10:55 p.m. Article 33 passes, 617 to 103. There will now be two Proposition 2 1/2 debt exclusion override questions on the June ballot. And that’s a wrap for night one of Marblehead Town Meeting. “We need you back tomorrow night to do the rest of the business,” Moderator Jack Attridge implored the crowd.
10:48 p.m. Article 33, the Mary Alley renovations, will be the last piece of business for tonight. The meeting will reconvene Wednesday, May 7 at 7 p.m., again in the Marblehead High School field house.
10:43 p.m. Needing a two-thirds vote to pass because it proposes overriding the limits of Proposition 2 1/2, the Marblehead High roof project passes, 804 votes to 283. It will now appear on the town election ballot in June, where it will need a simple majority vote to pass.
10:08 p.m. The meeting is now continuing with Marblehead Assistant School Superintendent Mike Pfifferling presenting Article 34, the debt exclusion override to address the roof and HVAC system at Marblehead High School. Among the speakers in favor of the article are Joe King, a physics and engineering teacher at MHS, and three MHS seniors, who attested to the dismal conditions in the building. “We’re past a point where this is acceptable,” said Dante Genovesi. Residents Sam Altreuter and Seamus Hourihan sought to bifurcate the roof portion of the project from the HVAC piece. Hourihan wondered if the Trump administration’s tariff regime would make the HVAC project more expensive to do now and whether it would be better off to wait.
10:01 p.m. By a vote of 951 to 759, Town Meeting has approved Article 23, the town’s plan to comply with the MBTA Communities Act.
9:57 p.m. There will be no written ballot on Article 23, 676 “yes,” 1,029 “no.” We are now onto the vote on the main motion on Article 23, the MBTA Communities Act zoning compliance plan.
9:51 p.m. Yael Magen’s proposed amendment fails, 673 votes in favor, 1,060 against. We are now going to vote on whether there should be a written ballot taken on Article 23, per Moderator Jack Attridge.
9:35 p.m. Town Meeting is now debating another amendment to Article 23 offered by Yael Magen, a candidate for Select Board and an attorney who works with municipalities. Part of the amendment is advisory to the Select Board to seek a compliance exemption.
9:28 p.m. The question is called on John DiPiano’s motion to vote indefinite postpone Article 23. The motion fails, with 750 voting in favor and 1,028 opposed.
8:17 p.m. Town Meeting begins debating John DiPiano’s motion to vote indefinite postponement on Article 23. DiPiano describes how he used a Freedom of Information Act request to determine that the town only had $475,000 in lost grants at stake by not adopting a compliance plan, which worked out to $58 to $59 per household. “I’m willing to write that check to retain our zoning independence,” he tells Town Meeting. DiPiano also quotes from filings from that the town’s law firm, Mead, Talerman & Costa, has made in litigation on behalf of other cities and towns, including Middleton, Wrentham and Hanson, prompted by State Auditor Diana DiZoglio’s determination that the MBTA Communities Act is an “unfunded mandate.” Those towns are seeking a preliminary injunction to stop MBTA Communities Act enforcement while the “unfunded mandate” issue is litigate, while the state has moved to dismiss the towns’ complaints. Superior Court Judge Mark C. Gildea heard oral arguments on those motions April 2 and has the matter under advisement. DiPiano closes his remarks by saying that if Town Meeting approves Article 23 tonight, he will be taking steps to initiate a town-wide vote to revisit that decision.
Select Board member Dan Fox recommends opposing indefinite postponement, referencing the Supreme Judicial Court’s decision upholding the constitutionality of the MBTA Communities Act.
“We are a 3A community, whether we like it or not,” Fox said.
Fox noted that 3A has “brought out a lot of disrespect in this town,” pitting neighbor against neighbor and prompting members of the Planning Board to be worried about threats.
Town Planner Alex Eitler is now giving an overview of the town’s plan. Eitler notes that of the 199 parcels in Marblehead’s three designated districts, only three are vacant, and they are owned by the town. Between the open space requirement and two-parking-space requirement, developers would be losing between 50% and 70% of their parcels. “That makes development extremely difficult,” Eitler said.
