December 6, 2022 Select Board Meeting
Agenda – Plymouth Select Board 12-6-22 Agenda
Official Minutes – Plymouth Select Board Minutes 12-6-22
PACTV Video Coverage
Unofficial Transcript
Please note this transcription is unofficial. If you find an error, use the contact page to notify Plymouth On The Record.
Betty Cavacco:
Welcome to the Tuesday, December 6th, Plymouth Select Board meeting. Could you please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance?
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.
Betty Cavacco:
Thank you, everyone. In accordance with Section 2475, and pursuant to Chapter 20 of the Acts of 2021, this meeting will be conducted via remote means and in-person. Members of the public who wish to watch the meeting may do so in the following manner: tune into PACTV government cable access channels Comcast Channel 15 or Verizon Channel 47 and watch the meeting as it is aired live, or watch the meeting live on PACTV website at pactv.org. Members of the public who wish to participate in the meeting may do so in the following manner:
In-person: at the Great Hall on the second floor of Plymouth Town Hall, 26 Court Street; and
Remote: go to the website that’s on the Select Board’s page.
First order of business is Public Comment. Okay. Pat?
Pat McCarthy:
I’ll be quick. First of all, I want to thank everybody for all the efforts that have gone into making Town Hall look so festive and Christmassy. A Merry Christmas to everybody. It looks awesome. I’m here tonight on behalf of the Board of the Plymouth Area League of Women Voters. Just to let the public know about an event that we are having this week. And I know all of you are very aware, but just to let the public know. The League is sponsoring a public forum on December 8th, this Thursday here in the Great Hall at 7:00 p.m. And the reason we’re having this is it’s with regards to people sharing their concerns about taxation and taxes in Plymouth and why are we paying so much money.
So, the theme of the forum is ‘My taxes have gone up. Where does my money go? What can I do about it?’ And the panel that the league is working with are Lynne Barrett, Director of Finance, Derek Brindisi Town Manager, Dr. Christopher Campbell, Superintendent of Schools and Patrick Flaherty is the Moderator. It will also be live on PACTV. There’s been a committee from the League that has worked on issues and concerns with the group who are the panelists. And these are some of the issues and thoughts that the League is hoping to address through the panel at the meeting. Questions or misconceptions that the public has about the town departments and budgets that are asked for, is there anything that would be surprising or Illuminating to the average person regarding town departments and budgets? What are some of the most common questions or misconceptions about the school department and its budget? For example, the transportation costs for the Plymouth School District in relation to others in the state that are getting reimbursements and Plymouth does not. Regional School districts in the Commonwealth get large amount of reimbursements for transportation costs and we do not. The numbers of many unfunded and underfunded mandates for the schools. How high are Plymouth taxes relative to other municipalities? And understanding the tax rate per 1000 of assessed value and the concept that’s been talked about over the years of a building moratorium and would that be beneficial. And one of the most important things of course to the League, we’re a nonpartisan organization. We work on issues in education, voter service, encouraging people to participate especially by voting and what can the average taxpayer do about any of these concerns or questions. To pay attention to the review of the budget cycle that’s going on right now especially right now through the FinCom, Select Board and town meeting and how can people get involved with helping solve some of the problems. Join a committee. There are many openings on town committees, communicate with your town meeting members and vote.
[0:05:05]
Pat McCarthy:
I also am a town meeting member, Vice chair of Precinct 18. And I just wanted to let everybody know and we’ve tried to circulate through social media and people can watch and just follow up with their questions. Thank you so much.
Betty Cavacco:
Thank you. Steve?
Steve Lydon:
Steve Lydon. I’d like to know if I will have the opportunity to speak after the presentation for the Simes House.
Betty Cavacco:
Sure.
Steve Lydon:
Thank you.
Betty Cavacco:
Mr. Serkey?
Richard Serkey:
Rich Serkey, Precinct 2. On November 15, 2022, the Select Board convened an executive session purportedly under Purpose 6 of the Open Meeting Law. Purpose 6 reads as follows: to consider the purchase, exchange, lease or value of real property, if the chair declares that an open meeting may have a detrimental effect on the negotiating position of the public body. Upon information and belief, the subject of the executive session was a proposed development agreement between the town and Claremont Plymouth LLC for at least 348 new housing units behind Walmart in exchange for a payment by Claremont to the town of $2.5 million for a water booster pump station, which would be needed to support these new housing units. That agreement is not a proper subject of an executive session, in my opinion, because it does not involve “the purchase, exchange, lease or value of real property.” That meeting, in my opinion, should have occurred in open session.
Secondly, regardless of whether the meeting was an open session or an executive session, the Zoning Board which I understand was present should not have been present at the session because this project will require one or more special permits from the Zoning Board. The Zoning Board is an adjudicatory board. It functions like a court. It holds hearings at which it considers in open session written and oral presentations by supporters and opponents of a project. The Planning Board, for example, formally submits to the Zoning Board at the Zoning Board hearing a written advisory report setting forth the Planning Board’s findings and recommendation to the Zoning Board.
There is no joint meeting between the Planning Board and the Zoning Board before the Zoning Board hearing. The select board is no different in this respect. In this case, the Select Board should have submitted to the Zoning Board the proposed “development agreement” along with an advisory report stating in this case why the Zoning Board should grant the special permits or the board should have attended the Zoning Board hearing and made an oral presentation. The Zoning Board is like the Supreme Court and the Select Board is like the president. If the president has a case before the Supreme Court, he cannot meet with the justices before oral argument before the court. He’s like any other litigant in such a case. No pre-hearing one-sided lobbying is allowed. You’re meeting with the Select Board whose members you appoint was in my opinion one-sided lobbying.
This is not the first time that the Select Board has in my opinion violated the Open Meeting Law. The board seems to have a habit of convening executive sessions and then instructing your attorney to find a permitted purpose for it later. This is the first time, to my knowledge, that the Select Board has convened a joint meeting with a Zoning Board prior to the Zoning Board’s public hearing. Thank you.
Betty Cavacco:
Mr. Serkey, this is just something that you continue and continue and continue. The executive session, the attorneys knew all about the executive session. They didn’t say that we were doing something that was out of Open Meeting Law regulation. And continually, this is what you do. I mean, you’ve already lost several cases that you’ve brought forward to the attorney general’s office.
[0:10:10]
Richard Serkey:
I didn’t lose them on the merits. I lost them–
Betty Cavacco:
No, you lost them, period. You lost them and you’ve cost these taxpayers upwards of $30,000 for your antics with Open Meeting Law violations. So, if you’re going to want to go after Open Meeting Law, don’t waste this board’s time. Go right to the attorney general, because that $30,000, these taxpayers are paying. I understand that you’re a retired attorney. We have a gaggle of attorneys that we deal with. And you know what? If you don’t think we’re doing a good job, there’s elections come may, put your name on the ballot if you can do better.
Richard Serkey:
I have a right as a citizen to make my feelings known. And I would respond to what you just said by saying that if you didn’t violate the Open Meeting Law continuously, you wouldn’t have to listen to me.
Betty Cavacco:
You lost. Four times, you lost. You cost the residents over $30,000 and that didn’t even include our staff time. Like find another hobby or you know what? Help us. Why don’t you help us. You showed up in an executive session last week. You know you shouldn’t have been there. It was posted on the agenda and we’re supposed to treat you differently than anyone else? This is ridiculous. You don’t like it. Do something about it.
Richard Serkey:
I’m here.
Betty Cavacco:
You want to go to the attorney general, go to the attorney general. Put your name on the ballot in May. I’ll vote for you.
Richard Serkey:
If anybody costs the town $30,000–
Betty Cavacco:
You did.
Richard Serkey:
The board did.
Betty Cavacco:
You did.
Richard Serkey:
No, you did.
Betty Cavacco:
You did because you lost.
Richard Serkey:
I lost on procedural grounds and not on substantive grounds.
Betty Cavacco:
You’re done. Okay, next. We have Committee Appointments. The Historic District Commission (One Alternate Seat). Oh, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. The Tax Classification. I was trying to go right around that, so sorry. I’d love to.
Anne Dunn:
Good evening. My name is Anne Dunn. I’m the Director of Assessing. At this time, I’d just like to thank the Board of Assessors for all the time that they put in. And presently, I’m just going to mention the names that are here. James Sullivan (Chair), Dick Finnegan (Vice-Chair), Donna Randles and Mike Hourahan and also Rick Nolan just joined our board and he is not present tonight. So, thank you very much. I do have some presentations off to the left. There is a lot of information that’s hard to see. This presentation is also on the town’s website under the Assessor’s page, for anyone at home that wants to look at it after the presentation. Thank you.
So, tonight is for the tax classification. We’re going to go over:
- The purpose of the hearing,
- Overview of key changes,
- Valuation by the class both residential and commercial, single-family home
- The changes of values among several years
- And the changes between fiscal years
- Average bill information for both single-family home and commercial
- Shift information, if the board chooses to shift away from residential towards commercial, industrial and personal property.
- Considerations;
- And recommendations by the Finance Department
So, tonight, the purpose of this meeting is for the town to adopt the Tax Policy. So, that’s asking, whether you’re going to keep it as a unified rate, which is treating all classes which is residential, industrial, commercial and personal property the same or are you going to shift away from the residential towards the commercial, industrial and personal property. Additionally at this time, there are several exemptions and discounts which could be adopted, which we are not recommending.
One is an open space discount that’s up to 25% of the residential factor. Currently, the Town of Plymouth doesn’t have any classified in the 200 Code which is Open Space.
The residential exemption which is up to 20% of the average of all residential value and the eligibility it may must be your primary residence. We see this in many communities that have second homes such as Nantucket, Martha’s Vineyard and the Cape. And currently, we are not recommending this.
Small commercial exemption, it’s up to 10% of the assessed value of all eligible properties. To be eligible, has to be occupied by the business. The value of that has to be less than one million dollars and no more than 10 employees in the aggregate.
[0:15:07]
Anne Dunn:
All of these discounts or exemptions are shifts within the classes themselves. So, tonight, we’re going to look at some key points from Fiscal ‘22 to ‘23. Currently, the unified tax rate is estimated at $13.71. This is a decrease of $1.72 over Fiscal ‘22. The average single-family home is now at $495,902. That is an increase of $78,655. Based on a unified estimated tax rate, the tax for that single-family home would be $6,798.82, which is an increase $362.71. And the way the values are established, we use the calendar 2021 sales. And as you all know, we did see an appreciation in the market at that time.
The median single-family home for Fiscal ‘23 is currently at 451,300 and that’s a $72,400 increase. The tax for that at a unified 1371 would be $6,187.32, and that is an increase of $340.89 from Fiscal ‘22. The average commercial value for Fiscal ‘23 is 1,431,678. That’s an increase of $178,359. The tax for the average commercial is $19,638.31. This is an increase of $289.59. The median commercial value is $531,150. This has increased $69,150 from Fiscal ’22. The median commercial tax is $7,282.07. That’s an increase of a $197.64 from Fiscal ‘22.
This is hard to read. So, overall, the residential value for Fiscal ‘23 is at $12.7 billion. That is a 20% increase over Fiscal ‘22. The commercial is approximately $1.2 billion, that’s a 14% increase from Fiscal ‘22. Industrial is 463 million. We see 2.8%. Overall commercial and industrials at 1.6 billion and it’s an average of 10% increase. Personal property for Fiscal ‘23 is $526 million. That increased 7.6%. The overall commercial, industrial and personal property is $2.1 billion dollars and it is a 9.9% percent increase. Total value, taxable value for the Town of Plymouth for Fiscal ‘23 is $14.9 billion. An overall increase of 18.93%.
So, where do the values make up? As you can see by this chart, residential is 85% of the total valuation. Commercial makes up 8%, industrial is 2%, Pilgrim Plant is 1% and personal property is 4%. As we talk about shifts, these percentages are important. So, this is just another chart to say where did the single-family tax bill? How’s it changed? As you can see, as we mentioned, from Fiscal ‘22 to ’23, it’s estimated to increase $360.71 to $6,789.92. And as you can see over the last five years, the valuation has increased $919.13 cents or the tax, excuse me. The single-family home value increased the 78,656 to be 495,902 for Fiscal 2023. Over the last five years, the average single-family home has increased $141,000. The number of single-family homes that we have on the tax rolls for Fiscal ‘23 has increased 248 from Fiscal ‘22. And over the last five years, we’ve added 919 homes to the tax roll.
The commercial during this time, we know that the tax rate for the average commercial has increased $289.59 to be $19,628.31.
[0:20:01]
Anne Dunn:
As you can see over the last five years, the average tax bill has increased $1,346 dollars. The average commercial value increased 178 to 359 this year bringing it to 1,431,678. Over the last five years, the average commercials increased $326,338. And as you can see the number of parcels brought on for the commercial has not really. Some have been allocated towards the residential with senior housing and affordable housing.
This chart just represents what was on the prior showing that the average commercial which is in pink for Fiscal 2019 was $18,282 dollars and for Fiscal ’23, it’s $19,628. The residential during that time for Fiscal ‘19 was $5,870 and for Fiscal ’19, it was 5,000 and for Fiscal ’23, it’s $6,789.92.
So, when we talk about the single-family home, where are the values contained? Currently, 1% is less than $200,000. 7% fall between $200 and 299,000. 24% are between $300 and $399,000. 32% where we see our average value of $495,902 and our median of 451,300 is 32%. 29% fall between %500 and $749,000. 5% are between 750 and 999,000 and approximately 2% is a million dollars or more.
For the commercial, 34% is less than $299,000. 14% fall between $300 and 499,000. 21%, they’re between $500 and 999,000 and this is where we find our median value of 531,500. 25% are between 1 million and 4.9 million and 6% are greater or equal to $5 million.
As we talk about the shift, what does it really mean? So, if the town voted to shift 1%, the single-family home would save $9.92 and the average commercial would increase $243. A 5% shift, the average single-family home would save $59.51 and the average commercial would increase $987.85. The 31% that I have in the bracket, that is what would be needed to keep the average single-family home close to what it was in Fiscal ’22, which was approximately $6,438. So, the single-family home would save $362.01 and the average commercial would increase $6,084.62.
So, as you think about the diversity of the tax base, we had mentioned this: 85% is residential, 8% is commercial, industrial is 3% and personal property is 4. Again, as I had just mentioned on the prior slide, in order to maintain an average tax bill from Fiscal ’22, a 31% shift would be needed. The residential would decrease $362 and the average commercial bill would increase $6,085. So, values fall in all orders. So, a property value of $250,000 at a unified rate. All classes would pay $3,427.50. If we were to shift to 31%, the residential would save $182.50 and the commercial for the $250,000 value would increase $1,062,50. A property value of $450, all classes would pay $6,169.50. The 31% shift, the residential would save $328.50 and the commercial would increase $1,912,50.
[0:25:03]
Anne Dunn:
A property valued at $750,000. Unified rate, all classes would pay $10,282.50. 31% shift, the residential would save $547.50 and the commercial, industrial and personal property would increase $3,187.50. A million-dollar property, all classes at a unified rate would pay $13,710. At the 31% shift, the residential would save $730 and the commercial, industrial and personal property would increase $4,250.
So, as you consider whether to shift, what is the diversity of the tax base? As we had mentioned, residential is at 85 commercial is at 8, industrial is at 3% and personal property is at 4. One of the questions you have is does the commercial, industrial and personal property have the ability to absorb the shift? As we had seen in one of the slides, 48% of the commercial value is less than $500,000. In economic development, we have to think of how do you want to continue? Some commercial properties look down on the split rate thinking you’re not a friendly community. That’s something to think about. We also have to think about the pandemic, what that has done to our commercial properties and now we’re seeing the interest rate rise, what will that do? So, those are all very important things. And the Finance Department currently is recommending a unified rate estimated to be 1371 for Fiscal ‘23. Thank you.
Betty Cavacco:
Does the board have any questions or comment for Miss Dunn? John?
John Mahoney:
Anne, could you just put the pie back up there, please? That one. You just passed it. So, how many times have you made this presentation over the years?
Anne Dunn:
Twenty.
John Mahoney:
So, could you just go into a quick description of what personal property is and how that is taxed?
Anne Dunn:
Yes, a personal property is business equipment, office machinery, inventory and furniture and fixtures. In each and every year, we’ll send out a formal list to all properties and they will notify us hopefully and we’ll go and do inspections. So, we actually go and take inventory of what they have. It’s tangible. You have to be able to pick it up and take it out. If it’s attached to the building, it wouldn’t be considered personal property.
John Mahoney:
Okay, thank you. So, you’ve done this approximately 20 times. Is this one different or significant because, and we all know that the value of the plant has been depreciating significantly over the last decade, but is this the first time that personal property has exceeded all industrial?
Anne Dunn:
Actually, it was last year the first year that we started to see that.
John Mahoney:
Okay, okay. And this is year two?
Anne Dunn:
Right. With the decrease, uh-hmm.
John Mahoney:
All right. Thank you. Appreciate all the hard work you put into this. Still as bland as ever but I know–and your committee over there, I appreciate their diligence.
Betty Cavacco:
Mr. Bletzer?
Charlie Bletzer:
Yeah, I’d just like to make a comment. One thing that jumps out at me is the commercial. In the last five years, we have three commercial parcels in the last five years. It’s something I’ve talked about when I ran for election is economic development and increase the commercial tax revenue, and that’s enticing. We’re going to do that by enticing businesses to come to Plymouth. So, I support the unified single tax rate because I don’t think it’s time to do a split tax rate right now because it will hurt the commercial businesses. And if we’re trying to entice companies and businesses to come to Plymouth, I think we need to keep it unified single rate. So, that’s my comment. Thank you.
Betty Cavacco:
Mr. Helm?
