GLOVER — Sometimes, Town Meeting in a small town is less a time to make decisions than an occasion to officially confirm decisions that have already been made by an informal network of community leaders.
That has rarely been more evident than on Tuesday, when Glover voters approved three significant personnel changes by acclamation. There was never more than one candidate nominated for any job, so the voters, who never once lined up to cast paper ballots, completed the town and school business and headed home by 3:40 in the afternoon.
Keone Maher, for example, had made it so clear that he didn’t want a second term as selectman that nobody bothered to nominate him. His three-year term went to Selectman Tara Nelson, who had been appointed to replace the ailing Nash Basom. Ms. Nelson was quickly nominated and, in a ritual that became routine Tuesday, nominations were closed after a decent interval and the clerk was instructed to cast one ballot for Ms. Nelson.
The year remaining in her term went, in turn, to Bucky Shelton, again with no other nominee. A long list of lesser town offices were filled by their incumbents, without opposition. The sole exception was second constable Adam Heuslein of Barton. He’d been appointed to the job after no one could be found to take it at last year’s Town Meeting. However, said Moderator Nick Ecker-Racz, the secretary of state had ruled that the office must be filled by a Glover resident. Mark Wright got the job, without opposition.
The pattern was repeated at the end of the afternoon’s school meeting, when board member Wanda Webster stepped down to be replaced by Leah Rodgers, the only person nominated for the job.
Ms. Webster got a rousing round of applause for her service to the town, as did Mr. Maher and, when he appeared toward the end of the meeting, Mr. Basom.
The town and school budgets also passed on voice votes without audible opposition, in the amounts requested by their respective boards.
After voters approved contributions to 22 local and regional agencies in a lump-sum appropriation of $26,519, they approved a town budget that will call for local taxes of $676,000.
Noting that the numbers in Glover’s town report are “kind of misleading,” Mr. Maher said that, while the selectmen plan to spend $53,000 less this year than last year, taxes will climb by about $30,000.
Once the town budget passed, the meeting moved on to a special appropriation of $50,000 to rebuild Glover’s gravel roads, which the selectman had separated from their budget. Mr. Ecker-Racz and Mr. Maher agreed that, in a year of economic hardship, the $50,000 request gave voters an opportunity to reduce their tax burden, should they feel the need.
Noting that a $7,000 state grant to be used on Dexter Mountain Road hadn’t been included in the budget, Chuck Holden moved to reduce the $50,000 by that amount.
His amendment failed on a voice vote, however, and the full $50,000 was appropriated.
Voters were no less generous at the school meeting. They approved a 2009-’10 budget of $1,842,257, up almost 5 percent from this year’s budget. Of that amount, just over $1-million is budgeted from local taxes.
“You get what you pay for,” Ami English said of the school budget. “Our test scores were phenomenal, there’s no two ways about it. I moved to this town because of the school.”
Ms. Webster, the outgoing school board chairman, agreed. “As far as the performance of our students goes, it’s something to be proud of.”
There was considerable debate about a three-part article aimed at the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant.
It urged the Vermont Legislature to “recognize” that:
Because the plant poses a safety risk, its operating license should not be extended past its 2012 expiration date;
Its power can be replaced by a combination of local renewable energy, hydro electricity and efficiency measures; and
Its owner, Entergy Corporation, should be required to fully fund the plant’s cleanup and decommissioning.
The first two points got a lot of argument. Ross Clark argued that renewable energy is simply not available in New England, and that power from Hydro Quebec requires flooding miles of Indian lands.
Skip Borrell, who served for 20 years on a nuclear submarine, argued that “a lot of scare tactics are going on to get the plant shut down.” On the issue of safety, he said, people should put their faith in the engineers of the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
On the other side, resident Linda Elbow cited a 2007 study by the state Department of Public Service that said efficiency measures could save 215 megawatts of power by 2015. That would eliminate the need for most of the 250 megawatts the nuclear plant supplies to Vermont, she argued.
“Barrels of nuclear waste are just going to be piling up somewhere,” said Amy Auger. “To me that’s an issue. We Vermonters have an opportunity to lead the way in going green.”
In making up their minds, said Daniel Mcnamara, voters should imagine the nuclear plant is in Barton rather than at the southern end of the state. “There are statistics that show higher cancer rates near the plant,” he said. The plant’s nuclear waste, he added, will remain dangerous for ten thousand years.
A resolution presented itself when Mr. Holden said it was the decommissioning costs that most bothered him. “If these people disappear,” he said of Entergy, “it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out who’s going to pay for it.”
Mr. Maher moved to strike the first two paragraphs from the article and leave only the third, which dealt with decommissioning.
That amendment passed, 34 to 26 by a show of hands, on the only contested vote of the day. The remnant of the article then passed easily, by voice vote.
Mr. Ecker-Racz said he thought Glover was one of about 40 Vermont towns that were scheduled to debate Vermont Yankee at Town Meeting.
