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HomeMy WebLinkAbout1981-02-09 Board of Selectmen MinutesThe Board of Selectmen held their regular meeting on this date with all members present; Selectmen T homes J. McEvoy, Charles A. Salisbury, Ralph R. Joyce, R. Louis DiFruscto with Chairman John W. Graham presiding. The warren! was approved as submitted. CONSERVATION COMMISSION: Meeting with the Conservation Commission was cancelled at the request of the Chairman~as both he and the Vice-Chairman were unable to attend. SALE OF OLD AMBULANCE: Letter received from the Fire Chief looking for some direction in selltn~ the used Class ~ ambulance. Stmce February 11, 1980, the Board of Fire Engineers have advertised for the bid and only received 2 bids both of which were too low. They have just recently received a bid of $2,002 from Bernie Judge, 59 WaverlylRoad. The Chief feels that we will not get a better offer. A motion was made to except the bid if we can, if Town Counsel says the bid is still legal, and if not, put it up for bid once again and ask for the highest bid. Selectman Salisbury suggested that since it was a member of the Department that was making the bid, that regardless of the legality of selling it at this price, to protect the Town's interest, we ought to go out for bidding indicate that we are not interested in anything less than $2,000. Motion was made and unanimously approved that we go out for bid and except no bid l~ss than $2,000. AMBULANCE SERVICE: A discussion was held with the F ire Chief on the ambulance service now being provided by North Andover. Letter was received by an outside Ambulance Servi, indicating that some communities may be switching to their service. Some questions the Fire Chief bas on an outside service is..Where, would located? What is their response time? Are they familiar with the Town Streets? The Chief indicated that he fee~s that North Andover can provide the s~ice.better than an outside agency and probably at a lower cost because of the fo~lowing reasons: The Fire Department uses on-duty firefighters.~17 are Registered EMT's and 15 are assigned to the ambulance as well as being first- line firefighters. They are re-certified every two years. When there is an accident in Town the Fire Dept. now responds with:. 1) The nearest Engin~ Co. 2).. The pick-up truck with the Hurst Tool (Jaws of Life). 3) The ambulance. I~'~h~iambulance is out ona call and a second call is received, the nearest Engi~elCo. is dispatched and a mutual aid ambulance is called to respond to the sc~ne. We bare mutual aid agreements with Lawrence, Metbuen, Andover and Middlet0'n. ~To sumlit up, the Fire Chief feels that an outside service can ~do it as effectively and efficiently as the N.A. Fire Dept. now does. IDFAiFINANCING REQUEST-MICROMATICS: George Schruender stated that his Board unanimously approved the request since i~as already approved when the same company was going in on Osgood Street across, from Western Electric. They ran into some problems with the contractor and theyare changing their spot to the Willows Industrial Park. It's the sameamount of financing, the same bondage, even though they are paying more for~the'land. It was unanimously approved by the Selectmen that the request be granted. LASVEGAS NIGHT-AMERICAN CANCER SOCIETY: Letter received-requesting a Las Vegas night to take place some time in May for'the'benefit of the American Cancer Society. The request was unanimously approved bY the Boa:d. PARKINGONMAY STREET: Letter received from Police Chief requestin "No Parking" on both sides of May Street,· from the intersection of Belmont and May Streets, 198 ft. on Mey St. abutting the new elderly project on Belmont St. so as not to restrict emergen- cy fire'or Police apparatus. It was unanimously approved by the Board. ~5~ FEBRUARY 9, 19.81 (continued) _ MERRIMACK COLLEGE-SECURITY POLICE: Letter received from the Police Chief advising the Selectmen that Merrimack Co,IeEe'has 11 Special Police Officers with the same rights of arrest as our Police Dept. Branted to them under G.L. Ch. 1~7 Sec. 10G, only for incidents occurinE on campus. They will be required to testfy in Court. They. have been approved by the Commissioner of Public Safety, Frank Trabucco, and the approval has been validated by notarization process. They'will not carry ~uns, but will be equipped with clubs and handcuffs. Chief Donnelly feels that the implementation will be very beneficial to the Town. Board unan- imously voted to accept the letter for the file. .,, TOWN REPORT BIDS: Three bids were received for the printing of the Town Report. It wasunan- imously voted to go with.the low bidder, Graphics Concepts & Design, INC.. Woburn, Mass. for $2,586. and to also concur with the Administrator's recommendation to save money by eliminating the color cover. COUNCIL ON AGING-RESiGNATION: Letter or resignation from Edward Billa from the Council On Aging was ex- cepted with regret. Letter of thanks and appreciation for his services. will be sent. · INSURANCE FLEET POLIC~.CHANGES: Dick Lafond recommended dropping the fire and theft coverage on some lower- valued vehicles, ones under $1,000 of value since wet have a $300 deductible it is not really worth insuring those vehicles. He also recommended in-' creasing the deductible from $300 to $1,000 on all other vehicles ekcept the private passenger vehicles. The' motion was approved to accept Mr. Lafond's recommendation. SHEEP SHEARING DAY: Request received to close off Mass. Ave., between Osgood Street and Apademy Road o~S~nday, .May 17, between 1 and 5 p.m. for the Textile Museum'.s 10th Annual Sheep Shearing Day. Unanimously approved to ~ant the request subject to Police and Fire Chief's approval. coMMUNITY CENTE~TRUSTEES:' '- A meeting was held to discuss what should be done with the Community. Center now that we have received a $200,000 grant from HUD for a Senior Center at the Community Center and to come up with an Article in regards to this. Gayton Osgood discussed four ways to. handle this and the pro's and con's of the following: 1) The Town could acquire the property by purchase or gift and take title to all or part 'of the property. 