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FALLS VILLAGE — The Board of Finance cut some $28,099 from the Board of Selectmen’s proposed spending plan for 2024-25 at a three-hour special meeting Wednesday, April 24.
Finance chair David Wilburn started off by saying the board had to strike “a balance between delivering expected services and the cost of those services.”
“A budget is not just a collection of numbers. It is an expression of our values and aspirations.”
During public comment there was support for more funding from the town for the David M. Hunt Library.
The board then proceeded through the spending plan, line by line.
The library came up again. finance board member John Steines said that the library requested a 40% increase in funding. The selectmen reduced the increase to 30%, which is still more of a percentage increase than other services.
As the meeting wound down, Steines said, “This is not the way to run budgets.”
He proposed that the finance board meet with all departments throughout the year to discuss their spending needs. “We’ll be poised to do a better job” next year, Steines said.
The Board of Finance will hold another special meeting Monday, April 29, to discuss the education spending plan and recommend both municipal and education plans to a public hearing.
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SALISBURY — The 2024-25 budget proposals for municipal and education spending are set and will be the subject of a hybrid (in-person and online) town meeting Wednesday, May 8 at 7:30 p.m.
The public hearing was Monday, May 22. There was one question, about the transfer station.
After the hearing the Board of Finance voted unanimously to present the Board of Selectmen’s budget of $8,619,572 (an increase of $401,742 or 4.8%) and the Board of Education’s budget of $6,535,939 (an increase of $195,665 or 3.09%) to the town meeting.
Salisbury’s Region One assessment for 2024-25 is $4,412,718, an increase of $236,606 (5.67%).
Total education spending for 2024-25 is $10,948,657, an increase of $432,271 (4.11%).
The Region One referendum is Tuesday, May 7, with voting at Town Hall from noon to 8 p.m.
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FALLS VILLAGE — Eric Veden’s newest Falls Village video is out.
Episode 32 kicks off with Kenny Rogers, who describes himself as a permanent New York resident with a home in Falls Village.
A firefighter by profession (albeit with a law degree), Rogers came to Falls Village in 2004 and got married here, at the South Canaan Meeting House.
Rogers said he worked in the same place for 22 years. “Everything was pretty good, until 9/11.”
On that fateful day, Rogers’ truck and crew were called into action after the second plane hit the World Trade Center.
“When we got down there, the traffic was extremely compliant. Never saw anything like it.”
The firefighters who responded ahead of Rogers’ crew died. Veden asked how he felt about that.
Rogers says, “I’m alive.”
“I have so much, and so many lost everything. So I took it well. There were many people who did not take it well.”
Rachel Gall, student of astrophysics, middle school science teacher, farmer and fiddler is next, complete with dog.
She recalls her 10th grade year at a kibbutz in Israel. Not initially excited by the prospect, she was ultimately glad for the experience.
“There aren’t too many of them left,” she says. “I got to work on a tropical fish farm.”
She currently works as a middle school science teacher in New Milford.
The viewer is next taken on a mushroom foraging adventure at Adamah Farm at the Isabella Freedman Jewish Retreat Center.
Mushroom expert Carly Sugar provides hands-on demonstrations and running commentary, with plenty of clear video to illustrate.
The next segment is a visit with the Falls Village Volunteer Fire Deparytment, with Michelle Hansen and Andrea Downs pitching the department’s ongoing 100th anniversary celebration and associated activities. Think small children deploying water squirting devices far superior to any squirt gun.
Episode 32 concludes with a visit with Catherine Palmer Paton, starting in her family home. In the kitchen, to be exact.
“We’d have 30 people in here.” The children would put on talent shows, and her father would say “This isn’t a gymnasium.”
“Well, it should be!”
The Falls Village videos are available for borrowing or for sale at the David M. Hunt Library and can also be seen on YouTube.
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NORTH CANAAN — The proposal to create a 20-lot subdivision along the Housatonic River is back on the agenda for the Planning and Zoning Commission.
After several public hearings in the fall of 2023, the application was withdrawn and amended based on commission, resident, and professional feedback. The proposal from contractor Allied Engineering was once more put to public hearing in Town Hall Monday, April 22.
The applicant is seeking approval to split the property, owned by Bruce McEver, into 20 buildable lots and to construct a new road built to town standards. The road will eventually be transferred to town ownership.
Drawings at the Public Hearing showed theoretical 5-bedroom houses on the lots, but the application is not seeking permission to build any homes.
The proposed road will be 26 feet wide and will have fire hydrants installed every 500 feet. A homeowners assocation (HOA) would be created for the subdivision.
The Inland Wetlands Commission has reviewed the amended application and approved it. There will be a conservation easement stretching 300-feet from the river’s edge to protect the inner corridor from construction. River-adjacent properties will own a portion of the conserved land, but the easement itself will be deeded to a land use group and a brush-cleared walking path will be added along the river.
During the fall hearings, many residents expressed concern over the use of Highland Lane (a private, dirt road) as the sole access to the subdivision. In response, the applicant has agreed to pave Highland Lane from Honey Hill Road to the proposed new road.
More than a dozen citizens raised lingering concerns and questions at the April 22 hearing, most related to the plans for Highland Lane.
“I am strongly opposed to the Town of North Canaan taking over a private road,” said Sue Boults. “No where in the Plan of Conservation and Development does it say that North Canaan wants to take over more roads or build more roads.”
Housatonic Valley Association’s Julia Rogers offered advice on alternative ways to structure the conservation easement: “Management of a conservation easement that crosses multiple parcels and doesn’t have road access can be really challenging for a land trust or other entity to manage and enforce. A better solution would be a single parcel that connects directly to the road.”
Naturalist and area conservationist Tom Zetterstrom thanked McEver for his efforts to remediate the property from invasive species. He asked clarifying questions about the land easement, which will be answered when the hearing continues May 13 at 7 p.m. in Town Hall.
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