An interesting exchange of statements: Tax Assessor David Robert was trying to explain where the budget calculates motor vehicle taxes, and council member Louise Durfee noted that increasing car taxes — which occurs outside of the mandated cap on tax increases — “helps the town.” Interesting that, in her view, there’s such a distinction between “the town” and the people who may be seeing an average of $350 or more increase in annual taxes.

7:29 p.m.

Council Member Jay Lambert noted a reservation about saying to a fifth of the town who are unemployed and another fifth who are struggling, and so on, that they’re just gong to have to accept a 9% increase.

Durfee subsequently stated that “the powers that be” have determined that some of the difficulty is going to be borne by the taxpayers. Funny, I thought the town council and school committee are the “powers that be” in Tiverton.

7:35 p.m.

Budget Committee Chairman Jeff Caron has mentioned that his committee has slated for the school district and town to each see a 1.7% increase — the extra having emerged with the proposed state funding formula for schools. (It’s not going to pass, I’d wager, but we can pretend otherwise, if we like.)

7:39 p.m.

Lambert just stated that he would only “reluctantly” support an increase at the cap, and no more. “We just have to learn to live within that economic reality.” Before the meeting, he looked back at previous budgets and noticed an approximate 180% increase of the tax levy over the last ten years. He noted, too, that the state government looks to be no better off next year.

His instruction: cut the budget, and if people don’t like what’s lost, they should motivate themselves and neighbors to change the state government so that the politicians will “get off their fat asses” and do something.

7:45 p.m.

Durfee is arguing that, since the municipal side is under a 4.5% spending increase. And the school committee is shooting to come in at a 4.5% spending increase. Yet, somehow, the tax levy goes up 9+%.

8:19 p.m.

Lambert has fallen for the reasoning that it’s responsible for the council to count the spending as “under the cap.”

Unanimous vote to move forward the budget that clearly breaks the cap.

I tried to speak just to point out two things for perspective, but the council voted (unanimously) to move the question. So much for citizen participation.

The two (very quick) points I wanted to make were:

1) A statement by Laura Epke that a $100,000 increase in the budget “only” represents a nickle increase in the tax rate. Of course, the tax rate is calculated per thousand, and the increase will be much more than that nickel’s worth. The average increase in property taxes will still be $350 or more.
2) The council is satisfied that its proposed budget only increased three-point-something percent. Inflation currently stands at 2.63% year-over-year.

8:26 p.m.

Jeff Caron has snuck up to the microphone to raise the question of requesting a tax-cap waiver. My prediction: big hoopla coming up when if we can’t keep the financial town meeting’s budget below the tax cap.

And I’d like to reiterate that every single town council voted to propose a budget that will almost certainly exceed the levy cap.

Oddly, the Coalition doesn’t cite this factor as a “root cause”:

“Root causes” of the underage drinking in town, according to the strategic planning committee of Prevention coalition, are “easy access to alcohol, community attitudes, inconsistent knowledge of alcohol-related laws, and peer influence, including the growing presence of gang members from nearby cities.”

Gang activity in town, said Tiverton Police Chief Thomas Blakey, “has been going on to some degree” for a long time. There is no sudden increase in gang presence in town, he said, “it’s just something we should be cognizant of.”

Obviously, we can’t close of our border with Fall River, although stepping up inspection of suspicious drivers with Massachusetts plates might have some beneficial effects. Similarly, having been a teenager, once, I’ll attest that more consistent “knowledge of alcohol-related laws” would not have curbed my behavior, although more police harassment might have done so. (Of course, the open space presents a problem, there.)

Happily, the solutions that I’d suggest for addressing teenage drinking are precisely the solutions that I’ve been suggesting for the Tiverton community more broadly. The first is economic development, and by this, I don’t mean additional bureaucrats to tweak this and pitch that; I mean a change of attitudes toward trying to control what can go where. Main Street in North Tiverton is clearly not as attractive to businesses as would be a plot of land along the highway — the truly peculiar thing being that putting stores, offices, and other operations in such an easily accessible location would probably be less disruptive to the rest of the town. Wherever they’re located, more businesses means more potential for entry-level jobs and more activities, whether arcades, movies, or whatever, that don’t involve beer and a remote location in the woods.

