Dexter council rejects four-day municipal office schedule
By Mike Lange
Staff Writer
DEXTER — It was proposed as a way to save energy and allow town employees some “down time” to process reports and take in-house training.
But based on constituent concerns, the Dexter Town Council unanimously rejected a proposal to have the municipal offices open four days a week instead of five.
The town office operating hours ordinance was one of several public hearings on the Feb. 20 council agenda, but it was the one that drew the most comments.
The municipal offices are now open Monday through Friday from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., and the proposed schedule would have been Tuesday through Friday from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. There would be no reduction in working hours for the staff, explained Town Manager Shelley Watson.
Former council chairman Peter Haskell noted that if a holiday occurred on a Monday, the staff would take Tuesday off and cut the office hours to three days a week. “You better put a lot of thought into this before you vote,” Haskell said.
Gil Reynolds also opposed the change, saying that if “anyone running for town council on a platform that included closing the town office on Monday, I don’t know how many votes that person would get … I think something is being taken away from the people. If you are going to do this, do it on a trial basis and see what it does.”
Jim Costedio suggested that if the policy was implemented, the town office should be open four days a week minimum. If a holiday fell on a Monday “the employees could take a floating holiday instead of closing on a Tuesday,” he said.
Tony Pomerleau said that he “has a problem with losing the services we get. You can’t even fix a sewer without a permit. Some things can’t wait until a Tuesday.”
Other compromises suggested were opening the office one hour later, but keeping the five-day schedule; and closing for a half-day on Wednesday
Councilor Mike Blake said that he had nine phone calls about the proposal “and there wasn’t one person in favor of it. If they wanted to open the office an hour earlier, you could probably sell me on that. But closing a full day during the week isn’t going to fly.”
Chairman Fred Banks said that he also had several phone calls “and they were all against it.”
The council eventually rejected the proposal 7-0.
The other resolutions were disposed of rather quickly.
The council unanimously voted to dissolve the Dexter Municipal Golf Course Board of Directors, since they were no longer active. Costedio, who operates the facility, explained that the course was originally run by the town using municipal employees but that’s no longer the case. “Since we’ve sustained our membership, it tells me that they’re happy,” Costedio said. “And the people who were on the board tell me that they didn’t think they were accomplishing a whole lot.”
The council also voted to raise cemetery rates, which reportedly had not been adjusted in more than 20 years. A full feeschedule is available at the town office.
Due to an oversight last year, the position of cemetery sexton wasn’t included in the annual budget. So the council voted to take $3,600 for salary and $297 for FICA out of unexpended revenue to fund the position through June 30. The town’s fiscal year begins on July 1.
A last-minute addition to the agenda was a request to take $2,000 out of the highway reserve fund to replace a transmission in a public works one-ton truck. Watson said that the vehicle is used for plowing, so the expenditure was deemed necessary. The council concurred.
One item carried over from the meeting will be addressed at a special session on Thursday, Feb. 27 at 7 p.m.
There was a resolution on the table to approve the lease of the town-owned campground facility at last Thursday’s meeting, but Councilor Sharon Grant said she had strong reservations about approving it without hearing from all interested parties.
Two people are interested in the lease — Nick Pinkham and Larry Marshall — so the council will hear a presentation from them before awarding the bid.