Chilmark voters will decide on nearly $750,000 in school overrides, new restrictions on leaf blowers and a raft of changes to town zoning bylaws at the annual town meeting next week.

The meeting will take place at the Chilmark Community Center on Monday, April 28 at 7 p.m. The quorum is 25 people. Janet Weidner will serve as town moderator. 

At the top of the 25-article warrant are several funding questions for the schools. The town will ask voters to approve two overrides relating to the up-Island regional school district and the Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School, totaling approximately $541,000 combined. 

The overrides are meant to cover the rising costs for the district, according to chair Robert Lionette, the Chilmark member of the up-Island regional school committee. The costs include funding various new educational programs introduced across the schools, as well as staffing for those programs.

Chilmark School funding is on the warrant. — Ray Ewing

“It’s the cost of doing business,” Mr. Lionette said. “The assessment is based on a very complicated formula that factors in population, costs of operating the building of two town buildings, staffing within each building. It varies from year to year based on population models, based on staffing needs and such.” 

If the overrides and budget are approved, property taxes will go up, according to town assessor Pamela Bunker, though she didn’t have figures on the potential rise.  

“I don’t see it as a significant increase, but there definitely will be an increase in taxes, absolutely,” she said. “Though I do think it’ll be similar to last year.” 

The median home value in fiscal year 2025 was just above $2 million. The property tax bill for someone with a median home value was just under $5,000. 

Voters will also be asked to borrow an additional $200,000 for repairs to the up-Island schools. The money would help pay for the removal of the bell tower at Chilmark School and HVAC repairs at the West Tisbury School. 

The largest override request of the evening is already moot, due to a vote taken at the West Tisbury town meeting earlier this month. That request was for $700,000 for a feasibility study for the West Tisbury School building. Voters in West Tisbury rejected the spending.

Following in the footsteps of Edgartown, Oak Bluffs and West Tisbury, Chilmark voters will consider a bylaw that would phase out the use of gas-powered leaf blowers. 

Gas-powered blowers would be prohibited starting in June 2028. Until then, the town would set fall and spring seasons for when blowers would be allowed. The bylaw would allow people to use leaf blowers between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. on weekdays and 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturdays. Leaf blowers would be prohibited on Sundays and federal holidays.

Under the phaseout, electric leaf blowers would also have to follow the time restrictions starting in June 2028. 

A second leaf-blower bylaw submitted by citizen petition is also on the warrant. According to Joan Malkin, a member of the town conservation commission who signed the petition, there are only minor differences between the two articles. 

“The first [article] talks about federal holidays [only] and the second one talks about Christmas, New Year’s, Thanksgiving,” she said at a public information session earlier this month. “The second one [also] has a window of operation that’s been moved a month later as a result of feedback from the community. But the plan would be that if the first one was approved, we would indefinitely table the second one.” 

Voters will be asked to approve Community Preservation Act (CPA) to support various projects around the Island. Funding requests include $100,000 for the restoration and preservation of the Little Lady — the last wooden western-rig fishing dragger that is still in operation in New England that fishes out of Menemsha. Another request is to contribute $261,000 to an affordable housing project for school employees on Old Courthouse Road in West Tisbury. All towns are being asked to contribute funds to the housing development, which would be built by the nonprofit Island Housing Trust.

The Chilmark energy committee is putting forward a new bylaw that will affect new construction. Under the proposed regulations, beginning in 2026 new homes in Chilmark would not be allowed to use fossil fuels unless than also have solar energy. Homes less than 4,000 square feet using fossil fuels would need to add 4 kilowatts of solar energy. Homes larger than 4,000 square feet using fossil fuels would need to balance out the total use of the dwelling with solar. 

The bylaw is aimed at preparing the town to qualify for the state Climate Leader Community designation, which would introduce more grant opportunities for town projects. 

“The specialized energy code is a small step that the state would like towns to take in order to foster more renewable energy,” committee chair Robert Hannemann said. “It’s a relatively minor change. Adopting this code is a means to an end, not an end in itself.”

West Tisbury and Aquinnah have similar energy codes in place.  

Also on the warrant are amendments to definitions in the zoning bylaws around numerous structures found within a property, such as dwellings, guest houses and short-term rentals.

Town administrator Timothy Carroll said the proposed changes simplify the existing regulations.  

“The planning board has architects and engineers and lawyers on it, and so they decided they wanted to rewrite the definitions and then put in additional things we’re working on for the accessory dwelling unit definitions,” he said. 

The proposed amendments also address definitions relating to accessory dwelling units (ADU). The amendments are a step to comply with the new ADU laws adopted by the state earlier this year.  

“When you have a state bylaw that has more power than our local bylaw, there’s even confusion in town [about] what you do in the interim,” planning board chair Rich Ossnoss said at the public information session. “We felt the best thing to do was pursue this bylaw now.”

The annual town election will be held Wednesday, April 30. All the override questions will need to be passed at both town meeting and at the polls in order to be approved.

Three-term select board member James Malkin is not running for reelection. Matthew Poole is the lone candidate running for the position. Mr. Poole is a member of the board of health and most recently served as chair of the Chilmark Community Center moderator’s committee. Previously, he was the health agent in Edgartown for over 20 years. There are no contested races on the ballot.

Polls will be open from noon to 8 p.m. at the Chilmark Community Center. 

Editor's note: this article has been updated with more information about the proposed energy bylaw.