Harry Helm:
Anne, I have a question relating to the personal property, which is conveniently still up there. That 4% is an amalgamation of both residents, personal property and commercial. Can you give an estimate that we won’t hold how much–how does that break down as a percentage resident versus–
[0:30:08]
Anne Dunn:
I actually don’t have it but we have about 1600 second-home personal properties. So, for second-home personal property, we have the authority to tax on the contents of people’s homes. And currently, we have done it through an analysis. We send out a form of list and we asked the residents what they feel the value of their home is and we will do an analysis. We take the overall average percentage and put it against the building value, and that is how that’s determined.
Harry Helm:
But a question, just your estimate, is the large majority of that 4% personal property that attributes to commercial and industrial?
Anne Dunn:
Yes.
Harry Helm:
Okay, thank you.
Anne Dunn:
I can give you a better breakdown later.
Harry Helm:
No. That’s not–I just wanted just to make sure that that was the case.
Anne Dunn:
Yes.
Harry Helm:
Okay, thank you.
Betty Cavacco:
Anyone else? I just have one comment and I think I’ve said it every year since I’ve been on the board is that if we could tax some of these large businesses maybe there’s, I don’t know, I know every year you say no to me but hey, you might as well try again. If there was like a square footage or like a Walmart or a BJ’s or a big organization that could have a separate tax rate. And I know we don’t have anything in place to do that. I will never try to tax a split tax rate that would hurt all of our small businesses because we have so many of them, but is there any legislation that we could look into to say whether it’s a home rule petition or something to say that any facility over 40,000 square feet is taxed in a different. And I’m just throwing that number out. I don’t even know how big 40,000 square. I know it’s big but do you know what I’m saying? But I wouldn’t mind having the bigger folks pay bigger money but the smaller folks stay with what we’re paying now type of thing.
Anne Dunn:
Currently, no.
Betty Cavacco:
You could have stopped me like five minutes ago, but thank you, Anne. We’ll bring that–now, are you looking for a motion for this? Okay.
John Mahoney:
I make a motion that the board adopts unified tax rate for the next fiscal year.
Charlie Bletzer:
I second that.
Betty Cavacco:
Motioned by Mr. Mahoney, seconded by Mr. Bletzer. Discussion? All those in favor? Unanimous. Thank you.
Next are Committee Appointments. Now, the board has everybody’s resumes and letters. Are there any board members, are there any potential seats from the Historic Commission that would like to get up and speak?
Okay. So, we have Anthony Sarcone, Florence Lathrop, Jo anne Makely, Kimberlee Canducci, Linda Seidman and Lisa Mitchell.
Charlie Bletzer:
I believe, Madam Chairman that Mr. Sarcone took his name out. I think Anthony sent us that.
Betty Cavacco:
You’re right, he did. So, this is one alternate seat. Mr. Helm?
Harry Helm:
Whether they make a statement to the board or not, I would like to know that they are all here or present via Zoom. I think that’s an important consideration.
Anthony Senesi:
Through the chair, I can determine that. As Mr. Bletzer said, Mr. Sarcone has withdrawn. Florence Lathrop is live via Zoom as is Jo Anne Makely, I apologize if I’m mispronouncing your name. Kimberlee Canducci is in-person and Linda Seidman is–
Linda Seidman:
I’m on. Yeah, here I am.
Anthony Senesi:
–is live via Zoom. Lisa Mitchell cannot attend um tonight due to a sickness but she did say that if it would be at all possible to have her interview next meeting, she’d appreciate that. And that’s for the Historic District Commission candidates.
[0:35:05]
Betty Cavacco:
One alternate seat.
Anthony Senesi:
Correct.
Harry Helm:
Anthony, am I correct Jo Anne Makely is not present?
Anthony Senesi:
Correct.
Betty Cavacco:
Okay. Ms. Lathrop, do you have any–would you like to say something?
Florence Lathrop:
Sure. Good evening. My name is Florence Sepley [?] Lathrop rather than Lothrop. And I moved to Plymouth about two years ago amidst the pandemic and we were very delighted to find a place in Plymouth. I was a member of the Hull Historic District Commission for 15 years or so. And the problems we had were mostly in the district that was residential and it was at risk of being having a lot of houses torn down and condos put up. And so, in 1992, before I was there, a Historic District Commission was formed and we succeeded, thank you very much, to the Historic District Commission and to the people who supported it. We’re able to keep these historic homes intact. We had a few difficulties wih particularly one family who wanted to build a very large house, which would not have been like the other houses in the district commission. And we were able to work with that family to bring it into actually to completely redo the plans of the house. And I was very proud of that and proud of all that we did there.
So, when I moved to Plymouth, it was wonderful to see. I wasn’t very familiar with Plymouth to see that all it had been done, but that it must be very difficult to continue to hold on to what is historical in the historic district. So, I would love to be an alternate on this committee. My previous experience besides that is that I was a consultant to the Boston Symphony Orchestra when I was an archivist to create archives there. I worked at one of the Harvard libraries for 15 years as a Head of historic uh Collections and access and also preservation of manuscripts archives, works of art on paper and so forth. Thank you. So, if you have any questions, I’d be glad to answer.
John Mahoney:
Florence, a question for you and all the other candidates. So, there’s a building down on the waterfront historical at the corner of Union and Water Street. Historically, I believe it goes back to 1857. Just outside of the current historical district area and are you going to be amenable to working with the commission and looking at bringing a proposal forward to the executive board and eventually the town meeting potentially to expand the current area?
Florence Lathrop:
I certainly would be and I certainly work hard on that. It can be very difficult. I don’t know what the history of that has been in Plymouth and it takes a lot of persistence and research. I think about research of the property itself but also if possible, how long it has been there and what has gone on around it. But I would certainly be very honored to be part of what sounds like very good work of expanding the district itself.
John Mahoney:
Thank you.
Linda Seidman:
Yes, and I would also be amenable to research and physically visiting the site and doing talking to people within the community about expanding it. I have no objection to that.
[0:40:11]
Betty Cavacco:
Okay. That’s Linda Seidman? Is that Linda Seidman?
Linda Seidman:
Linda Seidman, yeah. Yes. Would it be all right if I have a couple of questions?
Betty Cavacco:
Hold on a second. Mrs. Makely, are you finished? I’m sorry. Oh, Florence, I’m sorry.
Florence Lathrop:
Oh, hi.
Betty Cavacco:
Are you finished?
Florence Lathrop:
Yes, that’s fine. Thank you.
Betty Cavacco:
Great, thank you. Actually, Ms. Canducci was before Ms. Seidman. So, why don’t we just stay in order? Ms. Canducci, do you have anything to say? Could you please go to the podium?
Kimberlee Canducci:
First of all, thank you for the opportunity to be here and to apply. I’m a little nervous but I’m born and raised in Plymouth.
Betty Cavacco:
Turn the mic on, please.
Kimberlee Canducci:
I’m very, very passionate about my hometown. My family goes back to the Mayflower on at least three to four lines, five according to my mother beginning with Dr. Fuller, who was I believe the ship’s doctor. I’m a real estate broker. I’ve been active with the Veterans United. I’m one of their Platinum agents in Plymouth. It’s over 90% of my business in real estate. And I have served eight years on the Pilgrim Hall Museum. Also, served on the Plymouth Cultural Council. And I’ve also served on Matt Muratore’s election campaigns for the last five plus years as well.
So, I’m old enough to remember the Plymouth Redevelopment on Summer Street back in the 60s. And I’m all for expanding the historic district as much as we can down on the waterfront on the area that you referred to off of Bradford Street. I am a little bit familiar with the project. I think that reserving the integrity of Plymouth is extremely important. It’s a personal passion of mine having been grown up here and seen all the changes in the growth that the town has gone through over the last 30, 50 years. So, it would really be my pleasure to serve on the board and I hope that I could be selected.
Betty Cavacco:
Great. Any questions for Ms. Canducci? No? Oh, Mr. Helm?
Harry Helm:
So, Ms. Canducci, since you have so much experience and you’ve lived here all your life, apropos to Mr. Mahoney’s question, what would you suggest the expansion of the historic district to include?
Kimberlee Canducci:
Well, I’d have to know more about exactly what the parameters are currently on the table and what their plans are. I don’t have enough information about that to make a decision right now. It’s just to say though that expanding it can only be a benefit to the town in my opinion. I just think that the more that we can do to preserve the Integrity of the town and to expand and to do smart growth, if you will, and we have to say current with the times, I understand that. And it’s a fine line to walk sometimes and I’d like to participate in that process.
Harry Helm:
Thank you.
Kimberlee Canducci:
You’re welcome.
Betty Cavacco:
Thank you.
Kimberlee Canducci:
That’s it? Okay. Thank you.
Betty Cavacco:
Now, Mrs. Seidman?
Linda Seidman:
Yes. I know you all have the information that I filled out online, so I don’t want to go repeating that. But I have lived in Plymouth eight years, worked at Plymouth Plantation and I feel like this would be a natural progression for me after learning so much about Plymouth, its history and how important it is to preserve it. The question I had was about how many applications do you receive each year and will the members of the committee, do we physically visit different sites? Are there other meetings that we would attend? Exactly, how does the committee work?
Betty Cavacco:
Well, once we appoint a committee, we try not to micromanage the committee so that would be all within the purview of the committee. But like today, we have one, two, three, four, five. We have five applicants. Sometimes we have more, sometimes we have less. Sometimes we have none. I’m noticing that in one of our committees, there’s three full seats and there’s only two applicants so we’ll be putting that out to bid again. So, it really is difficult to say.
[0:45:01]
Betty Cavacco:
And the inner workings of the committee really should be–those details should be discussed and formulated with the committee itself.
Linda Seidman:
So, well, what I was referring to is applications. Is applications to the Historic Commission, about how many homes and people in Plymouth are applying for renovations and changes that the committee has to look at?
Betty Cavacco:
Yeah. We don’t have that type of information. I would think maybe the Building Department would have that.
Linda Seidman:
Yeah, I was just curious.
Betty Cavacco:
Or the chairman of the historic district, they could have that as well.
Linda Seidman:
Okay. All right, thank you.
Betty Cavacco:
You’re welcome. Okay. Now, is there a Lisa Mitchell?
Harry Helm:
No. She’s unable to attend.
Betty Cavacco:
Okay. All right. So, now, we go for the vote. First one, Florence Lathrop? No votes. Jo Anne Makely, she bailed it. She’s not here. Okay. Yes, Joanne Makely? No votes. Kimberly Canducci? Five votes. Linda Seidman? No votes. And Lisa Mitchell? No votes. Congratulations. Ms. Canducci.
Next is the Climate Action/ Net Zero Advisory Committee. There are three full seats and we have one, two, three, four, five applicants. Any of the applicants wishing to be heard or speak or make a comment?
Anthony Senesi:
There are a number via Zoom. I’m going to let them in. One moment.
Betty Cavacco:
Okay.
Harry Helm:
As he’s doing that, may I ask a question? Anthony, on our agenda, it says 3+ full seats. What does that mean?
Anthony Senesi:
So, at the moment, there are three that we have determined, the CA/NZ has determined are available. There may be more, but that is to be determined based off of absences that have occurred in the committee.
Harry Helm:
So, tonight is three not 3+?
Anthony Senesi:
Yes, that is correct.
Harry Helm:
Thank you.
Anthony Senesi:
In addition to that, the CA/NZ Committee and the admin for that committee requests that the board hold off on voting for the CA/NZ Committee until the 13th, if possible, just to gather more information and to reach out to the candidates as well.
Betty Cavacco:
So, why?
Harry Helm:
So, in other words, let’s not do this tonight? Am I correct? That’s what the CA/NZ Committee is asking us?
Anthony Senesi:
It’s possible to interview the candidates now that are currently present and then–
Betty Cavacco:
No, we’re not going to do that. We’re going to do it all at the same time. I mean, if that’s–
Anthony Senesi:
There are also two other candidates that need to be interviewed on the 13th as well that were not able to attend tonight.
Harry Helm:
Yeah. I just don’t think it’s fair to people we would interview tonight to not have the ability to come back on the 13th to speak again. So, why should we do this tonight?
Betty Cavacco:
And our agenda is pretty full for the 13th already, is it not? May not be on the 13th so but we’ll pull it up and we can do it at another time.
Charlie Bletzer:
Can I make a suggestion? So, there may be more than three, Anthony? You’re pretty sure that’s why it’s going to be next week? So, why don’t we pick three tonight and then next week whoever doesn’t get picked come on the 13th and we’ll add more on the 13th because these people have made an effort to come here tonight.
Betty Cavacco:
Mr. Helm?
Harry Helm:
Okay. In regards to that suggestion, am I correct in believing that they don’t know if they’ll be more than three that the plus is not carved in stone, the additional members?
[0:50:14]
Harry Helm:
So, we might elect three this week or vote on three this week and then on the 13th, those other people who couldn’t make it would not be even considered because there wouldn’t be any seats.
Anthony Senesi:
Let’s just say that there’s three vacant positions at the moment.
Harry Helm:
So, if we vote for three tonight, we would be acting contrary to the CA/NZ Committee suggestion?
Anthony Senesi:
Correct. If you voted tonight, the CA/NZ Committee would not be in favor of that. But if you wanted to hear the interviews of the candidates that are currently here, I’ll let the board decide with that.
Betty Cavacco:
Nope. We will put this on another agenda. And like I said, not on the 13th because we’re full. I know that agenda is pretty full but–Mr. Mahoney?
John Mahoney:
So, Anthony, clarify this. Are you implying that the current members of this committee want to vet candidates that are appointed by the Select Board before we appoint them?
Anthony Senesi:
I mean, generally, there are boards and committees that would like to speak to the candidates at some point along the process. And I know some chairs even make recommendations to the board.
Anthony Senesi:
So, that’s what you were implying that they were suggesting. So, I think that we need to figure out exactly how many seats that this committee needs. Everybody comes in on one night and I don’t think the current members should be vetting them. I think these individuals either Zoom in or get up to that microphone, state their case and we vote them up or down.
Betty Cavacco:
Isn’t that what we have said? I know I’m losing my–
John Mahoney:
But that variable.
Betty Cavacco:
I guess, we have two comments from the audience, so.
Steve Lydon:
I was confused about the two votes. There’s three seats. Now, there’s five seats, might be five seats. Do you have to re-advertise again if you’re adding more seats to this committee?
Betty Cavacco:
Yes. So, right now, there’s only three seats and two people can’t make it and they want to be heard. So, we’re going to pull this and we’ll move it to another agenda. Do you have–no? Okay.
Harry Helm:
Well, actually, yeah, I just would like to be clear about my motivations in agreeing with Mr. Mahoney is not because two people couldn’t make it tonight. It’s because the CA/NZ Committee is not clear on what it is asking us to do. Just to be fair to everybody, because there were people for Historic Commission who were unable to make it tonight and we went ahead with a vote. So, I think we just need to be clear about why we are delaying this and it should not be because people were unable to make it.
Betty Cavacco:
Mr. Quintal?
Dick Quintal:
How many people are on this committee right now? Do you know, Anthony?
Anthony Senesi:
I don’t have that available.
Dick Quintal:
Okay. Does anybody know? Seven. So, we’re going to add three more and make it 10?
Betty Cavacco:
It must be three vacancies.
Dick Quintal:
So, we’ll just fill in three vacancies.
Derek Brindisi:
If I could.
Dick Quintal:
Yes, please.
Derek Brindisi:
I agree with the board. I think you should just delay this. Get all this cleared up. We can come back in January and discuss it then.
Harry Helm:
I would like to hear from our environmental resources, I can’t remember his title.
Mark Reil:
Climate Resiliency and Sustainability Planner, Mark Reil. So, the CA/NZ Committee has some people who haven’t been showing up to meetings and are in question. So, there are some positions maybe I think that’s where the plus came from because there’s some unsurely there. But we’re working that out. The request to not have an appointment made tonight but to interview was more of we didn’t know the process that you typically go down.
[0:55:04]
Mark Reil:
But there were a couple candidates who said they could not attend tonight but could attend a future meeting. They were quality candidates based on their resumes. So, we’re looking for people who come to the table with some really good experience to help with the Climate Action Planning. So, we’re hoping that you could put it off to at least make sure that we get all the candidates as possible.
Betty Cavacco:
John?
John Mahoney:
So, Mark, when the committee is completely whole, how many members?
Mark Reil:
Eleven.
John Mahoney:
Thank you.
Betty Cavacco:
Harry?
Harry Helm:
Will the CA/NZ Committee know how many members it needs to add the next time we have one of these, so we don’t have a three plus concept but a more definite three, four or five? Will they know that?
Mark Reil:
Yes.
Harry Helm:
Okay.
Betty Cavacco:
All right. Oh, Mr. Quintal?
Dick Quintal:
Thank you, Mark. I don’t know. I feel very uncomfortable with this. We’ve advertised for three positions, people are here and now, we’re going to put it out there for whenever the date might be and it’s plus and since when does a committee actually tell us that we’re appointing? If that’s the way it is then, you should just appoint your own people and be done with it? Let’s move on.
Betty Cavacco:
He’s got a point.
Dick Quintal:
I think we need to ask the questions, a recommendation is fine but all these people that are here for the Historic Commission go before them and ask their own questions and then be recommended to us. I mean, I just don’t believe that’s the way it’s supposed to work. So, I feel bad for the people that are here tonight and I would like to hear it for them but it’s position of the board and the majority rule, so.
Betty Cavacco:
Well, we could do three tonight and then if there’s more positions sometime in January, we could do them in January. I mean, Mr. Quintal is 100% correct. We appoint not anyone else. Even though honestly, we get recommendations from board members, I don’t even look at them. So, it’s the wish of the board. Do you want to move forward with three tonight and then if there’s more they move forward again or do we want to just table the whole thing? Charlie?
Charlie Bletzer:
I’ll make a motion that we do that.
Betty Cavacco:
Which one?
Charlie Bletzer:
That we vote tonight for three people.
