Finance Committee Ad Hoc Budget Document Subcommittee Aug 28, 2026

continue. All right, you're good. This is the August 28th Finance Committee ad hoc budget document subcommittee. Um, so I will call on everyone to make sure they can hear me and be heard. Um, Kathy, >> yes, here. >> Councelor Breivik >> here. >> All right. And we have Sean here as well. >> Mhm. >> Great. Um, all right. So, we are called to order at 10:00 a.m. Um, how I don't know how folks want to proceed though. I I actually had to go back and listen to our last meeting because [laughter] it had been so long since we had met. Um, and it seems like where we left off was a whole long list of items that Shawn had that you were going to report back to us a bit about on those and whether they were, you know, feasible, um, whether they were going to add work, help things out a little bit. And then I had followed up with the charter review folks and Kathy, you had sent out another message to counselors. So, we sort of had those pieces to bring back together. Um, and then I just wanted to ask like time timelinewise, where are we hoping to be at the end of this meeting? Like we need to report back to council um and and submit a report. I'm just not 100% sure on what our, you know, where we need to be at the end of today. Yep. Go ahead, Kathy. >> Um, you know, just on responding to that, Kathleen, um, not on the earlier part, but in theory, we were supposed to report back to the council on the 31st. Yeah. So, but we can postpone that final date. So, you can you can write a very short email. >> Okay. that says um you know or you can make it an attached document for for that says um we've started meeting we have some and then when we finish today some thoughts >> okay >> but we need to bring it back to the finance committee so we're asking for an extension >> okay all right >> can I just add too that that 31st meeting is not a not a regular council meeting anymore anyway so it was um turned into a work session on Hampshire College. So, we wouldn't have been able to present at that meeting anyway. >> Okay. And then we won't have a finance meeting until the 15th. So, we can bring it to finance then and then subsequently to the council, >> right? So, we could um I don't know whether you have the council schedule, but we could expect to Well, Athena here, so I'm just looking at council. Um council meets on the September 28th. So, we could say we expect to be able to report back on the 28th. >> Okay. Yep. And the idea is that we would submit that I would draft um a a short written, you know, a written report with some of our conclusions and suggestions and our process and then we would we would bring that I could bring that to finance on the 15th and then look at it with everybody and then from there go to council. Does that sound right? >> Yes. >> Okay. and just let me know. I'm here as your backup to review or work on the draft. So, just >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We can do that. We can work on that together. >> Yeah. Feel free to send it to me like just a, you know, a few days before the maybe before the finance committee meeting. I can take a look at it. >> Great. >> I thought your recall on where we would be today is is sort of in Sean's lap. And what I can't remember is way back at the very beginning of this I sent in some thoughts and and and it was around and I don't remember whether I ever shared it with the two of you. I sent it to Sean, you know, but it was like what things could potentially be in the executive thing and we did talk about it. We talked about it verbally and which tables I thought were particularly important and what tables might be missing. And then the other thing Sean had asked us to do is to go through the departments where they give that very detailed list of activities and he said that's time consuming. So >> identify those that we think are useful and I did that in that very first thing. So just as a refresher um >> Yeah. Yeah. And in our last meeting we talked about that document but I can't swear that I've actually seen that document that you drafted. So, if you could forward it to me and maybe Jill, then we could um I could make sure that you know that the details of I have the general sense from our verbal conversation, but I think maybe you have some specifics there that would be helpful. So, >> yeah, I did do specifics and >> Kathy, do you want me to see if I can find it quickly and send it to the group? >> And I sent it, you know, sort of shortly after that very first beating of ours, so in July. >> Yeah, I'll take a look for it and send it out to the group. You may have said I mean this this summer has been kind of a black hole. So >> well and and the the thing I tried to do when I said table I said the table on page X you know of you know so um sometimes I couldn't say page X because no there were always a page number you know so you know examples are things the count of employees. >> Yeah, >> you know they were pretty obvious kinds of tables to and they were things that I always searched for. where I knew they existed, but the current indexing and Mandy's one comment um one overarching was to the extent there were page numbers listed at a minimum, you know, she was sort of looking at when does uh safety start, you know, where is crest, you know, just and Sean had just talked about how because it's a collection of PDFs, it's difficult it page numbers after the fact, but it's difficult to index. And I don't know I don't know the capacity of word, you know, and the thing about the PDFs is they've got graphics in them. >> Yeah. >> So that also doesn't uh he just sent it to everybody. >> Oh, great. Okay. >> So anyway, that's what I did. I I would responded to as specifically as I could. And the one thing I noticed in the charter comments you got, >> yeah, >> I can't think of an easy way of addressing this is some people found it difficult to have to look at a capital plan report and you know capital is not buried in the current budget book. just shows up as total spending and shows you by cash versus debt exclusion, but it doesn't show you a list of projects, you know, and you know, so I have no idea um how to rectify that other than to make sure there's a hot link in a document because the capital plan gets way too detailed. And the thing about that is in the report since I'm on all these committees, the debt service schedule is in the report, the main report that drives a big chunk of capital spending every year. You know, how much have we already committed to is sitting there. Um whether people find it because I think it's the last page of the report, Sean, you know, so it was one of those >> and the capital plan is linked. Um that was one of Paul. So when I update you guys on the different things, Paul that was one of his comments was I mean we can add the school budget, we can add the library budget, we we link to them because they are in themselves long documents and