Adams Prepares For Tough Budget Decisions
 Town Administrator Tony Mazzucco summarizes the fiscal 2016 budget at a public meeting at the Adams Visitors Center. |
This is the first in a series of articles on this week's review of the Adams fiscal 2016 budget. Part 2 can be found here.
ADAMS, Mass. — Town Administrator Tony Mazzucco said Adams will have to go through some changes to fix budget trends.
He presented a preliminary budget fiscal 2016 to the Selectmen, Finance Committee, and the public Tuesday night.
His presentation can be found here.
Mazzucco explained the more than $14 million budget does not mark a change in the town's declining stream of revenue and tax base that cannot keep up with increasing expenses. He said he projects a 75 cent increase to residential tax rates and 64 cents to commercial.
"We are going to have to look at other sources of revenue because every year revenue does not meet the expenses and if we can't cut reoccurring expenses they are just going to keep going up from here," Mazzucco said.
Mazzucco said the town has a structural deficit and is forced to cut the budget every year because of increasing expenses and decreasing revenue. He said with salary increases, the town cannot keep up and the money must be taken from somewhere else or more positions must be cut.
He said this year he proposes cutting four positions.
"Our expenses are growing faster than our revenue, and if we don't fix the structural problem we are always going to be in the same position every single year when the budget comes up," Mazzucco said. "We will have to pick three or four positions to cut or three or four services to eliminate."
He said the personnel budget has increased by 1.22 percent to $5,752,440 this fiscal year and following the trend, by 2020 the personnel budget will be over $7 million.
He said the town will have a little over $1 million in free cash, a decreased amount than years prior, and more than half will go toward offsetting the tax rate.
The town is $18,000 away from its levy limit but he did not advocate for a Proposition 2 1/2 override.
"It wouldn't work for us," he said. "Not only do we have to take into account what people can afford in the community, but even if we had an override … we would be in the same spot next year and have to have another override."
Mazzucco advocated for an array of changes like having the Finance Committee meet more often and develop more specific financial policies, finding cheaper ways to power the wastewater treatment plant, creating a state aid cushion in anticipation of years of decreased funding, and more aggressively going after unpaid taxes
Selectman John Duval agreed with Mazzucco but advocated for more drastic "big ideas."
"We can't cut our way to a solution just like we can't tax our way to a solution," Duval said. "I think we need something bigger to change the way we operate here."
Mazzucco agreed and said the town will go through a new strategic planning process. He added that he would like to create a designated economic development committee that would purely focus on bringing jobs to Adams and helping grow revenue.
"Economic development starts and ends on jobs," he said. "We can't cut our way out of it and we can't spend our way out of it. We have to grow our way out of it…growing our tax base is the only way we can move forward."
Mazzucco said the town has been in survival mode every year and he hopes within five to six years after implementing some of these plans to stabilize finances and close the fiscal gap.
"We need to reduce positions, we need to scale down our operations, we need time to adjust, and we need to find solutions," he said. "I think we can get to a point where we could at least hold our head above water."
The second budget meeting will be held Wednesday at 6 p.m. in the Visitors Center.
Tags: #adamsbudget, fiscal 2016, municipal budget,
