Swampscott Select Board Finds $109K To Balance School Spending

SWAMPSCOTT, MA — A nearly four-hour Select Board "scrub" of the town budget aimed at finding $130,000 in town-side savings or additional revenues to restore that amount to the school budget ahead of next week's annual town meeting led to about $109,000 in funds for reallocation through slashed cell phones for some municipal employees, reductions in legal spending and some maintenance items, as well as revised expectations from the increased local lodging tax.

The Select Board opted to put the roughly $20,000 difference back into the tax levy — which would result in about a $3 increase in tax bills for the median single-family homeowner on top of the $732.93 already baked into the budget.

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The Select Board members debated, but ultimately chose not to adopt proposals to reduce the Finance Committee's "reserve fund" for emergency expenditures, reductions in negotiated bonuses for some town employees and a suggestion from Select Board member Doug Thompson to require town employees making more than $100,000 to forfeit $100 a month in salary.

"This Board voted 4-0 to fully fund the schools at the end of the day," said Select Board member Danielle Leonard of last month's action to close a $660,000 gap between the School Committee budget and one proposed by the town. "And this exercise that we just did should have been done three months ago, three years ago, every single year. Because as we sit here, and we nickel and dime every line item, we proved why we did this exercise. Because things are that arbitrary. And maybe we did have padding in extra lines that we should not have.

"And how can we — in good faith — have padding in extra lines, and look at these people (on the School Committee) and say: 'I can't help you anymore, figure it out?'"

Leonard supported rescinding the bonuses because of the downturn in the financial outlook in the time since former Town Administrator Sean Fitzgerald negotiated the bonus options, but the Board opted not to vote on that action.

"Even though it's not guaranteed in your contract," newly elected Select Board Chair Katie Phelan said, "there are people who rely on those funds. They work their tails off to try to attain those funds. So, to just pull them out and not have any incentive for the hard work is difficult if that's your expectation. That could seriously hinder morale for those roles."

Interim Town Administrator Gino Cresta said that his staff had worked to streamline the budget as much as possible during the finance season leading up to Wednesday's meeting.

"This isn't the first time we scrubbed the budget," he said. "This is multiple times, in fairness."

(Scott Souza is a Patch field editor covering Beverly, Danvers, Marblehead, Peabody, Salem and Swampscott. He can be reached at Scott.Souza@Patch.com. X/Twitter: @Scott_Souza.)