WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — The Finance Committee last week voted to recommend town meeting pass a fiscal year 2025 budget that would result in about a 1 percent increase in the amount of money needed to be raised in property taxes.

 

The meeting at Town Hall was the last in a five-week series of sessions during which Fin Comm members repeatedly pushed to keep the tax levy increase as close to zero as possible at a time of rising costs both for Town Hall and the public schools.

 

"Overall, what I think you'll see is not a budget that is very exciting in terms of new ideas, new initiatives, things of that nature," Town Manager Bob Menicocci said when introducing the FY25 spending plan at the Fin Comm's Feb. 21 meeting. "But it is exciting if you want to see a relatively balanced budget that's responsible to the callout of where people wanted the budget to land.

 

"What that means as a bottom line is that we bring to you a budget today that shows a fair amount of growth in it despite the fact that we're really not adding anything new. It's just the cost of doing business for the most part. That's not a fun and happy thing. We want to deliver on the promise of having a budget that's reasonable and shows not a great deal of growth in taxation."

 

Over the next month, members of the Fin Comm encouraged Menicocci to raise the budget's revenue estimates from non-property tax sources (like the excise tax) and lower budgeted expenditures to better reflect actual spending in prior years.

 

Repeatedly, Menicocci defended the town's practice, which predates his arrival, of conservative estimates for both revenue and expenses, a practice that has led to a healthy unreserved fund balance, or free cash, that is applied to subsequent years' budgets.

 

Generally, free cash accrued in Year X is spent in Year Y on one-time expenses, like capital acquisitions, or applied to the Year Y budget to lower the tax rate.

 

In FY25, for example, Menicocci's plan calls for $1.4 million in free cash to be used toward a $2 million capital plan that will include a vacuum/jet truck for the Department of Public Works, a milling and paving project on North Hoosac Road, a new dump truck/plow sander and other infrastructure improvements.

 

Free cash also provides a cushion for the town in the year when it is raised, Menicocci said. If expenses run out of control, the town can access money from its unreserved fund balance with a simple majority vote at a special town meeting. Fin Comm members, in particular Fred Puddester, pushed back against the idea that the town should raise more in taxation than it needs in any given year.

 

"Yes, there will be future free cash [in FY25], but, in October, when a hurricane comes through, the bank account will be empty," Menicocci said at the March 13 Fin Comm meeting. "We all have to understand there's that factor."

 

"When the hurricane comes, say, 'We have a real problem. We need more tax revenue,' " Puddester said.

 

"If there's an exigent issue, we need to act," Menicocci replied. "It's nice to have a little bit of a cushion."

 

That March 13 meeting also saw another exchange between Menicocci and Puddester regarding the Fin Comm's overriding goal of keeping the budget as "flat as possible," a challenge issued by Chair Melissa Cragg at the Feb. 21 meeting that became a North Star for the panel.

 

"Do we agree we should keep the [tax] levy flat?" Puddester asked at the March 13 meeting.

 

"I think there's a vague understanding," Menicocci said. "I don't think it's something we've actually voted on. There are definitely concerns around that. Not everyone is on the same page on that. I hear all sides. Some folks are comfortable with … "

 

"Sounds like folks who are comfortable with their property taxes," Puddester interjected.

 

"Fred, if I could just finish," Menicocci said. "Everybody has a want. And if [increased taxes] were for 'this,' they could get behind it. That's what I hear on the pet project kind of front.

 

"If our levy is flat, we will be somewhat unique. Many other communities, peer communities, are looking at much, much steeper increases. If that's the goal, that's great. I'd ask that we keep an eye on it being a consensus goal. While the Select Board has said, broadly, let's keep an eye on this and keep it under control, they haven't said specifically what they are comfortable with and what they aren't. If this is the case at the expense of reserves, they didn't speak to that yet. That's important to recognize."

 

Longtime Fin Comm member Elaine Neely made a succinct case for holding the line on taxes.

 

"We have a tax rate which is causing long-time residents, people I grew up with, to move out of town because they can't afford the tax rate," Neely said. "I very much am in favor of keeping it flat."

