Budget Passes On Third Round, Council Lowers Projected Mill Rate Further

By John Voket & Kendra Bobowick

Local voters passed a third round budget vote on Tuesday, June 8, by 271 votes. The next evening, members of the Legislative Council found a way to give a little something back to taxpayers in return.

Thanks to an anticipated uptick in building permit revenues and a slight adjustment to anticipated tax collections, the council voted unanimously to lower the projected mill rate slightly, basically rounding down the number from 24.03 to 24.

The action came after a conference call among several officials, including Finance Director Robert Tait, First Selectman Pat Llodra, Council Finance Committee Chair Benjamin Spragg, and Council Chairman Jeff Capeci, who concurred the reduction in taxation was both appropriate and affordable. A few minutes later, as a brief special meeting convened in the Reed Intermediate School media center, the rest of the council concurred in a unanimous voice vote.

Newtown’s third referendum on Tuesday brought a measurably higher turnout than the previous two attempts, on April 27 and on May 18. The budget of $104,284,615 passed with 2,589 for and 2,318 against the spending plan. Including absentee ballots, 4,907 voters came out Tuesday compared to 4,492 for the last failed vote. That turnout represents nearly 30 percent of the town’s qualified taxpayers.

In the final 15 minutes before the polls closed, workers saw an uncharacteristic rush that had more than 200 people streaming through the door at one point. At about 7:48 pm, one mother was overheard telling her young child, “I was number 427, on the nose.”

As the clock in the hall struck 8 pm, workers were forced to literally shut out latecomers who were rushing toward the middle school gym door to cast their budget ballot. But had those relatively few voters who missed the bell all cast No votes, the outcome would have been the same.

A few minutes later, that eventuality was confirmed to the gathering of local officials and interested voters who waited — some, like Mr Capeci, harboring very pensive expressions. Upon realizing the vote count registered a pass, relief washed across most of the faces of those who previously reflected disappointment following the failed April and May referenda.

First Selectman Pat Llodra smiled as moderator Nancy Laren read the machine counts. Mrs Llodra speculated that the “preponderance of additional voters” made the difference this time around — nearly 30 percent of eligible voters turned out compared to about 27 percent for May’s vote.

“I hope [residents] realize that this is the best budget we could manage given the circumstances and the elevated passion for distribution of resources,” Mrs Llodra said.

Mr Capeci said he believed the credit for the third budget’s passage rested on the shoulders of education supporters. “We were able to get school supporters to come out to vote Yes for this budget,” he told The Bee.

More Votes Cast

The margin of victory for taxpayers supporting the 2010-11 plan is a jump from the original 51-vote margin that defeated this year’s second referendum, and the 97-vote margin against the original proposal in April.

Action by the Legislative Council ahead of the third budget proposal assumed that taxpayers were calling for more money to be added to the school district’s requested increase. Following the May 18 budget defeat, town officials collaborated and restored $200,000 to the school district’s portion of the budget request making the school spending proposal for the coming fiscal year $67 million. That “olive branch” gesture would ultimate increase taxation for the coming year by 2.44 percent.

While the final referendum endorsed a mill rate of 24.03, the council has the ability to lower that number by Charter if circumstances develop that could permit the adjustment. Those circumstances were discovered as Mr Spragg reviewed the budget details following its passage. He said anticipated tax collections could be adjusted slightly in the overall budget revenue projections, and recalled the first selectman reporting a modest, three-month upward trend in permitting fees over the same time last year, and felt that trend could take some additional weight off taxpayers shoulders.

As a result, Mr Spragg — who served more than two decades as Newtown’s finance director — estimated the shaving of the mill rate to 24 from the incrementally higher approved amount could be offset by those two actions.

A mill equals one dollar in taxation for every $1,000 in taxable property.

Provided there are no further adjustments that must be made by Mr Tait in the accounting, that will be the final number applied to the 2010-11 tax bills. Tax Collector Carol Mahoney said she plans to have tax bills go out June 29, and the final day to pay without facing penalties and added interest will be Monday, August 2.

Budget Poll #3

For the third time this year, The Newtown Bee also offered its own budget survey, which attempted to provide insight as to why taxpayers voted as they did. The complete results of that survey are posted for review at www.NewtownBee.com.

For the third round of the survey, 330 participants pushed the Yes vote option to more than 59 percent, a turnaround from the first two surveys, which reflected substantially higher percentages of No votes.

The highest number of respondents (101) responding to a follow-up question about their motivation, said they were voting Yes because they were afraid a No vote would cause the budget to be cut even more. Another 73 participants said they were voting Yes because they believed the proposed budget is the right budget for Newtown this year.

Seventy-five respondents said they would vote No because they wanted to see more money cut from both town and school expenditures, and 42 said they were voting no because they wanted to see less money spent exclusively on the schools.

What was different about the third-round vote was a clarity of purpose among budget supporters that was somewhat muddled during the May referendum. That earlier vote may have been influenced somewhat by a movement supported primarily by elected officials from the Independent Party of Newtown.

Those officials unanimously endorsed casting a No vote on May 18 to send a message to Legislative Council members to add more money to the school district’s requested increase, which totals in excess of $67 million. The district’s original request was reduced by $2.5 million by the Board of Finance and its recommendation was endorsed by the council ahead of the first failed referendum.

Several letter writers and callers to The Newtown Bee since the May 18 referendum expressed a sense of disorientation because they felt a No vote on the last referendum meant they wanted taxation or spending reduced further.

A letter from Newtown resident Glenn Kessler directed to IPN Councilman Kevin Fitzgerald, which was shared with The Bee, stated: “It is incredulous to me that as a member of the majority of citizens who voted twice against having our taxes raised I now find it necessary to write to you to clarify what No means. When I voted No on the previous two proposed budget increases I relied on the fact that a No vote means No. It has traditionally, historically and logically meant No and has never meant yes. That is No, the proposed budget increases are too high and need to be lowered.”

Council action to restore the school funds will shifted $100,000 from the town-side budget’s contingency fund, leaving municipal operations with $311,000 less for the next fiscal year than the town-side has available in the current budget. The additional $100,000 added back to the school’s request will come from slightly increased taxation, nudging the tax increase that failed in the second referendum slightly higher.