BUCKLAND — Annual Town Meeting voters approved all 17 warrant articles Saturday, including a smaller town budget than what was proposed last year, and authorization for the Selectboard to continue as planned with a street improvement project.
The meeting Saturday morning was held in the parking lot of Mohawk Trail Regional School. Voters stayed in their vehicles for the most part, voting by raising bright orange cards out their windows. Addressing attendees required walking to a microphone, which was sanitized after each use.
Though the warrant had 17 articles, they were grouped into five votable motions, saving time and the formalities of voting related articles separately. The whole meeting took about an hour and a half.
The town’s operating budget for fiscal year 2021 was approved as proposed at roughly $1.7 million — a decrease from the current fiscal year of $35,453. Town Administrator Heather Butler previously said that town financial planners are bracing in case state aid funding drops due to the ongoing pandemic.
Buckland’s contribution to the Mohawk Trail Regional School District’s budget was also approved as proposed at about $2.4 million.
The $10 million street improvement project addresses a 1.7 mile-long corridor along Conway Street, Summer Street, South Street and Conway Road, and is proposed to include widening of the streets, new curbs and new sidewalks that are accessibility code-compliant. The Massachusetts Department of Transportation (MassDOT) is managing the project and coordinating funding.
Voters were asked to authorize the Selectboard to acquire land around the roads for the purpose of the project.
But MassDOT’s plans have not been publicly discussed yet. Butler said a public hearing had been scheduled for March 31, but it had to be canceled due to the then-recent outbreak of the coronavirus in Massachusetts.
The public hearing was rescheduled to an online meeting on July 10 — two weeks after Town Meeting voters were being asked to vote.
“Typically this vote would have been made after a public hearing,” Butler said. “But — well, it’s a pandemic. So things are out of order.”
If the vote were to wait until after the July presentation, she said, it would likely delay the project by as long as a year. (Expected dates for construction were not included in the information provided by MassDOT prior to the July 10 presentation.)
Voters agreed to authorize the Selectboard to acquire any necessary properties.
Reach Max Marcus at mmarcus@recorder.com or 413-930-4231.