WELD – Residents tweaked, clarified and streamlined several articles as they discussed town business during a four-hour meeting Saturday, not counting the hour break for a turkey dinner.

When the debate was over, they had agreed to raise $183,482.64 for this year’s operations, nearly $3,500 more than last year. They also appropriated $103,121.53 from various accounts, which was $13,112.86 less than the previous year.

Between 35 and 40 people attended the meeting at the town hall.

Residents voted to pursue the nomination of the town hall to the National Register of Historic Places, and to reduce the Wednesday hours at the transfer station.

The initial article was to close the station all day Wednesdays from Nov. 1 to April 1, but it failed. A second article that was introduced also passed: to leave the station open from noon to 4 p.m. on Wednesdays after Jan. 1 to the end of March. The hours will remain the same on Sundays.

Moderator Richard Doughty kept the meeting flowing smoothly, only banging his gavel a few times to keep those gathered on track.

Business was punctuated often with laughter, including Edmund Hutchinson’s suggestion that the bicentennial celebration be held earlier than 2016 because some people might not be able to be there.

Though some people wondered if they needed a comprehensive plan to guide the small, rural town into the future, or $3,300 for a 10-by-16-foot storage shed at the town office, those articles passed.

Voters also approved taking $14,000 from the surplus account for the first of three payments to the Maine Department of Environmental Protection for the $41,000 cleanup of a gas leak. The state waived interest if the town pays that amount, otherwise it would be a 15 percent interest on the amount owed retroactive to Aug. 31, 2006, Selectman Nancy Stowell said.

About 10 yards of contaminated soil was found at the fire station where a pump island at a former gas station had once stood.

Stowell told residents that law dictates that the town pay for the cleanup of the soil.

Voters also approved a building permit fee schedule that ranged from $20 to $75, and an after-the-fact permit fee structure that ranged from $100 to $1,000 a day.