MINUTES
BOARD OF FINANCE
DECEMBER 18, 2007
A REGULAR MEETING of the Board of Finance was held on Tuesday, December 18, 2007 in the Council Chambers.
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, Corp. Counsel Ernestine Yuille Weaver, Comptroller Alice Proulx, Data Processing Manager Rudy Pullano, and Board of Education Facilities Manager David Bascetta.
Mayor Bingham called the meeting to order at 5:00 p.m.
MINUTES #025
On a motion by Mr. Farley, seconded by Mr. Zeller, the board, with the exception of Mrs. Pesce and Mrs. Traub who abstained, voted to accept
the minutes of the regular meeting held November 20, 2007.
OPEN TO THE PUBLIC #035
On a motion by Mr. Bushka, seconded by Mr. Zeller, the board voted unanimously to open the meeting to the public. There was no public participation.
EXPEND FROM AUCTION PROCEEDS (VEH. REP. CONT.) #050
On a motion by Mr. Farley, seconded by Mr. Scoville, a discussion took place in regard to the Council’s request to authorize the Board of Education to expend $3,680.00 of auction proceeds from Vehicle Replacement Contingency. (Tabled on 11/20/07).
Mayor Bingham said the item was tabled due to a concern about whether or not it had passed by the Superintendent’s desk.
Board of Education Facilities Manager David Bascetta indicated that the Superintendent of Schools had given him permission to bring the request before this board. He noted that there was some confusion in terms of the Vehicle Replacement Contingency, and that the Board of Education still does not belong to it; therefore, the proceeds from the auction could have been steered to a different account. The truck that was auctioned was originally purchased through a capital expenditure in 1994 and deemed unworthy to be on the road by the city’s Fleet Manager Mike Michaud, but, because it still had some value, it was brought to the auction.
Mr. Bascetta said that from the time of the auction to the present, unforseen expenses occurred on one of their major snow removing pieces of equipment that needed to be addressed immediately. His request was to bring the $3,680.00 back to their budget or transfer the funds directly to the vehicle maintenance department where it could defer some of the costs on the repairs they need to have done.
Mayor Bingham asked Mr. Bascetta if he had a general maintenance account for repairs.
Mr. Bascetta said he did, however, that line item has $19,000.00 to maintain more than 35 pieces of equipment. Since it’s not a large amount of money, he was hoping to get the $3,680.00 back in order to offset some of the costs to repair the major snow removing piece of equipment.
Mr. Bascetta informed the board that there was a misunderstanding on the Board of Education’s list of vehicle inventory and the board is still waiting for the revised list and schedule before the Vehicle Replacement Program can be forwarded to the Board of Education. He stated that the Board of Education has not passed a formal policy and they have not received a proper report that would address their vehicles directly. The original report omitted better than half of their vehicle inventory so there’s no adequate way to see how they’re going to perform in that program in the next ten years. Most of the larger pieces of equipment, a few plows, and a few tractors were omitted from the list. It was his understanding that Mercury Associates was supposed to send them a revised list at
the end of this month for them to re-visit.
Mr. Farley asked how they will financially handle the remainder of the $19,000.00 for repairs after Mercury Associates finishes the report and the Board of Education gets on board with the program.
Mayor Bingham indicated that the Vehicle Replacement Program going forward will have a charge back system. The City of Torrington will ultimately own the vehicles, which will be based on a 15 year schedule of replacement, and charged an X amount to replace them. The Board of Education will be billed for the maintenance work that’s performed on those vehicles. By tracking the maintenance costs for each piece of equipment, they’ll have a better understanding on how to budget for them.
Comptroller Alice Proulx said the general fund purchased the vehicle in the first place, so any salvage value that we get for sold vehicles goes back into the Vehicle Replacement Contingency. Any residual in the Board of Education budget is still general fund money. At the end of the year, it still goes back to the general fund. The $3,680.00 would have either gone back into the general fund as a miscellaneous revenue or gone back into the Vehicle Replacement Contingency Account, which is what we do with all the salvage values. Any emergency repairs for vehicles are brought forward to this board for monies to be taken out of the Vehicle Replacement Contingency. Basically, it’s general fund money. If we were to give the $3,680.00 back to the Board of Education, which is the general
fund budget, we would essentially be changing their budget. This way, the repairs are coming out of the proper fund which is where the salvage values for those vehicle sales go into.
Mr. Scoville asked if this was the Board of Education’s first request like this.
Mr. Bascetta said yes, because they were never involved in the Vehicle Replacement Contingency.
Ms. Proulx said they were really talking about where they would put a residual value for a vehicle paid out of the general fund if those resources went back to the Board of Education.
Mr. Bascetta asked if the funds could go back to the Equipment Maintenance Department where they could offset some of their charges for the repairs.