Betty Cavacco:
Okay.
Dick Quintal:
I’ll second it.
Betty Cavacco:
Motion by Mr. Bletzer, seconded by Mr. Quintal. Discussion? No. All those in favor? Okay. We’ll appoint three people tonight. So, out of all those people and I don’t know who’s here and who’s not here, is there anyone that wishes to speak?
Harry Helm:
I want to know who’s here and not.
Betty Cavacco:
Who is here and who’s not here?
Anthony Senesi:
In the audience is Anthony Mayo, present.
Betty Cavacco:
He is not present?
Anthony Senesi:
Carl Donaldson is currently on Zoom.
Harry Helm:
Mayo is present.
Anthony Senesi:
As Donald Ross, present. Mary Jo Gatslick is on Zoom, as Michael Bena present, in-person. That’s everyone.
Betty Cavacco:
Okay.
Harry Helm:
So, am I correct Anthony Mayo is not present here or at Zoom?
Anthony Senesi:
Correct.
Betty Cavacco:
Okay. So, obviously, he probably doesn’t have anything to say. Mr. Donaldson, do you have anything you’d like to say? We do have your resume and the board has reviewed it, but if you have any additional comments, we’ll take those and please keep it to two minutes. No?
Anthony Senesi:
Mr. Donaldson, you have to unmute yourself.
[1:00:07]
Carl Donaldson:
There we go. Hello?
Betty Cavacco:
Hello.
Carl Donaldson:
There we go. Thank you. Yes. I’ve come before the board before for this position. So, as far as this position for the committee, I have a background in city planning with concentrations in resiliency. I’ve lived in Plymouth for four years and I’m very interested in climate and climate change and how that affects our economy and as well as litigation for different emissions and things like that.
Betty Cavacco:
Great. Does the board have any questions for Mr. Donaldson? Great. Thank you so much. Mr. Ross? Does Mr. Ross have anything to say?
Anthony Senesi:
Mr. Ross is not present.
Betty Cavacco:
Okay. And he doesn’t have anything to say either. Ms. Gatslick?
Mary Jo Gatslick:
Good evening, everybody. My name is Mary Jo Gatslick and I’ve been a resident of Plymouth since 1986. My background is in environmental and at the job that I had prior to my retirement involved looking for ways to reduce cost for the company that I worked for. So, I’m familiar with the different programs out there. I’m familiar with what’s available and how to reduce the footprint of the different things that we’re looking at for the committee.
Betty Cavacco:
Does the board have any questions for Ms. Gatslick? Okay. Thank you. Now, can I thank each one of them as we go along? Is that okay? All right. Just making sure. Mr. Bena? Oh, I’m sorry, I was looking at the TV.
Michael Bena:
Mr. Bena. I was walking over. So, I’ve currently lived in Plymouth for four years. Prior to that growing up, spent a lot of time on Great Herring Pond where my grandfather had a house, so very familiar with Plymouth, some of the challenges that climate change has brought here. Lived in Colorado for a long time in the middle where I lived in a resort town that also had a big focus on climate change being up in the mountains at lower elevation where we were starting to see a lot less snow. I also worked for the ski area for a time and a lot of our focus was on dealing with climate change, reducing the impact from the heavy tourism industry in an area that we’re trying to maintain the beauty of. So, I’d like to do the same here in Plymouth especially raising a family here now. I have two young sons that love the outdoors and want to see it maintained.
Betty Cavacco:
Great. Does the board have any questions? Mr. Quintal?
Dick Quintal:
I have one for all three applicants that we’ve heard from tonight. Do you plan on attending the meetings?
Michael Bena:
Yes.
Carl Donaldson:
Yes.
Mary Jo Gatslick:
Yes.
Dick Quintal:
Thank you. And we do have a policy, do we not on attendance? And is it also a policy for removal? So, I suggest in going forward. If there’s a committee or group out there that they’re having an issue with this that they abide by the policy and sent in to us and then we won’t be like in this, that’s all. Thank you very much.
Betty Cavacco:
Thank you, Mr. Quintal. Mr. Helm?
Harry Helm:
Yeah. I want to go back and I do have a question for Ms. Gatslick. Ms. Gatslick, given your professional experience with the Pilgrim Station, the EPA, the NRC and that you’re sitting on the Citizens’ Board, what is your position on Holtec’s dumping of radioactive water into the bay?
Mary Jo Gatslick:
Sir, I’m not going to respond to that.
Harry Helm:
Will you explain to the residents of Plymouth why you’re refusing to respond to something that’s very important to them and you are looking to be on the Climate Action/ Net Zero Advisory Committee, which is about environment?
[1:05:11]
Mary Jo Gatslick:
That’s correct, but I can’t speak from an NDCAP standpoint. It would not be fair to my fellow members. However, what people need to keep in mind is that the waste is not a waste until it’s been demonstrated to be a waste. And Holtec has said in the previous NDCAP meeting minutes that they would treat it as a waste if it is in fact identified as a waste. At this point in time, it has not been identified. So, if it’s a waste, it will be treated as a waste. If it’s not a waste, it won’t be treated as, it will be treated as such. You got to believe the science. You can’t let emotion or–
Harry Helm:
Thank you for your response. I think your position on this is very clear if people listen to it. Thank you.
Charlie Bletzer:
Madam Chairman?
Betty Cavacco:
Mr. Bletzer?
Charlie Bletzer:
I know a couple of candidates down here and maybe they want to be here next week. But just looking at resumes, Mr. Ross, he’s got quite a resume and I don’t know him but I’m looking at his resume and I think it’s kind of impressive. So, I just want the board to just take note of his resume if we’re going to vote tonight. So, thank you.
Betty Cavacco:
Are we ready to vote? Mr. Donaldson? Unanimous. Actually, someone has asked that we do a roll call vote for the people watching on Zoom, because they can’t see us. So, Mr. Bletzer?
Charlie Bletzer:
Yes.
Betty Cavacco:
Mr. Helm?
Harry Helm:
Yes.
Betty Cavacco:
Mr. Quintal?
Dick Quintal:
Yes.
Betty Cavacco:
Mr. Mahoney?
John Mahoney:
Yes.
Betty Cavacco:
Myself, yes. Congratulations, Mr. Donaldson.
Card Donaldson:
Thank you.
Betty Cavacco:
Donald Ross?
Charlie Bletzer:
Yes.
Betty Cavacco:
Mr. Helm?
Harry Helm:
Yes.
Betty Cavacco:
Mr. Quintal?
Dick Quintal:
Yes.
Betty Cavacco:
Mr. Mahoney?
John Mahoney:
No.
Betty Cavacco:
Myself, yes. Congratulations, Mr. Ross. Mary Jo Gatslick. Mr. Bletzer?
Charlie Bletzer:
No.
Betty Cavacco:
Mr. Helm?
Harry Helm:
No.
Betty Cavacco:
Mr. Quintal?
Dick Quintal:
No.
Betty Cavacco:
Mr. Mahoney?
John Mahoney:
Yes.
Betty Cavacco:
Myself, no. And Michael Bena. Mr. Bletzer?
Charlie Bletzer:
Yes.
Betty Cavacco:
I’m sorry. Mr. Helm?
Harry Helm:
Yes.
Betty Cavacco:
Mr. Quintal?
Dick Quintal:
Yes.
Betty Cavacco:
Mr. Mahoney?
John Mahoney:
Yes.
Betty Cavacco:
And myself, yes. So, our new members are: Mr. Donaldson, Mr. Ross and Mr. Bena. Anthony, would you please send that out to them, please?
Anthony Senesi:
Yes.
Betty Cavacco:
Thank you. So, next is our Cable Advisory Committee and we have three full seats and two applicants. So, we’re going to send out that third seat again, please if possible.
Anthony Senesi:
Absolutely. Is Donna Nichols in the audience? She’s not on Zoom. Len Levin is not available today. He fell sick today and was not able to attend. So, we do not have any candidates for interviews for the Cable Advisory Committee tonight.
Betty Cavacco:
Okay. So, it’s at the board’s discretion. What would you like?
John Mahoney:
Madam Chair?
Betty Cavacco:
Yes?
John Mahoney:
We had a presentation a month or so ago with a couple of the Cable Advisory Committee meetings. They’re in desperate need of help.
Betty Cavacco:
Correct, yes.
John Mahoney:
So, I know these two individuals couldn’t make it tonight, but there’s two people who submitted their resumes for three spots and I have no problem making a motion to approve both of them being appointed.
Betty Cavacco:
Okay. Is that a motion?
John Mahoney:
Yes.
Dick Quintal:
Second.
Betty Cavacco:
Motioned by Mr. Mahoney, seconded by Mr. Quintal. Discussion? All those in favor? Mr. Mahoney?
John Mahoney:
Yes.
Betty Cavacco:
Mr. Quintal?
Dick Quintal:
Yes.
Betty Cavacco:
Mr. Helm?
Harry Helm:
Yes.
Betty Cavacco:
Mr. Bletzer?
Charlie Bletzer:
Yes.
Betty Cavacco:
Myself, yes. Unanimous. Okay. Next is Water Conservation Committee Recent Work Proposal.
Anthony Senesi:
Madam Chair, Mr. Cody of the Water Conservation Committee is going to be Zooming in tonight and giving a presentation. Mr. Cody, you are able to share your screen.
Eric Cody:
Thank you. Can everyone hear me?
Betty Cavacco:
Yes.
[1:09:59]
Eric Cody:
Okay. And hopefully you can see the screenshare as well.
Anthony Senesi:
Yes, we can.
Eric Cody:
Good evening, and thank you for the opportunity to provide an update on the Water Conservation Committee, what we’ve been doing. I’ll try and be brief. I’m also going to make some recommendations to the Select Board in your role as Water Commissioners. I had intended to be there this evening, but I got a vile respiratory bug a few days ago and you do not want me in the room with you. So, virtual it is. I’ll describe the compelling need for water conservation in Plymouth, highlight work we’ve been doing over the past two years while we’ve been in existence, and I’ll lay out three specific recommendations for you.
I can’t see who’s in the crowd, but I don’t know if Peter Gordon, the town Water Superintendent is there but Peter has been our close partner and his staff has been great to work with. I know at least one other member of the committee, Kristine Danielson is in the audience. Dan Gorczyca, Peg Blackwell and recently retiring Morgan Wealti are the other members of the committee who’ve contributed to what I’m going to present to you.
There’s another Committee member here, Mr. Mahoney who has an insider’s view of these issues since he served on this committee during his first year and as you know, he’s also expressed a keen interest in water resource issues. Plymouth can’t afford to be complacent about its fresh water supply for all the reasons shown on this chart. These are serious, and in some cases, imminent threats. Let’s talk just about the first one.
Members of your board have repeatedly stressed that economic growth is a way to alleviate residential tax burden. Let’s talk about how water plays into that. Continuing growth in the town’s Revenue base cannot be supported without adequate water supply. How much growth are we talking about? Half the housing in Plymouth was built in the last 50 years, the other half took 350 years. I don’t think anybody thinks this trend is going to tail off anytime soon just simply because of the vast land area that’s inside our borders. So, what are our options? Impose a building moratorium, take that Draconian step. I don’t believe that’s the best way to balance water resources and development needs. It’s a blunt instrument approach. Another option, rely exclusively on building an ongoing series of new town wells costing millions of dollars each. This is the status quo. It seems like there’s a never-ending acquired land, start the development process and so on, or we can save water. Conservation is a cost-effective way to maximize water supply and reduce the burden on the town water system in the bargain. It’s a largely untapped resource here in Plymouth.
The Water Conservation Committee adopted these goals and objectives two years ago to ensure that conservation becomes an integral part of long-term water planning. We came to realize early on that the target audience is not limited to customers on the town’s water system. No matter how we get our water delivered to us, it all comes ultimately from the same source: the Plymouth Carver Aquifer. So, it’s a shared responsibility for all of us who live here and work in town.
The objectives here are self-explanatory, but I’ll be happy to discuss any of them if you’re interested. The committee has been learning by doing. We’ve developed educational materials, looked at other cities and towns in Massachusetts and beyond, tested pilot programs, analyzed water usage data and used social media for outreach to town residents. These experiences have demonstrated that the potential for water conservation in Plymouth is likely to be significant. The most tangible result of these early efforts was a report we issued in February of this year. It’s available on the town’s website at the address shown here. This report contains the basis for our long-term water savings estimate, estimates and identify specific conservation programs likely to have significant potential here in Plymouth. Three strategic recommendations emanate from this report. I’ll cover each of them in turn.
Recommendation #1, if you don’t know where you’re going, it’s hard to get there to benchmark progress. Our committee estimates that at least 15% of the total water forecast to be delivered to homes and businesses on the town system can be saved by 2037, 15 years out.
[1:15:10]
Eric Cody:
This is as much as 300 million gallons a year, the rough equivalent of a town well. Three of the current town wells are authorized a maximum annual output in that range. I personally think this target could be achieved in much less than 15 years. The report we released in February supports this estimate in several ways, three ways. I encourage anyone who’s interested to check it out. We’ve done our homework. Your formal adoption of this target will address the omission of conservation in the 2019 Draft Water Master Plan.
Recommendation #2, the Select Board as Water Commissioners should consider implementing a seasonal water rate in 2023. Summer water use drives capacity on the town water system. Average use in summer months is roughly 80% higher than in winter and it’s outdoor watering that does that. Many lawn irrigation systems run daily when an inch of water once a week would be better. Lawns are being watered in the rain, rooftops are being watered by misdirected sprinklers. Outdoor watering bans during drought declarations are being ignored. There’s a problem here. Residents are wasting precious water. And remember, we’re throwing drinking water, quality water on our lawns. Just as important, low-use water customers are cross-subsidizing their high summer use neighbors. Summer peak demands determine pumping capacity. Yet, there’s no reflection of seasonality in the current water rates. And the technical way of saying this I guess is the prices water customers pay are not aligned with the costs they impose on the system. It’s time for Plymouth to at least consider a seasonal rate structure. It’s not a rate increase if it’s done properly. Many customers annual water costs will actually decline and those who saturate their lawns with drinking water will finally pay their fair share.
Recommendation #3, last but not least, we believe the Water Division needs a full-time person to spearhead water conservation, analyze customer usage data, Implement programs, evaluate results, pursue grants and measure progress toward the savings target. A volunteer committee cannot hope to fulfill these roles at the scale that’s needed. A modest 3% conservation charge on water bills would generate roughly a $150,000 based on current water revenues. This would cover the salary and benefit costs of this position and some program expenses. The return on investment we expect to see on this is outsized deferring a new well by several years or eliminating the need for just one new well in the future will save millions of dollars. It’s time to get serious about water conservation here in Plymouth, and our committee looks to your board to lead the town in this promising direction. Thank you, and I’ll be happy to answer questions if you have any.
Betty Cavacco:
Does the board have any questions? Mr. Mahoney?
John Mahoney:
All right. Eric, so going back to and it goes without saying that certainly appreciate your leadership on this issue over the last couple of years and the dedication of your committee. The second recommendation, it’s certainly not a fee increase on anybody which is shifting and looking at it from a different perspective. And there are examples out there in Massachusetts of communities that already do this?
Eric Cody:
That’s a great question, John. Thank you. Yes, the second recommendation was the seasonal water rate. By the way, Plymouth current water rates are quite progressive. The more you use, the more you pay. That’s a well-regarded rate. The problem is, it doesn’t discourage anyone from just dumping water on their lawns willy-nilly in the summer. So, that if it’s done correctly, actually the majority of water rate payers will see a rate decrease. This is what’s called a revenue neutral rate restructuring, which means that basically if we raise the summer rates and maybe that’s just the top tier summer rates, we don’t target a higher level of revenues to be collected.
[1:20:00]
Eric Cody:
So, what we want to do is reduce off season rates probably in the lowest or all three tiers in the off-peak months. And this is not hard to do. My guess is we would just focus on the peak summer months one quarter if we’re not in a position of having monthly rates, monthly bills. There are ways to do this. But it’s not a rate increase. If it’s done properly, many customers will see their rates actually decline. So, I don’t know if I answered your question.
John Mahoney:
No, you did. So, Derek, Lynne, can I get you up to the microphone? I’m going to do my best not to put you on the spot. Yes. So, you saw the second recommendation here from the committee. I’m intrigued by at least getting that data and seeing what it would look like, but who does that? Is that our current Finance Director or is the water–
Derek Brindisi:
Which data are you referring to? Which data? Because we have new meters and according to the DPW director, we now have completed our first year with the new meters so we have really good data, water consumption data that we can use now. We didn’t have that up until this year.
John Mahoney:
Eric, can you put the second recommendation up on the screen?
Eric Code:
Sure.
Lynne Barrett:
I just had a head regarding that structure because right now, we have obviously the four tiers but residential, commercial like the restaurants, do you know what I mean? Like their season, their busy season I think here in Plymouth is the summer. So, I’m not sure if their recommendation is to maybe split commercial from residential.
John Mahoney:
I don’t think he’s suggesting that. I think it’s strictly volume. And I think we’ve all driven around this community and other communities where it might be raining up, but we see sprinklers on. The board annually, it’s an annual event where there’s a drought conditions and we’ll vote to approve a moratorium on watering your Lawns and some days it’ll affect even numbers of the street or the odd numbers and things of that nature, but that’s never enforced. So, the peak of water usage is during the summer time and I think what Mr. Cody and his committee are suggesting is just looking at this from a different perspective. And I know we have four rates Lynne, they’re progressive, there’s four tiers but it doesn’t differentiate between commercial and residential. It’s strictly usage, correct?
Lynne Barrett:
That’s correct, that’s correct. So, I didn’t know if that model had to differentiate between those people who are watering lawns versus a restaurant. That was my only question. But it sounds like it doesn’t.
