Harbormaster Transition Under Way

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Members of the Mattapoisett Board of Selectmen interviewed three potential candidates Wednesday for an opening for the town’s Harbormaster position.

The three candidates are Katelyn Schwebach (of Mattapoisett), Robert Caton (also of Mattapoisett) and Jill R. Simmons (of Fairhaven). Currently, Horace Field III is the interim Harbormaster, and he will stay on in the future as Assistant Harbormaster, as well as to train the newly appointed Harbormaster.

Selectmen’s questions revolved around concern over the applicants’ ability to handle different types of vessels, as well as willingness to be on-call and to be fully devoted to the job during boating season and experience in customer service.

The job’s busy season is from early May to late October, when most boating activity takes place.

All three candidates seemed highly qualified for the position, with officials saying that the Mattapoisett Marine Advisory Board had previously narrowed the group of three down from a group of 11. Ultimately, the decision of who to hire is up to the Board of Selectmen.

“It goes to the quality of the top three people,” said Alan Gillis, Chair of the Marine Advisory Board.

The group hopes have someone in the position by July 15.

By Nick Walecka

Vendors for Rochester Country Fair

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The Rochester Country Fair is seeking interested vendors for participation in the upcoming Rochester Country Fair. The Fair, now in its 14th year, features a unique mix of old-fashioned events and contests, a parade, woodsman show, tractor pulls and so much more.

This year’s “Welcome to the Jungle” Theme Fair will be held August 15 through 18 at 65 Pine Street in Rochester. Craft Vendor booth spaces are available for a fee of $125. Space is limited and is given on a first come, first serve basis, with preference given to vendors selling unique and homemade items. Applications and registration info can be found on the Fair’s website at www.rochesterma.com or emailing rcfvendor@comcast.net.

For those interested in visiting the Fair, it will offer many unique old-fashioned events for the entire family.

You will need to come prepared if you wish to participate. You must bring your own frog to compete in the Frog Race. Other children’s events will include Running with Scissors Obstacle Course, Nerf Olympics, and a Lawn Mower Race just to name a few. For the young at heart, the Fair will offer Truck and Tractor Pulling, Horseshoe Contest and Live Wrestling featuring WWE Hall of Famer Jimmy “Superfly” Snuka!

Admission to the Fair is $4 on Thursday and $5 on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Children age 5 and under get in free. There is no fee for parking. Additional event information can be obtained on the Fair’s website www.rochesterma.com.

Road Race Award Winners

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The Mattapoisett Road Race Committee recently met to finalize preparations for it’s 43rd 5-mile run to be held Thursday, 4 July at 9:00am. The Committee is headed by Bill Tilden, ORRHS Athletic Director.

Throughout the history of the Race, the Committee has given over $120,000 in awards to Tri-Town Students who have been involved with running. Awards for 2013 went to Abigail Hiller, Fredric Murolo, Alex Milde, Janice Weldon and Brian Tranfaglia of Mattapoisett; Alexandra Saccone, Luke Mattar, Meagan Bell and Nick Pacheco of Marion and Hannah Welsh from Rochester.

Community merchants continue to be generous in their support with donations or sponsors of t-shirts. Highlights for this year’s race are the Harpoon Harmonizers singing the “Star Spangled Banner,” Core Performance Tech shirts for the first 750 registered runners, sale of “Future Runner” shirts the day before and day of the race, and recognition of the most spirited spectators along the Race route!

Runners can sign up at Shipyard Park on July 3 from 5:00 to 8:00 pm for $20.00 or on July 4 from 7:30 to 8:30 am for $25.

More information at www.mattapoisettroadrace.com. Also, check us out on Facebook!

Southeastern Massachusetts Artisan Exposition

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Professional artisans throughout Massachusetts and Rhode Island have been selected by Anthi Frangiadis Associates to participate in the premiere Southeastern Massachusetts Artisan Exposition (SEMAX), an outdoor tented exposition featuring handmade artisan work that can be used in and around buildings, taking place June 29 and June 30 in Marion Village. Architectural applications for both interior and exterior uses were given priority during the selection process in the following media categories: clay, glass, stone, wood, metal, fiber, vegetation, and any mix of the mentioned media. Fine art complements the exposition and is limited in scope.

Exposition tickets are available in advance for $5 per person (children under 12, free) at Anthi Frangiadis Associates, 11 Spring Street, Marion, MA, or online www.anthif.com/rsvp. Exposition tickets the days of the event are $10 per person. Due to the nature of the artisan work, we kindly request no pets or strollers under the big and fabulous Sperry tent. The Pythagorean Lodge A.F. & A.M. will offer a fine selection of food and beverages; proceeds will benefit the Masonic Angel Fund. The Lodge menu will be complemented by R’Shucks Travelin’ Raw Bar.

