001[Music] thank you everyone for being here I'd like to call our um our meeting to our public hearing on the budget to order uh before we get into uh the presentation I would like to ask everyone to stand and I would like councilman Gman to lead us in the pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for it stands one nation God indivisible with libery and justice for all so the first thing we'll do tonight is uh we do have a presentation normally we do it at the first council meeting in March but last night we uh due to some uh what was on the agenda last night we thought it'd be a good idea to do the presentation before we open up the public hearing tonight
002so at this point I believe I'm going to turn it over to the town manager good evening good evening Mr chairman yes I think I will uh move to the uh Podium and then I'll give the presentation there um I will likely go through about uh 10 slides deep into the presentation uh in terms of expenses and then then I'll uh turn to superintendent uh for his part of the presentation and then uh back to me for uh the remainder uh in terms of Revenue on uh Debt Service and so forth so with that I'll I'll take my post up there and we'll get started so I'll start uh with um a repeat of the comment I made last night which is this this these numbers are going to look uh familiar in terms of
003a sense of of the uh impact uh as it did from you know from last year I think the uh increases were uh 20 or $30,000 apart um and last year was just over 6% uh and this year we're at 5.82 but I'll I'll jump into that so it's going to look somewhat familiar um the uh State mandates uh as we mentioned and talked about last night in detail uh about the motor vehicle and the uh valuation changes um roughly the impact as you'll see in a later slide is about 600 uh a little over $600,000 um the veterans exemptions that we talked about uh that Sarah Carey had walked us through last night um has an impact as well I do have that number that was an open question from last night that $4
004million uh equates to a net impact Revenue loss of 132,000 so there some of the headwinds uh based on state mandates that we're we're facing and uh in the uh Grand list growth item two uh we're at 39% and that's significant as you'll see later on uh in the slide deck when we get to um I think it's slide 11 later on you'll see that in the past or previous two years that growth has been sign significantly higher uh that has uh resulted in almost a million dollars in in Revenue um in the last previous two years so we we'll get to that that'll be later on but um not what we expected in terms of of uh Grand list growth um the hiring point point number three was just something I wanted to add
005uh to try to put into perspective um what we're facing with in in the market um running a quick quick report uh back from uh July 1st just 8 months in we've hired 15 new employees three of which you've seen here before the council in terms of police officers with uh another 12 in various departments throughout the town in term and and of course you've heard uh you know about some of the higher profile ones in terms of department heads but the um Library director and assistant have both moved on and so we're filling those positions uh the planner is uh retiring and leaving next week so we're in the process of bringing a new person on board and so forth and so on uh but that's uh almost two a month in average uh
006and so it's been a very very busy year and terms of the employee uh retirements and or just leaving and working on on retention and Recruitment and uh I will say that consistently throughout this process in the interviews um the 4-day work week has come up as a major uh attraction to uh planville and and what we're seeing is that these lateral transfers coming in are uh at or above uh what we're posting in terms of Market salaries so it's uh quite a challenge for us um but again knock on wood um I think the planville reputation is is very good and combined with a 4-day work week it's making the difference uh for us so we'll continue to do the best we can on uh Recruitment and Retention so proposed budget uh 76,1 74,7
007uh represents a 5.82% uh increase year-over-year of 4,1 18784 uh as I said that's um really close to the same numbers you saw last year now into the uh more nitty-gritty in terms of the uh the um mill rate increase uh Blended rate is going to be uh proposed at this point 1.73 um and you look at the um differences there in the six-year average um umus 1.22 Ms or 6 - 6.5 3% just like to give a historical um average if you will or the last uh you know few years just to put it into context of what kind of movement we've had uh with respect to the budgets and and Mill rates and obviously you know we continue to work with the state and this this sort of moving Target with Motor Vehicles
008so uh it's it's a challenge as well now um Board of Ed uh breakdown is uh 2.5 uh million or for a 5.54% increase town government 1.3 million or 6.07 uh capital projects $250,000 and Debt Service additional 100,000 that's how we get to the 4,187 848 and a 5.82 that's the breakdown here is a visual pie chart for you sometimes helpful and our average increases as you see uh in the last 12 years expenditures um so the last four years have been um incredibly difficult uh in meeting the challenges uh we've talked in the past about inflations and mandates all coming together in The Perfect Storm uh to continue to drive uh our expenditures up so here's the inflation um schedule we've had that in the past as well like just want to be consistent
