By JOSEPH FITZGERALD

UXBRIDGE — Annual Town Meeting voters will get down to business Tuesday to consider a proposed $34.9 million operating budget for the fiscal years that starts July 1; funding for a study to determine the feasibility of building a new high school; and the purchase of wellhead protection land off Commerce Drive.

The meeting gets under way at 7 p.m. in the Uxbridge High School gymnasium, 62 Capron St.
There are 32 articles on the warrant, including Article 14, a $550,000 debt exclusion warrant article to fund a feasibility study to determine costs associated with the construction of a new high school.
If approved by at least a two-thirds vote, the debt exclusion will have to be approved by a majority vote at a special election. If approved then, the School Building Committee would hire an engineering to perform the work, which would be eligible for grant funding from the Massachusetts School Building Authority.
The MSBA's grant program is a nonentitlement, discretionary program based on need, as determined by the MSBA. Any costs the town incurs in connection with the feasibility study in excess of any grant approved by and received from the MSBA would be the responsibility of the town.
The town is looking once again into building a new school on a Quaker Highway parcel acquired a few years ago for that purpose. Design plans for the school have already been completed; the School Building Committee needs the feasibility study to determine to what extent work done to date can be used in the new construction project. Town voters defeated a proposal for a new $32.4 million high school about six years ago.
If approved and the feasibility study is undertaken, the results of that study would be available for public review at the fall annual town meeting.
Article 14 asks voters to approve the purchase of wellhead protection land. If approved, the town would spend up to $550,000 to buy certain parcels known collectively as the Cnossen well land off Commerce Drive for a future well field site. The 17-plus-acre parcel abuts the town's Rosenfield well field land. Previous test wells, pumping and engineering studies have indicated a substantial source of water available at the site.
The town’s water engineers have recommended that the town acquire the property not only to increase available sources but to protect interference and influence on the existing well field by owners other than the town.
In Article 2, the town is seeking voter approval to transfer $60,000 from a retained earnings ambulance account to an operating account to purchase equipment to outfit town ambulances for advanced life support service. Specifically, the money would pay for cardiac monitoring equipment for the two ambulances, necessitated by the discontinuation of services provided by Milford Regional Hospital.
Voters at the town meeting will also be asked to approve a proposed $34,901,455 operating budget for fiscal 2008-09. The budget as recommended by Town Manager Jill R. Myers eliminates several municipal positions and includes a recommended schools budget $700,000 less than what schools officials were seeking.
The budget eliminates three full-time municipal positions and four part-time positions, reduces police overtime and cuts back on hours of operation at the Senior Center.
The cuts include: A full-time department of public works management position; a full time parks and DPW position; one vacant full-time library position; a building inspector reduced to part-time; a part-time conservation administrator position reduced; and four part-time positions eliminated in the offices of town manager, town clerk and town assessor. Police overtime and vacation fill-in are also significantly reduced, as will be Senior Center service hours, according to the proposed budgets.
Passage of the budget is in its current form will give the school a net increase of about $670,000 over the past two fiscal years, or 3.9 percent over last year. The difference between the School Committee's request and the town manager's recommendation is roughly $757,000.
If the School Committee is unable to operate within the town manager's recommended budget, Myers is suggesting the committee consider further reducing the budget or requesting a Proposition 2 ½ override ballot — not a transfer from stabilization.
Article 32, submitted by citizen petition, asks voters to authorize the Board of Selectmen, by a majority vote of the board, to place an underride ballot question before the voters.
The question would ask whether the town should reduce the amount of real estate and personal property taxes to be assessed for the fiscal year beginning July 1 by an amount equal to $1.2 million.