Voters in Hopkinton will have a chance to question the candidates running for two contested positions Wednesday night before filling out their ballots next week.
There are three candidates running for the tax collector’s position and two running for a seat on the school board. All candidates for each position are expected to attend the forum, which begins at 6:30 p.m. at town hall.
Steve Lux faces Norman Goupil in the school board race. The winner will fill the seat left by outgoing school board member David Luneau, a member of the N.H. House and vice chair of the House education committee.
On the town side, three candidates are vying for the town clerk/tax collector’s position. Incumbent Chuck Gangel is being challenged by Carol Harless and Amy O’Brien.
The tax collector’s position has had some more buzz around it compared to previous years since the tax collector’s office was abruptly moved from the Bates building in Contoocook to town hall last fall.
The town’s select board voted in October to incorporate the clerk and tax collector’s office into town hall. At the time, board members said it was a temporary move made on the advice of the town’s legal counsel.
Those plans changed over the following months as the board entered the thick of its budget planning workshops. It was during the budget process when the board decided to keep the tax collector’s office in town hall and began exploring options to sell the Bates building.
The move has been met with criticism from members of the public, and a peition has been created calling for the select board to abandon its plan.
Some argue that while consolidation of town offices at town hall makes fiscal sense, it could create too much traffic at town hall and overwhelm the space. Members of the select board have said that some the savings derived from consolidating offices and selling the Bates building can be put toward improving accesibility at town hall.
The school board is asking voters to support a multi-million dollar facilities project across all three of the town’s schools. Questions surrounding this project, valued just below $9.8 million, and how it will be carried out are anticipated for Lux and Goupil, the two candidates running for the school board.
The project’s big-ticket objectives include adding class space at Harold Martin – the town’s lower elementary school, renovating science labs at the middle-high school, and replacing the roofs on all three schools.
If the project is approved at the school district’s annual meeting March 9, it will add about $1.15 per $1,000 of assessed property value to the tax rate, or about $287 a year for a home worth $250,000.
(Nick Stoico can be reached at 369-3321, nstoico@cmonitor.com or on Twitter @NickStoico.)