[Speaker 24] (1:34 - 1:35)
Everybody ready?

[Speaker 4] (1:38 - 2:53)
Okay, welcome to the September 4th Select Board meeting. This is a great meeting tonight because we have special guests on the Girl Scouts getting their awards. And we're going to start off with them leading us in the Pledge of Allegiance.

And we are being recorded so you girls can keep playing this over. Okay, so if you could join us in standing up for the Pledge of Allegiance. And Girl Scouts, if you can lead us.

Any time? I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Okay, so we're going to start our meeting first with public comments.

If anyone has a public comment, please come to the microphone. And if you could give us your name and your address and your precinct, if you know it. And if you could keep it limited to three minutes, that would be appreciated.

[Speaker 9] (2:55 - 8:29)
My name is Michelle Wecker. Actually, Michelle Gosselin. I just recently got married, so the name change is still...

I've been a resident in Swampscott since 2020. And I live on the Reddington Street. And I'm very nervous, so I apologize if I slip over.

I'm not very good at public speaking. But I wrote it out so it will be clear and concise, hopefully. This year, my husband and I decided to offer a pool for use with the community.

Our guests that we have are primarily moms and dads and their children. But we've also hosted special needs children for swimming lessons with mother, older adults for rehabilitation, and mom and kid play dates. We don't allow large groups, parties, or commercial events.

We use the Swimfully platform to offer this to our community. For those who don't know what the Swimfully platform is, it's a short-term rental property share platform that is equivalent to that of VRBO Airbnb. There's no legal difference between the three platforms.

When we were advised that the town... When we heard that the town of Swampscott does not have issues for short-term rentals and that there's active Airbnb and VRBOs there, I decided to further confirm prior to initiating my profile on Swimfully. I searched the bylaws, and I could not find any bylaw that restricted the use of short-term rentals such as Airbnb and VRBO in Swimfully.

Not saying that my research is end-all, be-all, but I could not find it in anywhere I was looking. In July 2024, we received a letter from the town stating I was in violation of the Swampscott law and if I would not take down my Swimfully profile, they will fine me $300 per day. This letter also stated that if I was agreed by the letter, I can appeal.

The letter did not include pertinent information about what bylaw I was reportedly in violation of, nor did it include details for the appeal process. Without proper information provided by the time, I do not have the ability to ensure my own due process and gain understanding of what the actual issue is. I was shocked to receive this letter because there have been no complaints by the neighbors to me and my husband, no reports to the police.

We have always been present and at home and sometimes even out in the pool with our guests to ensure they are respectful of our neighbors and the noise limitations that we have. I followed up with Mr. Cummings via email and by phone to request more information regarding the letter. I wanted to understand what Swampscott bylaw I was supposedly in violation of as well as the appeal process.

The appeal process was not well defined on the Swampscott webpage, so I couldn't start process without the additional information. Mr. Cummings was unable to share with me the specific bylaw and he also shared that he did not know what the appeal process was on the phone. At the end of our phone call, we agreed that Mr. Cummings would provide additional information to me since the letter was lacking as such and I also requested him to provide me with the formal complaint so I can understand what's going on. He committed that he would follow up with me within the next week and a half. There was no follow up until a month later when I received an email stating that I didn't comply with his original letter. This baffles me.

There were no emails or phone records that showed he ever followed up and honestly there's no evidence to his claim. Within the next week, I received a letter from the town's external counsel. This letter did not provide the law that they claimed I'm in violation of and also stated I did not appeal immediately and threaded additional court action.

Why should I be subject to receiving threatening letters from the town and lawyers when my request for additional information is to ensure my own due process is not compromised? How can a town send a residence letter claiming they are violating a bylaw but refuse to share necessary information to assert their claim? The town has stripped me of my own due process right as a citizen, as the town's taxpayer, and as your neighbor.

Is it too much to ask the town to operate with transparency and within the law while respecting the rights of their residents? All I want is to better understand what the issue is and what law the town feels like I'm violating. There is no need for further legal action threats by the town lawyer.

Let's have a conversation and refrain from unnecessary lawyer fees at the taxpayer's expense. I encourage the select board to reach out to me directly, meet me at the table for a fair and unbiased conversation. I don't feel it's appropriate to deny the residents' ability to ensure their own due process and involve lawyers prior to any fair, unbiased conversations.

I have a voice I feel deserves to be heard, not ignored by the town. I truly felt I was trying to resolve things with Mr. Cummings, but it was clear there was no effort on his end to answer the outstanding questions we had regarding the claim, as simple as just providing what bylaw I'm in violation of. Thank you.

Thank you. Here is my contact information. I encourage you guys to reach out to me and have a fair conversation about this.

Thank you.

[Speaker 4] (8:33 - 8:37)
Do we have anyone else for public comment? Ms. Patz?

[Speaker 17] (8:44 - 9:34)
Hi there. My name is Jeannie Patz. I live at 29 Mason Road.

And I'm back. I saw on the agenda that there is a discussion and possible vote on the Mason Road resident-only parking possibility, and I just wanted to express my hope that we have the board's support on that. I speak on behalf of my husband and I and many of our neighbors.

As I previously stated, and I'll stop after I say this, just that we're concerned about visibility and safety of pedestrians and cyclists and congestion on the street, particularly at pickup, with ability for people to pass safely and also emergency vehicles. So that's all I have to say. I appreciate your time and hope we have your support.

Thank you. Thank you.

[Speaker 4] (9:36 - 10:50)
Is there anyone else here for public comment? Did I see one of those Girl Scouts here for public comment? Okay.

I did, but I think they checked. All right, so we are finished with public comment, and now we will move to presentation of awards to Girl Scout Troop 67141. And when we do this is we call out your name.

You come down and you pick it up. Would anybody like to hand these out first? Sure.

I'll call out your name. You know what? Actually, let me just show you, show the public what they look like.

This is what the official citation looks like. I can't see that well from here, but it is beautiful. And this is in recognition of your hard work and dedication to your bronze award project, raising awareness about water pollution at Kings Beach for Girl Scout Troop 67141.

But before we actually start to present them out, I think how about if you, do we have some Girl Scouts that would like to tell us what your project was? Is that okay?

[Speaker 23] (11:02 - 11:02)
Okay.

[Speaker 14] (11:09 - 11:26)
Our troop made a beach bag for Kings Beach to teach families and neighbors about how our beach is covered in pollution from- Hold on a second.

[Speaker 4] (11:26 - 11:44)
Come down over here because we need to get you on TV. Okay, come on. Right in front of me.

Stand right in front of me. And then you could face- And then face the audience. There you go.

All right? There you go. No pressure.

[Speaker 3] (11:44 - 11:45)
Yeah.

[Speaker 14] (11:45 - 12:03)
Yeah, so the storm drain from Stacy's brook is broken and- The pipes are made out of clay, so over time they've cracked.

[Speaker 20] (12:04 - 12:16)
We are one of the last towns that got cut off from where they redid all the pipes. So we were trying to raise awareness on how to clean the beach.

[Speaker 14] (12:17 - 12:53)
We made a public- We made a public bag for families to have fun activities to do at the beach. Probably not kings, but like fishermen's. And we also made a bag for adults or older kids to learn about how the beach is being polluted.

And that's all I know. It's at the library. It's not quite in yet, but you can check it out in like a couple of weeks.

[Speaker 20] (12:54 - 13:06)
We also made a public service announcement to describe and give you more information about Kings Beach.

[Speaker 4] (13:09 - 13:16)
Very good. Do you want to sing a song or anything?

[Speaker 3] (13:16 - 13:20)
Can you tell us where we can view the public service announcement? Is there a place we can see it?

[Speaker 20] (13:20 - 13:23)
Yeah. The website.

[Speaker 14] (13:25 - 13:36)
Do you know it? Bit.ly. Bit.ly. Slash. Slash.

Swim. Safe. Swamp Scott.

Very good.

[Speaker 3] (13:37 - 13:40)
Maybe we can put that up for people to donate. Good job.

[Speaker 4] (13:44 - 14:15)
Okay. So. We have made Delano.

Did she come here today? Nora. May.

Why don't you stay down here? Come on right down here. Stay here.

We're going to take a picture. We have Nora. Lens.

[Speaker 21] (14:20 - 14:21)
Maybe.

[Speaker 4] (14:27 - 14:29)
Rihanna.

[Speaker 21] (14:36 - 14:56)
Emerson Rose. Emery shows. Spencer.

I don't want. In grace. Great job.

[Speaker 4] (15:00 - 15:32)
Okay. We're just going to take one minute and take a picture with all the kids. If you all don't mind.

Oh, yes. So we have. Shauna Delano is a troop leader.

And you know what? Oh, really? Amanda Grant Rose.

I didn't know Amanda was a girl scout leader, too. That's great. Great.

[Speaker 21] (15:49 - 15:50)
All right.

[Speaker 4] (15:53 - 15:56)
What is the next? What's the next level? It's the silver.

[Speaker 2] (16:00 - 16:01)
All right.

[Speaker 4] (16:01 - 16:03)
So when are they coming back for the silver?

[Speaker 2] (16:03 - 16:04)
Three years.

[Speaker 4] (16:05 - 16:06)
Okay. We'll put you on the calendar.

[Speaker 8] (16:10 - 16:11)
Good job, girls.

[Speaker 21] (16:12 - 16:13)
Thank you.

[Speaker 1] (16:13 - 16:13)
All right.

[Speaker 3] (16:14 - 16:14)
Thank you, girls.

[Speaker 1] (16:14 - 16:15)
Congrats. Thank you.

[Speaker 3] (16:16 - 16:19)
Do you like those? That's okay. I think there's some more.

[Speaker 1] (16:19 - 16:20)
Great job, girls.

[Speaker 3] (16:20 - 16:22)
Good job.

[Speaker 4] (16:30 - 16:47)
Okay. We'll let them exit. You guys are leaving?

[Speaker 23] (16:50 - 16:51)
Okay.

[Speaker 4] (17:00 - 17:04)
So now we're going to move to the town administrator's report.

[Speaker 1] (17:06 - 25:26)
Okay. Tough act to follow, but really pleased to just recognize some extraordinary acts of heroism. This past week, Sergeant Locke, Officer Kenyon and Officer Caruso of the Swampsville Police Department and a number of Swampsville firefighters responded to an individual that was in need of help.

These individuals worked to save a life and really special recognition for our public safety staff. I'd like to schedule some time over the next few weeks to bring them in and just recognize them publicly. It's been a while since we've had an award ceremony for some of the public safety officials, and it's time to really highlight just this extraordinary act of heroism.

This past week, I did meet with Bob Powell, Heidi Weir, and Danielle Strauss to coordinate some of the work to move forward with the Community Life Center $100,000 feasibility study. This is an important process. Certainly looking forward to advancing this effort.

This was approved at town meeting and discussed at our last select board meeting. Fire Department is busy with their next hiring round. We had interviews today and a number of individuals who took the exam in August will be pulled in for interviews over the next week, and we expect to have some conditional offers over the next month.

I really want to thank everybody that worked so hard to move forward with our new elementary school. We opened it up this week, and by all accounts, it's been a wonderful success. Police, fire, facilities, school department, volunteers all came together to help support a number of changes in the neighborhood.

I want to thank the neighborhood again. This has been a really difficult process. Building a new elementary school is always difficult, but many of the neighbors have been absolutely wonderful to work with.

There are some changes that we're going to be recommending. We're seeing traffic patterns evolve. We're seeing pedestrian behavior evolve, and over the next few weeks and months, we'll continue to look at ways that we can help ensure that we support optimal investment in pedestrian safety.

Police and public safety teams will be making recommendations to help support changes this week, but also we anticipate that we'll need more community forums and meetings just to continue to listen to folks about some of these changes. There's been a lot of conversations happening around Kings Beach. We're just really pleased to see the Girl Scouts talking about this.

We've been complaining about the water quality at Kings Beach for the better part of the last century. It's interesting to look at news reports from the 1960s. The Lynn item did stories in the 60s of how awful the water quality was then.

It seems like every generation can't seem to figure it out. We have worked hard over the last two years to really pull together stakeholders from the City of Lynn and Congressman Moulton's office, Senator Warren's office, and our state delegation. Last week, I met with Mayor Nicholson, Representative Armini, and Representative Crichton's office, and Congressman Moulton's office, and Senator Warren's office to go over a number of technologies that we've explored over the last year.

We've looked at ozone technology. We've looked at ultraviolet light. We've looked at parasitic acid.

All of these technologies to address bacteria have been evaluated by DEP. They feel as though all of these technologies would be harmful to the microbiology, the microbiome of the shellfish, and potentially would be problematic in terms of implementation. Ultraviolet light isn't problematic to the microbiome, but it's been looked at as being problematic.

It's clear that we've got to continue to evaluate some strategies. We have talked about doing a few more tests for the ultraviolet light, but we're coming to the end of exploring these alternatives. We do have additional work to do to evaluate an outfall, and certainly I'm eager to help advance a solution that ultimately will help this younger generation get beyond the conversation about why Kings Beach is continually closed due to bacteria.

This past week I worked with Chris Huzzidi, the vice president of Swanset Little League. They're putting a new storage shed on the field at the middle school. They've gone through the process of working with our CONCOM and building department.

I really want to thank the Little League for all that they're doing for our young citizens. The Health Department has launched a new podcast looking for guests that have been affected by opioid use. If you have a loved one that has been struggling with opioid abuse and use, please contact Jeff Vaughn.

We really want to get stories out that would help families that are dealing with some of these challenges. We are having a meeting next week with the Department of Conservation and Recreation here in Swanset. The Department of Conservation and Recreation does visit regions where they have state parks.

This is their stewardship council. Ted Dooley, a member of our planning board, serves as a representative on the stewardship council. It's a good opportunity for us to talk more about the seawall at Kings Beach and some of the other priorities that we've identified for Swanset.

The Recreation Department is really firing on all cylinders. We have parties and events almost every weekend. We've had a wonderful first-ever back-to-school event.

