By Devon Cormier
Staff Writer

New Boston selectmen have decided to add a warrant article to the March ballot that will ask voters to approve supplemental insurance for the 50 volunteer firefighters in town.

Fire Chief Dan MacDonald and more than a dozen supporters spoke at the Monday, Jan. 10, selectmen’s meeting with hopes of getting the selectmen’s support. To that end, MacDonald brought with him a petition with signatures of more than 20 registered voters to get the warrant on the ballot if selectmen don’t support it. It was the day before the petitioned warrant article deadline, but selectmen decided to sup- port the contentious article, which will be on the ballot in March.

“I am very happy but still feeling a bit cautious,” said MacDonald.

Many finance committee members showed up to support the warrant article as well. Committee member Brandy Mitroff said she was in support of selectmen putting the warrant article on the ballot because petitioned warrant articles don’t garner as much support from voters, who generally assume the selectmen do not support a petitioned article.

“The job demands that if a building is burning you go inside,” said Mitroff,“This is a good thing.”

Finance Committee Chairman Louis Lanzillotti sat next to his son at the meeting and declined commenting much on the issue because his son is a volunteer firefighter.

“We call on our fire department to make a lot of personal sacrifices as well as financial ones to answer our calls,” said Lanzillotti.

The issue of supplemental insurance for New Boston’s vol- unteer firefighters has been a hot debate for years. Selectmen have showed marked reluctance in supporting insurance that will cost taxpayers less than $4,000 a year to fill gaps in the firefighters worker’s compensation benefits. A meeting with the insurance representative and a state worker’s compensation specialist seemed to turn opinions around as selectmen showed complete support for the insurance at their last meeting.

The warrant articles will ask voters to approve an 80-20 split for supplemental insurance. If it passes, the town will be paying for 80 percent of the insurance, which includes disability benefits and first week disability benefits. Worker’s compensation only covers a percentage of missed wages after the subscriber missed work for more than three days.

The other 20 percent of the supplemental insurance cost will be picked up by the firefighters themselves.

Now, selectmen will make sure the wording on the petition complies with regulations and include the warrant article on the March ballot for voters to decide.

MacDonald said he is pleased selectmen decided to support the article although he believes it would have passed as a petitioned warrant article anyway.