It’s your money, so get involved

It’s budget time. Some years, that statement is one that gets too little attention, whether on the federal, state, city or town levels. This year, however, all strata of budgets are commanding attention, riveting citizens, and of course public employees, as perhaps never before. That’s because of the dearth of public money and the inevitability of cuts in funding and increases in taxes. When reality hits in the form of fiscal pain for all income groups, especially with gasoline and home heating oil prices moving steadily and likely irreversibly up, what seemed like a breather after the depths of the recession will vaporize. Reporter Karen Bartomioli gave a good primer last week in this newspaper for anyone wanting to get involved with providing oversight to municipal governments as they tackle this year’s budgets. This is the year to do it, to get involved. As town boards and commissions plan for the next fiscal year (beginning July 1), there still may have to be cuts, and it is always more likely that such cuts will apply to those whose voices are not part of the discussion. Every town resident has the opportunity to attend public budget hearings, so there is no excuse for being excluded from the decision-making process.It is exactly this sort of process that benefits most from open government laws. The draft budgets have been available at preliminary budget hearings and workshops in every Northwest Corner town. Those numbers are open for discussion now; they won’t be once the final budget is complete and voted in. Now is the time for all citizens to be heard and to affect the way the finances of their towns will in turn affect their own fiscal realities. Don’t miss those budget hearings.Congratulations to the Salisbury Winter Sports Association for accomplishing what was really an uphill climb a short year ago. What a task they took on, once they decided to not only host the 85th annual SWSA Jumpfest two weeks ago, but also the U.S. Junior Olympics this past week. They at SWSA are quite a group of volunteers who managed to keep the new ski jump viable for both weekends through the vagaries of New England’s February weather. And oh yes, of course they also managed, with deep community support, to raise the money to build a new jump while simultaneously planning the events. Suffice it to say there must be some exhausted, if very satisfied, SWSA volunteers this week. They should all take a well-deserved break before plunging into the planning for next year.