Sunday, February 15, 2009

FM #30 - This week in Franklin, MA

This is podcast #30 in the series on what matters in Franklin, MA. I review the Walgreens decision, the Gallery 218 opening, the School Committee meeting and the Town Council meeting all from this week. You give me about ten minutes, I'll tell you what you should be aware of.

Time: 11 minutes, 29 seconds



MP3 File

Session Notes:

Music intro
My intro
FM #30

This internet radio show or podcast for Franklin Matters is number 30 in the series. In this session, I’ll focus on what you should know about what happened this week in Franklin, MA.

1 - The Planning Board approved Walgreens development of the Four Corners property. Traffic at the corner of 140, King and Chestnut was a concern. They are coordinating with the town to create a right turn only lane for those coming up King so that they can turn right onto 140. The second lane will allow traffic to proceed directly through to Chestnut or to turn left on 140 and head into Town. This may still be an issue but isn't expected to be a big one. Time will tell.

The surprise for me was in the new opening date for Walgreens. During the prior Planning Board session, the discussion was concerned with the traffic improvements. Would the Town get the plans in time (April) to get them completed for an opening in Sep/Oct. Now the opening is not until April 2010.

You can view both Planning Board sessions via the video archive now available on the Town web site. The links will be included in the text version of this podcast.

Planning Board - 1/26/09 meeting reviewing the Walgreens plan

Planning Board - 2/9/09 meeting with final approval for Walgreens

2 - The Alumni Show opened at Galley 218 on Tuesday. A Slide show of pictures I took of the opening is available. The link will be included in the notes.

Disclosure: yes, Allison Sherlock is related to me. She happens to be the #1 daughter, a 2004 graduate of FHS and a 2008 graduate of Assumption College. Her sister, Carolyn, a 2006 FHS grad is pursuing her studies at Northeastern Univ and currently working a co-op this semester.

3 – The School Committee meeting was a full one Tuesday night. I have already provided the live reporting updates on Franklin Matters so I'll just point you to the three key presentations
The presentation documents for each of these are available.


4 – The School Committee started discussion on what the priorities should be as they get into the detail planning for the fiscal year 2010 budget. A "level service" budget, that is providing the same level of service next year as this, accounts for the cost increases in salary, benefits, transportation, etc would require an increase of 3.5 million dollars. The town has already told the school to come in with a "level funded" budget. That is using the same amount of money this coming year as is being used this year. Considering last year, the budget cut required 40 plus positions to go out the door, the 3.5 million shortfall this year may require another 60 or so positions to go out the door. How that would be done will be the major discussion over the next couple of months.

5 – The Town Council meeting on Wednesday was short, lasting less than an hour. They had spent an hour prior to the formal meeting in a goal setting session that unfortunately I was unable to participate in so I have no idea what they did. I do plan on finding out. I would encourage you to do likewise.

The meeting as short as it was, did have some points of interest. The capital budget will come before the Council for a formal vote sometime in March. Jeff is looking to get a better understanding of what the snow budget will really be in case any further adjustments need to be made.

The councilor comments section was also notable for the cautionary words and appeals to sacrifice as the work on the fiscal 2010 budget approaches. I encourage you to tap into the town web site and view the video archives. You can go straight to the councilor comments section to hear what they had to say.

Finally, I want to broach the O word. In all the discussions and news articles about the coming 2010 budget shortfall, one option we should keep in mind is for an operational override. Now, above all the other times it has been proposed would be a good time to actually pass one. We have dug ourselves into a hole depending up state revenues to cover our daily requirements. The state is not going to be increasing aid anytime soon. Franklin needs to step up and start paying their own way.

Yes, it will be a sacrifice but the one real benefit we will get is that for every tax dollar we put up for Franklin, it stays in Franklin.

I leave it here for now but will come back to this override topic as the budget season progresses.

To recap this week in Franklin:
  • Walgreens is coming in 2010
  • Gallery 218 features art works of FHS alumni
  • The school committee meeting has multiple presentations worthy of viewing
  • The capital budget will be coming up for vote in March
  • 2010 will be a tough budget
  • there should be an override option to offset job and service cuts
The week ahead will be a quiet one as school vacation is upon us and there are no major meetings scheduled for the town council or school committee. There is a Financial Planning Committee meeting on Thursday the 19th.


Have a great week in Franklin!

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This podcast has been a public service provided to my fellow citizens of Franklin, MA

For additional information, please visit Franklinmatters.blogspot.com/

If you have questions or comments you can reach me directly at shersteve @ gmail dot com

The musical intro and closing is from the Podsafe Music Network
Jon Schmidt - Powerful Exhilarating Piano Music

2 comments:

  1. "Finally, I want to broach the O word. In all the discussions and news articles about the coming 2010 budget shortfall, one option we should keep in mind is for an operational override. Now, above all the other times it has been proposed would be a good time to actually pass one. We have dug ourselves into a hole depending up state revenues to cover our daily requirements. The state is not going to be increasing aid anytime soon. Franklin needs to step up and start paying their own way."

    Again, someone must have money to suggest that those without should suffer the same fate as others have in this country by losing their home, and having their kids out in the streets. Keep raising the taxes, the more homeless the more crimes, and with Franklin that has an undermanned police force for the size of Franklin (27 area sq miles) needs more police to counter the crime that will soon be here. This fiasco with the financial crisis is long lasting .. we are heading downward even more so.. some in economics are saying the entire year of 2009 and some into 2010 will be worse than it is now... are you ready to build a new school just to have no one going in it because they have no home base to come from to go into? I think the problem is - that some are detached from reality.. they have money fancy cars and homes, and the reason they have things like that, is becuase they want others to pay so they can have.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Sorry but I cannot agree with you. Some folks have been detached from reality and going along their merry way living off the state money. We have been fortunate to benefit from the political connections for this long. With the state level budget problems and other communities now realizing how much we do get compared to them, our gravy train is coming to an end.

    So as tough as it is, it is about time we started paying for our own way. It will require some tough choices but I don't see any alternative. There is no magic to this.

    Expenses are increasing, revenues are not. The Town is already operating as efficient as possible. I understand that is hard to believe for some but it is true. Our only option is to increase revenues. One by expanding the commercial base and two by expanding our our tax input.

    ReplyDelete