UPDATED: Board of Finance Sets Budget for Public Hearing

The figures in the article below have been adjusted to match the final iteration of the budget presented by Director of Finance Deborah Cerrato.

The Suffield Board of Finance made some final alterations to the town budget then approved presenting it at an upcoming public hearing at its meeting on Thursday, April 14.

The total expenditure for the town in the coming financial year is now $50,220,137, assuming that trash collection fees are rolled into the mill rate. The total projected revenue comes in at $17,169,439. The taxes needed from the town to balance the budget total $33,050,698.

The general government budget is $13,253,210 and the Board of Education budget is $30,761,551.

“This is the budget we are going to present to the electorate on April 27,” said Board of Finance Chairman Justin Donnelly.

The budget itself has a mill rate increase of .96 percent. Because the town is proposing to roll trash collection fees into the mill rate, the total increase to the mill rate is 4.2 percent.

Residents will pay for trash collection through their taxes under the plan instead of paying a separate fee. The average Suffield taxpayer will pay less for trash removal but those with high property values (roughly more than $500,000) will see a cost increase.

The board unanimously approved reducing the town contingency fund by $50,000 to a total of $200,000. The board also removed the Ffyler Place reconstruction plan from the Advisory Committee on Capital Expenditures’ (ACCE) budget, reducing the budget by $31,000.

These reductions brought the mill rate increase to less than 1 percent, a condition of the memorandum of understanding approved by the Boards of Finance and Selectmen earlier this winter.

The lone dissenter against the budget was Ryan Anderson, who advocated for no increase to the mill rate as a way to gather resident support for the change to the trash collection program.

The Local Capital Improvement Program (LoCIP) funds that ACCE had partnered with the Ffyler Place project, $94,000, were moved to the pavement management plan for the time being, although what those funds are ultimately spent on may change.

Two major changes to the budget were suggested at the board’s meeting on Monday, April 11: a reduction of the general government budget of $100,000 and a reduction of the Board of Education budget of $200,000.

First Selectman Tom Frenaye presented a memo with itemized reductions to the board. The largest budget reductions were $31,166 from some town employees’ medical insurance plans and $20,000 in burn fee money for the landfill. The net reduction from the changes was the removal of $100,707 from the budget.

The Board of Education, which can have its overall budget reduced by the Board of Finance but controls line-item expenditures, has not submitted their revised budget yet.

The budget will be presented at a public hearing at Suffield High School on April 27. A town meeting to approve or reject the budget will be held in early May.