Fees for recreational boaters in Marion are going up this fiscal year in order to fund a long-range 10-13-year plan to replace the harbormaster’s main patrol boat.

Harbormaster Isaac Perry presented his proposed fee hikes to the Marion Board of Selectmen on January 22, which resulted in approval of the fees that will result in a roughly $54,000 annual increase in revenue.

A new patrol boat is priced at about $500,000-$600,000, Perry said.

Fees have not been increased since “the mid-2000s,” Perry told the board, and a portion of the increase in revenue will be set aside in the Waterways Account every year to replace the 13-year-old patrol boat that is now 13 years into its roughly 25-year life expectancy.

The boat berth fees at Island Wharf and Old Landing are going up from $150 to $200, and from $75 to $80, respectively. The fee for dinghy and kayak racks will go up from $40 to $50, and the per-foot fee will go up from $4 to $5 per foot.

Personal and commercial mooring fees are also increasing from $60 to $70, and $150 to $180, respectively.

Fiscal year 2018 revenue from waterways fees totaled about $313,000, and the increase will bring that revenue in FY19 up to $365,543.

Island Wharf is by far the biggest increase, Perry pointed out, due mainly because of the expansion the wharf has undergone and the fact that more employee work time has resulted because of the expansion.

“[Island Wharf has] tripled in size since this fee has been enacted, so we think it justifies the increase,” Perry said.

The fee amounts were adopted after Perry researched other area waterways fees in towns such as Wareham, New Bedford, Dartmouth, Mattapoisett, and towns on Cape Cod.

“We wanted to keep ours in line with what the norm is throughout the state,” said Perry.

In other matters, an appointment with Finance Committee Chairman Peter Winters will have to be rescheduled after Winters emailed Dawson that day to inform the board that he would be unable to attend the meeting that night. Runner up representative of the FinCom Alan Minard also emailed Dawson stating that he would also not be able to attend.

The topic of the meeting was so that the selectmen could discuss the Finance Committee’s decision last Tuesday to delay the approval of the board’s request for a Reserve Fund transfer in order to fund the town administrator’s 5.4 percent pay raise. During that FinCom meeting on January 15 there was some obvious contention between the committee and representatives from the Town House, Selectman John Waterman, and especially with Finance Director Judy Mooney.

Winters, Minard, and the rest of the FinCom asserted that the transfer was not necessary at the time, and went ahead and approved a Reserve Fund transfer to fund the fire chief’s pay raise of 8.8 percent. [See the article in the January 17 edition of The Wanderer titled “FinCom Chairman is a ‘(Bleep)’”.]

Also during the meeting, the members of the Town Administrator Search Committee have been chosen, with selectmen appointing at-large residents Judith Rosbe, Jim Ryba, and Elise Frangos, who will join Selectman Randy Parker and Harbormaster Isaac Perry in the five-member committee. The committee is tasked with reviewing the resumes recommended by headhunting consultant Bernard Lynch and ultimately presenting finalists to the board.

The board also voted to transfer the responsibility and authority over Sprague’s Cove from the Board of Selectmen to the Conservation Commission.

The next meeting of the Marion Board of Selectmen is scheduled for February 5 at 7:00 pm at the Marion Town House.

Marion Board of Selectmen

By Jean Perry

Mattapoisett Town Administrator Michael Gagne explained to the Board of Selectmen on January 22 the Bike/Ped Committee’s approach to the Tier 2 Complete Streets process. The committee has scheduled two dates for public input workshops to help prioritize the projects proposed for the Complete Streets grant funding.

Mattapoisett recently was accepted as a Tier 1 Complete Streets community, which makes it eligible for a $40,000 grant for the development of the design and budgets for the projects identified by the Town for the program. Once the projects have been ranked and budgets have been developed, they get submitted to the state and become eligible for up to $400,000 in grant funding.

Gagne stated that the Bike/Ped Committee, which has expertise in pedestrian and bike safety … , “sought public input … from folks all over town [to] share concerns and thoughts about safety. Citizen input from the ground up helps to develop a healthy plan.”

The workshop is tentatively scheduled for February 12 at Center School, with a snow date of February 13. Gagne noted that there is expected to be $25 million available for Tier 3 improvements.

Also during the meeting, at the request of the Mattapoisett Police Department, the board voted unanimously to replace the “No Parking This Side” signs on the east side of Main Street from Church Street north to Route 6. Parked cars on the east side of the road have become a safety issue, according to Safety Officer Sergeant Justin King.