Ms. Proulx said that’s what will happen once we get the billing for it. It’ll be paid out of the Vehicle Replacement Contingency to Equipment Maintenance. This is just a request for Mr. Bascetta to expend the money out of Vehicle Replacement Contingency for the repairs because this is above and beyond what his equipment repair budget is.
Mr. Bascetta explained that the Board of Education had ownership of this vehicle from 1994 and it was deemed unusable. Had he decided to repair the vehicle instead of auctioning it off, they would continue to have the vehicle, but because they don’t have the vehicle any longer, he was looking to get the value of it, which is $3,680.00, put back into the same department.
Mrs. Traub cited a similar instance with the Torringford Elementary School project where the committee received rebates which they wanted to apply to the project and they were told anything coming back would come back to the city because the city is the one who funded the project to begin with.
Mrs. Traub said the Board of Education should have knowledge of any request for additional funds. She noted that the maintenance repairs line item should be looked at when everybody starts reviewing their budgets to see if it has a severe problem and if it warrants requesting money from the city. She wasn’t certain at this point that they should worry about requesting additional funds from the city when they still have funds in their line items.
MOTION TO DENY #625
On the previous motion, the board voted unanimously to deny the Council’s request to authorize the Board of Education to expend $3,680.00 of auction proceeds from Vehicle Replacement Contingency.
HOMELAND SECURITY PURCHASES #635
On a motion by Mr. Farley, seconded by Mr. Zeller, the board voted unanimously to accept the Council’s request to waive the bid process and authorize the use of $24,544.00 from Contingency to purchase communication equipment and accountability system. Funds will be reimbursed from 2005-2006 Homeland Security grants.
Mayor Bingham pointed out that the 2007 and 2008 funds will be shared by the region.
EXPEND PRIOR YEAR FUNDS #725
On a motion by Mr. Farley, seconded by Mr. Zeller, the board voted unanimously to authorize the expenditure of funds from prior year PO#03-4369 (Financial Management Upgrades) for the implementation of the “cost charge back system” proposed by Mercury Associates.
Mrs. Pesce pointed out that the request didn’t specify the amount of money.
Ms. Proulx indicated that it was $8,640.00.
Mrs. Traub asked if the cost included all departments, including the Board of Education. She expressed her concern about Mercury Associate’s ability to deliver an accurate report when they omitted 50% of the Board of Education’s equipment.
Mayor Bingham noted that it did include the Board of Education, but if it didn’t include all of their equipment, he would have them remedy the matter. He noted that Mercury’s next stage would be to tell all departments, including the Board of Education, what they should put in their budgets for vehicle replacement.
Mrs. Traub said Nancy Haynes, the Business Manager, was aware of the discrepancy and the reason the board didn’t make any decisions on getting involved at the time was because they didn’t have accurate information and didn’t feel comfortable going forward. She said she heard an adjusted report would be available some time in December that would have all the Board of Education’s information on it.
Mayor Bingham said he hoped to have a report (revised) ready for next month.
PRIOR YEAR: FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT UPGRADES #840
On a motion by Mrs. Traub, seconded by Mrs. Pesce, the board voted unanimously to authorize the expenditure of an amount not to exceed $10,500.00 from prior year PO#03-4369 (Financial Management Upgrades) for the purchase and support of a new citywide Email system.
Ms. Proulx explained that these were encumbrances which had accumulated over two or three years for a huge project of shared services, namely a financial management upgrade, with the Board of Education. That didn’t occur and encumbrances remained open in the event we did move forward with it. This is the most appropriate use of these funds since they are upgrades to all of our systems.
Mrs. Traub asked how much had been encumbered and not used, and which shared services were they looking to do.
Ms. Proulx said there was a total of $200,000.00 over the course of three or four years. She said they implemented the use of the same financial management system, and they were looking to incorporate shared services with field maintenance and equipment maintenance. If the encumbrances were closed, the revenue would go back into the general fund balance.
Mr. Zeller pointed out that the expenditure was a bit over $10,000.00 and asked if went out to bid.
Rudy Pullano, Data Processing Manager, indicated that there were separate components, including the licensing, software and hardware, which came from different vendors.
BUS: MAYOR & MEMBERS #960
On a motion by Mr. Scoville, seconded by Mr. Farley, the board voted unanimously to consider business presented by Mayor Bingham and members of the Board of Finance.
Mayor Bingham and the board welcomed Mrs. Pesce and Mrs. Traub to the board.
Mr. Farley commended everyone involved in the successful referendum to renovate City Hall.
ADJOURNMENT #1040
On a motion by Mr. Scoville, seconded by Mrs. Traub, the board voted unanimously to adjourn at 5:35 p.m.
ATTEST: JOLINE LeBLANC
ASST. CITY CLERK
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