We had an event last week with a lot of our young students on the first day of school. Town Hall along was packed. I want to thank Jackie Camerlingo and Danielle Strauss and, frankly, Diane Marchese and all the staff at Town Hall for helping to coordinate this wonderful event.

David is busy coordinating his annual BASH Swamptoberfest this Saturday, September 7th from 4 to 8. We're going to have Brian Mays and the guitarist from the band Boston, Gary Goudreau, who is a Swanset resident. This is a low-cost event, and certainly a town-wide yard sale is Saturday, September 4th.

So get rid of all your stuff in your basement and don't throw it away. Recycle it. Help make the planet a little cleaner and greener.

I do want to invite town residents to join us on September 11th for an event at the Swanset Fire Department. We're meeting, as we do every year, just to commemorate Swanset's losses in that event. The VFW also has a September 11th breakfast at 8.30 in the morning. You can RSVP with the DAV commander, Jeff Blonder, at 617-967-6892 by September 8th. That's my report.

[Speaker 4] (25:28 - 25:34)
Thank you, Sean. Any questions from the board on the report?

[Speaker 7] (25:36 - 25:37)
A lot of nice stuff going on.

[Speaker 4] (25:39 - 25:46)
Agreed. What day is PorchFest?

[Speaker 1] (25:47 - 26:19)
Sunday, the 14th. I believe it's the 14th. Joe Gillette is performing the lead band at the gazebo.

Joe, did you want to come down and talk a little bit about PorchFest? Sure. I'm sorry.

I'm always trying to plug the no-cost, low-cost events. What will be the first song, Joe?

[Speaker 18] (26:20 - 26:56)
It'll be Such Sweet Thunder, so if you missed our concert in the spring, you'll hear a little taste of that. It's a Duke Ellington mix. But PorchFest is a fantastic event, so kudos to Swampscott for embracing the culture, the desire for people to come out and share music together and to get people into different neighborhoods.

So the Blue Big Band, which is Swampscott's community jazz orchestra, Phil Burrow asked if we would open up at the gazebo at noon, so that's a community band that'll be playing Duke Ellington music, and then wander through town, have some fun. There'll be some great stuff, so yeah, thank you to Swampscott for making it happen.

[Speaker 1] (26:56 - 26:57)
Thank you, Joe.

[Speaker 18] (26:57 - 27:07)
The thing that makes me most sad is that I probably won't be able to go around to the yard sales that morning, because I'll be too busy setting up. What? All right.

Joe, could you sing anything for us tonight?

[Speaker 23] (27:07 - 27:08)
I can't sing. I'll trombone.

[Speaker 18] (27:09 - 27:09)
No, all right.

[Speaker 4] (27:14 - 27:27)
Okay, so next we have two proclamations that Katie is going to read for us. The first proclamation is suicide prevention. Okay.

[Speaker 3] (27:28 - 32:08)
Whereas September is known globally as Suicide Prevention in Action Month, the National Suicide Prevention in Action Month proclamation was created to raise the visibility of mental health resources and suicide prevention services available in our community. The goal is to start the conversation about mental health and the impact of suicide to help destigmatize the conversation and help connect people with the appropriate support services. And whereas according to the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, suicide is the second leading cause of death among individuals between the ages of 10 and 34, with more than 48,000 people dying by suicide annually in the United States, with a daily rate of 132.

In 2023, more than 626 Massachusetts residents died by suicide. And whereas every suicide directly impacts a minimum of 100 additional people, including friends, family, coworkers, neighbors, and community members. And whereas the town of Swampscott publicly places its full support behind those who work in the fields of mental health, education, and law enforcement.

And whereas global organizations like Hope for the Day, as well as the town's local mental health partners, serve on the front lines of a war that many still refuse to discuss as stigma regarding suicide and mental health issues is far too prevalent. And whereas we encourage all residents to take the time to understand the importance of mental health education and recognize that taking care of ourselves and others include taking care of our mental health. Now therefore, on behalf of the entire Select Board, we do hereby proclaim September 2024 as National Suicide Prevention and Action Month in the town of Swampscott, Massachusetts, and encourage all citizens to join us in this worthy observation.

And our second proclamation. National Senior Month Proclamation. Whereas since 2007, National Senior Center Month is celebrated every year in September as recognized by the National Council on Aging and National Institute of Senior Centers to celebrate senior centers across the country and the incredible work they do to enrich and extend the lives of older adults.

And whereas the Swampscott Senior Center is committed to be an inclusive community and welcoming of all people, regardless of their race, religion, sexual orientation, and gender identity, and recognizes that we are a diverse community. And whereas the town of Swampscott supports the rights of every citizen to experience equality and freedom from discrimination. And whereas the origin of National Senior Center Month can be found in the National Senior Center Week, which was first celebrated annually in May 1979 to recognize the more than 10,000 senior centers throughout the nation and gain wide support through organizations such as the National Council on Aging, the U.S. Conference of Mayors Aging Task Force, and the full Senate and House Select Committee on Aging.

And whereas in 1985, President Ronald Reagan signed the first Senior Center Week Presidential Proclamation with the support of the National Institute of Senior Centers, and by 2007, the idea behind the National Senior Center Week became so popular that NISC expanded the celebration of senior centers to an entire month by designating each September to be the month of celebration. And whereas in 2021, the town of Swampscott appointed a full-time director to lead the senior center and has doubled its budget. And whereas the town of Swampscott has a senior center that focuses on social, educational, and wellness programs by providing seniors with a wide variety of enriching programming, nutritious meals, and low-cost transportation.

And whereas the town of Swampscott is proud of our expanding senior community and understands that senior centers are paramount to the overall health of our senior citizens, particularly as the center strives to engage with isolated seniors, bringing them into the community. And whereas Swampscott is embarking on an endeavor to create a state-of-the-art center for all ages designated to address the needs of seniors together with all generations in one community center. And now, therefore, by virtue of the authority vested in the town administrator and each of the below-select board members in the town of Swampscott, we hereby proclaim the month of September as National Senior Center Month in the town of Swampscott, Massachusetts, and encourage all faith-based and nonprofit organizations, residents, businesses, and public institutions to acknowledge, honor, and value and celebrate older adults' contributions to our community and to recognize the importance of those who serve them daily.

[Speaker 23] (32:10 - 32:10)
Hooray.

[Speaker 4] (32:10 - 33:15)
Thank you, Katie. Okay, so if the board would allow, would you mind if I just jump to number three and then back to number two only because it's very quick and we have some people online that might not be able to stay online too long. So, Diane, who did you say we had online?

Brian Longin. Okay, so we did bring this up. This is the conversation about a policy regarding the placement of art and memorials on town property, and we started the conversation at our last meeting.

We're going to have a little bit more conversation at this meeting, and then once Open Space has their meeting, we will come back and give a final vote. So is it Brian and Tonya or just Brian? I only speak I.

Brian, you can speak. I.

[Speaker 23] (33:16 - 33:16)
Yes, you can.

[Speaker 4] (33:18 - 33:19)
Okay.

[Speaker 23] (33:19 - 33:21)
Can you hear me? We can hear you.

[Speaker 4] (33:21 - 33:27)
Oh, we certainly can. Brian, congratulations are in order for you, right?

[Speaker 10] (33:28 - 35:38)
Yes, thank you. Trying to sneak away for a couple minutes wasn't easy, but happy to be here. Well, I'm just here to support this policy.

It's been on the mission of the Open Space and Recreation Committee, and I'm here on their behalf, and I'm a volunteer for that committee. It's been a goal of ours ever since we created the plan, so we've tried to research some other towns who have similar policies in an attempt to develop a bit more of a systematic approach into placing art and memorials in town and even leading towards hopefully more diverse art and memorials in town, especially as we look to develop a rail trail and or school areas, there's a real opportunity to follow other towns like Newbury Courts Rail Trail and have interactive and interesting installations. So to make it a little more systematic, we tried to pull the best parts of policies from around Massachusetts and developed one for you all to take a look at. We even received some feedback from you guys in your last meeting that we tried to incorporate a little bit more into this policy, so we urge you to maybe take a read of it.

We don't find it to be very controversial, but maybe it will be. Really just looking to get people in town to come together and decide on what's really appropriate for locations, and we attached an appendix to the policy just as an inspiration for the board and for the town to consider other areas besides Memorial Ave for placement. So happy to talk about it a little bit with you guys, happy to receive feedback from you guys at another time.

I know the Open Space Committee is meeting on Tuesday, and I'd be happy to revise this even with more feedback. But that's all I really have. Open to your suggestions as well.

[Speaker 5] (35:40 - 36:03)
Hey, Brian, thank you for joining us. He's back. Just a quick question.

Do we have any, just in your opinion and in the opinion of the Open Space and Rec Commissions, do we have any art installations or statues or anything where a movement within town would be recommended?

[Speaker 10] (36:05 - 36:07)
I'm sorry, to move?

[Speaker 5] (36:08 - 36:10)
Yeah, is there anything that's currently installed?

[Speaker 10] (36:10 - 37:57)
No, I think that recently, though, we had statues in storage or public art pieces in storage that went up at Phillips Peak, the Fisherman's Pier, and the football field. There was no real deliberation on where those would go. I don't necessarily want to cite on anybody's, I don't really want to say it was done poorly, but it just didn't necessarily have transparency and the town didn't have necessary input towards where those locations might be.

And moving forward, when there's such a situation, it might be interesting or transparent and ethical to bring together some representatives from committees and determining, okay, A, you have a good idea here, go for it, or B, consider some other alternatives before finalizing the plan. And not only the committee, but bringing in some of the public safety officials and or architects in town to assure that A, the placement of another memorial wouldn't be outshining one that's already there, or it doesn't necessarily blend in with the aesthetics of the neighborhood or whatever it is. There's no real, I'm not sure the town goes out and purchases a memorial and art all that often, so it's really about when somebody wants to donate something or the town is able to acquire something cost-effectively, what do we do at that point?

I certainly don't want this to become a burden. I don't think anybody in the committee wants this to become a burden for anybody in the town, but for us to at least assemble a group of interested citizens and add some value to this process, transparency to this process.

[Speaker 22] (37:59 - 38:00)
Thanks.

[Speaker 4] (38:03 - 38:05)
Danielle, do you have any questions for Doug?

[Speaker 8] (38:05 - 38:22)
No, I think it's wonderful what Brian was just saying, and I think it makes a lot of sense, and I think that I would just request more clarification on the process, which I think I got the gist of by reading through the material, but I think it makes a lot of sense.

[Speaker 10] (38:24 - 38:46)
Yeah, and I urge you not to vote on it. We revised it a bit and gave you guys a new copy tonight, so please take a read. Let us know what you're thinking.

If you want changes or amendments, we're certainly open to that. But this is really just a blend of some of the other towns and where it's been successful. There hasn't been any real pushback in those areas.

[Speaker 5] (38:47 - 38:59)
Brian, just one more question. This may be for you or this may be for Sean. Do we have an idea of inventory of what we have in storage from an art perspective?

Are we art collectors, Sean?

[Speaker 1] (39:00 - 40:36)
We generally do not collect art. We have a lot of folks that like to donate stuff. I'm looking out in the audience, and I see some folks that have been very generous.

They'd like to make donations to the town. I generally don't. I am very careful about what we accept because it comes with a commitment to maintain it, insure it, protect it, and frankly, having a committee that can help us determine its appropriateness aesthetically.

Everybody's got an opinion about art, and we probably need a few folks to act as a sounding board. We could go out and inventory some of the art. Some of the art is actually monuments.

Some of the art is things that are out on our open space or around the town, and I often hear people do come and complain about it, or they'll express their opinion about why it can't look more grander or why it looks so aesthetically displeasing. As a town administrator not having a background in art, I'm at a loss at times to always opinion about what the right aesthetic is, but David, if the board would like an inventory, or perhaps if we could ask our open space committee to put an inventory together and determine the appropriateness of some of the public art, we can certainly do that as an exercise.

[Speaker 5] (40:36 - 40:45)
I was really referring to things that may be in storage or not on public display currently. That was really the intent.

[Speaker 1] (40:45 - 41:12)
At this point, I don't believe we have anything in storage. I can check with Gino. I know that we had a piece of art in storage for a couple of years that we recently put out, and it has attracted quite a bit of conversation, and we had talked about perhaps putting it back in storage, so we're in the process of trying to figure out what to do with that.

I'm thrilled that a committee has decided to show up and help us with it.

[Speaker 10] (41:15 - 42:12)
I'd like to just add one more thing. Sorry. The impetus for this also arose with a former committee member, Richard Smith, and desire that memorials have really just been placed in Memorial Avenue by Town Center.

So we initially wanted you all to put a moratorium on that and consider placing memorials in other places in town, and not that there aren't other places in town with memorials, but that when you clutter this central area with many memorials, it can detract from other memorials. So just also encouraging the town to consider, not diminishing at all what veterans are and how important they are and what wars are and how important wars are to memorialize, but there are other things to memorialize in town, whether it's Swamp Scots history or interesting people and just for us to consider that with such a committee. So that's all.

[Speaker 4] (42:12 - 42:17)
Okay. So we are going to add two cents.

[Speaker 7] (42:20 - 42:49)
I think it looks great. I'd be prepared to vote on it tonight, but it sounds like we're not going to do that, except that I don't, again, it's my comment from last time, the Appendix A feels like that's one version, one committee's version, and we need the whole committee as the whole point of this. This would be a standing committee that would be kind of ad hoc when there's a reason for them to come in to rise up.

But I think it's great that there's this structure as a draft, but I don't think that should be part of the policy.

[Speaker 4] (42:50 - 42:51)
Okay.

[Speaker 3] (42:53 - 43:49)
Yeah. May I? Please.

The appendix does say potential art and memorial locations, so I feel like it's not saying this is it, the end all, be all. And I think as town evolves and changes and maybe central locations shift a little or things are built or we'd like to see residents pulled to certain things like Archer Street and places to hike or walk or the rail trail as that gets built, I think the list will only get longer. And maybe to Brian's comment, certain groups might agree that some of these places should not be considered any longer because they're fully memorializing already and we should move on to other locations.

All right.

