FALCONER - After 15 years of dedicated service, Lucian Lodestro is ready to resign from the Ellicott Town Board.
Attorney William L. Wright Jr. made the announcement during the last board meeting that Lodestro, a board member for the past 15 years, had submitted a letter of intention to resign from his position.
In his letter of resignation, Lodestro stated: "I, Lucian Lodestro, councilman representing Ward 3, am resigning from the board, effective Nov. 1, 2012. I will be moving out of the town of Ellicott. It has been a pleasure to serve the town for so many years."
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To commemorate his many years of service, the Ellicott Town Board presented Lucian Lodestro with a plaque as a way to give thanks.
P-J photo by Remington Whitcomb
To commemorate his many years of service, the members of the town board presented Lodestro with a plaque as a way to give thanks.
"Lucian is just a huge loss to the town," said Cecil Miller, town supervisor. "He's been a great councilman - he's very dedicated - he's taken on some projects over the years where he's just been a one man show. He was my health teacher in high school, and I have a tremendous amount of respect for him. Out of anyone I've worked with over the years, he's the one I've learned the most from. He will be impossible to replace, but we obviously will need to try."
Miller said that before another boardmember is appointed to Lodestro's old ward, the town board will likely see what takes place with regard to redistricting. He said the board does not want to appoint a member to a ward which might potentially be eliminated.
With regard to the override of the 2 percent tax cap, the board resolved to do so because they felt it was their last option.
"We're not the first (town) to do it," said Miller. "I don't know what percentage, but I know a lot of the towns are overriding it this year. It seems that workers' compensation switching to the towns' budgets is the biggest factor for (the override). We have some other challenges as well - whether we'll be able to cut some more out of our budget, we'll see, but I personally don't see any way we will be even close to the 2 percent tax cap."
Miller said that he is actively searching for ways to reduce spending in the budget, however he believes Ellicott is at a point where cutting anything else from the budget could mean a loss of services for residents of the town.
"Anything we cut is going to impact services at this point," said Miller. "There's no more low hanging fruit. Sometimes it helps to explain to people what they're facing with regard to hard numbers. Right now, if we passed the budget, a $100,000 house would see less than a $100 increase in their taxes. A lot of times people don't realize how small the town tax is. They get this big tax bill, what with school taxes and county taxes - town taxes are really the smallest portion of it. It doesn't make it any better that we are forced to (override the 2 percent tax cap), but we want people to know that we're working as hard as we can to keep things manageable."