Article 3
$50 per meeting for the Town Moderator.
Yes 1,245 No 450
Article 4
$50 per meeting for the School Moderator
Yes 1,199 No 496
Article 5
$500 a year for each Selectman
Yes 1,160 No 537
Article 6
Town Budget
$10,289,768; which is $247,000 (2.5 percent) over last year’s budget of $10,042,768.
Yes 1,009 No 684
Article 8
$500 a year for each School Board member
Yes 970 No 719
Article 10
School Budget
$27,750,839; which is $69,729 ( 0.25 percent) more than this year’s budget of $27,681,110.
Yes 768 No 917
Article 11
School District buy property next to Union Street School
Yes 700 No 991
Article 12
$30,000 to Springfield Regional Development Corp.
Yes 915 No 767
Article 13
$20,000 to Springfield On The Move
Yes 909 No 772
Article 14
$2,000 to Springfield Community Band
Yes 962 No 722
Article 15
$10,000 to Turning Point Recovery
Yes 814 No 869
Article 16
$9,000 to SEVCA
Yes 1,094 No 586
Article 17
$63,500 to Visiting Nurse Association
Yes 1,195 No 489
Article 18
$10,000 to Health Care and Rehabilitation Services
Yes 776 No 890
Article 19
$8,000 to Senior Solutions (Council on Aging)
Yes 1,305 No 388
Article 20
$4000 to Valley Health Connections
Yes 988 No 713
Article 21
$12,500 to CT River Transit
Yes 1,014 No 586
Article 22
$3,300 to RSVP Volunteer Center
Yes 1,039 No 664
Article 23
$8,000 to Meals on Wheels
Yes 1,422 No 280
Article 24
$3,000 to Windsor County Partners
Yes 983 No 710
Article 25
$50,000 to Family Center
Yes 1,117 No 577
Article 26
$5,000 to Springfield Supportive Housing
Yes 889 No 796
Article 27
Exempt Community Players Building and land from property taxes
Yes 979 No 719
All of the following candidates were uncontested so are now elected. The following figures do not include write-in candidates which are slow to count so these are termed "unofficial results".
Town Moderator
Patrick M. Ankuda - 1,599
Town School District Moderator
Patrick M. Ankuda - 1,583
Selectman
Stephanie Gibson - 1, 472
School Director
Jeanice Garfield - 1,183
Ken Vandenburgh - 1,256
Library Trustee
Kevin J. Coen - 1,524
Trustee of Public Funds - 3 yr.
Michael H. Filipak - 1,478
Trustee of Public Funds - 2 yr.
Deborah A. Luse 1,407
Cemetery Commissioner - 5 yr.
Ronald S. Griffen - 1,479
Cemetery Commissioner - 1 yr.
Hugh S. Putnam - 1,503
Town Agent
Stephen S. Ankuda - 1,557
First Constable
Richard Ripchick - 1,503
River Valley Technical Center ballot
Article 1(Shared by 4 member school districts: Bellows Falls Union High School, Black River High School, Green Mountain High School, and Springfield High School.) $3,098,810 to RVTC Yes 962 No 751 |
Thank you, in advance, for posting the results. Very helpful.
ReplyDeleteThank you for a clear and concise layout for the results. This is very much appreciated.
DeleteI heard the school budget passed, but the town budget did not.
ReplyDeleteI must say as a parent its very sad that the CHILDREN OF SPRINGFIELD WILL BE THE ONES TO SUFFER FOR THIS!! VERY VERY SAD!
ReplyDeleteSuffer the children......I hope all the 'NO' voters are very proud of themselves. How does it feel to deny a child the opportunity to excell?
DeleteHow does it feel to look a child in the eyes and tell them "the road ends here".
I guess now you know.
Proud of yourselves?
Interesting. Expected the School budget vote, that has become an annual Springfield ritual--but thought they would support getting rid of the house in front of Union Street school. HCRS didn't do the Turning Point Club any favors by admitting they are so involved with it, but they both would probably have failed anyway. If HCRS ever wants to get a special appropriation from Springfield again it is going to have to become more transparent, get a local CEO or Board Chairman and do some serious work on improving its reputation. Just having people like Mia Taniche exclaim how wonderful it is and attacking people who criticize it and demanding that people put up evidence isn't the the route to success.
DeleteWhy does HCRS have such a bad reputation? Other organizations and their leaders have been attacked on this blogsite, but they seem to survive unscathed, but HCRS and the one group closely associated with it went down in flames. I don't understand, can someone who has been around longer than I explain?
