On November 8th , 2024 the Town of Windham had its Budget Public Hearing that by law is required to have before the Budget for Fiscal Year 2025 could be officially rubber stamped into law. As promised we have captured the entire meeting on video and have finished with a few technical alterations to the content to create a more enjoyable viewing experience.
This important meeting was roughly 28 minutes in duration. As you will notice not one of the elected town board members had anything to say about the budget. Nor did the town board attempt to explain the budget or outline any information about the key features of the budget this year. This is a situation that cannot be allowed to continue.
While it is true that the Town of Windham made the Preliminary Budget for Fiscal year 2025 available upon request. It was limited to a review in the office of the town clerk and only between the hours of 9am and 4pm. This lack of access is a calculated ploy to keep the town board from having to answer difficult questions about the Budget and the priorities its sets for the entire community. Some of the most important aspects our community’s every day living standards are determined by our local town or village in conjunction with county budgets . That is why we feel it is our duty to inform the community as to how these budgets work and what our roles in these processes are as citizens of these communities.
What we must do now?
We must demand that the Town Board make the Tentative and Preliminary Budgets available on the Town Website for inspection like the County of Greene does. This will allow the community to access the information anywhere and anytime which is critical to home owners that are either part-time , working, or elderly.
We must demand that the Town Board makes the Public Hearings for Tax Cap Limit and Budgets informative sessions— this means having experts testify and using Power Point slides to show the long-term debt , expenditures , revenues , and state and federal to the community in a manner that is easily understandable to laypersons.
We must demand that the Town Board allows for a period of time before the Public Hearings written comments to be submitted and read into the record [as is required by the Open Meetings Law].
We must demand as a community more transparency in the Budget and the Public Hearing Process— We believe as a community we must pressure our Town Board to adopt local legislation that would require special informative Town Board Meetings for the Budget Process to be held each year. These could be held during the regular Town Board Meetings or several special sessions. We must insist as a community that local government represents our complete population as best as possible.
Conclusion:
We are going to use the Freedom of Information Law to access the town of Windham budget for fiscal year 2025 as soon as possible. This document as soon as we receive it will be made available to the entire community. We hope that this will give the community the information they require to understand if the Town Board is truly representing their priorities in the budget. We must push for more transparency in the community for these important issues with our local government. We must force our local government to be more responsive to our community’s needs. We must when possible attempt a permissive referendums for budgets.
It is critical that we as a community develop stronger understandings of our budgets and how they reflect the priorities of the community.
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