Council Approves Stewart Budget 9 – 5

The majority Republican City Council approved Republican Mayor Erin Stewart’s controversial city budget for the upcoming budget year.

The budget provides for the property tax rate and budget allocations for the budget year that begins on July 1, 2020 and ends on June 30, 2021.

Earlier in the year Stewart proposed that the city operating allocation to New Britain schools should receive $0 of new funding in the upcoming city budget year. Meanwhile, she appears to be proposing a $3 million increase in the City Hall budget.

The Council has now given that budget its approval by a 9 to 5 vote.

While not increasing the mill rate, the budget has been criticized for appearing to be balanced based significantly on cutting the city Medical-Self Insurance Fund, the fund that covers the costs of medical care for city employees.

“I have heard that this budget is balanced,” said Ald. Chris Anderson (D-AL), “but it is balanced on the backs of City employees because pensions and healthcare are underfunded by almost $15 million.” The reduction in Medical Self-Insurance fund allocation appears to mask overall increases in the remainder of the General Fund budget.

Saying, “that spending since 2015 has outpaced new revenues by $6.9 million, not including New Britain’s unfunded liabilities,” Anderson added that, “Although I cannot support this budget because it is not sustainable, I remain committed to fighting for a fair budget that doesn’t rely on one-shot transactions to work. The future of our community depends on it.”

Stewart has also been criticized for the low city commitment to funding for the operation of the city’s schools, repeatedly freezing the amount of money that the city allocates locally to its schools, as her budget does this year, despite millions of dollars in increases in funding for City Hall departments.

City education funding, the amount of money that the city allocates from local taxes to fund the regular annual budget of the city’s schools, has become a significant issue for New Britain. Stewart’s budgets to have only increased city funding for New Britain schools’ operating budgets by an average of less than 0.7% per year.

As the New Britain Progressive has reported, the low amount of education funding provided by the city government appears to be correlated with low student academic test scores in New Britain.

The Council did make minor changes to Stewart’s budget, adding funding for an Assistant Fire Chief and adding funding to the Police budget because of a recently approved union contract.