Minot Board of Selectmen

Met: Tuesday night

Cable contract

Issue: The town’s contract with Time Warner Cable to provide cable and Internet services within its border is up for renewal in December.

The scoop: Selectmen will ask people serving on the town’s cable contract renewal committee to sign up at the March 7 town meeting and will officially appoint members of that committee at their regular March 9 meeting. The intent is to have the committee hold a public hearing March 25 to gain input on what people would like to see in a new contract.

Disaster reimbursement

The scoop: Road Manager Arlan Saunders said the town should receive a check for $59,476.55 from federal officials for the December storms within two weeks. He noted that he doesn’t expect money owed by the state to be paid this year. The state’s share for the December disaster is $11,895.31, which added to the $18,557.87 the state owes for the August washouts, chiefly in the West Minot area, totals $30,453.18. Most likely the town could see the funds in another budget year.

Road salt

The scoop: Last September when the bid price for road salt came in at $73.43 per ton – a 35 percent increase over the $54.53 per ton that the town paid a year ago – Saunders vowed he would use less salt in the mixture that he would put on roads as a way to contain costs. At this point Saunders estimates that even having to deal with a rather difficult winter, he will wind up reducing the amount of salt used by between 15 and 20 percent.