Meeting transcript
Board of Finance - Special Meeting Budget Workshop
May 18, 2022 · Watch on YouTube · All meetings
Okay. Thank you, everybody. I'm going go ahead and call this meeting to order. This is a special budget workshop meeting on Wednesday, 05/18/2022. Let's go ahead and start by saying the Pledge of Allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of The United States Of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, liberty and justice for all. Thank you.
Okay. Moving on to agenda item number two, that is public speak. Eric, do you want to see if we can roll through and find the public, if we have anybody who wants to contribute to the public speak portion? Again, I would just, I guess, request everybody that you restrict to the agenda, which is obviously the budget. We're here to come up with a decision on what budget to present to the town meeting on Tuesday, May 24. So we just kind of keep it pertinent, succinct if you could, and to the point, and we'll we'll go ahead and get started. Eric.
Okay. I'm gonna do it on the order in which it appears on my screen. First, Valerie Gruen.
Hi. I would just like to say I'm sorry that we're doing this again this year, having to come back to the table. I do feel that the board of Ed and myself, we presented responsible and an academic sound budget. I've been saying that for a while. You know, I would encourage this board of finance not to make any cuts to the school. If if that happens, unfortunately, this point, having received no money in many years and seven years, we would be cutting services. And it's, you know, still pandemic post pandemic COVID times. At this point, you know, we would have to contemplate cutting some mental health services, we'd have to contemplate, you know, cutting our services to our kids we don't want to do that. These are things that our kids need. But we would literally have to look at cutting services and programs to the kids and I just hope that this board will agree that that would not be in the best interest of children right now. Okay. Thanks, Val. Okay. Next up on my list, Jerry Creme.
I want to thank the Board of Finance for your quick response in having this meeting. And I have to echo Valerie's sentiments. I guess I'm not sure why do we keep doing the same thing year after year when it doesn't seem to work really well. I think we need a different system Because this keeps on happening. And, I don't have any answers. I just have a lot of questions. And, I apologize. And I'm sorry to the Board of Finance that you have to go through this over and over again, year after year. I don't know how you do it. But, I appreciate your efforts, and I too ask that you not cut the school budget. We really need everything we've we can we have. Thank you. Thank you, Jerry. Okay. Next on my list, Steven Fuss.
Steven, you're muted if you're trying to speak. We're not hearing it.
All right, Steven, going once, going twice. Okay. And then there are three phone numbers on there. There is last number, last four, 5579. Would you like to speak? Okay. I think that's actually Marina. So 9537, would you like to speak?
Yes. My name is Elizabeth Partridge, and I'm on one fifty one Lakeside. And I have a couple things to say. First of all and I'm gonna make this pretty quick, so that should be not an issue. First of all, my recollection of the budget is going up something greater than 10%. And I guess I'd like to know what other people are getting a 10% increase in their income, because most of the people who are paying these taxes, or a good portion of the people who are paying these taxes, are retired, and they are not getting a 10% increase. We'll not get a 10% increase next year either. So I think that that's part of the issue that you're facing. The second thing is I came out of the corporate world for many years, a good forty plus years. And when I was in the corporate world, we had what they called tasks every year, T A S K, a task. And sometimes you had a task every year, and they'd say, here's your task, 15%,
and you were charged with reducing your budget by 15%. They didn't care how you did it, just do it. All right? And that's what a lot of these people are coming from. They're not coming from an educational world where the budget keeps going up year after year after year. And then the third thing I want to say is after hearing the people say, oh, we actually have to have something of increases in the Board of Ed and so on, you can't reduce those dollars. It made me think of when I was a kid. My father was on the Board of Education for many, many years and then was on a town council subsequent to that. And I remember when he was on the Board of Education, what he would say would be, all we have to do to get the people to agree to the budget is tell them that we're going to make the kids walk based on what the state requirement was. So anyone within a mile for elementary, a mile and a half for junior high, and two miles for high school was no longer going to be bused. And the parents would go, Oh my god, you can't do that, and they'd approve the budget. And I think that that's what we're hearing now. Oh, we're going to cut services and you can't do that, and so you want people to buy into that. I think that you probably would have heard some of these things coming out in the town meeting,
but what you said in the town meeting was questions only. And when you do questions only, people who have comments are just going to sit back and wait and vote it down. And that's what you got. So you shouldn't have been too surprised that this is what you got because you didn't want to listen to comments, you only wanted to listen to questions. So, those are my comments.
Okay. And the last number there ends in 4212. And you're muted. I I can't unmute you. Yep. You're unmuted now. I just
I think I unmuted myself. This is good evening. This is Shannon Loudon, and I'll just echo what Valerie and other members of the board of Ed have already said, but add stuff to it. Number one, more than just respectfully requesting, I really am pleading with you, not to further cut the Board of Education's budget. We truly, as an elementary school, cannot meet and I'll just be very clear coming from the corporate world, we have financial obligations that are contractual. If you choose to further reduce our budget, we will not be able to meet those financial obligations, and therefore, services may have to be cut. Just a couple quick facts. Since the twenty fifteen-twenty sixteen fiscal year, Andover Elementary School's budget has decreased by 10%.
We haven't had an increase in more than seven years. Meanwhile, over the last five years, because I've looked at student enrollment, student enrollment has basically been stagnant and is going to be the same next year. So as with everybody else's expenses, our expenses increase year by year by year, and yet we've had a decreased budget for the last seven years. Number two, the RAM budget. We can't do anything about it now. It has passed even though it failed in Andover. I just want you to know that, essentially, what the three towns voted to do is give 1,000,000 more dollars to RAM for 10 students more than Andover Elementary School has. Let's just put that in perspective. Each of those 10 students basically is attributed with a $100,000 extra in expense.
Outrageous to me. And I'm not trying to criticize the Vam Board of Ed as the Andover Board of Ed did. We did our best. We didn't get any increase last year. We haven't had it for seven years, and we're doing our best to meet what I think is the board of finance's obligation and the board of education's obligation, which is not simply to do the will of the voters, but to do what we believe is best for the town. And as I've said many years now, Andover Elementary School is one of the top, if not the top reason why people move to Andover, and it needs to be supported accordingly. Finally, if you are looking at from where might these dollars come, both for the town budget and our Andover Elementary School budget, when I looked at the budgets and when I looked at whatever was available to the public and I asked Sherry Holmes about this, whether or not it was made available to the public, she confirmed that I only could get this information through through freedom freedom of information. What I'm curious about is, and I've paid attention and have a memory, I believe right now there is some $450,000 available and or, already sitting in an account from the $948,000 we got for the pandemic relief. And in fact, that was earmarked by the Board of Selectmen to be used for our community center.
My understanding is $450,000 of that no longer will be needed for the community center. But it has been said that that money is to be used for future employees, for possible additions to the community center because we have to be under a million dollars to not be covered by the Davis Bacon Act and have to use union employees to do the community center. I just wanna suggest to the board of finance that we've got $450,000 that should not be being used for possible future employees at the community center, but can be used right now to minimize any increase in taxes for what I know is a frequent cry from the seniors and justifiably. If they're on fixed incomes, even though I know the retirement accounts were increased by about 6%, Social Security and people on fixed income this year, let's help out everybody. Let's use that $450,000 that was given to the town for pandemic relief to provide some relief for the taxpayers. Thanks very much. Thank you, Shannon. Okay. Next on the list, Kimberly Persson. That's
it. Nothing to say at this time. Thank you. Okay.
The last I have on my is Liz. I'm sorry. Always pronounce your last name incorrectly. Come on. Try it.
Low check. Low catch. Good job. Low catch. Okay. Yep. Okay. So,
my concerns, and I voiced them in my in my letter in the reminder on Friday, is the lack of by the administration of the school when you go on Hebron and Marlborough's websites you get very detailed much more detailed budgets, and much more detailed updated expenditures. And I feel like we had a lot of high hopes for what was going to come out of this new financial software, and I really don't feel like we've gotten what we paid for. The taxpayers haven't anyways. I mean, maybe you guys see something that we don't see, but as of last week, the expenditures for the school were not even up to date. And as a voting taxpayer, I don't even know how to even support a budget that's not even up to date. The budget that's on there is not even up to date. It's got handwritten marks on it, and I just don't think that is up to date or professional. And I think I would like the Board of Finance to really push back and demand more details at a more professional level from the superintendent's office of the school.
That's all I have to say for now. Okay. I
think that is everybody on the list. If there's anybody I missed, please chime in now.
Yeah, congrats to everyone in my screen. Okay. All right. Thank you, Eric. Thank you everybody for your input. Obviously a challenging situation, guess, for us all. I guess I'll open it up to the Board of Finance members. Think most of you probably saw the results just so you have a good context for it. Linda did I'm sorry, Linda. Diane did put the tally together. This failed referendum roughly 53% to 4647%. Most of the respondents who actually answered the advisory questions voted or indicated that they felt that both the elementary and the town budget was too high, slightly higher percentage for the elementary school budget versus those who thought it was too low. So it was roughly 60% to 25% on the AES budget and 49% to 29% on the town budget and again there were several that were left blank that's why there's not 100% so when presuming most of those people who left it blank
didn't feel strongly in one way or the other, we probably could have worded those questions a little bit differently, such as if you feel like we're in the general range, then please leave it blank. Maybe that would have been a better way to approach it. I'm not sure it would have changed the results. So we do have the budget in front of us that we recommended to the town. It did pass that town meeting. Just one point of clarification. Somebody had mentioned that they thought the town, that the budget overall had had gone up about 10%. It is true that the overall town general budget expenditure budget was up about 10 and a half percent. 88.7% when you did all the capital funds, so it wasn't quite overall 10%, was a little bit less than that. The overall budget in terms of the expenditures being recommended for the town of Andover, though, was only at 3.76% over last year, so it's a little less than 4% in terms of the overall expenditures recommended. So just a little context and a little preface from me. I guess I'll open it up to the board members and see if anybody wants to make any points or suggestions about how to approach
budget, we need to come up with a recommendation such that we can present it to town meeting again on Tuesday, May 24. Anyone want to give a start?
Mark, I just wanted to make a statement just, you know, to just just one statement and I, you know, I'm the newbie on the on the block, so I'm not gonna start the process, but I just wanted to say that I, that we all know as a town together, we're all in this together, you know, from my two and a half years of watching this, you know, it tends to be like, you know, just as an observer, as a person that it might be town versus the Board of Ed, I really want to put it out there that we really, like some of the speakers have said, we really just want to work together to come up with some kind of good budget that will pass, that's fair to everyone, that benefits everyone, but also that those of us that are serving on it and those that I've gotten to know all of you, you know we really are dedicated, professional, take it seriously, and, you know, put a lot of time and effort into studying it. So it's nothing personal at all. It's gonna be hard. I'm sure we're gonna have opposing viewpoints, or hopefully we're all going to be open minded to everyone's viewpoint.
