This Monday, Dec. 4, vote NO NO NO to an unnecessary tax increase

This Monday, Dec. 4, we vote from 7am to 8pm on how to fund 3 projects — a new Hastings school, a new Fire Station and a preschool.

You can watch on YouTube at https://youtube.com/watch?v=2uXTdFu3R2I a 1-hour long LexMedia TV debate between the NO and YES campaigns moderated by Jim Shaw of the Colonial Times.

The questions on Monday are not “Shall the Town build these projects?” — we would answer YES for the new Hastings, YES for the new Fire Station and NO for the preschool because it's a white elephant — a bad proposal coming too soon (we don't know yet where a 7th elementary school could be built), it's only a 1-story building and it's far too expensive per preschooler served. The well-designed new Hastings school and new Fire Station must be built. The question is how to fund the $5 million in annual debt service they will cost.

The ballot questions ask “Shall the Town of Lexington be allowed to exempt from the provisions of proposition two and one-half... the amounts required to pay for the bonds issued in order to pay costs...” for the projects (key word is “exempt”), or about $5 million per year.

The answers are NO, NO and NO because the town can fund the new Hastings school and new Fire Station without raising taxes, without delaying them and without forgoing $16.5 million in state reimbursement from the State's MSBA, which has in the past extended its 120-day requirement for other projects.

If voters say YES the town will raise $6 million annually more in taxes to repay the projects’ “exempted” debt ($5 million for the new Hastings and Fire Station plus $1 million for the preschool) — an extra +3% tax increase, $350-$490 more in annual taxes for a typical house (assessed at $831,000). Even the latest Town documents do not calculate this percentage figure, so we did from official Town documents.

If voters say NO, NO and NO the town can fund the projects without any new tax increase, by saving $6.5 million, more than enough to pay the $5 million in debt service for the new Hastings and new Fire Station:

— Reassign 10 of our elementary students to another school and implement the Schools' December 2016 policy whereby students new to Lexington are no longer guaranteed their "neighborhood school", while staying within current classroom guidelines. The School Committee can decide this immediately. 3,143 of our 3,153 elementary students won’t be affected and average class size would rise from 21.6 students per classroom systemwide (as of Oct 1, 2017) to 24.3 students per classroom. This saves about $2 million each year and frees up 16 classrooms to accommodate rising enrollments, the equivalent of almost a full new school we won’t have to build. Details at Lexvote.org/sc.

— Raise permanently all employees’ annual salaries by $7,000 and reduce the town’s 85% contribution to health premiums to 50% (like in Concord). This increases or maintains total compensation for every single employee. But more married employees will subscribe to a plan from their spouse’s employer, saving the town $2.5 million (net of salary increases). This will end the indirect subsidies other employers now receive from Lexington taxpayers (because our 85% is so high). It can be done in 2018, by putting the health benefits negotiations recently started on hold until the town can propose a full package to our unions, and by keeping our current agreement in effect until a new one is reached. Details at Lexvote.org/hc.

— Get the state or communities sending us METCO students to fund the $2 million (or more) that the program now costs Lexington taxpayers beyond the current state subsidy of $1.5 million, or reduce the number of new METCO students accepted in Lexington each year. Details at Lexvote.org/metco.

It’s not too late: we must implement these three measures, whose savings will pay for the projects without raising taxes yet again — and expensive high school renovations loom. The town’s reserves ($37 million: $28 million in our Capital Stabilization Fund plus $9 million in our Stabilization Fund) can cover the debt service for the projects until these three measures are fully implemented.

Additionally, Lexington can raise more money by getting the state to recognize that large commercial properties are not currently assessed at their full market value (many are now vastly under-assessed): our leaders have done nothing about this.

Lexington can also cut taxes on small homes (where most seniors and people with limited incomes live) with a “residential exemption”. One is finally considered, but... 13 years after it was first proposed — the YES campaign is now trying to scare the voters by telling them that the three money-saving proposals have been looked at, and deemed unfeasible: this is just plain wrong, just like a residential exemption was "deemed" undesirable for 12 years after it was first proposed, and in the 13th year, it has become desirable.

Vote NO, NO and NO this Monday, Dec. 4: the town can and will fund $5 million in annual debt service for the new Hastings school and the new Fire Station without another +3% tax increase. If we want Lexington to remain diverse, let's not increase our taxes unnecessarily: our seniors and people with limited incomes cannot afford it, when Lexington already has the 8th highest taxes in Massachusetts.