Town Council Summary for Nov 13, 2019

The first two items on the agenda were the swearing in of the Town Clerk and then of the new Town Council along with the organization of the new Council. This did happen albeit slightly out of order as Asst Clerk Nancy Danelo was supposed to swear in Teresa Burr who would then swear in the council. Teresa swore in the Council and then confirmed her own swearing in.
There were three individual motions and sets of votes to elect the Officers of the new Council: Chair, Vice-Chair, Clerk.

• motion by Jones to nominate Mercer, seconded, passed 9-0
• motion by Pellegri to nominate Dellorco, seconded, passed 9-0
• motion by Earls to nominate Jones, seconded, passed 9-0

License transactions

• BJ's got a manager change, everything else remains the same
• Ichigo Ichi's changed ownership so new license, otherwise menu and service remains the same
• Little Shop of Oils received a license to pair wine with their vinegar and oil gift baskets. After much discussion, the license was approved. 
• JAC Restaurant which had an application submitted for the former Dhrani Grill (or Artistry Kitchen) location withdrew their application. No additional info was provided.

As opposed to other meetings where formal license hearings were opened for each item, there was a vote to close the Little Shop of Oils discussion (which hadn't been formally opened, nor had the prior two). Also of note, I had the vote as 6-3. The "Actions Taken" doc shows 8-1. Re-listening to the recording, the Chair counts to six approvals and stops before saying what the final total is. A review of the video may be more conclusive.

Open Meeting and Conflict of Interest overview
Also slightly out of order, this probably should have been done before the license transaction discussion but ...

Storm water Utility Fee discussion 
The first of many discussions on this topic. There has been much work done to prepare for the EPA regulation on storm water.  Check pages 11-12 for the grants obtained since 2007. Due to the estimated costs of $2M per year to manage storm water, a utility fee is proposed. More work by the Town Council and the Town is required to bring this to reality. Page 28 shows estimates for how much the proposed utility fee would cost the 'average' housing and commercial lots. 

Franklin Dept Public Works -storm water from Franklin Matters

The published agenda and documents for the Franklin Town Council meeting scheduled for Wednesday, November 13, 2019. https://www.franklinma.gov/town-council/agenda/november-13-town-council-agenda 

•  
• "Actions Taken" document (which oddly leaves out the re-organization votes)
• https://www.franklinma.gov/sites/franklinma/files/uploads/town_council_actions_taken_for_november_13_2019.pdf
• Additional info can be found in my notes reported live during the meeting
• Live reporting: Legislation through to Closing
• https://www.franklinmatters.org/2019/11/live-reporting-legislation-through-to.html
• Live reporting: Presentations - Open Meeting; Stor...
• https://www.franklinmatters.org/2019/11/live-reporting-presentations-open.html
• Live reporting: License transactions
• https://www.franklinmatters.org/2019/11/live-reporting-license-transactions.html
• Live reporting: Town Council - Nov 13, 2019

https://www.franklinmatters.org/2019/11/live-reporting-town-council-nov-13-2019.html

 

a tree well, one of the many storm water mitigations Franklin implements