Finding The Formula

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Created on Monday, 03 March 2014 19:15

Written by Julianne Walshaw

Tuesday many towns across the state will gather to hammer out their budgets on Town Meeting Day. Aside from basic operating budgets, voters will have the opportunity to approve additional spending appropriations to non-profit organizations that service towns throughout Caledonia County.

Some of these funding requests tend to vary from town to town. The variation is based on what formula an organization is using to calculate their funding requests. There isn't one set way to come up with these appropriations, many organizations do what works best for their purpose.

Population is a common number to use when coming up with an appropriation figure. Fairbanks Museum and Planetarium Executive Director, Adam Kane, says that they look at the 2000 census for the towns they serve, and ask for $1.00 per person per year, a request that is usually approved.

"We get to talk to these towns every year and show them what their appropriation has done," Kane said, "They get the benifit of being able to come to the Fairbanks Museum with free admission."

The total appropriation amount the museum recieves from Town Meeting Day makes up roughly 8% of their operating budget. 

Northeast Kingdom Human Services also use census numbers to calculate their funds, however unlike the Fairbanks Museum, they use the more recent 2010 census.

According to Chief Human Resource and Compliance Officer, Mark Beattie, $1.05 per person per town has been the formula for the past decade. The numbers may sound like a lot to some, but Beattie explained, "it's very, very little... for us it's about $76,000. All of the funding goes to support child psychiatry... the funds are very valuable in supporting that effort."  

The Area Agency on Aging for Northeastern Vermont takes a different approach by looking at the data they have stored on their clients to calculate their request.

"We serve a broad service area; Orleans, Essex and Caledonia County... each town varys in size and numbers of seniors, so we try to match our appropriation requests to the number of seniors we know we serve in that town," Executive Director Lisa Viles explained. "From the data on the clients we serve... from case management and meal services... we have a census of how many [seniors] we are serving in a town."

Viles explained that despite the growing number of seniors in the state, the Area Agency on Aging doesn't often ask for a huge increase in funding, even though they do not charge for any of their services.

"Vermont has one of the highest populations over 60 in the country, I believe we're in the top 5%. We have not had much of an increase for the towns. We understand the hardships of the people in the communities, so we've only asked for modest increases on occasions."

Viles feels fortunate that the agency has over 50 towns in their service area that continue to approve their funding requests. "Sometimes we will get slightly lower than what we ask for, but other times we've been pleasantly surprised that a town thought we deserved more and have voted in appropriations with a higher amount!"

The number of those being served is not the only factor some organizations have to think about. Operation costs, such as the cost of fuel is a factor for Rural Community Transit. With the price at the pump climbing over the years R.C.T. stands by their customers, keeping their price per mile at 34 cents. Opereations and safety manager David Towle says the freeze is in place because 58 cents per mile would be a larger burden on tax payers.