if we add the school budget, you know, we'll go from 200 pages to 300 pages and they're different formats because they're different elected bodies that have, you know, kind of decide what format they want their budget in. So, it's it's going to be it's not I don't think there's ever going to be a way where we can force the schools to develop a budget in our our format, nor would we want to be forced to develop a budget in their format. Same thing with the library, right? Um but we could certainly add them as an appendix, but right now we just sort of link them. Um thinking that's probably the easiest. >> So, what I mean I I went to the charter folks, there was not substantial feedback in terms of anything specific. It was very general. And then Kathy, you had gone to council and it sounded like you got we had I know I saw the feedback from Mandy. There was no additional We don't have we don't have new information to bring to this group today, right? >> No. Sam sent comments right at the very beginning, but most of him was say was saying how much he likes the report. You know, like don't don't mut what he thinks is a very robust report. Um, >> yeah. >> And >> so, so what makes sense here today is Sean, do you wanna, you had left with that list. Um, Sure. >> Do you want to start with that and sort of tell us what what thoughts you have on those items and where we should go? >> Yeah. And let me um Jill, I don't think you were at the last meeting, so let me just quickly go through like the highlevel items first just to recap what are the major areas and then I'll I'll give the feedback on each one. So, um, the first high overarching recommendation was to relocate critical data. Um, you know, moving things forward to the executive summary, that kind of thing. Um, the next one was to condense the executive summary, making it easier to digest for the public, maybe not having, you know, the letter from the top manager in there, things like that. >> Um, third was to expand the grant section and include more information. Fourth was to have more detailed line information on the budget pages about you know more specific expenditure breakdowns. Um five was a consolidated spending table um for each department so that when someone looks at a department they can see general fund spending, capital spending, grant spending kind of all you know one spot. >> Can I just ask you on that would you be able to show >> pension and health insurance also? I mean I don't know that because it's because it's an >> we could and we used to but it's just an allocation. It's just an like we don't directly tie those they have a you know they're we have a health insurance account we have a pension account. So the only way we would do it is we'd say what are the salaries and then break it down proportionally and you know it wouldn't actually reflect do the people actually have health insurance in that account or it would just be a an allocation. So, um, we could do that, but it it it's up to you. Well, I think we have to talk about the value of it, I guess. >> So, so while we while we're on that, could you if you can't do that easily and it's particularly difficult, >> not hard. It's just is it meaningful because it's >> well the only thing >> not truly the cost associated with that department. Same thing with pension, right? a department might have um you know more or less pensionable employees or more >> just that if you have a $700,000 department and there's another $400,000 in health insurance and pension everyone thinks of it as just that little slice because they can't see it. So, and I know the um it varies because not everyone is p is benefited first of all the if the hours below 20 and health insurance it's it's a real challenge because it depends on what kind of plan they picked you know both individual or >> Yeah. And we wouldn't want to be we wouldn't want to get to that granular of a level um for budgeting because then that would be like budgeting each department's health insurance separately and we don't do that. >> Yeah. No. And that's too but you do do it for the enterprise funds. So I don't know if people have looked at it but when you do enterprise funds they carry the costs of the pension and the health insurance. So you can see benefit and it's just so you know if there's any way even in the executive summary where it's not specific it says on average >> of >> I mean we could give you a a cost uh a indirect cost rate for example I mean for every every dollar of of benefited salaries you know it's a 80 cents for health insurance and and pension we could easily give you that >> or you could just say adds you know adds 45% or do it you on average it adds. >> Yeah, we could definitely do that. >> Okay. And so it's just one that it's you don't see the total cost of a department when you've excluded something that adds I mean you can really see it in the enterprise funds. I think we're up to it adding almost 50%. I mean this is not a small ad >> and I'm just doing the whole thing workers comp and there's but the two biggies are health insurance and pension >> you know and then the so just when you're doing departments and schools the schools what we the this is mainly the elementary school the elementary school we carry the pension costs of the the the people who aren't teachers um you know the the non-eing And then we carry the pension cost for the library. And again, we've been getting those in the finance committee. And so it's a sentence in what was a 29page report last time. You know that by the way, you know, and and it's just because they're big when it's at $2.5 million. Um you don't see it in the school budget at all, you know. >> Yeah. But but similarly, you don't see it in the in the town budget, the town operating budget either, right? I mean there's so the way I like to think about it there there are some costs that are kind of off the top and pension is one of them oped is one of them state assessments um >> right so you don't see it embedded in the things but >> you don't see it in any of the operating budgets >> well in your municipal budget you do show where does pinch it does show up oh no it's a line it's a line in >> yeah because remember that that's not up in the operating right so the school operating the library operating the town operating I'll stressing. >> No, they're they're all treated pretty equally in terms of the costs. You know, the only thing that's really changed over the years that was a a decision by the town and, you know, to support the schools was the schools used to have to um budget for charter and choice and then we we stopped doing that. Um we we pulled charter and choice out and just kind of funded it through the state assessments. Um, so that that was kind of the last big structural change that was made. >> And we pay the town pays the charter assessment for the elementary school, correct? >> Yeah. Yeah, we pay it's part of our state assessments and then the town keeps