[Speaker 3] (0:04 - 5:30)
OK, good morning, everyone. I'd like to welcome you to the EF Gilmore DAV's Candidates Forum. Before we begin, I'd like to recognize current select person David Grisham, who is here, if you'd like to stand.

Thank you. I'd like to welcome you. Once again, this is the third year we've done this.

And the reason we've done it is our veterans fill gaps. We saw an opportunity to open up a forum for veterans, so veterans could come in and talk to the candidates. But more importantly, since veterans are also residents of this town, there's about 500 veterans in this town.

And they have family members. And their concerns are not only veterans, but they care about the schools, the roads, the parks, and everything else, the police, the fire. You know, they care about everything.

You know, a lot of our freedoms come because of veterans. So I want to make sure that is discussed. The most important thing I want to mention today is that the DAV is a nonpartisan group.

We do not support or endorse or help any candidates. This is an educational forum only. It doesn't express any support or non-support for any candidate running for either local, state, or federal office.

We do not do that. Some veterans organizations do take stands, but we do not. The DAV, this DAV is probably one of the most active, I'm proud to say, one of the most active veterans service organizations in the North Shore.

The past month alone, we had a dinner at the Habitat Plus Home, Group Home in Lynn, which is a transitional home for homeless and substance abuse veterans. We also had a Vietnam veteran breakfast here this past month. We also recently were awarded a grant from the Better Beach Association of Massachusetts.

We're going to once again have a veterans beach party. Hopefully we'll have better weather this year than last year. Last year we had to postpone it like three times, but hopefully that will be without further ado.

The DAV members, after this forum, we'll have a quick meeting. There doesn't seem to be a lot of DAV members. A couple of them are in Salem.

There's, I guess, a National Guard parade in Salem today, but we'll have a brief meeting after. At this time I'd like to introduce the candidates. The order is going to be we flip the coin and Danielle is going to speak first and then Katie will speak second, and we'll reverse the order for the closing remarks.

The forum is going to have an opening statement. Then we'll take questions from the audience. Try to keep your questions short and brief, and if you could address both candidates, that would be perfect.

At this time I'd like to introduce Katie Arrington. She grew up in Swamscott. She and her husband Dan are now residing with their two children, Thomas and Haley, in Swamscott.

They live in Katie's childhood home together with Katie's parents and aunt. Katie works for a mechanical contracting company on the North Shore. Katie is an avid volunteer, a longtime town meeting member, eight-year religious ed teacher at St. John's, two-term president for the Clark Elementary School PTO, and has helped on many local political campaigns. As a parent, a daughter, a professional, and an experienced community leader, she is running to make Swamscott more affordable for families like hers and families like yours. The second candidate, Daniel Leonard. Daniel was raised in Revere, Mass., the youngest of four children of the late Dante and Margaret Ferrara in a close-knit Italian household that she holds near to her heart. Daniel is married to Caitlin Leonard, a Swamscott native and physical ed teacher in Swamscott, as well as the Varsity Girls basketball coach. Daniel and Caitlin are the parents of seven-year-old daughter, Shay, four-year-old son Tate, and their dog, Liguini. Daniel has a Bachelor of Science degree in Business Management from Endicott College.

She is currently employed in Human Resources as a benefit and welfare consultant for Harvard University. Before Harvard, Daniel was the Human Resource Administrator for Linfield Public Schools. She is incredibly proud of having worked for the Swamscott Public Schools for almost ten years, both in central office and at the middle school.

Daniel is an active member of the Stanley School PTO and the Town Recreation Committee. She is also a member of the Parents' Council Advisory Committee for the new Swamscott Elementary School, for which she was personally selected. Daniel was instrumental in leading the charge to bring back the popular Fourth of July race for children and residents of this town this past summer.

At this time, I'd like to invite Daniel up to speak. No, she does not speak. Just press that.

I think you have to hold it, too. As long as it's green.

[Speaker 1] (5:30 - 8:05)
Okay, good. Can everybody hear me? Thank you very much, Jeff, for that lovely biography on me.

And thank you for hosting this event. This is wonderful. Thank you all for coming today.

I know it's a Saturday and it's sunny out, so that's a rarity around here lately. So thank you all for coming. I really do appreciate it.

So as Jeff said, I live in Swamscott for the past seven years with my wife and two children. My daughter's in first grade, my son is in preschool. I am not from Swamscott originally.

My wife's family is fifth-generation Swamscott. My mother-in-law is a Polesky, my father-in-law is a Leonard. And my wife, as Jeff said, is the coach of the girls' basketball team, and some of you probably remember her from her days of playing basketball here in her hometown.

It's an understatement to say that everything I do focuses on my children, and that is what really got me into this race. We are here for the long haul. We, as I said, have two little ones, and nothing is more important to me than maintaining and helping this town be the best that it can be for future generations of Swamscott.

With that said, there are special... Today we're looking at special considerations in the situations with veterans and seniors, and I feel like those are two... First of all, senior citizens make up just under 30% of Swamscott's population, so that demographic is one that we do need to devote much more focus than we currently do, in my personal opinion, and the veteran community as well.

We owe a lot to veterans, and it is my intent to do what I can do if I'm lucky enough to be elected to the select board, to make sure that we're adequately servicing our veterans. That is something that I would like to learn more about from the veterans in our community, which I think we're just about 500 or somewhere around 500 that live in Swamscott. I am aware of efforts to reestablish a veterans committee that have been championed by Mary DiCillo and Mary Ellen Fletcher, and I'm very much a proponent of that, because I do want to ensure that what we are doing for our veterans is enough.

I suspect it's not, but I don't know that for a fact. I would certainly like to hear from the veterans in this community to let me know what their feelings are there. This is obviously not limited to just veterans and seniors, and I'm happy to answer any questions about any other issue in town that you might have.

That would be my pleasure, and I just want to thank you all again for taking the time to come out today and listen to us. I really appreciate it.

[Speaker 3] (8:07 - 8:12)
APPLAUSE Thank you, Danielle. Katie?

[Speaker 2] (8:14 - 11:16)
Can you hear me? Too close? There we go.

Good morning. Talking about myself is not something I like to do, and public speaking is not something I do often. So the best way to introduce myself to you is to talk about my parents, Mary and Jerry Murphy.

Mary and Jerry Murphy are two of the kindest and loving people you could ever know. They live by the motto, work hard and be kind. Both of my parents worked full-time to ensure that our family never went without.

My mother at Union Hospital in Lynn for her entire career. My father spent his early years in the Navy during the Vietnam War, working on the USS John F. Kennedy, and post-war working for many years at Logan Airport.

I loved when my dad managed a small airline that flew to Maine because my dad would occasionally let me make the boarding announcements. And one time he even got me the autograph of Nancy Kerrigan, Christy Yamaguchi and Scott Hamilton when they flew. I was a huge figure skater.

My parents made so many sacrifices for our family. If my mom could not arrange her work schedule to be home at night, my dad would change his schedule and vice versa. So what does this all have to do with me running for Swampscot's lap board?

Well, everything. The Murphy household was filled with love and fun, but my parents were always real with me. They talked to me about budgets and the difference between a want and a need.

I'm thrilled that Dan and I were able to return to Swampscot to raise our children and that we can live together with my parents and my aunt to ensure that we all can afford to live here in town. My parents get to stay in a home they work tirelessly for, and my husband and I get to share housing expenses and save on child care. My children are going to be better people because they have Mary and Jerry as active, loving grandparents.

We work well together. We are mostly kind to one another. We support each other, and I wouldn't have it any other way.

I'm running for Swampscot's lap board because I want to make Swampscot as affordable as possible for everyone. Today we're going to talk about many topics important to you. I don't have answers to every issue.

What I have is a lived experience of family, tough economic choices, and a desire to listen, learn, and help others. I'm not someone that raises her voice or criticizes others. If you want someone like that, you don't want to vote for me.

Instead, I am going to do as my parents showed me and as Dan and I show our children. Listen with your heart and your mind. Speak with kindness and empathy.

Leave things better than when you arrived. I look forward to the discussion today, and I thank you all for being here.

[Speaker 3] (11:22 - 11:58)
Thank you. At this time, I'm going to open up the floor for questions. I'm going to start on this side and move over to this side.

If you have a question, please raise your hand, and I'll recognize you. And if you'd like to introduce yourselves, that would also be good so the candidates know who's speaking. Anyone on this side?

