 Egremont News |
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Issue 16 |
July, 2004 |
We would like to welcome new elected officials Planning Board member Cathy Fracasse, Assessor Dan Martin, Moderator Tom Gage and Cemetery Commissioners Herman Trudeau Jr.
The Selectmen’s meeting schedule for the months of July and August will be as follows on Tuesday evening at 7pm at Town Hall:
July 6, July 20, August 3, August 17 and August 31.
Congratulations to our local High School Graduates: Stephen Byrne, Jessica Lynn Cardinal, Meghan Elizabeth Flynn, Megan C. Montgomery, and Danny Lee Waite.
It is time to obtain your FY 2005 dump sticker. Please stop by the Town Hall to pick it up or call us and we will mail it to you.
Alarm permits are renewable on July 1st. Notices have been sent. If you have any type of alarm system in your home and you didn’t get a renewal notice, please contact Town Hall.
Assessors:
Reminder for those residents qualifying their properties under Chapter 61A & 61B, forms must be submitted to our office by October 1, 2004. Forms may be obtained from our office or the Selectmen’s Office at Town Hall.
Beginning July 1 the Board will have a clerk for a few hours per week. Check with Town Hall as to the hours.
French Park:
The French Park Committee along with the newly formed French Park Fund has been busy meeting and taking inventory of equipment that needs to be updated. Projects already underway for this summer are the volleyball courts to be re-sanded and new nets to be installed. The current riding ring is going to be enlarged thanks to a generous contribution from an Egremont resident. The walking trails through the park are being maintained and more trails are being cut. We hope to have a map of the trails soon. We are also collecting information regarding the history of French Park which will soon become a brochure available to Egremont residents and visitors to the park. If any one has interesting history of the park please feel free to contact us.
There will be no French Park Day this year, unless we get an overwhelming response from the residents. Although we have had wonderful events in the past, French Park Day has not been very well attended in the recent past.
The French Park Fund and committee has a wish list of projects for the future such as new tennis courts, playground equipment for younger children and to extend the walking trails.
The French Park Fund welcomes contributions of all types. Contributions qualify for a federal income tax deduction. Recent significant contributions have been made by the board. Contributions can be made to the French Park Fund and sent to the treasurer Richard Goodkind at 164 Hillsdale Rd., Great Barrington, MA. 01230.
Volley ball night, sponsored by Southern Berkshire YMCA, will be held every Wednesday night from 7-8pm starting July 7th through August 25th. All families are welcome.
Affordable Housing:
The Affordable Housing Committee continues to work on a comprehensive affordable housing plan for submission to the state and is investigating possible sites in Egremont where affordable housing would be feasible and appropriate. One possible site is the “annex,” located between Town Hall and the North Firehouse. If you are interested in this subject, please contact Richard Allen at 528-2108.
Waste Water Management:
Update on district formation-
With assistance from Town Counsel Jerome Scully establishing acts have been submitted to the State Legislature to formally establish an Egremont Wastewater Management District (WWMD), which town voters have already given initial approval of at the 2003 Town Meeting. Rather than forming an enterprise system, which is the structure of the Egremont Water Department, a District gives voting power to our many part-time homeowners within its boundaries on District matters. It also keeps any expenses or financial obligations that are voted and approved by the District strictly within the District.
As many of you know, the State of Massachusetts has fairly strict environmental codes by which all septic systems must be judged part of. In the industry those codes are referred to as 310 CMR 15.000 Minimum Requirements for the Subsurface Disposal of Sanitary Sewage – most of us simply refer to these codes as “Title 5”. Whether your home or business will be part of a community sewer, part of a shared or clustered septic system or simply part of a managed septic system pumping schedule the District will be the legal entity, with commissioners and a committee, which can assist and manage if you so choose in matters pertaining to wastewater within the designated boundary lines. (See maps of Service Area 1 and Service Area 2.) Larger maps are posted at Town Hall and at both the North and South Egremont Post Offices.
