This Week's Winchendon News
Town Manager Gives Preliminary Budget Presentation for FY2027 to Tri-Board Meeting
Town Manager Bill McKinney, Board of Selectmen members Erika Eitland, Tiffany Newton and Andrew Beauvais, and School Committee member Greg Vine listen to a question from School Committee Chair Mike Barbaro
Photo copyright Town of Winchendon
At the joint meeting of the Board of Selectmen, Finance Committee and School Committee on Thursday, February 5, members of the three boards heard the first "preliminary budget presentation" of the FY2027 town budget given by Town Manager Bill McKinney.
There was some suspense around the FY2027 budget, because it was at this time last year that voters were told about the deep budget deficit--more than $4 million initially--faced by the town for FY2026, and the need for a Proposition 2-1/2 override to keep the library, Senior Center and Parks & Recreation Commission from being defunded and closed. After the more modest of two proposed overrides passed last May, voters were warned that the town would continue to face the same dilemma because some mandatory costs (such as health insurance) were consistently increasing more than 2.5 percent.
It came as a muted relief when Mr. McKinney explained that in the preliminary budget for FY2027, which is still being worked on, the town is only seeing a deficit of $1.4 million, and no override or closing of entire departments was recommended.
Mr. McKinney explained that some of the budget figures were based on estimates, and he hoped the final information will be coming in within a few weeks. The School Department budget is increasing by $608,169 (or 3.37 percent). Police Department is increasing by $137,230, and Fire Department by $345,645. "The [Fire] chief has a pretty impressive business plan put together that will actually bring more revenue for the town, which is why that number is higher. But you also see the ambulance revenue number is higher as well," Mr. McKinney said. DPW is increasing $225,570. "There are just a lot of costs going on with maintaining the town, maintaining all the town vehicles, Mr. McKinney said.
Grouped together in the presentation, Town Manager/Board of Selectmen/Finance Committee expenses were reduced by $216,210. Mr. McKinney explained that although there were some salary increases, a $250,000 line item called "Town Manager Reserve" for covering negotiated salary increases has been zeroed out. Finance/Legal is increasing by $48,500 because attorneys' rates are going up. IT/Town Clerk is increasing by $48,185. The town is moving its accounting from QDS to Munis, and this will make handling the accounts more efficient. But Town Clerk expenses are budgeted higher because there will also be a state election in FY2027, in November 2026, along with the annual town election in May 2027.
On the second slide, Conservation, Planning, Town Hall, Building Department and Health Department all had small increases. Council on Aging is increasing $21,470, Veterans' Services $16,000, Beals Memorial Libraty $19,625, Parks & Recreation and Historical Commissions jointly are increasing $13,370.
Mr. McKinney explained that he was using an estimate for the Montachusett Regional Vocational Technical School (Monty Tech) assessment because he didn't have the actual number for it yet--it's calculated based on the school's costs and Winchendon's enrollment there. The placeholder is an increase of $17,000.
"Unfortunately, [school bus transportation] continues to go up," Mr. McKinney said--it's increasing $101,000 in the preliminary budget. "We're going into year two of a five year bid that we had with only one bidder. That is something...that they are looking at, because a lot of town and school districts only have one bidder. So that's something the state is looking into."
School tuition, for Winchendon students to attend school choice placements and charter schools, is up $3,020, but the total budget amount is $1,041,790.
Debt service is increased $100,000 (to a total for FY2027 of $1,285,000) because of borrowing for a new ambulance, the school boiler project and the $200,000 feasibility study for the MSBA school buildings.
Property and liability insurance is increasing $68,000.
