[This transcript was generated automatically from audio using AI and hasn't been reviewed by a person -- it can contain mistakes, including plausible-sounding sentences that were never actually said. Treat it as a starting point, not a verbatim record.]

[0:08] And we're on. Okay, welcome to the Monday, September 28th, 2026 meeting of the Francis Towns
[0:15] Elecord. I am select and Scott Heath with me is select and Charlie Pyle. Karen Fitzgerald
[0:22] will not join us tonight.
[0:26] So we called meeting to order at 535.
[0:35] First up is new business.
[0:36] We have two payroll and accounts payable manifest dated September 30th, 2026.
[0:44] I will move. We approve the payroll accounts payable manifest.
[0:48] Second, all in favor?
[0:50] Aye.
[1:15] Thank you.
[1:24] Next item is approved in minutes from August 31st, September 14th, and September 21st, 2026.
[1:33] I do have one correction to the September 14th minute, and that is the correct name of
[1:44] I have a new way to let it for her to fly very trusty.
[1:49] Alternate position.
[1:51] We'll be updating the name.
[1:53] Okay.
[1:54] She's already got a point in it, so just a housekeeping measure.
[1:59] Do you mind?
[2:00] Thank you.
[2:00] Because I'll make a motion that we approve the minutes for August 31st, September 14th, and
[2:07] September 21st with the correction of Katelyn's last name.
[2:12] I'll second it.
[2:13] All in favor?
[2:14] Hi.
[2:14] Hi.
[2:14] Thank you, Sarah.
[2:34] Thank you.
[2:36] Radification of the coffee shop.
[2:39] So, you should be RFP.
[2:42] Oh, back mid September and the quick turnaround date.
[2:46] I only give one week because it doesn't take longer than that.
[2:49] People give me a bit.
[2:50] We would see one bit from Irving Oil for heating oil at 4.975 per gallon and
[3:00] propane at 1.583 in comparison. Last year propane was 1.4 in change and heating
[3:10] Oil was, what did I say earlier, to something, to 87?
[3:15] Something like that, yeah.
[3:17] I was talking with some pews last week and I got to brag about our oil price because
[3:24] everybody was seeing five plus, just everybody knows.
[3:31] Am I right?
[3:32] This is the only building that now uses oil, this oil, yeah.
[3:36] So we forgot I could bring this to propane.
[3:38] I mean, question comes with a pubine tanker.
[3:42] That's what we were going to move back into the question.
[3:48] Go to Barrier Tank, back there and run a line in.
[3:55] We've got to run through the parking lot, which means digging up the trench in the parking
[4:04] lot.
[4:05] I don't know, how big a barring in a front, meaning it's being able to take a front, barring
[4:11] in a front.
[4:15] Well, with the cost of being, whether it'd be worth it for the amount of, you know, what
[4:19] and see what the amount of fuel of this building uses.
[4:22] About 1200 gallons, pretty consistent.
[4:26] That's less of a home for use in heating season, I don't think.
[4:33] There's not a lot of money at $2 when you get to $5.
[4:37] Right.
[4:43] If we ever do a handicap, access, and that can sign it,
[4:48] combine it in.
[4:50] OK.
[4:51] I'll take a motion to approve the bid for Erming for heating fuel.
[4:59] Yeah.
[5:00] I'll make that motion.
[5:02] Seconded.
[5:03] All those in favor?
[5:04] All right.
[5:17] No, no.
[5:17] To committees regarding meetings.
[5:21] So I think both of you had seen the invalid came today from the city's empty.
[5:27] Yes.
[5:27] And I said this draft up to you too much.
[5:30] If you're a chance to look at it.
[5:31] I added a new paragraph, the first paragraph, just trying to soften the letter a little bit.
[5:38] This is part of our tension and it's something that we've known for a long time.
[5:42] A lot of committees, subcommittees, don't submit their minutes to just building for filing.
[5:52] There
[5:57] are many of our committees are very good at getting them done into this building.