The duties, responsibilities and financial obligations of the District will be as broad as or limited as the members of the District vote them to be. Properties in the District that are not actively involved in either a Wastewater Management Plan, a Community Sewer Project or the like would pay a $25 to $50/year (perhaps adjusted for inflation) to cover costs of mailings and basic planning. If District voters approve the allocation of funding for, say, a community sewer in the South Egremont Village the District will be the entity that will fund, manage, operate and “tax” its users a fee for inclusion in that sewer. If, say, residents around Prospect Lake opt for shared or clustered septic systems, the District would organize and run that type of system (state regulations on shared system without a District are quite cumbersome and onerous: with a District managing a clustered system approval from the state is given more freely.) The District would be the entity that would actively pursue grant funding, where available, for all of its projects.
After the State Legislature approves the District boundaries and Bylaws (which will be very general and allow the District to create any rules and regulations that it needs) the Town of Egremont will hold a special Town Meeting to accept what the legislature approved and formally establish the District. Members of the District will then have a vote to organize itself. This vote will be done by ballot with each property owner having one vote. The WWMD would be divided into three voting and service areas: North, South and Lake. Each area would be responsible to finance its own project. Each area would have the opportunity to withdraw from the District with a majority vote of the property owners. Commissioners (two from South, one from North, one from the Lake and one appointed by the Selectmen) would be elected, and Bylaws may be updated as needed. The Commissioners would elect a Chairman and establish a budget.
Proper wastewater disposal may not be the most glamorous of subjects but we all can agree that protecting our drinking water and maintaining the health of our community is an issue we all feel strongly about and want to work towards preserving. Substandard septic systems and the dangers associated with them affect us all in Egremont. The duty of an Egremont Wastewater Management District will be protecting the health of our community now and in the future.
Egremont Planning Board:
On June 8, 2004, at a Special Town Meeting, Egremont voters decided to postpone action on the proposed Egremont bylaw. Some voters expressed concern, both during the meeting and to Planning Board members afterward, that the number of proposed changes to the bylaw and the amount of information presented for review was overwhelming.
The purpose of the bylaw proposal was to reformat the existing bylaw, to bring it into conformity with current state law, and to clarify existing ambiguities which had caused difficulties in the past. Based on comments from townspeople that there were too many changes and that this was too much to do all at once, the Planning Board now proposes approaching these steps individually.
The board suggests that the first step be to reformat the bylaw using the same language as in the current bylaw. Putting our bylaw into a more conventional and logical form will make it easier to integrate bylaw changes in the future. As at the recent Special Town Meeting, the bylaw would be presented as a single article. The new bylaw would be the same as the present bylaw but with a different appearance.
Then, either at the same town meeting or a later time, changes for clarity and for consistency with law can be addressed as separate articles to be voted on individually. In that way, a clear comparison can be made between the present language as reformatted and the new proposals. In addition, the town can begin to consider numerous new planning ideas which were suggested and discussed during the planning process.
The Planning Board hopes that this process will meet the concerns of townspeople that proposals at town meeting be clear and understandable and presented in manageable fashion.
Our consultant’s work under the state’s Community Development Plan funding is coming to a close. Their work is being incorporated into a Community Development Plan document along with the mapping and transportation planning produced under the grant, all of which are required aspects of the grant funding received by the town. This final work, along with the grant funding, is being coordinated by Berkshire Regional Planning Commission and should be completed in the near future.
Based on widespread interest by both public safety officials and townspeople in general in improving cellular service in town, the Planning Board has been in contact with telecommunications companies to let them know of the town’s interest in having cellular coverage in Egremont. As of this writing, no response has been received, but the board will continue to investigate this matter.
The Planning Board welcomes comments and suggestions from townspeople about the bylaw process and any other town planning issues. Comments can be sent to the Egremont Planning Board at PO Box 368, South Egremont, MA 01258, or by contacting any board member through the Town Hall at (413) 528-0182.