DeleteHCRS never answered my question as to who was on their board of directors and it looked like the moderator at the informational meeting didn't even know their key spokesperson at the informational meeting. Do they even have any local board members who aren't people some how associated with one of their programs? Maybe they need to approach some of their critics and get them involved in order to clean up their reputation, they seem to be in denial as to their reputation which is a pretty dangerous thing for people in their business.
DeleteThere is one thing for certain. The elderly are more likely to support services to themselves than they are to support educating their grandchildren.
ReplyDeleteIn response to 11:47 I, myself am irritated that the visiting nurse program got the money they received. The poor old folks don't understand that visiting nurse charges medicare and/or Medicaid when they come and check your vitals (some doing a poor job at that) and then leave. The flu shot they give is supplied by the state to them and THEN they charge medicare for the shot. So to offer them the amount that we do is robbery.
DeleteTo anonymous - 3/5/13 It should be up to the parents to support their childrens education, NOT the grandparents!! Most of us older folks are living on social security - you will be there one day and maybe then you will understand.
DeleteThe only children who seem to feel punished here are the ones posting such hysterical nonsense as 10:19 and 10:29. Obviously fiscal responsibility isn't practiced by their "parents"!
ReplyDeleteAre you insane, the people of this town vote the schools budget down out of spite it is not the parents, the teachers or the kids fault. And fiscal responsibility the budget was fair and did not go up nearly as much as the town budget that passed.
DeleteBlah, blah, blah... Stop drooling and get a grip.
DeleteWhy does RVTC pass and the Springfield School District not pass?
ReplyDeleteBetter question is why does the Town budget pass and the School budget fail?
Deletetown budget always passes
DeleteThat's what is kind of amazing since they offloaded a bunch of line items into special appropriations. Unfortunate that the school can't offload some of it social service responsibilities out of the budget, and perhaps quit paying the Town to perform the public services it should be providing like police at large public school events, etc. and for the use of Park Street School, etc.
DeleteZACTLY!....the Town leeches off the School System and it's "just the way it is". Fire Dept and Police Dept. actually CHARGE the schools for responding to incidents. HOW CRAZY IS THAT!!!!!
DeleteProve it
DeleteThose special appropriations do not belong in the Town Budget, hence the term Special, requiring 200 signatures to get on the ballot.
DeleteAnother crazy thing is look at the total votes received by the school board members.
ReplyDeletePeople had no problem voting NO on the school budget, BECAUSE THEY WERE UPSET WITH THE WAY THE SCHOOL DISTRICT WAS BEING RUN OR BECAUSE OF THE COST, but had no problem voting for its leaders.
Wouldn't you just leave that one blank?
Please take a minute to consider this! Our children do not and should not suffer because of additional cuts! If we simply vote no and do nothing more our misguided administration will make cuts like music and art. We must send a message loud and clear, poorly planned infrastructure expenses like wireless systems, money for wage increases and new positions must be cut and then the next year should be spent planning a revamp of our district. We must stop throwing good money after bad! Please! Send letters, emails, make phone calls. A clear message must be sent!
ReplyDeleteIs this suppose to make sense? You want to cut the computer system, potentially lose teachers because of non-competitive wages, and avoid filling positions...and you think this won't affect our children? I agree they shouldn't cut music and art -- although they have pretty much gutted the music program with their scheduling at the High School anyway -- but not sure this is the right approach.
DeleteI'll agree that technology at the high school level should be current, but to buy brand new laptops for elementary level students seems a bit excessive. Why not upgrade only at high school level and pass down the technology being replaced to middle school, then the middle school level to elementary, etc. Let's face it, the students getting ready to graduate and enter the job market are the ones who really need the new technology, not the lower grades. I'm sorry, but I don't feel it's necessary to have the most modern computer equipment in a kindergarten classroom. Teach those kids how to write their names or how about starting to read? Until a student reaches middle school level they should be learning basic academic skills, not how to navigate a social network or build a website. Just my opinion, but if some of these costs were pared back it would help the budget and put the money where it might do the most good.
DeletePeople move to a town or city because of its schools; not paved roads or parking spaces. Until we decide to make our school system better the town will continue to remain stagnant. Until we elect more forward thinking individuals to manage our town we will remain the "town that used to be"
ReplyDelete"until we elect more forward thinking individuals"
DeleteUmmm we need more forward thinking individuals to step forward and run for leadership positions. Both seats on the School Board and the lone seat on the select board were unopposed. Now that is change we can beleive in.
so where exactly would all the new people work. im very confused here. money has been thrown and thrown with lesser results. they need better what to do the job they are paid for. public service is a privlege not an entitlement.
