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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2003-04-10-CEC-summit Summary points from the Selectmen-School Committee-Capital Expenditure- Appropriation Summit at Lexington High School 5:00 – 7:00 p.m. April 10, 2003 Operating Budget 1. Loren Wood still expects to offer amendment to cut expenses across the board, use $500,000 to cut short-term borrowing/debt-service costs. Selectmen and Appropriation unanimously opposed. 2. Dawn McKenna and Peter Kelley propose to cut solid waste coordinator, use those funds rather than subjecting to override or using free cash to pay for weekly recycling and MIS/Town website. Selectmen opposed 3-2, see coordinator as important; would take from free cash. Appropriation will report, but are 7-1 vs. cutting the position, and 6- 2 vs. putting the extra spending on the override (which was agreed upon by the summit budget process); and therefore would fund from free cash. [Correspondent's query: restoring weekly recycling was justified as a nice service AND to sustain whatever recycling is now being done; but isn't that recycling volume ALSO prompted by the recycling coordinator, cutting whom would likely boost trash volume, at a resulting cost to the Town? doesn't the coordinator prompt the programs for school and apartment recycling, which would otherwise tail off?] 3. Free cash update, John Ryan: $2.135 million certified, $630,000 being used to balance FY '04, balance of about $1.5 million. [Correspondent's query; will Deborah be making her free cash update presentation to Town Meeting 4/14 and 4/28? Surely we need some such lively audiovisual element to kick off each night!?] 4. Other budget reductions: none 5. Increase override amount? Leo: no Deborah, if Town Meeting accepts the Fred Rosenberg and David Kaufman amendments to make weekly recycling and MIS/website subject to override, the Selectmen would have to agree to do so, which they say they will not do; which would kill those items outright. So Town Meeting ought to be told that before the votes? School Capital, Harrington and Fiske See Spt. Benton handout. State has approved only one project per town; Lexington has asked for Harrington, rather than the state choice of Fiske, to reflect current construction staging and Harrington role as swing space. Fiske in worst physical shape, not being maintained, and grossly overcrowded, inadequate for current arts and SPED programs for example. [Benton later said that if new Harrington were built and Fiske not, she would move Fiske to old Harrington rather than maintain/invest in/spend on the improvements necessary at Fiske!] Exhibit p. 7 shows huge, multimillion-dollar annual maintenance spending required at all elementary schools, beginning with Fiske and Harrington, if the replacement program is not pursued; this in accord with the school capital plan, which called for suspension of maintenance spending after replacement was agreed upon and begun. The state moratorium on new projects will last perhaps 6 months. Who knows? (Sherry Gordon pointed out, however, that the governor will want a much leaned-down program, so 50% reimbursement is unlikely when/if the program resumes, at least for towns like Lexington.) Chairman Close said since the spring 2002 override was sold on the basis of 50% override, some citizen voice/approval/affirmation is needed to go forward with Fiske at 100% local cost. On the other hand, the work needs to be done, and if the capital program is derailed or deferred, the schools will be in crisis by 2011, with inadequate space and the number of rooms far short of academic/program plans and requirements; and the town will incur huge maintenance costs. To keep on track, one would want voter approval by end of this year, construction documents ready, and bidding in time (Jan. 2004) to raze Fiske immediately upon the end of classes the following June. In general, there was consensus that: the town government ought to appeal to the governor; that work ought to proceed to full construction documents (at a cost $230,000 greater than proceeding to, say, 50% construction documentation-work is now in advanced design and planning); and that voters will have to be asked to affirm proceeding even if the Town pays 100%. (Note that given the per s.f. limit under SBA, Lexington stood to be reimbursed something like $6.4 million of the $16 million project cost for Fiske, not 50% of the total; so the increment for the Town is not the full extra $8 million.) Financing to date: Town borrowed $14 million in February for Harrington (under the $32.150 million debt-exclusion appropriation); planned to borrow the Harrington balance and the Fisk planning/architectural fees next spring. Questions: when take to a vote (fall 2003, at Selectmen's discretion, but Rick White cautions not to enter lightly into special-election voting on nonbinding questions, something the Town has not wanted to do; see if could be staged to hold off to March 2004-to be researched); are there rules on nonbinding referendums (and is this "nonbinding," in that if townspeople vote "no," how could the Town proceed?)