[Speaker 4] (43:50 - 43:56)
So this will be coming back for a quick vote later on. Okay.

[Speaker 10] (43:57 - 43:58)
Thanks, Brian.

[Speaker 4] (43:58 - 43:59)
Thank you, Brian.

[Speaker 10] (43:59 - 44:01)
Thank you, everyone. Have a nice evening.

[Speaker 4] (44:02 - 44:41)
So now we're going to for the Board of Assessors, do you have to open the meeting? Do you have to take a vote? So now we're going to a discussion, a presentation of the overview of the assessing function in response to the comments made by a select board member at the last meeting.

Just say it. All right.

[Speaker 2] (44:42 - 45:13)
Okay. So first of all, thank you for having us tonight. I'm not sure if you're all familiar with our board.

I'm the chairperson of the Board of Assessors. I've been on the board for seven years. And I am here with Neal Sheehan, who is the vice chair.

He has been on the board for 25 years. And our newest member, Charlie Patsios, who got on the board earlier.

[Speaker 11] (45:14 - 45:15)
I've been on the board for 25 years.

[Speaker 2] (45:17 - 50:22)
That has been a great addition to this point. So just came to respond to some comments that were made. And I'm going to respond directly to you, Mr. Grishman. During the August 20th select board meeting, you made very serious accusations that I'm corrupt and politically motivated. You further alleged that our board completes business, which does not align with mass general law. That I solicited abatements, granted abatements to my neighbors, and that we treat taxpayers unfairly.

On August 27th, you made statements on social media, repeating the same outrageous claims. I'm here to say that your statements are 100% false and unsubstantiated. The facts are, whether intentionally or unintentionally, your property was misrepresented to our board through an abatement application that you initiated.

And upon review, I noticed the error. I approach this elected and voluntary position with integrity. You and everyone should know that I do my research.

You are not currently paying taxes for your finished basement area. It is assessed as an unfinished area. When I asked for the error to be corrected, I was told it had been updated.

Over a year later, it is still not correct. Furthermore, our town staff has been including you in the matter, which is entirely inappropriate. Because as a select board member, it suggests that you are receiving preferential treatment from our town staff.

Any other taxpayer would not receive that same level of involvement. Every abatement we process as a board meets mass general laws, and we have market data to support our actions. No letters were sent by any member of our board.

My neighbors did not receive abatements. The addresses and assessed values of assessors are submitted to and scrutinized by the Department of Revenue every year. I have asked you to be recused from assessing business due to conflict of interest, and yet you continue to be included, while at times, our actual select board liaison has been excluded.

Additionally, I specifically feel that I have been targeted and harassed by you, our town administrator, and former assessing staff. I have been told that the recent article, Abatement Debate in the Lynn Item, was written because you, our town administrator, and our former director of assessing contacted the newspaper. I have documents that I've obtained through a public records request that show you and our former director of assessment shared non-public information with the reporter.

Some of that information violates mass general laws. I interpret this to be a hostile act from all of you. I have abundant evidence that supports our work, decisions, refutes your allegations, and shows that our board has been treated with hostility for trying to do our job.

To be perfectly clear, I absolutely do not want to be doing this here tonight, and it's incredibly unfortunate that we all have to be. I have been trying to handle this respectfully and discreetly. However, your false and defamatory public statements have left me no choice but to respond to them here tonight.

I'm a professional and certified by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts to appraise real estate. Your claims are slanderous. They put my integrity into question and threaten my livelihood.

This is not a joke. My integrity means everything to me. I cannot and will not walk away from this.

Please stop slandering us. I'm asking you to retract your statements and provide me and our board members, both current and former, with an apology tonight. And to the rest of the select board, I'd like to request that, moving forward, the town administrator be removed from the processing of any and all assessing business while we fill the open position for a new assessing agent.

We have not been able to complete any meaningful work this year, and with the value approvals quickly approaching, we need better town support. Thank you.

[Speaker 12] (50:29 - 54:53)
Neil Sheehan, 24 years on the board. Thank you for the opportunity. Normally we only get to see each other in November or December.

I would much rather keep it that way. It's the assessors of kind of a silent thing that provides information, that sets a tax rate, and it is what it is. But just a brief history.

With the assessors in my 24 years, I've served with seven board members, seven assistant assessors, one executive secretary I worked under, and three town administrators. When I first started, we had one full-time assistant assessor, two full-time clerks, and an assistant clerk. Today we have no one because she was left for the job.

We only have an assistant that's 15 hours, that is not enough, and an assistant clerk in the office. Properties and values haven't changed in the town, but the office has. And we've been given, tied our hands behind our backs, blindfold on, and do your job.

It's impossible. And we're seeing today what's going on, why there's issues. We're in much better shape than my humble head, and thank God we have a current board that watches over things, look at valuations, and is involved.

And this comes back to Sean saying, hey, I'd like you guys to be more aggressively involved. We've done that. And it really hasn't worked, I can tell you that.

And to her credit, she does yeoman's work, looks at every valuation that I've never done in 24 years. I just, you know, shame on me because it's my job, but she looks at it, she researches it, she backs it up. And it's not picking anyone out.

It's a card we look at. We don't look at the name. We look at the address and look at the valuation.

That's all it is. Never in my 24 years have we ever done, picked on anyone, singled anyone out. We look at the card.

If there's something wrong with it, we fix it. It's been like that for all my eight years in the town of Burlington. I've never had the back and forth and the stuff that's gone on in this town in 24 years.

And it's sad to say there's no reason for it. The assessors are a silent job. We do our job, get it done.

We've got to put everything to the DOR and follow their regulations. And there should be no other input from anyone else but the board, the assistant assessor, that we're following the DOR. I saw some things that we try to change, and it's a fight, and there's no reason for it.

There's no reason to be here. There's certain things should be done, they should be taken care of. There shouldn't be back and forth emails.

No, you can't do this. Go into a law, cope them in and pay, saying, no, they're not allowed to do that, which turns out to be untrue. We are a board.

We know what we do. We have to be certified. We sign documents that is on our name and no one else.

So I just have some issues that we're not singling anyone out. It's a property. If it needs to be adjusted, get it adjusted.

It shouldn't be this difficult. And I don't know why all these years it has been. And I can tell you this.

I ran, I guess, in 1990, and I don't think I'm that old, but, God, that seems like a long time ago. You are old. Public services and public trust.

I've always followed through on that and always will. And I wish everyone would do the same thing. That's what we're here for.

That's what we serve the taxpayers. That's what we serve the community. And if you can look at yourself in the mirror and you follow that, then you can smile and put your head down and have a good night's sleep.

Thank you.

[Speaker 11] (54:56 - 59:07)
My name is Charles Patzios. I don't want to discuss anything specifically in regards to the topic at hand, but everything that surrounds it before and after. I am passionate about serving in the town.

I'm passionate about serving on this board. There's a tremendous amount of preparation that goes into it, and I spent several hours today on the OR website taking those courses that allow me to do the best job that I possibly can do for the town. And I believe that everybody that's here tonight wants what's best for the town.

And I know that sometimes our emotions can get ahead of us. I certainly am a prime example of that. And though I disagree many times with Sean, there was a statement that he had made, could have been a few years ago now, Sean, and he said something to the effect, and this is the way I remember it, he said, if you have an issue with something, if you have a problem with a board member or a committee or anything that has to do with the town, before we take it to the level of where we're publicly and our emotions get ahead of us so we can say things that we might regret later, he said, just bring it to me or bring it to a board member, bring it to whoever it is. He goes, and if you don't get satisfaction there, bring it to who's around. And if that doesn't work, then bring it public.

I can just tell you from, I took that to heart, Sean. And the reason I find myself today serving on a few different committees and the chair of the housing authority and also elected on the board of assessors and the governor's appointee to the housing authority is because the commitment to put my emotions behind my intellect. Hopefully I have more of that than emotion.

This event tonight is avoidable. It should be avoidable. And I can just tell you that before anybody else speaks after us as the board of assessors concludes a statement, I ask that you take a look at something that's as sensitive as what the board of assessors does, which is to look at property cards and to make the correct decisions and to look at abatements and to make the right decisions as they are allowed by law.

And it's not popular when you raise someone's taxes or what they need to pay, whatever the correct terminology is. The result of how we spend our money is what this board does. And it's not popular, but it's needed.

And it needs to be done fairly and equitably and with no outside influence, especially from people like me in my past where I would throw a bomb. I was really good at it, I thought. I entertained people.

And maybe I even said things that people wanted to say but wouldn't say because maybe they shouldn't have said it, but I did. I regret that. I don't regret tonight saying that these things that are occurring, they're beneath the town.

We can do so much better as a community. And I implore everybody, thank you for working for free, by the way. Everyone here is working for free and getting criticized for it.

So I would just ask that everybody think about that and consider you might have had a bad night that night. Who knows? But I humbly, if I have offended anybody in the past, I humbly apologize tonight to anybody that I offended.

And I say that sincerely. I didn't mean it. My emotions got the best of me.

But I can promise you one thing, my integrity has me now, and I want to do what's best for this community. And I want to do it even if it's not popular. And I would do it, and I ask respectfully, if you have something bad to say, say it behind my back and not to my face so you don't hurt my feelings.

Thank you. Thank you.

[Speaker 4] (59:09 - 59:13)
All set. Select board.

[Speaker 7] (59:14 - 59:41)
I just have a couple kind of initial clarifying questions. So, and I don't actually know the answer to this. So was there a posted Board of Assessors meeting tonight?

Yes. Yes? Okay.

Because I had no idea. I think usually when we have these agendas, we know that we're having kind of like a joint meeting. I didn't know that we were having a joint meeting literally until.

[Speaker 4] (59:42 - 59:52)
I'm not sure if you referred to this as a joint meeting because they're speaking on their own. But just in case, they had to, they also posted a meeting too.

[Speaker 7] (59:52 - 1:00:10)
Okay. And then, so when I came in here, because we don't have any material on this, it says we have going to have a presentation of the assessing function. I don't, I'm not really sure I got a presentation of the assessing function here.

[Speaker 4] (1:00:11 - 1:00:25)
I think it says in response to comments made by select board member, by select board member. So I think the assessing function in response is the key.

[Speaker 7] (1:00:25 - 1:03:37)
Right. What I hear, I've heard a response to the comments, but I haven't really heard an overview of the assessing function. And I think this goes back to our last kind of kerfuffle from my perspective, which is that I'm not really sure what we're doing here.

Are we trying to actually come to a conclusion about good management of town government, in which case we're having a real sincere conversation about the management of the assessing function, which would be great and I think would be nice, and that would include the board of assessors, and it would include the assessor and maybe patriot properties. I don't know, maybe other pieces to make sure that we really understand all of that because that would be educational for me. But I feel like what instead we're having here is kind of a mostly kind of personal back and forth that is doing a little bit to Mr. Patios' comments, is kind of dragging us down as opposed to raising us up. And so, again, I understand that comments were made and I'm sure different parties can go, yes, but that person said this and that person did that, and we can kind of go back and back and back and people have different ideas of where the starting point was to this. But what I don't feel like we're set up to do here is actually get resolution on good management of the assessing function. And instead we're set up for a tit-for-tat back and forth about people, start bringing out deeper and deeper personal things and everyone's going to have a different version of who got slighted when and who did what thing wrong.

And I just don't see how this is really... I just don't feel like we're set up for success here. So I'm disappointed in that.

I'd love to have a conversation, a real conversation, about whether or not other towns have a part-time assessor function and is that right for this size town. That's a factual thing. We could get other data.

We could make a good budget decision about what the implications are for that and how has that hampered us, et cetera, et cetera. But I feel like when we're talking about in response to comments made, the chair of the Board of Assessors has had previous opportunities in public comment to make responses and could continue to do that. And that would kind of make sense to me.

But I just don't. Madam Chairwoman, I'm not really sure.

[Speaker 4] (1:03:37 - 1:04:56)
So I can clarify that for you. At our last meeting, the chair of the Board of Assessors was called corrupt and political. To make an accusation like that is pretty serious.

So if there is a request to come to the select board meeting and to respond to that accusation, that is her right to come. And if anybody on the Board of Assessors has something to say, so that is what the line item is. To call someone corrupt and political, in my opinion, is just over the top.

And for me to say, no, you cannot come here and speak to us, I can't do that. So as far as having additional meetings to discuss the function of the Board of Assessors, to be really honest with you, I'm not sure that's in our purview. We would have to really look into that.

I know the Board of Assessors is working with the DOR currently to look at the entire way in which assessing is handled in Swampscot and whether or not the amount of labor that's going towards assessing is the right amount of labor. So to answer your question, why are they here tonight, it's to answer the accusation.

[Speaker 7] (1:04:58 - 1:05:14)
Okay, I'm left still. Public comment could do that. Then it seems like we're not really talking about an overview of the assessing function.

I don't feel like the title is correct. I don't really, I don't understand, you know, what. Okay.

[Speaker 8] (1:05:15 - 1:08:48)
Daniel? So to your point, Doug, yes, I think it's clear that we have some concerns in the Assessor's Office. Partly what Neil said, that they're short-staffed, to say the least, right?

So that's something that we definitely need to address and we need to work through. My feeling on this, and I've said this to David directly, I'll say this to Tasia, to anybody else who's listening, I echo what Charlie said. This should have never got to this point.

And it got to this point because you brought it here, David. And I said this to you directly, that this wasn't the appropriate forum, and I still don't think it is the appropriate forum for this. If you had made these claims as a resident in public comment, I could understand that.

But once you sit at that seat, at the seat that we all sit at, you then can't use that to make your comments and then not have someone respond to them. That's just human nature, right? We can't let you do that and then not let the response come in as well.

So I have nothing but respect for the Board, the entire Board. Your background, the length of time you guys have worked here, been elected to do this job, which is a job that nobody wants, right? Nobody wants to tax people.

Nobody wants to increase tax or tell people that their property cards are incorrect. So I would never want to do it, and I commend you for doing it for free. As, you know, Charlie said, we all do this for free, right?

And it is yeoman's work. So I am just disgusted that we're here discussing this, to be honest, and that is not a slight on you to say. Unfortunately, David, I have to place the blame at your feet.

