{"id":46780,"date":"2023-10-26T14:24:25","date_gmt":"2023-10-26T14:24:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thelandmark.com\/?p=46780"},"modified":"2023-10-26T14:24:25","modified_gmt":"2023-10-26T14:24:25","slug":"sterling-oks-8-of-9-warrant-items","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/2023\/10\/26\/sterling-oks-8-of-9-warrant-items\/","title":{"rendered":"Sterling OK's 8 of 9 warrant items"},"content":{"rendered":"
By Jan Gottesman<\/em>
\nThe Item<\/em><\/div>\n

STERLING \u2014 The special town meeting of Oct. 16 was initially called to address a citizens\u2019 petition, but the warrant grew to nine articles.<\/p>\n

Voters approved all but one article, to amend the regional school agreement to reflect the latest population figures, which includes weighted voting.<\/p>\n

Four of the five member towns must approve the change.<\/p>\n

According to School Committee member Linda Woodland, while the make-up of the committee is reviewed every five years, and the make-up was set to be changed at the upcoming May election from 19 to 16, the committee was hoping to make it closer to an even weighting, which would require one more member for Holden.<\/p>\n

But Finance Committee Chair George Handy said his board did not recommend approval, adding it would \u201cfurther dilute the voting power of non-Holden towns,\u201d allowing Holden and any other town to push through a vote. Under the already planned change, Handy said Holden, Rutland and Sterling representatives, as a block, could push through a vote.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t like that, either, but we are stuck with it,\u201d Handy said.<\/p>\n

Woodland noted that, while she does not dispute Handy\u2019s math, in her five years involved with the committee, towns have not voted in block.<\/p>\n

The article was defeated, 223-46.<\/p>\n

The two citizens\u2019 petitions on the warrant, both concerning the Board of Health, were approved.<\/p>\n

The first is to \u201curge the Board of Health to rescind their Dec. 8, 2022, revisions to Sterling Subsurface Disposal System Regulations\u201d by deleting mandates for deep observation hole inspection requirements.<\/p>\n

Some residents who spoke called the mandate subjective, pointing out that Sterling was the only community with this regulation.<\/p>\n

While people were still at the microphones to comment, there was a call to end discussion, which was approved 134-131.<\/p>\n

The ultimate vote was approved to urge the change, 251-33.<\/p>\n

In an email to supporters Monday night, proponent Gary Menin wrote: \u201cThanks so very much to all of you who overwhelmingly voted tonight towards controlling your own destiny.\u201d<\/p>\n

He also made a promise for the future: \u201cNow if our tone-deaf board does not move quickly to rescind \u2014 I certainly would be happy to lead the next initiative \u2014 the \u2018recall\u2019 of two members of the board.\u201d<\/p>\n

The second citizens\u2019 petition called for $10,000 to audit the Sterling Board of Health \u201cto examine the systems, programs and financial data\u201d to provide \u201cindependent assurance that our community\u2019s financial interests are paramount and that statements are reliable, accurate and complete.\u201d<\/p>\n

Confusion occurred over amendments; the first was to present the actual amendment submitted by residents as the one printed had some differences from what was submitted, then that amendment was amended to include a source for the money, in this case the general stabilization fund.<\/p>\n

The Finance Committee recommended passage, and it was clarified that if the audit costs more than $10,000, the town would have to return to a town meeting to get additional funding.<\/p>\n

Richard Lane, speaking for the amended article, said it was important not just to audit the finances, but the practices.<\/p>\n

The article passed, 217-52.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Jan Gottesman The Item STERLING \u2014 The special town meeting of Oct. 16 was initially called to address a citizens\u2019 petition, but the warrant grew to nine articles. Voters approved all but one article, to amend the regional school agreement to reflect the latest population figures, which includes weighted voting. Four of the five […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":96545,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_gspb_post_css":"","_sitemap_exclude":false,"_sitemap_priority":"","_sitemap_frequency":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-46780","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"blocksy_meta":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46780","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46780"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46780\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/96545"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46780"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46780"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46780"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}