05/07/2007 Annual Town Meeting - Laserfiche WebLink

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FINANCE COMMITTEE RECOMMENDATIONS CII WARRANT ARTICLES SPECIALTOWN MEETING ARTICLES The Town Meeting on May 7th is divided into two separate parts each having its own set of Warrant Articles, The first part is called the SPECIAL TOWN MEETING and addresses town business having to do with the current Fiscal Year(2007)which ends on June 30, 2007. There are 9 Articles listed which request voter approval to either transfer funds from FY 07 budget line items of expense with unexpended funds to budget line items of expense which have been over expended, or to appropriate monies from surplus funds to pay the expenses under-funded in the FY 07 budget, Without going into a lot of detail, Articles 1, 2,3, and 7 involve transfers of funds within departmental or line accounts. Article 4 requests an approval to appropriate from surplus funds $37,925 to pay additional expenses related to the permanent bonding of some $8.8 million in capital expenditures, Article 5 requests$13,519 to pay legal expenses associated with the taking of 20 foreclosed properties; Article 6 requests $31,176 to,pay additional unemployment benefits incurred by the laying off of a number of school and town employees in recent years; Article 8 requests an additional 56,100 to continue the water quality analysis program of the Popponesset Bay and Waquoit Bay estuaries, and Article 9 requests approval of a $19,125 appropriation for the second year payment on the lease of a police vehicle, the cost of which was omitted in the FY 07 capital budget. The bottom tine is that approval of these articles will neither have an impact on the FY 08 budget, nor will it affect the final 2007 municipal tax rate. While each Article will be voted individually, the FINANCE COMMITTEE RECOMMENDS YOUR APPROVAL ON EACH OF "MESE 9 ARTICLES. The Board of Selectmen has also placed 5 Articles in this "Special" portion of the Town Meeting seeking approval to appropriate a total of$1,411,400 in already collected and available state and local Community Preservation Act Funds. This is being done in order to allow implementation of these projects before the start of the FY 08, which does not begin until July 1. By way of background, ptior to 2004, Cape Cod municipalities had the option of participating in a program called the Cape Cod Open Space Land Acquisition Program (a.k.a. Cape Cod Land Bank) to raise funds locally to purchase lands to be kept as open space. Mashpee's participation in the "Land Bank" program began in 1999. Beginning with the FY 05 budget, the State offered an optional program called the Community Preservation Act(CPA) which would allow a municipality to collect funds through an annual 3% surcharge on property assessments, which would then be matched by state funds, thereby substantially increasing the amount of money available. The program, however, did impose specific, limited categories for which funds could be used. These uses include the acquisition, creation, preservation, rehabilitation and/or restoration of: 1). Open Space; 2). Historic Resources; 3). Recreational Land, and, 4). Affordable Housing. 5