Lewiston Council Delays Budget Vote to May 19 Amid Taxpayer Concerns

[2:03] Carl L. Sheline: Hello. Welcome to our Tuesday evening budget workshop. We're joined here by Administrator Kainrath and Director Roy, among other people. Thank you all the department heads for being here. Administrator Kainrath, we had some questions from the last meeting that you can answer for us, please. [2:26] Bryan Kaenrath: All right. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Yeah, so to follow up on April 23rd meeting, we had a number of questions and information to get back to you with, so we have a bit of a list here, and we'll bring up some department heads to speak in specifics about a number of these. So we'll start with, we had a question regarding overtime and potential overtime savings in the departments. This mostly impacts the fire department, police department, and public works. So we did sit down and discuss these budgets. You know, I think as we anticipated last time, there isn't, you know, a large amount of savings I think to be achieved. Sure, we did want to bring up the departments to talk a little more in-depth regarding their overtime budgets. You did hear from Chief Karen, you know, his largely is contractual with the 17 he has to have on, but Director Ghani, if he's here, maybe we can start with him, and he can just talk about some of the specifics regarding his overtime lines, and then we can move to the police department. Good [3:33] Kevin Gong: evening, Kevin Gong, a Public Works Director. We've went through several of our overtime accounts last meeting. I went over page 18. There's no descriptions on those, so we're looking at page 18 again, over time four three one down through four three nine zero, our public works accounts. Some of the larger accounts are highway, winter operations, and open spaces. In looking at those accounts, the Public Works is dealing with emergencies, potholes, everything related to streets, sidewalk sweeping is done under stormwater, so it's charged out to that. If we look at our winter operations, we talked a little bit about that, where it's all staff are plowing, so anytime water and sewer staff, anybody in other divisions outside of highway, all those divisions have crew that plow, so either part of an A team or a B team, but any overtime occurred by winter ops is put into this overtime account. So last time, we're requesting $255,000 in the FY27 request. Currently, we're at $322,000 spent for FY26. So we plan on an average of storms and cutting that budget. You know, if we have a drought year or a dry year, may realize it. Or it could be like this year when we go over. One of the other ones is open spaces. So we looked at our open space account, and I've got Deputy Director Bates here to go into any additional detail if you want. But those are that highway that open space account is to address. All the parks in the city that we that we mow and maintain, litter collection, leaf collection, mowing, as well as the different playgrounds in those perks, as well as cemeteries and other spaces that just vacant lots that are city-owned that were required to maintain. So those spaces typically because of the staffing issues and depending on the type of season we have, wet weather, we're out there mowing on over time just because of capacity. So if we have a drought year, we could be under and mowing less, but we're also trying to stay to the mowing Heights that it's in city ordinances as every other lot out in the city is being held to. So we also do Christmas setup and Christmas lighting in that open space account. We do handle emergencies, so litter cleanup that's happened on nights or weekends. So, you know, those overtime things are happening because of capacity issues on the crew. And if we trimmed any of these two budgets that I went over, then we would be looking at slower response time, large storm events we'd be tapping staff in and where our primary routes are the arterials, the open space account we'd be looking at impacting those parks and open spaces, Christmas lights and those type of events. So without directly impacting services, we, you know, we feel we can't cut those budgets without impacting services to the community, just [7:09] Bryan Kaenrath: very quickly while we have, we have you up here, also there was some discussion about potentially contracting out some of the mowing or some of the open space work, and from what Deputy Director Bates told us, we actually did a look at that number of years ago, I think it was 2016 or 17. We did actually put that out to bid, and what they found was the cost savings were not there, and also the quality of some of the contractors were not ones that we would be comfortable with as far as handling some of the services. So any more to add on that as far as potential savings or the idea of, you know, [7:45] Kevin Gong: Contracting out some of these services, absolutely. So we discussed a little bit more internally after meeting with administration, going over these lines. we do have specialty a quick equipment. We have large mowers to address some of these large spaces to mow as efficiently as we can. We have specialty sweepers and field maintenance for the turf. So that's some of the startup issues that we saw in 2016. Is that the level of equipment that a contractor? It's not a regular small landscape person. That's, that's going to go and address this with some of the special equipment we have. Some of the factors that we looked at too is it all comes down to personnel hours. So we've gained efficiencies on a lot of our new equipment. We had staff over in rec and moved over to PW W. It's moving personnel around if you reork, it's the same staff time. And then if you look at contracting out, there's some of the startup costs. So we're buying equipment at government rate, we're paying fuel, and our fuel do not have any tax road escalators, and we do, we start dealing with insurances, right? So if you have a subcontractor, they've got to have coverage to doing work on city property. So those are factors that weigh in on a bid in addition to some of the logistics outlined by Administrator Kane Routh. [9:11] Carl L. Sheline: Yes, questions for Director Ganier. Councilor Longchamps. Thank you, Mayor. [9:16] Susan G. Longchamps: Excuse me. Can you tell me how much money we are spending on mowing the parks and stuff right now? [9:24] Kevin Gong: Sure. Deputy Bates, do you have that information? I will say one thing I left off. We don't ask our contractors to do it for free and break even. We are a nonprofit in public works, and so contractors come in there with some profit margin as well. So mowing over time was about $24,000. [Susan G. Longchamps: In over time.] In over time only, yes. [9:52] Susan G. Longchamps: How much is it that we're actually, that's allotted or that you put in there for the mowing? Not talking over time, sorry. [10:17] Kevin Gong: We'll look it up and try to get it to you in a few moments if not okay in an [10:21] Carl L. Sheline: email follow-up. Yeah, we'll come back to Councillor Roy. Thank you so [10:30] Michael R. Roy: after your explanation of going out to bid and all that stuff for open spaces, then I would, I would think that maybe adopt a spot wouldn't work either, like having people out there to adopt a spot and take care of instead of us having to [10:49] Kevin Gong: Go out there so our each of our supervisors work directly with any volunteer groups that want to come in there, and we do have several adoptive spots right here by Veterans Bridge. There's different spaces that have been picked up, and there's some agreements that are in place with, so you know, we want to make sure the volunteer is working in a safe space in a safe manner, and we support those groups when we can. We also have a local artist that's looking to do a memorial for the October shooting, so she's trying to create a space coming from Lincoln Street through the walkway across Jenkins Bridge into Auburn and have some connectivity. So our arborist is working, an open space crews are working with those people that want to do [11:35] Michael R. Roy: that because they think, you know, there are a lot of businesses out there that are startups or whatever that would really want their names on these spots, right? So I appreciate that. And if we can get that on a web page or something like that to announce it to a lot more people, maybe that could be [11:52] Kevin Gong: something we do. Veterans Park. There's a lot of volunteers that go into Veterans Park. We provide some free water and be able to support that as well as our own trucks that go around and help maintain watering of these different areas. [12:06] Joshua L. Nagine: Thank you, counseling aging. You won't have the answer for this right now, but I, but I would like to have it. I would like a breakdown of all of the city parks that we have and the associated costs with maintenance for each of the city parks. I'd also like to have an idea of the maintenance that we're doing on vacant lots so I can see that as well. One of the things that I would put forward, just as an example, on the corner of Montello Fair and College, there's a triangular space there that hosts a bus stop with outsides at the moment that's defunct. That city property that we mow, that is also fairly useless for uses for the neighborhood. And, you know, I've advocated before to close Fair Street and sell that property, to close that slip lane on Fair Street and sell that property. If there are properties that we're holding on to that we have absolutely no plan to do anything with but we're just going into mowing them, maybe we should start to relinquish some of these properties. So ultimately what I'd like to see is a breakdown of the cost to maintain each of these parks, a list of these parks, and then maybe we can decide whether or Not we're going to divest a couple of these parks, especially the pocket parks, that for instance on the corner of Montello Farron College, I'm not quite sure what that property does for us on any level, but it could be a building lot. If you got rid of that slip line, you could reduce traffic accidents in that corridor. If we cut, for instance, if we said, hey, let's take 10% off of the open spaces totals for this year, is that going to adversely effect what's [14:04] Kevin Gong: happening right now? One thing I did fail to mention, electrical has it in there over time, I believe the open space account. We talked about the in-kind services. There are some of the different setups for different activities that nonprofessional services are using. And we do in kind. It's traffic control or litter collection and around in the different parks. So 10%, we can look at that. But like I said, if we're dealing with mowing and those expenses, it depends on the year. If we have a drought year and we're not out there mowing as frequently, then those incidents could see a reality. We are, we do have several fields that we do water. And we're watering that. That so we keep it strong enough to support soccer and whatever is going on those fields. So Mart Paint is one where we're trying to keep