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Petitioning candidate Ernie Nepomuceno, who owns Samuel Dallas in a commercial building near the intersection of Federal and Silvermine roads, said that as first selectman he would submit "a more realistic budget" to the Board of Selectmen in his presentation each February to the full board.
The candidate, who has been chairman of the Board of Finance since early 2002, said that 92 percent of the funds for the budget come from taxpayer revenues and only 8 percent from outside sources, such as state and federal funds.
"If the first selectman puts out a budget to the Board of Selectmen that's realistic, affordable, reasonable, it will get passed the first time," Mr. Nepomuceno said during the forum, which was moderated by former state House Speaker Francis Collins, who is the Brookfield co-counsel.
The Board of Finance usually takes the selectmen's budget and holds a series of sessions with department heads in March and then presents its initial recommendation to a public hearing in mid-April. Then the finance board reviews that recommendation and sends its final proposal to the annual town meeting in early May and a referendum in mid-May.
Former state Senate Republican Leader Lew Rome of Bloomfield, who was the GOP nominee for governor in 1982, has said that "there is no more important document that sits on any chief executive's desk than the budget."
Republican candidate Bill Tinsley, who owns Play It Again Sports near the intersection of Federal and Candlewood Lake roads, said that his "strategy would be, as first selectman, to be an advocate for the budget that's put forth" by the finance board.
"When it comes to the budget hearing, there is no one that gets up and advocates for what we're trying to do," he said, making reference to the public session that is held each April by the finance board, which he has been a member of since late 2003.
"Certainly, I haven't seen a recent first selectman do it," Mr. Tinsley said at the forum, which attracted about 100 people.
He said that municipal officials should "increase the dialogue around budgets."
"It's all about spending," Mr. Tinsley said.
"We don't have any discussion on how we're going to make the money that we're going to spend," said the GOP candidate, who presented a plan for commercial development along Federal Road and at Berkshire Corporate Park during a forum Sept. 14.
Mr. Tinsley has said that only 14 percent of Brookfield's tax revenue comes from commercial and industrial sources and that under his program that figure could double in roughly 10 years.
Democratic candidate Bill Davidson, who owned Davidson Insurance Services in Danbury from 1981 to 2001, said that in recent years municipal officials have made an error by using a top-down instead of a bottom-up approach to formulating the town's budget.
"It has been a case of figuring out what the numbers are going to be and what might get passed for taxes," said the candidate, who noted that the budget was approved in the first referendum in four of the six years that he was chairman of the finance board between late 1996 and 2001.
"The approach should be, 'Let's find out what the needs and wants of this community are,'" Mr. Davidson said. "Let's build the budget from the bottom to the top without a predetermined number.
"When we get to the top, we may go, 'Whoa, that's not going to fly,' and you may have to go back and get things to fit," he continued. "But don't go out and say right away that this is the number. Start at the bottom and determine what the citizens want."
Mr. Tinsley repeated some of the charges that Republican Town Committee Chairman Marty Flynn made in a recent news release on Mr. Davidson's comments at an earlier debate regarding his leadership on the finance board, saying, among other things, that during four of the 15 years that Mr. Davidson served on that panel the town began the new fiscal year on July 1 without a budget since no package had yet been approved at referendum.
He said that in 1996, Mr. Davidson's first year as chairman of that panel, the town defeated a proposed budget in the first referendum and then sent the same exact figure back to the voters in a second referendum where it was defeated by a large margin.
The budget was not approved that year until July 13.
The revised second budget was approved by the finance board on a 4-3 vote, with then-Republican First Selectman Bonnie Smith, an ex-officio member, casting the deciding vote.
Ms. Smith said at the time that the initial budget had been defeated by a small margin with a low turnout that was partly the result of thunderstorms that occurred through the early evening before the polls closed.
Mr. Davidson said this week that it was his first year as the chairman and that he and the finance board "learned some lessons" that helped it in developing budgets in the future.
After that, he said, the only time a budget was defeated during his time as chairman of the finance board was in 1999, when it fell by less than 100 votes in the initial townwide balloting during a re-valuation year for property values.
Mr. Nepomuceno said that Mr. Davidson was the chairman of the finance board during "boom times" when the federal government had budget surpluses and the nation was experiencing the longest economic expansion in its 233-year history.
"After 9/11, times changed," he said regarding the decline in the economy following the terrorist attacks in 2001, just shortly before he succeeded Mr. Davidson as the chairman of the finance board.
"We lost many jobs after 9/11," said Mr. Nepomuceno.
Mr. Davidson said that there have been strong economic years in this decade.
"Brookfield is starving its municipal structures," said the Democratic nominee, who has advocated, among other things, the hiring of a municipal planner and a geographic computer information system in the land-use office such as the one that other towns in the Housatonic Valley Council of Elected Officials utilize.
The three candidates have had careers that are different from many government officials since they each have experience as small business owners.
Former state Sen. David Cappiello (R-Danbury), who was the Republican candidate for the U.S. House seat in the Fifth District last year, has said that, for example, only a handful of the 187 members of the General Assembly have ever owned their own business.
First Selectman Robert Silvaggi, who won the office two years ago as a petitioning candidate, announced in July that he would not seek a second term. This is the first time since 1983 that there is not an incumbent first selectman on the ballot.
The debate was taped by Channel 21 and will be aired over the coming weeks.
The Sept. 21 debate at Brookfield High School that was sponsored by The Housatonic Times is currently airing nightly at 6 o'clock on Channel 17.
