Our town administrator, Mr. Gagne, has responded to the opinion letter from Ms. Days about a week ago. You can find his response at this link. In reading the two letters, I am struck that they don't seem to be...
..talking about the same thing. Ms. Days talks about the requirements of the town charter (Section 5-3) which says,
The budget message of the executive administrator shall, include, specifically, projection of the fiscal and financial needs of the town for at least the next five fiscal years, or such longer period as may be deemed appropriate, both as to income and expenses, as well as any substantial financial expenditures contemplated by any department, committee, or board during such period, including budget programs related to infrastructure maintenance, improvement and expansion. The message shall also include a forecast of any fiscal trends which the executive administrator believes are likely to have an affect on the town’s revenues or expenses.
The charter says that the budget message will be an annual submission by the Executive Administrator to the Finance Committee and town.
Mr, Gagne's response, while listing a variety of planning documents and reports, does not mention the budget message as it seems to be envisioned in the Dartmouth town charter. It is this budget message about which Ms. Days was inquiring, "Neither our long-term revenue projection (which we do have) nor a complete long-term financial projection, the budget message, (which we don't have) constitutes the entire five-year plan". I wrote in this post that the plan, as envisioned in the charter, is being worked on but still incomplete. After reading Mr Gagne's letter, I am not sure we were talking about the same thing. I will continue to inquire about it and let you know here what I find out.
Thursday, June 19, 2008
What IS a plan?
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16 comments:
I would think that since the executive administrator answers to the Select Board his letter would have been vetted by his bosses. If Mr Gagne is writing letters that do not represent the SB views who does he speak for? Is communication between the SB and the Exec Admin still so poor that something like this still occurs?
I really think that when the Charter changed, M.Gagne did not change with it. He might not know what his job description is anymore. He has worked for the town for 20 some odd years, and doesn't know how to conduct business any other way.
Maybe this is an opportunity for the SB to discuss this with him.
The SB, in the past, at least, seems to have been part of the problem, if the members did not require him to present a 5-year plan to them. How easy would it be for them to change now? They always seem to be quite happy with the status quo and all involved in it, and don't hesitate to say so; praise all around for everyone's wonderful job.
Mr. Trimble, has the SB specifically requested this 'plan' from the executive admin? If not, why not? When was the last time a performance review was performed of our administrator's job performance? If our town is to be run like a business, most businesses review their top administrators performance on at least a yearly basis and report back to their shareholders. If performance is not up to par, the person is given the reasons and an opportunity to make improvements. If that person is never evaluated as to strngths and weaknesses they will never know they are not performing upto the task. It's time for a performance evaluation to put a stop once and for all to this circular discussion that seems to have no resolution.
Between you, Ms. Gilbert and Mr. Michaud, this should be able to be accomplished.
Freetown sure seems to "get it".
"Freetown override is 'band-aid'"
http://www.southcoasttoday.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080620/NEWS/806200351
Freetown gets some of 'it' FrankG. The are paying 90% of their employees health care and are hoping to get to 70%!
Also FrankG, few in Dartmouth that I am aware of have said that an override is the 'end all, be all' but rather a part of a solution.
Without a finite plan that closes the deficit gap an override is not even part of the solution. It just buys time while we continue to scratch our heads. Pretty soon you end up with a whole box of band-aids and still no solutions.
Also, I have always said that if we had done a better job with controlling health care costs by limiting high-priced plans, offering "plus 1" plans, having reasonable co-pays, and bidding out the service, that we could be in a situation of giving our employees a better percentage split. 50/50 doesn't seem right to me, and of course neither does 90/10. Something around 60/40 is much more common.
Our Town Administrator is tasked with running our town. He can and does have his own opinions that differ from those of the Select Board members. For that matter, the opinions on the Select Board differ too. There is no requirement to clear the Executive Administrator's or a Select Board member's opinion with the others. People do need to understand that the town administrator and Select Board members are speaking only for themselves. That applies to my postings here and the published letters from others.
I don't know if the Select Board has specifically asked for a budget message such as the Town Charter calls for. I will find that out.
My understanding is that there have been performance reviews for the past few years but I have not participated in any as yet during my short tenure.
Perhaps I should clarify my comment and add that the Select Board sets the policies that are followed by the town. The town administrators must follow those policies. They may agree or disagree with the policies but would circumvent them at some risk.
Thanks for the explanation Mr Trimble. An item as important as this 'plan' seems to be I would think should be at the top of both the SB and Town Administrators list of things to do. If for no other reason than to say 'it's done' let's move forward. Could we agree on that at least? Can we get this 'plan' done and make some progress please.
Lastly, are performance reviews ever made public?
I disagree FrankG. A sensible override is part of the solution for Dartmouth along with some of the changes that have been made and continue to be made. Even Freetown noted many of the same problems that we face, they face, from health care costs, utility costs and un-funded state mandates.
Dartmouth has gotten its reasonable override. Now where is the progress?
It is ok to disagree, but let's be clear about what we disagree about. If another override is necessary it needs to come after the plan is developed, and everything has been done to close the escalating gap between revenue and expenses. Bil has Blogged early on about just what the problem is, and his explanation is very good.
The BRTF found it very clear that if big changes in how we do business aren't done, we will need $3M overrides every 3 years. I suppose you think those are sensible and will support every one. I assure you that will NEVER happen with the majority of the taxpayers.
Attitudes are changing in town and that is good, but everything that has been done so far is in the category of saving hundreds and maybe some thousands. The problem is that we need millions. Most things are "in progress" or "will do" or "will try to do", but nothing on the list so far will close the gap.
Several of us have spoken about how there needs to be structural change as well as adopting every good business practice we can get our hands on. Those that think we can just crawl along will find that decisions will have to be made in a reactive mode during a crisis, again. It is much better to be proactive and work to the proper end under a controlled situation.
The $2M+ overrides that were passed allow that controlled situation to take place, but only for a little while. The clock is ticking and in about 2 years we will be in crisis mode again.
Sure, other communities are in a similar situation as we are. Most of them will find out that we are just ahead of the curve, but if you think large overrides will pass in every community as bail-out money, you are mistaken. Every community has to learn how to get more value for the taxpayer money that is already given, and only ask for more when ALL avenues are exhausted. Any more overrides until that time are neither sensible or reasonable, and in fact impede the real progress necessary.
As the other anonymous points out, sensible/reasonable overrides are also in the eye of the taxpayer. Some will support no more overrides under any circumstances, so that plan on how to close the gap, as well as real change better get here in a hurry.
FrankG, yes, I see more override requests in the future for Dartmouth as well as many other municipalities. Turning around the ship of state can only happen so fast no matter how good the intentions are. I see that as an issue that needs to be discussed so that we are not in crisis mode 2 years down the road. It's all well and good to preach about structural changes but as we all can see this does not happen overnight and there are a large number in town that do not agree more cuts and sacrifices are the only answer either. So we'll have to agreee to disagree.
This town cannot count on overrides in the future, especially considering their failure in the past.
Dartmouth voters are not going to continue to throw more money at the town. We need a five year plan and even longer (some towns have a 10 year plan). This is something that has been requested for some time, yet we still have no plan.
I'm sorry to say that M.Gagne's letter in the S-T did more to confuse people then answer a question that Bev Days asked. It is obvious that the SB needs to direct M.Gagne to design a plan for Dartmouth.
One of the reasons things happen so slowly is that we do not have a strong town leader. Most in town agree.
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