ReplyDeleteInteresting mangling of the English language -- but you did hit most of the Teapublican talking points.
Deletesorry springfield taught me to sound my words out. so attack me. you are so superior.
DeleteWhat did they teach you about grammar?
Delete"they need better what to do the job they are paid for."
Oh yes, a privilege to be beaten down upon each year. Ha! A privilege. What in all of this makes you think any of these roles are a privilege? These blogs are just a sampling of the moronic things the workers in the public sector have to deal with. What crazy cart did you fall off of? I am thinking someone visited one of the drug houses one too many times. A Privilege. I seriously am laughing my a$$ off.
ReplyDeleteStill trying to get my head around, "public service is a privilege not an entitlement". Am beginning to believe that the GOP kool aid has so saturated the minds of people that the talking points take on a life of their own. What exactly can that possibly mean? Is that somehow supposed to be persuasive of some point?
DeleteSchool budget starts with the union contract - we can't pay for wage increases and benefits when we are not seeing an increase in our own wages. Just can't afford it.
ReplyDeleteSO what you are saying is, you didn't get a raise, so teachers should get one either. Small minded!!!
DeleteActually that comment is based on logic and not a small mind like yours... If one does not see an increase in their own wages and yet their taxes go up in order to pay the wages and benefits of school union employees each year it doesn't take a genius to figure out who is getting the shaft. It isn't the teachers, pea brain.
DeleteYep, that is what he/she is saying alright. It doesn't matter that teachers have masters degrees, and continuing education requirements, and have to navigate through an increasing minefield of regulations which could cost them their jobs or their licenses. It doesn't matter that these are the people supposedly handling and training our most precious commodities -- if the person in the factory doesn't get a raise, neither should they.
DeleteMay I suggest to the poster a re-write. Maybe you should be saying a reduction in staff would leave monies for raises while helping keep the budget under control. Now I’m not saying that is what I favor but it would sound more intelligent. Thus begs the question, if the budget was lower would you even question any raises? Or still give the automatic no vote?
DeleteWith all that said I am not a union person nor feel certain positions should be protected by one. Teaching is one of those. Performance and merit should outweigh automatic increases based on years of service. Student attendance, classroom participation, homework accomplish and teacher attendance could all play a role in deciding merit. If a teacher motivates (and I believe many do) children will react. Having a teacher show up everyday saves the district money, that too should be rewarded. I think it’s crazy that a poor performing teacher is so well protected. This of course is where image of a few creates a stigma of many.
I’m not happy about losing wages over the past few years but it comes with my chosen profession. It’s up to me to turn things around and will. But I will not begrudge others of their livelihood to justify my suffering. Now it you want to talk benefit packages this discussion will take a whole new twist.
Historically the public was able to lure in teachers for low starting pay with great benefit packages. In fact, most teachers were underpaid for their abilities and education, but were willing to accept that due to the increased job security and benefits. It wasn't unusual for one spouse to take a teaching position so that the family was assured of some income coming in and insurance so that the other spouse could operate a small business which had no health insurance. What has happened here is that income has become so polarized and our farming and retail markets have so changed, that it is difficult for people to remain in the middle-class. The merchant class is basically extinct and the prosperous family farmer is also, and joining them in the career graveyard is the skilled blue collar worker making a union scale wage. It isn't that the teachers have been massively successful in increasing their incomes, its that the rest of America has managed to allow themselves to be flushed down the toilet. So is it now the proposal to take the teachers who are training our youth and flush them down the toilet as well?
DeleteThank you Aethelred the Town Shill. Why should taxes go up every year and those paying them have less to survive on and yet they must pay more for school union members and get nothing other than a failing school system in return. How stupid can you be?
DeleteThis seems to be the answer to everything, namely to call people shills. Whatever. The point is that we need to exert effort to build up the opportunities for the people who are living and working in Springfield. You do not do that by tearing down other groups -- that is a purely GOP strategy that hasn't worked. The answer is not that you destroy the teaching profession in order to make it a greater participant in an overall economic decline, the answer is you need to create more jobs and opportunities so that the unskilled person working in the factories or as a grocery store clerk has a chance to make more money. The key is to restore the middle class, but you don't do that by slashing education budgets. In fact that is counterproductive.