the uh reimbursement, the reimbursement goes into the general fund as part of the overall picture. >> Okay. Councelor Breick, you had your hand up. >> Yeah. Yeah, I just want to make sure Sean, do you to to apply an even percentage like we're talking about, do you feel like that runs the risk of being more misleading in terms of >> percentage for um >> for benefits of the pensions? >> I think the percentage or or flat dollar amount I I mean it all depends what you're looking at it for. So we do provide that data in one of the financial indicator charts. We show like the percentage that benefits is of total salaries. So you can as sort of a trend over time. So you can see that it's basically growing as a as a percentage of you know salaries over time. Um and yeah I guess it it all depends who's using the data and for what purpose. Um I think it it's we can accurately say you know if our health insurance and retirement costs are $10 million and our salaries are hund00 million for example that you know for every dollar of salaries there's 10 cents of benefits or something like that. Um, and then people could do with it what they want. But >> so we Oh, go ahead, Joe. >> But if you're not tracking it by department, it does it runs the risk of being inaccurate and then and then one figure that I know. Yeah. And I just don't know how much if people will like easily understand that >> again the data it may be better in like the financial indicators presentation which is more planning and higher level and then again folks can use if they you know I get Cathy's point Kathy wants to be able to say the police department doesn't cost $5 million it costs $7.5 million right and crest doesn't cost $800,000 it costs you know 900,000 so I get wanting to understand the truth true total cost of a department right um so we can certainly provide that information but just I think your point is because we don't budget that deep I mean we do budget we know who gets it but in terms of our accounts we don't budget by department we budget total health you know total HMO plans total PO plans that kind of thing >> right so then maybe it's just making really clear that it's an allocation just getting a clear note >> they used to do it I mean it was it did that they did an allocation like that in the old town median budget books >> town meeting used to have it as a last couple pages, you know, just so you could see it. So I'm less I guess I'm less concerned about the department level and more so in the executive summary which we're shortening if that chart on benefits could go in there you know that you already have for indicators because the the issue for me is because of what's been happening with health insurance. It eats up >> it's been eating up almost half of our three and a half% revenue growth. You know, so giving people the public and the council a sense we think we're getting 5 million more a year or three and a half or whatever the number is. The projection and health insurance is about to take half of that is is is something people have to keep in mind when they're talking about um where the the crunch is coming from. >> Right. Okay. Well, re related to this, I was curious instead of having some of this detail in the departments, is there any benefit to having more detail in the employee benefit section? Like is there is are there any natural ways in which you do break down that employee benefits information that would like would it fit there better? or are there, you know, is there is there work you're already doing or buckets that it's already in that you could show us? Would that help at all? >> Yeah, I mean, I think we talked about getting rid of the staffing charts in the budget pages because, you know, they're not particularly informative and maybe replacing them with a different type of chart that keys in on a, you know, an important variable for that department. And so, um, you know, that chart we talked about percent benefits as a percentage of salaries might be a useful chart to put on the benefits budget page, um, for >> and the issue right now, Kathleen, I mean, I think that's in my my suggestion sheet, but pensions is under assessment and health insurance is under benefits, right? We we have two things in very if you want to find pensions you have to know that's called assessment and you have to you have to know that to find it because the first time I opened the budget book I thought benefits meant >> health insurance pensions and everything else and I said where where's pensions and it's just because it's funded in a different way. Um >> and then OPED is a similar thing and we know we know from the meeting um that you missed Jill um when we were having them explained is that there's a point at which the assessment for pensions going to drop dramatically and then OPED may go up during that time period but once we once we get to fully funded we still will have expense but we're not funding anymore you know so there's a different stream. So there's there's a benefit, but that's in a 10 that's a 10 year and fiveyear look. So I'm just saying that they're in two different places right now. So there may be >> a clever way with a chart in the executive summary or a chart leading. >> We could also do we talked about a more robust staffing section. So the staffing section could be like staffing and benefits, you know, it could have the FTE charts um and it could have the benefit information. >> Yeah. And then we also talked about how there's certain items that you know might might be in the presentation versus the budget book. And it may be that these are naturally completely separate sections in the budget book, but maybe there's an opportunity in the budget presentation to pull something together that shows all the benefits or you know just if if that's like an overarching question that people have um you know some things may live more naturally in that presentation than in the book itself. >> Yep. Yeah. Yeah, because there might be a year where health insurance is not a big topic. Hopefully, knock on wood that year will come soon, >> right? Yeah, it gives you a chance to highlight what what what's bubbles to the top that year. Um, so this was number five on your list that we got off. Um, do you want you want to continue with your >> Yep. Um, number six was highlight key challenges more and connect them to the budget. So that section and for departments um number seven was staffing trends report as we mentioned having something more similar to the schools that's right now we kind of give a a highle table but um and this would be I think at being more position specific eight was condensed revenue and expense reports with more line item detail similar to Northampton. So I it's basically the munish report that Northampton uses that gives a little more breakdown of revenues and expenses. Um and that's what I got. So I don't know do we want to start back at one and just see kind of go quickly each one