By Natalie De La Garza
Staff Writer
CARIBOU — With the fate of the state’s budget still undetermined, Caribou City Councilors opted to postpone setting the tax rate until Thursday, June 27.
Councilors agreed to hold a special Thursday meeting with the understanding that the legislature will or will not override Governor Paul LePage’s budgetary veto on Wednesday; Councilor Joan Theriault asked Caribou’s Legislative Representative Carol McElwee, who was in attendance during the council meeting on Monday night, to weigh in on the subject.
McElwee expressed that she would like to see the veto overridden and expressed her opinion that “I think it’s in the works to be overridden, but then again …”
“… Anything could happen,” concluded Mayor Gary Aiken, with McElwee’s agreement.
Council did discuss setting the mil rate during the Monday meeting, and clarified that they could later rescind the motion before June 30.
“It seems procedurally complicated to pass and then rescind — it seems procedurally simpler to wait,” said Councilor Aaron Kouhoupt.
While council agreed to meet on June 27, the meeting’s 5 p.m. time was set so that councilors and city officials would be able to attend the highly-anticipated Thursdays on Sweden event, which starts at 5:30 p.m.
Council is slated to come to a final agreement on the 2013-14 budget, which currently has a proposed expenditure of $8,894,532 — down $64,292 from last year.
The proposed budget includes recent cuts totaling almost $124,000 that were made during a budget workshop on June 17; during that meeting, council looked at possible cost-saving measures to make up a $381,000 shortfall in state revenue sharing.
The workshop centered on cutting costs, and a few cutting statements were made regarding the personal priorities of other councilors.
A total of $12,500 was further cut from general government expenses, and $500 of those funds came from Councilor Kouhoupt volunteering to serve without pay. Citing the list of possible additional cuts proposed to fill the $380,000 shortfall, he stated that every department in the city is taking fairly significant hits.
“We’ve asked city employees and the citizens to make sacrifices over and over again, going back and asking them to go to the well again,” Kouhoupt said during the June 17 meeting. “I have a hard time personally accepting any sort of compensation when we’re doing those kind of things.”
“I think,” he added, “no matter how nominal, I think that it’s important for the city leadership, city management to look at themselves as well and try to share a little bit in what we’re asking our staff and our citizens to do, and what they’re giving up,” Kouhoupt stated, encouraging the council and city management to voluntarily reduce their pay.
Aiken expressed that while he can’t speak for other councilors, “I know that myself and some of the other councilors don’t pocket the money we make at this table,” he said, explaining that donations are often given to the rec department and other charities. Kouhoupt responded by citing that employees and citizens also have charities that they’re looking to contribute toward, and cited that the city has eliminated an employee [at the library] and reduced pay by cutting hours.
“While I applaud your giving of your funds to charity, we’re not alone in how we would spend our money and provide to charities — citizens and employees could be doing the exact same thing,” Kouhoupt said. “I think we should lead from the top, we should set an example, we’re asking to make amazing cuts as part of this thing, and it’s not the first time … this is probably a last-ditch effort, this is the minimum we can go. And I think it’s only fair for us to sacrifice along with them,” he added, again mentioning his opinion that management should reduce their pay as well.
The charter gives councilors the option of receiving pay or not — there is no room for partial payment.
“Three or four years ago, I was here and we didn’t accept pay,” said Councilor David Martin, expressing that some people had a problem with that. “I made the proposal in the charter amendments that the councilor could choose to take or not to take — in hindsight, maybe it should have been any way you want it to, but that’s where it came from.”
Responding to Martin’s historic note, Kouhoupt explained that his argument was context driven.
“We are at the bottom of the barrel this year, so my argument in context for this year is that it is a year where I think that it would be prudent to do so,” he said. “But it is up to each individual councilor’s discretion … whatever allows you to sleep at night works fine.”
As the conversation became stagnant, Kouhoupt expressed himself once more.
“As leadership, we can stand with those employees or we could just make them shoulder the burden on their own — anyone want to step up and do so, or are we just going to leave it hanging in the wind?” he asked.
Councilor Philip MacDonough answered.
“I’m going to continue donating mine to the causes that I’ve determined to donate to,” he said. “I don’t put it in my pocket – it goes to good causes.”
With an already-scrutinized budget, compiling proposed cuts to make up for the $381,000 shortfall would have meant drastic changes should council have adopted them all — and City Manager Austin Bleess readily admitted that “Not many of these cuts that we’re proposing are good cuts by any means.”
Council approved many of the cuts suggested by department heads, like $25,000 from general assistance and about $25,000 from public works and strongly disagreed to other drastic cuts, like closing the Nylander museum.
Council will again discuss the budget, possibly for the final time, on Thursday June 27, at 5 p.m. in the city councilor chambers.