John Mahoney:
That’s some data I would definitely like to look at, but I guess the question through the chair to the town manager is who’s in the best position to get that done for us to provide the board with that information? What would that would look like?
Derek brindisi:
Again, talking to the DPW director, so, first of all, let me say that this is something that it’s been at the DPW, it’s been on their radar for the Water Division to look at seasonal water rates. So, this is a great recommendation. It’s been discussed in the past. Again, according to the DPW Director, I think it’s probably best that we could bring in a consultant to look at that data and then come back to the board with a recommendation for a seasonal rate.
John Mahoney:
Now, is that something in time for May of ‘23 or realistically, we’re 18 months out. It’s really a discussion for May of ‘24.
Derek Brindisi:
I mean, I don’t see why it couldn’t get done if we started sooner rather than later for ’23, but I’d have to check with how quickly it can get accomplished.
John Mahoney:
I’m just asking.
Derek Brindisi:
Yeah. I mean, I have to check to see how quickly but I mean, ’23–I mean, there’s some time there. We got about six months to do something like that.
John Mahoney:
All right. Eric, recommendation number three that you were proposing a surcharge, how much revenue did you determine that was going to raise?
Eric Cody:
About 150,000. I think when I checked, it was about 5 million in revenues for the Water Division. So, about $150,000.
John Mahoney:
Okay. So, Derek, you were saying that we now have our first entire annual data?
[1:25:05]
Derek Brindisi:
We do, yes.
John Mahoney:
Through the meters and is that something that the board can be provided with?
Derek Brindisi:
The data?
John Mahoney:
Yeah.
Derek Brindisi:
Sure. Are you looking for the water consumption data?
John Mahoney:
All the data that those meters are providing. Obviously, the consumption, sure.
Derek Brindisi:
Sure. We can provide that.
Eric Cody:
I should add that Peter Gordon’s people in the Water Division have been great in getting us data that we need to plan programs and evaluate them. They’ve given us more than 60,000 records over the last year or so. We’re waiting for more from them at this point. It actually would be easier if they had someone in the department who was doing some of this. We’re creating work for them. It’s unfortunate we’re sort of Outsiders and I think having a person who would become the focal point in the Water Division for this type of work, I think is essential to scaling these programs up.
John Mahoney:
I’m just going to reference Brockton. For decades, they’ve controlled Silver Lake, which is the seventh largest naturally occurring body of water in the state. And I do know that decades ago, I think Brockton was pulling about 20 million gallons a day out of that body of water and it wasn’t sufficient for what they needed or what they thought they needed. And then they signed a contract, which I believe they still pay $7 million dollars a year for a desalinization plant down on the Taunton River. But what happened was, they went into a mode of finally investing in infrastructure, which we’ve done an excellent job with in this community replacing especially century-old pipes and preventing loss from the system and other conservation measures. And I think there was a significant reduction in what they were taking daily out of Silver Lake and it got to the point where they didn’t need to access water from the desalinization plant even though they were locked into the contract. I think to the tune of $7 million a year. So, I’m certainly on board. I know Mr. Gordon isn’t here tonight with whatever we can do from a conservation perspective. We are in Dire Straits. We’ve been talking about water especially in West Plymouth with respect to the last–well, there was an executive session that Mr. Serkey mentioned during public comment. So, it’s out there. Mr. Beder has been up at that podium a few months ago referencing the fact that we are currently negative two. And if you look at the wells in the southern end of the community, the wells in the southern end of the town are in better health than the ones in the northern and western end of town because they have more open space around them. So, I’m not going to dominate this discussion, but we can’t talk about water enough because water is economic development, it’s public health and it’s public safety.
Betty Cavacco:
I have a great suggestion. Let’s put a building moratorium up and we wouldn’t have to worry so much about water, which is something that I want to move forward with on the town meeting warrant article. Mr. Williams?
Donald Williams:
My name is Don Williams. I live at 42 Carters Bridge Road. I’ve been a resident of Plymouth for 19 years. I’m very interested in the water situation. I’m not a member of Eric’s committee, but I have been to a number of the meetings and I can assure this board that if anybody has done the proper research for coming up with this conclusion, it’s been Eric Cody and his committee. They’ve gone to other towns; they’ve gone to the Water Department. The Water Department has been very cooperative but it’s become also apparent that the more data that we have, we collectively as Plymouth have, the better off we are. And part of that data is not as easily forthcoming from the Water Department without somebody who’s dedicated to doing that specifically and only exclusively. I don’t want to speak any more than that except to tell you that water is going to be very important not only for our residential people but for our commercial people development. And oftentimes, as most of commercial uses more water per capita per employee that is than residential. So, if we want to grow in terms of tax health, we’re going to have to provide that water.
[1:30:06]
Donald Williams:
And in closing, I did a calculation the other day and that calculation involved how much PFAS would it take to put our aquifer of billions and billions of gallons over the legal limit for drinking water. That legal limit is 20 parts per trillion, 80 pounds in the whole aquifer would put us at 20 trillion parts per million of PFAS. So, water is something that we definitely have to consider very seriously both for development and residential health. And I urge you to support this committee, because they have done their homework. They have worked hard. They’ve taken programs out to the Town of Plymouth and they’ve been successful. They’ve gotten people to get bins for compost. They’ve gotten people to get rain barrels. No bins for compost, sorry about that blank moment there. And they’ve gotten people to talk about watering their lawns in a sane way, and this is something that’s been absolutely essential. And Eric and his committee have done one heck of a job. So, I urge you to support them when they ask for it. Thank you.
Betty Cavacco:
Well, we have no issues supporting any of our committees, but I do believe that we are going to require some more information and more details. So, when we have that information, we can move forward. Go ahead.
Anthony Senesi:
Madam Chair, we also have Pat Adelmann that has her hand raised as well.
Pat Adelmann:
I have a question. Have you heard about brown water when you use, when you water your lawns? Now, I don’t know if that would cost the town. I don’t know if that necessitates another, what do they call it? A thing on your house, a water meter. I don’t know. But people in different states use the brown water. They don’t use the good water. And well, brown water is good water but it’s not rated the same. Have you heard that, John? Have you heard about brown water?
John Mahoney:
I have not heard about that one.
Pat Adelmann:
Okay. I wish he was still here but okay, it’s a thought.
John Mahoney:
Anthony, is Eric Cody still there?
Anthony Senesi:
Yes, he is.
Eric Cody:
Yes. That’s actually something we have looked at. I mean, in effect, the rain barrels that we’ve run–we’ve provided rain barrels both in 2021 and 2022 to Plymouth residents and that’s actually a form of brown water because it’s never been processed. It’s coming off rooftops. And those programs were very well received by Plymouth residents. There’s a lot of technology that goes and you can actually separate water. I use it for watering, but there’s some fairly exotic approaches to it as well, which we have not investigated yet.
Betty Cavacco:
Okay. Any more questions or comments for Mr. Cody? I’m sorry, Ms. Adelmann.
Pat Adelmann:
Thank you. I’d like to really commend Mr. Cody and his committee for all the work they’ve done. At the beginning of the presentation, Mr. Cody mentioned the aquifer being contaminated and I’m wondering if he can speak about the sand and gravel mining and excess fertilizing and how the septic systems, faulty septic systems contribute to that contamination. Thank you.
Eric Cody:
It’s a great question. I can do it qualitatively, but obviously not quantitatively. When you have it–certainly, Don Williams could describe what happens at Great Herring Pond when you get surface runoff from fertilizers, phosphorus, nitrogen or leaking septic systems that get into the surface water and eventually it works its way into the groundwater below.
[1:35:02]
Eric Cody:
I didn’t say the aquifer had been contaminated, but there’s obviously the potential for that. We’ve got something a couple of thousand different compounds of PFAS alone. And everyone ought to be concerned about the potential for really messing up things royally here. So, I think the question that you raised is an important one and I think that conservation allows us some flexibility to deal with all these issues. The less water we use, the better we are because we’ll be pulling less out of the aquifer itself. I know I can’t give a definitive answer to your question though.
Pat Adelmann:
Thank you. I agree about conservation and the importance of it, and I am so pleased that you brought it up and the town is looking into giving more incentives for that. Thank you.
Charlie Bletzer:
I have a question. Mr. Cody, through Ms. Adelmann’s question to you about the aquifer. I see fertilizers can hurt the aquifer and I can see how leaky septic, but how does sand and gravel? How does that affect the aquifer because you didn’t answer that part of it?
Eric Cody:
Okay. Yeah, good point. Man, I’m not a soil scientist but whenever you strip away the natural vegetation on a site, you remove the filtering that happens as water in the natural water cycle percolates through `the ground to the water table. So, simply by removing the surface. I mean, basically, sand and gravel are a form of strip mining, they take away the whole vegetative filtering layer on the surface. So, I think when people express concern about that kind of operation, they’re right. I mean, there’s a potential effect on the quality of water. You’re getting less filtering as water makes its way to the subsurface.
Charlie Bletzer:
But if it’s then properly, let’s say a building is put on that property that’s been stripped and the right vegetation is replanted on the site, would that negatively affect the aquifer if it’s done properly?
Eric Cody:
Again, I’m not an expert on this, but if you restore all the vegetation and you reforest an area, you’re eventually going to get the same kind of benefit back that you destroyed when you started your strip-mining operation. So, yeah, it’s real important to reforest and re-vegetate. No question.
Charlie Bletzer:
Yeah, that’s all. Because if they’re strip-mining to put a building on a piece of property in and they do it properly with the right vegetation replanted and drainage and all that, I would hope that it might not necessarily negatively affect the aquifer. So, thank you.
Betty Cavacco:
Mr. Williams?
Donald Williams:
Yeah, you’re right. If you can put in a 50-year-old tree to replace a 50-year-old tree, what happens is when they take away the top layer of sand and gravel for example, they don’t plant the trees immediately and that means that the rain water is closer to the surface or is easier to get into the aquifer because there’s less soil to go through. The other thing about building a house on a property is that the roofs and the patios and the driveways are encouraging runoff because they’re impervious surfaces. So, even if you put the same number of trees on that property, that property is still going to have a deleterious effect on runoff which is one source of the pollution that gets into the aquifer. For example, Great Herring Pond, we’re seeing that in spades now and there’s no question that septic is also another–septic is the major cause of pollution in the ponds. It’s probably the major cause of pollution in the groundwater too and that comes from houses and that comes from septic.
[1:40:01]
Charlie Bletzer:
The reason why I asked that is I don’t want people thinking that every time somebody does a commercial development and has to strip the land that it’s hurting our aquifers. I don’t want people to think that.
Donald Williams:
No. Generally, they do that and generally, they don’t put the trees back and certainly not in either the number or in the age. The number of leaves is important because every leaf that a drop of water hits, it’s going to slow it down and slowing that water down enables you to reduce the amount of runoff that goes into a pond.
Charlie Bletzer:
Yeah, but we also have a Planning Board that’s very qualified to making sure that when they do the site, they do it properly.
Donald Williams:
Well, we just have to be more sensitive to that, I think especially as we go along.
Charlie Bletzer:
No, no, I get it but we can’t say you can’t do it because you can’t strip land to put a building on it. We need to have some progress and we need some commercial economic development.
Donald Williams:
No question. It’s finding that balance.
Charlie Bletzer:
Right. Yeah, working together and doing it properly, so.
Donald Williams:
I’m just worried personally that sooner or later there’s going to be a tipping point beyond which we can’t Rectify it and that 80-pound calculation that I did in PFAS in the aquifer, for the whole aquifer, that was a real eye-opener.
Charlie Bletzer:
And one last thing Mr. Williams, where did you get the stat? That kind of surprised me that the employee is more usage than the residential person, the commercial employee.
Donald Williams:
No, I don’t think I said that that was a definite thing. I said it could be.
Charlie Bletzer:
I forget how many times more. I don’t know if you misspoke because I know I’m going to–
Donald Williams:
What happens when you’re in manufacturing is if you use water for cooling, if you use water for rinsing, you can get into a much higher amount. I’m not familiar with what’s going on specifically in Plymouth for the number of commercials that may be per capita more using of water than residential. So, if I said that, I misspoke.
Charlie Bletzer:
Okay. That’s all. Thank you for clarifying that. I appreciate that.
Betty Cavacco:
Mr Lydon?
Steve Lydon:
Steve Lydon. We’ve talked a lot about the aquifer and what affects the aquifer. We’re talking about septic systems. We’re talking about gravel removal, but no one’s mentioned cranberry bogs and what goes from the cranberry bogs into our lakes. Down where I live on White Island Pond was contaminated at just about every year because the cranberry bogs would take water out of White Island Pond, put it in their bogs and then put it back into White Island Pond. So, they’re going to fix this problem. They’re taking out 400,000 yards of gravel to build a retention pond. And when I asked, “Are you going to line it, so the contaminants that’s going to keep this water away from White Island Pond?” They said, “No. This is the most economical and environmental way that we can do it.” I said, “That doesn’t make sense to me.” So, I think if we’re going to start looking at different ways to protect the aquifer, I think we should start looking at the agricultural and the cranberry bogs. Thank you.
Betty Cavacco:
Thank you.
Anthony Senesi:
Madam Chair, Meg Sheehan has her hand raised.
Betty Cavacco:
Okay. Ms. Sheehan?
Meg Sheehan:
Thank you, Chairman Cavacco for recognizing me. Two questions that I wanted to ask. One goes back to something that Mr. Cody mentioned and it relates to PFAS contamination of the wells. I do believe according to research that our group has done that there has been PFAS found in the North Plymouth wells and I’m just wondering if anyone knows anything about that.
Derek Brindisi:
Through the Chair, I can answer Ms. Sheehan’s questions. So, all of our wells have been tested and in fact, the state mandates that all public water supplies must test their waters for PFAS and PFOS. One of our wells did have PFAS found in the water. I’m not sure the limit, that’s not the limit, the amount. I do know it’s well beneath the action level of the 20 parts per trillion though. So, the town does not have to take any action against that water supply because it’s below the standard set by DEP.
Meg Sheehan:
I appreciate that. And EPA has come out with new levels that are going to be adopted by DEP very soon and it will be I believe much lower than that maybe around five parts per trillion.
[1:45:14]
Meg Sheehan:
So, this second point I wanted to address is when Mr. Williams was talking about the impacts of deforestation and removing trees and soil and vegetation from the land. Yes, it’s absolutely true that sand and gravel and the trees and vegetation protect and filter our sole source aquifer. And in addition to that, the vegetation and the trees play a role in transmitting that water into the aquifer and that’s called evapo-transpiration. And when we remove the trees and the sand and gravel and the vegetation, it means that more of the water evaporates into the atmosphere. And so, there’s less water recharging into our aquifer. So, it’s important to look at that when we talk about water quantity and the impacts of land use changes whether it’s from sand and gravel removal or flaring land to put in impervious surfaces.
And on Mr. Lydon’s point about the cranberry bog agriculture. Our coalition is very concerned about this as you may know. I think he might be referring to the reservoir that’s being dug by E.J. Pond of cranberries in South Plymouth. That is not actually an agricultural reservoir. It’s orders of magnitude larger than any reservoir that could possibly be needed to irrigate those bogs according to the Water Management Act Standards. And I think the town would be very wise to look at the extent to which sand and gravel mining is occurring in the sole source aquifer, because that does expose the aquifer to contamination. Thank you.
Betty Cavacco:
Thank you. Mr. Quintal?
Dick Quintal:
Yes. I’d like to thank the committee for a great job, but I have some concerns with some of the comments. Actually, quite a few of them. One on the 3% for conservation. Why would it have to be the actual taxpayers? If it’s going to save so much money and so much good, why to just take it out of the budget? I mean, something on the on that line. And Lynne is absolutely correct on the water bills especially for commercial. We’ll say restaurants because I remember years ago, they were putting some door knockers out by accident, and it happened to come back. Some of these places have a 10- 15,000 water bill. I mean, do you honestly think it’s fair to charge the largest users without cause? Have you in waste rather than that’s with the conservation should be and I bet if you went to any business in town and said this is things you can do to conserve water, I don’t see one of them that wouldn’t want to be a part of that. So, I think that that needs to be looked at. At least for my support, it definitely needs some more work but I do support it but I just support on how the budget is, where the budget is. We got the water problems. I don’t know why the water superintendent isn’t here or the DPW Director. I think on a water presentation, the superintendent of the Water Department should be here but that’s just my own thing. And then, we’re asking Lynne Barrett. I know she’s very intelligent but this really isn’t–that’s not what she does. I mean, you give her the numbers or she’ll get the numbers but as far as their operation and what’s working and what’s not working, that needs to come from the superintendent or the DPW Director. If not, both and they should both be here. That’s just my own opinion.
Eric Cody:
If I could respond just to the first part of your comment. I would like to clarify that you mentioned taxpayers. There’s no taxpayer skin in this game. We’re talking about putting a 3% conservation factor on water customers bills and all the benefits that will derive from that–
Dick Quintal:
You’re absolutely correct. So, I mean, rate payer. Let’s use that word.
Eric Cody:
Okay. Yeah, yeah.
[1:50:00]
Eric Cody:
And the rate payers will benefit from that both short and long-term. I mean, the obvious in our pitch is that long-term if you can just delay an $8 million well a couple of years, this is going to pay for itself big time. But there’s a short-term benefit too. If we’ve got somebody who’s rolling out, whose job it is in the Water Division to implement water conservation programs then water customers can take advantage of, that’s a benefit for a modest 3% surcharge on the bill. And by the way, that sort of approach in conservation factor is used all around the world for utilities both water, electric and Gas utilities. That’s how conservation programs very often are funded. A lot of times they’re much higher percentage charges than what we’re proposing.
Betty Cavacco:
Thank you. Anyone else? Any other board members? Okay. Thank you, Mr. Cody. As soon as we have additional information, we’ll be able to move forward.
The next order of business is the Simes House, and I believe that’s Mr. Zupperoli. You’ve got one minute, Bob.
