West Tisbury voters will meet their new poet laureate and take up a warrant that is expected to spark discussion over more than one article at the annual town meeting next week.

The meeting begins at 6 p.m. Tuesday in the West Tisbury School — an hour earlier than usual. Free child care is being provided (advance registration is required).

Along with the much-debated Islandwide housing bank legislation, recommended 5-0 by the town finance and advisory committee, the warrant includes a proposed residential building size bylaw and two new bylaws for wiring and electrification in new or substantially remodeled buildings.

There are 51 articles on the warrant. Moderator Dan Waters will preside.

Originally dubbed Preserve West Tisbury, the building size bylaw would amend town zoning bylaws to require a special permit for most new home construction that exceeds specific limits on square footage per acre. The bylaw is based on one Chilmark approved in 2013, and includes a two-year review period.

The article has been aired in a series of public presentations over the past few months following more than two years of development by a committee appointed by the planning board.

“They’ve done a great job at having a lot of public forums,” town administrator Jennifer Rand said.

Still, Ms. Rand said she expects the proposed amendment to draw arguments from both sides on the town meeting floor.

“I think we certainly will have some conversation,” she said.

The wiring and electrification bylaws, which seek to reduce the use of fossil fuels, would require all new buildings and those that are being substantially renovated to be wired for an electric car charger and to be electrified for heating, hot water and cooling.

Ms. Rand said both are directly modeled on bylaws passed in Aquinnah in recent years.

If approved, the bylaws will still need select board and state legislative action to become effective.

“That’s a two-step process,” Ms. Rand said. “The select board has to send it to the legislature, because we would be making a more stringent building code.”

The town capital budget for 2023 is $22.1 million just over 9 per cent higher than in 2022, when capital appropriations totaled $20.3 million.

The largest share of the budget is for education, totaling $12.3 million, with $9.3 million for the up-Island school district and $3 million for the high school.

The budget also allots $2.9 million for public safety, $1.9 million for general government, $1.7 million for employee benefits and $1 million for culture and recreation.

Debt service accounts for $924,022 of the budget and human services for $631,314, with $462,071 for the highway department and $135,924 for sanitation.

Spending requests on the warrant include $145,000 for a new “all season machine” for brush cutting, sweeping and storm cleanup, to replace the town’s aging Kubota tractor, which is slated to be auctioned or traded in for $10,000 to $15,000.

There’s also $115,000 for a 20,000-gallon water tank, to be stored at the Lambert’s Cove Beach parking lot for firefighting emergencies, and $35,000 for a new police cruiser.

“The nature of doing business in the town is [that] sometimes you need stuff,” Ms. Rand told the Gazette.

Voters also will be asked to approve the new, year-round town position of climate/energy committee assistant, a part-time job.

A steep rise in the town elections budget, from $6,189 in 2022 to $14,978 in 2023, reflects two changes, town clerk Tara Whiting-Wells said.

Postage, which previously had not been part of the elections budget, now accounts for $4,000. Ms. Whiting-Wells said town treasurer/collector director Bruce Stone recommended the addition so that the clerk’s office would no longer have to tap the select board for postage.

“We do have more residents [and] we do have more people voting by mail,” said Ms. Whiting-Wells, whose office also mails 1,800 town census surveys each year.

The rest of the increase is due to the higher number of elections in the year to come, with a national primary in November joining the town meetings in September and next April.

Ms. Whiting-Wells said she always budgets for one additional election as well, “just in case.”

One nonbinding article from the finance committee asks the select board to increase building permit fees to cover the building department’s annual budget.

At their regular meeting on Wednesday this week, both select board members came said they opposed the article.

Board chairman Skipper Manter said taxpayers are already funding town departments.

“I don’t believe there should be any fees,” he said.

Board member Cynthia Mitchell did not object to permit fees, but pointed out that the building department also handles zoning business.

“There’s a certain percentage of the budget that’s really attributable to zoning, not building,” Ms. Mitchell said, estimating that as much as 40 per cent of building inspectors’ time on the job is spent on zoning matters.

Backing that amount out of the $255,000 the department spent last year, she said, the town is already close to covering the building department’s costs with the existing permit fees.

“I don’t think this warrant article is necessary,” Ms. Mitchell concluded.

Tuesday’s town meeting will open with a reading by outgoing poet laureate Spencer Thurlow, who will introduce new poet laureate Tain Leonard-Peck.

The town election is Thursday; polls are open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. at the town public safety building.

Ballot questions include the housing bank, a regional measure asking that radioactive wastewater from the closed Pilgrim nuclear plant not be discharged into Cape Cod Bay, and a request to allow $423,000 toward design work for the renovation of the Howes House senior center.

Ms. Mitchell is running unopposed for re-election, but there is a three-way race to complete the remaining year of the late Kent Healy’s term. James Klingensmith, Christopher Lyons and Jessica Miller are all running.

Mr. Healy died last October. Ms Mitchell and Mr. Manter decided to let voters to decide on who should replace him, rather than making an appointment.

“I’m looking forward to having that third member back with us,” Mr. Manter said Wednesday, noting that he and Ms. Mitchell had gotten through the intervening months without a deadlock.

“Both of us compromised a little to get things done, but we managed to get it done,” he said.