DeleteWhat I am saying is people's wallets only have so much money. It doesn't grow on trees... I am sure there are teachers worth it but bottom line is we have to keep it affordable for the taxpayers in the community. Haven't you noticed all the foreclosures in town? That is a pretty good indication of our current economy.
DeleteIf you don't have it in your pocket then how can you pay it out? Doesn't get any more simple than that - even for us "simple minded" folks. School budget/town budget has to match the wealth of the people that are paying for it.
DeleteWell perhaps the "simple minded" folks out to be applying for real estate tax rebates which are provided for under the law instead of doing the truly "simple minded" thing of voting down the school budget which makes it more difficult for us to train and retain other than the "simple minded".
DeleteHow many of our population receive state aide? How many families are now collecting unemployment in this town? It isn't a simple answer as applying for property tax rebate. Also, where do you think the money comes from for the property tax rebates? There is a bigger picture that even my simple mind gets. This information is important when these are the people you are asking to increase their property taxes.
DeleteI agree that our kids are taking the brunt of it. However I did vote no. Only because our school board asks and asks and we give and give and they continue to cut programs. We give to protect programs yet they piss away our budget and take away what we are paying for. As soon as our board changes it ways I'll be glad to pay any amount.
ReplyDeleteWhat if no one new runs again next year? Will you vote no again then?
DeleteNot sure I follow the logic here. If you want the board to change, you either run yourself or you conjole someone else into running. Constant budget defeats does not inspire people to run for the school board, at least not the ones who protect valued programs. What it inspires is people to give up.
DeleteWhy are we paying for Frank P to be out on paid leave to the end of his contract, sounds like a "vacation" paid? Makes you wonder what has been going on in the schools lately, doesn't it??
ReplyDeleteWould you rather have him still in there messing things up? If the district didn't pay him for his "leave" they could face legal battles with accompanying charges or they could buy out his contract and take a chance he'd sue, more legal charges. This way, he gets paid for the remainder of his time under contract, but he's out of the district so cannot do more harm. It may seem like wasted money, but in the long run it saves the district money. It's another one of those "contract situations."
DeleteThis is not particularly unusual. The idea is for them to be out finding employment elsewhere. Zach has been picking up the pieces for quite some time now.
DeleteThanks Mr. Shill!
DeleteI for one am very glad that Frank is out and Zack is in. I feel he is trustworthy and ready to hold staff accountable. However I do not feel that the admin needs or deserves a raise at this time. I feel they need to prove that under new direction that the eductional level of the students picks up and we are showing better scores. I agree they have gotten better, but for what we are paying for they need to increase a bit more . As far as the school board goes we do need new people to stand up and be placed on the ballot. If my job was so I could take the time to do an honorable roll I would run. Certainly there are many educated people in this town that would and should stand up and run next year. Please do so. We can blog all day but it doesn't do any good if the right people are not reading or listening. Stand up and be part of the solution and not the problem.
DeleteOne of the problems with both the town and school budgets is that they are always offered apologetically. "We're trying to keep your taxes low, so we cut this and this and this, but it's still going up 2.5 percent. Please don't hit us!"
ReplyDeleteMy property taxes on a $59,000 house are less than $5 a day-- a 2.5% increase is ten cents. And I scream at my taxes.
But to drive a car from Springfield to Chester and back costs me $3.50 in gas alone, and $6 in total costs-- and I don't think a thing about it. I used to put on 25-35,000 miles a year without blinking an eye-- at a total cost of between $41 and $57 a day, eight to eleven times more than it costs to run both the school and the town.
If I can afford to do that, I can certainly be sold on the idea that what I want from the town is the best, not the cheapest.
It's time that both the town and the schools started saying to people, "We're not going to treat you like peasants; you're going to get the best services for yourselves and your kids, and you're going to pay for it."
And the people who complain about the pay and benefits for cops, teachers, town workers, school support staff and anybody else who's better off-- it's time for you to consider what you deserve. You will never improve your own condition by trying to reduce someone else to it. You won't get a better deal working for Wal-Mart if you negotiate only for yourself, and if you don't act now, when you are finally eligible for Social Security (if they don't hack it to pieces before then), you will get less than $1,100 a month. What you want to do is get what union workers fight for-- a defined benefit rather than a cash benefit pension. You're not going to get anything if you attack those who had the sense to say yes to organizing.
Open your eyes: http://www.upworthy.com/9-out-of-10-americans-are-completely-wrong-about-this-mind-blowing-fact-2?c=upw1
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Delete10:47--I have no idea what you're talking about.
