Fall Town Meeting 2007

[Tom]

The Oct. 15 Town Meeting will be asked to vote on 10 articles, including the creation of a capital reserve fund, in the final version of the warrant approved by selectmen Tuesday night. The town has an unusually hefty amount of free cash this year -- $4.7 million.

Of that, $754,000 comes from additional state reimbursement for the high school, Elm and Boyden construction projects. The state agreed to cover its share of the interest costs on bond anticipation notes. Boynton would use that money to seed the proposed capital reserve fund, which he estimated could earn $35,000 or so a year to help pay for improvements to buildings and equipment.

Also contributing to free cash are $1 million in building fees paid on the expansion of the Siemens facility on Coney Street. Another $620,000 comes in special education Medicaid reimbursements, which a routing fall TM article calls for turning over to the schools. In addition, the town closed out FY07 $1 million on the plus side for the 12 months, Boynton said.

A capital article on the warrant could be used to provide money for sprinklers in portable classrooms at Old Post Elementary School and smoke detectors at Bird and Johnson middle schools, he said. The smoke detector projects could cost $360,000, he said.

An article asks for rezoning for construction of an office building on Route 1 in Walpole at the site of the warehouse on Common Street.

Boynton said he expects there'll be an update at Town Meeting on a rezoning study and on the effort to create a housing production plan that would give the town more leverage in dealing with 40B housing proposals.

[Tom]

Fall Town Meeting finished in one session Monday night, Oct. 15, rezoning land off Route 1 for an office building and agreeing, after some discussion, to put $754,000 into a new fund for debt service.

On the petition of Charles Zarba, Town Meeting rezoned five acres he owns behind both his existing office building on Route 1 and a moving company warehouse on Old Post Road he is acquiring to build a new office building with retail space. The five acres is being rezoned from residential to highway business so it can be used for parking for the new building, James Brady, Zarba's attorney, told Town Meeting.

After TM Rep. Susanne Murphy, who's also on the zoning board, mentioned that she'd heard a Lowe's home improvement store was a possibility, Brady said he too had heard lots of talk, but that Zarba's plan is for a 55,000-square-foot office building. He noted the plan requires approval by town boards and the five acres are to be restricted by deed to parking only.

Before the town sold the five-acre parcel it had taken for taxes back to Zarba, selectmen dedicated the land as open space -- changing that will require an act of the Legislature. When selectmen authorized an auction for the land, they imposed a restriction that the residentially zoned property could not be used for housing, an added safeguard against a 40B. Zarba was the only bidder, paying $135,000 or so for a parcel he lost a few years earlier on a $12,000 tax bill. The parcel is landlocked, and while there's been talk that Zarba did "quite well," the town got "very fair value" for the land, Brady said. He noted that the new building is expected to net the town more than $100,000 in additional property taxes annually.

Charles Hershman of Sharon Country Day School (which is in Walpole) urged Town Meeting to consider the impact on his camp and the aquifer. Brady responded that the plan calls for maintaining a wooded buffer alongside the camp four times the required 40 feet. The rezoning passed easily on a voice vote.

Three Town Meeting representatives said they would prefer to see the $754,000 additional the town is receiving from the state for three school projects go to cut tax bills rather than seeding a new debt reserve fund. Town Administrator Michael Boynton said if the money works out to as little as $50 a household. The article passed easily.

In presentation on the proposal for a new library, Trustee Maura Rudolph indicated townspeople could be asked for an override at the November, 2008, election. A state grant of $4 million could cover 30 percent of the cost, and the library is seeking private funds now.

Representatives agreed to a special Town Meeting next March on zoning; the planning board is to host four more forums through January before the draft is put into final form for action by Town Meeting.

Recent version of draft (http://th.walpole.ma.us/ZoningBylaw9-12-07.pdf)