Appropriations & Oversight Committee — 2017-05-15
Attendance
Robert A. Boisselle ; Donald L. Conn Jr. ; Scott M. Forbes ; Gail Infurna ; Jennifer L. Lemmerman ; Mary Beth McAteer-Margolis ; Monica C. Medeiros ; Peter D. Mortimer ; John N. Tramontozzi ; Francis X. Wright Jr. ; Michael P. Zwirko
Agenda
- Call to Order
- Public Participation
- Orders
- ORDER-2017-156 : Reauthorization of Inspection Services Revolving Account #2658 for FY2018
- ORDER-2017-158 : Reauthorization of Police Department False Alarm Revolving Fund # 2665 for FY18
- ORDER-2017-140 : City of Melrose Operating Budget for Fiscal Year 2018 in the amount of $77,397,009.19 (Seventy-Seven Million, Three Hundred Ninety-Seven Thousand, Nine Dollars and Nineteen Cents)
- Adjournment
Minutes
CITY OF MELROSE APPROPRIATIONS COMMITTEE CALENDAR● MAY 15, 2017 Aldermanic Chamber, Melrose City Hall Budget Hearing 7:30 PM 562 Main Street, Melrose, MA 02176 The public should take notice that the Melrose Board of Aldermen may, on certain occasions, have a quorum in attendance due to standing committees of the Board of Aldermen consisting of both voting and non-voting members. Members attending this duly posted meeting are participating and deliberating only in conjunction with the business of the standing committee. Attendee Name Title Status Arrived Peter D. Mortimer Chairman Present Gail M. Infurna Vice Chairman Present Michael P. Zwirko Alderman at Large Present John N. Tramontozzi Ward 1 Alderman Present Monica C. Medeiros Alderman at Large Absent Robert A. Boisselle Ward 4 Alderman Absent Francis X. Wright Jr. Ward 3 Alderman Present Mary Beth McAteer-Margolis Alderman at Large Present Jennifer L. Lemmerman Ward 2 Alderman Present Scott M. Forbes Ward 7 Alderman Present Donald L. Conn Jr. President/Ex-officio Member Present
ORDER-2017-156 Revolving Fund/Reauthorization Reauthorization of Inspection Services Revolving Account #2658 for FY2018 Recommend Passage Board of Aldermen
ORDER-2017-158 Revolving Fund/Reauthorization Reauthorization of Police Department False Alarm Revolving Fund # 2665 for FY18 Recommend Passage Board of Aldermen
ORDER-2017-140 Operating Budgets (City, School, Regional School) City of Melrose Operating Budget for Fiscal Year 2018 in the amount of $77,397,009.19 (Seventy-Seven Million, Three Hundred Ninety-Seven Thousand, Nine Dollars and Nineteen Cents) Appropriations Committee City of Melrose Page 1 Updated 5/31/2017 1:42 PM
Transcript
▶ 0:03 Peter D. Mortimer: Good evening ladies and gentlemen. This is the Appropriations Committee for the Board of Aldermen for the City of Melrose. It is a committee of the whole consisting of all the members of the Board of Aldermen. I am the chairman Peter Mortimer the vice-chair is alderman Gail Inferna we are joined by alderman Michael Zwirko alderman John Tramontozzi alderman Monica Medeiros excuse me alderman Robert Boisselle again alderman Francis Wright alderman Mary Beth McIntyre Margolis alderman Alderman Jennifer Lemmerman, Alderman Scott Forbes, and President Donald Kahn. The date of this meeting is May 15th, 2017. This meeting is being recorded by MMTV and is available for future viewing on the City of Melrose website and on the Melrose Mass Television website.
▶ 1:10 Peter D. Mortimer: Is there a motion to open the floor? Motion to open the floor. Second. Mary Beth McAteer-Margolis opens the floor for public participation, duly seconded by Alderman Inferna. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed, hearing none, we're open for public participation. If there are any members of the public who would like to come forward and ask questions or make comments about any order before the appropriations committee tonight, please do so now. Seeing none. Motion to close public participation. Alderman Forbes makes a motion to close public participation, duly seconded by Alderman Zwirko. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Thank you. Motion to close public participation prevails. The first order we have before us is order 2017-156.
▶ 1:59 Peter D. Mortimer: It is a reauthorization of inspection services revolving account number 2658 for fiscal year 2018. And we are joined by Mr. De La Russo, please. Motion to suspend the rules so we can hear from proper city officials. Second. Alderman Forbes has made a motion to suspend the rules that we may hear from the appropriate city officials, duly seconded by Alderman Zwerchel. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed, hearing none. Good evening, Mr. De La Russo. Good evening. City auditor. Good evening. You give us a synopsis of this order, please. Certainly. It's an annual event, as we've become accustomed to, for the revolving funds. This is relative to the Inspectional Services Department. They're requesting, respectfully, that Fund No. 2658 be allowed to be reauthorized.