Okay. Please use the microphone. I think we have to turn the microphone on.

Thank you.

[Speaker 14] (12:11 - 13:24)
It sounds like it's on. All right. Anyway, my name is Art Friedman, Precinct 4.

I'm interested in Fisherman's Beach. I've been involved since December with the plan to try to figure out how the town is going to address the flow of the coliform pollution into the beach. And I think it's a really important public health concern for our town.

I spend most of my time on the water on the beach on my boat, and I think it's very important. So the main thing is this APA fund, which has been kind of kicked around for the last five months or so that I've been involved, and I just wonder are we going to use this fund, your plans to use this fund toward the mitigation. There's a meeting coming up next Wednesday to discuss it, but obviously you won't be a part of that, but you will be in the future as far as working with the fishermen and with Kings Beach.

And so I appreciate your comments as far as what your plans are, your feelings to how the town, what the town needs to do to mitigate this situation, which is very important. And the other thing which was mentioned at the prior town meeting.

[Speaker 3] (13:30 - 13:40)
Okay, let's handle the first question. I'm going to come back to the second one. We'll start with Danielle this time and then we'll go to Katie and then the next question we'll go to Katie and then Danielle.

Okay.

[Speaker 1] (13:42 - 16:11)
Thank you very much for your question. So the first part of your question is surrounding ARPA funds in the pollution of the beaches. If I surmise that correctly.

So at the last select board meeting, I spoke and that was the third meeting that I had actually attended where I actually got up and spoke to the select board about just that very issue. So ARPA funds are given, we're given to the town of Swampscott by the federal government to cover areas of deficiency during the COVID pandemic. We were given just over $4 million.

And part of when they gave us that money, they had guidelines that they suggested that we use it for part of it was infrastructure repair to sewer water pipes. I have urged the town select board at this last meeting to utilize the ARPA funds that we were given to clean the beaches. The beaches are integral to living in Swampscott, right?

They are not only for our enjoyment and for our use when we can use them, which is not as often as we'd like, but they to me are directly tied to our property value, right? Who wants to live in a beach community where they can't utilize the beach? And just from a safety and health perspective, right?

We all have children. We all have, we may not all have children. We all like to spend time at the beach who wants to deal with whether or not the bacteria count was high today, whether or not we can swim, whether we should have our dogs on the beach, whether we should be on the beach.

It's just not something that we can afford to not pay any more attention to. We have kicked this around long enough. And my comment to the select board was that we should immediately begin to use ARPA money to take care of our problem that we have at the beaches.

Now, it's not just a basic problem. We are under consent decree from the government for a number of years now, literally saying to Swampscott, do your part and clean your beaches. And we have neglected to do enough of that, right?

We're sitting on this money, on this ARPA money, and we listen to the town administrator give us a laundry list of things that he wants to spend it on, including a mobile town hall for $500,000, okay? It's just that. It's laughable, right?

So that was my point to the select board at just this past meeting, and we don't need to do it by the way of a sewer tax increase, which is how the town administrator would prefer to deliver the funds to clean the beaches. We need it now. We need it to come from ARPA, and we need it to begin immediately.

And that is how I feel about the beaches.

[Speaker 3] (16:11 - 16:14)
Thank you. Katie, would you like to respond to that question?

[Speaker 2] (16:15 - 17:13)
Okay, we're green. Yeah, I agree. We need to use the ARPA money to fix beaches.

We can't have what we have coming up onto our pathways. We can't have kids and residents and, like, Danielle's dogs and all the people wondering if we can utilize our beaches. I'm fine with using the ARPA money.

I also think that we need to be collaborative and rope in our state representatives and LHIN because it's not just a swamp scot issue. We can't, this generation, and it's going to be more expensive than just the ARPA money. We have to think of our whole scope, and we have to bring in others to the conversation.

[Speaker 3] (17:15 - 17:25)
Thank you. I'll come back to your second question later. I just want to see if anyone else has any questions.

Yes?

[Speaker 10] (17:30 - 19:22)
Hi, Barbara DiPietro, 94 Eastman Avenue, and I am junior vice president of the VFW Auxiliary. Last week, maybe the week before, we had a presentation that I'm sure you're aware of about the veterans' housing on Pine Street. It was very preliminary.

People from B'nai B'rith, who are the people who developed Michon and plan to develop this, were there and very receptive to the comments. There's one area that is near and dear to my heart. They would like to tear down the current post and build one on the end that is 1,480 square feet.

The current post is 5,800 square feet. That's not going to work. Where we have now is not big enough to make it that much smaller.

That's smaller, if any of you are familiar with it, smaller than the downstairs area. The downstairs area is 1,800. I would like to know how much you are willing to support the veterans.

We're fighting for this. Housing is a wonderful thing. They're talking 30 to 40 units, over 55, low income.

The town needs this. This checks an awful lot of boxes for the town, and it's wonderful, but this part of it, and in the length of time it's going to take to build this, which I would guess would be a couple of years, what are we going to do with the veterans? Where are they going to go?

So I'm hoping we have your support for this.

[Speaker 3] (19:23 - 19:50)
Thank you. Can I add something being the commander of the Disabled Maritime? We are the largest veteran service organization, maybe on the North Shore.

We have not been consulted or asked to participate in any of the veterans' housing or the new VFW building, and we're always willing to come to the table at any time, but we've reached out to the town, and we've not been included in any meetings or discussions, so I just want to add that.

[Speaker 2] (19:55 - 21:31)
So I was at that meeting, and I can appreciate that question. Thank you. And I'm sorry that you don't feel seen.

So at that meeting, I felt, and I watched the presentation from Brunei and the town, and it is, it's in very early stages, but I really feel that this project is a big deal for the town. They want to make things right with the veterans. They want to give you what you want.

So do I know where to put the VFW while we're in transition? I don't, but I also left that meeting saying, whether I sit in this seat, I'm going to be involved in that project because this is too important. Our veterans need a place where they can come together.

Our veterans need a place where they can be and feel safe. They need services, and they need their own community, and they need to be included in our community more than we have. So I think because it is very preliminary, and they will continue to do more meetings, so I'm hoping that we will rope in the DAV.

This is something that SwampScot needs to do for our veterans, and like I said, whatever I can do, whether I sit in this seat or not, I'm going to be an advocate for this project and for our veterans.

[Speaker 1] (21:37 - 24:43)
Thank you, Mrs. DiPietro, for the comment, and Jeff, thank you for your input. So first off, to address your piece of it, Jeff, this is exactly how SwampScot goes about every major proposal and situation. They do it in a vacuum exclusively by the select board.

The way to do this would have been to, of course, include every veteran in their input, and it's a small population. As I just said, we don't have a million veterans in town. It wouldn't have taken a whole lot to solicit and include the input of those stakeholders that hold this project near and dear, right?

So that's the first misstep, and that is what we do every single time. We fail to listen to the people of this town and get the resident input to drive us forward in how we proceed with projects. To your question, Mrs. DiPietro, so, yes, that is not sufficient, right?

So we do have other spots in town that we can potentially utilize, and maybe it's Reach Arts, maybe it's somewhere, but at the very heart of this thing is the fact that we need to listen to what you guys need us to do, right? That we work for you, right? The select board is there and elected to work for the people, the veterans, the residents, the taxpayers of this town, right?

And we need to do a better job at listening to what the needs are of the people in this town, right? So that is like the cornerstone of my campaign. That is why I'm doing this.

So to say I would be an advocate is an understatement because every time I see something not going the way it should be, I'm very vocal, and I make my voice heard, and I go to the select board in an appropriate way, and I say, what's the thought process here? What are we doing? What aren't we doing?

What can we do better, right? I have no problem doing that. I've done it before.

I'll continue to do it. I'll do it for veterans, and I'll do it for the taxpayers of Swanscott. That's why I'm sitting here.

There's absolutely no other reason for me to be undertaking a spot on the select board, to be quite honest. It's a difficult job. I have nothing but respect for the people that are taking their time to do it.

But I think that I can do it in a way that will actually collaborate with the residents, will listen to the residents, and have their voices be the driving force behind what we need. In this case, it's veterans. And in this case, we need to find out if veterans are getting the service that they need, right, because we're now 50% we have a 50% person doing Lynn and Swanscott, right?

