Manjikian Blasts New Planning Board Chair in Resignation Letter: ‘Hostile Work Environment’

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Photo: Planning Board Chair Charles Clark (left) and former member Raffi Manjikian.

In a tempestuous letter sent to the Belmont Board of Selectmen on Friday, Oct. 13, Raffi Manjikian abruptly resigned as an associate member of the Belmont Planning Board, eight days after fellow board member Charles Clark was named the body’s new chair.

Manjikian said he could not support the selection of Clark to lead the board after he treated him and then Planning Board Chair Liz Allison in “a hostile and threatening manner” and “creating a ‘hostile’ work environment” for future Planning Board meetings. 

“I have lost all confidence that I can make any meaningful contribution to our community as your appointee to the Planning Board,” he told the Selectmen.

Clark’s response to Manjikian’s attack was short and concise. 

“I wish him the best,” Clark told the Belmontonian.

Clark was elected chair in a 3-2 vote on Thursday, Oct. 5 with newly-appointed Stephen Pinkerton selected as vice chair.

Manjikian’s resignation came less than three weeks after the Selectmen reappointed him to the board for a term ending in 2019.

The bad blood between Manjikian and Clark goes back to a Sept. 5 Planning Board meeting where Clark accused Manjikian and Allison of an abuse of power in presenting a controversial proposal dubbed the “Big Idea” moving the Belmont Public Library from its current home on Concord Avenue to Waverley Square as part of a public/private revitalization of the business center.

“It’s not a ‘Big Idea.’ It’s a big lie,” Clark said at the Sept. 5 meeting. “I also think as a result [of] the actions that you’ve taken, you should resign as chair of the Planning Board and remove yourself from this process because I think you violated your responsibilities,” Clarks said to Allison. 

“[T]he manner in which Charles Clark, took upon himself to use our public meeting to attack a colleague [Allison]; to air his ill-tempered rant, for the public to watch, was deliberate and calibrated,” said Manjikian.

He noted the Sept. 5 incident was the second – the first at the Beech Street Center in August – “attacking this same colleague in an affect-laden outburst” then quoting Clark as saying “‘… you have not heard the last from me …’ [(W]hile pointing his finger towards [Allison’s] face.[)]

“In a work setting, this behavior would likely result in a terminiation of employment,” Manjikian wrote.

Manjikian is calling on the Selectmen to “take clear decisive action to address this misconduct.” 

“My volunteer service has long been guided by a principle ‘with each other, for each other,'” Manjikian stated. “I fail to see that I can uphold that principle in the face of such disregard for some people with whom you do not agree.”

Two Nights? Now Six Articles Before Special Town Meeting

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Photo: Moderator Mike Widmer at the February 2016 Special Town Meeting.

A citizens’ petition seeking to elect members of the Planning Board brings to six the number of articles in the warrant for the Special Town Meeting next month.

The warrant – which was open and closed on Tuesday, Oct. 10 – will likely take more than the traditional single night to vote on the measures before the 290-plus member legislative body.

“It looks like we’ll need to plan for two nights to complete the meeting,” said Town Clerk Ellen Cushman as she accepted the planning board petition on Tuesday. 

The articles are:

  • Reports from town departments and committees, residents.
  • Amendment to the General Bylaws: Revolving Funds,
  • Appropriation for modular classrooms at the Burbank School ($2.6 million),
  • Appropriation of funds ($370,000) for schematic design and authorization of a Building Committee for a Department of Public Works short-term option and a Police building short-term option,
  • Appropriation of schematic design ($150,000) and authorization of a Library Building Committee.
  • Citizens’ Petition to create an elected Planning Board. 

The first night of the Special Town Meeting will take place on Monday, Nov. 13 at 7 p.m. at the Chenery Middle School. If needed, an additional night will be held on Wednesday, Nov. 15. 

Citizens’ Petition To Create Elected Planning Board Filed With Town Clerk [VIDEO]

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Photo: The residents behind the citizens’ petition to create an elected board (from left): Anne Mahon, Paul Roberts, and Wayne Mesard. Town Clerk Ellen Cushman is collecting the petitions.

Three residents filed a citizens’ petition with Belmont Town Clerk Ellen Cushman to transform the appointed Planning Board into an elected body on Tuesday morning, Oct. 10. 