▶ 2:56 Peter D. Mortimer: And what they're asking for at this particular point in time is that the cap be set at $15,000 for fiscal year 2018. The revenues are used for expenditures limited to equipment, contracted inspectors, education and printing. The Director of Inspectional Services will be responsible for our warrants and payments from this fund. And in addition, they're asked that an additional funds be carried forward into the next fiscal year, which is standard. Thank you very much, sir. Are there any questions or comments from the Board of Aldermen? Seeing none, is there a motion, please? Motion to recommend. Recommend. Alderman McAteer-Margolis, thank you, Mr. De La Rousseau. Thank you. Alderman McAteer-Margolis has made a motion to recommend this order for passage.
▶ 3:43 Peter D. Mortimer: Duly seconded by? Second. Alderman Inferna, all in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed, hearing none, this order will be recommended for passage at our final budget hearing in June. Pardon me, that's incorrect. This order will be recommended for passage at our next full board meeting. I'll second it. The next order. That's right, right? Tonight. Yeah, that's right, tonight. Mary Beth Carter, too. Mary Reader, I mean. Mr. Chairman, I'd move that we consider order 2017-153 next. President Kahn has made a motion to take the orders out of order, considering 0217-153 out of order. Is there a second, please? Second. All in favor of taking 2017-153 out of order, please say aye. Aye. opposed hearing none we will take the false alarm revolving account number two six six five out of
▶ 4:41 Peter D. Mortimer: order mr delarusso uh point of order chief chief lyle please uh alderman's worker what's your point of order please is it order one five three or one five eight uh one five three it's in uh number four on in department hearing it looks like it's one five eight on one on something yeah on my computer the order is one five eight but the account is two six six five see this the order formerly known as one five sorry yeah very good we get the idea now we do it uh thank you very much for your point of order alderman Zwirko chief lyle please please proceed thank you uh this has been in place for for several years now it's been a very effective tool for the police department to reduce false alarms and 10 years ago the false alarms are
▶ 5:46 somewhere around 2500 a year this year we're at 981 to date i think it's been a very very successful tool and a byproduct of that it supports the police department's fleet we pay for our service to dealerships when there's a surcharge or and or excuse me uh car washes we We use it to maintain the fleet through car washes, and minor things like wiper blades, things that we don't push off on DPW. Thank you very much. The next, is there any questions or comments? Just a quick question. All these work out, please. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Chief, could you just tell me how the funds actually make it to this account, exactly how it works? Generally, once a month, my assistant, she invoices for false alarms.
▶ 6:35 that we do obviously have a sensitivity to the neighbors and different residents when we have a major storm and there's multiple alarms so we do not even bill we're very very accommodating to the community as far as that the bills go out once a month and then we receive payment and I also understand that there's a form that folks can thought if they're going on vacation in which they would also supply the alarm information in the event an alarm goes off form as as well as through our website as far as folks, we call them vacant houses, as well as if you're going away for a few weeks, the sector officer will go by your home, but the big thing about the alarm registration form is on a holiday week and
▶ 7:16 Peter D. Mortimer: the last thing your neighbors need is your alarm going off for three or four days. All right, well, thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Alderman Search. President Kahn, please. Any changes to this account, Chief, the cap or anything else? No, we're fine at ten. Motion to recommend this order. Mr. Chairman. Second. President Kahn has made a motion to recommend this order for passage, duly seconded by Alderman Zwirko. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed, hearing none, this will be recommended at our next full board meeting. Thank you very much, Chief. You're welcome. All right, the next order we have before us is our City of Melrose Operating Budget, order number 2017-140 for fiscal year 2018 in the amount of $77,397,919.
▶ 8:12 Peter D. Mortimer: And continuing on with the various budgets contained therein, the next budget we have before us is Department 211. It's the Melrose Police Department in the amount of $4,407,228.58. We're once again going to be joined by Chief of Police, Michael Lyle. Thank you. Good evening again, sir. You're welcome. Just a little snapshot of what over the past 10-12 months where the Monroe's Police Department has gone through. This past year we had two officers graduate the police academy, Richard Cooney last November. Dale Parsons this past February. We have two officers retiring, Officer Lenny Ford, most of the folks know him from riding his motorcycle doing his traffic duties. After 31 years, Lenny is going to be retiring on July 1st, on or about July 1st.
▶ 9:15 And also Steve Dennis, he's been a longtime patrolman, 37 years he would have in if he stayed until July 31st of this year. So I wish those two the best in their next chapter in their lives. Staffing levels right now, we have 34 patrolmen. Obviously, we'll go down to 32 come July 1st. Nine sergeants, full lieutenants and myself. Calls for service this past year, 12,912. 46 arrests to date, 109 summonses. Parking year to date, 52, 55 citations, parking citations. And bringing in approximately 183,000 on fines and penalties. Grants this year, we're still running our COPS grant, which is supporting our school resource officer in the middle school. 9-1-1 grants, we have two, traffic enforcement grant, a pedestrian bicycle safety grant,
▶ 10:11 alcohol grant, and a Vesta dog grant, and you're going to see the newest member of the Murrell's Police Department very shortly, he's got four legs. On sad note, 32 overdoses this past year, in 2016. Officers deployed in Naxalone 17 times, and unfortunately we had six deaths in the city, residents one non-resident and if you look at 15 we had three three deaths two residents one non-resident so we're by no shape or form are we out of the woods with uh opioids in this this community and in this region thank you very much sir you're welcome alderman's worker please thank you mr chairman um chief you had mentioned that there will be two um retirements this year and And I also noticed that there's also two positions that are vacant currently that are budgeted for.
