The chair of the Planning Board last week stopped by a meeting of the Finance Committee to defend the planners' recent activities to promote economic diversity and growth in town.
The Finance Committee is hoping to finally complete a years-long effort to consolidate and update fees and fines that have been scattered throughout the city's ordinances.
Finance Committee Chair Jodi-Lee Szczepaniak-Locke shared parting words with the Select Board last Monday after informing the board she would resign after the 2025 budget is resolved.
Carla Fosser and Charles "Chuck" Lewitt were appointed earlier in January by Town Moderator Ronald Boucher, filling posts that had been vacant for at least two years.
The committee has already sent out letters to department heads about returning budgets by Feb. 15. Committee Chair Jodi-Lee Szczepaniak-Locke said she hopes to reduce the budget as much as possible.
Town Manager Tom Hutcheson told the Finance Committee on Wednesday that he is proposing a hike employee wages as a retention tool and add new positions.
The TIF will provide 100 percent forgiveness of the incremental increase in property taxes resulting from the construction of a building expansion in the first and second years and decrease by 20 percent every two years.
The committee voted Tuesday to suggest the Board of Selectmen add the change to a special town meeting warrant. Town Administrator Jay Green said there should be a special town meeting sometime in mid-November.
Article 1 authorizes the town to pay $8,643 in sewer and debt expenses not anticipated in time for the annual town meeting and Article 3 would move $2,066 from free cash to the Miscellaneous Grants account to cure a deficit. This is a deficit from a prior year so only a majority vote is required for this to pass.
Green said finance committees in other communities in the state generally have less than 10 members. He noted that both Finance Committee Chair Carol Cushenette and Vice Chair Timothy R. Burdick favor decreasing the committee's size.
Dan Caplinger, who has in the past raised concerns about how the town funded settlements with former employees that arose out of a series of lawsuits against the town again stated his case on Wednesday night.