Selectboard adds articles to March ballot

By COURTNEY LAMDIN | Staff Writer
mireporter@mac.com

Several articles will appear on this year’s Town Meeting Day ballot.

The board approved adding on to the March ballot a $1.6 million proposal to expand the Milton Public Library and $250,000 in bonds to fix 900 feet of West Milton Road. Also included is an option to establish a reserve fund to computerize and restore municipal records.

If the articles pass, taxpayers will not pay a higher tax rates in fiscal year 2011 – the cost would be incurred in following years’ budgets, said John Cushing, town clerk and treasurer.

Library expansion

This year voters can choose to support a $1.6 million expansion for the library that would double its size.

Cushing estimates that if a 20-year bond were taken out, it will raise the tax rate by about 2 cents, including interest.

Librarians Fran Ferro and Kathy Dulac said the library has run out of space – shelves cover the windows, and it’s become difficult to schedule programs without disrupting the other patrons.

“Right now we really have to limit what we can do and when we can do it,” Dulac said.

The library’s new concept map, furnished by Black River Design, shows an extension of the building toward Park Place and two wings on the building’s north and south sides. These will not impact the parking lot or road, Ferro said; only the Memorial Garden would need to be moved.

The south wing would hold adult fiction and non-fiction books, and the north wing would house a separate meeting room, kitchen and restrooms. The front office and storage space would also be expanded.

The meeting room will provide a quiet space to hold story time and do crafts, with access to a sink, Dulac said.

“If we’re going to do a paint project or papier-mâché, I just need that space, and we’ve never had that here,” Dulac said.

In 2009, the library held 599 adult and children programs with 10,289 attendees.

The tough economy draws more people to the library for its free books and programs, Ferro and Dulac said. There were almost 6,100 people in 2009 who used the computers but struggled to find room to work. The total library visits number 31,720.

“If you’re trying to write a résumé, you’re balancing on your lap, or children are doing reports on their homework, and there’s no wiggle room,” Ferro said, adding the new design would incorporate more room for desktops and workspaces for people who bring laptops.

Library staff has struggled to provide these workspaces.

“We’re at the point now that we have to take that space away if we want to expand our collection,” Dulac said. That collection now stands at 38,677 in books, tapes and other resource materials.

Dulac hopes the public will support the project, she said.

“It’s one of the things in town that you can really see your tax dollars at work,” she said.

Road improvements

West Milton Road could see some improvements if voters pass this ballot item, which asks for $250,000 to reconstruct and pave 900 feet of the street.

Road improvements are usually funded from the general fund's capital improvement plan, but “the cost of financing this project is too great to be paid out of the ordinary annual income and revenue of the Town of Milton,” the board’s resolution states.

If paid upfront, this project could add about 2 cents onto a future year’s tax rate, Cushing said.

Municipal records fund

Rather than charging taxpayers to restore and computerize municipal records, the town hopes to set up a reserve fund to pay this expense.

The town would create this fund through a portion of its $10 per page recording fee for mortgage deeds – some can be 30 pages long.

“For every $10 we collect, $3.50 will go into the reserve fund,” said John Cushing, town clerk and treasurer. “As we [computerize] our records, we will use that revenue that goes into that reserve to pay that expense, and the taxpayer will not pay a penny.”

The remaining $6.50 would go into the general fund as revenue for the town.

Previously, the town set aside $1 per page for computerization. If approved by voters, the fund would be retroactive to July 1, 2009.

Over the years, towns like Milton have worked to increase recording fees to offset computerization and restoration efforts – a cost Cushing described as “major.”

If this account had been activated last year, $38,565.77 in recording fees would have been generated for computerization, Cushing said.

The town’s goal is to first preserve land records going back 40 years, he said.

“There’s nothing more important for anyone who owns land than the land records,” Cushing said, adding the computerization efforts will make it easier to do title searches.