The Jennifer Rusinoski Memorial Scholarship Foundation is pleased to announce the recipient of our first annual $2,000 scholarship. The recipient of this year’s award is Ty Evan Mackenzie of Marion. Ty plans to attend the University of New England. For more information or if you would like to contribute to next year’s scholarship, please contact the foundation at 508-922-0541.
Mattapoisett Recreation is taking online registrations for our summer one-week clinics. The Laxwell Girl’s Lacrosse Training Clinic is geared towards girl’s lacrosse players in Grades 3-8 and will focus on: Stick work, Shooting, Defense, Footwork, Speed and Team Play. Dates are July 29 to August 2 from 9:00 – 12:00 pm at ORR High School field Cost is $165. MATTREC’s Girls Volleyball Clinic run by Julie Letourneau will be a great opportunity to learn the basic skills and rules of volleyball and work on fundamental skills. Open to Girls Grade 4-8. Dates are August 5 to 8 from 9:00-11:30 am at ORR High School Gymnasium. The Brian Rudolph Basketball Training Clinic is for players in Grades 4-8 and will focus on: Ball handling, footwork, shooting, finishing moves, defensive techniques, conditioning and basketball IQ. Dates are July 15 to 19 from 9:00 – 12:00 pm at ORR High School Gym. Cost is $165.
Sign up today and check out our other programs at www.mattrec.net.
Sitting at his kitchen table, Tom Grondin models the breaststroke, his hands together in a praying position before extending straightforward and letting go into respective sideways directions, then looping back around, tightly to his sides to maximize aerodynamics and finally, back into the original position for the next go-round.
Only Grondin doesn’t conduct his show-and-tell in slow motion, the 17-year-old from Marion demonstrates his swimming mechanics at what looks more like his pace in competition. He does so fluidly.
It’s no wonder, Grondin has been swimming since third or fourth grade. Swimming isn’t the only sport he participates in as a person on the autism spectrum, but it’s one where he excels.
“If he’s doing freestyle, he’ll dive in and he’ll go the first six or seven, eight strokes without breathing … and then come up and breathe,” said Leo Grondin, Tom’s father.
Tom’s abilities were on display for a larger audience at Harvard University from June 7 through June 9 at the Massachusetts Special Olympics Summer Games.
Representing the Sandwich Sharks, Grondin won an individual gold medal at the games in the 100-yard Freestyle. His personal best won a silver medal in the 100 Individual Medley (Butterfly, Backstroke, Breaststroke and Freestyle), and he earned his second gold medal of the games as a member of the Sharks’ 4×50 relay team.
Asked the best part of swimming, Grondin didn’t hesitate to say, “Freestyle.” He was also eager to say he prefers swimming “in the pool” as opposed to the ocean. Grondin says no one has ever trashed-talked him in competition; the competitors in Special Olympics and in his YMCA competitions converse but practice good sportsmanship.
Tom began summer school on Monday at Old Rochester Regional High School, where he is a rising senior. He participates in multiple sports, including basketball and helped the Bulldogs’ Unified team get the better of Tri-Town police and fire departments. He has also competed in Unified track and field, running the 400 and throwing the shot put and the javelin.
Having taken lessons at the Old Colony (Middleborough) YMCA with Niko Duarte, Tom competes with the Gleason Family (Wareham) YMCA Riptides swim team, which has a motto, “Everyone swims, everyone wins.”
Tom’s older brother Lee (ORR Class of 2023) attends Roger Williams University where he studies Marine Biology.
The Grondin family expresses “huge” appreciation to all of Tom’s supporters “who provided so much encouragement and well wishes that helped him achieve such success this year” and look forward to next season and more personal-best times in the pool.
By Mick Colageo
The Wareham Garden Club presents “Tour des Fleurs – A Gateway Garden Stroll”, Saturday, July 13 from 9 am to 3 pm. The stroll will include seven gardens. Four homes are in one association neighborhood, and all are uniquely different from one another including vegetable gardening. All use an exquisite selection of perennials and complimentary annuals that are standouts. Photograpy will be displayed at this location for purchase. The next home is close by and the uniqueness of depth and texture of gardens twist and turn down to water’s edge. The owners’ art will be on display. The sixth property spills into Buzzards Bay with impressive topiary plantings, shrubbery, succulents and arrangements. Lastly is a home with a cranberry bog view with impressive Hostas, lush evergreens, glorious day lilies and lots of horticulture, as well as more photography.
Advance tickets are $35 can be purchased on the club’s website at www.warehamgardenclub.org or day of tour for $40 at the registration desk at the Wareham Free Library, 59 Marion Road, Wareham where everyone will be given the map of homes. Also at the library you will be able to participate in a silent auction. Some teasers are gift certificates to garden centers, nautical paintings, day at a pool with lunch and a day on a boat with lunch.
