Recap Special Town Council Meeting May 22, 2012

RECAP SPECIAL TOWN COUNCIL MEETING – MAY 22^ND

Last night’s special town council meeting was a very special night for a very special lady. JoAnn Campbell received the “Spirit of American Foundation Tribute” award and very deservedly so. Mrs. Campbell volunteers a vast majority of her time to the town of Lisbon. There is no way in the world I could list all of the volunteer work she does. The lists of her accomplishments were outlined during the ceremony but I could not write fast enough to record them. This lady is involved with almost every aspect of this town. Mrs. Campbell truly deserves this award for all she does of the community. Hats off to JoAnn Campbell!!!!!

The council adopted the 17 articles of the school budget by a 7-0 vote on everything. This included the warrant for the school budget validation referendum. The council also approved the bid for the Town Annual Report to be published by the Walsh Printing. The council reduced the number of copies to 350 instead of the normal 500 because there were 144 copies still in the vault from the last ones published. After the initial posting of these reports, I never saw any on display so I can understand why there were so many left over. I cannot understand why they did not remain on the counter, wall or on display throughout the year.

Next the council moved into a workshop on the municipal budget. I stayed for about an hour of the workshop and then left. The main problem is the council is still discussing the 2% pay raise the people at the Public Hearing unanimously were against. However, Councilor Bowie is still bringing this subject up and the council had a lengthy discussion which ended with Mrs. Fitzgerald, a member of the Advisory Board, walking out. Apparently, Bowie and a few members of the council have decided to ignore the desires of the people of Lisbon in the same manner as they ignore recommendations by the Advisory Board.

Councilors Ward and Lunt would like to see improvements to local roads but instead there is a plan on the table to place $50,000.00 in an account and let it accumulate until there is enough to actually start repairing out local roads. There were several other subjection's made from councilors but nothing was resolved while I was there. It got to the point where the discussions were no longer productive so I left.

There is still too much money in the municipal budget which could be either cut or utilized in more productive places. One of the main ones is Professional Development. The town is asking for approximately $55,925.00 for training of our town employees. I am baffled as to why we need so much training for our town employees who are receiving so many awards for the job they are performing. This money could be better utilized to repair roads or utilize the money for capital improvements. There is no return on investment for Professional Development.

No decision has been made on the final outcome for the municipal budget so there is no telling how much our taxes are going to go up. Rest assured taxes are going to rise.

Vote them out in November.

Larry Fillmore

Concerned Citizen