[0:07] Okay. Uh, our next item on the agenda is
open form and announcements. Uh, does
[0:12] anybody have anything to talk about
that's outside the scope of the agenda
[0:17] this evening?
Okay. I don't think we do. Um, just a
[0:21] couple housekeeping items. We have
copies of the presentation that we're
[0:25] going to be showing down here as well as
copies of the agenda. So, if you don't
[0:29] have one of those and you feel like you
will have difficulty seeing on the the
[0:33] screen behind me, just put your hand up
and we'll we'll Mike, would you mind?
[0:39] Oh, boy. Okay. I don't know if we have
enough to accommodate everybody. So, um
[0:46] Okay.
[0:49] » This [clears throat] has also been
posted to our packet. So, it is
[0:51] available online. So, if you can access
it via your smartphone if you have that
[0:56] with you.
[0:59] And I'm going to give Mike a second to
get that information out to you folks.
[1:05] » So, I'm gonna I'm going to move on to
our next agit agenda item, which is our
[1:10] health insurance listening session. The
reason why we're all here this evening.
[1:13] And first, I just want to say thank you
for all of you all taking out time from
[1:18] your day to come here and be with us
this afternoon. We also have quite a
[1:22] number of people on our Zoom meeting. Um
we recognize that this is an imposition
[1:27] to you all to take up time and come uh
and we recognize that this is an
[1:31] important con uh topic for you. So thank
you very much uh for making the effort.
[1:36] We really appreciate it.
[1:40] » I am going to get to that in one second.
Yep. So thank you for that segue. Uh my
[1:45] name is Chris Barrett. I am the current
chair of the select board. Uh just to
[1:49] give a little bit of history about me,
I've been volunteering for the town for
[1:52] about 15 years now in various positions.
Uh most recently, uh this is now my
[1:57] second term as a select board member. Um
with the rest of my board here, I'm
[2:03] going to introduce them. We have Sean
Kelly, Noel, Tom, Elizabeth.
[2:09] These are folks that have all been like
myself, volunteering in one capacity or
[2:13] another for this community for a very,
very long time. Uh we all have kids that
[2:18] have gone through the school systems and
taken part in uh programs like what the
[2:23] park and wreck offers. Um we recognize
that the efforts that you and the
[2:30] retirees
um are what make Westford the place that
[2:36] we all want to live and raise our
families in today. Um, I can't tell you
[2:41] how positive my interactions have been
um with the teachers in the schools, uh,
[2:49] with the professional staff that I've
had the opportunity to work with over
[2:52] the past decade and a half. Uh, I've
seen just displays excellence that I
[2:58] would never have thought possible. The
dedication,
[3:02] uh, the willingness to go the extra mile
is truly remarkable.
[3:07] And I just think, you know, I'm not
alone in that. I recognize that our
[3:13] residents probably feel the same way.
And I understand that this discussion is
[3:18] probably making a lot of folks feel like
we're not being listened to. We're not
[3:23] being uh we don't feel like the
leadership recognizes what we do for the
[3:28] community. And I want to make sure that
everybody is really clear that on behalf
[3:33] of myself and I think I'm speaking for
my board as well that we truly value
[3:38] your contributions to this community.
Again, because of your efforts, we have
[3:43] a wonderful community to live and raise
our families in. So, thank you for that.
[3:49] Now, having said that, one of the
challenges that I've recognized in my
[3:54] time as a board member on the select
board is that we have to make really,
[3:58] really hard decisions
and we are representing the entirety of
[4:04] Westford, all 25,000.
Well, when we have difficult decisions,
[4:10] um, it's really, really challenging. And
we have that scenario unfolding today.
[4:19] But it hasn't started today. This has
been coming for years. Starting with our
[4:26] budget override attempt a few years ago.
This board went through extreme lengths
[4:30] to try to get a budget override passed.
Uh many listening sessions, outreach to
[4:37] the community. we went and hosted
finally one of the largest town meetings
[4:42] this community has ever had and
unfortunately
[4:46] um that budget override did not pass at
the ballot and as a result we've had to
[4:52] make some really really hard decisions
uh including laying people off and
[4:56] really tightening our belts and
unfortunately that financial situation
[5:01] has not improved significantly.
What we have done as a leadership team
[5:06] in working with Kristen, our town
manager, is to try to find as many
[5:11] efficiencies as we can to try to make
our budget dollars go as far as they
[5:17] can. And Kristen's going to go into that
with a presentation that she has
[5:20] following my remarks.
And we continue to look for avenues to
[5:26] increase growth and to bring more
revenue into this community so that we
[5:31] can all enjoy the things that we want to
enjoy. Uh including health insurance,
[5:36] including you know salaries that are
measure it with our benchmark
[5:40] communities. Um but still, you know,
keep our buildings functioning, keep our
[5:45] police, you know, staffed well, our fire
department staffed well, make sure that
[5:51] we have fire trucks and things of that
nature. There's so many competing
[5:54] priority. It's very difficult to satisfy
all of them.
[5:59] So,
one of the things that we've been doing
[6:02] and when we've been looking at these
efficiencies is following the playbook,
[6:08] if you will, that came out of the budget
task force effort. Uh, this group did a
[6:14] multi-month deep dive into every area of
Westford's town government, including
[6:20] the schools, and looked at how we could
do things better. And if you want, that
[6:26] report is on the town website. It's a
it's actually a good read. Um, and we've
[6:32] gone through and tried to tackle a
number of the recommendations that were
[6:36] made in that task force's report. And
one of those is to look at health
[6:43] insurance.
To start that initiative off, we engaged
[6:48] an independent consultant to do a review
of our current health insurance
[6:52] operations. uh that came back to us
earlier this year and since then we've
[6:57] been having discussions about how do we
need to make some changes in order to
[7:03] try to rightsize the health insurance
offerings so that they are can measure
[7:07] it with again our benchmark communities
and to implement this these changes in a
[7:14] way that matches our budget needs to
some degree. Um, and I will say that we
[7:22] have had to work at a pace faster than
we're all comfortable with.
[7:29] Um,
however, we have learned that we have
[7:35] some more time. We have some more
options. And as part of the presentation
[7:40] that Kristen's giving after I'm done,
she's going to talk about the new
[7:44] timeline that we're going to be
potentially utilizing to do this health
[7:48] insurance review. And hopefully that
will give us some more time to sort of
[7:54] reset, figure out where we're going to
go uh with a more thoughtful process
[7:59] than what we had previously established
or used. So, with that, um, I'm going to
[8:05] just take a quick pause. Going to just
turn to my fellow select board members.
[8:09] Is there any comments from the board
before I turn it over to Kristen
[8:14] that you want to make?
>> I think most of the comments I have are
[8:17] what you just Sorry.
>> Hi, Tom Clay. I was just going to say
[8:21] that I think most of the comments I have
are either you've already made them or
[8:24] they're in Kristen's report. So,
>> I'm good.
[8:27] » Same. Thank you. Okay. So, with that,
I'm going to turn the mic over to
[8:32] Kristen last. Here's our town manager
and she's going to give the presentation
[8:35] that hopefully we can all view up on the
screen. And uh thank you very much for
[8:39] your time. Do you want to use this mic?
[8:49] Thank you.
[8:54] All right. Good afternoon everyone. Uh
thank you so much for those of you who
[8:57] are in the room here at Stonybrook and
on Zoom. Also, uh we have WCAT here who
[9:02] is taping this. This is not live
streamed this evening, but you will be
[9:05] able to access the video likely tomorrow
or over the weekend. And the Zoom is
[9:10] being recorded as well that will be
posting to the town's web page. Uh we
[9:14] did post this presentation to the packet
documents this afternoon. So, we are um
[9:19] you may access it there. Uh also, if you
do need a hard copy when you leave,
[9:23] please contact the town manager's office
tomorrow and we are happy to get you a
[9:27] copy if you need that.
And oh, I hear there's some more coming
[9:30] as well. Um, I did want to introduce uh
the assistant town manager of strategic
[9:35] operations, Mike Edwards, here and also
Dan O'Donnell, our finance director. Uh,
[9:40] they have been also instrumental in this
discussion, as well as our HR director,
[9:44] Pam Hicks, who's on vacation, and the
number of our health insurance trust
[9:48] members, some who are here today and
some who are here online. Um, we have
[9:53] enabled the question and answer function
on the Zoom. So, if you are not in the
[9:57] room and you do have a question, please
type it into that question and answer
[10:01] function. If you're having trouble with
that, you can type it into the chat, but
[10:05] we would prefer the question and answer
function. I am going to go through the
[10:08] entire presentation before we take
questions and answers because it does
[10:12] flow very nicely and it may answer some
of your questions after that. Um, some
[10:17] of these things that I am going to
mention, uh, Chris has said before, but
[10:21] I think it's, uh, fine to duplicate
those efforts as well. So, let's make
[10:26] sure this works.
All right. So, just I always like to
[10:31] start a presentation with the overview
of what we're going to talk about today.
[10:35] Uh Chris mentioned why we are here. I'm
going to dig into that a little bit
[10:38] more. We're going to talk a little bit
more about the budget task force report
[10:42] and how that addressed health insurance.
We're going to talk about Westford's
[10:46] specific efforts to date related to
efficiencies and change. We're going to
[10:51] talk about our overall financial and
operational challenges. We're going to
[10:55] talk about health insurance trends that
came out of the locked report and what
[10:59] we're seeing in the market. We will talk
about our market basket comparisons.
[11:03] That is the 20 20 communities that we
compare ourselves related to
[11:08] classification and compensation.
We're going to then wind down to talk
[11:12] about where we're going from here,
specifically the timeline and then
[11:16] outlining next steps and then giving you
all a chance to ask questions and then
[11:21] what the process is for outreach moving
forward.
[11:25] So why we are here? So as Chris alluded
to, the budget task force report
[11:30] identified health insurance as one of
our major structural budget issues and
[11:34] ma major costs within the town budget.
The company Locked In was retained
[11:40] through the Health Insurance Trust uh
with the support of the select board
[11:44] back in November of 2025 to
independently evaluate our health
[11:48] insurance program in total.
Most recently on July 1st, the Health
[11:55] Insurance Trust voted on a number of
items and the select board reviewed
[12:00] those votes on July 2nd. I'm going to
read them, but know that these may
[12:05] change over the course of the
presentation. There may be discussions
[12:08] and decisions that may change. So the
first vote was to no longer pursue the
[12:12] GIC as a healthcare plan for
implementation uh effective July 1st,
[12:17] 2027
to defer implementation of a GIC
[12:21] lookalike plan or a benchmark plan uh
until of design changes for November uh
[12:27] 2026 renewal and allow the health
insurance trust to reassess that in the
[12:32] spring of 2027 and to pursue pursue
negotiations with the insurance advisory
[12:37] committee, discussions with the
insurance advisory committee and uh
[12:40] negotiations with the PEC public
employee committee uh towards
[12:44] implementation of a midpoint plan design
change intended to take effect November
[12:49] 1st of 2026. We'll talk about that
November 1st date in a minute.
[12:56] So based upon further review after these
votes took place and conversations with
[13:01] our broker Hub and I just want to note
our broker uh Mark Christelli from hub
[13:06] is on the line. So if there are specific
questions about our existing plan design
[13:10] or any changes, he is available to speak
to that. Uh he is on the zoom. Uh we
[13:15] learned that plan uh adjustments could
be made mid year or midcycle. So that is
[13:20] new information that we did not present
and uh were not clear on back at the
[13:25] beginning of July. So now we have a new
timeline that is in play that we're
[13:29] going to discuss today. and we want to
make sure that further evaluation of
[13:33] plan changes is taking place by the
health insurance trust.
[13:39] So digging a little bit deeper into the
budget task force report and if you look
[13:42] at this presentation online the light
blue is a clickable link so it will
[13:46] bring you right to the budget task force
report that was published in October of
[13:50] 2023. That overall report identified
townwide long-term structural deficits
[13:55] that we had. It identified the health
insurance as one of our largest
[14:00] financial pressures, estimating 1 to2
million of budget impact in fiscal 25
[14:05] and 26. We started fiscal 27 two weeks
ago on July 1st, just for context. It
[14:12] identified that the expenses of our
partially self-insured plan were far
[14:16] higher than forecasted over the past 12
months. And that was in 2022 to 2023.
[14:22] And the recommendation of that report
was to review Westford's health
[14:25] insurance strategy to ensure that it was
the most cost-effective course.
[14:32] I want to note that the select board and
the town staff and other boards and
[14:36] committees along with the finance
committee uh and others have done an
[14:42] immense amount of work since that budget
task force report was implemented and
[14:47] accepted. We've started to pay off
smaller capital projects rather than
[14:52] carrying the debt. We've
implemented a townwide centralized fleet
[14:58] fueling that for as much a much less
cost than going to the pump at the town
[15:02] of Westford. We've uh now implemented a
self-sustaining recreation enterprise
[15:07] that is no longer subsidized by the
general fund.
[15:11] We continue to implement energy
efficiency projects utilizing grants,
[15:15] incentives, and net metering credits at
no cost to the taxpayer. In some
[15:19] instances,
we did have a reduction of staff
[15:23] following the unsuccessful override in
all areas.