it strong so that when the Balloon Festival comes in it's not muddy, it's not worn down. So we don't over water it but we're trying to maintain good healthy through those things but we can get you that information that you requested. I think Deputy Director Bates has a list right now but we'll put the cost to it for each [15:18] Joshua L. Nagine: each park and what you requested I'd appreciate that from what I understand the softball fields that we just took over we've refused an MOU to the organizations that wanted to maintain those fields is that correct I'm not [15:31] Kevin Gong: sure officially that we've refused it I know that we've had discussion administration as well as with Union because there are some contractual issues there maybe Deputy O'Malley might be able to speak to that status a little more but I know we've had one in draft and in discussion Deputy Minister [15:46] Carl L. Sheline: Mr. O'Malley, did you want to speak to that? [15:48] Bryan Kaenrath: Yeah, that wasn't refused. There is a CBA with a public works union that does not allow volunteers to use power equipment to mow the lawn. So we've met with the union, and we're going to have the city mow it. They will do the setup. We're gonna drop off the chalk to line the field, the quick dry, those kind of things, and they will maintain it that way, [16:14] Joshua L. Nagine: but the mowing will be done by the city and so just to clarify anytime a volunteer group or let's say a neighborhood group says I want to maintain public space if they're using power tools that cannot be done because of contractual agreements that is correct thank you [16:37] Carl L. Sheline: Yes Councillor Chittim thank [16:42] David B. Chittim: you Mr. Mayor Director Gagne I know there's no fat in this budget we are coming to the point where we're going to have to start cutting services in order to if we if we want to lower the tax rate so I understand your rationale for all of those overtime costs which is what we're talking about right now but for example if we eliminate the Christmas lighting in Dufresne Plaza much of that I'm understanding is done on overtime that's a way to reduce services that is not going to be hugely painful to people it will be adversely affecting the city because everybody wants Christmas lights it helps the joy of the city however it's not essential so my approach to this is yes we're going to have to start cutting services if we want to get this tax rate down below ten eleven percent increase over last year and that's that's the question I'm going to be asking continually of you and all the other department heads as well yep [17:42] Kevin Gong: Deputy Director Bates do you have the cost of overtime for Christmas lights we do put up Christmas lights during straight time so if you'll see we'll have bucket trucks on Lisbon Street in different quarters so I think it's the amount of and that's the shoulder season for us So we're trying to get ready for winter with plowing events and whatnot So it's one more activity to add on some fairly small crews that are specific to those spaces So that's why we augment with some overtime Yet that amount it's just shy of 4,500 for Christmas lights over time only [18:20] David B. Chittim: Thank you. Yeah, this was example exemplary only I mean, I'm not picking on that I'm just looking at I've been talking to constituents about saying do you want to pay an extra 10 to 11 to 12 percent? On your taxes, or do you want to have your road not plowed until 9 o'clock in the morning? That's the level that I'm talking about, and I'm getting some traction with constituents who say we can stand better a reduction in services from the city, whether it be garbage pickup or snow plowing. Whatever we can stand, that better than we can stand the hit that it's going to take to our pocketbooks to maintain that level of service. So that's the mindset that I'm trying to get across at this point. Yep, and I [19:00] Kevin Gong: appreciate that. I'm trying to show a level of magnitude. So we are doing as much as we can during straight time. Our winter operations is kept at where it's at because of a lot of design planning and how we're using the brine system. So we're actually going out and pre-treating the roads during straight time when we have that time, right, we instead of just doing on overtime. So we're doing as much on straight time as we can for all these different activities, and I appreciate your discussion of actually talking about services, because if we do cut these, then that's going to be our messaging when customers call us saying can you do this, why is this taking longer. Because we take a lot of heat. Our dispatch people are here tonight, they're the ones receiving the calls as well as administration. I'm sure you are people upset. So we get it, and we're trying to answer and say yes to as much as possible. But if a 10% cut across the board is it then, but when we start talking about actual services that are being changed [20:01] David B. Chittim: I think that's important. Thank you. Yes, and certainly feel free to blame me. It's it's me that cut the taxes that cut the services. That's the only way we can make this happen. Thank you [20:17] Carl L. Sheline: any further questions for director Gagne at this time thank [Unidentified speaker (Police Chief): you and] thank you director Bates so [20:33] Bryan Kaenrath: I think I'll ask chief Connolly or a rep from the police department to come up and talk about their overtime chief [20:46] Unidentified speaker (Police Chief): welcome thank you for coming so I believe deputy director O'Malley touched on this in the last meeting but for the most part at the police department it's it's fairly contractual it's based on personnel replacement for vacations things like that I can tell you that this current year we're at 876 701 which is only a 15,000 or close to 16 thousand dollar increase from last year and really what that comes down to is wages and colas things along those lines the only contractual or the only built-in Overtime that we have, and that again is contractual, is our criminal investigation division. We have one detective that's required to be on call for an entire week, every, you know, every week of the year, and they're required to get 10 hours of overtime for that, and again, that's contractual. Other than that, you know, we make adjustments as much as we can when we're hiring replacement shifts, such as, you know, somebody has a vacation day or a sick day off, for example, third shift. We only hire for half That shift for a patrolman instead of a full eight-hour shift. When dealing with supervisors, the same thing, they only work five hours of a shift, so we go only one supervisor and we go down to actually five officers overnight at times during certain portions of the night. So we really try to minimize it as much as possible, you know. The, I honestly don't see an area where we could, you know, skimp, I guess, as far as it comes with the overtime, other than the only thing that we could would be the in-kind Services, you know, and that's something that, you know, I know is important to the city to have some of those events, but we run around probably forty thousand dollars a year for the PD and overtime for those, the various events in the city. Anything [23:02] Carl L. Sheline: You want to add, Administrator Kane Roth? No, I think she covered up. Questions? Yeah, questions for the chief. [23:11] Bret Martel: Yes, Counselor Martel. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thanks for coming, chief. The openings that we have for the police department for officers, they're already built into the budget. If you were able to hire those out, would that have any impact on your overtime? Would your overtime in theory be able to go down if you had more officers, or would you just be able to staff more officers and still have the same overtime requirements? I think that's certainly a possibility. [23:37] Unidentified speaker (Police Chief): Obviously, when there's more officers off, you know what I mean, or we have less manpower, right, that becomes an issue. There's potentially more overtime. To be honest, it's been several years where we've actually been at full complement, but I certainly think that [23:53] Bret Martel: would assist thank you yeah my thoughts are you 'd mentioned covering vacations and stuff like that if you have more staff it just seems like there could be more street time built in rather than overtime certainly I mean [24:05] Unidentified speaker (Police Chief): We're running the bare minimum in a lot of cases now. Yes, I was able to go on a [24:10] Bret Martel: Ride along Saturday night, Friday night, so I was able to see your staff in action. I thought they did a great job, so thank you for that too. Thank you, Councillor Nagine. [24:23] Joshua L. Nagine: Thank you, Mr. Mayor, Chief. Just really quickly, the right now, how many offices are we down? [24:31] Unidentified speaker (Police Chief): Well, so we have the two frozen positions, so technically nine, but down seven if [24:37] Joshua L. Nagine: you're counting the seven. And what do you expect by the summer? Are there retirements coming? [24:44] Unidentified speaker (Police Chief): Are there, we definitely know that three people will be leaving by August. Okay, and so [24:50] Joshua L. Nagine: best-case scenario, if you don't hire, will be down nine [Unidentified speaker (Police Chief): ten, okay, so] Ultimately, I'm not too concerned about the overtime with the police department at all. I do know that with the police department, there is also a contractual agreement that stipulates that you work eight-hour shifts and you start at 7, 3, and 11. And so again, when we try to find efficiencies and we but up against the contractual agreements, I think it's difficult. But other than that, you know, other than that contractual requirement, I don't see how we cut more when we need police on the streets. [25:37] David B. Chittim: Councilor Chiddum. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I do not mean to put you on the spot. Chief, but I'm looking at the historical over time. Four years ago or five years ago, depending on how you count, the overtime for patrol was $8,000. It then went to $80,000 and remained there for two years, and then had another tenfold jump in 2026 to seven hundred and thirty three thousand dollars. Do you have an explanation for why those significant jumps? Because that's the level that we've been maintaining thus far, although year-to-date now we're at 35,000 according to the figures I have out of 750 000 request. I don't have the answer for you, but [26:19] Unidentified speaker (Police Chief): I certainly can get it. I have last year's, which was 733, and then you know our request [26:25] David B. Chittim: this year for 747. Yes, yeah, and these numbers are showing year to date, and we are three quarters of the way through the year. I'm not sure when this was, so I don't know whether we're two-thirds, it's three quarters, or what, but we're at $35,000 for patrol overtime, and that's, that's concerning to me, because extrapolating that out over the remaining, the remainder of the fiscal year, will come nowhere near the three quarter million dollars that's been requested or that was spent, what it was approved for the 2026 budget. Mr. Mayor, Deputy Administrator O'Malley, I do have [27:04] Bryan Kaenrath: I do have that page in front of me. I'm not sure if the counselor is reading the right line. If you go back to 2023 and 2024, the overtime budget was $565,000 and $542,000. I believe that was when we got that increase of offices, about five or six, when we offered a pay increase. Then as you go along, as the numbers of offices have dropped down, we've increased from 542,000 up to 726,000 in 2025. There was 733 in 2026. Now we're requesting, says she's requesting 747,897 for 2027. So I'm not sure if you're [27:45] David B. Chittim: reading the correct line, counselor. There must be a problem with my spreadsheet then, because those numbers don't show up on the overtime line for PATROL. So if I will assume the responsibility for that, we will, double check and double check that. [28:01] Carl L. Sheline: councilor, or sorry, one second, council. I'm trying, Councilor Longchamps. Chief, did you want to add anything else at this time? No, or were you finished for right this second? Sure. Yeah. Okay. [28:15] Susan G. Longchamps: Yeah, thank you. yes, Councilor Longchamps. Thank you for being here. Chief, I guess it really boils down to a decision that we have to make on whether we exclude the in-kind donations for about $40,000. Is that what you said, roughly? Yeah, I think it's like [28:37] Unidentified speaker (Police Chief): 41,000 for the PD, 40 or 40 thousand one hundred and forty three dollars is what we are estimated to spend this year, I mean [28:54] Susan G. Longchamps: that's really the only place that I've heard where we might be able to make a small dent, and although I don't want to do that, I do believe in the events, they do bring life to our city, and so I'm not sure that we should do that, but it looks like that may be the only place that we can shed a little bit off the police department. [29:18] Carl L. Sheline: You, Chief, you're talking about things like balloon festival, Dempsey challenge, Liberty Festival, am I correct? Yes, like trek across Maine, Lewiston [29:29] Unidentified speaker (Police Chief): live, holiday at the plaza, they're the traditional ones that tend to come to [29:35] Carl L. Sheline: Lewiston every year and you just mentioned a couple that are city of Lewiston events even yes okay understood anything further councilor long traps counselor naging did you did you have your hand up i'm fine mr mayor thank you though okay any other anything else for our chief conley thank you so much thank you [30:04] Bryan Kaenrath: Okay, Chief Karen did speak briefly at the last meeting regarding his contractual obligations. Also, if there's interest, we could bring him back up for further explanation. [30:17] Carl L. Sheline: Chief, yeah, Chief Karen is here. Chief, we don't want you to feel left out, so I think maybe a recap, if you can just move the microphone closer to yourself, just [30:39] Bryan Kaenrath: Talk about your obligations. Yes, I wasn't sure if you had any specific questions. [30:43] Unidentified speaker (Police Chief): But I know that the line you did make mention that it was, there was high, and I know so the reason it is so large is because, as I was explaining, is we have minimum man and we have 17 people on shift every day, and when someone is out we have to replace them with overtime. Some days there are days where no one's out, but there are days where there might be four or five people out, and it's a 24-hour shift of overtime. We do have replacement personnel. We try to maintain one per shift, but if there's three vacancies that day, three people on vacation, two vacations and a sick leave, whatever it might be, I'm hiring overtime that day. So I did just do a quick look for the trailing 12 months of what we are actual overtime expenses, and it's 1 million three hundred and thirty six thousand dollars eight hundred eighty four dollars, eight hundred eighty four dollars, and it breaks it down. Our largest category is vacation replacement at six hundred and sixty-five thousand dollars, and then we had sick replacement, right, four hundred and six thousand was the second, but sick is, it's also personal days and there's some long-term sick leaves in there, so [32:08] Carl L. Sheline: So if I understand you, have one floater that can shift around, but as soon as there's more than one person out, it's overtime. [32:14] Unidentified speaker (Police Chief): Yeah, so there's one per shift. Right, okay. Councilor Najee. [32:20] Joshua L. Nagine: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, Chief. So each of the stations is required to have 17 people, or is it 17 people across the? [32:26] Unidentified speaker (Police Chief): It's 17 people on duty across all the stations. Across all the stations. [32:31] Joshua L. Nagine: And that's a contractual agreement and not like a requirement through OSHA or a state? No, it is contractual. Okay. Okay. And again, when we pull somebody in for overtime, is a fire shift 24 hours, or are we paying for 24 hours of overtime? [32:49] Unidentified speaker (Police Chief): It is. So it would have to be covered. The shift is 24 hours, so when someone is hired for an overtime shift, it's for the 24-hour shift. [32:57] Joshua L. Nagine: So if we were to adopt a scheduling system like Auburn uses, for instance, we would have to actually completely change the contractual agreements. [33:05] Unidentified speaker (Police Chief): I was under the assumption that Auburn was on a 24-hour schedule. Well they are [33:11] Joshua L. Nagine: on a 24-hour schedule, but they have significantly reduced overtime because of the K schedule that they use. I think they have one ambulance that they staff. [33:19] Unidentified speaker (Police Chief): On a daily basis, but the rest of the department is running on four shifts, 24 hours a day, so it's just, it's just one unit that they're staffing, I don't know [33:31] Joshua L. Nagine: how many hours per week, okay, but so just so you understand, like what the perception is, ultimately if that overtime is both required and guaranteed, the feedback I've gotten from quite a few taxpayers is that's actually base pay even though they're working more hours, so you know it's, it's like a guaranteed salary, and so I don't know if we can't change that due to the contractual agreement, again, three times in a row we run into three serious issues with trying to find efficiencies based on, and it's not just your department, based on the contractual agreements that are in place that are holding us back from being more efficient with our spending. And I will say this, I am well aware of the fact that we do not have a lot of money to fund departments, and we have run into situations where we have defunded or not defunded but not properly funded departments in the past, it's just trying to find places where we can save money right now is very difficult when we're told that we can't make changes based on what was agreed to in contracts, so further [34:47] Carl L. Sheline: questions for the chief, thank you very much, back [34:58] Bryan Kaenrath: to you administrator, the next area we explored was reducing the service choice of what service life of vehicles by at least 20 percent, so I think we'll invite again Director Gagne back up, if you could speak to this issue or whatever you'd like to have speak for you [35:23] Kevin Gong: Good evening, so I had referenced when we first discussed this on the LC IP, I feel like I think it's page 65 is the list of all the vehicles that are proposed, looked at it with our fleet superintendent as well as Deputy Director Bates, so that we have a couple new vehicles that we're requesting, one is a trailer jump with log and brush loader, help us pick up brush and be more efficient and in a better fashion that reduces workers comp, the other one that we're looking at is a spill response trailer That would be new to the fleet. That one's 27,000. The trailer dump with log brush loader is 87,500. Other than that, we these are existing vehicles on the list. The request to add 20% more, so going down through the loader is 17, that 17 years old, it's 450,000 for replacement. That piece of equipment takes 14 to 16 months to replace. So currently it's a it's a two-wheel drive, it's a front-wheel drive. We've lost their rear diff in that, so you know, waiting 14 to 16 months, that might have a large failure. And we could be down that unit, so just giving you some of the logistics. A couple of pickups, they're currently 13 and 16 years old, those are three to six months to get. Some of our other items, six-wheel plow truck and sander, that's 14 years old, takes 12 to 14 months. Welder and shop truck, 12 to 14 months to get, it's currently 19 years old. So if you're going down through their remote steep train mower, that one's actually replacing a unit, that unit that we have is 19 years old. We're looking to get. Better efficiencies with that and actually mow in areas that we currently cannot with the current mower. We're looking to replace the crane chassis, that's a 2005, that's 21 years old, and the street sign service truck, that's that's 15 years old. So you know, depending on what is pushed back and we can't predict, but I know that our fleet we're trying to, and I've heard in the past it's like run it into the ground. Well, some of them we are, some of them we have potential failures that would sign line. That unit and have us either rent one or go without a unit. So we do keep light trucks are about 10 to 12 years on average, depending on its use and maintenance, and then sometimes the make and model. So we'd be adding two years on to that to go 20%. Our heavy trucks we try to keep 15 to 18 years, that would be adding three to four years, and then heavy equipment it's 15 to 20 years, and we try to rotate that so we're not just abusing one vehicle in one fashion, but we do circulate that up to the pit to. Be as efficient, so we are extending some of these out. We do try to keep the idea that there is some salvage value in some of it. Some of this somebody could use as a yard plow truck, or if it's a larger vehicle chassis or a loader of special piece of equipment, there may be interest by a private contractor or somebody that's got an off-road use. But at the same time, once the either an engine or transmission failure goes, at this point it's going to be kind of scrap metal, so we try to keep that. balance of cost of repair to keep it operational and then trade in value. But we try to, Counselor Chittum, I think he had said, you know, run it till the end of life. So we do try to get as much life out of it as we can. So, you know, I think having the new vehicles that are requested, holding those off a year would totally appropriate. I think it's the CIP, so we are looking at bonding. This is the request and that, my understand, it's not fund balance as proposed. We're looking at doing a bond. [39:47] Joshua L. Nagine: Councillor Nagine, yes. Thank You Mr. Mayor, just