and see if there's more discussion? >> Yeah, I think that would be helpful. >> So the first one was relocate critical data. Um so in terms of effort that's easy. I think the hard part is making sure that whatever we relocate is kind of like a shared everyone agrees, you know, um that that's a good thing to move, right? Because I think this is an area that could be kind of specific to the reader. Um, so you know, I think what we would do is we would look at your what you've provided Kathy and any other feedback we receive and then make a decision whether we feel like, yeah, that's a good thing to move for everyone or if we felt like it was maybe too, you know, issue specific for that year, we might not move it because we're trying not to we want the budget to kind of the structure to be stable whatever we move it to going forward. Um, but I think we're definitely open to moving things that are are helpful for folks. >> So, Sean, in terms of that one, like you we talked about Kathy's list. Do you feel like you need more information from this group in terms of relocate critical information or do you feel like you've gotten >> I would just suggest look at Kathy's list and if you totally agree with everything in her list, just send an emails um that effect and if and you could even send it just to me. I just want to make sure, you know, to avoid any deliberation. Um, and if there's anything in addition that, you know, or that you wouldn't do, you can include that feedback and that way I can pull it all together. >> Okay, [clears throat] great. >> So, I have a just a, you know, I'm I'm pulling mine up. >> Yeah, go ahead. >> But I did things like I gave key tables and so you'll see it in my first thing. So consolidated bundle, cut town staffing, long range financial outlook, pie chart showing the share of budget, reserves, assessments, debt service costs, you know. So I went down and said here are the pages of each. So it wasn't a huge list. The one thing I think I added, Kathleen, because you've asked about it more than once and to the extent we can find it, it's buried is the ambulance fund. >> You know, if we have these financial, you know, so it was the grants. So just on this, I had this vision of a short executive summary followed by these tables so that if you uh saw the first 10 or 15 pages of the budget book, you would have uh take you know a take-home kind of message and you'd have key tables. So that's when I went through it. I think total revenues, the allocation by departments. So that's what that was my thinking about moving them out of wherever they are. Um and so we just came up with staffing and benefits, you know. So it's it's a so I didn't know whether on the executive summary, Sean. Um right now it's got the town manager budget message which is like 17 pages long. Uh, we put all of the G goals and bud budget guidelines in there and you get the reason I'm looking is you finally get the spending summary on page 31. You know, I mean, you don't get to and then the other thing it has uh in it that I know was, you know, a guide to how to read the budget, you know, go here, go there. So, I don't know what your think your and Paul's thinking was um about how to shorten it. Yeah. No, I think definitely move the letter out. I think that's something we can do. And quite frankly, shorten the letter. The letter is one of those things that um gets a little longer every year, kind of like the budget guidelines, and every now and then you got to prune it, I think. And so I think we're at a place where I think the feedback we're receiving is maybe it needs to be pruned. Um and the um so we can move the letter out. I think we certainly can move more charts up. the you know the original intent was there's that budget in brief on the inside cover that gives you like the very high level overview of the budget the first page and total budget key changes yeah so we can keep that and then we can shorten up that executive summary to you know five pages or whatever might be >> people aren't I'm sitting here paging through but this is this kind of a thing where you you know see the whole budget and then it's got a list of big things that you might want to know about and the extent people read it by turning over the first cover to [laughter] find >> hope. Right. >> If you're reading it online, you definitely find it, you know. >> Yeah. >> So, um, so yeah, I mean, we're Yeah, we can do that. I think we just have to give some thought. I we've spent a lot of time trying to kind of clearly articulate how the council's goals tie to budget decisions, right? Um, and we just have to think about I we don't want to lose that. I don't believe, but we can pull some of that out of the executive summary. >> And and some of what I thought just so in my the memo that you I didn't share, I guess I should have shared it right away, but is it's not that I don't find that useful, it's that I'm thinking maybe it should be in an appendix. >> Yeah. >> You know, um because it it takes so many pages. Um but since some of what we have one voice who comes to the council meeting regularly saying that the town manager did this that or the other thing and often it's driven by council decisions. It wasn't the town manager often >> in his cave making a decision. Um, so drawing attention to the fact that there's been key points where the council has said what we want the manager to achieve and we've done budget guidelines, I think is useful. It's just it just bulks it up so much. Um, >> yeah. No, again, we could we can think about how to um make a section on on goals and budget guidelines, things that shape the budget. Um, and maybe it's near closer to the back. Um, so yeah, I think the, you know, one overarching piece of feedback that Paul gave and I agree with is we don't want to and and we talked about this last time, we still want the document to kind of conform to GFOA. >> Yeah. >> Uh, best practices around what's what's in the budget and what's not, but I think you have latitude to an extent about where it shows up. Um, we've always tried to, you know, there's usually four sections. You have um your executive summary. You have a um organizational section that describes the organization has the org charts how you know why things are the way they are. That's where a lot of your guiding documents are. Then you have your financial section and that's the meat of the budget with all the the numbers. And then at the end you have your organ umformational section where you just provide data that um can be useful. So there's those four sections are sort of the framework that GFOA and you know uh uh MASBO which is the school budget organization um recommend for how you structure it but even within that structure we you know we can move things around quite a bit. >> Yeah. Oh go ahead Kathy. >> No no you go. you. >> Oh, I was just I was just going to say that it may you know that it's great to have all the information about the council's decisions