Greenfield Open Space Committee
Minutes
February 21st, 2007
Attended: Karen Day, Carol Irvin, Laura Putnam, Janet Romanelli
Absent: Jim Chase
Special attendees: Neal Brown
1. Minutes from November 8th, 2006, January 10th, 2007 and January 31st, 2007 were approved with minor edits and will be sent to the town administrative assistant for posting on the Open Space website. The meeting on December 13th, 2006 was a combined meeting with the Con Com and minutes would be posted there.
2. Budget hearing on Feb. 8th- - tough questions were asked by Gene Mitchell, Kent Vincent and Peter Hopkins, but Karen (and Roger) said it came off well.
3. The mailing in support of the warrant article was discussed. Karen has dumped parts of the “justification” doc that was presented to the BOS and the “dollars and sense” doc that went into the Spirit into a .pdf and left space for beautiful Greenfield pictures that Ken Paulsen sent and Jaffrey “sprawl” pix that Laura will take tomorrow on North Rd. Laura will check OvernightPrints.com for a price for a quantity of 670; Karen will call Savron. Facts/text: GES is at 90/120, and it was agreed that a couple of good-sized duplex subdivisions would make that worrisome, along with
increased need for fire and police coverage and other costly community services. How would we get acres developed since the master plan update? - ask Emily Hague, Carol Hall. How would we get Open Space in Greenfield compared to other towns? Not sure, but an argument could be made that, since Hillsborough County is the fastest-growing county in the state, and all the abutting towns have active Open Space plans, we could be looked at by developers as the weak link, the next domino to fall. When asked, say, what do you want Greenfield to look like?
4. Old Bennington Rd. Project #1 - Ray Cilley will be contacting Janet Thursday with a quote for a Conservation Easement Appraisal; Con Com will vote next week on whether or not to proceed.
5. Forest Rd. Project #1 - Laura drafted a letter to the owner, since the listing has expired. It was reviewed, discussed and wordsmithed by the attendees. Janet will make the edits and send the letter.
6. Maps - the question was, how to overlay the tax maps onto the WAP maps, and possibly Emily Hague could help us. Janet has a question out to Lucie about it. In terms of maps to keep around, Janet will call Southwest Planning to get four copies of the Natural Resource and Conservation Lands map for members to carry, but will find out from Emily first if there is anything newer.
7. Report on the Public Meeting for the Comprehensive Conservation Plan for the Wapack National Wildlife Refuge - Janet attended: the heir was there and expansion of the Refuge was discussed, along with NRI, trail maintenance, the views, attracting more wildlife and policing the area.
8. Con Com: Programs for Earth Day to replace Tom Tyning were discussed. Neal, Laura and Karen will look into it. “The Bear”? Bird program by Francie Von Mertens?
9. Heritage Commission - on Janet’s agenda but didn’t make it to the discussion.
10. Criteria Evaluation form - it needs to be re-created and customized for our area. Folks to ask for input would include Meade Cadot, Emily Hague and Gordon Russell. Also Barry Wicklow, a bio professor from Francestown.
11. Website - take Lucie off, since she will attend when she can and has decided not to become a voting member.
12. Warrant article - Lee LeBlanc is very enthusiastic about it. Have five-signature papers ready in case a secret ballot is called for. We need people to raise hands and vote. Who will speak up? Would Ray Cilley be willing?
Submitted by Janet Romanelli
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