AMHERST — With forecasts for local and state revenues in flux amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Amherst officials will soon begin outlining a strategy for preparing a municipal budget for the fiscal year that begins July 1.
Town Manager Paul Bockelman said Tuesday that he anticipates calling a meeting of the Budget Coordinating Group to discuss the fiscal year 2021 budget, and the many questions the current environment raises for funding town, school and Jones Library system operations.
“The unknowns are what the federal and state government are going to do,” Bockelman said.
The Budget Coordinating Group includes Bockelman, Superintendent Michael Morris, Library Director Sharon Sharry and representatives from the Town Council, School Committee and trustees for the library. A standing committee that has periodic discussions in advance of budget season, the group was last heavily involved in budget discussions when Amherst faced financial challenges and successfully sought a Proposition 2½ general override in 2010.
Bockelman said the group is set up to prepare for eventualities caused by recessions and economic downturns, and can go over revenue forecasts and plot a unified way to confront financial challenges.
Because the municipal budget depends on state aid as a major source of funding, Bockelman said Amherst will face a situation most cities and towns across Massachusetts are confronting: a dramatic reduction in revenues.
“When the state catches a cold, towns get pneumonia — that will probably be the case for us,” Bockelman said.
But how bad the budget is could depend on how the state and federal government respond. This could become more clear in the coming weeks.
“The spoiler is we don’t know, and nobody knows,” Bockelman said.
The financial numbers at the end of March remained decent, but that is not expected to hold as spring continues.
Locally, revenue from lodging and meals taxes are plummeting, parking revenue is in free fall, and excise taxes are minimal since no one is purchasing new vehicles. Permit fees and growth related to additions and renovations at homes is also dropping.
Bockelman told the Town Council that because of unknowns that will remain in May and June, the town could adopt a one-twelfth budget mechanism, allowing an interim, one-month-at-a-time approach.
“Clearly expenditures will have to be looked at for fiscal year ’21,” Bockelman said.
Though there could be cuts in spending in the current year’s budget as a way to begin preparing for similar trims in the next budget, Bockelman said he is not yet ready to make any decisions on that possibility. In fact, the town, he said, has already had to make some additions to the current budget, including purchases of personal protective equipment.
Scott Merzbach can be reached at smerzbach@gazettenet.com.
