Table of Contents

• Background
• Where We Are Now
• Why This Matters
• The Legality Of It All
• Take Your Power Back
• All Is Not Lost

Background

As of April 28th 2026, the Selectboard has not set a date for a re-vote on the Kimball Public Library's budget. This is what the town said they wanted at Town Meeting.

Why not?

The Budget Process

During the budget process the Kimball Board of Trustees presented a budget to the Selectboard that accounted for raises, increased operating costs, and, notably, an increase to the library director's salary. After reviewing this proposed budget the Selectboard refused to send the library's proposed budget to the voters and instead substituted their own budget, a budget with errors. They stated that the proposed budget was to big of an ask, with one member called the request "offensive" in the meeting and another stating it was "pretty offensive" in a later interview.

In the end the Selectboard decided not to put the proposed budget to vote at Town Meeting this year. Instead they agreed to a small increase with much of that to be raised by increased Library Board fundraising. Many people in town, myself included, lamented this decision, but kept our eyes focused on the possibility of new Selectboard members coming in to create a general cultural shift within the board itself. But, that was until it was realized that there was an error in the budget put forth by the town. An accounting error had been made that meant the library wasn't even going to get the measly increase the Selectboard agreed to.

Voting Down The Budget

After this error was noticed by the library's director, the Town Manager and the Selectboard were made aware of this. However, the Selectboard declined to meet to address this issue. I believe they stated they could not obtain a quorum before the deadline for the Town Meeting warning, which was only a few days away. This was clearly due to a lack of importance placed on this issue. I understand that Selectboard members may have busy lives, but warning for a special meeting and having it the next day should always be possible for urgent matters. Members are, after all, allowed to attend meetings virtually, and a single issue meeting to vote on a correction wouldn't take long.

All of this taken together, the lowered approved budget, the accounting error, and the unwillingness to correct this error, was too much of an insult to our library for the people in town to bear, so we rallied together to get the budget voted down. The idea was, at the time, that we'd vote down the budget and then the Selectboard would swiftly set forth a new date for the people of the town to vote on a new budget for the library that was inline with what we, the voters, wanted. In the end we succeeded and the budget was voted down at the ballot box.

Where We Are Now

Well, here we are nearly 2 months after Town Meeting, and what has happened with the library's budget since then?

Nothing, apparently.

The Timeline So Far

Since Town Meeting there have been a number of meetings of the Selectboard and of the various board and committees relevant to the budgeting process. Promptly following Town Meeting the Kimball Board of Trustees had a meeting to discuss what to do about the budget going forward. In that meeting they decided that, since there was plenty of time, they would put forth their originally proposed budget. Now that there was a Finance Director in town they could send it to the Budget Committee for review. And they did that.

3 days later the Budget Committee had it's first meeting of the year. In that meeting the Budget Committee reviewed the proposed budget and made the determination that they would recommend the budget to the Selectboard. What this means is that on March 17th, less than two weeks after Town Meeting and before the Selectboard had any meetings of its own, the Budget Committee recommended that the Selectboard allow the voters of this town to vote of the proposed budget from the library's Board of Trustees.

Since this recommendation there have been crickets from the Selectboard. They have not even mentioned the library's budget in the last 2 months. Many of us here in town have given them grace. We didn't know precisely when the Budget Committee actually passed on that recommendation to them; they had a whirlwind of extended meetings in mid-March; and, I think, we all had faith that the next time we saw a meeting announcement from them that it would include action on the library budget.

This optimism was clearly misplaced. The Selectboard has found time to have 2 special meetings in the last week with only an executive session on the agenda, but no time to discuss the library's budget. I've heard, through the grapevine, that the Selectboard wasn't made aware of the library's proposed budget, or that they did hear about it from the Budget Committee but didn't receive it through the "proper channels" yet. I call bullshit on this.

The Selectboard's Inaction

I'm a regular involved citizen and I know what's been going on with the budget, so the Selectboard certainly did. Their inaction on this matter clearly shows that they are not prioritizing bringing the vote on the budget to the people of this town. Even if "proper channels" were not used to pass the budget along (and I don't believe there is any law or ordinance that specifically requires that), they should have brought it up in a meeting as a show of good faith to the voters in town.

