Farmington Town Meeting Focuses on Bonding Questions

Just 66 people attended the Farmington Annual Town Meeting Monday. And only a handful spoke on the proposed 2013-14 town operating budget or the bonding questions.  

But those who did all spoke favorably and several offered suggestions on how officials might sell the public on the budget and the capital projects proposed for bonding.  

In addition to education about the town’s financial health and the school system’s notable test scores and achievement - detailed in presentations by town officials - speakers told officials that any literature sent to the public should underscore the importance of the bonding items.  

“The important thing is you need to know the question is there on the ballot and don’t skip over it,” Liz Fitzsimmons said during public comment on the question of $3 million appropriation for road repairs. “Remember it’s on the ballot; remember you need to answer yes so you’ll have the roads.”  

She went on to speak in support of the other two bonding items – a $1.1 million heating plant for Irving A Robbins and a bundled $1.375 million bonding package at the middle school including an emergency generator, parking lot repairs and new tennis courts.  

“Fill in the bubble for yes. Don’t drop off after three. Fill in yes for all three questions on May 2,” Fitzsimmons said.  

While she – as the president of Farmington Future - spoke in support of each question, a few residents got up to speak in favor of the projects individually.

Pierre Guertin said that the powerful storms of the past few years made many realize that emergency generators are necessary, though not necessarily affordable for every family.  

“Your community is the next line of support and to be able to have folks on the east side of town have access to shelter when the other side of town is not accessible, I think is critically important,” Guertin said. “Instead of paying the $4-5 grand at your own house, this is going to cost you probably $10-20 per year and help everyone.”  

Proposed is an emergency generator that could be installed at Irving Robbins to make the middle school a second emergency shelter. Flooding during the recent two 100-year storms revealed that flooding on Route 4 could cut off residents from the high school, the town’s current emergency shelter.  

Sarah Willett also favored the generator for IAR.   “I used to live on Basswood so it was no problem to get to the high school. But now I live on Garden Street. If the river floods, I’m not going to get to Farmington High School,” she said.  

Willett recommended showing a map of town that would point out why the second shelter would be necessary in cases of flooding.  

Ann Newbury asked why the emergency generator at IAR was not also bundled with the other IAR projects. Council Chairman answered “with the most honest answer” he could give: “This thing needs to pass.”  

“When we saw the state of this heating plant from 1950, I hearkened back to my childhood days when my mother used to read me Mike Mulligan’s steam shovel,” Hogan said. “It needs to get done and if it gets lumped in with other items and fails, we have a substantial problem.”  

In fact, the project was originally included in the IAR package but was pulled out for fear it would fail.  

The three bonding questions and budget referendum make four questions for residents to answer yes or no on May 2. See the actual ballot here.