their responses to our students
[40:52] and our families, the help that they've
[40:54] provided really is another avenue of showing partnership
[40:57] between the town and the schools.
[41:00] And I just want to thank them for, for all the time
[41:03] and efforts that they put in
[41:05] for our families and our students.
[41:06] So
[41:11] I, I just wanna stress that I think one
[41:13] of the most important things that the public should be aware
[41:15] of about is, is the coordination we try
[41:17] and keep between the town
[41:19] and the school district as far as all the,
[41:22] the huge capital projects.
[41:24] You know, labor costs are one thing,
[41:25] but we know that the capital projects are the ones
[41:28] that always make the news
[41:30] because monetarily they're just,
[41:33] just big elephants in the room.
[41:34] And the fact that we try
[41:35] and coordinate 'em so that you are not trying
[41:37] to build a new school at the same time we're gonna build a
[41:40] police station and oh by the way,
[41:41] your taxes just want up $10 a piece.
[41:43] You know, I, I think that coordination is, is a huge,
[41:47] huge step in the public.
[41:48] Should be aware of it.
[41:58] I actually, the Only other thing I would say is,
[42:01] you know, we have our budget process coming up in the
[42:03] next month or so.
[42:05] Obviously people here listen online, they should watch
[42:08] that process 'cause more feedback that we get
[42:12] and it, I think
[42:13] for some people it would be an eye-opening experience of
[42:15] what we can actually mitigate
[42:18] and do to try to keep the numbers as manageable as possible
[42:22] and, you know, just watch and, and share ideas with us.
[42:28] 'cause there's a very small pie that we can actually affect
[42:33] when it comes to the budget process, especially
[42:36] with health insurance labor
[42:37] and all that kind of stuff that, you know, is scheduled
[42:41] to go up at high numbers.
[42:43] That's all I gotta say about that. It's just something
[42:44] that I would hope people would do.
[42:46] 'cause you know, the things you read, things you hear,
[42:49] even when you read 1300 and they talk about tax cap
[42:53] and there's a line there that says this will,
[42:55] this will not affect classroom
[42:59] classroom expenses.
[43:01] I don't know how you can make that claim when, if you don't.
[43:04] I just, if you've watched a budget process,
[43:06] you can't make that claim.
[43:07] And I, and I, and I wonder when people talk about it like
[43:10] that, I just don't know how that is a viable point
[43:14] of, you know, point to make.
[43:15] So I encourage everyone to, you know, run in for office
[43:19] families, whatever, just watch the process
[43:21] and give any input that you have.
[43:24] To that point too, you know, you guys are, you know,
[43:26] under a charter and, and you set your budget.
[43:29] All the school board does is we propose a budget
[43:32] and then, you know, we have a,
[43:34] there's a deliberative session where
[43:37] everyone in town can come and
[43:38] voice their opinion on the budget.
[43:40] The people in that room get to vote on
[43:42] what the budget is gonna be.
[43:43] You know, anyone in that room can propose
[43:45] a change to what we proposed.
[43:47] And if the people in the room are, a majority of them agree
[43:50] with that, then that's what goes to the ballot.
[43:53] And then once something comes outta that room
[43:56] and gets on the ballot, then you have another chance
[43:58] to vote on that or the default budget.
[44:00] So I would especially encourage, you know, everyone in town
[44:03] to pay attention to the budget process
[44:05] because it's your budget.
[44:09] Yeah. I think people forget that 94 to 97%
[44:13] of our budgets right now are all personnel costs.
[44:17] Doesn't leave much room.
[44:18] So that if you want to say, oh, we need to cut, cut here,
[44:21] cut there, you have to ask, okay,
[44:24] what personnel are you cutting?
[44:25] What services are you cutting?
[44:28] Yeah. Yeah. I mean that's absolutely right.
[44:30] You know, I mean on our, our side that's,
[44:32] those are the big movers, right?
[44:34] Personnel and benefits.
[44:36] You know, we can cut these little things that are, you know,
[44:39] they're not gonna have a big impact.
[44:40] You know, if you have to make a big cut,
[44:43] that's the bulk of it.
[44:45] Yeah. I think to the point too,
[44:46] when Jane mentioned the adequacy numbers, you know,
[44:49] we lost half million dollars coming into this fiscal year.
[44:52] So, you know, you get costs going up whatever it is, three,
[44:55] four, 5% and you lose half a million dollars on, you know,
[44:57] it's just one more thing that you have to take people
[45:00] that need to understand and take in consideration.
[45:07] Okay. So I think those are all the items
[45:10] that we had at least developed on our agenda.
[45:14] So I think for purposes of the council,
[45:16] because we are still in to aurn.
[45:19] Yep. So other than that, I guess we'll hand it over
[45:22] to Aaron.
[45:25] So from the town council side,
[45:26] is there a motion to adjourn?
[45:27] There is a motion to adjourn. My favorite motion.
[45:31] All right. We have a motion by Council Mills
[45:33] and a a second by Councilor Foote.
[45:36] And we have Councilor Healy remote.
[45:38] So we have to seek a roll call vote.
[45:39] So I'll start with Councilor Flood? Yes. Councilor Foote.
[45:42] Yes. Councilor Chase? Yes. Councilor Mills? Yes.
[45:45] Councilor Webb? Yes. Councilor Healy. Are you still there?
[45:50] Sure. If he's able to. All right.
[45:53] Well, we've got a majority. So council votes?
[45:55] Yes, I got chair votes. Yes.
[45:56] And council is adjourned. Thank you everybody.
[45:59] All right. For the school board, we will be in recess
[46:01] until six 30 until we begin our regular meeting.