Robert Zupperoli:
Actually, I just have a short hour and a half long presentation that will articulate and highlight the work that’s been done by the Simes House over the past few months.
Betty Cavacco:
Well take your time. We’ll be back in tomorrow.
Robert Zupperoli:
We should be out by Christmas Eve. So, the Simes House. Here are some photographs of the Simes House as it was and as it currently is today. Just for historical purposes, the Simes House was built in approximately 1863.
In 1864, it was assessed at $9,000.
In 1893, there were connections to the hotel Pilgrim, a 20-room in and part of that was because of the proximity of the house to the beaches that are in Manomet. It provided a great respite for tourists and for other residents of Plymouth coming down from Boston in and around the North Shore. It allowed people a chance to vacation.
In 1907, the Simes House was a nursing home known as the Broadview. In 1923, it was a girls’ camp known as Camp Baisley. In 1954, the original farm was parceled out into 16 lots. These are some interior views of the Simes House as it is today. In 2009, the Simes House was taken for taxes. In 2010, the Simes House Foundation was established. In 2015 to 2017, the Community Preservation Commission and the Simes House renovation and restoration began and occurred. $4.5 million were appropriated for that restoration and of which 115,000 are left from that original warrant. In 2022, the Simes House was taken back by the Town of Plymouth from the, I believe the organization is the Manomet Village Steering Committee because of some of the issues that had happened as a result of the Simes House not being able to become a revenue generating site and tax purposes.
So, as a result in July of 2022, the Simes House Task Force was formed to try and come up with recommendations for what this piece of property could be, some of the potentials that it has and what it could mean for certainly the residents of Manomet and for overall, for the town of Plymouth. The task force was comprised of Mr. Derek Brindisi, the Town Manager who served as Chair of the task force, myself as a member of the Advisory and Finance Committee. I served as Vice-chair. The voting members of the task force included Alice Baker, Karen Buechs, Stephen Cole, Victoria Costa, Monica Mullin and Julie Gallant. All of whom had various interests and areas of expertise in terms of relating to the CPC, economic development, residents of the Simes House, their experience with Manomet Village and real estate and also working at the state level.
[1:55:03]
Robert Zupperoli:
What we decided as a best way to gather information and data was that we should conduct some surveys. The first was an interest survey primarily for the residents of the town and if the Simes House was going to be used as a municipal site. I want to share with you some of the data that was gleaned from that survey. People were almost 50/50 split as to whether or not they visited the Simes House. And if it were not used as a municipal purpose, what other purposes could people foresee the Simes House being used for? By and large, people would like to see an arts and entertainment center as part of the use of the Simes House. Professional building and as a bed and breakfast closely followed. In terms of the other uses, there was a variety of respondents and responses to that. They included affordable housing, a community center, restaurants, use as a public library or as a branch of the Manomet Public Library. The responses for this particular survey were really very, very varied.
Most of the respondents and as you can see from this particular survey, 302 residents responded. Most of the respondents came from Precinct 6. No surprise, Precinct 6 is where the Simes House is located. Residents did favor the use of the Simes House as a satellite Town Hall, and they would like to see if that were a possible use for the site, they would like to see all of the services that our current Town Hall offers being offered in a satellite facility. Day hours were preferred and this is an issue that will come up and that I’ll review later, because this is actually part of the reason why Simes House may not be a suitable site for a satellite Town Hall. Monday through Friday with Friday being the least desirable were all days that people would like to use the site.
So, some of the municipal survey takeaways are that residents in South Plymouth do desire a satellite office for Town Hall to conduct Town business. We’ve often heard and we’ve often said somewhat sarcastically that if anyone needs to come to Town Hall here in Court Street in the center of Plymouth from South Plymouth, they need to pack a lunch. So, a satellite in South Plymouth to benefit the residents is a desire that people have. Residents would also like the opportunity to discuss this further and they’d like to discuss it with the board.
Queries that remain from this were that the Simes House itself as the location for the satellite offices. There is some significant problems that present itself as the Simes House being in that site. Part of that being the concerns from town meeting. It would cost a considerable amount of money to renovate the Simes House in order to be used as a satellite Town Hall. Town meeting, I convent you to say is moving in a very fiscally conservative direction and I’m not sure that town meeting would be in favor of that. Also, there’d be collective bargaining issues that the board and the Town Manager would have with frontline staff being a change of work location and a change in time.
Library use came up as a possible use for the facility. However, Plymouth Public’s Library current location is very satisfactory to the Library Administration as well as well as the Library Board of Trustees. So, they would not be interested in moving from its current location to the Simes House. There are also concerns with bookshelves and books weigh a lot and the Simes House as it currently is would need to be restructured particularly on the first floor in order to withstand the weight of books and bookshelves.
In order to see if that could actually happen, the task force looked at having a structural analysis or an engineer’s report written to see if that actually was feasible with the site currently as it is. That price tag came back at about $48,000 and the task force was not interested in spending that kind of money on a structural analysis that would not go anywhere.
[2:00:08]
Robert Zupperoli:
The Board of Trustees and Library Administration was very clear that they’re happy with the Manomet Branch as it is and were not interested in moving. We also were approached by the Housing Authority. The Housing Authority is interested in finding itself a new location. Currently, they’re at 130 Court. However, for the Housing Authority to go into the Simes House, the desire is that they would be able to purchase the building not rent or lease.
We surveyed non-profits across the town to see what their interest would be with the non-profit agencies and representatives in the town. So, they all were 501(c)s. There are seven respondents that turned in responses for this. They are based for the most part in Plymouth. About 72% of the nonprofits surveyed are based in Plymouth and they’ve been in operation for excess of 10 years. Most of them have board members in excess of 10 members and they provide a variety of services. The other that you see most are all community services, the other environmental services, human services, domestic services, youth development and economic development are the other that you see. The others are all pretty self-explanatory.
The nonprofits for the most part do plan to expand and they would like to visit the Simes House. However, these two slides provide some questions and they left me personally with some wonderings. They want to visit, they don’t want to visit. They would like to visit, they’re not sure if they would like to visit. By and large, non-profits are attracted to buildings like the Simes House because of their uniqueness.
So, the decision and the responses about whether or not it would be a suitable location is almost evenly split. Non-profits as I alluded to earlier tend to like buildings like the Simes House because they are unique architecturally, structurally, historically, they offer little nooks and crannies. They offer things that box buildings don’t and non-profits tend to like those characteristics.
The non-profit takeaways. They were all 501(c)s based in Plymouth. They all provide a variety of services. They all plan to expand. They tend to light buildings like the Simes with this kind of character. Some of the questions that were left, is this a viable option for a 501 organization? Part of the query that the respondents had was what kind of a lease agreement, what kind of an agreement would the town be offering them? And finding the right 501(c) organization to go into the facility. So, that would take some marketing and looking for the right 501(c). The right nonprofit would mean not limiting the organization that would take possession of the building and use the building as a site.
The business survey, whereas the non-profit survey showed some favor, the business survey provided a completely different outlook. Their businesses are located in Plymouth for the most part. They’ve operated for 10 years or more. They are open to the public. They employ 11+ people. They service more than 10 customers and they provide a variety of services.
[2:05:08]
Robert Zupperoli:
The other that you see is represented by food services, arts and entertainment, customer services, legal aid and the trades. It’s almost a 50/50 split as to whether or not the businesses plan to expand. They are not considering relocating for the most part. And they have not visited the Simes House for the most part. They do not see the Simes House as a suitable location for a for-profit business. This has to do with the way and where the Simes House, the building itself is located on the lot, sufficient parking, access to the facility and whether or not the Simes House actually would be suitable to their particular business.
So, some final takeaways and some recommendations. As a municipal use, the Task Force could not see this as a possible municipal use. It’s not recommended. Private use and a private sale, not recommended. The recommendation, however, is that the town should keep the Simes House and market it to a non-profit. This would mean and this would also keep the work that the CPC has put into the Simes House, that work would be maintained. A non-profit would probably maintain the look and the feel of the building as a historical building. There would not be significant renovations made to it. It would not be, in other words, a level and rebuild. And the CPC has put a tremendous amount of work into the Simes House as a historical location, as an open space and for affordable housing because let’s not forget, there are two apartments on the third floor that we would also need to consider.
The recommendation would be to look at leasing with the triple net lease. This would provide for some tax revenue because the tenant pays the taxes, the utilities and the other fees. So, the other fees and I put that in quotation marks because that would allow the potential tenant to use the Simes House and renovate it as they see fit and still maintain the character of the building. Essentially, nothing would be lost and it would provide needed maintenance on the building and a presence in Manomet not only for the building itself but for the landscaping around it.
The duration of the lease would be something that would be key to negotiating with a non-profit partly because given the times that we’re in and with cost for materials increasing and due to inflation, the duration of the lease would need to be structured in such a way that whatever non-profit decides to take over the building, whatever nonprofit the building is marketed to, would have the time to make it a success. So, the town with the duration of the lease and with a triple net lease, the town is in a unique position to get very creative and very innovative with the way that it’s using its buildings. That’s all I have for you. So, the recommendation of the Task Force is for the town to hold on to the building, use a triple net lease and find a suitable non-profit to go into the building.
Betty Cavacco:
Great. Thanks so much. Do the board have any questions?
Charlie Bletzer:
Nope.
Harry Helm:
First, Mr. Zuperroli and the other committee members, just want to thank you for all the work I know you guys put in on this and thank you for the recommendation. Certainly, seems to be a viable sort of thing and is actually in a way kind of what the, and this is one thing the Manomet Village Common was attempting to do, but they were trying to lease it out to separate organizations. And that’s just one thing I wanted to point out just so that everybody’s clear on this. You mentioned the Manomet Village Steering Committee, that’s associated with the Planning Board. The former organization was the Manomet Village Common Incorporated and I certainly understand the confusion. I was on both of them and confused them all the time. But thank you for all the work that was done.
Betty Cavacco:
Charlie?
Charlie Bletzer:
Robert, thank you. I know you did a lot of work and Derek and the rest of the group. I was on town meeting when we voted for this $4.5 million or Billy says it’s less than four million but whatever it was, it was a lot of money. I voted for it because it was going to be a community center, a Town Hall Annex. The residents of Manomet, a place for them to go and I thought they could have meetings there and do some town business there. So, I was all for that. And so, we put all this money into it and what I’ve seen and I’m not being critical of anybody but the reason why we didn’t reappoint the board recently is because the building sat there empty. Okay? We get two one-bedroom apartments in there, paying 1100 a month, I think. And good for them. Affordable housing is great, but that’s a lot of money spending for 4.5 million. So, what I’d like to see there because I get questions on these non-profits, are they going to be able to maintain this building and this other committee couldn’t do it, they couldn’t do it. So, that’s my first question. If we give it to a non-profit, is the town going to recoup any money out of it? And it’s not just all about money. If it’s a non-profit that’s providing a service to the Manomet area or the Plymouth, it’s great. If we could have maybe a meeting room that they could use but my concern is money on maintaining. And the town meeting voted to spend 4.5 million but they don’t want to spend 48,000 doing a structural assessment. That seems like not much money compared to 4.5 million. So, I’ll let you answer it in a second.
Robert Zupperoli:
Write them down because I’ll forget.
Charlie Bletzer:
No, why don’t you answer those and I’m going to tell you what I’d really like to see happen.
Robert Zupperoli:
If I remember all the points that you made, Charlie, the reason that the Task Force did not want to see the building sold is because of the amount of money that was put into it. $4.5 million is a lot of money.
Charlie Bletzer:
I know we can never get our money back.
Robert Zupperoli:
And we’d never get our money back, exactly.
Charlie Bletzer:
We’d be lucky to get 800,000 for it. I agree with that.
Robert Zupperoli:
So, that was one. I think the type of lease would be important and finding the right non-profit. So, that would take a lot of marketing and that would involve um finding a non-profit that does have some deep pockets, that could afford the lease, that could afford the taxes, the utilities and be willing to put in the necessary renovations, repairs and maintenance to the building and the grounds that that building would require.
Charlie Bletzer:
You think you can find somebody that could do that? So, what happens if they come back to us and they’re already in there and they come back and we can’t pay the triple net, we can’t pay taxes, we can’t pay the lease. We can’t–
Betty Cavacco:
Goodbye.
Charlie Bletzer:
Okay. We’re going to be in the same boat.
Robert Zupperoli:
The town maintains ownership of the building so the town is essentially the landlord. I think the easiest way that for me, this is how I helped my brain understand it. Remember, I’m a reading and language arts teacher so real estate and numbers not necessarily. The triple net lease would keep the Simes House. The town is still the owner, the town is still the landlord so they’re responsible. The non-profit whatever tenant goes into the building is responsible for all of that. The town maintains ownership. If you can’t pay the lease, you’re out. On the flip side, for the tenant, the triple net lease is really almost like a mortgage. They have the opportunity to really take ownership of the building, to really put their mark on it, put their stamp on it as their own and then after a certain period, after five, seven, even a 10-year lease, I think the town would be in a really unique position to offer that non-profit the sale of the building because by that point, enough revenue would have been generated that the town may have recouped some of its losses, the nonprofit would have built up equity, they would have built a foothold in the community and why not buy the building that they’re in.
Charlie Bletzer:
I mean, the triple net, that real estate is that’s worth a lot of money. I can’t imagine what the taxes would be in that building.
[2:15:02]
Charlie Bletzer:
So, how about this scenario? This is what I envision at least talking about it.
Robert Zupperoli:
Did I answer your questions?
Charlie Bletzer:
You did, yeah. So, here’s what I envision is we have a library in Manomet down the street from where the Simes House is. We own the Simes House. Why don’t we sell the library and move into the Simes House? And here’s the thing is the trustees don’t like it, the staff isn’t–guess what? The taxpayers own the library. The trustees don’t own the library. So, it’s up to us to tell them what we want to do. The town manager, if he thinks it’s a good idea, if we can use that Simes House as a municipal building for what we talked about stickers, permits, taxes and also move the library over there and sell the library.
Robert Zupperoli:
So, I think there are two parts of that. And one addresses an earlier question that you had and that regards the $48,000 for the structural analysis. That wasn’t a town meeting issue. That was a bid that came back to the task force when we put out for bids to try and find a structural and engineers report. And we, the Task Force decided that that would be a waste of money because in our very first meeting, our very first meeting was August 2nd and the library director happened to be there. We went through a tour of the building. Afterwards, I was tasked with meeting with the library director or at least talking to her to see if there was any further interest that the library would have.
Also, the members of the trustees–
Charlie Bletzer:
Let me stop you right there. It’s not whether they’re interested. I really believe that the town owns the building and the taxpayers own that building.
Robert Zupperoli:
I’m not disagreeing with you. Let me–
Charlie Bletzer:
So, it should be up to what we as a board and the town manager, if we think that that’s appropriate for them to go into and we can use that as a municipal building, they move in there.
Betty Cavacco:
There’s other issues with that, Charlie.
Charlie Bletzer:
What’s the other issue?
Betty Cavacco:
In the library that they’re in now, there’s a specific line of sight that they can see in every single room that where their desk is. In the Simes House, they cannot.
Charlie Bletzer:
That’s what?
Betty Cavacco:
I don’t know if I’d want to have my child on camera somewhere, just saying. But I think the board vetted that and we’ve asked them to come back with these suggestions and recommendations and I think if we can find a non-profit that can hold their own and we actually get some revenue out of it, I think that’s great. And I am the liaison to the committee.
Robert Zupperoli:
My only issue with–no, not my only issue. One of my issues with forcing the library into a building–
Charlie Bletzer:
I’m pro-library so I don’t want this–
Robert Zupperoli:
No, no, no. I’m not saying that you’re not.
Charlie Bletzer:
I just want to know. They know because I’m there all the time. I love the library.
Robert Zupperoli:
No, no, no. I’m not saying that you’re not. So, let me use another language. I think to force a department into a facility that one, they have no interest in. Two, it’s not practical for the use of that department. I believe that the Select Board would create more problems than they would solve. And again, just the physical structure of the building and the layout of the building, it doesn’t allow for a good flow. It doesn’t allow for ample space or proper use of space. There would need to be considerable renovations done to the building as it is now in order for it to function as a library. And I would caution the Board to force a town department into a facility that they have no interest in using.
Charlie Bletzer:
We’re never going to make money up for that building, I don’t think so. But I want to see some use of that building and I want the residents to be able to use that building. That’s why we bought it and preserved this and that’s not happening. Under what you’re talking about and no disrespect, it may be the right plan. I’m just one person, but I just want to see that building being used and being maintained because I’m watching it just deteriorate and it bothers me every time I drive by it. But anyway.
[2:20:03]
Betty Cavacco:
Any other questions or comments from the board? Mr. Quintal?
Dick Quintal:
Thank you for all your work, everybody. I don’t know if I’m so much sold on the finding a non-profit. I mean, we found a couple. And in fairness, it was in Covid also, but the bottom line is there are plenty of businesses that were out there, business agreements being done through Covid although different. This possible sale of South Meadow Road and I wasn’t at the executive session so that’s why I’m using the word possible. I know that the foundation and company had plans for a shared kitchen in there and I know there’s a big demand for that. Have you looked at maybe reaching out to the foundation as a non-profit with some people with some money to maybe to go in there and look at this quest?
Robert Zupperoli:
Which foundation are you referring to, I’m sorry?
Dick Quintal:
The Economic Foundation.
Robert Zupperoli:
Oh, actually, Stephen Cole was on, yeah. He’s a member of the Task Force.
Dick Quintal:
Did he ever at any point bring that up?
Robert Zupperoli:
He brought up a number of options and possibilities that could be interested in going into the Simes House, shared kitchen is one of them, arts and entertainment and a connection to the Priscilla Beach Theatre is another one. He had a third and I just spoke with him this afternoon and I’m sorry it escapes me right now.