Proceeds from the club’s events help fund their community projects, including civic beautification; monthly garden therapy at the Wareham Council on Aging, Educational Programs, and the Scholarship Program that awards grants to Wareham residents who are planning to further their education with a focus on horticulture, agriculture, the environment, earth sciences, biology, or conservation.
Begin with a summer sunset by the harbor, friends and neighbors and your own delicious picnic fare. Add great live music by Seth Asser & Gary Brown. Throw in fresh local oysters. Result? The Great Community Picnic on Thursday evening, August 1 from 5:30 to 8:30 pm at Munro Preserve adjacent to the town wharf.
Mattapoisett Land Trust and Mattapoisett Museum, the event hosts, will provide tables, chairs and tablecloths. Bring your own food, utensils & plates. Creatively transform your table with flowers, napkins, etc.
Tables available for 4 ($160), 6 ($240), 8 ($320) or 10 ($400) diners. A place at the community table costs $40. Buy a ticket for the community table or buy a table. Space is limited – buy a table while they last. Tickets are available online: www.mattapoisettmuseum.org/event-info/the-2024-great-community-picnic-2. Ticket sales will end on Monday, July 22 or when we sell out, whichever comes first. Make plans now to join us for this festive memorable evening.
To the Editor
Thank you to everyone who attended the DOT hearing on June 18th and to those who submitted questions which were due last week. The Town is moving forward with good discussions at the Select Board Meetings on the formation of a Committee to assist the Select Board on this road project and at least 10 citizens have volunteered to serve on the Committee. This is wonderful progress and our Town should unite to work on this project for results that will best serve our community, including saving as many of our heritage trees as possible.
This corridor road project has already taken many years and we have heard that it is scheduled to begin in 2028. That is not a promise from DOT, it is an estimate. To get all the bells and whistles that are included in this project we must wait this long, we must go through all the steps of working with DOT. Our Highway Department will still need to manage the repairs to the roadway in the meantime, just as our Tree Warden will continue to monitor the health of our trees on this roadway. Our Select Board will continue to hold important meetings on this project just as we believe the new Committee will do the same. And our role as citizens interested in knowing what the project will look like when the final 25% plan is submitted to DOT have several ways to continue to follow what changes are being made:
1. Check the Select Board agendas which are posted at Town Hall and available online under the Select Board listing on the Town Website. Here you can also see videos of their meetings that discuss the Road Project.
2. Follow our Facebook pages that have been set up for this project: Friends of Mattapoisett Village Roads and Friends of Mattapoisett Trees. We’ll continue to provide links on these pages for new developments
3. And of course, if you are reading this, you read our local newspapers. A special thanks to The Wanderer for covering the developments concerning our Village Corridor and the village trees.
A sincere thanks to everyone in our town working on this,
Sandra Hering
The views expressed in the “Letters to the Editor” column are not necessarily those of The Wanderer, its staff or advertisers. The Wanderer will gladly accept any and all correspondence relating to timely and pertinent issues in the great Marion, Mattapoisett and Rochester area, provided they include the author’s name, address and phone number for verification. We cannot publish anonymous, unsigned or unconfirmed submissions. The Wanderer reserves the right to edit, condense and otherwise alter submissions for purposes of clarity and/or spacing considerations. The Wanderer may choose to not run letters that thank businesses, and The Wanderer has the right to edit letters to omit business names. The Wanderer also reserves the right to deny publication of any submitted correspondence. All letters must be typed and submitted directly to: news@wanderer.com.
Rochester’s Select Board Monday granted the town’s Historic District Commission permission to use Town Counsel in the court appeal that is being filed against the commission’s Briggs Hobby Barn permit decision.
The board swiftly and unanimously approved the request to help the commission defend itself in court after Select Board Chairman Brad Morse explained simply, “They are asking our attorney to represent them. I agree with that.”
Briggs Hobby Barn is a plan to construct two buildings to store and repair collectible automobiles, trucks and other motor vehicles on New Bedford Road. It received a Special Permit from the Zoning Board of Appeals on May 23 and a site-plan-review permit from the Planning Board on June 11.
The Historic District Commission’s Certificate of Appropriateness that the Briggs project received on June 5 included a condition mandating the erection of a “25-percent-visibility” fence for the Briggs Hobby Barn property on New Bedford Road.
Quickly thereafter, Briggs attorney Karla Chaffee complained to the Planning Board that a solid stockade fence had been her client’s proposal for the cemetery border to the property since the project was first designed. She said she will take court action against that condition, as it will change the design plan and might reignite the entire permitting process.
In other action, the Select Board learned that $467,543 remains in the town’s Capital Planning account for spending in the new fiscal year (FY25) that began on July 1. Capital Planning Committee Chairman David Arancio asked the board for direction in how that money should be spent.