The second is more intelligent allocation of the funds that we already devote to the children of our town. Certainly, the school district should not even be thinking about decreasing programs and activities. Further still, if the department cannot maintain the fortitude to rein in adult pay and benefits in order to provide more expansive services to students, then the town should reorder its priorities and either direct education funds toward extracurriculars apart from the schools or leave the money with the taxpayers, to fund activities of their own choosing.

Mr. Goncalo, for example, is getting a 2.65% raise, to $86,127, and his administrative assistant is going up 4.04%, to $37,454. The town clerk is budgeted for a 3.5% raise, to $51,899, with another $4,864 going to her clerical staff, plus another $800 for longevity bonuses in the office.

The town solicitor gets another $25,000 for litigation; the municipal court clerk gets another $538; the building/zoning official gets $508 more and $1,000 of new vacation coverage, with $894 more for clerical; the town planner goes up $1,014, plus $996 for clerical. The tax assessor’s office sees $1,300 more for personnel services, another $1,537 for clerical, and $1,000 in office longevity bonuses. Similarly, the treasurer gets $1,853 more and $2,189 more for clerical. The part-time tax collector loses $645, but the clerical staff gains $1,535.

In the fire department, the 32 firefighters’ salary line items are only going up $2,281, but the chief gets $1,125 more and the clerk gets another $1,643. Moreover, overtime is budgeted for an additional $20,000, and longevity takes another $9,043.

The police department, by contrast, is seeing an overall $3,673 decrease in salaries, including drops in longevity, holiday pay, and overtime. One should note, though that the chief is getting an additional $2,101, the two records clerks are splitting $8,529, and the secretary gets another $965. The animal control officer also sees a $994 increase.

Elsewhere in town government, a new harbor master assistant is getting $2,400. The public works superintendent is getting $1,466 more, and his clerk, $996, while the eight maintenance workers are collectively costing only an additional $1,283. The two landfill workers are only seeing $306 more, albeit with $600 more in sick time. The town’s maintenance foreman gets $1,394, and custodial personnel, $859. The senior center director’s raise is 5.4%, to $46,305, and the assistant director’s 6.48% to $16,190.

And none of this takes into account that insurance benefits are budgeted to cost the town another $198,159.

These increases in personnel costs would clearly not be exorbitant in normal times, and I don’t mean to suggest that any particular employees don’t deserve every penny of additional money even during extraordinarily difficult times. The point is that there’s a reason the budget committee has had to take a scalpel to the budget just to get it under the levy increase, even as local taxpayers make up for projected decreases in state aid.

It would certainly be reasonable to argue on behalf of that exchange of taxpayer dollars over the cap for increases in personnel costs, but it’s an argument that has to be made. Those who wish to increase taxes by double-digit percentages can’t just badmouth those of us on the other side and pretend that the budget numbers are akin to a force of nature that we simply must accept.

Committee Chairman Jeffrey Caron read a statement into the record recounting the times he asked Town Administrator James Goncalo to make cuts and present them to the committee so they would not have to make cuts without guidance. Goncalo said the budget he presented was “a fair representation of what was needed to maintain services.” He noted there were no salary increases for any of the labor unions. The cuts to numerous line items were made because the committee has been told that it cannot touch salary accounts for labor, Budget Committee Vice Chairman Robert Coulter said. Salary costs account for the greatest percentage of the budget and if unions agreed to concessions, the other accounts would not have to be impacted, he said.

The roughly 4.5% increase in property taxes covers the expected loss in state aid almost within $1,000, so all of the cuts in the Budget Committee’s proposal are being made to compensate for increases in spending elsewhere — increases like step raises for teachers and increasing healthcare costs for all employees. That’s simply got to change. There’s no way around it.

