MINOT — Town Administrator Arlan Saunders said he expects to begin selling cemetery plots in the expanded Center Hill Cemetery next week.

“There are 40 or 50 people on the list already so I’ll be sending out letters, 10 or so a week, having them set up appointments,” he told selectmen at their meeting Monday.

Selectmen voted Monday to accept the cemetery committee’s recommended plot deed and interment forms as well as specifications for monument foundations.

Saunders noted that specifications were developed that committee members hope will deal with the high clay content of the soils on Center Minot Hill. The clay can cause considerable frost heaving, which pushes stone monuments out of line.

Specifications call for a two-inch rigid Styrofoam board to be placed beneath the four-inch concrete pad on which the monument would be set.

“Originally they had been talking about putting in a bed of pea-sized gravel, but, set into a clay soil, that could just fill up with water and really cause a frost heave problem,” Saunders said.

Saunders noted that the committee is looking for ideas on a design for a memorial garden, which would be located at the top of the cemetery, fairly near Center Minot Hill Road.

Saunders also reported that the winter sand pile is up and at an overall cost that is a little less than what it cost the town eight or 10 years ago.

The total cost for 3,500 cubic yards of sand — with salt added and a covering tarp purchased and in place — is $32,752.

“The cost for salt was the same as last year, sand was a few pennies a yard less and the cost for the tarp was up a little,” Saunders said.

He estimated that, with sand left over from last year, the town has about 5,000 cubic yards all piled and ready for the first storm that blows in.

The Board of Appeals, Saunders advised selectmen, will meet at 6 p.m. Tuesday, Nov. 9, to consider developer Chuck Starbird’s appeal of the board’s refusal in September to reverse the town’s code enforcement officer’s decision denying Starbird a building permit for his property off the end of York Road.

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