Keene News

[Kat Kanning]

Keene Board of Education, regular meeting, Tuesday, March 15, 6:30 p.m., Fuller School Library, 422 Elm St., Keene.

[Kat Kanning]

Keene lawmaker stepping down
   

IAN BAGLEY
Sentinel Staff


A first-term Keene legislator is planning to resign less than five months after she was elected.

In an e-mail, Democrat Stephanie Sinclair, 22, said she?s moving to Boston to take a full-time job, and won?t be able to continue as one of Keene?s six state representatives.

?I tried very hard to work different ways in keeping the seat, even by living with a friend in Keene, but I just couldn?t swing it,? she said.

?I love that I had the opportunity to be involved in this great state, and I appreciate everything everyone has done for me.?


      


Sinclair said she put her resignation letter in the mail to Concord. A secretary at the office of House Speaker Douglas W. Scamman said it hasn?t arrived yet.

However, she has already been removed from the Election Law Committee, replaced by Suzanne Harvey, D-Nashua.

Sinclair was the fifth-highest vote-getter in the Nov. 8 election, winning 5,998 votes. She and her Democratic colleagues beat Republicans Dean J. Eaton, Douglas K. Fish, George M. Gline, Roger U. Day, Robert C. Adam and Michael A. Jacques.

In her first few months in office, Sinclair has participated in 25 House votes, and has been absent for 46.

Asked to comment on the resignation, Jacques, chairman of the Keene Republican Committee, said he was ?disappointed that someone would go through the process, get elected like that ... and then quit.?

However, he added it was hard to criticize her for moving to take a job. Jacques said he?s looking forward to fielding Republican candidates in a special election.

State Rep. Daniel A. Eaton, D-Keene, said the Democrats are already considering a candidate to fill Sinclair?s seat. He wouldn?t release the candidate?s name yet, but said people will be ?very pleased? when they learn who it is.

State representatives receive $100 a year from the state for their work in Concord. Eaton said people have little awareness about how hard it can be financially to serve in the House, where unpredictable hours interfere with work.

According to fellow Democrat Timothy N. Robertson, Sinclair was invited to file as a candidate when no other Democrat offered to run for the sixth Keene House seat.

City Clerk Patricia Little says it will be up to the Keene City Council to decide whether to hold a special election. She said if there is a special election, it would likely coincide with municipal elections in the fall.

Sinclair, who graduated from Keene State College in May, said she had several different part-time jobs in Keene before she moved to Boston two weeks ago to take a full-time job managing a shop at Faneuil Hall.

[Kat Kanning]

Tuesday, April 05, 2005

34 West St., redistricting on tap tonight
   

Nika Carlson
Sentinel Staff


Housekeeping could be a little better, but the air is perfectly normal in N.H. School Administrative Unit 29?s offices at 34 West St.

A study of the air quality in the 94-year-old building found normal levels of bacteria, mildew and carbon dioxide, all typical measures of the safety and comfort of the air in a building.

Humidity was a little low, but that?s expected in the winter, and dust levels were a little high, but that could be fixed with more diligent cleaning, the report says.


      


The 40-page report will be presented to the Keene Board of Education?s building and facilities committee at its meeting tonight. Board members have yet to see the results.

Investigators did find a small mold patch on the mailroom wall near a mended pipe, but that?s already been fixed, said Thomas R. Remillard, director of buildings and grounds for the Keene School District.

The study, conducted in early March by Concord?s Scott Lawson Group, Ltd., is the first in a series of three of the conditions at the building.

The other two studies looking at the space needs of administrators in the building as well as its soundness are underway and should be done by June, Remillard said.

The building, which the Keene School District owns and rents to Unit 29 for its administrative offices, has been under study for about a year and has been the subject of some controversy.

Some Keene school board members said it wasn?t cost-effective or safe to keep Unit 29 administrators in the building, backing that opinion with a study released in September.

Other board members called that study one-dimensional and politically motivated, asking for more proof.

In January, the Keene school board approved spending up to $15,000 to study what Unit 29 administrators needed for space and what might be wrong with 34 West St.

And in March, voters approved a citizen petition article allowing the district to sell the building, a possibility if studies show it?s not worth keeping.

