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FINCOM 20250215 Minutes
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Canton Finance Committee Minutes Voted on: 3/5/25 801 Washington Street Vote: 7-0-0 Canton, MA 02021 Finance Committee Meeting Minutes February 12, 2025 Virtual Meeting Finance Committee Members Present: Dave Clough, Dan Cole, John Leonetti, Emilio Mauro, Reuki Schutt and Cindy Thomas. Finance Committee Members absent: Kristin Mirliani and Maureen Menconi. Guests Present: Sue Desjardins, Assistant Treasurer/Collector Charlie Doody, Town Administrator Jan Kemalian, Assistant Town Administrator Jody Middleton, Human Resource Director Helena Rafferty, Chief of Police Wendell Robery, Chief of Fire Department Randy Scollins, III, Finance Director Ellen Jones, Recording Secretary Call Meeting to Order: Mr. Mauro called the virtual meeting to order at 7:00 p.m. Mr. Mauro introduced the Finance Committee members and the guests that were present at the virtual meeting. New Business: Discussion — Executive Office Budgets — F26 Budget Reguests — Charlie Doody & Jan Kemalian Discussion —129 — Executive Office - FY26 Budget Request The Administrative Secretary Salary (Ms. Kemalian's former title before being promoted to Assistant Town Administrator) is Increasing $4,169 from $116,281 to $120,450 (this includes her contractual 20-year step Increase). Longevity Increase — An increase from $2,700 to $4,450 for FY26. This is for Mr. Doody's longevity Increase for being employed with the Town for 30 years. Communication Specialist —An increase of $20,400 from $9,600 to $30,000 for FY26. Mr. Doody stated that this is the most significant request In the Executive Office budget. This request Is to add a 20-hour benefits eligible position to the Executive Office budget. He further stated that this position would manage the organization's communication, strategy and public image. He stated that the Town needs to do a better job in communicating clear, consistent, accurate, effective, timely information to the public. Some of the items that a Communications Specialist would handle right away would be to write press releases, create statements that the Select Board would issue, manage social media and correct misinformation that often is found on public websites, Facebook pages, blogs etc. Mr. Doody's experience over the past two years has made it clear that the Town really does not have the "bandwidth" to do this job effectively. Currently, Ms. Kemalian, Mr. Doody, Ms. Bogue and Ms. Levitsky try to manage the communications to the Town. Because of all the other responsibilities that they have it is difficult for them to manage the communications in a timely manner. They have experienced over the past few years the inability to react in a timely manner to correct inaccuracies that are in the various social media platforms. By the time their office becomes aware of these inaccuracies, it is often too late to correct. If information is not correct that day or that hour then it becomes too late. Mr. Doody stated that many of the residents consume information in a different way from different sources, in particular the young population, from social media, websites, blogs, YouTube, Instagram etc. It is his opinion that these platforms are the things that are missing from a communications standpoint. The Communications Specialist would be responsible for managing all the different platforms and making sure the Town is communicating effectively. The Town engages the services of a public relations firm in Canton called JGPR (John Guilfoyle Public Relations) for approximately $9,600 per year (contract expiring). The $9,600 will be shifted for the Communications Specialist Salary. The increase would be $20,400 for an annual FY26 salary of $30,000. Mr. Mauro, the Finance Committee Liaison to the Executive Office, spoke in support for the hiring of a Communications Specialist as a great opportunity for the Town to make sure that the Town has the communication capacity, especially FINCOM 20260212 Final Minutes WRS EM DVC ,docx Page 1 of 9 2/17/25
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given the different outlets of communications today. He also stated that as a Finance Committee member and the Chair of the Master Plan Implementation Committee that this would be a great opportunity for public services, not just to correct information, but to let people know more effectively what is going on in the Town. He also sees this as an opportunity toincrease the public participation and opportunity to have full, correct information in a real time way. Inter - government communication can improve, as various committees and departments can have a better sense of what other departments are doing as well as getting their messages out as needed. Mr. Clough stated that it sounds like there may be three primary functions of the Communications Specialist position: to write press releases, to write Select Board statements and to correct misinformation on social media. He stated that he thinks this position is primarily geared toward being the "arbiter of truth on Facebook". He is concerned that this could be problematic for the Town to get Involved with and could have free speech implications and that they could continue to send messaging/information as they are now. It is his opinion that the $20,000 may be a waste and that the $10,000 would be sufficient to handle a press release per month. Further, having viewed the Canton related content on httos://Igpr.net/tag/canton, Mr. Clough noted only approximately a dozen posts in the last year by the current public relations firm. The funds proposed here could be used in other budgets, He is also concerned at the rate the Executive Office is growing with regard to spending as compared to the prior administration. He spoke in opposition of the $20,000 appropriation for the Communications Specialist. Mr. Doody responded that Mr. Clough's comments were the reason why the Town needs a Communications Specialist because there Is so much going on in the Town and the Executive Office needs a Communications Specialist to communicate what is going on to the public more effectively. He also stated that the JGPR public relations firm released more than 12 press releases in a year and that one or two were related to the Police Audit and others were related to the Serenity Garden project, the Menorah Lighting, and the Veterans' breakfast, among other postings, but these posts did not meet the Town need for capacity. Ms. Kemalian wanted to make sure that Mr. Clough understood that this is not just a Communications Specialist for the Executive Office and that this position would be a Communications Specialist for the entire Town of Canton. The individual would not only be focused on the Executive Office and the Select Board but would also be focused on communications from all Town boards and committees, all Town -wide events and any matters that need to be communicated to residents and businesses not just for the Select Board. Mr. Clough responded that the Town is already compensating employees for posting on social media, such as the Paul Revere Heritage Site and the Community Preservation Committee in their roles for specific departments or committees respectively. In his opinion, this communications position is not necessary. Mr. Mauro assumes that the Communications Specialist would help the Town to expand communications capacity that the Town is unable to do at the current time and would allow better coordination of different departments communications and avoid inequities between departments Ms. Thomas commented on the website discussion and the Town's inability to keep the website up-to-date and have good, quality information that citizens would be looking for. Per Mr. Doody, the Communications Specialist would work closely with Mr. Jutras, Mr. Kelly and Ms. Musto of the Information Systems department for updating the website. Mr. Leonetti is supportive of the position request but having served on the Community Preservation Committee for 31/2 years allocating millions of dollars on projects for the community, every year the primary question was how to inform the community of the funds that are available and how to engage the community in projects that are worthy of those funds. This was a consistent ask and need with a few individuals checking the website and posting in the Canton Citizen for general awareness of the funds. After having some experience on the Community Preservation Committee and after conducting a survey many years ago the members were starting to question if they were communicating to the public enough, given that they had not heard from the public for 6-7 years. Mr. Leonetti appreciates Mr. Clough's comments but stated that more speech is the answer for contributing to free speech and for those reasons 20 hours per week seems like a lot of time to "circle up" with the various Committee members to communicate with the public. He inquired if the Communications Specialist would be taking feedback and responding or would it be just outbound messages of press releases, and would the Specialist be engaging with the community or just messaging back to the community. Mr. Doody stated that the Community Specialist would have to be two-way communications, engaging department heads and committees to respond to their needs to get information out to the residents. Ms. Kemalian stated that there are many, many communities in Massachusetts that have Communications Specialists/Managers/Directors. If the funding is approved, the Executive Office would work with the HR Director and took at job descriptions from other Towns to see what would fit in Canton and how they are managed. Mr. Clough responded that he did some research and he could only find Cambridge and Boston that have a Communications FINCOM 20250212 Final Minutes WRS EM DVC .docx Page 2 of 9 2/17/25