WINDHAM – The Windham Town Council voted unanimously Tuesday night to approve next year’s $14.35 million budget.

The budget requires approval by registered Windham voters at annual town meeting Saturday, June 15, starting at 9 a.m. at Windham Town Hall. Voters have the option of reducing line items within the budget but can’t increase spending or swap money within departments.

While contention surrounded the proposal to cut skate park staffing (see related story, page 1), much of the budget received little public comment throughout the past two months.

Councilors spent Tuesday night debating several key points concerning the development of fields in Windham, Lippman Park, the library’s Annie Akers Bremon Fund, and two extra positions for nighttime rescue.

Field space

Lack of playing fields has become an issue in town with sports leagues competing for space. Windham’s lacrosse and soccer leagues have sought mediation from the town for the limited space at Gambo field complex in South Windham. To assuage the growing requests for more town-owned playing space, the finance committee of the Town Council, made up of councilors Matt Noel, Kevin Call and Peter Anania, proposed spending $100,000 to seed a fund for new fields with the possibility that similar expenditures could be made on an annual basis until enough money is collected to build a new field or complex of fields.

While they seemed to agree more fields were needed for the growing recreational needs, councilors Tuesday night debated how the town would fund the $100,000 expenditure already included by the finance committee in next year’s budget. The committee originally proposed paying the sum through the town’s fund balance, which is an account similar to surplus and contains about $5.5 million. Noel instead asked councilors to consider funding the field account through general taxation, a proposal that would have added 5.5 cents to next year’s property tax rate.

Noel said the expenditure, which would likely be an annual occurrence in order to slowly build funds to pay for better playing fields in town, would have been an “essential part” of the tax rate.

“I think it’s an integral part of what the town needs to do and the assets that it’s entrusted to be maintained. And I think the mil rate needs to represent those costs, and right now it’s not,” Noel said.

Councilor Peter Anania argued that residents have already overspent on taxes to build the surplus and that the “seed money” for new fields should come out of the fund balance this year with no impact to the tax rate. Anania also said he didn’t want to increase the tax rate with no definite proposal in place for spending the money.

Councilors decided against changing the funding mechanism, but agreed to further debate about how best to build up a field fund that Councilor David Nadeau said would require at least $500,000-$700,000 per field, complete with irrigation.

Library money

After much council debate and input from the town’s attorney, the council voted unanimously to direct $50,000 of the $133,000 Annie Akers Bremon Trust toward improvements at the Donnabeth Lippman Park.

The trust was set up several decades ago by a longtime Windham woman who bequeathed money to the Windham Public Library. The trust, which was used to build and provide materials for the library, has grown to $133,000.

Advice was needed from the town attorney, Ken Cole III, since wording in the will, which was read aloud at Tuesday night’s meeting by former Councilor Carol Waig, indicates the money is to be used by the library. Further language, Cole said, allows the council to choose where to the direct monies.

While Waig was adamant the will says money can only be used for the library, Town Manager Tony Plante said “[Waig] is correct, the original purpose is to support the library and continue to support the construction or maintenance of the library, but in the opinion of the town attorney, the [council] is allowed wide latitude….as long as the purpose is one of general benefit of the community. In [Cole’s] opinion, Lippman Park is a legitimate use of it.”

Councilors had discussed appropriating $96,000 of the account to the Lippman Fund but compromised at $50,000 after the will was read.

Councilors also agreed the library will receive a one-time payout of $35,000 from the Bremon fund to be used for Cloud services (online data storage) and the purchase of e-books, leaving about $46,000 in the fund for future library use.

Night response

Councilors rejected a proposal to fund two additional rescue personnel for nighttime shifts. The $159,000 proposal was intended to reduce response times for emergency responders, which are at an average of 9.8 minutes at night compared to 7.1 minutes during the day.

The proposal would have allowed Windham to recoup an estimated $50,000 it spends on mutual aid from surrounding towns. Thirty-five percent of Windham 3,500 annual calls are made at night.

The finance committee, which reviewed the town manager’s preliminary budget during nine meetings in the previous two months, failed to make a recommendation to the full council on the proposal. Likewise, councilors decided to “kick the can down the road,” as Councilor Tommy Gleason described it Tuesday night, so they could learn more about the issues surrounding delayed response times. They agreed to revisit the proposal in the 2015 budget cycle.