PERU — Voters approved a $1.4 million 2022-23 municipal budget Tuesday, which includes a process to replace a 33-year-old fire truck, according to outgoing Select Board Chairperson Tammi Lyons.
All but two of 47 articles were approved.
Town officials were up all night counting the results by hand.
“The budget is a little higher, but we have some large pieces in there,” said Lyons.
The town approved $100,000 to go toward a revaluation, and $46,000 for repairs to the town office parking lot. However, they did not approve spending up to $28,000 for a used 4×4 pickup for the highway department.
Daniel Carrier Jr. was elected the new fire chief, defeating fellow town firefighter Corey Mills, 204-95. He will complete the final year of a three-year term by Bill Hussey, who has retired.
The town will also have three new Select Board members.
Kathryn Lawrence ran unopposed for a three-year term. Patrick Houghton (189 votes) defeated Kevin Taylor (65) and Kimberly Truitt (39) to complete the final two years of a three-year term. And Arthur Clifford (177) defeated John Witherell (108) for the last year of a three-year term.
For Regional School Unit 56, Angela Cushman (288) defeated John Witherell (108) for a three-year term on the board of directors, with Deanna Dolloff (211) defeating Tina Courway (77) for the last two years of a three-year term.
Lyons said the highest priority is replacing Engine 12, the oldest of three fire trucks. “It’s the truck that’s down to the (Worthley) pond. It’s been good up to this point. It’s just finally wearing out,” said Lyons.
She said the cost of the truck will not exceed $300,000.
“We’re looking to fund half the purchase of the truck with the (American Rescue Plan Act) money, but the town has to vote on the usage of that money,” she said.
Lyons said the truck recently got new tires and had some work done to it, but it’s still usable, “so it’s giving us the time to find a truck that meets our needs.”
She added, “It needs to be replaced, so we’re trying to be proactive before we don’t have a truck that we can use at all.”
Regarding the $100,000 approved to go toward a revaluation, Lyons said, “Last year, we asked for $150,000 to do a townwide revaluation, which was voted down.”
She said that after talking to assessors recently, “There’s no way we could get on an agenda to have a reval done before 2024, and they anticipated our costs at that point would be around $200,000.”
Lyons said the idea behind this article is to start building toward that.
“So if we could put $100,000 in this year’s budget, hold the balance, then if they put $100,000 in the budget the year after, at that point would fund the reval, which needs to be done,” she said.
Lyons said she believes the last time the town had a full revaluation was 22 years ago. Revaluations are typically made every 10 years or so.
“It desperately needs to be done,” Lyons said.
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