Resident Rick Smyers calls opponents of 3A’s fears “unfounded” and says the impact of 3A will be “modest.” If you are worried about multi-family housing on Broughton Road, “you are about 70 years too late,” he says. He notes that there are all sorts of uses that are allowed, but developers have not taken advantage of those zoning provisions because the projects would not be economically viable.
Bob Erbetta urges resistance to the state mandate. “Two hundred and fifty years ago, we didn’t take kindly to being mandated by the British government, and we kicked them out,” Erbetta said.
Former Finance Committee member Jack Buba agreed.
“Marbleheaders are not afraid of the state,” he said.
8:15 p.m. In the first major vote of the night, Town Meeting has decided to take up Article 23, the MBTA Communities Act compliance plan, as the first matter of the night. Vote is 1,035 in favor, 727 opposed.
8:04 p.m. Seamus Hourihan’s proposal to rearrange the order in which the articles are being considered is now being debated. If it passes, the meeting will first take up Article 23, the MBTA Communities Act compliance plan, Article 34, the MHS roof and HVAC project, and then Article 33, the Mary Alley Building renovation project. Resident Bill McHugh speaks in opposition to the amendment. MBTA Communities Act opponent John DiPiano also urges a “no” vote. Nick Ward urges a “yes” vote for parents who have childcare concerns.
8 p.m. Still waiting for our first vote. The unofficial count of number of voters in the room is 1,726, per Moderator Jack Attridge.
7:48 p.m. We spoke too soon. On a fourth clicker test, it appears that approximately 50 of the over 1,700 clickers in use are not functioning properly. People who believe they have non-working clickers are being asked to swap them out.
7:31 p.m. Town Moderator Jack Attridge runs a “clicker test” with the question: Will the Celtics win Game 2 against New York? A total of 1,093 votes are cast, 870 “in favor” (yes), 223 “opposed” (no). A second test using the same test question is interrupted when Attridge suggests that voters should be seeing the word “OK” after they vote, but a number of people indicated they got no such message. “I’ve asked for patience tonight and hope you can give it to me,” he told the crowd. He added that anyone with a malfunctioning clicker could exchange it for a working device, but “they can’t trade them in” once balloting begins. The third time proves to be the charm: 1,553 votes roll in this time. “Now were rolling,” says Attridge. After a 10-minute delay, we’re ready to get started.
7:16 p.m. Former Veterans Agent David Rodgers asks for a moment of silence in honor of former Select Board member, Marine, “clam cop” and “great family man” Harry Christensen, who died on Easter Sunday. Rodgers noted that Christensen, who was “wounded twice, saved lives and was awarded a Silver Star” for his service in Vietnam, had recently been honored with a flyover of four Osprey military aircraft. Rodgers then led the recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance.
7:12 p.m. Moderator Jack Attridge asks people to find their seats. The meeting will be starting soon.
7 p.m. Town Moderator Jack Attridge takes to the microphone to say that there is a line down to the Jacobi Community Center still waiting to get into town meeting, and thus the start of the meeting will be delayed slightly. After thanking the crowd for its patience, he remarks that “patience” will be a “common theme for the night.”
6:44 p.m. Before the proceedings get under way, a tip of the cap to custodian Bruce Hamilton, who was responsible for leading the effort to set up the field house and the thousands of chairs.
6:21 p.m. Voters have begun to make their way into the field house at Marblehead High School for annual town meeting, which had to be postponed when too many people showed up at the Veterans Middle School the previous night.
In terms of “first orders of business,” Town Moderator Jack Attridge has indicated that there is a proposed amendment to the very first article, typically passed without much discussion, to take the articles in numerical order. The proposal is to instead have Town Meeting first take up Article 23, related to the town’s proposed plan to comply with the MBTA Communities Act, along with Articles 33 and 34. Articles 33 and 34 are debt exclusion overrides (which would raise property taxes for 15-20 years) to pay for a new MHS roof and renovations to the Mary Alley Municipal Building.
Attridge said he also plans to ask Town Meeting if a majority of voters want to use a written ballot for Article 23. If there is a written ballot, the result of the vote would not be allowed to be reconsidered later in the evening, according to town bylaws.
For details about all of the articles (proposals) on the town meeting warrant, see the Current’s Town Meeting guide.
