Selectboard Meeting Notes Redux- Board Approves 12% Property Tax Increase; Won’t Tax Cats

The Brattleboro Selectboard approved their revised FY26 budget with a 12% property tax increase without further changes, ignoring a great deal of feedback from the Finance Committee and members of the public that there were other items to consider and concerns that root problems were being put off for future years.

The board agreed that no cuts to staff will be considered. Staff positions in Brattleboro are seemingly guaranteed forever.

The board also asked that the community be more respectful when taking about municipal affairs, and laughed at Liz’s serious suggestion to tax cats.

Sorry for the delay. The internet was being wonky for me last night. This meeting is worth getting down, though.

 

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Franz –  So I just want to mention something a couple people in town are concerned with – and that’s the general tone of discussion around municipal affairs. That they have taken on a nasty edge recently, in social media or other forums. Let’s get opinions out there but restrain ourselves from the open antagonism that can be shown. Somebody once said something like “Be nice.”

Peter – Speak up. It is good to project.

Richard – I have a comment mostly about the budget so I’ll wait.

David L –  You may recall I sent a message with a proposed method of reporting EMS billing and collections such that the collection data is synced with the quarter of the billing. When will the FD make its next presentation and will such data be included?

Potter – First meeting in February, and we can take a look at the data that way.

Oscar H – this is about the budget … I’ll save it.

Dick Degray – a couple things. I was hoping to ask if John or Patrick had any idea of what revenue has come in for EMS billing off the top of your head. I’ve been looking for the audit and when will that be out. I like to look at it. And third, what Franz said. I’m really concerned about where our town is in the last few years we have had an undercurrent percolating and in the last month it is turned up and bubbling. There is divisiveness and people recruiting people for RTM like it is them vs us. I encourage people to run and who gets elected, but what it not a good process is when we recruit people to run. We saw that at the last special meeting. Town meeting works best when we work together, and I don’t see that happen. I see the wedge being driven deeper and deeper. We need to stand up to this and come together on issues that effect the town. I ask everyone to tone the rhetoric down and start working together. Facebook is not your friend. It  is probably the worst invention to hit society ever. People go after one another. That’s not who we are as a community. The way it is goin now, if you don’t agree you are against me and there is no middle ground.

Daniel – ballpark figure for EMS?

Potter – Kim Frost said we were at 64% halfway through the year including the $250l you transferred. Audit is getting close.

(Lissa discusses the 250th anniversary )

Jill ST – request selectboard to put something on the ballot – a request for the safe injection site . You met with legislators and had asked whether the town would get a vote on that and =you didn’t get a clear answer. I followed up and the state wasn’t going to ask towns.  I ask that you put it on the ballot.

Daniel – I was in the room when you asked staff about it and there were questions. Unless board members want to see this come back, we need to see something in writing.

Jill – Town Attny has looked at it and has given me the wording. He had the exact wording –  before any safe injection site, the town would have a vote. This would be s statement to the state of Vermont.

Liz – are you proposing the selectboard place it on the ballot?

Jill – yes, you have that power. If not, then I have to collect signatures. The reason to ask you is basic. Let the people speak.  It was discussed. Burlington is getting it. It is still a valid point – what do town voters feel?

Daniel – put it in writing to us.

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(consent agenda) (no discussion)

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Sue – the request is for a second reading on Chapter 15 which is the establishment and regulation of the DID – First hearing was Dec 3. Three changes – 1. a cleanup of the boundaries. 2. To change the way the appropriation is made. Annually DBA comes with a request and a budget. The challenge is that there fiscal year is July 1 and are still fundraising. So, an annual request and a report of things done from now on. Remove the date of the annual meeting. They want flexibility.  and 3. Every 5 years they are to vote if it was to continue. It was a state requirement. No longer required. So we’d remove that here. There are other ways to get feedback on if it is working. Town must make a financial commitment to keep it a DID. It can be tax stabilization or a multiyear financial commitments. That’s the overview.  No changes requested after the first reading.

Daniel – comments?

