Paul Sieloff told the Board of Selectmen on Monday that if the Elementary School budget is drastically cut as proposed, it may free up enough funds to pay Mount Greylock's request.

LANESBOROUGH, Mass. — Town Administrator Paul Sieloff may come off his stance that the town needs an override to fund the high school budget.

 

Sieloff said on Monday that high school officials may be coming down on their request while the elementary school may be coming in lower than expected. The administrator says he is going to look at the requests and see if the gap he expected is going to be closed.

 

"We thought we'd recommend an override," Sieloff told the Selectmen on Monday. "The interesting wild card is the elementary school budget, which brings into play the override situation."

 

The Lanesborough School Committee budget was at first proposed to be $100,000 less than last year — mostly because of a drastic $165,000 cut from special education salaries.

 

However, School Committee members last week felt the budget may be playing things too close to the vest and discussed adding $40,000 back in for contingency should something unexpected arise during the year.

 

Nonetheless, Sieloff says the drastic cuts at the elementary school could free up some additional funds for the Mount Greylock budget. The Mount Greylock Regional School budget was first proposed to raise Lanesborough's assessment by some $250,000 but through cuts, increased state aid, and a gift from Williams College, that has been pared back to a $91,487. Lanesborough was willing to give the school about $26,000 at first.

 

"We hoped the elementary school was coming down substantially and we could use that for capital," Sieloff said, but avoiding an override might be just as good as a use to keep taxes from rising.

 

On the town's operational budget, Sieloff said he is "pretty comfortable" with the numbers but is waiting to hear from the schools before releasing it. Neither school has held a public hearing on their budgets in Lanesborough.

 

"Basically, it is a straightforward budget," the administrator said.

 

The services are expected to stay the same with contractual obligations being the main increases, he said. 

 

Sieloff said a capital budget is also nearly completed. The town has allocated some $316,000 of its free cash to make capital repairs. That is expected to include $100,000 for a new fire truck, $50,000 to $80,000 to cover a deficit in snow and ice (depending on the rest of the winter), $35,000 to $40,000 for the police chief, who is cashing in unused vacation time, and somewhere between $20,000 and $25,000 of the free cash for each of three areas: to fix up Town hall, other post-employment benefits (OPEB), and stabilization.

 

"We are down to a little less than $20,000," Sieloff said.

 

The Selectmen suggested purchasing a new vehicle for the Highway Department as well but Sieloff says there isn't enough left for that. The administrator says if a vehicle costs less than $50,000, he likes to use free cash to pay for that so the town doesn't have to borrow. However, there isn't enough for another vehicle this year.

 

Overall, Sieloff says the free cash funds should be used for capital repairs and not operational and he hopes to make use of more. He is proposing to increase the snow and ice budget in hopes in the future less free cash will be used for that. He also used free cash to settle a long pending lawsuit in previous years. 

 

"At some point, we'll get beyond those things and start to focus on making targeted investments," he said.