Finance
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Finance Department
Anthony T. Logalbo, Finance Director
The Department of Finance and Administration consists of five divisions: Administration, Assessing, Treasurer/Collector, Accounting and Town Clerk. The Department is also responsible for budget management, Town purchasing administration, Town payroll administration, group insurance management (in collaboration with the Personnel Department) and Retirement System administration. The Town Treasurer serves as the Parking Clerk, administering the parking violation system. The Town Treasurer also serves as Treasurer for the Trustees of Town Donations. The report of the Town Clerk Division appears elsewhere in this Town Report.
Administration Division
Anthony T. Logalbo, Finance Director and Treasurer-Collector
Helen Boudreau, Senior Administrative Assistant
Jonathan Harris, Budget and Purchasing Administrator
Michael Ward, Budget Analyst
This Division handles Town payroll administration and all federal and State reporting of wages and payroll taxes for the Town departments, the Concord Public Schools (k-8) and the Concord Retirement System. The Finance Director/Treasurer-Collector is responsible for group insurance administration and is custodian-treasurer of the Retirement System and treasurer of the Trustees of Town Donations. The Division also handles development. publication and management of the Town Manager's budget, the Enterprise Fund budgets, and the five-year Capital Improvement Program. The Division provides guidance and oversight of procurement and public bidding procedures for all Town departments under the Town Manager in accordance with applicable State laws. The Finance Director is delegated by the Town Manager to act as the Chief Procurement Officer for all non-school departments. The Division provides staff support to the 15-member Concord Finance Committee appointed by the Town Moderator.
Payroll
Total payrolls for the Town Government departments and the Concord Public Schools, for the fiscal periods ended June 30, 2005 and 2006, were as follows:
Group Insurance
Group health plans are offered to the Town's employees through the multi-town Minuteman-Nashoba Health Group (mnhg) established in December, 1990 under the authority granted by Massachusetts General Laws Chapter 32B, § 12 which permits local governments to join together for the joint provision of employee group health insurance plans. The mnhg presently includes 17 area towns and regional school districts with more than 4,000 employee members and over 10,000 covered persons (employees, dependents and retirees). Fiscal operations for the group are handled by the Concord Finance Department, Administration Division. The Group's financial performance is independently audited annually.
The primary health care networks offered are the Harvard Pilgrim Health Plan (hp), the Tufts Total Health Plan, and the Fallon Health Plan. These plans, the Group's plans for supplemental Medicare coverage for retirees (administered by Tufts), and an out-of-area plan administered by Harvard Pilgrim are self-funded. The mnhg Group establishes the prices for the various plans annually based on actual claims experience and the protection of a stop-loss reinsurance program. Harvard, Tufts and Fallon are paid an administrative fee based on the number of enrollees and negotiated annually. Additionally, Senior plans for Medicare-eligible subscribers are offered on a premium basis through Harvard Pilgrim, Tufts and Fallon Health Plans.
For the Group's plan years ending May 31, 2005 and May 31, 2006, the following financial information was reported.
Treasurer-Collector Division
Patricia A. Robertson,
Assistant Treasurer-Collector
The Treasurer-Collector Division of the Finance Department is responsible for the receipt, investment and disbursement of all Town funds, billing and collection of all taxes and utilities, parking violation collection, billing and collection of landfill fees and curbside refuse collection subscriptions, and debt management. This Division serves as custodian-treasurer for the Concord Retirement System and manages the funds of the Trustees of Town Donations.
Short-term Investments
For the year ended June 30, 2006, the Town's short-term investment activities earned an average return of 4.48%. This was a significant increase over the previous year's return of 2.38%. With short-term money market rates steadily climbing throughout the year, the earnings rate on investments for the month of June 2006 was 4.90%. This is in comparison to the earnings rate of 3.02% for July 2005, the start of fiscal year 2006. Interest earnings on short-term investments of all Town funds totaled $1,016,278 for the fiscal year ended June 30, 2006. Interest earnings funded about 1.6% of the $62.6 million General Fund budget for the fiscal year that ended June 30, 2006. See table previous page.
Debt and Credit Rating
Three short-term bond anticipation notes and two long-term serial bonds were issued during fiscal year 2006. A bond with a maximum serial maturity of 20 years was issued on November 16, 2005 for $4,190,000 and a bond with a maximum serial maturity of ten years was issued on March 1, 2006 for $4,800,000, as detailed here and here.
Tax Collection
Property tax collections during FY06 totaled $52,744,565.58 net of refunds. This is 6.2% more than the prior year. The delinquency rate on the FY06 tax levy was 0.69% as of June 30, 2006, the eleventh consecutive year in which this rate has been under 1%. The total dollar amount of property taxes outstanding on the tax collector's records (all years) was $518,279 at the end of FY06.
During FY06, $143,705 of unpaid property taxes was transferred to Tax Title accounts, along with $12,925 in penalty interest and related charges. A Tax Title is a legal procedure involving advertisement of the delinquency and the recording of a priority lien against the deed to protect the Town's claim. $88,712 was collected during the year on Tax Title accounts, along with $16,926 in penalty interest. Tax Titles bear a penalty interest rate of 16% per annum. At June 30, 2006, 31 properties were in Tax Title status, amounting to accumulated unpaid taxes of $284,546 (compared to 28 parcels and $216,627 at June 30, 2005).
53G Fund
In accordance with Massachusetts General Law Chapter 44, Section 53G as adopted by the Concord Board of Appeals, the Board may determine (due to a proposed project's size, scale, complexity, potential impact or use of land) that the review of a permit application warrants the assistance of outside consultants. Project applicants must pay for the services provided by the independent advisor. Funds provided by the applicant for this purpose are deposited with the Town Treasurer in an account separate from other monies. Expenditures made from the account may be made without further appropriation and used only for the review of a specific project whose funds have been received from the applicant.