▶ 11:06 Michael P. Zwirko: Will those be filled by the retirement? Yes, the goal here is obviously Officer O'Donnell, he has to retire next year, mandatory, on or about March 1st of next year. One of those offices is going to replace him. Stephen Dennis, he could have left several years ago. He's opted to leave this Friday. He's going to retire Friday. We will replace those two with the two new hires. So those vacancies, at least in the salary line, I mean, those are just planning to be filled. who just haven't been named yet yes it's a it's quite a process yep i can understand and i had a question on um the overtime i noticed that the overtime that we've been allotted for 2018 in this budget is actually about 125 000 less than what was actual in uh 2016 and
▶ 11:52 i'm just uh excuse me um about a hundred thousand less than 2017. i apologize i'm just i'm just curious if you feel that that line item is adequate for what potentially could be some staffing you know I could say you know it could be adequate under ideal circumstances but every year I know that we're gonna have an officer injured an illness or a long-term excuse me a long-term military deployment you know this year if you look at our court time it blew up because of a major case that we had going so those are the unknowns and it's very difficult to predict the unknowns i could say yes and you know what more than likely we're going to go over yeah and that's just a fact and the auditor's office has been you know pretty solid with me
▶ 12:35 Michael P. Zwirko: this past 12 months assisting us finding additional funding thank you for the information the last part i just wanted to point out for folks is that we i'm very pleased to see that the administration put a line item in this year for some narcan as you had just alluded to at the end of your testimony you had stated that you know unfortunately we're not out of the woods yet but it's nice to at least have a line item for that life-saving drug so appreciate to see that from the administration this time around i want to thank this board for supporting me on that last year i really do um it's it's it's a life-saving product i will say this that the naxalon that we were using we're still using some of our older stuff now which is going to be phased out into
▶ 13:16 a new form it gives a four grams of a dosage um and one in one application where we were given two and two so uh it'll certainly assist folks uh in their recovery program excuse me program well and thank you for that too so uh those are all the questions i had at this time i appreciate it chief thank you mr chairman thank you very much alderman's work oh president khan please chief when do you anticipate filling those two vacancies we're working now i think interviews are scheduled if that goes right once they go through the interview process and then it's you You know, physicals, psych eval, and then a PAT test. And then we're ready, and then you know what, we're waiting for an academy slot.
▶ 13:57 You know, hopefully Redding does come around, they were going to cancel their academy. I don't know if that's changed for September. By September we would have them in February or March of next year. And your budget is up a little more than 5% and it appears to me from looking at it that that's based on negotiated contractual increases. Contracts, yes. And an increase in the overtime. Yes. And we talk every year about the overtime and there are two ways to deal with this. We can either hire more officers or we can keep incurring overtime costs. And if we remain at the same staffing levels, we're going to have the same issue every year. And with all due respect to your good management, I don't see the overtime going down.
▶ 14:41 Gail Infurna: We're with the same workforce that we have at this point in time. And we have the same discussion every year, but I don't see it changing unless there's more staff, that's all. Thank you very much, President Codd. Alderman Inferno, please. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Chief, for all that you are doing out there, and your staff, they're doing a great job. I do see that we have an increase in the ammunition. want to open up any sort of a subject here but you know is that because of the cost of ammunition has just gone up um you know way back when when they started the gulf war the the price of ammunition doubled and it continues to rise we have gone to some more cost-effective rounds but
▶ 15:26 Mary Beth McAteer-Margolis: it's still expensive and you know we haven't increased that line for a number of years okay thank you thank you very much alderman inferno alderman MacMaster my goal is thank you mr. chairman so I just I just wanted to clarify on the on the staffing chief the two new hires that you mentioned at the beginning are they filling those vacancies that are showing on the on the salary sheet or not they will be Joe on July 1 those two new hires will replace the two have that have exited and those are the ones they've already gone through the Academy no they have they have not no we haven't hired them yet you haven't hired them yet okay so so there's going to be two open seats okay and that with those two new hires we will be at 34
▶ 16:11 Mary Beth McAteer-Margolis: or only we'll be back to 34 but it will be a process right well we're going to lose one next next february officer o'donnell is going to be mandatory he has to retire by honor about march 1st we'll go down to 33. and then if you continue in fall of 18 we have another officer that meets the threshold he has to leave in October so one in one out so is there any way that we can help you in terms of your budget to be prepared for those in terms of getting ready to hire them or getting in slots in the Academy or do you always sort of have to be behind the eight ball and wait until no I think that's a proactive approach is you know it's not often you know when when the officer has to go right so when you know that you should hire in advance and that's what
▶ 16:56 Mary Beth McAteer-Margolis: doing we just didn't anticipate officer dennis deciding to leave there's probably three other officers that meet that threshold now that you know that reach 32 years and they can go and are all of these um officers on in the regular budget or when you mentioned like the um the cops grant is that one officer that's on that grant or officer cooney was hired under the cops grant to fill a vacancy that occurs when we put an officer at the middle school right our sro mr bill higgins and that's the only position that you have that's outside the budget yes well that is going to be shrinking too that's a three-year program okay so we should be thinking proactively in terms of next year the end of the end of this fiscal year for replacements is what you're
▶ 17:42 Mary Beth McAteer-Margolis: telling us i would think that we'd probably have to do something in you know the spring january of next year okay and i do um think uh president khan is you know well versed in turn in discussing the over the overtime is obviously affected by well there's two ways to manage the police department with overtime or additional bodies and you have to weigh both values and then the only other question i had was on the um nexon how many doses do you get out of like for each how much does each dose cost you have two thousand dollars budgeted you said it was used like 17 times is that adequate for that yes but we also had a big we had a large donation to us that's why you see that line item so strong okay um so we're very fortunate this the new uh type of max loan i do not know that cost
▶ 18:31 Peter D. Mortimer: we're paying about 20 a dose right now it's come down dramatically we're buying it through the department of public health now okay which is a pool buying throughout the state great well thank you um and thank your officers for for all of their there's a number of them behind me yep thank you gentlemen thank you for saving those lives thank you ladies and gentlemen is there any further alderman wishing to be heard supposed to move bottom line second we have a motion to move the bottom line from alderman forbes duly seconded by president khan all in favor please say aye aye any opposed hearing none this budget we recommend it for the board Chief, would you like to introduce the new canine unit?
