Hamilton Select Board Sets Single Tax Rate, Eyes ARPA Funds for Water Project

HAMILTON — November 15, 2021 — Hamilton Select Board unanimously sets a single property tax rate and hears pitch for $1.4 million ARPA water project. The board approved a residential tax factor of one for fiscal year 2022, setting the rate at $17.88 per thousand dollars of assessed value — two cents above the budgeted estimate — with Finance Director Alex McGee noting more than $23 million in new growth, roughly two-thirds of it from the Canterbury Brook development, generating about $406,000 in additional levy capacity. Town Manager Joe Domelowicz and McGee presented Hamilton's $2.4 million American Rescue Plan Act allocation and flagged the granular activated carbon water filtration project as the top priority, with three bids ranging from just over $3 million to $3.6 million and the low bidder holding his price only through December 20. The board tabled a resolution supporting state expanded producer responsibility legislation for paper and packaging — bills S.610 and H.878 — that advocates said could reimburse Hamilton for all of its $281,000 in annual recycling costs, pending member review of support letters from Boston, Cambridge, and the Massachusetts Municipal Association.