PETERSHAM – Voters are invited to kick off the New Year by attending a Special Town Meeting this Saturday afternoon.

They’ll be deciding on a three-article warrant when the meeting gets underway at 2 p.m. at Town Hall. At the 2024 Annual Town Meeting, voters reduced the quorum required to convene from 10% to 7.5% of the total number of registered voters in Petersham – meaning that approximately 85 people need to show up this weekend to conduct business.

The main purpose of the meeting is to pass a proposal to reduce the FY25 municipal operating budget approved at last year’s ATM by a total of $97,500, thus reducing the amount of money the town needs to raise via taxation. The reduction is necessary because the current level of FY25 spending approved by voters exceeds the tax levy limit allowed under Proposition 2½. It was discussed at the meeting that the budget, passed last June, was miscalculated. 

Members of the Advisory Finance Committee and Selectboard met Monday night to discuss how best to pitch the proposal to voters.

“We need to rectify the situation that became apparent in the assessors’ tax recap sheet that indicated we have gone above our maximum allowable level,” AFC Chair Rich Cavanaugh explained at Monday’s meeting. “We were above our maximum allowable levy by a little over 96-thousand dollars over the 2½ limit.”

“In order to make up that difference,” Cavanaugh continued, “we were looking at what might be available to us through available funds. With the help of Dana Robinson, our treasurer, we identified $50,000 that had been accumulating in the tax title surveys and appraisals account, $10,000 from the Town Hall North Parking Area account, and then $37,500 from our stabilization fund. That’s what makes up the $97,500, which gives us just a little bit of wiggle room to address other things that might happen.”

If the town cannot bring the budget to within the limits of Proposition 2½, Cavanaugh explained, it will be unable to set the tax rate or send out tax bills. These bills would normally be sent out in January, but because of the current situation, they won’t go to taxpayers until February, assuming that the proposed reductions are approved.

Cavanaugh said the $97,500 reduction in the tax levy will result in a lower tax rate. The projected tax rate based on the budget approved at the June 2024 ATM was $16.12 per $1,000 of property value. If voters approved the recommendation of the AFC and Selectboard to reduce the tax levy, the estimated rate will be $14.53 per $1,000 of valuation.

The final article on the warrant asks voters to “appropriate from available funds a sum of…$955 to pay legal bills from prior years…” A report from the Selectboard said the total is the amount due on four invoices from KP Law submitted in November 2024. A report from the board states, “Three invoices were from FY23 and one from FY22; all referred to work by our town attorney, David Doneski, working on zoning issues. Because the prior fiscal years have been official ‘closed out’ (reconciled), we cannot pay these bills without a…vote in a Special Town Meeting.”

The board further explained that $13,457 set aside for legal costs was “carried over” from FY24 to FY25, meaning no transfer of funds will be necessary to pay the invoices.

Greg Vine can be reached at gvineadn@gmail.com.