So from what I've spoken to from people and residents in town, what have they told me, they've said that that's not enough, right? So that's something that we need to pay attention to. Again, I think we need a subcommittee, a veteran subcommittee to be recreated, and I think that needs to be a group of people that can be the voice for veterans in this town and communicate even more to the select board what the needs are, right?

I don't think we've done enough. And those are some of the things that I would like to see, but I would certainly consider myself an advocate for the veterans.

[Speaker 3] (24:46 - 24:55)
Thank you. Any other questions? Yes?

Come to the mic, please.

[Speaker 4] (24:55 - 27:12)
Well, the veterans select board at the time put forth a rezoning. It was going to be all the property along the railroad tracks almost pre, like they knew what the state was going to do with this last bill that was passed about the train station. And somehow they included the property that now was going to be developed as to veterans' housing.

And at the time it was going to cover everything from the liquor store, the veterans' post, and the old Boomer Breed property. There was a mini revolt at town meeting, and it was voted, the zoning was just withdrawn. But it's been like they've been scratching away at it.

And the latest thing was when they bought the property, the old Boomer Breed property, and the next thing you know they're going to do veterans' housing, we're going to tear down the post. They built a cannabis place to replace the liquor store that both our board of selectmen and the town administrator, who are currently still there, said we shouldn't be in the liquor business. I guess being in the marijuana business is much better.

So, I mean, you know, this has been like an itch for them to close down the VFW post. During the COVID, the town actively just suppressed everything the VFW post tried to do to stay open during the COVID. And nothing was done to help them.

So, I mean, I'd like to see, and I'm listening to you both, you know, that the town perhaps take a step back. I think the selling this veterans' housing, it's not going to benefit Swanscot. There's only 500 veterans in the town, and I don't think any of them, income-wise, would qualify for the housing.

Because there's always that income thing. And if you live in this town, you're probably, pardon? Well, it can probably be everybody by the time we're through, but it would probably be more people from out of town than people in town.

[Speaker 3] (27:13 - 27:13)
Thank you.

[Speaker 4] (27:13 - 27:14)
I think that's a problem.

[Speaker 3] (27:15 - 27:18)
Danielle, I think Danielle's and then Katie.

[Speaker 1] (27:20 - 29:55)
Thank you very much for your comments, sir. And you're right. Unfortunately, the relationship between town and veterans is a little bit fraught, right?

And it goes back 7, 10, at least that many number of years, because I don't feel like the town has always acted in the best interest of their veterans, right? And that's something, as a community, we need to be better at. And unfortunately, that relationship is not just with veterans.

We've seen that same relationship between town and school, town and police, town and fire. That's part of the community aspect of why I'm running, right? So we need to, again, I would just reiterate that I really feel strongly about the need to have the Veterans Committee recreated, and I think that it is integral that we repair the relationship with our veterans that, unfortunately, the town administrator and the select board were negligent about, right?

And that is something we need to make a real concerted effort and focus on. And I think that unless we have somebody in this seat who is not afraid to admit that maybe we handled things on the town side incorrectly and we didn't do enough for veterans, then that's never going to happen, right? We, at this point, need to be the squeaky wheel.

We need to be the people that stand up for veterans and say, you know what? You did this X, Y, and Z. You're calling the VFW post a bar.

It is not a bar. It is a facility that veterans utilize for social gatherings and to meet with one another and do whatever it is they like, and they have the right to do that, and that should be at the forefront of our concern. How do we repair that relationship?

Because it's clear that they have done some things on the town side that have not coexisted well with the veteran group. So let's admit it, let's fix it, and let's see what we can do in the future. You're right.

There are just about 500 veterans in town. So if we're proposing 40 units, right, how many of our actual Swamp Scout veterans are going to be able to take advantage of that? Probably not many, right?

But at the very least, we should be employing a committee or the veterans agent to work with the veteran community and see if there are some people that are interested, because that first round is the chance for Swamp Scout veterans to get one of those 40 units, right? So we need to do that outreach and make sure we're reaching the veterans to find out who needs our help and who is interested in this housing. And then if we don't have any, then we don't, but at least we make that effort.

We owe it to the veteran group to make that effort.

[Speaker 3] (29:57 - 30:03)
Thank you. Please silence your cell phones.

[Speaker 2] (30:07 - 31:15)
Thanks. We definitely need to collaborate, and when I sit in that seat, I want to collaborate with the veterans. My father is a veteran.

I have a retired Navy SEAL as a cousin, both of my grandfathers. This is a really important issue to me. I want to champion you.

I want to make the town see you, and I believe they are starting to do that. It's not been done perfectly, but this is our opportunity to move forward and to make something right, to give you the space you need, both in community space, meeting space, and for those that need it, the residential space. I do want to work with you, and when I sit in that seat, I will be your champion.

[Speaker 3] (31:18 - 31:34)
Thank you. Are you standing up, John, for a question? Okay.

Use the microphone. Introduce yourself. I know everyone knows you, but it's for the cable.

The cable needs it.

[Speaker 6] (31:41 - 34:39)
Hello. Everybody hear me now? Yes.

All right. Thank you. I just want to make a statement.

I want to back up what Judge Jason had to say and what Jeff's been talking. Now, I can go back a long time, further than some of you probably have been in town. After the first war, veterans were treated very badly in Swansket, and not because of who they were, but because of what was behind them.

And I used to kid my father and my uncle, or my father's brother, who came home from the second war, with five Purple Hearts and a Bronze Star, and he used to say to me different things, and I won't repeat them in his language, but what is wrong with this town? How come they don't support us? Well, number one, the town was built by big businessmen along the coast, and those of us who were born here were raised by families that came in and worked for those folks.

But them folks that built those big mansions along the coast only came here because of one thing, the ocean. And that's what they wanted. And from then on, I said, you know something, Dad?

It sounds like the same thing that's going on now, but only their faces have changed, but their attitudes haven't. Do they come into Swansket from Lynn, Saugus, or wherever? Is there an air change?

Is there a water change, or whatever it is that puts them in that attitude? And he goes, I don't know, but I've been trying to figure it out for 90 years. And I've been trying to figure it out for 80 years or more.

And from what George was saying, the VFW, the American Legion, the DAV have all supported the veterans. And if any one of you were a Swansket resident or otherwise come down to our post to see who's there and who's not, you won't find more than four or five guys in there because they don't want to come down here and be accused of being drunks, as we've been called. And the reason why your post is built the way it is is because the folks across the street and up the road didn't want to see those drunks, quote, come out of the front of the building and fall all over the place.

Well, we don't have drunks. And the building was put so that the entrance was on the backside into the parking lot so they couldn't see those, quote, drunks, which we don't have. And I'm sorry to say that, but I needed to.

And I needed to back up what Mr. Chasen has and what Jeff has been talking about. But we have three major units down here, the VFW, the Legion, and the DAV. And the Legion and the VFW were established back in 1923 after the first war.

And I want to thank you for listening to me.

[Speaker 3] (34:40 - 36:17)
Thank you. I also want to recognize select person Doug Thompson, who just arrived. Also at this time, before we take the next question, I probably should have done this before.

The DAV doesn't get any funds from the town or the state. We basically run a deficit, and that's okay because we enjoy running programs for veterans. So I have a little bucket here, and I'm going to circulate it around.

If people would like to make a donation, that would be used for veterans. Like I said, we had a Vietnam veterans breakfast this year. We're going to have a veterans beach party.

We support the Habitat Plus group home in Lynn. We're doing a lot of veterans claims. The past year we filed probably 20 or 30 claims for VA funding for veterans.

Many of them received increases and new claims, and we're always out there for the veterans. And so I'm going to circulate this bucket. If people would like to make a donation, I'd really appreciate it.

Thank you. Okay, any other questions? Okay, lady, yep.

If you could once again go to the microphone, because this is being taped by a lovely cable system, and it's broadcast live now, but it's also going to be on tape. So people, if you know anyone that's in town and would like to find out more about these candidates, tell them to watch cable. Thank you.

[Speaker 9] (36:18 - 38:15)
My name is Marla Bellowstock. I live at the corner of Lewis and Pleasant. So the new school, the middle school, that's my neighborhood.

I am very, very concerned about the fact that I don't think, and I know you're not the school committee. You're on the building part. I don't think it's being looked at properly at all.

What was said at the beginning was we just hope the parents will put their kids on the school buses that we're going to give. They're not giving them. 1.8 miles is the same as it was when I went to school, basically two miles. That's just up here. That's it. So how many cars, extra cars, do you think will be in the neighborhood?

300? 400? It's going to be a nightmare, a nightmare for the cars.

They said, oh, we're going to have the schools come different. Ten minutes is not enough time at all. This is going to be crazy.

I'm looking forward to the new school for the kids, definitely. I went to that Stanley school, so I know, you know, the school's neat. But nobody is really, really looking at the traffic nightmare.

And having crossing guards is not the answer. All that's going to do is make more traffic. I hate to say that, but every time a child walks to the crosswalk, they don't wait for a group of kids.

They stop the cars. One child goes across. One car goes through.

They stop the cars again when the next kid comes to the crosswalk. The kids don't wait. So as a select board for the traffic and the congestion is the main reason I feel that I would like to hear if you have any solutions to the whole neighborhood, from the middle school all the way down to Stamp, whatever you want to call the new school, to the new school, but it goes beyond.

[Speaker 3] (38:16 - 38:18)
Thank you. Katie, I think you're starting.

[Speaker 2] (38:22 - 39:57)
So I have a preschooler that's graduating, so I will have a kindergartner, and my daughter Hallie will be the first kindergarten class into the elementary school, and we cannot wait. I hear your concern. I would hope that we will all work collaboratively.

I think they're going to figure it out. The first couple days are going to be half days, and they're going to have team meetings to say what worked, what didn't, what do we need to change. In regards to crossing guards, my dad that I spoke of, when he retired from Lynn Juvenile, his career there, he isn't a great guy of being retired, so he decided to become a crossing guard, and I think we could work collaboratively with our school resource officer to discuss sending in big groups.

I know they're doing parking here, walking your children. There are ways to work collaboratively so that the residents and the school will be happy. It may not be perfect, but I really do think we're going to figure it out if we take the time to all work together to make everybody happy, or at least as much as possible.

[Speaker 1] (40:04 - 42:59)
Thank you, Myla, for that question. You bring up a great point. At the last select board meeting, Mary Ellen Fletcher asked the town administrator to begin having conversations with residents that abut the new elementary school.

I attended a meet and greet event on Mason Road, and I heard from about 15 Mason Road residents of their concern about what is happening with the new elementary school as it relates to the abutters. So the resounding statement that I heard was that we need to begin community outreach now with people that are going to be affected by this, you're right, this traffic nightmare, which it potentially could be. I do understand that there are now four buses instead of the original two buses that will be taking children.

They do have funding for four buses, which is roughly about 250 kids, let's say, at a high, and they're, I think, anticipating somewhere around 750 kids. So we're still talking about 500 kids that need to be, yes, right, potentially 500 cars. So I don't think the school department has done, or even the town has done enough to start facilitating the community meetings that need to happen.

So that is, I have already, I do sit on the parent advisory board for the new elementary school. I have already emailed the new principal, Lori Sanborn, who I used to work with at the middle school, and I told her just that. I said we need to start community outreach.

I'm not in a position of being anything other than a resident right now. I did already start that, and I have sat with, like I said, just last week, Jeannie Pats, Mark Eichler, there were at least Martha Caesars, there were at least 15 people present at that meeting, majority of which were Nason Road, Orchard Circle. Right, and so your side of it, the Pleasant Street, Lewis Street, all that surrounding area.

Yep. You're going to have both, exactly. So we need to start community outreach now, not in June, not in July, not when school starts.

That's too late. We need to do it now. We need to let people know where resident parking is going to be, if there are speed bumps coming in, how it's going to affect people.

That has to happen now, and it's not going to happen unless we demand it, right, because what I have found in my experience is that if we just sit passively by and wait for the town or the school department to do things on our behalf, it doesn't happen. So unfortunately, the squeaky wheel gets the grease, in my opinion. So I think that we have to demand those conversations now, and hopefully that's going to happen.

Mary Ellen Fletcher did ask the town administrator by June 1st to begin setting up community meetings. Hopefully he follows through and does that. But I think that's a good start if that does happen.

But we need to have it happen now.

[Speaker 3] (43:01 - 43:05)
Mary DiCillo, I see. And then I'm going to go back here. So Mary?

[Speaker 5] (43:08 - 47:28)
Hi, I'm Mary DiCillo, and I live on 7 Rockland Street. Oh, sorry, I live on 7 Rockland Street, Precinct 4, and I'm a town meeting member. I am very happy that we have two candidates, and it's not yet another unopposed.

I know I've run for office in the town before, and it's rigorous and it's hard, and I very much appreciate that you've come forward. So whatever the outcome, I greatly appreciate that. That's what service is, and that's why these veterans are here, is they serve the country so that we can have free elections.

And to me, I get very emotional about it because I worked with veterans up at Salem State, and I heard their stories of transitioning from the Afghan War and the Iraq War, and I'll never be the same after working with veterans. And I kind of joke, but I don't mean it as a joke. It changed my life.

I've done a lot of work as a professional, but it changed my life. And what became very clear to me is that veteran culture is a veteran culture, and we have to honor that. And however they served, wherever they served, whether they were deployed or not deployed, and the town, not just on Memorial Day and not just on Veterans Day, has to celebrate its veterans.

And I personally think the 500 is an undercount because I believe a lot of Vietnam veterans are not captured in that count because a lot of Vietnam veterans have, because of their experience, did not want to be identified. So I am encouraging, I'm just standing up here as a civilian to say that whatever happens, I have written directly to the select board in the last six months saying very emphatically, I have six different points, no decision can be made by this town until there are direct input from veterans. No decision.

And that means having a committee that used to be there and somehow disappeared from the current copy of the town charter. I'm not sure how that happened. But I have a hard copy document of a website that says that there was a veterans committee here at some point, and I don't know quite how that disappeared.

So I'm imploring you both, and I'm sure I heard what you say. I assume that you have that same commitment. Your family served.

I don't know. I didn't hear about your family. But it's really important.

And I think all of us who are from, we don't have a culture here that we send a lot of people to the military from Swampscott High School. Part of that, we really need to start thinking about, you know, I was once at a dinner party during the Iraq War, the very beginning, and there were about ten of us sitting there, all of whom had sons who could qualify. And everybody was, rah, rah, Iraq War, right?

And I said, so would you send your son? And, you know, oh, no, he's going off to college. And I said, hmm, interesting.

So our mentality as a town has to change regarding just the military culture itself. The bar, and I just want to reiterate, it is not a bar. It is what appears at every base around the world is a place that people go for collation, as Jeff's favorite phrase is, collation.

I love that word, to gather and to be with people like your book group. It's a stupid example, but that's the culture. And for it to be characterized as just a place where these people are hanging out and drinking is such an affront to me and to the veterans.

I just have to say that out loud. So thank you very much, and I appreciate your service.

[Speaker 3] (47:30 - 47:40)
Thank you. Dr. Schweiner.

[Speaker 8] (47:51 - 49:45)
Hi, my name is Sheila Billings, and I live at 15 Laurel Road, right in the middle of, yikes. And so I just want to say, yes, we're going to need some help. I'm worrying about idling cars, 500 idling cars.

Anyway, first, thank you to the veterans for running this. You're fighting for democracy still by having this for us, so that we can meet these beautiful candidates that thank you for running. Okay.

My big question is, as a person on a fixed income, I am alarmed. I'm a new citizen of Swampskate, almost three years, still getting used to the whole town government and how that works. Apologies to both of you, because all my e-mails.

Apologies to the select people. I have a lot of questions, and I'm never sure who to ask. So thank you for your patience.

But anyway, I'm worried about seeing all the really expensive ideas that people have for using the new open space. What it feels to me is pushback from many citizens about having any kinds of businesses to ruin the small-town feeling of Swampskate, but who would pay taxes and help mitigate the expenses. I'm worried about the taxes going up more so that I won't be able to live here.

So that's my question. Thank you. And one other question for the people over there.

It might be hard for some people to cut through all the chairs to get over here to ask a question, so I don't know if maybe the mic will be able to go over there to the people instead of. . .

Thank you.

[Speaker 3] (49:47 - 49:49)
Any others? Okay.

[Speaker 1] (49:54 - 50:03)
So thank you for that question, Mrs. Billings. So I think your questions, if I just want to make sure I capture them all. So you're on Laurel Road, so you're concerned about the congestion.

[Speaker 8] (50:11 - 50:30)
I mean, the blast in my dandruff fell right off the wall one day. I was in shock. They told me my health was in shape, and I'm not okay.

And I haven't been able to get any response, but I asked to have someone come out and look and see if there was any stuff.

[Speaker 1] (50:31 - 55:26)
So that's a very big problem, right? So the lack of response to resident concerns is at the heart of one of my reasons for running for select board. I have often emailed my thoughts to the school department as well, not just to the select board.

You know, last year when the school department told us they had a deficit of almost $600,000, I emailed them a litany list of ways that they could make those cuts and not affect teachers or support staff, right? Because I was concerned about teachers and boots on the ground and people that actually affect the daily lives of children. I never received a response from any school committee member.

So I am in the same boat that you're in. That's why I'm doing this. So to your point about the new school, yes, again, you should have someone that comes out in response to you when you say something has fallen off the wall because of the blasting.

Those are promises that were made that we're not keeping, right? So unfortunately, again, what we need to do is we need to be a collective voice and go to the school department and say, or the school building committee. I honestly don't know which is the better.

I think it's probably a collaboration of both the school department and the board of selectmen, and say we need to reach out to the community. We need to address the concerns of the abutters. It's not an option.

They don't have an option. They have an obligation. You live there.

You were told one thing. We need to make sure that that is what ends up happening, right? The congestion is going to be very real.

The traffic is going to be a hot button topic. We're at April. That school opens the end of August, and no one has heard a word, and that's not acceptable.

It just isn't. So part of hopefully, you know, if I'm lucky enough to get on the board, I would be happy to facilitate that. I'm proud to say that four out of five school committee members have Leonard signs on their front lawns, and you can bet that Danielle Leonard will be the person that's going to reach out to those four out of five and say, what the heck is going on with the traffic pattern?

When are we reaching out to the community that abuts the new elementary school to start that conversation? And unless we start doing that, unless we actually start using our voices, no one is going to listen. So I am happy to be the advocate to do that because, as I said, I'm lucky enough to maintain a lot of relationships with the school department, and for that, you know, so I feel like that would help facilitate conversations that way, and I do know who to contact, and hopefully I would get a better response.

I'm not sure, but I would certainly be happy to try, and I think that that's what we need. We need people that will be more responsive and work on the actual residents' behalves. So that was your first.

Your second piece was taxes. That is another thing that in the litany list of nice-to-have things that the town administrator rolled out for what he wants to spend ARPA money is ludicrous to me, to be quite honest. I am nothing but concerned with keeping our taxes level and relative.

I am not in favor of increasing them at all, and you're quite right. Like, we are squeezing that segment of our population, the senior population, the middle class, that do all they can do, as Katie said earlier, just to be able to afford to stay in their houses. You know, to begin to think of a $30 million library when I don't see anything wrong with the existing library, I mean, I can't even begin to describe my surprise at that is what was the result of the two visioning sessions that the town had.

Clearly, we did not do enough outreach on the residents' behalf to find out what the residents wanted to see on that site, right? When I see over 500 comments on social media from people outraged about the thought of a $30 million library, that says to me we did not do our job in reaching out to the residents to see what exactly they wanted to see on that site. They voted it in town meeting.

I was part of that town meeting in 2022 where I listened and I heard that if we vote for this, it'll be green space, right? What happened to the green space? That is not my recommendation.

That wouldn't be my first choice. I personally would like to see maybe a mini hat shell, maybe a performing arts center, maybe some food trucks, maybe a splash pad. There are a multitude of things we could use that space for that would give everybody a little bit of buy-in.

The people that want green space, the people that want commercial development, the people that, you know, the people of Swampscott and what they want. It doesn't really matter what I want. It matters what the town as a collective unit wants.

And from what I was told in 2022, that was supposed to be green space. I might not agree with it, but that is how it was sold. So for us to now come out with a $30 million library, when we didn't even consult our library trustees who stood up at the last select board meeting to say I had no idea about this, seems completely out of touch, right?

And I think that's part of the problem that we're seeing in different forms, in different areas, in different issues. It always comes back to the same thing. Residents are not being listened to.

And that's what we need to get back to.

[Speaker 3] (55:31 - 55:31)
Katie?

[Speaker 2] (55:33 - 57:02)
So your first issue about the banjo off the wall, I'm so sorry that happened. Hill International is the general contractor on that project, and they have a liaison. I'm happy I have that information.

I'm happy to connect that with you and anybody else that has issues as a result of blasting. I'm happy to give that information, no problem. Just I'll get your contact info before we leave.

Your second question about affordability, so we need to slow our tax growth. We need to up our commercial revenue. We need to work collaboratively to make sure that our taxes are not going up.

We need to make sure that our residents are paying. We need to work collaboratively. We need to up our commercial, and we need to slow our tax growth.

In regards to the library, it's not what we discussed. It's in the early stages. And I would hope that from the resounding cry, I would hope that the town would hear, and we can have a collaborative discussion.

But that's it.

[Speaker 3] (57:05 - 57:24)
Wait a minute, John. John, sit down, please. No, there's two.

Doug Thompson's here, too. Okay. Yeah, well, he's right over there.

Okay. Gentleman over there. Wait a minute, John.

Okay. We got a gentleman over there.

[Speaker 7] (57:36 - 57:38)
I'm kind of afraid to get to the mic here.

[Speaker 6] (57:38 - 57:41)
I won't bite you.

[Speaker 7] (57:41 - 58:37)
Oh. Is this on? Can people hear me?

My name is Jim Olivetti. I've lived in Swampscott now 13 years. I have enjoyed the experience with my wife, retired up here.

I'm the chair of the tree committee of the town. And there are a couple of things I want to say. The first is a commercial.

The tree committee is rededicating a veterans arboretum that was set up right after World War II. My dad served in the Pacific in World War II, so it's meaningful to me. And that will be on the Saturday of Memorial Day weekend.

I know the veterans are working with the tree committee to make our part a success. Brian Drummond, you haven't talked with Brian? No.

Well, that's a surprise. But, okay, great.

[Speaker 3] (58:37 - 58:44)
Like I said, we don't get much communication from people, even though we're the largest veteran service organization in town.

[Speaker 7] (58:44 - 1:00:33)
All right. Well, anyway, that is going to happen. And we have been working with some veterans group, I know.

I haven't been, but Brian Drummond, who's on the committee, has. And that will be Saturday morning at 11 o'clock. And I hope some of the veterans will come and enjoy that rededication.

The original arboretum was at Town Hall. And there are still several trees standing from those planted right after World War II, including one to a member of the Paradise family that was killed in Normandy. The second thing is that I want to say is that I agree with you that what we developed as a result of the town meeting that hundreds and hundreds of people came to at the Hawthorne about what should be done with that space, open space did come up and a library didn't.

I spent my career in libraries. And my own personal opinion is the library that we have now with the renovations that are done is a perfectly acceptable solution. The question I have for both of you is do you have a sense of whether you would support or what your position is on the Community Preservation Act?

And having the town join that particular effort. Nahant has been a member for years. Salem has been a member of that.

Not a member, but has been a participant with the Community Preservation Act for many years and have developed some great open space and historic preservation with funds from that. So I'd like to hear both of you about that. Thank you for the time.

Katie.

[Speaker 2] (1:00:36 - 1:02:17)
So let's take Nahant for an example. Nahant has been in the CPA for about 24 years. They repaired their 40 steps.

They've added playgrounds. They've fixed their seawalls. They've done a litany of things.

And they did it with Community Preservation Act money. So what it is is you can elect 1% to 3% most towns do between 1% and 1.5%. And that money itself can only be used for historic projects, open space, and affordable housing. It has to be these.

We would have a separate group of residents and professionals to determine what projects to be used. The select board isn't involved in the sense of it doesn't decide. The committee decides.

And then, yes, it goes to town meeting and follows those channels. But we have already been, with our registry deeds, you, Swampscott, a portion of that money went to fix those things in Nahant. And we've lost out.

It tried to get here. I think it was in 2006. And it didn't pass.

So I am obviously for affordability. I do think this would take some of the bite out of different projects that we want to do. So I would support the Community Preservation Act.

[Speaker 1] (1:02:24 - 1:05:07)
Thank you for the question. So I think the CPA definitely has worked in certain communities. It's worked in Salem.

It's worked in Nahant, as Katie just said. It was voted down in Danvers. It was voted down by this community itself in 2007.

And I suspect the reason why it was voted down was because it does increase people's taxes. So when we say there's a committee that would be established to oversee these funds that are placed, that are increased via tax and placed in a fund, I immediately have concerns, and I'll tell you why. I have volunteered over the years for countless committees in the town of Swampscott.

I have a bachelor's degree. I have a decent background. I was never called for one.

I have found, in my personal experience, that the select board appoints people that they feel will be favorable to their causes. So they establish committees of people that they know or like or will basically vote the way that they think they should vote. And those of us that dissent or disagree are often not included on these committees.

So I would be very curious as to who would be appointed to this committee and who would actually oversee that. The Community Preservation Act might have a lot of wonderful points about it. We, as taxpayers and residents, have not been given that information.

We're expected to vote on this at town meeting, I understand, in, what, four or five weeks. But very little information has been circulated out. I did go to the town website last night just to see what was up there, and it does list a paragraph about the CPA, but doesn't detail approximately how much an increase those of us would feel on our tax bill, what we're actually talking about in terms of dollars, who would oversee it, who appoints the committee, little, you know, small questions that I would have.

So while it might be a great thing, some towns have adopted it. Danvers recently did not. This town has already said no to it 15 years ago.

Yes, it might be time to revisit it, but we need much more conversation about it before we're asked to vote on it on town meeting. Right now, I would be completely against it. I would not support it.

I don't have enough information, and I have very many questions about how we would appoint people on this committee, who those people would be, and how it would basically be overseen. I want to know what the projects are that are slated for this thing. What type of projects do you think need historical repair?

I mean, are we talking about the Glover House, maybe preserving that? What exactly is this money going to be used for, and who is going to oversee it? So without answers to those questions, I would absolutely be opposed to it.

[Speaker 3] (1:05:11 - 1:05:15)
Katie, I don't want to make this a debate, but so if you had a couple of comments.

[Speaker 2] (1:05:16 - 1:05:51)
So I attended the CPA meeting last week. I was the only candidate there. But the CPA Act is not currently going to town meeting.

It will be on the ballot in November. There will be continuous outreach, more meetings to make residents feel heard, and so that they can understand what this actually is and what will occur if we choose to vote for it in November.

[Speaker 3] (1:05:51 - 1:05:58)
Thank you. Okay. You've already asked one question.

I'm going to come over here. These two ladies would be the next two questions.

[Speaker 11] (1:06:02 - 1:07:47)
Hi. My name is Tessia Vasilio. I am a town meeting member.

I'm also the chair of the board of assessors. So I was discouraged to hear that the vets were not consulted. They were consulted with regard to the housing project.

On Wednesday, the select board meeting, the board of trustees for the library also stood up and said the same thing. I think it was about a year, year and a half ago. The solid waste committee stood up at town meeting and shared the same exact problem.

There was a town warrant article for banning plastic in town. They also were not consulted. In the past, we've had quite a bit of turnover at town hall, and we ‑‑ I appreciate your comments so much, Danielle, about appointing committees.

We have also on the board of assessors faced some challenges with town hall. I have invited a third party, the department of revenue, who would be better, to come and assist us to work through these challenges, which was met with a proposal to change our board to an appointed committee instead of an elected committee. With that, there was a select board member in the past who was advocating for an outside resource to come in and provide a report and do an investigation.

I know typically the response to investigations is for us to do them internally. And I just wanted to get your thoughts on that and ask what would you do differently. Thank you.

[Speaker 1] (1:07:51 - 1:10:54)
Thank you for your question, Tasia. So at the last select board meeting, I did speak up at public comment because they did have on the agenda that they were looking to take the board of assessors, which is currently in elected position, and change the charter and actually make that an appointed position. And my comment at that meeting was to be very careful about doing something so serious because it gives the perception that you're taking the power away from the people.

And that's exactly, in my personal opinion, what the intent is behind that. And that is not something that is acceptable to me. I feel like, as you just said, so many groups are ignored and not part of the collaborative discussion when it comes to major issues in town.

And that is, I feel like it's done on purpose. And I think that we need to get better and we need to demand collaboration. And the select board needs to remember that they are there as elected officials on behalf of the residents of this town.

We put them in those roles, right? So it is an obligation to listen and collaborate about where our money is going, how it's being spent, and where we want it directed, right? And I feel like that has not happened.

And I feel like it continues to happen and it will continue until we decide to elect people that will pay more attention to what resident need is. But, yes, I did speak at the most recent select board against that. No, I do not feel the board of assessors should go from an elected position that we as town people go and vote.

That's democracy. That's how we work in the United States, right? We vote for who we want to see on that board, as we do for housing or moderator or any other elected position.

And to take that position and make it appointed by a town administrator who I do not have the utmost faith in, right? And just listening to the comments here, listening to people that veterans and various groups that are never consulted, not collaborated with, no. I do not feel comfortable with the direction he's taking this town.

And that is evident by his litany list of what he wants to spend our ARPA money on. And that is really tone deaf to me. We are not listening to the people of this community.

I would absolutely support an external, outside consultant. In my human resources background, very rarely have I ever seen internal investigations deliver unbiased views, right? It corrupts the process when we try to go about things internally, right?

We need transparency here. We need someone from outside of this town who has no skin in the game to come in and do an assessment and do an investigation. If we want to really see the true results, that's what we need.

If we don't and if we're only interested in what we want the results to look like, then we should continue to have internal investigations because that's what it gives you.

[Speaker 2] (1:10:59 - 1:12:21)
Sure. So I want all residents to feel heard. I want our town to work together.

I want people to feel confident in our officials. And sitting in that seat, I would like to institute, at least for myself, I can't speak for others, office hours. I'm going to be here from 3 to 5.

Come tell me your thoughts, opinions. I'd like to hear what you have to say. That's been the best part of this campaign is talking to everybody.

People who agree with me, people who don't. In regards to investigations, I'm fine with outside sources. It's fine.

I can't do anything until I sit in that seat. I am not opposed to hard conversations and hard decisions. I want to do the work and I want to do it with all of you.

I want to hear from you all. I want to work with our elected officials and I want to work with the residents. Because ultimately, you want us to work for you.

So we need to work together.

[Speaker 3] (1:12:24 - 1:12:37)
Thank you. We'll just take one or two more questions. Okay.

It will be her, her. Okay. We've got more than a couple.

If you could make your questions real short, I'd appreciate it. Thank you.

[Speaker 13] (1:12:38 - 1:13:52)
So my name is Andrea Moore. I live in Precinct 3. And I would like to kind of tie together a couple of questions that I've seen here tonight with a specific ask.

So people have talked a lot about, you know, the rising costs of living here. And with the ARPA funds, we have a one-time available fund that will allow us to defray the, you know, multi-multimillion-dollar cost of revamping our century-old sewer system. This is basically like a grant that we've been given by the federal government.

It's sitting in our bank account. And, you know, it's basically essentially free money for us to be able to use. It's also money that was designed to be a relief for our taxpayers.

So when we consider the fact that we are sitting, we're looking at a multimillion-dollar project that is going to eventually cost us taxpayer money, but we have free money in the bank account right now at the tune of $2.1 million, what would your specific dollar amount be if you were at the next select board meeting and you were having the conversation of ARPA? What would that specific dollar amount be that you would be dedicating toward fixing our sewer systems? Thank you.

[Speaker 1] (1:13:59 - 1:15:52)
Hi, Andrea. Thank you for your question. So in a nutshell, I would devote all of the ARPA money to cleaning the beaches and fixing the sewerage and infrastructure pipe problem that we have.

We were given that money with a set of guidelines that were pretty loose, but they did not include bonus payouts as we utilized that money for back in 2022. I spoke in front of the select board when they voted to use over $100,000 of that money for a list of people with the town administrator at the very top of that list getting a $7,500 bonus. I spoke then, and I asked them what their thought process was in utilizing ARPA money for that purpose because I didn't agree with it.

I felt like we had bigger fish to fry and bigger needs. So to answer your question and not take too much time, I would take all of the money that we have available for ARPA, and I would put it towards maintaining our over 100-year-old sewer and water pipes because 50% of our sewer and water pipes are over 100 years old, and we wonder why those pipes are leaking sewerage into our beaches. That's basic common sense.

So, yes, I would take it, and that money is not going to do it all by no means. But if we don't start applying massive amounts of money towards this project, we're going to have a bigger problem. And, yes, Lynn is certainly a partner here.

Nahant is a partner here. Lynn is doing their part. Swampscott is the town that's under federal decree for a number of years now to clean up its beaches.

How much longer are we going to sit on this money or have this fancy list of what we should use it for? It's lunacy, really. So to answer your question, I would apply all of our available ARPA funds at this time towards infrastructure repair of our sewer and water pipes to clean these beaches.

[Speaker 2] (1:15:57 - 1:16:30)
Okay, we're green. I also would give all the ARPA money for fixing our beaches. We have to, you know, I liken it to a few years ago we had to repoint our house.

I would love to, want and need, we need to fix it. It's not going to fix the whole problem. So we need to continue to work with Representative Creighton, Representative Armini, and Lynn, because we just have to fix it.

That's the bottom line.

[Speaker 3] (1:16:34 - 1:16:47)
George, I'm going to get you last because you already asked a question. I'm sorry. I just want to get as many people in as possible.

If the topic has already been covered, don't ask the question.

[Speaker 15] (1:16:50 - 1:17:27)
Alexis Runstadler, Precinct 6, town meeting member. I have a budget question for you. Sorry, Alexis Runstadler, Precinct 6.

I have a budget question for you. Currently, the school budget takes up about 65 percent of the entire town budget, and that is probably going to increase more rapidly than the rest of the budget. And when that happens, we'll have less money for other things like the senior center, veteran services.

So I'm wondering how you would propose to fix this dynamic. Thanks.

[Speaker 2] (1:17:29 - 1:18:47)
Sure. Is it me first? Okay.

So, sure. That's a great question. We have to work collaboratively with the school.

We so our budget is 65 percent. The school is 65 percent of the budget, and it's only going to grow. And I we're going to have to figure things out and work collaboratively with the superintendent and the entire school system.

And I am the person that can do that. I am concerned that my opponent is married to a school employee, meaning that because our budget is 65 percent of the school, 65 percent of our budget, she now has to recuse herself on all school matters. And how can we have an elected official that can't vote on school budget issues when it's 65 percent of our budget?

[Speaker 1] (1:18:52 - 1:22:06)
Thank you for that. I am incredibly proud to be married to a public school teacher for the town of Swampscott. I was a school employee for a number of years, and I would draw your attention to Mary Ann Speranza Hartman, who was a nurse and a school department employee and an active member of the school committee for a number of years.

So I'm not quite sure why my wife being a school teacher would be a negative, as this is a race for select board and not school committee. Very many number of people that serve on elected boards in town are residents and school employees, town employees. There's a lot of that.

So firstly, yes, if there was any type of situation where I would have to recuse myself, I would. The school committee and the superintendent are the people who set the budget for the school department. That's not done by the select board.

So I'm not quite sure really where that comes from, but let me say this to answer Alexis's question. It's actually a little more than 65 percent of the budget of the town budget that's taken over by schools. But to that end, it all begins with collaboration.

It begins collaboratively between the superintendent and members of the select board and town administrator. Currently, we have a superintendent who is uncomfortable even sitting alone in a room with our existing town administrator. She's actually gone on record and said that because of dishonesty and patterns of situations where the town administrator hasn't been forthright and upcoming about the budget.

So I think first we have to work on repairing that relationship. So in order to do that, once you get people talking and communicating effectively, I am sure that they would be able to collaborate and work out any type of issues that they have budget-wise. As I said previously, last year I sent a very detailed e-mail to the school department and to every single member of the school committee where they could go ahead and reduce their budget deficit without affecting teachers and school personnel because, yes, I am concerned about the teachers in this town as we all should be.

They do a very big job every day educating every one of our children, not just mine, and certainly not just mine because my wife is one. So, yeah, I absolutely think that school teachers are important, and a lot of them are in this community, and a lot of them work for the children in this community, and that's admirable. So if there was any issue or any need for me to recuse myself from a vote, I certainly would, of course.

I'm not sure that that would ever come up, though, because the budget is set by the school department and by the superintendent, and I think that if we can begin working collaboratively with the schools, again, that we would have a much better chance of negotiating our budget details and our deficits. But four out of five school committee members, again, are supporting me and have my signs on their lawn. So, yes, I think that I could be a conduit to that process pretty effectively without raising any ethical concerns about school budgets or anything of that nature.

[Speaker 3] (1:22:07 - 1:22:34)
Okay, I'm going to take you and then George. Those will be the last two questions. I'm sorry.

Okay, you. Three questions. That's it.

Quick questions, because I want to have closing remarks. It's getting late, and I apologize to the DAV members who have sat through this whole thing, but this is an important thing to make sure that the town hears our veterans. You know, we are members of this community, so I apologize to the DAV members who are sitting here.

[Speaker 12] (1:22:36 - 1:23:54)
My name is Tom Billings. I live on 15 Laurel Road. It's my third year in the town.

We wanted to move here. We're glad we moved here. We attend regular meetings to become informed, so I'll make my question very simple and straightforward.

I listened last year to two wonderful men. They're on the Board of Selectmen, and they put long-range planning for Paradise Road, for the Finnan Square. I hear wonderful ideas about the library.

Ideas, ideas, ideas, ideas, ideas. If this town has a plan, I'm not aware of it, and I think that I'm talking about miscommunication. I don't think the town has a five- or ten-year plan, and I'm shocked because places that I've been involved with and held public office, whenever you did a project, you did it completely ahead of time, and you envisioned what it was going to cost, what it was going to be like five years, ten years out.

Would you be for having a five- or ten-year plan for Swampskate to include the different pieces so that the people could be empowered to use their resources to make it happen?

[Speaker 2] (1:23:59 - 1:24:55)
So I believe we do have a master plan. I believe it's on the town website. I can reach out and find out that information for you, but I believe it is on the website.

I want the residents to feel heard. I want the residents to feel heard. Like I said, I would love to institute for myself.

I can't speak for the other board members' office hours, so people could come and tell their thoughts, opinions, issues, and then I could go back and say, hey, this is what Longley Road feels like. We need to work collaboratively. We need to make people feel heard, and we need to work together, because otherwise, whether we have a master plan or not, we're not going to get anything done, because it's just going to be fighting, and that's just not a good use of time or resources.

[Speaker 1] (1:25:01 - 1:26:31)
Thank you for your question, Mr. Billings. We do have a master plan. Do most new residents to town know much about it?

Probably not, right? And is that something we could make a better effort on educating people about? Sure, and I don't think it actually goes quite into detail about specific streets, like Paradise Road or neighborhoods, if you will.

But, yes, would it be nice if we had some type of outreach to new people moving into town to include things like that, right, where we tell people this is our long-term vision for X. You know, we tend to throw a lot of information on our website and consider that sufficient, but how welcoming is that, right, especially to new people moving into town? It really isn't.

So maybe we could get better at that's a great suggestion, at doing more in terms of reach out to make people understand what our long-term goals are. And, again, that kind of comes back to a lot of the points that I'm making. Do we do enough reach out to residents, to taxpayers, to inform them of our thought process about how we're proceeding with things, what we vision, what we like to see?

We probably don't, and I think that's probably one of the areas of improvement for us as a unit, as a community, as a select board, as town hall as well. I think we could make ourselves more available and really give more residents more information about what we're doing and be a little bit more transparent. I think that's a requirement, and I think that would help a lot of people that are just new moving into town that haven't lived here forever, that aren't familiar with our vision or our master plan.

[Speaker 3] (1:26:33 - 1:26:40)
George, do you have a quick question? And then I'll go over here for the last question. Then we'll have closing statements from each candidate.

[Speaker 4] (1:26:45 - 1:30:18)
George Jason, Precinct 3. It used to be 2, but now we're 3. A little gerrymandering by the town moderator, as I believe.

The town has never had a good relation with the veterans. In the 1980s, the American Legion Post dissolved, gave to the town a piece of property at the corner of Thomas and Burrough Street. The town never accepted the deed, so for almost 30 years the property sat there with the town using it as a senior center and had never accepted the deed, signed it over, never gone before a town meeting to accept it.

About 30 years later, the town decides they built this beautiful facility here, and they decide they're going to sell the former Legion Post until they found out they didn't own it. They had never accepted it. The deed had never been signed.

There had been no transfer. The town then turned around and said to the Legion here, just sign this piece of paper and we'll be all set. And the Legion said, well, there's a provisio that once you sell the property that you have to give a certain amount of money to the veterans' scholarship fund at the high school.

