• Good evening, and welcome to our January 14 work session. Our first item of business is a discussion with,
• Frank Balby,
• regarding the DPW Garage and DPW operations.
• just before we start off, right, so the board has taken,
• a site visit to the garage.
• And, as part of that site visit, we asked the superintendent to come back so that he could answer any questions or concerns
• that the board has about,
• operations at DPW,
• whether those are
• about vehicles, staffing, the buildings themselves,
• whatever whatever questions,
• people from the board, may have.
• Okay. Cool. Please.
• Superintendent,
• thank you very much, for the tour. We really, really appreciate it. It's always good to be back there and to see, you know, how things have evolved since since the last visit. So I wanted to just mention that,
• you know, we're involved in the Westchester Municipal Officials Association
• gathering with
• other other local elected officials. So we we had a meeting last Thursday,
• and I was able to give them a little bit of a briefing based on the information you'd provided us on the renewable diesel.
• Mhmm. And it is it is most impressive that
• that we're we're we're basically doing all of our vehicles with with renewable diesel.
• They they were they were astounded. I I said we didn't invent it. We we borrowed it from New York City and from Westchester Airport. But your reflections on on the renewable diesel experiment so far, no longer an experiment now. Right. So Well, first, I I wanna say thank you guys for for
• I like when when we have visitors. I I do I do enjoy giving tours of the building. I'm sort of proud of the building and the guys and what we do. So I kinda like showing that off. So
• yeah. I mean, admittedly, I was I was going skeptical. I think anybody would, and I think anybody should. Right? It's it's the new you know, it's it's I would say it's the asbestos. Right? It's like, oh, this is great. It does everything, and then hold on. Let's see how this is. Right. So
• yeah. But we had that pilot program. We had the spare tank, and we did choose some vehicles.
• We didn't have
• you know, and there were vehicles that we use. It's not like we filled them up and and parked them, that was it. And
• there were no issues. I mean, you know, nothing and we gave it a good run. It was three months
• in those vehicles. So,
yeah, everything so far has been has been has been good. The the estimated reduction in our carbon footprint is very significant. Yeah. 12% as I recall.
Yeah. So that's, you know, that's a that's a big number. Yeah. Right? Yeah. It'll make you look for sure when stuff like that comes around. Mhmm. Yeah.
• at the facility, I'll ask it now.
• Assuming
• that we'll have a few more snow events
• throughout
• the year, maybe we'll be lucky and we won't, but we've had a few so far. How do things stack up in terms of
• equipment and supply for salt
and other other items for the rest of the year? Material has been has been good. So we we were lucky. We had a nice
• leftover supply from last year. So that got us through the the initial part of the winter.
• The equipment is good.
• The guys are holding up. Unfortunately,
• you know, the budget as we budget,
• our
• overtime
• for winter operations,
• we kinda throw a number at it every year. Right. It's a guess.
• Most years,
• our number is higher than what we actually use.
• This year, unfortunately, it won't be. But, unfortunately, there's not much we can do about it. Right? The snow comes snow and ice comes, we we have to take care of it.
• Short of that, though, I mean, the guys are doing a good job. The equipment's holding up. We I like this nice we had a nice two or three week break here where it warmed up a little bit. We got rid of some of the snow, Took a little deep breath.
• Unfortunately, you know, we're expecting more snow,
• so we're ready. Yeah. It'd be nice if we don't get any. Yeah. So if you can do anything about that, that'd great.
• another meeting. Oh, okay. But
• and, again, you know, just the diversity of activities that you're you're undertaking there on our behalf, whether it's
• it's sanitation,
• public works, building things like our new EMS facility
• and all of our recycling
• and snow removal. So thank you and and the team for all of that, and thanks again for the tour tonight. I may have a couple more questions, but I'll turn it over.
And I, you know, I just wanna say it's this is my second time that I've visited the facility. And, you know, the stewardship
• of the village residents' tax dollars is evident when you walk through that building just in in terms of how organized and clean
• and how thoughtful
• you are. I mean and the entire team is in terms of,
• the equipment
• and what is needed and trying to get a truck to sort of last a little longer.
• We definitely saw some equipment,
• that is it you know, will need to be retired,
• kinda going forward. So we'll get into that during the budgetary period. But I just wanna thank you and your team for doing it just an incredible job in, being such good stewards.
Thank you, guys. Thank you. And the board's always been very supportive of supportive of us. So, you know, thank you guys for for for allowing us to do that.
• As trustee Nicholson said, your team is just fabulous.
• I think it's the friendliest DPW crew I've ever seen in my life, and they're so dedicated,
• including the cots
• that we saw lined up against the wall. That's what the DPW team sleeps on when there are emergencies or we get snowstorms,
• and that was pretty something to see. And, you know, I just wanna thank you for leading an an awesome team and and for the great work. Couple of questions.
• Well, what keeps you up at night, and how can the board of trustees,
• you know, help you
• be successful?
• there's a lot of disturbing news lately, but We should point out Frank actually does not sleep. Yeah. Oh, he one of the cocks surfers. Yeah.
• keeping up renewable diesel is a great example. Right? Like, all this new stuff always comes up. Right? And and you see you see New York City do it. You see Yonkers do it. And and
• and
• and I'll say, in my experience,
• more often than not, it's it's a flash in the pan thing, which is why I was pushing so hard for maybe a pilot program for this renewable diesel because, like, we're not New York City. We're not Yonkers. Right? All that you you guys have seen, all the trucks we have, we use
• all the time. Right? Especially the pickup trucks and and those large vehicles, large trucks.
• So and and as a DPW, we're very protective of our especially our fleet. So
• my one point would be when this new stuff does come up, great. Let's discuss it. But let's let's let Yonkers break it. Let's let New York City break it, and then, you know, what's wrong with it? Because all this stuff develops. Even these EVs, right, when they first came out,
• they're developing if they're gonna get there, but, you know, we're not there yet. So it's stuff like that. It's kinda like the just a rational approach to
• to stuff like that. There's there's usually always a,
• an eagerness to jump onto this stuff, which I get.
• I'm always a little hesitant, right, because,
• because we are so protective of our
• fleet and our budget. Right? Because I'm responsible for that all that money. Right? So I wanna make sure that we have it to do everything, not just these little not little, but, know, these little these
• projects that come up.
• of the central garage budget.
• So but it sounds
• like we wouldn't really be expecting much of an increase relating to shifting
• to
• this
So I think the plan is to offset some of the the the cost of that renewable diesel from
• the the renewable fund that we get from the
• the panels Yeah. On top of the DPW facility.
• Mhmm. So that actually will help.
• There is a little bit of a a price increase, but the fact that we can shift that price from the from the panels is a big help.
• and how do you prioritize those work orders?
• You know, I'm sure if you talk with every resident, they may say, oh, well, you know, there's a light fixture outside of my home or there's, you know, a small pothole that just emerged. How do you keep track of it all and Yeah. Prioritize it all? The easiest way is the the DPW website.
The village website, the DPW page has, like, a request for service.
• And that's usually the most effective way
• to do you can always call, of course. Deborah always answers the phone. She always passes along messages. But the most effective is probably
• the DPW website.
• Because it might be Sunday morning at 09:00 and you remember, you know, you wanna report a pothole or or a fixture out.
• And that goes to all of us. That goes all to myself, the general foreman, and the assistant general foreman.
• And then every morning we meet, you know, we're all together in the morning. And,
• you know, that's when we hey. Did you see that the pothole request that came out? Yeah. You know what? We're doing potholes tomorrow. Let's add it to the list. Stuff like that. That's that's sort of how we operate. Mhmm.
• And we'll jump on
• you know, we have to prioritize with what we're doing that day slash that week.
• If there's a light out, we try to get onto it right away because that's kind of a you know, it's a safety concern.
• The the other stuff will have to you know, if it's a tree that has to be trimmed and it's not dangerous, well, then we'll just put it on like a a list to do whenever we go out again. Right?
• you know, of, like, the next one to three years,
• just so residents could start?
• We can all get a heads up for the needs.
In terms of equipment? Equipment. Yeah. So I think the next big,
• piece of equipment scheduled to be replaced is our our loader,
• the large, loader.
• It's sort of our workhorse. We use it. We that's how we remove. That's the biggest piece of equipment used to remove snow in the train station parking lot.
• How we load the salt, how we load our
• sand gravel item for, how we,
• unload equipment and and material.
• It's getting towards the end of its life.
• So I think that's the biggest. You
• know, we've always we've always been lucky
• with the board as sort of a two way street. Right? You guys do see us out sit out there. We are accomplishing projects and and getting tasks done. The So board has always been very,
• like, reciprocal and say, okay. Well, they if they're asking for equipment, they must need it. Right? So Mhmm.
• But that's the biggest one that that's probably coming up next.
• how impressive the
• facility is.
• There's so much going on in there. There's such the pride of everyone who works there is so evident walking through.
• I don't know if it looks that
• neat every single day.
• That was sort of the question that I was thinking as we went through every space.
• Everything was
• pristine.
• I mean, obviously, everybody knew we were coming, but it looks I I mean, it's pretty hard it would be pretty hard to fabricate
• that level of
• organization
• and and just everything
• had a place. It is
• so impressive. I I would really like it if we
• maybe I don't know if it it's a security issue to do it, but to most residents have no idea what's going on in there. So I think to be able to share some photos or maybe do a little profile on what's going on in there,
• Seeing the DPW crews out
• through all the seasons, whether it's super hot or super cold, it is sort of nice to see where all of you guys live.
• It was really it was a
• a
• to to see that. So thank you so much. And thank you to to, you know, everyone who does that every night. I'm sure it gets pulled together.
• I was I'm so interested to hear that there's a maybe I'm the only one, but I didn't know there was a d p I don't
• have I never called DPW for a request?
• Maybe. I don't know. But I love that there's this form on the on the website. I definitely didn't know it was there. So that's very interest how what percentage of the requests come that way? Do you think people know?
• 90% of the request for, like, recycling bins come in through that. Oh, they do? Okay. Because and they all come in Sunday afternoon because everybody sort of remembers Sunday afternoon,
• which is great. That's why it's there. Right? When you remember, you just fill it out and it's Right. Sense to us.
• I'll say every year we get it more and more people use it because it's it is so easy. You can just send it. You can send it from your phone, you know, when you remember it. So
I don't have a percentage on it. No. But I mean We have tried, sorry. We have tried to publicize
• the form availability
• in the past. But what that has led to sometimes is an onslaught of Oh, sure. Yeah. Requests coming in all at once and it kind of overwhelms.