009and and continue to run with that trend on the six-year uh average 3.58 that was as of February uh presentation here uh my general government summary of expenditures General government up 4.63 Public Safety up 1.3% Public Works up 5.2% Health and Human Services 2.4 Civic and cultural 3.9 employee fringe benefits 6.6 5 and Sun uh 59.6 7 the transfers out um I did want to say um just the insurance and I I'm repeating myself and again um just it's a highlight from last night as well but looking at double digigit numbers in terms of health insurance uh cost for uh both the town and and Board of Ed going up 10 and 11% respectively uh major uh major increases so uh again major drivers um Personnel cost 530,000 police retirement um 69,000 Municipal flat health
010insurance is 187,000 other contractual 492,000 gas diesel fuel 33,000 other insurances on the other side not the health but the other insurances we have a decrease which is good it's always helpful and uh other line items 102 so on our side U major drivers um equate to the uh 1.3 million that we have outlined and I think that's where I'm going to pause in terms of our uh expenditures and uh I will turn the mic and the pointer to our superintendent Brian ree po it's a clicker more than a pointer good evening um thank you for this opportunity my apologies foring back this is the best you here sorry um so thank you for the opportunity um to present our budget tonight we really appreciate all the support we um get uh we're trying to
011do really good things um and um all of your support is very much part of that so and so I know many of you know this but our budget process really starts when we finish the last year um September and October are about bringing our department heads together and kind of coming up with what are the needs um and what are are the needs to to make uh the work we're trying to do happen um because the budget is one of the biggest leverage points in our process December becomes a month of number crunching um and then January is a a number of long nights with the board going over every line item and asking um many many many questions um and we try to answer them the best we can um and support them
012to move forward to segue from the town manager's report um the the retent retent and recruitment um is one of the buried things in our budget there was a time you could come in at a lower percentage because you knew if you lost a a teacher at the elementary school who was at the higher steps you could bring somebody in at the lower steps and you could pretty much guarantee every year that was something you could do um that time has passed um those um if you um are in any field in our schools um you have the ability to move around the state if you choose to do so um that has never been the case in 26 years of education um we have never had that opportunity um and now pretty much any
013teacher has that opportunity so um it's a buried number um you can't kind of necessarily find it but we are not able to do some of the magic we did once where we could bring kind of through attrition find a fair amount of savings so we're doing some really really good stuff for the town for our students um we see a lot of our students increasing their dual enrollment which means they're taking college classes while they're in high school so what does that do it does two things for them it allows them to start college with some credits so maybe that means they save some money for their family maybe that means they are have the opportunity to take other classes in college um because they're there anyway um or It prepares them to say
014I can take a college class I know what that's about um and there's nothing better than trying something out when you're have a little more protection like the high school setting we also have our students increasing the amount of AP courses they take um in percentages increasing how many AP courses and tests they're taking um and so and if you can take an AP class you know you can walk right into most universities um state universities anyway um and know that you're up for that kind of material um so that's a great offer we have and the fact that our students uh continue to increase the number of students and the number of tests that are taken both and the scores are continued to Rise um all together is really good news for us we're
015always engaging last night there was a conversation about do we um have any relationships with Trump um and they've been very supportive of us they actually have been in the schools um and we are very appreciative of them and many many other organizations the Dunkin Donuts guy in town said you know look if you need anything catered let me know because we will help you out with that um so um it is a very supportive community and we have some very nice relationships um that make a big difference for planville we are we use the the remnants of the um covid funds and a reading Grant um to put a new K3 instructional um reading program in for next year um and that was purchased without affecting the town um but we're really excited that
