WESTERLO — Town officials in Westerlo hoped for a big turnout Tuesday that would ratify their plan to borrow $887,000 to renovate the former school building that now serves as the town hall.

Of 70 water outlets tested in the Berne-Knox-Westerlo school district, only one showed lead levels exceeding the state-required action level of 15 parts per billion.

The winner of  a town board seat remained yet to be decided after all  the machine-cast votes were tallied and announced late Tuesday at Town Hall. A small crowd of interested observers that included the Town Supervisor Vasilios Lefkaditis,  Deputy Supervisor Amy Pokorny, Councilman Earl Barcomb,  and both candidates looked on.

But no triumphant moment occurred because the final result now depends on absentee ballots that have yet to be counted.

ALTAMONT — St. Lucy’s/St. Bernadette’s Church in Altamont is sponsoring two spring trips, both leaving from Albany.

The "Best of Spain" travelers will leave on March 30, escorted by Jean Gagnon of the Plaza Travel Center, and return April 10, 2017. Space is limited to 40 participants.

A two-year-old nonfiction residency program at the Carey Institute for Global Good has received long-term support in the form of a Logan Family Foundation grant.

WESTERLO —  The preliminary $2.8 million town budget does not ignore “the elephant in the room,” says town board member William Bichteman.

RENSSELAERVILLE — The proposed  $2.5 million town budget for 2017 has numbers not so different from those in the 2016 budget. The plan has moved through a series of town board workshops, has been approved as preliminary, and will receive public comment at a Nov. 9 hearing before it’s finally adopted.

This was a marked contrast to the state comptroller’s audit conducted three years ago, which found  that layers of accounting practices spread over several years had generated inaccurate financial records and overstated tax revenues.