Middlesex Town Meeting Solutions Committee
Meeting Minutes
December 12, 2005

Present: Kelly Ault, Susan Clark, Dave Shepard, Barb Whitchurch, Greg Whitchurch

1. Approval of Previous Meeting Minutes
Minutes from Town Meeting Solution’s Committee (TMSC) meetings of October 17th and November 14th were reviewed. Greg made a motion to approve the minutes with a second by Barb. Minutes were approved.

2. Town Budget Information for Town Meeting
Susan reported that two pie charts illustrating the town budget will be prepared for Town Meeting. One will show the entire budget, including the school budgets, while the other will provide more details about just the town budget without the school budgets. The Select Board is supportive of including both in the Town Report. Blown-up versions of the charts could be prepared to post on the walls at Town Meeting. There could also be a spreadsheet that will show how much each budget item will cost in taxes if one owned property of a certain value. Figures would be provided for several examples (e.g. $100,000 property, $200,000 property).

The Select Board is also willing to do a short introduction of the budget before the discussion and vote on the budget. This is complicated by the fact that not all budget items are known by Town Meeting.

3. Middlesex History Book
The history of Middlesex prepared by the Middlesex Historical Society will be available for sale at Town Meeting. Susan suggested a slide show of images from the book that could show either a short time before the actual start of Town Meeting or all during the day when people stop in to vote the Australian ballot portion of the voting.

4. Zoning Articles
For the December issue of the Middlesex Monthly there will be an article by Kimberly Hagen on the perceived advantages and disadvantages of zoning regulations. There will also be an article on the history of land use regulation and planning in Middlesex.

5. Town Website
Greg will be working on a webpage for the Conservation Commission. It was mentioned that the zoning proposal that was defeated by the voters in November, 2004 should be removed from the website to avoid confusion. It was also suggested that it would be useful to post a copy of the current zoning regulations on the website if an electronic copy can be located.

6. Childcare for Town Meeting
There will be a meeting in January with Rumney School principal, Elaine Laine, to discuss providing childcare at Rumney School during Town Meeting. Susan is interested in the potential for a childcare exchange with a neighboring town that may have Town Meeting at a different time from Middlesex so that caregivers wouldn’t have to miss Town Meeting.

7. Updated Town Contacts Sheet
Dave reported that he has checked with June and it isn’t possible to send out the updated town contacts sheet with the property tax bills. Susan will check with the Select Board about their willingness to pay for distributing the contact sheet. If they are interested, possibilities include mailing them or including as an insert in the Middlesex Monthly.

8. Town Meeting Invocation
Some towns have some sort of an invocation to start off Town Meeting and Susan proposed that Middlesex might do this. She suggested someone in town who would be voting for the first time might deliver it. The town of Danville has an invocation that Middlesex could use.

The next TMSC meeting will be January 9, 2006 at the Town Office and 7:00 pm.

Minutes recorded by Dave Shepard