MGL chapter 71 Section 38N. 
The school committee of each city, town or regional school district shall hold a public hearing on its proposed annual budget not less than seven days after publication of a notice thereof in a newspaper having general circulation in such city, town or district. Prior to such public hearing said committee shall make available to the public at least one copy of said proposed budget for a time period of not less than forty-eight hours either at the office of the superintendent of schools or at a place so designated by said committee. At the time and place so advertised or at any time or place to which such hearing may from time to time be adjourned all interested persons shall be given an opportunity to be heard for or against the whole or any part of the proposed budget. Such hearing shall be conducted by a quorum of the school committee. For the purposes of this section a quorum shall consist of a majority of the members of said school committee.

Jeff Bennett

My question is this; is this the best way to do things and more importantly, is it the way things should be done? The Town Treasurer is the one charged with doing the borrowing (see town meeting vote & warrant article) also tracking of Town debt is responsibility of Treasurer, so why would the treasurer be on the sidelines so to speak rather than directly involved? Simpy, the town accountant is charged with ensuring bills are legal and charged to proper account and entered under same and Treasurer is responsible for paying town bills and keeping track of Town debt. Simply put, how much you start with, how much spent and how much is left. My opinion is the Town accountant and treasurer should be front and center, not on the side. Read the following and think about that and remember, just because we do it that way does not mean it is correct. Where have I heard that before? Seems like the Town has just gone in a big circle with town finance which equals changing nothing, in my opinion.

Attached is what I distributed and discussed at last night’s meeting.  The first page is the project budget, showing invoiced to date per budget line etc. The second page is the process that we go through in entering and tracking invoices through the propay  system.  The third page is a printout from the propay system showing the current status.  If you like I can discuss these with you. 

Currently Holly has done a great job getting the invoices into the propay system and getting things up to date.  At this point everything is as far as it can go until the MSBA allows her to enter the full budget into the system, currently only the Feasibility budget is in the Propay system.

Timothy Alix 
Project Manager
Project Management | Northeast
Main +1 413 592 0030 X123 | Mobile +1 860 930 5036 | Fax +1 413 285 8592 Tim.Alix@colliers.com

Colliers International

(formerly Strategic Building Solutions)
67 Hunt Street | Suite 119

Agawam, MA 01001 | United Stateswww.colliers.com/projectmanagementnortheast

I think it’s OK for the Selectman’s office to enter the information and request reimbursement.  The treasurer and accountant will be aware of what is getting reimbursed electronically and can have access to the propay system at any time to take a look at the status.   They will need to understand what the net cost to the Town is on an ongoing basis to ensure that there are sufficient funds to move forward.  With each electronic reimbursement request, paperwork is generated by the system which will need to be signed by multiple parties, so the accountant and Treasurer could review the summaries of each request.  The requests can only be done once a month, so they could plan to review the info at that time.

Timothy Alix 
Project Manager
Project Management | Northeast
Main +1 413 592 0030 X123 | Mobile +1 860 930 5036 | Fax +1 413 285 8592 

Tim.Alix@colliers.com

Jeff Bennett

Posted on: February 29, 2016 - 5:17pm

The Board of Selectmen's Office will have limited hours this week. 

Tuesday, March 1, 2016,         8:30 a.m. - 5:00 p.m.

Wednesday, March 2, 2016     12 p.m. - 5:00 p.m.

Thursday, March 3, 2016         12 p.m. - 3:00 p.m.

Hours return to normal on Monday, March 7, 2016

The above is from Templeton Town website.

Jeff Bennett

Need for Templeton water tanks;

From the Templeton water dept., the need for the tanks is mainly for fire protection, according to email received by me from Templeton light & Water.

Jeff,

The three water storage tanks that we have in Templeton are required predominantly for fire protection.  When all full we have roughly 1,800,000 gallons available in the event of a fire.  The water distribution system design allows us, if necessary, to tie the lower elevation water mains to the higher elevation ones using booster stations and gate valves.  There was a fire the other day in which the second oldest building in town had burnt and there were 252,000 gallons of water used.  This dropped the water level at the Johnson Avenue tank by about 10’ and the South Road tank by about 8’ (different tank dimensions, same water displacement).  Ron our Water Superintendent would understand more about the tanks as they apply to the actual distribution system, but I think that the weight of the stored water assists normal gravity flow to equalize pressure in the water mains which in turn equalizes it at the customers’ locations.

To my knowledge there are no benefits to water quality with a concrete versus a steel water storage tank, but the steel tanks are now constructed in stages with seams that can fail over time.  Also, the MassDEP requires re-painting of interior and exterior tank walls every 15 years, a very costly process.  The concrete tank never requires paint on the interior of it and on the exterior only for aesthetic purposes, but no MassDEP mandates.  We have been told by our consultants that the life of a new concrete water storage tank today is anywhere from 60-100 years, and this is longer than that of a new steel on.

Question asked, question answered.

Jeff Bennett