Coordinator report March 4, 2010 In support of the proposed thirty town western MA fiber to home Broadband system, the Town of Colrain is proposing, as lead town, a project feasibility study to be supported by a technical assistance grant funded and conducted by FRCOG. I'd like a vote to support and join this request. This is the same service under which Warwick got technical assistance on our Open Space and Recreation Plan. Here is some very good news on the financial front. The first opportunity to "take out" or call the bond debt on the Warwick Community School is in April of this year. The MA School Building Authority is willing to reissue the debt. Initially we saw an opportunity to pay off the state's 70% share and refinance the Town's share at a lower interest rate. The district's financial advisor reports that after paying some fees out of the proceeds from the state we can retire the state's portion, the Town's debt in its entirety, and have about $11k returned to the town out of the deal. We need a vote by the Selectboard to instruct the School Committee to take the buy-out. This is a no-brainer. How can this be? They are reimbursing us the cost of future interest even though we are retiring the debt early with their money. I have been asked to attend the next WCS school council meeting to discuss the physical plant with stakeholders / parents. Mr. Toth has agreed to join me on behalf of the building and energy committee. We have received some complaints about overly aggressive tax collections. Some folks objected to not getting a "grace" period to pay late. Some objected to excise tax bills being mailed in the same envelope with property tax bills resulting in them overlooking the excise bill. A few objected that the collector is greedy. A small number were profane and I haven't responded to them. The vast majority of taxpayers who pay on time don't, I believe, have a lot of sympathy for those complaining about our aggressive collections. It helps keep our tax-rate and borrowing down. That big regional snowstorm that circled the northeast last week has resulted in a call by MEMA for us to submit our associated costs for snow removal and property damage for a potential federal emergency declaration. Tim answered and submitted approximately $34k in costs Warwick incurred for sand, salt, fuel, overtime, hired equipment, vehicle use and damages. The town forest logging on Wendell Road is completed. The forester reports that he is happy with the result and looks forward to following this forest over time and suggests we keep an eye on the red pine to see if it continues to decline or die back. If it does, we may want to continue salvaging it (and letting white pine take its place). We had frozen conditions right up until the end and therefore the loggers, Tom and Sean King, did not need to put much brush in the main road. The road is not improved, but also not worse. Right now the road is blocked by a log set back from Wendell Road. The committee will move ahead with a steel gate in the spring. The sale contract was for $10,020 and we netted after forester management fees $7,279.29 credited to the Forest Revolving Account. The Moore's Pond beach appraisal came in at $13,000 and the cost of the appraisal was covered by donations. There was quite a lot of conflict generated by the press coverage of the most recent Selectboard meeting and the "Hot Seat" headline. As a result I have determined that missing a Selectboard meeting makes extra work. After interviewing each of you and hearing from a number of residents I wrote a letter to the editor clarifying the highway matters discussed. My letter was published and that has taken the heat down some. The board's draft letter to Tim in praise of his response to the village center noise issue is included in your meeting package. We are in good shape on the omnibus budget draft. The big questions are the school budgets, the amount of and how to finance the sprinkler repairs, and money articles. PVRS anticipates having its current 3.62 % budget increase proposal reduced at the March committee meeting. The BEC is proposing to address the roof and chimneys at the Town Hall. I am supporting a proposal to purchase an additional one ton highway truck. And there is the beach proposal. We need to vote to open and set a date to close the annual town meeting warrant. Town clerk is concerned about compliance with required ethics training. The webmaster has posted a link to the test site. Folks should know that they can't fail the test. It won't let you go to the next question until you answer the current one correctly. http://db.state.ma.us/ethics/quiz_MEthics/index.asp The Broadband Enterprise Fund's financial performance is about $9,500 in the black year to date. The Broadband Committee set its priorities for additional build-out. These are: 1. upgrade the backhaul on the cell tower from 900 MHz to another frequency 2. Add 2.4 GHz and move customers to that frequency where we can to reserve the non line of sight 900 for those who can't get anything else. 3. Expand the reach of the system to the unserved areas with additional access point tower sites. At MBI's (broadband institute) request I wrote a letter of support for their $50M "middle mile" proposal to the federal government. It would bring fiber backhaul to thirty of so western MA town centers. This week $32M was awarded of federal money to "Open Cape" a project on the cape and islands that is sure to incite lawsuits by the incumbent telcos and cable operators who will face competition. Warwick Broadband Committee has agreed not to submit for federal funding as it had planned because of the focus on "middle mile" and lack of federal support for "last mile" provision. Agriculture committee submitted the final draft, for publication of Warwick's proposed right to farm by-law which will be considered for adoption at the May 3 annual town meeting. The Agriculture committee incorporated almost all of the many comments received. The exception is one that asked for a prohibition on night farming operations. That was not included because often farmers must load their trucks very early or late to reach market in a timely way, or work into the night to complete harvesting before a storm. The Committee wanted to allow farmers maximum flexibility in their operations. A copy is in the library and it is available on-line at the town's website. I sent a letter to Sandri Inc. our fuel oil vendor telling them not to deliver any oil in excess of the bid price to the town. This was both an effort to get them to correctly track the contract and to avoid violating procurement regulations. We have enough in the town hall tanks to get through the winter and enough in the contract to meet the needs of other town departments. Once winter is over I'll do the work to be able to buy oil at the best price available to top off the tanks. FRCOG is running procurement on elevator maintenance contracts that we will join. There is a meeting at Greenfield HS to "Get to know regional organizations" on March 11th at 7 pm. The retirement system and council of governments will present. We received our second DOR letter requesting our Schedule A which is required to close the previous year's books and establish free cash. I suggest that we increase the accountant's hours so she can accomplish this on time in the future. The accountant submitted the Schedule A to the DOR this week. A hard copy is on file. Following is a link to online burning permits thru Shelburne Control. http://www.fcburnpermits.com/townlist.php I note that the Franklin County Retirement System granted retired employees a 3% COLA increase. Congratulations to Warwick's official town website and to its volunteer webmaster, Ed Lemon. Warwick is to receive Common Cause Massachusetts' 2010 e-Government Award with Distinction. The award will be presented on Tuesday March 16th at 11am in Hearing Room A-1 at the State House in Boston. To see the award criteria visit www.commoncause.org/egov10 Snow and Ice costs through warrant 18 are 71% of town meeting appropriation and about $26k lower than prior year actual. Tim reports that compensatory time use has reduced wage costs almost $3k over the period.