Degray – I made a request that DID voting not be removed. I think when you read this there would be no control here in reality.  This removes the selectboard and I don’t think that should be removed and this should not be in perpetuity. Not many remember how this started. Used to be funded by business people, then the Town, then the legislation changed and the special assessment tax on the buildings happened. This is so building owners can say no. It might not happen, but the language should stay here. I doubt this would ever come before the board if this changes. For some accountability. We owe it to the building owners. Not sure who made this request – Sue or DBA.

Sue – it came from me because it is not a requirement of the statute.

Daniel – so on page 18 of this packet and 104 of the ordinances it mentions the change in statue designation. 

Sue – no longer required to take a vote. Does require a downtown organization. It could be an organization or it could be the town.

Liz – this is taxation without representation. I want to make sure the people in the downtown distract could vote on whether they want to continue to be taxed.

Sue – the budget gets approved by the membership, which includes them. 

Franz – what occurred to me. Might some other organization want to become the downtown organization – is there a process for evaluating that? It does put this into perpetuity? What if we wanted to change to a different group?

Sue – a question for the Town Atty. Nothing locks us to the downtown alliance. The board could make a change.

Kate T – DBA – thank you for the explanation. We came forward with this because we are celebrating 25 years and in past years when we have come there has always been back and forth. There is oversight of the membership on creating the budget. The annual meeting allows for review and a vote. Annual we ask members to say yes to us as an organization, work plan and budget  The other piece is about making the process more accurate.

Lissa – I agree with Degray. There needs regular accountability around the DBA – we tried to get earlier mission statements and weren’t able to access that info. We pay an extra $800 to be part of this and I think there needs to be more accountability to property owners who are paying for the group.  I don’t feel with the performance of DBA – Gallery Walk has hurt our Gallery because everyone is in the parking lot and there is no parking. Others agree. parking lot parties take business away. The general consensus- money is spent on it but it isn’t spent as well as previous gallery walks. There needs to be taxation with representation. No ill feelings. Kate does a good job, but the organization raises lots of questions for us as building owners.

Daniel – accountability is within the organization and they would report annual to the board…

Sue – DBA would still come, ask for funds, give you a report, and it would go to RTM. Members approve their budget, you approve their request, and RTM ultimately votes.

Franz – this could go either way and be fine. Value in having a formal process every 8 years or so? It’s hard to know, but my preference is to have people come back every 5-8 years and talk to us to make sure it is all going goo.

Sue – annually the organization will always come to you. The planning dept would undertake a vote and we’d bring that back, not the DID. The Town would take the pulse, not the organization.

Liz – I’m hearing that the DBA will still come, and if they want more money they will ask for it, and the rest is within the DBA structure.

Degray – when is the last time the Town took a vote of the members of the district?

Sue – I’ll guess it was probably 2018… or 2017.

Degray – I think that was done at Town Meeting. RTM has to approve us staying in the district. This provision is for the building owners. When were the owners of the building – 83 of us – had the opportunity to vote on – it was done in 2010 or so – the Town is supposed to do it. I believe they have failed to do so, therefore I hope someone says let’s take it out and have the vote and continue to ave it every 5-8 years.

Sue – 2017-18 done with property owners. It has been done while I’ve been working.

Daniel – like this ordinance or want to see something different?

Liz – more information, to understand what Degray’s questions mean.

Daniel – more understanding of how the assessed parties can have a say?  My feeling is that this isn’t critical to happen tonight as long as we give decent direction.

Richard – so this has to be reviewed – is it a legal issues? Can we do this on our own?

Daniel – the thing that is coming out is something no longer required by statute, but we could leave it in locally if we want.  This is why we do the first and second readings. Just need clear direction.

Degray – I was a building owner and don’t remember the vote…

Sue – it might have been informal…

Patrick M – administered through the Town Clerk’s office in 2018. I don’t know if there are records…

Hillary Francis – it was in 2018 and I do have a record of that. I have the results and mailing labels. Selectboard got the results.

Liz – let’s just wait, review the info, and we’ll decide next time.

Potter – you are looking for language to poll the members outside the DBA bylaws – 

Liz – property owners who are assessed.

