2023-03-27-AC-min - Laserfiche WebLink

Browse Search

03/27/2023 AC Minutes 1 Minutes Town of Lexington Appropriation Committee (AC) March 27, 2023 Place and Time: Robbins Room – Cary Memorial Building, 1605 Massachusetts Ave.; 7:00 p.m.–7:30 p.m. Members Present: Glenn Parker, Chair; Sanjay Padaki, Vice-Chair; Anil Ahuja; John Bartenstein; Alan Levine, Secretary; Eric Michelson; Sean Osborne; Lily Manhua Yan; Carolyn Kosnoff, Assis- tant Town Manager, Finance (non-voting, ex officio) Members Absent: None Other Attendees: None At 7:04 p.m. Mr. Parker called the meeting to order. Announcements and Liaison Reports Mr. Michelson announced that the Minuteman Regional High School will be hosting a meeting to discuss inviting new member communities to join the regional school district. Mr. Bartenstein stated that adding more communities would reduce the availability of slots for students from Lexington, which Mr. Michelson acknowledged. The Committee suggested that Mr. Michelson ask whether new communities would be required to “buy in” by contributing an initial payment to cover some of the capital costs associated with the recently completed school building construction. Mr. Padaki reminded the Committee that an extension to remote meeting protocols was included in the current state budget that is awaiting the Governor’s signature. Once approved, this would make it possible for the Committee to use fully remote meeting again, if desired. Appropriation Committee positions at the 2023 Annual Town Meeting Mr. Parker noted that the Committee will need to take positions on several proposed amendments to Article 10, which has a date certain of Wednesday, March 29. He will ask the Committee to do this at the next meeting at 7:00PM, prior to the session of the Annual Town Meeting on that date. Mr. Parker opened a discussion by asking for the committee’s position on possible amendments to Article 4, the FY2024 operating budget. The Committee unanimously supports the current motion, as recommended in our report to Town Meeting, but members also offered some options for how the budget could be amended to provide more funding for the Lexington Public Schools if Town Meeting chose to do so. Mr. Levine stated that Town Meeting should not interfere with negotiations between the School Committee, Superintendent, and the Lexington Education Association. Mr. Michelson noted that the proposed education budget includes a salary adjustment account that is intended to fund possible increases in salaries and the number of FTEs, and that there is no need to delay action on Article 4. Mr. Osborne stated that interference in teacher’s union negotiations would set a bad precedent for all other union negotiations with the Town. Ms. Kosnoff stated that the operating budget is designed as an integrated request that cannot be broken out into individual items. Furthermore, delaying con- sideration of the operating budget until all other financial articles are approved would greatly con- strain the options for making any adjustments to the operating budget. The Committee agreed that no changes in the education budget should be funded with Free Cash.