The Board of Selectmen will most likely take up the question of whether to buy the 36-year-old ladder truck that the Fire Department is now leasing at the board’s next meeting on July 14, Chairman Ron Ricci said in a phone interview this week.
The budget for fiscal 2015 is already set, and it does not include money to buy the ladder truck, which Ricci expects to cost about $23,000 all together, including needed certifications and repairs. Rollstone Bank has offered a grant of $5,000 toward the purchase.
Several selectmen, as well as members of the Capital Planning and Investment Committee, have mentioned using money from the Rantoul Trust for the engine. Albert Rantoul, a longtime Harvard resident who owned a chicken farm on Stow Road, left that trust to the town about 25 years ago. As of June 30, 2014, according to the 2014 Annual Town Report issued this spring, the trust held $191,156.
The Rantoul Trust is “the only avenue to purchase the truck,” Ricci said. “There are no other discretionary funds.”
Selectwoman Lucy Wallace, however, said in a phone call that she had expected the purchase to be made with money from the stabilization fund, which covers unexpected expenses. She said that although she had not read the Rantoul Trust provisions, her understanding was that it was intended for town buildings. Buying the engine is “outside the scope of what I thought the trust was for,” Wallace said.
Purchase pending
No firm decision on the purchase has yet been made, Ricci said, explaining that he is concerned about the truck’s age. Any need Harvard has for a ladder truck, he said, is currently handled through mutual aid with Ayer or Devens.
Buying the engine won a limited endorsement of the Capital Planning and Investment Committee, whose members voted to put a $5,000 ceiling on yearly repairs to the truck. The issue was expected to go to the Finance Committee Wednesday evening, July 8. Although the purchasing decision is up to the Board of Selectmen, the Finance Committee must factor the cost of maintaining an additional fire engine into the town’s omnibus budget in future years.
