Explain the Ballot with Brain Moser

Brian will be hosting the following meetings to inform and explain this year's Annual Town Ballot for those who may be interested and have questions before casting a vote.


Monday, March 3rd @ 7:00pm at the Winchester VFW

Sunday, March 9th @ 7:00pm at the Thayer Library in Asheulot


"Whenever the people are well informed, they can be trusted with their own government; that whenever things get so far wrong as to attract their notice, they may be relied on to set them to rights."

 Thomas Jefferson

Winchester voters debate spending for school district

File this under no one gives a crap ..

By Melanie Plenda Contributing Writer/Keene Sentinel

WINCHESTER — Despite efforts by some to trim the proposed school budget by $240,000, the voting body decided not to make any more cuts at Saturday’s school district deliberative session.
In all, roughly 38 voters attended the 90-minute session at Winchester School to discuss the warrant articles that will appear on the town’s ballot March 11.

The school district’s $11,182,226 budget and two collective bargaining agreements were on the agenda at Saturday’s session. The budget is up $95,686, or just under 1 percent, from the current $11,086,540 budget. The default budget is $11,296,355. Though the budget increase is slight, the amount of money to be raised by local taxes is up $413,298, or 7.8 percent, because of a drop in revenue from state sources.

Selectman Sherman Thetford Saturday proposed amending the budget to $10,942,225, saying that the town was able to cut a large amount of money from its budget and the school board was able to cut something on the order of $700,000 a few years ago.

“I believe if you sharpen your pencils a bit, you could find places to cut ... without affecting services,” Thetford said.

He said his proposed cuts would save taxpayers 75 to 80 cents on the dollar whereas the proposed school district budget could raise the tax rate $1.67 to $1.92 depending on the revenues the district takes in.

School board member Richard Horton said comparing the town budget to the school budget is not an apples-to-apples comparison. He said the district has contractual obligations that the town doesn’t have that it must meet and more personnel to contend with.

The school district’s proposed budget does reflect some savings through reassigning of job responsibilities among other changes, Lewis said in a previous interview with The Sentinel.

School Board member Elisha Jackson added members were able to cut more money in prior years because they were dealing with a larger budget at the time. But between previous local cuts and federal funding cuts, that is no longer the case.

District Superintendent James M. Lewis was asked how enrollment was looking since it’s been widely reported that other school districts in the region are seeing a drop. Lewis said Winchester is actually seeing a leveling off and a slight increase in enrollments, particularly in kindergarten. He said by way of example, two years ago they were expecting 50 students in kindergarten and ended up with 70 and last year they expected 50 and had 60.

He added that Winchester typically also has a higher special education population.

“Whatever the reason, we attract more SPED students than other districts,” he said. “And we legally have to provide services to those students.”

Jackson pointed out that costs per special education student went up this year from $26,599 per student to $29,000. She added that tuition for the district’s 177 Keene High School students also went up from $12,521 to $13,081.

School board member Bill McGrath sided with those who wanted to see more cuts. He said that last year the district made some positions full time that he wasn’t convinced needed to be. He said he has a friend who is a principal in Massachusetts at a school with 435 students and a staff of 100; whereas, he said, Winchester has 435 students and has a staff of 120.

“How can they do it in their school and we can’t do it in ours?” he asked rhetorically.

He also said he wasn’t entirely convinced that smaller class sizes were beneficial to students or necessary, saying that the state allows a maximum of 30 students per class, while some Winchester classes only have 16 or 17 students.

Voter Kenneth Whippie pointed out that 30 students per classroom is a maximum under state law, not a recommendation.
 “A small number of students doesn’t inhibit a good education, but a large number does,” Whippie said.

In the end, the amendment to cut the budget was defeated in a vote of 23 to 13. The proposed $11,182,226 budget will be on the ballot in March.

Voters Saturday also placed a two-year collective bargaining agreement with the Winchester Teachers’ Association on the ballot that would cost an additional $118,498 for the 2014-15 school year and $63,285 for the 2015-16 school year if approved. Voters would be approving both figures with a ‘yes’ vote, but only the first would go into effect this year.

School board members explained that the larger amount this year reflects pay raises in part for teachers who went out and got their master’s degrees. The higher education earned deserves more pay, they explained. They also wanted to do the raises the first year because as part of the collective bargaining agreement many teachers will see their health insurance costs go from paying 7 to 15 percent of coverage to 15 percent across the board.
 So, how many of you got a raise this year to help pay for your insurance increases?