Daniel – absent that requirement in statute, is there a mechanism for a regular vote

Potter – if you have authority we’ll bring back language, and an estimate of the cost of gathering that information.

Daniel – okay, we’ll get info.

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The FY 26 Development Process.

Potter – so this follow up is to your meeting of Dec 17 and you went through 58 possible reductions or revenue increases. You adopted are summarized in Attachment A, then we took those reductions and increases into a budget format, Attachment B, and also in the form of a revised capital plan is that Attachment C. Finally Attachment D shows the budget assumptions.   Then, so doing all of that the revised budget shows an estimated total of just over $25 million, $2,080 per capita for services, lower than neighboring communities. It is a budget that would provide services that people value (Attachment E) – all the things the town delivers – library, parks and rec, town clerk, planning, trash and recycling, maintenance of roads, sidewalks, emergency response and police.  Happy to review all the work we do for residents and visitors. The cost to deliver them is to increase by 9.2% would allow us to continue solid waste program, support police downtown to reduce chaos and disorder, and increased human service grants. These are investments in the community. To deliver, we need to raise $19, 841,000 in property tax – a municipal tax rate of $1628 per $100,000 of assessed value . That’s $175 more than this current year.

Potter – The Table 1 shows how that plays out for people in various scenarios with ranges of income and assessed value.  You can see that half of all taxpayers would see an increase of $321 or less to deliver all of those services. I want to note that within this tax increase, and for people with properties worth $366k… they’d see $643 – some will see $321 or less and some will see a more significant increase. I do want to note that this tax increase includes significant trash service costs avoided by the household. Town paying for it means households are saving trash costs – $4-600 per household. Don’t have to pay to get rid of trash. BY supporting this budget you support the collective municipality for everyone.  The question of further reductions came up and you asked about human services funding. One possibility is to got to RTM and see if a reduction to 1% of the amount could be reduced – $230k or so. That would bring the tax rate down to $1609 per $100k. There would have to be a proportional lowering of support to Brattleboro nonprofits. WE looked at what other towns do for human services. South Burlington gives $15k. Winooski does none. Montpelier does $134k at the ballot as a separate item.  If you did all of that and got it to $1609… if that’s not enough, then you could revisit the list in Attachment F – 1.1 million more in budget reductions. Another $88 of reductions – under $1600. The questions tonight are is there anything you want to explore further, do you need further feedback, and how would you like to proceed?

Daniel – so when we were presented with the base budget it was a surprise but we knew we took actions around public safety, solid waste contract…when we saw the budget and the 22% tax rate increase – it was hard to swallow. We took that in and sat with it and we had a meeting. We wanted to see it be reduced and to preserve the actions we took around public safety and solid waste. We didn’t say what to do. We said cut it and show us implications. Staff worked hard to bring back a slate of possible reductions that we considered and we reduced the budget by almost by almost $2 million in that meeting. That’s presented back. Instead of 22% tax increase it is a 12% tax increase – good work done by the town staff that preserves essential services and new projects. My question – is this a budget we can move forward with or is there something else you want to see.

Richard – I want to offer my perspective.. Perspective is important. The people of Brattleboro elected us to represent them. We don’t take that trust lightly. WE take lots of input and we make decisions. A budget is a complicated matter and I’ve been trying to put things in perspective. I tried to compare us to other towns – populations are a marker but aren’t accurate. There are 12k people here, Essex (11k), Rutland (16k)  Keene  (22k)and Greenfield don’t compare to us. We should be considered a hub town with extra expenses. Someday maybe the state will recognize this. 22% increase caused some panic. The board and staff have trimmed $2 million. Of the 10 town manager salaries – 6 are below, 3 are equal and 1 is above the state averages. We’d’ pay more if all are at state averages. It can be difficult to fill them at below average salaries. Brattleboro gets good services. WE shouldn’t cut personnel. If we look at the numbers, we have progressive taxation. Those with more pay more. We help those who need help, and those with more give more. If your homestead is value at 100% of the median or $183k, and income is 100% of median at $5000, you would see no increase in your taxes. Zero.  That same household has income about $67500, the increase would be $321.  (etc.)  These numbers have variables that can change and we don’t know about education taxes. We have little control of factors that rule our lives. We can’t expect to pay less for new vehicles. The tax implications will be difficult for many. The price we pay for doing no harm with an eye on the future.

