Dear Readers,
Last night the City Council Finance Committee met with the School Department about their budget for next fiscal year. The meeting was one of the best we’ve had in years.
As mentioned in Saturday’s column, the Mayor’s proposed budget as it stands calls for a 3.5% tax increase ($2.3 million), new taxes on dining and lodging (about $500,000), and draining funds (over $900,000) from our dwindling free cash account (currently about $1.6 million). The City Council Finance Committee is trying to reduce these increases and free up some capacity to spend more on fixing up our roads and infrastructure, improving technology in schools, addressing the $100+ million in capital requests submitted by departments, and to start addressing the massive snowballing obligations related to retiree benefits (over $230 million in healthcare alone).
In order to do this, we have to make budget reduction recommendations throughout the city budget – including all the largest departments: schools, fire, police, DPW, and IT. These are not easy to do, but we have heard loud and clear from taxpayers that they cannot take much more, and they want us to prioritize spending in different ways.
Last night we recommended a reduction in the School Department budget of $600,000. This is about 1% of their budget. This would give them a budget that is still higher than last year’s actual budget. The City Council plays no role in deciding how to manage the School Department budget – that’s completely up to the School Administration and the School Committee. Based on the final comments in the meeting, it sounds like they are unfortunately choosing to layoff teachers.
It should be noted that just prior to this meeting, the School Committee met and voted to ratify a new teacher’s contract. This contract increases salaries by 1.5% in the first year (about $550,000), and 2.5% in years two and three (over $900,000 each). Total three year cost is over $4.3 million. This is the first contract of many that we be negotiated this year, so it sets the precedents.
In the coming days, you are likely to read stories and hear commentary on social media about how unfair or uncaring the City Council is. This is far from the truth. Every single councilor cares deeply about this city and everyone who lives and works here. We have major challenges, and we have to make some very hard choices.
Budgeting is a balancing act. Do we charge more taxes to limited income senior citizens to pay for salary increases for school administrators? Do we make people pay more to eat out in order to pave a road? Is that fair to the struggling restaurant owners? Do we increase the cost of doing business in Westfield to pay for granite pillars and speed bumps?
You need to decide how much more you can or want to pay in taxes, whether or not you want new taxes on meals and lodging, and whether or not you want to drain the limited savings that the city has. If you don’t want this, you have to be willing to support the tough budget recommendations that will be made in the coming weeks. If you are willing to pay more taxes to cover salary increases for city employees, than you need to tell the councilors that as well.
My guess after hearing some of the comments last night is that even with the recommendations of the Finance Committee, there will not be any realistic way to stop a massive tax increase. I don’t like it, but I don’t think it’s possible to avoid given the condition of the city finances. The School Department represents about 65% of the City Budget. If we can reduce the budget by $600,000 and apply a similar reduction in every other department, that only adds up to about $923,000 – far below the reductions necessary to avoid the massive tax increases. If the $600,000 cut gets reduced, it will add more to the tax burden.
If you would like to weigh in on this matter, please attend any of the budget meetings in the coming weeks, read the budget on the City’s website at http://www.CityofWestfield.org, and/or attend the Public Hearing on the Budget on June 27th at 6PM. Please reach out to your City Councilors and let them know your concerns and priorities.
On Thursday, the City Council Finance Committee will be meeting with the following departments starting at 5:30 in City Hall: City Clerk, Board of Registrars, Health Department, Landfill,
Community Development, Zoning, Planning, Conservation, and Council on Aging.
Regards,
Dave Flaherty
City Councilor
