The Select Board Wednesday nixed two articles proposed by a committee researching the possibility of creating a town safety complex, saying the timing was premature.
The idea of a safety complex to house the town’s police, fire and emergency management has been tossed around for years, and for the past year, a committee has been working on identifying locations and determining its needs and feasibility.
The board decided it was too early for the town to consider any warrant articles pertaining to a safety complex that is likely at least 10 years down the road.
“They haven’t yet come to a time when they’ve determined what their purpose is,” said Select Board Chair Lee Mayhew on Wednesday, during a discussion of the warrant articles the town is proposing for March Town Meeting.
The committee requested that the board consider a warrant article that would give the authority to the Select Board to purchase land or property, and a second article that would open a capital reserve account for a safety complex, and place $10,000 in that reserve.
The board decided not to place either article on the warrant, declaring it too early in the process, as well as expressing the opinion that any land buys should be done at Town Meeting with the approval of the public, rather than just the board’s authority.
The board also decided not to support or include in the warrant an article that would have discontinued Scout Road, a dirt road that provides access to the preserved Rose Mountain. The Conservation Commission has requested that the road be closed off to prevent vehicles accessing Rose Mountain and deteriorating the trails.
If members of the committee or any other citizens wish to see the articles on the warrant, they can submit it to the board by petition, noted Mayhew. Petition warrant articles must be submitted by Feb. 7.
The town anticipates purchasing a new fire rescue vehicle this year, although the board did not unanimously agree upon the article. An article to withdraw $149,000 from capital reserves to purchase the truck was supported 2-1 by the board to replace the department’s 2002 vehicle. The board did not support a request by the fire chief to keep the 2002 vehicle as a back-up, arguing that there is no place to store that vehicle, and noting that it is not used often enough to make it necessary.
In another article, the town asks to convert a capital reserve originally meant to finance Lyndeborough’s portion of closing the Wilton landfill into a reserve for the replacement of fire department equipment. The account holds about $82,000, and Mayhew noted that would not be sufficient to cover the cost of closing the landfill, which would likely have to be bonded if it were to ever occur.
The town intends to add to multiple capital reserve accounts for the eventual replacement of town vehicles:
$19,000 for the replacement of the 1994 Fire Department pumper
$40,000 for the 1984 Fire Department tanker
$20,000 for the 2008 Volvo dump truck
$8,000 for the 2008 backhoe
$6,000 for the 2016 Highway Department one-ton truck
$16,000 for the 2016 mid-sized dump truck