Like any household or business, the Town of Granby has its share of physical assets to protect and maintain. Whether it’s buildings at the Town Hall complex, plow trucks, schools or Salmon Brook Park, there are millions of dollars’ worth of physical plant, rolling stock and infrastructure that we as a town have the responsibility and obligation to manage and maintain. All three boards—selectmen, education and finance—play differing roles in making that happen. And very clearly, so too do the taxpayers who foot the bill for taking care of what they have invested in this community.
While day-to-day upkeep is carried within the municipal and education operating budgets, the outlays for infrastructure repairs and capital improvements—whether it’s roadwork and overlay, equipment and rolling stock or facility improvements and fixes—are largely funded and managed through the Small Capital–Infrastructure section of the overall town budget presented at the public hearing in April. Prior to that, it is part of the Plus One budget process—the projection of what is under consideration for operations in the next fiscal year, but also includes projections into the near-term years as well.
The boards commit about $3M annually into the Small Capital fund through the annual budget. Expenditures fluctuate a bit depending upon perceived need and available resources. The program also draws funding from the state Town Aid for Roads (TAR) and Local Capital Improvement (LOCIP) assistance categories. Occasionally funding comes from other town-held funds if related to a particular expenditure.
For major capital needs such as school or municipal renovation and construction projects—costing seven figures whether bundled or individual—funding is usually handled through borrowing via 20, 15 or even 10-year bonds. This bonding flattens out the cost of a major expense and is an important tool in providing stability to the mill rate year-to-year as the debt service cost is part of the annual budgets going forward.
Over time all that the Town of Granby owns ages and wears, requiring the need to plan for when and what should be replaced or repaired, and how to pay for doing so. For more than four decades we have steadily improved and invested in our physical plant and hard assets, but we face the facts that the “new” middle school is 32 years old, the library nearly 45, the additions and renovations at the town hall complex are about 25 and the additions and renovations at Wells and Kelly schools are hitting 20 years of age. The passage of time brings with it the need to prepare for major upkeep expense as roofs and mechanicals age and begin to show their age. There is a cost to taking care of what we have—but in the long run it is worth putting in the time and money to methodically take care of and manage our assets.