DeleteI agree, we are not going to improve the situation by trying to pull the government employees down to a lower pay scale. What we need is to push others up to a higher pay scale. Look at what the nursing homes in the area are doing? They are paying the people who do the actual work, the LNA's, less than poverty level while the organizations reap in high pay. The school does the same thing with its aides. And other organizations do the same thing in Town when they receive substantial contracts from the D.O.C. We need some type of Davis Bacon Act or something for every organization that is receiving government aid.
DeleteUntil people are "pushed" up to a higher pay scale we can't afford the increase. We have got to get higher paying jobs here first. People can't move here for a good school system if there aren't good paying jobs for them. Sure they can start a business here and how many businesses have we seen come and go??? I know I don't have the answers but I do know that this community cannot afford the school budget.
DeleteI don't think that the people are going to be "pushed" up to a higher pay scale until they start vigorously supporting policies with that in mind, and quit defeating programs and actions that have that in mind. Slashing school budgets, especially teachers who educate our kids and spend money in our comunity is counterproductive and simply accelerates the downward spiral. Instead we need to be advocating and trying to get raises for the workers in the industries anchored here like the nursing homes, aides at tha school, police, etc. Push up, instead of pull down. It has been shown that some of the areas with the highest taxes and highest level of services are the ones where there are the most jobs being created (except in China), not the ones where they have been implementing austerity. Austerity doesn't work.
DeleteAethelred, are you suggesting competitive wages? Or a pay scale that is dictated? I agreed with you on bring everyone up. But how is that done without effecting the cost of services provide by those in the private sector. We all know that when cost go up so do the price of the service. This has a trickledown effect.
DeleteNow you mention school aides, police and nursing homes where does that money come from? Teachers are spending money in town, I certainly hope so. Since most live elsewhere and even have different color license plates I question that. That is not a knock on them but a rebuttal to your statement, because to be honest I don’t spend money in this town, not that I don't want to but we don't have much to buy. (Or at least what I need.)
This is what gets me. Everyone says folks need to make more money. So do I. Okay so that happens, then what? Do those that made more now need more, after all the sheep have more to take? As an employer the question is how many times can you give a raise to an employee before a maximum is met? A line must be drawn for everyone. In a business the person(s) of ownership draw the line, in the public sector there seems to be no line or anyone to draw one.
You may be saying this and I'm missing it but what we need is more people. The kind with jobs, pay taxes and have families. Let's get the teachers and staff back into the community. This promotes new business to open to keep shopping local. In other words we need numbers, and not the ones Chuckie is working on.
Let's take the example of the nursing homes, many, if not all, are owned or managed by large chains. The headquarters of most of those chains are in Nashville, Tennessee. The vast majority of the elderly and others confined to nursing homes are having their stays covered by Medicaid at a fixed rate. But while Medicaid fixes the rate that the nursing homes can charge for their services, they do not necessarily fix the rate that the nursing homes have to pay their employees. The simple truth is that we have hundreds, if not thousands, of women working in nursing homes as lna's -- they have no benefits, or very poor benefits, and they are frequently paid only a few dollars over minimum wage -- yet they are subjected to intense regulation, the violation of which can cause them to lose their license, etc. What has happened in the nursing home industry is that the women that due most of the work and provide most of the care are overworked and often are working under miserable working conditons and in constant fear of being fired. They normally get fired because the nursing home is understaffed and overbooked, so when an LNA takes a short-cut in order to get everything done and something goes wrong, the LNA gets thrown under the bus by the nursing home which moves on unscathed. There needs to be a limit on the amount that the company can rake off in profit over the amount that they are paying their staff -- and the LNA's need to get a union to demand better wages. Although I know less about them, I suspect that the same thing is true of the big chain grocery stores--except they are not deriving their profits directly from the government.
DeleteAethelred, right on. I commend you on a well written piece that makes a point. In fact while I myself do not favor many unions, I believe those in the medical field should be unionized. And I mean everyone from the floor sweeper to the RN.
DeleteNow with that being said what I read here is a person that has a problem with the bottom of the food chain being taken advantage of (and I do sympathize). But those issues are a distraction to the subject at hand. How do we attract youth back into the community? Not all are going to be LNA’s, although I guess it could be work in demand among an aging community.
