China TIF Committee Votes to Seek Consultant for Fourth Amendment

[0:43] Speaker A (unidentified): Okay, hold on. I'm going to pause the way I'm chatting to see if it can hear the voices. Actually, Stephen, can you hear us? Here we go. Let it rip. I still got 559. Oh, now it says six. So we all ready? [2:19] Speaker B (unidentified): Yeah. Well, I think we should pledge our allegiance. And [2:33] Speaker C (unidentified): to the Republic, for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. And [2:56] Speaker B (unidentified): I assume that you have the word with you. [2:58] Speaker A (unidentified): Sure, you can direct me to that, sure. You have a sheet that looks like this. This is the current year detail on the TIF account. I'm showing the expenditures for the 26-27 tip. They're pretty straightforward and they match up to the expenditures as well. [Speaker D (unidentified): Further] on I have a little more information. One file is C2. I'm just trying to keep the running total of everything over the years. So on the top of C2 you'll have the China Community Days, second page down is China Ice Days, and then you'll have the Community Garden. Those are funds that have come out of C2. One expenditure that also came out of C2 was $1,000. I think it was for the China Lake Association, and I can't remember the exact year, but I can look that up. It was for their, they had something that came in that they applied and we gave them $1,000 for. Additional information for C7 is the breakdown of the China Four Seasons Club Thurston Park and community and forest requests and expenditures and then I have a summary sheet for the 26-27 TIP projects so that is [4:42] Speaker E (unidentified): what I had for you was the was there an amendment to the program itself did I read that someone the third amended program is this yes but has it been amended since the last time we met when did we last meet oh a couple months ago so no okay [5:04] Speaker A (unidentified): this was approved on march 23rd 2026 by the department of economic and community development [5:19] Speaker E (unidentified): the other thing that i think we 've usually gone over in the past is money's allocated but not spent you're [5:30] Speaker A (unidentified): not going to get that from me today day. The auditors still doing their stuff. So until the audit gets done, I don't have that here. [5:44] Speaker E (unidentified): So I'm just wondering if there's anything there's much in the in the old business. We haven't moved on to that. Well, [5:59] Speaker F (unidentified): we want to talk about what we're into 2627 already. Yeah, we've improved 35,000. We've spent 25,000 for season 10. Correct. Did you see that from your awareness of what you're doing? Is that 9,000 going to work okay? [6:21] Speaker A (unidentified): They know what they have remaining, and they know that's as much as they have to work with. So, yes, they have several trail projects. I don't know if I have on this sheet, but they are working on the power line trail work. So they've done a total of $25,928 on the power line trail. I know with some of the additional funds Tom had mentioned that they are going to possibly start some more trail work. There's, depending upon where they're at in the budget and [7:11] Speaker F (unidentified): My guessing right that the money that didn't get expended under Thurston Park, yeah, they haven't expended any money yet, right, and is any of last year's carry forward what [7:31] Speaker A (unidentified): Happened? Yes, so you'll check the running grand total, like if you go up the 70,000 for Thurston Park, just above it is 25,000, yeah, that's the carry forward towards the 45, so that totals up to the 70,000. Huh, okay, so the far right column in that case and in the Four Seasons Club is what [7:54] Speaker F (unidentified): They cared for, okay, that's all, which [8:23] Speaker B (unidentified): We do all that or are you ready to go [8:32] Speaker F (unidentified): How did the, how did we feel like the money for kind of community worked out, and we didn't use, didn't need quite all of it, is that kind of in your phone, it ebbs and [8:48] Speaker A (unidentified): Flows, and we do our best, because, yeah, I mean, so it basically worked, you make it work [9:05] Speaker E (unidentified): Fifteen thousand to twenty five thousand in the new, in the third amended TIP, yeah [9:11] Speaker A (unidentified): That's the overall for C2, okay, all right, but [9:17] Speaker E (unidentified): The only thing, really, that's the only thing for C2 that's really taking advantage of that is China Community [9:23] Speaker A (unidentified): No, that is not correct. You have China Ice Days, which is at the fireworks, and you also have the community garden. And that one expenditure for CLA that I had mentioned. [9:36] Speaker F (unidentified): Where did the community garden come up? [9:39] Speaker A (unidentified): On the last page of that. You're welcome. [9:47] Speaker E (unidentified): So C2 has a total of $25,000. Correct. Correct. And then we're splitting it between the community days, the garden, and the ice days. [9:57] Speaker A (unidentified): And it's not all? Okay. And community days has another 7,000 that can be used throughout the year for other community events. [10:14] Speaker E (unidentified): But for this year, for community days, it looks like they've spent about... [10:21] Speaker A (unidentified): For the specific summer event. [10:22] Speaker E (unidentified): Yeah, for that one event, yes, the thousand argument number two [10:28] Speaker F (unidentified): So where was the seven thousand unified, but you said they had seven defense throughout the year [10:36] Speaker A (unidentified): The seven thousand was something that we originally discussed, was it in, did it start in the TIFF and then it ended with a slope board, I don't remember, I think we, I think the TIFF [10:57] Speaker C (unidentified): $19,000 for the town to do community events. Yeah. Blackboard set a budget of $12,000 for community itself. Yeah. And then the additional $7,000 would be for if there was any other events that the town wanted to have throughout the year. [11:17] Speaker