Dick Quintal:
That’s okay.
Robert Zupperoli:
Actually, there he is.
Dick Quintal:
There he is, the man, a legend.
Betty Cavacco:
It’s Stephen Cole.
Stephen Cole:
Hey, folks. Dickie, great question and I really appreciate you being mindful of the shared kitchen concept. I think one of the limitations with that location for a shared kitchen is that they don’t even have a real kitchen with a real floor right now. So, there’s obviously some upgrades that are necessary. And I think access points. In order for a shared kitchen to be successful, you have to have access points I think for food trucks to be able to pull in there. We have to think about the end users of our shared kitchen. So, my concern for that location is it may not be suitable. And I also heard some rumblings that perhaps across the street from that location in the Commercial Plaza there, someone else was actually exploring something like that.
Dick Quintal:
What were your other suggestions? Do you have anything else that you think might go in there?
Stephen Cole:
Robert just touched a little bit on adding a pipeline for the successful Priscilla Beach Theatre group. I understand those kids age out at a certain point and I think there are other theater groups in this area that could benefit from having their own space. I think it provides unique opportunities. Something akin to kid playhouse. When Robert and I spoke earlier, he had some other good examples of arts and entertainment venues that could draw more people into the region and spend more money. There’s certainly restaurants that can support something like that. And just to put a little bit of a number on this. I was talking to Bob Hollis not long ago on a project we were working on together and I understand that they have 70 to 75,000 ticket sales annually. And naturally, they’re an established brand. They’re an identity. They have a full staff that’s able to schedule events, but I think that given the success of the Priscilla Beach Theatre group maybe something like that could also create a pipeline for some of the older kids and also maybe attract some high-level talent of Plymouth for a summer or a portion of a summer for original shows.
Robert Zupperoli:
The two examples that I referenced were the Westport Country Playhouse and the Good Speed Opera House. Westport Connecticut and East Haddam Connecticut were pretty much summer places and when these two facilities were taken over. I mean, we all know Westport Country Playhouse, it was Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward. The level of talent and the caliber of talent that Westport Country Playhouse attracts as well as Good Speed Opera. Good Speed brings Broadway shows to East Haddam during the summer. Westport, same and they also are able to have a lot of cross-pollination, if you will, with some of the theaters and Westport on Broadway and Westport itself and East Adam come alive during their seasons. And that’s all because of the types of facilities that they have and something that started really as summer stock that has grown tremendously over the years. And personally, for me, that would be the most attractive use of the building, that would be the most attractive non-profit to market to.
[2:25:11]
Robert Zupperoli:
Would we to approach Priscilla Beach and see what their goals are in terms of expanding and if this is a facility that they’d be interested in.
Stephen Cole:
And I might add, there are other existing theater groups that we might approach also. I think it’s an excellent recommendation, Robert on your part. We should approach them as well as others.
Dick Quintal:
Well, I like the idea and not only that, the site outside even has capabilities, cocktails whatever. I’m not talking about a watering hole. I’m talking about a place where you go see a show, have a couple drinks outside, it’s nice. I mean, I think it could be turned into a money maker with the right person. Putting it on a non-profit is a big responsibility unless you get somebody in the theater. If you can get somebody in the business end of it.
Robert Zupperoli:
Need a non-profit with deep pockets.
Dick Quintal:
Yeah, that’s going to be able to show how that’s going to work. That’s really the bottom line. I mean, I think the town went in to preserve it for its looks and for history. And if we can maintain that at the same time and turn it around at least make it self-maintaining because it’s very hard for public/private entities to go together. And to give you the perfect example, you can have all the smartest people in the world here and Memorial Hall is a perfectly example. I mean, it’s come a long way from the day but it’s still not properly maintained. It’s just not. So, that’s my point with that. The town’s already put the money in it. Let’s move on, but let’s see if we can get at least maintain, to maintain itself and if it can show a profit, that’s even better.
Robert Zupperoli:
And I think that would come with things like a duration of the lease that would allow whatever agency goes in there to have time to be successful. I mean, I really don’t think that given the economy and the direction the economy is going, I really don’t see this turning around in a year but three to five years, I think that might be a little bit more realistic for a non-profit or some type of agency like that to go in and renovate, rehab and really put some good use into the building. My opinion, anyway.
Betty Cavacco:
Mr. Mahoney?
John Mahoney:
So, I just want to thank you Mr. Zupperoli for your presentation. I know Mr. Brindisi, one of his first challenges of getting the job of Town Manager was to chair of this committee. I didn’t have the good fortune of attending any of your committee meetings but I’m sure I missed out on a lot of excitement. Having said that, we can talk about whatever the number is. The community has invested numerous millions of dollars into this building to preserve this building for the village of Manomet. It’s around roughly an acre of land and that was the intention when we embarked down this road about a decade ago.
So, the Town Manager just shared with us. I had the laptop up a letter from the Library Board of Trustees. There’s obviously a 10 to 15 issues with respect to moving a library over to that location and their significant challenges. So, that’s probably off the table right now.
You mentioned triple net, Robert. I’m a single or double net individual. Primary thing we want to do is protect our investment. I want someone in there that’s going to respect the building, maintain the building and open it for the public. I don’t need tax revenue from them. We want them to keep the heat on, to keep the lights on and do whatever proactive maintenance they can. That’s the most important thing going forward and respect the nature and the historical stature of that building. That’s the best that we can ask for. I don’t need any tax revenue. I mean, if they’re properly maintaining that building, that’s a significant enough investment for me. So, that’s all I can add.
Now, whether that solution comes from Economic Development to Mr. Cole or a non-profit or whatever it takes on, but I’m certainly not going to enter in a negotiation and I’m only one of five and try to squeeze every penny out of somebody to get them in there. I want them to go in there and be successful.
[2:30:02]
Betty Cavacco:
Tax revenue would be helpful. Just saying. So, do we want to vote on this or is it just a presentation?
Derek Brindisi:
I guess the question is how would you like us to proceed?
Betty Cavacco:
We have a couple comments. Okay. You got two minutes, Bill.
Bill Keohan:
Thank you. I don’t need two minutes at all. I just wanted to make one clarification that it is $3.8 million that was dispensed on that building to create two affordable units, four office suites, conference room, ADA compliant bathrooms, elevators and access to the second floor and community space and a public park. So, if you start to think about what we’re poised to do with Stephens Field at nearly $4 million move a few tennis courts and what we were able to achieve there, I think people need to put in perspective what we actually spent at that location to create these amenities to support this Village Center. I think Manomet is a village that doesn’t get the attention that it needs to get. There are lots of residents of this location in southern Plymouth and the idea was to create a building that would bring community enhancing features to the Village Center. I think we have an opportunity to look at other opportunities. I think the working group did a great job analyzing as much as it could, but I think there’s still some work we need to do. If we are going to start to move to put it back out to bid, we have to take into account the experiences that we had on the first bidding process and where we are today compared to how that bidding process went before. So, there’s things that if you were to go in that direction, we would definitely have to revisit to make it more likely that they succeed. But the more important aspect of this is that we always have to keep an open mind out to other possibilities at this location: a municipal use, a library, some other efficient use because now the Town of Plymouth has two buildings in this Village Center and they want to be efficient about their costs and we are encroaching on some tighter, leaner years and we need to be thinking about consolidating our expenditures in this location. I think this building offers quite a bit. I do know that at one point we had offered to do a structural analysis of the building for the purposes of books, which is a straight up analysis that costs a couple of thousand dollars. By the time that the 48,000 referenced bid went out, it covered a lot more than just structural. It was conditions of current conditions and pitchers and it was a thing that went out to bid through the Procurement Office. There could have been a more efficient way of getting an analysis of that basic question about support and books and structure. That’s what we initially looked at but we were told that the working group would pursue a different avenue and a larger question went out with a larger cost associated with it. So, I don’t want to think that that is the only route to determine what this building could take on in terms of its structural Integrity. I think there’s other ways of looking at the structural component of the building in a more cost-efficient way. So, I think we should just keep our minds open to these other possibilities of the village as you discuss it amongst yourself.
I know the CPC is very interested in what your thought processes are and what questions you might have for them. So, the committee continues to stand by to be as helpful as it possibly can. Thank you.
Betty Cavacco:
Thank you, Bill.
Steve Lydon:
The dream goes on to be a nightmare. The dream went on that this was going to be a community center. This is going to be a community center. We’re going to have a gazebo. We’re going to have concerts. We’re going to have weddings. None of that happened. We had two non-profits that took over the building and got nowhere. The guy across the street put signs up that if you park there and you go to the Simes House, he’s going to tow you. So, they have no really parking. So, I don’t know where you’re going to get these venues to have shows and cocktail parties and all this other stuff. They were going to have the Charlie Tree. They moved the Charlie tree. It died. The next one they put in, it died. I would sell this building. Why are we keeping this building? I know it’s going to cost money because it’s got restrictions, but every year it’s going to cost money to keep this building, to maintain it and to mow the lawns, cut the grass, plow the driveways and for what? We’re never going to get our money back. It’s a white elephant. It’s time to let it go.
[2:35:02]
Steve Lydon:
I’m sorry, but the history was great but I’m interested in the future. I know, John, you say you don’t care about the taxes, I do. You just saw the taxes are going up. We need what we can get and this building is going to cost us money, not make money. So, I’m sorry, I think it’s gone as far as it can go. Nobody wants it. The library don’t want it. The Housing Authority doesn’t want it. You can’t get a non-profit that wants it. So, sell it. Thank you.
Anthony Senesi:
Madam Chair, Pat Adelmann has her hand raised as well.
Karen Buechs:
I get what John–
Pat Adelmann:
Hi. Oh, who’s that?
Karen Buechs:
Mrs. Buechs.
Betty Cavacco:
Oh, sorry. Mrs. Buechs first and then Pat.
Karen Buechs:
Okay. I get what John is trying to say if they put the money into it and all of that. I get that. But I want to say as a member of two non-profits that were in there, it was a total failure and we tried very hard. Put our own thousands of dollars into it. John Moody put over 12,000. My husband and I must have put in two or three. Our time, our effort was for Manomet. We believed in it, we still do. But if you think I’m here to tell you the truth that you’re going to put a non-profit unless it has a lot of money, a lot of service, it’s not going to work. If you can get somebody in there that would reconstruct that kitchen, take some of the profit for that and share it with the town, tried that too.
I like the idea of the entertainment. I like Stephen Cole’s presentation. And by the way, the committee did do their best. They were sincere. Robert did a lot of hard work. I will give you that, Robert but I never heard from the library. Robert went. I don’t know what was said. Now, a lot was done outside of the committee. At times, I sat there sitting on my thumbs. Other times correcting minutes. We really didn’t do much, if you want the truth. When I would bring up things, it was put aside. Somebody else would try and bring it up, it was put aside. Now, I know he’s getting upset but that’s the way it was. I love you, Derek. You do a good job but this means a lot to a lot of people. A lot of people in all of Plymouth. And I’m telling you, if you get the wrong people in there, they’re going to be back. So, I don’t want it to fail.
Betty Cavacco:
Actually, I mean, I disagree. I think there was a lot of back and forth. I mean, we have a letter. The board has a letter from the Board of Trustees from the library and I don’t have the appetite to force an organization like that in there. Right, and I don’t. And it would cost probably hundreds of thousands of dollars to get them in there, hundreds of thousands of dollars. And I don’t think–and you’re going to sell a building for–what was the estimate? 850,000 when we spent 3.8 million. Oh, it’s not even going to come close to what we would just have to do for–I mean, why don’t we just give it a try? I mean, why can’t we find a non-profit or I don’t even care if it’s a non-profit, some business that wants to go in there and they’re going to sign a lease and they’re going to have to abide by the legal obligations of that lease. And if they don’t, we say goodbye. I mean, we have the legal rights to do that. I mean, we know if it’s going to fail, I mean, we can make them report to us every three months.
[2:40:02]
Karen Buechs:
That’s a good idea but Randy met with the veterans. They came and he brought up the house. They’re interested in going in there. I think that should be solicited.
Betty Cavacco:
Well, they can come to the board if they want to go in there. They can be just like anybody else that we’re going to vet to go in there, correct?
Karen Buechs:
But I don’t even blame a person like Stephen who says sell it. I don’t want to sell it, but I don’t blame the people who say that because they just see a big pit.
Betty Cavacco:
Karen, you know me by now, I never wanted it in the first place and I was absolutely insane when they took the commercial kitchen out of there. So, like I said, but it’s ours. We spent a lot of money on it. The residents spent a lot of money on it and I think that we just move forward. I have every faith in Derek and Brad to vet what we need to go in there. Me, I don’t care if it’s a non-profit. I don’t care if it’s Mickey Mouse as long as they pay the rent. I do want revenue. I’m not looking at unicorns and rainbows that just keep the place going. If we can get revenue, we should get revenue.
Charlie Bletzer:
I have a question first. This is either for Robert or for Derek. Can you guesstimate what the triple net would be for that building? I mean, it’s not exact but if you can roughly–
Derek Brindisi:
We have to look at the assessed value. I know we just talked about that. So, it’d be the assessed value, the lease payment.
Robert Zupperoli:
You need the assessed value, the lease payment and the utilities.
Charlie Bletzer:
Any idea what that would come to? What’s the triple net? What do you think the triple net of that building is?
Bill Keohan:
What you’re really starting to talk about are the details of a lease agreement that you would have with an individual.
Charlie Bletzer:
I’m just trying to figure out what the cost would be for that building for a non-profit.
Bill Keohan:
It would be limited to what you’re going to get per square footage per floor, which partially we might bring in. It’s a very limited amount of money you’re going to be able to negotiate to perform over a period of time for the square footage you have. So, I think that where you’re getting into triple nets, you’re getting into a design of a lease that really is outside of this discussion for this point. I think we all know that if you’re going to lease it it’s going to be on a case-by-case basis. It’s really going to be really based on what you put out to bid in terms of an RFP. So, I think you need to focus, if you are going that route, focus on the design of your RFP and make that part of the negotiation with the recipient who might be awarded the lease.
Betty Cavacco:
Mr. Quintal?
Dick Quintal:
Derek, what’s the board think about maybe putting it out for RFP. Let’s see what comes back and then we can have a conversation rather than trying to drive up this might happen, that might happen. We might be until I don’t know quite a while.
Robert Zupperoli:
Christmas is coming.
Dick Quintal:
Yeah. Well, I was going to say Christmas but it’s holiday.
Derek Brindisi:
If I could. I mean, that’s the bottom line. We can spend the next two weeks debating of how much revenue we’re going to bring in but the market’s going to drive the lease payment, right? There’s been some small market analysis of what commercial and space is in the Manomet area. I can tell you though we’ve talked to non-profits who expressed a heavy interest in leasing that. Some of these non-profits we’ve talked to are already leasing space here in Plymouth. The problem is they’re outgrowing the space and they’re looking for bigger space. So, I don’t think we should shy away from non-profits because there’s been two field nonprofits. Remember, those were startup non-profits. They didn’t have any revenue. They didn’t have a mission. They didn’t know if they were coming or if they were going but with these organizations, we’re talking to today, they’ve been in place for decades. They have a mission. They have a revenue source and how they generate funds. So, they have financials that can pay the lease payments that the chairman talked about. So, I think that’s the pursuit. I think as Mr. Quintal pointed out, we put out a notice and we see if we get any interested buyers.
[2:45:04]
Betty Cavacco:
I agree. Mr. Helm?
Harry Helm:
I’d just like to clarify, interested renters.
Derek Brindisi:
Renters, sorry.
Harry Helm:
It’s been a long evening.
Betty Cavacco:
And we have–
Harry Helm:
And then Pat.
Betty Cavacco:
Yes. That’s what I was going to say.
Harry Helm:
I just want to make a point because it seems like we’re moving towards a vote. So, I just want clarification from the Town Manager. This RFP would not require any more taxpayer dollars to be spent on this building and it would give us revenue, it would pay a certain amount of taxes, it would pay the utilities for the building? Would it pay upkeep for the building?
Derek Brindisi:
A typical lease agreement, the landlord is responsible for the maintenance of the building. And right now, we are responsible for the maintenance of building. We have two tenants on the third floor, as you know. I do think that there’s going to be some upfront costs. Right now, we have one floor, maybe two floors where we have damaged walls from a lot of damage that has to be repaired. We asked the facilities director to walk through there with the DPW director. They made a small analysis of the deficiencies. We’d have to assign a cost to that but I can say most potential tenants are going to want this to be in optimal condition before they move into the building.
Harry Helm:
So, was an examination of the deficiencies of the building, which I believe I suggested a long time ago ever done?
Derek Brindisi:
So, we submitted a request for quotes to do two things: to analyze the structural Integrity of the building for the purposes of a library and then number two, to do a conditions assessment of the inside of the building. So, everything you just described. And that quote came in. One engineering firm came back and they quoted to do those two analyses at $48,000.
Harry Helm:
What about to do the one since we wouldn’t be looking at structural for a library? Somebody to estimate the fact that I can tell you when they redid this house, the windows were not reglazed.
Derek Brindisi:
That’s right.
Harry Helm:
Okay. There were no weather stripping put in the doors. Well, I was in there at Christmas time and the lack of glazing on the windows, you could actually see the curtains moving. Okay. So, all of that sort of thing: the walls and all that sort of stuff. I know there is a $115,000 set aside for painting the building. Could that be used for that? My concern is that as we go down this road, if we look at an RFP situation and my overall concern is the taxpayers of Plymouth have already put a considerable amount of money into this building. And I think most of them would have difficulty wrapping their brains around putting hundreds and hundreds of thousand dollars more into it unless we explore an income producing solution. Maybe it’s what Mr. Cole suggested, a consortium of entertainment concepts. I mean, my concern is–I got what you said about there’s going to need some costs in fixing some things that weren’t done. Okay? I mean, but we don’t know how much that’s going to cost us.