Board meeting schedule:
Assessors - Wednesdays 9am to 11am & Tuesdays 7pm to 9pm
Board of Health - Monday & Wednesday 8am-1pm, Tuesday 10:30am-3:30pm, Thursday 10am-1pm
Board of Selectmen - Tuesday evenings 7pm
Planning Board - Second & Fourth Monday 7:30pm
Archives Room - First Saturday 9-noon
Building Inspector - Tuesdays 12:30pm - 3:30pm
Town Clerk - Tuesday evenings 7pm - 9pm
Conservation Commission - Second and Fourth Thursdays 7:00pm
Waste Water Management - Third Tuesday 3:30pm
Water Department - Third Thursday 4:30pm
Did you Know?
The Lee Visiting Nurse comes to Town Hall the first Wednesday of every month for blood pressure checks from 11:30 to 12:30. All are welcome.
You can obtain Tax Assessment and Property Record Field card information on the web. Log on to the CAMA Support site at www.csc-ma.us/Egremont. Go to the Public Access section. You can search on the property owner name or the location. Shortly you will be able to obtain Tax Maps there also. This will especially interest appraisers and real estate personnel.
The Town’s web site is up and running. Log on to www.egremont-ma.gov. We would love your feedback.
As well as having compost bins for sale, the Town now has a small supply of kitchen compost buckets.
Library:
Coming July 17
MR. WHISKERS
To Entertain
CHILDREN of
all ages
1pm at
The Egremont
Fire Library
Come and
Bring your
Freinds
Sponsored by
The Friends of the
Egremont Free Library
The School
David Allen Hunter
1920's
Near the center of the village,
With the store across the street,
There’s a building long familiar
To the tramp of little feet.
‘Tis a modest wooden structure
Where one teacher sits to rule
And the children go for learning
To that little village school.
It is builded so one gable
Faces on the village way
And upon a pole above it
Oft’ a flag is on display.
There’s a playground out before it
Where the children romp and fool
When no class is held in session
In that little village school.
I am sometimes in the village
At the hours of one or nice,
When the teacher rings the handbell
And the children form in line.
Then a something stirs my mem’ry
Like a ripple in a pool
As I see the youngsters marching
In that little village school.
Just a flicker of the pages–
I am starting from the farm
One a happy summer morning
With my lunch beneath my arm,
Up across the hill I’m tramping
Where the air is sweet and cool–
O’er the brook upon the footbridge
To that little village school.
I can see the girls and fellows
Gathered in that room again,
Where we used to read and figure,
Study, spell and wield the pen.
Oh, what magic strands unravel
From old Mem’ry’s mystic pool
As I think of those who knew me
At that little village school.
But the crowd who then were youngsters
Now are men and women grown.Some have left the little village
Some have families of their own.
Still I find a joy in writing
With a pencil for a tool
Of our happy days together
At that little village school.
The first school in Egremont was in West Egremont in 1938 the building was moved to what is now the Jug End Reservation property. The second school was in the south village on the corner of “Shop Hill”, now called Baldwin Hill South. The first school house in the north part of town was built near the Prospect Lake Road and later moved. There was also a school on Route 71 at the corner of Baldwin Hill East. Another school was located on Route 23 by Bott Hill Road. In 1880 all grade schools were closed and two new schools built - one in the south village and the other south of the north village. The one in the south village is still in use today. The one on Route 71 was sold by the Town about 12 years ago. These schools taught up to 6th grade and then students wishing to further their education were tuitioned elsewhere. On March 2, 1953 the Southern Berkshire Regional School District was formed creating the first grade 1 through grade 12 district in the Commonwealth. Classes began in the new school in September of 1955. Full sessions of all grades began in January of 1956.
Town of Egremont
P.O. Box 368
South Egremont MA 01258
413-528-0182
Printed by Office Administrator Mary Brazie
as submitted by Town Department.