By Mary Macedo, Neighb News Correspondent
At its meeting on Monday, 1/27 the Fairhaven Board of Public Works discussed the new dog park, and revisited the discussion about vehicular traffic at Cushman Park.
The board first met with the Town Planner Paul Foley about the potential locations for a dog park in Fairhaven.
Mr. Foley explained that the dog park can be grant funded and that there are two grant options, but the location must be on town owned property to receive the grants.
He showed the board a PowerPoint presentation of all the locations and how each location was ranked through a set of criteria that would be best suitable location for the dog park. Mr. Foley said that they have looked at many locations and gave each location a score.
The top two ranked locations were south of the former Rogers School, and North Street east of Main Street where the Old Stone School House is.
Mr. Foley explained that the northeast corner of Livesey Park was also ranked very high, but they felt that Livesey Park has too much going on and adding a dog park would take away from already existing activities.
Board member Robert “Hoppy’ Hobson asked Mr. Foley why Fort Phoenix was not an option for the dog park.
Mr. Foley explained that Fort Phoenix is a state owned property, not a town owned, and therefore they would not be eligible for the grants if that location was used.
Mr. Foley agreed that Fort Phoenix would have been a great location.
Mr. Hobson suggested that maybe there is some way that Mr. Foley could make a deal with the grant people.
Mr. Foley said the town would have to buy the property from the state.
Mr. Hobson also suggested that Mr. Foley looked at Macomber Park.
Mr. Foley said that he did not originally look there because of the new BMX track, but it is definitely a good location to look at.
Mr. Foley explained that the North Street location was a nice spot for the dog park because it is an underused area that could be utilized and it also has access to water and electricity. He also said although there are neighbors, there is a spot away from the majority of the neighbors.
Chairperson Brian Wotton suggested putting out a poll to residents on whether they want to see a dog park in town and then possibly poll residents about locations in town.
Mr. Hobson, as well as other board members, had concerns about who would be allowed to go into the dog park as far as only residents from Fairhaven or neighboring towns as well.
Mr. Foley explained that the New Bedford dog park is only for New Bedford residents and you have to pay for a $10 key fob to get in. He said that they could do something similar in Fairhaven.
Mr. Wotton suggested that the dog park be put in a location where other activities are going on. He explained that he felt like a dog park would be more utilized in areas where there are other things to do and is more of a place to bring the whole family.
Mr. Wotton suggested Cushman Park, Macomber Park, and even Livesey Park if there is enough space.
Mr. Foley said he liked the idea of Cushman Park, but he thought it would be too crowded.
Board member Cameron Durant said that Cushman Park is underutilized and is a big waste of green space. Mr. Wotton said he agreed and that Cushman Park is not too crowded.
Mr. Durant also said he thinks Macomber Park is a great option too.
Mr. Foley said he would go back and look at Cushman Park and Macomber Park and then come back in front the board.
In another matter board member Keith Silvia asked Mr. Foley about an issue regarding road work grant money.
Mr. Silvia said that Mr. Foley was supposed to apply for $600,000 grant to fix roads, but Mr. Foley never applied for the grant. Mr. Silvia said he wanted to know why.
Mr. Foley explained that they were informed by two different people that the town was not eligible this year for the grant and that they could try again next year.
In another matter the board met with Mario Ribeiro’s engineer for the Pasta House’s new external grease trap.
The board was informed that the Pasta House was in the process of designing the engineering of a 1500 gallon external grease trap to be located in the parking lot.
Mr. Durant expressed his frustration that Mr. Ribeiro had three months to come up with a plan for a grease trap and has only just hired the engineer last week to begin the planning.
BPW Superintendent Vincent Furtado said they need to know how long these plans are going to take and how long until the grease trap is finished.
In another matter the board discussed the budget for road work. Mr. Wotton said the board is just voting on the amount of money that should be asked for at town meeting to fix roads. He explained that the board would vote on the actual roads to be fixed at a later date after they speak with residents about the road concerns.
The board made a motion to ask for $375,000 for road work at town meeting. The motion passed unanimously.
In another matter the board met with Adam Jankauskas of City Compost, who explained that his company picks up curbside compost mostly in the North Shore area of Massachusetts, but he has started broadening to Western Massachusetts and now the Southcoast.