[15:27] We are starting to actively and have
been actively auctioning off surplus
[15:31] equipment to backfill our free cash.
Back at the spring of 2026 town meeting,
[15:37] we uh asked the town meeting to
authorize to file with the legislature
[15:42] uh to change digital legal ads to
release the burden on uh residents and
[15:46] businesses who are filing for uh permits
that require legal ads. We're continuing
[15:52] to support our economic development
efforts and that was a uh budget item in
[15:56] the fiscal 27 budget to continue to try
to increase our revenue and our
[16:00] commercial tax base.
We implemented a pay as youth throw
[16:04] hybrid program partially shifting the
cost of the curbside trash services to
[16:09] residents who are using that service.
And we continue to look at a townwide
[16:14] fee review to align fees with the actual
cost of providing certain services. So
[16:19] these items hit certain categories. It
hits taxpayers, it hits employees, and
[16:24] it hits businesses. So I just want to be
be cognizant about that.
[16:29] We also need to understand that we have
continuous townwide financial and
[16:34] operational pressures. Our costs are
rising faster than our projected revenue
[16:39] growth under Proposition 2 and a half.
Our fiscal 26 and 27 budgets relied on
[16:44] plan use of one-time funds to maintain
services and that was primarily in the
[16:49] school budget and they laid out a very
robust plan of how they would be
[16:53] spending down those one-time fees. our
school transportation expenses and our
[16:58] special education tuition are continuing
to increase above that two and a half
[17:02] limit. We see our rising uh energy,
utility, and other operating costs.
[17:08] We continue to need to fund our Middle
Sex County retirement system liability
[17:12] and that continues to increase as we
have many more retirees and that cost is
[17:16] increasing. We want to make sure that
our other post-employment benefits, OPEB
[17:20] funding, is strong to maintain our AAA
bond rating, which ensures that we get
[17:26] the lowest possible interest rate when
we're going to borrow for capital
[17:30] projects.
We've seen that we've deferred
[17:33] maintenance across our properties and
facilities, and that has been shown in
[17:36] our townwide facilities updates that
have been discussed. We talked a little
[17:40] bit about that on Tuesday night at the
Robinson School Building Committee
[17:43] meeting with the tri boards.
We also continue to prioritize
[17:48] competitive compensation for recruitment
and retention. This is a major item that
[17:52] the select board identified in our
strategic plan that we need to continue
[17:55] to do to ensure that we retain our
employees and we recruit active
[18:01] employees. And then we are also seeing
as we've discussed our health insurance
[18:06] expenses and rising Medicare costs. And
you will see that in a future slide.
[18:12] So this slide lays out two things. The
red line outlines the percent of our
[18:19] health insurance costs over the percent
of our operating budget year-over-year.
[18:26] On this far side, it starts with fiscal
19 and the other side ends at fiscal 27
[18:32] because we've budgeted for that. So you
will see that our health insurance costs
[18:37] in terms of budget is increasing
year-over-year.
[18:40] We also wanted to make sure that we
showed you that in fiscal 22 we
[18:44] implemented the health insurance trust
and that trust balance has been growing
[18:49] over time which is a good thing because
we are using it to buffer in certain
[18:53] areas and that was identified in the
lock report that we did have a healthy
[18:57] trust fund balance finally when we were
doing the budget task force report in
[19:02] 2023 our balance was not good at that
point in time so we're proud to say that
[19:07] that has increased
[19:11] What's also telling though is our
subscribers. So in the uh red orange
[19:17] color is our total of non-medicare
plans. So our active employee plans and
[19:23] you can see that that is actually
decreasing from fiscal 2010 to fiscal
[19:29] 27.
Our Medicare subscribers is actually
[19:35] increasing. We have a number of retirees
that are increasing.
[19:40] We also have five-year trends that are
showing that our Medicare costs have
[19:44] risen 13.4%
over the past 5 years and our
[19:48] non-Medicare costs have increased 7%
over that period of time. That is more
[19:53] than the 2 and a half% that we're
allowed to raise through Proposition 2
[19:56] and a half.
[20:01] There's been a lot of conversation and a
lot of confusion over how we compare
[20:04] ourselves to our market basket. So those
20 communities that we compare ourselves
[20:09] related to compensation and
classification. I'm not going to go
[20:12] through everything, but there are three
packets online and I have linked them
[20:17] here. So we have a market basket premium
rate and contribution analysis for the
[20:22] active plans. We have our overall annual
town contribution rates and then we
[20:27] broke it down to our retirey Medicare
employee contributions.
[20:32] I want to caution you that when you're
reviewing this data, you should review
[20:36] it as a comprehensive package because if
you look at it each individual table, it
[20:41] tells an individual story, but you
really should be looking at it
[20:45] comprehensively.
to summarize these sheets because there
[20:50] are a lot to look at and it may not be
familiar to you. Westford is an outlier
[20:55] in employee employer contribution
percentages but not in employer
[20:59] spending. So in the employer
contribution percentage, we're at the
[21:04] bottom of the market basket. For
employer dollar contributions in the HMO
[21:09] and the PO plans, we're approximately
average or slightly below the market.
[21:14] For employee dollar contribution for the
HSA, we are below average. And for the
[21:21] retiree Medicare contribution, we're
really in the lower middle of that.
[21:26] We do have one of the most comprehensive
plan designs within our market basket.
[21:31] So, I want to note that.
[21:35] So where do we go from here and what do
we do with all of this data? So I just
[21:40] want to be clear that there have been no
plan design changes since the
[21:44] implementation of the trust in 2021.
That is actually very uncommon. Many
[21:50] municipalities and many private sector
entities or nonprofits are looking at
[21:55] changes every year or every two years.
So we have some options to look at.
[22:01] We'd like to see the Health Insurance
Trust review a midpoint plan design that
[22:05] was discussed at the last trust meeting
and discussed at the select board
[22:08] meeting on July 2nd. We do still want to
identify and and look into a benchmark
[22:14] lookalike plan. We want to look at our
fund balance and potentially a targeted
[22:19] drawdown to alleviate general fund
implementation into the health insurance
[22:24] trust.
We wanted to create a fund balance
[22:28] policy. When the health insurance trust
was implemented, it was noted that we
[22:32] should have about a $3.5 to $7.3 million
balance. Now that we've had a trust for
[22:38] over 5 years, it's prudent to look at
what that targeted fund balance should
[22:42] be and create a policy. And there may be
other alternatives that we have not
[22:46] thought of. And I know one of the
frequently asked questions we got was,
[22:50] can we submit other alternatives? Please
do. and I know some of you have and then
[22:55] we will likely begin negotiations if
anything comes out of that health
[22:58] insurance trust meeting under uh Mass
General Law chapter 32 section 21 and
[23:04] 22. That may sound foreign to you. We do
have more information on the website,
[23:08] but that is this the general law through
the Commonwealth of Massachusetts on
[23:11] health how health insurance is changed
and negotiated in the public sector.
[23:18] So this slide may be slightly difficult
to read in the room. Again, it is online
[23:22] and we can get you additional packets.
And it talks about a timeline. And now
[23:27] that we've found that we could do a mid
plan adjustment, we have developed a
[23:33] timeline for a potential adjustment for
May, excuse me, March 1st of 2027.
[23:40] It is not clear if this would be an
active employee only or a retiree only
[23:45] or a combination change at this point in
time. That needs to be investigated and
[23:49] reviewed by the health insurance trust.
So I want to be clear about that. We are
[23:53] currently under number one. So June 2nd
to July 24th, we're modeling options.
[23:59] We're calculating savings and we're
preparing for potential mitigation. And
[24:03] I will talk about that in a previous in
a prior in a future slide.
[24:08] July 24th to August 7th, we anticipate
that the health insurance trust will
[24:14] meet and will review and potentially
endorse a plan change proposal. I have
[24:20] called for a health insurance trust
meeting for next Thursday, July 30th. Uh
[24:26] if we can get all the members together
or most of the members together, you'll
[24:30] be notified of that meeting and of
course welcome to attend.
[24:35] Between August 7th and August 21st, if
the Health Insurance Trust comes up with
[24:40] a plan, the select board would vote to
enter into negotiations which would be
[24:46] led by the town manager.
And then August 21st to August 28th
[24:51] would be step five where there'd be
formal PEC notice. So public employee
[24:55] committee including proposed changes,
savings, and a mitigation plan.
[25:01] And then step six, August 31st to
September 30th, would be that 30-day
[25:07] negotiation window for the PEC. And that
is a state law. That is not something
[25:12] that the town of Westford has made up.
[25:16] If we can come to an agreement, if there
are changes proposed with the PEC,
[25:22] by that point in time, there would be a
vote by October 9th, there would be
[25:27] final local approval in terms of a
contract by December 15th and a written
[25:33] agreement. And then there would be a
60-day notification period.
[25:39] If there is not an agreement, Mass
General Law has an appeal process to a
[25:45] state board and that re review process
takes between 30 to 60 days. The review
[25:52] panel would make their decision and then
if there is an implementation that would
[25:56] follow, but both of these paths would
contemplate a March 1st change if
[26:01] possible.
[26:05] So I want to talk a little bit about
mitigation. So, this may be a foreign
[26:09] term to some of you, but if a
municipality is contemplating plan
[26:14] design changes, they are required by
state law to negotiate with the PEC a
[26:20] mitigation for those who may be impacted
by the changes that are proposed. Um,
[26:27] I'm not going to read the entire slide,
but some examples are a health
[26:31] reimbursement associate agreement, some
wellness programs, a healthc care trust
[26:37] fund, which we actually have,
out-ofpocket caps, other qualified
[26:41] medical expenses, and health insurance
premium holidays. We are not required to
[26:47] give a mitigation package over 25% of
the savings that the town of Westford
[26:52] would see if there is a change. So, I
want to be clear about that.
[26:58] So, I'm wrapping up here. So, if you're
thinking of questions, now is the time
[27:02] to to get those ready. Um, next steps.
We want to continue public engagement.
[27:07] Um, I will admit from my standpoint, we
may not have done the best job engaging
[27:12] our employees and our retirees and the
public related to this. I see this
[27:16] action today as a reset to gain trust
and confidence that we want to educate
[27:22] you all. We want to provide as much
information as we can in a clear and
[27:26] concise manner and we want to receive
your input.
[27:30] Again, we want to receive your feedback.
Stay in contact with your IA and PEC
[27:36] representatives if you're an employee or
retiree. Um, just in case you're not
[27:41] aware, I did just this week uh name Jod
Ross as the retiree IA representative.
[27:46] Marilyn Frank, thank you so much for
your uh service over the years. She did
[27:50] resign a few months ago, but the
retirees now do have an IA and PEC
[27:55] representative. Thank you, Jody.
And there will be future,
[28:01] [applause]
[28:04] like I said before, there will be future
trust and select board meetings and all
[28:08] of those are in public, open to all of
you, and are posted. And if you need or
[28:13] want to email the town manager's office,
we have that email listed here, or the
[28:16] select board, um, feel free to do so.
So, with that, I'm going to turn it back
[28:21] over to Chairperson Barrett, and um Mike
Edwards is going to monitor the question
[28:27] and answer. So, I'll leave it to you,
Chris.
[28:31] Thank you very much, Kristen, for that
comprehensive uh presentation. Uh I'm
[28:37] sure there was a lot of acronyms though
that were thrown around and uh if you do
[28:40] have any questions on those again please
put them in the chat if you're on the on
[28:44] the sorry the question and answer uh
portion of Zoom and you obviously you
[28:49] can ask uh today um two questions
actually for me to you Kristen and one
[28:55] is you did highlight or mention that we
we have stumbled a little bit with our
[28:59] communications um so with this new
timeline and the expectation of of a
[29:06] number of future meetings. Could you
just go a little bit more into detail on
[29:10] how folks can be notified that meetings
are going to occur and sign up for any
[29:16] sort of, you know, email distribution
list that we may be maintaining at this
[29:20] point so that you can be as involved as
possible.
[29:23] » Can you do Absolutely. So, um, if you're
comfortable with the website, you can
[29:28] sign up under the notify me tab for
select board meetings and health
[29:33] insurance trust meetings. Um, we do have
a healthy email list right now for
[29:39] retirees, but if you are not on that
list, please contact your retiree
[29:43] association, whether it's MTRS or Middle
Sex, and they will get you on that list
[29:47] and we will update that as well. Um, we
are trying to do as much on social
[29:52] media, posting these meetings as well or
following along for the health insurance
[29:56] trust website or the select board
website. Um, so we are doing our best to
[30:02] get the word out. I know not everybody
can access those ways. Even if you have
[30:06] a question and you want to understand
that, contact our office. We're happy to
[30:09] help.
So, one logistic thing, when we do open
[30:13] it up to questions and answers, I'm
going to put the microphone here. If you
[30:16] are able-bodied to come up to the
microphone, we'd really appreciate it
[30:20] because the owl is picking up the Zoom
for people who are on the Zoom to
[30:24] listen. If you are not able-bodied, just
raise your hand. We're happy to walk a
[30:28] mic to you and we may just repeat the
question if those at home can't reach
[30:31] it. But if you have any other questions,
Chris, that you want me to answer, happy
[30:33] to do that.
>> Yeah, thank you very much, uh, Kristen.