Retirement costs are increasing $256,200 (10.46 percent), Workers' Compensation $15,000, Unemployment insurance $30,000. "I put some extra money into there because we've had a lot of unemployment claims this year. I think we're well over halfway through that $150,000 that we had budgeted," Mr. McKinney said. Medicare is increasing $15,000 and Health/Life Insurance is increasing $549,300 (17.53 percent) "So the health insurance, we do not know our number yet," Mr. McKinney clarified. "Obviously, last year we had a significant increase that was projected through by 16 percent, I put in, I think a 15 percent escalation. The health insurance is broken down between active and retirees. So the actives are on a fiscal year, the retirees are a calendar year, because it ties with Medicare. And that one just went up January 1, was up over 20 percent for the retirees. So that's a significant cost. So again, that's an estimate. I don't know what that final is going to be. Then Medicare taxes. So as salaries go up, obviously the Medicare tax goes up." (Medicare is one of what are called "payroll taxes," along with Social Security.)
Added all together, the expense side of the FY2027 budget is increasing $2,452,544 from FY2026, or 6.45 percent.
Mr. McKinney then presented the projected town revenues for FY2027.
Chapter 70/Local Aid from the state is increasing $121,023 (or 0.73 percent). Property tax revenue is expected to increase $546,737 (or 3.12 percent). Excise tax has not yet been confirmed by the state, so that is an unknown. Ambulance revenue is projected to increase $300,000, or 46 percent.
Other revenues are projected to stay largely the same, and are relatively small bits of the whole budget. They include things such as building permits, the 3 percent retail cannabis tax, the meals tax, Special Ed Medicaid reimbursements, interest income, PILOT payments from solar fields, and fines and fees paid to the Town Clerk. (Voters rejected a lodging excise tax at the Special Town Meeting last December which would have added a bit more revenue from AirBnB short-term rentals that have sprouted up around Lake Monomonac and a few other places in town.)
Altogether, the town's revenue is projected to increase by $1,127,726, or 2.98 percent. The difference between projected expenses and projected revenues for FY2027 is a deficit of $1,439,871.
Mr. McKinney moved to a slide displaying a chart of the amount of state aid Winchendon has received from FY2023 through FY2027, showing how the annual increase has plummeted over those years. Between FY2023 and FY2024, Chapter 70 funding increased 12.07 percent and Local Aid increased 3.2 percent. For FY2025, the increases were only 2.78 percent for Chapter 70 and 3.0 percent for Local Aid. For FY2027, the increases are 0.64 percent for Chapter 70 and 1.4 percent for Local Aid.
"So here's a chart that I've brought up every year since I've been here," Mr. McKinney said. "It's the revenue from the state. The Mass Municipal Association put out a study. It's actually on their website. They've been talking about it quite a bit, called the Fiscal Storm. It's hitting all of the cities and towns across the state. And basically the state's not keeping up with what it should be giving the cities and towns...the property taxes are only going up two and a half percent. And as you can see, that's a very small number on what the state gives us [for FY2027]. That's less than a 1 percent increase. So that's a big part of the problem, we're not getting more money from the state." (You can read the MMA report at www.mma.org/resources/a-perfect-storm-cities-and-towns-face-historic-fiscal-pressures/.)
(When Proposition 2-1/2 was passed in 1980, there was an agreement baked into it that the state would compensate cities and towns for their lower property tax amounts through higher levels of funding from the state budget. To a large extent, this has not happened.)
School Committee Chair Mike Barbaro raised the topic of the delinquent property taxes owed to the town, saying that the town could hire one of the third party companies the town auditor mentioned to buy the debt and collect the taxes. Mr. McKinney said that was possible but it would only be a one-time payment. School Committee member Karen Kast mentioned another source of uncollected money mentioned by the auditor, the tailings or uncashed checks that are floating around, suggesting that the town can resolve those.
Continuing with his presentation, Mr. McKinney said, "The goal this year is to not have to go for an override, but to try to find some of those one-time funds to try to get through the year. But again, we have an ongoing, like every town does, a problem that we have many, many costs that are growing more than two and a half percent, and we can only go up two and a half percent on our property taxes. The state, which gives us almost as much as taxes, is going up less than 1 percent. So if they were going up two and a half percent, we'd be in much better shape. If they gave us the extra $400,000 that they gave us last year, that'd be $300,000 off this $1.4 million. So that's where we stand right now."