driving the budget, but it might actually be I don't know if it's at all possible, but it might actually be helpful to have within a department page something that says, "Oh, we added and I think you do this to some extent already where it's like we added these staff to meet council goal." you know, I mean, so that when you're looking at the fire department, you you there's no mystery as to that that's the staff have been added. You don't have to remember it from or have read the, you know, more dense narrative section elsewhere in the budget. You know, that information is there. It's just maybe not in the same place. >> Okay. >> Yeah, I [clears throat] feel like you see that sometimes and it's one of those things that you just wish I wish I saw in every section. I think that's right. And yeah, if there was a category or something that was required, I think that's >> Yeah, I think that that's and and Sean, the what you just did of the the general GFOA, I like that organization a lot. So that info section can be the dense tables. And so for the table nicks amongst us, you know, you know, it's just right now our info section is throughout the whole budget book. Um, so just when you're thinking about it, what And I I really do want to make sure this becomes easier rather than harder for you. >> Yeah, I get that. >> You know, so that if they're tables that you're naturally producing anywhere or that can be spit out of a system because Excel has got them all. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. So in any case, that's just my >> Okay. >> So I think these two first two, this one and the next one condensing the executive summary kind of go together. Um, so moving the more critical tables to the front and moving some of the the, you know, fluff out of the executive summary back. Um, and people can read it if they want to. >> Yeah. And also, I'll just say like having these tables all together. One person mentioned to me that it would be nice to be able to print like the things you want in color all together and then not have to work, you know, and then a lot of it you could just print and buy. So having tables on consecutive pages or in one section that you could then print it all in color and look at it nicely. You know, >> this is this is what I've been doing is literally finding the page I want, printing a page so that I don't have to find it again. Um and uh yeah, so and then I stick it in the cover of the book. >> Jill, Bill Jill, go ahead. One other thing on format and this maybe is not possible but something that a resident has brought up to me several times is having access to the numbers pieces in Excel >> and I know you can't share it in that out in that format but I don't know if there's if that's just maybe food for thought or there's any way to make it such that people can play with the numbers on their own. There are folks that want to do that. I know. I'm [laughter] um yeah, let me think. I mean, we can download budget reports um and that might be something we can just post online or something like that and then folks could grab it there >> if there's a table section and it's not overly formatted. Adobe now lets you go from PDF format to Excel, >> right? But but it loses everything if you've copied a picture in, you know, as opposed to uh import, you know. So there's Yeah. Having struggled with how do I take the table back to a table that I can >> Yeah. >> manipulate. >> No, we can I think one of the later recommendations is the is a report that would probably be something we could make available in Excel and it would give I think a level of that detail. All right, expand grant section and include more information. So, I think um I think the key here really, and we talked a little bit about this last time, is just um I think I definitely agree that we need to to spend some time on our grant section because it's even in the development of it, it's a little bit clunky and I think it's just a section that when we built the budget document, we didn't um you know, it was dep prioritized overall. Um, so I think we definitely need to spend some time there. Um, and I think just having more information about what would, you know, what is the information that we need should include and how, um, we can make sure we try to do that. >> Did I just speak to that or maybe the Kathleen? >> No, go ahead Kathy. >> It's never been clear to me and I'll just use one department or I'll use police. Please have two people funded by a contract and I and unless you go to the listen to them talk about it, it's it's a contract that we don't pay for. That's one example. Crest for a while had a person paid for by a grant. So I never knew whether the count of people >> in Crest included the grant-f funded one which was a precarious >> Yeah. position. So just two two quick distinctions there and and I think the staffing if we are able to do the staffing trends report the staffing trends report breaks it down between general fund grants and revolving so that would um I think resolve that right now we do I think we give a grant number but it's not by department so you wouldn't >> but that would be like what the schools do then you can see some positions are completely funded by >> Yeah exactly um and then but I do want to just uh make the point So, the police have a contract with an outside agency. I know it feels like they're two people that work for us, but they don't work for us. They work for the agency. >> Crest has somebody that we hired that actually works for us, and they're funded by a grant. So, it's it's um just a different >> They're really different. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. And at the time that you're producing the budget book, because the grant section as it exists now, like it has a time frame, right, of like these are the grants that we and and they have sort of a start and end date per grant, but at the time that you're producing that, you you don't necessarily know all the grant money that is going to feed in for that year, right? So that makes it challenging to say we might learn later, oh this department had this grant, but it wasn't necessarily 100% known at the time of making >> a few recurring grants. So I think most time of grants we'll do like a what do we have now and then a look back but there are some grants that we you know knock on wood get consistently the um the big one is um our senior center gets a formula grant from the state and that funds part of a position there um and we've gotten that for several years in a row. So um most of the other ones are you know sort of specific to additional initiatives that the departments are working on. Um, but no, yeah, the time frames are always a little bit staggered because they're not all on the same time frame. Some are federal, some are state, and they have different ones. Some are private. Um, but we'll figure out a way to consistently share that. >> Yeah. I mean I just I think just to the