It seems the modern thing is for a community to create a market for itself or a stigma. We see Ludlow as a ski town, Claremont as a place to shop, Hanover is a college town, Windsor is a bedroom community, Brattleboro is a hippie town, etc. We have seem to become a social service / drug town. It this where we want to be? I feel most town folks think not. Yet the school system tells us we are below poverty level so kids cannot be taught. The police cannot take on the drug issues for lack of staff due to lack of taxes. The fire department needs two more people to drive ambulances for the aging to get a ride over to that nursing home, no tax dollars for that either.
Do we change or remain status quo? I don’t think we know how to change right now nor do we seem too interested in do so. Those with some power seem to enjoy it, those without also seem to enjoy it. Status quo means future leadership could be troubling. Since we don’t have much need to spend our tax money wisely. Let’s not keep throwing it into things that are not working. Start listening to committees of taxpayers that are put together such as the school budget. Then, and only then you will start to get folks joining in the discussion. Until then they are only sheep, apparently in the way of Ted Turner.
Harry Byrd, what I am suggesting is that trickle down economics is a fallacy, if you want an economic situation to turn around you have to make sure the water hits at the ground level (it will eventually make it back up to the sky, but it needs to get to the ground), so if you want other businesses to start thriving you need to have water bubbling up out of the ground. If we treat our lowest level employees like crap, then at some point they just give up and go on disability or financial aide. Springfield treats its lower level employees like crap and since the concerns that are treating them like crap are taking the profits they make off these peasants directly out of Town, then something needs to be done. There is no justification for the costs of such things as nursing homes if they are not paying their employees -- all their employees a living wage. They are not, yet they are in most cases very profitable. What we have is not trickle down, but something like how hemlock trees create deeryards -- the way they do that is that they trap the snow up in the upper reaches of the trees so it never hits the ground. As a result the snow evaporates directly back into the air without accumulating and watering the ground. So what we have is economic benefit coming down from the sky (wealthy investors or the government) hits the very upper reaches of management, creates profit and goes back to the wealthy investors. That is crap. The same thing is happening in some of the bigger not for profits.
DeleteAethelred, you missed or miss-undstood my point. I wrote of trickle-down by means of increase business cost would result in higher prices of care to it's patients. Hopefully you are not so set on opinion that a catch word creates a party line reply. Hey, I don't believe in trickle-down economics. I believe in investment, a successful investment brings in the best minds, best labor force and provide the best customer service to allow for success. As a business grows, then provide reward to those that helped grow it. This my friend is up to each business to decide for themselves, that's why it called capitalism.
DeleteIf you don't like your position and think you're being taken advantage of, leave. Don't walk but run, I have in the past. We get to do that in America. One of the few things I learned in college was a simple line by a business professor, "Do you know the golden rule? He who has the gold rules." Can't say I like it, but thems the facts!
Here are some facts for you to stew on: The median income for a household in the town was $34,169, and the median income for a family was $42,620. Males had a median income of $31,931 versus $23,019 for females. The per capita income for the town was $18,452. About 8.3% of families and 9.8% of the population were below the poverty line, including 10.3% of those under age 18 and 11.4% of those age 65 or over. In the last 7 years my taxes have doubled. Better than half that is the education tax. And for what? I have not seen any improvement to either the town or the school system. Paying teachers more money does not guarantee better educated children. How many kids that graduate from Springfield STAY in Springfield to help build the community. I would guess it is awfully low because the town offers VERY little for well paying jobs and have done very little to encourage good companies to conduct business in Springfield. And yes I greatly believe there are serious mis-appropriation of funds. Look around!!!
ReplyDeletePersons in those income brackets, if they are paying real estate taxes -- which they may well not be -- are all entitled to have the real estate taxes on their residences reduced. You are correct, however, that we are exporting our best and brightest kids, and though a lot of them are starting to trickle back into the area -- too many of them are locating in Weathersfield. Slashing the school budgets is not the way to attract the bright kids back. By the way, I disagree with you about the schools, they are producing graduates that do fine in college -- the problem is that those who go off to college don't come back here immediately after college, they frequently go elsewhere and build up a nest egg before returning -- if they return. There are a lot of things that we could be doing to get more life and vigor in the Town, slashing the School budget is not one of them. I have some confidence in the new Superintendent's ability to implement some innovation into the system and attempt to get the board to think outside the box -- which is what we need.
DeleteProperty tax rebates isn't free money --it comes from taxes. Have you talked to any local reactors and bankers lately? We have people who have lost their homes. Stockmarket is just starting to come back, low interest rates on deposits and a lot of unemployed people - there isn't the money floating around in this town to support the proposed school budget. I wish we were a prospering town and we could afford it but look at the numbers - the money isn't there.
