The fix is in on the water deficit
Notice which departments didn't contribute... Police and Fire who between them spend 2 million a year plus on OT. Arrests are down 80%, FPD said they are giving out summons instead of arresting some criminal violators. Crime continues to drop in the Ham so it would be sensible to think that court time OT has dramatically been reduced, detective time, etc, yet the administration takes money from media services which is separately funded by the three cable company's. That revenue (almost 1 million a year and dropping) is only to be used for public access, Gov access and the school channel as far as I know.
And again, the administration ignores the revenue that will be coming in slowly over the next two years from the cannabis industry, which the COO stated would be 500k to 600k when everyone is up and running. I would have preferred to see that tax revenue go towards the deficit.
From the MWDN:
The fix for the multi million-dollar gap will come from dipping into the city’s free cash reserve. The water and sewer department enterprise funds will each be cut by $100,000 and $200,000 more will be taken from the general reserve fund. The proposal includes using $2.1 million from free cash to cover the deficit.
Various city departments will pitch in about $661,000 to refill the free cash fund, including $411,000 from the city’s schools, $150,000 from the library, $27,000 from the Council on Aging, $22,700 from media services, $21,000 from Planning and Community Development, $19,000 from capital projects and $10,000 from Loring Arena.
More:Framingham Finance Subcommittee agrees on solution to $2.5M water-sewer fund deficit
Some councilors were concerned about the $150,000 being allocated from the library budget, however, Mary Ellen Kelly, the city’s chief financial officer, said the library funds are savings from unfilled jobs. The library has been closed throughout the ongoing pandemic.
“This is not a cut to the library budget,” said Kelly. “These are funds that are essentially savings, but have been generated by vacancies that occurred during the course of the fiscal year.”
posted by Jim Pillsbury @ 1:01 PM
4 Comments
4 Comments:
I think taking from the library makes sense. Having been closed to the public for a year now they must have saved a lot on salaries, and if they have not, then shame on them. You don't need the same number of staff to operate a business that is not open, even I can figure that out.
We had to come up with this money somewhere and there were not a lot of options. This is better than adding to the already planned water and sewer rate increases I hope you would agree
I agree on the library as well.They were the low hanging fruit. And I thought that Loring was state ordered shut down for a while last year. I would bet there's utility savings there.
Maybe I'm wrong but I don't see how a rate increases is still not going to happen. I'll ask George. I thought we were 1 million plus for last year and 1 million plus for this year and next year which starts in July, may be still not at pre-pandemic water usage levels.
I thought they were saying a rate increase for the water and sewer of 20%? If that is not the plan then what is? Bail them out again next year? We had to bail them out before the pandemic so that is not the cause of their being in the hole.
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