Agenda – Plymouth Select Board 3-15-22 Agenda

Official Minutes – Plymouth Select Board 3-15-22 Minutes

Please note this transcription is unofficial. If you find an error, use the contact page to notify Plymouth On The Record.

Dick Quintal:

Good evening, everyone. Welcome to the Select Board Meeting at Tuesday, March 15th, 2022. Please join the board in the pledge of allegiance to the flag.

All:

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all.

Dick Quintal:

The first order of business will be a public hearing for the American Legion. In accordance with Chapter 138 of the Massachusetts General Laws as amended notice is hereby given that a public hearing will be held at the Plymouth Town Hall, 26th Court Street on Tuesday, March 15th, 2022 at 6:05 pm to consider the application for our new Annual All-Alcohol license–excuse me. Yeah, I picked the wrong one. Okay.

Let me start that over, please. In accordance with Chapter 138 of the Massachusetts General Laws as amended notice is hereby given that a public hearing will be held at the Plymouth Town Hall, 26 Court Street on Tuesday, March 15th, 2022, at 6:00 PM to consider the application for an Alteration of Premise on Plymouth Poles #40 American Legion Incorporation holder of an all-annual club license, 199 Federal Furnace Road Beth Lynch as manager. Description of the premises is as follows:

• 60 X 120 structure
• Main floor consists of function hall by area; members room, restrooms, kitchen, walk-in cooler and storage room.
• Basement with storage area
• 12 X 30 outside deck

Applicant seeks to add the existing outdoor pavilion that is adjacent to the main building. I now declare this hearing open. It will be presented would be Mr. Goodwin if we need you Dana or Beth. You? Okay. Is there anyone wishing to speak in favor of this application? Anyone wishing to speak in opposition? Okay. I’m going to bring it back to the board. It is simply adding the outdoor pavilion adjusting their electric license to accommodate that building.

Charlie Bletzer:

Mr. Chairman?

Dick Quintal:

Mr. Bletzer?

Charlie Bletzer:

I’ll make a motion to approve this.

Dick Quintal:

Well, I have to close the hearing first. So, that’s what they’re looking to do and seeing no questions–any questions from board members? Seeing none. I now declare the hearing close and await the motion of the board. Mr. Bletzer?

Charlie Bletzer:

I’ll make the motion again.

Patrick Flaherty:

Second.

Dick Quintal:

Discussion? All those in favor? Unanimous, thank you.

In accordance with Chapter 138 of the Massachusetts General Laws as amended, notice is hereby given that a public hearing will be held at Plymouth Town Hall, 26 Court Street on Tuesday, March 15, 2022 at 6:05 PM to consider the application for a new Annual All-alcohol license for Mea Thai Cuisine, LLC doing business as the Mea Thai Cuisine, 60 Court Street, Robert Ball, manager. Description of the premises are as follows:

• One floor 1200 square feet consisting of dining room, storage and employee area with bathrooms kitchen, storage area in the back.
• Two entrances, two exits, outdoor dining area, cordoned off parking spaces

This application is actually for outdoor dining. I now declare the hearing open. Anyone wishing to speak in favor of this application? Anyone wishing to speak in opposition of this application? Okay. I now declare the hearing closed and bring it back to the board for comments questions or a motion?

0:05:01

Charlie Bletzer:

I have a question Mr. Chairman.

Chris Badot:

I do have a petitioner on virtually, if you could switch that over.

Charlie Bletzer:

Mr. Ball, this is Charlie Bletzer, I have a question for you if you’re there.

Robert Ball:

Yep, I’m here.

Charlie Bletzer:

My question, Mr. Ball, is are you taking over another restaurant? Is that what you’re doing or–

Robert Ball:

No, we’ve been opened for eight months now. We just never had a liquor license. We’re just serving food. We’re looking to add the liquor license.

Charlie Bletzer:

I got you. So, you’re just adding the license to a liquor to what you’re doing there for food. I understand that, okay.

Robert Ball:

People have been asking us with wine.

Charlie Bletzer:

Right. Okay. How’s business been so far?

Robert Ball:

It was good. No complaints. A little slow for the February and all that, but yeah.

Charlie Bletzer:

Okay. Well good luck with that. Okay, sir?

Robert Ball:

Thank you.

Dick Quintal:

Any other questions or comments on the board? Waiting a motion.

Harry Helm:

I motion that we approve.

Charlie Bletzer:

I second that motion.

Dick Quintal:

Second by Mr. Bletzer. All those in favor? Unanimous. Thank you.

