WHITMAN – Personnel cuts made in recent days to balance the town’s budget have been upsetting, but debate and discussion were largely in keeping with town officials often-repeated call for respectful discourse.
It went off the rails only once when a personal comment about the school his daughter attends devolved into a shouting match between former Select Board member Randy LaMattina ended with LaMattina being escorted from Town Hall auditorium – and an after-the-fact apology from School Committee member Steve Bois.
Free cash, meanwhile was left anemic by transfers to increase hours of the building inspector – $32,018; and Veterans Service Officer – $13,065, leaving free cash at about $63,000. It had started at a $103,000 balance.
As for the emotionally taxing personnel cuts, the Select Board plans to revisit the proposed cut of two firefighters and other public safety cuts at a fall town meeting.
The cuts proposed to the Fire Department’s budget raised concerns almost as soon as the meeting started.
“We’re talking about a $750,000 loss in revenue if we lose that second ambulance,” one resident said, referring to Fire Chief Timothy Clancy’s opening remarks [see related story]. “That more than makes up for what they were looking for – and they weren’t even looking to increase their budget, it was level-funded. It was less than level funded.”
He reminded people that the Fire Department are the people who are going to respond in emergencies.
seeking level funding
“They’re the ones that are going to take care of our citizens when we need them,” he said. “This is a pretty significant cut to their budget. … If it’s in order, I like to make a motion that we level-fund their budget.”
As he returned to his seat to write out an amendment to level-fund the Fire Department budget again, Resident Bob Kimball said it was his understanding that the Select Board planned to return $100,000 to the Fire Department budget, asking if they didn’t need to make that an amendment, too.
Moderator Michael Seele said there would have to make an amendment, if they wanted to make a change. The amendment was filed and, after a lengthy discussion, the amendment was defeated by a voice vote and the original budget line was adopted.
Select Board member Shawn Kain had said that the funds would be sought at a town meeting in the fall.
“We want to work out a plan with the police and fire chiefs to plan more thoroughly so we can more appropriately work with the Finance Committee,” Kain said. “But we voted to make that a priority and make it happen in the fall.”
The ambulance account has been more healthy than had been projected, and Kain said he felt confident the projections will fall in line with what they are looking for.
“We are taking a small risk, but I feel comfortable with the risk and I want to give it a priority, given the current circumstances,” he said.
The amendment presented, meanwhile, returned the level-funded figure of $4,110,180.
Kain said he appreciated the sentiment of the motion, as the board has prioritized public safety, but they did not want to support the motion at this time to avoid throwing Article 2 out of balance.
“Clearly, if you look this evening, the respect for public safety is not in this budget,” resident Randy LaMattina, a former Select Board chair said, seeking to remind voters what the ambulance reserve account is for.
“Specifically, gear replacement, and purchase of new apparatus,” he said. “A fire truck is supposed to be purchased this year, It actually won’t because it went through the Building and Facilities Committee and then somehow got squashed.”
He argued the way to support the Fire Department would be to “support the amendment and give them the money right now.”
“If they’e going to have to look somewhere else to find it, they’re going to have to find it,” he said. “They have free cash – they can look there.”
Finance concerns
Finance Chair Kathleen Ottina, meanwhile pointed out that the $4,110,180 was the figure approved in the fiscal 2025 budget for the Fire Department, and during the past year.
“The Fire chief didn’t ask for $4,110,000,” she said, “He asked for $3,945,000. This number has no bearing on discussions the Finance Committee had with the Fire Chief and I urge you to vote against this amendment,”
Firefighters’ union president Scott Figgins said he appreciated what the Select Board and Finance Committee were trying to do, but on behalf of his rank-and-file membership. He echoed LaMattina in reminding the Town Meeting that eight years ago voters in that Town Meeting supported an override article – that also passed at the ballot box – for four additional firefighters to handle the increase in call traffic. It was one of only two overrides to pass in Whitman within the past 25 years.
It had been more than 70 years since the department had increases in staffing.
“Every time I come to Town Meeting or go to a Select Board meeting the biggest thing we say is, ‘Let the people speak,’” Figgins said. “We worked in unison with the other departments, we didn’t say a word because we were all going together to this override as one, and the minute the override didn’t pass, money was taken from us and given to another department that is getting a substantial increase. The other departments are also getting an increase or being level-funded.
“We are the only department that is getting cut – and getting a significant cut,” he said, arguing that, in a department with 500 employees, 23 positions is not a significant cut, but with the Fire Department’s roster of 24 positions, the loss of two is significant.
“The voters spoke,” Figgins said of the May 17 ballot question on the override. “They said no. They want the services they pay for, they don’t want them cut.”
