Monterey Select Board
Minutes of the meeting of 10/18/10
Meeting Opened at: 7:00pm
Select Board Members Present: Jonathan Sylbert, Chairperson, Wayne Burkhart, and Scott Jenssen
Also in attendance for parts of the meeting: Sue Protheroe for the Monterey News and Barry Karson, Planning Board member
The board reviewed Director of Operations, Maynard Forbes’ weekly reports from the weeks ending 10/9 & 10/16 which included:
1. Maintaining Fairview Rd, Hupi Rd, Tyringham, Blue Hill, Mt Hunger, Chestnut Hill, Cronk and Corashire.
2. Repairing the leaf blower.
3. Fixing loose board on New Marlboro Rd Bridge.
4. Servicing the 2000 – 550 and the 2005 – 550.
5. Driveway permits.
The board reviewed Police Chief, Gareth Backhaus’ weekly reports for 10/4-10/16/10 which included:
1. Well being check on Pixley Rd.
2. Motor vehicle accident on Main Rd.
3. Suspicious activity reported at Main Rd & Pixley; investigated, nothing found.
4. Assisted Gould Farm with an out of control guest.
5. Assisted party with a lockout on Lime Rock Lane
6. Assisted Fire Dept. with an alarm call on Main Rd.
7. Assisted with a lockout on Main Rd.
Miscellaneous Select Board Items Reviewed:
1. The Board welcomed Wayne back.
2. The minutes from 10.4.10 were approved as written.
3. Warrants were signed. The Board had questions on the guardrail payments and the guardrail installed on Tryon’s property; M. Forbes will be asked about this.
4. Inter-Departmental Secretary’s weekly report for the last two weeks was reviewed.
5. The Board has determined that $3,000 was carried over from last year for the creation of a master plan and it has been decided that $2,000 of this money will be used to hire the consultant to review our bylaws as this does fall under a master plan for Monterey. The suggestion to borrow the money from the Tree Warden’s account which was discussed at the 10/4/10 meeting will not be necessary and has been taken off the table. Robert Lazzarini has been made aware of this and has started the process; he’s also going to ask about looking at the Town Bylaws in addition to the Town Zoning Bylaws.
6. Drawdown will begin today (10/18), it was postponed from 10/15 because of the rainstorms.
7. The Board discussed the purchase of MGL books for the town hall, M. Noe informed the Board that currently they are updated every year at a cost of about $2000-2200. The books aren’t used all that often and the same information is available online at mass.gov. The Board decided to discontinue purchasing the books and if information is needed the town hall or library can assist in obtaining the information online. A motion was made to stop purchasing the books, which was seconded and passed unanimously. The current supply of books will remain in the town hall for now.
8. M. Noe informed the Board of some programming changes that were made to update software at our web host. These changes have affected the way our site looks and we are working on resolving the issue. Virtual Town Hall (VTH) has suggested that we are due for other upgrades and those would cost $995. M. Noe was asking permission to spend up to $995 from the computer budget to make our site a little “prettier” and more user-friendly and to hopefully assist in some of the programming errors we are currently experiencing. The Board asked M. Noe to work with VTH first on fixing the errors caused by their upgrade and we’ll go from there.
9. Mail was reviewed which included:
a. The Southern Berkshire Regional Emergency Planning Committee received a Certificate of Achievement from the Commonwealth of Mass State Emergency Response Commission on their achievement of recertification for July 29, 2010 – October 1, 2013.
b. Complaint from Patricia Jennison regarding a recent incident involving disposing of flags. The Board will respond to Patricia letting her know the situation was dealt with as soon as the Board heard of the situation.
c. J. Sylbert will be attending a meeting on the 27th at the school.
d. A letter to William Dodge from Maynard regarding his open driveway permit and the possibility of revoking his permit because certain items have not been completed as proposed.
10. Barry Karson was present to update the Board on what’s been happening at the Planning Board meetings with regards to the cell tower presentations they’ve heard.
11. The Board reviewed the Winter Road Policy submitted by Maynard Forbes. The Board approved it as submitted pending something added with regards to the recent article in The Beacon concerning “reasonable care” standards. The Board also asked M. Noe to find out from Maynard if there is a spot outside of the fence at the Transfer Station or Highway Department to leave winter sand for residents to be available at all hours, not just when the transfer station is open. Once finalized a copy will be made available at the Town Hall and on the town website. Barry Karson asked about what can be done about the piles left at the end of driveways by the town plows; the Board agreed that the Town can not stop at every driveway and unfortunately this is the nature of the winter beast and the
town’s responsibility is to keep the town roads passable.
12. The Board briefly discussed creating a town noise ordinance, currently any noise disturbances prior to 6am or after 10pm go through the Police Department as a disturbing the peace complaint. The Board asked M. Noe to find samples of noise ordinances from other towns for the Board to review.
13. The Board also discussed the agenda item of updating the alarm bylaws and felt that Shawn Tryon, Fire Chief should also review the current bylaws in addition to the Police Chief to add any suggestions he might have.
A motion was made and unanimously approved to adjourn the meeting at: 8:05pm
Submitted by:
Melissa Noe, Inter-Departmental Secretary via audio recording
Approved by:
Monterey Select Board
Select Board Members
Minutes Book
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