Wait. But I'm sorry. I didn't just mean about the recycle bins. No. I'm talking about the request for servers. In general. Right. Yeah. Oh, well, you because something pops into your head. I just didn't realize it was here, but that's great. Yeah. It's certainly better
• than having people call the manager's office, which I think is probably Some people do that. I mean, you know, when
I was starting here, right, you know, we had there were no forms for recycling bins. There were no forms for metal pickup. There was no you know, everybody was just calling. I mean, poor Julie probably got 200 phone calls a week. Oh, right. You know, but it was we put all that stuff online and like Frank was saying, I think the large majority of stuff probably comes in for at least metal pickup and and Metal pickup and recycling, I'd say I'm not gonna say all of them, but Yeah. A good amount of them. No. Well, I mean, I do like to I that that's when I get to talk to Deb is when is when I need a metal pickup. But this is this is great. So I'm I'm thank you for pointing that up. Thank you for whoever asked the question
• I wish I could come up with some very clever question about what's happening, but I think we can all see what's happening. You guys are knocking it out of the park all four seasons
• whenever there's something good happening or there's an emergency. So
• please
• just keep,
• you know, doing what you're all doing. And it does everyone seems very happy.
• You guys it it seems like a a a crew of people that really like to work together.
• The only thing that I did think as we were walking through, especially the storage areas, and then we were talking about municipal police, and we were talking about
• things that are stored in other places.
• I I guess
• I'm just thinking about and I don't wanna put you on the spot about it, but just sort of maybe the efficiency of where things are stored. Like, you know, you're so busy doing the work every day. It's, you know, hard to say, oh, if we were to reorganize where things are are located. But I just wonder, it seems like maybe that's something
• there's never downtime. But, you know, just
• in all this the locations that are not in one play that that are not all at the garage or are around.
• Just thought
• thinking about, you know,
• how and where things are stored. If that if that's something
• that we could, you know, either provide more storage so that it makes more sense. Because right now, maybe
• there are
• things in a lot of different locations.
• But I don't as I said, I'm you know, I was struggling to think of something something
• that could be improved. I just can't say enough good things. Thank you to all of please pass along. I will. Thank you very much. And just to on that, the first comment, there's
• DPW. Right? We're in construction. We're dirty all the time or whatever.
• I have to say, I'm pretty proud. They're pretty clean. Like, you saw the the locker room and the break room? Yeah. It's pretty they they do a pretty good job picking up after themselves and cleaning up. Not everybody, but as a whole, they absolutely do. It's tough when you're getting off a a water leak and you're full of mud and you're tracking mud. Yeah. That gets cleaned the next day or whatever, but they do a pretty good job. They Yeah. They do. I'm I was surprised. Even now, like, eight years later, when I was still surprised, like, man, they're
you wouldn't think it's like that. But No. I was really shocked. It's amazing inside there. Thank you. I just wanna ask this one question, last question.
• for you, but
• and I know we'll we'll cover it more deeply when we get into budgets. But since we have a live audience,
• you know, if residents or we all could be doing something differently to help this situation, that would be good to know now.
• Disposal fees of trash has almost doubled, it looks like, in '26
• versus '25.
• And I was curious what the causes of that are
• and, you know, if there's anything that we as residents could or should be doing differently
• with our trash or how we think about trash, I don't know. It's,
• you know
• I don't know that I can answer that. I mean yeah. So,
• yeah, I think people should be definitely more
• thoughtful on waste. Right? Waste production, what they what they do.
• It's unfortunately
• it I'm gonna be honest. It's one of those things that we talk about and it sounds great and when and but when you go out to to to
• actually the real world, people don't really think about it. Right? They just use, throw out, use and throw out. Mhmm. And Are the fee increases because we have more trash or because
the key skill is charging us more money? It's it's Westchester County. So the the Westchester County runs the solid waste disposal
• and, you know, they significantly
• increased their fees for garbage, solid waste. And they I mean, they also increased their fees for organic waste like leaves as well. Mhmm.
• You know, significantly,
• as you said. It was a it was a very significant increase.
• But they went you know, most
• for many years, they were increasing it, like, a dollar a ton.
• And then this most recent year, I think it went up, like, $12
• a ton or so. I mean, it was, like, a really severe increase,
• and that was the result. We were actually doing
• pretty well with our,
• disposal
• fees.
• Basically, we were covering
• the carding the disposal fees were being covered by the fees that were paid by the commercial
• entities to have twice a week pickup.
• So,
• you know, like, your ShopRite and your,
• you know, all the other businesses that get picked up more than once a week, they have to pay extra for that service.
• And so,
• the fees were basically being covered by that. So,
• that's not really the case now. Mhmm. We we did in this past budget, we did raise the commercial
• garbage fees, but, you know, we couldn't raise them that much. I mean, that would have been Maybe it's worth determining
Yeah. I mean, we can we'll discuss this during the budget. You know, I mean, I I think the answer to your other question is, you know, obviously,
• should recycle when possible because the village does not pay anything for
• recycling drop off.
• So please, you know, if something is if is recyclable,
• put it out for recycling so that we don't get charged for it in your garbage.
• You know, people that's also that requires some education, right, to know. Wait. I'm sorry. What do you mean by we don't pay anything for recycling drop off? So when we drop off garbage, solid waste, right, we get charged the tipping fee, which is what trustee Nachtala was talking about. When we drop off our recycling, there is no tipping fee.
• So recycling drop off is free because they wanna encourage people to recycle.
• So now
• that may change next year. We don't know. Right? But as of right now,
every I mean, recycling has always been right. I mean, as far as I know. And it's also so the county, it's a commodity. So the county
• collects it, processes it, and sells it. So I think that that's sort of also what what what helps that. That's why they're not trying to So superintendent,
• relates to what trustee
• Nachteller was discussing.
• But from our sustainability committee through the board and then to you, we stood up, I think, a pretty good composting program. I think everyone's very pleased with the way you guys are running it and all the different parts of it.
• We wanna grow that over time and not only grow it from our own
• Croton households, but also add some more institutions to it
• if if possible. So
• what what what do you think are the barriers or limitations or or needs in terms of growing that over time? Not not not this week, but, you know, over over the years.
I I think there's a there's a couple. Right? There's buy in, having residents. You know, we there are like you said, there's a good core group that Yep. That are into it. They do it. That's that Yep. That's their thing. Getting everybody to me, it's kinda the same as the leave the leaves. Right? Yep. That's a great thing to do. I mean, I do it at my house. Yep. I you can't I don't see a way to force everybody to do that. Right? That you just you have to sort of educate and hope that people
• see it and do it. Right? It's kind of the same thing. So I don't know that everybody
• would want to do it, and it's not really something we can force to do. I think it's a I think it's a good program.
• You know, and then there would also be the the obvious
• hurdles. Right? There's equipment. You would kinda need
• Space. Space for it. You would need a truck for it. You need personnel for it because
• it would sort of interrupt our existing
• sanitation schedule. Right? So you'd have to Sure. Fit it in somewhere somehow.
• So there may be personnel
• needed for that.
I'm assuming you're meaning like a village wide, like a curbside or You know, and, you know, some, you know, partnerships, you know, with some of the other large institutions.
• I don't need to name them tonight, but, you know, we'll we'll we'll be talking to them over the course of,
• you know, the this this year, next year. And and, you know, it's it's something I think that could that could obviously, you know, help reduce your volume, although it it it creates a volume in another in another area. So it's it's budgetary. It's it's institutional.
• I I myself,
• as an example, was skeptical
• initially, not of composting, but did we really have enough in our in our household? Well, when you when you add the grounds from from a pot of coffee every day, it at the end of the week, it's really heavy. So it's it's been great for us in terms of it's it's basically taken us from two garbage loaders a week to, in most
• most weeks, just one. So it's,
• you know, I think people there's that communication and education thing. But Recycling and composting could help save the the village one. So so, you know, we'll obviously, you know, kinda go step by step on this, but it's it's it's good to know that, you know, we we have the the core capacity
• to to at least begin the conversation,
and then we'll see what the budgetary implications are. Yeah. I would caution a little bit because there are some municipalities that do, a full curbside
• Yep. Yep. Food composting,
• and their their waste numbers haven't gone down all that much. Interesting. Interesting. Last
• time I no. I haven't talked to them in a couple of years. The last time I talked to them, they were kinda like, it's not really one to one.
• I'm not quite sure why because you're stating that if you're taking it out of this bag and put it in this bag, well, then there's no more weight there. Yeah. But it wasn't really a one to one Fascinating. Comparison. Yeah. Well,
we'll we'll we'll roll up our sleeves and get into this. Know I'm saying it's not a good program. I'm just say I'm just trying to set expectations. That's all. No. I it is a good program because you guys are doing a great job in running it, so I appreciate that. Thank you.
Thank you so much. Thank you, guys. Alright. Thanks, Ryan. Have a good night. Have a good night.
• we have Beth Ferguson who's here from fiscal advisers to talk to us about our
• bond ratings.
• Hi, Beth. Hello.
So I am Beth Ferguson, and I'm with Fiscal Advisors and Marketing. And I serve as the village's municipal adviser.
• Many of you probably don't know me. I was here
• several years ago.
• And every municipality needs a municipal adviser whenever you're issuing debt in the capital markets. If you're doing, bonds or bond anticipation notes, which the village does every year to fund its capital projects.
• So I am the behind the scenes person that's putting together the disclosure document that goes out to the,
• potential investors,
• taking in bids, verifying them, and doing everything to closing, and then doing an annual continuing disclosure, which is required by the Securities and Exchange Commission.
• But a large part of,
• what goes into,
• issuing a bond is your rating.
• And every municipality
• does have a rating,
• which is
• takes into account a lot of factors.
• And then
• your rating is with,
• Moody's Investor Service. I these are some summary pages from,
• the reports that Moody's has sent that are up right now. So your credit rating is a double a two,
• which is a very high credit rating. There's only two higher. There's a triple a and a double a one,
• then it goes double a two, and then it goes double a three, and then there's
• six levels below
• the double a three. So certainly, The Village is at one of the highest tiers,
• and you have been for
• a very long time since I've been working with
• the village.
• It's hard to move
• up to the next two categories,
• but it's certainly something that the village has been working towards.
• So if we just wanna look here,
• I just wanted to highlight that Moody's did say, that your credit strengths were,
• your strong income,
• resident wealth levels
• and, an improving fund balance.
• And there were a couple of factors that could lead to an upgrade,
• a sustained decline in leverage to below 250%
• of revenues. What does that mean? They're putting in that your debt and bonds, but also your OPEB
• numbers. And that's just a hard number to move across the board for all municipalities in New York State. That's just,
• you can do it when you're I'm sorry. Could you just define OPEB for the board? Sorry. Yeah. Other post employment benefits. So health care for retired employees.
