Board OKs budget for city

Jun 14, 2010 — The Telegraph (Nashua, N.H.)

Patrick Meighan

Jun. 9, 2010 (McClatchy-Tribune Regional News delivered by Newstex) -- NASHUA -- The Board of Aldermen approved the fiscal 2011 budget Tuesday after rejecting an attempt to restore $340,000 in police overtime.

No attempt was made to add money to the school budget, despite continued pleas from school supporters, including four who spoke at the beginning of the meeting. Instead, two aldermen said there's a strong chance the Board of Education will tap money set aside for severance pay to prevent having to lay off 15 teachers at the high school.

The budget, approved by a 12-3 vote, was the combined operating and general fund budget of $240 million proposed by Mayor Donnalee Lozeau. It will go into effect July 1 and extend through June 30, 2011.

The budget represents a 2.1 percent increase overall from current spending, Lozeau said in her remarks to the board, in which she advocated for passing the budget as proposed.

"It's a solid budget," Lozeau said. "It keeps the community in the excellent shape that it's been in."

Most of the aldermen agreed, except for a handful who sought to restore money to the police overtime account. Lozeau had cut a total of $400,000, including $340,000 in overtime, from the Police Department's spending request.

I understand that Nashua isn't made of gold," said Alderman-at-Large Benjamin Clemons, who proposed adding the police overtime back, a move also supported by the majority of the Budget Review Committee.

Clemons said he understood that people are hurting because of the bad economic times, but he also noted that crime tends to increase in tough times. Police officers won't stop investigating crimes because of less overtime, but the cut could hurt the Police Department in other areas, such as community policing programs, Clemons said.

While the city budget overall was "lean" and responsible, Clemons said he couldn't support it without the police overtime.

Joining Clemons in voting against the budget were Aldermen-at-Large David Deane and Lori Wilshire, who also spoke in favor of restoring the police overtime money. Deane didn't explain his vote.

The budget falls $1.3 million beneath the city's spending cap. Lozeau estimates the proposed fiscal 2011 budget would result in a 3 percent increase in the tax rate, depending on state funding.

Much of the attention during this budget season has gone to school spending, especially since a $3 million overexpenditure was discovered last spring.

Despite a 4.6 percent increase, cuts had to be made to personnel and programs to account for mandated costs like contracted salary increases and severance payments. School officials said the district would have to make major structural changes to education in the city next year, including limiting credit allowances for freshmen and sophomores and closing the alternative program for at-risk students.

Ward 2 Alderman Richard LaRose said all departments made tough choices to contain spending in the budget, not just the school department.

"I believe the budget that the mayor presented is a fair budget for everyone," LaRose said.

For the past two months, a group of parents, teachers, students and other school supporters lobbied to have money added to the education budget, submitting a petition with more than 1,000 names. Of the five people who spoke in the public comment period, one asked that the city look for revenue sources other than local taxes to fund spending, while the four others asked for money to be added to the school department.

But some aldermen, including Clemons, said they were confident Superintendent Mark Conrad and the Board of Education would find money in the budget to at least prevent laying off the high school teachers. The source of that revenue, aldermen said, was likely to be money set aside as severance pay for retiring teachers.

In her remarks, Lozeau said that about 55 teachers eligible to retire haven't yet decided if they will. Underfunding the severance account was a factor that led to the overexpenditure in the school budget discovered last year, the mayor and some other aldermen cautioned.

However, Alderman-at-Large Barbara Pressly said the school board has "informally agreed" to add the 15 high school teachers back into the budget.

Tapping the severance pay would eliminate "the most egregious of the cuts," Ward 5 Alderman Michael Tabacsko said.

Despite the concerns expressed about underfunding severance pay, Tabacsko said, "I'm very comfortable taking that risk."

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