MINUTES
SPECIAL JOINT MEETING
BOARD OF FINANCE & THE
BOARD OF COUNCILMEN
MAY 14, 2008
A SPECIAL JOINT MEETING of the Board of Finance and the Board of Councilmen was held on Wednesday, May 14, 2008 in the Council Chambers to discuss the budget.
Those in attendance included Mayor Ryan J. Bingham, members of the Board of Finance Daniel Farley, Laurene Pesce, Mark Bushka, Thomas Scoville, Wendy Traub, and James Zeller, members of the Board of Councilmen Rick E. Dalla Valle, Michael Colangelo, Elinor Carbone, Thomas C. Jerram, Marie P. Soliani, and Drake L. Waldron, Corp. Counsel Ernestine Yuille Weaver, and Comptroller Alice Proulx.
Mayor Bingham called the meeting to order at 6:00 p.m.
A discussion took place on the city budgets by the City Council and Board of Finance. Mayor Bingham noted that he would go over additional changes in the Parks & Recreation Budget. He thanked both boards for all their hard work and dedication. He asked the boards if they had any questions or comments.
Mr. Scoville asked if the mid size apparatus was added back into the vehicle replacement in the Fire Department Budget.
Mayor Bingham stated that several departments didn’t budget anything for their vehicle replacements and, during the April 28th meeting, the Council put everything back to status quo, or what they had been budgeted for, going from zero back to last year’s numbers because that would allow them the level of funding needed to start the new program.
Mr. Scoville noted that a large amount had not yet been expended in the Public Safety Miscellaneous Budget.
Ms. Proulx noted that there’s a revenue offset on Outside Duty Police. In regard to Heart & Hypertension, they try to budget for possible settlements. Whatever is not expended goes back into the Fund Balance.
FINAL APPROVAL #145
On a motion by Councilor Dalla Valle, seconded by Councilor Carbone, a discussion was opened to further consider approval of city budgets to finalize and advance them to the Board of Finance.
Mayor Bingham reviewed the new recommended changes by the Parks & Recreation Commission.
Line Item 5105 - Part time, increase of 26,702.00
Line Item 5753 - FICA, increase of $2,042.00
Line Item 5274.0001 - Maintenance Parks, increase of $1,328.00
Line Item 5398.0001 - Custodians, increase of $3,500.00
Line Item 5400 - Programs Community, reduced by $6,568.00
New bottom Line - $455,640.00
On a motion by Councilor Colangelo, seconded by Councilor Jerram, the board voted unanimously to tentatively approve the Recreation Budget, as amended.
Councilor Dalla Valle pointed out that the city is paying $8,034.00 for police protection at Twister games. He noted that the Twisters was the only team in the city that the city pays for, and that the city even charges Torrington High School kids to play at the field. When the Twisters first came to the city, they were giving 50% of their season ticket money to the city. That lasted two or three years, then it stopped. He believed the $8,034.00 for police protection was unnecessary because the Twisters are turning themselves into a business.
Chairman of the Parks & Recreation Commission Pat Fairchild indicated that this has been a concern of the Commission for many years. Unfortunately, it hasn’t been addressed because of the turnover in Parks & Recreation Directors.
Councilor Dalla Valle indicated that the city is paying anywhere between $20,000.00 and $21,000.00, between the police and maintenance, for the Twisters to play there.
Mr. Zeller inquired whether there was a contract involved, or any other offsetting revenue that they send to the city to compensate for the cost.
Councilor Dalla Valle stated that there is no contract, and they haven’t given the city money from ticket sales for years.
Mayor Bingham indicated that they sell signs, but that’s a separate entity, and they do park improvements based on a sub committee’s recommendations.
Councilor Dalla Valle said they have a salesperson who sells the signs to businesses and they keep that money to help with improvements.
MOTION #385
Councilor Dalla Valle made a motion to reduce this budget by $8,034.00, which would eliminate paying for police protection for the Twister games. Councilor Carbone seconded the motion.
A discussion continued.
Mr. Zeller asked if the police department would staff anyone at the games.
Councilor Dalla Valle indicated that police protection would be required; the City of Torrington would not be paying for it.
