Finance Committee Minutes

Tolland Finance Committee

Minutes

Meeting Type: Regular - Teleconference

Meeting Date: Tuesday April 14, 2020

Meeting Time: 7:00 PM

Meeting Location: Remote via Teleconference

ORDER of BUSINESS:

Call to Order At 7:02 PM

Attendance; Ted Locke, Mira Munson, Cathy Parzych, Pat Storey; Absent – Margaret McClellan

Old Business

The committee reviewed the budget document sent out by Margaret on April 7. There were questions on the way the Free Cash number was developed and why there was no money set aside for the Stabilization account. Pat will follow up with Margaret on these.

Ted explained the School departments decision to join the LPVCA(?) consortium for bussing and discontinue having the school district own the busses and hire the drivers. Administratively, not having to deal with the everyday bussing issues will free up Administrators to deal with higher level issues. Financially, it will enable the district to appropriate less capital funds each year since they won’t be buying buses; this will lessen the district’s annual capital repayment costs. Although the operational cost for the consortium will be slightly higher than running the system by the district, the money the district will receive from the consortium for the busses they turn over to them will be used over the next several years to offset the increased operational costs. All the current drivers will be employed by the consortium and the routes will stay the same for next year.

The committee voted unanimously to approve and recommend to the voters’ line items 1 thru 57, plus the storage container shelving, the repeater and the air pack purchases. No decision was made on the stabilization fund or free cash pending receiving more information.

We discussed the Capital Improvement Program Bylaw. The Selectmen asked that the Capital planning subcommittee be expanded to include some members of the community not on the Finance Committee. It has been rewritten this way and Pat will send it out to the other members of the Finance Committee for their approval. The Selectmen decided not to include this proposed bylaw on the Warrant for this year’s Annual Town Meeting. In view of the restrictions on meetings at this time, they want to keep the meeting as short and as noncontroversial as possible. A special town meeting will be held in the future to address this bylaw.

New Business

None

At 8:05 PM the Committee voted unanimously to adjourn.

Next Meeting TBD

Respectfully Submitted

Pat Storey