[6:07] may not realize that at least two different places because unfortunately I get to say that the offices don't necessarily talk to each other.
[6:17] Yeah, that's unfortunate.
[6:23] Not a good thing.
[6:25] Jimmy, just a couple five animosity.
[6:30] There's one of those things that comes up periodically.
[6:33] I think because now Sarah does a great job with minutes of the land use
[6:37] and just land these boards, and a couple of other boards have people who have experienced
[6:46] doing this, then they're covered, but it's so typical that you get new people in and
[6:52] they don't understand.
[6:54] A couple of thoughts.
[6:56] Do we want to say, in the second paragraph, so few of these boards and apprentices are filing
[7:03] their minutes, and then in parentheses draft and approved, because we were talking earlier
[7:11] people that confused about draft versus approved. And then I'll draft minutes was minute
[7:19] within. I might underline five within five business days of the meeting to emphasize,
[7:26] Because that's the RSA. That's the key.
[7:36] And then, yeah,
[7:43] in a sense any change the minutes
[7:45] needs to be filed with a town clerk. But I think most people, most committees are going
[7:51] to have a draft and then wait for the approval.
[8:02] We're responsible for meeting in some year
[8:03] and select board office for responsible for posting.
[8:08] I think that's also confusing because the
[8:15] members
[8:15] of the Condal School Board, we're complaining because school board minutes weren't available on the website.
[8:26] That doesn't necessarily true as long as they're available somewhere.
[8:35] Whether they're available somewhere, like all the other boards, that's a bite committee issue.
[8:46] But the posting on the town webpage is not necessarily the requirement of the statute,
[8:54] the statute is to make them available for the public in a public place.
[8:58] Correct. And if we don't, if you, if we do have to have them on the website or post a message
[9:03] of where they're available, they can be accessed.
[9:08] Okay. So it's easier to have them on the website.
[9:11] Right. Right. But what about these other committees? So are you going to, I think, how is that going to get communicated?
[9:17] I won't pick on a committee, but let's just say we have another committee that sends to Pam within the five days to send an email to Pam.
[9:30] Are you going to put something on the website that says minutes of XYZ, ABC, other block committee is available at the time close-ups?
[9:42] I think
[9:46] we could do a statement that draft meeting minutes are available and only approved
[9:50] minutes are opposed to the website.
[9:52] That might be helpful.
[9:54] Mm-hmm.
[9:55] Right, Greg?
[9:55] Yeah.
[9:58] Let's try to make this easy, but clear.
[10:01] Right.
[10:03] And as convenient as possible, the word wants to be accessed.
[10:08] And the other thing I was thinking about is maybe in the spring as the climate is remained
[10:12] in committees convene. Some of these smaller committees might need a reminder of this because
[10:23] they'll get new people, somebody new will come in and be clear for whatever, not something
[10:30] that Sarah's involved in or one of the other major committees.
[10:35] Yeah, it's the minor subcommittees, not the demorator.
[10:39] Yeah, well, we get a different subcommittees.
[10:40] And there's changeover in a lot of these committees.
[10:43] Or they'll meet a couple of times, and all of a sudden they'll take on a, I mean,
[10:49] look at Reck and look at transfer states.
[10:51] Well, it plays this also a committee, you know.
[10:56] Now, they're active in doing things where they'll make a paradigm, they know.
[11:00] You know, get the word out and I have this perpetual problem because I mean it's not
[11:11] a phrase.
[11:12] I don't know.
[11:13] No, no.
[11:14] And it's not new.
[11:15] This code hadn't even predates all the updates that are right to know, and this is something
[11:23] that goes way back.
[11:24] How do we get minutes available?
[11:30] most most committees are very good. There are a few that may be lacked the information
[11:40] to many of those areas. And also, I think that not only are the committees aware of what
[11:46] the time frame is, they want to wait till the minutes are approved before they submit them.
