Happy with the latest budget?

I’m still trying to find out details, but at least education doesn’t appear to be suffering as much as I feared.

Bye, Theresa! Taxpayer prez says she’s moving

“I myself am not able to afford to live in this town,” [Theresa] McGrath said. She said her agenda was to cut taxes. “I don’t want to move. I’m going to have to move,” she said.
Maybe I’m crazy, but if West Hartford Taxpayer co-prez Theresa McGrath is moving, why is she setting our community’s agenda? [...]

Now the council needs to stand strong

The town council plans to hold a public comment hearing on how to revise the budget starting at 7:30 p.m.  The council itself will vote on Wednesday night.
“Residents are welcome to come and offer their views,” Mayor Scott Slifka told the Courant. “We want to make sure people know about it and that it will [...]

Budget “adjustments” promise pain

The town manager laid out for the council what it will take to reach different tax hike percentages. Here’s a PDF of the information that the council got.
I imagine that once the council picks how much it wants to cut, the town manager and school superintendent will lay out what specific cuts can be made to [...]

Slashing services the only option

The choice that our town leaders face is clear: they can either slash education more deeply or they can dump long-established services that town residents value.
Today’s story in The Hartford Courant devotes too much space to debunking the misleading numbers used by the West Hartford Taxpayers Association — old news, guys! — and not enough to [...]

Ouch. What’s next?

While I know there were many people who voted against the budget because they wanted more money for education, there’s no sense arguing that a majority of those who voted are not looking for more cuts. Obviously, given the margin, there’s no other way to analyze what happened.
But I still believe a large majority in [...]

Yes or no? The referendum finale

For me, it’s yes.
But let’s see how it goes Tuesday. Reports from the polls are welcome.

Tax revolt or just revolting? A yes vote is key.

If you want kids to sit in more crowded classrooms, vote no.
If you want to gut our gifted and talented program, vote no.
If you want to see kindergarten hours cut in half, vote no.
If you want to see services slashed and programs pared, vote no.
But if you want to see the traditional commitment to good [...]

Resident pleads for ‘Yes’ vote

This email & an addendum came in to me today. They seem worth sharing: 
I doubt there is anyone left who is unaware of this, but we are going
to referendum on Tuesday to support or send back the town budget.
Whatever your opinion, you should make it to the polls, so that we
really know what the majority [...]

Vote yes on the budget

Look, I’m disgusted with the cuts in education that have already been made, as are many others. But at this point, what’s done is done. Maybe next year we can push for more.
This year, though, we have to choose whether to support a flawed budget or vote it down. If it gets knocked down, it [...]