After substantial discussions over recent weeks, Marion’s Community Preservation Committee voted on March 5 to finalize its Fiscal Year 2022 recommendations of applications received for town and state-matching funds under the state’s Community Preservation Act.

            Nine applications will be recommended for CPA funding at Spring Town Meeting. Ten applications had originally been presented before the CPC, one of which came off the final list and a second that was substantially limited from its original scope. Both changes cited eligibility issues.

            The vast majority of available funds are recommended by Friday’s CPC vote for Town of Marion projects including $90,000 for completion of the Town House Annex exterior and another $90,000 for near completion of the Town House’s Main Street entrance. CPA funds would pay for the design of a historically appropriate entry, the replacement of entry doors and windows, and restoration of the Annex facade as it faces Main Street.

            The Annex project originally requested $221,000 but was redesigned before presentation to the CPC by focusing on building work for $90,000 that will empty the final $33,440.99 in the Historical Preservation Commission’s account and also take $56,555.01 from undesignated funds. The concrete steps on the Main Street side will be completed at a later date.

            The other Town of Marion applications recommended by the CPC for funding include $30,000 for the Historical Commission’s cultural inventory, $30,000 to construct an asphalt, multi-use (walking) path to be installed on the grounds of the Cushing Community Center, $10,000 to purchase and install approximately 1,100 feet of split-post and rail fencing at Silvershell Beach, and a sixth town application for $5,675 to fund and place 250 cast-aluminum grave markers on veterans’ graves at town cemeteries.

            Sippican Historical Society was approved for a recommendation of $25,000 in CPA funding for its ongoing archival cataloguing, and Elizabeth Taber Library was approved for a recommendation of $4,867 in funding to complete its Reading Circle bench with four granite book covers celebrating diversity in authorship and readership.

            The Sippican Women’s Club had hoped for CPA funding to cover a wider scope of upgrades for the historic building housing Handy’s Tavern, but the CPC determined the restoration of the building’s front and rear entry doors to be the limits of applicability at $4,200.

            Marion’s Recreation Department boating program, which originally submitted a $30,000 request, was a poor fit for CPA funding as presented, an outcome that representative Chris Collings readily accepted and took back to the drawing board in his effort to get the program sufficiently funded.

            Prior to the application votes, the CPC voted to honor Town Administrator Jay McGrail’s request that CPA funding earmarked for the waterproofing of the front area of the Town House’s first floor be applied to all of the floor, the approval not changing the amount of money.

            At the conclusion of the meeting, CPC member and Board of Selectmen Chairman Randy Parker thanked CPC Chairman Jeff Doubrava for his three years of service in the CPC’s lead role.

            The next meeting of the Marion CPC will be held in December.

Marion Community Preservation Committee

By Mick Colageo

            In the Marion Finance Committee’s only order of business in its March 3 meeting, its members voted to approve a transfer from the reserve fund in order to solve a personnel dispute involving a union member who left Marion employment during Fiscal Year 2021.

            Per terms of an agreement to remain confidential, the town will additionally fund a negotiated severance package in the amount of $40,000.

            “My takeaway is that this is a good thing for the town. It’s a payout of less than we would have had to pay if this person had gone to arbitration, won, and had to come back, so this is probably less than that. And it also ensures that we won’t have the employee around,” said Finance Committee Chairman Peter Winters. “It’s pretty much a done deal; this is just the transfer of the funds.”

            Town Counsel Jon Witten negotiated the settlement with assistance from Town Administrator Jay McGrail. Selectman John Waterman was involved from the very beginnings of the dispute with the employee. “I think where this has ended up is as good as we could expect, what Jay’s been able to work out here,” said Waterman.

            “The reason why we can’t go into detail is there is a signed, confidentially agreement in place,” said McGrail, who told FinCom, “I really appreciate the trust that you clearly have in the leadership that you have in place at the town here that we can bring this to you and you can approve it the way you just did. It’s a statement to you, and I appreciate that.”

            “We already know you got the best deal possible; there’s no more value we can add,” said FinCom member Charlie Larkin.

            “And it’s a good thing for this employee to not come back, based on my understanding,” said Winters.

            In other business, McGrail told FinCom that he and Town Accountant Judy Mooney sent the updated budget to the two School Committee chairs.

            Due to a medical emergency involving a member of school administration apparently resulting in the rescheduling of both the ORR School District’s public hearing (originally scheduled for March 2 and pushed to March 10) and the selectmen’s joint meeting with FinCom, McGrail estimates that the public budget hearing will be held on the last Wednesday of the month, March 31.

            Assuming the school budget number does not change for the meeting on March 10, McGrail told FinCom he figures that a week later following budget recommendations that he will be looking to FinCom for its vote on Town Meeting warrant Article 2.

            McGrail told FinCom member Shea Assad that he heard that the individual is doing better. “All signs point to him feeling better when I spoke to Mike (Nelson) on Monday,” said McGrail.

