Town seeks input on long-range plan through survey

April 7, 2016 | Chris Goudreau
cgoudreau@thereminder.com

LONGMEADOW – Do you want to help shape the future of Longmeadow? A survey is now live seeking input from residents about long-range planning for the community.

Town Manager Stephen Crane told Reminder Publications the survey, which was prepared with assistance with the Pioneer Valley Planning Commission, explores key issues such as town finances, services, housing, and economic development.

He added he plans to include the survey in a booklet for the May 10 Annual Town Meeting warrant in an effort to open up dialogue with the community about the threat of hitting a tax ceiling under Proposition 2 ½, which is projected for fiscal year 2022.

“The pressures on our budget by our limited ability to increase taxation [was] really laid bare for everyone involved in the fiscal year 2017 budget,” Crane noted. “And while I think it’s good that the Select Board and the School Committee did come to a compromise and we can present Town Meeting with a budget that is supported by both bodies, it wasn’t easy to get there. A lot things had to give to make that happen.”

Crane said he received a lot of feedback from residents during the budget process about the looming Proposition 2 ½ levy limit.

“The message was clearly getting out there,” he explained. “People connected the dots on the stresses of the budget and what this is really going to look like in the future if we don’t change what we’re doing.”

A copy of the survey in one section includes lists of services such as police, senior, and fire operations and requests whether residents would like to see reduced services, increased fees, a regionalized service, or no change to services.

Crane said he would like to see the survey generate as many responses as possible.

“The changes that will need to be made for our future will ultimately need to be made by residents at Town Meeting,” he explained. “The power and the decision making will ultimately be in the hands of Town Meeting and so we really want to have people start thinking about this now.”

The town plans to examine the survey data following the July 31 deadline for closing the survey to participants, Crane said.

“We’re going to look at it two ways,” he noted. “We’re going to look at the data from an operational standpoint and really hopefully the data will show what people’s priorities are in terms of services and so we can look at that operationally as we evaluate what things can we fund and what things can we not fund?”

The second part of analyzing the survey would be to look at developing properties if there is a “demonstrative appetite” for that from residents, Crane said.

He added one parcel in town is the water tower property – a town owned site located off of Academy Drive – which consists of several acres. The first step would be to create a master plan of the site and hopefully develop it. This could increase the town’s tax revenue.

“I think that people would like to see development that does not add a burden to the schools,” Crane said.

There could be a need for zoning changes and other Town Meeting votes in order for development plans to move forward, he noted.

One of the biggest challenges Longmeadow faces – which is driving the community toward the tax limit – is the fact that the town is mostly built out, Crane said. Longmeadow receives very little new growth on annual basis.

“By being able to apply all of that new growth to your levy, it allows you to absorb the costs of increased services – new buildings and new developments and new people – incurred,” he added. “While we haven’t had a lot of new homes or new development, just inflationary pressures often go up more than 2.5 percent each year.”

Residents seeking to fill out the online survey can visit www.surveymonkey.com/r/LongmeadowLRP.

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