• It's hard to move that needle until you're renegotiating contracts, and then it can take
• decades for those numbers to kind of come down. So that would be one positive if you were able to move that down somewhat.
• And the village did,
• put into place a debt policy
• a number of years ago such that you're only issuing debt to fill
• retiring
• debt or less. So that was certainly helpful as well to,
• mitigate
• the debt that's coming online with any new bonds or notes.
• And then the other factor that could lead to an upgrade, they stated, was maintenance of fund balance to above 50% of your revenues.
• That's a that's a hard thing to do as well. But certainly, the village has been moving towards that, and you are right at that level. At least you were at the end of 2024.
• And I don't have the final numbers for 2025 yet, but it's probably pretty close to that as well.
• Factors that could lead to a downgrade was an increase
• of that OPEB
• number
• or a decline in your fund balance to below 25%
• of revenues.
• So that's kind of the backdrop.
• So the factors that Moody's weights,
• there are four factors, and 30% of the rating is based on the economy. So that's not something you really have any control over. But your numbers are very good, as I was stating.
• Your financial performance
• is also 30%,
• and that's your available fund balance, your liquidity ratios, which means cash on hand, are two of the big factors that they look at there.
• Your institutional framework
• is 10% of the weight. That's just a number that they assign to all municipalities across New York State,
• because of the
• environment in which you're working, where we have the
• tax cap in place
• and other management type factors. So pretty much across the board, every municipality gets the same
• rating
• leverage in that category.
• And then your your leverage, which is your your long time liabilities
• and and your fixed costs,
• and that's also 30%
• of your rating.
• So the last time the
• Moody's actually rated you was not this last year because the bond issue was smaller. It's anytime we're going for a million or more, we go to Moody's,
• because you need to have the rating whenever you're issuing bonds for investors
• from an investor standpoint.
• But what I was able to get,
• from Moody's is your scorecard
• so that we can just take a look at where you're balanced out. And these this included numbers
• as of,
• your 2024
• audit.
• So
• all of your,
• economy related statistics
• are in the triple a category.
• So very positive.
• I don't think this is this is the part that's not online. Right, Beth? Oh, this is because it was confidential. Oh, okay. So we can discuss it. Okay. But Moody's doesn't want us posting it anywhere. Okay. And it's certainly something that you should all be aware of. But again, they it's sort of internal documents that they work off of. Okay. And I just wanted to make sure we have the most up to date information so that I could I did. You have that in your email if you wanna pull it. Yeah. Yeah. Mhmm. Mhmm.
• Then they,
• when we get to the financial performance,
• they say anything greater than,
• 35 percent of fund balance as a percent of revenues gets you into the triple a category.
• But, again, they were
• positing in their most recent report that they wanted you to be at 50%.
• And I will say, even if you're at 50% for a few years,
• we would hope that they would move the rating up, but Moody's is very slow to move
• in any case, unless you were doing something,
• either spectacular
• or
• if if the fund balance decided to, all of a sudden decided to move
• not decided. If you all decided to use fund balance,
• for
• ongoing operations,
• let's say,
• they would see that as a negative
• and pick it up right away. I'm I'm not to say that their rating would be
• decreased in one year, but if they saw a trend over a year or two of decreasing fund balances, that would certainly become an issue,
• just so you all know.
• fact that we're paying down our debt Mhmm. Each year, I would I would think that they that makes them smile. That does it is helpful. Yeah. Yes. That is helpful. You know what? The issue is,
• and the other post employment benefits
• are lumped together. Right. So it's not moving the needle as much as we hope it would because the OPEB benefits are get so much higher. Talk about,
• pension obligations.
Correct? Yes. Yep. Yes. It's pensions. It's also health care that the benefits that you're paying out to your retirees, which they've earned. And it's contractually
• that's the numbers are what the numbers are. They they they,
• they see that as a a total package. Right? They do. They do. Okay. Yes. Yeah. It did wasn't always that way. It was something that
• audits. It was required in an audit,
• I wanna say, sometime over the last
• half a dozen years or so,
• that they see the total number. Yep. Now there's always the argument,
• never gonna have to pay that all out in one year. Sure. That's just not the way it works. Yeah. But Moody's just sees it as a number. They see it as something that you're on the hook for over the long term. Right. And but I would ask
• whether it's pension
• or or other health care post employment benefits,
generally are standard. They're not not excessive in any way. They're No. No. But as as Beth was saying, a lot you know, I mean,
• some of these benefits are for people who retired thirty years ago. Right? I mean, we have we have people who retired in the eighties and are still
• with us and are collecting and are still collecting their benefits. Right? So It's in the nature of the public employment system. Mhmm. And and so It's just and and as to what Beth was saying also,
• you know, I mean,
• they make us count every you know, the everything upfront, they do it through actuaries and, you know, they determine, you know, amortize everything for, you know they expect somebody at this stage of life to live for x number of years and this is how much it's gonna cost.
• And, I mean, they're just you know, when Alan is here as in two weeks to go over the audit, he's gonna tell you that that number is really meaningless because
• it's not going to
• we can't do anything about it. Mhmm. Because in New York State, you're not allowed to prepay
• your your OPEB liabilities. Mhmm. And it's,
• you know, I mean, it it really you know, just because the actuary says somebody's gonna live for x number of years doesn't actually mean they're gonna Right. Right. Right? So it it's it's just unfortunate that it has to be counted
in these. And and we have and have had good investment advisers, you know, so Yes. We're we're growing, you know, the the the pot that pays out those those obligations over time. So Fine. Yeah. Yeah. Right. The
economy has something to do with that. Yeah. Yeah. I didn't I didn't mean to interrupt I'm happy to have the discuss I I'd rather have a discussion as we go along. Don't hold your questions till the end. It's it's better that way.
• You know, really, the only thing you can do is when you renegotiate contracts, if you can get your employees to pay in a little bit more,
that's the that's the that is the one way over time you can maybe affect those. Let us know how that goes. Yeah. I mean, I I think, you know, I mean, our our employees generally pay. Yep. You know, I mean, I think they pay the average, if not a little bit higher than what other municipalities pay. I mean, generally speaking, they're paying fifteen
• fifteen to 20% of their health care costs. Significant. Yeah. Mhmm. So
• was in the double a category, but that was standard for all municipalities
• across New York State. There's not much you can do about that.
• And then your leverage numbers, as we were just talking,
• are more along the lines of being in the a category
• just because of how high they are. But, again, it that's that's across New York state.
• So
• what can you try to do to make your rating go up?
• Continue what you're doing, maintaining
• your fund balance,
• trying to add to it maybe a little bit, if
• you can, to try to keep it at that 50% level. It's I know it's a balancing act
• because you are beholden to your taxpayers as well as to doing what's in the best interest of the credit rating of the village.
• Certainly,
• you did put
• a debt policy in place that was seen as very positive.
• You also have a fund balance policy in place that was seen as very positive by, Moody's Investor Service.
• So those types of things are also very helpful.
• One idea I did have
• is
• there are two rating agencies
• that
• rate all of the municipalities. And it's Moody's Investor Service,
• and the other one is S and P Global Ratings or Standard and Poor's Global Ratings.
• It might be worth considering
• moving to the other rating agency.
• It's something I have been able to do successfully
• for one or two other municipalities in Westchester that had your similar rating, and they were able to move up
• a rating notch. Because I do think
• Moody's is very focused on fund balance.
• And
• they're they're that is where they're gonna stay. They're not gonna move off of that.
• So it's certainly something worth considering. And I hadn't even spoken to Brian about it or maybe we've maybe we've had those in the past. Conversation,
• but
• I I actually think it's something worth considering
Yeah. For the future. Future. So from a borrowing perspective, like, what would be the advantage?
• Like
• when you get a credit rating and you're going for a mortgage. So the higher the credit rating,
• it your lower your interest costs. Yeah. Yeah. But I'm gonna say the difference between
• so there's
• triple a, but the difference between, like, a double a one, a double a two, and a double a three
• might be
• point o 5%.
• Yeah. Better for each sort of category. So you're certainly gonna,
• garner
• lower interest costs over time, particularly when we're issuing long term bonds. Yeah. Yeah.
So that's it is a benefit. Yep. Can you talk about how we stack up to our neighboring municipalities or the rest of Westchester? You know,
I didn't bring that piece of paper with me, but I can share it with Brian tomorrow and he can send it to all of you because I do have a listing of where everybody,
• stacks up with their current ratings as of the end of the year.
• And you're right in the middle of the pack. Right.
• There's
• there are some triple a's for sure. There's quite a few double a ones. There's quite a few double a twos. There's some double a threes. And then there's there's some of that are rated somewhat lower than that.
• Maybe
• a city or two, I can think of off the top of my head.
• to making the switch to the other
• The investment community is not does not care one way or the other if you have a Moody's or an S and P rating as long as you have one. But in your experience working with both of them based on our profile
Mhmm. It sounds like it it could make it could make a difference. And then just, I guess I don't think it would go down.
• okay.
• You know, so I I I wanna say that. It it's definitely not gonna go down. Right. It it could remain the same, but there could definitely be a bump up in my experience.
• you make a decision and you commit to it or can you sort of shop back and forth? How does that work? Yeah. Usually,
• we decide and we would this would be done the next time bonds were issued. Right. So it's not gonna happen right away.
• Now I lost my train of thought.
• There's not gonna be a difference between
• how the market perceives S and P or Moody's. I will say that. And I'm sorry. What was
you know, and then we decided, like, what's Oh. But going back and forth. Mean, we wouldn't I wouldn't go back and forth from year to year. Once we moved away from Moody's and we got the rating from S and P, then we would most likely just But it's probably worth it may be worth the risk to do it even if we remain the same. So Moody's and Moody's would maintain
• the rating on
• your outstanding bonds. So there would still be on an annual basis, they do what they they have their own sort of credit review
• on an annual basis. We'd still have to supply the the audits to them, and they would see the other information that's publicly available.
• And they would maintain that rating because they rated the bonds. So all the bonds that are issued have an outstanding Moody's rating. It would be any of your bonds going forward
• with that have an S and P rating. Great. Thank you. Mhmm. I have a question.
• The scorecard is very helpful because it shows the levers
• and how we're performing against each of these metrics.
• So one metric here under economy is called resident resident income ratio.
• My question is how might this be impacted
• if our population growth in the future
• starts shifting
• as we build more affordable housing
• And there might be less
• flexibility
• in certain income levels to adjust to tax hikes or Mhmm. You know, how might
• project being built. But what is the number of the people that are living there compared to the total population of the village?
• I don't know if it would overall affect it greatly.
• You know, I don't I don't think it would move the needle so much
• because the the number of people is not gonna be
• have enough of an effect on the total
• income.