▶ 19:14 Yes. I think if you bring him up into the center circle here, the cameras for the people at home would be able to see him better. This is Officer Brian Traynor, he's our new canine handler. How you doing? I'm your partner, this is Nero Ambrose. Nero is his birth name, his American name is Ambrose. His what? Nero is his birth name, Ambrose is his American name. Amro, oh he's beautiful. They've gone through approximately eight weeks of training, they're half way through phase one of full training. They'll take a few months off. Yeah, smell my cough. Is he a shepherd? He is a shepherd, it's a long-haired dog. Long-haired, it's beautiful. Big face. Very beautiful dog. Awesome dog. All in favor of recommending this budget, please say aye.
▶ 20:11 Peter D. Mortimer: Aye. Any opposed, hearing none, it will be recommended to the full board. Motion to recess. Motion to recess, Mr. Chairman. Alderman's Worker has made a motion to recess the Board of Aldermen. It was duly seconded by President Kahn, by way of explanation for the people in the room and the people watching at home. Tonight we also have scheduled a full board meeting, and we are going to start that now. It was scheduled for 7.45, so we have finished the last order. We're going to start the full board meeting. And later this evening, we will return to the remainder of the appropriations meeting, primarily on budget hearings. Motion to recess, all in favor please say aye. Aye. Any opposed, hearing none, appropriations is in recess, full board will start now.
▶ 55:00 It is the assessor's office in the amount of $340,496.32. To Wilcox, would you join us, sir, please? Please proceed, sir. What I want to do is just outline some of the upcoming projects besides local taxation that we're completing in the assessor's office with this budget this year. We're looking to migrate the assessing database from an internal server to a cloud environment for better field use. We're looking to develop new online tools for our assessing webpage. We plan to drastically increase the numbers of online tasks for residents and promote a 24-7 government. We're also going to deploy change detector software, which is from our last flyover that was done about a month ago. this software does is it allows us to see any addition or deletion of a
▶ 56:01 building outline down to 144 square feet another project we're going to do is we're going to start to digitize all our records we're going to scan and geo reference every plan deed and assessing map and other assessing materials in the office we're also going to create the city-owned database so any property owned by the city controlled either by the board of aldermen the school department or the conservation commission will have the scanned plan deed and field cards and any other materials so that any public official can go in and get all that information very easily and lastly we're going to continue to work with city departments to simplify tasks using technology thank you very much mr wilcox president khan please so uh it appears your budget is up
▶ 56:55 about three three and a half percent this year it's it's up a little over eleven thousand dollars is that correct that's correct and it looks like uh the increases in the salary lines for the most part is that correct that's correct um it's uh sad to say that one of our long-term staff members will be retiring in the spring and this is to adjust for any uh vacation time owed or anything owed for the change in staff okay and you have three full-time employees in your budget is that correct it's not correct currently we have uh two full-time and one three-quarter um okay and after this retirement what's your staffing level going to be i recommended we had three full-time uh employees including myself everybody is all salaries that are paid by your department are
▶ 57:40 contained within your department budget is that correct that's correct we we have um three board members which have stipends uh those are the only additional and everything is paid out of our budget and it looked like the only other thing that i took note of and maybe other people were more more thorough than i am but uh it appeared that you switched ten thousand dollars from your profession from your reval to your professional services could you just explain that transaction please sure i felt that some of the professional services um line items should not be covered under the revaluation mainly the scanning project it doesn't necessarily mean revaluation when we're looking at city-owned properties but it's something we have to do by law so i switched ten
▶ 58:19 dollars i re uh ten thousand dollars i reduced the line item in revaluation and increased it in professional services for a net zero change thank you those are all the questions that i have mr chairman thank you president khan any further alderman wishing to be heard seeing none there's If there's a motion to recommend this budget for passage by Alderman Zwirko. Second. Seconded by Alderman McAteer-Margolis. All in favor of the recommendation for passage, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Hearing none, this order will be recommended for passage. Thank you very much, sir. The next budget we have before us is budget number 241. It is the Inspectional Services Department in the amount of $257,036.69.
