Town Budget

I went to the joint meeting of the selectboard and the finance committee last week. It was another eye opener. You just have to come to these meetings. They’re like Alice in Wonderland.

When the discussion got around to salaries, the discussion got a bit hot. The members of the finance committee, and Bruce Cumsky, seemed to generally be in favor of no salary increases. They spoke about the fact that many Egremonters are suffering financially, and that things may well get worse. They said at least two other towns in south county had decided on no increases.

But Bruce Turner said it was unfair not to give increases. And Tom Haas nodded his agreement. I think Turner volunteered to not increase his selectman’s salary, but he didn’t volunteer to reduce it.

Then Juliette Haas, a town employee, made a plea for raising salaries.

It’s important to point out some facts. Bruce Cumsky is a small businessman whose business is undoubtedly suffering. Several members of the finance committee are in similar positions. Bruce Turner is a municipal employee of a town in the eastern part of the state. He’s hoping for money from the feds to help bail out towns (and let them avoid tough financial decisions). Tom Haas is the husband of Juliette. He’s also a library trustee, and that board continues apace to plan a new town library. You decide how those facts affect people’s positions.

I strongly believe Tom Haas should recuse himself from all discussions and votes on salaries. That is especially true since the selectmen are considering across the board increases, not ones tailored to individual employees. If it were the latter, he could recuse himself from voting on Juliette’s salary, and his conflict of interest would not be as great, although it would still be a conflict.

There are a lot of Egremonters whose incomes have declined, in some cases by a lot. Members of the selectboard may think it unfair not to raise salaries. They ought to think about the unfairness of asking taxpayers whose incomes have gone down – sometimes way down - to pony up for town employees lucky enough to still be employed. And they ought to think about the inappropriateness of voting to increase compensation of their relatives.