Deadline for EFUD election candidates nears ahead of May 14 annual meeting

March 28, 2025  |  By Lisa Scagliotti 

Waterbury's Water Treatment plant is located on Barnes Hill in Waterbury Center. Photo by Gordon Miller

The annual meeting for Waterbury’s Edward Farrar Utility District, which oversees the municipal water and wastewater operations, will take place on Wednesday, May 14.

The district is managed by a five-member Board of Commissioners and the deadline for candidates to file to run for open positions on the board is 5 p.m. on Monday, April 7. 

The board’s two one-year positions are on the ballot as well as one three-year position. The current commissioners in those seats say they plan to run for re-election: Rick Weston and Natalie Sherman are in the one-year seats; Cynthia Parks is ending a three-year term. 

According to district Clerk Karen Petrovic, candidates must submit a petition with at least 16 signatures of registered voters from the utility district. Candidates also must be a registered voter residing in the district. 

EFUD boundary map source data was provided by Central Vermont Regional Planning Commission. NOTE: Town officials have pointed out that the source data has some minor errors. Some properties near the Country Club of Vermont are included in the shaded area incorrectly. It affects 4-5 parcels. If you are in doubt, check with the town clerk’s office on your voting eligibility.

The EFUD district boundaries are those of the former Village of Waterbury which was dissolved in 2018. The area encompasses properties served by municipal wastewater. (see map) 

To confirm eligibility to be a candidate or to vote in the EFUD election and at the annual meeting, contact Petrovic at 802-244-8447 or by email at karen@waterburyvt.com.

The EFUD board meets next at 4:30 p.m. on Wednesday, April 9, where it will finalize the warning for the annual meeting. 

Municipal Manager Tom Leitz last week told the Waterbury Select Board that he and EFUD Chair P. Howard “Skip” Flanders are working on drafting a question to include on the EFUD annual meeting warning on whether to commission a study to assess the costs and benefits of merging the district’s water and wastewater operations into town government. 

“To be clear, this is not a study about how would a merger happen,” Leitz said. “It is strictly limited to simply hear the efficiencies, hear the inefficiencies.”

The goal would be to limit the scope of a study to “just the facts” collected in a short time and to then assess what the next steps might be based on the study’s information. 

More information about EFUD and its board is online on the WaterburyVt.com website under Boards and Meetings. The district’s annual report will be posted online and available in printed copies in late April.

Last year’s EFUD annual meeting and election was held on May 8 and 144 voters cast ballots in the election; fewer than 20 district residents attended the in-person meeting.