Friday Updates - November 1, 2024

Friday, November 1, 2024

The last of the colorful leaves for the season. Courtesy, Todd Selig

Daylight Savings Time ends this weekend! Don't forget to set your clocks back one hour this Saturday evening before you go to bed.

TOWN CLERK'S OFFICE CLOSED ON ELECTION DAY

Just a reminder that the Durham Town Clerk’s Office will be closed on Election Day, Tuesday, November 5, 2024, and will re-open at 12pm on Wednesday, November 6, 2024. Residents are not permitted to do motor vehicle registrations in other towns (many clerk offices will be closed on Tuesday), but payments may be left in the town hall drop box. 

A family of skeletons attended the Downtown Trick-or-Treat on Saturday, October 26. Courtesy, Todd Selig

WATER & SEWER BILLS ARE ON THE WAY

Water and sewer bills for the 4th and final billing of 2024 are being mailed now to be received by Tuesday, October 29, 2024, and will be due on Friday, November 29, 2024. You may make payments online at www.ci.durham.nh.us/clerk or by mailing a check to 8 Newmarket Road, Durham, NH 03824. You may also leave payments in the town hall dropbox located at 8 Newmarket Road, Durham, NH. Residents may also pay for their water and sewer bill in person between 8am-4:30pm, Monday-Friday. 

Please note that you may experience longer wait times if you visit us in person before election day, as we are busy registering voters and receiving returned absentee ballots. Please email rdeane@ci.durham.nh.us if you have any questions about your water and sewer bill. The Town Clerk’s Office will be closed on Election Day 11/5/24, Veteran’s Day 11/11/24, and Thanksgiving Holiday 11/28-29/24. Bills postmarked or left in the town hall drop box by 11/29/24 will not be charged interest.

FY 2025 BUDGET DEVELOPMENT PROCESS IN FINAL STAGES LEADING UP TO PRESENTATION TO COUNCIL ON NOV. 4

Administrator Selig and the Business Office are wrapping up budget development at the moment.

Here’s the short version:

• Department requests came in resulting in a FY projected Town/Municipal only tax rate increase of 16.29%.
• Admin. Selig’s first round of cuts (eliminating all new requested positions and other major reductions from requested), changes, reductions, trimming, reallocation brought our projections down to an 8.65% municipal only tax rate projected increase.
• Business Manager Jablonski and Mr. Selig met to review once again, and Admin. Selig made further changes/reductions bringing the projected tax rate increase to 8.11%. (Note the reductions are smaller with each round.)
• At this point, after literally reviewing every line item, Mr. Selig has made further reductions lowering the projected tax rate increase for the local/municipal portion of the rate to 7.71%.  He is unable to reduce more without impacting core programming/services, our already minimal staffing, important projects, etc.
• Basically at this juncture Mr. Selig does not believe it will be possible to achieve the Council’s CPI-U (Boston-Cambridge-Newton, MA-NH) goal of 3.4% as of September.
• On a positive note, the water and wastewater funds will come in at or below CPI-U, which is good news.

More to come but very directly -- this is where we are at this time.

As Mr. Selig has written many times before, without broadening the tax base, we are running up against a wall. Increased tax base growth for 2025 is projected to be only about 1%. Tax rate growth for this year came in about $10 million lower than projected, making it that much harder for FY 2025 fiscal planning. 

By Town Charter, the Administrator has until the last business day in October to provide the Town Council with a proposed budget for the upcoming fiscal year (January 1 – December 31, 2025). The Council then has until the last business day in December to adopt a budget of its own, or the Administrator’s proposal becomes the budget by default. 

We’ll shortly be sending the budget information to the printer in advance of presenting it to the Council next week on Halloween – October 31.

The UNH Dance Team helped hand out candy at the Downtown Trick-or-Treat this past Saturday. Courtesy, Todd Selig

Did You Know? 

Although people often rake and bag leaves to prevent their lawns from being smothered and to make yards look better, in most cases, you're fine not moving them. In fact, many environmental experts say raking leaves and removing them from your property is not only bad for your lawn but for the environment as well.

Consider using some of your leaves in a backyard compost pile 

OR 

Use your lawn mower and chop the leaves up. Not only will the leaves provide excellent nitrogen and organic matter that your winter grass will love, it will:

• protect root systems;
• preserve soil moisture, and 
• the lawn mower will help cut weeds, providing critical light for your grass

Mulching your leaves also helps wildlife. Insects depend on leaf litter in the winter to provide protective habitat and food. Those insects in turn become winter food for other animals like birds. 

Not only does mulching your leaves help your grass and soil, it also helps reduce greenhouse gases and limits waste. 

Check out this YouTube clip HERE for more details.

Article source: Chesapeake Bay Foundation 

Brought to you by the IWMAC Committee 

Questions about recycling or composting? Email us at: DurhamRecycles603@gmail.com

Check us out on Instagram: sustainable.durham.nh

Not sure if an item can be recycled? Check here: https://recyclesmartma.org/

Want to learn more about the Swap Shop? Click HERE for information.

These Trick-or-Treaters rode into Downtown on their trusty dragons! Courtesy, Liz Keenum 

The Durham Professional Firefighters Local #2253 would like to introduce Smokey the Fire Dog. Smokey will give short tips on Fire Safety, weekly, so Parents and guardians can generate conversation with their children about Fire Safety. Keep an eye out in the weekly updates. These small questions and tips are a great way for you as a Parent/Guardian to teach your kids about Fire Safety. The more they know the safer they will be.

