Voters consider $1.1m override

Georgetown voters next week will decide whether a $1.1 million Proposition 2 1/2 tax increase is needed to meet the town's spending needs for fiscal 2008.

Paving the way for the ballot vote, the annual Town Meeting on Monday authorized $1,061,822 in additional funding for the fiscal 2008 operating budget, conditioned on passage of an override at the annual town election next Monday.

The $22.5 million budget approved by Town Meeting does not include the $1.1 million in override money. If the override passes, 71 percent of the added funds would go to the schools, and the rest to other town departments.

Supporters of the override, which would add $334 to the tax bill of an average single-family home assessed at $412,485 (or $84 for every $100,000 of home value), were pleased by the Town Meeting vote but remain cautious about the fate of the override.

"The reality is that it's a small step. The real proof here is whether or not it passes at the election next Monday," said Selectman Matt Vincent. "We've seen a number of instances around here where an override has been approved at Town Meeting to be put on the ballot, only to see it defeated the following week."

That was the case last year, when voters rejected a $381,167 override for the school budget and a $250,000 capital exclusion -- a one-year tax increase -- to reconstruct the Bailey Lane Bridge, after Town Meeting voted to support that spending.

Vincent said he is encouraged, though, that in contrast to last year, the spending article tied to this year's override received an overwhelming majority vote at Town Meeting. He said that fact "makes me believe there are many, many more people engaged in the process of participating and voting this year."

Supporters say the override would provide a modest boost to the town's revenues that is critically needed to keep pace with rising costs in areas such as health insurance and pensions.

"It represents a compromise between funding our town to a level in which we can provide ideal services against a balance of the hardship that taxes create for certain families and individuals in town," Vincent said. "I think what this would give us is really the bare minimum level of funding to keep our heads above the water."

Even with the additional $1.1 million, Vincent said, the town would still lack adequate funding for its Highway Department. He said the override money also does not provide funds to open Town Hall more than the current four days a week, does not address the need for additional staffing in the Fire Department, and "at the end of the day, it still leaves us with funding for our school system that is far below the state average."

The Commission on Public Secondary Schools last November placed Georgetown's middle/high school on warning status for what it said was the community's failure to provide an adequate and reliable source of funding. School officials have called funding a districtwide concern, noting that the town's per-pupil spending was the lowest of K-12 school systems in the state in 2005-2006.

Vincent said that defeat of the override would mean the loss of two to three teachers, a reading tutor, the school facilities manager, and a custodian at the schools; a reduction in funding for the library, the Fire Department, and veterans services; the turning off of 75 street lights; and the cancellation of hazardous waste drop-off days, among other cuts.

He said passage of the override would prevent those cuts while also providing money for pressing needs, including the hiring of four to five teachers and a Highway Department laborer; the purchase of safety equipment for the Fire Departments; additional hours for the town planner, the town clerk and their assistants; and funds for repairing storm drains and beaver control. It would also provide money for raises for nonschool employees. (The operating budget includes funding for raises for teachers due to a contract negotiated with them last year.)

But Selectman Lawrence Brennan said the town and its taxpayers cannot afford the spending that the tax increase would provide.

"We continue to put chains around ourselves with obligations charged on plastic for which we have no resources to fund. And we continue to be too darn nice and to say 'yes' to almost every requested increase. We do so to the detriment to those who are less able to support such excesses," he said, adding: "Georgetown has always been an affordable community. Now we are turning into 'little Boxford' or 'little Wellesley.' "

Brennan said it took selectmen just about an hour and a half to identify, in response to a request from the Finance Committee, $110,000 in nonschool cuts that could be made to nonschool departments if the override fails.

"Truthfully, it's not that hard to say no," he said of spending requests. "I would recommend a lot of people start to use that word.... When someone says they want something new, say 'That sounds great, but not this year.' "

But Elisabeth Tollman, chairwoman of Believe in Georgetown, a ballot committee formed to promote passage of the override, said the town cannot solve its fiscal problems without new tax revenues.

"Georgetown has been very frugal, and it has had great results," she said. "But at this point, the fiscal situation in town... is very precarious. Where we are right now, there is no other solution than increasing taxes by a modest amount," adding that even with that increase, Georgetown's tax bills would remain among the lowest in the region.