[11:52] I think there may be confusion about who they should submit them to, but I think they wait for
[11:55] Approved minutes thinking oh, I have the drafts available, you know, in my mind, I'm like it's a table, yeah
[12:06] Okay, so
[12:09] you want a motion to approve and send?
[12:14] I'll make that motion
[12:16] Well, second
[12:18] I'll avail it. I
[12:29] Donation acceptance
[12:31] patriotic purposes
[12:32] $100 from Larry Kurt
[12:35] make a motion to accept it.
[12:38] Well, second.
[12:39] All in favor?
[12:40] Aye.
[12:41] So where did that came from?
[12:43] Apparently, a couple members of the Patriots
[12:46] purposes committee met with the aggregate family
[12:49] and brought them to show where Charlie's grave site was
[12:52] and the acceptance of such.
[12:54] Show them what?
[12:55] Where are Charlie's grave site was?
[13:00] They had a plied date.
[13:01] They planted the new service medallion that day as well.
[13:05] Oh, okay.
[13:08] Old
[13:16] business slash updates.
[13:18] The sale of Matt 5, watt 52.
[13:29] So tonight is just the statutory time frame for finalizing that decision.
[13:35] I call for our public hearings.
[13:37] We've received all the comments from the committees that were necessary.
[13:42] So now we just come down to the upper down on, will you prove the same?
[13:45] Do you have any amount of $17,000?
[13:47] Well, no,
[13:52] jacking, no grease and spilling to the post fail.
[13:56] So I'll make a motion that will show the proof.
[14:03] Oh exactly.
[14:03] And fire block did.
[14:06] All in here?
[14:07] All right.
[14:28] Okay, do you think you've got anywhere to walk?
[14:32] I'm sorry.
[14:33] So we might be waiting for a bit.
[14:34] I'll leave it here.
[14:36] Would you like me to tell you a bit?
[14:39] 530?
[14:39] because I didn't know how long we were going to be doing.
[14:41] You just wanted to be the last one here, don't you?
[14:46] Oh, okay.
[14:55] Anything else going on?
[14:59] Um...
[15:01] So next week Scott, we're going to come in to talk about a whole layup of Veterans Park, and a proposal for future monuments for Middle East conflicts, Vietnam, etc. No meeting on 12th, because for Columbus Day, when we come back on the 19th, that will be the initial presentation of the 2027 draft budget.
[15:30] We wind you up expecting to have a draft budget for review.
[15:37] Soon.
[15:44] End of next week.
[15:48] As long as it's before, I talk about it because it's long as it's before the meeting.
[15:53] Yes.
[15:53] Oh yes.
[15:54] I don't know when I.
[16:07] Now do you want to give us some update on the health trust?
[16:11] I'm really excited about the rates.
[16:13] Sure, so HealthFest had their two public hearings last week for their rate setting.
[16:22] Initial rates came in at 9% increase over the previous year.
[16:31] When I talked to Theresa Williams, she reminded me that now that they've done that initial
[16:39] rate adjustment, now each group has to go through its experience level and they go through
[16:43] that process to come down to the final rates and to remind me that last year we started
[16:47] out at over 10.6 and ended at 1.6. So, when do they know the adjustments? October.
[16:58] Oh, so it's something that October 8th is the vote by the Health Trust Board. So on the
[17:04] morning of the 9th, I'll show calling it. She'll call me the afternoon of the 8th.
[17:14] Are
[17:14] Are we, they look at the town separately from the district?
[17:20] No.
[17:20] So it's district-wide, but
[17:27] I would think.
[17:31] You would think.
[17:32] I don't know how it is.
[17:33] I mean, I have heard that Conval region has a bit
[17:38] of a cancer cluster in it, which hurts, right?
[17:50] It's OK.
[17:55] So I don't understand the invoices.
[17:57] We had many splits at the air station.
[17:59] Yes, so that was their warrant article this year.
[18:03] Okay, that's all I wanted to make sure that it was budgeted and approved.
[18:06] Yep.
