Budget deliberations will go three rounds

WINSTED — The Winchester Board of Selectmen will review department budgets and begin making cuts when at public hearings for the proposed fiscal 2011-12 budget Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, April 5 through 7.Each hearing is scheduled to be held at Town Hall at 7 p.m.Last week, on March 22 and 23, the head of each town department met with the Board of Selectmen and Interim Town Manager Paul Vayer to discuss their budget requests.At the March 22 meeting, Police Chief Robert Scannell said he has grave concerns about the department’s fleet of vehicles.“Three of our front-line police cruisers have over 100,000 miles on them and the sargent’s vehicle has over 135,000 on it,” Scannell said. “There are some safety issues.”Scannell said the proposed line item for vehicle maintenance has gone up by at least $6,000 in the proposed budget.“If we get new vehicles that line item would go down,” Scannell said. “For example, in the last four months we had to put a new transmission and radiator in a supervisor’s vehicle, which cost $5,000. That is not a good investment to put into an old vehicle.”“Obviously, we need to do something about the cars,” Mayor Candy Perez told Scannell.However, no plan was developed at the meeting for replacing vehicles.Scannell added that he is concerned with manpower issues in the department.“Currently we have 19 sworn officers, which is down from fiscal 2008-09 when we had 24 officers,” he said. “This year, we might have two officers retiring, so this might put us behind the eight ball.”He also added that he is concerned with several safety and liability issues in the police department’s building.“Our cell block is antiquated and it lends itself to possible suicide issues,” Scannell said.The total budget proposed by Scannell for fiscal 2010-11 is $2,915,486, while Vayer has proposed $2,685,602.For her department’s budget, town Recreation Director Tricia Twomey requested her position be upgraded from part-time to full-time status.“During the spring and summer seasons, I volunteer 21 extra hours more than I’m actually paid for, and in the winter I volunteer 10 extra hours,” Twomey said. “There are new programs that I would like to build up, but without a full-time job that has health benefits, it will not work.”In her budget request for fiscal 2010-11, Twomey has requested a salary of $55,629, while Vayer has proposed a salary of $29,463.Currently, Twomey’s salary stands at $25,414 for fiscal 2010-11.As for the total budget for the department, Twomey has proposed $289,792 for fiscal 2010-11, while Vayer has proposed $212,361.For the proposed budget in the town clerk’s office, Sheila Sedlack requested $193,756 while Vayer has proposed $183,673.Sedlack told the selectmen that she is concerned with the training and education budget line item under the proposed town clerk’s budget being cut.“The way [state] legislation gets passed it changes the mandates we have to follow from year to year,” Sedlack said. “Also, I would like to have funds in order to put records online. It’s something that’s not crucial, but it’s nice to do.”In the 2011-12 proposed budget, Sedlack proposes an administrative salary of $53,000, while Vayer proposes a salary of $50,000.For his budget requests, Building Inspector Marc Melanson requested that the selectmen hire a full-time housing inspector and fire marshal.“We are behind with annual building inspections,” Melanson said. “We are only getting about 40 percent of building inspections done. The fire marshal [William Baldwin] is currently looking into charging fees for inspections, which will bring in a lot more revenue.”In the 2011-12 proposed budget, Melanson proposes a total of $162,799 for salaries for the fire marshal, the building official and the housing inspector, while Vayer proposes $116,285.

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