The evening of 2024-11-18 was a meeting of the Mendon Town Board.
There were a number of comments on the Village’s recent Fire Department Community Meetings. To paraphrase what was said, we are at a fork in the road in how emergency services are provided. We appear to be moving away from volunteer services, and towards paid staff. Which is nothing new for anyone that has been paying attention. But as with any transition, there can be hiccups along the way.
Tonight was the Public Hearing for the Preliminary Budget. Only adjustment I heard was changing Town Justices salary, as the closing of the Village Court would lead to an increased workload for them. Which makes sense. I believe I heard this means another Public Hearing, but I will admit I might well have that detail wrong.
There was a surprisingly in depth discussion on next years Holiday schedule, and how that was applied to the Highway Department. I will admit I did not understand where the issue was. The Highway Department claims logistical and scheduling issues require they use a different holiday should then the office. If the staff are ok with it, and everyone knows about it in advance? Then I would think any holiday schedule is fine. But with the amount of discussion, clearly there were concerns. Unfortunately, it eluded me as to where the issue was. In the end, this was tabled for a future meeting.
There will be a special meeting of this group to close out the year on December 30th at 4PM. Likely be pretty short, as those things tend to be.
IT policies were approved. In the interests of full disclosure, I helped draft these. To be fair, they were made using templates provided by New York Conference of Mayors as the starting point. Which were then tweaked to fit the Town.
An agreement with a former employee, Arthur Morrell, was reached. While I am very curious as to the background and story here, at the end of the day, as a resident of Mendon, all I likely need to know is the financial impact to the Town. Thankfully, this number was provided on the Town website, ~$27k.
And those are my Observations From Audience Land for the November 18, 2024 meeting of the Mendon Town Board.