You know, I don't want to, you know, I always like to say that I may come in with an opinion, but I really can be swayed I mean I do listen to everything I do study everything and I do you know I do happen to work in a school so I hope that's a perspective that I can uniquely bring to the table if questions come up so that's all I just really you know there's we took it to town meeting we've had public hearings there wasn't a lot of things said so we do take that in. Yeah, so me as a newbie, just wanted to say I think we can all come together to some kind of joint happiness or something that can make everyone fair and equitable to everyone and hopefully can pass and run the town well
in school. It's a good reminder, Joanne. I agree. It is a challenging environment, but this is what we're here for. We have to find compromise. It's our process, I'm sure we can do it respectfully and with grace. So Rob, you had your hand up? Yep.
I guess what I wanna say is this. As people have mentioned, you know, AES budget has been flat or decreased seven years in a row. There were, there has been, I feel long standing feeling like their budget was too high, but I also feel that, but that feeling is out of date. And, you know, enrollment bottomed out years ago and we've held the line and we've held the line and we've held the line and whatever fat that anybody thought was left to that budget has been wrung out. And now we're in a situation where we're actually going to be facing, as our board of ed is telling us, a crunch point where we're actually going to have a decrease in AS's ability to do the things that it does.
And I'm a how do I put this? I have been supportive of the idea that the board of finance's job is to bring a budget before the town that is both responsible and passable. And those things are often intention. All right. But we've gotten to the point we zeroed out the budgets last year. We kicked the can to get it passed. At some point, I feel like this board has to stand up and say, hang on a second to the town. Like, the voters are not completely passive vessels. We can talk to them and explain to them that at some point, if you keep doing this, there are consequences. If we don't believe in this budget, if we think this budget is too high, if we as a board think that there's something that needs to be cut, then by all means, let's talk about that. But if it's just, you know, it can't pass. Okay. Well, from my perspective, at some point, we have to step up as a board and say, hang on a minute, We've been working this problem for years. We really do try,
and this is a responsible budget. And maybe we go back with a cut. Sure. Because it was $53.46, and that warrants some equitable cutting. And for for the record, I would say that we would, you know, cut equally from the town and the school to make that happen. But at some point, our job is not just to offer up a budget passively. Okay. The budget failed, so we'll just hack and slash. At some point, we have to step up and say, look, we thought about these things. We considered everything. We heard from the boards and commissions and everybody. And we put this together and we believe in it. And it's important. This this is the sort of thing that our town needs. If we want to catch up on our roadwork, if we want to continue to have a top shelf elementary school, which is, you know, as as has been mentioned, I think one of the major reasons a young family will move into this town,
then these are the things that we need to fund. And, you know, so I think we have to kind of keep in mind both of these things. One, that, yes, it got voted down and we may need to consider cuts. But at the same time, what are we willing to step up and say as a board to defend a responsible budget that may not be palatable necessarily at first to the town's voters. Maybe we have to tell them why, you know, more vocally, why we need to catch up on our roadwork, why we need to do spend money to cut down the trees that have been dying. Maybe we need to do that, a better job of that. So that's my gut take. I admit I'm a little fired up about this. I just dropped my kid off at AES. You know, my other one's coming in. My express bring her there right now. You know, to me, you can't have a flat budget for eight years in a row and expect that the school just rolls on like it's no big deal. At some point, you hit resistance. Are we there. I think we might be. What do you think. That's, that's what I say for now. You're muted, Mark. Sorry. Thanks, Rob. Other members of the board? Linda?
Hi, I think whatever we decide to do, Nobody's going to be happy. The one thing I do want to say I don't think you can really compare the high school dropping students and the elementary school dropping students, because it was a few years ago, but there were three kids one wanted to graduate work in a machine shop. The second kid wanted to be a physics major And the third kid was going into a senior year and didn't know what he wanted to be when he went to college. So the number of classes, you have to offer those three kids. Have to be offered whether you've got 100 students or 90 students in the school because they're different. So you can't really compare the high school and elementary school. You just can't divide the number and say there's so many high school classes. I don't know. Think we're going to have a hard time. I don't think the budget's going to pass unless we decide to cut something. Okay. Thank you, Linda. Louise, Diane, anything?
I have a point. Yeah, Louise? I know it's gonna be very difficult all the way around, but I thought the basis of us going to the town was to see what the town wanted to be done. Unfortunately, you know, it depends on who comes out. I think we only had like 400 people. I'm not sure if that speaks to if people didn't care or didn't understand. I mean, there was lots of opportunity for them to tune in on some of the the videos and all that and the meetings to find out exactly what's going on. So it's it's. I'm kind of in the middle of the road, but to a point where. The town is speaking. And based on the questions we posed. And based on who came out. Basically, the majority rules. And I think we need to probably make cuts probably in both situations because it's coming up high in both. But I think cuts do need to be made. Okay. Thanks, Louise.
I
agree with everyone. I think the results of the advisory questions point us in the direction that overwhelmingly most people thought both budgets were too high. So I think we have to look at it and make some cuts as hard as they're going to be. There's no easy way to get this done. If we don't get a budget that passes, we end up with this year's budget to work with going forward. So it doesn't benefit us not to get a budget that doesn't pass. So we really just need to kind of dig in and just figure out what we can do and where we can make some cuts. I've gone through everything this afternoon. So I have pretty much a list of things that
we can talk about when we're ready. Okay. Before we get specific, I was just doing it overall, my observances from two years of watching and then getting voted in and really devoting myself to spending a lot of time learning, reading, listening to people. So I think I said it best in my letter too, that I definitely support sending, you know, an increase. I definitely don't want to see a zero or anything like that. I know we need to make progress. We need to fund things for the school. Mental health cannot be touched. I think that, you know, things like that nature, of course. But I think we have to come to some kind of reductions, so I wanted to just voice my opinion on that, know, think it wouldn't be worthwhile of us, I feel like we were a little passive in our meetings, Rob, to tell you one thing, you know, just to speak directly to you. And I took a back seat. I was ready every single meeting. You know, I studied up. I'm like, nope, you guys all wanna go to the town.
If you wanted to cut something.
No, no, I could have spoken up. I'm very respectful of processes, learning people. I know my mind and I know I can speak at any point, but I learn from people around me and I listen and I do that kind of thing. So I learn from all you, so I, you know, so all I'm saying is I think at this point I support some cuts too, I'm not saying I need drastic cuts or anything, but in order to, you know and that's worldly too like seeing inflation seeing I took time to go to the affordable housing thing I think I'm going to be our representative on that committee this past week and they held a workshop where I learned a lot even though I'm in every meeting and go to as many as I can. I can't believe that our population is really decreasing and that the age fifty to seventy population is huge, so we really, we want our school to continue, we want to have those seniors
to have affordable housing in town, this really is related to finances, so that their houses can turn over to families of young with young children to keep our school populated and going you know so I mean it's all kind of goes together but I it really opened my eyes that affordable housing thing which I didn't think Andover even needed to think about but I learned a lot just by going so we'll talk about that another time so I would like to see some cuts you know that don't hurt I know that that's probably not possible but we'll just see what happens as we start our conversation.
Can I just throw a little ending bit on, like, that I I wanted to include in what I said, and I I didn't quite get there? I just wanna say, like, I'm not saying that we shouldn't cut anything. The results of the referendum indicate that we should. I'm not saying that. What I'm saying is we should take a hard look, pick the hills to die on, And then whatever we do, I really believe that we as a board should try our level best to then come out strongly. And so say we're at x dollars and we decided to cut $50,000 from the budget, whatever it is, that we should then really be willing to, gosh, back that. Okay? We were passive. You're right. We took a budget to the town. We said, here's what we got.
We didn't make you know, it wasn't the the meeting was very, you know, there wasn't much back and forth or anything like that. And part of that is just the rules of the meeting. Like, the the whole thing about questions versus comments is actually kind of baked into the the way the meeting is supposed to work, and it actually isn't great. And I agree with that. But the the point is we should do our level best tonight to get to a number we think is is both responsible and passable, and then back the heck out of it. That's what I'm trying to say. If we don't believe in it, then why are we put putting it before the ten? That's what I'm trying to say.
Okay. Alright, thanks, Rob. Okay, I mean, I I would I think everyone's got a fair point. We all know that the the budget went down at referendum. I don't disagree that we're probably going to have to make some cuts, and I would agree with Rob that we need to make those cuts carefully if we do make them. There's three options here. We could change the budget and end up with an increase. We could present the same budget we did last time to the town and see if we get a different result, which is possible. You know, you're not necessarily going to have the same voter block and the second go round as you did the first for better or worse. Or the third thing is that we can make some overall cuts, obviously, and present a lower reduced budget to the town, anticipating this more likely going to be palate voters. And hopefully we're going to pass in some agreement on that. So I didn't say any of you don't know. I'm just trying to recap the situation. Personally, I don't know of anything that I would cut. I am back on this budget, and, you know, we do have a lot of mechanisms by which people can comment or ask questions. I mean, we had several budget meetings, and I know that a lot of people can't make them. That's just the
modern life, right? We're busy. All of us, we had several budget meetings, we had a budget hearing, we had an email address, know, we can always take letters, but that is limiting. Rob's right, kind of is baked into the process a little bit. By the time we get to town meeting, it's really about voting on the budget line items, making proposals or motions to change it, or otherwise, we take a vote as we did in the past. So can we sell it better? Yeah, we probably can. I mean, there's part of me that says we've been selling it for about four months, because we've been working on it as the Board of Ed, but it's not really reasonable, I guess, to expect that anybody's necessarily going to follow it the way that we do and understand it the way we do and attend all the Board of Ed meetings, attend all the Board of Finance meetings, etc. So it's just, maybe we need to come up with a better mechanism before we get to town meeting to communicate. And then maybe as Rob said, more forcefully or clearly communicate, at the town meeting. It's a little complicated. How do we do that without getting into the weeds? Maybe we need to get in the weeds. We're trying to avoid that. But, it's, it's still tough without making it a really, really long and boring presentation. So I guess that's, that's my 2¢. I'm going to leave it at that for now. Does anybody want to make any motions or have any discussions about particular aspects of the budget?
Eric, you have something to add? Yeah, just before we start getting into cuts, I sent you all an email on the third of this month. As most of you know, the state budget did pass. The state has capped the mill rate for motor vehicles at 32.46, but they use this crazy formula based on last year's taxation for how much each town is supposed to get. So the town of Andover will get in revenue $114,008.61? Correct. Correct. That is going to hold?
It's baked into the budget. That's the official notice that we've gotten from the state, from OPM. And they said we should get that in August. Now, you know, whether we do or not, you know, but it's, it's the same as any other of the state line items that we get. Generally speaking, they give us what they say they're going to give us unless they do a budget rescission. But since they're expected to give it to us early in the year, it's unlikely that we would get a rescission for that. The good news is if you just subtract that number from our budget, then that gets us basically down to the cap line for motor vehicles. Essentially that is a net gain for us of that $114,000 So, that's all I have to say about revenue. That obviously doesn't cut expenses,
which I think is what people are asking, but at least it reduces the bottom line to most people, which is always good. Is that money guaranteed? Is that a done deal?
The state budget has passed. They gave an Excel spreadsheet to the town, which I can share with you if you want. But the first line is Andover and when you get to municipal transition grant for Andover, it's 114,861. You know, that's it's as in place as any other number. You know, we have to assume that since the budget passed, you know, what they say they're going to give us for for all the funds is correct.