[30:36] Uh, I think one of the things that I
took away from the number of emails that
[30:41] we received, and I believe that number
was over well over a hundred. So, again,
[30:46] thank you very much for taking the time
to draft those emails. Um, it really
[30:50] meant a lot to to me and I'm sure to my
fellow board members as well as town
[30:54] staff that uh you took the time to do
that. Um, but one of the things that I
[30:59] took away was, you know, what is this
going to mean to me? What how is it
[31:03] going to affect my deductibles or my
premiums? So, Kristen, can I know this
[31:10] is difficult, but with the timeline that
we just sort of unveiled, at what point
[31:14] do you you know, this is a guesstimate
to some degree. Please be in mind, keep
[31:19] that in mind, but when do you think
people will be able to get answers to
[31:22] questions like that? Sure.
So, we have initially worked with hub on
[31:29] what some plan design changes may
potentially look like and what it may
[31:34] look like for a low user of the plan, a
medium user of the plan, and a high user
[31:40] of the plan. So, that information is out
there, but we need to do a better job
[31:43] boiling it down for you. Unfortunately,
because health insurance is so personal
[31:47] and everybody's situation is so
different, we can't put up a calculator
[31:51] for you to plug in what your situation
is like we did for the override just to
[31:56] plug in your t in your home so you could
see, you know, if your taxes were going
[32:00] up or not. Um, so we will do our best to
try to take a low user, a medium user,
[32:06] and a high user and balance that out and
model that out. Um and we'll work with
[32:11] hub on some other modeling because they
are familiar with doing this with other
[32:15] municipalities as well.
>> Okay. Thank you Kristen. Um first is
[32:19] there any questions from the rest of the
board here?
[32:22] » Are we ready to hear from the the
public? Okay, fantastic. Um so I know we
[32:27] have a number of questions online. Why
don't we take one right now and then
[32:32] again if you're interested in asking a
question, you're here in this room,
[32:35] please come down to this mic and queue
in this quarter or raise your hand and
[32:38] we can bring a mic to you. So, uh, why
don't I pass that?
[32:42] » Sure. So, the first question comes from
an anonymous attendee. I know a few
[32:46] years ago the town used to go out to bid
on different insurance companies to see
[32:49] which would offer the best rates. Is
there a possibility to do that again?
[32:53] Some of the documents make it seem like
Blue Cross Blue Shield is the only
[32:56] option. Western is a large customer of
theirs and I think they would reduce
[33:00] their premiums if they knew they could
lose us as a customer if we were
[33:03] shopping around for better deals.
>> So Mark, could you um discuss from your
[33:10] standpoint as our broker about how you
do go out to bid uh each year when we're
[33:14] in the renewal period?
>> Sure. Yeah. In the past at Westford, we
[33:19] have looked at other alternatives,
keeping in mind that, you know, Westford
[33:23] is now on what what the insurance world
would call a self-insured plan. So
[33:28] approximately 85% of all your costs and
have really nothing to do with Blue
[33:34] Cross Blue Shield or with Harvard or
Mass General or Singular Etna. That 85%
[33:40] of costs of the plan are are direct
reimburse reimbursements to healthcare
[33:44] providers and to pharmacists. So what's
left over to negotiate on is about 15%.
[33:51] Roughly so roughly about six to 7% is
what actually goes to Blue Cross Blue
[33:56] Shield for administration. So that's
what gets paid to them um to do what
[34:02] they do, negotiate discounts, administer
claims and everything else they do. And
[34:08] then the other uh balance of that uh is
for stop-loss insurance. So that's the
[34:12] actual insurance. So, we do have some
insurance even though we're
[34:16] self-insured. So, we have a very large
deductible that uh the town
[34:21] self-insures.
Um and then above that deductible, the
[34:27] uh and there's a separate stop-loss
insurance company that pays anything
[34:30] above that. So, at the end of the day,
when you're negotiating discounts from
[34:35] carriers, you're really negotiating on
15% of the overall cost. So just kind of
[34:41] simple math, if we were able to find a
claims administrator and the stop-loss
[34:46] carrier to be 10% below what your
current fixed costs are, that'd be about
[34:51] 1.5%
of the overall cost of your health. And
[34:56] not a little 1.5%, but you know, we
certainly have looked at different third
[35:01] party administrators out there and some
claims administrators charge less than
[35:05] the cost.
And um from a stoploss insurance
[35:09] standpoint, that's something we've put
out to bid to 20 carriers every year to
[35:14] try to find the very best stop-loss.
Just to give you a little color on the
[35:18] stop-loss insurance, I'd say over the
past four years, the insurance carriers
[35:22] probably paid out in excess
of uh a million dollars in claims and
[35:28] they've taken an increase.
>> Thanks, Mark. I think we're going to
[35:32] move on to the next question.
Anybody
[35:38] in person? Why don't
>> Why don't we just keep going through the
[35:41] mic? Let's just keep moving what's
online.
[35:42] » All right. So, next question comes from
Janet Dubner. Are you committed to
[35:46] ensure that retirees who have moved out
of state will still be able to access
[35:50] Westford's insurance coverage.
[35:54] » Uh, that's an emphatic yes.
[35:59] » Okay. Next question coming online from
Jesse Byer. Being that the data shows we
[36:03] rank at the bottom in contribution
percentage and below mid in actual
[36:07] dollars the town town contributes, I'm
curious why the select board is asking
[36:11] employees to absorb more of this burden.
The data clearly shows the town should
[36:15] be doing more, not less. So, it's
disappointing that it appears the
[36:19] decision is being made independent of
the data. What is going to happen if a
[36:24] switch is made and we fall to the bottom
of our peers?
[36:31] Uh, okay. Thank you, Jesse, for that
question. Um, I don't know if I'm the
[36:35] Kristen, do you want to take this? Nope.
Okay.
[36:40] Tom wants to take it. Very good.
>> I'm happy to take a step.
[36:45] So, um, it took me a while to to go
through all these numbers and feel like
[36:49] I've got a good grip on it. So, uh,
absolutely right that, uh, that the town
[36:53] gives 35% supports 35% which is at the
low end, but, um, if you look at the
[36:59] dollars, I don't know if we're bringing
that up or not, but if you look at the
[37:02] dollars in the report, you can pull it
up. We're very very close to the average
[37:05] of what the town pays on behalf of you.
So, the the policy is actually a richer
[37:09] policy. It's a little bit more
expensive. Uh, so we have a smaller
[37:12] percentage, but the actual dollars that
we pay are very very close to the uh to
[37:16] the B to the the average within our
market basket. So, uh, we're close in
[37:21] there. Um, why are we even considering
this at all? Well, uh, I think the
[37:25] answer to that might be in the, um, the
slide that looks at the percent of
[37:29] budget. So when we look at uh long-term
planning for the town and we look at
[37:33] things that are rising faster than 2 and
a half% and are consuming more and more
[37:37] budget dollars, uh we feel like we have
to take a look at those and see if uh
[37:41] there are steps that we can take
reasonably together in partnership that
[37:45] will help us sort of in over the long
term remain within our our sort of
[37:49] budget uh capacity. And so I think the
numbers show that we uh pay about 50%
[37:55] more in healthcare now than we did in
2019. So, it's a big jump. I think it's
[38:00] 11% of our budget instead of 9%,
something like that. So, it's continuing
[38:04] to grow. And so, just like we do with
every other uh spending category in
[38:09] town, we want to make sure we're looking
carefully to see if there's some
[38:11] adjustments that we can make to still
have a reasonable plan, but but help us
[38:15] over the long term make sure that we're
not eating into other critical services
[38:20] with with any with any uh expense
category that we deal with. And that was
[38:24] the finding of the budget task force was
we need to look at those things over
[38:27] time. if we don't tend that garden over
time and they continue to consume more
[38:31] and more resource, it's less uh
teachers, fewer firefighters, fewer
[38:35] other public service and that we're able
to offer here in town. So, so that's why
[38:39] we feel like we have to take this this
reasonable look.
[38:44] » Any other comments from the board on
that question?
[38:47] I mean because I think that this is
brought up a lot right which is sorry
[38:52] Sean Kelly um from the select board also
the select board appointee to the health
[38:58] insurance trust
I'm acutely aware that that we rank low
[39:03] on the employer contribution right it's
35% where most of our peer communities
[39:09] are about 30%.
One of health health insurance is
[39:13] tremendously complicated, right? And
there are certain le levers that you can
[39:17] pull um that can change behavior and
save costs, right? Um one of those is if
[39:24] you make adjustments to a a plan, you
can in theory actually reduce overall
[39:30] premiums, right? So by instituting
things like co-pays and deductibles,
[39:36] things of that nature, you can change
behavior of the users to prevent, let's
[39:42] say, costly emergency visits, things
like that. Um, if there's a deductible
[39:47] associate associated with it, that can
also result in lower overall premiums.
[39:54] And the idea is is and I think what's
getting left out is if there is a plan
[40:00] design change, this could this will
result in lower premiums for for
[40:06] a lot of people a lot of people who are
current users and um partake in our
[40:12] health plan. I I think that's getting
lost on it because one of the things
[40:15] that I often hear from our employees is
that our current insurance model is too
[40:20] expensive even for them, right? So we
could by making plan design changes
[40:26] actually reduce the premium in in an
ideal world and I can't speak for my
[40:32] colleagues but I would love to see us be
able to reduce the premiums and then up
[40:36] the employer contribution and I don't
think that those two things are um
[40:43] inconsistent and I think it's something
that we can do long term but we first
[40:47] need to start making plan design
changes. So, I think that we can save
[40:50] the town money and that we can also
offer a plan uh that's maybe not as
[40:55] robust but has a lower premium. So,
>> Sean, thank you very much for those
[41:00] comments. And I want to say was it uh we
have a 56% or 54% enrollment. Is that
[41:06] about right?
>> 56% of our employees take advantage of
[41:09] our health insurance options. Now, uh we
do have somebody at the mic. So, why
[41:14] don't we go to you, sir? Can we We've
got a mic there. Good. If I'm sorry if
[41:18] you would just please let us know your
name and address so we have it for the
[41:22] record. Thank you.
>> Uh it doesn't have to be it could be
[41:23] your position.
>> I got you. Uh Tyler Buts I work for the
[41:27] highway department. Uh just hearing that
we're low in percentage contribution
[41:35] but the dollars is even. All that really
says to me is if it changes it's going
[41:41] to punish the people who actually use it
and those are the people who need it the
[41:44] most. So, am I wrong in that or is that
am I picking that up correctly?
[41:53] I mean, I can I can take a stab at. We
do have Mark from MB on it, but at our
[41:57] last health insurance trust meeting, um
Mark indicated that plan design changes
[42:02] would cost um it would result in more
out-ofpocket expenses for 60 or 2/3% of
[42:11] users, whereas one-third of users would
have overall cost savings. So, yes, if
[42:18] you're a high user of it, it's going to
cost more.
[42:21] » From my recollection, it was around
$2,000 from the high users. I just I
[42:27] just feel like that's not that's not
right.
[42:29] » Sure.
>> Shouldn't be punishing people for using
[42:31] it and contributing either retirees
portions of their lives and for
[42:37] employees portions of our day. And it
just sucks.
[42:44] [applause]
[42:50] We have another question in the queue
here. So, why don't we take one and then
[42:54] we'll get to the mic.
>> Thanks, Chris. So, from Larry Panero,
[42:58] the water enterprise fund allocated a
significant amount of funds for
[43:02] postretirement benefit costs. So, there
should be plenty of funds available to
[43:05] cover the water department retiree
postbenefit expenses. And these costs do
[43:09] not impact the town's deficits. The
water department retirees should be
[43:13] excluded from any changes.
[43:18] » So if there are changes, it affects all
in the group, right? We're not going to
[43:23] exclude if you're a water department
employee or not. I would like to ask Dan
[43:27] to answer the question if he knows the
answer about the enterprise and the
[43:31] contributions to health insurance.
[43:37] So the water enterprise oped fund which
is the other post-employment benefits
[43:41] including health insurance for the water
enterprise was fully funded years ago.
[43:45] Uh they it kind of serves as a model for
how we want our general fund uh oped
[43:50] account to work in the future. Uh
however as I understand it like all of
[43:54] our our plan changes are the same
throughout the entire town for town and
[43:59] schools.
[44:06] Okay. Well, let's take you at the mic,
please.
[44:08] » Thank you. Melanie Jazokus, 26th year uh
teacher at Westford Academy. Um I just
[44:13] had and I I think I'm echoing what this
young gentleman said about um
[44:18] discouraging people from seeking help if
they need it. Um because I Sean, it
[44:24] sounded like twothirds of people, you
know, may have um that
[44:29] premium increase or especially if we're
going with deductibles now. Um I think
[44:33] that's my biggest concern is that people
won't seek the help that they need. Um
[44:38] and I know at least in the schools, we
talk about mental health all the time
[44:41] with students and staff. Um and and that
I think concerns me overall is that
[44:46] people just won't seek the help or the
treatment that they need if so I guess
[44:50] it's not really a question. It's more of
a statement. Um and I wasn't sure how um
[44:54] the low user, medium user, and high user
was going to be kind of detailed out,
[44:58] but I think that question was answered.
So um yeah, I would just have you think
[45:02] about that. That would be great. Thanks.
