Two residents who said they live on Valley Forge Road asked Weston's Board of Finance on Thursday, Oct. 29, to make Town Hall back up its request for $76,000 for a smaller redesign of their road. Before the board acts on the money, they want the town to show a scope of work, a work plan and a timeline.
"We suffer every day from the results of the deferred maintenance on that road," said David McConaughey, one of the two.
The selectmen approved the request on Oct. 15: $31,000 moved from the finished Lyons Plains Road project and $45,000 in new money, to redesign the project within the existing pavement and, the town hopes, keep a state grant of more than $5 million. Both pieces still need the finance board's approval. The board's next regular meeting is Thursday, Nov. 12, at 7:30 p.m. As of Nov. 3, the town had not posted an agenda for it.
The Oct. 29 session was one of two public comment meetings the board scheduled for 2026. Chair Michael Imber said the board would listen and not answer questions, but that "the public's contribution tonight will have influence with the Board of Finance in its actions." Four residents spoke.
McConaughey and the other Valley Forge Road resident, Ross Colbert, said residents have been contacting Town Hall about the road since May 2025 and that most of their messages were ignored. Both said they welcomed the decision to redesign. Colbert said the town's Oct. 13 funding memo "listed only public comment and resistance" as the reasons for the redesign, and left out what he called regulatory, environmental, managerial and oversight problems that remain unresolved. That memo, from Town Administrator Karl Kilduff, says the town went back to the state "following public comments and resistance to the project as originally scoped." Colbert said he hoped the new design would "uphold the town's commitment to respect private property."
Amy Sanborn, who said she lives on Old Hyde Road, questioned the new money. Leftover Lyons Plains Road money might fairly cover some of the redesign, she said, and money already appropriated for grant-related projects could be used instead of a supplemental appropriation of new money, "keeping that powder dry." She also asked the board, as it prepares the 2027-28 budget, to check how much is left in the town's building-repair, maintenance and grant-project accounts before recommending more.
Sanborn also asked when residents would hear about community conversations on the middle school. Imber answered that the Board of Education is "putting out an RFP right now to hire a communications consultant," an idea its chair raised in October. No community conversation is on the calendar, he said, but he hopes for one in early December and another in January.
The session was also Christopher Bryant's last on the finance board. The board unanimously adopted a resolution thanking him for his service since 2023. The selectmen appointed him on Oct. 22 to Anthony Pesco's seat, a move that was to take effect Nov. 1, once he resigned from the finance board. As his last act on the board, Bryant moved to close the session.
A refill for the schools' reserve
At its Oct. 8 meeting, the board voted to add $535,584 to the Board of Education's non-lapsing account, a reserve where the schools can keep money left over at the end of a year instead of returning it to the town. The money comes from unspent fiscal 2025 purchase orders and the schools' fiscal 2026 surplus, according to the district's request memo. That surplus has not been audited, and the district's year-end report says there may be minor adjustments before the audit concludes in December. It was the first time the schools had asked to refill the account, Imber said at the meeting.
Memos to the board from Phillip Cross, the district's chief financial and operations officer, list three specific uses, with the rest held for unexpected costs:
- a multi-attachment loader with a lift and snow plow, about $158,000, which the district would otherwise put in its next capital budget
- $136,423 for the second of three payments under an early retirement incentive for teachers; six teachers are taking part
- a new assessment of the condition of the district's buildings; the last one was completed in 2017, Cross said at the meeting
Cross said the district wants the assessment to produce at least a 10-year capital plan, and Imber said he expected the results to be used to update the long-range forecast the town has been using to weigh the Weston Middle School project.