• presentation,
• which is appreciated.
• So and secondly, I'm just wondering, you know, this is probably not the time for it, but, know, from time to time, it is timely to do a a a bond refinancing
• to to get a a lower. Is is that recognized
• by the by the rating services as a as a good thing when you when you do that and end up with a lower rate? Oh,
sure. Because you have you have less less debt outstanding also overall. So Yeah. Absolutely. Because you'll be paying less interest over time, and they're looking at the total debt picture. So that's certainly seen as positive. And I do look at that.
• I don't necessarily tell Brian that, but I look at it at least a couple of times a year. Yep. In the current interest rate environment, you have some very low debt that's outstanding. Right. And the interest rates
• we know the interest rates went up. So Please call us. Oh, no.
I'm happy to do a refinance anytime soon. Say, now is now is the week to do it. Yeah. And we have we have We did one about three years ago. We did one about three years I think. And I think it and it ended up saving us over the long run well over a million dollars. Yes. Yeah. So it was it was definitely worth it. You know, we fought hard to preserve that right in the in the 2017
• this last tax bill. So yeah.
• When when the time's right. Yes.
• similar to this where it says fund balance as a percent
• of total revenues?
You could get back to us. Yeah. I don't I don't know if it's I mean, we have a schedule that details all the fund balance, but I don't know if it specifically says, you know, this is a percentage of revenues. That I think that would be helpful as you prepare
• is a double edged sword of sorts is that you have rating agencies that want you to have
• fund balance, high fund balance, and not use it for operating purposes.
• And then on the flip side, you have the state controller's office who will come down on you and be like, you're overtaxing your residents because you have too much fund balance. So it's a very it's a tough balancing act that you have to try to to do. And I mean, we're I think we're doing it pretty successfully because we have we have the fund balance policy.
• We're within the fund balance policy of how much can be unallocated.
• We have a lot of assigned fund balance now for certain capital projects, right, which is a very good practice to have so that the money is not just sitting there. So that if the state controller was to come down, you would be able to say, we're not just hoarding this money. It has a it has a set purpose.
• So, you know, as long as we continue to do those,
• sorts of things, we should hopefully be on the right track. But it's it
• it doesn't help when, you know, the the parties are, you know, have different goals. I was gonna say But who do the capital markets listen to manager, the controller, That's or a good question. Right. So the so the auditor who has advised us year in and year out to get our fund balance down or Yeah. To a certain percentage will be here in a month or so. And Yeah. Two he'll be here two weeks from today. From today. Yeah. Mhmm. Okay. And, you know, the controller's office, they say,
• unassigned,
• fund balance. But for municipalities,
• the controller's office has always said, what is deemed as reasonable?
• Yeah. What do you deem as reasonable? You know, you're a smaller village. If something major were to happen, it's good to have the money in the bank if there's some sort of a one off
• expense. Yeah. And actually,
• that is
• if you
• were if you are planning to use fund balance
• from a rating perspective,
• the best use of that is for a one shot. Like, if you're gonna use it to pay for some of your capital programs.
• You never wanna be in a position where you're needing to use fund balance to fund operations on an annual basis, and this village is not. But there are places that do that because at some point, you run out of fund balance. And then what are you doing? So,
• it's always best to use the fund balance if you needed to buy that truck for the for the superintendent
or something like that. So Going back to the question of size, I've heard that, the rating agencies consider,
• you know,
• size as a factor in the sense of your tax base and the diversity that you have there.
• You know, so it can be more challenging for a village than, say, a town to have a
• higher rating, all things being equal. Mhmm. Where is that captured in,
• the the rubric that you supplied us, the scorecard?
• And that's what they're judging
• all the other municipalities
• whether you're a village, a town, a city, or a county. So this is kind of the average
• Mhmm. Of everybody spread across The US.
• And then this is how your village is stacking up.
• And when I talk about it, I'm again, this is this was in your packet, but it's not necessarily something that's up here. You know, you you are the blue column here. So you can see how you're stacking up compared
• to any everybody else that's everybody else that's in the triple a rating or the double a rating
• category.
• But I take your point, and you are correct because it's harder for a village.
• They do some
• they've moved away from it somewhat, but it used to be you know,
• what is what is the total assessed value of your municipality?
• And is that going up or down?
• And, you know, of course, a place like, the city of Rye is gonna have a much bigger number.
• So it is it can be more difficult for a village
• in that.
• And
• once again, that's something that you don't have any control over.
• could have a big significant percentage impact on on your your share.
• heftier fund balance for a smaller municipality
• because it's
• if
• how much is a 5% or a 10 fund balance on a very small budget, you know, if if you have some sort of a major issue?
• The roof collapses or whatever. Something happens.
• Yeah, it's prudent it's prudent to have a a larger number.
• economy and income for a moment. If I'm reading this correctly, when it says resident income, it says MHI adjusted for RPP.
• Can you fill in those acronyms, please? Yeah. Let me take a look. Yes.
• Right
• here.
Is that the first line, Brian? Yes. Yeah. I think the MHI is median household Oh, median household income. That is median house. Yes.
me you know, for what they're what Moody's is looking at then is basically median household income, which is to say
• what who is in the middle of the distribution, which is to say changes kind of on the either upper or lower bands, the bottom and top decile don't have an impact on that. Mhmm. And they're they're actually looking at
• they're census driven. So Yep. Yeah. Okay.
• is regional price parity.
• Yeah. So it takes a region's median household income and adjust it to reflect the local cost of living
• according to Google AI. Thank you. Thank you for Google. That
• was Google Google AI. Thank you. Okay.
• from the board?
• Okay.
• No. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks, Pat. Appreciate it. Absolutely.
I just wanna add, I sit in a lot of these things. This was one of the most informative that I've seen. Very educational for the public.
• And kudos.
• Everybody, questions and answers. Very good. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Josh.
• I've seen a lot of them. I I was impressed. I was I was very There were questions. Education going on here. Yes. I thought it was good. Well,
you. Service. And thank all of you. Thank you for the work you do. Yes. Thank you. Have a good night. Thank you.
• So just in case, since you guys are sitting here and you're not watching it at home, so we have the multi view
• on
• with the new camera system. Mhmm. So people who are watching this at home are seeing the dais.
• They're seeing Beth in the audience, and then they're seeing what's on the screen all on Wow. One screen right now. So
• it's it's a much improved
• experience. Because I know a lot of times people would say, you know, we'd be talking about something on the screen and they wouldn't be able to see it because the camera would just be on us. Yes. So yeah. So it's a much better experience. Great.
• Okay.
• So based off the last discussion that we had on this topic,
• I have drafted
• the, budget priority survey that,
• assuming the board
• approves it, will be going out to the public in the near future.
• So I I have not included,
• the intro introduction section, right, that will kind of explain what this is, why we're why we're doing this. Right? That will be,
• added at a later And the budget process. Correct. Yeah. Just an overview of the budget process. So that will be added.
• But if you you know, if anyone from the board had any suggestions, I'm I'm welcome to hear them. But this just kinda dealt with,
• specifically the questions that would be that would be asked.
• So, you know, it's broken down into a couple different sections. We have, you know, resident satisfaction.
• How satisfied are you with village services,
• infrastructures,
• amenities?
• How would you rate the value for your village tax dollar?
• Spending priorities, right, we wanna gauge people's interest on,
• you know, where
• what's your priority? Is it an infrastructure,
• public safety? I'm sorry.
• Is it on public safety, infrastructure, recreation,
• arts and culture?
• You know, where would that be?
• And then
Which of the five municipal services do you believe have should have its current funding reduced or held flat to create resources for higher priority areas? Right? So the first question will kind of inform the second question.
• And then
• on to revenue options,
• right, if we needed to increase or maintain funding for a priority service,
• you know, how would you like to see that funded? Would you like an increase in your property taxes, increase user fees,
• introduce new types of user fees,
• or use our savings, which is what we were just kind of talking about with the fund balance.
• And then,
• we ask about overall priorities.
• What should the highest priority be for the upcoming budget?
• You know, keep any tax increase as low as possible, keep fee increases as low as possible, reducing debt and increasing savings,
• improving village services,
• even if there must be, you know, a modest increase
• in taxes, improving village infrastructure with the modest increase in taxes,
• or improving services and or infrastructure
• with an increase above the tax
• cap, the tax levy limit.
• And then section four, how should the village manage its financial strategy for long term capital planning?
• You know, maintain your our low tax rate rate by only funding essential immediate needs and deferring maintenance
• even if that diminishes public assets and amenities.
• Prioritize fiscal stability by building large reserves and fully funding future expenses,
• which may require upfront tax increases or borrowing money for major projects,
• spreading the cost over decades
• through the use of bonds.
• And that was that was pretty much it. We we our goal was to keep the survey short and sweet while getting the most,
• information possible from people. You know, we we know that people have, you know, relatively
• short attention spans, and so we wanted to make sure that it didn't
• it didn't take too long for people to complete.
• material, I think, also should be relatively short, but just informing people how how the budget works and and what our internal budget process is. What platform are you gonna push this out on? Is there something on the website or were you just gonna do a Google? So the website has a has a survey function,
that we've used in the past. So I was actually gonna talk to our comms people and see what they thought. But, you know, assuming that they
• agree with it, I was just gonna use the website.
• I want to I wanna be able to have the flexibility within the survey to not have every question to not just have to pick one in in every question. I would like to use a platform that's gonna give us flexibility.
• For example,
• I think in section three,
• it could be beneficial
• to,
• instead of just asking people to pick one, if they could be forced to rank them because I think that'll give us a better overall cross section of what people,
• a rank a ranking of those will give us instead of just having to pick one,
• it'll give us a better overall outcome for that question.
• And for a couple of the other ones, I
• think
• for spending priorities
• and for
• well, minimally for spending priorities, I would like to add,
• for both those questions,
• an other section
• so that if somebody has something that isn't I don't I I don't think that you missed anything,
• but I think it might be interesting to see if there's,
• so if somebody doesn't has another idea, they could just edit it. And I don't think it'll be I don't think there will be that much, but I don't want people to not have the opportunity
• to do so. And then just at the end, I would like to add, you know, a open space for any other comments
• in case there's something that's not captured. I know the purpose is to keep it short, but if we're taking the time to reach out to people and ask them what they think, this will be a mechanism to maybe get some type of feedback that we wouldn't have the opportunity to get any other way. And I just don't know. The platform on the website might be much more rigid than, like, a Google form would be where each question can be framed in a different way. So the that's I think this I should have started by saying this is great. It is short. You know that I want it to be short because
• I have a short attention span. But I think that people will have no problem getting to the end of this, and they will appreciate being asked.
