The Town Council Approves Borrowing $1.05 Million – But For What?

At the meeting on November 10, 2025, Councilors Deb Carney, Craig Marr, and Peter Slom voted to borrow up to $1.05 million; Councilor Stokes voted no.

Councilors Carney, Marr, and Slom cited Section 13 (B) in Charlestown’s Charter and the question presented to voters in 2015 that authorized the acquisition, preservation, and protection of up to $2 million of open space, saying the Charter requires that an open space bond needs to be issued at some point in order to pay the town back.

They voted to issue a bond now, in 2026, so the bond proceeds could be used, not to preserve open space, but to finance unspecified future projects.

Councilor Stokes stated that the bond does not need to be issued now and that it is not financially prudent to do so. Throughout the Council’s discussions in August, October, and November Councilor Stokes gave his reasons for his opposition:

• The open space properties have been acquired over 10 years and paid for.
• The expenditure for properties acquired had been placed in budgets and approved at financial referendums.
• Most, if not all, of the money used for these expenditures has already been “reimbursed.”
• Paying the administrative costs to borrow the money and the interest costs over the life of the loan is expensive, and the money could be used for something else.
• The money loaned will need to be paid back.
• Projects will be financed with the bond proceeds, but voters will not be able to approve how the funds are used.
• If the town needs to borrow money for a future project, the voters should be asked to approve the specific expenditure.

He stated that he has a responsibility to the charter but also a responsibility to the taxpayers to make the best financial decisions for them he can possibly make. He reiterated, “You’re paying money back that’s already been paid back by incurring debt. That’s not reasonable.”

Attorney Ellen Corneau, who has been the town’s Bond Counsel since 1992, stated it seems that the Charter provision requires the cost of acquiring real estate which is authorized to be acquired by the voters at a financial referendum but not specifically identified needs to be paid for with bond proceeds.

Attorney Corneau pointed out that the Charter provision is unusual—one she has not seen in other charters. She said charter provisions normally provide the authority to issue bonds without mandating that they be issued and that, as she has discussed with Councilor Carney, the town may want to amend the Charter so the town would not be required to issue expensive debt unnecessarily if funds are available.

What open space properties were acquired?

Since the authorization in 2015, approximately $1.05 million has been expended to acquire and pay for four open space properties: the Patricia Sprague Forest Preserve (in 2016), a strip of land next to the Charlestown Town Hall (early in 2018); an addition to the Pasquiset Pond Preserve (late in 2018), and the Tucker Woods Preserve (in 2021). The town was assisted by Natural Heritage Grants from the RI Department of Environmental Management (RIDEM) for acquisition of the Sprague Forest Preserve and the Tucker Woods Preserve and with the assistance of The Nature Conservancy for the addition to the Pasquiset Pond Preserve:

*This grant is missing from Exhibit A of the Town Council Resolution approved on November 10. The $258,750.00 is a grant from RIDEM that had originally been awarded to the Charlestown Land Trust and had been subsequently turned over to the town and used toward the acquisition of the Sprague Forest Preserve.

Is the Town Council able to issue this bond without asking voters at a financial referendum?

The answer appears to be yes. The Town Council was authorized to borrow this money by a vote in 2015 which authorized “the financing, acquisition, preservation, or protection of open space up $2 million.” At that time, voters also approved issuing bonds.

Does the bond need to be issued in 2026—and for what?

Councilor Stokes maintained this Council doesn’t have any more responsibility than the last Council or the next to issue the bond now.

Councilor Carney maintained the Town Council should not ignore the Charter and the language of the warrant question, saying that the Charter does not say the money can be taken from the General Fund and leaving things hanging out there violates the spirit of the ballot question. Councilor Slom agreed.

Councilor Stokes noted the Charter language does not state when a bond needs to be issued or the amount that needs to be issued. Rather, the charter provision states only that the real estate acquisitions being discussed need to be “purchased with funds, in part, provided by government and/or non-profit agencies, or with previously approved bond funds or if acquired by grant, gift or bequest.”

He noted that, when an open space property was acquired, in a number of cases, money was put into the next year’s budget to reimburse the expenditure, and that, if the $1.05-million bond is issued, the General Fund would be “overaged” by a significant amount.

Councilor Stokes noted the town has a surplus of multiple millions of dollars and the proposed bond would put a significant burden on taxpayers for property that has already been purchased and paid for. He said he would also make the argument that when the taxpayers voted on those budgets with those line items in them at financial referendums, they approved paying for specific properties.

Councilor Carney pointed out that the Council would be replenishing the General Fund and that some of the money could be used for other things. She stated, “We know we have a huge capital issue coming up with things that need to be built in the town, in terms of renovations at the town hall, problems that were not addressed in the past that need to be addressed.”

Councilor Stokes agreed there are issues that need to be addressed. However, he pointed out that issuing the bond would create a significant overage in the General Fund because the General Fund has already been replenished. He stated that “you’re basically just getting a free extra million dollars to move around.” He stated also, “The voters aren’t really approving the usage of that overage of money.”

He also questioned why the town would not wait until the entire $2 million had been expended.

Should the full $1.05 million be borrowed?

