MARCH 16 EDDINGTON SELECTMEN'S MEETING & PUBLIC HEARING

The second of two Public Hearings took place last night at the Town Office to review the proposed 2010-2011 Town Budget. The suggestions/corrections discussed at the March 2 Public Hearing have been incorporated. At last night's meeting Susan Shane asked some budgeting questions regarding various figures - one in particular pertaining to cost savings in personnel health insurance. That correction will be made from the floor at the Town Meeting so people can vote on the corrected (and lower) figure for the budget.

It was also noted that if voters want to participate in deciding on the Moderator for the Town Meeting, they need to be at the Town Office by 7:58AM on March 29 since THAT decision (vote) will be done promptly at 8:00AM. It seems that we voters can participate in that selection - BUT we need to be there at the appointed time of others will make the decision for us.

The Town's Wind Mill Moratorium, as developed by the Town's Planning Committee, was submitted at the Public Hearing as well. According to the Town Manager, the Planning Committee has been working long hours on the ordinance since last July and is "close" to having the ordinance completed - but "close" isn't done so the Moratorium will, in essence, put a Hold on any permits being issued (up to 180 days) allowing time for the Planning Committee to finish its work. While the State has put out a Basic Ordinance, the Town's Planning Committee feels, after much Due Diligence, there are several areas where some fine tuning is needed.

Having completed the Public Hearing at 6:30p, the group went into a regular Selectmen Meeting with an agenda. There were 17 people in attendance in addition to the full Board of Selectmen and the Town Manager. Therefore, at the first "Public Access", this writer took the advantage of sharing some of the essential "questions & issues" evolving from the school board's joint meetings of the Budget & Finance Committee with the Financial Advisory Board over the past two weeks. The BOTTOM LINE was to encourage more people to attend the remaining meetings of the joint committee to see and hear what was going on and being discussed.

Karen Clark continued with a review of topics being "considered" to meet the coming budget crunch as part of her School Board Report.

Under the Board of Selectmen's New Business was the passage of a motion to Send Letters to State Senator Richard Rosen and House Representative Ben Pratt - the issue being the pending tax penalty of $180,000 (which will be withheld by the state - in addition to the other funding the state will fail to send as its share of the district's public education - thereby increasing the amount via property taxes we will be required to pay toward the school district's 2010-2011 budget).

The meeting concluded at approximately 7:15pm