This is a personal, individual, resident matter that could have been handled outside of this body. None of us want to deal with this. None of us on the Select Board want to deal with this.

Now I want to deal with it because now I'm hearing that things are inaccurate and that there is interference that shouldn't exist, maybe from the town administrator, maybe from this Board. So now, yes, now like a dog with a bone, I want to know about it, okay? But it didn't have to be in this very public, inappropriate forum.

We could have done this differently, right? So now we're all here and everybody has to waste their time, to be quite honest. We all have day jobs and things to do.

And we come here and we have our meetings to get things done to better this town. We are not bettering this town with this discussion, okay? This is not drop a bomb, as Charlie said, and run away because that is what happened when you made those comments the last time.

And it wasn't appropriate. And I've told you that. That's just my opinion.

I'm speaking as I always do. Like this is how I feel, right? So I apologize to you and every member of this Board for David because I don't know if David will do it, but I will, okay?

Because I don't feel it's appropriate. I really thank you for what you do. I know it's not easy.

I am not questioning your ethics. I would never do that. That is not my wheelhouse.

I leave that stuff to the experts. I trust you people to do what you do. I've never heard anybody in this town claim that there is a problem or that the assessors are corrupt.

I would never make a claim like that without facts. I don't feel like there are facts here to back that up. So I apologize that you've had to do this.

I really wish this could have been done a different way. That is all I have to say.

[Speaker 16] (1:08:49 - 1:08:52)
Is there an option for a question or comment?

[Speaker 4] (1:08:53 - 1:08:57)
No. The Board is still speaking.

[Speaker 16] (1:08:58 - 1:08:59)
I apologize. I thought you were finished.

[Speaker 4] (1:09:00 - 1:09:00)
I am.

[Speaker 16] (1:09:01 - 1:09:05)
I'm just a little confused. I'm trying to follow up. Sorry.

[Speaker 4] (1:09:07 - 1:09:08)
David?

[Speaker 11] (1:09:12 - 1:10:17)
David, before you speak, and I know this is out of terms, I ask that you indulge us. What's happening right now is going to be a reflection when we vote on the CPA because this is beneath the CPA, and our taxation for CPA rides on our real estate tax. I implore everybody to find a dignified solution.

I practice humility. I do a lousy job, but I never stop trying to hit the bullseye. I implore everybody tonight to find a way to back us back down to a point where I know humility tastes pretty good after a while.

It's very freeing for me. All I can just say is please think carefully because the town, our reputation is being defined, or another chapter is being defined tonight. Please take the high road, everybody.

[Speaker 16] (1:10:19 - 1:11:09)
Okay? Does that mean the board is done? He was asking.

No, I'm – No, so this is – I'm just trying to – forgive me. I don't know all the ins and outs. I'm just trying to figure it out.

That's all. I just figured it out. Thank you for the transparency tonight.

That's all I wanted to add, but I don't understand the certifications and the lengths of certifications, what makes someone certified. It was just a clarifying question because I don't feel like this is a waste of time. I actually think this is great.

We have the transparency of the town, and I was trying to understand what is involved with being a, quote, expert in the field given it's been brought up a number of times. I'm just trying to understand from the audience. Thank you.

[Speaker 4] (1:11:10 - 1:11:11)
Thank you.

[Speaker 5] (1:11:11 - 1:13:03)
All right. So there's a few pieces of information that I have. You know, the fact that I would make these accusations without any proof is absolutely ridiculous.

So just kind of walking through a timeline, a letter that was sent by the town administrator. I'll read some excerpts from this letter dated November 15, 2023. Dear Chairperson Vasiliu, this letter is to inform you there are serious concerns regarding the Board of Assessors' discussions regarding possible reclassification of certain properties owned by members of the Board of Assessors.

As you know, Swampscott's currently building a new elementary school, which is anticipated to be completed sometime in late summer, early fall 2024. As two of the three current board members live in the immediate neighborhood of the school construction project, there appears to be a conflict of interest in reclassification of these properties. As Swampscott's Board of Assessors is a three-member elected board, there are serious implications related to Mass General Law, Chapter 268A, the conflict of interest law that the board needs to consider.

After a discussion with town council, in my opinion, the board's discussions on this matter may violate Section 19 of Chapter 268A for either board member to participate in the reclassification discussion and vote. I do not believe there are exceptions to state ethics commission that would allow the Board of Assessors to participate in these deliberations. It goes on.

I do believe that the SEC State Ethics Commission would find any discussion, vote, or other action by the conflicted Board of Assessors members regarding the proposed reclassification that would violate Section 19 and subject them to enforcement by the Ethics Commission, potential monetary fines. So I recommend that the board not take this issue up. Please reach out with any questions.

Sincerely, Sean Fitzgerald, Town Administrator. That's one piece of evidence that was provided on November 15th, 2023.

[Speaker 2] (1:13:04 - 1:13:05)
Okay. Can I respond to that?

[Speaker 5] (1:13:05 - 1:13:06)
No, no. I'm speaking first.

[Speaker 2] (1:13:06 - 1:13:07)
He's going to finish.

[Speaker 5] (1:13:08 - 1:16:21)
There was then a meeting that was held on Monday, January 8th, 2024. Present was Chair Tasiya Vassiliou, Vice Chair Neal Sheehan, Secretary Laura Goodman. Town officials present, Cheryl Michella, Select Board Liaison Mary Ellen Fletcher, Acting Human Resources Director Pete Kane.

On page two of these minutes, under Other Business, LG, Laura Goodman, questioned why letters enclosing the abatement applications that the board voted to send to residents in specific neighborhoods around the school were not mailed. Cheryl Michella said there was no concrete direction provided as to who would be mailing these letters, that it was her understanding that the board voted for the board to send the letters. She added that she discussed this with the town administrator in Pete Kane, PK, who stressed that specific audiences cannot be targeted for providing abatement applications.

They would need to be sent to the entire town. At this point, LG, Laura Goodman, recused herself from the discussion and left the meeting at 1253. Per the meeting minutes of 1-8-24, Laura Goodman asked a question regarding an abatement application that the board voted to send.

It was clearly a conflict of interest and clearly an ethics violation. Laura Goodman had been notified by town council in Q4 of 2023 that she had a conflict. She asked this question in a public meeting anyway and then recused herself.

In my opinion, too little, too late. I also have information that was provided to me by Cheryl Michella. It just kind of goes through the timeline.

She started keeping a diary of these events. She started in fall of 2023. So I'm going to skip around.

I have a few things. So fall of 2023, the board of assessors started having conversations about giving residents of the Stanley School neighborhood a discount on their assessed value because of construction noise taking place with the construction of the new school. Board members thought that when the Swampscott High School was built, those residents received a discount or an abatement.

Mark Harrell of Patriot Properties and I, Cheryl Michella, both did research and no one in the high school neighborhood received a discount or an abatement. I informed the board of assessors that a temporary nuisance does not meet the criteria for an abatement or assessment discount. Assessment values are based on market value, which I would include a permanent negative influence, such as a house next to a gas station.

I also cautioned this would be setting precedents in a town that would be in direct contrast to Mass General Law, Chapter 59. Cheryl also spoke with other town assessors, the president of the MAAO, and they all agreed that a temporary nuisance simply does not meet the criteria for an abatement. January 2024, Lisa Taylor and I were both informed separately by a few residents who came to the office that a board of assessing member informed them they were entitled to an abatement because of the Stanley School construction nuisance.

And they came into the office for an abatement application and asked for assistance in filling out the application. The office ended up with 32 applications for abatements, which were based on the construction nuisance of the school. Several applications cited very similar reasons for the abatement.

[Speaker 2] (1:16:21 - 1:16:25)
In February- This is confidential information. It's non-public.

[Speaker 5] (1:16:25 - 1:16:26)
It's very general.

[Speaker 2] (1:16:26 - 1:16:26)
You're breaking that.

[Speaker 5] (1:16:26 - 1:17:04)
It's very general. No, it's not. I sent a letter to the board of assessors recommending they deny the abatement applications related to the school nuisance because they did not meet abatement criteria as stated in Mass General Law 59.

And there was no market support that the value of the properties declined as a result of the noise. And that since two of the three board of assessing members live in the neighborhood, there was also a potential conflict of interest and bias. I've spoken to the DOR, the MAAO president, and the assessors of several towns.

And quite simply, abatements are not granted for a temporary nuisance. There was no response from the board of assessors.

[Speaker 7] (1:17:05 - 1:17:07)
David, can you clarify? Are you speaking for yourself?

[Speaker 5] (1:17:07 - 1:17:09)
These are notes from Cheryl Michelle.

[Speaker 12] (1:17:10 - 1:17:14)
Who no longer works for the town and was removed from town hall, correct?

[Speaker 2] (1:17:15 - 1:17:17)
I don't find it- Wait, wait, wait.

[Speaker 5] (1:17:17 - 1:17:20)
Hold, please. Hold, please. I'm speaking.

[Speaker 4] (1:17:20 - 1:17:22)
When he's finished, you can respond.

[Speaker 5] (1:17:22 - 1:20:21)
Additionally, so I'm looking at a letter from February 21st, 2024. Ms. Facilio had mentioned in her remarks that there was information that substantiated these abatements being given in the Stanley School neighborhood. This is a letter from Cheryl Michelle from February of 2024.

Please note, the Stanley School construction project that began in December of 22, fiscal year 24 property assessments are as of January 1, 2023. Property assessments are based on market value. The result of the market analysis for property sold within .2 miles of the Stanley School, located at 10 Whitman Road, during the time period 1-1-22 and 12-31-22, shows the average list price as $799,833 and an average sale price of $854,167. There were six sales during the period, all but one sold at or above the list price. So for those of you who want to follow along, average sales price was 6.75% above ask. In expanding the sales search to .3 miles from the school and narrowing the time frame to 6-1-22 to the end of the year in 22, the average list price was $919,182. And the average sales price was $989,636 with 11 sales. All but two sales sold at or below the list price. There is no market data to support that the school construction project has negatively impacted the market value of the neighborhood.

And in fact, the market value of the neighborhood has risen in line with the increase in market value for the entire town. None of the applications received have included data that shows the value of their property has been impacted. Additionally, there's no methodology and assessment practice to show the impact of a temporary project.

The school construction project is temporary. Proper assessment and appraisal methodologies consider permanent neighborhood market influences only. Additionally, the role of the Board of Assessors is to be an unbiased board.

It is not the role of the Board of Assessors to encourage residents to file an abatement, which we already know they did because the question was asked by Laura Goodman, 1-824. It's in the minutes. So it's not the role of the Board of Assessors to encourage residents to file an abatement, to tell them ahead of time that they're entitled to an abatement without following the laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.

It's my understanding from several residents that a neighborhood-wide email and word of mouth has been communicated across the neighborhood. Two of the three Board of Assessors live in the immediate neighborhood of the school, and this is a conflict of interest and additionally may be seen as biased. I would urge the Board of Assessors to review the mass conflict of interest law, specifically the Code of Conduct section.

I mean, this is why I brought this to the attention of the Board. This is not a waste of time.

[Speaker 8] (1:20:21 - 1:20:37)
No, it's not. It's not, David. You did it for your own personal situation, and now you're trying to target them and tarnish them with this stuff about the assessor.

This has nothing to do with anything that she just spoke of. Nothing. And you know it, and I know it.

[Speaker 5] (1:20:37 - 1:20:41)
This is way bigger than that. It's not, David. This is way bigger.

[Speaker 8] (1:20:41 - 1:20:42)
It's not.

[Speaker 5] (1:20:42 - 1:20:48)
Do you think, so you believe, so for the few at the expense of- David, your property card is wrong.

[Speaker 8] (1:20:49 - 1:20:50)
Is your property card wrong?

[Speaker 5] (1:20:50 - 1:20:50)
It's not.

[Speaker 8] (1:20:50 - 1:20:51)
It is.

[Speaker 5] (1:20:51 - 1:20:52)
My property card.

[Speaker 8] (1:20:52 - 1:20:58)
Your basement is finished. It says it's not. That's simple.

She's trying to fix it. End it. Move on.

[Speaker 5] (1:20:58 - 1:21:01)
Look, look, look. You're trying to sweep this under the rug.

[Speaker 8] (1:21:01 - 1:21:03)
I'm not. All right. I'm not.

[Speaker 5] (1:21:03 - 1:21:04)
I just don't think it's a conspiracy.

[Speaker 4] (1:21:05 - 1:21:05)
I don't.

[Speaker 8] (1:21:05 - 1:21:07)
Order. Order. I just don't.

[Speaker 4] (1:21:08 - 1:21:14)
Order. Order. Please.

Tosia, did you want to answer in his- I do.

[Speaker 2] (1:21:14 - 1:23:42)
That was a lot of information, and it's hard to go back and respond to all of it. Sure. So walk me through this, okay?

Sure. That letter from Sean, that was spurred because I went to the assessing office, and I was trying to do research to see how blasting impacts property values. We have a quarry in Swampscott with properties that are continuously impacted by blasting.

The property values there for land are not the same as they are in other parts of town. I asked a question to do some research. The next thing I know, nobody calls me.

Nobody asks me any questions. I get this very passive, aggressively threatening letter from Sean, which you read, and after that fact, months later, I asked for the communication with town council, and I see this lengthy discussion back and forth where it looked like somebody filed an S section 22 or something like that, and that it was recorded with the town clerk and sent to the state ethics commission. There should have been a response from that within 30 days.

I never heard anything. That entire letter was based on just, it was imaginary. It was created.

I was just doing research, and it became this whole thing that I was going to give myself an abatement, that Laura was going to give herself an abatement. Suddenly, we live in the immediate neighborhood. Laura does.

I do not. I stood before this board when the blasting permit was being voted on, and my first words to you were, I do not live in the immediate neighborhood, but I am on the same block of ledge. If you look at where abatements in town were granted, and I have a map, and I could show you, they are not anywhere near me.

Okay, what was next?

[Speaker 5] (1:23:45 - 1:23:49)
You live 600 feet away from the school. That is the immediate neighborhood. I'm sorry.