So just for the context, the information that Eric presented I know we kind of touched on that briefly before we talked about it, but it was too late to bake into the budget that would take our difference in that fact does take our total by taxation from 4.9% increase to a 3.8% increase. Correct. So I made that change running in the budget.
That's a pretty significant change right in and of itself. I mean, when I came into this meeting tonight, I hadn't caught up on everything. I've been busy today and my gut reaction was maybe we could cut 1% of the increase out and that just did it. So that's tremendous news and I think we should really think hard about whether we want to go over to top that.
The only thing that we keep talking about Rob and I agree with you, it's great news. It's just that it marries the town to the spending, you know, and the fluctuating grand list. That's all I mean. So I was going to ask Eric. Maybe I missed something in your translation, why was I thinking there was only a $15,000 difference that it would make? So now we're getting more funds in from the state.
I guess for me to understand this I would have to look at if we can only take the mill rate reduction
or the mill rate difference was like 20,000 or something like that that might have been
Right, I remember thinking that, you know, we didn't really need to factor it. So this is we're getting that much more and this is on the motor vehicle mill or this is mill rate overall? Motor vehicle, I think specific. Yeah, specifically the motor vehicle, the mill rate. Yeah, remember the whole account. I tried to like take it all in. So that's a huge difference from a $15,000 difference. So now we're gonna get in 114 something. Guess I'm still having a hard time. I just, I think it's great. It's a windfall for the town and I wanted to know if we could have it as a rainy day fund or if like this year the school ran into trouble where unexpected things came up. So I again it's all good I just want to make sure that we think about the spending not any in particular but that that's always my worry you find a way to fund something for one year when you guys used to use the fund balance at a bigger rate. And then it's a stop gap for a year, and then we go over things. But again, I know Diane was going to ask. She knows a little bit more. Dan?
I haven't followed this very closely because I didn't think it would be materialized for this budget here because you never get what they say you're gonna get. But I'm worried about it being called a transition amount. And for me to make sense in my mind of it, I would like to see our budget redone on the revenue side and break out motor vehicle and show me what the revenue would be at the max mill rate so I can understand all the numbers again. I just don't think taking 114,000 lumping it off is the right way to go. We should really be correcting the revenue because-
Eric, can you give me the chance to share my screen? Certainly.
And we don't have motor vehicle broken out separately. Alright. New tab. Hang on. So if we're gonna have to build motor vehicle at a different rate now, that's a whole change for us. I am working on it. Hang on a sec.
Yeah. It's it's probably not of that much value. I understand what they were saying basically what I did Diana just added a added a line that allows. Yeah.
That me sharing or you sharing. Oh, shit. Oh, that's you. Okay, that's fine. Mean, I've got it there. You've done the same thing I did was basically just add a row into the revenue page.
No, I don't want to share that one. That was okay. Sorry about that. That was not a budget for You want me to share the Hang on.
But we're still having a reduction of revenue on the taxes because we can't tax at 36 mils. So we've got to adjust the revenue down and add a revenue in. Well,
actually I don't. I don't think so because if we if we include that money, and I think this is what Eric was getting at earlier. Right. We include that revenue in the existing budget, it drops our mill rate to 32.44. The state's regulation says that the mill rate cap is three point three two point four six. So, that drops our mill rate below the cap but we still get the $114,000 and there's no loss of the 19,000 that we anticipated based on our expected mill rate. Is that what you were getting at for Eric? That is exactly what I'm getting at now.
But Joanne had a point also that can you hear me? Yep. Okay. That this will be because the way the state is doing the revenues, it's for as of the mill rate for the year previous. So next year, we will get zero, whereas this year we get 114. So just be aware that that is a one year revenue stream available. You're muted, Mark.
Sorry, I was just saying I think that's the absolutely correct way to assume how it's going to proceed. We cannot assume we're going to have any kind of recurring revenue like that. But it is exactly as Joanne said, it's a windfall. This is not something you're going to get every year or get repeatedly or easily. So
And we did go through quite a bit of work on this revenue calculations here, working these this year and looking at what we can expect continued revenue to be. We've never really kind of offset a windfall, except for what we're using use of fund balance every year. So most of the revenues we've had on our list there is really stuff we expect to continue to get at some level. Just to add it in and say we're not cutting expenses is really not, in my eyes, a responsible thing to do because it's just going to be back next year.
Okay. What I would say to that is that you know these sort of fluctuations happen year to year and we deal with them as they come up. I'd also like to get back to the point that Shannon made about the the $4.50 k in grant money. I wanna I wanna understand a little better about what we can and cannot do with that money. I've been confused from the beginning about what we can and cannot do with that money. If that money cannot be used in a certain way, need to I need to know that clearly. If that money is there and can be used in the way that some feel it can be used, then, you know, I understand that it's similar to what we've just been discussing, a one shot deal. It still helps us in the immediate situation. So and that's a lot of money. It's a huge sum for us in terms of our overall budget. So where are we with that, guys? So Where are we on that?
ARPA funds have to be used based on the regulations and the regulations are all tied to COVID-nineteen kind of eligibility requirements. So just taking money and reducing our tax burden with that, it's not an eligible expense. You have to spend money
on projects. If you put the $450,000 towards a particular project and then reduce the expense line for that project, that might be eligible I'd like to hear from Eric about the status of that is that number real and what is your take on how it could be used.
So the first thing I would say is that the Board of Selectmen is very clearly voted to spend all of the ARPA funds for the community center. There should be give or take 9 and 80,000 or 990,000. Actually don't remember the exact number in ARPA funds. There is also a community, a multi use building fund that the town has funded, You know, over the years. I was just trying to see whether I could give you the. The. Permanent fund total.
So just to clarify, this is not our money, this is the town's fund. Right.
Don't have money we have put aside an earmark for this purpose that we no longer need for so we should think about that.
Well so what I would say is you as a board of finance do have the authority to transfer money from one fund to another and spend from funds as you've done in the past. Can't eliminate a fund. I think only the Board of Selectmen can eliminate a fund, but you can certainly transfer money between funds or from one place to another, if you so choose.
So my question would be, if we have 400 some odd thousand dollars in a fund, that is a fund that is no longer needed because the project is fully funded by a grant. What are we doing? Know that. Yeah. We do not know. I don't think you were at that meeting either.
Diane and I were at the meeting and I know that they talked about at the community center meeting that that money was there, but that was, and I mean, I don't wanna speak for the board of selectmen or anything like that, but I know there's gonna be a lot of other, you know, that's for the building of a basic, basic building. And then they're going to need things that tie into the building. You know, I don't know if it has anything to do with, you know, in the nursing office or in the things that everybody in the community can use. There might be things that need to be purchased. So it still was going to be earmarked for things that they need to purchase for there. But again,
I'm not that So we're gonna spend a million 5 on the community center? No, I got again, I'm just giving you facts from being at the meeting so that we can all digest it. The question. No, no, no, I'm I'm sorry. I I understand and I understand you're just trying to be informational. I apologize if it sounded differently. Oh, No. You're fine. I'm just trying to get my arms around it because, you know, we've been saving up for a while for that and, you know, we've put aside tax money for that and then, you know, if we get, you know, monies, we get them, we get the funding one way and we can we could spend it another way and I guess, alright, so let me back up.
If we need that money for a purpose, fine, okay, but just the same way that we look at operating expenditures and everything else in our budget and scrutinize it and question why we need to spend this for that, we should look at that too in the same exact way. Just as hard as we would look at the AES budget, just as hard as we would look at the increase in say the public works, what is that money doing? What are we doing with that? Do we need it for this purpose? And if we do, fine, then let's talk about it and let's make sure that we're in agreement with it and then let's back it. Again, this is my kind of unifying theme. Let's make sure that we're in agreement that this is what's needed and then back it, guys. That's my point.
So I can tell you where we are with the community center because I'm on the committee. So we are far from finalizing on what how much money we're going to need. We have a site plan and we have a basic bare bones budget put together. We haven't even gone to the design build phase RFP to get a builder and architect to draw up final plans and give us hard costs. We don't even have hard costs yet. So, the town put aside that money in that fund, in that permanent fund for the community center. I don't think we can take money away from that fund. And I would not be in favor of taking money away from that fund until we know what the community center is gonna cost us. And we're not gonna know that until probably the end of this year,
after this fiscal year. We are in the process. Have, you know, the board of selectmen has approved us to go to RFP for the design build phase. We're in the process of trying to put that RFP together now. But until that RFP goes out and we get all those bids back, goes all through CIP, we have no idea what the dollars are going to be.
Okay, all right. That seems very reasonable and I would, I, you know, I tend to agree with Diane on this one, and everybody knows I think I'm generally very strong I'm a strong supporter of the budget as it is, I'll just say that I am also very concerned about taking something away that is an investment in this town is something that the taxpayers have wanted for a long time. You know, one of the things I think could add value to living here. It obviously adds value to the, you know, for our seniors, but I think also for the regular part of the community and construction costs are not certain this is something I would be very concerned about. And if it were something else I might feel more comfortable about doing transfers, but I, given the uncertainty around that and the fact that this was allocated for this community center thinking it was going to be a long term project, I would be very hesitant to remove those those funds either. If we had a little more certainty around what it was going be, I'd be okay. I'll be out for it.
Okay. I just want to be clear on that. Yeah.
It may be a conversation where we're having next budget cycle, know, when there's money still left in that fund.
Right. I mean, if it's not needed, I don't think we need to spend money just because it's there. Right. I'd much rather see I'd much rather take that. If I could do it right now, I felt confident that we wouldn't need that $400,000 or some significant portion thereof for the community center. My own personal belief is I take that night. I add half of that at least to the to the road fund road improvement fund and then, you know, get this stuff done that we need to get done here. Or maybe allocate it to road fund and back off the expenditure somewhere else. But that's that's kind of be my take on it. But it's still on the table. Certainly somebody can make a motion that we we change the fund transfers based on that understanding.
Well, I guess my thought is this. Are in a situation where we need to cut. We need to bring the budget in lower the amount raised by taxation lower for this budget to get this thing passed. I am, as I've said before, not opposed to making some equitable cuts. However, there's, you know, I understand the point about uncertainty about, you know, do we need some or all of that $4.50 going forward to finish off, you know, put the finishing touches, if you will, on that project. I guess what I'm saying is, when we're in this sort of crunch situation, you know, everything's on the table. And that's something we should consider. And that's, you know, maybe I will make a motion later tonight to move some of that money, not all of it
certainly. Yeah. Enough. Diane.
Okay, I'm going to dive into cuts because I don't want to be on this meeting till midnight. So
I cleared my schedule. Sorry, go ahead. I thank you. I have identified
about $120,000 that we can cut from the town budget. And I will give you my thought process on this and let everybody hear what it is. I am thinking right now, and these are all in the funds transfers. It's not touching anything in the expenditure side except one item. So let me kind of run through that to see what everybody thinks about this. To date, we have contingency fund in there at $75,000 Yeah. I propose we reduce it back down to 50. That will give us $25,000 We have a request from Department of Public Works equipment. They've requested $115,000 I propose that we reduce it to $100,000 That buys us another $15,000 Road maintenance fund,
they're asking for $330,000 I would propose we reduce it $10,000 to $3.20. So there's another 10,000. Tree fund, we did a lot of tree work this year. The request was for 75,000. I propose we reduce it down to 50,000. No, give us another $25,000 We have a building maintenance fund that they're requesting $60,000 for. I propose we reduce that to 55, get us another $5,000 And then we have a fire engine fund that they're requesting $100,000 I propose we reduce it to 80 and that will give us $20,000 And then I propose that we reduce, eliminate the request for a part time public work summer employee for $20,000
That comes up to $120,000 right there.