Derek Brindisi:
That’s right. Not yet. So, the facilities director and the DPW director went through the building last week. Again, they identified what they would find as weaknesses or deficiencies. The next step that they suggested is that they could bring in contractors to look at those and come up with some cost estimate, some ballpark cost estimates before we go to hiring an engineering firm to do that.
Harry Helm:
Okay. Thank you.
Betty Cavacco:
Ms. Adelmann and then Mrs. Baker.
Pat Adelmann:
Thank you for allowing my questions. I was wondering if the tenants in the affordable housing would be displaced when we find a non-profit or whoever you seek to lease the building?
Robert Zupperoli:
Actually, that was one of our concerns and that whatever we do going forward, we would do everything possible to make sure that the two tenants on the third floor in the affordable housing units were to stay.
[2:50:02]
Derek Brindisi:
And they have lease agreements that carry them through December of 2023 anyways.
Pat Adelmann:
Thank you.
Betty Cavacco:
Mrs. Baker?
Alice Baker:
Can you hear me, Betty?
Betty Cavacco:
Yes.
Alice Baker:
Okay. Thank you for allowing me to speak. First of all, I want to thank Bob who’s done a terrific job in the presentation and working with the other members. Fair market value, we all know that we’re not going to get $3.8 million on this property. To sell it, I agree with the others not to sell it. That something needs to be done with this property. I love the Simes House. We did come up with the plan on the non-profit which I don’t think we should eliminate at this point. And again, I think we should move forward in going back to some more meetings and address some of the concerns that we’ve heard tonight, put them on the table, let’s talk about them and see our goals. We had concerns from the Select Board members. We’ve had concerns from the public. So, I think we should move forward and consider some of those recommendations and move from there. And I know that just the meeting before the other night, Derek did bring up because I know I did the minutes on it that he did bring it up in addressing that we should maybe look in to make a necessary repairs that will bring back to the standard conditions which Harry was just speaking about also. And again, I guess Derek reached out to DPW and a few others on that. So, we haven’t heard back. So, that’s something else we should look into finding out what the results is on that. But again, I think we should probably go back to the table and discuss some of these issues that were brought up here before this election tonight. And I thank you for allowing me to speak and to keep the Simes House and do something that’s right for the Town of Plymouth, in Manomet and Simes House alone. Thank you so much.
Betty Cavacco:
Thank you. I don’t believe we need to go back to the table. I think the town manager has the direction of what the committee said, what the concerns are. And I believe as Mr. Quintal pointed out, putting out an RFP with all those concerns that we just discussed and you know how to do it so I think that’s the best. And I’ll make a motion to direct the Town Manager to put on an RFP.
Dick Quintal:
Second.
Betty Cavacco:
Discussion? All those in favor? Oh, go ahead.
Dick Quintal:
I just want to say, and when he comes back with his recommendations, if I don’t feel at that time that it’s worth carrying on then I as a member will vote to cut it loose. If that means resale. I’m just saying, if it’s not palatable to me as an individual then I will vote to relieve it. I’m not saying it’s going to, but I’m just saying if the proposals come back and they’re really not too strong if you will or if it just doesn’t make sense to keep doing it, I’m not going to do it. We need to move on. What is that building costing us right now a year or a month? Did anybody know? I mean, on the maintenance that we are doing or somebody–
Betty Cavacco:
We aren’t doing any.
Dick Quintal:
Well, somebody has to pay electric and stuff.
Derek Brindisi:
It’s utilities and it’s going to cost us to handle the–well, it’s already costing us to do all the outside maintenance. So, grass cutting during the summer months and clean up in the fall months and then we’ll be handling all the plowing of the driveways and cleaning up the sidewalks. So, it’s going to be a cost.
Dick Quintal:
I just have a question for Derek. Derek, you got like a timeframe roughly? Not that I’m writing it down.
Derek Brindisi:
To put this out to bid?
Dick Quintal:
Yeah. What do you think?
Derek Brindisi:
I mean, honestly, I think that we could probably get it out to bid by the end of January, put it out to bid for 30 days. So, maybe come back to the board in March sometime.
Betty Cavacco:
Okay.
Karen Buechs:
Can I just ask? When you do get the RFPs, can you notify us as it goes along?
Betty Cavacco:
Sure. Absolutely. Okay. All those in favor? Unanimous. All right. Now, we have the American Rescue Plan Act Request. Are we tabling Brewster Gardens?
[2:55:01]
Derek Brindisi:
We’re going to table Brewster Gardens for this evening. So, the request is $400,000 for Allerton Street Park.
Betty Cavacco:
Right.
Derek Brindisi:
So, we wanted to show off the Board. We wanted a formal presentation on this. But as you know, Mr. Faiella is our Parks Director and he’s here to answer any questions.
Nick Faiella:
Thank you. Good evening. Thank you for your time. So, I’m just going to read this memo while you can scan through that, if you’d like. The DPW respectfully requests that the Select Board consider the approval of 400,000 in ARPA Funds which would facilitate immediate improvements to the Allerton Street Park. These improvements would include a new playground area, ADA accessible pathways to the playground, replace the existing fence with wooden guardrail and loaming and seeding the entire park turf area. The playground area would also include an ADA accessible port in place rubber surfacing with ADA accessible equipment and pathways. The playground area will be relocated to the northeast side of the park. The wooden guard rail will serve as a safety barrier preventing vehicles from accessing the park as well as providing an overall aesthetic value to the park itself.
Betty Cavacco:
Mr. Mahoney?
John Mahoney:
So, Nick, the $400,000 ARPA money, is that from the county?
Derek Brindisi:
No, it’s our local money. That’s our allocation.
John Mahoney:
Okay. All right. And the second question and I don’t know if my colleague Harry wants to weigh in in this. Significant issues over there with respect to it being referred to as a de facto dog park. So, the proposal is to do a complete revamp $400,000 investment, how does that affect–there’s a committee that Mr. Helm is on and moving forward with this issue and what’s that going to look like coming out the other side especially–are you looking for construction in ’23?
Nick Faiella:
It would be immediate. So, we’ll start very soon.
John Mahoney:
So, once the finished product is here, how is that going to affect us coming out the other side on that dog issue?
Derek Brindisi:
I’ll take that. So, do you want to take that Mr. Helm?
Harry Helm:
I’ll listen to what you have to say and I may have to add some things.
Derek Brindisi:
Sure. So, if the board were to approve this this evening, we would direct the Parks Department to begin the media construction. So, the first order of business would be to remove the fencing and then to remove the playground equipment and then after that, it’ll start the reconstruction process of the park. Once complete, there will be no fencing in the park. There’ll be the wooden–what do you call those?
Nick Faiella:
Wooden guardrails.
Derek Brindisi:
The wooden guardrails to protect the park from vehicles from driving into it, but there would be no fencing that would contain animals in the park any longer.
John Mahoney:
Does that neighborhood, those streets around that area, do they know that this is coming? Is this still on the horizon for them? They’re conscious of what’s going on here or is this something that’s just–is it permeated with that group of people?
Derek Brindisi:
We haven’t held any public hearings relative to the reconstruction of the park, if that’s what you’re asking me.
John Mahoney:
Okay. So, if you go into construction, you’re going to remove the chain link around that park.
Derek Brindisi:
Immediately.
John Mahoney:
During construction, is there going to be any form of barricades around the area preventing the public from going in or–
Nick Faiella:
So, the guardrail would be planned to go in immediately after or during the fence removal. The contractor said it could happen within the next couple weeks.
John Mahoney:
Okay. Thank you.
Harry Helm:
May I add some things dog park wise? First of all, the Allerton Park is not a dog park. It has never been a dog park. Plymouth does not have dog parks. The people who are using it as a dog park are breaking the law. They are breaking leash laws. If they continue to use it after this park is put in without using their leashes, they will be continuing to break the leash laws.
[3:00:09]
Harry Helm:
We have progressed far enough, the Dog Park Task Force Committee and have subdivided into working groups to move towards a report and a recommendation to this body, to the board. But we’ve done enough research that we are keenly aware that there is no study, no recommendation. There is no one out there in the world who has worked on dog parks that recommends in any way, shape or form that something like the Allerton Street Park be utilized as a dog park. There are constant recommendations in fact to the opposite that these should not and must not be located in densely populated areas for the same reasons that we’re finding from the residents of the Allerton area. There is disruption by them. And you’ll notice, for instance, Kingston where they’ve located theirs. It’s by their landfill. Okay? It’s nowhere near houses. So, the concept which was briefly discussed out of the Allerton Park when immediately off the table as even a concept as a future location for actual real dog park. So, that’s where we are. That’s how Allerton Street fits into it. And that’s basically the bottom line as it relates to dog parks.
Charlie Bletzer:
Hey, Nick, I suggest we should probably get a sign there explaining what’s happening and effective immediately or effective this is not a dog park, dog are not allowed, something like that. As Harry said it’s not a dog park. And I’ve driven by it a thousand times but there’s not enough area there to put a fenced area for dogs, right? That wouldn’t work. And actually, they shouldn’t be where the kids are anyway. But I think we need some signage explaining it and hopefully, we can get a dog park soon somewhere. In the meantime, they can find somewhere else to bring their dogs. But there’s a lot of people that have dogs so there’s people who are going to be upset but this looks like a beautiful park and the people in that area, they deserve this. So, they really do because that looks like hell right now. Anyway, thanks.
Derek Brindisi:
To your point, Mr. Bletzer, we talked about having a large sign printed so that folks can see coming in 2023 the image of the renovations there.
Betty Cavacco:
Okay.
Female:
I think you’ve seen me before. Anyways, I just want to say thank you for the consideration and for moving forward to this. I think as a long-term resident of Plymouth, we’re very grateful and thank you for making this happen. And it is, I agree. It’s going to be beautiful when it’s done and the kids in the town deserve it.
Charlie Bletzer:
And thank you for your patience too.
Female:
No, thank you for doing. Appreciate it.
Betty Cavacco:
Everett?
Everett Malaguti:
Everett Malaguti, Precinct 2. I just have a couple questions. So, the first one is since this is the first time I’ve actually heard about the reconstruction for this, I’m wondering not just a sign saying “Coming Attraction ’23” but I’m wondering if like we had for other concept designs for things that the public can also see the design on the town website as well too. The second question is, and this was actually brought up during the whole dog park issue, and it was brought up by Ms. Ashley Shaw. Since this is one of roughly I think two maybe three playgrounds in total in town that are fenced in for children that have behavioral tendencies that especially I believe her child has that they need more enclosed spaces for that and if we’re just putting a simple barrier that doesn’t really retain children within the playground area that there’s a fear that they could run off into traffic and all that. And we’re losing an area that we already have that’s fenced in, it’s limiting the ability for residents to use the park for their children since they’re trying to be all-encompassing for ADA compliance and all that.
[3:05:17]
Everett Malaguti:
If we’re not fencing in that I think we’re taking part of the ADA off the table for that, which I think still needs to be an issue for that. Thank you.
Nick Faiella:
Yes. So, this quote actually includes black vinyl fencing to enclose the port in place ADA accessible park completely.
Harry Helm:
So, in other words, the playground will be fenced in separately so that children with what’s called elopement issues will be protected. Okay. Your first question if you don’t mind me answering, yes, the designs actually I believe it was discussed that they may be part of that sign that’s put up, but also, we discussed having this stuff on the town website. The materials, the design, all that stuff. So, yes, to your first question.
Betty Cavacco:
All right. Do we have a motion to approve?
Dick Quintal:
Motion to approve.
Charlie Bletzer:
Second.
Betty Cavacco:
Motioned by Mr. Quintal, second by Mr. Bletzer. All those in favor? Name roll call. Mr. Bletzer?
Charlie Bletzer:
Yes.
Betty Cavacco:
Mr. Helm?
Harry Helm:
Yes.
Dick Quintal:
Yes.
John Mahoney:
Yes.
Betty Cavacco:
Mr. Mahoney? And myself, yes. And that’s unanimous.
Nick Faiella:
Thank you.
Betty Cavacco:
Thank you. The next is the 2022 Renewal Certification for ABCC as presented in the agenda packet. And that’s all the liquor licenses in town.
Dick Quintal:
Move them as presented.
Harry Helm:
Second.
Betty Cavacco:
Motion by Mr. Quintal, second by Mr. Helm. Discussion? All those in favor?
Charlie Bletzer:
Charlie Bletzer, yes.
Harry Helm:
Yes.
Dick Quintal:
Yes.
John Mahoney:
Yes.
Betty Cavacco:
Unanimous. Select Board Article Request for 2023 Annual Town Meeting Warrant. Do any of the board members have any requests? Mr. Mahoney?
John Mahoney:
This is for April town meeting Derek, correct?
Derek Brindisi:
April annual town meaning, correct.
John Mahoney:
Correct. So, we talked about the inability, the long-term plan. We hear that all the time with respect to infrastructure, water, finances, etc. You can see what’s going on here. On the school side, I’m hoping Madam Chair that we–I don’t know if it’s going to happen both before we turn into the new year but there’s a joint meeting coming up. There’s going to be redistricting in probably five years and I know that they have currently a consultant working on multiple options to present to the school side for a potential new school coming up. I think we have an opportunity with the fund that was created I think at town meeting in 2014 where we sponsored a home rule petition to segregate out the meals tax that we passed and put it in its own separate interest-bearing account to pay for the bond on this building. I think that if we tweak some of the language five to ten years down the road, if and when we get to the point where we go out and borrow for a potential new elementary school, if handled correctly, that meals tax will position the community not to pick up the cost of a new elementary school but might be help pay or not have all of it go on the backs of the property taxes that the residents, commercial, industrial pay in this community. And specifically, what am I referring to? I’m referring to that the tax doesn’t go away, but in that legislation, there was a sunset clause and what it says is this tax doesn’t stop in July 1st of 2040. The tax then because it’s no longer earmarked for anywhere, it goes into the general fund. And if we eliminate that and tweak it and we can keep our hands off the money for five to eight years, it will build up and position the community to like I said not raise property taxes on the entire thing for the school side. So, that’s what I would suggest.
[3:10:03]
Derek Brindisi:
So, are you recommending to remove the sunset clause from the legislation?
John Mahoney:
Correct, but because as it stands right now, if you don’t do that when you get to that fiscal year which I believe would be ’41, July 1st of 40 would be FY ’41, that money ends up into the black hole.
Derek Brindisi:
Right. You’re saying in ’41, the meals tax dollars will go into the general fund.
John Mahoney:
Correct. So, Ms. Barrett had put together a scenario a town meeting eight years ago where because of that variable, the account was going to build up a surplus that was sufficient enough to pay the last seven years of the mortgage on this building, the FY 41-47, leaving that and then that money would fall into the general fund and we all know what happens with that. What I’m saying is you don’t have to have all that money built up if the sunset clause is eliminated and we keep it staying into its own interest-bearing account and we don’t allow it to go into the general fund. I would also suggest that we allow two years of mortgage payments of this building to build up into that account because you saw what happened during the pandemic, we had to backfill one year with I believe free cash of money from a stabilization fund. So, we’ve got to be able to leave the money alone, but I think if handled correctly. and you can see that something’s going to happen on the school side. You have eight elementary schools between the age of 45 and 112. I know Mr. Campbell has been on the record recently of talking about they had a report that says our facilities are outdated and God bless, Chris but I think it’s obvious to everyone that you’re not competing with China when you have elementary school students in a building in North Plymouth getting educated in a stairwell, in a building that’s 112 years old.
Dick Quintal:
With all due respect I think you should hold them comments because I was at that meeting and vocal for that school and that’s a very elementary school that I went to and the people in that community that attend that school don’t want to hear that right now. So, if you’re speaking for you, that’s good but don’t speak for precinct one.
Betty Cavacco:
Well, if we want to talk about facilities, let’s do that. We talk about all the needs that the school has, the school has this, the school has that. Well, we continue to operate as two separate entities. That’s a problem. There is no reason and I have asked every year for the five years I have been on this board for consolidation. We get the stair. Derek has brought it up. I mean, honestly, if we’re going to work together as a team to do what’s best for the Town of Plymouth residents, we need to consolidate two departments. And one is facilities because we do facilities really bad and the other is benefits. And I guess, they don’t have a great track record with benefits. But I’m telling you right now I am not meeting by having a joint meeting even though we are supposed to for lip service again for five years. I’m all done with that. Do what you say you want to do and let’s get it done. There is no reason why we shouldn’t be consolidating because you know what? Folks are going to realize this budget’s tight. And if they don’t start doing what we should be doing together and doing really what’s best for the community, we’re going to have layoffs. So, I’m just tired of talking about what we should do, what we shouldn’t do and oh, yeah, let’s meet. Dick and I were the liaisons to the Consolidation Committee, never had one meeting. So, I mean, it’s ridiculous. You know what? We are held accountable every single day and that needs to go across the board. Let’s do the right thing for our community and stop talking about ways to cut, cut, cut when cuts the low-hanging fruit, they are not willing to do. So, yes, Mr. Helm?
[3:15:02]
Harry Helm:
Thank you, Madam Chair. John, a question for you, what year as you’ve been thinking about this, when were you thinking of doing this change where we would lower the amount headed to the account for this building?
John Mahoney:
You’re not going to lower any amount heading to the account.
Harry Helm:
Okay. So, you’re just talking about adding for 2041 the language that wouldn’t go back into the general fund?