to clarify Director, you were saying pulling these off of the CIP is completely acceptable, you know, and we're [39:57] Kevin Gong: in a tight year and asking for new pieces of equipment that we don't currently don't have in the fleet. I think that's something that is totally reasonable, say you know, let's not ask this year for those items. So that item would be a trailer dump with the log brush loader and the spill response trailer. That's 27,000 for the trailer and 87,500 for the trailer dump. So you're [40:20] Joshua L. Nagine: just talking about the new vehicles, you're not talking about the replacement, the new, the new philly request, not the loader or the plow gear that costs half a million dollars unfortunately. [40:28] Kevin Gong: No, the lead time on the lower is 14 to 16 months and some of it is specialty equipment with plow gear. So we can get a loader but you can't necessarily get the front plow gear as well as the side wing and get that fitted up, that takes some of the time. Now that makes sense, the [40:47] Joshua L. Nagine: the one thing i would just point out is any of the monies that we borrow on the lcip then become debt service that we have to pay off in the following years which reduces our available revenues. So it does hit the budget and it hits it with interest. But yeah, thank you. Further [41:05] Carl L. Sheline: comments for Dr Gagne about vehicles? Thank you Administrator Keenrath. What's left? Right, we could continue [41:17] Bryan Kaenrath: on vehicles if we'd like to hear from the police department about extending the life of police vehicles, either Chief or rep from PD, Chief Conley or your designee. Hello [41:41] Unidentified speaker (Police Chief): again, so in reference to the vehicles for us, obviously I know you've heard it at nauseam, the take-home program, but I do have an update in reference to that. I'm sure most of you are aware that we had turned the mic. Can you hear me now? Okay. Yes, thank you. I'm sure a lot of you are aware that we had... Senator Collins' office had supported us in some appropriations funds, some congressionally directed funding after the mass shooting. What had happened is the initial year that we applied for it, they didn't move forward with any congressionally directed funding, but she supported us and advocated our department for the next year and about a month or so ago we found out that we did receive that those funds the issue with that for us was that we were told we received it was put into law but it's kind of in this window right now where it then gets submitted to a grant manager so part of the funding that we had requested or part of the items that we had requested in that, obviously this was prior to us looking into the take-home program, we had, we had requested 10 vehicles for the amount of nine hundred and eighty thousand dollars. So we were on, like I said, we were unsure, we're unsure where we're at with that. But I was able to reach out to them this week and learn that one, we will be receiving those funds for sure, or we're confident that we'll be receiving those funds before the end of the fiscal year, which would be in the fall of this year, and two, that we would be authorized to use those and then remove close to, would be nine hundred and eighty thousand dollars, close to a million dollars off of the LC IP, because obviously we wouldn't need as many vehicles in the LC IP. So just wanted to share that with you all. I would imagine, I know that doesn't directly affect technically the budget, but I would imagine with the debt service and maybe Director Roy could expand on how that could potentially affect the tax rate. Any thoughts, Director Roy? [44:06] Unidentified speaker (Finance Director): So if you remember last time we had talked about the interest being over the three years is $275,298, bringing the total bond over three years $5,521,564. With this reduction, with the principal being $4,266,226, the interest would be $223,669.80, which is a reduction of $51,629 in interest. So the total of the bond would be $4,489,895. Thank [44:45] Carl L. Sheline: you. Anything further, Chief? No more questions for the Chief about take-home vehicles. I guess we're good. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, [45:03] Bryan Kaenrath: moving on. The next question was regarding wage reductions or COLA reductions, voluntary wage reductions, with all of our collective bargaining agreements. Deputy Administrator O'Malley, do you want to comment on the results of that inquiry? Corey? I did email all of the unions. And while some of them were sympathetic to the budget woes that we're experiencing, no one was in favor of reducing their COLAs. [45:35] Carl L. Sheline: That's that. Yeah, anything further, or is that all the updates? Administrator Kuehnweiler? [45:42] Bryan Kaenrath: Those were the main updates from the last meeting. If there's anything we haven't covered, we're obviously interested in taking more questions otherwise i think we move on to further deliberations just for a scheduling update we do have this meeting this evening we can have another meeting on thursday evening a week from tonight though is our at least on the calendar our budget passage evening which requires the corks office to get out the agenda on thursday for that so i think we do need to get a good idea of if we're in a position to pass a budget on Tuesday, a week from tonight. Madam Clerk, I don't know if you want to comment at all on schedule and timeline and just some of the logistics we're working through with this process. Sure. [46:26] Kevin Gong: So just for logistics, as you know, the deadline to have agenda material to us is tomorrow at noon, and that would be that we would then release the agenda on Thursday like usual for a Tuesday night meeting. So that would mean either finalizing the budget this evening so those numbers can be prepared for the budget resolve in the budget orders so that can go out on Thursday. Another potential option, and we've never done this, but it doesn't say that we couldn't, is that if you meet again on Thursday evening and finalize everything, then the agenda packet could go out Monday for a Tuesday night meeting. You would need to debate, you know, the pros and cons of releasing that to the public on Monday as opposed to Thursday, which they're normally used to getting. But if you need additional time to do the final deliberations, we just wanted to review with you the logistics of releasing and [47:18] Carl L. Sheline: preparing the agenda material. Thank you, Madam Clerk. And also of note, we do have [47:26] Bryan Kaenrath: scheduled our city attorney to join us on Thursday this week to talk and answer questions about the powers and duties of the council regarding the budget process. So that is also on the calendar for Thursday evening, and I think he'll also talk about, I know I've mentioned a few times, the ability of counselors by charter to offer amendments to the budget. So I think he can speak further on that after our questions. I know that's not our normal process, but that is a charter permitted power of individual counselors. And so if we are going to talk about amendments being offered, I think there also needs to be some process put in place around that for when amendments would be due, because they should be published on the agenda, not just offered up and sort of free-for-all on the last day of the budget. So that is also scheduled for Thursday. [48:16] Carl L. Sheline: With the city attorney, the timing of that might be tough based on if we have, yeah, our conversation with the attorney, and then that will be a day after, you know, amendments would do be due if we put them in our budget administrator Canrath, and perhaps also with Madam Clerk, could you also explain I believe we need a super majority to pass this budget, and then what would happen if we do not have a super majority to pass this budget? [48:47] Bryan Kaenrath: So we have until the end of May to pass a budget. In the event a budget is not approved, removes my understanding is that it does revert back to the city administrator for a budget, but I would then also have to comply with the 3.3 CPI, correct? [49:07] Kevin Gong: Charter also says that the city administrator has 72 hours to do that. [49:14] Bryan Kaenrath: Okay, our memory has not happened before in any recent times, I understood. [49:22] Carl L. Sheline: Just for the public's benefit to and for all of us here to understand where we're at, so counselors, yes, let's, I guess discuss about where we're, where we're all feeling. We'll just go on, we'll start with counselor for what one and just [49:36] Joshua L. Nagine: work on down the line. Counseling agent, Thank You Mr. Mayor, two things. One, I'd be more comfortable with planning to close out the budget on the 19th as opposed to the fifth, if we can get there by the 19th. The second thing is there's been some commentary about the public comment process, and usually our public hearings are at the beginning of the budget and the night we were approved the budget. And so I believe there was some support for having public comment and feedback during the meeting on the 5th, which would give us a couple of weeks to respond back to citizen and constituent feedback and concern that's kind of where i'm at this moment i 'm not quite sure if i can get all of the amendments in for next tuesday's or excuse next tuesday's meeting but i'm gonna i'll do my best and i assume if they're bullet points that would be fine as well like i mean it [50:38] Kevin Gong: would be up to you. It would be in a format that the council would review, discuss, and then vote on. [50:42] Joshua L. Nagine: Ultimately, okay, yeah, so that's that's where I'm at, so basically push two weeks, yeah, and hopefully we can close by the 19th, but yeah. [50:56] Carl L. Sheline: Thank You councillor and aging comes our luncheons Thank You mayor is that all of our [51:03] Susan G. Longchamps: that's our discussion right now it's just this the budget yes well I know the budget but is it just pushing it or keeping it on our regular schedule date [51:13] Carl L. Sheline: Well, also, I guess your thoughts on the budget in terms of where we wanted to end up big cetera But yeah general budget discussion and your general thoughts [51:23] Susan G. Longchamps: I'm sure I'll have more thoughts and comments as we move along But if you could just move them one thing I would be neglecting if I didn't mention which is not a part of our budget But the Reval's people are now Receiving them and we have a lot of panicked families a lot of elderly people I understand that this is something that had to be done we neglected to do it for 38 years but that can't fall back solely on the citizens of Lewiston so quickly we decided in 23 that we were going to implement this people just started receiving their assessments over the last few days and you know some may say we should implement this right away i think that's so unfair to do i would really like to ask our city administrator if you could kindly or beg mr haley whichever one you'd prefer to do if we could wait two years We have a very