By Brian Burns
Staff writer

Town Meeting members approved a $48.6 million operating budget for fiscal 2004 on Monday night, following all of the finance committee’s budget recommendations with only a few questions.

Based on an anticipated 15 percent cut in state aid, the budget manages to preserve some key positions in the police, fire and school departments – but it will still result in some serious cuts.

This year’s budget process has been one of the most difficult in recent memory. Town and school officials have had to plan for some serious budget cuts while at the same time dealing with confusing and sometimes contradictory information from the state.

The process has yielded some healthy debates between the finance committee, selectmen and the school committee – most notably about the use of trash fees or reserve funds to bolster the town’s budget.

Yet all of the budget lines voted Monday night were passed as the FinCom recommended, with little debate from the Town Meeting floor.

According to the latest projections, Walpole will have about $1.84 million less in state funding to work with next year – a cut that Town Administrator Michael Boynton characterized as deeper than the town’s “fair share” of the state cuts. Fiscal 2004 begins on July 1.

Spending for fiscal 2004 will be about $1 million higher than it is this year. The additional funds are the result of higher local collections and the use of free cash for one time expenses.

Those increases are outweighed by the funds needed to fulfill the town’s new contract negotiations and to cover the cost of rising expenses, however.

In order to compensate for the shortfall in state aid, Boynton has had to cut several municipal positions and consolidate others.

The budget passed Monday calls for the elimination of a building maintenance custodian, the town administrator’s aide, a health department sanitarian, a DPW motor equipment mechanic, the deputy engineering inspector, the superintendent of the parks department and a DPW highway craftsman.

The cuts have also resulted in a reduction in hours for the zoning secretary. The town’s collection office will be losing a staff member to the Town Clerk’s office. The vacated position in the collector’s office will not be filled, Boynton said.

The Walpole Public Library is losing the high school pages that help to shelve books in the afternoon. The library will be closed an additional day a week beginning in September.

On the school side, the reduction in state aid will mean the elimination of 21.4 full time positions, including nine classroom teachers, two media specialists, two administrators and approximately six health and gym teachers.

The Town Meeting-approved school budget of $23.9 million includes $45,000 that was transferred over from free cash and $291,000 in additional appropriations – “savings” that the town realized after the health insurance and solid waste budgets turned out to be lower than expected.

    It does not include the $591,000 in funds that the schools are hoping to see from a fully funded special education circuit breaker.

The school committee’s approved budget of $24,686,000 anticipates those funds.

If everything goes according to the school plan, the department could end up saving more than 20 teachers and keep class sizes below the 30-student mark.

Additional appropriations also made it possible for the police department to keep two dispatcher positions.

Thanks to a complex formula that involves increasing ambulance fees and working towards a full paramedics license, the fire department budget has enough funds to keep the two firefighter-paramedic positions that were originally going to be cut July 1.

The fire budget also includes funding for one month’s worth of salaries for four new firefighter/paramedics.

Those positions will be filled in June of 2004, the last month of the fiscal year, as part of Chief Edward Hartmann’s long-term plan for upgrading to paramedics service.

The only budget line that was subject to any extended debate on Monday night was that of the board of assessors.

An alternative motion submitted by Town Meeting member Carol Lane and seconded by Tom Bowen sought to take away the $8,500 in salaries that is traditionally paid to the three-member board of assessors.

In return, Lane proposed to increase the board’s expense account by $2,000 to cover any unanticipated expenses. Thus the net savings of her proposal would be $6500.

In presenting her alternative motion, Lane pointed out that the assessors are the only elected board members in town who are paid for their services. Even selectmen no longer receive a stipend, she said.

Lane said that she had submitted the alternative motion to give Town Meeting a chance to look at the policy again.

Assessor John Fisher told Town Meeting members that his board occupies a unique position in town.

As assessors, they have to take course work and pass a test just to be certified, he said. If they don’t do their job the right way, then the town can’t collect tax money.

The $8,500 or so in salary that is split among the three board members hasn’t changed in 20 years, Fisher said. However, their responsibilities have increased significantly.

“It is deserved,” Fisher said. “I urge you to continue to do it tonight.”

Town Meeting member Mary Jane Brady asked if the FinCom had discussed the alternative motion. (Both Lane and Bowen are FinCom members.)

FinCom Chairman Al DeNapoli told her no.

Lane said that she had asked the question when the assessors were before the FinCom. She did not formally present her alternative to the committee.

Brady said that since the substitute motion would constitute a major change, she would prefer to have it reviewed by all committees rather than be something that came off the floor at Town Meeting.

Saying that he had tried “desperately” to stay out of the conversation, Assessor and Town Meeting member Clem Boragine listed three reasons why he thought the assessors deserved compensation.

 First, they are the only town board that answers directly to the state Department of Revenue, he said.

Second, they do an awful lot of confidential work with senior tax abatements and are very successful at it, he said.

Third, the Department of Revenue has made so many changes to the assessment process over the last 10 years that they have to spend a great deal of time just trying to catch up, he said.

Boragine said that the town made a big mistake in taking away the stipend for the board of selectmen several years ago.

The board of assessors doesn’t deserve the same “slap in the face,” he said.

On a voice vote, Town Meeting approved the FinCom’s main motion, continuing the assessors’ stipends..

Town Meeting members made it through 14 of 42 articles Monday night before adjourning shortly after 10:30 p.m. They were scheduled to reconvene last night.

A special Town Meeting is planned for this Monday (May 12) to discuss two zoning changes proposed by former selectman Joanne Muti.