Monterey Select Board
Minutes of the meeting of 10/27/14
Meeting Opened at: 9am
Select Board Members Present: Wayne Burkhart, Chairperson, Scott Jenssen and Kenn Basler
Also in attendance for parts of the meeting: David Irland for the Monterey News, Bettina Schwartz, Anthony Corsi of National Grid, Mike Mielke Sr, Mike Mielke Jr, Shawn Tryon, Raymond Tryon, Robert and Muriel Lazzarini, Mark Cappadonna of Colonial Power, Michal Vatis, Martin Mraz, Monica Webb, Carol Ingher and Karen Allen
At 9am the Board held a joint pole hearing for poles proposed on Cronk Rd. This hearing proposes new poles to come down Cronk Rd instead of the previously submitted request to come down Chestnut Hill. This new proposal would cost the homeowner less than the originally submitted plan due to requiring less poles. Anthony Corsi of the Engineering Dept of National Grid gave an overview. The homeowner, Martin Mraz stated that he has spoken to someone at National Grid (Sheryl) that has stated it would be ok to have the poles come from Western Mass Utilities from Otis down Sandisfield Rd; costing him less than both the National Grid options. Anthony Corsi stated that his supervisors informed him that this would not be allowed. Michael Vatis a resident on Cronk Rd is opposed to the poles coming
down Cronk Rd and listed several environmental and aesthetic consequences he felt would occur if this option were to be approved. The Board feels that the Sandisfield Rd option is the best and is discouraged with the policy of National Grid to charge the homeowner for the poles to run a necessary utility to a new homeowner’s property. The homeowner has already spoken to National Grid and they will not decrease the cost of the poles. The Board requested that if this hearing is to be continued that National Grid should have another representative present that can better answer the questions the Board has. It was decided to postpone the hearing until more information can be provided and until WMECO responds on whether they will bring in power from Otis.
The board met with Mark Cappadona of Colonial Power to discuss the following:
The Board is interested in joining the electrical aggregation to help lower the rates for Monterey residents as 10 surrounding towns have already done.
Municipal aggregation takes the buying power of everyone in the area for residential power; the service is an opt-out service. First there will have to be a town vote to enter into the aggregation and then the Select Board will vote on the contract. This would bring a choice for power to the resident and really only affects the electron running through the wire and cost of it; there are no changes to the bill or who fixes your meter, etc.
If a residential home is net metered with solar they will pay the lower rates that the town contracts into but when they are over-producing energy they will get the National Grid rate.
If town meeting approved this in January or February, a plan from Colonial would immediately follow which would then need to be approved by the DPU; potentially being finalized by next fall/winter.
As an aside Mark stated that with regards to the pole hearing held prior he works with several towns and several power companies and it is not unheard of to have two different power companies supplying power for one town.
Miscellaneous Select Board Items Reviewed:
1. Mike Mielke Sr and Mike Mielke Jr came in to speak to the Board about the article in the Berkshire Record with regards to the Treasurer, payroll and her performance. Mike Sr took exception with the article in the Berkshire Record and felt that this opened up defamation of character, character assassination and he would like to diffuse this situation now before it gets any worse. Kenn explained that right now the Dept of Revenue (according to meetings and articles he’s attended and read) is pushing towns to make elected Treasurers appointed as the other 80% of Massachusetts has done as this position requires a special expertise/knowledge that not everyone possesses and presents additional problems when the Treasurer is not available during business hours. Kenn feels that a change of this
nature would make things run more efficiently; especially here in Monterey. Kenn stated that the article that appeared in the Record was taken from the Select Board minutes online and that the reporter never attended a Select Board meeting nor did they contact any member of the Board for comments. The article was written completely out of context. Kenn does have a meeting set up with the editor there regarding the inappropriateness of the article. Kenn argued that he felt that part of the issue here is that the performance of employees has to be discussed during an open meeting and appears in the minutes and possibly in local newspapers. Mike Sr requested that the Board publically apologize to Bethany and requests a retraction of the article. The Board took that under advisement. In response to the part of the article that spoke to changing elected to appointed Wayne feels that more deliberation is necessary. Mike Jr is concerned
about the level of support she receives from her coworkers and the Board.
2. The issues with the Treasurer stem from her being unavailable during business hours. Outside instituions such as the bank and Berkshire County Retirement have had to reach out to the Tax Collector, Administrative Assistant and Select Board due to unanswered emails and voicemails left for the Treasurer prompting the Select Board to get invloved.
