Belmont Town Meeting Tonight: What Would You Spend $20,000 On?

Let's say, for arguments sake, $19,500 is found under one of the chairs at the Chenery Middle School when Belmont's annual Town Meeting reconvenes tonight at 7 p.m.

Since no one claims the dough – and everyone decides that the "free" cash should be used to help the town and not pocketed – what should Town Meeting spend the money on?

Put it into the unreserved fund? Give it to the School Department? How about using it for sidewalks and trees? Couldn't we send a 93 cent check to every citizen in town? 

When you put your mind to it, there are literally thousands of line items that the money could be spent.

And it appears that Town Meeting will have that opportunity tonight after two anonymous donors in recent days presented a total of $19,500 to the town to purchase an electronic voting system that will count ballots at meetings such as future Town Meetings, according to Belmont Town Clerk Ellen Cushman. 

The amount is exactly the same as the Capital Budget Committee agreed to allocate from it's $1.1 million budget to purchase the same system. 

Articles on board tonight:

And since the donation came so suddenly, neither the Warrant Committee – the group that serves as the financial watchdog for the approximately 290 Town Meeting members – or the Capital Budget Committee will not have time to conduct a proper review by the time Town Meeting re-ups tonight.

Cushman predicts that Town Moderator Mike Widmer will take the amount out of Article 20 – which contains the Capital Budget Committee requests – and have a separate vote on the money, at which time he will likely allow "floor" amendments at which time representatives can ask that the $19,500 be placed in another line item in the budget. 

While $19,500 is a little more than .0002 percent of the $91 million fiscal year 2014 budget under debate tonight, it is likely to be one of the major issues facing the representatives as the coming year budget is all but set in stone.

If last week's Warrant Discussion Night on the Financial Articles of the Annual Town Meeting hosted by the Belmont League of Women Voters  – in which the Warrant and Capital Budget committees provided an overview of the financial articles to be reviewed tonight – was any indication, the possible areas of discussion and debate will center on the Capital Budget article. 

While most residents at the meeting were silent on the big money items such as department and the school budget, several representatives were eager to question some of the requests approved by Capital Budget.

One, interestingly enough, was the electronic voting measure, as well as $75,000 being set aside for a comprehensive study of the turf field at the High School's Harris Field. 

Tonight the meeting will be about all things money: the budgets and capital budget allocations. If Town Meeting can not make it through the  articles on the agenda, it will continue with financial items on Wednesday, June 5. 

If the financial articles are finished before 10 p.m., then Town Meeting will reconvene the Special Town meeting that was closed on May 2. 

If the financial articles are the only articles acted on tonight, then the Special Town Meeting will be reconvened on Wednesday. 

Documents involving the financial articles can also be found by following this link to the May 20 Supplemental Mailing on the Town Meeting Member Information page of the Town Clerk’s section of the website: http://www.belmont-ma.gov/Public_Documents/BelmontMA_Clerk/2013ATMMailing3.pdf