NORTH STONINGTON REPUBLICAN TOWN COMMITTEE PLATFORM

North Stonington Faces the Challenges of Tomorrow

We believe experience is critical at this time in our history, with rising costs of living and turmoil in our State and Federal governments. What is needed is realistic teamwork.

We continually have to review our municipal environment and keep up with the current issues, prioritizing projects, and adjusting schedules constantly to serve the needs of North Stonington and its residents and taxpayers.

Our town faces the same struggles that the cities and towns throughout the State face and even the State itself is struggling. The unfunded mandates and the cost of running government have put a strain on all of us, so that doing what we want is not always possible but only doing what we need.

Our local government relies on a few full time employees, a lot of part time staff and of course our priceless volunteers. North Stonington like many other communities has found that we are losing our volunteers to the demands of work and family. The amount of required services has not diminished and the accomplishment of the tasks has become more complicated and costly.

For example, new fiscal mandates implemented by the State in July, are so complicated it is coming to the point that the Town will have to have the expertise of a CPA to complete financial reporting tasks each year and each department in the Town faces similar mandates and requirements.

A municipal budget is an estimate of a known scope of work, but we all know that there are always unknowns and surprises in every budget. Balancing a budget is a constant struggle, sometimes robbing Peter to pay Paul, but eventually Peter wants his money back! Between the balancing we have to keep focused on our Town’s Plan of Conservation and Development, working to achieve our goals and constantly adjusting to change.

ISSUES


Town Population Growth. We believe that American citizens have the absolute right to live where they want to. Our party welcomes new residents to North Stonington from all walks of life and encourages them to be actively involved in our Town. However, we also believe that housing development should compliment our Town and respect the land and our community with regarding safety, environmental impact, and congestion.


Budget and Taxes. We believe in a balanced approach to the Town Budget and the taxes which fund these budgets. We believe the highest priorities of each budget should be funded but that the property tax rate should not be set so high that it impacts the quality of life for North Stonington residents.

Economic Development. We support clean, low impact development that will not have a service cost equal or higher to the tax income gain and degrade the Town’s quality of life.



Route 2. We support Route 2 improvements implemented using the context sensitive design and the Wilbur Smith Access Management Concepts, which will maximize Route 2 capacity with maintaining the rural character and not causing a north south separation. We will work with both DOT and Tribe to accomplish this.

Financial Town Planning. The school building project and emergency service is the cornerstone and the largest cost of both the short and long term facilities financial planning for the town, both need building projects.

We support a cost effective school building project which addresses the needs of the school (additions and renovations) at an affordable cost, maximize State reimbursement, utilizing the project management concept. The borrowing should be on an annual basis to maximize low interest rates and only lock into long term borrowing if borrowing rates increase. If favorable financing is available, the emergency services needs should be bundled with the school loans.

Other smaller town projects should be short termed borrowing or funded thru the annual capital budget.

Plan of Conservation and Development. We support a joint effort of all the boards and commissions and public to review adherence to the plan and the funding to support Planning and Zoning with zoning regulations to implement the plan. These are living documents that must be maintained constantly.

Conservation Plan. The town inventory of land and a completed plan will give Planning and Zoning help to establish the zoning areas and the road map as to how the town will develop to maintain the rural character and quality of life for our residents.
The real solution is to get everyone involved, more combined meetings, more sub-committees, and re-establish the process that was used for the Town Plan of Conservation and development.