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Westbrook’s 1.3% Budget Increase to Go to Town Meeting

With no state budget in place—and proposals from Governor Dannel Malloy floated to zero-out town education cost sharing funds and shift part of the teachers’ pension cost to the town—the Board of Finance (BOF) last week voted to present a combined town and schools budget of $29,778,494, an increase of $373,085 or 1.3 percent. The Board of Selectmen (BOS) also opted for flexibility and deferred a decision on which capital funding requests to honor.

This means the new proposed town government budget will be $11,877,579, an increase of $210,681 or 1.8 percent higher than the current year’s budget.

The Board of Education-adopted budget of $17,900,915 includes an increase over the current year of $162,404, or 0.9 percent.

The original BOS-adopted budget proposed a 2.4 percent increase, an increase in spending of $277,951 over the current year. With continuing uncertainty about what costs or cuts the state budget could bring to Westbrook, however, both the BOS and the BOF wanted to reduce the budget to bring the increase in under two percent.

At a Joint BOS and BOF Meeting held April 6, the BOF began by reviewing a list of recommended cuts, spread across many town departments, that together reduced the budget increase. After discussing the proposed cuts, the BOF voted to adopt the changes.

The original purpose of the meeting was to choose from among the capital requests from town departments and allocate the $200,000 set aside as capital funds in the proposed town budget for 2017-’18. Capital funding pays for town projects that are expected to serve the town for several years, such as a new vehicle or roof, as opposed to annual operating expenses like payroll or vehicle maintenance.

With state revenue sharing amounts uncertain as the governor and State Legislature grapple with the state budget, leaders chose to defer a decision until more information is known.

“It would be close to $1 million [to Westbrook] if Malloy’s plans for cuts and pensions move forward,” said First Selectman Noel Bishop. “I suggest we defer any capital requests in light of the financial situation at the state level.

“We have at least $200,000 in the general operating budget for capital projects in town next year. If all capital project requests were approved, it would be $2.5 million. We’re not forgetting about them. We just need to wait until we find out where we stand with the state,” said Bishop.

Another factor for Bishop was the town’s recently completed property revaluation that dropped the overall value of the town’s Grand List, a key component in mill rate calculation, by 2.71 percent. With property values down, some owners are asking why their taxes aren’t going down. All else being equal, there is an inverse relationship between the Grand List and taxes. A decrease in the Grand List creates an increase in taxes if the overall town budget remains the same. With confusion about that and the state budget uncertainty, Bishop recommended the town defer action on capital requests.

Both Selectman John Hall III and Selectman Mary Labbadia agreed with Bishop; the BOS unanimously recommended action on capital requests be deferred. The BOF, after discussion, voted to accept the BOS recommendation to defer action.

Town Meeting vs. Referendum

The BOS will this year again send the town budget to a Town Meeting for adoption rather than to a referendum. To inform voters in advance of that meeting, Bishop said the town was preparing a budget summary brochure to mail to the town’s property owners in advance of the Town Meeting.

At the April 11 meeting of the Board of Selectmen, the Board voted to set the public hearing on the 2017-’18 budget for Monday, May 1, at 7 p.m. at the Mulvey Municipal Center and the Town Budget Meeting for May 16 at 7 p.m.

At the annual budget meeting on May 1, speakers for both the town and school budgets will make presentations. Residents will also have the opportunity to ask questions and make comments. Printed budget hand-outs will also be available for the public at the meeting.

In addition to the budget public hearing presentations, town leaders are finalizing a budget summary brochure the town will mail to town property owners in advance of the May 16 Town Budget Meeting vote.

The Town Meeting to act on the proposed budget will be on Tuesday, May 16, at 7 p.m. at Westbrook High School, 156 McVeagh Road, Westbrook.

Selectman John Hall III recently urged Registrar of Voters Nancy Moore to find ways to streamline the voting process at the Town Meeting if possible. He also asked that Finance Director Donna Castracane keep the town budget presentation at that meeting to no more than 15 minutes to allow voting to start by 7:30 p.m.

Hall was responding to complaints he heard from residents who attended the May 2016 Town Budget Meeting. Some complained that the budget presentations were too long, which meant that the voting process started too late. Others said that once the voting began, it took too long and the room was too small to accommodate the process.

Those complaints are one reason that the BOS decided to shift the Town Meeting vote on the budget to Westbrook High School this year.

This is the second year in a row that the BOS chose to send the proposed budget to a Town Meeting for action instead of to a town-wide referendum vote.