Above: A look at what the Town is asking voters to decide this Monday night.
Special Town Meeting is coming up this Monday evening! Here’s my updated overview of what’s up for a vote.
The STM on Monday, October 27th is scheduled to open at 6:30 pm at Trottier Middle School, 49 Parkerville Road. (For more detail on attending, scroll down.)
Warrant Articles To Be Voted On
The Special Town Meeting will be asked to vote on the following 10 Articles.
The Select Board has voted to make four motions for Articles that aren’t as printed as in the Warrant.1 Those are for Articles 3, 7, 8, and 10. I’ll include that detail in my updated summaries below
I’ll also note that none of the funding for Articles below would raise FY26 taxes. All of the requests come from free cash or another fund.2
1. Amend Zoning Code – Add Highway Major Retail Use
I’ve covered this previously. But here’s my high level recap:
This is the zoning change proposed by Atlantic Management (owners of 21 Coslin Drive in the old EMC complex) to allow Costco to apply for a special permit to open a store on the property. The amendment is to the Industrial Park zoning bylaw but is defined to only applies to their parcel.
The Planning Board intends to work on a future Article for other changes to modernize uses and attract appropriate businesses to the Industrial Park zone. That was temporarily tabled to avoid confusion with voters about this Article. (The Select Board urged the focus on getting this Article passed after being informed that if it isn’t passed this fall, Costco may move on to a location in a different town.)
If the Article passes as written, the business would be required to apply for a discretionary special permit and go through Major Site Plan Approval. That would be through a public hearing process in front of the Planning Board.
For more context, read my past coverage here. And you can watch the public forum held last week here. You can also see the presentation the Select Board intends to make at Town Meeting in favor of the Article here. (And stay tuned for a future post on the forum and other recent public discussions.)
2. Amend Town Code – Golf Revolving Funds
The Select Board is asking Town Meeting to amend the revolving fund to allow the Town’s investment in the course to start paying off. But this Article will likely have opponents push to indefinitely postpone it, at least until the project to install an irrigation system at the Golf Course is completed
When the Town purchased the Golf Course and took over management, the revolving fund was created to specify that any user fees collected would be dedicated to the golf course (operations, maintenance, improvements, etc.). Looking at the revenue trendline, the Town had believed the Golf Course may soon be collecting more revenue than is needed to maintain it. But recent developments have called that into question.
Town Meeting voters previously approved a CPC project to partially fund the replacement of the irrigation system. But when the project budgeted at $475K finally went out to bid this year, the lowest bid that came back was $718K. That was rejected, and the Town will try again. At this point, the cost for the planned project has a big question mark.
Article 2 proposes that fees collected into the revolving fund would still be “encumbered” to cover the costs budgeted for the course’s operations and Capital Plan, plus a $75,000 buffer. Each year, any amount collected above that buffer would be transferred into the Town’s general coffers to help offset other Town expenses and reduce the burden on property taxes.
At this week’s Select Board meeting, member Kathy Cook noted that the Community Preservation Committee (CPC) voiced opposition to the Article. She appeared to believe that was based on a misunderstanding of the intent. She and Town Administrator Mark Purple stressed that the rollover into the Town’s Operating Budget would only happen if enough revenue is collected for all of the needs that the Golf Course Committee has identified for Capital Projects and other expenses, plus $75K, and there are still funds remaining.
At last week’s seperate meetings of the Golf Course Committee and the CPC, members discussed concern about how “unencumbered” funds would be determined. Each committee planned to ask the Select Board to table the Article.
3. Appropriation for former Atwood Water Tank Site Remediation
This is another Article I’ve already covered, but here’s my high level recap:
Last year, testing of the site of the former Atwood Water Tower was tested for contaminated soil. The study confirmed high levels of lead in soil in the area where the tower used to stand. This Article calls for $100,000 to deal with the first 1-2 phases of addressing the issue.
The stated intent was for $85K to fund the feasibility study and documents needed to go out to bid for the eventual (and more expensive) cleanup project. (Funding the cleanup would need to be approved at a future Town Meeting.) Prompted by an abutter’s inquiry, the Select Board added $15K to also cover the cost of a temporary safety measure to contain contaminated soil.
While the Article’s language didn’t appear to be worded to include the site work, the Select Board voted this week to approve Motion language that does. The motions will ask for a vote to:
appropriate from Free Cash the sum of $100,000 for site work, engineering, design, bidding and related work associated with the remediation of the former Atwood water tank site; or do or act anything in relation thereto.
