On March 15, dog owner Thomas Hibbert, 26 Joanne Drive, came before the Marion Select Board to defend his position that “Finley,” an 80-pound, 9.5-year-old Rottweiler, should not be deemed a “dangerous” dog.
An incident between Hibbert’s dog and neighbor Debra Cohen’s 20-pound “Archie” took place on December 12, 2021. Archie was attacked by Finley, causing several bite wounds that required medical treatment.
The incident was reported to Animal Control Officer Susan Connor and followed up with a letter from Cohen to the Select Board on January 3 expressing her concerns.
Hibbert did not deny that the attack had taken place, instead he offered a psychological report from a veterinarian that stated Cohen’s dog was a trigger for aggressive behavior by Finley. Hibbert asserted that his dog is not violent, saying, “You can come in my house.”
Cohen said that she had not seen Finley outside the home since the incident and was not advocating that the animal be destroyed, but she feared Finley’s hurling herself against the windows whenever she walked by with Archie might result in the animal getting loose.
Hibbert stated, “That day was an accident, the dog is always in the house.” But on the day in question, the Hibbert family was all outside the home and Finley was able to run out an open back door and into the street where Cohen was passing. “Archie is a trigger for her,” Hibbert repeated several times. He went on to say his dog is in constant pain, receiving several different types of medication and probably is at the end of her life. He said he was willing to keep her in the house and pleaded, “The dog is not dangerous, she hasn’t bitten before, it would be wrong to put her down.”
Hibbert said that he immediately went to the aid of Cohen and her dog, paid for emergency medical care and has apologized profusely. Cohen said she didn’t feel safe in her neighborhood.
Town Counsel Jon Witten said the Select Board had to decide if the dog was simply a nuisance or a dangerous dog. If they found Finley fell into the latter category, there was a number of measures they could impose upon Hibbert.
After reviewing a variety of conditions from muzzling to leashing to restraining the animal in a humane manner, the board elected to require an interior, dog-proof doorway barrier, an exterior enclosure, and monitoring by the dog officer. In legal parlance, the dog will be “confined to the keeper of the dog.” If Hibbert fails to meet the conditions set out by the board, fines of up to $300 per day may be imposed.
In other business, Matt Zuker of Zuker Development met with the board to informally discuss a revised plan to construct 48 units consisting of 36 detached homes and 12 townhouses on property located at 78 Wareham Road.
Zuker acknowledged that earlier attempts to get a zoning bylaw change through Town Meeting that would allow the cluster development failed and that his team could have done better. Now he said they were ready to try again. A Planning Board meeting is scheduled for Monday, March 21.
Part of Zuker’s presentation included drawings of the proposed homes’ aesthetics as coastal cottages in keeping with the town’s image, but the bigger news was an agreement crafted with the assistance of Town Administrator Jay McGrail that would benefit the community’s water and sewer systems.
Several critical areas of proposed assistance that Zuker would lend to the town include: 1) payment of up to $1,265,630 to the town for the removal of extraneous infiltration and inflow (I/I); 2) payment of $123,000 to the town to contribute to the design and construction of a project to replace the existing Creek Road pump station; 3) payment of $37,000 to the town to perform a force main condition assessment to assess the pipeline integrity and determine the need for future actions for the Creek Road and Front Street pump station force main; 4) design and installation of a new sewer pump station and sewer mains along Wareham Road to connect to the existing 10-inch sewer on Wareham Road near Point Road consistent with the town’s plans for extending sewers to the River Road needs area (including sewer service to River Road and parts of Wareham Road,) including manholes and main stubs for intersecting streets and with service laterals for each fronted property fronted along the sewer line; 5) payment of all applicable sewer connection and permit fees as required by town policies and regulations and 6) replacement of portions of the existing water mains in the area leading to the development and increase in the size of the pipe to allow for adequate fire-flow capacity and inclusion of the proper interconnection of the new water main with the existing mains in the intersection of Point Road and Wareham Road, the transfer of service laterals for each fronted property along the new water main, and the proper abandonment of the existing 6-inch water main in the area.
Earlier in the meeting, Gaelle Hyppolite was appointed to the Affordable Housing Trust. The board also approved the appointment of probationary police officers Randy Jacob and Stephen Dawson as full-time officers.
The next meeting of the Marion Select Board is scheduled for Tuesday, April 5, at 6:00 pm.
Marion Select Board
By Marilou Newell