>> Great. Thank you for your comment. Why
[45:06] don't we take another one from the
queue?
[45:08] » Sure. Uh anonymous attendee writes, "Can
you please explain exactly how the
[45:12] retirees will be impacted? In some
communication, it sounded like the
[45:16] retiree coverage was being
discontinued."
[45:20] So the retirey coverage is absolutely
not going to be discontinued. We're not
[45:25] going to be even looking at that right
now. With this reset, we are looking at
[45:30] both the active plans and the retiree
plans and we'll present those ch
[45:36] potential changes if that occurs. So, we
do not have that clearly right now, but
[45:40] there will not be an elimination of a
retiree plan.
[45:48] » Thank you, Kristen. Why don't you go
ahead, sir?
[45:52] » Tim Hall, 51 North Street, retiree. I
have a couple of questions. One is where
[45:58] do we rank with those 20 towns as far as
percentages? I I know that you said
[46:04] we're on the lower side, but what is the
average? Is it 7525? Is it 8020? That's
[46:10] my first question.
>> Okay, why don't we just take that first
[46:13] question? So, as Kristen alluded to
earlier with her presentation, uh we do
[46:18] have this information on the town
website, there's I mean at least 18
[46:23] pages of comparison data ranging from
the employee and the town's
[46:29] contributions to the premium cost and I
did we ever get the deductible
[46:34] information in there as well? No, that
is not. That will be coming in in a
[46:37] future iteration. So, there's at least
two or three ways that this can be
[46:40] looked at uh depending on which plans
that you use um and whether or not
[46:45] you're using a family versus you're a
single consumer. So, to go over that in
[46:50] a lot of detail here is probably outside
the scope of this meeting. Um but it is
[46:54] available to you uh to consume and if
you have questions, I would recommend
[46:57] talking with the town manager's office.
>> Okay. Thank you.
[47:00] » Yeah. My second question is is coming in
here this today. Um I did bump into a
[47:07] couple of employees from the school
department and I want to know if I know
[47:12] Pam Hicks and Kristen has made good
efforts to make sure that the
[47:16] communication but these people told me
that nobody's heard of it. So I where
[47:21] Pam is the head of HR here with the town
side, the assistant superintendent is
[47:28] the head of the HR side for the schools,
which is also our biggest employee base
[47:34] and the biggest retiree base. Are they
making sure that their notifications are
[47:39] getting out there as well?
>> Thank you. Um, I can tell you that Pam
[47:44] Hicks sent an email to all town and
school employees two weeks ago. I did as
[47:49] well earlier this week. I understand
that not all school employees are
[47:53] checking their email because it is
summertime. So I did get a lot of reply
[47:59] automatic replies that they were out of
the office. Courtney Moran was aware of
[48:03] this meeting. Um I am not aware if she
had any additional outreach to the
[48:07] teachers. I can't answer that question.
It's
[48:09] » not just the teachers. It's
>> some sorry I do not know if Courtney had
[48:13] any additional correspondence with the
additional staff. Again,
[48:21] that was a great question and you know,
we've definitely uh know that
[48:24] communication is a challenge, not just
on this issue, but with a lot of things
[48:27] that the town does and we're continuing
to look to improve our avenues to get
[48:32] out the word to the residents uh and
retirees in this case. Um I will say
[48:38] that with this new timeline, uh a lot of
the action, so to speak, will start to
[48:42] take place when school is back in
session. So I think that communication
[48:46] challenge might lessen a little bit but
we remain 100% committed to improve
[48:52] communication levels to the best that we
are able. I mean that is 100% something
[48:57] that this board has been behind from uh
the time that I've been there and this
[49:01] particular situation is no exception and
it actually proves that you know we
[49:05] still need to do better. So uh we
appreciate your patience and we are
[49:08] going to try to do better in the future
with communication. Uh why don't we take
[49:12] a question from the queue here. Hang on
one second, Captain. Uh, so just a
[49:16] followup from Jesse Byer. My original
question is in regards to actual dollars
[49:20] the town contributes. In several cases,
we are even below our GIC community
[49:24] peers in what the town contributes. The
slide shows below mid already before
[49:29] changes. Um, not really a question
there, but Jesse, thank you for the
[49:32] followup.
[49:37] » Okay, thank you Jesse. Uh, next at the
mic.
[49:40] » Um, my name is Brandon Holmes. um the
town resident and work for the police
[49:45] department. Uh my question is is um
we've already the health insurance trust
[49:50] has voted to move $950,000 back over to
the town fund and we're projected to
[49:55] save over a million dollars from
reducing GLP ones from our coverage. Um
[50:00] that's almost $2 million. Is there a
target budget line that you're looking
[50:03] to save um like an end goal or is it
just overall? I just was curious on how
[50:09] deep we're looking to go on the savings
side. Thank you.
[50:12] Uh that's a great question. I think at
this point uh we are not able to give a
[50:18] hard number. Um we recognize or we are
aware at this point that we are
[50:24] potentially facing significant budget
challenges for FY28. Uh that is still
[50:31] you know quite some time away and we're
going to see some changes in our expect
[50:35] our projections between now and then. Um
but we we do know that that
[50:42] is a fairly substantial deficit at this
time. So we are looking to you know save
[50:48] wherever we can. Um do we have any other
questions
[50:53] » Mark?
Okay.
[50:57] » Hi Ellen Rainville the library director
and insurance is not my favorite reading
[51:04] genre. I have found that out. So I have
some comments. Um
[51:11] I think that employees now are under the
impression that as we move employees on
[51:18] that side of the ledger closer to the
market basket,
[51:23] we aren't seeing what equal action is
being taken on the town side of the
[51:28] ledger. So, if there could be a
consideration of the town paying a
[51:34] higher percentage as we absorb
non-pretax,
[51:39] non-predictable costs in terms of
co-pays and in terms of um deductibles.
[51:46] I think that would be most of us would
agree that would be the fair thing to
[51:50] the employees. On the face of it, when I
read the 170 pages and everything else,
[51:57] it seemed like we had a comprehensive
plan that was costly, but because
[52:03] employees were paying such a high
percentage, we were getting what we paid
[52:07] for. So, I'm glad to hear for the first
time that the actual cost that the town
[52:13] pays is average because I don't think I
saw that data and I also never saw the
[52:19] data of how many subscribers were in the
insurance
[52:24] um plans of other towns. So, for
example, I couldn't compute what the
[52:29] cost per subscriber was from community
to community.
[52:34] I did go down another rabbit hole to see
if everyone in the GIC had a AAA bond
[52:40] rating and they don't and I would wonder
if joining the GIC would impact our bond
[52:46] rating. Um I also respectfully ask us
not to talk about transferring costs to
[52:53] employees as an efficiency.
We don't see it as an efficiency. We see
[52:59] it as a migrated cost that we're being
asked to assume.
[53:03] And finally, and I know this is not
always popular when I bring this up, but
[53:08] I'm an old feminist, so I'm going to say
it. My mother sent me the first issue of
[53:13] Miz Magazine when I was in college. When
I looked at your demographics of those
[53:19] of us who are being covered by health
insurance, it's predominantly female.
[53:24] I looked at age, I looked at gender. So
I just want to remind us, you know, as
[53:30] we are aging into the retirement group,
we have an age that's more associated
[53:36] with illness.
Women have earned only 82 cents for
[53:41] every dollar of males. They are likely
to live longer. They are likely to
[53:45] outlive their spouses. And so I am also
concerned as a female about the cost to
[53:52] the women who are retiring out of the
town.
[53:58] » [applause]
[54:06] » Thank you for that feedback, Ellen.
Appreciate it.
[54:08] » Thank you, Ellen. Um, I just had two
questions. Now, my name is Jennifer
[54:12] Clero and I work as the director of the
Cameron Senior Center. Um, when you were
[54:16] doing the market basket, I was just
wondering, did you look at the other
[54:20] benefits that the other towns um were
providing such as short-term disability,
[54:25] dental, visual, I mean, vision,
long-term disability, because I know
[54:29] that's something that we're we're having
to absorb on top of our premiums.
[54:35] Um, can anybody speak to that?
>> Jennifer, I can help answer that. So,
[54:39] this market basket comparison is purely
health insurance. uh we have had a
[54:43] discussion with hub to review the market
basket related to those other
[54:47] insuranceances. They are working on it
but it does take time because there are
[54:51] so many in intricacies. So we do
anticipate eventually being able to
[54:55] present that data.
>> Okay. And then my follow-up question
[54:58] would be you know on your long-term
planning um what other revenue analysis
[55:04] are you doing outside of health
insurance that we haven't heard about
[55:07] today? I know we're focusing a lot on
health insurance. Are there some other
[55:11] new revenue ideas that you have outside
of health insurance?
[55:17] » I can answer that Chris if that's okay.
So yes, there are a number of other
[55:22] items that we are pursuing related to
revenue generation. Um if you attended
[55:27] town meeting or uh have been following
along the economic development committee
[55:31] and the land use management department
is actively pursuing additional
[55:36] businesses and understanding how we can
grow our commercial base. Uh we recently
[55:40] completed two corridor studies that
speak to that. Uh we know that we will
[55:45] have additional new growth in the coming
years related to the permitted projects
[55:49] at 219 Littleton Road, the former
Westward Regency and 37 Powers Road. We
[55:55] know that comes with additional services
needed with police and fire and
[55:58] potential schools, but there will be new
growth potential there. Um and there are
[56:03] other things that we're working on
related to revenue. I noted in the
[56:06] presentation, we're going to be we have
started and going to continue a full fee
[56:10] analysis and understanding where those
fees may hit. Is it a business owner? Is
[56:15] it a resident? Is it somewhere else? So,
that's just a a brief menu of some of
[56:19] the things that we're working on. So,
hopefully that helps.
[56:24] » And just one more thing to add, um this
has come up in the past, not necessarily
[56:29] specific to this topic, but just in
general to taxes. So, we do have a new
[56:36] uh working group that's looking at how
Westbird aortions its tax rates across
[56:42] residential, commercial, industrial. Um
that group started a few probably now
[56:48] about six, seven weeks ago. They're
feverishly trying to get that analysis
[56:52] done. Um so a lot of people have come to
us and say hey why don't we have a split
[56:57] tax rate for example or other types of
programs that help uh ease the burden on
[57:03] say maybe senior citizens uh that are
residents of this community. So please
[57:08] keep an eye out for the results of that
effort because I do think it will be
[57:11] helpful for answering some questions
that I've seen posed in some of the
[57:15] emails that we've gotten. The other
thing that I just wanted to just point
[57:18] out is and this is related Ellen to your
question. Mike, can you just hold up
[57:23] that blue chart? I believe that's part
of the packet and this this is the the
[57:27] what we've sort of been talking about in
terms of the market basket comparison.
[57:30] You can kind of see how thick it is. So,
this is what's going to allow us to
[57:34] visually allow you all as well to
visually see where we are for the
[57:39] different plans. uh again the different
types of analysis being whether it's uh
[57:44] contribution analysis or contribution uh
percentage um or premium and that's
[57:49] going to go and be broken down by both
family and single-user plan. So a lot of
[57:54] rich data there for for you to consume
and if you have again any questions uh
[57:59] town manager's office or any of the
select board members would welcome those
[58:03] questions. Uh do we have any other uh we
do have some more questions come in.
[58:07] Yeah.
[58:14] » I'm going to give that to you.
>> Tom Clay again. Just another example,
[58:19] Ellen, of of places that were looking at
addressing long-term structural
[58:23] challenges. So, pay as you throw came
out of that effort. It was recommended
[58:26] as something to look at um uh by the
budget task force. The idea was how do
[58:31] we cost share basically with the
residents in this case to make sure that
[58:34] over a long period of time we're not uh
spending more and more on trash at the
[58:38] expense of first responders, teachers
and all the other valuable services that
[58:41] we have. So uh if you if you uh if you
have the time and interest you can look
[58:46] in the budget task force that actually
gives a long list of uh of revenue
[58:50] source things that we investigate. Some
of them we've already done, some of them
[58:53] are pending, but u lots of effort there
and an important thing for us to be
[58:57] focused on.
[59:01] Thank you, Tom, for that additional
context. All right, we're going to take
[59:04] another question from our queue.
There's a comment first. I'll just read
[59:09] from an anonymous attendee. Not all
employees have Westford K12 or Westford
[59:13] MA.gov emails. There is a pool of
employees who were not notified of this
[59:16] meeting. Have employees go look for
information rather than pushing it out
[59:20] is putting the burden on the employees.
Um,
[59:26] question. Yeah.
>> So, if that is the case, um if you could
[59:31] contact TMAA westwardmma.gov with that
information, we would like to put you on
[59:36] our email list. Also, please sign up for
notifications. Um I was not aware of
[59:41] that. So, please so thank you for making
that comment this evening. Um and we
[59:45] will do our best to get you on a list.
>> That is a fact. And I think the uh the
[59:54] school office has a list of all non uh
email
[1:00:01] uh employees and
>> we can certainly reach out to the
[1:00:06] schools and make sure we're taking
advantage of every opportunity to reach
[1:00:09] people. Well, let me just reiterate what
the gentleman said of the how.