[Speaker 2] (1:23:50 - 1:23:54)
No, it isn't. There's seven acres of woods between me and the school.

[Speaker 5] (1:23:54 - 1:23:57)
That is the immediate neighborhood, but continue.

[Speaker 4] (1:23:59 - 1:24:04)
Did you receive an abatement? Did you receive any money? Can I just show you the map?

[Speaker 2] (1:24:04 - 1:24:05)
Can I get on the screen?

[Speaker 12] (1:24:05 - 1:24:08)
She didn't file an abatement. She didn't file an abatement.

[Speaker 2] (1:24:08 - 1:24:10)
I want to show you this map.

[Speaker 5] (1:24:11 - 1:24:19)
You live on Lewis Road, 600 feet away from the school. You're a neighbor. Saying anything to the contrary is simply untrue and misleading.

[Speaker 2] (1:24:19 - 1:24:25)
Okay, let's go back. You talked about the sales in the neighborhood.

[Speaker 22] (1:24:26 - 1:24:26)
I did.

[Speaker 2] (1:24:26 - 1:25:51)
You did. And a lot of what you said is correct. The one piece that you're missing is that one sale that didn't sell for asking price, and it sold below, was directly located across the street from the school.

It was listed at a time when the school had closed and construction was just about to begin. The listing agent who listed that property is incredibly professional and reputable. She fully disclosed the construction project that was happening directly across the street.

There was a link to the school building project website which talked about the blasting impact. It showed the traffic pattern changes. It showed that the number of trips that were going to go right in front of that house increased from 900 car trips a day to 2,700.

I took that sale and I compared it to other sales, and it should have sold for more. I am a certified real estate appraiser. I know what I'm doing when I do that.

That property should have sold for more. It was impacted by the temporary external obsolescence of that school construction project which was just about to begin.

[Speaker 5] (1:25:53 - 1:25:59)
Six properties sold, all but one at or above the list price.

[Speaker 2] (1:25:59 - 1:26:31)
When you look at the map of where all of those are, many of them are not within eyesight of the school. There's a property on Humphrey Street. Almost every property in town was in a bidding war at that time.

There's a property on Humphrey Street. You can't see the school from it. The properties are within 0.2 miles. They're not influenced by the school. They couldn't even see it. The ones that are immediately there were definitely impacted.

[Speaker 5] (1:26:36 - 1:26:40)
6.75% above ask. 7.7% above ask.

[Speaker 4] (1:26:40 - 1:26:41)
All right, so we've gone.

[Speaker 2] (1:26:41 - 1:26:43)
I would like to be plugged in if I can be.

[Speaker 19] (1:26:47 - 1:26:52)
If you could send me the invite.

[Speaker 7] (1:26:56 - 1:28:45)
Can I ask a process question? It's my experience that in situations like this, it's extremely difficult to come to a resolution even if two mutually desiring adults wish to sit down in a mature fashion and figure out the facts. That's challenging enough.

But to try to do this in a fishbowl seems challenging. I don't wish to, in any way, shape or form, minimize the facts and impressions and perceptions of anybody involved. I'm not here to adjudicate that.

I'm not prepared to do that. I know that there are facts and impressions, et cetera, that might weigh on either side, as it typically is when there's a dispute. And I don't want to, in any way, shape, or form, take away from your prerogative, David.

But I would like to propose that we figure out a different path out of this. And the parties can decide. You can decide as chair whether or not we take the off-ramp now or we take a risk that we have a crash, even worse, in ten minutes.

But I do feel as though I had hoped and I had thought maybe we were actually going to have this meeting in an executive session, and that was the way we were going to adjudicate this situation?

[Speaker 4] (1:28:45 - 1:28:50)
Actually, we couldn't have the meeting in executive session. I checked with legal counsel.

[Speaker 7] (1:28:52 - 1:29:40)
But subsets of this board, you know, maybe so it's not one-on-one or whatever, although that's a little bit complicated for the assessment board since there's only three of them, in terms of having a little subgroup or something. There should be some way that we could resolve this, at least pieces of it, offline. And I would sincerely like to make sure that we have a discussion truly about the assessing function because now I think the public may be much more aware or worried or concerned about the basics of the assessing function, rightly or wrongly, based on things that have been said here tonight.

So that's my request.

[Speaker 4] (1:29:41 - 1:29:41)
Tosia?

[Speaker 2] (1:29:43 - 1:32:13)
Honestly, I feel the need to respond to what he just said. There has been so much hostility. It has been so difficult this year for us.

We are trying to do a good job. We are trying to be fair to all taxpayers in town. We identify opportunities regularly where we find people are not being treated fairly.

There is nothing wrong with researching and seeing if people are impacted and if they are, trying to adjust their values because they're supposed to be taxed on their fair cash value. We're doing our job. And when I just ask a simple question in the assessing office from our assessing director and it turns into a report to the SEC with a threatening letter to me without a phone call, without any, nobody picked up the phone to say, hey, Tosia, I just heard this, are you planning on doing this?

Nobody did that. This is how it's been for several months now. And it has to stop.

There is no collaboration. There have been so many times that town staff will run to town council to try to find something we're doing wrong. We don't have the ability to reach out to town council and ask if we're taking the correct route.

When they find out that town council told them that we're within our rights to do what we do, they don't share it with us until we demand to know. It is not the way you treat people. It is not collaborative.

It is not about working together here. I don't know why it has to be this way. It is incredibly petty.

It's ridiculous. I've never worked in an environment like this, ever. We are constantly under attack.

They are constantly going to town council. They are constantly trying to entrap us. We're not told about it.

It is absolutely unacceptable.

[Speaker 7] (1:32:15 - 1:32:23)
I'm not trying to take away your right to adjudicate that. But this is what happens, right? Now you're starting to make allegations about other people.

[Speaker 8] (1:32:24 - 1:32:27)
I need to respond. This is what happens. I'd like to hear your response.

[Speaker 1] (1:32:28 - 1:32:30)
Let me just say this.

[Speaker 2] (1:32:30 - 1:32:51)
I'm not done responding. I'm not done responding. We were on the letters.

Those notes confirm that a letter wasn't sent. That's what they confirm. You show me that someone on our board sent a letter, and you can say it again.

[Speaker 5] (1:32:52 - 1:32:53)
You were soliciting.

[Speaker 2] (1:32:53 - 1:32:56)
We were not soliciting. We were not.

[Speaker 7] (1:32:58 - 1:33:01)
I'm sorry, Sia. The minutes don't reflect what you're saying.

[Speaker 2] (1:33:02 - 1:33:08)
The minutes say that a letter could not be sent. They do not say that we sent a letter.

[Speaker 7] (1:33:09 - 1:33:11)
The minutes reflect the fact that there was a desire to send a letter.

[Speaker 2] (1:33:11 - 1:34:07)
Yes, there absolutely was. And let me explain why. Because when we were approving the values at the end of the year, for fiscal year 24, our plan was to look at the neighborhood, find out what the impact was, and address it, which is what we should have done.

We had so much conversation back and forth about this, and it was an open meeting, and everyone was telling us, you can't do that, you can't do that, you can't do that. Well, we didn't have the votes to do it that way, so we were told that this had been done through the abatement process in the past. We were specifically told it was done that way at the high school.

We were specifically told it was done that way over at the field when some new lights went up. That's what we were told.

[Speaker 4] (1:34:07 - 1:34:15)
I have a recording of it. I was at the meeting, and Patriot Properties brought that up. Are you 100%?

[Speaker 2] (1:34:16 - 1:34:51)
We decided not to do that. We didn't have the votes to do it. We didn't agree on it.

So we couldn't do it that way. We wanted to address the people that were impacted. Somebody suggested a letter, and you know what?

It was wrong. To send a letter would have been wrong. We are grateful that we were protected in that way, but it doesn't make us bad people.

Those properties were impacted. We have data.

[Speaker 12] (1:34:52 - 1:34:54)
It was about being proactive.

[Speaker 1] (1:34:55 - 1:34:56)
Can I just say a few things?

[Speaker 12] (1:34:56 - 1:34:57)
Yeah, go ahead.

[Speaker 1] (1:34:57 - 1:38:32)
Neil, Laura, Charlie, thank you. Your volunteers as well. This is difficult.

We're all passionate about trying to support good government. I want to figure this out. But I also want to just say I have a responsibility to protect employees, and every one of the employees that we've had have been good people.

They've worked hard, and they're certified. They're experts in assessing, and they also, many of them have served on boards of assessors as well. And I have to listen to my staff, and when they come to me, because I can't attend every board meeting and every committee meeting in town, and they say, hey, I've had conversations time and time again that are concerning me and are problematic.

I have to kind of listen to my department heads and say, all right, how do we address this? I knew that the board was talking about trying to figure out how to address some concerns that have been brought to your attention from that neighborhood that was impacted by the new school. I had a number of conversations with town council because it is a nuanced discretionary authority of a board of assessors to grant certain abatements, but the four corners of that are really difficult because there's a lot of past practice and a lot of different protocols.

After discussing it with town council and a number of assessors, it was clear that this concept of a courtesy abatement for whatever you want to call it, whether it's some market condition, just isn't a standard that is in the Massachusetts general law in any regulation from DOR. These are definitions of best practice, and I sent that letter to caution the board and to protect you from doing things that ultimately may have put you in a position to get a complaint. Laura, I'm glad you recused yourself because you did file for an abatement and you did appropriately step away and let your board make the decision.

But the appearance is trouble, and I know that that may be frustrating to hear, but it did upset my assessor agent. What I was trying to do to say it, and maybe a phone call to you would have been more helpful, and I've been invited to attend meetings by not one assessor agent, not two, but three. Three of them have come to me at different times and have said, Sean, I'm having a hard time communicating and working with the chair of the board, and I'm having a hard time getting the timeline for the tax classification done because we have statutory obligations to get classification done, and we're a busy town.

We just became a AAA community because we've been recognized as having strong financial management, strong financial standards, and the assessing function is the core of that. And I know we have a good handle on most of the assessing, but this has been concerning. And again, I don't want to get into the specifics.

[Speaker 2] (1:38:32 - 1:38:37)
You went on a wild goose chase over a rumor that you never questioned.

[Speaker 1] (1:38:37 - 1:39:07)
Yeah, I will tell you, you have said some things as well that aren't fair, and I'm not going to get into it. But Mariel, let me just finish a few points. Dick Simmons is sitting in the back row here.

He's been a professional assessor. He's worked for municipalities. He has shared with me numerous times.

He went into Dave Grishman's house and inspected it. Have you ever been in Dave Grishman's house? I'm just telling you, like, for me...

[Speaker 2] (1:39:07 - 1:39:12)
But Dave Grishman has shared very publicly.

[Speaker 1] (1:39:12 - 1:39:18)
Understood, but I'm going with an individual that has an impeccable reputation.

[Speaker 2] (1:39:18 - 1:39:22)
Yeah, it's concerning to me. That is actually very concerning to me.

[Speaker 1] (1:39:22 - 1:39:37)
He is the person that established the property tax record card. And it's your prerogative to kind of question it and push back and look at it, but it just appears as though...

[Speaker 2] (1:39:37 - 1:39:38)
It's finished.

[Speaker 1] (1:39:38 - 1:40:51)
So listen, in the end, if you don't believe me, you don't have to believe me, you don't have to believe Dick Simmons, you don't have to believe Cheryl. She's not even here tonight, and frankly, I don't think anybody should be, you know, saying anything about, you know, the professional competencies of the people that we've employed. Because they all have been solid employees.

They all have expressed concern about the dynamic here. So it's not just the fact that somehow Town Hall is leaning in. I haven't leaned into this.

I've never asked an assessor agent to change a value, to suppress a value. I've looked at every value. I've gone over it with you and with the board because I think we should look at every value to discuss the importance of getting those properties right.

But, you know, for me, it's just... It's the wrong environment for us to have these conversations. I think, you know, these conversations may be appealing from a transparency perspective, but we've got to clean some of this stuff up.

And, frankly, the comments you made, and, frankly, the comments you made, Danielle, about me interfering or investigating me for doing my job.

[Speaker 8] (1:40:51 - 1:40:52)
What did I make, Sean?

[Speaker 1] (1:40:52 - 1:40:55)
You said that maybe the town administrator...

[Speaker 8] (1:40:55 - 1:40:59)
That's what she said. I know. And if that's the case, then I'm concerned.

And that's me being honest.

[Speaker 1] (1:40:59 - 1:41:18)
I'm concerned that those types of aspersions sound like they're retaliatory because I sent a letter to protect the integrity of the town's function. I get the chair of the board kind of coming here and saying, oh, the town administrator's sending this hostile letter.

[Speaker 8] (1:41:18 - 1:41:26)
This whole thing could be said about everybody here, right? Retaliatory? We don't want to go there, okay?

Because everybody's going there right now.

[Speaker 19] (1:41:26 - 1:41:29)
All right, now may I speak? No.

[Speaker 12] (1:41:29 - 1:41:41)
Have you talked to Patriot Properties, Sean? Many times. Okay.

Mark Harrell. Can I just... I just asked if you talked to Patriot Properties.

That's all I asked, and that was regarding valuation.

[Speaker 19] (1:41:41 - 1:42:02)
I just wanted to say one thing. I think that the topic of this was about a property card. This was about a basement.

And I think the question is, that's where this began. And so I think the question is, is your basement finished? Is your basement finished?

David.

[Speaker 7] (1:42:04 - 1:42:06)
Why do we have to make this personal?

[Speaker 19] (1:42:07 - 1:42:11)
Because there's not personal. This was about making a correction.

[Speaker 2] (1:42:12 - 1:42:13)
He's claiming that we're targeting them.

[Speaker 19] (1:42:13 - 1:42:14)
This is what started the whole thing off.

[Speaker 2] (1:42:14 - 1:42:18)
Is the basement finished, and have you been paying taxes on it?

[Speaker 19] (1:42:19 - 1:42:21)
That's my only question. I mean, that's all I wanted to ask.

[Speaker 2] (1:42:21 - 1:42:25)
You're questioning our integrity, yet you have advertised on social media.

