BRISTOL — Two attempts to reduce the operating budget for the Newfound Area School District failed during the Feb. 1 deliberative session, with the district’s adoption of the Official Ballot Act taking center stage in the debate.
Bristol resident Paul Simard — a strong advocate for his town’s adoption of RSA 40:13, the Official Ballot Act, commonly known as SB2 — questioned the constitutionality of a budget proposal that gives voters no real choice. If they reject the spending plan proposed by the district’s budget committee, a higher default budget takes effect — a budget that, in this case, includes capital improvement items that are not in the regular budget.
School district attorney John Teague said New Hampshire’s constitution does not into play, because the adoption of the Official Ballot Act defines how the decision goes.
“I understand you think it’s a constitutional right [to vote the way you want],” he said, “but it’s the practical consequences of the way the law was written. No one expected that the default budget would be higher, but that happens, and, in the end, the effect may be you don’t have the vote you want.”
The discussion arose while considering the second attempt to reduce the proposed operating budget by another Bristol resident, John Sellers.
Sellers initially tried to reduce the budget by $800,000, a figure that corresponds with a budget cap override in 2017 that voters intended for the replacement of the high school roof. The school board chose to interpret that vote not as a one-time expenditure but as part of the district’s capital improvement plan — although at the time of the vote, no such plan existed. The school board adopted its CIP without a public hearing later that spring. Nonetheless, the board used the argument to include future CIP projects in the default budget.
It was a bold move to address long-deferred building maintenance, which was suffering under the district’s tax cap which limits the increase in the tax assessment to member towns to no more than 2 percent.
Voters challenged that decision but the school board held firm, leading to a vote at last year’s school district meeting to take the authority for building a default budget away from the school board and vesting it with the school district budget committee, which serves as an independent arbiter of financial proposals.
Members of the budget committee relied on the superintendent and business manager to develop the default budget, then chose between two options the administrators presented. One represented a strict reading of state statutes which left out one-time capital improvement plan items, while the second option interpreted CIP items as ongoing expenses that should be included in the default budget. Although not all of the budget committee members were present for the preliminary discussion on the default budget, those attending voted to adopt the proposal that included the CIP items that night, rather than taking time to review the proposals and allow other members to participate.
Budget Committee Chair Ruby Hill of Danbury, who missed that meeting, asked the budget committee at a subsequent meeting to reconsider its vote, but the other members would not reopen the discussion.
When challenged at the deliberative session on Saturday, Vice-Chair Kim Bliss of Alexandria said they relied on the administration for recommendations and, besides, they didn’t have access to a computer that would allow them to delve into the budget.
Sellers called that “a lame excuse” and said, “They let us down this year.”
School Board Chair Jeff Levesque of Groton, who serves on the budget committee, said they got all the figures they needed, and that the administration went “above and beyond” by providing the two options, with and without the CIP money. He added that, with the rules governing default budgets, “There is not a lot to decide.”
After attendees soundly defeated Sellers’ first proposed amendment on a voice vote, he proposed a second amendment, calling for a $500,000 budget reduction.
“I agree that maintenance needs to be done,” Sellers said, “but [former school administrator] Archie Auger asked for that $800,000 two or three years ago, and you didn’t give it back, but rolled it into the budget. This amendment still leaves you with $300,000.”
Budget committee member John Jenness of New Hampton asked Business Administrator Michael Limanni to list how much money was returned to the district over the past three years. Limanni provided the figures for the past five years, starting with last year and going backward: $190,461; $1,184,338; $337,646; $957,000; and $783,000.”
Simard returned to the microphone to say, “Thank you for returning the money you overtaxed the taxpayers.”
Gina Rescigno of Groton, a former budget committee member, said, “I don’t think anybody feels we don’t need the money. It’s about how it wasn’t done properly, and was rolled into the budget without anyone knowing. It’s not about you don’t need it, it’s how it was done behind the taxpayers’ backs.”
Sellers’ second amendment also fell to resounding defeat, in part because his amendment did not identify where those reductions might occur.
Simard spoke in favor of a petitioned article that was based on an advisory article passed by the voters last year, asking that one-time expenditures of $25,000 or more be placed on the warrant as separate articles, rather than being included in the operating budget where they were more difficult to pick out.
“It was passed last year and the school board chose not to observe this article,” Simard said. “The voters and the taxpayers have been very generous; we’re just asking for you to give us a say on what contributes to taxation.”
Bristol resident Rick Alpers opposed the article, saying it would allow voters to micromanage the operation of the school district. “We have an elected body to set policies and drive the district,” he said.
Fred Robinson of Danbury asked for an interpretation of the convoluted language of the article which seemed to exclude elementary schools from the policy.
Sellers said that was in response the school board’s arguments last year that presenting expenditures in separate articles for voters to decide upon could result in a denial of funds for projects at the outlying elementary schools.
Bristol resident Susan Duncan summed up the problems facing voters by saying, “It’s frustration with the structure we’ve adopted here.”
Turnout at the school district meetings has declined sharply since the adoption of 40:13, which splits the meeting into two parts: the first when people can debate and amend articles and the second when they have a yes-no ballot choice on each article. Intended as a way of broadening the participation by allowing people to cast a ballot if they are unable to attend a long meeting, the Official Ballot Act also takes away the incentive to participate in the discussions and hear opposing views. At Saturday’s deliberative session, three-quarters of the seats in the high school auditorium were empty.
“Before SB2, I fought for little things like mats for wrestling,” Duncan said.
Today, there is little debate on budget details, and by keeping even major expenditures within the budget, rather in separate warrant articles, voters are likely to overlook them.
“Our district has lost so much,” Duncan said. “This is a pitiful showing today. These are our teachers who help our children … and we’re going to decide what the mass of voters will vote on.
“With the default budget, people can manipulate it,” she continued. “The legislature has been trying to address this, but you are keeping people from saying ‘we need this’ — we sometimes win and sometimes lose, but what you gave us is a mess, and we need to get rid of that. SB2 is the problem.”
In the end, the warrant remained untouched and will go on the ballot as presented. It calls for total spending of $24,596,576, a 4.5 percent increase from this year. Some of that is covered by grants and an increase in adequacy aid, including from Keno revenues. The district also secured a five-year grant for Project Promise, an after-school program. The result is that the portion of expenses to be paid by the seven member towns is $254 below what is allowed by the tax cap.
The default budget is $24,620,357.
