Barre Finance Committee Authorizes Higher Snow Removal Spending Amid Budget Pressures

BARRE -- January 24, 2018, Barre Finance Committee votes to raise snow removal spending ceilings as FY19 budget pressures mount. The committee, chaired by Zachary Macutkiewicz, unanimously authorized raising the highway snow removal supplies account to $200,000 from $105,000 and the overtime account to $250,000, with the overtime line already 96 percent expended in January. The governor's FY19 local aid estimates, received the day of the meeting, showed a 3.5 percent increase in unrestricted government aid but a nearly 40 percent cut in state-owned land reimbursements, a $40,000 reduction that the town administrator said would produce a $24,000 structural deficit if not restored. A property tax impact sheet distributed at the meeting showed that using the full 2.5 percent Proposition 2½ levy increase alone would raise the average single-family tax bill by $87. The committee plans to press state legislators on the reimbursement discrepancy and has set a firm position of no more than a 2 percent increase in the regional school assessment ahead of the Quabbin district's first budget meeting.