SALEM — Selectmen voted last night to return a $1,500 check offered in December to pay for some of the costs of a police detail at the town's holiday parade.
Pat Hargeaves, a selectman and the chairman of the parade committee, offered the check last month as partial payment for a $3,672 bill he told selectmen he received for the detail. But Finance Director Jane Savastano said the town never billed Hargreaves nor the parade committee, intending to pick up the cost of the detail. Hargreaves requested the bill from the finance department.
The town budgeted $1,900 for the police detail, but the cost wound up being higher due to an increase in police detail rates and because more officers were needed, Savastano said last month. The town was going to absorb those additional costs.
The town has forgiven the debt for the parade police detail for several years, interim Town Manager Henry LaBranche said last night. The town budgeted the expense in 2009 to make the process more efficient, but it is not in the 2010 budget because all funding for outside organizations was cut by Town Manager Jonathan Sistare, Savastano said.
The board voted 4-0, with Hargreaves stepping down for the discussion, to return the $1,500 check rather than accept it as a donation.
"I would suggest you use it to pay the bill next year, and do a better job fundraising," Selectman Everett McBride said. "I don't know how you do that."
Hargreaves said he requested the bill due to a communication error — he said in December he did not know about the $1,900. During the meeting in December and last night, Hargreaves said the Police Department provided more officers and cars than the eight officers and two cars he requested, something Chairman Arthur Barnes took issue with last night.
"What happened last time we met was an attempt to donate $1,500 and take a slap at the Police Department because of the number of officers present at the parade," Barnes said. "And I just do not understand biting the hand that feeds you."
McBride told Hargreaves that if he would need money from the town again to cover parade costs such as the details, he should request it through the annual town warrant.
Hargreaves asked if he would get the eight officers he requested or be given more, and McBride advised him to check with the department in advance. LaBranche said he would also talk to police Chief Paul Donovan during staff meetings about getting the number of officers needed early for budgeting.
Selectman Elizabeth Roth said she voted to return the money because she thought the town should support some nonprofits and that in the future they would need to be consistent. With funding for other groups cut in 2010, this year's parade should face the same scrutiny, she said.
"I think that's something we should be concerned about," she said.
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