The Concord Finance Committee spent the evening reviewing a conservative five-year fiscal forecast prepared by town finance staff and running model scenarios to see how guideline choices will affect property taxes and unused levy capacity.

Anthony, the town's Chief Financial Officer, told the committee his five-year revenue model groups receipts into property taxes, state aid, local receipts and other financing sources and that the town uses Division of Local Service guidance to compute the levy limit. "We work off of the prior year levy, we add 2.5% increase, then we add new growth, and that produces the levy limit," he said. Staff carried a modest estimate of new growth ($1M range) forward cautiously, noting that some projects are not yet permitted.

On the expense side, the town modeled 4% annual growth for town government and schools as a conservative scenario, and factored in a worst-case health-insurance increase of roughly 12% for FY26 when building projections. Anthony said the town expects a decline in interest revenue as rates fall and highlighted a one-time projected free-cash certification of $9.8 million last year, with staff expecting certification could be nearer $11 million this year.

The presentation included a 10-year capital picture with about $389 million of raw requests and enterprise projects; staff emphasized that enterprise funds (water, sewer, recreation) represent a large share and the raw total is a planning figure, not a final ask. Staff also listed potential excluded-debt projects (three building projects and a road project) and noted debt timing and amortization remain to be refined.

Committee members pressed staff on several items: one member pointed to a table projecting rapid year-over-year growth in proposed PILOT (payments in lieu of taxes) revenue and asked why the numbers doubled; another member said the five-year projection showed expenses exceeding revenues by FY2028 under the conservative assumptions and asked whether the town should begin planning for an override. Anthony said the 4% expense assumption is intentionally conservative and that the model is a worst-case scenario used for planning: "That's why you shoot high."

Staff also reported long-term liability positions: OPEB was shown about 61.27% funded (unfunded liability roughly $19.5 million using a 6.75% discount rate) and the retirement system about 93.09% funded, with town and retirement board amortization schedules targeting full funding in coming years.

On policy modeling, Quasi and Lindsay (guideline subcommittee) presented a tax-impact model showing an aggregate 3.57% scenario and quantified that each additional $100,000 of spending above modeled revenues consumes roughly 10 basis points of excess levy capacity. Using the inverse calculation, staff said holding unused levy capacity constant at today's level would imply an aggregate guideline near 2.44% for the coming year — presented as a benchmark, not a final vote. The committee scheduled a vote on preliminary guideline scenarios at its next meeting and recorded action items for staff to produce scenarios and to refine debt and capital timing.

The meeting concluded with recorded action items and a motion to adjourn, which the committee approved by voice vote.