Liz – one, specific, and some summary remarks. Some specifics – does anyone want to give licenses to cats?

Daniel – that is where you are starting?

Liz – but also, one goal we have in revenue sharing, I notice we have a state current use payment of $20900k and that’s not enough. We need more revenue form the state. We should consider non residential fees for library and recreation to increase. Also, on pg 69, it has been by experience that employees would be happy to reduce the employee recognition program. Traffic Safety Budget could be cut as not essential. We could reduce contribution to bus service. It would impact Saturday service. Maybe we can cut that $50k in half. Those are my immediate goals. I want to comment that in reading the comments of the public in the past, I think the time to complain about the sustainability coordinator job has passed. This job takes in kore than is paid out.  Communications coordinator is doing an excellent job. The staff values his work. Finally, regarding police, nobody wants to talk about crime. I want the police to do their job and we asked Chief Hardy to come up with a plan to attend to the chaos and crime, in an innovative way. Cops without guns is just want the community safety report asked for. WE can’t slice and dice it and get it on the cheap. We’re behind it and will pay for it.  

Peter- taxing cats…

Franz – where to start is the question. what we have done so far is to look at a wide range of possible adjustments to the budget to get the tax rate down. I would not say that most have reduced the spending but have modify calculations about revenues or defer maintenance to the future. It might be appropriate but we didn’t cut the budget. I hear two competing narratives in Brattleboro – one is the tax increases are necessary to preserve Brattleboro as a desirable and functional place- and the other is that it will destroy Brattleboro as a place to live. Views from intelligent people. I don’t know which is true, or is more true. I’ve been looking for a middle path to preserve the stuff we really need but a harder line on things we can get along without because a lot of people think that following the path is going to damage the town significantly. I don’t know… Cilla or Corpuses.  We said we’d talk about things not on the list..we didn’t because it was late at night. There are other ideas we have not talked about. There is also the hole we created in  our reserve funds. We spent money we didn’t have. We have not talked about getting our fund balance back up to where it should be for emergencies.  I would have preferred spending less of it for emergency. It is in pursuit of valuable efforts. I’m still on the fence with this budget.  I’d like to discuss somewhat ifs… and this changes. Like what if the downtown safety action plan, which I support… but I wonder if a smaller contingent of officers could get the job done at a lower cost. Operationally it would be hard to make that change. I have a lot of questions. I on’t know where I’m going to land.

Peter Case – I don’t know where to start. Thanks Richard for what you said, what Liz said. I would challenge town staff to maybe shout from the rooftops the last time taxes went down. Maybe not increases like this year. It was a year with much out of our control. It was the community, and solid waste. Free market trash pickup doesn’t look good. Competing narratives is something we deal with day to day. I pay close to$600 a month in property taxes, and close to $7k a year. All of us at this table pay taxes. We are agreeing upon this for ourselves as well. I understand it. WE have to deal with it. I don’t think people will pull up stakes and move out. A smaller community action plan would have been presented at the time. I feel strongly about the cuts we already made. We could make more. You know where I stand about cutting staff. They have names. They do hard work. WE should to that and think about what w e are saying. Those responsibilities will shift to someone else.