[1:00:13] » Uh he did mention that the school
maintains a list of emails for uh
[1:00:18] employees that do not have access uh to
town or school emails. So, we'll we'll
[1:00:23] reach out to uh to Courtney and Dr. Chu
and make sure we take advantage of that.
[1:00:28] We're we are taking every opportunity we
can, but we have to know how to get in
[1:00:32] touch with people. We have posted
flyers. We have put things in break
[1:00:35] rooms, um locker rooms, restrooms, etc.
So, social media, we we're doing
[1:00:41] everything we can, but you can help us
get the information out if you can feed
[1:00:44] it to us how we can get in touch with
people. So, thank you. Um,
[1:00:50] » so Mark, I I see that you're maybe
waiting in the wings. Do you want us to
[1:00:54] take some more questions? Okay. All
right. Go ahead.
[1:00:58] » So, next question, uh, from Nate
McKinnon. Isn't it true that the report
[1:01:01] to the town indicated that Westford had
the highest total cost per employees for
[1:01:05] the HMO plan compared to all other
communities? The HMO accounts for 59% of
[1:01:10] our total enroles. This report indicates
that for our most subscribed plan, we
[1:01:15] pay more for individual and family plans
than all other communities. Given this,
[1:01:19] what is the source of information that
we paying average?
[1:01:26] » So, we're just pulling the page number
from the report. So Mike, if you can
[1:01:30] find it and give me the page number.
>> So pages seven and eight.
[1:01:37] » Okay. So we are looking at if you're
looking at the packet, the market basket
[1:01:40] contribution rates and monthly
contributions.
[1:01:45] pages seven and eight out of 28
[1:01:51] that shows that Westford is below in
employer dollar amount contribution for
[1:01:56] single
and HMO employer contribution family.
[1:02:02] Westford is also below market basket.
[1:02:10] » The premium
>> total premium.
[1:02:14] » Yes.
[1:02:18] » Take this back.
[1:02:24] » Uh just give us a qu a second to see if
we can bring that up on the screen here.
[1:02:31] So this is a 28page PDF uh market
basket, premium rate and contribution
[1:02:37] analysis. It goes through HMO, PO, HSA.
Uh this particular file does not include
[1:02:44] retiree but retiree is a separate file.
[1:02:50] So the HMO employer contribution percent
for single Westford is going to be in
[1:02:55] green. I'm going to decrease this a
little bit just so you can see the
[1:02:59] chart.
Westford is at the lowest at 60%.
[1:03:05] HMO employer contribution percent
family.
[1:03:09] Westford is towards the bottom at 65%.
[1:03:15] HMO employee contribution percent
single.
[1:03:20] Westford is at uh the top.
[1:03:25] HMO employee contrib contribution
percent family.
[1:03:29] Westford is towards the top.
[1:03:34] HMO full monthly premium for the single
employee. There's two HMO plans. There's
[1:03:40] a high and a low and those are in green.
Just tell me when to stop. pull me up.
[1:03:47] HMO monthly full premium for a family
towards the top
[1:03:58] HMO employer contribution.
[1:04:04] Okay, since Kristen did mention this is
28 pages, just to show a hands, we were
[1:04:09] be happy to to go through the rest of
these slides, but if people are not
[1:04:11] interested and just want to look at this
data on their own, we'll let them do
[1:04:14] that. I think we've answered the the
point that Nate made. I'm not seeing any
[1:04:18] hands, so why don't we move on to the
next question.
[1:04:24] Looks like Mark's not at the stand, so
we'll just keep rolling through these.
[1:04:28] » Go ahead.
>> So, Larry Panero again writes, "Has the
[1:04:32] town ever considered to change the tax
rate for businesses? Currently, they pay
[1:04:36] the same rate as the residential rate."
So, the town did have a study committee
[1:04:41] uh I believe in 2010 that reviewed that
and they decided not to change it. Uh
[1:04:46] every year in November, the select board
hears from the chief assessor and they
[1:04:50] hold a tax classification hearing to
decide if they would change the rate or
[1:04:54] not. Right now, as excuse me,
[clears throat] as Chris alluded to or
[1:04:58] others on the select board alluded to,
there is another study committee looking
[1:05:02] at the tax rate uh related to
residential and commercial splits.
[1:05:08] It doesn't change the
>> it would shift the burden to the
[1:05:12] businesses uh off the residential. Um
the amount that we raise stays the same.
[1:05:17] We can only raise by 2 and a half% plus
new growth.
[1:05:24] » Okay, we now have somebody at the mic.
Let's turn it over to this gentleman.
[1:05:27] Please let us know who you are.
>> Uh Mark Cost, uh chair of the finance
[1:05:32] committee for a long time, member of the
select board and chair capital committee
[1:05:36] forever. Uh, first of all, thank you for
acknowledging the communication issues
[1:05:42] um, not only with the select board, but
I have to admit also with the health
[1:05:46] insurance trust in informing the public
about what was happening, when it was
[1:05:52] happening, and feeling like it was a
rush to get a job done. And I'm glad to
[1:05:56] hear that some of these changes have at
least been deferred.
[1:06:01] Um, second of all, the issue of
our expenses rising more than Prop 2 and
[1:06:06] a half are not new. They've been going
on at least since 2008 when I started to
[1:06:13] get involved. This has been an ongoing
issue. So, this is not new. It's not new
[1:06:18] to the schools. It's not new to the town
departments and it's certainly not new
[1:06:22] as it relates to health insurance.
Um,
[1:06:27] lastly, so these are more comments that
question, which is probably not a
[1:06:31] surprise to you. First of all, Chris,
thanks for acknowledging the 100 plus
[1:06:34] emails. I'm sure most of those were from
me, if not uh not all. Um,
[1:06:41] making decisions about health insurance
costs outside of a budget process seems
[1:06:48] completely incoherent to me. to do this
and not have the taxpayers in town
[1:06:55] understand the other choices that could
be made outside of the costs of changing
[1:07:02] people's health insurance cost seems
completely wrong. So I would encourage
[1:07:07] you I saw these I was hoping to hear
nothing was happening this fall but to
[1:07:12] see that some things could still happen
this fall outside of the taxpayer
[1:07:17] understanding what's happened into their
costs going into next fiscal uh I don't
[1:07:23] understand that. So I'd ask you to
reconsider the timeline. Thank you.
[1:07:29] » Oh okay. Uh thank you very much for
those comments Mark. Uh we do have some
[1:07:33] additional copies of the presentation
and meeting material. So if you're still
[1:07:37] looking for that, just raise your hand
and this gentleman here will bring them
[1:07:40] over to you.
Okay.
[1:07:47] Well, we have we have plenty more
questions. Okay. We have somebody else
[1:07:50] at the mic, so why don't we go ahead and
take you and then we'll get to our
[1:07:53] online questions.
>> Hi, my name is Caren Wilkins. I'm in my
[1:07:56] 13th year at Blanchard Middle School.
Um, it's more of a I just want to see if
[1:08:01] you can comment on the survey that went
out to the employees because I'm not
[1:08:04] sure if everybody heard that. I did hear
it at the trustee meeting um a couple
[1:08:09] months ago, but I did hear um I thought
that those answers were really
[1:08:13] interesting and I think that we should
take that into consideration a lot when
[1:08:16] we're talking about employee retention
since you were talking about employee
[1:08:19] retention being really really important.
Um, and I just want to take into
[1:08:23] consideration like the way that the
employees are feeling about this because
[1:08:27] it seemed like those are really high
numbers um, in that survey. So, I didn't
[1:08:31] know if you might be able to share some
of those numbers with everybody. So, I
[1:08:34] can comment that we did send out a
survey last um, summer and fall. Uh, I
[1:08:40] unfortunately don't have those numbers
in front of me now, but they are uh,
[1:08:43] posted. We're able to get them to you if
you need. Uh, and those were taken into
[1:08:47] consideration when Lockton prepared
their report. If you have any other
[1:08:50] specific questions, I'm happy to to talk
with you about that.
[1:08:53] » Well, I just think it's important to say
like employees, you know, in order to
[1:08:57] retain employees and we have a lot of
employees and they're hoping that the
[1:09:00] insurance stays similar to what we have.
Um, I just think that's an important
[1:09:05] thing to take into consideration um
just getting people in as employees, you
[1:09:11] know, getting new employees in and
repaying what they already have. The
[1:09:16] insurance is a huge deal for that. Sure.
[1:09:22] So, she's just talking about that the
survey results she wants to make sure
[1:09:25] that people understand that employees
were mostly satisfied with the health
[1:09:29] insurance and want to maintain what they
have now, which I understand. Thank you
[1:09:33] very much.
[1:09:36] » Took a question from online from Ed KBY.
Can you please share with the retiree
[1:09:41] population the links to the online
webinar materials as well as the various
[1:09:44] select board reports you referenced
today? Uh they are all currently shared
[1:09:50] uh on the town's website in a few
places. One on the health insurance
[1:09:53] trust website link directly uh but also
you can go to the do to the document
[1:09:58] center and find the individual packet
item. So everything is posted if you
[1:10:02] have any trouble finding that. Um please
feel free to email or call our office.
[1:10:10] » I think did you have a point?
>> I just had a quick Y
[1:10:13] » I just had a quick question Mike. So, I
know that we sent um we pushed out
[1:10:18] notice of this meeting. I'm wondering if
we could just push out to everyone who
[1:10:22] we we have access to a link to these
materials just to save them the trouble
[1:10:25] of hunting and pecking through the
through the website.
[1:10:29] » We did already. Okay. Thank you.
>> Uh Tom, thank you very much for that
[1:10:34] comment. I do want to also add uh this
is obviously a topic of interest for
[1:10:39] lots of people. Um, I I think maybe if
we could make an effort to put something
[1:10:44] on the homepage so people aren't trying
to navigate to find it, especially
[1:10:48] people who are not familiar with our
website. Let's see if we can make it a
[1:10:51] little bit easier for folks to to get to
this information.
[1:10:55] » And we can absolutely, again, in
reference to that gentleman's comment,
[1:10:58] we can reach out to the schools, see if
they have additional emails, and then
[1:11:01] the things that we have previously
pushed out, we can push out again.
[1:11:09] take a question from the microphone.
>> Hi, Nicole Keefe. I've been at day
[1:11:13] school teacher for 28 years. I just I
appreciate the pushing off the timeline
[1:11:19] uh till March, but and I'm also
appreciative to hear that you're looking
[1:11:23] having a committee look at the tax base
or the the rate between businesses and
[1:11:27] residents. But I'm curious
what's the timeline for that committee
[1:11:33] and why wouldn't you look at those
pieces first before implementing health
[1:11:38] insurance changes to all the employees?
>> Sure. So the select board set the
[1:11:42] deadline for the tax working group to
report back in August of 2026. So within
[1:11:47] the next month. So that will be coming
uh and we have to look at all of these
[1:11:52] things in tandem as they all layer in.
[1:11:59] I just wanted to uh it took again took
me a little while to understand how the
[1:12:02] tax classification works. I just want to
emphasize something that uh came up
[1:12:05] before. So we do have the ability once a
year during the tax classification
[1:12:10] hearing to to choose the allocation of
burden between residents and commercial
[1:12:14] taxpayers. But that doesn't affect the
total amount collected. The total amount
[1:12:18] collected that we can use which is
called the levy uh that is basically
[1:12:23] capped at this 2 and a half%. So the
only change we can make is who pays how
[1:12:27] much. So it would affect the residents
and how much they pay in taxes or the
[1:12:31] businesses and how much they they pay,
but it wouldn't change the available
[1:12:34] funds. So just just to make it clear,
and we will look at this again, the
[1:12:39] reason that we decided to keep it the
same between commercial and residential
[1:12:43] when we reviewed this in 2010 was
because Westford is now about 90%
[1:12:48] residential, 10% commercial. So in order
to make a $1 difference for residents,
[1:12:55] we have to make a 10. If we offset $1
for residents, that raises the
[1:12:59] commercial by 10. And so it has a huge
effect on the commercial to make any
[1:13:03] real difference for the resident. And
the other issue is we want to make sure
[1:13:07] we're competitive and attracting
businesses. We want to make sure that
[1:13:10] when people are choosing where to
locate, they don't see any disadvantage
[1:13:13] coming to Westford. At the time that we
looked at it, other communities like us
[1:13:17] that had the same kind of, you know,
office type uh commercial property
[1:13:21] footprint had similar uh tax rate had
had also had a the same same tax rate
[1:13:26] between residents. So those are the
things that uh that are at stake here.
[1:13:31] Please join in the the tax uh
classification committee that's doing
[1:13:34] the study now if you're interested in
that. But just to make it clear that
[1:13:37] that's an allocation issue, not a total
dollars raised issue.
[1:13:43] Uh thank you Tom for breaking that down
for us. Really helpful. Uh I will also
[1:13:47] add to his comments and I think you know
Kristen did mention this is that we we
[1:13:52] do have a wonderful economic development
committee in this community uh that
[1:13:56] works very very hard to try to enhance
Westford as a place that businesses want
[1:14:02] to do business in. Um and we have spent
funds to hire consultants to work with
[1:14:09] that group over the last was it about 18
months at this point uh to see if we can
[1:14:14] continue to grow our commercial base
because we know that is one way that we
[1:14:18] can uh try to offset the burden on our
residents. Okay, we have another
[1:14:23] question online.