▶ 59:03 Mr. Johnson, welcome. Good evening, thank you, Mr. Chairman. Good evening, sir. Good evening. It's been pretty busy lately over the last couple of years, to say the least. To present time, we've issued a little over 2,900 permits for a total revenue of $526,000 for FY17. And it's quite busy and we anticipated to keep going through the summer anyhow thank you mr johnson president codd please and mr johnson again as with the prior department it looks like you're up just a little over three percent in your budget and then i think in your budget it's about eight thousand dollar increase um and do you have any of the dreaded not in the not in the city budget salaries in your department no sir so all
▶ 1:00:03 Michael P. Zwirko: All of your salaries that are paid by your department are set forth in the budget that's before us. Yes, sir. And it's yourself and Ms. Alfin's position and the two inspector positions, is that correct? That is correct. That's all I have. Thank you, President Kahn. Alderman Search, please. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you for being here tonight, Mr. Johnston. I just wanted to say I know how busy it is in your department, and I greatly appreciate the work you do to be responsive to either concerns that come in from residents, respond to you know an issue that's going on with a permit and even you know helping out contractors as well so you know it's interesting to see in this current market when you have the house prices go up as much as they do people
▶ 1:00:43 Michael P. Zwirko: tend to improve their own home rather than find a new one to buy so I can certainly understand why we're getting nearly half a million dollars or over half a million dollars in receipts so testament to the work that's going on in your office too so I appreciate that thank you very much you're welcome the Question that this came up and apologies if you can't answer it, but this came up in the mayor's speech when he presented the budget There's some upgrades that are coming. Is this to your office? For permitting we're in the process of working on a new permit tracking system. That is correct. I actually had a Close to three hour meeting today on it. Okay with some training involved. We anticipate rolling that out internally
▶ 1:01:23 sometime end of June with a public rollout two to three months after that you know we we anticipated trying to roll it out at the same time to the public and and I thought about it I gave it a lot of thought and we decided to keep it internal we call it the office side for at least two months so we could get fully acquainted with the system so when you get those calls we'll be able to serve the public better with the right answer and not have to look through a book or through some website to find the answer for them so we want to know the system inside and out upside and down that way when we do have that call from a contractor or a homeowner down the road saying hey I'm trying to put this permanent you know we
▶ 1:02:14 can give them the correct answer and take care of bless you and take care of it in a matter of minutes right and so you'll be able to respond through the system as well is that through through the system or by phone if they call typically in those instances will end up having a phone call as they do now with the with the website the city's website and what them trying to find their permanent information I see you on your computer now let's click on it and do it together and I walk them through it sure and in the system that we're about to employ is that a system that is common amongst municipalities meaning if I have contractor from you know danvers that comes down to do work i mean is it just something that
▶ 1:02:56 generally they they should be familiar with those are just user inquisitive intuitive each each system um is i think this company provides roughly to about 14 other towns or 13 other towns so if they're already registered in one of those towns they don't have to register here they that that database is used for all the towns good to know all right well thank you that's all the questions i had mr chairman thank you alderman Zwirko alderman inferno please thank you very much mr chairman but um as alderman Zwirko was answering his question asking his questions mr johnson answered mine so thank you thank you alderman inferno alderman MacMaster margolis um thank you mr chairman um thank you for being here this evening mr johnson um is the cost of
▶ 1:03:44 Mary Beth McAteer-Margolis: that um new program new software included in your budget is that the new professional services is that no no we have that covered under um the capital outlay i believe it's the capital outlay okay and that will allow um contractors and homeowners to to apply for permits online eventually eventually eventually yes and is it something that then like the public can review i mean if your neighbors it's going to be efficient they can look it up and say oh let's see it'll be fully functional it'll have um i think it actually will have a better interface with the public um than the one we have currently it'll be a lot of user friendly and you anticipate that it will be somewhat equal in terms of the workflow it won't increase it or necessarily decrease it
▶ 1:04:32 i hope it to decrease it you hope it decreases it yes okay great thank you very much thank you Alderman McAteer-Margolis. Alderman Forbes, please. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Just a quick question. 2,900 permits is quite impressive with the number that you stated for us for the past fiscal year. Is that higher, a lot higher compared to last year or the year before? That's to date for FY17. For FY16, I had a total of between plumbing gas, electrical weights and measures and building code building 34 a little over 3,400 and then these are done Monday through Friday or is it seven days a week Monday through Friday Monday through Friday so I mean you're doing about at least well an average average building project would take three building
▶ 1:05:29 Peter D. Mortimer: inspections to electrical inspections to plumbing inspections and to gas inspections sure okay so my question would be are you approaching maximum capacity for what you're able to handle now or do you still have room as far as additional staff later on uh more the potential to even have that discussion i have that covered under my professional services you know as things fluctuate because it is a moving you know where we're down from last year it could go up next year or you know the next two months could shoot me through the roof it just depends on what happens but i have that covered through my professional services uh budget where i have an as needed building inspector that comes in uh that's basically on call right now you know
▶ 1:06:16 Peter D. Mortimer: typically right now he's roughly about two three days a week which is why that line item is important for you because it provides you the flexibility that you need yes yes all right it makes physical sense to do that yeah great thank you mr chairman thank you alderman forbes seeing no further alderman wishing to be heard alderman's worker makes a motion to recommend this budget for passage duly seconded by alderman forbes all in favor please say aye aye aye any opposed hearing none this order this budget will be recommended for passage thank you very much mr johnson have a good evening thank you as well thank you thank you the next budget we have before us is budget 135 the auditor in the amount of 355 114 dollars and 33 cents good evening once again mr delarusso
▶ 1:07:01 Good evening. The fiscal year 18 office of the auditor's budget is 2,915.19 less than what was budgeted for fiscal 17. The salary category of the budget reflects contractually agreed increases from FY17. We have eliminated the allocation for overtime expenditures completely. The contractual category of the budget for professional services has been decreased by $3,500 from the original FY17 allocation, as the office transition is now complete, and the other charges category of the budget continues to be funded at the same level as FY17. Your support of this budget request is most appreciated, and thank you for allowing me to be here this evening. Thank you, Mr. De La Russo. President Kahn, please.