Mr. Hartman? Boy Scouts of America.

Lee Hartman:

So, if we could have the screen put back on, please? There you go. Okay. So, this is Lee Hartman, Director of Planning Development-Town of Plymouth. This is a request that comes from the Division of Fisheries and Wildlife Commonwealth through the DCR, Department of Recreation and Conservation. So, if you look, you see that red square in the bottom of the map that’s on the screen, that’s 800 acres of what’s known as Camp Cachalot which is owned by the Moby Dick Council out of New Bedford. It’s about 800 acres in the Town of Plymouth. There’s another small piece that’s also in the Town of Wareham.

In 1998, for a million dollars, the council received a conservation or put a conservation restriction on this property. So, there is a conservation restriction on this property today, which essentially says you can use it for scouting and for recreational purposes, passive recreational only. Other than that, there are no other uses allowed here. So, since ’98, Fisheries and Wildlife is now looking to acquire this land. I don’t know what the purchase price is, but it is nice to see finally a boy scout camp in Plymouth that doesn’t go to development and that will be protected. It’s surrounded to the north by the state and to the west by the state forest, to the east you have the Massasoit–no, Squanto Camp that is to the east, that also has a conservation restriction on it, and to the south is the Town of Wareham. So, the state law requires that before they can acquire a piece of property, they give a town 120-day notice. They want to do it sooner than that, so they’re asking you two things tonight. One is to acknowledge that I’m here and presenting this and the second is to waive the 120-day period, so they can move that acquisition of that land ahead quicker than the 120-day. Thank you.

Dick Quintal:

Thank you, Lee. Any questions from the board? Seeing none, I’m waiting the motion of the board.

Harry Helm:

I motioned that we acknowledge Mr. Hartman’s presentation, and that we move to reduce the normal period to 30 days.

Charlie Bletzer:

I’ll second the motion.

0:10:01

Dick Quintal:

It was second. Discussion? All those in favor? Unanimous. Thank you, Mr. Hartman. And again, thank you for helping us out for the last period upstairs acting as town manager. Good job, Lee.

Lee Hartman:

It was my privilege. It was a great experience and thank you.

Dick Quintal:

Town Meeting update?

Derek Brindisi:

All right. Yeah. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. So, as you know Representative Muratore submitted a bill on behalf of the Town of Plymouth to file legislation for the ability to offer hybrid town meetings. At this time, the legislation has been filed and has been referred to committee. The committee has not yet heard this bill. So, there’s no further action at this time.

Dick Quintal:

Comments from the board? Okay. Town manager’s report.

Derek Brindisi:

Great. So, I thank you through the chair, members of the board. This is my first official meeting as your town manager, so I appreciate the opportunity to be here this evening. Just for some quick updates, I did send the board a notice earlier this evening that we received from MassDOT our Chapter 90 allocation. It’s approximately $1.6 million this year. After talking to the DPW Director, that’s typical from what we would receive year over year. So, as you know, the state has a surplus of dollars this year, so we’re expecting to see an amendment to the Chapter 90 roads money sometime later on this coming fiscal year.

Moving on, I wanted to note that Mr. Paul Vecchi, our Building Inspector has been with the town for 36 years is officially retiring. As of tomorrow in town hall, they’re going to hold a retirement ceremony for him. So, inviting those folks from the public who’ve worked with Mr. Vecchi over time to attend his retirement ceremony here at town hall from 9:00 to 11:00 AM. So, if anyone’s available tomorrow, we’d appreciate you stopping by.

The town clerk’s office is now offering weddings here in this room. In the past, that was prohibited. We received the number of inquiries over the past few years to allow folks to have their weddings here in this room. So, Mr. Hartman had been working with Pearl Sears, our Town Clerk, and has now allowed that as a policy to allow weddings in this room.

Mr. Hartman reported today that the master planning process has begun, and they are starting a gap analysis, so there’ll be more to report on that moving forward. Planning board meetings, the planning board has decided to move to Wednesdays at 7:00 PM so that will de-conflict any potential conflict we have with select board meetings as you know. The DPW Director will begin in a couple of weeks. He wants to present to the board the pavement management program. They’re expecting to repave 32 streets this coming paving season, and he wants the board to be aware of which streets those will be. So, again, he’ll be here to present those in the next couple of weeks. The DPW feasibility process has begun. The OPM is meeting with DPW staff next Monday to go over operations to determine a phase-in approach to a potential future remodeled DPW facility.