SEMAX is an outdoor tented exposition with a focus on architectural applications for both exterior and interior use. The exposition will feature over 30 artisans from across Massachusetts and Rhode Island who design and handcraft furniture, accessories, and fine art and is open to the public and trade. Artisans will showcase works in clay, glass, metal, wood, fiber and mixed media. All work is for sale, order and/or commission.

For more information, visit www.anthif.com and click on the SEMAX logo or call 508-748-3494.

Tennis Court Issues

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To the Editor:  

The Mattapoisett Community Tennis Association (MCTA) is a public service organization like the Lions Club, Boy Scouts and the Red Cross. We are a nonprofit corporation chartered in Massachusetts in 1999, and registered with the United States Tennis Association (USTA). We have no paid employees – we are all volunteers – and our goal is help all of the people in the community get together to play tennis. Our only income is from donations and a very small membership fee of $15 per year. What we get out this effort is having people to play tennis with since we are all tennis players.

Another public service organization, the Lions Club, raised the money to rebuild and enlarge the four tennis courts at Center School in the early 1970s. It was a huge success. Hundreds of people in the community used and enjoyed the courts. It was the first Golden Age of Tennis. Twenty-five years later, the courts were in need of repair again. But the Lions Club had changed its focus to supporting eye research only, so the MCTA was founded in 1999 for the express purpose of revitalizing the four courts at Center School. The MCTA raised $35,000 and spent $25,000 patching the surface of the four courts, making them playable again in 2001. Then we experienced the second Golden Age of Tennis. The courts were in constant use by the community, the ORR High School tennis team and the MCTA.

As part of the renovation of Center School in 2003-4, a driveway was put in to the back of Center School, cutting two of the four courts in half. The MCTA had submitted an article in Town Meeting in 2000 for the repair of the courts, but received only $4,500 from the Town. So the MCTA used $2,500 of this to have the engineering firm that helped with the design of the school renovation design three courts in 2004 to fit into the remaining area. We have been trying to find a way to fund the construction of these three courts ever since.

This year the Recreation Department was able to obtain a grant of $170,000 from the Community Preservation Act Fund, which is just what is needed to build the three new courts we had designed. But without any consideration of the design we had for three courts, they went ahead with making new plans for just two courts in that area, and tearing up what was left of the courts that had been cut in half, making them into some kind of a public park.

The mainstay of tennis today is drop-in tennis, where players come together at a given time and place to play tennis for an hour and a half. After the two courts had been cut in half in 2004 there were still two courts remaining at Center School. But the MCTA found that we could not organize drop-in tennis on just two courts. So the MCTA has been forced to play in Marion, Wareham and at Old Rochester Regional High School ever since. It is very hard to keep a drop-in tennis program going when we have to move from one place to another during the season.

The Recreation Department, Board of Selectmen, and Town Administrator were well aware of our efforts to rebuild three courts at Center School. We had made presentations to all of the town departments involved with this project for over a 10-year period. When nothing appeared to be happening in response to our efforts, we petitioned an article in Town Meeting in 2010 for $100,000 to rebuild the three courts, and were planning to make up the remaining cost of $20,000 to $30,000. But the article was amended to include only $15,000 from free cash, and failed by 6 votes because it would not have moved the project forward.

The Recreation Department is rushing to get the two-court project started before the people in town can voice their opposition to their plan of reducing the number of tennis courts in that location. The MCTA has asked for a meeting with the Town Administrator, Board of Selectmen and Recreation Chairman to discuss this issue. But they have not responded to our request. It appears that our only option is to call for a special town meeting. The MCTA provides a valuable service to the community at very low cost. We hope that the town officials will begin to work with this public service organization to provide the value that the people in this community deserve. We have been helping the people in this community for 13 years. Now we need your help in convincing the town officials to reconsider their plan for only two courts.

Robert Brown

Mattapoisett

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.

Proud Ghosts of Point Connett V

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Editors note: This story has been serialized into six parts which will appear weekly in The Wanderer and at wanderer.com

•Click Here to Read Part One

•Click Here to Read Part Two

•Click Here to Read Part Three

•Click Here to Read Part Four

By Rudd Wyman

Part V

I am about to go outside the tent for a smoke, and am approached by a distinguished-looking gentleman in Randy boat shoes, with dyed red hair poking from a signature baseball cap reading “Coed Naked Volleyball.”

