The Borough Votes Too—

It’s Budget Decision Time

By John Voket

Any Newtown taxpayer who feels inconvenienced by a quick trip to the polls for next Tuesday’s budget referendum may be inspired by residents of the Borough of Newtown. They get to vote on two budgets next week.

According to Town Clerk Cindy Simon, the annual Newtown townwide budget referendum will be held on Tuesday, April 26, from 6 am to 8 pm, at the Newtown Middle School Gymnasium. Ms Simon said the sole item on the budget referendum will on the following question: “Shall the sum of $90,006,226 be appropriated as the annual Town Budget for the 2005-2006 fiscal year?”

She said in a release to The Bee Wednesday that any person who is a registered voter in the Town of Newtown or who is a US citizen who is assessed at least $1,000 for the real estate or motor vehicles on the 2004 Grand List for the Town of Newtown is qualified to vote at the referendum.

Absentee ballots are available for the referendum during office hours, Monday through Friday, 8 am to 4:30 pm, and the town clerk’s office will have special hours on Saturday, April 23, from 9 am to noon for the sole purpose of absentee ballot voting.

According to the town clerk, any qualified person who meets any of the following criteria may vote by absentee ballot: active service in the Armed Forces; absence from the town during all the hours of voting; illness; physical disability; religious tenets that forbid secular activity on the day of the referendum; or duties as a referendum official at a polling place other than your own during all the hours of voting.

Taxpayers who live or own property in the Borough of Newtown are asked to turn out to Town Hall South for their annual budget vote Thursday, April 28, at 7:30 pm. Unlike the townwide referendum, which is conducted with voting machines, the borough vote is passed or defeated by qualified borough residents who gather for the activity in a meeting format.

Newtown residents who do not reside within the approximately one-square-mile of the borough are neither qualified nor permitted to vote on the borough budget.

Next Tuesday, qualified Newtown voters will be asked to accept or turn down a proposal that represents a $90 million-plus budget funding both municipal and educational operations, salaries, benefits, supplies, improvements, programs, and debt service. If the budget is approved by a majority of those taxpayers April 26, the new town budget will increase local taxes by 4.8 percent, and is expected to increase next year’s tax rate to 26.1 mills.

A mill represents one dollar in taxes for every $1,000 of assessed property value. According to town Finance Director Benjamin Spragg, the recommended budget for the year ending June 30, 2006, is as follows:

Board of Selectmen (municipal) budget — $33,067,456

Board of Education budget — $56,938,770

Total Budget — $90,006,226

Revenues provided in the selectmen’s budget are expected to total $11,655,935 and the Board of Education’s revenue contribution stands at $4,274,840, leaving $74,075,451 to be raised by taxation.

In a prepared release, First Selectman Herb Rosenthal explained that personnel related expenditures account for 60 percent of the increase. Of those items, the projected increase in premiums for employee health insurance is $571,250, or one third of the entire budget increase. Personnel wages, including contractual pay increases, anticipated union contract negotiations for three unions, and 3.5 new positions amount to an increase of about $430,000.

Nonsalary expenditures in the highway ($139,950) and winter maintenance ($60,000), parks and recreation ($152,483), public safety ($225,533) and library ($68,000) accounts have increases that amount to $645,966, or 37 percent of the budget increase. Therefore, all of the remaining accounts in the budget have an increase in expenditures of only $99,975 above the current year.

“It took the selectmen four meetings again this year to consider agency requests that would have resulted in an increase of almost 12 percent,” Mr Rosenthal said. “The selectmen cut those items by over $1.8 million to reach the submitted budget. Many of the decisions were difficult, but all were unanimous.”

Sarah Beier, co-chair of Citizens For Newtown, a local budget information group, referred to a recent letter to the editor she circulated in The Bee. In the letter, she challenged Newtown taxpayers to turn out and endorse the package.

“We have approximately 17,000 registered voters yet only about 5,300 voted last year,” she said, reading from the memo. “Let the record show this year that many more of us will care enough to vote April 26th for the things that make our town so special: responsive and civic-minded fire and police, schools bursting with eager children and dedicated staff, diverse recreational programs for all ages, a fabulous library, an overcrowded but spirited senior center, a large, picturesque town with well-maintained roads, numerous behind-the-scenes community services, and all of the things in between that we take for granted every day of our lives.”

 

Borough Budget Meeting

For the borough vote, qualified taxpayers are being asked to endorse or defeat a 2005-2006 proposal that represents an almost $27,000 reduction from the current budget. If accepted as presented, the new budget would represent an additional 0.85 mills in property taxes to property owners in the borough exclusively.

This tax would be in addition to any increase levied by the Town of Newtown for the next fiscal year. The borough proposes to raise $165,752 in property taxes, $20,000, which represents a reimbursement for the Health District, $14,000 in building permit and zoning fees, and about $1,000 in interest.

During an interview Monday, Warden Joan Crick, the ranking political leader in the district, said the interest was derived from the current borough general fund. While the records she had on hand reflected a current general fund balance of $157,000, she said a $28,000 expenditure for fire hydrant service to the United Water Company was scheduled to be made from that fund before the end of this fiscal year.

Victor Krochta, who is challenging Ms Crick for the warden post, told The Bee Wednesday that he was not happy that fellow borough residents were being forced to vote on their budget two days after the townwide referendum, and just a few days before borough voters will once again be called to vote in the May 2 Warden’s election.

Mr Krochta expressed frustration with the budget proposal, and felt borough taxpayers deserved to have the level of information about the budget process that was afforded to the general Newtown population over the past few months.

“I believe there is a need for a line-by-line review of the proposed expenditures against the current budget, before the 2005-2006 proposal is considered,” he said. “After studying the proposal, I have come to the conclusion that certain expenditures may be inflated and that the total borough budget reflects inadequate research and management.”

He cited several line items that had expended far less than the amount funded in the current budget.

“For example, the current budget reflects $4,000 for advertising but the most recent figures I am able to obtain reflect that only $900 was spent. The borough budgeted $2,000 for tree maintenance and no money was spent, and the 2005-2006 budget reflects an increase in that line item to $3,000,” he pointed out.

“In 2005, the only tree removal project I can find was done by Newtown Public Works crews at the expense of all Newtown taxpayers instead of using budgeted borough funds,” he said.

According to Mr Krochta, borough voters could reject the budget, or call for further clarification of any line items before the final vote is called.