Millville officials endorse tax override again
— The Millville Board of Selectmen has unanimously voted to place before voters a $1.1 million Proposition 2½ override that will coincide with the annual town election set for Monday, April 1.
This is the second consecutive year town voters will be asked to approve an override to cover a town operating budget deficit, which is expected to exceed $500,000 for the upcoming FY20 budget. Faced with a $300,000 structural deficit last year, the town pitched a $1.8 million property tax override to voters last June, but it was rejected at the polls. As a result, the town implemented significant cuts in service, including eliminating municipal trash service; closing the Senior Center and laying off all its employees; shutting off 64 percent of the town’s street lights; cutting all stipends; eliminating vacant positions; reducing town hall department hours; and laying off a fulltime firefighter.
With a draft fiscal 2020 budget that is in deficit by several hundred thousand dollars, the selectmen voted 4-0 at a workshop on Feb. 21 to recommend next steps, including a $1,173,183 Proposition 2½ general tax override.
“Working closely with town departments, committees and regional school budgets, it was apparent that the revenues, one-time spending sources and cuts would not allow the town town balance the FY20 budget,” Selectmen Chairman Jennifer Dean Wing said in a prepared statement read aloud at the board’s meeting earlier this week. “Under Massachusetts General Law 59, Subsection 21CA, it is the responsibility of the local appropriating body – the Millville Board of Selectmen – to place a Proposition 2½ ballot question before the voters.”
“It is the responsibility of the boards to present all funding possibilities to the townspeople in order to balance the budget by the voters at the annual town meeting on Monday, May 13,” Dean Wing said. “All pertinent information will be made available to the townspeople prior to the annual town election. This will occur after the Black- stone-Millville Regional School District budget public hearing on March 13.”
If history repeats itself and voters defeat the override in April, then the town would be in the same position as last year when it was forced to reduce budgets and make painful cuts to town services to close the budget deficit.
“It’s our responsibility to give the townspeople all the possibilities to fund their community,” Dean Wing said. “We would be doing a disservice by not asking our community to fund the town.”