If, perhaps, the members of the Selectboard did not know that the library had submitted a budget, and believed that they submitted it through the proper avenues, then this is cause for serious concern. If the Selectboard members are not plugged into this information ecosystem, are siloed in it in anyway, or are willfully ignorant of the information being transferred within it, then they are clearly not representing this town adequately.

Why This Matters

The entire purpose of the voters of the town voting on a budget is to give us the opportunity to directly make decisions about how we want to see money spent in town. The Selectboard acts as the gatekeepers between those budgets and the voters. With a Selectboard that accurately represents the populace this system works mostly fine. But, sometimes our Selectboards become unaligned with the voters of this town. This can lead to budgets being unnecessarily adjusted before going to vote, or possible delays on second votes in the event of a failure... but these issues seem to be dependent on which department in town we're talking about. You see, this library budget issues stands in stark contrast to the police budget issue from 2023 (and before, but lets stick with 2023 for a direct comparison).

The Selectboard's Hypocrisy

In 2023, after voters turned down the initial police budget, the Selectboard discussed it at-length during their next meeting only a few days later. In that meeting they also set a date to discuss this item again at a meeting where the police budget was the only agenda item. In that second meeting they discussed the budget some more with some new figures and motioned to approve the budget, and all of this was within 3 weeks of Town Meeting. After that some time was taken for a nice FAQ document to use to sell residents on the police budget, and then the actual warning was motioned for at the next Selectboard meeting.

It sure seems that the Selectboard really cared about getting that second vote on the police budget, so why is there no urgency for the library? Well, it's due to the makeup of the Selectboard, plain and simple.

Libraries are places for education, places for community engagements, places that provide free community specific services, and places that generally give people the tools to fight back against oppression. Police, on the other hand, are upholders of the law. More specifically, they enforce the law and they enforce laws concerning private property. As such, people with more private property are more likely to have an innate sense that policing is a valuable service that must be available at all times.

This can be further exempified in the difference in how they adopted budgets for each departments this year. The police department's proposed 35% increase in revenue raised by taxes went to vote as a "necessary" item, as opposed to the hand wringing over the library's budget. If you want to see the Selectboard's priority laid bare then look at the proposed budget numbers that they approved for the year.

A Cynical Plan

I'll also point out that the faster you schedule the Special Town Meeting for a budget, the more time you have to schedule a second one in case it fails again. The ability to have two meetins before the start of the fiscal year in July is actually really important here. This is because, if we were allowed to vote on the library's full proposed budget then we, the voters of this town, could decide that the library's proposed budget is actually too much to bear, or even "offensive" if you will. With time for 2 meetings we would have the ability to use our voting powers to better refine the libarary's budget.

Unfortunately, we may be at a point where we now only have time for 1 Special Town Meeting. With that in mind the Selectboard will most certainly take the "pragmatic" route of not allowing us to vote on the libary's proposed budget, in case it fails and there isn't time for a second vote before the next fiscal year starts in July. This gives them a better reason to turn down the library's proposed budget again, as opposed to simply calling it "pretty offensive."

The Legality Of It All

There is, under the surface of all this, the question of what the Selectboard's role actually should be in the library's budgetting process. Since we elect a Board of Trustees to oversee the library, and they make the proposed budget, shouldn't the Selectboard just be passing that budget onto us to vote on instead of being handwringing middlemen? It would make more intunitive sense, and would allow the Selectboard to pass all blame for the issue of the library's budget onto the library's own board, but what does the law say?

The General Powers of the Library

The powers of the library's Board of Trustees is governed by 22 V.S.A. § 143. Previously, this statute was a bit broad, especially in regards to the budgeting process. It laid out that the Board of Trustees had the "full power" to manage the library, create bylaws, control and manage the property, etc... However, in 2024, the state legislature passed bill S.220 which better codified the powers of the board and added verbiage to address their powers over the budget.

22 V.S.A. § 143 now explicitly says the board has the full power to "establish a library budget for consideration by the legislative body of the municipality for inclusion in the municipality’s budget." But, how exactly do we interpret that? Luckily, we don't need to have law degrees to interpret the legislative intent here, as we have a ruling from the Supreme Court that explains the board's powers much better.