2) The Town can lease the property from the Community Center. 3) The Town can§ire the Community CenterBoard the $200,000 in C.D. Funds to build a Senior Center. &)' Handle it the same way we handle a Housing Rehhilitation Grant and Just go in ~nd rehabilitate the property as a Senior"Center. HUD says that any of the above-mentioned is O.K. Selectman DiFruscio suggested we make it a a Community and Senior Center. Mal Norwood,. President of the Community ,Center stated that the Board of Directors feel that the best avenue is to go with the long-term lease. But noted that the last paragraph of the lease they now have will'b~ve to be changed. The lease now states that the Town takes care of regular maintenance of the property and that they take care of any major problems. He stated that they do not have the money to continue with this in the new lease. He stated that if the Town leases if for 50 years they will have to take responsibility for both buildings. The Trustees. , would like to stay on as advisors and would like to see it continued to be rented to the Family Kindergarden. The Board preferred not going into buying the property and going into the landlord business but rather to ~: lease the property. Selectman Joyce would like more precise knowledge, of just where the $200,000 will be going before making a final decision. Ga}'ton Osgood noted that since we will not be receiving any money until August, we have not been able to hire an architect to draw up plans. It was mentioned that maybe the lease already held, which ends in 1990, can be extended and possibly modified to meet HUD's expectations and that maybe it does not have to be done at this Town Meeting. Selectman Salisbury made a motion to take it under advisement and investigate what we have to 9ut into the Town Meeting Warrant to extend our current lease stating that we obviously have to discuss this some more. The B card voted unanimously to approve the motion. FEBRUARY 9, 1981 (continued) S aPmER' S FO D ROAD LA DF LL': 2 $ The Selectmen asked Bud Cyr, Highway Surveyor, to come in and answer questions from a petition give to the Selectmen at last week's meeting when 20 questioned the activities at the Sharpener's Pond R cad Landfill charging Cyr with giving away Town property. The following are the questions raised and Mr. Cyr's reponses: l) ~_ment and men total dollars to truck the wood? Mr. C..r s.~ .L_~ : .... cut and ~ ; : =~u uuau ~ onxy cost the Town the $350 for the chain saw plus the oil and fuel to operate it. The men were preparing the site for the landfill. The money was appropriated in the budget. 2) What has the Town received from Mr. Rea in return for this wood? A) T.~y_p.~_ of e ui ment and rate of a . On the day in question, Mr. Rea received 7 or 8 cords of wood for the use of his machine. The cost of a cord of wood in the woods is about $30. The wood was handled.and trucked out by Mr. Rea. Mr. Cyr figured that the above amount was what it cost Mr. Rea to operate his machinery at the site (8 hrs. of work at $28 per day - $224). Also several weeks before Mr. Ray made 6 or 700 yards of good fill available to him. All it cost the Town was to truck it. 3) Establish a rocedure for removal and comnensation to the Town for the matnin dry cord wood on site A~Droximatel 1-15 cords If the site goes as originally planned, the wood on the site will be used to construct a building to house machinery and toilet facilities for the men. Mr. Cyr did find someon to come in and take out some logs a. week ago. Cyr had a check for $581.43 fo: four loads and another check coming. He requested the Selectmen to put the money toward the Chapter 88 (Sharpner's Pond Fund) to be used for further development of the site. The only other wood taken out of there was a small amount put in the lot next to his house for a few of his men. He also has a list of 50 names of people ~ho have received wood. No one who has ever asked has been refused wood, The wood was in his way and he was glad to see it go so he could get in~:there and get his work done. &) Should not the Tree De)artme~ which is for the of work be re uired to handk this ro ect? Mr. Cyr indicated that the Tree Dept. has never offered any assistance. His department is qualified to do the Job. It was mentioned that he has more men to handle this type of project. 5) Materials and su lies stock iled on C r's ro err ad scent to his home ~latin a Zonin By-Law. Cyr /ndicated t~at it is more vonvenient for him to store things at his house where he lives xn a remote area that is close to the growing areas of the Tow~. As far as zoning, if the Selectmen want him to move it, he will. 6) The feasibili the site with "three feet of frost on the The site was absolutely free of frost. The frost is on the street but in the woods there are lots of trees and leaves, on the ground, there is no frost. Even if there was frost, the D9 bulldozer they were using would go through feet Of frost. 7) Mone enerated from sellin the wood should be turned over to the eneral Town fund.______.~. Mr. Cyr agreed wholeheartedly. John Lyons then suggested that we give Mr. Cyr a vote of confidence. Selectman Salisbury recommended that we do give Bud Cyr a vote of confidence and if some one has questions of these sorts in the future, they should meet and discuss it with :the other person involved and, if not resolved, then brin~ it to the Selectmen who will try to act on it before it turns into a public hearing. The Board voted unanimously to give a vote of confidence to Bud ~yr and request achange in procedure in the future for handling th~.s~nds ~-n~ocedures.. Karen A. Robertson, Acting Secretar7 *~lerk 254