By DAN TOMASELLO
LYNNFIELD — The Select Board closed the Spring Town Meeting warrant during a March 25 meeting.
Spring Town Meeting will take place on Monday, April 29, beginning at 7 p.m. in the Lynnfield Middle School auditorium. A quorum of 175 voters is needed for Town Meeting to proceed.
Assistant Town Administrator Bob Curtin gave an overview of the 15-article warrant. He said Article 6 headlines the warrant, which will ask Spring Town Meeting to approve the recommended fiscal year 2025 operating budget. The $69,882,770 operating budget for FY25 represents a 4 percent increase over FY24’s $65,737,091.18 spending plan.
Curtin said Article 7 pertains to the $1,638,570 capital budget for the next fiscal year. The FY25 capital budget includes $300,000 for road construction, $120,000 for a Ford F-550 dump truck for the Department of Public Works, $60,000 for a police cruiser, $100,000 to have the seats at Lynnfield High School reupholstered and $125,000 for school technology.
The FY25 capital budget also includes $110,000 to raze the historic Danforth House that is located near the Reedy Meadow Golf Course. The capital budget also includes $180,00 for a fire alarm bucket truck, $30,000 for Pillings Pond algae treatment and $15,000 for a new phone system for the Lynnfield Public Library.
Traffic committee proposed
Curtin said Article 15 is a citizens’ petition that would create a Traffic Safety Advisory Committee (TSAC). Main Street resident Tom Manning submitted the citizens’ petition.
“The TSAC is an advisory committee reporting to the Select Board,” states Article 15. “The purpose of the TSAC will be to evaluate public safety and nuisance issues involving traffic, roads and related infrastructure in the town. A monthly meeting forum will allow for townspeople to bring forward issues that will be heard and reviewed by the committee and conduct any business related to its function as described in this article. The TSAC’s primary function will be to facilitate issue resolution and communications between townspeople and the Select Board.”
If Spring Town Meeting approves Article 15, the TSAC will be required to give a monthly report about traffic issues as well as recommendations for “resolving each issue” to the Select Board. The TSAC would also be required to give a quarterly report about “the status of all issues” to the Select Board.
“The Select Board will appoint four members who are town employees or officials with responsibility for traffic, roads or related infrastructure and three resident members who are not employees or officials of the town of Lynnfield,” states Article 15. “The Select Board will exercise best efforts to select the three resident members from areas of town with higher incidence of traffic safety issues, as determined by the Select Board. The chair of the TSAC will be named by the Select Board and rotate every three years or otherwise and necessary to ensure successful operations of the committee.”
Remaining articles
Curtin said Article 1 will ask Town Meeting to approve the annual Town Report. Article 2 will choose all town officers “not required to be chosen by ballot,” which are three field drivers, one pound keeper and three wood measurers.
“These are ceremonial positions that date back to Colonial days,” said Curtin about Article 2.
Curtin said Article 3 will request Town Meeting to approve the salaries for the Board of Assessors and the Select Board, which are the only boards in town that get paid. The Select Board chair will be receiving $850 while the other two Select Board members will be getting $750 each. The Board of Assessors chair will receive $4,150 and the other two members will be getting $3,550.
“These haven’t changed for many years and the last time they were changed, they went down,” said Curtin.
Curtin said Article 4 will ask Spring Town Meeting to “vote to raise and appropriate or appropriate by transfer from available funds, sums of money to supplement certain accounts in the current 2024 fiscal year budget where balances are below projected expenditures for various reasons.”
Article 5 will request Spring Town Meeting to pay overdue bills from a prior fiscal year.
“Town Accountant/Assistant Finance Director Julie McCarthy is working on both of those articles,” said Curtin about Articles 4 and 5.
Curtin said Article 8 will request Spring Town Meeting to authorize appropriating $100,000 to the Stabilization Fund, which is the town’s rainy day fund.
According to the warrant, Article 9 will request Town Meeting to appropriate funds to the Emergency Medical Service Enterprise Fund’s budget. Article 10 will request Town Meeting to allocate funds from “Golf Enterprise receipts and/or Golf Enterprise Retained Earnings to pay expenses and contractual services required to operate the Reedy Meadow Golf Course and King Rail Golf Course.”
“Both of those are funded through receipts that come in from those services,” said Curtin.
Curtin said Article 11 will set spending limits for the town’s revolving funds. The limit for the Council on Aging’s revolving fund totals $125,000. The Board of Health’s revolving fund’s limit is $15,000. The Lynnfield Public Library’s revolving fund limit totals $10,000. Lynnfield Recreation’s revolving fund limit equals $425,000. The DPW’s fields’ revolving fund limit totals $100,000. The DPW’s revolving fund limit for the Al Merritt Media and Cultural Center is $10,000, and the Tree Replacement Fund is $10,000.
“The departments use the money to fund various programs that the money came in for,” said Curtin.
Curtin said Article 12 will ask Spring Town Meeting to accept provisions of the BRAVE Act by “addressing compensation and benefits to town employees in the service of the armed forces of the commonwealth or a reserve component of the armed forces of the United States.”
“The BRAVE Act is a state law that local communities can adopt and many have,” said Curtin. “It reflects the state’s policy of when someone goes into active duty, they get paid for their regular salary for a brief period of time. The town pays the difference between the salary they would earn here and what they are getting paid for their military service. This is something we discussed with the Lynnfield Police Association during contract negotiations, and we said we would present this to the voters. This affects very few of our employees. It’s not a major financial commitment that we are making.”
Curtin said Article 13 would incorporate the town’s building fees into the General Bylaws.
“Over the last couple of years, we have tried to put our fee structure into our bylaws,” said Curtin. “Town Meeting voters said they would rather have us set fees through the bylaws than having each department do that with the Select Board’s approval. We are bringing the current building fees before the voters at Town Meeting.”
Article 14 will accept Sagamore Place on upper Main Street as a public way. Select Board Chair Joe Connell said accepting Sagamore Place as a public way will allow the DPW to maintain the street, plow snow and collect trash and recycling.