For more context, read my past coverage here. And you can see the presentation the Select Board intends to make here.
The following three Articles are related to changes to the Salary Administration Plan (SAP) for non-union Town employees:
4. Amend Town Code – Personnel Bylaw, Consolidation of BA Classification
Currently, Business Administrator positions are split into two pay level classifications, Business Admin 1 & 2. This simplifies the Salary Administration Plan by combining them into one position. The lower level employees will get a “slight salary adjustment” retroactive to July 1st. (The increased budget for FY26 would be covered by Free Cash.)
5. Amend Town Code – Personnel Bylaw, Vacation Accrual
The SAP currently designates 2 weeks vacation per year for employees who have worked for the Town for less than two years. The Personnel Board reports that 3 weeks is the default starting point in the current employment market. When recruiting to fill recent job openings, the board has had to continually vote to approve extra vacation time for the new hires.
They are now asking to make 3 weeks the default for employees for 0-7 years of employment.
6. Appropriation for Market Adjustment for Tenured Non-Union Employees
To retain and fairly pay employees, the Personnel Board is recommending that employees who have worked for the Town for 7+ years and still haven’t reached “Step 8” in the 15 step pay schedule, be moved up to that level. The adjustment comes with a $78,783 cost for the salary changes retroactive to July 1st. (The increased budget for FY26 would be covered by Free Cash.)
Both of the following Articles are to approve how to apply the funds already collected from the Town’s agreements with the cable companies (Verizon, Charter, and ComCast) designated to be dedicated to funding public access media:
7. Appropriation of Cable Funds for McAuliffe Hearing Room
This would allow the Town to use a portion of the funds to upgrade the A/V equipment used for recording videos of Town board and committee meetings in the Town House Hearing room, including hybrid meetings (allowing zoom participation).
The motion made on the floor will request $120,000 of the Cable Funds. Again, this won’t impact taxes (or increase customers’ cable fees.)
8. Appropriation of Cable Funds for SAM Operating Budget
The motion will request that the remaining $129,000 of Cable Funds not needed for the above project be transferred into the operating budget for Southborough Access Media, which provides public media access for our town. (If Article 7 is amended or fails, it will impact the amount to be included in the motion for this Article.)
9. Amend Zoning Code – Update ADU
As I’ve previously covered, this version of the bylaw is intended to simply update the Town’s bylaws to be consistent with the rights that have already been enshrined in state law. The Town’s bylaws are currently written to be more restrictive than is now legally allowed. The changes are made to make clear to the public what is and isn’t allowed, and the process.
The change also eliminates a cap (that hadn’t been properly tracked and enforced anyway) on the number of accessory apartments the Town can issue special permits for. The Zoning Board of Appeals recently confirmed their support for the Article.
For more context, read my past coverage here. And you can read the Planning Board’s presentation that will be made at Town Meeting here.
10. Creation of Governance Committee
This Article would authorize formation of a committee to study Southborough’s Town government and make recommendations for improving its efficiency. The committee would only have the power to make suggestions, not changes. And any significant changes would need approval by Town Meeting (and possibly the state legislature).
The Article initially described a wide range of topics the committee could assess:
(a) expansion or reduction in the number of elected positions: (b) transitioning to a Town Manager form of government; (c) moving from open Town Meeting to representative Town Meeting; and (d) allowing remote participation and voting at Town Meeting.
After resident Karen Hanlon Shimkus wrote a Letter to the Editor on this blog (and comments) voicing alarm about the board’s plan, they first revised the Article, to make the Moderator (rather than themselves) the appointing authority for members. And this week, at the suggestion of former Advisory member John Butler, they struck language making suggestions about specific ideas the committee might look into.
The intent of the change was that the Select Board won’t prescribe the potential changes the committee will research in the effort to improve Town government efficiency. Cook agreed, saying that hadn’t been the board’s intent in the first place.
The Motion will now ask voters to simply:
authorize the establishment of a Town Government Structure Committee (the “Committee”). The Committee shall be composed of seven (7) registered voters, none of who shall be currently elected officials, appointed by the Moderator. The Committee’s charge shall expire on June 30, 2027. The Committee shall review the current structure of Southborough’s Town government and propose such by-laws or other legislation as it deems appropriate to modernize its structure and improve its efficiency and effectiveness. The Committee shall hold at least three public forums concerning its analysis and proposed recommendations.