Mr. McKinney then went over the four Enterprise Funds. The Water, Sewer and Transfer Station Enterprise Funds are doing exactly what they are supposed to do, with revenue higher than expenses by very small amounts. The PEG Access Enterprise Fund is unchanged. He confirmed that the town still has a contract with Templeton allowing Templeton residents to use the Winchendon transfer station, as well as a shared animal control agreement. Those agreements will be looked at with Templeton's town administrator.
Several members of the boards suggested possible things to consider, including changing town counsel (Mr. McKinney said that attorneys' fees are about the same everywhere) or forming an Enterprise Fund for the ambulance service (the ambulance fees are not enough to cover the Fire Department expenses as well).
Department Heads Clarify FY2027 Budget Requests to Tri-Board Meeting
Chief Wolski (left) explains the PD budget to the Tri-Board members
Photo copyright Town of Winchendon
Chief Smith (left) confirms a point with Town Manager Bill McKinney
Photo copyright Town of Winchendon
Following Town Manager Bill McKinney's preliminary presentation of the draft town budget for FY2027 to the joint meeting of the Board of Selectmen, Finance Committee and School Committee on Thursday, February 5, the Fire and Police Chiefs came forward to explain their budget requests in more detail and answer questions.
Chief of Police Dan Wolski was the first to take "the hot seat," saying he wouldn't go through all the police budget line by line, but wanted to touch on the bigger items. While most of the salary line items have increases, Chief Wolski said, "a significant factor is that, as I mentioned several times in the last year and a half, we're anticipating five police retiring in the next three years. Two of those five are going to be retiring in around July of this coming year...I did not reduce the salaries for those officers that are retiring because, particularly for a preliminary budget, I didn't think it was prudent to do that, because although I'm pretty confident that they're going to retire, until they actually retire...I factored out, we intend to hire folks to replace those officers that are retiring, but the officers that are retiring are retiring at the very highest pay step that they could be receiving, and they have a lot of seniority. Not only do they have seniority, but they're sergeants, so they're at a higher pay. The officers that will be coming in will be at a much, much lower step." The savings will be about $65,000 from this difference, he said, but it's not reflected in the budget.
Chief Wolski also clarified that when the FY2026 budget was being discussed, contracts had not been settled because no one knew whether the override would pass or not. The larger increases in FY2027 compared to the FY2026 include this year's contracts being settled. The line items in FY2027 show a 5 percent increase but it's actually two years of contracted 2.5 percent increases.
Other line items cover expenses such as utilities and maintainance of the police station. Other items have been reduced because the expense wasn't needed. Chief Wolski gave an example of line item #519040, PD Uniforms. "It's not exclusively uniforms, but another thing that was coming out of PD Uniform line items was an expense for tasers, a service agreement that we had, and when we got tasers five years ago, the department was equipped with tasers. We had a five year service agreement, and the cost of that service agreement was $10,000 a year...It included certain equipment that's required with the tasers, things of that nature...The vendor said at the end of this five years that the tasers that you currently have are now at their end of life and no longer supported by the manufacturer, and so they're basically really expensive paperweights."
The company would not allow an extension of the agreement, Chief Wolski said, so the department applied to Robinson Broadhurst Foundation and received funding to replace the tasers. This meant that the old service agreement was cancelled, so that line item shows a reduction of $9,900.
Chief Wolski said that he'd actually put in a budget for about $7,000 less than in Mr. McKinney's budget, with small reductions for things like utilities where he felt he could pare it down. Mr. McKinney explained that he left those items level-funded because he was concerned about the costs of electricity going up.
Board of Selectmen Chair Andrew Beauvais asked if the department had looked into energy efficiency grants or solar panels to help reduce electric costs, and also, whether the department had considered electric vehicles and generating some of its own power to charge them.
Chief Wolski said, "All of our cruisers now are hybrid vehicles, and that's something that we've embraced in the last five years. So we've slowly phased out our complete gas vehicles and gone to hybrid and I've again, looking at previous fiscal years, I've seen a marked reduction in our fuel costs for gasoline. So that's one of the line items that I did ask for reduction. Because I think that we're seeing a savings because we're driving hybrid vehicles." Going to all-electric, he said, runs into the limitations of available infrastructure to support all-electric vehicles in the region.
