City budget passes

By Katelyn Gendron-List, Staff Writer

AGAWAM After many hours of laboring over every minute detail of the new city budget, prior to the City Council meeting, the Agawam City Council passed the FY 2008 budget almost unanimously late last month.

The Agawam City Council voted 10 to one in favor of the budget, which according to Richard Cohen, mayor of Agawam, is a budget that maintains all public services and not a single layoff.

"I am extremely pleased that it passed because I think that it is an excellent budget," Cohen said. "The fiscal year 2008 budget is balanced, well thought out, and maintains all employees and services, while still keeping in mind our citizens and preserving our low tax rate."

When comparing Agawam to other cities and towns in the area, Agawam has the most comprehensive budget without having to substantially increase taxes, especially with the constant increases in the costs of insurance and fuel, according to Robert Magovern, vice president of the Agawam City Council.

"The budget was under a four percent increase, and that even includes things that people are facing at home because the cost of living and business is constantly increasing," Cohen said. "But we were still able to maintain our lowest split tax rate of any of the surrounding communities."

The current residential tax rate is $11.82 per every $1,000 value of home, and $25.65/$1,000 for commercial and industrial, Cohen stated.

Even though the budget passed in an hour at the City Council that means very little, according to Magovern. The budget was passed after three very thorough subcommittee meetings where City Councilors were given the opportunity to review various aspects of the budget in detail, debate topics, and ask questions.

"I don't want anyone to think that because the budget passed in an hour that there was very little time being put into it," Magovern said. "All of our subcommittees spent hours and hours together, and the department heads answered all of our questions there, rather than using the council floor to discuss the budget."

In addition to keeping the lowest split tax rate in the region, Cohen also stated that the budget maintained all the services that the people of Agawam have come to expect, such as the Police and Fire Departments, the school system and the library. There are also still no user fees in Agawam for buses, sports, or trash pickup.

However one Agawam city councilor, and chair of the Finance Committee, Cecilia Calabrese, did not agree with the proposed fiscal 2008 budget and opted not to vote in favor of the budget.

"The other city councilors knew my issues with the budget so they were not a secret," Calabrese said. "I've been talking about this since January or February of this year, that too much money is being spent on outside legal fees and not on special education services in schools."

However when asked about the possible lack of funds, John Kane, assistant superintendent of business and personnel for Agawam Public Schools, stated that there is plenty of money allocated every year for special education. And as far as the amount of outside legal fees, Kane went on to state that every three years it is a negotiation year, and because this year is a negotiation year, money for outside legal services must increase.

Calabrese went on to state that another reason she did not vote in favor of the new budget was because she was only able to attend one of the three subcommittee meetings due to scheduling conflicts. However she did not vote in favor of the budget last year either citing "too much fat in the budget."

"I cannot believe that there wasn't something that could be trimmed out of this year's budget," Calabrese said. "I know that some people in departments like the police chief and the superintendent of DPW got some pretty substantial raises [in salary] and that didn't have to be."

When asked about the raises in salary, Cohen stated that the raises given to the Police Chief and the Superintendent of the Department of Public Works were granted in two stages, one in FY 2007 and the other in FY 2008 via collective bargaining agreements.

Calabrese also stated her concern for the setting of the tax factor at the end of the calendar year, as she believes that property values have peeked and will start to go down.

"I am sure that the overall budget is reasonable but I think that maybe we could be doing better," Calabrese said.

In terms of next year's budget Magovern stated his concern for the maintenance of the parks, as there is an ever increasing number of parks, which according to him, will considerably increase the budget to be reflected in FY 2009.

"We're adding all of these parks and there's got to be allowances for maintenance," Magovern said. "Hopefully we'll have enough business increase to cover the tax space."

Overall the mayor stated that he is very pleased with the final product of this year's budget.

"This is my eighth balanced budget," Cohen said. "I am proud of the budget. I think that it was well thought out and I just want people to feel at home in Agawam."