016we believe that that is going to make a big difference for our younger grades in Reading we're implementing a K12 instructional model so teachers have common language that they can talk about um as they study how to do our um do more for our students and know more about what they're learning and how to teach them better uh we're always increasing our supports for our students with special needs um we've created opportunities for our students um to to share when they're having difficulties by asking them to um asking them questions um helping them through technology and trying to meet their needs where they are um and before they are you know get worse um we are also jumping into the process of developing a state-of-the-art curriculum um during the pandemic and and the years since
017a lot of expectations around curriculum has changed and we're really excited um to move along those on that process so part of what I wanted to do is kind of share with you kind of where where to look at this budget in terms of the bigger picture um and I apologize because I can't actually read it all the way across the room but that red line oh is this a pointer sweet that red line which is right there um in the middle that's planville and if you look at the um the blue lines from left to right are the costs per student um in our state so you see ours is essentially in the bottom about the bottom 25% of districts um so when you're on the street and somebody says well aren't we more
018expensive than every other District you can say no actually uh about 75% are more um costs more per student than we do wrong button so this is one of the things in the m in the news you'll see that there's a conversation out there about4 million or $50 million for excess costs so this graph shows you over the last 18 years um what's happened with excess cost in terms of the percentage the state has um been able to give us um so um while the costs of tuition have steadily risen at the 3 to 5% level um over this time time frame instead of staying with that state reimbursement the state has essentially kep kept their numbers the same um and the impact to that is that um the amount we get back continues to
019decrease and you can see that's a pretty strong trend line um and so as the state legislators are what they're doing right now is they're trying to fix this they're trying to bring it up so they're not watching this number go down um and I know that's been a conflict in the news but it does affect us because whereas at one point we were in the 80% or 90% which is hundreds of thousands of dollars um we are now you know hovering in that 60s in the 60s um so they're pretty confident they're going to be able to make some progress on it um however just wanted you to know that that does affect us everything's about how you know the big picture so take salaries out of our budget um and you look at
020this graph and if you look at the the top four colors five colors actually because there's a little blue on top um you see that all the way across over the last five years um those the amounts almost don't change those are our supplies those are are our fees those are our transportation those are tuition those are all those Professional Services equipment and so if you look at that and you look at probably that there's been a decent amount of inflation on those um you see a trend that essentially that green band and orange band and yellow band essentially stay the same um so they are um not really moving in fact we trimmed about $200,000 out of Supply requests um this budget Alone um to try to meet um to keep that number the
021same the blue below is benefits that's health insurance and other insurances um and you can see how that has made a steady climb over the last five years and it kind of puts it in context to what's happening um with our budget um our budget is higher than I would like to present at the same time that blue which is our health insurance primarily uh is what's driving uh the percentage over a percentage that I would like to see so when we look at the budget in whole um you look at salaries are up about 5.29% benefits are up 7.28% um and Professional Services are up about 8% um repairs 3.8% um in tuition and transportation are up 5.47% um utilities are up about 77% um equipment's actually down 1% and dues are up 1.63%
022so you can see how um we are in the people business and the people numbers in here really Drive our budget forward so what are we doing in this budget in terms of Staffing changes um we are we have an U A World Language teacher at at the middle school that we do not plan to fill it's currently vacant now um so we'd like to reallocate recycle that position um and address our multilingual learner um issue need we have up at the high school um we are struggling with our some of our math scores um and we really don't have a terrific amount of support in math area um and so the two additional math instructional resource teachers um and and the other piece is three security guards which would allow us to have consistent
023security supports so to just kind of go through each one of those just a little bit um reinforcing our math with instructional resource teachers um would allow us to really support um schools individually currently it's really one person supporting three schools and about a thousand students um this would allow one per Elementary School um it would allow us to support students who are struggling in the tier one what everybody um gets for education is tier one tier two and tier three would allow us to have them engaged with those students on a regular basis um and would also allow us to support um teachers in the classroom to have more U professional development embedded opportunities um to work with these math instruction experts so the multilingual learner program um is a program that we have
