SHUTESBURY — Voters at Saturday’s annual Town Meeting will consider a request to tap into slightly less than half of the town’s $1.69 million in reserves to reduce the long-term borrowing approved in 2015 for a municipal broadband project.
The 37-article warrant also includes a series of zoning changes, including addressing marijuana sales and cultivation, and approval of the town’s fiscal 2020 budget.
Town Meeting begins at 9 a.m. at Shutesbury Elementary School, with a ballot election for town offices at the same location from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m.
The $6.59 million municipal budget is $145,958, or 2.3 percent higher than the current year’s $6.45 million budget. The budget includes an assessment of $1.78 million for the Amherst-Pelham Regional Schools, which is $320 less than this year, and $2.17 million for the elementary school, which is $134,225, or 6.6 percent higher, than this year’s $2.04 million budget.
Town Meeting also must decide whether to continue supporting an alternative funding formula for the regional school district. Some Shutesbury residents are expected to express concern about the formula, though, because they say it has caused the town to absorb higher costs for the middle and high schools in recent years.
The formula must be agreed upon by the four communities that make up the district — Shutesbury, Amherst, Leverett and Pelham. Amherst and Leverett have already adopted the formula, while Pelham will take up the measure May 11.
Former Select Board member Mike Vinskey, of West Pelham Road, is a lead sponsor of a petition hoping to move $750,000 from stabilization and other “rainy day” accounts to pay down the $1.69 million debt for the broadband buildout approved by Town Meeting in May 2015 and a subsequent ballot vote in June 2015.
Vinskey said there is $1.7 million in reserves that could be used to trim these borrowing costs.
“It makes sense to make use of some of that cash to cut down the borrowing,” Vinskey said. “I don’t see any reason we can’t make a decision now on how much we’ll go out to borrow.”
The article is not supported by the Finance Committee and other town officials, who have indicated it would be hasty to drawdown the town’s reserves for this purpose.
Other spending includes $64,354 from the stabilization account to purchase a new chassis for the fire department’s used rescue vehicle, $5,699 in free cash to buy an extractor washer and hanging dryer for fire department’s protective gear and another $2,082 to complete landscape edging around the preschool playground at the elementary school
From the Community Preservation Act, $34,000 will go toward renovations at the Old Town Hall building, which was built in 1829, and $28,000 will be used to create a house for a first-time homebuyer.
The marijuana zoning article would lay out the special permit process for retailers and growers, and set requirements for how far they must locate from homes and schools. The bylaw would limit Shutesbury to two sellers and set the rules for indoor and outdoor growing.
Other zoning articles include restricting the keeping of livestock within 400 feet of Lake Wyola and tweaking the rules and process to approve ground-mounted solar arrays and cell towers.
Three citizen petitions include one calling on the United States to join the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, another to support forming a state commission to study the Massachusetts state seal and endorsing Medicare for All or a single-payer health care system.
The election ballot has just one contested race, for a three-year position on the Cemetery Commission between incumbent Marilyn E. Tibbetts of Pelham Hill Road and challenger Janice S. Stone of Montague Road.
Paul J. Lyons of Old Orchard Road is running for the one-year post as moderator, with incumbent Penelope Kim not seeking reelection.
Incumbents are running unopposed for the remainder of the seats, including Melissa Makepeace-O’Neil of West Pelham Road, for Select Board, Catherine Hilton of Kinder Lane for Board of Health, Marilyn E. Tibbetts for constable, Bradley R. Foster, West Pelham Road, and Michele Regan-Ladd, Wendell Road, for library trustees, and Linda Feduik Rotondo of Leverett Road, Jeffrey R. Lacy of Baker Road and Robert S. Raymond, also of Baker Road, for Planning Board.
No one took out papers for three-year seats on the School Committee and Municipal Light Plant.
Scott Merzbach can be reached at smerzbach@gazettenet.com.