Walpole: a case study in recession's toll

An ever-shrinking pot of dollars screams for attention in municipal ledgers across the region, but the real measure of tough times comes in quieter, more subtle ways. Walpole paints the picture for scores of suburbs like it.

The town’s community chorus was dropped this fall. The library has fewer hours on Saturday. And soccer moms say they are more apt to gather at a friend’s house after games rather than head to a restaurant.

“People don’t have the money to go out to eat,’’ said Aicha Kelley, a member of the Parents Advisory Committee for the Boyden Elementary School.

The crunch can also be seen at Re-Plays, a downtown sporting-goods store where ice skates, skis, and hockey equipment are crammed on shelves. There, Charlie Harcovitz is selling more consignment items than ever, hundreds of them, with half the proceeds going to former owners looking for a little extra cash.

Walpole, of course, is not alone with its troubles in a state where total local aid plummeted by $761 million this fiscal year. But the pain in Walpole, a bedroom suburb of 23,000 with above-average income and property values, is a stark reminder that the bad times have been ruthlessly undiscriminating.

“Walpole is well managed, it’s conservative, it’s focused on efficiently delivering services, and it’s a middle-class community where people like to live,’’ said Geoffrey Beckwith, executive director of the Massachusetts Municipal Association. “It’s representative of just how deeply communities across the state are being dragged down by this fiscal crisis.’’

Class sizes in Walpole are swelling, dozens of town jobs have been axed, and restaurants are not being inspected as often as the health director would prefer. The East Walpole fire station has been closed. School fees have been raised for sports and extracurricular activities. And the Recreation Department, which dropped 34 of its 52 autumn offerings for adult education, is raising prices an average of 20 percent for its winter offerings.

The Police Department has also been hit hard, cutting a program to combat rape and aggression and a popular initiative in which individual officers were linked to particular schools. It also lost four officers, leaving a force of 36, the same size as in 1977, to cover a town of 21 square miles. Though overall crime has remained stable, larceny has been on the rise, and police tallied record numbers of calls and arrests last year.

“The officers are pretty much going from call to call,’’ Police Chief Richard Stillman said.

Although state tax revenue appears to be improving, more Draconian cuts are possible in fiscal 2011. Lincoln Lynch III, the superintendent of schools, has warned town officials that dozens of additional layoffs might be necessary on top of the 28 positions cut this year. Walpole lost $1 million in state aid this fiscal year.

“We’ve cut the fat. We’ve cut the meat. Now we’re cutting bone and extremities,’’ Lynch said. “This is my 23d year in education, and I have never seen anything close to the destruction that the recession is causing to our public schools.’’

All of this has added up to a worry that residents may have to make do with less from their town for some time to come.

“If the roller coaster keeps going down, I don’t know that we’ll be able to maintain that same level of service that folks have become accustomed to,’’ said Michael Boynton, the town administrator. “We’re not saying that as a scare tactic. Creativity will go only so far.’’

As difficult as the cutbacks have been, they have been mitigated somewhat by an all-hands-on-deck mentality. “It’s tough,’’ said Jim Johnson, the assistant town administrator. “But we’re doing our best to get by.’’

Robin Chapell, the health director, simply smiled and shook her head when asked how many extra hours she works. Johnson said that working through lunch and staying late are not uncommon at Town Hall. And Josh Cole, the recreation director, said he is working more weekends and evenings “to keep an eye on things’’ that used to be supervised by others.

“The good news is that, through the efforts of the staff, we are doing our best to keep up,’’ Boynton said. “But the bad news is you can only go so far with reduced funds.’’

As painful as the cuts have been, some residents see a benefit in the regeneration of community. Volunteerism is soaring, donations to the food pantry have increased, and parent groups are redoubling their efforts, through spaghetti dinners and movie nights, to raise money for the schools.

Residents are also using the library more, where the free entertainment of books, DVDs, movies, and public computers is becoming increasingly popular.

“We are busy,’’ said Norma Jean Cauldwell, the assistant director, who has worked at the library for 22 years. “There’s nothing like a recession to make people appreciate library services. The upside - and I hesitate to use that word - is that it does encourage people to discover what the library has to offer.’’

The library has also benefited from the largesse of Walpole’s taxpayers, who traditionally have been loath to override limits on the municipal budget. But by eight votes last summer, town voters approved $6.2 million for a new library, which will also receive a $3.8 million state grant.

“It’s fantastic,’’ Cauldwell said.

-- By Brian MacQuarrie, Globe Staff  |  December 18, 2009