A (unidentified): And then if anything weird happened, we were also, if something for China Community Days, we didn't need to come back to you. [11:24] Speaker C (unidentified): You. Thank you. So I just do that. [11:31] Speaker B (unidentified): The only thing [11:39] Speaker E (unidentified): that I had or I mean, we are going to respond old business for moving down a new business. I thought we're just in the financial report. Okay. All right. I don't [11:49] Speaker B (unidentified): want to do that was which is a nice question. So any more financial report? If not, we didn't have anything [12:15] Speaker A (unidentified): under old business, so that's great. We just leave it on there as a placeholder. Okay. So it is. [12:26] Speaker B (unidentified): What I remember from our last discussion was the notion that we were going to work on a fourth amendment. [12:36] Speaker E (unidentified): Yeah, we talked about it. [12:37] Speaker B (unidentified): Yeah, that's what we recognize, at least in the whole trail question, if you think. The whole what question? Trails. [12:47] Speaker E (unidentified): Trails, yeah. So the,, there, every year there seems to be, I don't want to, I don't want, I wouldn't call it a convention, but there's, you have 14 in the club and 13 are both competing for the same. [13:04] Speaker D (unidentified): What we've tried to do is to get a rough idea as trails have been very popular with the TIF committee and so I think it's the biggest allotment each year and it's grown over time, and we try to, you know, there still isn't enough when people present their budget, and they work it out between themselves, how it gets divided up. [13:39] Speaker B (unidentified): So that's kind of what happened at this last meeting, when Four Seasons yielded $10,000 than what they were initially awarded. [13:52] Speaker E (unidentified): For a little bit of context [13:54] Speaker C (unidentified): I wasn't here [13:57] Speaker D (unidentified): because the meeting was called when I was coming in as a way [14:00] Speaker E (unidentified): but you were heavily involved in the initial TIF [14:07] Speaker D (unidentified): No so the third TIF was when I became involved and the prior TIF the first and second TIF did not have the kind of detail channel that we started on with the players with the second now the second I'm saying the second is when he came involved right and then so we had more detail there was the original tiff and then an amendment predated anybody I mean maybe Deborah Joanne, she signed off on the warrant, any of it. I'm sorry. So the second is when we began to have these detailed allotments and there was more attention, shall we say, to the pots being kept to themselves and not reaching into one for work on another. [15:12] Speaker E (unidentified): Yeah, I guess if we wanted to further change that, we would need to have a fourth amendment. [15:20] Speaker D (unidentified): That's right, and then what I mean, it's the, if you look on the individual breakdowns by year are summarized here, so they can, I mean, you want to look at them individually. [Speaker B (unidentified): Usually, we're] on page 35 of the third amendment. I [15:54] Speaker E (unidentified): think the question is. Yeah, I see what you're saying. The question is. [16:03] Speaker F (unidentified): Can we do something in how we structure what we're offering as guidance that doesn't have the two trail maids that have different interests competing so much, that they're each doing something valuable and don't know the energy that is put into saying, well, they're getting more, they're getting lesser, you know, if you get more, I'll get less, it's constructive. That's sort of what we're thinking about. [16:41] Speaker D (unidentified): That? Well, if we're talking about a fourth amended TIF, the one thing you could do is it went from $60,000 to $80,000 between the second and third, if I'm not mistaken. It could go from $80,000 to $100,000 because we had foreseen spending $245,000, I think, that the state didn't approve, and so all of a sudden we have money that's designated here for the parking lot. Did that die off, parking lot? Are you talking at the, yeah, the church took care of it. Okay, all right, but that and was how much did we have for that? It was a one time [17:35] Speaker C (unidentified): $50,000. Okay. So that's [17:38] Speaker D (unidentified): $50,000 that could be as part of a Fourth Amendment could be, we could go from $80,000 to $130,000 and not affect anything else. Can you explain [17:53] Speaker F (unidentified): why that didn't work? Probably not. Because the [17:59] Speaker D (unidentified): way I read the statute, my fellow lawyer, I thought was legitimate, but the approving authority at the state said we ain't going to allow it that way. [18:13] Speaker F (unidentified): Put your words around it for me for a minute. Give me your vision for a minute, because I never was around hearing that. [18:22] Speaker D (unidentified): Well, we have offered on the agenda the statute. [18:29] Speaker A (unidentified): And, Jamie, I actually just passed you the two statutes and the, what else did I say? Just keep reading. DBCD. The rule. Rule. Yeah. [18:45] Speaker D (unidentified): But we need to look at the one you put in the agenda that I have in the front here. [18:52] Speaker E (unidentified): So I think it's fair to say we tried and got it rolled out. Right. [18:55] Speaker F (unidentified): Right. I'm just interested in our thinking and their thinking, because we may be facing that never thinking of a number four. [19:03] Speaker D (unidentified): I've printed it off here somewhere. But there are three different sections that you can obtain money through. Through, we mostly do the community development, part C, let's say. This, I looked at part B of the authorized project costs section, and they have a part that says costs related to construction, etc. For expansion of construction alteration, expansion of facilities not located within the district, i.e. the parking lot, not lose my place here, so it's not limited to, etc., etc. So I took the view that the reason we were offering the $50,000 was because people using the causeway were adding to the wear and tear on the product. And this facility that fit within that [20:33] Speaker A (unidentified): was my opinion. No, that sounds good, but it didn't fly. [20:38] Speaker D (unidentified): It didn't fly, so that frees up $50,000, so when we backed it out of what the voters approved, but the money is still there, and it has no claim on it at the present, but if we have an amendment, we could add that to... [21:02] Speaker F (unidentified): When you say the money was still there, you mean that we took that much in taxes from CMP and didn't allocate it there. Right. [21:13] Speaker D (unidentified): So the TIP fund has that additional money on earmark. There's other money that's on earmark, too. But that would be one solution. It would be easy to do it, but a fourth of that. [21:32] Speaker C (unidentified): Be required, right, so we've always been really conservative on how much we budget for our TIFF program, make sure that we don't exceed the revenue that we do, you know. Do you know what is anticipated for revenue from those [21:54] Speaker A (unidentified): properties this year? No, I haven't had a chance to get [21:57] Speaker E (unidentified): That would be huge, you know, I would think. He's in tomorrow. Yeah. [22:05] Speaker D (unidentified): I think what we did, and I'm looking for, we did an estimate on it, right? [22:12] Speaker C (unidentified): Yeah. But we're always conservative on the rest of it, which is wise. [22:18] Speaker F (unidentified): Yeah, we're not ever spending. Yeah, right. [22:20] Speaker D (unidentified): But we have quite a surplus. Yeah, I was going to say. We have quite a surplus, to me, is the bottom line. Yes. And that $50,000 is now part of that and I'm looking for something that... [22:36] Speaker E (unidentified): It might be on page 19. [22:39] Speaker D (unidentified): 19 or I'm looking at 36 at the moment, but let me look at the 15. I don't think that's too far in the beginning. Well, there you go. That. Now that should show, wow, what are we, Becky, we worked on that, 's Exhibit C. [23:03] Speaker A (unidentified): Yep. And does that show us anything? Total remnants? Well, if we are seeing the gross new tax so I'm just trying to capture there we go I was looking for the captured so we're capturing 373 thousand for the 25 26 year and we only was our about was it 215 or was it i mean it sounds like 215 yeah i mean so there's still that difference between the 215 and the 373 yeah right so we only we budgeted a hundred thousand [23:55] Speaker E (unidentified): less than we could yeah i think from my perspective it's well it's good to have a surplus but we got to do something with it because ultimately the tip is it can be a good thing but if we're not using the money then the other side of me is thinking okay well this is this is not going to the tax base and we're not properly dispersing them or using the money basically right we're going to lose it in 2045 unless something else happens anyway but that's a long way off and i just worry about that a little bit because i did do some research on after the last meeting about some other tips and there have some that have gone that have gone not debunked but have gone belly up whatever you want to call it because it wasn't getting properly used and from a taxpayer standpoint you kind of want you wanted to get used the right way or you wanted to go back to the tax base [25:01] Speaker D (unidentified): Well, let's remember why we did the thing. It was, we didn't, it was not because new business came here, it was purely a tax shelter. Everybody's familiar with that then, that we wanted to keep our subsidy, we didn't want to pay more to the county, just because CMP put a very expensive power line, so. [25:24] Speaker F (unidentified): But I think it's out of integrity to say we didn't want new business. Did you just say we didn't want new business, we just were going to tax shelter? [25:34] Speaker D (unidentified): No, the reason we did it was because the shelter, those things, it was a windfall in a sense that we didn't attract the business. business. The business plopped itself into our lap. So the question you raised, though, Ben, I think, you know, we're, we're 10, at least 10 years, how old was the program? 2015. So we're 15, we're 10, plus years into it is the time I saw on the agenda at one point that there was hiring of a consultant to look at and see are we still we still need that protection is there more value in having this come into the general fund will we will we be all right with the county and the state revenue sharing and so on or is it still beneficial to us to keep it there keep it coming it. Maybe we're young enough that there won't be a change, but cash flow projections were made to make that decision, and maybe we should look at them again, or have new ones done. [27:02] Speaker F (unidentified): So, you probably, you know that I have a concern that what I was looking at China's wonderful support of its recreational and its public profile in terms of a good place to live with recreational opportunities but I have a huge concern about all the rest of our cultural underpinnings as a as a community and I was I think what you know that I think you know that I'm kind of focused on the South China Library but oh I didn't know where you were going oh that's That's where I'm starting to fall in. That's where you need your meeting. [27:52] Speaker A (unidentified): I only missed one meeting. [27:56] Speaker F (unidentified): Well, I've missed your one meeting. [27:59] Speaker D (unidentified): I've heard you speak from those chairs. [28:01] Speaker F (unidentified): Yes, from there. That's why you know. But I was very struck when I read the newspaper article last spring about Skowhegan supporting their library. And I thought, how'd they do that? And so I've just been trying to think about that and I don't have answers yet but I have thoughts that head in the direction that have bearing on this and that is that in Skowhegan they have a development district well and actually we do too we just don't think of it the same way as we