New London City Clerk Certifies Challenge To 2014 Budget, Tax Rate

New London’s city clerk has certified a petition challenge to the City Council’s approved budget and tax rate for the 2014 fiscal year.

City Clerk Nathan Caron said he received additional signatures for the petition effort by the organization Lower Our Taxes, also known as Looking Out for Taxpayers, prior to the Tuesday deadline. He said he approved about 680 names on Wednesday.

A petition effort requires signatures equaling 10 percent of the number of voters in the last municipal election, or a minimum of 483. LOT failed to meet this threshold on June 12, within the first 10 days after Mayor Daryl Finizio approved the Council budget, but had another 10 days to gather signatures under the City Charter.

The petition seeks to overturn the $41,565,314 municipal budget, $40,414,666 school budget, and mill rate of 27.5. The mill rate, or tax per $1,000 of assessed value, is a 3.38 percent increase from the current rate of 26.6.

The petition will be presented to the City Council at its regular meeting on Monday. At that time, councilors may decide to reconsider the budget and tax rate on their own or have residents vote on the budget in either a special referendum election or the next regular municipal election in November.

Registrar of Voters Bill Giesing previously said the registrars’ budget included funding for one anticipated referendum.

The Council approved the municipal and school budget in a 4-3 vote on May 21 and the tax rate in a unanimous vote on May 28. Opponents to the budget thought the school budget did not adequately state how the funding would be spent and also spoke in favor of an alternate budget proposed by Councilor Adam Sprecace.

The Council’s budget used funding restored by the state legislature as well as other anticipated savings to replenish several department budgets experiencing major cuts in Finizio’s budget proposal. One of the largest remaining reductions is to the New London Police Department, which is about $900,000 below its 2013 funding level. Police Chief Margaret Ackley said the reduction could result in 15 layoffs, but Finizio has said no layoffs would occur before the fiscal year’s halfway point to allow time to seek additional revenues and savings.

Sprecace’s budget proposal included the same tax increase , but projected that no layoffs would be necessary. Councilors opposed to this budget said they did not agree with the proposed school funding, which limited the district's budget increase to a mandated salary increase negotiated with school unions. Finance Director Jeff Smith also said he did not think the level of savings Sprecace projected in employee expenses would be feasible.

LOT successfully challenged the 2013 municipal budget and tax rate at referendum last year, but was rebuffed in a second attempt. Law Director Jeffrey Londregan said that per the City Charter additional referendums would not be possible following the approval of a revised budget and tax rate on Oct. 9 because the city had made 2013 fiscal year expenditures equivalent to 25 percent of the prior year’s budget.

The Council disagreed with the opinion, but was unable to muster the majority necessary to revise the budget on its own or set a special election. As a result, the referendum was set for November—four months after the conclusion of the 2013 fiscal year on June 30.

LOT sued the city over this decision in January, charging that the city did not have authority to collect taxes for the 2013 fiscal year. The lawsuit is ongoing, and the referendum vote on the 2013 budget is still set to take place in the regular municipal election on Nov. 5.

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