PUBLIC

Oscar H – Finance Committee – I want to read a resolution you have al seen. We passed it by a 5-0 vote. It’s a diverse committee and each had their own reasons for voting for this. The committee is concerned the selectboard  was unwilling to consider staff cuts during its Dec 17 discussion of reducing the FY26 budget , relying instead on cuts to services and deferrals to FY27. The Finance Committee call upon the selectboard to instruct the Town manager to present to the selectboard a list of potential staff cuts to consider for FY26 by its next meeting. We recognize that the concept of staff cuts is painful but we believe that considering it is an essential part of the responsible management of the Town. The Finance Committee is also deeply concerned about the lack of a long term financial plan. In the interim we call upon the selectboard to identify cuts and deferrals made during its Dec 17 meeting that are anticipated to reappear in the FY27 budget. We would like to see this list before the FY26 budget is approved. Ideally a pro forma budget for FY27 should be included while the FY26 budget is being considered. So I know you’ve all seen that before. I just want to follow that up with a couple, my personal take on why this is important and keep bringing it up. I’m not a small government guy. I know these people have names and it is a fantastic staff, and they are hired for a reason. I’m not coming at this  as someone who wants to cut staff or sees obvious cuts to make.  Here’s where I’m coming from. This board said 22% is too high, we want to make cuts. Starting from that premise, I feel like the cuts that were presented and accepted are largely of a kind that are just moving the problem until next year. There are a lot of things that are “we are not going to do this for one year”  or “we are going to defer this program or this maintenance” . There are a couple of big items that involve savings that are achieved by spending money that is not renewable, for example if there was something in the budget that was $200k,  and we paid for it this year out of the revolving loan fund, I have a very hard time calling that a savings. That is just us using up a non-renewable resource so that the number is lower, and then finally there are also… now I forgot… there are a lot of these items. What I’m worried about is that it is January. September 1 is in less than 9 months. All five of you could be on the board again next year. In less than 9 months you will have next year’s budget in front of you, with all of the deferrals back on the list because they haven’t been cut, all of the options for dealing with those will have been reduced because the accounts will have been partially spent, and I just think it is going to make everyone’s lives harder to have a two year process instead of one year. That is why I think we are not setting ourselves up for success by doing it this way.

Daniel – thanks – I gave you a bit more time than usual there.  Who else?

Kate O – I agree with everything Oscar just said. I’m worried about two things… well, more than two. The first is the current and long term financial viability of our town. Everything you are doing goes against every  fiscally responsible practice.  say this as someone who sat there for 6 years and as someone who worked for the Governor of the State of Vermont for 11 years and saw budgets from start to finish. We are setting ourselves up for disaster. Up at the state we had to make hard decisions but we did it and we did it for the right reasons.  Before you, there has been a long list of selectboard members, town managers, and department heads who have had to make some really really hard decisions to get our town on a fiscally responsible path, and you folks are blowing it up in a matter of months. So I’m worried about that. I’m also worried about the people who are going to have to pay these taxes. It is not like there will be a mass exodus, that’s not what I’m worried about. I’m worried about the people who can’t afford a $342 or whatever tax increase. This is not just $341. It is $341 plus the $110 dollars of tax increase we are doing this year. And that is also on top of the thousands of dollars people are already paying. Those -people, not just those who work in town government, but the citizens of our community have names as well. And we cannot forget that. And I think that is one of the things that is being totally forgotten here. Over the last meeting and the last couple of weeks, members of this board have asked me “Kate, what should we cut?”. I have been honest and I have told you. So I want to ask you folks on behalf of all the people – taxpayers and renters who are going to be impacted by this – what should they cut from their household budget to pay for this tax increase? Do they have to turn their lights off, turn their heat down, buy less good food, don’t go to the doctor or dentist. I’m not exaggerating. Those are real life things. I think it is really important. No one has mentioned the people that have to pay these taxes and the burden it is upon them. I wish you would look at this again, do what it right, and do it for the people of this community. Thanks.

Daniel – thanks Kate. Gary?

Gary – I reiterate on what Kate says. You are going to create more issues, more problems more homelessness. We don’t know what this year will hold with the new president. Step back and do some crunching of the numbers. You will create more homelessness, and then they can’t get jobs. A lot of people don’t own businesses or buildings… on fixed incomes who really rely on tis. What would you do if you were in their shoes?

Mary D – I want to bring up that this is like shifting shells. You put more costs on the residents… like costs of bags. It is out of our pockets. Like Kate says… our savings are being depleted as well. Your numbers aren’t quite right, either. It all adds up. The education tax is on us. Don’t shift the shell to get more money out of Brattleboro residents. pare down the budget to be sustainable. Education costs could shift thoughts about children and families. Kinds are too expensive. people don’t want families anymore. Not more one dime.