John Mahoney:
Correct. So, the meals tax I think is rebounded strongly post pandemic. I think we’re now up to $2 to 2.1 million dollars. We’re on pace for a little over 2 million, Lynne. Okay? So, the mortgage on this building is 1.79 a year. So, we only have a $200,000 differential. So, what I’m saying is Lynne had put numbers together for town meeting that was going to have a 15 to 20 million-dollar amount in that account on July 1st of 40 that was going to be sufficient to pay the last seven years of the mortgage and then have four to seven million dollars left over. And then the tax doesn’t stop, it just ends up going into the black hole. What I’m suggesting is if we start long-term planning here and you can seem it doesn’t matter if it’s Elementary School AB or C, there are going to be multiple new schools and some of them are going to need to be modernized and they’re working I believe with AI3, which was the consultant on I know at least the South High School project that’s going to come in and give them multiple options. I’m just saying if we plan accordingly now when you arrive at that point in the future like we do in the private sector, there will be money in play and it won’t just be raising 100 million dollars in property taxes on everyone in the community.
Harry Helm:
Mr. Mahoney, I totally agree with you. In fact, when I was running over a year and a half ago, I proposed this to work proactively now so that wherever we’re ready, the money doesn’t just start going into the general fund. Okay? But I have to tell you, you and I are going to disagree about where it needs to go. And I believe that it needs to go into facilities maintenance. I don’t think it should go to new schools. We’ve never seen a report from the school district about why we need new schools. We’ve never seen an accurate actual discussion of why we maintain as many schools as we do when we’ve seen over a decade of declining enrollment. And I understand why our school spending continues to go up and that is largely because of unfunded state mandates, but they’ve never really addressed to the FinCom in my time and my year and a half on the board what they’re planning to do about the fact that they have declining enrollment yet they want to keep all these schools open. And yet, they also now want to replace some of them. So, I mean, for me, I understand and agree with what you’re saying as a concept but we’re going to be at odds on where we believe that money should go. And I can tell you, if you’re going to do a home rule petition, number one it needs, as you know, it’s a warrant article because it has to go through town meeting, they have to agree. You have to be very specific.
John Mahoney:
Correct. Yes. So, right now, I wouldn’t advocate for the money to go anywhere because you want it to continue to grow where you have some sort of annual buffer. That buffer right now is insufficient and it won’t be sufficient for multiple more years whether it goes to building maintenance, a new school or a new library or–
Harry Helm:
No, I understand but if you’re proposing a warrant article for a home rule petition, that home rule petition must say in let’s say just 2041 or whether it’s 2040, whatever that date is, whatever’s determined when the original allocation to pay for the Town Hall, for lack of a better word, sunsets okay even though it’s not a technically sunset but let’s just use that, that sunsets and it starts going into the general fund. If you have a warrant article now and you’re working towards that, you have to be specific about when it sunsets what our town meeting members are proposing having it what it will go to.
[3:20:14]
Harry Helm:
But what I’m hearing from you is that it’s going to go to the school department.
John Mahoney:
No, I wouldn’t say that. I think we have time to figure out exactly what we wanted to say. And I don’t think what I’m suggesting we go with a home rule petition. I want to amend the home rule petition that we got passed in 2014. I don’t know how much longer I have here. All I can tell you is I’m not going to stand by and do nothing and allow that money to go back into the black hole.
Harry Helm:
And I will be standing right alongside of you and I bet everybody on this board will be standing right alongside.
John Mahoney:
Right. So, we can always have those philosophical discussions over where we want it to end up, but it can’t end up there.
Harry Helm:
I know but I just think in terms of since we’re talking about a warrant article and revising a home rule petition, which is at the state level and our state delegation has to take it forward that we have at some point in the very near future, relatively near future we’re going to have to be specific.
John Mahoney:
Absolutely. Completely agree.
Betty Cavacco:
Okay. Anyone else because I know how you have something.
John Mahoney:
All right. I’m sorry. Madam Chair, so, are we going to have a joint meeting with the School Committee by the end of January? So, you haven’t locked anything in yet.
Betty Cavacco:
No.
John Mahoney:
Okay.
Betty Cavacco:
I think the School Committee needs to prove that they’re willing to do something instead of lip service because you know what? I don’t have the time to listen to it. Let’s do it. You want to do it. I’m all there. I’m all for you. You just want to talk about it some more, I’m good. I can talk to a million people out here every day. So, I want a commitment that they’re actually going to do what they say and not talk about it again because like I said, January, it’ll be six years. Mr. Helm?
Harry Helm:
A question, did we ever receive a response to our proposal for consolidation of the concept? They said they were going to go away I think this was last year on and off site, did they ever come back from the off-site and tell us?
Betty Cavacco:
No. It’s a long trip, I guess.
Harry Helm:
Okay. So, there was never the promised response. Okay. Just wanted to confirm that.
Betty Cavacco:
Correct. Right. So, anything else?
Dick Quintal:
Do we have to vote on the 100,000 for Brewster?
Betty Cavacco:
No. We pulled it, yeah. So, one of the things that I have unless any of the other board members have anything else because I’m going to go in. So, one of the things that I’ve always talked about and I know Derek’s already tired of listening to me and he’s young seven or eight months that he’s been here. Building moratorium. Before we couldn’t do any kind of building moratorium because of whatever reason that they came up with. Now, it’s Public Safety. We have issues with water. And I think now is the time to have town meeting decide is if we’re going to move forward with this. One of the things John talks about water, water, water. Well, guess what? Wells, wells, wells, cost millions, millions and millions. And I’m not going to sit here and approve millions and millions and millions for wells when we continue to allow people, large developments to build. I mean, the walk is a disgrace that those people should have put in a well. And now, we’re going to suffer for it. So, I want to find some way, somehow to be able to put in some kind of building moratorium as a warrant article for town meeting. And hopefully, have town meeting support it because um I don’t think the residents know that a well is seven to ten million dollars. And when we keep allowing all this building and water needs and we’re in trouble with water right now and we need to do something to fix it. So, I guess, it’s the DPW director should probably consider it a gift that he wasn’t here tonight because I have a lot of things to say about it. But that’s what I want to do.
[3:25:00]
Dick Quintal:
Madam Chair?
Betty Cavacco:
Yes.
Dick Quintal:
If I could, before we do action on that, could we hear from the building inspector because I know that I’m sure and I can’t remember it, that’s why I need to be briefed on it, there’s going to be percussion to that. They’re going to come out of the woodwork. There’s a lot of grandfathering. So, it might not be the right–well, I’m not saying that. I don’t mind listening but I think we need to get some more information.
Harry Helm:
Well, we need to have somebody to talk with the people in Planning Department because we can put a moratorium on it and I’m concerned that it’s going to drive everybody to 40b because our moratorium is like just in the 40b.
Betty Cavacco:
Yes, but a 40b is not allowable from my understanding if it’s a public safety issue and it’s the water. So, I think those are some of the things that you have to find.
Harry Helm:
You have to prove that it’s a water issue and that’s not going to help any of the development in the area that you really want to prevent development in the south, in Cedarville and South and Southwestern, the Wareham area because we don’t have a well problem down there yet. And if you encourage developers to go 40b and take their 40b’s into the South of Plymouth, I mean, we already have a school problem with our busing expenses. I’m not saying that I disagree with this, but I’m agreeing with Dick that we need to hear from people on this.
Betty Cavacco:
And I agree as well.
Charlie Bletzer:
Madam Chairman, I can just tell you we’ve already talked to–Lee Hartman’s talked about it and that’s why you have to talk to Lee, talk to the Building Department and they’ll tell you what’s going to happen. If that word gets out there’s going to be a moratorium, they’re going to inundate the Building Department with permits and it’s going to backfire on you. The real answer is I mean, we’ve got to fix the water problem. That’s the real answer is not a building moratorium but let’s fix this water problem and we’re working on a plan and I’m hoping we’re going to get there very soon.
Betty Cavacco:
I think the moratorium will go hand-in-hand with fixing the water problem.
Charlie Bletzer:
I’ll just leave it to the experts to explain it to you. And I’m just telling you, Lee Hartman, we’ve had this discussion. He’s told me what happens in the building moratorium.
Betty Cavacco:
I know what happens. They’re all going to come in here and they’re all going to look for permits and then it’s going to be up to–
Charlie Bletzer:
Okay. It’s going to backfire us.
Betty Cavacco:
–Planning and Zoning to whether they’re going to approve the permits or not. So, when Planning and Zoning say there’s not enough water, guess what? Their permits don’t get approved. So, I think that like Mr. Quintal said, we get people in here to answer our questions and I would still like to leave an article open for the potential of a building moratorium, if possible.
Charlie Bletzer:
In certain areas of town, if somebody wanted to get a permit right now, they probably wouldn’t get it if there’s a water issue. But again, I’m going to say it one more time, let’s fix the water problem. We have to fix it.
Betty Cavacco:
Well, when you have like $50 million, the water problem will be fixed.
Charlie Bletzer:
Well, no, it’s not going to be 50 million, it’s going to be less than that.
Betty Cavacco:
You get three wells.
Charlie Bletzer:
Well, we have to start somewhere. We have a problem in West Plymouth.
Betty Cavacco:
Three wells is $36, $40 million.
Charlie Bletzer:
We have to start there. Okay. So, anyway, that’s all I’m going to say because it’s getting late but listen to the experts.
John Mahoney:
I’ve heard Mr. Hartman weigh in on this before, it was years ago, about what the ramifications are and what happens but I agree with the Chair and Mr. Quintal, it’s a topic that we need to revisit and we need to have clearly delineated the pros and the cons. And I’m sure if you put a moratorium on building and you have no new growth coming in for two years, that’s going to affect your unused levy capacity and there are financial implications and 40b implications in plain but we need to have a discussion at least.
Betty Cavacco:
Absolutely. Anything else? All right. Town Manager’s report. You got 20 seconds.
Derek Brindisi:
20 seconds, okay. We’ll make it quick. So, we’ll start with some good news since it’s been a long night. You may have heard or may not have heard but the South Meadow Road building went out to bid per your instructions back in June to the credit of Mr. Brothers and our procurement office. And it came back with the winning bid at $1.2 million. So, still a little bit work has to get done. We haven’t finalized approaches and sale and a closing date on this but that’s what we’re pursuing right now. So, again, much credit to the board for making that decision back in June.
[3:30:13]
Derek Brindisi:
Moving forward, just a couple. You’ll see on Water Street we have a number of projects that are assigned to take place. We have the flood wall project that is happening right now. So, if you go down there, you see there’s been some trees that have been taken down and they’ll build that flood wall around the pump station and then in the next few weeks. In addition to that, you’ll see starting the end of this week, early next week the Water Street Interceptor Project. So, that’ll take place from South Park Ave all the way to the state pier. Again, that’s a sewer replacement project as well. You’ve heard a lot about this, Stephens Field project. We’re meeting with the Stephens Field Committee on Thursday. There’s been a few minor revisions to the plan itself. We’ve had internal meetings with parks, recreation, public works and others to look at what they came up with and we had to make some revisions. So, we’re going to go back on Thursday to meet with that committee to present our revisions. Hopefully, they support those revisions.
As you remember at the fall town meeting, town meeting approved the statute to allow us to reduce speed limits from 30 miles per hour in a thickly settled zone down to 25 miles per hour. Our DPW is working with OCPC right now to identify what streets would be impacted. Once we identified what streets those are, we’ll be coming back to the board for a final approval.
SeeClickFix is going to be our 311 system. So, Anthony, Brad, our I.T Director, they’ve been working with this vendor to roll this out. We hope, we’re aiming for a rollout sometime in February. So, we originally projected April, things are going well so we’ll try to maintain a February start date on our 311 system. Anthony, whenever you are ready you just let me know.
So, I have some bad news. I’ve talked a lot about graffiti. I feel like I spend every other meeting talking about graffiti especially our downtown area. You know in a lot of our buildings and vehicles have been tagged over the summer months. So, this is as you can see the Burial Hill path side of the John Carver Inn. It’s been cleaned up. So, we asked the Planning Department specifically Tom Moore to see what he can do about cleaning up the graffiti on the back side. You can keep advancing the slides. This is the building to the left is on School Street as well. Again, all the graffiti has been cleaned up. Keep going.
So, now the bad news comes. Is that the last slide? Okay. So, I received this notice from Tom Moore one afternoon. I read his email that evening. I was excited to report to you how all this graffiti has been cleaned up. That night, I was informed by the police chief that those buildings had already been tagged. And it wasn’t just somebody writing the name. I mean, massive tagging. The good news is three arrests were made. So, we think that although we’ve consumed some resources here, it was an attraction for them to re-tag this building. So, those three folks have been apprehended and we plan on part of the restitution having them pay for the buildings to be cleaned up again.
And then one thing you may have noticed in today’s discussions, this wall over here was starting to use as a projector not just for presentations but so that you can get a better visual on who’s attending these meetings via Zoom. So, we’re in the process of building out our conference room so that they have better Zoom capability and virtual capability.
As far as our migrant update, there are about 110 people that are in one of our hotels. 33 of those 110 people are school age and 25 and non-school age. So, there’s your migrant update. And then the last thing I just wanted to bring up. You probably have seen on the news that there was a vehicle that went over Warren Bridge and into Eel River. It received a lot of media attention this morning. The good news is there were only minor injuries and no death. So, the Fire Department did a great job in responding to that call and rescuing the two individuals and then extracting the vehicle from the water. Pending any questions that’s all I have for this evening.
Betty Cavacco:
Any questions for the Town Manager? Okay. The next is Select Board Open Discussion – New Business/ Letters/ Old business. Mr. Mahoney?
[3:35:10]
John Mahoney:
So, the NDCAP Committee which I chair is the 21-member state decommissioning committee advisory to the governor for Pilgrim Station. So, the significant takeaway from the last meeting and by the way, everybody was pretty well behaved if in case you didn’t watch, but having said that, within the next 60 days, I think before the end of January, a team of three or four people from the state including Jack Priest from the Department of Public Health will go down to the station. They’re going to sample water from three different areas at various levels in the containers where the water currently sits and that water is going to be tested. So–
Betty Cavacco:
The town will be joining them as well.
John Mahoney:
Are you suggesting that or you know that?
Derek Brindisi:
We requested that on multiple fronts. We’ve asked for support from the state delegation, our federal delegation and most recently when we had a site visit, we asked Holtec if we could send a representative to be a part of the observation process of the sampling of that water. At no point has Holtec committed to allowing us to do that.
Betty Cavacco:
Yeah. They said, absolutely for the town.
John Mahoney:
Yeah, and I had made a suggestion that somebody from the federal delegation also gets in on that but they’ve got to line up the date and the time and I’m sure–so, you want somebody from the town to get in on that site visit?
Derek Brindisi:
Yeah. Specifically, I asked if David Gould could be present for that purpose, yeah.
John Mahoney:
Yeah. So, I’ll follow up on that. So, having said that, it’s going to be sent out to a couple of testing sites and I do know that the federal delegation is also working with Holtec to getting their own sample and sending that out to an independent lab but the potential exists that before the next meeting in late January, that testing is done and that might be made public in late January at that meeting. So, just a heads up. And I’m sorry, and then a few minutes ago, I forwarded an email with a letter from the Environmental Protection Agency to Mr. Brindisi to share with the board. So, there’s some good stuff in the letter.
Dick Quintal:
That was Dr. Singh.
John Mahoney:
He doesn’t miss anything, but I haven’t met him yet.
Betty Cavacco:
You’re not missing anything. I have just unless anybody else has anything else. I had I received a phone call yesterday. Today’s Tuesday. Yeah, Monday. And there’s a group that’s called Citizens for a Better Plymouth and they meet every Sunday night, I think John you’ve been there a couple times.
John Mahoney:
No, before September I was–
Betty Cavacco:
Since you get the votes?
John Mahoney:
No. I was advocating for a change in the county commissioners.
Betty Cavacco:
So, I did receive a phone call and someone asked me, I guessed the chairman of the Charter Commission, Mr. Abbott made the claim that if the charter as presented doesn’t pass that the Board of Selectmen will go to the state house and change the charter themselves. So, I just want everybody to know that that cannot happen, would never happen, will not happen. The only people that are going to be changing the charter is the voter. So, the Selectmen have no jurisdiction over the charter. We wouldn’t even attempt to do that, but I find it troublesome that people can just make things up to push an agenda. And I guess that’s all I’ll say. I’ve been on a roll tonight so I’m going to be quiet now. Mr. Quintal?
Dick Quintal:
I just want to reach out and compliment Anthony for the forms that the applicants for the committees fill out and put down. I think very nice, very organized and a great job.
Anthony Senesi:
Thank you. More to come.
Betty Cavacco:
We have License and Administrative Notes. And if no one has an issue with anyone, I’d like to see both moved as a group.
Charlie Bletzer:
One question, Madam Chairman. I see Renewal Certificate for ABCC and they were disapproved for the Moonrise Audio Visual, Moonrise Cinemas and the Gyro LLC. Is there a reason why that was disapproved?
[3:40:28]
Betty Cavacco:
Do we know why that was disapproved?
Anthony Senesi:
Sorry, can you repeat that?
Betty Cavacco:
The Moonrise Cinemas and the Gyro–
Charlie Bletzer:
Because I don’t remember them. Did they came before us and then it went to ABCC and they disapproved it? Because that’s usually how it works.
Anthony Senesi:
I would have to check with Lisa Johnson in our office but I believe those two places decided not to.
Dick Quintal:
Exactly. I was just going to say that.
Anthony Senesi:
I think the language is a little bit off on that.
Charlie Bletzer:
That makes sense. Anthony, if it’s something different, you can let me know.
Dick Quintal:
Yeah. You have to notify him. You have to actually vote on it and then re-apply or–
Charlie Bletzer:
That’s what I figured. So, okay. Thank you.
Betty Cavacco:
Do I have a motion?
Dick Quintal:
Motion.
Charlie Bletzer:
Second.
Betty Cavacco:
Motion from Mr. Quintal, second from Mr. Bletzer. Discussion? All those in favor? Okay.
Dick Quintal:
Motion to adjourn.
John Mahoney:
Second.
Betty Cavacco:
That comes quick, huh. Motion to adjourn and we’ll see everybody next week. Thank you.