024throughout the district um and one of the issues with MultiLing multilingual learner uh programs is that when a when a school hits a certain level um 20 students and they stay at 20 students for more than a year the expectation been made from the state that you have to have a program which means you have to have somebody with the right certification so we're currently right at that cus where our numbers support us to consider or to consider at the high school of needing a multilingual teacher um and these these teachers support our students um to who come in um and need support to get through our curriculum and and to make progress in English um and um be able to engage in our curriculum so security coverage we currently have um some security um
025officers who float from school to school um and when we talked about you know we'd love the opportunity to be able to say nope it's not about floating from school to school that there's a consistent amount of coverage throughout the district um and um so that's how we ended up with uh three additional security guards um it's a program that I think we do get a lot of um positive in interaction from the community um we've actually chosen some really um impressive security guards who do the relationship piece and uh provide the security um so I think we've done a nice job with that we would love to expand it so if you look at our percentages and again I'm trying to give you context to the world we live in um that's our percentage
026increase um and it's right right in the middle just to the bottom right quadrant um and everything to the left are districts many of which are very close by who are putting in increases much higher than we are um and and again it's context it's it's being um the covid grants having run out the costs of everything are have increased lately um and it is not um easy to retain um or at least to recruit U without ending up spending more money so just to give you kind of the the what's going on in the world approach so the numbers for those who like just the straight numbers please um essentially this the top number is our budget that we're currently working under and with everything that's been changed the bottom number 4777 9177 is
027the uh end result budget request and you see how we get there and what it's made of in Terms of insurance so something else just in case um the council or anybody else for that matter um every time we get a question about the budget um we post it on our website um and here is the website um and it allows us to kind of keep an ongoing dialogue about what's in the budget what we're asking what we're looking for why um anytime people have questions um because a lot of times if you have the question somebody else also has the question so based on that premise we put it right out there and have you um anybody's able to access it at any point so I think I usually want to say any questions
028but I think I'm supposed to turn the mic over to Mr paus hopefully I didn't move any of his stuff okay we're back um back to the uh breakdown as I mentioned this is slide 11 this is the grand list uh comparison uh on the right column you see that our increas is 28,224 um in the past two years uh we've had uh a millionar just over a million dollars um so you know it it's a driver and obviously you know Revenue uh all additional total revenues help so um it was less than expected and um that's the impact the um Grand list comparison breaking it down the um real estate was uh down 58,500 um motor vehicle um hit that I mentioned was 621,000 uh and person property um was was up which was
029uh very positive uh 911, 786 so uh uh very helpful uh but our total um is uh 218 there so that's the breakdown on the on the grand list um the footnote there um is just something we're monitoring at the state level uh should they you know it's Connecticut Bill 72 six if finalized would make a major swing for us so um is something we're monitoring very closely obviously that's a big big swings to to the point where you know it would uh um you know have a almost a 686,000 uh difference so uh we will as this process unfold um hopefully um be able to uh comment on the status of that bill hopefully in a positive way our uh direct Revenue changes the grand list as I mentioned 218 license and permits 75,000
030uh other taxes uh down um 8,000 um just trying to get to my notes that's the um drop in um prior um motor vehicle taxes so that's why that's down um fines and fees uh 177,000 uh use of money is essentially our interest income uh and the intergovernmental uh transfer uh intergovernmental uh fund revenue from the state the bright spot there as I mentioned last night was about 400,000 in uh the MS I mean MSA the municipal Revenue sharing account um and ECS so that's where uh those funds come from the state uh and uh other revenues um down 75,000 and uh the transfers in from uh uh sewer uh 11,000 uh so that completes the uh direct Revenue um number of 1, 29249 and uh a comment on the use of our our fund
