2012-10-03-min-summit1 - Laserfiche WebLink

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October 3, 2012 town meeting. As Sara Arnold will be out of town during the last week in October, he suggested that week be used by Committee members to prepare their reports. Additional meetings will be scheduled as needed. The goal is to publish the Committee's report by November 12, which means that article write -ups must be completed by November 8. 2. Ledgemont Tax Increment Financing (TIF): Vistaprint, currently located at Ledgemont 2, has presented the Town with a TIF proposal associated with its potential expansion into a proposed new building to be constructed at the site, to be known as Ledgemont 3. Vistaprint would like to take this proposal to the November special town meeting. Carl Valente has created an internal negotiating team and invited the Appropriation Committee to send a representative. Robert Cohen will attend the next meeting of the team, to be held on October 16 and Joe Pato will attend an October 18 meeting. Additional meetings are expected to follow; Joe Pato and Robert Cohen will coordinate attendance. Also, a tour of the Ledgemont property is being planned, probably on October 11 at 11 a.m. The Selectmen are expected to discuss the Vistaprint TIF proposal at their November 5 meeting. There was concern about the Appropriation Committee taking a position before the Selectmen vote, but given the short time frame, this may be necessary. It was noted that Waltham has not accepted the TIF enabling legislation, but Burlington has. There was discussion about the process. When Shire proposed a TIF several years ago, the Selectmen met with stakeholders who provided feedback about its prospects of passage at Town Meeting, following which adjustments were made. It is anticipated that there will be a similar process in the present case. Carl Valente noted two changes to the law regarding TIFs: • Personal property taxation can now be included. A formula is no longer used to determine whether a company is eligible for state tax relief, while the state committee that oversees these decisions has some discretion, companies are more likely to receive state assistance than previously. 3. School Committee: The School Committee will be holding a meeting on Saturday, October 13, to discuss increases in the estimated cost of building a new Estabrook School. Mollie Garberg will attend. 4. Special Town Meeting Warrant Articles: Glenn Parker asked Committee members to think about who should be invited to future meetings to provide the Committee with additional information needed for warrant article write -ups. Rob Addelson will help on the article proposing the appropriation of additional funds to the OPEB trust account to address unfunded liabilities. He was urged to work on scheduling a meeting of the OPEB working group. There was general consensus that it would be helpful to engage actuary Dan Sherman to review and confirm calculations and policy suggestions of the OPEB working group. It was suggested that DPW Director Bill Hadley or Town Engineer John Livsey would be helpful when discussing Article 5 Estabrook School Access Improvements. 2