Petitions seek request for money that Selectmen cut
By Caitlyn Kelleher JOURNAL REPORTER

"Not even being able to ask at town meeting is really where I have a problem with it." - LORRAINE EMERSON

The town of Westminster has received three citizen's petitions since the beginning of the month for the Annual Town Meeting.

Two of the articles are going to ask voters to appropriate money that Selectmen and Advisory Board members had eliminated from the proposed list of expenditures for the year.

The articles will ask voters to appropriate $10,000 for the 250h Anniversary Committee and the other would ask for $40,000 for building improvements to the highway garage on Bacon Street.

"Not even being able to ask at town meeting is really where I have a problem with it," said Lorraine Emerson, who started and filed both petitions. "If the town wants to say no, I can accept that."

These two petitions came in on April 1, as a response to the Board of Selectmen's cut of proposed warrant articles at their meeting on March 26.

Emerson, a commissioner for the Department of Public Works and a member of the 250th Anniversary Committee, said she is upset that the articles were removed from the warrant after being requested by "a recognized department and a recognized committee, that is the key here." Emerson said neither group was approached before the articles were removed, even though she was at the Selectmen's meeting the night before.

Emerson said she did not feel like she had any choice but to put the articles on as a citizen's petition. A citizen's petition requires only 10 signatures of registered voters for placement on the annual town meeting warrant and 100 for placement on a special town meeting warrant.

Selectman John Fairbanks says his board and the Advisory Board are the only ones to review all the budget numbers and have the best concept of the entire budget.

"I believe we are in a position where we have to throttle back (the spending)," Fairbanks said. "We'll look at all those things in the fall."

Fairbanks said the budget is tight and that past practice may have to change, and that every request may not make it to the voters every time.

At their March meeting the Selectmen had decided to ask the 250th Anniversary Committee to return with their request for funding in the fall. But they said they would not guarantee its placement on the warrant.

"(The fall town meeting) is too late for us," Emerson said of the 250th Committee. "We need to know if the town supports us or not. Because if they don't, we need to scale back the activities."

Emerson said there are also fundraising efforts to supplement the $30,000 the town has already appropriated, and the additional $10,000 they are asking for this year.

The article for the highway garage building repairs includes the siding, window and door replacement, as well as architectural/ engineering and construction-related costs for emergency backup power.

In past meetings, Selectman Thomas O'Toole has said he wants an entire plan for the building before appropriating any money.

The third petition is a request to rescind the town's wetland bylaw, which strengthens the state's Wetland Protection Act.

The town's bylaw prohibits building alterations to the ground within 25 feet of any resource area on a lot that was created after the date the adoption of the bylaw on May 1, 2004, and for lots created before that date be required to protect public health and safety, or the lot would become unbuildable without the alteration.

The lead petitioner for that article, Harry Redkey, was unreachable for comment.