Members Present: Chairman Marshall L. Harris, Vice Chairman Stephen C. Lobik, Clerk Douglas R. North
Superintendent: Craig W. Jalbert
Secretary: Dale Barnes-Johnson
Open the Meeting: The meeting was called to order at 6:30 p.m.
Accept the Minutes: A motion was made by Doug and seconded by Marty to accept the Meeting Minutes from March 15, 2007. Motion passed unanimously.
OLD BUSINESS:
S.R.F. Project: Craig would like to schedule a public hearing prior to the town meeting; he plans to have an informative presentation followed by an open discussion session. Based on the input, this information will be compiled and added to the web site for those who could not make the public hearing. Craig suggested April 25, 2007 at the Selectmen’s Conference room and the Commission agreed.
Craig has been researching funding options to find out what the policy is for meeting the USDA loan requirement for their grant/loan program; if the project is 1.5 million, the 30% grant portion would be 500 thousand, however it is still unknown what the loan requirement would be to get the grant funds. The USDA application is very involved; however it may be worth while. Ideally, the $165 thousand needed to cover the SRF excluded engineering costs could be borrowed from USDA. USDA has no pre-payment penalty for paying prior to the 40 year term; between our Water Surplus and the Quaboag Heights entrance fees, this can realistically be done. All this depends on the loan amount required. Tata & Howard (T&H) can help with the extensive
application and the engineering requirements.
Mark Leuders of the Carl Leuders Company is scheduled to come out April 4th to demo a water tank telemetering system that uses CB radio frequencies vs. the telephone lines we use now ($106/month expense). The system also incorporates its own built in back up power. If the demo is successful we could abandon the phone lines and save that expense and receive better reliability. A complete transmitter-receiver pair quotes for $4000.00. Additional receivers would be extra.
Sewer Grinder / Monson Developmental Center (MDC) Agreement: Bid for the new grinder was advertised today. The agreement from MDC was received and forwarded to Town Council Ken Albano who suggested a slight modification. Pat Oney, representing MDC, then had one slight modification, which Ken approved, everything is all set.
Doug made a motion to accept the Monson Developmental Center – Town of Monson Sewage Agreement; Steve seconded motion, all in favor. Motion passed unanimously.
McCray Development: Craig sent a letter to the Planning Board alerting them of two issues to be addressed. Craig met at the site with the contractor Bradway Construction and the Developer, Charlie Richards; both agreed to address the sewer manhole deficiencies. Final as built drawing is progressing. The neighborhood is anxious to have the road accepted as the buses won’t go down, and the mail will not deliver. Craig is confident Mr. Richards will continue to be very cooperative.
NEW BUSINESS:
Articles for Town Meeting: Basically two Annual Articles need to be requested for the FY2008 Water and Sewer Enterprise Budgets. Three Special Articles are needed, one for the State Revolving Fund (SRF) Project, and two for the Ely Road Land acquisition, which Town Council, Ken Albano will be preparing language
NEXT MEETING: The next meeting has been set for Wednesday, April 11, 2007.
ADJOURN: At 7:15 p.m., a motion was made by Doug and seconded by Steve to adjourn from open session to go into executive session for the purpose of discussing Ely Road Land Appraisals and not to return to open session. Motion passed unanimously.
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Douglas R. North, Clerk
cc: Selectmen
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