Special Appropriations To Be Considered By Board Of Finance

The Board of Finance, during a meeting Wednesday at 7 p.m. in town hall, will discuss and take action on several requests for special appropriations.

A special appropriation request for $90,000 from the Madison Public Schools, if approved, will be added to the reserve fund for unanticipated external placements for special education students for tuition and transportation services.

Also, the finance board will consider a special appropriation request for $12,470.30 for additional equipment required in the emergency dispatch center. This request was already presented to the Board of Selectmen at their meeting on Dec. 5 and was unanimously approved.

Proposal for special appropriation to hire chef and assistant chef at senior center voted down at Board of Selectmen meeting

The Board of Finance also is scheduled to discuss a proposal for senior services food service. A similar proposal was considered at the Board of Selectmen meeting Dec. 5.

At that meeting, a special appropriation request of $42,000 from Senior Services to provide meal services in Senior Center Café beginning January 2012, was voted down three to two, with First Selectman Fillmore McPherson, Selectman Joe MacDougald, and Selectman Joan Walker voting against it. Selectmen Diane Stadterman and Al Goldberg voted in favor of the proposal.

McPherson, MacDougald, and Walker said they were in favor of considering some sort of nutritional or meal program at the center. They said they were not in favor of the specific proposal because they wanted to make sure they knew more about the town's overall financial position and how making such a commitment now would affect other programs in town. They also said they wanted additional information from Senior Services as to what the impact might be if the program were delayed, rather than started right away.

Special appropriation would have provided seed money for lunch program

Madison Senior Services Supervisor Joseph Petrella presented a proposal that said the special appropriation of $42,000 would have provided seed money to get a lunch program started. The goal of the lunch program is to "provide Madison Seniors with a nutritional lunch at an affordable price," the proposal says. "In order to begin operations an do a pilot program, "seed" money is required to hire staff and cover initial costs of the program." 

According to the proposal, it would cost about $46,800 a year to hire a chef, and about $18,720 a year to hire an assistant chef. Those figures account for salary only, and benefits would be in addition to that, according to the proposal.

Petrella said the initial proposal was developed based on information provided by the Guilford Senior Center, which provides a meal service at its senior center.

Fiscal prudence pulling on the reins

Selectman Al Goldberg, while he voted in favor of the proposal, said he understood the concerns of those who wanted additional information before committing to the hiring of two additional people by the town. He asked whether it might make sense to cooperate with Guilford, so that some of the costs would be shared. "Our hearts are in this, but our fiscal prudence is pulling on the reins here," he said.

Stadterman said she didn't want to belittle the fiscal impact of the proposal, but she said providing such a service is in line with the goals of the new senior center.

"It has to do with the philosophy of what we want to do for our seniors," she said. "The new senior center is not just about having a nice place to go, or a better room to do arts and crafts in, it's about our responsibility to our seniors ... Just as we have a responsibility to provide well-balanced food service to our children, we have the same responsibility to our seniors. We built the building, we need to use the building."

Selectmen recommend that the proposal be forwarded for discussion

MacDougald noted that, during the last budget cycle, the selectmen and Board of Finance reluctantly cut money from the town's road programs and some of the funding for submerged fire tanks in the north end of town, among other programs

"I'm leery about being locked in now and a) not being able to follow through and b) having more important priorities come along," he said. "I want to see the state of the consolidated budget before we move forward on this."

The selectmen recommended the proposal be taken to the Board of Finance as a discussion item.