Voters also placed on the ballot an article asking for $21,552 for salary and benefit increases for the Winchester Support Staff Association as part of another collective bargaining agreement. A similar one-year contract for the support staff barely passed at district meeting last year, with 54 percent support.

The official voting on the warrant and election of school board members will be Tuesday, March 11. The polls are open from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m.

Slight spending increase, teachers contract on tap in Winchester School District deliberative session

WINCHESTER — School board and budget committee members tried to be creative in assigning job responsibilities for staff next year to keep Winchester School’s budget from climbing too much.
The school district’s $11,182,226 budget and two collective bargaining agreements will be up for discussion at Saturday’s deliberative session, where voters can amend articles before the March election.

The budget is up $95,686, or just under 1 percent, from the current $11,086,540 budget. The default budget is $11,296,355.

District officials are trying to delegate more responsibilities to current staff to keep costs down, Superintendent James M. Lewis said.

“We know the town just doesn’t have the money for big increases, there’s no secret about that,” he said.

One of the best examples is restructuring the principal and superintendent positions.

Pamela Bigelow, principal of the kindergarten through 8th-grade Winchester School, has announced her plans to retire at the end of this year. Prior to taking over the superintendent role in fall 2012, Lewis was principal of Winchester School for about three years.

Now, the school board is advertising for a principal for the kindergarten through 5th-grade part of the school for next year, while Lewis will take on the principal duties of the middle school-age students.

They haven’t nailed down the savings associated with that change, and it will partly depend on who the district hires for the elementary principal position, but it will save money, Lewis said.

The district likely also will have to reorganize its teaching staff, because there are two 3rd-grade teachers this year, but the incoming 3rd-grade next year requires three classes. The district can’t afford to hire a new teacher, so adminstrators will probably move one from another grade level.

Lewis said the size of the incoming 3rd-grade class isn’t unusual. Enrollment in Winchester has been strong in recent years, and a couple of years ago, the school had to add a fourth kindergarten class at the last minute when there were 75 kindergartners.

Though the budget increase is slight, the amount of money to be raised by local taxes is up $413,298, or 7.8 percent, because of a drop in revenue from state sources, Lewis said.

Voters will also see a two-year collective bargaining agreement with the Winchester Teachers’ Association that would cost an additional $118,498 for the 2014-15 school year and $63,285 for the 2015-16 school year.

The previous teachers contract was a three-year agreement, but Lewis said the groups negotiated a two-year agreement because of the unpredictability of costs, especially for health insurance and retirement.

Another collective bargaining agreement would cost the town about $21,552 for salary and benefit increases for the Winchester Support Staff Association. A similar one-year contract for the support staff barely passed at district meeting last year, with 54 percent support.

Lewis said he thinks both contracts reflect responsible spending and that school employees gave a number of concessions to keep the increase manageable.

The budget committee and school board, groups that sparred over school spending a couple years ago, support all the articles on the ballot.

The deliberative session is scheduled for Saturday at 9 a.m. at Winchester School.

Kaitlin Mulhere can be reached at 352-1234, extension 1439​, or kmulhere@keenesentinel.com. Follow her on Twitter @KMulhereKS.

Winchester voters back police pay raise

By Meghan Foley Sentinel Staff

WINCHESTER — A warrant article to raise the pay of Winchester police officers to be more competitive with other communities received support from the majority of voters at deliberative session Saturday.
The article, if passed at a town meeting on March 11, would give officers and other employees of the Winchester Police Department an 8 percent raise effective July 1. The raises, which include payroll expenses, would add $35,756 to the town’s operating budget, Selectman Sherman Tedford said.

They would also be on top of an up to 3 percent merit raise all town employees would receive if the town’s 2014-15 budget passes.

As an SB2 town, Winchester residents are allowed to discuss and amend town meeting warrant articles during a deliberative session. The meeting is then adjourned until March when residents vote by ballot on the warrant articles.

Originally, the warrant article about the police department raises had listed an amount of $28,576. Tedford said the amount didn’t include the payroll expenses, and he made a motion Saturday to amend the article, which was seconded by Selectman Theresa G. Sepe before being approved by voters.

Police Chief Gary A. Phillips passionately explained to approximately 70 voters attending the meeting at the town hall why they should back the warrant article, which the selectmen unanimously recommended.

“We have a problem being competitive with these other towns,” he said, as his wife handed out copies of a two-page packet to voters. “We have a problem maintaining our quality people.”