[18:08] Thank you.
[18:09] And I did meet with precision temperature control Friday for updated the system here.
[18:16] Just waiting on the final pricing on that.
[18:19] So they went through and looked at if we did everything that would be correct.
[18:24] They can't do anything with that end because our wonderful federal government has changed
[18:28] the cooling of the infringement again.
[18:33] Why can't they do anything?
[18:35] Because that uses a coolant that was authorized by the federal government between 2015 and
[18:42] 2025.
[18:43] Oh, to go off of that.
[18:48] You did say he was going to call around and see if anybody had a 2025 head sitting on his
[18:53] somewhere that he could use on that end but so he's recommending right now there is upstairs
[19:01] in Pam's office there is two one and a half ten units he's recommending to change that
[19:09] to one head upstairs for a three-ton unit and one head down here for a three-ton unit and he said
[19:17] that would sufficiently cool this off for that three four weeks a year that it's needed.
[19:23] What about heating it before it gets below?
[19:30] So the two units that he described are the same as the one we got down there.
[19:35] They will heat efficiently down to four degrees.
[19:38] The price jumps substantially when you go to the negative temperatures.
[19:46] So
[19:48] many splits in the beehive, but that's it.
[19:51] So I'm not really, I know Karen's got both at her house and she says that she uses many
[19:58] splits.
[19:58] but if it gets like you guys are upstairs, so if it gets cold, you'll still have the heat.
[20:05] Correct. So the units on the select boards and those are heat, that is a heat pump,
[20:12] so that does provide heat and cool. And I typically hold on to that side,
[20:16] for the shoulder season, now through mid-November, to supply all the heat and then switch over to oil.
[20:23] So here goes a lot as possible. What about down here? We do the same thing.
[20:30] We use it primarily. I mean,
[20:37] they might warm the rub up enough.
[20:43] So right now, we keep just room during the winter, we only keep it at 62.
[20:48] And we crank it up just for meetings.
[20:49] Which also was very inefficient.
[20:52] Right.
[20:53] I don't think you have to play with it somehow.
[21:08] You've got it from moisture and stuff.
[21:10] Yeah.
[21:10] But
[21:20] also under new business, just, well, I don't know,
[21:25] business, business, or any more categorized it as,
[21:31] the inventory of vehicles that Alex Collins' property is increasing again.
[21:38] Part of our arrangement, some of them with him was that he was to make appointments with
[21:46] the ZBA and planning board about how to move forward.
[21:51] He contacted both boards, but has not made any appointments or moved forward at all about
[21:59] anything.
[22:00] So I don't know if we have to take some kind of further action to remind him that he was
[22:11] asked to take additional action about getting his use permanent.
[22:16] So the board's waiting for him to contact them. Now they're waiting for him to come
[22:22] actually apply. There's been no application submitted to either board about anything.
[22:31] They talked to them on the phone but trust
[22:37] me I really don't want to visit this
[22:38] thing again but now I'm hearing complaints about vehicles following up again. So I
[22:45] just wanted to put it on the table. We don't have to make any decisions tonight. I
[22:49] I'm just waiting to carry this here,
[22:53] but maybe a letter,
[22:55] C-seeing with two land use boards saying we understand
[23:00] you've reached out and contact them,
[23:05] but we also understand the moment they're waiting to hear
[23:09] for you and affecting application or further information.
[23:16] Yeah.
[23:16] I'll trap it up for next week's review.
[23:19] It's going to be very simple.
[23:20] Yeah.
[23:21] Another one coming up, that was on, I was wondering if I was on enforcement, which we will discuss
[23:29] at the meeting on the 19th, that will be the capacity exhaustion of Graham's ZBA appeal.
[23:41] Oh, he guys until October 10th was a yellow road, so he doesn't talk to protect or feel
[23:46] that, which I don't want to use, I don't know, I haven't talked to John, but I don't
[23:51] know if he made any plans to tear that down, or what can I do?