extent that it's possible to give everybody the best understanding possible the total amount of money coming in from various sources and how it's being applied that you know I mean that's the best we can do you know with >> and I think what I've heard previously too is being tying the grant to the departments more clearly so what department is you know where are those funds going what department is use utilizing those funds And I'm going to give some thought to that cuz maybe it's even the grant section or the grants are with the departments as opposed to broken out kind of on an island. >> Yeah. And I think the way it's just the way that the grant fund summary is inserted currently in the budget. I'm not sure it's even searchable like if you search the document. So maybe that's just >> I'm sure that's just a pain to try to figure out. But >> it is. and and where do we so an example of the money flowing in is community preservation act. We have early on we I think even this time we funded part of a planning staff person out of it. Um >> uh >> yeah it to work with housing and other thing you know in terms of housing development and um it it funded it for Sean, you can only remember it funed. >> Yeah, it's been I think it's been three years and then they might have just done the next, you know, the next year of another three-year plan or two-year plan. >> So, when you're talking about the columns, there's, you know, there's grant, there's revolving fund, and there's CPA where CPA only occasionally picks up. We would probably lump the way the schools do it is we we'd probably include CPA with grants um or or so there's usually general fund grants and special revenue funds. So it might be we probably would do maybe more appropriate to be special revenue um for the CPA. Um and we have a few rec department employees who also have a portion of their salary funded with um with the revolving funds. And so they would go in that special revenue fund section, >> but we can um what the schools do is they put a little tag that tells you what what it is. So like for schools, it's like title one, title 2 A. They put a little description next to the FTE so you know what program is funding it. >> I think that's how Northampton has it in their, you know, in their it's in in their budget. it's in the departments where they will show that it's from a grant or it's from and then it'll just have a little explainer and I do think it would be good to have CPA >> either in special funds or maybe not as grant because I think there's a confusing yeah >> yeah there's just a I think there's just a misunderstanding sometimes that CPA is money from outside of our community and you know a portion of it is but the largest portion of it really is originating from within our community so to call it a grant sometimes gives people I think the wrong idea about what it is, >> right? Yep. Absolutely. >> All right. So, are we good on the grant part then? The >> I think so. >> Okay. Do you want to move on to is it the more >> Yeah. So, the detailed line information one. So, um you know, this would probably be the most amount of effort depending on the structure that we go in. So, I've been thinking a little bit about, you know, what level of detail that's more than what we currently provide. Um, and you know, based on what Jill shared last time in terms of, you know, what would be helpful. Um, so I think it's really just going to be a matter of can we get it done this year. Um, and working with the town manager to make sure that he's comfortable with it. >> And can you give me So there's salaries, there's pay. What else are we talking about? >> So I mean, >> we just said we're not doing benefits. So what what's the >> well operate the other costs? Yeah. >> Yeah. I mean it would be breaking down the operating expenses into a more um a more granular breakdown. So there's some things that all departments have that are recurring that we could look to have like a a similar format for. So um utility costs for buildings for example could be a breakout. Um dues and subscriptions um could be a breakout. Travel C. you know, we could have I could think of probably five to 10 types of sub accounts that would cover 95% of the, you know, spending and then we could have an other for, you know, those kind of random one-off things that are department specific. Yeah, I think the idea was map it to how you are already categorizing expenses internally and just you know and and maybe you do it do that in more of a level of detail than you need to present and you can group some things together >> or maybe the other way around but but just that it would like the idea would be that it would line up with kind of how you're already tracking expenses. >> Yeah. And I think that is like, you know, I definitely understand how that can be helpful. Like some departments have to pay a lot for utilities and you don't necessarily know that by looking at the operating costs, but you know, if you look at Jeremiah's facility budget, for example, you know, probably 75% of it is electricity, oil, and water um usage. So you you'd be able to tease you'd be able to see that more clearly um in this. So it's I mean it sounds like for this one there's pretty broad agreement that this is something worth doing and we might just put into our recommendations that we're you're going to take a look at it and some it may come in this year it may come in next year depending on you know it sounds like it's worth taking the time to figure it out and change it once and you know um yeah >> think through it and see what you know and and if that doesn't happen for this budget cycle to me it makes sense to to take the time to figure it out and then change it even if it's two budget >> cycle. And I view it as um and just to again talk through this, I I view it as um replacing some information that's already there. And I'm hoping there might be a way for me to do this in a way that actually might be time neutral. So, right now, the way this is kind of done is there's a a narrative in each section that kind of like talks about the breakout of expenses in the budget. Um, and that's kind of a clunky section that takes a lot of like formatting and it's easy to miss um easy to miss like uh costs, you know, a type of cost in there. So, my thought is this would replace that section and be uniform across all departments. Um, and if we can do it, you know, do it set it up right, that it might be time neutral or save us on having to do a lot of um, you know, editing if we do it right. So, >> so I'm hopeful on that. >> Well, and I I'm just paging through. So, facilities is a good example that um, you break down um, $253,000 in a pie chart with a lot of words. >> Yeah. You know, so if you just had lines, it it would save you creating that picture. >> Yeah. No, exactly. That's that's the section I'm thinking of. We would potentially get rid of and that would give us some space to do something else. >> And