During informational meetings on the override, voters were told only one firefighter would be lost if it passed, and now two stand to be cut, according to Figgins.
“Now they’re taking more money from us than what was originally said,” he said. “That is unheard of to us. That is not fair. We always say ‘don’t pit us against each other’ – well, you just did. And we’re standing up for ourselves.”
Resident Tina Mones said people were given clear information that if the override failed there would be cuts.
“When people voted no, they knew they were cutting services to police, to fire and to a lot of departments in town,” she said. “This is what the people said. They said no, so when the Fire Department doesn’t get funded the way they wanted to they should have been out there, getting people to vote yes on the override.”
Town Counsel Peter Sumners said that, in his legal opinion, Article 2 must be balanced and state law does not allow towns to deficit spend.
“It is my understanding that there is not sufficient money in free cash to fund this article, so an appropriation source would have to be identified,” he said.
Kimball said Whitman is a complete town.
“It’s not the Fire Department, it’s not the School Department,” he said, citing the fact, as Mones, had, that 70 percent of voters said no. With the issue slated to be brought before a fall Town Meeting, he argued that the Fire Department is no losing anybody.
“They’re still maintaining the same number of people,” he said. “We’re a complete town. If you want to take this money from here, you tell me, in the article, where you’re going to get the money from because I don’t want it to give it from anybody else. I want them to be as whole as we can. It’s a complete town.”.
Former Town Administrator Frank Lynam noted there had been comments made about the use of free cash and balancing budgets.
“The simple fact is we can no longer raise enough money to fund the services that the residents of Whitman have become accustomed to receiving while we continue to work within the confines of Proposition 2.5,” he read from remarks he made during another Town Meeting debate seven years ago. “Fixed costs continue to rise at a greater rate.”
He had enumerated in 2018 that those costs include many being discussed that night – education, technology, public safety, solid waste, veterans’ services, health, life and liability insurance, county retirement and other post-employment benefits (OPEB).
“We presented a budget that year that relied heavily on free cash,” he said. Something that’s been done year after year. He urged the Town Meeting to approve the budget presented, because that’s what the voters said on May 17.
ZBA Chair John Goldrosen spoke in favor of fully funding another position – that of building inspector – citing the difficulty in keeping experienced people after a nearly 30-percent cut in salary. The current inspector had told Carter that he would likely be seeking employment elsewhere after she called him about the proposed cut to part-time in the full-time position.
“It will be a loss to the town,” he said.
School Committee member – and former member of the Finance Committee – Rosemay Hill cautioned aganst any change that Town Meeting should be wary of making cuts that create or contribute to long-term financial problems, cautioning against any cuts that could create a problem of the inability to create revenue.
“This is another cut that does not make sense to me,” LaMattina said, underscoring that, during his time on the Select Board the Building Inspector was made a full-time position.
“That didn’t just happen arbitrarily because Bob Curran was retiring,” he said. “Mr. Curran, through the course of his career, went above and beyond – well over it – but when the board looked at this, there was a need for a full-time building inspector.”
LaMAttins pointed out that building is not slowing down in Whitman, noting there are several large projects going on at the moment, and building inspections can create revenue, as does the Fire Department through its inspections as well as ambulance receipts.
“Folks, you need to look at what you’re doing,” he said, adding that the Town Meeting was being asked to gut and canibalize all town departments for the benefit of one – the School Department. “This is why we’re at Town Meeting. What the Finance Committee and the Select Board are giving you are suggestions [his emphasis]. The people who sit in this room are the ones who make the budget.”
Goldrosen then made a motion to amend the article by increasing the building inspector salary to $185,650. Building Inspector Robert Piccirilli said that figure does not reflect his salary, but includes all the inspectors in the department.
“This isn’t an easy discussion,” Kain said, noting that Town Meeting is not ideal to cut down the building inspector salary, at this time it appears new growth projections for next year reflect a lower number than this year.
Piccirilli countered that growth may have been slow, but Whitman is about to grow.
The amendment was approved by a vote of 79-47.
Again, Sumners, rose to opine that the budget needs to be balanced and the town cannot deficit spend to pay for salaries.
Hill asked what line did those filing an amendment propose to be the funding source to be, and proposed that the funds be taken from free cash.
Following a huddle by town officials, Goldrosen amended his amendment to raise and appropriate $153,632 and transfer $32,018 from free cash. The amount beyond what the Select Board recommended would come from free cash.
“If the point of this amendment is to restore the building inspector to full time, his salary would have been $99,613,” Ottina said. “The recommendation was to make it a part-time position at $68,000. The difference is $31,613. It may be nit-picking, but we’ve spent months combing through these budgets, so if you want to restore the building inspector to a full-time position, it shouldn’t be $32,018 from free cash, it should be $31,613.”