And there are two ways to get there:

1. Forcing current elected and appointed officials to learn the lesson through a few cycles of contract negotiations and painful cuts to services, school programs, and town activities, which TCC does not favor and would like to avoid.
2. Replacing the elected officials with people who already understand that town government is not a jobs program for privileged individuals.

7:20 p.m.

During discussion of community block grants, the topic of subsidized youth employment came up, along with mention of a statistic that the number of working teens is down to historical lows. I agree with the benefits of work, for young Americans, and if there’s money to be had, it should be used.

That said, I’d make two suggestions: First, that having businesses in town would be a good first step to ensuring that kids who want to work can do so, and without public subsidy. Every time a mall or a grocery store or other such project is kept out of the town it affects such intentions.

My second point is less immediately within our control. Kids today are much more sedentary, with tremendous distractions and entertaining lures that keep them in the house.

7:42 p.m.

Interesting to note that the fellow who used the podium at a recent School Committee meeting to decry the town’s retirement villages as “a cancer on our community” has been taking the Town Council microphone repeatedly. With a tone bespeaking insinuation he’s been making references to “the community, by which I don’t mean gated communities.” Council Member Louise Durfee chuckled at that.

One suspects the speaker thinks he’s jabbing at TCC (“what these [unnamed] people are doing to our town”). I suspect he’s just conveying to the average viewer — who hasn’t already chosen a side — will think he’s a slightly nutty local character.

7:50 p.m.

During a public hearing on various inspection requirements and fees, it came to light that the state of Rhode Island is requiring towns to inspect temporary tents — not only the fire marshal, but for the structure of the tent itself. That’s another $60 to put a tent on your property in Tiverton.

It’s worth noting that the state is mandating the inspection, but it’s the town coming up with the $60 fee. Such is Rhode Island.

8:34 p.m.

The budget discussion is up. Administrator Jim Goncalo presented a revised budget, but Council Member Durfee raised the Budget Committee’s vote to cut the budget. The question is what happens next. Durfee: do we just go to the FTM and argue for our proposal.

Council Member Jay Lambert is suggesting that the Council hold off on discussion until after the Budget Committee’s vote on Thursday.

Apparently, it’s a possibility that the Budget Committee and Town Council will present different budgets to the FTM.

8:39 p.m.

Durfee just mentioned the possibility that the General Assembly will allow the town to raise another million plus via the vehicle tax. Notably, she didn’t even raise the question of whether that would be worth doing to the townsfolk.

Council President Don Bollin is suggesting that it might be worth seeking a postponement by the General Assembly of the FTM until late summer so that we all have the relevant numbers to debate. I’d agree with that, although it does make open contract negotiations problematic.

9:19 p.m.

We’re still here. Long meeting. Town Administrator Jim Goncalo just presented a memo of items that might be cut should his proposed budget not be approved.

Curious: Among the possibilities is closing the office in the fire department that offers building planning services. It came to light, though, that those services might in some degree be covered by the fees that the town charges for them. Of what possible use (other than propaganda) could this list be if it includes services that might pay for themselves?

9:27 p.m.

The “cancer” guy is at it again, taking to the microphone to express dislike for every town interaction with the retirement communities. He’s reminding me of the heckler in this scene; he even looks a lot like him:

10:03 p.m.

Town Solicitor Andy Teitz is introducing various language items that he’s put together for the council. Right now, they’re talking about a “standby motion” that would put the language to exceed the tax cap in the FTM docket. On the one hand, it makes sense to have the language in there for consideration. On the other hand, providing it beforehand gives the impression that it’s intended for use.

10:07 p.m.

Budget Committee Chairman Jeff Caron made the point that his committee seems likely to come in under the cap and that printing this language with town resources “greases the skids” to exceed the cap.

10:10 p.m.

Louise Durfee is railing against the cuts of the Budget Committee, suggesting that the townspeople are going to incite people to turn out and raise taxes above the cap.

10:29 p.m.

Putting the language for exceeding the cap in the docket has been tabled until the next regularly scheduled council meeting, in the hopes that other matters will resolve the necessity of it.

