Published May 23, 2019

By MAUREEN DOHERTY

NORTH READING — The Select Board held its standard informational public hearing Monday night on the 29 articles that comprise the June 10 Town Meeting warrant.

While there were a couple of people in the audience for at least part of the presentation, no direct questions from the public to the board were asked about the $70.5M budget proposed for FY20 under Article 15 or the multi-million dollar capital improvement plan under Article 16, both of which will be recommended for passage by the board at Town Meeting, or any of the other 27 warrant articles.

Town Meeting warrants were scheduled to be mailed out to all residents on Wednesday and should be arriving by Friday or Saturday.

It was the first full meeting since the board reorganized after the May 7 town election with new members Richard Wallner and Liane Gonzalez joining new Chairwoman Kate Manupelli and members Stephen O’Leary and Andrew Schultz. It was also last time the board will meet in advance of Town Meeting. They will convene at 6 p.m. on Monday, June 10 in the principal’s conference room at NRHS, an hour prior to the start of Town Meeting, to review any last minute details.

Article 25: Swan Pond Road

The board spent most of the hearing discussing the last few articles. In particular, Article 25, which seeks to appropriate funds to conduct the road survey, engineering design and/or the construction of about 2,700 linear feet of Swan Pond Road, which is now gravel.

This request grew out of a citizens’ petition filed at the June 2018 Town Meeting by the majority of residents on this unaccepted gravel road who would like to partner with the town to improve the road with pavement and drainage. But efforts to do so have been stymied because the road has never been laid out; it doesn’t qualify as even a paper street on a long forgotten subdivision plan. The neighborhood that grew up around Swan Pond originated as camps which did not have public electrical service until 1988; most residents prior to the flip being switched used generators for their power needs. The homes there today are year round and far from camps.

The town owns a good portion of the abutting wooded land along Swan Pond Road, plows the 2,700 feet in the winter and adds new gravel several times a year after it washes out, just as it does for approximately 5 miles of unaccepted dirt roads scattered elsewhere in town. This is the town’s policy to maintain basic public safety and emergency vehicle access. The town and all of the abutting residents have the right to pass and re-pass over what is essentially each owner’s private property.

This leaves a lot of unknowns as to the existing condition of road and the type and extent of drainage design that would be necessary to pave it. Further complicating the design of any potential stormwater management plan is the fact that Swan Pond is a public drinking water reservoir for the town of Danvers therefore any runoff would have to meet tougher standards. Improving the quality of that water run-off into the pond was among the reasons cited by the residents who advocated at Town Meeting last year on behalf of their citizens’ petition.

This survey is essential for Town Engineer John Klipfel and DPW Director Patrick Bower to determine the town’s options in roadway design as well as the cost involved and how those costs would be divided between the abutting property owners and the town.

A year ago the DPW was tasked with getting the roadway survey done for $10,000, to establish a starting point, and report back to Town Meeting. But since Swan Pond Road is private property the town is required to get signed permission from each property owner to allow the survey to be done. It was a known fact entering this process that the owners of the last property on the street were not interested in upgrading any portion of roadway on their property and therefore they would not be part of the survey.

At this point, according to Town Administrator Michael Gilleberto, the town has obtained the permission of all but one additional property owner for the survey to be done. This property owner’s lot is located at the midpoint of the road approximately 1,100 linear feet from the nearest paved road, according to the town engineer. The roadway also bisects this property owner’s lot as it takes a zig and a zag around trees and the house.

According to the T.A., this property owner is not opposed to the road being upgraded but does not want to commit to having to pay a portion of the currently unknown cost for doing so.

Select Board member Stephen O’Leary favored having the town engineer complete the survey for the first 1,100 feet, skipping over the portion that cuts through that property owner’s lot and then completing the rest of the survey through the properties of the remaining residents who do want these upgrades.

“The town would get a better sense of the scope of the work (involved) if we can get around this one property owner,” O’Leary said.

Klipfel was hesitant to endorse doing it piecemeal.

In response to a question about the potential drainage needs on that one lot, Klipfel said the section being skipped is not one of the areas they anticipate would be a “contributor” to any drainage issues.

Select Board member Andrew Schultz questioned the wisdom of spending any funds on a private road without the full support of the residents who would benefit, including their agreement to share in the costs of these improvements. “These residents bought a house on a dirt road,” Schultz said, not wanting the town to set a precedent or expectation that other dirt roads would also be improved.

But Manupelli responded, “We moved passed that already and we have been, as a board, fully supportive” of the premise of getting the survey done in order to report back the findings to Town Meeting. “It does not mean we are going to fund it,” Manupelli added later in the meeting, since the purpose of the survey was to determine the actual cost.

O’Leary made a motion to encourage the administration to move forward with the survey of Swan Pond Road where permission has been granted, which passed unanimously.