Chilmark Board of Selectmen Minutes August 3, 2004
Present: Frank M. Fenner, Jr., J. B. Riggs Parker, Tim Carroll, David Norton, Melanie Becker, Lenny Jason Jr., Dennis Jason, Chris Flanders, Jonathan ?, Brian Cioffi, Max McCreery, Molly Flender, Mark Lovewell, Lorraine Doyle, Jane Greene, Mr. & Mrs. Wayne Kurth, Jeff Day, Simon & Robin Bollin, Steve Gallas, Mr. & Mrs. Jeremy Mayhew.
Meeting called to order at 7:33 PM in the Selectmen’s Meeting Room at the Town Hall.
Minutes of July 6th , 16th and 20th, 2004 approved as amended.
TriTown Ambulance
Mrs. Mary Murphy Boyd came before the Selectmen as their representative on the TriTown Ambulance Committee. She requested the Selectmen vote to obtain a waiver from the Office of Emergency Medical Services allowing the island to run Advanced Life Support (ALS) with one Paramedic on duty instead of two. She explained that this is the same waiver many communities have during startup of ALS service and that all the island towns were being asked to seek the waiver for the new island-wide ALS system.
Mr. Fenner asked if this would increase the town’s liability. Mrs. Boyd said that it decreases the town’s liability by getting advanced emergency medical care to patients pre-hospital.
Mr. Parker moved and Mr. Fenner seconded a motion to seek the waiver pending review of the liability. SO VOTED: Two Ayes.
Middle Line Road
Mrs. Flender asked the Selectmen to withdraw the warrant article request she had made on behalf of the Housing Committee. She said that she was doing this to have more time to work on a plan. She told the Selectmen that she will need $20,000 to do the pre-development planning. She said there would be a joint meeting on August 25th for people to get together and work on the plan as a group.
Mr. Parker asked who are we serving; what is our market group for this project? He asked if they were Chilmark people and what were our goals that we are attempting to achieve? He asked if they were Seniors, 80% of Median Income or 100% of Median Income? Mr. Parker spoke of an article in the MV Times and asked if the Housing Committee learned anything applicable to our project from the Pennywise Path project in Edgartown. Mr. Parker asked how Middle Line Road fits into a town capital plan. Mr. Parker asked if using the Community Preservation Funds to pay for the Middle Line Road preplanning would restrict the future use of the property. He asked if the Housing Committee had received a written opinion on this.
Mrs. Flender said that she had a verbal opinion from the Department of Revenue that it was ok to use the Community Preservation funds for planning purposes in a mixed income project and that the law itself says that the money can be used “in support of housing”. She said that five other Massachusetts towns have already used their CPA funds for planning. She said at a worst case, the town would have to pro-rate the CPA funds over the whole project.
Mr. Parker said he hoped that was correct, but that he preferred to not use the CPA funds without a written opinion from the commonwealth. He suggested a new warrant article at the September Special Town Meeting to fund the planning from another source unless the commonwealth approved use of the CPA funds. Mrs. Flender said that the town needed to pay a pending bill from Vineyard Land Surveying for the work done to date and that her committee has been working on this project for four years and needed funding to complete it. Mr. Parker moved and Mr. Fenner seconded a motion to place an article on the next Special Town Meeting warrant for up to $45,000 to pay for preplanning and pre-development costs from free cash unless the town has a written opinion from
the commonwealth allowing the use of the CPA funds without restricting the entire project. SO VOTED: Two Ayes.
Resident Home Sites
Ten candidates for the Resident Homesite Program came before the Selectmen. Jeff Day read a letter from them to the Selectmen. He said it was signed by twelve people and that they were here tonight with him. Asking for home ownership instead of rental units at Middle Line Road. Mr. Fenner said the Selectmen would take their request under advisement. He said that when the real options are known, there might be dramatic changes due to perc tests and such.
Mr. Day said that some of the concern is that homesites have been left out of the discussion and only rentals are being talked about at the Middle Line Road. He said that Chilmark’s current housing needs are this group of twelve people and that they want home ownership and not rentals. He said that no rental feasability study has been made.
Mr. Parker said that information is needed, particularly on rental needs. Mrs. Flender said it is very difficult to get those rental folks to respond. Mr. Fenner and Mr. Parker said that a survey should be sent to all residents, not just heads-of-household. Ms. Doyle said that in the last survey there was a 4:1 desire to have home ownership instead of rentals. Ms. Greene said that everyone on the homesite list are in need of affordable rentals. Mr. Day disputed this. He said that the majority of his ad hoc group was in favor of homesites over rentals and that they did not want affordable rental units. He said that affordable rental units do no always lead to home ownership and in some cases, depending on the rules, could hinder
movement to home ownership. Mrs. Flender reminded the group that the special town meeting had voted for six home ownership units as well as rentals.
Resignation
Lorraine Doyle, the Administrative Assistant to Housing, Community Preservation Committee, Site Review Committee and the Zoning Board of Appeals, resigned her 30 hour a week position effective Monday August 9th 2004. Mr. Carroll asked for permission to hire a temporary Administrative Assistant for the thirty days allowed under the bylaw, with a possibility of extending it another thirty days to allow the committees and Mr. Carroll to discuss how the job might benefit from restructuring with each other and the Personnel Board. Mr. Parker moved and Mr. Fenner seconded a motion to authorize the Executive Secretary to hire a temporary employee as described above. SO VOTED: Two Ayes.