There were no new project applications in fiscal year 2006 whose review necessitated the assistance of outside consultants. As the account remained inactive in fiscal year 2006, the balance in the 53G Fund is $0.00.
Assessing Division
Lynn Masson, M.A.A.,
Town Appraiser
The Assessing Division of the Finance Department is responsible for the fair and thorough implementation of the assessment of all real estate and personal property for taxation purposes, in accordance with State law and professional practices. The Division assists taxpayers in determining eligibility for statutory property tax exemptions and in understanding the basis for all property assessments. The Division also carries out the valuation of all real property under construction as of each June 30, determines the applicability of the Supplemental Assessment law for construction receiving a Certificate of Occupancy during the year, and evaluates all property sales during the year for inclusion into the computer-assisted mass appraisal system. The Division is responsible for the commitment of more than 16,000 motor vehicle excise tax bills annually, based on data received from the Registry of Motor Vehicles, and assists taxpayers with the adjustment of excise bills throughout the year as vehicles are added and removed from registration.
The Town Appraiser and a staff of three members assists the five-member Board of Assessors. The Board, appointed by the Town Manager, is the decision-making body with respect to all assessment determinations. This year a position of Associate Board Member was added to the Board by the Town Manager as a non-voting member.
Property Valuation
Massachusetts General Law requires the Town to value property for tax purposes as of January 1st. Every three years, the Department of Revenue (dor) certifies a full revaluation of local assessments at "full and fair cash value." The two years in between are termed "Interim" years, during which Interim Year Adjustments are made to keep values at full and fair cash value.
For Fiscal Year 2007 (FY2007), an Interim Year, the assessment date was January 1, 2006. Calendar Year 2005 "arms length" sales were analyzed to derive the factors used to update values. Property values on average remained relatively flat from FY2006, although various segments increased or decreased appreciably based on market conditions. The goal of the Board of Assessors is to value properties as equitably and consistently as possible. The table on the following page summarizes the Town's values by property use.
Tax Levy
At the 2006 Annual Town Meeting, taxpayers voted appropriations totaling $65,355,439 for the Fiscal Year July 1, 2006 through June 30, 2007, a 6.4% increase over the prior year. In addition, certain State assessments, deficits and the overlay must be added to determine the total budget amount. The FY 2007 total General Fund budgeted amount is $66,289,371. Monies to support this local spending are raised by the property tax levy, State aid, local receipts and other sources. The Maximum Permitted Levy is the total amount of money that can be raised through real and personal property taxes and is the largest source of revenue for the Town. The Maximum Permitted Levy in FY 2007 is $57,220,919. The adopted budget requires a levy amount of $56,065,720; $1,155,199 of the levy limit remains unused.
The FY 2007 Levy Limit calculation is shown in the table to the right. The FY 2007 property tax levy increased from FY 2006 by 5.2%.
Property Tax Rate
The Town of Concord has repeatedly had one of the lowest tax rates of the surrounding communities; however, the average tax bill is one of the highest in the State. This is due to the Town's high average single family residential valuation of $922,372. The median single family residential valuation is $718,550.
The tax rate, in its simplest form, is the tax levy divided by the Town's taxable valuation. This is called the Uniform Tax Rate and under this rate, each class of property pays a share of the tax levy equal to its share of the total Town value. The calculation for the Town of Concord for FY 2007 is:
$56,065,720 / $5,309,253,833 = .01056
or $10.56 per thousand dollars of assessed valuation. This rate is a 3.2% increase over the prior year rate of $10.23.
Property taxes are billed quarterly, but the tax rate is set midway through the fiscal year. The first two tax payments were due August 1 and November 1, 2006. These were estimated based on the previous year's taxes plus 6.2%, an estimate of what the tax levy increase would be for the full fiscal year. The actual tax levy increase for FY07 was a full percentage point less than this estimate due largely to increased State assistance resulting from enactment of the FY07 State budget.
At their December 14 meeting, the Board of Selectmen voted a "residential factor" of 1.00, thereby setting the tax rate at the Uniform Tax Rate as has been the practice for the last 10 years. The third and fourth tax payments are due on February 1 and May 1, 2007, based on the total annual taxes minus the total billed on the first two quarterly bills.
Motor Vehicle Excise Tax
The Assessing Division is responsible for committing the Motor Vehicle Excise Taxes to the Town Collector. The tax is calculated by the Registry of Motor Vehicles and is based on the manufacturer's list price multiplied by a yearly discount. The yearly discount schedule is as follows:
50% the year preceding the designated year of manufacture
90% the year of manufacture
60% the second year of manufacture
40% the third year of manufacture
25% the fourth year of manufacture
10% the fifth and all succeeding years of manufacture
Once the value of the vehicle is determined, an excise tax is calculated at the rate of $25.00 per thousand. The tax is adjusted by the number of months the vehicle is on the road in the calendar year. Abatements are issued when vehicles are sold or disposed of, subject to a minimum calendar year bill of $5.00.
The Assessing Division committed the following excise tax amounts to the Town Tax Collector during Fiscal Year 2006:
Accounting Division
Gail Eagan-Henry,
Town Accountant
The Accounting Division is responsible for maintaining the financial records of the Town, preparation of the weekly disbursement warrant for approval, and management of the annual audit. This Division also handles the billing of the Town's 5,400 water/sewer accounts and 7,800 electric accounts for the Town's utilities.
In fiscal year 2006, the Division continued to pursue its mission to provide department managers with up to date, accurate financial information.
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