“Did I hear that you have coffee?”

Before he started taking questions from those gathered at Newtown Senior Center one recent morning, Bruce Walczak asked one of his own. The first selectman was the guest of honor for the inaugural Brews With Bruce, a monthly program for the town’s top elected leader at 8 Simpson Street, and he wanted to make sure there was at least one cup with his name on it.

Director of Human Services Natalie Griffith welcomed Walczak, saying the new series continues Donuts with Dan and Java with Jeff, similar monthly programs with previous first selectmen Dan Rosenthal and Jeff Capeci, respectively. The popular program has been a monthly opportunity for conversation over coffee and breakfast treats with the town leaders.

Pulling up a chair between two of five tables filled with guests on April 11, Walczak took a sip of the fresh brew and then launched into 90 minutes of Q&A and open discussion. He opened by offering an overview of the budget process, calling it “one of the biggest topics in recent months.”

He broke down different stages of the municipal budget process, including “this year’s initial increase of 8.5%,” he said. Subsequent meetings with department heads lowered that number to 3.57%, he said, which was approved by the Board of Finance “with almost no cuts” before it went to the Legislative Council.

“They nicked me for another .4%, so my budget is 3.1%,” he said. “It really is a bare bones budget.”

On the school budget side, Walczak said “over 20% is dedicated to special education, and that can run from a kiddo who’s kind of having trouble, maybe they don’t do well in the classroom, they have ADHD so they’re really struggling, all the way to very severely limited kids. We have some kids who have a full-time person assigned to them so they can attend school.

“If we didn’t do that we would have to send them out of town, to Hartford, where the bill is $200,000 a year,” he explained. “Building up our own special education department, with special teachers and classrooms, costs a lot of money because the special ed program is state mandated. Each child has an individual plan, and people can get pretty upset if we don’t follow that.”

One woman said she has a daughter with special needs who is now in her 50s.

“When she went through school there really wasn’t much for her,” the woman said. “There’s so much more for students now.”

Both budgets, Walczak said, “are really, really well vetted. They’re fair, there’s not a lot of excess.” He encouraged those in the room to support the budget while also acknowledging “it’s a lot of money, especially when you’re on a fixed income.

“I get it, but it’s money well spent,” he assured them.

In response to one of the first questions from the floor, Walczak said there is an English as a Second Language program available for students who don’t speak English. He said there are also programs available for “students heading toward a non-college type of career, for kids who want to work a trade. They can get a fair amount of accommodation in academics and trade information at the high school.”

Walczak asked those present to raise their hands if they had children who went through the school system. About a dozen hands went up.

He then asked for a show of hands “if you complain about the taxes now that you don’t have any kids in school.” While a few people chuckled knowingly, the first selectman asked them to be honest about their answer, and then to consider the fact it currently costs $24,000 per year per child in the schools.

He hears from many people, he said, who want to know why their taxes are still so high even if they don’t have children in the local school system.

“Does anyone in this room have taxes that are $24,000 a year? $15,000? Maybe about $10,000?

“If you have a child, that’s costing the town $24,000 a year, and you’re paying $10,000 a year in taxes, that’s $14,000 a year on the rest of the town,” he said. “When your kids get out of school, you owe a couple hundred thousand dollars. That’s why you pay taxes.”

Louise Zierzow asked how much of the budget is put toward Newtown Senior Center and local senior citizens.

Walczak mentioned tax abatement programs for senior citizens at certain income levels, “a pretty liberal program, one that [former First Selectman] Pat Llodra described as one of the best in the state, that costs us about $1.7 million a year.”

The Town also spends approximately $500,000 on senior center staff and programs, he said. Rent abatement, benefits for volunteer first responders, and senior veteran tax benefits are also covered within the municipal budget, Walczak added.

Public Works accounts for $8 million annually, he said. There is also a $3 million annual paving budget, he added.

A follow-up question from Zierzow asked whether there is an increased allocation to the senior center this year.

“It appears to me that we have a significant increase in the seniors that participate in the programs here,” she said.

Walczak said the senior center budget was originally cut by $34,000, “which had to do with the HART transportation.

“When we learned a little bit more about the dynamics of that, we put the money back into the budget,” he added. “Our senior transit program, we spend $95,000 a year — a lot of it through grants — to run it, and our income for charges on it is $5,000 a year. There’s a lot of programs and expenditures that are baked into other programs, that benefit seniors as well as others. The school budget is the big one that feels like you’re not getting any benefit out of it but if you look at it the way I described it, there’s lots of parents in town that have two kids, ‘borrowing’ $40,000 a year.”

Another woman in the room said she sees high taxes as “in a way a benefit. It keeps the school systems good, and it raises the property values.”

Recalling his career as a counselor to relocating employees, who would talk with people “about home prices, and schools, all of that,” Walczak said he could “categorically tell you that towns that have the highest property values also have the highest rated schools.”

Conversation continued back and forth, with questions, occasional challenges, and good dialogue between attendees and their guest. Walczak was asked about the local business market, real estate and commerce plans for Fairfield Hills, affordable housing including state mandates, traffic congestion, parking within the Fairfield Hills campus, and local traffic management during his visit.

While many questions were raised and answered during last week’s session, one key one was missed: How does the current first selectman take his coffee?

Brews with Bruce will be presented monthly at Newtown Senior Center and is open to all Newtown residents. The program is included in annual NSC memberships; nonmembers will have to purchase a day pass to attend. Reservations are required for all. Check the Senior News column and watch our calendars, in print and online, for details on subsequent dates or contact Newtown Senior Center at 203-270-4310 to learn more.

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Managing Editor Shannon Hicks can be reached at shannon@thebee.com.