            Larkin offered to assist budget preparation in any way his help could be used. McGrail recommended Larkin email Nelson.

            Marion is among 13 towns outside Bristol County that are being saddled with debt service by Dighton-based Bristol County Agricultural High School.

            “We completely disagree with the assessment we received for the debt,” said McGrail, who is working with Representative Bill Straus in an effort to change a situation he summarized as “taxation without representation,” alluding to the Boston Tea Party.

            “We’ll throw our tea into the water,” quipped Winters.

            Marion already pays Bristol Aggie an assessment, but with only four students attending, the town feels the debt service in excess of $20,000 is unacceptable, especially without a seat at the management table.

            “It’s principle, too, because once the door is open,” said Waterman.

            McGrail was told that Marion will have an opportunity to meet with the Bristol County commissioners directly to relay their concerns.

            Winters asked for an update.

            “We don’t know if we’ll have an update before the Town Meeting, but I can tell you we’re not paying the bill,” said McGrail.

            Citing the Old Rochester Regional School District’s relative-enrollment budgeting formula and the uncertainty of school choice students on Marion’s school budget, Waterman suggested investment in a long-term study of enrollments in all three of the Tri-Towns.

            FinCom’s planned joint meeting with the Board of Selectmen and school administration originally scheduled for March 2 was rescheduled for Wednesday, March 10, at 7:00 pm. The budget schedule will culminate with the April 13 submission of the warrant of articles for Annual Town Meeting to the printer.

Marion Finance Committee

By Mick Colageo

            The Marion Affordable Housing Trust is taking steps to assess its progress since 2015 on procuring opportunities for affordable housing in town. On March 9, the trust met with Eric Arbeene from the Southeastern Regional Planning & Economic Development District (SRPEDD) to review the 2015 Marion Housing Plan and learned that, despite having accomplished very little listed in that plan, the town will nonetheless exceed its 10 percent state-mandated quota for affordable housing.

            Trust members acknowledged that affordable housing is a sensitive subject for some Marion residents, and community perception is often just one of the many constraints that obstruct affordable housing developments in communities.

            “With 40B,” Arbeene said, “some people just tense right up and they don’t know what it is …” Arbeene’s pre-meeting research revealed to him that a 40B development, the proposed Heron Cove off Wareham Road, was currently before the Zoning Board of Appeals, and this latest expanded 120-unit development would put Marion at about 13 percent affordable housing.

            The town is also engaging a consultant to assess town-owned properties such as the Community Center parcel donated to the town from the VFW exclusively for senior housing, while the demographics support a growing need for senior housing in Marion.

            According to Arbeene, the population in Marion has barely increased since 2000, but the composition of the population surely has. The 60-plus “retirement age” population has increased from 22.7 percent in 2000 to 34.1 percent in 2019, while school enrollment at Sippican School has decreased by 16 percent over the past decade. Just over 44 percent of Marion households include a person age 65 or over, and 25.7 percent of those households are single-person.

            The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development has classified households that spend over 30 percent of their income on housing as “cost-burdened” households, and in Marion 30 percent of households are classified as cost-burdened. Of those cost-burdened households, 27 percent are homeowners, and 45 percent are renters.

            Just glancing at Marion’s 2015 Housing Needs Assessment, Arbeene got a sense of the development constraints that had encumbered affordable housing in Marion back in 2015. The trust confirmed that Marion has since then approved an updated Master Plan and is serviced by some degree of public transportation. Other than that, the town has moved very little toward accomplishing prior goals in the 2015 plan, such as adopting bylaws and changing zoning conducive to housing development, providing incentives for senior developments, or modifying multiple-unit rental housing provisions.

            Arbeene wasn’t trying to make anyone on the trust feel bad about that, he said. He just needed to get a sense of what has been done since the last time SRPEDD assisted the town with this assessment type.

            Arbeene noted that development constraints are still there by and large, and some trust members suggested it was due to a lack of capacity, time, money, and a lack of interest.

            “Small town, lot of demands,” commented Selectman and Planning Board member Norm Hills, who sits on the Affordable Housing Trust. “And right now, the (costs to clean up the wastewater) lagoons are eating us alive.”

            Moving forward, Arbeene will assist the trust in developing goals and strategies in the affordable housing arena. “How can we overcome some of these constraints? Can we overcome some of the constraints?” asked Arbeen. “Do we have the same issues?” It looks like a “yes,” he commented, turning to community perception again as a significant constraint.

            “Community perceptions — something that’s not just in Marion,” said Arbeene. “There are a lot of misconceptions about that.” Affordable housing, however, is in high demand and a priority in the commonwealth at this time, he noted. He told the trust that he would do further research, share it with the trust in the meantime, and return for another presentation during the trust’s meeting in April.

            That would be helpful, said Hills, but he added that, once the second 40B process inches toward completion, “The pressure to push for more affordable housing is going to go way down.” This could alter the goals and strategies of Marion in the foreseeable future.