The Fire Department is now working on their study. So, as you know, town meeting approved a Fire Department study that will review operations, policies and procedures and this review, and once the study is complete will basically be a road map for future fire operations here in town. We’re expecting that study to be completed within the next six months. So, more to come on that. The Fire Department and co-department met over at the Holtec facility today. There’s been a number of structures that have been removed, and so our public safety officials and code enforcement officials continue to work with Holtec to ensure that all safety measures are in place during the deconstruction period.

And then before I end, I also wanted to thank Lee Hartman during my slow transition here into town. Lee’s been great. He’s given me a lot of great advice and information as I started to transition to town, so I appreciate all the work that he’s done for me and for the town over the past two and a half months.

0:15:00

Derek Brindisi:

And then I will end by saying that my door is always open. So, for those folks that are listening at home, you can reach me at my email address at DBrindisi, so that’s B-R-I-N-D-I-S-I @plymouth-ma.gov. So, questions, comments, concerns, if you have feedback on how we can do things better, I would ask that you shoot me an email. If you’re in town hall, feel free to stop by. My door is always open. I’m always happy to meet with constituents to hear about how we can make improvements here in town hall. With that, I’ll turn it back to the chair.

Dick Quintal:

Thank you. Any questions for Mr. Brindisi? I would just like to say welcome to America’s Hometown, Derek.

Derek Brindisi:

Thank you.

Dick Quintal:

I know you’ve been very busy, and that’s good you dived right in and hit the road running, which is what I was hoping, and it’s nice to see. Thank you.

Derek Brindisi:

Thank you.

Dick Quintal:

Is there anyone wishing to speak under public comment, Chris? I know we’re a little early, but somebody should come in. As always, just let me know. Okay. Well, like I say we’re early, so if somebody, any meeting–well, you’ll be also retiring pretty soon. You’re going to be promoted to another position, so congratulations to you too.

Okay. Licenses and administrative notes. We have one for the Texas Roadhouse Holdings LLC, 20 Shops at 5 Way. It’s a change of current officers that you have enclosed with your packet.

Charlie Bletzer:

So, moved.

Dick Quintal:

Discussion? All those in favor? Unanimous. Administrative notes 1 and 2.

Patrick Flaherty:

I make a motion to accept them both together.

Dick Quintal:

Thank you. And a second?

Harry Helm:

Second.

Dick Quintal:

Second by Mr. Helm. All those in favor? Unanimous. Committee Liaison updates? Designee updates? Old business? Letters?

I know we had a lot who come in the office from Mr. Gallerani on the Cordage Stack. It was his wish that we bring it up, and I know Lee’s still here. So, there’s been an issue with it. I think they did an inspection. Lee, help me out if I don’t have it right. They are looking to actually dismantle it. And it was voted at the North Plymouth Steering Committee to also recommend removal of the stack, but there are some citizens throughout the town, myself included as a resident, that want to try to take a look at that and see if that can be preserved. I know they reached out to Bill Keohan on the CPC committee and Bill’s commended to me on having it looked at by engineering and whatever they do. And in due respect, they also had that done, but Bill says there are other communities at four or five. I know one of them was Lexington where they saved the stack. So, it’s premature. I mean, we as a town just can’t go in and say, “Hold up, it’s on private property,” but Lee, I don’t know if you can touch on that.

Lee Hartman:

Sure. Just a couple of things. So, I think if the CPC is interested in having an independent review, they can reach out to the Gennitis [?]. They’re very cooperative, they’ve worked with us on a number of things. I’d be happy to reach out to them too to try to get permission for that review if CPC has some funding to help any kind of preservation. I think it’s not something they want to take down, the Gennitis. It’s something they feel structurally they have to. So, we can look at that.

I would also point out that we do have the demolition delay by law. In a case like this, if you have documentation that says it’s an immediate threat, that bylaw probably doesn’t apply, but we do have Historic District Commission, they have been notified of the request too. So, they’ll be looking at it also.

Dick Quintal:

Okay. So, is it fair to say that we would be notified before they would take that down? I just don’t want the people to think that we fell asleep at the switch. I mean, I don’t want it to be–

Lee Hartman:

Sure. I’ll have a conversation with them and Bill Keohan tomorrow.

0:20:02

Dick Quintal:

All right. So, you’ll get back to us?

Lee Hartman:

Sure. Yeah.

Dick Quintal:

Thank you very much. Any other questions or comments from board members? Okay. New business? Mr. Flaherty?

