Who gets final say on plans to redo parking at the General Store and the sidewalks in the center of town? The answer, apparently, has been hiding in plain sight for more than a dozen years: It’s the Select Board, Town Counsel Mark Lanza declared last week.
The board’s jurisdiction is spelled out in the minutes of the Oct. 10, 2007, Special Town Meeting, Lanza wrote in a Nov. 13 letter to the Select Board. At that meeting, the record shows, attendees approved two articles that transferred care, custody, management, and control of rental income of town Common land between the General Store and the Congregational Church from the Parks and Recreation Commission to the Board of Selectmen. Articles 12 and 13 also empowered the board to sell or otherwise dispose of the land as they saw fit, including the authority to grant easements to the store and church for use of the property, albeit without the board’s giving up its right to alter its “use or surface” in the future. The full text of the articles can be found in the 2007 Annual Town Report.
The 2007 meeting was attended by 382 voters and both articles passed by the required two-thirds vote, with only a smattering of “nays.” Three months later, in January 2008, selectmen Lucy Wallace, Tim Clark, and Bob Eubank, and Town Administrator Tim Bragan granted three easements—two for the store and one for the church—each for the price of a dollar. The three grants were recorded at the Worcester Registry of Deeds Feb. 5, 2008.
Two easements, designated “A” and “C,” allowed the store and church to each upgrade their septic systems, using plots adjacent to their buildings. Both expired, by design, when the owners connected to the new town center sewer system.
The third easement, labeled “B,” is a “non-exclusive” easement granted to the General Store “permitting access, ingress and egress on foot and by motorized and non-motorized vehicles and parking for the owners, employees, agents, suppliers, customers and all other visitors or invitees” to the General Store. Easement B covers the entire parking area in front of the store and was granted to the owner “in perpetuity.” However, like the other two easements, while “B” obligates the Select Board to notify the store owners of any changes planned for the area, it does not require their consent.
While Lanza’s letter deals explicitly with easement “A” only, the minutes of the 2007 Special Town Meeting make clear that the Select Board’s authority applies to the entire property, which includes all three easements as shown on a plan prepared by David Ross Associates for the town in September 2007.
The impact of these findings is to move final approval of the controversial Complete Streets proposal for new parking and sidewalks in town center to the Select Board, which will vote on the plan at its Dec. 3 meeting. Parks and Rec, which until last week was thought to have jurisdiction, had been prepared to vote on the proposal Monday night, but Chair Doug Thornton dropped the item from his agenda on learning of Lanza’s letter. The Historical Commission—advised by Lanza that it has no jurisdiction over the property—voted Oct. 30 to take no action. Finally, the Planning Board—which had been waiting for the vote of Parks and Rec—voted unanimously Monday night to approve the latest site plan, with waivers, clearing the way for the Select Board to approve or reject the project.
As of Monday night, Parks and Rec members were only beginning to grapple with the implications of Lanza’s finding. The commission continues to have jurisdiction over the rest of the Common and town parks and athletic fields, but member Joe Reynolds and others want town officials to provide a list of the properties for which the commission is responsible and, if needed, a town meeting vote to formalize their jurisdiction.
The commission has continued to purchase picnic tables and bike racks, make plans for a community patio, and issue permits for such uses as the construction of a temporary ice skating rink and the sale of Christmas trees by the Bromfield Baseball Booster Club. Issuing permits for such uses in the future would presumably be the responsibility of the Select Board. When Columbia Pictures came to town last year and built a set for “Little Women” on the property, the Select Board, through Bragan, handled negotiations, setting and collecting fees for its use, and drawing objections from the commission that in retrospect could have been settled by a reading of the 2007 Town Report.
Although Parks and Rec has been preparing to build a community patio once the Complete Streets project is done, former member Bob O’Shea, who has been leading the effort, said Monday that responsibility for the project properly belongs now to the Select Board, and he appeared at this week’s Select Board meeting to wash his hands of the project.
For those pushing for changes to the Complete Streets plan, such as eliminating the sidewalk in front of the General, it’s the members of the Select Board they need to convince. DPW Director Tim Kilhart warned Monday in an informal discussion with the Press that any such changes would require a redo of the entire plan, increasing the cost of the project, delaying its start, while changes to the sidewalk could derail it entirely. At Planning Board Monday night, planner Chris Ryan said that walking away from this year’s $370,000 Complete Streets grant could jeopardize future applications for funding, such as the proposed multimillion dollar upgrade to Ayer Road.
General Store manager Scott Hayward told the Press that while the letter of the law may give the Select Board authority to act unilaterally to approve the Complete Streets proposal, doing so without giving stakeholders a chance to contribute violated the democratic values of the community.
