By MARK SARDELLA
WAKEFIELD — The Town Council this week approved three more FY 2025 departmental budgets, which will now go before Annual Town Meeting on April 29. The Police, Library and Information Technology budgets all received unanimous approval from councilors after some discussion Monday night.
Town Accountant Kevin Gill presented the numbers for each budget followed by discussion with the department heads.
Gill said that the $7,514,617 Police Department budget includes an increase of $357,477, of which $343,977 will cover the recently settled police union contract.
In response to a question from Town Councilor Edward Dombroski, Police Chief Steven Skory said that recruitment of officers continues to be an issue. He said that it can take as long as a year between selecting a recruit off the Civil Service list and putting that officer out on the street.
Skory said that a lot of Police Departments are removing themselves from Civil Service and are scooping up potential recruits. He talked about pending legislation that would allow the Police Department to hire half of its new officers from Civil Service and half outside of Civil Service.
Dombroski asked Skory about the impact of the town’s population growth on the Police Department’s staffing needs.
Skory said that he anticipates up to 1,200 new housing units in Wakefield over the next few years and expects to ask the town for more staffing in response to the population growth.
Skory also said that he anticipates nine officer retirements in the next few years and is being proactive in trying to get recruits into the police academy early so that they are on board before existing officers retire. He said that he now has 47 officers, but for most of the preceding year, WPD has been operating three to four officers short.
In response to another question, Skory called the end result of the recent renovations at the Police Station “fantastic,” adding, “Everyone is happy with the building.”
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The $1,972,883 Library Department budget will see an increase of $49,364, of which $34,149 is for contractual increases for library administrators and supervisors. It was noted the the library staff contract is currently pending.
In response to a question from Town Councilor Edward Dombroski, Library Director Catherine McDonald said that circulation of materials is back to pre-pandemic levels, while other metrics are still lagging.
McDonald said that the library is looking at the impact of anticipated population growth especially on the Children’s Room.
Finance Committee member Dan Sherman said that the FinCom subcommittee was comfortable with the library budget.
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The Information Technology budget request for FT 2025 includes an increase of $14,098 for a total of $493,253. IT Director Todd Bowden answered a few questions from the Town Council and Finance Committee liaison Brian Cusack offered his support for the budget request.
