MINOT – With 327 registered voters signing in, Saturday’s annual town meeting turnout may well have set a record.

“That’s a whole lot more than the 120 who attended last year and I can’t remember anything like it in the 13 years I have been registrar,” said Registrar of Voters Hester Gilpatric.

Selectman Eda Tripp couldn’t recall a greater number in years beyond 13. “We had some crowded meetings when we used to be at the West Minot Grange Hall, but I don’t believe that fully packed the Grange Hall could even hold 300.”

Gilpatric suggested some credit for the increase should be given to the 16 eighth-graders who, under the direction of teachers Sandy Ferland and Lori Hibbard, tended to some 47 children while their parents were taking care of town business.

In one of the first items for action, the tradition of holding the annual town meeting in March remained constant with the defeat of a proposal to change the town’s fiscal year to coincide with the state’s school funding year and which would require a later town meeting date.

One of the meeting’s lighter moments came when, in the interest of preserving another local tradition, townspeople nudged Charlie Clifford into making the motion for funding the town’s street light account.

While the street light article came with the recommendation that $2,000 be appropriated, Clifford made a motion to raise no money.

When, after a show-of-hands vote, town meeting moderator John Geismar announced the motion for no money had carried, chairman of the selectmen George “Buster” Downing, perplexed and perhaps moderately concerned, pointed out that the town might be in somewhat of a legal tickle if it simply turned off its dozen or so strategically placed street lights.

“Perhaps there is some way we can reconsider this,” suggested Downing.

Geismar said he could accept a motion from someone who had been on the prevailing side in the previous vote.

Declaring himself as one who had voted in the affirmative, Clifford made a motion for $2,000.

It passed.

Townspeople also accepted the final portion of Star Drive Extension as a town road and rejected an amendment to the road ordinance that would have allowed a subdivision developer to obtain building permits for lots on an unaccepted street provided the developer had given the town a performance guarantee bond to cover proper completion of the street.

Accepted were ordinance amendments that require holders of building permits to begin work within two years and to complete the exterior portion of any construction within two years of the construction start date. An amendment also specifies that payment of the town’s development impact fee will be made at the time the building permit is issued.

Voters also approved $5,000 for work on the existing Minot Memorial Park ball field and authorized selectmen to appoint a recreation committee to oversee recreational uses of all town land. The immediate focus of the committee’s work will be the use of the 76 acres between the school and town office lots.

Approval was given to forming a committee to review the town’s comprehensive plan and all ordinances. Ten thousand dollars was earmarked for contracting technical help in the review.