Redistricting

Redistricting will also be on the table at tonight?s committee meeting, a request from board member Stephanie Hunter.

After hearing about uneven numbers of students in the schools ? stuffed classrooms in places and emptier classes in others ? Hunter wanted to know more about how the district would approach redrawing the lines the determine who goes to what school, she said.

?I know it was mentioned in the past and basically, I had just general questions about how they would determine the redistricting; the process we would go about if we wanted to do that,? she said. ?This is nothing definite. It?s just an exploration process. It may not even be a good idea, but it?s something I was curious.?

Redistricting has flitted across the Keene board?s agenda several times in the last decade. Keene thought about the idea in the early 1990s when Fuller School became overcrowded, but public opinion sided against it.

Redrawing school lines came up again in 2002, when the Keene Board of Education looked at the best ways to balance school space and student population in Keene.

The most cost-effective and least-disruptive of the options, released in a study in September of that year, was to redraw school boundaries for the middle and five elementary schools.

However, nothing ever came of the report.

The Keene Board of Education?s Building Facilities and Ancillary Services Committee will meet at 5:15 p.m. at Tilden School on School Street. The Finance Committee will meet at 6:30 p.m., or just after the previous meeting.

[Russell Kanning]

oh so now the building is too good to get rid of......sell that thing....we don't need it.

[Kat Kanning]

Keene city council said they must spend $3 million more this upcoming year and will need to raise taxes 10%!

Senator Sununu will be in Keene today ~1:30.

[jgmaynard]

SPEND $3 Mill or raise taxes?

"If we have extra money, that means we have to raise more"

ONLY the government! 

I've gotta start hitting those meetings again........

JM

[Kat Kanning]

Budget of bad newsNumbers add up to significant rise in taxes in Keene

BENJAMIN YELLE
Sentinel Staff

Facing a proposed 9 percent budget increase ? with the amount to be raised by taxes expected to jump by 21 percent ? the Keene City Council?s finance committee set to cutting the fat out of that plan Thursday night.

It didn?t find any ? voting instead to increase the amount taxpayers will contribute toward the overall $46.6 million proposal, which includes the city government?s budget, services paid by user fees, such as water and sewer, and construction projects.

The finance committee proposes raising $17,985,286 from property taxes. That number is up $71,096 from the amount recommended by City Manager John A. MacLean.

MacLean had proposed a $27,502,637 budget for city services for the fiscal year beginning July 1.

The finance committee cut that request by about $154,000, but it voted to keep $225,000 in savings, leaving $71,000 more to come from taxpayers.

While several factors will determine how much individual property owners? taxes go up, city officials estimate an increase of about $400 on a property valued at $172,000 (see related box).

The finance committee kicked off the night by voting to raise $225,000 from property taxes, instead of taking it from a savings account. MacLean had suggested taking that money from savings to offset the amount to be raised through taxes. That fund has been used to soften the property-tax impact of previous budgets.

The account is at 5.5 percent of the city budget now; MacLean had recommended dropping it to 5.1 percent.

But with several major construction projects on the horizon, Councilor Nathaniel M. Stout said the council can?t risk hurting the city?s bond rating by further reducing that account.

Companies such as Moody?s Investors Services rate communities? financial health and those ratings are used by bond companies to set interest rates. Keene has one of the best rates in New Hampshire, meaning it pays less than most communities when it borrows money.

A key factor to that rating is keeping at least 5 percent of the budget in a savings account. City policy calls for 5 to 10 percent of the budget to be set aside, and for the past five years that percentage has steadily decreased.

While the city is still in the target range percentage-wise, Finance Director Martha M. Landry said Moody?s also worries about downward trends in savings.

?We?re cutting it very close,? she said.

Landry said she couldn?t predict how the rating agency would respond to another decrease in the savings account, but it would probably notice it.

Councilor Robert H. Farrar, speaking from the audience, said it?s not worth the risk. The city needs millions of dollars? worth of new sewer lines to meet U.S. Environmental Protection Agency standards and has several other big projects in the works.

?It just scares the devil out of me what we?re going to be putting underground in five to 10 years for construction,? he said. ?You?ve got to keep that reserve up, you?ve got to.?

