Town Meets on Monday: Budget talk expected to rule
Published on April 28th, 2004
STONEHAM, MA - In what has proven an especially trying fiscal year, Monday night's Annual Town Meeting will be heavily dominated by financial propositions, as 17 out of 25 warrant articles involve money in one form or another.
With town officials preparing to accommodate a large crowd, Town Clerk John Hanright has indicated that closed-circuit television monitors might have to be set up in the basement of Town Hall if too large of a crowd shows up. According to Hanright, if such a situation was to arise, Town Moderator Michael Rotondi would appoint assistant moderators who would communicate the votes and requests to speak through walkie talkies.
"We expect a large crowd. If people could please show up a little bit earlier so can get everybody in their seats, we can start as close to 7:30 p.m. as possible," Hanright requested of citizens at this Tuesday's Selectmen meeting.
Without a doubt, with an anticipated $4.3 million deficit expected in FY05, the warrant's last article, which sets the budget for the next year, will certainly pull in a large crowd.
According to Finance Board member Jim Grayson, because town officials expect citizens to arrive at Town Meeting armed with amendments to the FY05 budget article, officials might request that citizens approve a balancing motion.
"It would basically mean that if anybody wants to come up with an increase for an expenditure, that they came back with a balancing action so we're not just increasing expenditures because money is so tight," explained Grayson.
Because money is so scarce this year, the town's Finance Board rejected several articles, that would increase costs. Specifically, the Finance Board rejected two citizen warrant articles that would increase the Board of Selectmen membership by 2 persons, citing the $6000 in costs associated with the proposals.
In a similar unfavorable vote in conflict with the Selectmen's favorable recommendation, the Finance Board felt that two drainage improvement articles at Pine and Cardinal Streets shouldn't be conducted outside of the DPW's normally scheduled maintenance of the town's water and sewer maintenance.
"I think when we discussed this with the DPW, we agreed that they should be paying for this and making decisions about what the priorities are," explained D'Angelo.
While the Selectmen met with the Finance Board Tuesday night to mend some of the differences between the two boards, it remained unclear as to how the Selectmen would proceed with the articles.
Although the Finance Board rejected those articles, which would increase town expenditures, the board voted favorably on four articles that would increase town costs.
Both the Finance Board and Board of Selectmen favor approving article 22, which would appropriate $227,870 for the replacement of 24,000 square feet of the middle school roof and pay for repairs to the school's heating and electrical systems.
In addition, both boards favor the passage of articles 19, 20 and 21, which would appropriate a total of $550,000 for repairs to the town's water and sewer infrastructure under the DPW's yearly replacement program and borrow $60,000 for a pick-up truck and skid load for the fire department (an article that was actually approved at last October's Town Meeting but subsequently shot down due to a legal difficulty with the article's wording).
Although the Selectmen previously opposed article 12, which would allow citizens to place a proposition 2 1/2 underride on the ballot, that decision was reversed last night at the suggestion of the Finance Board.
According to Finance Board Richard Gregorio, supporting a measure that would allow citizens to lower the tax levy acts in the spirit of a Town Meeting style government.
"The Finance and Advisory Board believes this article is consistent with the true spirit of town government...The Board believes, that if by a vote of the residents, the Town were to mandate reduced taxes, then such an action would be an expression of the will of the people," reads Gregorio's Town Meeting booklet write-up.
Differing with the Selectmen on warrant article 5, which was sponsored by Selectman Charlie Smith, the Finance Board strongly feels that it's in the town's best financial interests to allow the town administrator to lease out the Arena for up to 10 years.
"We'd probably be $30,000 in the positive if this was approved when it should have been," opined Finance Board member Eric Rubin, referring to the legally stifled decision to lease out the Arena to Facilities Management Corp., a for-profit firm. "Instead, it's [the lease proposal] has been shut down and the Arena is losing money."
Despite receiving the support of Smith and new Board of Selectmen member John DePinto, the remaining board members defeated a push to reverse its unfavorable recommendation on the article. Two articles seeking to rezone an Emerald Court property and to lease the Fire Station roof to potential cell-phone carriers, will not be considered. While a Town Meeting audience could potentially vote in favor of the cell-phone antennae agreement, the Emerald Court article can not legally be considered by a Town Meeting audience because the town's Planning Board voted unfavorably on the proposal -- which was defeated by last October's Town Meeting audience.
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