Interesting. At least it looks like someone had the foresight to see a new truck was needed. Does it say how much the town saved over the period of time for the truck?
Having said that, I can completely understand planning to get a fire truck when needed. However, is it not a matter of if the town really needs it, then maybe something else needs to go unfunded? (Maybe something that is not tied to public safety?)
As this has peaked my interest in terms of town spending, I tried to look up some history for Meredith concerning capital purchases and found the below from the 2008 town report. Not always sure if I’m interpreting these things correctly but if you look at the spending trend (not including any 2009 purchases such as the Fire Truck), it appears that:
For a 7 year period from 1998-2004 Capital Purchases/Debt were ~ $7.6M
For a 4 year period from 2005-2008 Capital Purchases/Debt were ~ $8.9M
That’s a 15% increase from past history in almost half as many years.
1988 Cotton Hill Sewer Bond $603,200
1989 Library Expansion Bond $750,000
1988 Water System Improvement Bond $2,000,000
1994 Cataldo Road Sewer Bond $229,000
1998 Westbury Road Sewer Bond $55,000
1998 Wagon Wheel Sewer Bond $211,874
1999 Pleasant Street Bond $1,400,000
2001 Neal Shore Sewer Bond $200,000
2002 Plymouth St/Rte 3 North Bond $948,770
2002 Plymouth St/Rte 3 North Bond $637,467
2004 Conservation Bond $500,000
2004 East Bluff Village Sewer Bond $115,381
2005 Community Center Bond $3,500,000
2007 Police Station Bond $1,500,000
2007 Bundled Water/Sewer/Roads $1,220,000
2008 Fire Station Bond $2,292,882
2008 Page Pond Conservation $400,000
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