BYRON – Residents will decide whether to place a moratorium on subdivisions when they meet on Monday. They will also decide whether to raise $15,000 to go toward the purchase of a new firetruck, a cost largely responsible for the 25 percent increase in the proposed 2004 municipal budget.

Selectman Bruce Simmons, who is running for his first, full, three-year term, said the $15,000 town match is critical to the town receiving $135,000 to buy a new firetruck pumper. Several town officials wrote a successful grant for the money last year, which will come from the Federal Emergency Management Agency if residents approve the match.

Simmons, a retired Andover Comsat engineer and member of the River Valley Growth Council, is serving out the remaining one year of a three-year term started by longtime former Selectman Roger Boucher. Also up for re-election this year are Town Clerk Rosie White, and Tax Collector and Treasurer Melissa Plourde. Both women are seeking additional one-year terms to their positions. All nominations and elections are from the floor.

Simmons said an article titled Land Subdivision Moratorium Ordinance was put on the warrant to give the town a chance to set up new rules and regulations governing such development.

“This area has been discovered. We’ve had inquiries for subdivisions,” said Simmons.

At the same time, the Planning Board, which has been dormant for nearly a dozen years, is being resurrected.

If all 32 articles are passed by residents, they will have raised almost $109,000, up 25 percent from last year’s nearly $87,000 for running the municipal government.

Among the changes are $2,500 more for maintenance of town cemeteries. Simmons said International Paper donated a half-acre of land next to the current Stockbridge/Mystic Hill Cemetery located on Roxbury Pond Road so the cemetery could expand. The additional money is needed for filling, loaming and planting grass.

An additional $1,000 each has been added the special bridge account and to the capital equipment account, and $1,200 to the town office maintenance account. Also experiencing increases are costs for town employees, solid waste disposal and ambulance services. Reductions, primarily because of carry-over from last year, include those for insurance, schoolhouse repairs, town equipment repairs, highway garage costs and attorney fees.

eadams@sunjournal.com

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