[23:56] Richard and I made that, which one was, that was the one that the structure too close to
[24:00] the road.
[24:01] Oh, right.
[24:02] I thought she was denied his variance.
[24:05] Various.
[24:09] And his appeal to the ZBA runs out.
[24:13] Well, it's 30 days from the dedicated decision.
[24:15] The device that made a decision on that.
[24:25] I don't have a school update.
[24:28] Everything is progressing.
[24:31] I think there is agreement on the sale of the building,
[24:37] which is kind of governed by statute.
[24:42] content is being negotiated, and any potential tuition agreement is also being negotiated,
[24:55] and because that's subject to it, too, right to know where
[25:06] that is except it's ongoing.
[25:11] But some people hoped it would be done this month, not the meeting next week, to continue
[25:20] the process.
[25:27] Okay.
[25:30] We have anything else to be updated on or talked about?
[25:34] I'm trying to stick my head on my head.
[25:36] Oh, I know.
[25:36] Our people transprostations out, have already had one interested party called today.
[25:43] And for what work was that now?
[25:45] That is just the next three-year contract for hauling contract.
[25:48] Oh, a hauling contract, okay.
[25:51] Good.
[25:53] Are we going to get input from the waste disposal committee on that?
[25:58] Really just to price it.
[26:00] Okay.
[26:01] What we're asking for is to do it on the actual polls.
[26:09] Do they cover the recyclables too?
[26:12] Just the hauling of mixed paper and glass.
[26:14] That's it.
[26:17] You can't even do money for me to pay for these things?
[26:19] No, we're paying to it.
[26:20] I was trying to get rid of it.
[26:23] I don't pay for anything.
[26:29] But the income from aluminum is...
[26:33] The aluminum income is fantastic.
[26:35] I mean, cardboard has a nice income.
[26:37] It's not huge like aluminum.
[26:39] But we're getting ready for another aluminum haul
[26:41] and it could be the potential of $8,000 this year.
[26:44] Excellent.
[26:47] That's going to be good information for people to know.
[26:49] Yes.
[26:50] Absolutely.
[26:55] Yeah, I detailed all of that in the August.
[27:03] French's town news.
[27:09] About the other year.
[27:10] Never French too.
[27:11] No, no, keep pushing it.
[27:12] Yeah, I got it.
[27:16] And the
[27:19] UTV Committee, still no interest?
[27:21] Nothing, from anybody.
[27:24] And I've got that online form set up so the emails that come in will go to all of us
[27:29] so you will know second I know.
[27:31] Okay.
[27:32] Well, to the point where I'm wondering if we should give it another month and just can it for lack of interest?
[27:40] I was going to put a focus or at least something on my November article to put it back out there.
[27:53] Okay, let's try and draw our attention to it.
[27:58] Nobody signs up, there's no point in spending more time on it.
[28:09] He said he got stuck in traffic coming back from mass.
[28:12] He's about 10 to 15 minutes out, but he said he was planning on addressing millions.
[28:19] So he said if you have questions he'll still come over but otherwise just let him know.
[28:27] He's updated us.
[28:29] Yeah.
[28:29] I don't have any questions other than what Blair has kept us informed about but you know can't
[28:36] really say much more because it's right.
[28:38] All the parties involved were well aware of it to meet them all the time, but yeah.
[28:44] So if they have no, I don't think where he needs to come in, he doesn't sound like he's
[28:50] got anything new to tell us, he's Dassy, we have anything, but no, because what he provided
[28:56] us was very clear and I was just, I can't say, it was just generally information on kind
[29:06] of the rules of the road of the health officer and what information the public can, and
[29:11] that includes us, can be aware of, or not, right, sorry.
[29:21] Okay, then.
[29:24] So, is there any other material that requires a non-public?
[29:30] No.
[29:32] No non-publics, no more business.
[29:35] I'll move to be a dream.
[29:37] Second, all those in favor.
[29:39] Thank you very much.
[29:42] Thank you everybody.