An updated letter from Shimkus makes clear that she still wants voters to oppose the effort, which she argues is an attempt to steal voters’ voices. It’s worth noting that while Shimkus’ first letter indicated that the idea came completely out of the blue with no public discussion, it is part of an initiative that the board had publicly discussed and among the goals the board encouraged me to share with readers this summer. (You can read about that here.)
In discussing Article 10’s original wording, the Select Board didn’t specify which elected boards they thought a committee might recommend changing. And the only reason I have heard them provide for looking into changes to boards and committees is advice they have received that the Town has too many committees. (Member Al Hamilton has also complained that candidates are often unopposed on the ballot.)
As for some of the other suggested ideas that the Article originally proposed as potential areas to consider, . .
I’ve heard a lot of past public comments in support of remote voting for Town Meetings. But even if Town Meeting voters eventually backed a recommendation to move to remote voting, that would have to be supported by the State House and approved by the Attorney General. That seems unlikely since the state has yet to approve requests by other towns for remote voting at Town Meetings.
On the flip side, Towns with over 6,000 residents are able to switch to a representative Town Meeting. And according to the Mass Municipal Association, 32 have. (The number of representatives elected to represent districts varies by Town and can run from 45 to 240.) But I haven’t heard any real public support for that concept in Southborough over the years. And Open Town Meetings are much more popular form of governance in our state, still used by 260 towns.
The concept of adopting a Town Manager has been one that sparked strong support and opposition in the past. As commenter Alan Belniak pointed out, there doesn’t appear to be a clear difference between the position of Town Manager and Town Administrator. However, in Southborough, the title comes with the context that years ago, a committee proposed moving to a Town Manager position under a detailed Charter that apparently defined the position to have much with much more authority than the old Town Administrator role. That failed by 11 votes in 2012 through an Indefinite postponement.
At the following Annual Town Meeting, voters were asked to approve a “Strong Town Administrator” (a compromise that added authority to the role , but less than the prior proposed charter had outlined) and expand the Select Board (from 3-5). Those Articles passed. But a subsequent effort to further expand the Town Administrator’s control over Town dept chiefs failed in 2014 (along with an Article to make the Town Clerk an appointed position). In 2018, Selectman Dan Kolenda raised the idea of revisiting the concept of Town Manager and bringing a new Article to Town Meeting in 2019. The board expressed support for looking into it, but the effort never got off the ground at that time.
Select Board members have frequently raised the desire to have Town Administrator Mark Purple and Town employees have more authority to handle administrative matters they think don’t belong on a Select Board agenda. But, according to Town Administrator Mark Purple, Town Counsel has advised that the Town’s Charter doesn’t allow the Select Board to delegate those authorities.
Participating in the Meeting
The meeting is open to all registered Southborough voters (as of October 17th) who act as the Town’s legislature. Before voting on Articles, voters can also ask questions, make comments to try to persuade others, propose amendments to revise Articles and more. (There are some constraints on speaking and making motions, some of which are at the discretion of the Town Moderator who runs the meeting.)
The Town Clerk will again allow parents to bring children with them to sit in the cafeteria, where they will have full A/V access to the meeting in the main hall (the auditorium). Parents can vote from there, and even make comments which will be seen and heard by the audience in the other room(s). (An additional backup room with full A/V may also be opened in the gymnasium if the auditorium fills up.)
Town Clerk Jim Hegarty told the Select Board that he revamped the voter check-in process to be smoother and quicker. (He’s also bringing back the clickers for potential use on close votes.)
You can find the official Warrant and other details on the dedicated meeting page here. That’s also where the Town may post additional handouts prior to the meeting.
- The Warrant serves as notice to the public about the topics up for a vote. But Article sponsors are allowed to make motions that include some revisions without going through the process of asking the hall to approve an amendment. Allowing that (and proposed amendments) is the reason Articles end with the boilerplate legal language “or do or act anything in relation thereto”.
- At Annual Town Meeting in April, voters approved appropriating a certain amount of money through raising taxes and other means for FY26. The use of Free Cash means that appropriation won’t be increased. So the new expense won’t impact the taxes that were forecast last spring. But that doesn’t mean that “Free Cash” is actually free. The funds are drawn from surplus tax revenue collected that could have been applied to reduce taxpayers’ burden the following fiscal year.