You said that was a $20,000 line item on the public works. Part time employee. Yeah. The summer person. That tallies, what did you say, to $125,120. Those 120.
Diane, did you think about we do I mean, this is a great idea of coming up with ways to, you know, not hit any line altogether, but did you think about possibly, and no one wants to reduce anything, but maybe reducing the roadwork fund just a little more since they're asking for $3.30, maybe reduce. I
of switched my thoughts on that because I was looking the roadwork to reduce it more but got input from Jay Tuttle you know he'd rather give up that part time employee and keep the money towards the roads because he saw him on my street today because the costs are really going up for the roads with inflation and you know he's seeing that he's going to need every cent we can give him to get. Right and
I'll just chime in you know we all live in this town, we all see the roads, you know this is a long term project we've been trying to do and I I I struggle with every time we cut that budget, I know we need to make cuts I completely agree, but you know it's frustrating because we fall further and further behind. Time we do these cuts and we had this plan. Had this ten year plan. We were going to catch up on our roads and we can't do it if we keep doing this. I'm I'm all in agreement with kind of a moderate path where if we're going to make cuts, make a little bit here and a little bit there and not really try to load it all into one thing
like the road fund. I think we really do need to fund that. So, Diana, I appreciate by the way, I really appreciate that you sat down and came up with a suite of cuts that makes sense to you, because we do need to dig into this and talk about it in real terms. What is it we're gonna agree to that we think is still responsible and will still move us forward? So thank you for that. And, you know, I I don't know. I agree with all of it, but I think that's a really good starting framework.
Diane too, people have been having that's I'm glad he brought that to the table because they want a full time worker, you know, which I'm sure right and then trying to find a seasonal employee it's just hard. Have heard that conversation
as well. I don't even know if they would find a person, you know, hopefully college student, but they have a lot of options and they were looking for a long, so I like that he brought that to the table as suggestion, because now they won't be looking for the two people, they'd want their full time guy to have the crew. Okay. I mean, is nice that it's all over the place and not hurting any line in particular. And I purposely left the
bridges and culvert funds alone because we've got a lot of things coming up with those that are going to be time sensitive and we still have to keep funding those in I
think Jay and Eric said at one of our meetings too, but maybe they still need the money because you have to order equipment so far in advance and there's like some kind of mini excavator thing that they want to order but maybe because production is so far behind they told us we may not get it this year but maybe we need to still keep that on the table I don't know I can't I only speak to what I know I don't know maintenance equipment
I recall the same conversation we're dealing with that and we talk about our capital improvement committee as well that the all of this supply chain issues and inflation and whatever is impacting everything and so when we go to order something you know the lead time is longer than usual and the ability to lock in prices is more difficult.
Okay. Well, I think we have a we can continue conversation certainly there's a couple about these specific cuts what I would suggest would be that we entertain motions on each of them individually. Unless we want to continue discussing, we could discuss each one individually, we have further discussion about them. I think that probably is a more direct way to proceed. It's on the record, we get some some options there. Or somebody can motion to entertain the idea of making all of the changes that Diana's online as well at one time. I have a question first. Have a comment
Diane that that's a lot of great work you did. I I and I think everyone else appreciates that. Secondly, I'd like to hear Eric's take on what type of impact that would be on town and if he feels that something like this is feasible.
Well, anything's feasible. I can just tell you what the pluses kind of and minuses for. And, know, Jay and I have had a bunch of conversations about, you know, and I gave it to him point blank about a month ago and said, look, at the end of the day, there's a likelihood that a lot of these are getting cut. You know, what hurts you the least? Know, what would you want to hold on to the most? So, from my perspective, holding onto the Bunker Hill Bridge Fund is probably the thing we need to, because we know that's a defined expense. And we know, you know, we're going to be paying the bill starting, you know, a little over a year from now. And we're still going to need more money beyond this for that when that comes due. So I wouldn't cut that one. The other funds,
I mean, the fire engine tanker fund, that's maybe somewhat problematic in the sense that there are two vehicles that at some point in the next, I mean, the fire department is assuming they're coming off the road. They're removing two vehicles from the road in about three years and replacing them with a single engine rescue combo. In other words, taking their heavy rescue vehicle and their, their second engine, their older engine, which are both ones in '91 and ones I think in '98. Getting rid of both of those and buying a new, single vehicle. But that single vehicle replacement today is about $800,000 on today's basis. You've really got two options, either you just tell them they can't, or we have to start funding that. Everything else, don't really object to. On all those funds, we just do the amount of work we have the money for, you know, building maintenance fund, whatever we have, we end up applying towards projects. You know, the more money we have, the more likelihood we have to tackle some big projects that are coming. But you know, it kind of is what it is. The other one I think you probably could do. It's not ideal, but we funded the insurance severance pretty heavily last year because we had a really large payout for Ed Kasich when he left. There's really only two employees right now that are a liability that we'd have to
spend any significant amount of money on in terms of severance if they left. That severance fund basically pays off the if an employee left and we owe them money for insurance and whatnot. So right now we basically probably barely have enough to cover if our two employees that would be our two biggest ticket employees left at the same time, we could basically cover it. You could take the $5,000 fund for the insurance severance and get away with not doing that this year. So that's one.
And a quick question just to sorry about that. What would signify that they need an insurance severance? Is this if they had a payout instead of taking insurance?
No, not for insurance. It's for, know, so employees get sick days and you're allowed to get paid off for one quarter of their accumulated sick days. It's an incentive to keep people from not taking their sick days frivolously,
basically. No, thank you. You just, I, when it's under insurance, I've never heard of that. So, I totally get the other one. Thank you.
Yep. That's all I have to say. I mean, if there were one on the town side, I would defend it would be road improvement fund. Frankly, we've already made a decision that we are probably not going to do any crack sealing this year because we need that $40,000 just in asphalt costs. If it does get cut, it gets cut. We just do less roadwork.
So are we saying we would rather cut that severance number 5,000 and put that 5,000 back into the road maintenance fund, and only cut road maintenance by 5,000.
I would. So, I guess what I would say is that the one I would least like you to cut is the Bunker Hill Bridge Fund. I didn't have any cuts for that. Right. No, the second one I the second one I would like to not cut would be the road improvement fund. So in the grand scheme of things, those on the town side, those would be the two I would defend the most. But that's, again, that's just my take on it.
Well, for me, it's just moving numbers around. I'm only cutting the road maintenance fund by $10,000 in my proposal. So if you rather take 5,000 from the severance and only 5,000 from the road bank we still come up with the 120.
I have no preference. I'm going to suggest something just because I don't want it to get too far lost in here but And again thanks Dan for for for this work, because it does spur some good discussion and some options I'm going to suggest that we may take a bigger whack at the contingency fund. The contingency fund is just what it is. It's a contingency, right? We do it because it's a prudent thing to do to have contingency in there. But we just talked about a $450,000 community fund that if we really got into trouble, and I know we don't want to spend this and I was just the first person vigorously arguing to not utilize that fund, but if we were to get in trouble later in the year in some real insignificant way, There are some opportunities to tap some of those other funds with fund transfers down the road. So for me that kind of militates against the idea that we may need that much in a contingency fund this year in a tight budget year.
So what do you say you want to do like a 25?
Diane advocated for 25 to start with. Would personally at least take 35 out of there. That would take us down to 40,000 added to the contingency fund. We didn't have additional funds out there that could potentially be reused, you know, in a real emergency, then I would be very low to do that because I tend to be conservative about contingency planning. But given the fact that there is some, there is some another fund out there that we really don't know whether we're going to need it or not. And it's a significant fund. I mean, we're not talking like we borrow half of that fund or something like that. Think that we could could take a bigger whack at the contingency fund.
I would go back personally and, you know, fully fund the road maintenance and and also, I think most of the other stuff is pretty reasonable. And I share Eric's angst a little bit about the fire department.
Can I ask you a quick question just as a kind of point of procedure? In the past, we've typically had a contingency fund of either 50 or 75 ks I think it is usually our our level 50 last year. Have we used the last few years?
At our. Didn't we use like 25,000 Eric I want to say. I think that's right. I just want to
bring that up. We've got a lot of overexpanded accounts this year so we have no idea what we're going to use this year out of that 50.
Oh, I think we're going to use just about all of it. I mean, I would be That's my worry. There's about a 90% chance we'll finish in the black, but that's about as far as I'm willing to say okay this year's budget.
So my take is I wouldn't want to go below about 50. In the contingency fund, simply because I think that's about the level we've used at most. I I totally understand what you're saying, Mark. It it makes sense and we're kind of coming at this from different directions, and we're coming kinda the same place. But I worry that if we go below 50 ish in the contingency fund that we end up triggering a mess. That's my that's my only thought. I am if we're at 75 now, I am perfectly happy to cut that 20 by 25 to get down to 50 in contingency fund. Beyond that, I start to get squeamish. That's my take. Yeah.
Understandable. Yeah. Other input from the board, and these specific cuts or additional
Can, can I just say something. Yep. Well, if we go back to what we first talked about the town thought both the voters thought both the town budget and the education budget were too high. So, we're going to have to pick a figure for everybody tonight. I don't think it would.
I mean this isn't the only cut we still have to make some cuts on the school side we can't just Right. Know that's what nobody's mentioned it so. Oh,
I'm just trying to get the town piece. You just gotta do it one thing at a time it's one line at a time. Yep. I understand. I
think we should think about how what our total cut target should be because I think we wanna make it equitable, right? So if you're cutting a 100 from the town budget, you talking about cutting a 100 from the school budget? Don't. No, I'm not talking 100 for the school.
Because this afternoon I was just randomly thinking how are we going to do this that's fair to everybody and makes everybody happy? So the only thing I could come up with was the town has an overage from last year of over 300 and the school has an overage of over 200. So if we took 25% of their 225% of our overage we'd come up with between 100 and 25 and $150,000 to knock off the budget. I mean it's really a weird way of thinking about it. Only thing that came to me. You say 2% overage I'm not 25%. If you look at the education budget is 220,000 over what they asked for last year. The town budget says it's 300 and something over. So if we took 25 of their 22025% of our 300 and whatever we'd wind up with between 125 and $150 deduction in the total budget. Yeah,
I'm personally not really a favor of just saying we need to be equitable, I think we need to go really we should go line by line by line through the budget and anything that we identify that we think is a reasonable cut, you know, to get us to a place where taxpayers are more comfortable, then I think we should do that. I'm personally I, you know, whether we cut more to the school and less to the town or vice versa, I don't think that we should necessarily end up in a place where we assume that both need to be equitable cuts, I understand what you're saying because we are trying to balance interests here. And that is one way to do it but, but I just, I think, if we can, it would be better to target specific things that we think makes sense to cut. Okay, I just figured I'd throw it out there.
