Leverett Town Seal

Massachusetts

Leverett

Town of Leverett
9 Montague Road
Leverett, MA 01054
Town Clerk: (413) 548-9150
Tax Collector: (413) 548-9666
Assessor: (413) 548-4945
Town Hall Fax: (413) 548-1035
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Select Board/FinCom/Capital Planning

Tuesday, March 3, 2020, 7:00 pm until 9:00 pm
Public Safety Complex
A meeting of the Selectboard

Meeting of Selectboard

Members: (Quorum)

  • Absent: Peter d'Errico, Chair
  • Present: Tom Hankinson, at 7:00 PM
  • Present: Julie Shively, at 7:00 PM

Also Present:

  • Present at Town Hall: Margie M. and Tom H. Present by conference call due to COVID 19 outbreak: Peter d.
  • Julie S.
  • Lisa S.
  • Jerri H. for the Montague Reporter
  • Denzel H.

See original Agenda Final Minutes

Meeting opened: 7:00 PM

Meeting closed: 10:02 PM

  1. Meeting Preliminaries

  2. Appointments

    • 7:00 : Select Board, Finanace Committee, Capital Planning - With FinCom--which dept. increases go into the budget for budget hearing With Capital Planning--which Capital Requests to put on warrant

      General Discussion...
      Leverett Town Hall, 7 pm
      Present: Julie S., Peter D., Tom H. from Selectboard and Ann D., Phil C., Gregg W., Jed P., Steve N., from Finance Committee plus Margie M., and Gerri from the Montague Reporter

      Capital Planning
      Wes Gosinsky and Ricky Roberts joined the meeting to discuss the capital items they are recommending for funding this year. Each item was gone through. The Police and Fire radios cost is still unclear. Agreed to fund the new excavator for the highway department, which means that the backhoe will not be replaced, through borrowing. Agreed to give as much money to the capital plan as possible and to leave budget amounts for Capital and OPEB level from last year.

      Special Article Requests
      The group went through all the special article requests received this year. Front walk at town hall was removed (the crosswalk should be moved to lead to the accessible walkway not the stone walkway), others were left on for further consideration.

      The group agreed to meet again on March 10th at 6:30 to go over the budget requests before the budget hearing.

      Finance and Capital Planning Committee members left the meeting

    • 8:15: Teawaddle Water

      General Discussion...
      Teawaddle Hill Road Neighbors
      Steve Nagy, Pat Duffy, and Virginia Goodale met with the Selectboard to ask what is happening with the Amherst water line. Steve insisted that the town does not know the cost of construction because no bid has been sought and received and the Board agreed to get a price on going out to bid. He would like to solicit help from the state. The residents took issue with the idea of the town buying their houses and Virginia yelled and swore. Virginia also pointed out that her yard has not yet been repaired from truck damage during the deep well test.

  3. Business

    • Ambulance Contract

      General Discussion...
      Margie reported that no ambulance entities showed interest in responding to Leverett’s calls. The amount proposed by Amherst for FY 21 was accepted.

    • Annual Report Dedication

    • Appoint Police Officers

      General Discussion...
      Police Chief
      Police Chief Scott Minckler requested the appointment of Mark Vitale and James Bernier as Reserve Officers. Voted: 3-0 in favor of appointing Mark Vitale and James Bernier as Reserve Officers at $18.56 per hour pending satisfactory physical.

    • Approv minutes of February 18

      General Discussion...
      Minutes to Feb 18th meeting were approved.

    • Emergency Team, Mass notification system change

      General Discussion...
      Margie notified the Board that the Emergency Management Team is looking into switching the vendor that sends telephone mass communications to one that is less expensive and looks to be easier to use through a mobile app that department heads can use on the road. Selectboard agreed that this sounded fine.

    • Waive fee for Coop use of Town Hall for Meeting?

      General Discussion...
      The Leverett Coop has requested that the fee for the use of the Town Hall for their events and meetings be waived. Board did not agree.

  4. Mail

    • Tim Batchelder letter of resignation

  5. Other business

    • Unexpected itmes

      General Discussion...
      The landfill monitoring contract for FY 21 was awarded to ATC at the cost of $24,930. ATC was the only vendor who submitted a quote.
      The three year contract for town buildings’ fuel oil was signed with Sprague Operating Resources,, LLC. Procurement was done by the Lower Pioneer Valley Educational Collaborative. John K. can now lock in the oil price when he wants.
      Tom will work on the transfer station shed policy and send it out for discussion next meeting.
      Annual Report dedication discussion was postponed until the next meeting.

  6. Meeting Wrap-up

The listing of matters is those reasonably anticipated by the Chair which may be discussed at the meeting. Not all items listed may in fact be discussed and other items not listed may also be brought up for discussion to the extent permitted by law.

Minutes prepared by Margie McGinnis

Minutes approved on Monday, Apr 27, 2020