would downtown Skowhegan you know I mean downtown Skowhegan looks like something that looks like a city and we don't really have something that looks quite like that except I think sometimes Chinatown is safe, South Chinatown looks like that. So in the development district in Skowhegan, in their TIP, they are clear that things like libraries and museums and are all part of creating the quality of this of that community that brings that attracts energy and therefore attracts business that and that makes sense in terms of a city when you think about city it makes it a little weirder thinking about us that makes you following I'm wondering [29:28] Speaker D (unidentified): I'm wondering what you're leading up to, because we have constraints, you know, we are not, we just can't spend, I don't think there's any basis to spend it for museums or libraries. Because you need to, we need to, this has been handed out, Section 5-52-25, Part C, and that's where we land, A and B. We're not Rumford putting up a new paper machine. We are not Rumford putting in new traffic lights because of an expansion of their paper now. So that's A and B. C is what the department is economic. Those two are economic. Now, community is where we have our, that's what we can spend money. [30:32] Speaker F (unidentified): That's trails. Community is a library. [30:36] Speaker D (unidentified): Yes, but let's go through, Ms. Blair, and see where you can find a library. [30:43] Speaker F (unidentified): Well, that's what I'm thinking about trying to think of. [30:47] Speaker D (unidentified): We can get the town attorney to go. That's what I was going to say. Would you like to read the plain English yourself? [30:53] Speaker E (unidentified): No, yeah, I think that makes total sense to do. And I think we said something about a consultant, right? And perhaps the consultant could look at what you're proposing, Joanne, and say, does this, could we make it work based on the statutes that we have from the state? And if they say, through some magic, we can bend and meet the statutes, then perhaps. If not, then... [31:19] Speaker F (unidentified): Yeah, that's totally comfortable. [31:22] Speaker E (unidentified): And I think it's the same type of situation as the church parking lot, right, where we read it, we felt like we were okay, we took it to the state, and they said no, it doesn't meet that requirement. [31:38] Speaker F (unidentified): Yeah. I do have an interesting question, another to you, and that is that our development district, Pine Tree Development District, that map is on the wall. Does that have anything to do with our TIF reality? [31:53] Speaker D (unidentified): I don't think so. When I first started on this, I looked into that and the statute lapsed or something. But in terms of a consultant, I'm thinking of financial. We have a town attorney who's been involved. This would be a question for her. So if we want to make a motion to ask the select board and the town manager, can we fund with TIP funds a library or a museum? Is there a way to do that? Our town attorney will come back. I'm a retired attorney. I'm not allowed to give advice, and I never acted. [32:32] Speaker F (unidentified): You don't want to anymore. [32:34] Speaker D (unidentified): But I think it's worth looking at some of these things and then seeing what else could we do. [32:43] Speaker A (unidentified): But that's what I really think that we should be working on tonight. Not specifics. We really need to say, hey, are we going to look to do a Fourth Amendment tip? Okay, great. Well, what are the things we want to capture? All right, we want to ask a question about libraries, museums, we want to ask about emergency services, we want to ask about maybe doing the trail funding differently, but we really want to capture all of those pieces tonight and then figure out, you do not spend half your life doing that. I don't have any time. But exactly, so we need, we have money in this tip to be able to hire an attorney, hire a consultant. The city of Augusta uses a consultant, and I know at least one person speaks very highly of her. I don't know, but I just think that this, if you have somebody that speaks this language, because this is a unique language, when you're talking about a TIP, you just need somebody that has that experience to be able to negotiate and help us move forward, because we can say oh I want this and oh I want this, but if you don't have somebody here speaking the language, then, you know, we're just kicking the ball around and we're doing nothing and not getting anywhere. [34:01] Speaker F (unidentified): Because another example is that actually, in what we would once upon a time consider a development zone, is the huge parking lot at Farrington's. I don't, it's weird, I mean, it's the same, it's a huger problem than the church parking lot for the upper amblage. it but the parking on Harry kids would have I think if improved and if we did put some really informative signage helped with parking questions with that South China landing, I mean South China landing is problematical, no parking where what's a closed place where there's a whole bunch of paved space, well right there and people don't like to walk, I don't want to walk but they've walked that far and you know don't want to have any too much use but apparently Nash's did ask about the possibility of something I don't know what last year and didn't get anywhere, which doesn't surprise me, but it's the same kind of thing like how much, how much support do we want to give to their being more,, more, community, more solid community services. Yes, they're not. So, [35:22] Speaker A (unidentified): so on pages 14, 15, 16, 17. Those are the maps, right. But so if somebody is in this specific section, does that give them, just remind me what the importance of those maps are [35:50] Speaker D (unidentified): they are the district [35:52] Speaker A (unidentified): so if I have a property district which somebody sitting at this table does, yes I do, so does that mean if she wanted to do something that is incorporated in our TIP, does that make it a more, does it make it a better place to