Councilor Jerram suggested inviting someone from the Twisters to a meeting. The city would still have to budget for police protection; it’s just a matter of recapturing the funds. Perhaps some negotiating should be pursued because they do receive benefits from the city at the taxpayer’s expense. He was concerned that if the funds were removed from the Recreation Budget, that they may go back in under Public Safety Miscellaneous.
Councilor Dalla Valle said it was the responsibility of the organization putting on an event to supply the police. The city is under no obligation to provide police protection at an event, other than a city event. The city does pay it, and it is reimbursed by the organization, plus 5%, but it will never show up in a different budget.
Councilor Jerram noted that they had to show it as an expense somewhere in the budget.
Councilor Dalla Valle said the city bills the contractor and pays the police officer, so there is no hidden expense showing up anyplace else.
Mayor Bingham stated that he had not met with the new owners yet, but will definitely make them aware of the matter.
Councilor Jerram thought that perhaps this kind of discussion with the Twisters should have been held two months ago.
Councilor Carbone said the reason she feels differently about it today than she did a month ago is the fact that the team has been purchased and, up until now, it was a non-profit organization. Now that it will be run as a business, it changes her perspective on the matter.
Councilor Colangelo thought it was best to leave the funds in the budget at this time and approach the Twisters in a timely manner. He thought the funds could always be used somewhere else within the Recreation budget.
Councilor Jerram suggested that perhaps all the benefits should be eliminated if the Twister’s composition has changed where they are there to make as much money as possible. He didn’t know if that was the right course of action, though.
Councilor Dalla Valle added that they also make money from the concession stand.
Councilor Waldron stated that they should also look at the fact that the Twisters are not charged to use the field, yet the high school is.
Mr. Farley said if the city cuts the money from the budget and the Mayor makes the presentation to the Twisters, what’s to prevent them from pulling out of Torrington or dissolving the team? He thought there needed to be some sort of discussion with the Twisters prior to making the decision to cut the expense from the budget.
Mayor Bingham agreed. Perhaps he could discuss the matter with them this week and have an answer by next week.
Mrs. Traub said she was very surprised that the people who purchased the team hadn’t contacted the city to discuss their plans. She said if the $8,000.00 was removed from the Recreation Budget and put into overtime, it could technically be moved back.
Councilor Dalla Valle said if it’s moved to overtime, it’s revenue offset, so if
it comes back, it becomes a liability.
Mrs. Traub suggested getting in touch with them soon.
Mr. Farley said it sounds like they expect to do business as usual.
Mrs. Traub noted that they were changing the ticket prices.
VOTE #805
Councilors Dalla Valle and Carbone voted in favor of the motion to remove the $8,034.00 from the Recreation Budget. Councilors Colangelo, Jerram, Soliani, and Waldron voted against the motion. On a 2-4 vote, the motion failed.
Mrs. Traub wanted to verify that the Board of Education will not have a contingency. No request has come forward from them at this point. There was discussion at their open meeting last week that they would like to add a contingency for next year, but she had heard nothing to that effect to date.
She felt the decision to take it out was a good one. She noted that they did ask the Board of Finance for additional funds several years ago when they ran into an unforseen situation. The Board of Finance realizes that the Board of Education doesn’t have an overage that they can go into. She also noted that they are expecting to receive another projected $600,000.00 to $700,000.00 for their excess out-of-district placements, and they found funds within their budget, so they will not have a deficit. She didn’t believe they needed the $250,000.00 contingency set aside by the city.
Mayor Bingham stated that all city budgets had been tentatively approved by the City Council. Once they are fully approved, they will proceed to the Board of Finance, where they have the opportunity to change line items on the city side only.
Mr. Scoville noted that they still don’t have all the pieces they need in terms of revenue. There’s always the possibility of having to come back to the Council to look for more cuts.
Councilor Soliani asked the Board of Finance not to take any money from Contingency in order to keep the mill rate down. Taking anything out of there could put the city right back to where it was in 1996 when the sewers collapsed and we didn’t even have a bond rating to repair them. She’s not in favor of taking any money out of the rainy day fund other than for catastrophic situations, because it took so many years to build it. Cutting into your savings to make your daily expenditures work is very irresponsible.
Councilor Dalla Valle asked Councilor Soliani if she was talking about Contingency or the Undesignated Fund Balance.
Councilor Soliani said “Any of them.”
