Town of Lyme
Budget Committee
January 28, 2004
7:00pm
Lyme Town Offices
PUBLIC HEARING on Proposed Lyme Highway Maintenance Facility Bond
PUBLIC HEARING on Proposed Town and School Budgets
Approved: February 11, 2004 by Budget Committee
Approved: February 18th by Board of Selectmen
Present at this meeting: Selectmen: Richard Jones and Peter Bleyler. Budget Committee Members: Gibb Cornwell, Mike Smith, Josh Kilham, Chairman Barney Brannen, Judy Shelnutt-Brotman, and Freda Swan. Road Agent Fred Stearns III. Transfer Station Committee members: Steve Maddock and Simon Carr, Energy Committee members: Carola Lea and Claudia Kern. Project managers for CCI: Ross Currier and Bryant Lehr. Public: Don Elder, Tony Ryan. Administrative Assistant Carole Bont, and Scribe Dina Cutting.
PUBLIC HEARING OF BOARD OF SELECTMEN
The Public Hearing on the Bond for the Lyme Highway Maintenance Facility was started at 7:05am.
Mr. Jones brought the Selectmen’s meeting to order and opened their Public Hearing about the Bond for the proposed Lyme Highway Maintenance Facility which includes the Highway Garage. Following this discussion the Budget Committee will hold their Public Hearing concerning the proposed Town and School Budgets. The Highway Maintenance Facility bond will be worded in such a way so that it will cover more than just the building. The Town will need to address the salt shed and other structural issues related to the Highway Facility at the same time. It was noted that the Transfer Station will be addressed by its own Committee at a later date.
Ms. Shelnutt-Brotman, Chair of the Facilities Committee, passed out handouts concerning the proposed Highway Garage. Project managers for CCI, Ross Currier and Bryant Lehr were present to answer any questions that came up. Ms. Shelnutt-Brotman reviewed the Committee’s work and proposed figures for this project. The Committee does not have final sketches and figures. The Committee has finished the preliminary work. The Committee cannot pay for final plans until the Bond is passed. Followed was a discussion concerning how a bond is setup, when and if you can pay down a bond early, saving money by paying on the bond early, interest rates, and the term of the bond. The School Bond was also discussed. It was noted that the School Bond cannot be paid down early without a penalty. If the Town has the option to pay this
Bond down early the Town could save about $25,000.00. It was noted that the Committee should be ready to inform the Town about the status of the School Bond. The goal is to make as much information as possible available to the public ahead of time. February 11th, 2004, will be a Budget Committee’s Public Hearing on the money warrant articles and a public meeting to inform community members about the proposed Highway Maintenance Facilities and Bond. This meeting will be held at the Lyme Center Academy. Ms. Shellnutt-Brotman urged community members to join them at their weekly meetings. She urged them to bring any questions or concerns to the Public Works Facility Building Committee to be addressed.
In order to keep the cost of the Highway Garage down some aspects of the garage were cut. There will be two items that will be considered as add-ons.
1) The mezzanine, a wood framed storage space above the office. This would be very nice to have. There is a need for storage space. Wood-framed storage space would be “bare boned”, versus steel-beam supported storage space which would support more weight. It will cost much more per square foot to put this in after the building is built.
2) The “Green” wood furnace. This is a furnace that runs on wood pellets. It has an automatic feed system. The additional installation cost of about $17,000.00. The Committee is talking to the Lyme Foundation about the possibilities of helping with this in the way of a grant.
The warrant article for the Bond will only be for the cost of the facilities without the mezzanine or Green wood furnace. Although the Committee believes these two add-ons are important, the Committee is trying to keep the cost down. The Committee will be looking at some insulation issues with the Energy Committee. If the Bond passes the Committee will be able to work from finalized plans, and then they can look at some energy saving issues. Followed was a discussion concerning the yearly cost of this building, the proposed budget and whether there was enough money budgeted to pay monthly utilities. The Committee will be contacting Public Services of New Hampshire to gather information on what they think the cost will be and how to save energy in this building.
Mr. Brannen asked Tony Ryan and Fred Stearns if they would publicly support this proposal for the Highway Garage. They both felt this was a sound proposal, and agreed to support it at the informational meetings and Town Meeting when the time comes.
