Shutesbury Finance Committee

Minutes from 5/12/2003 meeting at Town Hall

APPROVED MINUTES

 

Present:  Chair Eric Stocker, members Al Beswick, Nancy Beswick, and Steve Hasbrouck (recording minutes).  This was a joint meeting with the Select Board.  All three board members were present: Patrick Callahan, Ralph Armstrong, and Becky Torres.  Leslie Bracebridge, David Ames, and newly elected Select Board member Joe Jacobs were also present.  We were joined at 7:30 PM by Marianne Jorgensen and Helen Vivian.

 

We started the meeting at 7:08 PM.

 

            We needed to get the budget finalized so we could release it to the public in a timely fashion before the Special Town Meeting being held Tuesday, May 27, 2003.  The last item on the budget Eric was focusing on was the Shutesbury Elementary School (SES) budget.  We had asked the School Committee to cut $100,000 from the FY03 budget.  We settled on that number as that was how much we were projecting being cut in Chapter 70 money.  We are now being told we will be cut $115,000.  One of the first difficulties was figuring out exactly what the FY03 budget number was.  We decided it was the FY02 number ($1,387,266, they were level funded last year) plus the $33,219 the town received in the fall of 2002 from the state, resulting in $1,420,485.  Cutting $100,000 from that would mean asking the SES budget to be $1,320,485.  Eric’s proposal didn’t go that far.  He put forth that we deduct the step raises and “contingency” money in the current budget earmarked for raises and add back in a number ($20,150) equal to employees receiving a 2% raise.  Eric got the 2% increase number from Charlie Paulin at the Union 28 office.  He pointed out he wasn’t certain his figuring reduced all raises for all SES employees to 2%.  In specific he wondered about the principal’s raise being at 4%.  People expressed satisfaction with his proposal.  We felt it only fair to hold all town employees, not just non-teachers, to a 2% raise this year.  We figured out the principal’s reduction in wage would add another $1,331 to the saving thereby making Eric’s proposal become $1,347,835 for the SES.  Representatives from the school would be arriving at 7:30.

            The Regional assessment will hopefully end up at an 8.76% increase over last year’s assessment.  This is so much better than the nearly 19% we were first faced with.  All four towns have to agree to modify the regional agreement for this one year to make this proposal go through.  This solution was proposed by the Amherst people as a way of fairly sharing the burden of the regional assessment increasing drastically from last year plus this proposal also puts back in the 7th grade team that had been cut.  We felt this was a good solution.

            The Reading First grant came up for discussion.  Al pointed out that it could not be used to replace anything that was cut from the budget.  It was suppose to be used for new programs.  It may be able to replace other grants that were lost.  It is to be used on K – 3 only.  At 7:30 we were joined by Helen and Marianne.

            We ascertained that the budget we had in hand, the $1,384,766 figure, was the figure the School Committee approved.  There had been no change since that budget got released on 3/12/2003.  Eric made his presentation of how we got to our reduced number.  Discussion ensued.  The first consideration Helen brought up was that contract negotiations were ongoing with the teachers now.  We didn’t know what the results of those negotiations were going to be and that is why they built in the contingency money.  Marianne mentioned that the step raises have traditionally been seen as a compensation for the fact that there isn’t management a teacher can advance into, as in the private sector, so that isn’t really seen as a raise although it does increase the wage.  Also, the contracts have always been for three years.  Someone pointed out that in the past teachers have received raises that were higher than town employees.

            The discussion came around to which number do we put on the warrant, what number do we use in the budget.  Helen said that, by law, the budget approved by the School Committee has to be used.  David Ames wasn’t quite certain of that but decided we could go that way.  Becky pointed out that in years past the Finance Committee presented a budget at Town Meeting that had a “Requested” column and a “Recommended” column.  In recent years we have agreed on a number before Town Meeting but we also have this option of presentation to use.  People were reminded that we only vote on the bottom line for the SES.  There is an elected board, the School Committee, that oversees the SES budget process.  We cannot tell them how to spend their money.  We can only say how much money we are willing to give them.  We cannot tell them what raises to give to their employees.  Using our number, the budget shortfall would be $67,980.  Using the School Committee’s number, that figure rises to $104,911.  If we decide to pay for all of this with free cash, the number has a severe impact on FY05 as well.  Eric reviewed that we are already spending free cash due to warrant articles.  If everything passes we are spending $131,000 on “fixed” costs before our deficit.  Finally, Helen re-informed us that the School Committee meets again on May 21st.  They may decide to change their budget at that time.  There is the possibility that we will have a number in common by the time of the Special Town Meeting.  To help achieve that goal we agreed to meet on Thursday, May 22nd.

            To finish off this discussion three motions were made and passed unanimously by the Select Board.  The first requested we install a “Requested” and “Recommended” column in the budget.  The second was that the Select Board and Fin. Comm. recommend a budget with total expenditures of $4,226,038.  The last motion was that the warrant will have the total of $4,262,969, the expenditures we recommend plus the $36,931 higher amount of the School Committees budget.  We thanked Helen and Marianne for their time and efforts as they departed.

            Before the Fin. Comm. went off to finish their meeting on their own they voted unanimously in favor of supporting Warrant Article 1 that would require already retired employees to join the health plan.  This will not have any cost to the retiree and will protect the town from possible future fines.

            After we reconvened in our own space, we got a progress report from Nancy on the Personnel Committee.  They are in favor of the 2% raise.  They are not sure if next year is a 52.2 or 52.3 year.  They are postponing their comprehensive compensation plan for a year.  They are planning on rewording personnel bylaws, much like David Ames and Leslie Bracebridge have done on the town bylaws, to get the wording clear.  She said the mediator was at the last police negotiating session yet is staying quietly in the background.

            Next we answered some of Julie Taylor’s specific questions on the budget.  We unanimously accepted the minutes from the 4/30 meeting.  Steve announced he was moving out of town by September and would therefore be leaving the Fin. Comm.  This will leave us with two openings.  We adjourned at 8:59.

 

Respectfully submitted,

 

 

Steve Hasbrouck