Finance committee member Angelo D. DiBernardo Jr. said he understands the councilors? concern, but the city would still be within the recommended levels at 5.1 percent. With most of the proposed spending increases in this year?s budget due to things the council can?t control ? such as fuel and energy costs, health insurance and payroll ? the council needs to save money anywhere it can, he said.

But Councilor Frederick B. Parsells, also speaking from the audience, said saving money now at the expense of losing the bond rating was a bad trade.

?I feel like the 3-year-old getting close to the hot stove,? he said.

?If our bond rating slips, we?re screwed,? added finance committee Chairman Randy L. Filiault.

The council voted 3-1 to keep the savings account at 5.5 percent of the total budget.

?Okay, now let?s find a quarter million to take back out,? Filiault said after the vote.

They didn?t find it.

Then, Filiault suggested dropping the reserve fund to 5.3 percent of the budget. He said that would split the difference between the current amount and the 5.1 percent recommended by MacLean, and ease the tax burden by more than $100,000.

But Stout disagreed with that suggestion. He said cutting the savings account at all would still represent a fifth straight drop and the council has to stop that trend.

Filiault?s proposal failed on a tie vote. Filiault and DiBernardo voted in favor, Stout and Margaret A. Lynch were opposed. Christopher C. Coates was absent.

Cuts made, money added

During the budget review, the committee voted to take $5,000 from the budget for the Greater Keene Chamber of Commerce. That money was from an account for a downtown commerce coordinator, but that position wasn?t filled this year.

The committee also cut $5,000 for the Partner City Committee, $55,000 for lights at the city?s new basketball courts on Water Street and $59,000 for safety improvements in front of the Keene Family YMCA on Roxbury Street.

The improvements were proposed after three Fitzwilliam children were hit by a car while crossing in a crosswalk there. Since YMCA officials are considering moving out of downtown, the committee decided to hold off on the improvements until that decision is made.

But for all the cuts, the committee also added money in several areas.

The list:

$4,000 for the conservation commission. A typographical error set that amount at $1,000 instead of $5,000.

$1,840 for energy-efficient lights at Dillant-Hopkins Airport. A rebate from Public Service Co. of New Hampshire will cover half that cost, airport Director Edward J. Mattern said, and energy savings will eventually make up for the rest of the cost.

$3,000 to repair leaking roofs at the recreation department.

$3,880 for interns in the planning department.

Filiault said he could sum up the budget in two words: ?Extremely frustrating.?

He said the trickle-down effect of cuts in state money are putting more of the tax burden on local governments.

?I think nobody up here had a good time tonight,? he said.

Residents will have a chance to comment on the budget proposal at a public hearing next Thursday before the city council. The proposal then goes back to the finance committee, which will present a final recommendation to the city council.

A budget must be adopted before the start of the new fiscal year on July 1.

[Lloyd Danforth]

A conservation committee could be put together by volunteers, that have an interest in saving city landmarks. Buy them the ocaisional lunch.
Intern, in every industry, work for free.  Buy them the ocaisional lunch.

[jgmaynard]

You know.... If someone had say, and accounting background, and wanted to look through the city budget and the CIP budget (both available free at the mayor's office - go in and ask for one), I bet they/we could find something to cut out of the budget...... And then if we did somethin' sillly, like wrote letters to the editor about the savings we found, and supported it with at least a couple of property-tax protests in the center of town.....

That might just be enough to get one of us  elected to City Council this November.

JM

[Russell Kanning]

As a highly trained accounting professional.......I trust that you could find many ways for the city to save money.

Sometimes it is not healthy for accountants to look at government books......it is too ugly.

[davemincin]

Ouch!!    A 9% budget increase would even be outragious for Dover!

Perhaps something you Keene folks might want to go after.  Even if you are
unsuccessful, it would be some ammo for the next city council election!

[jgmaynard]

Of course, they said they couldn't find ANYTHING to cut out......

I've tried pouring over the budget and CIP budget both times I've run, and got lost in the maze of numbers, and debits, credits, etc...

JM

[Russell Kanning]

That is the point.....they don't want people to understand it.......but,that is supposed to be their job.

[joeyforpresident]

How's the Sentinel's treatment of the FSP been?

Are they as liberal as the college?

[Kat Kanning]

They've  been OK covering our nhfree events.  One of their editorial guys called freestaters "creepy" though (probably without having met any of us).