▶ 1:08:07 Peter D. Mortimer: Yes, so your budget is actually down a bit, and it's because of the economies that you just indicated. And also, we had three long term employees who retired in the last year and were replaced by others, is that correct? Yes, so that you're absolutely correct, Alderman Kahn, it's exactly what happened. Nothing further. Thank you, President Kahn. Seeing no further, Alderman wishing to be heard. Alderman McAteer-Margolis has made a motion to recommend this budget for passage. Second. Duly seconded by Alderman Zwirko. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed, hearing none, budget 135, the auditor's budget will be recommended to the full board for passage. Thank you very much. You're welcome, sir.
▶ 1:08:47 The next budget we have before us is budget 942. It is the stabilization funds in the amount of $100,000. Please proceed, Mr. Delarosa. Yes, thank you. We, we call on this community foundation stabilization fund that currently it has 1,814,078.93. We're asking that an additional 50,000 be appropriated to that fund, which will give it over 1,864,000 if so approved. The second part of this request is to fund the OPEB, Post-Employment Benefits Trust Fund, $50,000. Currently that balance is $259,112.05 and that would again provide it with a balance of over $309,112.05. Thank you, sir. President Kahn, please. Yeah, so we're approaching $2 million in our General Stabilization Fund, is that correct?
▶ 1:09:54 That is correct. And is there a point in time where you foresee ceasing to make payments into this fund on an annual basis? Through the Chair, probably not because it's part of a formula that's used to maintain continuation with the budget. As the budget goes up, so does the need to maintain reserve levels. So that helps complement the increased budget every year, and it keeps us essentially in balance. And the other portion that we're funding here is this OPEB obligation to the tune of $50,000 for this year. And my understanding is that funding this budget on an annual basis is something that the bond rating agencies are very interested in seeing, is that correct? absolutely correct and i do have a handout if i may be allowed to please thank you
▶ 1:11:00 take a moment i would appreciate it oh you're a working chairman god's not done with me yet and thank you and if i uh may ask the indulgence of the board I would, the first part of the handout, I think it's important that we revisit where we've been with the rating agencies. And in fact, I was here in 2004 where we were an A plus. And I've been blessed to be here since then. And we, as a unit, have progressed to a double A plus. The reason for this chart, before I discuss a little bit more into the actual OPEB, is that to demonstrate to the community that movements to positive credit ratings take time. They don't happen overnight. They take a lot of hard work. This board has participated in that hard work, and I want to thank you personally for that,
▶ 1:12:29 because over the years why we have come together and worked to make this happen this did not happen by itself someone tells you that they're misleading you secondly is that the need once you hit a certain level it becomes very much more important to do whatever you can to maintain that level we are at was considered a triple a level for rating purposes from investors that means even though this chance is double a plus in essence when we as a community go out to bond which we anticipate this november we generally get rates that they only provide for those that are triple a communities so we we have much to be proud of extremely much to be proud of Back in, in the next part of the letter, October 29th of 2013, I approached this board and
▶ 1:13:30 you were gracious enough to allow us to set up this OPEB stabilization fund. What this is designed to do is no different than the pension fund. Years ago, the pension systems were not funded appropriately. What they did is this commonwealth turned around, implemented a program to develop a schedule to fund pensions, which we participate in here in Melrose, and what they're saying is that you have the normal cost. There's two components. There's the normal cost, the cost that we write the check each year to the person that's retired. And there's a part two, which is a liability. The cost, which for those employees that have yet to retire, but down the road, we know we're going to have that obligation to pay out.