large Elderly population here in Lewiston, and I just think it's unfair To do this so fast. I mean Some numbers are doubling some numbers are tripling So I know mr. Healy did say one year he was comfortable with but I think if we could get the majority of council to if they should Agree with what I'm asking to push it two years. He may reconsider I would hope SO I'LL BE BACK WITH BUDGET STUFF, BUT I JUST WANTED TO SAY THAT. [53:08] Carl L. Sheline: SORRY. ONE SECOND, ADMINISTRATOR. I'M SORRY. COUNCILOR LONGCHAMPS. IF WE CAN HAVE IT QUIET IN THE COUNCIL CHAMBERS, THAT WOULD BE GREAT. COUNCILOR LONGCHAMPS, DID YOU HAVE ANY THOUGHTS ABOUT THE BUDGET RIGHT NOW? NO. NOT RIGHT THIS MOMENT. OKAY. COUNCILOR ROY. [53:27] Michael R. Roy: THANK YOU, MR. MAYOR. SO I'M IN FAVOR OF PUSHING TWO WEEKS AS FAR AS THE BUDGET. BUT LIKE COUNCIL LONGCHAMPS, I WOULD DEFINITELY ENCOURAGE EVERYBODY TO THINK ABOUT PUSHING THE RE-EVALUATION OUT TWO YEARS EASY. ALL THE E-MAILS, ALL THE PHONE CALLS, WE CAN'T ABSORB THIS IN SUCH A SHORT TIME. YES, WE'VE HAD SOME TIME TO THINK ABOUT IT, BUT THERE WAS no ideas of how to cope with such a big burden that we're putting on the taxpayers. And this can't happen. We can't absorb this. A lot of people can't. So I'm in favor of like council lawn champs. I would I would push it out two years and then phase it in. I would not just do a hundred percent push in because I don't think we can do that. And then give alternatives to processes to lower the burden on our seniors and the people that qualify for some programs out there and make those known on the website, really send out letters. We have to get the word out there to have people remain in their homes. And I know we're not knocking on their doors to kick them out, but potentially they're gonna have to sell. And we don't want that. We want everybody who's lived here for years and years and years to stay here. And that's where I fall on that. AS FAR AS THE BUDGET AND STUFF LIKE THAT, I DO HAVE SOME OTHER QUESTIONS THAT I WANT TO ASK. I DON'T KNOW IF THAT IS SOMETHING I CAN DO RIGHT NOW OR IF I HAVE TO WAIT UNTIL THURSDAY. [55:03] Carl L. Sheline: I THINK QUESTIONS ARE FINE AT THIS TIME. [55:06] Michael R. Roy: DO WE HAVE ANY JOBS THAT WERE CREATED THROUGH THE PANDEMIC OR WITH PANDEMIC FUNDING THAT ARE NOW HERE AND THE GRANTS HAVE DRIED UP AND THE CITY IS ABSORBING THOSE positions do we have any positions like that you don't have to answer right now if you need to look into that would be great because again if we don't if we can't find grants to continue paying them then those are some positions we may have to look at one question to help with the school budget I don't know if there's any positions with the school and the city that overlap where the city could take on some of those positions instead of only having the school okay so you kind of you shook your head you know what i'm talking about if we can check into that because i think you know the school every year has you know a lot of unfunded mandates and a lot of you know budgetary restrictions and they have a hard time and along those same lines i know this is GOING TO BE A QUESTION FOR OUR FOR OUR COUNCIL I PERSONALLY AS A COUNCILOR WOULD FEEL OKAY WITH HAVING OUR CITY BUDGET OUT TO VOTE AND ALSO HAVING THE CITIZENS SAY HEY THESE THIS PORTION OF THE BUDGET WE CAN WE CAN DO WITHOUT THOSE SERVICES LET'S CUT THAT SO AGAIN GIVING US CLEAR GUIDELINES I feel that they should be more Welcome to speak on this budget. I don't know if that's something we can do But I feel like they need to be their voices need to be heard Because every year when the taxes go up, we're the ones up here that you know we have to make these decisions, but if it's a collective agreement with the citizens out there to make those decisions to and Tell the council where they feel should be cut. I think that's great. So I'd be in favor of that. As far as something that council said last time, when people retire, when people, you know, lose their jobs or whatever, I think, you know, instead of bringing it back to the council to fill those positions, I mean, a city administrator could say, you know, this position, well, we can hold off a bit. You know, budgetary reasons, we can hold off. I don't think it needs to come back to the council, but I think as a city administrator, you could say that. So that way there, it kind of takes out the middle man in a sense for us. So that's one of the other things that I had. Also, cross-training staff, you know, into other positions so that, you know, when people do lose their jobs, we get cross-trained staff so that they can pick up and we don't have to go into overtime. A lot of things like, you know, we do have a lot of nonprofits. I saw this in another town where they have 51% of their land is nonprofits. What are the nonprofits giving back to the city? Are they giving, I mean, they're getting the tax breaks and all that stuff, but what services are they giving to the city? What are they providing for the city? So those are the things that I want to see too, you know, what we do. And I love, don't get me wrong, I love all the nonprofits and so like that, but we need to see some stuff if we're not going to be taxing people, we need to see those services, okay? As far as like, oh, with overtime and stuff like this, and I know I'm just going on and I apologize for this, but these are thoughts when I've gotten all these phone calls. You know, for a long time, a lot of people had the use it or lose it mentality. We have all this overtime funding. If we have all this funding this year and we don't use it all next year, we're not going to have that same funding. So we got to use it. We got to find a way to use it. I think we need to tighten our budgets now and I don't, you know, just like everybody else when your bills come in higher than what you expected, you have to make cuts in your household. We have to make cuts here. We have to look at our budgets, and I said it last time, if we could look at our departments and maybe make a 20% cut, I don't know what that looks like. But every department, if you make a 20% cut, that helps taxes on the other side. Okay, because that's what we would do in a household. We'd make those cuts. Also, let's see. The CMP corridor. What are we seeing for savings from that? Our taxes. The way it was sold is that the CMP corridor, when it comes in, there's going to be a great big tax relief on our citizens. What are we seeing? I haven't seen anything. I thought about that, too. I had a little bit of help with that one. I don't feel like right now we can absorb a triple, my taxes went up, well, I wouldn't say, my value, my house value went up $178,000. I'm a single parent. Single income. Can't absorb that. So I feel with every one of you when you got your tax bill. So I had a lot of thoughts about that. And let's see. What will it take for us up here? What cuts do we need to make in this budget? I hear a lot of people saying there's a lot of waste out there. What would it take for us up here to come in at either where we need to be at the budget at 3.3%, what would it take for from where we are now to go down to a 3.3 and then what would it take to go down to a zero increase I mean as far as services that we're gonna reduce staff that we're gonna reduce think about that and I mean I'm just putting this out there for everybody to get a big picture on this because again we're hearing a lot of emails we're hearing a lot of phone calls and they say there's a lot of fat you got to trim the fat you got to trim the fat well I want to see it where we are right now with the budget to come down to a 3.3 percent what is that going to take does that mean jobs does that mean we have to close city hall for four out of the five days a week what services do we lose these are the things that i want people to know because i think in this whole process i wanted to be very transparent i'm sure everybody else did let's be transparent about this and where it's going to go what we need to do to make that happen so that's what I got for right now. [1:01:52] Carl L. Sheline: Councilor Noble. I [1:01:57] Joshua L. Nagine: Second what Mike said. Councilor Roy said also people are asking, we got a lot of emails, people are asking for us to cut jobs, and I would also like for people to know what that would look like as far as what their services from the city would look like, because we also get a lot of complaints about that already. So basically everything Mike said, and just wondering about that part, you know. I'll just respond quickly since two of you brought [1:02:37] Bryan Kaenrath: up to get to the 3.3, that is well beyond the tier three cuts that we talked about with jobs. It's, it's significant personnel cuts. So in a nutshell, I mean obviously we can go into more detail later, but just so everyone knows to get to that number, that is well beyond what we were talking about with tier three guts [1:02:58] Carl L. Sheline: Director Roy, while we're chatting up here, can you figure what that dollar amount would be for three point three and zero percent, just so you know, just for a frame of reference here? Councilor Noble, did you have anything else? Okay, Councilor Chittim, it's you. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. [1:03:17] David B. Chittim: The 3.3 is the overall tax levy, including the county, the school, and the city. Is that correct? [1:03:24] Bryan Kaenrath: Yes, if that's what you're referencing, the municipal tax levy. We're not talking about just the city operating budget, right? [1:03:32] David B. Chittim: The charter requires a supermajority to exceed 3.3 of the CPI, and that's the total tax levy, including the school. No. That's only the municipal side? [1:03:44] Unidentified speaker (Finance Director): Tax levy, only the municipal tax levy. Thank you for clarifying that. And if I could answer what would need to be removed additionally after the tier three with the take-home vehicles was another two million nine hundred ninety two thousand one hundred eighty six. So to get before, get to what, to get to what to get to the 3.3, okay, I'm sorry, would you repeat that number? Two million nine hundred ninety two [1:04:19] David B. Chittim: thousand one eighty six. Thank you. Just the city budget, that's the city budget. I'm looking at 1.8, but I've already, it's already been pointed out to me that my spreadsheet is in error, so but it's a significant amount of money. I agree that we ought to postpone the decision until May 19th if we have until the end of May for us to have cogent amendments to the budget submitted by noon tomorrow is unreasonable, but particularly since we haven't heard from City Council, our corporate council about what Our rights and responsibilities are, so I would target that rather than May 5th as the drop-dead date for establishing a budget. I believe the sense of the council up here is that we do not want to cut job position positions from the city payroll. That's unfortunate because, as several councillors have said, this is when we have to make serious cuts, and the only cuts that we have left our personnel. I don't believe there's any fat