>> We do and this is a long question
[1:14:27] followed by a comment. So, I'm going to
ask I'm going to read the question.
[1:14:30] We'll answer it and then I can respond
with the remainder of the comment. I'm
[1:14:34] sorry if I missed introductions, but
what is Mark Chrysatelli's position in
[1:14:37] the town? He works or used to work in
the insurance industry. I'm confused by
[1:14:41] his answer to the question about
considering other providers than BCS in
[1:14:45] order to save money.
[1:14:50] So, Mark Christelli works for Hub. The
town of Westford has hired Hub to be our
[1:14:56] insurance broker.
[1:15:00] And following up on that, now that that
question was answered, uh even if it
[1:15:03] saves 15 or if it's only 15% of total
cost, it still makes sense to me to
[1:15:07] consider the option of shopping around,
especially since when we used to do this
[1:15:11] years ago, we did not have this problem
of affording health insurance. Premiums
[1:15:15] have been increasing astronomically
since we have been staying with BCBS.
[1:15:19] The market basket analysis shows the
town who spends much less on health
[1:15:23] insurance than we do have other
insurance companies. Please consider
[1:15:27] saving costs by shopping around rather
than deferring costs onto employees.
[1:15:31] Thank you for your time and
consideration.
[1:15:36] Uh we have one further question from
Sandy Collins. As you discussed today,
[1:15:40] the possibility of increasing
deductibles, excuse me, or premiums for
[1:15:44] higher users as an option. I'm very
concerned that as retirees they're no
[1:15:49] longer working, they will be adversely
impacted at a time they may need
[1:15:52] insurance the most. Also, please
although the effort in obtaining data is
[1:15:56] appreciated and necessary, would you
request a one to two-page comparison of
[1:16:00] benefits and services, premium costs for
individuals, families, and deductible
[1:16:04] impacts so rational decisions can be
made?
[1:16:10] » Uh Sandy, thank you for the question.
Um, as as we've talked about already, it
[1:16:15] is not as easy as, you know, just
bringing a one to two-page analysis into
[1:16:20] play here. We've just already
highlighted the 28page, you know,
[1:16:24] analysis that we have and as we get
deeper into the plan design changes, uh,
[1:16:28] that makes it even more difficult, but
we will do our very best to try to, um,
[1:16:33] you know, make it as readable and
digestible for everyone as possible. So,
[1:16:37] thank you for that feedback. We have a
question at the mic.
[1:16:40] » Uh, Diane Wood, 122 depot. Uh, I want to
reinforce, and I'm sure everybody else
[1:16:45] does, the the need for much greater
communication, especially as it relates
[1:16:50] to the general community. Uh, I suspect
99% of the people in this room are
[1:16:55] either employees or retirees. I I don't
see representation from the community or
[1:17:01] at least visibility or or comments. Um,
so more communication. there should
[1:17:08] there should have been more communicate
more um visibility from the community
[1:17:13] more people in this room who don't
represent employees or or retirees and I
[1:17:18] think you need both sides because I
would say most of the people don't
[1:17:22] understand all the details that are
going on right now. So just reinforcing
[1:17:27] the stronger need and I know there's
just so much you can do. However, um
[1:17:32] that's a segment of the community that
really needs to better understand how
[1:17:35] this will impact them. And I don't think
99% of the people who are not employees
[1:17:41] understands that. Thanks.
>> Thank you so much, Diane. Um I had a
[1:17:47] conversation with the select board a few
weeks ago that I thought it was a good
[1:17:50] idea to have a listening session with
the employees and the retirees. So that
[1:17:54] meeting today is a target meeting for
employees and retirees. We will
[1:17:58] definitely have more re more meetings
and outreach to the residents, but this
[1:18:02] meeting today after my discussions with
the board was really targeted towards
[1:18:06] retirees and employees. So, just to
reiterate that,
[1:18:12] » yeah, Diane, thank you very much for
that question and a great answer,
[1:18:15] Kristen. And, you know, as we've heard
many times, we are going to try to keep
[1:18:19] the communication avenue as open and uh
and people as engaged as possible.
[1:18:24] Another question at the mic. Nina
Mangan, retiree, Westward resident. Um,
[1:18:30] can you tell me the number of market
basket uh communities that are
[1:18:34] participating in GIC?
[1:18:39] » Mark, could you tell us the number of
market basket communities that are in
[1:18:43] the GIC? I believe it's nine. [sighs]
[1:18:47] » Yeah, I was I was going to guess eight
>> out of 20.
[1:18:51] » 20. Okay. And I know that at the last
meeting that I attended that you did say
[1:18:56] that you had talked with town. Um the
reason I'm asking is because I've read a
[1:19:03] lot of the letters that I found really
respectful and very informative and I
[1:19:08] know that a couple of people that are
very respected in town. Um one being
[1:19:12] Patty Dubbie. Her letter I found
enlightening. And it says here, "In my
[1:19:16] 25 years as a Town of Westford employee
and two years as a retiree, I have heard
[1:19:22] very few positive comments about GIC
from her counterparts." And I think
[1:19:27] that's significant. She's well connected
to other communities and to hear that I
[1:19:32] don't know why. Well, I do know why
you're you're looking into this, but it
[1:19:36] concerns me that you're
it appears to us that that's where
[1:19:41] you're leaning and and that might not be
true. Um, however, it concerns me that
[1:19:50] that that's something that we're really
considering out of going online and and
[1:19:53] hearing and seeing negative things. As I
mentioned at the last meeting, it
[1:19:58] concerns me for people who use mental
health that Westford is considering an
[1:20:03] insurance
provider that is very limited in that
[1:20:08] way. It has pride itself over the years
and worked hard. We have students,
[1:20:15] PE, community members have children that
we know is a problem in today's world,
[1:20:21] yet they're going to be probably not
going to get the access that they need.
[1:20:25] I just feel like that's very um
disheartening to me. Um
[1:20:33] if we went to GIC, I've also heard that
it's very difficult to to backtrack and
[1:20:40] get out of GIC. And I'd like that to be
seriously considered. I mean, every
[1:20:45] other insurance company that we've gone
with, we always have the assurance that
[1:20:48] it's not going to be, it will be hard
work for, you know, administrators to
[1:20:53] make that change. However, that change
can be made. I get the feeling that
[1:20:57] that's going to be very hard, costly to
the town. Um, I'd feel better entering
[1:21:02] into GIC if I knew that that we can
change our mind in a year after we've
[1:21:08] experienced for ourselves. And I I don't
believe that that's really the case.
[1:21:14] » Just ask question.
>> Just I'm gonna ask you to pause because
[1:21:18] you've brought up a lot of great
questions and before we lose track of
[1:21:22] everything that you're saying, I want to
take an opportunity to to try to respond
[1:21:25] a little bit. Um, I think part of the
confusion between when you're talking
[1:21:29] about GIC and when we're talking about
plan redesign changes and GIC benchmark
[1:21:34] lookalike plans, that doesn't
necessarily mean that the health
[1:21:37] insurance trust is going to move us to
the GIC. They actually don't have the
[1:21:41] authority to do that. What we're talking
about is one of the compensation
[1:21:48] practices that Westford has always
followed, which is to try to provide
[1:21:52] compensation to our employees, which is
at the midline of our benchmark
[1:21:56] communities, is something that we're
trying to implement for health insurance
[1:22:00] as well or look towards implementing.
And what that benchmark is in many cases
[1:22:07] is a GIC plan. And so that's where that
terminology comes from. Um now having
[1:22:15] said that
uh the select board has the authority to
[1:22:21] dissolve the trust and move the town
into the GIC.
[1:22:26] Um this board has not set any hard or
fast timelines or you know plans to do
[1:22:33] that. I think there would need to be
quite a bit more
[1:22:37] educational opportunities for both the
town leadership and stakeholders,
[1:22:43] retirees and employees to get educated
about what the GIC can offer. You
[1:22:48] brought up a question about mental
health. Um, you know, the GIC does have
[1:22:54] plans that provide mental health
coverage. So I think that one of the
[1:22:58] things that we could probably do to help
you just make people feel more informed
[1:23:03] is to provide an educational session so
that if the select board, you know,
[1:23:09] decides in the near future or, you know,
from now later in the future to move,
[1:23:15] people will feel a little bit better
informed. Um, as far as, you know, all
[1:23:20] we've heard is negative things about the
GIC. Um, I can tell you that I've not
[1:23:26] heard that. Um, I have heard positive
things about the GIC. I have heard from
[1:23:32] Westford
uh employees and retirees that they fear
[1:23:36] that there's just always negative
consequences. But you know, our town
[1:23:41] manager did reach out to I believe five
town managers for our mark our eight
[1:23:46] town managers um of the the market
basket communities and ask what their um
[1:23:52] experience has been on the GIC. Uh that
is a public document. I believe it's in
[1:23:58] one of the health insurance trust
packets. I saw it.
[1:24:00] » Okay. Uh and and you know by and large
th those town managers said that it was
[1:24:06] a great move for their communities. Um
>> but for what
[1:24:11] » let me finish. Yeah. And so you know
obviously they're they may be speaking
[1:24:14] from a pure budget perspective but some
did offer you know feedback that the
[1:24:19] employees seem generally well satisfied
with it. Um
[1:24:23] so you know again tonight we're really
talking about what the health insurance
[1:24:27] trust is going to be doing in terms of
next steps. Uh and you know the select
[1:24:32] board will be continuing to discuss GIC
as a potential option. But you know what
[1:24:37] I see going forward as a first move if
we continue to go down that path is to
[1:24:42] have an educational session where we
bring in somebody from the GIC to a
[1:24:46] session like this where we can answer
questions from retirees and employees.
[1:24:50] So am I wrong in if you're looking at
GIC options whatever that may be I'm not
[1:24:57] well verssed in this at all
>> are you also looking at the same time
[1:25:00] what blue cross blue shield what we have
today will be
[1:25:03] » yes so when we talk about plan redesign
changes and we talk about a
[1:25:08] » so they're comparable
>> a 15% benchmark plan that's taking the
[1:25:14] benchmark GIC plan and basically halfing
the deductibles halfing the co-pays A
[1:25:20] full GIC benchmark plan would be taking
what the GIC offers and you could see
[1:25:25] how much that costs to some of the
because some of the towns on our
[1:25:29] comparison as you just heard basically
our GIC uh enrolled uh so you can do a
[1:25:36] rough comparison. Now you'll have to
take into account how much the percent
[1:25:40] that the town pays versus the employees
pay. Right? So it's, you know, you're
[1:25:43] doing the right comparison, but that
data will be analyzed by the health
[1:25:49] insurance trust and discussed and
debated. Public input will be very
[1:25:53] welcome during that process. And as you
heard from Kristen, who is the chair of
[1:25:58] the health insurance trust, that first
step is going to be taking place in the
[1:26:02] next week or so.
>> Okay.
[1:26:04] » There was one other question that you
answered, which was why do people feel
[1:26:07] why do communities feel like they can't
get out of the GIC? Well, the GIC does
[1:26:11] mandate a three-year enrollment. You
can't leave, you know, within 3 years.
[1:26:16] And generally speaking, what we have
heard, the reason why many of these
[1:26:21] communities can't leave is because
financially it's to their advantage not
[1:26:25] to.
>> Okay.
[1:26:27] » So, please, if you have any other
questions.
[1:26:30] » Yeah. Um,
[1:26:36] so as a retiree, if I were to leave and
go p if I was unhappy with the decision
[1:26:42] that's made for the town and I go
private because I'm Medicare age, um,
[1:26:49] can I come back at some point or am I
then like the dental, I can no longer
[1:26:54] come back to the town retirey?
Um, I actually don't know that answer.
[1:27:01] So, if you could send me an email or the
TMAA email, we will get back to you.
[1:27:06] » Yeah,
>> I think that would be helpful because
[1:27:09] everything that people have said, this
is going to be costly for those of us
[1:27:13] that are older and that are using our
insurance that we've never used before,
[1:27:18] paid all these years, and many of us,
myself included, have been so fortunate
[1:27:23] not to be unhealthy. And now we're going
to have the deductibles. We're going to
[1:27:29] have it. It's just very um
disheartening. Uh the only other thing I
[1:27:34] wanted to say is another letter that was
written. Um it said that this person's
[1:27:41] concerned that GIC is a short time
short-term cost savings um to help with
[1:27:47] the FY28 budget along with presumptions
of saving in the future.
[1:27:52] Even Loctton has said repetitively that
the that his estimate of cost savings
[1:27:58] may not occur and may not continue
before decision to enter you know we
[1:28:04] need to consider this and and that again
unless we're having a significant
[1:28:09] savings significant I just am very
disappointed that the town would
[1:28:14] consider doing this to its employees and
to its retirees and all these people who
[1:28:19] have worked 30 years of their life maybe
less maybe more. Um, they chose to serve
[1:28:24] the town. They chose to do this. They
chose to work for lesser income than
[1:28:30] they could have, but they chose this
because they were weighing out the
[1:28:34] benefits of retirement. And now that's
being compromised. And I think that's
[1:28:39] something that's very serious that you
should consider. [applause]
[1:28:52] Uh Nina, thank you very much for your
very well thought out and uh questions.