In August, Councilor Carney proposed issuing a bond up to the $2-million cap voted in 2015, and she also reported money had been reserved in the 2024–2025 budget to issue the bond and pay six months interest.

She asked Councilors Slom and Stokes, “So, before we authorize bond council to spend a lot of her time going through drafting an official resolution, I wanted the council to discuss and see where the two of you felt with regards to how much we should issue at this point.”

Councilor Stokes said the discussion should be continued to a meeting when Councilor Marr was present.

In October, Councilor Carney stated, “the town was more inclined to issue the bond for $1,050,000—the amount the Town had already spent from the General Fund—as opposed to the full $2,000,000.”

Stating again that the General Fund needed to be reimbursed by the amount which had been expended, she stated she preferred to issue the bond now. She also warned that funds will be tight in the upcoming budget cycle and repeated, “My intention with this is to take this money and reimburse the town for the money that came out of the General Fund.”

In response, Councilor Stokes recounted he had explored the reimbursement issue with Treasurer Patrick Gormley, and so far they found that the town had expended funds from the General Fund on several occasions but also that $593,000 had been reimbursed (in the 2021–2022 and 2024–2025 budgets), leaving approximately $452,000 which possibly had not been reimbursed. Councilor Stokes noted there would need to be a much deeper dive to figure out exactly what had been reimbursed.

Councilor Stokes went on to say that he is not talking about whether things were done correctly in the past; he said that what he is saying is, “…you’re going to indebt us a million dollars for no reason beyond, well, they should have done it, but they didn’t.”

Councilor Stokes maintained that issuing a bond of $1.05 million is borrowing too much money and the most that should be bonded is the amount that has not been reimbursed. He suggested, alternatively, if approximately $452,000 did still need to be reimbursed, the General Fund could be reimbursed in subsequent budgets.

What will the bond proceeds be used for?

There were many questions as to whether the bond proceeds can be used for something other than preserving open space. It appears the answer is yes.

Councilor Stokes explained the way the accounting would work: When the funds authorized in 2015 for open space were expended for the four properties, the amounts were recorded in the town’s Open Space Fund (Fund 72); that is, each transaction was recorded as a “liability.” The liability has then been reduced when money was replenished through subsequent budgets. When the bond is issued, the bond proceeds will be placed in Fund 72, which will zero out the account. However, because an estimated $590,000 has been reimbursed, the balance would contain an “overage,” and the overage would then be transferred to the Unassigned Fund Balance where it can be used for other projects.

Councilor Stokes also noted that any unreimbursed amount, even though it is called a liability in the town’s accounting system, costs taxpayers nothing.

In response to questions from residents about the use of the bond proceeds and how the bond would be paid back, Attorney Corneau also asked the Council the following: “From what I understand what you were saying before, the bond proceeds aren’t going to be used for additional open space purchases. So they’re going to sit in your account. You use that money to pay back the bond. Right?” Councilor Carney confirmed that Attorney Corneau’s statement was correct.

What about the length of the bond?

Town Financial Advisor, Matt Blais, who also attended the November meeting, gave estimates of the amount of interest the town would pay on bonds of various lengths, that is, the town would pay approximately $135,000 per year for a ten-year bond, $180,000 per year for a seven-year bond, and $240,000 per year for a five-year bond. It is worth noting this means that the bonding of $1.05 million would cost the town between $1.2 million to $1.3 million over the life of the loan.

Councilor Stokes inquired whether the town could sell itself its own short-term note with a zero interest rate. Attorney Corneau said she would have to do research regarding the town’s powers and state law; Mr. Blais cautioned, because the Town would be acting as both lender and borrower on the same note, research was needed to determine whether the note would provide an actual, valid obligation as opposed to an internal bookkeeping entry or transfer.

Both Attorney Corneau and Mr. Blaise stated that a short-term bond—of a period of a year, or even less—could be sold. Mr. Blais stated that if the town is looking for the absolute lowest borrowing cost, the next option would be a short-term bond because the shorter the duration of the bond, the lower the total cost of servicing the debt.

Would taxpayers pay again for property already paid for?

Councilor Stokes maintained taxpayers would be double-taxed because the General Fund had already been reimbursed for some, if not all, of the money expended.

Treasurer Gormley observed, because it appears that at least $590,000 has been paid back over two budgets, “If we were to go out to bond for the full amount and just carry that bond as a traditional 10 year, that’s where I see it being like a double taxation.”

Councilor Stokes said he did not understand why the Council would put the Town into debt when taxpayers had already paid for the land acquisitions through approved budgets. He also said he understands the ins and outs of what was done and what was not done, but, “I also don’t see a reason to unnecessarily add interest and unnecessarily add to our tax rate and our taxable stuff for things that we were in a financial position to be able to pay off in subsequent budgets, which again were also approved budgets.”

Instead, he suggested that any remaining hole created could be resolved by transferring the money from the Unassigned Fund Balance into the General Fund in future budgets, if it is determined this has not already occurred.

You can learn more about the author Ruth Platner on her profile page.

Descriptions of the 4 open space properties mentioned in this post, along with all of Charlestown’s other open space properties, can be found in our Guide to Public Recreation/Conservation/Hiking Areas in Charlestown Rhode Island