in the budget. We could say we could go back and say every department take 10% off its supply line. That would mean less copier paper, it would mean less sand and brine for the roads in the in the wintertime. Supplies is a is a big item, that's one area we have control over that would not cost jobs. It would reduce services, and I've said many times that this is the balancing act between reducing services and keeping the costs down, not keeping the taxes down. So I would urge counselors, particularly given that deputy administrator Romali has spoken with the unions who have no desire to take any reductions in their hard-won colas and steps. Frankly, their feet aren't in the fire because the council up here is saying no, we don't want to cut positions. The last time any kind of traction was made with getting concessions from the unions, feet were in the fire, and there were personnel cuts that were accepted and espoused by the council. That's not the situation here. So if I were a union representative and someone came to me and said gee, the council is sort of waffling on whether we're going to lose jobs or not, do you want to give up any of your salary, my answer would be obviously no, I don't. If I knew for a fact that my co-workers might lose their jobs, my answer might be a little different. So I think the response from the unions is entirely understandable. As long as the council's up here saying we are not going to cut positions, then we really have no tools left in which to reduce the budget. I also want to know about the school budget in order the school budget is looking at a 12% increase I believe over last year. We have the only control we have over that is you need to reduce your bottom line by a percentage, and I think we all need to be thinking about that. Nobody wants to reduce the cost and the and the nobody wants to reduce the funds that we provide to education, is the future of our city, but we're also talking about the immediate future of our city with many counselors saying that folks are going to be driven from their homes. I have had Communications from my constituents saying, "If this budget goes through and this reval goes through, I am selling. I am leaving Lewiston. I have had generations, but I can no longer afford this." That's the position we're in. These are hard decisions, and I argue firmly that the only way that we can reduce the burden on the taxpayer at this point, after we take the one and two cent pieces that we can scavenge from, let's not put Christmas tree lights up, the only way we can have significant impact on the budget is to regrettably tell our loyal employees some of you no longer have jobs. That's the hard reality. As far as vacancies in positions, if a position becomes vacant over the course of the year, that doesn't do us any good. When we're putting the budget together, we need to know that now, because we have to budget for that position all year long. We can't say, "Well, I think that Malcolm Smith is going to retire in January, so we're only going to fund half of that year." That takes the decision away from the employee. We're required to fund these positions. If the positions become vacant, they've already been funded. The budget has been set. We can't go back and retract that money. So to ask the administrator to say, "Well, let's hold off on filling that position," that's a reasonable request, but to have it to come back to council to authorize the release of money that we have already approved in the budget doesn't make any sense to me. Bottom line, this is a very painful situation. We are going to have to cut positions. Period. [1:09:48] Bret Martel: Counselor Martel: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Yeah, I definitely think we need to push this off till at least the 19th. I don't see any point in trying to do a budget on the fifth. I don't think we're anywhere near close enough. I'm having a real hard time. I know we talked about overtime tonight, but it just, we've got a couple fully staffed or nearly staffed departments, and to have that kind of overtime draw feels like there's got to be able to find some efficiencies there, especially if there aren't a bunch of missing positions, and it just sounds like we can't, we have contractual obligations. It just, it seems like no one can do it. So if we're making all of these bad deals that put us in bad situations that allow us no way out or any flexibility, when I? Myself has probably gone closer to two dozen emails that I've responded to in the last 24 hours than a dozen. People are feeling the pain, people are getting upset. I had a feeling this would happen when these when these evaluations went out. It's getting real, people are seeing it and You know, I'm looking on the side of the people that are, at least seven or eight people told me that they, no questions, they'll be packing up and leaving. They'll be selling their house, they're headed out of town. One individual said he's looking to buy property out of town so he can take his brother, in-laws, and someone else out of town because they, it's not worth it. We're charging people more and more every year and giving everyone less and less and less. And it's obscene to keep going this way. and I don't even want to get going on the re-evaluation tonight. I'm gonna try to keep my comments to the budget because again I'm reading here about messages in the Sun Journal or WMTW or whatever else about from 2003 2004 2005 about rollouts and making the public aware of these re-evaluations and everything else and we're gonna sit up here now after the vast majority of this council will be working on their third budget knowing that this reevaluation was coming. This was not dropped on anyone. this was not surprised to anybody and to sit here and to try and behave under that excuse is disingenuous in my opinion. i would like to see the city sell any of the vacant properties that we're not currently using or developing and limit sell them or find a way i don't know if this is possible i'm not a real estate professional but put restrictions on THOSE SALES THAT THEY HAVE TO BE THEY HAVE TO STAY ON THE TAX ROLLS NO MORE NON-PROFITS NO MORE SKATING AND DRIVING BECAUSE THE MORE AND MORE OF THESE NON-PROFITS THAT COME IN AND BUY BUILDINGS WITH GOVERNMENT MONEY OR HOWEVER THEY DO IT THEY'RE NOT PAYING TAXES THEY USE SERVICES AND ALL OF THAT BURDEN GETS SHIFTED TO HOMEOWNERS AND LANDLORDS AND TAXPAYERS IN ANOTHER WAY. SO IF WE HAVE ALL THESE CONTRACTUAL OBLIGATIONS THAT WE CAN'T CUT OVERTIME WE CAN'T ANYTHING else and we just need to take a real look at what we can cut every single thing that isn't bolted down to a union is fair game for me so i plan on having a solid amount of Amendments, I'm just gonna, instead of trying to wrap all of them off here, I'm going to just present those to the city administrator. I apologize, I'm frustrated because I've had a lot of people reach out to me in the last 24 hours and they are feeling this and they are scared. I think panic was the correct word. And we are so far beyond creative solutions for 50 cent issues. We're not trimming fat, we're lopping off limbs. It's what needs to happen and the quicker we can come to the realization that 's the case the better. And I just would like to remind everyone that the reevaluation is very difficult and it feels drastic, but it's a cost neutral action. It doesn't actually increase the budget one penny. So the only money that we're taking from any of you is money that we're spending on something else. We don't need to collect a single dollar that we aren't going to give to someone else or spend in some other way. So the reevaluation is difficult. It should have been handled differently by multiple administrations from both sides of THE AISLE OVER DECADES. UM, BUT LIKE I SAID, 688 PEOPLE SITTING UP HERE HAVE WORKED ON THREE, SORRY, UH, COUNCILOR HERMAN'S NOT HERE, HAVE WORKED ON THREE BUDGETS KNOWING THIS WAS COMING, KNOWING THAT THIS WAS THE DATE AND THIS WAS GOING TO BE IMPLEMENTED. THERE WAS TIME TO PREPARE, THERE WAS TIME TO MAKE PEOPLE AWARE, AND IT DIDN'T HAPPEN. SO THIS SENSE OF URGENCY TO SEND OUT NOTICES NOW OR WHATEVER, WE ARE SO FAR LATE TO THE GAME AND THE FAULT FOR THAT LIES UP HERE, NOT IN THE PUBLIC, BUT IT'S JUST THE REALITY OF THE SITUATION WE'RE DEALING WITH. I WOULD HAVE LIKED TO SEE SOME FUND BALANCE LAST YEAR PRESERVED SO WE COULD HAVE OFFSET THE BLOW OF THIS RE-EVALUATION, BUT NO ONE WANTED TO MAKE ANY DIFFICULT DECISIONS LAST YEAR EITHER. SO, YEAH, IT'S NOT FAT. IT'S LIMBS, AND THAT'S WHAT IT'S GOING TO TAKE. [1:15:05] Carl L. Sheline: A COUPLE OF THINGS HERE. SO, ONE COUNSELOR MENTIONED CMP. CMP IS CURRENTLY PAYING TAXES. We also sheltered some of that and a TIF correct administrator. Canera for reference of the NEC you see yes. Yeah, and so yes, Texas would be even higher if we didn't have CMP and Madam clerk, so are there any, Anything else that we should be thinking about or any considerations if we move the budget vote to the 19th? So [1:15:39] Kevin Gong: So two things. One is the ad is going in tomorrow's paper regarding the public hearing, but that's fine. We can still hold the public hearing on May 5th because that actually ties in with what Councilor Nagine was recommending. So the legal ad is in the paper that the public hearing will be on May 5th. And then related to the school budget, the charter says that the school budget adoption by the council can be done at a separate time from the city budget. So the referendum for the school budget is May 12th, and so we would be planning to put on the May 5th agenda the adoption of the school budget for the City Council to vote yes if you are interested or vote no depending upon what direction you want to take. Absentee ballots have been issued because you called for that election on April 7th, so that authorized us to issue absentee ballots. By state law, absentee ballots cannot be returned until after the City Council adopts the school budget because it's a validation election. You're confirming the vote of the council. So I don't know what the thoughts are of the council regarding the school budget, but we will be putting that on the May 5th agenda because of the May 12th election. So yes, I mean, I would recommend to the [1:17:03] Carl L. Sheline: council that we keep the school budget on next Tuesday's meeting, and then there are no other considerations for moving the city budget vote to the 19th. No, it's just it's traditionally [1:17:16] Kevin Gong: been on the first Tuesday of May, probably to allow for enough wiggle room because the budget has to be adopted by May 31st, the 11th month of the fiscal year per the charter. Okay, thank you. [1:17:32] Carl L. Sheline: Yeah, and I think given the fact that we're going to have the attorney here on Thursday providing guidance about you know amendments and the best way to submit them, I think it makes a lot of sense just to do the city budget vote on the on the 19th to allow us time to work through that process pending his guidance We'll wrap back around here councillor Nei Jean Thank You. Mr. Mayor [1:17:59] Joshua L. Nagine: One thing I would like to