do whatever it is, open a business let's say, so how does that play into that, 's what I want to understand [36:24] Speaker F (unidentified): so Joanne puts a [36:26] Speaker D (unidentified): property on the market and says [36:29] Speaker B (unidentified): you can put a [36:30] Speaker D (unidentified): Great business you got all this access and you know we've got TIP money that we can spend on this. That would be something if we don't allow for that kind of thing, but to make to be an inducement we will, you're going to build your widget factory here, you need access, you need some power things, and we will pay for that and you can pay us back or over time or it will just make you a grant to make the low, you know you need sources of money for your budget, your capital budget, and here's what you get. A grant from the town to take care of part of them so. [37:21] Speaker A (unidentified): Is there a reason not to have property in China Village, South China Village, and maybe even more of the Route 3 corridor listed than this minuscule amount that is currently in there? I just I never I felt that the maps never really encompassed everything and I also go back to that parking lot. If that parking lot actually was listed on page 17 we would have had a much [37:55] Speaker D (unidentified): better tool. I think it would be difficult, no matter what, because it's really, what's the project? The project is, there's private ownership, non-profit is private ownership, but they're not putting up anything and we're not doing anything like building a row or you know providing access or whatever or the property to have a business on it right. [38:33] Speaker A (unidentified): I just always wonder because there are much better ways that we could capture properties that we would like to designate more for business and I just didn't feel that when these maps were originally created that it necessarily met that and you know obviously 10 years have gone by and there are different properties that I you know potentially could see just because of the interest that's been out there with them for new business. So part of the part of the Fourth Amendment, yeah, that's what I want to know we could I think but I think [39:15] Speaker D (unidentified): you could modify the district, okay, change the maps, yeah, could we perhaps, but again where's the [39:24] Speaker E (unidentified): town attorney? She's not here. Yes, that's what I was going to ask is could we perhaps have somebody come to our next, is that are there TIP funds available to have somebody come to our next meeting or even or even review the review the TIP in its current form? We come up with a basic list of questions to ask, they could come to the next meeting, we could we could pose the questions. [39:46] Speaker A (unidentified): And get some basic answers. So this is why that consult. Yeah, I mean, it's exactly why. So I, this is the only person I knew. I just like to wrap and print it stuff off. Don't, so, LaRochelle Consulting, she works with the City of Augusta, I know she does the TIP. [40:14] Speaker D (unidentified): Is it Reagan? Yes. He's a former city councilor. Yeah. [40:20] Speaker A (unidentified): So, I worked a couple Googles, and this is the only person so far. So if anybody else has anyone, I just think, I'm not sure that Attorney Meter is the one to roll with us on this. I think it's more of somebody that's going to be a consultant. Attorney Meter will end up being more of a last review to keep us out of trouble. But you need somebody that's going to come in and do all the legwork for us. And okay we want to do this and that person's going to whip through the maps and figure out things and you know while we talk to businesses or you know while we look at the lay of the land and property you're not just looking at this document and going oh well they want to add this and it's going to be the person that's going to be your go-getter. I don't know if she is or anybody [41:12] Speaker E (unidentified): else is, but how do we start that initial communication? Just reach out? Didn't [41:21] Speaker A (unidentified): we talk about that last meeting about allocating some funds for consultant? We talked to bow or PR, okay, which is different than as part of the TIP projects we put [41:38] Speaker D (unidentified): money aside. So we don't have a budgeted item, but we have a project expense fund that would pay Reagan LaRochelle or an attorney or an architect or whatever. The select board would, you know, we'd make it, get a proposal, you know, do some, put out an RFP or whatever, and then bring it back to the select board. The TIP committee recommends hiring this person for that much, that kind of fees or having them on retainer just like the down attorney. [42:12] Speaker A (unidentified): And that would come out of Project C1, program expenses. [42:16] Speaker F (unidentified): Right, yeah. And what money do we have in that? [42:19] Speaker C (unidentified): It's $25,000. [42:21] Speaker D (unidentified): Oh, go for it. [42:22] Speaker F (unidentified): I make a motion that we go forward with finding a consultant, not a lawyer-lawyer, consultant that would guide us in considering making our TIF maximally useful to the community. [42:40] Speaker D (unidentified): Who's going to prepare the RFP? [42:42] Speaker E (unidentified): Well, I think, so it's $25,000 annually. Do we know how much is in there currently? [Speaker A (unidentified): We have $25,000.] I was going to say, like, I don't... [42:51] Speaker D (unidentified): I think we haven't spent a lot out of that. Yeah, exactly. We lowered it in the third, fifth. [42:56] Speaker E (unidentified): Yeah, I remember that. [42:58] Speaker A (unidentified): Well, there should be at least $50,000, so... [43:09] Speaker C (unidentified): Plus, you're in again this year. [43:12] Speaker A (unidentified): Yeah, I don't think we spent... I'd have to look to see if we spent on anything. [43:15] Speaker E (unidentified): Thing I must see one last year but I don't recall we did it once you just have to have some it was [43:20] Speaker A (unidentified): a little bit of attorney for you I think yeah