[1:28:56] Really was helpful to have that. Um we
have some more questions online. So
[1:29:00] Mike, we do uh anonymous attendee
asks, "I get the sense we are currently
[1:29:06] avoiding what the increases might be.
Having my personal health insurance
[1:29:09] programs go up by 20% last year was a
big shock. And as one gentleman pointed
[1:29:13] out, we use this insurance more now
because we need it more now. It feels
[1:29:17] like we are being punished for doing so.
Any chance that you can even off the
[1:29:22] offset the cost to everyone instead of
just slapping it on to the retirees?
[1:29:30] » So, as I said in my presentation, we
have not made any
[1:29:36] suggested changes. We are reviewing what
it may mean to make changes to active
[1:29:41] employees and what it may mean to make
changes to retirees. Once we have that
[1:29:46] data, we will present that out, but we
do not have that information at this
[1:29:50] point in time.
[1:29:54] » And another question from Jesse Byer. I
think it would be good to understand how
[1:29:58] much savings there is for the town if
any switch is made. I'd hate to make a
[1:30:01] change that say passes 500,000 of cost
to employees and only saves the town
[1:30:06] $150,000 or something like that. I feel
this is a key question needing to be
[1:30:11] answered yet.
[1:30:16] Uh Jesse again thank you for the
question and spot on. I mean certainly
[1:30:20] we are going to do that analysis in the
months to come. So appreciate it. Any
[1:30:25] other questions Mike? Okay. Any other
questions from members of the audience?
[1:30:32] Yes, please come on down to the mic.
Thank you. It's just so that you folks
[1:30:37] can hear online.
[1:30:40] » I think it's just a clarification
question. Um I I know Kristen when you
[1:30:45] did your presentation on the very it
seems like on the overview or the very
[1:30:49] first slide there was um mentioned that
there's it just seems like there's
[1:30:55] confusion with a statement maybe that
says that we weren't going to the GIC
[1:31:00] but now we're talking about the GIC. So
some of us are a little confused.
[1:31:08] So, one of the first slides outlined
what the health insurance trust voted on
[1:31:14] on July 1st. And one of those votes, and
Sean can speak more directly as he w he
[1:31:21] also uh voted on the trust was that uh
the town would not pursue going to the
[1:31:26] GIC for July 1st of 2027.
Um, now we know we have some more time
[1:31:33] to make potential changes with a
potential March 1st uh, adjustment. Um,
[1:31:39] however, I'll let the select board speak
to uh, if they feel that the GIC is or
[1:31:44] is not on the table. I don't have that
information.
[1:31:50] » Thank you for that question. As I
mentioned previously, uh the select
[1:31:54] board I think would feel it prudent to
provide more opportunity for education
[1:32:01] on the GIC. That's something that uh we
have not had an opportunity to do. Um I
[1:32:06] feel strongly that you know the more
that we can educate people about
[1:32:09] different topics, the better the
resulting conversation will be. So, uh,
[1:32:15] I I do think that the right move is to
at least have a conversation, have that
[1:32:19] educ or sorry, have that educational
opportunity provided and then we'll have
[1:32:24] conversations like we're having tonight
to answer any additional questions and
[1:32:28] go from there.
>> Yes, please.
[1:32:36] » Hi, Elizabeth. Um, there there are a
couple of points I' I'd like to just
[1:32:40] offer up uh as you find them useful. Um,
GIC does make a lot of information
[1:32:48] publicly available. It's a it's a
program that, you know, almost 500,000
[1:32:54] people use in the state. Um, some as the
subscriber, some as families. Um, as
[1:32:59] Chris said, it's very important to us
that we structure information so it
[1:33:03] feels interactive and guided and
comprehensible. Um, but I mentioned that
[1:33:08] you if if you are so inclined, there is
information out there that is easy to
[1:33:12] find. Um, so if you were to search on
FY27
[1:33:17] and GIC plan, you'd come up with a
colorful I think it's about a dozen
[1:33:24] pages and it and it might do a few
things that um have come up in some of
[1:33:29] the letters I've read. And I think of
them as letters. The emails you've sent
[1:33:32] us are really letters. They're they're
personal. They're compelling. we are
[1:33:35] reading them and and as I've read them,
I've I've wanted to figure out how to
[1:33:41] thread this needle of just just making
sure that some of the the facts are out
[1:33:46] there because with some facts, some of
it is um a little less daunting. Um and
[1:33:51] so, you know, Chris mentioned one of
them that that the medical plans that
[1:33:55] the GIC offers are medical plans. Um
they aren't kind of plans, they're
[1:34:00] plans. They have um and you can read
them. They have mental health, uh,
[1:34:04] substance abuse, addictive behaviors.
You know, that's an example of one of
[1:34:08] the things that, um, was in some of
these letters that was questioned. And,
[1:34:12] you know, you you you could see it if
you wanted to. You know, please know,
[1:34:16] I'm not asking you to do it. I'm just
trying to to remove some of the sense
[1:34:21] that I think I hear, which is that you
feel, you know, blowing in the wind. Um,
[1:34:26] so if you want to come out of the wind,
if you want to read it, it's there. You
[1:34:30] could see that some of the co-pays are
really low. Um, you can see that some of
[1:34:34] the um caps are uh potentially good for
you. As I mentioned, some of these
[1:34:40] letters were were very detailed in how
much people pay out right now in
[1:34:46] insurance. And although it is not true
for everybody, there are scenarios where
[1:34:51] there are
um aspects of choice that that might be
[1:34:56] beneficial. And I'm not advocating for
the GIC, but I do really feel that
[1:35:02] there's a lot of um
understandable fears that are driving
[1:35:09] views on it. And we're just trying to
get to what's real about it. And in many
[1:35:13] conversations about difficult choices,
it's helpful to know what that outer
[1:35:18] bumper is. And that's the outer bumper.
And so adding shape to that is part of
[1:35:22] just get getting aware of where the
bumpers are. And also it is so important
[1:35:28] that we're part of this middle
communication. But it is uncomfortable.
[1:35:32] I mean there's so many things where we
we don't know all the answers. It is
[1:35:36] part of being excuse me in the journey
along the way while possibilities are
[1:35:42] being considered when there's a a a
reverse. um you know, we thought
[1:35:47] something was going down one path and
tried to share that and we had to
[1:35:51] reverse and we learned more and now
we're going forward again. So um you
[1:35:56] know, I'm going to wrap this all up to
say, you know, I I really appreciate all
[1:36:00] your letters. I'm glad they're part of
the public record. They are important.
[1:36:04] Um if you are so inclined, I just want
you to know there is some information
[1:36:09] there, but we're very committed to also
packaging more in a very structured way
[1:36:14] as we learn it. very glad you're on the
journey with us. Wish it weren't bumpy.
[1:36:20] Um it is. We're acknowledging it. We're
here together on that. You know, thank
[1:36:24] you for sharing the input we've asked
for and and I believe the conversations
[1:36:30] are are in a robust way today but going
to continue.
[1:36:40] » All right. Thank you, Elizabeth. That
was a really great way to put all of
[1:36:43] this into a different context and
understanding. So, I appreciate your
[1:36:46] your comments. Um, we have some
gentlemen at the mic. So, go ahead, sir.
[1:36:52] » Uh, my question would be is with the
plan design changes uh that are
[1:36:56] proposed, has there been any analysis
that's done is if we make this more
[1:36:59] attractive and attract more users, um,
what would our savings be at that point
[1:37:05] if even if it raises by 5 to 10%.
[1:37:10] » Thank you, Captain Holmes. That is
certainly one of the things that the
[1:37:12] health insurance trust is reviewing is
if we do make plan design changes, would
[1:37:17] that increase the number of people on
the plan, what would we anticipate and
[1:37:21] what would that uh anticipate related to
additional costs that we would um see.
[1:37:25] So that is part of the analysis that we
are looking at with hub.
[1:37:28] » Okay, thank you.
[1:37:33] » Okay, you're next.
>> Tim Hall, North Street. Um question is
[1:37:39] if you guys are considering I know
you're not considering the GIC this time
[1:37:42] around but for FY28 if you are
considering the GIC
[1:37:47] um would you at least
try to maybe offer a little bit more of
[1:37:53] the percentage picked up like say a town
like Lexington where they're on the GIC
[1:37:59] they pick up 80%. we only pick up 65 and
where we're going to lose things like
[1:38:04] mental health coverage and other things.
It would be nice to get something out of
[1:38:11] it. Anyway,
>> uh again, thank you for your comments.
[1:38:14] Uh just to be clear, GIC does provide
mental health coverage. So, just want to
[1:38:18] make sure everybody is aware of that
because that keeps coming up. Um, but
[1:38:23] it's I think a little too early in the
journey uh to to to give you a a hard
[1:38:28] and fast yes on that because we would
first need to have that educational step
[1:38:33] get us a little bit more informed about
the GIC and what it might look like for
[1:38:37] Westford. uh we we do have some analysis
done by Lockton that shows uh a you know
[1:38:45] the amount of proposed savings if we
were to go to the GIC as well as a
[1:38:49] breakdown of how that savings might
change if we had additional enrollment.
[1:38:54] Um but one of the things that has not
been discussed at this point is you know
[1:38:59] potentially changing the uh contribution
from the community towards or to to the
[1:39:06] to the uh employees on that. So I think
that's something in the future that we
[1:39:10] could definitely analyze um as we get
further along that path if we decide to
[1:39:14] go that way. We may not. We may decide
that we have the educational session and
[1:39:18] say this is not right for Westford. But
I I do see that that's an option that I
[1:39:23] would not say is off the table. I just
can't give you a firm answer on it at
[1:39:26] this point.
>> Understood. Thank you.
[1:39:28] » You're welcome.
>> Hi, Phyllis Snider, retirey. I just have
[1:39:31] a question. Did you interview other
insurance companies or just GIC
[1:39:37] or did you mention that like TUS or
something else? Did you look at them
[1:39:41] also?
[1:39:46] So I think um in terms of the market and
Mark can speak to this if I misstep u
[1:39:50] Mark Christelli um over the course of
the past few years the town of
[1:39:55] Westford's health insurance trust has
talked to the GIC
[1:39:59] which offers a multitude of plans
through a multitude of providers. We
[1:40:03] have talked to the Massachusetts
interlocal insurance association Maya
[1:40:07] about their plan offerings and we talk
with hub about their their offerings as
[1:40:12] well. So we continue to have these
discussions every single year
[1:40:16] » because years ago we did have TUS and we
had um I forget the other one.
[1:40:21] » There was Fallon as well
>> and a third one. There was another one
[1:40:24] too.
>> I I maybe Harvard Pilgrim. I'm not sure.
[1:40:29] » I thought there was another one.
>> GIC has a number of plans. I don't have
[1:40:33] the the copy in front of me, but there's
a number of options to choose from based
[1:40:37] upon active and retiree, um based upon
the region that you're in and all of
[1:40:42] those items, but I don't want to get
into that this evening.
[1:40:49] » All right, we have a question at the
mic.
[1:40:50] » Hi, I'm Jody Ross, 34 Lawson Road. So,
I'm privileged to be the PEC rep for the
[1:40:56] retirees and thank you Kristen for just
appointing me to the IA for retirees.
[1:41:01] What I hear from the retirees is they're
afraid of having to change doctors or
[1:41:08] change facilities or drug benefits. And
that's what I hear from most of them.
[1:41:13] And I think the unknown is what's really
um creating a lot of angst. Uh the GIC,
[1:41:21] we none of us really know whether we
would have to change doctors, not if
[1:41:25] they're in Florida, New Hampshire,
whatever. That would be really important
[1:41:29] to understand that. Um somebody asked I
think it was Nina about um survey my
[1:41:36] recollection didn't look but remember
from meeting I believe it was 73% of our
[1:41:42] employees said that they like their
health insurance plan and I believe it
[1:41:46] was 55% said they would pay more to keep
it. I may have those numbers wrong but
[1:41:52] the uh retirees were not surveyed. So,
all I would say is somebody asked, I
[1:41:58] think Diane, about Westford residents.
Would it be okay if I asked how many
[1:42:03] people in the room are Westford
residents?
[1:42:06] » Would that be okay?
>> Sure. I'm happy to ask on your behalf.
[1:42:09] Okay.
>> Uh, just curious. You don't have to
[1:42:11] answer this question, but if you're a
Westford resident, please raise your
[1:42:13] hand.
>> Great. Thank you. So the reason why I
[1:42:18] asked that is because when I was the
town manager, we had about 350
[1:42:23] town employees who were residents. And I
know I always tried to hire residents
[1:42:28] when I could, but you know, we are
residents. We were hit by pay as you
[1:42:33] throw. Some of us are on fixed incomes,
most of us. So, I just think we got to
[1:42:39] really understand what we're doing to
I'm advocating for retirees, but we
[1:42:44] really have to pay attention and give
them more time than you make a decision
[1:42:49] one week and and um we hear a week and
then we're into it. We need more time to
[1:42:54] be able to find out how this will impact
us. So, thank you very much.
[1:43:00] [applause]
[1:43:05] » Great. Uh Jody, thank you very much for
the questions and uh we do hope that
[1:43:09] with the new timeline that we are
discussing here this evening that we'll
[1:43:13] provide that opportunity to make sure
that everybody has the chance to ask
[1:43:17] questions and get answers um as we work
through the public process that uh we
[1:43:23] have to follow in order to make a plan
design change. So please try and stay
[1:43:27] engaged on that.
