No Default Budget Discussion Until Day Before Vote

By Thomas P. Caldwell

BRISTOL — School Board Chair Jeff Levesque of Groton has decided to let the clock run out on opportunities to correct the Newfound Area School District’s default budget, waiting until the day before residents cast their votes to discuss an apparent error that added $712,300 in new spending into the backup budget.

Bristol resident Archie Auger discovered that the default budget, which takes effect if voters turn down the proposed spending figure on the March 13 ballot, includes items in the school district’s capital improvement plan, which voters have never funded.

A default budget is supposed to keep a town or school district operating at its current level, with adjustments for one-time expenditures and contractual obligations. A Weare resident recently prevailed in a challenge to that town’s default budget, which included $60,000 that voters had never agreed to spend.

Business Administrator Michael Limanni had mentioned that Newfound’s default budget included funding for capital improvement plan projects during the school district’s deliberative session, but the comment went past people who were focusing on last year’s vote to add $800,000 to the operating budget to replace the high school roof. Limanni’s comment came in response to a question about whether that $800,000 was part of the default budget.

There was further discussion about the capital improvement plan in the context of the proposed budget, but it was not until after the meeting that Auger realized that the money also was in the default budget.

A capital improvement plan is a long-term goal-setting device that seeks to even out spending over a 10-year period by prioritizing needs and putting spending on a timeline. Adoption of the plan does not fund the items, but indicates when they should be undertaken. Each year, spending items identified in the plan typically end up as special warrant articles.

Capital improvement plans generally are developed by an outside group such as a planning board or budget committee which takes an impartial view of the needs. In Newfound’s case, the plan was developed by the facilities committee, a subcommittee of the school board, which welcomed several school district employees as voting members. The school board then approved the plan in May without putting it to a vote of the school district.

Auger maintains that, because voters never approved of the plan, the $712,300 that was placed in the default budget is illegal.

Levesque said the school district attorney advised that inclusion of capital improvement items in the default budget is proper.

He has placed the discussion on the agenda for the school board’s March 12 meeting at the high school library.

6 March 2018