Voters keep town clerks busy mailing ballots ahead of school budget vote

June 13, 2020  |  By Lisa Scagliotti

More than 1,400 voters across the Harwood Union School District have already requested early ballots by mail for the second vote on a $39.75 million 2020-21 school budget set for Tuesday, June 16. 

Town clerks in the district’s six communities - Duxbury, Fayston, Moretown, Waitsfield, Warren and Waterbury - all said on Friday that they have been busy mailing out ballots ahead of the vote. 

School and elections officials have encouraged the public to vote early by requesting ballots early in order to reduce the number of people voting in person given public health concerns for the COVID-19 pandemic. 

In the most populous community in the district, Waterbury Town Clerk Carla Lawrence said she has mailed out 520 ballots. Duxbury Town Clerk Maureen Harvey said she’s sent out 112. Totals from other town clerks were: 251 in Moretown, just over 200 in Fayston, 191 in Waitsfield, 174 in Warren. 

There may not be time for ballots voters receive from their town clerks after Friday to make it back by mail before the polls close on Tuesday. Clerks said they are telling voters they may drop off sealed ballots in person as long as they arrive before 7 p.m. Tuesday when the polls close.

Voters may cast ballots in person on Tuesday. Each town will have one polling place with procedures varying slightly, although all are designed to adhere to state public health guidelines, such as mask-wearing. Duxbury and Moretown, for example, plan to have drive-up voting with voters remaining in their cars to mark their ballots. 

The other towns will have walk-in voting with election workers paying careful attention to the number of people allowed in at one time and sanitizing stations in between voters. Here are details for voting in each community. 

• Waterbury: Voting in the Steel Community Room at the Municipal Complex, 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Masks will be required and spares will be available if needed, Lawrence said. Election workers will be stationed at the doors to allow two voters into the room at a time to vote at separate tables which will be cleaned between voters. Before Tuesday, anyone with a marked ballot to return may drop it off in the dropbox at the entrance to the municipal offices which are closed to the public. On Tuesday, all ballots need to be turned in by 7 p.m. when the polls close. 

• Duxbury: Voting at Crossett Brook Middle School, 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. “We will be doing drive-thru so there will be no people in the polling place and no use of the cafeteria,” Harvey said. “They will drive up to the check in desk and receive a ballot. They will then pull forward and mark their ballot. Once the ballot is marked, they will pull ahead to deposit the ballot and check out without getting out of their car.” Marked early ballots may be returned at the polling place Tuesday; before Tuesday, they may be placed in the lock box outside the town offices, Harvey said.  

• Warren: Voting will be at Warren Elementary School, 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Voters will be asked to wear masks and practice six-foot social distancing, according to Town Clerk Reta Goss. Marked ballots to be returned may be dropped off at the school on Tuesday or beforehand in the drop box at the Warren Municipal Building. 

• Waitsfield: Voting at Waitsfield Elementary School, 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Town Clerk Jennifer Peterson said marked ballots will be handled the customary way: “As with all elections, absentee ballots can be dropped off at the polling place by the close of the election.”

• Moretown: Voting will be outside in the Moretown Elementary School/Town Offices parking lot, 10 a.m. to 7 p.m.  Voters will be required to wear masks and voting will be done via drive-up only, Assistant Town Clerk Sasha Elwell said. Voters will enter through the school entrance, check in and get a ballot, vote in their car, check out and deposit ballots into the locked box which will be brought to the car window; then exit.

• Fayston: Voting will be at the Fayston Municipal Building, 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Weather permitting, voting will be set up outside, Assistant Town Clerk Sarah Stavraky said. Voters will be asked to wear masks and use hand sanitizer upon arrival. Workers will set up and direct voters so they move through the polling area with separate in and out points. The town clerk’s office is open by appointment now but it will close at noon Monday in order to prepare for Tuesday’s vote. Anyone with a marked early ballot to drop off may do so at the town offices by that time or by 7 p.m. at the polls on Tuesday. 

Similar bottom line, different plan for schools

The district’s voters are considering a school budget of $39,751,941 for fiscal year 2020-21 for the second time this year. Voters on Town Meeting Day rejected a very similar amount by a vote of 3,048 to 2,254. The new budget is just $20,000 less but it no longer calls for merging Harwood Middle School with Crossett Brook Middle School this fall. 

The first budget would have shifted all seventh and eighth graders at Harwood to Crossett as well as Moretown’s fifth and sixth graders, necessitating temporary classrooms to be used until Crossett Brook could have been enlarged. 

The new spending plan remains at essentially the same bottom line through a series of spending cuts made after the failed first budget. School board members stress that its actual expenditures for the upcoming year are $100,000 less than expenditures in the current budget year. A $1.88 million surplus added into the district’s maintenance fund counts in the revenue column.  

The impact of the budget on taxpayers will vary by town in the Harwood district. According to school budget summary details, the Waterbury school tax rate is expected to increase 4.3% with this budget which would mean an increase of $175 on the tax bill for a home valued at $250,000. 

In Duxbury, the school portion of property taxes would increase 5.9% which would add $250 to the tax bill on a home valued at $250,000, according to the school district’s budget information. 

Impacts on property taxes in the district’s other communities range from just under a half of 1% in Waitsfield to 4% in Fayston. 

A link to information assembled by the administration and school board regarding the budget can be found on the school district’s website’s home page, HUUSD.org.