The town is in the throes of negotiating a successor contract with Verizon. Verizon proposes to enter into a 7-year contract with the town, which is of shorter duration than the current contract with Verizon or Comcast. Gagne believes Verizon’s proposal for a shorter contract is due to the fast-paced changes in the industry and technology. In consultation with attorney Bill Hewig of Kopelman and Paige, Gagne determined that it would be in the best interest of the town to negotiate with Verizon to receive HD transmission to all residents for public access programming. ORCTV currently transmits in HD; therefore, Verizon would merely be required to receive the HD signal and deliver it to its subscribers. This would be with the hope that Comcast would follow suit. Selectman Paul Silva pushed back on this idea, with concurrence from the other selectmen, citing the desire to have both cable companies on the same contract duration. Silva asked Gagne to revisit the issue with Hewig.

In other business, Gagne reported that the governor is asking all municipalities to assume level funding for budgetary purposes for this year. To the governor’s credit, Gagne said, the administration is looking at the Chapter 90 funds – for highways and roadways – which has been level funded for five years.

The next meeting of the Mattapoisett Board of Selectmen is scheduled for February 12 at 6:30 pm at the Mattapoisett Town Hall.

Mattapoisett Board of Selectmen

By Sarah French Storer

Mattapoisett residents are being asked to improve their recycling practices ahead of a new program that entails a curbside visual inspection of residents’ recycling bins on recycling day.

But don’t start calling them the “recycling police” just yet.

Mattapoisett Health Agent Dale Barrows intends on soliciting the services of some active seniors who sign up for the Senior Work-Off Abatement Program to travel across Mattapoisett to designated areas each recycling day to lift the lid on your recycling bin to get a peek at whether you’re an offender of contaminated recycling – un-rinsed plastic, glass, and metal cans, or the presence of items that just don’t belong in the bin, such as plastic coat hangers or plastic bags.

With the help of a $22,000 state-funded Smart Recycling Grant, Mattapoisett will first establish a public outreach educational initiative through postcard mailings, the printed media, and television programming that will guide Mattapoisett residents specifically on what is allowed and what is not allowed into the recycling bin.

The first mailing will be sent out in the summer during the July tax bill cycle. The Board of Health is considering at least one public educational meeting on recycling and the Town’s educational outreach, and hopes that, like Fairhaven’s claim of an 82% reduction in recycling contamination after implementing its own Smart Recycling program, Mattapoisett will see similar positive results.

The board viewed a draft of that postcard during its January 22 meeting, with a couple of tentative updates pointed out by Assistant Board of Health Agent Kate Tapper.

Tapper said the public needs to be updated on some items that are no longer accepted into the recycling stream, such as medication bottles, and those small plastic film windows on envelopes now need to be torn out and thrown away before being placed in the recycling bin.

“So, it gets a little bit confusing,” said Tapper. “It’s gotten very, very specific on what you can and what you cannot put in.”

Some are still bagging recyclables in plastic bags, said Health Agent Dale Barrows – a definite no-no and “the biggest violation” that residents are committing. This prompted Board of Health member Carmelo Nicolosi to wonder if that educational post card should feature what is NOT allowed in the recycling bin instead of what IS allowed.

The board hopes to reach the folks who are less inclined to recycle or recycle properly – those residents whose lives may be busy, as well as those “wishcyclers,” said Barrows – people who put stuff that they think should be recycled into the bin, even if those items are not allowed.

But it’s not the Board of Health’s objective to punish people for not recycling properly – after all, Mattapoisett residents are already being punished via higher recyclables disposal costs imposed by the recycling hauler, ABC Disposal, which the Town of Mattapoisett is currently fighting in an ongoing legal battle.

No, the Board of Health simply wants to educate people on how to recycle, and then follow-up by monitoring residents’ behavior, bringing awareness to those who still might not have heard, read, or seen instructions on how to recycle the right way.

“It’s going to be an educational program, first,” said Barrows. After, Barrows envisions two fit, active, willing seniors to travel through Mattapoisett to inspect people’s recycling. Those bins found to contain items that do not belong will be at the curb, and a sticker left on the bin explaining that the recycling is unacceptable, with feedback on what the resident did wrong.

The program, Tapper emphasized, is to educate specifically Mattapoisett residents, as other towns may have other recycling restrictions. Still, she acknowledged, once the program gets underway, “We’re going to get a lot of phone calls.”

“People are gonna get upset about it if [their bin] gets refused,” Barrows concurred.

“As long as they know ahead of time this is what you have to do,” said Tapper. “I think our residents want to do the right thing, but I think it’s gotten so confusing. The rules have changed.”

The next meeting of the Mattapoisett Board of Health is scheduled for February 19 at 10:00 am at the Mattapoisett Town Hall.

Mattapoisett Board of Health

By Jean Perry