Mayor Patrick Taylor said during the year’s first Coffee with the Mayor gathering, how he’d like to see Highlands get aggressive with its paving plans.
“We have town roads and streets that are in need of paving,” he said.
Paving, along with the upcoming Fiscal Year 2020-21 budget, town lighting and becoming a Bear Wise City were some of the topics Taylor touched on during the hour long informal gathering between the mayor and town residents at the Hudson Library on Friday, Feb. 28.
Taylor kicked off this year’s first Coffee with the Mayor gathering a month early because there is just too much to talk about to wait, he said.
“This is our budget time of the year and there are a lot of things going on in Highlands that the public needs to know about and discuss,” Taylor said to about 30 attending residents. “These are issues the public needs to know about and have a venue in which to voice their opinions and concerns.”
As always, the mayor began this seventh year of Coffee with the Mayor with the usual disclaimer.
“This is an informal conversation between the residents and the mayor,” Taylor said. “This is not official town policy.”
Andy Schmar, president of the Friends of the Library, who sponsored this season’s first Coffee with the Mayor, said times were changing and so was the library.
“The library isn’t just a repository of books anymore,” Schmar said.
Coffee with the Mayor meetings happen at the Hudson Library on the last Friday of each month between March and October. Each month an organization in town like the Friends of the Library sponsor the monthly coffee get-togethers providing a light lunch and refreshments such as fruit, finger sandwiches and beverages.
Taylor started his talk touching on the upcoming budget and explaining what the various numbers meant. He also touched on other projects the town has undertaken and will begin in the coming year such as paving, the town’s new water tank and trash.
“We have a trash problem on the plateau,” Taylor said. “Since we are a municipal government on the plateau it becomes our problem and I’m always pointing the finger saying it’s not just us, it’s the county. People that live around this area are in need of a better system and recycling.”
Taylor talked about the portable recycling trailer project
“It’s a pretty current technique,” he said. “This past summer we thought putting a trash dumpster out for household garbage would be nice and put a trash dumpster out.”
The dumpsters would fill up on a daily basis and increased to three dumpsters which turned the rec center parking lot into a trash dump.
“The problem was the town had to deal with all that and it was more a county problem,” Taylor said. “We ought to have a partnership with the county to help deal with household garbage and recycling.”
The mayor said visitors don’t know where the county trash sites are located and leave their trash at random places in town.
“We need to find a more centrally located place for recycling and for handling household garbage,” he said. “We have a lot of people who come in here from VRBOs and don’t know where to put their trash.”