April 5, 2016 Minutes
Westport Finance Committee (Fincom)
Meeting Minutes
Westport Town Hall
April 5, 2016
Present: Shana Shufelt (SS), Dick Brewer (DB), Charles “Buzzy” Baron (BB), Hugh Morton (HM), Bob McCarthy (BM), Mark Carney (MC), Karen Powell (KP)
Absent: Tracy Priestner (TP), Gary Carreiro (GC)
Attending: Terry Provencal (TA), Tim King (TK)
SS opened the meeting at 7:00 p.m. with the traditional salute to the flag.
Minutes: March 8th minutes were presented and BB motioned and DB seconded to approve as is. All were in favor with MC and KP abstaining.
March 15th minutes were presented and BB motioned and DB seconded to approve as is. All were in favor.
March 22nd minutes were presented and BB motioned and MC seconded to approve as is. All were in favor with KP abstaining.
Reports:
Administrator: None
School Building: None
Accountant: None
Liaison: None
FY17 Budgets:
Marine Services: Chris Leonard, Director of Marine Services was in attendance to discuss the budget for the new Marine Services department under the Harbor Enterprise which takes Shellfish out of the general fund and adds them to the Harbor. He is also in the process of adding an Assistant to the Personnel Bylaws for the upcoming fiscal year. The budget is $188,938. It actually decreases the total budgets by combining the positions
Beach Enterprise: Tim St. Michel was in attendance to present the budget for the Beach Enterprise for FY17. It is level funded.
Street Lights: This budget is level funded in the amount of $18,000 for FY17.
Planning: Jim Hartnett and Jim Whitin were in attendance to discuss the budget for FY17 which is level funded.
CPC: Bill Raus, Chair, and Betty Slade, Vice-chair, were in attendance to discuss the proposal to Town Meeting. They have several projects on the docket for FY17 and are trying to close out some of the old projects left open. Hm motioned and BB seconded to recommend at town meeting. All were in favor.
Waterline Enterprise: The budget for this enterprise is decreased from last year due to the decrease of the engineering line item since no facility will have to be built to address the TTHM issue which has been adequately under control.
Appeals Board: This is a level funded budget of $6,294.
Commission on Disability: Stanley Cornwall, Chair, was in attendance to discuss the increase in his budget to allow for a recording secretary in the amount of $700.
Annual Town Meeting:
Article 18: This is to approve the budget for the Harbor Enterprise. There is some confusion as to the amount. It was presented to us as $188,938 and the article totals $197,938. MC motioned and BB seconded to recommend the article not to exceed the $197,938. All were in favor.
Article 9: This is a capital items article with a truck for the Harbor Enterprise of $40,000 to come out of Municipal Waterways Fund. BM motioned and MC seconded to recommend this part of the article. All were in favor.
Article 20: This article is to set the budget and funding for the Beach Enterprise. MC motioned and BB seconded to recommend this article. All were in favor.
Article 3: There is a $5,500 transfer for Street Lights to cover an over budget caused by incorrect percentages due to net metering credits.
DB stated there was an error in the calculations for the transfer request for the Fire Department and the actual number is $68,246 for FY16 and $14,031 for FY15 which is in Article 8.
Article 6 & 21: Jim Walsh was in attendance to discuss this article which will revoke a previous town meeting article approving the Transfer Station to be an enterprise fund. The previous article was never acted on. The second article is to approve the budget for the Transfer Station as an enterprise fund if the first article fails. The motion is that if Article 6 passes then Article 21 will be passed over. If Article 6 fails, then the Fincom recommends Article 21. The motion was made by BB and seconded by HM. The vote was 6-1 with BM opposing.
Article 23: This is to allocate $10k to be used to apply for a $605k grant for a watershed plan and other programs. This is the town match required when applying for the grant. BM motioned and BB seconded to recommend passing over based on the Planning boards recommendation. All were in favor.
Article 39: The Planning board is not recommending this because of the petitioner. No action has been taken by the Planning Board.
Article 40 & 41: These have been recommended to the BOS by the Planning Board and it is non-binding to accept all that has been done.
Article 17: This includes 2 revolving accounts that belong to the Planning Board. One is the GIS update to add new subdivision and is a pass through where the fees are collected directly from the contractor and the second is for Site Plan Review which has not been used to date.
Article 19: This is for the budget for the Waterline Enterprise. HM motioned and DB seconded to recommend. The vote was unanimous in favor.
Article 13: This was motioned by BB and seconded by BM to pass over the article. All were in favor.
Article 2: This is to pay prior year bills received after June 30th and where no money was encumbered. BB motioned and HM seconded to recommend. All were in favor.
Article 5: This is to set the salaries of the elected officials and boards in town. TK thinks the Fincom should invite them in to discuss this and voice their opinions. BB thinks the boards shouldn’t get paid at all and use that money for increases in the elected salaries.
Other Items:
Highway department put in a request to approve deficit spending for Snow & Ice in the amount of $20k due to a last minute unplanned storm. MC motioned and BB seconded to approve the request. All were in favor.
Adjournment and next meeting: There being no further business to come before this meeting, a motion to adjourn the meeting at 9:15 p.m. was made by BB and seconded by MC and the vote in favor was unanimous. The next regularly scheduled meeting will be on April 19th at 7 p.m. at the Westport Town Hall.
Respectfully submitted,
Nicole Botelho, Recording Clerk