then some of these have kind of nothing under that line. Uh it has a huge amount under that. And then >> subscriptions >> and then it's mainly subscriptions. So you look at it, there's an entire pie chart to say almost all of that is pres you know. So it you add just one line to the breaking down and and that I think that makes a lot of sense because it also is a picture >> one less picture. So and then you know the uh operating capital versus very few have operating capital you know so just trying to think through Sean again making it easier for you that you're already tracking it that way. Um and the level of when you see do we need someone operating expenses do we might need to break down $10,000. So so a few people few departments have or 5,000 you know a few have >> yeah very small yeah >> have almost nothing. So >> yeah, we would probably apply the same again the same framework to all departments in ter that would be the most time um effective for our time and the reason is is because we have you know our accounting system is an org and an object. That's the two pieces of our accounts. The org tells you what department and the object tells you the thing. And so like you know for example office supplies is the same object across all departments, right? So, um, it it would be having those objects will allow us to kind of break things into these categories once we settle on the categories. >> Does Jeremy's department, Jeremiah's department now pick up the utility costs for the police building and both of our fire stations? You know, one thing we might do as part of this is um I think we should decide how we want to handle facilities because it's a legacy of um town meeting and just um decisions that were made a long time ago, but it's not consistent. So, so police facility is almost treated like its own department. It's got its own like section. Um, fire is in the fire budget and then fire operating budget and then all the others are like on a building by building basis that we lump together for Jeremiah's facility section. So, it's not done consistently, but it's done the way that the chart of accounts was set up a long time ago. Um, and we've been talking for a while that at some point we should pull the facility costs out of fire and the facility costs out of police and treat them similar to other um, and I'm we were trying to think is there any reason why one reason why I talked to Sonia and they they didn't do that was because they wanted to when you do the schedule A um, for the state you report on public safety expenses and so they wanted those public safety those facility costs to be in the public safety bucket and so that's why it's kind of treated separately. Um everything else is just like a general government like a lumped in a big bucket. So that's why it's set up the way it is. It's trying to figure out there's a way we can for budget presentation not do it that way. Um but for reporting we still make sure we report it properly. >> So is that is that the case with with Mson then too? Like the with the schedule a you report >> you report library separately, right? Like does that >> so Mson is technically >> the the Mson town? >> Yeah. >> Memorial building that the library rents space from, right? Library. It's not their building. It's our building. >> So any of their utilities there would be accounted for in their in their rent, I guess. Yeah. Yeah. And then it's like it would be great at like the way you have it now. Some of these facilities are broken out differently on the quarterly reports, right? Like you see the child care facility and you see and a you know or the Ammer whatever the one of the school one of the old schools is there. >> So it would be good as you're thinking through this maybe to have those two things match you know so that we see it in the budget and we see it on the report. Ideally, what we'd like to do is create a facility section that then has accounts underneath it for each of the buildings. So, you could have one facility section and it would roll up and you could see totals and then break into the detail if you wanted to. And that would make Jeremiah's life a lot easier, too, because instead of managing, you know, 10 different little, you know, different account numbers and things like that, he could have it all in kind of one consolidated format. But um it's one of those projects that's we just have to find time to do it >> and and we sort of see that in JCPC when we get uh um across the buildings. >> Yeah. um he's been given >> that's why we can give you that information because and one thing you'll see new going forward that we're doing now is and this might be the beginning of what I just talked about is we're going to create a new block a new org kind of like just for facilities in general not specific to a building and that's where we're going to put the Wildwood fund funding for now which will be the only thing in that section at this point and it'll that's what'll allow us to give you you know monthly reports on spend ending in use. But if we set it up the right way, that could be like the beginning and then we could add to it over time um as we transition, you know, away from having it separated the way it is now. Um again, you'd still be able to get all the information you have now, but it' all be have the same or as opposed to right now it has 10 different orgs and it's complicated. All right. [sighs] So, the next one I think we spent some time already on consolidated spending table. So, unless there's anything else, but um that's definitely something that we can do. Schools do it. >> Um highlight key challenges more connect to the budget. Um Paul likes that, thinks it could be valuable. Um and that departments, you know, would would like to share that. So, we just have to think about and it'll happen in the next month or so, how we pose that question to department heads. Um, and so I might bounce that off you guys through email before we send that out. Um, staffing trends report. Again, we have a template for it. It's just about time to do it. So, um, if you know, if we can get it done this year, we will certainly try to do so. Um, and it might be, you know, it might be the case that we set up the framework this year, but we don't go back historically and we let it the history kind of roll in over time. That's how we did at the schools. We kind of did the first year and then built upon it from there. Um, so if we can get some history in there, which I know would be helpful, we will. But I think we'll start by just trying to get into the the more positional framework. Um, and then the last one, condensed revenue and expense reports with more line item details. Again, that's just a munish report. So, just got to um, you know, think about I think that's one of those reports that would probably go closer to the beginning of the budget document because it's a nice summary of the of the revenues and expenses. And again, that might be able