I’m writing this open-letter to all residents and taxpayers of the city of Westbrook in an effort to help clarify my position on the budget that I presented to the City Council, on behalf of each and every one of you, on April 9, 2005.

Last week’s American Journal pointed to tensions between the city and the schools. At last Wednesday’s school committee meeting, the president of the Westbrook Teacher’s Association painted me as trying to balance the city budget at the expense of our school children. Neither of these characterizations is true. If there is tension, I do not feel it, nor is it coming from the city’s administration. As your chief elected official, I was elected to make the difficult choices and decisions that would benefit the greatest numbers here in our city. Was it easy to say and mean that I expected both the city and the schools to fund their respective budgets at current year levels? Absolutely not. The decisions on the city-side were no less difficult to make than those that the school department must make. It would have been easy to do nothing; to continue to do business as it has been done over the past years and to increase your property taxes. That’s not what you want; at least it is not what the countless number of residents that stop and speak to me want.

I know some residents are upset about the city not providing the heavy item trash pick-up. There are ongoing discussions about reinstating it. Last year, the Council removed it in an effort to lower the overall budget. It was not included in this year’s budget because there is a significant cost to it, not every household in the city takes advantage of it, and it is abused by non-residents, who add to the cost that you as taxpayers must pay in your yearly tax bill. I’ve also heard that some taxpayers do not feel that they receive enough in services for their tax dollars. I believe that there is excellent value for every dollar that you pay in taxes and whether it is heavy trash pick-up, our police, fire or rescue services, or our schools, there is a cost associated with everything that we provide as a city to you, our taxpayers. We cannot continue to do the same things and/or provide the same services or levels of services that we have over the years if we are to control our costs and provide you with lower property taxes.

At Wednesday’s school committee meeting the union president questioned where all the people were who wanted lower taxes. He wondered why they weren’t at the meeting insisting that the school budget be lowered. Perhaps it is because our residents expect their elected leaders to do the right thing and they feel no need to attend to express their support.

We have an excellent opportunity this year to provide some tax relief to our residents. Granted, it is not substantial and a far cry from what the Legislature portrayed they would bring us if the Palesky bill were defeated. Westbrook (our school system) is to receive over $2.1 million in additional state funding for the next fiscal year, but that doesn’t mean the school system has to spend it. Last November both the City Council and the superintendent of schools pledged to return 100 percent of these funds to the taxpayers in the form of tax relief. As your mayor, I’m helping to keep that promise by expecting the schools to hold the line on their expenses. I understand that contractually they have over $900,000 in increases to deal with. That makes their decision-making process difficult, but it is time that difficult decisions are made.