With a turnout exceeding the required 100 needed to build a quorum, which Greenwood “Woody” Hartley made sure was noted for the record, the Rochester Annual Town Meeting on June 13 succeeded in passing a number of articles with little to no discussion. However, a couple of zoning bylaw amendments required further explanation for some residents fired up over First Amendment Freedom of Speech rights. Another personnel bylaw was amended on the floor, and a citizen petition to place strict limitations on two-family conversions was unanimously postponed indefinitely.
Although both easily passed the 2/3 vote requirement, two zoning bylaw changes pertaining to signage regulations elicited some debate from residents concerned mostly about political signs, which are required to be removed from properties within 48 hours after an election.
“Most of these regulations are already in effect and they’re scattered all over…” said Planning Board Chairman Arnold Johnson, specifying that the bylaw amendments change very little about current regulations. Article 22 simply sought to organize the bylaws and omit redundancies between different board regulations. “What we’re trying to do is make things smoother…. We’re not taking anybody’s rights away.”
Article 23 was a follow-up to Article 22, which inserted definitions and omitted outdated language from the signage bylaw.
Article 14 brought Highway Department and Fire Department employee, as well as representative of the Personnel Board, Harrison Harding to the microphone to speak out about the proposed amendment to the personnel bylaw to eliminate the existing sick day buyback which pays non-union employees 50% of their pay rate for each unused sick day upon retirement or resignation.
Harding said first that the town meeting warrant, which stated that the Board of Selectmen along with the Personnel Board sponsored the article, was misleading.
“It was never discussed by the Personnel Board at all,” said Harding. He proposed amending the article to apply the change to new hires only, as well as language that would allow current non-union employees to carry their unused sick time over with them should they switch employment positions within the town.
Woody Hartley said he found Harding’s approach “fair, reasonable, and perhaps appropriate,” before town meeting voted to accept Harding’s amendment to the article. The article passed with the amendment with only just a few ‘nays.’
With a decisive vote, Town Meeting voted unanimously to indefinitely postpone Bradford Estates resident Tobias Paulo’s citizen’s petition to ban two-family conversions within 1,200 feet of the nearest single-family house, roughly a quarter-mile distance.
The Planning Board held its public hearing for Paulo’s article and voted not to recommend it. Voters sided with the Planning Board on the matter.
Also during Town Meeting, voters adopted a proposed bylaw regulating the withdrawal of water from any ponds, streams, surface, or sub-surface water in the Town of Rochester. The other three towns that are part of the Mattapoisett River Valley Water Supply District also adopted their own versions of the bylaw to protect drinking water sources from possible contamination.
The article stems from semi-recent complaints by the Towns of Mattapoisett and Fairhaven over local landscaper Yard Boss’ withdrawal of water from the Mattapoisett River for its hydro-seeding truck. This new bylaw prohibits the withdrawal of water within the town into vehicle tanks or tanks contained in any vehicle. A permit may be issued by the town, Commonwealth of Massachusetts, or the U.S. government, the article specified.
The bylaw set a penalty of $100 for a first-time violation and $500 for subsequent violations.
In all, 23 of the 25 warrant articles were adopted, including the reduction of the Annual Town Meeting quorum back down from 100 to 75; adoption of the FY2017 operating budget of $20,403,762; and the purchase of an ambulance for $240,000.
The Special Town Meeting article to transfer $67,318 from the town stabilization fund into the snow and ice removal account also passed.
By Jean Perry