Patrick Flaherty:

Thank you, and welcome officially Derek to the party. We’re all very happy that you’re here on full-time status. And thanks Lee very much for all your efforts over the last few months. I know we all appreciate that.

There were a couple items that I wanted to just bring up now that you’re on full time that have been a little bit delayed, but I think they’re very positive items. Last fall at town meeting, there was the approval of the legislature so there could be a youth commission formed and there’s the materials, and it’s been done in other towns and there’s sort of a model for how that can be set up. Happy to share that with you, but it’s something that’s led by the town manager. And so, now that you’re here, I’d love to get that process moving and see if we can get that up and running.

And then, again, last year was the Net-Zero Decarbonization Committee that was approved by the board, and there’s been some submissions to join that from residents and other constituents, and I’d like to just see if we can have that put on as an administrative note just to formally get those folks together, so they can start working on that committee. I know that as it goes forward, there’ll be some interaction like any town committee with town staff and not necessarily pulling in resources but just interaction like the other committees, and I wanted to make sure that as it’s forming, that’s something that you can have a hand in and set how that goes and get that off in the right direction. So, those are my two items.

Dick Quintal:

Mr. Bletzer?

Charlie Bletzer:

Yeah. Derek, again, I echo with what Patrick and Dick said, congratulations. Welcome. I’m excited to have you as our town manager and look forward to working with you on a lot of projects. I’ve had some tourism people and some business people ask me a question, and I believe it’s your call to make one of the outside bathrooms that we have attached to our town hall, what’s the time frame for them to be opened to the public? And I know in the past they haven’t been open that much. People have been unhappy about that. So, I’d like you to look into having those bathrooms open as often as we can. They’re very much needed especially on the weekends right now, but they are much needed. I think it’s your decision to make when you want to open them, so.

Derek Brindisi:

Yeah, I’m happy to look into that.

Charlie Bletzer:

Yeah, okay. Thank you very much.

Dick Quintal:

Anything else under new business? I have just a couple of things under new business. One of them, Derek would be and I don’t know if this is for finance or who but with the rising price of fuel, what that’s going to do to people’s budgets in the town, different departments, the police, DPW? And what we should expect or where we’re at? So, in other words we kind of see what’s coming before it happens and try to react to it. And then second of all, and I don’t know the answer and I’m glad Lee is still sitting here, teach you to sit around, Lee. Do we have any zoning in place right now for biotech or pharmaceuticals? Do we need any special zoning or any kind of language?

Lee Hartman:

So, those uses are allowed. We’re actually a biotech ready community. We have a certification from the state. We’re recognized as a biotech community, so those uses are allowed, uses not even special permit in the industrial park and the airport district. I would have to look, but I’m going to guess that some of that’s also allowed maybe in mixed commerce or highway commercial, but we certainly have that in the industrial parks as an allowed use.

Dick Quintal:

Okay. I heard industrial park and I think you said airport. So, let’s say for example there’s an area that isn’t in this you’ve called it a district. Could we get a map of really where we are right now today just so we could all take a peek at it and see if there’s something we can do in case somebody knocks at the door, which is a very big possibility? You know what I mean.

Lee Hartman:

Yeah, sure.

Dick Quintal:

Let me ask you one more question since you’re here. If we were to realize we had a parcel, let’s say 20 acres, and if we had a biotech company/pharmaceutical ready to come in or wanted to come in, they would have to go to town meeting or?

0:25:09

Lee Hartman:

Well, you mean if it was outside of one of the zones?

Dick Quintal:

Exactly, yeah.

Lee Hartman:

Yeah. We take a vote at town meeting to change that parcel from whatever zone to a commercial zone. But again, I think–well, I’ll look and I’ll create a list of where it’s allowed.

Dick Quintal:

Well, I mean, if it’s not a bunch of–I mean, because like we say industrial park, but we know our parks are pretty much well. So, that’s why I’m asking you that.

Lee Hartman:

So, it’s the industrial park, it’s Camelot, but there is always change in turnover all the time, but I’ll need to look. So, for example the grove shops at 5 perhaps, I need to look at the zoning there. I would guess at the very least a special permit use, but let me look. There’s a fair amount of space in a location like that where they use a special permit or if it’s allowed.

Dick Quintal:

Okay. Thank you. Anything else under new business? No. I guess, we have a motion to adjourn.

Harry Helm:

Motion to adjourn.

Charlie Bletzer:

Second that.

Dick Quintal:

Okay. Thank you for watching everyone. We’ll see you next week. Have a wonderful week and keep the people in the Ukraine in your thoughts and prayers. Thank you.