New Ipswich’s warrant this year includes a request for an additional police officer and petition articles to expand the Select Board and a budget increase cap.
The town’s proposed budget this year is $4.03 million, which is about an 11% increase from the current budget of $3.62 million.
One proposed petition article would put a percentage increase cap on future budgets. Petition articles are written by citizens and placed on the warrant after being supported by at least 25 registered voters, or at least 2% of the total registered voters in town.
The proposed budget cap would limit the annual increase in the town’s operating budget to no more than the percentage change in the U.S. City Average of the Consumer Price Index for all Urban Consumers (CPI-U). This year, that would have been a 2.7% increase.
Articles call for five-member Select Board, new rules for ZBA appointments
There are six articles on the warrant this year that were submitted by citizen petition. Four of the petition articles deal with elected town positions, including one that would increase the Select Board from three positions to five.
Several towns in New Hampshire have five-member boards, including Milford, with a population of just over 16,000. The town of Croydon, with has a population of less than 1,000 people, adopted a five-member board in 2023.
Another article calls for compliance with RSA 673:5, which requires the Select Board to appoint Zoning Board of Adjustment members for three-year terms. Specifically, the article says that members can be reappointed for a second term, but the reappointment must be done prior to the first term’s expiration, and any members not officially reappointed would void any votes they make.
Reappointing ZBA members to their positions was recently part of a series of appeals made by neighbors of a tea party business, Silver Scones. As part of their appeal of the Zoning Board’s approval of the business, one of the allegations made was that sitting members Walker Farrey and David Lage were not regularly reappointed to their positions, and thus were not eligible to vote on the matter.
The town argued that the law allows appointed members to continue in their positions until replaced.
Another article would place term limits on the Zoning Board. If approved, the article would only allow two consecutive three-year terms, or a total of six years. Any current member of the board who has served for six consecutive years on the board or more would be required to resign within 90 days of the article passing, and would not be allowed to be reappointed for a period of three years. Former members also could not be reappointed until at least three years after they last sat on the board.
Another petition article would make it unlawful for any person with a felony plea or conviction to serve in specific town positions, including on the Select Board, as the town administrator, the town clerk, or other positions with accounting responsibilities. Any person with a felony plea or conviction must immediately resign or refuse an election or appointment into one of these positions.
Other articles on the warrant
The town is requesting funds to increase the size of its police force for the coming year. The total cost of the article is $74,914 to create a seventh full-time police officer position, and would pay for half a year’s salary and benefits. If approved, the position would be included in the town’s budget going forward, at a cost of approximately $149,628.
The town is also looking into upgrading and relocating the emergency service communications. The town is seeking authorization to relocate the communications systems to the cell tower located on Old Rindge Road, at a cost of about $180,000.
New Ipswich is continuing its request for funds for roadwork from last year, asking for a total of $600,000 for road maintenance, reconstruction and paving, split between two articles, the same as last year.
Articles for the support of non-town services, including the ambulance and the library, are once again included on the warrant. The Souhegan Valley Ambulance Service is requesting $165,288 for the service this year. This is an increase of about $14,000 from last year.
The New Ipswich Library is requesting $45,000, the same as last year’s request.
In a single article, the town is requesting $391,000 to be contributed to a group of nine capital reserve and expendable trust funds. The largest requests are $95,000 each for the highway and fire department reserves, with $65,000 requested for the police reserve, $50,000 for building maintenance, $30,000 for the revaluation and fire protection equipment reserves, $15,000 for parks and recreation, $6,000 for pool maintenance, and $5,000 for fire department communications.
In a separate article, the town is also requesting to add $15,000 from the sale of the town’s 2001 International fire vehicle into the fire department’s reserve.
The town will hold its deliberative session, where residents can hear, debate, and amend proposed articles, on Feb. 3 at 7 p.m. in the Mascenic Regional High School Auditorium. Final voting on all articles will be held March 10 from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. in the Mascenic Regional High School gymnasium. Voting will also include the election of town officers and voting on proposed zoning amendments.