Andover Town Meeting Passes $197.8 Million Operating Budget

ANDOVER, MA — Andover residents gathered outside Saturday for the annual town meeting, months after initially planned. Voters passed the full warrant, including the nearly $200 million Fiscal Year 2021 operating budget and the sale of the Town Yard property. The full 2021 budget is nearly $209 million.

Under the Fiscal Year 2021 budget, the average single-family property tax bill is estimated to increase by 4.66 percent.

The meeting, initially scheduled for April, was postponed due to the coronavirus. It took place outside, in a tent on the field behind West Middle School, for the same reason. In the interim, the town operated under monthly 1/12th budgets from the beginning of the fiscal year in July.

The budget was twice-revised due to the coronavirus, first with major cuts and then with the town and school operating budgets restored.

Town meeting voters also authorized the Select Board to sell the Old Town Yard and approved a community choice aggregation program and a solar energy bylaw, among other articles.

The full warrant is available here and the presentations are here.

Christopher Huffaker can be reached at 412-265-8353 or chris.huffaker@patch.com.

An earlier version of this budget referred to the operating budget as the budget. It has been corrected.