December 24, 2009
 
$19.2 million town budget forwarded

By DAN O'BRIEN

GOFFSTOWN - The Goffstown Budget Committee passed a town budget of $19.2 million after slashing more than $973,000 from the Board of Selectmen’s budget proposal on Tuesday, Dec. 15.

That amount has increased about $2.5 million since three years ago.

The budget passed in a 9-3 vote with committee members Sue Tremblay, Steve Fournier and David Pierce casting the opposing votes, saying the cuts made were too deep. Chairman Dan Cloutier abstained.

Last week, the Budget Committee reinstated money it had proposed to cut from police, fire and public works after the department heads warned of drastic reductions of services and layoffs had the proposals gone through.

The final debate was whether to cut funds from the Capital Improvement Projects account. Committee member Guy Caron had proposed cutting more than $600,000 from CIP to help restore cuts to police, fire and public works. That was on top of more than $761,000 the committee had already cut from CIP.

A discussion on CIP cuts was tabled until Tuesday, when the committee ultimately decided to cut a total of $828,627 from the account. Most of the cuts will affect road repairs.

Funding for a sidewalk snowplow remains in the budget, but had previously been considered for getting cut.

The Budget Committee will present its budget to the public at a selectmen meeting Jan. 6, and deliberative sessions will occur in the following weeks. There are 15 warrant articles that are expected to be discussed at that time.