By RUSS OLIVO and
JOSEPH B. NADEAU

WOONSOCKET — Faced with a heavy outpouring of opposition from property owners, the City Council last night narrowly defeated a supplemental tax bill to wipe out a School Department deficit of $3.7 million.

The vote paves the way for the School Committee to file a lawsuit against the city under the Caruolo Act, a move advocates of the supplemental tax bill contend will only deepen the School Department's — and the city's — financial problems. Caruolo gives school departments the power to file suit in Superior Court to compel their municipal counterparts to provide revenue to wipe out operating deficits, and the School Committee had vowed to vote in favor of such an action no later than tomorrow if the council balked at supplemental taxes.
After some five hours of discussion, at just about midnight, the council did just that, voting 4-3 against the measure. In the end, it was Councilwoman Suzanne Vadenais who tipped the balance. Early in the evening, she indicated a reluctant willingness to support supplemental taxes, but by the end of the night she had changed her mind.
“It was a very difficult decision,” she said. “After listening to all the people who spoke tonight, I can't vote for this.”
Vadenais joined Councilors Stella Brien, Christopher Beauchamp and Roger G. Jalette Jr. in opposing the measure. Council President Leo T. Fontaine, William Schneck and John Ward were in favor of it.
The measure would have given the city authority to hike all classes of taxes — residential, business and business equipment — about 10 percent. The average homeowner would have paid roughly an extra $231 this fiscal year.
Though the hike would have been about the same on small businesses percentage-wise, they would have paid significantly more since they are already taxed at a higher rate.
Before the vote, dozens of residents and business owners weighed in on the supplemental tax hike, many of them expressing anger and frustration at the fast-growing cost of local government. Some urged members of the City Council to find more spending cuts in order to avoid worsening the burden on property owners, while others challenged the council let the School Committee sue the city and fight the Caruolo Act in court – advice the council apparently took to heart.
“I challenge you to vote no to the supplemental tax,” said city resident Jim Hoyle. “We can't afford it. Challenge the Caruolo Act. We feel like we're being held hostage by the School Committee with this act.”
Harris Hall was so packed that admittance was closed after about 130 spectators filled the room. People were standing against the back walls because there weren't any more seats left and there was a line of speakers behind the lectern waiting to address the council that snaked out into the foyer. More than two hours after the session began, people were still waiting for their turn to speak, and the council hadn't even recited the Pledge of Allegiance to mark the formal start of the agenda.
But the tenor of the meeting actually began on the sidewalk outside, where a gathering of homeowners and proprietors of small businesses waved signs as they waited, before the meeting, for council members to arrive at City Hall. The signs bore slogans that included, “No Supplemental Tax Bill,” and “We Follow Our Budget.”
A sign-toting Jeanne Budnick, proprietor of Pepin Lumber, a family-owned business for generations, said the city should be forced to live within the constraints that everyday property owners and merchants deal with. In difficult economic times like these, Budnick said, another bill for the owners of businesses and homes will only make things worse for people struggling with unemployment, cuts in hours and higher health care costs.
“We all know these are difficult times,” Budnick said . “We're making cuts left and right. I think it's time the city lived within its means. We have to live within our means and this supplemental tax bill is the easy way out. It's one more thing to make people lose their homes and businesses.”
John Gregory, president of the Northern Rhode Island Chamber of Commerce, echoed those remarks in Harris Hall, saying business owners already shoulder far too much of the tax burden in the city. While Gregory acknowledged that the causes of the city's financial plight might not be all of its own doing, he said it is unfair for the council to balance the budget on the backs of citizens and small business owners, some of which might fold as a result of being forced to shoulder a significant, unforeseen expense.
“Unlike you, the business person cannot afford to send out a supplemental invoice to their customers to balance their budget,” said Gregory.
Walter Chubka, the owner of Vose Hardware, said the supplemental tax bill means he will have to shell out about $3,000 in new taxes this fiscal year that he wasn't planning for. He said, “I don't know where we're going to find the extra $3,000, as we are already struggling.”
Spectators offered robust applause for many speakers, some of whom vented their most powerful expressions of frustration against teachers and members of the School Committee. One man complained of a lack of accountability from school officials, saying they “owned” their flawed budget even though they had heaped the blame on former Schools Supt. Maureen Macera's mismanagement. Another went so far as to suggest that in the complex world of school financing, it might be time to abolish the School Committee and replace it with professionals who can do a better job of keeping the books in order.
“Maybe what we're asking of them is more than what they're capable of doing,” said city resident Normand Piette.
Some, like Larry Poitras, a longtime city resident and well-known host of his own talk-radio show,  said teachers should be pitching in with more concessions, as workers in “the real world” have been forced to do.  He rebuked officials for using the excuse that they are bound by union contracts for failing to compel teachers to make bigger sacrifices on salaries and health care co-pays, deriding the givebacks offered so far as “an insult” and “a joke.”
“Take a chance,” Poitras said. “Go to court. It'll be a good investment. Spend the money.”
Not everyone in the room was against the proposed supplemental tax bill, however. A few carried signs with a different message, such as “Raise Taxes. Save Our Schools and Save Our City.” One Woonsocket High School student approached the lectern and said all of her extracurricular activities, including National Honor Society, would be cut from the budget if the council did not okay  new taxes.
 But when Schools Supt. Robert Gerardi took the lectern to defend the measure, he was greeted by jeers of “go home” and “he's not a taxpayer.”
Gerardi said city officials had worked hard to brainstorm alternatives to the supplemental tax. But “the bottom line is the bottom line,” said Gerardi, and the council owes a duty to schoolchildren as well as property owners.
“You represent the children,” the superintendent said. “The reality is they don't vote but you need to represent them. You need to honor the education they need.”
The rejected measure called for hikes in three different tax rates of about 10 percent. Although residential homeowners qualify for varying levels of “homestead” exemptions, they currently pay at the rate of $13.23 per thousand dollars. Business property is currently taxed at the rate of $32.16 per thousand and would have been subject to a supplemental assessment at the rate of $3.31 per thousand. And business equipment, taxed at $46.58 per thousand, would have faced an additional $4.81 per thousand .