They negotiated with the town administrator and came up with a figure of $20,000. The town then turned around and leased the property for one year to reach out. No offense to reach out.

I think they've done a great job. But kind of a little zing to the former legions to kind of, see, you might have won, but you lost. And that's just what they've done with the VFW.

The VFW property, the current building, was built by VFW members at the cost of over $100,000, along with remediation of the property itself, the land, which had belonged to the town and was a sewer and water garage. To get the right to build a building on that property, the VFW gave to the town five or six properties up in Foster's Dam, which the town sold and they've been developed, and the town is collecting taxes on them for all this time period. Also, the town made it as part of the thing that they had to sell, that the building itself belonged to the town, along with the property.

They didn't give the property to the VFW. They just allowed them to build on it. And now, all of a sudden, the town's exercising their right as landlord to tear down the building and build the 40 units there and give us only 1,400 square feet.

And I think you have to really understand the background of the town, and the town delivered this veterans housing project to the VFW post, who are the owners of the building, are the leasees of the building, as a finished project, and really just dropped it on their lap and said, here, this is what you're getting from us, and this is what we're going to do, and we'll give you a corner of the building.

So, I mean, I think that to really understand why veterans are very suspicious of this town and why every time the town administrator stands up at the monument on Memorial Day and Veterans Day and spouts off how much he thinks of veterans, why most of us don't think much of him.

[Speaker 3] (1:30:19 - 1:30:27)
Thank you. Last question over here. Thank you.

[Speaker 16] (1:30:29 - 1:31:04)
Thank you very much. Peter Boris, Precinct 5, Charlotte Road. I'd like to thank all my fellow veterans, and I apologize, it's not a veteran-related question.

Very simple, yes or no. Do the candidates support the town allowing, the continuation of the town allowing us to park boats and trailer storage in Phillips Park parking lot? Yes or no.

Do you support it? The town manager is trying to take it away. Thank you.

[Speaker 1] (1:31:04 - 1:32:09)
Thank you for the question. Do I support it? Yes, I do.

It has always been allowed. It has been a source of a number of resident comments to me as I've been out campaigning and meeting with people. Yes, I would support that.

I can't fathom why it was taken away. The only thing I can think is that ahead of maybe the proposed pickleball situation, is that maybe that was why they thought that was going to pass and that they ultimately decided to not allow for the boat storage and boat rental spots there. But that lot is frequently used for that.

It has been in the past. It is unpaved for that reason because it is in the flood zone. And yes.

Is it for beach parking also? Yes. Do I think we need to do a little bit better job outlining the handicapped spots that we have now secured down there?

Yes. But yes, I do think it should be allowed. I don't know why it wasn't, why it was discontinued.

But yes, I think you should be allowed to store your boats there.

[Speaker 3] (1:32:09 - 1:32:12)
Thank you. Katie?

[Speaker 2] (1:32:13 - 1:32:58)
Sure. To be honest, I live in Precinct 1. I don't do a ton of boating.

It's just not my thing. I don't really have a problem with the boats. I would be interested to figure out a way to revamp that area.

Like we said, like a Home Depot bucket with cement for a handicap sign isn't acceptable in my mind. I don't really have, the boats don't bother me. I don't really have an opinion.

If there's some other reason that they shouldn't be there, then we can have that discussion as needed. But they don't bother me.

[Speaker 3] (1:32:59 - 1:33:13)
Thank you. At this time, we'll have our closing statements. And as we had in the opening statements, we're going to reverse the order.

So Katie is going to speak first with her brief closing remarks, and then Danielle. Thank you.

[Speaker 2] (1:33:24 - 1:35:46)
It's been fun talking to you all. Sitting here, I can't help but think about my late grandmother, who in 1990 was one of the first female select board members in Rockport. I kind of feel like she would be smiling down on me at this point.

It's just a fun personal reason for running. Thank you to the DAV and Lynn Swampscott Veteran Services for organizing this forum. I have to admit that I do love that two women with young families are up here and care so much to run for the select board.

Our town needs people who care about it. So thank you to Danielle for running. It really matters.

Thanks also to my husband, Dan, and my kids, Thomas and Hallie, for supporting me and understanding why this is so important to me. Swampscott is a wonderful place, but we all know that it's not cheap to live here. Wouldn't it be amazing if we had all the money we needed?

But we don't, and not having all the money in the world means that every decision we make is difficult and at times controversial. There is no avoiding tough decisions, but we can do a better job making tough decisions. We can share more information.

We can solicit more input from residents. We can be more patient with each other, and we can do it all while still being kind to one another. I suspect there are not many policy differences between Danielle and myself, but there are differences, and I hope today was informative for you.

My upbringing and lived experience in Swampscott is very different from many people who have run for or have served on the select board. My upbringing and lived experience in Swampscott is my superpower. It defines me.

It gives me clarity as to what is important. Making Swampscott affordable for all residents is what's important. In doing so, however, I will not forget to listen with my heart and my mind, to speak with kindness and empathy, and to leave things better than I arrived.

I thank you for sharing your time with me today, and I respectfully ask for your vote on Tuesday, April 30th. Thank you. Thank you.

[Speaker 1] (1:35:52 - 1:38:11)
Thanks very much. First off, thank you to Jeff Flander for organizing this event, and thank you all for taking the time out of your busy Saturdays to come down and listen. I, too, like Katie said, am incredibly proud of the fact that two females are running for this position, and, yes, it is a rigorous nonpaying job, to be quite honest with you, and one that I, if I'm lucky enough to be your candidate selected to the select board, I am honored to be in that role.

I will say I have, on three separate occasions, gone down to the select board and voiced my concerns about a myriad of issues over the past few years, and I will continue to do that. That is who I am. That is why I'm here.

I'm here to be the voice for residents of this community because I feel like we are not listened to, and I think it's time for us to get back to common sense and a common sense approach to governing, and part of that is paying attention to our finances, keeping our taxes in line, and really focusing on what we need to have to run this town the way it has been run historically and the way that will be best for future generations of Swampscot residents, including cleaning our beaches, fixing our aging infrastructure, and building back our sense of community.

It's clear today, listening to many veterans that caught up to speak, thank you all for your service, first of all, and I am incredibly disappointed to hear that you feel disassociated from this town government. I'm incredibly sorry for the way you've been treated over the years. Quite frankly, that dates back years.

Mr. Chaisson, Mr. DiPietro, you've all mentioned things that are really disappointing to me, and I think it's time not just for veterans but as residents as a whole that we get back to respecting the people of this town, respecting their wishes, their desires, and how they want to move us forward, and let that be our guiding light as opposed to a laundry list of wants that are not attainable for a town of 15,000 people. So, yes, I ask for your vote on April 30th, specifically, if you'd like to see a change in the way the governing body of this community has been acting, because I really think it's time for us to get back to basics and focus more on what the residents want us to do.

[Speaker 3] (1:38:15 - 1:40:30)
Thank you. I'd like to thank Katie and Danielle for attending this forum. I hope it was helpful to both of you.

And I thank everyone for attending and supporting these candidates. And most importantly, I urge you to go out and vote on April 30th. Traditionally, town elections don't get a lot of people to vote, but if you know anyone in town, please have them vote.

And I'm a resident of Precinct 2. Currently, we have two people running for town meeting in Precinct 2. There are 27 openings in Precinct 2.

I know other precincts have openings. If you do want to get involved in town government, I strongly urge you to write your name in for town meeting. It's disappointing when I go to the polls and I see two names on a ballot, and it says, vote for no more than 27 people.

It makes it an easy decision who to vote for, but I really would like people to get involved. Those are how the issues that we talked about get solved. I know it's easy to complain, but it's harder to get in there and get into the fight.

Get into the fight. Vote on April 30th, and also run for town meeting. Thank you, and once again, I want to apologize to the DAV members who have stuck around, but I think this is an important function of this organization.

It's important that we build relationships with the town, and we build relationships with the citizens of this town to know all the good things that the DAV do on a daily basis helping veterans. I'd like to thank the Senior Center for allowing us to meet here, and for Swampscot Cable to, at a short notice, tape this program, and I think it's even going live right now. Thank you.

John, we have two members of the Board of Selectmen, and I introduced both of them. It's up to them. I don't want to put them on the spot.

I understand that. Thank you very much. Have a good day, everyone.