Daniel – expenditures went up 9.2% Property taxes need to be raised to pay… the budget isn’t just property taxes. That went up 12%.

Bob O – Following on what Franz said. I looked at proposed reduction on Attachment A and did a quick run through. There are three or four buckets  – $383k of deferrals, meaning you are taking something out and deferring to next year or another process. It may increase costs to wait on maintenance. The other bucket was replacements – robbing Peter to pay Paul – taking from a fund to pay for another. about $670k. The chargebacks of $37k in chargebacks – PAYT bags, charges back to residents for services. Those three buckets is $1.4 million. That is most of the reductions. So a closer look, maybe?

Daniel – thanks Bob.

Sarah G – I joined the meeting late. Clarification pleae. The Town Manager was talking about other towns giving for social services. Montpelier doesn’t give anything – it goes to a ballot. S Burlington give $15k… so where do we fall in that?

Daniel – $461k

Sara – ok. We give $461k for a town of 12k people? Thanks for clarifying that.

Degray – under redundancy. Liz talked about cutting funding for the Moover – removing some Saturday service. Lifting the tax burden by placing it on the people who use the bus service is quite noble of us. I don’t support it at all. I left downtown a year ago. It was on fire in 2022, and 2023, and the town did nothing, doing EMS, and then you overreacted. The Chief has never had 27 officer. It would be nice to see what she does with them before we add more. A month ago Fish said the downtown had improved. Getting the Bratt team and Justin on street. We are in a tax crunch and you are entrenched on not reducing those people. I support police but don’t like paying for something I’m not going to get or don’t need. I think you are listening but not hearing me. It’s the sad part of everyone following the process, but I have a pretty good pulse on what is happening downtown. Three officers at this time is not the right way to go. If you revisited that… what happens if town meeting rejects the expenditure? What happens then? 10% increase is not something that the majority of people in this community can afford. Just because your house has a value doesn’t mean you have a pocket full of money. There are many who are property rich but pocket poor, and we think that because you have all this land and you have a home on the land that you have a lot of money. Then there is the school tax and water and sewer tax – that is an enterprise fund and it affects the pockets of everybody who uses those services, which is about 95% of the community. So I’m going to ask you not to accept this and find some cuts, and certainly not registering cats – now that is something new. I’ve been around for a long long time and I haven’t heard that so you get credit for something ingenious, but I ask the board to do the work and say we have to cut this budget down to 6, 5, 4… where we are at is not acceptable for the community.

Amanda – I’ll disagree with Degray. The three officers are needed. Hardy is doing a good job shuffling right now. In West B, I haven’t seen a police cruiser… maybe one day in three months. Our vulnerable people on RT and the rural roads, we are at risk, too. Everything is going downtown. Could there be a tax exemption for farms if they have working cats? Our cats have jobs.

Millicent – What is the process and the cost to the town if the budget is rejected at RTM?  I agree with what others have said.

Daniel – we’ve kicked that around. I spoke with Patrick. You will leave the meeting wit a budget. It might not be the same size … someone will amend the budget number and arrive at a figure. Once that happens it comes back to town staff and they will need to make it work.

Patrick – good, fair.. that is the benefit of having a town meeting to debate it. The meeting could choose to do nothing but why do that?

Jill- the town staff makes that decision? It is the selectboard that decides on the budgets.

Daniel – the TM mages town staff. We do policy setting. If the meeting s ays cut it by $3 million, that would be advisory to the selectboard, and we’d be wise to listen to them, then we’d direct the town administration to do it.  Others?

Degray – I would like the budget after town meeting – 50 reps to sign the petition to ave it go to the voters of the town. We’d find out if the selectboard and RTM was doing a good job.

Daniel – that is your right. We’ve heard feedback. I’m looking for direction. There is no obvious consensus right now. Does the board want to look at specific things to cut or new revenues to add. Is the budget what you are asking for? Cutting the general fund budget is not the same as… we asked for a 10% reduction in the budget and we were provided with that information and we considered it and made decisions, so we reduced the tax rate from 22% to 12%. Public says that is still concerning. What do we want to do?