Mr. Maddock spoke about the Transfer Station Committee’s information concerning property for a new site to house the Recycling and Transfer Station. Followed was a brief discussion concerning possible sites for the Transfer Station, encouraging all to let the Transfer Committee know of any possible sites. The Town of Lyme is committed to recycling however we are not doing a very good job. The Transfer Committee will continue to meet and keep looking at options available to the Town. They will be visiting other sites to gather information. The Budget Committee, Selectmen and Transfer Committee do not want to lose any viable options. The Town needs to address the Highway Garage and then look at the Transfer Station needs and options. Any kind of lease or purchase would
require a 2/3rds vote at Town Meeting. Such a vote cannot be taken this year. The Transfer Station Committee has $10,000.00 to work with.
At this time (8:15pm), there being no further questions or comments, Mr. Jones moved to close the Public Hearing. Seconded by Mr. Bleyler. Voted unanimously in favor.
Mr. Jones moved to recommend a bond for $555,000.00, $530,000.00 to come from a USDA bond and $25,000.00 to come from THE Public Works Facility Capital Reserve fund, to finance the construction of a New Lyme Highway Maintenance Facility. Seconded by Mr. Bleyler. Voted unanimously in favor.
Mr. Jones moved to adjourn the Selectmen’s meeting for the Public Hearing on the Highway facilities Bond. Seconded by Mr. Bleyler. Voted unanimously in favor.
PUBLIC HEARING OF BUDGET COMMITTEE
At 8:17 the Public Hearing for the proposed Town and School Budgets was called to order by Chair Brannen.
New budget worksheets were distributed. The Budget Committee has a few issues to deal with tonight.
1) MS-7 is not revised and will not be available for signatures tonight.
2) The Library Budget.
3) The warrant article for the Library.
The Librarian’s benefits line needs to be increased to $18,218.00. When the Trustees submitted the figures for the budget they did not include the total benefits amount. They inadvertently forgot to include the retirement benefits for the Librarian. Would the Budget Committee please add $1,953.00 to this line? This would make the bottom line for the Library’s budget $108,763.00. Followed was a discussion concerning the correct way to present the Library’s budget to the Town at Town Meeting. The DRA give Carole Bont the language for this warrant article. This would take the amount of the Library budget to come from taxes ($108,763.00), and add to it the $10,565.00 the Library has from its own account and put it all in an individual warrant article. The warrant article now meets the “gross budgeting” requirements of our independent auditors as well as the requirements of the DRA. After a brief discussion Mr. Smith commented that we have to follow the DRA rules and if Bob Anderson told
us to handle this warrant article a certain way then we need to do it.
Ms. Shelnutt-Brotman moved that line 358 be increased to$108,763.00 to add the retirement benefits, and the total amount $119,328.00 for the Library be an individual warrant article for the Library’s budget. Seconded by Mr. Smith. Voted unanimously in favor.
Ms. Shelnutt-Brotman moved $2,709,770.00 as the figure for line 453, Current Years Appropriations. Seconded by Mr. Cornwell. Voted unanimously in favor.
Mr. Smith moved that we raise $530,000.00 in a bond or loan source for the purpose of building the Lyme Highway Maintenance Facility. Seconded by Mr. Cornwell. Voted unanimously in favor.
The Budget Committee will meet on February 11th, 2004 at 7:00pm for a Public Informational Meeting concerning the proposed Bond for the Lyme Highway Maintenance Facility. After this meeting the Budget Committee will vote on any warrant articles containing money (if any have been submitted). Before this forum the Budget Committee will meet at 6:30pm in the meeting room of the Lyme Center Academy to discuss and sign the MS-7 and MS-27. Mr. Brannen will ask Mr. Bardos to be present to answer any question the Budget Committee may have.
It was decided to have a work meeting to prepare for presenting the Bond at little town meeting and Town Meeting. This meeting will be at 7: 00 pm, on Tuesday February 17th, 2004
REMINDERS:February 11th, 2004, 6:30pm Lyme Center Academy meeting room to sign MS-7 & MS-27.
7:00pm Lyme Center Academy hall (up stairs) for Public Informational Meeting on Highway facilities bond.
After this meeting Budget Committee to vote on Warrant Articles, if needed.
February 17th, 2004, 7:00pm Working Meeting for Budget Committee concerning the presentation of the Bond and Budget for Little Town Meeting and Town Meeting.
At 8:45 Mr. Jones moved to Close the Public Hearing and adjourn this meeting, Seconded by Mr. Smith. Voted unanimously in favor.
Respectfully Submitted,
Dina Cutting
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