HEBRON — Voters approved an approximate $785,000 municipal budget Saturday as about 40 voters turned out for annual town meeting at the Hebron Station School.
The approved municipal budget includes about a 3 percent raise for town employees.
Voters re-elected incumbents Selectman Dan Eichorn, Moody Library Trustee William Clough and Budget Committee member James Trundy’s, each for a three-year term before turning to the financial and other business also contained in the 55-article warrant.
The majority of voters also gave selectmen authorization to enter into a multiyear contract for a period of not more than three years for the operation of the town’s transfer station. The contract would include the removal of recyclables.
The Oxford County Regional Recycling board of directors voted last year to stop taking recyclables as of June 30 of this year after more than 20 years of service. They intend to disband the organization as soon as they get the necessary number of members towns to vote to disband. Hebron must now find a new place to dispose of its recyclables.
Selectmen told voters they are looking at ways to resolve the recycling issues including contracting with a company to take away the recycles, buying a truck to do it themselves, curbside pickup and other methods.
The vote provided authorization only to look at contracting out the service.
Selectmen Chairman Richard Deans said the town is also looking at a 25-yard compactor truck out of Florida that would cost the town $57,900 and would allow the town to bring the recyclables to a destination themselves.
“We will work out something,” said Dan Eichorn. If the town buys the truck it will deal with the recyclables, If not, the board will look at contracting out the service for both recycling and trash removal.
The purchase of the truck would require special town meeting action.
Voters also agreed to spend $5,000 to buy a mower for the town.
Selectman Jim Reid told voters that last year it cost the town more than $6,000 a year to keep town property mowed last year through an outside contract. This year, the new town garage lawn also has to be mowed.
“It makes some sense to us to mow our own grass,” Reid said.
The majority of voters shot down a request by the Hebron Historical Society to use $5,000 to move and rehabilitate an old railroad building.
Some voters said the building is filled with lead paint, structurally unsound and not worth the effort to move it.
It is not clear yet where the building would go, but Historical Society members say with the limited number of historical buildings in town, this is one of the few remaining pieces of history left in town. They hope to move it perhaps to the Hebron Station School for use by the students at their garden or perhaps the ballfield.
“We don’t have a lot left. Our feeling is we should preserve it as part of the history of the town,” said member Robert Swift.
The Society members agreed that should the building not be repairable they would abandoned their plans.
“It should be done with private donations,” said Selectman Jim Reid who said the in his estimation the building would fall down if attempts were made to move it.
In other action, voters:
- Authorized selectmen to use $41, 365 from the state for the timber harvested at the Sanatorium and $5,503 from the General Fund for the purchase of the bucket loader.
- Agreed to enter into a lease purchase finance agreement for the purchase of a new backhoe so long as the purchase price, after the trade in of the town’s current backhoe does not exceed $81,550.
- OK’d $100,000 for the maintenance of summer roads and $120,00 for the care and maintain care of winter roads.
- $45,000 for the Fire Department’s operation budget and $9,570 for hydrant rental for the protection of structures in Hebron.
- $100,000 for the paving account.
This year, the town is celebrating its 225th anniversary and a special cake was on hand during the lunch break to celebrate. Lunch was served by the Hebron Historical Society, as usual, for a nominal fee.
ldixon@sunmediagroup
Selectmen Chairman Richard Deans, left, and Historical Society vice president Robert Swift, stand behind a cake made to celebrate the town’s 225th anniversary as voters take pictures during a luncheon break at Saturday’s annual town meeting.
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