Liz – the homestead rebate act has an effect. It is important to understand that this is one of the few state actions that lowers the tax burden on those who can least afford it. taxes here are higher than surrounding towns. I want revenue sharing. The homestead act is revenue sharing at the individual homeowner level. We should make sure everyone eligible applies. It will show the burdens and show how much of a hardscrabble town we are that this many people need help, and the state would see Brattleboro needs help for the state burdens placed upon us and other host communities. That’s number 1. The other thing is that, I have been on the finance committee and a 6 year board member. There is a difference of being on the board – others have been on and are looking from the outside – we have a responsibility to the taxpayers and to the community we want. The budget we have meets the need of the overall community health. I’d say if we are reducing the increase to 12% and say to RTM do you really want 2% to go to Human Services? That will reduce the ta burden to the community. So I’m in favor of this budget. Don’t know if we can give cats licenses, but if we want to do these little tweaks they’c be great. We need to pass a budget and be responsible for the scope of services in town.

Daniel – Liz likes it. and Richard says he can live  with it.

Richard – Personnel cuts – the finance committee thinks thats the way to go. It’s a difficult decision with lots of implications. If you worked in a town when you might lose you might lose your job, what sort of morale situation are you setting up. We owe it to the people who work for the town. They created an incredibly stable town and to hang them out to dry for the good of everyone else, I have trouble with that. Look at things from the shoes of other people. The taxes are a burden, but we also have a significant workforce – those people support our economy. They buy things. Not all live here, but…  perspectives. We have to look at the bigger picture. I support the budget.

Daniel – we can categorize critiques in a few ways – one is saying you have deferred things to a future year, not necessarily net year. Things can be deferred for a decade. I don’t think deferrals are great for the town. One of the reasons this room is so cols is putting off maintenance. It depends on how you view the challenge. 22% was hard to take and we asked for a reduction. You can critique the reductions and say they are only good for one year, and most people here only have a one year term. There is an election in March. The board here next year will look different and they will have different priorities. We are not responsible for next year’s budget at this time. BY making cuts, that is continuing to provide a good level of service through staffing. It preserves an excellent level of service for the net 12 months. I don’t feel responsible for FY27 budget. The question of considering staff cuts. Kate proposed we cut sustainability coordinator, communications coordinator, and not hire the three additional officers. Liz spoke to the coordinator brining in ore than it costs. Communications has added valued and we’ll eed it with the new solid waste and parking changes. So savings from them don’t have enough of a benefit. The three police officers…the case was made in August – I’ve heard critiques that it was hasty and an overreaction… with people here saying things were out of control – we took action as quickly as we could, and the three officers would be in this budget due to the timeline and avoiding delays. the five proposed staff cuts – I don’t see the benefit beyond savings. Are there three people who want to see staff cuts at a future meeting?

Peter – Liz brought up good points about revenue sharing. Instead of cutting people, we can charge them to do more. We are here looking at more taxes. Instrad of cutting positions, perhaps we have them do more, like communicate how homestead rebates work. Maybe they can he with those efforts. They will pay immediate dividends. You don’t cut people to save $10 on taxes. If the Chief thought she could do this with one officer she would have proposed it. We take her at her word. We all have a unique ability to forget the pain we were in this summer. I couldn’t walk down the street without people talking about the downtown. It has  calmed down now because of us and Chief Hardy, and I’m proud of that work. I’m in favor of the budget we presented.

Franz- I want to comment on Oscars comments about the future. WE can agree this is a difficult process and it would be wise to learn from it and forestall difficulties in the future – we need to better anticipate what is coming – we have expanded town government significantly, but failed to anticipate cost increases for solid waste, or expanding the police department. maybe if we had anticipated it, we would have made different spending decisions in the past. We have valuable positions but we might not have added them if we knew what was coming. We have to look at the future implications of our decisions. We can make it through this year, but what are we are setting ourselves up for the future? We spent our unallocated fund balance. It was sacrosanct to not go below 10%. We spent $675k that we don’t have any plan to replace. We need to see the impact. Same with deferred maintenance and spending down the revolving loan process. We will make it through FY26, and we’ll do what we  have to do, but it is a mistake to set ourselves up for problems if we can avoid it. I have no additional cuts, the time to have those discussions has passed, I don’t think we ever heard from the police what our choices are. I lie the pieces but we never heard “what if” 28 officers, or 3 Bratt team members. I don’t suggest we change it at this point, but we need more of that thinking in advance going forward.  This isn’t a question. We need to look at the effects of future budgets in terms of what we are doing today. It is an important principle we need to respect.

