GOSHEN — The good people of Goshen wanted to spend some money at their annual town meeting on Monday night. The 35 or so residents at the meeting OK’d a municipal spending proposal for 2019-2020 of $222,970, which is $19,783 (or 8.1 percent) less than the figure approved at last year’s gathering. Then they voted to spend $42,945 to cover the town’s share of paving Capen Hill Road (a $222,500 project of which the state will pay two-thirds) and to spend $32,000 for the town’s share of the $128,000 project to replace the Broken Wire Road Culvert on the Goshen Ripton Road. Goshen residents also OK’d spending $212,700 through the highway budget.
But Goshen voters hadn’t closed their pocketbooks yet. They moved and approved proposals to give $1,000 to the Brandon Library and $1,500 to be spend on the town cemetery.
Assistant Town Clerk Marci Hayes noted that they probably weren’t simply spending for the sake of spending; some of the money for the roads was to match grants that would fund needed repairs. She said there seemed to be a lot of complaints about potholes in the roads.
In voting for town officials, incumbent Selectman David McKinnon will return for a three-year term and Town Clerk Rosemary McKinnon also won another three years in office; both were uncontested. Hayes was elected to a constable position. A Goshen seat on the Otter Valley Unified Union School District Board had not takers on the ballot, but Bill Mathis put himself up as a write-in candidate and won. Mathis, of course, is the retired former superintendent of the Otter Valley schools.
Hayes said the longest conversation at Monday’s town meeting was on the town’s contribution to the Brandon Leicester Salisbury Goshen Mosquito Control District. Some people didn’t want their property sprayed with pesticide; some asked how the town could get out of the association. BLSG Board Chairman Ben Lawton, a Goshen resident, addressed questions in a civil discussion.
OVUUSD voters in Goshen and the five other Otter Valley towns approved a school district budget of $19,935,847, which represents a 3.7 percent increase in total spending over last year and a 2.7 percent per equalized student increase. The vote was relatively close — 707-622. Those same voters defeated a bond measure of $2.93 million for safety, security and operational improvements at district schools.