Thetford’s annual Town Meeting and school meeting will take place starting at 9 a.m. on Saturday, March 3, in the multipurpose room of Thetford Elementary School. On Tuesday, March 6, voters will elect town and school officers and decide on the school district budget and deficit bond by ballot. Polls that day will be open from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. at Thetford Town Hall.
Thetford
If Thetford voters approve the Thetford school budget as proposed, they can expect costs to rise about 2 percent and taxes to rise about 5 percent over the current year’s.
To arrive at the proposed operating budget of $9 million, the School Board had to figure out “how to make some cuts that were sustainable that weren’t going to harm our kids,” said Shannon Darrah, the board’s chairwoman.
The school budget includes a reduction of one classroom teacher and one paraprofessional, as well as reducing the hours of a Spanish teacher position and a librarian, she said.
It also includes increases in special education, vocational education, prekindergarten and debt service to pay off a deficit from the 2016-17 school year, she said.
Despite these increases, Darrah pointed to the state to explain the tax increase. If voters approve the school budget, Thetford can expect to see a nearly 5 percent tax rate increase, bringing the school rate up almost 9 cents to $1.98 per $100 of assessed value, for a total of $4,950 for a home valued at $250,000.
Darrah said 8 cents of Thetford’s increase is due to a statewide education fund deficit.
“We’re being fiscally conservative in our stuff,” Darrah said.
Darrah said she is closely watching as state legislators craft new bills that could change the way the state pays for education. She is hopeful that they won’t put a change into effect that would affect the budget or tax rates as they stand now.
“At least passing this (budget) we have some idea of what it’s going to do” to the property tax rate, she said.
On the town side, voters will be asked to approve spending of $2.56 million, up almost 5 percent over that approved last year.
Primary drivers of the increase include a request from the fire department to begin paying a stipend to members of the Thetford Volunteer Fire Department, health insurance costs, the construction of a sidewalk on Thetford Hill and three months of salary and benefits for a new town manager or administrator, who the Selectboard aims to hire in the fall.
If voters approve the fire department’s request of about $26,000 for the first year of a five-year plan, which is listed as a separate warning article, it will be the first time the town has paid its firefighters, Selectboard Chairman Stuart Rogers said.
“That’s totally new,” he said. “The fire department has been, just as the name implies, volunteer.”
The town received a grant some years ago to construct a sidewalk on Thetford Hill to allow pedestrians to safely walk from the library and post office, Rogers said. Construction is expected to take place this summer and the town will be responsible for a portion of the cost, a one-time payment of $77,575, he said.
Rogers said the Selectboard meets once a week for several hours in order to manage the town’s business. To improve efficiency, the board is proposing to hire a town manager or administrator. Hiring a town manager would require approval by the town’s voters.
Such a vote would come during a Special Town Meeting Rogers expects will take place sometime after July 1, which also will include a bond vote to cover costs related to damage from a storm that took place last July and caused $4.5 million in damages. The town is waiting for federal reimbursement for some of the costs, he said.
Other articles on Thetford’s warning include $39,515 in appropriation requests from social service organizations, the creation of a capital fund for Treasure Island, the creation of a fund for the town’s food shelf, capital funding for the police, fire department and public works; and a non-binding article related to improving energy efficiency in Thetford and beyond.
If voters approve all spending articles, the tax rate is expected to increase 3 cents to 73 cents per $100 of property value. As a result, municipal property taxes for a property valued at $250,000 would rise to $1,825.
There are no contested races on either the town or school side. In fact, no one has filed to run for a two-year Selectboard seat, Town Clerk Tracy Borst said in an email.
Nora Doyle-Burr can be reached at ndoyleburr@vnews.com or 603-727-3213.