Um do we have a question? One more
[1:43:31] question. Okay,
>> we do have we have one more from Sandy
[1:43:34] Collins. You you answered this before.
I'll give you a chance to do it once
[1:43:37] more. Can you assure us that if a plan
change is made that retirees who live
[1:43:41] out of state will still have full
coverage? It's already difficult to get
[1:43:44] a new provider.
[1:43:50] » I'm assuming if so if we we're if it
depends on what the change is, right?
[1:43:55] So, if the health insurance trust
decides to make plan design changes and
[1:44:00] and they they stay with Blue Cross Blue
Shield, uh I don't expect you to lose
[1:44:05] your coverage. So, am I correct with
that? Health insurance trust people.
[1:44:09] Correct. Thank you. Yeah.
>> Uh any other questions on
[1:44:16] » question at the mic?
>> No, I have some comments.
[1:44:19] » Okay.
>> Um I'm going to repeat,
[1:44:21] » but Ellen, I have to say your question
your comments sometimes come across as
[1:44:24] questions. Just so you know, [laughter]
>> I'll I'll see.
[1:44:27] » Okay.
>> Well, maybe I can mix them up and they
[1:44:30] can be enthusiastic exclamation.
>> I just want to make sure that we we get
[1:44:34] you the answers you want. So, if it is a
question, just frame it as a question.
[1:44:36] We'll be happy to try and answer.
>> I actually want to revisit some of the
[1:44:39] data, some information that I sent to
the select board and also some things
[1:44:44] that I saw in both the locked in and the
hub report. So, um
[1:44:50] now I'm going to say this as a 54year
town employee. So I am so proud
[1:44:55] obviously I'm still working here to be
an employee of Westford and I've been in
[1:45:00] many a leadership group where every
single department head in the room said
[1:45:05] the reason they were working for
Westford was because of public service.
[1:45:10] It's a wonderful wonderful work ethic
that we have in this town. I'm always
[1:45:14] proud to say no our tax rate is lower.
you know, go on the website and look.
[1:45:20] And I love to tease people and tell them
that we figure out the employee leave
[1:45:24] acrual to the 110,000th every week.
Heaven forbid we should spend 110,000th
[1:45:31] of a penny that is not due one of our
workers. Um,
[1:45:36] when I read the reports that we saw from
my reading, the only health insurance
[1:45:44] that was actually solvent was Westford's
Health Insurance Trust, not the GIC,
[1:45:51] not the other three that were listed. We
had the only one that was not in
[1:45:57] deficit.
When I look at the GIC and how it's
[1:46:01] subsidized by Commonwealth taxpayers,
it's not sustainable.
[1:46:07] It we assume the liability of every
member of every community that's in the
[1:46:13] GIC. We have to
um we have to join it before we know the
[1:46:20] rate and we can't negotiate the rate
that we're going to pay. When I look at
[1:46:26] how hard over five decades Westford has
worked, and I went through gas shortages
[1:46:32] in the mid70s, the awful early 90s, we
never made funds in the roaring 80s
[1:46:39] because of the limits that we had for
where we could invest town funds and
[1:46:44] that was because that was prudent and
that was legal. We went through the
[1:46:49] awful 90s, 2004, 2008. We've had so many
setbacks and I can't even believe after
[1:46:56] so hard all the hard work we've done to
keep Westford at a AAA bond rating and a
[1:47:04] fiscally managed community that we would
consider the GIC.
[1:47:10] [applause]
[1:47:16] » Uh do we have another question online or
is that
[1:47:19] » comment online? Uh to anyone wondering
if their doctors are covered by GIC
[1:47:24] plans, GIC has a provider search. Uh
Health New England.org/gic
[1:47:31] provider search. You can look it up on
GIC's website.
[1:47:36] » Great. Gentleman at the mic.
>> Uh just have a question from Mark from
[1:47:40] hub. Um
what does the health insurance trust
[1:47:46] look like it's going to do
year-over-year for the next three years?
[1:47:51] That's a big question.
>> Yeah. So, so Mark, uh, let me take that
[1:47:55] first and then if I I need to interact
or you need to interject. So, um, the
[1:48:00] health insurance trust looks at the
rates every year. Um, health insurance
[1:48:05] across the board and every municipality
or any private sector in the US really
[1:48:10] is going up year-over-year. So, we are
tasked with ensuring that our trust has
[1:48:15] enough funds to make sure that we can
afford our health insurance, but we
[1:48:20] generally don't look 3 to 5 years out
because the trends are changing so
[1:48:26] quickly and the medical is changing so
quickly. Mark, I don't know if you have
[1:48:30] anything else you wanted to add to that.
>> Yeah, no, Chris, I think that's well
[1:48:35] said and and that's why we have to meet
with the trust very regularly. So we
[1:48:39] meet um many times during the year to
review the financials, review claim
[1:48:43] trends, specifically what's going on
with Westford, but also what's going on
[1:48:49] in the overall healthcare economy. Um
and uh we we take all that data just to
[1:48:56] help us forecast in advance. Um the best
I could do as far as forecasting the
[1:49:02] next three years would be you know
honestly just looking at general trend
[1:49:07] but you know your group is although it's
a large organization it it can
[1:49:12] [clears throat] it's more of a roller
coaster as far as peaks and valleys of
[1:49:15] where the healthcare costs go and and a
lot can change between now the next
[1:49:20] three years. So, you know, as Chris
mentioned, the health plans trust has
[1:49:24] been very um healthy and as the previous
um um questioner had mentioned as well.
[1:49:32] And um you know, again, that's the
trustees are very well educated and they
[1:49:38] do their best to keep their finger on
the pulse of what's going on in the
[1:49:42] healthcare industry and their own plan
to help make sure they don't ever run
[1:49:47] the deficit in the future.
So, there's no dollar amount look
[1:49:53] looking forward.
>> No, we definitely factor in health
[1:49:57] insurance um expenses in our five-year
projection that we do. Um and Dan
[1:50:02] O'Donnell can speak to that a little
bit, but there's no specific number that
[1:50:05] we can give you.
>> Okay, thank you.
[1:50:10] » Uh great. Thank you for the question.
How are we looking online for questions?
[1:50:13] Are we clear there or we have one in the
way?
[1:50:16] We do that.
>> Okay,
[1:50:20] » we have a comment. Uh, this is only one
of the GIC providers, the same gentleman
[1:50:23] who posted the prior um the prior link.
Uh, one of the GIC providers and that is
[1:50:29] based solely in Western Mass. That is
not accurate. The GIC actually has
[1:50:32] several providers and individuals should
go to www.mmass.govic.
[1:50:43] » Thank you. And that's again what my
colleague Elizabeth was mentioning in
[1:50:47] terms of a great resource if you do want
to learn a little bit more about the
[1:50:50] GIC. A lot of good information there. Uh
are we is that another one or are we
[1:50:54] clear? All right. Any other questions
from members of the audience?
[1:50:59] » Yes, you have your hand raised. Do you
can you come down? Yep. Great. Thank
[1:51:03] you.
[1:51:07] » What happens
what happens to the people that live out
[1:51:11] of state?
I'm sorry just for the repeating closer
[1:51:14] to the mic.
>> What happens to the people that live out
[1:51:17] of state with GIC?
[1:51:24] » So, as Elizabeth stated, there's many
different options on the GIC website
[1:51:29] that um there's more narrow networks for
people who live in Massachusetts.
[1:51:32] There's wider networks for people who
live out of state. The costs do change
[1:51:36] based upon which plan you choose and
which network you're in. Does Westford
[1:51:41] still cover us?
>> Would Westford still cover you if we
[1:51:45] went to the GIC?
>> Yes, there would be an employee
[1:51:48] contribution and an employer
contribution. Yes.
[1:51:53] » Okay.
[1:51:56] » Yeah. Once again, um refer to
Elizabeth's uh comment. Um you when you
[1:52:02] go and look at the FY27 plan offerings
on mass.gov gov for GIC. It will give
[1:52:09] you a PDF that shows how the GIC plans
are made available to where you live in
[1:52:15] the state of Massachusetts, outside of
the state of Massachusetts, and when
[1:52:18] you're within the state of
Massachusetts, it even breaks it down by
[1:52:21] county. And then it will show you which
of the the different insurers are
[1:52:25] available to you depending on where you
live. So, that information is there um
[1:52:29] if you are so interested in in looking
into it. Uh any other questions at this
[1:52:35] point from members of the audience? Are
we how are we online? Clear online.
[1:52:40] Okay. Uh do we have any closing remarks
from members of the select board before
[1:52:44] I ask for a motion to adjurnn? Yeah,
>> sure.
[1:52:53] So, it's come up a couple times about um
the tax working group and I am the
[1:52:58] select board who uh select board member
who is a part of that group. Um so, it
[1:53:03] is it is up to me to really know some of
these dates. So, I just wanted to um let
[1:53:08] you know that our report's going to come
out in September. That's the the due
[1:53:12] date there. And also that if you're
looking for the most recent time that
[1:53:16] analysis was done um 2018. So just
trying to again if you're looking for
[1:53:23] more information just to land some with
some more specifics of your personal
[1:53:27] questions um those are two things I'll
point you to. Look for uh the working
[1:53:31] group I'm a part of to report out in
September. And uh if you want to know
[1:53:36] more of what Tom was explaining um from
past findings, you're you're going to
[1:53:41] get data from 2018.
[1:53:48] » Okay. Thank you, Elizabeth. Okay. Before
I close out, I just want to again uh
[1:53:53] talk about communication. So uh we have
the ability to subscribe to alerts on
[1:54:00] our website. So you can subscribe to
when a
[1:54:04] board or committee like the health
insurance trust is posting their
[1:54:08] meetings. That's one way of staying
involved. Um we will do our best to
[1:54:13] engage retirees as well. Our HR director
does have email addresses that she can
[1:54:19] send uh information to. If you are aware
of a colleague or fellow retiree that
[1:54:25] you know is not being made aware of
what's going on, please let us know. I
[1:54:29] think the best place for that would be
the town manager's office. Uh again, you
[1:54:34] can get them via phone or if they have
the email address. Um we also are trying
[1:54:39] to really push our social media
channels. So, of course, we post on our
[1:54:43] town website. We have news alerts just
in general that go out through the
[1:54:46] town's news uh website, but we also have
a Facebook page. We have a newly uh spun
[1:54:53] up Instagram. We are on X. So there's
numerous ways that you guys can receive
[1:54:58] the information um in a more passive
sense rather than trying to search it
[1:55:02] out. We will push stuff out to you. Uh
so I I encourage everybody to try to
[1:55:06] make use of those communication channels
and please let your fellow, you know,
[1:55:11] retirees and employees know about those
options because the more we can inform
[1:55:15] everybody about these discussions, the
better off we all will be. And I really
[1:55:20] truly believe that. So we welcome the
feedback. Again, you can email the town
[1:55:25] manager's office or any of the select
board. We really appreciate the time
[1:55:28] that folks took to send out the emails
that they did over the last week or so.
[1:55:33] Um, I did get uh one email that said
something along the lines, I hope that
[1:55:37] AI isn't reading these. Rest assured
that we are reading them and we truly
[1:55:41] appreciate your thoughts and questions.
Uh, it really makes for a much richer
[1:55:45] discussion. Um I do think out of some of
those questions we have put together a
[1:55:49] frequently asked questions document that
is available at the health insurance
[1:55:53] trust website is that what it is and and
the select board packet for this. So
[1:55:58] that is also something that we will
continue to probably develop as this
[1:56:02] conversation moves forward. Okay, one
last call out for questions. Nothing
[1:56:08] online. Um Mark from hub, thank you very
much for joining us this evening.
[1:56:13] Appreciate your feedback. Um, is there
any questions or last words from the
[1:56:17] town manager?
>> I just really appreciate everybody's
[1:56:21] time today um and the emails and
comments. Uh, once again, it is likely
[1:56:27] that the health insurance trust is going
to meet next Thursday afternoon. So, um,
[1:56:31] if you are interested, please mark that
on your calendar now as just a
[1:56:34] placeholder. Um, and again, feel free to
email tma westwardmma.gov. That reaches
[1:56:40] the town manager's office or select
board westwardmma.gov. gov that reaches
[1:56:44] the select board as well as the town
manager's office.
[1:56:49] » Okay, thank you very much Kristen and uh
Mike just pointed out to me um
[1:56:55] you know some of people have done um an
really nice job of framing the concerns
[1:57:00] that they have with this topic and that
in some cases included you know putting
[1:57:05] forth some financial and medical
information in the emails. Um those are
[1:57:11] those can be considered public
documents. So, I just want to caution
[1:57:14] folks that um if you are going to share
information, just keep that that in
[1:57:18] mind. Okay. Um Okay. With that said, uh
I'm going to look for a motion to
[1:57:23] adjourn this meeting.
>> Do I have a second? Okay. All those in
[1:57:27] favor, please say I.
>> All right. This meeting is adjourned.
[1:57:30] Thank you very much for your time this
evening and for everybody who attended
[1:57:33] online. We really appreciate you taking
your time. Thank you.