 

Molly Magavern, who joined the panel last year, offered a counterpoint.

 

"I'm not quite there yet in saying we should keep the tax rate flat," she said at the March 13 meeting. "In the 30-plus years I've lived here, when I was on the School Committee for six years, when I was on the School Council for another six years, what I've observed is people in this town are willing to pay for the pretty high level of services we're getting.

 

"I'm trying to think of initiatives that were voted down at town meeting. We almost unanimously passed a very expensive fire station [in February 20230]. People are willing to pay for things in this town. I want to temper that with the obvious concern that we don't want to price people out of this town either. But I'm not quite there yet in saying a 1 percent increase or something like that we shouldn't consider."

 

And that is about where the town budget landed in the version that the Finance Committee endorsed on Wednesday night.

 

Cragg explained after the meeting that the actual levy will be up by about 2 percent, but after a $100,000 application of free cash and adjustments for new growth in the property tax base, the effective increase for taxpayers will be closer to 1 percent.

 

While the spending plan for the fiscal year that begins on July 1 is approved by town meeting in May, the final property tax rate for FY25 is determined in late summer after the town's assessor presents their findings to the Select Board at its tax classification hearing.

 

In the weeks leading up to Wednesday's advisory votes on 25 town meeting warrant articles related to spending, the Fin Comm had the opportunity to pore over the spending plan and ask pointed questions of Menicocci, town department heads and other governmental and non-governmental bodies funded by the budget.

 

No department head got more of a grilling than DPW Director Craig Clough.

 

"While it appears, superficially, you're only asking for a 1.75 percent increase [from FY24], when we compare it to the number for this year's first six months, annualized … it still seems that I think you were asking for a lot more than you need," Cragg told Clough at the Fin Comm's March 6 meeting.

 

"On highway … if you look at six months [actual expenses], it's $422,000. Double it, and you get $845,000. Look at the detail to see what's missing, you can see asphalt and chip seal at zero for the year, so I'm assuming some seasonality to that. So I added the whole thing in and inflated it. That brings me to a budget of just over $1 million. But you're asking for here $1,283,928. Explain to us why this needs to increase by 30 percent."

 

Clough, who started as DPW early in FY24, said he cannot speak to how the department was budgeted in the past but told the committee the budget he proposed is reasonable given the expenses he will face in the coming fiscal year.

 

"I might want to move these numbers around in the future," Clough said. "But just coming into it the first year and still using old contracts for paving, I'm not sure where we're going to land on it. But I do want to try to utilize that money to preserve our roads better than we have in the past.

 

"We do have other contracts coming into play this year that we usually do biannually. Every two years we do our gravel crushing, because we can't get a contractor in here to crush gravel for us for $10,000. Mobilization is $6,500 just to get their equipment here. If we don't try to build that money up a little bit more, we can't get a contractor to come in."

 

And the FY24 year-to-date actuals are skewed in the DPW by vacancies in some positions, like the one Clough left to become director in June 2023; that spot was vacant until November, he told the Fin Comm.

 

Michael Sussman asked Clough where the actuals for the highway budget will land when the books are closed on June 30.

 

"That's hard to say," Clough answered. "We're just putting out bids now for certain jobs we're going to be doing that are in our operating budget — like gravel crushing and stump and brush grinding. You're going to see more money spent this year, because we're starting to get to some of these things that haven't been done in a while.

"We won't know what the real numbers are until we get bids in — if we even get bids. Sometimes we can't get someone to bid because we're not a large enough project. I can't give you a real number, but I daresay we won't be leftover with $330,000 again this year, because I want to utilize it. I don't want to leave it sitting there when I know there are things that need to get done."

 

One week later, Cragg said she agreed with Menicocci that the DPW budget should stay as presented.

 

"I kind of concur with that," she said. "I'd like to give Craig [Clough] a year under his belt like we gave [Menicocci] a year under your belt. Next year, when we're all sitting around this table, if they're coming in at the same levels, we have to say …

 

"I would hope at that point we've also settled our approach to other questions that have come up," Menicocci said. "Craig has done an amazing job getting up to speed. There's a lot of work to take on, not just day to day but understanding the long-term needs of the organization. He's very thoughtful in what he's doing."

