Monticello residents approved a slightly increased municipal budget and elected two members to the Select Board on April 1.
The budget of $510,779.96 included increases of $10,000 for the paving account, along with $10,000 more for the winter road’s account, according to Town Manager Ginger Pryor. Residents also agreed to set aside $2,000 to repair broken headstones at the cemetery.
“The other accounts increased a little bit, but they were just negligible increases,” she said. “I think everyone was happy that we were able to keep the budget down as low as we did.”
Five people ran for a single three-year term on the Select Board.
They included Jimmy Burpee, Diane Doe, Myrna Ford, Lawrence Goff and Lisa Good.
Lawrence Goff secured the position.
Max Upton secured a one-year term on the same board.
Residents also voted on two ordinances that were addressed again this year, after they failed to pass at the town meeting last year.
One question on the warrant read, “Shall an ordinance titled “Town of Monticello Automobile Graveyard and Junkyard Ordinance” be enacted?”
Last year, Pryor said that there were a few properties that she was getting regular complaints about, and the ordinance was written to assist town officials with that.
The other, “draft fowl chicken” ordinance, was written to provide municipal authority to enforce standards established regarding chickens within the residential business district of the town. A number of residents thought that people shouldn’t be raising livestock in that area. Revisions to the proposed ordinance removed livestock and clarified what is needed for chickens, not roosters, to be raised in the residential/business district.
Pryor said on Tuesday that people had a lot of different opinions about the ordinances and asked a lot of questions, but after a close vote, the two ordinances failed again.
