By Pattie Pacella, Neighb News Correspondent
The Acushnet Selectboard held an emergency meeting on Friday, 3/20/20, at 10:00 a.m., to discuss the COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic and the town’s response to it.
Chairperson Roger Cabral was attende the meeting remotely; board members david Desroches and Kevin. Gaspar were in the meeting room along with Town Administrator Julie Hebert.
Ms. Hebert explained a “30 day Plan” that she and Mr. Gaspar worked on for the town employees. She explained that the Town Buildings were closed to the public.
She said the plan requires that department heads be working on Monday, Wednesday and Friday; and clerical staff be in the office on Tuesday and Thursday.
Mr. Gaspar stated the schedule would “stagger” employees and help alleviate their concerns not to have to work with more than one person in their office.
Ms. Hebert stated that social distancing is encouraged and that department heads would be forwarding weekly progress reports to the Town Administrator.
Mr. Cabral stated he was fine with the 30-day plan, but he did think that it was important to have government offices open.
“We need to provide the public with full access,” Mr. Cabral said.
Ms. Hebert also stated that most department heads have laptops and computers that can be taken home, and there was a remote access policy that needed to be voted in by the Selectboard.
The board approved that remote policy.
Town Clerk Pamela Labonte was also present to discuss the timing of Town Meeting and advised the Selectboard if the meeting had to be postponed that information needed to be submitted to her so that the Town Moderator could move the date if necessary.
The Selectboard agreed to continue to monitor the situation and will follow up with Ms. Labonte in the near future.
In other business, the Selectboard delayed the golf course opening another week to March 30, 2020.
On the state level, on Monday, 3/23, the Governor closed all non essential businesses in the state (see page 3). Government offices were also ordered closed except for essential personnel.
Visit the town’s website at https:// www.acushnet.ma.us for updates
Acushnet has also launched an online application for registering and activating burning permits. Visit https://www.acushnet.ma.us/home/ news/burning-permit for more information, or call the fire department at 508-998-0250.
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