Walpole mulls splitting clerk, tax collector into separate offices
Mar. 5—WALPOLE — Many towns and school districts across the region will hold their annual meetings next week. Here's a look at Walpole's warrant:
Budget proposal: $4,817,011, up $137,207, or 2.9 percent, from the $4,679,804 budget voters approved last year.
Hot topic: A pair of ballot articles consider restructuring the combined roles of town clerk and tax collector, which are currently held by one person. One article asks voters whether to continue that combined office. If a majority opposes that measure, voters in 2024 will elect two separate positions: a town clerk with a three-year term and a tax collector. The selectboard unanimously recommends discontinuing the combined office.
Selectboard Chairwoman Peggy Pschirrer said board members believe it is a convenient time to separate the roles, following the retirement of longtime Town Clerk and Tax Collector Sandy Smith at the end of last year.
Another article applies only if voters opt to end the combined office. In that case, voters will decide Tuesday whether to discontinue the popular election of town tax collector and instead allow the selectboard to appoint someone to that role for one-year terms. The selectboard recommends that article. If it passes, the person elected tax collector in 2024 would serve until the next annual town election, at which point the elected office would end.
Other warrant articles:
*Spend $200,000 from unassigned funds to repaint town hall, repair damage to the building's roof and renovate the North Walpole Branch Library, among other work on municipal structures.
*Raise $200,000 to purchase a truck for the highway department. Half of the funds would come from the town's unassigned funds, with the other half coming from an unspent state highway block grant.
*Take out a $38,000 loan to purchase a new police vehicle and raise $13,000 through general taxation for the first year's payment.
*Replace the existing dog ordinance with new regulations that would establish the standards — as defined by state law — under which people can complain to law enforcement about a dog, and create harsher penalties for owners whose dogs violate those standards. Pschirrer, the selectboard chairwoman, said the new regulations are needed because Walpole received more than 100 complaints last year that dogs were not leashed, including several reports that people had been chased by dogs and multiple instances in which they were bitten.
Contested races: Bill Carmody and Trevor MacLachlan are running for an open seat with a two-year term on the Walpole Planning Board.
Elections: Tuesday, March 9, from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. at Walpole Town Hall and at St. Peter's Church, 38 Church St. in North Walpole.
Town meeting: Saturday, March 13, at 1 p.m. at the Walpole Elementary School gymnasium.
Caleb Symons can be reached at 352-1234, extension 1420, or csymons@keenesentinel.com. Follow him on Twitter @CalebSymonsKS.