With a nod to Planning and Land Use Coordinator Nicole Roberts who applied for the grant, Chief Wolski said the department had benefited from the Green Communities grant to weatherize and insulate the police station, which is an old building that formerly served as a courthouse.
Following Chief Wolski, Fire Chief Tom Smith came forward. Mr. Beauvais asked about the large increase in the fire department line item for housemen (that is, regular duty crews who work scheduled shifts in the fire station). That item increases $273,780 in the FY2027 budget, 35.4 percent. Meanwhile, budgeted overtime is reduced by $90,000, or nearly half.
Chief Smith explained that he is requesting two additional firefighters, which will give him more ability to restructure the schedule and reduce the overtime paid. "One of the biggest things that I've heard from the community, from the various boards and meetings, is the town needs to figure out a way to increase their revenues, and in order to increase revenues, and for the fire department and the ambulance service to effectively do that portion, we need to basically run it as a business," he said. Additional personnel will reduce response times, provide better service, and allow the department to staff two full ambulances 24 hours a day. Potentially the department could be bringing in $400,000 on top of the additional revenue in the budget, he estimated.
The department is looking at taking over the facility at Clearbrook Treatment Center, which is in Winchendon but very close to Templeton. This will allow them to bring in more revenue--a minimum of $200,000, he said--through answering calls in Templeton. They have also been negotiating with Royalston, which does not have its own transporting ambulance. But to handle these opportunities, the department needs additional crew. Chief Smith said he has also been talking to the new fire chief in Rindge, NH. "So with the $200,000 additional plus the potential to go anywhere between $350K and $400K more, I feel the two additional staffing, which is the housemen account, is an investment into bringing more monies into the community. Obviously I'd love to have six more guys, but we can only start at a certain point," he said.
Mr. Beauvais asked about the department's ISO rating (this is a rating established by Verisk indicating a community's fire-protection and fire-suppression abilities. It directly impacts homeowner insurance rates. The scale runs from 1 to 10 with 10 being the lowest level of protection. www.isomitigation.com/ppc/).
Chief Smith said, "I believe, with ISO, they've changed their rating systems, and I want to say we're in the vicinity of a 9...we were at 9, and went to a 6.7 on their new scale. And I do not know exactly where we are right now. We are due for to have ISO come in and reevaluate...It does take into consideration, not just fire. It takes in fire, police, DPW, water systems, and a lot of factors. But ultimately, I think that the staffing would increase our rating, are points for the fire department, because we'd be able to get additional pieces out the door sooner."
"So overall, is it true that improving the ISO rating overall, would homeowners would see premium reductions in their hazard insurance, because it would evaluate, the better your rating, the lower your premiums?" Mr. Beauvais asked, and Chief Smith said, "yes."
In response to questions, Chief Smith said there are currently three personnel on shift at a time, around the clock. If two are out and a call comes in, they have to wait for call firefighters to come in or staff on a call to get back. In one instance, a single person initially responded to a structure fire on Mill Street. This is a real safety issue for the crew who respond.
School Committee Chair Mike Barbaro said, "I absolutely agree that we need to add more firefighters. I think that's been a conversation ongoing. It does cut down your overtime, it's more safer operations for the fire department. My main concern is when you talk about the ambulance. So by adding all this other area, did you factor in the fact that the ambulance is $500,000 and we're burning them out every two years, two to three years. Adding this additional territory, we can't even get the ambulances we order" because it takes so long for them to be built and delivered. Another one was ordered last year.
Chief Smith said that the ambulances take about two years to build, and they're currently lasting about six to eight years. He said that the department has considered the issues of maintainance and additional mileage on the ambulances, and they have a solution. They're changing the mileage fees for billing, and the new vehicle will not be diesel, it will use regular gas, which "will save drastically as far as maintenance cost goes" as well as the amount of down time for the vehicles.
School Committee member Greg Vine asked if the town had thought about establishing an ambulance reserve fund, so that ambulance purchases wouldn't always require a debt exclusion vote.
