Simsbury Board of Finance Budget Hearing April 18, 2023

Board of Finance Budget Hearing April 18 2023

The Board of Finance should be aware of the financial issues facing the taxpayers.

The stock market is down, there is talk of a rescission, and we face inflation with all of our everyday expenses.

Increases in the revaluations is giving false indications of prosperity.

There are serious unintended consequences in arbitrarily increasing the assessments without any models in place to justify the increases.

Simsbury will become a ghost town as small businesses can no longer sustain the increases and will leave town.

Renters will leave town when rents become increased and becomes unaffordable.

Many houses will be sold at greatly reduced values as the owners can no longer afford the taxes.

When a business has their assessment reduced by $1million, something is terribly wrong.

The Board of Finance should bring in the Assessor to question how she determined these assessments.

Many assessment appeals will reduce the tax collections.

The free money from ARPA has skewed the taxing model since many of the expenditures cannot be sustained.

Social Workers for the schools and Youth Services are budgeted for $700,000 without out-placement for long and short-term therapy.

Social Workers can identify issues with mental health and addiction but do not have the tools to treat the symptoms.

Money should be spent for placement centers with psychiatric physicians, psychologists and others to help people rid themselves of their addiction in a timely manner.

The insurance companies should make treatment affordable to all socio-economic groups.

Throwing money at Social Workers who can identify the problems but do not have the tools for long-term benefits.

The issues of addiction and mental health cannot be solved by throwing money at Social Workers without having placement centers for therapy.

What benefits are derived from a $700,000 infusion of tax dollars for Social Workers?

The $350,000 Tariffville Pickleball Courts have been delayed due to environmental issues with DEEP.

The Simsbury Farms Special Revenue Fund has a short-fall of $180,000.

The Board of Finance should review the yearly deficits with the infusion of taxpayer dollars into the Special Revenue Fund when it was initiated to be self-sufficient.

The Recreation Department should review the status of the Golf Course as a town facility or as many towns have done, with a specialized golf management team to reduce costs.

At the present time there are 16 homes in foreclosure.

The town has several schools that are non-taxable and use all our services.

However, Westminster School has given the town a stipend each year in lieu of taxes.

The Ethel Walker School has Gross Receipts of $23,369.253 and assets of $81,712,401 as stated in their tax filings.

The Ethel Walker School should follow the lead of Westminster School and give the town a stipend in lieu of taxes.

This is not the time to increase taxes.

The Board of Finance should determine the cost benefit analysis of all projects before entering them into our budget expenditures.

I am asking the Board of Finance to review the expenditures in the budget and reduce the budget with no increase in taxes.