The warrant for the May 14 Town Meeting was officially closed at the Select Board’s March 29 meeting. The board will meet again April 5 to approve the 32-article document, which contains no surprises. The following are some of the highlights.
Article 2 asks voters to approve the Department of Public Works collective bargaining agreement, which both the town and the DPW union have finally signed, ending a difficult two-year negotiation. Article 3 seeks approval for the less contentious Police Department contract. Articles 8, 9, and 10 ask voters to approve three new town employee positions—assistant director for the Council on Aging, administrative assistant to the land use boards, and assistant accountant.
Fiscal 2023 capital requests total about $1.6 million, all to be funded from the Capital Stabilization and Investment Fund. About half that amount represents School Committee requests, mainly for Bromfield improvements. The other half is about evenly split between Fire Department and DPW items, with a few small requests from other departments. There are no new borrowing articles in the warrant.
In some of the more interesting non-money articles, the town will get to decide if it wants to lease land near Hildreth House to a telecommunications company that would install a cell tower, lease the roof of the new senior center building to a power company that would install solar panels, and increase the town moderator’s term from one year to three years. There is also a citizen petition to officially change the holiday name “Columbus Day” to “Indigenous Peoples’ Day” on all town documents, a move already made by the Harvard Public Schools.
The Select Board also approved polling hours of noon to 8 p.m. for the May 17 Town Election, where voters will choose a town moderator, two Select Board members, two library trustees, one School Committee member, and two Warner Free Lecture trustees. There will also be one question on the ballot regarding modifying the Harvard Charter so that terms for School Committee members will begin on the first day of July following their election. The second session of Annual Town Meeting passed this modification in October 2021, and it was recently approved by the state attorney general. This is the final step needed to make the change to the charter.
