NORTON - Norton will vote Monday night on becoming sewer partners with Mansfield and Foxboro.

Under an annual town meeting proposal, the three towns would form a regional sewer district commission to oversee the wastewater treatment plant, which is in Norton but which Mansfield runs now.

All three towns must approve the proposal.

Norton and Foxboro will vote at annual town meetings on Monday. Norton's meeting is at 7 p.m. at the Henri A. Yelle Elementary School, 64 West Main St.

Foxboro's meeting is at 7:30 p.m. at Foxboro High School. Mansfield's annual meeting is at 7 p.m. May 20.

If approved by all three towns, the communities' selectmen and the water and sewer commissions would draft special legislation to create the regional sewer commission. The officials then would ask their legislators to file it.

The regional board's membership would be based on population. Mansfield would have three votes, and Norton and Foxboro two each.

Also requiring town meeting approval is a proposed revision of the wastewater treatment agreement the three towns signed in 1986 and amended in 1987.

"We think it's a very sensible plan for the future," Norton Town Manager James Purcell said. "I think it's in all three towns' best interests to do so."

The towns would have proportionate ownership of the treatment plant when all is said and done, Purcell said.

Norton has both annual and special town meetings Monday night.

The annual agenda includes 23 requests.

Besides the sewer proposals, the budget is expected to be debated hotly.

The special meeting agenda includes 10 requests. Water and sewer commissioners seek $185,000 to upgrade the water department's monitoring system, known as SCADA.

The current system is "very, very old" and was custom-made, Purcell said.

"We're paying for a lot of repairs," he said.

Repairing the current system would cost Norton in the long run the same as getting a new one, he said.

Finance committee Chairman Lee Tarantino said his board is recommending spending $175,000, from Norton's water surplus account.

The conservation commission seeks $54,045 to begin repairing the Norton Reservoir Dam toward complying with a state order to do so, Purcell said.

The funds would be transferred from a Norton Reservoir dredging account, he said.

Tarantino said the state has ordered Norton to do about $1 million in repairs.

However, Norton is exploring doing some of that work in-house, reducing the cost, he said.

MICHAEL GELBWASSER covers Norton for The Sun Chronicle. He can be reached at 508-236-0439 or at mgelbwasser@thesunchronicle.com.