Pepperell Selectmen Back Regional Dispatch Study, Warn of $250,000 Budget Gap

PEPPERELL — January 28, 2019 — Pepperell selectmen approved a regional dispatch feasibility study grant and heard a preliminary fiscal 2020 budget projecting a roughly $250,000 deficit at the January 28 meeting. Town Administrator Andrew Nutter told the board that the town faces a $28.3 million spending plan against $28 million in anticipated revenue, with three key figures — health insurance, retirement, and the Nashoba Valley Tech assessment — still outstanding. Nutter disclosed that North Middlesex Regional School District would present a 4.81 percent budget increase, roughly $250,000 above what the three member towns had said they could afford. The board also voted unanimously to support a Department of Local and Technical Assistance grant for a tri-town dispatch study with Ashby and Townsend and appointed Matthew Quinton Cutler, a CPA and VP of tax at a Burlington-area firm, to the Finance Committee. Separately, the board received a letter from former Zoning Board of Appeals member Dr. Vincent Primus calling the ZBA's January 16 reversal of a commercial-dumping-ground determination at 161 National Road a "gross error in judgment" and urging the board to appeal — with the 20-day legal window set to open once the decision is filed with the Town Clerk later that week.