GRANVILLE — Residents of Granville passed the town, highway and school budgets by voice vote on Tuesday evening at the town hall.
Granville’s overall public spending plan for 2017-2018 was approved at $345,873. The municipal spending plan was passed as presented at $178,073, down 2 percent from $181,781 for the current year. Highway spending was approved at $167,800, which is down 7.6 percent from $179,500.
Richard Poole announced his candidacy for selectman from the floor of Tuesday’s meeting. He was approved for a three-year term, and will replace Selectman Norm Arseneault, whose term expired this week. School board member Erika Linskey was re-elected to a three-year term in a floor vote.
Voters rejected an article that would have allowed the U.S. Postal Service to erect a modular building on a rented space next to the town hall, which would have housed a new Granville Post Office.
Residents passed a school spending plan of $764,433, a 13.6 percent increase from last year, which is attributed to an increase in students. Granville had a low of 22 students in 2013, and currently it has 44 students in pre-K to 12th grade.
On April 11, residents in Granville and Hancock will vote on whether to create the Granville Hancock Unified District in compliance with Act 46, Vermont’s school governance unification law. If this is approved, and some other moves in the White River Valley SU are approved, Granville would see four years of property tax breaks.
In 2016, Windsor Northwest and Orange Windsor supervisory unions merged to form the White River Valley Supervisory Union, which encompasses 10 towns. Granville and Hancock are the only two towns in the union that tuition all of their students to the schools of the student’s choice. In addition to the tax breaks, it is hoped that the unification will level out the swings in student numbers and thus swings up and down in the education taxes residents pay.