Mr. Jankauskas said his company services around 2000 homes and businesses across Massachusetts.
Mr. Hobson said he worried about the smell of the compost sitting on the curb on a hot day.
Mr. Jankauskas said it is no different than trash sitting on the curb on a hot day. He said the company also provides snap-on lids for the bins and the bins are replaced with clean ones each time.
Board member Frank Coelho asked if any neighboring towns used his company.
Mr. Jankauskas said right now his company just go to homes and businesses that ask for the service. He said they do not have any entire town or city contracts currently, they just go to individual residents that opt to have the service. The company currently services a handful of homes in Plymouth, Mattapoisett, and New Bedford.
Mr. Hobson asked which day would the compost be curbside.
Mr. Jankauskas said the town can decide what day would be best for their residents.
Mr. Durant said it would be nice to give residents the option to dispose of their compost with this company. He suggested doing it as a pilot program and let residents opt in if they want to in the future.
The board also discussed a curbside bylaw. Mr. Furtado explained that they get a lot of complaints about residents leaving the garbage bins out on the curb for days.
Mr. Furtado said New Bedford fines residents for leaving their bins out past a certain time. He said he thought they should just come up with rules about keeping the bins from 7 a.m.- 7 p.m. or something along those lines and if the town wants to fine residents then we can think about that in the future.
Mr. Wotton said that he agrees with the idea, but might have to adjust the times for residents who work later at night. Mr. Wotton made a motion to discuss the issue in more detail at the next meeting. The motion passed unanimously.
In another matter the board met with Ray Gardner about a previous BPW meeting discussion regarding vehicular traffic at Cushman Park.
The members of the BPW went by to take a look at the park. Mr. Gardner and the board noticed that people can easily drive into the park from Main Street.
Mr. Wotton said they need to look into erecting a pole, jersey barrier or a rope to block cars.
Mr. Wotton said there should be no vehicular traffic in the park and if it is from BPW trucks shame on us.
Mr. Furtado said he will be talking to the school department and any other departments that use the park to let them know about the vehicular traffic issues.
The board also discussed meeting dates for next few months. At the last BPW meeting Mr. Coelho asked if they could alternate their meetings with the Selectboard because he sometimes likes to attend the Selectboard meetings and sometimes the BPW members are needed at Selectboard meetings.
Mr. Furtado explained that he looked into all the Selectboard dates from now through June and there were only two dates that conflicted with BPW meetings.
Mr. Furtado suggested they could skip a week and wait three weeks for a BPW meeting or do two meetings in a row.
Mr. Wotton said that if they try to fix those two dates it is going mess up the rest after that. He suggested they just leave those two dates alone because all the other dates align all the way through June. He said if someone needs to make either of those two Selectboard meetings they can adjust to accommodate them.
“Why we got to go to the Selectboard meetings,” Mr. Hobson asked.
Mr. Furtado said that we don’t need to go but Frank asked to have them alternated in case one of us needs to wants to go.
“I don’t think it’s a big deal,” Mr. Hobson said. “If he wants to go to the Selectboard’s meeting.”
“Well just leave it the way it is,” Mr. Coelho said standing up and putting all his papers in front of him into a pile.
“That’s what I say,” Mr. Hobson said. “I don’t want to change the date.”
“You’re the one that was bitching about it before….now all of a sudden,” Mr. Coelho said pointing his finger at Mr. Hobson and slamming his fold of papers.
“Make up your mind one way or the other,” Mr. Coelho said putting on his jacket. “You’re all over the place Hoppy.”
Mr. Coelho proceeded to grab his things and left the BPW meeting before it was over.
“He’s the one that wanted to change the meeting not me,” Mr. Hobson said.
“Did Frank not realize there was a whole other section of the agenda,” Mr. Wotton asked. “I mean we’re just discussing, I don’t think there was any reason to get up and storm out of here.”
“He’s not mad at you guys he’s mad at me,” Mr. Hobson said.
“As long as it’s you and not me,” Mr. Wotton said. “I was just trying to appease him.”
“Hey I’m his friend and he’s mad at me,” said Mr. Hobson laughing.
Given that the BPW meetings and Selectboard meetings only conflict twice between now and June the board chose to leave the dates as is.
The board will post the BPW dates online through June and adjust as needed.
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