Facing deficit, selectmen reject grant to add firefighters: Two on board couldn't vote due to conflict of interest

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June 26, 2008

By Brian Messenger

With the potential for a $4 million budget deficit for fiscal year 2010, selectmen chose to control costs rather than pursue a federal grant that would have temporarily helped pay for five new firefighters.

Andover had been given preliminary approval for the grant, which could have given the town more than $1.5 million in assistance from the Federal Emergency Management Agency under its Staffing for Adequate Fire and Emergency Response, or SAFER, program.

The proposal to add the firefighters was defeated 2-1, with only Selectman Mary Lyman voteing in favor. Voting against the proposal were selectmen Alex Vispoli and Brian Major.

Because of a potential conflict of interest, selectmen Ted Teichert and Jerry Stabile recused themselves from the June 23 meeting once the SAFER grant proposal was taken up on the board's agenda. Both selectmen have brothers who are employees of Andover's fire department and did not vote.

It took Lyman, Vispoli and Major a full hour of discussion before they voted on the grant proposal.

"It kills me not to support this," said Major. "But with the budget difficulties that we have before us, I just don't see it working. We're going to have some drastic measures before us to make ends meet in fiscal 2010."

Major said the town could enter next year's budget planning facing a $4 million operating deficit. A Proposition 21/2 override proposal is also a possibility, Major said at the June 23 meeting, which was not televised. If approved at Town Meeting and the ballot box, an override would permanently raise property taxes in town.

"We're going into FY10 with a problem," said Vispoli. "This is probably one of the toughest votes that I can remember being on the board, because I can argue both sides."

FEMA would have paid all but $69,000 of the salary and benefits for five new firefighters next year under the five-year SAFER program. If awarded the grant, fire Chief Michael Mansfield told selectmen he would have added a fourth firefighter on each shift to one of the department's ladder trucks and potentially add a firefighter to the department's aerial ladder truck.

Andover's liability would have gradually increased over the course of the grant to $290,000 in the fourth year and $390,000 during the fifth and final year.

Mansfield told selectmen his department would have been able to reduce the cost of the additional firefighters through a combination of new revenues and an annual reduction in overtime spending.

If given the choice to hire five new town employees, Town Manager Buzz Stapczynski told the board he would choose to increase staffing levels in either the fire or police departments.

"I think this grant provides a tremendous opportunity for the town," said Stapczynski.

Stapczynski said the police department plans to use intermittent officers to decrease its annual overtime costs.

"The chief sought it out and found a way to supplement his force," said Stapczynski. "On the fire side, Chief Mansfield should be commended for his pursuit of the grant."

Mansfield told the board it was not the number of fires in Andover that his department should be judged on, but instead the variety of different tasks they perform, including issuing safety permits and performing technical rescues.

"I may be down but I'm not out and I'll be back," Mansfield told the board after the vote.

Teichert and Stabile chose not to participate in the vote after Town Counsel Thomas Urbelis suggested their input could be considered a conflict of interest, since the grant proposal would potentially affect their brothers' overtime income.

"Under those circumstances," Urbelis wrote in a June 18 statement, "your brothers would have a 'financial interest' in the SAFER grant and therefore, it is my opinion that you may not participate in the deliberation or vote on the SAFER grant."