            The next regular meeting of the Marion Affordable Housing Trust will be on April 13 at 6:00 pm. The trust will meet again in the meantime on March 30 at 6:00 pm just to vote on two invoices with a quorum present.

Marion Affordable Housing Trust

By Jean Perry

            The Mattapoisett River Valley Water District Commission apparently has settled on a plan of attack in its ongoing effort to calculate the cost and determine the optimum timing for the borrowing it will take to make the long-awaited upgrade to its water treatment facility.

            The nearly obsolete Targa II water-treating system presently used is several years beyond its expiration date, and a brand new, state-of-the-art Puron MP system will only cost $1,100,100 more to install, so there has been little to no debate on which way the MRV will go. The ultimate decision is further leveraged by Koch company’s announcement this year that replacement filters for the current system and associated parts will only be made available until the midway point of 2021.

            The remaining question is financial strategy, and what came out of the March 9 commission meeting was an agreement to seek another meeting with Koch representatives with the intention of nailing down the company’s timeline, including pilot testing, then finalize financing and finally get the project onto the warrants for special fall town meetings for the participating towns or their 2022 annual town meetings.

            Commission Treasurer Meghan Davis presented a loan scenario with Unibank that broke down the impacts of debt of the filter replacement to each town. She explained it as “one debt option, but there are many ways we can go through it.”

            The hypothetical scenario presented broke down the towns’ portions to Mattapoisett at 31 percent, Marion at 11 percent, and Fairhaven at 51 percent. Per average ratepayer, that translates over the first five years to $83 per year for Mattapoisett ratepayers and $36 per year for Marion ratepayers.

            Since existing debt drops off between 2027 and 2028, there is an incentive for MRV to readily accept the current drag in the Koch company’s Puron technology approval process at the state level. The downside there is Koch is only offering replacement parts to the existing system through July of 2021.

            Commission member Paul Silva complimented Davis on the effort it took to construct the scenario and suggested using the $800,000 that the commission has in reserve. “We don’t want to go back to Town Meeting and ask for more money,” he said. “We’re talking about five years until the major portion of that old debt falls off. If we push it off one year, we can change the numbers by 20 percent.”

            According to Gregory, Tata & Howard will need to make an addendum of $8,100 in billing to cover any additional work in the filter-replacement evaluation. Gregory estimates that the engineering group is under budget so far, so a strong finish could offset the amendment amount. “Just in case we need the funding in place to cover it and to provide an addendum report at the end,” he said. The commission voted to approve the amendment, which will consist of assistance to Koch in piloting with technical aspects.

            In her commission Treasurer’s Report, Davis reported $68,379.66 in total invoices, including $11,772.16 in chemicals, $45,519.62 in electrical (two months fell into one billing period), and $6,202.05 for Tata & Howard’s three projects billed to FY21. The total figure also takes into account the $5,000 invoice from the MRV Water Supply Protection Advisory Committee for monitoring services. The MRV Water District Commission voted to approve the report and pay the invoices.

            The bulk of the Water Supply Protection Advisory Committee discussion centered around what member Laurell Farinon estimates to be 13 separate phragmites stands in Snipatuit Pond. The problem with invasive species in Snipatuit is far greater than initially hoped.

            “These are not cheap projects,” she said, estimating that the phragmites could cost the committee tens of thousands of dollars to remove and could be beyond the committee’s purview. “It’s everybody’s responsibility, but it could consume our funding, and we have to look at our mission…. Phragmites, it’s a tough one.”

            Gregory agreed the problem is “way beyond what we thought it originally would be…. We could be getting into some significant cost there.” Paul Howard, also of Tata & Howard, said, “It’s a massive problem throughout the state.”

            Blair Bailey, Rochester’s town counsel, said the Department of Environmental Protection “would need to be the lead agency…. Nobody’s really stepped up to say they’re going to make a concerted effort.”

            Farinon reported that Snow’s Pond asked about accessing MRV data and graphs for the pond’s monitoring effort.

            In his Water Supply Protection Advisory Committee Treasurer’s Report, Jeff Furtado reported three bills for February: Watling for $251.72, Bailey for $50, and Tata & Howard engineers for $1,587.75. Billing for the year to date is $27,710.64. With no change in income, the ending balance is $244,027.56. The committee voted to pay the following invoices: Tata & Howard $3,405.03; Megan McCarthy (graph work) $187; Watling (well and stream assistance) $251.72; and Blair Bailey $50.

            Gregory also reported on monitoring equipment valued at just under $1,100 and discussed a replacement Levelogger.

            The next meeting of the Mattapoisett River Valley Water Supply Protection Advisory Committee and Water District Commission is scheduled for April 13 at 3:30 pm and 4:00 pm, respectively.

MRV Water Supply Protection Advisory Committee/District Commission

By Mick Colageo