And obviously, the school budget is a little different and I think everybody would get I know the board understands this and probably most people on this call that obviously from the school budget it's one line at it right so we just have to make a make a judgment based on that line. If we cut $120,000
in the town budget that will bring the town budget increase down to 7% from 10 down to seven. And then we would have to come up with a number for the school.
I just wanted to finish our conversation on the town. Just had. Yeah, go ahead, Joy. I know we were expanding, so before we get too far off, it's gonna be quick. I just wanted to ask Eric to follow-up. I remember at our meeting and then we brought it up again. Did we hit on those line items, Eric, when you made suggestions at one of the meetings that if things got cut? I mean, there anything else big that we're not thinking of that you, I mean, I remembered that piece of equipment thing that Jay talked about. Am I missing anything or are we just good where we are? I'm not looking to add to take more away.
So what what the board asked me was what are the five biggest?
I remember I'm in all the meetings, so I Sure. Thank you. Maybe that's the way you talk, so I don't want to attack you on that. No. No, I want you to know that. I just wanted to give you a chance to maybe bring something to the table that we didn't think of. Right, you did say. Thank you.
Right, and I mean, I'm not if you think about the big changes that are occurring would be the addition of the fourth person at personnel or correction, the extra employee at public works. That's the biggest single ticket line item that's about, you know, $75,000 by the time you propagate all the costs for the employee about $75,000 You know, and then, then contingency or the transfers and major funds. So those are really the two areas where there's significant change. I mean, I think the other some of the other places where we have big costs, those are just essentially driven by cost of equipment and cost of
of fuel and stuff like that these days. Thank you. I thought there were specific things that if they had to be targeted, you guys had preferred. So I just wanted to make sure. I mean, if. So thank you. That's it. Yep. I'm good with the town discussion, Mark. Thank you for letting me. I just had that thing floating out there that we might have missed one that would have been preferred. All. Yeah, that's a fair question. Other discussion?
Are we ready for motions? I can make one motion at a time. Can make a motion at any given time. I guess can I ask you a quick question before we go If
we were to approve the cuts that are proposed, what would the budget, would the ultimate amount raised by taxation be?
It would be, you want a percentage increase or what do Yeah, you percentage. The dollar
amount. Yeah, thanks. Yeah, the percentage increase total by taxation would be 2.5%. Okay.
So we were at a 400 and something thousand dollar Wait a minute. 2.5? Yeah. Just with that $1.20?
That also includes that also includes the 114,000 from the from the state. I haven't landed on that 114,000.
Yeah, the 114 is part of this whole discussion, right? Because that goes to 3.8.
Well, you could say the same about educational cost sharing as part of the budget, right? I mean, obviously, that's something that we do year over year over year. But, you know, personally, based on what we know, think it'd be irresponsible not to include it. I agree. The budget passed, you know, and I guess that's my- Before including
that, then taking 120 away from the town is too much.
That's what I'm asking, by the way. That's why I asked this question. Do are we going too hard here? You know, we we lost a a budget vote 53 to 46. You know, do we need to make cuts this deep? When we're when we are as we said, you know, when we we put this budget together, you know, we know we have needs. So, you know, my take is, look, we should make moderate cuts. We should make some reasonable reaction to the town referendums. But at the same time, if we've got a thing, know, we've got this 100, what should we call it coming in, and we can make a few moderate cuts in addition to that and bring back a budget
that is significantly reduced, then, you know, maybe we don't have to make all of these cuts. Maybe we can come in in between. That's why I asked the question two and a half percent. Okay, so 3.8 right is the number if we make no cuts at all. Every but we we clear on that.
Yeah. 3.7. Yeah. Yeah. I think it's three point. Yeah. 3.7.
Basically, 3.8. Okay. Yep. Yep. We what the the budget we took to the town at the town meeting was just shy of five. Right? It was 4.9. Is that correct? Yes. Yep. I made some adjustments. I believe that's the case because we took that 50 k out at the meeting. Remember? So we ended up a little under 5%. Yeah. 4.9. Yep. Yep.
So we're at 3.8 before we do anything, guys. So okay.
But 3.8, hold on Rob, to clarify, when you say 3.8 before we do anything, you're including the 114 ks plus. Correct.
Yes, I am. One time windfall though, we just wanna make sure that we're being fair with the spending overall. And I agree with that.
That's all. I mean, that could have been one of those funds that we have, like Diane mentioned, when everyone wanted to dip into the possible community center. That's going to be another thing that could be something good. Yes. You know to have on this site for we may we have a finance department that's going to need some work
you know I don't need to have two things looming over our heads right now We have to hire a treasurer. Okay? And we have to get the financial department straightened out and the software straightened out. We're gonna have to pay for professional services for that software to be straightened out. So, I mean, so we have two expenses, you know, we only put $15,000 in the budget for the treasurer. I don't know if that number will do it or not for a part time treasurer. So we have two variables that we have trying to figure out how we're gonna find the money for next year, next fiscal year that we, you know,
so that's why I would like to cut a little bit of spending because we can't I hear you, and I understand that. Guys, be careful. We're not talking over each other too much. It's starting to get there. It's getting tough to follow. So go ahead. I'll
shut up. Those are the variables that we don't really have baked into this budget yet. And that 114 revenue can offset some of that. You mean the uncertainty about additional expenditures?
That that we don't have in this budget yet that are gonna be hitting. Variables. Yeah. Yes. And I and I completely understand
the point that if you bake in, you know, a certain level of spending that, you know, you're kind of going forward, it propagates. I understand that. I do. I just want to be clear on how we get to where we need to go today.
I think we made little cuts that aren't going to hurt as we've discussed them fully so.
Well, can I just make a if we're done talking? Because I know some of these cuts we probably are okay with and some we may not be. Do you wanna just address each one one by one and then? I
think that would be preferable, but it's whoever wants to entertain the motion, we could do it as one package or we could do them individually. Individually is probably cleaner and faster. But I would say we can do you. Eric
seems to want to say something before we get started.
Just want to make one quick point, if you'll allow me. And that is if you're going to cut the 20,000 for the part time position, Don't cut it all the way down to zero. Leave at least $2,500 in there because we don't, we often use temporary employees for flaggers for roadwork projects. And because we have a lot of roadwork, you know, we're without without hiring an actual summer helper, we're going to end up using, you know, some outside people to do flaggers. So don't bring that all the way down to zero. You know, we don't have to hire a regular full time summer helper if that's not in the feasible in the budget, but it does need to be something that's all. Okay, thanks, Eric.
Okay. Well, we certainly talked through a lot of this, but I don't want to cut off discussion further. But I do think it probably makes sense for us to entertain some motions if there's anything specific we want to do here. Let me do an easy one. Go for it.
Maybe it's not an easy one. I make a motion to reduce our contingency fund down to $50,000
I'll second that one. Okay. The motion has been made by Diane to produce the contingency fund to $50,000 Rob is seconded. Do we have any other discussion? Okay, hearing none, I will call for a vote. All those on the board in favor say aye. Aye. All those opposed say nay. Do we have any abstentions? Okay, hearing none, the motion passes.
Oh, we got one done. One down, more to go. Right. Here you go.
Do you have any further action or discussion? I'll go for the next one.
I would propose we make a motion to reduce the Department of Public Works equipment fund down to $100,000 to save us 15,000. Oh, yes. Says a reduction of 15 ks. Reduction of 15 ks.
Second it. I think it's good to know how much we're Thank you for including how much we're reducing. Yeah, Joanne, did you send you seconding?
Yes. Okay, thanks. I'm sorry I missed that I was busy on the spreadsheet. Okay, so Diane is moved to reduce the DPW equipment fund from 115,000 to $100,000 Joanne seconded. Discussion on this.
Did we I just the one thing I want to ask, did we talk through the impact of this? I don't recall when Eric we asked Eric what the impact of all of this would be, whether this one had a material impact, like, in the next year or two, what this does. That's the only question I have. I don't have a big objection to this. I just want to know, you know how far we're kicking the can.
I think it was primarily designed to fund some of the plow trucks down the road, given the increase in the cost and things. Eric's muted. I don't Eric, if you want to put in any more there. I don't know if there was a specific target for the spending. So
CIP approved public works purchasing two pieces of equipment right away. One is a small skid steer. I remember that. Yep. And
that's, I think that's somewhere around $65,000 And the other one is a commercial snowblower. But that's a relatively minor expense. The next big thing looming is if you look in our capital plan, we were assuming in 2023. So not this year's budget, but the year after we would be purchasing a plow truck. That plow truck on today's basis is around $260,000 something like that. So the cost has gone up. The last one we bought was around 190,000. So in five years, the cost of that has gone up considerably. But I mean, if we don't have the budget to buy it outright, then we finance it. That's
all you can do. So it is what it is.
Right. But that financing obviously costs us over time. Okay. That's all. That's what I wanted to know. Thank you.
Other discussion on the motion? Hearing none, going to call for a vote. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Any abstentions? Okay, the motion passes. Thank you. Okay, further discussion or motions on this budget?
Okay, I'm going to go down my list. Based on our discussions, I'm not gonna talk about the road maintenance fund right now. We'll do that last, I make a motion that we take the tree fund, move it down to 50,000, which was is a reduction of $25,000 $50,000 is what we spent in the last budget. So this is just a flat. It's taking away an increase of $25,000 I second that.
Okay, so Diane you are proposing that for the tree fund tree removal fund we take it from $75,000 down to $50,000 Correct.
Eric, can you tell us what that'll do in terms of impact? That we asked him the overall, but that's
Right. No. I I'm sorry. I just wanted to refresh her. I apologize, Joanne, but No. And I have the problem. Just go ahead, Erin. Because I'm getting a little tired, and I admit it.
Yeah. No. No. No. No. I mean, I think that's why we went through the whole we asked him to give us the significance of this at the beginning.
He gave us the impact but okay fine never mind.
Because I had a good point and I then Eric can speak this is where I think that windfall can come in you know, for things that come up this year, like we did listen as a town that we needed these trees taken down and they're very dangerous and I'm sure we'll have it again, so we got a lot of work done this past year, So having the extra money available should such a situation come up again would be a place, right? That it could come from.
But I'll let let I guess the real question is, I think those end up being a recurring expense and tree removal work probably is just gonna be a recurring expense. I I don't wanna fall behind is look. The only reason I asked, and I don't mean to be a jerk about it, is that, you know, I worry in all of this, every cut we make. I worry about what it does to our kind of long term planning and getting ahead of stuff. So that's all it and I apologize. Know we have to do that.
Bad. I know he's already spoken to it. I just wanted to bring it up again. That's it. I'll shut up.
So just so everybody knows, we funded the tree fund last year at $50,000 So this is just funding it again next year at the same rate. It's just taking away an increase in the tree fund. But Diane,
the one difference last year is that we had just prior to the end of the budget, we had dumped $30,000 from the previous budget into the tree fund. So we actually spent somewhere around $80,000 on the town side. What we were incredibly fortunate last year is that we worked very hard to convince Eversource to commit significant money. So last year we spent $80,000 in town and we got the utility company to kick in around 115,000 So we actually spent about 200,000 ballpark last year total on tree work, not we, but we got accomplished. The likelihood of us getting the utility company to kick in every year is pretty small, but we're sure going to try,
you know, but whatever we have, we'll spend. So if you give us 50, we'll spend 50. Okay. Thanks, Eric. The
last fund update balance that you gave me, Eric, from April 19, we have $17,800 in that fund right now. So I don't know if we've spent any of that money. So everybody knows where the fund stands right now.