Both the amendment and the line item were approved by a voice vote.
When the school budget same up for discussion, LaMattina asked how many retirements have there been so far and has excess and deficiency funds been used to help balance the school budget.
Superintendent of Schools Jeff Szymaniak said there had been one retirement in November, three teachers retiring and seven paraprofessionals retiring. No excess and deficiency has been used in the budget this year.
“If they would have kicked in E&D in this year, if there had been a push to get that done, we would not be collecting town services,” he said. He then made a motion to amend the article down to $19,417,569. “This is a consistent source of revenue or the schools and they have kicked it in year after year – why is it not being done this year, is my question.”
He had been asked by the moderator to address the Town Meeting through him, rather than turing and addressing the audience as he had already done a few times during the meeting.
“Year after year we were not borrowing against the school budget,” Hill said. “We have our largest building [under construction] that middle school, right now, and we’re borrowing against that school budget and because we had used E&D, it has affected our [bond] ratings. Using E&D was never a good idea, ever.”
She also said voting another amount just kicks the school budget to another Town Meeting.
Szymaniak said that, if the budget were not passed at the Town Meeting, the school district would not have a budget as of July 1, which would lead to a super town meeting of both communities, with the district under a 1/12 budget as of July 1.
“It was challenging to reduce a budget to the number of $4,750,000,” he said. “We were able to do that, the School Committee affirmed that on recommendation by me – 7-3. Three people, actual persons, don’t have jobs as of July 1.”
He’s reduced the athletics budget by $250,000 contingent on user fees, if those fees don’t match the cut, certain sports will not run in the district next year.
“Through the eyes of the state, we are not funding our district appropriately,” Kain said.
School Committee member Steve Bois said he came to the Town Meeting when he heard E&D characterized as “the schools’ free cash,” initially calling out LaMattina by name, but backing off – a bit – when admonished by Seele.
“I don’t think someone who hasn’t had their child, in 13 years, of public schooling has a right to question us, like we’re the problem,” Bois said.
“You want to bring up my daughter?” LaMattina shouted from another microphone stand. “My daughter only went to Whitman public schools…”
“Mr. Bois has the floor,” Seele said from the podium.
“… until the sixth grade,” LaMattina said.
“Mr. LaMattina!” Seele shouted. “If you don’t stop, I’m going to ask you to leave the meeting.”
“… and then we pulled her out because the Whitman-Hanson School District was failing her!” LaMattina continued. “But she’s going back to public education, Steve, she’s going to the U.S. Naval Academy…”
“Mr. LaMattina!” Seele shouted. “[You] be quiet.”
“Folks, do not fall for the fearmongering,” LaMattina continued. “If you notice they’ve done nothing but [unintelligible] this position because they used temporary money for full-time positions. If you want your services back, follow the amendment.”
He was then escorted out of the Town Meeting by Whitman Police officers.
Bois offered his apologies to the LaMattinas. He explained his 30-year job in the Presidential Library system is being cut and he is under strain, he apologized and stepped aside.
Voters rejected the amendment and passed the school budget article.
Other articles
Michelle Winnett of Raynor Avenue, asked why the Select Board’s administrative assistant was the only one in that job category without hours being cut.
“With the volume of work that goes through that office, [it] could not function without an administrative assistant,” Carter said. “We interact with every single town department, and the work goes through there is something that could not be absorbed by the assistant town administrator or the town administrator.”
Another resident asked why the Select Board has a salary line.
Carter emphasized that the Select Board does not receive compensation, but oversees the town administrator, assistant town administrator, administrative assistant, recording secretary and municipal hearing assistant salaries.
The salaries and expense lines of the Technology Department were also questioned as to details concerning cost increases, their qualifications and what steps are in place to mitigate hacking attempts such as the one WHRSD sustained a few years ago.
Technology Director Josh McNeil explained that the assistant technology director’s salary level was aimed at retaining a “highly qualified, highly skilled individual that is way above par in relation to what we’re actually trying to pay him at this point and with all the cyber security situations going on these days – I don’t want to toot our own horn or anything for the town of Whitman – but we probably have two of the best IT individuals, relation to the skill, experience and education.”
The assistant director also holds a master’s degree, state procurement and purchasing certification as well as an ethical hacking certification. The department has also undergone a cyber security audit paid for by Plymouth County, not by direct taxpayer funding. The county provided strong recommendations to WPD officials, which $26,000 included in the expense line will fund,
“We’re still working behind the scenes on a grant,” McNeil said. “If we don’t obtain the grant, then the three copiers we have on the list are not going to be.”