Padding town budget is not a good idea

Although I've ended my quest to serve our town as a member of the Council and greatly reduced my watchdog activities, there's an annual event I can't bring myself to miss and those are the budget hearings leading up to the Financial Town Meeting.

Years of government oversight have convinced me that Budget Review is the most important part of our role as citizens and taxpayers. This year's budget is especially crucial.

At last week's hearing, the first of three scheduled, I was hammered by repeated use of the word "increase." Since I'm generally pleased with the job Town Administrator Keiser is doing, it took a while to register what he was proposing. It wasn't good.

He said because the State Legislature passed a law reducing the maximum increase a town budget could be raised in a year; it was beneficial to seek the maximum allowed budget increase this year and for the next three years, to support the foundation for future budgets.

Yes, he's proposing, rather than level fund the town budget and avoid tax increases, we should essentially "stuff the budget" in order to reach the maximum increase and build up expenditures as high as possible.

This means the portion of the budget that is funded by property tax will be raised to $16,867,530 this year, $17,668,737 next year, $18,463,830 the year after and $19,248,542 the year after that.

Even with that strategy, he still proposes to "increase" the transfer station fee up to $95, raise building permit fees, boat parking fees, and Fort Getty fees.

Most taxpayers believe an administrator scrutinizes budget requests and pushes for the lowest possible expenditures; unfortunately Mr. Keiser's approach is just the opposite as the following facts disclose.

For budget account numbers 70001.00-70800.383 there are 191 line items of requests submitted by department heads. Each line item lists (a.) last year's budget amount (b.) the department head's request for 2008 (c.) the Town Administrator's recommendation to the Town Council.

Of the total number of line items, only 13 out of 191 are reduced under the Administrator's recommendation totaling $79,899 of savings. However, $60,000 of that was from two line items that are not regular expenditures, meaning he cut a mere $19,000 from $7,079,959 in requests!

Of the remaining line items, 96 are level funded (no increase or decrease) and a whopping 81 items are increased… with 13 requests exceeding what the department heads asked for.

So what will the extra budget stuffing money be used for? Wage increases for his department heads.

Armed with a Personnel Committee survey suggesting our department heads are being paid below market compared with fifteen other towns, the Town Administrator is proposing a 12-percent increase of $7,000 for the Town Clerk, $10,142 for the Town Planner, an 18-percent raise, and $14,769 for the Finance Director, a 23-percent increase.

Now I'm not saying that those employees don't deserve fair wages for their positions. They're all fine people and assets to the town. But these department heads, in their own budget requests, asked for increases far less than he is seeking.

True, a leader needs dedication and cooperation from his staff, but I don't see how declaring we've been paying them less than the average of 15 other municipalities for all these years will do much good for their overall morale or our checkbooks.

Just imagine a food critic moving into town and after enjoying his first meal at one of our favorite restaurants, yelling out to the owner "Boy that meal was great and your prices are 25 percent lower than any restaurant in the state," then turning to the staff and saying, "Customers at other restaurants pay a 25 percent tip for this level of service."

Why disrupt the apple cart? Just because other towns happen to overpay their employees to put up with poor management practices doesn't mean we should follow suit, especially when we've been managing our town pretty well.

It's appropriate that pay rates are based on an economy of scale. In the private sector, a store manager in a low volume store is paid less than a manager in a high volume store. Certain positions have a wage cap to meet sustainable income requirements. When employees want more than the maximum pay for their position, they either seek more responsibility or move on.

Mr. Keiser argues he is concerned that it would be difficult to replace key employees at their current wages with people of comparable experience. Well, I think we need to consider the quality of the work environment and the workload demands that an employee has to endure before we take that leap.

If we accept the premise that we've been paying our employees less than average, there must be reasons they have been staying on. A new $3,300,000 office, a short walk to views of the bay and lunch on a blanket at Beavertail all have value.

Besides, few private sector jobs offer a retirement program guaranteeing the equivalent benefits of having $1,000,000 in the bank. Yes, most municipal employees in Rhode Island will have the retirement income equal to that of a millionaire and get cost of living increases on top.

Although I still hold Mr. Keiser in high regard for his management skills and people-friendly style of administration, I just don't believe this budget strategy and the jump in payroll is the correct path for Jamestown.

Let's slow things down a bit. A new Town Hall, DPW facility, $3,000,000 of open space, new union contracts and the crushing debt service of Water and Sewer upgrades are big loads to carry for a small town.

If you're concerned about the uncertainty of the economy, energy costs and the impacts a recession will have on your income, then you probably agree this "max out the budget" strategy is out of line.

So, please contact a Council person, attend the next budget hearing on Thursday, March 20 and speak out against this costly budget plan.