Manchester Finance Committee votes 3 to 4 against the senior center article

Manchester's Finance Committee voted Thursday night not to recommend the senior and community center borrowing on the Nov. 16 special town meeting warrant. The vote was 3 in favor and 4 against, from the meeting video. The committee had put off the vote a week ago while the wording was fixed.

What happened

• A motion to recommend the article, which lets the town borrow up to $7.5 million for the center at the former Masonic building, failed 3 to 4. The warrant book will say the committee does not recommend it.
• Members who voted no said the town should wait until spring, that the cost is high and that a large capital bill is already coming.
• The committee rewrote the warrant book's explanation of the Essex Elementary School article so readers do not expect the state to pay 36.84 percent of the $95 million project. The state grant is about $20.9 million.
• Town only debt payments would climb from 2.38 percent of the operating budget this year to a high of 6.89 percent in fiscal 2031, the finance director's draft schedule shows. The town's policy limit is 10 percent.
• The committee meets again Thursday, Nov. 12, four days before town meeting.

Senior center: the wording changed, the vote still failed

Last week the committee asked the Select Board to take the word "grants" out of the article, so that any grant lowers the town's borrowing instead of counting toward the $3 million in gifts that must be raised first. The Select Board made that change Monday. (Read what the Select Board decided.)

Chair Sarah Mellish read the article as it now stands. It appropriates $7.5 million. Nothing can be borrowed or spent until voters pass a Proposition 2 1/2 debt exclusion, a ballot vote that lets the payments sit outside the normal tax limit, and until the town has written commitments or payments of gifts or donations totaling $3 million, paid to the town before bonds are issued.

Peter Twining said he wanted the town to take on no legal liability until the $3 million is in the account, not just promised. Town Administrator Tony Barletta said he would not go out to bid or sign a contract before the $3 million is in the Essex County Community Foundation account that holds the donations. The warrant is posted and cannot change, he said, but the motion made at town meeting can be worded more tightly, and he will ask legal counsel.

One member asked why the project could not fit inside the regular tax limit. Mellish said the fiscal 2027 budget has no room left, so the only path is a debt exclusion.

On the roll call, Andy Oldeman, Albert Creighton III and Mellish voted yes. Dean Nahatis, John Croft, Gar Morse and Twining voted no.

Select Board member Brian Sollosy said the board had rewritten the article to meet the committee's concerns and called the result disappointing. He said the vote would make raising the $3 million harder. Mellish said the committee had raised concerns but had never taken a vote, and she did not know how it would come out.

One member said the town would be better off waiting six months, since nothing would be spent before the money is raised anyway. Croft said he had a problem with how the project got to this point, with the condominium arrangement for the building, and with the spending when a large capital budget is ahead. A member recalled that when town meeting approved $1 million for the building, voters were told no more town money would be needed.

Mellish will explain the vote at town meeting.

The other articles

The committee took no position on the article that drops the 7 p.m. start time for annual town meeting, on the two articles about the town's ballot rules and on the sign bylaw, saying none of them has a financial impact. Its votes last week on the fire engine, the water meter paydown and the Essex school stand, since that wording did not change. (Read what the committee decided last week.)

The school article: explaining 36.84 percent

The school article says the state will pay up to 36.84 percent of eligible costs. Members said that number confuses people, because 36.84 percent of the $95 million project is far more than the roughly $20.9 million grant the district expects. Superintendent Pam Beaudoin gave that figure on Zoom. A member said the grant works out to about 22 percent of the project.

Barletta explained the gap. The state school building authority caps the construction cost it will count at $605 a square foot, about 60 percent of what construction really costs here, and it does the same for site work. Only 1,200 of the building's 72,000 square feet are left out entirely. The district's base rate is 31 percent, raised to 36.84 percent by incentive points.

The committee struck three bullet points from the draft and added a sentence saying the state's approved project cost by policy leaves out a portion of the actual cost of construction and site work. Beaudoin said Essex's shorter explanation worked well, and she offered a 10 minute video on the project. The book goes to the printer Friday. The state certifies the project and its grant on Dec. 9.

Debt: where the town stands

Finance Director Andrea Mainville handed out a draft schedule of town debt, which she is still updating. Counting only town debt, not the school district's, yearly debt payments are 2.38 percent of the operating budget in fiscal 2027, 3.54 percent in fiscal 2028 and a high of 6.89 percent in fiscal 2031 before they fall. Town policy says those payments should not pass 10 percent. A second policy caps total debt at 1.75 percent of assessed value, about $69 million; about $36 million is authorized today. The schedule assumes 4 percent interest over 20 years, with the school paid over 30 years.

Mainville said Tappan Street bids came in $455,000 under budget and the PFAS water treatment project almost $1.2 million under. The culvert project, which got $5 million at the April town meeting, now has $6.5 million in grants and goes out to bid in November once its Army Corps permit arrives. The Town Hall rotunda work is coming in at $3,441,585 against a budget of $3,698,464.

Also discussed

• Department heads have turned in their capital requests, and operating budget requests are due in about two weeks.
• Barletta said the clerical, fire and public works union contracts are settled and police talks have started. The settled contracts run three years from July 2026.

What was decided

• Recommend the senior and community center article, up to $7.5 million: failed, 3 to 4, from the meeting video.
• Town meeting start time, ballot rule articles and sign bylaw: no position, from the meeting video.
• Minutes of Sept. 17, Oct. 5 and Oct. 15: approved, from the meeting video.

What happens next

• Friday, Oct. 23: the warrant book goes to the printer.
• Monday, Nov. 9: Planning Board public hearing on the sign bylaw.
• Thursday, Nov. 12: next Finance Committee meeting.
• Monday, Nov. 16: special town meeting at Memorial School.
• Thursday, Dec. 10: special town election on the ballot questions.

Where to find the records

• Finance Committee agenda, Oct. 22
• Meeting video, posted by the town
• Finance Committee page, where minutes are posted when approved

Earlier coverage: Manchester sets its Nov. 16 warrant but holds back on the $95 million school article (Oct. 21), the Select Board's warrant vote. Manchester backs fire engine money, delays senior center vote (Oct. 17), the committee's first review of the articles. Essex school building committee OKs $95.4M design, 10 to 0 (Oct. 17), the design vote. Manchester's share of the new Essex school would be about $50 million after state aid, boards are told (Oct. 9), the joint boards meeting.

How we did this: Cape Ann Current watched the meeting online and checked names against the agenda and the committee's roster on the town website. These are our meeting notes, not the town's minutes.