Residents will have the chance to have their say on a $34 million proposed budget at a town meeting on Monday, May 13 at Westbrook High School at 7 p.m.

Following a public hearing on April 17, the Board of Finance (BOF) has forwarded a proposed $34,106,110 budget to voters. The proposed total budget represents a $757,421 or 2.3% increase over the current spending. The proposed capital plan has $2,455,977 in projects in year one.

BOF Chairman Paul Winch said the operating budget is comprised of a town budget of $14,071,368 and a Board of Education (BOE) budget of $20,034,742. Winch said that the mill rate would be set after the town meeting and that there might be a slight increase.

Winch praised the work the town and BOF did during the budget process.

“Once again, we had great collaboration between the Board of Selectmen and BOF. We started last summer, and we brought the BOE in and some of the larger departments in town in the in fall so when we got to February, we had done a lot of work to avoid any surprises in the budget,” Winch said. “Getting together early helped, and we’ve gotten a lot better at dialogue between BOE and town, which helps make things easy.”

Earlier this year, Winch said that over the course of several months, the BOF was able to trim some initial expected expenditures.

“We were able to get it down. There were no draconian cuts, but we were able to save money on insurance and get the debt down,” Winch said last month.

Beyond normal drivers of change like inflation, Winch pointed to contracted salary raises as another prominent reason for the increase. “We had a collecting barraging that led to a salary increase we had to build in; that is a big reason for the increase,” Winch said.

As for the capital budget, Winch said funds were allocated for a new police vehicle, projects at the schools, public works and fire department equipment, and long-term projects like paving.

Next Steps

While most area towns conduct budget approvals via referendum, Westbrook has mainly used a town meeting format for the last eight years. One benefit of a town meeting vote is that the town can publish a citizen’s voting guide for the budget.

The citizen’s guide is intended to inform voters about the budget and the town’s finances before voting. State guidance directs that the town remain neutral in presenting the budget details in any summary document presented to the voters.

“It really is a great tool and very helpful,” Winch said of the citizen's guide.

Winch said the guide will be sent out shortly and that more information on the proposed budget is available at www.westbrookct.us.