have, as soon as it can be provided, is all of the new positions and programs initiated by the city from fiscal year 2020 onward. So just a listing of all the new programs that were started and all the new positions from 2020 onward. We're talking about new [1:18:18] Bryan Kaenrath: positions that were new for FY20 and to now. [1:18:21] Joshua L. Nagine: Right. And same thing for any program that we started 2020 onward. One thing that's abundantly clear as we have to come up with a cohesive pilot program that we're bringing forward to the public. I know we have something that we, you know, have kind of like looked at dusting off a little bit, but we need to bring that forward. And, you know, I don't know, it needs to be like, I would love to say, hey, let's set up a committee, but it needs to be activated. Like, we need to get it done. So perhaps a committee is not the best format that it's done in, but we absolutely need to be reaching out to the nonprofits in our community in order to ask, especially the ones that, you know, I'm just going to frame this, I know there's a lot of arguments against non-profits looking ahead. Clubhouse, which is in my ward and it serves a bunch of people both in our community and in the region, is a community organization. You can call it an NGO, you can call it a non-profit, it's a community organization. And so when we talk about non-profits, that there are community organizations and there are folks that are either statewide or national organizations or organizations who don't serve and live in our community, that I think are some of the challenges. So just to name that, the garbage contract that we're looking at, we took on more than a doubling of our of our garbage contract, and I know that we're supposedly stuck in it for five years, but we're paying $250,000 in excess to EMWAC to burn waste. I WOULD LOVE TO FIND OUT IF THERE'S A POSSIBILITY OF HAVING, FINDING OUT HOW WE CAN CUT THAT $250,000 OUT OF THE BUDGET. AND THEN ALSO IF YOU LOOK AT THE PROGRAM THAT BATH ADOPTED, INSTEAD OF GOING WITH JUST CASELA, THEY HAD SEVERAL DIFFERENT PROGRAMS. AGAIN, CITY PROPERTY SALES, SUPER IMPORTANT. I would like to also advocate that we look at all of our revenue streams and consider increasing them. One of the things that comes to mind is the parking garage fees. Like, could we, could we raise a monthly parking garage fee to 65 or 70 dollars? Why would we not if it's not? If it's lower than what we're seeing in other communities, and so anywhere where we can turn some revenue without out putting it completely on the backs of the taxpayers. So I'll have again some amendments that I'm putting forward. You know, one of the things I know is CMMC, again, I brought it up before, High Street is on the paving schedule for this year, and I know that Prime just took over CMMC, and I know the regional hospital is very important, but that entire project sits on a non-profit's footprint that is only for the hospital and so like the question is can there be a conversation where we say hey can you pick up a hundred thousand of this because it's super expensive to rebuild their entire campus infrastructure that 's all I have to say at this moment but yeah the new positions and programs in 2020 onward are super important for me yes counselor long [1:21:34] Susan G. Longchamps: Champs, I'm just wondering, administrator, if you could answer the question if you WOULDN'T MIND THAT COUNSELOR ROY ASKED REGARDING DO WE HAVE ANY CURRENT EMPLOYEES CURRENTLY THAT WERE HIRED DURING COVID? YEAH, WE'D HAVE TO DOUBLE CHECK ON COVAX. WE'RE TALKING ABOUT FIVE. [1:21:54] Bryan Kaenrath: PLUS YEARS AGO, POTENTIALLY THERE IS ONE UM POSITION THAT WAS GRANT FUNDED. WE DID LOSE THE GRANT FUNDING FOR THAT POSITION IN HR, AND SO THEN NOW THAT POSITION IS EFFECTIVELY ON YOU KNOW ON THE RULES. UM SO BUT WE'D HAVE TO LET US GO BACK AND DOUBLE CHECK ON ALL OF THE, I DON'T KNOW IF WE WANT TO SPEAK RIGHT NOW AND ALL THE POSITIONS OR POTENTIAL POSITIONS. I DON'T THINK. [1:22:16] Carl L. Sheline: THERE ARE ANY MAYBE, BUT DO WE HAVE UH DIRECTOR TERRIO HERE? UH MR MAYOR, UH I GUESS WE HAVE A. [1:22:23] Bryan Kaenrath: DEPUTY ADMINISTRATOR O'MALLEY, UH WE HAVE CREATED NO POSITIONS FROM COVID. THE POSITION THAT THE CITY ADMINISTRATOR WAS REFERRING TO WAS A GRANT, BUT IT WAS NOT FROM COVID FUNDS. AND COUNCIL NAGINE, IF YOU LOOK ON PAGE 16 OF YOUR BUDGET BOOK, IT GOES BACK TO 2017. IT HAS THE LISTING OF ALL THE POSITIONS, UM YOU KNOW THE NUMBER FOR EACH DEPARTMENT, RIGHT? IT HAS THE NUMBER FOR. [1:22:45] Joshua L. Nagine: EACH DEPARTMENT BUT INDIVIDUAL POSITIONS LIKE I KNOW THAT WE TOOK ON UH A UM ASSISTANT OR DEPUTY. [1:22:52] Bryan Kaenrath: UH FIRE CHIEF TWO YEARS AGO I BELIEVE. YEAH, SO IF YOU LOOK AT RIGHT, SO IF YOU LOOK AT UM Fire, it'll show where the increase in 2024 it goes to from 78 to 79 and then to 80 in 2025. [1:23:07] Joshua L. Nagine: So I'm looking for the specific positions in progress, right? [1:23:10] Bryan Kaenrath: I've provided that list to councillor Martel for three years back that I can send to you to everyone. [1:23:16] Joshua L. Nagine: He had asked for that previously. Okay, I still want to have it from 2020 onward. [1:23:23] Susan G. Longchamps: Okay, thank you since we were on the topic of nonprofits as much as I appreciate Bates College and all the students you know every time they purchase a home or homes or buildings it's it's coming off from it's taking away from our tax base I would like our city administrator to have a conversation with Bates regarding I'd like to see them donate money towards our budget every year I mean you're talking there's over 2,000 students at like $90,000 a year that 's a lot of money and they're purchasing more and more houses and buildings, multi units, for their students, that they are, these students aren't staying there for free, they're renting these units out to them, so some way somehow I feel as though they need to contribute more to our city financially. I would like to say that second, I think it's going to be impossible for us to get to the 3.3. I just think it's, if we were to deduct two million dollars, if I remember that number correctly, 2.5, 2.5, about how many positions would that be, because there's, there's no other way, positions, they are [1:24:54] Bryan Kaenrath: but I know that you can say they made, there were a hundred thousand all in [1:24:57] Susan G. Longchamps: each position, that's 25 positions, so another 25, and we have how many employees currently within the city, 360 full-time, approximately 360, how many does the school department have, do we know, a little over 1200 I think, 12 or 1300, a little over 1200 or 1300, if we were to take the 1.9 from our fund balance to add to this, I know we had that discussion, bringing us down to nine percent, you mean it would take us down to nine percent, and I know we've talked about the different tiers, one, two, and three, it looks like tier two is three positions, is that right [1:25:54] Bryan Kaenrath: approximately three or four and [1:25:58] Susan G. Longchamps: what would that put us at so [1:26:04] Bryan Kaenrath: that was on one of the sheets that came out, director Roy, can you remind us of where we were at tier two versus tier three is for savings. [1:26:13] Unidentified speaker (Finance Director): So if you were to take the tier, the tier two was 295,530 for three positions. Tier three was 454,482. That would be 750,012. With using the fund balance, we would need to cut another 1,042,000. So that, those positions won't even get us to the 3.3. We'd be shy about $300,000. [1:26:48] Bryan Kaenrath: That's if you're trying to get down to the 3.3. [1:26:51] Susan G. Longchamps: I don't think we can. I mean, not unless... That would be the scenario, basically. Right. This is kind of a ridiculous question, but I'm going to ask it anyway. Supplies. Where are we at? Do we have a number for supplies throughout the city for the different departments? [1:27:17] Bryan Kaenrath: A total. of all the departments combined, right, I suppose we could, we could calculate that, thank you [1:27:26] Unidentified speaker (Finance Director): it is on one of your pages but hold on [1:27:32] Carl L. Sheline: well she's calculating that, do you have anything else [1:27:35] Unidentified speaker (Finance Director): Councilor Longchamps, after I hear that number, if that's okay. Yes, there under all of the departments is three million one for supplies. But you have to remember that includes Items social services you can't remove, so we'd have to take a look at each department and go through and see. But for most of the smaller departments, office supplies aren't very much of a budget. The other supplies are probably the larger ones are police and fire, which are supplies that they need to be able to do their jobs. [1:28:16] Susan G. Longchamps: What is the amount for the police and the fire, if you would please? It's [1:28:33] Unidentified speaker (Finance Director): gonna take a little bit because we just have them all the supply, so I'd have to sort by because it's all by the departments going down by the actual object. So in order to do that I'll pull it up and [1:28:47] Susan G. Longchamps: I'll let you know in a minute. Thank you. I think if we could cut there I'd like to have that discussion. depending on what those supplies are exactly, we have to make cuts. I've said that already. I just don't know that we're going to get down to 3.3, but I will definitely email some suggestions over to you. And thank you. [1:29:19] Bryan Kaenrath: If I could, Mr. Mayor, just a no on the properties. So the city actually did just place. [1:29:25] Carl L. Sheline: Are you talking about vacant properties? [1:29:26] Bryan Kaenrath: Correct, city-owned properties that are on the books. We did just place, I believe it's 28 properties on the market. They're currently on the MLS with our contracted broker. Most of the properties are smaller, non-buildable lots. Some are a little bit bigger. We actually have gotten some offers in that we're going to be bringing to you at the next council meeting for consideration. So but again most of these properties and these lots are not, you know, under major cash cows. They're smaller lots, run middle, unbuildable, really of interest maybe to a neighbor or in the butter, but we will have some offers to bring forward. So just know that we did actually put out an extensive list just within the last couple weeks on the market. I believe the numbers 28 properties and you can see their current list on the MLS. And what we bring those offers forward so that's that's in the works. [1:30:17] Carl L. Sheline: Thank you for that Anything further at this time councillor long champs, I guess I would ask [1:30:25] Susan G. Longchamps: so are we going to take money from the fund balance to help with this budget or is that? I know I had suggested it, but I don't know if we got [1:30:36] Carl L. Sheline: If I may councillor long champs, I'd like to work through everyone then I was gonna bring that up. Thank you Yeah, we will come back to that here before we close for the evening Are you good? I'M GOOD. COUNCILOR ROY, BACK TO YOU. THANK