probably yeah so another area we could we do [43:26] Speaker D (unidentified): pay the Kennebec Valley Council of Governments they have some stuff but I see the cap manager you're shaking your head I would at least helping us find a consultant yes maybe I would [43:44] Speaker A (unidentified): I would encourage us to consider for that I was going yes we could reach out if they could yeah [43:50] Speaker D (unidentified): What do you any ideas any thoughts yeah we'll do it no we just yeah you can put it you can respond to the RFP right but we really like you know identifying somebody that was what I meant [44:07] Speaker C (unidentified): It would be nice to maybe have three different people, you know, give you a call and recommend a few and have like three different people respond to an RFP and we might have some choice I guess. Yeah. [44:28] Speaker F (unidentified): I'm thinking that maybe there was somebody connected to Unity's process so I think that was pre-TIF. But Zane did a new hotel. But they have a lot of money from Clifford. [44:41] Speaker D (unidentified): And another thought is the prior town assessor was involved with this. And he, you know, he works for Scowhegan. He used to work for Scowhegan. There are other towns. And he was experienced with these things. And he contributed now. That's another maybe the new assessor has that background or something or there are other [45:08] Speaker A (unidentified): assessors who sideline from that but just thinking everybody is very stretched thin so [45:18] Speaker E (unidentified): Yeah okay it's a good thought though but maybe he could then he may have some [45:26] Speaker C (unidentified): ideas, also recommendations. [45:28] Speaker D (unidentified): You may have seen it, or she may have seen somebody. [45:32] Speaker C (unidentified): They assess several different towns, so they see a lot of different [45:37] Speaker E (unidentified): things out there. Is it fair to say that the assessed value of the substation has [Speaker D (unidentified): continued to rise?] Yes, I was going to say on a plane higher than what was originally projected. [45:53] Speaker C (unidentified): I think we've always projected to the appreciation value going forward because typically infrastructure like that appreciates but yeah it hasn't been the trend right especially post 2020 right but it didn't it didn't appreciate this year oh yeah I'm sorry what I was saying was we assumed appreciation but that hasn't been [46:20] Speaker E (unidentified): the trend yeah so I guess where I was going with that is can we based on the last 10 years we can only are we assuming that the tip will have more money as we go as we continue on [46:39] Speaker D (unidentified): I think a good place to look, Exhibit C, and what you see is starting with 2027, we were assuming a 12.5 mil assessment rate. And so that's fluctuated. But you also see these, you know, 266 for 2027, whereas the year before might have been, I don't know, was something in that ballpark. So you see 28 going to 263, 259, so that the original numbers were more at that level than they are now. So there again, a consultant, that might be something we ask a consultant to do, because this was done by, you know, the prior assessor, if I'm not mistaken. But he ran these numbers, but it was a guess, I would say. [47:43] Speaker C (unidentified): It's always going to be a guess. [47:45] Speaker A (unidentified): And you keep in mind that we've had to do some, yeah, keep up with the market revaluation, but it's not revaluation. [48:02] Speaker C (unidentified): What's the word, it's like a spot revaluation, no, across the board, the increase, yeah, doing it, is there something we could come up with that. [48:18] Speaker E (unidentified): Compares the projected versus actual, like. [48:28] Speaker F (unidentified): A 10-year, what we actually, yeah, spending, right, what we spent, but we, what we took in, what we spent. [48:38] Speaker C (unidentified): Well, I don't know, on this table, in these previous years, is that what the actual was? [48:46] Speaker A (unidentified): Yeah. Yeah. To the far right. [48:48] Speaker C (unidentified): I said, why wouldn't it be? We knew what it was. [48:50] Speaker A (unidentified): This is your antifragrance. Right. [48:53] Speaker C (unidentified): That's what we're going to have. Right. [48:58] Speaker D (unidentified): I mean, I think we're going to have, we seem to have plenty of money. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. That's my point. Right. But there again, that would be part of what I was talking about before. You would look at this as, you know, where are we better off? Are we better off with the money coming straight into the general fund, or are we still better off with the money being protected. [49:30] Speaker E (unidentified): In the TIF? Protective in the tip, as long as we are using it and using it for projects and community. [49:39] Speaker D (unidentified): Another thing we could do is change. Right now we capture 100%. And then we could capture 75% going forward. Right. Or something like that. And that might be the balance that somebody comes up with is another amendment. [49:59] Speaker F (unidentified): And 25% of it go into the regular tax revenue that would then potentially raise our school and county and other contributions, possibly. [50:12] Speaker D (unidentified): Yeah, but you would see whether there's value in, you know, slicing it a little differently. [50:19] Speaker C (unidentified): I know one of the things that really kind of got the thought of the Fourth Amendment going was the fact that they came up with a new legislation that you can start using it for some EMS stuff, which we all know that 's huge. Because EMS, I mean, you're going to get a lot of buy-in, especially with the select board and with the people because this EMS thing is it's becoming a problem that is going to be very hard to overcome with the tax, trying to keep taxes at a decent level [51:02] Speaker D (unidentified): So are you, I mean, I've been reading about this but I haven't seen anything in the tip, but are you saying that other towns are using this for