At Monday’s eHop Know Your Vote forum, representatives from the town discussed articles and issues that will come before Town Meeting voters next Monday (May 2).
Town Meeting Moderator Ellen Rutter discussed the setup for the meeting, noting that a walk-through was done earlier in the day at the High School Athletic Center. Typically, Town Meeting is held at the Hopkinton Middle School auditorium, but the Select Board voted to support a change suggested by the Health Department.
“The reason they chose this spot is because we can do better social distancing and we also have better air handling than in the middle school. So it’s in the high school, in the field house,” Rutter said. “We are setting up 600 chairs. It would be awesome if we had that many people attend.”
Rutter explained that rules dictate that 1 percent of the town’s registered voters — which comes out to a new high of 128 voters based on the town’s increased population — must be present for the meeting to proceed.
The meeting starts next Monday at 7 p.m. and will run until about 11 p.m., with a continuation Tuesday at 7 p.m. if needed.
“We don’t expect to get through the whole warrant in one night,” Rutter said. “I’m saying probably two nights.”
Rutter said attendees should be aware that food and drinks other than water should not be consumed at the meeting.
“The only thing allowed in the field house because of the basketball floor is water,” she said. “If people need to take a break and have a snack, you’re welcome to step outside, you can go into the cafeteria. … We will have probably one organized break, but people can come and go, so if a person needs to take a break, take a phone call or something like that, they can step outside of the meeting.”
Among the items discussed at Monday’s forum were funding for HCAM, the town’s potential purchase of the Conroy property between Saddle Hill Road and the State Forest, the town water PFAS problem, the Lykan tax increment finance (TIF) agreement, and the citizen’s petition to acquire forested land off Frankland Road to prevent a solar development.
The forum can be viewed at HCAM.
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