YOU. [1:30:52] Michael R. Roy: QUESTION THAT I HAVE ABOUT, WE HAVE PROPERTIES IN NEIGHBORHOODS THAT ARE BOUGHT BY OUT OF STATE PROVIDERS THAT DO IN-HOME. GROUP HOMES. ARE THEY TAXED? [1:31:14] Bryan Kaenrath: IF THEY'RE A PRIVATE ENTITY, I BELIEVE THEY WOULD BE TAXED. IF THEY'RE A NONPROFIT, IT WOULD BE DIFFERENT. I'M NOT SURE OF THE STATUS OF ALL OF THESE. IF WE DO HAVE SOME THAT ARE OF A NONPROFIT STATUS, I WOULD HAVE TO GO BACK AND CHECK THAT OUT. [1:31:28] Michael R. Roy: I WOULD LIKE TO KNOW THAT BECAUSE I THINK THAT'S ONLY FAIR IF WE'VE GOT OUTER STATE AGENCIES THAT ARE NONPROFITS BUYING THESE UP AND TAKING THEM OFF THE TAX RULES. I WOULD REALLY LOVE TO SEE THAT, SEE THE NUMBERS ON THAT. ALSO, I WOULD BE TOO IN FAVOR. I'VE BEEN TALKING ABOUT THIS FOR A COUPLE OF YEARS NOW. YOU KNOW, I LOVE BATES COLLEGE. I LOVE THE SPORTING EVENTS. I LOVE ALL THAT STUFF. BUT I DO FEEL LIKE THEY SHOULD CONTRIBUTE IN SOME WAYS TO OUR EDUCATION BUDGET. I REALLY FEEL THAT THEY SHOULD BE, YOU KNOW, HELPING US TO SUPPORT EDUCATION IN THIS CITY. You know, as a nonprofit, these are potential, these are potential students that could go to Bates, so I think, you know, investing in Lewiston, investing in our youth, I think that is something that I would really love to see really soon, so that's, it's one of my last comments right now for tonight. [1:32:30] Carl L. Sheline: I, Councillor Noble. Okay, Councillor Chittim, any final thoughts from you? Yes, on the, on [1:32:40] David B. Chittim: the pilot, the payment in lieu of taxes, Portland, as many people know, has an ordinance in the process that would require the city to ask for contributions, voluntary contributions, from its tax exempt people. I prefer the term tax exempt to nonprofit because it's, it's a broader definition, so anyone who is tax exempt is generally designated so under state law. It's not something that we say, well, you don't have to pay taxes, this is a state designation. Portland has proposed an ordinance that would ask For tax exempt organizations to contribute over an escalating three-year period ending at 40% of the taxes that they would otherwise be responsible for, it's a great idea and concept. But my understanding is that this has now been halted because there have been lawsuits preferred against the city for even asking for contributions. The city has no legal authority to require contributions from tax-exempt properties. One of my telephone calls this afternoon WAS SOMEBODY WHO HAS CHANGED HIS WAY OF THINKING ABOUT THE STORM WATER FEE. REMEMBER WHEN THAT WAS IMPOSED? THIS WAS A HORRIBLE THING. YOU'RE JUST SOAKING MORE MONEY FROM THE CITY OF THE TAXPAYERS. YOU'RE FIGURED OUT ANOTHER WAY TO GET MONEY FROM US. WELL, IN REALITY, I THINK MORE AND MORE PEOPLE ARE REALIZING THAT THIS WAS ACTUALLY A SAVINGS TO THE TAXPAYERS BECAUSE IT SPREAD THE BURDEN OF MAINTAINING A SPECIFIC SEGMENT OF CITY INFRASTRUCTURE OVER THE ENTIRE city instead of just the non tax-exempt people. The question he asked me was, can't we do that some more? Can't we increase the stormwater fee? Well, not really, because it's an enterprise fund and the money that's generated by that fund goes to maintaining the stormwater structure. It doesn't go to paying teachers salaries or police overtime or the clerk's assistance. It's dedicated to that, so we can't really inflate that just because we need more money in the general fund. I haven't given enough thought to think to consider, are there other enterprise funds that we could create that would spread the cost burden of operating this city more evenly across all of its constituents instead of just its taxpayers? That I think is worthy of consideration. I do think that a pilot program in as much as we have the authority to do that. You've heard me before, you're never going to get an answer to the question unless you ask it. So we need to be asking every tax-exempt organization in the city, every single one of them without fail, are you willing to contribute to the welfare of this community? That brings me to another point that another other constituent had raised. As you know, Ward six is a different entity than the majority of the city. We're we're a breed apart in Ward six. One of The telephone calls said this is gonna hurt, but I'm fortunate I feel that I can afford this. Many people can't. Would it be possible to include on the tax bills to everybody, are you willing to contribute an extra something to operating the city? I get these all the time from the tax-exempt nonprofit organizations that I belong to, your dues are $25 a year or $100 a year, would you be willing to throw in an additional 50 bucks or so? That's worthy of consideration because I bet you dollars to donuts there are folks out there who love this city enough and who can afford to that would be willing to say yes I'm going to give you a little bit more than you are demanding from me for your taxes. I'm not going to claim it's going to amount to more than a hill of beans, but it's a start and it's a way to let people who appreciate this city show that appreciation. Again, if you don't ask the question you will not get the answer, so I would encourage a reprinting of the tax bills for the ones that go out in September, in August I'm sorry, to put a question on there, are you willing to contribute a little more over and above what we've assessed for your taxes? That's all I have for now. [1:37:16] Carl L. Sheline: Councilor Martel did you have anything? Thank You Mr. Mayor, the last the one [1:37:20] Bret Martel: thing I forgot to touch on earlier was the school committee needs to sharpen their pencil too. I was watching, I don't think it was the most recent meeting but THE ONE BEFORE, THE CITY COUNCIL REPRESENTATIVE TO THE SCHOOL COMMITTEE AND THEN AT LEAST ONE OTHER MEMBER OF THE SCHOOL COMMITTEE IN AN OPEN MEETING UH WE'RE DEBATING AND DIALOGUING ABOUT UH LET'S HOLD OFF ON MAKING THESE CUTS BECAUSE THE PUBLIC'S GOING TO KICK BACK OUR FIRST BUDGET ANYWAY SO IT'S LET'S SAVE THESE SO THAT WE CAN PERFORMATIVELY PUT THEM IN LIKE MAKE SOME CUTS. YOU'VE GOT THREE TO FOUR TIMES THE EMPLOYEES OF THE CITY OF LOUISTON, THAT IS THE MAJORITY OF THE BUDGET, SO UM THERE'S SOME CUTTING NEEDS TO GET DONE OVER THERE AS WELL, AND UM JUST SOME OF THE DISCUSSIONS THAT HAPPENED IN OPEN MEETING I THINK ARE INSULTING TO TAXPAYERS. PRETTY MUCH SAYS YOU KNOW LET'S WAIT FOR THEM TO KICK BACK THE FIRST ONE, INCUR THE COST OF ANOTHER UH REFERENDUM VOTE, UH I DON'T KNOW IT'S JUST TIME FOR EVERYONE TO GET SERIOUS THERE'S A LOT OF MONEY THAT NEEDS TO BE CUT FROM BOTH SIDES THANK [1:38:29] Carl L. Sheline: You, councilors, thank you, staff. if I could just have a thumbs up from councilors who, are, in support of using fund balance at this time, just so we can get a sense of where we're at. One, two, three, and that would be to the nine percent threshold. I, yeah, I assume that's what we're all mostly in agreement towards. Appears they're deep, you know, I realize we have a counselor missing right now, but appears to be support for using fund balance. Okay, anything further? [1:39:05] Joshua L. Nagine: Counselor in aging, yes, just for a point of, two points of clarification. So if we don't have a supermajority to pass the budget, you would have to present us a budget that actually stays within the 3.3, the 3.3, okay, that's one piece. And then two, just to clarify, we don't actually need a super majority in order to approve the tier three [1:39:28] Bryan Kaenrath: cuts that were put forward, correct? If there's a final budget that incorporates them, you five, you have to support that because at tier three we're still over the 3.3 CPI. [1:39:39] Joshua L. Nagine: So it takes five votes. I'm just weighing those two things, and ultimately I think all of us are going to come forward with amendments, hopefully. And so even if we were supporting tier three, maybe there are other cuts, I don't know, it depends. but I just wanted to kind of iron that out. So one, no super majority, we're going to 3.3 anyways. [1:40:01] Bryan Kaenrath: Anything over 3.3 [1:40:03] Carl L. Sheline: requires the five vote super majority. Okay, thank you. Councilor Chiddom, did I see your hand up? [1:40:12] David B. Chittim: You did, but again, I have forgotten what I was going to say. Well, we'll be back here on Thursday. [1:40:21] Unidentified speaker (Finance Director): Okay, yes, Dr. Roy, did you have something? So this, the supply line for PD and fire is eight hundred and seventy seven thousand nine hundred and forty two, and then Public Works out of that three million is two million eighty one eighty eight, which the large portion of that is gas and oil and then salt, so there's only like 227 000 that could be looked at in each of the smaller departments. Thank you very [1:40:56] Susan G. Longchamps: much. I say we look at it. Okay, if we can, yeah. And since I'm here, so sorry, but as far as tax exempt, just really quick, instead of using your word, your non-profit, the unfortunate thing is, it's sad that we even have to go and ask, you know, if these people were willing and they're so kind, you think that the organizations would have already stepped up to help our city. [1:41:33] Carl L. Sheline: Okay, so we, yes, comes from aging, did you have something else? Just one more point on revenues. [1:41:39] Joshua L. Nagine: I'm gonna hold you to that, counselor. Yep. So the home health care facilities that run in the city are primarily in single-family homes. They do occupy apartment units as well, but primarily single-family homes, thereby doing a double whammy where it's a business that is actually generating revenue, but is removing a home from the market that a family could possibly purchase. Because it is a business, we could address some of the, I am not against home healthcare in any way, shape or form, but if we had a business licensing process that charged an amount that is appropriate for these services, we could offset some of our budget costs and calls for service because some of these places are getting calls for service from both our fire department, EMS, and the police. I just want to put that forward. I know that is not going to help this budget right this second, but we have to do something in order to start [1:42:39] Carl L. Sheline: balancing these things. So understood, just to recap quickly here, it appears that there's support to move the city budget vote to the 19th. We will keep the school budget vote for next Tuesday, and appears to be support for using the or going down to nine percent in fund balance, and we will have the attorney here to kick things off on Thursday to provide guidance on the amendment process, and we can provide [1:43:15] Bryan Kaenrath: updated numbers of where we are with the 9% calculated in for fund balance. Yeah. [1:43:20] Carl L. Sheline: We can crank those numbers in between. Anything further? Administrator Kainrath? I'm good for the moment, thank you. Deputy Administrator O'Malley? Director Roy? Just because I want to leave you out, Madam Clerk? Okay, we're calling it a night. We'll be back here on Thursday. Thank you so much, Lewiston. Thank you, counselors, and thank you, staff.