? [A couple of questions the correspondent was waiting to ask when the discussion ended: [1. In deciding how far to go with Fiske construction documents (and therefore what costs to incur while the project is at risk): how far do the S.C./PBC need to go to have a VERY reliable cost estimate for the project? One cannot, in my view, name a figure for the voters to affirm, and then have it be badly off. So that is a rational criterion for deterimining how far to go, and a justification to voters for going that far/incurring those expenses. [2. I gather that the state has indicated that any project proceeding to construction during the moratorium is forever off the list for future consideration of reimbursement (on the reasonable basis that if the community begins, it must think it can pay the bills on its own). Where exactly does Lexington stand in regard to this risk with Fiske: a stage of design or construction documents? bidding? letting a contract? putting a shovel in the ground? What risk do we run in proceeding relative to when the moratorium comes off, if it appears likely to do so? Voters will want to know.] 201 Bedford Street/DPW/Senior Center The moderator will call a recess within Town Meeting for discussion under Article 25 but not bound by Town Meeting rules (so no one can call the question, for example), and QUESTION: WILL THERE BE then resume Town Meeting business. ACTIONABLE ARTICLES ON WHICH THE COMMITTEE WILL WANT TO TAKE A POSITION? STILL UNRESOLVED. SEE SEPARATE E-MEMO ON LIKELY POSITION, IF ONE IS TAKEN. Paul Lapointe summarized the current report draft. For him the Fiske funding problem makes even more urgent the question of how DPW and senior center needs will be financed, and how important it is to consider capital project financing broadly, lest we fail ourselves and the wider community. He did highlight the higher (new) construction costs at Hartwell Ave. vs. Bedford St. (footings, methane), and possibly net higher operating costs for DPW there, but then the offsets from higher tax revenue were 201 Bedford St. partially privately redeveloped. Dawn McKenna thought the community conversation/discussion was too limited for Town Meeting to act yet, and that the committee gave short shrift to prior studies. Leo McSweeney saw the community conversation beginning at Town Meeting. Narain raised the social costs (environmental regulations/compliance, service delivery) and alternative opportunity costs ofusing the Hartwell Ave. site, the project costs for senior center and DPW as currently scaled ($6 mil. and $12 mil. respectively); not ready for vote. Will there be a resolution and motions for action under the three articles? Lapointe said that is a call for the Selectmen, since the study committee reported to them. (The Selectmen did not respond directly.) COA wants Article 14, or some such authorization, so it has funds to proceed to needs analysis (not site-specific) and assessment of the current senior center space space and its potential reuse (for adult daycare or other; 9,700 s.f.). Under Article 12, he understands, there are funds left from the DPW Camp Dresser McKee studies that would pay for environmental assessment; Rick White concurs, but will get details under the authorization, and of spending so far, for Selectmen [and presumably of interest to Appropriation]. Peter Kelley reduced the question to one: can we sell the Town heritage, land, which needs to be retianed for future use? Cost and financing questions are all secondary. Paul Hamburger and Al Levine of Appropriation more or less concurred, as did Karen Dooks, citing future needs known and unknown, space needs assessment (fire house, etc.). [Correspondent notes that there are other parcels for redevelopment: Munroe and Adams schools, other School Committee sites, etc.0 [There are also interesting financing questions at least relative to the current Town capital wish list; extra private development like Ledgemont is effectively off the table, and if private redevelopment at 201 Bedford and part of Hartwell is off the table too, ALL the capital costs, including as much as 100% Town financing for the elementary schools, falls on the property tax levy through debt-exclusions, apparently without much if any incremental commercial tax base; is this remotely feasible? Which capital items get cut back?] Charles Hornig: Capital Expenditure hasn't moved beyond discussion to taking positions because a. need to know what the Selectmen will produce for action (motions) and when b. need detailed understanding of what the Article 12 and 14 requests are for and what the funds will buy c. need a clean Article 14 request: hard to reprogram site-specific/ willing-buyer, willing-seller appropriation under Article 8 from 2000, and those funds will be needed for site studies in future; rather, ask for clean (new) fnds for needs assessment, independent of ANY site analysis, and specify how much funding and for what Paul Hamburger wondered on what schedule any of the projects (DPW, for instance) would proceed, and where DPW and senior center would rank in Town's order of priorities. [Correspondent's query: Is a stand-alone senior center, de facto, kaput, or contingent on future availability of Harrington?] John Rosenberg, Clerk, CEC