Shutesbury Board of Selectmen with Finance Committee February 27, 2007 Meeting Minutes Finance Committee Members Present: Chairman Eric Stocker, Russ Wilson, Al Springer, Al Beswick and Lori Tuominen arrived at 7:20 P.M. Select Board Members present: Chairman Rebecca Torres, Debra Pichanick and Ralph Armstrong. Also Present: Town Administrator David C. Dann and Leslie Bracebridge, recording. Eric opened the meeting at 7:05 P.M.: 1. Committee Reports: Russ recommended attendance at Planning Board meetings. Personnel Board will meet on March 8. The School Committee meets tomorrow night. Selectmen, Finance Committee and School representatives will meet on March 13. 2. Expense Report comments: * Uncertainty of the meaning of the after school program funding figures on the 2/28/07 expense report. * Remaining funds in this year’s sand and snow removal budget will likely build next year’s Free Cash. The winter is not over yet. * The Planning Board will be spending their budget down on consultants. * School Choice: The School Committee is aware that it’s a problem sending students out to other school systems and is working to limit it. * No one is collecting unemployment benefits at this time, so there will likely be a significant amount of that line funding next year’s free cash. * Legal expenses: Town Counsel Donna MacNicol will discuss potential legal expenses if the zoning revisions pass, for the FY 08 budget. There could be considerable legal expenses over a period of two to three years. There may be outside agencies including the Conservation Law Foundation that might assist with some or all of the legal expenses. Al Beswick recommends this be addressed at the Annual Town Meeting as well as the Public Hearings. Becky requests that the Finance Committee also comment at town meeting. Al Beswick: The Finance Committee can’t comment on the plan itself, only on the financial implications. Eric: Should we put extra funds for legal expenses in the budget this year? Al Beswick: The town might spend less money on legal expenses if the plan is put into place than it would spend to educate children if more houses are put up without the zoning revisions. Becky: How the zoning revisions would affect the number of houses built can not be easily predicted. 3. Possible Warrant Articles using Stabilization Funds (listed on the third page of Addendum #1) include: * Set-up of an unemployment revolving fund, * The FY 08 Capital budget, * Matching funds for the Library design grant and * Possible last minute school needs. 4. David reviewed library funds. (Addendum #2.) Trust funds earn $3-4,000/year. Trustees have said that they would be willing to use a significant amount of the trust funds for the building repairs that are needed. Is it too late to ask the Library Trustees to put the $9,923 of Barr Ashcraft funds toward the $20,000 matching funds for the design funds? The town would have to put forth a significant amount more in matching funds for the actual building project, the library must carefully plan for that. The Ashcraft funds could be used for that. The $20,000 for matching funds is to come from a warrant article. 5. David reported "good news" from Accountant Gail Weiss: A duplication of "School Choice" in both the revenue and expense sides of the proposed FY 08 budget (Addendum #1.) Because School Choice will appear as revenue on the cherry sheet, Line 90 in the amount of $44,450.00 will be removed from the budget, reducing the budget gap by the $39,450.00 from the revenues page and thus reducing the $144,263 gap to $104,813. Eric: Could see the closing of the budget deficit: $40,000 from School Choice, $20,000 from Highway, and 6. David added: Free Cash should be $100,000 to $150,000 which opened the discussion of the use of Stabilization and Free Cash in the FY 08 budget. The Treasurer prefers to keep Free Cash at $300,000 to avoid having to go out to borrow. Becky recommends funding part of the capital items out of Stabilization if a budget gap remains. David added: Using Stabilization stops the use of Free Cash that can "catch up with you." Becky: Some towns build up stabilization. Eric: We keep using Free Cash, so we don’t build up Stabilization. David: If the $150,000 keeps coming into Free Cash that’s what the Finance Committee has to work with. Stabilization spending takes a 2/3’s vote. If it doesn’t pass, then the motion could be amended to come from free cash. * Highway Backhoe and Building: Borrow, not debt exclusion. Borrowing will level out the debt schedule. Does it make sense to combine them if equipment (the backhoe) can only be borrowed over a period of 5 years? Should the Highway Building be "bundled" with the Dam? Have the Treasurer run the figures for a five-year loan for the backhoe and a longer period for the building. The Treasurer will be asked to run a number of options. * Finance Committee members agreed it made sense to wait until it is known what state funds are coming in before debating how to fund warrant articles. 7. The Finance Committee favors having town meeting vote the budget before discussing the zoning revisions. 8. The regional school budget, to be available on March 10 will indicate whether Shutesbury’s 3% budget figure is good. 9. By consensus vote, Lori Tuominen was selected to represent the Finance Committee on the Library Needs Assessment Committee. 10. Unanimously voted to expend $1500 from Finance Committee Reserve Funds for the Tree Warden’s expense line leaving a balance of $27,201.00 in the reserve funds. 11. Up-coming meetings/events: The legislative aides will be meeting with the Selectmen on Thursday March 1 at 6 P.M. Finance Committee members are encouraged to attend. March 10 Regional School budget presentation at 9:30 AM, Middle School. The next Finance Committee meeting will be March 13 with the Selectmen and the School Committee at 7 P.M. Stan Rosenberg’s annual event will be in Northampton on April 7. Governor Patrick will be present and speaking. Adjourned at 8:35 P.M. Respectfully submitted, Leslie Bracebridge Administrative Secretary 070227 joint Finance and Selectboard 1