10:35 p.m.

Council President Don Bollin is going on and on about the problems of state laws and policies. We all get it. Can we move on. It’s nearly 11:00.

10:36 p.m.

And finally to the proposed policy for exceeding the cap. Teitz says he’s giving up trying to hone the policy into legal language and leaving it up to the council.

10:39 p.m.

Lambert has put together a different resolution.

I picked the wrong day to cut back on my coffee intake.

10:44 p.m.

We’re back to the debate about whether the law really means “also” when it says the council must vote and the town meeting must “also” do so. It’s really unbelievable. What good is the law if it doesn’t mean what it says.

10:52 p.m.

We’re right back to the council arguing that the FTM can do whatever it wants. Clearly false. This body is just bringing this up every two weeks until it manages to get the vote that certain members (and the solicitor) desire.

Just my opinion, of course, but it’s definitely a firm one.

11:15 p.m.

Durfee made a motion to table the policy. It passes, with Lambert and Bollin objecting. The temper appears to be that the whole thing should just go to court (with the Coulters’ lawsuit) and be resolved there.

1. Justice Silverstein emphasized that Rhode Island law forbids teacher contracts from extending beyond three years’ duration.
2. When a contract has expired it has, well, expired and has no legally binding force.
3. Rhode Island law requires school districts to maintain balanced budgets, and the remuneration of employees cannot be presumed to take precedence over other expenditures.

Number 1, it seems to me, means that the union’s gotcha, last August, by which it claimed that it didn’t need to renegotiate its contract for this school year (and, moreover, avoided higher health care coshares) had no basis in the law. If the district’s attorney, Stephen Robinson, wasn’t aware of this consideration, then he should be replaced at first opportunity. If the school committee opted not to pursue it, then that decision should be added to the evidence that they should all be replaced, as well.

Combining numbers 2 and 3, the lesson for Tiverton is that the financial town meeting (FTM) can set the district’s budget and empower the school committee to unilaterally extract the required savings from the unions. To put it bluntly, in ongoing negotiations, the School Committee should take the Budget Committee’s recent vote to place a leveled budget on the docket for the FTM as a reason to require a 5-6% reduction in the salary/health benefit line items of its contracts. If the union does not agree, and if the FTM does not produce a much larger pool of money for the schools, the School Committee should declare negotiations at an impasse and impose the necessary savings.

If the School Committee agrees to a more conciliatory contract prior to the FTM, it will be evidence that its members wish to lock the town into giving teachers’ pay priority over services, programs, and facilities. All of the talk about taxpayers’ attacks on kids will be so much vile rhetoric, because the committee will have been the one to determine that the students should be squeezed to compensate for revenue shortfalls.

Tiverton Citizens for Change is not anti-services or anti-school. In fact we have stated in multiple public forums, in writing and in speech, that we oppose cutting any town services and believe that all of our goals can be achieved with contract reform. Those asserting that TCC is anti-this-and-that is being flat-out dishonest. We ask that voters take note of this as they consider their choices in 2010.

See Brian Medeiros, Christopher Cotta and Michael Burk’s anti TCC rants.

Our position is that citizens are angry at government that will not control spending, while allowing students and residents to suffer with less. TCC supports the preservation of current student programming, holding the line on taxes and reduction of labor costs through contract reform as we have seen with Police, Fire and Municipal unions. Any 2010 spending increases must be kept well below the Tax Cap.

TCC will issue a public statement describing our support for a specific percent increase before the FTM which takes place May 8.

Dave Nelson
President of Tiverton Citizens for Change

I can say that with both of my kids, our experience with Tiverton schools has been remarkable. Nothing’s perfect, and I sometimes may have an issue with the school department, but given the enormous challenges they face, I believe that overall, our schools serve our town and our kids well. Like most services, education isn’t just an expense, but an investment in our own future. I speak not in political terms, but as a parent of a 7-year-old who loves his school, loves his teachers, loves his classmates, and is doing phenomenally well. I see every day the hard work of dedicated professionals.

