The 12-member Bristol Budget Committee made its recommendations for the 2011 budget at a joint meeting Feb. 15 with the Bristol Board of Selectmen.
The committee differed with the selectmen on requests from non-profit organizations. While the selectmen recommended sizable cuts to town funding of several organizations, the committee, with some dissent, recommended the full requests of each agency.
The meeting opened with presentations from representatives of Central Lincoln County Adult Education, Youth Promise, Bristol Consolidated School and the Central Lincoln County School System (AOS #93).
Mary Trescot, executive director of Youth Promise, talked about the organization’s mission, including its effort to establish “boundaries” for its clients – boundaries the children’s parents often fail to maintain.
Trescot told a story about a boy who visited her office with his mother. The boy was wearing a “marijuana t-shirt” and Trescot told him to go into the bathroom and turn the shirt inside out.
After, despite a feeble protest, the boy left for the bathroom, his mother told Trescot “‘I guess I shouldn’t have bought [the shirt] for him.”
The Budget Committee, by a 10-2 vote, recommended Youth Promise’s full, $1500 request. (The selectmen had recommended $1000).
“They’re talking about kids who could cost us a heck of a lot more if they don’t work with them the way they’re working with them,” committee member Roberta Watson said.
Ellen Dickens, director of Central Lincoln County Adult Education, followed with a description of the recent growth in demand for the program. Six current Adult Education students haven’t attended high school at all, while 16 have completed one year or less.
“Those students need much more intensive service from us,” Dickens said.
Four Bristol residents graduated from Adult Education last year and seven Bristol residents are currently enrolled.
The Budget Committee later recommended Adult Education’s full, $9254 request. The selectmen had recommended $8102, equal to last year’s appropriation.
AOS #93 Supt. Robert Bouchard, Bristol Consolidated School (BCS) principal Jennifer Ribeiro and district business manager Deborah Giles answered questions about the proposed $4,176,936, education budget.
Total proposed expenses amount to an $85,892 decrease from the 2010-2011 fiscal year, with Bristol’s appropriation accounting for $3,538,077. The “fund beginning balance,” or surplus, is $421,583, an increase of $202,885 (92.8 percent), accounting for over half of the reduction in the total local appropriation.
The 2011-2012 state subsidy is up $52,137 (45.2 percent) to $167,530 and the budget also includes $49,745 in funding resulting from the passage of the federal jobs bill.
The proposed budget includes a $177,249 (7.1 percent) drop in regular instruction, including a $51,100 decrease in teacher salaries and accompanying decreases in teacher health insurance and other benefits.
According to Giles, BCS teachers will receive a 2.7 percent raise this year based on their contract.
The teachers receive raises “based on years of experience,” Bouchard said.
The school’s bus contract with First Student also includes a built-in, three percent annual hike designed to offset fluctuation in fuel prices, Bouchard said.
The 2011 budget figures heating oil prices at $3.50 per gallon, Bouchard said.
Phil Congdon encouraged the district to “run the numbers very carefully” and “very seriously” consider a switch to electric heat, a suggestion other committee members disagreed with.
“Oil may not be the best fuel going forward,” Congdon said.
According to Bouchard, the new elementary school in Jefferson will heat with wood chips.
Watson objected to at least one teacher’s salary. “You’re paying someone over $70,000 to teach 11 kids,” Watson said. “I think it’s wrong.”
Robert Davidson also expressed concern about growing salaries and asked the district to provide more information to the committee, including individual salaries and test scores.
The committee recommended the general instruction portion of the education budget 11-1 (Watson dissented) and the remainder of the education budgets, including the total budget, unanimously.
“Although we don’t always agree, I think we should wish Bob well in his retirement,” committee member Harry Lowd III said. The committee gave Bouchard, who is retiring just months after receiving the 2011 Superintendent of the Year award, an enthusiastic round of applause.
Discussion of the non-profit organizations followed, with Robert Tibbetts, Chairman of the Bristol Board of Selectmen, responding to a question about the selectmen’s decisions to recommend some requests in full while recommending cuts for other agencies.
“The ones that get our total recommendation are the ones that affect the largest number of people in town,” Tibbetts said.
Budget Committee members, however, questioned the selectmen’s logic.
“The town always chooses to support the proposed amount,” Watson said. “We represent the town.”
Any attempt to modify requests “flies in the face of practicality and experience,” committee member Jack Fitzpatrick said.
The committee, by a 9-3 vote, recommended the full, $2000 request from the Central Lincoln County YMCA. (The selectmen had recommended $1000).
After some discussion, the committee, by a 10-2 vote, recommended the full, $14,000 request from the Bristol Area Library (selectmen: $10,000).
“It’s a gem,” Watson said of the library. “It’s beyond me how you can think this isn’t something that not only affects, but is a huge asset for Bristol,” she told the selectmen.
“It doesn’t mean that we don’t support it. We just try to get a balance,” Selectman Paul Yates said. “If you don’t just say no once in a while it never stops.”
“Times are hard right now,” Yates said, underlining the selectmen’s attempt to hold the town’s mil rate.
“We’re willing to spend money to open a visitor’s center,” Watson replied.
Despite complaints about the agency’s failure to send a representative to speak with the committee, the committee also recommended, by a 9-3 vote, the full, $1200 request from Healthy Kids.
The committee recommended, by an 8-4 vote (the closest of the evening), the full, $8000 request from Lincoln County Television (LCTV). LCTV’s request didn’t pass at the 2010 annual town meeting. The selectmen had recommended $5000.
“Why we want to spend, spend, spend… I just don’t know,” Yates said.
Before adjournment, Davidson encouraged other members of the committee to protest the Lincoln County budget. He specifically cited the budget impact of the Two Bridges Regional Jail in Wiscasset.
“We’re nickel and dime-ing thousands of dollars,” Davidson said. “You can really save here if we holler at the right people.”