Town Meeting Members Paul Roberts (Pct. 8), Anne Mahon (Pct. 4) and Wayne Mesard (Pct. 3) are seeking to have the measure approved as an article by the Special Town Meeting when it meets on Monday, Nov. 13.

“The Planning Board is an incredibly important body of the town of Belmont,” said Roberts, who handed in the petition to Cushman with 162 signatures, much more than the 100 required by the town’s bylaws. 

“It has jurisdiction over the physical shape of our community,” Roberts said about the board which is charged under the town’s bylaws to “protect and preserve the character and the quality of life that defines Belmont.” 

But as it stands today, the appointed board is not accountable to the voters, but only to the selectmen, said Roberts. As an elected body, the petitioners believe the professionalism of the board will increase with a larger pool of interested people who will run. 

Mahon said too many times in the past outstanding candidates were passed over with little explanation. Under an elected form, those seeking a seat at the table will be able to demonstrate their skills and ideas to the town electorate rather than the three selectmen.

“This isn’t an advisory board. This is an administrative board, an operational part of the government,” said Mesard, which Roberts noted is similar to the selectmen, school committee and the library board of trustees. 

The five-member board – which includes an associate member – drafts zoning proposals, studies land-use patterns, reviews traffic concerns and evaluates specific development projects such as the Cushing Village project and recently the Belmont Day School’s classroom/gym development and roadway.

For more than a decade, the Planning Board and its members have come under fire by critics. Complaints of being unfriendly to business surfaced with the Cushing Village site and design review which took 18 months to conclude or in overstepping its jurisdiction with the proposal to move the town’s public library to Waverley Square as part of a redevelopment of the business center without reaching out to the Board of Library Trustees beforehand.

Roberts pointed out that Belmont’s board, whose members are appointed by the Board of Selectmen, is an anomaly when compared to neighboring towns. Communities such as Newton, Weston, Watertown, Lexington, and Winchester are just a few municipalities that elect their planning boards.

The petition will first be certified by the Town Clerk – due to technology issues Cushman was unable to make that call as of 3:45 p.m. Tuesday – before proceeding to the Bylaw Review Committee which reviews proposals for General Bylaw changes to make sure that they do not conflict with existing bylaws.

Six Projects Clear First Hurdle Towards Securing CPC Funding

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Photo: The Belmont Veterans Memorial project.

More fields being restored, a “re-do” and a saving a Belmont barn have submitted preliminary applications for funding by the town’s Community Preservation Committee, according to information released by the CPC on Tuesday, Oct. 3.

A total of six applications were received by the committee by its Sept.29 deadline,  according to Michael Trainor, who this week stepped down from the CPC Admin Coordinator position after five years of working for the CPC.

While five of the six have specific dollar amounts, one – the second request for an inter-generational walking path at the Grove Street Playground – was submitted without a price tag attached.

But in the preliminary application stage, “it’s not entirely necessary since the CPC is just looking at whether or not the project would be eligible to receive funding under Mass General Law and Belmont’s specific list of criteria,” said Trainor.

With the amount for the Grove Street project to come, the total dollars requested is $748,000. While the CPC will select the projects to obtain grants, Town Meeting will have the final say which receives funding.

The projects, the amount requested and the applicants are:

  • Town Field Playground restoration $180,000 (Courtney Eldridge, Friends of Town Field Playground)
  • Payson Park Music Festival shed/hatch $50,000 (Tomi Olson, Payson Park Music Festival)
  • McLean Barn conditions study and stabilization $165,000 (Ellen O’Brien, Lauren Meier, Glenn Clancy) 
  • Belmont Veterans Memorial restoration and enhancement $103,000 (Angelo Firenze, Belmont Veterans Memorial Committee)
  • Funds set aside for the Housing Trust $250,000 (Judith Feins, Belmont Housing Trust)
  • Construction of a Grove Street Park Intergenerational Walking Path TBD (Donna Ruvolo, Friends of Grove Street Park)

The Town Field project follows other park restoration projects including this year’s PQ Park renovation and the Grove Street Park path is similar in aim and name as the one approved for Clay Pit Pond. Tomi Olson’s hatch shell project was submitted last year but rejected after Olson could not produce the written support of abutters the committee had requested. Belmont received the abandoned dairy barn, located just south of the Rock Meadow Conservation Land off Mill Street, in 2005 from McLean Hospital. And the Belmont Veterans Memorial has been raising private funds to help pay for the renovation and construction on Clay Pit Pond.