DeleteThe point is you argue that all these people with low incomes can't afford the taxes, but their taxes are subject to being reduced according to their income. Then you switch to talking about the stock market which the majority of the people in Springfield own no stocks in. The truth is when you talk the poor people into defeating the school budget, you are tricking them into impairing the ability of their children to rise out of poverty. Its kind of like a few years ago we had a guy going around to all the elderly in the housing for the elderly complexes scaring them into believing their taxes were going up -- they don't even pay real estate taxes and the housing projects they live in have rates determined by Federal law. This is simply asinine manipulation of the poor.
DeleteI just reviewed the 2011 tax statistics for Springfield, and found that 58 returns declared an aggregate Adjusted Gross Income of minus $11.56 million. (Can anybody explain how a family can come up with an average negative income of $218,000?). This of course throws a huge wrench into computing an average per return (and by implication per household). Excluding it yields an average of $41,849; including it, an average income of $38,693.
DeleteWhen we factor in the number of exemptions claimed, it's a question of are these dependents, or are they the over-65, blind, etc., type. Assuming they are dependents, we come up with a per capita income ranging from $446 to $77,162, not including the negative $64,428 of that interesting bottom group. Excluding them, the average per capita income is $16,993; with them, it's $11,904
For a single person to get by in Vermont (I've talked about this before), he or she has to make at least $9 per hour, $18,720 a year (sorry, no paid vacation). Depending on the household composition when there are dependents present, the hourly income has to range from $13.78 (two adults) to $29.27 (one adult, three kids). I'll have to do some more crunching before I can report on this.
Average household income doesn't tell you much about how the money is spread out; you could have one kid holding all the marbles and the other 4,355 sharing one marble and still get that. But a look at median income, where 50% earn more and 50% earn less, shows us that it's at the $25,000-$29,999 range; hardly Big Oil money.
Clearly, we should all be looking at what needs to be done (apart from driving out all those families averaging a negative $64K a year) to improve the income situation in Springfield. We should also be looking at what the implications are for the present situation, but what must be done to mitigate the bad effects.
Chuckles you just wrote 323 words and said nothing. I’m pretty sure it’s 323 words but maybe a recount is justified as I had a phone call while counting. I’ll have to look into this further before I can report on that.
DeleteLet’s make this simple. We have a shrinking tax base, losing our brightest minds upon graduation and spending that may be impossible to keep under control. The elderly are the voting base since the youth that would vote (intelligently) have moved on. You want an Article to pass, don’t relate it to the school. The town certainly is smart enough to do that. Grandma is more concerned about getting a ambulance ride when needed than if the kid down the street gets an education.
Keep crunching the numbers and let us know what you come up with. I’m predicting a declining population of tax payers, an aging community, over inflated home values and lack of quality employment. We do have farmers markets, a good availability of illegal drugs and regular anti-war protest on Saturdays. Maybe the best business to start is Springfield is a U-Haul franchise. Doesn’t say much when your SRDC head doesn’t live, use the schools or shop in town. Not sure about our SOM person.
Hopefully I got me fact’s right, I did very little research on this other than living it.
Lead, follow or get out of the way, as Ted Turner always says.
DeleteWhat possibilities do you see in using the assets which our elderly have learned, honed and polished over the years to turn Springfield around? Thinking about that is likely to be more productive than making self-fulfilling prophesies.
"People look at what is and ask, "Why?" I look at what could be and ask, "Why not?" --RFK
Chuckles, bad news for you. I'm not playing your game. (You do make me chuckle, no pun intended, saying self-fulfilling prophesise.)I have that book of quotes too, I picked it up at a yard sale last year on Union Street, seems the folks needed the money to move.
DeleteYou seem to want to change the subject often when put on the spot, no surprise there. The elderly have paid their dues, those that want to be active are. Many are content living their lives out. This is why we need youth, a solid tax base and homeowners not slumlords.
By the way Ted was a great leader, he couldn't even stay awake during his baseball teams World Series games! I guess he was out of the way.