“My name is Henry Wiggington,” he says, “and I am an old sailing buddy of Bob’s. I have enjoyed your magazine essays: ‘Shark Hunter’s Guide for Dummies’ and ‘Sailing for the Heluvit.’

“I would like to ask you if you truly believe everything that you write about.”

This was not a direct question, and I took the offensive: “Are you truly into volleyball?” “The hat is a disguise,” he says. “I teach a journalism course at Harvard, emphasis on creativity. In September, my class will focus on juvenile behavior and teenage awareness.” Peering at me over a bulbous nose, Wigginton continues. “Harvard will pay you to chair a three-day workshop on creativity.”

He hands me a colorful business card: “Henry Wiggington, Coed Volleyball for Mature Adults.” I wonder: wrong card?

I am aware that Henry is not after my autograph, and, smelling smoke in the cockpit, I intend to ask Bob about Wigginton’s shenanigans.

My war hero friend is a respected businessman in Norfolk, his Winter home, and he is the architect of a well-publicized aerial photo of Point Connett.Rain has held off, and Bob, on the seawall, is sipping a Sam Adams while enjoying the serenity of a few quiet moments away from the tent. I applaud that the blowfish remain gone, and we reminisce about a sword fishing adventure off Noman’s aboard his Tashtigo. There were beach buggy trips in my World War II Jeep, Weegetum, catching striped bass. Fishing has been an important factor to relieve my friend of postwar stress. “Is Henry Wigginton a friend of yours?” I ask Bob.

“Hanky Panky? He is a good person, Rudd, and crewed for me before the war,” Bob says. “However, Hanky lies a lot, and has frequent delusions of grandeur. In June, Hanky was held hostage by aliens, escaped, and he was captured by the Mattapoisett Police when he ran a red light on Route 6.”

I tell Bob that tonight Hanky is a Harvard Professor drumming up a midnight volleyball game.

My daughter, Sarah, a beautiful social butterfly, appears and asks, “Anyone up for a game of friendly volleyball?”

“You saw the hat!” I said, and we both laugh.

As Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “Life is a succession of lessons, which must be lived to be understood.” I recall an unexpected, shocking experience while power-sanding a wooden boat barefoot on wet grass, and wonder how I survived to possess a loving family.

While philosophizing, my son (Steve) and Jill’s son (Jim) return from Angelica, each hefting a keeper striper.

During the 1940s and 1950s, striper fishing from Dad’s 28-foot Hackercraft was an exciting challenge.  At this time, So-Ho may have been the fastest cabin cruiser on Buzzards Bay. Sleeping four, my family had delightful weekend trips across the Bay, through one of three holes, to Tarpaulin Cove, Hadley Harbor and Cutty Hunk. We cruised along side of the New York Yacht Club, with America’s Cup defenders, when beautiful ships sailed into Mattapoisett Harbor.

At an early age, I gained respect for the ocean, a fact that must have impressed both Andy Anderson and my Dad. Returning to Point Connett after a Boston trip, where my folks shared fog bound adventures with a crew of Amish people aboard a black schooner, we approached the East entrance to the Canal, and a routine entry. However, about halfway through suddenly waves hit So-Ho from every direction. Mom and I dawned life preservers as a waterfall of sea crashed through the windshield knocking off Dad’s glasses. Pots, pans, boxes, and oranges floated on the cabin floor as we plowed into a mountain of angry sea. To avoid being bowled over, Dad kept the bow straight into the turbulent water as any variation to Port or to Starboard would have been a certain knockdown. Finally, upon entering Buzzards Bay, there was a calm conclusion to a frightful experience for a young sailor and parents.

Continued Next Week

•Click Here to Read Part One

•Click Here to Read Part Two

•Click Here to Read Part Three

•Click Here to Read Part Four



Shawmut Approved; CPA Slammed

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After months of deliberations, Shawmut Associates LLC got the green light on Tuesday to redevelop the C&D Waste Recycling Facility at 50 Cranberry Highway, which will more than double the square footage of the current structure – itself slated for demolition – while making the site one of the highest-producing recycling centers in the region.

Representatives for the new company, Zero Waste Solutions, said it will recycle 95 percent of the materials that come through its facilities and start construction in August.

“I want to thank the people of Rochester and the members of its boards and commissions,” said Michael Camara of Shawmut parent company ABC Disposal Service Inc. “This is a game changer. It will put Rochester and Massachusetts on the map and set the new norm for waste management and recyclables.”

Board members Ben Bailey and Susan Teal recused themselves from the vote, which had to be a supermajority for approval. Five of the five voting members supported the applicant after plans were revised to satisfy conditions. The public hearing had closed earlier this month.

