The Finance Committee met last night and were presented with info on warrant articles for the Fall Town Meeting. The Director of the DPW, Mr Hickox, went over articles to transfer funds from the sewer and water enterprise retained earnings to the operating accounts of the enterprises. The need for the transfer was increased utility, chemical, and fuel costs for the sewer enterprise and increased chemical cost for the water enterprise. Mr Hickox was not sure ...
...whether the rates would be need to be raised to cover future operating budgets. He indicated that he and the Budget Director will meet this week to go over the numbers.
The committee discussed the need for more information when presented with Reserve Fund transfer requests. Noting the departmental turn backs from departments such as the police, Mr Lynam questioned whether a different decision would have been reached by the Finance Committee on Reserve Fund transfers for cruiser repair at the end of last year. The town administrators may move funds within a line item appropriation by town meeting without any action by the Finance Committee or Town Meeting. In the case cited, the funds needed for repair could have been transferred within the police expense line item to cover the cost. The police expense line item finished the year under budget.
The Finance Committee voted to support the use of FY08 surplus revenue to cover the settlement of collective bargaining contracts which require retroactive increases for FY08. The town is currently in FY09. They also discussed that all increased labor costs would have to be provided out of the current FY09 budget. This will require action by town meeting to transfer funds within line items of the budget. Some budget items will have to be reduced and the funds transferred to salary line items. The Budget Director is still looking at current line item budgets to decide where these transfers would come from.
The Finance Committee took a dim view of proposed articles to use FY08 surplus revenue to provide funds to set up an employee education account, a disaster preparedness account and a emergency fuel assistance account. Each of these three requests was for $10,000. They cited their policy of not using one time revenue for recurring expense.
Not discussed in that vein was an article to transfer $300,000 or more for instructional materials from surplus revenue to the school department. I believe that the instructional material article is also against our policy of not using nonrecurring revenue for recurring expense. The Finance Committee is claiming these materials are one time capital expenditures. I think not. There may be good reason to provide the surplus revenue for instructional materials and I probably would support the measure. However we must acknowledge that it is against our policy and state the reasons we feel compelled to provide the funds anyway.
Friday, September 19, 2008
My Finance Committee meeting report
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14 comments:
I don't see a difference between the school article and the others that were panned. The state DOE includes money for instructional materials in their foundation budget. It seems apparent they, the state DOE, feel this is an ongoing expense. Dartmouth schools spend well below the amount that the state includes in that foundation. Yes Greg, I know they have some money in the budget every year for instructional materials. Obviously not a sufficient amount.
I agree with the Fincomm in that the the books are a capital expense as would be a roof or other piece of machinery. People want the schools to be run like a business. The business is learning. If the business is learning then a set of equipment(books) designed to last ten years has to be considered a capital expense. If they were to be used one year than I would agree to that it is an ongoing expense.
Thanks anon 10:58. I could'nt have said it better myself, notwithstanding what poor policy would have me say. ;)
Greg Jones
Accepting for the sake of argument that the books themselves are a capital expense, should the training required and the student workbooks then be excluded from the amount of the appropriation? If not, how do training and consumable materials fit the description of capital expense? Ms. Clark has stated that training and consumable materials are part of the purchase.
Returning to the premise that books are capital items, your definition is so broad that almost anything fits into it. By your definition, a desk, a telephone, a trumpet, or a basketball would all be capital expenses. That seems clearly ridiculous to me. Buying those things or books as capital items would be poor policy :)
Bill - thanks for the updates on meeting discussions and the other info you share. It would be nice if we could move to get the FinCom meetings televised.
I would not break out the training required for the k-5 program or the workbooks for that matter no more than I would break out the cost of an air filter on a police cruiser. But honestly poor policy I'm going to try and stick to my new, new years resolution and refrain from posting to anonymous posts. I know they seem to be a necessary part of getting dialogue going but they too often morph into less than informative diatribes. Until that changes, if it ever changes, I'll keep my comments limited to forums where people identify themselves and stand behind their comments not a pen name.
Greg Jones
What less than informative dialogue are you referring to? I pointed out that the school request contains elements that clearly cannot be construed as capital expense and the definition of capital outlay that you and the FinComm want to apply is so broad that nearly anything fits the description. Having no reasonable counterargument, you resign from the discussion citing my pseudonym as the reason.
Sorry poor policy, did not mean to impune your posts in particular that have generally been above board even though I don't agree with them usually.
Overall, I just find it funny talking with people that refuse to put their name to their opinions. I'm not trying to stop the practice but I don't have to participate in it either. Consider it my loss, I can live with that.
Greg Jones
"Capital Expense: A capital expenditure is one that will benefit one year or more. It can increase the quantity or quality of services to be gained from the asset" (http://www.abcsmallbiz.com/reference/glossary/glossary_bcd.html) the books are obvious. the training(provided the same teachers teaching this year will be teaching next year) is also obvious
in fact all the objects you named(desks,telephones etc) are indeed capital expenses according to the definition. This definition was not plucked out of thin air to meet this example. These are what capital expenses are. examples that arent are school supplies,copy paper etc...
I agree with Anon 2:01 about the capital expense especially after reading the definition of capital expense. I also agree with Mr Jones about Anon submissions. An old saying goes" dont say anything you wont sign you name to.
OK then. By your definition of capital expense, the $10,000 for training of employees and for disaster preparedness is capital expense. Therefore the FinComm should support those articles as well. But they don't! Which takes me back to what I originally posited, there is no difference between the school article which they support and the others that they do not. It seems to be poor policy ;)
As yet, no one has addressed the consumables (workbooks, etc.) within the proposed article.
I 100% agree with FrankG. I think the FinCom meetings should be televised. FinCom, along with the SB and SC meetings, pretty much dictate the governing of our Town, each in its own way. Other boards are televised; why not FinCom? I think the residents would gain a lot of knowledge from televised meetings, as they would see how financial decisions come about, and the reasoning behind them, not to mention the dialogue that goes on between FinCom members and Town administrators, which frequently is of opposite sides. Televising meetings would help to eliminate misinformation.
I also agree. Many interested people cant attend due to busy lives(myself included) especially since the beginning of school. I definitly would watch. The more people who become informed and rely less on heresay and misinformation the better Dartmouth will be.
Some of us have told Fin Com they need to be televised for a few years. Complain to the Chair and the Moderator. More stuff goes on at Fin Com than SB. Too bad the school dept. never had a SC/ Fin Com Liasion, would have helped education for years.
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