[Speaker 5] (1:42:25 - 1:42:31)
The abatement request started being discussed in 2022.

[Speaker 2] (1:42:32 - 1:43:00)
That you have a beautiful finished basement. Your field card does not reflect any permits were pulled. And it doesn't reflect that it's being valued with a finished basement.

Our interim director of assessment inspected your property. You state in your own words that he was on site for an hour and inspected the entire house. So please tell us, is your basement finished?

[Speaker 5] (1:43:00 - 1:43:22)
After the inspection, it's outside of my hands. This whole thing, you're pivoting to, you're like, look here. Look, abatement requests started being discussed.

Abatement requests in the Stanley neighborhood started being discussed in 22. Minutes from October 11th of 22, state this.

[Speaker 21] (1:43:22 - 1:43:24)
You're changing the subject. All right, stop.

[Speaker 5] (1:43:24 - 1:43:38)
No, no, no. I'm speaking. Hold on.

Are you 100% sure that Patriot Properties has offered abatements in neighborhoods such as Precinct 1 around the high school? Are you 100% sure?

[Speaker 2] (1:43:38 - 1:43:38)
Patriot Properties doesn't offer abatements.

[Speaker 5] (1:43:39 - 1:43:43)
No, no, no. She made a statement earlier about the fact that.

[Speaker 2] (1:43:43 - 1:43:48)
I wasn't on the board then. She was told that. I have a recording where they do say that.

[Speaker 5] (1:43:48 - 1:43:52)
Okay. Well, I did a little research. I called Mark Carroll.

I talked to him on August 28th.

[Speaker 2] (1:43:53 - 1:43:57)
Where is he? I have him on record saying that he did.

[Speaker 5] (1:43:58 - 1:44:10)
I asked him about the abatements in the Stanley School neighborhood offered to the neighbors of Swampscott Elementary School. He said he was adamant, capital, that this was wrong and should have never happened, period.

[Speaker 4] (1:44:12 - 1:44:14)
I have the recording. How do you know that your paper is right?

[Speaker 5] (1:44:15 - 1:44:15)
Stop.

[Speaker 4] (1:44:16 - 1:44:29)
Mark Carroll has worked in the town since 1980. Katie Phelan. David, I have to be honest with you.

I was in the meeting. That did not happen. That did not happen in a meeting.

The meetings are actually recorded.

[Speaker 2] (1:44:29 - 1:44:30)
I have it recorded.

[Speaker 4] (1:44:30 - 1:44:33)
You can go back and look at it. Katie Phelan.

[Speaker 3] (1:44:39 - 1:47:09)
I would like to debate a totally different point that was made here tonight, which is that we're all here doing this for free. Because what this has cost us is far greater than any monetary amount, quite frankly. And Doug very graciously tried to give us an out to go down this road.

Charlie echoed that. And yet we're still—now we've gone, I think, perhaps too far down the road. The question I ask is, what is the resolution?

I think the issue is that there are too many issues to be resolved. So if the issue is, David, is your field card wrong, then I don't know that this is the appropriate forum for that conversation. However, if the issue is whether or not we should have elected or appointed assessors, whether or not we should have a full-time assessor, whether or not we should be regionalizing assessments so we're working with other towns to afford to have more assessing function for the board of assessors, if that's the conversation, all day, every day, let's have it.

Because that's what we're here for. The five of us. But you can't open the door and let it all fall out and then not take care of it, right?

So unfortunately, that's what happened during the select board time last week. We opened the door. I mean, we've been doing— We didn't open the door.

Well, the door's been open for some time. There's been articles. There's been now select board time.

And so then this conversation started. It doesn't feel like—I'm very glad to be wrong, but I don't think I am—that this is going to go anywhere this evening. That we are going to come to any factual conclusions to the many issues that are at hand.

I echo what Doug said, that if there is an appropriate forum that we could resolve some of this, whether it be another meeting that is just dedicated to this conversation, a public meeting, I don't really care at this point because now we've pretty much, I think, aired most of the dirty laundry. So let's get it in the wash cycle and let's figure it out.

[Speaker 2] (1:47:09 - 1:47:10)
I agree.

[Speaker 3] (1:47:10 - 1:47:40)
I mean, I don't think that— When I'm constantly being attacked publicly, it is not okay. If you could just wait one second. I don't disagree with you.

But what I would like to happen is to understand what the plan is to go forward, to identify the issues, and to resolve them in a meaningful way. Because I don't think this is it. And I think that this, if it continues, it will only cost us more and more.

[Speaker 12] (1:47:41 - 1:47:43)
We can ask the DOR.

[Speaker 4] (1:47:44 - 1:47:46)
DOR is coming in.

[Speaker 2] (1:47:47 - 1:47:48)
We did. We asked them and they're coming.

[Speaker 12] (1:47:48 - 1:47:51)
Okay. I didn't know if we had to do it through the chairman or the board or something.

[Speaker 8] (1:47:52 - 1:47:54)
What is the scope of that? What are they doing?

[Speaker 2] (1:47:55 - 1:48:20)
They have a team that comes in and helps you clarify rules and— Set policy? Yeah. So at that time, I had reached out to them in March because things were escalating and we needed help and we couldn't get clarification.

People wanted—nobody would tell us what their role, what they believed their role to be.

[Speaker 3] (1:48:21 - 1:48:29)
So when, just to be clear, when DOR comes and you meet with them and you ask questions, is it an open meeting? Or is it a separate conversation?

[Speaker 4] (1:48:29 - 1:48:31)
It's a separate conversation.

[Speaker 3] (1:48:31 - 1:48:35)
Can we be part of that conversation? Is that appropriate or allowable?

[Speaker 4] (1:48:35 - 1:48:37)
We'd have to double-check on that. Okay.

[Speaker 3] (1:48:37 - 1:50:18)
If we can't all be, perhaps some of us should be. Absolutely. And we should be just absorbing some of the information and making sure that all of the issues are resolved and not just some of the issues are resolved.

I hope that everybody agrees that this is not going to resolve anything except the fact that there are facts being thrown around on both sides that none of the four of us can corroborate or understand because we don't have the information. So it would be irresponsible to come to a conclusion because I don't—I understand what you're saying and I understand what he's saying, but I don't know the accuracy and the timeframe and the context and all these things that are important for truth. So I just echo Doug's sentiments that we table this discussion going forward unless there is a particularly egregious thing that needs to come out this evening to be resolved this evening.

It sounds like we've been dealing with this at least since November, so I don't know what two or three or four weeks going forward is going to be detrimental. But I'm happy to understand that if it is, and let's find a better forum with a direction towards resolution because this is not that. This is just back-and-forth hearsay or information that we cannot corroborate, basically.

[Speaker 4] (1:50:19 - 1:50:20)
Can we work on that?

[Speaker 2] (1:50:21 - 1:50:51)
Yeah, I just want to say one more thing. People need to walk into that conversation with the right attitude. And what I see is a lot of smirking and a lot of giggling.

And I have been trying to do things respectfully and discreetly and really working hard to get problems solved without making this, but people need to walk into this with the right attitude. And they need to be receptive to hearing both sides.

[Speaker 4] (1:50:55 - 1:51:28)
Yeah, I think when people are sitting at a board and you're smirking and giggling, I do think it gives people the thought process that they're being disrespected. So I am sorry for that. It's not the first time I've heard it.

But tonight, the reason why I did put this on the agenda at your request was to give you the opportunity to address the comments that were made by Mr. Grishman. So we will turn around and we'll put something together and we'll make a plan to go forward and to get some resolution here.

[Speaker 2] (1:51:28 - 1:51:29)
I thank you for that.

[Speaker 4] (1:51:29 - 1:51:32)
Thank you for coming. Mary Ellen, I have it before you.

[Speaker 8] (1:51:32 - 1:51:59)
Oh, jeez. I'm sorry. Go ahead.

I need to have this. Diane, please. I want to make sure that we have on record what the issues are.

I want David's issues. I want to see his issues so that we know exactly what we're resolving. Right?

And we can get this somehow, eventually, with DOR or whoever, close this loop. Okay. I want to hear what the ‑‑ just so we know it and it's in the minutes, what exactly the issues are that we need to resolve or that need to be resolved.

[Speaker 5] (1:52:00 - 1:52:05)
So David's is the ‑‑ I'll send you a comprehensive list.

[Speaker 8] (1:52:05 - 1:52:06)
Okay.

[Speaker 1] (1:52:06 - 1:52:10)
You as well, please. And heal it out of the comments.

[Speaker 8] (1:52:11 - 1:52:23)
No, see, I don't want to do that. I don't want to piece it together. I want to actually know what the issues are to resolve so we can fix them, Sean, instead of ignoring them and pretending they don't exist.

No, I ‑‑ I want them fixed. All right.

[Speaker 22] (1:52:23 - 1:52:24)
I want to ‑‑ So let her go.

[Speaker 8] (1:52:24 - 1:52:25)
I want to wrap this up.

[Speaker 5] (1:52:25 - 1:52:26)
This is our problem.

[Speaker 8] (1:52:26 - 1:52:27)
This is why we don't fix things.

[Speaker 5] (1:52:27 - 1:52:47)
Understood. But we also have with us our former Director of Assessing, Dick Simmons, in the audience. I would love to hear from him, should he wish to speak and address ‑‑ Honestly, I don't want to hear from anybody anymore.

[Speaker 4] (1:52:47 - 1:53:04)
I just want a list of people. I want this ‑‑ Send me a list. This topic is going to be closed now.

I have a list. This topic is closed. Taseer, you have your list.

David, you have your list. Yep. And we're going to move on to the next line on the agenda.

[Speaker 3] (1:53:04 - 1:53:08)
I believe ‑‑ Don't move. Oh, I was just going to say you have to close your meeting.

[Speaker 4] (1:53:08 - 1:53:10)
Oh, Taseer, you have to close your meeting?

[Speaker 2] (1:53:10 - 1:53:11)
We're closing our meeting.

[Speaker 4] (1:53:12 - 1:53:13)
You're being recorded? Hi.

[Speaker 11] (1:53:14 - 1:53:14)
Yeah.

[Speaker 3] (1:53:31 - 1:53:38)
But I don't want to be misconstrued as I'm strongly against it. I just need to excuse myself for one minute.

[Speaker 4] (1:53:39 - 1:53:42)
So, you know, we'll jump down to ‑‑ Inside the agenda?

[Speaker 3] (1:53:43 - 1:53:44)
Do you need help? No.

[Speaker 4] (1:53:46 - 1:54:06)
Yeah, why don't we ‑‑ Well, yes, why don't we jump over to discussion and possible vote to alter parking on Forest and Mason Road. Chief? That's the other thing.

Forest.

[Speaker 6] (1:54:25 - 2:01:57)
Good evening. So I'll make this somewhat brief and allow questions regarding the Swampscot Elementary School. First off, I want to echo what Sean reiterated and talked about earlier this evening.

I want to thank the residents. I want to thank the neighbors. I want to thank our entire staff who have done tremendous work to put this together to ensure that it's been an all hands on deck approach to ensure the safety and security of Swampscot Elementary School.

So I was asked here to come tonight to talk about a couple recommendations, specifically to apply resident only parking restrictions along Mason Road from Neighborhood to Laurel. We are asking for those restrictions to be from 7 to 9.30 a.m. and 1 to 3 p.m. Monday through Friday. Also, to apply resident only parking restrictions along Lower Forest Avenue from Laurel Road to Sergeant Road the same times, 7 a.m. to 9.30 a.m. and 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. Monday through Friday. That will coincide with pick up and drop off every day. While we're out there, you may have already heard that the first couple days there were a couple hiccups. I want to commend the schools.

I want to commend the fire department, DPW, being out there and listening to the residents and seeing what was going on. As you know, the first day there was some communication issues with cell phones when it came to drop off where parents' cell phones were not working with the school staff and therefore there was no communications. It took – drop off was very efficient.

Pick up was chaos. And that took about an hour the first day. After those two days, the team got together and we rectified that by ensuring that teachers had iPads and they were using the Wi-Fi to communicate the pick ups.

Additionally, while we're out there, we've had no less than six officers out there and approximately nine crossing guards. I can give you those locations if you'd like. One thing that we did see out there was a couple issues.

One of the things at – we ended up having an officer stationed at Laurel Road at the – near the UU. It was – I was out there myself and it was – there was a lot of people – parents rocking their kids to school. There were a lot of congestion issues in the morning.

So we also stationed an officer out there to assist with traffic control and to assure that there was no drop off and walk your kid to school. Additionally, we had a crossing guard in that area. We have an officer stationed right in front of the school at 1 Whitman.

There's been no issues there, also alongside a crossing guard. And then we have two officers, Officer Rain and Officer Wilson, who have been instrumental in this entire plan. They're there to assist with any needs, any evolving needs at the school.

We've also stationed an officer at Forest Ave. Extension in Humphrey. David, you and I were talking about that's a horrible intersection and I just call that the kill zone. I'm being facetious, but being out there, there's just traffic everywhere.

And so one of the recommendations and one of the things that we saw was if there's any residents or anybody who happens to go through lower Forest Ave. – or, I'm sorry, Forest Ave. Extension onto Humphrey, that there are no left turns allowed because you have traffic coming from Marblehead on Atlantic and also traffic coming from Tedesco on Humphrey. And it makes it very difficult for anyone trying to turn left. So those are one of the things that we are suggesting, a no left turn sign.

And we are working with Gino to ensure that that's put up right away. Also, one of the things that I saw while I was out there was the island right there at Atlantic and Humphrey. There's a small little island that if we are able to shave down some of the trees, clear some of the brush, that'll help with any obstruction issues from anyone coming from the Tedesco area traveling on to Humphrey.

Our team is currently working, Brian and Kevin Reen, Brian Wilson, Officer Wilson, and Officer Reen are working with Gino to ensure that there is a rapid flashing beacon right at Atlantic and Humphrey so motorists are aware that there will be a stop sign. Because that was one of the changes that was made. I think that's a lot of it.