What The Case Law Says

In Hartford Board of Library Trustees v. Town of Hartford the Supreme Court determined that the Selectboard cannot infringe on the library Board of Trustee's ability to exert their "full power to manage" a library. In this case specifically, the Supreme Court directly laid out that the Board of Trustees has the power to set the salary and wages of a librarian, and that a town may not change the salary set by the board. Since the Board of Trustees is given this power by the voters, then, per the Supreme Court, "If the townspeople are unhappy with the performance of the library trustees, either because of a lack of administrative efficiency or for any other reason, they may vote the trustees out of office, or they may decide to undertake a system in which the trustees are appointed by town officials rather than elected"

To that end, the Selectboard has violated the case law when they adjusted the proposed salaries for the library's staff back in January, and they would violate it again if they choose to usurp the library's Board of Trustees power to set those in their budget. I believe the best way to ensure that we do not violate the law, or the spirit of the law, is to allow the voters of this town to vote directly on the library's proposed budget as soon as possible.

Take Your Power Back

Whether you agree, or fervently disagree, with my general take on the Selectboard's attitude towards the police, it is undeniable that they clearly prioritize funding the police department over the library. So, if you want to be able to vote on funding our library, what can you do?

Well, here are a few things

Bitch & Moan

That's right, bitch and moan until our representatives cannot ignore you and must take action. I mean, that's my whole strategy with writing this anyways. If we all vocalize our opinion on this subject, both online and offline, then they will be more encourage to take action.

This doesn't mean that they will. As one of our Selectboard members put it when discussing a separate library issue back in March, "50 people in town want it right... there are thousands of people in town." Referring to a group advocating for something as merely "50 people" instead of representing the general sentiment is a good way to dismiss us, which is why bitching and moaning won't always work.

Make Your Own Petition

Compared to other states, Vermont has some great laws governing the powers given to the general public. To that end, they allow us to create petitions to do basically anything the Selectboard can do.

You want the library's budget to be 1 trillion dollars? Great, start a petition. You want to get rid of the Town Manager position and force the Selectboard to be more active in their role? Awesome, start a petition. Vise versa, do you want to get rid of the Selectboard and only have a Town Manager? Fantastic, start a petition. You want to have a Special Town Meeting to have your petitions on the ballot instead of waiting for regular Town Meeting? Amazing plan, start a petition. The world really is your oyster with this (to a degree, there are, of course, stipulations). Most petitions do require 5% of the voters in town to sign them, and others may require more, but 5% is only around 190 people so you can make it happen.

I will note that, in the case of wanting a vote on the library's budget to happen sooner than later, the petition route isn't really viable due to the time lag between having all the signatures and a Special Town Meeting actually being scheduled. However, if the Selectboard doesn't put up for a vote the budget the library asked for, and you really want the option to vote on that budget, you can create a petition for a Special Meeting with that on the warning whenever you want (this is not legal advice. I could be a bit off base here). Sure, changing the budget after the start of the fiscal year is probably a huge pain for the town, but our library is important.

Remove Them

You have all the real power in this town, and you have the power to remove those in position of power as well.

Now, I have buried the lead with this one a bit, as Randolph does not have a viable path to remove Selectboard members before their term expires currently. But, with the powers given to us by state statue, we have the power to make that an option. You can create a petition for a charter that lays out a recall process for Selectboard members, and, after fighting to get signature and having a few public hearings, you can have that charter voted on in the next Town Meeting. Once passed you can implement that recall process as soon as you see fit.

This process is a bit involved, and doing all the work of creating a charter for a single policy may not be entirely worth it. Yet, I still think the ability to recall Selectboard members before their terms expire is one of those things needed to ensure we can hold their feet to the fire in more tangible ways. Underhill did it, Essex Junction did it, why not Randolph?

All Is Not Lost

Depsite all of the doom and gloom above, it's good to keep in mind that we are lucky enough to at least have the ability to talk about issues with our representatives and, collectively, take action. The powers given to us by the state put us in charge of town, and any board we disagree with is merely temporary. We can all come together as a community, as we have many time before, to make the changes to our town and it's government that we want to see.

Most of all, if anyone wishes to educate themselves more on matters of public policy or the rights of voters, they can always head down to the Kimball Public Library to absorb some of the wonderful information housed within its walls.

Dustin Adams