The new city budget represents an overall increase of $4.1 million over current spending.
Westfield City Hall.WESTFIELD – The city’s proposed spending plan for fiscal 2012 totals $121.7 million and provides for no layoffs, furloughs or standard raises for municipal or school employees.
“The budget is lean but it is designed to move Westfield forward,” Mayor Daniel M. Knapik said Thursday, just before submitting the budget package to the City Council for review. The council must act on the plan by June 30.
The mayor is asking for $108.8 million to finance operations of municipal departments, including the School Department, that rely on property taxes. That amount represents an increase of 3.5 percent, or about $3.7 million over current spending.
An additional $12.8 million is sought for operations within the Water Department, Waste Water Treatment, ambulance, Community Preservation and stormwater management. Those departments are financed through user fees.
Daniel KnapikKnapik plans to use $1.4 million in reserves, about $600,000 more than this year, to offset spending in the year beginning July 1. That will leave the city an estimated $7.7 million in cash reserves.
Knapik presented his budget proposal to the City Council a full month earlier than in previous years.
Several council members, especially Finance Chairman Richard E. Onofrey Jr. and Councilor at-Large David A. Flaherty, complained last year they did not have sufficient time to review the financial needs of all municipal departments. Also, as a result of that lack of review, the council made a last-minute $862,000 cut in school spending, only to restore $744,000 at the 11th hour last June 30.
Council President Christopher Keefe said Thursday the early filing “comes as good news. It will give the council some flexibility in its review.”
Flaherty also welcomed the early filing, saying “this will give us more time to explore” the budget. “I offer no promises but my job is to be conservative. We need to look under the hood,” he said.
The FY12 budget formally recognizes the city’s new Technology Center located on Apremont Way as a municipal department, with a budget of $1.2 million and three additional employees.
The new budget will also add a parking enforcement officer, a post eliminated in 2008, and an estimated four additional part-time positions at different departments.
Last year, the mayor sought concessions from all municipal employees and laid off at least five city workers to balance spending. Concessions included furloughs of one to three days for various employee groups.
The budget includes $52.4 million for the School Department, an increase of $1.2 million from FY11; $6.8 million for the Police Department, a decrease of about $118,000; and just under $5.1 million for the Fire Department, a decrease of about $73,000 from current spending.
The budget also assumes the city will proceed with a consolidation of services among city and School Department efforts in personnel, law and purchasing.
Knapik said the budget does not include funds for either the city or school personnel director jobs. A decision on funding a single personnel manager for both will be made later, he indicated.
The mayor said property taxes must increase by the annual 2.5 percent to help finance the budget.
Also, he will bank on receipt of $32.5 million in state Chapter 70 education funds and another $4.9 million in state aid to the city to finance operations next year. Combined, state allocations represent a projected decrease of $200,000.
City financial officers anticipate Westfield’s new growth, building construction and expansion, will bring in $500,000 to help finance the budget.
As for moving the city forward, Knapik said he plans to repair or replace roofs at several schools, repair the roof on City Hall, move forward with design for a new elementary school and spend at least $2 million in road improvement projects during the new fiscal year.