It's town meeting season, and with costs on the rise, several towns in the Cape and Islands region have been facing significant budget overrides.
Eastham was one of those towns. CAI's Gilda Geist spoke to Parker Mumford of the Provincetown Independent to learn more about Eastham town meeting results.
Gilda Geist Eastham town meeting voters approved more than $3 million in overrides. Can you remind folks what an override is and tell us what voters thought?
Parker Mumford So in Massachusetts, overrides are required if a town wants to increase its tax levy by more than 2.5 percent over the previous year. It's kind of a way to keep towns from spending too much without voters' approval. When a town want to raise the tax levy beyond that 2.5 percent, they need to get approval at the ballot box [on May 19], and obviously the funding also has to be appropriated at town meeting. And so this year, in order to have a level services budget, Eastham actually did need an override. A lot of the voters were okay with that increase, but there were still concerns of financial strain. The measure ended up passing, but there was a little bit of debate.
GG Voters also approved an expansion of the residential tax exemption (RTE). What was the purpose of that article, and how did people vote?
PM So this article actually passed pretty quickly. Most of the concerns here were just about how it would be enforced. So Eastham approved an RTE last year for year-round residences, but this expansion would also allow year-around rental properties to claim the exemption on their property taxes as well. This is something that most of the voters seemed to approve of. It was actually something that was recommended by t part-time residents association who had initially been campaigning against the implementation of an RTE.
GG Was the purpose of that to incentivize property owners who rent out their properties to rent them to year-round residents rather than to tourists on a short-term basis?
PM Absolutely, that's part of it. And I think another part is just an idea of fairness. I think that a lot of both part-time and year-round residents alike thought it was kind of unfair for a house to be inhabited year-round to not be able to claim the RTE just because its owner was somewhere else.
GG There was also an article to limit fertilizers at Eastham town meeting. What happened with that one?
PM So this was an interesting one. This one was added to the warrant at the request of Laura Kelley, who's a local horticulturist. She came before the select board on the day that the warrant closed, telling them that she thought that her petition would actually have more force if the select board added it, rather than if it was submitted as an extra at the end of the warrant. And this was a request for a home rule petition, the same one that was approved in Wellfleet and Orleans, that would have limited fertilizers in Eastham. The select board was a little concerned about how that would be enforced. They actually voted against recommending the article, but it still passed at town meeting. I think everyone in the room seemed to like the idea of limiting fertilizer, even if there was some disagreement on whether or not the petition would actually be effective.
GG Any other highlights from the Eastham town meeting?
PM So I actually wanted to shout out two of my coworkers, Delaney Dryfoos and Paul Benson. I actually was not there at the meeting. The two of them were there taking notes for me, taking photos and recording the meeting and they were the ones that actually helped me get this article written—I was traveling at the time—so big thanks to them.