Important dates for the applicants include:

  • Nov. 8, 2017: a public meeting to discuss the applications.
  • Dec. 4, 2017: Final applications are due
  • Jan. 12, 2018: The CPC selects projects
  • March 2, 2018: Project Summary Reports Due 
  • Late April 2018: League of Women Voters Meeting
  • Early May 2018: Town Meeting

New Location for Police HQ, Renovated DPW, But Both A Decade Away [VIDEO]

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Photo: The future home (to the left) of the Belmont Police Department.

The future home of the Belmont Police Department will be located in a wooded corner of the Water Division facility at the end of Woodland Street. That’s if Town Meeting accepts the recommendation of the body created recently to analyze the town’s major capital projects.

But according to the chair of the Major Capital Project Working Group, the long-term solutions to the Police Department’s inadequate and substandard headquarters at the corner of Concord Avenue and Pleasant Street as well as constructing a new Department of Public Works facility could take more than a decade before the first shovel breaks ground on either project. 

“We are looking for some immediate fixes for both of these facilities to remediate accessibility and just to create a humane conditions for our employees,” Anne Marie Mahoney told the Belmontonian on Friday, Sept. 29 after it announced an initial outline on the future of two of the five town facilities – besides the police headquarters and the DPW buildings, a new ice skating rink, the former incinerator site and Belmont Public Library – the working group was in charge of reviewing.

The renovation/new construction at Belmont High School is well on its way under the charge of its own building committee and the Massachusetts School Building Authority. 

The first concrete step towards finding a solution will be an article in the Nov. 13 Special Town Meeting warrant which will include a request for “short-term remedies” at the current Police headquarters and the DPW buildings that will include updated changing and shower areas as well as improved office space, according to Mahoney.

The Working Group is holding a public meeting on Thursday, Oct. 19 from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. at the Beech Street Center to discuss both long and short-term plans.

The police headquarters will also have an exterior elevator shaft installed to make the building Americans with Disabilities Act compliant and install a fence and roof to create a more secure sally port when officers bring those arrested into the building.

The article will seek $370,000 – $230,000 for the police and $140,000 at the DPW – for schematic designs. Two line items in the town budget that the funds can be appropriated are either the Kendall School Insurance Account or the fines assessed against the former Cushing Village owner/developer for delays in closing the project, according to Town Treasurer Floyd Carman, who is a Working Group member.

“We want to make the building habitable for the people working there,” said Mahoney.

Once the designs are submitted, the town will come back to Town Meeting – Town Treasurer and Working Group member Floyd Carman said that would occur in May or June 2018 – seeking a bond authorization of between $4 million to $5 million for the remedies.

During this time the Working Group will complete a report that will discuss the long-term solutions including moving the police station to Woodland and renovating the DPW yard. Recent estimates have each building project costing north of $20 million. But the permanent solution “won’t be discussed for years,” said member Roy Epstein, who is chair of the Warrant Committee. 

“We don’t want a dust-up over money” when the cost of the projects will be broad estimates for years to come, said Epstein.

The reason the Working Group is not asking for a long-term fix immediately is how such projects are funded. Capital projects are financed through a debt exclusion, which will include the high school renovation/new construction project with an expected price tag of $200 million. 

“Funding is the issue which is why we are not going forward with an ask for both buildings. and that’s why they are always at the end of the line,” said Mahoney 

Yet there is at least one town department which would like to move forward on a long-term solution.   Assistant Police Chief James McIsaac, who was sitting in on Friday’s meeting, suggested the debt exclusion vote for a new police station be placed on the same ballot as the high school project, either in November 2018 or April 2019.

Created in February, the Working Group has been actively gathering data and interviewing parties impacted by the project. On Thursday, the members sat down with 20 residents from Woodland Road and Waverley Terrace to discuss placing the police station in the Water Division yard. 