Equitable Group
Chris Flanders and Mark from the Equitable came before the Selectmen to present their 457(b) deferred compensation program for employees. This program is in competition with the ING product offered through the state treasurer. Equitable is owned by AXA Financial. Mr. Flanders said that there would be two licensed advisors available to all plan participants. Mr. Fenner asked if the Personnel Board had any questions for Mr. Flanders. Ms. Greene said no. Mr. Parker asked about the initial investor interview that analyzes the staffs’ financial picture and makes personalized recommendations in a bound report. Ms. Greene asked if the Selectmen would like the Personnel Board to look into this. Mr. Fenner and Mr. Parker said yes.
Personnel Board
Mr. McCreery and Ms. Greene presented the Personnel Board’s two special town meeting warrant article requests. The first was to create the position of Personnel Officer and place it on grade 11. The second was to amend the Personnel Bylaw to provide for the Personnel Officer to replace functions performed by the Selectmen, Executive Secretary and department heads. Mr. McCreery said that this was not designed to usurp the Selectmen but to put in place two levels of review before involving the Selectmen and to take on a staff function for the Selectmen. They said they were meeting in two days to discuss the bylaw more.
Ms. Greene said that if the Personnel Officer was not approved that she would withdraw the bylaw amendment. Mr. Parker said that it was important to start explaining this to people in town hall and that their support for a Personnel Officer was important. Mr. Fenner suggested a staff meeting. Ms. Greene said a public hearing was needed. She said that one department head was pleased with the new position.
Mrs. Becker said that the position should be reviewed to see how it works in other towns and how it relates to the statutory duties of the Treasurer and Town Accountant. She offered to work with the Personnel Board on this review. Mr. McCreery said that the Personnel Board would sit with each group, like the Treasurer and Accountant, to resolve issues. Mrs. Becker suggested that Town Counsel be consulted regarding state statutes and the Treasurer.
Special Town Meeting
The Selectmen moved approval of the September 27th 2004 Special Town Meeting Warrant to the August 17th meeting. Mr. Parker said he would like a draft capital plan. Mr. Carroll said he would try and gather the supervising department heads for a meeting to work on a draft capital plan.
The board discussed articles from the Community Preservation Committee, Cemetery Commission, Police Department, Fire Department, Harbor Master and the need to get a price for repairing or replacing the floating dock. The Harbor Master said he would get a price.
Harbor
Mr. Parker said that the dock behind the transient yacht dock was overwhelmed by dinghies and the “Under 18 feet and under 18 years of age” section was being abused. Mr. Fenner suggested colored tags for dinghies using the town moorings. Mr. Jason spoke about the Mooring Assignment Committee issuing an additional decal for dinghies to boats with mooring permits in the pond. Mr. Carroll suggested observing what dinghies on the transient dock that didn’t move over the course of three days and then dealing with them.
Special Election
Mr. Carroll told the board that in order to have an override vote to fund the Personnel Officer and the bonding for the School Repairs that a special election was needed. The state was allowing the towns to put questions on the November state ballot if they were submitted by 5pm tomorrow. The board discussed when to call a special election. Since it required hand delivery to Boston by 5 PM the next day, the board postponed any decision about when to have the special election.
Landfill Capping
The board discussed Change Order # 2 in the amount of $13,661.35 for costs related to the discovery of additional municipal solid waste outside the engineer’s drawn area. Mr. Parker moved and Mr. Fenner seconded a motion to authorize the Vice Chairman to sign in the absence of the Chairman. SO VOTED: Two Ayes.
Emergency Management
The board received a memorandum from Daniel Bryant requesting the appointment of William “Bill” Smith as the Deputy Director of Emergency Management. Mr. Parker moved and Mr. Fenner seconded a motion to appoint William Smith Deputy Director of Emergency Management. SO VOTED: Two Ayes.
Beach
Lifeguard McCoy was returned to duty after satisfying the board’s requirements. Parking Attendant was indefinitely suspended on the request of Beach Superintendent Mastromonaco for failing to report for work. Moved by Mr. Fenner and seconded by Mr. Parker. SO VOTED: Two Ayes.
Police
Chief Rich reported the resignation of Traffic Officer R. Samuel Carroll.
Town Clerk
Mr. Parker moved and Mr. Fenner seconded a motion to sign the job description submitted by the Personnel Board. SO VOTED: Two Ayes.
Conservation Commission
The Selectmen agreed to advertise to replace Helen Parker.
School
Mr. Carroll updated the Selectmen on the resignations of the two Up Island School Principals. It was agreed that the Selectmen would ask to be involved in the process seeking a interim and permanent solution.
Suburban Coalition
The Selectmen decided to not be members of the coalition.
Special Town Meeting
Mr. Parker asked that the Event Bylaw be placed on the Special Town Meeting warrant.
Mr. Parker moved and Mr. Fenner seconded a motion to go into Executive Session for the purposes of discussing pending litigation, land acquisition and the approval of minutes and to not return to regular session at 10:21 PM. SO VOTED: Fenner AYE, Parker AYE.
Meeting adjourned at 10:45 PM
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