Before you ask me for an override...

The current economic climate does not bode well for an override -- either capital or operating.  There certainly may be some legitimate reasons to ask -- BUT the fact is that too many people have seen their incomes diminished with no related decrease in living expenses.

Before anybody asks me for more of my money, I would like to see:

1)  A Plan -- If we know that municipal expenses are climbing faster than the related tax revenue, what are we doing about it?  Wage freezes are helpful (and appreciated), but long-term, we need to expect a serious reduction in services.  What services are going to be reduced?  What services would my tax increase preserve?

2)  Realistic labor contracts -- the biggest expenses we face are labor-related costs.  We have no choice but to reduce headcount.  Whose heads would my tax increase preserve?  (I would be far more willing to save the heads of the folks who have been trying to solve the problem.)  Like the private sector, we will likely lose some good employees to better-paying towns.  It's unavoidable.

3) More consolidation & cooperation -- what services can we share with other Towns?  Why can't we share Building Inspectors, or Dog Catchers with Bourne or Mashpee?  Why don't we have a centralized maintenance facility that would maintain & repair all town-owned vehicles -- Police, DPW, Fire, Schools, etc.? 

4)  Consolidate non-essential services and charge those that utilize them.  A real Recreation Department would be a great place to consolidate Beaches, the Golf course, the Marina, The Oakcrest Cove Yacht Basin (aka O'Keefe's Cottages), The Pool, The Community School, and assorted fields.  These are all fun places -- but the world would not stop if they disappeared.   These operations should be required to cover ALL of their operating expenses and related debt service -- which would likely require bifurcating the golf course debt from the conservation land debt. 

5)  Dump the Dump -- I admit I get more value from my dump sticker than somebody without 4 kids.  Folks benefitting from the use of the Town's transfer statement should bear the cost of that service. But let's also look at the costs -- do we really need more people on duty at the dump than we have at the Fire Department?  Are we REALLY making enough from scrap metal sales to justify the cost of paying somebody to sit there and babysit it? 

6)  Build a Building --- combine the 3-4 Town Office buildings, with Police & Fire in a single new building --- and sell everything else.  I wouldn't mind paying a capital override if it was going to consolidate operations and reduce long term operating costs.  It makes no sense to spend more money patching obsolete facilities.  I've never understood spending $3 million to re-do Town Hall so that it has LESS useable office space -- and more public meeting space (with minimal parking & septic capacities).  If you need meeting space -- use a school!

7)  Consider suspending contributions to the Community Preservation Fund.  There are numerous restrictions and obligations associated with this program -- but is there is a potential to suspend contributions for a specified period of time?  This may allow tax dollars to be diverted to preserve  essential services for at least a limited time.  Realistically, funding a fire/police station is far more important to the "greater good" than renovating a church -- or some other old building.  (The discussion regarding potential funding for the dilapidated Clark-Haddad building made me cringe!)

8)  Revisit the conversation about the privatization of building maintenance and food service operations at the schools.  The prior Business Manager claimed these were "no win'" proposals.  BUT consider revisiting them with the current, more aggressive, school administration -- and maybe a small committee of townspeople with experience in financial analysis and operational planning.

9) Revisit the discussion of School Transportation costs.  There have been far bigger balls in play  at the School Dept. lately.  But, earlier this year,  the Superintendent made a bold move by using operating funds  to purchase 4 vans and take over some transport services from the Cape Cod Collaborative.  This move saved the District approximately $300K this year -- even AFTER deducting the cost of the vans.  The use of part-time drivers also further reduced costs by eliminating full-time employee benefit costs.  We also need to review transportation costs  with an eye towards reducing/eliminating free transportation to those not entitled by law.

10)  Review the School District's relationship with the Cape Cod Collaborative.  Although the concept of sharing resources with other Districts to provide Special Education services is certainly sound -- the reality is that the CCC provides another layer of bureaucracy that frequently resulted in inflated costs.  Sandwich has reduced this expense considerably by bringing some transportation and SPED services back in-house.  This review process needs to be expanded and the new Sandwich reps to the CCC needs to more aggressively pursue cost efficiencies at the Colloborative so that it can achieve its original objective of saving member district costs.

11)  Admit that the Commercial Development ship left the dock without us.  It has been pointed out very clearly that even if we could squeeze in two more plazas the size of the 6A Stop & Shop, the average taxpayer would not save enough money to buy dinner at the Taverna!  The development restrictions of  "The Olde Day" have effectively doomed us to depend on residential development to carry the majority of our local tax burden.  And, since we don't have the nice beaches and warm water of the other Cape towns, we also don't have the second homes -- owned by those nice people who pay their taxes but use very few services ... particularly school services!

At the risk of sounding pessimistic, we really are looking over a cliff.  And, next Spring when the annual crop of candidates starts talking about "working together", "thinking outside the box", "transparency", and the fact that they "Know there is a huge amount of waste out there" (although they can't actually say where "there" is!) --- if they don't have some sort of professional experience, I may be tempted to push them over that cliff!