Joanne, you had your hand up also. I was sorry, I was agreeing. Then again, this is a thing if it's needed, and I've heard this said they're going to transfer money to use it. So I think it's a smart way to fund it. And thank goodness you got the grants and you had Eversource help and got a lot of work done. And if it becomes a need in town, transfers will be made, right? So with funds on emergency basis. I don't see it as being too dangerous of a I'd be in favor of this cut this year or to fund it at the same level.
Any other discussion on the motion? Okay, hearing none, I'm going to call for a vote. All those in favor of the motion to reduce the tree removal fund by $25,000 keeping a level of $50,000 All those in favor say aye. Aye. All those opposed? Any? No.
Anyone, no. Any abstentions? Okay. Motion passes five-one-zero. Thank you, guys. All right. Do we have any other motions on the budget? I'm going to go keep on going.
Building maintenance, I make a motion that the building maintenance fund be funded at $55,000 which is a reduction of $5,000 We have a second for the motion. I second it for the second. Okay, Rob seconds. Any discussion on the matter.
Pretty small cut. I don't know. I don't know what that's really going to do but it gets us where we need to go. So yeah.
Other comments. All right, hearing none. Bring it up for a vote. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Any abstentions? Okay, hearing none, motion passes six-zero-zero. Thank you. Okay, do you have any other motions or discussions on the budget? I have another. The road. I am.
Make a motion that we reduce the fire engine fund to fund it this year at $80,000 which is a reduction of $20,000 It gives them an increase of what we funded it last year of 20,000. They were looking for an increase of 40,000. So it's just cutting their increase in half. So it would fund it at 80,000, which would be a $20,000 reduction.
Okay, do we have a second for the motion? I'll second it. Okay, we second. Thank you. Discussion.
Anybody feel like we should go in, you know, ten ten higher and kind of meet them in the middle more towards their target amount at 90 instead of, you know what I'm saying? I understand what you're doing. You're you're taking last year's budget and this year's budget and cutting the difference. My take is, you know, we're all dealing with inflation and the increase in equipment costs and whatever. And maybe we should plan for that.
I tend to agree I'm a little uncomfortable with this cut. You know, it is I think more than what we did last year, but
I don't know enough about the particulars. Unfortunately Kirk. I don't know what's on their slate of what they need but a lot of the things that a fire department would need do qualify for ARPA funds.
Yeah I I'm not against the cut in particular I'm just questioning the size of the cut that's all maybe in my my gut reaction is can we make your cut half as big Can we cut 10 instead of 20? That's my take. Take it for what it is. It's full beyond.
Could be swayed either way. I I could go either way on that. I I don't I think we're already giving them an increase. You know, we're just cutting what their increase is in half. Like Diane said, they wanted 40 more. We're still giving them 20 more, which is good. That's an increase to a budget line or or what they you know? So I could be swayed if if someone else And I'm at a disadvantage because I don't know what they need next year. I I
wish Kurt was here. He's not. I know. Yeah. He he would probably be able to speak to this more fully than any of us can. Yeah. Is that one of my reasons for caution specifically is that he isn't here. And so my take is, it's not a huge amount of money one way or the other. Can we cut 10 instead of 20? That's my call. Your motion on the floor is 20, and so be it. I'm just throwing out there during discussion.
Okay. I'm gonna ask Eric, and maybe you can clarify this, but I think that there's no plans to immediately buy equipment. It's more to to fund to increase the fund lead fund levels for future purchases. Is that correct?
As far as I know, there's two things on the docket this year. And I was just looking back through. I don't have that note here because I didn't assume I was going be the one defending their budget. So I know that they had requested a replacement of the AC unit for the building because they have an issue with that. Forgot whether they were planning on replacing their compressor, their SCBA compressor system this year or next year. That was a fairly expensive purchase.
Yeah. That was a big deal, if memory serves. That compressor
system was a big deal. That was Yeah. I thought we did a fun transfer to try to take care of that this year.
Okay. I thought we did two. I thought, but they didn't purchase it yet. I think that's separate, but I I I could be wrong. We're
talking about now. I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I just want to make one just kind of procedural point that, you know, if if we do make a change and it turns out that we did it unlimited information, we gain information later, this could always change at the town meeting too. I mean, this isn't the final. Right? So there is an opportunity to reverse things if we feel like we did something. We we we can't increase. Right? Can't increase. Correct.
That's my point. So we ought to be careful. That's my point.
So piece of information for everybody as of April 19, the balance in that fund is $40,000 So they only have $40,000 in that fund right now. Okay. Because we just bought some.
Because I just bought no. We just bought something. I don't know what They they
bought significant piece of equipment if memory serves. So that's anyway, look, guys, I mean, we're haggling over fairly small sum, but I just wanted to on the side of caution here. That's all I'm saying. And I think that based on the referendum results, we're not that far off from impassable budget and that we should on the side of caution when we slash things. That's all. That's my take. Other discussion?
Well, I'll just put this thought out here because we haven't talked about road maintenance. Was thinking about giving them their full funding and not making a 10,000 reduction there. So does that change anybody's mind on the fire engine fund?
I would rather fund roads for sure. I mean, think that's an ongoing major issue that we need to address. And I think that's the, I'm with you, Diane, if I think if I'm following what you're talking about, if we have Right. To
I'm just trying to weigh the two. Do you know what I mean? It's just.
Yeah. And I would weigh it towards roads guys. That's my take y'all chime in, but that's my take is the road fund is the most important because we are, I think behind
and we've been trying to catch up for, I don't know, the entire time I've been on the sport. Let's let's talk about this motion if we could just to move it along. So any further discussion on this motion?
Well, do you want me to withdraw this motion and then? I'd like to vote.
I think we vote. Okay. Okay. Just procedurally, you know, we can vote and we can change it again if you want. All right. So to restate the motion, it's to take. Yeah
so the motion is to change the proposed fire engine tanker truck fund from $100,000 to $80,000 right. 20,000 from the previous approved budget. Very good.
Okay, no more discussion let's call for a vote all those in favor say Aye. Aye.
Aye. All those opposed say nay. Nay. And abstentions, I'm going to abstain. So I think we had one, two, three, three eyes. Louise, I didn't catch your vote. You approved. I said I. Okay. So it's four-one-one. Four-one-one. Yeah. Thank you.
Okay. My last motion until we get to the school. Hang on, that one passed? Yes. Okay. It did. Four yeas, one nay, and one abstention. Okay. Okay.
I make a motion to reduce the public works part time helper budget from '20 down to seventeen five. I mean, we move seventeen five. We leave 2,500 in there. That's what I wanna say
for the a little bit. So a reduction of $17.05? Yes. A reduction of 70. That's it. Just to be clear. Okay. Got it. Joined. Yeah,
think Joanne second that am I right, Joanne? Did I hear you correctly? Yeah. Okay. So this is to. And this is one to state for the record that that is just to be clear that is account 1 Dash100Dash3Dash301Dash111SalaryDashPw. Correct. Yeah, let me go for a spreadsheet.
Six. Yes. So we'll leave a budget amount of 2,500 in there.
Okay. So we're voting to change that budget line item to $2,500 That's the motion underway. Right.
Okay. All right. Very good. Do we have any discussion?
It's based on our earlier discussion and hearing that Jay had brought that to the table wanting to keep the full time worker on board and just have a year round worker. I'd like, and I think that gives us a chance to see what they do in a year with the extra person, you know, and they'll hire their temps like Eric said. So I think I appreciate him bringing that to the table And and giving us that option. I I'd like to see how much they get done with the extra person and everything else. So I'm in favor.
Okay. Any other discussion? I think we're cutting that one pretty close to bone, but I'll go with Eric's guidance on that if he thinks the amount is accurate or adequate. I'm okay with that. So if nobody has any further discussion, I guess we'll call for a vote. All those in favor say aye. Aye.
Any opposed? Any abstentions? Okay, thank you. The motion passes 600. So that comes up to
Well, thing I'll bring up if we want to normally as chair I don't introduce motions but Eric did mention also the opportunity to reduce the insurance services fund or insurance severance insurance fund by $5,000 he felt that was a safe reduction. I agree on that.
Totally forgot about that. Yeah, that's wrote seven twenty four in the spreadsheet for those of you paying attention. So that's only funded at $5,000 They felt that what we have in that fund is adequate. If I understood properly so if somebody wants to make a motion we could do something with that account.
I'll make a motion to reduce the insurance severance account to zero for this fiscal year.
Second. I'll second it. Okay Louise seconds any discussion. Okay hearing none I'll call for a vote all those in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Any abstentions? Motion passes. Thank you. Okay. Further discussions on the budget? All right, I'm actually on.
So how much should we reduce the town by I'm just trying to come up with the numbers here.
Not sure of the total reduction I didn't have it calculated that way.
But I'm at it, I'm trying to add it up. Okay. Two seconds. My handy dandy little calculator. Well, did any of your proposed changes fail?
I did not bring up the road maintenance, so I didn't do this. I kinda get it. So it's like 110, right? We're down to 107,500. Does that sound right?
I thought your original proposal was 120. Right. And we didn't
do the road part, which is $10, but we did add the 5 ks. So there's a net change of at least 15. Yeah. And then and then we added 2,500 we left in the part time. Oh, that one worker. Right. Okay.
So I'm going to just before we get too far into this, I'm going to I'm just going to make a motion because like we've already discussed this, I don't want this to get lost. But I'm going to add make a motion that we add into the budget a revenue line item for the state reimbursement for the lost motor vehicle property tax revenue. And the amount I'll second that motion. In the state budget of 114,000. 114,000 and there's actually a specific amount. Oh, sorry. That's a round figure?
No, it's not around figure. That's what I'm telling you. 114,861.
There you go. So yeah, the 114 was an approximate. Yeah. 114 and change. I'll second that, by the way. Any discussion on this motion.
I just want to bring it up again So we're 100% sure we're getting it. Eric has a letter that gives that exact amount and it's only because there was a change that we found out today in the meeting and that's all. So it's a 100% guaranteed that we're having that. Yeah, that's all I want to be sure of. It's a good thing. So thank you. That's it. Yeah,
this was a something that actually had passed before, but we wanted to we weren't comfortable with making that change in the you know, before the town at the town meeting because it was still too new, but it seems like everything's passed. It seems pretty locked in based on kind of what I'm hearing.
I have one question because I don't know the answer to this. Is this mill rate cap going to change from year to year? Is it fixed? How does it work? What's the impact next fiscal year for us? Probably a one time thing. We're not gonna get it next year. No, I mean, far as the state mandating a cap, you're thinking it's just a one time Oh, the cap. No, the cap I think is perpetual.
It's enshrined in law unless they choose to change it again. Right, Eric? You understand that any differently? Correct. No, there actually was already a cap.
And that cap was set at 45. They just dropped the cap from 45 to a new cap of 32.46. Think the governor actually wanted to drop it a lot lower than that. But the legislature, the final budget passed that they agreed. That's what the limit was.
