[R]UTLAND — Members of the Board of Aldermen trimmed very little from next year’s proposed municipal spending plan during their initial review, but they aren’t done yet.
The board is set to meet at 5:30 p.m. today, Dec. 20, for its final budget session. The 11 members are expected to hammer out a number that will appear on the ballot for voters to consider on Town Meeting Day in March.
Board committees have been meeting for several weeks to review different parts of the plan for fiscal year 2019. Mayor David Allaire last month presented to the board his proposal with a 4.5 percent increase in spending.
The board’s Public Safety Committee reviewed the proposed spending plans for the Police and Fire departments and, after a bit of debate, agreed to recommend both as presented.
Alderman Tom DePoy, a committee member, remarked at the meeting on how little money has been trimmed.
“We’ve only cut about $30,000 of a $1.2 million increase,” DePoy said of the overall budget.
The board can only reduce the budget, not make additions, according to the city charter.
The budget the mayor presented totals just over $22.02 million, up about 4.5 percent, or $946,058, from this year’s spending plan of a little more than $21 million.
However, he didn’t account for special items for social service agencies, which totaled about $300,000 in this year’s budget.
If social service agencies get approval for the same amounts as the current year, that would bring the spending increase to more than $1.2 million, or close to 6 percent.
The Public Safety Committee debated a bit Tuesday night whether to reduce the number of sworn police officer positions in the proposed budget from 40 to 39. That is projected to save about $100,000.
DePoy raised the issue, saying he wasn’t necessarily in favor of it. But he said the department historically has rarely reached the fully budgeted staffing number because of turnover over the course of a year.
Police Chief Brian Kilcullen told the panel the department is currently paying the salaries for 39 sworn officers and that another is close to coming on board.
Alderman William Notte, the committee chair, said he couldn’t support bringing the force down to 39, especially since the proposed budget had already reduced that figure from 41 to 40.
Notte said public safety is an area taxpayers expect to be funded, adding that he hears very few people say they want fewer police officers rather than more.
Allaire echoed Notte’s comments, saying he didn’t have people coming up to him on the streets to tell him the city has too many police officers.
Eventually the panel agreed to leave the 40 sworn officers in the budget.
DePoy asked the chief to look at reducing the overtime budget, especially if the department was going to be fully staffed.
“I’ll look at it again,” Kilcullen replied.
A few big-ticket items that generated debate at the committee level in recent weeks but survived the initial review are expected to come up again tonight.
At the top of that list is a proposed 3 percent pay raise for nonunion employees. That figure made it through the committees, though board members said they would revisit the matter at the final budget meeting.
The 3 percent increase was proposed to keep the nonunion increase on par with what union members get.
Also at the committee level there was a bid to remove a little more than half the $692,000 budgeted to fund the city’s pension liabilities.
The board approved a resolution in 2016 to start setting aside money to pay down costs associated with its now-closed pension fund, which several years ago had been underfunded.
Another item that stirred discussion at the committee level, but remains in the budget, is a proposal for the Department of Public Works to buy a 5-ton dump truck with plow to replace a 2000 truck. That purchase is budgeted at $142,000.
The department has eight of those trucks and seeks to replace one a year to make sure the winter maintenance fleet remains in “reasonable” condition, Public Works Commissioner Jeffrey Wennberg wrote to the board.
