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HomeMy WebLinkAboutFINCOM MIN 07302009 Town of Mansfield Finance Committee Minutes of July 30, 2009 '{PO . ll,'iJ I '/0 :..u i- 10,.. ivl::. A /!'02 'J' Attending: James Lazzara Charlene Lavin Andres Gazzolo Karl Chambers Tommy Ratliff Motion: To Open at 7:30p.m. (Chambers - Lazzara) 5 - 0 Passes Mr. Gazzolo began the meeting with a review of the week. He said that earlier that day the state announced that the town should prepare for more cuts during fiscal year 2010 as a reaction to the shortfall in revenue at the state level. Mr. Gazzolo said that while the town has tried to close out fiscal year 2009 they have come across several issues since some of the detail work was not done previously. He listed all of the findings that have come up as a result of this. He said that he has a meeting scheduled with Ms. Kearney and Ms. Donovan the following week to discuss the possibility of a negative free cash. He said that if that happens there may be a need to take funds from fiscal year 2010 to cover fiscal year 2009. Mr. Gazzolo said that there is a special town meeting scheduled for August 18. At this meeting there are articles in regards to the fire department contract that was signed by the previous town manager and an amendment to the charter. Mr. Gazzolo updated the Finance Committee on the consolidation committee and said that Mr. Moran and Ms. Levine will be the representatives from the Board of Selectmen. He said that Mr. Lazzara will work to schedule the first meeting and the committee can begin their review using the flow chart that Mr. Riccio provided. Mr. Lazzara will keep the Finance Committee up to date on the status of this committee. Mr. Gazzolo said that as part of the GIS review he spoke with the MIS director. The director requested to make a presentation to the Finance Committee and wants them to better understand the implications of the decisions the town may make. Mr. Gazzolo said that the Finance Committee will make a recommendation to the Board of Selectmen on the changes to the charter that they are proposing. He said that this will likely be at the fall town meeting. Mr. Gazzolo said that the town has sold one of the old fire trucks and the Board of Selectmen have voted to keep the money from that sale for capital; hopefully it would be in the same area. Mr. Gazzolo said that the Finance Committee will have to wait to review the model until Mr. Arnold is present. Also, the accounting department has requested a little more time to adjust to the new system prior to reviewing the entire model. Mr. Gazzolo said that there was a presentation to the Board of Selectmen about the retirees from the town. He said that there are clearly two groups of retirees and that the older of the groups retired with less income. Mr. Lazzara said that they need a better explanation of how the money is used, all they have now is the total amount and not the breakdown. Mr. Gazzolo said that he invited the Fire Chief and Mr. Amoruso to attend the meeting. He said that they were there to discuss the possibility of privatizing the ambulance service. He said that if the town was going to keep the ambulance service internally then they should establish a plan for the ambulances similar to how they replace the cruisers. Chief Boldrighini said that he does agree with setting up a T replacement plan similar to the cruisers, but that he did not agree with the privatization. He said that if the town went to privatization they would have a much longer response time for ambulance calls. He said that currently the firefighters are also medics, intermediates and EMTs, they all work in a duel role to work with both the fire department and the ambulances. He said that with a private service the town would still be paying for firefighters to respond to the same calls, and that in many cases they would end up handling the majority of the call. Chief Boldrighini said that if the town keeps the ambulance service internal and uses the money from the ambulance fees to go to ambulances they would be better off. He said that the ambulance function could be a separate enterprise account and self-sustaining. Mr. Gazzolo suggested that the Chief, Mr. Amoruso and representatives from the Finance Committee get together to work through the options. Mr. Lazzara said that they need to look at the ambulance service as an entirely different department and work out a budget for it. A representative from Mansfield Ambulance Fund, Ed Burgue, came to tell the Finance Committee that the Fund is still there and still accumulating. He said that Ken Parsons is the current chairman. Mr. Gazzolo said that the previous evening someone had brought up that the Moody's downgrading of the town. A statement was made that the cause was that "we had given away $450,000". He said that he did not agree with that and that the Finance Committee was not a part of the presentation that had been made. He said that in the future it would be good financial sense if there was advance notice of when those things would be happening so that a presentation could be prepared. Vote Motion to approve the minutes of the July 23 Finance Committee meeting. (Lazzara - Chambers) 5 - 0 Passes Vote Motion to approve amendments to the minutes of the June 25 Executive Session Finance Committee meeting. (Lazzara - Lavin) 5 - 0 Passes Mr. Gazzolo said that the schools are having a meeting on August 4 to discuss some of their financial situations. He said that the stimulus money that the town is anticipating is now not expected until January. He said that the schools are also requesting 5.5 additional staff. Mr. Gazzolo said that there was a memo from the attorney general's office exonerating the Board of Selectmen from the complaint that had been filed. He said that the complaint in regards to the Finance Committee has not had a response. Motion: To Close at 8:30p.m. (Lazzara - Ratliff) 5 - 0 Passes d[,ifl, II ~ 7rFti7 /~l~ Signature of lerk (' . ,.., d' L;. 0'-1 Date of Approval o . ......".,. "'''_'~'''h_''~ ., . "~_..,~,, _..__C""'_"'_~"__""'~"'~'_'_'''___'''_'''_~m''''''''''-''-'''___ T