Budget Committee Meeting, February 15, 2024

Budget Committee disapproves school operating budget as amended. Implicitly recommends the default budget.

The Budget Committee met briefly to make its final recommendation to the voters about the school operating budget. The budget it had recommended to the voters at the school deliberative session was amended there to restore funding for a paraprofessional position which is currently vacant and which had been removed from the budget in the budgeting process. 

• Operating budget as amended: $16,703k

• Default budget: $16,517k

• Difference: $186k

At the deliberative session, Budget Committee member Tom Butkiewicz warned the voters present that increasing the school operating budget would increase the chances that on election day the voters might reject the proposed budget, leaving the school with the default budget. This committee meeting tipped the scales in that direction by declining to recommend the proposed operating budget to the voters.

The committee debated whether the position was needed. It was noted that two school board members voted against the amendment, and that the $40k was minuscule relative to the entire budget. 

There was a debate about whether the vote of a member who attended the meeting via Zoom would be legal. This brought up concerns from a member who was not allowed to attend meetings during the pandemic because they declined to wear a mask. At that time the Zoom link wasn’t working. Because of this, he was deprived of his right to vote. The committee decided to set a precedent and accept the vote via Zoom. 

The motion failed, 6 to 5. [Note: The sound quality on the recording is terrible. The votes for Decker and Dabrieo were not clear.]

Voting in favor of the proposed operating budget as amended: Sandra Jones, Charlotte Fyfe, Owen Friend-Gray, Megan Sebasco, Tim Dabrieo.

Opposed: Robert Kelly, Michael Kelly, Brent Tweed, Thomas Butkiewicz, Jeffrey Morrison, John Decker.

Watch the video: