Deficit means drastic cuts to service levels
By Melissa Muntz Community Reporter

Shrewsbury - Shrewsbury is faced with a minimum $1.3 million deficit in the fiscal year (FY) 2009 municipal budget, and has little to no options to raise additional long-term revenue to close that gap without going to the voters.

The Board of Selectmen met March 10 to discuss the budget, and Town Manager Daniel Morgado painted a bleak portrait of the fiscal year ahead.

"If in fact we have to cut spending, and we will have to cut spending, it has to come out of operations and that means personnel," he said. "That's the only solution, or the town's recurring revenue stream has to be expanded."

The deficit would be difficult, if not impossible, to cut from the budget without a serious degradation of services, he said. The entire library budget, for example, is just $1.2 million. Highway is $1.6 million, while police and fire combined have a $6.9 million budget, with most other departments costing the town anywhere from $500 to $350,000 a year.

"It's going to wipe out a fair amount of the municipal budget, and if you're going to reduce existing service levels, which services will it be, what departments is it going to be?" he asked. "We're talking about taking services that we have traditionally provided and just eliminating them."

Although making drastic cuts to service levels is something that board members said was hard to face, it appears that there may be no other choice.

"[The town's financial diffi- culty] is a structural problem, and without a source of steady long-term increased revenue, then it does require a structural solution," Chair Maurice DePalo said. "It's hard to accept that it's inevitable, but it might be."

The board discussed placing an override question on the ballot, with most discussion revolving around a one-year "band aid" override, recognizing that people may not be able to aff ord to vote yes.

"Things aren't good out there. People are losing their jobs, thousands of jobs are being lost. I had the misfortune of going to the grocery store and was astounded by my bill because everything has gone up $.20, $.30, $.40," Selectman Bruce Card said. "You feel it when you go to the gas station, when you have oil delivered to your home. But I believe it's the responsibility of the selectmen to bring the best possible solution to the town and let the people have their say."

The general consensus from the board was that an override question in some form would be needed to get through FY 2009. However, the selectmen were quick to note that the success of the override, based on the failure of the past three questions, is uncertain.

Still, they said, it's the best solution they can come up with.

"We've asked the question five different ways and the answers have always been the same. But the problem hasn't left," Selectman John Lebeaux said. "There has been a constant and continual decline in what we are able to do … and we're starting to see an erosion in the things we value."

The budget numbers presented by Morgado could change based on staff health care negotiations and state aid numbers, but he said the town should look at the worst-case scenario as solid numbers may not be available for another month.

The board can always add items back into the budget late in the process, he said, but removing items in April would be much more difficult.

The selectmen will take the next several days considering what format a question might take, what uses any override funds would be designated for and how much they will ask the community to pay.