Residents at Naples Annual Town Meeting last Wednesday voted in favor of all but one of the 58 articles on the town’s warrant. This approves the Naples municipal budget for 2005-2006 ($3.03 million) with the exception of $50,000 for Sidewalk Winter Maintenance listed in the failed article.
The failed article concerned plowing, sanding and clearing of snow on sidewalks along Route 302 during the winter season. Prior to the meeting, a group of Naples residents delivered a petition to Town Manager Derik Goodine asking the town to consider a proposal to rid snow from the sidewalks.
Goodine in turn put the decision before the Naples selectmen as to whether or not this issue should go to public referendum. After discussing snow removal costs at the Board of Selectmen meeting on March 21, the board opted to add Sidewalk Winter Maintenance as an article on the town warrant.
After weighing the cost-to-benefit ratio of the sidewalk snow removal, the selectmen, along with the budget committee, recommended a “no” vote on the warrant article. And the voters seemed to follow this recommendation.
“We’re not set up for it,” Selectman Dana Watson said of the sidewalk snow removal. “We don’t have any kind of town crew so we’d have to contract out for it and that would be too expensive. Someday it might be a good thing, but not today.”
Watson said that approval of the $50,000 for sidewalk snow removal would have put the town over the LD1 spending tax cap for Naples.
Another contended article on the warrant that would have put the budget over the tax cap was article 19. This article let the voters decide whether to hire a full or a part-time recreation director for Naples. The board of selectmen recommended that the town hire a full-time recreation director while the budget committee recommended that the town hire a part-time director. In the end, the voters sided with the budget committee, approving $126,780 for the rec department opposed to $147,990.
There was also debate on article 43 to discontinue a portion of Lake House Road. This article gave the Board of Selectmen the authority to give that portion of road to nearby developers in exchange for a straightening of the road. Board of Selectmen Chairman Rick Paraschak cited that Lakehouse Road has been a dangerous and even deadly road in the past because of its bend.
“It’s a win-win for both of us,” Paraschak said of the deal with the developers.
It is still unclear what exact effect the Naples municipal budget for 2005-2006 will have on town’s tax rate. Aside from the department and services budgets, the municipal budget approved a number of new and continued projects for the coming fiscal year. $27,341 was approved for Sheriff patrols of the causeway this summer and $6,000 was approved for future improvements to the causeway. $9,000 will go to dock additions and repairs, and $200,000 will go toward a new sand/salt shed for the town of Naples.
Paraschak said he was refreshed by the “heathly debate” at the annual town meeting and is pleased by the outcome of the municipal budget for 2005-2006.
“I thought the budget was well prepared by the budget committee and the town manager,” Paraschak said. “It was very conservative. I believe we could have been faced with a $1.60 mill rate (increase) and the way it looks now, (the increase) may be as small as 40 cents.”
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