Arancio noted happily that $1,167,230 has already been spent by the town on capital items in the past years, but he cautioned the board to not spend over-confidently. “The caveat here is we need to be conservative here,” he said. “This may not be what our budgets look like in future years.”
Select Board member Adam Murphy noted the Capital Planning Committee’s current priorities include Highway Department equipment and a police chief’s vehicle. Arancio said that request has been withdrawn for now as budgets are in a transitional period. The town currently has an interim police chief and an interim town administrator. Their full-time replacements may have other plans for their budgets, Arancio said. Morse moved to take the current Capital Planning recommendations under advisement.
The board awarded a Citation of Appreciation to retiring Finance Committee Chairman Kris Stoltenberg for 39 years of service to the town.
The board approved Dennis P. McCarthy as a new associate member of the Zoning Board of Appeals and reappointed Justin Bouley and James Austin to the Finance Committee. The board accepted the resignation letter of Historic District Commission member Susan Fleming.
Interim Town Administrator Suzanne Szyndlar reported the town’s oldest citizen is Maureen Riley, age 102. She will be presented with the town’s Boston Post Cane in a ceremony on July 12.
Szyndlar reported the town administrator search committee will start interviewing 10 applicants it has heard from so far for the job on July 9. She said the committee will remain open to receiving more applications until the position is filled.
The board approved Eversource’s request to continue its public hearings into permitting a new utility pole and manhole for the Rounseville Road project until August 5.
The next meeting of the Rochester Select Board will be held on Monday, July 15, at 6:00 pm at the Rochester Council on Aging, 67 Dexter Lane.
Rochester Select Board
By Michael J. DeCicco
The Mattapoisett Library has a variety of July happenings for adults and teens.
Join local artist Devin McLaughlin on Saturday, July 13, for a fun-filled day of creativity. Devin will begin the morning with a watercolor exploration workshop from 10:30 am to noon and conclude with a step-by-step acrylic painting lesson from 1 to 3 pm. Both programs are recommended for patrons aged 12 and up. Registration is required. Please dress accordingly as paint can be messy.
There will be an interactive “Whodunit” event on Tuesday, July 16, at 6 pm. In this self-contained mystery game, players complete puzzles, collect clues, and investigate evidence to solve The Case of the Wayward Ball. No registration required. Recommended for ages 12 and up.
Learn everything necessary to start needle felting from The Felted Bee on Tuesday, July 30, from 10 am to 12 pm. In this beginner-friendly workshop, participants will learn skills and techniques to create an adorable needle-felted sloth. Tools and materials are included. Recommended for ages 12 and up. Space is limited. Registration is required.
Have you snagged your free Mattapoisett Library swag bag yet? Pick one up while supplies last. And don’t forget to grab a Book Bingo card at the circulation desk. The first five participants to get a Bingo score a prize. The first two participants to cover the whole card earn a bigger prize. Don’t let this opportunity pass you by.
For more information, please contact the library at mfpl@sailsinc.org, check our website, MattapoisettLibrary.org, or visit us at 7 Barstow Street, Mattapoisett.
June Series Wrap-up – Tuesday Night Ensign Division
Odyssey ended the monthly series with 2 first place finishes locking up first place for the month. Brou Ha Ha grabbed 2 second place finishes Tuesday and move ahead of Black Ice by 1 point to finish second for the series. Rounding out the field was Brass Monkey placing fourth and Hamburglar fifth for the series.
Wednesday Night PHRF Division – Class A. No Quarter Given completed their unbeaten streak Wednesday in a close race against Restless, winning by just 41 seconds. Surprise finished third followed by Coconuts and Billy Budd. For the series the standings remained as the last race.
Class B – Kinsail came on strong in the last race beating Fir Na Tine (2nd) and Chickadee (3rd) but it wasn’t quite enough to take the monthly series.
Chickadee won the series over Fir Na Tine by one point followed closely in third by Kinsail 2 points behind.
Racers will take the July 4th week to rest up before starting the July series.
MYC cruisers will chase the fireworks next week around the Bay. Get up to date info on our website on where the action is headed.
www.mattapoisettyc.org
The Friends of the Elizabeth Taber Library will sponsor their Summer Book Sale at the Marion Music Hall, 164 Front St, Marion on Friday, July 26 from 9 am-3 pm & Saturday, July 27 from 9 am-3 pm. Thousands of books, all in good condition, as well as puzzles, games, and CD’s, DVD’s will be available for purchase. Elizabeth Taber Library logo T-shirts will also be available for purchase.
Proceeds from the sale will benefit the Elizabeth Taber Library’s Summer Reading Program and activity presentations.
The Friends are always welcoming new members to join and also have volunteer opportunities for those who might be interested.
Please plan to stop into the Music Hall for the Summer Book Sale being held rain or shine!