to replace some of I think there's a a clunky chart in there on revenues that breaks things local receipts down. Um, this would do that. So, we might be able to get rid of that chart. >> Sean, is that something since it's a MUNS report, is that something that would be easy to generate like just a sample? I'm just just curious in terms of describing for our report. Like, >> if you look at Northampton, it's the same one that's in the Northampton report. Okay. If you look at the Northampton budget document near the beginning, you know, there's a very consolidated table that breaks down revenues, then has the their basically the org level, >> okay, >> of each of their revenues. So rolls up the smaller accounts into the orgs by so like fees versus um >> Okay, got it. I know which one that is. >> And then there's an expense version of that too, right after it. >> Okay, great. I can take a look that way I can describe it accurately and record. Okay. So, it sounds like a lot of this sounds like it's doable um either on this budget cycle or the two items I think were a possibility for the future if not for this one. >> Are there any other things that people wanted to bring forward, suggestions or questions? I don't have any other um and I like the fact that you said either this cycle or the next cycle so that we you know that and I think you know in terms of the goal of this is what I agree with what you said Sean is that the changes we make we're willing to live with you know it won't be that we'll think of something new and different next year you know it's it's an ongoing uh document it. And again, I you know, Sam keeps saying we love the budget book. There's It's not that the budget book isn't useful. I find it very useful. I just eight years in, I know where to look for things and I know I know I know if it's not there, I know where to look on the main website for it, you know, in terms of I can walk back and forth, but but that's that not every we shouldn't have to have that that background knowledge. Um for >> and for for new for anybody new to the council um uh you know it probably is a walk through the budget you know the first month you're elected just so you know what's in it you know the last year's budget book um >> and and quarterly reports you know Jill I I think you saw it but Sean has started adding what you asked for definitions of terms you know what what's in this bucket you rather than just a name of it. And I think that's extremely helpful for going back and knowing what we're talking about. Um, >> and Mandy's comments were about indexing the the budget document. I think we can definitely do that. I don't have a ton of experience indexing in PDF, but I know it's not super hard. So, we can right now the table of contents, you can click on the page number in the table of contents and it will bring you to the right page. But I think what Mandy's asking for is can you index like the departments within that? so you can get to the departments quicker and I'm sure um we can do that next time around. And then I just think in the in the report, you know, obviously this came out of the request from the charter review and we should be clear that as you say Kathy, we need to live with these changes that this is this is happening because of a process and we've formed a committee and a subcommittee and we're and this isn't going to be an annual I mean people can obviously always make suggestions but but this is our opportunity where we're making some maybe some big changes and it's not people shouldn't really expect this level of of change on an ongoing basis because of how much work it is um for Sean and his folks. >> Yeah. And when I say live with I mean like I mean every 5 years yeah is reasonable. I mean we can always we'll we will probably continue to make little tweaks here and there every year just based on what we hear from people but I think that you know not live with like we can never change it again but um yeah. >> Yeah. So does it sound so we're our goal is to bring some of this to finance on the 15th right to to take a look as as for the finance committee is the idea that the that the because it's the idea is that the finance committee would then forward on this report to the town council correct so Jill if I if I have a draft and I don't know Kathy you're welcome you know obviously can look at a draft too um I can circulate Jill I was thinking I would try to have a draft by the 8th um and then Maybe you then you could take a look at it and see what feedback you have before we get it to the finance committee on the 15th. Does that sound >> That sounds perfect. >> Reasonable. Okay. >> Thank you. >> And Sean is a quick read, Kathleen. >> Okay, good. So, I can send it to every I mean I can I'm happy to I just >> What does that happen? I don't just not sure of the process with >> No, I'm just mainly saying that if we captured what he what he is committing to I want to make sure we're capturing committed to and so it's just the word smithing of um that's that's that seems right. I mean he usually I shouldn't say this sh but usually [laughter] it's back in an hour you know because he doesn't bother >> depends on the time of the year. Yeah. what it is. But yeah, >> well, I won't expect to back in an hour, but I will definitely share it around so you can everyone can verify that it reflects the conversation and um and everyone's memory. >> I think that sounds great. Um and if you draft it in a way, you know, I don't really need to see it, you know, I've got it kind of um if you draft it in a way that it easily becomes a report to the council then. >> Yep. Yep. That's what I'll do. Then then you then you'll save yourself a lot of >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'll just I'll start it as a draft report to the council and we'll share that draft report with finance after you all have weighed in and then they can edit as you know at make additions or whatever and then we'll pass it along to council. So we don't need to convene again. It sounds like right. We've >> I think you know I I think we we just finished our work unless unless when we meet on the 15th people want us to now take a look at something else. No. >> Yeah. [laughter] Yeah. Yeah. >> No, no, no. I think I think we just finished our work. Um >> Okay, good. Well, thank you. So, I guess we'll take a vote to um we'll take a motion to adjourn. >> Just just a quick note that we're supposed to have public comment. There's no public in attendance, but so just to to note. >> Okay. So, we don't need >> public comments open. There's no public comment. >> No members of the public here. And now we can close. Thanks. >> All right. So, I'll repeat it. There's no We have public comment and no members of the public. So, public comment is closed. Opened and closed. >> And Kathy makes a motion to adjurnn. >> And I'll second it and then we'll take a vote. So, Kathy, >> yes. >> Councelor Breivik, >> yes. All right, I think