As well meaning as they may be, folks like Mr. Medeiros will soon find themselves fighting a rear-guard action to preserve a shell of the services that they characterize TCC as attempting to dismantle. To the contrary, TCC is working — and withstanding the vitriol and defamation that such activity inevitably draws — to ensure that his children see their educational opportunities increase, rather than deteriorate. As a former member of the Town Council, Medeiros bears minimal responsibility, but during his time in local government, this was the trend in school district funding:

At the latest PTO meeting for Pocasset Elementary School, Principal Fran Blaess noted that the school lacks the funds to replace a broken ring in its playground. And yet, the district’s working budget documents (PDF) call for more than a half-million-dollar increase in salaries, with another $200,000 increase for medical benefits. When the administration and School Committee do speak of decreasing payroll, they always lead with layoffs — equivalent to a reduction in services and programs. They don’t want to presume even to appear to be unilaterally dictating contract terms.

Well, they should be dictating terms, and they shouldn’t see their action as unilateral. They should see it as backed and supported not only by taxpayers who, themselves, have been watching their incomes shrink, but also by parents who are dispirited that they must pay for private school in order to procure the services that they enjoyed in public schools as children.

As nerve wracking as it may be, sometimes the boat has to be rocked, not to destroy it, but to save it.

A grab-bag of issues gave rise to the questioning, which were numerous and remained largely unresolved. It was unclear at meeting’s end what actions the treasurer would take in response to the council’s expressed concerns. In addition, there were other known questions that went unasked due to Mr. DiMattia’s unexpected departure.

One issue discussed at length was a $46,267 item listed in the annual financial audit, that appeared as a public works “expenditure” in the restricted landfill closure account.

With Mr. DiMattia before them at the witness table, council members fired away.

As a restricted account, the landfill money is not supposed to be available for spending. Other issues that the members raised had to do with the absence of interest reported on sewer interceptor bonds, questions with reporting of abatements, and spending on an audit that the council expresses authority to approve. No accusations of wrongdoing have been made, that I’ve seen.

Mr. DiMattia published a letter in yesterday’s Newport Daily News that addressed such issues:

The article states incorrectly that there are outstanding financial reports that are overdue on revenues, expenditures and interest income. I have completed all financial reports through January 2010 and issued an 82-page investment report to the Town Council. The council and I agreed that as treasurer, I will prepare an investment report on a quarterly basis and the next investment report is due in April.

The article also was incorrect when it implied that as town treasurer, I am responsible for budget shortfalls. The Tiverton town charter, Section 602, states that the Tiverton town treasurer’s only budget responsibility is to prepare an annual department budget for the treasurer’s office, which is submitted to the Budget Committee for review and approval. The revenue and expenditure budget is a collective effort of all department heads, the town administrator, the Town Council members and the Budget Committee and approved by the voters of Tiverton at the annual financial town meeting in May. …

The article once again is incorrect in assigning blame to the treasurer for the loss in the Landfill Investment Account. This account is being reviewed and still must be verified by detailed schedules yet to be received for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2009, from the audit firm Parmelee, Poirier & Associates LLP. All of these landfill investments were made by prior treasurers before I became treasurer in fiscal 2009. I will complete a financial analysis of all landfill investments included in the audit for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2009, and present a report at the next Town Council meeting on March 8.

As a budgetary matter as well as a political one, this dispute bears watching. It’s already evidence, however, of the importance of contention in government at all levels. When officials who are ultimately accountable only to the voters butt heads, they tend to correct each other’s mistakes and scatter information beyond the town hall, state house, or capitol and into the public consciousness.

One might suppose her words are directed towards National Education Association Tiverton leadership, for their role in slow rolling the current Teacher contract negotiations through numerous State Labor Board Complaints and petty squabbles over ‘ground rules’. Instead, it is the School Committee Ms Pallash seeks to caution from engaging in such behavior, and instead, “find rational middle ground”. While Ms Pallash is thoughtful and well intentioned, there is more we must be aware of.

