Joanne Veech will ensure strong Financial Management for Randolph

I was educated to save money for a rainy day. I have a BS in accounting, an MBA in Finance and have career experience with one of the world’s premier professional services firms. I am acutely aware of the importance of sound fiscal management. One of the pillars of Randolph’s financial security is a healthy budget surplus.  Here’s why:

• A strong surplus provides a financial cushion for unanticipated expenditures or reductions in revenue collections.
• A surplus ensures long-term financial stability and is one of the reasons the Township has been able to adopt annual budgets with no increases in the municipal tax rate for the last four years.
• Our surplus is important for cash flow as it avoids costly borrowing to meet cash demands.
• Our surplus is the foundation to financially manage the impact of tax appeals.

The Council has supported our Township Manager and Finance team ensuring Randolph has proper reserves for unforeseen events such as the clean up after major wind, rain and snow storms, as well as this current COVID pandemic.  We also use our surplus every year to pay in cash to pave our roads – funds are not borrowed for this purpose. In the case of our Water and Sewer budget, our surplus is a prudent way to save and pay for large projects costing millions of dollars. We save the funding needs in advance for large projects, so we don’t need to come up with millions of tax dollars in one year. A prudent surplus is one of the reasons we have our triple AAA bond rating which enables the township to borrow funds at significantly lower interest rates.

When a township doesn’t have a surplus, they need to raise taxes.  The Council has continually ensured we have funds available for the reasons stated above. It’s my goal to continue to support this approach.