“It went very well,” said Mahoney, with homeowners telling her their greatest concerns were landscaping and keeping the headquarters out of eyesight of the neighbors’ homes. 

The 411 On The Town’s New Trash Collection System

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Photo: A 64-gallon bin being lifted into an automated trash collecting truck.

Note: Below is a letter from the Belmont Department of Public Works with details on the new automated trash collection system approved by the Board of Selectmen.

At their meeting this past Monday, Sept. 25, the Board of Selectmen voted in favor for the Department of Public Works to obtain competitive bids for automated trash collection. This change in service will require residents to place their trash in the provided 64-gallon wheeled cart and set in front of their residence. After the RFP is put out in October and a hauler is chosen there will be information on more specific details. However at this time here are the known details: 

This change in service will require residents to place their trash in the provided 64-gallon wheeled cart and set in front of their residence. After the Request For Proposal is put out in October and a hauler is chosen there will be information on more specific details.

However at this time here are the known details: 

  • Only trash will have automated collection 
  • The Town will provide wheeled 64-gallon containers. There will be a consideration for residents that have concerns maneuvering their carts to the curb. DPW will set up a home evaluation to determine the best method to accommodate the resident. 
  • The option to buy an overflow bag will be available. 

The selectman also voted for the following curbside services to be bid on the next contract. All of the services will remain the same except for bulky items. Residents will now only be allowed one bulky item per week and it must be scheduled through the DPW Office. Residents are now doing this for CRT’s and appliances. 

  • One bulky item per week 
  • Every other week dual stream recycling collection 
  • CRT’s (televisions, computer monitors and laptops) 
  • Appliances 
  • Yard waste collection 

The Belmont DPW feels that the automated collection with 64-gallon carts will balance Belmont residents’ expectations between services, costs and environmental impacts. This will put the Town in a better position now and in the future. 

There will be additional detail information with more specific details in the months after the RFP is awarded. Any questions or suggestions, please contact Mary Beth Calnan/Belmont Recycling Coordinator at mcalnan@belmont-ma.gov or 617-993-2689.

Schools Asking $2.6 Million For Burbank Modulars At Special Town Meeting

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Photo: Modular classrooms.

The Belmont School Committee will seek $2.6 million from November’s Special Town meeting to purchase and install four modular classrooms and pay for long-anticipated repairs at the Burbank Elementary School.

The classrooms are expected to be up and running by the first day of the 2018-19 school year in September 2018, according to Belmont Schools Superintendent John Phelan who spoke before the Belmont School Committee Tuesday night, Sept. 26.

Phelan told the school committee his talk ‘is a preview of the presentation” he will be making to the 290 Town Meeting members on Nov. 13, which is an update of a report in June after the Burbank was selected to receive the modulars. 

The added short-term space is needed due to the rapid growth of student enrollment throughout the district. In the past year, 132 new students entered the system taking the school population to 4,540 as of September 2017. Additionally, there are more teachers in the elementary schools to help reduce class sizes that reach into the mid to high 20s.

The Burbank’s four modulars, which will cost $1,070,400, will be sited adjacent to the rear of the school building which will allow for a covered walkway between the two structures. A good chunk of the money – $1.1 million – will be dedicated to utility work including bringing electrical, water and gas from School Street to the rear of the school. 

The funds will also pay for the repair and expansion of the parking lot and the overhaul of the asphalt playground area, including possibly adding a turf playing surface at “Maeve’s Corner” a shaded area whose grass surface is turned muddy throughout the year.

“These upgrades at the Burbank were overdue. That back playground should have been replaced years ago. The parking has been insufficient,” said Phelan. 

As in June, the furniture, instructional materials and technology will be paid out of the department’s account rather than add to an already substantial request. 

‘We are asking a lot from the town by asking more money for the modulars, said Phelan. “We want to be mindful that we are advocating for the schools as part of the larger community.”                                    

Selectmen OK Automated Trash Collection, Pay As You Throw Set Aside For Now

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Photo: Kim Slack speaking before the Board of Selectmen, DPW Director Jay Marcotte looking on.

Belmont residents will soon have their curbside trash picked up by an automated trash collection truck requiring each household to use a 65-gallon wheeled barrel to place their garbage after the Belmont Board of Selectmen voted 2 to 1 to back the recommendation of the Department of Public Works Director Jay Marcotte to make a move towards mechanization.