Chief Smith said, "What would be almost more my preference than an enterprise account would be a return receipts account. When I was previously Chief in Templeton, before I left, I created a return receipts account over there. We sat down and ambulance revenue goes into the return receipts account. And then at Town Meeting, it can be X amount can be set aside, and then the remainder can be voted out to go to the community, or in your budget. We had it set up so that when I left, it was set up for not only the ambulances, but for the fire engines, all in lease to purchase agreements with the ambulance revenue. And in the fifth year of those lease to purchase agreements, the town would then replace three dump trucks." Right now, he said, all the ambulance revenue goes into the General Fund.
The Fire Department has gotten a total of more than $2.6 million in grant money over the past 12 years, Chief Smith said, with more than 50 grants awarded. "Pretty much any grant we put in for, we do," he said.
He concluded by answering some questions about the nuts and bolts of setting ambulance fees in a competitive market for ambulance services.
Nomination Papers for Elected Town Boards Due March 16
Residents who would like to run for an open seat on an elected Town Board in the 2026 Town Elections in May need to turn in their nomination papers, with the required number of signatures, by Monday, March 16 at 5:00 p.m. Nomination papers may be picked up at the Town Clerk's office in Town Hall, 109 Front St. Candidates must be residents and registered to vote in Winchendon. The following seats are available:
1 seat for Board of Selectmen (3-year term)
2 seats for School Committee (3-year term)
2 seats for Board of Health (3-year term)
1 seat for Board Health (2-year unexpired term)
1 seat for Board of Health (1-year unexpired term)
1 seat for Housing Authority (5-year term)
An "unexpired term" means the person holding that seat resigned before their elected term was completed.
Important! All members of elected boards whose terms expire as of June 30, 2026 must pull nomination papers and run for their seat, if they wish to continue serving on that board. This includes members who were appointed to fill a vacancy with time left on that term.
For details about what a board or committee does, and how often and when it meets, see the page for that board on the town website, https://www.townofwinchendon.com/260/BOARDS-COMMITTEES. All board and committee meetings are open to the public, so interested candidates are welcome to sit in on meetings and speak to current members before or after the meeting.
Resident Asks BOS to Establish a Formal Policy for Informing the Public
At the Board of Selectmen's meeting on Monday, February 9, resident Theresa Langdon came forward during the public comment period to present a statement to the Board.
"I'm here tonight to formally request that the town develop and adopt a protocol, bylaw, policy, or other official governing document that clearly addresses the complete disclosure information obtained by town officials and the corresponding responsibility to inform the public," she began. "Transparent governance is essential to meaningful civic participation. At present, there does not seem to appear to be a clearly defined or consistently applied standard outlining what information public officials are obligated to disclose, how and when such information should be shared, and whose bears responsibility for ensuring that residents are adequately informed of matters affecting them.
"Two recent examples to illustrate this include town officials, both paid and volunteer, met to discuss not disclosing to the public that it was reported there were buried batteries at the [Mabardy Landfill on River Street] in violation of state regs, and also that a debt exclusion that included a 100 percent increase in the amount asked, for $32 million instead of $16 million, was not disclosed to the public prior to the town vote. "I request the town consider establishing written policy that, at a minimum, addresses four important issues.
"One, affirms the principles of full and timely disclosure of all non confidential information obtained by town officials in the course of their duties.
"Two, defines the responsibility of officials in proactively informed citizens, rather than relying solely on public records or requests or indirect access.
"Three, clarifies procedures, timelines and methods of disseminating information to the public.
"And four, identifies accountability measures to ensure compliance with this policy.
"Such a document would promote transparency, reduce confusion, and strengthen public confidence in local government by ensuring that residents have access to complete and accurate information necessary for informed engagement.
"In closing, it would be beyond my imagination to consider that anyone in leadership would not enthusiastically embrace this opportunity to immediately ensure transparent and honest government."
After Ms. Langdon made her statement, Board Chair Andrew Beauvais thanked her, and asked her to send a copy to the Town Manager's office so the Board would have it in writing.
