BRATTLEBORO — The Brattleboro Representative Town Meeting (RTM) elects each year members of the body to serve as a Finance Committee to review the budget as proposed by the Selectboard so as to improve the ability of RTM members to make an informed judgment as they vote on the budget article.
In the past, the Finance Committee also reviewed and reported on the budget for the town's three elementary schools and the Brattleboro Union High School District 6.
With the implementation of Act 46, which consolidated Brattleboro's elementary schools with those of Dummerston, Guilford, and Putney in the Windham Southeast School District (WSESD), which also includes the middle school, the high school, and other educational institutions, the Finance Committee has opted to exclude school matters from its work and to concentrate on the town budget.
Aside from the fact that our small Finance Committee has enough work to do on a $19.5 million municipal budget, it is inappropriate for a Brattleboro-only committee to be the sole independent review body for a school district that impacts the students and ratepayers of four towns.
Speaking only for myself, I urge citizens in the WSESD to call upon the District board to include in its warning for this year an article to establish an independent citizens' committee to review budgets that are warned for the annual meeting of the WSESD. Such a committee should be composed of at least one person from each of the four towns.
Sincerely,
F. David Levenbach, Brattleboro
District 3 member of the RTM and member of the Finance Committee