The decision came after nearly four hours of presentations, discussion and debate before approximately 70 residents in the Town Hall auditorium on Monday, Sept. 25. Marcotte will now create a request for proposal (RFP) for a five-year contract by the end of October which will allow the winning bidder to purchase new equipment and acquire the nearly 10,000 bins that will go to each household in Belmont.

While “there is no panacea” when it comes to waste collection, Marcotte told the board the automated system – which is fast becoming the industry standard – strikes “a happy medium” regarding cost and the reduction of trash the town will collect.

He noted that using the barrels with the automated collection trucks – which has a mechanical arm that grabs the cans and flips them into a collection area – is the “right-sized for a majority of similar municipalities.” He pointed to the reduction in the trash in towns such as Burington (24 percent), Wilmington (26 percent), Dracut (19 percent) and  Dedham (35 percent) who have recently turned to automation.

According to Marcotte, Belmont’s new collection program – which will begin in 2018 – is similar to the one operated by the town of Wakefield which began its automated system in 2014.

Marcotte said data the department has gathered indicates the 65-gallon bins will meet the capacity needs of three of four Belmont households.

In a compromise to residents and board members, the DPW will accommodate residents who find using a 65-gallon barrel to be unwieldy, difficult to move, or more than they need by providing a 35-gallon barrel as an alternative.

Adam Dash voted against the motion because it did not have a provision to research the viability of using 35-gallon bins rather than the bulkier one.

While many of the current curbside services will remain in place in the next contract – the town will continue a separate recycling pickup and yard waste collection – large “bulky” items such as mattresses and furniture will now be limited to one free removal a week.                                                                                           

While selecting a traditional pickup and haul collection system, the selectmen said they had not abandoned the Pay-As-You-Throw method from future discussion. The PAYT approach was one of the most hotly debated of the items discussed. A presentation by Kim Slack of Sustainable Belmont focused on the dual benefits of reducing trash while cutting the town’s carbon footprint by undertaking this program. 

PAYT is just that, requiring households to purchase biodegradable bags for between $1 and $2 a bag for trash collection. Slack said that nearly 40 percent of Bay State communities have undertaken this system and have seen trash reduced from 25 percent to 50 percent. 

“Why not encourage more recycling,” quired Slack, noting that Belmont’s rate has not budged from the current 22 percent of total recycling, compared to Arlington’s 30 percent.

But several residents spoke against PAYT, calling it a hidden tax on residents, many who approved a 1990 override that paid for the current system of unlimited curbside collection. 

“I’m suggesting this is an underhanded way of an override,” said former Selectman Stephen Rosales who said recycling rates could be increased with more education, rather than a regressive “tax.” 

At the end of the meeting, the selectmen suggested discussing in the next two years whether to implement the PAYT method with the automated system.

Girl Ruggers Feted by Town For Historic State Championship

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Photo: Girls Rugby state champions with the Board of Selectmen.

It’s been three months since a group of Belmont High “ruggers” captured the historic first-ever state-sanctioned girls rugby championship in the US on a warm late spring day in Beverly.

This week, the victory was hailed officially by the town as the Board of Selectmen issued a proclamation celebrating the victory at Monday’s board meeting, Sept. 18.

Belmont High School Girls’ Head Coach Kate McCabe and a good number of the players attended the reading of the declaration by Chair Jim Williams, received a nice round of applause and got their photos taken afterward. 

Belmont High School Girls’ Head Coach Kate McCabe and captain Sara Nelson speaking before the Belmont Board of Selectmen.

Facilities Director Boyle To Retire At Year’s End

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Photo: Gerald Boyle

Gerald Boyle, who was Belmont’s first-ever joint Facilities Director, announced his retirement at Monday’s Board of Selectmen’s meeting.

Boyle, who spent a 34-year career in municipal government, arrived in Belmont in September 2013 to head the town’s newly created joint facilities managers position, responsible for all municipal buildings including those under the control of the school department.

For decades, the town and the school department had separate managers which was a bone of contention for more than 20 years. A non-binding citizen’s article to consolidate the buildings and grounds into one department was approved at a Special Town Meeting in Nov. 2010.