Wayland Finance Committee presses schools on late capital requests

WAYLAND — December 18, 2023 — Wayland Finance Committee challenges schools over mid-year capital asks. Meeting Dec. 18, members worked through roughly two dozen written questions on the draft five-year capital plan and heard the town finance director object to school requests added after the May budget vote, including a $60,000 boiler repair, a $170,000 fire alarm line and a $400,000 student information system. The Snake Brook wastewater design has risen to about $2.5 million, with $900,000 already authorized as debt and a $1.4 million grant pending. Free cash is expected to certify in January near $8 million, well above the roughly $2 million the plan assumes. One member called a roughly $300,000 vocational education increase "the wrong direction," asking who would tell neighbors about "a 6 percent increase year over year." A sustainability package once pegged near $12 million was scaled back pending a master plan.