So the impact to us for next year is if expenses go up and we have to have a bigger budget next year, our mill rate may be higher than what we can charge.
Unless the property values continue to increase, in which case that would drive the mill rate down. Right. So it's going to be a complex interplay and hard What's to our reason? Money
for the loss. Is this just a one time money for the transition? It's not going to be in every year events, right? So this is just here. Now you figure it out next year. Yeah.
Fortunately, impact to us was only $19 and change based on our previous mill rate. So we weren't a high mill rate town on that. I think the impact actually is pretty negligible. Can look at this as, as again, as Joanne said, as a windfall because it's not going to come again. Okay.
So further discussion about adding this line item to the revenue section of the spreadsheet of the budget. Okay, I'll go ahead and take a vote. Those in favor say Aye. Aye. Any opposed? Any abstentions? Sorry.
Okay, sounds like we had unanimous approval at 600. The motion passes will add that to the budget as a line item in the revenue area. Okay.
Give me a moment here. Just updating the spreadsheet. I wanna make sure I'm tracking this stuff.
So if my numbers are right, this gives us an estimated mill rate at this point with the changes we've outlined of 32.08. And that's including the point one one from this year's budget that gets applied to next year's.
Yeah, I have I have a slightly different number, Eric, but I'm not sure I captured everything. Okay.
Eric are you saying that you deducted the point one one as well? Yeah it's that's built in starting with the two two thirty two point ninety seven, which is kind of ingrained in my mind. We're deducting the the point 11 and then the changes we've made tonight comes to 32.08. Correct.
Well, yes, so the estimated mill rate calculated estimated mill rate, if my numbers are correct, are 32.08. Mark, what did you have?
I'm sorry give me a second. Ah, I see what I did.
Mark, am I allowed to ask a question out of turn? Yeah, chair recognizes you. Go ahead.
Eric, are you able to tell me the total, sorry, my other, my side computer is not working. This the total spending line. So are you
asking the just so I get the right one you want, you're asking the total amount by taxation?
Or I'll take that one total amount by taxation, total amount by taxation
would be $9,988,008.52, which would be a $251,000 increase. 251,008
From last year. From last year. That's taking into account the windfall and then the changes?
That's taking into account all the changes that you've passed by motion tonight. Okay. And the 114? Yes. Correct. That's new. Right. Right. Okay. Thank you.
I'm going to go ahead and I'm working with two spreadsheets here, so I'm trying to reconcile everything. I think we can continue our discussion and Eric, maybe you and I will just synchronize our subtotals after we continue, after I get this cleared up a little bit. What's that windfall amount? $1.14 $8.61.
I have to see the numbers. I'm trying to adjust my spreadsheet at the same time. Yeah.
Oh, this is good. I wanna make sure we're check we're running a check on each other. Hopefully, putting it here will do that. So okay.
Okay. So just so we have all the numbers at this point, this means that the Andover Elementary School is a 5.1% increase in the budget. The town budget increases by 7.2%. The total by taxation increases by 2.6%. RAM goes down 1.8%. And we decrease the amount of fund balance used from last year to this year by 60%. Okay. My numbers don't match yours.
So, Eric, you're referring to the revenue tab, correct? The numbers there? No,
I was referring to debt. Yeah, yes, correct. The revenue tab under the budget by entity. So can you run through them again?
So Andover elementary school is still a 5.1% in this. I see 5.6 on my spreadsheet so I guess
something's not calculating right. Well that's because you didn't take off the $20,000 you had decreased from their budget, probably.
Yeah, it's most probably my guess. Yeah, it should be 5.13 technically, but yeah, the original was 5.65, but then we reduced it by 20,000, so that took it down to 5.13. So, Eric, what did you have for RAM is minus 1.8 in the town you had what
the town is 7.2%. And fund balance is minus 60% and the debt service is basically zero. AES debt service is paid off. Yep. Okay.
Eric, can you tell me what you have in cell M737, which is the fund transfers? On the budget page? M737, I have 925. Okay. Yeah. That's that's where I got my error.
I have 925 too. So hey. Okay. We're all getting it.
So 50,000 in contingency. Department of Public Works is 180 for the fire department fund, $3.30 for roadwork, 50 for tree removal, 160 for Bunker Hill Bridge, Bridge And Culvert at 100 and building maintenance at 55.
Yeah, I had a typo. Okay. I'm gonna say the, I reduce your Bunker Hill Bridge funding by to $5 inadvertently. That was not a Freudian slip or anything. Wouldn't that be nice.
I want that thing fixed. Okay, 7.2% was your line item for the town budget. Yep that's what I got okay good. Okay, that's where we're at currently. Unless total total by taxation increase of 2.6% correct.
Yes, that's what I have $251,851 That's what I have. Mill rate 32.08? Correct. Okay. I agree.
It's good. It's having an internal double check plus an auditor right. Okay, good. Okay, any further discussion on the line items in the budget.
Well, we have to address the school. We have to make a cut to the school. 60% of the. All right. That it was too high. So. I don't think we can ignore it.
Guess we can discuss it further or somebody can make a motion to reduce or
I have a quick question. I'm not sure. This is just informational. When I was at the last board of ed meeting, I just wanted to sit in I thought maybe Eric will know I see Valerie's on the the call but there was something about a $40,000 so I don't know if that's another little windfall that could be a positive Was there was some kind of auditor situation where there was $40,000 found in the budget. I don't know if that's up for discussion. No? I'm wrong? Okay. So never mind. I thought that would be a good thing. Why don't Why don't we ask for clarification?
Would you like me to clarify? I can. Yep, go ahead, Valerie. Thank you. Okay, thank you for letting me speak. Joanna, what she's talking about was last year, if you remember, we asked the Board of Finance to put the $40,000 into the non lapsing account, we're using for that unexplained cost from last year. What Sherry had said at the meeting was that that money had not yet been transferred in there until the audit was completed. Once the audit was completed, then that would be determined to be the excess amount from last year and then it would get put in there. So that's what it was, was the auditor wouldn't let her transfer that over until the audit was complete. Thank you, Val. Mean, thought
it was maybe found money or something. No. No. But but that's the full you have the right number. It was 40,000, but it was just that she couldn't transfer it over till the audit was complete. Michael wouldn't let her. Okay.
Point of clarification. I thought that $40,000 wasn't a 100% of the excess funds. There was money coming back to the town and then money going into lapsing. Correct. We had asked for 6. You
guys approved 40 and kept the 20. So that's why the 40 was going into our account, and the 20 went to you guys.
Okay. But I don't know if the 20 has been transferred or not. So I'm sure it's there someplace. We don't have it.
We'll have Well, some of have to move it because it's in it's in the school's budget, so it's not in the town.
So I I don't know where over there it is, but I do know that the auditor wouldn't allow the 40 to be transferred into the nonlapsing until the audit was completed.
Diane, anything left over at the end of the audit automatically gets rolled into the unexpended fund balance.
Okay. So the auditor should be coming up with more than $40,000 that's left over on the school.
All right. Okay. Other discussions or anybody wanna make a motion?
Well, we've cut over $100,000 out of the town's budget. So I think we need to make some cuts on the school budget.
I just I just wanna say one thing. We that we already cut 20 from the town budget before we took it to the town.
School budget, What? Mean, You mean the school budget, right? Yeah. With school budget. Sorry.
I just wanna bring that up throughout out out there. And that said, though I earlier, you know, I was talking about things being equitable and all that. I agree with that. I still think that. I think we should be careful. You know, AES, again, has had seven years of flat or reduced budgets. I think there was a feeling in town for a long time that the AES budget was too high. I think that many voters still feel that way, and I understand that and I respect that. And at the same time, I feel also that those of us who have been engaged with this process and been looking at their budget should be able to say either we agree or disagree, you know, whether it's really reasonable to continue on this path where even with a flat enrollment for the last, I don't know how many years now. Think it's been like about four years where it's been flat. We should continue to squeeze them. Or if we are willing to accept the fact that, you know, costs go up, you know, they have a new contract. Their raises are not insane by any stretch of the imagination,
but they have to meet those obligations. I am not opposed to cutting something, but I would be very, very careful about what we cut. Because to me, this is one of the big things we have in town, right? AS is a big deal in this town. It's one of the reasons why people move here. And I'll be straight up with you guys. I have two kids in that school. One of them is about to leave. She's going to ram next year, but I have two kids in that school. They've benefited tremendously from that school. So I would be very, very cautious about a one to one, you know. We cut this much from the town budget. Therefore, we must cut this from their budget kind of approach. That's all I have to say. I don't have any particular thoughts about what we ought to cut from their budget. What is reasonable or unreasonable? I kind of I'll be honest, I trust the Board of Ed. So y'all do what you're gonna do. But I am very cautious about hacking and slashing here.
Go ahead. I have a comment.
Go ahead, Louise. Just a reminder, we don't have any motions before the board, but go ahead, Louise. Right. I have a couple of questions.
Well, first comment is I think we have to respect what the public has stated in the referendum. It's that they feel it's too high, at least the majority. Secondly, when my when my kids were going to school in South Windsor, we had issues years ago and under the sports, I mean, they didn't want to cut anything major and I know sports may be major to some people but I have a question as to what AES does for sports, and if there's something that can be directed over to the parents of the students that would save some money.
Are you asking a question for Val? Should we ask her to answer? If I could, please. Yeah, sure. Val, do you have any input on that?
We don't have sports programs here. Teams, sports teams at all, Louise, in the elementary. Oh, I did not know that. Okay, so there's no sports budget at all? There is no sports budget. There's no. We have one budget. We have our regular regular budget, our general fund budget. We do not have both a capital improvement budget, a sports budget. We have one budget. That's it.
Okay. It's kinda hard to know if it wasn't broken down, So that's why I'm asking. Well, thank you. It's more budget. Okay. So much for that, but however, I do have to kind of respect what the town has said. And I feel this should be a cut. I don't know to what, but something that would reflect that we did listen to what the referendum results were. Thank you. Other Diane. Sorry sorry and first.
I am going to make a motion, and then we can discuss it. I'm going to make a motion that we reduce the school budget by $50,000 Okay, we have a second on that. I'll second for discussion. Okay. Further discussion?
I think if you count for the town, we've just cut like $113,000 plus at the town meeting, cut 50,000. So we've cut over $160,000 off the town budget. I think we need to do something on the school side based on the advisory questions on the referendum. It was in the highest rated number was a school budget too high 60%. I think we need to do something and if we reduce it by 50,000 that still brings them at a 3.9% increase. Okay. Just unreasonable and just.
Joanne had her hand up. Ahead. Yeah, no, she's next. Go ahead.