• Of course, the you know, when you ask people what they think, then we have data points. Right. I'm hearing Angelielli,
• right, saying what
• the survey means we're gonna have information we have to answer. But I think that being able to take this feedback,
• you know, and as we're as we're embarking on the budget process will be very helpful to to us as we make considerations.
Do you have a a timeline for when you think this is gonna go out? I think we were looking at February. Right? Because we wanted to have the information back,
you know, towards the end of the month, That gave us plenty of time to kind of factor it in. Great. But I mean, I would I am interested to get obviously, now we have this great resource of the comms
• Yes. Experts.
• So I definitely wanna hear what their thoughts are as well. Thank you. And whatever they can do to make it look good. Yes. Yes.
• Yeah. Yeah.
• time, you know, week, ten days or, you know, whatever you think. I I I
that's a good question. I'm not yeah. I mean, we have to we could leave I it mean, we could leave it open for a little while, you know. I mean, there's not you know, if we get it out there in the February,
I mean, that we could leave it open for, you know, two weeks Yep. You know, let people I mean, I think also we, you know, we wanna get a I'm sure we have a sample size in mind. So we I won't
• you know, but there it's good to have an end date, but also let's be flexible. You know, let's not close it on the end date and then and, you know, if we maybe we need a couple of re prompts, you know, people typically when you send it out, gonna respond right away. When you send it out again, they're gonna they're not gonna go back to it. So but the comms team will be able to give us advice about that also. Okay. Manager, will the intro explain what we mean by village services?
• for example, the first
• question, how satisfied are you with village services?
• I don't know. People might think we're including schools.
• I'm not sure. But I I think we
• may need to either say schools are not included or, you know, not part of the I mean, could we say I
Well, I mean, we do a lot. That's, you know, that's gonna be a long question. But I think that's a good point. I think maybe he say that in the intro I think in the intro yeah. Intro. Yeah. I think in the intro would be inappropriate.
Yeah. Yeah. Pleased to point that out. Or you might have to just put it in more than one plate, you know, just like in parentheses in some somewhere else to remind people that it's not schools. I think that's very local government. We we provide, you know, police and fire and all of those. Yeah. All those things. Have done an explanation in the summary of kind of, you know, your total tax bill. Right? This is the percent that is village taxes. Right? So people kind of understand that going in,
• I think would be helpful. Okay.
• residents have requested,
• drainage
• in parks, for example.
• So my question is where it says spending priorities,
• which of the following, you know, service areas is your single highest priority?
• We have infrastructure
• which includes drainage,
• and then we say wreck and parks.
Parks should be part of infrastructure. That was a that was a typo.
• Yeah. Recreation is supposed to be separate. Like, if you look at if you look at the next the next question there, recreation is separate. Yeah. So yeah. Yeah. So Alright. Yeah. That's just that's I'll I'll correct that, obviously. Thank you. Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Yeah.
• get too, like, tactical on this, but I know infrastructure,
• there's
• two forms of it. One is maintaining what we have,
• you know, just maintaining what we have. And then the second part of it is expanding infrastructure.
• It's taking on new things, new trucks,
• a sewer main to a different park or, you know, I just I don't know if we need to
• dimensionalize that for people or if if it would help us in the budget prioritization
• process?
I mean, I you know I'll just speak for myself. I mean, I don't think there's any question. We have to maintain what we have. Right? I mean, the the real question is how much do people want us to invest in
• new? In newer. New. Right? I mean, that's that's how that's how I would interpret it. So
• but, I mean, we can't we really can't let
• what we have fall apart. That doesn't end well for anybody.
• And then just just a last suggestion whether at the end, would it be helpful to identify resident capital project priorities
• in, a forced rank question?
• So
• looking down the line on projects that may take up to, you know, five or have a longer
• shelf life or Mhmm. You know, however you phrase it, you know, how would you prioritize these? For example,
• parking,
• you know, a walkable youth center or an arts music cultural center, riverfront expansion. I don't know, you know, things that you may have discussed previously.
I I mean, I don't know if we wanna get I don't know if we wanna get project specific in the in the the survey itself. I mean, you're gonna you're certainly gonna have a lot of time to talk about that as part of the the budget process.
• But I think the general categories will kinda give you,
• right, people's general ideas if they want, you know, if they want you to spend
• money on parks, for example. Right? Then we have a whole list of projects that you can consider.
• You know, if they want it spent on infrastructure,
• you know, similar.
• sort of option for people to comment Yes. Yeah. Would
allow people we would Yeah. They could say they could say, I really would love to have x y z. Yeah. Right. Mhmm. Yeah. Okay.
Thank you. Yep. Yeah. I mean, if my concern with having to making the options too granular, right, if you have, like, more than 10 or dozen or whatever,
• you know, the the quote unquote winning priority
• Exactly. Might be the priority of, like, 10 or 12% of the You
could could list 20 and still people will still feel you've left a lot out. Yeah.
• Okay.
• This is great. Thank you. It's really Yeah. It is. It's great. Thank you. Very interesting Thank you. Results,
• Maybe we could think of something with the communications
• team of incentivizing
• in some way,
• getting people to take the survey. I don't know what that would be right off the top of my head, but
it would be great if we could get people to take the Yeah. I mean, when we've done when we've done surveys in the past, I mean, our our residents are pretty engaged generally.
• Mhmm. So, I mean, I would think that we'll get,
• you know, at least a couple 100
• responses.
• Mhmm. I mean, when we did the when we've done surveys
• by mail, we've gotten even higher responses than that, you know. But online, we should we should Is there gonna be I didn't mean to interrupt you, but is there gonna be a hard copy option for people who don't wanna take it online? Like, maybe at the seniors, We could give it or we could have a computer set up for them to take it there. We've actually done that in the past. Like, we when we've done stuff online, my assistant has gone down there to, like, help them fill stuff out. Right. So, yeah, we can certainly do that.
• this is gonna be anonymous?
I mean, if people wanna identify themselves, they can do that in that box at the bottom, but we're not gonna ask for that. Right. Yeah. Or you could have a space for them, you know you know, include your email as an optional choice. The other thing is just in talking about a little bit of what
• not getting too granular.
• However,
• I wonder if there's something
• if we could add a question that is specifically like, you know, if you had a dream thing to add into the budget that's not that doesn't fall into one of these categories, what would it be? It's sort of like a fun question, and we might get some really interesting feedback about what people, you know, what people are thinking. The you know, because this is kinda dry.
• Right? So but I mean, that might be a fun way to, you know, hear what somebody is like
• I don't know. We just if we're reaching out Yeah. You know, it it could be, I don't know Yeah. Fun. Yes.
I don't disagree. I I'm sure it would be fun, but I mean, I don't I mean, realistically, are we gonna be able to do anything with that information? Like, it's No. But I mean, it's it's a way to it's a channel for people to tell right. But, I mean, I don't know. Maybe I just think it could be could be an interesting little Isn't that what experiment.
Yeah. Mean, isn't that the idea Yeah. But I think that if you'd like again your you know, people are gonna see the comment section and write, thank you. You know, they're not gonna think like, I want a helipad. We So I think that anyway In your directions, manager, we could we could give a little guidance on the comments section
Wish list. Ideas you may have for the future. Yeah. And I think kind of the back to kind of the marketing of this is like, you know, we want residents. We wanna hear from you. Right. Right? I mean, very much like,
• you know, we're doing this for a reason. We're doing this so that we get the feedback,
• you know, feedback from you as we go into the budget season. Yes. This is sort of directed
• residents. What can you do for Croton?
You can fill this survey out. Does does can the system generate a reminder at a certain point?
I don't I mean, it it doesn't auto do that, but it's very easy for us to just ask it. To just clone what we have and resend it out. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Maybe maybe we do that at the halfway point. Yep.
• I I mean, are you do you want me to bring this back to have you guys, like, approve it at the next meeting? Or, I mean, is this enough direction to just
pull it together and send it out? I mean, I personally would like to see it again once the comms team takes a look at it and you implement the suggestions that we made. I would say, you know,
Depending and that may not be until the February 4 meeting just because of how our meeting you know, we meet next week and we have a holiday and everything. So it may we may not get it out till after February 4. But,
• I mean, I that that gives people plenty of time still.
Yeah. Do we have to approve it before it goes out? Or is that something that could just be could we just No. I don't that's why I'm saying because that next round of our feedback have to be in public,
• could individually send me your feedback if you wanted to. Right? But I mean, if you wanna have a discussion about it, then it has to be at either a work session or Yeah. I don't think I think but you'll share with us what it's gonna look like before it goes out and then we can
nail this in the next round without more discussion from us. Yeah. Yeah. That that that was my that was my Yep. Point. Yeah. Yeah. So We we can mail it in. Okay.
• Alright.
• Discussion on excuse me. Review of recommendations presented by the Recreation Advisory Committee.
• I see that we have the chair with us. Would you like would the chair like to briefly introduce the recommendations or summarize them? Or or not. If if you're just here to observe, that's fine. I thought I just needed
• If you're just here to observe, that's fine. Sorry. Okay. Thank you.
• item on as correspondence. The RAC had sent in three recommendations,
• which were the installation of an AED at BlackRock Park,
• reviewing
• the dog park hours and,
• allowing for nonresidents
• a limited number of nonresidents
• to,
• you know, bring their dogs to the park, get a pass for the park,
• and then having a CPR first aid course scheduled for the public through the rec department.
• So
• since our last meeting, I did confirm
• that the,
• the hours for the the dog park and all the parks is,
• under my authority, obviously. So it's yeah. Obviously, we can have a discussion about it, but there's no formal action that the board needs to take because it's at I set the hours for the park. So,
• so there's no, action that the board would need to take on that.
• Frank did provide
• an estimate
• for
• the installation of the AED.
• It's gonna the the estimated cost that he has is $4,144,
• which covers the actual AED unit,
• the pediatric
• add on for the AED,
• the enclosure, the box that it's gonna go in on the outside of the building,
• the sign,
• to alert people where the AED is,
• and then,
• electrician
• costs and material costs
• make up the remainder of that.
• So
• if if we wanna move forward with this, we're gonna have to take the money out of contingency, which, I mean, we can. There's there's sufficient funds there for us to do that. So that's not an issue.
• But they don't have they don't have funds available in the parks line for this. So we need to come out of contingency. The the total amount is? $4,144.
• the the the usage of Black Rock Park, you know, has gone up with our with our Bocce
• facility there. There has been an incident there. I think it makes makes sense to to go forward with that.