▶ 1:14:17 That's generally two-thirds of the pie. The one-third is what's called the normal year-to-year cost. Two-thirds is the big liability at the end of the rainbow. So we've done that for pensions. What's happened is GASB, the Government Accounting Standards Board, has made a determination that cities and towns, as well as the Commonwealth, basically have to consider doing the exact same thing for health insurance. we are required now by law every two years we have to produce a report which goes to everyone in the umbrella for other post-employment benefits every two years it's a mandate we have to demonstrate to the third parties that we have taken this seriously that we are making in a an effort to fund what what is our obligation and they take this into account when they set up
▶ 1:15:15 on rating and they ask for this report we do our official statements to go to borrow they ask for these reports this has now become part of the process the problem we have here is that we are in absolutely no financial position to fund this at the level that was required to be funded at which is in excess of 11 million dollars a year which is almost double if it's not double the pension obligation each year and that's not melrose that's every single community in the commonwealth as well as the commonwealth itself that's the um you know they said the big elephant hide behind the door he's not hiding anymore he's out and now it's it's on us to look at this and say how do we collectively manage this obligation if you look in your packet
▶ 1:16:09 stand and pause i took the last couple of pages from their last report which was dated up in october 23rd of 2015 again they're coming out um this fall to take another hard look and they stress in here a couple important factors um one in particular and it's on on your page five on the very bottom it says that overall we believe melrose's budgetary performance will remain pressured by the city's high pension and opeb contributions in the next three to five years in addition while we understand management has established a trust to address the city's opeb obligation and will continue to pay 100 of the art cost which is the normal cost for health insurance we still believe officials lack a credible plan to alleviate the stress these unfunded liabilities
▶ 1:17:18 will continue to pose on budgetary performance turning the page under the section entitled downward scenario page six they indicate that although unlikely during the two years parameter of the outlook period significant pressure on budgetary performance and flexibility due to rising pension and OPEB costs or significant additional debt issuance could lead to a downward rating action. Let's take that apart. There's three components. The first is they talk about pension. Well, pensions, we have a funding schedule by law that we're adhering to and we're two years ahead of schedule. So we put that over here. OPEB is sitting in the middle. We have debt over here. We have a debt program that we don't exceed 5%, we pay 80% of our debt will be paid within 10 years.
▶ 1:18:15 That's exactly where we want to be, and better. Here's the issue, the OPEB. Sitting right in the middle is this obligation that is looking us in the face now and is also reflected in all our financial statements today that we have to be concerned with. I would ask respectfully that we embrace this appropriation with the knowledge that we as a community are moving forward, A, to, we recognize that we have this obligation, we are not ignoring it, and we are doing the best we possibly can with what we have to address this. But it's not gonna go away. It's of concern to myself and I'm sure everyone in here that's part of our our municipal world the other good thing that this board has done and i want to
▶ 1:19:13 again commend it the way we adopted the opeb trust fund was that should unfortunately we have a shortfall in health insurance liability for whatever reason we will be able to use a portion of this to offset that again it would have to be through this board we're hopeful that that doesn't happen but you do have some flexibility here that you wouldn't have otherwise in other words you maintain control of that fund right here on this board you haven't given it to a third party to manage or control it sits here so having so um any questions i like to i'm here you still have the floor sir thank you i i will support this order but i would embrace it as if it were a a porcupine this is this is a product of higher levels of government bond rating
▶ 1:20:05 agencies and think tanks that live in some alternative universe this is your classic unfunded mandate it is ridiculous for letters to come out expecting with a $70 odd million budget that we're going to be able to allocate $10 or $11 million for this purpose for a fund that's not going to be utilized for years and years and years and years. I understand that we have to report it, we have to support this. And I understand we have to seek the best funds in return that we can get on our borrowing. But this tyranny of higher levels of government and bond rating agencies is improper. And hopefully someday somebody will do something about it. Thank you, President Kahn. Alderman Search, please. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you, Patrick, for the presentation this evening.
▶ 1:21:05 Michael P. Zwirko: You're welcome. Apologies if I get a little wonkish. So, has the Division of Local Services given any guidance with respect to OPEB funding at all? Any relief, any, you know, provisions or forecasting years out? Because as you mentioned, you know, this isn't a Melrose problem. This is a Commonwealth of Massachusetts problem. Through the Chair, you know, there's a couple of things that have been put forward. one item that has been talked about and i don't know how much leverage it's going to get is that in some fashion they allow us to put you know a certain contribution and i don't know what that's going to be outside of a funding schedule but that once the pension obligation is relieved then we would allocate the funds that we would typically apply towards the pension towards this
▶ 1:21:59 Michael P. Zwirko: effort that has been talked about but outside of that um and and to alderman khan's point there is no direct relief of any kind forthcoming and uh you said that if if we approve this uh fifty thousand dollars towards the opeb fund reserve account uh that'll put us at 300 what was the balance 309 000 and and our obligation is somewhere around 11 million yes it's a proverbial drop in the bucket um another question i had and i'm quoting this from the report that you gave us it said although unlikely during the two-year parameter of the outlook period so in the past two years um we have uh maybe maybe maybe some debt has left our ledger but we've also brought some on so as we move forward to the fall and you said that the rating