According to NEA/Tiverton Union President Amy Mullen, NEA Assistant Director Patrick Crowley has filed complaints with the Rhode Island State Labor Relations Board regarding the posting of information about contract negotiations on the Tiverton Schools’ web site. This posting is mostly basic budget data describing Tiverton’s School Budget. It contains, among other things, over a half million dollars for pay raises and almost $300K for increases in health benefits. Yes, an INCREASE of over $800K over the previous contract. Instead of accepting this generous offer, despite desperate economic conditions, the NEA has taken to filing grievances. I do not believe ‘middle ground’ is what Mullen and Crowley are after. They want more, and they want it out of the public’s view. This sounds like the force, bullying and disrespect to which Ms Pallash refers; from the union towards the school committee, the town and ultimately the students of the Tiverton Schools.

Taxpayers have funded this generosity for too long. Taxpayers are angry at government that will not control spending, while allowing students to suffer with less. TCC supports the preservation of current student programming, holding the line on taxes and reduction of labor costs through contract reform. Any 2010 spending increases must be kept well below the Tax Cap.

Unbelievably, the tone deaf NEA feel big salary increases combined with generous health and retirement benefits are a right, not a privilege, and ignore the needs of our community. To pay next years’ $20 million in labor costs the School Committee is contemplating cutting funding for books, pencils and paper for heavens sake! Do you want your town officials to allow this?

Had enough? Create Change, become a candidate for Tiverton public office. Email us at info@tivertonCC.com.

On January 27, 2009, the school committee approved a largely retroactive contract for teachers that ate up about $300,000 of that year’s budget, added approximately $150,000 to the current year’s, and is contributing more than that to the $600,000-plus increase in salaries and benefits budgeted for the next fiscal year. At a November 2008 meeting, Ms. Pallasch argued for approval, saying, “Let’s start working on the new one, and give ourselves a little bit of room to refocus on the classroom and away from the adults.” The argument was that we should resolve the running dispute while there was still time to negotiate the subsequent contract amicably.

At the time, I spoke up to predict that the union would not negotiate. Rather, it would wait out the recession based on the obvious reasoning that it could avoid concessions during hard economic times and — as we’ve taught its members to expect — receive retroactive raises when times improved. I also handed out a chart showing that there had been no abatement of the increases in teacher salaries and benefits in the past decade. Indeed, the per-pupil dollar amount had gone up more (54%) than the same number for the state as a whole (40%). Over the same period, the chart showed that most other expenditures had hardly moved.

Well, negotiations did not resume with an amicable tone. Indeed, in August, the union pointed out a clause in the contract extending it for another year. The school committee had somehow missed the trick that it was supposed to notify the union of its intention to negotiate the next contract a full month before the previous one was actually approved. Changes in healthcare copayments for which the committee had budgeted went out the window. So did negotiations.

Now, a year after its ill-considered vote, the school committee is talking about cutting supplies and classroom technology. They’re approaching the town’s budget committee with numbers that will require double-digit tax increases. ‘And here’s Deb Pallasch: “Let’s realize that we’re all in this together …Let’s work through the process that we have, which is collective bargaining. Let’s go to mediation. If we need to go to arbitration, let’s go to arbitration.”

By way of reply: First, a hard line, including zero probability of retroactive raises, must be part of the collective bargaining process if a reasonable balance is to be struck. Second, Pallasch’s assertion, in her letter, that I’m suggesting “$750,000 or more of cuts in salaries and benefits” is simply not true. Most of the amount necessary to close projected deficits could be achieved simply by freezing salaries and benefits at their current rate. It wouldn’t even be a “concession,” because the union currently has no contract. (Again, why would they negotiate if the committee behaves as if there’s a contract in place regardless?)

Third, Pallasch’s accusation that my suggestion would incur legal fees is a silly ploy in light of her willingness to go through the processes of mediation and arbitration, which also require lawyers. In the meantime, our students are suffering by their lack of proficiency in math and science and by the ever decreasing amount of programs and resources available to them, even as well-paid adults reap rewards at a pace with no correlation with the economy.