Marblehead Town Meeting Extended To Second Night

MARBLEHEAD, MA — The Marblehead annual town meeting will extend into a second night after it got off to a late and slow start running through the 48 articles of the town warrant.

The meeting started more than a half-hour late as the capacity crowd packed into the Marblehead Middle School auditorium and then stalled during debate on a capital expenditure override that would cover replacements and improvements in roads and sidewalks, building roofs and technology.

A written ballot vote was requested, which came back in favor of sending the perspective costs to a townwide override vote by a 406 to 114 margin. The passage of the article with 78.1 percent approval exceeded the two-thirds majority necessary for the townwide vote.

The capital costs will occur over periods of five to 10 years but do require a Proposition 2 1/2 debt exclusion. The Board of Selectmen will determine whether they will be considered collectively or individually as three separate items — town infrastructure, buildings and technology — in the townwide vote.

Partially because of the time involved in taking the ballot vote, the meeting was was ended at 10:20 p.m. after about three hours with 29 of the 49 articles determined.

Still to come is the $3 million proposed school surplus budget which, if passed, will also be subject to a townwide override vote.

Among the other articles remaining are the transfer of a school lot to the town or recreation department to be used as a bike park, the proposed "summer break" from gas-powered leaf blowers between June 15 and Oct. 15, and the official changing of the Board of Selectmen's name to the Select Board in line with most other towns in Eastern Massachusetts in recent years, along with updating to more gender-neutral terminology in the town bylaws.

The full town meeting warrant can be found here.

(Scott Souza is a Patch field editor covering Beverly, Danvers, Marblehead, Peabody, Salem and Swampscott. He can be reached at Scott.Souza@Patch.com. Twitter: @Scott_Souza.)