Elsewhere on the agenda, Conservation Commission Chairman Rosemary Smith – speaking additionally as a member of the Open Space Action Committee – and Conservation Agent Laurell Farinon shared with the Planning Board their vision for the Community Preservation Act, which they plan to present at Fall Town Meeting.

The CPA is a state law passed in 2000 that allows communities to establish a local fund to support affordable housing, parks and recreation (including athletic fields), open spaces and historic resources. Those municipalities that do adopt the act – currently 155 across Massachusetts – also receive a percentage of matching funds from the statewide Community Preservation Trust Fund each year.

Participating towns and cities raise CPA funds through a surcharge on property taxes. Smith said that the Rochester article would ask voters for a 1.5 percent increase (3 percent is the maximum), an average of $47 per homeowner annually, according to Smith’s calculations.

The town defeated the measure in 2006, and the majority of Planning Board members expressed their own distaste for the CPA and skepticism that it would meet a better fate in 2013.

“I helped with the Open Space plan, and I’m a proud member of the Rochester Land Trust, but I’m concerned on several points,” Chairman Arnold Johnson said. “It’s a tax on the tax. I personally think there’s going to be a backlash.”

Bailey was adamant in his opposition.

“You’re forcing more money out of people’s pockets to fund projects they don’t want,” he said. “Even it is only $50, why do I want to pay another tax? This program is very overreaching.”

Other members called the CPA “wasteful” and a “hurt to residents in a rough economy.”

Teal was the Planning Board’s lone supporter of the CPA.

“Had we gotten in in 2006, the funds would have paid for the Town Hall renovations, the Dexter fields, a lot of projects,” she said. “Rochester would be way ahead. It benefits all of us. Nobody wants to pay additional taxes, but we do want additional services. It is a functioning mechanism.”

Johnson and others argued that voters end up approving those projects almost without exception at Town Meeting, while CPA-funded projects would be hand-picked by a board.

By meeting’s end, the tone had softened, with Johnson suggesting that the Open Space Action Committee ask residents attending the upcoming Country Fair what they think, while Board member John DeMaggio asked if they would consider a 1 percent surcharge instead of 1.5 percent. Smith and Farinon thanked the Planning Board for its feedback.

By Shawn Badgley

Zucco Set for Miss Massachusetts Pageant

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Jillian Zucco, 20, of Mattapoisett, will be competing in the Miss Massachusetts Scholarship Pageant, a preliminary to the Miss America Pageant, this weekend at the Hanover Theatre in Worcester. She will be competing with 20 other young bright and talented women from across the state. Jillian is the reigning Miss Fall River who was crowned in November, and since her coronation has been busy making appearances at numerous community events, where she performs and speaks to various audiences on her platform, “Choose a Cause, Make a Difference,” promoting the spirit of volunteerism. Zucco’s talent is a vocal performance.

The competition is a two-day event. All contestants compete on Friday evening in all categories. The show opens on Saturday night with the announcement of the Top 10 and the people’s choice winner (decided by an online vote at www.missmass.org, which closes at midnight on Friday night). Only these 11 will compete at Saturday’s Finals.

Zucco is a 2011 graduate of ORRHS and a current student in the Honors Nursing Program at UMass Dartmouth.

Board of Health Closes Leisure Shores Beach

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The Mattapoisett Board of Health has closed the Leisure Shores Beach due to high bacteria count. The beach us scheduled to be retested today and could be reopened as early as Wednesday.

Joaquin A. “Jack” Lombard

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Joaquin A. “Jack” Lombard, 78, of St. Petersburg, FL, formerly of Rochester, MA died June 13, 2013 in the Bay Pines VA Healthcare System, Bay Pines, FL. He was the son of the late Joaquim and Rose (Bento) Lombard.

He was born in Rochester, MA and lived in Atlanta, GA for many years before moving to St. Petersburg 4 years ago.

Mr. Lombard served in the United States Navy and United States Air Force.

He graduated from New Bedford High School and Devries University in Atlanta, GA.

Mr. Lombard worked as an Electronics Technician for MARTA in Atlanta, GA for many years before retiring.

Survivors include his sister, Dorothy LaPrade of Sacramento, CA.

His Mass of Christian Burial will be held at 10:00 a.m. on Tuesday, July 2, 2013 in St. Patrick’s Church, 82 High St., Wareham, MA. Burial will follow in St. Patrick’s Cemetery, Wareham. Visiting hours have been omitted.

Arrangements are by the Chapman, Cole & Gleason Funeral Home, 2599 Cranberry Hwy., Wareham.