WEEK #44

It’s that time of year again to set the clocks back. Daylight Saving Time ends every year on the first Sunday in November. This means it starts to get darker earlier. When you change your clocks, it's also a great time to check the batteries in your smoke alarms and carbon monoxide detectors.

During election day on Nov. 5th, the senior class will be selling Krispy Kreme donuts to raise money so for an awesome senior week filled with various events and activities!

OYSTER RIVER SCHOOL NEWS

No School November 5

All ORCSD schools will be closed for a teacher workshop day on Tuesday, November 5. Please note that parent teacher conferences for students in grades 5-8 were rescheduled to January 27, 2025. Parents and guardians are encouraged to review their student(s)'s academic progress in PowerSchool and contact teachers directly with any questions or concerns.

ORHS Named to 2024 Advanced Placement School Honor Roll

Superintendent Dr. Robert Shaps and Principal Rebecca Noe are proud to share that Oyster River High School (ORHS) has earned a Bronze distinction on the 2024 Advanced Placement (AP) School Honor Roll. The AP School Honor Roll recognizes schools that have done outstanding work to welcome more students into AP courses and support them on the path to college success. To learn more, click HERE.

Moharimet School Pumpkin Stroll

On October 17, Moharimet School hosted its annual Pumpkin Stroll. The District would like to thank the many staff, volunteers, and community members who helped the stroll come to life. Over 50 parents came in to help students carve pumpkins, and the Moharimet PTO did a wonderful job supporting the event and hosting the bake sale. What a great event! Photos and additional information are available HERE.

Mast Way School Unleashes Student Creativity with Poetry

The 2024-2025 school year will be one of poetry for Mast Way students. The school made plans to focus on a poet and a poetry style each month. To learn more, click HERE.

ORMS Student Create Food Trucks in Health Class

Did you know that for the past 5 years, Mrs. Pirtle’s 7th grade Health class has been hosting a food truck activity on the Oyster River Middle School's (ORMS) 2nd floor? This activity helps students understand the importance of nutrition and having a healthy lifestyle by harnessing the students’ creativity and tying it to ORMS’ health curriculum. Photos and additional information are available HERE.

October 28 Internet and Digital Safety Presentation, 6:00 - 7:30 p.m.

This ORCSD free admission program is presented by the New Hampshire Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force (ICAC) at the Morse Recital Hall (Oyster River Middle School). This program is for adults only and not suitable for students. The program includes an introduction to ICAC, how predators use social media, digital safety for cell phone, personal devices and gaming systems, and a demonstration with K-9 Niko who is New Hampshire's first Electronic Storage Detection K-9. No registration required.

November 8 Veteran's Day Breakfast

The Oyster River Middle School (ORMS) will be hosting its third annual Veteran's Day Ceremony and Breakfast on November 8, 8:30 - 10:30 a.m. The ceremony will be held at 8:30 a.m. in the Morse Recital Hall followed by breakfast. Please RSVP HERE.

2024-2025 ORCSD Music Department Concert Schedule

It's almost concert season and we will have lot of exciting opportunities to support Oyster River students in their artistic endeavors this year. You may view our online calendar to find coming concerts and activities or view the Music Department's flyer HERE.

UNH Theater students present "How Democracies Die," a theatrical exploration of the New York Times best-selling book by Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt, October 30 - November 2 at 7:00 p.m. and November 3 at 2:00 p.m.

The play, devised by UNH students, will delve into the book’s examination of how we have arrived at this moment in our democracy. As stated in the Wall Street Journal’s review; “The authors argue, with good evidence, that democracies aren’t destroyed because of the impulses of a single man; they are, instead, degraded in the course of a partisan tit for tat dynamic that degrades norms over time until one side sees an opening to deliver the death blow.” The result of more than twenty years of studying the breakdown of democracies from the 1930s to the present, the book’s authors have provided an artistic springboard to understand how democracies die, and how ours can not only be saved, but thrive.

Each performance will be immediately followed by an audience discussion with featured panelists.

Click HERE for more information.

FATHERS AND THEIR FIRST-GRADE STUDENTS NEEDED FOR UNH RESEARCH STUDY

Undergraduate psychology student, Alyanna Magsipoc, UNH professor Dr. Pablo Chavajay and graduate student Mercy Sulaiman are conducting a research study examining parent-child interactions in joint activities. They are interested in learning about the forms of interactions between parents and their first-grade children as they engage together in sharing a book. This study will help better understand the ways parents support children’s learning.   

This research study involves only one short session (~20 minutes) where parents will be asked to share a book with their first-grade children and at the end of this activity, parents will be also asked to respond to a few questions related to the activity just completed. The activity will be video and/or audio recorded to allow for free flow of conversation and interactions between parents and children. 

Currently, there is already a satisfactory sample of mothers, but they are short on father participants. If you are a father with a first-grade student and would like to participate in this study with your child, please contact Alyanna at Alyanna.Magsipoc@unh.edu or 603-496-6688, or Dr. Pablo Chavajay at Pablo.Chavajay@unh.edu or 603-862-1882.