One of the things that we're going to work with the Department of Transportation is Atlantic and Humphrey, if you're trying to head towards Marblehead, that is a horrible left turn because you also have traffic coming from town traveling either on to Atlantic or Humphrey. So that is also, at least from pick up and drop off areas, it is very congested. We just want to ensure that the public is safe in that.

Those are most of the issues that we've seen. I will say that it has been pretty seamless as of late because we are constantly meeting and involving and if there's any issues, we're going to address it. One last thing was Nason and Orchard.

That also is very congested during pick up. And so that's one of the reasons that we ask that there be restrictive parking because it's very difficult. What happens is vehicles coming from neighborhood on Nason and then vehicles coming from the opposite direction, from Laurel to Orchard, everyone gets stuck right there.

It's only about a 15-minute time period, but it's a parking lot for that 15 minutes. And so that's where it creates a hazard for any first responders or anybody actually traveling through the neighborhood. And so that is the primary reason to ask for the restricted parking.

And I'm open. I don't want to take too long, but I'm open to any questions that you may have regarding traffic.

[Speaker 8] (2:01:58 - 2:02:25)
So I have some questions, Reuben. One of the areas that you were just speaking about, the intersection of Atlantic and Humphrey, definitely needs something. I mean, it is the most dangerous intersection I think we have in town.

Is there any plan, and this might not be you, this is more of a Geno-Sean question, to paint crosswalks in that area because there is only one crosswalk as of right now, and it goes straight on.

[Speaker 6] (2:02:25 - 2:02:25)
On Kensington.

[Speaker 8] (2:02:26 - 2:02:46)
Yeah. I mean, there are people that could potentially, kids would be potentially crossing from Forest Avenue Extension onto Atlantic on that side of the street through that island, and there are no crosswalks there. So that's one of my concerns.

And I know that you said the beacon, they're putting one of those flashing beacons at Atlantic crossing in Orchard.

[Speaker 6] (2:02:46 - 2:02:57)
It's right from Orchard Road, around Orchard Road, to the stop sign almost where you're meeting Forest Avenue Extension, where you're making that turn.

[Speaker 8] (2:02:57 - 2:03:24)
Because I have spoken to a couple of residents at Atlantic Crossing that are really concerned about the speed of cars these past couple of days, and it's really like a racetrack out there. So they were concerned for the crossing guard because the cars weren't stopping for the crossing guard. So that beacon would be helpful.

And then the intersection of Orchard and Mason, where I don't think there was originally going to be a crossing guard, but there is now.

[Speaker 6] (2:03:24 - 2:04:09)
Yes, we have moved one crossing guard, and we've also stationed an officer there in the interim. We've had that since. I was literally walking that area, and I saw that, and I was concerned as well immediately.

So you have people trying to turn into it. They're within the crosswalks because, you know, you've got to be next in line to pick up your kid, and so that was what was occurring. So we have officers out there to ensure that either stop at the crosswalk to allow that free flow of pedestrian crosswalk.

Or, you know, being out there has also made a difference.

[Speaker 8] (2:04:09 - 2:04:10)
Yes, absolutely.

[Speaker 6] (2:04:10 - 2:04:24)
Being out there with our lights and being very visible has truly made a difference. And so it really is a matter of slowing vehicles down as well as being visible out there right now.

[Speaker 8] (2:04:24 - 2:04:47)
And they did say that the first day issues were really primarily because of the lack of cell phone coverage. So they're trying to text child numbers to the people inside to get the kids out, so that was causing the delay. The walking chalkies weren't working.

Correct. So I think that that is, you know, the schools are doing a great job trying to get that fixed. Okay.

So, Katie?

[Speaker 3] (2:04:49 - 2:05:44)
Was there any conversation about exiting from the UU and not turning onto Laurel and having people who need to access? Because the way I understood the flow of traffic was if you were exiting towards Forest, you got a certain color, and if you were exiting out in the opposite direction towards, you were exiting out Whitman and you got another basically color placard, right? And so that would help the flow of traffic so that you wouldn't be circumnavigating the way you're supposed to be going and help prevent.

So when you come out of the UU and you're walking, to have to have the cars turn on Laurel or go straight across, I find to be a distraction for the crossing guard to figure out which way people are going. They don't use a blinker. And I just wondered if there was any conversation about just saying if you exit out the UU, you have to go down Forest.

You can't turn onto Laurel. And if you need to access Laurel, then you need to go out Whitman.

[Speaker 6] (2:05:45 - 2:05:54)
That has not been discussed, but I was out there with you, and I did see that as well. You're talking about the green side and the yellow side.

[Speaker 3] (2:05:54 - 2:05:54)
Yeah.

[Speaker 6] (2:05:54 - 2:06:33)
So anybody coming into the school who heads through the green side will go out, right back out through Orchard, Orchard Road, Orchard Circle. Anybody coming in the yellow side, to coincide with the grades, they will head out the UU. There is typically less traffic on that yellow side towards the UU.

That's why we're still kind of assessing. But I do agree. There's traveling, you know, just crossing the street into the UU lot, there's still a lot of traffic in that area.

Yeah.

[Speaker 3] (2:06:34 - 2:07:05)
I think that it's manageable now because there's a lot of walking, a lot of biking, and then as, you know, we transition to colder weather and people start using vehicular traffic more in that area, that it will be difficult for the kids that are walking and biking to manage that intersection and the crossing guard, to be honest, because when you're coming out of the UU, the traffic is going in two directions rather than in one direction.

So just something to think about going forward.

[Speaker 6] (2:07:06 - 2:07:28)
One of the things that I've been told as well is the first couple days, the first few days of school, there was a lot of foot traffic and then not so much. It kind of tapered off. We believe that, you know, everybody wants to take their child to school, take the pictures and walk them to school.

It hasn't been as busy, but that's not, you know, it could change because it's excellent weather right now.

[Speaker 4] (2:07:29 - 2:07:29)
Yeah. Right.

[Speaker 7] (2:07:31 - 2:07:33)
So I'd like to make a motion.

[Speaker 4] (2:07:34 - 2:07:39)
That's going to be my question. Can I have a motion, Doug, and a second, David?

[Speaker 7] (2:07:39 - 2:07:49)
I'd like to make a motion to support the recommendation to provide for resident-only parking on Foster Ave and Mason Road as described.

[Speaker 23] (2:07:50 - 2:07:50)
Forced.

[Speaker 7] (2:07:50 - 2:07:53)
Second. It's Forest Ave. It's Forest.

[Speaker 18] (2:07:53 - 2:07:56)
It's not Foster. I'm just thinking it's Foster.

[Speaker 5] (2:07:56 - 2:07:56)
It's a typo.

[Speaker 18] (2:07:57 - 2:07:57)
Come on.

[Speaker 5] (2:07:58 - 2:08:04)
Forest. And we're also looking to change the traffic pattern back to a two-way configuration for the Reddington. Correct.

[Speaker 4] (2:08:05 - 2:08:05)
Yes. We voted on that.

[Speaker 5] (2:08:05 - 2:08:06)
Oh, okay.

[Speaker 4] (2:08:06 - 2:08:10)
Sorry. It was just on the – Didn't we? A couple months ago.

A couple weeks ago.

[Speaker 7] (2:08:10 - 2:08:10)
Reddington?

[Speaker 4] (2:08:11 - 2:08:11)
Yeah.

[Speaker 7] (2:08:11 - 2:08:13)
It's just on the recommendations.

[Speaker 6] (2:08:13 - 2:08:15)
It was like last month.

[Speaker 4] (2:08:15 - 2:08:15)
Yeah.

[Speaker 6] (2:08:15 - 2:08:22)
We put all of these recommendations together. But, yes, that is to – that was absolutely separate. That's done.

[Speaker 4] (2:08:22 - 2:08:27)
Okay. Okay. So the motion is – For Forest and Mason.

Yep.

[Speaker 7] (2:08:28 - 2:08:28)
Second.

[Speaker 4] (2:08:31 - 2:08:38)
Hold on a minute. And then are you making a second motion for Laurel and Sargent? No, that's Forest.

[Speaker 3] (2:08:38 - 2:08:44)
Lower Forest Avenue from Laurel to Sargent. He's making a motion reflective of the suggestion. All right.

[Speaker 4] (2:08:44 - 2:08:48)
So we have a first and a second? Yeah. All in favor?

Aye. Opposed? Okay.

[Speaker 6] (2:08:49 - 2:09:03)
So I have – Motion carries. Thank you very much. I have the specific directions for Diane.

It is from – on Mason, from neighborhood to Laurel is what we're referring to.

[Speaker 1] (2:09:03 - 2:09:25)
I just want to make sure that we're – But follow-up tomorrow with – Basically Hill Street. The neighborhood dropped so that they are aware that this has been approved by the board. Certainly.

We'll just make sure everybody gets the right – And we don't have to approve when you're making something just strictly left turn, right? Yes. You're in charge of all – We do have to do that, too?

[Speaker 4] (2:09:25 - 2:09:25)
Yeah.

[Speaker 1] (2:09:26 - 2:09:26)
All right.

[Speaker 4] (2:09:26 - 2:09:28)
So is that – you'll come later on for that?

[Speaker 1] (2:09:28 - 2:09:32)
We need another week to kind of – Figure it out? Otherwise, we'll be voting every week.

[Speaker 4] (2:09:33 - 2:09:33)
Oh, good.

[Speaker 23] (2:09:34 - 2:09:34)
Okay.

[Speaker 1] (2:09:36 - 2:10:11)
But you're concerned about the crosswalks are legitimate. There are a number of other locations. As the traffic patterns evolve, we want more students biking and walking to school, but they're not going to do it if we don't make it safe.

And we've got to give the parents confidence that we're in key intersections where folks want to walk, that we have the right pedestrian safety investments. Public safety teams will be working with school staff, and we'll be making those recommendations over the next couple of weeks.

[Speaker 3] (2:10:12 - 2:11:16)
Can I say one thing before the chief is? I know it's been said multiple times. I personally texted you the second day of school, but it is important that we recognize how amazingly supportive our public safety folks have been in town to the transition to the school.

Not only are they showing up, but they're showing up with a smile and kindness and politeness to teachers and staff and kids. And I have said this at meetings before, positive interaction with public safety officers is so important for kids because they're here to facilitate the laws, but they're also here to protect and serve us, and kids need to understand they're a safe space. And so, again, I just want to say thank you very much, and please make sure your team and all, you know, even the volunteers who showed up with their say yes shirts, so proud to be on the first open day of school.

I mean, they were there giving everything, and it's just, it's acknowledged, and it's noticed, and it's appreciated.

[Speaker 6] (2:11:16 - 2:11:17)
Thank you.

[Speaker 3] (2:11:17 - 2:11:19)
Thank you, chief.

[Speaker 4] (2:11:24 - 2:11:26)
In one minute?

[Speaker 15] (2:11:26 - 2:11:31)
Yep. The school's been doing a very good job getting the kids in and out.

[Speaker 23] (2:11:31 - 2:11:31)
Yep.

[Speaker 15] (2:11:32 - 2:12:32)
They've really, the police have been there, the crossing guards have watched them all. Excellent. The resident parking isn't really going to do much because there's still parking there when you're not there, and they're not there, like, school pickup after.

They're blocking all their parking in front of all the neighbors and things like that. In front of my house, it's been great because the kids, seven cars are coming out at once. Traffic hasn't been going down Orchard.

Forest, the neighbors told me, Forest Ave, going out that way, and a lot of cars going out that way. The parking, hardest part about this is going to be Mason and Orchard getting the 600 cars into there. My only real resolve looking at the whole thing is you need to bring them in from Forest Ave extension and have them come out Orchard, and you need to bring them in Orchard and go out Forest Ave that way.

[Speaker 6] (2:12:33 - 2:12:35)
Forest Ave extension is for the school buses only.

[Speaker 15] (2:12:35 - 2:12:42)
I know. And that is 700 cars into that one intersection.

[Speaker 4] (2:12:42 - 2:12:47)
Thank you, Doug, and I'm sure the chief would love to have you take them out for lunch.

[Speaker 6] (2:12:49 - 2:12:51)
He already has my number. Okay.

[Speaker 4] (2:12:54 - 2:13:03)
All right. We are going to be moving to our next line item, which is a review of select board handbook.

[Speaker 8] (2:13:06 - 2:13:23)
I would like to make a motion. I don't know what I'm doing, but I want to make a motion. I've lost my mind tonight.

I would like to create a task force. Is that what I'm asking for? Where Katie and I will work on red line revisions of the handbook and present it at the next meeting.

[Speaker 4] (2:13:23 - 2:13:35)
Is it your plan to look at other towns and things like that and just to see and to tweak it? Yes. Okay, and what's your time frame looking like?

The next meeting. We will have it for the next meeting with revisions.

[Speaker 8] (2:13:37 - 2:13:49)
We will take our existing handbook. You'll be emailing that to us? Yes, and I will email the red line to all of us ahead of time so that we can look at it.

So that's your motion.

[Speaker 4] (2:13:49 - 2:13:55)
Is there a second? We're going to have a discussion. So now we're going to have a discussion?

[Speaker 5] (2:13:55 - 2:14:04)
No, I think that's fantastic. I just want to make sure that we're setting you up for success. Is two weeks really enough time?

[Speaker 8] (2:14:04 - 2:14:20)
I've been looking at it. I know that Katie kind of glanced at it. I don't think there's a lot that needs to be tweaked.

There's just a couple of things. It doesn't have a recommendation about social media. There's just wording of some things that I think we could do a little bit better.

[Speaker 4] (2:14:20 - 2:14:26)
But I think what David is saying, and I would agree with him, that maybe you want to go a little bit more than two weeks?

[Speaker 8] (2:14:26 - 2:14:36)
My goal would be not to so that we can actually implement it. Okay. So that's kind of the reason for wanting to do it quickly.

Thank you. I just feel like we need something.

[Speaker 22] (2:14:36 - 2:14:37)
No, I hear you.

[Speaker 8] (2:14:38 - 2:14:40)
I don't want it to be longer.