▶ 1:22:57 agencies will be here do you think that we at least meet um their their comment here in the downward scenario uh paragraph where uh they would have no reason to put us on a negative outlook yeah we're um in the in the cap rate seat on the debt we have a position that is very uh good they've recognized that throughout the report and i think they're anxious for us to continue what we've been doing and not change course and that's their way of saying you guys are doing it right don't change course don't take on a lot of debt because you have other obligations and outside of a debt exclusion it would probably not be advantageous to take on a significant capital project like that thank you and my last question and this is more of a comment and it
▶ 1:23:44 Michael P. Zwirko: might be more directed towards marianne long in human resources but i'm just curious you know we we do have some non-union positions within the city that we hire and I'm just wondering why we haven't maybe thought of making some positions non-pension eligible that might be able to relieve ourselves of some burden additional and you know there are private types of retirement accounts that could be you know matched from the employer standpoint I understand what the union negotiations especially Public Safety and you know our school department you know they certainly work hard for those pensions and it is something that they collectively bargain which I support but we do have some non-union positions and we maybe could alleviate some burden by offering a
▶ 1:24:22 Mary Beth McAteer-Margolis: similar program that many private industries do to those employees has there been any consideration of this I would have to speak with me understood those are all the questions I had mr. chairman Thank You alderman's work oh next in queue we have alderman MacMaster my goals Oh Thank You mr. chairman so So, Mr. De La Rousseau, so we have the annual obligation for retirement, and that's a set amount that we have to put in every year. That's correct. And this is, in addition to this, the other employment benefits, like the health insurance and- Yes, principally health insurance. Right, and did I also understand that you said if we ran short, If we had an increase in our health insurance costs annually
▶ 1:25:13 Mary Beth McAteer-Margolis: that was unanticipated that we could take money from this fund? Again, in part, it'd be related to the retiree portion. To the retiree portion. Because it's designed for that portion. Okay, and if it were necessary that we, if we weren't meeting what the authorities felt was the necessary contribution contribution can we move money from like the stabilization fund into this fund to achieve that you know quite frankly I wouldn't make that recommendation because the two are for two specific statutory purposes this one was set up by statute for the old pavement that has certain rules and regulations that pertain to that if in fact for example you were to move a certain portion over it um would then uh still first of all would never be
▶ 1:26:10 enough i.e or say but secondly now we have distorted our uh positioning as far as reserve levels because that reserve has now been um set aside for a different purpose not in general like the regular stabilization fund right so i think you'd be setting yourself up for some uh possible conflicts in the future but you did say we could like we're already kind of ahead of the game a little bit with the regular retirement contributions that we have to make with the um payments to the perk fund or whatever it is yeah the pension schedule the caveat to that is um the unfortunate part is that it's still subject to market so at some point if you have to rebalance which means you have to read which every two years we do uh uh we actually do that we rebalance and get a uh
▶ 1:27:01 the actuary in to do a new funding schedule at that point the retirement board would have to make a determination can you maintain that two years um relief or do you actually actually go a year or more oh to keep the payment reasonable because one of the things we're trying to avoid in all cases is the spike you don't want to see an increase one year 500 000 in your pension and the next year because our next year are 200 000 going like that so you really try to maintain stability that's important because by if you don't then what happens is all the other operations you have in the city are going to be jeopardized everything goes out of whack very quickly and we have to maintain really comes down to balance maintain balance be constant
▶ 1:27:47 that's what this says you guys have been stable and you've maintained balance that's what this says right here no nothing else more than that other than the fact that you've been prudent in doing it so it wouldn't be your recommendation now or in the foreseeable future to take any of those um retirement funds and put them towards this towards this fund no no even though we're a little ahead of the game in that no i actually wouldn't and i'm also concerned again um back to earlier comments that i don't think that the ball has landed here this is they have let this out there without a resolve that a communities in massachusetts can address because the proposition two and a half right at some point as all the comments is going to be a realization that this
▶ 1:28:35 is not realistic and at what point do you say you know we have to take a second look at this because most communities cannot fund at levels that they've been asked to period and that's not you know an opinion that's fact so they have to do they have to take a look at this hard and make a decision and we meet our annual contribution to the retirement fund every year we have to do we have to put that in every year yeah each and every year you make that commitment and you To meet that obligation, by law, that is the very first bill, the very first bill that has to be paid, even over debt, is retirement, the pension, believe it or not. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Waldman, MacMaster, Margolis.
▶ 1:29:26 President Kahn, please. You may not know the answer, but I have to ask. What's the Commonwealth doing to satisfy its OPEB obligations? I want you to tell me that they have $20 billion in an account. Do you know? You know what? I'd be happy to find out, but my understanding is that they're having the same tug of war that we're having because their number is very, very significant. And for the board's purpose, I will find that out and let you know what I can. And when do we hit our current funding schedule for our pension? I believe it's 2038. Okay, and nobody should be under any misconception that this is not a moving target that will be radically changed by the higher ups when we get to the end of our funding schedule.
▶ 1:30:17 Peter D. Mortimer: That's all. I move to recommend this budget, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, President Kahn. President Kahn has made a motion to recommend this budget be passed and duly seconded by Alderman McAteer-Margolis. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed, hearing none, this budget will be recommended to the full board. Thank you very, very much. Thank you very much, Mr. DelaRusso. After returning from recess, we have completed the totality of our business before the appropriations adjourn. Alderman Zwirko has made a motion to adjourn the meeting, duly seconded by Alderman McAteer-Margolis. All in favor of adjournment, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed, hearing none, the Committee on Appropriations is hereby adjourned.
▶ 1:30:55 Peter D. Mortimer: Thank you, one and all.