 

The Fin Comm did succeed in getting a couple of changes in the revenue and expenditure sides of the ledger for FY25.

 

On March 13, Cragg noted that the final budget included a $92,000 reduction in a $1.4 million line item for health insurance to make the budgeting less conservative. And Menicocci confirmed on Thursday morning that he added $40,000 to the anticipated revenue line for motor vehicle excise taxes — a specific "conservative" estimate that was called out by the committee at its March 13 meeting.

 

In addition to all the town departments, the Fin Comm heard presentations from the town's two public school districts — the Northern Berkshire Vocational Regional School District and Mount Greylock — and three non-profits that, for years, have received taxpayer support from town meeting: the Williamstown Youth Center, Williamstown Chamber of Commerce and Williamstown Community Preschool.

 

The NBVRSD, or McCann Tech, appropriation to the town is up by 25.6 percent from a year ago, an increase attributable to more students from Williamstown attending the North Adams vocational school.

 

Its $326,687 bill pales in comparison to the $13.8 million assessment from the preK-12 Mount Greylock district, which educates the majority of town residents.

 

The Finance Committee did not question the 3.9 percent increase from Mount Greylock's FY24 assessment. Rather, it recognized that the district will need more town support in years to come. It was clear from Wednesday's comments that members of the Fin Comm heard loud and clear the district's message that relying on its reserves to offset rising costs is not a sustainable strategy.

 

"It's not reasonable for them to … keep saying to them we want the same quality of product but only at a 3 percent additional cost," Cragg said. "Because they're not going to be able to pull this reserve in every year. We can limp in this year, but we can't continue to do it forever."

 

The Fin Comm also did not challenge the funding requests from the Chamber of Commerce or the Youth Center, but some members did take issue with Community Preschool, specifically around how the non-profit plans to deal with building needs at its home in the former Methodist Church on Main Street.

 

"It sounds like, even in a period of renovation, your cash on hand already represents three or four years of capital expenditures," Cragg said at the March 13 meeting.

 

WCP Board President Lauren Svenson told the Fin Comm that after a couple of years of receiving increased state and federal aid during the COVID-19 pandemic, the preschool is operating at about the break-even point or at a little bit of a loss at this time.

 

"We have a really old building and a really big building, and we're looking to do the bare minimum to make the building a safe place for the kids," Svenson said. "We are working on a full construction set with an architect that will take it out to bid. … I think the amount of money we could spend on maintenance is unknown at this point, but it's not a small quantity."

 

Later in the meeting, Cragg noted that the preschool was late in providing the financial report that the Fin Comm requests of non-profits seeking financial support from the town and that the school has not provided the committee with the long-term capital plan that the committee has requested in years past.

 

"They're sitting on $1 million plus in cash, and that is after they did the repairs that we asked for," Cragg said. "We do need to get their attention and say we're going to consider you again next year, but this year we're going to take you out. I don't think I have the votes for that, but I'd be irresponsible if I didn't put it on the table."

 

No one moved to strike the preschool warrant article from the town meeting agenda, and, ultimately, it received a 7-0 recommendation from the panel at its March 20 meeting. Cragg said Fin Comm members Magavern and Michael Sussman would reach out to the preschool board of directors about creating a long-term plan.

 

Toward the end of Wednesday's meeting, Cragg indicated she was pleased with what the Finance Committee accomplished this winter.

 

"A 1 percent increase given the inflationary pressures everyone is under — to come up with a 1 percent increase in property taxes is yeoman's work," Cragg said. "Next year … I don't see how the schools will come across with another year of 3 percent increases.

 

"What I'm hoping is next year maybe there are some savings in the DPW budget that can be given to education … so we can steadily raise the property tax. I hope our Select Board friends find a 1 percent increase in property taxes acceptable."

 

The Select Board, like the Fin Comm, makes advisory votes on the budget to the annual town meeting, which is scheduled for May 21 23 at Mount Greylock Regional School.