Every year, the Town Council invites the public to submit written comments as part of the Town Manager’s evaluation. Comments are due by midnight, Thursday October 30th. Although he is not directly involved in developing the budget for the schools, the Town Manager has a lot of impact on how much funding reaches the schools. We hope that you will take a moment to complete the Town Manager’s evaluation. Members of SOS Amherst have compiled some suggestions taht you might consider when completing the evaluation form, specifically for question two which asks about areas for improvement.
What you can say:
2) Please share up to three areas for improvement you observed in the Town Manager’s performance over the past year
- Provide proactive clarity and transparency with all budgets, including requiring other municipal departments to provide detailed budgets (like the schools do), and make these budgets publicly available. Budgets are currently not detailed or transparent enough to allow for public review of spending.
- More accurately project revenues and expenditures enabling operating budgets to be maximized and reducing end of year surpluses. Year over year surpluses are too large.
- Prioritize essential functions and services in all decision making rather than allocating scarce resources to less necessary projects – money is not being spent wisely in all instances.
- Utilize the Budget Coordinating Group to facilitate communication between the town, the schools and the library. This group did not meet regularly last year and was not used as intended in the Charter to help coordinate among sectors of town.
- Be willing to consider resource allocation that does not rely on equal percentages across functional areas as this is not a common way of budgeting in other municipalities and doesn’t account for different needs.
- Work with Amherst College and UMASS to encourage more monetary contributions to the Town. Ensure that when contributions are made, agreements benefit the schools.
- Keep in mind that the Amherst Master plan includes this goal: “Support high-quality schools that are adequately staffed and properly equipped.
How to complete the Evaluation:
- The public can use this form to provide feedback: https://forms.office.com/r/
xWnbf9LfnM - Members of the public are encouraged to review the Town Manager’s Executive and Administrative Duties as outlined in the Amherst Home Rule Charter, as well as the Town Manager’s Performance Goals which include both policy and management goals covering a multitude of topics important to the community and the Town Manager’s Self-Evaluation.
- Members of the Public should be aware these submissions will be read by every Town Council member and the Town Manager. However, these are personnel documents, and as such, are exempt from public disclosure. The forms become part of the Town Manager’s personnel file, with the same protections and restricted access as any employee’s personnel file.