• that all the other parks
• have AEDs
• that are maintained by either the school or
• the
the like, ASAP. Like, if there's a place where can you explain that? Yes. Sure. So there was a law that was passed by the legislature
• that required all
• youth sports to have AEDs available. So,
• Little League purchased AEDs,
• for our five fields
• and,
• donated them to the village. Right? So they made the initial purchase. Now they donated them to the village, so we are maintaining them. And then when their
• lifetime is up, right, when they need to be replaced, it will then be the village's responsibility
• to, buy replacement units.
• So we have AEDs currently at Croton Landing,
• Dobbs,
• Duck Pond,
• Manus,
• and so Manus slash firefighters, they share one. And then is that it? And then the one there's
• there's one that is stored at
• Dobbs that they bring to,
• Vassalo
• if there's games, you know, like, I think t ball uses Vassalo. Mhmm. So they bring one there because we don't have anywhere to actually,
• like, install it at Fasallo.
• No. Senesco doesn't have one. Okay. That's not not now, but that's something I think we ought to consider. And I'm thinking not not so much in terms of sports there, but in terms of the the heavy use of the pavilion, and you get a wide range of of folks there, and anything anything can happen. So it's something we all You know, I don't I don't know if,
the sailing school may have one. I I certainly can check with Jean Bouchard, right, and see. What's the closest one? Yeah. But they're they're you know, I they may have one. I mean, the police obviously carry them in their vehicles so that, you know, they're there during concerts and stuff like that.
But, yeah, no, we can certainly look. I mean, the park obviously has high usage. And in discussions at Rec, we confirm there is a seasonal one that goes down to Silver Lake. So there could be maybe a seasonal
• opportunity,
• that Yeah. That you wouldn't have to We wouldn't have to install it at Senesqua, but that it's just there for the summer months kinda thing. Okay.
• ASO and Little League are
• right? Because
• Little League is
• one sport. Yes. But there's a but so they use the same fields, and so ASO and Little League have an agreement about how that Well, so the AEDs are ours now. Right? The
League bought them. Okay. And then I don't know if ASO reimbursed them for the one that's because right. Because Little League doesn't really use Croton Landing. That's soccer. Right. Right? So I don't know I don't know how the how it worked between those two organizations. But the end result is is that the machines were donated to the village, so we own them now.
• And we're responsible for them. So they're they're in the,
• they're in the enclosures
• at each park. And, you know, if there is an emergency,
• you call 911,
• and the 60 control
• dispatchers are able to give the person the code to open up the enclosure
• and,
• you know, take the machine and use it. So
• I thought you said and there was oh, and then the the Yeah. Then there's one that gets carried to Vassal. That's the fifth one. Yeah. Okay. Yeah.
question of the BlackRock talk, are you Yeah. But I just wanna I just wanna make sure. Yeah. Okay. I thought you're Yeah. So Okay. Is everybody everybody's okay? We'll bring this to the next meeting. We'll to the transfer?
• Okay. Yeah.
• dog park,
• I just wanted to clarify. You you were saying both the hours of operation
• and the school districts are within administrative,
• the hours of operation are under my purview. But but you have already authorized
• in the law,
• school district residents.
• I don't think the laws I don't think the dog park is I don't think the law specifically says
• school district residents are are not allowed in the dog park. So I don't think you there's anything that you need to change. Okay. But we can I mean, we can confirm that? But Right. Well, what what I was wondering
is with complete respect and affection for our recreation committee and its leadership
• that are here, I do wanna give
• others the opportunity
• to to speak to this at at one of our one of our business meetings.
• Even if if it's not something that specifically is being voted on, I I I wanna, you know, have give them that forum so that they have a chance to to let us know how they feel, particularly the residents. Yeah. I mean, I I'll just
I think and I said this previously that my opinion is that the hours were negotiated,
• and, you know, it was a long discussion that took place between the patrons of the park and the neighbors in the area.
• And, you know, that these hours have been
• set
• they were set before COVID to to this number. During
• COVID, we closed the park on the weekends
• When when we were ready to reopen the park, we had that long negotiation between the two the two groups. We ended up settling on the same hours that it had been prior to COVID on the weekends.
• And, you know, it seems to be it seems to be working. I mean, people are are using the are using the park.
• You know, I mean,
• I I I'm sure there are numerous things that we could do that might bring more people to the park. It could also make people not wanna go to the park. Right? You know? So there's
• I I think there's certain things that,
• you know, have worked well,
• and, you know, the change in the hour seems to have been one of those one of those things. So if for
• people that have,
• been here for a while,
• you will recall that we had many, many meetings where we had people from, you know, BlackRock either pro or against Yep. At every one of those meetings. Right? And,
• I mean, it's been we have not heard from people in years from black for BlackRock. That's correct. So so oh, listen. That's just my my thoughts on it. Obviously, I put this on the agenda because we wanted to have the board to have a discussion on it, but that's I just wanted to share where Yeah. Well And I'm just saying before we make a decision, if if we're gonna
make a decision down the road, you know, we ought to set up an opportunity for folks to come in and and talk to us about it.
But I think that what the piece of this that I'm interested in and especially because we have people from the rec advisory committee here tonight,
• I and what it I love the how succinct this is. But I think I would like to under because I was part of
• I was looking through emails today.
• It was a lot of emails about on this topic. I would just I would sort of like to understand why this because and it did feel like at the time,
• there was a lot of community engagement in the process and it felt like it was pretty settled. Yeah. So my question is
• why does you know, why are we revisiting I want I want us all to understand
• both the board and the community why we're revisiting this now.
• And also, those discussions that happened
• I wasn't on the board at the time. I was the chair of the rec advisory committee. So a lot of those discussions were happening at the rec advisory committee meetings. I don't remember exactly how the community knew those conversations were gonna take place at rec advisory,
• but the community knew and came. And so a lot of that, those conversations were had not necessarily at a work session or a business meeting. Although there were or it wouldn't have been a work session or a business meeting.
• There were there were comments made, but there was community conversation at the rec advisory
• level
• that is different than what happens in this room in this setting. So
• that is just a comment. But what I would like to ask maybe is if Deb wants to come up and just explain to us why this made it onto this memo,
• if you're if you are okay to do that. Why it's made on its this memo today or whenever it was sent, January 2. Mhmm. Yeah. I like John John Debbie Braddock. This is John Sesso.
Debbie, just you gotta you're talking to the microphone. Sorry. We we took your Nobody will be able to hear you. Mhmm. Okay.
• Braddock, John Sasso. And
• through the
• the recreation advisory,
• we started looking at the parks.
• And we
• were at the,
• Black Rock Park because of the bocce court that was there and the work that was being done.
• And we,
• as a committee, went out and we had the rest of our
• our people take a look at this on a Sunday morning. Some couldn't go and they came another day. And we saw the people and we saw the park
• and
• we asked questions. What do you think? You know, what what what do you like? How is it? How many people? And through the last three years?
• Two. Two. Two. Last two years,
• it came up about things that needed to be done at the park. And we made a list,
• and we we spoke with John Bouchard
• who graciously
• cut the, you know, whatever the bushes and the
• growth that didn't belong there.
• We asked about signs that said, you know, speak quietly. I don't know what dog speaks loud, but the sign is on the fence.
• And John and I went as people were there,
• and we spoke with 15 to 20 people at different times. This was not all in one day, one weekend, one month. We did this over.
• so part of my, we selected parks to
• go and interview people to see if there were issues at all the parks.
• And one of the issues that came up
• well, there were two. One was
• we heard from people who are
• not village residents, but school district residents
• that aren't able to use the dog bar.
• One resident lives right across the bridge, has to go to Austin.
• Another is a secretary in the recreation office who's a
• school district person that has to go to Austin.
• Just doesn't seem right.
• So we bring that feedback to you to say we think that there ought to be that extended.
• Now part of that comes from the fact that there's no one in this village who's at BlackRock more than me.
• And I say that proudly because I started the bocce program and it's grown really greatly.
• But I'm there seven days a week. I give free lessons three
• seasons of
• the each year,
• two mornings a week. There's now a women's group that started. They play Wednesday mornings
• and another Friday group, and then there's a couples group on Sundays. I've been involved with all of them as we've
• kinda
• it's been my thing to grow.
• We don't hear barking,
• and I I say this. I don't have a dog. I I don't have a dog in a race.
• The only noise we hear, it comes from across the river. There are dogs that bark. There's sores that go on. There's a rooster until recently. I don't know what happened to him. And
• so we're just bringing feedback to you.
• And that is Appreciate that. The people at the dog park, it's never crowded.
• I'm there very often.
• It's not loud. I never hear dogs barking,
• and I'm just bringing that feedback to you. You have the decisions to make about all of it.
• But I wanted you to hear a clear picture
• of just what it's like down there.
• And
• the the the people that we've talked to in the dark work are very
• reasonable,
• concerned.
• And
• some of the folks that we met are weekend workers
• who one one guy is a conductor who lives on Grant Street. Bruce, I forget his last name.
• And he tries to get there, and he at 04:00, he has to leave, and he wants to let his dog run.
• And he said it'd be great if he extended it. He says there's no one here.
• I said, well, it's reasonable, but I'll bring it to them. And, a nurse
• actually, two nurses talked to us.
• So these are issues of village residents that are saying,
• we don't see that we're a problem. We don't understand
• why it couldn't be readdressed.
• And again, it's for you guys to discuss. But Mhmm.
• We're just bringing you what we found.
• about what it is you wanna see with the parks or what could we make it better and not bring it to the board.
• You know, just because it might not be something people wanna hear, well, then we're not doing our job. We we see that there's a a group of people, one of them is here, who puts out little bags for the
• things that need to go in the garbage. And
• the
• Thank you. Thank What?
• I'm thanking her behind you. Oh, yeah. And all yeah. The that's for the doggy bags. And, you know, we've talked about benches and through the generosity of people, we're gonna have couple of benches put there.
• I had brought back that there were plastic chairs and they didn't look safe and
• Sorry. They were mic from my back. Well, that we're not we're not we're grateful.
• We are happy that someone shared that, and I was told, well, you know, that's not safe. And if they fell and I was like, look. This
• has been down there for a number of years.
• I and John, we could not have been the first ones to see those benches,
• those plastic chairs.
• And I didn't hear any bad things about it, but if we can make it better, that's what we're doing. And
• there we've we've met a family down there with two two little dogs and two little kids and taking their garbage and the garbage is taken out. And, you know, it needs some trimming and some things done. Attention. Right. But what we would do to any other park. So
• to me,
• when people come and buy homes and take their dogs out and walk or run or whatever it is they're gonna do, We want it to be as maintained as any other park that we have. So we would ask that you, you know, think about it and understand that the people who,
• the nurses said, we we get out of work. We we you know, we're out of work. We get home. And what's a nice thing to do? And we're not talking
• late at night. We're there's no lights there. So it's not like they're going there in the dark. We're talking about in the in the nice nice weather when our other parks are open and
• and people could go. So we just sent it's they're part of the community, and you'll hear more about other parks what people are liking.
