Westford's elected officials ignore this year's fiscal reality

[Tony1941]

Was I mistaken when I heard that $50K was voted on to support a 50 Million & counting unfunded pension liability?

No, you were not wrong but you were not told the whole truth. The approval of this article accepts the provisions of MGL Chapter 32B Section 20 which stipulates that the whole $55 million deficit must be funded within an actuarially reasonable period of time.
For a 25 year time frame that translates to over $2 million/year. Mr. Gozzo pointed out that it would take over 1100 years for the fund to be fully funded at $50,000. After listening to a totally irresponsible and incorrect presentation from Ms. Marchand and Town Counsel, John ???, the 2011 ATM packed with municipal employees and believers in the welfare state approved it.

I am not sure how a senior on a relatively fixed income will be able to live in Westford and for that matter MA

I understand your concern. No social security benefit increase for two consecutive years but increases in Medicare Part B, increase in the state sales tax and real estate tax increases, you have been severely impacted. By the way, the 2011 ATM voted to impose a 0.75% tax on meals. A penny here, a penny there, a dollar here and a dollar there,it pretty soon becomes a substantial amount.
For example:
According to Mr. Robert Creegan, the FY13 indicates a 16% increase in your real estate taxes.
The accuracy of Mr. Creegan's projections were not challenged by either the Finance Committee, the outgoing Finance Director or the Board of Selectmen.

Sorry if I have my facts wrong.

Nothing to be sorry about. You should have attended the first session of the 2011 ATM, so you could see the pigs that were feeding on the Town's sparse treasury. Mr. Keele, Mr Olsen, Ms Marchand, Ms Harde et al were cheering the pigs on and Ms Harde silenced the opposition with the assistance of "Move the Previous Question" motions from stooges.

You should plan to attend to 2nd session of the 2011 ATM at 7 pm on Monday, the 28th of March 2011 and observe the Community Preservation Fund providing fodder for more welfare queens.

[Tony1941]

This also looks like a site one might be tempted to call authoritative:

http://finance1.doe.mass.edu/schfin/...ry.aspx?ID=326

(The Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education website)

Authoritative but Misleading to the Casual Observer??
The problem of using averages is that they tend to hide the truth. I is like measuring your body temperature at you belly button while you head is inside a 300F oven and your feet are in a bucket of ice water.
The average salary that is reported on the site is correct but when you look at all towns, yo will see some towns will have the average salary drop from one year to the next. This is caused when many teachers at top step retiring and replacements are hired at lower steps. Other towns will have double digit increases from year to year.
In 2003, Westford had over 50 senior teachers retiring which would have depressed the average salary being reported the following year.
If you were to look at the teacher contracts for each town, which I have done for Westford, you get down to the facts.