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Showing posts with label Town Council. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Town Council. Show all posts
Friday, September 21, 2018
Saturday, September 15, 2018
MUNIS UPDATE
(1) The Town Manager and the Town Council did not seek out anyone with conversion experience to get their input.
(2) All
conversions need to have the installation and training included in the original
contract.
(3) Never
enter into a multiply year contract prior to having seen how well the software
package is working for your organization.
The Town Manager, Diane Barnes, recommended to the Town Council to
accept the software owners’ proposal for multiply years.
Tuesday, September 11, 2018
Friday, August 31, 2018
Tuesday, August 28, 2018
WHAT IS WRONG WITH THIS PICTURE?
According to
google, these are the mil rates and population for towns in Androscoggin
County. What should stand out to everyone is the major discrepancy between
the mil rates and the populations.
TOWNS MIL RATE POPULATION
Auburn 23.68 22,948
Sabattus 17.75 5,015
Lisbon 24.84 8,846
Lewiston 28.67 36,140
Durham 18.85 3,940
Wales 14.85 1,634
Greene 17.80 4,373
Poland 14.74 5,544
Minot 15.85 2,596
Livermore Falls
21.60 3,115
Turner 17.05 5,765
As you can see Lisbon has moved into
second place in the county as far as the mil rate goes surpassing Auburn.
These figures for population are from 2016. The reason for the discrepancy is because our Town
Manager, Diane Barnes, compares populations when determining salaries instead
of the tax base for the towns. As everyone knows Auburn has many more
commercial businesses than Lisbon and yet our mil rate is higher.
There is no
way that the salaries of Department Heads in Lisbon should be as high as they
are starting out. We just do not have the tax base to support such high salaries and
the Town Manager knew this from the start but used population to establish
salaries without comparing tax bases and our Town Council believes everything
the Town Manager says as gospel.
The Town
Council needs to delay voting on spending issues until the Council can do
adequate investigations. The Town
Council needs to cut spending to include the Town Manager’s salary. The Department Heads are receiving between $1,200.00 and
$1,800.00 annually and taxpayers in Lisbon cannot afford these increases. There is no way to reduce Department
Heads salaries because the Town Manager, Diane Barnes has committed the
taxpayers into paying these outrageous salaries.
Taxpayers and the Town Council have
to pay more attention to the spending habits of the Town Manager and her
Department Heads. We have to bring down our mil rate so that it is more in
line with our population and other towns in the county.
Let’s put a halt to excessive spending
and start comparing apple to apples instead of apples to oranges.
Larry Fillmore
CENSORSHIP IN LISBON
Monday, August 27, 2018
TAX BILLS
From the chatter this weekend on Lisbon Maine Community Information website, residents of Lisbon received their new tax bills. I found it amusing that residents were shocked their taxes had increased so much. The Lisbon Reporter and LisbonMaine.net have been warning residents for several months prior to the Town Council approval of the budget.
Wednesday, August 22, 2018
WHAT DO YOU THINK?
Friday, August 17, 2018
DIG DEEP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
WHO’S IN CHARGE????
I just
reviewed the latest Town Council video and was amazed. The video reflects that the Town Manager, Diane Barnes,
ONLY feeds the Town Council information she wants them to know instead of
presenting ALL the facts. The
Town Council can never reach a sound decision unless they have all the
information available on any subject matter.
I will explain:
2018-152
Asset Forfeiture Funds – This item
was on the agenda because during the budget prepared by Diane Barnes; she
conned the Town Council into using taxpayer dollars from the Unassigned Fund
Balance instead of using Asset Forfeiture funds available in the Police
Department. According to the
Recommendations, prepared by the Town Manager, Diane Bares, it says and I
quote: “Staff did not recommend the use of forfeiture funds since there is
uncertainty in replenishing these funds now and in the future. These assets have been used for matching
grant funds for law enforcement equipment.”
The last time I
checked, the people elected members of the Town Council to represent them when
it comes to spending their money, not Diane Barnes or her staff.
The option of using the forfeiture funds should have been presented, at
the time of the budget discuss, for the Town Council to decide which way they
wanted to go but instead this information was withheld from the Town
Council. There is $6,786.04 in Federal
funds and $13,972.30 in State funds available to be used for the purchase of
the firearms at $7,800.00. The Town Council reversed their decision
and is now using the forfeiture funds instead of the Unassigned Fund
Balance. This is the right choice, as
far as I am concerned.
