Voters at Canterbury Town Meeting approve new printer

Jostling a folded piece of paper, holding it marooned in the air, selectman Beth Blair detailed the faithful service of Canterbury’s deteriorating, 10-year-old printer to an audience of neighbors and voters.

Since 2016, the machine has printed 252,000 pages of material: the agenda and minutes of every meeting, every flyer, every itemized budget, every twice-yearly tax bill mailed to every property taxpayer in town. Its sputtering last act has been to crumple copy paper, as Blair demonstrated in the gym of the Canterbury Elementary School, making print-outs nearly illegible.

A warrant article requesting voters’ permission to raise $4,000 to purchase a new printer brought Brendan O’Donnell up to the microphone at town meeting Friday evening.

His unassuming query produced a chorus of laughter: “So, am I correct that, if we vote ‘no,’ you won’t be able to send us tax bills?”

Simple moments of levity punctuated Canterbury’s procedural annual meeting, which proved to be as congenial as it was efficient. All warrant articles, including the proposed operating budget, passed with minimal deliberation and near-unanimous voter approval, allowing the town to move forward on the various equipment purchases that dominated the town warrant.

Canterbury entered into its town meeting with a positive prognosis from Scott Doherty, chair of the Board of Selectmen.

The town’s finances are strong, and 2025 was the second consecutive year where officials were able to offset the tax burden by drawing on $500,000 of reserved funds. It’s unlikely, however, that the town will be able to continue resorting to that relief valve, Doherty warned.

With only one active bond payment by the end of 2026, the town isn’t overburdened by debt, but there were other invisible challenges to note, namely hiring and retention.

“We had a full-time police officer resign in February, 2025. We’re still advertising for a full-time replacement,” he said. “In a few weeks, the police chief will be meeting with the select board and the town administrator to discuss a long-term plan for wages and benefits for our police officers.”

All the mandates from last year’s warrant articles have been completed or are nearing completion: Renovations to the Sam Lake House garage are in their final stages, a new voting machine is in service and the Elkins Public Library was recently insulated. The town expects that its new fire engine will be delivered by May and has plans to begin saving to purchase a subsequent fire vehicle in 10 years.

At town meeting, the purchase of a new packer truck, the warrant article that carried the largest tax impact besides the budget, drew moderate discussion.

The town’s existing packer track, purchased in 1998, is kept idling while the Transfer Station is open. With 24,000 hours of run time, and having required $10,000 of repairs in 2025 alone, it appeared to the Board of Selectmen to be a good candidate for replacement.

“The check engine light is on, the turbo is making funny noises, and I don’t know about trucks, but that can’t be good,” Blair explained on the board’s behalf.

In the end, the meeting progressed swiftly, stalled momentarily by a few clerical and procedural questions.

The $3.6 million operating budget represents a 3.4% increase over last year’s budget. All told, the warrant articles and budget will have a tax impact of $5.92 for every $1,000 of property value, or $2,368 for the average $400,000 home.

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