[Speaker 3] (2:14:41 - 2:15:21)
To redline it to open discussion. It's not likely that we would open discussion. Everybody's going to agree with everything we redline, right?

Or that people won't have input in that. I want the input. There's a couple of things that I just see missing now.

Having sort of lived it a little bit longer than the last time we looked at it. That I think might be helpful or pertinent. And adding some of that and then getting input.

And then maybe doing it again. And then coming back and voting on it is probably a realistic timeline. But I don't have an issue with two weeks time period for an initial redline.

[Speaker 5] (2:15:22 - 2:15:31)
Okay. So you're saying that we would have something to look at next meeting. We'd review it.

And then we would take a final vote in our first October. We can tweak it.

[Speaker 3] (2:15:32 - 2:15:37)
We would have a discussion post that redline. So I'm sure people will have thoughts and feelings.

[Speaker 8] (2:15:37 - 2:15:44)
Right. If there are things that you guys think might be missing, I want to know. So it's comfortable for everybody.

Gotcha.

[Speaker 4] (2:15:45 - 2:16:06)
Okay. So can we have a vote on this? All in favor?

Aye. Aye. Okay.

Motion carries. This will be moved over. All right.

Discussion on a possible vote to reappoint or appoint members on the following boards and commissions. I have a motion for a recreation commission.

[Speaker 8] (2:16:07 - 2:16:07)
Motion.

[Speaker 4] (2:16:07 - 2:16:15)
Janelle Cameron. Second. All in favor?

Aye. I have a motion for Swanscott for all ages. Sue Sussman.

Claire Regan.

[Speaker 5] (2:16:15 - 2:16:17)
So moved. Second.

[Speaker 4] (2:16:18 - 2:16:26)
All in favor? Aye. Aye.

And a motion for zoning board of appeals. Sue Sinrich, associate.

[Speaker 7] (2:16:26 - 2:16:27)
So moved.

[Speaker 4] (2:16:27 - 2:16:28)
Second.

[Speaker 7] (2:16:28 - 2:17:50)
Discussion. I just want to make sure we got a email from our resident appointment czar. And I just want to make sure that we're kind of all super square on this, both this one and the one in the consent agenda, which we're not necessarily talking about right now.

But it is. I think we're all square about this, but I don't understand what the esteemed Mr. Demento concerns are here. But we have five full members and five year terms.

Three. What's their title? Is it associate or alternate?

Associate members. Three associate. Three associate.

Yeah. Have three year terms. All we're doing with this one is this person happened to be appointed just for one year.

Right now. We're kind of re upping them. Right.

It's a new term. It's a new term. But it says.

Is it true? For two years. Is that correct?

[Speaker 21] (2:17:52 - 2:17:52)
Yes.

[Speaker 7] (2:17:53 - 2:17:53)
Yeah.

[Speaker 23] (2:17:55 - 2:17:55)
Yeah.

[Speaker 7] (2:17:57 - 2:18:03)
Yep. True. Your term.

That's what it says on the website and everything else. Okay. Anyone else?

Other questions?

[Speaker 4] (2:18:04 - 2:18:06)
I think we're right.

[Speaker 7] (2:18:06 - 2:18:06)
Yeah.

[Speaker 4] (2:18:06 - 2:18:11)
Daniel, because you're the liaison and you looked into this. I did. Okay.

Yeah.

[Speaker 8] (2:18:11 - 2:18:21)
And I actually talked to Marissa Meaney and the Roman, the chair, and we went back and they gave me the timeline. So as Diane presented, it is correct.

[Speaker 7] (2:18:21 - 2:18:23)
Excellent. Great. Thank you.

I should have just asked that. Sorry.

[Speaker 4] (2:18:26 - 2:18:36)
So are you good? Okay. So can I.

Are you good? I'm great. Okay.

So can I have a motion for a zoning board of appeals? Susan sandwich motion. All in favor.

[Speaker 3] (2:18:37 - 2:18:38)
We already did the motion and we seconded it. We just.

[Speaker 4] (2:18:38 - 2:18:53)
Oh, God. Okay. Aye.

Aye. Aye. And I'm a no.

All right. So now we have six, seven special town meeting discussion to change the bylaw for voting members for conservation commission.

[Speaker 1] (2:18:54 - 2:19:25)
This is sort of housekeeping. It's a update in Massachusetts general law that has municipal acceptance, allows the conservation commission members to vote on adjudicatory members. The conservation commission, like planning board, adjudicate on certain applications before them.

And so this is just a section of the MGLs that the chair of the committee would like to advance. I don't think there's action by the board tonight other than to just be aware.

[Speaker 4] (2:19:25 - 2:19:26)
That this is something we're going to want to do.

[Speaker 1] (2:19:27 - 2:19:39)
If, you know, the commission would like to advance this, it would either be on a special town meeting warrant or a annual town meeting warrant.

[Speaker 4] (2:19:39 - 2:19:49)
Is this to have the alternate member have the ability? Because right now we would have an alternate member that has no voting rights. So what's the point in being an alternate member?

[Speaker 1] (2:19:50 - 2:19:53)
So the alternate member may not be at every one of the meetings.

[Speaker 4] (2:19:53 - 2:19:53)
Right.

[Speaker 1] (2:19:53 - 2:20:08)
And they still want them to be able to. Have the right to vote. Have the right to participate in an adjudicatory matter without being a violation of MGLs.

Right. Without accepting this, we have that risk. Right.

[Speaker 4] (2:20:09 - 2:20:11)
Okay. So we don't have to take a motion or anything like that.

[Speaker 1] (2:20:11 - 2:20:18)
But that's a good. That's a heads up. If it's the board that you're okay with advancing this, I'll forward it off to town council and we'll.

[Speaker 4] (2:20:18 - 2:20:20)
Does anybody have an opinion on that?

[Speaker 1] (2:20:20 - 2:20:24)
If you do, Tony Banderwich would love to talk to you about it.

[Speaker 4] (2:20:25 - 2:20:28)
I don't. Hold on a second. She's on.

Hold on a second.

[Speaker 1] (2:20:29 - 2:20:29)
Oh, she is on.

[Speaker 4] (2:20:30 - 2:20:40)
Tony, did you want to say anything? Because I have a funny feeling that the board is in favor of this. Is the board in favor of this?

Okay. Okay. So we're happy to.

So can I have a motion in favor for.

[Speaker 7] (2:20:40 - 2:20:41)
She does have her hand up.

[Speaker 4] (2:20:41 - 2:20:43)
She does have her hand up. Oh, okay.

[Speaker 8] (2:20:43 - 2:20:45)
She should be good to talk.

[Speaker 4] (2:20:45 - 2:20:46)
Okay, Tony.

[Speaker 7] (2:20:47 - 2:20:49)
You have to unmute yourself, though.

[Speaker 4] (2:20:56 - 2:21:01)
Tony, are you there? All right.

[Speaker 19] (2:21:01 - 2:21:03)
He's saying she also is in favor.

[Speaker 4] (2:21:03 - 2:21:09)
I think she's in favor, too. She must have withdrawn. All right.

So can we have a motion? So moved.

[Speaker 7] (2:21:09 - 2:21:10)
Second.

[Speaker 4] (2:21:10 - 2:21:11)
All in favor? Aye.

[Speaker 3] (2:21:12 - 2:21:15)
What did. Can you clarify what exactly we voted on?

[Speaker 4] (2:21:16 - 2:21:18)
To give Sean. Our support.

[Speaker 3] (2:21:18 - 2:21:18)
Yes.

[Speaker 4] (2:21:19 - 2:21:26)
Okay. Aye. So if we should have a special town meeting, this will be.

No surprises. This is. It will be no surprises.

[Speaker 13] (2:21:26 - 2:21:33)
I just figured out how to unmute myself. I could give you my interpretation of what's going on.

[Speaker 4] (2:21:33 - 2:21:34)
Okay.

[Speaker 13] (2:21:35 - 2:23:17)
So there's actually two things. One is a mass general law that allows. If a member is absent from a meeting.

That they can still go to the next meeting and vote as long as they. Review the record from the meeting they missed. That's a general law chapter 39, 23 D.

And I did run this by Kiki law. Which indicated that it would have to go to town meeting. To be approved.

The second one concerns. The. Having an alternate that can vote.

We do have. Mistakenly. Called him an alternate.

He's an associate member. A non voting associate member. And to have an alternate, which means he can vote.

The chair decides that there's an absence and we need another. Member. In order to have a quorum, which is always a problem with.

Committees and the commission. Is making sure we have a quorum. This one.

Is actually even a little more difficult, but also we'll have to go to town meeting, but it also has to get approved. By the state legislature. And I did run this by KP law.

And in both cases, KP law has given us. A draft warrant article. Which can be circulated to the board to look at.

And I'm happy to answer any questions. You may have.

[Speaker 8] (2:23:19 - 2:23:27)
Tony, I have one question and it's just regarding. How frequently do you reach out to KP law? And is that done through the town town staff?

[Speaker 13] (2:23:28 - 2:23:49)
I always. I always ask Sean. If I have a question, if it would be okay.

If I could ask KP law. And when it's something like this, which. Wouldn't necessitate going to town meeting.

I certainly don't want to take it upon the commission. To do that ourself without having some legal guidance.

[Speaker 8] (2:23:49 - 2:23:51)
Right. No, I, I completely.

[Speaker 1] (2:23:51 - 2:24:23)
No board or committee member. And expend money. Right.

And essentially reach out to town council is spending money. That's my concern. Without my authorization.

Just because at the end of the day. If the town budget. Is overexpended.

You're looking for me. You're not looking for a board of committee. Right.

I generally. You know, if it's a question that we can answer going to the MMA or getting going to another source, like typically we go down that path. If it's something that we.

Have dealt with before. You know, that we have a legal response. We don't go back and ask town council again.

[Speaker 23] (2:24:24 - 2:24:24)
Right. Right.

[Speaker 1] (2:24:25 - 2:24:32)
I usually, you know, I, I rarely ever have said no. We can't talk to legal counsel. I just try to.

[Speaker 8] (2:24:33 - 2:24:36)
That makes me nervous from a financial standpoint, but that's.

[Speaker 1] (2:24:36 - 2:24:37)
I know, but.

[Speaker 8] (2:24:37 - 2:24:39)
I know what you're saying. I just want to make sure it's resonated.

[Speaker 1] (2:24:39 - 2:24:42)
You know, you wind up in a. Yeah. A situation.

[Speaker 4] (2:24:42 - 2:25:11)
All right. We're all set. Yeah.

Okay. Okay. Okay.

So now we're going to move to Tony. You're all set, right? Yes.

Okay. Thank you. Now we're going to move to our consent agenda.

And I would like to pull out the minutes for eight 20. I didn't get a chance to finish those up. So I'd like to have a motion to approve the consent agenda.

Minus item number three. Vote to approve minutes.

[Speaker 15] (2:25:11 - 2:25:16)
So move. Wait a minute. Okay.

Sorry. I'd like to pull out number one. So.

[Speaker 7] (2:25:17 - 2:25:17)
Yeah.

[Speaker 4] (2:25:18 - 2:25:20)
You want to pull out number one?

[Speaker 8] (2:25:20 - 2:25:37)
Yeah. That shouldn't be alternate, right? That should be associate.

Oh, I don't know. It came through as alternate when I was talking to Marissa. Yeah.

It should be associate. That's all. Yeah.

So we'll just. Okay.

[Speaker 4] (2:25:37 - 2:26:07)
So change that to associate. Okay. So could we have a motion to approve the consent agenda?

Minus number three. Second. Katie.

Oh, good. All in favor. Aye.

Aye. So moved. Select board time.

I'm good. Daniel's good. Doug.

[Speaker 22] (2:26:11 - 2:26:20)
David. So we're, uh, what is this? we're not officially talking about the Fontobra Fest this weekend, four to eight town hall.

Hope to see everybody there. This is the fifth. Yeah.

Congrats, David.

[Speaker 3] (2:26:20 - 2:26:25)
Katie. Townwide yard sale. Same day.

Yeah.

[Speaker 5] (2:26:26 - 2:26:28)
It's the seventh, isn't it? Or is it the 14th?

[Speaker 3] (2:26:29 - 2:26:38)
Oh, you should start getting ready for it. You should be cleaning out your, um, closets and basements. There you go.

for the Townwide Yard Sale, which is the 14th.

[Speaker 4] (2:26:39 - 2:27:22)
So I have one thing to say for select board time. We talk about yard sales. We talk about concerts.

We talk about beer gardens. We talk about a lot of things and the importance of community. The most important thing about community is being respectful to each other.

And I don't think that throwing bombs at each other is a sign of community. So I would really like, in the future, if people have issues, go to the source first. I'm disappointed in what's happened at the last two meetings, and I'm hopeful that we can just move on and do better.

And that's my time.

[Speaker 1] (2:27:23 - 2:27:33)
I bet we can make some progress. I think there are good people, and I think we just need to sit down and have some careful conversations. I think there's stuff on both sides that people have to be.

[Speaker 4] (2:27:33 - 2:27:50)
There always is. So we will do better. Thank you, board of assessors, for coming.

And we will be back. Oh, wait, wait, no, no, it's not a motion to adjourn. I also want to thank Joe Dulette and Nate Beischheim for handling the media tonight.

Thank you, gentlemen.

[Speaker 7] (2:27:50 - 2:28:14)
One more thing. Housing series. Swampscott Senior Center has put together this amazing series about affordable housing, pathways to housing as we age, et cetera, et cetera.

That's the moderator. Starts September 16th. Despite the moderator, it's going to be a great, great series of events starting September 16th.

[Speaker 23] (2:28:14 - 2:28:15)
638.

[Speaker 3] (2:28:18 - 2:28:21)
OK, thank you. David, do you want to say it again?

[Speaker 5] (2:28:22 - 2:28:23)
Motion to adjourn.

[Speaker 3] (2:28:23 - 2:28:25)
Second. All in favor?

[Speaker 5] (2:28:25 - 2:28:25)
Aye.

[Speaker 22] (2:28:26 - 2:28:26)
Aye.

[Speaker 24] (2:28:26 - 2:28:27)
Motion carries.