This is a prime example
of how the Town Manager, Diane Barnes, manipulates information she presents to
the Town Council to get her way. At first, I blamed the
Town Council for making, what I considered poor decisions, but when I started
looking into it, I realized they were not getting ALL the information and
therefore they could not make a logical and right decision. This has happened a lot and really needs to
stop.
I thank the Town Council and
especially Councilor Allen Ward, for getting this on the agenda and correcting
this situation. Taxpayers are paying much more in taxes than
they should and the Town Council must start looking for ways to cut spending.
Thank you Councilor Ward.
Larry FillmoreFriday, August 10, 2018
Monday, August 6, 2018
LACK OF ACCOUNTABILITY
HOW TO LEGALLY SCREW REIDENTS OF LISBON
Mrs. Colston
This is a FOAA request.
I am looking for the money taken out of the
Undesignated Fund the last four years. Can you provide this information by years?
Thank you
2016: $10,293.47 was taken from unassigned fund balance to cover charter requirements for maintaining a reserve funded by animal control fees
2017: N/A nothing was designated
or spent from fund balance.
2018: The following amounts were designated and
spent from fund balance:
$50,000 for computer server
upgrade. $30,663 has been spent to date.
$20,000 has been designated for
Generator pad and infrastructure
$30,000 was designated for Town
clerk storage. $26,547 was spent an
the remainder put back into fund balance
$40,000 was designated and spent
for Police radio upgrades
$35,000 was designated and
spent for a Police cruiser
$75,000 was designated for the
Fire Department Capital Improvements
$300,000 was designated for
public works trucks. $275,445 was spent
and the remainder put back into fund balance
$20,000 was designated and
spent for Recreation Department
playground
$25,000 was designated for new
flooring in various town buildings. The
money was not required and was put back into
fund balance.
2019: The following amounts have been designated for
use during the upcoming year:
$26,125 for an error in 2018
Technology budget
$50,000 to establish an accrued
leave payout reserve
$10,000 for Book restorations
in the clerks office
$7,800 for Police Department
firearms upgrades
$50,000 for the Fire Department
various equipment upgrades
$8,000 for carpeting in the
Library
$323,274 to pay off outstanding
debt service.
WHY ARE WE PAYING SUCH HIGH TAXES?
The
taxpayers in Lisbon have had their taxes raised for the last four years and
will probably experience an increase in taxes every year from here on out. This
trend must stop if the taxpayers of Lisbon are going to stay out of bankruptcy. We have been over taxed for the last four years and I will
explain it to you.
Take a look
at the carry forward for this year and it is the same for the last four years:
I did not
total all of the funds here but as you can see it is a large amount of your tax dollars. So where did all this money come from and why
is it being carried forward? Was this money
left over from previous year budget; if so, someone needs to explain why our
taxes were raised if the town did not need our money? Personally, I
would have been happy to keep my own money.
Now, let’s
take a look at the Undesignated Fund expenditures for the last four years:
As you can see, the town spent a lot of money from the Undesignated Fund. Look at it by years:
2016 $10,293.47
2017 None
(Which I do not believe)
2018
$595,000.00
2019
$475,199.00
Well, how did the town get so much
money in the Undesignated Fund? Apparently, the tooth fairy blessed Lisbon. I have a
better answer and that is the Town Manager, Diane Barnes has been padding her
budget without the knowledge of the Town Council. The Town Council has been supporting the Town Manager instead
of supporting us, the taxpayers.
This is really ridiculous to have so much money left over every year and
have so much money in the Undesignated Fund.
This is our tax dollars at work.
This
explains the high taxes and where our tax dollars are going. We need to tell the Town Manager, Diane
Barnes, that we will not put up with this from now on. The
Town Council has to start making the Town Manager accountable for her actions. I realize that she works for the Town Council
and not the citizens of Lisbon; so it is the Town Council responsibility to see
that this never happens again. Having over a
half million dollars every year is ripping the taxpayers off every year.
It is time to hold both the Town
Council and the Town Manager accountable for the way they spend our tax
dollars.
Larry Fillmore
Wednesday, July 25, 2018
Monday, July 9, 2018
GIVING CREDIT WHERE CREDIT IS DUE
remark that placing a solar
light at the School Street/Route 196 Garden
might prevent vehicles from
driving into the garden, and hopefully
stopping the annual
destruction of the garden and Worumbo Mill Wheels.
the perimeter of the
garden.
called the PW director and
left a message, thanking him.
the solar lights, and, with the help of his son, put the them around
the perimeter of the
garden.
lesson for his son.
unselfish act.
He is my hero!
Dorothy Fitzgerald
Concerned Citizen
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