Mr. Scoville strongly disagreed with Councilor Soliani. Granted, when the Undesignated Fund Balance was $45,000.00, it was too low. The bond rating of the city was the same at $45,000.00 as it is at $12 million. The $12 million is too large for an Undesignated Fund Balance. The city’s Undesignated Fund Balance increased $3 million in the past year alone. It’s not doing any good just sitting there. Some of it needs to be used in a down turn of an economy. The original recommendation was that it should be increased 3% to 5% of the total budget, and we’re more than10% at this time.
Mr. Bushka asked Ms. Proulx if she knew what the operating surplus will be for June 30, 2008.
Ms. Proulx said she’s thinking that there will be none, so there’s $2.3 million that was designated to the 2007-08 budget that will be coming out of Fund Balance.
Mrs. Traub asked where that will leave the city.
Ms. Proulx said there will be approximately $10 million left in the Fund Balance.
Mrs. Traub asked Ms. Proulx if the Fund Balance we had made a big difference in the re-financing of the bonds.
Ms. Proulx said it really didn’t make a difference. The bond rating agency said they don’t base it on percentages, they base it on whether or not our trend is to use the Fund Balance to support our operating budget. They want to see the Fund Balance grow without using a large portion of our funds for operating costs.
Mrs. Pesce inquired about the city’s balancing of the 2007-08 budget.
Ms. Proulx noted that the city designated $2.3 million of Fund Balance.
Mrs. Traub said she thought the coming year is the one they may have to tap into the Undesignated Fund Balance for because no one has any idea what’s going to happen with fuel, the economy, etc. They should definitely anticipate that something drastic is going to happen next year. They might be in a similar situation where they will need to take another $2 or $3 million. She pointed out that Mayor Bingham instructed his department heads to keep a close look at their budgets in the coming year.
Mrs. Pesce asked if the staggering manner in which new police officers are hired will hyper inflate next year’s budget when all of them are included in the budget.
Mayor Bingham stated that staggering will spread the cost over two years.
Mrs. Pesce stated that, at some point it will be an extraordinary expense because they will all be on payroll for the entire year.
Mayor Bingham said the increase next year is expected to be $176,000.00.
Councilor Jerram stated that the Council worked very hard to keep the spending down and he hoped that any cuts that needed to be made would be proportional in terms of the increase in spending in both the city and Board of Education side. He’s on record for saying that the Board of Education is on a trend toward a $100 million budget, and it will only take about another five years to get there at the rate they’re going.
Councilor Soliani said they could end up dipping into the fund every year because there’s money in there and it’s an easy thing to do. The people of Torrington can’t afford to continue this trend. She hopes the Board of Finance can find cuts so the use of the Undesignated Fund Balance is kept at a minimal or not used at all.
Councilor Carbone agreed with Councilor Jerram as far as the Board of Education is concerned. She indicated that the Mayor, the City Council, and the Board of Finance has demonstrated a commitment to the Board of Education at a time when it desperately needed it. She was in favor of a proportional look at whatever cuts are made, if cuts have to be made. It’s time to be more realistic about what the city can afford.
FINAL APPROVAL OF ALL CITY BUDGETS #1580
Councilor Jerram made a motion to approve the budget in its entirety. Councilor Waldron seconded the motion. A discussion took place.
Councilor Dalla Valle said to approve this budget in its entirety would be detrimental to the financial well being of every taxpayer in the City of Torrington; therefore, he will vote against the budget in its entirety.
Councilor Jerram asked if it was detrimental because of the $8,000.00 for police protection at Fuessenich.
Councilor Dalla Valle said “I said the budget.”
VOTE #1630
Councilors Carbone, Jerram and Waldron voted in favor of the motion to approve the budget in its entirely. Councilors Dalla Valle, Colangelo and Soliani voted against the motion. Mayor Bingham broke the tie and voted in favor of the motion. The motion carried.
ADJOURNMENT #1640
On a motion by Councilor Colangelo, seconded by Councilor Dalla Valle, the Council voted unanimously to adjourn at 6:50 p.m.
On a motion by Mr. Zeller, seconded by Mrs. Traub, the Board of Finance voted unanimously to adjourn at 6:50 p.m.
ATTEST: JOLINE LeBLANC
ASST. CITY CLERK
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