Interesting, Harry Byrd, although I would bet, if it were possible to prove, that the majority of the intelligent people remaining in Springfield are the ones who are supporting the school budget, because they understand the value of education. Meanwhile, the relatively uneducated who are getting crushed by Teapublican politics are the ones primarily causing the defeat of the budgets. Its kind or an ironic economic suicide, they derive no benefit from defeating the school budgets, only adverse consequences, yet they get manipulated by the affluent conservative talking points into blaming the schools for all their woes and they go out and make it even more difficult for the schools to care and train their children. This coupled by the fact that many simply do not get the fact that today's schools are not doing the things that they did back in the 1950's where the girls got a second rate experience and the disabled were institutionalized by the State. Today's schools by law, not by choice, are also the primary social service agency for our children. Most of the parents if they can find jobs are both employed and their jobs pay so poorly that they couldn't not both be employed. Meanwhile, we have not for profits encouraging people not to rehabilitate, but to go on disability so they often are a perpetuation of the problem in their families which can only be solved by getting and keeping the kids away from their families in school sponsored extracurricular programs -- which unfortunately are also getting cut back. Slashing the school budgets, dropping programs, discouraging younger teachers from entering the profession by lowering pay and benefits, none of that helps solve the problem, but rather exacerbates the problem.
DeleteWe have seen our property values decline and our 401ks and yes, we are the people paying the property taxes. You say most people in town don't care about the interest rates because they don't have assets? There is your sign.... who is left to pay? We have a lot of elderly people trying to stay in their homes and getting very little interest off their IRA to supplement social security.
DeleteBuild it and they will come hasn't worked yet. We can't spend money we don't have.
Name calling and degrading people that don't agree with you doesn't get anything accomplished. Let's try finding out people's objections and concerns and work on the obstacles.
Aethelred, I'd be willing to bet that we agree on more common ground than one would think. But throwing rocks and labeling will not solve our problems. I don't know about you but I grew up during the Civil Rights movement in the 1960's. I learned to see a person, and did as well still do. This party labeling that seems to only come about over the past 10 years is not helping any cause. We will never reach a happy place for everyone in this country, never has been that way and never will. So let's try to present agruements that provide some education and gets people thinking. Let's stop acting like Washington DC and start acting like Springfield VT a community of 9,000.
DeleteI agree with Harry on this one, party politics do not play a central role in local government. Sure, some people tend to let the national party line play in to their local political decision, but in order for a community to be successful there cannot be such things as Democrats and Republicans (or Teapublicans).
DeleteWe have to understand that we are all in this together. Not everyone will be happy, I for one am pissed that the VNA was awarded $63,000, but enough people feel that is valuable so I live with it.
I wish more people would see the value in our school system, but for many reasons they don't. It is quite clear that residents see the value in town government, perhaps, our town manager and select board could work closer with the superintendent and school board to share what they have been doing so well in order to get budgets passed over the past 20 years. I wish the town manager and select board would understand that it is in their best interests to have a strong school system, but it appears there is very little communication between the two groups.
What is frustrating is that there seems to be a lack of willingness on the communities part to get involved. The lack of names on the ballot for school and select board were a shock to me. There seems to be a lot of frustration in the community, but very few willing to step forward and volunteer their time and talents. Next people will say, well my job doesn't allow me to...thats fine, but dont complain. People have had jobs for 100 years, they have found time to serve their community.
I would agree except that what you hear constantly are the Teapublican talking points. If it quacks like a duck on an issue, its probably a duck. The question comes down to stimulus vs. austerity. Many of the Annonymous postings here are people who are promoting austerity. "We can't afford this, so let's cut the budget" Then I suppose we will be able to afford it, or we will have more money to spend,etc. That just promotes and accelerates the downward spiral. Yes the school is a local issue, is it devoid of connection to the large political debate going on in this country? Absolutely not. This is the big government vs small government debate being played out on the local level.
DeleteExactly my point. Why get hung up on talking points! Educate the audience, plant some seeds and hope they reap. Throwing talking points around have gotten us nowhere. Stop watching the boob tube to get an opinion, start watching it to gather information and create your own opinion. And you are not going to do that watching just one channel or reading just one newspaper.
DeleteNow with that said I retire for today. Chuckie you're on duty now.
A town with the prison and state offices - Turning Point and HCRS is needed. HCRS employs a lot of local folks as well. I didn't vote yes for either one - lack of transparency - let the voters know what you do. Telling us the employees are amazing doesn't give us any information. When asked who sits on the board and replying that we have to do our research doesn't cut it. When you are asking for money you should have facts and figures for us. Give us some real success stories - give us something we can sink our teeth into. What would our money be used for? Taxpayers shouldn't have to guess.
ReplyDeleteHow much of the school budget is already used for the items in the contract? What percentage is left?
ReplyDelete