CHINA — The town is moving forward with property purchases, as authorized by one of the eight approved referendum questions of the 12 that were on the election ballot.

The Board of Selectmen voted Monday night to allow Town Manager Dan L’Heureux to go ahead with the purchases, which include a $12,000 property abutting the Town Office and a $10,000 property by the causeway at the north end of China Lake.

The property abutting the Town Office is for “long-term plans,” L’Heureux said, and the property by the causeway is being purchased with tax increment financing, or TIF, funds to provide more parking space near the lake.

The TIF district was established in 2015 in an agreement with Central Maine Power about upgrades the company was making, and it covers about 110 acres. The fund accumulates about $270,000 a year in taxes from the line improvements, and the money must be used for economic improvement projects.

China voters in the Nov. 8 election also allocated $3,800 for a community needs assessment related to the town’s elderly residents and the issue of aging in place. The town will appoint a committee to do a “deeper demographic dive” into China’s residents, L’Heureux said, and conduct the survey to determine China’s needs. He expects the committee to be formed in a month or so, he said.

Four of the referendum questions did not pass, including three that proposed amended town ordinances and one that proposed transferring funds for long-term planning.

Residents voted not to amend the solid waste flow control and solid waste disposal ordinances, both of which did not propose “material changes,” L’Heureux said, but rather just proposed updating the language. The selectmen proposed updating the flow control ordinance to reflect that China will be sending its waste to the Fiberight plant in Hampden in 2018, and no longer to the Penobscot Energy Recovery Co. facility. The disposal ordinance proposed upgrading the language, as the document was written in 1992 and has not been amended since.

“A 24-year-old document was just going to be updated,” L’Heureux said.

The land development code, which received some criticism at public hearings from residents and former town officials, also was rejected.

L’Heureux thinks residents might not have received enough information on the proposed changes beforehand, he said.

“I think that that has been a long-term sensitivity municipalities have had,” he said.

The selectmen plan to bring those proposals back to the residents for a vote at Town Meeting in the spring, when they can have a direct discussion with residents on the floor.

L’Heureux also said the town plans to try to distribute information more broadly using “multiple media” and possibly holding more public hearings.

He also said he wasn’t disappointed that the proposal to transfer $100,000 from the unassigned fund balance to the town’s capital and equipment account was voted down. L’Heureux said long-term capital planning is an important factor in keeping the tax rate down, but maintaining a healthy fund balance is good, too.

Madeline St. Amour — 861-9239

[email protected]

Twitter: @madelinestamour