The Approved Budget for the Town of Andover for Fiscal 2010 is $130,817,866 which reflects an increase of .07% over 2009.
Where are the monies spent?
Town Departments: $33,228,923
School Department: $59,728,158
Fixed Costs: $31,623,304, covers health insurance, debt service, general insurance, unemployment compensation, retirement fund.
Water & Sewer: $6,237,481
To view this breakdown as a pie chart, copy and paste this link into your browser: http://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0B4DybAa5lil0YzhiNzJiYjQtNDBjYy00NWNlLTg2YzItMmQxNmNlOTM5YjRj&hl=en
The challenge moving forward is how to balance our budget responsibly while the ongoing costs continue to exceed revenues.
The three Boards are diligently working with our local & State representatives to explore every option for efficiencies and/or avenues for fiscal reform. It is important to recognize that we are taxing to the levy limit and that the bulk of our cost structure relates to employee compensation. At some stage, we will need to either raise taxes/increase revenues or further reduce services. At the local level, much progress has been made involving some union concessions in the form of forgoing pay increases previously agreed to and/or furloughs.
Copy the link below and paste it into your browser to view a timeline of the budget process:
http://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0B4DybAa5lil0Nzg1OTRjYTMtZWZjYy00ZmIzLWEyYTEtM2E0ZDM1OTNmOGE3&hl=en
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Please clarify how the fixed costs relate to the town and school budget figures listed immediately above them in this posting. It appears that health insurance costs are handled for both the town and school depts together on outside of the the $33M and $59M budgets? Is that correct?
ReplyDeleteQuestion on process of posting (and please excuse my ignorance): It appears that you can only post with a name if you've set up a profile elsewhere or also have a URL? Will all comments be therefore posted anonymously unless we include our name in the posting? Thank you.
ReplyDeleteBonnie Zahorik
Another process clarification question: It appears that you can post comments on the first 2 topics but not on the next 2?
ReplyDeleteAlso - in the collective bargaining posting, it would be helpful to see when the current agreements expire so we can understand when any new terms negotiated would have the potential to take effect. Thank you!
In answer to the procedural questions above about posting comments: you can post anonymously, or if you want to use your name you can do so by setting up a free account on Google, OpenID, AIM, or one of the other sources listed in the drop-down menu that appears below the "Post a Comment" box.
ReplyDeleteAlso, thank you for pointing out that you are unable to post comments to two of the topics. I have fixed that glitch so you should be able to post comments to all topics now.
Regarding the question on when collective bargaining agreements expire: if you go to the url below you will see all the town and school collective bargaining agreements. The first page of each agreement shows when that agreement expires.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.aps1.net/index.aspx?nid=400
In answer to the question about fixed costs, above:
ReplyDeleteYes, the health insurance expenditure ($12,440,000 for FY10) includes ALL employees, both town & school outside of the $33M Town and $59M School budgets. This obligation continues to see double digit increases every year and is part of the employee contract.......therefore, any material change has to be bargained with the unions.
Have we considered reducing benefits - i.e. health insurance to retirees? Use retiree benefits as a leverage point in contracts. I bet the union management will throw the retirees under the bus in order to get some other, less valuable, benefit from the town.
ReplyDeleteIn response to the post above: retirees are included in all health insurance committee meetings along with the collective bargaining groups. Some retirees are eligible for benefits from the federal government; they are notified of the different benefit packages that are available each year.
ReplyDelete