• We did it with Dobbs when we were going to make some changes. We asked people,
• you know, what do you think? We went and stood and took
• little surveys. Right. So we present that to you, and we ask you to just consider it.
Thank you. I would add one other thing that while we're talking about it, and that is
• during the summer, because we're there a lot,
• there's a lot of
• people who come and visit BlackRock and go swimming,
• go fishing. The park rangers have to tour around. As soon as they leave, another caravan
• comes in. We see it. I never saw this before. And they actually have the kids swimming in the river.
• And the rangers check their licenses and they you know, everybody has to leave.
• But it might be that you might need to hire even a part time person to screen people as they come in because in the summer,
• it could be liability for the building and open park that kids go into the river. I don't know. I'm just mentioning it. Mhmm. It's a very busy time. Mhmm.
• Added to that,
• parking could be an issue. I don't know if there's any expanded use
• in your view of the we have fourteen, fifteen cars there just for bocce. And then you have the door park. Mhmm. And there are it there's a limited space. So if this
• if there are other activities planned, it's something to be considered. That's all.
• Thank you. And if I knew we were on television, I would wear my dress shorts.
And we're we're we're better television now. We're it's a it's a it's a really clear picture.
Well and and like I said, the people have have been more than kind Yeah. In giving their their thoughts. And
• I don't know,
• you know, there were conversations that,
• there used to be a
• a heavy fear, a concern about being there,
• because maybe people weren't so receptive to having that. But I think with the use of,
• the park itself now, things have, you know, really quieted down and it's
• not as
• concerning. So
• Mhmm. Without saying anything bad. Alright?
• Thank you for Is is there something else? Background. You know, we we tried to do the right thing by sending it. And if it is something that,
• Ryan, you do make the decision on, I,
• I hope
• and one of the questions I brought to Maria the other day was,
• how many people have dog park per
• dog park permits?
• You send out something each year,
• and the people were good enough to tell me they get a little sticker. If they have one dog, they have two dogs, they get two stickers. You have to make sure the dog's registered.
• You go from one office to another,
• and then you can use the park. And I said, so tell me how many
• people have permits to use the dog park?
• And then why couldn't we, as they are doing what they have to do to get their the recreation card and the dog park sticker,
• why can't we give them a four question survey?
• Why couldn't we just say, you know, at that point in time? I don't know if they're paying money at at that point or just, you know, it's a yearly thing. There's no cost for the dog park. No. No. I mean, when they come, you know, to renew. Right? It's it They have to renew.
Yeah. But there's no cost for people for the dog park. There if you're talking about the rec ID cards, there's a cost. Right. They have to get that first. Yeah. I know. But there's many more people that have rec ID cards than have dog park. But in order to get the sticker, they have to have the recreation. Then they go and get the sticker. Yes. I'm aware. Yes. So we would have to know how many people get the stickers. Right? Yeah. We have a list. Yes. Good. So why can't we survey
I I think the board is gonna talk about that. I don't necessarily see that we have to survey them, but we can talk about that and see what the what the the thought is. Yeah. Okay. Yep. Would
I think we have to have a discussion. I don't think we're at that point yet. It's the future. Oh, okay. Alright. No. Just Not so. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you. Thank
There's just one. Yeah. Please. Decision. Because I think there was a comment that we haven't heard from people
• about the dog park in in years. But
• I know I've heard from several people
• who live adjacent
• to the dog park. So, you know, right right across the street.
• And
• those residents,
you know, feel that their peace would be compromised. Yeah. I'm sorry. Just to clarify. I meant I meant prior to receiving this memo. Right? Because we all we all received the email from the neighbors. Right? That was
• generated because of the fact that this was on the agenda. Right. Right. Okay. Yeah. Just So I'm sorry. That that's what I meant prior to prior to now. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. Yep.
Do you And Oh, sorry. Go ahead. Go ahead. I was just gonna ask, is does it make any sense to separate out these two
• requests too? Because it's like
• no more, you know, than 12 adding
school residents as a possibility and breaking out the hours for the Yeah. And I'm and, you know, if we can I'm I didn't mean to stifle discussion there. I mean, I'm more than happy to continue the conversation on the hours if we wanna do that. But we can also talk about the school district residents.
• I did look up some additional information.
• You know, the two nearest dog parks that I found that allow nonresidents
• to join,
• The town of Bedford,
• charges a $175
• for nonresidents,
• and they cap it at 60 permits.
• The town of Ossining charges $25
• for nonresidents. So a little bit of a difference between the two.
• And as far as I could tell, they don't have any cap on the number of nonresidents.
• So
• and sort of usage on the dog park, you know, what what's been the trend over the past, couple years?
• So we have
• reg licensed dogs and, you know, the number fluctuates,
• but it's somewhere in the area of, like, 500 to 600.
• Now
• Dogs that live in Crewe? Well, dogs that are licensed Licensed to live in Crewe. Okay. I I would estimate that there are is at least three times that many dogs in the village. Right? Because really? There are a lot of people that don't don't
• realize
• that they the law is that they're supposed to license their dog. Right? So even though we do try to get the word out to people, you know, we we know that there's a much higher population than that.
• Gonna let me see,
• I had to I had to go on to the public Wi Fi because the internal Wi Fi wasn't working, but let me see if it's back now.
Yeah. So if anyone's listening and needs to license their dog, you can do it online. Mhmm. Go to go to the village website.
• $15 if your dog is spayed or neutered and 25 if it's not, I believe. So,
• and we you can do it online,
• and we will mail you the tag that goes on the collar. Yeah. A little tag. You got a yeah. Right? You get you get a little something for your trouble. You know?
• Your dog can be cool. Yeah. I'm
Yeah. I I don't I, know, I used to before I came here, I worked for the town of Bedford, and I don't remember it being nearly that expensive. I knew that they always charge people, but I don't remember it being that high. It's all those Hollywood people.
• It looks like
• in 2025,
• we had issued
• fifty two
• fifty two families
• permits.
• Right? So, you know, that's 52. One, you know, one permit could cover,
• you know, a family of four. Right? Because it's issued it's issued by family. K.
• Now I think that that for some reason, last year's number was, like, artificially
• low.
• I just wanna see what it was the previous year.
I just I when I was looking through the emails today, I saw I think this was in 2019,
• and there were eight there were 87. Yeah. It was the number that jumped that that Yeah. But was back then. I don't That's I didn't do a deep dive of anything else. That just happened to jump out. Okay.
• there were 57.
• this is the year I was remembering. In 2023, we had 87. So
• Yeah. Yeah. So for some reason, there was a
drop off. So are peep do you think people are using the park but not getting the tags? Do we do we have any idea about what the
• know there was like a ranger situation there or there or something. There was a sitch.
• But
• do we think that everybody who's using it is
has a tag? Or do we think that people are going who do not have tags? I think people are going who do not have rangers tell us they check regularly. Oh, and they do. They absolutely do. I mean, they're, you know, they're there on a regular basis, but, you know, we may have one or two rangers working and they have to patrol, you know, 15 parks. Right? So they can't be everywhere all at once.
• But, you know, also, we you know, I think that there are some people who may
• live outside the village that do go there because they find it more convenient or, you know, they quiet or whatever it might be. And so,
• you know, I think,
• legalizing that situation
• would be,
• you know, in a limited number as the RAC is proposing,
• would be a best of both worlds scenario where those people would not have to be worried that they're gonna be thrown out of the park.
• The village is able to make a little extra revenue to, you know, fund operation,
• fund maintenance of the park, whatever it might be.
• So I think that that I think that that proposal certainly is where is
• is worthy of considering because
• I I would not be surprised if they were like I said, if there are people from the school district that are already going there, you know,
• on the QT.
• for this Sorry. Into the microphone, please. In the two years, I'm there every day. Never seen more than five cars for that dog park ever.
• And
• truth be told,
• there is a neighbor who, I don't know who it is, who discourages people and is very rude. What I've heard from the dog people themselves when we interviewed them,
• intimidates some of the women, don't even go anymore.
• So just to be clear about it, whatever you're hearing about neighbors,
• they could report something to the police. They need to not intimidate women
• who now don't even go to the dog park. This is what we were told. This is not my experience.
• So I just wanna add that. Thanks, John. Thank you. Thank you.
I don't I don't know if anyone on the board has any thoughts on the
• addition of the school district residents,
• the
• hour of the day and the the fact that this is such a fresh fresh idea. I I don't I don't say it lacks merit. I think I think I just wanna let it breathe a little bit and get some more input.
• we don't really have we don't really have any idea because we don't there's no way to count. It's not like the park ranger goes I I don't know. Actually, I have no idea how the park rang when the park ranger goes there. So we don't we have we don't
• you know, we have the what
• John and Debbie are saying about their observations about
• the usage, but we don't really know what the usage is. Like, if this were Silver Lake, we would know exactly how many people were coming and how, you know, and how many school district for us. Like, we we just don't have that kind of data for this, and it's really hard
• for me to make a decision based on
• no data or how we feel about how this is working or how we feel about how we should change how it's working. So that's why I'm struggling with this. What I would be interested in doing is
• if there were some way to see to see, are there 12 school district residents who are waiting to open this up? So could we on, you know, say, we're put together a waiting list of school district residents pending whether or not this becomes open or not and get a list. And then the first 12 if we decided to do this, the first 12 people on this list would be because, like, we don't know if there are 12 people from the school district or if there are a 112 people from the school district or that are interested in doing this.
• And I just feel like I've
• there's not a lot of I mean,
• unless we
• put I mean, could we put like a counter or something so you could see how many times the gate open and close? It wouldn't be an accurate count. And also, you know, maybe chat with the rangers a little bit. Or something. I just feel like The rangers are not they don't work at this point. Right? So that's Yeah. You know. Just wanna I know that a gate a gate opening and closing would be a terrible way to, like, get accurate information,
• but I'm just struggling with
• no data to make a decision.
I I think the piece of data that we do have are people that number of people that have registered, families that have registered. And that seems like from 2023,
• we've seen a pretty significant decrease
• in the amount of families that are registered dog park users. Now
• is that because they're not registering anymore or is that because Right. Did they find that the ranger was never there? Well, and, like, COVID really shifted people's work schedules. Right? People don't work from home anymore as much as they did back in 2023.
