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Bishop: Capital Projects: All You Need to Know

The Board of Selectmen has submitted its recommended operating budget for fiscal year 2019-’20 to the Board of Finance, which is meeting with all department heads to determine its final recommended operating budgets. Beginning on Thursday, March 21, the Board of Selectmen and the Board of Finance will meet with individual department heads and determine the feasibility of each individual capital request knowing that typically there are more requests than available funds for any fiscal year. Accordingly, a multiple-year Capital Plan is established for those projects that are approved but the costs may need to be spread over several fiscal years. The Capital Plan will be discussed on Wednesday, April 10 at the Annual Town Meeting

While all requests may be deemed appropriate, prudent financial planning requires that some projects may not be funded. Projects of more than a million dollars may require retaining outside, objective consultants to assist the boards in determining their feasibility and costs before approval of any capital funds. For high-cost initiatives, funding may not be available without bonding. We are also watching carefully decisions in Hartford that could have an impact on our municipal budgets.

There are, however, some projects that have been tabled for several years and, in my opinion, deserve very high priority. The jetties on Seaside Avenue that protect our shoreline need immediate repair for obvious reasons. Continued dredging of the Patchogue River is essential for our marine industry. The library wants to convert one of the storage areas on the lower level into an additional community room with advanced technology and will serve many different purposes for Westbrook residents. Its plan has been submitted in previous years with detailed information and clear documentation. These are the types of capital projects that need to be addressed in the next fiscal year.

We will mail to every Westbrook resident, as we have in previous years, the Citizen’s Guide to the Budget, which is an excellent summary of all aspects related to both the municipal and Board of Education budgets.

Finally, it is very important that as members of the public you attend the meeting on capital plans on April 10. The operating budget will be discussed on Monday, April 22 at the annual Town Budget Hearing. The final vote on the budgets will take place on Tuesday, May 7.