The packet included information from the Local Government Center showing Winchester’s police department employee salaries for 2013 being from 11 to 28 percent below the 2012 state average — depending on the position — for towns with a population of 2,000-4,999.

For example, the state average salary for a patrolman in communities of this size in 2012 was $41,923. In Winchester, patrolmen are paid either $36,956 or $37,127.

Winchester has a population of 4,341, according to the 2010 U.S. Census. Had is the key word ..

The packet also included information from the N.H. Occupational Employment and Wages 2012 survey, which further showed Winchester police officers are being paid less than their counterparts in the area.

Besides providing incentive for officers to stay with the Winchester Police Department, increasing the salaries will help the town better protect its investment of having to train and outfit the officers when they’re hired, Phillips said.

Often times, Winchester officers go to work for other area police departments after two to three years, which is the time it takes to be fully trained and have proven themselves, he said.

It costs roughly $18,000-$20,000 to train and outfit an officer, and for that upfront expense, it’s good if they hang around for a while, he said.

Voters extensively scrutinized a warrant article Saturday to appropriate $5,000 for the operation and maintenance of the Sheridan House by the Winchester Historical Society.

Neither the Winchester Board of Selectmen nor the budget committee recommended the petition warrant article, which prompted several questions and statements from voters.

“In the situation we are in right now, we might not exist next year,” historical society Treasurer Elena M. Heiden said.

The Sheridan House, which is on Back Ashuelot Road, is a museum of the town’s history. Besides housing several artifacts, a barn on the property shelters some of Winchester’s historic fire equipment.

The organization relies on membership fees, donations and fundraisers to generate revenue, but it’s having trouble making ends meet as of late, she said.

“We had a major situation with our furnace where it was leaking water, and we have a $632 bill we still haven’t paid yet,” she said.

In addition, heating oil was recently delivered to the house, which has to be kept at a certain temperature so the historical items inside don’t get damaged, she said.

Sepe said she supports the Sheridan House, but she voted against recommending the article because no one who submitted it came to the selectmen to explain what the $5,000 would be used for.

Erin G. Robb, who submitted the petition warrant article, then apologized to the board for not getting that information to them.

“I truly didn’t give it a thought after I got the signatures (for the petition),” she said.

Robb is president of the historical society board of trustees.

In the future, that information will be provided to the selectmen, she said.

Voters approved the warrant article for the ballot.

Voters also approved amending a petition warrant article that sought to require the town clerk and tax collector’s office to remain open twice a month on Wednesday nights until 8 p.m.

The amended version seeks to have the town clerk and tax collector’s office continue to operate under the hours currently in place, from 7 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Monday through Thursday.

Resident Kenneth Cole said he submitted the warrant article because he wanted people to have better access to the town clerk and tax collector’s office.

His proposal was immediately met with opposition from selectmen, other residents and James M. Tetreault, Winchester town clerk and tax collector.

The town clerk and tax collector’s office is open at the same time as other town offices in the town hall.

“As a selectman, I’m not putting one person in this building at night,” Tedford said. “It’s a security issue.”

Tetreault said it makes no sense for his office to be open at night because state support for motor vehicle transactions shuts down for the day at 6 p.m.

For residents who can’t make it to town hall during business hours, he can make arrangements with them to register their vehicles, he said.

“We’ll work with you,” he said.

During the roughly four-hour deliberative session, voters approved an amended warrant article about appropriating $3,298,617 for the town’s 2014-15 proposed operating budget.

The number is a decrease of $15,644 from the $3,314,261 in the original warrant article. The proposed $3,298,617 budget represents a decrease of $119,044 from the 2013-14 budget of $3,417,661. It’s also less than the default budget of $3,314,261.

The Winchester Board of Selectmen recommended the change because it’s important for three or four other spending articles on the warrant to pass, Tedford said.

Those warrant articles, which were approved, included a seven-year lease and purchase agreement for a new custom pumper fire truck, and a five-year lease and purchase agreement for a new dump truck with plow and sander equipment.

“We found some areas where we can reduce the budget and hopefully not reduce services,” Tedford said. “I believe with these changes, we’ll be able to hold the line with the tax rate.”

The 32-article warrant will now go before residents to vote on by ballot on March 11.

Meghan Foley can be reached at 352-1234, extension 1436, or mfoley@keenesentinel.com. Follow her on Twitter @MFoleyKS.