• That's true. So I would imagine that there's probably less
• is the reason. But, you know, so I think, you know, I would be open to,
• you know, a a certain number of school district residents being allowed to use it Yeah. Potentially,
• you know, if we are seeing such a decrease. And let's let's verify that as
much as we can. I think as trustee slip and said, let's see what what the numbers are and and
• and what they mean. I wanna say just in in general,
• you know, we're we're we're holding off on this, but I do wanna thank
• the recreation committee for Mhmm. For coming up with this, for Yeah. Yeah. Getting us to the point where we can discuss it a little bit, and we'll see what happens. Yeah. But this is this is what we should be doing. Yeah. And I also wanna thank the neighbors and the dog park users who came and sat through a lot at this meeting to not really have resolution on this. But, you know, I think that having
• you know, as I said before, it was a
• very long process when we discussed it last time. But there was a lot of, you know, interaction of people on both sides to get to the to to get to something that has has seemingly been working for the for the time being. So I don't know.
Oh, I'm sorry. Yeah. Go ahead. And I was just gonna add I just wanna say that whatever residents
• are are listening or might even be here that we
• we we've heard you preliminarily,
• and we wanna hear we wanna hear more.
• And we we wanna get a little bit more definitive in terms of your own experiences and and and hear that as well. So it's all important. Yeah. And I think the hours I mean, the current hours were established
how many years ago, Brian? After that? Twenty I think we did it in 2022.
• '2. '2. Yeah.
Yeah. So, I mean, I think that, you know, that that was you know, I I wanna be respectful of that process because it really was very
• thoughtful
• and extensive
• process where there were where there was give and take on both sides. By it was completely bilateral.
It was it was an equal number of residents and and and dog park users that were at the table. Mhmm. Yeah. Yep. So I I think that respecting that,
• I'm pretty sure it used to be eight to eight. It's eight to eight during the summer on weekdays. It is still now? Okay.
So weekdays, it's eight to eight in the summertime and eight to six in the wintertime. Okay. And then the
• the Weekend. Weekend hours are ten to four currently,
• and the request would be ten to six on the rack.
• the DOPR conversation is never a short or simple one.
Oh, in CPR, I I the manager has stepped out for a minute, but, you know, the that that is sort of agreed upon by the rec department Yep. That there will be offering a CPR course in the summer. Yep. So that is a fantastic
• idea that RAC brought up and that is being actioned on
• by the recreation department. Mhmm.
Okay. Great. We're gonna do that. Yeah. That's great. Yeah. Absolutely. That's that's great. Yep.
• Sorry. No problem.
• So there's a check mark by one and three, and Yeah. And we'll continue on two.
• Very good.
• Yeah. And I did I'm sorry. Obviously, I had to just deal with something there. But
did we share that the CPR class was scheduled? Yes. Sorry. That's where it a check mark on one and three. Okay. Thank you. We'll continue on two. It'll be this summer. Okay. Great. Thank you. Thank you. In the summer. Thank you. Alright.
• the village attorney and I have put together,
• this local law
• to establish the position of village auditor,
• which is authorized under the village law.
• Under the New York State village law, the board of trustees is tasked with reviewing the,
• claims against the village for payment and making sure that they are,
• you know
• Valid claims. Valid claims. Yes. So,
• historically,
• that has been done by myself and my predecessors
• in my you know, the position of village manager. We review every claim
• that,
• is made to make sure it has the proper backup that it has,
• you know, it is a valid purchase that it doesn't have sales tax charge. Right? You know, just to make sure that it meets all the criteria to actually
• be paid.
• And then the warrant comes to the village board for approval.
• And so the warrant is the whole,
• abstract of bills.
• So that part would not change. The warrant would still be coming.
• Really nothing is is changing because I'm still gonna be reviewing the bills assuming that the board up, you know, appoints me to the position of village auditor. Oh, okay. Thanks. That was my question. Yeah. Okay. And then, you'll still be approving the warrant. But this just kind of formalizes it.
• Again, it's one of the things that the office of the state controller
• has,
• identified,
• you know, when they've done audits in places where, you know, they say that you don't have this,
you know, you don't have this specific Independent. It's an independent office. Correct.
Okay. So and if the board so if you don't have this set up and the board is not doing that audit of claims, you could potentially have a demerit.
So we're trying to avoid that. Does it make sense for the village manager to be the village auditor or should it be somebody
• else who's
• further away
• from,
Right. I mean, I think it makes sense. I mean, that's how we've been doing it for
• fifty years. I mean, it's yeah. Right. I mean, it's
• I've
• I think that we know the most of what's going on in the village and know if a if a claim is something that is valid or if it's something that is not
• necessarily
• something, you know, something that may raise an eyebrow and say, why why did we buy this? Or, you know,
so yeah. I mean I was just wondering, like, in terms of checks and balances, like, if you the buck stops with you on everything. So is this not a stop gap measure before something gets to you to have the question asked? That was Mhmm. I I I'm sorry. I'm not I don't follow what you're saying.
• You're the one who's ultimately signs off on
• everything and the board the board does. Right? Right. But before it gets to us I was just wondering if this was an opportunity to separate something
• out from the village manager and make it
• you know, so it's like another another
• level of check and balance.
That that's up to the board if they wanted to do something like that, obviously. But, I did check with Nikon,
• and I asked their their
• opinion on the compatibility of the offices
• and at least weighed at NICOM and said he doesn't think this is an incompatible duty that the manager could perform it. It's performed, I think, in Port Chester by the village manager.
• It's currently performed by Briarcliffe,
• the
• village manager.
• And I don't know if Mount Kisco as well. It might be. It's listed upon the duties of the them. But, obviously, there could be play you could have checks and balances and you Yeah. I I just wanna be clear. It's not that I don't think you can do it. I know you can do I just don't know if this,
• What's it? Having another set of eyes on it before it gets to you is the point of having the position. But if it's not and it makes sense to do it this way, then In my I'm not opposed to do to having you do it.
• the the mechanism that we've been using anyway. Yes. But but instead of you doing it
• by default because it's always been on your desk or the desk of any village manager,
• we're creating the appropriate
• Framework. Function and framework.
• So so I think that's I think let
me yeah. I just wanna just but I'll just give a quick, you know, high level overview. Right? So an invoice comes in
• depending on which department it is,
• the
• office assistant or, you know, the whoever might be,
• in working the front desk will take the invoice,
• code it, give it to the department head to sign off on,
• and then it gets inputted into Munis. The finance department
• then prints out the,
• voucher form that goes with the invoice.
• They do the first check on things, right, to make sure that it's coded correctly, that it actually has a signature on it, that, right, that the department actually signed off on it. They do they do those checks. And then, the Friday before a meeting, I get a big basket of vouchers that I look through in my office. And so I'm I'm really performing the second check already. Right? The finance department has done their initial check on them, and then I'm doing the final check before the voucher gets added to the agenda to be approved by the board. Yeah. So
I'm reading the duties and it says a claims. So what does a claim mean? The claim claim is a funny word. It really means bills. Yes. Okay.
It's a claim for Things are not like a notice of claim. Right. Yeah. Right. So And I was just gonna add, if you were to take someone who was civil a civil service person and try to add this auditor responsibility
• to that, you should probably check with Craig just to make sure that you wouldn't have to pay more or expand their duties or provide a stipend or something along those lines. Yeah. So Sorry. I just need to talk to Jeanette for one minute again. Sure. So a claim a claim yeah. A claim is a bill. It's a bill. In this context, it is a it's a bill. It's
• like, you know, it's
• it's valid claims that you've entered into this agreement and they have to pay it. Okay.
• Ask me legal questions. Or yeah. Yeah. What else do wanna ask? Ask? I'll do my best. Or,
• me if I'm wrong, but it it falls under the generally,
• the warrants,
• you know, category that we begin our meetings with Right. In each meeting. And those are in effect claims that have that have come through the process effectively or without without question.
It's not they're for the village to pay, but then we have to approve them. Yeah. He and the the auditor is really just looking for the validity of the claim. They're not
• debating.
• It's there's not a renegotiation
• aspect to this. It's
claim, pay, valid, pay. Yeah. It's really making sure that it it there's no discretion in it. I mean, the big the biggest thing that I see when I go through the bills most of the time is that somebody is charged as tax,
• right, which we Right. Obviously, we're exempt from sales tax, so we don't pay that.
• That's really the biggest the biggest issue that comes in on the bills. You know, occasionally, something may have been,
• you know, the department head will have written one code and it may have been entered incorrectly. Right? You know, just mistyped or something like that. So you can sometimes catch something like that. It it's really as the attorney was saying, it's not like I don't I don't see someone and be like, oh, well, you know, we really should only be paying $49
• for that and not $59. That's not that's not what I'm doing. If I, you know, if I see something at that point, I'll say to the department head, I really think we need to shop around in the future for something like this if I think it's too high. But we're not negotiating
the past the past bills. And that way on on two Wednesdays a month when the treasurer presents us,
• a set of warrants
• for
• the, at the beginning of the meeting, we know that through that process that's included you, these are all clean claims.
That's correct. Yeah. And from my from my understanding of the process, Brian's not inputting any checks and he's not signing any checks. So there's already a procedural
• safeguard
built into the way you operate your check system. Okay. So that was basically what I was asking. I didn't know if this was a duplication of
• Mhmm. Something, you know. That's fine. Yeah. That's this seems fine to me. Yeah.
• for the next meeting. Thank you. Yep. I am. Thank you. I'm just happy it's not an extra person. Yeah. That's Oh, no. Yeah. No. I was like, oh. Yeah. Because I mean, that's
• in a lot of school districts,
• you might know this for me. Right? Right. Yeah. That's why I was asking. Yeah. A lot of school districts will actually hire somebody else just to just to do this. Right? But we don't I I don't think that we really have that. In some organizations, you'll have a treasurer, a finance director, and a controller. Yeah. But
Alright. Okay. We got exec session time. Well, before we do Oh, that's alright. You're right. Yes. I apologize. I
• so at our last meeting, we had our annual report from the Conservation Advisory Council.
• That's a nice capstone to the
• this chapter
• in, John Ehlers,
• career of civic service. He will be stepping away as chair. He will stay on the CAC
• and continue to be organizing
• cleanups,
• but he is stepping away from being the chair. So I will be appointing Eva Thaddeus, who's currently a member of the CAC, as his replacement.
• We also have Stepping Up for Arts and Humanities,
• Ellen Eclip and
• Lenore Edmond
• for Bicycle and Pedestrian Committee, James Nadeau and Dan Ozuruk
• Oh, excuse me, Ozuric.
• And
• for the PAC,
• Manuel Manuel Cornell Junior
• and for the VB Jan Johnson.
• Do I have a motion to approve? So moved. Second.
• Motion by trustee Simon, second by trustee Nicholson. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Aye.
• to discuss the matter, concerning, specific individuals?
• So moved. Second. Motion by trustee Simon, second by trustee Nicholson. All in favor? Aye.