Daniel – it seems like this board will proceed with this budget in this form. That’s the end of it?

Franz – we didn’t talk about Liz’s proposals…

Daniel – no one spoke up…

Peter – how many cats in Brattleboro.

Amanda – the revenue sharing – we are the welcome mat for the state of Vermont and I’d love to see some revenue sharing on that. With the welcome mat can be more policing. The state should support it. The sustainability coordinator – we had to tighten our belts on the farm.  The coordinator getting grants for DPW, the pool, etc… it is the sustainability of our town. WE should aggressively go after grants. Let’s go. Federal funding is changing and the state is changing. That is that person’s job and they need to do it well.

Daniel – one other consideration to make tonight.  Staff said they’d do focus groups with RTM members and come back to us with the results. We can absorb it and consider it further ont he 28th.

Liz – I don’t agree with that. The process is that the public and RTM members don’t have a greater say, This is the process. We take input from the community. We present this to RTM and that is where they have their say. RTM members are represented here this evening.

Franz – decisions have been made, what additional input do we need at this point. Our minds are made up.

Oscar – Two technical questions – went you spent the fund balance on downtown stuff, you would use leftover of Williams St grants, but that is being spent in drawdowns? Not going to emergency fund? 

Potter – the proposal is to use it to keep the tax rate down.

Oscar And then I’m hazy on the PAYT bag program – how does that work?

Daniel – yes, there are things to be worked out there. The plan is to not lose the revenue from PAYT bags. How that will happen is TBD.

Potter – because the new system will happen in January 2026, we’ll have time to develop a way to capture that additional money with a new system next fall.

Oscar – have we discussed with Casella? They are very automated.

Prudence – I’d like to support reducing social service funding , and say that as someone who works with and on non profits. I think that $461k is much to much for a town government to fund. That’s not the role. Reduce it to 1% and that would still be higher than most others.

David L – the second round of comments by board members. Quipp said this was solving the FY26 budget problem and the net board will face the FY27 budget. This year’s budget increase will be net year’s base budget. Unless you anticipate a giant increase in revenues you hand the net board a bug messy problem.

Daniel – board -anything else?

Heidi F – also a Town Lister. I am sitting here without answers but I keep thinking that part of what will happen is a reassessment of properties. Wr’ve hired an outside firm to do the assessments. That is beginning in 2025 and continuing through 2027, then final assessments will be made. The cost of that process to the town and for the taxpayers who will be reassessed. Not sure how it impacts the budget. I expect the firm needs to be paid. No one has mentioned this. Also, not quite sure about EMS and fire reporting for billing at the February meeting. That could affect this budget going forward. That’s another big piece not discussed. Coming down the pike soon.

Daniel – the cost of the reassessment is paid out of a special fund – not the general fund. Properties will be reassessed and values will go up and we’l have a new grand lust. EMS revenue has a conservative figure here in the budget. We’ve only seen small bits of data on this. Based on what we’ve seen we’ll look at something better than what we are estimating, but no crystal balls here

Degray – no one gave me an answer – what happens if RTM reject the use of the surplus funds. I disagree with where you are at and appreciate the work that you have put in, all the work Kate has put in. She has given you what you have asked for. Several people have been with the process from the beginning. We need public participation in all issues that come before the town. Thanks for your work on this.

Daniel – this is not the end at all. We’ll proceed with this. There is the warning. There is RTM. WE’ll see what happens then. We’ll re-litigate all these points there.  We’ll proceed with this revised budget and 

Potter – we will put together this budget for final consideration Jan 21 and will bring a draft warning for the RTM and ballot then.

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They do committee appointments.