EMS, is that, you know, because when I find the new statute to be hard to understand, are you thinking [51:23] Speaker C (unidentified): that you're going to build a building for that's what it yes sounds like that was one of the things that was would be allowed allowable the consultant you have for that committee is that 's coming [51:36] Speaker D (unidentified): coming from? Where is it coming from? [51:38] Speaker A (unidentified): The Gauch State Statute from MMA, from, I think Attorney Meader talked about it. [51:51] Speaker D (unidentified): Peter and MMA as sort of a salve to throwing the parking lot out, the person at the DECB said, oh, you should look at this new statute because maybe there's something you can qualify for. Well, I don't know what we qualify for, but the attorney Peter is looking [52:18] Speaker F (unidentified): at it. Why wouldn't the fire department call and they're just like emergency services, if it was a town fire department it might not, I mean, I mean, I don't know what I'm talking about there, but one of the problems of there being private but community support, how is that [52:36] Speaker E (unidentified): disapproval, are you talking specifically about the volunteer fire departments, yeah, or are you [52:45] Speaker C (unidentified): talking about offsetting the delta in the room, no, well, no, I think it's municipal type departments, I believe, and it is what's, you know, and we're looking at, I don't see Sax looking at, you know, making a recommendation on where to go forward in the future with, you know, the rescue, with the fire departments. Sounds like there may be a recommendation coming to do something with some sort of a municipal rescue. [Speaker D (unidentified): Here's my concern.] They would need some sort of a place to be housed. I mean, the federal government and the state government have really squeezed the funding for all EMS, and it's really put a burden on the towns, and it's going to, it's starting to be, well it already is, a problem, and it's only going to get worse, and if we can use some of this TIF to help us with that situation, I'm very interested in looking into what's possible. [53:58] Speaker D (unidentified): I'm interested. There's a kicker in here that troubles me for something like public departments. It talks about capital costs used to provide so on and so forth, the need for which is related to general economic development. Now, we know in our town, this is not the need for EMS and fire has nothing to do with economic development. We don't have any economic development this day. [54:34] Speaker F (unidentified): That can't be true. [54:36] Speaker A (unidentified): I mean, that's economic development, and they need to have fire and emergency services. So how does that not assist them in their dollar general, family dollar, the bank? [54:50] Speaker B (unidentified): I mean, who's going to move to this town if they investigate what our response time is for fire and rescue? [54:57] Speaker D (unidentified): Yeah. All right. Well, I didn't think of those things. I take it back. [55:06] Speaker E (unidentified): It sounds like we've got plenty of money in the program expense. [55:12] Speaker D (unidentified): There's other things to qualify for here, but whatever. [55:15] Speaker E (unidentified): So I think Joanna made a motion to reach out. I think that's a good idea. It's trying to find somebody that can help us as a group and as a town, make sense of what we can do or what we can't do. [55:32] Speaker A (unidentified): So really, the request would be to the select board that we ask if we can put out an RFP for consultant services using TIP funds, really. [55:45] Speaker E (unidentified): And then to help us modernize our TIP program. [55:50] Speaker F (unidentified): It sounds like a sufficient number of words, Nick. [55:56] Speaker D (unidentified): Nick, if we're happy. [55:57] Speaker F (unidentified): We're 10 years in. [55:59] Speaker E (unidentified): We know, we kind of have a sense of what we've done. I mean the causeway is a great example of what we've done in 10 years, right? We've got another how many years? 2045. 2045. 2045. 19 years. 18 years. We want to try to make the most of that time assuming we do not extend the tip or we can't extend it that fast. Right or unless there's some type of unless something happens the same or yeah right so we just we know we have that amount of time left we want to try to maximize it so we need somebody to help us figure out how to [56:37] Speaker D (unidentified): do that there are relief valves too they think you get some like two years if you're in the middle of [56:43] Speaker C (unidentified): our prime year there's some oh really yeah so is there an expert in that statement that [56:54] Speaker F (unidentified): we can look for someone that wanted as emotional well the motion is that we hire a consultant that starts by talking to us and that this if this needs approval by the select board please to make their support and that we want to look at ways in which we can more broadly support community [57:21] Speaker A (unidentified): and using it to fund. [57:26] Speaker E (unidentified): Motion is made. I'll second it. [57:29] Speaker B (unidentified): All those in favor? [57:33] Speaker A (unidentified): Okay. Everybody 6-0? I know somebody [57:39] Speaker D (unidentified): and she's not looking at us to know if everybody's [57:41] Speaker E (unidentified): voting for it. I think it's, when it goes to what's left for, I think it's if we can emphasize the fact that we'd be using existing money in a program this would not be any [58:06] Speaker F (unidentified): Any other thoughts [58:13] Speaker C (unidentified): people had that they might want to do with it or any other questions? [58:21] Speaker E (unidentified): The only other thing I had a thought of is I know that there was one of the select board meetings there was a presentation about a community center of some kind and i didn't know if that if we wanted [58:33] Speaker A (unidentified): to ask something about that oh when david got over there i've [58:41] Speaker C (unidentified): been to the take some more words