The Rochester Select Board Monday night unanimously approved the Host Agreement that will plant “Megan’s Organic Market,” a cannabis retail store, within the Rochester Crossroads mixed-use development at Routes 58 and 28.
Before the approval vote, Town Administrator Glenn Cannon and Town Counsel Blair Bailey reported the agreement includes the state-required mandate that the town will receive 3% of its revenues. Plus, the store will have to pay an impact fee of up to $100,000 after its first year of operation.
Bailey said this fee will be based on the business’s actual impact on the town’s infrastructure after that year.
The pact also notes the business agreed to contribute some sort of “community investment” to the town, Bailey said. But the specifics of that are yet to be determined, he explained.
Company principal Nick Andrian told the selectmen in his first meeting with them in August that the company’s typical design is to place the actual products on display on the store shelves, not behind the checkout counter. But since Massachusetts does not allow that, the Rochester store will display “dummy packaging” that customers can take to the counter to do the actual ordering.
The selectmen started Monday’s meeting with a trio of Rochester Police Department promotions. The board approved Chief Robert Small’s recommendation to appoint Emmanuel Matias, currently a part-time patrolman, to a full-time position. Brendan Emberg was promoted from full-time officer to detective. Officer Jason Denham was promoted to sergeant.
Next came appointments to the town’s new Personnel Board, an effort sparked by the fact that Rochester, until now, had no such committee to handle the town’s personnel issues.
The Personnel Board Appointing Authority consisting of Select Board Chairman Woody Hartley, Town Moderator David Arancio and Finance Committee Chairman Kris Stoltenberg appointed to the new board: Marion’s deputy harbormaster and shellfish officer Adam Murphy, retired U.S. Coast Guard officer and Marion firefighter Peter Bourgault, and Christine Nash, a retired educator and school superintendent from four school districts.
Before the vote, Hartley said until now the town has relied on the town administrators and others with little applicable experience for its decisions on human-resources issues. “It’s an area we need to strengthen,” he said.
Appointing Authority members said the new board will now handle matters such as cost-of-living increases, pay-step increases and grievances.
The board then approved two more projects for funding out of the $10,000 that Covanta Company’s recent “outreach contribution” recently gave to the town. The money will go to the Facilities Department to irrigate the athletic fields and to replace athletic field bleachers. The board had previously endorsed the use of these funds for a Police Department emergency restraint chair.
Cannon announced that $50,000 in state funding facilitated by Senator Michael Rodrigues has been received for the Council on Aging to buy a new minivan for senior transportation. Funds totaling another $50,000 facilitated by Representative William Straus have been received for the Public Safety Infrastructure Feasibility Study.
The board’s next meeting is scheduled for Monday, October 31, at 6:00 pm at Town Hall and accessible via Zoom.
Rochester Select Board
by Michael J. DeCicco