031balance uh it's been the same and I'm recommending the same unchanged at 1,424 um you know there's a lot to be said I guess around a healthy fund balance and um you know we're still um from our rating agencies uh still meeting that or still fit within that range that's a positive comment on on our bond rating so um again it's open for discussion I'm sure the council will want to discuss it but at this point I'm I'm recommending uh the same level at this point and so budget summary um proposed additional expenditures um 4,187 848 direct revenue of 1, 29249 difference of 2,899 95699 Debt Service principle of 19,35 th000 breaks down that the town government is 9,400 th000 Board of Education 9, 95,000 debt payments total debt service principal and interest 4 million
032$18,350 town government $921,000 Board of Education 1,704 375 available 1,654 412 so the estimated uh 9 million interest only payment is on the um Bond issuance that I referenced last night and going to bond going to the market in June so uh all that plays out the availability uh of uh 1.3 million to uh transfer into the debt management fund Capital Improvement plan townside 9576 board of education 388,000 for a total expenditure of 1, 346,000 recommended revenues general fund fund 750,000 on assigned fund balance of 596 that gets us to the 1.3 million in terms of expenditures that's the breakdown CIP town and Board of Education uh additional detail um Chromebooks 208,000 the roadways uh Department six wheeel dump and plow uh that's the final uh payment of the two payment 150,000 police vehicles two
033at 125,000 uh Board of Education Tech staff laptops 122,000 building and grounds four-wheel drive Ford uh F250 67,000 Finance uh uh assessor reval at 60,000 tech services sidewalk repair replacement 50,000 and remaining uh 29 projects um totaling 56220 for the total of 1,346 th000 in total 36 32 from the town four from the board of AD that's the breakdown and that's it that's where we end Mr chairman open it question or let you open it to the uh to the public yeah I don't know if there's any quick questions I mean we have a number of work sessions coming up uh the council will be meeting on uh next week Monday through Thursday the 10th 11th 12th and 13th we'll also meet uh the following week Tuesday and Wednesday the 18th and 19th in work
034sessions we do have a regular meeting on the 17th uh Monday the 17th um so I think the council will have enough opportunity to ask questions um is there anything real quick anyone wants to ask before I open it up for public comment all right well then what we'll do thank you very much superintendent thank you um what we'll do now is open it up for public comment um if anyone wishes to address the public hearing please uh step forward to the podium give your name and address you'll have three minutes to make your comments uh you'll hear a ring that means you have about 30 seconds left the second ring uh means time is run out is there anyone that wishes to address the Council on the proposed budget all right seeing no one
035uh what I am going to do we did get an email submission uh for someone who wasn't going to be able to be here tonight uh this is Rachel Buchanan uh 134 Broad Street Apartment one she did ask that we read this uh because she wasn't able to be here tonight um I voted no on the board of ed budget it was a it was proposed at a 4.75% increase by the superintendent of Plainville Community Schools and then increased to 5.53% during my tenure on the board over the last three and a half years this percent has nearly doubled our budget on the board of education accounts for nearly 70% of planville budget it is not easy to say no I always want to say yes especially to providing security officers in all of our
036schools as a single line item I would have emphatically said yes to that request however our job is to look at the entire body of work now for clarity when the Board of Ed gets handed a budget appropriately 67% of that is made up of teachers cont teachers contracted salaries and health insurance costs health insurance costs have skyrocketed so now we have a forced uncontrollable if you will along with the pre-negotiated salaries that are not on the table for discussion at the time we are approving our annual budget so so of our total budget we the board are moving around 33% of what's left I was pleased with super the superintendent and his team's presentation of the budget their effort to bring us as lean as a budget as they said they could I understand
037the complexity of theirs and our assignment it was not an easy decision to say no this is my home Hometown my alma Moder I want the very best for it it's because of this that I needed to put my foot down and say enough is enough our academic scores and results do not reflect Excellence not even close mediocre at best and in many areas not meeting expectations it's time to drill down and figure out why we are spending more to get less um so that was submitted for the public hearing um I'll go ahead and ask one more time anyone wish to address the council regarding the public hearing and seeing no one thank you everyone for being here and look forward to speaking with the board I think on the 13th is our work
038session night um again I would just remind if if people do have questions you know forwarding them to the superintendent ahead of time isn't a bad thing to do it you know it's always good to get more information out there than less so if we do have questions feel free to forward those on uh the same with the town manager um if there's anything in the budget as you look through it this weekend feel free to forward any questions to them so thank you very much everyone um motion to adjourn second motion as second all those in favor I we are adjourned see everybody on Monday [Music]