Charlotte Selectboard gets public feedback on budget

During the Charlotte Selectboard’s second special meeting to retool the municipal budget that was shot down on Town Meeting Day, members proposed changes to cut more than $170,000 from the $2.9 million spending plan.

Although they didn’t adopt a new budget Tuesday night, selectboard members are working quickly in preparation for another budget vote May 2.

The issue that loomed over most of two-hour-long meeting — comprised mostly of public comment — were increases in employee salaries and benefits.

Residents were vocal about their disapproval of the market analysis done by Gallagher, Flynn & Company, which the town hired to look at how salaries for Charlotte’s municipal salaries stacked up against other Vermont towns.

“We hired an expert, Gallagher and Flynn, to do a market analysis for us to see where we stood in terms of what we’re paying our employees. The goal was to get to the market rate, which we did. We were way behind the eight ball so that brought us up to a market rate,” selectboard chair Jim Faulkner said at the informational meeting prior to the annual town meeting vote.

Resident Pete Demick cited several issues he had with the analysis. “I just finished reading the whole thing and I’m just kind of just stunned. Why is Gallagher Flynn running this town? The bulk of the problem with the budget is the salary benefit compensation caused by Gallagher and Flynn. The report is not accurate for a small town like Charlotte.”

Other residents even went so far as to question whether this study was entirely made up.

“The comparison towns that (the analysis) used for our town planner were Brattleboro, Norwich, Stowe, Jericho, Essex and Milton,” said resident and former planning commission member Bill Stuono. “Missing from this is Shelburne, Hinesburg and North Ferrisburgh, which are our town abutters. I don’t really understand it. Makes me think that this was a fictitious study with made-up numbers meant to create salaries out of proportion with our community.”

In addition to raises reflected in the market analysis, according to the town’s Salary Administration Policy employees will also receive an additional 2-to-3 percent annual increase in addition to a 7.5 percent increase in cost-of-living adjustments.

In response to citizen concerns, selectboard members have proposed to nix the additional 2-to-3 percent increase.

“We have an annual employee increase and it’s a 3 percent increase,” said Faulkner, who explained that because the town is close to the recommendations made in the analysis, “we don’t now need to jump again, with 2 or 3 percent.”

He said that unless the salary policy is revised, the cost-of-living adjustment “is not something that we create. It is a federal agency that creates that. So, unless we change our policies here, we can’t really make a change to that. We’d rather use the experts to tell us what that increase is.”

Another Charlotte resident, Eli Lesser-Goldsmith, who is CEO of Healthy Living Market and Café, had different thoughts as to why the town is now being forced to pinch pennies.

“We’re one of the richest, most successful towns in all of Chittenden County. We should have an abundance of riches, but we stifle any attempt of growth in our town. And so, of course, this is the end result,” he said.

“Imagine if we had a doctor’s office, a gas station, housing in the village, all those entities would be paying new taxes. But instead, we cut and trim and get rid of all the fun and things that our town needs. So instead, we’re cutting a $2,000 computer, some speed bumps. Let’s neglect the beach. Let’s squeeze our hard-working town staff on salary. This is sad in my opinion,” he said. “You know, not one bit of talk about how we can change things in our town, add new taxpayers and new taxes.”

“Our culture of no continues,” he said.

In addition to employee salary cuts, the town has proposed a slew of other cuts, including the senior center, planning and zoning, traffic calming measures, donations and more. The salary policy, along with employee benefits plans, will be reevaluated at next week’s Tuesday night meeting.

“The selectboard has a very difficult job in front of it because you put forward a budget that the voters rejected it. So, we have this difficult work of cutting things that everybody values, the employees are certainly valued,” newly elected selectboard member Kelly Devine said. “I hope that no one will listen to this discussion and think that any of this is based on lack of value for any of these things we have in town.”