3. Muriel Lazzarini reported to the Board that she has heard that the Town Clerk has submitted her resignation effective January 1st; the Board was unaware of any resignation but had heard that she may not run again. The Board would feel disappointed if the Clerk were to resign or not run again but that is out of their control. Kenn left to inquire about the rumor with the Town Clerk and Emily confirmed that she is not resigning January 1st and will be fulfilling her term [which expires May of 2016]. Scott stated that it was unfair of Bob and Muriel to attack the Board for not addressing rumors especially when they aren’t even aware of them. Muriel suggested that some restructuring of the town offices is necessary in order to keep the Town Clerk in her position as
it was implied that the Town Clerk does not like the Administrative Assistant and refuses to work with her. Ray suggested that the Board may be passing off too many of their duties to the Administrative Assistant to handle for them. Scott agreed to meet during the week to discuss these issues with Muriel and Ray to discuss the ideas they might have with regards to restructuring town hall.
4. The Board made a motion to appoint Donald Torrico as the part time representative to an 8 month term on the Employee Compensation Advisory Committee. The motion was seconded and approved unanimously.
5. Anthony Corsi of National returned and stated that he has measured the last pole from Sandisfield to the Mraz’s house and it would be 1700 feet, longer than the other two proposals. He just wanted the Board to be aware and would not be putting anymore time into the matter until we hear back from WMECO. The Board explained that right now the Board feels that the WMECO proposal talked about today is the favored proposal with the 1st Sandisfield proposal being next and Cronk being last.
6. Carol Ingher came in to state that she is in favor of the Board pursuing joining an aggregation to help lower the electric rates for the residents.
7. Monica Webb of WiredWest came in to provide the Board with information about this Wednesday’s regional meeting with MBI. Monica provided the Board with the WiredWest Regional Fiber Network Financing Process for Towns (attached). This proposal would require a 2/3 town meeting vote authorizing the town to issue a general obligation bond under MGL Chapter 44:8(8) to fund capex for its Municipal Lighting Plant’s share of the project. This money can be raised by an MLP for telecom outside of regular town levy limits, up to 5% of the total town assessed value. Costs will vary based on the wired mileage and number of premises. Monterey’s cost at 60% would be approximately $1.98million.
8. Mail was reviewed which included:
a. Email from Bethany Mielke, Treasurer (attached) with regards to the article in last week’s Berkshire Record.
b. The Board reviewed a letter from EDM Architecture Engineering and Management with regards to their proposal to provide a visual structural investigation of the existing Monterey School Building. The Board is going to wait to act on this until after the upcoming school committee meeting where the discussion regarding New Marlborough and Sheffield’s requests to close the Monterey school has been decided to go forward or not.
c. MASS Interchange Fall 2014 Volume 28 Number 3
d. A letter from the Committee for safer roads and bridges requesting that the Board of Selectmen move to endorse a NO vote on statewide ballot Question 1. The Board did not take action on this.
e. Agreement/Notice to Proceed from MASSDOT with regards to the roadway reconstruction and related work on RT 23 from the town line of Gt. Barrington to the town line of Otis.
9. The Board discussed the recent appointment/hiring of Beth Parks to clean up/organize the swap shack and what the required hours for the position will be. It was agreed to pay the position minimum wage up to a total of $1,000 for a period of 5 months at 2-3 hours per week.
10. M. Noe asked to speak with the Board about the implications made earlier in the meeting that she has done or is doing something to the Town Clerk that would not allow her to perform her duties and make it difficult to work in the town hall. The Town Clerk was not prepared to meet to today and agreed to meet at another date. It was agreed to have Wayne try to speak with Emily one on one before the next meeting encouraging her to work this out at the next meeting.
11. It was requested to appoint Maryellen Brown and Kay Purcell to the Council on aging as they have shown interest in being on that committee. The Board felt it would be appropriate to speak with the existing COA members to see if they had any issues with this prior to making the appointments. Currently Linda Hebert is on the COA and Mike Johnson has been reappointed but has not accepted or refused his appointment yet and has been unresponsive to most requests made to him regarding this. Mike will be asked to attend next Monday’s meeting to discuss. It was also noted that the State had called M. Noe requesting a response regarding the COA paperwork that was due. M. Noe completed and submitted the paperwork with the help of someone at the State and Wayne Burkhart.
12. The Board discussed the possibility of a working meeting that would still be open to the public to sit in on however would allow the Board to only work on administrative items for that hour and then address the public, employees and any other items that arise. It was agreed that the morning meetings will now begin at 8:30am and from 8:30 – 9:30am it will be a working meeting and from 9:30am on the Board will address everything else. This will start with the 11/3 meeting. This will also require M. Noe to come in a half hour earlier on Mondays which she will either add to her comp time balance or leave a half hour early on another day.
13. The Board asked M. Noe to create a draft FY16 budget with all of the capital items we are anticipating as well as other items that have come up to see where we currently stand.
14. Administrative Assistant’s weekly report was reviewed.
15. Police Chief’s weekly report was reviewed.
A motion was made and unanimously approved to adjourn the meeting at: 12:30pm
Submitted by:
Melissa Noe, Administrative Assistant
Approved by:
Monterey Select Board
Select Board Members
Minutes Book
Town Clerk
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