about [58:43] Speaker E (unidentified): that so like a i've been to the my oldest does travel basketball and we go all the way to belgrade to go to their gym and it's a it's a very nice facility and they use it for a lot they have a lot of they have many like they'll do something for they'll have dances there they'll have halloween fun retreats there they'll have all kinds of new there's a holiday event they'll have it there and it's it's a nice it's a nice building oh you'd be [59:15] Speaker F (unidentified): like behind the civic center kind of well yeah then that means that the support for everything thing from the legion to the, we don't have a grange, to the church's faces, to, oh dear, I'm trying to think what else. It will shift a whole bunch of stuff if that were to happen. And the school, Jim, and our school facilities. So who knows? [59:44] Speaker D (unidentified): Back to the statute, there's unauthorized project costs, may not approve project of possibilities for predominantly for the general conduct of general government for public recreational purposes including they're not limited to and so on so recreation centers [1:00:08] Speaker A (unidentified): athletic fields so i think again yeah that's so weird to me [1:00:20] Speaker D (unidentified): I guess that's how this new thing got in, the 50%. There were like 12 legislative sponsors for the thing. One of them was a former city councilor, city manager in Augusta. [1:00:40] Speaker E (unidentified): I do like the idea of the consultant and trying to help us grow. [1:00:44] Speaker D (unidentified): And this year, we can get bills like that in, because right after the election, but the second year that's just ended, 2026, June 30, 26, yeah, he couldn't do that. So it's every other year you get a window. You [1:01:14] Speaker B (unidentified): need to go drafting that, or who's drafting it? I don't understand. I don't know the works of this. [1:01:18] Speaker A (unidentified): We'll just put it on the select board agenda for the fifth to just make sure that they approve moving forward with trying to find get it put an RFP together. If I had extra time give me a go steal one from somebody. We'll see and talk to Katie Cogg and the assessor and just see if we can get any leads of where we could actually send it. So now we just need help remembering to put it on the agenda for the 5th. [1:01:50] Speaker B (unidentified): You need help with that? I know. I just need to. [1:01:53] Speaker A (unidentified): I'll be in on Friday. Yeah. When he looks at the agenda and I've forgotten it, he needs to remind me. [1:01:59] Speaker F (unidentified): Because he's a selection. [1:02:01] Speaker A (unidentified): He needs to run this book to remember. You got to know things could happen. Okay. [1:02:10] Speaker C (unidentified): That's all. It's a good place to start, I guess. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. [1:02:18] Speaker B (unidentified): Well, in my mind, before coming to this meeting, that was our goal, was to start the conversation about a fourth amendment. And I'm not sure that there's much more on that subject to talk about until we've identified someone, except for us getting a list together of those questions. Absolutely. And maybe we should, the ones that we already have in mind, maybe we capture tonight but then circulate and the others that come to you over the next days weeks that you think are absolutely important for us to consider or have to question the consultant [1:03:04] Speaker A (unidentified): and set a meeting date to if we could okay [1:03:19] Speaker B (unidentified): would this be a meeting to have hopefully the consultant you never know we make it worse than [1:03:27] Speaker A (unidentified): magic we might not so the select board meets on the 5th and the 19th if we meet on the 26th which is a Monday that would give the select board two meetings maybe to make something happen so [1:03:43] Speaker D (unidentified): So I'd be in favor of the 26th, that [1:03:50] Speaker A (unidentified): would be for everybody. That's about four weeks. 26th at 6 p.m. for a claim. And should everybody bring their questions to that meeting of things that they are thinking? Would that be the best? And then we can compile it depending on either way we'd have the project to compile it and or meet with the potential. [1:04:16] Speaker D (unidentified): and for me [1:04:19] Speaker B (unidentified): I think live conversation rather than email about talking about these ideas is probably better [1:04:25] Speaker D (unidentified): and I think that's consistent with our role as a public [1:04:31] Speaker B (unidentified): body yeah I would also [1:04:35] Speaker E (unidentified): not be surprised if the consultant pool is very slim [1:04:42] Speaker D (unidentified): oh did you just google like I did [1:04:45] Speaker E (unidentified): no but I mean, this seems like something that is very, specific. Yes, it is. Right? [1:04:51] Speaker B (unidentified): And speaking from my place on another committee in this town, an excellent, which I would have thought was kind of a small world, an excellent consultant was involved. Super. [1:05:03] Speaker A (unidentified): Great. Of course, that came from a lead from somebody. So, well, we'll have to hope that we have enough lead. Yeah. Yep. [1:05:12] Speaker F (unidentified): Absolutely. Then you have to attach your ear to the grass. [1:05:19] Speaker D (unidentified): Attorney Meter might be a good source. He has other town clients. [1:05:29] Speaker A (unidentified): And I figure there's a couple other towns that have TIFs, so if it's not somebody, if they have an outside person that does work for them. [1:05:39] Speaker D (unidentified): Yeah, I mean, Augusta has an economic development director. Right, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. What if then there was another thought? MMA. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That was fun. Was it fun? [1:06:01] Speaker F (unidentified): Yeah. It was fun. Thanks, everybody. Productive meeting. Oh, it's fun to invite you. They're really excited about it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.