The Financial Management Team and Selectboard hosted a budget presentation for Highway, Fire/EMS, and Police on March 6th. Residents heard about preliminary budgets asking for an additional $669,918 in funds for these departments. This amounts to 5.7% of the entire FY23 operating budget. Much of the resident discussion focused on two areas. Fire Chief Bennett wants to have an EMT on duty for the ambulance between the hours of 5pm and 7am, 7 days a week. He feels that this will help reduce the ambulance response time from an average of over 20 minutes during those hours. Police Chief Patriarca is requesting two additional full-time officers. This would allow him to add a Lieutenant position to help with the administrative burden, freeing up a Sergeant to spend more time on supervision and patrol. The other officer would add to the patrol roster.
You can find the budget presentations here. The meeting was not recorded. If you would like to discuss these budgets, please reach out to Sherry Patch at townadministrator@town.princeton.ma.us or 978-464-2102.