Thank you, Rob. I was gonna say, you know, it's always difficult when making cuts to anything, but I think it's reasonable not to go one to one with the town on this and come in a little a little lighter and then hopefully not affect the areas you know that were brought up earlier. Clearly the budget will help with the mental health or the services that the kids need. You know, like any budget, hopefully they can find, you know, like we did, we won't go line to line on their budget, but I think it's reasonable with what the townspeople have asked and year to year, and from my years as just a person looking at things, it's hard to compare all kinds of schools, and I've been told that. You know, we are lucky to have such a great school in town where the, you know, the kids do really well, everyone's being supportive, we all want the best for the kids, working in schools, I mean, a hard place to work, you know, as far as it takes a certain type of person, so we all know that it's caring, giving people, you know, so that's number one, that's gonna help guide the education, you know, you get that and it seems like from every meeting I've gone in the past three years being involved again in the town now that my kids are grown,
You know, that's all I feel going to meetings, know, everyone has that. So that's number one there. But again, this is hopefully them looking at their budget areas where they can cut back a little bit. And again, we always bring it up. There's the contingency funds that hopefully they can come to the Board of Finance or come to someone if there are drastic emergencies that aren't funded. I think I've heard that you all say that in the meeting. So I think this is a fair thing, yeah, this year. I mean, it's gonna cover their contractual and which is number one and things that are brought up, heating and all those kind of things and then hopefully they can pare down a little bit like we've been able to do without hurting it too much you know as far as that.
Okay, all right. Other discussion on the motion at hand?
This is just to clarify, this is a 50 ks cut, correct? Correct.
I also want to point out just as a reminder that whatever we do here will end up at the town budget meeting, and it cannot be increased at the town budget meeting. It can only be decreased or modified for the same amount. Yeah. So once once we do this, it's it's done for at least this round of voting.
Yeah. And I I mean, and I know this is pedantic, but just bear with me. You know, we did cut 20 Canada budget before we sent it to town meeting last time. So it's from the original ask, we're down 70 now. Just, I mean, just to be clear. Okay. Thank you. Do you have further discussion?
I was just gonna add to that, Rob. I mean, that that was hard to do, but there was a specific reason I think that that was made at the time. Yes, it was.
I agree. I'm not trying to be confrontational. I mean, I I understand. You know, but there, I mean, there was a reason
that neither. I am not trying to be confrontational either. Am simply stating facts. Brought it up. It's information. Okay. Oh, okay. I was gonna finish my point, but
I'm good. I mean, we would have left it on had there not been major changes, you know, it probably would have went as is, but there was a specific reason, and that's why I think it was addressed. If
memory serves, I mean, I didn't really disagree with it. I'm just pointing it out. That's all. I'm not, you know, again, this is I'm not trying to pick a fight, Joanne.
I'm just pointing it Let's let's address the motion if we could, guys. Let's do that. Discussion on the $50,000 reduction proposed? Okay, hearing none I'm going to call for a vote then. All those in favor say aye. Aye.
Okay, all those posts a nay. Any abstentions. Okay, the motion passes for two zero. This would reduce the AES budget line items from 400 and whoops 4,102,787 that would take it down to $4,052,007.87. I have okay. So just as a point of information that leaves the total to be raised by taxation now at 9,938,852, which is an increase of 2.1. I've captured everything and I think I have.
So just for just to clarify, I mean, you know, we took the first budget before the town. It was just shy of 5%. Now we're just over two. So that's a pretty significant decrease. I I hope that this board will step up and defend this budget. That's all I have to say.
Duly noted. Do we have any other discussion or motions to be made with this budget before us?
Clark, can you just repeat? Sorry, can you repeat the The total 9,000,000?
So the this is the total total to be raised by taxation is 9,938,852, which is a 2.1% increase.
And then we're still, I mean, and I think Diane quoted earlier, so we did reduce the school budget, but there's still a significant increase over last year. So what was the percentage? Which So that leaves the school increase at 3.9%. I just want to update my stuff. Thank you.
And the the town budget, I think, remains a an even higher increase. 7.2
for the town. Yeah. 7.2%. Eric, don't know if you're following along, if you're checking those numbers. Yes, I am. Okay.
Thank you. I just was keeping a cheat sheet too to double check. I have the same numbers as you, so hopefully all of our spreadsheets are in sync.
That gets you to an estimated mill rate of 31.91. That's what I get. Correct.
Yep. Alright. Well done, everyone. Hope we can all, you know, step up and defend this budget.
Yeah. Hey, Rob. Can I ask a question? And this this is just asking. Are you thinking that by my letter in the I mean, I always defend everything that we do. Well, think I
don't think I'm sorry, ahead. He thinks we it does he get the sense that we won't?
Well, think if I'm not I don't wanna put words in Rob's mouth, but I have not read your letter. It's been so I read the river for my mental health. I have not read your letter. That is not what I'm talking about. Am talking about the idea that when we go to town meeting and we go to a referendum, sometimes it's a very dry process whereby the board of finance shows up and, you know, we do our best. Whatever. But okay. So look. I'm not this isn't Oh, yeah. Because you wrote letters to the release, which I didn't even know about until somebody told me about it tonight. So no,
Joanne. I'm just not talking about your letter. I'm is not if we if we need to beef up our presentation at the town meeting. Yeah. Yeah. And or communicate forcefully elsewhere. So that's What I'm saying is if we agree
that this is a good budget, let's back it. And you know what? If that if if if you feel that's criticism criticism of you,
then I don't know. It wasn't about what I was trying to say.
Getting off agenda, guys. I think, you know, I understand. Theologian asked a question for clarification. That's all I wanted. And thank you. Yeah, because I would have explained myself that I just, it was just, yeah, so thank you. I just wanted to make sure that he didn't think we weren't because I think we're all working hard to get to it. Thank you.
Okay, do we have any other discussions about the budget as it stands now any other line item changes requests. We could entertain a motion to accept the budget as amended and present that to the town meeting on Tuesday if nobody else has any other changes they want to entertain.
I'll make a motion that we present this budget at the next town meeting. I'll second it.
Okay. Any further discussion. Okay, hearing none will take a vote all those in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed. Okay. Any abstentions? Okay. Hearing none, the motion passes 600. Thank you, guys. Thanks Mark as always.
After we have no further discussion we'll move on to the next agenda item which is item for correspondence. I don't know if anybody's received any correspondence we did have one email I know from member of the public that went out to all the board members. Is there anything else or anything coming into the town that we should be aware of? Not that I know of.
Okay, thank you, Eric. Hearing none, we'll move on to agenda item five, which is the public speak portion of the second public speak portion of the agenda meeting on the meeting. Eric, do want to go ahead and do the rounds? Sure. So first up on my screen, Valerie Bruneau.
Thanks, Eric. Disappointed to say the least. Dollars 70,000 from a budget that was as tight as could be. And Louise brought up, don't you have a fund for this? Don't you have a fund for that? We have an operational capital, everything all in one. And again, disappointed, very disappointed. There will definitely have to be ways for us to figure out how to make programming cuts here in the building. I respect the process. Obviously, I've been on with you for two and a half hours. I can see the process. I just disagree with it. And my job is to advocate for the school and the kids and the family. Okay, thanks, Val. Okay, next up, Jeff Murray. No comment, Eric. I'm good. Okay. After Jeff Murray is Scott Persson. I'm good also, Eric. Thank Okay.
Liz, and I'm going to try here. Low check. Am I closer? Close.
Low catch. Thank you. Okay. Sorry. Thank you. I'm as good as I can be for now. Okay. Kimberly Person. Nothing right now. Thank you. Okay. Caitlin McIntosh.
Hi. I apologize because I did miss the beginning of the meeting because of the kids school concert. So I apologize if this is repeating something. I just wanted to thank you guys for your time tonight and your dedication to this town. I did have a question in regards to the nonbinding questions that are on the ballot. I know there was some discussion last year that they were kind of confusing, being that there's only two answers. And I know that the system only allows for two answers. I guess I was wondering if they could possibly be written to make it very clear that if you do not answer the question, that means that you think the budget is where it should be as opposed to thinking that you have to choose too high or too low or possibly rewriting the questions in a way that would make it so that someone could
answer like, is the budget too high? And then a different question, is the budget too low? With a yes or no instead of too high or too low as answers. So just just a clarification question more than anything, but thank you guys very much for your time.
Yeah, thank you, Caitlin. We did actually did toss out a couple of ideas around there and it is a little bit limiting how we do it. Duly noted, thanks.
Okay, and the last three are cell phone numbers, phone ending in 9537.
Yeah, my only question on this is there are many statements during the evening that the elementary school budget has been flat for the past, I don't know, four or five, six years, the numbers have been going around. But at the same time, we're saying that the increase was originally 5.1% and now it's 3.9%. I'm still trying to justify that it's been flat but it has an increase and I just don't understand that.
I think what we're talking about specifically was the In the past, there's been a for the school only that the there haven't been increases to the school budget today yes school budget. So some of the numbers we've been talking about are combined numbers for the budget as a whole. So the school, the school hasn't always had increases that sometimes the town has had or vice versa or ram had so there's it's a combined budget and that can be a little confusing about what exactly percentage we're talking about at that point. So right now the way there is a school and increase the school budget and we ended up at whoops wrong one. Go ahead, Eric. Were you gonna pick something? 3.9%. Yeah. Yeah. 3.8. Yeah.
Right. And and for years and years, you know, the the AES budget itself has dropped, but or stayed flat. But, you know, that doesn't control the RAM budget or the town budget. Like, it's one component of the whole. Yeah.
It just seems that we didn't talk about flat budget until you got to the school budget. And then you kept saying, it's been flat for the last five, six years or whatever. And I don't think that it really has been. Think that we're there's been a lot of shifting of money between the town, whether it's a finance person and so on. And I don't think that we're always being above board in all of those statements. So I just want to make sure that we're all on the same page on that. Okay. Okay.
Next, cell phone number 4212. Please unmute yourself if you'd like to speak.
This is Shannon Loudon. I just want to thank the Board of Finance very much for all of your hard work prior to tonight and tonight. I, too, am very disappointed in the results, just knowing how much effort and time and scrutiny the Board of Education put into our budget considerations and arrived at a budget that was unanimously passed by the Board of Education. I know that we all have difficult decisions to make, but I I don't know. I I feel as though I've been on the board of ed for almost six for six years now, and I feel like every year, we are criticized for having too high a budget. And yet this year, we had more than six budget seminars, budget workshops, and nary a person came on there and said, this is where we propose you cut, or why can't you cut here? Whereas tonight, we heard about fund after fund after fund that the town has. We've been accused of having all those funds at the school level. We do not. So I think a 7.2% increase for the town and a 3.9%
increase for the school, I understand it. I appreciate all the work that you did. I just don't know that knowing what we need at the school, that that's gonna be viable. And just quickly in response to what was just said, as I said in my comment at the beginning of this meeting, since the twenty fifteen twenty sixteen fiscal year, the AES budget has decreased by 10%. The total budget has decreased by 10%, while in the last five years, our student enrollment has been stagnant. Thank you for your work. We'll see what happens next Wednesday. K. Thank you.
Okay. And the last number, I think that's Marina. Correct? 5579? Yeah. That's me. Okay.
So, that should be it unless there's somebody I'm missing. If there is, I apologize.
I think that looks correct to me. I think you captured everybody. Thank you, Eric. Okay. We'll move on to agenda item six, which is adjournment. Would anybody like to make a motion to adjourn the meeting? I'll make a motion to adjourn the meeting. Thank you, Do we have a second? Second.
Okay, Rob. Any discussion? Hearing none, let's vote. All those in favor of adjournment say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Any abstentions? Okay. Thank you everybody. We'll work on the presentation. Make sure