HomeMy WebLinkAbout2000-03-12-CEC-min
Charles: Comments interspersed.
Deborah: Figure this is the fastest way to tell you what I've changed
in
the spreadsheet. -Tom G-
At 06:12 PM 3/12/2000 -0500, you wrote:
>I disagree with some of your small-ticket items.
>
>1. We decreased the FY02 portable classrooms to $225K (3 rooms).
Typo; fixed in attached spreadsheet, but I do think John Moynihan views
their small-ticket request of $300K as more of a place holder than a
firm
budget request. Wing and a prayer.
>2. I prefer to keep the big-ticket studies in the big-ticket budget.
Putting
>them here confuses the issue of how they get funded. If you leave them
in,
>at least mark them separately as funded through a debt exclusion.
All accounting for big-ticket studies is confusing, because the funding
base actually shifts provisionally from cash capital to big-ticket. I
think
we make our numbers impossible to follow for other Town finance people
if
we depart from the Town's method of presentation. I've responded to
this
issue in the new spreadsheet in two ways: (1) I did mark the big-ticket
studies separately and totalled them separately; (2) Per our telephone
call, I separated exempt BANs from nonexempt. Then I hid the accounting
hair in the BAN section. (See formulae in line 28 of sheet "Available
Cash
Capital" in the attached spreadsheet. They count as bond revenue the
sale
of exempt bonds, but do not book a penalty for the payoff, because your
friend, the debt exclusion has picked up the tab for you. On the other
hand, the formulae that calculate interest need to do so until the
exempt
BAN is paid off, just like the case with the nonexempt BAN. Argh!)
>3. For Street Resurfacing (Scenario 1), I intepreted the sense of the
>committee some time ago that the $500K + Chapter 90 + $5M debt
exclusion was
>sufficient. I've been carrying 0 for this in FY02-FY05. I don't
remember
>when (if ever) this was discussed. The VHB study does say that
$800K/year is
>enough once we spend the $5M.
I don't know that the Committee ever took a formal vote, but agree it's
the
rational thing to do. Hence, have changed the attached spreadsheet. By
the
way, I think Peter thinks we can throw cash-capital money at this
problem
for awhile and that will keep additional streets from sliding into no
man's
land. I suspect it's an opinion we may have to address.
>4. We added $30K in FY02 for playgrounds.
Typo; fixed in attached spreadsheet.
>5. Where do your GF assumptions come from? Mine come from the 3-year
revenue
>forecast.
Yuch! I've followed your lead, and shown the entire calculation in the
attached spreadsheet to circumvent the error on page 9 of the budget
book
you pointed out in your subsequent e-mail.
>6. You need to allow for authorized but unissued debt. We do have some
for
>the library.
Included the numbers from your spreadsheet in the attached spreadsheet.
>7. BAN borrowing in FY02 is $1,375,000. Remember the Senior Center
design.
Good point; fixed in attached spreadsheet.
>8. I'm assuming that we go to long-term borrowing on the Senior Center
in
>2003 and the Elem. Schools phase 1 in 2006.
Don't necessarily agree about the schools, but have taken path of least
resistance and used those assumptions in attached spreadsheet.
>I've updated my spreadsheet to correct my own errors and attached it
again.
Cool. I've made good use of it.