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Date: 6/10/2020
WEST SPRINGFIELD – With exactly one month until the new fiscal year begins on July 1, the West Springfield Town Council approved an operating budget for FY21 in the amount of $101,953,378.53.
Mayor Will Reichelt and Town Chief Financial Officer Sharon Wilcox presented the budget to the council at its June 1 meeting. Reichelt had previously explained that he and Wilcox had based the proposed budget on that of FY20 and then trimmed approximately $1.5 million.
“Financially, right now, we’re still in a good space,” Reichelt said, noting that there was no need for a tax rate increase and no layoffs.
Wilcox explained that there had been a .29 percent increase over FY20, partially due to increases in state-mandated costs.
The town is anticipating a 14 percent drop in state aid, although final numbers have not yet been released. The town has also lost direct revenue in the form of meal and hospitality taxes.
“We’ll see at least a quarter of revenue missing due to closures over the past several months,” Wilcox said.
To make up for the missing revenue, Wilcox said, the town eliminated non-recurring costs and cut positions which were vacant or from which current personnel were retiring.
She said that the town is being very cautious in where they use money from the free cash account in case the state funding cut is more dire than expected.
Town Councilor Nathan Bech applauded the government departments for being “creative” to make the budget work.
“There’s many unknowns,” Councilor Edward Sullivan said regarding state aid in town revenue. “Kudos to the mayor and his team for putting this together.”
The council also approved the budgets for four enterprise funds - the Ambulance Enterprise fund at $1,984,642.64, the Water Enterprise Fund for $6,023,717.58, the Sewer Enterprise Fund for $6,668,911.59 and the Cable Television Public Access Enterprise fund $344,747.08.
Councilor Sean Powers reported that the high school students who had proposed a polystyrene ban in February had updated the council with details on alternative products and pricing differences. However, Powers said local “Ma and Pa” shops and restaurants have expressed concerns about the ban.
“I think it’s important to show our students and our future leaders that while things outside in the federal government and globally may be changing the course of the way we may act - we as a local municipality have the ability to continue to try and control things from within,” Powers said.
Due to financial hardships caused by the pandemic, which had not yet happened when the ban was originally proposed, Powers suggested changing the effective date to two years from passage rather than one year. He said that as town officials, they had to “balance the environmental, the town, the community and the businesses.”
Councilor Michael Eger disagreed with the amendment as proposed and said a single year was the correct window for businesses to comply with the ban if passed, but noted now might not be the time for it. Fellow Councilor Dan O’Brien agreed with Eger.
“In this time I am reluctant to add one burden or regulation to businesses as their kids from the state regulated into the ground,” O’Brien said and suggested tabling the ban for one year until financial hardships have eased.
“In year-and-a-half, if we are in no better position, we have a lot of other things to worry about,” Powers countered. He again stated that a two-year window to comply would not be financially detrimental to businesses, none of which, he noted, had appeared before the council on the matter.
Eger insisted that he is against polystyrene but said, “a lot of these places will have to reprice their menu items.” Councilor George Kelly also said now was not the time for the ban.
Ultimately, the council voted to approve the polystyrene ban with a two-year window for businesses to comply.
The council also approved two reserve fund transfers in the amount of $75,000 for unforeseen overtime in the fire department and $143,265.94 supplemental snow and ice removal funds.
During the public comment Jeanne Galloway of the Board of Health praised school nurses for their help with COVID-19 case contact tracing.